By Yohann DeSabrais
a.k.a. Technuma Saturn
Prologue...
"What are you talking about?"
Kaolinite couldn`t believe what she just heard. She knew well she
had the favor of professor Tomoe in the daemon egg research lab,
and that was bound to attract some conflict with the other members
of the Witches 5. But that one of them would go as far as trying to
kill her to get her place, this just seemed insane.
"Trust me, Kaolinite." whispered Villuy. "I heard the others talking,
and pretty soon you may end up on the wrong side of a firewall when
an explosion happens."
"That`s ludicrous. None of them would go THAT far." replied Kaolinite,
passing her fingers in her long black hair.
"Oh yeah? And what would you think of that anonymous letter in your
locker, along with all those snails?" said Villuy.
Kaolinite couldn`t argue with that; she had indeed received a
threatening letter, and had done her best not to let it get to her,
but still...
"So? What can I do if I don`t know who sent me that letter?!"
"Well... I heard Mimete call you snail lady behind your back on
several occasions."
"MIMETE?!? You`re crazy, she`s much too passive and submissive to do
anything so bold! You`re just wasting my time, Villuy, go away."
said Kaolinite who didn`t care to hear more of the witche`s rantings.
At that moment, the intruder alarm went off.
"Someone`s inside- past our first perimeter defenses! Incredible!!!"
said Tomoe`s assistant.
Villuy couldn`t believe it either. "Who could be stupid enough to
attack us head-on?!?" she asked in disbelief.
"Someone with a death wish, that`s who!" said Eudial as she walked
by them and revved up her fire buster. "Let`s show the intruder who`s
queen of the hill!!!"
A sickening odor of putrefaction invaded the laboratory, causing
awful bouts of nausea to all those present. The lights faded
unnaturaly, bringing an atmosphere of dread to the already gloomy
workshop.
"What`s going on?!?" screamed Mimete.
"The dread lord of darkness has entered your lair, treacherous
snakes!" said a loud growling voice behind Eudial. She spun around
to meet the source of the taunt, but out of the darkness came a flash
of cold steel which struck her squarely in the chest, rupturing her
arteries and digging deep inside her left lung. She died instantly,
her final gurgling sound made inaudible by the clanking noise of her
falling fire weapon.
As the dread knight took full form in his golden armor and battle
axe, Mimete screamed with all the strenght of the uncontrollable
terror which held her soul in its twisted claws. Villuy froze in
fear, incapable of moving a single muscle.
"Ronmar, first knightmare of the spheres, has arrived. Fear me.
Loathe me. Die by my hands." growled the dread knight, his red eyes
flashing under the visor of his golden helm.
Kaolinite was just as afraid as her collegues, but she wasn`t going
to let that monstrosity kill her or any other of her subordinates-
she made a run for it, plunging forward with all the speed her body
could muster, running by the hulking warrior to reach the weapons
cabinet behind him.
He was faster.
Kaolinite`s run was brutally halted by the horrid pain of her right
side being ripped apart from her armpit to her waist by the sharp
blade of his axe. She fell limply to the ground, her warm blood
spurting on the cold concrete floor and mingling with Eudial`s whom
she could see in front of her. Eudial`s eyes were lifeless and her
skin was beginning to take a frozen expression of death.
As her vision blurred and darkened, she could hear the last screams
of Villuy and Mimete who met the same tragic fate as she and Eudial
had.
Everything went black.
Kaolinite woke up screaming, again. She had the nightmare of Ronmar`s
attack upon the Witches 5 hideout, as she had for every single night
since that moment when she woke up in the morgue. It had been a
miracle that her system had somehow managed to restart itself after
over two hours of being clinically dead, and an even greater one that
the pathologist took a fifteen minute break before starting her
autopsy.
It had taken seven ten-hours long surgeries to mend her severed bones
and muscles, and for all the damage done to her by that blow she
had received, the doctors hadn`t found any arteries to be cut at
all. Her lucky star had been watching on her, or so she thought.
She quickly realized that her old life had been destroyed: Tomoe and
all of her old associates were dead now, and so was the young Hotaru
whom she loved as though she were her own daughter. Her health had
also been shattered, as the horrid wound had never properly healed
iself despite the best medical care her fortune could buy. Her chest
was being constantly wracked with bursts of intolerable spasms. Her
only solace was to be found in the pain killers which she took in
amounts that no humans should dare attempt to consume. Despite the
fact that her doctor warned her against it, Kaolinite just keep in
swallowing the pills she had become addicted to, because she didn`t
care.
She swallowed another couple of pills, then washed it down with a
swig of jamaican rhum. Her stomach felt like it had just been
incinerated by a scorching fireball as it felt the ravages of her
ever growing ulcer- she was going down in a descending spiral of
self-destruction but she didn`t give a damn.
She`d live just long enough to destroy the monster who took away
the man who had given her a chance to prove her talents, the only
man who had treated her with respect... the one man she
had ever loved, and had been taken away from her before she could
tell him just how she felt.
Incapable of sleeping, she picked up a clipboard that she kept close
by at all times, studying professor Tomoe`s notes on daemon egg
creation. She was going to improve on his designs, although this
would prove immensely difficult. No one had a grasp on daemon eggs
processing like the deceased scientist. If there was a way to do it,
however, she`d find it.
The familiar rush of alcohol mixed with pain supressors began to kick
in, giving Kaolinite a momentary respite from the pain in her chest.
If only it could heal the pain in her heart, she thought... tired
and heartbroken, she cried herself to an all too short and agitated
sleep.
* * *
CYCLES OF LIFE: EPISODE 32
RAGING HEARTQUAKE
Sitting silently in her appartment, Makoto reflected back upon the
tragic death of her lover Ghangoroth a week before. She felt the
soft fabric of his folded cape in her hands, dragged her fingers
along the sculpted gold button marked with the greek letter psi. It
had taken six senshi over two hours to pry his frozen body out of
the ice block created by Dokuryo.
In all her sadness, she had barely noticed upon returning to Tokyo
that she couldn`t walk after transforming to her normal self again.
Crying herself out of tears on Usagi`s couch, she hadn`t noticed
anything around her for quite a while.
With a week gone by, her life was slowly returning to something more
normal. She had adapted her place to fit her changing needs; even if
her legs were paralyzed, she was intent on keeping her independance.
It was useful in her efforts to attain this goal that she could at
any given time transform into Sailor Jupiter and temporarily regain
her ability to walk. She was spending more and more time in her soul
powered form as the days went by, and she often answered the door to
her visiting senshi friends in this fashion. It surprised them at
first, but they were getting used to it.
In the empty appartment she had dreamed of sharing with the man who
had introduced himself to her as Xavier, only the faint background
noises of the busy Tokyo streets could be heard. Even though Makoto
was all cried out now, she felt a terrible hole inside, one she felt
would never be filled again despite Usako`s reassurance.
She cried again, her tears wetting the soft cloth of the cape.
* * *
She was turning around many heads of young boys, even though she was
much older than any one of them... or their great-grandparents, for
that matter. With her long bright red ponytails floating in the
subzero wind, Usako was a new woman whose seemingly eighteen years
old body was hiding her true age: upwards of 900 years.
She had begun to change her lifestyle according to her newfound
maturity, although many of the aspects of her former self would
probably be lost for good.
