For old readers of this story, please note that this chapter is not new, it is the second half of chapter 6a. New material will be covered in chapter 8 onwards.
v\v/v will denote Crystal Tokyo era Senshi journals/recording. Normal Emerald journals will be shown as usual( -#- )
Sailor Moon and associated characters/background were created by Naoko Takeuchi. No disrespect is intended in their use.
-#-
The paradox of Crystal Tokyo's peace is... well, a polite word for it would be intriguing. The city's internal peace is built upon a lie - the lie of pure conformity. And its peace from external sources is just as... 'intriguing'.
Peace through superior firepower - sometimes quite literally - seems quite out-of-step with the Crystal ethos. And yet, in the end, that's all it truly amounts to. The average serf in that pretty eyesore doesn't realise how often they've come to the edge.
Their peace-everlasting, their glorious civilisation, their wonder of the ages, their beauteous feudal throwback... what a joke! So insular, so insulated, so unaware they are. I doubt that city has gone more than ten years without at least a couple of demons trying their luck at invading it; but the average drone would never know of it because, to be quite honest with myself, they've got the best protectors in this and possibly any galaxy.
The four mighty Senshi, strong pillars without whose support the city would crumble. One godlike queen, in more than word alone she and her power IS the city. The Time Guardian, her protection drawn like a stifling, invisible cloak over the metropolis. Their Royal Guard, their army, the mortar that stops things like me seeping through the cracks.
I'm not sure where Endymion fits into the building analogy. Perhaps that brainwash-bait is the outhouse or something. Ah well, he does serve as a good distraction for the invaders who have kidnap fetishes. Just goes to show that even a fifth wheel on a unicycle has its uses.
Together, intertwined, they are the city. Not the magic minerals that compose its bones, nor the mindnumb subhumans that populate it. No. No, Venus, Mercury, Jupiter, Pluto, Mars, Serenity: they are the city. These warriors are the peace.
And yet, how can people of war 'be' the peace? Quite the conundrum.
Still, seeing peace, or a reasonable illusion of such, built upon the shoulders of those of war leaves a question hanging, one that is more a curiosity than anything else, but still nags away on quiet nights such as this one.
If these warriors were encased with all of us, as I know they were, if Pluto cannot interfere well enough to act the role, then who protected the Earth during the Great Ice? Who ensured there was still an Earth there for Serenity to enslave when she freed herself? Who?
- Journal entry, early 2600, found in the keeping of a small village of
youma in Western Australia. As to who protected the Earth during the Ice,
it seems certain that an iceball would not have been much of a prize to
any energy marauders.
-- Maybe, but... well, in the end, only Pluto knows.
-#-
In a dark, grimy alley of Tokyo, there was a gentle whuff of air as eleven creatures materialised. Three of the youma collapsed, and another two disintegrated, fatally drained from the rash dimensional teleport.
"So this is Earth," one of the still-standing youma noted, trying to forget the religious experience of being gazed on by its goddess by looking around at the dirty concrete walls that surrounded them. "This is the 'beautiful' world spoken of in the legends!?"
"Beautiful?" Emerald queried as he casually dropped his human cargo, before tearing a strip of cloth from Endymion's cape, using it to staunch the slowly congealing blood from his reopened wound. "No, not really. But one day, this place will be beautiful. And on that day, it will never be uglier. To judge a place or person by 'beauty'... ha! That way lies only delusion of the worst kind."
Another youma nodded. "Beauty is for fools. Strength and energy is all we need to create a perfect world."
Emerald grimaced. He was in too much pain to listen to youma muscle-flexing. "A perfect world is a dead world, in one way or another. It's the flaws that make life worth living." He looked around. "You all have to get out of this city. There are too many psychics in this part of the world capable of detecting your kind, you will die if you remain. In fact, if you stick around I'll kill you myself - you are complications I do not want hanging over my head."
