The Last Tigers

In the blue light of evening, Skyler watches the tigers laze beneath the trees, their tails twitching. Even in Florida, far from their native Malaysia, the big cats seem content. It will be night soon, and Skyler shivers despite the muggy heat. She’s always been afraid of the dark, but tonight her fear goes deeper. Her father’s nature preserve is the only home these two tigers have ever known . . . and now, it is about to be taken away from them.

“We have to move them tonight,” her father had said an hour ago, his face grim. “If we wait until tomorrow, Nina says it will be too late.”

Skyler’s heart had clutched. She’d known something was wrong when her father’s friend Nina called three times that afternoon, the phone conversations increasingly frantic.

Charlie and Lulu are the last of their kind. Thirty years ago, before the great pandemic of 2020, there were a few hundred Malayan tigers left in the wild. But after a terrible virus gripped the planet, it was believed that medicine made from the tigers’ hearts could offer a cure for future viruses. The tigers were hunted, captured, and killed.

Now, in 2050, it is happening again: a new virus, a new threat to the tigers. Nina has learned from a friend at the Better Drug Agency that tomorrow, people from her lab are coming to take Charlie and Lulu away.

Skyler cannot bear to think about this. She grew up with the tigers, and over the years, she has come to look like a tiger herself. Her brown hair has tawny stripes. Her dark eyes have golden streaks. Her tanned skin has long, silvery scars from where the tigers have scratched her. She loves the tigers, so she loves the scars. Each scar tells a love story.

She crouches on the damp ground where the tigers lie, their massive bodies camouflaged by leaves. Their soft fur slides through her fingers. “Charlie, Lulu, time to move you,” she sings.

Skyler has been singing to the tigers since they were cubs, when they were as afraid of the dark as she was, scared of its secret noises and flitting shadows. Filling those dark spaces with her voice helped them all to be brave. Tonight, she must sing the tigers to safety. If Charlie and Lulu die, there will be no Malayan tigers left. How can the world not care?

“People are afraid, Sky,” her father says.

Skyler’s father has told her stories about the pandemic of 2020—about hospitals crowded with sick people and long lines at grocery stores. People couldn’t hug or hold hands. They stayed home from work, from school. Apparently, back then, kids used a computer program called Zoom to see their teachers and classmates on the screen. It sounds so primitive to Skyler, so different from VR Classroom and VR Field Trip, which her school uses for remote science experiments and trips to Tokyo or Paris.

Her father says the pandemic was a hard time but also a time of great courage. “We learned to be careful but also brave,” he tells Skyler. “That’s how we made it through.”

They will make it through this time too, he says. But first, they have to save the tigers. He has a plan: Nina lives on her own island, not far from shore, where the tigers will be safe.    

Now Charlie butts under Skyler’s hand and chuffs—a throaty, blowing noise that means he’s happy. Lulu rolls onto her back, her white belly lifting toward Skyler’s hand. Despite their love for her, the tigers could kill Skyler with one flick of a paw, one crunch of their jaws. Her father says, “Never assume you’re safe. With wild animals, instinct is stronger than anything.”

How do you love something that could kill you? Very carefully.

Skyler always keeps her sound-beam handy. It looks like a flashlight, but with one press of the button it glows orange, producing a sound and a laser beam that stop an animal from moving without hurting it, unlike the cruel stun guns and tranquilizer darts of the old days.

Suddenly, Skyler hears footsteps on the path. The tigers hear them too.

Her father rushes into the clearing, alarmed. “The people from the Better Drug Agency came early—their trucks are at the front gate!”

“Oh no!” Skyler cries, scrambling to her feet. The tigers rise too, alert, golden eyes glowing in the dusk.

There is only one entrance to the nature preserve, a long, winding drive from the highway to the front gate. Otherwise, this vast stretch of tropical forest and swamp is surrounded by a tall electric fence.

Her father scans the forest. “There’s no time, Sky. I have to let the BDA agents in. They’ll tear this place apart if I don’t.”

“But the tigers,” Skyler wails.

Her father’s jaw tightens. “Nina can be at Pelican Point with her boat, but we have to get them out of here NOW . . . without being seen.”

Skyler feels a flicker of hope. “Can we cut a hole in the fence?”

“Not unless I turn off the power. And besides, it’s too risky to go across the highway with the tigers.”

“Wait,” Skyler says suddenly. “What about going under the highway?”