This one was a case in point: a young girl who was Chibi-Usa`s best
friend, Momoko. The eight year old girl hadn`t seen her best friend
in over a week now, and had a look of sadness to her face that made
the scarlet lady feel bad. In the rush of soul power that had
triggered her sudden growth, she had forgotten to consider the
repercussions of the small lady disappearing for good.
Usako hesitated for a second before approaching Momoko who was
standing on the street corner waiting for her bus to arrive... would
she just be reopening a bleeding wound unnecessarily, or could she
actually do her old friend some good? She didn`t have to ponder this
matter for long, Momoko turning around and noticing Usako staring at
her. The ressemblance was way too striking to ignore, and the young
girl came to her.
"Excuse me, are you related to a girl named Tsukino Chibi-Usa?" she
asked.
"Yes..." said Usako, hesitating as to what to say next. "I`m her
big sister Usako."
Momoko smiled faintly. "Do you know where Chibi-Usa is? I tried to
call her at her aunt Ikuko`s house, but she`s never there..." she
said.
"She had to leave in a hurry back home... she`s sorry she couldn`t
reach you before she returned but she wanted me to tell you how much
she loved having you as a friend." said Usako, smiling back to her
small friend.
"If you see her, can you tell her I`ll miss her?"
"Sure thing, Momoko, I`ll do that." replied Usako. As she turned
around to leave, Momoko took her hand and stopped her.
"Usako... will I see you again?" she asked.
Scarlet lady could see the loneliness in the young girl`s eyes, and
it touched her like she never imagined that a single stare could.
"Of course... I`d love to be your friend." she replied.
"I`m going to see a movie... would you like to come with me?"
"Yeah, let`s do it!"
The heavy and noisy bus arrived at their corner and stopped. The two
girls got on board and left to reach a nearby movie theater.
Maybe her new life wouldn`t be so difficult to adapt to after all.
* * *
Dokuryo was bored.
It had been a week already since that hurried mission to replace the
shattered aebonite crystal in the Osaka region, the most flamboyant
success of the dark empire, as it had sealed the fate of earth by
repairing the energy gathering network and providing more power to
his lord Aebonite than any of Beryl`s minions had ever been able to
collect. The senshi were helpless to find the operating base of the
dark empire due to a clever trick devised by Ghangoroth, so no new
mission had arisen that would require his talents.
And so he laid in bed, sleeping in late as he had every single
morning since that glorious triumph in which he was forced to kill
his old friend Ghangoroth.
"It wasn`t my fault, I was aiming Sailor Jupiter, he`s the one who
wanted to protect her." he silently told himself, convincing the best
he could his tortured conscience. Wasn`t it his ally Ghangoroth who
had pulled him out of that toxic sewer line to give him a position
of general in the new empire? Hadn`t he saved his life before in the
battle of the moon kingdom???
He tried to go back to sleep, ignoring this annoying voice in his
head.
"Are you awake, Dokuryo?" said a soft voice behind his bedroom
door.
"You can come in, Thorelia." said Dokuryo, pulling the bedsheet to
cover himself.
The sculptress entered the room and closed the door behind her. She
was wearing a brand new mask which she had worked on carefully for
many hours, one she hoped would please her friend.
"You have a lovely face today, Thorelia." he said. She blushed.
"Thank you for saying so. I had no youma to make in over three days,
so I had all the time to make myself a few extras... although
Aebonite told me I should have my real flesh face any day now. I
can`t wait... finally I can be with you without having to fear my
features might melt down and fall on your clothes... or your
scales..." she said, caressing the bare hardened skin of the toxic
dragon. He shivered and pulled back, using the bedsheet as though
it were a shield. "Why are you afraid? we`ve kissed before..."
"Yes, but... you`ve never seen what my body really looks like..." he
replied, looking away.
"What about your body? What could possibly be worse than this curse
Beryl gave me out of jealousy for my beauty???"
"There`s something I never told anyone, something only Ghangoroth
knew for reading it in my mind and which he swore to keep secret...
I`m not really a man... or a woman, for that matter..."
"What are you talking about?"
"I`m androgynous. I have neither the sexual attributes of a male or
a female." he said, finally daring to show his body to the woman he
had come to trust with his life.
She was shocked to see that he told the truth; although he had the
squarish shoulder and large muscle mass of a man, he had no other
visible distinction as to his gender, if he even had one.
"I chose to consider myself a male because my deep voice fit the
description." he said, covering himself as quickly as he had striped
down. "If you feel too repulsed to ever touch me again, I`ll
understand."
"Don`t ever say anything like that again!" the sculptress replied,
throwing her arms around his shoulders and kissing him passionately.
With this embrace, all his self-loathing vanished in a few seconds,
never to return.
She certainly knew how to make him feel good.
* * *
"Come on, there has to be an explanation, it doesn`t make any sense!"
said Ami to her laptop.
She had been working for over nine hours straight now, guzzling cup
after cup of dark coffee to stave off sleep. The image was right
there for her to see on the screen, she could tap the satellite
network and use a special program of hers to monitor the flux of
earth`s geothermal energy; that was how she noticed the location of
the shattered aebonite crustal to begin with... but where all this
energy going???
It would make sense that it was being channeled to a single
collection point where their enemies of the dark empire would surely
be found, but as the energy lines gathered more and more power from
one redirection point to the next in the planetwide web, there should
be substancial increases in powerline intensity, as well as major
surge points where two or more lines met and merged into a single
one.
Then why was she staring at an evenly distributed power intensity
map? Why weren`t there any surge points or increasingly strong lines?
"This makes no sense..." repeated Ami out loud.
Her mother walked into the kitchen where Ami had been working since
nine o'clock the previous evening and figured her daughter must have
been there since then. That was just the sort of thing Ami was
capable of doing.
"Ami, have you had ANY sleep last night?"
"No, I must figure this out before it`s too late... temperatures
keep dropping worldwide, the earth will freeze if the senshi don`t
stop the dark empire!!!" she replied, too tired to hide her growing
frustration.
"Sweetie, you`ll never figure this out or defeat my former allies
if you`re too tired to think straight. I`m ordering you to get some
sleep right now."
"But mom..."
"I said now, I won`t take no for an answer, young lady!!!"
Ami admitted defeat, because she knew that her mother never could be
made to change her mind when she called her "young lady". She yawned
loudly as she dragged herself to her room and barely had the strength
to remove her clothes before collapsing heavily on her waterbed. She
was so tired that instead of neatly folding her clothes to put them
away, she just tossed them aside beside her bed like Minako had been
trying to teach her for weeks.
No sooner had her eyes closed that she was already having dreams.
Inside a very large courtyard of what seemed like military barracks,
a long row of soldiers was moving in step and passing in front of her
without as much as noticing her. A second row was coming from another
direction, and met the first row under a large arch under which both
rows came side to side and walked on forward in the same direction...
but because the arch was not large enough to accomodate a two men
wide row, the arch actually SHRUNK them half-size so that the total
width of the two side by side rows of half-size soldiers were no
larger than a single row of full-sized ones! And this double row met
another one under a second arch, shrinking again to accomodate the
full number of soldiers in the merging rows, though without
increasing the total width of the forming parade of soldiers.
Ami woke up suddenly after having slept a mere fifteen minutes.
