Chapter Four: Hi Scouts! Meet the New Sailor!
A few weeks passed and life settled into a routine. School was going all right and Sailor Moon and the Inner Guard easily handled the one other monster attack that occurred. Cassie made few other friends outside of the group of girls. She did manage, however, to make a few enemies, especially among that group of high schoolers known far and wide as the 'in' crowd. They didn't appreciate Cassie refusing to join them, and the girls really didn't appreciate the attention that she received from the guys.
The one senior that Cassie did make friends with was a girl named Zoe Wilton. Zoe was in all of Cassie's senior classes. She was also an outsider in the close knit world of Crossroads High. Much to the surprise of the other students the new girl and the loner became close friends within a couple of days of meeting.
Outside of school, Sailor Athena and Perseus were busy trying to locate the source of the monsters that were beginning to pop up again. If they were indeed Dark Kingdom youma, then something must have survived the battle between Princess Serenity and the Negaforce empowered Queen Beryl. The other Scouts did not seem to realize that there might be a new menace brewing somewhere in the Negaverse.
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"We're not getting anywhere Percy. I think that we are going to have to reveal ourselves to the others. I don't think we're going to find something concrete enough to base anything on." Cassie and Percy were sitting on Cassie's bed going through a huge pile of paper that had overflowed onto every other flat surface in the room, including a good portion of the floor. "The reports coming in from our contacts are practically useless. Even the results from the scans from the satellites are so gabbled that I can hardly make heads or tails of them."
"The satellites are doing pretty well considering they were put in orbit over 25,000 years ago. Even crystal technology wears out eventually." Percy studiously avoided looking at his charge.
"You're evading the issue Perseus." Cassie shook her fist at the gray tomcat. Her bedroom door swung open with a bang. Both occupants of the room jumped a mile. They glared at the intruder.
"What's going on Cass? Planning another assault on the Tower of London?" Christopher Whitmore sauntered into his sister's bedroom. "How's it going Fuzzball?"
"The name is Perseus. Like in the Greek hero?!" Percy growled with mock exasperation. Christopher had known about Percy and his sister's alter ego, Sailor Athena, almost from the beginning, a little over 4 years ago now. Percy had been forced to inform Chris of the situation himself after Cassie gone catatonic due to over-extending her newly awoken powers.
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Four years ago
Perseus and his Sailor Scout had begun almost immediately to gather what information they could about the Negaverse after finding one another. The pair followed rumors to a place in Central Park that was gaining a reputation as a place where people disappeared. It was immediately apparent that it was a Negaverse plot when a six armed youma leapt out of the bushes at the fourteen year old girl. She had transformed and after an intense but short battle had destroyed the creature.
"You know Percy, I could get to like this Sailor Scout stuff!" Cassie smiled down at the cat in her arms as they made there way back to the house.
"You're doing just fine, but don't get cocky kid!" The cat mock glared at the giggling girl.
"Who do you think you are, Fuzzball, Han Solo?" Cassie giggled harder as Percy rolled his eyes. 'It's nice to now know why the image of Alderaan blowing up always effected me so. It's just like what must have happened to Athena.' She slipped into a subway station in order to catch the train back to Manhattan. As she slipped her token into the turnstile, she felt the beginning twinges of a distant pain. She ignored it; sure that it was just a normal side effect to battling evil energy-stealing monsters.
When they got back to the brownstone, Percy and Cassie went up to her room. Percy jumped up into the window to take a well-deserved nap. A sudden thud from behind him startled him right off of the ledge. He surged to his feet when he realized that it was Cassie. He ran to her terrified. She was unconscious and as he watched she stopped breathing. Frantic, he charged from the room to find help.
Christopher was sitting in the living room watching afternoon cartoons. Perseus flung himself into the startled twelve-year-old's arms. "Christopher, you must help your sister!" the cat yelled.
Chris yelped and flung the animal from him. "You can talk! How?"
"There is no time for this, Cassandra's not breathing!" The cat ran back up the stairs to Cassie's bedroom. Christopher followed dazedly. When he saw his sister lying in the floor as still as death, he leapt in to action. The lessons in CPR that he had learned in Boy Scouts ran through his head and he chanted them like a mantra as he knelt by the pale girl. After several minutes of rescue breathing, Cassie finally began to breathe on her own again.
