September came really quickly, Crane have been send in a mission to investigate several activities 10 kilometers away in the bamboo forest but he went missing for four days, Harry who was waiting for him in the Hall of the Warriors was thinking what could have happened and think that he might have been kidnapped or heart.
While there he heard a conversation coming from Master Shifu's quarters, he isn't usually permitted to interfere but he could try to listen what they are talking and began to sneak slowly till he placed himself near the door to listen.
"We should have gone with him." Tigress said irritated.
"If we would have accompanied him he wouldn't have been caught in this trap by the crocodile bandits." Mantis said.
"We should go and rescue him." Viper said.
"I agree we will to go after him as soon as possible." Master Shifu said putting the parchment down.
"Yeah but who would stay with Harry?" Monkey asked in a way he knew what the eleven year old crane boy could do.
"I will order Zeng to keep an eye on him to don't do something unusual." Master Shifu said before ordering "Now all of you prepare, we will leave in an hour" They bowed and left the room, Harry stayed near the entrance when they went to their rooms to prepare and no one saw him except master Shifu, he was looking at him with suspicion he knew that he they heard their conversation, Harry knew that he will say something.
"Go to your room young one, this is something too difficult for one of your age now." Harry was a bit uncertain about this but he obeyed the words of the Grand Master and began to walk away towards his room and wait for them to leave and their return.
After they left to search for Crane, Harry went to the hall of the warriors to wait; although Zeng was there the palace was really deserted without the Furious Five, Po and Shifu it was more like an abandoned school during the summer holiday, although winter is near. But after an hour Harry began to get bored of doing nothing and began to think what he could do while waiting.
"Harry, is everything all right?" The goose massager asked.
"Everything is fine Zeng I was only thinking." Harry said.
"Don't know what to do while they are all on a mission?" He asked, aside from his master, Zeng was the second one who he can relay on and care what he was doing, Zeng also liked him because he respected him for what he was doing, and he once asked him how the job as a massager was.
"Yeah, doing nothing is really boring it always seems that the time stands still instead of advancing." Harry said.
"Well, how about to do something while waiting." The goose proposed.
"I think I will train a little on targets and then read something." Harry said and went to the training hall.
In the mean time somewhere in the bamboo forest Shifu together with Po and the other furious five were looking for Crane and try to figure out what could have happened.
"Who do you think is behind the kidnapping?" Mantis asked.
"Who ever it was it truly was cunning." Tigress said and then Viper noticed a feather on the ground that sourly belonged to Crane.
"Guys I think I found something." Viper said tracking there attention "It is one of Crane's feathers; it means it should be near."
"Very good, keep searching for clues that will lead to him." Master Shifu said and kept searching but after a while everything seemed that that was the only clue they could found but then Po tripped and went into a whole that was covered with leaves.
"Traps!" Tigress said tracking the attention of the others who got in battle positions but before noticing they were staying on another trap, a net that cached the rest of them. In that moment they're captors came.
"Hahaha. It seems it worked better then expected." The head of the crocodile bandit said.
"Fung, we should have known." Po said.
"It seems we will get seven times the ransom." Fung said.
"Can I ask you who will give you the ransom if we are all here?" Monkey asked making him to think about it, he never putted that in mind.
"Darn it." He said throwing his helmet to the ground.
In the meantime at the Jade Palace, Harry had made its kung fu training and read some of the ancient texts, by doing this the time passed much more quickly but while reading he noticed that it was nearly sunset, Shifu, Po and the others should have returned by now.
"Strange, what could take them so long?" He said and after a minute he realized "Something must have happened." He placed the scroll on the table and went outside the palace and extended his wigs to fly.
"Where are you going?" Zeng asked.
"I want only to fly a little before night fall, I am returning fast." Harry said he knew the fact that Shifu ordered him to don't let him go and added something "Hey Zeng isn't now your lunch break now."
"Oh, it is, I think I lost the track of time." Zeng said. "Well then if you want, you can go, but please come quickly."
"I will, don't worry." Harry said and went into the air towards the bamboo forest, while flying he looked where the masters could be and while looking he noticed the crocodile bandits talking and behind them he noticed that all the masters were bound with ropes. That wasn't good; he knew that he should do something but what.
