573 | What Happens When a Skinwalker Breaks into a Zoo

I'm about to ruin one of the most fun and wholesome places on earth for you. And if you don't like to hear stories with violence against animals, then consider yourself warned. This story is called The Wrong Count, and was sent to me by an anonymous sender. In it, two zookeepers endure a stormy night while watching over the animals. But something breaks in. Something that is neither human nor animal. This story answers an interesting question. What happens when a skinwalker sneaks into a zoo? I started at the zoo when I was 23 years old, right out of community college with my associates in animal science. And I've worked every section at least twice. Ungulates, carnivores, primates, birds, reptiles. I've done it all. I'm a zookeeper. I'm a professional, and I love what I do. But prepare yourself, because what I'm about to share with you is going to sound crazy. I could say I'm not the type of person who likes to make things up, but you probably wouldn't believe me, especially after hearing this. But this is a very true story, no matter how ridiculous it sounds. You should also know that I love animals. I know our animals, and I know how they move and how they sound. I'm used to their behavior. When they're sick or scared or breeding or dying, I've seen all of it. So when I tell you something was wrong that night, I hope you'll at least hear me out. A thunderstorm rolled in that night, around 6pm. The weather service had been predicting it all week. They were saying it was a huge system coming down from Canada. and it would be sitting on top of us for 12 hours. We actually spent most of that day getting ready. We had to secure some loose equipment and check drainage grades. We also had to make sure all the indoor holding areas were prepped in case we had to bring some animals in from their outdoor exhibits. For our zoo and for mini zoos, this is standard storm protocol and it wasn't anything we hadn't done a dozen times before. I was on the night shift that week. Just me and my co-worker, J.J. Wheeler. We'd actually joined on at that zoo only a couple months apart, so basically we'd been there around the same amount of time. Night shift during a storm is usually pretty quiet, except for the storm. You do your rounds and check on the animals and make sure nothing's flooding or leaking. Mostly you sit in the keeper station, watching the rain come down, making sure nothing gets worse. Obviously, most animals don't like storms any more than people do. They tend to hunker down in their shelters and wait it out. By the time my shift started at 8pm, the rain was coming down something fierce. It was bad enough I couldn't see the parking lot lights from the keeper entrance. The thunder was basically constant. Movies don't really do that kind of thunder justice. You know, the loud bang and several seconds of stunned silence. This was more like a continuous low rumbling, with lots of peaks and no valleys. There was lightning every couple of seconds. And it was so humid, it felt like I was trying to breathe through a pillow. JJ was already in the keeper's station when I got there. He was drinking some coffee and watching the weather radar on his phone. Going to be a long one, he said. Yeah, looks like it. Main gate's already locked down. Bartley left about an hour ago, said to call him if anything goes sideways. But otherwise, we're on our own till six. Tom Bartley was the night supervisor. He lived about 40 minutes away and had a tendency to head home early whenever storms came through. Couldn't really blame the guy. There wasn't much he could do here that JJ and I couldn't handle ourselves. I poured myself a cup of coffee and settled in. The station had a bank of monitors showing feeds from cameras around the zoo, most of them washed out by rain and darkness. I could see the outlines of buildings, the shapes of trees bending in the wind, but not much after that. The audio feeds were just static and thunder. Around 9.30, JJ's radio crackled. It was the automated perimeter alert, the system that monitored the fencing around the zoo's boundary. Sector 7, JJ said, checking the notification on the main console. Looks like we've got a breach. Sector 7 was the northeast corner of the property, back behind the African Savannah exhibit. The fence there was older than the rest of it, chain leak instead of the newer steel mesh. And boy, did it love to come down in high winds. We'd reported it to maintenance half a dozen times, but nothing ever got done. Very, very tiresome. I'll go check it out, I said. You want some company? Nah, JJ, I've got it. Probably just a tree branch, or maybe an entire tree, we'll see. If it's anything serious, I'll radio you. I grabbed a rain jacket and a flashlight, then headed out. The path to Sector 7 ran past the Big Cat complex, and along the back of the ungulate yards. The rain was coming down sideways, driven by a wind that was making the trees creak and groan. I pointed my flashlight beam through the dark, but it didn't help much, considering all that rain. The lions were in their night house, which was standard for weather like this. But as I passed their outdoor enclosure, I noticed something that made me slow down. The viewing lights were on, those dim red ones we use so visitors can see the animals after dark. And in that faint glow, I could see all