All My Colleagues Are Animals 86p3

Chapter 86 – Part 3

The weather was bad, and it was extremely difficult to get an empty taxi.

The big sister who was raising a Golden Retriever held her umbrella and waited for a car with the red panda.

To have delayed the big sister’s time like this, the red panda’s mood became more and more anxious.

Seeing an empty car drive up from a distance, she excitedly waved her hand and got into the back seat.

She waved goodbye to the big sister passerby, and the dampness was blocked outside the car door.

She turned her head and was suddenly stunned for a moment.

The car smelled very bad, full of the smell of cigarettes and alcohol, which made the red panda feel sick.

More importantly, the person in the driver’s seat was a male human.

Mom had said that when she was out and about, she should choose female humans for help or for consumption.

The red panda hesitated for a moment.

But, with such a heavy thunderstorm, it would be difficult for her to get another empty car.

I want to go home. I want to see Mom and my younger sister.

And the big sister passerby is still on the roadside. I can’t continue to delay her.

“You’re soaked. Do you want a tissue?” the driver asked, looking back.

One sentence, and the innocent little red panda let down her guard.

This driver seems to be a kind and enthusiastic person.

“Where are you going?”

The male driver looked at her, his gaze sweeping over the young girl’s exceptionally beautiful face, and it grew deeper and deeper.

The little red panda pursed her lips, and for some reason, a chill ran down her spine for a moment.

“No. 108, Huai Shu Street, West District.”

She said, a beat later.

The car began to move.

The wind and rain were raging outside the window, and there was constant lightning and thunder.

When the lightning flashed, the red panda saw the driver’s sinister face in the rear-view mirror, and she trembled with a natural, dangerous alertness.

Her heart clenched, and for some reason, she suddenly transformed into a red panda.

She looked down at her furry paws, lost in confusion.

Ever since she had transformed into a human, she had not known how to transform back into her beast form, but now, she had done it by a strange twist of fate.

The car drove to the suburbs for a long, long time, and was about to arrive home.

The driver looked back, wanting to admire his prey again. But he saw that in the back seat was not the young woman from just now, but a… what kind of animal?

His brain, which had been made even more dull by the smoke and alcohol, crashed.

After a moment of daze, he turned the steering wheel and drove in another direction.

There was a place that had been looking for animals recently, he remembered.

…

The car slowly stopped at the entrance of a zoo in the suburbs.

The red panda thought she had arrived home and, licking the tip of her teeth, looked out the window with a certain excitement.

But she saw that the place was not familiar.

…Biyu Zoo?

Through the thick curtain of rain, she barely managed to make out the large characters on the sign.

The driver got out of the car and went in to talk to the man at the zoo entrance for a moment.

Then he opened the back seat and said to the man, “Well, what do you think?”

“It’s actually a red panda,” the man said with pleasant surprise. “Okay, I’ll buy it.”

The driver happily took the money, and the man shouted to the back, “Red Sister, come and get the animal.”

The red panda was taken away by Red Sister.

And the driver, with the money in his pocket, drove home, satisfied.

On the way through the mountains, the night lights were dim and the road was slippery. The rain was pouring down, and he was hit by a large rock that had suddenly rolled down from the mountain.

The thunderstorm was huge, and no car ever passed through such a remote place.

He howled in pain for a long time and died a miserable death.

For these experiences, the red panda easily summarized them and said, “At that time, I had arrived in the city, but I ran into a bad driver and was taken to the zoo.”

She quickly skipped over the depressing parts and talked about the exciting parts.

“I heard from the people at the zoo that that bad driver died that night. Later, the bad zoo also caught fire, and the bad people’s cries were miserable, and not a single one of them escaped.”

She waited for her mother, little mom, and Yu Bao to ask how the zoo had caught fire, so she could say how smart and brave she was.

But the starry sky room was quite silent for a moment, and no one asked, only someone gently stroking her fur.

Pei the Little Able Cat cleared her throat. “How did the zoo catch fire?”

Finally, Ye Qingyu took the bait and asked, in a hoarse voice, “How did it catch fire?”

Red Sister was the only woman in the zoo, and also the director’s older sister.

