Chapter Seventy-four: Debellatio
SpongeBob brushed a tear from his eye at the display before him, in the underground lab. Plankton and Karen had fallen in love again. Maybe for the first time. SpongeBob broke awash in tears. "How beautiful." He honked his nose into his tie.
The two had remained for a time, hugging each other, Karen wrapping her wires several times around Plankton, to the point where onlookers would think that she was trying to suffocate her husband. He wrapped his stubby arms around Karen as much as possible. In that moment, all was perfect.
A blur swished from the right. Robo-Plankton, not nearly as nice as the real Plankton.
SpongeBob swiveled around, blowing a Cruise Bubble. It exploded upon Robo-Plankton, driving him back.
After seeing such love, having to hurt Robo-Plankton was a shame.
Not only did SpongeBob want to give Plankton and Karen as much time together as possible, he also wanted to talk to Robo-Plankton, like he had spoken to Fisheye. The former fish seemed to be coming around. Perhaps there was hope for Robo-Plankton.
Robo-Plankton growled. "He's taking what's rightfully mine. Out of my way." His laser vibrated. About to launch.
"Do you need fun in your life?" SpongeBob winked. "I can spell it for ya."
Michiru made an unreadable face.
"I have no interest in this thing you call 'fun.' Now. Get. Out. Of. My. Way." Robo-Plankton's laser burst. If SpongeBob dodged, then Plankton and Karen would be vaporized, breaking them out of their perfect intimacy, so rare in this world.
A wave roared before SpongeBob. The laser dissipated within.
SpongeBob wiped his brow. "Thanks, Michiru."
"Why didn't you move?" Robo-Plankton said, blocked by the wave.
"Because Plankton's with his wife."
"Every man for himself."
SpongeBob's heart softened. "Is that what pushes you?" The selfish attitude must be what was motivating the real Plankton, too.
"All that matters is that I take back my Karen and my beautiful SpongeBot. I shall rule the universe with them as my most trusted lackeys."
"I'm no one's lackey," Karen said from behind SpongeBob. Shattered perfection.
"That's right," the real Plankton said. "She's my equal, and she shall rule beside me in our kingdom." At least he was going to share the universe he still planned to conquer.
"I don't need any of you," Robo-Plankton said. "My lovely SpongeBot will fill every void." His lasers launched red beams, piercing a hole in the wall. Robo-Plankton flew through.
Plankton pointed to his robot self. "After him."
Karen stood on her wires. "You're letting me go outside?"
"Of course. I won't confine you anymore. My fear was driving me, but not now, not ever. I know that you're committed to me, and I'm committed to you just as much." Plankton gagged. "I'm starting to sound as sappy as Chibi-Usa."
"No, Plankton. You're growing."
"Huh? Well." He coughed. "W-we have to go."
"I love how embarrassed you get when we start talking about the mushy-gushy stuff." Karen lumbered on her wires. A wave bumped Karen and SpongeBob upon it.
Michiru flew ahead of them. "I'll go first." They rushed through the hole, Michiru carrying them using the sea. Robo-Plankton was out of sight.
"Where did he go?" SpongeBob said.
"I let him back in," King Neptune boomed from the sky.
Plankton growled. "You id—" Karen slapped a wire over his mouth.
"Yes, yes, I know what you're thinking. I'll explain why later. You have two worlds to save." The air tore apart, revealing Dead Moon's lair. "Hurry."
The four flew through the portal, entering Dead Moon's lair. The portal swirled shut.
A wrinkled woman, skullike, stripped of her skin, was encased in ice, her expression a combination of distress, horror, anger. Before the woman stood Chibi-Usa and four other Guardians who mysteriously resembled the Amazoness Quartet. Fisheye remained in the shadows, near the fallen skulls. Chibi-Usa knelt near her parents, staring at an empty spot on the ground, her eyes dead.
What had happened here?
Usagi looked at them, but her eyes didn't light up. Chibi-Usa didn't notice them. Mamoru pursed his lips.
So many sad people.
