This story takes place entirely at the Central Park Zoo. It'll be its own thing entirely, and won't have any references to the films.
It was 6AM in Britain, and as the sky was lightening up with the sun's gradual ascension amongst the darkness, the country's live morning program, entitled 'Rise & Shine' had began its introduction sequence, with a bunch of reporters laughing together in the midst of a dull, yet formal song. Andrew Blake and Sandra Jones, the two reporters that appear live on the program, had began their usual introductions as soon as the cameras began airing live in the studio.
"Good morning Britain, don't forget to wrap up warm today, because it's gonna be freezing, haha.." Andrew said, with Sandra shortly taking over.
"Indeed it is, but the weather can be put aside for a moment, because something that can only be described as a dream-come-true has emerged over in New York, Central Park Zoo. We'll shortly be talking to one of the zoo keepers live, but first, a bit of context.." Sandra said.
"Had myself and Sandra told you all, eye-to-eye, that animals can behave like humans in terms of their movements and general characteristics, you'd probably be thinking of us as the odd pair you see on the news every morning. Well...surprise surprise, for once, we're not-"
"What are you saying, Andrew?" Sandra laughed, "that I also talk oddly?"
"Well no, but obviously with the media throwing a ton of names around, it's only fair that I play their game too?"
The cameramen behind the studio were slightly chuckling, but not to the point that they could be heard on the live cameras to the people watching from home. Andrew was shrugging his shoulders as if he didn't do anything.
"Anyways, uh..." Andrew said, moving on, "officials at the Central Park Zoo have discovered indeed that their animals, under the magic of security cameras, can walk and they're even seen engaging with each other with hand gestures like humans, and not even science can explain it..."
The heading on the bottom of the screen for the people watching the live morning program was: Animals evolving?
"Well uh, Sandra, could you explain this if you were told to?"
"Not in the slightest, I don't even think the top zoo experts can give us an explanation, but- oh, hang on, we're now going to go live to the Central Park Zoo, with one of the keepers, Emily Parker..."
The screen on the live program for the watchers had switched to two separate live feeds, with one featuring the Rise and Shine interviewers, and one live from New York in the Central Park Zoo, with the keeper standing in front of the camera.
"Joining us now is one of the veteran keepers, Emily Parker...Emily, tell us about this...how did your team make this remarkable discovery?" Andrew asked.
Behind Emily was the Central Park Zoo itself, vacant of Alex, Marty, Melman or Gloria for the moment.
"Well you know, we leave these security cameras on at night, in order to monitor the zoo in case anybody trespasses, and when we looked over the footage...we genuinely thought at first that it was a fluke, you know, that somebody had somehow hacked into our system and used editing skills, but when we inspected the footage...everything just seemed so real and...I can't even put it into words...not fake. We take good care of our animals, too, and admittedly, one of our animals, called Alex the Lion, has shown this sort of behaviour before, but he was looking like he was actually TALKING to our Zebra, and they were both standing on their two feet, and we could quite clearly make out their mouths moving like they were talking to each other. What's even better about this story is that it's also our Hippo and Giraffe that do the same, and the four of them are like...doing it, I've no idea how, but our zoo takes great pride in this, so chances are we're going to look into this with much greater detail..."
"And Emily, uh, you know, with this only now being revealed, are you saying that your zoo has known about this for ages, and it's only now that you've revealed it to the world?"
"Well, I wouldn't put it like that necessarily, but we knew about some aspects of it from Alex, our lion, but we didn't really think much of it because we've had him for so long...but hey, everyone knows now, so we need to clearly see what our pathway is like after this...and uh, all of our staff are incredibly excited over it, it's given us a good vibe, that's for sure, haha..."
"Well Emily, we haven't got much time to spare, but thanks for spending a minute or so with us sharing this..."
"Not a problem, guys, have a good day over there..." Emily said.
As Andrew and Sandra were back to the full screen, the two looked at each other with surprise.
"Wow...hey, I don't think they're 'lion' about this, are they?" Andrew said, chuckling, with the camera crew chuckling.
"God, Andrew..." Sandra said, placing her palm over her head.
Andrew couldn't stop chuckling at his rubbish pun.
"Okay, we..hahahahaha...we'll take you to the weather now, haha..." he struggled, chuckling as his face started turning red.
