THE PAST BECOMES THE PRESENT
Eager for this chapter I know you've all been, and now will be presented with it! It's the most intense chapter of the fic, mind you, and that's saying a lot! So, anyhow, here we are! Chapter 4 of this five chapter fanfic! It may not be the conclusion or the whole climax, but its powerfulness will more than fill those empty slots along with utterly knock you dead! So let's get on with it without further ado, shall we?
I own not a single one of the characters except for Cu-Hun. All others belong to Kung Fu Panda/Dreamworks Studios!
The story continues from where it last left off!
Chapter 4-The Final Rise And Fall Of Pure Evil!
Beginning this chapter, we look into the dungeon lair of Cu-Hun first, where he and his remaining assassins currently were. They had been in here for a while, and they had been talking about when to mount their next assault. Specifically, at what point of Tigress and the developing of her cruel crystal created condition. After much discussing, they at last reached a conclusion.
"As you know," Cu-Hun said, "those of you who are still here did a marvelous job in your assistance to me. Furthermore, what we set out to do was an utter success. Which means that you deserve rewards galore for such loyalty, hard work and bravery. As such, we will make sure to attack just as Tigress is in the last stage of her condition, as well as her life, and thus destroy the others with maximum agony caused to them, and maximum fear struck into the villagers, thus insuring we will conquer Peace Valley without question and all get endless spoils on top of it."
"Sounds like the best way for us to do it to me, fearless leader!" an assassin told him. "So, how long do you think Tigress has been affected by this? Is now the time for us to go, or is it best to wait?" "Allow me to check with my sorcery powers…" Cu-Hun replied as he put his black magic to use to find out about the answer to his assassin's question. He very quickly realized Tigress was getting rapidly closer to the end of this, though a lot was still gonna happen, but even so, and he said: "Now would be the perfect time for us to go! She is, in fact, approaching the stage where she's truly beyond reach! So it would be best we took off now for maximum impact of victory and to cause her and her friends, not to mention the whole Peace Valley, maximum pain!"
"Hey, we aren't arguing with that!" said another assassin. "Especially since we'll get to make the others pay for taking down our pals in our last fight!" "Then let's go!" Cu-Hun said. "The sooner we get there, the greater a result of the sort described we'll get!" So all of his assassins who still lived gathered around him, and he used a teleportation spell to get them exactly where Tigress currently was. Speaking of that, let's get to the part I know you've been REALLY suspense-laden about. Namely, Tigress's next explosive power burst.
As seen before, Tigress now had a black alien symbiote with white eyes and a giant white spider on the chest go all over her body from head to toe, and a green power ring was on her right index finger. She could not stop a thing as the ring created all kinds of horrible monstrosities and engines of destruction which tore across this region of the valley, and also many killer weapons which immediately went off. She couldn't stop a thing when the alien symbiote twisted itself in so many ways and invariably attacked innocent villagers, and also sprayed webbing almost everywhere, either!
"MAKE THIS END!" Tigress cried. "I DON'T WANT TO DESTROY THIS VALLEY! HEEEELP!" Tigress may have been a strong spirited woman, but she still had a breaking point like everyone else, and all this had pushed her way past that breaking point. Yeah, she was the most powerful member of the Furious Five, but this was not only ridiculous, it was outright scary, downright deadly and utterly dangerous in the worst kind of fashion! Especially when the symbiote disappeared off her and so did the ring, only for several batarangs to fly outta her paws and go everywhere, and then for her to yell: "HADOKEN! NO! I DIDN'T SAY THAT! NO! I DEMAND THIS TO STOP!" and for a gigantic blue fireball to fly into the air and cause humongous-ass explosions galore. Tigress's level of lack of control was higher than ever.
"We have to stop her and cure her, but how?" Po screamed. "There's no way to even approach her, let alone do her in or shut off this disaster power explosion she's been afflicted with!" "TIGRESS!" Tai Lung called. "I KNOW YOU CAN HEAR ME! IT'S ME, TAI LUNG! USE YOUR MIND! YOUR SPIRIT! YOUR…" Tigress tried, but it only took a second for her to be unable to and cause an immense explosion of light which was followed by a great many ray blasts of light, which Tai Lung and Po had to duck under while they shielded the others with their arms. "Well, that didn't work!" commented Monkey. "SHUT IT!" Po and Tai Lung yelled at him furiously in unison. "Sorry…" Monkey said quietly.
