Chris was panting heavily.
It was a completely ridiculous sight.
The foreign expert had scrambled up the massive oak tree faster than a terrified squirrel, bolting into the branches before Titan even made a single aggressive move.
He had literally climbed all the way up to the newly built birdhouse just to avoid walking next to the baby crocodile.
“Hey, buddy, is it really that serious?” Old Larry laughed.
He was initially startled by Chris’s sudden acrobatic leap, but seeing the man clinging to the tree trunk in a bespoke suit was simply too fucking funny to ignore.
“Weren’t you two just having an intimate moment underwater?”
“Being in the water and being on land are two totally different concepts, okay?!” Chris grumbled, his voice strained as he hugged a thick branch.
“Yeah, I know how it looks.
Who would have thought the guy perfectly fine swimming with crocodiles would be terrified to take a walk with one?”
“Relax, Number Three is incredibly friendly,” Old Larry chuckled.
“Just be careful not to bump into the crow chicks up there.
The alpha raven gets pretty damn protective.”
“What alpha raven?”
Chris pulled himself higher, leaning half his body over a sturdy branch.
He turned his head and found three pairs of tiny, curious eyes staring directly at him from inside the wooden birdhouse.
“Caw!”
A piercing, aggressive shriek erupted from directly overhead.
Chris snapped his head up.
A massive, iridescent black raven was glaring down at him from a higher branch.
“A wild raven?
That is actually quite rare for this region,” Chris commented, his zoological curiosity briefly overriding his panic.
His curiosity vanished the exact second the massive bird spun around and pointed its feathered rear end directly at his face.
“Wait.
What the fuck are you doing?”
A bright, ominous glob of white paste appeared amidst the black tail feathers.
“Stop!
Don’t you fucking dare!”
Splat!
Chris violently threw himself out of the tree.
He hit the ground hard, rolling awkwardly across the stone pavement to break his fall.
Almost simultaneously, a massive, ice-cream-sized glob of white bird shit completely bypassed the spot where his head had just been, grazing the lower leaves and splattering violently against the tree roots.
“Holy shit, that was way too close,” Chris gasped.
Still visibly shaken, he stood up and frantically brushed the dirt and crushed leaves off his expensive trousers.
He turned around.
Old Larry and Titan were staring at him with matching expressions of utter, deadpan disbelief.
Chris let out a long, helpless sigh.
“The animals in your zoo are really fucking something else.”
“Buddy, you haven’t even seen the craziest shit yet,” Old Larry grinned.
“Just let me calm down for a minute,” Chris groaned, clutching his lower back.
He wasn’t physically injured, but his pride was in absolute tatters.
“Let’s go talk somewhere else.”
Inside the medical clinic.
Two wooden chairs were positioned facing each other across the examination table.
Old Larry was meticulously brewing a fresh pot of black tea.
Wait.
Are you fucking serious?
You gave me a teacup?
Titan lay flat on the stainless steel table, his heavy tail dangling off the edge.
He stared at the tiny, delicate porcelain teacup placed directly in front of his snout with an expression of profound, human-like astonishment.
Chris remained completely silent.
He just quietly scooted his wooden chair a few inches further away from the crocodile’s jaws.
Old Larry poured the steaming tea into their cups, not hesitating to fill Titan’s tiny cup to the brim.
Titan stared at the hot liquid.
He honestly had to stop and calculate the physics of how he was supposed to drink hot tea with a massive, elongated reptilian snout.
“Director Larry, I will cut straight to the chase,” Chris said, sitting upright.
He had assumed this was going to be a formal business meeting, which was why he had worn the expensive suit.
But considering he had nearly committed suicide by jumping out of a tree in the summer heat, he had abandoned the jacket.
He was now sitting there in just a brown vest and a slightly wrinkled white dress shirt.
Slurp, gulp.
Titan found the perfect geometric angle.
He tilted his massive head sideways and gently clamped his razor-sharp teeth around the delicate outer edges of the porcelain cup.
Under Chris’s absolutely horrified gaze, the baby crocodile smoothly tilted his head back, letting the warm tea pour cleanly down his throat without spilling a single drop.
He then gently placed the perfectly intact teacup back onto the table.
Absolute insanity.
Old Larry had no real baseline for standard crocodilian intelligence, so he thought this was perfectly normal.
Chris, however, had spent a decade studying these reptiles.
His eyes nearly popped completely out of his fucking skull.
Splash, splash.
Completely unfazed, Old Larry silently poured Titan another cup of tea and gestured for Chris to continue.
“Ahem.
Right.” Chris coughed, violently snapping himself out of his daze.
However, his eyes remained glued to Titan.
“It is actually quite a crazy coincidence, but the project I wanted to discuss with you involves crocodiles.”
Hmm?
