Kung Fu Panda Stories

Chapter 7- Sparring to the crowd

This one is pretty long folks!

Morning, about 7 a.m. Po crawled off the floor, he fell off his bed in his sleep again, and stood up realising that he was in a perfect angle to be facing the hole in the wall. He noticed that Tigress was in sight through the hole, but meditating, he let a sigh of relief, which alerted Tigress. Her eyes snapped open, and she just glared at Po, but evenwith no words, he quickly got the message, and moved away from the hole.

"Phew...that was close," Po whispered to himself. He couldn't imagine what she would have done if she saw...him... Wait a minute, she just saw me looking through the hole, and she said...oh hell. But, if she was REALLY going to do something, she would have attacked me right then, I hope. Po spent the rest of the morning in suspense, but he would have to get over it, or it would interrupt his training, and if suspense over Tigress slowed his training, Shifu would kill him.

LATER

Shifu walked into the sleeping hall, with the Masters, and Po, immediately popping out of their doors to greeting him. "Well, today, there will be no practicing with the obstacles in the training hall; we will be going down to the arena for one-on-one sparring."

"Aw, sweet!" Po shouted, the masters all just stared at him in anger. Tigress looked excited, however, maybe she was hoping to get him so she could whoop his ass again.

"Po, please try to take today's training seriously, for once." Shifu requested with a heavy sigh.

Oh yeah, sorry. I'll do that."

Shifu just shook his head as he left the sleeping hall, the others following. "Po, are you stupid enough to forget something I told you 8 hours ago?" Tigress questioned Po as they walked out of the hall. "I thought I told you what would happen if I saw you looking through that hole."

"Yeah, I remember, I kind of fell out of my bed and woke up in the right position. Sorry..."

"Hm, I thought I heard a loud crash coming from your room." Tigress chuckled at her own humor. "But still, you'd best hope your not sparring me. Otherwise, you know what will happen." Tigress gave the panda a menacing, yet joking, glare. She wouldn't really do that to him, since it was an accident.

Po gave a nervous laugh. He was always a little nervous going up against Tigress, probably because of his feelings for her, and the fact that he always went back with a couple of bruises, and, if she was in a bad mood, a broken bone or two.

As they approached the arena, Master Shifu turned to the 6 and gave out their sparring partners. "Mantis, you will be fighting Viper. Monkey on Crane, and Po, you will be fighting Tigress." A feeling of dread fell over Po, he was doomed. The arena gates are very close to the stairs, and if she got right shot on him... Well, you remember what would happen.

Mantis and Viper's fight was an interesting one, with their styles being the quickest and hardest to hit, it lasted for a good long while, until Mantis landed a blow to one of Viper's nerves, and paralysed her from the uh...half way and up. (Do snakes even have waists?) Crane was able to keep Monkey at bay for a good long while, flying around and staying out of Monkey's reach, and quickly finished the fight with a powerful swoop from at least 100 feet above the arena.

Well, this was it. Tigress and Po had to fight, for real this time, there could be no holding back. Po had to keep his thoughts straight, and not think about his feelings for Tigress. Oh god, I'm dead, was all that he could think. With that, the two got ready for combat, Tigress went into her normal fighting stance, and Po did the same, only his stance, a lot more sloppy than Tigress'.

"Prepare yourselves, Masters. Especially you Po..." Shifu shouted out to them, and with that, the gong rang, and their fight began.

Tigress opened up with quick swipe at Po's chest, a very vulnerable spot. Po tried to retaliate with a punch to Tigress' chest, but she quickly blocked him and kicked him off of his feet. Tigress stepped over Po and looked at him; she bent down so that they were face to face again. "Good thing that was an accident, because if I had hit you an inch higher, you would be at the bottom of those steps with 90 of your bones in pieces."

She leaned back up and gestured for Po to get up. She wasn't done kicking his ass yet. Po struggled his way up, and when he finally was, he tried to do a back-kick on Tigress, which she jumped out of the way of. "Is that really all you got?" She shouted. The master of Tiger style stood in a very bored position; she was underestimating him, like Tai Lung did. She thought he was too weak to beat her, but he wasn't about to let her win. Out of nowhere, he took a jump towards Tigress, a clumsy one, but one long enough to give him the reach to hit her right in the chest. Tigress flew back, and crashed into the spectator stands, (which were empty, by the way).

Everyone kept looking back and forth between Po, and the pile of dust that just emerged from the stands. After a few seconds, the 5 and Shifu rushed to Tigress' aid. Po was the first over there, he felt horrible, how could he do that to Tigress...the one he, no, I don't LOVE HER! He shouted in his mind, but no matter what he said to himself, he couldn't help it, he was in love with Tigress, but now, he needed to help the one he loved, who he just happened to push into a concrete pile of chairs.

They could hear some faint coughing, but it was obviously coming from underneath the rubble. Po stood closer to the rubble than all of them, worried over what had happened to Tigress. They could still hear coughing, but nothing more after that. "Well, don't just stand there, start lifting the rubble away!" Shifu shouted at the 5 as he approached the debris. The 5 quickly started helping each other move the huge stones from the pile, and soon enough, Tigress' head was revealed. She had fallen unconscious by the time they got to her, but they could tell she was breathing.

They continued to work, Po working the hardest, he lifted at least 5 huge rocks a minute, he was going to save her, he didn't care what she did to him once she woke up, if she died, he wouldn't know what to do. Oh god, oh god, what have I done?! Were the words that kept flying through his mind. Bit by bit, rock by rock, Tigress was revealed, her clothes were torn, her body scraped and bruised. She looked like hell, her beautiful coat was mangled, parts of it were gone, leaving only bare skin. Po lifted her out gently, and quickly took her back to her room, where Viper would try to care for her.