The past was becoming the present in nearly every way. All the destruction caused by Tai Lung snapping, going nuts and going on his ultra-insane rampage was now returning a ten fold, all of Tigress' lack of control of her strength she previously had was now back with her and magnified by an order of magnitude and everything Shifu feared of her once and also once knew and feared of Tai Lung was right now occurring right before his and everyone else's eyes. And, as if that weren't enough, all of the horrible suffering Tigress went through was returned, only now in a new form for a new reason. But, just as it seemed things could not get any worse, the seven heroes trying to help Tigress heard a familiar voice.
"Yeah, quite a sight to behold, isn't it? But she's about to be lucky compared to you bastards and bitches!" "That voice…" exclaimed Crane. Everyone got up and turned to see that it was, in fact, Cu-Hun and his remaining assassins. "YOU!" Viper exploded, which was very unlike her, but this was way too much of an emergency and something that she was unable to stand. "YOU DID THIS TO TIGRESS, YOU ASSHOLE!" "And look at all the innocent lives you're destroying!" Tai Lung shouted. "Even when I was berserk and crazy, I did not cause this much damage and destruction!" "Glad to know I leave your ass in the dust, Lung!" Cu-Hun cruelly derided him. "By the way, my magical powers tell me you've gotten some warm feelings developed for Tigress and vice-versa. Won't it be just heartbreaking to watch her die, then? Which she will soon." "I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU!" Tai Lung roared, but Po grabbed him before he could throw himself at Cu-Hun.
"Tai Lung, the last time we tried to fight him, he crushed and sliced us, and that was when you, me, Shifu and Tigress were facing him all at once! You'll only get yourself made into another one of his victims! I know your reason, and I don't blame you, but we can't make this already hell on earth situation worse!" "Point taken, panda." Tai Lung replied. "But if you could let go of me so that maybe there'd be something we could do to help Tigress and/or take down Cu-Hun, or at least a chance for that…" "Of course." Po said, letting go of him. But then the group of heroes was torn between two powerful obstacles. If they tried to help Tigress, Cu-Hun would destroy them along with his assassins. If they tried to attack Cu-Hun and his assassins, Tigress could die and so could they. It was an impossible spot!
"So, you find yourselves in such a painful position!" Cu-Hun told them. "Serves you right for killing our pals!" snidely remarked one of the assassins. "Which, by the way, you'll pay for! We guarantee it!" another assassin added. Just then, Tigress was seen in the air. Her new light powers propelled her up there after she unleashed them, as they'd given her the power to fly once more. "Ah, looks like she's gotten high again!" Cu-Hun punned, which instilled fury in all seven of the kung-fu heroes. He laughed in their faces and said: "My assassins! Take care of them! I will tend to Tigress. After all, by now, she doubtless is broken worse than a dead stick, at least spiritually, anyway, and just wants to fucking die. So I'll go and speed up the process of what my crystal's curse would do to her anyway and grant her wish! !"
The assassins did not have to be asked twice. Not at all. They took to facing off against the seven kung fu heroes aside from Tigress while Cu-Hun went directly for Tigress herself. While Tigress was throwing her light bolts and flashes around and also making explosions of the stuff, she was also making sharp spikes of bone and many wooden thorns fly out of her body, all of which were raining down everywhere. "Well, Tigress, had a good go with your new powers, eh?" asked Cu-Hun. "How do you like them? How does it feel to be the most powerful being in all of China? !" He then teleported them to the end of a cliff, which was above several tall stone, stalagmite resembling spikes. It was obvious how he meant to see Tigress dead after a long fight.
We will look at Cu-Hun's fight with Tigress, but after we see how the rest of his assassins are dealt with by Tai Lung, Shifu, Po, Viper, Crane, Monkey and Mantis. One of the assassin minions of Cu-Hun said: "We meet again for the second and last time. You got lucky with the others. Now that luck runs out along with your lifespans." "Not a chance, assholes!" Tai Lung snarled. "We nailed half of you jerks before, and that was Tigress had no threatening condition and we thus weren't determined to help her ASAP, nor furiously hateful towards the source of that shit!" "You have no chance against us now!" added Crane. "We'll just see about that." an assassin sneered as they charged at one another.
