Disclaimer: I own nothing! I own nothing! (Sing along!)
A/N: Final thank you's…I could almost cry! Lysia Croft (you've been with this story since the beginning, and your support has been amazing! so many reasons to say thank you!) hota-chan (hey, anytime you join the party, you're still welcome! Thanks for taking the time, and for reviewing!) cardcaptoreternity (for sticking it out even when the going got tough and a little dark), Caytlyn Rose (see, the ending at long last! Thanks for your enthusiasm!) Erase99 (glad to find someone who shares my sense of humor! Arigatou!) silver starlight wolf (ah, so sweet! Thank you!) ice illuser (I like to keep you guys twisting! Thanks for reading!) moonlitephox (here is the ending you seek! I hope it live up to expectations! Thank you!) midnight, (wow! Speaking of enthusiasm…glad you like it, hope this is a good enough ending for you! Thanks!) Two very special thank you's! Issalee, for a beautiful lullaby, and several of the longest, but greatest and sweetest, reviews I have ever seen! And aiisha, for everything that has or will ever happen. Kisses, girl!
Now, on to the big finale!
When everything is gone, when there is no one left to laugh, or cry, or live, or die, there is a strange peacefulness beyond rest, beyond simple death. There is nothing left to lose, nothing left to gain, no one left to worry about. The universe just gives a simple sigh, and cries its last tear, which shimmers, the final star of hope in a void of silence, and then… it is gone.
She was floating in the silence, and could stay there forever.
Peace. Be still. Rest now, child, for everything you ever loved is dead, and there is no need to weep anymore.
"You don't believe that, Serenity."
The voice was familiar, yet entirely out of place in this scene.
Go away. I want to sleep.
"No you don't, Serenity."
But I'm dead.
"You are not dead. Not yet. And I hope you will stay alive."
Why?
"Because I will cry if you die."
Oh. Please, don't do that.
"If you don't want me to cry, you must stay alive."
Then I will stay alive.
"Good."
Usagi's eyes focused slowly on what was in front of her, and she felt her tattered, bloodied lips curve up into a smile.
"Inanna?"
The woman floating in front of her was tall, taller than Setsuna or Haruka, taller even than Galaxia. Long, carnelian red hair fanned around her naked body, which glowed with a strange, beautiful light. Golden eyes shone into hers, and her full lips smiled gently.
"Yes, Serenity."
"Oh!" she sighed, then coughed on a trickle of blood. "You are so… beautiful. Why… did you… want to look like… me?"
"Poor child," Inanna murmured. "How can you understand how much I hated this form, the form of a murderess?"
"Iie, Inanna. It is just the form of… a mother."
The Star reached out with her long-fingered hands, and cupped Usagi's face.
"You are in such pain, all to help me. Such a good Sailor Scout. Such a good friend. You're mother would be so very proud."
Usagi's smile grew, though her eyes felt tired. "Good."
She looked past Inanna, her brow furrowing slightly in confusion. She and the Star, and beyond them all her friends, floated in a sort of golden, glowing sphere. Outside the Abyss raged, battering the delicate surface of the bubble, without effect.
"How…?"
Inanna raised her eyes up, and grimaced. "It is not so very powerful as it believes. Don't worry about it."
"And… everyone is safe?" Usagi looked at all her Senshi, all the Shitennou, and Mamoru's dear face. "You? You're safe?"
"Yes, Serenity. I'm… I'm fine."
It looked strange for Inanna, wearing not the face of a Princess, but the face of a Star, to be crying.
"Don't," Usagi sighed, lifting a hand to touch that beautiful face. She saw her fingers, mangled meat and visible bone, and let them fall back to her side. She could not touch something so lovely with such bloody ugliness. She had no strength to try and raise her other hand. "Don't cry, Inanna. It will all be okay."
"Yes, it will."
Something in her eyes looked familiar. There was strength, and wistfulness, and protectiveness, just as Queen Serenity had looked right before…
"Iie," Usagi whispered. "Inanna, don't be sad. I am going… to save you! I will protect you! I… I promised you… Oh, don't go away…"
"Now you're being silly," the Star murmured, laughing just a little bit. "Why should you die for me, when I have been dead for so very long?"
"Don't go. Oh, don't go."
Usagi wept shamelessly, her tears stinging the cuts on her face, her grief shattering her heart anew. Inanna cried also, stroking her face with gentle fingers.
