"We are gathered here today to discuss our next steps and perhaps if we are willing to induct a new member."

We were all sitting around the original safe house. The two story building housed the tea-brokers union on the first floor. The second floor was used for various nefarious planning and plots and the spouses auxiliary to the union. We had commandeered it recently and we only had to clean out when the auxiliary came in for their weekly potluck.

Surrounding me were all the people that had contributed to my success, and had foolishly decided to stick around.

"It is good that you are well. This one is in good spirits, especially now that the threat of the demonic cultivators has been dealt with. Perhaps we can refocus on smaller jobs like the tea house conundrum."

Moon Xiru was every bit the middle aged zaddy that kept the women at bay with a switch. He had an immaculate beard that any man would love and a man bun that just won't quit. He was a member of the tea brokers union and also one of the moon clan cousins that just happened to work outside of the clan proper. His union had given us a task to try and deal with new local tea houses serving to go cups.

They believed it was going to cut into their business. I didn't have the heart to tell them that those customers were probably not their base and they might have been better off just selling directly to the tea houses.

At least this way more people would be sampling their product more regularly.

"Do they really need us to follow up on that? Didn't we give them enough information from Xueyies extended stakeout there?" Kang Egiya said.

As the group's scribe Egiya was in charge of the minutes as well as keeping us on track. If we were making money as well she would be our accountant. To be frank I could have taken her job, but I saw my role as more of a mastermind one. The actual leader was probably Moon Lee.

"We can take on their case. As I recall, there was a more pressing matter that kept us from closing that open ended matter. Perhaps a better question is, what does the Tea Brokers union want us to do about this situation?" Moon Lee said.

Moon Lee was always dressed in a blue cultivators robe with a white sash or vice versa. I had taken to calling her bluey after the current reigning cartoon dog that had dominated my house when the girls were younger. Or course I never said it to her face, so this was more of a myself and Min discussion. Moon Lee was closer to my age, unmarried with no kids and by the looks of it happier with both.

"Alright so we have the option to pick that up in full or in part. Does it matter if we put you on this job, Moon Xiru?" I asked.

"It would be strange. This one was the reason we have this contract, so," he shrugged, sipping on some tea that hadn't been there before,"eh?"

"Alright. Well everyone knows Lorenzo, except Xueyie, so Jin Xueyie, Lorenzo," I said, gesturing to both of them.

"A pleasure to meet you," he said.

"Likewise. I don't even have to pretend. I'm glad that Joe has a friend here for once," the woman in stage makeup said.

"Hey! I'm Joe's friend," Egiya.

"Agreed," Moon Xiru said.

I turned to look at Moon Lee, who at that moment was particularly interested in her fingernails. Like she was planning on a major renovation in the near term and her favorite place had those acrylics that she was been waiting patiently like such a good girl for.

"What. What?" She said,"Oh you wanted solidarity. I agree with whatever it is."

"Uh huh. Well perhaps we can let Lorenzo get a word in before this devolves into jokes. Did you want to say something?"

The man stood up, gave a little bow and walked to the center of the room.

"I have brought something that you all will like."

I knew that the man had brought food as the smell hadn't escaped me, but the sheer amount gave us all pause.

"I always like to eat and drink when I'm with family and Joe is my family now, so..."

"Thank you for this," Moon Lee said.

A chorus of thank yous followed as we descended on a spread that had to have been painstakingly pieces together from several vendors. It was abundantly clear that he had spread my pocket change out. He had gotten several options that all spoke to me. Fried tomatoes over meat buns made peace with several noodle dishes.

"You know you had me at these thick noodles," I said, slurping the tender savory iron udon noodles.

"I wasn't going to wait but then you guys were talking about tea brokers unions and a stakeout and things for interesting so I kinda forgot I had this all," he said.

This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

"What he means to say is that he would take on the role of the supplier," Moon Xiru said,"as this combination of-is that chopped braised yak? It is?-anyway this combination of food is so colorful and-what is that vegetable and how is it so delectable..."

"I'll vote to accept this man," Moon Lee said,"If he promises to do this on a regular basis."

"I'm using Joe's money for this but I presume that this worker cooperative criminal syndicate has some petty cash lying around?"

"We can probably find that. That's what we can fund. Especially if Moon Fei is still out on convalescent leave way after we expect him to be," I said.

"After we make sure that the workman's comp is fully funded by the proceeds-"

"This one is sorry, but workman's comp?" Moon Xiru said.