Soon enough, there was a melee, but it predictably looked to be a pretty damn one sided melee. Because let me tell you, here's how the fight went. Firstly, six assassins were all at once fighting Shifu, one of them going: "The one where it all started! First the snow leopard, then the Furious Five and finally the panda! Sure, all have joined up and all loose ends have been tied up, but now it ends for he who began it!" But Shifu told them: "I'm afraid you couldn't be more wrong. The only ones who it's ending for are the six of you!" He then proceeded to beat them about with his stick, fists, feet and head. Soon enough, all of them had gotten their necks broken and lay down dead. There was also the matter of Viper, Mantis and Monkey, all three of whom were facing assassins galore, much more than their master. And one assassin said: "Before the three of you die, please tell me. How does it feel that your leader is soon going to perish from that crystallization treatment she got? And especially since she's like a sister to you, snake?" "You just signed your own death warrants for sure!" Mantis snapped, and he, Viper and Monkey were on them like stink on shit. All three of them beat about the assassins until all of them lay dead and in pools of blood, and Viper said: "That'll teach you to use personal attacks!" Then Monkey commented: "You did it to us emotionally, so we did it to you physically!" He held up two pairs of balls he'd torn off of his share of assassins he killed during the vicious fight. Viper, again, was normally not like she was now, but much too much was at stake and pissing her off for her to be her usual, kind self.
Now we go to Crane, who was surrounded by several assassins on his own, and then one spoke: "We hear you're the most mature member of the Furious Five, feathers." Another told him: "We wonder if maturity will mean crap when you're facing many of us at once like you are, though?" A third mentioned: "Me, I have to say I have my fucking doubts!" All of them started laughing evilly, but Crane snapped: "Allow me to prove those doubts wrong, then!" He normally was very patient and slow to anger, but in this case, there was too much of an emergency, and the way they were disrespecting him in the midst of it was just too hard an obstacle for his maturity to overcome. Considering Tigress's life was on the line, that was understandable. So Crane flew in and knocked the assassins off their feet, then saying: "So who's laughing now, you good for nothing murderers?" He then dove on down and began beating them up with his wings, feet and bill, until at last all lay dead above him. Although Crane was rather out of breath, he knew he'd won, so he felt good nonetheless.
Finally, we go to the assassins that Po and Tai Lung were facing, who would really get pasted for two reasons. The first was the power level of the two, and the second, well, you'll see it. Anyhow, Po said: "Okay, Tai Lung, we're the two most powerful members of this group, so naturally we get the most of Cu-Hun's assassins to deal with!" "Of course we do, Po!" Tai Lung said. "But they won't stand a chance against even ONE of us, let alone both at once!" "Oh, we won't, will we?" asked an assassin as he threw ninja stars at them. But they dodged and Po ran in and flattened, beat up, crushed and kicked to death half of the bunch he and Tai Lung were facing, undoubtedly the half who meant to attack him. "Yeah, I think you won't." Po replied. But with Tai Lung, things got much more brutal in terms of how he'd fight. Why? Because one of the assassins he was facing said: "Well, the panda destroyed half of us rather well, I admit. But with all your current emotional conflictions from the tiger's current condition, we're willing to bet your otherwise impressive talents will have been cut quite short, yes?" "NEVER." Tai Lung growled. "And you're about to find out just how extreme a degree of never it is."
"Is that a fact?" asked another assassin. "By the way, Cu-Hun gave us implications earlier that you were starting to develop feelings for the bitch who is Tigress, and vice versa. In fact, you two were bound, chances are, to become outright lovebirds eventually." "Shame she had to be so unfortunate as she is now, isn't it?" asked another of Tai Lung's assassin opponents. "Tell us, grey and spotted," a third asked maliciously, "just before you and your group attacked us to protect the so-called Peace Valley and Cu-Hun got her tagged with his magical crystal, thus causing her the deadly derailing which she's currently goddamn going through, did you happen to have been writing any poetry for her prior to the alarm being sounded?" A fourth said the words which ensured Tai Lung would give them his worst and at the same time would also easily seal their fate. "And if so, did you right at the end of it the words 'TILL DEATH DO US PART'?"
