A BROKEN CROWN [Anze/Wei]

Of course many wanted the forest to remain as it was. Today wasn't any different. The place was the same. Squirrels were fighting one another for nuts, ant hills declaring war on each other and male deer still squaring off for the right to mate with females. The circle of life produced the miracle of nature. Even the plants were still pumping out the final remains of their pollen and spores.

There would be a disturbance in the forest. This distraction came in the form of a moving shadow who was shifting from tree branch to tree branch. Whatever the thing was it was a blur. Even the hyper-active squirrels dropped their nuts, scratched their heads and tried to keep track of the moving object. Hummingbirds had a tough time keeping up. Deer looked up to investigate. Keeping a steady target sighting of the fast moving tree dweller was tough even for the animals that lived in this forest.

"My anaconda don't."

"My anaconda don't."

"My anaconda don't want none unless you got buns hun! Oh my god! Look at her butt!"

Now of course those words were not something the birds of the forest would sing. That came from a cheap cassette tape player attached to headphones that played loudly. The person playing the song were afraid to put the headphones on because the sound was deafening. Whoever this was they decided to land onto the ground and began moving in all sorts of strange and quite frightening ways that made animals either run away or stare in confusion. It was as if this person was an animal themselves or at least part forest creature. The person had an aura of belonging in this type of setting but at the same time they didn't belong.

"Little in the middle but you got much back! I say I like big butts and I cannot lie! You other brothers can't deny! That when a girl walks in with an itty bitty waist! And a round thing in your face! You get sprung!"

If someone were to ever suggest the monkey king, an ancient being, would be dressed up in street clothing and dancing to Sir Mix-A-Lot's "Baby Got Back" of course there would be some questioning of truthfulness. Sun Wukong was known for his joker ways. However there were limits. Even he wouldn't listen to a song like this. Oh, no, it wasn't because of the lyrics. He found no issue with what Sir Mix-A-Lot was laying down on the track. He came from a time period in what people now know as China. Back in his younger days the country didn't even have a name and such thoughts like his wasn't exactly unusual or at least not in his opinion.

From head to toe he looked like a poser. Sun was sporting a pair of flat shoes that he thought would impress the young people. The hoodie he had on said, "Compton" in big bold letters on the front even though he had no idea where that place was. Even his pants were jeans that had a few rips in tears in them that he intentionally inflicted because he thought ripped and horrible looking jeans was the style these days. Sun was trying hard to fit in but that wasn't the reason why he dressed like this and tried to listen to pop culture iconic music. He needed to understand his son Wei a little better. So, instead of being rational and talking to his son he decided to do everything Wei likely didn't do in hopes of trying to connect to a youngster he barely knew.

Sun turned the cassette player off and put it into his hoodie's pocket. A sigh came from him. Rarely was the monkey king ever really sad. Unlike some other immortals he realized just how lucky he was to be him. At the same time Wei appeared to hate him. He could take many things. His own song hating him was one of those situations that was unbearable. If only everyone involved knew of his sacrifice. If only everyone knew that he didn't abandon his kid. There was a little shock in Sun. After all he knew all someone had to do was open up a history book and see that he didn't give up on anything regardless of how much he wasn't crazy about responsibility.

He removed the hood from his head. Just his facial appearance made some animals move along. They weren't leaving from fear. Most were just like, "meh" and wen on about their business. Sun wasn't even impressive looking anymore even to an animal without his armor, that staff and that fearsome power. But the more he looked around the world the more irrelevant he was becoming. At one point he would of had to train for years to learn how to match the power to bust through steel. Modern day firearms accomplished that task even without being an immortal. He would have taken a long time to travel from one country to another. The automobiles of today and match his speed and even surpass what he can do in travel. It wasn't the Jade Emperor that made deities and immortals irrelevant. Technology was making everyone like Sun appear to be obsolete.

The very thought that Wei didn't understand him or that humans believed themselves to be superior to him brought out some anger. With a flash of yellow light his street clothes went flying off of him to reveal the monkey king in all of his glory. Well, at least former glory. Even then most of the animals didn't even notice him. Back in his old days just the sight of him in public would scare animals and humans alike. He caused wide spread destruction whenever he wanted. He was like a gun. Much in the same way animals of today appear to know that guns are dangerous if that particular species of animals are hunted by gun-wielding people often is the same way back in the old times Sun was feared. Now the creatures of the forest thought of him as just some armor wearing fool. Even a woodpecker who had stopped pecking into a side of a tree to pay Sun some attention went back to pecking.

