Chapter Two: The descent

Ascension

Disclaimer: I don't own the characters.

Chapter Two: The descent

It was like being devoid of feeling. Eyes sewn shut in what seemed like eternal blindness, Rei could not see a thing. Her arms were wound tight around her legs, pulling them tightly to her chest in a forced fetal position. She was encased in a sort of thick fluid; it flowed through her body, her lungs, her eyes, the very blood in her veins. It was her life support.

The only thing she could think of to name the slick substance was embryonic. She succumbed to its nourishments and felt it grow warm with motherly affection. Before she could fully absorb the balmy care the case began to drain, pulling her to the bottom in a slow suction action and drawing her to the unseen floor.

The warmness of the case imbued with embryonic fluid flowed out and in gusted a cooler, lighter air. Once the case had reached equilibrium Rei could move her limbs, twitch, grasp some of the thick, gooey substance in her fingers. Her body lurched, now devoid of being surrounded by care-giving sustenance and the fluid oozed from her throat and mouth.

She pushed herself up and heaved, fluid mixed with vomit pooling before her unseeing eyes and onto her splayed fingers. It dripped leisurely from her nose like a child with a cold and eventually the seal on her eyes began to dissolve. Rei, however, waited to open them. Her naked body shivered, embryonic fluid still coating her in a light sheen, as her clouded mind began to clear the fog.

It was…

Her lungs caved as a pressure built in her chest, momentarily putting a hiatus on her ability to breathe. Her body jerked with the necessity of oxygen, begging for a breath. That yearning was lost, however, when a heat enveloped her body, not outside, but inside. It bubbled and flowed within her, pushing all desire for air aside. It felt like power, raw and unearthly power…

Rebirth.

"Rei!"

She awoke startled, quickly realizing that the pressure in her head was from the lack of oxygen. She gasped hard, sucking air into her lungs so quickly that her chest burned and she began to sputter.

"You weren't breathing," Ami said worriedly, absentmindedly picking at a few blades of grass that tickled the tips of her fingers. "I woke up the same way."

Rei placed a hand to her aching head, panting, trying to regain some sense of balance yet failing miserably to do so. The world around her spun and it was impossible for her to grasp anything in her confused state. She held up a hand, not precisely knowing why she did so, but it was the only action she could come up with to convey silence. Her other hand stayed fast to her forehead trying to suck the pain from her brain.

"It goes away in minutes," Ami explained as she placed a hand on Rei's shoulder and the raven haired priestess smiled with thanks. Ami could never cease to amaze her with her constant altruism

"Thanks Ami," she voiced as the buzz was already beginning to dissipate. "This mission wasn't contrived very well," she complained angrily, standing and taking a shaky look at their surroundings. They were on the bank of some river, its waters shallow yet deep enough to drown.

Minako nodded in agreement. "We went in with too much cursoriness." She frowned, feeling a bit of responsibility since she was supposed to consume the role of leader amongst her inner Senshi. She should have said something, should have asked to form a more concrete plan before blindly sending themselves into a suicide mission. It was funny how only when they landed in the alternate dimension that she questioned what she was actually supposed to do. "We don't know where we are, what we're supposed to do and for the life of me I can't get my wand to appear."

At this Rei paled. In quick desperation she flicked her wrist slightly, hoping to feel the hard materialization of her symbolism for hope. No wand appeared however and no power fizzled in her palm. Initially shock washed over her as she realized that they were stuck in an alternate dimension with no power. She opened her mouth to express said alarm when a realization came over her.

She made eye contact with Ami and knew that the brainiac had had the same epiphany as she had.

"The dream," they said together, smiling at the unison of their voices. At Minako's confused glance, Ami decided to explain.

"I'm guessing you had the same dream as Minako and I had before we woke up," she first said to Rei, and at the priestess's brief nod, she continued, "I'm assuming that that was some sort of transfer of power." She placed a hand to her chin and Rei and Minako knew that they were about to be subject to Ami's unguarded conceit. "The first warmth we felt was our Senshi powers, contained, something we knew well enough to use it with our eyes closed. To be analytical," she murmured, smiling a bit at the use of her scholastic abilities in Senshi business, "the fluid was the containment, the comfort and our Senshi abilities."

