made up word: prosadium- hatred or disdain for one's family

Hey everyone! well this is my first chapter since arriving in college but I hope it's as good as anything else

Making the Cut
Chapter 13
Rough ride

The next morning we woke before the sun had even begun to risen, the price to pay for having to meet a farmer. Zed and Germaine walked me to the farm they had mentioned the night before. When we caught sight of the farm they both told me to hang back while they talked to farmer for a second, a stocky grizzeled-haired marmot, who currently was loading goods into a cart. I wondered what they would have to tell him, but complied. When they came back they said I was all set to go with him.

"We wish you the best of luck." Germaine said, her original attitude toward me completely forgotten now.

"Thanks, I'm gonna need it." I said.

"No you won't." Zed said smiling.

A few minute later, I was traveling down the road in the farmer's cart. His cart was considerably smaller than the coach. Nearly half the size actually. The rear of the cart was cluttered with a few bails of hay, a barrel of apples, and an axe and shovel that rested in a bundle of fire wood. I hadn't realized it at the time but the farmer was Felix Yen, the same one that was interviewed in the article Pearljing Gazette. He didn't say too much despite the fact that I was sitting right next to him in the front as he steered the cart with the reins.

Every once in a while he and I chewed over the usual topic conversations used to avoid awkward silences like the weather and other stuff like that. The silence didn't bother me too much though. I was content either way.

It wasn't until about an hour later that he spoke again. "So Germaine and Zed tell me you're interested in trainin' under Master Montenegro."

For a second I wondered why they would tell him that until I realized it was their cover up story for me.
"Yeah. Well I've always known a little kung fu, but I wanna start doing some real training."

"Good luck with that. I hear that that Montenegro fella isn't an easy guy to please. I'm guessin' that's why you came to Pearljing. You was lookin' for Keen Lee Academy and got a surprise didn'tya?"

"A surprise? Oh yeah, Keen Lee's death. Yeah I couldn't believe when I heard about that." I spoke doing my best to sound devastated.

He went on. "You're tellin' me. I can't imagine what this alleged rhino had against him or his students. Keen's been 'round here for some time. Come to think of it, wheredya say you're from?"

"Shinghue." I said recalling a city I'd read on the map.

Felix said "We don't get many of your folk 'round here."

"My folk?" I questioned confused.

"Badgers." he replied.

I sighed. "Ya don't say?" I turned back to watching the unchanging landscape slowly pass by trying to avoid the subject I seemed incapable of escaping.

He went on "Can't say that I've seen a badger before. At least not since those Grentows."

I suddenly found the landscape less interesting. I turned back toward him. "What did you say?"

" 's talking about two badgers that were in a city I lived in a while back. Cal and Jia Grentow."

"What else do you know about them?" I said immediately wishing I could reword what I just said.

"It was around… 9 maybe 10 years ago they were taken away." He said thinking rather hard.

"What for?" I asked trying to sound interested, which I was but for different reasons than he thought.

"Drug dealing, drug use, and child abuse. Seems they had a youngen, supposedly walloped 'em pretty bad. Can you imagine somen' like that?"

"No." I don't have to imagine. "Do you know what happened to them?" I asked.

"Cal and Jia or the kid?" he asked.

"Both, I guess."

"Well Cal and Jia were arrested of course. As you can imagine with all those charges. As for the kid, well, they got him outta that house. Not sure after that."

I became lost in thought. For the first time I had confirmation from someone else about who my parents were. The memory of them had become so instilled in my brain that I often forgot that I had only remembered them last year though a dream. I had intended on not telling anyone of my dream. To this day only two people knew the truth about my parents. The first had been my friend Musaki. It had been just a few days before Christmas when I told him about my parents. Truthfully, he had made it tremendously easier making the first move when he had told me of his parent's past and how they were tragically killed. The second person was the one I'm shocked wasn't the first person; Po. Telling him had taken some time, which surprised me, but I remembered it as easily as anything else.

On one late night I was hanging out in Po's room. It was a typical night for us. I'd come over to his room planning on saying goodnight and he and I would end up talking for 45 minutes. On one rare occasion Master Shifu even came by telling us to go to bed. While he lay in his bed, I sat on the cot I had slept in when we had previously shared a room. I wasn't sure why he had never moved that cot, but I was glad he kept it. We had somehow gotten onto the subject of dreams and Po began to tell me about in the past when he received his dreams from Master Oogway, the ones that eventually pointed to me as the The Next Dragon Warrior.

