A soft sheet of wet snow stuck together well as snowballs cut through the cold wintry air. It was winter vacation in Tokyo, Japan. Students of all ages filled the streets as they moved from one place to another, sometimes in large groups, sometimes individually. The latter was the case of one 14 year old girl by the name of Seino Kaen. She had raven-black hair that was cropped shorter than an Olympic medalist friend of her mother's. Though, you would have a hard time telling that her hair was so dark. With the wet snowfall clinging to everything, her hair was as white as a good friend of her's. For three days now the snow had been falling. The streets were thick with the crunching and clinging white mess. Of course, so were the parks. The parks were abundant with children and teenagers alike, sledding and having snowball fights.
On this snowy day, Kaen was on her way home from her white-haired friend's house. Okino Rikka was her name. She had invited Kaen over to she wouldn't have to be home for so long with her sister's friends. This form of pity hadn't set well with Kaen, and soon she left all together after Rikka's other friends had come over. Kaen preferred loneliness over an over-abundance of giggling 14-year-old girls.
Kaen trudged through the snow as she climbed the steps to her family's temple, where her mother was a priestess and had a calligraphy class. No sooner had she reached the top of the stairs that a snowball hit her in the center of her forehead. She didn't need to wipe the snow from her eyes to know who had thrown the mis-guided snowball.
"Oh, I'm so sorry!" cried the shocked voice of Okino Aisu, the most oblivious girl in Juuban High School. Kaen wiped the snow away and looked at the group. It was still hard for her to believe that her sister had so many friends. Granted, all of them she had grown up with since birth and they were all the children of their mother's best friends, but none of them went to her school. "I'm so, so sorry!" Aisu apologized as she ran over to Kaen. She lifted up her snowy scarf and shook off most of the snow before trying to wipe Kaen's forehead. Kaen brushed the scarf away.
"It is okay!" Kaen said. "Don't worry!"
"I was aiming for Naien!" Aisu said. "Oh, I'm so sorry!"
"It isn't like I haven't been hit by a snowball before!" Kaen said as she walked away quickly. She reached the door to her room and practically jumped in, sliding the door closed behind her. She sighed as she kicked off her boots and slid out of her coat. "She was aiming for Naien," she said to herself. "Of course. Everything that gets thrown at her lands on me." She let herself fall on her bed with a weary plop. In her mind she looked over the people who had been standing in the snow. " Jino Reikon and Seirei," she muttered, "Kinpa's brother and sister. Kigino Tenka, Hana's sister. Okino Aisu and Kogarashi, Rikka's sister and brother. Seino Naien, my sister..." Then she sat up with a start. "Chibi Usa and Hotaru!" Without putting her snow boots back on, Kaen flew out of her room and tackled a pink-haired rabbit in the snow. "Chibi Usa-san!" Kaen shouted happily. She looked up and saw that she had pulled another girl in. "Hotaru-san!"
"Hello Kaen," Chibi Usa said from the snow. Kaen rolled off, allowing the two other girls to pick themselves up. "I was wondering if you had seen us."
"Kousagi didn't say you were back!" Kaen said.
"Kousagi doesn't know," Chibi Usa said. "No one knew we were coming back. It is a surprise."
"It might be better, though, if my family were even here," Hotaru said.
"Don't worry Hotaru-chan," Chibi Usa said. "They'll come back before school begins again." Hotaru smiled and wiped the snow from her glasses. Chibi Usa was doing the same.
"Kousagi will be so happy to see you!" Kaen said as she stood. "She's been going out of her mind!"
"How come?" Chibi Usa asked. "Surely it can't be because we've been away."
"She and Kinpa have been complaining about nightmares where you two are in danger," Reikon said as he patted together another snowball.
"Come to think of it, so had Rikka," Kogarashi said.
"So has Hana," Tenka said, "But her nightmares have involved a couple of us, too."
"Kaen, haven't you been having nightmares, too?" Naien asked. Kaen scoffed.
"Nightmares come standard in this family," she said sourly. Chibi Usa sighed, knowing that with Rei's psychic abilities probably passed on to Naien and Kaen. "But Chibi Usa-san, Hotaru-san, it is really nice to see you again. I'd better go inside, thought. I sort of jumped out here without necessities." She laughed nervously and made her way back to her room, her black socks now plastered in white. The others laughed, some loudly, some quietly. Feeling rather embarrassed, Kaen jumped inside and closed the door in a hurry.
