Panda Chase

1

NOT A ZOO

'HARRYYYYYYYYY! JORDAAAAAAAAAAAN!'

'Yikes!' said Harry Fox, and ducked under the bunk bed.

His twin brother, Jordan, headed for the wardrobe. But he had a little dropper of milk in one hand, and a tiny baby animal in the other. And everyone knows you can't run with babies.

The twins' mum burst into Mission Fox Headquarters before Jordan had crossed the room. She looked mad.

She sounded even crosser!

'THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE A HOUSE,' she yelled, 'NOT A ZOO! And what's that in your hand?' Jordan tried to hide the baby animal behind his back.

'Milk,' he said, holding up the dropper.

'I meant your other hand.'

Sprung!

'A baby ringtail possum.' Jordan showed her. 'Its mum got run over by a car.'

'Oh! Poor little munchkin,' said Mrs Fox, bending over it and cooing. Like all mothers, she loved tiny babies.

There was a slight noise from across the room.

'You can come out now, Harry,' Mrs Fox said. 'I know you're under the bed.'

Harry came crawling out.

'Hi Mum,' he said cheerfully.

'Don't Hi Mum me,' she growled. 'I've just come from the bathroom.'

Oops! thought Jordan.

'Come with me, both of you,' their mother ordered. 'NOW!'

The twins followed her downstairs to the bathroom. So did Myrtle, their enormous dog, who was a Great-Dane-Newfoundland cross. She had come to see what all the noise was about. All three of them crowded next to the bath.

'Would one of you like to explain this?' Mrs Fox asked.

The bath was half full of muddy brown water. And that wasn't all. Something was in the water. Something alive. Every few seconds, a scary-looking claw would poke out of the water.

'Looks like some yabbies,' Harry said innocently.

Their mother looked at one twin, then the other. 'Would one of you like to tell me why there are yabbies in our bath?'

'There are too many to go in the fish tank,' Jordan explained. He was still holding the baby possum and the dropper of milk, and Myrtle was watching him closely. Myrtle loved milk. 'Besides, nobody uses the bath since we got the new shower.'

'Well, I'm not having it filled with smelly zoo animals!' said Mrs Fox.

Harry leaned over and sniffed the muddy water. 'They're not very smelly.'

'And they're not just animals,' added Jordan, who had looked yabbies up on BRAIN, a special app on the FoxPhone (it stood for Bird, Reptile and Animal Identification Network). 'They're crustaceans. And they don't usually live in zoos.'

'Just get rid of them!' growled their mother. 'Take them back to wherever it was you got them.'

'We can't,' Jordan said. 'They were in Bunyip Dam, and it's gone.'

'Gone?' said Mrs Fox.

Harry nodded. 'It got filled in by a bulldozer.'

'They're building some new houses there,' Jordan explained.

'We only just got the yabbies out in time,' said Harry.

Mrs Fox sighed. It was hard being the mother of twins, especially twins who kept bringing animals home.

'Take them somewhere else then,' she said. 'What about Lawson Park?'

There was a lake in Lawson Park. But it was all the way across town.

'Could you drive us?' Harry asked.

Their mother looked at her watch. 'I'm getting my hair done after lunch,' she said. 'I can drop you at the park on the way, then pick you up when I'm finished.'

'Cool,' said the twins, and turned to go.

'Not so fast!' said their mother. 'I want this bath emptied right now!'

'But we're not taking the yabbies for ages,' said Harry.

Mrs Fox shrugged. 'They'll be okay in buckets for a couple of hours. I want this bath spotless before we go.'

Once the twins got the yabbies out of the filthy bath, it was really hard to scrub away the mud stains. Jordan frowned as he worked.

'Don't worry, Jordan,' said Harry. 'We're nearly finished.'

'I don't care about the bath,' Jordan said. 'I'm thinking about Lawson Park. People catch yabbies there all the time.'

Unlike Jordan and Harry, who rescued things, most people caught yabbies to eat.

'Where else can we put them?' asked Harry.

Jordan checked outside the bathroom door to make sure nobody was listening. The coast was clear.

'The Old Quarry,' he whispered.