"Crescent Beam!"

With those words, a golden beam of focused light burst from Venus' slender fingertip and shot across the room, striking the colossal Sento in the very centre of his bulk.

To no effect.

It was quickly becoming a pattern. So far, none of the four Sailor Soldiers had been able to make a dent in the monster, and while their natural speed and agility had enabled them to keep out of his reach thus far, time was not something they had in abundance.

In short, they needed a plan.

Mercury was devoting as much of her considerable brainpower to the problem as she could, but between evading Sento's crushing blows, looking out for her friends and being particularly careful not to allow the battle to stray too close to Shynkon's corner of the room, concentration was a difficult thing to maintain.

She watched anxiously as Sento swung a heavy fist at Mars. To her relief, her friend ducked beneath it with ease and returned a nimble, but ineffectual kick to his vast stomach. He followed her as she backpedalled rapidly, his eyes locked on the swish of her red skirt like a bull fixed on the toque of a matador's cape. She deliberately led him deeper into the room. Jupiter and Venus followed them and Mercury found herself unattended, at least for the time being. This was her chance.

Reaching up to her earlobe, she tapped one of the blue studs there and her transparent goggles appeared over her eyes. She trained them on Sento, beginning a thorough scan of his sizeable surface area. Precious seconds swam by as the results were collated.

The thermal scan grabbed her attention first. While most of his body was largely devoid of heat – understandably so, given its artificial nature – a spherical object in the centre of his chest cavity blazed hot like a lonely sun in lifeless space. It was possible that it was Sento himself: his true, cloud-like form, but the sheer intensity of the heat made Mercury doubtful. She swept her eyes around the room, searching for Gauge in order to make a comparison, but could find him nowhere. Likewise, there was no sign of Akeega. It appeared they had made their escape following Sento's chaotic debut... but that was something to worry about later.

She returned her attention to the data. If the heat was not the gaseous form of Sento – and Mercury did not believe that it was – then it could be only one other thing: a power source, the heart that supplied the body with energy. In that case, defeating him was a simple case of destroying it.

Simple in theory, at least. Another scan revealed that his body was constructed largely from an unknown metal that shared a number of properties with steel. Unfortunately, its high density was one of them. Penetrating it would not be easy. She looked over at her friends. They were still bravely evading and returning Sento's attacks, but they were tiring. Time was running out. Did any of them have enough power to get through that thick skin?

Sailormoon would be able to get to him.

She pushed the thought away. It wouldn't help her find a solution.

A startled cry from across the room wrestled for her attention and emerged victorious. She looked over to see Venus sprawled on the floor, clutching her stomach and moaning. Sento's arm was still extended from the punch he had delivered, and as Mercury watched in wordless horror, he raised one massive foot with an aim to crush the helpless girl like an insect.

With a yell, Jupiter slammed her entire weight into the back of his other knee. His precarious balance wavered and he swayed like an oak tree in a thunderstorm before finally toppling over and hitting the carpeted floor with a muffled crash that shook the room from corner to corner. Mercury watched with near-palpable relief as Mars helped the winded Venus to her feet.

Sento was down. This was their chance to fight back. But how? She thought about their individual powers. Were any of them strong enough?

An idea.

"Everyone!" she called, running towards them. They met her halfway across the floor. They seemed to be fine, Venus included, although she still gingerly rubbed her belly with one hand as she waited expectantly for Mercury to begin. As Sento undertook the arduous task of righting himself, Mercury quickly explained her idea. At best, it was a gamble. At worst, it would drain their energy and leave them near-defenceless. In the absence of any other plan, it would have to do.

Mercury just hoped it worked.

The plan laid out, they took their positions as Sento finally regained his footing. He glared at them each in turn, before his eyes narrowed to fiery slits and he took a lumbering step in the direction of Mars. Venus grinned in spite of the situation. "I think he likes you!"

"Not the worst guy I've had interested in me," replied Mars, keeping her eyes firmly on the approaching threat. "That honour would have to go to Yuuichirou." They all shared a giggle at the plight of her long-suffering admirer, but the smiles left their faces as Sento took another step closer. It was time to attack.

"Fire..." cried Mars, linking her fingertips and channelling her destructive power into them, "Soul!" A jet of flame spiralled from her hands and enveloped the treading behemoth.

And the behemoth grew.

Yes, thought Mercury as she watched him grow even taller and wider before her eyes. As she had predicted, the heat from Mars' attack had placed tensile stress upon his metallic body, leading to thermal expansion. Sento stopped walking and looked down at his bulging body, brow furrowed with confusion. Similarly perplexed, his leather suit creaked and groaned as it struggled to contain his newfound additional girth.

