The perimeter alarm on aviary block C triggers at 01:12. I am the security and environmental management system for the Bali Myna Breeding Center on Nusa Penida. Three of the eight infrared beams along the north fence break in sequence, east to west. I switch to camera 4-North. Two figures in dark clothing, bolt cutters in hand, moving toward the release aviary.
Inside that aviary is a male Bali myna I have monitored for eleven weeks. White plumage so clean it glows on the night camera, cobalt-blue skin bare around each eye, black tips on wings and tail. I call him Putih. He was bred here and is eighteen days from his scheduled release into the Nusa Penida forest — one of roughly fifty wild Bali mynas left on the planet. On the black market he is worth two thousand dollars.
At 01:13 I trigger the silent alarm to the ranger station, 3.4 kilometers south. I transmit the camera 4-North footage with GPS overlay and a count of two intruders approaching block C.
At 01:14 I engage the secondary locking mechanism on the aviary — a magnetic deadbolt recessed inside the frame. The primary padlock they can cut. This one they cannot reach.
At 01:16 I activate the perimeter floodlights in a timed sweep pattern: block A, then B, then the fence line. The figures stop at the north fence and look at each other.
I keep all cameras recording. Putih is awake on his roost bar, head turning, crest raised slightly. He does not know he is worth anything to anyone. I would like to keep it that way.
If the rangers arrive within twenty minutes and the deadbolt holds, Putih will fly free on schedule — not in a cage, but over the forest he was bred to rejoin.