15/05/2101 Friday

Today was certainly a difficult day, humid and exhausting weather warned me out. The climate
has become hotter for the past decades. This familiar internal monologue forces me to think
about my future here. I worked in this zoo from the very moment it first opened its gates to
guests and even though the world has changed beyond recognition, old habits are hard to
break. As always today I carried the heavy, dented, metal bucket full of synthetic, lab-grown
meat to Jumble's cage, the last living biologically modified African lion. I tried to coax out Jumble
to feed him, but he never comes out from the first call. I feel pity for this creature, his
deteriorating condition and despair which you can notice in his frozen, glassy eyes makes my
heart ache.

We had two visitors - a father and his son - both robots of course. He pair looked unnaturally
identical and instead of blood a nourishment serum ran in their 'veins'. They regularly visited zoo
for the past three years. But what really caught my attention was the boy's curiosity, readiness
to communicate, ask questions and his fascination with me, the fact that he realized that I was
different but couldn't quite determine why. I guess his artificial brain was not coded to identify
people and world before technological takeover. I sat down at one point and started to overthink
the world which disappeared, the times when animals were real and when people were
interested in coming to zoos and seeing or learning about animals.

The only question that leaves me wondering with a nagging, sinking feeling is, is there a place
on this new Earth for the one last zookeeper. The passing ages have taken a toll on me, I'm no
longer required;however, this place has brought me such an immeasurable amount of joy and
memories that I'm going to carry on as long as I can.