Author's Note: That's right, I've already started my next story. If there's one thing I learned from "The Art of Assassination", it's that I love writing the Wu Sisters, so I took that to it's logical conclusion and decided to write an entire backstory fic about them. There is exactly one other story like this that I'm aware of: "Circling Flames" by Synchronized Harmony, which unfortunately never made it past three chapters. So here's hoping I can actually finish this thing.

Please note that this will be quite a lot darker than TaoA, so I upped the rating to T.

Anyway, on with the story.

Chapter 1: The Vow

The city of Jinzhou was known for a lot of things. Among those were street-fighting, rampant crime, and the large, dark forest that surrounded it. On this particular night, that forest was lit by only a single source of light coming from a small campfire. Huddled around the fire were three clouded leopard cubs, covered in tattered brown clothes and dirt-ridden fur.

Their names were Su, Wing, and Wan Wu, and as of now, they were orphans.

This wasn't as big of a shift for them as one might think. Their family had always been dirt poor, so they were used to living in squalor and struggling to survive. Most people would ask why a poor couple would want three more mouths to feed. The short answer would be, they didn't. They never wanted children at all, but their libidos were apparently more important to them than survival. And since they couldn't afford birth control herbs…frankly, they were lucky they only got three.

Needless to say, it wasn't a huge surprise when the sisters woke up one morning to find that they were the only ones in the house.

"I think the rice is ready," Wing said, peering into the pot that sat on top of the fire. "Su, come help me with this."

Su nodded and walked over to the pot, ignoring the pricking of the pebbles on her bare feet. Shoes were just another luxury their family couldn't afford. As far as they were concerned, having natural pads on your feet was enough of an excuse not to bother with them.

Luckily for them, the house wasn't left completely empty as there were still a few stray loaves of bread and some bags of rice left in the pantry. Su wondered if their parents had simply forgotten them, or if they wanted to give their daughters some kind of fighting chance. The idea that they did it out of compassion she dismissed entirely. They never cared about them before; why start now?

"Got it?"

"Yeah."

Su and Wing grabbed onto the pot and used their combined strength to lift it and drain the water into the grass. They then emptied the rice into three separate bowls and took two of them for themselves. Su brought the remaining bowl over to Wan, who barely acknowledged it.

Like all children, they had once been innocent and naïve, firmly believing that their parents loved them despite all evidence to the contrary. But over the years, their continued neglect eventually killed that attitude, replacing it with bitter cynicism. Su and Wing had stopped caring about their parents quite some time ago.

Wan unfortunately, had never reached that stage. While her sisters warned her not to grow too attached to their parents, Wan ignored them, thinking they were just overreacting. So when it became clear that their parents had truly abandoned them, she took it much harder. She had spent the past few days huddled in the sisters' shared bedroom, doing almost nothing but sleeping and crying. After failing to get her to come out, Su and Wing were forced to just leave her food outside her door and hope that she would recover in time. It was only today that she had finally left her room and joined her sisters around the campfire, but she wasn't looking much better. She hadn't said a word to them and was keeping her gaze firmly on the ground. Seeing the normally perky and cheerful Wan in this state disturbed her sisters greatly.

Su couldn't take it anymore and she placed a comforting paw on Wan's shoulder. She wasn't expecting much of a response, but she felt that she had to help. "Wan, please cheer up. It'll be okay."

To her surprise, Wan didn't just respond, she actually yelled at her. "Okay?! Our parents are gone! They're goneand they're never coming back! How is that okay?!"

It took Su a moment to think of an acceptable answer to that question. "Because we don't need them." Wan didn't seem to understand, so Su repeated herself. "Our parents. We don't need them."

This time she got it. "W-What are you talking about?! Of course we need them!" she cried.

Wan was near-hysterical now, but Su remained calm. "Do we? Remember that time you fell and sprained your ankle? Who was it that brought you inside to rest and watched over you? Was it our parents?"

"N-No," Wan shakily admitted. "That was y-you and Wing…"

Wing caught on quickly to what Su was doing and decided to help out. "Yeah, and what about that time I got sick from River Fever? Who was it that brought me food and water until I got better?"

"T-That was us…"

Su nodded. "Exactly. We've always had to take care of ourselves. The only ones we can rely on are each other." She extended one paw towards her sisters face-down. "I want us to make a vow. No matter what happens, no matter what hardships we face, we will always, always, stick together."

Wing put her paw in on top of Su's almost immediately, but Wan hesitated. "Wan?" Wing asked, glaring at her accusingly.

"I-I'm sorry. It's not that I'm not loyal to you, it's just..."

"You're still loyal to them," Wing growled. Wan flinched under Wing's glare.

Su gave her a much warmer look. "Wan, please. You need to let them go. Everything will be okay, I promise."

Wan still looked uncertain for a moment, but after a long pause, she finally smiled for the first time in far too long. With one arm, she reached up and wiped the remaining tears frm her eyes. With the other, she placed her paw on top of her sisters'.

"It's settled then. Let it be known that the Wu Sisters shall always be together." The three sisters finished their meal with renewned hope. They didn't know what trails awaited them in the future, but at least they knew that they wouldn't have to face them alone.