"I'm confused," Minako confessed, throwing up her hands in defeat. Though she first had a sort of grip on the situation, Rei couldn't help but agree with her blonde haired friend.

Ami hummed. "Well," she said, "if the fluid and the warmth resemble our Senshi powers and control of such powers then you have to realize that both the fluid and the warmth disappeared."

Minako's interested demeanor faded quickly into incredulity. "You can't be serious?" she cried. "Are you saying we've lost our powers?"

"Yes and no," Ami explained. "You have to realize Mina-chan that we're not in our dimension anymore. Our Senshi powers do not exist anymore. No longer can we transform into our alter ego's because the affinity we had with our planets back home does not exist here."

Rei leaned forward. "What are we going to do without our powers? How can we possibly face off against ineffable dangers without reasonable defense?" Ami did not respond and chose to ignore her comment.

"Do you remember the second warmth?"

The two nodded.

"That, I believe, is what I mentioned first, a transfer of power. Instead of being contained within our wands or stretched between the relationships with our planets, all of our unbridled power has been forced within our bodies. The container isn't our wands anymore, but rather," she waved her hands in front of herself, "us. It's become a sort of spirit energy, if you will."

"So then this headache and the pain were side effects, symptoms of this 'transfer of power'," Minako supplied, placing her hand to her stomach. Now that Ami had explained her hypothesis it was like a dam of realization was unleashed. She could feel the power surging through her body in torrents.

"And how to use it?" Rei asked, looking down at her palms.

"Unfortunately beyond my comprehension."

Rei nodded, she'd figured as much. "While this is an issue we have to come to terms with soon, and I mean soon, we have more pressing issues at the moment. Like Mako-chan."


The descent was hard and fast. It was unfathomable how she possibly could have survived such a fall but since she'd blacked out on the way down, the reason she was still alive was unbeknownst to her. The dream that had claimed her mind blurred away in a puddle of unknown. She'd hit her head somewhere in the midst of the plunge and could only faintly comprehend her surroundings.

Vision unstable, the shapes of towering sentry-like trees muddied the landscape, accompanied by the blooming growth of hazy flowers. Makoto groaned and tried to push herself at least to her knees. Her efforts were weak, however, and, at the trickle of warm blood down her neck, she knew she wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. She halted a groan in the depths of her throat at the spinning headache and pain that cultivated her mind and body.

She felt as if she were in a dream of swirling colors fading in and out of her mind. This made it all the more confusing when a pair of sneakers appeared before her eyes. Was she hallucinating? She moaned and reached for the sneakers, aching to feel some sort of concrete evidence that she hadn't somehow died and gone to heaven, that she could actually feel something tangible.


Orihime squealed as the girl before her reached for her shoe. "Tatsuki!" she cried to her nearby friend who was ambling down the hill. Taking her hands from her pockets, Tatsuki looked over her shoulder lackadaisically at her best friend's shrill call.

"What is it, Orihime?" she asked as she walked over to the busty girl. She was leaning over a girl who currently occupied an awkward position on the grass. What caused Tatsuki to raise a curious eyebrow was how the girl kept reaching for Orihime's shoe, said girl yelping and taking a step backwards each time.

Feeling a little overprotective Tatsuki pulled Orihime backwards behind her and leaned over the mumbling girl. It was dark out, and who knew what kind of people lurked outside at night? "Is she drunk?" she questioned aloud to herself, only partially catching a glance at the red stain trickling down her neck. "She's bleeding!"

Orihime blinked. Bleeding? She asked herself, leaning over Tatsuki's shoulder to where the short haired girl pointed. "Should we take her to a hospital?"

Tatsuki gaped. Sometimes the extent of Orihime's unselfishness confused and amazed her. "What if she's on drugs? She doesn't look quite sane. In fact, she might be contagious with something, maybe we should just walk away…"

"Tatsuki!" Orihime chastised, giving the girl a light slap on her shoulder before lightly shoving her to the side. "It doesn't matter either way. If someone is in need of help, then we should help them." Consequently, at that moment, Orihime pulled the weak girl to her knees and slung one of her clammy arms over her shoulders. Looking back she pinned Tatsuki with a meaningful stare. "Are you going to help?"


