Chapter Thirty - We Would Have Succeeded
***
"What's bad?" Zoisite asked. "What are you talking about?"
"Isolate and enlarge the image of that starship," Aiyana said.
Nephrite shot an annoyed look at the king. Endymion shrugged. "Do it," he said.
Zoisite obeyed.
"Oh, kami-sama!" Aiyana said for the third time.
"Kami what?" Zoisite asked. "What are you getting so worked up about?"
"The rotor on the back of the ship is the same, and the gunnery port is of the same design. Besides, it looks exactly like it! That's the Shadowtail!"
"The what?"
"Oh, no...they're still coming, after all that." Aiyana began to pace the length of the control room.
"Well, she's certainly got your nervous habits," Nephrite commented.
"Aiyana," Sailormercury said, "calm down, have a seat, and please explain yourself coherently."
"That would be appreciated," Zoisite added dryly.
"I'm not from this planet," Aiyana replied, seating herself in one of the chairs at the control deck. "I'm from another galaxy, actually. The closest one, the only one visible by the naked eye from the Milky Way. I'm from the galaxy you call Andromeda. Although I was born on Earth, it seems that sometime shortly after my twelfth birthday, I was taken to the Andromeda galaxy, and my memories of Earth were erased."
"Wow," Nephrite said.
"This ship is from the Andromeda galaxy. Or more appropriately, the Omega Empire, which includes the Andromedan galaxy and a small triple-star system about fifty million kilometres away. The two planets in the system are named Centauri and Proximi." Aiyana smiled wryly. "They're pulling my strings. I used to pilot that ship."
"What?"
"Where I come from, there's a highly exalted and methodical Military," Aiyana continued. "I was at the top of the Military...second only to the prince of the system, who was the true head of the Military. The system is based on the letters in our alphabet. The first three and the last dictated the Aristocracy, but the Military was the next level down...I was First Delta Aiyana Khalidah. The Deltas were the highest-ranking segment of the Military consisting of seven specialized officers...kind of like a spy organization. Espionage, assassination, intelligence, that sort of thing."
Nephrite frowned.
"The reason why I was sent to Earth in the first place was to assassinate the king and queen." Aiyana winced. "It was supposed to be an easy mission for me."
"Have you ever done it before?" Nephrite asked quietly.
Aiyana didn't answer his question. "They sent me here, along with the Second Delta - Tamashiiro Tenkami, his name was. Or Tenkami Tamashiiro, by Japanese naming. My mission was to assassinate the king and queen, and also to delete the memory off the mainframe computer, infect it with a stylized virus we had developed, and crash the computer system. The virus was highly deadly to even our computers. It would have completely melted your system.
"Unfortunately, Delta Tenkami and I weren't on particularly good terms." Aiyana looked away. "He resented me for moving up in the Military. And even though I was higher than him, I was afraid of him. Highly afraid. Needless to say, the trip here was rather cold, and he only assisted me into getting into the palace. Although there was no specific mandate saying that he had to wait for me, it was generally accepted that he would. But he didn't - he left me a small envoy with just enough fuel to return home, and left on his path home, leaving me to do the work myself."
"What a snake," Sailorjupiter said.
"Be glad, Hayashino-san," said Aiyana, smiling dryly. "If he'd helped me, we would have succeeded. We were the two top-ranking in the Military, and we were both experienced in this kind of thing. It was supposed to be a stealth mission.
"Unfortunately, as you know, by the time I got to the king and queen's bedroom - undetected so far - someone hit me in the back of the head." She smiled weirdly, a twisted little smile. "Who was it?"
"Sailorsaturn," King Endymion answered, startling everyone.
"Hotaru?!"
"Yes. She told me. She felt Aiyana's presence on Earth. Hotaru developed transport powers to a limited extent - she could teleport herself, but only to a scene where her own powers were at work, and only in the greatest of dire needs. Whatever elixir Aiyana had taken - yes, she wrote me about that too - had excited the power of Saturn within Aiyana, and it brought her here. She transformed into Sailorsaturn and hit her with the blunt end of the glaive. But she was instantly brought back, once she had done what she needed to do, and that's why no one saw her."
