Several blocks away, the penguins peeked around the corner of a very large department store. They waited until a group of humans approached the door, then they scooted through the door under the humans' feet. Once inside, Skipper smiled, looking at the walls and displays full of merchandise.
"This'll do nicely! Boys, commence operation Smart Shopper."
The penguins set to work.
"It doesn't look like it's getting any closer." Alex said, glaring at the Empire State Building.
Melman ducked another storefront canopy, only to run into a garbage can. The can fell over, spilling trash all over the sidewalk. The wind picked it up and caused it to join its fellow garbage in the street. Melman made a face, "Ugh, I forgot how dirty the city is!"
Something in a store window caught Alex's eye. "Hey, guys! Look at this!"
Everyone gathered around the window. There were TVs inside, all tuned to a news channel. A news anchorman stood in front of a picture of a cargo ship.
The cargo ship!
The anchorman began talking, "Just in from the South Atlantic, the missing sailors from the lost cargo ship have been found after two weeks."
Gloria sighed, "That's a relief!"
The anchorman continued, "…were found just off Cape Horn, Africa in several small lifeboats. Though very cold, they all seem to be alright. They will be headed home pending investigation, as the cargo ship was allegedly hijacked. The ship, containing the Central Park Zoo's former animal residents, remains missing. The boat was taking the zoo's feature attraction, Alex the Lion, to his new home in Kenya's wildlife preserve."
The camera pulled away to reveal an anchorwoman sitting next to the anchorman. She nodded at the man, "Well, I sure hope they find those animals soon, and that they are all okay." She looked straight out of the TV, "Alex, if you're out there, remember, New York misses you. We wish you the best."
The man smiled at the camera, "Now it's time for the late evening sports coverage. The Knicks pulled off an astounding comeback game, losing by only 6 points compared to the 28-point lead they gave Dallas the last game…"
Alex grinned, "Did you hear that?"
"Yeah," said Melman, "they lost again. What else is new?"
"Some things never change," Gloria remarked.
"They're getting better, only 6 points this time!" Marty pointed out.
"True," Melman and Gloria nodded. Cora looked confused.
Alex shook his head, "Not basketball, the news report! The people! They didn't mean to dump me on that…that…island!"
"Hey," Marty put his hooves on his hips, "I happen to have enjoyed 'that that island' !"
"My point is," Alex said, "they still love me! New York, my city still wants me!"
"I don't know, Alex," Marty said skeptically, "I mean, that was only one person."
Alex waved his paw, "It was on the news, so it must be true!"
"Guys, shhh! We better keep it down!" Cora nodded towards some people who were looking strangely at the clothed animals.
"Oh, right, right!" Alex whispered, "sorry!"
Melman squinted at the still-distant Empire State Building. "We should really keep moving if we want to get to Central Park by morning."
"Yeah," said Cora, "What time is it, anyway?"
"5:00 A.M." Melman said, "According to my inner clock."
Gloria shook her head and looked at the dark night's sky, lit only by the city lights, "Maybe it needs new batteries."
The animals began trekking through the city again.
"Guess I got used to dirt." Marty remarked, "This sidewalk seems really hard!"
Alex glanced at his feet. He hadn't noticed. He looked at how Marty, Cora, and Melman walked stiffly down the sidewalk as though their hooves were sore. Gloria didn't seem to have that problem.
"Sorry about that, guys." Alex apologized, "Once we get to the zoo, the ground will be softer."
"That would be nice." Melman sighed.
Without warning, Marty broke into song, "I like to move it, move it. I like to move it, move it."
Grinning, Alex joined in, "I like to move it, move it. We like to…"
"Move it!" A well-dressed lady carrying multiple shopping bags brushed past Alex, who was partially obstructing a door to a shop.
"Sorry!" Alex called to her, forgetting that she could only hear lion sounds.
The lady looked at Alex, screamed, and ran inside the shop, slamming the door shut behind her.
Alex looked perplexed, "Why do they always do that?"
"Don't worry, Alex." Marty reassured his best friend, "Once you're back in the zoo, they'll treat you like the top cat again. Everything will be just like it used to be!"
The lion smiled at his striped pal, "I know it will, except for one thing. We have Cora." The lion nearly frowned, but remembered not to. For some reason, it still bugged him that she had buddied up to Marty.
"So it'll be even better than it used to be!" Gloria exclaimed on Cora's behalf. She managed to smile at Cora and glare at Alex at the same time. Alex sighed. Nothing could get past Gloria.
"I think it's looking closer now than before!" Melman scrutinized the Empire State Building.
"Then let's go get it!" Alex led the way.