Only Dead Moon had caused their sadness. Never the robots. Never Plankton.
Jumping off the wave and then tumbling on the ground, SpongeBob hurried to Chibi-Usa's side. "Are you okay?"
Chibi-Usa burst into tears, burying her face into her hands. Maybe SpongeBob had said the wrong thing. She obviously wasn't okay.
Juno clenched her hands. "Damn Nehellenia."
SpongeBob whipped his head about. "Where is she?"
Juno pointed to the frozen woman. SpongeBob's insides lifted and fell at the same time. The former queen had been defeated, but the effects of her selfishness remained.
Could she still see what she'd done? Could she relish in the misery she'd crushed Chibi-Usa with?
Usagi gathered her daughter into her arms. Chibi-Usa sobbed.
CereCere stepped beside SpongeBob, whispered, "Nehellenia killed Helios."
SpongeBob gasped. "He can't really be… Can he?"
Mamoru, rubbing his daughter's shoulder, shrugged and shook his head. Perhaps not wanting to distress his daughter further.
"We'll avenge him, Princess." VesVes wore a sailor suit. Somehow, she and her sisters had transformed into Guardians. A lot had happened in the mere minutes that SpongeBob, Plankton, and Michiru had been gone.
"No more revenge," Chibi-Usa said, voice broken. "Just, I want Helios back. That's all."
SpongeBob softened. "Revenge doesn't solve anything." He turned toward the new Guardians. "Nehellenia made it her life's mission to get revenge, and look what happened. She made herself and lots of other people miserable right along with her. And then she ended up frozen in ice." She might be stuck for eternity watching the emptiness of her lair.
Michiru's eyes lightened at CereCere. Discerning. "Are you on our side now?"
"We are." She placed a hand on her heart. "My true name is Ceres. We defeated Nehellenia together with our princess but, in a way, she won." Ceres rubbed her arm. "I wish we could make her happy for once."
SpongeBob couldn't bring Helios back or make Chibi-Usa happy, but he knew who could. He cupped his hands around his mouth. "King Neptune."
Silence, save for the yells of swords and attacks from the other side of the darkness, where the rest of the Sailor Team fought SteelPants. Usually, King Neptune responded to SpongeBob. Why was he staying away when he'd helped their enemy minutes ago?
"I beg you, King Neptune, please take away Chibi-Usa's tears. Bring back the one she loves."
SteelPants laughed.
SpongeBob aimed his bubble wand at SteelPants and Robo-Plankton. "You stole my likeness to laugh at others. To take away what others treasure. You tricked Karen. You played with her feelings."
Hotaru scowled at Robo-Plankton, finally tearing her gaze from Chibi-Usa. "You stole my memories of one of my only friends for your selfish ambition."
SpongeBob gasped. "Who?"
Hotaru's frown deepened. Looked ashamed, like what had happened was her fault. "You."
"Y-you don't remember me anymore?"
She blinked as she tried to remember. "I… It's fuzzy."
SpongeBob turned to Robo-Plankton, his vision blurring with tears. "Why would you do that?"
Robo-Plankton cackled. "Gee, I didn't know so many people down here were idiots. For power. It won't matter what memories you have of your friends once Bikini Bottom becomes mine."
"Is that what you'll do to everyone? Take their precious memories of their friends away?"
"If it makes my reign better."
SpongeBob let the tears fall. How cruel. He needed to defeat the robots not for mere revenge, but to protect the rest of Bikini Bottom, possibly the human world, just as the humans were protecting the sea creatures.
Patrick and Sandy ran to either side of SpongeBob. They'd been with the sponge since the beginning. Patrick almost literally, since the two were born.
Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask floated above SpongeBob. So had the Sailor Team.
"What about Chibi-Usa?" Sandy said to the couple.
"She told us that she wants us to keep the robots from hurting anyone else." Usagi smiled at her daughter, on her knees, head pressed to the floor. "Even in her grief, she's putting others above herself. I wish she realized how strong she really is."
