I'm not feeling so good this week, so this chapter won't be up to the usual standard. Sorry.
"Su?!" Mr. Ping squawked as he caught sight of the empty bed.
He leapt through the hole in the floor and scrambled about the deserted bedroom.
Where was she?! She had only been gone for a couple of minutes... and Mr. Ping had been in the kitchen for most of that time! If Su had gone downstairs then he would have seen her!
And what if she had gone downstairs and he somehow hadn't seen her? What kind of guardian was he? What was he going to do?!
He spun around on the spot, his mind swimming with terror. He stopped when he glanced at Po's bed and realized that the old, tattered bed-sheet was missing.
A thought came to him, and he leapt onto Po's old and sunken bed and poked his head out the window.
Just as he had thought, just below the windowsill a rope made of sheets was dangling from a protruding thick nail, stretching all the way down to the ground two floors below. Su must have collected more sheets from the other upstairs rooms.
But why...
Mr. Ping leapt down from the bed, and as he did so, his foot rushed a piece of paper he had knocked off the bedside table during his frantic search around the room. He looked down, and realized with a jolt that piece of paper was a hastily scribbled note. And judging from the wet shimmer of the ink, it had been written very recently.
It took seven seconds for him to pick it up and read the entirety of the note...
"Oh... oh my... oh no, Su!"
... and by the eighth second he had dropped the note and was running for the stairs, shouting for a messenger goose named Zeng. He had to get a message to them, and get it to them quickly.
As they trudged along the Thread of Hope, a rope bridge stretching all the way across the misty abyss that served as the only way in to the Valley of Peace, Po frequently found his thoughts returning to Tigress, and his eyes frequently straying in her direction. It was a warm day, unusually sunny weather for the winter season, and it was for this reason that she was back in her normal sleeveless red vest. The panda couldn't help but feel slightly disappointed that she had switched back to less feminine clothing. She had looked so beautiful in that shimmering green and white dress, with the Heart of China bouncing on her chest-
Stop that!
Po mentally slapped himself.
He was going on a mission now. Now was not the time for amateur romance.
Once this was over and they were back in the Jade Palace, he would begin his 'training' then.
Tigress scowled as the bridge they travelled across brought back memories of the first battle the Furious Five had ever lost.
It had been her own fault, really. It wasn't arrogance that had made her disobey Shifu two or three years ago (at least she hoped it wasn't), but a deep seated need to finally make him proud of her, to receive the tiniest hint of praise. Of course now she and the others were receiving it in spades, but still... she frowned and glanced at Shifu, who was walking alongside Emperor Xian up ahead... Tigress had a feeling that things between her and her master weren't quite fixed yet.
She suddenly sensed a pair of eyes staring at her.
She turned her head towards the panda walking just behind her, just in time to spot him quickly turning his gaze in another direction. He seemed fixed on the food cart, but the shifty look in his eyes and the redness of his cheeks betrayed him.
Tigress gave him a suspicious look and turned her head back to facing forward.
He had been doing that a lot lately.
Two days after they reached the other end of the Thread of Hope, Viper was slithering across the grassy field at the rear of the group when she spotted one of the bags beginning to slip from the supply cart Po was pulling. She quickly sprung onto the edge of the cart and pushed the bag back inside with her tail.
"Viper?" Po turned his head when he heard the disturbance. "What are you doing?"
"One of the bags was falling off."
"Oh. Thanks, Viper."
Po gave a puzzled when Viper, instead of slithering back off the cart, slithered up until she was just behind his head.
"Sooo..." Po heard her say slyly. "How did it go with Tigress the other night?"
Po nearly tripped over flat earth.
"H-how did you find out about that?!"
"Su told us." Viper said matter-of-factly. "She told us all about how you woke her up in the middle of the night by screaming your head off. She said that you and Tigress had been having a little tea party."
Po clenched his teeth in monumental embarrassment.
"For your information, it was not a date!" he said, teeth still pressed together. "Tigress was getting a little upset from all those guys staring at her and whispering about her at the Winter Feast, and I just wanted to cheer her up."
"Oh, that..." Viper frowned a little. "I overheard two of the masters that night. They were saying that in her dress, Tigress looked a lot like someone they used to know. I asked them who they were talking about, but they were reluctant to mention her name in front of the Emperor."