The brush with death required detailed explanations from both Perseus and Cassandra. Christopher had to hear the whole story, or at least as much as the Guardian Cat could dig out of his fractured memories, of the Sailor Scouts. Cassandra was forced to give a complete run down of the events that led to her collapse.
After listening for a good long while as Cassie and Percy debated the reason for her adverse reaction, Christopher broke in. "Look, if Cass gets her powers from a blown up planet, then maybe her powers are broken too." Scout and Cat stared at the young boy. "And I hope you know that whatever else goes on, I am going to be involved. There is no way I am losing my sister to some evil force or to her own powers without a fight." The boy crossed his arms across his chest and met their eyes fiercely.
It was then that Perseus, Guardian Cat to Sailor Athena, had realized that his charge's powers were a two edged sword as dangerous in their own way as the Silver Crystal, and that he had gained another ally in the quest against the Negaverse. He nodded to the boy. "You're right, we will have to think of another way to deal with the Negaverse. One that doesn't pose such a threat to Cassie."
It had taken Chris and Percy both to convince Cassie that she would do no good in the fight against the Negaverse if she died in some minor battle due to her own powers backfiring. She reluctantly agreed. Determination pooled in her eyes as the last of vestiges of childhood disappeared from her face. The fourteen year old girl became a cool, competent adult over the next few months as she, her suddenly mature little brother, and her Guardian Cat planned their part in the fight against the greatest evil to ever threaten the Earth.
The other Scouts would fight the pitched battles with the forces of evil while Sailor Athena fought from the shadows. She became the intelligence service for the reborn members of Princess Serenity's court. She worked tirelessly to establish a network of informants using every trick in the book and some that she had invented on her own. With help from Sailor Pluto, she had gotten the ancient system of relay and watcher satellites scattered through out the solar system going again. There were gaps in the system where satellites had been destroyed over the millennia, but the remains were still much better than anything else available to track the evidence of incursions from the Negaverse. The information that she, Chris, and Perseus painstakingly gathered was dumped into the one remaining working mainframe computer in the Moon Kingdom. From there the information was sent out to Mercury's computer or was accessed by Luna and Artemis through the hidden links in the games at the Crown Arcade. Unfortunately, it was a one way service, which explained why Cassie hadn't know who the other Scouts were in real life until she had met them in civilian and Scout forms.
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Present day
"What ever Fuzzball. Need some help with this mess?" the boy waved his hand at the papers strewn across the otherwise neat room. He cleared a spot on the floor and sat down.
"I was just saying, before some Neanderthal came barging in here," Chris put on his 'who me?' innocent look. Cassie snorted and continued, "I think that we're going to have to reveal what little we know to the other Sailor Scouts. In person, or they're not likely to believe it."
"Do you know the identities of the other Scouts?" Chris perked up at the thought.
"I'm pretty sure of Princess Serenity, the Inner Guard, and Endymion."
"Who are they?" Chris demanded.
"That is not my secret little brother. If they want you to know who they are, they'll have to tell you themselves." Chris looked mutinous. "Look Chris, if they knew my secret identity, would you like them to start telling their relatives?"
"No…" Chris sighed. "I hate it when my sister's logic goes against me."
"You should be used to it. After all, I am Athena, the Goddess of Wisdom!" Cassie struck an absurd pose on the bed.
"Some goddess!" Chris sneered playfully, "More like a demigod, a minor demigod."
"Anyway," Perseus cut in before a full-fledged insult match could begin. "I still don't think that you should reveal yourself. It's bad enough that Sailor Athena is now known to exist. I don't want to risk you."
"I can't risk not telling the other Sailor Scouts about our information. What if the Dark Kingdom really is on the rise again?" Cassie stared down at her mentor with steely eyes. The big gray tomcat, now starting to go white on the muzzle and around his ears, stared back undaunted.
"I can go to Luna or Artemis and tell them what little we know," Percy stated.
"That is a possibility," Cassie admitted. She was going to say something more when something began to beep.
"What's that?" Chris asked.
"It's my communication compact. I set it to monitor other Scouts communicators." She flipped open the silver compact. There was no picture this time, but voices could be clearly heard. Sailor Moon was calling frantically for help. A monster was attacking in downtown. The other Scouts responded, but except for Sailor Jupiter, they were all too far away to get there in time to be of help. Except that is for Sailor Athena.
