Chapter 11- Misty Melee and Death Match
The selection process went quicker this time. A wave of the hand from Shang Tsung, a burst of magical flames, and two new images appeared above the Chalice of Champions. There was a pause from everyone as they mentally registered the next pair of chosen warriors, Sailor Neptune and Sailor Saturn.
Sailor Uranus turned to Sailor Neptune and drew her into a silent embrace in her arms. Sailor Neptune felt a tug at her dark green uniform skirt and looked down to see the littlest of the Outer Sailors, Sailor Saturn staring up at her and Sailor Uranus. She pulled the small teenager close to her and the little family held each other for a moment. The many years that they had spent raising her since her rebirth following the demise of the Shadow Galactica organization and the reawakening after the Great Sleep, came back in spades and neither of them could fathom the thought of letting their 'child' face such a dangerous enemy on her own.
"Oh please. I'm going to be sick!" Tanya's voice could have shattered glass. Her unexpected comment caught most of the Sailors by surprise. The tastelessness of it caused many of them to glare at her with distain.
Sailor Neptune glanced up at Sailor Uranus, but her lover did not pull away to go after Tanya. She chose instead to remain where she was, holding her tightly. Finally, Sailor Neptune was the one to pull away after a few more seconds, maintaining her hold of Sailor Saturn's hand.
"We will be back." She said with a confident and reassuring tone, looking at the blonde haired sailor.
Sailor Uranus nodded. Her lip twitched, trying to smile a good-bye to her lover.
"Good-bye and good luck" She replied back with a shift of her body weight.
Sailor Neptune and Sailor Saturn walked down together without a word. Tanya meanwhile, never ceased her verbal taunting.
"Wait a moment!" Shang Tsung said as he held up his hand. "It would be completely unfair to send you into battle without at least a glance at your opponents."
I highly doubt you care much for fairness. Sailor Neptune thought as she nodded her head, keeping her face blank.
A wave of his hands, another burst of mystical flames and two new images appeared.
There was a short pause as the images materialized. Once they both had, Tanya began to laugh out loud. One image was of a ninja in grey, or was it murky white? His image seemed to have a haze over it. The other was of a man clad entirely from head to toe in black. Not even his arms or face were visible, just solid black like a human silhouette.
Shang Tsung was grinning in a way that Sailor Neptune did not like, however, she had liked nothing about this man to begin with.
"Excellent! Smoke and Noob Saibot." He exclaimed with a clap of his hands.
"Which one is which?" Sailor Saturn asked as she stared up at the images, wide-eyed.
"Oh, you'll figure it out in a moment, Sailor Saturn." Shang Tsung's replied as his grin widened further. Sailor Neptune put her hand on the little girl's shoulder, pulling her behind her in a protective manner, before realizing how ridiculous that was.
"Yes, we will, thank you." Sailor Neptune turned toward the portal with Sailor Saturn, taking her hand again. "We will return soon."
"I'm sure you will," said Shang Tsung as they stepped into the portal together.
Sailor Neptune took one step as the portal cleared and doubled over as something hard and cold ran against her leg. She put out her hands to feel for the obstacle, squinting as the swirling black faded away.
A headstone. Oh my.
Sailor Neptune straightened up body upright and looked around. Yes, she was indeed in a graveyard, at night no less. It was clearly a very old graveyard so, well, populated that graves were almost built on top of each other. Mausoleums and statues of weeping angles dwarfed the plainer and more traditional headstones, the names and dates on which were almost all eroded away by years of weather and age. How old was this place, truly?
Does it matter?
No.
A tree—a weeping willow tree, naturally—bowed to the earth nearby. Sailor Neptune made her way toward it, stepping delicately around each headstone and stone marker. She scanned the area around her as she moved along, taking note of the relevant factors that would come to play in the upcoming battle. Tight space, many twists and turns, possible other hazards such as open graves. That was a disadvantage to her. It would be difficult to run, and jumping or any aerial attacks were now a greater risk. Perhaps if she could sneak into one of the nearby mausoleums, and defend herself from there, that might work. Or the reverse. If she could somehow trap him, she could maybe end this battle without too much effort. Watching the previous battles had made her cautious about underestimating the enemy's fighting skills. .
Reaching the weeping willow, Sailor Neptune slipped into its shadows. She could watch the majority of the area from here until her opponent showed up. Smoke or what had that other ninja's name been? Noob Sailbot, she remembered after a few seconds.
