Dream of Reality
Chapter Two
by Makura Koneko
"…not to what I had previously perceived as reality. But in going to sleep that night, I came into another reality...or is this simply all the dream? I don't know. You've read, now you decide…"
Legolas Greenleaf, Prince of Mirkwood, closed the black leather bound book with silver etchings, a solemn look on his face.
He had just finished reading the long tale of the girl known as Serenity. The tale she had believed to be reality, but in fact had turned out to be nothing more than a dream… Her joys? Self given. Her enemies? Self inflicted. Her power? That was perhaps the only thing that was real. Her power was far greater than even she could imagine, let alone know. Her flaws? Most likely nonexistent. From the day of the announcement of her engagement to the Earthen Prince Endymion, it was all a dream.
True, the spirits of her friends had managed to instill themselves in her dreams, so they were real, if not in a physical sense. Their words were real; she hadn't been controlling their actions. But the rest… Beryl and Metallia were figments of her imagination, borne out of her desperate need to know why her beloved Kingdom was no more. This Sailor Moon? This particular entity never truly existed, save within Serenity's mind, brought up out of her long hidden, deathly strong desire to be a Senshi, to be able to help her friends whenever they went into battle.
The Silver Crystal? A trinket, no more. A child's memory. Something her mother had given to her as a young girl, told her teasingly it was magic, that if she never needed help in the direst of moments, it would bring help. It had been, of course, a sort of summoner, something that would bring her mother to her if ever she were in trouble.
Somehow, Serenity's subconscious took that and turned the small, simple, almost worthless stone into this object of massive power. He wondered how she was reacting to now knowing it didn't really exist…? And if it did, it was on the Moon, most likely broken, and worth no more than a mere river stone, save for its ability to summon her mother? Even that ability was worthless, for Serenity's mother was now one of the eighteen spirits within her… How did she do it? All that power…barely contained by the translucent flesh of this tiny girl...
It was a wonder she had survived the journey from Mordor back to Rivendell, so fragile she was. Legolas had kept his promise to Serenity's mother, the Queen; he had protected her, even when the guards that bordered Rivendell had at first refused to let her enter.
"The evil within her is greater than even we can hide," they had said. Then Frodo had loosed the news that Sauron was defeated. The guards had been distracted by this –or perhaps only pretended- thus Legolas managed to get Serenity into Rivendell without further problems.
She had been given a set of rooms, the bedroom she had hardly left since entering it. She'd hardly said a word… Once when trying to talk to her, Legolas had expressed that should she ever desire to tell anyone about her dreamlife, he would gladly listen, was even a bit curious.
The next morning, today, he had found the book he now held in his hands on the writing table. He turned it over and over in his hands, contemplating its contents. He wondered what it would be like, to have one's body decay, but the soul remain, as that was what happened to the Senshi. To connect the mind of your soul to the dream mind of a friend, instill yourself in that friend's dreams. To walk along in an illusion of your home, knowing it was all fake, that it was all conjured up by the wishful dreaming of one girl.
Legolas sighed. This girl was a mystery. The girl in the book, Usagi Tsukino? He felt like he knew her very well. This girl on the bed beside him? Completely unknown. Her hair was still completely black. Her eyes were blue, now, thank God, but a much, much, much darker shade of blue, almost black. And they seemed…they seemed to hold the cosmos themselves, bursting with unnaturally potent life. It wasn't right. Beautiful, but not right, and somehow frighteningly deadly.
Serenity stirred in her bed, hugging the satin sheets closer to her, her movements frail and trembling. She had regained much of her strength, spending her days walking in circles around her room, building up her muscles until her strength gave out. Then, for the rest of the day, she would sit at her window and keep vigil over the valley, as if it was hers to protect. She often looked at things like that. Even him. It was amusing; her, protect him? Perhaps at another time, in another situation. But the girl was barely able to walk in a straight line for more than a few minutes.
But then again, there was that power within her…the level and magnitude of which had given even Lord Elrond something to mull over. He had bid Legolas keep an eye on that level of power. Also to watch that pinprick of darkness that was so potent it might as well have been Sauron himself…
It was odd, though. Although that bit of darkness was within her, it was separate from her soul. How Legolas knew this, he did not know. It was as if he was suddenly privy to her every emotion, every need. Big brother times ten.
Again, Legolas sighed. Almost nothing about this girl made sense. She was a mystery. And like all mysteries, one can only do so much to unfold them. From there on…it is anyone's guess how things will go.
