Kodoku no Fortress
Hour V
By Spirit-hime
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Author's note: Thank you everyone for all the warm comments you have given me! Often the only thing it takes is a single compliment from a reader to make me think, "hey, someone actually likes this. Maybe I should work on it today." When I'm in need of a little encouragement to get me to write, I usually go back and read those great reviews you've all left. Thank you so much. I've also been getting a few comments about how the time flow is a little hard to follow. Truthfully, a lot of that is intentional. This is, after all, a story about Sailor Pluto, the senshi of time. It's supposed to have a screwed up continuum. I hope this hasn't made it too confusing, though. I am trying my best!
Thanks, and enjoy!
************
That smell. That sweet, warm, home-spun smell. That delicious, comfortable, childhood smell. It filled your nostrils first and your mouth second. It was thick and tangible enough that you felt as though you could eat it right out of the air, yet always your tastebuds were just a little disappointed for lack of physical sustenance. It permeated your clothes, ruffled your hair. It was a youthful kind of smell. The kind one associated with leaning across a flour-sprinkled table to watch wrinkled fists punching a swollen blob of dough. It was the kind that conjured up images of buttery yellow cookies tediously cut into delicate shapes of stars, hearts, and rocking horses, before they were sugared in colors of pink, green, and cornflower blue. It was like every kitchen ever baked in, every skilled grandmother who ever warmed the hearts of her family from a dining room table. If ever there was a time machine that could carry you back to those days, it was this smell.
Which was why, as Setsuna stood studying a bouquet of tiny white flowers that seemed to be crafted entirely of sugar, she felt a little nostalgic. She recalled a tiny Hotaru--barely a few weeks past being a toddler and already reading philosophy--propped up on tiptoes, the front of her sundress pressed perilously against the back of the chair she stood upon, dutifully pouring the contents of a Neslie Toll House bag into a mixing bowl. Michiru--ever health conscious--had warned them not to eat the uncooked dough unless they desired to have their fingers soundly thwapped by a wooden spoon. She was clearly fighting a loosing battle, however, as all three delinquents (Haruka included) had scandelously swiped fingerfuls of sugary globs at every turn. They'd barely turned out enough to make a decent batch that day, but it was worth it. Because Hotaru had spilled three eggs onto the floor. Because Haruka had smeared dough onto Michiru's nose, only to lick it off again. Because the front of Setsuna's favorite dress had been powdered in a light snow of flour. Because no one really likes chocolate chip cookies so much as they enjoy making them. And because of that smell.
That smell had appeared another time in her life, too. A time when all she knew was cold, empty desolation. When the slightest ounce of warmth was as welcome as the dawn. The rain had beat against the windows, creating a vast, hollow echo throughout the empty palace. The oven was set, its little red light glowing cheerfully. He'd grabbed her around the waist from behind, startling her and causing the eggs in her hand to drop onto the tiled floor. He wouldn't let her go while she mixed the ingredients together, snatching chocolate chips from the bowl whenever she turned to reach for something. That was when she turned on him and planted a palmful of dough in his face. That act had caused their cooking session to degenerate into an all-out war. Setsuna couldn't remember whether they ever got to the cooking part. All she could remember was how he'd held her down and eaten the sweet mixture of flour, sugar, eggs, and chocolate chips off of her neck. Charon never really was one for conventional things.
The tiny flowers shattered in her hands. Slivers of sweet icing drifted to the floor, where they were immediately forgotten. Charon. Charon and Oroszlan. Charon and Menaki Neko. She could not remember one without the other. They converged in her mind. They were two sides of a golden coin. They were one in the same. They were opposing forces; one a warm, caring soul, the other a cruel, murderous creature. They were seperate entities, but somehow in her mind the line between them was becoming blurred. Where she saw Charon, there was Leijona, lurking behind the shadows. When she saw Oroszlan, there was Charon, his face wraught with despair. The great cat somehow filled all her memories of him, and yet... and yet...
And yet she had forgotten it. Somehow, in the span of countless centuries, in a time when she still knew the color of his eyes, she had forgotten the other side of the coin. She remembered her source of happiness in the days of her youth. But she had forgotten the part about what brought that happiness to an abrupt and bitter end. The line between fulfillment and desolation was balanced on the tip of a lion's claw.
She shook her head in a futile attempt to clear it. Stop dwelling, darn it. You aren't helping any.
To distract herself, she glanced around. Where am I this time, she thought dully. Time traveling. She'd been time traveling again. It seemed as though every time she did this, her mind shook off the memories of whatever world she left behind, as though her attempts to forget the past had finally succeeded in a very literal sense. Scattered images still lingered in her mind. Some of them involved rather frightening versions of Chiba Mamoru. Some contained a small dark object that she could barely picture. And in one...
No. That just couldn't be. Feijona? The lion? Alive? It was beyond comprehension. How could a creature that had died thousands of years ago just pop back up again like nothing had happened? Oh sure, some things could be reborn, supposing their starseeds could be salvaged, but Setsuna had stared right through that great blue glob, and all she'd seen was the sky behind it. It had been as empty and starless as Chaos itself. No part of that monster's true form was solid enough to be salvagable. There was nothing to resurrect. Unless...
Unless it was never dead to begin with.
She shuddered. The shards of broken sugary flowers crunched beneath her feet. Oh yeah, she was dwelling again. Pay attention, Setsuna. Where are you?
The answer to that question was not quite as simple as she'd hoped.
