Greetings, everyone. I have a new story. Or is it an older story?
This is18 something like a Prequel to "Tai Lung – The Journey". It5 tells the background story of4 the character Cien, who has his13 first appearance in "Tai Lung – The Journey" and reappears15 in "Kung Fu Panda: Light and Shadow", where15 he has a bigger role. And he will also have a role14 in the coming sequel of "Kung Fu Panda: Light and Shadow". He also appears in "Space Panda".
This story will even have a cover picture from the start, which I have drawn myself. Okay I can't draw very well, but I hope these eyes look still good.
I hope you will have fun reading this story, as much as I will have fun writing it.
Kung Fu Panda belongs to DreamWorks.
This part of the world, the idea and these characters belong to me.
"So where should I begin?" I ask.
"It's your story. Decide for yourself, Cien." Aijna replies.
"Oh, I can decide for myself?...That makes it not easier you know?"
She sighs.
"Need I remind you that it was your idea?"
"No, no….I will find a starting point. Give me only some time to think about this."
"Will this last long? I admit we have time, but I am not the pat..."
"Wait, I have it!"
She sighs again.
"…Good…then begin."
"Once was very good looking young panther...how this sounds?"
"Like a fairy tale. Every word of it."
"Ha ha. Very funny."
"I know, I am a very funny vixen."
She grins gleefully.
"Okay…this panther had a friend...a very good friend…"
"Wait a minute. Isn't this already too far?"
"What do you mean?"
"For example how have you met him?"
"…Yeah you are right. So where...Ha! I have a better idea."
"Good. Where will you start this time?"
"...I think I begin there...where everyone begins..."
Birth of a Shadow
Act I
Chapter I: Everyone has a beginning
Once upon a time in a country far far away I was born.
…Yeah it sounds like a fairy tale, but you must admit, that this is a fact like by everyone.
I was born a panther like my mother and my father were. My mother was the smaller one, with a face, which smiles often and has sad blue eyes. She had a birthmark on her chest: a white spot.
My father had more noticeable cheek fur, bigger jaws and sharp yellow eyes. He had fought once in a war, where he learned many skills and got a small scar, which crossed his mouth, but he never told us about this time. About his origins he kept discreet also.
When I was born, I had already a sister, three years older than me. Her name was Alice, but we called her Liz and me also Sis. She wore always some brown clothes and a red headband. She resembled mother from who she had the same birthmark, although she had dad's eyes. Also her character had much of our mum.
By the way my eyes are the perfect mix of my parents. My eyes are green.
We lived in a small village at the border of the civilization. The next village was at least two days away.
Okay "in the village" is an exaggeration. Outside of it, close to the forest is more correctly. The villagers didn't like us much. We were the only felines in the whole region. In the village, which had the characteristic name "Granica Swiata" – which means Frontier of the World – were living most often sheep, dogs, ducks, pigs, goats, chickens and cows. And obviously we were treated like outsiders also and fortunately only that.
The villagers didn't like us, but needed us. My father was the only lumberjack of the village, because everyone feared the forest. They said that ghosts and monsters were lurking in there.
Our house was built by my dad with his own hands and was nothing more than a small hut out of wood. Close to it was a bigger lake, which reached also to the village. They said that once a beautiful girl has died in there, while swimming in the middle of it. Since then it is told, that the ghost of this girl appears when it is Full Moon and the anniversary of her death.
You see in our small village there are many more stories like that. Believe them or not, I never cared for them much.
And oh yeah, my name. My mother called me Jacob, after her father. But all called me only Kuba, a shorten version of the name. Only my Sis called me Maly Kuba, what means nothing more than Little Kuba. Or simply only Maly, which means Little One. And no it was not meant in a positive manner. You see she was bigger than me. And indeed the whole time I knew her. My father, who was also bigger than me, said always that she had more of him in matters of the size and me more of my mother.
After I began to understand, what this means to be smaller than a girl, my life had always a horrible after taste in it.
We lived in peace. My father went working in the forest, my mother cared for us, my Sis explored the world around her and I began to make my first steps. More than once I landed in the grass, but I tried it still.
Although I don't remember much about my first years – who does? – my first memorable memory was, when I was still very young. My Sis and I played in the lake, while mother was washing our clothes. I played with her "Horror from the Deep Sea" and tried to surprise her by diving and reappearing again where she didn't expect it. My swimming skills weren't the best, although it was still enough in the shallow area close to the banks, and by the way she could see always my back. But then I tried to dive deeper and got caught by sea plants. I couldn't set myself free and my lungs were filling with water. Then I passed out.
