Stupid Humans!
Ji Xiao and Lin Zi’s dorm room was on the third floor. By the time the two of them chased the little black cat to the stairwell, it had already scampered down the stairs and was almost at the second floor.
Ji Xiao was not especially attached to the little tabby cat, but he was extremely determined to get it back. Not for any other reason, just because the cat belonged to Shen Yu. If the cat was lost while in his care, he strongly suspected Shen Yu would chop him up and turn him straight into cat food.
He leaned over the stair railing and looked down. The little black cat even looked up at him from the second floor. There was an indescribable meaning in its eyes, and he had the distinct feeling that this little black cat was looking down on him.
When it came to running, Ji Xiao was absolutely first-rate, but racing a cat on the stairs meant the advantage was completely not on his side. He had only just run down two steps when the little black cat suddenly leaped straight down through the middle of the stairwell and landed on the second floor.
The moment Ji Xiao saw that, he panicked. Once outside the building was the squad courtyard, with a whole bunch of trees and grass planted there. If the cat ran out there, catching it afterward would basically be hopeless. He gritted his teeth, braced a hand on the railing, and vaulted over it.
When he landed on the second-floor stairs, he heard Lin Zi shout from behind him, “Master Ji, nice moves!”
“Get lost!” Ji Xiao cursed. When he jumped down, his foot had landed on the edge of the step, and he had nearly twisted his ankle and rolled straight down the stairs.
The little black cat was less than two meters away from him now. Ji Xiao lunged forward, trying to grab its tail, but although the little black cat did not look back, it nimbly sprang forward and jumped onto the stairs leading down to the first floor.
Ji Xiao was truly out of options. As he ran downstairs, he shouted toward the first floor, “Anyone down there? Help catch that black cat!”
“What black cat?” Wu Zhijun’s voice came up from the first floor.
“It’s coming down now,” Lin Zi also ran down. “Boss, block it! It stole our Xiao Hua!”
In the middle of all this chaos, Lin Zi had still found time to give the little tabby cat a name on the spot. Ji Xiao found the name a bit hard to accept, but at this point he still shouted along with him, “It’s got Xiao Hua in its mouth!”
The black cat had just hopped onto the first-floor hallway and turned toward the stairwell exit when it saw someone standing there in the corridor, blocking its way. The two firefighters behind it had already chased it down, and that guy who had jumped straight from the third floor to the second had even grabbed a bucket along the way, shouting for them to trap it under the bucket.
Trap a cat with a bucket?
Stupid humans! A bunch of idiots!
Without even thinking, it ran straight toward the person blocking the way in the hallway. The kitten in its mouth had been very well-behaved the whole time, but it was not big to begin with, and after running around while carrying this kitten, its teeth and neck were both aching, and it did not dare bite down too hard.
Whatever!
“That one?” Wu Zhijun had been planning to go out into the courtyard to stretch a bit. He had only just stepped out of the office when he heard Ji Xiao and Lin Zi shouting at the top of their lungs. Now, seeing this little black cat sprinting straight at him with a kitten in its mouth, he jumped in fright.
“Yes yes yes yes!” Ji Xiao yelled in a rapid string.
Wu Zhijun felt a headache coming on. He had never caught a cat before, and he had no idea why, instead of avoiding him, this cat was charging straight at him.
Before he had even figured out whether he should scoop the little black cat up with his hands or block it with his foot, the little black cat had already run up to him. What happened next left all of them frozen in place.
The little black cat gave a light leap and wrapped itself around Wu Zhijun’s leg. Then, waving its tiny paws, it climbed up with astonishing agility, scrambling right up his pant leg to his waist. After that, it kicked off beneath his raised arm and landed steadily on the ground behind him.
By the time Wu Zhijun came back to his senses and turned around, the little black cat had already vanished out through the hallway entrance with its tail held high, Xiao Hua still dangling from its mouth.
“It’s over…” Ji Xiao chased outside, but there was already no trace at all of the little black cat anywhere in the squad courtyard. “Shen Yu is definitely going to kill me!”
“Has that cat gone crazy or what? What kind of deal is this, running into our place to steal a cat?” Lin Zi pushed aside the nearby bushes, completely unable to make sense of what had just happened.
