Chapter 48. In which Cao Cao throws a dangerously good party.

Pang Tong turned around and breathed a sigh of relief. “Oh, hey Xu Shu. Can you kindly not say that so loudly? The lives of all the Southerners depend on you.”

“What about the lives of all of Cao Cao’s redshirts?” said Xu Shu. “No one ever thinks about them.”

“That’s uncomfortably true, so I’ll ignore it,” said Pang Tong.

“Well, I’m still not-so-secretly loyal to Liu Bei,” said Xu Shu. “But I don’t really want to die in the fire. How’s this: tell me how I can escape, and I keep your secret?”

“That’s incredibly noble of you,” said Pang Tong, and whispered in Xu Shu’s ear.

That night, Pang Tong left, and Xu Shu started spreading rumours. Before long, word was going round that Han Sui and Ma Teng were attacking the capital.

Cao Cao called an emergency meeting. “The redshirts are all worried,” he said. “I don’t know if this rumour is true or not, but we should probably be prepared in case it is.”

Xu Shu stepped up. “Hey, you know how I collect a salary, but don’t actually do anything?”

“Yeah?”

“How about I do something? Give me three thousand redshirts and I’ll hold San Pass.”

“That’ll work,” said Cao Cao. “Go ahead.”

Xu Shu high-tailed it.

When all of Cao Cao’s preparations were done, he was so confident that he threw a company party. All of his employees were invited, and there was plenty of food and karaoke.

It was a beautiful night, and everybody had a great time under the moonlight. After quite a few drinks, Cao Cao got up to make a speech.

“My only goal is to unite the country!” he announced. “And we’re almost there! Once we take over the south, this war-torn land will finally see peace.”

Everyone cheered and drank toast after toast. Cao Cao pointed in the general direction of the enemy. “Haw! Haw! All their guys are deserting!”

“Shhhh!” warned Little Xun, but Cao Cao laughed. “We’re all friends here!” He hiccuped, then faced where he thought Liu Bei was and blew a raspberry.

“Listen everyone,” he said. “I’m fifty-four. Just FYI. But you know what I’m going to do when I take over the south? I’ll marry both of the Qiao sisters and keep them in the Bronze Bird Tower! It’ll be awesome.”

“Wait a minute,” said Little Xun. “You mean that far-fetched pun Zhuge Liang invented on the spot to provoke Zhou Yu was true?”

“Damn straight it was,” answered Cao Cao. “I’m a supervillain. Creating cryptic riddles that reveal my evil plans is part of the package.”

Just then, a raven squawked. “Dumb bird!” slurred Cao Cao. “Why won’t it shut up?”

“The moon must be so bright, it thinks it’s daytime,” said someone.

That was the funniest thing Cao Cao had ever heard, and he doubled over with laughter. “Another drink! Hey, maybe the river wants a drink too.” He dumped his cup into the river. “Hey, guys, look at my spear!”

The guests drew a sigh of relief when he held up his actual spear. “I beat the Yellow Scarves, Lu Bu, and the Yuans with this,” he said proudly. “Where’s the mike? You guys, do my backup vocals.”

He started singing, but instead of the mike, he sang into the tip of the spear.

“There’s an old mill by the stream, Nellie Dean
Where we used to sit and dream, Nellie Dean…”

It was long, and incredibly off-key, but when he was done the equally drunk guests clapped enthusiastically.

Except one. “Boss!” scolded Liu Fu, one of his long-time employees. “That’s a sad song! It’s bad luck!”

“Are you calling me bad luck?” said Cao Cao, and stabbed Liu Fu in the face.

The guests all scampered away. Cao Cao stared at Liu Fu’s body, threw up, and passed out.

The next day, he woke up with a terrible hangover and an extremely painful conscience. When Liu Fu’s son knocked on the door, he was already in tears.

“Can I have my dad’s body back?” asked Liu Xi timidly.

