rattlerofthestars:

  Watching Ping retreat back to the advisor made him close his eyes with realization. Of course. He forgot that his recent acquaintance was a soldier. He was a little girly and a bit awkward, but he was still just a soldier- and Jim had just mouthed off to someone of apparently high importance and proceeded to get Ping into trouble. Yet, for some reason, that magic word made Chi Fu see Jim in a new light. It was ridiculous. Still, he felt really bad that he was stuck with kitchen duties. He understood how that felt. Back home, he had been a busser for his mother’s restaurant. Then he was a cabin boy on the RLS Legacy. Honestly, he wouldn’t mind helping the soldier out later…if he walked away from this.

  “Someone get me the friend of the century award.” The self proclaimed scholar muttered beneath his breath. Ping had been very helpful. He put up with Jim’s cockiness and seemed like a genuinely nice guy. Then he got smacked with awful chores for his absence. He didn’t deserve to take any backlash from the spacer’s behavior. It wasn’t really his fault. He made a mental note to mention this to the captain. With a goofy smile, Jim waved in Ping’s direction as Chi Fu lead him down a row of tents. As they walked, the consul decided to rain questions down all over him, such as- What do you study? Do you have personal business with the captain? Where are you heading? Where do you come from? And, ohohoho, you couldn’t be of the Hun army you look nothing like them! How silly!

  His presence was beginning to irritate the living crap out of Jim, so finally he answer. “Look-! I’m just a visitor. I came from overseas and I was uh, here with my fellow colleagues but we became separated. I was told by the farmers down the way that your captain might be able to help. Then I lost my way through the mountain pass. That’s when your soldier found me.”

Ping swept the dirt floor of the mess tent with a broom that kept losing bristles.  He chopped dried pork and jùn and scallions, he fed handful after handful of thick noodles into a big, steaming iron pot of water and tried to concentrate only on his work.  The cook seemed surprised that Ping seemed so deft and quick to learn - after all, not every boy was raised to cook skillfully - and when he complimented Ping the young recruit smiled, barely aware of what what he murmured in thanks.  He knew that it was best for him to keep his mind on the task at hand, not to wonder what Jim and the captain discussed or to strain his ears for the sounds of training: footfalls in dusty earth or grunts and the clack of kon staves one against the other.

It was an unnerving feeling, not that he missed training exactly but…Ping couldn’t suppress a sigh.  It was as if, like the pot of softening noodles, he had to release some steam to meld his thoughts.  But once he allowed himself to think about it, Ping found the answer clear as water: What it really came down to was that on the one hand kitchen duty was a welcome, calm respite from training.  And on the other hand - 

On the other hand, Ping was far enough behind the rest of the men as it was.  He had less strength on his side, less endurance, no prior training at all.  The other men of Sichuan had doubtless spent longer hours in the sun than had Ping (and without being called in to sew or practice their dancing), had worked more than his eighteen years in their fields.  Perhaps some of them, like the captain, had already been training as soldiers when news of the Hun raids first arrived.  But Ping needed any advantage he could grasp, and where had he spent his day?  Cooking and cleaning.  

He lingered in the mess tent during supper, ashamed (as men punished with mess duty often were) for the others to so much as spot him as they discussed their day’s training.  The only thing for which Ping could be thankful was that he now had the time, and the energy, to hurry to the outskirts of the camp and see if he could find Jim.