Chapter 10
Two gargoyles with large, bat-like wings landed on a vast square, dragging dazed Haruka. Monsters put the girl on a hard stone, and then rose up into the air, flying away from the place which even they were afraid of. The blonde tried to get up on her own. She felt that someone's strong hand had gripped her arm and pulling her up, it forced her to assume erect position. Haruka turned her head around and saw two strangers. The first one was wearing a brown armor, and its head resembled large, single eye. Its leather glove pressed the girl's body causing her pain. The second monster looked like a large, bipedal pig dressed in a dark uniform. Haruka tried to break free from the grip of the monstrosity. She was too weak. Her attempt of rebellion was punished by the swine-man with striking her stomach by a wooden mace. The girl lost all the willingness for a disobedience. Two monsters led her to the stone building in the dark mountain's scenery. Inside the building, the pig squealed at the blonde, showing her the small door on the other side of the little completely empty corridor. Haruka turned around, trying to oppose him again, but the monster was adamant. He pushed the girl so firmly that she was thrown into the little room behind the door, and stopped on the stone wall with a very rough surface. Two torturers also came in the room. The pig came up to Haruka, tore her jacket off, and at the same time the one-eyed monster tore trousers off her. A moment later, the boar-man also tore T-shirt off Haruka's body. The befuddled girl leaned against the wall. She saw the entire event like through a fog, not entirely understanding what was happening to her, and not remebering why she had come to such a horrible place. After a moment, the pig tore also girl's bra and panties off, leaving her naked. Haruka lost her balance, she fell down, wounding her thigh on a rough rock. Two monsters vacated the room taking the girl's clothes with them and in the same moment, streams of water under pressure fired from the wall. Somebody or something decided to wash the person newly arrived to the city. Soon rivulets of water were cut off, leaving the girl wet, lying in a puddle of water. The monster with a giant eye ran into the room carrying new clothes that Uranus was supposed to put on. When the girl didn't want to carry out an order, the ogre kicked her into the wounded part of the leg. Haruka, still not being fully conscious of the reality surrounding her, obediently put old clothes on. They were loose trousers and a short-sleeved shirt. Soon, the blonde was led to other part of the stone building, and then she was forced to enter the narrow stairwell leading to basements. By the next gate, the pig ordered the girl to come close the corner in which other monster stood, the one looking like a large lizard man. The reptile took the piece of an iron bar out from behind the stone and put it to the shoulder of the woman-warrior. Haruka shouted from a pain, and eyes tears appeared in her. The monster marked her with a number. After a brief lapse, the girl was led to the long corridor, full of locked doors. Ones of them was opened by the pig man, and Haruka was pushed into the interior of the cell. She was dizzy and felt very weak. She lay down on the bed made from old rags and turned her face to the wall. Other prisoner of the stone city came closer to her. He looked like an alien from the outer space. He was a bald man, with grey skin and big almond-shaped eyes. He moved his hand in blonde's direction, but seeing the state she was in, he decided not to pester her with an attempt of a contact.
Haruka went to sleep very quickly, because she was extremely weakened. Her mind was recalling events of a few past days, this time in a form of the chaotic nightmare. She could see burning airship falling above her city, Michiru playing a violin on the stage, observed by hundreds of eyes amongst which there were also the ones belonging to the white-haired man. The girl then again survived disappearing her beloved in the gate made of whirling flames and walked around dark corridors of the thirteenth Floor of the Cygnus Tower which were even darker and more horrifying in a dream than in the wake world and looked like a maze forged in rocks and used to all bury daredevils who were unlucky enough to travel inside them forever. She felt pain inflicted by Setsuna's lies and the betrayal she committed towards Helios and the Elysion world. In the sleep, she was based on a balcony of the stone palace and was looking at the distant city built in the middle of the red desert and the party behind walls of Chronos' stronghold. She was helpless when the man dressed in the white suit asked Michiru to dance and played with her in the very heart of a ballroom.