The flowers she had so carelessly crushed were not the only edible thing in this room. In fact, she was pretty darn sure that nearly everything she set her eyes upon were all set to give her caveties. The furniture, which she had initially mistaken for wood, rather reminded her of gingerbread. The floor was delicately tiled with large wheel-like peppermints, their shiny surfaces swirled in red and wintergreen. Brick walls looked to be constructed of sugar cubes and frosting. Doorframes and windowsills were of vibrantly ribboned candycanes. Fudge-furnished chairs and couches were stacked high with colorful licorice cushions. Icing chandeliers dripped from the ceiling, their lights casting a dappled glow upon the room.
In short, the whole darn place gave her a Hansel and Gretel vibe, and she rather preferred not to find out where the witch was hiding.
(It should be noted that Setsuna was a woman who had been around for thousands of years, and had seen a great many unusual things in her time. The fact that she didn't so much as bat an eyelash at the notion of being trapped inside a world constructed by the psycho brothers Grimm, who seemed to take a great delight in scaring the Moon Dust out of small children, said a great deal about her personality--namely, that she should have settled down in a retirement home a long time ago.)
A muffled sound she hadn't noticed during her prolonged thought process began to filter through her senses. It was the kind of sound one would expect in this sort of place. The kind that either added or subtracted from the eerie atmosphere, that made the sugar-coated world become childish or creepy, depending on how you looked at it. It was the unmistakeable sound of children's laughter.
By the sounds of it, there was more than one. Quite a few more than one, actually. The gleeful shrieks, punctuated by the occasional playful scream, were high-pitched enough to indicate that this was a herd of very small children. Just then there was a loud thunk on the far wall--hard enough that a few nic-nacs were knocked from the shelf--which was immediately followed by a sobbing wail. Setsuna inwardly rolled her eyes, remembering distinctly a time when young Hotaru had managed to destroy the majority of Michiru's favorite china. That same sort of sound had alerted her of the disaster: a crash, followed by crying. Ah, the joy of kids.
Rolling up her sleeves, Setsuna made her way towards the door. Of course, somewhere between the sleeves and the door, she made a discovery that was only slightly more shocking than the world itself (though not really: see the parenthetical aside above). Her outfit had somehow warped itself into something that made her look like she'd walked right out of an American western--the kind that specialized in damsels in distress and sweet country women who pined after the lonely cowboy. It consisted of a frilly baby blue loose-fitting blouse, a long floral-patterned skirt, a rather large white ruffled apron that very nearly acted as a skirt in itself, and a white knit shawl. Great, Setsuna thought bleakly. I'm Mother Goose.
With a flip of her green hair--which had been neatly twisted into a French braid that trailed nearly to the small of her back--Setsuna steeled herself for the horrors that lay beyond the milk chocolate door, and turned the gumdrop handle.
It was chaos. It would have made the most steel-hearted babysitter cry. It was a daycare worker's nightmare. And the most frightening part was, she recognised most of them.
The one who had hit her head was a chibi version of Usagi. She sat on the floor sobbing, her hands holding her head between the two odango. Chibi Michiru and chibi Hotaru were next to her, busily painting pictures of fishies and butterflies on the wall with colorful sticky frosting. Chibi Makoto was breaking the legs off of gingerbread chairs and knawing away at them, one by one. Chibi Haruka had found a jar of jawbreakers and was throwing them at everyone from on top of a high shelf. Chibi Mamoru, meanwhile, was deftly stuffing handfuls of chocolate chips down his pants. Chibi Minako was chasing chibi Ami around the room with handfuls of gummy worms. Chibi Rei was folding edible rice paper into little cranes, before biting their heads off.
The sight was beyond surreal. It was frickin' bizarre. Having dreams about these kinds of things often caused people to have themselves commited, or at least stop eating triple hot fudge sundaes before bed.
It wasn't just the sight, though. It was the noise. The high-pitched giggles, the ear-shattering squeals, the sobs and shouts and clatters and bangs and constant escalating drum of the vein pulsating in her temple. It was enough to make you cry, enough to make you scream.
She did.
At first, there was only stunned silence. Chibi Minako stopped in midstep, her outstretched fist still clenched around some very squished-looking gummy worms. Chibi Haruka allowed several jawbreakers to slip from her hand, where they clattered to the floor. Chibi Hotaru stood dripping purple and orange frosting. Chibi Makoto was trying very hard to hide behind a half-eaten stool.
It was then that the crying started.
One would expect the first sob to come from chibi Usagi. But it was chibi Rei--who, in her surprise, had crushed one of her origami creations. It was all downhill from there. Before Setsuna knew it, they were all wailing at the tops of their little lungs, streams of tears rolling down their faces.
It was at this point that Setsuna decided she no longer had a soft spot for children.
If it had been, say, Michiru in this situation, and not Setsuna, the children would have been quieted and tended to in less time than you can say "who wants to hear a story?" But chibi Michiru was currently wailing her teal little head off, and was in no capacity to be helping poor Setsuna at this point. But even though Setsuna was not Michiru, and could therefore not quiet a bawling 3-year-old whilst applying mascara and balancing three teacups on her head, there was one undeniable aspect of Setsuna's personality. The woman loved children. Absolutely loved them. It was no wonder her first friend in centuries happened to be a certain young pink-haired princess. And even now, as she was surrounded by what's referred to by many bachelors as a Worst Case Scenario, she couldn't help but love the little monsters.
Which was why she made such an effort to cheer the little buggers up.
At first, she tried to console them just by talking. This proved to be an impossible feat, as their voices could easily be likened to twenty nitrogen-laden steam engines smashing into one another simultaneously, and drowned out anything short of another blood-curdling scream (which really wouldn't help matters any). She briefly considered a method often used with baby Hotaru, which was to pick her up and hold her, but unless she grew a few dozen more arms, such a thing could prove difficult. She then recalled one of Haruka's favorite remedies. No, not proping infant Hotaru on the seat of a motorcycle and speeding around town for twenty minutes. Haruka's other (and less dangerous) method was to somehow make Hotaru laugh. This could involve anything from weird faces to odd dances. It was a nearly foolproof plan, and by the time she was finished Hotaru would be giggling away, completely oblivious to whatever had upset her in the first place.
