After the Divorce, My Wife Is Impossible to Coax - Chapter 23 

Chapter 23 

“Dr. Lu, the dispatch center has sent instructions. An adult rhesus macaque has been found electrocuted in a no-man’s land. Captain An is waiting for you to board.”

After the new dispatcher took over, An Zhaoyu received the new mission quickly, and Lu Shen received the notification at the same time.

“I’ll be right there.” Lu Shen packed a defibrillator and a portable ECG machine into her travel bag, along with an electrolyte solution for mammals.

“Let me carry that,” Jiang Chu, acting as an Alpha intern, took the initiative to help with the heavy gear. Lu Shen didn’t stand on ceremony with her.

As soon as the two boarded, the helicopter started up. From the cockpit, An Zhaoyu glanced back once before immediately flying toward the destination.

“The monkey climbed a high-voltage power pole on its own. After being shocked at the transformer substation, it fell from a three-meter-high pole. It is currently unconscious. Witnesses have not moved the injured monkey,” the team member on the line described the situation in detail to Lu Shen so she could prepare for the rescue in advance.

“Understood.” Lu Shen fell into thought, momentarily forgetting the intern beside her. Jiang Chu didn’t disturb her.

Rhesus macaques are primates very similar to humans. Doctors specialized in their emergency care are rare—most are in nature reserves far away. Ordinary veterinarians are often helpless in such cases, so the center could only send Lu Shen, who held a double degree in veterinary medicine, to handle it.

The helicopter landed on a flat stretch of land near railway tracks in a deserted suburb. It was sparsely populated, but fortunately, a passing train passenger had witnessed the electrocution, filmed it, and called the medical center.

The injured monkey’s fur had been shocked straight, standing out in an explosive, radial pattern. A strong smell of burning hung in the air. It was curled on the ground, looking as if it were already dead.

“Is the power cut?”

“This is a mid-point transformer station for city power; it’s hard to cut all the power. However, the area has been isolated with an insulating net.”

Lu Shen knelt down to check the monkey’s vital signs. “Heartbeat and breathing have stopped.”

“Is it gone, Dr. Lu?” The search and rescue team member felt a bit dejected. Even without medical knowledge, the meaning of “stopped heartbeat and breathing” was very clear.

“Let’s try.” After confirming there were no fractures in the torso, Lu Shen laid the macaque flat. She instructed Jiang Chu to set up the simple ventilator while she knelt beside it to perform electrical defibrillation and CPR.

After five or six cycles, Lu Shen was breathless from the exertion. CPR looks simple, but you only realize how much strength it takes once you do it. This adult macaque was quite large, roughly the size of a human teenager.

“Teacher Lu, let me take over,” Jiang Chu volunteered.

“We can do it too, Dr. Lu,” the rescue team members offered. CPR was a basic emergency skill; An Zhaoyu and her team had undergone professional medical training. They had intended to help, but someone had beaten them to it.

“And who is this?” An Zhaoyu asked Lu Shen with her eyelids drooping lazily. Her tone was as casual as it could be, feeling slightly out of place in such an emergency.

“An intern.” Lu Shen watched Jiang Chu’s movements and the monkey’s reaction closely, fearing the intern might mess up. After all, Jiang Chu had only passed exams on models and hadn’t practiced on a real subject yet.

In reality, Jiang Chu did quite well—her movements were standard and her frequency was appropriate. After Lu Shen administered a shot of adrenaline, she began the second round of defibrillation.

An intern? An Zhaoyu raised an eyebrow.

The way this Alpha intern looked at Dr. Lu was far from “pure.” While Lu Shen was performing CPR earlier, the intern’s eyes had been glued to her, unable to hide her affection.

500% chance she has a crush on Lu Shen.

Let her have a crush, An Zhaoyu curled her lips; she wasn’t the jealous type. She knew Lu Shen was married. Dr. Lu was a woman of few words and simply wasn’t the type to cheat. She didn’t even let her own wife touch her easily, let alone an intern.

An Zhaoyu felt very, very at ease.

“Heartbeat is back.” After twenty cycles, Lu Shen saw the monkey’s chest rise and fall. She immediately re-checked the vital signs. “Electrocuted creatures often fall into a state of suspended animation. You can’t give up on the rescue too easily.”

