The Strangers Purpose

The shadows were long on his face…the face of a warrior… He stood before his Empress, a frown spread across his full lips…he knew not of how to approach her, but it had taken her years to allow any one to see her. She was stunningly beautiful, but her eyes reflected her hatred for all. They almost spoiled her beauty…almost. She was said to be cautious around all, but her power exceeded all others… she had nothing to fear from anyone…

"My Queen," he said, his voice fearful yet strong, "I have found Prince Tobius. He has already contacted the Princess Mini-Serenity… I suggest we attack immediately, before the others…"

"SILENCE!" Queen Hannibelle's voice was hard as stone and could pierce through a raging Nor'Easter. Serlio Serpent, a member of the Fifth Alliance, shuddered under her hateful voice. Queen Hannibelle lifted her arm and pointed a finger at Serlio.

" I am your queen," she said, " And I take orders from no one. If I wanted to forge an attack I would have made the order to do so. You have disgraced yourself for imposing an order on myself and the High Counsel. Go to your Alliance and inform them that there will be no attack held just yet. So go! NOW!" and with that Serlio stood up, bowed, and turned on his heel to go back into the light.

Queen Hannibelle was alone after the doors to the throne were closed. She lifted her hand and waved a circle in the air. A glowing orb appeared before her. In it was the youthful face of the one she loved. She sighed deeply. She knew she could never have him, he was of a richer quality. A good quality. She had no quality and was evil. She couldn't stand the thought of him being so close when she couldn't have him. Oh well, she thought, I'll need to stop this self pitying and start focusing on the destruction of the sailorscouts. Queen Hannibelle began to wonder what her husband, Mahalika, would do to her if he found out about her straying emotions. She waved her hand in the air and Tobius' face disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Kelloggs. There were Kelloggs on the table again. That's all they had been eating for about a week now. Rini moaned loudly as her grandmother poured her a bowl of flakes. Her mind reviewed the things that had taken place during the past few days as she grabbed the sugar out of the cabinet. Tobius had confronted Darian, who had wanted to attack him in a full fledged rage, and Serena, who had fallen to her knees, was begging Tobius to forgive her for what she had done, all the while Tobius was blushing so much that he looked feverish. (Darian would find out later in a blur of colorful words from Tobius why Serena had done this) It turns out that Luna and Artimus where part of the circle of lies. Luna had not known about Tobius, but she knew that Serena had had another child who was brought up by Queen Serenity. Luna was never informed, however, that her child would come forth and find her from the future…but the fact that Luna knew about her own child and Serena had not had put Serena in a rage. She had started to scream at Luna and Rini couldn't help but laugh when she thought of Luna's scratch marks all over her young mothers face! As usual, no one noticed Serena's pain, and, though Lita objected to this because she was baking, everyone had proceeded into the kitchen, where they all listened as Tobius retold his life story, but much shorter than the tale he had told Rini.

Tobius walked into the kitchen, yawning slightly, and sat down at the table.

"Hey Princess," he said. She smiled softly at the nickname she had gained in just one day.

"Hey, Big Bro'," he laughed cheerfully. She had started calling him that whenever he called her Princess. "You might want to go out today. All the girls are coming over to talk about our new enemy. But if you're here I don't think they will ever get around to talking. If you know what I mean?"

He knew exactly what she was she was talking about. Ever since the girls (Leda, Mina, Ami, and Trista) had discovered that an equally sensitive, exact replica of Darian was walking around he had gotten no peace whenever they were around. Leda kept telling him how she had beaten up a lot of their enemies, and how strong she was. Mina would just flutter eyelashes an giggle, which was very annoying when he really did want to talk to her. Ami would blush and clam up, unless Tobius said anything about school work, then she was extremely open. Trista was different though. He could actually talk to her, but he didn't know if she liked him or not. Not that he really would consider being with her, it was just that he was comfortable around her. He could talk to her about all the things that would plague his mind, even though he had only known her for about a week.

His thoughts were interrupted by the sweet sound of his mothers voice.

"Hi dear," she said as she sat down at the table and kissed Rini's cheek, "Hello to you, too, Tobius," she said as she patted his hand and kissed his cheek, also.

"Good morning Mother," Rini and Tobius said in unison.

A tired, ruffled looking Darien entered the room just then and, looking at the family-like scene, smiled inwardly.

"Hi everyone," he said and sat down at the table.

Pouring herself a bowl of Kelloggs, Serena sighed quietly as she looked at the clock. "It's already one thirty. The girls should be here any moment…"

Her last words were drowned out by the sound of the doorbell ringing.

"That should be them now," Darien said as he straightened his tie and went to answer the door.

"You should go now before they all see you."

"Yeah, I know…" Tobius said in response to Rini's statement.

Just then a loud cry was heard from the living room.

"TOBIUS!"

"AHHHHH"

"What the…?!" Serena said, jumping up from the table and dashing into the living room.

Rini and Tobius looked at each other and then closely followed.

"What happened?" Serena asked as she looked at the scene before her.

Darien was sprawled on the couch, Leda was on the floor in front of him. Trista, looking quite startled, was helping Mina and Ami up from the floor. Amarah and Michelle were laughing quietly in the corner, while Hotaru was glowing a violent shade of purple in the center of the room.