His eyes narrowed. Either he was becoming unimpressive or these animals saw unusual people on the regular. He knew about the weird beings on this island. Still for those people to be so weird to have animals that acted like this, like he was nothing out of the ordinary, was truly remarkable. But if these creatures believed that just looking different was all Sun could do he would show them. There was still anger. Sure, he pulled pranks. He loved to joke. Rarely did he take many things seriously. However the monkey king was known to have a bit of a temper if his power was being challenged or he was considered to be irrelevant. Its not tough to see that Sun was an attention seeker. Why else would he go through the trouble of pulling so many pranks and joking? He loved attention. These animals brought out rage in him that wasn't already present.

A foot stomp caused what looked to be a hairpin to drop from the side of the right ear. Before that hair pin touched the ground it grew into a much bigger staff. When the staff made an appearance Sun apprehended the object with two fingers and began twirling it sideways with such a speed that leaves from the trees began to fall. Then he brought the mythical object over his head and twirled it in place. When the twirling stopped, to anyone watching from a distance, it would appear that Sun was fighting people that weren't there. However this was just his way of practicing and venting anger. As much as Wei was upset with him he was also mad at his son. He caught wind of some of the feelings his boy had about him. That pissed Sun off to no end. As he spun in place, took staff strikes at imaginary targets and began performing all sorts of acrobatic feats such as backflips and aerial side twirls pieces of his hair were falling out. Those pieces of hair began forming themselves into life size copies of the monkey king.

"Why weren't you around?" asked one of the copies. Sun turned towards the one speaking. His feet would move his body forward. He took a few steps on the copies' chest as if pectoral muscles were walls and delivered a forearm bash to the skull. There was a gnashing of teeth. His hands went to fists. The staff was floating to his side because he could make it levitate. Other copies were taunting him. This was Sun's own doing but sometimes whenever he created copies of himself he couldn't control them. Therefore those doppelganger hair pieces would say things that was on his mind without him necessarily wanting to hear his own opinion personified.

"You're a terrible father!"

"You left your only son with a mortal knowing full well she couldn't protect him like you could!"

"I would hate for you to be my father."

"The Jade Emperor was right. You are a failure. Even with all your power you failed your own son. I don't know if I should laugh or cry. You're pathetic."

If Wei only knew about this. Each time he tried to create another version of himself Sun had to hear this from his own copies. He was being tortured in sleep, while being awake and even while fighting or practicing to fight. There was no escape from what he did. Each and every battle he had throughout history now was being boxed into the mental category of regret. If he didn't make so many enemies he could have been there for his kid. If he wasn't the monkey king he could have helped Wei become a man. But he had no choice but to do what he did. Those copies were smashed one by one with that staff and with his fury. He couldn't stand this anymore. He dropped to one knee. Normally he wouldn't be gassed so quickly. But since his immortality had some issues these days he wasn't the beast he used to be.

The more Sun acted out his frustration the more distracted he became. Even the animals that he would have normally noticed throughout the forest with his class of senses were invisible to him. He was in his own little world right now of self-pity and sadness. If anyone were to do a psychological profile of the guy they would find that he was a perfectionist. The very idea of failure was something that bothered him. What was more disturbing to Sun was that he didn't just fail himself but he was defeated by circumstances in life that caused him to fail his beloved son as well.

Times like these caused him to regret ever fighting as many beings as he did in the past. Honestly he didn't think most could take him in a physical contest. However he understood the common modern expression of why superheroes wore masks. That mask wasn't to protect the hero but served as protection for those that the hero valued and treasured. If only he didn't allow his name to become so famous Wei Sun might have had a chance of leading a relatively normal life with a father. But of course normal was relative. One could hardly call the life that would be led with a joker like this as typical.

If anyone were around watching him he wouldn't have noticed. He was trying to recover from only making a few clones. In the past he could have made hundreds of himself without any concern but in his current state even mustering just ten hair copies was a tough task. Sun was still on one knee gasping for air. He was spent. Now there were times where he had glimpses of his old power. But more times than not he wasn't himself and only restricted to a shell of his abilities. That too was a result of a sacrifice he made for his kid.