From that second forward, Tai Lung was zooming at them and ripping them to shreds once he reached them. He'd completely forgotten about the fact he was redeemed, the fact he'd patched things up with the families of those he killed during his time of being crazy and tragically evil, the fact he was part of the group and the Jade Palace once more now, the fact that he'd become a hero, the fact Shifu loved him once more, the fact he was so powerful, talented and once more admired, plus cured of ever going crazy or evil again. Because right now, after they threw that personal attack his way about Tigress, she who was so horribly cursed right now and who he'd fallen for and(though he wasn't sure of this despite its trueness)vice versa, all he cared about or could think about was causing them as much of an agonizing death as possible. Using everything he had-be it nerve strike, power kick, claw attack, punch flurry, teeth or anything else-he ripped, beat, tore, struck, kicked, head-butted, chewed, bit, tossed, slammed and pummeled these assassins to pieces. To bits. To shreds. To ribbons. To mutilated corpses. By the time Tai Lung was done, he was standing over a mess of meat, blood, broken weapons and spilled organs.
"Tai Lung…" gasped Po, suddenly alerting him back to the state he'd previously been in. "My God…you, like, ruined them…worse than I could ever have hoped to…" Po was starting to turn white, even in his black areas and especially in his white areas. "They insulted Tigress, Po…" was all Tai Lung could possibly bring himself to say, since he'd spent so much energy and fury. Po, realizing what he meant immediately(thankfully for Tai Lung), then said: "Ah, of course. I should have figured. Good thing is, all these assassins are now dead. But there is still the matter of Tigress to consider!" "Dear God, yes!" Tai Lung exclaimed. "We have to see where she is! I pray she's not dead…OH, NO!"
Po and Tai Lung realized that Tigress was now out of sight. As soon as the other five came and Shifu told them: "Tai Lung! Po! It's over for Cu-Hun's minions! We must go and face Cu-Hun himself and rescue Tigress from her conditions! WHAT IN GOD'S NAME? You two…what has gotten you so spooked all of a sudden? We can't have this happen NOW! We have to help Tigress against Cu-Hun!" "But that's just what's got us freaked, master!" Tai Lung told him. "She's out of sight! She could have gone anywhere!" "Then we have to hurry more than ever!" Shifu said. "Oh, of course! How could we have been so foolish?" asked Po. "We can only try and find her, with your sense of smell again, Tai Lung," Crane said, "and pray she hasn't already died!" Tai Lung immediately started sniffing and leading the way, but he snarled at Crane: "Crane, don't even THINK about there being a POSSIBILITY she's dead! She isn't, we will find her, we will destroy Cu-Hun and we will save her. PERIOD! No other way it's happening! No way, no how!"
Viper whispered to Monkey as everyone followed Tai Lung while he tracked down Cu-Hun: "I shudder to think how much Tai Lung's grief will dwarf our own if Tigress does turn out to have died." "You and me both, Viper, though it will be a horrible thing for all of us, and I hope to heaven it doesn't turn out that way as much as you and the rest of us do." We now take an interlude from them and go to the fight I just KNOW you've all been waiting for, rabid for, yelling for and eager for…namely, the final confrontation of Tigress and Cu-Hun!
At the edge of the cliff they were at, it made little difference to Tigress where she was in her kind of condition and position. While Tigress now was having another change in power, this time it being that she was now blasting a special blast out of her hands which turned things to metal, she had nevertheless easily heard Cu-Hun's cruel personal attack at her and, after being teleported here once he said it, shouted: "YOU! CU-HUN! YOU DID THIS TO ME, YOU BASTARD! YOU AND THAT HORRIBLE CRYSTAL OF YOURS MADE ME THIS WAY! MADE ME DESTROY EVERYTHING IN MY PATH! MADE ME VOMIT UP POWERS I COULD NOT POSSIBLY CONTROL OF VARIED SORTS! IF I DIE, I TAKE YOU WITH ME FIRST! YOU RUINED ME! YOU DESTROYED ME! YOU MADE ME ENDANGER INNOCENTS AND MY FRIENDS! YOU OBLITERATED EVERYTHING I AM ABOUT AND STAND FOR! YOU FUCKING DISGRACED ME! NOW I WILL DESTROY YOU BEFORE I AM DESTROYED MYSELF BY ALL OF THIS!" She tried to direct her metal blast powers at Cu-Hun, but Cu-Hun just used a magic spell to reject it and make sure he was unaffected by it.
