Through the Looking Glass: Penance: Chapter 5-B
Shifu: Chapter 5
Shifu sat in his room that night, meditating in front of a prayer candle that lit the small room acceptably enough.
It was enough for the aging kung fu master to be able to concentrate on his thoughts, at any rate.
And there had been quite a few thoughts spiraling through his head. The first were visions of Tai Lung and Tails, as Cream had called her friend so often; the two of them seemed to be hugging each other, both sobbing quite loudly as they whispered to each other. This was intercut with scenes of the rabbit he had become rather fond of being stuck in situations she should not have to be in.
And then there were the visions of death he had been recieving. A death that would change everything on a personal level and a level of China's peace.
He had little time to dwell on these thoughts, for then the door behind him opened. Opening an eye quickly, Shifu sat still, already knowing who it was.
"What is it, Cream?" asked the red panda softly.
"Master Shifu...?" asked the rabbit, a little bewildered that he had been able to tell she was there. "I wanted to ask you something..."
"Go ahead," assured the kung fu master, sitting on the mat the entire time as he heard Cream's footsteps approach.
"I've been thinking..." she began. "I've been thinking these thoughts for a very long time..." She hesitated slightly, unsure of how to continue. "I wonder... how far do you think Tails has gone in his regrets?"
Shifu was silent as he contemplated the question in his head slowly. His ears twitched slightly as he did, his tail swishing back and forth ever faithfully to his heartbeat. The rabbit was about to say something else when he spoke up.
"I don't think he is beyond help," replied the master slowly. "We all have things we regret. And like all things, regrets stay with us forever... But we can learn to live with them, and we can learn not to question the 'what if'."
Cream was not convinced by this. "But Tails had to go through some pretty awful stuff," replied the rabbit. "I don't know if he'll ever fully heal himself..."
"Cream, I have had many regrets..." replied Shifu at length. "The greatest regret I have? Raising Tai Lung the way I did... I wish I had done everything differently with him... But I had my chance to fix all that."
"Po?" asked the rabbit.
"Yes," Shifu said, closing his eyes again. "I trained him as much as I could as well, but this time because I was under a time constraint. But there was something different about my training of Po that stood away from Tai Lung's training. Po... Po was already sweet and innocent. Somehow, I felt myself not wanting to change that. And in doing so, he understood the secret of the Dragon Scroll. That... was my pennance for my actions towards Tai Lung."
Cream nodded, but she still was not satisfied. "But what can Tails do? To find his own peace, I mean."
The kung fu master paused as his ear twitched uncomfortably. "Cream... may I tell you a secret?"
"Of course," replied the rabbit innocently. "What is it?"
Shifu nodded. "I have been receiving more visions," he replied. "They are of Tails and Tai Lung... They seem to be holding each other, crying in my visions..."
"So they are each other's redemptions is what you're saying?" asked the rabbit.
The red panda smiled at how much Cream had picked up on. "Precisely," replied the panda happily. "I can never hear exactly what they say, but they were smiling... as if everything was going to be all right..."
"But is that a good thing for China?" asked the rabbit inquisitively.
"Only time will tell," stated Shifu slowly. "Anyways, you should be off to bed now."
"I was on my way," the rabbit countered. "But since that question popped up when I passed by, I thought I might ask. Sorry if I bothered you."
Shifu seemed to chuckle at this. "Cream, you know that you don't bother me when you enter my quarters with valid questions," he replied.
"Okay..." replied the rabbit. "Good night, Master Shifu!"
"Good night, Cream," the red panda said in kind.
And with this, Shifu heard the rabbit leave the room, closing the door softly behind her as she exited. Smiling softly at the rabbit, the panda reflected on the training he had given her earlier that morning.
Shifu was still meditating late into the night when he suddenly thought he heard a series of footsteps in the hall. His ear twitched slightly as he took note of this, thinking maybe Cream had not gone to sleep.
But when the footsteps trawled right past his door, he suddenly had the strange apprehension that something was wrong.
Sighing and blowing out the prayer candle that was laid out before him, Shifu stood up, creeping towards his door without making a sound.
Right as he got at the door, he suddenly heard some signs of a struggle coming from the end of the hallway. Ears raised high in fear, Shifu slowly slid the door of his room open and suddenly heard things much clearer.
The sounds were coming from Cream's room.
Eyes wide, Shifu slowly advanced to the rabbit's quarters, partly not to make any noise and mostly to avoid giving him away to whoever had decided to enter the rabbit's room. He kept himself on high alert.
