One little twig. That was all it took.
One little twig fallen from a guard's clothing was all Tigress needed to pick the locks on the cuffs and the door to her cell, and then she was quietly sneaking down a corridor poorly lit with tiny torches. Inexplicably, the first thought on her mind when she was free of cuffs for the first time in weeks was that she felt like noodles.
Tigress heard the oncoming guards before she saw them, and ducked into an empty cell. She held her breath and curled her paws into fists, just in case. The guards stopped just outside the door. Judging from the conversation that ensued, there were two of them.
"... Wow, that crazy cat's on the warpath. I hope we find Tigress soon."
"You're worried about Izumi? I'm more worried about what Lady Hei Nuwang will do!"
Lady Hei Nuwang. The leader of the Children of Nuwa had only visited Tigress twice since her capture. The first time was to inform her of their intent to use her to make the Dragon Warrior cooperate when the time came. The second time was to interrogate her on the possible whereabouts of Master Shifu and her friends. Both times Tigress had remained defiant, even in the face of her subtle threats and her... special abilities. She knew of no kung fu techniques that involved the manipulation of purple gemstones, but at the same time Hei Nuwang didn't look like any demon she had ever seen.
"Look, Tigress'll probably be heading for the nearest possible exit. That's upstairs. It's either that or the catacombs." He made a sound as if he had shuddered. "There's something spooky in that place."
"Upstairs it is then." His companion said at once. There were more footsteps, and then they were gone. Tigress pondered over what she had heard. If all the guards and their mothers had the same idea, then the upstairs exit was a no go, even if she had the option of fighting her way through.
With a sigh, Tigress started looking for the catacombs, wondering what it was about that place that the guards found so spooky.
Stupid.
Stupid.
Stupid!
Po cursed himself over and over as he vaulted over abandoned carts and toppled barrels in a desperate bid to escape his pursuers. Two dozen glassy-eyed citizens the last time he looked back. What scared him more than anything was how quiet they were. They didn't shout or grunt like the soldiers did. All he could hear were their footsteps as they chased him silently down the cluttered, narrow street. Po had been too determined to reach the HQ, too distracted by his fear for Tigress and his fear of Ember, to see or hear the signs that those weirdos were nearby. Creepy murmurs and fleeing soldiers. How the heck did he miss that?
There were way too many of them, and all of them were innocent, mind controlled citizens. Po had to lose them, and fast. Once again his own weight was acting against him, and before he knew it he was panting and sweating as if he was climbing ten sets of stairs.
"Okay, time out!" He yelled without looking back. "Time out!" The citizens had no intention of stopping, and Po was reaching the end of the street. All that was there was a tall building with a heavy door. If it was locked, he was screwed.
The last obstacle was three fallen barrels lined up on the ground. Po vaulted right over them and slammed his shoulder in the door. It flew right open. Po stumbled inside, slammed the door shut and looked frantically around for something to block it with. Spying a tall wooden cabinet, Po quickly shoved it against the door. Seconds later he heard people banging against it on the other side. "Booyeah!" Po laughed. "Can't touch this, can you? I'm the biggest blur you're never gonna see!" The banging grew more intense. That cabinet wouldn't hold for long, even with the two chairs and sack of radishes that Po flung against it for good measure. It was time to leave.
He raced through two rooms and out the other side. The next two streets were mercifully empty. The third opened out into a huge square, at the centre of which was his destination. Again, Po wondered why Ember would lead him to the HQ of all places. Why was she leading him to anywhere in the first place?
Then Po heard a shout and looked to his right. Far down the square, an un-brainwashed soldier was stumbling away from a large group of citizens. He didn't get far. Ten seconds after Po spotted them, the boar's pursuers were upon him. Po ducked behind the rickshaw cart he'd conveniently stopped beside and cringed, waiting for the poor guy's death screams. After five seconds, Po steeled himself and peeked out from behind the cart. Two of the citizens were holding the trembling boar by the arms. The rest had stepped away, except for three that slowly approached their prey.
Po's jaw dropped as he recognised the one in front. It was Top Dog.
Tigress had searched eight corridors, checked twenty-two rooms, and taken out ten soldiers before she found the entrance to the catacombs, a single white door at the end of the eighth corridor. She had a single moment of doubt, that whatever was down there was more than even she could handle, before quietly pulling the door open and entering.
There was no lighting in the stairs leading down into the catacombs whatsoever. Tigress looked behind her to make sure she hadn't been seen, and then closed the door.
