Chapter 21

Po was hungry. This wouldn't usually have been a suprise to anyone, but this was serious. He was starving. To death.

Somehow, that doesn't seem jokey anymore.

He knew he needed food, within the next day or so. Oh, so thirsty... He could pass out from dehydration at any time. It was, what, day 3 in the arena. He wasn't cold, due to the fat on his body. He hadn't any major injuries, but a few cuts. He hadn't managed to get anything from the cornucopia, no rucksack with supplies, no weaponry apart from the sharp stone he'd managed to find the day before. If anyone found him, there was nowhere to hide, nothing to defend himself with apart from a stone and his kung-fu, which probably wasn't much use considering everyone was a kung-fu master here.

He made the desicision to get as far away from everyone as possible, see if there was anything at the end of the arena for him to use. Keep away from everyone - maybe, when they died, it would hurt less.

It didn't. When he found out Crane was dead, Po broke down and cried for an hour.

Crane was the first one to properly accept him. Crane was like his older brother, always watching over his mistakes. Crane...

Last night, no-one important died. Earlier this morning, one, two, three cannons went off. Three more dead.

"Let's hope it's not one of us..." The desperate whisper escaped his lips.

Maybe someone would feel sorry for him, and send him some form of support. Po would eat anything. He was desperate.

Slumping down in resignation, Po could only hope no-one would find him and kill him whilst he slept.

"Beep...

Beep...

Beep..." Lifting his head to look towards the sound, he spotted a silver parachute floating in his general direction.

Support! Yes! Awesome!

Pushing himself up in a new wave of adrenaline, he ran and grabbed it from the freefall. The beeping stopped as he pulled off the lid and looked at the content.

Firstly, a note from his mentor, who looked eerly like Shifu:

'Remember who you care about, who you love. Keep fighting, because there will be a point, and I can't keep supplying you like this.' Unsure of what was being implied, Po kept the note and looked back into the parachute, screwing off a second lid. He was so close to falling to his knees and thanking every god in turn.

Soup. Oh yeah!

Quickly, he started to devour it, and it was gone before anyone could blink. His hunger and thirst had been temporarily quenched, though he knew it wouldn't last long.

He also knew, nearby, there wouldcbe somewhere he could find supplies.

Po only hoped it wasn't too far.

The art of going unnoticed was easy for Viper when it involved green trees. The markings on her were evolved for this kind of activity - hunting prey. Though she was far too moralised to even think about killing anyone on the good side of everything, especially Po. So, as she stalked the Panda along, she tried to make it look as if she was innocently going long, having not seen Po and their paths having only accidentally crossed.

She was a good actress, having fooled many enemies before not only with her beauty but with her convincing skills also. Hopefully, much of China wouldn't know she had spotted Po and known of his presence ages before. Sneaking little glances at him, Viper assesed his condition. He looked hungry, had some mini-cuts around his body, wore the same clothing (though no equipment or rucksacks) as all the other warriors in these... games. Overall, he looked not terrible, but not great. Tigress was doing much better, Viper realised, and was tempted to break off the alliance with her to help Po, but then noted that it would make more sense for this 'rebellion' if she stayed with Tigress. Mantis and Monkey needed to be gone so there was more fuel to burn the rebellion's flame brighter when she... died.

Not to sound sadistic or anything.

A silver parachute suddenly brought her out of her thoughts, as it descended towards Po. He grabbed itand ripped off the lid in his haste, slowly bringing out a note with a confused look on his face. Risking being caught, Viper slid down to read it's message.

'Remember who you care about, who you love. Keep fighting, because there will be a point, and I can't keep supplying you like this.' Obviously it made sense to Viper, who had forknowlege, but Po didn't understand at that point in time, with no Tigress nearby, and quickly dismissed it as inhaled his soup. Whilst he was eating, Viper merged back into the trees, a faint grin on her face. Knowing everyone had probably seen her, she gave a knowing wink in no direction exactly, to look as if she knew what she was doing to hunt and had formulated a secret plan, before sliding back to her alliance with Tigress, and her 'supposed' resting tree.

A/N: So, I spent a lot of todays in a wood, greatly annoying my family and confusing my dogs, but I am now able to vividly picture this scene. I hope you all enjoy it, I am so happy to have gotted, what, 7 reviews for the last chapter.. PLEASE REVIEW TO GET ME TO 100 IT WOULD MAKE ALL THIS WORTHWHILE! REVIEW! REVIEW! REVIEW! Also, I was checking my traffic stats, and I was totally blown away: 142 Hits and 118 Visitors for Chapter 20! I was honestly close to screaming and going hysterical... THANKYOUALLILOVEYOUALLSOMUCH! Please review to make it 100 reviews, I will cry (out of happiness) when that happens and post up another chapter. Okay, slightly insane, but g'night!