Here we are. An alternate version of Monkey's past. It may not do very well...but maybe it will. Won't know until afterwards.

Let's go~

It was quite some time before they made it there, to Monkey's house. He had been sipent for most of the time, and it did not seem that it would end very soon until they actually got into the building. It looked broken down for the most part. There were cracks in the wall due to aging, plants began growing all over the building due to not being trimmed. He didn't mind the second part too much, but the first part he worries about the place falling down around him. He'll be able to escape quickly enough if it did come to that, but being cautious was not unjustified. The most concerning part about the building was Monkey's insistence on staying here no matter how broken down it was. How could he?

Monkey reached the door, and he pushed it open. It was difficult, seeing that the door scraped along the ground loudly, thus created a loud creaking noise that highly irritated Tigress's ears. Po and Fung didn't appreciate the sound either. They each stepped into the house, then immediatlely noted that the inside was not much better than the outside. The walls inside were just as cracked as the ones outside, there wasn't much furniture except for the hammock in the back of the room, and the plants from outside made their way inside as well. But other than that, the place seemed pretty well-carer for, compared to the outside.

...does Monkey live here by himself?

"Yeah, sorry. I know it may look pretty crappy, but it's only because I spend a lot of my time outside instead of being holed up in here." Monkey said a bit quietly. "As you can see, there isn't really anything to do inside said house, which leads to the reason why I spend so much time outside."

"As those guards said, you seem to have quite a natural talent, as well as regular tendency, to prank people nonstop. And yet...you say that none of these pranks are for negative intentions?" Tigress said, folding her arms.

Monkey nods, while perfectly balancing himself on his tail...something Tigress took a special mental note of. Mr. Ping was already getting lunch started, so for the time being, get down to business. "Alright, my tale is pretty time consuming, so let's hear yours, first. Why did you all come for me?"

Their request certainly will be less time-consuming than his story, so they might as well give away their part first. "You're right about our request being less time-consuming than your entire story, so I will just cut this down to the important part. We're recruiting you."

"Recruit?"

"Yeah man!" Po cheered. "We're gathering up a team for us to hang with!"

"What my overly jolly and friendly comrade is trying to say..." Fung started. "Is that we're starting up a team alright. A team of Kung Fu prodigies...such as yourself."

Monkey folded his arms. "How do you know I have a talent for Kung Fu?"

Fung tapped his jaws. "Hm...I never thought about that..."

"Except that we know that those Rhinos were fought were some sort of elites in this area. And they must have been after you for a very long time. Evading them would take much more skill than you give yourself credit for." Tigress said.

Monkey blinked a couple times, before rubbing his head in a bit of a sheepish manner. "Alright, you caught me, kinda. I may have some skills when it comes to Kung Fu. But that's only due to two things. My brother teaching me some things about it, and constantly running away from the so-called 'patrol' that keeps chasing me because I give them so much trouble. Sure I feel bad that some other people kinda get caught in my pranking sprees. And sometimes I even go after them too but that's innocent fun. Me messing with those guards is all intentional, just because I hate them." He sighed before looking outside seriously. "They're the ones causing a lot of crap in this village. They work for some higher up, noble, stuck-up rich guy who thinks he's untouchable. A lot of those nobles are like that...and just my luck, me and my brother ran into one of the seriously arrogant and stubborn types."

Po cocked his head to the side. "Can you simplify that?"

"He's a rich bastard."

"Oh." Po, being poor alongside his father, had no idea what having lots of money felt like. Judging from Monkey beginning to describe his experience with one, he wasn't sure he would lile having lots of money. A decent amount to get by that would help him and his father get by. They didn't mind having more stuff, but were always fine with what they had.

"So then, Monkey. How is it that the village came to be this way? And how exactly are you involved in it?" Mr. Ping asked again, as he was about finished with making noodles, and handed a bowl over to everyone present. Monkey's spirits were already lifted just from the smell of it. He takes a bowl and looks up to everyone.

He nodded while holding one finger up. "Alright. Like I said, I got caught up in a rich guys dark shade. Me and my brother were just being kids. We didn't know what we were starting..." He sighed. "The guys name is Jong Sung Jai Kai Chow."

Pause.

...

"...Eh?" Po, Mr. Ping and Fung cocked their heads to the side, in confusion.

"He said Jong Sung Jai Kai Chow." Tigress repeated for them.

"Jong...sum...ha...wha?" Poor Po was so confused with the tongue twister.

Monkey sighed. "Repeat after me. "Jong Sung..."

"Jong Sung..."

"Jai Kai..."

"Jai Kai..."

"Chow."

Po just blinked. Fung stared at Monkey with a look of confusion. "...why the hell does he need five names at once?"

