by Tianyi Zhang
“Oh, we need to leave someone here to watch over the house.”
Shi Zhaochang appointed Little Wang. Little Wang was the one he had subdued.
“I want Little Wang to stay here.”
“But… But…” Mistress Shi was worried that the cook at the Liu’s would only be able to make dough noodle soup. They could never get used to that.
“Fine,” Elder Master Shi said. “We’ll leave Little Wang here.”
Zhaochang figured he had everything settled, so he could go take care of his things.
“Have to get it done quickly,” He rushed out the door.
His heart was pounding. He couldn’t say how his luck would run this time. But he had to be fast. If the devils started the fight he wouldn’t have the time for this.
His hands were in his sleeves, eyes focused on his splayfoot stance. He puffed out a breath. If he couldn’t take care of this in the next day or two…
“All things must rely on fate. Master said…”
Oh, Master said he was a man of fate.
A smile flashed from the corners of his mouth, and his heart pounded even harder.
“Ah, I’ll find her today. How could such a big place as Shanghai be without a Thirteenth Sister?”
Oh, it turns out he is looking for a Thirteenth Sister!
That’s right! Looking for a Thirteenth Sister. Elder Brother said there were a lot of those kind of people at the Southern Market, so today Elder Brother is going with him to look. But, he has to spend a bit of money. Right now that fated Thirteenth Sister is waiting there.
Faster dammit. He called for a rickshaw.
“Rick…” but then he remembered Shanghainese called out “Dicksaw.” “Dick…”
Right then he thought of something else. He spun around and darted into his house, and in one breath made it up to his room.
His room was just as cold as it was outside. The window latch had never been fixed, so the paper in the window rattled. The stove hadn’t been lit in a week, but there was still a big pile of soot in the stove tray. The Yue Fei in the poster on the wall seemed to fear the cold a bit—his belly didn’t stick out as much.
Shi Zhaochang leapt over to his bed and lifted up the mattress to pull out the brocade box.
“Dammit!” Shi Zhaochang pulled out the mud-pellet from the box. He raised his arm to throw the mud-pellet out the window, but one of the women was drying her underthings on the opposite balcony. He lowered his arm. His gongfu was strong now, and he didn’t want to accidentally kill her with it.
He looked all around, then threw the mud-pellet in the spittoon.
Just like that, there was nothing at all between him and the Woman Warrior of National Salvation, Miss He Manli.
“Evil!” he said between clenched teeth. But then he sighed.
He felt she must be Evil long ago, but only recently could he do it: could he break it off. To lose a woman like that didn’t mean anything. He could never do good deeds with anyone who was Evil, isn’t that right.
“Men and women mixed up together, look at the Evil energy!”
He always thought that. He even let it slip when he was walking with Elder Brother. Elder Brother said something to him, he said…
“Eh? Uh?”
This all might have just been someone conjured by The Supreme Ultimate Master to test his disciple’s heart. Perhaps the Woman Warrior of National Salvation was the incarnation of some monster come to harm Shi Zhaochang.
But, when he thought about that woman warrior, his heart would ache. How? Did he love her? That he couldn’t admit. Maybe he regretted spending fifty dollars all for nothing. Also, he was always recalling that energy when she sat on his lap, the energy of the two of them, lip to lip. It was like an aftertaste of a dream on waking.
He quietly breathed out through his teeth. He wouldn’t let Elder Brother know, otherwise Elder Brother would take him for someone who is pining for an Evil woman.
Sitting on his lap…
But there was also that hunk sitting on her lap!
“Humph!” The tendon in Shi Zhaochang’s cheek popped out. “Evil!”
He started walking a bit faster.
“Second Brother, slow down,” Hu Genbao caught up to him. “It’s still early.”
Shi Zhaochang smiled apologetically, then fell back to his original gait.
“I’m… I’m… I’m worried that if we are late, we won’t find her.”
This time he must find a true woman warrior. A true Thirteenth Sister. One who is Good, without any doubt.