"I think that this might just have been taken out of our hands." Cassie stood up and pulled out her transformation pen. "Athena Star Power!"
No matter how many times he watched his sister transform, Christopher was always overwhelmed by the raw display of the power Cassie commanded. Her body lifted off the ground, spinning gracefully. Millions of tiny gray musical notes and burgundy Greek letters swirled in a cloud around her. Dancing points of light coalesced into crystalline matrix around her. The gray and burgundy matrix shattered and Sailor Athena stood where Cassandra Whitmore had been. She posed for a brief second and then turned and opened the French doors leading out on to her balcony.
"Athena!" She stopped and looked back at her brother, "Be careful, sis."
"Don't used your mystical attacks!" Percy commanded, his fear for her blazing in his green eyes.
Athena pulled a long slender bladed sword from her dimensional pocket. "I'll try to just use this." The warrior grinned and then ran out of the room. Her brother and her mentor watched her vault from her balcony to the roof and from there away towards battle.
"Put all of these papers away before your parents see them. I'm going to follow her." Perseus headed out after his Sailor Scout.
"If you need me, call me on my communicator!" Chris called after the Guardian Cat.
"I will!"
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Sailors Moon and Jupiter were having a difficult time. There were two monsters this time working together to attack the Scouts. One was almost human looking, except that was a mottled puce green and its arms were curved blades from the elbow down. The other monster was a giant lizard that walked on its hind legs and occasionally spat acid. Sailor Jupiter was jumping in and out of range of the blade monster's reach alternating physically attacking the thing and throwing lightning at it. The lightning attacks did little other than enrage the thing further.
Sailor Moon was having a harder time keeping the lizard creature occupied. She would bounce her tiara off of the lizard's head to gain its attention and then let the thing chase her around the street while dodging the acid it spat at her. She managed to lead the godzilla wanna be away from Jupiter and her monster. Luckily the thing wasn't very bright and the tactic was enough to keep it from attacking the few remaining conscious (and not so very bright for staying around to watch) civilians in the area. The girls were tiring, but without the other Scouts to help there was little else they could do.
Sailor Jupiter finally made a mistake after fighting her monster for a good fifteen minutes. She lost her footing on curb and fell over onto her back. The monster roared in triumph and raised its blade-arm for the final stroke. Jupiter closed her eyes and tensed for the blow. It never came. She opened her eyes to see Sailor Athena between her and the monster. Athena had caught the monster's blade-arms on her sword.
Jupiter scrambled to her feet. "Boy am I glad to see you!"
"Glad to be of service," Sailor Athena replied flippantly. "Let's see what we can do about this thing!"
"You got it girl!" Jupiter grinned fiercely and returned to the battle. Between the two warrior Scouts, they were able to begin to score on the monster. Within a few minutes, Athena managed to break the monster's blade right off of one of its arm. The monster was on the defensive, but Jupiter's lighting still didn't affect it.
"Distract it and when I tell you, hit it with all you've got!" Athena yelled at the tall brunette.
Jupiter gave her a thumbs up. "Hey you, Negatrash! Your mother was a can opener!" The monster roared in fury and charged her. While the monster was occupied, Athena leapt silently into a high flip over it. At the top her arch she spun her sword once and drove it with the full weight of her enhanced Scout strength into the creature's back. She released the sword's hilt and landed on her feet behind the thing. The blade monster spun around, trying to reach the sword in its back. When it caught sight of Athena, it reached for her.
Athena quickly backed away from the lumbering beast. "Jupiter! The sword! Hit the sword with your lightning! It'll act as a channel!"
"Right! I call on the powers of Love and Nature to help me vanquish this monster! Jupiter! Thunder! Dragon!" The massive charge of electricity hit the hilt of the sword sticking out of the beast's back. It screamed in anguish before turning into a pile of dust. "Dusted!" Jupiter caroled. She ran over to remains of the monster and picked up Athena's sword. There wasn't a mark on it. "This is some weapon Athena! Where did you get it?"
The gray-clad Scout smiled as she took the sword out of Jupiter's hand. "It's an old family heirloom." The two girls grinned at one another for a second while they tried to get their breath back. "Hey, where is Sailor Moon?" Athena panted.
