Note: this is what happened if Tigress accidentally got food poisoning in a foreign country. And... Happy Chinese New Year!
Tigress wasn't used to waking up in a hospital bed. Really, the only time she really had was when she'd fractured her wrist during her first day of training when she was seven, and another time when she came into contact with River Fever and had to be isolated from everyone. If she allowed making any generalisation, she normally had her comrade and Shifu to find an antidote or patch gaping chest wounds in the Jade Palace's infirmary. So when she woke on starched sheets, listening to various cacophony of unfamiliar voices rather than voices of Mantis and Monkey arguing, confusion rolled in.
"Hey, it's okay," a voice to her left said. "You're in a hospital, but you're going to be okay. I mean, well...you weren't going to be okay, but I sneaked some of my dad's miracle herbs in and the doctors think you've made a miraculous recovery, but you're okay, you really are."
Po's face moved into view. His lips were pale and his eyes looked huge because he was so close. She immediately relaxed a little because Po was there and he looked fine. Unharmed. She tried to say something, but her throat was dry, so she ended up gesturing a little helplessly.
"What? Oh! Here, they left some water. Do you need help sitting up? I…" Po's paw fluttered for a second before she saw the determination take over. When he helped her adjust the bed and sit up, he remained unsurprisingly gentle. Po was always full of surprises, but that was never one of them. He handed her a water cup and refilled it after she drained it.
"Where?" she finally managed to say.
"Kazakhstan, still. We're in—oh, I can't pronounce it. I tried...but the nurse laughed at me," Po explained a little sheepishly. Then, the memory rolled in. The Furious Five and Dragon Warrior were assigned for an important secret mission in Kazakhstan to trace a group of bandits who were reported running away from China after stealing a few ancient artefacts from Gongmen museum—presumably to be sold for profit in the black market. But before their plan of ambush materialised, she had become ill of a very serious food poisoning.
"I guess I need to expand my cooking repertoire to include yak's milk," Po commented, which was the suspected culpable ingredient that had apparently sent her there.
"Please don't," she quipped, feeling the pungent scent of it still linger on her tastebud. "I'll stick with tofu diet."
"I told you to give your portion to me," Po pointed out, rather unnecessarily.
"I was trying to be polite to our host," she defended. How could Po remained in perfect health even after taking over everyone's portion (except for herself) was a mystery to her. "Where is the other?"
"Waiting on the dock, they're trying to find a messenger to send a message to Shifu before deciding to continue or abort the mission."
She didn't say anything, but perhaps her expression did.
"Anyway, you're going to be fine, they just want to keep you one night more, and that's when I laughed at the nurse because—well, that right there." He nodded at the fact that she had already swung her legs out of bed. "Guess you're signing out against medical advice."
"Damn right I am," she retorted. Her legs were shaking when she finally pushed herself to her feet, but she closed her eyes for a second and found her centre. Then she took another step and tipped forward.
Po caught her, bracing her with his paws on her shoulders. It put their faces close together, but she noticed a much more pressing matter: she could feel every bump and ridge in his paws through the thin fabric of the hospital gown, and there was definitely a ring on a finger he usually left bare. To double-check, she looked down at his left paw. She was pretty sure she wasn't hallucinating the rather simple wedding ring on his ring finger.
His wince didn't just speak volumes, it wrote a cliff-notes series as well.
"Tigress?" he said. "I...I was looking for a way to break that to you gently when you woke up and then you did wake up and it totally slipped my mind, and um, I can explain, I really can."
"Is there a Kazakh out there I'm going to have to go put the fear of god into?" she asked, and she was surprised by just how much she disliked that idea.
The Panda grimaced. "I can do that myself, thanks, but no, not exactly. You…yeah, let's sit you down first."
"Po, I'm fine—"
"By which you mean you're falling over." He gave him a solid push back onto the hospital bed. She could have fought him off, but she had learned not to argue with that expression.
The Panda took a deep breath."Tigress, they weren't going to let me in here."
"What?"
