By Yohann DeSabrais
a.k.a. Technuma Saturn
Prologue
One thousand years ago...
The moon kingdom had been dreading this instant for quite some
time, now.
From the moment it had first been noticed by the royal astronomers
stationned on the Charon outer station, just on the outside of the
solar system, the Leviathan comet had been hanging over the head of
Queen Serenity like the sword of Damocles that it really was.
Many attempts had been made to curve its trajectory, reduce its
great speed and even destroy it altogether.
All of these attempts failed dismaly. Not even the queen herself
could stop it as her silver crystal, already brittle from many
centuries of use in forging the silver millenium, shattered into
a hundred useless pieces.
For all of the efforts made, nothing would help the doomed satellite
of earth. The habitants had already begun fleeing to other planets
while the population of earth prayed for the consequences of such an
impact on the moon to be minimal on their own ecosystem. The long
shining dart of death was now the only thing visible in the moon sky,
its menace looming in a promise of unescapable oblivion.
Only three people remained on the lunar surface, in a last ditch
effort to put an end to the menace.
Three Technum guardians stared towards the Leviathan comet.
The first one dressed in emerald green, Kitechnum Jendra. The second
one dressed in sapphire blue, Technuma Saturn. The last one and
certainly the most powerful, wearing shining silver, Technazul Terra.
"I understand why you would want to do this, Technazul, but my
question is... are you CERTAIN this is what you want to do?" asked
Kitechnum.
"By doing this, you`ll be rendering useless the regen-cloning process,
your essence will be lost to us! None of my medical equipment can
help you if you sacrifice yourself in this fashion." added Technuma.
"Yes, I`m quite sure." said Technazul, a single tear rolling down his
cheek. "I am doing this so that my newborn daughter may have the
future she deserves. My darling Usagi will get a chance to grow,
live and love on the moon."
"Then let it begin." coldly said Kitechnum. He was sad of losing a
friend, but he knew that this sacrifice would not be in vain.
Raising his hands to his chest, Technazul slowly began charging raw
Technum energy in his entire body. As more and more charged in his
body, he gradually channelled it into his heart where it melded with
the very lifeforce that fueled his earthly existence. Fighting
against the pain that wracked his nerves, Technazul felt his life
fleeting away while the energies within himself drained outside of
his physical form into a single point in the air. Flowing out of
his palms and forming a three inch large sphere of energy, Technazul
used the last of his lifeforce to compress this refined Technum into
a small glithering silver crystal.
He then colapsed into the arms of Technuma, his body already starting
to grow cold. Seeing the new silver crystal floating above the ground
in the very spot where Technazul had forged it, Kitechnum hesitantly
picked it up in his trembling hands. He felt the presence of
Technazul in his palms, the crystal being vibrant with the warmth of
the man who had willingly given his life so that his loved ones may
live.
"He`s... dead." said Technuma, incapable of finding a pulse on the
guardian`s body.
"No, he`s not. He still lives within this crystal." said Kitechnum.
"It`s so tragic that it had to come to this... do you think it`s
really possible Technazul might have been right?"
"About what?"
"About this comet being MANUFACTURED, so that this sacrifice of his
would be the only way to save the moon kingdom from destruction!"
said Technuma.
"Maybe. But even if we accused HIM, where would that lead us? We
don`t have any proof to sustain our claim." replied Kitechnum with
implacable reasoning.
"So what do we do? Go back to Saturn Station Alpha and pretend
nothing`s happened? If we`re right about this, then we`ll be right
besides a conninving manipulator every day until we can expose him...
unless he gets us both before we manage to get proof to convince
the others."
"I`m sorry to say that too much power in the hands of anyone is a
great risk to take. Not even us guardians are immune to the dangers
of megalomany..." said Kitechnum, looking at the glowing crystal
in his right hand. "If you`ll excuse me now, I have a comet to
destroy."
* * *
CYCLES OF LIFE: EPISODE 19
IN COLD BLOOD
The rumbling in her stomach woke her up rather early.
Her head felt woozy from the uncomfortable sleep she had. The white
glow from the neon lights above her head helped ensure that Usagi
would have a miserable night`s rest. And so the young girl found
herself with nothing to do but lie there and think about what had
been happening to her over the past few days.
The pain started to hammer inside her skull again, though not quite
as strong as the last evening. She could nowclearly recall Haruka
and Michiru arriving at Tokyo`s international airport, Michiru
announcing her engagement to Haruka and the gloomy warning from
Setsuna.
She was hoping that her friends would drop by again to tell her more.
Usagi had this nagging suspicion that she was missing something
really, really important. Something she simply had to know.
* * *
At roughly the same moment, Umino and Naru where coming to see their
friend. They carried their backpacks which contained some essentials
they were bringing Usagi and... another friend in need.
"I`ll go check on Usagi if you don`t mind going on your own..." said
Naru.
"Don`t worry, we`re both smart people, we understand each other." he
answered. Umino kissed Naru softly and went on his way to a different
room close to Usagi`s.
He entered the smaller, private room. Gently approaching Mizuno Ami
who was asleep in a chair next to the bed, he placed his hand on her
shoulder to wake her up.
"Whu... what... is it?" she asked, yawning.
"It`s been three days, Ami. You need rest. You can leave her side a
few hours, now that her condition has stabilized." said Umino.
He looked up from the emotionaly tired Ami to the young girl lying in
the bed. Her face and arms severely bruised, she had large blackeyes
and many wounds all over her body. Connected to many medical monitors,
her lifesigns had to be closely followed to ensure that her cerebral
swelling was kept under control.
Minako was indeed paying a high price for her deadly encounter with
Gallagher.
"She still hasn`t woken up since that battle..." said Ami, holding
back her tears with all her strenght.
"She`ll pull through, Sailor Venus is a fighter." replied Umino. Her
opened his backpack and pulled out Ami`s laptop. "Here, thank you for
letting me use it to track Usagi`s escape pod. It was very helpful."
he said.
