Disclaimer: All usual disclaimers apply. The characters discussed are historical but the likenesses and context is owned by Tecmo Koei
Enlist You Able Men and Come Follow Me: Part 1
Ever since moving into the Zhou family manor, Sun Ce hadn't been allowed in the town much, but that didn't stop him from eventually finding a way to sneak past the gates and into the streets. He had nearly everything he could've wanted at the manor, but seeing groups of kids his age loiter around the produce vendors, playing all sorts of games, Sun Ce was reminded of his loneliness at the mansion.
He managed to strike up a conversation with one of the children and joined in on their game of kicking a felt purse full of beans amongst themselves, doing their best to not let it touch the ground.
At some point he noticed a lot of older kids and teenagers leaving the house of the schoolmaster. They were students, identifiable by the same white garments the youngest Zhou child wore.
The purse full of beads landed ignored at Sun Ce's feet. He was too engrossed in seeing one particular group of teens round on a much younger boy.
"Come on, pretty boy." One older boy shoved Zhou Yu in the shoulder before he could make it past them. "Look at us when we speak to you!"
Alarmed at what looked like a serious altercation, Sun Ce drifted away from the circle of children to listen in on the conversation. There he saw Zhou Yu's shoulders go rigid, but the boy tilted his head up to meet his senior in the eyes.
"As if being a freak wasn't enough…" the older boy seethed. "Showing us up every session is blatantly disrespectful to your elders."
"Brat," another senior spat and the rest began to round on the Zhou boy.
"Hey!" Sun Ce yelled from across the road, having enough of the exchange. "Let him alone!"
The boys paused for a moment to get a good look at Sun Ce before laughing and taunting, "Look at this chubby runt too! Careful you don't hurt yourself, little pig."
Sun Ce glared. He wanted to let these boys feel the full weight of his fists. Enflamed, he barely noticed Zhou Yu's posture start to shake.
"Look at this, pretty boy's chunky boyfriend has come to save him!"
The older boys continued to laugh and mock, and Zhou Yu's gaze slowly began to darken, the tension winding tighter and tighter, a horrid storm brewing in the child's mind.
"If you're letting a kid as young as him best you in school, you should go home and study," Sun Ce shot back. The teens reeled. The leader among them looked about the strike, but faltered, noticing the attention from the adults in the market aiming their way. The senior sneered at Zhou Yu once again, "Go on and play with your pig, brat."
The students dispersed and instead of acknowledging Sun Ce's attempt to thwart an altercation, Zhou Yu turned on his heel to head home, not giving the other boy any regard. Sun Ce followed him, miffed at the coldness and ingratitude. "What was that about?" he asked.
"Nothing," Zhou Yu spat, not breaking his stride.
"Didn't look like 'nothing'. Does that happen all the time? Why don't you tell them off?"
Zhou Yu stopped and gave Sun Ce an annoyed glance over his shoulder. "You ask too many questions."
Sun Ce pressed on, "Why don't you go to the teacher about them?"
"Because I don't need saving!" Zhou Yu pouted, for once actually looking like the child he was.
Sun Ce eyed the boy, and said calmly, "I know you don't."He stared back off in the direction where the students left, "They were annoying me, is all. I'm surprised you could stand it."
"I can't! But now you've just made it worse!" Zhou Yu stormed off back to his family's home wanting to be free of the stares being directed at them. And wanting to be free of Sun Ce's prying.
Sun Ce felt his own temper swell. This kid was so utterly maddening and frustrating. "How!? Doing nothing just tells them you are okay with it!"
"It gets them bored eventually, fool!" Zhou Yu spat as they both slipped through the gates to the Zhou family courtyard.
"I'm a fool? I would never let guys like that run over me. And why are you so mean to me? I'm only trying to be nice to you. Heaven knows it looks like you need a friend."
Zhou Yu grumbled something unintelligible, fists clenching. "Go away. I didn't ask to be your friend," he uttered with clenched teeth.
Sun Ce huffed and finally turned his back to the kid, stubbornly crossing his arms. "You are as they say: a freak."
