Seated at the makeup table
Back arrow straight
The General assesses the territory
She must now conquer.

Merciful Goddess of Compassion,
Spare me the literary clichés!

I laugh as I begin.

Colonel Chu is simply going to die when he sees me tonight.
The inflexible prick is going to choke
When he realizes that he had been taking orders from a woman the whole time.
Still and all,
There was no one I could trust more to keep my supply-lines relatively corruption-free.
And the infantry moves on its stomach.

Sigh. The scabbard-scar on my left hand will be hard to hide.
Still, these hands are slender and well formed.
Perhaps some misdirection.
The jade bracelet with the seal of "General Hua" engraved therein should lure the eye away
And remind them that I am still their "old man."

Ah, how I’ve longed to tend to this complexion.
It’s recovered quite a bit from the winter encampment two years ago.
A little lotion.
A little powder.
Mmm. The magic of becoming
Who I am.

That was the hardest lesson to learn.
We could never win while I tried to be my father.
Oh, he could have won this war himself in his time,
But I could not be him.
"General Hua" did not win this war.
Mulan won this war.

By the Jade Emperor,
I am glad to be rid of that armor
And into something soft!

A little
Oh, so little
Blush on the checks.
I am not the painted
Chicky going to see Ah-Matchmaker,
Nor the inevitable camp-follower
Hoping to ensnare some young officer.
I am the remote Mulan
And I have the power.
You can look but you can’t touch, boys.

Hmmm. Unless I say so.

Who do I respect enough to make my husband?
There’s that lieutenant in the 5^th Cavalry.
Ma would accept his family,
And he did show some spark in the Northern Campaign
Despite Colonel Wen’s plodding methodical-ness.
Mmm. And not a bad figure in the saddle.
I’ll send out feelers when the furor has died down a bit.
Poor boy, he has no hope.
Grin.

It’s good to let these eyes be charming again.
"General Hua" was a very serious commander.
No one was ever too close to the "old man".
Fah. I was so earnest when we started.
We had a lot to learn,
The army and I.
But Ba’s training stood me well.
I looked like a General from day one.
But everyone’s chi flows a bit different,
And Mongols made inroads to the day I gave up playing Ba’s rote stratagems.
I wonder if anyone realizes that the battle of Little-Peach Pass was the turning point of the war.
We lost that battle,
But I finally made decisions like Mulan that day.
I found my command that day.
I found myself.

Eyebrows!
My features are so delicate it’s a wonder that no one ever caught on.
But the glamour of command is hard to see through.
I still laugh at the time my flow hit in the middle of battle
And my aide saw the stain on my pants
And thought I had been wounded
And I had to act all stalwart as "the churgeons are needed for the critically wounded.
That’s an order, Captain Lu!"
Honestly, all I needed was a bucket and five minutes alone.
The pest.
I’ll miss him.

Hair.
Down, of course.
It’s nice to have it even and clean again.
Perhaps a peach-blossom:
It will be a nice contrast with the blue.
The flower’s army.

It’s integrity that wins wars in the end.
Even though I disobeyed Ba, and
Wore a man’s hat for three years,
I was always true to myself.
Image is just another tool of the warrior.
And now I choose another image.
Mulan is both the victorious General and a good man’s daughter.
The chroniclers will just have to live with that.

Stand tall, Mulan.
You have a world to face as a woman now.
The secret is that there is no secret.
The General creates a vision
That others rush to fill.
There will be the challenges of peace.
The advancement of the Hua fortunes,
And whatever marriage alliance we will choose to make for me.
Am I no more than the dutiful daughter or the brilliant General?

I am Mulan!