"So that's what they were whispering about her for." Po replied. "I thought it was because she looked beautiful."
"They were talking about that too."
"Oh."
"So back to my question... how did it go with Tigress?" Viper asked.
"I told you it was not a date!" The redness in Po's cheeks flared up once again.
"I know that." Viper chuckled at poor Po's reaction. "I just want to know how it went."
"Alright... if you must know, Tigress felt better and we both went to bed. It didn't end in kissing, hugging, 'thanks for walking me home' speeches, or any romantic stuff of any kind!"
"What's her favorite tea?"
"Green tea with honey. Why?"
"Just curious."
"Can we talk about something else, please? If Shifu or Tigress hear our conversation I'm dead meat!"
"Alright, alright." Viper laughed. "Let's talk about noodles."
"Noodles?"
"Yes. What's the secret ingredient?"
"Not telling."
"Why not?"
"Because it's secret!"
"No point if having a secret ingredient if there isn't one."
"What?"
"Nothing! Let's talk about tea!"
Three days later, they set up camp in a small clearing in the middle of a bamboo forest. While the others all sat around the warm fire, sharing stories and basically making good conversation, Monkey sat alone in his tent, staring down at the pair of dao swords lying in front of him. Several days ago one of them had been covered in rust. Now, after much work and care on Monkey's part, it looked just as deadly as its twin brother.
Monkey picked up the once rusted sword and ran his fingers over the flat of the blade. Fifteen years ago, the night the sword disappeared and a small army of imperial soldiers had been brutally murdered had become known across China as the Himalayan Imperial Army Massacre.
And now it was happening again. In a fortress deep in the mountains, people were dying at the hands of some powerful and bloodthirsty creature.
Could it be?
Ten days into their surprisingly uneventful journey, two days before they would venture into the largest mountain range in the world, the traveling group stopped at Zhongtu City, a bustling city slightly smaller than the likes of Gongmen, and also happened to be Di Tan's old hometown.
In front of a modest little house on the outskirts of the city, Di Tan was pulling a small bag full of belongings from one of the carts.
"Thank you for allowing me to join you on the journey." Di Tan bowed respectfully to Emperor Xian. "I greatly appreciate this."
Xian chuckled.
"It wasn't as if we had any choice." he replied. "There is no way I'm making my eighty-four year old chef travel all the way here to visit his relatives all by himself."
"We will return to pick you up once the situation at the fortress has been resolved." Shifu said.
"That should be a couple of weeks at the most, correct?" Di Tan asked.
"Yes." Shifu nodded in response.
"Oh lovely! I've been hoping to spend some decent quality time with my son's family." Di Tan beamed. "Well, I won't keep you here any longer. Bye now!"
With a friendly wave, he turned and headed towards the front door of the house.
General Tujiu snarled, crumpled up the scroll and flung it into one corner of the map room.
As he stared out the window of the fortress with an expression of indignant fury, the crumple up paper began to slowly unfold again, steadily revealing the contents of the message...
General Tujiu.
The Masters' Council has observed your latest report on the crisis unfolding at the Himalayan fortress.
To be perfectly honest, it's exactly the sort of useless finger-pointing we had expected of you ever since you ignored the Emperor's orders to retreat from the site.
The consequences of your insubordination and arrogance may very well have cost dozens of lives. Your transparent scapegoating does nothing to change the fact that you are solely responsible for this turn of events.
It is our opinion that you should receive immediate demotion for insubordination and gross misconduct in the field.
Master Croc.
Head of the Gongmen City Masters' Council.
They would regret this. That Tujiu promised.
The murderer of a hundred soldiers slung its latest kill over its shoulder before beginning the long but effortless climb up the mountains towards its lair.
As it pulled itself up the rock face with its massive arms, it had a sudden feeling that something was about to change. Whether this change was good or bad, it didn't know.
No matter.
Right now, it would focus on the task at hand: eliminate the intruders at the fortress one by one until there weren't enough to defend.
It hesitated mid-climb as it heard her again, her weak voice in its mind again calling out for help.
Once it got into the fortress, it would find her.
And then it would set her free.
Again, sorry about the quality. Hopefully I'll be feeling better next week.
Anyway, keep reviewing, and could those reviewers who haven't done so yet please comment on the previous chapters so I know what it is about each chapter you like. Thanks.