Makoto awoke to the sound of bickering. Her head swam with pain and a frown picked at the corners of her lips. At first she thought she'd been passed out on her couch and woken with the full throttle of a migraine. The memories of the meeting, the Time Gates and the fall hit her fast, followed by a strong wave of pain. And then there was the incontrovertible fact that she was in another dimension. Alone.

She shot up, almost immediately regretting the decision as the pain in her temples rose to an almost unbearable level. There wasn't a worse situation (at the time) that she could have thought of. She was separated from her friends in a place where she had no knowledge of her surroundings or the inhabitants.

She was about to sit up, slower and more controlled than last time, when the whispers from around the corners reached her ears one again. It sounded like females but, being in a different dimension, who knew what other sort of being it was. One of them was speaking in harsh, low tones and the other one, though battling back profusely, spoke in a softer sort of voice.

Makoto was only dully aware of her surroundings; a picture of a brown haired boy in one corner coupled with a little shrine and the couch she was lying on were the only things that managed to catch her eye. Her thoughts, however, remained on the whispering beings around the corner.

Suspicion engulfed her mind. The writing on some books near the shrine was in Japanese. Had they not left Japan at all? Or had these 'other dimension folk' captured her, created an illusion of familiar surroundings, and plan to eat her later on? Her guard went up when the voices started to move from the tiny connected kitchen and in Makoto's direction.

"This was dangerous, Orihime," she heard whispered. "Why couldn't we just take her to a hospital or something? We should have at least taken her to Ichigo's…"

"Tatsuki…"

Their names were even Japanese. Either they hadn't fucking left Japan at all or these people were really good. The voices crept even closer and Makoto panicked. Ignoring the throbbing pain threatening to destroy her brain she leapt from the coach just as two girls turned the corner from the tiny connected kitchen.

"Oh!" One of them yelped, a small busty redhead, and was immediately pulled behind the other girl. She looked well muscled and immediately took a stance which Makoto recognized. She was skilled.

Crouching a little Makoto took a tentative step backwards, hands twitching with anticipation. "Who are you?" she demanded, cursing her raspy voice. She hoped they couldn't decipher the pain laced with her words. "Where am I?"

"Who are we?" the dark haired girl asked, crossing her arms in anger. "Who the hell are you? We found you moaning and groaning in the park like some lunatic. Are you a drug addict?"

They even spoke Japanese.

Makoto was very confused

However, at the sudden accusation Makoto's shock overran her confusion. What the hell? Caught off guard, her mouth dropped open. "D-drug addict?" she stammered. "What kind of—" She held up her hand and ceased the curse that was going to come out of her mouth. "No I am not a drug addict."

The awkward silence that ensued caused a pocked of suffocation to engulf Makoto's throat and for a moment she forgot how to breathe. She missed her friends, there was no way she could sense them and she was all alone now with two crazy girls that thought she was a drug addict.

The only thing she craved at the moment was the comfort of her friends, to see Rei's cool smile, Ami's kind eyes or Minako's bubbly spirit. The thought that none of these passions might ever be witnessed again caused an unwanted tightness in her throat.

This ultimately reminded her that she needed oxygen. Slowly she began to breathe.

"How is your head?"

Makoto's eyes shifted from the furious, protective looking girl to the smaller one behind her. She had a strange resemblance to Usagi in the way that she looked at Makoto with a genuine kindness and a sort of joviality that was hard to achieve. But then again, she was in a different dimension. Who's to say they don't invite you into their house, turn into aliens, then bite you're head off when you least expect it?

Ignoring the question, Makoto knew her own question in return would most likely confused, or scare, the two girls before her. She put herself out on a limb and asked it anyway. "Are we in… Japan?"

The darker haired girl threw up her hands. "That's it, Orihime! She's crazy!" She took long, strong strides to reach Makoto, who consequently backed up even further and held up her hands.

"Wait!" she cried.

Think fast, think fast.

"I was mugged!"

At this, the dark haired one paused. Her eyes shifted quickly to the dried blood on Makoto's neck and her eyes softened for a moment. This show of kindness, however, disappeared as she stared inquisitively at Makoto once more.

Makoto could swear her own heart was beating a mile a minute. In all honesty she was excited, this whole situation turned on 'survival mode' and the basic instincts and raw nature of continued existence rushed through her veins.

