31.i The Golden-Hooped Rod of Compliance

~ Anari ~

Anari wasn’t really sure what she was seeing.

Surely it was Sun Ritsu who was leaping and landing higher and higher up the rungs of the spaghetti staircase. He and Sun Surina seemed trapped in a dance of their own. There was no doubt that Anari could catch up to them if she wanted, but she couldn’t predict their movements the same way that they could predict each other’s. Sun Ritsu, as dense as he was, seemed to know exactly where Sailor Sun would land next.

“Bodhi,” Anari barked. “Pick up Ham Song and follow me. We shouldn’t let them get away.”

Bodhi’s expression had become much more serious over the course of the last few seconds. They swiftly scooped up the pig and without another word, jogged down the aisle of rollercoasters in Anari’s wake.

“What makes you think he would go this far for an earring?” Bodhi asked when they had caught up to Anari’s side. Based on the way they framed the question, Anari suspected that the monk was looking for both her and the pig’s opinion.

“Jade is valuable to be sure,” Ham Song said, “but it’s not so rare that the lawful monkey would need to go to these lengths to protect it. Perhaps the earring has sentimental value since he found it at the Peach Festival?” He glanced up at Anari from under Bodhi’s arm as he said this, arching his bristly eyebrow in curiosity.

Anari brushed away her initial embarrassment at the question and answered truthfully, “That’s a possibility. After he won a staff at one of the gaming booths, he dropped it into the Jade Pool, where it transformed into an earring.”

Ham Song squealed. “Wait! That earring… used to be a staff?”

Anari shook her head. “Not a real monkey staff. Trust me, it was nothing but a toy.”

From high above, someone cried, “CHANGE!”

Spoof!

A sudden cloud of orange smoke materialized out of nowhere, momentarily concealing the two sun clones.

Bodhi pressed their hand against Anari’s abdomen to keep her from going any further. They too came to a stop and let Ham Song slip out from under their arm.

Then Bodhi pointed to the sky and said, “Look!”

The orange haze cleared.

Anari and Ham Song turned their attention to the top of two roller coasters that stood opposite of each other. Sun Surina balanced on the peak of a red coaster. Ritsu glared at her from the edge of another painted in a rusted slime green.

Something was different about Sun Ritsu. Besides the fact that his glamour had somewhat faded, he now had something that he didn’t have before.

A black and golden pole, thicker than the width of a bus and almost twice as long as the height of the roller coaster, accompanied the sun clone. Ritsu held the pole at an angle and moved it behind his back, as if to protect it from the other clone.

Though the staff was massive, it possessed traces of the same design as Ritsu’s earring, which, judging by Anari’s assessment, was nowhere in sight.

“That…” Anari whispered in disbelief. “That can’t be what I think it is.”

How had Sun Ritsu known that saying that word – change – would result in his little jade ornament transforming into something so immense and legendary? Yes, his glamour had dropped, but he was still nowhere near the Radiant State.

So, then… how?

The spideress didn’t want to consider the implications behind the monkey’s actions.

Sun Surina addressed Anari’s and the rest of the cadre’s confusion when she crossed her arms and chuckled, “The Golden-Hooped Rod of Compliance. I knew it.” She gave her scepter a little twirl and aimed it in Ritsu’s direction. “So it was you who had the legendary Great Sage’s staff all along? I always wondered who had plucked it directly from the ocean treasury. You sure have a way of commanding the rod. I thought for sure that I’d be able to keep it away from you.”

Sun Ritsu, who, not that long ago could barely balance on a stone wall in the Garden of Immortal Peaches, did not so much as quiver in his crouch hundreds of feet above the concrete streets.

Assessing Surina with a heavy golden gaze, he said, “Is that why you stayed so close to the Heavenly River? So that you could eventually steal back the staff if it ever passed through the village?”

Surina’s shimmery glamour flickered for the first time since she arrived.

“Can one of you explain exactly what is going on here!” Ham Song squealed loud enough for his voice to carry across the entire theme park. “Sailor Sun, what do you mean ‘plucked it directly from the ocean treasury’?”

