Panda Panic (7 page)

“But what about you?” asked Little Bear. “Where will you sleep, Ping? Do you want to come and stay at my house? We could have a sleepover and—”

“I'm afraid I don't have time for sleepovers,” said Ping, in his this-is-the-end-of-the-conversation voice. “I have to be at the palace before nightfall.”

“Oh,” said Little Bear disappointedly. “OK, then. Bye bye, Ping. Have a nice life.” And with a sad wave of his little black paw he trundled off into the dark forest, leaving Ping all on his own.

As soon as Little Bear was out of sight, Ping breathed a sigh of relief. Never again, no matter how long he lived, would he ever tell another lie. It was exhausting trying to keep track of what he'd said. He sat down on a rock and rubbed the bottom of his paws. He was tired and hungry. Not only that, but looking around at the forest and not recognizing a single feature, he realized just how far he was from home. The thought made him shudder. He'd never spent a night away from his mother before. He should have taken up Little Bear's offer of a bed. But it was too late now. As the shadows lengthened and the air turned cold, Ping sat on the ground and curled up with his back against the rock. He didn't like being alone. Not only that, but those spooky noises had started up again.

The wind whistled.

The leaves rustled.

The twigs snapped.

Ping gasped, sat up, and opened his eyes wide. Something was out there! It was coming closer! And this time it wasn't Little Bear, because Little Bear had gone home!

CHAPTER SIX

P
ing decided that there was only one way to conquer his fear. He would walk on. He felt braver when he was moving, and by singing a song about what a fun adventure he was having, he managed to raise his spirits.

My name is Ping,

Adventuring.

A panda bear,

Without a care!

Oh, this is fun.

There goes the sun.

It's getting dark,

Oh, what a lark!

I am so glad,

I don't feel bad,

That I'm alone,

And miles from home.

He then added some loud whistling to scare away any beasts that might be stalking him. But despite the whistling and the singing, he was still feeling nervous. As his eyes flitted from side to side to check that there wasn't something waiting to pounce on him from behind the bushes, Ping realized that fear was not something he had ever experienced before. Giant pandas did not exactly live life on the edge. There was nothing to fear about sleeping, eating, and going poo forty-seven times a day. Unless you accidentally picked up a snake instead of a stick of bamboo and tried to chew its head off. That would be scary. Or sleeping on a volcano. That would be, too. But, generally, pandas lived a safe life without any nasty surprises. And right now Ping wanted a safe life more than anything else in the world. Seeing his sister again, saying sorry to his mother—anything would be preferable to standing in the middle of this gloomy forest with tree shadows stretching out toward him like ghostly fingers.

My name is Ping,

A fighting king,

A dangerous bear,

So don't you dare!

The sun was starting to set when Ping reached a fork in the track. To the left was a path that continued alongside the river, while to the right was a path that disappeared into the forest. Which one should he take? He couldn't get lost if he followed the river, but lurking in the rock pools along its banks would be thousands of mosquitoes waiting to bite him. The forest, on the other hand, would be mosquito-free, but would also be darker and full of the bad sounds that Ping did not want to hear. Like that sound he was hearing now. He spun around. Behind him there was an unmistakable sound of dry leaves crunching. Ping strained every bone in his ears. There it was again. He could hear footsteps—
actual
footsteps gathering pace and running toward him!

Help!
he screamed inside his head.
Please don't let it be a snow leopard!
And now that he'd had that thought, he couldn't get the picture out of his head—of sharp teeth and red eyes and hot, steamy breath in his face. There it was! There was its shadow! Spreading out from between the trees like an oozing swamp of molasses, rolling out toward him like a long, black tongue! It was huge! Ping knew that he had told his sister that he wasn't scared of snow leopards, but that was not
now
. Not now when his life was in danger. He turned and ran, his heart thumping in his chest like a war drum. He didn't look where he was going. Anywhere would do. The shadow was big and getting bigger. This was no ordinary snow leopard; this was a
giant
snow leopard that would gobble Ping up like a pistachio nut!

“NOOOOOOOOOOOO!” he cried as the cold shadow clipped his heels and tripped him up. “LEAVE ME BE!”

“Why?” said a familiar voice behind him. “I thought I was your friend.”

Ping was lying on the ground with his face in a puddle of slime. He lifted his head, turned around, and was surprised to see Little Bear standing over him.

“You again!” he exclaimed, wiping the green goo off his forehead.

