//------------------------------// // Of the Great Mint // Story: Three More Things! // by Tatsurou //------------------------------// As Sun Wukong continued to eat his popcorn, he listened to his new friends' attempts to convince him that he should make peace with the Monkey King rather than lock him up again. The first part of the story came from Kitten, discussing Tiger. "When Jackie was younger, his life was...not ideal," Kitten explained, his evasiveness plainly an attempt to avoid discussing things he felt the youngsters present weren't ready to hear. "Gee, who would have thought being the only Asian in an American classroom shortly after World War 2 would be rough?" Tiger offered waspishly. "It wasn't that close!" Jackie countered. "It was the next generation!" "You mean the generation of kids who grew up with their parents' hate but not understanding the reason for it, and so focused it through childish bitterness rather than mature distaste?" Jade pointed out flatly. Tiger chuckled as Kitten winced. "These kids aren't dumb," he pointed out in amusement. Sighing, Kitten continued. "Anyway, Jackie was left with a lot of anger...and our training in martial arts with Uncle taught him discipline. But..." "That just led to him taking everything he felt risked him becoming a bad guy, and locking it up deep inside him until it became me," Tiger finished bitterly. "Not enough to create a complete split personality until the Tiger Talisman got involved, but enough to leave him with problems in managing his anger." "Oh?" Sun Wukong asked curiously. "How so? It sounds like he - or you - had things under control." "Suppressed anger is under pressure inside the heart," the Domestic Viper observed calmly. "And prrresssurrre...makes things strongerrrr," the feline Viper added. "The longerrrr it is contained, the harrrderrr that becomes...until eitherrrr it explodes, or a vent is forrrrced..." "And Jackie refused to let himself vent," Kitten explained regretfully. "He feared letting his anger out once would make it easier to do again...and again...until he didn't bother putting it away again." "The few real explosions that happened probably didn't help..." Tiger allowed apologetically. "Probably should have handled it better with that gang in-" "No, that was totally called for," Kitten insisted. "What we saw? They needed to pay." Tiger raised an eyebrow. "If you agree that they deserved it, why did Jackie collapse emotionally from it?" "Oh, I can answer that," Sun Wukong spoke up. "It's easy to accept that something is deserved or necessary. Dealing with having done it yourself, however, is a completely different story, and much harder." He stroked his beard thoughtfully. "And I suppose I see what you mean about locking things away. The internal issues that created the Monkey King inside me...it would indeed have been better to deal with them rather than locking it away. And dealing with it now should happen. But...I don't see why that includes making peace with him, rather than breaking him down and reassimilating him into myself." "Won't that just recreate the problem?" Sweetie asked curiously. "I mean, this all happened because you didn't like that side of yourself. If you still don't like that side of yourself, what's to stop you from doing it again sometime down the line, convinced it 'won't happen that way this time'?" "Setting aside the whole question of...well, how do I say this?" Jade scratched her head as she tried to think how to express what she was saying. "I don't think you trust...in...my...self-righteous suicide..." Audrey crooned gently. "...yeah, that," Jade pointed out. "Monkey King may be a part of you, but as of now he's his own distinct entity with his own personality. Incomplete like you, but...alive. Is it right to just kill him?" Sun raised an eyebrow. "Do you truly think it's possible for one as dedicated to the Light as I to coexist with something that dark and evil?" He blinked as Emeraude waved at him from Jade's shoulder. "In the same body..." He frowned as Queen flaunted herself from Jade's other shoulder, only for Emeraude to start yelling at her to 'act Jade's age'. "...I see. Well, I suppose it is possible. But why would I want to do it? And why would he want to? It seems to me it might be better to make the separation permanent." Kitten and Tiger exchanged a look. "Well, at least he doesn't want to lock him away anymore," Tiger allowed ruefully. "A step in the right direction," Kitten agreed. "Now we just need to convince him that the parts the Monkey King represents are essential to being his true self." "Somehow I doubt that'll be easy," the Domestic Viper observed. "We'd probably have better luck convincing the Monkey King of that than the other way around." "Then why don't we?" the feline Viper purred. "Then we can let these two talk it out. It's betterrr forrr them if they worrrrk it out themselves, anyway, rrrright Jackie?" She sauntered between the two Jackies, brushing up against both in a playful manner that drew their attention to the fact she was clad only in her fur. "An excellent idea," Sun Wukong concluded. "If you can get my other half to be willing to talk things out, I will be more than happy to come to a compromise with him regarding how we become whole. After all, one of my issues is how unreasonably wicked he is, going way too far with his pranks, especially on those who can't handle it." "Well, this went better than I anticipated," Hsi observed calmly. "One half is already ready to reconsider. Now we just need to find the Monkey King and talk him around-" A sudden wrench seemed to hit the entire world, followed by an aetheral howling that seemed to dig at the mind without bothering to go through the ears. Colors outside the visible spectrum flashed into vision, and touches of octarine light bounced off enchanted surfaces as the magics flinched from the auric impact. "...before his attempts at pranking tear the world asunder," Hsi murmured worriedly as he spread his wings. "How odd," Sun Wukong mused thoughtfully. "He doesn't normally go this overboard. He normally has more self control in how much of his power he uses at once...oh, that's me, isn't it?"