Something clicked in her mind, something so marvelous in its
ingeniosity, so astounding in its simplicity that she could only
laugh uncontrollably from the sheer mental shock of the epiphany
she`d just reached.
Throwing on her wrinkled clothes, she ran back to the kitchen where
her mother protested, insisting that she should rest immediately.
"In just a minute, mom, I have to check this first before it slips
my mind..." she replied, punching in several buttons to alter her
detector program.
After a few seconds, the compressed energy waves revealed their
cleverly hidden secret to Ami as she finally witnessed the fearsome
beauty of the earth`s energy drain by Aebonite. All of it was being
redirected towards the north pole somewhere, although it would take
several hours to pinpoint the exact location.
"I did it, mom, I..." Ami said, dropping in her mother`s arms totally
exhausted.
"Yes, Ami, I knew you`d do it." she said, smiling as she took her
sleeping daughter to her bedroom.
* * *
Adjusting his sleeping cycle to the land of the midnight sun had
proven quite challenging to the most recent addition of the dark
empire high brass. Tossing and turning in his bed, he just couldn`t
get any sleep as his internal clock simply refused to adjust to the
time difference.
Besides, it was getting late, and his splitting headache would surely
refuse him any sleep anyhow. So he got up and dressed himself in the
tight black leather clothing he`d been given by his lord Aebonite.
Looking at his reflection in the mirror, he couldn`t help but wonder
why he was wearing this strange necklace that just wouldn`t come
off. Not that he minded; he found it rather sexy, and it felt good
on his skin...
"I think I`ll go for a walk... I`ll bet Tokyo is beautiful in the
dead of winter." he thought.
Using the dark powers that flowed through him like poison in his
veins, he opened a dark portal that glimmered in black vileness.
He stepped through and he was gone.
* * *
"Well, this is it. The complex is finally complete, after over two
years and a six months interruption in the construction work." said
the forman who had been hired to oversee the final stage of
construction for the huge structure that had been named Poldzer
Triangle.
"Why was construction halted anyway?" wondered the electrician who
screwed in the final power outlet.
"Remember the Tomoe massacre? It was that guy`s holding who had
ordered this place. When he was killed this summer, the workers got
scared, saying that this place was haunted by his spirit and those
of the girls who died with him."
"I think that`s a load of crap, but if the workforce believes it,
that`s enough to halt any efforts to finish up this place." said the
electrician. "Well, that`s it, you can tell the new owners that they
can take possession of their complex!"
"I think they`re arriving just now." said the foreman, looking out
the fourth floor window to the entrance where a luxurious limousine
was pulling by. "I heard that they furnished the top floor of the
main building already so they could come in discreetly before the
official opening this week."
They both looked down and saw a very large man step out. He had a
very muscular frame, almost animalistic in shape, and he hid every
inch of his skin with thick clothing, from the gloves on his hands
to the shroud wrapped around his head. He helped out a frail looking
teenage girl who moved slowly in a very uncertain way, relying on
the large man for support every step of the way.
"So have you heard who they are, by any chance?" asked the
electrician who walked back to his toolbox to pick up his things.
"No, only that she`s the rich heir to some dead industrialist...
didn`t catch the name, though. She`s very keen on privacy, that`s
for sure."
"I doesn`t matter, anyway. I just want to be out of here fast, this
place is giving me the creeps like you wouldn`t believe."
"I thought you didn`t believe in spirits?" wondered the foreman.
"I don`t. I just have a very bad feeling about this place, that`s
all."
* * *
The lobby elevator doors opened to Fenris and Crystallite, letting
them in. Fenris took a small crystal key and turned it in the control
panel, allowing the elevator to reach the top floor.
The floor numbers flew by on the indicator while the cabin steadily
made its way up.
"We`re almost there, my lady." said the powerful manwolf to the weak
girl resting against his muscular body.
"Perfect. I have a feeling we left the fortress just in time." she
said, her hushed voice barely audible over the elevator motor huming.
"If it`s not to bold of me to ask... why did we leave? Do you not
trust your husband`s plan?"
"Of course I trust him. I trust him to fail, that`s all. The senshi
will soon collide with him, and I don`t want to be there when it
happens. He can`t keep his location hidden for long... and I have my
own plans to think about. Did you get word from Black Baron yet?"
"He had a message sent to us, my lady. He will arrive shortly in a
week or two."
"Good. My plan is going along splendidly..." commented Crystallite.
She reached inside a secret pocket on the loose waist of her robe
and pulled out a set of twelve cards.
"What are these?" asked Fenris who removed the thick shroud around
his head that was getting much too hot to bear.
"Those were Gallagher`s. They monitor the progress of the scouts on
their progress towards their ascension to the senshi soul power."
she replied.
On the cards were the images of nine senshi, Sailor Moon, Mars,
Jupiter, Neptune, Uranus, Venus, Mercury, Saturn and their latest
addition Sailor Terra, the recently matured Usako.
"We`re almost there. Only three more to go." she said, smiling.
* * *
Her heart was like a ship at sea during a monsoon. Laurella walked
aimlessly in the red daylight of dawn, not minding the freezing
winter air that bit right through her coat. Her feet were slowly
losing all sensation but she didn`t care. She just wanted to be
alone with her thoughts, most of them concerning her missing
boyfriend Shingo whom Makoto had revealed to have been brainwashed
by the dark empire into becoming the Malachite Warlord.
"We can bring him back, girl, we did it a few times already for
Mamoru!" Usagi had told her to cheer her up, but she couldn`t help
but worry. What were those bastards doing to him? What horrors had
they put him through to break his will? And mostly... had this youma
cat bitch put her dirty paws on him? That last one was really
burning her up.
Without noticing, her aimless walk led her to go where Shingo and
her had shared their first kiss, a small park with old swings where
they`d stopped and talked for hours about their memories from the
moon kingdom. It was after that night that Laurella had stopped
having the same dream of her death over and over and began to
remember the good times she had with her mentor Kitechnum Jendra.
She sat in the same frost covered swing she was sitting in at that
moment, staring at the empty swing where Shingo should have been.
A tear came down her cheek, freezing up halfway down her face.
"I`ll get you back, Kit, I swear, or I`ll die in the process..." she
whispered.
She then lifted her eyes and saw a man dressed in black near the
edge of the park... SHINGO! It was him!!! This was her chance, she
had to take it!
Lost in thought, the corrupt Tsukino Shingo was suddenly distracted
by the sound of a girl screaming her transformation words, turning
under his eyes into Sailor Jendra. He looked at her run towards him,
but he did nothing to hide, run or transform into his battle armor.
He wanted to talk with her.
"Shingo, you came here... do you remember this place?" she asked
him.
"No, not really, should I?" he replied, his evil eyes flashing
malevolence.
"This.. is where we first kissed... I still remember the night, it
was july fourth, under the soft moonlight... it was the most
wonderful thing that had ever happened to me in my wretched
existence!"
"I may not remember you... or this place... but you do feel familiar
somehow." he said, doubt showing in his eyes. Laurella felt her hopes
rising, she was getting through to him!!!
"Try to remember the times we shared... the love we have... you`re
the one who helped unlock my most horrible suppressed memories! I
never loved anyone else but you!!!" she pleaded.