"Look where we are, 5th Avenue!" Melman cheered as he read a street sign, "And there's the Empire State Building!"
"The zoo is just up this way!" Marty started trotting north. Alex caught him by the tail.
"We'd get there faster if we took the subway." The lion said.
Melman shook his head, "I don't know, Alex. We'd have to go to the 34th Street station and take it up to Lexington, then walk over to the zoo. It might actually be faster to walk straight there."
"But the longer we're out on the streets, the more likely it is that we'll be found." Cora pointed out.
"Exactly!" Alex clapped his paws.
"Why don't we vote on it?" Gloria suggested.
"Okay." Everyone said.
"All for subway?"
Marty, Cora, and Alex raised their paws and hooves.
"All for the street?"
Melman sadly lifted a hoof.
Gloria nodded, "Subway it is, then."
"Cool!" Cora smiled, "One question, though."
"What?"
Cora blinked, "What's a subway?"
"Yeah! We're almost there!" Alex jumped up excitedly as the animals left the subway station.
Cora looked surprised, "That thing was fast! I think I feel sick!"
"Me too," groaned Melman.
Cora and the others began walking down the sidewalk toward Central Park.
"I can almost smell the steak from here!" Alex rubbed his stomach.
"Full plan healthcare here I come!" Melman perked up.
Gloria closed her eyes, "Mmm, you know it! I am going to soak until I shrivel!"
Marty laughed, Gloria didn't shrivel even when she spent all day in her pool! "That would take a lot of soakin', Glo!"
"That's my point!" Gloria sighed.
"Look!" Alex's voice was high-pitched and nearly a whisper, "There it is!"
Sure enough, ahead of the five friends was a large rectangle of green in the middle of the city. The green was interrupted by a vine-covered brick wall with signs reading, "Central Park Zoo" on it.
"It's really there!" Alex gestured toward it, "I mean, we're really there! Here. We're here!"
Marty caught Alex's enthusiasm, "Well, what are we waiting for?"
Laughing, the five friends ran the rest of the way to the zoo entrance. A large red sign hung up on the gate. It read, "Closed for Renovation".
"Aww, it's closed." Melman said disappointedly.
Alex looked dismayed, then determined, "Of course it is! The zoo closes before sunset, remember?"
"What's this 'renovation'?" Gloria asked.
Alex scratched his head, "I don't know, I've never seen it before."
"Well," Cora sighed, "How are we going to get in, then?"
Alex's eyes glinted in the light from a coffee shop. "Don't worry, I have a plan!"
Melman shook his head, "I hate it when he says that."
"I thought getting out of this place was hard!" Marty said from inside a shrub.
"Shh!" A lion shaped plant said in Alex's voice, "We can't make a new hole in the wall because that would wake up the people! My other idea would have worked if the people hadn't patched up the hole Gloria made when we left!"
"What did you expect?" a tree said, sneezing, "They're people…they're paranoid. Oh no! Is this poison oak?"
"Melman!" a Gloria-sounding shrub hissed, "I'm pretty sure there's no poison oak in New York City!"
"But they might have planted some while we were gone!" the Melman-tree pointed out.
"Why would they do that?" a bush with Cora's voice asked, "People are allergic to poison oak!"
"Shh!" the lion plant said again, "here he comes!"
The shrubbery stopped talking as a night watchman strolled by, unlocking the gate to the zoo.
Involuntarily, one of the bushes began to shiver.
"NOW!" Alex yelled. Five plants dashed past the very startled night watchman and into the zoo. They planted themselves in various spots among the scenery.
The watchman blinked and exited the zoo, locking the gate, "I need some coffee, that's all. Just some coffee." He headed across the street in search of a 24-hour coffee shop.
Once he was gone, the five odd plants erupted.
"The oldest trick in the book!" Alex cheered, pulling leaves out of his mane. Melman dropped the branch he was holding in his mouth and shook off the ones on his body. Gloria, Cora, and Marty brushed leaves off of themselves. Worn out from the evening's activities, none of them said anything for a while.
"Is it just me, or is it really quiet around here?" Alex noticed. Even at night in the zoo, the animals snored.
"Of course, Al! Remember? All the animals are back on Madagascar except for us and the penguins." Marty explained.
"But," Alex frowned, "it's a zoo. Wouldn't they have gotten new animals by now? What's a zoo without animals?"
Marty shrugged, "Does it matter? There are animals here, now!"
"That's right!" Alex grinned, "Boy, won't the people be surprised to see us here!"
"I've been robbed!" Melman yelled. His voice came from his old house. The other animals rushed over.
"What do you mean?" Cora called to him.