Ami did her best to try and smile.
"I`m glad I could help..." she tried to say, then started crying.
Umino hugged her and gave her all the support he could. He knew how
much Minako meant to her, and wasn`t ready to abandon hope of Sailor
Venus pulling through without any permanent brain damage.
"She made it this far, she won`t give up." he said softly, looking
over to the fallen scout. The sound of her machine assisted breathing
filled the room, dreadful reminder to Gallagher`s agenda.
* * *
Darkness surrounded the silhouette of a man with a purpose, a driving
goal which had been defining him for longer than anyone could
remember or suspect. Sitting in a stiff lotus position he`d learned
from a being even older than himself, he meditated on his mission.
The sweet smell of sandalwood incense drifted through the empty room.
Well, almost empty. The floor around him was riddled with a variety
of magical instruments necessary to the various rituals he used.
Among the tools of Gallagher were the hilt of a broken black metal
sword, a black cloth mask and twelve medium sized cards, all of them
blank save one.
It showed the image of the soul powered Sailor Moon, proudly holding
Avenger.
Gallagher placed the cards in a pocket of his shirt. He was ready to
gather the missing pieces of Heresy whose broken hilt he had
retrieved from a research lab. The timing was just right, he had to
get moving.
He picked up the sword hilt and placed it in the sheath hangin from
his belt. He then left the dark, miserable appartment.
* * *
Like all the fifteen years old teenagers in Tokyo, Tsukino Shingo was
quite fascinated by video games and had a natural talent for playing
them, and so did his girlfriend Laurella Hammerson. What set Shingo
apart from the rest of other young teenage boys was the his Technum
guardian inheritance which granted him strong powers that got
stronger with each passing day. It is the rather unusual
manifestation of these new powers that was currently preventing him
from concentrating on his game play.
Laurella was beating the crap out of him that day.
"Okay, Kit, what`s the deal? Are you LETTING me win?!?" she asked.
Laurella had gotten used to call him Kit, a shorter form of
Kitechnum, the name of his previous incarnation whom she was madly
in love with... and still was to that day. Shingo was also quite
taken with Laurella, the reincarnated Sailor Jendra who had died
alongside him.
"No, I`m not, I just can`t get my thoughts focused. I keep getting
these... how can I say it... impressions. Like something out of the
past is about to resurface, and I have some part to play in it
somehow." he explained, throwing his game controller onto one of
the many piles of stuffed toys strewned about Laurella`s bedroom.
"Or maybe I`m just not digesting that pizza I had for lunch." he
added, laughing nervously.
"Don`t worry, I know a good way of making that bad feeling go away."
replied the young girl, kissing Shingo tenderly.
* * *
The aura of respect was rather commanding to those who visited the
Tokyo Golden Sun art museum. Many visitors were admiring the ancient
works of arts, ranging from renaissance paintings to ancient statues
from the early japanese dynasties, as well as several more modern
works.
Being both highly intelligent, very artistic and trained in art
appreciation, Ami and Michiru were able to fully enjoy the rich
textures and underlying messages to the old italian paintings.
"This is undeniably an attempt from man to reach god within his
lifetime, to attain divine perfection but keep his imperfect nature
as well." described Ami eloquently.
"Indeed, the rich color scheme and smooth composition would seem to
deny this impossible dream and make unattainable this goal by simple
wishful thinking." mentionned Michiru.
Minako and Haruka, however, were not so skilled.
"Hum, I like the pretty colors." said Haruka.
"Ditto." replied Minako.
The two blonde girls looked at each other and understood immediately
that they were thinking the same thing: they came here to be nice
for their girlfriends, but that the next double date should be
something less... well... intellectual.
"Excuse me a second, I have to go to the bathroom..." said Minako,
retreating to the next hall where she remembered seeing the women`s
room. It would give her a five minute breather to stay away from the
intense artistic brainstorming between Mercury and Neptune.
Unfortunately for her, she took a wrong turn somewhere on her way
and quickly got lost.
That`s when she noticed this strange character dressed all in black.
That in itself wasn`t too surprising; many of the younger people in
both Japan and Europe where she`d lived for some time did that all
the time.
What made him stand apart wasn`t his cape and hood either. It was his
mask and the black sword hanging at his side. And the fact that
nobody else but her seemed to notice him despite his odd appearance
and the loud stepping noise of his black leather boots.
She decided that it might be a good idea to follow him, see what he
was up to. That wasn`t too hard, as he made no effort to conceal
himself. His strange arcane aura took care of that.
After a few minutes of an unhurried stroll through the greek art
gallery and the french expressionist exhibition, he finally entered
one of the least visited halls, where were exposed some of the
stranger works, the unappreciated and the downright bizarre.
And bizarre indeed was the statue which seemed to get his attention:
a strange one-piece dark marble work representing four nightmarish
warriors dreesed in hellish armors and bearing deadly polearms. Just
seeing that thing sent a shiver down Minako`s spine, yet she couldn`t
pry her eyes off it. Like a nightmare that one fears not from memory
but from the very idea of ever having it.
Staying behind one of the room`s larger eyesores, Minako spied on
him, ready to act in case he did anything strange. And he did just
that.
The masked and hooded man lifted his right hand and began quoting
exerpts from his own diaries, a manuscript written in obvious
biblical overtones.
"And thus the impure was thrown out of the mighty heavens by the
God creator, cast into the shadows of his own designs..." he said
softly.
Minako slowly began searching blindly through her purse for her
transformation pen. She couldn`t pry her eyes off this strange
spectacle, especially when the man`s hands charged themselves with
a glow of raw blue energy.
* * *
"Kit, are you alright?" wondered Laurella, as her boyfriend`s face
twisted itself in apparent pain.
"I don`t feel so good." he said.
