Missing

Missing By Rachel Eckhouse “Excuse me,” said the loud speaker, “may I have your attention please, the monkey exhibit will be closing early” “I wonder what that’s about” said Grace. “Yeah I mean they didn’t even tell us in advance and were interns here” added Steve. As they sprinted back to the sign that said employees, only they came upon bursting with commotion. As they entered into the room all they could hear was “Who do you think took him?” and “I wonder where he is?” “Excuse me, EXCUSE ME!” Grace tried yelling over the roaring crowd, but it didn’t work, no one heard her. Grace and Steve stepped outside and saw one lonely volunteer packing up from an animal show. They quickly walked over to him, and with each step they saw that he didn’t look very friendly. But grace decided it was worth a try to ask him what was going on. Steve looked down to his nametag and said “Hi Bill, I was wondering if you could tell me what’s going on today?” Bill looked up from what he was doing and hesitated to tell them but the words finally came out. “Bobo has gone missing, the last time anyone saw him was last night when they were locking up.” Grace and Steve just stood there with a panicked look on their faces. “We have got to find him,” Said Grace. “Well if u want a little head start, I do some janitorial stuff after hours and I found this,” suddenly Bill took out a key. “Well what is it?” said Steve “It’s a key that opens every door in the zoo; I found it lying in front of Bobo’s cage last night.” responded Bill, “Only 3 people in the whole zoo have it’ “Who are those people?” Grace asked. “The owner Mr. Pickle, the security guard tom, and me.” said Bill Just then Bill pulled out another key that looked just like the one he found. “But I can promise you that it wasn’t me because I was picking up my daughter last night from a birthday party” Bill said. “So we have narrowed it down to two people” said Steve. As if in cue Tom walked out of Reptile Land. Grace and Steve ran to catch up with him and ask him a few questions. ‘Tom!” yelled grace, “can we talk to u for a second?” Tom spun around with a big smile on his face and said, “Of coarse you can.” “We just had a few questions,” said Steve, “where were you last night when Bobo went missing?” “I was in the butterfly cage,” said Tom, “making sure there were no holes for them to get out of.” “Ok thanks but just one more question,” Grace started, “Do you have any reason to believe it was Mr. Pickle that took Bobo. “Yes, actually I do,” said Tom, “Mr. Pickle is always talking to us about how we don’t work together as a team, as you probably saw when you walked into the break room. He has always been trying to find ways to make us more apperceive of each other” “Thank you for your help Tom, we really appreciate it” Steve said. Grace and Steve sprinted as fast as they could to Mr. Pickle’s office and asked him the same questions they asked Tom. His first answer didn’t really help with anything but it was when he answered the second question the wheels started to turn in Grace’s head. “Mr. Pickle,” Steve said, “do you have any reason to believe that Tom the head of security would have taken Bobo. “Yes Tom is always complaining that Bobo is always causing trouble with the visitors and makes his job twice as hard as it should be.” “Thank you Mr. Pickle for you cooperation, we promise to get Bobo back as soon as we can,” Grace said. Grace and Steve walked over to a picnic table to discuss what information they had collected. As they talked and talked they both kept going back and forth on who could have done it. They were about to reach a decision all they sudden they herd a monkey noise coming from around Mr. Pickles office. Grace and Steve both gasped and right then and there they both knew exactly who took it. Steve ran as fast as he could and Grace not trailing far behind him. They burst into Mr. Pickle’s office only to find Bobo sitting right on his lap. “Ok kids you caught me” Said Mr. Pickle “But why would you steal Bobo?” said Grace Mr. Pickle explained to both of them that he didn’t like the way the staff treated each other and that he was planning to return Bobo as soon as they started acting like a team instead of fighting with each other. That night everything was back to normal, Bobo was back safe and sound, Tom was cleaning as usual, and Tom was walking around checking all the cages. All of the sudden both Tom and Bill heard a loud bag from the Big Cats area and ran to see what happened. As the got to the area where the sound came from they were both astonished to see a man in all black run as fast as he could to the exit carrying the zoos most prized possession…