A/N: Warning for slightly lemony material, innuendo, and crude humor.

Despite his status as the 'comedian', Monkey was better known for his pranks than his jokes. If somebody was missing an item and found it displayed in a humorous place, they knew it was Monkey. If anyone walked into their room to find it replaced with the contents of another's, they knew who to chase around the Palace and yell at. Master Mantis, in fact, was the jokester, in complement to Monkey's prankster status. He often made the whole group roar in laughter during dinner or breakfast, and he kept just about everybody from taking themselves too seriously. Even Tigress would laugh on occasion, though those occasions had been growing more and more frequent as the years went by.

Unfortunately, Mantis was also known for his teasing. Nobody could get away with any misstep or mistake without him calling them out on it, and more often than not he got them to laugh about it.

But he really didn't know when to leave well enough alone.

The fact that Po and Tigress had become such good friends so quickly had largely been ignored. Po was easily likable and instantly became familiar with everybody he met (even some of his enemies), and within a year the Five felt as close to him as they did each other. Tigress, on the other hand, had always remained a bit reserved in her friendship with the others, and before Po arrived she had hardened herself until the Masters barely recognized her as the enthusiastic, amiable young student they had first met.

But Po made her smile. When she took her training too far, Po was the one who brought her back, cooled her down, and stayed with her until she ate and rested; when she was bottling something up, Po was the one who could get her to talk about it, and his efforts eventually made him her closest friend. The Five did not begrudge Po this honor, simply glad that Tigress was opening up and becoming more comfortable, with others and with herself.

But it did give Mantis a lot of teasing material.

He didn't often tease Tigress to her face, knowing she wouldn't tolerate it, so Po usually got the brunt of his jokes, which were more often than not aimed primarily at him anyway. He had managed keep his crush on Tigress a secret for a grand total of one day, and Mantis had thought it was hilarious; even more so when he and Tigress began to be best friends.

"So, how was your special training with Tigress today?"
"Wow, you and Tigress have been spending a lot of time in the ironwood grove lately, huh?"
"That Double-Death Strike of yours is real cool, Po; did you make it up while dancing?"

"Why didn't you come check on me after the cannon blew us away?"
"So why was Tigress's action figure the only one you packed?"
Po took these in good humor, and could often laugh them off or respond with a tease himself. But when one of Mantis's jokes finally hit home, two months after their mission in Gongmen, he was completely caught off guard.

"Must have been cold on the Serpent's Tooth Pass," Mantis had on said the evening of Po and Tigress's return from a mission in the mountains.

"Hope you two cuddled for warmth."

He laughed and looked up, expecting Po to be doing the same, but to his surprise the panda was hunched over slightly, staring fixedly at the eggplant he was slicing for dinner. Mantis looked around at the others and laughed quietly.

"So, Po, did you two cuddle for warmth?"
"Uh, well, I mean…"
"Po!"

Po cringed, his eyes shut tight.

"Well, I mean it was getting dark and then it started snowing and it was getting colder and we found the cave just in time but there wasn't anything we could use for a fire-"
"So, wait, you two actually cuddled for warmth? You actually cuddled with Tigress for warmth!"

Mantis crowed about this for days and teased Po at every opportunity, and his jokes steadily became dirtier and dirtier within the next few years. Every time Po and Tigress attended a mission by themselves, or trained alone, or visited the village together, Mantis would ask Po how he and Tigress were getting along, and if the rest of the Five should expect wedding invitations soon. Shifu, who knew of the jokes and to whom they were aimed, allowed Mantis to continue them as long as Shifu himself was out of earshot.

The teasing became halfway serious when Mantis somehow found out about Po sleeping in Tigress's room whenever he had a nightmare, and many times Po had to ask Mantis to dial his teasing down a little when his jokes became too crude. Mantis was in the middle of a diatribe on what tiger/panda babies would look like when Tigress found out.

Although Tigress had received her fair share of jokes, Mantis, in the sense of self-preservation, had saved the nastier and more intimate ones for the panda. Tigress was extremely unamused to hear the insect Master's jokes and speculations about her private business upon entering the kitchen for lunch, and left almost immediately after she arrived. Po dropped what he was doing, glared at Mantis, and hurried after her.

