AUTHOR'S NOTES: Oh! I've posted two fics in five days! This must be a
record... ^_^;;;;; Anyway, this is my Usa-day fic, and the beginning of yet
another epic.
*dodges various thrown items*
I swear I'll finish TWOH this summer, even if it kills me!
Moving on, this is yet another canon fic- which should tell you something.
Of course, I'm completely innocent, and any blame falls on either Demando
or the following people:
Elysia
Patchie
Mizu
Kawaii-imouto-chan
They all contributed to my madness in some was- it's not my fault!
DEMANDO: Your halo is crooked.
MEREDITH: Is it, now? ^_^
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the feedback, and please direct any feedback to
mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com.
~Meredith
[http://www.demando.net]
LEGAL DISCLAIMER:
There was an Evil Mad Scientist,
Who lived in a pair of high-heels,
She didn't own Sailor Moon,
It's characters she would not steal,
She cackled evilly and filled her husband with dread,
Disclaimed all her fanfics and hit Mamoru over the head.
(Just for good measure, mind you. ^_~)
PERSONAL DISCLAIMER: I am a hopeless romantic, but not a very nice one. YOU
HAVE BEEN WARNED.
-----------------------------------------------------
The Dark is Rising: Prelude I
by Meredith Bronwen Mallory
mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com
-----------------------------------------------------
She was about to commit the greatest the Sin of her lifetime.
Setsuna paused for a moment in her stirring of the dark Avril tea, turning
the thought over in her mind several times, looking it over with a clinical
eye. Her garnet eyes narrowed ever so slightly as her heart lurched
painfully within her breast. Perhaps no so clinical after all. The Angel of
Time wished for detachment, prayed for apathy, but knew all to well that
it would be denied to her, as so many things were.
For a a brief moment- too brief to ease Setsuna's guilt- her own will
battled with that of the Command. But no, she had no Choice. The Command
would not be broken, the Will of the Universe would not be denied. She was
merely an instrument, a tool, her foolish human desires and emotions were
to be sacrificed in the name of the greater good.
It wouldn't be the first time.
With care, Setsuna finished with the tea (it smelled familiar- why?) and
removed the small black cauldron from its place suspended over the bed of
glowing crystals. Nemesis was denied a great deal- even fire.
, Setsuna thought without mercy, Idly, she wondered what ingenious (or
was that desperate?) Nemesisian exile had discovered how to generate heat
from those crystals posessing the Mica mineral. Without her, that pitiful
band of original colonists would probably never have survived. Rhyolite-
that was her name.
Rhyolite...
Serenity's incarnation had been named after her.
NO! Setsuna shook her head violently, almost spilling the tea (where do I
know that smell from?). She would not think about that right now.
Concentrating on loading the tea tray, Setsuan emptied the cauldron into
the pot and added the two tall containers of whatever Nemesisians
substituted for sugar and honey. That completed, she stepped daintily over
the body of Princess Rhyolite's pregnant maidservant, comforting herself
that the young girl was only unconscious.
I take only one life today.
Her hands trembled visibly as she set the tray down one last time. The
next time she picked it up, it would be deadly. Her palms burned, stung
with the pain of willful betrayal, as she reached into the pocket of her
borrowed servant's uniform and withdrew a vile of distilled Genkido nectar.
The flower only grew on Nemesis, and even then it was rare, growing only in
the most treacherous climes of Rueben
Setsuna thought,
Suspect what, Setsuna?
Suspect that a Sailor Senshi poisoned her own mistress and Queen? That the
perfection that is the Angel of Time soiled her hands with the blood of
betrayal?
NO! Rhyolite was not Serenity, Serenity was not Rhyolite. They would never
be interchangeable. That was why Rhyolite must die. They shared the same
soul, that was all. Setsuna leaned for a moment on the polished black
counter, breathing heavily, wondering if she was thinking her own thoughts
or that of the Command. She couldn't be sure. Of it's own Will, her
delicately manicured hands
(you take such good take of your hands, Setsuna- but you kill with them)
uncorked the vile and poured the contents into the tea pot. For a moment
the shimmering red liquid swirled hypnotically at the surface, before
sinking the mix with the rest of the tea. It was done.
