Three weeks and five days before the Jade Palace's destruction...
Ember had done something to Su. Po would have to be even dumber than usual to deny it.
He also wouldn't deny that the earlier conversation with her had totally freaked him out. He thought that after the monks had fixed the mental damage Ember had inflicted on Su, Crane and himself, everything would be okay. He and Crane had definitely felt a lot better afterwards. As for Su, while her insomnia had been mostly cured, she still wasn't right. Not only that, she was getting worse.
That was why Po was now standing outside the door to the meeting room. He could hear voices inside. The meeting was well underway.
Po raised his fist to knock, but hesitated. Shifu would kill him for interrupting. On the other hand, the old master would kill him for not immediately telling him if someone was about to have a major physicalogical breakdown.
And so he knocked.
"Come in!"
Po winced. Shifu didn't sound happy. Po braced himself and entered.
Shifu, Master Eagle Jr. and Top Dog were seated around a small round table in the sparsely decorated room. Zeng was standing beside them, serving hot tea. "This had better be important." Shifu said.
Po wrung his paws. "Master Shifu, if someone was having a physicalogical breakdown, you'd want me to tell you right away, right?"
"A what breakdown?"
Po wasn't sure how to get the message across without the others finding out. "You know, when someone starts..." he crossed his eyes. "Falling apart?"
"Unless someone has been cursed by a skinless demon, I have no idea what you are talking about."
Eagle Jr. and Top Dog glanced at each other.
Po twirled his finger and crossed his eyes. "I mean when someone is falling to pieces." Shifu stared. "When they're cracking like crackers." Shifu kept staring. "When their tree isn't going all the way to the top branch."
Suddenly Top Dog laughed. "Dragon Warrior, you mean psychological!"
"Gaaaaah!" Po smacked his forehead. No wonder Shifu wasn't getting it! "Sorry, Master Shifu!"
"Can you seriously not pronounce the word psychological, panda?" Shifu shook his head. "What is going on?"
Po glanced at the guests then back at his master. "Master Shifu, I need to talk to you in private." Shifu didn't budge. "Look, this crazy dragon lady-"
"You are talking about the Dragon Empress, I presume?" Top Dog spoke.
Po turned his head. Top Dog was a lot sharper than the other bureaucrats he'd met. "Yeah."
"We were just discussing her. Grandmaster Shifu told me you have had a few close encounters with her. Would you kindly pull up a seat and tell us about them?"
Po caught the glint in Shifu's eye. Wordlessly he sat down in the chair Zeng had just pushed behind him. He had some difficulty squeezing his butt between the arms.
"They weren't encounters so much as dreams." He decided to start with. "I don't know if Master Shifu mentioned this, but one time when this happened, me, Crane and Su had started sleepwalking. Basically, in every dream Ember would say something creepy and then kill me. After that, I wake up. I think the sleepwalking stuff was her way of controlling us. Like some kind of demonic possession."
"Possession." Top Dog repeated dismally. "Perhaps the habit of killing you at the end of each dream is how she relinquishes control. Does she have any other abilities?"
"She can control fire." Po replied. "That was how she... took out Tujiu. She can probably move stuff with her mind, too."
"And most disturbing of all, she can paralyze people without even touching them." Eagle Jr. added.
Top Dog twitched. "She can what?"
"I experienced it first hand. It's like a nerve attack, but she doesn't need to physically touch you to perform it. Half the imperial army fell victim to this."
Top Dog cast his eyes down to the half empty tea cup and held his fist to his mouth. "A nerve attack that doesn't need physical contact... how can we fight something like that?"
"Anything is possible." Shifu said. "We just need to find her weakness and make her suffer for it. A weapon, arrogance, anything that we can use against her. Po, from what you've seen, would you consider her insane?"
"Well, duh!" Po said. "She killed Tujiu! She nearly drove me, Crane and Su nuts! She set her crazy yeti general on us-"
But when the yeti tried to choke you to death, she stopped him, a voice in Po's head reminded him. And when you were falling to your death, she saved you then, too.
Po stopped speaking. That's right. She did.
But why?
"Dragon Warrior?" Top Dog inquired.
"Perhaps we should leave him be for now." Eagle Jr. said. "If Master Viper was traumatised after witnessing one of Ember's violent acts, how would he have felt witnessing them first hand?"
Top Dog sighed. "In any event, allowing this creature to live is far too dangerous. I recommend eliminating her to be top priority."