The Five had watched the two with care and surreptitious eyes when they returned for afternoon training, but neither of them acted differently, even during dinner. Mantis ventured a few jibes at their expense, and they either ignored him or joked back. Everybody let out a silent sigh of relief, and they all thought that would be the end of it…until something awakened Crane in the middle of the night.

The Masters had grown used to Po going to the kitchen for a midnight snack, so at first Crane ignored the quiet opening and closing of the panda's bedroom door - until he heard footsteps and the squeak of a futon.

"What-"
"Shh."
Every muscle in Crane's body stiffened. Tigress was in Po's room. That had never happened before.

"Are you sure you-"
"Yes."
"Here? Now?"
"Just stay quiet."
There was a rustle and Po's futon creaked again.

"Well, what do you-"
"Just…show me what you usually do, and then we can do it together."
Crane's feathers ruffled. Against his better judgement, he silently leaned closer to the paper wall.

"Alright, just let me…"
The futon creaked again, and there was a soft, silky swish of fabric.

"Oh…I didn't know you had that much…equipment."

Crane's beak dropped.

"Yeah, I'm actually quite pleased with it."
"I admit, I've never seen a…chisel…that big before."
"Good thing we've both got big hands, huh?"
Crane nearly choked. He silently scurried over to the opposite wall and tapped lightly with a wing. After a few moments, Monkey opened the door with bleary eyes. Crane slapped his wing over the simian's mouth and urgently nodded his head to the wall he shared with Po; Monkey's eyes widened, and they both crept over and leaned their heads to the paper.
"Wow, you really know how to handle a…chisel," Po whispered. Monkey's jaw dropped and he looked at Crane with disbelief. Crane nodded at him frantically.

"I'm not sure if I'm holding it right…"
"No, you're fine. Just make sure you grasp it firmly…"

Po, grinning widely, reached over to adjust Tigress's grip on the chisel, then handed her a half-carved block of wood.

"Now you move like this, just up and down…"
Tigress, sat beside him on the floor, clenched her teeth, silently laughing. She gently chiseled away flakes of wood from the undefined torso of the new figurine, and then leaned against the panda to use his belly as a backrest.

"Do you mind if I…?"
"Oh, no, go ahead. I'm all yours."

Within ten minutes Monkey and Crane had also summoned Viper and Mantis. Viper had at first tried to admonish the others on their eavesdropping, thinking it unbearably rude, but she stopped when she heard the pair say:

"Is it supposed to be that…pink?"
"Yeah, actually, but it gets more red when it's thicker."

Monkey jumped when she quickly slithered around his feet and pressed her head close to the paper wall.

"Here; just gently grasp the head-"

"-Like this?"

"Yeah, but not too tight or you'll hurt it. Just – yeah, like that – and pull very slowly, twisting a little bit."

Monkey covered his mouth with one hand, eyes wide and shoulders heaving.

I knew it, Mantis mouthed to him. I knew it!

Crane agitatedly waved a wing for them to settle down.

"This is a lot messier than I thought it would be," they heard Tigress mutter.

"Yeah, it is. I'm glad it's easy to clean off of fur, though, or else I would have gotten into a lot of trouble with my dad. I mean, you just can't serve soup when you're covered in…"
Viper gagged. There was a quiet susurrus or fur-on-fur.

"It dries quickly," Tigress whispered.

"Don't worry about it, it washes off well."

Po brushed his paint-splattered hand across his stomach, removing wood shavings from the white fur. He noticed Tigress's arm was covered in shavings and wood dust, and made to brush her off as well.
"Here, I can get that…"
"It's alright, I'll clean up later," she whispered back. He gestured to her face, where she had a smear of wood paint on her cheek.

"Oh, there's…on your face…"

Mantis had to stumble away from the wall, his eyes clenched tight, holding his head in his claw-thingies.

"Now, if you wanna…"
"Oh. Of course."
"Here, move a little closer…I'll give you this, and…"

There were a few quiet rustles, but for a minute or two Mantis and the others didn't hear anything. He looked up at Monkey, who shrugged. Viper mouthed Do you think they're-? and Crane raised his wings in an uncertain gesture, just before the group heard:
"Hmm. That fits into the hole surprisingly well."
"Mm-hmm. The more you go up and down, right here, the easier it slides-"

Viper fainted; Crane caught her with one foot before she could hit the floor, and the snake revived almost instantly, quickly slithering back to her place at the wall, looking both scandalized and delighted.

