Black Moon Rising

Dear Sailor Moon community: It's no surprise that I love Sailor Moon. But I have a confession I need to make to you. I friggin' love the Black Moon Clan. Each and every twisted, dysfunctional one of them. I think it's hard not to. I mean, they were all manipulated into committing acts of evil under the guise of creating a better lives for them and their people who were, presumably, wrongly exiled and are now paying for the sins of their ancestors. Boo, I say, BOO! The point here, I guess, is that I love them, and this here story is going to be all up in their business.

Anyway, this will be done as a sort of diversion from my other SM fic, Requiem. Both will be updated regularly, though this one's a little less complicated, so it's easier to write. Anyhow, read it, let me know what you think. I'm open to suggestions, and believe me, I'll totally include them if they rock my socks.

Prologue

He rolled out of the flames, eyes shut tightly against the pain and the humiliation of his final defeat. Nobody was there to see it, but that was part of the problem; the senshi should have been there, dying with him. It seemed only fair He slammed the ground with a tightly closed fist, jaw clenched and glaring at the hot ground his forehead was uncomfortably pressed against. "Damn them…"

A long peal of laughter echoed through the ship and he grimaced as it grated against his ears. Despite his dire situation, he couldn't help but feel annoyance well up inside him. Esmeraude. Didn't she have the decency to just let him die in peace? "You really are a miserable sight, Rubeus…" she seemed to purr, and the redhead sharply exhaled. She might be a damn nuisance, but with her here, it meant he didn't need to die in a fire. Always a plus.

Pushing up off the ground, he put his irritation to the side and decided to play nice. "Esmeraude, you're a lifesaver! Please, take me back to the future with you; this ship will explode in two minutes!" He reached out to her, pleading, begging for her to just take his hand and get him out of there so he could finally go back home. Let the prince punish him in whatever way he saw fit, it didn't matter. At least he'd be alive. Though the pride he was ignoring in the back of his mind was retching to see the man grovel at the thigh high boots of a woman.

"Oh, really?" was all she said, and the man's red eyes widened in understanding at the cold, callous look on the green haired beauty's face. Well, this wasn't good…

With a quick flick of her wrist, Esmeraude brought her red feathered fan down sharply on the defeated man's hand, sneering in disgust at the pathetic creature. Really, where was the man's pride? Had he no shame? Surely, he must have known that dying quietly would have been the least he could do. After all, she was only there to make his final moments a little more miserable, not to help the wretch, goodness no! But she had to admit, if he had any shame at all, his weak and pathetic whimper of, "Huh? What?" wouldn't have been half as satisfying.

"Sailor Moon, the senshi, and the Rabbit too. You lost them all. And you still want to live in disgrace?" she drawled in a singsong voice, pointing her fan in the face of the wide eyed trembling man, his jaw slack in shock as he slowly realized that his comrade was not here to help him. Esmeraude just smirked. Victory was so, so sweet. "You are such a pitiful man."

And it was true. The words struck home and he felt as though he were being punched in the gut with every word, every syllable and whatever pride he had left slowly dissolved when he realized that this wasn't just a barrage of cruel worlds from the emerald haired beauty; there was harsh truth to the things she said, and that hurt the most. He, Kurenai no Rubeus, was on his knees, defeated and disgraced, before a woman he hated, begging for his life. It was pitiful. Lord, he didn't deserve to live.

"Our glorious clan doesn't need an incompetent man like you!" she boldly declared, haughtily gazing down at the man at her feet, clutching his hand and cut and bruised and bleeding, looking up at her with wide, pleading eyes. She couldn't have been more pleased as she glared at him from over the feathers of her fan. Such a fitting end for this dog…. "I think it's time for you to disappear along with this ship…" she finally said with laughter in her voice after she finished taking the sight in. She again laughed loudly as she watched panic, disbelief, pleading and finally acceptance wash over the redhead's face, and with one last look at that haunting stare, she teleported out of the ship, leaving the man to burn alive or go down with the ship. Whichever came first.

It was a surreal feeling, really. He had heard everything she said, felt she was correct even, but he did not really understand what was going on, what she intended when she had sad the clan didn't need him, or that it was time for him to vanish. Perhaps it was the heat, or the severe beating he had taken from Sailor Moon, but he sat there listening to her and feeling almost drugged, dissociated from his body as his mind failed to process his own impending death. It was only when she vanished from the space before him that he suddenly felt as though he had fallen back to earth, his body feeling tired and heavy and he knew he was going to die.