Then he heard something like an animal cry erupt from behind him and before Sun Ce knew it he felt his feet leave the ground, as he was lifted and shoved into a nearby trough. He was a fearless boy, but he was taken by such a shock, and he soon found that no matter how hard he tried to raise his head from the water, he couldn't break the surface to breathe. He then became scared. Very, very scared. He began flailing about in panic, only catching glimpses of Zhou Yu's distorted, unhinged face as he tried to claw at him.
As soon as Sun Ce found the pressure holding him down lessen, he immediately crawled out of the trough, coughing and crying, slinking away as fast as he could, not daring to look back to see if the other child was coming after him.
When he entered his mother's quarters, she didn't make a mention of his disheveled state at first, as it was not unusual for him to return him wet or dirty. But when she noticed him shaking, face scrunched in distress, Lady Wu gave him a second glance and Sun Ce started sniffing, eyes red-rimmed and watering. She asked nothing, but brought Sun Ce into her embrace, comforting him as he wept for the next several hours.
Her son didn't outright tell her what happened, but the young boy made several mentions through tears and hiccoughs that he wanted to leave, that he missed his father. Lady Wu took a wild guess that he had an altercation with another boy, most likely the young Zhou child. She soothed him as best she could, made him some warm soup, and sat with him giving him words of comfort until he fell asleep.
When Sun Ce awoke the next morning, his mother confronted him on what upset him the day before. The child pouted and tried to find excuses to change the subject. Lady Wu didn't cease her questioning. It helped that her assumptions were correct: Sun Ce was upset over Zhou Yu. However, Sun Ce appeared very fearful of the idea of letting her confront the other boy on his behalf. Eventually she stood, telling him her intentions to bring the matter up to Master Zhou Yi.
Before he could respond his mother was already on her way out the door.
"Wait, mama-"
Lady Wu gave a small gasp of surprise as she opened the door to their guest house, finding Zhou Yu in front of the threshold on his knees, head downward in supplication.
"What is this, young master Zhou?" Lady Wu recovered quickly from her shock. Sun Ce crawled over and peered over the side of his mother's robes to see the commotion.
"I have wronged your family. A treasured guest," Zhou Yu explained stiffly, never looking up at the woman. "I am to reflect my shame, my lady."
"How long have you been out here on your knees, Zhou Yu?"
His lips barely parted, but he stopped and remained silent. Lady Wu gave an exhaustive sigh, tilting her head to the side as she decided to play by the boy's rules.
"Answer me," she ordered, still a bit breathless from shock.
He responded better to the hardened tone. "Since the moon was at its highest."
Sun Ce had no idea what time that was but he still gathered that Zhou Yu had been in this self reflection position since the middle of the night. That horrified his mother as her eyes flitted to the boy's knees. "My Heavens child, no! You must have blisters or worse. Come inside this instant!"
Young Zhou Yu did not have the urgency Ce or his mother did. He bowed, forehead to the ground, uttering his thanks, before, not without some expression of pain, he got up from his knees.
Lady Wu pulled open a drawer of a small mahogany chest, pulling out a jar of ointment and some hemp gauze. "Ce, please step beside him," Lady Wu instructed her eldest son. Sun Ce, unsure of what his mother wanted of him, did as he asked. "You might want to hold onto him in a moment."
She dabbed the cloth in the ointment container, and hovered over his injured knee, looking up at the boy's face again, "This will hurt a bit. Don't hesitate to cry if it hurts." And then she applied the cloth. Zhou Yu didn't cry, he barely reacted. A big difference from the yelps she hears from Ce and the cries from Quan. But he did flinch. Ce, who was holding onto his shoulder, felt his body jump slightly at the pressure.
Finally, Zhou Yu hissed and leaned forward, succumbing to the stinging sensation. Lady Wu reached up to rub the child's shoulder comfortingly while she still held the cloth to his wound, "Almost done".
Following his mother's instructions, Sun Ce helped her patch up the sores on Zhou Yu's knees. The boy broke his silence, murmuring his thanks, "After…yesterday, you didn't have to help me."