"Ah, there – does that feel okay?"
Tigress mm-hmmed quietly.

"I admit, it's a lot more fun when you've got somebody to do it with."
"Surely you've had plenty of practice," they heard Tigress whisper.

"Well, sure, but after a while my hand really gets tired…"
Monkey turned around to laugh quietly into his hand, and found himself face-to-face with Master Shifu. He jerked back with a startled twitch, bumping into Crane, who frantically fluttered a wing at him. Monkey grabbed the feathers in front of his face and pulled. Crane turned around, annoyed, and froze.

"What is the meaning of this?" Shifu demanded. Or he would have, if Viper had not slapped the end of her tail across his mouth. Shifu smacked it away with his staff, about to ream her out for her disrespect, but she urgently pointed her tail at the wall, gesturing for quiet. Shifu swallowed his anger, and leaned closer, glaring at the snake. There was nothing for a brief moment, and then:

"I admit, this was never something I was interested in until you came here," Tigress muttered.

"Yeah. I've never shared this with anybody else. It's just kind of private, y'know?"
Shifu's ears twitched. He leaned closer.

"It's not as complicated as I thought it would be," Tigress murmured.

"It'll get easier the more we practice," said Po quietly.

"Will you hand me a bit of that lubricant? I feel something catching."

Po passed her the bottle of woodworking lubricant and she lightly oiled the arm of the figurine, manipulating it up and down to make it move more smoothly. Po handed her the next bit, a forearm, and she delicately slid it into place. She looked up at Po, who smiled in the dull moonlight.

"This is quite satisfying," she whispered. She and Po glanced over at the wall and grinned.

Shifu jerked his head back from the wall, and nearly tripped over Mantis in his rush to get out into the hallway. The Five, surprised at his sudden movement, followed him out of Crane's room.

Shifu ran to the entrance of Po's room and threw open the doors.

"Stop this instant," he yelled, "There will be no - wha-what are you, are you…woodcarving?!"

Mantis and the others peeked over his shoulder into Po's room, where the panda and the tiger were sitting together on the floor, surrounded by wood shavings, paint flecks staining their fingers. Tigress was paused in the middle of fitting a figurine's leg into its torso, a bottle of woodworking lubricant in one paw.

Shifu looked at Po and Tigress. Po and Tigress looked at him. The Five looked at all three of them, and then looked at each other. Po and Tigress looked at the Five, and Shifu saw their grins. He mentally congratulated them on the most elaborate prank done at the Jade Palace yet, almost too amused to be annoyed.

"If you are truly insistent on these…woodworking lessons…I must request that you continue them in your free time instead of in the middle of the night. You and your fellow students need your rest."

Shifu then left, the group behind him immediately parting to clear his path.

"I suggest you all go back to sleep," he said, calmly walking down the hall. He turned the corner, then pressed against the wall, ears turned to the doorway.

"Wait a minute," Crane said agitatedly. "You…that…the entire time you were just carving dolls?"
"Action figures," Po said with a huff. Crane's feathers ruffled. Shifu heard the high criiiiick of Mantis jumping onto something.
"But seriously, you were just woodworking?"
"Of course," said Tigress calmly. Shifu could hear a small smile in her voice, and laughed quietly to himself.

"What did you think we were doing?"

A/N: I am not sorry.

I'm pretending that, in Fortitude, where Tigress slept curled atop Po's stomach, Po woke her up before anybody else awakened and nobody but Shifu and Crane saw what happened, and Crane knew how to keep his beak shut.

Viper fainting is not too off the wall, given that in the second film when Po stuffs thirty-eight bean buns into his mouth she collapses for a second.

I'm not entirely sure where this came from, but I laughed about it the entire morning at my volunteer job while I plotted bits out in my head. I'm sure that I looked a little crazy, cleaning out litter boxes while giggling to myself.

To anyone who is hoping for TiPo smutty chapters, this is about as dirty as I'm gonna get. I may imply, insinuate, etc, but I'm not going to show them doing anything more intimate than cuddles.