* * *
"Burning through the hells of deceit and lies, so shall the impure
be reborn under a guise of darkness, not of evil or treachery but of
a new light casting reflection upon existence..." continued the man,
his whole body charged up like a dynamo. His cape was fluttering like
a flag during a storm despite the total lack of wind or air movement;
he wasn`t even touching the ground anymore, he simply hovered a few
inches above ground.
"For sure the guy is trouble!" thought Minako who discreetly changed
into Sailor Venus.
"The great Lord had turned his back from his greatest mistake in
error, for surely it was to become his most glorious triumph! Let the
reborn embrace his destiny and receive his prize, his justly deserved
weapon, the instrument of vengence upon the heretic Himself!" he
screamed, focusing the blue aura of energy into a blasting beam
directed to the statue of the four fearsome warriors.
It was shattered into a hundred thousand shreds of burning hot marble
that were scattered throughout the wide exhibition hall as the
defeaning explosive sound reverberated and echoed a hundred times
over.
* * *
Shingo screamed in terrible pain as the energies unleashed by
Gallagher found an harmonic resonance into his brain. He collapsed
on the ground in pain as the energies of a paradox unearthed from
the distant past was being reawakened into solid reality.
Heresy was soon to be reforged, and the young guardian could feel
its emerging presence.
* * *
Among the scrap remains of the statue was a sharp piece of sharp
metal. It looked as it could fit perfectly onto the hilt of the
broken sword Gallagher pulled from his sheath.
He slowly bent over to pick it up, only to have a thin ray of
golden light knock it out of reach a split second before he did.
Looking up from the origin of the blast, he saw the proud and
beautiful Sailor Venus firmly standing her ground.
"I am Sailor Venus, and I won`t stand for the destruction of art,
no matter how ugly it is!" she said, taking her battle pose.
"I feel your mind is weak, young fighter." said Gallagher, charging
his left hand with blue energy once again. "But fear not. It is
burning hot with the passion of war, and needs only the hammer of
truth to forge it into a mighty weapon of justice."
He lifted his hand, unleashing a shockwave that sent Venus flying
into a wall, knocking the air out of her lungs. He then floated back
down to the rubble littered floor.
"Please let me be the smith who forges that iron." he added without
showing emotion.
Venus tried to get back up, but was overpowered by Gallagher who
brutally punched her in the stomach and the face in a violent
sequence of powerful blows. His speed and strenght were simply too
great for her, and she wasn`t able to get a single blow through. In
a last desperate attack, she swung a weak punch through the shroud
that prevented her from seeing well; her bleeding, rapidly swelling
face was too much a hindrance to overcome, and she missed.
Gallagher did not even need to strike again, Sailor Venus losing
consciousness on her own.
This being done, he pointed the sword hilt to the broken blade piece
which flew over to Heresy and reattached itself, fusing back with
the same material resistance as the forgotten sword had before it
was shattered.
"One piece of the puzzle falls in place. Now for the other..." he
whispered, hearing the steps of the three other scouts who came
charging to Venus`s rescus, alerted by the explosion.
With one swift move of his left hand, another blue energy explosion
greeted Neptune, Uranus and Mercury, showering them with shards of
the blasted floor.
"What happened here?" asked Neptune, coughing on the floating dust
cloud surrounding them.
"NO!" screamed Mercury as she saw her badly beaten girlfriend. "What
has that bastard done to you?!?"
As Sailor Mercury ran to assist the unconscious Venus, Uranus and
Neptune stood ready for the fight.
"You hurt our friend, you`ll pay for that!" said Neptune.
"We`ve destroyed our enemies for offenses less serious than that..."
said Uranus without unclenching her teeth.
"And so the flock turned on their sheperd, unaware of the stick he
carried." replied Gallagher, floating back up until his feet were
above shoulder level of the two scouts. "Thus he gave them the harsh
lesson they justly deserved for incurring his righteous fury!!!"
Dark ribbons formed around the partially repaired black metal sword,
spinning in wildly erratic ellipse so large and fast that they
blurred the masked man, shielding him in a deadly cocoon.
"What`s that?!?" whispered Uranus.
"I don`t know... but whatever the hell it is, be ready to..."
replied Neptune. She didn`t have time to pronounce the word DODGE
that a stream of ribbons soared in their direction at lightning
speed.
"LOOK OUT!!!" screamed Mercury, as she saw the black ribbons wrapping
themselves around the arms, chest and legs of her allies. Uranus was
particularly unlucky; one of them was wrapped tightly around her
neck, choking her rapidly.
"DEEP SUBMERGE!!!" yelled Neptune, sending a wave of mystic water
towards the man who was trying to kill the only women she ever
loved.
No effect. The spinning ribbon shield of Gallagher shrugged off the
attack easily. Michiru panicked as she couldn`t free herself or help
Haruka.
"Fight him, Uranus, don`t let him kill you!" she begged, watching as
the young scout fought desperately for air, her face turning
increasingly red. Her eyelids fluttered, and her eyes turned on
themselves as her body went limp. Using all her strenght in one last
attempt at freedom, she failed to break the strange material, thin
yet seemingly unbreakable.
"No mere mortal warrior could ever hope to defeat Gallagher." he
said coldly.
Sailor Neptune screamed in a violent rage, something inside her
snapped. Her love was simply too powerful to let her soulmate die
in such a trivial manner. A great surge of untold energy exploded
in her mind, filled her heart and body; her whole sailor uniform
tore itself from the inside out from the unimaginable golden light
that gloriously announced the universe that another senshi was born.
Sailor Neptune was now wearing the senshi fuku, holding in her hand
the mighty Monsoon, a sharp trident made of pure lapis-lazuli. In
one slash, she was free. In two slashes so was Haruka who breathed
again, her eyes opening slightly.
"Very impressive, but can that toy match the power of Heresy?"
taunted Gallagher. From his incomplete sword came a roaring bolt
of blue lightning which Monsoon blocked with ease.