Shingo showed love in his eyes for just a second- then his collar
jolted him with a strong burst of dark energy, returning his traits
to the twisted expression of evil contempt he had before.
"Stay away from me, girl, I am the Malachite Warlord, I owe love to
no one!!!" he snarled, pushing away Sailor Jendra.
"But I love you, you can`t just ignore that!" she said, more tears
going down her cheeks.
"Stay away from me, Laurella... I`m evil, don`t you see?!" he said,
running away from her with self-doubt written all over his face.
"He called me Laurella..." she thought. She quickly activated the
emergency senshi summon signal on her comm-watch and ran after him-
she was going to return him to the side of good!
She saw him open a portal and disappear in it... without a second
thought, she jumped in just quickly enough to follow him inside
before it disappeared as well.
They were gone from Tokyo.
* * *
The senshi received the alert signal, but could do little about it-
they got a few seconds` worth of it, then it cut short.
Ami`s mother woke her up when she received a call from her friends
saying that Laurella was gone and that no one knew where she was.
Akane knew from what Ami had told her that this was surely senshi
business, which was why she got her out of bed.
Fortunately for Sailor Mercury, Jendra`s watch was still sending out
the alert signal. She was able to easily track it down... to the
north pole!!!
"Oh boy, I think the dark empire might have taken for home the old
hideout Beryl used three years ago..." she commented as her laptop
pinpointed the exact location at D-point. "So THAT`s where it
was..."
"I thought you went there before..." asked her mother.
"Yes, but we took a space warp there, and my computer couldn`t
handle the strain and figure out exactly where we were... and
moreover I smashed it to kill a demon girl."
"This time around, you know where it is."
"Yeah, I have to tell the others right away, we must save Laurella!"
* * *
She`d taken space warp portals before, she knew how it was supposed
to feel- smooth, fast and comfortable... but this one, created by a
minion of the dark empire, was anything but that. The dark energies
concentrated into a tunnel had made her sick... she fought with all
her strenght, but it was no use. When she arrived on the other side,
she threw up. Her stomach twisted itself violently in a desperate
attempt to reject all the negativity she`d picked up along the way
to the dark empire fortress.
Spitting out the revolting taste of stomach acids in her mouth as
best she could, Laurella looked around trying to figure where she
was. It was awfully dark in there, wherever there was.
Her eyes slowly became accustomed to the faint amount of light, so
she picked out the shape of Shingo; he was down on his knees,
holding his head in his hands. He was obviously feeling a lot of
pain.
No sooner did she try and get close to him that a large floodlight
appeared from nowhere, putting both her and Shingo in the spotlight.
He got up and laughed, and Sailor Jendra realized that she was in the
very throne room of Beryl, the one Usagi had described from her
confrontation against the brainwashed Prince Endymion... talk about
history repeating itself!
She also noticed someone sitting in the throne, a tall, slim man with
long dark blue hair tied in a ponytail except for a few strands going
down over his face. He wore a very elaborate dark empire uniform
decorated with pure, untreated aebonite crystal.
"You`re Aebonite, aren`t you?" she asked, doing her best to keep her
composure regardless of the fact that she`d just spilled the entire
contents of her stomach a few seconds before.
"Quite correct, child... so glad you could join us in this little
impromptu get together!" he said, lifting a glass of blod red wine
to salute his guest.
In front of her, Shingo`s armor covered his body and turned him once
again into the Malachite Warlord.
"Shingo, listen to me... you can beat this, you were almost there
five minutes ago!!!" she said.
"You`re wasting your time, dear... this was nothing more than a
setup to get you here." said the warlord in a mocking tone.
"Indeed it was. His loyalties are mine alone... show him your eyes,
my servant." ordered Lord Aebonite to the warrior. He took off his
helmet, allowing Laurella to see his eyes that burned with
unforgiving hatred directed towards her. Aebonite picked up a
heavy black halberd resting against his throne and brought it to
his lackey.
"You see, dear Sailor Jendra, he`s not your boyfriend anymore. I
own him, body..." he said, handing him over the dreadful weapon.
"...mind..." he added, staring right into those hateful eyes and
seeing there the undying devotion he programmed himself. "...and
SOUL!"
He then put his hand behind the warrior`s head, bringing him closer
to him... and kissing his lips.
Laurella felt her heart shatter when she saw them kiss, as the last
remnant of hope she had of healing her lover was crushed mercilessly
in the iron fist of Aebonite.
When they separated their lips, Aebonite whispered something in
his ear.
"Kill her... but don`t damage the face, Thorelia wants it."
* * *
They had assembled quickly outside of Usagi`s house, which had
become a new rallying point for the senshi since her parents knew
of their powers.
They had already transformed, Prince Endymion and all the senshi,
even Sailor Mars who still seemed shaken up emotionaly; however,
she had insisted on being there to give the dark empire the
retribution it deserved. There was still one more senshi that would
join them...
Usako left the house and joined them outside, still untransformed.
"So, is the grown Sailor Chibi-Moon ready for her first fight?"
wondered Jupiter, happy to see her friend joining the effort.
"I`m coming all right, but not as Chibi-Moon... TERRA SOUL POWER
TRANSFORM!!!" she said.
A flash of golden light surrounded her, removing her regular clothes
and replacing them with the pink, red and black fuku of the mighty
Sailor Terra, complete with the visor and metal guards like the
other senshi. On her right tigh were the kanji which spelled CHIKYUU
NO SENSHI, soldier of the earth. "Now I`m ready."
"I`ve never been to Beryl`s hideout, so we`ll have to use a senshi
teleport to get there." said Pluto, motioning her allies to form a
circle. "Endymion has great power within himself, he will be able to
come along this way."
Taking each other`s hands and forming a circle, the senshi
concentrated their power into forming a large bubble around them.
A few seconds later, it shot upwards at a mind boggling speed and
was already halfway across the globe towards D-point.
* * *
The warlord took the halberd well in hand and smiled wickedly as he
tightened his grip around its shaft, thinking what he would do to
Sailor Jendra. He looked at her, she had become broken, hopeless, a
shadow of the warrior she used to be. All because her love had been
crushed.
"Shingo... Kit... listen to me, you can`t do this! We love each
other!" she begged him, falling on her knees in helpless desperation.
"Nonsense. I love my master Aebonite, and no one else... and I will
please him by bringing him your severed head." he replied grimly,
walking towards her and lifting up his weapon like a cobra getting
ready to strike.
"Then if you will not love me... then you must kill me!" she said,
ripping up her suit to offer her bare chest to his blade. This
unexpected move made him hesitate a second, as he hadn`t expected
her to surrender her life in this manner. He looked at his master,
unsure if he should proceed.
Aebonite nodded to give his consent. "Do what you will." was what he
read on his lips. He turned his attention back to Sailor Jendra.
"I would die for our love... never doubt it for an instant." she
said, tears flowing from her eyes.
A long silent and tense moment of hesitation and doubt followed...
then the warlord broke it with a few words.
"I never did doubt that."
With a savage scream, he brought down his weapon and struck Sailor
Jendra, piercing her soft flesh and tearing the blade all the way
through her chest, going right through her heart.
She silently cried while her life slowly slipped away, the warm
sticky blood dripping on her chest and back from the entry and exit
wounds. Before she died, she found just enough strenght to look
Shingo in the eyes and mutter "I love you".
