Penny Ling.

So sensitive, so over-emotional, so kind and easily hurt this little panda is. How on earth did she come by Littlest Pet Shop, and become friends with all of the other animals, none of which are anything in the most like her.

Well, that's a story. Luckily for you I'm willing to take some of my precious time to tell it. I hope that you enjoy, for this is one of my favorite tales to tell. Without further ado, I present to you, this story, which title is based upon the song that Pepper recently sung about the panda in question: Being Friends.

Being Friends

By Drizzle117

"Oh, Mommy, what if she doesn't like daycare? What if the other animals are mean to her? You know how sensitive our little Penny can be!"

The little girl clutched her mother's hand, her blonde pigtails seemingly quaking, but in fact her whole body was shaking nervously. In her other arm she held a bright pink purse. Large blue-grey eyes blinked out at the wide world surrounding the small group.

As the girl's mother reassured her that their Penny would be okay, and that Littlest Pet Shop was a great place, a small navy blue paw poked out of the purse and the head of a young female panda appeared.

Penny Ling had never been much of a social pet. Sure, she loved being told how pretty she was, but being around others made her insides queasy. Now both her owner's mother and father were working full time, meaning they had to place her in a daycare. With other pets!

Penny shuddered at the thought of it. At least she could practice her ribbon dancing in a large open space. But wait! What if the other pets made fun of her for ribbon dancing?

The little panda wanted to cry. What if no one likes me? She couldn't bear to think about it, and just buried her head back into the little purse that she was always carried around in and stayed like that for the rest of the walk. Slowly, very slowly, her eyelids drooped over her tired eyes and Penny Ling fell into a restless sleep.

"We're here!"

This cry woke the panda from her agitated slumber. She pushed her head up and out of the little purse to see where in the world she was, and her eyes widened so much she thought that they must have been as big as the moon.

They were standing in front of a very small purple-and-pinkish building. The sign read very clearly: Littlest Pet Shop. Penny could see in through a window about six other animals frolicking in the window, but they all stopped playing when they noticed her owner and her owner's mother and stared at them, fascinated. The panda winced and ducked back into her purse.

"Mommy, look at the other animals!" her owner squealed, her worries about Penny's fears completely abandoned at the prospect of seeing new, cute furry faces. The blonde girl bounced up to the window and pressed her face against it. "There's a cute puppy, and a little…weasel, is it?"

"I think that's a mongoose, honey," her mother said, coming up behind her daughter and placing one hand on her shoulder. The little girl screeched with delight.

"Penny Ling, these are your new friends," she trilled, roughly grabbing her pet around the waist and hoisting her out of the purse. The panda tried but failed to grab the edges of her hideaway place and was pressed against the window against her will.

She squealed in protest and pushed herself backwards not by a lot, but just enough for her to see the other pets staring at her with complete curiosity in their gazes.

The most stunning out of them was easily a dog, with many different shades of purple and pink in her fur. Her ice blue eyes seemed to go right through Penny's soul, and her black beret didn't really add any comfort to the image—if anything, it made her seem even more…what was the word? Frightening?

A pink spider monkey swung from ropes slung across the top of the play area for the pets, her gaze sweeping Penny with an excited, hyper kind of look in them. A light blue mongoose flinched backwards as the monkey's tail brushed his nose, his amber eyes blinking as he stumbled backwards into a wall. A light green lizard looked at her curiously, and then, out of the blue, dropped to the ground and began to spin on his head, and an orange-brown porcupine—or was it a hedgehog?—looked at her curiously, pressing his tiny paws against the window. Penny blinked—three times.

Finally, a grey-and-white skunk looked at her with curious rose-colored eyes. The panda seemed to feel that the skunk was sizing her up—but for what exactly? She had the same effect the dog did, but the funny thing was that she didn't look incredibly intimidating at first glance, like the other. Penny couldn't place a paw on it, but she knew that there was something about that skunk different than the rest.