Unfortunately, there was one problem with this idea. In all her cold, desolate years spent in solitude behind the Gates of Time, not once had Setsuna ever been so inclined to make anyone laugh. She now found herself completely at a loss as to how exactly one goes about doing such a thing. She tried to look back upon things she'd caught on television, anything that could be considered amusing, but most of what her mind came up with consisted of racy jokes and men in skirts. Wonderful idea, Setsuna. Cheer them up with drag queens.
Well, think Setsuna. What do kids like? She had a disturbing mental picture of herself shouting, "hey kids, pull my finger!" It wasn't at all pleasant, and she immediately wished her brain came equipped with a "delete" key.
Nevertheless, the munchkins weren't going to stop crying anytime soon, and Setsuna was always one to rise to the occasion.
Okay. She couldn't dance. And making faces was out of the question. But she could sing. And oh, how amusing her singing was.
The lyrics began, nervous and stretched as they were. There were a few extra lilts to the tune that slipped into her shaky voice. However, as she progressed the notes became stronger, louder. One by one, the children stopped howling to stare at the woman from whose throat the odd tune was being emitted. It was the strangest thing they'd ever heard. It was the first thing that had popped into Setsuna's head.
It was Achy Breaky Heart¹.
There's something about country music and its odd American twang that sounds so foreign to a Japanese ear that it becomes something altogether alien and incomprehensible. And when such a bizarre form of cacophony is being sung by a tall green-haired woman whose voice is unaccustomed to any sort of singing outside of "Happy Birthday To You" it becomes something akin to tapdancing chickens.
One by one, the children stopped crying. Now she was surrounded by a sea of blank stares. They weren't laughing, but it was most definitely an improvement.
"Don't tell my heart, my achy breaky heart, I just don't think he'd understand..." With the full attention of the kids around her, the soldier of time and space ploughed onward bravely, willingly and with sound mind making a fool of herself in front of a roomful of munchkins whose favorite music included such things as "Itsy Bitsy Spider." As she sang the chorus for what felt like the fourth time, she became more confident, and began to stride forward bravely, her Mother Hubbard boots clamping in time with the beat.
Of course, she forgot about the jawbreakers that had been scattered all over the floor.
"It might blow up and kill this maOOOOP!" With one misplaced step, Setsuna's feet flew well above her head, the world did a summersault, and next thing she knew, she was sprawled on the floor, acres of skirt flung over her head.
They hadn't laughed before, but they certainly did now.
Setsuna flung back the layers of ruffles and flower print from her face. The room, once flooded with tears, was now filled with childish giggles. Under the circumstances, it was music to her ears. She thought with a twinge of embarrassment about how that laughter had come to be, and made a mental note to never EVER tell anyone about this incident.
After the initial amusement wore off, the children began to swarm forward like an army of Munchkins with battle cries of, "Setsuna-neesan², read me a story!" "Setsuna-neesan, come see what I drawed for you!" "Setsuna-neesan, can we play house?"
Many people would have found that situation even more frightening than the crying one. At least when they're crying, kids are too preoccupied with that very pasttime to bother paying any attention to you. Thusly, they don't seek you out. The moment they begin to regard you as a respected figure, a source of entertainment and comfort, you can pretty much kiss your freedom goodbye. Many people would have been thinking this just then. But Setsuna was not many people.
So it was that hands were held, stories were read, noses were wiped, and Setsuna found herself almost enjoying her time with the little scoundrels. It was the kind of work one could lose oneself in, especially because of the sheer volume of children that seemed to reside in the sugary gingerbread house. Wave upon wave of them came; every time one set would be put down for a nap, another would appear needing to be fed. Once this group was fed, another would demand a game. By the time these ones had finished playing, the first set would have woken up again. On and on it went, an endless, mindless cycle. And yet.
And yet, Setsuna thought, as she carried a pair of pink-haired twins up the chocolate stairs, I can't remember the last time I've felt this way. This sense of gratification, of being needed by someone else. Sailor Pluto is revered. Sailor Pluto is respected by all. But never is Meiou Setsuna needed in that personal, human way that so many people desire to be needed.
Hotaru had given her a taste of this, a brief moment of near-motherhood. It was but a flicker in a long, dark night--a flicker that had long been extinguished. Hotaru had outgrown her childish ways. And Setsuna had outgrown her usefulness as anything other than a trusted friend. Such is life for the guardian of time.
She hardly dwelled on this fact, however, as the children left her little opportunity to think at all. Chibi Ami--ever inquisitive--kept crawling into places where she shouldn't be. She had most recently been discovered at the back of the linen closet. Chibi Usagi, hopelessly clumsy, had an awful habit of breaking things. In the span of an hour she'd managed to smash two plates, a vase, a doll, and Setsuna's toe. Chibi Haruka kept kissing the other girls until they cried, and was often seen chasing them down the hallway or cornering them in a bedroom.
There were others, too. Ones that Setsuna didn't recognize. Some were easy enough to guess, of course. The one with the cat ears could no doubt be Sailor Mau, and it stood to reason that the tiny grey-haired girl that the cat-like child kept chasing was Sailor Chuu. The Starlights turned up beneath a bed, pulling each other's ponytails.