"Whoa, whoa!" Po yelped. "I'm all for stopping her, but don't you think that's a bit too hasty?"
"He is right." Shifu said. "Other than the fact that she ruled Shambhala, no-one knows anything about Ember. For all we know, killing her could do more harm than good."
Top Dog. sighed. "I apologise for not telling you sooner, but Ember's fate is out of your hands. I already spoke to the emperor, and he has personally given the order to kill Ember if she is found."
Shifu tensed. "Po. Leave."
Po stood up quickly and brought the chair with him. He pushed, but his butt was firmly wedged between the arms. "Master Shifu..."
"Oh for crying out loud, sit down!"
"Yes, Master." Po slowly sat back down, unwilling to look at Eagle Jr. and Top Dog.
Eagle Jr. tilted his head towards Top Dog. "I told you he wouldn't like this."
"I met the emperor long before you." Shifu said. "He has hated executions since he was a child. I would like to know how you talked him into this."
"With all due respect, you brought this on yourself." Top Dog replied.
Uh oh, Po thought when he saw the look on Shifu's face.
"Excuse me?" The red panda asked.
"Tujiu failed to stop Ember's general from releasing her. So did you." Top Dog said. "It was pulling the strings from the very beginning, always keeping one step ahead of you, and by the time you got the upper hand, it was too late. And now we have an incredibly dangerous creature with powers we have no way of fighting against on the loose."
Po didn't feel so good, and not just because the arms of the chair were pressing against his stomach. Now that he thought about it, it was probably the biggest failure they had ever achieved.
Shifu seemed to deflate a little, though the furious glint never left his eyes. "You are right. I take full responsibility for that failure. But that is still no reason to outright murder her. We can't kill her until we have exhausted every other option."
Top Dog let out a frustrated sigh. "Well what do you suggest we do? Waste time and money craving a prison out of a mountain just for the sake of one prisoner, only for them to escape anyway?"
Shifu's eyes glinted even more dangerously. "That was Master Oogway's decision, not mine. It was for the best."
"Really? Tell me, was leaving people to rot in a tailor made hellhole his answer to everything?"
"What?"
"It was what he did to Tai Lung, wasn't it? And when Fenghuang turned against him, sealing her in an owl shaped cage was his big idea, as was the Sarcophagus of Su Wu. You and Oogway really enjoy making people suffer, don't you?"
Before Po could even try to defend him, Shifu stood up and sent his teacup and saucer flying with one swipe of his arm. The cup shattered against the bare wall. Lukewarm tea splattered across the floor, barely missing Zeng's legs. The glint in Shifu's eyes had become flaming daggers.
"Oogway and I raised Tai Lung since he was a cub! How could we have killed him?!" He roared. "Putting him in jail was the hardest decision I'd ever made in my life, and Ember deserves the same!"
Top Dog stared at the red panda. "Too many have died for her to deserve to live."
"No-one deserves to die. Not even Tujiu."
Shifu strode out without another word. Po folded his arms and glowered at Top Dog. "Even I could have handled that better." With that, he stood up and followed his master out the door, taking the chair with him.
As he thought back to that rather eventful meeting, Po couldn't help but wonder if Top Dog had a point. Maybe Ember was too powerful to be imprisoned. Even Chorh-Gom prison had only lasted a couple of decades before Tai Lung figured a way out. If they succeeded in capturing Ember and putting her in her own tailor made prison, how long would it last until a seriously ticked off Ember broke out and all hell broke loose?
Plip! Po jumped, but it was just a droplet of water falling from the damp roof of the ceiling. The catacombs were freezing cold and pitch black except for the glowing orb of hero's chi hovering a couple of inches above his paw. The walls of the catacombs were smooth and decorated with skulls embedded in the walls. Every five feet he passed a sealed coffin.
Po's paws were trembling as he walked, causing the glowing orb to shiver as it floated in mid air. After that had happened in that other room, he didn't feel safe at all. The sound of the warden's dying scream kept ringing in his ears.
It's a pity what happened to the warden. That's what happens when you hurt us.
Po spun round on the spot, and saw nothing. He hadn't imagined it. He'd just heard Ember's voice.
"Shuh-Shut up." He said.
Do you really think you can talk that way to me? You may be the Dragon Warrior, but I am the Dragon Empress.
Po gasped as the searing heat came out of nowhere, searing the skin beneath his fur. It felt like he had fallen into a pot of molten metal. He expected fire to envelop him at any second, killing him like it had killed Tujiu, but none appeared. As suddenly as it came, the heat left, seemingly taking all the warmth in Po's body with it. He shivered, and as his concentration wavered the glowing orb dissipated.
