Share

Chapter 7

Author: ghost
last update Last Updated: 2021-12-01 22:00:08

"DON’T FORGET TO feed the pandas Abe!"

Albert tread towards the panda area with a bunch of bamboo shoots in his shoulders. When he reached there, he greeted the two new additions to their shelter, Po and Ling Wong. Po was missing his left hind leg and Ling Wong’s a blind albino. They were rescued from an illegal research company of "evil" geneticists. 

"Some of those hardcore Darwinists y'know," his friend Connie stated.

Albert went in and gave the giant bears their brunch. "I heard. Apparently, they were trying to speed up evolution," Albert grimaces.

"I never understood why companies like this exist y'know," Connie said in her bewilderment. She rested her chin on her palm and placed her elbow in the fence and wandered off while staring at the eating pandas. 

"Why so serious? It's simple: to them, they're the good guys," Albert answered as he leans in towards the fence adjacent to where Connie is outside. He stared at the eating pandas while he lingers on the appropriation of the anti-hero in himself. He held himself back from breaking down in a soliloquy lest Connie think less about him. 

But he did used think for so long that what he was doing was not that far a derivation from the neutrality of the law; he was raised in that values under the roof of orders of the Baron. But he lately realized that the norm he’d been living was grades under the level of normalcy; even more than the so-called creature accelerators.

However, he didn’t dive deep into more of that memory avenue right while he’s at his peace zone. He just intently watched the adorable fluffs feast on the tall grass. Watching eating pandas has always been their guilty pleasure. Their last panda encounter was around a year ago so this is a well welcome comeback back for the black-and-white ursa aficionados. They pass a bit of time silently watching and hoping they don’t choke on the bamboo. 

After a while, Connie got closer to Abe's position as she grabs his head and caressed it. She cleared her throat and whispered to his ear, "Albert dear, can—"

"No." Albert looked at her with a straight face.

She babied up and slumped. "Ohhh come on! Just this once, please?"

"Yeah, I'm still on no."

"Pretty please?"

"The physical appearance of the please makes no difference," Albert referenced Despicable Me. They both chuckled a tad to that.

"I didn’t yield then; I won’t yield now.”

“And I thought the islands changed you.”

“Why does everyone kept saying that? It’s only been half a year.” He turned more towards his fellow-zoologist and he resumed his repudiation with a straight face. “And as much as I love you, I really hate night shifts." 

Connie's been bugging him for a while now about taking her night shift. And he knew exactly why; she's been looking for a break so he can go out with a date. But some part of Albert doesn't like working nights. Night owl as he is, the moon had always been his partner during his prepubescent sprees so he’s associated it with all the mischief he’d done. So, Albert cyclically denied the favor of Connie; it's not that he's being a bad friend.

"You know you're really being a bad friend, y'know," she mumbled.

Albert looked at her with a face that paints "really?".

Connie took it back immediately. "I'm kidding, you're the best, love ya’, see you around. I'll ask someone else probably. Bye!" Connie kissed his cheek and ran off towards the crowded areas.

Albert genuinely like her personality. Not surprisingly, he had many experiences with South, East and Southeast Asians during his time and their warmth is a really welcome trait to his Western glacial identity. Not to diminish Albert's friendliness that he apparently has, but he only is friendly to people he like and that's not a lot. And to those he does, he's only friendly in his head. 

Albert's been taught by the Baron and the world he was raised in to minimize his emotional output in his face. That was a factor, but most it, at least he thought, was him being desensitization towards fast-paced heartbeat events in his upbringing that he’s not easily excitable anymore. Even small fractions of emotions got reduced to a 2.

So, when he smiles, he's pretty much betraying how he was raised. He didn't mind though. He let one smile unto himself when she ran off like a gazelle blown in the wind.

He patted the head of the pair of grayscales and walked towards the offices near the labs. He wore some surgical gloves, masks, goggles and finally his lab coat. He thought about how he hates the specimen they'll be working on today. 

His job with the Pierre’s empire before this was only tranquil zero percent of the times. He did whatever they wanted him to do and that does a lot of things to a person. The underground was a mess then so he had to be hands-down hands-on with all the men-and-women-handling with the others as they use their paws, claws and jaws to topple literal empires.

So, when he finally got semi-fired when they capsized all the titans needed, he decided to change his daily stress-levels and put himself in an environment where every creature is a beautiful one. But nothing is perfect, there were still humans here and...

Snakes? Why did it have to be snakes? He channeled his inner Indiana Jones as he whips himself up for the diamondback rattlesnake, Jörmungandr’s, surgery.

“So, do you want me to swap with you?” Connie remembered Albert’s ophidiophobia.

Albert looked at her as she wore an obvious conniving smile in her face.

She resumed when the frightened man didn’t answer. “I can swap with you in just one condition, Abe.” Her smile never diminished.

He thought about it. Unlike the one that traumatized him as a kid, this one's heavily sedated and he's a professional surrounded by other professionals; also, he's now an adult. He looked at the pitiful nope rope as he composed himself. 

One half-hour later, he finally got out of his red room.

Connie was fetching water in a distance but she had that look directed at the exhausted serpent fearer. 

Told you so.

Yeah, I know.

After their silent exchange, he went back to his locker to change. While digging through his bag, his phone rang. Almost premonitively, he didn't look at the contact's name and just answered without filter, "Ana, I told you I'll pick you up after work". 

The phone died. 

Sensing something wrong, he looked at the phone and, surprise, it was the person he aptly named 'Aa.Margarita'. Panicked rightfully swelled from him and he hurried outside to try calling her back. He opened the door but bumped Connie who was looking for him as well. His phone fell to the water bucket Connie was carrying with a soft drop.

plop

Everyone from a 10-mile radius dropped their jaws as Albert tried to resuscitate the phone.