As she went, she hardly dwelled upon the past. In fact, with each passing task, her memories seemed to slip away from her, flowing from her mind like rippling water. It was hardly an unpleasant feeling--in fact, it was very much a release--and while she never acknowledged the phenomenon, she began to feel a numb sense of relief.
As the sun began to set and the light began to fade from the sugar-pane windows, the house of gingerbread at last began to settle. Setsuna made her way from bedroom to bedroom, tucking in the tiny tots and whispering good-nights. She soon found her way to a bedroom that still had the light on. The door pulled open with a small creak, and she peeked her head inside. A tiny girl with indigo hair and eyes of the fiercest electric blue sat curled on the bed of frosting, a book clutched in her arms. Setsuna didn't recognize her, but she assumed the child was an unknown sailor senshi and dismissed the matter completely. She smiled at the little girl. "Time to sleep, little one."
The girl held out the book urgently. "Will you read me a story, Setsuna-neesan? Please?" The girl's voice was soft, syrupy-sweet.
Setsuna couldn't resist.
The two curled up on the bed, the layers of sweet-smelling covers enveloping them. The girl arranged herself between the older woman's arms so that she could watch the pages as they turned. She never made a sound, never inturrupted Setsuna's deep, flowing voice. It was a gentle story, about two children in a faraway land who found a world beneath the river, and lived there together for all eternity. Setsuna found that the story, told through her own voice, had a hypnotic quality, and by the time she turned the last page, she felt a tired sort of contentment. She was just about to rise from the bed when the little girl turned up with another book. "Please, Setsuna-neesan? Just one more?" How could she say no? They devoured that book, and the next, and the next. There seemed to be no passage of time, nothing to indicate how long they sat there together, delving into one sweet little story after another. The more they read, the less Setsuna wanted to stop, the less she wanted to be anywhere else except here in this bed of candy, her own voice rising and falling in the darkness. There was nothing else except the gingerbread house, there was no one else except the children.
At one point, as Setsuna set down one book and prepared to pick up another, the little girl craned her neck to look up at her. "Setsuna-neesan, will you be here forever?"
The book grudgingly slipped from her fingers. "I... I don't know. I guess we'll have to see, won't we?"
"But you've been here forever already, right? You've always been here, with us?"
"I..." was that true? Yes. There was nothing else. There was only the gingerbread house. "Yes. Yes, I suppose so."
"So you'll stay forever, right? Forever and ever?"
"Of course. Forever and ever."
She lost track of how many books they'd read. One after another they fell from her hands, and one after another they were replaced by new ones. She was thoroughly enjoying one about a boy and a girl who were trapped in two seperate towers, forever longing for one another but never able to get beyond the stone walls, when she realized the child was asleep. Setsuna smiled, and closed the book.
Strange, how long had she been reading? She cast her eyes around the room for a clock. One that looked as though it had been constructed out of bubblegum pointed at a red gumball in place of where five would normally be.
She knew that she should get up, that she should check on the other kids. But it felt so nice to sit here, propped up by candy pillows with the little girl sleeping next to her. She longed for the complacent feeling that the books brought. Her fingers groped for another one.
This book was different from the others. There were no words, only pictures. The pictures themselves seemed disjointed, as though they were not quite so concerned with the story as they were with capturing single moments of it. Each picture was so intricate, so detailed, that it almost seemed to breathe with life. A great, heavy door that was so thickly entangled in rose bushes that one could barely see it. A boat that drifted aimlessly down a river, vacant of whatever occupant that had once rowed it. A Russian Blue kitten who crouched behind a propped-up mask in order to catch some mice unawares.
She turned the page. A man clothed in rags, peering from beneath a tattered hood, his face nearly obscured. But those eyes. Those bright black eyes that peered out at her, so sharp that they sliced through the paper and into her very soul. There was something in his hand. He was reaching out, offering it to her. She began to reach back, so sure that it was real, that she could slide her hand right into the page and take the object. An icy wind seemed to stir from the picture, brushing across her face, waking up her dulled senses. It carried with it smells of dust, of shadows, of tears. And a whisper. A whisper so clear yet so distant that she was not sure whether she had dreamt it. "Please... do not forget."
Forget? Forget what? Do not forget...
"Charon."
"NO!" The child's scream was piercing, jarring. She leapt from the bed, snatching the book from Setsuna's hand and closing it forcefully.
Setsuna stared at her dumbfounded. "Give me the book."
"No!"
"Young lady, give me that book."
"No!" In that single word, her shrill voice had dropped into a deep, menacing growl. Her cobalt eyes flashed, filling all the room with their blue hue. Her lips curled into a feral snarl. "You could have had happiness here, you know. You could have lived here forever, surrounded by everything you ever wanted. To be needed. To be loved. Instead you still choose to return to your bitter memories, like a dog returning to its vomit. You've had your chance, Pluto. Now you are a trespasser, and I can no longer tolerate your presence here."
Setsuna's mind was reeling. It was all a trap. The lioness trapped the hunter. The key. I need the key. But the key is in the book, I can feel it.
But the key was meant for me. It is mine for the taking. And I'm tired of waiting for someone else to help me.
She stretched a hand out towards the book. "To my hand!" As if waiting for this, a light shot from the book's pages, straight into her palm. She did not even need to see it; she could feel the heavy stone against her fingers.
The child screamed. "No!"
Setsuna smirked, squeezing the object in her hand. "Maybe next time."
And then she was gone.
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¹"Achy Breaky Heart" performed by Billy Ray Cyrus; originally sung by The Marcy Brothers under the title "Don't Tell My Heart". My sincerest apologies for using this song.
²"neesan" or "onee-san" is the Japanese word for "older sister." Children sometimes use the "neesan" or "niisan" (older brother) suffix for older people who they are familiar with, but aren't necessarily related to.