Suri smirked. She raised her voice and didn’t take her eyes off of Sun Ritsu.

“My disgruntled friend, isn’t it obvious?” Suri gestured to Ritsu with her wand. “That staff isn’t just any old quarterstaff. It’s the morphing, semi-sentient Compliant Golden-Hooped Rod formed centuries ago in the Heavenly River.”

Anari’s suspicions by now had been confirmed. Ritsu had known all along that he was in possession of a true monkey king’s staff. How else could he call it to life outside of his enlightened state? And what was more, this was the most powerful quarterstaff across the entire Ninth Heaven.

Which meant that Ritsu had only been pretending to look for it.

“Anari?” Bodhi tried to wave her down. “Where are you going?”

Anari wished that she could give the monk a proper goodbye, but there was no time. She had to get out of there. The spider spirit didn’t think as she fled the fairgrounds.

The whole way back to the inn was a blur. She wasn’t sure what she was feeling in those moments. Anger? Hurt?

In truth, she was just plain confused.

Why would I want to have anything to do with a Sun like that?

He had always been an idiot and a loser. But now he was a liar too?

(You’re one to talk! What about what happened in the Hall of Perfect Light? You lied about what the phoenix said he saw.)

The spirit was hit with images of perfect light illuminating the washed-up seashells shaped to form a crown…

“Shut up!” Anari hissed. “That’s not the same!”

The spider shook her head clear of the saboteur’s presence and focused on packing her stuff. She had to get the hell out of there before Sun Ritsu caught up to her and–

“Anari?”

Too late. Sun Ritsu was already in the doorway. His golden aura had almost completely faded by now. He looked on with that more familiar, dopey expression.

“You’re leaving?” He stepped inside. “Why?”

Because I swore I wouldn’t fall for another Sun and yet here I am.

Anari couldn’t look him in the eye. She also didn’t fail to notice that the Golden-Hooped Rod of Compliance was back in its ornamental shape, dangling from Ritsu’s ear.

“Anari…”

He was too close now. The smell of peach soda rolled off of his form like a fizzy aftershave. Anari gently pushed his hand away with one of her glamoured arms when he tried to reach for her.

“Sun.” She finally made eye contact with him. “You lied to me just so I would stay with you. I wasted my whole vacation trying to help you.”

(Pft. Yeah right. It was hardly a waste.)

Ritsu’s hands trembled slightly before falling by his sides and curling into fists.

“I didn’t tell you some stuff, sure. But–”

All eight of Anari’s eyes burned as if lit by a black fire. “That’s withholding information and it’s the same as lying.”

Ritsu faltered. “Anari, I like you so much that I… I forget sometimes that we’re still strangers. I just wanted to spend more time with you.” He sighed, crossed his arms over his chest, and looked off to the side. “That’s the truth. I swear.”

The spider acted before she could talk herself out of it. She crossed the gap between them, her lips finding Ritsu’s, sure and true. She kept all eight of her limbs close to her frame because if she let herself wrap them around the sun clone, she knew that she would not let go.

This, however, didn’t stop Ritsu from uncrossing his arms and taking her face between his rough, warm palms. Anari shivered as he dragged the pad of his thumb along her cheekbone, pressing ever so slightly to prompt her to separate her lips. The spider gave in with a soft gasp. Ritsu steadied her head as he slowed down and deepened the kiss. Anari swallowed her own throaty sounds as Ritsu took control and kept going. Measuredly. Thoughtfully.

When he withdrew, his naturally tan complexion was warmer and peachy in color. With his hooded, golden brown gaze, Ritsu searched Anari’s with tentative longing.

“I’m sorry I lied to you.”

Anari wanted so many things. If only she could move her body forward instead of giving in to this habitual recoiling! She hated herself for it.

The spider sighed. “Sun, I…” She reached up and gently pried Ritsu’s hands from her face. “I have to go.”

Anari turned away before she could really register the disappointment and shock in Ritsu’s features. The sun clone called for her again. The spider wanted to stay so badly. She would have heard Sun Ritsu explain himself a million times had she been capable.

But there was only one Sun who Anari would bend for.

It was he who she had to return to.