TO BE CONTINUED...
a.k.a. Technuma Saturn
Prologue...
"What are you talking about?"
Kaolinite couldn`t believe what she just heard. She knew well she
had the favor of professor Tomoe in the daemon egg research lab,
and that was bound to attract some conflict with the other members
of the Witches 5. But that one of them would go as far as trying to
kill her to get her place, this just seemed insane.
"Trust me, Kaolinite." whispered Villuy. "I heard the others talking,
and pretty soon you may end up on the wrong side of a firewall when
an explosion happens."
"That`s ludicrous. None of them would go THAT far." replied Kaolinite,
passing her fingers in her long black hair.
"Oh yeah? And what would you think of that anonymous letter in your
locker, along with all those snails?" said Villuy.
Kaolinite couldn`t argue with that; she had indeed received a
threatening letter, and had done her best not to let it get to her,
but still...
"So? What can I do if I don`t know who sent me that letter?!"
"Well... I heard Mimete call you snail lady behind your back on
several occasions."
"MIMETE?!? You`re crazy, she`s much too passive and submissive to do
anything so bold! You`re just wasting my time, Villuy, go away."
said Kaolinite who didn`t care to hear more of the witche`s rantings.
At that moment, the intruder alarm went off.
"Someone`s inside- past our first perimeter defenses! Incredible!!!"
said Tomoe`s assistant.
Villuy couldn`t believe it either. "Who could be stupid enough to
attack us head-on?!?" she asked in disbelief.
"Someone with a death wish, that`s who!" said Eudial as she walked
by them and revved up her fire buster. "Let`s show the intruder who`s
queen of the hill!!!"
A sickening odor of putrefaction invaded the laboratory, causing
awful bouts of nausea to all those present. The lights faded
unnaturaly, bringing an atmosphere of dread to the already gloomy
workshop.
"What`s going on?!?" screamed Mimete.
"The dread lord of darkness has entered your lair, treacherous
snakes!" said a loud growling voice behind Eudial. She spun around
to meet the source of the taunt, but out of the darkness came a flash
of cold steel which struck her squarely in the chest, rupturing her
arteries and digging deep inside her left lung. She died instantly,
her final gurgling sound made inaudible by the clanking noise of her
falling fire weapon.
As the dread knight took full form in his golden armor and battle
axe, Mimete screamed with all the strenght of the uncontrollable
terror which held her soul in its twisted claws. Villuy froze in
fear, incapable of moving a single muscle.
"Ronmar, first knightmare of the spheres, has arrived. Fear me.
Loathe me. Die by my hands." growled the dread knight, his red eyes
flashing under the visor of his golden helm.
Kaolinite was just as afraid as her collegues, but she wasn`t going
to let that monstrosity kill her or any other of her subordinates-
she made a run for it, plunging forward with all the speed her body
could muster, running by the hulking warrior to reach the weapons
cabinet behind him.
He was faster.
Kaolinite`s run was brutally halted by the horrid pain of her right
side being ripped apart from her armpit to her waist by the sharp
blade of his axe. She fell limply to the ground, her warm blood
spurting on the cold concrete floor and mingling with Eudial`s whom
she could see in front of her. Eudial`s eyes were lifeless and her
skin was beginning to take a frozen expression of death.
As her vision blurred and darkened, she could hear the last screams
of Villuy and Mimete who met the same tragic fate as she and Eudial
had.
Everything went black.
Kaolinite woke up screaming, again. She had the nightmare of Ronmar`s
attack upon the Witches 5 hideout, as she had for every single night
since that moment when she woke up in the morgue. It had been a
miracle that her system had somehow managed to restart itself after
over two hours of being clinically dead, and an even greater one that
the pathologist took a fifteen minute break before starting her
autopsy.
It had taken seven ten-hours long surgeries to mend her severed bones
and muscles, and for all the damage done to her by that blow she
had received, the doctors hadn`t found any arteries to be cut at
all. Her lucky star had been watching on her, or so she thought.
She quickly realized that her old life had been destroyed: Tomoe and
all of her old associates were dead now, and so was the young Hotaru
whom she loved as though she were her own daughter. Her health had
also been shattered, as the horrid wound had never properly healed
iself despite the best medical care her fortune could buy. Her chest
was being constantly wracked with bursts of intolerable spasms. Her
only solace was to be found in the pain killers which she took in
amounts that no humans should dare attempt to consume. Despite the
fact that her doctor warned her against it, Kaolinite just keep in
swallowing the pills she had become addicted to, because she didn`t
care.
She swallowed another couple of pills, then washed it down with a
swig of jamaican rhum. Her stomach felt like it had just been
incinerated by a scorching fireball as it felt the ravages of her
ever growing ulcer- she was going down in a descending spiral of
self-destruction but she didn`t give a damn.
She`d live just long enough to destroy the monster who took away
the man who had given her a chance to prove her talents, the only
man who had treated her with respect... the one man she
had ever loved, and had been taken away from her before she could
tell him just how she felt.
Incapable of sleeping, she picked up a clipboard that she kept close
by at all times, studying professor Tomoe`s notes on daemon egg
creation. She was going to improve on his designs, although this
would prove immensely difficult. No one had a grasp on daemon eggs
processing like the deceased scientist. If there was a way to do it,
however, she`d find it.
The familiar rush of alcohol mixed with pain supressors began to kick
in, giving Kaolinite a momentary respite from the pain in her chest.
If only it could heal the pain in her heart, she thought... tired
and heartbroken, she cried herself to an all too short and agitated
sleep.
* * *
CYCLES OF LIFE: EPISODE 32
RAGING HEARTQUAKE
Sitting silently in her appartment, Makoto reflected back upon the
tragic death of her lover Ghangoroth a week before. She felt the
soft fabric of his folded cape in her hands, dragged her fingers
along the sculpted gold button marked with the greek letter psi. It
had taken six senshi over two hours to pry his frozen body out of
the ice block created by Dokuryo.
In all her sadness, she had barely noticed upon returning to Tokyo
that she couldn`t walk after transforming to her normal self again.
Crying herself out of tears on Usagi`s couch, she hadn`t noticed
anything around her for quite a while.
With a week gone by, her life was slowly returning to something more
normal. She had adapted her place to fit her changing needs; even if
her legs were paralyzed, she was intent on keeping her independance.
It was useful in her efforts to attain this goal that she could at
any given time transform into Sailor Jupiter and temporarily regain
her ability to walk. She was spending more and more time in her soul
powered form as the days went by, and she often answered the door to
her visiting senshi friends in this fashion. It surprised them at
first, but they were getting used to it.
In the empty appartment she had dreamed of sharing with the man who
had introduced himself to her as Xavier, only the faint background
noises of the busy Tokyo streets could be heard. Even though Makoto
was all cried out now, she felt a terrible hole inside, one she felt
would never be filled again despite Usako`s reassurance.
She cried again, her tears wetting the soft cloth of the cape.
* * *
She was turning around many heads of young boys, even though she was
much older than any one of them... or their great-grandparents, for
that matter. With her long bright red ponytails floating in the
subzero wind, Usako was a new woman whose seemingly eighteen years
old body was hiding her true age: upwards of 900 years.
She had begun to change her lifestyle according to her newfound
maturity, although many of the aspects of her former self would
probably be lost for good.