"Wrong, you stripe-covered slut!" Cu-Hun gloated. "For this is where I speed up your death by killing you before the new powers I gave you do!" Tigress suddenly shrank down to being as small as a gnat, then she grew in size to be five times bigger than Cu-Hun. "JUST TRY IT! I'LL CRUSH YOU ONE WAY OR THE OTHER!" She shrunk down to her normal size and did not change in size again, but she then developed a bow shooter around her wrist and fired many arrows at Cu-Hun. They hit him in the chest and he said: "ARRRRRGGGHHH! That hurts, bitch! I think you need to be cut the fuck down to size!" He tossed several blades at Tigress, who then developed, by chance, the power to repel matter, and she deflected them all, but then she leapt at him and kicked him in the jaw. "NEVER! YOU DIE, AND I DON'T DIE UNTIL I MAKE YOU DIE, BASTARD! YOU PAY FOR WHAT YOU DID TO ME AND WHAT YOU MADE ME DO AS A RESULT NOW!"
"UNNNNGHHHH!" Cu-Hun said as blood flew out of his mouth. "Getting HORNY with me, are you, bitch?" He rammed her in the chest with his horns, but though it caused her great agony, she nevertheless withstood it and drove many punches and kicks into him. "THAT WAS THE LAST TIME YOU WILL EVER CONNECT YOUR BODY WITH MINE EXCEPT FOR ME KICKING YOUR ASS, MONSTER!" she roared. Suddenly, a red symbiote formed over her body and she began making killer weapons galore out of it while using it to wale against Cu-Hun. But Cu-Hun fought back by casting a fire and sonics spell on her which made sure it got shredded right off of her, then he kicked Tigress hard. "I'd beg to differ on that, and two billion of those symbiotes couldn't help you against me, especially with your lack of any control whatsoever. Which, ironically, I myself instilled in you!" He drew out a long sword.
He swung it at Tigress while saying: "And now, bitch, I cut you down to size!" But Tigress suddenly grew a magic wand while she dodged to the side of that sword and cast a spell to knock it from his hands. "NOT A CHANCE!" She hit him with several spells, but he asked: "So, you like casting magic spells, do you? Well, so do I, sorcerer assassin that I am, and here's plenty of my own in return!" He threw many spells her way, but she leapt from them as she did a long jump forward and kicked him in the guts. Then she did an uppercut on his chin, but he kicked her, took two spears and slashed at her with them, nailing her each time, landed two punches on her and tossed her to the ground. "OOOWWWWW!" she went. "And if you think that's painful," he said, taking out a many bladed stick club, "wait until you feel what the finishing blow will be like!" But Tigress got up and, despite her horrible, bleeding, gruesome wounds from the blows she'd taken, developed just then the power to drain vitality from anyone she touched along with the ability to fly and create high impact forces, and at last leapt so that she landed right behind him in a summersault.
"IS THAT A FACT, YOU ASSHOLE?" she shouted. "WELL, LET'S SEE YOU BACK UP THAT SUPPOSEDLY FIRM STATEMENT, HUH?" Cu-Hun charged at her, going: "THIS IS WHERE YOUR HEART STOPS BEATING IN MY HAND, BITCH! YOU ARE MINE, AND MY CRYSTAL'S EFFECTS ACT MUCH FASTER NOW THAN THEY WOULD HAVE ORIGINALLY WITH MY HELP OF SPEEDING THEM UP LIKE SO!" He swung his powerful weapon at her, and though he connected the first time, causing her to be cut even more badly than before as well as horribly bludgeoned, Tigress was not killed due to her natural strength, durability and damage soak ability, and she flipped right over his next swing as he said: "What? You still stand? You must have soaked up a lot of that new power I gave you to go with your own! No matter! I will still see you dead, and all your friends come next along with your master, including that snow leopard you seem to be so infatuated with! In the meanwhile, may you spin in turmoil and despair in the Neatherrealm's deepest pits with your whore mother and douchebag father, bitch!"
Well, this just set Tigress off more than ever, if that was possible. Hearing about what he intended to do to all of her friends, plus her master, but especially the Tai Lung who she was once enemies with and yet now was ironically starting to love, and, unknown to her, vice versa, was enough to make her fury skyrocket easily. But insulting her dead parents like that? FORGET IT. This, combined with the aforementioned intentions for her comrades, master and potential lover, made it so that she just didn't bother landing. She was going to finish him off right here and now, no more delays! Kicking him in the chin, she then used her new power to create impacts to shake the ground and make Cu-Hun lose balance, plus drop his weapon in the process. "What the hell?" he said, but then Tigress flew up into the air, then came flying right down at him. After that, she touched his face with both her hands and drained out a considerable portion of his power. "AARRRRRRRRRRRRRGGHHH!" he screamed. But Tigress did not stop here. Kicking him hard, and having made it so that he flew towards the edge of the cliff much faster than he would have at full power due to draining his vitality, she then flew and picked up his weapon. "What the hell are you doing?" Cu-Hun exclaimed as he saw her flying towards him. "EXACTLY WHAT I WISH I COULD HAVE DONE THE LAST TIME WE FOUGHT, CU-HUN!" thundered Tigress.
