Okay, I think I'm enjoying this piece too much. I thought that my updates would be very spread out and infrequent. It might still slow down at some point, but so far I'm going quickly. There should be some interesting things coming up soon.
About twenty to twenty-five soldierscalled the camp "home" by his estimation. Each one looked battle-hardened and dangerous, unlike those Captain Li Shang found himself in charge of training back when "Ping" joined the army. Not a slacker or weakling in sight. In fact, as Mushu crept between tents and mock fights, he could help but think Shang would have killed to be able to lead these warriors against the Huns. If it wasn't for the fact that they thought that killing Mulan was perfectly fine, that is.
In his scouting, the crimson dragon made a very exciting discovery. One tent held a stockpile of everything needed for battle. Including rockets. Each one out-weighed him, but they could roll easily. So Mushu found him spending his morning moving explosives by timing his trips so that no one was watching. This monotonous work kept him busy all morning. But it didn't keep him from thinking or remembering.
Freezing cold snow beneath his feet crunched with each step. It was over. The masquerade as "Ping," his claim of being sent by the ancestors, and Cri-Kee's reputation of being lucky were nothing more than memories. Mulan no longer hid her true gender. No, that pompous Chi Fu dragged her (after defeating the Hun army, saving Shang, and going over a cliff edge) out into the chilly wind while she was hurt and wrapped in a blanket. Just to humiliate the girl and to call for her death. Thankfully, Shang had more sense and honor than that and didn't behead his savior (though the small dragon thought his heart stopped as the sword hovered over her head). But she was left here in the mountains. Still, all their little team's secrets were out in the open now.
His charge seemed resigned to the disgrace she'd brought with her actions. Mulan felt that she'd only confirm her worthlessness. Even the red guardian's jokes and own confession did little to undo her sadness. Mushu did remind her that she had good intentions, unlike him. That had to count for something. Even though neither of them could look forward to their return home, waiting wouldn't make it better.
"Yeah, this ain't going to be pretty," he admitted. "But don't worry, okay? Things will work out." Well, maybe… Doubtless he'd have some real problems and her life would be rough. But what else is new? "We started this thing together and that's how we'll finish it." The dragon truly meant it. They were a team. She might be Zhou's daughter, but she was a certain scaly creature's charge. Mushu intended to stand by her. After everything she'd been through and been abandoned by her new friends, she needed a friend that wouldn't. He wrapped his arms as far as they would go and hugged her. "I promise."
Now, he was far away from her. Likely, she was now waiting in the family shrine and wondering why he didn't protect her. And the ancestors would be filling her ears with all of his failures. He wasn't there because Mushu wanted to do this much for her. But he'd broken his promise. They didn't finish together.
The dragon paused with his current rocket so a soldier could go by. The man, his mustache a thin thing that drooped beneath his nose, marched by his position, spotting neither the guardian nor his burden. He simply moved confidently across the camp.
"Thank the ancestors for obliviousness," Mushu muttered. "No one actually notices anything when it's right under their nose."
By now, he'd hidden half a dozen rockets in the forest. As he rolled the seventh into place, his stomach reminded him that food would be a good idea. He glanced back towards the camp.
"Now if I was lunch, where would I be?" grumbled the dragon.
"The lucky cricket can write," remarked Shang, his expression carefully neutral as he watched the bouncing insect. "Why am I not surprised?"
"Cri-Kee is a rather talented cricket," Mulan answered tiredly. Against her husband's advice, she was sitting up and pulled on one of "Ping's" old training uniforms. They were looser and easier to manage than a dress. "Remind me to tell you about what happened at the matchmaker's sometime."
Before he could respond, the general was distracted by an urgent chirping. Cri-Kee was wiping his feet clean of ink as he glanced over his message. Shang picked it up and brought it over to his wife. Their eyes scanned it quickly.