three of them. They weren't pacing, and they weren't sleeping either. They weren't doing anything I was expecting them to be doing right now. They were lined up at the fence, all three of them shoulder to shoulder, completely still like feline statues. They were facing the ungulate yard on the other side of that path. I stopped and watched them for a minute. Lions are ambush predators. They'll watch prey animals for hours sometimes, waiting for the right moment to strike. But these weren't watching the way hunters watch. There was something fixed about their attention. They were rigid. They didn't appear to be tracking movement, looking for weakness. They were staring at one specific spot in the zebra enclosure, all three of them almost unnaturally focused on the same spot. To me, they looked more hypnotized. I tried to see what they were looking at, but I had no luck from where I was. The zebra yard was dark anyway. The animals were presumably sheltered in their barn, and the rain made it impossible to pick out details. So whatever had their attention, I couldn't find it. The big male, the one we called Caesar, suddenly made a sound. Not quite a roar or a growl, something really low though. It sounded like the warning vocalization I'd heard maybe twice in all my years working with big cats. They make that sound when they sense something dangerous, something that could even threaten them. I stood there in the rain, listening to that sound and feeling the hair rise on my arms. I made a mental note to mention it to JJ and kept walking. The fence in Sector 7 was down, just like I'd expected. A big oak limb had come off in the wind and taken out about 20 feet of chain link. Despite that much damage, it appeared pretty clean. Nothing that couldn't be patched temporarily with some zip ties and a tarp until maintenance could get out here in the morning. I spent about half an hour in the rain securing what I could. After that, I radioed JJ to let him know the situation. Copy that, he said. You want to do a full perimeter check while you're out there? Ah, what the heck. Might as well. I'm already soaked. I walked the entire boundary fence, all the way around the property. Took me about an hour. The only other damage I found was a section near the loading dock, where some debris had piled up against the mesh. But it wasn't anything major. By the time I got back to the keeper's station, I was cold and wet, and so ready for more coffee. Anything interesting? JJ asked. The lines are acting weird. I saw all three of them lined up at the fence, just staring at the zebra yard. Storm stress, probably. Yeah, I guess so. I wasn't actually sure about that when I said it. I don't think JJ believed it either. We'd been doing this long enough to know what storm stress looked like. And that wasn't storm stress. What it was at that moment, I couldn't tell you. but I would soon find out. Around midnight, we did our first full animal check. This is standard procedure during severe weather. You walk through every building, verifying that every animal is accounted for and healthy, and you note anything unusual. It takes about two hours to cover the whole zoo. I took the north half, which included the African section. JJ took the south half, which included the primates in the reptile house. The ungulate barn was warm and dry, a long building with individual stalls for the zebras, giraffes, and various antelope species. The animals were restless, but they're always like that during storms. The giraffes were swaying slightly in their stalls, the antelope were pacing back and forth, nothing crazy, normal behavior, all of it. The zebras were in the back section, four stalls in a row. I walked down the line, counting them off. Their stripe patterns are actually unique to each individual. They're kind of like human fingerprints, in a way. So I knew these animals by sight. There was Duchess, the oldest female, in stall one. Bongo, the male, in stall two. Ziggy, in stall three. And in stall four, there should have been Pepper. But stall 4 was empty. I checked my clipboard. Pepper was definitely supposed to be inside. The day shift notes said all four zebras had been moved to the barn at 5pm, when the storm started getting bad. I looked at the stall again, thinking maybe she was lying down in a corner where I couldn't see her. But the stall was empty. Clean bedding, full water bucket, but no zebra. I felt the first flicker of real concern. A missing animal is serious. It means paperwork, incident reports, possibly a search if the animal got loose somehow. I radioed JJ. Hey, I've got a problem in the ungulate barn. Pepper isn't in her stall. What do you mean not in her stall? I mean she's not here. The stall is empty. That can't be right. Dayshift logged all four zebras in the barn before they left. I'm looking at the stall right now, Jay. She's not in there. There was a pause. I could hear JJ thinking through the same possibilities I was thinking through now. Animal got moved. Someone forgot to log it. Or Animal got out somehow and nobody noticed. Hopefully the animal was hiding somewhere in the barn. Somewhere I hadn't checked yet. Did you look outside? He asked. Not yet. I was about to. Check the yard. Maybe she got back out before they closed the barn doors all the way. I'll pull up the camera footage, see if I can figure out what happened. I went back