Before she could truly register all of these facts, she was yanked away from the window and brought to the front of the store by her excited owner, the little blonde girl. The mother opened the front door slowly, and her daughter rushed in, placing Penny on the ground as she whipped around, looking at seemingly everything.

"Can I help you?" a nice-sounding voice echoed from the back of the store. The little panda whipped around to see a kindly looking woman with grey hair and a flowered dress standing at the counter, looking at the new customers with a glint in her green eyes that made her seem younger than she looked.

"Yes," the mother said, smiling. "I called in a few days ago to ask if you could squeeze in one more pet at your regular daycare, and you said I could start bringing her in today."

"Of course," the older woman grinned. "My name is Mrs. Twombly, by the way. I'm the owner of this little slice of paradise, Littlest Pet Shop. Was it…" Mrs. Twombly flipped through a little notebook she had by the cash register and squinted. "…Penny Ling?"

Penny's heart did a tiny flip-flop when she heard her name, and her stomach felt as if a million butterflies were flittering around inside. She let out a tiny squeak as the little girl picked her up and placed her gently on the counter.

"My name is Tara and this is my best friend, Penny Ling!" the blonde girl said, scuffling at the ground with one foot. "Will you take good care of her?"

Mrs. Twombly leaned down and placed one hand on Tara's shoulder. "If there's one thing I know how to do, it's take care of pets, especially little cuties like your Penny Ling. Don't worry, Tara, she'll always be fine when you come and pick her up at the end of the day."

The little girl grinned, bouncing on her heels, and her pigtails completing the exact same motion. "That's good!"

"Tara, we really must get going—you to school and I to work," her mother said, cutting into the conversation quickly and grabbing her daughter's hand. "So, Mrs. Twombly, we'll be back at…12:00 PM sound good?"

Penny's heart almost skipped a beat as the shop owner nodded. If she looked at the clock now, it was about…9:00 AM, meaning she had…THREE HOURS to spend here?

As the bells at the entrance of the store jingled, signaling that the panda's owner and mother had left, the young panda felt slightly woozy. She thought that maybe an hour she could stand, but twelve of them—with six other pets that she had never met before?

"Aren't you adorable?" murmured Mrs. T fondly as she slowly picked up Penny by the waist and placed her in front of a swinging door that read: Littlest Pet Shop on it. "In here are your new friends—and just wait until you meet them. They're the sweetest little animals I've ever met in my life!"

The kind woman gave a gentle shove to the panda and the door swung open as Penny touched it. She flinched, not wanting to go inside, but one final push from Mrs. T and she was in the play area.

Within less than five seconds she was completely surrounded.

"Who're you?" asked the green lizard that Penny had seen earlier. She wondered if he could possibly be a type of gecko, as he was sticking to the wall.

"You seem like a bear-y nice pet," the skunk said, and then couldn't seem to help herself. She burst out laughing. "Get it? Bear-y nice, since she's a bear?"

"We get it, Pepper," the pink spider monkey rolled her eyes, and Penny couldn't help realizing from this gesture that this crew had heard a lot of similar jokes from this skunk.

"Well, what's your name?" asked the blue mongoose curiously, looking at her with wide amber eyes. The panda wanted to reply, but it was like someone had grabbed her tongue and tied it into a knot—she just couldn't speak.

It took her several seconds to catch her voice, and even then it came out as a hoarse whisper. "M-my name is P-Penny Ling." She looked down at the ground and kicked at one of her feet, expecting criticism—of what, she didn't know, but she had learned to expect anything. That was what came from being overly emotional and scared all the time.

"Hi, P-Penny Ling!" all of the pets said as one, grinning happily. The panda blinked, staring at their wide, cheerful faces, which certainly didn't appear to be criticizing her.

"Well, now we know your name but you don't know ours," the dog that she had seen in the front window announced in a loud, drawling voice that Penny would normally have associated with some sort of famous model, or diva queen. "Well, I'll try to introduce you to everyone with a little song that I call…Introducing you to everyone!"

