Xiao-Niao had calmed down a bit thanks to the quick assurances of the other girls in the barracks, so by the time Po and his friends got to her to check on her well-being, everything was pretty much fine. It was more of the shock that had set her off, and in all fairness, Tai Lin had gotten slammed the worst out of the two, though she clearly didn't show it. The group decided they would head into the kitchen to collaborate and calm down, and also to figure out what to do. Madame Zhou was curious to find out who had started the rumors in the first place, since she figured determining the source could help root out any further development. Po said it was definitely a good idea, but they didn't really know where to start on that. Madame Zhou said she had her ways and after enjoying some of the cookies that Tai Lin had made, dismissed herself from the table. Ordai wondered if the rumors were based on something factual that had gotten blown out of proportion. For example, Tai Lin learned a chi move from Tai Lung, so perhaps the skeptical villagers who were deathly afraid of Tai Lung had taken it to mean that Tai Lin was his protégé or worse. Mantis said it could have been a possibility, but then the question was, who told the villagers Tai Lin had met the vicious snow leopard? No one in the Jade Palace had made mention of it, so who did?

Tai Lin was too irritated to bother exploring the subject further, and so the conversation was soon dropped and move onto something more pleasant for the time being. Eventually, Xiao-Niao suggested a calming origami activity which the Furious Five oddly enough asked to participate in, though this was primarily because they had nothing else to do for the day and they would rather avoid all the chaos and commotion going on around the Jade Palace for the time being.

"Speaking of chaos and all things annoying," Mantis noted. "What happened to Ella? We haven't seen her all day. I don't think she was even at breakfast this morning."

"Maybe she's hanging out with the royal family," Ordai suggested. "Or shopping?"

"It's probably something like that," Lu-Shi said. "Anyway, it's one less person to deal with."

"Where do we want to do origami shapes?" Po asked.

"Why don't we chill in the barracks?" Jai-Rong suggested. "It'll probably be more quiet in there anyway."

Everyone else at the table murmured in agreement and got up to head to the barracks. Viper offered to make tea and told everyone to go ahead without her. Crane started asking to stay behind to help, but Tai Lin jumped in before he could even get a word out and wound up staying behind instead, much to Crane's visible annoyance. The large group headed over to the barracks and headed up the stairs to where the girls were sleeping. Xiao-Niao's room, it turned out, was the one Po had seen several weeks earlier with the pictures on the wall and the giant fluffy pillow on the bed. Upon entering the room, he could also see that Xiao-Niao had her lute placed gently along the wall, a trunk full of her clothes, a bunch of paper cranes hanging from the ceiling, and some random origami shapes scattered along the floor by the bed.

"Aren't they pretty?" Xiao-Niao asked, pushing the origamis off to the side of her room and picking up the paper she had been using and putting it on her bed. "I might have gone a little overboard this morning, but it was a bit stressful this morning in my defense."

"No need to apologize," Leopard told her with a reassuring pat to the shoulder. "It's understandable."

Xiao-Niao moved over to the left side of the room and gently pushed the sliding door open. "I figure with all of us we could use some more room," she told everyone. "Just don't touch Lam's stuff. She can be a little protective over her personal things."

"Who's on the other side of the room?" Mantis asked.

"Madame Zhou. And I can't open that door anyway. She made it clear the first day we were here that we were not allowed in her room unless it was an emergency. Like her spraining her ankle or having an allergic reaction to bees."

"Yeah, she was pretty snippety about it, too," Jai-Rong noted.

Xiao-Niao settled on her bed while the rest of the masters and the girls settled around the two opened rooms to start learning origami. While Xiao-Niao started giving out instructions and showing the basics on how to make a simple origami fan, Tai Lin came into the room with a large tray, two tea pots, and several tea cups. When asked where Viper was, Tai Lin simply replied that she had decided to see if Tigress wanted to hang out with them and would be back soon. She then placed the tray down on the floor and began to pour and distribute the tea to everybody sitting on the floor. Xiao-Niao then began to teach everyone how to properly fold the paper into neat little shapes, starting with a fan since it was the easiest one to do. Po, who never was particularly nimble, struggled with trying to get the paper in exactly the right spot and eventually needed help from Xiao-Niao to fix it. Viper eventually came back to join the group, explaining that Tigress wanted to be alone for the time being and declined the invite to make paper shapes. Xiao-Niao got her some paper and kept on with her origami lesson. Every once in a while she would stop to help someone struggling, but primarily kept herself calm and relaxed by slowly folding all the paper together. Everyone soon had to stop for lunch, realizing that they had quickly filled in the two hours between talking in the kitchen and doing little origami projects. Po offered to make it since cooking helped to keep him calm and since Lam was currently MIA. (Though she was definitely down in the village somewhere the last time he had seen her). He then left the barracks and the Five and the girls helped to clean up the room a little bit of paper fans and paper cranes before joining him for lunch. (Mantis was absent since he had offered to grab Tigress to eat since she tended to zone out if too into training). They sat down and quietly talked, trying to stay away from the subject of the rumors. A few of the girls were worried that Ming might come barging back in, but considering that she had been offended by Tai Lin, Po didn't think it likely, which turned out to be a correct assumption since the person who came into the kitchen was actually the emperor.