"I dunno, man." Monkey shrugged. "Anyway, I told you the name. Now I'll just tell the story behind the two of us and my bro..."

(Flashback)

The village was in a large uproar at the moment. The entire time, they were either yelling with intense anger, highly annoyed with the childish situation they have been placed in, while the smaller portion of the population were taking only the positives of their predictament in contrast to most others being, and were actually laughing quite a lot. Despite being reprimanded about it and being told that this was serious business, they just couldn't help but laugh aloud.

"These pranks are getting extremely annoying!"

"Why doesn't anyone do something about this?! It's been going on for too long!"

"We need someone to apprehend those delinquents!"

"I dunno, guys. These pranks are pretty funny. Maybe we should take it easy on them...?"

"No one cares what you think, goat!"

"Oh..."

The different perspectives of this problem could be seen very clearly by all sides when it came to the town pranksters. Some were glad there was some fun involved, others were highly irritated by the daily annoyance, and then there's the neutral party who just wishes that everyone would just stop arguing.

And of course, we have the culprits. Their names being: Monkey and Wu Kong. Brothers three years apart, Monkey being the younger, with Wu Kong being the older one. 7 years old and 10 years old, respectively. And they were snickering quite loudly, a safe distance from anyone that could find them.

"Kahahahaha! They don't suspect a thing! What a bunch of losers!" " Wu Kong cackled.

Monkey, his smaller, younger brother, laughed along with him. "Yeah! Hehe, losers!" He laughed, as they high fived one another. He felt a bit of stinging as he lifted up his tail. It was bleeding slightly. "Oh. Looks like I hurt my tail while I was running."

"You did?! Aw man." Wu Kong groaned, grabbing his skull with both of his paws. "Mom is gonna kill me."

"Maybe if we just explain it to her...?"

"Monkey she KNOWS what we're doing. What she WON'T like is that you got hurt while doing so. However...it might get worse if I try to lie about your condition." Wu Kong sighed, sliding said paw down his face. "Like I said, she's gonna kill me dead. Kill me so dead!"

Monkey just looked confused as he followed his worried brother home, sneakily so that irritated villagers would not find them. As said before, Monkey and Wu Kong were the village pranksters for quite some time now. What made them so unbearably irritating was the fact that they couldn't be be caught. Be it angry villagers, village guards, or even powerful WARRIORS, they could not be caught by anybody. Mainly because they choose prank-and-run bececause fighting was completely out of the speed and highly skilled trickery at such a young age made them impossible to catch.

But they don't always get off easily, though. Because they have to face the person who gives them much more lectures than any aged elder could. Sooner or later, they always returned home to mother.

"You boys and your tricks..." Nuân(Chinese name for 'warm') said to the two boys with a mix of a sigh and a giggle. She had blonde hair with a bun and a flower, a golden robe with brown trimming, and black eyes. Wu Kong and Monkey also chuckled a bit, before the former wailed in pain from their mother slapping him so hard in the back of his head. "Why is Monkey's tail bleeding?!"

"I didn't know he got cut!" Wu Kong held his stinging head. "We only found out after we started coming home!"

Nuân took a deep breath, then sighed after she and her sons calmed down. She soon began bandaging Monkey's bleeding tail. "Well...since you two went on yet another pranking spree...might as well tell me about it. Go on, tell me."

"Weeellll...we went with the classics and just threw tomatoes at anyone that passed by us. And get this...they were EXPLODING tomatoes. EACH." Wu Kong said proudly. "And the teachers say I don't know how to mix things together."

Nuân snickered. "Oh my! That does sound hilarious! But still, you should be more careful." She finished up bandaging Monkey's tail, and lighgly kissed it. "There. All better."

"Thanks, Mom." Monkey smiled cheerfully. She then went to kiss his forehead a couple times, making him laugh. "M-Mom! Come on, that tickles! Hahaha! Cut it out!"

Wu Kong huffed. "Hmph. I think you're enjoying that too much." That was before Nuân pulled him in and began kissing his forehead too. "H-Huh?! W-Wait...!"

"Come now, Wu Kong. I don't play favorites. I show love to the both of you."

"No no! That's okay, really!"

"Nope. Too late for that.".

"Moooooom!" Wu Kong whined, while Monkey simply laughed his tail off, both were covered in kiss marks from their mother's love. Wu Kong can deny it all he wants, but he really likes the affection he's being given. Monkey even more so. Granted, she was all they had. Their father for all they knew, walked out on her the day Monkey was born. It left Wu Kong with distaste for his father, and Monkey not knowing his father at all. The two brothers were left with their mother being the only onw to take care of them.