This one was a case in point: a young girl who was Chibi-Usa`s best
friend, Momoko. The eight year old girl hadn`t seen her best friend
in over a week now, and had a look of sadness to her face that made
the scarlet lady feel bad. In the rush of soul power that had
triggered her sudden growth, she had forgotten to consider the
repercussions of the small lady disappearing for good.
Usako hesitated for a second before approaching Momoko who was
standing on the street corner waiting for her bus to arrive... would
she just be reopening a bleeding wound unnecessarily, or could she
actually do her old friend some good? She didn`t have to ponder this
matter for long, Momoko turning around and noticing Usako staring at
her. The ressemblance was way too striking to ignore, and the young
girl came to her.
"Excuse me, are you related to a girl named Tsukino Chibi-Usa?" she
asked.
"Yes..." said Usako, hesitating as to what to say next. "I`m her
big sister Usako."
Momoko smiled faintly. "Do you know where Chibi-Usa is? I tried to
call her at her aunt Ikuko`s house, but she`s never there..." she
said.
"She had to leave in a hurry back home... she`s sorry she couldn`t
reach you before she returned but she wanted me to tell you how much
she loved having you as a friend." said Usako, smiling back to her
small friend.
"If you see her, can you tell her I`ll miss her?"
"Sure thing, Momoko, I`ll do that." replied Usako. As she turned
around to leave, Momoko took her hand and stopped her.
"Usako... will I see you again?" she asked.
Scarlet lady could see the loneliness in the young girl`s eyes, and
it touched her like she never imagined that a single stare could.
"Of course... I`d love to be your friend." she replied.
"I`m going to see a movie... would you like to come with me?"
"Yeah, let`s do it!"
The heavy and noisy bus arrived at their corner and stopped. The two
girls got on board and left to reach a nearby movie theater.
Maybe her new life wouldn`t be so difficult to adapt to after all.
* * *
Dokuryo was bored.
It had been a week already since that hurried mission to replace the
shattered aebonite crystal in the Osaka region, the most flamboyant
success of the dark empire, as it had sealed the fate of earth by
repairing the energy gathering network and providing more power to
his lord Aebonite than any of Beryl`s minions had ever been able to
collect. The senshi were helpless to find the operating base of the
dark empire due to a clever trick devised by Ghangoroth, so no new
mission had arisen that would require his talents.
And so he laid in bed, sleeping in late as he had every single
morning since that glorious triumph in which he was forced to kill
his old friend Ghangoroth.
"It wasn`t my fault, I was aiming Sailor Jupiter, he`s the one who
wanted to protect her." he silently told himself, convincing the best
he could his tortured conscience. Wasn`t it his ally Ghangoroth who
had pulled him out of that toxic sewer line to give him a position
of general in the new empire? Hadn`t he saved his life before in the
battle of the moon kingdom???
He tried to go back to sleep, ignoring this annoying voice in his
head.
"Are you awake, Dokuryo?" said a soft voice behind his bedroom
door.
"You can come in, Thorelia." said Dokuryo, pulling the bedsheet to
cover himself.
The sculptress entered the room and closed the door behind her. She
was wearing a brand new mask which she had worked on carefully for
many hours, one she hoped would please her friend.
"You have a lovely face today, Thorelia." he said. She blushed.
"Thank you for saying so. I had no youma to make in over three days,
so I had all the time to make myself a few extras... although
Aebonite told me I should have my real flesh face any day now. I
can`t wait... finally I can be with you without having to fear my
features might melt down and fall on your clothes... or your
scales..." she said, caressing the bare hardened skin of the toxic
dragon. He shivered and pulled back, using the bedsheet as though
it were a shield. "Why are you afraid? we`ve kissed before..."
"Yes, but... you`ve never seen what my body really looks like..." he
replied, looking away.
"What about your body? What could possibly be worse than this curse
Beryl gave me out of jealousy for my beauty???"
"There`s something I never told anyone, something only Ghangoroth
knew for reading it in my mind and which he swore to keep secret...
I`m not really a man... or a woman, for that matter..."
"What are you talking about?"
"I`m androgynous. I have neither the sexual attributes of a male or
a female." he said, finally daring to show his body to the woman he
had come to trust with his life.
She was shocked to see that he told the truth; although he had the
squarish shoulder and large muscle mass of a man, he had no other
visible distinction as to his gender, if he even had one.
"I chose to consider myself a male because my deep voice fit the
description." he said, covering himself as quickly as he had striped
down. "If you feel too repulsed to ever touch me again, I`ll
understand."
"Don`t ever say anything like that again!" the sculptress replied,
throwing her arms around his shoulders and kissing him passionately.
With this embrace, all his self-loathing vanished in a few seconds,
never to return.
She certainly knew how to make him feel good.
* * *
"Come on, there has to be an explanation, it doesn`t make any sense!"
said Ami to her laptop.
She had been working for over nine hours straight now, guzzling cup
after cup of dark coffee to stave off sleep. The image was right
there for her to see on the screen, she could tap the satellite
network and use a special program of hers to monitor the flux of
earth`s geothermal energy; that was how she noticed the location of
the shattered aebonite crustal to begin with... but where all this
energy going???
It would make sense that it was being channeled to a single
collection point where their enemies of the dark empire would surely
be found, but as the energy lines gathered more and more power from
one redirection point to the next in the planetwide web, there should
be substancial increases in powerline intensity, as well as major
surge points where two or more lines met and merged into a single
one.
Then why was she staring at an evenly distributed power intensity
map? Why weren`t there any surge points or increasingly strong lines?
"This makes no sense..." repeated Ami out loud.
Her mother walked into the kitchen where Ami had been working since
nine o'clock the previous evening and figured her daughter must have
been there since then. That was just the sort of thing Ami was
capable of doing.
"Ami, have you had ANY sleep last night?"
"No, I must figure this out before it`s too late... temperatures
keep dropping worldwide, the earth will freeze if the senshi don`t
stop the dark empire!!!" she replied, too tired to hide her growing
frustration.
"Sweetie, you`ll never figure this out or defeat my former allies
if you`re too tired to think straight. I`m ordering you to get some
sleep right now."
"But mom..."
"I said now, I won`t take no for an answer, young lady!!!"
Ami admitted defeat, because she knew that her mother never could be
made to change her mind when she called her "young lady". She yawned
loudly as she dragged herself to her room and barely had the strength
to remove her clothes before collapsing heavily on her waterbed. She
was so tired that instead of neatly folding her clothes to put them
away, she just tossed them aside beside her bed like Minako had been
trying to teach her for weeks.
No sooner had her eyes closed that she was already having dreams.
Inside a very large courtyard of what seemed like military barracks,
a long row of soldiers was moving in step and passing in front of her
without as much as noticing her. A second row was coming from another
direction, and met the first row under a large arch under which both
rows came side to side and walked on forward in the same direction...
but because the arch was not large enough to accomodate a two men
wide row, the arch actually SHRUNK them half-size so that the total
width of the two side by side rows of half-size soldiers were no
larger than a single row of full-sized ones! And this double row met
another one under a second arch, shrinking again to accomodate the
full number of soldiers in the merging rows, though without
increasing the total width of the forming parade of soldiers.
Ami woke up suddenly after having slept a mere fifteen minutes.