A sudden scream split the air. "That answers that question," Jupiter said wryly, "This way Athena!" They ran toward the sound. Sailor Moon had lured her lizard monster into a courtyard surrounded on three sides by high walls and containing a huge concrete modern art sculpture. The lizard had finally trapped the agile runner in a corner.
"Someone help!" Sailor Moon shrieked. The lizard opened its mouth to spit a glob of acid at the super-heroine.
A flash of red streaked across the creature's nose. It yelped and grabbed its wounded snout.
"Tuxedo Mask!" chorused the Scouts.
"It's not very nice to spit at a lady!" The man in the tuxedo was perched on the wall above Sailor Moon. He jumped down by her.
"Took you long enough Muffin." Sailor Moon gazed up at the tall hero.
"Sorry, I was in the middle of a test." Tuxedo Mask scooped up Sailor Moon and jumped out of the corner. They landed near the huge statue.
"Its all right," Sailor Moon murmured. The lovers gazed into each other's eyes, for the moment oblivious to the rest of the world.
"Excuse me folks, but what should we do about the monster?" Jupiter interrupted the mushy moment.
Tuxedo Mask snapped back to reality. "Attack it of course."
"Conventional attacks don't seem to bother these things much." Athena answered as she stepped out from behind the tall brunette Scout.
"Who are you?" Tuxedo demanded.
"I'm Sailor Athena… Move!!!"
Tuxedo Mask and Sailor Moon dodged the charging lizard-creature. It slid to a halt underneath the towering surrealistic statue.
"If you can't go through a problem sometimes you can go around it," Athena stated. She slid her sword back into her sub-space pocket. She powered up for her attack. "Athena Sonic…" This time instead just two javelins, she continued spinning and throwing until six of the silver spears of power were imbedded in the statue. "Shatter!" The javelins exploded in sequence, causing the towering mass of stone to collapse exactly where Athena wanted it: on top of the Negaverse monster.
Tuxedo Mask, Sailor Moon, and Sailor Jupiter gaped at the pile of rubble for a moment and then turned face Athena. "You destroyed the statue!" Sailor Moon finally squeaked.
"Yes I did." Athena collapsed to her knees. Sailor Jupiter moved toward her as the pile of stones erupted like a volcano. The lizard-creature stumbled out, bleeding green blood from a dozen wounds. "Finish it!" Sailor Athena ordered before passing out.
Sailor Moon whipped out the Spiral Moon Rod and dusted the monster. When she turned back to the fallen Scout nestled in Tuxedo Mask's arms; she noticed a gray cat watching from a short distance. The moon on its forehead marked it as a Guardian Cat. It padded over to the little group.
"Please take her some place to recover," he begged in a small voice, his desperate helplessness evident in his green eyes.
"My apartment is nearby. Let's take her there," Jupiter offered.
Tuxedo Mask nodded and leapt off with the unconscious warrior in his arms. Sailor Moon followed her lover, and Jupiter brought up the rear with the cat in her arms.
**********
Surging, bone deep pain finally drove her back to consciousness. She sighed as she recognized the residue of injudicious use of her mystical attacks. When Sailor Athena opened her eyes, the first thing she saw was a pair of green eyes beneath a crescent moon.
"Percy…" she whispered. The cat sitting on her chest leaned forward to rub his chin across her cheek.
"Your going to be the death of me yet, milady. You about gave me a heart attack," Percy said softly.
"I about gave myself one, Fuzzball." Athena wrapped one arm around the cat and used the other to push herself up into a sitting position. She let Percy slip down into her lap as she surveyed the room. She was on a bed with a green sprig-patterned coverlet on it. The bedroom appointments were very delicate and feminine in shades of green, pink, and pale yellow. She didn't recognize any of it.
"Where are we?"
"Sailor Jupiter's apartment."
"And the others?"
The cat jerked his head toward the partially open door. "In the living room. All of them are here."
"All?" Athena raised one eyebrow in question.
"Well, everyone except the Outer Guard."
"Let's not keep them waiting then." As the weary Scout started to get up, Percy jumped out of her lap and onto the floor. After Athena stood up, her knees buckled and she almost fell. By clinging to a nearby dresser, she managed to stay on her feet. Through shear force of will, she made her pain-ridden body stand and walk almost naturally, albeit slowly. Perseus opened his mouth to say something, but the look in her gray eyes- darkened almost to black by pain- stopped him. He simply settled for walking beside her as she crossed the seemingly endless floor towards the door.
