CHAPTER 2: Company?

"What gives?!" Mushu exclaimed, smashing into the back of Mulan's heels.

Mulan leaned down to whisper in his ear. "Somebody's here." The pair of them eyed the two white horses tethered to the stand beside the trough, next to Kahn.

"Official," Mushu murmured, scuttling up to her shoulder as she straightened. "Do you think Shang's with them? You think they want you back at war early, you know, as an officer? You think that maybe they're making an order that you aren't allowed to return?" Mushu continued to recite every frightful possibility that had run through Mulan's mind a million times since she had heard the rumors of the war until finally she reached up, impatient, and forced his jaws closed.

"Shutup Mushu, somebody's going to hear you," Mulan ordered. "As if that's ever stopped you before."

"Hey!" Mushu snapped, muffled, fighting his mouth free. None 'a that! I can keep my mouth closed if I want to; it just so happens that I DON'T want to, so there. Anyway, are we gonna go in? Think I should hide?"

"Mushu?" Mulan suddenly spun around, catching the little lizard off-guard.

"Uh," Mushu forced a big cheesy, innocent smile up at her that seemed to read exactly: 'you ain't gonna go for my mouth again are ya?' "Yeeees?"

"Shh!" She held one finger up to her lips, worriedly glancing at her door every few seconds. "They really ARE going to hear you and think I'm crazy…well crazier than they already think I am, and whatever it is and whoever it may be that is STILL embarrassing!"

"Oooh, I get the picture!" Mushu nodded. "I'll be around if you need me."

"Thank you," she smiled down at him. "I appreciate it."

Raising a final cocky eyebrow at her he grinned back, "you should!" With that he disappeared without a trace into the cloth at Mulan's neck.

Grandma Fa came rushing out of the doorway as if she had been waiting for the conversation to end. "Mulan! I knew I heard you out here! They're all waiting for you inside!"

"Who is?" Mulan asked.

"Eh, you're family, soldiers, people, you know, the usual," Grandma grinned up at her amusing granddaughter. "Just get in there!"

Mulan smiled slightly and began to rush towards the door.

"And Mulan?" Grandma called back her attention momentarily back.

"Yes?"

"You still have that lucky cricket?" she winked.

Without responding except for an amused smile and a quick nod Mulan spun around and continued to rush for the door. As a matter of fact, quirky…or whatever Mushu called him, was still around somewhere. Funny where friends were able to pop up when you needed them, though Crikee…'oh THAT'S what his name is!'…had gotten her into just about as much trouble as Mushu had. JUST ABOUT.

"Mulan!" Her father exclaimed the moment her figure could be seen in the doorway. The two men who she hadn't quite recognized yet bowed, one somewhat reluctantly. "We have been waiting."

"I'm sorry," she replied, trying not to be curt. "I didn't know that we were expecting company." She turned a quick smile to the two men, rising from their bows. Flinching the smile erased itself from her face, piece by gradual piece. She knew that one of them had seemed familiar, but what in the world was Chi Fu doing in her home? Was nowhere safe? Somehow, she doubted it. With him was a tall man with a broad chest that supported the emblem of the Emperors personal guards and he seemed QUITE proud of it.

'This,' she thought gloomily, meeting the gaze of the ever curious Mushu, peeking just slightly out of her collar, 'is going to be a long night!'