As Setsuna made her way out of the kitchen and into the corridor, passing
the guards with an air of 'I belong here, don't bother me', two fragments
of memory fell into place. The tea was made from Avril, a night blooming
flower. It grew on Pluto as well as Nemesis.
Or used to. Pluto was a dead world- now. Internally, Setsuna shuddered,
but the Will had taken hold of her now. There was no turning back. Like a
thing on automation the emerald-haired woman gliding through the silent
black corridors of Demando's underground fortress. Her dark brown skirts
brushed along the steps, making accusing whispers as she climbed higher,
towards the surface. Bellow, the Zougenotou Fortress stretched for some five
miles- providing housing for Demando's army, personal servants and his
court. But only the Zougenotou, only the White Tower was visible from the
air. It rose above the desolate landscape of Nemesis, stark and beautiful-
a monument to Demando's military genius and Saffir's architectural talent.
It was there, it that high ivory cage that Demando kept his most prized
possession.
His wife.
At least, that was how Setsuna thought of it. What she did not know (or
chose not to know) was how Rhyolite had begged her husband for that high
room, when all Demando had desired was to hide her away in the depths of
the underground base. In that Tower, she was vulnerable to attack, but the
Princess' own unique brand of persuasion convinced Demando to let her stay
in her loft birdcage. It reminded her of flying, she said, and they both
knew she could no longer fly. But it eased Setsuna's guilty heart and her
unwilling hands to think of this as a liberation.
she thought,
The wide, bulky stair case gave way to a dainty spiral as Setsuna reached
the surface, but she had a ways yet to go. Now the dim light of Nemesis
filtered in through the tiny windows, casting for Setsuna a barely visible
shadow. Her legs felt as though they might give way, so much did her own
awareness rattle against her body, and for the first time Setsuna wondered
if she really would be able to live with herself after this. To kill the
one she was supposed to protect, to take the life of the Angel of Mercy,
Sailor Moon- it was the ultimate transgression.
Hoping to garner some strength, Setsuna whispered those words given to her
by the dying, twisted heap of flesh that had been the previous Angel of
Time.
"I am Temperance, the Angel of Time."
(Be fifteen, be taken from your home. Be frightened, tremble so much that
you embarrass yourself as you are led into the inner-most room of the
temple. Feel ill as the Priestess removes her hood and reveals to you her
true Face, the Face of Time.)
"I am without emotion, for emotion does not serve me."
(Throw yourself at her feet, beg her to take another, anyone besides
yourself. Clutch at those black, all concealing robes and feel her eyes on
you, measuring you, finding you unworthy. But you must suffice. There is no
other.)
"I am loyal only to the Will of the Universe. I do as it Commands."
(Feel the Priestess' claw-like hand press against your shoulder. Feel it
curl and draw blood. Hear her words, like dry leaves against the coldest of
stone, feel her chill breath against your ear. She says there is no hope-
none at all. You are the one.)
"I answer to no one."
(Now, be seventeen, but feel thousands and thousands of years older. Look
down at your Home. See the swirl of green cloud against the violet oceans
of Pluto. Know that it is evening on that planet, on your home. Aunt
Lyndisty is dressing for dinner. Cousin Miyuki and Cousin Matataki are
playing hide and go seek with Cousin Sayoni. Sister Hitomi is taking the
roast from the oven.)
"I have no guilt, for I am blameless."
(Feel the pain curl up and scrape along your insides. See the stars in the
distance cease to be, for Metalia has come. See that darkness, that all
consuming darkness, wrap around your home. Do not move, do nothing to stop
it- the Silver Millennium must know, must believe what devastation Metalia
is capable of. Your own people will be the sacrificial lamb. See that
shinning violet orb bellow you become a swirling mass of ebony. Know now
that everyone is dead. Lyndisty and Miyuki and Matataki and Sayoni and
Hitomi and and and...)
"I am Senshi Pluto, I hold the hour glass in my stainless palms."
Setsuna stopped as she reached the top of the stairs, a trembling waif in
the pale Nemesis night. She gripped the tray so hard that the decorative
carvings dug into her hands. Before her stood the door to Princess
Rhyolite's private chambers, and beyond that... her prey.