"It`s time for you to receive your dues, monster!" boasted Neptune
with confidence. "DEEP WATER..."
She spun around her trident, an ocean blue gleam being emitted from
her weapon. A distant sound of raging waters made itself heard,
approaching rapidly.
"...TSUNAMI..."
The sound of water revealed its source as a huge wave of water
appeared out of nowhere from all around Michiru; it surged forward
towards Gallagher, forming a huge vortex that encased him totally,
spinning faster and faster while picking up a lot of the rubble on
the floor.
"...CRUSHER!!!" completed soul powered Sailor Neptune.
Gallagher quickly found himself in an out of control ride inside
the monstrous vortex, upside down and getting slashed repeatedly
by the sharp marble scraps. The water pressure mounted to
intolerable levels, crushing his lungs with over two hundred
atmospheres of sheer force. After a few seconds that seemed like
years to him, the vortex broke suddenly, catapulting him right
through one of the delicately crafted stain-glass windows.
Ironically, it represented the fall of Baast, the angel who
rebelled against God only to be cast out of heaven to become
lord of all hells.
"Haruka, are you all right?" said the triumphant senshi, rushing
to her lover.
"I`ll be... just fine... go finish off... that bastard!" she said,
coughing and wheezing.
"The hell with Gallagher! I`m not leaving you here while you`re
wounded!!!" she replied.
"Somebody get an ambulance, Minako`s dying!" implored Mercury.
Venus`s lifesigns were fading fast.
* * *
Outside the museum, Gallagher landed brutally on the pavement of the
parking lot amidst the dissipating wave of Technum-based water. His
breathing almost impossible to keep up, his muscles bruised and his
clothes drenched, he still managed to hold on to Heresy throughout
the whole devastating attack of Sailor Neptune.
He laughed, reaching painfully for the cards in his secret pocket.
Only ten were blank now, a card now being blessed with the graceful
image of the soul powered Neptune.
"Another senshi is ready, everything is proceeding as I planned."
he thought.
He limped away, putting Heresy back in its sheath.
* * *
Sitting silently inside his cramped bioengineering workstation,
Technuma Saturn stared at the four screens displaying the data he
collected from his daughter`s brain structure.
He just couldn`t see what could have possibly gone wrong. Everything
was set just right, using his tried and tested neural sculpting
devices, the Prime`s proven subconscious learning systems, Technara`s
infallible computer terminals, Litechnae`s incorruptible softwares...
nothing had been left to chance.
These seizures made no sense.
Technuma wondered if there might have been something he`d forgotten
to take into account. He was sure that for some reason, something
slipped away unnoticed.
He tried to grasp it, but the more he wracked his brain trying to
access the more fleeting memories of his younger days when he first
learned about bioconstruction, but it just made his head hurt even
more.
Suddenly, he felt more relaxed. The soothing presence of the greyish
ancient one always had this presence on him, so he suspected that he
might be entering his genetics lab for a visit.
"Hello, elder one. I didn`t hear you come in my lab." he said with a
smile, stretching out of the bubble shaped workspace. Surely enough,
there was the Prime, concerned with his young creation. Technuma
wasn`t exactly young after many thousand years of continued
existence, but on a cosmic scale he was still a teenager.
The Prime frowned in an expression of deep concern.
"You`re right, I have been pushing myself a lot." replied Technuma
to the ancient one`s telepathic "message". The Prime never spoke,
and his telepathy was an usual form of the lost psionic art;
whenever he wanted you to know something, you just did. No words
or images actually entered your mind, you just knew.
The Prime smiled and brushed his large hand in the guradian`s hair.
From his eight feet of height, he towered over him.
"I am feeling kind of tired, I`ll work better once I`ve had sleep."
he agreed with the Prime`s silent question, leaving for his quarters.
The Prime watched him leave, pleased that the guardian was not
hurting himself with the painful secrets locked in his head.
He took a look inside the tiny workstation, observing at the flow of
data on the multiple screens. With the flik of a switch, he turned
it off.
* * *
Hidden in the confines of his miserable slum appartment, Gallagher
carefully removed his clothes. His strong muscled body had taken a
beating the likes of which he didn`t think was possible to be coming
from a human fighter. He began the slow healing process that would
allow him to continue on his quest. Meditation and energy reflux
would do the trick, given enough time.
* * *
In the private hospital room paid for by her parents, Minako laid
in deep coma halfway between life and death. Beeping monitors keep
her heartbeat, blood pressure and brain activity in check. The sight
of the beautiful young girl on the brink of passing away was an awful
one... especially to her girlfriend, Ami, who cried her heart out
in Usagi`s arms.
"Don`t worry, Ami, we`ll get him- he`ll die for this, I promise!"
swore Makoto, anger burning in her heart. She clenched her fists
until her fingers turned white and her nails dug deep into her flesh,
drawing blood.
Vengence floated in the air. No one was insensible to this tragedy,
not the sweet Laurella or the friendly Chibi-Usa, not the level
headed Rei or even the future seeing Setsuna.
They wanted blood, and soon they would see it run.
* * *
All these memories of tragedy came flooding back to Usagi who
remembered that her friend Minako was just a few doors away fighting
for her life. She tried painfully to get up, but her kid brother
stopped her.
"Whoa! Sis, you`re in no shape to go anywhere!" he protested. Shingo
suddenly found himself agreeing with Rei who told him that Usagi
could be very annoying while regaining her lost memories. "Besides,
your head is still full of holes like Luna`s!!!"
"But Minako... she`s over there and..."
"...and she`s being treated by the best doctors in the country!"
completed Shingo. "Ami is standing by her side more time each day
that her tired body can handle already as well."
"But... what about Gallagher?" she asked.
"It`s all over, Usagi. That battle`s over, and only you can tell
us the outcome..." said Shingo.
"If only I can remember it." finished Usagi, tears streaming down
her face.
