Thank you all for the reviews!!! I'm so happy la la la : ) and thanks to Sana Jisushi for the suggestion, I'm adding Rini into this chapter (and Luna)
Ima=Mercury Atile=Jupiter Aneresa=Moon Eire=Mars Animi=Venus
Luna looked down at Serena. She couldn't quite name it, but something looked different about her. Had Serena's hair always been that curly? She reached far back into her memory, but something seemed to be blocking it. She resolved to get to the bottom of that later. For now, she had to get Serena up for school. The girl had already thrown the alarm clock out the window. Luna sighed to herself, the things that guardians have to do… with that, she leaped down from the windowsill, hitting the sleeping blonde square in the stomach.
"Ahhhh!! That hurt!!" Aneresa smacked the black cat with a pillow. It took another minute for her to come fully awake. Luna glanced at the clock on the wall. By now Serena should have been running madly and screaming about being so late. Instead, she was just sitting quietly staring around the room like she'd never seen it before.
"Where were you last night Luna?" She asked. Luna wondered why there were tears in the girl's eyes. Her motherly instincts took over.
"I was out with Diana and Artemis, you know that," she said gently, "Is something wrong?" She wandered over to Aneresa who, in turn, began to stroke her soft fur absentmindedly.
"Who am I?" Aneresa asked so quietly Luna wasn't sure she'd heard right. Identity questions had come up before, but that was way back when Serena had first become Sailor Moon, and then the Moon Princess. Now she was a sophomore in high school and had changed a lot from the whining, scared girl, who had simply wanted a normal life. There had never been a real break between crisis, so fighting had just become the norm. Luna looked at Aneresa with concern. It always worried her when Serena cried this way. She was about to answer her when a pinked haired girl ran noisily into the room.
"Seerrreeennaa!!!! You're going to be late again. When are you going to…" She stopped short when she saw the tears in Aneresa's eyes. A bell tinkled softly. Diana trotted into the room and looked at the scene. She hopped into Aneresa's lap as Rini closed the door.
"What's wrong, Serena?" Rini frowned as she continued, "And don't tell me you're upset again about Darien studying abroad a semester." Aneresa shook her head and pulled herself together. She hadn't even considered Darien before. She was feeling more at home here than she had the night before. Aneresa had the feeling that the longer she stayed, the more this would be home and real, and the less America would be. The thought scared her. She had loving parents, two sisters, a pet dog…the list went on and on. She had a life, but it was her dream last night that had brought to reality the realization that this was life too.
"I dreamed the Moon Kingdom was destroyed. Then, I was in the final fight with Beryl and everyone died. I won, but she just kept screaming in agony and cursing me and…" Aneresa stopped suddenly and studied Rini. She was young, maybe eleven, definitely not old enough to tell what she had seen and heard in that dream. She shuddered, then tried a weak smile.
"I'm ok now, I need to get ready for school." Rini looked uncertain.
"Are you sure you're all right?" Diana asked with the innocent eyes of a kitten.
"Yeah, I'll be fine. Thanks Diana." Diana jumped onto Rini's shoulder and the two left. Luna looked at the girl who was under her care. She could see that Aneresa was not "all right."
"Would it help to talk about it?" she asked. Aneresa had never been good at staying quiet about anything for long. She poured her heart out to Luna, telling her everything. Luna cringed at the dream, but then Aneresa said she wasn't Serena.
"There are five of us, we all live in Rockford, IL, in America. We were just playing, just having fun like we do every week. Now we're, like, Alice in Wonderland or something, you know? And it's only been one night and I can feel myself beginning to forget the real world." Aneresa got up and went to the closet, "The clothes I was wearing disappeared." She glanced in the mirror, "Oh my gosh! My hair used to be curly and I was over weight." Luna gave a start at the curly hair part, Aneresa was right; her hair was now a perfect match to Serena's. "Is Aneresa going to slowly disappear and be replaced by Serena?" She could feel the tears coming again. She had never hated her life, and now she was talking to a cat. Luna was at a loss for words. She was torn between comforting Aneresa, demanding what happened to Serena, and sending her to a doctor. In the end it didn't matter much, Serena's mom came in and angrily threw Aneresa the school uniform, saying that if she weren't out of the house in two minutes she wouldn't get any desert for a month. Some part of Aneresa was gripped with a sudden irresistible fear at this thought. She was out in two seconds flat, running like her life depended on it with Luna hot on her heels.