After everyone had stood up to quickly bow, he looked at the Five with a confused and serious look and asked, "Would I be impertinent if I asked some questions of everybody here?"

"No, your majesty," Crane assured him.

"Thank you." He glanced up at the girls and then back at the Five and sighed. "Since Master Shifu is......preoccupied in....hashing things out with Superintendent Woo....and vice versa....perhaps someone could kindly explain to me what on earth happened this morning that has our trusted superintendent and relation feeling slighted?"

Tai Lin laughed curtly, but then covered her mouth. The emperor gave her a measuring look. "Is something funny?" he questioned.

"No," Tai Lin said quickly. "Or...not in that sense, your majesty. Did Ming actually tell you someone threatened her with a cookie?" She held in another laugh.

"I know you feel this is amusing, but our superintendents are an extension of the imperial family and should be treated with the same level of respect, regardless of their behavior."

"Forgive me, your majesty. But to be fair, she was making a bit of a fuss over nothing."

Po and the Five looked at each other before Po sighed and volunteered to explain what exactly happened. He told the emperor about Tai Lin being angry about the rumors in the valley, Ming's condescending attitude and exacerbation of the situation and her growing heated argument with Lam, Lam's threat, Tai Lin's attempt to calm the situation which turned out to be fruitless, and the fallout of the conversation up to the point where he convened with the Furious Five and decided to stay clear of Shifu and Superintendent Woo. The emperor listened carefully before turning to the Furious Five and asking about the fallout with Shifu and Wu, gave careful ear to that side of the story, and then sighed.

"Thank you for explaining," he said. He thought for another moment before sighing. "I'm going to discuss this with the empress before I make any kind of hasty decision," he told everyone. He went to leave the kitchen, but then turned back around and asked if Po had any idea where Lam was. Po wasn't sure but said the last he saw of her, she had left the Jade Palace and gone down to the village. The emperor thanked him and left the kitchen. Not even ten minutes later, Mantis came back with Tigress who was less than interested in speaking and simply scarfed down her food before quickly leaving the kitchen to go back to training. She left so quickly that Po had barely had time to even process her coming in or even yell out to her to not get a cramp from the exercise. There was a bit of a concerned atmosphere going around the table, even despite Mantis explaining to everyone that Tigress had expressed interest in keeping as far away from any noise as possible. This, combined with the serious tone of the emperor left the company in a bit of an uncomfortable silence, and eventually they all decided to go back to the barracks to relax. Po offered to teach everyone how to meditate, which the masters used as a way to focus their minds and and keep calm. The Furious Five offered to help and gave the group some pointers to help them lessen their anxieties from the day. Somewhere in the middle of the lesson, Monkey decided to get up and look for Tigress to see if she wanted to try meditating with them and give her muscles a break from training all morning. However, he was only gone for about twenty minutes since Tigress had immediately dismissed the idea and sent him back to the group. Po didn't see this as much of a surprise since Tigress generally preferred to punch things when she was irritated, and since Wu had done a good deal of button pushing and had even interrupted the Furious Five's training to complain, she was probably beyond annoyed at this.

"What I don't understand is why she has to be so short with everyone," Ordai had commented after listening to the boys talk. "I get maybe she's frustrated with Superintendent Wu causing all the fuss-"

"Or stressed," Po added.

"Mmm...I still say frustrated.....I mean, really. What kind of person takes her anger out on her friends?"

"Ordai, not now, please," Leopard told her sternly. "If you really have an issue with Tigress, you can talk that out to her face privately. Not behind her back in front of her friends. Now, the whole point of meditating is to relax and focus on positive things, so let's get back to doing that, shall we?"

Ordai sighed but complied and the group slowly got back to quietly meditating in the room. Po sat there quietly with everyone else, but his mind had started to swirl with a lot of annoyed and uncomfortable thoughts that he couldn't dismiss. They kept swirling and beating his brain even after everyone decided to take a break and go back to origami making and then to a little show and tell as suggested by Destiny who was interested in hearing about the families of the Furious Five and other personal details. Po glanced at Ordai every so often, though he did it subtly, so no one really took note. He was very forgiving and flexible when it came to his friends since he knew that everyone had different conflicting personality traits. Ordai was very straightforward and linear, but very creative so Po knew that it took her a while to fully understand the people around her. However, the longer that she hung out with everyone, the more Po could see the lack of empathy and respect she carried and it was really starting to bother him.

