Strange Life of a Cat

Chapter 27: Who Knows What Cats Are Thinking

Yuan Zi's real name was Yuan Zhiyi. Besides Papa Jiao, Wei Ling and him, another one of Papa Jiao's old college friends in Chuhua, Fei Hang, also invested.

After Professor Yuan passed away, Yuan Zhiyi began his own career. Recently, he had been abroad. Most of the equipment they needed was produced abroad. Besides, he wanted to gain some experience in the field.

Though his father had passed away, the professor's connections were still there. This put them a head above competitors.

Zheng Tan didn't know much about the science stuff, but he did know that the equipment they bought was easily above 10000 a piece. That was in dollars, not Yuan. Zheng Tan rarely went to the lab. The few glimpses he took of the equipment didn't tell him much. The labels were all in English. The few times Chinese showed up, it was the names of owners.

He heard that the Bio department invested two million in equipment recently. However, during his trip to the lab yesterday, he did not notice much of a difference.

It was no wonder Papa Jiao was complaining about not having enough money for the company. The fund he received could not be used for this purpose. He invested the family's entire savings, a little less than two million yuan, in the company. This kind of money wouldn't be able to purchase too much equipment.

That day, Papa Jiao told Zheng Tan that he received a call from Mr. Guo saying that there was an urgent job.

All of the work Mr. Guo threw in his way was related to modeling for ads. It was a piece of cake for Zheng Tan. It was mostly videos and story posters these few times. If the job was urgent, then the pay was definitely negotiable. Papa Jiao took care of money matters. All Zheng Tan had to do was go over and strike a few poses.

The afternoon Papa Jiao received the call from Mr. Guo, the man came to the hospital with health foods and vitamin supplements. He paid Mama Jiao a visit before leaving to chat business with Papa Jiao in the hallway.

"Kitten food?" Papa Jiao asked.

"Yeah. One of my brother's client's cat had a litter of kittens. The mommy cat got injured and was being treated at my brother's clinic. The kittens are six weeks now and are off milk. The client said that he was keeping only one kitten out of five. The rest he was planning to give away. I took a look. The kittens were gorgeous. So I planned to use this opportunity to shoot a kitten food ad."

Mr. Guo's brother was a vet. Before the pet centre was built, his clinic was separate from Mr. Guo's pet store. Now that they were combined, they shared customers. Originally, Mr. Guo was planning to wait before making kitten food ads. It was hard to achieve the effect he envisioned with kittens. After all, kittens were not trained and would not obey instructions.

"If it's a kitten food ad, why do you need Charcoal?" Papa Jiao asked.

"I wanted to shoot the kittens together with a cat. Kittens are too hard to control on their own. I thought it might be better if a cat was there to control them. It's still going to be difficult but hopefully easier than before."

"What do you mean?" Papa Jiao still did not get it. First of all, his cat was a male. In the wild, male cats sometimes killed their kittens. Pet cats did the same in some circumstances. It was unsafe for kittens to be around a male cat. Secondly, Mr. Guo had a few cats in his store. They were all calm and gentle. Some of the cats were expensive breeds. Certainly, they were better than his ill-tempered house cat.

"I want Charcoal to go do a tryout. We'll see how things turn out. All the cats in my store tried yesterday. None of them achieved the desired effect. That's why I came to find Charcoal."

Papa Jiao accepted Mr. Guo's explanation. They started to talk about the pay.

As the humans were chatting, Zheng Tan was slightly upset. He disliked most human children beside Jiao Yuan and Gu Youzi, let alone kittens. This job was such a pain in the ass.

Xiao Guo left after agreeing on a price. He would pick up Zheng Tan tomorrow morning. If Zheng Tan could complete the task, the pay would be the agreed-upon amount. The kitten food in Mr. Guo's shop was on the pricey side, but the quality was top-notch as well. It would certainly make him a lot of money if he could break into the market. So this time, Zheng Tan's pay was higher than before.

After hearing the pay, Zheng Tan decided to swallow his disdain for kitten-sitting. It was just an advertisement. The job would take at most a few hours.

"Charcoal, I will remember the investment I made with the money in your account. Maybe one day, you will become a big shareholder in our company. Also, there is no need to push yourself for the job. You're going over there to shoot an ad, not to be upset. The worst that could happen is that we don't do the ad."

Zheng Tan meowed to show he understood. Papa Jiao was clearly joking at first, so Zheng Tan didn't take his words to heart. However, he agreed wholeheartedly with Papa Jiao on the second issue. He did not pressure himself but ate and slept like usual.

The next morning, Zheng Tan didn't go running, but waited on the tall Parasol tree in the quarters. He had done the same thing the last few times Mr. Guo came to get him. So the man didn't even have to enter the building; he just had to look up at the tree branches.

Most of the leaves had fallen out, so Mr. Guo could see Zheng Tan right away.

His face cracked into a smile when he saw the cat. He looked like he just saw gold. He patted the black duffel bag on his shoulder.

"Come on Charcoal, time to go to work."

Zheng Tan disliked pet travel cases. So whenever Mr. Guo came to pick him up, he would bring a large duffel bag or backpack.

The pet center was not far from the quarters. Mr. Guo came on a scooter. He put the bag in the front basket of the scooter. Zheng Tan stayed inside the bag but poked out his head to look at passing scenery.

Mr. Guo's pet center was on the rise. He had plenty of old customers, and now, because of the ads, more and more people knew of his store. After placing ads on some online forums, he received a few bulk orders. These eventually turned into some long-time customers.