Lady Wu placed her hands on her hips, "If you wish to atone for yesterday, Master Zhou Yu, I request some time to speak to your father. Could you pass on the message?"
Sun Ce and Zhou Yu exchanged silent glances and Zhou Yu nodded slowly, apprehension in his narrow gaze.
The master of the house was as gracious a host as one could be, with his fine offerings of tea and calm welcoming way he regarded Lady Wu. It was the first time Lady Wu had such a private meeting with the man who allowed her family to stay in his home. Normally the children, his brother, or any number of visitors would also be in attendance.
Lady Wu had long figured that Zhou Yi was perpetually stressed and haggard. He was not an old man himself, but there were already signs of gray in his long, glorious hair and lines along his narrow sharp eyes. And he had a distant gaze as if his mind was always worrying about something.
"I'm sorry, my lady. I do not make the best of company of late," he apologized vaguely as Lady Wu took the mantle of preparing the tea. "Please I hope you don't feel the need to confine yourselves to the guest wing."
"I don't," Lady Wu replied airily as she set about serving the tea. "But I do what I can to reign in the extra activity my clan can cause."
She paused to gauge how Zhou Yi felt about the tea. The soft sigh from his lips, and seeing the tightness in his shoulders lessen just a bit, told her he had no misgivings about her tea making.
"And it seems…It seems that despite being peers of the same age, my Sun Ce has caused some distress in your boy. There was an incident–"
"I heard," the hardness in his voice was flinty. "And if he has learned anything from me, he better have been at your son's feet begging for forgiveness."
"Something like that did occur…" she set aside her own tea and folded her hands in her lap. "I think having us around–a whole separate family–might have upended the young man's routine. I hope he does not feel like a guest in his own home."
Zhou Yi finished another sip of his tea, concerned thoughts behind his eyes.
"With or without you, I struggle to keep him adjusted," he murmured almost to himself. "I never heard of someone being too intelligent for their age, but my son would be a good example of such a person. He's hyper sensitive about our world around him and it's no wonder he can struggle with social necessities at times."
"He is a brilliant boy," Lady Wu nodded in agreement. "Where is his mother, may I ask?" The question was long on her mind ever since she set foot in the household, as she noticed she was the only consistent female presence–aside from some maids–in the manor. She had thus far been afraid to ask. The conflicts over the years caused many tragedies and she did not want to reopen old wounds.
Zhou Yi frowned and set his cup down with a harsh clatter. "Away," was his sharp answer.
The way he said it was clear he did not want to give any more details than that, and Lady Wu let it alone. Zhou Yi downed the rest of his cup and then shook his head solemnly.
"I'm inadequate in many areas, madam," he said. "I offer no excuses, only explanations. My time as prefect was…tumultuous to say the least. Whatever the odds were, my leaving that position still feels like a failure, a wound that won't ever go away. Knowing usefulness and humility–a virtue my family learned abundance of–is what kept me alive. My children must know the same."
"Still," he paused. "I am aware that the way we go about raising and forming our sons is not the ideal for most families."
"Too much humility can become a hindrance to those who are truly great," Lady Wu offered softly. The Sun family learned quickly that too much humility can make one complacent or ripe for exploitation. One cannot cultivate one's own greatness if one was so concerned about one-upping people. But arrogance was a sword waiting to strike back at its owner. "I do think genuine hard work is the key to all greatness. Your sons do not lack it, but my eldest son has seemed idle of late. It is hard for him to be productive. Learning from his peers is something I had hoped he would embrace."
Zhou Yi arched an eyebrow as he seemed to understand where Lady Wu was leading this conversation. "Certainly you should have no concerns about Sun Ce's future when it comes to military and martial exploits. His father has more than earned his stripes, so to speak, to be a more efficient guide in that department than I would be to be honest. But it would be an honor to assist in the boy's teachings in other avenues, if that is your desire."
Lady Wu, unsatisfied with the man's response to her concerns about his own son, forced a bit of a smile, and bowed, "I thank you Second Master Zhou."
Zhou Yi waved his hand dismissively, "Please, my lady, if you are staying here for the time being, don't feel the need to stand on ceremony. It's asking for too much aching backs and knees."