outside, into the rain. The zebra yard was dark, except for the faint glow of some perimeter lights and the occasional flash of lightning. I swept my flashlight across the enclosure, looking for any sign of movement. And I found her! Or I thought I did. There was a zebra standing at the far end of the yard, near the fence that bordered the lion enclosure. It was alone, which was unusual. Zebras are herd animals. They don't like being separated from the group, especially in bad weather. Why would Pepper leave the barn and come out here in the rain, just standing there? She wasn even grazing or moving just standing I watched this zebra for a minute waiting for her to do something But she didn It continued standing so still with its head slightly lowered facing away from me rain streaming down its flanks. The lightning flashed, and I got a better look at her outline, the shape of her body outlined by darkness. That wasn't Pepper. Something about this zebra looked wrong, but I wasn't sure why at first. Was it the neck? Maybe the legs? The way it was standing was strange too. All four legs perfectly straight, evenly spaced, like the model of a zebra, not an actual zebra. You see, in real life, these creatures shift their weight around, cock their hips, rest one leg. But this one was standing like it had been placed there, like a little model on someone's shelf. I told myself it was just the lightning, the sudden and stark contrast of light and shadows for a brief moment. Then I noticed the lions were still at their fence, and they were still staring this way. and I could hear that low rumbling sound coming from them. The warning sound. They were looking at the same zebra that I was. I lifted my radio. JJ, I found her. She's in the yard. How'd she get out there? I've got no idea. I'm gonna try to get her back in the barn. Do you need me to come help? Let me see what I can do first. If she won't cooperate, I'll give you a call. I walked over to the gate that led into the zebra enclosure. Standard procedure for this kind of thing was to approach slowly. Get behind the animal. Guide it toward where you want it to go. Zebras aren't naturally aggressive, but they can kick hard enough to break bones if they're startled. I opened up the gate and stepped into the yard. The mud sucked at my boots, and the rain was freezing cold on my face. I kept the flashlight pointed low so I wouldn't spook the animal, letting my eyes adjust to the dark. The zebra had not moved yet. It was still standing in the same spot. That odd stillness about it made me think of the lions, of the way they'd been lined up at their fence, staring at this exact spot. What in the world was going on? I was maybe 30 feet away when it turned its head and looked at me. Even the way it moved its head was all messed up. I knew it right away. It was like joints bending in a direction they're not supposed to bend. Zebra necks have a limited range of motion. They can turn their heads to look behind them, but only to a certain degree, only with a certain quality of movement. This one turned its head too far. smoothly too, seemingly without any of the normal constraints of muscle and bone. It turned until it was looking at me over its shoulder with one black eye, and it kept turning past the point the spine should have prevented further rotation. I froze up. I couldn't make myself move, even if I wanted to. The zebra was staring at me now. Its eye caught the light and reflected back, and I noticed the eye shine was far too bright and differently colored than I expected from a zebra, like there was something behind that eye that I didn't recognize. I didn't feel like a zookeeper in that moment. I felt like a prey animal. To an herbivore? Then it turned its head back, slowly, with that same smooth rotation. After that, it began to walk towards the barn. I stood there in the rain, watching it until it disappeared through the barn door. My heart was pounding the entire time. I nearly dropped my darn flashlight. Before this, I had never wanted to run away from a zebra, but my legs were ready to bolt at any second. I felt the need to get out of that enclosure, as if I was in the lion pen, and not the zebra yard. I told myself that I was a professional, that my current thoughts and instincts were just nonsense brought on by a storm. What I just saw, there's a rational explanation to. What I saw was impossible, which means I didn't really see it. So I went back into the barn. The zebra was in stall four, Pepper's stall. It was standing in the corner with its head down, now looking exactly the way a normal zebra looks when it's settling in for the night. The other three zebras were in their stalls too, but now they were each pressed up against the walls as far from stall four as they could get. Their ears were flat back against their skulls, and their eyes were showing white. I'd never seen them react to Pepper like that before, or the zebra that was supposed to be Pepper. I counted them again, one, two, three, four, the correct number. I closed the barn door and walked back to the keeper station. My job was technically done, and I did not want to stay in the barn any longer. JJ looked up when I came in. Got her back inside? Yeah. What was she doing out there? I don't know. I sat down in my chair. My legs felt weak. A day shift must have miscounted or something. Left one outside by accident. That