Chapter Fourteen

Hotaru blinked and realised that she was staring at her own reflection in the train window. Had she fallen asleep? She glanced outside hoping to catch sight of some familiar landmarks, but dusk had fallen and it was hard to see much of anything save for the usual haphazard array of lights that marked houses and other smaller buildings. Finally, the train lurched to a stop and she breathed a sigh of relief. She might have dozed off, but there were still a few stops before hers.

As the train pulled away she rubbed her hands over her face. The train was going to be expressing past the next few stops and the last thing she needed was to doze off again. Turning back to the window, she studied her reflection again. Her face looked drawn and tired, and her eyes, normally a quietly expressive shade of deep purple, seemed dull and almost lifeless. The last few days had taken their toll and although part of her wanted nothing more than to crawl into bed and sleep, another part of her dreaded what her dreams might bring.

Shifting to lean her head against the window, she let her gaze run lazily over the rest of the carriage. It was empty, which was a little surprising but not unheard of, and she wondered whether it would be a good idea to use her unexpected solitude to contact the other senshi. Yet almost as quickly as the idea came, she discarded it. They might still be fighting and she didn't want to risk distracting them.

She glanced out of the window again. Another thirty minutes till her stop, maybe a bit more. Her eyes drifted shut.

Thump.

She jerked up into a sitting position and looked around for the source of the noise. There was no one there and nothing nearby that could have made the sound. She sighed. Maybe she was being paranoid. She let her head fall back against the window again.

Thump.

Her eyes shot open. There it was again and if she wasn't mistaken, the noise had come from above her, almost like there was something on the roof. No longer caring how ridiculous she felt, she got to her feet and walked to the centre of the carriage, her eyes on the roof above her.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

There was definitely something up on the roof. The noises started from the centre and then moved toward the edge. Slowly, she turned to the window closest to where the last sound had come from and took a slow step back. Her breathing hastened a fraction and she slipped, almost unconsciously, into a loose fighting stance.

Nothing.

And then the window behind her came apart in a spray of broken glass. Something whistled through the air toward her and she dropped into a crouch. Sparks flew and one of the tall poles that lined the aisle of the carriage crashed to the ground, cut cleanly in half. Before she could move again, something struck her with enough force to lift her up off the ground and slam her into the opposite wall of the carriage.

Pain shot through her and she heard the screech of metal as the carriage wall dented from the impact of her body. Beside her, a window shattered and the angry howl of the wind filled her ears. She wrenched herself from the wall and stumbled away, kicking one half of the ruined pole at her attacker. He knocked the cylinder of metal aside easily, but she managed to buy enough time to get her first good look at him.

He wasn't much taller than her, but he moved with the lithe deadly grace that only years of combat experience could bring. There was a sword in his right hand, and its blade was of a strange black metal that seemed oddly familiar. She felt a cold sweat break out along her forehead. The metal was almost too black to be real, so dark it seemed to be made of the very night beyond the broken windowpanes and rather than reflect the sterile light that filled the carriage, it appeared almost to devour it. Only one weapon she'd ever seen before looked like that: the Silence Glaive.

Then her gaze moved to the cloak he wore and deep inside her, she felt Saturn stir as millennia of loathing seethed coldly and terribly to life. His cloak was a purple so dark that it could easily have been black and the clasp that closed it was a black raven clutching a glaive in its claws.

It was the crest of the Royal House of Saturn.

The thought slithered to the front of her mind like a vast serpent made of pitch. She swallowed. The thought belonged to Saturn, and with it came the image of a vast and desolate plain peopled only with lingering ghosts and the ruins of once great buildings.

They did this.

And then Saturn was pressing on her mind, the silence inside her beating like some alien heart.

"You're only a shadow of her." His voice was mocking, each word pitched perfectly to insult her. "But she's there inside you, I can feel it." His sword traced the air in a lazy figure eight, the tip beginning to glow with the colour of old rust. "I just have to bring her out."

He thrust his sword forward and she blanched as a wave of raw force rolled off the weapon. It tore through the air toward her, ripping apart the poles on either side of the central aisle. If she had been in her senshi form, she could have used her glaive to block the blast or bat it away, but there wasn't enough time for her to transform.

Have you forgotten what we are?

Violet light shimmered into existence around her hands and she thrust them forward. The blast fractured into countless smaller pieces that ricocheted wildly off her palms, gouging holes in the roof, the sides of the carriage, and even the floor. The lights flared, one of them exploding, before they began to flicker, bathing the carriage in an unsteady stream of fragile light.

"Yes." A slow, cruel smile crossed his lips as he took first one step forward and then another, his pace quickening. "That was exactly what I was looking for."