“Good. Good. Good.” He recited to himself. “Not like the Woman Warrior of National Salvation, with her… Men and women all mixed up together. Not like the way she…”
Then a thought popped into his head—like a wedge painfully poking into his heart. It was like he had caught a fever. His lips trembled. He feared he had accidently spoken aloud. He stole a glance at Hu Genbao.
“Surely I’m not Evil, oh!”
The Evil of woman and men mixed up together, but Shi Zhaochang had to find a Thirteenth Sister, that couldn’t be also…? There wouldn’t be anything mixed up about it, but to have no wariness at all between man and woman…
It was that last that was difficult to take.
“Elder Brother,” he panted out, “You said… You said…You said…”
He stuttered along for a long time before coming out with the question of whether or not a man like him going and looking for a Thirteenth Sister to be with might be not proper.
“Second Brother, don’t worry. If it weren’t proper, would your Elder Brother be going with you?”
Shi Zhaochang smiled and exhaled. He had to restrain himself from embracing Elder Brother.
The world today is truly not like it was in the past: A certain cause would lead to a certain result. The Thirteenth Sister of the past had a relationship with Lord An. And this was ordained by heaven as well. Master had said that there was a fated connection between him and a woman warrior. He and that woman warrior would do good deeds, assisted by Elder Brother and Elder Brother Disciple. He also had to subdue those Evil ones, He Manli and that Missed-Whatever-Tao. He had to get back the capital that he laid out. But this would have to wait until he vanquished the devils. First, he would go to…
Elder Brother pulled at his arm.
“Second Brother, we’re here. Here it is!”
There was an empty space surrounded by some people. In the center was a sallow-faced guy stripped to the waist.
He shouted out, “At home one relies on parents, but once you leave the home you must rely on friends… Ka-ching! Ka-ching!”
The surrounding people tossed in some copper coins. They fell into the muddy earth with a plopping sound.
Shi Zhaochang did not throw anything. First he had to see Thirteenth Sister, otherwise it would be a waste of copper and wouldn’t be worth it.
He pushed through the crowd. An awful smell assaulted his nose. These people seemed to all be rickshaw pullers or baggage haulers. But Shi Zhaochang persisted, because Elder Brother was pushing him.
“There, Elder Brother, look.”
A girl! Probably fifteen years old. Her face was shiny and pallid, and skinny as a dried fish. Her thick cotton-padded jacket had faded green cotton poking out of several holes. A black belt cinched up tight making her whole body look like a fish bladder. Cotton pants ran below into leg wraps.
This girl had her braids in her mouth as she looked lethargically at the sallow-faced man.
“…the Overturned Tripod!...” The man shouted. “A man can make a slip, a horse can throw a shoe. Practice good or practice vice, I hope I can rely on you…”
The girl spat into her hands and put her hands on the ground as her legs shot up straight to the sky.
Her feet were bound like dumplings.
Ah, truly it was Thirteenth Sister!
Then she stuck her right hand into the air as her body shifted to the left and her leg stuck out to the right.
The sallow-faced man shouted out, “There it is! Drawing the bow from the left and the right!”
The girl put her left hand up into the air again.
Shi Zhaochang tried to think what he should do. So he loudly shouted out, “Bravo!”
The sallow-faced man locked eyes with him.
Thirteenth Sister stood back up panting, letting her braid out of her mouth and wiping the sweat from her brow with her sleeve.
“How?...” Shi Zhaochang stared carefully at her. “Elder Brother, is Thirteenth Sister like that?”
Elder Brother stuck his chest back and aimed his sharp face at Shi Zhaochang, then hesitated. His face broke out all over wrinkled in smiles.
“Not to your fancy? There’s only one in Shanghai. This one right here. There’s no other shop for it. Second Brother you are… You are… Master said that you and she are fated.”
For some reason Shi Zhaochang’s heart thumped and his face flushed.