A breeze whispered over the graves and through the long grass and the leaves of the willow tree. In the distance, Sailor Neptune could just barely make out a line of thick black trees. A graveyard at the edge of the woods. That would be most disconcerting to stumble across during a pleasant nature walk in the evening.
The breeze blew again, this time from the other direction, and Sailor Neptune felt the hair on the back of her neck rise.
"Where there is Smoke, there is fire." A dry whisper said from somewhere behind her.
She started to turn just as the blow caught her in the center of her neck. Sailor Neptune stumbled forward pedaling her arms and legs, praying she would land between headstones rather than on one.
Luck was on her side. She moved with her momentum and rolled up to her feet, extending her hand before her until she felt her body balance itself out again. Spinning around to face her stealthy assailant, she extended her left arm around until she felt the familiar weight of her violin as it magically appeared in her hand. The wand appeared in her right hand and she wasted no time.
"Submarine Violin Tide!"
From the damp ground, groundwater, filthy and fetid, boiled to the surface and gathered into a wave. The putrid smelling liquid raced toward the willow tree and the grey, wraith-like ninja still standing beneath it. As the wave reached its apex, a puff of roiling white smoke suddenly streaked out of the wave's path, zooming above and even through the graves until it reached a particularly lovely angel statue, where it enlarged and solidified back into the grey ninja.
Sailor Neptune's stomach rolled. She looked over all the graves, the statues and everything else between her and the ninja. All of them were obstacles to her.
She couldn't run. He didn't need to.
I need to make it to the woods.
Sailor Saturn's first sensation in her arena was annoyance as the tip of the Silence Glaive caught on something. The branch of a tree.
Is this the training wood where Sailor Vesta fought that awful man creature? If it was, that would be good. Sailor Saturn knew those woods as well as any Sailor and she was the smallest. Perfect setup for an ambush.
But no. These trees were not familiar to her, not from the training woods or anywhere that she recognized. They were grey and twisted, barely trees at all except for the fact they had leaves on top.
Sailor Saturn gently twisted the Silence Glaive free and then tapped it against the thicker part of the branch it had been caught on. The sound was weird and it sounded more like she was tapping a rock than wood. She reached out and touched the tree. It was rock. Or a very, very dead and long since petrified tree.
So she was in a strange forest she did not know, and judging by the darkness, it was nighttime as well. But that was alright. She was the soldier of Death and Ruin. Darkness suited her. Now at she needed was to find out where this opponent she was supposed to fight was.
I hope Sailor Neptune's alright.
That single thought flashed through her brain. Sailor Saturn held the Silence Glaive close. It reassured her. Plus, although her eyes were getting used to the dark, she still couldn't see the branches that the twin blades of her glaive might catch on. It was so much taller than she was.
A breeze made her shiver and various shadows of every size and shape danced on the trunks of the rock trees as she moved deeper into the forest.
What was that?
Out of the corner of her eye, something hadn't been right. Sailor Saturn lowered the Silence Glaive, aiming it for the largest tree she could see in front of her. It was there that she had seen it. She was sure of it.
The breeze rustled again, and the shadows danced once more, and then there it was.
A shadow of a man, swaying back and forth in the breeze, both of his fists raised up and in her direction.
Sailor Saturn spun and aimed the blades of her Silence Glaive at where the owner of the shadow would have to be. "I am the Soldier of Death and Rebirth, Sailor Saturn, and I order you to show yourself!"
"Certainly." The cryptic voice said. It took her a few seconds to hone in on its origin but when she did, she couldn't help but feel her blood immediately chill a few degrees in her veins.
The voice was right beside her. Sailor Saturn spun, swinging the glaive as she did, when something struck her ankles, and her feet flew out from underneath her. She landed on her bottom, but slashed down with the Glaive, close enough to make—she had a feeling this was Noob Sailbot—scramble away.
"Such a large weapon for a little child." The deep, icy voice mockingly stated.
"Larger than you can imagine." Sailor Saturn replied back as she scrambled back up to her feet and spun in a pirouette. "Death Ribbon Revolution!"
Ribbons, their blade edges glowing even in the dark, shot from the tip of the Glaive and tightened around Noob Sailbot. The dark ninja fought against the ribbons, then hissed something in a language that Sailor Saturn didn't understand.
There was a weight on her shoulders, and suddenly she was flying. She yelped as she crashed through dark tree branches—back first, thankfully—and then she was above the forest, in the pure night air.