In the Central Park Zoo office, all of the staff were discussing ways in which they could potentially interact with Alex the Lion in particular, and possibly the other animals that're known to behave like humans. They loved Alex; he'd always be on stage, bringing in crowds, and selling merchandise from the zoo's gift shop. But now that pretty much the entire world knows of Alex's unique behaviour in comparison to most animals, the zoo wanted to step up their game with him, alongside Marty, Gloria and Melman potentially.
"Good day, everyone..." the head staff member said to all of his colleagues gathered around the table. "Alex, in short, has received worldwide attention, and recently, we've been gaining tons of attention for it. What can we do to take advantage of this?"
"How so? like, what are you proposing?" one of the staff members asked the head staff.
"I'm proposing a brand new event involving Alex and that zebra; I doubt the hippo and the giraffe will be capable of my idea. What if...because of their human characteristics and their ability to clearly understand us, even though we can't understand them and all we hear are roars and whatnot, we hold an animal wrestling sort of thing? so you'd have that zebra going against the lion. Think about it...they can think for themselves, and they have a good friendship, from the footage we've gathered, and the amount of worldwide attention that'd draw? the zoo would gain enough funds to expand?"
"But-"
"And before any of you say this is some sort of cruelty, we're talking about HUMAN-LIKE animals here; in that sense, they aren't proper animals if they've got the mindset of a human? plus, they love staying here, and especially Alex himself. What do you all say?"
The staff had all surprisingly nodded along with the idea. The head staff member was right; it wasn't animal cruelty because of two things: one is that Alex LOVES the Central Park Zoo, and would never leave it. The other is that, like the staff have said, Alex, Gloria, Melman and Marty all have human characteristics and can clearly interact with each other in a human manner, so they'd essentially be treated like humans. Alex loved fighting, too, so it was all the more convenient for him to take part in it should it go down.
"So uh, how are we gonna train them up for this?" another staff member asked.
"Train? all we have to do is talk. They can clearly understand what we're saying, so all we have to do is, again, talk to them. Training isn't needed at all, but we'll bring a couple of superior-trained zookeepers to be safe. I've got a good feeling about this, it'll bring a positive step forward towards the reputation of zoos across the world!"
Again, he had a point with that, and all of the staff nodded with the proposal. All that was needed now was to finalize the actual wrestling contest itself, and tell the animals about it.
Marty and Alex had heard about the news via the speakers across the zoo, echoing in their loudest volume. The second it mentioned 'wrestling', the two of them instantly thought about how a contest between themselves would go. Marty was casually leaning against his enclosure's stone wall, whilst Alex was sitting down against it, munching proudly on a bit of steak.
"You like to think you're the man of the yaard, Alex, come on, whadya say? put it to the test, tough guy?"
Alex spat out a bit of his steak upon Marty challenging him in the contest that was being proposed by the zoo staff.
"Sorry? I can't hear you over my delightful steak, which, by the way, is probably stronger than you?"
"As far as I'm concerned Alex, you ain't no real lion. You're a tiny cub with overgrown hair, and hey, me and you both know that we've been friends for a long while now...correct? I could toss you around like a piece of plastic, my man?"
Alex finished off his steak, leaping up from the wall to do a brief little dance, out of an entirely satire mood.
"Look, they've already concluded that me and you are gonna fight, and hey, Marty, you know what a go-kart is, don't you?"
Marty looked confused; he didn't understand the point Alex was trying to make by asking him about a go-kart.
"Well I'm like a go-kart; fast, and if you get in my way, you get ran over. You? uh, ah man, what do they call it when cars are crumbling? oh yeah, you're like a rusty, blown-out car; when you go, you're fast for a second, and then you crash down to the ground because your wheels blow out. I've got speed on my side, Marty, I'm as fast as a shooting staaaaar..."
These were just friendly exchanges between them, and they laughed it off in the end, but you have to imagine that all of these comments will get into their heads come the day of the contest. It's not just the fact that Alex and Marty are close friends that'll put pressure on them to physically fight, it'll also be the worldwide media coverage. Various countries will want to be there to see ANIMALS fighting and INTERACTING like humans; the biggest breakthrough in the history of mankind, one that science can't even explain, so naturally, there's going to be a gigantic audience there, amongst zookeepers and the staff.
And because they've now shown to the zookeepers that they can seemingly interact and behave like humans, the contest itself will take place inside some sort of stage, one that can take slams, and one that'll basically be appropriate for an animal fight. It'll need to be strong, though, for the simple fact that it'll be a lion and a zebra going face-to-face. In regards to the legality of this, the animals have shown that they can behave like humans in terms of their movements and interactions, so the contest will be 100% legalised to take place.