He blurred forward almost too fast for her to see and she could hear Saturn in her head telling her to move before she got both of them killed. She dodged backward and looked for something she could use as a weapon. There was nothing. The remnants of the poles that were scattered around the ruined carriage were either too short or damaged to the point where she doubted they'd last even a few seconds in her hands. Another slash came her way and she shifted to the side, letting it strike the ground, but he was ready and she only saw the swirl of his cloak before his kick knocked down the centre of the carriage.

She skidded to a stop against the far wall and dragged herself up to her feet in time to duck another attack. He made a disgusted sound and then his knee was ramming into her chin. She struck the wall hard and thoughts flashed through her mind as she saw him lift his sword again. Where was everyone? Why wasn't anybody coming to investigate? Saturn's voice, cold and terrible filled her ears.

We will always be alone. Accept it.

No, she thought wildly, throwing herself forward and out of the way as she scrambled to find some room. She wasn't alone, she had Setsuna, Haruka, and Michiru, and all of the others.

Then where are they now?

They were helping people. That was what they did wasn't it? He rushed forward, his blade a black blur as he lashed out again and again. She felt a cut open on her thigh, another on her shoulder, and then she slipped, blood flowing down her side from the nick across her ribs. A fraction slower and he'd have cut her in half.

There is no else.

Why was she alone? She kicked blindly at him, scoring a clumsy hit off his shoulder that forced him back. Where was her strength? Why was she so weak?

Because you are afraid of what we are.

Of course she was afraid. Saturn was a monster. She'd killed a whole planet and she'd almost killed Haruka and Setsuna. Hotaru didn't want to be anything like her.

Monsters aren't born. They are made.

Unbidden, memories flooded through her of a small house at the edge of a vast ravine and of years spent learning how to fight. Bile rose in her throat as she relived kill after kill in the shadow of the Great Rift.

That is who we are.

He came forward again and she lurched back, clutching at her head. No, she thought. That was who Saturn had chosen to be. She hadn't chosen that, she would never choose that.

If they killed the ones you loved, if they took away all that was precious to you, would you really have chosen any differently?

She felt the sting of another wound along her forearm and realised with horrible certainty that he was toying with her. "Why are you doing this?" she cried. "Why won't you leave me alone?"

He smirked. "Looking at you, I can see that she's so close now, all it would take it is one more push." He flicked his sword to the side, her blood splattering onto the wall. "Do you want to know why I am doing this?" He lunged forward, striking her in the shoulder with the hilt of his sword. "Because I can." Each word was punctuated with a strike with the flat of his sword and she could barely focus on what he was saying through the pain. "And when I'm done, I'll go after your friends and it will be a hundred times worse for them than this." He shoved her back to sprawl on the ground. "What do you think of that?"

She said nothing. Her eyes glazed as her mind repeated his words over and over again. He wasn't going to stop with just her. He would go after everyone and he would hurt all of them too. And hurt them worse than he was hurting her. For a moment, the whole world was gone. The roar of the wind through the broken windows and the holes in the carriage fell away. The flickering lights that lit the carriage wheeled above her and then vanished like so much mist before the morning sun. Her body was numb and all she could feel was nothing.

Was she dead?

No.

Then what was that sound?

It was there, the only thing left in the entire world. It rustled on the edges of her awareness, a low and gentle sound that was somehow soothing it its utter finality. It was all that was real in her after everything else was stripped away. It was the secret of creation, the beginning and the end of everything she was and could ever be.

It was silence.

And it was perfect.

She stood. It was like she was thinking clearly for the first time in her life. The man in front of her wanted to take from her everything that she considered important. Mercy, kindness, compassion no longer applied. He was nothing more than a walking corpse. Something about her must have changed, because as she raised her head and met his gaze, he took a slow, uncertain step back.

Now you understand.

She nodded slowly. Her wounds no longer bothered her. Calmly, she catalogued the damage and began to factor in how it would affect her ability to obliterate her opponent. "I understand." She tilted her head to one side, bloody bangs brushing down over her eyes. "Where should I begin?"

Take his weapon from him.

Yes, she thought, remembering something she'd heard a long time ago. "You should learn how to fight without a weapon because any weapon can be taken from you. Your hands, your feet, your knees, and your elbows, and the rest of your body cannot be taken from you short of crippling you or killing you…" she breathed the words out reverently.

"What are you babbling about?" he growled and she watched as he regathered himself and brandished his sword. "Well?"

Now!

She darted forward and his sword stabbed forward to catch her in the chest. At the last moment, she ghosted to the side and the edge of the sword skimmed the side of her ruined shirt. His eyes widened in surprise before she clamped one hand around the wrist of his sword arm and lunged forward, her other elbow swinging up and then down onto the bridge of his nose.