Zhou Yu found he liked being Chief of a place like Juchao. It was a small community and he felt he could freely roam about town without much ceremony. So far in his tenure, the citizens were friendly and patient when administrative issues would arise.
Of course, him roaming about such a small town had struck the ladies, as it normally did. To their credit, they weren't as tittering as ladies and courtesans in the large imperial districts. In fact most displayed a healthy amount of wariness towards him when he first arrived, uncertain of who would police their beloved town.
Then rumors began to go about when he decided to move his residence at the corner of the red light district, that the young chief had a more than healthy enough appetite for physical pleasure. His reasonings for moving had nothing to do with the proximity of available women, but everything to do with an administrative strategy known to be practiced by his father during his Prefect days.
Placing a residence of authority in bad areas of town did more to preserve order than any amount of armed patrolmen could ever do. Zhou Yu would always have mixed feelings about his father's practices and teachings, but in this area, no one was better. His father was brilliant and wise in this method, as it had worked, but it required that the administrator be comfortable in less desirable settings.
And sure, his residence was set in a pleasant grove between a brothel and a gambling parlor, but he found it suitable, and had its own conveniences. The market square, for example, was just down the road from his home, and the nights were filled with music to entertain patrons.
He'd enjoy himself a few interesting and humorous conversations with drunkards as they stumbled to their next pub. Humoring a few equally drunk or promiscuous women as well. Night life in Juchao achieved a relative peace with him around, and the citizens were more free to have fun with their vices and nightly activities, now they were less wary of criminals and bandits ruining the fun.
When Zhou Yu found time to step away from his duties in Juchao, he hastened to join Sun Ce's various assemblies to determine their next move. Currently, they were left with plenty of options, it was up to Sun Ce to decide which would be the most beneficial in achieving his desires.
Thus far, Zhou Yu felt he ingratiated himself well enough to the Sun clan's officers, the likes of Han Dang nearly slack jawed on some days at his insight. Still, it was clear one individual was not convinced of Zhou Yu's position at Sun Ce's side. Cheng Pu treated him icily from day one and relations didn't get any better the more Zhou Yu spoke.
For Zhou Yu's part, he tried to not let it get the best of him and ignored the glares, but there were times when he truly felt the elder general was trying to get under his skin.
After carefully considering the options around them, pushing back against one of the larger warlords was the conclusion Zhou Yu felt made the most sense. In one particular meeting, the assembly had already determined that making an offensive attack would be the direction the army should go. The question was against whom.
"I would suggest Liu Yao," Zhou Yu offered the council. "Yuan Shu already has designs on his territory, so any action there wouldn't rouse him too much."
As Zhou Yu spoke, Cheng Pu not subtly began grumbling to himself, voicing his displeasure at the youth's plan. "...largest southland force…Imperial family…who the fuck cares about Yuan Shu…"
Cursing, Zhou Yu slammed his hand down on the table in front of him, teeth grinding as he stared angrily into Cheng Pu's haughty gaze. Logic and calm headed analysis left him that day, and he let the ugly side of him — the zealous, passionate side that he long wanted to suppress – get the best of him. Thus far he'd prided himself on not letting things like Cheng Pu's barbs affect his performance, but not today. Cheng Pu had drained all graciousness Zhou Yu had from him.
A silence fell over the older advisors and generals as Zhou Yu saw red and roared at Cheng Pu. "Do you have something more important or valuable to contribute than what I'm discussing now?!"
"Gongjin…" was Sun Ce's warning tone. He was probably the only one who had first hand experience of Zhou Yu's temper thus far, and could tell when that temper was quickly overwhelming his rational thoughts.
"No, I'd like to know what genius idea he has that he has to constantly undermine my time to speak to counsel?"
After a brief flash of shock crossing his aged features, Cheng Pu silently stood from his seat, face falling back to dispassion as he watched Sun Ce rush to drag the ferociously angry Zhou Yu away from the counsel.
"I'm not going to take an insult from a pasty youth such as yourself," the elder general growled. "Especially one who thinks being reckless is the same as being clever."