“Fine,” he muttered. This Thirteenth Sister wasn’t horrible, she was just a little dirty. If you stripped her and scrubbed her…you’d have to scrub, might suffer some damage to the vital essence. And this Thirteenth Sister was much cheaper than the Woman Warrior of National Salvation.
His entire body felt warm. He stared attentively at Thirteenth Sister until the crowd started to break up.
The sallow-faced man picked his padded jacket from the ground and put it right on his shiny torso—no undergarment at all. Then he grumbled something at the guy who played the drums as he collected his things.
Shi Zhaochang watched Thirteenth Sister
Thirteenth Sister took off her belt, hocked a clump of yellow snot on the muddy ground, and rubbed her palms together.
Shi Zhaochang tilted his head to glance at Elder Brother, who stuck out his chin in encouragement. And so he quite cautiously took up his Upright stance and slowly walked toward Thirteenth Sister. His breath started to come quickly. He took a deep breath and saluted Thirteenth Sister. His tongue moved like it was twitching.
“I…I…I, Shi Zhaochang… You’re gongfu is so good…Here is… Here is twenty cents…”
Thirteenth Sister seemed to become stone, staring at him without moving a muscle.
He reached into his pocket where there were five “Guangdong Double Dimes.” He didn’t know which ones were the lead ones. But he had to pull his hand out quickly.
Ah, who the hell cares, just grab whichever.
“Uh, here it is,” he moved closer to Thirteenth Sister and the sallow-faced man turned around to look at him carefully, but he didn’t notice. “I… I have to fight the XX devils with you. Together we… we also will suppress the bandits, we… we… There are people in this world who don’t know their place, they don’t believe in the Divine Way… Not like… We have to subdue them… Then we have to subdue the Woman Warrior of National Salvation… Evil…”
The girl’s eyes were wide open, looking at his hands, then his face. She didn’t take the twenty cents. He lifted up his right hand, fingers trembling.
Ah, she thinks it’s too little. He determinedly thrust his hand back in his pocket.
“Another twenty cents… We are connected by fate…”
But Thirteenth Sister took two steps backward, turning her head to look for the sallow-faced man.
There was a sudden clash of noise as he threw a gong on the drums. Then he advanced on Shi Zhaochang.
“Getting’ fresh with me girl, eh!” He locked eyes as he spoke, spitting in his hands.
Shi Zhaochang trembled all over, politely bending at the waist. His eyes were on him, but then he shot a glance at Thirteenth Sister. “I, I… The Supreme Ultimate Master is my Master, I am… I am Shi Zhaochang… I can spit blades and pass though earth, water, wood, and metal…”
This sputtered from the mouth of the other man:
“Aye know do not me girl… You… Your grannie’s cock!”
Thwack! Shi Zhaochang was cracked in the face.
“What! You! You!” Shi Zhaochang didn’t have time to get into his stance, he stumbled to the side.
Next he took a punch to the chest: Bam! There was a whiff of Shaolin style in it.
Shi Zhaochang retreated a couple of steps and took stock of his opponent. He turned his head to look for Elder Brother. Who knows where he had run off to.
The sallow-faced man stood there with clenched fists for a while, eyeing Shi Zhaochang before tottering off to leave.
“Get lost!” He picked up his load.
Shi Zhaochang’s right hand dropped the two Guangdong Double Dimes in his pocket with a clink. He looked at the silhouette of the sallow-faced man shouldering his load, and resolved to have a go at him—test their skill. In a flash, his legs formed a stance: and he held the stance for three minutes, four minutes, five minutes, all without moving a muscle.
What?
The others had long gone.
“Come here!” Shi Zhaochang yelled.
But no one heard him.
After he held the stance for a while, once his legs were sore and trembling he finally gradually stood up straight. Then he shielded his eyes with his right hand and looked all around. He sighed and started to walk. His chest hurt a little bit and his right cheek felt as hot as if it had been scalded.
“Whose fault is this?” Another sigh, and his heart pounded nearly out of his chest.
