The Art of the Web

Chapter 1: Spider Infestation

Disclaimer: I do not own Skunk Fu or any of its characters. They belong to Cartoon Saloon and CAKE Entertainment. However, the story line and any OC (Original Characters) that appears in this story belong to me.

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It has been a week ever since Raccoon agreed to come to the Valley with Skunk, Fox, and Rabbit. To recap, he is the last line of the Raccoonus family. He has been living by himself in his family temple for five years. In those years, countless thieves kept on coming to take the families prized possession, a scroll that contains not only his history, but probably more then ten-thousand kung fu moves and fighting styles. Raccoon lost his ability to trust ever since, but when he met Skunk and his friends, he got it back.

He really liked the Valley, for many reasons. For one, he has made many new friends, he has gotten to know all of them: Tiger, Snake, Mantis, Mr. Fish, Crane, Ms. Duck, Bird, Ox, Pig, Dr. Turtle, the Killer Bees, and Frog. They were all very nice to him... although there was one occasion with the Killer Bees, he accidentally disturbed the Killer Bees's hive, he got stung so much it practically paralyzed him. But despite this, he still likes the residents of the valley. The second reason is that he loved the scenery. The grass and the flowers and the gentle gust of wind for once on his face.

Panda has not only agreed to let Raccoon stay here, he also agreed to let Raccoon be an apprentice. Right now, he and Panda were training at the valley hill top. Both were in a zen-like state meditation. Both side across each other, taking deep breaths, inhaling and exhaling. Panda had to admit, training with Raccoon was a little... different. He expected Raccoon to act like Skunk, skipping the calm exercises to the fighting arts. But he acts like... well, more like him. This is what really amazed Panda.

Panda opened one eye on the side where Raccoon is, "I must say young one, you're different then what I expected." Panda said.

Having heard this, Raccoon did the same thing to Panda and opened one eye, "What do you mean?" Raccoon asked.

Panda chuckled lightly, "When I was just training Skunk, he always wanted to go straight into the fighting arts." Panda continued, "But you, you haven't argued about my teachings."

"Hmm, really?" Raccoon received a nod from Panda, "Ha, can't say I'm suprised though. The difference between me and Skunk is that I like to take things slow, I relax myself before learning the ways of fighting."

"Is that right?"

"Yeah, its like my family says, 'you can't build a castle without laying the foundation'."

Panda chuckled lightly, "I couldn't have said it better myself."

Both closed their eyes back and both inhaled and exhaled their breath. "It sure is a nice day today." Panda commented.

"I know, it's so peaceful, not a care in the world." Raccoon agreed. But, unknowing to them, mostly Panda, a spider was coming down and landed on his nose. Panda had an annoyed look on his face and started to wiggle his nose, Panda's face turned from a calm look to an annoyed one. He then started to wiggle his nose to get rid of this irritation. Since it didn't come off he has to swish it away, he opened his eyes to see the black spider on his nose.

His eyes widened, "GA-OOH!" he screamed, Panda lost his balance and rolled down the hill. Raccoon had already gotten up after Panda screamed and watched his master rolling down the hill and he flinched when he heard a loud crash.

"Panda, are you alright?!" Raccoon yelled out.

He listened real hard to hear Panda say something, then he heard him. "Get... Dr. Turtle..." Raccoon was about to go till he heard a different voice.

"And a ice pack!" the voice yelled, Raccoon guessed that Panda ran over someone and ran to get Turtle.

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Duck was at her kitchen cooking her famous dumplings for everyone's lunch. She is also making soup for them to. She was humming a tune to herself as she was looking through her cook books. "Now lets see here, 2 cups of sliced onions." She raised her wing without leaving her gaze on the book, she quickly chopped the onions with her wing. She scooped the chopped onions and tossed it inside the pot. "Next, I add in the celery and the carrots." She placed the book down and grabbed the carrots and celery and did the same thing with the onions. She then tossed it into the mix.

She stirred her soup while adding some some salt and pepper, "And finally, I add in two sliced potatoes and let it boil." She went to grab two potatoes, but when grabbed the potato she accidentally grabbed a brown tarantula, "Huh? I don't remember a potato being so hairy." Then the "potato" started to move and popped out 8 legs. "AAH!" Duck screamed and tossed it in the air, the spider landed and scurried away when Duck attempts to squish it wit a skillet.

She chased after it with each smash missing it, she jumped up into the air and slammed the skillet on it, but Tiger came into the scene screaming for some reason and Duck hit Tiger on the head. Tiger fell down on the ground with a bump on his head. Duck landed seeing what she did, "Oh, dear." Then she heard another scream seeing Panda rolling down the hill coming towards Tiger and her. "Oh, my" she said as Panda collided with Duck and Tiger.

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Pig, Ox, and Bird were near the river, they were eating a big bowl of blueberries as a snack.

"Mmm, these are the sweetest blueberries I have ever tasted." Bird commented.

"Yeah, they're awesome." Ox said, as they continued to eat Tiger came by walking.

"Hi, Tiger." Pig greeted.

"Hi, guys." Tiger waved at them, "Might I ask what you are eating?"

"Blueberries, you want some?" Ox offered as he pushed the bowl to Tiger.

