Hurricane Island [Diddy Kong x Dixie Kong]

Chapter 25: The Keys

The next day, all the animals were waking up. It hadn't been a quality night's sleep for Diddy and Dixie; the spaces where they had to sleep were very uncomfortable, but still, they were enough for a restful sleep.

Suddenly, the door of the room opened, waking up the two kongs in an instant. The people entered, again with pillars of food behind them and, as the day before, they distributed it to each of the animals. The food was the same, so Diddy had to forcibly eat it, while Dixie still carried bananas in her backpack. Upon completion, the employees left the room. A multitude of human voices could also be heard again outside the zoo.

"Did you sleep well?" Diddy asked Dixie as he saw her reach his cage.

"No," Dixie replied, rubbing her head. "The hiding place was very narrow... Do you want bananas?"

Dixie gave Diddy a couple of bananas and sat next to his cage while they ate. As she looked around the room, she noticed something that caught her eye instantly... By chance, the employees who were recently there had left the front door open, which lit Dixie's mind.

"Diddy, look!" she pointed to the door, and Diddy turned to look.

"You're not thinking about going there, are you?" Diddy asked, catching Dixie's idea.

"And where else could I go?" said Dixie, shrugging. "Maybe I'll find the keys so I can open your cage."

"But what if those people catch you?" Diddy exclaimed worriedly.

"I'll know how to hide well, don't worry," Dixie replied without taking her eyes off the door.

Dixie immediately walked to the door and took a look outside. There was a wide hall with some doors to the surroundings, and a staircase could be seen at the back that led to the upstairs.

"Hey, Trixie girl," an elephant who was caged near the door called her. "I hope you don't think about walking through that door or you'll end up just like us."

"I just need some keys," Dixie replied.

"The only ones who have those keys are those three tamers. Do you know what danger it entails to do that?"

"But I'll never get Diddy out of here without doing anything," she replied and, without arguing further, walked through the door and began to walk stealthily through the new room.

Dixie looked at every corner of the hall: this one had a refined look with decoration accessories and elegant paintings. Suddenly, footsteps were heard coming towards where Dixie was, so she immediately ran to the staircase. Then, a group of assistant employees passed by.

"Hey! But who left this door open?" one of them exclaimed, instantly closing the door to the animal room.

Dixie continued to go upstairs to see what was above. But then, she was paralyzed when, a few centimeters in front of her, a human leg and another prosthetic leg appeared. She looked up, fearing that she had failed so quickly in her search; it was one of the tamers... Fortunately, he was reading some sheets of paper that served to cover Dixie's presence. She immediately slipped away just as the tamer raised his head and went downstairs. For a moment, Dixie's breathing had quickened as she reached the next floor.

The atmosphere of the upstairs was also quite elegant, it also had large paintings and shelves. Dixie, out of curiosity, took a quick look at everything that was hanging on the wall, where it could see several magazine and newspaper covers about the circus and the zoo, with titles such as: "Zoovlaki, awarded to the best", "We visited the Zoovlaki Zoo, an amazing place", "The Great Circus of the Zoovlaki Brothers, an attraction not to be missed", "To the best and most impressive circus in the city", in addition to current and old photos of the place. There were even pictures of the three tamers when they were younger and with all their limbs complete, but they also looked different... Dixie looked at them in detail and with a gesture of strangeness. Later, she saw another article titled: "Award to the Owens brothers, known as the 'Zoovlaki' Brothers", accompanied by a subtitle: "Brand, Brett and Fred Owens, famous for their Zoovlaki Circus", which seemed to mention the names of those tamers.