Chapter 11: Wolf's Code of Honor.
The first thing Shu noticed when she reached the top of the staircase was that the door to Zhong's bedroom was open. The second thing was that a piece of balled-up paper was lying on the floor between the door and the stairs.
Even before she picked it up and straightened it out, she knew it was the song he had written. The first thing an enraged Zhong would want to destroy. That didn't scare her though, or keep her from going inside to check on the wolf.
She wasn't surprised to see him hunched over his bedside table again; something told her he did that a lot. She also wasn't surprised when he ignored her, refusing to even turn his head to look at his uninvited guest.
She slapped the wrinkled paper down right next to him on the desk, but the lupine remained uninterested. "Who was that angry guy?", she asked. She didn't expect him to actually answer.
"Koran. We were friends when we were pups", he quietly replied.
"You two don't seem very friendly now, so what changed?", Shu noted.
The older wolf sighed. "I let him down. I let everyone down, and they've all hated my guts for years. Now they're just being honest about it", Zhong replied, closing his eyes and pinching his snout. The war vet was a little surprised himself he was telling Shu all this, but he supposed he had kept it all to himself for so long it felt good to share his shame - his issues - with someone else. Besides, he really didn't care what anybody knew about him anymore.
"So you're just going to let your pack walk out on you?", she said in disbelief.
"There's nothing I can do to stop them. They're my men, not my slaves, and the decision to leave has always been theirs", he replied dejectedly, slumping back into his chair.
"But you can talk to them, convince them to come back", she reasoned.
Zhong scowled suddenly. "How?! They've lost all their faith in me. They'll never trust me again", he demanded almost impatiently, like he was tired of her bothering him and just wanted her to leave.
Shu opened her mouth again but this time Zhong cut her off. "Listen to me. This is what's gonna happen. Right now they're packing up all their food and their clothes and their weapons, and when the sun rises tomorrow morning they'll move onto the new town to start killing and pillaging again there. And the panda's friends will hunt them down and either capture them or kill them – they'll have no choice. While I'll spend the rest of my life here. It's no more than what I deserve", he said harshly.
But far from discouraging Shu and getting the girl off his back, he only made her mad. It was time to do things the way Zhong would and get aggressive. The she-wolf suddenly grabbed the back of his chair, claws sinking into wood, and spun it around (quite roughly since it wasn't one of those chairs on wheels) so they could talk face-to-face. He finally flinched when she practically exploded at him.
"Po's right. I can't believe you're just going to turn tail and back down like this! You survived life as an outcast, you helped build a doomsday weapon and topple one of the most powerful cities in China. Not to mention you survived a knife being buried in your chest!", she growled, getting right in the one-eyed commander's face. And even though he knew he shouldn't have let himself be intimidated by a female civilian, he felt the back of his head hit wood as Shu pushed him further and further into his chair.
"I might not have heard of you until now, but your badassness is so infamous, so legendary to the people of Gongmen City that your name still scares them, even now that you're 'dead'. I for one refuse to believe that you're overrated, that you're going to quit just because your boys are a little mad at you. Shake it off, soldier! Where's that never say die wolf spirit?!", she demanded, her voice rising to a brand new octave.
Zhong, still taken aback by her outburst, just stared at her for a few seconds, eyes darting all over the place as he studied her features, before the lupine scowled again. "Why do you care so much anyway?", he asked flippantly.
Despite the attitude, Shu had to admit it was a good question. The she-wolf's glower softened. Just like how she knew when it was time to be aggressive, she also knew when to dial it down and take a few steps back. "I care because I like you, Zhong, and I like your ambitions for your troops. I don't want to see you throw in the towel", she replied honestly and sympathetically.
Zhong's expression softened again too, and she knew he was taking what she said into consideration. With every word she said, she was getting through to him more and more. But she couldn't stop where she was. She had to make sure it sunk in. "If you won't do it for yourself, or even for them, do it for Po", she suggested.
"Po?", Zhong questioned, confused.
"You heard what Crane said. He and his pals are about to run off to a fight where they'll be way outnumbered. There's even a chance not all of them will come back, so they could use all the help they can get", she reasoned, pounding her fist into her palm.
