Sailor Moon Aeons.
Book 2: Rebirth.
Act 13: The Return.
Episode 147: New old foes.

By Razor Knight
Last update: July 6, 2017

Sailor Venus was shocked. How could that monster be so strong? She clutched her bleeding arm and glared at it. "I will not let you win, Eidol!"

The creature, Eidol, laughed, its lizard-like fangs showing. "Foolish girl. I have captured the rest of the Senshi easily, what makes you think you'll defeat me?"

"You caught them all off-guard, but I was ready for you, thanks to Aiko's warning. I admit you are one sneaky freak, but don't think you'll be able to use your shadowy tricks against the goddess of light!"

"I will defeat you, Venus, and then- And then I- Uh-"

Venus sighed. "Cut!"

'Eidol' looked at her apologetically. "Sorry, Lady Venus, I will not mess up again."

"Let's take a five minutes break. Read that scene again, Kairel, and we'll give it another try."

She smiled as the youma walked out of the set. She had been a bit surprised when the studio agreed to let her direct this movie, but after seeing who wrote the script, it was clear why. It was amusing to see Usagi still used her pen name and not her real name, even though all her fans knew 'Susuki Nagito' was her. Maybe, like with Sailor Moon, she had grown used to that 'mask.'

It was also surprising to be in the same set with a youma. He was a good actor, but most fight scenes put him on edge. Most likely intimidated by having to fight an actual Senshi, even if it was not a real fight.

Three years had passed since the Darklings were defeated. Minako was almost thirty now, most of her friends were. Her daughter Hikaru was six and already able to generate light, and Hisako was eight and surprisingly close to a first level Senshi power-wise. Ami and Terry's son, Takamaru, was only two years old, but she was sure he would start using either (or both?) of his parents' elements in a few years.

She knew that, if they had kept their identities secret, it would have been hard to hide their nature for much longer. All the Senshi looked like they were in their late teens, and she had seen some people be weirded out by her looks.

Youma had adapted to living amongst humans, even though many still disguised themselves. Kairel used his true form while filming, but the rest of the cast thought that was the disguise. Hidden in plain sight, so to speak. Mankind had a surprisingly mild reaction to the news that youma were amongst them, and while there were those who weren't okay with the idea, the fact they had helped mankind many times in the past was enough for the 'conspiracy' theories not catching on.

She heard screams outside and sighed. While no major threat had appeared in three years, weak aliens an other creeps kept on showing up. It gave them a chance to flex their muscles, if only briefly.

Minako appeared outside and couldn't help but gasp. There was an Omega there, wrecking a jewelry store. "Damn it, Onara again?"

The Omega looked at her. "Optional target found. Primary mission compromised. Elimination of optional target required." It rose its hand and sent a flame blast her way.

Venus dodged its attack easily, but knew this was bad. The area was crowded, she couldn't let it keep attacking. She summoned her talisman, and it punched through the ground. Like the other Senshi, she needed no words or movement to use her skills. Just thinking the name of the skill was enough. Venus Chain Swarm.

The creature saw chains coming out of the ground, and was ensnared by them in a blink. Then the chains lit up with light mana, and the Omega exploded.

"That was almost too easy." What was Onara thinking, sending Omega to fight them? It finally hit her, the Omega had called her an 'optional target.' Did it mean it was looking for one of her friends, or- She would have to ask someone else about that.

Looking to the side, she saw Kairel standing there, staring at her. "Oh, good timing, I was about to go back in. I have some Senshi business to deal with, so tell the rest of the crew we're taking a break. I'll give the studio a call later."

"Will do, Lady Venus."

"... And please stop calling me that. Call me Minako. Heck, call me by my last name if you want."

"Right. Lady Aino it is, then."

Minako let out a long sigh. Apparently, one could not teach an old youma new tricks.

Ky'ma looked at the three men. They were aiming their guns at her, which was amusing. She hadn't been slacking off for the last few years, or even before that, she had asked Terry to help her be good at fighting. While she could easily copy someone and use their fighting skill, those skills were gone as soon as she returned to normal, and her normal form (which to her was both her 'catgirl' disguise and her original form,) was quite unskilled. And she had learnt a lot about melee combat, along with some basic mana manipulation, so she was quite out of these thugs' league.

"You think you can stop us, bitch? You ain't no Guardian!"

The 'catgirl' laughed, turning back to her real form. "I know I will never be as powerful as those three, but to deal with petty criminals, I'm more than enough."

Her foes shot, bullets passing right through her. It was an advantage she had over all the other mages in the city. Her true form was pure energy, and thus physical attacks were useless against her in that form. It was also why she usually dropped her disguise to fight.

"What the fuck are you?"

"Really? I'm bored of telling every nobody I beat what I am. I'm an alien."

"Damn, this city is full of freaks."

Ky'ma sighed. "There we go, another group of morons calling me a freak." The men shot at her again, and she groaned. "Okay, let me take care of your toys before you hurt someone with them."

The men saw her shoot three thin, bluish beams, which hit their weapons, freezing them in their hands. "How the hell-"

"Magic. We 'freaks' are known for using that to take care of scum." Before the men said anything else, an Omega appeared near them. Ky'ma frowned. She had seen one of those, years ago, and it took only Naru - who didn't even bother to transform - to defeat it. "Hmm... Guess it's time for you boys to take a nap." She zapped the three unconscious and turned to the creature. It hadn't noticed her, but she wanted to know what it was doing in a mall. "Hey, Robocop!"

