Zoobreak

The children place the animals in exhibits with the same or similar creatures. The ferret is reluctant to leave Ben until it sees another ferret, and the piglet and hen want to stay together, but otherwise, everything goes smoothly. In the office, Logan sees two figures in addition to the two known security guards on the security feed. He warns the others, but as Melissa watches the screen, she thinks, instead of security guards, “they looked like trouble” (199).

The reptile enclosure isn’t what the children expect, and Savannah uses her animal knowledge to find safe places to leave the animals. Griffin is relieved when all the animals are away, but Ben is sad and tells Griffin about the spot opening up at the sleep school, which makes Griffin sad, too. As the boys head back to meet up with the others, Mr. Nastase and Klaus appear. Griffin uses his walkie-talkie to make sure the rest of the group hears what is going on. The others don’t know what to do until Melissa channels Griffin, saying, “[W]e need a plan” (207).

Mr. Nastase plans to steal new animals for his zoo, stage a breakout, and pin the blame on the children. As he steals a baby alligator, Griffin and Ben try to reason with Klaus, who seems like he’s having second thoughts. The children threaten to rat Mr. Nastase out to the police, but he is unconcerned. He aims a tranquilizer gun at Griffin, but Klaus jumps in the way, taking the shot and passing out. The others hear everything over the walkie-talkie and order Melissa to kill the lights. She does, “and then everything [goes] black” (212).

In the dark, Mr. Nastase drops the alligator. Griffin’s friends break him out of the reptile enclosure, and the group gets outside before they realize Ben is missing. The police show up before they can go back inside to help Ben. The children and police run inside together as Melissa turns on the lights, and they find Mr. Nastase atop a stool trying to get away from the snapping alligator, a still unconscious Klaus, and Ben, “snoring softly, for all the world like he was in the comfort of his own bed” (215). They find out that the children’s parents are all waiting at the police station, which makes them realize they’re all going to be in trouble.

On the way to the police station, Griffin apologizes to the group because “[he] should have known that you can’t keep piling plan on top of plan on top of plan without getting burned” (218). At the police station, the group learns Darren is responsible for the police showing up and their parents getting involved, and seeing everything come together makes Griffin realize that he should have gotten their parents involved sooner instead of coming up with increasingly elaborate plans that put his friends in danger.

When the police finally give the families more information, Savannah interrupts to take all the blame because she got the others involved to save Cleopatra. The police admire this, but they aren’t arresting any of the children. Mr. Nastase is guilty of animal cruelty and many other crimes, and the police decide to focus on him instead. Still, they dug up the previous time the group broke laws involving a baseball card, and they let the children go with a warning that, if their names come up again, “you’ll be arrested, cuffed, fingerprinted, and prosecuted to the full extent of the law” (226).

Klaus takes a job at the Long Island Zoo, and Mr. Nastase gets community service after he rats out a stolen-animal criminal ring. When Savannah’s friend at the Long Island Zoo returns, Savannah helps her find proper homes for the new animals at various locations—all except the ferret. After a conference between Ben’s parents and the nurse at school, who somehow found out about the ferret, they make a deal: Ben can keep going to school, and the ferret will help keep him awake during the day so he sleeps better at night. The ferret then bites Ben’s dad’s finger. Ben’s dad good-naturedly tells Ben to keep that little monster away from him, to which Ben responds, “he’s not a monster; he’s my personal guardian angel!” (233). Ben and Griffin unpack Ben’s stuff, with both boys glad they won’t be separated after all.