doesn't really sound like him. I know. JJ looked at me with an eyebrow raised. I must have looked shaken, because his expression changed, and he began to look worried. You okay, man? I'm fine. Just cold is all. I picked up my coffee. It was empty. I stared at it for a moment, not really realizing it was empty until a few seconds later. Hey, can you pull up the camera feed from the zebra yard? I want to check something. What time? Just now, basically. The last fifteen minutes or so. JJ typed something into the console. The main monitor flickered and showed a grainy night-vision view of the zebra enclosure. We watched as I walked into frame, flashlight visible as a white flare against the dark. We watched as I approached the zebra. We saw the part where it turned its head to look at me. But on the video, from that angle, the movement didn't look weird. The head turned, it stopped, then turned back. From there, it didn't look unusual. Just a zebra looking at a zookeeper in the rain. Now, I should have felt relieved, right? But I wasn't. I felt something cold settle in my stomach. What were you looking for? JJ asked. Nothing. Never mind. Forget it. The camera feed went back to real time. And we stayed there, just watching the cameras, chatting on occasion, or listening to the storm. But after some time, I couldn't help but notice that after two hours, the lions still stood in the same spot, staring at the zebra yard. The next few hours after that were quiet. The storm kept hammering the zoo, wind, rain, and thunder, but inside the keeper station, everything felt muffled and still. JJ did paperwork, and I pretended to do paperwork, and the talking had died down. Around 2am, JJ got up to do his rounds. I'll take the primate house and the reptile building, he said. Back in an hour. Gotcha. Hey, you sure you're alright? You've been staring at that same page for like 40 minutes. Just tired, man. I'm fine. I could tell he didn't quite believe me, but he didn't push it. JJ was good like that. He knew when to give people space. After he left, I pulled up the camera feeds on the main console. I started to cycle through them. The zoo looked empty and dark. Just rain-slicked paths and closed buildings. The occasional shape of an animal shelter. I found the zebra yard and let it sit on my screen, watching the night vision footage for any sign of movement. The four zebras were still in the barn. I could see them on the interior camera. Their four striped shapes huddled in their stalls. Three of them were still clustered together as much as their individual stalls allowed, pressing against the farthest walls away from stall four. The fourth zebra, that was supposed to be Pepper, was standing perfectly still, right dead center of its space. It wasn't lying down. Zebras lie down to sleep sometimes, especially when they're comfortable. The other three were all in normal resting positions, bodies lowered, legs folded, but the one in stall four was just standing. Now I sat there, and I watched stall four specifically, for about 15 minutes straight. I did not see that animal move once. Not a shift of weight, not a flick of an ear, nor the twitch of a tail. Not a thing. I was watching a video feed, but it was more like watching a photograph. I was still staring at the screen, when the radio crackled. Hey. It was JJ. Could you, uh, meet me at the primate house? Yeah, man. What's wrong? For about two seconds straight, he didn't reply. Then he said, Just come here, okay? There's something I need to show you. I grabbed my jacket and flashlight, then headed back out. The rain had somewhat let up, settling into a steady drizzle, but the wind was still gusting hard enough to make the trees groan. The path to the primate house ran past the lion enclosure and I looked for them as I passed but in this darkness I couldn't see them and I didn't want to wait around for lightning to show me what was or wasn't out there. I hoped they'd finally gone inside. JJ was waiting at the entrance to the primate building. His face was pale in the glow of my flashlight and he was holding his own flashlight in a grip so tight it made his hand look even bonier than usual. Hey, what's going on? I asked. Rather than answer at first, he grinded his jaw and thought. He looked scared. Finally he spoke. I was in the corridor, doing the ape check. Everything was normal. I counted heads, checked the locks, all the usual. Then I came around the corner by the chimp enclosure. And I saw you. What? I've been at the station. While you were standing in the hallway, about twenty feet away, looking at me. I felt that cold sensation in my stomach again, now spreading upwards to my chest. J, I wasn't in the primate house. I've been in the keeper station the whole time. I know. JJ's voice cracked slightly. I know you weren't here, but I saw you. You were standing right there in the hallway and you were waving at me. Waving back and forth and you smiled for some reason. But it didn't look like your smile, man. I don't know how to explain it. JJ, this sounds crazy, I'm not gonna lie. Bro, I could have just not said anything. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. What'd you do after that? I called out to you, asked what you were doing over here. But you didn't answer, you just kept waving. A second or two later, you started to walk away, toward the orangutan section. So I followed you. What'd you see after that? There was nothing there. The corridor was empty, I checked every room, every closet. Every space big enough for a person to hide in, but there was nothing. So I came back to where I first saw you and I radioed you. I needed to make sure you were real, that I was talking to the real you. JJ, that wasn't me. We stood there in the dark outside the primate house, rain dripping from the overhang, as both of us tried to process what he was saying. I wanted to say something reassuring, or that he'd imagined it, but I couldn't say that. It was clear he believed what he saw just as I had and I was starting to think these things were connected Man I need you to do something Could you say something only you would know JJ asked. What? Something only you would know. Something I could verify. I need to be sure it's really you. I understood what he was asking. If something could look like me, and could wave at him and smile at him, walking around like a man, then how did he know I was really me? It was a big jump in logic. This could be an intruder. Why didn't he think I was just playing a prank on him? Even though it was something I'd never done to him before. Instead, JJ was going full invasion of the body snatchers on me. Could I blame him? I mean the way the animals had been acting. I don't know. so I played along. All right, all right. Uh, the Christmas party last year. You got drunk, and you told everyone about the time you accidentally let the macaque loose in the gift shop. Bartley still gives you grief about it. JJ let out a big breath. His shoulders lowered. Okay, okay, that's real, that happened. You're the real you. Thank goodness. Can we go back inside now, you weirdo? I'm freezing. Let's get warm and talk about this. We went inside the primate house together. And neither of us wanted to be alone anymore. So why did you just assume it was a copy of me? Like some sci-fi film. Not someone who broke in. Or heck, not even me trying to scare you. Because, man, it looked exactly like you. But I could tell it wasn't you. Just trust me on this. Even if it sounds insane. Could be a glitch in the Matrix or something, I don't know. Yeah, yeah, sorry. Not trying to make you sound like a madman. It's just, tonight's been kinda weird, you know? You're telling me. The building was warm and humid. The air was heavy, with that dank, primate smell. The apes were restless, moving frantically around in their night spaces and vocalizing. But they weren't screaming or panicking. Their vocalizations were soft. Something was wrong. There was stress in the way they moved, like animals that knew something was wrong and could not figure out what it was. Kind of like us. JJ showed me where he'd seen... me, or the thing that looked like me. It was a straight corridor leading from the chimp section to the orangutans, with doors on either side opening into keeper areas and storage rooms. Nothing special about it. No place for anyone to hide. So no explanation for how it could have appeared and then disappeared. But we checked every room anyway, finding nothing. And what the hell is happening? JJ said. We were standing back in the corridor, both of us looking at the spot where he'd seen my double. I took the moment to come clean, letting him know about the zebra incident, but carefully admitting that I wasn't completely sure about what I saw. When I was done, he rubbed his head and walked around in a circle, saying, what the heck man, what the heck, should we call someone? Bartley? The police? I don't think that's a good idea. I don't think they're gonna like the sound of, we're seeing doppelgangers at our zoo, please send help. If they do send someone, they're probably going to bring a drug test. Alright, so what are we going to do? I thought about it for a moment. I tried to be logical, calm. We were still at the point where what we'd seen could be explained in some way, even if it was a stretch. Heck, for all we knew, there was a gas leak somewhere, making us see crap. But that didn't mean we couldn't be safe and careful about it. I couldn't deny that there was a part of me that wanted to run. and get away from this zoo for a while. Well, Jay, we're gonna have to keep doing our jobs. We finish the rounds, we document anything weird we find, and we wait until morning. Once the day shift gets here, we can tell Bartley what happened, and let him decide how to handle it. I mean, come on. We're not even sure if it's just the storm making us see things. Jay Jay didn't look happy with that answer, but he nodded anyway. Neither of us had any better ideas. We finished the primate house, together, and headed back toward the keeper station. The rain had almost stopped by then, now just a mist hanging in the air, making halos around the pathway lights. The storm was passing, and in a few hours it would be dawn. Everything would go back to normal. It was almost over. We were passing the Lion Nighthouse when we heard it. A voice. A child's voice coming from inside the building. I stopped and so did JJ. His head turned toward the nighthouse door. Did you hear that? He whispered. I nodded. We stood motionless in the dark and listened to see if it came again. And it did. Hello? Is someone there? It was definitely a little girl, maybe six or seven years old, judging by her sound. She sounded scared and lost. Please, can someone help