"Sure." Tiger grabbed several blue berries with his paw and tossed them in his mouth. He chewed and swallowed his food, "These are delicious." He took another handful and stuffed them in his mouth, "Where did you get them?"

"We got it from that bush over there." Bird said as he pointed out the bush of blue berries. Tiger went to the bush and started to pick out of the bush and start eating, but he didn't notice that he grabbed a blue colored spider and tossed it in his mouth.

"Wow. Tiger just ate a cool looking blueberry, it had 8 legs and orange eyes on it." Pig said out loud.

Tiger's eyes widen opened after hearing Pig what he said. He spat out the blueberries to see that Pig was right, he put a spider in his mouth. He started to run away screaming as he reached near a hill, he was suddenly got bonked in the head by Duck with a skillet at hand(or wing in her case). And if that wasn't bad enough for Tiger, Panda came rolling down the hill and crashed on Tiger and Duck. Then they heard Raccoon's voice, "Panda, are you alright?!"

Panda got up from his back, a little dizzy, "Get... Dr. Turtle..." He said before falling down again.

Then Tiger got up and shouted, "And a ice pack!" And fell like Panda.

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Ever since this incident happened they announced an immediate meeting of the valley. Most of the valley animals were at the top of the hill all were overlapping with different conversations of their 'recent visitors'. They all stopped to see Tiger, Panda, Duck, and Dr. Turtle coming up. They were surprised that they see Tiger, Duck and Panda covered in bandages and Tiger holding an ice pack over his head.

"Whoa. What happened to you guys?" Rabbit asked.

"It's a long story." Panda, Duck, and Tiger replied simultaneously. Panda got to his seat as well as Tiger, Duck, and Dr. Turtle.

"Now I believe you know why you're all here." Panda said and most responded with nodds. "Well for those of you that don't know, there has been an unusual large amount of spiders in the valley."

"You're telling me, I almost ate one." Tiger said as a bad memory came to his head and shuddered at that moment.

"Do you think Baboon is doing this?" Rabbit asked.

"Well he did try to attack us with an army of ants." Fox replied.

"That I do not know, but I'm having both Snake and Crane to be on lookout to see if the monkeys are planning this invasion." Panda said he was about to continue till Skunk interrupted.

"Master Panda, where's Raccoon?" Skunk asked.

"I'm having Raccoon to search around the valley to capture all the spiders to prevent anymore mishaps." Panda answered.

"Can I help him?"

"Of course, he must be at the training grounds by now." Panda said as Skunk left the meeting to find Raccoon.

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"Gotcha." Raccoon said as he caught another spider and put it in the jar. "Okay, this makes my 20th capture." He then placed the trapped spider with the others in a wagon. "I don't know why, but I have a bad feeling that something in my past is coming back to haunt me." Raccoon was about to ponder about more of this till he heard someone.

"Hey, Raccoon." Raccoon turned to who was calling him, it was Skunk.

"Hey, Skunk. I thought you were at the gathering."

"I was, but I volunteered to help you catch the spiders."

"Alright, help me pull the wagon."

Skunk and Raccoon went in front of the wagon and pulled to there next location. The day went on with Skunk and Raccoon finding and capturing the spiders from the rest of the valley. In the meantime, the other animals were still at the meeting. This time the insects of the valley(the Killer Bees, Mantis, and the Fireflies) were talking about the spider issue.

"Yo Panda, you've gotta do something about them spiders man." one of the Killer Bees said.

"Yes. I must insist. Something. Must be done." Mantis said.

"We don't want to be caught by those hideous, hairy beast while moving in the night." Blinky's mother said then turned to Rabbit, "No offense."

"GRR, WHY I OUGHTA!" Rabbit yelled and was about to attack but was held down by Fox and Tiger.

"Please, I understand your concern." Panda said then the bees went near Panda's face as he leaned backwards.

"Oh yeah! Well, how would you feel if you're stuck on a spider's web and your body fluids drained out of your still-breathing body, huh?!" the Killer Bees said.

"W-well, I..." Panda stammered.

"Now hold on there, we're not the enemy here." Turtle said preventing someone from getting hurt again, "We are dealing with the situation, but it takes time."

"Fine." The Bees said as they flew back to their nest. Panda relaxed and took a deep breath. Then he sees Raccoon and Skunk came in with Snake and Crane.

"Alright, what do you have to report?" Panda asked.

"Well, Skunk and I searched the entire valley and caught 50 spiders so far." Raccoon answered.

"Hmm, I see." Panda said then turned to Crane and Snake, "And you two?"

"I have been snooping around the mountains and confirmed that neither Baboon or Dragon aren't planning anything involving this conspiracy." Snake said then Crane stepped up.

"Although, it seems that the monkeys are having the same problem as we are." Crane said.

"So Dragon and Baboon aren't the cause of this, then who?" Panda wondered. Mostly everyone was thinking who else could have done this and why. Then Skunk and Raccoon yawned clearly that they are tired. "Everyone it is getting late, you all should get some sleep, we will be discussing this matter in the morning." Panda ordered and they agreed as they went back to their homes to get some sleep. While everyone went down the hill Raccoon remained.

He looked out at the forest with a sudden feeling knowing where this all started, "I have a bad feeling about this." Raccoon said grimly as he went down to get some sleep.