To be continued...
a.k.a. Technuma Saturn
Prologue
One thousand years ago...
The moon kingdom had been dreading this instant for quite some
time, now.
From the moment it had first been noticed by the royal astronomers
stationned on the Charon outer station, just on the outside of the
solar system, the Leviathan comet had been hanging over the head of
Queen Serenity like the sword of Damocles that it really was.
Many attempts had been made to curve its trajectory, reduce its
great speed and even destroy it altogether.
All of these attempts failed dismaly. Not even the queen herself
could stop it as her silver crystal, already brittle from many
centuries of use in forging the silver millenium, shattered into
a hundred useless pieces.
For all of the efforts made, nothing would help the doomed satellite
of earth. The habitants had already begun fleeing to other planets
while the population of earth prayed for the consequences of such an
impact on the moon to be minimal on their own ecosystem. The long
shining dart of death was now the only thing visible in the moon sky,
its menace looming in a promise of unescapable oblivion.
Only three people remained on the lunar surface, in a last ditch
effort to put an end to the menace.
Three Technum guardians stared towards the Leviathan comet.
The first one dressed in emerald green, Kitechnum Jendra. The second
one dressed in sapphire blue, Technuma Saturn. The last one and
certainly the most powerful, wearing shining silver, Technazul Terra.
"I understand why you would want to do this, Technazul, but my
question is... are you CERTAIN this is what you want to do?" asked
Kitechnum.
"By doing this, you`ll be rendering useless the regen-cloning process,
your essence will be lost to us! None of my medical equipment can
help you if you sacrifice yourself in this fashion." added Technuma.
"Yes, I`m quite sure." said Technazul, a single tear rolling down his
cheek. "I am doing this so that my newborn daughter may have the
future she deserves. My darling Usagi will get a chance to grow,
live and love on the moon."
"Then let it begin." coldly said Kitechnum. He was sad of losing a
friend, but he knew that this sacrifice would not be in vain.
Raising his hands to his chest, Technazul slowly began charging raw
Technum energy in his entire body. As more and more charged in his
body, he gradually channelled it into his heart where it melded with
the very lifeforce that fueled his earthly existence. Fighting
against the pain that wracked his nerves, Technazul felt his life
fleeting away while the energies within himself drained outside of
his physical form into a single point in the air. Flowing out of
his palms and forming a three inch large sphere of energy, Technazul
used the last of his lifeforce to compress this refined Technum into
a small glithering silver crystal.
He then colapsed into the arms of Technuma, his body already starting
to grow cold. Seeing the new silver crystal floating above the ground
in the very spot where Technazul had forged it, Kitechnum hesitantly
picked it up in his trembling hands. He felt the presence of
Technazul in his palms, the crystal being vibrant with the warmth of
the man who had willingly given his life so that his loved ones may
live.
"He`s... dead." said Technuma, incapable of finding a pulse on the
guardian`s body.
"No, he`s not. He still lives within this crystal." said Kitechnum.
"It`s so tragic that it had to come to this... do you think it`s
really possible Technazul might have been right?"
"About what?"
"About this comet being MANUFACTURED, so that this sacrifice of his
would be the only way to save the moon kingdom from destruction!"
said Technuma.
"Maybe. But even if we accused HIM, where would that lead us? We
don`t have any proof to sustain our claim." replied Kitechnum with
implacable reasoning.
"So what do we do? Go back to Saturn Station Alpha and pretend
nothing`s happened? If we`re right about this, then we`ll be right
besides a conninving manipulator every day until we can expose him...
unless he gets us both before we manage to get proof to convince
the others."
"I`m sorry to say that too much power in the hands of anyone is a
great risk to take. Not even us guardians are immune to the dangers
of megalomany..." said Kitechnum, looking at the glowing crystal
in his right hand. "If you`ll excuse me now, I have a comet to
destroy."
* * *
CYCLES OF LIFE: EPISODE 19
IN COLD BLOOD
The rumbling in her stomach woke her up rather early.
Her head felt woozy from the uncomfortable sleep she had. The white
glow from the neon lights above her head helped ensure that Usagi
would have a miserable night`s rest. And so the young girl found
herself with nothing to do but lie there and think about what had
been happening to her over the past few days.
The pain started to hammer inside her skull again, though not quite
as strong as the last evening. She could nowclearly recall Haruka
and Michiru arriving at Tokyo`s international airport, Michiru
announcing her engagement to Haruka and the gloomy warning from
Setsuna.
She was hoping that her friends would drop by again to tell her more.
Usagi had this nagging suspicion that she was missing something
really, really important. Something she simply had to know.
* * *
At roughly the same moment, Umino and Naru where coming to see their
friend. They carried their backpacks which contained some essentials
they were bringing Usagi and... another friend in need.
"I`ll go check on Usagi if you don`t mind going on your own..." said
Naru.
"Don`t worry, we`re both smart people, we understand each other." he
answered. Umino kissed Naru softly and went on his way to a different
room close to Usagi`s.
He entered the smaller, private room. Gently approaching Mizuno Ami
who was asleep in a chair next to the bed, he placed his hand on her
shoulder to wake her up.
"Whu... what... is it?" she asked, yawning.
"It`s been three days, Ami. You need rest. You can leave her side a
few hours, now that her condition has stabilized." said Umino.
He looked up from the emotionaly tired Ami to the young girl lying in
the bed. Her face and arms severely bruised, she had large blackeyes
and many wounds all over her body. Connected to many medical monitors,
her lifesigns had to be closely followed to ensure that her cerebral
swelling was kept under control.
Minako was indeed paying a high price for her deadly encounter with
Gallagher.
"She still hasn`t woken up since that battle..." said Ami, holding
back her tears with all her strenght.
"She`ll pull through, Sailor Venus is a fighter." replied Umino. Her
opened his backpack and pulled out Ami`s laptop. "Here, thank you for
letting me use it to track Usagi`s escape pod. It was very helpful."
he said.