"NO!" Cu-Hun yelled. "YOU STAY THE HELL AWAY FROM ME!" He fired several death spells of various black magic sorts at her, but Tigress flew in between them and created several high impacts to shake up the edge of cliff he was dangerously close to the end of. Just then, Tai Lung, Shifu, Po, Mantis, Monkey, Crane and Viper showed up, but when they saw what they did, despite being relieved to have found Tigress still alive(especially in the cases of Shifu, Viper and Tai Lung), they froze in shock instantaneously. Meantime, Cu-Hun yelled out: "WHOA…WHOAAA…WHOAAAA…!" as he lost his balance even worse than before, and Tigress created one last impact to hit him hard and a second later whacked him with his own powerful weapon. This sent Cu-Hun falling down off of the cliff, screaming out loud "E-!" as it happened, and his screaming only ceased when he landed on several spikes on his front, making it so he was impaled. Impaled through the chest, stomach, shoulders, hands, neck, face, legs and feet, with all of the spikes going through the front of his body sticking up out of his back, the backs of his shoulders, neck and skull, and the backs of all four of his limbs and appendages. And his crystal flew right away from him thanks to the impact, not stopping sailing through the area until it hit a spike and shattered to pieces, never to be fixed or do anything like it did to Tigress again.
After bleeding out from his impalement, just like the spikes were covered in blood, Cu-Hun died, a victim of his own trap which he meant for Tigress. An irony like nothing else and a painful death like nothing else. While Cu-Hun's corpse lay on those spikes, lots of magic was rejected from his dead body thanks to his dying as well as the impact from his death, and it went everywhere, flying across Peace Valley, undoing every last bit of the damage Tigress was incapable of stopping herself from doing, but also, in the case of one big spell, hitting Tigress hard and powering her up more than ever to the point where she uncontrollably flew up into the air, yelling: "YESSSSS! I HAVE AT LAST KILLED CU-HUN! EVEN IF I MUST DIE NOW, AT LEAST HE IS NO MORE AND NEITHER ARE HIS EVIL WAYS! SO AT LEAST I WILL HAVE DIED A HEROINE TO THE END! WHAAAAAAAT?" But this did not last, for Tigress was suddenly overloading. Hence the last thing that she said. Why? Because this last power-up spell also saw to it that all of the effects of Cu-Hun's crystal were reversed. Which meant that Tigress did not die in any way, but rather, lived and turned completely back to normal.
Back on the ground, Po exclaimed: "Dear God, did you see that? She managed to kill Cu-Hun! And with his own weapon, no less!" "Yes, and there will be cause to celebrate that later, Po!" Shifu reminded him. "But despite how alarming this may have been at first, and despite how great it is Cu-Hun is finally dead, our problems are far from over! We have to help Tigress, if we can even find her in the sky!" Everyone looked about, but then Crane said: "Well, I wish we could find her, but she flew up pretty high and got a pretty big charge out of that magic spell that hit her while those others flew everywhere, whatever it was!" "Thank you, Captain Obvious!" Monkey said. "Won't make it any easier to find where she flew, and we don't even know whether or not the fatal effects have taken place yet." Tai Lung exploded at Monkey: "DON'T YOU EVEN THINK THAT, SIMIAN BOY! TIGRESS HAS NOT DIED AND WE WILL FIND…her?"
Back in the sky, Tigress, realizing what had happened to her, and how she was herself again, thought: "Dear lord…" She would have been relieved and happy to have become her normal self once more and survive after all, but there was one fact preventing that. SHE COULD NOT FLY! When she was her normal self, she could not fly, and now that the rejected spell had cured her of Cu-Hun's crystal and its curse on her, she once more could not fly! And she was many orders of magnitude up in the air! Unsurprisingly, she quickly started to fall and plummet way, way back down to the ground, screaming out loud as she did so: "!" Tai Lung was the first to see her and said: "Oh, my God! That spell must have charged her one last time before making sure she'd return to normal, and now she's falling! I HAVE TO CATCH HER!" "DO IT, TAI LUNG!" Shifu shouted, almost having a heart attack at the thought of Tigress dying like she looked to be about to along with the others. Tai Lung was about to leap up into the air, but he saw Tigress was now so close to the ground thanks to how fast she was falling, she'd hit the ground and die unless he stayed right where he was and caught her.