me? JJ and I looked at each other. There should not be anyone in the Lion Night House, let alone a child. The building was locked. Even if a child had somehow gotten into the zoo during a storm, how would they get into a secured building? How would they get past multiple locked doors between the public areas and the animal holding spaces? But that voice was certainly real. Not some illusion or hallucination, like we could excuse the rest of the night as being. Because this was something we both heard. And it was coming from inside. We have to check, JJ said. You're right, I know. We went to the door. I swiped my keycard and the lock clicked open. The corridor beyond was dark, lit only by the dim red glow of the nightlights. The air smelled like Big Cat, all musky, and it never quite goes away no matter how much you clean. I could hear the lions moving in their holding spaces. Their paws make this soft thudding sound on the concrete, and their heavy breathing is often raspy. Hello? I called out. If someone's in here, make some noise so we can find you. You're not in trouble, I promise. The little girl's voice echoed down the corridor. Please, I'm so scared. It's really dark in here. The voice was coming from the main holding area. The space where the lions spent their nights when the weather was bad. When they could not be in the outdoor enclosure. This is wrong, man, JJ said. This is really, really bad. I knew what he was talking about. Everything about this felt wrong. The voice, the timing, the location. Just the impossibility of it. Some kid breaking in, being locked in a building in a restricted area in the middle of the night during a storm? What are the odds? Not to mention, how had the lions not found her? But there was a child in there, and we had to do something. We could not just walk away. I moved down the corridor toward the holding area, surrounded by red-tinged darkness. The lion smell got stronger as I went. I could hear them more clearly now, the soft sounds of their movement and the low vocalization. They're smart animals, very keen. They knew we were here. The holding area had a viewing slot, a small window that keepers used to check on the animals without having to open the main door. I approached it Slowly, my flashlight pointed at the floor, my heart trying to climb up my throat. Please let me out. It's so dark in here. Please. And the lions... The voice said. It was coming from inside the holding area. I was sure of it, from inside the space where the lions were. I reached the viewing slot. I lifted the light and I looked through. All three lions were in there, all of them awake, their eyes reflecting from the beam, becoming bright green points in the dark. They were staring at me. Not at the door, not at the window, but at the exact spot where my face would be visible through the slot. They weren't moving now, not making a sound either. Just watching. The voice came again. Please, I'm scared. It was coming from the corner of the enclosure. The corner that was outside my beam, wrapped in shadows so thick I couldn't see anything there. When her voice came, the lines didn't look towards her. They didn't react to it. They just kept staring at me. I tried to angle my flashlight as best I could toward that corner, just to see what was over there. The beam just seemed to die in that darkness, possibly too far. swallowed up before it could reach what was over there. But I did catch the edge of something, just for a second, a shape that was even darker than the shadows. Something crouched very low to the ground. One of the lions made a noise then, a low, deep sound in its throat, basically a rumble. Another warning sound. I've been working with big cats for a while now. This reminded me of a noise they make when they're trying to communicate with their pack, trying to warn the others, trying to say, Don't go over there. We can't protect you if you go. Please let me out. The voice had changed. Just enough. That childlike quality was there, but there was something else beneath it. Something that didn't quite fit the sound of a person. Almost mechanical. It's so dark and lonely in here. Won't you come and get me? I was certain of it now. It was like there was a second voice layered underneath it. The child's voice on top. But something else under it. Something deeper. Something even these lions didn't like. I backed away from the viewing slot. I think we need to go. Now, I said to JJ. He didn't say a word. Together, we walked back down the corridor. That voice, though, seemed to follow us, still calling out from inside the holding area, but somehow not getting farther away as we left. We made it to the exit and pushed through the door, stepping out into the night air. JJ was right behind me. The door swung shut and the voice was cut off. Not entirely, though. It was still there, faint but barely audible. We stopped and listened. For a moment, I thought we'd gotten away. That was, until the voice started to get louder again. It was moving, moving towards us. We did not go back to the keeper station. We sat outside on a bench near the main path, in clear view of the sky, and we waited for the sun to come up. Neither of us wanted to be inside anymore. We didn't want walls around us, not spaces or halls where someone could hide, or something. No darkness either, where something could hide and watch. The mist lifted