Once vital signs stabilized, Lu Shen provided fluids to the unconscious monkey while monitoring the ECG and checking its limbs.

One of its legs was indeed fractured. An Zhaoyu had the team transport the monkey onto the rescue plane to be sent directly to the nearest wildlife reserve, where there were specialized animal doctors.

“High-voltage electrical shocks usually cause severe burns. The most prominent feature of an electrical wound is that the skin surface wound is small, but the damage to deep tissues beneath the skin is extensive. Large-scale tissue damage and hemolysis can easily lead to hyperkalemia and hypovolemic shock. Therefore, fluids must be administered quickly while monitoring the ECG, as hyperkalemia can easily lead to arrhythmia and cardiac arrest.”

Jiang Chu immediately took out her phone to record what was said, planning to look up more materials later. Lu Shen’s voice reached An Zhaoyu’s ears at the same time. Usually, Lu Shen didn’t explain things to the rescue team like this; it was likely because Jiang Chu was there that she was being so detailed and professional.

“Captain, what’s with that look?”

After the mission was completed, Lu Shen took Jiang Chu back to the inpatient department. Wen Yuncheng noticed that the Captain’s gaze kept following Dr. Lu and the intern, and couldn’t help but tease her.

“What look?” An Zhaoyu turned to ask him.

“A ‘wanting to tear someone apart’ look,” Wen Yuncheng said the truth and then quickly ducked away. That little intern didn’t even offend her, why so fierce?

Lu Shen also sensed that An Zhaoyu and Jiang Chu seemed to be at odds. “Jiang Chu, do you know her?”

“No…” Jiang Chu could feel An Zhaoyu’s hostility. The Omega Captain’s gaze felt penetrative, as if it exposed her inner thoughts to the sun, making her feel instinctively guilty.

She had heard from Jiang Ling that An Zhaoyu didn’t like Lu Shen and had only helped her brother pursue her in the past. But looking at it just now, that didn’t seem to be the case.

As for Lu Shen… Jiang Chu lowered her head. In Lu Shen’s speech, the way she addressed people marked her level of intimacy: she called others by their full names, but she only used a single title for An Zhaoyu.

They were married. That was a fact.

And they had a baby. Lu Shen’s computer screensaver was a photo of their baby; Jiang Chu had seen it. Every time Lu Shen opened her laptop, her expression turned incredibly soft.

Lu Shen didn’t dwell on the issue and told Jiang Chu to manage her own time.

“Teacher Lu, where are you going?” Jiang Chu saw her preparing to leave the duty room.

“I’m going to the research building to find Professor Fu.”

Fu Xinglan was Lu Shen’s doctoral supervisor—a high-level Alpha workaholic who practically lived in the research building. She rarely left the medical center, dedicating her life to studying Omega suppressants.

Lu Ming’s research on suppressants had already achieved ideal results, allowing Omegas in heat to pass the period smoothly. However, what Fu Xinglan wanted to develop was a suppressant that could be used by an Omega even after being marked by an Alpha—a suppressant that could block an Alpha’s influence over an Omega.

Given the current crisis of a plummeting population, this topic wasn’t well-regarded. But for some reason, Fu Xinglan, an Alpha herself, was obsessed with it. Her research group was currently very short on Ph.D. and Master’s students.

When Lu Shen was pursuing her doctorate, many supervisors wanted her in their groups—mainly because of her father Lu Ming’s reputation. Lu Shen had politely declined many olive branches and ultimately chose Professor Fu Xinglan, who had no students under her wing.

Because this topic interested her as well.

Fu Xinglan, being desperate for help, was naturally satisfied with Lu Shen. However, she still spent every day and night in the lab.

“Professor Fu,” Lu Shen brought her laptop into the laboratory.

“Mm,” Fu Xinglan was recording data with a pen and didn’t look up. Lu Shen didn’t disturb her and sat nearby to wait.

The lab was large. Near the window, a screen partitioned off a space containing a folding cot and a simple wardrobe. Professor Fu spent nearly half of every month living here to process experimental results as quickly as possible.

She wore a white lab coat over a black shirt and suit trousers. Her wardrobe was filled with identical shirts, just in slightly different colors, and the same for her trousers. Lu Shen knew her habit: she was too lazy to pick out outfits, so once she found a style that worked, it never changed. This included the height she rolled up her sleeves and the length of the shirt peeking out—it was always the same.