Hour V
By Spirit-hime
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Author's note: Thank you everyone for all the warm comments you have given me! Often the only thing it takes is a single compliment from a reader to make me think, "hey, someone actually likes this. Maybe I should work on it today." When I'm in need of a little encouragement to get me to write, I usually go back and read those great reviews you've all left. Thank you so much. I've also been getting a few comments about how the time flow is a little hard to follow. Truthfully, a lot of that is intentional. This is, after all, a story about Sailor Pluto, the senshi of time. It's supposed to have a screwed up continuum. I hope this hasn't made it too confusing, though. I am trying my best!
Thanks, and enjoy!
************
That smell. That sweet, warm, home-spun smell. That delicious, comfortable, childhood smell. It filled your nostrils first and your mouth second. It was thick and tangible enough that you felt as though you could eat it right out of the air, yet always your tastebuds were just a little disappointed for lack of physical sustenance. It permeated your clothes, ruffled your hair. It was a youthful kind of smell. The kind one associated with leaning across a flour-sprinkled table to watch wrinkled fists punching a swollen blob of dough. It was the kind that conjured up images of buttery yellow cookies tediously cut into delicate shapes of stars, hearts, and rocking horses, before they were sugared in colors of pink, green, and cornflower blue. It was like every kitchen ever baked in, every skilled grandmother who ever warmed the hearts of her family from a dining room table. If ever there was a time machine that could carry you back to those days, it was this smell.
Which was why, as Setsuna stood studying a bouquet of tiny white flowers that seemed to be crafted entirely of sugar, she felt a little nostalgic. She recalled a tiny Hotaru--barely a few weeks past being a toddler and already reading philosophy--propped up on tiptoes, the front of her sundress pressed perilously against the back of the chair she stood upon, dutifully pouring the contents of a Neslie Toll House bag into a mixing bowl. Michiru--ever health conscious--had warned them not to eat the uncooked dough unless they desired to have their fingers soundly thwapped by a wooden spoon. She was clearly fighting a loosing battle, however, as all three delinquents (Haruka included) had scandelously swiped fingerfuls of sugary globs at every turn. They'd barely turned out enough to make a decent batch that day, but it was worth it. Because Hotaru had spilled three eggs onto the floor. Because Haruka had smeared dough onto Michiru's nose, only to lick it off again. Because the front of Setsuna's favorite dress had been powdered in a light snow of flour. Because no one really likes chocolate chip cookies so much as they enjoy making them. And because of that smell.
That smell had appeared another time in her life, too. A time when all she knew was cold, empty desolation. When the slightest ounce of warmth was as welcome as the dawn. The rain had beat against the windows, creating a vast, hollow echo throughout the empty palace. The oven was set, its little red light glowing cheerfully. He'd grabbed her around the waist from behind, startling her and causing the eggs in her hand to drop onto the tiled floor. He wouldn't let her go while she mixed the ingredients together, snatching chocolate chips from the bowl whenever she turned to reach for something. That was when she turned on him and planted a palmful of dough in his face. That act had caused their cooking session to degenerate into an all-out war. Setsuna couldn't remember whether they ever got to the cooking part. All she could remember was how he'd held her down and eaten the sweet mixture of flour, sugar, eggs, and chocolate chips off of her neck. Charon never really was one for conventional things.
The tiny flowers shattered in her hands. Slivers of sweet icing drifted to the floor, where they were immediately forgotten. Charon. Charon and Oroszlan. Charon and Menaki Neko. She could not remember one without the other. They converged in her mind. They were two sides of a golden coin. They were one in the same. They were opposing forces; one a warm, caring soul, the other a cruel, murderous creature. They were seperate entities, but somehow in her mind the line between them was becoming blurred. Where she saw Charon, there was Leijona, lurking behind the shadows. When she saw Oroszlan, there was Charon, his face wraught with despair. The great cat somehow filled all her memories of him, and yet... and yet...
And yet she had forgotten it. Somehow, in the span of countless centuries, in a time when she still knew the color of his eyes, she had forgotten the other side of the coin. She remembered her source of happiness in the days of her youth. But she had forgotten the part about what brought that happiness to an abrupt and bitter end. The line between fulfillment and desolation was balanced on the tip of a lion's claw.
She shook her head in a futile attempt to clear it. Stop dwelling, darn it. You aren't helping any.
To distract herself, she glanced around. Where am I this time, she thought dully. Time traveling. She'd been time traveling again. It seemed as though every time she did this, her mind shook off the memories of whatever world she left behind, as though her attempts to forget the past had finally succeeded in a very literal sense. Scattered images still lingered in her mind. Some of them involved rather frightening versions of Chiba Mamoru. Some contained a small dark object that she could barely picture. And in one...
No. That just couldn't be. Feijona? The lion? Alive? It was beyond comprehension. How could a creature that had died thousands of years ago just pop back up again like nothing had happened? Oh sure, some things could be reborn, supposing their starseeds could be salvaged, but Setsuna had stared right through that great blue glob, and all she'd seen was the sky behind it. It had been as empty and starless as Chaos itself. No part of that monster's true form was solid enough to be salvagable. There was nothing to resurrect. Unless...
Unless it was never dead to begin with.
She shuddered. The shards of broken sugary flowers crunched beneath her feet. Oh yeah, she was dwelling again. Pay attention, Setsuna. Where are you?
The answer to that question was not quite as simple as she'd hoped.