“Xiao Hua…” Ji Xiao lifted the plastic bucket and called helplessly. Then, after thinking about it, he felt the name was too country bumpkin, so he called out again, “Huahua… Xiao Hua… Damn it, Master Lin, your naming skills really are exceptionally terrible!”
“Maomao!” Lin Zi stood beside him and shouted too.
“What are you two idiots doing?” Wu Zhijun followed them out. “Do either of you have any sense left? Back to the dorm, both of you!”
“That’s my sister’s cat, boss, our family treasure’s cat,” Ji Xiao said, turning around and slowly walking back. “When she asks me for it later, what am I supposed to give her?”
“It’s just that kind of calico alley cat. They sell them at the bird-and-flower market. Go buy her another one.” Wu Zhijun checked the time and headed toward the duty room by the gate. His daughter always came to the fire station by herself after school, and around this time every day, he would usually wait for her at the entrance.
Ji Xiao and Lin Zi went back to the dorm in low spirits. Ji Xiao cleaned up the empty cardboard box in the hallway and the fish-and-rice mash that had not been touched at all, and he truly could not understand why that little black cat had behaved the way it had.
“Xiao Hua is female,” Lin Zi said, standing by the door and watching Ji Xiao clean up. “That black cat, I checked last time, it’s male.”
“What are you trying to say?” Ji Xiao was still sunk in his imagination of all the ways Shen Yu would torture him for losing the cat. “It stole a little female cat to take home and make its wife…”
“It’s not impossible. That little black cat may look small now, but it’ll grow up sooner or later. It’s planning ahead.”
“…You’re really something.”
Ding Wei rarely got hurt, and since he had just moved, he did not have anything at all for bandaging this kitten. But he did not go to a pet hospital. The price was too high, and he did not have that kind of spare money.
Still, he could go find Su Gui. That guy got hurt all the time. Life was never easy for mice, no matter the era, so Su Gui had every kind of medicine stocked up.
By the time he got to Su Gui’s place, it was still fairly early, not yet time for him to go wandering outside.
“Why are you here?” Su Gui opened the door and let him in, but very quickly backed away several steps, pointing at the shopping bag in his hand. “What’s in there?!”
Ding Wei ignored him. He put the bag on the table, took the kitten out, then turned to look at Su Gui. “Any way to deal with this? Its hind leg is broken.”
“Are you crazy?” The moment Su Gui saw the cat in his hands, his brows knitted tightly together. “Why did you bring a cat here?”
“I said its leg is broken.” Ding Wei narrowed his eyes at him. He knew Su Gui was afraid of cats. Even when he himself was in cat form, Su Gui always kept far away.
“You’re asking me to save a cat? You’re asking me to bandage a cat?” Su Gui was extremely unwilling, but he did not dare openly defy Ding Wei, so he could only mutter under his breath while rummaging through the medicine box.
Although Su Gui was very afraid of cats, he still carefully shaved the fur off the kitten’s hind leg, then reset the broken bone and fixed it in place with a very small splint. Fortunately, this was only a kitten that had just been weaned. On top of that, it was already weak from hunger and pain, so it did not struggle much.
“Where did you pick up this cat?” After bandaging it, Su Gui backed away again, keeping a distance of more than two meters from the kitten.
“Fire station.” Ding Wei pulled a can of cat food out of the bag, opened it, and set it in front of the kitten. Its leg probably did not hurt as much anymore, and only then did the kitten finally move its nose over to the can, sniff it, and begin eating.
“…You’re really insane.” Su Gui froze for a second. He had actually gone to the fire station to pick up a cat. “And then?”
“Take it back.” Ding Wei glanced at him.
“You really go looking for trouble when there’s none to be had.” Su Gui sighed. “Don’t tell me you’ve fallen for that firefighter?”
“Which one?” Ding Wei poked a finger into the cat food, put it in his mouth, and tasted it. The flavor was not bad.
“Your lifesaver.”
Ding Wei did not say anything. In his mind, the image instantly appeared of that man chasing after him with a bucket in his hand. Tch. Fallen for someone like that? What a joke.
“Little kitty.” Seeing that he was not speaking, Su Gui sat down by the wall and smiled. “Have you ever liked anyone before?”