Such a Professor Fu was still single.

It was said that an Omega had once liked her, but Professor Fu’s head was empty of everything except research. She didn’t know how to make an Omega happy, let alone how to develop a romantic relationship. She only had a refined and beautiful face. That Omega had been disappointed, complaining to others that she was like an emotionless robot who was indifferent to pheromones. Since then, no Omega wanted to get close to her.

Now thirty-five, Professor Fu was prepared to spend her life alone. As long as she had a lab, she could live perfectly well.

Once the data was recorded, Fu Xinglan checked it twice more before taking off her protective goggles.

“What is it? A new discovery?”

Every time she spoke, it was about experiments and discoveries. Lu Shen was used to her style and got straight to the point.

“Professor, I think we might find some inspiration in Beta pheromones.”

“Oh? Tell me more.” Fu Xinglan became interested.

Their project had hit a bottleneck. Suppressing an Omega’s heat wasn’t difficult, but if they encountered deliberate stimulation from an Alpha’s pheromones, the effectiveness of the suppressant would be greatly reduced, and the Omega would still be forced into heat. That wasn’t the result they wanted.

“Beta pheromones can also help an Omega through heat, and…” Lu Shen weighed her words carefully. She couldn’t very well mention how An Zhaoyu would “counter-attack” every time she was temporarily marked by her. “…and perhaps they can change an Omega’s state.”

When An Zhaoyu was pregnant, her mental strength was more fragile than usual. Lu Shen often gave her pheromone comfort. An Omega temporarily marked by mild “woodland” Beta pheromones would become desensitized to the perception of other Alphas.

When they went to the hospital for check-ups, they often encountered Alphas harassing others. Although Lu Shen’s pheromones weren’t aggressive, they made An Zhaoyu feel much better and immune to the deliberate interference of other Alphas.

However, Lu Shen wasn’t sure if this was just because An Zhaoyu’s own grade was high. After all, Beta pheromones were usually ignored. Compared to Alphas and Omegas, Beta scents were very faint and basically had no presence.

As a precious reproductive resource, Omegas were almost entirely paired with Alphas. People like Lu Shen and An Zhaoyu were rare. Alphas outnumbered Omegas, and while Betas could theoretically reproduce with any gender, they usually paired with other Betas or Alphas.

The people Lu Shen had been set up with on blind dates were usually Alphas or Betas. An Zhaoyu’s action of barging into her room that day had actually unintentionally provided her with a new line of thinking.

Fu Xinglan nodded and began sketching on her notebook without answering immediately. Lu Shen knew she was thinking, so she sent over a package of relevant papers and materials she had collected and then headed back.

When she returned to the duty room, she found An Zhaoyu there.

“What happened?” This seemed to be the first time An Zhaoyu had entered the duty room. Lu Shen’s gaze swept over her; she didn’t look injured.

“Mom just sent a message saying the baby seems to have a bit of a cold,” An Zhaoyu handed her phone to Lu Shen.

Jiang Chu was also there, sitting nearby and reading.

“It’s okay, I’ll take some medicine back later,” Lu Shen leaned in to take a look. Yesterday, He Nanchun had mentioned that Xiao Zhou was sneezing a bit, but Lu Shen had checked her thoroughly—there were no other symptoms and it wasn’t serious.

When she handed the phone back to An Zhaoyu, she realized they were standing very close. Their shoulders were almost touching. Lu Shen wanted to step back, but from the corner of her eye, she noticed Jiang Chu watching them. Furthermore, An Zhaoyu had one hand propped on the desk behind Lu Shen, so she didn’t move.

“Jiang Chu, it’s already clock-out time. You can head back early.”

Jiang Chu was very serious about her studies. Interns in other groups left exactly on time or even early, but she always required Lu Shen to tell her to leave. If she hadn’t known about her family situation, Lu Shen would have thought she had some reason for not wanting to go home.

“Oh,” Jiang Chu started packing her things.

“Then let’s go home too,” An Zhaoyu put away her phone and spoke with a smile.

“Okay.”

An Zhaoyu was a bit strange today, but Lu Shen couldn’t quite put her finger on why.

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