"What do I do? What do I do?" He asked himself but then he remembered something that he read from the ancient texts about a sleeping potion and then he figured out what to do. And flew back towards the palace, once there he took out the scroll with the recipe for the potion, gathered all the ingredients necessary for it and began to make the potion and didn't stopped till he did it correctly, now everything he had to do is to find a way to make the crocodiles to take it.
"How, I will make them to eat it?" He asked himself before feeling a bit hungry.
"I should eat something." He went to the kitchen and took a bean bun and began to eat after a minute he realized what he could do.
"That's it." He said to himself and took a plate and filled it with dumplings.
"Now, the secret ingredient," He took the sleep potion, put it on the dumplings and mixed it wit two sticks.
"Perfect, now I only need to get to their camp." He said to himself, he knew that he couldn't go out because it was now dark and probably Zeng will stop him, with this in mind he took another dumpling and putted the remaining potion on it, in a second Zeng came.
"Hey, what are you doing?"
"Nothing, do you want a dumpling?" He asked hoping that he will let himself tricked.
"Oh thanks." He said before eating it, after a moment he began to feel sleepy and having his eyes heavy, he began to close his eyes more and more while saying "Oh, I never thought I fell so sleepy." And collapsed to the ground and Harry took him to his room.
"Sorry Zeng but I need to save them." Harry said, he went back to the kitchen and took the dumplings before bursting in the air and flew in the bamboo forest towards the camp where the masters are held captive, he arrived in a really short time and noticed from above that only three bandits are guarding them while the others are sleeping. He landed behind a bush and listened of what they are talking but then he noticed that another crocodile was coming and that was the moment, he threw the plate behind the bush and after a moment he noticed the plate.
"Hey guys want to eat?" He asked and took the plate to them.
"Where did you found them?" One short Crocodile named Ghary asked.
"I don't know, still let's eat." He said and all began to eat and in only a minute they were feeling sleepy, the masters noticed what was going on.
"How could those dumplings appear out of no where?" Po asked.
"What ever is happening something is going on." Monkey said and in that moment they all felled a sleep. Then Crane noticed something in a bush, there was something or someone there.
"Good, all clear." The voice from the bush said and Crane realized that it was none other then Harry who went near them.
"Harry, it was you." Crane whispered happily to see him, the others also noticed him.
"Harry what are you doing here?" Tigress asked.
"I came only to help." He said and began to unravel the node, it didn't took him too long, it seems that the crocodiles are not good at making good nods.
"Nice work." Crane said.
"Well done." Monkey said
"Good work but what was in the dumplings?" Tigress asked.
"I took a recipe for a sleeping potion from one of the sacred scrolls and put it in the dumplings, they will sleep till tomorrow." He said.
"Not bad but you know that you will got a punishment for going without authorization." Tigress said.
"I know but at least the plan worked." He said before asking "So what would be my punishment?"
"I will let Crane to decide once we return to the Jade Palace." She said.
"We better go before they wake up." Viper said.
"Wait, we want to give them a little lesson." Mantis said before beginning to say his plan of using the ropes to ravel them while sleeping and take them to Chor Gome prison. And with the approval of master Shifu they all began to do as he said, after that Monkey, Mantis, Po and Viper took them while Master Shifu, Crane, Tigress and Harry went back to the Jade Palace.
When they entered in the Hall of the Warriors the three masters turned around towards the young crane who knew what would happen.
"You know what will come, don't you?" Tigress said in her usual tone.
"I will get a punishment for going unaccompanied and without authorization." He said knowing what will come.
"For that I will let you master to decide." She said and turned to the older avian, didn't wanted to much to give him a punishment for saving them and because it will only be a de facto punishment because Tigress and Shifu admitted that without him they will still be now in the hands of the bandits while walking back to the palace.
"Well, as punishment you will clean up the dust in the archives, the barracks and in the Hall of the Warriors, then you will have to water and rake the peach tree and that will be all." He said but even his student could tell by the tone he used that it will be more like a de facto thing, the punishment was also too easy in his opinion.