She stepped forward and knocked- boldly and without remorse.
Remorse was for later.
-----
Princess Rhyolite; Consort of Prince Demando- sometimes called the Heart
of Nemesis by her admirers- knelt by her bed in prayer. Her hair was the
exact shade of sunlight brushed gold as Serenity's, a color that Setsuna
had previously been sure could not be reproduced. It was bound up in
several intricate sections of braids, the rest falling loosely to brush
along the backs of her legs. A long, iridescent robe of crimson graced her
body, trimmed in black and slightly reminiscent of Serenity's robes of
state.
Serenity, trapped within her crystal prison- soulless- not sleeping (as
Setsuna had told the King) but very, very dead.
Rhyolite's lips moved faintly as she chanted her prayer, while Setsuna
stood frozen in the doorway. The maidservant who had let her in stood still
as well, loathe to interrupt her mistress.
"Fire, Water, Earth and Air,
Lay me to my bed with care,
If I die before I wake...."
Setsuna's soul tore red hot and scathing against her conflicting emotions
and the orders of Command.
she thought. Even thinking hurt
now. She was supposed to be a doll, a tool, an emotionless robot.
"Ma'am?" her voice sounded flat and dull in her own ears, and it broke the
spell of concentration that had gathered around the Princess.
"Yes?" Rhyolite asked, rising to her feet with barely managed grace.
"I brought your Midnight Supper, as you asked." Rhyolite frowned.
"Is something the matter with Gypsum?" the Princess asked, concern
filtering into her beautiful, painfully familiar features. Her eyes were an
aquamarine blue, dotted with gold.
"Gypsum?" Setsuna asked stupidly. Quickly, she added; "She wasn't feeling
well."
"Not the baby, I hope!" Rhyolite cried, "Its too soon..."
"No, not the baby."
"Good," the Princess smiled, accepting the tray from Setsuna and setting
it on the vanity, pouring a cup for herself and adding sweeteners 'by
ear'. She turned towards Setsuna, "Would you like some...?"
"My name is Shiori," Setsuna lied, "And no thank you, your Highness."
Rhyolite nodded in acceptance and took a seat on the small couch by the
window, looking at the foreign 'maid' with curiosity.
"You must be new here, Shiori," Rhyolite said, smiling, "How do you like
it at Zougenotou?"
"Just fine, your Majesty," Setsuna wrung her hands behind her back,
desperately. The Princess sensed she was nervous and smiled kindly, all too
kindly. The Senshi of Time had not been prepared for just how much this
girl would remind her of Serenity.
"You can sit down, dear," the golden child suggested, "Where are you
from?"
"Rueben, your Ladyship, and I would rather stand." The Princess looked
hurt, but said nothing.
For a moment she stared slightly off at some distant point, before she
bounced a little. Excitement swept over her features.
"Do you have word from my husband?" Setsuna swallowed hard and shook her
head. The other girl's shoulder's drooped to some extent, but she rolled
her eyes and made a little kicking motion with her foot.
"Drat that man!" the expression on her face mirrored exactly the one Usagi
often wore when Rei chastised her for no reason- a type of half-laughing
pout. " 'There's no need for you to come to this meeting' he says! 'It'll
only take a little while' he says! Men!" she shook her head and sighed,
"He's probably done more harm to the negotiations than good." Setsuna
recalled- perhaps because the Command willed her to recall- that Rhyolite
was often the tempering force behind Demando's alliances. There was a
reason she was called the Heart of Nemesis.
At last, as Setsuna had been waiting and dreading; Rhyolite took the tea
cup in her dainty, child like hands and raised it to her lips. She drank
deeply, and gazed at Setsuna over the poisoned liquid with innocent, wide
eyes. The Senshi felt as if the poison was sliding down her own throat,
needles pinching the flesh there.
"You look flushed, Shiori, are you sure you don't want to sit down?"
Setsuna raged internally,
"If it pleases the Princess," the Angel of Time managed, "I am not feeling
well myself, and would like to be excused."
"You don't need to ask me!" Rhyolite fussed, "Go lie down, dear. If you
get the chance, please tell Gypsum that she's not to be out of bed until
she feels one hundred percent. I'll be down in the morning to see her."