Ami did her best to try and smile.
"I`m glad I could help..." she tried to say, then started crying.
Umino hugged her and gave her all the support he could. He knew how
much Minako meant to her, and wasn`t ready to abandon hope of Sailor
Venus pulling through without any permanent brain damage.
"She made it this far, she won`t give up." he said softly, looking
over to the fallen scout. The sound of her machine assisted breathing
filled the room, dreadful reminder to Gallagher`s agenda.
* * *
Darkness surrounded the silhouette of a man with a purpose, a driving
goal which had been defining him for longer than anyone could
remember or suspect. Sitting in a stiff lotus position he`d learned
from a being even older than himself, he meditated on his mission.
The sweet smell of sandalwood incense drifted through the empty room.
Well, almost empty. The floor around him was riddled with a variety
of magical instruments necessary to the various rituals he used.
Among the tools of Gallagher were the hilt of a broken black metal
sword, a black cloth mask and twelve medium sized cards, all of them
blank save one.
It showed the image of the soul powered Sailor Moon, proudly holding
Avenger.
Gallagher placed the cards in a pocket of his shirt. He was ready to
gather the missing pieces of Heresy whose broken hilt he had
retrieved from a research lab. The timing was just right, he had to
get moving.
He picked up the sword hilt and placed it in the sheath hangin from
his belt. He then left the dark, miserable appartment.
* * *
Like all the fifteen years old teenagers in Tokyo, Tsukino Shingo was
quite fascinated by video games and had a natural talent for playing
them, and so did his girlfriend Laurella Hammerson. What set Shingo
apart from the rest of other young teenage boys was the his Technum
guardian inheritance which granted him strong powers that got
stronger with each passing day. It is the rather unusual
manifestation of these new powers that was currently preventing him
from concentrating on his game play.
Laurella was beating the crap out of him that day.
"Okay, Kit, what`s the deal? Are you LETTING me win?!?" she asked.
Laurella had gotten used to call him Kit, a shorter form of
Kitechnum, the name of his previous incarnation whom she was madly
in love with... and still was to that day. Shingo was also quite
taken with Laurella, the reincarnated Sailor Jendra who had died
alongside him.
"No, I`m not, I just can`t get my thoughts focused. I keep getting
these... how can I say it... impressions. Like something out of the
past is about to resurface, and I have some part to play in it
somehow." he explained, throwing his game controller onto one of
the many piles of stuffed toys strewned about Laurella`s bedroom.
"Or maybe I`m just not digesting that pizza I had for lunch." he
added, laughing nervously.
"Don`t worry, I know a good way of making that bad feeling go away."
replied the young girl, kissing Shingo tenderly.
* * *
The aura of respect was rather commanding to those who visited the
Tokyo Golden Sun art museum. Many visitors were admiring the ancient
works of arts, ranging from renaissance paintings to ancient statues
from the early japanese dynasties, as well as several more modern
works.
Being both highly intelligent, very artistic and trained in art
appreciation, Ami and Michiru were able to fully enjoy the rich
textures and underlying messages to the old italian paintings.
"This is undeniably an attempt from man to reach god within his
lifetime, to attain divine perfection but keep his imperfect nature
as well." described Ami eloquently.
"Indeed, the rich color scheme and smooth composition would seem to
deny this impossible dream and make unattainable this goal by simple
wishful thinking." mentionned Michiru.
Minako and Haruka, however, were not so skilled.
"Hum, I like the pretty colors." said Haruka.
"Ditto." replied Minako.
The two blonde girls looked at each other and understood immediately
that they were thinking the same thing: they came here to be nice
for their girlfriends, but that the next double date should be
something less... well... intellectual.
"Excuse me a second, I have to go to the bathroom..." said Minako,
retreating to the next hall where she remembered seeing the women`s
room. It would give her a five minute breather to stay away from the
intense artistic brainstorming between Mercury and Neptune.
Unfortunately for her, she took a wrong turn somewhere on her way
and quickly got lost.
That`s when she noticed this strange character dressed all in black.
That in itself wasn`t too surprising; many of the younger people in
both Japan and Europe where she`d lived for some time did that all
the time.
What made him stand apart wasn`t his cape and hood either. It was his
mask and the black sword hanging at his side. And the fact that
nobody else but her seemed to notice him despite his odd appearance
and the loud stepping noise of his black leather boots.
She decided that it might be a good idea to follow him, see what he
was up to. That wasn`t too hard, as he made no effort to conceal
himself. His strange arcane aura took care of that.
After a few minutes of an unhurried stroll through the greek art
gallery and the french expressionist exhibition, he finally entered
one of the least visited halls, where were exposed some of the
stranger works, the unappreciated and the downright bizarre.
And bizarre indeed was the statue which seemed to get his attention:
a strange one-piece dark marble work representing four nightmarish
warriors dreesed in hellish armors and bearing deadly polearms. Just
seeing that thing sent a shiver down Minako`s spine, yet she couldn`t
pry her eyes off it. Like a nightmare that one fears not from memory
but from the very idea of ever having it.
Staying behind one of the room`s larger eyesores, Minako spied on
him, ready to act in case he did anything strange. And he did just
that.
The masked and hooded man lifted his right hand and began quoting
exerpts from his own diaries, a manuscript written in obvious
biblical overtones.
"And thus the impure was thrown out of the mighty heavens by the
God creator, cast into the shadows of his own designs..." he said
softly.
Minako slowly began searching blindly through her purse for her
transformation pen. She couldn`t pry her eyes off this strange
spectacle, especially when the man`s hands charged themselves with
a glow of raw blue energy.
* * *
"Kit, are you alright?" wondered Laurella, as her boyfriend`s face
twisted itself in apparent pain.
"I don`t feel so good." he said.