"Esmeraude! Help me!" He screamed, trying to scramble to his feet and desperately reaching out to where the woman once was, but to no avail; she was gone, and she wasn't coming back. "Esmeraude!" he cried again, slamming his fists down on the burning floor as fear tightened his chest and tears fell from his eyes, not in sadness or fear, but from pain and the searing heat around him. The ground beneath him now shook, a mere tremble at first which quickly became violent as the furnace intensified and the flames crept closer to the prone man. In a last ditch effort to hang on for as long as he could, he drew up all the power he could – very little in his weakened state – and with a fierce clenching in his chest, the last of his power was expelled as the flames engulfed him, enveloping him in hellish heat for only an instant before he felt his whole body grow cold, as though he were unceremoniously dumped into cold water. The last thing he remembered was a cold wind rushing around him as he felt himself falling.

He couldn't see it, but Saphir could feel the cruel smirk that marred Esmeraude's face as she told his brother, "Prince Dimande. As expected, it seems Rubeus wasn't up to the task…" Saphir gripped his legs tighter as he sat at the base of a large pillar just outside the throne room. He laid his head on his arm and winced as his brother dispassionately drawled, "I see. I had thought he was a little more capable than that. Then, Esmeraude, work hard so you do not share his fate…"

And that was it. Their whole lives they had been together. They had grown up together, for crying out loud, and that was it. Rubeus was dead, and that is all his brother had to say for his death. Saphir could not help but begin crying. It was true that he had not liked Rubeus, so to speak; after all, the man had been nothing short of an arrogant, sadistic, womanizing bastard who bordered on the sociopathic, but even he deserved more than that when the man he died serving found out about his demise. Thought he was more capable indeed…Saphir had thought his brother was kinder than that.

He had been hoping – praying – that Rubeus would succeed so he could come home, not so much for the war, but for himself. His desire for the commander to return was entirely selfish, he knew that, and now that he was dead, the prince couldn't help but feel awful for ever having thought like that. But even now, as he sat crying in the large, spacious hallway, he couldn't tell if he was crying for his dead clan mate, or for his own loss. He was counting on Rubeus' return. Rubeus knew where Petz was…

With his death, the location of the sisters Ayakashi was lost. It was perfect. The sisters were safe, human, living on Earth, where they had always wanted to be, where he wanted to be, with its fabled fields of beautiful flowers…Rubeus may have been more successful than he had thought. Truly, it was perfect; there was nobody connected to the girls left alive that could possibly bring them back to Nemesis. If he hadn't known better, he'd say that the psychopathic asshole had planned it like this himself…

It was all too much. He'd never see Petz again. With renewed energy, Saphir let himself go and wept freely into his arms.

The sky was just beginning to lighten with impending dawn and was mirrored in the water of the lake in the park, a special treat for early risers, though few were out and about in the cold autumn morning. A light breeze and falling leaves kept the lake from ever being still, the water marred by ripples and foliage and ducks that splashed about in the shallow depths.

He could not see much, though his eyes were open, he could feel that. Just varying shades of darkness overwhelmed his vision, though he could make out dark silhouettes and shadows of trees and a pathway and a dock extending into what he assumed must be a lake. He knew this place. He had been here before. He…he…

Everything was in pain, and the man couldn't remember how he got there or where exactly he was. Everything was out of focus, and the only thing that was real at that moment was the sharp, burning pain all over his body. He groaned, tried to move but found he could not, he just did not have the strength. Light slowly began to flood his vision, and though everything was fuzzy, he could at least see shapes and colors. This was something he could work with, but he needed to get up. He had no idea how long he had been out, but dawn was breaking, and no doubt it wouldn't be long before he was found by some passerby, and he just couldn't stomach that thought, not when he was so weak and so pathetic.

With considerable effort, he managed to lay his hand flat on the ground, an effort to push himself onto his stomach from his side failing when his shaky hand slipped out away from his body on thick, warm liquid that he was only just now beginning to notice. He brought the trembling hand to his face and tried to focus blank, listless eyes on it, only to see it covered in a deep crimson that matched the pool he lay in. Blood. Everywhere. He groaned deeply, chuckling weakly as he coughed and shuddered there on the ground, the same thick, horrible liquid running from his mouth with every forceful exhale. This was looking to be one of those days where he just should not have gotten out of bed.