Setsuna said, "Yes, your Majesty" She turned and passed through the
threshold, but she did not cry.
Expressionless, she glided down the twisted column of steps and vanished
from Nemesis all together.
Into the depths of her own private Hell.
-------
The Creature stirred. Shale could feel its ugly, reptilian body shift
against his back; its dry, pointed muzzle moving against the open wound on
his own neck. Having been lax with slumber, the claws that held Shale's
beating heart now tightened in awareness- and Shale felt his own terror
crystallize as well. Greedily, he grasped at the emotion, knowing that it
was his own.
He owned so little, any more.
Desperately, the young man attempted to control his breathing- if the
creature moved at all then its full consciousness would soon follow. His
hands- his mutilated, scarred and changing hands- shook as he positioned
the shears, then snipped the new, fresh stalk of Wormwood from its root.
He could almost taste it now, the heady, rich and smoky texture of the drug
as it moved through his blood stream. Being a scientist, he carefully took
note of which organs it would hit first as it traveled to its final
destination- his brain.
Of all the mind-altering, addictive drugs in the universe, many said that
Wormwood was the most dangerous of all. A native of Nemesis' harsh,
unforgiving clime, Wormwood was seemingly harmless in the first few small
doses. In the end, however, it flushed from the the body the most
important of minerals, replacing it with tiny colonies of Wormwood
crystals. As with most things from Nemesis, the result was death. For many
of its victims, the drug replaced everyday sanity with a tumult of colors,
took the senses and completely rearranged them. But for Dr. Shale Levitite-
who's reality was an endless swirl of alien thoughts and alien feelings-
the drug induced sanity. He hoarded that sanity like precious gold; for, as
each day passed, his body belonged more to the alien being that rode his
back and clutched at his heart with deliberately painful claws.
The bowels of Zougenotou's research facility were the perfect for growing
Wormwood, Shale thought thankfully. The emotion almost surprised him, yes,
but it meant that he was wrestling a bit of control from the horrid,
sleeping monster. Anymore, he feared he almost understood the alien
thoughts that reached out to his own, rifled through his memories and left
him feeling like an empty container. And last night, what had it said?
Jik-
Jak-
Jakokuzuishou.
Oh yes, Shale knew that word. Without meaning to, he let his free hand
lift to touch the delicate black sigil that rested against his forehead. He
had the Mark, alright, the Mark of one who could touch the jakokuzuishou's
dark, wild power. What was it they had said about him, when he'd stood in
the Registry office with wide, unblinking eyes?
"He's not worth the training."
Oh.
With his three Wormwood stalks in hand, Shale moved towards the pitiful
fire in the center of his room. He tried to remember what he'd sacrificed
in the burning this time- notes, most definitely, maybe even paper money. A
picture of his little sister, too. He knelt by those warm, forbidden
flames, cloaked by one of his few remaining sheets and felt miserable. His
face, beneath the cowl of the sheet, was too disfigured for any clear guess
at an age- no one would have believed he was but twenty two.
The flames licked at the edges of the Wormwood stalk, reflecting in
Shale's deep, gray eyes as they watched, hungering to touch reality. What
had happened, after the Registry office? He shoved the hot, burning end of
the stalk against his scarred hands, felt the sap eat away at the flesh
there, and remembered. There had been schooling, lots of it.
"If I can't use the jakokuzuishou's power, then I'll study it." Who had he
said that to? The Girl, yes, HER!
Like a steel trap, the Creature's thoughts closed around Shale's as they
wandered down that familiar path, shoving the memories away from the boy.
With a groan of despair, Shale hunched forward and wept. He shoved another
stalk of Wormwood up against what was left of his nose, and sniffed
forcefully. The charred plant burned a little, but he could barely feel it
any more. The skin and cartilage had peeled away days ago.
"Give her back," Shale begged, hating himself for being so pathetic, yet
yearning for whatever it was that was left of himself. The Creature's arm
moved painfully between his exposed ribs, and again the clawed hand
contracted around his heart. "Please!" he gasped out.