Her natural night vision took over from there. Tigress slowly made her way down the cold stone steps. Her heavy breath was loud in her ears, and everything else was utterly quiet. She grew aware of how sore she was. Her chafed wrists were stinging. There were bruises on her body from when she'd made a snide remark about Izumi's face. To top it all off, she hadn't slept properly in days. She rubbed her eyes and carried on, reaching the bottom of the stairs minutes later. The tunnel before her was naturally formed, the rough walls and ceiling shining with wetness.
There were three things on Tigress's mind now. One, Po had escaped the other prison and was now somewhere in the Imperial City. Two, she had to find him so she could properly apologise for deliberately delaying their first date. Three, she really hoped she hadn't just walked into a maze.
Much to her relief, it soon became apparent that the catacombs stretched into a single dark path, albeit with many twists and turns. The ground itself seemed to slope downwards, and every now and then she came across a short set of steps she needed to descend. Eventually Tigress began to worry over where the hell she was going. She moved quickly, even though her ribs were starting to hurt again. She would have to repay Izumi if she ever saw that crazy bobtail again.
The path seemed to never end. Tigress went down the umpteenth set of stairs. Turned right. Travelled fifteen feet before turning left. More stairs. She was going deeper and deeper. She turned left again, then right. The pain was getting worse. Yet another set of stairs. She went straight for a while before finding more stairs, this time going upwards. Each step sent a stab of pain shooting through her body. She reached the top and ended up in a corridor that looked manmade. She turned right and stopped in her tracks.
At first she thought she was looking at soldiers, but these things were not flesh and blood. They looked like terracotta warriors, except they were not usually sculpted in such erratic, twisted poses, lacking eyes or holding rusted, broken daggers. There seemed to be at least thirty of them, all blocking the widened corridor before her. Tigress was gasping now. Her ribs were torturing her, but she was more worried about the warriors as they suddenly started twitching. The harsh sound of clay scraping against clay filled the air. As one they turned to face her.
Top Dog had the same glazed look in his eyes as all the other brainwashed citizens, including the two firmly holding the struggling boar soldier in place. The boar yelled and kicked, but even from his hiding place Po could see that it was no use.
Soon Top Dog was leaning over their prisoner. Like his fellow minions, he didn't say a word. He only gazed down at the boar with the subtlest of glares. Po had a sudden impulse to look away, but a morbid curiosity stopped him.
Then Top Dog's eyes started to glow red. They glowed as fiercely as the eyeholes of Ember's dragon mask. He reached out and touched the boar between the eyes.
Po covered his mouth in horror as the boar started convulsing in the citizens' iron grip, Top Dog's paw never leaving his skin. His eyes twitched and rolled in their sockets. Then the convulsing stopped and the boar went limp. The citizens set him down on the pavement and slowly but surely started to scatter. Po kept himself crouched on all four behind the cart as he stared at the still boar, wondering what the heck they had done to kill him.
Then the boar slowly pushed himself up, glazed eyes staring at nothing. It was like watching a pack of hopping ghosts turning a living being into their own kind.
Po swallowed back bile. He turned his gaze down to the pavement beneath him as he struggled to take in what he had just witnessed. He would never let them do the same thing to him. Never.
Suddenly there was a shout. Po looked up to see the boar fully upright and pointing right at the cart he was hiding behind. The head of every mind controlled citizen in the square turned in his direction.
Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap!
Po pushed himself up off the ground and ran for the nearest building, the footsteps of dozens of pursuing citizens scarily loud in his ears. He reached the building, burst through the door, slammed it shut and pushed a nearby cupboard against it.
Seconds later the door trembled from the force of many fists pounding at the wood. "Ember what did you do?!" Po yelled as he looked for another way out. There was no other door, and the stairs were blocked by debris. The culprit of the destruction, an intact cannonball, lay nestled in the charred wood. Po rushed to one of the tiny windows and looked out. There were so many of them making their way to his location. He saw Top Dog approaching from the direction of the HQ. Behind him stalked an armoured elephant carrying an appropriately sized axe.
"Aw man!" Po yelled. He heard a thud behind him and spun round. Several rabbits had forced their way in through another window and were advancing with what looked like crystal knives.
Po went into his stance. This was going to suck.
Terracotta warriors. That must be what these creatures were. Except Tigress had never heard of a living terracotta warrior that moved so strangely. If they weren't made of clay, she would have guessed that they were drunk.
The clay crocodiles moved so slowly that they seemed almost curious about the panting, staring tiger. Her arm felt torn between staying wrapped around her torso and raising itself with a fist at the ready. She had eavesdropped on many a guard whispering about the alchemic experiments the inner circle dabbled in, but this... "Who are these people?" She muttered.