“That's the second time you've been scared of me,” giggled Little Bear. “I'm surprised, with all your combat training.”

“Don't be ridiculous!” scoffed Ping. “I knew it was you. I was just playing. Like when we were playing Bandits and Bodyguards. I was seeing if you could catch me, which you couldn't.”

“Then why were you screaming ‘NOO OOOOOOOOOO!'” asked Little Bear, mimicking Ping's terrified scream.

“You didn't give me a chance to finish my sentence,” said Ping. “I was planning to say ‘NOOOOOOOOOOOO! YOU CAN'T CATCH ME!'”

Little Bear thought about this for a moment.

“Then why did you shout ‘LEAVE ME BE!' instead?” he asked.

“Because,” said Ping slowly, giving himself time to think up yet another excuse. “I was being bothered by a bee and I wanted it to leave me. I'd have thought that was obvious. Anyway, that's quite enough about me,” he added, changing the subject to avoid further questions. “What are you doing back here? I thought I sent you home to bed.”

“But I don't want to go home,” said Little Bear. “I've had a change of heart. I want to come with you! To the palace! To have an adventure! I never do anything fun here. And I've never had a friend before.”

“No! No! No! No! No!” Ping said sternly. “I'm happy to be your friend, Little Bear, but you must go home.”

Ping suddenly noticed that Little Bear had covered his eyes and appeared to be crying. At least, his shoulders were shaking and his voice was trembling with emotion.

“I can't go home,” he whispered. “I lied about the bandits taking my daddy and selling him to the circus.”

Ping looked surprised.

“It's worse than that!” blubbed Little Bear. “They took my mommy too!”

“They took your daddy
and
your mommy?” gasped Ping. The shock of such awful news caused Ping to catch his breath. He felt terrible saying what he'd just said.

“So I don't have a home,” continued Little Bear, sobbing for all he was worth. “I'm all on my own.”

Ping felt tears welling up in his own eyes. It was the saddest story he'd ever heard.

“And it's so boring being a bear on your own,” said Little Bear, raising his sorrowful eyes to look straight at Ping. It was a look that melted Ping's heart. As if hearing the terrible tale about Little Bear's parents was not enough, Ping knew all there was to know about life being boring for bears. He felt Little Bear's pain, and there and then made a pledge never to abandon his little friend again. There was still the matter of how he would deal with his lie about being the Emperor's bodyguard, but Ping couldn't think about that now. Having Little Bear back was all that mattered. And it suited Ping. He too was scared and lonely, and he was secretly delighted to have company again.

“Fine,” he said. “Well, you'll have to come with me now as it's too dangerous to send you back. But I don't know what the Emperor will say.”

Little Bear smiled, then grinned, then beamed with joy.

“I knew you'd take me back,” he said. “You say you're tough, but underneath you're just a great big softie!”

The first thing they needed to do was find somewhere safe and warm to spend the night. Now that there were two of them, Ping was no longer scared and he set off along the shaded path that disappeared into the forest. Little Bear scampered behind, chattering excitedly about what he would say to the Emperor when they met, while Ping gave some serious thought to what he was going to do when Little Bear discovered that there was no Emperor and that his new best friend was a liar.

“I can't let it happen,” Ping thought. “I'm going to look like such a fool.”

It was this that inspired him to think up believable ways to
avoid
meeting the Emperor. What were his options? He could fall over, pretend to break his leg, and say he couldn't walk any farther, but he'd have to make the broken leg look convincing and that might involve pain. He could go into the forest for a poo and pretend to fall down a big hole that he couldn't get out of. He wouldn't really fall into a hole because that would be dangerous. He'd have to dig a hole first, then climb a tree and throw his voice so it
sounded
like he was in the hole. The problem was, he couldn't throw his voice. No. Far simpler to say he'd just lost his way, but then Little Bear would never believe that, because he thought Ping was perfect and could do no wrong. Eventually, Ping settled on a plan involving memory loss. When they didn't find a palace in the morning he would pretend to have banged his head in the night and lost his memory, which, amongst other things, had left him not knowing his own name, not knowing the words for frogs, fish, and flowers, and not knowing directions to the Emperor's palace. It wasn't a great plan. In fact it wasn't even good, but it was the only one Ping had and it would have to do.

“Look!” shouted Little Bear all of a sudden. The shrillness of his voice snapped Ping out of his daydream. “The palace!”