SpongeBot SteelPants dwarfed them all. Robo-Plankton hovered near his fiancée. Karen remained enshrouded in the shadows, Plankton standing on her shoulder. The rest of the Sailor Team flew around SteelPants.
SpongeBob blew a jetpack onto his back and shot forward. He blew out a Cruise Bubble. SteelPants chopped the ground, rupturing stone. Several spike-shaped pieces struck the Guardians, popped the Cruise Bubble. The pieces battered SpongeBob, and he faltered.
Patrick caught him in his arms. "I got ya, buddy." He pounded forward.
"Thanks, Patrick."
"You're making a mockery of karate." Sandy lassoed a skull, whipped her lasso and propelled herself into the air. She lassoed the air, flying toward SteelPants. The robot threw a chop toward Sandy. The squirrel lassoed its wrist and swung downward, but the robot's arm didn't budge. She landed on the robot's arm and ran up, toward its face, where green buttons dotted the corners of its forehead, each of its cheeks, the tip of its nose. When it had chopped, green had glinted from its palms; the green buttons overlaid its hands, too.
Weaknesses.
Sailor Venus launched Venus Love and Beauty Shock, the golden beam striking the robot's back. SteelPants lurched forward, but no electricity or smoke billowed from its back. Sailor Mars released a flaming arrow, striking the same spot. No response. Sailor Uranus and Sailor Jupiter smashed fists onto the spot. SteelPants didn't even jerk.
"Go for the green buttons," Sailor Mercury said. The loudest SpongeBob had heard her. Good thing he wasn't the only one who'd noticed.
The Team converged on SteelPants. Robo-Plankton swung in front of his fiancée. Lasers jetted from his bucket, grazing Patrick, Venus, Mercury. SteelPants shook his arm, shaking off Sandy, the squirrel trying to lasso the air, only for a laser to slice her, spinning her onto the ground.
"Wait a minute," SpongeBob said, still in Patrick's arms. "You put Hotaru's memories in the robot."
"Ding, ding, ding. We have a winner." Robo-Plankton warmed up his lasers.
"We have to go inside and get them." No way would SpongeBob let Hotaru return to the surface with hardly any memory of him left. "C'mon, Patrick."
"I command you to stop, my loyal minion," Robo-Plankton said.
Patrick skidded to a halt.
"Patrick, what're you doing?" SpongeBob said.
"Stopping, like my master told me to."
The real Plankton, upon Karen's shoulder to the side of the fray, shouted, "I'm your master, you lummox. I command you to get inside SteelPants using any means necessary."
"Aye-aye." Patrick rushed forward.
"I command you to stop." Robo-Plankton.
Patrick screeched to a stop.
"Go." The real Plankton.
"Stop." Robo-Plankton.
"Go, darn it."
"No, stop."
Patrick jerked, stopping and going upon command.
"Patrick, you stu…" Rei ran a hand over her face. Loosed an enflamed arrow onto one of SteelPants' green buttons, bursting the button in glass and acid. "Can't you see that the real Plankton is your real master? When do you think that robot became your master?"
"They're the same person." Patrick hefted SpongeBob higher. "That's why I'm following both of them."
Haruka threw a fist toward SteelPants and then swayed, the robot nearly chopping off her head. "What you said makes no sense."
A vein protruded from Plankton's forehead. "I'm the real Plankton. You listen to me, and me alone."
"No, you listen to me." Robo-Plankton blasted out a laser, and Karen wheeled sideways, the laser grazing her monitor, smoke trailing. "I am your master."
Plankton ground his teeth. "Your true master would never hurt his own wife." He leaped for Robo-Plankton. Michiru swung before Plankton, caught him in the palm of her hand. Plankton struggled in her grip.
"You've done enough," Michiru said. "We don't want you to get hurt any more."
Plankton seethed. "I don't care about getting hurt. He hurt Karen." He slipped out of Michiru's grip and dove for the robot.
"Plankton…" Karen turned toward Patrick, frozen in mid-stride. "Patrick, he's your true master. Listen to him, and him alone."
