Hello there!

Sorry, this isn't an update. I'm only reposting these last three chapters because it was brought to my attention that the grammar wasn't so hot. So, here is the more-polished version of those three chapters!

Here is the next chapter in the story (in case you somehow didn't realize that already…) Hope you all like it!

Oh, by the way, I renamed this story "The Empress-Part 1" because, under further thought, I decided that Part 2 was going to be rated M. However, Part 1 really isn't quite as dark as Part 2 is planned to be (I'm planning to have some very harsh "I don't want to keep reading" moments, so yeah…) so I figured I could leave it rated T. I don't really know, I guess it's subject to change, so we'll see… Anyway-

On with the show!

The Winding Rivers- Morning

Shao lived in a haze during his boat ride home. Nothing seemed to matter anymore, not the water and trees passing him by, not the fisherman trying to strike up a conversation with him, not the prospect of eating.

Nothing. There was nothing.

Shao had somehow dulled his mind, made it so where he wasn't ever thinking. He didn't want to have to think ever again. He knew that if he started, he would never be able to stop.

It was Croc's face that really haunted Shao. When he had turned back around to see if he had shot him or not, it was what was left of the face that scarred him.

He hadn't expected so much blood. He thought it was going to look like that small hole in the wall that Qian had made when he demonstrated the object's potential in their basement. He must have been standing too close to him. But the blood, oh, how it terrified him.

How that seemed like so long ago, Shao thought to himself. Well, he didn't really think that. He just felt it. Gone were the days of quietly standing by the counter, handing out herbs and mushrooms and taking money in exchange. Gone were the days of sitting at the corner of Dragon Warrior Noodles and Tofu, waiting for his order to be ready so that he could take the second bag to the pig on the park bench.

Shao spent most of his time in the depths of the small boat, where there were a few cots set up. He just slept and slept, only getting up to mechanically shovel food down his mouth and forcing water down his throat.

The fisherman suspected that he was some kind of criminal, but he mistakenly took him for some kind of thief who had stolen something valuable from the Tower. That would explain his willingness to give him so much money.

If he only knew that Shao gave him that much money out of pure desperation, he might have reconsidered. If he knew what the goat was really running from, he would have never left the dock that night.

About four days into the journey, Shao opened his eyes. He was laying on his cot, where he had spent most of his time, and sat up. He had tried to sleep his way through the trip, but sleep only began to tire him. He decided that it was finally time to get up.

He threw the thin blanket away from him, rolled out of the cot, and walked over underneath the trapdoor, pushing it open with his hooves. He pulled himself out of the hull and onto the deck of the small boat.

"Good morning," the fisherman welcomed, currently steering the boat.

Shao did not answer. He only walked over to the edge of the boat and leaned over the gunwale. He looked around him.

It was early morning, with the Sun just beginning to rise over the peaks of mountains. The day was young, and the sky still carried a tint of red and orange, letting the thin, wispy clouds float by. There were mostly uninhabited forests around this part of the river, so they passed by him, only to go on and on for what seemed like forever.

Shao peered down into the water below. The bow of the boat cut through the water, and made ripples off of the sides. But the wind was not blowing that morning, and the water sat perfectly still when the ripples didn't disturb it.

He looked into the water and saw his own face staring back at him. He did not look good. The space under his eyes had darkened, showing his recent time of restless sleep and dulled-out days. He looked at his eyes, and saw a goat looking back, confused and ashamed. But he just looked so tired. It was like he hadn't slept for months, which was ironic, given that he had tried to sleep his last few days behind him.

Everything had melded together in one blur during his trip on the boat. Sleeping, eating, drinking, sleeping, and then repeating the process over and over again. He didn't know when it would end. When would he be able to think again, he wondered? The gods knew he didn't want to, but he was going to have to eventually. What would happen? He simply couldn't relive that moment, but he knew that it would appear in his dreams again and again and again. He would be trapped in that moment forever, and there would never be any rest.

Finally, hunched over the gunwale of the boat, Shao made his first coherent thought since he had completed his crime.

"What am I going to do now?" he wondered. "Am I really going to try to finish this? I mean, that entire journey was to prove that I could do it; to prepare myself for the greater challenge. And now I did it. So am I going to go through with it? Can I really do it again? I didn't mean to do it with Croc. I wasn't going to do it. But Ox came in, and…"

Shao couldn't bring himself to think about what happened after that.