It was a week later that the signs began to show. First her already pale skin began to look practically transparent, papery and loose, like an old woman's. The fine bones of her hand showed through the skin, as did the pale purple veins. Her breathing became slightly more labored than was normal, and her daily walks around her room ceased to staggering walks to the window once a day to gaze out at all of Imladris.
Then the storms had begun.
It had started with the occasional rainstorm. Nothing new, except that they seemed…agonized. Angry, almost. Angry at something that they could do nothing to vanquish.
Then came the snow- in early summer? Yes, snow began to descend upon the valley, far before it's time. Never before had it so stormed in Imladris, the magics of the elves keeping the worst at bay. Rainstorms, surely, but never such furious blizzards and thunderstorms and sleet and winds…
Legolas was, again, sitting at Serenity's bedside, worrying both about the city, about Serenity, and about the messenger he'd sent to his father a few days ago with a message explaining briefly why he had not yet returned home, despite Sauron having been defeated.
Legolas had made a promise to watch over the girl, yes, but even that did not explain the drive with which he protected her. Did he love her? No, not like that. Elves were soulbonded the moment they laid eyes on their soulmates, and he was not bonded with this girl. Not like that. But bonded in a different way? Most definitely. But of what genre this bond was, he did not know. Brotherly? Not quite. Too strong. It didn't explain how he seemed to instinctively know what she was feeling, thinking, wanting…
It was confusing indeed. More mysteries abounded by the day. It was frustrating, knowing that he had the source of many answers to those mysteries right in front of him, yet even when she was awake, Serenity didn't speak a word. Hardly ever even looked at him.
It was very frustrating indeed, but at the moment, his frustration would have to wait; her breathing was getting worse…
Serenity knew exactly what was happening.
That power building inside her? It was eating away at her very body. Too much… Now she knew what Sauron had kept her for. A battery.
Now she knew why he had allowed her friends to die, but kept her alive. He knew they would flee to her soul to protect her essence from the evil saturating her physical body. Knew they would implant themselves within her. Once that had happened, twenty flows of immense power, including her own, were being channeled directly into her body. When those flows of power didn't find the bodies of her Senshi, they instead flowed into her, since she was the shell that housed the spirits of those that the flows of power were supposed to go to.
Only Sauron's constant feeding off that buildup, of the overflow of too many power flows in her single body had kept her alive. Now, with no one and nothing sipping at the power, keeping it small enough so that her body could contain it, she was being torn apart from the inside out…
And it hurt…
Even in sleep, it hurt, on a level far beyond physical. It was as if her very soul were being shredded. She cried with all her heart, and the earth cried with her.
The storms…she wanted to stop them. It was destroying the city she had come to love. She watched the city every day…the city with a name she did not know. She would watch the people…she had come to know some by face, those that passed her line of vision daily.
The storms…they were angry. Angry that they could not help her.
The storms…they were the embodiments of her friends passions.
Earthquakes… Her beloved. Her husband. Endymion.
Thunder… Jupiter, Makoto.
Snow… Mercury, Ami.
Wind… Uranus, Haruka
Rain… Neptune, Michiru.
The moon had long ago ceased to show up at night; her mother.
Nightmares plagued everyone's sleep; her unborn daughter.
Fires had been breaking out, for no reason. That would be Mars, Rei.
The sun would refuse to shine on the valley. Venus, Minako.
The darkness of the night would become ominous…children would cry in fright of monsters that lurked in shadows. Saturn, Hotaru.
Time for the elderly would run out…babes would be born too soon… Pluto, Setsuna.
Serenity had to stop the storms… She knew how. Could she risk it?
Did she have a choice?
No, she didn't.
In her sleep, a single tear ran down her face.
Under the blankets, a tiny star of multi colored light twinkled into existence inside the cage formed by her fingers, against her palm. Slowly it grew, and solidified into the same spike-star crystal that had been formed in that cavern in Mt. Doom, the crystal that had been formed by the joining of her friends and families star spirit crystals.
The pinprick of darkness that Legolas had been sensing was in that crystal in her hand. He thought it was her he was sensing. No, it was Hotaru he was sensing. If only she could tell him…make him stop worrying… For she, too, could sense his emotions and thoughts just as he could feel hers.
A most unusual union, indeed…
Serenity concentrated.
