Panda Quests

Chapter 5-Amber

They walked down the tunnel. It was dark, very dark. All of the sudden, the group heard a squelching noise. 

“Ah!” Coco's voice could be heard through the gloom though none of them could see her. “This is disgusting! It is wet, humid, musty and my foot is covered in… something!”

 After a while of trudging down into the earth. They saw a warm light ahead and looked out to see a beautiful jungle with  thriving high trees that had chocolate brown bark and beautiful lush green leaves, they saw stocks of bamboo thick as a panda’s leg, and large bushes that smelled wonderful. If they craned their necks to look up they could see stone with roots poking through a ceiling of some sort! There was warm golden light that came from shining wisps that wove between branches and leaves. Small houses were nestled throughout the forest and in trees. 

They had found the hidden forest of the Amber pandas! A baby Amber panda cub with fur the color of the most beautiful trees bark somersaulted past them singing a funny song that went something like this.

I want a friend

A friend

A happy silly friend.

I want a friend

A friend

A jolly goofy friend.

A friend.

A friend to laugh with meee!

A friend

A friend to play with meee! 

Let's chase a bee!

Weeee!

They were tempted to try to play with the cub but decided that they had to keep going if they ever wanted to make any progress. They walked through the forest and looked around to see if there were any pandas that could help Willow. They looked into the windows of a small house that was made of bark and gigantic leaves the size of a large panda's paw. There was a panda in it that was a caramel color. It was reading a book to a young panda with big wide eyes and a happy smile.

 Everyone looked so happy here. Coco Bean wondered what it would have been like if she had been born in the hidden Amber panda forest instead of in Diamond City. She would have grown up being able to get bamboo without getting scratched up and dirty. She could have had somebody to look after her and comfort her, someone who cared about her. Coco Bean’s sadness was welling up inside her. Stop thinking about things in the past and think about the present, She told herself. Right now they had to find some jade mint to heal her burn. She looked down at the patch on Willow's leg with no hair that had a red burn mark on it. 

They came to a wide open clearing with beautiful golden, magenta, and teal  flowers. The  houses were made of oak and had gold trim on the edges. The gold looked like molten sunshine. Willow hadn’t ever seen gold. It was beautiful! Because of the largeness of the houses, she guessed that this was where the royalty lived. Sure enough, there was a panda with a gold crown on her head that looked like golden braided grass with two leaves and was inladen with jewels of magnificent emerald, jade, and amber.

 The panda had knowing eyes and a kind smile. And oh her fur! It was a wonderfully golden brown color with soft and silky fur. They approached the queen. She turned to them with wide eyes, and exclaimed, “what are you doing?! There is a cutie eye panda in my tribe! How did you find us!” The queen raged. “Did this silly panda cub lead you here? I don’t even know her! How would you know where this is?!” The queen paused for some breath. “Actually, I should be asking why I don’t know you!” 

“Uh.” Said Willow, annoyed. “That was a lot of questions to answer. 

“Sorry.” Said the queen softly. “Come with me.” 

She brought them through the doors of the biggest house and led them to a room with big green glass windows. There were a bundle of bamboo stalks in the corner and a grassy floor. There was a small table made out of wood that was carved to look like bark. The queen told them they could sit in one of the stump-like chairs. Once they were all settled in, they told her their story. She was a good listener, and the queen said they could stay. She also said that they could call her Rosemary.

They settled down in a house made of bark, and Coco’s leg was tended to. Coco was getting to know all the other pandas in her tribe. She already had a favorite panda cub. His name was Melon. He loved books. Coco Bean would read him a book every day. While Coco was doing that, Willow would hang out with a panda she had met named Maple. Willow and Coco Bean also learned a lot about Rosemary and the past queens and kings like how all pandas from the royal bloodline have golden fur. Scout spent his time out in the forest snapping at passing butterflies and basking in the sunlight.

Then, one day when Coco was walking to the library to find a new book for melon, she heard a familiar voice. She knew that greasy voice! It had to be him. He was muttering the usual “heh heh heh”. She ran to get Willow and almost walked into her. Willow said that an elderly panda named Lavender had been shot by a tranquilizer dart. 

They ran to Rosemary. When they had alerted the queen she told everyone to help Willow and Coco Bean get ready to fight. This was the man from the circus who had captured Coco Bean and Willow!