At some point, the girl felt someone's presence. But it wasn't her another sleepy phantom. Haruka intuitively knew that the man who watched her had been as real as herself and somehow found a way of making contact with her in the world of her dreams. The grey-skined alien, who she had seen when two monsters had thrown her into the interior of the cell, stood near the girl. The girl was spotted by guests of the palace. A few of them approached her taking out weapons of a different kind. The man in the green armor prepared for the fight with a sword, while humanoid robot reloaded its machine guns. Haruka knew that she had no chance in the clash with opponents, not being able to transform into Sailor Senshi. She felt fear, a real fear, even though what she could see was only a product of her mind. The stranger appeared before her. He lifted both hands up and apparitions attacking her dissolved into thin air. Surprised Haruka turned to the strange being, tried to say something, but her mouth remained dumb. The stranger smiled to her mimicking the facial expression of the human face.
The blonde woke up, having felt being touched with some hard object. She opened her eyes and realized that two monsters with faces looking like pig's snouts had bowed over her.
"Get up!" One of them shouted.
"Quickly!" The second one added. At the same time, the other guard forced the grey skinned companion of Haruka's cell to leave. The girl sat down on the floor. She clenched fists and was ready for the fight against assailants. She heard someone's voice in the head.
"Don't do it. Do what they are saying. Differently, you will be beaten up. There are too many of them."
The blonde was confused. She didn't know where these words of advice had come from. But she quickly realized that a grey alien being was their author. Her eyes encountered the look of the stranger. She smiled to him.
"Get up!" The pig grunted again as it struck the girl's calves with his cold, steel lance.
"Ok, ok. I will go with you. I wish no problems." Sailor Uranus replied. Guards led Harukaand her co-companion from the cell to the dark corridor of the underground complex. It turned out that prisoners from other cells were also forced to leave and everyone headed to the tall gate on the other end of the corridor.
"Where are we? What is happening here? Where are they leading us?" The girl asked the grey being going calmly in the direction shown by demonic guards.
"You are asking too much. You recovered quickly from the dark fever which Chronus sent to you." The girl heard the reply of the stranger in her thoughts, although he didn't even moved his lips.
"Leave my head! Answer me normally!" Haruka became nervous.
"The communication through telepathy is the most logical solution in the situation which we are in. In the underground there are no beings who are able to catch our thoughts. Verbal conversations between prisoners are forbidden. You won't be punished." The stranger answered using the direct transfer of thoughts.
"And as for your questions... we are in the stone city in Chronos' world... everyone here are slaves, working in order to keep this world alive... they are leading us to our places of work. You are new here, therefore somebody will give you the appropriate allotment right away. Looking at your young and healthy body, I am afraid that this job won't be easy.
In the place of corridor's forking, the monster with the face of a pig stopped Haruks, not letting her go in the same direction as her fellow prisoner.
"You're going there!" He shouted pointing at the second door, leading deeper into the underground. Haruka, followed the procession of people dressed in grey clothes. She went on slippery stairs dripping with some dirty and stinking gunk. At the end of the walk, the girl noticed two people guarding huge metal double doors. Both were dressed in dark uniforms covering the whole body, and they had gas masks on their faces. As it turned out, the guards handed out protective masks to prisoners, which were supposed to protect them from what waited behind the armored door. At first, Haruka didn't want to accept the mask, but the man standing before her turned to her, recommending her to carry out an order.
"Better do what they ordered you to do. Otherwise the stink which is behind this gate will kill you." He announced standing in the queue of persons waiting for opening of the gate. Haruka put the mask on and also joined the row. Two men in black costumes opened the door, letting all prisoners to enter to the chamber behind it. The black-haired stranger was right. The blonde felt a terrible stink which reached her nose even through material of the protective mask. Inconceivable stink of rotting meat struck her. When her eyes got used to the semi-darkness in the cavern, it turned out that she was in a mine. She saw objects lying around her resembling pickaxes, saws, knives and carts waiting for the loading of rocks. When she examined walls of the cave closer, it turned out that it was no a mine of coal or ore of some metal but it was mine of a meat. Walls of rotting, stinking meat in a colour changing from red to disgusting green rose up before the girl.