They stare at each other. “The old drainage pipe,” her father says slowly. “That might work, Sky! Quick, bring the tigers.”

As her father disappears into the forest, Skyler sings urgently, “Lulu, Charlie, walk behind me.”

They follow her down the dark path. An armadillo waddles into the bushes. A wild boar browses nearby. Ahead, almost hidden by vines, Skyler sees the dim outline of the drainage pipe. Her father struggles to remove the rusty grate.

Yanking off the cover, he looks at Charlie and Lulu. “Will they go through it?”

The pipe is huge and dark, like a tunnel, like a cave. Skyler can’t imagine stepping into it.

Her voice quakes. “How long is it?”

“A few hundred feet. The other end is only a mile from the beach where Nina will have her boat. But Sky . . .”

Skyler’s whole body quivers. The tigers pace back and forth, staring into the black pipe.

Her father crouches beside her, his face close to hers. “I have to stay here to deal with the BDA agents. Can you do it? Will they follow you?”

Skyler looks at the tigers, then at her father. She tries to sound strong. “They’ll follow me if I sing to them.”

He hugs her close. “Follow the pipe to the creek, then the creek to the beach. I’ll tell Nina to be there. And hold on to your sound-beam.”

Skyler stands at the lip of the pipe. The tigers mill around her, ears pricked, full of tense energy.

“Charlie, Lulu, do what I do,” she sings softly.

The pipe is a gaping black hole. She can’t seem to breathe.

Charlie and Lulu come to her. Skyler feels the warmth radiating from their bodies, the rippling of their skin.

She steps into the blackness.

Charlie pads past her. Lulu follows her.

Skyler hears the clank of the grate closing behind them, and then her father’s quick steps, fading.

At first, she can’t see anything. She lifts her cell phone, but its light barely dents the darkness. Ahead, she glimpses the shadowy slope of Charlie’s back. Behind her, she feels Lulu’s hot breath. She hears small crackles, distant rustlings.

Her neck prickles with fear.

Skyler begins to sing, her voice echoing: “Lulu, Charlie, don’t leave me.”

The pipe has a thin stream trickling through it, and soon Skyler’s sneakers are soaked, squelching with each step. She keeps going.

She can’t tell how far they’ve come. What if her father is wrong? What if the pipe doesn’t lead to the creek? What if it doesn’t lead outside at all?

Suddenly, Charlie stops, tail twitching. Skyler edges around him, peering into the blackness.

Then she sees it, coiled in the light of her cell phone. Its patterned skin glistens.

A python!

Behind her, Charlie crouches, tight as a spring.

The huge snake slithers toward them through moist leaves.

Skyler fumbles for her sound-beam.

For a second, she is trapped between a tiger about to pounce and a snake about to strike. Her trembling hand grips the sound-beam, thumb on the button. Zap!

The orange beam hits the python. It is frozen . . . so close, but unable to harm them now.

Skyler takes a deep breath, stepping over the python’s limp body. “Charlie, Lulu, snake won’t hurt you,” she sings.

The tigers follow.

Now the darkness bears down all around them, and Skyler has to fight the urge to run. But Lulu pauses, lifting her head, sniffing. Skyler smells it too: the strong scent of seawater, of kelp and fish and shells. She hears the distant crash of waves.

Far ahead is a circle of light: the open mouth of the drainage pipe! Beyond it, moonlight flickers on water. Pelican Point glows on the horizon, a pale strip of sand.

Together, Skyler and the tigers emerge onto the bank of the creek. They have made it through the darkness.

Skyler gulps the damp night air and pushes through the tall reeds, slipping on mud.

The tigers hurry too. They love the water, love to swim. Charlie is trotting, Lulu running ahead.

“Lulu, Charlie, stay here with me,” Skyler sings, rushing to keep up.

Together, they come out of the creek onto the sand, which shimmers under the sliver of moon.

Across the beach, a figure moves swiftly toward them.

“Skyler!” It’s Nina, waving. “You did it! Bring them to the boat. Your dad is on his way.”

Charlie and Lulu lope toward the water, splashing along the shore. For a minute, Skyler watches them. Nothing is more beautiful than these tigers in the moonlight, playing in the waves.

But it is time to go.

“Charlie, Lulu, now we’ll save you,” she sings.

They turn toward her voice. As Skyler and Nina walk down the beach, the tigers follow, ambling toward the safety of the boat, toward the promise of their future lives.