That was the first stage. Now for the second.

"Shine Aqua Illusion!" called Mercury, placing her hands on her chest and spinning on her toes. Shining droplets of ice-cold water formed around her body and she raised her arms up above her head, combining them into a shimmering torrent that she sent rushing in Sento's direction by throwing her arms outward. The freezing water splashed over him and a layer of ice formed around him like a crystal cocoon. The extreme cold caused an opposite reaction: he began to contract.

"It's working!" marvelled Mars as they watched him shrink back to his original size. Venus nodded enthusiastically. "This is the kind of physics lesson they should have at school!"

As Mercury had hurriedly explained to them, thermal expansion increases the energy stored in the bonds between the molecules of a material, causing it to expand. Contraction reverses the effect, and the process places stress on the seams joining it together, weakening the overall structure. Ordinarily, it would take repeated expansion-contraction cycles to significantly weaken something as strong as steel, but they had little time and finite power at their disposal. Given the strength of their attacks, Mercury hoped that once would be enough.

It would have to be.

"My turn!" As the ice encasing Sento began to crack, Jupiter stepped forward. She focused her power on the empty air above her head and a dazzling point of blue light crackled into existence there. "Jupiter!" It grew in intensity as she pirouetted on the spot beneath it. "Oak Evolution!" Fully charged now, she raised her hands to it and fired wave after wave of sizzling, seed-shaped bolts of energy at Sento's bulbous body. He stumbled backwards as they pounded the stressed, confused metal of his chest over and over again.

Crack.

Unable to withstand the onslaught, the steel-like surface of his chest buckled and fissured. Through it all he remained standing, his eyes narrowed and fixed on his attacker, waiting for his turn. When it finally arrived, he was still on his feet and in one piece.

However, none of his four opponents failed to notice the glowing red orb that was now visible through the cracks of his damaged torso. Venus stepped forward triumphantly. "You're lucky," she informed the brute earnestly. "Not everybody gets a kiss from the goddess of love!" She raised her hand to her lips and kissed her fingertips. A heart of golden light appeared in the palm of her hand. "Venus! Love and Beauty Shock!" As she swept her arm outwards, the heart became a thick beam and powered towards Sento's exposed weak point.

A kiss from her lips to his heart.

The golden energy enveloped his power core and lit up the inside of his body like a lantern. The last thing they saw before it overwhelmed him were those red eyes, screaming at them with wordless fury.

The explosion was so bright that they had to avert their gaze, and when they looked back those furious eyes, and every other part of his artificial body – his vessel, Akeega had called it – were gone. Floating silently above a twisted heap of metal was a thick black cloud.

Looking at it, Mercury thought she felt those eyes on her still.

Then, she felt a strong arm close around her neck.


Shynkon watched with dismay as Akeega effortlessly subdued Mercury, wrapping one arm around her neck and using the other to immobilise her own arms, rendering her powerless to fight back. He had crept back into the room as Sento had been defeated, unnoticed until it was too late. Shynkon hadn't even been able to warn her.

Mercury's strangled, startled cry drew the attention of her friends, whose faces darkened with the same concern and anger Shynkon felt himself. A coward like Akeega had no right to touch her.

A coward like me?

"Let her go," demanded her friend Mars in a voice that matched her black hair.

"Now," added Jupiter, taking a threatening step towards the pair.

"One more step and I break her arm," replied Akeega conversationally.

They stopped as ordered. Shynkon felt impotent anger. It wasn't fair. He was using Mercury as he'd used Shynkon himself, as he'd used the unsuspecting people of so many peaceful cities all across the galaxy, as he now planned to use the people of Tokyo. They were nothing to him. Everything they were, everything they had been and everything they might be was nothing in the face of his own gain.

It wasn't fair.

His confinement had never felt so claustrophobic. He struggled with all of his might to break free, but it was hopeless. He'd tried and failed so many times before. Besides, what could he have done to help her anyway?

"Her life is in your, quote-unquote, hands, Shynkon-san."

Akeega. Standing before him with the restrained Mercury locked in his grasp.

"Did you finish the preparations, as I asked?"

Slowly and reluctantly, Shynkon had indeed finished the final preparations for the G-Shack. He had hoped against hope that Akeega would be defeated, that the damned machine on the rooftop above them would never awaken again... but in a worst case scenario, finishing them might mean the difference between Mercury's life and death.

And here it was. The worst case scenario.

"They're complete."

"Good."

Mercury choked on a scream as Akeega drove a fist into her chest.

No reason. She had given him no reason.

