'Stone Pillar'

I was moving apartments and had to go without the internet and power for a week. So I wasn't able to update as early as I wanted to. I'm still working on the next chapters to my stories but I thought I'd do this short one-shot to show I was still alive.

"Where there is no struggle, there is no strength." – Oprah Winfrey

He was her everything… well except for Kung Fu that is. Ever since they confessed their love for each other they were an unstoppable fighting force that mowed down every threat before them. Nothing cold physically touch them when they were together, and they spent most of their free time together. Whether it was training or lunch time one was not far from the other and the connection only got stronger after they confirmed each other as mates for life.

Tigress was notorious for her stern demeanor and no one ready knew of her soft side except for a select lucky few, her panda being one of them. This didn't always mean she didn't feel emotions, she just held them closely to herself.

Po on the other hand would wear his emotions on his body like they were clothing that he could shed from himself whenever he wanted. Layer to layer. And it was rather safe to say that the panda had been rubbing off onto her. After they accepted each other into the lover's embrace, Tigress began to realize that emotions were not weaknesses.

But sometimes Po needed her hardcoreness, as he would say, whether he admitted it or not. Tigress was able to keep her emotions in check while Po was sometimes unable to do so.

Tigress silently thought about this as she laid in her and Po's extra larger bed in the palace. Their room was her old room in the student dormitories, it took some extra convincing to Shifu to combine their rooms although he finally agreed to it after their wedding.

Tigress rolled onto her side and peered down into the empty side of the bed, wishing it was filled.

He was away at the moment running a peace keeping mission in a neighboring village. Shifu told her it was a simple mission that shouldn't take more than a couple weeks. She trusted her Master. She trusted Po.

But her thoughts of emotions came rushing back to her as she remembered the day that Mr. Ping passed away.

FLASHBACK

"I'm sorry, Po" Shifu gulped as he stood before one of his prized students.

They were in the infirmary inside the Jade Palace. Po's dad had been staying there since he had gotten sick with a serious illness that attacked the immune system. With the grey goose being so ill Po thought it would be best if his dad stayed at the Palace where they could keep an eye on him.

He had only gotten worse.

"Your father… he didn't make it through the night, Po." Shifu said as softly as he could while placing a paw onto the panda's arm.

Po could only hang his head as if to blame himself. The rest of the five had been there with him also and stood behind him, all not exactly sure how to console the mighty bear. Tigress could only stare at the back of his head, wishing she could take away his pain somehow.

They all herd him sniff as he held back the tears.

"I just talked to him yesterday." Po choked out.

"The doctor said that a cold had bypassed his weekend immune system and it was just too much." Shifu quietly said to the panda.

Po only nodded as his paw raised to rub his face. Then he stood abruptly from where he had been sitting and quickly left the room. The Five could only trade looks between each other.

"Tigress he needs his partner. Right now he probably feels like he is all alone. Go to him my daughter." Shifu said to his feline daughter.

Tigress nodded in acknowledgement and got up to go find Po. After she had walked out the door it didn't take her long to find him in the Training Hall. She found him on all fours as he sobbed loudly at the ground. Her heart broke at the wet spots on the floor where his tears had fallen from his face. To her left she say a destroyed training dummy, which shocked her slightly as Po never destroyed the training dummies.

"Po." Tigress said as she knelt down beside her panda. She reached across his back to caress his shoulder.

The panda shook as soon as she touched him. He then quickly turned towards her, surprising the tiger, and pulled her into a hug burring his head into the crook of her neck

She could only hold him as he sobbed into her fur.

They stayed like that for hours.

END FLASHBACK

Tigress shivered as she remembered that day. It was the first time she really helped Po through something. After the whole ordeal, Po joked that she was his stone pillar. Although the other members of the Five laughed it off, she kind of liked the thought of supporting her significant other.

Her ears picked up some slight movement coming down the hall. They were heavy steps.

She smiled, although it disappeared quickly. The footfalls were moving fast, and seemed… distressed.

Tigress sat up slightly as the steps had reached the door, and then a large figure swiftly opened the door, stepped in, and shut it.

It was Po.

But something was wrong. He just stood at the door.

"Po?"

Silence.

Tigress stood up from the bed and walked over to her love and stopped just behind him. He turned to her with tears in his eyes, and then he fell to his knees before her.

"Po what's going on? Are you alright?" Tigress asked the panda that was on his knees before her.

"I killed him." Po whispered, moonlight peered in the window allowing Tigress to see the tears in his eyes.

"What?" She asked as her paws found his head.

"He was just a kid…" Po sniffed as he rubbed his cheek into her paws.

"What happened Po?" Tigress lifted his chin so that his eyes connected with hers.

"I was patrolling the streets at night on my mission when I thought I heard a scream come from a local home." Po shook his head not wanting to remember the events. "I rushed into the house… and this kid… he couldn't have been more than sixteen, was holding a knife to an older sheep's neck. I tried getting him to put the knife down, but he kept saying he was owed money… I don't know he looked like he was going to do it, like he was going to hurt the sheep." Po gulped as he looked up at Tigress she seemed to be trying to drink in all of his pain. "I reacted and when to deflect the knife, but he turned and feel onto it… Tigress he died because of me."

"Po…" Tigress whispered. Po only fell into her grip, his tears soaking into her shirt at her stomach. His paws grasping at her backside just above her tail, as if he was trying to bring her in closer.

Tigress could only hold him against her abdomen as he sobbed into her.

Eventually she got him to calm down, and got him into their bed. And there she held him protectively. She needed to be strong for him.

She was his stone pillar.

I know it was short, but it was something I had in my mind at work all day.

I will be posting the next chapter to Twist and Turns soon.

MrSimba593 Over and Out!