Thirteenth Sister’s guard in terms of gender mixing was even more Proper than Shi Zhaochang’s. He stuck this in his mind and thought about it. He analyzed himself—had he been tainted by the Evil spirit of the Warrior Woman of National Salvation? The entire journey he was as if in a dream.
“This is it, isn’t it?” He knelt facing the window. “Hear me Emperor Guan: I, Shi Zhaochang…”
He got on his bed but couldn’t sleep. He planned to go back tomorrow and offer his apology to Thirteenth Sister.
“I’ve been tainted by this New School—and that’s Evil. I’m like…” He said this to himself, but looked around like someone might have heard him.
Don’t worry: The family had moved to the house of Mr. Liu Liu. In the whole building was only himself and Little Wang. All was quiet.
Tomorrow he would go looking for Thirteenth Sister, Elder Brother and Elder Brother Disciple would help them out as they did good deeds. Spending a few dozen cents wouldn’t matter. He needed to bring a sword…
Suddenly-
Bang! Bang bang! Bang bang bang bang bang!
Gunshots!
“What’s this!”
14
Flying Blades Kill the Enemy
Little Wang rushed into Shi Zhaochang’s room.
Elder Master, we’re done for! This is bad!”
There was no light in the room.
Shi Zhaochang lifted his quilt and sat up, pulling on his silk jacket. His teeth were disobediently chattering the whole time like an electric bell. His lips had gone white. Afraid? Who’s afraid! It was bitterly cold, that’s all.
“Don’t rush,” Shi Zhaochang’s voice quavered.
The sounds of gunshots outside were coming closer together. It sounded like there was some trouble nearby. It was like the bang bang of the gunshots were happening right outside the window, shaking so much that his heart hurt.
Little Wang shrieked out in falsetto: “Elder Master, Elder Master, we have to leave now!”
“Leave!” Shi Zhaochang go back on the bed, his legs were fighting to keep him from standing up. “Little Wang, we must do good deeds… Buy me a stealth suit…”
“What?!”
He gritted his teeth and calmly said, “Stealth. Suit. Warriors wear them.”
“Whe
re would I go to buy that? Master! Don’t… don’t…”
“How? You!” Shi Zhaochang bared his teeth at Little Wang as if he were going to eat him up. “Did I, Elder Master Shi, not subdue you? Didn’t you cast aside Evil and return to the path of Good! Don’t rush, we must fight the XX devils… My Elder Brother and Elder Brother Disciple will come to assist me. Wait a bit, they must come, and we must… must, must…”
But the other didn’t pay any attention to this—that low born nothing!
“Don’t… Don’t… Master, let’s go downstairs and lie down on the floor. Don’t be so… so…”
Little Wang turned and fled.
Reddish clouds smeared across the sky outside the window, sometimes darker, sometimes lighter.
The gunshots came so thick the sounded as one—the cracks and bangs couldn’t be distinguished, like peals of thunder crying out unending.
Someone was calling out something indistinctly.
“Little Wang! Little Wang!” Shi Zhaochang rushed out the door after him. In the darkness, with only the light of the fires, he came across a vague shadow.
Little Wang on the floor of the guest room.
The gunshots come without a letup: Pow! Pow! Pow! Just like they were flying through inside the room. The further-away shots sounded a bit like birds: “tweee!”
“Quickly Master, get down, quickly…”
“Little Wang, hurry and go buy me a stealth suit. I must…”
“I won’t go! I won’t go! The guns…. I’m afraid I’ll catch a bullet… You… You…”
“You attend me. When I tell you to do something…”
“I won’t go! I won’t go! I’d rather… rather…”
Suddenly the heavens cried out with booms—one after another so that people’s heads would swell.
Airplanes!
Things got worse and worse. Dammit, he needed that stealth suit now! “Little Wang! Little Wang…”
“I won’t go! I won’t go! Take this money, you can order me however you like but I won’t do it, I… I…”