She leaned in closer to the one-eyed canine. "From what I've heard, Po's been sticking up for you all day: this is your chance to repay him. You owe him Zhong. He needs you back in the game", she coaxed, appealing to the better nature she knew the bandit had.
Zhong was quiet again, lowering his head as probably a hundred different thoughts raced through his head at once. Shu was right of course. Could he really let yet another yet another person bite the dust because of his inaction?
When he raised his head again, his expression had changed. There was a brand new look in his red eye, one of decisiveness and determination. Like he knew what had to be done. "It's more than just me he needs. He needs the pack. And I'm going to make sure he gets it", he declared, balling his furry fingers into fists.
Shu stepped back as the lupine shot up out of his chair, newly invigorated. He spun around towards the door and made his first running step towards it before he abruptly stopped in his tracks. To Shu's confusion, he turned around to look at her again.
"Thank you", he said softly.
Knowing what he was thanking her for, she nodded.
The pair shared one long look, both of them staring each other in the eyes like they were trying to see what laid beyond them, before Zhong broke away – changing direction again and running out his bedroom door, towards the stairs.
Shu realized, a second late, that she should probably follow him and ran twice as fast to catch up.
Zhong still reached the bottom first, and found Tai and Jing waiting for him in the living room. They both looked surprised to see their leader come down from his bedroom so soon (having thought it would take at least a day for him to bounce back from an argument that brutal).
By the time Shu was at his back, Zhong banged his paw on the newel post to make sure he had both of their attentions (he needn't have worried), before clearing his throat.
"Alright boys, listen up. There are four wolves in here, four cabins out there, and thirty in total living in this campsite. Thirty wolves who won't be here tomorrow morning unless we do something about that right now. So who wants to help me round them all up and talk some sense into the bunch?", he asked, folding his arms.
And for what seemed like the kajillionth time that day, someone looked at him like they couldn't believe what he was saying. He was really starting to get tired of that expression.
Of course, Tai and Jing had a good reason for looking the way they did. The way Zhong had strode into the room, knowing what he needed to do and plainly spelling it out for all of them without any uncertainty, he had almost seemed like his old self again, instead of the guilt-ridden war dog who had kept himself mostly cooped up in his room for the past three months.
Zhong impatiently drummed his fingers on the railing. "Well?", he asked, growing tired of the silence as well.
Tai and Jing blinked, finally realizing their inaction.
"Yeah, yeah", Jing said quickly.
"Sure", Tai agreed.
"Perfect", their commander grinned, rubbing his paws together. What he was about to do next was stupid and dangerous, and there was a very good chance it could get him killed. All in all, he'd missed doing crazy stunts like this one.
For the first time in a long, long time, Zhong Yu had regained something he'd been missing since Lord Shen perished. A reason to keep fighting. To keep on keeping on like he'd always done.
((()-()))
Darkness settled over the forest. The moon slowly climbed it's way towards the center of the night sky. It's appearance had been blocked by the sun all day, but now that it had moved towards the western hemisphere, it was the moon's time to shine.
Zhong paid no attention to it, however; he was too busy surveying all the faces that surrounded him.
After feeling completely and irreversibly damned all day, for once, just once, he felt like the luckiest man alive. Because if it had been just him or Shu trying to gather the others, no one would have listened; they wouldn't have paid them any attention. After all, Shu was a stranger, an outsider, and Zhong was the failure, the traitor who let them down. Which was why Zhong had never been more thankful Tai and Jing were still on his side.
Their opinions didn't mean much to the other wolves, but still meant far more than Zhong and Shu's. Because unlike Zhong, they still had the respect of their brethren. Their benefit of the doubt. They were the only ones who could convince the whole pack to come out of their cabins, put off packing for just a few minutes, and convene outside to hear what their former leader had to say. The only two who could persuade them to at least hear Zhong out because they no longer had anything to lose – and it would give them a chance to chew him out some more if they wanted to.