The hedgehog looked at her with an annoyed expression on his face. "You mean the one where you have no idea what to say the last two lines, after you introduce me?"

The dog nodded, pulling a small microphone onto her hat and adjusting it in front of her face. "It's going to be wonderful!"

Penny blinked. "Is it really necessary—?"

"I'm gonna tell you 'bout a few things, so watch me go, steal the show, settle back and try to follow," the dog began, prancing up to Penny and staring at her with those ice blue eyes. "My name is Zoe Trent, and to the full extent I'm the big star here, I sing the songs that represent! Yeah-yeah-yeah!"

Immediately Zoe's microphone was snatched away from her by the skunk, who looked rather nervous as she pranced back and forth on the windowsill. "Hi…my name is Pepper Clark, and I'm a bit of a star too, well, not so much as a comedian…"

Zoe swept in, taking her microphone back and wrapping herself in the newly named Pepper's tail. Penny watched, confused, as the dog began to sing again.

"Pepper here is my good friend, ask her any knock-knock joke 'cause she's kind of a comedian, and when she's happy, you can tell, just stick your nose up and give the room a quick smell…"

A greenish spray had been emitted into the room by a nervous looking Pepper, who laughed nervously. "He-heh…I get kind of nervous meeting new pets," she mumbled into her tail as the other pets stuck out their tongues and held their noses. Penny herself plugged her nose and waved the air in front of her, disgusted by the horrific stink.

She turned to see the green lizard dancing on the floor like she had watched him do earlier, and Zoe continued to sing. "Yeah, that's Vinnie Terrio on the floor—I'd like to say he's done but he's probably gonna get back up and dance some more. But don't you worry, he's got a heart of gold—not very bright, but he's one of us!"

"Can't you just tell me your names?" Penny started to say, but was cut off by the rest of the group belting out in a loud, melodic tone that gave the panda the impression that they had sang this very song many times before.

"We're the littlest, littlest, pet shop pets—yeah the littlest, littlest, pet shop pets, we're the littlest, littlest pet shop pets, we're the littlest pet shop pets."

Penny pressed herself against the wall as a splatter of paint came flying her way. The pink spider monkey laughed and giggled as she used her hands to smear large blobs of paint into what vaguely appeared to be…was that her?

Zoe spun up next to the dog in an ornate twirling motion and zipped to a halt. "Minka Mark is a monkey artist—talks a mile a minute so you better get started. She's gonna paint this, she's gonna paint that, and now she's disappeared, does anyone here know where she's at?"

Penny jumped as the monkey now introduced as Minka leapt on top of her head and leaned down, investigating the panda's small bag of things by picking through it with her human-like fingers. She grabbed one of the ribbon-dance poles, a bright silver one that was one of Penny's particular favorites, and squealed, "Ooh, shiny pole! Can I have it, can I, can I, CAN I?"

"Um…" the panda whispered back, placing her paw over the pole and gently placing it back into her bag. "No…"

She was interrupted once again, but this time not by Zoe. The blue mongoose had coughed a loud "AH-HEM" and held up a magic wand. In the other hand was what appeared to be a magic hat. As he tapped the wand to the hat, a large explosion of smoke appeared, completely covering the mongoose. He coughed several times, and then mumbled, "Not again," as his hat disappeared into a pile of rubbish.

Zoe trotted up and placed one paw on his back—the mongoose yelped and jumped about a foot in the air, then curled up into a ball, shivering, as the dog began to sing. "This is Sunil Nevla, he's a mongoose, he's sort of a magician but his magic is a little loose. Sure he's kind of glum, and likes to make a fuss, we don't mind at all, because he's one of us!"

