35.ii Like Scooping the Moon from the Water

~ Ham Song ~

A phantom wind swirled around Sun Surina’s ankles as she knelt low and double wrapped the handle of the grocery bag swollen with peaches around her wrist. With her other arm, she tucked Ham Song snug against her abdomen.

The bristly hairs along Ham Song’s body tingled at the anticipation of sudden flight. He wanted to ask Suri if she was about to perform that amazing feat that only highly adept sun clones could pull off – the coveted cloud-somersault.

Cotton-candy colored clouds materialized in the sky just under Sun Surina’s feet. Ham Song watched in wonder as Suri bounced from cloud to cloud like a spacer treading across the surface of the moon. The border between the Dog and Rabbit Provinces stretched out below them, creating a hard contrast between the dreamy pastels of Kawaii Village versus the more washed-out colors of the Dog Province slums.

During this buoyant flight to Bodhi’s holding cell, Ham Song couldn’t help but put together a few things. For one, he knew that sun clones could not cloud-somersault without a staff. It was one of the reasons why he made sure that Sun Ritsu did his best to always keep the staff on his person and to hide it in plain sight. At first, Ritsu had been reluctant to do so, but when Ham Song asked if Ritsu wanted another incident like the one at the Hall of Perfect Light, the monkey heeded his companion and begrudgingly reattached the miniaturized Golden-Hooped Rod to his ear.

All this time, Ham Song had assumed Sun Surina had wanted the staff to increase her rank and improve her ability to travel. But now he was realizing that her little star-tipped scepter was also a staff. Suri was merely clever enough to disguise it as a decoration – a harmless element of flair in her cheeky schoolgirl act.

It begged the question, Dear Traveler, what would Suri want with a monkey’s staff when she already had one that suited her needs just fine? She didn’t seem like the black market peddling type. So the only explanation was that she was taking the staff on behalf of someone else.

Perhaps it was a stretch, Ham Song was beginning to realize. Still, he couldn’t help his mind working out the possibilities. He knew Sun Surina wasn’t a bad spirit, but with the spideress having gone AWOL and the monk a whole walking disaster, it was now up to Ham Song to look out for Sun Ritsu’s best interests.

“What’s the matter, dear pig? Never traveled by way of cloud-strolling before?” Sun Surina asked as she gracefully took off from another dissolving cloud.

Dismissing the suspicions for now, Ham Song grunted thoughtfully. “Cloud-strolling? Is that what they’re calling it these days? Hm. Well, I’ve never seen a Sun cloud-somersault like this before.”

“Sweet immortal peaches, you think I’m cloud-somersaulting. That’s a laugh.”

Ham Song didn’t know there was a difference and he told Suri so. The celebrity thief was patient enough to explain the difference between the various forms of travel among today’s sun clones. According to Sun Surina, you had your cloud-strollers, cloud-surfers, and lastly, your cloud-crawlers.

“Only the real heavy hitters can cloud-somersault, dear pig. See how my clouds don’t stay together once I’ve pushed off from them? I don’t have the spiritual energy to sustain them after I’ve moved on.”

A round of applause sounded off below as a crowd of locals recognized their favorite idol floating overhead.

“Now that you think about it,” Ham Song said, “back in my day, monkey kings always left a streak of cloud trails in the sky when they traveled by these means.”

Surina hummed at the thought. “Back in your day, hm? I must hold in my arms a rare and ancient hog in that case. I myself only know of one sun clone who can streak the sky with his cloud-somersaulting.”

It was impossible to tell, Dear Traveler, but Ham Song went positively pink when Suri called him rare and ancient. Then, clearing his throat, he asked, “So you do? Who might that be?”

Suri’s arms tightened around the pig’s midsection and she dove into a front flip off of the final cloud before landing on the pale yellow concrete.

“A very good friend of mine, who honestly hates it when I brag about him. So I’m going to respect his privacy for now.” She sweetly tapped the triangular tip of Ham Song’s snout with her scepter before setting him down.

Ham Song, who hadn’t been expecting that sudden swerve in body orientation, needed a moment to reclaim his balance and put his urge to puke again in check.

“Look alive, dear pig. We are here.” Surina’s tone grew serious and professional as she smoothed down her pleated skirt uniform.

Ham Song swallowed a few times, blinked the dizziness away and looked up at the mint-tiled building looming ominously just across the street.

“The Kawaii Village Correctional Facility.”