Or perhaps the Dragon Warrior had returned. But Shifu thought that possibility very unlikely anyways, as they were most likely heading to Beijing with Tai Lung in tow. Or so, he dreaded.
This possibility was very quickly drowned out, as then the sound of teeth sinking into flesh was barely noticeable. A small yelp of pain came from within the room, and Shifu braced himself for something.
"Master Shifu!" cried Cream's shrill voice into the night. "Hel--!"
And she was abruptly quieted. Almost as if somebody had covered her mouth.
Shifu was quick to act after hearing this; he slammed the door of Cream's room open quickly, not bothering with stealth as he knew something was terribly wrong.
And his fears were confirmed rather quickly. He had opened the door just in time to see a figure dressed in black holding Cream with a hand over her mouth, jumping right outside of a window that led outside. The figure seemed to be jumping amongst the trees, Cream looking back at Shifu with incredibly frightened caramel eyes.
Shifu shook his head and jumped out of the window right after the figure in black. The figure turned his head slightly, and noticing this he picked up the pace.
The red panda was not to be deterred; despite having a broken leg he was able to move quite fast when he needed to. This was such a case.
Thus, the kung fu master barrelled after the figure that had kidnapped Cream as they both seemed to dash down the mountain. Shifu kept up despite the many weavings in the path that the figure had tried to take to confuse him. All the while, Shifu kept up the chase as quickly as he could.
As he did, Shifu tried to figure out who the figure was. It was too small to belong to Tai Lung, so he knew that his former student was out of the question in terms of guilt. It looked like it had wings, however...
Shifu brushed this aside, he was doing good at giving chase, but he was not catching up as much as he would have liked. It was bad enough that they were slowly winding their way out onto the Valley of Peace, but Shifu had the feeling that Cream would be abducted well under the cover of the Devil's Mouth. He knew he had to catch up sometime before then or else run the risk of losing the rabbit in there.
As he thought of this, he suddenly realized that they were running along the stairs that led to the Jade Palace, and before Shifu knew what was happening he was traversing the rooftops of the Valley of Peace.
The red panda found himself quickly running over the rooftops, trying to catch up to the figure in black. Cream simply stared back at him with those frightened eyes the entire time, almost as if pleading to stop this chase.
Shifu's eyes were light by comparison, as if to say 'I'm trying'.
And almost as quickly as this reassurance was found, the panda suddenly found himself running along the mountain range beyond the valley. Here, the agent took to wing, holding Cream by the legs as Shifu ran as quickly as he could to catch up with them. Shifu was finding himself unsuccessful, however, and he finally began to take to bounding off of trees, mountainsides, whatever was by the road. This meant that Shifu was able to travel much faster and keep up with the person who had kidnapped Cream with greater ease. This tactic eventually found itself losing substance as they went up the sloped road, however. Because of that, Shifu found that he was slowly beginning to lag.
The adrenaline pumped through the panda's veins as he began running faster than he was sure he had ever moved in his life. The desperation was beginning to get to him, and slowly he began to catch up with Cream and the kidnapper again. The rabbit's eyes seemed to light up, thinking that Shifu could actually save her and that she would be all right.
But alas, Shifu looked in front of him just in time to see the first suspension bridge that hung over the Devil's Mouth. Cream's kidnapper noticed this too, and then he flew a little higher just as Shifu had jumped up to grab a hold of Cream's outstretched hand.
The bird then made a swerve to the right, and then he essentially dove into the fog at a very high velocity, disappearing from sight as the mist billowed slightly from the bird's entrance.
Shifu's soft cerulean eyes stared into the abyss, trying to see where the mist billowed so he could give chase from his side of the Devil's Mouth. However, he found that the billow had disappeared long before he had ever successfully managed to keep track of it. The kung fu master's eyes were wide as he saw this, the silence around him becoming too much to bear.
Looking back to where he figured the Jade Palace would be and then looking back at the Devil's Mouth, he shrugged.
"I hope destiny runs its course by the time I find you again," he said, holding his hands in front of him and bowing. "The Dragon Scroll is unguarded, and yet destiny calls all of us. Ah, well. At least I know it won't be touched while I am away..."
With this gesture, Shifu jumped over the suspension bridge's edge and broke out into a run along the cliff face. He eventually ran all the way down the cliff, and disappeared into the mist in search of the rabbit girl he had taken to liking.