The first room they searched was the food storage. Crates of fruits and vegetables were stacked haphazardly with a few bruised pieces littering the floor. They checked them all anyway, just in case. Tigress came up empty while Po came up with fruit juice leaking out of his stuffed cheeks. The next room was the armory, with weapons and shields leaning upright along the walls and a few on display stands in the center. Tigress stuffed a short hunting knife in her vest before they headed out.
The pair next stood in front of a solid steel door to the third room. It had the appearance of a high security prison cell with a small rectangular door in the center, through which food could be shoved through. They turned their heads to face each other and said simultaneously, "The king?"
"How do we bust him out?" Po asked, looking the impressive barrier over.
"First let's make sure he's actually in there," Tigress advised. "It could be empty and we'd be wasting precious time."
A reverberating slam answered from the other side.
The two jumped back. "What the-!"
Another slam, this one carrying the door a few centimeters past it's earthen frame.
"Watch out!" Po grounded his stance.
"Get ready!" Tigress unsheathed her claws.
"YEEEEE-HAW!" was the victory cry as the door burst open and the prisoner broke free. "WHO WANTS SOME?!"
The figure standing before them was a tall, thin, obviously malnourished, yak. The tip of his left horn had broken off, but could still do damage. His brown and gray fur was matted with filth and he wore a tattered red cape. A kilt of armor hung loosely off his left hip. "DO YOUR WORST, EVIL-MONGERS!"
Po blinked in astonishment. "General Tsin?"
"WHO WANTS TO KNOW?!" the yak spun to face him, his protruding chin held high and his wide nostrils flaring.
"Are you kidding me, Po?" Tigress also faced him. "Is EVERY prisoner here a friend of yours?"
"Po?" the yak narrowed his gaze at the panda. "That you, tubby?"
"As tubby as you are crazy," Po replied.
Tsin laughed uproariously. "Well I'll be dipped in hot mustard! What in tarnation are YOU doing down here?"
"We could ask the same thing," Tigress chimed in. "Why were you in that prison cell?"
The general seemed to notice her for the first time, "I do believe I asked my question first, missy."
Tigress turned to Po, her face conveying the question, Can we trust him?
"We're..." Po thought about his answer carefully "on a rescue mission."
"Not for me, I take it?" Tsin grinned ruefully.
"That depends."
"On what?"
"Po, look!" Tigress pointed at the yak's feet.
"What?" Tsin bent his head to look as well. "Did I step in it again?"
Before Po could ask what "it" was, he saw it: a tiny patch of silver shimmering faintly on the general's fur, just above his left hoof.
"No way!" Po gaped at him. "YOU'RE the king?"
"I am?" Tsin asked in confusion.
The kung fu masters looked at each other.
"Maybe that's a stain of something else..." Tigress suggested.
"He's got a cape though," Po countered.
"What about the medals?"
"MY MEDALS!" General Tsin roared. "I remember now! Those horn plated boot lickers took my medals!" He grabbed Po by the shoulders, "Listen here, son," he gestured between them with his free hoof "our beef gotta be put on hold for now. I gotta get back my medals from them varmints. Just sit tight and I'll be back to kick yer soft, simpering, little panda cub behind."
He turned down the corridor and ran, using one hoof to hold up his kilt.
The two shared another look and then ran after him.
Bao-Jia stared angrily at the underside of the bunk bed above him. It was only his 4th day in the soldier barracks but he was restless. Most of Prince Ch'eng's guards were civil enough and yet he knew he was wearing out his welcome. He joined them for their daily exercise and fighting routines, taking care to do so on the outskirts of their training area so as not to get in their way. He couldn't move as fast or do as much as they did, but it was better than doing nothing. It was melancholy times like this when, in the old days, Joo-Jin the court jester would magically appear and make him feel better.
"Hey there, your majesty," Joo-Jin appeared, as if thinking about him was enough to summon him.
"I told you not to call me that," Bao-Jia turned to face him. "It sounds patronizing."
"How about Mister B, then?" his friend suggested, sitting down on the bed next to him. "Or BJ?"
The former king gave him an unamused expression.
Joo-Jin began rubbing his chin, as if giving it more serious thought. "Snookums?"
Bao-Jia burst out laughing. "Heaven forbid," he replied with a smile. "Just my name will do."