They went in through the side door. It was closer to the studio, and there were less people here.

His employees were familiar with the black cat that their boss treated like the God of money. Mr. Guo's explanation was that this cat had special training, so it was extra good at following orders. It was an expensive hire. He emphasized expensive, so the employees would know to treat it better.

This cat was, in fact, his store's God of money. It was all because of him that the cat food sold so quickly. The ads played a big part in their sales. That and the quality of their food. Mr. Guo remembered to praise himself while praising others.

The employees did not doubt Mr. Guo's explanation. They saw Zheng Tan as similar to the animals in circuses. If Zheng Tan knew he was being compared to circus animals, who knew what he would think.

As usual, Zheng Tan hopped off the scooter and went into the studio. The people were the same, the cats and the golden retriever who all came to watch were the same, but a difference was easy to find.

In the corner of the studio, where there used to be equipment, was a pen. Inside were five, furry, little kittens. Three of which had the clear markings of a tabby. The other two kittens were black and white. Mr. Guo mentioned that these kittens were part Siberian cat, so their fur was slightly longer than your average cat.

Next to the pen was a cat tree, on it lay an American shorthair. Its two front legs were crossed together and it was watching the five kittens below.

The name of this cat was Prince. It belonged to the store and was named by Mr. Guo. The picture on the packaging of the canned cat food was of him.

The reason why he was used came down to the superiorities of the breed. American shorthairs had chubby faces and were slightly larger than other cats. The looked well built, unlike house cats which were often skinnier. Just on looks alone, it trumped Zheng Tan. Many cat food brands used American shorthairs on their packaging.

However, Zheng Tan was much smarter than that cat. This was an unfair competition. After all, Zheng Tan still thought about himself as a human. He didn't want to compare intelligence with a cat.

The other reason why Zheng Tan didn't make it on the packaging was because he was a black cat. Not everyone liked black cats. Some were still wary of them due to superstitious reasons.

So, looks were important. But Zheng Tan had no way of changing his looks, he didn't plan to dye his fur.

At the moment, Prince was staring at the five kittens. His paw flexed from time to time. He looked eager to jump in, but was not sure if he should.

"Everything still the same?" Mr. Guo asked the employees present.

"Yes. Whenever Prince went in, the kittens treated him as their arch enemy. The other cats were treated the same. Both the male and females. Boss, didn't you say Charcoal was ill-tempered. You sure he wouldn't bite the kittens?" One employee asked.

Zheng Tan, who was half-way up a cat tree, heard his words. He looked over at Mr. Guo.

How dare you bad mouth me! Who said I was ill-tempered? How was I ill-tempered?

As he thought angrily, Zheng Tan scratched the cat tree so hard that the inner fillings were showing. Prince saw this and inched in the opposite direction.

Looking at the scratch marks on the cat tree, Mr. Guo had a moment of doubt, but he decided to give it a try. He told all the employees to keep an eye on the pen. If Zheng Tan was going to bite the kittens, they would rush in to save them.

Zheng Tan squatted on the cat tree and looked down at the five kittens. At six weeks old, they were already showing curiosity. They used everything to sharpen their teeth. Everything was a toy to them. When they weren't playing with something, they played with their tails or paws. Zheng Tan saw this behavior as slightly schizophrenic.

Zheng Tan really wished he didn't have to go in to play with the little nuts. However, he was already here, so he at least had to pretend to work.

After some self-encouragement, Zheng Tan took a deep breath and jumped in.

The five kittens were deeply alarmed by the sudden appearance of Zheng Tan. Two of them immediately jumped and the fur on their backs stood up on end. They eyed Zheng Tan suspiciously.

Outside the pen, Mr. Guo and his employees all looked on nervously for any sign that the black cat was going to bite. Mr. Guo had promised the owner of the kittens that they would be returned safely when he borrowed them.

Zheng Tan stayed still after he entered the pen. He knew that everyone was watching him, so he had to keep his claws and teeth hidden. So he decided to do nothing and stood still. He planned to wait until the kittens passed their instinctive stage of alarm.

To everyone's surprise, the largest kitten of the bunch seemed to calm down. It started to come closer to Zheng Tan. At first, it inched slowly, then it picked up the pace, its tail held high.

Zheng Tan looked at the little tabby coming over. He didn't know how to react. It was so small. He could slap it away easily.

The tabby came to Zheng Tan's side and patted Zheng Tan on the front leg. Then patted him again, and again. Then it rolled over and started playing with Zheng Tan's paw.

Zheng Tan shook his whiskers. How he wanted to slap away the little thing.

Soon all the other kittens followed suit. Some played with his paws, others played with his tail.

Zheng Tan felt he had to do something. So he pulled away his tail and walked away. The five kittens followed behind him immediately. The largest one which ran faster even caught up and tried to grab Zheng Tan's tail.

Zheng Tan was losing patience and wanted to get away from the kittens. However, when he started to walk faster, the kittens started meowing like he was doing something inhumane.

So the following scene took place: A black cat traced the side of a pen and walked in circles. Behind it followed five kittens, which meowed whenever they couldn't keep up. The black cat would stop and wait, and they would quickly catch up.

"So are they judging cats by appearance?" An employee said. None of the cats in the store got along with the kittens, but the black cat was apparently different.

"Appearance?" Mr. Guo pointed at the cat walking in circles. "Who do you think is cuter? Our cats or that one?"

The employee fell silent.

Another employee then asked: "Why didn't the kittens reject Charcoal?"

"Who knows what cats are thinking." This was all Mr. Guo came up with.