At that point, Zhou Yu nearly launched himself at Cheng Pu, his temper at a fever pitch. If it weren't for Sun Ce holding him back, who knows what would've happened.
"A-alright Gongjin," Sun Ce tried to soothe in between nervous laughter. At this point he was frantically pulling his friend away from his other officers, trying very hard not to laugh as his friend issued a slew of creatively vulgar and violent words, graphic enough to cause Zhou Tai, former bandit and pirate mind you, to go ashen white at hearing them.
In the hallway, the intense sounds inside the meeting room muffled, Zhou Yu braced his back against the wall and leaned over, heaving twice as he frantically began breathing, feeling his body tighten. The ringing in his ears was the worst it's been since he was a child, when he was in rage for being picked on and abused by older students in class.
He long thought he was over such irritating displays of sensitivity. But he felt the same urge to run his fist through someone's face as he did then. The ringing even managed to silence Sun Ce's voice, until he bent down to meet Zhou Yu's gaze.
"...ay, buddy?"
Zhou Yu blinked and looked up, gazing into the calm eyes of his friend and said in a gasp of desperation. "You have to punish me, Bofu."
"What?"
Zhou Yu shook his head in defeat, catching his breath as the adrenaline from his display of rage suddenly left him. "I don't know what came over me…"
"Same thing that causes everyone else to lose it during meetings. This isn't exactly new for us," Sun Ce's jovial tone cut through the breaths Zhou Yu was taking trying to calm himself down. "And I much prefer you speak your mind."
"That display was still uncalled for. On both our parts, but mainly my own," Zhou Yu's voice kept on a breathless lilt, eyes shut tight against the seething frustration towards the elder strategists' disregard for his pertinent advice. It was one thing to be ignored in Yuan Shu's court. Yuan Shu and his cronies could all wither in failure for all he cared, but he wanted Sun Ce to succeed. How can that happen when he gets roadblocked by people equally close to Sun Ce?
Sun Ce plopped himself down on the bench next to him and gave a wide grin, "Man, that was the most awesome shit I have ever seen out of a human being. A room full of full grown veterans who fought with my father all scared out of their goddamn minds. I need people like that."
Zhou Yu's piercing eyes met his friends, stern and unforgiving, "I do not aim to be feared Sun Ce. And neither should you. Do we have to have a run down on the last man who wanted to rule by fear?"
"You and your 'run downs'," Sun Ce rolled his eyes and shook his head at Zhou Yu's humorlessness. "Of course I won't rule by fear. But I need people who aren't afraid of their own ideas. And I need scary fuckers. I don't care how many swears and insults are flying about, say it. Everyone else does, and you know what? After a night of sleeping or drinking we come back the next day, all better and ready to go again. I know you, buddy. You are perhaps one of the most head-in-the-game passionate people I know. You don't half-ass anything. But you hide your true potential all the fucking time. You don't have to hide that fact from everyone. Not here and not in front of me. You should know that from when we were kids."
There was a flinch from Zhou Yu at Sun Ce's mention of the past, as if the touch of nostalgia pained him. And all the while, Sun Ce could tell his friend didn't look convinced, and he wished he had the power to take his friend back in time to the myriad of meetings he's had where fist fights were involved, just to prove his point. Instead, he leaned over and placed a comforting hand on his friend's shoulder. "We're a sort of family here, Gongjin. We fight, bicker, and even punch one another, but we all still come back to help one another. Because that's what families do. For better or worse."
After heavy pat on the same shoulder, he rocked forward and stood from his seat on the bench, satisfied with his speech to his normally more thoughtful friend, "And I promise you, just because Cheng Pu is an elder, and one of my father's most prized officers, doesn't make him right all the time. If he's wrong, call him out. He'll come around eventually. Just when you call him I out, I prefer you not to threaten to skull-fuck him or whatever you were yelling earlier."
With that, and before Zhou Yu could even respond, he turned on his heel, and strutted down the hall, whistling a jaunty tune every step of the way.
A/N: The title of this chapter comes from the song Recruiting Sargeant by Great Big Sea