"Shit."
He had lost again. Despite his laborious, heated hours spent toiling away underneath his stuffy cloth blanket studiously examining his copy of Top Ten Tips to Win at Mah-Jong, he had once again flared up in anger as he witnessed the uncontrollable laughter bursting forward from the diminutive bird seated in front of him. Zeng's angled yellow beaks snapped shut and opened repeatedly as his wobbling larynx bobbed wildly under the immense strain of continuing his clamorous mirth.
"Just give up Heng," Zeng practically shouted as he lifted the opaque brown glass in front of him to gently tip into his lower beak. "You've never been good at strategy." He took another prolonged sip. "Hey, Heng… Zeng! Our names rhyme!"
"I think," Heng muttered with a grin, pulling the dirty glass away from the protesting Zeng. "You've had one too many."
"No such thing," Zeng replied, desperately scouring the oak table for another glass. "Nothing like getting too much."
Heng agreed, but only reluctantly. The claim made sense in only particular scenarios, he reasoned. For instance, the bar that they had chosen to occupy was very much a paradise of hedonism and radical thinking. But it was well-past midnight, but just before dawn so that the moon's round luminescence was still draped over most of the Valley – although it was receding rather quickly. The normally vociferous and bustling life in the bar seemed to subconsciously match the light's timid regression. The crowd was thin; no more than a few isolated individuals plopped lazily on isolated chairs just steeping over the blunt edge of the actual bar itself, with the barman's face shining with eagerness to return home as he hurriedly dragged the thick white rag over dirty glasses and haphazardly threw them into aging shelves just above him.
"Everyone's trying to get away," Heng remarked, watching the bartender purposely ignore a rather dirty glass and promptly fling it into a bag beneath his waist. "Can't cope."
"Copesh with whatsh?" Zeng slurred, the wine clearly distorting his speech to nearly incomprehensible, guttural sounds. "It's all goodsh my friend… all good in Chinash today – "
"You're quite drunk my friend," Heng reproached, tiredly slapping away Zeng's persistent reach towards the central bottle.
"Always… hic… could hold… yoursh winesh better…"
Heng, although feeling a fleeting sense of pride at the closely incoherent compliment, was more concerned with Zeng's current state. True, his tipsy movements and garbled pronunciations could easily be mistaken as yet another one of his failed attempts to perform stand-up at the local club, but Shifu would know… he would sniff it out, seize upon Zeng's lack of sobriety immediately and possibly strangle that thin neck until the poor bird asphyxiated. He's already gone through enough, Heng ruminated. What with Crane's passing and Monkey's incarceration…
With a pronounced sniffle, Heng coughed as he heard the expected noise.
A door was opening. The young rhino shifted in his chair to better ascertain the small figure crouched in between the narrow doorway. The few inhabitants of the tavern grumbled with confused objections as the moon's light glided through the space, highlighting the crowd of stubble-covered faces, drooling mouths and cylindrical wine glasses.
"Shut shthe door…"
"Whoshe thish guy?"
"Unlessh your my wife…"
"Pleash, no more brightysh things…"
The small figure was not the least bit disconcerted. Heng grudgingly admitted a furtive admiration for the man as he discerned the subtle squeaks of Zeng idly rolling around in his chair. Master Shifu's stride from underneath the heavy wooden doors was confident and purposeful; Heng observed the light steps as he turned his whole body to face his query. Even though he was aware of the moon's splendor outlining Shifu's ovular frame to produce a long shadow, the dark patch that appeared seemed much longer and broader than the frame size would allow; the distinctive marking of a man who casted a much larger presence – a grand impression that was instinctively more terrifying than the often falsely restrained posture.
"Welcome," Heng called out as Shifu's quick gait propelled him dangerously close to Zeng's exposed head. Heng, recalling the gravity of the situation, covertly attempted to thrust Zeng off his chair.