"No, Serenity. Don't cry for me. What kind of mother would I be if I let you die?"
"But why should you die for me? I promised you…"
"You promised to go with me into the Abyss. You promised to hold my hand. You promised to forgive me. You promised to love me." Inanna kissed her forehead. "You have kept every promise, Serenity, and I need you to know that I will always love you, too. But now I'm going somewhere you cannot follow."
"Please…"
Inanna's chin trembled until she had to bite her lip. Alabaster tears rolled down her face, falling onto Usagi's ruined body. They seared her flesh in a rapturous pain, but she could not look away from the eyes of the Star.
"I am so very weak, Serenity," Inanna whispered. "Don't ask me to stay anymore, or I might. And then you, and all your friends, and your world, and everything in this universe, will fall prey to the Abyss. You do not need to stay with me. The balance is restored, and as soon as the Abyss truly has a hold of me again, it cannot maintain the hole into your world. As I die it will close, and the world you love so much will be safe again."
Usagi shook her head slowly. "What will happen to you?"
"I… I will be with my children. I will get to hear Mehrdad speaking to me. I will hear Kaspar arguing with his brother, and Assim laughing. And I will hear Taraneh sing again."
"You don't know that. You don't know what is going to happen, do you?"
Inanna sighed. "No, I don't. But… but I believe it, because I want to believe it, and that is all that matters."
"Isn't there a way?" Usagi reached out blindly, no longer caring if she smeared Inanna with her blood. Her arms went around the other woman, pulling her close. "Isn't there a way… I don't have to fail you?"
"You shouldn't listen to the Abyss so much, Serenity. You are not a failure. You will be an amazing Queen someday, and a wonderful mother. But please, let me beg of you one more promise."
"Anything," Usagi whispered into her shoulder.
"When you sing to your daughter at night, or tell her a story, remember how much I truly, truly loved my children, and tell her so. Remember us to the next generation."
"I promise, I promise," she moaned. "Oh, don't go. I don't know enough about you! We just finally began to understand each other! How can you leave me now?"
"Dear Serenity. So wise, but so very young. Don't you know? Everything that lives—"
"Must die," Usagi finished. "I know."
"But everything that dies will always live on in the hearts of those who remember them. Even if you don't know that you remember something, you still let us breathe in your beating heart. In the very back of your mind, as you look at the darkness in the sky where a star once sang, and planets once danced, even if you don't know our names, you will know my children and I lived! And that is all I ask."
Inanna stroked her back tenderly. "So, you see, I will never really be gone. Neither will my children, or your mother, or even those caught in the Abyss. Live for us, and know that we live again in the laughter of your daughter."
"But I will never see you again!"
"No," Inanna admitted. "No, you won't. But… that is just another part of life. It is something you must accept as you grow older."
"I don't want to grow older! I don't want to be a great Queen, if it means that I will never—"
Usagi stopped short, almost choking on the words. They changed nothing. She would grow older, and become a Queen, and learn to live with this pain, and so many others. Because the universe did not care if you were young and hopeful. It took everything in the end, until all that was left were the bittersweet memories of a life rich with both joy and pain. These you handed to your children, with a soft prayer for their strength to face the bitter and the sweet, before you closed your eyes and shattered the safety of their innocence.
"See? You're already learning," Inanna teased.
"I hate learning."
"And yet you are still a child."
The Star laughed, and Usagi gasped against the breaking of her heart.
"Now kiss me goodbye, Serenity, and let me go. It's time to save your friends, and your love."
"Inanna…"
"Please, Serenity. For me. And for your daughter."
Usagi slowly nodded. "Hai. For you both. For you all."
Inanna pulled back just enough to look Usagi in the eye. Then she leaned forward, and gently kissed her on the lips. Usagi jerked, almost screaming as blinding heat raced through her body. Then she relaxed, her eyes closing, and sighed as sweetly as the universe as it died.
Yet when Inanna let her go, she had never felt more alive.
A glance down showed her body, fully restored, and clad in the white silk gown of the Moon Princess. Her hair swished by in the strange weightlessness of the sphere, the same gold as Inanna's eyes. She was whole, in a form more powerful than even Eternal Sailor Moon, and filled with a bitter joy and fierce sadness not entirely her own.
"Are you ready?" Inanna asked her.
"Iie."
Inanna only laughed. "Yes, you are. Now listen to me. Wake your friends as fast as you can, then head straight through the opening to your home. You only have as long as it takes the Abyss to completely devour me to get away. That won't be long."
