Chapter Twenty-Six
Restore my broken dreams
Shattered like fallen glass
I'm not ready to be broken just yet
[Sting]
"Why?" he screamed into the billowing sky, livid and shattered around him. "Why are you doing this to me?!"
And he flung himself over and over again at the resisting air until he fell to his knees, his hands clutching at the unforgiving rock beneath. As the lightning ripped the sky he could hear her crying, and the sound tore at him.
"Why?" he whispered.
"Have faith," her voice begged him, broken and tearful. "Everything will be alright."
Darien curled in on himself, slowly going numb with pain, and he closed his eyes.
"I can't live without you," the lost whisper reached him, and he squeezed his eyes tighter until the darkness flowered with bursts of light and agony that exploded into something fiercer. Darien bit back a scream as pain seared along his nerves and the darkness roared with an invisible fire.
"No …"
Savage heat beat at him, burning him, eating at him.
In the noise of screaming, tortured metal that filled his mind and made it impossible to think beyond the pain, he was trapped once more in the burning ruin of his life and there was the sound of someone crying … he was crying … a girl, crying and calling his name …
He whimpered, his lungs scorched and dry. Through the inferno, through the blackness and pain, he felt a girl's hands tug at him, her voice sobbing with terror. He cringed away, but she wouldn't let go.
"Don't leave me!"
Then guilt and anguish wrenched him apart, leaving him broken and twisted in the conflagration. There was nothing left but pain.
It was several moments before Darien realised that the ground underneath his cheek was cold and gritty. He slowly and painfully lifted a hand to his eyes, noting in dull surprise that the flesh under his glove wasn't blackened and burned, that his hands were a man's hands and not a nine year old boy's.
His fingers trembled horribly, and slowly he curled them into a fist to stop the shaking that was threatening to pull him apart. With some difficulty, he levered himself to his feet and swayed slightly.
He felt hot and sick.
As his vision blurred and cleared, he looked up and realised why he'd been summoned through the dream. His breath caught as he saw Sailor Moon in the darkness, hanging painfully by her wrists from a beam overhead in the warehouse they were in.
Something's wrong.
He was already moving, one hand reaching to pull a rose out of the air. Sailor Moon was trapped.
Something's very wrong.
Even as he moved out of the darkness into the faint puddle of light, his instincts screamed at him, and Sailor Moon dropped. She fell to the crates below, straightening with an odd little smile that wasn't right.
And Darien realised how stupid he'd been as she pulled off her costume with a little flourish.
"Zoicite."
"The one and only," the witch said brightly. And she was gone. Darien stumbled a little, turning too fast as everything spun around him, but he couldn't find her in the shadows. He had the nasty feeling that he was being stalked, and he shook his head slightly, trying to clear the spots across his vision.
"You know," Zoicite's voice drifted out of the darkness. "I really don't like you."
"I'm not very fond of you, either," Darien responded dully.
"You've wrecked my plans. You've stolen two of my crystals," she said conversationally. "My queen's really not happy about that. And that trick of yours, playing hero to the Moon brat, is really getting old. What do you see in that whining twit anyway? You should just let me squash her and save us both a whole lot of headaches."
"Do you really think you could?" Darien allowed himself a brief, pained smile. "She's kept you on the run, hasn't she?"
"Oh, please. Jedite and Nephrite may have been complete morons, but you don't seriously think I didn't figure out who the real ringleader is? Give me some credit, Cape Boy."
He caught a flicker of movement in the shadows and watched it warily.
"Take you out of the equation, and no more Scouts. But somehow I thought you'd be more of a challenge. Did you seriously think that was the real Sailor Moon?"
"If you're going to kill me, quit gloating and just do it," Darien interrupted. As a hot, sick wave of nausea and guilt swamped him, he welcomed the idea with relief.
"What, and take all the fun out of it? No, I don't think so."
She stepped forward into the dim light. "And if I just kill you now, you'll never get these, will you?" The witch held up a handful of glittering crystals. Five of them. Without thinking, Darien lunged at them and gave a sudden cry in the stinging blizzard of cherry blossom. He fell back as Zoicite's laughter rang around him, touching the back of his hand to a razor thin cut. And froze.
"The hero unmasked," Zoicite taunted above him.
He stared down at the shredded mask at his feet, his heartbeat sounding funny in his ears.
"So now we know."
He never saw the attack coming. He didn't even try to stop it, turning blindly to meet it, as pain lanced through his shoulder and the witch laughed. The world exploded in agony, then an unfamiliar voice called out and Zoicite screamed in frustration.