"There is an awful lot of snow here," Hanshi said as he stood in the snow-covered street outside the airport. Shizuka and Wakai were coming up behind him. "We don't normally get this much, do we?"
"No," Shizuka said. "It is almost as if we had never left Michigan."
"Is Kainashi out here with you?" Michiru called from the door. The three of them turned to her.
"No," Wakai said. "She was with you the last time we saw her."
"I last saw her with Haruka-san," Hanshi said. Michiru hung her head and sighed.
"That girl can't stay by us for a minute!" she said in a frustrated tone.
"Who can't?" Kainashi said from behind. Michiru turned to the tall girl and sighed.
"Where have you been?" Michiru asked.
"I was looking for Haruka," she said. "I thought she'd be with you."
"She is out looking for you!" Michiru said.
"No," Wakai said. "She's up there." He pointed to the roof of the airport, where their white-haired companion stood.
Michiru and Kainashi ran out to see. Michiru screamed. "Haruka!" she shouted. "What in the world are you doing up there?" She didn't reply, but rather walked away from the edge, disappearing.
"I'll get up there quick," Shizuka said as she jumped on top of a nearby car. Then she jumped to a design on the wall of the airport that stuck out. From there she leapt to the roof. She landed on the ledge and almost lost her balance, but a hand grabbed her wrist, pulling her back up. Shizuka looked up a saw Haruka. "Haruka-san, what are you doing up here?" she asked. Haruka smirked and, with a firm hold on Shizuka's wrist, threw her across the roof. Shizuka screamed, skidding hard to a stop. "What are you doing?" she screamed.
Again, Haruka smirked. She slowly approached Shizuka, her sailor uniform appearing without command. Slightly panicking, Shizuka held up her small glass sphere and shouted, "Neptune Neo Power, Make-Up!" The sphere left her hand and spun around her as she held her arms out straight to either side. Energy that took on the appearance of water surrounded her at her feet, flying up and hiding her. The water clung to her body, changing her winter coat and skirt into her sailor uniform. The sphere turned into the Deep Aqua Mirror. Shizuka, now Neo Sailor Neptune, grabbed it and held it in front of her. As she did, Sailor Uranus' World Shaking attack slammed into her, throwing her farther across the roof. "Sailor Uranus!" she shouted pleadingly. "Please stop!"
"Why should I?" Sailor Uranus asked, summoning another attack. Before she released it, another World Shaking attack hit her. Neptune looked to see another Sailor Uranus standing but feet away.
"Neptune, back away!" the second Sailor Uranus shouted. She ran at the first Uranus and kicked as she got up. "All right, start talking!" Uranus shouted to the one on the ground, "Who are you?"
The first looked up at the second with an evil grin. "World Shaking!" the first shouted. She drove her fist into the stomach of the first, releasing the attack then and there. The second Uranus flew high into the air. The first then jumped up, kicking the second hard. The second landed roughly, causing the whole roof to quake. Screams of pedestrians filled the air, drowning out Neptune's own scream.
The first Sailor Uranus landed gently a few feet from the second. The second got up wearily as the first approached. The second shouted in rage as she charged at the first, landing blow after blow form boot fist and foot. The first fought back, landing just as many blows and causing equal damage. After several minutes, the two broke away. Both were equally weary. "Neptune, attack her now that she's weak!" one shouted, pointing at the other.
"No Neptune!" the other shouted. "She's the imposter! Attack her!"
Neptune clutched the mirror in one hand as the other tightened into a fist. A ball of blue, water-like energy gathered into it. Neptune looked between the two, not sure of which was the real and which wasn't. They had moved too much in the hand-to-hand combat, switching places and simply going too fast for Neptune to keep them straight. "I..." she said tentatively, " I don't know who is who!"
"Shizuka!" shouted a voice. "Don't do it yet!"
"Kainashi?" Neptune whispered as a faint glowing approached the two Uranus' from behind. The glow tackled the Uranus on the right, causing them both to slide on the snow-covered roof.
"Get that one!" Kainashi shouted as she pointed to the still-standing Uranus. She and the tackled Uranus covered their heads as Neptune lifted the attack.