Finally, a voice of reason whispered in his mind.

"Just go back home," it told him. "That old goat lady told you, but you wouldn't listen. Now, with some luck, they won't be looking for you all the way in the Valley, and you might get away with this. But if you try something against the Masters of the Jade Palace, you will definitely get caught. Nobody has to know what you did. You can resume your life as it was."

But Shao knew that his life wouldn't be the same. How could he stand there, walking through the streets, when the news arrived to the Valley? Everyone would be talking about the horrible death of the great Master Croc of Gongmen City. How could he look away from those people and pretend like he didn't know? How could he simply shrug his shoulders and say, "Ah, that's bad news"?

He didn't know how he would ever cope with what he'd done. Shao closed his eyes, thinking.

"You'll create the monster you set out to destroy," the Soothsayer had told him. Was she right? Was he becoming hundreds of times worse than the danger predators posed? He certainly felt empty at the moment. He knew he should be ashamed, but somehow, he wasn't. He was simply so numb that there wasn't room for crippling shame.

But he knew that it would not last. His walls were weakening, and it was only a matter of time until those walls collapsed and the mounting pressure of shame and guilt washed over him. He did not relish that moment.

Shao knew what he needed to do. He needed to go home. He needed to restart his life and put his horrific crime behind him.

But somehow, there was something tugging at him. A memory. The memory of the evacuation, when Tai-Lung had turned against the Valley. A memory of a small tigress with blood-stained fists, claws, and teeth, and an unconscious pig at her feet.

Those thoughts tugged and tugged.

The Jade Palace- Morning

Shifu slowly put the scroll down. He had read it and reread it. He didn't want to believe it. Another death in Gongmen? It was terrible, Shifu thought.

And now he had to break the news to his students.

"Thank you, Zeng," Shifu solemnly told the messenger bird, who had interrupted his meditation to bring him the scroll. Shifu left the Dragon Grotto, which he understood had seen quite a lot of use as of late, and headed back down towards the palace kitchen. The Sun was just rising, and the morning gong had just been rung. He knew his students would most likely be in the kitchen.

Shifu walked down the long trail that led down the small mountain the grotto was located in, and passed the large, ornate decorations and buildings that made up the palace grounds. He finally reached the barracks and walked in the kitchen, where his students were quietly leaning over the table- on the table, in Mantis' and Viper's case- with their bowls of noodles pushed to the side, excitedly whispering among themselves. They didn't notice him walk up to the doorway.

Shifu's morbid message briefly left his mind for a moment.

"What are you all whispering about?"

Instantly, his students backed away, sitting erect in the table seats.

Out of tradition, Shifu looked at Po, because his expression always held the most information on it. Naturally enough, Po was embarrassed at something, his expression desperately trying to look innocent. He was failing spectacularly.

But then something caught Shifu's eye. Tigress' eyes were stuck to the floor. She looked… embarrassed? What could have possibly happened to make her, of all his students, embarrassed?

"Umm, it's nothing master," Po quickly tried to cover up. "I just told everyone…"

Monkey quickly covered for Po. "A joke! A really funny joke!"

Po, relieved that someone had come to his aid, built off of that. "Right! A joke. Yeah, that's it!"

Shifu looked back and forth between each of his students, but wasn't able to understand what had happened. Clearly, they were lying, but he decided that it couldn't have been anything major. He prepared himself again for having to be the one to deliver the terrible news.

"Students, something's happened in Gongmen City," he started.

"Gongmen City?" Po asked, memories of Shen coming to mind. "What is it? Are the wolves back? Is someone else trying to make cannons? Whatever it is, we'll take care of it with our sheer awesomeness!"

Po's bouncy response was shot down by Shifu's stern look. That look told Po that this was no laughing matter.

"No, none of those," he directed at Po. "Master Croc has been assassinated."

Silence. Dead silence.

Tigress was the first to break it. "What?" she asked softly, almost as if she too was afraid to break the sacred silence. "When?"

"It happened three days ago, late in the night. It appears that an assassin snuck into his room and killed him."