He looked up slowly, and some dim part of him noted a slim girl fighting the witch, cornsilk hair flying against her amber sailor suit. As the battle raged overhead, he flinched, his eyes dazzled by the fierce light in her hands, and they narrowed as he caught a different kind of glitter.
The witch was distracted, fighting hard to defend herself against this new, relentless attack, and there was a faint sparkle of crystals in her hand, riveting his attention. Five were in her hands. Two were his, tucked safely in his shirt pocket. This was his chance.
"Tuxedo Mask!"
His attention fractured as Sailor Moon's voice echoed through him, rocking his heart with a sickening lurch. Somewhere, Sailor Moon called out to him again, and she was fading fast. Darien was running before he even had time to think, before he had time to wonder how he had heard her.
The whole world narrowed down to her small pale form in the distance, trapped in a globe of sickly light, and he clutched at his heart as she folded and crumpled, caught by Mercury's arms. Sailor Moon struggled to stand again as Jupiter lifted her hands and flung lightning at their prison. Darien could hear the screams as the white lightning ricocheted around them and vanished. The globe still held them fast, and as he flew towards them, he could see them fighting against the force of the globe.
And as he passed another pile of crates, he could see the source of the magical prison. Pale and cold in the cloudy afternoon, a man whose face was hidden by his long white hair held one hand outstretched, watching the girls he had caught with a clinical fascination. He flexed his hand, and the four girls screamed.
The air beside the tall, cold man flickered and rained cherry blossom, and Darien slammed to a stop, flattening himself against a stack of crates as Zoicite appeared. The witch was breathless, her voice cracking with fury even at that distance. Darien watched in dismay as she spoke rapidly, and the man with the strange white hair and eyes like ice turned to glance around them.
"Malachite," Darien breathed. The fourth, and most dangerous, general.
And the most dangerous general flicked his fingers again casually, and Darien gasped with pain as Sailor Moon screamed and slumped, her whole body bowing with agony as she slid to the ground.
As the dark spots across his vision cleared, he realised that Zoicite was calling his name.
"Come out and play, Cape Boy." Zoicite's eyes were darting around, her voice sounding a little shrill. "Hand over the crystals, or your little fan club is finished."
He froze, unable to think, with the wind cold on his bare face. And his heart gave that sickening little lurch again as Sailor Moon called his name. His hand moved, reaching for the crystals.
There was an amber flash and a streak of gold, and Darien heard Zoicite's shriek of pure fury, and a faint grunt of surprise from the pale man. The crackling forcefield exploded in a shower of sparks and the Scouts were free, staring in shock at the golden figure standing over them with a big grin on her face.
The fifth Scout had arrived.
In the confusion, the witch and the pale man were gone, and Darien hid in the shadows, shaking uncontrollably, one hand lifting to touch a mask that wasn't there anymore.
He had never felt so naked and vulnerable.
His hand closed over the crystals he held, the facet edges cutting into his flesh as his grip tightened. There was nothing left for him to do here; the amber Scout had done it all, and they hadn't needed him.
As he closed his eyes, he could hear Sailor Moon, her voice a little shaky as she asked, "Where's Tuxedo Mask?" He imagined a look of disgust on her face. "Do you think he's …"
"We didn't need him anyway," Jupiter's voice carried mercilessly on the still air, and the stab of anger that shot through him died as quickly as it had been born.
He was nothing now, worse than useless, and he had almost betrayed everything in a moment's stupidity.
As Sailor Moon turned her head, eyes anxiously watching the shadows, he stepped back and disappeared into the darkness. She didn't need someone who could be fooled so easily. He closed his eyes, feeling sick at heart. How could he have been so stupid? Following that fake Sailor Moon like a little lost puppy.
She would never know how close he had come to giving Zoicite exactly what she wanted.
He stepped into the silent darkness of his apartment and staggered slightly as a wave of dizziness swept over him, clutching at the hot stinging of his shoulder.
He would have handed over the crystals with barely a thought and given up his only hope of finding the princess, and it would have achieved nothing. And slowly, he drew his hand back, slamming his fist against the wall.
How could he have been so stupid?
It was all eroding around him. Why was he so ready to throw in everything? How had he come so close to risking everything that mattered, and his princess' last chance, to protect Sailor Moon? His judgement was shot to hell, and as he closed his eyes in pain, he knew why. He cared.
He covered his bare face with his hands as the magic left him and Tuxedo Mask vanished. He had seen Sailor Moon, frightened and white under the theatrics, and he had reacted.
Darien started laughing, and couldn't stop, pushing his hands savagely through his hair as he slid to the floor.
He'd lost.
He'd lost everything.
Slowly, he became aware of the faint glow that lit up the gloom around him. Darien lifted his head.
"Nice place you've got here," Zoicite's glowing image said conversationally.