Thankfully, he not only caught her as soon as he saw she was close enough for him to catch her, but he did so powerfully so that there would be no chance she'd die, hit the ground or even lose consciousness. Tai Lung had saved her, she was alive and conscious and every one of the other kung fu warriors, especially Shifu and Viper, were relieved beyond belief. Tai Lung knelt to the ground, deciding to look Tigress right in the eyes and make sure to calm her down now that it was all over. You know, make her realize she'd survived and was now safe, and that this would never be done to her again. But as the other six surrounded the two and Tai Lung gently got Tigress's face to look at his own, he was shocked at what he saw. Tigress had an extremely un-Tigress-like look on her face. Her eyes were not full of confidence and hard, tough-girl beauty like they usually were, or even joy at finally being free of her curse, plus in Tai Lung's arms and alive now. No, they were looking utterly sad, frightened, broken, tearful and clearly showing something was all too horribly wrong.
You see, all of what she'd been through today had in fact had a horribly devastating impact on Tigress. Getting slashed by that crystal, taking on all these new powers she could not control, causing all the destruction she did and all that happened between the time after that and after she was finally cured from the rejected magic of the dead Cu-Hun. Not to mention the fall that would have killed her if it were not for Tai Lung's catching her. Put that all together with how this was such a harsh, sharp reminder of when she was a cub and could not control herself, thus making it so her childhood was even harsher than it was already from her becoming an orphan, not to mention how she nearly killed many innocents plus her own comrades along with herself without wanting to, and it's not hard to understand why all the pain from her past came right back to her after so long of her keeping her feelings bottled up and suppressing it. The past had become reality to her in the worst way, and although it would take A LOT, and I repeat, A LOT, to even begin to break her powerful, beautiful, strong, heroic spirit. But this was way beyond the boundary even an apparently unbreakable will and spirit like hers could withstand.
All the old pain and wounds surging through her newly reinjured and frightened self, Tigress said to Tai Lung: "Tai Lung…" She was on the verge of tears, which she did her best to fight back. "Tai Lung…hold me close to you…AND NEVER LET GO!" Tai Lung held her to his chest and comforted her as his arms were around her. Tigress cried. She couldn't help herself. She couldn't stop. As she cried into his fur, Tai Lung said: "Tigress, it's okay. You are normal again now. Let it out. You did not deserve any of this, and you will be treated as kindly as you should be for as long as it takes for you to recover. It's going to be okay. It's over. I know you're hurting. Just stay close to me…" He felt his fur wetten with her tears, but he just held on to her. The other stood and allowed her to bury herself into him. She well deserved it after all the horror she'd been through. Tigress just wept. She had a breaking point like everyone else, and though it was not an easy one to reach, she'd been given enough torture so that even her resistance to being broken could not withstand it. No one's could, as a matter of fact. Not against this kind of thing.
The other six just stood silent and thanked God that Tigress was alive. They would have hugged her tightly and thanked heaven that Tigress had lived and gotten back to normal, but right now, Tigress was in no shape for that sort of thing. She'd been through much too much. It was all too evident. However, they all got lucky. None of them intended to go back home anytime soon, especially since not only was Tigress in need of just being still and comforted, but all of them were quite tired after all this, but fortunately for them, a freak chance happenstance made it so they'd go home without having too. Since Tigress was now back to normal again from the magic, her body rejected the spell which had charged her up one last time before turning her back to normal. And the last remnants of the spell made it so that, by chance and freak warping as Tigress' body rejected it, all eight of them got good and teleported back to the Jade Palace. They were safe at home, but at first, not a one of them noticed. It was a very, very long while before anything but silence and Tigress's sad cries of despair and being broken while Tai Lung held her close was about the place. Still, Tai Lung and Tigress felt something warm between one another's bodies and hearts as they were in the position they were in. Something which suggested what they'd secretly felt for a while now and which was burning hotter than ever now, though in a subtle way.
Man, WHAT a chapter, huh? Quite the dramatic, climactic one, you must admit! The final chapter of this story will be shown after this one soon enough, but in the meantime, please rate and review!
