NaNoWriMo 03
NaNoWriMo Chapter 3. 2,173 words. 41,394 to go.
To Chapter 2
Father left Hiroshima Castle two weeks after he had returned. Nagamichi had told father that he sensed a storm coming, and he wanted to be as prepared as he could be. Choshu was attempting to convince American experts to come teach about airships, and father was to be there if they succeeded.
I walked down to the harbor with him. He was to sail to Choshu on board a ship Nagamichi had purchased from the Americans a few months earlier. Toliver had come as well, and as we headed to the port the two talked quickly in English. I walked a few steps behind, disinterested.
For me, father leaving was a normal thing. After mother and my brothers died he had gone away to learn from the British navy. I had not seen him at all from the age of five to the age of eight. After he returned he had come and gone often, trying to learn more about the ships of the Western nations. I knew I would miss him, but his absence would not hurt that much.
During the walk back to the castle, Toliver and I continued teaching each other to speak each other’s languages. He would point to something and say a word, and I would repeat it. Then I would tell him the Japanese word and he would say it back to me. Even in only two weeks we could speak to each other better than we had been able to at first.
As we approached the gate to the castle Toliver looked up at the cannon on top of the wall. He pointed to them and carefully spoke in Japanese. “You are learning that?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I am samurai.”
“I do not understand.” Toliver looked at me. “Why does a samurai woman have to do this?”
I switched to English. “You do not understand Japan. To be samurai is to do this.” I hurried through the gate and toward the keep, my feet moving too rapidly to be graceful in my kimono. Toliver did not try to catch up to me.
Toliver’s question haunted me the rest of the day. Why was I doing this? I knew the answer, of course. Samurai were the guardians of the Japan. All Samurai learned the way of the warrior from the time they are old enough to learn it. It was our duty to the Emperor. Samurai men had to always be prepared to ride to battle at need, and Samurai women knew that being able to defend the castle was as much their duty as bearing sons to their husbands.
I was still thinking about this when I went to practice on the cannon that afternoon. The thoughts were quickly driven from my mind when Yasushi arrived and organized the cannon crews. Two of the guns had been brought down from the wall and we were to practice hitting large targets placed in front of a thick mound of dirt.
“Hiroko-hime. You will run the ammunition today.”
I felt a thrill. So far I had been made to observe the guns as they were being fired. I had been made to stand on one side, and then on another. I had stood behind the men preparing the ammunition for firing and watch as they selected the different types of rounds. I had not yet been allowed to touch anything, only to explain what I had seen after the practicing was done and my ears were still ringing from the roaring of the guns.
I ran over to stand beside the chest that I had been learned was called a caisson, and which rode on a wagon named a limber. Quivering in anticipation I waited for the order.
“Load! Solid shot!”
With Yasushi’s shout I leaned forward, my hands shooting out for the rounds. My hands were slapped aside. “Do not get in the way!”
Humbled, I brought my hands back and waited to lean again until the round had been pulled free of the caisson. The man thrust the cannon ball and bag into my hands.
I staggered forward, my shoulder ramming hard into the caisson. The rounds were much heavier than I had somehow expected. I nearly dropped it.
“Be careful! Go! Quickly!”
Righting myself I turned and began running for the cannon. I could see Daichi already waiting by the wheel impatiently. I ran as fast as I could, cradling the cannonball to my chest as though it were my own infant.
“Turn around, Hiroko!” Yasushi bellowed. “Better your woman’s flesh take a bullet than that a shell did!”
I could feel a blush under my makeup. I knew that, but in my haste had forgotten. I quickly turned, then walked backwards as fast as I felt I could. Reaching the cannon’s wheel I rotated and passed the round to Daichi. He took it from me, muttering “Faster, woman,” then turned to hold the round up for the rammer to force it down the barrel. Shamed, I turned and ran back toward the distant caisson. I would do better next time.
I arrived at the caisson just as Yasushi shouted the command to fire. The cannons roared, and Yasushi shouted the order to ready a shell with a half second fuse. I leaned in, careful to keep my hands out of the way, and the cycle began again.
I was tired enough to take the stairs to the third floor slowly. Even after changing my clothing and restoring the makeup I had sweated into ruin my legs still felt unsteady. I had to move quickly when practicing with the naginata, but compared to that, carrying cannon balls over and over again at a backwards run seemed a dream worthy of a poem.
Entering the room with the Babbage Engine I sank gratefully to a cushion by the table. On the other side of the table Toliver looked up from a book in which he had been writing.
“No tea?”
I began stammering an apology, making my rubbery legs work to get back up. Toliver waved me back down. “Do not worry about it Miss Hiroko. Please stay sitting.”
Gratefully I sank back to the cushion, settling my hands into my lap. “Thank you,” I said. I spoke in Japanese to give my gratitude the proper weight and formality.