"How can you be so calm?" Princess Serenity asked, her voice awed.
"I miss them so much," Inanna whispered, smiling. "Even a remote possibility to see them again, and maybe to find a little peace… Oh, I'm so tired."
"Hai. It's time you rest."
Serenity turned towards her friends floating so close by She focused first on Mamoru's face, pale as death and equally motionless.
"Mamo-chan," she called. "Mamo-chan! Wake up!"
His lashes flickered fitfully, as though disturbed by some dream.
"Wake up!" Usagi cried. "ENDYMION!"
His body shimmered, ruined tuxedo giving way to black and silver armor, and a crimson lined silk cape. Something blue shone on his forehead. Blue eyes opened wide, and he looked at her with complete comprehension.
"Usako," he whispered. "SERENITY!"
"The others!" Inanna shouted. "Hurry, Serenity! The Abyss does not want any of you to escape! We can't let it figure out what we plan to do!"
"Mercury!" the teenager shouted, taking on the tone of Neo-Queen Serenity. "Venus! Mars! Jupiter! Saturn! Uranus! Neptune! Pluto! Hear your Queen! Do as I command! Wake up!"
Nine women jerked, eyes flying open. Their tiaras disappeared, baring their brilliantly glowing planet symbols. Beams of light, the colors of the Senshi's aura's, flared out, connecting them in a radiant ring.
"What?" Inanna cried out in surprise. "What is this, Serenity?"
The reincarnated Princess did not answer, merely looking to her Prince. Endymion raised his own voice, tone stern and noble.
"Kunzite! Jadeite! Nephrite! Zoisite! To your King!"
The men disappeared in a flash of blue light, reappearing in the silver and blue armor of the Generals of Terra's army. A silver character, ancient and lost with the Silver Millennium and Earth's great kingdom, appeared on Kunzite's forehead. Gold etched across Jadeite's brow, bronze on Nephrite's, and dark topaz on Zoisite's. Their light joined the Senshi's, reinforcing the circle of power.
"Serenity!" Inanna looked from one glowing guardian to another. "What are you doing?"
"What my grandmother knew we must always do," the Princess said. "Fighting the darkness the only way we can. With light inextinguishable."
The Star frowned, then nodded. "Yes. I believe you can do what even a Star could not."
"Oh, Inanna," Princess Serenity sighed. "You shouldn't listen to the Abyss so much. You are not a failure. You were a good mother, and a good friend. Now give me your hand."
Inanna looked at her uncertainly. "Why?"
"I can't leave you here."
"You can't take me back with you, darling."
"I know. But we can take you where you want to be."
"How?"
"Trust me." Serenity held out her hand.
Inanna hesitated for only a moment, then took her hand. "You can take me to my children? What do I have to do?"
"What are you willing to do?"
"Anything!"
Serenity smiled and blinked back the tears. "It won't be very hard. Just… believe in me."
She looked around at all her Senshi, their light reaching almost a blinding level. Then she looked at Endymion, who stared into her eyes with pained understanding. He could not guess what she had planned, but he knew it would hurt her. That was all he needed to know.
I love you. I love you all, so very much… She pulled Inanna once more into her embrace. So very, very much. Mother said love is our greatest strength, and giving those we love what they want, at our own sacrifice, is our greatest gift. So why does it hurt so much…to let go?
"Inanna," Serenity whispered in her ear, safe in the love of her friends, "trust me. Let go."
Inanna gave that sweet sigh, her last tear falling from her lashes into Serenity's hair. Her fingers clenched on Serenity's shoulders, and she let go.
The golden sphere burst like a soap bubble. The Abyss roared its triumph, racing towards them, only to be buffeted back by the burn of the Senshi's light.
"NO! WHAT ARE YOU DOING? THEY ARE OURS! OUR BLOOD! OUR CHILDREN!"
Serenity did not look, did not react. She locked her arms around Inanna, shaking, and calling up the power of the Silver Millennium, and all the love in her soul.
Why is it, the more we love, the more we suffer? Mama, I need you now. Hold my hand. I can't do this alone.
But there was no answer. Queen Serenity was gone, so far away she could not hear the plea of her only daughter, her dearest love. The Princess had to become the Queen she did not want to be, the child the woman she was not ready to be. Just one act of merciful love…
Oh, gods, help me!