She felt his nose break beneath the blow and tightened her hold on his sword arm. Silently, she continued to strike at his face with her elbow until finally he managed to get his other arm up to ward off the blows.

"That's enough!"

Ignoring his cry, she hopped upward, driving her knee into his ribs. She heard the creak of bone as she snaked the arm she'd been elbowing him with around the back of his neck, holding him in a clinch as she kneed him again and again. It was ugly and inelegant, but she didn't care. A moment later, she heard a wet snap as his ribs broke beneath the assault and as he faltered backward, she wrenched the wrist of his sword arm violently to one side. The blade clattered to the ground and she landed a solid kick to his chest that sent him skidding across the floor.

He stood slowly and clutched at his wounded side. She noted with calm dispassion that he'd begun to spit up blood. Clearly, one of his broken ribs must have punctured his lungs.

Finish it.

She advanced on him and he drew himself up, dropping into a fighting stance of his own. Almost contemptuously, she threw a kick at the side of one of his knees. The bone trembled beneath the weight of the kick, but held, and he staggered back.

Pathetic.

He bellowed and charged as best he could half-hobbled. One hand shot toward her jaw. Rather than dodge, she twisted and let his fist clatter off her shoulder. Pain shot through the joint, but she had what she wanted as she grabbed his extended arm, bracing the elbow with one arm and striking down on it with the other.

Snap.

A ragged howl left his lips as his elbow broke and almost on instinct, he swung at her with the other arm. She blocked the blow and repeated the procedure with almost mechanical efficiency.

"Please…" he groaned as she knocked him to the ground and straddled his chest. One hand grabbed the clasp of his cloak and tossed it aside. "Don't…"

Thump.

Thump.

Thump.

His head rocked back and struck the floor with each punch and she realised with a vague sense of detachment that she was probably killing him and found that she didn't care. He had threatened the people precious to her so his life was worth nothing.

"Would you listened to them if they begged?" she asked. Thump. Thump. Thump. "Would you have listened to me?" He was likely beyond hearing her now, but she didn't care. The silence was lifting now, and in its place was a dull roar. No, she realised, not a roar. It was screaming. She was screaming.

Thump.

Thump.

Thump.

And then the silence was gone entirely and she was staring down at his face. Or what was left of it. Her gorge rose and she was powerless to contain it, stumbling off him and heaving until there was nothing left in her stomach and her throat was a raw, bile-tasting mess. She slumped to the ground.

Through the ruins of his mouth, he groaned.

He was alive. How could he be alive? Saturn answered for her.

He's not human. You know that. Now finish it.

She stared at the twitching body as he struggled to move and felt her stomach convulse again. Had she done that? Her gaze dropped to her hands. The sheer force with which she'd been hitting him had torn off the skin on her knuckles. His blood was all over her.

"No," she whispered. "It couldn't have been me. It was Saturn." She pulled her knees up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, rocking slowly. "It was Saturn."

But inside she knew. She knew that it had been her. She could still feel the way his elbow gave beneath her strike, could still feel the crunch of her fists against his face. And he'd pleaded with her, or at least he'd tried to, but he'd stopped after the first few blows. Not out of choice. He probably hadn't had enough of a face left to form the words.

Slowly, her rocking stopped. There were lights appearing through the holes in the carriage. The train must be getting close to its stop. What if people found her like this, found her with him? What would they think?

You know what they would think.

Forcing back her panic, she transformed. She didn't care anymore. She couldn't stay here, couldn't look at what she'd done a moment longer. Blindly, she leapt out of the train and fled into the night. The whole way home, Saturn was silent and Hotaru was left alone with her thoughts.

"It was Saturn," she repeated under her breath. "It was Saturn."

But she knew the truth. Saturn might have spoken to her, might have shown her things, but Saturn had never once had control on the train. No, all of that had been her. She had chosen to practically slaughter that man. She and Saturn really were the same.

X X X

Author's Notes

Once again, I neither own this, nor am I making a dime off it.

This is probably the most violent chapter in this story to date. However, I do believe that it serves a purpose. In all of the previous incidents where Hotaru has gone "berserk", it has been Saturn either partially or totally in control of her actions. This time, Hotaru was the one in control and that makes a big, big difference. She can no longer just tell herself that all the bad things that she's done are because of Saturn. On some fundamental level, she can't help but wonder if there's really any difference between the two of them at all. And that's the point. One way or another, she's going to have to come to grips with just how she and Saturn are related.

As for the update, I wasn't sure I'd get one out this week, but I've managed to find the time. As I've said earlier, I've procrastinated on this story for a long time and I worry that doing so again will result in my slipping back into old habits.

As always, I appreciate your feedback. Your reviews and comments are much appreciated.