She had to stop the building of power within her before it tore her and the earth apart from the inside out… She had to redirect those eighteen extra flows of power…
Reaching deep down within herself, her physical body, she grasped, with one hand, a spec of potential life that had been formed inside of her thousands of years ago, on the Moon, on the wedding night of Princess Serenity's and Prince Endymion's wedding. The night before Sauron had destroyed everything. She seized that spec of sleeping life, cupped it gently, coddled it…loved it…
With her other 'hand' she snatched one of those nineteen flows of power, and slowly fed it into that potential life, nudging it with love and life as one would gently blow on a flame to coax it into a blaze…
Just as a small flame, that spec suddenly flared into a thriving, seething, joyously, ecstatic burst of life.
The first flow of power redirected, nightmares all over the earth suddenly ceased, and a smile graced Serenity's face.
Now…
With a fierceness that would have made a demon tremble, Serenity seized the last sixteen power strands, and shoved them into the star crystal in her hand, shoved them back into their proper spirit's hands. She felt her Senshi, their spirits within the crystal, grab onto their own power, take it from her, wrap it around themselves…
The power, overjoyed at feeling the soulful arms of their proper owners once more, surged…grew…mounted…climbed…
Serenity gasped in her sleep.
No!
The power grew, and grew, and grew… The storms outside went wild! They took on lives of their own, lashing, whip, tearing into the very strands of time and life. They were as rabid beasts, grabbing fistfuls of earth and reality and dreams with their fury and wracking it with their rage.
Mothers hugged their children to their bosoms, husbands covered their wives, animals flew for cover…
"Stop it!" Serenity commanded, unaware that she'd screamed the words out loud. She felt her Senshi try to regain control over their own power…but it was useless… Without physical bodies to anchor their power to, it was like trying to grab onto the wind; you could feel it, could trap a bit of air, but the wind would continue to blow and blow and blow…
With one last, wrenching tear in the fabric of reality, the blanket that covered Serenity vaporized, her entire body flared with light, light that filled the entire valley, and the crystal in her hand shattered. Seventeen bursts of light, each a different color, in groups of four, shot away from her body, away from the building, away from the valley…they sped away in more ways than one; they sped through space, reality, dreams, wishes, hopes, love, hate and time.
"I will find you!" Serenity screamed, sobs wracking her body.
Be strong…all seventeen spirits whispered back. One, the golden one, hung back just barely long enough to blow a soft bit of love to graze her cheek…a kiss…
"I will find you…" Serenity sobbed, and rolled on her side, naked, her clothes and the sheets and four poles of the bed evaporated. She didn't notice Legolas on the far side of the room, having been thrown back by the force of the light, staring at her with wide eyes.
As elves, Elrond included, began pouring into the room, Legolas's eyes flitted to the window, looking out side.
The storms had stopped.
Things had taken a considerable amount of time to get back to normal. An Elven lady had shooed all the males out of the room once they had overcome their shock. Legolas had refused to budge, but had conceded to turning his back while the Elven lady and one of her friends redressed the comatose…what was she to be called? She was no girl, no human, not an elf, certainly not a dwarf…angel? Legolas of heard of such creatures from humans. But no, even that didn't seem right. Many people knew of and believed in angels, but this creature…she was something never seen or heard of before.
When Legolas was allowed to turn again, he found that the bed had been remade, Serenity clad in a soft lacy white nightgown. Her pallor was no more the pasty white of near death, but a sweet peaches and cream hue.
"What are you?" Legolas couldn't help but ask softly as he resumed his place at her side, in that chair, examining her face, hair, hands, memorizing her. He had no illusions of a romance with this being, whoever, whatever she was. Her emotions for this 'Mamo-chan' had been beyond questionable. She would know they still lived- but not within her. No, Legolas had spotted those lights, those same lights that had bid him protect their princess, he had seen them fly away from her body.
What was it she had said? 'I will find you?' Yet another mystery to add to the growing list of intrigues attached to this female. Legolas wondered if ever a single one of them would be answered.
Evil awoke.
Evil sniffed the air currents of Existence.
Evil smelled its prey, the reason it had been created, its quarry.
Evil howled on the winds of time, and let loose its servants to learn what they would.
Serenity awoke with a startled gasp- that howl! She curled up, whimpering like a child, crystal tears poised to cascade down from her clear cerulean eyes- not a speck of black to be seen. Pain of more than one kind wracked her body; physical, emotional, spiritual… Oh, the pain that came with the absence of her loved ones… Yet, no…she felt one yet linger. She latched onto that, and calmed herself.