"I'll love you forever," she whispered in Inanna's ear.
"I know. And I'm sorry."
The Silver Imperium Crystal. She could see it in her mind, nestled in her mother's hand as the Queen showed it to an excited Princess. She did not need to hold it now. The power was in her heart, beating against Inanna's.
"Remember what I tell you now, little princess. Someday, you will need it. There are no words, no attacks to bring this power. Only your own will."
Her heart screamed out in anguished love. A single, tiny sliver of silver starlight slipped free of her bosom, only to pierce Inanna's chest. The Star gasped, her whole body growing ridged and trembling with power. The glow of her beautiful eyes and lovely skin turned to white. Her hair turned to pure light.
"Serenity!" she whispered, voice rapturous. "Thank you! Remember! The next generation! Your daughter, and my—"
Crystalline lances of silver light exploded out of her body. She slowly turned as she floated out of Serenity's embrace, as though to prove to the watching Abyss she was beyond its grasp forevermore. Then the power of the Queen of the Moon ripped through her body, shredding every fiber, every atom, until the Star Inanna was no more.
"NO!"
The Abyss' screams of fury were deafening. The Senshi and Shitennou moved closer together until they could hold each other's hands, solidifying the protection around their future King and Queen. Panicked looks were thrown to the Abyss as its rage grew to unimaginable bounds.
"YOU DARE! YOU DARE TO TAKE AWAY OUR RIGHTFUL PREY! WE SHALL EAT YOUR LOVER BEFORE YOUR OWN EYES!"
"Serenity!"
Her whole body shook with sobs. "Oh, gods! Where are you? I need you now!"
"Serenity!"
"How can you abandon me?"
"Serenity!"
"COME BACK TO ME!"
Endymion pulled her against him, his embrace crushing within his armor. "Serenity! We have to go!"
"She's gone!" Serenity wailed. "She's dead!"
"Hai! But we are alive, and she wanted it that way. Serenity!" He tipped her face up. "It's time to go home!"
"Princess! Prince!" Venus shouted. "The Abyss! It's breaking through!"
Princess Serenity looked at her friends blindly for a moment, then slowly shook her head. "Home."
"YOUR HOME IS WITH US NOW! YOU WILL TAKE HER PLACE, TREACHEROUS BRAT OF A TRAITOR LINE!"
A light sprang into Serenity's eyes, wrath surpassing even the Abyss.
"Silence!"
"YOU DARE TO SPEAK SO TO US!"
"Enough from you! I tire of your lies!"
"WE WILL RIP YOU—"
"Let's get out of here!" Mar shouted. "Before they come up with more creative ways to kill us!"
"There!" Serenity pointed through the swirls of darkness. "That way!"
"Are you sure?" Kunzite asked.
"Kunzite!" Endymion snapped. "Do as she says!"
"And no one die!" Serenity finished.
The experience was something like a Sailor Teleport, though slower and more ponderous. The Abyss lashed out at them from all sides, sometimes driving them back a step, sometimes knocking them off their path. But Serenity kept them moving in the direction where she felt Earth and the White Moon calling them home.
"THEY ARE OUR CHILDREN!" the Abyss shrieked. "WE WILL NOT LET THE WHITE MOON TAKE THEM FROM US AGAIN!"
"What are they talking about?" Uranus called
"Don't listen!" Serenity cried. "Listen only to me! Keep going forward!"
"SHE LIES TO YOU ALL!" the voices of their ancestors snarled. "HER KINGDOM IS BUILT ON LIES!"
"Oh, shut up!" Neptune snapped.
"There!"
Everyone followed Zoisite's excited eyes. In the roiling darkness, there was a tiny pinpoint of light.
"GO!" Serenity shouted. "GOGOGOGOGO!"
"We're going!" Jupiter screamed.
The ripping of the fabric between Earth and the Abyss was a shared agony through all their bodies. Together they tumbled back onto Earth.
"Ah!"
There was a crush of bodies, several cries of pain, and some swearing from the men and Uranus. Serenity lay face down on the asphalt of an Earthly alley, trying to breathe as someone's elbow dug into her ribs. Then Mercury toppled off her, landing at her side on the ground.
"Are you alright?" the blue-haired Senshi whispered.
Serenity lifted her head, looking around. Eight Senshi, four Shitennou, and one beautiful Tuxedo Mask… All whole and unharmed.
"Oh, good. None of you died."
Blessed oblivion took her away.