Act Thirteen - Negativity

The hours continued on, yet Neo-Queen Serenity seemed to grow weaker by the minute, despite the fact that Ami and Hotaru were prescribing the most powerful and potent medicines to combat her mysterious illness. The queen was resting peacefully as King Endymion sat by the bedside. He had not left the room all night long.

"Your Majesty, perhaps you should try to get some sleep," Ami suggested. "You look exhausted. Ifthere's any change, I promise you'll be the first to know."

"I don't want to leave Usako's side until I know she's going to be alright."

He reached for his wife's hand and brought it to his lips. She was so incredibly beautiful, even in her sleep. How would he survive if anything happened to her? Serenity was the air he breathed. Without her by his side, he would surely die.

"Why aren't the medications working, Ami-chan?" he asked. "I don't understand what's going on around here. The drugs should cure Serenity's illness if all she has is a major case of the flu, right?

Before Ami could answer him, Hotaru entered the room to change the queen's IV. Though there technically was no disease to fight, she was hoping against hope that treating her with mortal medicine would at least keep her alive until they found a cure. So far, the plan didn't seem to be working.

"How are her vital signs, Ami-san?" Hotaru inquired as she changed the IV bag.

"The good news is that we have stabilized her condition for the time being. She's weak, but the queen's a fighter."

"That's a good sign, right?" the king asked. "If she's in stable condition, then the medicines must be starting to work."

The doctor ignored the question, not wanting to give him any false hope. There was a slight chance that the drugs may be working, but she highly doubted the possibility. Most likely, the balance between the queen's positive and negative energy was about equal, causing it to appear as if she was getting better.

"I'm going to go back down to the lab and run a couple more tests," she said, taking another blood sample. "Ami-sab, if there are any sudden changes, I want you to increase the dosage of Positiv and contact me immediately."

She left the room, leaving King Endymion more confused than ever. Hotaru and Ami were not telling him the complete truth. He had never heard of using Positiv to treat influenza, as they claimed they were trying to do. First of all, from the pre-med classes he took in college, he knew that his wife was most definitely not suffering from the flu, unless it was a new form of the disease. He also knew that the drug Positiv, which he had helped Hotaru and Ami to develop, was usually used to heal the Sailor Soldiers and innocents after they had been attacked by negative energy, not to treat mortal diseases. This whole thing was not making sense. Why were they lying to him?

"I know there's something you two are not telling me, Ami-chan," he said. "Why won't anyone tell me what is really going on?"

Ami's eyes stared down at the floor, fearing that if she looked at him, she would break down and tell the king everything. She hated lying to him, but she and Hotaru agreed not to say anything until they knew more about Neo-Queen Serenity's illness.

"Maybe you should talk to Hotaru-chan," she suggested, fluffing one of the queen's pillows. "She could probably explain it better than I can."

Taking Ami's advice, King Endymion left the room and went down to the basement, where Hotaru's labs were located. He found the doctor at one of the workstations, performing another energy screening.

"It's just what I expected," she said aloud, unaware that she was not alone in the laboratory.

Her latest results correlated with her theory about Neo-Queen Serenity's current conditions. The test showed that the energy ratio was 53 positive to 47 negative. As long as the percentage of the positive energy was greater than the negative, the queen would only experience the mild symptoms like the fever and racing heartbeat she had earlier. But once the ratio was reversed, there was no telling what would happen. They only had a small window of opportunity to stop the negative energy from spreading before she took a turn for the worse. But how?

"Hotaru-chan, I want to know the truth," the king ordered as she bent down to record her recent findings. "Usako is my wife and I have the right to know why she is sick. She doesn't have the flu, does she?"

Realizing that it was useless to continue on with the charade, Hotaru slowly shook her head. "No, she does not, Your Majesty. There are no signs of disease anywhere in her body."

"I'm afraid I don't understand what you are saying, Hotaru-chan. I saw her practically faint in my arms, I've held her sweaty hands…"

She held the test-tube containing the energy test up to the light so that he could better see what she was talking about. "I've just performed a simple energy screening on a sample of the queen's blood. As you can see, the blood has separated into two distinct groups. At the bottom of the tube, the liquid is clear, which indicates positive energy. The black liquid above it shows negative energy."

"Negative energy?" he asked. "But how could this had happened? Usako was never attacked at the ball, nor anytime afterwards."

"All humans have some negative energy in their blood. In small doses, the energy is usually harmless, and in some cases, can even protect people from certain diseases, but when the energy starts to spread, there can be devastating consequences. It was an abundance of negative energy that killed that poor Maenad earlier this evening."

"Yes, Luna informed us about the cause of Aurora-san's death, but that doesn't answer my question. What caused Usako's negative energy to spread?"

Hotaru placed the tube back in the rack and began scrubbing her hands with soap. "The truth is, we don't exactly know what the cause is. Ami-san has a theory that since the Silver Crystal is controlled by Neo-Queen Serenity's heart, Queen Jade may be feeding the crystal negative energy, therefore…"

"…releasing the energy into Serenity's heart," he whispered, completing her thought. "If that is true, her only hope is for the Sailor Neo-Soldiers to defeat Jade and cleanse the crystal of the negative energy."

He buried his face in his hands and began to cry softly. Serenity was dying and there was nothing he could do but hope that their daughter brought the Silver Crystal back to Crystal Tokyo before it was too late.

Not sure how to comfort him, Hotaru simply kissed him lightly on the top of his head. "Don't worry, Endymion-sama. Chibi-Usa-chan is much stronger than you think. She'll get through this, I know she will. Peace and happiness once again come to Crystal Tokyo."