“Of course you can,” sobbed Cao Cao. “I didn’t mean to, I swear. I feel terrible. He’s getting the best funeral ever.”

When that sad little episode was over, Mao Jie and Yu Jin came to see Cao Cao. “The boats are chained up and ready.”

“Great,” said Cao Cao. “Everybody, meet on the flagship for orders.” He gave all the generals command of one squadron, and they all sailed out on a trial run.

Pang Tong had been right – the ships were as solid as dry land. The redshirts whooped and danced on the decks.

“About-face!” called Cao Cao, and the well-drilled troops turned around and sailed back in perfect order.

“This is awesome,” said Cao Cao. “We can’t possible lose.”

“Don’t jinx us!” warned Cheng Yu. “And what if they set us on fire? We wouldn’t be able to scatter.”

Cao Cao just laughed.

“Wait, he’s right,” said Little Xun. “What about fire?”

“Don’t worry about that,” said Cao Cao. “They’d need a southeast wind, and at this time of year the wind is only west. If they tried to start a fire, it would just blow right back on them.”

“Wow,” chorused all his advisors. “You are smart.”

Two of his minor generals, Jiao Chu and Zhang Nan, stood up. “Hey boss, how about we go on a lightning raid? We can steal some flags and drums to troll the enemy.”

“Are you sure about that?” asked Cao Cao. “You’re not exactly experienced sailors.”

“We can do it,” they said confidently. “We’ve got courage and confidence. What else do we need?”

“Well, brains and experience, for one thing,” said Cao Cao. “And all the big ships are chained together. We only have little motorboats.”

Jiao Chu snorted. “If we take big ships, what’s so impressive about that? The motorboats are fine.”

“We’ll just grab a flag, kill one leader each, and come back,” added Zhang Nan.

“Sure, if you’re that confident,” said Cao Cao. “Take ten boats each and five hundred redshirts.”

Jiao Chu and Zhang Nan high-fived.

“Make sure the redshirts have long spears and stiff, uh, bows,” added Cao Cao.

Jiao Chu stared at him. “Paging Dr. Freud…”

“Oh, be quiet,” said Cao Cao. “Just in case, Wen Ping will take thirty ships and come up behind-”

Zhang Nan snickered.

“Grow up!” snapped Cao Cao.

Zhou Yu saw the fleet of motorboats approaching a long way off, and rolled his eyes. “Anyone one want to take care of them?”

“Us!” Zhou Tai and Han Dang’s hands shot up. They took five ships each and sailed out.

Han Dang swatted off the hail of arrows with his shield. Jiao Chu soon got close, handling his long spear impressively. “Think you’re hard enough to take me?”

Han Dang only rolled his eyes and killed him with one powerful thrust.

Meanwhile, Zhang Nan bore down on Zhou Tai, who stood firm, gripping his sword tightly…

The narrator blew his whistle. “That’s enough!”

Everyone’s shoulders slumped. “Aw, you’re no fun.”

“Get on with it,” he said irritably. “And behave yourselves.”

Zhou Tai leapt onto Zhang Nan’s boat and cut him down with one slash. The redshirts scattered, some swimming for it and some paddling. Wen Ping hastened to the rescue, and the southerners met him head-on.

Soon, Wen Ping realized that he was losing and made a break for it. Turning around wasn’t easy with his ships lashed together, and Han Dang and Zhou Tai were right on his heels when Zhou Yu called them back.

“You don’t want to go too far away from the main army, or you’ll get cut off,” he explained. “Now, you saw how many ships they have. What do you think we can do about it?”

Just then, there was a loud crack. The huge yellow flag on Cao Cao’s mainmast broke off and fell into the water.

Zhou Yu laughed. “That’s a bad omen!” he said gleefully. “For them, I mean.”

The wind picked up, and the waves got higher. The southerners’ flags started to flap in the breeze, and one of them hit Zhou Yu in the face.

He turned ashen. “Fuck. FUCK!”

Zhou Yu suddenly coughed up blood and fainted.

 

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