"The same way as when she talked to me earlier," Aiyana said. "When you looked down at me over the bed, you didn't know it was me then?"
"It was dark and I wasn't thinking straight," Endymion said. "I was terrified. I saw the blood and halfway thought it was Selenity! I reached over, but she was still there, intact. Even after that, it was too dark to see anything."
"But why did they send you to assassinate the queen?" Zoisite pressed.
"That was only the first phase," Aiyana said. "They had a plan. The Andromedan system is small. They only have six small planets in their solar system, but the population is beginning to overflow. Also, they are running out of resources. They've been searching for what they need elsewhere. Well, they found a lot of it here. An excess of the fuel that we use is located on the planet Venus, and other planets in this system have other resources that Andromedans use.
"The Council proposed that we colonize this solar system, but they needed a base for their work. Andromedans are very much like humans; or rather, they're humanoid. They tend to be a lot taller, and they have slightly longer toes and fingers. Their ears are also weirdly shaped, they have stranger-looking noses, and their eyes are duller and kind of chinky. Their skin is also a lot more prone to diseases, since it's really pale and delicate." Aiyana paused. "The true Centurians and Proximians are kind of reptilian. They tend to be a little weaker than Andromedans or humans. They stand at a slightly shorter height than humans here, and they have long, tapering noses and two rows of teeth, one on the top and one on the bottom. They have tails, too, and usually red eyes. They look like a mix between a big reptile and a human."
The five humans recoiled.
"But," Aiyana continued, "the triple-star system has been ruling Andromeda for so long that they have had a lot of inbreeding, and now almost everyone in Andromeda and the two small planets have some kind of Alphan - that's what they call the two stars together - some kind of Alphan blood in them. There are all sorts of half-humanoid, half-reptilian creatures on the planet. That's why I was so strange-looking and exotic to them - I didn't have any Alphan features at all. Anyone who doesn't is considered...beautiful, I guess. The few pure Andromedans are like jewels to them. They are also stronger than the mixes an the pure Alphans; the Alphans have weaker immune systems and are more prone to diseases. That's why I've seen more than my share of Andromedans. They are prevalent in the military because of their stronger senses."
"So what are these...Andromedans...doing?"
"Well, they needed a base for their work," Aiyana said. "Being light-years away from the Milky Way, they couldn't travel back and forth from day to day, even from month to month. They do know how to do restoration to planets to make them habitable, but they needed a base to do even that. The planets here are just as unhabitable to them as they are to you.
"As they searched, though, they detected Earth. Earthians - humans - were much like the mix-breed of people on Andromeda, and they even seemed very closely related to Andromedans. They only very recently discovered Earth, and they decided to take it over." Aiyana sighed. "They were going to destroy most of the human race, and use the remaining ones to do grunt work. I guess they were also going to experiment to see what kind of super- race they could create. The Alphas, being weak themselves, were always interested in creating super-races. Half of their advanced technology budget is spent on elixirs and experiments for that purpose."
The five widened their eyes. "Are you serious?" Sailorjupiter said.
"Yes," said Aiyana. "I thought they might have dropped it when I didn't return...but it seems they haven't. I had forgotten all about it, what with being absorbed with Mikomi-chan..."
"And Masaya," King Endymion added teasingly.
Aiyana ignored him. "That's why I say we have to get everyone important out of the palace," Aiyana said. "They are definitely coming here first."
"But...what if they want to negotiate?"
"The Alphans don't negotiate, King Endymion. They took over Andromeda in just that way. Their Military is highly renowned and they never start anything without finishing it."
"Is there a Sailorandromeda?" Sailormercury asked curiously.