"But who would want Croc dead? Who would pay for an assassin?" Crane asked. "Even we have never been attacked by an assassin capable of sneaking into a place such as the Tower of Sacred Flame. Who would pay that much money for an assassin of that rank? And why did they only kill Master Croc, and not Master Ox?"

Shifu put his hand up to stop Crane. "I don't know. All I know is that Master Ox was walking down the hall in the middle of the night, saw Croc's door partially open, looked in, when he said there was a loud noise, similar to the explosions of Shen's black powder."

Everyone listened in shock. Master Croc, dead? How was it possible? And the noise? Had someone created a new weapon out of the outlawed black powder; made it smaller and more precise? They simply couldn't believe it.

"After that," Shifu continued, "Master Ox said the assassin ran out of the room and fled the building. They locked down the city and combed the place for him, but they didn't find anyone."

"And what did the assassin look like?" Tigress asked.

"They say he had kidnapped a servant and stolen his clothes. They describe him as a young male goat with pale white fur."

Shifu put his paws up the opposite sleeves and folded his arms across his chest, giving his students time to digest his words.

"Well, what can we do?" Tigress asked.

"For now? Nothing. I did not train you in hunting down a single individual. Nevertheless, we do not know this assassin's intentions or his location, so I advise you to keep a sharp lookout on the villagers that get close to you."

Shifu sighed. "That is all. You may begin your daily training when you finish your meal." With that, Shifu walked away, and his students sat on in silence.

When they had all woken up in the morning and arrived in the kitchen, Po and Tigress had each been in agony. Over the past few days, they had been silent about their new relationship. They didn't want to tell anyone about the two of them, they just wanted to exist in this exciting secret relationship status forever. But they knew that to make the next step in their love, they needed Shifu's approval.

Po had been silent as he prepared the noodles for their breakfast. He had set up the table for everyone, and they had all begun to eat when Tigress did Po's duty for him.

"Po and I are in a relationship," she had starkly stated, as if it was no more important than using the restroom. Their friends had each looked up from the bowls, shocked out of their sleepiness.

Of course, Crane and Viper were less shocked than Monkey and Mantis, and Viper had been the first to break the silence.

"Great job you two! You finally admitted it to each other, huh?"

Tigress' eyes suddenly turned wide. "Wait, you all knew!?

Monkey tried his very best to contain his laughter, but it slipped out, earning a vicious-looking glare from Tigress.

"Oh, come on, Tigress," Viper had continued, "everybody knew except for you two!"

Tigress had blushed under her fur as she dropped her chopsticks on the table, eliciting a laugh from everyone but Po.

Crane had stood up in an attempt to ease their embarrassment.

"Oh, come on guys, don't take our laughs so seriously. We're really happy for you and we're glad that you two finally had the courage to tell each other."

Normally, nobody would dare to tell Tigress that she didn't have the courage to do something, but this time, she could only look up at Crane, her lips not moving but her eyes saying- "Thank you."

Then, Viper had jumped on the table as she whispered-

"So when is the wedding going to be?"

Po had rolled his eyes. "Oh, come on guys, we only confessed to each other a few days ago. It's not like we-"

But he was interrupted by Mantis. "Well, I don't see why you can't just have it immediately! The gods know you've wanted to for ages now!"

"Wait, wait, we're not at tha-" Po had begun until he was cut off by Monkey, who was now leaning across the table as well.

"In fact, I think we can have it arranged in just a few weeks!"

At that point, everyone leaned towards the center of the table and each tried to whisper over the other when Shifu had walked in.

Now, after Shifu's announcement, their excitement had been extinguished like a small fire hit by a typhoon.

Finally, Mantis broke the silence. "I think we might have to postpone that wedding."

Ningjang

Lianmin put the paper back on the table and leaned back in her chair.

"Master Croc, dead?" she thought. "How terrible." But it wasn't that that really sparked her imagination. It was the assassin. The young male goat with pale white fur.

An assassin capable of sneaking in the Tower of Sacred Flame and assassinating one of the greatest living kung-fu masters? That was impressive.

He would make a worthy target.

Lianmin's skills had never been put to such a test. Oh sure, she'd bagged a few murderers and dangerous criminals, but none of them had been particularly bright, and they had been rather easy to capture. But this, this would be her crowning achievement. She didn't want the achievement for the fame of it. No, she simply wanted to prove to herself that she could do it.