Melman's head poked out of his house. He looked distraught, "There was over a hundred thousand dollars' worth of specialized medical equipment here when I left! It's all gone!"
"Some one robbed me, too!" Gloria cried from her pen, "They stole all of the water out of my pool! Why would someone steal water?"
Alex inspected his pen. "Where's my heat lamp?" he demanded, "And my den's been totally stripped! Even the Alex-cam is gone! How are my fans going to be able to watch me while I sleep?"
"Something is really, really wrong here." Marty surveyed what used to be his enclosure. It looked the same, minus one treadmill, a water trough, and hay in the bed. And, Marty noted sadly, his collection of Alex souvenirs was gone. All that was left was the mural on the wall, the one he'd always dreamed of living in.
The one that looked like Madagascar.
"Marty…" Cora gasped, looking at the mural.
"I know," Marty said.
Cora shook her head, "It looks just like that clearing, back on Madagascar." She glanced around at the empty space, "I gather that this isn't the way this place looked when you left?"
"No, not really," Marty pointed, "Over there was a treadmill, and over there was my water trough, that corner was my bed, and this spot was where I kept all of the presents that Alex gave me for my birthdays."
Alex's voice cried, "My name's gone!"
Marty excused himself from Cora and dashed to Alex's pen. The lion was staring in horror at the place on his house where his name sign used to hang. He stared at the spot, boring a hole into it with his clear blue eyes, "It's gone! It's not there anymore! I don't have a name anymore! I've been erased! From the zoo, from New York, from existence! I don't exist anymore!" Alex cried out, "You were right, Marty. New York doesn't miss me! They've forgotten me!"
Marty climbed over Alex's railing and approached his friend, "Alex…"
Alex was up to full-blown hysterics now, "They HATE me! Why do you hate me, New York?" he yelled at the city.
"Alex!" Marty grabbed Alex's shoulders and looked him in the eye, "They don't hate you! This is all some kind of a misunderstanding!"
Alex's eyes narrowed, "That began the night YOU decided to leave for Connecticut!" he growled. He instantly regretted it when he saw the hurt look in Marty's eyes.
"Marty, I'm…I'm sorry. I didn't mean it like…"
The zebra tried to act like Alex's comment hadn't bothered him, "Alex, it'll work out, you'll see."
"But," Alex felt despair draping over him, "it's all gone. All of it. Nothing's the same. Nothing's left. Nothing's here."
"I'm here." Marty tried to grin, "Man, I will always be here for you."
"So will we!" Melman said.
"That's right!" Gloria nodded.
Cora smiled shyly at Alex.
The discouraged lion looked around at all of his loyal friends. Gloria, who is always willing to set me straight when I get too crazy and helps us all out of messes. Melman, who is great at offering a new perspective on things, and goes along with my nutty plans. Cora, who seems to like me even though I haven't been that nice to her. His eyes stopped at his best friend of all. Marty, who has been my friend since I was a cub. Marty, who stuck with me even when I was furious at him for getting us all transferred. Marty, who went into fossa territory just to find and talk to me after I tried to eat him. Marty, who saved my life from the mean people and almost lost his own. Marty, who gave up his dream to follow me back to New York. Marty, who is always there, happy to help me when I need him the most.
I am an incredibly lucky cat. Alex thought.
"Thanks, you guys." Alex smiled warmly, calming down, "I really do appreciate it, even if I don't always show it."
Marty grinned at Alex, "We know you do, Al. And I can't blame you for getting upset about all of this." Marty gestured to the rest of the zoo, "I mean, this is a major disappointment!"
"I guess it's true what they say," Gloria sighed, "You can never really go home again."
"Yes you can," Cora looked up suddenly, "Home is where your heart is, right? So all you have to do is find out where your heart is, and that's where home is!"
Melman looked confused, "My home's in my chest?"
"Uh," Cora corrected, "where your heart is…metaphorically speaking."
Alex nodded, "Interesting."
Melman yawned, "I'm so tired. I think I'll…shnzzzzz." Melman fell asleep standing up near Alex's pen.
"I don't know where I'm gonna sleep, but I agree with Melman." Gloria said sleepily, "Goodnight, everybody."
Alex sighed at his empty house, "Goodnight, guys." He fell asleep under his nameless doorway.
Marty walked over to his concrete bed. He decided to sleep on the grassy ground instead.
Cora looked a little lost, and Marty noticed.
"Find a spot, Cora. The zoo's all ours tonight." Marty told her.
Cora smiled, "Hmm." She looked around, "How about there?" she pointed at a garden.
"Great choice!" Marty nodded, "I'll be over here if you need anything."
The animals bedded down for the night.