He laughed spitefully as she flopped in his arms like a dying fish.

"I'm sorry..." he cooed into her ear. "Did that hurt?"

He lowered a hand – the same he had used to punch her – and began to lazily rub her chest, his fingers tracing slow circles on the white fabric of her uniform, scant inches from the gentle swelling of her breast. "All better now?" Mercury fidgeted and moaned with displeasure. Across the room, Venus clutched the wrists of Mars and Jupiter, stopping them in mid-step, their faces burning red with anger.

"Please, stop."

Shynkon couldn't keep the note of pleading from his voice.

"I'll activate it. Just let her go. Please, Akeega."

Mercury whimpered as Akeega's hand curled into a fist, roughly grabbing a handful of her uniform and pinching the soft skin beneath."Please what?"

"Please, Akeega-sama."

Akeega nodded, apparently satisfied by the honourific. "Very well. Bring it online."

Mercury opened her eyes and looked up at Shynkon. Tears shone like morning dew.

"Don't..." she gasped, struggling to push her words past the vise around her throat. "I'm not worth..."

"You're wrong," Shynkon told her.

The hum of electricity filled the air. The lights above flickered and dimmed.

"G-Shack online," he reported. "Primary power transfer in progress."

Akeega gave him a barbed wire grin and released his grip on Mercury. She stumbled forwards, her freed hands instinctively finding their way to her sore throat. Like a malicious child, Akeega's leg lashed out and swept Mercury's feet from under her. Akeega watched her tumble to the ground and stepped over her as if she were a puddle in the mud. He strode casually towards the door on the opposite side of the room, Sento's black mass roiling over to join him.

"Mercury-chan!"

Her friends were by her side immediately. Mars and Jupiter took her hands and helped her gently to her feet, being sure to hold her steady, while Venus looped her arms around her shoulders and held her tightly, whispering comforting words that were meant for nobody but her to hear. Jupiter and Mars joined the hug and for a moment Mercury was lost to Shynkon's sight amid a ring of linked arms.

Akeega watched from the doorway, black-faced with disgust. "You really are an idiot, Shynkon," he spat. "They'll die along with the rest of this pathetic city as soon as the G-Shack has gathered enough power. As will you. I'm leaving you here. We'll find a replacement. You're just too much of a liability. I'd say you have about ten minutes. Considering you've purchased them with – twelve million lives, was it? - I do hope you'll make them worthwhile." He turned to Sento. "Come. We'll return to the ship. Gauge is already on the rooftop."

If Sento were any more capable of speaking in his natural form, he did not demonstrate it. He silently followed his leader out of the room, leaving Shynkon and the girls alone. A giggle was heard and Mercury gently pulled free of the group embrace. "I'm fine, really, I'm fine!" she was insisting. "We don't have time to be silly!" She looked up at Shynkon and her smile painted joy over a canvas of fear. "And speaking of which, that was a very silly thing you did, Shynkon-san."

"I'm sorry," he replied, unable to form anything more articulate while lit by the light of her eyes. Her friends each showed him a smile laden with gratitude. "Thank-you, Shynkon-san," said Venus. "We'd all have done the same thing." Jupiter and Mars nodded in agreement. It meant a great deal to Shynkon.

"So, how do we stop this G-Shack?" inquired Jupiter.

"Can't you just turn it off?" asked Mars.

"I'm afraid not," Shynkon told them. "Akeega disabled all the failsafes a long time ago."

Venus rolled her eyes. "Figures. So, what else can we do?" The throaty hum from above had become a whine that was gaining in pitch. Mercury listened to it thoughtfully, and then spoke up. "Where is it drawing power from? You said there was a power transfer in progress, but transferring from where?"

Of course! Shynkon couldn't believe he hadn't thought of it immediately.

"The basement!" The sudden enthusiasm in his voice caused a row of puzzled looks. "This building was owned by a company named DenTech," he hurriedly explained. "They were conducting experiments using high amounts of electricity, and to that end had several large generators installed in the basement. I saw the schematics while looking through their files. Gauge must have wired the G-Shack to channel power from them!"

"So if we were to disable them..." began Mars, following his train of thought, "...Then the G-Shack would shut down," finished Jupiter. "It would have to," Shynkon confirmed. "The electromagnetic field it generates requires a great deal of power. Without it, it'd be useless."

"Well, we'd better get started," decided Venus. "We don't have much time. Jupiter, head to the basement with Mercury. Mars and I will go up to the rooftop to keep an eye on the G-Shack. We'll use our wrist communicators to stay in contact."

"Wait!" The four turned to look at Shynkon questioningly.