The Omega turned to her for a second, apparently unsure how to react to her presence. "Entity identified as Ky'ma. Minor threat to mission. Ignoring."

"Minor threat?" Ky'ma snarled before rushing forwards, her body becoming metallic as her arms turned into blades. She spun and neatly cut the creature in three before smirking. "There's your minor threat."

"Those things are annoying, huh?"

The shapeshifter looked to the side, and saw Phase walking in. "Don't they always try to find Senshi?"

"They seem to be looking for something else. Minako fought one a few hours ago."

"So, why didn't you help me?"

"Because I was sure you wouldn't need it. I wanted to see how good the mighty Mirage was in a real fight."

Ky'ma cringed at that nickname. She never wanted nor needed a 'hero' name, but her fans had still managed to give her one. "So, maybe you've got another war coming."

"Maybe we'll finally find Onara's base and convince him to stop being an asshole. Or blast him to atoms. Either works for me."

Ami looked at the pile of smoking goo that had been an Omega a minute earlier. "Damn it..."

Aiko appeared near her. "Mom, what's wrong?"

"That thing... I tried to control it, to access its memory and see if I could locate Onara's base that way. It exploded on me."

"That's bad, they got smarter."

"It's also the first time something I'm hacking explodes before I can sever the link. I learnt something today, I shouldn't let that happen again, unless I'm in the mood for a headache."

To say Rei's life had changed a lot lately would have been a big understatement. Unlike most of her friends, she had not settled for a career path. She had been a priestess for most of her life, but after her rage destroyed what she had once called home, she couldn't go back, she didn't want to. If there really were higher powers watching over them, she wasn't sure she wanted to 'work' for them. It was quite hard for her to work for someone she didn't respect.

She had tried several jobs to keep her mind off what had happened, but even though job offers were plentiful, it was clear most of them were laced with ulterior motives. She knew next to nothing about most of the fields she had seen offers for. In short, most of these places didn't want her for her skills, they just wanted the free publicity a Senshi brought along.

She had been training Hisako on how to use magic, and had recently started teaching Hikaru, Minako's daughter. Thanks to this, she had figured something out about Senshi - they could become very good at manipulating mana, even before being able to use their Senshi forms. Or perhaps it was what Ami had guessed after she told her about it. Unlike them, these young magicians had learnt how to use magic first, instead of being thrown into a war with no actual mentors to learn from. It wasn't that the new generation was fast, but that her group had been taught things backwards.

"Wish I could be a Senshi already."

Rei looked at Hikaru. "When you're ready for it, you will become one."

"Wouldn't you just give me one of those wands..."

"Those wands were something the Mooncats used because we weren't ready. Looking back, it was quite a risky move, but luck was on our side."

Aiko appeared near them. "Hi, sorry to interrupt, but it seems peace may be over. We're gathering at the tower. An old foe of us is back in town."

"Onara?"

"Yes. Minako killed an Omega, so did Kim... Mako gave her customers a free show, too. But none of those Omega were out to attack us."

"That is new," Rei noted. "Any idea what they're up to?"

"No, but we're trying to figure it out."

Rei turned to the two young girls. "We'll continue training another time."

Aiko saw the two girls pout and smiled. "Maybe I can help with that."

"But we might need you at-" Rei caught herself before saying any more, and sighed. "Sorry, I forgot you can grab 'multitasking' and run away with it."

Aiko chuckled at that. "I am actually happy you guys can forget that, it means I'm human enough to make it hard to remember."

"True. Anyhow, I guess I'll see you there."

Hikaru looked at Aiko as Rei left. She didn't see her often, but was curious about something. "Uh, is it true that you were a computer before?"

"Not exactly. I was created as a computer program, an artificial intelligence for the secret base the Senshi had in the past."

"Wow. I thought Hisa was joking."

Aiko smiled. "I didn't become human overnight, and there's still people out there who think I don't deserve that 'title.'"

"They're stupid, then." Hikaru said.

"I agree," Hisako said.

"Thanks. Now, let's see if I can help you become great mages. The Senshi in you should wake up along the way."

Usagi couldn't remember the last time she had seen Ami so upset. "Ami, it's okay, we-"

"It's not. I hate not having any idea what the enemy is after."

Terry saw Usagi fall silent. "We can't really stop them from finding what they're looking for if we don't know what it is."

"Maybe we should let them run and follow them," Minako said.

"Onara got smarter," Mako said, "I thought about letting the one I fought go, but it exploded instead of teleporting away."

Ami sighed. "I took a much direct approach, and that Omega also exploded before I could access its data."

"So then, what can we do? We fool around until Setsuna points us in the right direction?" Haruka asked.

"Unfortunately, we can't afford to use mom's old methods."

Usagi saw the younger Pluto was there. "Saki, what-"

"There are things you have to find out on your own, but what the enemy is after... Knowing what that is will let you win the next war."

"So, what are they after?"

Younger Pluto looked at Usagi. "I know at least one of you knows the name Cygale."

A/N: This book has, right now, three different endings planned. When Usagi said destiny isn't set in stone, she may have been looking at my planning files.