"No, listen to m—"
"Quiet!" Karen blurred, stood before Robo-Plankton in an instant, lashed her cut wire onto his antennae, electrocuting the robot.
The real Plankton smacked into his robot self, joining the robot's electrocution. Gasping, Karen let go of the robot. Michiru snatched Plankton.
SteelPants' eyes reddened. It grinned, revealing metal teeth. It stepped near Karen, Plankton, and Michiru, looming.
They had hurt its fiancé, too.
Leaping out of Patrick's arms, SpongeBob wheeled his hand, creating a bubble bowl from the water and air. He threw the bowling ball, and it crashed into the green button on the tip of SteelPants' nose. Acid spewed from its remnants. Only four to go—two on its cheeks, two on the palms of each of its hands.
SteelPants kept going.
It spoke. "Kah-rah-tae." The three syllables expanded from its mouth, the same as what had nearly taken out Chibi-Usa. Each syllable flew toward Karen, Plankton, and Michiru.
Sailor Jupiter and Sailor Uranus flew toward two of the syllables, catching two in their arms, the force careening them backward. Clambering onto her feet, Sandy threw her lasso toward the remaining syllable, "TAE." Jupiter and Uranus crashed into Karen and Michiru respectively. They slammed onto the ground.
Haruka managed a smile at Michiru. "You're on top for a change."
Michiru slapped Haruka's cheek, twisting her girlfriend's neck sideways, and then bounded upright.
Haruka cupped her crimson cheek. "I'm guessing this isn't a good time for jokes."
Instead of responding, Michiru flew toward SteelPants, gesturing upward. The sea didn't come.
They were in another dimension. The rules didn't apply. For some reason, SpongeBob and Patrick could breathe despite the dimension being full of oxygen. Michiru's summoning of the sea wouldn't work.
SteelPants snatched Sandy's lasso and threw it and Sandy, slamming the squirrel into the skulls. The skulls clattered about as she fell.
Mercury played her harp. SteelPants perked. The real SpongeBob had an affinity for catchy music. SteelPants spread its arms and rocked back and forth. Problem was, its dancing caused its arms to smack several Guardians.
Hotaru remained by her friend, despite Chibi-Usa's plea to fight. With her destructive power, launching any other attack might spell the end for the Sailor Team, too.
The fight was not going well.
SpongeBob found himself shutting his eyes. "King Neptune, please. We need your help."
Haruka punched one "KAH", shattering the words. "Why would we need him after the hell he's given us?"
"He's not a bad guy. He can still help us." SpongeBob fell onto his knees, bowing his head to his chest. "I implore you, King Neptune."
He remained amidst SteelPants chopping and screaming tangible syllables, Robo-Plankton blasting out lasers, the Guardians retaliating in vain. Untouched, unmoved, by the chaos reigning around him. Focused on King Neptune. On Chibi-Usa's tears. On Helios' disappearing. The heartbreak that they had endured since coming to Bikini Bottom.
Usagi gasped. Others gasped in turn, and the fighting quieted.
A golden glow penetrated SpongeBob's view. He peered up.
Golden Spatulas had appeared from the darkness above. They descended upon SpongeBob, their light nearly blinding. Like the light was from heaven itself.
"Stand up."
When King Neptune gave a command, one must obey.
SpongeBob stood, and the Golden Spatulas swirled around him, swaddling him in their warm, protective glow.
In a swathe of light and sea, King Neptune appeared above, arms crossed. SpongeBob almost bowed, but King Neptune said, "You may stand in my presence, SpongeBob."
He gawked. "Why have I been afforded such a luxury, Your Godliness?" He'd never heard of such a thing, standing in the presence of a god.
King Neptune smiled. "I consider you an equal."
The wind was knocked out of SpongeBob. "Me?"
He nodded. "You."
"But why?"
The fight had stopped. All watched King Neptune and SpongeBob. The sponge hardly felt their stares, so entranced was he with the magnitude of the god's words.