"'I am so relieved you are okay, Mulan. That doctor seemed far uncertain that you would be. But now I'm worried about Mushu,'" read Shang. "'He has taken this entire event hard, blaming himself for not protecting you.'"
"That's crazy," interrupted Mulan. "It's none of your guy's fault that I was hurt. No one could have foreseen this."
Her husband tried to keep this in mind; but just like the guardian, he felt that he'd let her down. The role of the man in the relationship is to be the protector. Of course, Mulan wasn't a delicate blossom to be sheltered from the world. She fought beside him instead. Still, when he saw her fall with an arrow in her back, he couldn't help feeling he should have done something to prevent it.
"'He left with Kahn last night after muttering about being a failure, duty, and vengeance'," he continued to read. "'I am afraid he may do something rash. He is not back yet and that is not a good sign.'" Shang glanced at his wife when he finished. "You know him better than I do. What is the likeliness he's gotten tangled up in something dangerous?"
"Very high," she sighed. "He doesn't think before he acts and trouble follows him. And it sounds like he is lookingfor someone dangerous this time." She shot a quick look at the cricket who chirped in confirmation. "Which is why Cri-Kee is worried. We better find him."
"You're not going anywhere," her husband ordered, gently trying to guide her back to a lying position. "You worried us to death, Mulan. You shouldn't be up yet. Besides, we don't know where to even start looking yet."
A timid knock interrupted them. After a moment, Princess Mei poked her head in.
"I heard voices and… Mulan, you're awake!" the girl exclaimed, running in. "We thought you were…"
"Mulan!" shouted Su, following her sister.
In a few moments, every female in the household seemed to have filtered into the room. The warrior's mother embraced her daughter in a hug, tears relief evident in the older woman's eyes. Mulan flinched slightly, her wound apparently hurting, but returned the gesture. Grandmother Fa winked at Cri-Kee.
"I knew he was a lucky one," she muttered softly.
"Someone came by earlier," remarked Ting-Ting, sitting beside Mulan on the bed. "Your father and the others are talking with him. He said he knows who attacked you."
Before Shang could ask for details, Ling dashed by the doorway in a flash. A second later, he backed up and looked inside. The soldier stared for a moment at the scene before shouting excitedly towards the direction he'd come from and the rest of the people within the building.
"Mulan's awake!"
He ran inside and started babbling nearly incoherently. Shang could only make out a few words, but mostly it seemed to be more of the same thing. The thin man was expressing gratitude of the girl's survival. He also mentioned that they'd hunt down someone called Du Heng and that Kahn just ran into the stables ("No one even knew he was missing"). Cri-Kee's antennas perked at the horse's name. As the last of the people entered the small room, the insect hopped out the window.
"You think I am right, don't you?" sighed Heng, staring off into the distance. "I know she was a threat that had to be removed. But the attack on the 'war hero' and raising an army could be considered betrayal of the highest level."
The silken voice of Wei purred, "In this case, the ends excuse the means. Though the emperor has served for many years as a wise and benevolent ruler whose word should never be doubted, his recent behavior demonstrates he is in need of guidance from the younger generation. He needs a son-in-law to take over and rule in his stead. While he may not approve at first, your level-headed leadership and loyalty to tradition shall win him over after you wed Princess Ting-Ting. He shall see you make a far more worthy future ruler than that soldier who courts her now. When you take the throne, your family will receive the greatest honor possible. Surely, that honor shall exceed the smaller crimes committed for the greatest good."
"If it brings back the old ways and secures a solid ruler," he nodded in agreement, "then nothing is too great a cost. Without the unnatural girl, my support will only grow. They will realize that everything I do, I do for the people. And when I rule with you at my side, Wei, I will bring prosperity to the Middle Kingdom."
"And I shall stand by you," replied Wei. "Through whatever the challenges you face, I shall guide you. It is my duty."