The flowers she had so carelessly crushed were not the only edible thing in this room. In fact, she was pretty darn sure that nearly everything she set her eyes upon were all set to give her caveties. The furniture, which she had initially mistaken for wood, rather reminded her of gingerbread. The floor was delicately tiled with large wheel-like peppermints, their shiny surfaces swirled in red and wintergreen. Brick walls looked to be constructed of sugar cubes and frosting. Doorframes and windowsills were of vibrantly ribboned candycanes. Fudge-furnished chairs and couches were stacked high with colorful licorice cushions. Icing chandeliers dripped from the ceiling, their lights casting a dappled glow upon the room.
In short, the whole darn place gave her a Hansel and Gretel vibe, and she rather preferred not to find out where the witch was hiding.
(It should be noted that Setsuna was a woman who had been around for thousands of years, and had seen a great many unusual things in her time. The fact that she didn't so much as bat an eyelash at the notion of being trapped inside a world constructed by the psycho brothers Grimm, who seemed to take a great delight in scaring the Moon Dust out of small children, said a great deal about her personality--namely, that she should have settled down in a retirement home a long time ago.)
A muffled sound she hadn't noticed during her prolonged thought process began to filter through her senses. It was the kind of sound one would expect in this sort of place. The kind that either added or subtracted from the eerie atmosphere, that made the sugar-coated world become childish or creepy, depending on how you looked at it. It was the unmistakeable sound of children's laughter.
By the sounds of it, there was more than one. Quite a few more than one, actually. The gleeful shrieks, punctuated by the occasional playful scream, were high-pitched enough to indicate that this was a herd of very small children. Just then there was a loud thunk on the far wall--hard enough that a few nic-nacs were knocked from the shelf--which was immediately followed by a sobbing wail. Setsuna inwardly rolled her eyes, remembering distinctly a time when young Hotaru had managed to destroy the majority of Michiru's favorite china. That same sort of sound had alerted her of the disaster: a crash, followed by crying. Ah, the joy of kids.
Rolling up her sleeves, Setsuna made her way towards the door. Of course, somewhere between the sleeves and the door, she made a discovery that was only slightly more shocking than the world itself (though not really: see the parenthetical aside above). Her outfit had somehow warped itself into something that made her look like she'd walked right out of an American western--the kind that specialized in damsels in distress and sweet country women who pined after the lonely cowboy. It consisted of a frilly baby blue loose-fitting blouse, a long floral-patterned skirt, a rather large white ruffled apron that very nearly acted as a skirt in itself, and a white knit shawl. Great, Setsuna thought bleakly. I'm Mother Goose.
With a flip of her green hair--which had been neatly twisted into a French braid that trailed nearly to the small of her back--Setsuna steeled herself for the horrors that lay beyond the milk chocolate door, and turned the gumdrop handle.
It was chaos. It would have made the most steel-hearted babysitter cry. It was a daycare worker's nightmare. And the most frightening part was, she recognised most of them.
The one who had hit her head was a chibi version of Usagi. She sat on the floor sobbing, her hands holding her head between the two odango. Chibi Michiru and chibi Hotaru were next to her, busily painting pictures of fishies and butterflies on the wall with colorful sticky frosting. Chibi Makoto was breaking the legs off of gingerbread chairs and knawing away at them, one by one. Chibi Haruka had found a jar of jawbreakers and was throwing them at everyone from on top of a high shelf. Chibi Mamoru, meanwhile, was deftly stuffing handfuls of chocolate chips down his pants. Chibi Minako was chasing chibi Ami around the room with handfuls of gummy worms. Chibi Rei was folding edible rice paper into little cranes, before biting their heads off.
The sight was beyond surreal. It was frickin' bizarre. Having dreams about these kinds of things often caused people to have themselves commited, or at least stop eating triple hot fudge sundaes before bed.
It wasn't just the sight, though. It was the noise. The high-pitched giggles, the ear-shattering squeals, the sobs and shouts and clatters and bangs and constant escalating drum of the vein pulsating in her temple. It was enough to make you cry, enough to make you scream.
She did.
At first, there was only stunned silence. Chibi Minako stopped in midstep, her outstretched fist still clenched around some very squished-looking gummy worms. Chibi Haruka allowed several jawbreakers to slip from her hand, where they clattered to the floor. Chibi Hotaru stood dripping purple and orange frosting. Chibi Makoto was trying very hard to hide behind a half-eaten stool.
It was then that the crying started.
One would expect the first sob to come from chibi Usagi. But it was chibi Rei--who, in her surprise, had crushed one of her origami creations. It was all downhill from there. Before Setsuna knew it, they were all wailing at the tops of their little lungs, streams of tears rolling down their faces.
It was at this point that Setsuna decided she no longer had a soft spot for children.
If it had been, say, Michiru in this situation, and not Setsuna, the children would have been quieted and tended to in less time than you can say "who wants to hear a story?" But chibi Michiru was currently wailing her teal little head off, and was in no capacity to be helping poor Setsuna at this point. But even though Setsuna was not Michiru, and could therefore not quiet a bawling 3-year-old whilst applying mascara and balancing three teacups on her head, there was one undeniable aspect of Setsuna's personality. The woman loved children. Absolutely loved them. It was no wonder her first friend in centuries happened to be a certain young pink-haired princess. And even now, as she was surrounded by what's referred to by many bachelors as a Worst Case Scenario, she couldn't help but love the little monsters.
Which was why she made such an effort to cheer the little buggers up.
At first, she tried to console them just by talking. This proved to be an impossible feat, as their voices could easily be likened to twenty nitrogen-laden steam engines smashing into one another simultaneously, and drowned out anything short of another blood-curdling scream (which really wouldn't help matters any). She briefly considered a method often used with baby Hotaru, which was to pick her up and hold her, but unless she grew a few dozen more arms, such a thing could prove difficult. She then recalled one of Haruka's favorite remedies. No, not proping infant Hotaru on the seat of a motorcycle and speeding around town for twenty minutes. Haruka's other (and less dangerous) method was to somehow make Hotaru laugh. This could involve anything from weird faces to odd dances. It was a nearly foolproof plan, and by the time she was finished Hotaru would be giggling away, completely oblivious to whatever had upset her in the first place.
