John wasn’t the loud kid in class. He wasn’t the class clown either. He was the one who’d always show up on time, sit near the window, and listen like every word mattered. Eleven years old, a little too serious for his age, always the last to raise his hand but first to notice when someone dropped a pencil. He liked order. Schedules. Knowing what comes next.
So when Ms. Bell said they were going to the Taboofantazy Zoo for the school’s first field trip of the year, John felt the tiniest twist in his stomach. Not fear. Just… unfamiliarity. He didn’t even know how to pronounce it right, “Taboo-fan-tazzy”? “Tab-off-antasy”? The name felt like it didn’t want to be understood.
They handed out permission slips on Wednesday. By Thursday night, his bag was packed: sandwich, juice box, notebook, two sharpened pencils, and that cheap pair of binoculars his cousin left behind over the summer. He didn’t expect to use them. He just liked being prepared.
The bus ride was loud — wrappers crinkling, someone already queasy in the back. John stared out the window, watching the trees blur into fields and then into something… different.
The zoo didn’t look like a zoo.
There were no ticket booths, no crowds. Just a low black gate, moss-covered stone paths, and a sign that didn’t blink or shout:
Welcome to Taboofantazy. Rules are different here.
The teachers didn’t say much. Ms. Bell gave them the usual buddy system speech, told them to stay on the paths, and reminded them — more than once — not to touch anything behind glass. That last part stood out.
At first, it felt like any other animal place. There were monkeys. Sort of. Not swinging — more like floating in little pockets of mist. They made no noise. Just stared with these half-laughing, half-judging eyes. One kid, Reggie, tapped the glass. The monkey vanished. Not ran. Vanished. Gone like a dream you try to remember and can’t.
John kept moving.
There were cages labeled with names he didn’t understand: Blitherscale, Mourning Lion, The Last Duck (which was not a duck, but more like a wet, sighing cloud with eyes). No one explained. That was the oddest part. There were no guides, no signs saying “Fun Fact!” or “Did You Know?” Just glass and labels and something humming behind every wall, like the place was alive.
Around noon, something happened.
John’s group was near the far back of the zoo, past the hedge maze and that enclosure that looked suspiciously like a library. Sarah — the loud girl with the pigtails — dared someone to sneak off the path and peek into a dark alley marked “Off Limits – Staff Only”.
Ben went. Of course he did.
John saw it before anyone else did — the way the path under Ben’s feet shifted, just a little, like it inhaled. And then, gone. Not a scream. Not even a thud. Just… gone.
The group froze. Someone shouted his name. Ms. Bell came running, but there was nothing to see except smooth, untouched ground.
They searched for an hour. Two. A zoo staff member eventually showed up — not in uniform, but in a plain black coat with a patch over one eye. He didn’t give his name. Just said, “He’ll return when the zoo decides he’s ready.”
No one knew what that meant.
Back on the bus, it was quiet. No crinkling wrappers this time. Sarah was crying. Reggie kept whispering, “He’s pranking us. He’s hiding. Right?”
John didn’t speak. He was thinking about that monkey — how it looked at Reggie before vanishing. How everything in that zoo seemed to be watching, waiting. Judging choices.
Ben came back the next morning. Showed up to school like nothing happened. Said he remembered walking down the alley, then waking up in bed. Said he had weird dreams about a creature with no face asking questions he couldn’t hear.
The teachers told everyone not to talk about it. But of course, they did. Kids always do.
John never forgot that trip. Not because it was terrifying — it wasn’t. Not exactly. But because it made him feel like the world was thinner than he thought. Like there were doors everywhere, and some of them were disguised as field trips.
Years later, when someone asked him why he never broke rules, why he never crossed boundaries “just for fun,” he didn’t say much. Just looked at them for a second, then said:
“Some fences exist for a reason. Just because they don’t look like fences doesn’t mean you should climb them.”
And he meant it.