One of the only reasons why the copies sucked so much of his energy was that he was trying to control them. He could have made the copies without much cost to stamina. However controlling so many at once was difficult. Sun developed a headache. There were signs of dry mouth. He felt like he had ran a million mile marathon with no breaks in-between. This was the cost of trying to share his power. There was but a few times one could draw from a cup of water before that cup dried up. He was running on drops at this point.

For the first time in his life Sun was exhausted. He dropped to the ground landing face-first. Tasting the dirt, having a mouthful of grass and having ants crawl through his hair in an instant served as a humbling moment. Even the mighty could fall. It appeared he was out for a moment. Sun knew he couldn't go out like this. The training he was doing was meant to be of the maintaining variety. That was the problem with him. He'd never get any stronger than he already was. He weakened himself by stunting his own potential. That was a fate he didn't want his son to have to face which was why Wei, in reality, had more potential than he did. Sun had to steal fruit, magical items and be granted unreasonable amount of luck to get to where he was. Wei had all of that just by being his child. He gave Wei a much better starting point than what he ever had.

He turned his face so that he was laying on the side of his cheek upon the ground. A laugh came out of him. He found the situation to be hilarious. If only the Jade Emperor had seen him like this maybe there could be comedy to serve on both sides. All of that effort by the empire to destroy the monkey king and none of those efforts were good enough. But Sun pretty much doomed himself by doing the one thing nobody thought he could do; show love. Such irony continued his laughter. He never understood the person who would die for their significant other or the parent who would throw down their life for a child. Now he understood. A legend like himself had served their time. In order for another to step into the role he filled he had to be gone. There couldn't be two alpha lions in a single pride. As he laughed more of his essence was being sucked away and whether Wei knew it or not that physical energy was being stored in the staff provided for him.

"Not like this," he said.

Sure, he was weak. But Sun was not going to let his legend and name be marked down as weakness. As much as his body was in severe pain and as weak as he felt he had a final duty to serve to his son and his name. By fighting through his agony he would, in theory, continue to garner respect. If he went down like this nobody would respect the monkey king. There was no need to try to pass on a crown to Wei that was tarnished with dishonor and shame. The same being that fought countless immortals and somehow won shouldn't be found dead in the middle of a forest like some deceased animal. It was with the pride that was only surpassed by the love he had for his son that caused him to perform a push up to get back up to his feet.

His lands were shaky. He looked at his palms to notice they were sweaty. Another laugh came from him. Siphoning energy was no joke despite his laughter. Sun reached into his armor's opening towards the chest area and retrieved a small piece of fruit. This was the same fruit located in the heavens of Chinese myth and legend. There was but a small portion of it left that was the size of beetle. He downed the fruit. It tasted horrible. That fruit was immortal itself until eaten but he had that in his possession for centuries. This would provide him enough energy to complete his mission and at least see Wei Sun grow up to become a man. Of course even with that fruit being eaten there was no guarantee he'd survive become Wei's adulthood. If he had one last prayer it would be that he could mend the situation between himself and his son well enough to where he could at least be buried with some dignity. And if he has his way it will be the son burying the father. Not the other way around.

A hand reached out towards the staff on the ground that was sinking into the softened dirt due to how heavy it was. The object flew towards Sun who caught it and twirled it around before making it shrink. What was once a staff now looked like a baton. He had to conserve some amount of energy unless he absolutely had to use his abilities. Otherwise the siphoning wouldn't work as well. When he stopped the pity party and came to his senses he noticed something different about this place. If it was one thing a monkey knew it was when another one of its kind was around.

Sun turned around in place in a full circle sniffing at the air. That scent smelled familiar. Of course it would take him a minute to decide whose scent that was. Smelling so many over the course of human history and even the history before people meant he couldn't process but so many smells. His eyes widened. He knew this had to be somebody he met recently once he thought about it. Not to mention that he categorized scents based off of the type of being he ran into. This scent was under the close contacts category. This could mean one of two things. Either the demons from his old days had shown up here or...

"Sunny?" Sun looked around in the trees in place. His vision wasn't as good as it used to be but still far more acute than that of any human. Sunny was what he called his son. Since they both shared the same name there had to be something that distinguished one from another. When he was brushing on modern catchphrases and culture he came across the name Sunny which was short for Sun. There was another reason why he used that name. The monkey king was known for being methodical. He used that name because he wanted to appear as authentic as possible. Plus maybe hearing such a title would make Wei have some sympathy. Sun was also hoping Wei didn't view him in his time of weakness.