The next day MK's energy had returned and he was up in the morning, playing video games with Mei for a few hours before stopping once he'd almost destroyed the TV by throwing the remote at it on accident by being overzealous.
They stopped after that but luckily it was breakfast time and Pigsy had made steamed stuffed buns, MK practically inhaled the food in his hunger before turning his attention to Macaque who was still eating.
"Dad! Let's go train! I'm so ready." MK all but yelled out, pumped up and jumping on the spot and Macaque calmly picked up another bun, raising his eyebrow as he side glanced MK.
"Mm, sure. Let me finish eating first." MK nodded, bouncing in place as he watched Macaque eat for all of four seconds before Macaque sighed, put off eating his food with MK vibrating in place and staring at him.
"Okay, how about you go warm up on the deck while I finish and I'll come and find you when I'm done." He suggested and MK nodded excitedly, rushing out of the room at top speeds until he was going through fighting stances he'd been taught outside.
He continued doing that until Macaque eventually strolled out and he stopped, rushing up to the other with a giant smile.
"What are we doing today? Some more dodging? Something new? Oh my gosh, you should totally teach me-" Macaque cut him off with a hand on his shoulder.
"Actually kid, I think we should do something much more important today." MK's eyes grew wide, stars of wonder in them as his smile grew wider.
"Really? Yes! What are we doing?" He clapped his hands together, tail swishing about happily from behind him and Macaque grabbed it with his own tail just above the bandage that was there, stilling it.
"I'm going to teach you to use your tail." He said and MK's face scrunched up, crossing his arms.
"What! But I know how to use my tail! I use it all the time. Is this about what happened yesterday because that was an accident!" He pouted, tugging his tail out of Macaque's grip to prove it.
"You can use it, yes, but you don't have complete control over it the way Wukong and I do. You've never used it to fight or pick something up so the muscles in it are weak and underused." MK thought the words over, slowly uncrossing his arms as he thought.
"Well... I do think it would be cool to be able to pick things up with it." He seemed to get his excitement back at that, having convinced himself that this was also important and cool.
"And I can use it to trip people up just like baba does! That would be really cool! I could even hold things with it when my hands are full! It'll be like having three hands!" MK cheered, clapping his hands together. Macaque watched, amused before sitting down lotus style, an action MK immediately copied so they were facing each other.
"Alright, first things first I want you to copy my movements." He instructed, moving his tail so it was stretched out to the right. MK nodded, tongue sticking out slightly as he focused on the muscles in his tail and moved it sloppily to his right.
Once he had it Macaque moved his tail up and MK copied that, looking behind him at his own tail to focus enough to get it up as straight as Macaques was.
Macaque lowed his tail and then moved it swiftly to the left, extending it so it was flat and MK copied. Then, he raised it and MK copied that too.
They went on doing that, getting faster each time, and each time MK found it easier and easier, taking less effort to do what he wanted it to do.
Once they'd done that for a while and MK was finding it fairly easy they moved on to standing up and balancing plates on the tip of his tail.
He'd broken about five of them when they switched to books so that things didn't get destroyed, laughing about how Pigsy would definitely kill both of them if he saw the broken plates.
He managed to hold a total of two books on his tail for more than five minutes by the end, grinning even as they eventually clattered to the floor. By that point, his tail was aching with overuse and shook when he tried to hold any more weight on it. It was at that point that Macaque called it to a stop.
"Aww, but I was getting so good at it!" MK complained, pouting heavily until Macaque mentioned lunch and he perked up.
"Can we do a bit more after lunch?" He pleaded, giving the demon wide, begging eyes until the other rolled his eyes and gave in.
"Fine, but just for a little bit more." He conceded and MK jumped up, fisting the air in delight as he celebrated.
"Now come on, let's get some food." MK nodded along and followed Macaque eagerly inside, practically skipping.
True to his word they practiced more after lunch, not that MK would have let him bail, and both lost track of time as they practiced balancing, movement, and eventually gripping things (albeit very clumsily and loosely) right until the sunset which was when they decided to stop, heading in for dinner.
"How's training going, MK?" Mei asked, leaning over the table with a grin on her face and MK stuck his tail out, slipping it under his empty glass and shakily lifting it up with much concentration.
"Great!" He cheered out as Mei watched with wide, fascinated, and delighted eyes.
"Wow! That's awesome!" She yelled out and MK winced as the glass tipped off his tail, hands lunging forwards clumsily as he prepared for it to smash on the table only for Pigsy to appear from nowhere and grab it, setting it down with a glare at the two kids.
"No playing around with breakables you hear me?" He scolded and MK ducked his head sheepishly, deciding to definitely, absolutely not mention the plates he'd broken.
"Sorry, Pigsy." He apologized, making sure to look properly chastised so the other knew he wouldn't do it again but as soon as he was gone Mei and he shared a mischievous grin, knowing they were absolutely going to continue horseplaying with fragile things at some point later that day.
Sure enough, as soon as dinner was over MK and Mei found themselves practicing using MK's tail, making a game out of MK picking things up with it and throwing them as well as he could in Mei's general direction as she dove to catch them manically. She also took turns towing tings at him and trying to get him to catch them by looping the objects through his tail. Many things were broken by the end but the achievement they both felt when MK did catch something was well worth it.
By the time it was late in the evening MK had had such a wonderful day that he went to bed with a smile on his face, snuggling up under the covers until a thought hit him that wiped the smile right off his face.
Monkey King hadn't contacted him that day.
(Guys we're at chapter 60! Wow! I can't believe we've come this far. Thank you so much for sticking around and to everyone that's commented. I hope you enjoyed this chapter and I'll see you all next time!)