Ding Wei had never thought about that question. The only thing he had ever kept in his heart was cultivating nine tails. He had no time to think about anything else. He had no friends, and not many acquaintances either. Aside from seeing Su Gui often and occasionally fighting with him, he rarely had a chance to speak to anyone all day long.
“No. What about you?” Ding Wei sat down across from Su Gui, cross-legged.
“Of course not.” Su Gui waved a hand, his gaze dimming a little. “Cats are liked by people, at least. How many people have you seen who do not avoid mice when they see them? Even if I wanted to like someone, I would not get the chance…”
“Female mice,” Ding Wei said.
“Get lost. Then how about you go like that female cat on the table!” Su Gui shot him a glare.
“You want to die.” Ding Wei lifted his eyelids slightly.
Su Gui edged farther along the wall toward the corner. “You said it first.”
“If one day you can see my eight tails, would you make a wish?” Ding Wei asked, propping his chin on his hand.
“I would.” Su Gui also propped his chin on his hand and thought for a moment. “I’d want to go back to a very long time ago, when I was still a real mouse. I’d rather be a mouse, live a few years, than live this long in loneliness.”
“I wouldn’t help you.” Ding Wei tapped his chin with a finger. “If you went back, being by myself would be boring.”
“…You’re really cold.”
Lonely?
Ding Wei took the kitten home and let it sleep there for the night, planning to quietly put it back the next morning. But he slept until noon before waking up.
The kitten had already eaten all the cat food, and it had peed on his floor. It had also left a lump of poop on the small rug in front of the sofa.
Ding Wei stood there in front of that lump of poop for a long time before finally sighing. He took the rug into the bathroom to wash it, then cleaned up the urine on the floor, grabbed the kitten, and went out. He had to hurry and return it.
He had originally wanted to carry the kitten there in his mouth, but in the middle of the day, a cat strolling down the street with another cat in its mouth would be far too eye-catching. So in the end he still carried the kitten in his arms to the entrance of the fire station, planning to go in by the same route as yesterday.
He had only just approached the fire station gate when he suddenly heard the alarm bell ring inside. He stopped. A fire alarm? He hesitated, trying to decide whether he should slip in now while things were chaotic, or wait until everyone had left and then sneak in quietly.
Before he could decide, he saw two fire engines roar out from the garage facing the street with sirens blaring. Ding Wei quickly backed under a tree by the roadside with the kitten in his arms. The kitten in his arms had clearly been frightened by the sudden sirens, and it twisted uneasily.
Ding Wei reached out and pinched its ears shut with his fingers.
The fire engines were moving fast, practically charging out of the garage. As they passed by Ding Wei, he lifted his head and glanced toward the trucks.
The trucks were tall, and he could not see what was happening inside. He only saw the side profile of someone sitting by the window.
He was already very familiar with that profile.
“You didn’t even finish your meal, did you?” Zhang Xinwen looked at Ji Xiao, who was sitting beside him.
“I only got one bite in, and it was vegetables. If I’d known, I would’ve taken the meat first.” Ji Xiao smiled, then turned his head to look out the window. Getting called out to a fire scene in the middle of a meal was something that had happened often before. They were all used to it by now.
This time, the fire was at a warehouse storing feed. A warehouse… A faint uneasiness stirred in his chest.
There was a person standing under a tree outside the gate. Under normal circumstances, Ji Xiao would only glance once and not pay any attention, but the person was holding a cat, and it was a calico cat at that.
“Holy shit, Xiao Hua!” Ji Xiao shouted, sticking his head out.
When he got another look at the person holding the cat, he was even more startled. It was that student who worked at the café!
“What, what!” Lin Zi was driving and could not turn around, so he could only shout the question.
“The student we carried out is holding Xiao Hua!” The truck was moving fast, and in the blink of an eye it turned the corner and the person was out of sight. Ji Xiao pulled his head back in.
“Xiao Hua’s with him?” Lin Zi was shocked. “You sure you didn’t see wrong? Maybe your blood sugar dropped because you haven’t eaten.”
“It’s definitely him.” Ji Xiao was certain. That kid had a very delicate face, and it had left a deep impression on him. “…That’s too unbelievable.”