Sailor Saturn griped the Silence Glaive beneath her as she rose higher into the air. She couldn't lose her weapon by letting it fall from her hands. She needed it to defend herself. She was not an athlete like Sailor Pallas and her sisters, or Sailor Uranus. She didn't have the muscular endurance to push herself like they could; her body was small and not conditioned like theirs were. She would just have to hope that she could hold on long enough to figure out first how to get back down to the ground safely and then how to fight the man who was like a living shadow.
She tilted her head up to look at what was lifting her up into the air. She let out a gasp as she looked upon a shadowy bird of prey gripping her shoulders with its black talons. The raptor looked very similar to the shadow man, being completely black and featureless, only the shape and movement of its large wings gave her any indication as to what it was.
She had to escape it and quickly. She did not want to find out what this creature had in store for her when it reached whatever destination it was headed to. She gripped the staff of her glaive tightly in her hands and thrusted it upwards, aiming the twin blades towards what passed for the bird's ropey neck. The strike rang true and an unearthly screech echoed off the cool night air as the shadow bird let go of Sailor Saturn and dropped her back towards the ground.
As the landscape raced upwards to meet her, Sailor Saturn's mind raced on what to do, in anything, to break her fall. With seconds left, she extended her glaive out in front of her with outstretched arms. She lowered it so that the bottom of the shaft was a couple feet below her body.
The impact of the Glaive striking the ground sent a painful shock up her arms, but she had just enough strength to swing her slight bodyweight around the staff of the glaive like a dancer, breaking the momentum of her fall a little. She landed on her knees and skidded along the rough terrain, cutting her bare knees and tearing her gloves and boots in the process.
She could hear Sailor Uranus's voice in her head. Don't stop, Saturn. Be fast, by bold.
Sailor Saturn scrambled to her feet and looked around for a refuge. These definitely weren't the woods that she knew, but her only chance it would seem was to execute an ambush on her enemies. Because there was only one of her and at least two of them.
Sailor Neptune vaulted a short headstone and stumbled forward a little as she landed back on her feet. She was exceptionally graceful and coordinated, but Sailor Uranus had always been the better athlete, no matter how hard she trained.
Was he still behind her? She risked a glance over her shoulder to either confirm or deny that question. It was impossible to say. If he was, he was certainly not in human form. And as she had already found out, he could turn himself invisible altogether, just like that serpent man that Sailor Vesta had faced earlier. She slowly stepped backwards and felt something large pressed up against her. She turned her head again and looked to see what it was. It was a large tomb, not something that would be useful to her right now, it was built for one person and was much too tight for her move around, let along defend herself. However, that gave her an idea; a mausoleum might be a better alternative. The more she thought about it, that more she realized that that was her best chance. Not a great one, but much better than risking it on the open field, such as she already was. When she got an opening, she would make for the woods with the blackened trees. Hopefully the forest would give her more options on how to battle this unearthly adversary.
She dodged another headstone, a few more leaps, and a mausoleum loomed in front of her. As she neared its entrance, she could make out some details. There was no lock. No name on the door. Who knew what this place really was or why Shang Tsung had sent her here.
Sailor Neptune pushed open the door just enough for her to slip through. If Smoke—he must be Smoke—were to try and come in while invisible, he'd have to push the door open and thus reveal his position to her.
Inside, the mausoleum was what one would expect. Dark, cold, and walls lined from the ceiling to the floor with urns. As she moved deeper into the structure, the limited light inside revealed to her that none of the visible urns had any names engraved on them.
A rustle in the grave yard outside, and Sailor Neptune had an idea. She snatched an urn from its shelf and ripped off the lid. She plunged her hand into the nameless ash, and flung it just outside the still slightly ajar door.
Splat.
Some of the ash splashed back into Sailor Neptune's face from the light breeze that billowed through the open doorway while the majority of it clung to the heaving chest of a very large man, not more than two feet away from where she stood.
"Deep Submerge!" She immediately cried out.
The blue ball of energy hit Smoke before he had a chance to transform completely back into vapour. The ninja flew backward, striking a headstone with a satisfying crunch. His invisibility failed and he appeared in all his ghostly glory, writhing around in the dirt and debris of the shattered headstone.
Sailor Neptune took a deep breath and prepared to do a second Deep Submerge when Smoke stopped writhing and bolted upright, pausing as if listening for something.