As far as plans went, Rubeus wasn't overlooking the irony of that one either. He had them, the Sailor Senshi, in his ship. He had won. Sure, he didn't have Sailor Moon. Or the Rabbit. Or the Silver Crystal. Or anything they had set out to accomplish…but he did have the senshi. In hindsight, if he had just killed them while he had them crucified in his ship, as he easily could have, the defenses of Crystal Tokyo would have fallen. He'd have returned a hero, the war would have been won. He was too weak to be angry. He just wanted the pain to end.

His sharp red eyes eased into focus and he could see clearly, though his thinking was still a bit foggy, a fact that he attributed to the tremendous pain that coursed through his body. He didn't need to look at himself to know that he was covered in burns and bruises. A sharp pain in his chest led him to gingerly touch the area and felt it slick with hot blood. He looked down and with a grown of irritation tried to wipe away what he could with the tatters of his vest. He groaned and went limp on the ground again, sighing heavily from the effort; there was a sizable crescent moon shaped chunk torn out of his chest from where Sailor Moon's attack had struck him. It immediately began to bleed again, and he watched this listlessly, doing nothing to stop it and noticing a faint, gold glow from the bleeding wound. Something told him that he wasn't supposed to survive the attack…

He growled loudly against the pain as he rolled onto his stomach – and right into the pool of blood – and pushed himself up onto his elbows, groaning in pain as he lifted his sore, aching body off the ground and stood on his shaking, unsteady legs. It took nearly all his effort to walk over and lean against the nearest tree so he could catch his breath and stave off the lightheadedness he felt that threatened to render himself unconscious once again. "I am such an idiot…" he mumbled softly to nobody in particular, but he felt a bit better for having said it allowed. "Did I even have a plan?"

No, he didn't, and he knew this keenly. Teleporting out of that ship was perhaps one of his most idiotic impulses ever, and that was certainly saying something, since his early teens were steeped in nothing but idiocy, only this act of impulse did not have the benefit of being even remotely fun. Had he accepted his fate, he could have just died there. The pain would be over, and he wouldn't have been here suffering now. And now this…this…

Trapped in the past in a city he did not know surrounded by his enemies? Where would he go? How would he get by? Did he even want to? Really, he was as good as dead. All that teleporting off that time bomb did was delay his inevitable expiration, which was foolish, really, given how much agony he suffered now. And what would the senshi do to him if they found him? He shook his head softly and looked at the ground, his red eyes stoic and uncaring as he watched blood fall off his body in long, thick drips onto the dew covered grass at his feet. When the senshi found him, that was a better thing to ask, for they would find him, they had to. He held out his hand in front of him and tried to call upon his powers, felt the familiar, albeit faint, pull at his core, and yet nothing happened. He had given his all to escape, and whatever powers he had managed to recover in the time he lay unconscious on that path in the park no doubt were going to keeping him alive. No powers, at least not now. He felt completely naked without them, and he dropped his hand in defeat, briefly wondering if this was how humans felt. How did the Ayakashis do it? How could they accept being unburdened of their most valuable asset? He would never understand that…

Rubeus groaned in frustration, running his hand through his messy red hair, his thumb brushing his ear and his face scrunched in confusion and annoyance as he felt at the lobe; his earring was gone, as was the sliver of the lobe it was attached to, though that wound seemed to be healing and no longer bled. He sighed and carefully removed the remaining one, carefully placing it in the pocket of his pants; had that been gone too, he may have gone postal. After all, he could only take so much in one day before he absolutely had it. And the sun was only just now coming up...at three in the morning he had Sailor Moon and the Rabbit in the ship, and it must have been nearing six now. When had he last slept? His eye twitched at the thought; the unconsciousness didn't count. He felt completely exhausted. All he wanted at this point was a nap. And a five course steak dinner. And maybe a long, long bath. And while he was fantasizing, he may as well ask for a mermaid and a harem of large bosomed beautiful women and an island in the tropics, because he was just as likely to get those things as anything else.

With a deep breath, he let his body relax against the tree as he removed his vest and held the bloody, tattered thing to his chest, his other hand gingerly rubbing at his shoulder as he quietly watched the sun rise over the lake. He couldn't go home. His prince no doubt has heard he is dead, as he really should be. And he made some serious enemies out of the Ayakashi sisters. He really had nowhere to go.

"What do I do now?"