"What is it for Christ's sake!" She asked not being able to shake the unpleasant impression off.
"Our work." The man with black hair, who earlier had a word with the girl, replied.
"How it could come here?" The blonde asked.
"Nobody of us knows and nobody dared to ask. Probably there is a buried body of some inconceivably large creature which died many centuries ago, still in the process of a putrefactive disintegration. We must take its meat and give it to demons, protecting the castle of the ruler, as their foods. Don't ask me more questions and get to work, or else we both be punished for chatting in working hours." The prisoner didn't want to continue the conversation with the girl. One of men standing in the vicinity of the wall in the dress protecting the whole body came up to the blonde and put the saw to her hand.
"Go to the work!" He shouted pushing her towards other people waiting for allotted tasks. Haruka clenched fists. One move would be enough to take the guard's life, but she could not let herself to do it. There were too many monsters in the stone city, and she could not transform and use her magic. She had to carry out an order and slowly getting to know the new environment to find elements thanks to which she would have a chance of escape and return to the palace. The girl, acting the same as fellow workers, started cutting the rotting meat of the ancient being, which rested in the world in which she was forced to be.
In the same time, Michiru and Chronos entered the big, bright chamber full of diverse technology exploiting the energy lying dormant in the inside of the Silver Crystal. The light coming through windows in the roof was bright, but simultaneously gentle and deprived of the desert's heat. A large mirror stood In the middle of the chamber. It was dark colored, contrasting with white walls of the room.
"Look carefully, your new light is beginning here." Chronos turned to green haired women. He came up to the case lying close the mirror. When he opened it, the surroundings were filled with an emerald glow.
"It is a fluid space-time. The same one which you have inside your mirror." Chronos said looking at shapeless mass going up from the inside of the wooden box and slowly heading in the direction of the big mirror. When the flying object was close to its surface, it was pulled by it and landed on it creating a thin, waving coating, glowing with a green light.
"It is incomplete." The man said. He raised Michiru's mirror and, whispering something incomprehensible, he caused that the surface had separated from its rims and was also attracted by the big mirror. The ball of green substance was connected with the rest of the fluid and flattened on its entire area.
"It's ready. Now we must carry the most important test out. Come here."
Michiru ignored him. Chronos became nervous.
"Come here. Don't forget that your lover is at my mercy!"
The girl unwillingly did what he had asked her to do.
"We must check if you are able to establish contact with the inside of this mirror. You must plunge inside it and tell me what you feel. Don't be afraid. I will be holding you by the hand, so you won't lose contact with the world."
Michiru moved the hand towards the mirror. She cautiously touched its surface. The light which the mirror radiated increased its intensity in the vicinity of the girl's hand.
"Don't be afraid. Push more!"
Michiru pressed the mirror and after a moment her hand had get to its other side very easily. She looked at Chronos.
"What are you waiting for? One hand won't be enough."
The girl put the leg inside phosphorescing mirror, and later she decided to entirely cross the barrier and to go into the interior of the fluid space-time. When she was on the other side and dared to open her eyes, it turned out that she was floating at the very centre of boundless ocean of emerald light. Her body was much lighter than on the Earth, she thought that she could fly, not being concerned with a gravity. Maybe the laws of physics were different inside the strange space-time continuum than in the normal reality, maybe the gravity had no meaning there. The lighting travelling inside the mirror was attracted in the direction of the girl as if it was a life form interested in the appearance of a human. Michiru heard sounds, delicate vibrations with which the space answered her presence. After a moment, she felt strong pulling and appeared inside the bright chamber in the palace of Chronos. She was disorientated by the change of realities.
"It is enough for the first time. If you stayed there longer you might not come back." The man said. Michiru leaned against one of devices standing near the large mirror.
"What have you seen? What have you feel?" Chronos asked.
"A vast space surrounding me from every side. Light, plenty of the light... I remember nothing more." The girl whispered.