Something clicked in her mind, something so marvelous in its
ingeniosity, so astounding in its simplicity that she could only
laugh uncontrollably from the sheer mental shock of the epiphany
she`d just reached.
Throwing on her wrinkled clothes, she ran back to the kitchen where
her mother protested, insisting that she should rest immediately.
"In just a minute, mom, I have to check this first before it slips
my mind..." she replied, punching in several buttons to alter her
detector program.
After a few seconds, the compressed energy waves revealed their
cleverly hidden secret to Ami as she finally witnessed the fearsome
beauty of the earth`s energy drain by Aebonite. All of it was being
redirected towards the north pole somewhere, although it would take
several hours to pinpoint the exact location.
"I did it, mom, I..." Ami said, dropping in her mother`s arms totally
exhausted.
"Yes, Ami, I knew you`d do it." she said, smiling as she took her
sleeping daughter to her bedroom.
* * *
Adjusting his sleeping cycle to the land of the midnight sun had
proven quite challenging to the most recent addition of the dark
empire high brass. Tossing and turning in his bed, he just couldn`t
get any sleep as his internal clock simply refused to adjust to the
time difference.
Besides, it was getting late, and his splitting headache would surely
refuse him any sleep anyhow. So he got up and dressed himself in the
tight black leather clothing he`d been given by his lord Aebonite.
Looking at his reflection in the mirror, he couldn`t help but wonder
why he was wearing this strange necklace that just wouldn`t come
off. Not that he minded; he found it rather sexy, and it felt good
on his skin...
"I think I`ll go for a walk... I`ll bet Tokyo is beautiful in the
dead of winter." he thought.
Using the dark powers that flowed through him like poison in his
veins, he opened a dark portal that glimmered in black vileness.
He stepped through and he was gone.
* * *
"Well, this is it. The complex is finally complete, after over two
years and a six months interruption in the construction work." said
the forman who had been hired to oversee the final stage of
construction for the huge structure that had been named Poldzer
Triangle.
"Why was construction halted anyway?" wondered the electrician who
screwed in the final power outlet.
"Remember the Tomoe massacre? It was that guy`s holding who had
ordered this place. When he was killed this summer, the workers got
scared, saying that this place was haunted by his spirit and those
of the girls who died with him."
"I think that`s a load of crap, but if the workforce believes it,
that`s enough to halt any efforts to finish up this place." said the
electrician. "Well, that`s it, you can tell the new owners that they
can take possession of their complex!"
"I think they`re arriving just now." said the foreman, looking out
the fourth floor window to the entrance where a luxurious limousine
was pulling by. "I heard that they furnished the top floor of the
main building already so they could come in discreetly before the
official opening this week."
They both looked down and saw a very large man step out. He had a
very muscular frame, almost animalistic in shape, and he hid every
inch of his skin with thick clothing, from the gloves on his hands
to the shroud wrapped around his head. He helped out a frail looking
teenage girl who moved slowly in a very uncertain way, relying on
the large man for support every step of the way.
"So have you heard who they are, by any chance?" asked the
electrician who walked back to his toolbox to pick up his things.
"No, only that she`s the rich heir to some dead industrialist...
didn`t catch the name, though. She`s very keen on privacy, that`s
for sure."
"I doesn`t matter, anyway. I just want to be out of here fast, this
place is giving me the creeps like you wouldn`t believe."
"I thought you didn`t believe in spirits?" wondered the foreman.
"I don`t. I just have a very bad feeling about this place, that`s
all."
* * *
The lobby elevator doors opened to Fenris and Crystallite, letting
them in. Fenris took a small crystal key and turned it in the control
panel, allowing the elevator to reach the top floor.
The floor numbers flew by on the indicator while the cabin steadily
made its way up.
"We`re almost there, my lady." said the powerful manwolf to the weak
girl resting against his muscular body.
"Perfect. I have a feeling we left the fortress just in time." she
said, her hushed voice barely audible over the elevator motor huming.
"If it`s not to bold of me to ask... why did we leave? Do you not
trust your husband`s plan?"
"Of course I trust him. I trust him to fail, that`s all. The senshi
will soon collide with him, and I don`t want to be there when it
happens. He can`t keep his location hidden for long... and I have my
own plans to think about. Did you get word from Black Baron yet?"
"He had a message sent to us, my lady. He will arrive shortly in a
week or two."
"Good. My plan is going along splendidly..." commented Crystallite.
She reached inside a secret pocket on the loose waist of her robe
and pulled out a set of twelve cards.
"What are these?" asked Fenris who removed the thick shroud around
his head that was getting much too hot to bear.
"Those were Gallagher`s. They monitor the progress of the scouts on
their progress towards their ascension to the senshi soul power."
she replied.
On the cards were the images of nine senshi, Sailor Moon, Mars,
Jupiter, Neptune, Uranus, Venus, Mercury, Saturn and their latest
addition Sailor Terra, the recently matured Usako.
"We`re almost there. Only three more to go." she said, smiling.
* * *
Her heart was like a ship at sea during a monsoon. Laurella walked
aimlessly in the red daylight of dawn, not minding the freezing
winter air that bit right through her coat. Her feet were slowly
losing all sensation but she didn`t care. She just wanted to be
alone with her thoughts, most of them concerning her missing
boyfriend Shingo whom Makoto had revealed to have been brainwashed
by the dark empire into becoming the Malachite Warlord.
"We can bring him back, girl, we did it a few times already for
Mamoru!" Usagi had told her to cheer her up, but she couldn`t help
but worry. What were those bastards doing to him? What horrors had
they put him through to break his will? And mostly... had this youma
cat bitch put her dirty paws on him? That last one was really
burning her up.
Without noticing, her aimless walk led her to go where Shingo and
her had shared their first kiss, a small park with old swings where
they`d stopped and talked for hours about their memories from the
moon kingdom. It was after that night that Laurella had stopped
having the same dream of her death over and over and began to
remember the good times she had with her mentor Kitechnum Jendra.
She sat in the same frost covered swing she was sitting in at that
moment, staring at the empty swing where Shingo should have been.
A tear came down her cheek, freezing up halfway down her face.
"I`ll get you back, Kit, I swear, or I`ll die in the process..." she
whispered.
She then lifted her eyes and saw a man dressed in black near the
edge of the park... SHINGO! It was him!!! This was her chance, she
had to take it!
Lost in thought, the corrupt Tsukino Shingo was suddenly distracted
by the sound of a girl screaming her transformation words, turning
under his eyes into Sailor Jendra. He looked at her run towards him,
but he did nothing to hide, run or transform into his battle armor.
He wanted to talk with her.
"Shingo, you came here... do you remember this place?" she asked
him.
"No, not really, should I?" he replied, his evil eyes flashing
malevolence.
"This.. is where we first kissed... I still remember the night, it
was july fourth, under the soft moonlight... it was the most
wonderful thing that had ever happened to me in my wretched
existence!"
"I may not remember you... or this place... but you do feel familiar
somehow." he said, doubt showing in his eyes. Laurella felt her hopes
rising, she was getting through to him!!!
"Try to remember the times we shared... the love we have... you`re
the one who helped unlock my most horrible suppressed memories! I
never loved anyone else but you!!!" she pleaded.
Shingo showed love in his eyes for just a second- then his collar
jolted him with a strong burst of dark energy, returning his traits
to the twisted expression of evil contempt he had before.