"All right I will begin to clean up the dust in the archives first then I will do the rest." He said and took a dusk whisk and a broom and walked towards the archives and began to clean up. In the archives there were lots of artifacts like the mystical mirror of Ying and Yang and others as well that he is not allowed to touch them because they were fragile or because they were dangerous, before he could began to work his master entered.
"Sorry, you were beginning to work?" Crane asked.
"Yeah I need to get one with my punishment." He said in a sarcastic tone.
"So you know that this is rather a de facto thing, don't you." Crane asked with a smile.
"Yeah." Harry said smiling to his master.
"I came only to tell you, you noticed that on the rode I was talking with Tigress and master Shifu, right?" Crane said.
"Yeah I noticed that."
"In that talk both them said that even if you came unaccompanied and without authorization they admited that without you we were still be captive at the bandits and it was actually planed the punishment to be de facto." Crane said making him to giggle.
"It isn't even too much to do after all." Harry said.
"Well then I think I will let you to continue, oh and the others returned right five minutes ago." Crane said.
"Thank for telling me master." Harry said and began his work while crane went out in the hall and while walking he passed Mantis and Monkey who were going to the archives, they heard about the de facto punishment and wanted to see how is he doing and stopped at the entrance.
"We heard everything, so you got a punishment, right." Mantis said.
"Yeah I did." Harry replied rolling his head towards them while cleaning.
"And you're not angry about this?" Monkey said smiling.
"No I don't, I actually know everything." He said smiling.
"All right then we will let you continue your work." Monkey said and both them left, while cleaning dust was everywhere thing that was really irritating and some entered in the nose of Harry's beak and began to feel the need to sneeze.
"Ah, ah, ah chow." And in a blink on an eye a hurricane went out from the archives in the hall throwing mantis and monkey into a wall before going in the entire Jade Palace, taking every single particle of dust with it and went out, no object was out from its place but everyone felled, Monkey and Mantis looked around to see from where it came from, there were no windows in the hall or at the end of it where there were two ways to go, in the right was were it leaded to the place where they put all of Taotie's inventions the other was taking them to the kitchen but there were no opened windows so it might came from the archives and went to Harry, once they entered they noticed him sneezing from the dust.
"Hey Harry did you feel that?" Monkey asked while he was wiping his nose from the dust.
"Felled what?" He asked confused.
That strong wind." Monkey responded.
"Strong wind?" He said confused "What strong wind, I didn't felled any strong wind."
"How could you not felled it? It was like a hurricane that went through out the Palace." Mantis said.
"I didn't fell any strong wind, besides there is no window in here." Harry said showing the walls.
"Yeah you're right but from where it could have came?" Monkey asked.
"Well I don't know, besides I need to go back to work to clean up the dust." Harry said wanting to go back to work but both masters noticed something else.
"What dust exactly there is no more dust in here?" Mantis said touching one of the artifacts to search for dust.
"What? But I barely started." Harry said confused,
"Maybe that strange wind took the dust." Monkey said before adding "well, what ever how about you go to clean up the other rooms."
"All right." He said and leaved to clean up the rest of the rooms to end his de facto punishment. He walked till he reached the training hall where Crane, Viper, Shifu and Tigress were talking about what happened with that strange wind. He knew that it wasn't good to interrupt the masters but he wanted to know what happened.
"Hey, what is going on?" Harry asked.
"A strange wind like a hurricane went thought out the palace, we don't know from where it came or how." Master Shifu said.
"Oh, I heard about that, Master Monkey and Mantis told me." Harry said.
"The strange thing is that it didn't destroyed or removed anything from its place." Crane said.
"Oh, good that it didn't." Harry said.
"And it also cleaned up all the dust in the Jade Palace, including where you had to clean up." Tigress said.
"And what would that mean?" Harry asked.
"It means that you will only have to water and rake the Peach Tree, and you will be all done with your works, and you will go back to kung fu training." Tigress said.
"All right, I better began now." Harry said and went out from the training Hall and went to the peach tree to finish, it seems that it will be actually an easy day for him, he didn't knew how the wind came but at least it made his job a little easier but even he was thinking how it could have happened everything seemed to happen all so sudden like it was magic.