Sweet songs…lovely melodies…
She found herself gazing out the window, with wide, starkissed eyes, to what buildings she could see on the far side of the valley of…what was this place called, she wondered? A beautiful name it must have, for such a pretty, pretty place…
Lovely melodies, sweet songs, pretty voices…
"Tell me, pretty voices, what is this place called?" She asked in the voice of an innocently curious child.
Let us whisper to you, sweet child… The pretty voices answered back.
Ah!
Imladris!
"How pretty…pretty pretty…" she yawned, but she wasn't tired.
Come dance with us…come dance…
Serenity rose to her feet, slipping out from underneath the covers, and went to the door, dancing as she went, laughing sweetly.
Legolas woke with a start, to the sensation of something missing. Immediately his eyes flew to the bed- the empty bed.
In a flash the Elven prince had spirited to the window, and gazed down in shock at a most wondrous sight. Down below, and far to the right, at the edge of the woodland, dancing under the moonlight and stars, glowing with an unmistakably ethereal radiance, was Serenity.
Elven speed aiding him, he flew at once out of the room, flying past colors and people and faces and voices that blurred like a dream as he ran to where he'd seen a dancing fairy. He came to a stop at the edge of the small circular patch of soft grass. She danced and twirled and swayed on bare feet, sheer white nightgown swishing around her ankles, her long black hair swirling around her.
Blurred…everything blurred as in a dream. Peaceful and gentle, comforting and awe inspiring. Everything seemed to glow softly as with an inner light, as if Legolas was suddenly able to see the spirit of every flower, tree, every blade of grass. For indeed it looked like Serenity was dancing on a bed of thousands of tiny emeralds.
Serenity turned and looked at Legolas, and he regarded as she regarded him with a curious sense of inspirational delight.
"Come dance with me, Legolas," she said, her voice that of a million laughing children. It was both laughing, and sobbing. Delighted and frightened, ethereal and foreboding. Beautifully terrifying all at once. It seemed to him he felt her voice rather than heard it. Still she danced and smiled, swaying, holding her hand out to him as she danced her way over.
"Dance with me," she said. "The music is so pretty."
Legolas heard no music, and said so.
"Can't you hear it?" She said softly, casting her face up to the sky and twirling about, her arms open to embrace the universe. "They're singing, Legolas. It's so pretty…"
"I hear no voices nor any music, dear one," Legolas told her, as realization donned- she had the mind of a child. No, not even that. It was as if she had lost her mind, and all was left was the soul.
"I haven't lost my mind," Serenity said in a casual child's voice. "Just part of it!" she laughed.
"Who are you?" Legolas let the words slip out in a hushed whisper as he walked towards her. Serenity danced into his arms, wrapped her arms around his neck, and leaned up on tiptoes to whisper in his ear, and there was a power in her voice then that made the air around them sing with the stars.
"I am everything and nothing, I am laugher and despair, I am dreams and nightmares, I am death and life, I am fire and water, wind and earth. I am peace and chaos, I am time and history." She pulled back, and kissed him on the corner of his mouth before laughing gaily and whirling away once more, leaving Legolas to gaze after her in a mute sort of wonder.
"Come dance with me!" she pleaded again, casting a longing look at him as her body seemed to flow with the moonlight. "Please? Can't you hear them? They're singing…singing, singing, siiiingiiing…" She let her own voice sing, a melody so sweetly pure that Legolas indeed found himself moving towards her, taking her in his arms, and as she sang with the stars, together they danced a dance of child and guardian.
To Be Continued…
Warning: This will be one of those fics that won't make sense till the end. It will be intended to be whimsical, frightening, odd in its logic, one of those stories that really stretches how far your mind and imagination can go, just how much you can grasp.
Everyone please note that this will not be a Legolas/Serena. I am truly 100% sorry to those of you that were hoping for one, but as much as I have come to love that coupling… Lets just say due to certain things, Serena won't be Serena, and the person I'm going to have her become… pairing that Serena with Legolas just makes my skin crawl. You'll see what I mean if you stick with the story. Though another, albeit much more minor, reason for not doing that coupling is my attempt to stay as far away as possible from Mary-Sue-dom. If you don't know what that is, review and tell me and I'll e-mail you with an explanation.
My next story after this will, probably, be Legolas/Serena, so don't worry, L/S lovers! I have joined your ranks, after all, but the overall quality of my story comes before the pairings.
Now, hope you've all enjoyed, I'd be thrilled if you'd review with your opinions (if it's a flame, please at least explain what you don't like.), and hopefully see you at the next chapter! Ja ne!
Hope Makes the Universe Shine,
Makura Koneko