"There are senshi for each of the planets in Andromeda, but so far, only Sailorcaph has manifested her power," Aiyana said, smiling. "She is also very weak - has nothing that could be compared to your powers here. She was discovered quite by accident. She was a scientist and she discovered her own sailor crystal when she was doing x-ray and special magic resources research. She then concluded that there was a senshi for each planet in Andromeda, just no one had discovered." Aiyana nodded. "But as far as we know, there is no Sailorcentauri or Sailorproximi."
Jupiter and Mercury nodded.
"When they come, they're going to want the palace first," Aiyana said. "They probably landed somewhere far away, but not too far. They will get here with incredible speed, no doubt. And they think they have the element of surprise. When you get here, it'd be advisable to just leave the palace to them, and figure out a way to get it back later instead of being killed for it." Aiyana's face darkened. "Because they will kill you. They sent me to do it."
Endymion nodded. "We'll begin the evacuation of the palace and the immediate vicinity right now," he said. "Does anyone know a place where we can go?"
"Wait just a minute. All the important offices are near here. The palace, the council building, the royal hospital...all of it is in the immediate vicinity," Mercury said. "How are we going to evacuate thousands of sick people?"
"You don't have to do anything to the hospital yet," Aiyana said. "They won't touch it once they find out what it is. The Alphas are very frightened of disease, since they're more susceptible to it than we are. But the council building and definitely the palace will be of interest, as well as the archives. They'll be interested in the variety of Earthians there are to choose from and the main base of operations, since all the computers and control decks are in here."
"So we'll begin the evacuation of the palace, the council buildings, the archives, and any other business-related buildings in the immediate vicinity of the palace," Endymion said. "Immediately. How much time do you think we have, Aiyana?"
"Based on past experience," Aiyana said thoughtfully, "I'd say about two hours."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------- AN: When referring to the planets, I took the name from Proximi Centauri. Proximi Centauri is a real star about 4.3 light-years from Earth. I don't know how close or far they are from Andromeda, but I just used the names.
***
"What's bad?" Zoisite asked. "What are you talking about?"
"Isolate and enlarge the image of that starship," Aiyana said.
Nephrite shot an annoyed look at the king. Endymion shrugged. "Do it," he said.
Zoisite obeyed.
"Oh, kami-sama!" Aiyana said for the third time.
"Kami what?" Zoisite asked. "What are you getting so worked up about?"
"The rotor on the back of the ship is the same, and the gunnery port is of the same design. Besides, it looks exactly like it! That's the Shadowtail!"
"The what?"
"Oh, no...they're still coming, after all that." Aiyana began to pace the length of the control room.
"Well, she's certainly got your nervous habits," Nephrite commented.
"Aiyana," Sailormercury said, "calm down, have a seat, and please explain yourself coherently."
"That would be appreciated," Zoisite added dryly.
"I'm not from this planet," Aiyana replied, seating herself in one of the chairs at the control deck. "I'm from another galaxy, actually. The closest one, the only one visible by the naked eye from the Milky Way. I'm from the galaxy you call Andromeda. Although I was born on Earth, it seems that sometime shortly after my twelfth birthday, I was taken to the Andromeda galaxy, and my memories of Earth were erased."
"Wow," Nephrite said.
"This ship is from the Andromeda galaxy. Or more appropriately, the Omega Empire, which includes the Andromedan galaxy and a small triple-star system about fifty million kilometres away. The two planets in the system are named Centauri and Proximi." Aiyana smiled wryly. "They're pulling my strings. I used to pilot that ship."
"What?"
"Where I come from, there's a highly exalted and methodical Military," Aiyana continued. "I was at the top of the Military...second only to the prince of the system, who was the true head of the Military. The system is based on the letters in our alphabet. The first three and the last dictated the Aristocracy, but the Military was the next level down...I was First Delta Aiyana Khalidah. The Deltas were the highest-ranking segment of the Military consisting of seven specialized officers...kind of like a spy organization. Espionage, assassination, intelligence, that sort of thing."