"I think I understand," Penny whispered, watching the rest of the pets perform the "littlest pet shop pets" chorus. "I think the hedgehog can just tell me his na—"

She stopped. For a second, all was dead silent, and Penny wondered if she had just imagined it. But no, there it was again. The music had abruptly changed from an upbeat rhythm to something that resembled her favorite ribbon-dancing song! With an urge that only a true ribbon dancer could understand, she whipped out two of her poles and began to twirl.

The others all stopped and stared at her, their eyes wide, their jaws dropping wide open. They had no idea that she was capable of this, but she was. She had been practicing ever since she was a very little panda cub, and it was probably her favorite thing in the world to do.

This continued for a few seconds, and Penny Ling relished every heartbeat of it. Then, without warning, the lizard Vinnie slammed into her, apparently in the middle of one of his dance moved. Penny's eyes widened and she glared at him, fighting back the urge of tears. "Aw, Vinnie!" she snapped, and covered her mouth with her paws, hoping she didn't offend him.

He didn't seem offended, though, just kind of laughed and said, "Oops, sorry Penny Ling!" She glared at him once more and sort of stood up as the hedgehog walked into the clearing, now scattered with toys.

"Um, Zoe, maybe the song should end soon, we seem to be making quite a mess here…" he muttered as the dog whipped back next to him and the upbeat rhythm continued.

"This is Russell, Russell Ferguson, he's a little uptight and wants to get the song done," Zoe sang, and looked rather panicked for a second. Penny remembered what Russell had said before the song started: Zoe had no lines for after he was introduced.

But suddenly the ice blue eyes of the dog lit up, and she whipped around to the panda. "Penny Ling are you okay?" she sang.

Penny blinked, but nodded as she stood up, and watched as Zoe belted out the last line before the final chorus with complete and utter gusto.

"I think that's everybody, so what do you say?"

This final time the panda joined in with the singing, very softly, but she joined in all the same. "We're the littlest, littlest pet shop pets, yeah the littlest, littlest pet shop pets, we're the littlest, littlest pet shop pets, yes we're the littlest, littlest, littlest pet shop pets."

After the song ended, the whole group burst out into cheers, and crowded Penny like she was some sort of celebrity. "You were awesome!" Minka the monkey burst out, brushing Penny's nose with her tail.

"That ribbon-dancing was surely something," Pepper agreed gleefully. The skunk was now emitting her spray again, but this time it was a pinkish color, and when the panda sniffed at it, it smelled very good, like—

"—roses!" Sunil appeared to finish her thought.

The group laughed. "So, Penny, will you be staying with us a lot?" Russell asked curiously. The others stared at her, awaiting the answer.

"Well, today just three hours," mumbled Penny shyly, "but if it goes well today I'll get to stay all day, every day. That's what my owner says, at least." She scuffled at the ground and didn't meet the other's eyes.

"Three hours?" gasped Zoe. "That's hardly enough for us to play, and have lunch, and talk, and do all that wonderful stuff! Oh goodness me…I feel faint!" She put one paw to her head dramatically and collapsed onto a small pillow in the shape of a dog bone.

Penny blinked at her, and then looked up at the others, who looked like this was no big deal and was totally normal. She shrugged and decided to trust them.

"So how long have you guys been coming here?" the panda asked the others, looking at them curiously.

"I was the first," mumbled Zoe from the floor. "It was Russell after me, then Sunil and Pepper came about the same time, then Minka started to come, and Vinnie came after."

"That pretty much sums it all up," agreed Russell, who appeared to have been searching a clipboard clutched in one small paw for the exact information that Zoe had just given them. "But one could say that I'm pretty much the leader here."

"Russell keeps us all organized and in tip-top shape!" Minka agreed, poking the said hedgehog on the head with one of her paintbrushes.

"We used to be six, but now we're seven!" Vinnie exclaimed. "Because you think you're going to stay full time, right, Penny?" The green lizard looked at her hopefully, as well as all of the other pets standing around her in a circle. The panda began to back up against the wall.

"I'm not quite sure…" she whispered. "See, I've never really been around other pets much and…I don't know how to act."

