The Ticking Contingent: The Countdown vo.2

A grand entrance

Zhen surprisingly did a lot better with Po's training that morning, though she seemed to gravitate more towards Tigress and Monkey. Po honestly didn't really care as long as she did something. They could work on the listening specifically to Po later. Zhen still had no problem with taunting her opponents during training, but it was less mocking and more playful taunting. Granted Crane and Mantis didn't fully appreciate that, but Monkey seemed to get kick out of it. Po could handle that.

Training finally came to a conclusion and Po dismissed everyone for lunch, after which he checked in with Mrs. Jin to make sure he didn't have any meetings he was missing. Since the answer was no, Po headed straight down to the village to continue on with his classes on chi. As per usual, Li and Mr. Ping were the first to arrive since the two always had lunch before a good lesson (to stock up on energy, Li had told Po once), and then soon after the rest of the students followed in after.

"Okay!" Po announced to everyone. "You're getting the hang of focusing your chi and using the red lotus kick well. What I need to day is some good strong stances, and then we can move on to the most potent of them all: the Golden Lotus Clap!"

Everyone let out a collective "ooh!" and immediately lined up to start demonstrating their skills to Po. Since he didn't have a hundred eyes on his head, Po had them each demon straight their chi kicks one at a time, starting with a rabbit shop keeper who had been having the worst trouble in the class. He stared straight ahead at the water, took a deep breath, and then ran as fast as he could and kicked high into the air, releasing a bright red blast across the water, rippling it and causing little waves to form.

"Great job!" Po exclaimed. "That's a lot better than last time!"

The shop keeper beamed happily and went back to standing in line as Mr. Mulan moved up and began to release a series of kicks across the water, making a tidal wave that splashed a few villagers on the other side, much to their annoyance.

"That's really good," Po told him. "Just remember to keep yourself controlled so you don't splash other people."

Mr. Ping went next, flying towards the river with a loud, "Gaaaaaaaaaaaaah!" and launching a mighty chi kick across the water. A slightly bigger wave formed, crossing over the bank and onto dry land.

"One day I will do this to my noodle soup and destroy anyone who robs my shop!" Mr. Ping remarked, proudly walking back into line.

"Totally dad. But for now, let's keep it toned down a bit?"

Li went next and kicked even harder, creating a bigger tidal wave that splashed nearby vendors and caused them to give everyone a dirty look.

"Okay, guys," Po scolded. "I get that you're excited to get the hang of the kicks but you're splashing people." He gestured to the other side of the river where the villagers were trying to save whatever merchandise or personal belongings hadn't gotten soaked. "So let's keep it small and controlled until we do our lessons in a bigger area, okay?"

The group all agreed and Li and Mr. Ping apologized for the inconvenience and went back to demonstrations before Po determined they were ready for their next lesson.

"Now this move is a little dangerous since you can go blind if you do it wrong," he explained. "Basically: keep your eyes closed, focus your chi, and clap the energy as hard as you can. And on that note, I'm going to stand out of the way so I don't go blind for half of the day. And don't use it on anyone!"

Po proceeded to spread each person out a great distance apart, just out of range of each clap, and then stood even farther away to avoid getting himself blasted. The area was coordinated off to avoid passersby getting in the way too, so Po just kept an eye on everyone. A lot of the students in the group struggled at first to get their chi focused enough to blast out with a clap, but after a half hour, two or three people, including Li, started to get little blasts out. Po watched proudly off to the side, seeing the progression of each clap get bigger and bigger as the class went on. He suddenly felt a large energy blast overwhelm him, and the Dragon Warrior found himself slipping away from the valley and falling down a very large dark hole. He landed on an onyx floor which had no silhouettes and were surrounded by a glowing red lights. More blasts rang out, some in orange, some in red, and Po found himself ducking and dodging his way around each one. He managed to maneuver the lights around him and had them fall into the floor, keeping himself safe. Suddenly he felt a horrible pain fill his chest and Po felt all his air rush away from him, and suddenly a golden blast erupted from his chest and sank into the onyx floor, forming the pattern of a dragon. Po fell to the floor, weak, trying to make sense of what was happening. He felt a great amount of heat emanating from above and he glanced up to see a bright orange glow. Suddenly the dragon image on the floor glowed and moved, and the bright orange light erupted, sending Po into a hot orange haze with voices overlapping one another and making it difficult to concentrate or see. Po grimaced and clutched his ears as he tried to make out which direction the golden dragon was heading, though he soon heard a strange voice, a woman he didn't recognize, speaking in a condescending tone of voice:

"Can't you even die right?"

And suddenly the light shifted to a striking blue and Po found himself falling onto the ground, back in the Valley of Peace, trying his best to catch his breath.