Toliver’s beaklike nose sniffed a moment. He spoke in English. “You’ve been playing with those cannons again.”
My gratitude was swiftly replaced with wariness. I did not wish to return to the topic we had spoken of that morning. I did not doubt his disapproval, but I could not understand where it came from. The men serving the cannon may have questioned if a woman should choose a cannon as a weapon, but never doubted that I should train with weapons.
“Never mind that,” Toliver waved a hand as if to brush the topic away like it was a fly. “Here.” He pushed the book towards me, spinning it so that the bottom of the book was towards me instead of towards himself. “What do you think of that?”
I looked down at the book. He had drawn a series of circles like those I had seen on the cards. Next to them he had written in the strange characters that the Westerners used in place of true writing. “I can not read it.”
“You will. Later. What about this?” He reached over and tapped his finger on the picture.
“It looks like one of the cards.”
“It is.” He slid a card over to me, one without holes in it. Beside it he set a metal contraption he had told me he called a punch. “Make that card.”
I had watched him make other cards with this device, so I knew how I was supposed to punch one of the holes. I picked up the contraption, holding it in my left hand. Slipping the card into it with my right, I squeezed the handle and felt the thick paper crunch.
“That’s no where near where it should be.” Toliver took the card out of the punch. “Look, see?” He pointed at the hole I had made, then said several things which had words I did not understand. He slid another card over to me. “Try again.”
Saying nothing, I picked up the card and the punch again. I looked carefully at the punch, and then at the picture. Sticking the card into the punch I carefully slid it around until I thought it was in the right place. Glancing over at the picture one more time to make sure I was not punching a hole where one shouldn’t be. Tentatively I squeezed again until I felt the paper give way. I pulled the card out and looked at the hole critically.
“Keep going.”
With Toliver carefully watching everything I did, I punched several more holes, checking each time to make sure I was not punching any holes where none should be. When I finished, Toliver took the card. And looked at it closely.
“It could be better. But this is good.” He set the card down, then tapped one of the characters in the book. “Do you see this number?”
I looked down at the book. “What does it mean?”
“One.” He pointed at the ceiling.
Curious at his strange answer, I looked up at the castle’s wooden beams over head.
“No, no.” He sounded impatient. I looked back at him. He pointed again at the ceiling. “One.” He then pointed the finger next to it upward. “Two. Three.”
I understood. I lifted my thumb up before him and spoke in Japanese. “One.” Unfolding a finger I repeated his count, teaching him the numbers we used. “Two, three.”
Toliver pinched the bridge of his beak. “They use their thumbs.” He muttered. Then he leaned forward and tapped the character in the book. “This is one.”
“One,” I repeated.
He picked up the card I had made and stood, walking over to the engine. “Come over here, Miss Hiroko.”
Groaning inwardly I lifted myself up and walked over next to him.
Toliver took the card, then slipped the two outermost holes over two rods in the machine and slid it downward. The card then slid into hiding inside the depths of the maze of rods and gears. He tapped a large wheel on the side. “Turn it four times.”
The wheel had a grip sticking out of it, up at the top of it’s circle. I took hold of the grip and began to push. The wheel began to spin and with a whirring and a clicking of gears and rods the machine began to work. As the wheel spun I counted the number of turns in Japanese. “One. Two. Three. Four.” Stepping away from the wheel I looked back over to Toliver.
Toliver smiled, then tapped a gear. “What is this number?”
I leaned in close and looked at the one closest to the front of the gear. “One.”
Toliver reached around the machine and pulled out my card. “This is also one.”
I felt foolish. This machine that my father wanted me to learn had just taken several minutes of work to do what I could do with a single thumb. Toliver must have sensed my annoyance, though I had tried to keep it from my face. He stepped over to the table and tapped on the stack of cards he had been working on. “This is how much” here he used a word I did not know “it will take to get your father to get Hagi castle in his ship.”
I repeated the unknown word. Toliver smiled and repeated the word.
“I don’t understand.”
Toliver frowned. “It goes in the ship’s engine.”
I knew then the word meant coal. My father had explained how a steam engine worked, and about how coal was the best fuel, burning much hotter and longer than wood. “I understand this word.”
“Good.” Toliver tapped the cards again. “This is how much coal your father needs.”
“This is a big number?”
“It is a correct number.” Toliver then pulled down a map and began tapping it. He began speaking rapidly as he tapped various places on the map, and turned to a page in the book where he had drawn the ship that had taken my father away. I did not understand most of what he said, but I could guess he was talking about ocean currents and the size of the ship. It was too little to understand what he had done, but it was enough for me to understand what it meant. His Babbage engine could tell us how much coal a ship needed to go somewhere. I could not count that on one hand. I was not sure I could do all the math needed to do it at all, even if I had all day.
“Show me.”
With a smile, Toliver picked up the stack of cards and began feeding them into the Babbage Engine.