"Pphf! That's easy," Pepper rolled her rose colored eyes. "We'll teach you how to act! It's just ever so simple. All you do is introduce yourself—or Zoe introduces you—and then ask them questions about themselves, blah, blah, blah…and of course a few jokes thrown into the mixture help too…"

"And play games," added Minka.

"Perform magic tricks!" Sunil announced.

"Sing!" Zoe trilled.

"Well, playing a game does sound rather fun, I guess. What should we play?" Penny asked quietly. The others looked around at each other, shrugging.

"I don't know," was heard from various sections of the room, until Minka piped up from the ceiling with, "Hide and go seek, oh, I love that game! Can we play it, can we can we can we?"

"If Penny thinks it's a good idea," Russell agreed, turning to the panda. She nodded, her light blue-grey eyes lighting up. This was one of her favorite games—she played it with her little owner Tara all of the time.

"Who wants to be 'it?'" asked Pepper, glaring around at everyone in the circle surrounding Penny. They murmured among themselves, until somehow it was decided that it would be Vinnie.

"Okay, I'm gonna count to fifteen now," he said, placing his webbed fingers over his closed eyes. "One…two…"

Everyone scattered, leaving Penny alone in the open. The little panda's eyes widened and she tried as quickly as she could to scurry away. She whipped her head around anxiously, quickly spotting a large fire hydrant toy. She scrambled up the slide and pushed herself inside just as Vinnie's voice outside echoed, "Fifteen!"

The next few minutes were hushed and hectic. Penny pressed herself against the side of the toy, hoping that no one would think to look for her here—and no one did. Vinnie found Minka first, followed by Sunil, and then Russell, followed by Pepper, and finally Zoe. No one could seem to find her.

But as they looked for her, they talked. Penny hadn't realized her hearing was so good, because she could hear everything they said. They were talking about a lot of different things at first.

Zoe seemed to want Pepper to admit something, but Pepper wouldn't say a thing. Vinnie was talking about his new dance moves, but admittedly, no one was listening to him. Sunil was muttering things under his breath, probably magic incarnations that were doing nothing whatsoever. Penny became tired, and wanted to go to sleep. Just as she felt her eyelids closing, she heard this:

"And that Penny Ling panda, what do you think of her?"

The one who had spoken was Vinnie, presumably to the others. Penny felt herself freeze—she was hardly able to breathe as she waited for the answer. The green gecko continued to talk, since none of the others had answered him.

"See, she's just weird. What pet never plays with others? We're all…social butterflies! She won't ever be able to fit in with us if she keeps up this attitude she seems to have."

Penny's grey-blue eyes filled with tears. She had to breathe in and out several times to stop herself from boiling over the edge. Now Zoe was talking.

"Vinnie, don't be mean! I think she seems like a dear, even if she can be a little…" The dog seemed to pause on that one word, thinking over the choices she had in her head. "…a little…quiet."

"If you all would stop talking," broke in the voice of Russell, "I think that she would make a lovely addition to the Littlest Pet Shop daycare. We just have to act like her friend—"

"But she's so WEIRD!" Vinnie burst out.

The other pets began to scold the gecko for his insensitiveness, seemingly forgetting they were supposed to be playing hide-and-go-seek. But Penny heard none of it. One drop of water—just a single drop, but enough to set her off—rolled down her cheek.

And then the floodgates burst.

Penny Ling sobbed her heart out, screeching and curling up into a ball as tears flew out of her eyes as easily as leaves fell off of trees. The other pets stopped talking as a wave of salty water washed towards them. Out of the corner of one crying eye the panda thought she saw Sunil open an umbrella. She hoped it didn't protect them. She didn't want it to protect them!

"Penny Ling?" Russell yelled over the crying. "Vinnie didn't mean to say such mean things, and we're really sorry, but…"

"Please stop crying!" yelled Minka over the commotion. Penny pretended like she didn't hear anything and continued to sob into her paws. The others looked at each other with worried expressions.