Nephrite frowned.
"The reason why I was sent to Earth in the first place was to assassinate the king and queen." Aiyana winced. "It was supposed to be an easy mission for me."
"Have you ever done it before?" Nephrite asked quietly.
Aiyana didn't answer his question. "They sent me here, along with the Second Delta - Tamashiiro Tenkami, his name was. Or Tenkami Tamashiiro, by Japanese naming. My mission was to assassinate the king and queen, and also to delete the memory off the mainframe computer, infect it with a stylized virus we had developed, and crash the computer system. The virus was highly deadly to even our computers. It would have completely melted your system.
"Unfortunately, Delta Tenkami and I weren't on particularly good terms." Aiyana looked away. "He resented me for moving up in the Military. And even though I was higher than him, I was afraid of him. Highly afraid. Needless to say, the trip here was rather cold, and he only assisted me into getting into the palace. Although there was no specific mandate saying that he had to wait for me, it was generally accepted that he would. But he didn't - he left me a small envoy with just enough fuel to return home, and left on his path home, leaving me to do the work myself."
"What a snake," Sailorjupiter said.
"Be glad, Hayashino-san," said Aiyana, smiling dryly. "If he'd helped me, we would have succeeded. We were the two top-ranking in the Military, and we were both experienced in this kind of thing. It was supposed to be a stealth mission.
"Unfortunately, as you know, by the time I got to the king and queen's bedroom - undetected so far - someone hit me in the back of the head." She smiled weirdly, a twisted little smile. "Who was it?"
"Sailorsaturn," King Endymion answered, startling everyone.
"Hotaru?!"
"Yes. She told me. She felt Aiyana's presence on Earth. Hotaru developed transport powers to a limited extent - she could teleport herself, but only to a scene where her own powers were at work, and only in the greatest of dire needs. Whatever elixir Aiyana had taken - yes, she wrote me about that too - had excited the power of Saturn within Aiyana, and it brought her here. She transformed into Sailorsaturn and hit her with the blunt end of the glaive. But she was instantly brought back, once she had done what she needed to do, and that's why no one saw her."
"The same way as when she talked to me earlier," Aiyana said. "When you looked down at me over the bed, you didn't know it was me then?"
"It was dark and I wasn't thinking straight," Endymion said. "I was terrified. I saw the blood and halfway thought it was Selenity! I reached over, but she was still there, intact. Even after that, it was too dark to see anything."
"But why did they send you to assassinate the queen?" Zoisite pressed.
"That was only the first phase," Aiyana said. "They had a plan. The Andromedan system is small. They only have six small planets in their solar system, but the population is beginning to overflow. Also, they are running out of resources. They've been searching for what they need elsewhere. Well, they found a lot of it here. An excess of the fuel that we use is located on the planet Venus, and other planets in this system have other resources that Andromedans use.
"The Council proposed that we colonize this solar system, but they needed a base for their work. Andromedans are very much like humans; or rather, they're humanoid. They tend to be a lot taller, and they have slightly longer toes and fingers. Their ears are also weirdly shaped, they have stranger-looking noses, and their eyes are duller and kind of chinky. Their skin is also a lot more prone to diseases, since it's really pale and delicate." Aiyana paused. "The true Centurians and Proximians are kind of reptilian. They tend to be a little weaker than Andromedans or humans. They stand at a slightly shorter height than humans here, and they have long, tapering noses and two rows of teeth, one on the top and one on the bottom. They have tails, too, and usually red eyes. They look like a mix between a big reptile and a human."
The five humans recoiled.