The darkness was impenetrable. Po took several deep breaths. The cold was like knives stabbing all over his body.
"Let me tell you something." He stammered. "You don't scare me. I eat jerks like you for breakfast."
With that he started walking again. Maybe if he didn't stay rooted to the spot, he could convince himself of his own words. After a few minutes he had a new orb lighting the way and warming him back up.
Don't show weakness, he told himself. Don't let Ember think you're an easy target. You'll think of a way to stop her. You will. Once you've found Tigress and the others, of course. Po thought of the Heart of China resting against his chest and started walking a little faster.
Then he reached the fork in the tunnel and his shoulders slumped. Three paths to choose from, and no way to tell which led to the way out.
Did you know there was a map in the preparation room?
Po bit back an insult. "There's no way I'm going back there. What the heck was that thing?"
Let me in and I will tell you everything you know.
"No way, no how."
Then fester and rot.
Yeah, Top Dog definitely had a point.
After that Ember fell silent. Po sighed and held out a finger. "Eeny, meeny, miney, mo..."
By the end his finger fell on the middle path and he started walking again. Maybe mouthing off to the Dragon Empress hadn't been that smart. Then again, whatever she planned to do with his mind if he ever let her in couldn't be good considering her track record.
Before he knew it he was facing another three way fork. "Dang it!"
He leaned against the wall, fuming. The whole place was a labyrinth. He couldn't keep picking random paths or he'd never make it out. He would never find his friends.
Ember had said there was a map in the preparation room. The room where the warden had died. No. No way. What if that thing was still there? He wasn't very keen on being impaled by a living shadow.
And so he lifted his finger to pick his next path. "Eeny, meeny, miney..." Whoomph! "Son of a bean bun!"
All three paths had just violently combusted. Smokeless bright red fire blocked any chance on continuing onward. Through the flames of the middle path he thought he saw a masked figure on the other side, passing by. Though the flames of the left path he thought he saw two figures, one small, one stout.
Ember, you really want me to go back, don't you, Po thought. Fine, I'll play along, for now.
With a grimace Po pulled out his frying pan, turned round and headed back the way he came. Fortunately he knew which path was the right one when he reached the first fork and soon he was back in the preparation room.
It was just as quiet in here as it was back in the catacombs. Shadows still flickered on the walls. He kept a close eye on each one while the other searched for the map. He turned round and there it was, burned into the wall near the entrance to the catacombs. Po mentally kicked himself. How could he have missed that? He read the map carefully, and realised that he hadn't been exaggerating when he thought the place was a maze. There were dozens of paths leading into each other, with dots marking the location of each coffin. There were hundreds.
Po had no paper to copy the map with, so he would have to memorise it as best as he could. He looked to the entrance marked on the map, then tilted his eyes upwards to the first fork. From there he looked up the middle path he had already taken, towards the second four way fork where he had been blocked- wait, what?
Po leaned closer to the map. When he'd first reached the second fork, he had been faced with three paths. Yet on the map, there was a fourth. A fourth that had far more dots than the others, and led away from the other paths. It ended in a perfect drawing of the Heart of China.
A worried Po immediately put a paw on his chest. Yes, the emerald was still there. What the heck is Ember trying to pull?
Well, I'll just have to go back and find out, won't I?
Still keeping an eye out for any particularly dangerous looking shadows, Po returned to the catacombs. He reached the first fork, and took the middle path for the second time. He reached the second fork and... "What. The. Hell."
The three paths were gone. Not destroyed. Not buried in rubble. Gone. Like they had never existed.
To his left was a hole. A near perfect round black hole in the wall big enough to crawl into. A tiny pinprick of orange light was visible at the far end. Nestled in the mouth of the hole was a single scroll.
With trembling paws, Po picked it up and unrolled it. At first glance it looked like one of Crane's calligraphy drawings, except instead of a symbol it showed a picture. A picture of something he had seen before in normal paintings. The Imperial Palace. Kneeling in front of the palace was a sad looking tiger.
Po hoped this did not mean what he thought it mean. Did Ember want him to go to the imperial city? Is Tigress there? Are all his friends there? What did Ember do to them? What did she want from him?
He could hear Shifu's voice in his head. "Play along, Po. You'll find a way to stop her, eventually."
Yep, that's what Shifu would have said.
With a thudding heart, Po climbed into the hole and started crawling.