To Chapter 4
To Chapter 2
Father left Hiroshima Castle two weeks after he had returned. Nagamichi had told father that he sensed a storm coming, and he wanted to be as prepared as he could be. Choshu was attempting to convince American experts to come teach about airships, and father was to be there if they succeeded.
I walked down to the harbor with him. He was to sail to Choshu on board a ship Nagamichi had purchased from the Americans a few months earlier. Toliver had come as well, and as we headed to the port the two talked quickly in English. I walked a few steps behind, disinterested.
For me, father leaving was a normal thing. After mother and my brothers died he had gone away to learn from the British navy. I had not seen him at all from the age of five to the age of eight. After he returned he had come and gone often, trying to learn more about the ships of the Western nations. I knew I would miss him, but his absence would not hurt that much.
During the walk back to the castle, Toliver and I continued teaching each other to speak each other’s languages. He would point to something and say a word, and I would repeat it. Then I would tell him the Japanese word and he would say it back to me. Even in only two weeks we could speak to each other better than we had been able to at first.
As we approached the gate to the castle Toliver looked up at the cannon on top of the wall. He pointed to them and carefully spoke in Japanese. “You are learning that?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I am samurai.”
“I do not understand.” Toliver looked at me. “Why does a samurai woman have to do this?”
I switched to English. “You do not understand Japan. To be samurai is to do this.” I hurried through the gate and toward the keep, my feet moving too rapidly to be graceful in my kimono. Toliver did not try to catch up to me.
Toliver’s question haunted me the rest of the day. Why was I doing this? I knew the answer, of course. Samurai were the guardians of the Japan. All Samurai learned the way of the warrior from the time they are old enough to learn it. It was our duty to the Emperor. Samurai men had to always be prepared to ride to battle at need, and Samurai women knew that being able to defend the castle was as much their duty as bearing sons to their husbands.
I was still thinking about this when I went to practice on the cannon that afternoon. The thoughts were quickly driven from my mind when Yasushi arrived and organized the cannon crews. Two of the guns had been brought down from the wall and we were to practice hitting large targets placed in front of a thick mound of dirt.
“Hiroko-hime. You will run the ammunition today.”
I felt a thrill. So far I had been made to observe the guns as they were being fired. I had been made to stand on one side, and then on another. I had stood behind the men preparing the ammunition for firing and watch as they selected the different types of rounds. I had not yet been allowed to touch anything, only to explain what I had seen after the practicing was done and my ears were still ringing from the roaring of the guns.
I ran over to stand beside the chest that I had been learned was called a caisson, and which rode on a wagon named a limber. Quivering in anticipation I waited for the order.
“Load! Solid shot!”
With Yasushi’s shout I leaned forward, my hands shooting out for the rounds. My hands were slapped aside. “Do not get in the way!”
Humbled, I brought my hands back and waited to lean again until the round had been pulled free of the caisson. The man thrust the cannon ball and bag into my hands.
I staggered forward, my shoulder ramming hard into the caisson. The rounds were much heavier than I had somehow expected. I nearly dropped it.
“Be careful! Go! Quickly!”
Righting myself I turned and began running for the cannon. I could see Daichi already waiting by the wheel impatiently. I ran as fast as I could, cradling the cannonball to my chest as though it were my own infant.
“Turn around, Hiroko!” Yasushi bellowed. “Better your woman’s flesh take a bullet than that a shell did!”
I could feel a blush under my makeup. I knew that, but in my haste had forgotten. I quickly turned, then walked backwards as fast as I felt I could. Reaching the cannon’s wheel I rotated and passed the round to Daichi. He took it from me, muttering “Faster, woman,” then turned to hold the round up for the rammer to force it down the barrel. Shamed, I turned and ran back toward the distant caisson. I would do better next time.
I arrived at the caisson just as Yasushi shouted the command to fire. The cannons roared, and Yasushi shouted the order to ready a shell with a half second fuse. I leaned in, careful to keep my hands out of the way, and the cycle began again.
I was tired enough to take the stairs to the third floor slowly. Even after changing my clothing and restoring the makeup I had sweated into ruin my legs still felt unsteady. I had to move quickly when practicing with the naginata, but compared to that, carrying cannon balls over and over again at a backwards run seemed a dream worthy of a poem.
Entering the room with the Babbage Engine I sank gratefully to a cushion by the table. On the other side of the table Toliver looked up from a book in which he had been writing.
“No tea?”
I began stammering an apology, making my rubbery legs work to get back up. Toliver waved me back down. “Do not worry about it Miss Hiroko. Please stay sitting.”
Gratefully I sank back to the cushion, settling my hands into my lap. “Thank you,” I said. I spoke in Japanese to give my gratitude the proper weight and formality.
Toliver’s beaklike nose sniffed a moment. He spoke in English. “You’ve been playing with those cannons again.”
