It was a beautiful day in sehray-e-shomaal and floating above the clouds, with not a worry in the world, felt even better. The girls were having a grand time on the back of #212.
Amawas on the contrary was completely stupefied by their non-chalant behavior, seeing even #212 pitching into their jokes, she felt her patience tested at times.
Currently, the girls were playing a game called 'Chirri Udda' on his back. They would place both of their index fingers down, and then one of them would quickly start naming random creatures. If the named creature could fly, the other person would raise their index finger in the air. If, mistakenly, they lifted their finger for a creature that could not fly, like a cow or Gimpi, they'd lose.
Aatish had been eyeing them for quite sometime now, deep down she wanted to join in aswell because it looked really fun, but she didn't know the girls that well yet.
Khadija noticed it and waved at her, upon this, she glided closer.
"You know, three people can play this too" Said Khadija, Isra was grinning by her side.
Aatish reluctantly put her index finger of her paw forward, joining the the tip while Isra explained her the rules,
Aatish was a genuine soul, she could not stop smiling.
"Alright let's do this"
And they started playing, the girls cheated Aatish so much.
They invented new on the spot rules so that Aatish could go on calling most random names, but Aatish completely aloof of their deviousness simply lived in the moment and enjoyed the company of her new friends.
Amawas was flying up ahead, totally ignorning them.
***********
#212 had started feeling safe and comfortable lately, having Queen Golden in the grove, managing the affairs as best as they could be managed, and the girls being handled by both of the cats, and Zar-e-zameen, #212 felt easy.
He had also stopped caring long ago, overstressing himself on useless things like missions and important intel and what not, instead his mind would wander places seeking its own euphoria, he was slowly turning crazy in the company of the girls.
#212 shook his head slightly when he realized he was again day-dreaming. The girls had turned the notorious Nector#1 captain, funny.
But his internal strife aside,
#212 cared about them. He could sacrifice himself on the slightest heartbeat if it ever came to that for them, the girls had fulfilled his heart and the grove with their presence, they felt like family.
Carelessly gliding above an empty strech of land, he looked further towards the black dot infront of him, at Amawas.
He still wasn't quite sure about her, the sudden change in personality felt too unreal to be true. Currently they were passing above the old lair of Amawas where the previous #Nector1 squad had died by a serpent of her making.
But he wasn't the one to hold grudges, past was in the past.
His head drifted into day dreaming again. The girls and Aatish continued making ruckus on his back but he remained unbothered.
**********
After a few more hours of flying, the team reached a lush green stretch of land that was comfortably tucked between two mountains. It had huge fields of flowers and harbored bulbous looking creatures that looked like rhinos but with wings, sadly due to the high altitude, it was almost impossible to make the exact details.
#212 had his eyes peeled downwards though, his soldier instincts would kick in whenever they'd pass by an inhabited land, he found his gaze lingering at the fields of robin flowers and thought to himself
'I should take some back for justuju,' then blushed.
After a few more moments of gazing, his body stopped abruptly, purely on reflex, he looked infront and saw Amawas and Aatish stopped aswell, and before them was a scene that was too bizarre for earth, but perfectly normal for Sehra,
In front of them, protruding from the clouds was a chubby head with circular small maw, sucking in clouds around itself at an alarming speed, the creature whose head it was, stood below on the ground, it was just that his neck was so long that it literally protruded from the clouds.
"Isra look, a cloudfloud" #212 said, his eyes squinted in an amused gesture.
"What is a cloudfloud?" she asked, despite seeing one right infront of her, upon this the cloudfloud stopped sucking in the clouds and looked directly at her.
"What do you mean what is a clOuD fLOUd" it said,
"I mean what are you?" Isra replied.
"Didn't he just tell you.. a cloud- nvm, so, where are you guys headed to?" he asked with his eyes half squinted as if his head was flying in the clouds, and his voice as if he was a chain smoker. Cloud smoker.
"Uh... its private, will you tell anyone you saw us here?," asked #212
"Who am i gonna tell? literally noone passes by here, the pegarhinos rarely interact with me, my family actually abanonded me when my neck was only a tree long, they gave the fat pegarhinos some clouds to feed me time to time, but the clouds disappeared over night aswell. As you know, I'm a cloudfloud, i need clouds to live, so i was sad and helpless for days, i had no food and noone wanted to talk to me-"
Amawas's eye flinched.
"Listen damn worm, we are not interested in your pathetic life story, just tell us will you tell anyone or not?" She said bitterly.
"Oh well, suppose if someone listened to me story then i would not tell anyone about them but if they were as rude as you are then no guarantees madam" He said, still sucking in clouds, munching at the same time as talking to them.
Amawas streched her arm and a sickle formed in it,
#212 spoke from behind
"No, dont do anything, let's just hear his damn story, we can't risk a mess"
On this the cloudfloud started talking again.
"Anyways so i found a cloudfisher, his name was daal, he was abandoned by his parents aswell, and something clicked in my mind. As everyone knows the cloudfishers collect the clouds then solidify them and make their homes with it right, but he didn't know how to fly, so i made a deal with him, i used to lift him up with my neck and drop him, and he would try to flap his wings as fast as he can, then he lost his arm."
The cloudfloud was extremely lonely, even after noticing how agitated everyone was growing he felt like bursting out with genuine smile, he felt as he was cared for.
"So, one day the little bastard actually took flight, that day, he brought me one ton of compressed cloud candies, i could never forget that day really."
#212 was losing his patience.
"Is it near end?" he said with frusturation, the girls on the contrary were deeply invested in the cloudfloud's story, and so was Aatish, their mouths were open in amazement.
"Yes yes, so he kept feeding me and in return i would tell him stories and keep him entertained, funny thing, he would always burst into tears. So when my neck finally started to reach the clouds, my tiny friend simply disappeared. I dont know why though, i am a great story teller."
Then he uncaringly looked to his left and moved on, sucking the clouds in.
The team sighed in relief, it was time to fly past him and as they did, tiredly.
The cloudfloud turned around, and looked at them again.
"So, then what happened" he said.
At this Amawas groaned.
"One day i was so high, i swear i saw a cloud that talked to me, it looked like a fat cat, i saw a bird going into it and coming out as feathers only. That day was the most messed up day of my life"
That suddenly peaked the interest of the group, as they all converged to the cloudfloud attentively.
He kept looking at them and continued.
"I tell you, i tried sucking it in but it zapped me with electricity, then hung out with me, it used to carry fluffy nebulous clouds behind him, and gift me, I swear he was even better story teller than i am, ah what a guy he was, i wonder what happened to him, if you meet him, tell him, Moooong remembers him"
That drew sadness over the group, except Amawas, who kept herself solidified.
'what a guy indeed' #212 thought to himself.
Isra spoke.
"I will tell him, that moooong misses you, i'm sure he misses you aswell" Mooooong noticed her free-floating white hair and his lips curled up in a genuine smile.
"I'm sure he does" he said.
And then the team finally parted with moooong.