"Sure thing, My Name," Joo-Jin smiled back. Then he took on a slightly more serious tone. "Is something wrong? I didn't see you at sword practice this morning." He lowered his voice. "...are the other kids bullying you again?"
Bao-Jia felt heat climbing up his cheeks and he lowered his gaze. "You saw that?"
Yesterday, when he had been practicing his forward thrusts, he had been knocked over from behind by one of the soldiers walking past him.
"You're not fit for soldiering!" the leopard had called out, as he continued on his way in the company of his comrades. "It's no wonder your kingdom was taken over so easily!"
"Why don't you go catch some trout for us instead?" one of the others called back over his shoulder at him. "At least then you'll be good for something!"
"The idea of that guy being a king is a joke," the third one said, loud enough so Bao-Jia could hear. "And if that tigress is really his daughter, she's probably just as useless and dead by now."
Joo-Jin nodded his head slightly. "Yeah... I saw."
The two said nothing for a few moments, then the younger cat added, "You were a great king, you know. We all, those who worked in the palace, know how hard you worked to make sure you treated your subjects fairly and that they were happy. If Lijuan were here, she'd say the same thing."
The mention of his wife's name pained him. Bao-Jia swallowed the lump in his throat and blinked back hot, frustrated tears. "Thank you, old friend. But, that's not the real reason... or at least, not the entire reason I was brooding."
He sat up slowly, darting his eyes left and right as he got up close to Joo-Jin's ear and whispered, "How safe are we here from prying eyes and ears?"
"Hmm," the younger tiger stuck his tongue out in contemplation. In the old days he had started doing that just to be funny, but over time it became an engrained habit. "Come with me."
Joo-Jin grabbed the king's wrist and hauled him up, then tugged him along out the barracks door.
Bao-Jia blinked in surprise, "Where are we going?"
The jester flashed him one of his old mischievous smiles. "Remember the trees we used to climb as cubs?"
Joo-Jin guided them deep into the forest, taking so many twists and turns Bao-Jia was completely lost. His friend suddenly stopped before a seemingly random tree trunk. "This is it."
Bao-Jia looked up, but couldn't see anything past the dense leafy foliage. Adult tigers are not, by nature, willing or efficient climbers but are still capable of doing so. He stepped back and let his younger, lither friend go up first. Joo-Jin climbed with the speed and grace of a leopard, probably a skill he picked up from spending so much time among them. Bao-Jia was slower, but sure-footed and soon broke through the first layer of canopy. He couldn't see the younger cat and, figuring he was higher up, continued his steady climb.
At the sixth or seventh layer of canopy, he was no longer counting, Bao-Jia's head bumped into something solid. He blinked at the impregnable tangle of leaves above him and reached up to test if his senses were tricking him or not. He felt a hard, flat surface, to which the leaves were stuck with some sticky sap or residue. Peering quizzically at this barrier and at a loss of what else to do, he knocked.
"What's the password?" Joo-Jin's voice asked from the other side.
"Let me in, you turd!" the old king replied.
A large square of the barrier opened inward, revealing the trap door. The jester's face peered sternly down at him. "I'll let you in this time, but we're changing that password," he said, reaching down to help him up.
"What is this place?" he asked,
"An old forgotten scout point," his friend replied, closing the door behind him. "I found it once while I was out exploring. I thought it might come in handy someday."
Bao-Jia nodded. He looked around at the sparsely furnished interior. A couple of severed tree stumps served as either tables or chairs, the windows were covered with mosquito netting, and a single naked lightbulb dangled from the ceiling.
"Cozy," he said, trying to be polite. He and Joo-Jin had just sat down, when he spotted a small corner cupboard full of half eaten chips, protein bars, and... "Are those joke books?"
"Whoops!" his friend ran over and hid the books behind the cupboard. "You weren't supposed to see that. Trade secrets, you know."
"I won't tell a soul," the older tiger promised, though he couldn't keep a straight face as he said it.
The two fell into an awkward silence then, before Bao-Jia finally cleared his throat and began his account. "Ahem. Those, uh, bullies from before... something's not right about them."
"You mean maybe their mothers didn't love them enough?"
"Maybe," Bao-Jia agreed with a grin, "but besides that, I followed them afterward. I had it in mind to have a little talk with them. But as I was working up my nerve, I overheard their conversations with other soldiers. For instance, with one group they said something like 'Do you really want to spend your entire life locked up in some boring village? With someone always telling you what you can and can't do?' and then to another they'd comment, 'It's so dull and peaceful here. Don't you want to see some action?' Stuff like that."