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"Why did you bring her here?! We know nothing about her and now she is sure to figure out who you really are!" Sailor Mars was in fine form. You could almost see the fire dancing around the enraged girl's head.
"Hey! This girl saved my life today! And she saved yours the last time!" Jupiter was beginning to get a bit miffed. She stood up from her place on the couch to loom over the smaller girl. Mars didn't look impressed.
"That doesn't matter!" Mars poked a finger at the tall brunette. "Our duty is to protect the Princess! What if this Athena chick is just trying to get close enough to get her, huh?"
"Now Mars…" Sailor Moon started to protest when another voice broke in.
"If I had intended to harm Serenity, Raye, I would have done so already." Five Sailor Scouts and one tuxedo-clad super-hero turned to stare at the girl in the bedroom doorway.
Mars finally broke the dumb-founded silence. "How, how do you know…?" she stuttered.
Athena smiled wanly. "Because it was obvious once I knew that Luna was Serena's cat. Luna would never stray far from the Princess and since the four of you girls are so close to her, I knew you must be the Inner Guard." Athena took a step forward, swaying slightly. "From there it was only logical to conclude that Serena's cute older boyfriend is also the dashing Tuxedo Mask."
Tuxedo Mask rose silently to his feet eyes narrowing behind his domino. "You seem to think you know who we are. Now who are you?" he demanded.
The gray cat at Athena's feet arched his back and bristled his tail. "I don't like your tone young man!" he hissed, clearly prepared to attack the much, much bigger man.
"Perseus!" the whip-crack of authority in Athena's voice was unmistakable. The guardian Cat immediately snapped to a four-legged version of military attention. "It is a valid question," she went on much more gently. She smiled again, softly, sadly. She stared directly into Tuxedo Mask's hidden eyes. "During the Silver Millennium, I was the crown princess of the planet Athena, and first cousin to the crown prince of Earth, Endymion." She gave a small nod to the tall boy. His breath caught as glamour hiding her true identity began to fade. "I'm surprised that you haven't recognized me in this life, Dare." Athena lowered her head and let her Scout form slip away in a flash of silver light. Cassandra Whitmore raised her head to meet the shocked boy's eyes again. "Surprise Darien," she whispered.
Again a dumb founded silence filed the small apartment. Sailor Moon finally walked over to Cassie. "This is so cool! I bet you're going to be a great Scout!" The meatball-headed Scout had a huge grin on her face as she looked up at the taller girl.
"Thank you, Your Highness." Cassie returned the smile. Then she swayed on her feet and almost collapsed again, but Sailor Moon was able to steady her. The leader of the Scouts smile faded away as she realized how haggard Cassie looked.
"You shouldn't be up!" Sailor Moon jerked her head at Sailor Venus, who got up from her armchair. The two of them the led Cassandra do the chair and made her sit down in it. Perseus followed along at their heels, his eyes never leaving his charge. Mercury pulled out her computer and moved to stand over the weary girl. She began typing furiously.
"What is wrong with you?" asked Tuxedo Mask as he came to kneel beside the girl whom he considered his little sister.
"It's nothing. It will pass eventually." Cassie patted the hand he had placed on her knee.
"I've never seen readings like these. It's like your power aura is full of cracks." Mercury said absentmindedly as she studied the read out on her computer. She activated her visor to take more readings.
"That make sense, considering the shape that my planet is in."
"The shape your planet is in? Where is your planet, anyway? I've never heard of Athena," Jupiter asked.
"That is part of a long story. Why don't you all power down and I'll tell you what I know." The girls looked at each other and then giggled. They powered down into their civilian forms. Tuxedo Mask followed suit after a moment.
"I'll get something for us to snack on," Lita called as she went into her kitchen.
"Food! Great I'm starving!" Serena exclaimed.
"Like that's news!" Raye drawled.
"Oh Raye! You're so mean!" The wailing began. Cassie and Darien exchanged long-suffering glances.
Perseus jumped up into Cassie's lap. "I'm going to head back to the house and tell Chris you're all right. He must be out of his head with worry by now." Cassie nodded. Percy ran over to an open window and jumped out.
