Through the Looking Glass: Penance: Chapter 3-B
Cream: Chapter 3
The rabbit looked in the training area, shocked by everything she saw there. The entire training course was laid out before her; the bowl that seemed to be ready to move around, all of the pillars with wooden point-studded beams that spun around, the floor of holes from which fire plumes constantly rose, a whole series of moving serpents, and a bunch of wooden logs suspended from the ceiling by chains were what she beheld. As Shifu looked at the course, Cream looked back to the kung fu master in disbelief.
"You...?" she asked incredulously. "You expect me to be able to do all that on my first try?"
Shifu chuckled good-naturedly as he looked at the rabbit. "Everybody does if they know the absolute basics of Kung Fu," he said. "Po is the only person I've known to require a level zero, and that was only because he had no prior fighting experience. However, you say you have done some fighting, so I'll trust you can handle this on your first try."
A drop of sweat seemed to course through the skin underneath her fur as Cream looked at this. "Okay..." she said. "Suddenly, I'm not so sure I can do this."
"If you want, there is always the dummy over here," said Shifu as he walked to a corner of the obstacle course.
The rabbit trailed her master, suddenly noticing a dummy of what looked like an average panda standing in the corner. Nodding at this, the rabbit walked over to where Shifu had stood.
"Yeah, I'll start with this, thanks," she said as she walked over to the training dummy. "So I hit this thing?"
"Yes," replied the red panda softly as his student approached the dummy.
"Okay, doesn't sound too hard," she said.
Reeling back, she landed a punch on the dummy, the inflated bag sent careening back. Cream would have celebrated except for the fact that she noticed the dummy tilting back in her direction. Seeing this, she waited until the dummy leaned towards her, and then she hit it again with her clenched fist. As she expected, the dummy tilted towards her again.
She proceeded to land a series of slow kicks and punches to the rather large dummy, always letting it lean back to her before hitting it. Eventually she had memorized the timing of wen the dummy had swung, and then as she smiled fiercely she proceeded to pummel the dummy for a good ten minutes. Finally, she reared back right after she had landed a kick on the dummy, and very quickly followed it up with a rather strong kick that sent the dummy bouncing away from the corner. Keeping the ricochet in mind, Cream stepped to the side and watched as the dummy then rolled right past her, barrelling into the opposite wall where it finally settled into bobbing back and forth. Smiling and nodding, the rabbit turned to Shifu, who had stood silently watching her the whole time.
"So, how'd I do?" asked Cream, a small smile on her lips.
Shifu seemed pleased with this, nodding softly. "You have absolutely no form in your punching or kicking whatsoever," he replied. "But I see you have a very strong sense of timing and sensing patterns. That will get you farther than perfect form ever will. I say you personally will not need a level zero. And you are certainly above some of the students in the classroom."
The red panda then turned to the obstacle course. "I think you can manage this," he said without missing a beat. "Timing and patterns are important here; you should be able to survive this just fine."
Cream looked at the obstacle course, not looking forward to what was inside.
"I hope you're right," she said as she edged to the beginning of the course where the bowl lay on the floor precariously.
"Oh, no no no," said Shifu, directing the rabbit away from the bowl. "That is to practice fighting balance. You start, here."
She was deployed in front of the spinning pillars studded with bits of iron. Looking at this, she was a little apprehensive. "I'm not sure I can do this..." she said.
"True strength comes from within," recited the red panda as he gestured into there. "If you think you can do it, I am sure you will be able to push through."
The rabbit's soft caramel eyes looked over the obstacle course again, looking at everything. Gulping nervously, she sat down on the edge of the course, her hands gripping the edge strongly.
"Okay," she said, hesitantly. "I'll take your word for it, then."
With this, she jumped in front of the obstacle course, and then she slowly made her way through the group of pillars that were rooted to their spots on the ground.
The small beams that jutted out of the pillars then began to move when Cream nearly tripped on one. This sent the rabbit ducking quickly as she noticed a beam above her head trying to hit her, and then she jumped up when she remembered that the motion had started because of her foot. Curling into a ball, she narrowly dodged both beams whirling above and below her. She had barely landed when she found herself stepping over a beam that had moved from the opposite pillar. Quickly setting her foot down, she ducked, realizing another beam would attempt to hit her from above. This notion was proven correct when an iron-studded beam suddenly whipped the air over her head.