"You and your friends have shown me many things. But you, SpongeBob, have held a special place in my heart since you defeated me at creating the perfect krabby patty. Ever since then, I've been watching you. Watching how you treat others. You and your friends have saved Atlantis. You helped fish-eating humans. You've befriended a different, hostile species.
"Have you noticed that each time someone gave you a Golden Spatula, it was because you helped them? You showed them that thing. That word that Plankton had so much trouble saying…"
Plankton raised his fists. "Don't point out my weaknesses." He glanced at the others, shrank. "B-because I don't have any."
King Neptune regarded Plankton through half-lidded eyes. "I've been shown the light, so I won't punish you for your interrupting my beautiful speech." He cleared his throat. "It's love. You showed love to every single person who rewarded you with a Golden Spatula. That's why I gave the Golden Spatulas to those in Bikini Bottom. Not only so I could see when you showed them love, but also for your own benefit, for such a time as now."
"King Nep…" SpongeBob floated, debris rising from the ground. Power swelled inside him. The glow transferred from the Spatulas to SpongeBob, doming him, filling every part of his being.
The sponge had become solid gold.
He landed on the ground. He knew what he had to do.
He raised his bubble wand. Blew. Out emerged a golden bubble.
The golden Cruise Bubble trailed golden light. SteelPants scrambled, eyes darting every which way.
"Come on, darling, you can do it." Robo-Plankton dashed away from SteelPants, his fiancée, leaving SteelPants to fend for himself. "I'm here for you. All the way over here."
Plankton ground his teeth. "I'd never leave my love behind." He leaped, latching onto his robot self. Robo-Plankton swung this way and that, trying to shake Plankton off, but Plankton's grip was iron.
SteelPants screamed. Out of its mouth came the capital, yellow letters, "Aaaaa…" in tandem with the noise shaking the foundations of Dead Moon's void.
SpongeBob narrowed his golden eyes. Stay focused.
His bubble struck through the single-file letters like paper. The bubble speared SteelPants' mouth. Metal remnants exploded, showered onto the ground. SteelPants covered its mouth, backing into the wall.
Haruka whistled. "Damn, SpongeBob."
"I'm not done yet." He blew several golden bubbles in succession, toward each of the green buttons on SteelPants.
"No, no." Robo-Plankton shook himself more vigorously.
Plankton screwed open the robot's head and then jumped inside. "You don't care about her. You care about your empire. If she wasn't pivotal to your taking over Bikini Bottom, you wouldn't give a sea rat's behind about her."
Each of the bubbles burst on the remaining green buttons. SteelPants' eyes whirled about. She laughed, breath hitching, laughed brokenly. She hung down.
"Don't worry, baby. I'll revive you." Robo-Plankton tried to fly toward SteelPants, only to jerk back. "Darn you, my inferior self."
"Not inferior enough to stop you." Plankton's voice echoing in a monotone from his robot self's mouth, compliments of the microphone installed inside.
SteelPants remained still.
"Is it unconscious?" Mercury tightened her grip on her harp. "I mean, I don't think a robot can be unconscious, but you never know."
Haruka cracked her knuckles. "Let's not risk anything, shall we?"
SpongeBob molded himself into a ball. "Patrick."
"Aye-aye, cap'n." Patrick picked up the spongeball and hurled him. SpongeBob struck through the robot's eye, breaking an electric circuit, impaled the back of SteelPants. Electricity crackled around it.
Jupiter caught SpongeBob.
"One more time," SpongeBob said.
Makoto bit her lip. "Uh, I don't think that's a good idea."
"Trust me. If we've learned anything through all of this, it's to trust each other."
Jupiter looked from SpongeBob, the robot spinning in place, and back. Looked at SpongeBob differently. Like he had become a new person. He'd stayed the same since they'd met. Hadn't he?
Jupiter threw SpongeBob. Struck through the robot's remaining eye, through another node. Eyeless, mouthless, it could do barely anything.
Haruka caught SpongeBob.
"Again," SpongeBob said. "For Hotaru's memories."