It was true that Tigress was short-tempered and preferred punching to talking. It was true Lam was a bit of a hot-head and had trouble being composed around people who clashed with her. And it was true that the other girls and his friends had some strange or concerning habits. However, he knew and understood why and tried to work with that, just like his friends had tried to work with him being clumsy and a little over-ecstatic at times. Tigress had been raised to punch first and keep her feelings on the back burner to maintain her focus in kung fu. Lam was not a hot-head all the time and actually had great self-control. Tai Lin had to deal with seven years worth of people not listening to her or leaving her to her own devices, which made her more independent and less likely to get help. Po was really trying to not be irritated or mad at Ordai, but the comments she kept making about everyone was uncalled for. And in all honesty, the one she had just made at Tigress had weirdly made his blood start bubbling.

But he knew Tigress.

Everyone knew Tigress.

Forget having an honest discussion with Tigress. Po was going to have a private conversation with her. She was not about to have another showdown with one of his best friends.

Po was willing to be forgiving, but if Ordai was not going to be respectful even after he had a talk with her, then they were going to have an even more serious discussion about her stying at the Jade Palace.

As the day wound down, Crane offered to make one final attempt to get Tigress to join them, or at the very least talk about the frustrations of the day, and left the room to go and look for the Dragon Warrior. Po had kept quietly to himself, listening to his friends talk to his dating group while trying to keep meditating. Every once in a while, someone would ask him a question, but they could tell that Po was a little too pre-occupied and respected his privacy. Po wasn't sure how much time passed by, but he knew they had to have been talking for a few hours since his stomach suddenly made a very loud rumble, drawing everyone's attention.

"Sorry," the master apologized with an embarrassed flush on his face.

"Ah, don't worry about it," Lu-Shi promised with a laugh. "We should probably eat dinner before all our stomachs starts growling in unison."

"I'll do it," Po offered, getting up.

"Well, Lam's not here, so I don't think there's no argument on that one," Viper noted, glancing around the room. "I'm surprised she's not back yet."

"Yeah, where did she go?" Destiny asked. "You don't think the emperor actually arrested her, do you?"

"If that was the case, I think the emperor would have come in here for me," Tai Lin assured her.

"Oh. Yeah. That would make sense."

"You didn't threaten Ming though," Ordai pointed out.

"Honestly, Ming considered everything a threat and an insult. I'm not that concerned."

Po yawned. "Well, let's worry about that later," he said. "Any dinner requests?"

"Dumplings!" Lu-Shi cried excitedly.

"Sounds good to me," Mantis seconded.

"Anything sounds good to me," Snow Leopard told him.

"Dumplings it is. I'll let you guys know when they're ready."

Po then quickly made his way down the stairs and to the first floor of the barracks. As he went to leave, he was startled by a voice speaking from way down the hallway by one of the barrack rooms.

Crane? Po thought in surprise. He was going to leave, but then heard Tigress' voice and decided to hang back and hear the conversation. He didn't even realize the two had even come into the barracks.

"You just seem tense, is all," Crane was saying. "And uh...well, I know you don't really like to talk things out since that's...not really a you thing...but, um...I thought maybe...you'd like to...spar with me?"

Po blinked in surprise at hearing the suggestion, and was even more surprised to hear Tigress laughing in response.

Gee. I think that's the most reaction anyone's got out of her today, Po thought. He was tempted to get closer to hear the conversation better, but he was afraid he'd squeak the floor, so he just listened to Tigress thank Crane (or at least from what he could hear) for the offer, but she was just fine.

"I'll give you a raincheck on it though," she said. "The second Shifu finishes arguing with Wu and he gets back to our training, you get to go first."

Po couldn't see Crane's reaction, but he assumed it was probably one of noticeable terror. Not surprising. Tigress was a pretty intimidating person. "I'll...be ready?" Crane said faintly.

"You suggested it. Don't back out now."

Po smirked at the idea and quickly left the barracks before he lost control and laughed. Crane was a tough master and everybody knew it, but Tigress was the one person who made him visibly nervous. Granted, this was partially because Tigress was known for dishing out sprained or broken limbs during sparring, but this was also not entirely her fault either given her natural strength and tough stoic exterior. All Po knew was that the next training session was going to involve some hilarious sparring and he kind of wanted to see it......