Pepper prodded Vinnie forward and muttered something in his ear. When it looked as if the gecko didn't want to say anything, the skunk stomped on his tail.

"OUCH!" yelped the green reptile. "Okay, okay…" He stepped forward and looked up at the little panda's hiding place. "Hey Penny Ling, I'm really—"

"I—*sniff*—don't want—*sniff*—any apologies! I—*sniff*—am never coming back!" Penny let out another very loud sob and clambered out of her hiding spot. "I'm leaving!" Crying her eyes out, she fled to the other end of the pet shop and clambered up the tree, curling into the top branches. She looked wearily at the clock in the front desk. Still an hour left to go.

Why is my life such a misery? Penny wondered, sniffling, before dropping off to sleep.

"Um…Penny Ling?"

The little panda opened her eyes halfway to see three figures surrounding her. At first she thought it was her little owner Tara and her mother and father, but with a further investigation, she realized with a sinking feeling that it was Zoe, Minka, and Pepper.

"What do you want?" she sniffled, curling up into a ball and looking away.

"See, darling, we felt terrible about what Vinnie said, and about making you cry and all," the lavender-and-violet dog started, looking genuinely concerned. Any trace of the earlier fierceness Penny had seen in her vanished promptly.

"We knew that you wouldn't take the apology well from Vinnie," the skunk continued, looking at the ground and sighing, scuffling the tree branch with one paw.

"But we REALLY want you to come back and play with us forever, so we wanted to say that we're REALLY, REALLY, REALLY sorry for Vinnie!" Minka finished. "And while you were a-sleeping and a-snoozing, I made you this painting!"

The pink spider monkey held out a flat canvas to the panda, and, overwhelmed by her own curiosity, Penny Ling took it in her small paws.

She nearly choked on tears.

It was a picture of…her! And not just her, but her dance with her beautiful ribbons. Minka's art made it seem like she was floating, and the ribbons were her wings. It was one of the most beautiful things Penny had ever seen. She didn't know what quite to say.

"I…I…" she stuttered. The three pets looked at her with several different expressions—hope in Pepper's eyes, anxiousness in Minka's, and a calm, collected coolness in Zoe's. When she didn't say anything more, Pepper continued to talk.

"Now, Penny Ling," she said, allowing the smallest of smiles to creep to the corner of her mouth. "What do you want to do for the remaining…half hour that you're here?"

The panda took a deep breath and let a wide grin creep across her face. "Let's play a game of tag, how 'bout?"

And what I say next is absolutely the truth: the whole shop almost vibrated with the sounds of the cheers of the other pets as they realized that they'd made a new friend, and not screwed it up.

"Penny! Penny Ling, I'm back to take you home! Oh, you've made some friends? Well, isn't that just the greatest thing ever?"

Tara was as bouncy and as full of energy as she had ever been—going to her school hadn't changed her a bit. Penny was sure happy to be going back home, but she felt like there was a hole inside of her as she watched the other pets wave goodbye.

"Hope we'll see you again!" screeched Minka as she waved wildly.

"I think you will," Penny whispered, grinning as Tara and her mother walked out of the shop. Mrs. Twombly waved goodbye from the counter.

"So, Penny," the little girl said, looking down at her panda pet. "Would you like to go back there for full time, officially?"

Penny grinned up at her owner, and chirped, "Yes, definitely."

Somehow, even though all Tara could hear was little chirps and slight, friendly growls, Penny Ling knew, as she gazed back at Littlest Pet Shop, that her owner understood what she meant.

She would go back to Littlest.

"You won't get rid of me yet," Penny whispered teasingly back at the disappearing pet shop. "Oh, you won't get rid of me for a long while."

Curled up in Tara's arms, she snuggled closely to the little girl's stomach as Littlest Pet Shop disappeared from view. Penny wasn't worried, though.

She knew she would see it, and all of her newfound friends, again.