Unlike Makoto, Haruka didn't hesitate. She threw SpongeBob and then flew alongside him. So did Mercury.
"We've worked well together from the beginning," Mercury said. "I want to be with you for the end, too."
SpongeBob warmed. With his friends, he was always ready.
He struck through SteelPants' head, a metal brain was suspended in the middle. If its brain was anything like his, it'd be full of filing cabinets. Within one of those filing cabinets was housed Hotaru's memories.
Haruka sped up, fist outstretched. She'd help him pierce the brain.
SpongeBob struck the metal brain as Haruka punched it. The brain ruptured, and metal guts spilled out. Filing cabinets lined the walls, with miniature SteelPants sitting in cubicles, typing on computers. They looked toward him, and their eyes reddened. Small helicopter blades sprouted from the tops of their heads, and they flew toward the three.
Mercury strummed her harp. The small robots froze and cha-cha'd to the music.
Haruka slapped Ami on the back, the younger Guardian nearly lurching onto her face. "You finally learned how to fight down here."
Mercury blinked. Smiled slowly. "I guess I did."
SpongeBob unfurled himself. As Ami stroked the harp, Haruka and SpongeBob threw open the drawers in the office space that was SteelPants' brain. Labels were slapped upon the cabinets, written in jarbled letters that made sense to only the robots.
Haruka threw open two drawers at the same time. "I can't understand a word on these labels."
"Just keep looking." SpongeBob opened drawer after drawer, losing track of the ones he'd opened, scrummaging inside each drawer, pulling out jellyfishing nets, jellyfishing glasses, snail food, metal krabby patties.
Until he found the CD.
He pulled it out. "I think this is it."
"Are you sure?"
"No. But we can try."
"We only get one chance at this, SpongeBob. We have to be sure."
SpongeBob frowned at the CD. He inserted it into one of his holes.
Images of him swarmed his brain. In one, he stroked his black hair. Maybe, like Squidward, he harbored a secret fantasy of having hair.
No. He was always satisfied with his lack of hair. He was watching these memories from Hotaru's perspective. In these memories, he was Hotaru.
The image faded into one of SpongeBob laughing at the joy of seeing his heroes, Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy, in the Mermalair. He—Hotaru—laughed, too. What a wonderful laugh he has. He could hear her thoughts.
The image dissolved into SpongeBob hugging Gary after being reunited with the snail in the Mermalair, the fear of losing his pet melting in one moment. Hotaru softened at his love for his pet.
She thought well of him.
The memories were safe inside his head. He shook his head of the images. "I have them, Haruka. I really do. We can go."
Ami kept playing her harp. "I'll keep them distracted." She followed them, the miniature SteelPants square-dancing. The three passed through the first hole SpongeBob and Haruka had made, back into the Chum Bucket. In time to see Sandy and Minako lasso SteelPants, squeezing the robot like a juice box.
SteelPants froze, mouth a gawping hole, arms raised. Its arms popped off, slammed onto the ground. Its legs slid off, and it crashed facefirst. Sandy and Minako unwrapped the harmless robot.
Robo-Plankton reached for SteelPants. "My love." He snarled. "Get out of me."
"Certainly." Plankton threw his robot self to SteelPants, the robot bashing against the larger one. He screwed open his head and jumped out. Karen caught Plankton in her wires. Grabbing Karen, Haruka whisked her and Plankton away.
Mercury hovered above SteelPants. "Hyperspatial Sphere Generate." A bubble expanded around SteelPants and Robo-Plankton. Within, the robot exploded. Nuts and bolts bounced about the bubble.
Sweat broke upon Mercury's forehead. She couldn't suppress the robots alone.
King Neptune flew beside her. "This is how it's done." From his hands, a transparent dome expanded, surrounded Mercury's sphere and then clamped onto it. Mercury let out a sigh of relief, relaxed as the god's powers combined with hers. Remnants of both SteelPants and Robo-Plankton rattled about the sphere like pinballs, smoke filling the sphere and then fading.