* * *
"Burning through the hells of deceit and lies, so shall the impure
be reborn under a guise of darkness, not of evil or treachery but of
a new light casting reflection upon existence..." continued the man,
his whole body charged up like a dynamo. His cape was fluttering like
a flag during a storm despite the total lack of wind or air movement;
he wasn`t even touching the ground anymore, he simply hovered a few
inches above ground.
"For sure the guy is trouble!" thought Minako who discreetly changed
into Sailor Venus.
"The great Lord had turned his back from his greatest mistake in
error, for surely it was to become his most glorious triumph! Let the
reborn embrace his destiny and receive his prize, his justly deserved
weapon, the instrument of vengence upon the heretic Himself!" he
screamed, focusing the blue aura of energy into a blasting beam
directed to the statue of the four fearsome warriors.
It was shattered into a hundred thousand shreds of burning hot marble
that were scattered throughout the wide exhibition hall as the
defeaning explosive sound reverberated and echoed a hundred times
over.
* * *
Shingo screamed in terrible pain as the energies unleashed by
Gallagher found an harmonic resonance into his brain. He collapsed
on the ground in pain as the energies of a paradox unearthed from
the distant past was being reawakened into solid reality.
Heresy was soon to be reforged, and the young guardian could feel
its emerging presence.
* * *
Among the scrap remains of the statue was a sharp piece of sharp
metal. It looked as it could fit perfectly onto the hilt of the
broken sword Gallagher pulled from his sheath.
He slowly bent over to pick it up, only to have a thin ray of
golden light knock it out of reach a split second before he did.
Looking up from the origin of the blast, he saw the proud and
beautiful Sailor Venus firmly standing her ground.
"I am Sailor Venus, and I won`t stand for the destruction of art,
no matter how ugly it is!" she said, taking her battle pose.
"I feel your mind is weak, young fighter." said Gallagher, charging
his left hand with blue energy once again. "But fear not. It is
burning hot with the passion of war, and needs only the hammer of
truth to forge it into a mighty weapon of justice."
He lifted his hand, unleashing a shockwave that sent Venus flying
into a wall, knocking the air out of her lungs. He then floated back
down to the rubble littered floor.
"Please let me be the smith who forges that iron." he added without
showing emotion.
Venus tried to get back up, but was overpowered by Gallagher who
brutally punched her in the stomach and the face in a violent
sequence of powerful blows. His speed and strenght were simply too
great for her, and she wasn`t able to get a single blow through. In
a last desperate attack, she swung a weak punch through the shroud
that prevented her from seeing well; her bleeding, rapidly swelling
face was too much a hindrance to overcome, and she missed.
Gallagher did not even need to strike again, Sailor Venus losing
consciousness on her own.
This being done, he pointed the sword hilt to the broken blade piece
which flew over to Heresy and reattached itself, fusing back with
the same material resistance as the forgotten sword had before it
was shattered.
"One piece of the puzzle falls in place. Now for the other..." he
whispered, hearing the steps of the three other scouts who came
charging to Venus`s rescus, alerted by the explosion.
With one swift move of his left hand, another blue energy explosion
greeted Neptune, Uranus and Mercury, showering them with shards of
the blasted floor.
"What happened here?" asked Neptune, coughing on the floating dust
cloud surrounding them.
"NO!" screamed Mercury as she saw her badly beaten girlfriend. "What
has that bastard done to you?!?"
As Sailor Mercury ran to assist the unconscious Venus, Uranus and
Neptune stood ready for the fight.
"You hurt our friend, you`ll pay for that!" said Neptune.
"We`ve destroyed our enemies for offenses less serious than that..."
said Uranus without unclenching her teeth.
"And so the flock turned on their sheperd, unaware of the stick he
carried." replied Gallagher, floating back up until his feet were
above shoulder level of the two scouts. "Thus he gave them the harsh
lesson they justly deserved for incurring his righteous fury!!!"
Dark ribbons formed around the partially repaired black metal sword,
spinning in wildly erratic ellipse so large and fast that they
blurred the masked man, shielding him in a deadly cocoon.
"What`s that?!?" whispered Uranus.
"I don`t know... but whatever the hell it is, be ready to..."
replied Neptune. She didn`t have time to pronounce the word DODGE
that a stream of ribbons soared in their direction at lightning
speed.
"LOOK OUT!!!" screamed Mercury, as she saw the black ribbons wrapping
themselves around the arms, chest and legs of her allies. Uranus was
particularly unlucky; one of them was wrapped tightly around her
neck, choking her rapidly.
"DEEP SUBMERGE!!!" yelled Neptune, sending a wave of mystic water
towards the man who was trying to kill the only women she ever
loved.
No effect. The spinning ribbon shield of Gallagher shrugged off the
attack easily. Michiru panicked as she couldn`t free herself or help
Haruka.
"Fight him, Uranus, don`t let him kill you!" she begged, watching as
the young scout fought desperately for air, her face turning
increasingly red. Her eyelids fluttered, and her eyes turned on
themselves as her body went limp. Using all her strenght in one last
attempt at freedom, she failed to break the strange material, thin
yet seemingly unbreakable.
"No mere mortal warrior could ever hope to defeat Gallagher." he
said coldly.
Sailor Neptune screamed in a violent rage, something inside her
snapped. Her love was simply too powerful to let her soulmate die
in such a trivial manner. A great surge of untold energy exploded
in her mind, filled her heart and body; her whole sailor uniform
tore itself from the inside out from the unimaginable golden light
that gloriously announced the universe that another senshi was born.
Sailor Neptune was now wearing the senshi fuku, holding in her hand
the mighty Monsoon, a sharp trident made of pure lapis-lazuli. In
one slash, she was free. In two slashes so was Haruka who breathed
again, her eyes opening slightly.
"Very impressive, but can that toy match the power of Heresy?"
taunted Gallagher. From his incomplete sword came a roaring bolt
of blue lightning which Monsoon blocked with ease.