It seems that their father leaving them behind had a bigger effect on Wu Kong than one would realize. Their mother was plenty capable of providing the two boys with love. However, the issue lied with her ability to properly discipline them. The boys were in no shape or way, bad children. They just get on everyone's nerves too much and Nuân doesn't do much about it aside from stern talking and light slaps to the head. She loved them too much to do any serious discipline to them.

Though at some point this lack of dicipline would come back to haunt the three of them...

The next day, Monkey and Wu Long would wake up to the sound of very large stomping throughout the streets. Wondering what was going on, they got up and looked outside of their window to see what the commotion was about. At first Monkey didn't see what the big fuss was about. It just looked like a takin with golden fur, a black coat and red pants. They did look somewhat expensive, he might be rich. Monkey still did not understand what was going on, while Wu Kong was panicking loudly on the inside.

'Crap crap crap crap! He knows where our village is!' Wu Kong thought as he pushed Monkey's head into the ground. "Stay down and don't make a sound!" He hissed, as his brother reluctantly obeyed.

Nuân was just doing some shopping, picking up an apple from a stand, examining it for a few minutes, then serting it ba k where it was. When she noticed a shadow over her, she turned and looked up to the one standing over her. "Oh hello there. Are you new here?"

The takin nods in confirmation. "I am indeed new here, my friend. My name is Jong Sung Jao Kai Chow. Pleasant to meet you."

Nuân blinked a couple times. "Well...um...Mr. Jong. Your name is quite the tongue twister, in a way."

"Hm, I can see why you might think that, my friend. You see, I'm just looking around for someone. They stole quite a bit of the treasure from my stock, and I'm here to reclaim those treasures. Nothing more, nothing less."

She tapped her cheek. "Hm...come to thinl of it...my son Wu Kong once came home with a lot of stuff in a bag. He said he already sold the gold he took and got lots of currency back for them. I scolded him for taking others things and then selling them, as that's disrespectful. That gold wasn't yours, was it? If so, allow me to apologize on my son's behalf."

The takin just smiled, but behind it was something dark. "That's quite alright. There's more where that stuff came from, anyway. Though I would like to sit down and chat with you, since you are the first person to treat me kindly in this place so far. People seem to get the impression that I am intimidating. Would you like to have some tea with me?"

"Oh, I would like some tea, thank you. Let me just get home and-"

"No no, my friend. That is quite alright." He patted her back and walked along with her. "I have plenty of tea at my place. Your son will be fine."

"Oh. Well alright then! I don't want to stay out too late, though. I still have to get home soon."

Jong nods. "No need to worry. You'll be home soon..."

It has been a few hours since Nuân has been out shopping. The day was almost over and yet she has not come back yet. Monkey and Wu Kong were worried sick about her. They were fearing that something happened. After a while, Monkey stood up and began moving. Wu Kong grabbed his arm. "Where are you going?"

"I can't take this anymore. I'm looking for Mom. She's never been gone for this long before!"

"Monkey, calm down-"

"How can I?! Are YOU calm, Wu Kong?!" True to Monkey's words, Wy Kong's calm was a front. He too was in total fear of what their mother could be doing. His fear was mutltiplied by what Nuân telling them that she loved them, in the most softest and most loving voice she could muster, as if it were the last time she would ever say those words. Why would she do that...?

There were a couple knocks on their door. Wu Kong, with heavy hesitation, opened the door. To his relief, it was only a messenger goose. Less to his relief, he looked quite sullen. "What's going on...?" The goose sighed, unable to say anything. He just held out his wing.

Nuân's flower. The flower Monkey had gotten for her one time for her birthday. The flower she never takes off. The flower that was now covered with blood.

...Her blood.

"No..." He said in disbelief as he dropped to his knees. "I always steal stuff...and I usually get away with it. And even if I don't, I don't get that serious a punishment. But...all I stole was some gold in order to help us. I didn't...think he would come after her instead of us..." That's explained her farewell to them when she left for shopping. Her subconscious knew she wouldn't be coming back. Wu Kong was resisting the urge to cry, in order to turn see his brothers reaction. All he saw was a teared up face, as his eyes said it all.

They went too far. Stealing from rich people or nobles tend to have disasterous results. Like this one.

A day later, everyone has left Nuân after her funeral. Monkey set her flower atop her grave before leaving. He wanted to see how Wu Kong was taking this. the door to his room, only to see that Wu Kong was packing. "Wu Kong...what are you doing...?"

"I'm leaving, Monkey. I can't stay here."

"What...? You're going to leave...? B-But Mom just died! And you didn't even cime to her funeral!"

"She wouldn't hsve a funeral if I hadn't been so selfish!" He shouted at Monkey, making him flinch. He sighed. "I didn't deserve to come to her funeral, it's my fault she got killed. I didn't think that my stealing would catch up to us so harshly."

Monkey shook his head. "That doesn't mean you should leave! You're all I have left here!"