I awoke in our small hut. My mum and dad looked very happy and also very tired. Sis was standing in a background holding her tears. Till today I don't know, why she had cried. Of joy or guilt.
Since this incident I had a fear against water.
….
No, this is not explained correctly. Fear is an exaggeration. I….simply didn't like the water. That is all. …Really…
And since this incident my sister started to be stricter with me. Once I mistook this for being mean to me, but today I know that she did this, because she wanted to prevent another such incident. In this way she prevented many fun things, which I wanted to do, although I did them after I learned to trick her. Somehow to do what she forbade me was a much bigger fun, than doing the things itself.
When I was old enough, my father began to teach me. My father had a big knowledge about many different things. And like always he didn't talk much about where he learned it. My Sis he taught already three years longer than me.
He took us also into the forest.
I think he had different reasons for doing this. First was probably that he didn't want that we would be as superstitious as the villagers. Second was that we shouldn't be as fearful as them. Third was that he wanted us to teach orientation in a complete alien terrain. Fourth was that he wanted to show us his work as lumberjack. And fifth he wanted to teach us, how the forest looked like.
And the forest was beautiful and fearful at once. Many of the trees were very old and the ones, which weren't, were the ones he had planted himself in the areas, where he had cut the others down. In this way we learned that he wasn't only a lumberjack, but also a forester. He showed us the beautiful ways of life, which existed in the forest and nowhere else. He showed us small hills, small streams, rivers, small ponds, where we met big families of different amphibians, which greeted us, small families of birds, which lived in the trees outside of the village and much more.
The most impressive things were the ruins, built of people, which were nothing more than dust already, when my grandpa still lived. There were walls, towers, roads and castles. Today no one knows, who built them or for what purpose. All is forgotten.
My life changed dramatically – although I didn't guess this back then – when the first outlanders came. They were many, – most often dogs and wolves – dressed in armors, equipped with swords, axes, shields and much more. Their pigeon heralds said they are here, to occupy this land for their Duke Piast from the Western Lands.
First we were shocked, but after they planted only a flag in the ground – on the red flag was the picture of a white eagle with a crown – they marched further to the east. For a long time we wouldn't see them again.
At the same day I and Sis and dad walked through the forest.
"Wow, did you see these weapons? Much bigger than grandpa's sword." I explained.
"These guys looked creepy. So closed up.", my Sis added.
"Yeah and this strict faces. Like they hadn't fun for years anymore."
"I bet when they would go for a quick swim, they would look much nicer."
We crossed a small river by jumping over it and reached one of the tower ruins. It was built on a very small hill close to the river. Stone stairs led upwards to a platform, which ended in the pathetic rests of a tower. It is not the first time we were here.
"Look out, Maly." my Sis said after she jumped over it as well.
"Who is first up there." I said and began to run up, after she reached me.
Although I am the smaller one, I was always the faster. So she had no chance of reaching the platform before me.
"Winning!" I shouted loud and began to jump up and down.
Then I noticed him.
"Sis, look!" I said to her after she reached me and began to run to the location I noticed. In the middle of the tower ruin was lying someone. He was almost completely hidden under a grey cloak, but his feet could be seen. They were black.
"Look out!" my Sis said to me before calling for dad.
Then I reached him. The grey cloak had red spots on it. I took the cloak and threw it away.
It was my first – but not known from me then not the last – time I saw blood. He was covered in it from toe to head. He was a black wolf and his eyes were closed.
I tried to touch him, when he opened his eyes fast. He grabbed my hand and brought a dagger close to my throat. His eyes were black and showed fear. Not normal fear, but fear for his life like I know today.
First I thought he would pierce me through, but then he seemed to realize that I am not the one, he expected. His eyes got tired from one moment to another and he dropped the dagger, while letting my arm go. He collapsed on the ground again, eyes closed.
I tripped backwards shocked and panting.
My father pushed me away. He kneed down to the wolf boy.
"Is he…dead?" my Sis asked before she had closed up her mouth with her hands. She looked scared.
"No..." my dad said after a longer break.
He took him in his arms. "We need to get him to the hut. Fast! We can still save him."
So we ran back to our hut.
This was my first meeting with the person, which I would hate the most once.