Surprise, it's not water-resistant. 

"Stupid, cheap burner," he mumbled under his breath.

Reasonably, Connie was freaked out but Albert calmed her down and told her it was a dime a dozen phone. "I was just about to make a phone call, is all."

"Why're you in a hurry anyway?" he asked.

Connie answered, "Eh, someone's looking for you." She paused and leaned to his ear. "It's the one that got away."

Connie moved away from him to reveal Margaret on the lobby waiting for him. 

Continue to read this book for free
Scan code to download App

Latest chapter

  • 1st Death   Chapter 47

    “VV, DO YOU know where this is?” one of the butlers under VV’s command told him of the latest news.“This wretched place?” VV had never personally been there; but the countless stories about the butchery division of the old version of the company drove even him, a hitman who based his entire work ethic on Benedict Arnold: the world’s most hated traitor, to barf beaches.“I know where it is, but I haven’t been there yet. I heard only of stories.”He was in pursuit of a different brother and was growing restless, but something as reliable as this made his whimsical side come up to love the recent development. The added bonus of having to see Von’s expression, who he thought would be with him, after telling him of his wife barbecuing. He and his flunkeys rounded up the rest of them prancing around the city because of the treasure hunt to play one dodgeball. Only the dodgers this time would have no Sandy fi

  • 1st Death   Chapter 46

    WHEN CAINE READ the latest update from the one person the public deemed missing about another person misplaced by the eyes of the birdwatchers, something clicked in his mind. The old Warehouse G that he was apparently hiding had been cleaned, cleared and abandoned during the end of the underground wars that he commended Albert’s quick-thinking of using it as his hideout: he knew the place like the back of his hand, it has hidden secrets and it’s pretty expendable.“I hope their plan goes well,” Caine said while he walked out of the orphanage to his car. He trusted them enough that he thought that his help wouldn’t be needed anyway.And he was right­—about the plan part, the part about trust still had to be discovered by the flock cover in their shimmering plumage­—because the moment they read the news, they were already done with their chirps of briefing; they just had to improvise a few.The first one to leave w

  • 1st Death   Chapter 45

    DEATH; DEATH IS an enchantress. Whether you’re young or old; rich or poor; there will come a day when be ensnared by it and succumb to the grave, eventually. The love could’ve been looming over your cotton-soft heart since your birth, or an acquired intimacy for it one day while sat in the wool; for as long as one had as ever trod shoe-leather.Those were some of the thoughts Venin had the moment his country had been attacked by its neighbour with their tanks and their bombs; and their bombs and their guns. And as his head thought about how the world had always been a roundabout of chaos, like Thanos, he longed more and more for the approval of death.Before the hardships he went through, he never wanted to experience it first-hand; that’s why in his younger years, he strove for his passion—acting. But now that all those theatre masks, stage play and bongo drumming had been replac

  • 1st Death   Chapter 44

    EVER SINCE AUGUST came out of the room of deceitful contemptuous tête-à-têtes, there’d been some weird air discharging from his pores that caught Bright off-guard. It wasn’t an obvious one, because he still is the same person in the mannerisms in his actions and words and the entire personality, but there’s just something that he can’t locate even looking at the 88x94-foot map steady on his driving. He’s perspiring buckets when he asked again, “Sir, what happened there?” And like the 17 times he asked, 17 times there wasn’t any reply. That happened a few times before, so Bright didn’t really attribute that to anything rather other than him having found out some really critical information. Bright waited patiently minding his inaudible Ps and Qs to not overstep the mark secured by a portcullis guarding his Sherlockian mind palace. After a few moments more of Bright camping the premises, the hydraulic winches started releasing the drawbridge to what August was

  • 1st Death   Chapter 43

    THE BRICK BLOCKS withstood the trickle in heat as the room warmed up more from the summer reign over the two reconveners after their brief one-week recess of various tasks. Caine, upon losing his ship of an enforcer was grief-stricken for about 30 standard drinks, emerged a new monarch of his own devising where he concluded to himself that he—like a certain 1970 musical comedy—is the company. And as frightened as he was of dying without the fall of the empire that cost him a hundred people who worked side by side by side, he’s more frightened of letting them roam about while he sat on his chair, being alive. So, unusual for him it may be, he asked for help personally from a person capable enough to withstand the intensity of his words; but is also proficient enough that it won’t be a hindrance to his problem-solving. August, on the other end of the seat, had a less emotionally jarring week; but rather a pretty enervating one for his getting’ old eyes. Togethe

  • 1st Death   Chapter 42

    THE BUILDING WAS settling, but not more than Von; the doors were unhinged, but not more than Von; the woodworks were sapped, but not more than Von; the downfall of the warehouse was overtaxation, but so was Von’s. For as the wind whispered through the windows of their rustic solace, so did Albert’s story—though his ear to absorb the few one he found really easy to comprehend; like the Rihanna ft. Calvin Harris song story that he had with Margaret. Because even though he couldn’t find the strength and face to admit it, that experience they had was a mouse squeaker from probably one of the world’s most hopeless place. But what he can’t put twenty of his fingers on, was how did Caine “erase her memory” like erasing chalk from a blackboard. “It’s hard to comprehend, but it’s a higher for of hypnosis. I, myself can only do very little.” Albert also explained why the mind-wipe was important to the Baron’s reputation. “Marge knew so much, so Pierre just locked those

More Chapters
Explore and read good novels for free
Free access to a vast number of good novels on GoodNovel app. Download the books you like and read anywhere & anytime.
Read books for free on the app
SCAN CODE TO READ ON APP
DMCA.com Protection Status