as the hours passed, and the clouds began to break up. By 5am, the eastern horizon was slowly starting to light up, and by 5.30 there was true light, the first glow of dawn spreading across the zoo. That's when JJ grabbed me by the arm and pointed toward the African section. Look, he said, and I looked. The lion enclosure was visible from where we sat. a stretch of artificial savanna with rocks and tall grass and a shallow pool. The three lions were out there now standing at the fence line staring again at something in the zebra yard next door And in the zebra yard something was moving It was too far away to see clearly Just a shape moving across the enclosure toward the perimeter fence, moving in this sickening, disgusting way that's hard to put into words. It reached the fence, and it paused there for a moment, and even from this distance, I could swear it turned to look at us. Then it went over the fence, up and over the eight-foot fence in a single fluid motion, a movement that no zebra could possibly make. And it was gone, into the brush beyond the perimeter, into the trees. We found something at 6.15am. The day shift was starting to arrive by then. Cars pulling into the parking lot and we heard people talking. The normal, comfortable sounds of the zoo waking up. JJ and I should have gone to meet them. All the stuff that happened was stuff we needed to report to someone. But instead, we walked over to that zebra barn. Curiosity killed the cat. We both needed to see. We had to know. The barn door was still closed, just as we'd left it hours before. I opened it, and we stepped inside. And the most horrid smell hit me in the face, like someone had dumped months-old blood on my face. The other three zebras were pressed against the far wall still, their fear lingering of whatever was in the fourth stall. They were trembling too, their muscles twitching under their hides. I'd never seen them like that before. We got to Stalfour, and it was empty. Well, we thought so at first, but it really wasn't. There was something on the floor, laid out flat on the bedding like a rug. It took me a moment to understand what I was looking at. and when I did, I wanted to throw up. It was a zebra skin, a complete zebra skin. The hide had been separated from everything underneath it and spread out flat, legs extended, head still attached. The whole thing had been arranged with what looked like deliberate care, positioned in the center of the stall like a display. The stripes were very familiar. This was Pepper's skin. The real Pepper. The zebra that was supposed to have been in this stall when I left last night. But it was just her skin. We could not find the bones, the organs, the meat, or even the blood. Except for a few dark stains and the bedding underneath. Just the hide, laid out neatly on the floor like someone had unzipped her and pulled the rest out. The face was so messed up. The eyes were still in there, man, clouded and dull, staring up at the ceiling. The mouth was slightly open and the expression was one of surprise. It looked like Pepper had been caught off guard. by something. The poor thing never had a chance, never even had time to understand what was going to happen to her. JJ made a sound behind me, a kind of choking noise. I heard him stumble out of the barn, followed by retching in the grass outside. I stayed where I was. I couldn't take my eyes off of what was left of Pepper. The skin had been opened up along the belly, one single long precise cut, running from throat to the base of the tail. The edges weren't ragged like an animal attack, they were smooth, terribly clean. Whatever had done this had done it before, and it was taking its time. I thought about the thing I saw in stall four then. That thing I'd personally guided back to the barn. The thing that had turned its head too far to look at me with eyes that weren't its own. That monster. It had been wearing pepper like a costume. Like a suit it could put on and take off. And at some point during the night, while JJ and I were sitting outside watching the sky and waiting for dawn, it just decided it didn't need a disguise anymore. I wondered, what did that process look like? Had it peeled itself out of the skin the way a person steps out of clothes? Or did it simply stop holding the shape, let the skin fall away on its own? Involuntarily, a sound came to my head as I visualized it. A wet, tearing noise. God, I didn't want to wonder these things. but it was like when you're sitting at the edge of a cliff and you wonder what it would be like to just fall off. I backed out of the stall and closed the door behind me. JJ was sitting on the ground outside the barn. His face was yellow and gray. I sat down next to him and we stayed there for some time, silently. The sun was fully up now, warm on our faces, and somewhere in the distance I could hear the day shift going about their normal routines, getting ready for another day at the zoo. They didn't know what was out there. They had no idea what had been in here with us all night, walking among the animals, wearing something else's skin. what do we do jj asked finally i wasn't sure in all my years working with animals this was something i never expected to encounter there's no protocol for this no procedures we tell bartley i said show him what we found in the barn let him make the call for himself He's gonna think we