"Stay away from me, girl, I am the Malachite Warlord, I owe love to
no one!!!" he snarled, pushing away Sailor Jendra.
"But I love you, you can`t just ignore that!" she said, more tears
going down her cheeks.
"Stay away from me, Laurella... I`m evil, don`t you see?!" he said,
running away from her with self-doubt written all over his face.
"He called me Laurella..." she thought. She quickly activated the
emergency senshi summon signal on her comm-watch and ran after him-
she was going to return him to the side of good!
She saw him open a portal and disappear in it... without a second
thought, she jumped in just quickly enough to follow him inside
before it disappeared as well.
They were gone from Tokyo.
* * *
The senshi received the alert signal, but could do little about it-
they got a few seconds` worth of it, then it cut short.
Ami`s mother woke her up when she received a call from her friends
saying that Laurella was gone and that no one knew where she was.
Akane knew from what Ami had told her that this was surely senshi
business, which was why she got her out of bed.
Fortunately for Sailor Mercury, Jendra`s watch was still sending out
the alert signal. She was able to easily track it down... to the
north pole!!!
"Oh boy, I think the dark empire might have taken for home the old
hideout Beryl used three years ago..." she commented as her laptop
pinpointed the exact location at D-point. "So THAT`s where it
was..."
"I thought you went there before..." asked her mother.
"Yes, but we took a space warp there, and my computer couldn`t
handle the strain and figure out exactly where we were... and
moreover I smashed it to kill a demon girl."
"This time around, you know where it is."
"Yeah, I have to tell the others right away, we must save Laurella!"
* * *
She`d taken space warp portals before, she knew how it was supposed
to feel- smooth, fast and comfortable... but this one, created by a
minion of the dark empire, was anything but that. The dark energies
concentrated into a tunnel had made her sick... she fought with all
her strenght, but it was no use. When she arrived on the other side,
she threw up. Her stomach twisted itself violently in a desperate
attempt to reject all the negativity she`d picked up along the way
to the dark empire fortress.
Spitting out the revolting taste of stomach acids in her mouth as
best she could, Laurella looked around trying to figure where she
was. It was awfully dark in there, wherever there was.
Her eyes slowly became accustomed to the faint amount of light, so
she picked out the shape of Shingo; he was down on his knees,
holding his head in his hands. He was obviously feeling a lot of
pain.
No sooner did she try and get close to him that a large floodlight
appeared from nowhere, putting both her and Shingo in the spotlight.
He got up and laughed, and Sailor Jendra realized that she was in the
very throne room of Beryl, the one Usagi had described from her
confrontation against the brainwashed Prince Endymion... talk about
history repeating itself!
She also noticed someone sitting in the throne, a tall, slim man with
long dark blue hair tied in a ponytail except for a few strands going
down over his face. He wore a very elaborate dark empire uniform
decorated with pure, untreated aebonite crystal.
"You`re Aebonite, aren`t you?" she asked, doing her best to keep her
composure regardless of the fact that she`d just spilled the entire
contents of her stomach a few seconds before.
"Quite correct, child... so glad you could join us in this little
impromptu get together!" he said, lifting a glass of blod red wine
to salute his guest.
In front of her, Shingo`s armor covered his body and turned him once
again into the Malachite Warlord.
"Shingo, listen to me... you can beat this, you were almost there
five minutes ago!!!" she said.
"You`re wasting your time, dear... this was nothing more than a
setup to get you here." said the warlord in a mocking tone.
"Indeed it was. His loyalties are mine alone... show him your eyes,
my servant." ordered Lord Aebonite to the warrior. He took off his
helmet, allowing Laurella to see his eyes that burned with
unforgiving hatred directed towards her. Aebonite picked up a
heavy black halberd resting against his throne and brought it to
his lackey.
"You see, dear Sailor Jendra, he`s not your boyfriend anymore. I
own him, body..." he said, handing him over the dreadful weapon.
"...mind..." he added, staring right into those hateful eyes and
seeing there the undying devotion he programmed himself. "...and
SOUL!"
He then put his hand behind the warrior`s head, bringing him closer
to him... and kissing his lips.
Laurella felt her heart shatter when she saw them kiss, as the last
remnant of hope she had of healing her lover was crushed mercilessly
in the iron fist of Aebonite.
When they separated their lips, Aebonite whispered something in
his ear.
"Kill her... but don`t damage the face, Thorelia wants it."
* * *
They had assembled quickly outside of Usagi`s house, which had
become a new rallying point for the senshi since her parents knew
of their powers.
They had already transformed, Prince Endymion and all the senshi,
even Sailor Mars who still seemed shaken up emotionaly; however,
she had insisted on being there to give the dark empire the
retribution it deserved. There was still one more senshi that would
join them...
Usako left the house and joined them outside, still untransformed.
"So, is the grown Sailor Chibi-Moon ready for her first fight?"
wondered Jupiter, happy to see her friend joining the effort.
"I`m coming all right, but not as Chibi-Moon... TERRA SOUL POWER
TRANSFORM!!!" she said.
A flash of golden light surrounded her, removing her regular clothes
and replacing them with the pink, red and black fuku of the mighty
Sailor Terra, complete with the visor and metal guards like the
other senshi. On her right tigh were the kanji which spelled CHIKYUU
NO SENSHI, soldier of the earth. "Now I`m ready."
"I`ve never been to Beryl`s hideout, so we`ll have to use a senshi
teleport to get there." said Pluto, motioning her allies to form a
circle. "Endymion has great power within himself, he will be able to
come along this way."
Taking each other`s hands and forming a circle, the senshi
concentrated their power into forming a large bubble around them.
A few seconds later, it shot upwards at a mind boggling speed and
was already halfway across the globe towards D-point.
* * *
The warlord took the halberd well in hand and smiled wickedly as he
tightened his grip around its shaft, thinking what he would do to
Sailor Jendra. He looked at her, she had become broken, hopeless, a
shadow of the warrior she used to be. All because her love had been
crushed.
"Shingo... Kit... listen to me, you can`t do this! We love each
other!" she begged him, falling on her knees in helpless desperation.
"Nonsense. I love my master Aebonite, and no one else... and I will
please him by bringing him your severed head." he replied grimly,
walking towards her and lifting up his weapon like a cobra getting
ready to strike.
"Then if you will not love me... then you must kill me!" she said,
ripping up her suit to offer her bare chest to his blade. This
unexpected move made him hesitate a second, as he hadn`t expected
her to surrender her life in this manner. He looked at his master,
unsure if he should proceed.
Aebonite nodded to give his consent. "Do what you will." was what he
read on his lips. He turned his attention back to Sailor Jendra.
"I would die for our love... never doubt it for an instant." she
said, tears flowing from her eyes.
A long silent and tense moment of hesitation and doubt followed...
then the warlord broke it with a few words.
"I never did doubt that."
With a savage scream, he brought down his weapon and struck Sailor
Jendra, piercing her soft flesh and tearing the blade all the way
through her chest, going right through her heart.
She silently cried while her life slowly slipped away, the warm
sticky blood dripping on her chest and back from the entry and exit
wounds. Before she died, she found just enough strenght to look
Shingo in the eyes and mutter "I love you".
TO BE CONTINUED...