Outside Zhong's cabin, all thirty wolves stood side by side in a circle formed around him, Shu, Tai and Jing. They all kept their faces blank, neutral and emotionless as the one-eyed wolf stepped forward; except Koran who looked very bemused by the affair. He couldn't deny he was curious about just what Zhong was up to, as well as how pitiful it would actually be.
Like before, Zhong kept his expression as calm, composed and relaxed as possible as he prepared to drop a bombshell - and it was a big one. "We've all known each other for as long as any of us can remember, so you know I've never been the type to beat around the bush. I'm gonna cut to the chase right now, and tell you all that I need your help", he said casually.
And for half a second everything was quiet. Owls hooted and crickets chirped.
Before the field exploded with barks and laughter coming from countless lupines, except the one who stood glaring at Zhong as the war dog said perhaps the most foolhardy thing he'd ever said in his life. Not that his packmates' mocking bothered him. He would really have to be a fool not to expect a reaction like that one, and unlike their last confrontation, he wasn't going to let anything they said or did deter him from his goal.
He repeated himself. "I need you to help me help the Dragon Warrior", he explained.
Suddenly things weren't so funny anymore – and Koran wasn't the only one glowering.
Xen, the pack physician, was the first one to speak. "You're insane", he leered.
"Why should we help that panda?", another, Lon, added.
Zhong was ready and waiting to reply. "Because he tried to help us", he retorted.
That got another reaction out of them. Dozens of eyebrows arched for a few short moments before the wolves' reined in their shock and resumed scowling and growling at him. He knew they had to be thinking he was lying, that he was willing to say anything to get them back on his side again; so like Shu did for him, he had to keep trying harder to get them to see the truth. He came into the task knowing it wouldn't be easy.
"Before you all came bursting in looking for a fight, he tried to convince his friends to let us keep our freedom. He's come to care more about us and our welfare in one day than Shen ever did in twenty-five years, and now he's about to walk right into a slaughter. He's not my enemy anymore, so I'm going to go help him, and I'm asking for your aid too, since he's not your enemy either", he reasoned.
Lon shook his head aggressively. "He kicked our asses all across Gongmen this summer. Yours too. If the unbeatable Dragon Warrior and his friends could wipe the floor with us so easily, they don't need the help of us lowly thieves", he retorted in a mocking way.
Zhong Yu was disgusted. Even more so because there was once a time he was just like Lon, only a few months ago. The canine ground his teeth together. "So that's it then. The bear sticks his neck out for us and you still won't help. Why? Because you're still mad at me? Because you're holding a grudge against the panda? Because you're afraid of being captured? No! It's not any of that stuff at all!", he snapped, finally losing his patience.
He had promised himself he wouldn't let them get to him, but like Shu, he knew when it was time to stop playing Mr. Nice Guy (it really wasn't his style anyway) and get aggressive.
"We deserved that ass-kicking Po dealt us, because the real reason you're all going to let him die tonight is because you're just selfish enough to abandon him in his time of need!", he snarled. He hadn't felt this angry about something in ages; and this time he was pissed-off for all the right reasons.
His fury seemed to do the trick, taking a few of his packmates by surprise. After his failure at Gongmen Bay, they had started to think of him as just a sad, pathetic middle-aged man, and his outburst reminded them all that he was no pushover and he still had plenty of fire in his belly.
What he found even more interesting was that some of them were breaking eye contact; like they could no longer look him straight in the face as he spoke the truth they didn't want to hear. After all, he hadn't been the only wolf having to justify his actions to live with himself every day for years.
He'd discarded that ludicrous, self-defeating thought about how they were all too far gone. He just knew that like him, they still had that sense of honor buried deep down inside of them, some speck of decency, where they'd suppressed it all those years. He was about to dig it up.
However a few of the wolves' expressions remained unchanged – one of them grew even angrier and much more incredulous.
Zhong had feeling Koran couldn't hold it in any longer.
"You're one to talk to us about being selfish. You're the reason we're all living this!", he barked, breaking out of the circle so he could talk to Zhong up close. "We're just thinking about what's best for the pack; what you said we should do. Or have you forgotten that?!", he snapped accusingly.