"Come back to your room. You must rest and later try to plunge into the inside of the space again. Only through a direct contact you will learn how to control it. And you will be able to find my beloved. And one thing more. It probably belongs to you." The grey haired man gave Michiru her mirror.
"It can't work anymore, but it's too pretty to drop off." The girl took the object which was her Deep Aqua from his hand. She left the chamber leaving Chronos alone.
Haruka came back to the cramped cell after a long day of the exhausting work in the meat's mine. She was extremely worn out, her hands and legs ached her, she felt great disgust towards the job which she was forced to do. She sat down by the wall.
"What have I done?" She thought.
"You should have not associate with Chronos. He is a demon whose promises took you to the place in which you will spend the rest of your life." The girl heard the familiar voice in the head. It turned out, that her new friend, grey-skined alien, came back from the mine earlier than she.
"Can you talk normally?! I am not accustomed to voices in my head!" Haruka became nervous. She raised her voice at the fellow-prisoner, and her emotions, piling up in her from many hours, finally found an outlet.
"Well. You don't have to resort to using force." The stranger said in a completely natural way.
"I apologise. I should not react this way. Probably I already achieved my limits."
"If you let me enter your mind, I will move you into the place where you will be able to calm down. Will you agree?"
"Yes. But don't try to look into my memories."
Haruka noticed that scenery around her had started to change, and stone, grey walls of the prison cell turned into extensive green meadows and the blue sky, on which there was visible the Sun and a large gas planet with a strip of rings looming into a view from behid a horizon.
"Where are we?" The girl asked the alien.
"We are still in the cell in the underground of the stone city. But what you can see is an illusion originating in my memories. It is the world from which Zetas, my race, came, Holy of holies for each of us, the place which I will never see again, because I trusted the demon dressed in white."
"I don't know what bad thing you did, but you must know one. I asked Chronos for nothing, I signed no pacts with the devil! This monster kidnapped the person closest to me and hid her in his palace. I reached this cursed world, losing a lot, but he... he defeated me as if I was an amateur and closed in this place. And you, why are you here?"
"I helped with examinations of Chronos, since he promised to create the medicine for the technovirus plague which wreaked havoc on our worlds. Later, it turned out that he had only wanted to mutate the virus in order to create the army of mechanoids. I opposed him and I ended up in this place."
"We talk to each other, but I didn't tell you my name. My name is Haruka Tenouh."
"I am K'h'bloo Izul'H." The alien said. He moved his four-finger hand towards the girl.
"If I'm not mistaken, it is a gesture of greeting on your planet?" He asked.
"Not in all cultures, but it can be." The girl replied giving a hand to the stranger.
"You were assigned for getting the meat. It is the worst work, you had to really irritate Chronos."
"I'm going to irritate him. If I get out from here and I recover my weapon I will take revenge on him and on all people who forced me to do such a disgusting thing."
"Your optimism is unusual. But the naivety is a feature of young persons." The alien said sadly.
"The pessimism of yours must be legendary. But perhaps your entire race is like this."
K'h'bloo closed his eyes and the illusion of the beautiful meadow dissolved into thin air, leaving the sad truth of the underground dungeon. Haruka felt tired out and achy. Her disgust coming form immersing her hands into decaying body appeared again.
"When I removed telepathic stimulus from your mind, you felt that you are really exhausted. And it is only the first day of your work. Soon, you will forget what real objective of your visit in the world of Chronos was. Since when I have been forced to work in the mine of energetic minerals, I live only in telepathic illusions of the past. And now go to sleep. You must rest before the consecutive day of the hard work. Good dreams and let the Cosmic Awareness have you in its care. " Zeta Reticuli zed lay on the bed and turned away to the wall.
Haruka also rested on the makeshift bed. She looked at the ceiling, trying to fall asleep. Unfortunately, the dream didn't come. The girl didn't know how long the night lasted in the desert-like land and when the guards appear again to force her to perform other work. The girl closed her eyes, trying to listen intently to sounds coming from behind thick walls. The entire space around her was filled with the low sound of the noise, coming probably from milles and factories processing minerals into material being suitable for using by the Chronos' palace. From time to time, she heard a shout, an inhuman scream. She wasn't sure, whether it came from the neighbouring cell or from the distant desert surrounding the gloomy city of slaves. She turned aside, towards the wall. Sailor Neptune, in ball dress turned up at her thoughts.