"What happened?" Rini asked, bewildered.

Lita stood up and smiled crookedly, still shaken up slightly. "When Darien opened the door," she started, " I thought he was Tobius. I dashed through the door and jumped into his arms. He pushed me away though," she said, looking pointedly at Serena, who looked quite mad.

"So. Then what happened?" Serena asked sharply.

"Well," Trista said slowly, "Darien fell on the couch, tossing Leda to the floor as he did so. Then Mina and Ami tried to help her up. But in their haste, they managed to trample over Hotaru. Hotaru then began to glow that Purple color, and as a result, Mina and Ames here became floor glue. And those two giggle heads over there were shoved out of the way by me just in time to laugh their heads off!"

"Hey! If you had seen what we had seen you would be laughing too!" Amarah said between gasps of breathe.

Trista looked mad enough to smack the rest of the air out of Amarah's already deprived lungs, but stood calmly before Leda, Ami and Mina.

"Okay…" said Tobius softly, breaking the short silence that had settled around them, and bringing Leda's attention back to her original mission.

"Tobius!" she screeched, and lunged from her seat on the floor to the spot before him. She hugged him tightly and lifted him off of the floor as she did so.

"I…HUMPH!" he choked out as the air left his lungs and he inhaled deeply to gain back the loss of oxygen from his body.

A puff a smoke apparated in front of the denizen lounge. The orange-haired secretary looked up briefly to see who her new client might be. Seeing that it was just another general denizen, of the likes she saw every day, she ignored his presence and returned to her paperwork.

The green-haired member walked past her desk and stepped onto the old looking banister. Waiting for two seconds to get his bearings, he whistled a high pitch noise that, although caught some people off guard, was not regarded as anything but a little surprising. The tall member began to move swiftly up the banister, passing by many portraits of other Members of The Alliances before him. When the ride came to a stop, he stepped down gently, and began to walk towards the center of the Alliance stations; The Third Alliance. To get to his destination, he had to first pass through First Alliances quarters, and get checked in at the stopping point before he could continue. He wished the Alliance building wasn't apparation proof whenever he had to stop at this check point. The person, or humanoid, who manned this station, was a Furnt'Kuy. A type of skunk like human which had a foul odor, not to mention a bad attitude. But even though he gave only sour humor towards them, he silently thanked them every time the K'Toul Wars came up. Due to the massive intelligence the Furnt'Kuy obtained, they had been able to develop new artillery and machinery with a compatibility with old denizen weaponry. Which meant there would not be a need for new training and the War would be won very easily.

He looked up into the pale tan eyes of the Stop stationer. He heard the faint chirping/chuckling sound which was the native language of the Furnt'Kuy.

"I'm truly sorry, but I have no idea what you just said. I have been gone for a long time and am a little bit rusty on the different languages here in the Negaverse. Could you just telepath me?"

Welcome. This is the first Stop on your way to the next Alliance, the Third Alliance. I would really like for you to go ahead and complete your task, but no one is allowed past this Station for today and maybe the rest of the week. Their has been a burglary from the Sixth, Fifth and Third Alliances. As Station Master for this day, I must write down the names of any one who wishes to get through. So, what is your name sir?

"Tell me. Is this document to go straight to the Queen?"

Yes, sir the Stationer telepathed.

"Then, write this down next to my name. Tell her that I was here and will be back to try again in a weeks time, which should give me enough time to accomplish the rest of my task with the resources available,"

As the Stationer finished writing this, the green-haired man began to walk back to the banister.

Pardon, sir? the smelly stationer telepathed.

"Yes?"

What might your name be, sir?

"Oh, yes… My name…My name is…is…Tobius,"

The rift between space and time rippled outward, contorting into a sphere of black energy that moved from a single epicenter. The first limbs of a dark figure could be seen as another ripple spread through the black portal. Once the figure was through, all the ripples sent out through the sphere were retracted and the blackness fell in on itself to form a small round sphere of blue energy. The figure reached out its hand and gently plucked the circle from its position in time, and absorbed it into its palm.

The darkness that placed a shroud over the area around the shadowy figure caused a chill to run through the figures veins. The mission laid before her was a simple one. In fact, she had been given similar cases many times. But this one was different. She had seen the love begin to sprout, had watched it flourish, but she couldn't understand why it had to end. Her God had told her what to do, and it would be the hardest thing she had ever had to do in her whole life.

She pulled from her robe a glass file. In it was a blue energy cloud. She sighed quietly to herself when she remembered the trouble she had to go through to get the file enchanted with a spell of endurance. Her thoughts drifted back to her purpose and the sudden happiness she had felt drifted far away from any of her immediate thoughts. Back to task, she checked her surroundings to see where she was. Downtown Tokyo, she thought. I will only have to travel a little ways to get to their house.

Carefully placing the file back into her robe, she began to walk towards the Crossroads, wishing she was back in the Underworld.

The fire shown brightly across Rei's face. She felt its heat and was only comforted by its closeness. She reached down inside her, trying to see what it was she could be missing from the pieces laid down before her. She knew their new nemesis' name, but she was having trouble deciphering their purpose.