A smile spread across the ninja's face from underneath his mask. Sailor Neptune felt a touch of cold in her stomach that she hadn't felt until now.
Smoke raised an arm. "Noob Saibot!"
What?
A blow sent Sailor Neptune sprawling out of her sanctuary. The ground rushed toward her and her wrist snapped as she fell against the stone porch of the mausoleum. There was sharp pain from the broken joint, but it didn't matter to her. She could work through the pain. She jumped up to her feet and whirled around to face her new attacker.
From out of the mausoleum came a tall, black-clad man. The other image that had been in the fire. Noob Sailbot.
How? Why? Why is there two? He did not do this to the others.
As she backed away from Noob Saibot, a column of white smoke rose up behind her, and Smoke appeared. Sailor Neptune immediately registered his presence and turned around to face him. When her eyes met his again, she could see that he was still smiling.
His boot to her ribs sent her flying back against the wall beside the entrance to the mausoleum. This time however, she was not so lucky with her landing.
Iris glanced over at Sailor Uranus. The tall Sailor's fists were clenched, as well as her jaw. Iris had no doubt that, had either ninja been here, Sailor Uranus would have torn them both apart with her bare hands.
Tanya was laughing again. Shang Tsung had turned his back again on the Sailors and the royal family, but his shoulders were not so stiff and hunched upwards as they had been before.
He's put them in the same arena, but separate, one fighting a ninja who can duplicate himself, the other who can summon the first one, while neither of them can reach each other to help.
Shang Tsung briefly turned around and glanced up the stairs at Iris and smiled. Iris shivered as the weight of the realization that she was looking down at pure evil hit her again.
Thud.
Iris whipped around to see Sailor Uranus standing at the exterior wall of the Crystal Palace, one hand braced against it, the other in a fist by her side, her head bowed.
Hybrid started to walk toward Sailor Uranus but Iris reached out and touched her brother's hand. He instantly stopped at her touch and looked back at her.
Iris climbed out of her seat and, while everyone else remained transfixed with the screen, she slowly crept over to Sailor Uranus.
"Excuse me, uh, Sailor Uranus?" She quietly and fumblingly said.
The Sailor's shoulders heaved in a heavy sigh. "What do you want?"
"I am truly sorry for…for Neptune." Iris said with the truest of sincerity. She knew her words would probably be meaningless to Sailor Uranus but she felt the need to express her gratitude for someone risking their life for someone they just met to the other person that might truly appreciate it.
The blonde-haired Sailor lifted her head and turned to look at Iris for a moment. Then she looked back to the wall. "Don't be sorry. She is a Sailor Soldier. And she and I have always understood that we may be called to lay down our lives for a greater good." She pushed away from the wall and turned to face Iris, her eyes glittering. "Besides, she is not out yet."
There was something dangerous about the tall woman when her eyes shone like that. Iris hastened back to her seat and curled up again, praying that the horrible feeling growing in the pit of her stomach would turn out to be wrong.
Sailor Saturn slashed the Silence Glaive at Noob Saibot's shadow. The dark wraith's laugh hurt her ears and she nearly dropped her Glaive in her desperation to cover them.
The shadow charged at her again, his image flickering across the rock trees and limited light provided by the moon.
"Silence Wall!"
A barrier rose around her and the shadow paused at its borders. It knew better.
She held the wall in place, maintaining its density with the internal power of her chosen heavenly body. If she could hold him off long enough, maybe she could think of a better plan. Or at least figure out where the flesh and blood form of Noob Saibot had gone.
That question was answered almost immediately as the dark ninja, almost indistinguishable from his shadow, reappeared. He considered Sailor Saturn's current position and the energy barrier that she had managed to throw up in his absence. He studied her for a few more seconds and then made an odd, careless gesture at her, almost dismissing her.
Sailor Saturn felt her defence wall faltering, but Noob Saibot now stood next to his shadow. If she moved fast…
Breaking her concentration, she tightly gripped her glaive in her hands. The wall dissolved as she swung the Glaive over her head. "Press Crusher!" She widened her stance as a bolt of blue energy formed at the tip of the Glaive.
And then her boot slipped.
With a scream, she tumbled backward into a portal, the night sky vanishing above her, and then opening below her again as she found herself above the woods once more, diving into the trees.
As she fell, a flash of teal beyond the edge of the woods caught her eye.
"Neptune!" She choked out the name before crashing through the treetops, no time to put her Glaive out this time. She hit the ground and managed a shallow and garbled shriek at the sickening crunch of her breastbone.
