barrel of monkeys

Covering a broad area of over 250 acres, the Bronx zoo stretched out before a few of the Heroes For Hire. Misty Knight, Colleen Wing, and a newer recruit, White Tiger. The bronx ko held nearly 4,000 animals of over 700 different species. The zoo was a very big place. At that late hour, the zoo was closed. There appeared to be nobody around. Nearby, the Elephant enclosure, the reptile lair, and the great ape house could all be seen.

Most of the animals were on display in enclosures, separated from the public by moats and steep walls. Eventually, the women were accosted by a night watchmen who began questioning what they were doing in the zoo after closing. But, the interrogation was interrupted by an urgent call on the Night watchmen's radio that "Bertha's gone bonkers".

"Trouble in the great ape house!" the night watchmen declared as he gestured for the heroes to follow him.

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3 men and a woman stood gathered at the great Ape house. They wore the familiar tan safari outfits of zoo employees. One of the men carefully loaded a dart into a high-power air rifle.

When she saw the heroes, the woman approached them. "Thank god you're here! Our biggest ape, Bertha, just hurt her handler John. We've got to get him out of the enclosure, but Bertha is pregnant. If we use a tranquilizer on her, the drugs will kill her baby. You've gotta help us." the zoo employee begged.

Looking down into the enclosure, they saw several adult apes scattering the floor unconscious as well as a few juvenile apes, small red tranquilizer darts protruding from their rumps and legs. Lying among the gorillas was the unconscious zoo worker, John, bleeding from the nose and mouth. Thrashing around and screaming, was the pregnant ape Bertha. As they watched, Bertha slammed her mighty fists in a rage against the large artificial tree in the center of the enclosure.

"All the apes just went nuts!" whined the zoo employee with the air rifle. "They just started fighting each other and beating on the tree. I managed to dart all of them except for Bertha. Now, that man down there, John is a friend of mine. If you can't get him out of there safely, im just gonna sedate Bertha regardless of what that vet says."

Fu Manchu had attached one of his armed spirit Bombs to the artificial tree, placing it in a hole in the tree. Attached to the bomb was a radio transmitter which emitted a frequency undetectable by human hearing. This signal, however, was sending the endangered apes into a killing frenzy. It was safe to assume if the transmitter was switched off, or the bomb deactivated, the gorillas would return to their normal behavior. This strange signal had no effect on humans. Or White Tiger, who began her transformation into a majestic Bengal Tiger before entering the Ape's enclosure.

Prior to her days with the Heroes For Hire, the White Tiger had been a simple Bengal Tigress in the wilds. She had been created and transformed by a great entity known simply as the High Evolutionary, to hunt down a villain known as Man-Beast. She found herself with incredible abilities to shift between her tiger form into that of a human or a leonine-hybrid weretiger. All of her physical attributes had been heightened. the increased reflexes, agility, and speed as well as becoming a martial arts master, and being somewhat impervious to telepathy and mental-based attacks. She had become a full-time member of Heroes For Hire long ago, after assisting Iron Fist with a hostage situation involving the Hulk and Hercules.

White Tiger full reverted to her natural tiger form before entering the enclosure. As soon as she did, Bertha rampaged. Bertha neared White Tiger as if she planned to assault her. White Tiger bared her fangs and let out a low deep rumble at Bertha as ample warning. With no worthy opponent near, Bertha began bludgeoning the tree with her fists, which was the source of a painful buzzing intensifying in their head. Although the injured zoo employee appeared to be in no immediate danger of dying, he would still need to be taken to a hospital and receive medical attention. White Tiger, somewhat impervious to the mental pain of the frequency, decided disarming the bomb was the highest priority. If she could stop the bomb, the sound would hopefully stop.

Silently transmogrifying her body into that of a tiger-human hybrid, a weretiger, she slinked up to the tree where the bomb and transmitter were. For an elongated moment of tenuous understanding, White Tiger cautiously tried to comfort the hysterical mother ape. Once a basic understanding was formed, Bertha trusted White Tiger enough to allow her to try her hand at the tree. That is when the other Heroes For Hire then began instructing her, step by step, how to disarm the spirit bomb. Unfortunately, they were not the team in possession of Cameron's failsafe in case of the detonation. If this bomb exploded, thousands of animals (some endangered and near extinction) as well as the hundreds of zoo employees would be murdered in the concussive blast.

Nearing the end of the disarming, the injured zoo worker awoke and began moaning loudly. Bertha did not like this noise, and began tossing the handler about the enclosure like a rag doll. Quickly disarming the spirit bomb, White Tiger transformed back to her natural tiger form and managed to grab the handler by his collar between her jaw, and drag his nearly lifeless form from the enclosure. Bertha stood unscathed and unsedated, tragedy averted.

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