The man glanced at his companion. Even if Heng offered little appearance wise, he possessed charisma, ambition, and impressive military ability. Wei suggested he used those traits to expand. Originally, the homely soldier intended simply to kill Fa Mulan. But one short conversation with Wei showed him that it would be foolish and would disgrace the man's family and ancestors. Since Heng refused to be swayed from his mission, Wei suggested using the opportunity to gain more than just a simple loss of a girl. With his cunning and Heng's ambition, the start of an army was under way.
"I know it is," the man answered. "I know it is your duty to help me on my mission, but I thank you anyway. I am honored to have your presence."
"I still say we should hunt this rat down," Yao growled softly. "If he figures out she's alive, who's to say this Heng guy won't try again? We have a name now. Why aren't we going after him for what he's done to Mulan?"
Chien Po, trying to calm the short-tempered soldier, reminded, "But we don't know how to find him yet. And even if we did, should we be the ones to avenge her? She is not like other girls."
"She could probably take him on herself," added Ling. "Which is probably why the coward attacked her like that. But she's one of us. And she can't face him right now. So, it's not like we're defending her because she's a girl and needs protection because of that fact. We're her friends standing up for someone who needs us. She's saved our necks before. Remember the Huns in the mountains? I say we return the favor."
"Right!" shouted the stocky soldier. "We'll find this guy. He attacked Mulan. And if you mess with one of us, you mess with all of us."
The group, after assuring themselves of their friend's condition, had been shooed from the room. Her family remained with her. Su decided that she should prepare a meal in order to properly thank the Fa family for their hospitality and as a relief of all the tension that had engulfed the household since the attempted assassination. It turns out that Chien Po's princess not only loved to cook, but found it a great stress relief. She'd invited her sisters to help with the cooking. So the trio of soldiers was debating on what to do while Shang had gone out to the stable.
"I suppose if you put it that way," the largest man nodded slowly. "But we still don't know how to find him and we can't search all of China for him."
"Yeah, we'd have better luck finding Chi Fu's spine," grumbled Ling. "I don't know where to even start."
"If you men are willing to go on an unofficial mission," Shang interrupted, re-entering the house with a scroll and pad of ink in his hands, "I think I know how to find him."
"You know where he is?" asked Yao. "How?"
The general looked uncomfortable, "Let's just say I got it from someone who heard it straight from the horse's mouth. But the point is, I now have the location of Du Heng's camp, along with a few details of the layout. Give me an hour or two and I'll have a plan of attack."
"Perfect," the stocky soldier grinned evilly, pounding his fist into his hand. "It'll give me time to devise a painful method to deal with him."
"And Su to finish cooking," mumbled Chien Po.
"With any luck," Shang continued, "we'll storm the camp near sunset. While they out-number us, I feel that the four of us should be sufficient."
"Of course we are," the thinnest member of the trio remarked. "We make a great team and can take on anyone who stands in our way. General Shang, we'll follow where ever you lead us. They won't know what hit them."
Grandmother Fa watch as her daughter-in-law stroked Mulan's hair. The young warrior, still weakened by blood loss, had drifted back to sleep. But the sense of dread was gone this time. The fear that their unorthodox girl would never awaken again evaporated with her earlier awakening. The woman's grand-daugher would live. No, that concern was gone. What concerned the older woman was Mulan's face before she fell back asleep. The female soldier seemed worried about someone, but wouldn't say anything. Still, the eldest living Fa knew that something about her grand-daughter and recent events hinted at something unusual surrounded the child.
Grandmother Fa was not blind, deaf, nor dumb. Even with her occasional scoffs at the ancestors, she knew that those dead could still influence the world in their own way. They watched over their descendants as a parent would a child. She also remembered the ancient stories her own grandparents had passed on about impossible events being conquered by ordinary family members. Her own grandfather (Mulan's great-great-grandfather) claimed that in times of greatest hardship or danger, a powerful guardian would be sent to guard and guide them. The ancestors would only send such a creature if the situation was truly dire and the entire Fa family was at risk of dishonor or a terrible loss. They didn't send out guardians every time a member of the family joined the army after all. But Great-Great-Grandfather did claim he saw a strange monkey once following his grandfather. Of course, Great-Great-Grandmother also claimed her husband was crazy and senile. So, Grandmother Fa buried the tale in her mind and put most of her attention of other ways to influence the world without the use of "guardians." A lucky cricket, jade beads, apples, and a pendant were what she sent with Mulan to succeed with the matchmaker. And the old woman enjoyed her fortune telling skills when she used it for gambling (even if her son still won the bets most the time). She chose to influence the world in a variety of ways without trying to bother the ancestors for anything but real emergencies.