"I hurt my ally only to land in such a hole? It's unfair!" She whispered clenching her fist.
Meanwhile, Michiru was also submerged in a sleepless contemplations. Even though the place of her rest wasn't so depressing as Haruka's cell, it didn't change the fact that it was the same prison for her as for the blonde. The girl stood at the window looking at fires and smokes of the city on the other side of the desert of the death. She could hear the music and conversations of people in a ballroom. She didn't understand words, but they didn't interest her. She thought about Uranus, but also about what she saw and felt inside the fluid space-time. Could she control it like her magic mirror? Could she use the large mirror standing in the middle of the bright chamber? Answers to these questions were important, because they could show the effective weapon against Chronos. Further research of emerald lights was theonly sensible plan of action for the girl. The alternative was a journey through the desert to the place of Haruka's imprisonment which would certainly end in a death blow of the ardent whip of the Minotaur-like monster.
A next day dawned in the desert-like land. Two guards with pig faces turned up at Haruka's and K'h'bloo cell. This time the girl didn't protest and obediently carried out an order, as the alien from Zeta Reticuli advised her. She walked along the corridor in the direction of the door leading to the cave with the stinking meat. She felt much better than the day before. She watched her fellow-prisoners. The majority of them were people and men. Haruka noticed only a few women. The part of forced employees wasn't residents of the Earth. Apart from her acquaintance from Zeta Reticuli, the girl caught sight of silver-haired boys with elven beauty and pointed ears, a few creatures with a skin looking like a stone and the two-legged pig, belonging to the same kind as the guards of the prison. The blonde took up the mask sheltering from deathly fumes from the cave, and a moment later she took saw for cutting the meat off. She got down to work at the side of her companions in misery.
At the end of the day, persons in protective uniforms and gas masks got the equipment back from the girl and sprayed her by some substance from the rubber pipe to kill all bacteria which could attack her during mining works. Coming back to the cell, the girl was a witness of event unpleasant to her. Two pigs abused somebody lying by the wall of the corridor. When the blonde went up closer in spite of bans of the guard, it turned out that the beaten up person was K'h'bloo Izul'H.
"What is going on there!" She shouted.
"It's none of your business! Come back to the row!" The pig-man replied.
"Let her look! Let her learn that one isn't allowed to stop the work!"
"Can't you see that if you beat him more he won't be working anymore? He is exhausted!" Uranus became nervous.
"Mind your own business, because you can be on his place!" One of the guards, with a patch on the eye, announced.
"Haruka... do what they order you... leave me... behind" K'h'bloo whispered. His face was covered with green blood.
"Nobody let you speak!" The pig-man screamed again hitting the defenceless alien.
"No more." An anger appeared on Haruka's face. She ran towards one of pig people, pushed him and tore the lance out from his hand. She approached the guard torturing the alien and stuck the sharp object in his shoulder. The pig squealed frightfully, staggered on legs.
"Haruka... do not..." K'h'bloo whispered. Seeing confusion amongst forced workers, guards took energy horsewhips out and threatened everyone. They ordered them to quicken the pace and to come back to their cell rooms as soon as possible. Haruka hit the hurt monster, turning him over to the floor. She hit the snout of his companion, trying to stalk her from the back. The guard didn't react, but the blonde hit again, much stronger than previously. Soon the other monster came. Haruka reacted even faster, hitting his knees with her leg. However, Sailor Uranus victory was short-lived. The noise of the scuffle lured guards from other parts of the underground prison to the corridor. There was more and more of them with every passing moment. One of them took out energetic horsewhip and struck the girl's back with all his might. Haruka felt pain as all cells of her body were given an electric shock. Muscles rebelled against her. After a few seconds, she inertly fell down on the floor. Monsters decided to punish her immediately, in front of other prisoners' eyes. The pig hit the back of the lying woman-warrior again. The flow of the electric current through muscles of the girl caused the spasms of her body. Haruka jumped up, not controlling the movement of her body. Before she fell down, the man with the pig's face hit her for the third time. This time clothes of the blonde were torn, and her back exposed and ready to accept next blows of the horsewhip. Two other guards joined the executioner. They hit Uranus' body rhythmically, one after the other, everyone waiting patiently for his turn, everyone pleased with the participation in torturing of the young woman-warrior. Haruka's blood covered walls and floor, snouts of pigs, its drops even reacvhed the face of Zeta Reticuli helplessly watching the torment of his friend from the cell.