And with that, the time to be aggressive had passed just as quickly as it came. Now was the time for Zhong to regain control over his temper.
Zhong closed his eyes, inhaled, then exhaled. He was preparing to do something difficult again. What he had been putting off since his banishment. Facing up to his former friend.
"Koran. I know you hate me, and you have every reason to, but you have to listen to me", he insisted.
"Why?! You never listened to me", Koran growled. "From the day we first met Shen, when that bird started feeding us, I told you he was bad news. And when we became his soldiers, I warned you he was just using our might as a means to an end, but you were so busy focusing on that new world order shit he was feeding you that you didn't listen to a word I said. Me! Your oldest friend!", he vented; but underneath his anger there was sadness. A hurt that had never been addressed; wounds that were never healed but only left to fester as they were covered up again and again in a vain attempt to pretend like they didn't exist.
Po had opened Zhong's old wounds that afternoon when he asked him why he had betrayed the crown, and now he was doing the same to Koran. The only guy he knew who had bottled himself up as much as he had.
"Remember what we used to talk about in the academy? Serving and protecting? You threw all that away. You threw our dream away, you threw me away, and now you need my help?!", Koran said, close to his breaking point. As in close to actual tears.
Zhong's own singular eye felt damper than usual as he watched him suffer; as he allowed himself, for the first time, to see the full consequences his actions had had on his old friend.
Shu, Tai, Jing, Xen, Lon, everyone; they all stopped breathing as the pair of wolves laid out all their problems for the world to see. Or at least, everyone present in the meadow.
Zhong walked up to Koran, who was trying so hard to glower at him but couldn't because he was holding back salt water. The wolf with the mohawk placed his paw on his shoulder, and unlike before, Koran didn't punch in the face. He didn't do anything except stare at him, waiting for his next move.
Zhong Yu had never been good at apologies. Being the prideful war dog he was, he'd never felt the need to apologize for anything. But his pride barely existed now. He was a humbled wolf, dnd it helped he had learned a few lessons from Po and Shu about sympathy. "Koran, I'm sorry", he said quietly. Those three words couldn't have been any more honest.
And even though Koran had every reason to think he was lying and go into denial, he knew him well enough to know his regret was genuine. It was easy to hate an uncaring friend, but not a repentant one. Especially when you couldn't deny his remorsefulness.
Koran closed his eyes and let his head fall to his chest, as Zhong let go of his shoulder and backed away a few steps to give him space.
He wasn't angry anymore. He had wanted to hear those words for so long, a simple acknowledgement of wrongdoing – for twenty-five years – and now that he had, he didn't feel the way he thought he would. He wasn't feeling smug or satisfied or triumphant. He didn't know how to describe it.
"Kor, I'm trying to fix what I did. I'm trying to get the dream back", Zhong insisted, knowing his former friend was finally willing to listen.
Koran lifted his head, so Zhong could see his hopeless, defeated expression. "It's too late for that", he replied pessimistically.
Zhong shook his head. "I used to think that too until now, but it's never too late. Po reminded me that we're not just fugitives, we're royal guards. Protecting the people is our duty, not hiding away in these woods", he explained, gesturing to the trees surrounding them on all sides. "Do you still remember?", he inquired softly.
Apparently he did, since Koran didn't argue further. And apparently the others did as well, because when Zhong tore his gaze away from his estranged friend for the first time in several minutes, he realized his other comrades didn't look as angry or outraged anymore. Instead they seemed to be in deep thought, conflicted. As if everything he had said to Koran was starting to sink into them as well.
Their city, the one they once tried to conquer, needed them. There was certainly going to be collateral damage in the fight between the masters and the Yan-Li. Many lives besides those of the brawlers would probably be lost. Namely the villagers; who had already suffered so much at the paws of those who neglected their jobs.
The pack's instincts of self-preservation were warring with their desire (one they could no longer hide now that the boss wolf had forced them to confront it) to accept what Zhong was offering them – a chance to regain their long lost honor.