"Sounds serious," Joo-Jin said in a deep-throaty voice.
"I know it's a little shy of being outright mutinous," the king sighed "but it got me thinking... what if this is how revolutions always start? By guys like that sowing seeds of discontent among his peers? If I'd paid more attention to it when it was happening in my own kingdom, then maybe-"
"Stop," Joo-Jin cut him off. "That's enough, Bao-Jia. You need to forgive yourself for past mistakes and stop beating yourself up over them."
"But how can I forget?" The older tiger palmed his own face with his hand, looking dismally down at the floor through his spread fingers. "It's because of those mistakes that my family and my kingdom have had to suffer so much."
"You misunderstand me," the jester reached up and gently removed his sovereign's hand from his face, so they could look at each other straight in the eyes. "Forgiveness doesn't mean forgetting. It means accepting the fact that the past cannot be changed."
Bao-Jia stared at him for a minute. Then he chuckled, his features relaxing and making him look years younger. "I see, I see! My friend, you are indeed a very wise fool."
Joo-Jin smiled back, "I've been called worse."
But then the old king's smile faded and he gripped his friend's hand tightly. "There's one other thing I forgot to mention. At the end of every conversation, they always issued the same challenge. I heard it so often I feel I can recite it from memory. He said:
"We are, all of us, wild cats. But many of you have become domesticated...tame." He spat the words as if they left a bad taste in his mouth. "If you think I'm wrong, come and prove yourself tonight at the training grounds. If any of you are faster, stronger, or stealthier than I am..." He chuckled. "Well, if that happens, I'll let you dictate what my punishment should be. Otherwise, you all agree to be underlings in my secret club."
Joo-Jin felt a chill sweep through his body, making all his fur stand on end. "Okay," he said. "I think it's appropriate to be paranoid now."
"That went well," Po mumbled.
Tigress, General Tsin and he were caged separately in a row with a pair of armed Lin Kuei guards flanking them.
They had landed in their current situation when the general had led them there after running in and out of dozens of tunnels; stopping periodically to sniff the air, taste the dirt, or put his ears to the ground. Po couldn't tell if he was actually gathering information from doing this or simply going through the motions because he thought he looked cool doing it.
It must have worked because when they finally arrived, there were his medals prominently displayed in a glass case in the center of the room. No guards, no locks on the case, no visible security of any kind.
It was obviously a trap.
"HA!" General Tsin had cried triumphantly upon spotting them. "That was too easy!"
"There are more weapons here than thieves!" Tigress had gaped at their surroundings. They were in what appeared to be a second armory, almost three times as large and densely packed as the first. If Syaoran had been with them, he'd have been able to identify them as the mysterious late night delivery boxes he'd mentioned before.
"Do you think they're selling them on the black market?" Po queried as he picked up something that looked like a combination sword/grenade launcher.
As they were discussing this, the general walked right up and snatched his precious medals off the case.
SLAM
Down fell the heavy metal cages that currently held the trio. The flood of guards came soon after.
"I thought you said we could trust him!" Tigress hissed angrily at Po through clenched teeth.
"Nooo," Po corrected. "I said he was crazy. I never verbalized whether or not he was trustworthy."
"Would ya quit yer yappin?" Tsin, who was in the middle cage, scolded them. "What's important isn't whether or not I got the wiggling skull crack vibratories! What's important is-" He took turns puffing his chest out at each of them to show off the shiny treasures pinned on his fur "-I got my medals back! The KING is back! Watch out now!"
He struck his hands on his hips, in what he thought was a majestic pose, and completely forgot about holding up his kilt. It sank to the floor, revealing the fact that he wore no underwear.
Tigress covered her eyes and looked away, "I'd rather NOT watch."
"Ditto for me," Po empathized, mimicking her.
"Put yer pants back on, gramps!" The guard on the left thumped his spear butt against the bars of Tsin's cage. "The boss is comin and ya need ta look presentable!"
"Phooey!" Tsin spat, "I'M the boss here! These are MY tunnels and you all are tresspassin! Soon as I'm outta here I'm throwing the lot of ya dung smellin spam riders into the river! Ya'll need a good scrubbin, anywho!"
"Whatever," the guard retorted, unimpressed. "Just do it or I'm gonna start cutting off the parts I don't wanna see."