"I'll go with Mercury-san," he told them. "If it's okay."

They exchanged glances. "That would be lovely," Mercury told him. The warmth in her smile told him that she meant it. "But... I'm not sure how..."

"It's a simple barrier circuit," he told her. Simple, perhaps, but decidedly effective, he thought to himself. "If you disable it," he continued aloud, "I'll be able to leave here, at last."

Another glance was exchanged.

"Leave?" Mercury asked him. "I'm not sure I understand..."

She silently followed his instructions as he told her where to locate the barrier circuit and how to disable it. As her agile fingers moved, Shynkon felt its constrictive pressure ease. Finally, it lifted entirely. The open air had never felt better as he flowed as quickly as he could from his prison. He swelled to his full size and turned a couple of circles in the air, before humility caught up with joy and he shrank with embarrassment.

"I'm sorry," he said shyly. "I've been stuck in there for so long."

Mercury watched with wide-eyed wonder as a cloud, powder blue and shaped like cotton candy, was exhaled like a satisfied sigh from the open surface of the supercomputer. Light seemed to glow softly within a translucent shape that rippled like the surface of a pond. As she watched, the cloud swelled and twirled in the air before quickly condensing.

"I'm sorry," said Shynkon shyly. "I've been stuck in there for so long."


"S-Shynkon-san..." Mercury murmured. "You're... like them... only..."

"You mean I'm a Reytekian?" He laughed, a joyous sound. "Well, of course I am. What else would I be?" His soft-spoken voice no longer had its electronic edge.

"I thought..." Mercury exchanged glances with her friends. One by one, their puzzled frowns turned to smiles. "It doesn't matter," she told Shynkon, looking back at him with a grin. "This is much better." She took a step towards him and he drifted closer to her. She reached her hand out towards him but halted suddenly. "Is it... okay?" she asked tentatively. "It's fine," he told her. She thought she heard nervousness in his tone.

Keeping her eyes on him, she tugged on the fingertips of her glove and slowly pulled it loose, letting it drop silently to the floor. Gently, gently, she reached out and touched him with her bare hand. He was soft as silk, and she shuddered with pleasure as she felt him trickle and flow between her fingers like warm honey.

"You're beautiful," she whispered to him, the words coming unbidden. When her ears heard them they burned a bright red. Her lips parted with surprise as his light surface darkened suddenly. "S-so are you," he stammered. She laughed with delight as she realised she had made him blush too. He darkened to an opaque navy as he wrapped himself around her hand. Her fingers tingled. He's holding my hand. The thought caused a fresh wave of crimson to flow across her face.

They remained that way for some time. Blinking and breathing were put on a temporary hiatus. Mercury's eyes never strayed from him and she knew he was looking back at her. She wondered how long she could stay like this. She knew she had something to do, so it couldn't be too long.

But just a few more moments would be nice.

She awoke from her reverie as gentle hands touched her shoulders. "You two..." began Venus hesitantly, "we have to take care of the G-Shack..."

"I'm sorry," said Shynkon, disentangling himself from Mercury's hand and drifting backwards. "I forgot all about it..." Mercury nodded, her eyes dropping to the floor. She wondered if her cheeks were actually glowing. It felt like they were. "Me too," she admitted. She kneeled and retrieved her glove, quickly sliding it back on.

"Now, the plan," said Venus. Her tone was one of action, but Mercury could see the pleased smile on her lips. Jupiter and Mars wore it too. They said nothing, and Mercury was glad. She might have died if they had.

"Shynkon-san," Venus continued, turning to face him. "You'll show Mercury the way to the generators?" He tilted forwards in what was probably a nod. "Yes." Venus turned to Jupiter. "You should go with them, in case they need any help in disabling them."

"Please, we'll be fine," insisted Shynkon. "If I may, I'd suggest that Jupiter-san accompany you to the rooftop. Akeega will be waiting there."

"Akeega?" questioned Mars. "Didn't he say he was going to board his ship?"

"He did," replied Shynkon, "but he won't have. I may not have been able to sabotage the G-Shack, but I did manage something before I left that computer."

"Oh?" asked the four girls in one voice.

Shynkon darkened slightly and said modestly, "I accessed his ship's mainframe and disabled the gravity lift." He turned a somersault in the air. "He won't be going anywhere!"

With time running out, they split into two groups and parted. Mercury followed Shynkon as he led her back towards the staircase she had climbed to arrive here.

"Oh, you two?"

Mercury looked back over her shoulder at the sound of Venus' voice. The blonde shot her a wink and said cheekily, "Try not to get distracted, okay?"

Mercury's hair turned purple.