"Michiru... I'm sorry... goodbye ..." The girl whispered.
Suddenly, a red glitter flashed and a tall woman with white skin, black, long hair and red eyes, dressed in the scarlet dress appeared above the corridor. She descened on the floor with monsters and the maltreated girl slowly.
"Leave her alone! Immediately!" She shouted. When pigs saw who spoke to them, they immediately carried out her order and obediently left Haruka. The woman approached the girl and squatted by her face.
"This is the first time I've seen somebody fighting so bravely knowing that she has no chance of victory. You were a t source of amusement for me, my girl." The woman said.
"Three of you! Carry her to renovating baths chamber. And better hurry up, because I don't want her to die, do you understood?!"
Three guards looked at each other in surprise, but they carried the order without unnecessary questions. The mysterious woman came up to unconscious Haruka.
"I will see you soon." She said teleporting into the unknown.
K'h'bloo looked at his earthly familiar taken by guards deep into the dimwit corridor. He could not react, or help her in any way. He obediently got up off the floor and moved into his cell in the companyof two two-legged pigs armed in energy horsewhips.
Haruka opened her eyes. She became was so weakened that she could not move a limb. When the confusion resulting from regaining consciousness passed, the girl realized that she had been inside the alcove in a floor, filled up with water or some other transparent liquid. Her body was floating in a warm liquid. The feeling of the warmth reaching from the container engulfed her body. She leaned her head against the headrest attached to one of the swimming pool's walls. Memories of last hours, her attempt of the attack on guards and the painful penalty returned to her mind. The girl was surprised that she was still alive, although wounds were very serious and she lost a lot of blood. She didn't know who had shown her enough sympathy that she stopped guards and helped her to heal wounds inflicted by them. She was going to see the identity of her minder soon. The room was lightened up with a flash of red light and a pale woman with black hair, who earlier had helped her, appered in the room.
"Who are you..." Haruka wanted to ask, but her faint voice barely got out of her throat.
"Save your strength and help the healing bath heal all wounds. If I appeared a few seconds later, there would be nothing left after you apart from the wet stain on the floor of the corridor. You must stay here round the clock before you regain your strength entirely."
The woman walked around the container in which the blonde stayed. Haruka followed her with her eyes.
"You are probably thinking now who I am and why I helped you. I'm Aexal and I'm the administrator of the entire city and all mines which are there. I helped you because you gained my attention. For many years, since Chronos have put slaves in my care, I've observed all new prisoners, all these who rejected our master. And each of them was the same, each saw the pointlessness of the resistance quickly and obediently performed the work assigned to him or her. For many years I have been bored here waiting for somebody who will behave differently, who will be a constant source of amusement for me. And you appeared. I don't know why you are here, what you did that you were sentenced to the work in the mine, but you seemed to me different from all previous prisoners. You were able to take an uneven fight and, what's more, not for your freedom, but for the life of the fellow-prisoner whom you didn't even know fairly recently, somebody who doesn't even belong to your race and who if your places were reversed, certainly wouldn't come to your rescue. Such behaviour have not been seen in this city from its creation. Everything which is new intrigues and excites me."
