Title: Games Of The Night
Pairing: Shifu/Tigress
Rating: T to be safe
Disclaimer: Don't own Kung Fu Panda, just letting them run around a little.
A/N. So, was watching KFP with my friend, and we were joking about a few lines Tigress says, switching the meanings and wondering what Shifu's reaction would be. Well, we joked on about this scenario I fell in love with the idea and had to write it. I hope you all enjoy it as much as we did.

It was a surprisingly dark night tonight, as the moon hide away from the world, the Jade Palace, which normally gleamed in the moon light, seemed desolate in the darkness. Within his room, Shifu sighed deeply and rolled over for the fifth time that night, sleep escaping his grasp as he stared at the wall across from him, impatience getting the best of him. His body begged his mind to rest, to let go, yet his mind had other ideas in store, as random and incoherent thoughts ran wild behind his eyes, his gaze following the design of the wall across from him, boredom setting in so deeply, he was beginning to wonder what it felt like to not have this rather infuriating feeling consuming him.

It was night like this he felt as though he was losing the will to live, he thought sarcastically, moving onto his back once more. He listened carefully for any of the noises completely unique to the night to help lull him to sleep, yet it was an uncharacteristically quiet night, as well as dark. He could all but imagine Oogway watching him with humour shining in his eyes. With Shifu's luck it was his master whom had cursed him with this terribly odd night of silence and darkness to try and teach him a lesson of some sort.

He just wanted to sleep, was that too much to ask for? Apparently it was, his mind mocked at him, as he began to fidget, despite the protests of his body to sleep.

He was not sure how much time passed as he lay there, begging sleep to find him. His frustration at his predicament was beginning to inch its way through his being, as he gave up the fight and merely allowed himself to lay there. Cursing out the hidden moon for abandoning him, his fingers tapped absently against his blankets, the rhythm rather erratic if there was even a rhythm to be found.

Then something blessed happened; his ear twitched. He thanked any deities out there for the distraction as his highly attuned hearing finally picked out a sound, glad for the break of the suffocating silence. However, as he listened his eyes narrowed as he recognized what was causing the wonderful interruption to intrude upon his imposed solitude.

"I suggest you get back to bed, unless you wish to run laps tomorrow." Shifu said loudly at the unknown student. He knew all of those under him were adults, masters in their own right, but tonight there would be no mercy, for if he had to suffer through this torture, so did his students. It would build character, he thought rather humorously, as he listened for anymore telltale sounds of his rogue student.

When none came, he sighed for the hundredth time it felt like, once again abandoned to his cage of darkness. His infuriating mind had reached 350 when again the sounds returned, only this time he shot up in bed as the unknown adventurer of the night opened the door to his room, quickly closing it behind them with a resounding thud. His eyes had adjusted to the black enough for him to clearly see the outline of the disobedient master.

It wasn't exactly a stretch to guess whom it was from that alone.

"What the hell is the meaning of this?" He asked rather roughly, as his blue orbs watched the shape of Tigress carefully, before he leaned over to his bedside table to turn on his candle. He was not in the mood for whatever had forced her to seek him out. And he swore if Po had destroyed half the kitchen again in an attempt to prepare himself a midnight feast, Shifu was going to kill him.

When he turned back toward her, he took a quick moment to check her over for wounds or any slight damage to her person, but was relieved when he noted nothing was out of order. There were no visible marks, and her muscles were not tensed anywhere indicating she was suffering from an attack. Yet, these thoughts, and everything else within his mind, vanished when his aqua eyes met her golden orange ones.

He had see that look within her gaze many a time, the way her brilliant orbs burned with unspoken words and torments. She was looking at him as if he were her prey. The only thought that managed to break through was one he was not all that glad for. 'Wow...'

He mentally shook himself, and then proceeded to kick his own ass for that one, as they both looked as if they were frozen in place, forced to stare at each other for eternity. It was then the warning bells went off within his dazed mind, and he snapped himself back to the present, and everything else that came with it.

Opening his mouth, ready to demand why she was here, or better yet to just leave, the only word that had enough conviction and strength to break through the confines of his mouth was, "Tigress." He swiftly shut his lips after that, not believing the treachery his body was giving him. That single word had the complete opposite effect than what he had been aiming for.

He had wanted to rid her from his room, he wanted to be alone once more within the suffocating darkness but instead he had uttered a single word that was just as much an invitation for her to stay as, 'Do make yourself comfortable.' would have been.

"Master." His already wide eyes, widened the tiniest bit more at her tone of voice, the uttering of that one word making his muscles tense on high alert. The only way his now seemingly fried brain could describe the tone as she called him by his title would be... sultry. Never before this could he have imagined her being in any association with the word, but apparently all was not as he thought.

And then the frozen state was broken as she inched forward toward his bed slowly, almost as if she were in a slower state of motion than the rest of the world. And as she was finally out of her frozen state, his trance was lifted, and he finally managed to force his body to cooperate.

"Enough of this, what is it you want?" Shifu demanded, using the same voice he used when issuing his hardest of training orders, his best master voice, even as his treacherous eyes watched her body; the way her tail swished about, her paws as they landed upon the fabric of his blankets covering his bed, her lips as they pulled up into a smile, a low chuckle escaping them. Her forward advance stopped at least, as she considered his words.

Shifus hands began to push the covers off of his body, removing his restrictions should the need to flee once again arise. His mind still seemed unable to think up a logical reason for all this, in fact it felt as though all reason had left him the moment she had walked into his room. He cautiously noted how she pulled herself back up to her full height, her paws running sensuously across her stomach as she did so. Shifu felt his eye twitch as he watched the display.