"That's the problem. Without Mom, we won't be gettingoff scott-free anymore. I'm a bad influence, Monkey. We both know this. I don't want the same thing to happen to you because of my selfishness. It's not something you can change. Not as you are. I shamed us...I shamed us, and there's no fixing it. The damage is done. I just...have to get out of here." He said as he patted Monkey's head. "I'll miss you. Though the next time you see me, I'll be a criminal." He said as he walked past him and hopped on the windowsill.

"Wait! You don't have to do this! At least take me with you if you're so determined for this!"

Wu Kong sighed. "I can't do that. Jong isn't finished. He placed a bounty on me to completely finish the job. I told you, I can't stay here, it'll only put you in more danger than you're already in. At the moment, he doesn't know you exist. I can't let you get hunted down along with me. You're staying here."

Monkey had tears in his eyes. "But we're brothers...we're supposed to stick together, no matter what..."

Wu Kong was going to hate what he was going to say next, but it was the only way to be sure that Monkey didn't follow him. He refused to let the same fate that befell their mother strike Monkey down too. He knew he was being selfish. But he was so filled with shame and guilt that he didn't care at that moment. So he took a deep breath, hardened his heart, and turned ro Monkey with a blank stare.

"Sorry. But as long as I'm a criminal...we can't be brothers anymore. I'm not dragging you down with me."

He then leapt off, trying to keep himself from crying. He was sure Monkey was. Indeed, the younger brother looked at the window with a look of shock, before he slumped to the ground and hugged his kness, not knowing what else to do at the moment.

"Wu Kong...I know you don't mean that..."

(Present Day)

"I haven't seen him since." Monkey sighed. "I keep getting news that he made true to his prediction for being a criminal. I never would have guessed that he would actually go that far. It's really depressing, ya know. One of your siblings, if you have any, is someone you can always count on...then all of a sudden they take a turn for the worse. That kind of feeling...really sucks."

"I'm aware." Tigress said emotionlessly. Mr. Ping was well aware of what this meant, but he said nothing about it.

"Well then." Fenghuang said, opening the door, allowing Shifu and Zeng inside. "Seems that this one has had quite a rough time."

Monkey raised an eyebrow. "They're with us. The little guy is Shifu, he taught Tigress. The owl is Fenghuang, she taught Po." Fung reassured. Monkey nodded at this.

Po stood up, his bowl of noodles empty, and he readjusted his straw hat. Luckly Fenghuang had given him a strap that attaches to the hat so that it would not fall off. "Monkey...we beat three guards. How many are there in total?"

He looked confused. "Well...they have an entire of them just outside the village. There are at least like fifty guys or something. Why?"

"Cause I'm gonna kick every single one of their asses and make them leave! And if Jong is among them...I'll beat him up, too!"

Fenghuang smiled widely as she actually clapped her wings. "Took long enough! Finally, something to entertain me!" Monkey briefly became worried that Po was taught Kung Fu by a sadist.

"Alright then, guys! Let's move out!" Po nods as he stands up and leaves the building. Tigress and Fung follow right behind him without question. Monkey was left staring at the door, in a fit of surprise.

"Huh...didn't take the big guy as a person who curses or anything like that."

"Primate." Fenghuang said out of nowhere. Monkey turned to her in confusion. "Mind getting your head out of your ass and listen to what I have to say?"

And now I know who he got it from... he thought. "What is it?"

"Gotta nickname for ya. It shall be...Primate."

"...Did you even put effort into that?"

The owl blinked. "...You're right..." She genuinely began thinking about it for a bit, then pounded one wing into another. "OH! I got it! How about 'Shithead'? That's a good nickname for a monkey, right?" She ignored Shifu's harsh scolding for her casual use of vulgar words.

Monkey sweatdropped and rubbed his neck. "Eh...I think I'll stick with Primate."

"Excellent choice. Though I might still use the other name anyway, just for giggles."

"W-What...?! You can't do that-!"

"Well well, I believe it's time to head out and watch the trio do their thing. You're more than free to help them out."

"You're not going to?"

"Nope. I'm with them for spectator purposes only, until it's absolutely necessary to step in. Now hurry up and move!" She said impatiently, as she took for the skies again to follow Po, Tigress and Fung. Monkey just stared after her in confusion.

"Isn't she a riot?" Mr. Ping laughed. Shifu stared at the goose, in disbelief, and annoyance.

"No. No she isn't."

"Glad you agree!"

Shifu resisted the urge to facepalm. Right now, they had to make sure the younger warriors don't hurt themselves.."

Isn't Fenghuang just charming? :D

Anyway, the next chapter. Po and the others frwe Monkey's village from Jong's control. But will he actually be there...? We'll find out, won't we?

Until then. See ya~