He tried to remember her, what she smelled like, how she talked and
laughed, how she made love. She had black hair (maybe?) and wanted to be a
minister (or was that someone else?). That was probably right, she talked a
lot about saving *something*. Maybe it had been him.
Shale laughed, he needed saving *now*.
"Shale? Dr. Shale of Levitite?" there came a pounding, from somewhere.
Belatedly, the young man realized it was coming from his door, and that the
voice belonged to one of his colleagues.
"Don't come in!" he breathed out, loud as he could. Funny, what the nose
did for ones voice. He was only realizing it now that most of his own was
gone.
"Are you alright?" the voice squawked, obviously having noticed the
difference as well.
"No!" Shale muttered truthfully. He looked around his room, with its walls
lined in glittering Wormwood plants and it's floor space consumed by
abandoned fire pits. With any luck he'd burn the whole fortress down,
himself included , and save Nemesis the trouble. Considering the colored,
molten expanse of his own hands, Shale shook his head. "I'm very sick," he
added at last, "Please, I'm sorry I have been gone so long. I know that
Lord Master Demando's project is important, but I don't think I'd be any
help to you the way I am now." This, he thought, was also the truth. He'd
been surprised they hadn't come after him sooner, actually. Demando worked
his scientists harder than he did his slaves.
"Alright," the voice conceded, not without a great deal of suspicion, "But
you'll need to come in tomorrow. We're trying to angle the jakokuzuishou's
power to support Lord Master Demando's fleet, but it isn't working.
*Everyone* has to come in tomorrow."
"I get your point," Shale snapped, then listened as footsteps retreated
down the vacant hallway. Unsure of its source, Shale none the less allowed
the wave of riotous red anger to consume him.
With his twisted hands (looking at them now he thought they looked a lot
like claws) he dashed his few unharmed possessions to the floor, then stood
in the darkened room looking at the wreck of his life. In the dim light of
the fire, he could see his reflection in the tiny, broken shards of what
had been his mirror.
"Just look at me," he whispered in that odd, nose-less voice. How deep it
was, how it echoed. He found it made his skin crawl.
Then the Wormwood finally hit his system.
"Just look at this!" she had spread her arms wide, she had turned to him,
she had been alive. That last fact was perhaps the most startling of all,
Shale considered as he gazed over the wide horizon of this new memory. She
*had* had black hair, he felt some triumph at that. It dripped in tiny
finger curls from the top of her head, twisting like a thing alive. She
moved with a funny sway to her hips, but she was excited as she spoke to
him.
"Have they ever found another crystal, besides the Jakokuzuishou?"
"No, just tiny shards of the main crystal. We think the Jakokuzuishou was
moved once before, about a century before Lord Master Demando found it and
moved it to his fortress." Detached, the young scientist watched another,
more human version of himself follow his own lover into the cave. Nemesis
was riddled with caves, with crystals, and with life-forms that dealt in
death. No wonder they called it a dead moon. The Jakokuzuishou itself
dealt only in energy of destruction, it did not know how to rebuild.
Shale felt the monster move again, felt it leaning over his shoulder and
looking into his reflection with interest. It knew he was remembering, it
was interested in the results of this memory. So, there had been a cave,
yes, and his lover. They had been looking for more crystals, even if they
were just Jakokuzuishou. He'd climbed up to one of the ledges to check on
something- a reading? no, something she'd seen- but came back down with
nothing. He'd been shaking his head as he turned back to her, to see that
wide, frozen look in her blue eyes. (Her eyes, yes, they had been BLUE!).
He'd said her name then, in worry and askance. Jaw limp with horror, she'd
backed away from him, and it was only then that he felt the claws digging
into his ribs, driving into his heart.
Finally, she screamed.
It had been a while before the monster had really begun to move into his
body. It had been three years.
"What-" Shale drove a mutilated, swirling fist of color into the wall, "do
you want from me!?!" The present was a pale thing, but darker than the
cave he had remembered. The bed-sheet slipped away, revealing Shale's
grotesque body and that of the creature, bent around him. It was little
bigger than his torso, hind feet digging into his hips as it laid its
dragon-esque head on his shoulder. Practically feeling the creature's
satisfaction, its firm belief that NOW (finally) was the time to do what it
was born to do, Shale clenched his jaw and asked the fatal question.