My gratitude was swiftly replaced with wariness. I did not wish to return to the topic we had spoken of that morning. I did not doubt his disapproval, but I could not understand where it came from. The men serving the cannon may have questioned if a woman should choose a cannon as a weapon, but never doubted that I should train with weapons.
“Never mind that,” Toliver waved a hand as if to brush the topic away like it was a fly. “Here.” He pushed the book towards me, spinning it so that the bottom of the book was towards me instead of towards himself. “What do you think of that?”
I looked down at the book. He had drawn a series of circles like those I had seen on the cards. Next to them he had written in the strange characters that the Westerners used in place of true writing. “I can not read it.”
“You will. Later. What about this?” He reached over and tapped his finger on the picture.
“It looks like one of the cards.”
“It is.” He slid a card over to me, one without holes in it. Beside it he set a metal contraption he had told me he called a punch. “Make that card.”
I had watched him make other cards with this device, so I knew how I was supposed to punch one of the holes. I picked up the contraption, holding it in my left hand. Slipping the card into it with my right, I squeezed the handle and felt the thick paper crunch.
“That’s no where near where it should be.” Toliver took the card out of the punch. “Look, see?” He pointed at the hole I had made, then said several things which had words I did not understand. He slid another card over to me. “Try again.”
Saying nothing, I picked up the card and the punch again. I looked carefully at the punch, and then at the picture. Sticking the card into the punch I carefully slid it around until I thought it was in the right place. Glancing over at the picture one more time to make sure I was not punching a hole where one shouldn’t be. Tentatively I squeezed again until I felt the paper give way. I pulled the card out and looked at the hole critically.
“Keep going.”
With Toliver carefully watching everything I did, I punched several more holes, checking each time to make sure I was not punching any holes where none should be. When I finished, Toliver took the card. And looked at it closely.
“It could be better. But this is good.” He set the card down, then tapped one of the characters in the book. “Do you see this number?”
I looked down at the book. “What does it mean?”
“One.” He pointed at the ceiling.
Curious at his strange answer, I looked up at the castle’s wooden beams over head.
“No, no.” He sounded impatient. I looked back at him. He pointed again at the ceiling. “One.” He then pointed the finger next to it upward. “Two. Three.”
I understood. I lifted my thumb up before him and spoke in Japanese. “One.” Unfolding a finger I repeated his count, teaching him the numbers we used. “Two, three.”
Toliver pinched the bridge of his beak. “They use their thumbs.” He muttered. Then he leaned forward and tapped the character in the book. “This is one.”
“One,” I repeated.
He picked up the card I had made and stood, walking over to the engine. “Come over here, Miss Hiroko.”
Groaning inwardly I lifted myself up and walked over next to him.
Toliver took the card, then slipped the two outermost holes over two rods in the machine and slid it downward. The card then slid into hiding inside the depths of the maze of rods and gears. He tapped a large wheel on the side. “Turn it four times.”
The wheel had a grip sticking out of it, up at the top of it’s circle. I took hold of the grip and began to push. The wheel began to spin and with a whirring and a clicking of gears and rods the machine began to work. As the wheel spun I counted the number of turns in Japanese. “One. Two. Three. Four.” Stepping away from the wheel I looked back over to Toliver.
Toliver smiled, then tapped a gear. “What is this number?”
I leaned in close and looked at the one closest to the front of the gear. “One.”
Toliver reached around the machine and pulled out my card. “This is also one.”
I felt foolish. This machine that my father wanted me to learn had just taken several minutes of work to do what I could do with a single thumb. Toliver must have sensed my annoyance, though I had tried to keep it from my face. He stepped over to the table and tapped on the stack of cards he had been working on. “This is how much” here he used a word I did not know “it will take to get your father to get Hagi castle in his ship.”
I repeated the unknown word. Toliver smiled and repeated the word.
“I don’t understand.”
Toliver frowned. “It goes in the ship’s engine.”
I knew then the word meant coal. My father had explained how a steam engine worked, and about how coal was the best fuel, burning much hotter and longer than wood. “I understand this word.”
“Good.” Toliver tapped the cards again. “This is how much coal your father needs.”
“This is a big number?”
“It is a correct number.” Toliver then pulled down a map and began tapping it. He began speaking rapidly as he tapped various places on the map, and turned to a page in the book where he had drawn the ship that had taken my father away. I did not understand most of what he said, but I could guess he was talking about ocean currents and the size of the ship. It was too little to understand what he had done, but it was enough for me to understand what it meant. His Babbage engine could tell us how much coal a ship needed to go somewhere. I could not count that on one hand. I was not sure I could do all the math needed to do it at all, even if I had all day.
“Show me.”
With a smile, Toliver picked up the stack of cards and began feeding them into the Babbage Engine.
To Chapter 4