A whole new world

Chapter 3 : Mystries and escapades

Chapter 3 : Mysteries and escapades.

Tigress was the first one to spot it. The building in front of them was truly coming down but something vaguely white had appeared on the roof. The figure hesitated for a few moments, unsure what to do. "Too long", she thought. Then, when he began to lose his balance he took something from his back and held it in front of him, covered by his cloak and his arms. Feng had seen it too, as had Shifu. The moment he jumped, everything seemed to explode. When they looked again, only a pile of rubble with some small flames remained.

Then something in the bushes in front of it moved. Something crawled it. A young wolf cub, wrapped loosely in a large, stiff, filthy, white cloak.

"XIA!" Feng shouted, running towards his little girl and almost crushing her when he hold her in his arms again. Tears rolled once more, from relief and happiness this time.

"Baba?" came a weak response.

"Yes, yes, Baba is here". Fengs wife had arrived too and barely got to hug them when a healer arrived to check on Xia. Against all odds, she seemed to be fine. She had a couple of bruises on her sides and her breathing would be difficult for some time due to the smoke, but apart from that she appeared to be unharmed.

"This truly is a miracle" the healer, a goat said amazed. "I don't understand how she possibly came out alive, let alone unharmed!"

"Alex saved me. He promised he would help me and get us out, and that I would see mama and baba again. He told me to not go from under his cape. That the cape would protect me from the fire and ashes and splinters." The small voice led everyone surprised.

"Alex? Is that what the stranger is called who saved you? The one who was wearing this white cloak?" Shifu asked quickly.

"I think so. He said I could call him Alex, because his friends call him that too."

"Where is he? I need to thank him! He saved my daughter's life!" Feng said turning towards the rubble with the others.

Tigress had already been busy searching for this stranger. There were many things at work here. Strange things. She hated not knowing, to be in the dark and having to guess when things when not in control. Who was he? What was he? Why was he here? And how did a complete stranger manage not only know that there were two children inside, where they were, and got them out unharmed too? Especially knowing very well that she could not have done that. Maybe the sheep if she had known. But she would never have survived the fire and heat before she got Xia.

She kept turning rubble over when, when she turned over a large wooden floor-part, she froze for a moment. She picked up a white, wet piece of cloth she had seen him put before his mouth. To help against the smoke, she reasoned. She turned around and gave it to her master.

Shifu first looked surprised and stern, like he wanted to demand why she stopped searching, but his expression turned sad, and his ears lowered. He spread the cloth so that Feng and Tigress could see it too. It used to be white, with some sort of abstract drawing or decoration in blue on it. A lot of it was grey or even black from the fire, and it was very damaged. However, there was another color, a dark red, present in something that, unlike the blue was not a pattern. There was a lot of red. Feng lowered his head. There was no question what the red was. If the only thing they could find of him was a bloody piece of cloth...

Tigress didn't just let it with that, she moved back to the rubble site, and searched further, but she couldn't find another trace. It was not she first time she saw someone die in an awful way. But most of the times those were bandits, criminals and the like. To see someone die like this, a complete stranger who without much hesitation gave his life to save children from a burning hell, that was something different. Those people are very rare. She wondered why he did it. Did he know them? No, that clearly wasn't the case.