She took a step back, contemplating going back upstairs. Normally she would never dream of walking from a fight, but terracotta warriors were notoriously difficult to defeat, and she was injured who knows how badly.
The warriors were getting close. Tigress instinctively went into her stance, but the movement sent another wave of pain through her body. She held her breath, fighting back a cry.
A heavy silence fell. The eyeless warriors had stopped dead, frozen in place as if they were ordinary statues. What in the world?
Tigress exhaled. She cautiously stepped forward. Her ribs throbbed and she grunted.
The warriors in front twitched and went still again.
It took Tigress less than a second to understand. Sound.
Perhaps she wouldn't need her fists to get out of this.
The warriors starting moving once more and then Tigress heard what they heard; voices coming from the tunnel behind her. The guards were on her trail.
There was a nasty scraping sound. The warriors were on the move. Now Tigress was caught between a rock and a hard place... unless... it was incredibly risky... but nevertheless she pressed herself hard against the tunnel wall, the stone cold against her back.
Their focus entirely on the sound of approaching trespassers, the clay warriors trudged right past her, more than one passing within inches of her body. Tigress held her breath, fists clenched in case she was caught.
Then the last one traipsed by, and Tigress was clear. She didn't dare make a sound as she rushed to the door the warriors had been guarding.
She finally let herself smile as she pushed the door open and stepped outside into fresh air. Everywhere she saw there was grey rock and the occasionally tree. The ground itself was covered in tiny light grey pebbles. Distant mountains surrounded the area. She must be on a mountain herself. Tigress turned to face the door she had escaped from. She looked straight up. If the massive building looming over her wasn't as black as obsidian she would have been convinced she was staring at the fortress of white fortitude, which was still under imperial control in the Himalayas.
Tigress had not seen this coming. Báisè de Gāngyì had a twin.
Po grabbed the wrist of the first rabbit to reach him and squeezed. The rabbit was forced to drop his weapon, which he now saw was another piece of ice. He took down the rest of the rabbits with no trouble, but he was in no way prepared for the giant axe that tore right through the wall and nearly took off his arm at the elbow. Po tripped over a fallen chair and fell flat on his butt. Dazed, he watched as the elephant kicked down the rest of the wall and crouched low to get inside the destroyed room. Po rolled to the side and scrambled to his feet, his brain screaming for him to run. Obeying, Po ducked under the elephant's hand as he lunged for him and ran back out into the square.
The dozens of other citizens were instantly upon him. Po had to break a few noses to avoid being pinned to the ground. "Sorry! Sorry! It's for your own good, you know!" Po somersaulted over the majority of the horde, landing between two buffalos. Po wrapped an arm around one buffalo's neck and then jumped up to kick the second in the head. As the second buffalo collapsed Po threw the first to the ground and took off running. Ember wanted him to get to the HQ, so that was where he was going to go.
He made it nine steps before a rhino charged in from the side, sending him flying. He skidded painfully across the ground, rolling to his feet just in time to see the elephant rushing at him. The elephant had discarded his axe, instead coming at Po with arms raised to grab him. Po clenched his teeth. "Okay, that's the way you want it? That's the way you're gonna get it!"
He'd been practising ever since the Himalayas. Po took a deep breath... mustered up all his energy... directed it all into his right paw... and sent a glowing ball of Hero's Chi right into the elephant's chest. The elephant flew straight over the heads of the civilians and crashed into another building.
"Woohoo!" Po yelled, but still felt bad as he turned his glowing paw on the closest advanced civilians. He sent three rabbits flying into the recently turned boar, knocking him down. Then he sent a chi ball at a pair of pigs. Then a horse who looked a lot like Head of Chief District Superintendent Chang. With each golden projectile Po's limbs grew heavier. The next chi ball struck Top Dog right in the head.
With that last attack, Po fell to his knees, his energy spent.
The civilians stopped in their tracks.
Po's vision blurred, but he could make out the civilians as they turned their heads to the distant royal palace.
The boar soldier slowly stood back up. "Yes, mistress. We will leave him to you."
Dropping the pieces of ice they had been holding, they left the weary panda without so much as a glance, disappearing into the street on the far side of the square. Po stayed where he was, too tired to wonder why they stopped attacking just as suddenly as they started, or why they were heading for the palace. He was just glad that they were gone and he could finally catch a break.
He heard a groan. Top Dog was getting up. He rubbed his head, his eyes pained but alert. "Dragon Warrior?" He asked, blinking. "Did you just hit me in the head with a chi ball?"
Po cringed. "Please don't arrest me."