"Pathetic," Shifu's smooth voice stated. He only took a brief moment to survey Heng's angered expression. "Not you. Zeng." Shifu's lips slightly arched. "Well, maybe you too."
"It's his first –" Heng tried.
"Silence Private," Shifu commanded. "I am well aware of Zeng's proclivity for… pleasuring himself."
Even though Heng knew the red panda was referring to the alcoholism, the implied innuendo was reactively fiery and destructive…even Heng felt some shame swell from the insult.
"It is as much his first time drinking as you are the Guard's first entry into this scum-invested hovel," Shifu emphasized with a slithery enunciation, disgusted expressions leaping forward from his bearded face as he grasped a chair and quickly moved it close to the table, taking care to cast dirty glances at the drunken bystanders and rotting night lamps, crimson flames collapsing from weak amounts of fuel.
"It's not as bad as it seems," Heng argued. "The Guard doesn't usually take to drinking kindly…" Heng grimaced as he noticed Shifu's polite expression. "… neither does the Jade Palace, correct?"
"No, it does not," Shifu agreed, pulling the bottle away Zeng's weak grasp. "Under normal circumstances." Zeng weakly flapped his wing around, clearly missing the cold sensation residing on his feathers. Shifu regarded him with contempt. "Perhaps pathetic is an understatement…"
"Or overstatement, depending on how you look at it," Heng supplied. Shifu languidly suppressed a smirk.
"The sticker tells jokes!" the red panda chortled.
Heng frowned at the insulting designation. Sticker was the brutal nickname the local villagers had often thrown over the Guard's members; the cloak's name implied the insertion of a stick into their behind, which would explain their usually straight-faced manner and strict moral code. He had once laughed about it, slammed the table with his fists in pure joy at the amusing term, but no longer felt the same rush of happiness.
He knew better. He knew far better. From the Emperor ceasing funding to the local accusations of drug abuse within the Guard, the formerly respected and toned force was very much an aging empire; rapidly being rendered obsolete by massive corporations boasting of formidable private security. The Guard was still there, but it seemed to occupy a rather insignificant vessel in the minds of men; for in their darkest dreams, the Guard was merely a reminder of the shadows.
"The shadows in the Valley are growing," Shifu read almost subliminally. Heng contorted his face into a sleek smirk before replying.
"The shadows…" he stopped, waiting for Shifu to finish as he always did in these situations. "Yes… they are."
"It's all numbers really…"
"Quite yes, numbers…"
Heng arched his thick eyebrows and glared at Shifu, possessed by a sudden desire.
"So if you decide to create the supply of opium…"
"Then indeed, I have to create the demand, correct?" Shifu responded.
Heng chortled.
"Not exactly," he whispered. "Demand's already there. You just have to get it out onto the market, and…"
"Watch people fall." Shifu replied inaudibly.
Heng relaxed back into his chair, shutting his eyelids into a profound, lingering sort of pain. This pain was a visceral hatred, a very undeniable fury that surged with no remorse. Its very path troubled the fine patience that struggled to resist in the barrel-shaped chest… filling the entire room, perhaps even Heng himself, with a dark and infectious foreboding. In his supercilious manner, he might have once thought to ask Shifu why such terrible events were of his doing. He wondered deeply why someone, especially someone in Shifu's manner, laying out the very traps of society that crushed most of people.
"You are aware you have five minutes more with me before Commander Vachir alerts the Guard to your absence." Shifu sneered.
"I'll take my chances," muttered Heng, the squeaking of Zeng's chair shuttering to a halt as the frail bird slipped off the wooden surface and collapsed on the floor, eyes glazed over and mouth blowing hot wisps of air.
A/N: Long, long, long wait time! But, my life has been sort of busy lately... so that's my excuse! Hopefully (and I say this a lot), things will get better? Nah, I kid. It will.
R/R and enjoy the reading!
(And pray Kung Fu Panda LOA will release an episode... or KFP 3 details be revealed?)