Mina had caught the end of the quiet exchange. "Chris knows about you?" She was astonished and hurt.
"He knows who I am, but he doesn't know who the rest of you are." She smiled at the blonde. "Don't worry, he hasn't been hitting on you because you're Sailor Venus. He really does like you." Mina preened. "I knew that! After all I am the goddess of love!"
"Some goddess! What have you been doing? Luna and I have been searching for you everywhere!" Artemis declared as he and Luna leapt in the open window. "We have been so…" he trailed off as he caught sight of Cassie. "Meow, meow." He tried desperately to look like a normal cat, which hadn't been talking just thirty seconds earlier. The humans all started laughing while Luna just looked disgusted and hit him on the back of the head.
"Hello Luna, Artemis. I'm Cassandra, also known as Sailor Athena." Cassie said between giggles.
"Sailor Athena?" Luna asked.
"It's a long story. It started about four years ago…" Cassie told the assembled members of the Sailor Scout Team about meeting Perseus and about some of their adventures since then.
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"So you, Percy, and Chris have been feeding us information ever since?" Amy asked. She was still typing and didn't look like she was going to stop anytime soon.
Cassie nodded. "That and picking off the odd monster."
"How could you fight monsters with your powers like they are?" Mina asked.
"Well, for the most part the monsters that are outside of Tokyo are generally much more like humans. That means that their powers are weaker and that they can be dealt with using something other than a mystical attack. Between Chris and I, we've able to take care of them with minimal help from our other associates."
"Associates?" Darien cocked an eyebrow at her.
"Associates. Safely anonymous associates." Cassie said flatly. Her eyes invited no further questions.
"I've often wondered why the Negaverse or whatever only attacks here. Except for that time in London, of course." Amy said into the brittle silence.
"That is because the Negaverse and this universe only touch at certain points, at least in a physical sense. Most of those points have ancient, locks I guess for lack of a better word, that keep the two separated. The reason that I went to London soon after you defeat Queen Ruby Mina was to activate the lock in England, Stone Hendge. There are others scattered about that perform the same duties: The Great Pyramids, both those in Egypt and those in Central America, the monoliths on Easter Island, and various others. But the place where the separation of our universe and the Negaverse is the thinnest is here in Japan. No doubt, that is why Queen Serenity sent us here after the fall of the Moon Kingdom."
"What about D-point?" asked Luna softly. The Scouts looked acutely uncomfortable about the mention of the place where they all died stopping Beryl.
"D-point is over the point where Beryl's kingdom once existed. It is well warded now," Cassie said softly, her eyes focused on something that only she could see. "I never did like that woman. I wish that I had done worse to her than just give her the cold shoulder."
"What?" Serena gasped. Everyone's attention snapped back down on Cassie. She blinked.
"What is it?" Cassie asked, astounded by the reaction.
"You knew Beryl?" Raye snarled.
The confusion in Cassie's eyes only grew. "Of course! We all did during the Silver Millennium. Don't you remember?"
"No," Amy said softly, finally putting down her computer. "We don't remember much, except for the very end, the last battle when we all… died." Cassie looked around at their sorrow filled faces.
"I didn't realize. I don't remember much myself, but between Perseus and I, we have managed to put some things together." She paused looking at each of them in turn. "I'll have to get my notes, but I promise that I will tell you everything I remember."
Perseus bounded into the apartment through the window. He studied the tableau for a moment before interrupting. "Have you finished telling your tale, my lady?"
Cassie waved him over into her lap. He curled up comfortably, facing the crowd of young people. Cassie began stroking him. "Yes, I finished. But now we need to discuss the current problem."
"Current problem?" Darien snapped out of his private reverie.
"Amy?" Cassie turned suddenly cool, professional eyes on the blue haired girl.
"Yes?"
"Do you still have the readings on that armor-plated thing we fought the first time we met?"
"Of course! Why?"
"Would you pull them up please?" Cassie commanded politely. Amy quickly complied. Everyone else just watched, taken aback by the sudden change in Cassandra's manner.
"Now would you please compare them to the basic readings of each kind of monster that you have faced." Amy complied, with a slow stirring of fear worming its way through her. She gasped when she got the results.
"What is it Amy?!" Serena demanded.