Aexel said a word of the spell, and her red dress dissolved into thin air. The woman was completely naked. Only in few places her black hair covered her white skin. After a brief lapse of watching Haruka, Aexel entered the healing container and immersed her body up to her breasts. She approached the blonde smiling, and leaned her hands on her knees. Haruka looked at her with eyes expressing anger. The demoness approached the blonde and sat down on knees between blonde's spread legs. After a moment, she plunged both hands in the water seeking the crotch of the girl. She gently touched her sensitive place.
"Don't oppose me. I want only to fasten the process of your convalescence. You must admit that you have never felt such a pleasure. I'm unique, I'm a demon of delight." Aexel was closer to Haruka. She embraced her, cuddling up to her.
"If you try to do it with me one time, you will never again want to be with anybody else."
The white-skinned woman passionately kissed Haruka's mouth. The girl felt that the woman demon was taking control over her body. She raised hands and, after a moment, she touched Aexel, firmly hugging her body. Both women immersed into the healing bath such that only their head stuck out of the water. Their mouth were joined in a passionate kisses.
Haruka woke up in a big bed covered with a white bedding. She wasn't weakened and also gained the control over her own body. The emptiness was in her head, the girl could not remind herself what happened to her from the moment when she had left the cell in order to work at the meat mine. She sat down on the bed, surprised that she was in the luxury room, instead of on the floor of the underground cell. At some point, memories started flowing into her mind. She remembered that she had got into a fight for the life of her co-companion from the cell, lost and was beaten almost to death. She remembered the healing bath and the visit of the strange woman. She recalled the touch of her skin and the taste of her lips.
"Damn it!" Haruka shouted rising off the bed. She banged her fist on the vase with flowers lying on the table. The object fell on the floor breaking into small pieces.
"How could I...!" Uranus was furious. Anger seized her at the thought that she had an intercourse with other woman than Michiru. Although she did it because she was forced by the magic of the pale woman, she remembered that it had caused her a great pleasure. Tears appeared in her eyes.
"Michiru..." She whispered sitting down on the bed. She realized that she had been completely naked. The door of her room opened with a creaking sound and a tall man with a bald pate, dressed in a plain, grey dress resembling a habit, appeared. Haruka got hold of the duvet and laid it on her thighs, covering her body from the eyes of the stranger.
"My woman ordered me to give you message as soon as you wake up." The bald man said.
"Come to her as soon as possible, because she has important tasks for you. You will find clothes in the wardrobe." He added. He closed the door leaving Haruka alone. The girl clenched fists. Aexel at first forced her to make sex with her and then treated her as her slave. It would be better to die from blows of guards' horsewhips. She quickly chased evil thoughts away from her mind and decided to visit the strange woman. She had to settle a score with her. Having put on a white, gauzy tunic and white trousers which somebody put in the wardrobe, she left the room to the corridor of the stone city. She went along the stone footbridge looking at streets below. The place wasn't densly populated, but it also wasn't completely desolate. The girl noticed two monsters with membranous wings and a few figures dressed in the plain robes similar to the dress of the bald man who had visited her. Above Haruka's head, black clouds of smoke from factories of the city moved on red sky. The blonde entered the room on the other side of the footbridge. She looked around, noticing the chamber lightened up with a red glitter of the magic lamp, decorated by wooden furniture. As it turned out, Aexel waited for her there. The woman sat on the armchair looking at the woman-warrior and smiling coquettishly. Haruka clenched fists. She moved in the direction of the woman, but she stopped her with her raised hand.
"Don't be silly. You are alone, you don't have any weapon or special abilities. I know the magic of my dead planet. Even if you somehow managed to touch me without my consent, you wouldn't escape far. Everyone in this part of the city obey my orders. Even these mindless pigs. I'm not a threat to you, you should know it. Unless you're expressing your gratitude in this way."
"Gratitude, for what? Because you mocked me?" The girl didn't hide anger.
"I got you out of the dungeons in which you were supposed to spend the rest of your life. I healed your wounds and I gave you place to live in the part of the city which in this desolated world can be regarded as luxury. Isn't it a reason good enough for your gratitude?"