And bring justice to Master Croc's murderer at the same time, of course.

She sat up, out of her chair and headed to give Peng the news. They would be on the hunt soon.

The Jade Palace- Night

It had taken all day. He didn't want to do it. He couldn't do it. There was simply no way.

Tigress wanted to. She kept asking him and asking him, only to get the response of "Let's do it later, please."

What was he so afraid of, she wondered? What was the worst that could happen? It wasn't like Shifu was going to kill Po. They were only asking for his blessing in their marriage. What could go wrong?

It was night by now, and Po had procrastinated the entire day. Tigress prodded him and prodded him, but he was simply too afraid.

The funny thing was, he wasn't really sure of what he was afraid of. That Shifu would say "No?" That he would tell him to leave the Valley? That he would tell Po to get a new name and start a new life in the New World? Surely he wouldn't, Po's brain told him, but his heart just couldn't let go of that fear.

Finally, right before everyone went to bed, he felt as confident as he was going to ever feel, which wasn't much, but it was better than in the morning.

Po and Tigress silently walked down the hallway together. It briefly occurred to Po to reach out for Tigress' paw, but he held back. He wasn't really sure if she wanted that out of their relationship. Did she want to be touched yet? Or was she still trying to deal with her personal numbness? He couldn't be sure.

Finally, Po decided to take a brave step. As they passed by the barracks, passed the kitchen, passed the hallways, as they exited the Jade Palace and began the climb to the Dragon Grotto where Shifu was finishing his nightly meditation, Po reached out to Tigress and gently took her paw. Initially, like a reflex, she began to pull it back, but then she stopped. It was almost as if she had to combat her instincts to think about what was happening. She let the warmth of Po's hand flow through her own, and, after more deliberation, let her heart win. She opened up her paw and grasped Po's.

Tigress held his paw because it was more than just holding his paw. She was openly telling everyone, "You see this person right here? I love him. And I don't care if you approve or not."

On the other hand, Po was holding it for a different reason. Of course, he too was in love and wanted to be close to the love of his life, but his action had a different reason behind it.

The prospect of asking Shifu for Tigress' hand in marriage terrified him beyond belief. There was something far more terrifying with this. More so than with a physical threat, such as Tai-Lung, Shen, or Kai. Because with them, Po had been facing them. Now, he was facing himself. And he was a far more frightening opponent. The yin and yang existed between him and Tigress, yes, but also within each person. He had his joyfulness, his love, and his caring nature on one side, but he had his fears, his worries, his destroyed village where he was born, the way the kids picked on him when he was little for being different on the other side. All of that huddled together and made a much nastier, less likable version of himself. He shut that self away, kept its selfish desires and dangerous thoughts at bay. No one ever saw that side of him. It was only when there was no one else, when it was silent, did he show up. The silence invited him out like a dying light invites the shadows.

Right now, that part of him whispered in his ear.

"Shifu will never approve of this. Tigress is practically his daughter! You already know you're nothing but a 'fat panda' to him, who constantly needs improvement. You're not even a great student, how do you think he'll see you as a son-in-law?"

His other side disagreed. "No, he wouldn't do that. Sure, Shifu may point out my issues and weaknesses, but it's only because he cares about me and wants to see me do better in life."

Before he had asked Tigress, a similar question had prevented him from saying anything to her. What if he wasn't good enough for Tigress? She just seemed so elegant, so powerful, so graceful, so perfect. How could he stack up to that? He, a clumsy, silly, childish panda? The only thing that had washed that question from his mind had been when she told him that she was actually in love with him.

Po was forced to push those questions aside as the moment of victory or defeat was at hand. They had been climbing up the small mountain, getting higher and higher, and now, Po and Tigress finally rounded the corner.

The two of them, still holding each other's paws, stepped toward the meditating master.

What they didn't know was that, where the rivers ran by the Valley, a small fishing boat had just been tied to the dock. They didn't know that a young male goat with pale white fur stepped off the boat and into the Valley, unsure of where to go next.

And, that's the end of this chapter. Feel free to leave your thoughts and/or comments below! I thought that, especially after the chapter, I might slow it down a little bit, let myself catch my breath after that last chapter.

Keep being awesome!