Unfortunately, there was one problem with this idea. In all her cold, desolate years spent in solitude behind the Gates of Time, not once had Setsuna ever been so inclined to make anyone laugh. She now found herself completely at a loss as to how exactly one goes about doing such a thing. She tried to look back upon things she'd caught on television, anything that could be considered amusing, but most of what her mind came up with consisted of racy jokes and men in skirts. Wonderful idea, Setsuna. Cheer them up with drag queens.
Well, think Setsuna. What do kids like? She had a disturbing mental picture of herself shouting, "hey kids, pull my finger!" It wasn't at all pleasant, and she immediately wished her brain came equipped with a "delete" key.
Nevertheless, the munchkins weren't going to stop crying anytime soon, and Setsuna was always one to rise to the occasion.
Okay. She couldn't dance. And making faces was out of the question. But she could sing. And oh, how amusing her singing was.
The lyrics began, nervous and stretched as they were. There were a few extra lilts to the tune that slipped into her shaky voice. However, as she progressed the notes became stronger, louder. One by one, the children stopped howling to stare at the woman from whose throat the odd tune was being emitted. It was the strangest thing they'd ever heard. It was the first thing that had popped into Setsuna's head.
It was Achy Breaky Heart¹.
There's something about country music and its odd American twang that sounds so foreign to a Japanese ear that it becomes something altogether alien and incomprehensible. And when such a bizarre form of cacophony is being sung by a tall green-haired woman whose voice is unaccustomed to any sort of singing outside of "Happy Birthday To You" it becomes something akin to tapdancing chickens.
One by one, the children stopped crying. Now she was surrounded by a sea of blank stares. They weren't laughing, but it was most definitely an improvement.
"Don't tell my heart, my achy breaky heart, I just don't think he'd understand..." With the full attention of the kids around her, the soldier of time and space ploughed onward bravely, willingly and with sound mind making a fool of herself in front of a roomful of munchkins whose favorite music included such things as "Itsy Bitsy Spider." As she sang the chorus for what felt like the fourth time, she became more confident, and began to stride forward bravely, her Mother Hubbard boots clamping in time with the beat.
Of course, she forgot about the jawbreakers that had been scattered all over the floor.
"It might blow up and kill this maOOOOP!" With one misplaced step, Setsuna's feet flew well above her head, the world did a summersault, and next thing she knew, she was sprawled on the floor, acres of skirt flung over her head.
They hadn't laughed before, but they certainly did now.
Setsuna flung back the layers of ruffles and flower print from her face. The room, once flooded with tears, was now filled with childish giggles. Under the circumstances, it was music to her ears. She thought with a twinge of embarrassment about how that laughter had come to be, and made a mental note to never EVER tell anyone about this incident.
After the initial amusement wore off, the children began to swarm forward like an army of Munchkins with battle cries of, "Setsuna-neesan², read me a story!" "Setsuna-neesan, come see what I drawed for you!" "Setsuna-neesan, can we play house?"
Many people would have found that situation even more frightening than the crying one. At least when they're crying, kids are too preoccupied with that very pasttime to bother paying any attention to you. Thusly, they don't seek you out. The moment they begin to regard you as a respected figure, a source of entertainment and comfort, you can pretty much kiss your freedom goodbye. Many people would have been thinking this just then. But Setsuna was not many people.
So it was that hands were held, stories were read, noses were wiped, and Setsuna found herself almost enjoying her time with the little scoundrels. It was the kind of work one could lose oneself in, especially because of the sheer volume of children that seemed to reside in the sugary gingerbread house. Wave upon wave of them came; every time one set would be put down for a nap, another would appear needing to be fed. Once this group was fed, another would demand a game. By the time these ones had finished playing, the first set would have woken up again. On and on it went, an endless, mindless cycle. And yet.
And yet, Setsuna thought, as she carried a pair of pink-haired twins up the chocolate stairs, I can't remember the last time I've felt this way. This sense of gratification, of being needed by someone else. Sailor Pluto is revered. Sailor Pluto is respected by all. But never is Meiou Setsuna needed in that personal, human way that so many people desire to be needed.
Hotaru had given her a taste of this, a brief moment of near-motherhood. It was but a flicker in a long, dark night--a flicker that had long been extinguished. Hotaru had outgrown her childish ways. And Setsuna had outgrown her usefulness as anything other than a trusted friend. Such is life for the guardian of time.
She hardly dwelled on this fact, however, as the children left her little opportunity to think at all. Chibi Ami--ever inquisitive--kept crawling into places where she shouldn't be. She had most recently been discovered at the back of the linen closet. Chibi Usagi, hopelessly clumsy, had an awful habit of breaking things. In the span of an hour she'd managed to smash two plates, a vase, a doll, and Setsuna's toe. Chibi Haruka kept kissing the other girls until they cried, and was often seen chasing them down the hallway or cornering them in a bedroom.
There were others, too. Ones that Setsuna didn't recognize. Some were easy enough to guess, of course. The one with the cat ears could no doubt be Sailor Mau, and it stood to reason that the tiny grey-haired girl that the cat-like child kept chasing was Sailor Chuu. The Starlights turned up beneath a bed, pulling each other's ponytails.
As she went, she hardly dwelled upon the past. In fact, with each passing task, her memories seemed to slip away from her, flowing from her mind like rippling water. It was hardly an unpleasant feeling--in fact, it was very much a release--and while she never acknowledged the phenomenon, she began to feel a numb sense of relief.