"But," Aiyana continued, "the triple-star system has been ruling Andromeda for so long that they have had a lot of inbreeding, and now almost everyone in Andromeda and the two small planets have some kind of Alphan - that's what they call the two stars together - some kind of Alphan blood in them. There are all sorts of half-humanoid, half-reptilian creatures on the planet. That's why I was so strange-looking and exotic to them - I didn't have any Alphan features at all. Anyone who doesn't is considered...beautiful, I guess. The few pure Andromedans are like jewels to them. They are also stronger than the mixes an the pure Alphans; the Alphans have weaker immune systems and are more prone to diseases. That's why I've seen more than my share of Andromedans. They are prevalent in the military because of their stronger senses."
"So what are these...Andromedans...doing?"
"Well, they needed a base for their work," Aiyana said. "Being light-years away from the Milky Way, they couldn't travel back and forth from day to day, even from month to month. They do know how to do restoration to planets to make them habitable, but they needed a base to do even that. The planets here are just as unhabitable to them as they are to you.
"As they searched, though, they detected Earth. Earthians - humans - were much like the mix-breed of people on Andromeda, and they even seemed very closely related to Andromedans. They only very recently discovered Earth, and they decided to take it over." Aiyana sighed. "They were going to destroy most of the human race, and use the remaining ones to do grunt work. I guess they were also going to experiment to see what kind of super- race they could create. The Alphas, being weak themselves, were always interested in creating super-races. Half of their advanced technology budget is spent on elixirs and experiments for that purpose."
The five widened their eyes. "Are you serious?" Sailorjupiter said.
"Yes," said Aiyana. "I thought they might have dropped it when I didn't return...but it seems they haven't. I had forgotten all about it, what with being absorbed with Mikomi-chan..."
"And Masaya," King Endymion added teasingly.
Aiyana ignored him. "That's why I say we have to get everyone important out of the palace," Aiyana said. "They are definitely coming here first."
"But...what if they want to negotiate?"
"The Alphans don't negotiate, King Endymion. They took over Andromeda in just that way. Their Military is highly renowned and they never start anything without finishing it."
"Is there a Sailorandromeda?" Sailormercury asked curiously.
"There are senshi for each of the planets in Andromeda, but so far, only Sailorcaph has manifested her power," Aiyana said, smiling. "She is also very weak - has nothing that could be compared to your powers here. She was discovered quite by accident. She was a scientist and she discovered her own sailor crystal when she was doing x-ray and special magic resources research. She then concluded that there was a senshi for each planet in Andromeda, just no one had discovered." Aiyana nodded. "But as far as we know, there is no Sailorcentauri or Sailorproximi."
Jupiter and Mercury nodded.
"When they come, they're going to want the palace first," Aiyana said. "They probably landed somewhere far away, but not too far. They will get here with incredible speed, no doubt. And they think they have the element of surprise. When you get here, it'd be advisable to just leave the palace to them, and figure out a way to get it back later instead of being killed for it." Aiyana's face darkened. "Because they will kill you. They sent me to do it."
Endymion nodded. "We'll begin the evacuation of the palace and the immediate vicinity right now," he said. "Does anyone know a place where we can go?"
"Wait just a minute. All the important offices are near here. The palace, the council building, the royal hospital...all of it is in the immediate vicinity," Mercury said. "How are we going to evacuate thousands of sick people?"
"You don't have to do anything to the hospital yet," Aiyana said. "They won't touch it once they find out what it is. The Alphas are very frightened of disease, since they're more susceptible to it than we are. But the council building and definitely the palace will be of interest, as well as the archives. They'll be interested in the variety of Earthians there are to choose from and the main base of operations, since all the computers and control decks are in here."
"So we'll begin the evacuation of the palace, the council buildings, the archives, and any other business-related buildings in the immediate vicinity of the palace," Endymion said. "Immediately. How much time do you think we have, Aiyana?"
"Based on past experience," Aiyana said thoughtfully, "I'd say about two hours."
---------------------------------------------------------------------------- ---------------------------- AN: When referring to the planets, I took the name from Proximi Centauri. Proximi Centauri is a real star about 4.3 light-years from Earth. I don't know how close or far they are from Andromeda, but I just used the names.