Child Z

CHAPTER 17 - LEONIE

In the middle of the night, Leonie awoke from a stress dream and saw that Zane had called and left a voicemail. In the message, he asked in a panicky voice if she'd seen "all the craziness with Akna and Habab" on the news.

Leonie looked immediately on her phone and saw reports that armed Gorillas had stormed a municipal building in Denver and taken it over, now claiming to have in their possession Child Z's surrogate and several human hostages—employees of Simia the Gorillas had tracked down and kidnapped, including company liaison Habab Omar.

The Gorillas had released a ten-second handheld video showing the hostages gathered in what looked like a conference room, each person locked side by side in separate cages while a chimpanzee—the Child Z surrogate known as Akna—roamed freely about the room, watching the humans with curiosity as they shook their cages and pleaded for help. In one of the cages, which were too small to allow hostages to stand up, Leonie saw a woman wearing a tan headscarf whose eyes gleamed with terror.

The sight of her former liaison locked in a cage was so unbelievable, so disgusting and terrifying, Leonie's brain could barely make sense of it. Yet there it was.

Though the handheld video was shaky and brief, Leonie was certain the chimpanzee wandering freely about the room was indeed Akna, as the Gorillas claimed. There was something about the chimp's face, an expression Leonie could never forget, that told her the chimp in the video was the same one who'd carried her child.

The Gorillas had issued a statement: "Torturing animals is not only barbaric; it's also a crime. The head of Simia, Adrian Cooley, is guilty of this crime. We demand he face justice in a court of law."

Leonie pictured the man, his gray suit and soft smile. There was no way a billionaire executive was going to cooperate with a bunch of thugs wearing cheap Halloween masks.

The Gorillas' statement concluded: "When Mr. Cooley is brought to justice, we will release our hostages unharmed and disclose the whereabouts of Child Z, who is being kept safe at a separate location."

Child Z was obviously with Leonie, not the Gorillas. But since they had Akna, their bluff was believable and gave them leverage to negotiate.

She watched the clip of Akna and the hostages a few more times, pausing once for a long while on Habab's scared face. #FreeMamaZ, #PoidScum, and #humansRanimals2 were trending on social media.

Everything felt wrong, upside-down, on the brink of mayhem. Leonie was convinced now more than ever that leaving Colorado was the right thing to do. She only hoped it wasn't too late.

After fitful bouts of sleep, she awoke sometime later thinking the sun was beaming in through the window and panicked that she'd overslept. Then she realized the lamp was still on and that it was only 5AM. Pearl was fast asleep next to her, as was Brandon Junior in his cot.

Unable to fall back asleep, she texted Zane, imagining Habab crouching inside that cage with a look of terror on her face: Got your message. Unreal. We're distracting ourselves from the craziness with a hike. I'll be out of service most of the day but will call you tonight. I love you.

It wasn't the truth, nor was it entirely a lie. Today would involve hiking. Also, she normally didn't say I love you by text, but just in case things went wrong today, she needed Zane to know.

It was quiet downstairs. To the east, early dawn colored the horizon. Leonie peered out the window and saw their car in the driveway. She sank into the couch. For a moment, the world felt at rest, stable. She closed her eyes and tried to embrace the stillness but failed knowing stillness was illusory. Time was never still. The Earth was spinning, the sun rising, the clock ticking.