"Neptune Crushing Tsunami!" Neptune shouted, releasing the ball of energy at the standing Uranus. The ball turned into a tidal wave that swallowed her whole. The water began to disappear as the glow around Kainashi increased. The water was completely gone now, but the fake Sailor Uranus still stood.
"You little Sailor Bakas think you are so clever," the fake Uranus said in a growling voice as she began to deform. The uniform melted away as a snowy woman in a silver gown appeared. "You may have seen through the trick, but you don't have the strength to defeat me."
"Or so you think," Neptune said as she got into a defensive position. She never took her eyes from the snowy woman. "Crushing Tsunami!" Neptune released another attack at the woman, but this time it did nothing. It disappeared before it even touched her.
The woman chuckled as she sent icicles at Neptune. Neptune dodged most of them, but she couldn't avoid the sone that tore straight through her left leg. She screamed in agony as she fell. "Not so tough now, are you?" the woman said.
In a shaking voice, Neptune asked, "Who are you?"
The woman smiled. "I am Isical," the woman said. "I am the faithful servant to Lady Titania. I do believe you have already met." The woman turned to Uranus and Kainashi, but neither were there. Rather, Tenou Haruka was unconscious in the snow and Kainashi was nowhere to be found. "Where did that brat go?" Isical asked.
"I'm right here!" shouted the voice of Kainashi. Standing where the real Sailor Uranus had first appeared was a sailor senshi and an armor-clad knight. The sailor senshi was adorned in metallic blue and yellow. The sailor suit and gloves were metallic grey but the suit was missing everything below the bust. The sign of Uranus blazed in yellow on her forehead and in her hands was the Space Sword. The knight's armor was metallic blue like the senshi. He had a yellow cape and on his forehead blazed the sign of Uranus in yellow, just like the senshi. A mask was wrapped around his eyes that reminded Shizuka of the masked hero Zorro.
"You are you?" Isical asked.
"We are the new warriors of sky and space!" the senshi and knight replied in unison.
"I am Neo Sailor Uranus and I call my powers from space!" the senshi called.
"I am Uranus Knight and I call my powers from the sky!" the knight shouted.
"Together, we are protected by Uranus!" they ended together, posing in offensive positions. Isical smirked and sent her icicles as the two. Uranus Knight brought his cape around and used it to shield himself and Neo Uranus from the attack. When he whipped it back, Neo Uranus was gone. She was running around to the opposite side of Isical from Neptune. She stopped and held the sword in place.
Uranus Knight held one arm high and the other out to the side. "Wind!" As he shouted this word, Uranus Knight brought his arms together. "Call!" White and gold bands appeared around his arms, keeping them together. "Strike!" He pulled his arms apart, sending the broken bands into the air. They curved around and flew at Isical. They struck her hard, the curved pieces of light stabbing her and sticking in place. Isical screamed in pain as the blades made minor explosions all over her body.
Neo Uranus pointed the Space Sword at Isical. The sword, which was curved like an Arabian sword, began to straighten out. It became longer and thinner, but the three jewels remained the same. "Uranus!" The sword began to glow. "Spacial!" She swung the sword up over her head and around her back. "Disruption!" The swung the sword back down, sending three blades of light at Isical. The first blade was yellow; the second was red; the third was blue. The three blades wedged themselves in Isical, each exploding in their respected color. Uranus Knight and Neo Uranus flinched when they saw that all that remained of Isical was her head and one of her arms. Those remains soon disappeared.
"Shizuka!" Uranus Knight shouted as he ran at Neptune. "Are you okay? How bad did she get you?" Uranus Knight knelt beside the very confused senshi of water.
"I'm... Fine," she said. "Who are you?" The knight laughed and untied the mask. "Wakai!" Neptune exclaimed. She looked over at Neo Uranus, who was helping Haruka on her feet. "Kainashi! You're a sailor senshi, too!" Neo Uranus nodded.
"I think we'd better get out of here," Uranus Knight said. "Someone is bound to come looking." He easily picked Neptune up and carried her to the edge of the roof.
"No, not that way!" Neo Uranus shouted as her uniform disappeared. It was too late. People on the street below were already taking pictures of Uranus and Neptune. Uranus Knight cursed softly as he spun around and ran to the other edge where Haruka and Kainashi waited.