"We... I mean—I'm not your family. I know you trust me and you gave me the power to decide what to do with you whenever situations like this arise, but out here...they didn't recognize it, and I thought... I thought you were dying, and I had to do something."
She gave him a pointed look. Her 'dying?' was silent, but Po had seen that sarcastic expression for too much to understand it without her saying.
"You stopped breathing! The doctor suspected some sort of food allergy."
"What does this have to do with anything, Po? Who did you marry?" she demanded. This was not the first time she struggled to follow Po's panda logic.
Po ran his paws down his face and blew out a breath. "Look down."
She did, but all she really noticed was that the hospital gown was a great deal shorter than she liked. She shifted the hem a little and something gold glinted on her left paw. Again, she had to ascertain that she wasn't hallucinating. She made sure her voice was measured and calm when she said, "Po, why am I wearing a wedding ring?"
"Because I told them I was your husband and then I went, and um, faked our marriage certificate?" The words came out in a rush. "Look, please don't be mad. It's not permanent, none of it's real. I just I had to think of something and there was no way I told them we are related because... —well...it is pretty obvious that I am a panda, and you... well you," he said vaguely.
"Anyway, here is the thing..." Po reached to his pocket pulling out a parchment.
She couldn't read a word, but from the tacky embellished print around its border, she could make a good guess it was the matrimonial certificate. She could read two columns, presumably witnesses, where Crane's and Viper's name were written neatly. And then her's and Po's right on the centre adjacent to each other, framed with some Arabic inscription, and then Mantis' name right on the bottom.
"He was the fake officiator," Po explained. It would've been a funny joke if it wasn't her name on that marriage certificate. "Wait, are you mad? Is that your mad face? I can't tell."
"I'm not mad." But it was a lot to process, just like waking up in a hospital bed. The band on her finger felt oddly heavy for being a fake thing. But somewhere in her rationale had told her to relax. This was nothing real. "Where did you get the rings?"
"Hardware store down the street. If your finger turns green and falls off, try not to blame me." He rocked back on his heels, the usual gesture when he was nervous.
"No promises." She rubbed the edge of her claw over the ring. "It's not exactly great, but you did what you had to do and you saved my life. Thank you."
"Oh... You're...you're welcome." The sense of relief in his voice was undeniable, which was logical given the pretext: past experience had proven anyone who messed with Master Tigress would receive equally painful retribution.
For a moment, awkward silence reigned, and she stared at the ring on his claw while rubbing the one on her own.
Po cleared his throat. "Well, this is a great and fortuitous start to our fake marriage and all, but want help getting out of here now?"
Well, her only wish right now was to get out of this craziest plot-twist of her life, courtesy of Po. "Please."
She stood on her own long enough to pull on the street clothes he picked up for her, but she needed his assistance down the hallway to the front desk.
It took half an hour of arguing with the doctors before they let her sign the paperwork, and she was almost seeing double when Po helped her out of the hospital and to the rickshaw. She kept her arm around his shoulders. His hand was clammy around her wrist.
She collapsed gratefully onto the passenger seat.
"Are you okay to pull this thing?" Her cat senses registered the loud protestation given by Po's tummy. "I'm ok if you want to do a snack stop."
"I'll be fine," he reassured. "You should sleep. You're looking a little green, but not in a 'your finger is going to fall off' kind of way."
"I'll sleep on the boat."
"If you're sure."
"I am," she replied, smiling to him. "Say, how far do fake husband duties go, exactly?" she said with her usual nonchalance, which was a miscalculated move on her part—because the next second she was nearly catapulted out of her transport when Po released the handles that balanced the rickshaw.
"Tigress, I...I am not planning to consummate our fake marriage with—"
"I was hoping we could stop and you could buy me a herbal tea since I can't seem to find my purse," she clarified, and she had the pleasure to see Po turned to that bright, stutter-y red that she shouldn't enjoy as much as she did. But she was kind of a sadist, and it was cute.
Not that she was ever telling him that.
"Oh! R-right," he said. "Herbal tea... I...—I can make that happen."