"It`s time for you to receive your dues, monster!" boasted Neptune
with confidence. "DEEP WATER..."
She spun around her trident, an ocean blue gleam being emitted from
her weapon. A distant sound of raging waters made itself heard,
approaching rapidly.
"...TSUNAMI..."
The sound of water revealed its source as a huge wave of water
appeared out of nowhere from all around Michiru; it surged forward
towards Gallagher, forming a huge vortex that encased him totally,
spinning faster and faster while picking up a lot of the rubble on
the floor.
"...CRUSHER!!!" completed soul powered Sailor Neptune.
Gallagher quickly found himself in an out of control ride inside
the monstrous vortex, upside down and getting slashed repeatedly
by the sharp marble scraps. The water pressure mounted to
intolerable levels, crushing his lungs with over two hundred
atmospheres of sheer force. After a few seconds that seemed like
years to him, the vortex broke suddenly, catapulting him right
through one of the delicately crafted stain-glass windows.
Ironically, it represented the fall of Baast, the angel who
rebelled against God only to be cast out of heaven to become
lord of all hells.
"Haruka, are you all right?" said the triumphant senshi, rushing
to her lover.
"I`ll be... just fine... go finish off... that bastard!" she said,
coughing and wheezing.
"The hell with Gallagher! I`m not leaving you here while you`re
wounded!!!" she replied.
"Somebody get an ambulance, Minako`s dying!" implored Mercury.
Venus`s lifesigns were fading fast.
* * *
Outside the museum, Gallagher landed brutally on the pavement of the
parking lot amidst the dissipating wave of Technum-based water. His
breathing almost impossible to keep up, his muscles bruised and his
clothes drenched, he still managed to hold on to Heresy throughout
the whole devastating attack of Sailor Neptune.
He laughed, reaching painfully for the cards in his secret pocket.
Only ten were blank now, a card now being blessed with the graceful
image of the soul powered Neptune.
"Another senshi is ready, everything is proceeding as I planned."
he thought.
He limped away, putting Heresy back in its sheath.
* * *
Sitting silently inside his cramped bioengineering workstation,
Technuma Saturn stared at the four screens displaying the data he
collected from his daughter`s brain structure.
He just couldn`t see what could have possibly gone wrong. Everything
was set just right, using his tried and tested neural sculpting
devices, the Prime`s proven subconscious learning systems, Technara`s
infallible computer terminals, Litechnae`s incorruptible softwares...
nothing had been left to chance.
These seizures made no sense.
Technuma wondered if there might have been something he`d forgotten
to take into account. He was sure that for some reason, something
slipped away unnoticed.
He tried to grasp it, but the more he wracked his brain trying to
access the more fleeting memories of his younger days when he first
learned about bioconstruction, but it just made his head hurt even
more.
Suddenly, he felt more relaxed. The soothing presence of the greyish
ancient one always had this presence on him, so he suspected that he
might be entering his genetics lab for a visit.
"Hello, elder one. I didn`t hear you come in my lab." he said with a
smile, stretching out of the bubble shaped workspace. Surely enough,
there was the Prime, concerned with his young creation. Technuma
wasn`t exactly young after many thousand years of continued
existence, but on a cosmic scale he was still a teenager.
The Prime frowned in an expression of deep concern.
"You`re right, I have been pushing myself a lot." replied Technuma
to the ancient one`s telepathic "message". The Prime never spoke,
and his telepathy was an usual form of the lost psionic art;
whenever he wanted you to know something, you just did. No words
or images actually entered your mind, you just knew.
The Prime smiled and brushed his large hand in the guradian`s hair.
From his eight feet of height, he towered over him.
"I am feeling kind of tired, I`ll work better once I`ve had sleep."
he agreed with the Prime`s silent question, leaving for his quarters.
The Prime watched him leave, pleased that the guardian was not
hurting himself with the painful secrets locked in his head.
He took a look inside the tiny workstation, observing at the flow of
data on the multiple screens. With the flik of a switch, he turned
it off.
* * *
Hidden in the confines of his miserable slum appartment, Gallagher
carefully removed his clothes. His strong muscled body had taken a
beating the likes of which he didn`t think was possible to be coming
from a human fighter. He began the slow healing process that would
allow him to continue on his quest. Meditation and energy reflux
would do the trick, given enough time.
* * *
In the private hospital room paid for by her parents, Minako laid
in deep coma halfway between life and death. Beeping monitors keep
her heartbeat, blood pressure and brain activity in check. The sight
of the beautiful young girl on the brink of passing away was an awful
one... especially to her girlfriend, Ami, who cried her heart out
in Usagi`s arms.
"Don`t worry, Ami, we`ll get him- he`ll die for this, I promise!"
swore Makoto, anger burning in her heart. She clenched her fists
until her fingers turned white and her nails dug deep into her flesh,
drawing blood.
Vengence floated in the air. No one was insensible to this tragedy,
not the sweet Laurella or the friendly Chibi-Usa, not the level
headed Rei or even the future seeing Setsuna.
They wanted blood, and soon they would see it run.
* * *
All these memories of tragedy came flooding back to Usagi who
remembered that her friend Minako was just a few doors away fighting
for her life. She tried painfully to get up, but her kid brother
stopped her.
"Whoa! Sis, you`re in no shape to go anywhere!" he protested. Shingo
suddenly found himself agreeing with Rei who told him that Usagi
could be very annoying while regaining her lost memories. "Besides,
your head is still full of holes like Luna`s!!!"
"But Minako... she`s over there and..."
"...and she`s being treated by the best doctors in the country!"
completed Shingo. "Ami is standing by her side more time each day
that her tired body can handle already as well."
"But... what about Gallagher?" she asked.
"It`s all over, Usagi. That battle`s over, and only you can tell
us the outcome..." said Shingo.
"If only I can remember it." finished Usagi, tears streaming down
her face.
To be continued...