Prologue
Never leave ‘til tomorrow that which you can do today was the thought running through Lisa Moser’s head as she made her way down the frozen dirt road toward the snow-covered wooden cabin. She liked to think that she lived by that famous adage, which was the reason why she was at the nature park not far from her hometown in this weather, looking for the park ranger.
It wasn’t snowing anymore, but as the short day came to its end, it had gotten much colder, and the temperature had dropped way below the freezing point.
She knocked on the cabin’s massive wooden door and waited for a reply.
‘Yeah?’ A deep, brisk male voice called from inside.
Lisa took that as an invitation, stomped the snow off her boots, opened the door and walked right in. The cabin was basically a small office, with a reception desk and a few tiny rooms behind it. Off to the side there was a fireplace, and Lisa marched immediately over to warm up next to its roaring, welcoming heat.
‘Hi, Lisa, I wasn’t expecting to see you in this weather! What’s the occasion?’ the ranger called from behind the desk. He was big and strong, and a thick, black beard covered most of his friendly-looking face. He was smiling patiently, waiting for Lisa to warm up a little. She knew him well. The Nature Park and Bird Sanctuary was just outside her hometown, and the park had collaborated with her mom’s zoo on many occasions. They supported each other as often as they could, and Lisa considered the ranger a good friend. She rubbed her hands together over the open fire one more time and turned to talk to him.
‘Hi, Peter, how are you? How are things going around here?’ she said.
‘Well, you know—same old, same old,’ he said, and sighed, his smile giving way to a worried frown. ‘Unfortunately, not that great. The bird numbers are still dropping, and we see fewer and fewer newborn chicks every month—'
Lisa knew right away what he was talking about—there had been a steady decline in the bird population over the last few months, and nobody knew what the reason was. But after a few recent discoveries, Lisa had some theories about what was going on, and she was there to test them out.
‘I thought so,’ she said. ‘That’s why I’m here, actually, to take some water samples and run tests in our laboratory at the zoo. I think there might be a problem with the water here.’ Lisa didn’t want to say more, as she needed some evidence before accusing anybody, or even revealing the details of her theories.
‘Sure, no problem. What can I do for you?’ the ranger asked.
‘Nothing, really. I just stopped by to say hi and let you know I’m here. And to warm up a little. I’ll get the samples from the river and the swamp, and then head back to the zoo before I turn into a popsicle!’
The ranger chuckled and said, ‘Yeah, it’s really cold out there. I guess that’s why Daniel made me work this weekend! OK, take care. Let me know if you need anything!’
Lisa chuckled back, thinking about Daniel, the head ranger at the nature reserve. He ran everything around there, so she guessed it was OK to sometimes give yourself a weekend off, especially when the weather was so harsh. She adjusted the backpack on her shoulders, put her gloves back on and stepped outside into the biting cold. She knew her way around the park very well, so she didn’t expect to spend a lot of time collecting the samples. Ten minutes after she’d left the rangers’ cabin, she was already headed back toward the exit and the bus stop on the main road. She used one of the many narrow paths through the woods that crisscrossed the park as a shortcut, hearing nothing but her boots squeaking on the snow.
She was lost in her thoughts, marching down the path, when a shadow leaped from behind a tree just beside her. A strong arm wrapped around her arms and her body, and a hand covered her mouth. She tried to scream and kick, but the shadow just lifted her above the ground, so she was kicking nothing but air. She tried to scream louder, but the hand on her mouth pressed even harder. It was holding a rag of some sort.
Lisa tried to breathe in, and realized something horrifying—the rag smelled like a chemical she remembered from the veterinarian’s office. It was a solution they used to put the animals to sleep before they could safely operate on them. It was powerful and fast-acting, and Lisa knew she wouldn’t be able to fight this for much longer. As the world turned darker and darker around her, she couldn’t feel the cold anymore, and her body felt light and rubbery. Then everything went pitch-black, as she passed out.