did it. Maybe. But it's gonna be found one way or another. I think it's better we tell someone before someone just finds it. We can't just pretend it didn't happen. We found Bartley in the main office building. He listened to our story with this look on his face that shifted from skepticism to concern to something like fear. He then came with us to the zebra barn, and he looked at what was on the floor of Stalfor. He gasped and covered his mouth, and he stared at it for a long time like I did. You're sure this is Pepper? he asked finally. Yes, sir. The stripe pattern matches, and she's the only one missing. What about the cameras? Did you check the footage? We did, but the footage we had seen at the time seemed normal. Truthfully, sir, we haven't gone back to the station for some time. It didn't matter. The place didn't record its footage for very long, just hours before automatically being deleted. Bartley nodded slowly. I'm going to call the police, he said. and the State Wildlife Agency. This is beyond anything we can handle here, boys. What do you want us to do? Go home, both of you. Get some sleep, and don't talk to anyone about what you saw here. Not until you hear from me. I gotta figure out how to handle this. I didn't say anything else to Bartley. I was running on fumes, and whatever drips of caffeine were still left from that coffee. And the thought of remaining in this place any longer... I just wanted to get away. Somewhere safe, somewhere normal, and far away. JJ and I walked out to the parking lot together. Looking at the sky, you couldn't even tell there was a storm only hours ago. You'd think it was just another morning at the zoo. hey you think that thing in the hallway jj started as we reached our cars the one that looked like you do you think it was the same thing and that little girl we heard with the lions i'd been thinking about that too about what it meant if something like that could take a zebra shape and wear its skin. How could it have taken my shape without my skin? Had it still been wearing Pepper's skin when it was calling to us from the shadows of the lion's containment room? Jay, I don't know what it was, and I don't want to talk about it ever again. I felt bad for saying that, because some people need to talk about these things. They need to be able to talk about trauma and confidence with their close friends, but I was already feeling sick, thinking about someone with my face, my body, waving at my co-worker and smiling. Jay looked sad. He gave me a single nod, got in his car, and drove away. I went home and showered, tried to sleep, but sleep came hard. I had a nightmare finding the zebra skin hanging from my ceiling just above me when I woke up. The next day there were police, detectives with notebooks and crime scene technicians with cameras and evidence bags. It was like a murder happened instead of an animal killing. I told them what I'd seen. I could tell them pretty much everything because so much of it sounded so believable. I saw Pepper acting wrong. We saw figures around that shouldn't have been there. Saw someone leave in the early morning. Heard voices in the lion's enclosure. So long as I didn't tell them that I thought it was some monster that stole Pepper's skin, I was able to tell them pretty much everything. Though I have no idea if it came to anything. I still work here. Bartley tells me that the police think it was just a wild animal that broke in and killed Pepper. stayed long enough to have multiple meals off of her innards, which is why we didn't find much, except the skin. But I know he doesn't believe that. It's been long enough that I've talked about it again a couple of times with my co-workers. JJ's even joked about it. Joked about how disturbing it would be if it came back and looked like him instead. And Bartley has admitted that he knows this is no animal attack, but what he truly believes it was. he's never said. So if you're reading this, or better yet, hearing it from my favorite narrator, what do you think did this? What kind of creature or monster does this kind of thing? I've read stories about aliens and wendigos and skinwalkers, tons of 4chan green texts that talk about things that can mimic human voices and appearances. But a zebra? Why would something from those stories, even invade a zoo? Are skinwalkers afraid of the rain? Of storms? Did it spend the night with us, just to get shelter, passing the wee hours of the night, pranking the staff? Is that why Pepper had to die so horribly? Let me know what you think. I really liked this story. I hate what happened to that poor zebra, don't get me wrong. But this story was both unique and absolutely creepy. A skinwalker wearing the skin of a zebra. Never thought I'd see the day. And hopefully, we never see that day again. Good night. Thank you all so much for tuning into this episode of Unexplained Encounters. I'm your host, Darkness Prevails. Find me on X at Dark Prevails, if you care about my opinions or don't. Or find me on my other podcasts for more scary stories like this. I tell scary work-related stories on Tales from the Break Room, and scary forest-related stories on Alone in the Woods, both of which you can find on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and your favorite podcast app. Until next time everyone, stay safe out there, and stay creepy. Because this world is a strange one.