As the sun began to set and the light began to fade from the sugar-pane windows, the house of gingerbread at last began to settle. Setsuna made her way from bedroom to bedroom, tucking in the tiny tots and whispering good-nights. She soon found her way to a bedroom that still had the light on. The door pulled open with a small creak, and she peeked her head inside. A tiny girl with indigo hair and eyes of the fiercest electric blue sat curled on the bed of frosting, a book clutched in her arms. Setsuna didn't recognize her, but she assumed the child was an unknown sailor senshi and dismissed the matter completely. She smiled at the little girl. "Time to sleep, little one."
The girl held out the book urgently. "Will you read me a story, Setsuna-neesan? Please?" The girl's voice was soft, syrupy-sweet.
Setsuna couldn't resist.
The two curled up on the bed, the layers of sweet-smelling covers enveloping them. The girl arranged herself between the older woman's arms so that she could watch the pages as they turned. She never made a sound, never inturrupted Setsuna's deep, flowing voice. It was a gentle story, about two children in a faraway land who found a world beneath the river, and lived there together for all eternity. Setsuna found that the story, told through her own voice, had a hypnotic quality, and by the time she turned the last page, she felt a tired sort of contentment. She was just about to rise from the bed when the little girl turned up with another book. "Please, Setsuna-neesan? Just one more?" How could she say no? They devoured that book, and the next, and the next. There seemed to be no passage of time, nothing to indicate how long they sat there together, delving into one sweet little story after another. The more they read, the less Setsuna wanted to stop, the less she wanted to be anywhere else except here in this bed of candy, her own voice rising and falling in the darkness. There was nothing else except the gingerbread house, there was no one else except the children.
At one point, as Setsuna set down one book and prepared to pick up another, the little girl craned her neck to look up at her. "Setsuna-neesan, will you be here forever?"
The book grudgingly slipped from her fingers. "I... I don't know. I guess we'll have to see, won't we?"
"But you've been here forever already, right? You've always been here, with us?"
"I..." was that true? Yes. There was nothing else. There was only the gingerbread house. "Yes. Yes, I suppose so."
"So you'll stay forever, right? Forever and ever?"
"Of course. Forever and ever."
She lost track of how many books they'd read. One after another they fell from her hands, and one after another they were replaced by new ones. She was thoroughly enjoying one about a boy and a girl who were trapped in two seperate towers, forever longing for one another but never able to get beyond the stone walls, when she realized the child was asleep. Setsuna smiled, and closed the book.
Strange, how long had she been reading? She cast her eyes around the room for a clock. One that looked as though it had been constructed out of bubblegum pointed at a red gumball in place of where five would normally be.
She knew that she should get up, that she should check on the other kids. But it felt so nice to sit here, propped up by candy pillows with the little girl sleeping next to her. She longed for the complacent feeling that the books brought. Her fingers groped for another one.
This book was different from the others. There were no words, only pictures. The pictures themselves seemed disjointed, as though they were not quite so concerned with the story as they were with capturing single moments of it. Each picture was so intricate, so detailed, that it almost seemed to breathe with life. A great, heavy door that was so thickly entangled in rose bushes that one could barely see it. A boat that drifted aimlessly down a river, vacant of whatever occupant that had once rowed it. A Russian Blue kitten who crouched behind a propped-up mask in order to catch some mice unawares.
She turned the page. A man clothed in rags, peering from beneath a tattered hood, his face nearly obscured. But those eyes. Those bright black eyes that peered out at her, so sharp that they sliced through the paper and into her very soul. There was something in his hand. He was reaching out, offering it to her. She began to reach back, so sure that it was real, that she could slide her hand right into the page and take the object. An icy wind seemed to stir from the picture, brushing across her face, waking up her dulled senses. It carried with it smells of dust, of shadows, of tears. And a whisper. A whisper so clear yet so distant that she was not sure whether she had dreamt it. "Please... do not forget."
Forget? Forget what? Do not forget...
"Charon."
"NO!" The child's scream was piercing, jarring. She leapt from the bed, snatching the book from Setsuna's hand and closing it forcefully.
Setsuna stared at her dumbfounded. "Give me the book."
"No!"
"Young lady, give me that book."
"No!" In that single word, her shrill voice had dropped into a deep, menacing growl. Her cobalt eyes flashed, filling all the room with their blue hue. Her lips curled into a feral snarl. "You could have had happiness here, you know. You could have lived here forever, surrounded by everything you ever wanted. To be needed. To be loved. Instead you still choose to return to your bitter memories, like a dog returning to its vomit. You've had your chance, Pluto. Now you are a trespasser, and I can no longer tolerate your presence here."
Setsuna's mind was reeling. It was all a trap. The lioness trapped the hunter. The key. I need the key. But the key is in the book, I can feel it.
But the key was meant for me. It is mine for the taking. And I'm tired of waiting for someone else to help me.
She stretched a hand out towards the book. "To my hand!" As if waiting for this, a light shot from the book's pages, straight into her palm. She did not even need to see it; she could feel the heavy stone against her fingers.
The child screamed. "No!"
Setsuna smirked, squeezing the object in her hand. "Maybe next time."
And then she was gone.
************
¹"Achy Breaky Heart" performed by Billy Ray Cyrus; originally sung by The Marcy Brothers under the title "Don't Tell My Heart". My sincerest apologies for using this song.
²"neesan" or "onee-san" is the Japanese word for "older sister." Children sometimes use the "neesan" or "niisan" (older brother) suffix for older people who they are familiar with, but aren't necessarily related to.