The Stuff of Dreams

Punishment

The snow leopard always entered the class with his vest closed up but then opened it up later on. He placed his briefcase on the table, popped it open, and then took out everyone's papers from the day before. 

Scritch Scritch Scritch

Tai-Lung knew the sound of pencil writing anywhere. He looked up and saw Po in his spot at the second row of tables. He had a bright red leather journal, and he was scratching down as many ideas as he could remember. "Mr. Po?"

"Huh? Oh! Hello Mr. Tai-Lung," Po smiled and continued writing. The snow leopard blinked several times. He even rubbed his eyes. "Is something wrong?"

"You're here early."

"Oh, well. I got fired."

"What?!" shouted Tai-Lung and Crane who had come in a few minutes ago. Po quickly told them the whole story. Tai-Lung's normally neutral glare slowly turned into a snarl. With his arms crossed and his sharp teeth showing, his low growling suddenly stopped. 

"And what did you do then?"

"Nothing. You told me not to give in to my anger. You were right. It was a waste," Po sighed, closing the journal. "But I am sorry that I couldn't save the journal."

Tai-Lung sighed as well. "I'm more upset about this Boqin than anything else. He's turning out to be a good villain for you to write about."

"You think so?" Po asked.

"Egoistic is a great characteristic. It's hard to write and make believable, but it is profitable," Tai-Lung replied. 

"What about the tiger woman?" Crane asked. 

"Oh! Well, I actually scheduled an appointment with them. I'm so nervous. What do I do? I don't have any administration skills! I barely have skills as a writer!"

"Enough!" Tai-Lung boomed. The panda and crane shrunk into their seats. "Mr. Po," He grunted with a measured ounce of rage, "You talked about your determination to learn from this class, from others, and from me. Was that just a mere show or do you actually believe that you can learn?"

"I-I think I-"

"That is a yes or no question."

Po gulped, "Yes, Mr. Tai-Lung."

"Getting the next job should be your focus. So don't doubt yourself."

Po sighed, "Why not? I'm not the absolute best writer."

"I know," Tai-Lung said bluntly, "But doubting yourself isn't productive to learning how to become one." Po fell silent as the other classmates trickled in. Class began. "Today, we'll be going into the actual functions of Story. You already had some practice with it, but I can see that some of you still have a fanfiction problem in some of them." He eyed Po in the back. The panda shrunk his head into his shoulders. "As I have said, you can't write without having some kind of knowledge of the real world. Writing is a part of imagination, even in nonfiction, but there must be something that feels... real." Then he wrote this on the board:

You can't write about the world if you don't know what the world is like. 

Po raised his hand. "Mr. Tai-Lung, isn't it dangerous to have that rule?"

"Hm?"

"Well, it sounds like you're telling us to try everything."

"Ah, good question," Tai-Lung said, turning back to the students, "Of course, not everything that is permissible is beneficial. You do not need to kill someone to know how to hide a body or how it decays. You can do safe research, but only enough. So my rule of thumb is this: If you're spending more than one day researching what it was like back in 18th century Asia, then you're doing too much. Documentaries are pretty good at giving a wide range of information about time periods. I would warn you to use the internet with care."