"It was so weird to think that Oogway was trying to talk to me through my mind at night. I didn't really know him that long when he was alive. I'd only had one real conversation with him."

"That's too bad." I said. "I've only heard good things about him. I wish I had met him. You think he'd ever visit me in my dream?"

Po smiled. "I'm sure you'll get your own special dream. It'll probably be like nothing you've ever imagined."

Something in his words triggered a memory. The memory of the night I dreamt about my real parents. I was instantly silent.

Although I didn't notice it, my expression changed dramatically.

"Hey what's up." he said with a tone of concern in his voice.

I could have easily never said a thing. Clammed up. Changed the subject. Keep the conversation on this new direct path even when he called me on it.

But I didn't

Sharing secrets was something me and Po did. All best friends did, I guess.

"Po, would you believe me if I told you I've had a dream with meaning already?"

"You mean you've had a dream telling the future before?" Po asked trying to understand what I was telling him.

"Not the future." I said.

"It was about the past?"

I nodded. "Something I'd forgotten in the past. And wish had remained forgotten."

"That bad?" Po asked.

I answered slowly. "I saw my parents. My real parents."

"You saw them? What happened?"

"I remembered." I said. "I remembered everything about them."

I relayed to Po the entire dream leaving out details only when I thought he became uncomfortable. It was only the second time I'd talked about it, but talking about was the same as reliving it for me. In that moment I wished I'd gone with my original plan and said nothing. I hated that I was putting Po through this. Not that it was a terrible story. There were plenty of more terrible things in life than having abusive parents, but I hated that I always unloaded my problems on Po.

"I'm sorry, Jo. I'm sorry you had that dream too." When I didn't say anything he said. "Are you... ok?"

I shrugged. "I'm fine but... I don't know what to think. Before I had the dream, I occasionally thought about my mom and dad and wondered what happened to them. I had imagined that they never wanted to give me up but they had no choice because they couldn't take care of me or something. I wondered where they were and what they were doing now, and... if they had the option... would they want me back." I bit my lip trying to hold something in. "But I don't think about that. Not anymore."

My prosadium had grown greatly in the time I recounted the dream.

"I have a hard time believing you don't still think about it, the way before you had the dream." Po said.

"Fine." I mumbled. "Maybe I do. I just wish I'd never remembered it at all."

Po went on "I know it's tough, but it's not good to live in the past, especially when your past wasn't good to you. I had to make the same decision when I came to the Jade Palace. Besides, from the way you turned out, your foster parents didn't do too bad a job raising you."

"I guess not." I said recovering a little bit.

"Jo, I've told you time and time again, I think of you like a brother. I'm glad you're out of that house too.
I love you, Jo."

My mind was stunned right there. No one outside of my foster parents had ever told me they loved me. To be quite honest I felt strange being told it by another guy. But I knew it was a brotherly love.

"Jo, I don't know if you'd want to, but... would ya want sleep in here tonight. For old times' sake."

"Sure. I'd like that." I said smiling meekly.

After a brief pause I smiled and said "I love you too, Po." Po smiled back, his eyes beaming with care.

I'm not gonna lie. It felt a little weird saying it, but I knew it was the truth.

I yawned, the early wake-up still having its effects on me. I turned to Felix. "I might sleep for the some of the ride if that's ok."

"Sure thing. I'll wake ya if we get there." he said.

I climbed into the back of the cart and rested in a pile of the hay feeling the rock of the cart considerably happier with this memory than I'd been a minute ago.

My eyes cracked open. It was somewhere in midday, I only assumed by the way the sun blared down on me directly overhead as I still laid on my back. I went to block my eyes of the sun but found that I couldn't. As my eyes veered away from the sun to my hands I saw that both my hands were bound in front of me as were my feet.

Only then did I notice that the cart was no longer in motion. The squeak of the wheels was replaced by something else. I heard a faint scratching sound. I would have disregarded it but it had a consistent rhythm to it which seemed odd. I knew I had heard this sound before. I'd heard it when I was young and would watch my foster parents prepare dinner in the kitchen, and when Shifu tended to the weapons in the hall of warriors.

It was the sound of a whet stone.

It was only then that I noticed the large axe that was in the back of the cart was gone.

Hope Animation Universe doesn't mind me mentioning Lil' Saki.

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