"What do you want?"
It came not in words, but in sensations that scraped along the young man's
nerve endings. An explanation, it was, but of a logic so utterly removed
from humanity that it nearly drove Shale mad. The creature was not born, it
was alive, but utterly without a species or home or family to have loyalty
to. It couldn't reproduce, it didn't know how to. It had no will to live,
but it knew nothing of the art of dying either. No motivation stirred its
thoughts for centuries as it lay alive, but hating that life. It had seen
many things, yes, but it had no passion for these sights, no appreciation
for the history it had witnessed. Aware, it hated its own awareness for it
was alone alone alone.
Whirling away from the rainstorm of such complete alien thought, Shale
found himself removed from his own room and standing in one of the lower
stairwells that led to the surface world. He knew without really knowing,
that he had come there in a fit of madness, and idly wondered just how many
people had seen him. That train of thought was lost, however, as the
creature's thoughts began to move again, trying to force more understanding
into its victim. Shale felt his body quake and wrapped the sheet (when had
he picked it up?) around himself once more. He looked down on instinct, and
his stomach turned. Horrified, he lifted his hands to his face only to
discover that his fingers actually pressed only against smooth bone. That
meant that those flakes of skin... were his own.
He wondered why he was still alive.
Lost to himself, Shale continued up the staircase, as if distance from his
room might lessen the horror of his experience. As he reached the ground
level, the magnificent light of the Milky Way rained down through the
windows, and he realized just how much time he had lost. For a moment he
stood staring up into the heavens, feeling his own wonder muted by the
monsters extreme, hateful disinterest. How much sleep he'd lost, he did not
know, but his body ached with the effort of even that small climb. He
rested against the window case, turned his back to the stars and gazed up
the ornate, woven staircase leading to Lady Princess Rhyolite's chambers.
Whether the clarity was leant to him by the Wormwood or by the monster,
Shale did not know, but every-day things were finally coming back to him.
Of course, he should know who Princess Rhyolite was, there wasn't a soul on
Nemesis who didn't. She was an unusual thing, they said, she had heart and
compassion and (the strangest of all) wrote poetry about how beautiful
Nemesis was. No wonder Lord Master Demando had snatched her up and married
her.
Married.
Shale wished he knew where Her (he still couldn't remember her name. Why
can't you remember her name, you thrice damned bastard?) tomb was. Then he
might stand beside the empty marker and ask her to help him, or to pray for
him, or something. She had been a minister, she would have known what to
do. Frustration wrapped around the young scientist, as real as the alien
Thing that dug its claws into his hips and heart. Why should he bother,
when she was gone and he was...
-ALONE.
Had anything remained of Shale afterwards, he would have told you that
moment was the first time there was no distinction between his thoughts and
that of the Creature.
But after that, there wasn't any Shale at all.
A figure moved down the stairs, suddenly, and the newly born thing
standing by the window stared at it openly. For a moment, the collection of
memories and feelings believed that it was Her, but when the figure moved
into the starlight, the illusion was gone. This woman had green hair, not
black. Long and straight, her tresses drooped slightly when they should
have shifted with life. It was the way she walked, however, that gave away
the game. The woman had her arms wrapped around herself, her head lowered
with her lashes draped over her eyes, and she minimized the sway of her
pale, curved hips.
She walked like a fearful woman, a guilty woman.
Then she dropped away, out of existence, vanishing if she had never been.
The thing, the newly born thing that had been Shale, whispered in awe as
he looked at the empty stairway.
"The Angel of Time has been here," he whispered in that nose-less, deep
and echoing voice of his, "and she has brought death."
Beneath the sheet that concealed the abandoned body of Shale, the
creature- the Death Phantom- smiled its particular, hateful smile and began
to tell the Wiseman what to do.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
MEREDITH: You know what I'm going to say, don't you?
DEMANDO: Bwahahahaha?
MEREDITH: But it's so much more fun when *I* get to do it!
BWAHAHAHAHAHA!
Can I have some feedback now, please?
mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com
mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com
mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com
mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com
mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com
mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com
mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com
mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com
mallorys-girl@cinci.rr.com
Subtle enough?