She then jumped forward, expecting this back and forth motion to occur continually for some time. It was then she noticed that her small action had created a chain of events that radiated out, and suddenly she found herself ducking and jumping and sidestepping all over the place as she dodged the beams that were trying to hit her over and over again. Eventually, she began to get rather creative, getting down on her hands, and even attempting to deflect a few of the beams with her hands (although the pain in her hands whenever she tried to deflect a beam of wood was a little too great for her). Eventually, she moved through all of the pillars, and then she found herself on the other side of the pillars from where she had started from.
Sighing in relief, she looked up, noticing Shifu standing at the edge of the obstacle course with a small smile on his face.
"Good, good!" he called from above. "You don't seem to have a problem going through it; your reflexes are definitely quite good! You can definitely do this entire obstacle course!"
Cream looked up to Shifu, smiling broadly as she glanced behind her briefly. "I guess I can," she said, eyeing everything else that seemed to appear in the room. "Well, here goes!"
She then flapped her ears to fly, landing on top of the moving serpents as she began a high-strung dance of dodging and keeping her balance.
Cream somehow walked out of the training area, her legs feeling like jello as she was stumbling all over herself. Shifu was walking by her side, a smile on his face.
"Ow..." Cream moaned. "That really made me sore. How do the rest of them get through it in one piece?"
"Experience," replied Shifu softly. "You did quite well for being a first-timer to kung fu. Did you have any prior experience?"
The rabbit nearly collapsed again, but she managed to keep her composure. "Well, I did fight an evil doctor several times," replied the rabbit. "I remember that I used to have to time everything just a little before whenever I was beating his minions..."
The kung fu master's eyebrow rose in curiosity. "Really?" he asked softly.
"Yeah," said Cream. "That ended two years ago, though, around the same time Tails ran away."
"Ah," said Shifu. "Why?"
The rabbit rolled her eyes. "He went insane," she said. "Apparently, after so many years of trying to take over the world he lost his grip on his mind, and then he just lost his grip on reality with it."
"Oh," said Shifu, nodding sternly as the two of them walked up the mountain to the dormitories, the sun setting in the distance. "Do you think that this doctor--?"
"Oh, trust me, he had everything to do with Tails running away, I'm sure of it," she said grimly. "It's a really complicated story, but to make it short, the doctor forced Tails to kill his best friend. It was really painful, too."
Shifu's eyes widened in a rare display of genuine shock. "My..." he said breathlessly. "That is absolutely awful! Is that why 'Tails', as you call him, ran away?"
The rabbit nodded. "We all know it wasn't his fault that his friend died..." said Cream. "But... the two of them were like brothers... I don't think he could take the guilt..."
Shifu nodded, soft blue eyes looking at her. "I see..." he said. "To think I almost did the same thing so many years ago..."
"Tai Lung?" asked Cream, immediately guessing from what she had heard between the emperor and the kung fu master the day before.
"I was unable to stop him the first time I had to," replied the red panda softly as the two of them stopped on their walk up the mountain. "I could not bring myself to destroy what I had loved and cherished. I had been blinded by pride..." Shifu paused uncertainly, jaw set as he seemed to hesitate. "I could not, and did not want to see what he became. I feared the guilt that would accompany such an action. And now your friend did what I could not. It must be awful what he is going through right now."
"It is," Cream replied softly. "He barely said anything to us the day his friend died. I just want to tell him that we all forgive him. I think that will bring him home."
Shifu nodded somberly as they both restarted their trek up the mountains. "And the friend that died...?" asked Shifu. "What was his name."
"Sonic," stated Cream simply. "Sonic the Hedgehog."
"I hope this 'Sonic' person can rest in peace," Shifu said thoughtfully. "I wonder if he has met my old master in heaven..."
Cream simply shrugged, and the two of them continued conversing as they walked up the mountain.