"Workers compensation for on the job injuries. Moon Fei took several hits on our behalf so we need to make him right," I said.

"This is an unfamiliar concept, but this one takes your meaning. Such as it is, it would make sense for us to compensate him for being unable to work after what happened."

I waited a bit to see if anybody else wanted to talk about this.

"Moon Xiru, I'm curious if anything came from your outreach with the couriers guild since the incident. They were instrumental in helping us but-"

"His name was Hou Bai. We must honor his memory and sacrifice. We did not know to what depths of depravity the demonic sect would stoop. That they would disguise someone as him with the intent to hide his death, well this one cannot think of a more fitting end for those that stayed and fought."

I put a heavily laden hand on his back, then turned that into a side hug. Death here was a common occurrence, but to have someone die that you've asked for a routine favor, it shook me to the core. I have to admit that I hadn't thought much about the man but we probably needed to do something.

"Do we know if he had a family? I'm not familiar with the Hou clan."

"He had a wife, but blessedly no children," Xueyie said, "in the absence of her husband's wages, the Jin clan has seen fit to take her in until she is able to-to carry on. It's not much, but it's something that we can do."

"I would very much like to meet with her," I said,"That is, if your family will permit it."

I never knew what to say when someone died. Even less so when it's someone that was a father figure to another. Saying that you're sorry always felt wrong. Unless you killed the person yourself, but then you probably wouldn't be comforting their next of kin. The Jin family with their flair for the dramatic were a good place for a widow to go. Or at least I hope it would be.

"They are happy to do this. It is our part. The moon clan has done much. The Jin clan would like to do our part."

"Your family successfully got the Mandarin to appear just when we needed him. That in itself was a large part of our success. You got the system to work for us."

Xueyie blanched. She has been working on her hair quietly on the back. I got the impression that she engaged with her hair regularly in this same manner, removing beads carefully one by one.

"His name was Hou Bai," I said.

There had to be some way to honor his memory. The man had done a service to all of us. I just didn't know how to do it.

"Xueyie, could the Jin family-" I trailed off.

I didn't want to ask them to take this on, but I didn't see a better way.

There had to be a better way. It just wasn't on me to find it . That was something that I was going to have to learn to accept. I was the outsider here. This was not my culture. True, the group had its own culture already brewing, but Western jewel was its own beast.

Xueyie, if anything, was the resident muscle. She might have looked like a jock. She might act like a jock. But she was just a theater kid with dreams of getting out of that theater circuit. It was too bad that although everyone else could quit their day jobs and support this whole effort, she was the one who was still getting top billing as the empress in a play about the first emperor. It was really rather unfortunate that in this world actors were more prized than doctors. It was how the money went because many people were able to heal with their cultivation. But not everybody could convincingly pretend to be the empress. Oh and there was no TV.

As the muscle, she was often the strong silent type. She'd proved herself time and time again and had even fought tooth and nail against the do you want cultivators behind me as I was taking great pains to draw their leader out. If it hadn't been for her help, well I didn't want to think about that. She was instrumental. They all were.

"What can the Jin family do?" She asked.

"I'm not sure what to say. We need to honor him in some way but I don't know how we would do that. I also don't want to do the wrong thing. Can you handle this?"

"Of course. It would be a fitting duty for the Jin family."

Moon Lee stood up, straightening her skirts.

"I believe what Joe is dancing around is that he needs to figure out a way for us to make money. He's not entirely sure what we should be doing if I'm correct- yes thanks Joe. I take you nodding to mean you agree."

"What I would like to do is set up a therapy group for everyone that has been affected by the red fang. Just a group therapy that could lead to processing this awful situation that they were in. Lorenzo would help?"

He nodded.

"It would be a big group. There were-no; there are a lot of us."

"I understand therapy as a one on one tool. Perhaps the context of group therapy, does that just mean everyone together?" Moon Lee said.

Xueyie leaned in.

"Is this a thing that can be taught?" The actress said.

Lorenzo and I both gave each other the knowing look.

"It's not-"

"Weeeeeelll-"

We both stopped.

"You go ahead. You got here first after all."

"I mean we could take on an intern. There's no one from the American psychological association who's going to come here and check up on us. So if you wanted to come with and see what we do that might be okay? Lorenzo?"

"That's a sound idea. We are taught to look at the system and how it affects the individual, among other things. We can talk after this meeting though."

Xueyie smiled, swooping her hair around.

"I guess we have an intern, then.”