King Neptune drew back his hands, releasing his powers from Mercury's. Mercury lowered her own hands. The remaining nuts and bolts clattered to the ground.
They were no more.
"Don't worry about the other robots," King Neptune said. "Once I saw you were winning in here, I…decided to take care of them."
Haruka crossed her arms. "What happened to gods not being allowed to interfere?"
"I made an exception for you all. Because…" He licked his lips. The first time SpongeBob had seen King Neptune look uncomfortable. "Because."
"Is that your final answer?" Patrick said.
King Neptune glanced at each of them. Sighed. "No. No, it isn't. I don't have to put on airs all the time. At least, not in front of you all. You've taught me something. And that something, this thing you call 'love,' has made me tender towards each of you. So much so that, well, I have a present for you. You've been worried about your friends who the robots captured. Some who were turned into robots, whom I have turned back into their meager flesh and blood. I haven't forgotten about Biscuit Boy or the leg guy, either. They're safe and sound in Atlantis, where no one can hurt them but me, if I so choose."
"Have you chosen to?" Minako said.
"Why would I save them only to hurt them?"
"Because the only sense this place makes is none. You seem the type to do something cruel like hurting those you save."
"Not true. Anymore. Because of you all. Michiru, you've taught me that it's okay to interfere as a god. I'm sorry for letting my ego get in the way." He smiled wistfully. "I guess you all taught me how to apologize, too. Chiefly you, Plankton."
Plankton rubbed his hands. "One step closer to taking over the world. Brainwash a god first."
"I'll let your idiocy slide. Anyhow, I didn't think you'd teach me so much, but here we are. Here I am."
"Apology accepted," Michiru said. "Did I pass your test?"
King Neptune's smile lightened into one of happiness, no longer hiding the burden of carrying a world. "With flying colors."
In the quiet void, Chibi-Usa's sobs echoed, the Quartet, Setsuna, and Hotaru trying to comfort the princess, to no avail. Juno and Ceres rushed near Neptune.
"You're a god, right?" Juno said.
King Neptune reddened, summoned his trident. "Are my powers not obvious to you?"
Juno waved her hand dismissively. "Uh-huh. So, yes, you're a god. Good." Her eyebrows arched. "Our princess, she's grieving because Helios…" She choked. "Damn, I barely met the guy, but I'm crying. Can you bring Helios back, for our princess? I don't care if you don't like us, but do it for her. All that icky stuff you were talking about earlier, that applies to Chibi-Usa too, right?"
"It does." King Neptune stroked his beard.
SpongeBob clasped his hands and bowed, touching his forehead to the ground, his golden glow illuminating the stone and skulls. "Please, I implore you, Your Godliness, bring Helios back. For Chibi-Usa."
King Neptune twirled his mustache. His eyes drifted to the sobbing Chibi-Usa, to the empty ground, to Usagi, to Mamoru, and then to SpongeBob. "I've always heard you when you cry out to me, SpongeBob. Your heart is always pure. That is why I'll grant your request."
He raised his hands. Lightning struck within Dead Moon, lashing the ground and the skulls, some skulls shattering upon the ground, others exploding where they were. Another rending of the air, revealing a temple beyond.
Mamoru's eyes widened. "Elysion."
Chibi-Usa's head whipped up, eyes glassy from tears. "You're taking us there?" Her voice was soft.
"I am. I'll do my best to bring him back to Elysion. Since he's important to you all, he's important to me, too."
Chibi-Usa rose, no longer crushed with grief but powered with a glimmer of hope. "Thank you, King Neptune. I'll never forget your kindness." She rushed toward the open dimension. Stopped, turned and threw her arms around the god.
King Neptune froze. He worked his mouth, like he couldn't decide whether to speak or remain silent. Instead, he returned her embrace.
"This is what a hug feels like." He hugged her more tightly and then pulled back, squeezed her shoulders, and let her go. "He's waiting for you."
Chibi-Usa nodded. She no longer had a reason to cry.
She ran inside.