The general jutted out his chin indignantly, "Fine!" and shimmied up his kilt. His cage-mates both sighed in relief.
It was just in time. Two seconds later, Heilang walked in. His gaze swept once from Tigress to Po and then slowly back to her. "You should've escaped when you had the chance, little cat."
When she didn't respond, his eyes resettled on the general. "Looks like you didn't much appreciate our hospitality. Three square meals a week not good enough for you?"
"That slop you tried to poison me with ain't fit for pigs!" Tsin exclaimed. "No offense to pigs, a course."
Heilang spread his arms to include the three of them. "What am I going to do with you problem children? I've tried being nice and look how I'm repaid." He waggled his index finger and tsked at them. "Looks like I'll have to resort to cruel and unusual punishment then." He grinned slyly. "You'll be the first guinea pigs to test out our new secret weapon."
"You have another, secret, weapon?" Tigress asked disdainfully. "You mean selling all these weapons here won't be enough for you?"
"Sell?" Heilang made a disgusted face. "We're assassins, not smugglers."
It took a minute for that fact to register. When it did, even the general felt his blood run cold. Tigress held tightly onto the bars of her cage as she anxiously asked, "Who...?"
Heilang smiled but said nothing. Instead he sauntered over to a section of the armory where the crates were stacked in an odd manner; forming a sort of outline like an egg on stilts against the back wall. He approached and pressed an oddly protruding rock to the exterior of the left stilt.
The walls began to shake and slid down to reveal an egg-on-stilts shaped hole in their place.
General Tsin whistled appreciatively. "I didn't know that wall could do that."
"It couldn't before," Heilang admitted. "We've made many improvements to your little network of rat holes since we took over. And that's not even the most impressive part."
He disappeared inside the hole and all was quiet for a few seconds. Then the squeals and clicks of heavy machinery emanated from the void and a large metal egg with legs emerged. In the center of it was a small horizontal slit, from which the glowing blue eyes of the Lin Kuei within could be seen. Long metallic pincers extended and picked up Tsin's and Tigress's cages.
They began to squeeze.
The trapped occupants screamed in terror as the bars bent like tender bamboo shoots and it appeared they were going to be crushed.
"NOOO!" Po cried out, trying to reach for them through the bars of his own cage. "TIGRESS! GENERAL!"
They were too far away. He switched tactics and latched onto the bars instead, trying with all his might to pull them apart. They didn't budge. He tried rocking his cage, thinking maybe he could roll it forward, crash into the machine and make it drop them. It didn't even tip.
The Lin Kuei laughed at their pathetic antics. Heilang stopped squeezing and set the misshapen prisons back on the ground. The bars were bent so far in that if one of them had been Po's cage, he'd have acquired an unflattering hourglass figure. As it was, both of the comparatively thin occupants were shaken, but unharmed.
Then the 'shoulders' of the egg rose, revealing twin columns of rocket launchers, six on each side. The pincer arms rotated and folded, morphing into a pair of flame-throwers that immediately shot arching plumes of blinding fire into the air so hot, the conductive metal of their cages below it began turning red.
Everyone outside the egg, including the guards, began to choke. Tigress remembered Joo-Jin's warning about using fire in the tunnels and how it consumed their precious air. Heilang seemed unaffected and his blazing blue eyes bounced up and down with laughter.
How is this monstrosity possible? she thought, while gasping in the scant oxygen trickling in from the few air vents in the room. Like the wolf leader said, they were assassins, not engineers. Then she saw a small engraving peeping out from the underside of the egg and had to strain her smoky tear-filled eyes to read it.
"Property of Taotie. If found, please return to-"
Oh no... she began to hyperventilate. Toatie was a rogue student of the Jade Palace, a mechanical genius turned villain after he stole the sacred Jade Orb of Infinite Power. He used it to fuel his inventions and compensate for his lack of skill in kung fu. If this was truly one of his creations, they were in serious trouble.
"Our target," Heilang's voice came out echoey from within the egg "is the Snow Leopard Kingdom."
A/N: This chapter is dedicated to gwencarson126. Thanks for the idea of checking in with Bao-Jia. I promised a new chapter before the end of the year and I delivered! xD Having no job, no school, and lots of time to listen to audio books really helped too. I also made a few changes to older chapters, since I had to re-read this story to remember what all I had going on up to this point. Hope ya'll enjoy, and if not, constructive criticism is always welcome.