An ingenious story popped into her head. Thank goodness she'd been spending more time around Ami lately.

"You see, my parents died in a plane crash when I was really young." That was something she could say with true honesty. "My uncle took me up after the accident."

For some reason the red haired girl looked at Makoto with a fleeting glance of understanding, then shifted her eyes back towards the ground.

"He recently died and his second wife, that witch of a woman," it was hard for Makoto to keep a straight face through this fabrication. At first she'd thought it ingenious. Now it just sounded plane dumb. "Well, she sent me out here to live with my three cousins, whom I've never met before," she tried not to smile, "Ami, Minako, and Rei. Only problem is, since I was sent out here with little money and little information I'm kind of in a pickle now that I've been mugged." She put on her best 'hurt' face and her inclination towards seriousness returned. She then said the truest thing she could have then entire night.

"I have nowhere to go and I don't know what to do."

The dark haired girl gave her a skeptical glare and all Makoto could do was stare passively back. "How do we know you're telling the truth?"

Funny how roles could change quickly.

Makoto shrugged her shoulders. "I guess you don't."


It was almost like they were dead.

Usagi could not feel one trace of her inner Senshi and the bothersome fact itched at her mind for the rest of the day. If she hadn't known that they were in another dimension she really would have thought that they were gone. This was another worrisome thing. What if they did die? How would she know? Would she be able to get them back?

All of these questions consumed her mind and the mediocrity of her Senshi team against Galaxia when she first arrived also played out. What if they were too weak? Questions like these burned into her consciousness and she found that she would never be able to live truly happy if one part of her heart, if one of her friends, disappeared.

A hand touched her head and she could smell Michiru's perfume.

"We're leaving, Usagi-chan," she whispered, setting a glass of water on the table by the couch her princess was sitting on. "Please try to get some rest. Have trust in them. If not from you, then where will that external strength come from?"

The question floated around in her mind for a mere moment before being lost with the other myriad questions that surged through her brain. "Everything will be okay," was Usagi's only response. She looked up and gave Michiru a steady smile.

"Right," the water Senshi said, less enthusiastically. With a pat to Usagi's head, she and Haruka left.

Usagi wrapped the blanket around her tighter and stared at the TV, not really comprehending the anime show she was watching. All she wanted was movement, something distracting and noisy to keep the empty house from seeming so lonely.

All she wanted was to get warm…

Curl up…

And fall asleep…

Her eyelids grew heavy almost as if her wish had been granted. Funny, she hadn't felt tired before Michiru left… but soon a weighted darkness fell upon her.


Usagi…

Her lip twitched.

Usagi…

There was a vision of a cool and calculating smile and fierce eyes. His deep voice reverberated in her dream.

I'm back, Usagi…


"Usako!"

Usagi, startled, jumped from her sleeping position on the couch and grasped at her breast, clutching at her frantically beating heart. Her beady eyes shifted around the room until they landed on her worried looking boyfriend. His eyes were knitted together and his lips turned down in a frown.

"I've been trying to wake you for ten minutes," he place a soft hand to her head and it was almost like a weight had been lifted from her shoulders. "Are you alright?" He saw the tears in her eyes. "Usagi?"

"Call Haruka and Michiru."

Mamoru pulled out his watch. "Usagi it's two o'clock in the morning."

She shook her head vehemently. "Call them now!"

The room was quiet for a moment as Mamoru stared at her in a sort of staid coolness. He put a hand to her forehead and felt her skin burning up. Only problem was, instead of being flushed, her face was unbelievably pale. He knew what was going to happen next and grabbed a wide vase that was sitting on the table next to the couch, chucked the flowers to the ground along with the water and held it under her chin just in time to catch the vomit that spewed like a faucet from her lips.

This had happened the first time that man had contacted her in her dreams.

"Mamo-chan…" she groaned before unleashing another wave of vomit. At first he thought she was hyperventilating when her shoulders began to shake. However when clear tears mixed into the vomit in the vase he recognized she was crying. Her body shook and she let out the most horrendous cry he'd ever heard her scream. "They're going to die," she wailed, face contorted into an ugly mask of sorrow and pain before she threw up once more into the vase.