Titan looked up from his teacup.
“Some idiot illegally released two Siamese Crocodiles into the local municipal reservoir.”
“Wait a minute.
What the fuck?!” Old Larry gasped.
The old man, who had lived peacefully in the mountains for most of his life, looked genuinely horrified.
“How does that even happen?
A public reservoir?
Releasing live crocodiles?!”
“I know.
It is completely fucked,” Chris sighed, shaking his head.
“The other day, a local resident was fishing at the reservoir and accidentally hooked one of them.
The bastard nearly dragged the poor guy straight into the water.”
“Is the fisherman okay?”
“He is totally unhurt, but he lost his favorite fishing rod.” Chris treated these mind-blowing urban legends as casual tea-time conversation.
He reached over to the coat rack, pulling a thick stack of documents from his suit jacket.
“After receiving the news, our Association rented a boat to try and catch them.
But how the hell are we supposed to catch them on our own?
The biggest one is nearly twelve feet long.”
While Chris actively complained about his own team’s lack of tactical resources, Old Larry raised a very valid question.
“What about the local government?
What about the Department of Fish and Wildlife?
Don’t they give a shit about apex predators in a public water supply?”
Rustle, rustle.
“The main problem is that the government doesn’t view them as a severe, immediate threat,” Chris explained, flipping through the pages of the report.
“The climate up here is absolutely terrible for tropical Siamese Crocodiles.
A cold winter breeze could literally kill them.
The Department is incredibly underfunded; they don’t even have the budget to rent a patrol boat right now.
So, they are essentially just ignoring the problem and hoping the winter freezes them out.”
“Our plan is to catch them safely and relocate them to a proper farm,” Chris continued.
“Do you think you have the necessary space and conditions to hold them here?”
Old Larry glanced at Titan.
“Hell no.
I am already raising a Saltwater Crocodile.
Or whatever the hell kind of top-tier hybrid you said he was.
I don’t have the space or the money for two full-grown adults.”
I definitely agree with that.
“Then why did you even ask?” Old Larry grumbled.
“Where are you going to put two massive Siamese Crocodiles?”
“I literally own a massive commercial crocodile farm, remember?” Chris smiled.
“You never explicitly said you were going to put them there.”
“I heavily implied it.”
“You are just vaguely implying shit and expecting everyone to read your mind?
How can a professional be so incredibly naive?”
Titan finally figured out their dynamic.
When Old Larry and Chris were in the same room, they just transformed into a pair of cynical, complaining machines.
By the way, weren’t we just talking about catching wild crocodiles?
“So, what exactly is the plan?” Old Larry asked, getting back on track.
“Is there anything I can actually do to help you catch them?”
Old Larry felt it was a bit of a pity to see animals suffer.
Since he had made a vow to protect nature, he wanted to take action.
“Yes, there actually is,” Chris nodded.
“To be completely honest, I had no intention of asking for your help with this specific incident until I saw how terrifyingly smart your kid was.
I originally came here to discuss the Golden Tiger, but that is not urgent right now.”
As Chris spoke, he casually reached his hand out across the table, attempting to respectfully pat Titan’s long snout.
Snap!
The deafening, concussive crack of the crocodile’s jaws slamming shut almost made Chris say a permanent goodbye to his fucking fingers.
Titan had just wanted to aggressively dissuade the foreigner from touching him.
Little did the baby crocodile know, that terrifying display of lightning-fast restraint only made Chris even more convinced that Titan possessed unparalleled intelligence and self-control.
“How about we use your boy here as bait to lure those two Siamese Crocodiles out into the open?”
“Are you fucking serious?” Old Larry demanded.
“I am dead serious,” Chris replied, his tone hardening.
“If they stay in that freezing reservoir water much longer, they are going to get sick and die a miserable death anyway.
It is a necessary risk.”
Wait.
What about me?
Am I not a crocodile too?
Are you seriously trying to use me as live bait?
Titan stopped drinking his tea.
He slowly turned his head, locking his piercing, vertical amber eyes directly onto Chris.
The intense, predatory stare gave the foreign expert massive goosebumps.
“Don’t worry too much,” Chris added quickly, trying to soothe both the old man and the glaring reptile.
“One is twelve feet long, the other is barely seven.
They are both captive-bred Siamese Crocodiles, so they shouldn’t be overly aggressive.
What do you say, big guy?
If you agree, how about we hop in the car and head to the reservoir to discuss the tactical details?”
Great.
I have officially encountered a second madman.
However, Titan honestly didn’t care.
His prehistoric blood was boiling.
He was actually incredibly curious to see the raw difference in physical strength between his Deinosuchus body and a standard, modern crocodilian.
Besides, they were all technically part of the same reptilian family tree.
It was probably a good deed to help drag them out of a freezing lake before they died.