Excerpt: Me & You & The Animals Too

It was like any other night, the tiger paced around the enclosure, looking for a nice spot to lie down and sleep. The night was humid but the cool breeze ruffled through the tiger's fur. It wasn't hot enough for the tiger to want to jump into the water barrier to cool off but it was just humid and uncomfortable enough that it was unable to find a cool spot to sleep. Just as it was about to settle on a fallen log, it sniffed a strange scent that wasn't part of it's 'natural' habitat.
The sound of a lock unsnapping had the tiger turn around to face the door of the enclosure. This wasn't normal for it knew that the moment the sky turned dark, the keepers left and no one would come around to bother it. It was the best part of the day, not to be taunted by walking meat sacks, that would be so easily obtained if it wasn't for that water barrier.
The tiger turned towards the sound of foot steps and the scent of fear that could only be one thing in its mind. Prey. It turned around and saw three humans standing in the enclosure. It had seen the one on the far left before, the wrinkled old one that perpetually smelled of human sweat and that foul chemical that the humans put on to mask their scent. The man smiled, baring he's teeth, making the tiger growl. It was one thing to have humans in its territory, it was another to have three male humans baring their teeth at it. The tiger felt that they were encroaching into it's territory and so it growled and resumed its pacing.
“This one looks like a fine specimen; large and look at that beautiful fur. It's bound to fetch a high price in the market,” said the man on the far right, holding a long metal piece in his hands. The man smelled of confidence and absolutely no fear. The tiger growled and took a menacing step forward but the man just stood his ground while the other two stumbled back. “Don't worry lads. It's not going to hurt you.” The man snapped the metal piece into action and shot a dart at the tiger, an anaesthetic dart hit the tiger on the flank, making the tiger snarl in anger. Enraged by the presence of the men and the pain caused by the dart, the tiger charged and pounced on the men. However, the fast acting drug slowed the tiger's reaction and it only managed a half-hearted leap before it landed at the men's feet in a heap.
“I told you it won't hurt us.” The man knelt down by the now weakened tiger and smiled as he unsheathed a very sharp and big hunting knife. The moon glinted off the blade as the man slid it across the tiger's neck, severing the carotid artery. Warm, bright red blood spurted out, soaking the ground beneath the animal. The man watched the life drain out of the tiger and as the light faded from its eyes, the man gutted the carcass open with the ease of a professional, as if he had done it on more than a number of occasions. He turned to his two comrades and said, “What are you waiting for? Come help me with this.”
The two men hurried and dropped their bags to assist him. They carefully removed the fur coat off the carcass to preserve the pattern and the integrity of the coat as much as possible. Next they cut through the abdomen of the tiger, from the neck down to the groin, harvesting the internal organs. There was a thriving black market for tiger organs a some cultures believe that ingestion of different parts of a wild animal may not only bring luck but also improve their vitality and health. The male genitalia of the tiger is especially popular as it is believed that consuming it will cure any problems that a man has with his own reproductive system. Even the whiskers of the tiger were not spared as in some cultures, it is their equivalent of the Hand of Glory.
Once the men were done with their harvesting, the only thing that was left was the gutted, skinless carcass. They would have taken the flesh as well but it was too much for the three of them to handle, so they just left it as it was.
“We're just going to leave the carcass here?” the youngest of the three asked. “What if some one finds out?”
“Don't worry about it. It's all been taken cared off,” the older man answered. He wiped his brow with his handkerchief and smiled. “This is going to make us rich.”
“Just make sure that this can't be pointed at us,” said the man with the gun. “Or there will he hell to pay.”
“Like I said, there's nothing to worry about. Now, let's get out of here before someone comes because then there'll really be hell to pay.”
They packed their equipment and their harvest into their bags, making sure that they didn't leave anything behind. They left the same way they came in, from the the keeper's entrance, leaving the desecrated carcass of the tiger to the the mercy of the weather.