The Amber panda tribe had a good organized way of preparing  Willow and Coco Bean for battle. They grabbed bark armor for the two pandas. Willow got a bow made of a thin bamboo stalk and vines with expertly carved wooden arrows. Coco Bean got a small sword made of wood and grass. They found the man’s hiding spot, after the whole tribe looked for it. 

He was under a large fern with leaves big enough to shelter two pandas. The man still had his sword but instead of chainmail, he wore animal skins and instead of one dog he had three loyal wolves at his side. In the man's hand he held a blowdart and a shooter. He had not seen the pandas yet. When Coco shifted to see the dart, a fern frond shifted with her. 

A wolf pounced. The wolf never hit Coco Bean. Scout had tackled it, and they were now playing a deadly game. The other two wolves followed the first. Three to one wouldn’t be easy, but they had another thing to deal with. 

“Do you know why I am attacking your beloved village?” The man said with his awful greasy voice as he stepped out, and was  now face to face with Willow and Coco Bean. “Well, when my tent was burning because of that wretched elephant, who I have dealt with by the way. I cried for help, but you couldn’t help me.” He said spitting in their face “You were right there, but you went off to your next heroic adventure. After recovering from my many burns, I decided to become an animal hunter, to get my revenge. You pandas are my first target.”

“Your beautiful amber skin will be perfect for my collection. But I have seen too much black and white, I will just kill you then”. He looked at Willow. 

Fast as lightning, he had his sword out, and was striking at Willow. Coco Bean had barely enough time to parrie blocking his sword. Willow unstrung her bow, and climbed up a tree. She then saw what Scout was doing. He had killed one of the wolves, but had a terrible gash down his leg. Willow shot an arrow at the wolf attacking Scout, and it fell to the ground. Scout looked to see what had struck the wolf, and in that moment the other wolf sprung. 

The wolf struck Scout's neck before Scout could fight back, and struck the killing blow. Scout yelped as he fell. Willow glanced at Coco Bean, and saw that her fight wasn’t much better. She had a line of blood trickling from her left shoulder, and was getting really tired. The man didn’t appear to have any injury. He had already shot one blow dart at a passing panda who now lay on the ground next to them. Then, with horror, Willow realized that it was maple. Coco had tripped over the body of Maple, and fell to the ground. The man had his sword raised, and Willow raised her bow to shoot him down, but she never had time to shoot.

                  Chapter 6- Roses

Jade mint couldn’t cure the paralysis from the darts on Maple and Lavender, so they had to wait for it to wear off. Willow stayed with Maple the whole time. Afterwards, they had a funeral for Scout, and buried him in his favorite clearing. Willow and Coco Bean were heartbroken. When they were placing yellow roses by his grave, Queen Rosemary came. She set a candle on the grave and lit it. “He was very brave.”  She told them. “Come with me,” she said, gesturing  to Coco. “We need to talk about what happened in the battle”.

She brought Coco Bean to the same room they had visited on the first day they arrived at the hidden Amber panda forest. It actually had only been a week. “I have been giving you some time before I asked you this because of Scout, but you have had a day.” Rosemary said. “Please tell me what that was”. 

“Really, I don’t know what happened!” Coco spoke up. That was true. At the end of the battle golden sparks had sprayed from her paws, and onto the man’s face, spreading like fire, and burning like acid, Coco Bean hadn’t known what was happening but what she did know is that it was disgusting. The queen sighed. “I guessed that was what you would say. Please tell me if you find out more about it.”

Sunlight filtered through the giant green leaves and onto the mossy boulders. Parrots chattered, and a soft drip drop sound of water falling from leaf to leaf could be heard echoing around the underground space, and there was the sound of a river rushing nearby. Coco Bean was out on a walk in the beautiful underground Amber panda village. She now understood how Scout loved to roam around this beautiful place. Coco Bean walked a path she hadn’t been before. She loved exploring. She was fine with the overgrown leaves grabbing on to her, and the moss ground covered with fallen leaves and branched rubbing against her paws. She came to a stream with glistening water, so clear that she could see the rocky bottom.

Coco Bean sat for a little while with her legs in the water, enjoying the sound of rushing water and the sunshine soaking into her fur. Her peaceful feeling was cut out when something in the water bumped into her leg. It was a wooden box covered in algae with an elegant tree carved into the side. It looked like it had been in the river for a long time, but it wasn’t broken.

 Coco Bean carefully lifted the lid. Inside was a glass bottle with the same golden sparks whizzing around the inside of the bottle. This was magic.