Rome, Italy
(Alex's POV)
"OK! Strike up the band!" Stefano shouted. "You have a band?" Marty asked. "The Band" was actually a boombox and one of the dogs pushed the button. Stefano was balanced on a ball and holding onto a bunch of balls, "Prepare to be blown away!" Stefano declared as he rolled forward. Marty opened the curtain to let Stefano thru, "Blow me away!" I said. "Here we go!" Stefano said as he entered the ring.
"whoo!" "Yahhh!" "whoo!" "yes!" "Look at this..." Stefano said as he dropped the balls, "Whoa! Hey!" "It's nice to be…" Stefano said as he fell off the ball. "Yay." we said. Stefano throw up some balls. One of the balls hit a man in the head, "Hey!" he shouted. Stefano threw up another ball and knocked a dog out, "Whoa!" Stefano picked up the dog and moved him around like a doll, "How do dogs do that?" "Get on with it!" someone said as Vitaly just picked up a hoop and flipped it around instead of jumping thru it.
"Stupido!" someone shouted. "uh oh," I said. "boo!" the audience shouted. A boy in the audiene shot a spit-ball at one of the elephants causing it to lose it's balance. The elephant landed rear-first on the boy and…you don't want to know. In the rafters the penguins were watching, "Well, that was worth the price of admission," Skipper said. The remaining elephant fell down causing the horses to kick the dogs sending one flying into someone's sandwich. The dog punched the man and the people in the audience started to scream.
"Who's from Cincinnati?" Stefano said. I used a pole to drag Stefano backstage. "Stefano," I said, "You know blown away means good, right?" "Don't worry. The Big finale is coming up!" Stefano said as he returned to the stage. A bunch of bicycle horns were lined up in the middle of the circus ring, "Give me a downbeat! Look at this!" Stefano said. People in the audience started to leave, "Oh, no. no, this is not happening," I said. The voice of the ex-owner echoed in my head, "You have a deal, mi amigo." "It's good no?" Stefano said to the empty tent, "Yes, go out and get some food and come back!" "There not coming back," Marty whispered.
Meanwhile outside an angry mob had surrounded the chimps in the ticket booth. Mason and Phil sneaked out of the booth and placed a "Back in V" sign on the window. I was hyperventilating into a bag, "Deep Breaths," Marty said, "You're in a happy place. It's all good." The chimps arrived, "There's an angry mob outside," Mason said breathlessly, "and they're demanding their money back!" "I think we all know the right thing to do," Skipper said. "Like Give them their money back?" Elsa asked nervously. "No!" Skipper said, "We take the money and hightail it out of here!"
Shortly afterward
The train station
We ran across the platform the angry mob in close pursuit. Marty, Melmen, Gloria, and I jumped onto the train, "come on! Come on! Come on! Hurry up!" I shouted to Stefano. "Hop on the train," Marty shouted. Stefano had dropped his horns. Stefano looked in horror as the horns were destroyed by the mob. I grabbed him before the angry mob caught up with him. "Come on, guys!" Gloria shouted. I caught up with the train and hopped on "mammia mia!" Stefano shouted. "Hurry up!" everyone shouted. I grabbed onto to melmen and jumped onto the train. "Grazie, Alice." Stefano said. The Chimps were still on the platform and the mob was catching up, "Just throw us the money!" Julian said.
The chimps misheard Julian and abandoned the money to the people and dashed towards the train. Julian face-plamed as the chimps boarded the train. The formerly angry mob started to picked up the money as the train sped away. "We should have just gave them the money in the first place," Elsa said. "What would the fun in that be?" Skipper asked.
Meanwhile
Italian prison
A Prison Comandante with a clipboard opened a cell door and entered with two guards. "Captain Chantal Dubois. Get up" he said flipping thru his papers, "I'm going to have to send you back to Monaco under…Maximum Security." The two guards hit their batons against their hands to underline "Maximum Security". They looked at the bed to see Dubois seemly still asleep. The Comandante look at the one of the guards next to him then with a gesture of his head sent them towards the bed.
The guards approached the bed and removed the covers to reveal nothing but some pillows. "What!?" The Comandante said, "It's just a pillow!" "That's the oldest trick in the book, Comandante. Every Bambino in Italy knows the one." The Comandante shoved the pillow into the arms of the guard and said, "Maybe, but do they know about the old escape hole behind the innocent-looking poster?" The Comandante turns to an innocent looking poster and ripped it off the wall. Dubois had drawn and bunch of arrows, lips, and Stupido on a mirror behind the poster.
He pulled out a gun and said, "Or the really old I'm gonna hide up on the ceiling trick!" He fired some shots at the ceiling only to get a piece of the ceiling on his face. The guards whisled and hit their batons on the floor by the bed. "Or course," the Comandante replied walking up to the bed. He looked under the bed and found a hole, "The Secret Tunnel under the bed!" "Get this thing out of the way," he ordered. The two guards moved the bed over leaving the hole exposed. The Comandante gun in hand looked down the hole.
He cocked his gun and said, "Let's go!" The jumped down the hole the two guards following him down. Dubois was actually behind a shower curtain and cut a square hole into it. "This Secret Tunnel is a dead end!" the Comandante shouted for the bottom of the hole. "There's nothing but bedsprings and mattress stuffing down here!" one of the guards shouted. Dubois left the cell and closed the door behind her. "Was that the sound of a cell door closing?" the Comandante asked. Dubois then walked to the Comandante's office and sat down in front of a computer.
She loaded up the web browser then typed Missing lion in the search engine. She clicked on the search button on the site and found what she was looking for. "Voila!" Dubois said before hitting the print screen button on the keyboard. "Was that the sound of my HP printer printing?" The Comandante shouted. On the screen was a news article with a picture of alex titled "Famous Central Park Zoo Lion still missing"
(End of Chapter six)