"You are right in one thing. I chose you as my toy. You gave me a lot of pleasure, when you fought with pigs and when we were together." Aexel said. Haruka got up.
"I won't be controlled for the second time!" shouted. Aexel raised from the armchair and slowly came closer to her.
"You already gave me control. Didn't you see that in your heart of hearts you started wanting our night to begin as soon as possible? I can hear your fastening heartbeat." Haruka felt Aexel's breath on the neck.
"We should become closer. Why were you in my mine?"
"I came here in to kick Chronos's ass because he took what hadn't belonged to him! And kick everyone who try to stop me." Haruka answered, simultaneously feeling that the warmth of Aexel's hands affected her again.
"It is sad but everything belongs to him now. I pity you, if you delude yourself that it is differently." Aexel voice was sad and gentle. Haruka closed her eyes. She knew that the white-skinned woman took control over her again.
"Forget about everything and deliver never-ending pleasure to both of us." Aexel whispered in the blonde's ear. When Haruka recovered from the control, it turned out that she had been in the bedroom of the woman, very similar to the one in which she woke up earlier. Then she stopped being in control of herself again, and her mind was filled by one thought - the desire for the sex with Aexel. The black-haired woman kissed Haruka's mouth, and the blonde reached towards her back and unbuttoned her dress. Aexel threw clothes downand stood in a complete nakedness in front of Uranus' eyes.
"I knew that you wanted it." She said. Then she kissed Uranus again, but this time simultaneously taking the tunic off the girl's body. She lay down on the soft bed. Haruka pulled trousers off and bent over Aexel, sitting down on the bed.
"Let us have a moment of delight in this dying world." The pale woman said to her touching her shoulders. Haruka lay down on her, simultaneously kissing her passionately. Women were locked in a hug, when their hands intertwined, their skins came into a contact, and clithori touched each other. At some point, Michiru's face appeared in front of Haruka's eyes. Her blue eyes looked at her, and green hair waved on the sea wind.
"No!" She thought. Her lips caressed Aexel's neck.
"No!" Her mind protested. She stopped.
"I don't want to do it!" She shouted aloud, breaking free from the control of her new lover. She stood up, pushing Aexel aside.
"What is going on?" The white-skinned woman asked, still being befuddled from the sexual pleasure. Haruka reached for trousers, dressed them, and she put her tunic on a moment later.
"I found my former self. You have no control over me. Now I know why I'm here I won't get lost anymore! I came to this hell, because Chronos took what had been the most precious for me, the only person for whom I would give my life! I will find her and give her kidnapper the fate he deserves, for the ones who died in the airship, for everyone from the thirteenth floor, for prisoners who must throw mountains of the rotting meat!"
"How can you be so ungrateful!" Aexel ran up to Uranus. She didn't get dressed.
"Chronos rescued us, giving us this world. Perhaps this is not the best place, but it's all we have. There's nothing apart from that piece of rocks and the desert, don't you remember?" She said with tears in her eyes. Haruka smiled gently, and laughed a moment later.
"Are you laughing at it? Are you a madwoman?!"
"I'm laughing at your naivety. You're governing the entire city of slaves, but actually it is you who are the prisoner. You're a prisoner of Chronos' lies. The rest of the world exists, it is beautiful and bears no resemblance to this place. Where does Chronos take prisoners from? Did you try to talk to them?"
"I won't let you manipulate my loyalty to Chronos!"
"Even if you don't believe me you should know that you certainly aren't a chosen one of this bastard. I was in his palace. I saw him having a rich party for his friends there, while you still inhale mists from you factories!"
Aexel hit Haruka's face.
"Be quiet. Come back to your room. Tomorrow I'll order to take you back to the meat mine."
"Good. I prefer the stink of rot than the smell of your body. I'll only tell you one thing. There is alien who lives in my cell. He is a telepath. He can join our minds. You will see the beautiful world in which I was brought up. He will show you his homeland, worlds of all prisoners. You'll become convinced who actually is cheating you."
Haruka left the bedroom suite. The woman sat down on the bed. She knew that she would have the sleepless night ahead of her.