"I wish my dog was as smart as you. But I still don't know what you want."
I then had an idea. It was the only chance, probably. I then waved my paw at the computer in the corner of the room.
Anne looked in that direction.
"The computer?"
I nodded.
"I'm not going to give you that, it's not like there's anything you could do with it anyway... I mean, ok, you're a smart leopard, but there's no way, that, you're that smart, you couldn't mean, you want to, type, something. God what am I saying."
I nodded and held both forepaws forward and twitched my paw fingers, to try to do charades for typing.
"I mean, no, there's no way, and I'd have to let you out, to do that. I mean. I can't let a leopard loose."
I held my paw to my face and whined in frustration.
"Ok, suppose, I let you out, to, type something out. They're going to think I'm crazy. Do you, promise you'll not escape, I'll get in big trouble."
I nodded.
"To be clear, you want me to let you out of the cage, and you'll type something into the computer, and then you'll get back in the cage?"
I nodded.
Anne thought about it for a few seconds, and then said, "ok, just, as a final test, I'm going to just toss the keys in there. If I'm just going crazy I'll just tell my supervisor that I accidentally dropped my keychain in your cage and they'll work something out. But if you're as smart as you seem, you should be able to use the key to open the cage yourself."
I shrugged. That seemed doable. I just hoped my dexterity was up to the task.
"Ok, here goes." She tossed her keychain to the floor of the cage.
I picked it up in my right front paw. At first I thought this was easier said than done, and for reference, saying something wasn't exactly easy for me. My fingers were so short and wide and not as mobile as before. But I did it. It was hard to get off the floor until I hooked my index finger's claw around it. But I knew that was the easy part. I couldn't even see what I was doing. I sorted through the keys and rowwwed in frustration, not even knowing what key I was supposed to be using.
"Oh, it's the brass colored one, no, not the one with the angled top, the one with the very round top," she said, trying to be helpful.
"Roww?" I asked, holding up the right key between two paw fingers.
"That's the one. Oh my god, you're really the real deal aren't you."
I sighed as I attempted the more difficult task. While holding the key, I tried to fit my whole paw, and then just the two paw fingers around the grid of the cage. It was such a tight squeeze. I couldn't reach far enough with individual fingers, and eventually fit my whole paw through, while Karyn watched the whole ordeal. I looked over the top of the locking mechanism, trying to see what I was doing, but I just couldn't see the front of the lock to even see where the key should fit in. I looked over at Karyn's cage. Its lock was facing toward me and I could see it. Looking back and forth between the front panel of the locking mechanism that was built into her cage, and the back view of the one for my own cage, I tried to find a place to fit the key. Meanwhile Anne was watching all this.
"A little to the left, you've almost got it," she said.
I moved it to the left.
"No, my left."
"Aaoowww..." I moaned. Why would you say your left. I repositioned it further to the right than before moving it to the left, and I felt something. As I tried to fit it in, I lost my grip on it and the keychain fell to the floor, outside of the cage. I sighed and sat down on my haunches.
"You, I think, proved yourself. Not being able to see what you were doing from behind, that would have been difficult for a human, and you almost did it. I'm just going to let you out." Anne picked up the keychain, and opened the door to the cage.
I loped out and headed for the computer. It was clearly on but the screen was black. I squished my right front paw around the mouse and moved it a bit and the screen remained black. So I tapped a key on the keyboard and a light on the computer flashed and a few seconds later the screen turned on. It was a windows computer. I opened up notepad and started typing, one painful key at a time, not used to these short, blunt fingers that were too big for the keys.
"hello" I typed into the notepad window.
"Hello," Anne said.
"my nasme is jonm abnd that is klarryn"
"Your name is Jon-m and that's Clairin?" she said back.
"typo" I typed. "jon karyn" I typed more carefully.
"Karyn with a y? And no h in Jon?"
"shorrt for jonathan and her parfents are nuts"
Karyn couldn't see this, being on a computer screen in the corner of the room.
"Jonathan is a boy's name," Anne said.
"yes booy name ha ha laugth it up" I typed, not sure whether it was actually necessary or important to go into detail that I was supposed to be male and was upset about being made female, and not a girl that was resentful of having been named Jonathan.
"I'm sorry," Anne said, embarrassed. She looked over at Karyn. "So you're Karyn?"
Karyn nodded.
"annde i need you to picdk up that rock and sayt i wish jon and karyn would be out of this sityuation and bacxk to human in any way possible as fast as possible and hokme with the rock again" I typed. I didn't know how to phrase it quite right and missing a few letters here and there wasn't helping any.
"Back to human?"
I nodded.
"But we bought you from an animal foster home that raised you since you were cubs. We have thorough documentation on you from the moment you were born. You were never human."
"the stone chanhged history from your petrspective" I typed.
"So this rock, or, stone, is magic."
I nodded. "it grants wishes" I typed.
"What happens to the leopards then, when you're gone?"
"probasbly they never existed"
"We need them for our breeding program. We paid good money for you."
"hisrtory will change again, you won;t have paid money we'll just nevcer have been leopards, or maybe you'll get different leropards from same vbreeder if you never got us"
"I don't know, I can't do something that hurts the zoo," she said.
"if you want leopards you can wish for more first, it doesnt need to be us, wish up spome dinosaurs while your at it for all i care, your zoo can be a reral jurassicf park"
"I somehow suspect using the wrong your wasn't a typo," Anne said.
"you're a grammar nazi" I typed, annoyed.
"That's better," she said.
"but beware, wishes canmt be undone, only elaborated on" I typed.
"You mean the magic rock, it can't undo wishes?"
I nodded.
"Then supposing you used to be human, how am I supposed to wish you were human again."
I groaned. She had a good point.
"it may not worrk. but before gettting stuck like this, i wished to have shapechamnging powers, to be whatever i wanmt to be. I'm hoping that will take dominancve over the later wish my idiot friend made."
Anne read that without saying it out loud and looked over at Karyn and waved. Karyn waved a paw back.
"All right. But here's the deal. I'll try to return you back to whatever lives you had, but I will wish the rock to be returned to you later, after I have used it to help my zoo with its needs."
"i see no problem wityh that, if you keep your word"