But the spirits were there and did bother her. When Mulan left to join the army, a dream awakened Grandmother Fa and sent her to check the young woman's room. She was also the first one to notice that the statue in the garden had crumbled and the dragon incense burner was absent from the shrine. Both had been in place for as long as memory served. The old woman knew that these things were not only important, but that they were connected directly to the ancestors. If she considered the strange events, her hurried prayer for Mulan to be watched over, the nearly forgotten stories of her childhood, and Mulan's nearly hopeless situation becoming a victory, then Grandmother Fa came to one, highly superstitious conclusion: her grand-daughter possessed a guardian of some kind. Why she came to this conclusion, she couldn't explain. She credited this to her "elder instincts."
She'd felt like someone was watching at different points. She'd heard her grand-daughter speaking to someone when she was supposedly alone. If she paid attention, shrubbery would move at unexpected moments or a flash of red would be caught in the corner of her eye. Someone was watching out for Mulan. But now, Grandmother Fa noticed that barely perceptible presence seemed missing. And her grand-daughter was worried about the absence.
"Let her rest," suggested the elder. "She'll sleep more easily without us hovering over her."
Leading the parents out of the room, the ancient matriarch found a combination of a fancy dinner and a war council underway. The three girls (so sweet and normally cheerful) were setting out food. The largest of the soldier, Chien Po, smiled as the girl in the orange dress handed him a plate. The other two, Ling and Yao, alternated between eating and arguing about which one would get to "take care of him." Shang was pouring over a map of the surrounding terrain. He kept glancing at a scroll and then looking back at the map. Finally, he tapped a location on the map and nodding to himself.
"How is she?" asked Mei.
"Resting," Fa Li answered. "What's going on in here?"
Ling announced, "Shang knows how to find that Du Heng creep now. So we'll be going to invade their camp after we eat. Su and her sisters cooked."
As Zhou began to ask how they found him, Grandmother Fa decided to be an old, nosy woman and figure it out by snooping. Edging around, she began to read the scroll silently to herself.
'Shang, Kahn knows where Mushu is. He is at the camp of the man who attacked Mulan. There is a strong possibility that Mushu will try something dangerous against him. Kahn has given me directions to the location.'
From there, it seemed to be no more than the promised instructions to find the camp. Kahn was a horse outside in the stable. But the animal had been missing this morning. And if the writer truly gained the information from the stallion, that raised the question of who wrote it. She also wondered who "Mushu" could be.
As soon as Shang turned his attention away from his scroll, she subtly lifted it from the table. Doubtless, the message meant more beyond just a location. At least, it did to the right readers. And since Shang seemed to already know where to go (he'd already rolled up the map), then she intended to give it to someone who needed it.
Grandmother Fa returned to her grand-daughter's room and left the scroll beside the sleeping figure. Mulan likely knew who wrote this and who "Mushu" might be. And if her suspicious were correct, one of them was her missing guardian. Hopefully, the message would comfort the girl with at least some news. Or maybe she was just being a senile, interfering old woman. But it is far more fun that way rather than being a sweet, quiet, oblivious elder member of the family.
Come on, we all know that Grandmother is a fun character. She had a few of the best lines in them movie ("How lucky can they be? They're dead," "Sign me up for the next war," and "Would you like to stay forever?"). And I think she is smarter than most other people. I hope you liked it and review.