Every day, she did the most work, but got the most scolding.

Pei the Little Able Cat said, “Red Sister was the only kind human in the zoo who would secretly give me apple slices to eat. Those male humans were all so fierce, and sometimes when they were drunk, they would even hit her. I would sometimes see her secretly wiping her tears.”

Every day, the zoo was a lively place. On the stage, the animals would perform, and in the audience, the tourists would applaud and cheer.

And at night, when the tourists had dispersed, the zoo staff would gather around.

They would light a bonfire, smoke cigarettes, drink hard liquor, eat meat, and talk loudly. And Red Sister would silently add firewood for them on the side.

Behind them was a pile of dry firewood, all chopped by Red Sister, which they used as a backrest.

Several months had passed, and Red Sister’s body was always covered in new scars, but her gaze grew deeper and more resolute day by day.

She would chop a lot of firewood every day, saying it was because winter was coming.

The firewood gradually piled up higher than a person.

That night, the zoo was celebrating the end of a large performance.

The staff were all extremely drunk, and one was more of a mess than the other.

When everyone was passed out by the bonfire, Red Sister quietly opened the little animals’ cages and let them all out.

“Run,” she said in a whisper.

The other animals were stunned for a few seconds, and then they all ran away quickly.

Only the red panda was stunned in place, looking at the two dusty brocade bags tucked into the zoo director’s waistband.

—They looked a little familiar. Were they hers?

They were hers.

They… they seemed to be very important.

Why were they important?

The red panda tried hard to think, but she couldn’t remember anything at all.

But she was still determined to get the brocade bags back.

And so, she did not immediately run toward the long-awaited freedom outside the park, but quickly ran to the side of the bonfire.

She bit the two brocade bags at the zoo director’s waistband and pulled, trying to tear them off.

In her anxious movements, she scratched the zoo director’s back.

The drunken zoo director was so pained by the red panda’s sharp claws that he was furious.

He picked up a large, unopened bottle of hard liquor next to him and was about to smash it on the red panda.

But in his dizzy and weak state, he did not aim well. The bottle shattered, and the strong liquor splashed onto the outer ring of the bonfire, instantly igniting a high flame.

The zoo director, furious, picked up another bottle of hard liquor and, stumbling, wanted to continue to smash the red panda, but only repeated his mistake.

In the end, he lost his strength and fell to the ground, knocking over a large pile of dry firewood.

And the red panda had successfully gotten the brocade bags, and her four weak paws nimbly ran outside.

The high heat of the flames was chasing after her. Her heart was beating extremely fast, and she was so scared she trembled, and several times she wanted to stand up and surrender.

But she fought back her instincts and desperately ran outside.

Midway, she remembered something, but she suddenly stopped.

She turned to a nearby cooking hut and took away a talking, clipped-winged little fluffy bird.

The fire was spreading rapidly, and the drunkards behind her were screaming and rolling around.

The red panda, with the bird in her mouth, narrowly escaped from the zoo.

The tips of her reddish-brown fur were even a little curled from the heat.

“Sister Rong, why don’t you just eat me?”

The little fluffy bird was in the red panda’s mouth, and her two paws were helping to hold the brocade bags. She was dizzy and weak, and she said.

The red panda had no time to deal with the bird’s nonsense and ran hard for a while away from the zoo.

Suddenly, she seemed to sense something and stopped and turned her head.

She saw Red Sister standing in front of the raging zoo, waving at her.

…

Speaking of this, Pei the Little Able Cat proudly lifted her fluffy head. “Not only did I escape myself, but I also saved a little bird.”

“Now, she’s in my studio.”

Having said the exciting part, it was time to praise her, a little panda, for being so amazing, right?

Pei the Little Able Cat stretched her large tail and, in a soft and limp way, rolled over on the three humans, hinting with her actions.

Then, as she had wished, her mother held her in her arms and lovingly rubbed her head.

Ye Zhao took several deep and rapid breaths before she finally managed to suppress the trembling heartache in her heart.

But the moment she opened her mouth, she broke down, and a choked sob escaped her.

“My baby… is a particularly, particularly brave and kind little red panda.”