Noob Saibot and his shadow partner began to chuckle. Sailor Saturn whimpered as she tried to lift her Glaive, aiming it at their hearts. "Silence…Buster."
A double energy spiral flew out of the Glaive and slashed Noob Saibot once before continuing on passed him. The ninja swiped at the cut on his arm, still laughing.
Sailor Saturn pounded a tiny fist in the ground and collapsed. It hurt to breathe and she tasted blood in her mouth.
A third laughter joined Noob Saibot and the shadow. Sailor Saturn's head was angled just right to see the grey ninja come crashing through the trees, carrying the flash of teal she had spied beyond the woods. Sailor Neptune looked broken nearly in half, but she was still alive. Even from her angle down on the ground, Sailor Saturn could see the shallow expansion and contraction of Sailor Neptune's ribcage which meant that she was still breathing. She made no noise as the grey ninja—Smoke—threw her down on the ground beside Sailor Saturn.
It was only the two Sailors, comrades-in-arms, surrogate mother and adopted daughter, with their two opponents, plus the shadow.
Smoke and Noob Saibot exchanged glances, and seemed to come to a decision, nodding to each other. In lockstep, they walked toward the two Sailors sprawled on the forest floor.
Sailor Saturn felt weak fingers seeking hers, and she curled her hand around Sailor Neptune's, as much as she could. They had come in together, they would die together.
A flash of Sailor Neptune's mirror, clutched tightly in her other hand,, reflected the two ninjas stalking toward them. The Deep Aqua Mirror normally reflected an enemy's weak points.
There were none.
Sailor Saturn cried out and Sailor Neptune only moaned hoarsely when Noob Saibot's shadow and Smoke lifted them each by their neck collars. Sailor Saturn's head fell back enough to look up at Noob Saibot's face one more time as the black fist flew toward her face.
"No!" Sailor Uranus's voice did not shake as she called out to the image on the large mystical screen. There were no tears, no remorse, and just pure black rage. Iris would have accepted it right then if the tall woman had come over and killed her for causing the events that led to her lover's death.
Tanya was dancing madly next to Shang Tsung, her mocking laughter unbearable. Iris covered her ears and moaned when Neo-Queen Serenity's shadow drew her attention again.
The queen's blue eyes were filled with tears, but the tears did not spill down onto her cheeks. Beside her, King Endyimon remained silent but his facial expression spoke volumes.
"Once again, you will bring them home to us right now, Shang Tsung."
This time, Shang Tsung did not even turn to address the royal family. "Looks like a waste of a portal to me. There's nothing left."
"You!" The queen paused and the muscles in her throat worked as she swallowed hard. "You will return them to us, as you promised, as we agreed, right this moment."
Shang Tsung turned enough so they could see him roll his eyes. "All of you people of this kingdom are far too sentimental. But if you really insist."
"I do." Neo-Queen Serenity replied without hesitation.
A portal opened in the nighttime woods. Smoke and Noob Saibot each picked up their charge and, without delicacy, tossed them through the swirling black hole in space. A second later, the bodies sprawled to the ground in front of the Crystal Palace with a pair of heavy thuds.
Sailor Uranus descended down the steps but instead of racing to the body of her lover, or her daughter, she raced right up to Shang Tsung. "You! You and me, now. Open a portal. I'll fight you on any battleground you want, and I swear … I will kill you."
Tanya shoved herself between Sailor Uranus and her master. "You do not approach Shang Tsung. You are not worthy to fight him."
"I'll fight you first, then." Sailor Uranus responded, locking her eyes with brown eyes of the heartless witch that dared to step up to her.
Shang Tsung threw up his hands. "Easy there, Sailor Uranus. I'd be happy to let you fight. It seems that we have a tie right now. You have won three matches and I have I won the other three. To break the deadlock, one final battle must be fought and I have the perfect opponent in mind for you. Forget the Chalice of Champions. Do you trust me?"
"Not in the least." She retorted, not breaking her stare down with Tanya.
"Then you're smarter than your other Sailors." He gestured to the still-open portal beside him. "Go."
Sailor Uranus glanced back at the bodies of her lover and her daughter as the medics rushed over to them, then up at her queen.
"I will not fail you, your Majesty." She looked over towards Iris. "And I will not fail you, either."
Before another word could be spoken, she turned and vanished through the portal.
End of Chapter 11