"It's, it's just not possible." Amy muttered as she typed furiously on her palm-top.
"Amy?!!" Raye pleaded.
"It was a Dark Kingdom youma." Amy finally said in a stunned tone.
"A youma," Serena breathed.
"It can't be!" Luna protested. "Serena destroyed Beryl and the Negaforce!"
"She did," Cassie agreed. "But that was just one being, or two if you can really count a concentration of Negative energy a being. The Dark Kingdom is huge, and the Negaverse is every bit as big as our universe. It would have been almost impossible for even the Silver Crystal to destroy all of that, even if Serena really was capable of allowing that much gratuitous destruction. It would have been easy for some of Beryl's minions, especially those with the intelligence to see which way the wind was blowing, so to speak, to leave before the confrontation between Beryl and Princess Serenity."
Serena cowered back against Darien. "I can't believe it. Are you, are you sure that Beryl at least is gone?" Darien wrapped his arms around his soulmate.
"Beryl is definitely dead and gone. The crystal satellites recorded the entire battle and confirmed the destruction of the Beryl/Negaforce composite." Cassie sighed, looking suddenly much older than her eighteen years as lines of strain were emphasized by the growing shadows. "My contacts are working to confirm anything about this newest threat, but they are picking up very little. Either they have just started operations, or who ever is in charge is a lot more cautious than Beryl ever was."
"That is the scariest part," said Percy speaking up for the first time. "A cautious leader would be much more dangerous than Queen Beryl was capable of being. Her own obsessive, paranoid, destructive tendencies were her greatest weaknesses, and our strongest allies."
"How are we going to handle this?" Serena raised her head from where it was buried in Darien's shoulder. "Are we even capable of handling this?"
"Hey, none of that Meatball Head!" Raye shook her Princess's shoulder.
"Yeah! We can handle anything anyone throws at us!" Mina exclaimed.
"Yes, you girls handled Beryl and her generals, Alan and Ann, the whole NegaMoon Family, and Mistress 9 and Pharaoh 99. You've defeated youma, cardians, droids, and daemons. You'll defeat anyone who threatens this planet!" Luna said with Artemis nodding emphatically along.
"Besides," Lita grinned. "We kicked the Dark Kingdom's butt with just the five of us and Tuxie here. It should be a piece of cake to do it again with all ten Sailor Scouts!"
"Don't worry, Highness," Cassie shooed Perseus out of her lap and stood up. "You now have access to my entire information network. And knowledge is the most potent weapon anyone can have."
"So you say," Raye stared at the almost stranger with suspicious eyes. Cassie met them with the calm coolness that she had developed over four years of fighting a secret, dangerous war with only a cat and a young boy for help.
Serena stood due to some inner prompting and faced the gray-eyed girl. Cassandra met her eyes, unflinching. "Princess Serenity, I offer you my fealty. I offer the strength of my arms, the knowledge of my mind, and the blood of my heart." Perseus stood regally at his charge's side. As Cassandra sank into a deep curtsy, he lowered his forequarters in a bow. The sudden archaic formality threw everyone off guard, except for Serena. She stood for a moment looking down at the bent heads before her.
"There is no need for such formality, Cassandra," Serena was speaking in the crisp, proper tones that always heralded the presence of the Princess part of her personality. "Your loyalty and abilities are not in question." She paused and swept her eyes around the gathering of her dearest friends of two lifetimes. She reached out and put a small hand under Cassie's chin and lifted her back to her feet. "Welcome to the Sailor Scouts, Cassandra, Sailor Athena." Tears sparked in Cassie's eyes as Serena hugged her. "Thank you, Highness," Cassie whispered through her tear closed throat.
"Group Hug!" crowed Mina and snatched up Artemis. She then proceeded to crush him between her body and Cassie's back. All the other Scouts gathered around in a joyous embrace. Darien looked on with a huge, foolish grin on his face. Perseus smiled serenely at the spectacle. Luna walked over to him and rubbed her cheek along his before sitting down by the aging cat. "Welcome home Perseus." Percy wrapped his tail around the smaller cat. "It's good to finally be here… daughter."
Somewhere inside the giggling mass of girl, Artemis was gasping, "Air, Air!"
Next Time on Sailor Moon: Serenity's Court:
Cassie discovers something wonderful and frightening in: Cassie's Date.
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