Zhong looked back at Koran, who seemed close to making up his mind but not quite there yet. He still had something more he wanted to say. "You know that if we do this, we'll almost certainly be captured. Maybe even hanged", he rationalized, but only half-heartedly.
Zhong smiled. "It's not the life of the guard that matters, but the one he's guarding. First thing they taught us in school", he said, laughing fondly. He put his hand on Koran's shoulder again, and tilted his head to the side. "Besides, when have we ever been afraid of dying?", he asked, reminding him of all the scraps they have gotten in and out of – young and old.
The one-eyed wolf extended his paw to his fellow soldier. "So how about it? Will the wolves of Gongmen spend the rest of their lives running and hiding, or fight one last time, for their city?", he offered, and he was speaking to more than just Koran.
The soldier's decision could have went either way, and all Zhong could do was hope and believe in his oldest friend. And he did believe in him.
The other lupine may not have responded with words, but Zhong could tell, from the look in his eyes, the change in his brow, that he had finally come to a decision.
Seconds later, he felt five furry fingers curling around his own. Koran had accepted.
He'd done it. He'd done the impossible. It was almost too good to believe.
Was this how Po felt when he ended the twenty-five year war? Stunned? Relieved that the hardest part was over?
When Koran let go of his paw a second later, he pushed his relief to the side long enough to utter a simple "Thank you".
Koran's brows knitted together, in surprise no doubt. His old playmate hadn't thanked him for anything in years; the way he and Shen used to run the pack, cooperation was to be expected – demanded. And never thanked for.
"Thank me when the fight's over", he muttered in a surly fashion, reluctantly walking to his commander's side.
Zhong's other friends, who had stayed silent and invisible during the whole confrontation, decided it was time to make their choice and hop onboard the bandwagon.
"There's no way I'm missing out", Jing declared eagerly, doing as Koran did and flanking his boss.
Tai followed of course, but in a slightly more dignified walk as opposed Jing's run. "I've fought alongside you hundreds of times. I suppose one more time wouldn't hurt", he figured, joining Jing on Zhong's left. It was the first time he had ever heard Jing make a joke about anything. He was always so serious, even as a kid. Zhong's new mood was affecting everyone.
Unsurprisingly, the newcomer Shu was next to join them.
"I don't suppose there's any chance I can talk you out of this life-threatening conflict where you'll totally be in over your head?", Zhong asked her teasingly.
"No chance at all", she confirmed, joining Koran on his right.
Fives wolves were now in on the suicide mission, and a line was starting to form inside the circle of canines.
Zhong wasn't surprised when the sixth volunteer turned out to be Xen. The pack's doctor was many things, but he wasn't evil. He'd studied medicine (unofficially of course) so he could save lives; taking them had never been what he signed up for. As much as he wanted to be a ruthless and uncaring soul, he wasn't. His heart was stronger than his cowardice.
It was the same for Lon, and Zhao, and all the other wolves who joined their ranks, one by one. The circle receded more and more by the second, while the line stretched on and on.
It finally stopped growing when the last wolf with a death wish crossed over, either giving into pack mentality or his own guilty conscience, and the pack stood thirty strong. United as one.
The pearly white grin on Zhong's face was… incredible. Shu, no matter how good she was at putting herself in someone else's shoes, couldn't imagine the pride and ecstasy he was feeling. But it didn't last for long.
Like the Dragon Warrior, he now had a job to do and not much time to do it. The panda and his friends were already half an hour ahead of them, but wolves ran fast – hopefully they could make up that lost time.
"TO THE CITY!", Zhong yelled, pointing not at the trees on top of the basin they were standing in, surrounding their camp. but the town he instinctively knew laid miles beyond it.
They were sprinting on all fours in no time, and after climbing over the hill with ease, they tore through the forest like a pack of crazed, wild animals. They went over or around any obstacles (like trees) that blocked their path; determined not to stop until they reached their former home (except for Shu, who was running towards her current home).
Before they were half-way there, Jing decided to ask the question on the back of his mind (and every wolf's mind). "Err, commander? Who is she?", he inquired, glancing at the random she-wolf galloping alongside him and his leader.