"But Master... This is what you trained me for." Choking on his own air intake, his eyebrows raised as he let her words wash over him, remembering the last time she had spoken them. So stunned her words had left him that he knew not what to say, or even do for that matter, blue orbs watching as her advancement began once more, Tigress lowering herself to her paws and knees, inching her way across his bed towards him.

He cursed the fog that was settling behind his eyes, making his thoughts sluggish as he tried to remind himself that this was wrong, or maybe this wasn't even what it looked like, perhaps his mind was just running away with imagination, but the constant still remained; He needed to flee. Yet would his body listen? No, it had abandoned the will to respect his orders, and so there he sat, watching her slink toward him, the perfect vision of a goddess, the fire in her eyes all but burning him as he met her gaze.

And then... She was there. Right there in front of him, he had only to reach out his hand a few centimetres and it would make contact with fur... Oh how soft her fur looked, perhaps running his fingers through it would not be such a bad thing?

FOCUS! He had to focus, had to remove his mind from the present, ignore her closeness and the feeling of her breath against his own fur as she lowered her face to his neck. He had to ignore his body's reaction as she began to nuzzle him, the small shiver that ran up his spin as she situated herself as far in his lap as their bodies would allow, had to ignore the fact that her fur really was as soft as it looked, his hands raising themselves to her head. Had to imagine he wasn't smirking as she purred at the ministrations his fingers were doing, roaming down her neck, caressing the startlingly soft fur. Yes, he had to IGNORE all of that.

And then she was pulling away, her nuzzling had stopped; the breath upon his fur was gone. Instead it was transferred to his face, as she pinned him with her stare. He knew what was coming now, knew that if they had any chance of pretending this hadn't happened in the morning, of going back to what they were before tonight, he would have to stop it right now, end it and walk away, straight to some cold water if he knew what was good for him, and yet... even as she inched her face closer, her eyes beginning to drift shut, his body told his mind to shut up, as he leaned forward, connecting their lips for the first time.

Everything vanished. Time was nonexistent, and any life outside of his room was just that; outside of his room, and at the moment, his life. All he could focus on was the velvet feeling of her lips against his, the small whimper that had escaped her throat as they had made first contact, and the intoxicating smell of her, as his lips moved gently over hers. He immediately granted himself to her wishes, as she began to apply pressure into the kiss, allowing his body to recline once more into the pillows as she settled herself over him, her lips becoming more demanding in the kiss. Her tongue ran over his bottom lip, and he opened his mouth obediently, his own tongue meeting hers as they began a duel, both applying the same amount of pressure, both dancing around the other in perfect harmony. And then she was pulling back, her eyes boring into his, as the full magnitude of what they were doing hit them, and the tiniest of smiles spread across her red lips. How could anything that made her smile like that be wrong?, he asked himself as he watched her with dark blue eyes.

"Shifu, I..."

But Shifu would never hear the end of that sentence as he shot up in bed, his heart beating wildly as his eyes looked around the room with a crazed quality, looking for the entire world as if he had finally lost his mind, the darkness once again welcoming him to the land of the living. It took the small master a few moments to calm down, the sweat upon his skin making his fur look rather mussed as his panting began to dissipate.

It had all been a dream, every single aspect of it, and he wanted to curse out whoever up in the sky had decided to torture him with such a realistic scenario. Once his breathing was relatively calm, and his heart had stopped trying to beat its way out from behind his ribcage, Shifu for the second time that night... or would it be the first time?, leaned over and turned on his candle, gazing around his room once more, satisfying himself that he was indeed the only one within the dwelling.

With a groan he fell back against his bed, his hands coming up to run over his face in exhaustion, and exasperation. It had been so... real, his mind was still boggling over the fact it had all happened within his head. And when exactly had he fallen asleep? Perhaps when he had been so distracted with his boredom, or perhaps that had been part of the dream as well. Either way, it was damn terrifying.

He knew sleep would not come to him again that night, so it was with a lazy ease the newest Grand Master of the Jade Palace swung out of bed, deciding a cold soak in the water would help him immensely before his day were to truly begin.

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Tigress once more dodged another attack from Monkey, her body obeying her wishes perfectly, as she again lunged at her fellow member of the Five, however her mind was distracted, as she spared herself another glance in Master Shifus direction. She continued on like this for a few minutes, attacking, and blocking when needed, yet when she had a second her eyes' would shoot over to the small figure of Shifu, before once again returning to the ongoing battle.

The battle ended swiftly with Tigress pinning Monkey to the ground, her paw at his throat, eyes narrowed, as if she were going to go for the kill. She backed off immediately after Monkey acknowledged his defeat, nodding to the small master as he lifted himself off the ground. She had always enjoyed sparing with him, he forced her to mould her body to near impossible angles to dodge his attacks, and she welcomed the practice, for who knew when she would need that in real combat?

Once again, she turned to look at her master, catching his gaze. They stared at each other for a moment, her eyes questioning, his guarded, until his widened and a blush spread across his cheeks, before he nodded abruptly, turning and walking away, his limp barely noticeable.

Unsure what to make of the strange display, Tigress watched until her masters form disappeared, before shaking her head slowly. He had been doing that all day, gazing at her with those blocked eyes. She wasn't sure if she preferred that to the disappointed look he sometimes held or not. At least then she knew she had done something wrong, with this look she did not know what to think. With a small shrug, she turned and trudged her way toward the kitchen, knowing her mind would be preoccupied the rest of the day with this new mystery.

A/N. Hokey, so not my best, but it was surprisingly hard to write this and try and keep them in a semblance of character. Murder, I tells you, but the idea made me chuckle, so I carried on. Hope I didn't make your brain die too much from the bad writing, and if I did, my apologies!! Reviewing is love! Cookies for all!
Ciao