He grunted as he picked up Endymion. "One last thing. I'm most forgetful, and to tell the truth, I am not the nicest person to be around. If I meet you again, and do not remember you, then run, or I will kill you. That's just how it is. Welcome to Earth. Here's hoping that your stay is not a short one."
He smiled, shrugged, and disappeared into the shadows.
The youma looked at each other.
"What now?" one asked.
"We grow strong off the humans' energy, of course," another replied, glancing at the collapsed youma. She paused to think about their saviour's threat, her eyes shifting to the two dustpiles of her fallen comrades. "...Somewhere else."
Queen Beryl knew how to rule, and rulers delegated. Right now, she was delegating blame.
"Why do I think you have something to do with this unforgivable intrusion, Kunzite?"
"My queen? I do not--"
"You do not what!? You do not search for my prince when he has been taken? Is that what you do not?"
Kunzite bowed to hide his anger. Beryl was in one of those moods. Many an unfortunate youma had gone to the Sleep thanks to one of 'those moods'. Of course it wasn't her fault Endymion was gone. It was never her fault. "My queen, I meant to say that I do not wish to merely stand around. Please, allow me to search for Prince Endymion as well."
The energy-being known as Metallia wasn't wasting her time with meaningless recriminations or petty blame - there'd be time for that after the Earth prince was returned to her. Endymion was important to her plans; as the Earth's prince, he held certain connections to the planet's mana, much as the Senshi did to their own worlds. With him kneeling before her, his planet was sure to follow.
Her subjects could waste their time running around like the headless chickens they were. The kidnapper was intriguingly stealthy. But she had given a small part of her power to shape the dark Prince Endymion. He was her puppet, not Beryl's, and he could not be hidden from her.
It was time to take back that which was hers.
Hino Rei walked into her temple's grounds after another school's day. It had been a pretty good one; that maths test hadn't been as bad as she'd feared, and Hinachi-sensei had called in sick, so now that history assignment wouldn't be due until tomorrow. Spending all your spare time saving the world from vicious youma was a good thing and all that, but it didn't work very well as an excuse for not completing your homework.
Usagi would laugh herself silly if she found out that she close to flunking some subjects because of senshi-ing... well, sillier anyway. With a small snort, Rei ducked into the temple's private quarters, sliding the door closed behind her. She leant against the door for a few seconds, before she realised that something was a little out of place.
Emerald looked up from the task of winding a bandage around his chest. He'd already fixed his hand and his other wounds, and attended to Endymion. After all, Mars would have been furious if he hadn't at least set the man's arm. "I hope you don't mind company, Rei. We can come back if you feel like being alone."
"What in..." Rei shook her head. It was a dream - it had to be a dream. Her gaze drifted past Emerald to the couch. "Mamoru...?" She rushed over to her unconscious boyf... former boyfriend, checking his wounds. "How did he get here? What happened to him!?"
He ducked when he should have weaved. "The Kingdom's ruler did not take my breaking into her dimension well, and it appears that her wrath can sometimes be directed towards youma and others under her command. My impromptu prison break proved to be most damaging to me and my illustrious comrade over there."
She stared at him. "Are you INSANE!? You went to the Dark Kingdom by yourself? What, do you think you're immortal? You can't just waltz into the enemy's stronghold without backup! What were you thinking? WERE you thinking?"
His lips parted in a genuine smile, and his strange eyes seemed to sparkle. It was the first time she had ever looked into his gaze and not felt uncomfortable.
"You're welcome," he said, as his smile widened into a grin. "Never lose that fire, Rei. It's... so much your soul." He finished tying off the chest bandage, carefully flexing his body to make sure it wouldn't snap easily from his enhanced strength.
She shook her head, fighting the flush on her face. "You should have taken us with you."
He blinked. "I didn't mean to steal your thunder."
"That's not it! Look at him," she pointed down to the unconscious Mamoru, "look at you! If we had of gone together, we could have got out with no-one hurt."
Emerald sighed. "Let's just say that I am not a team player, and leave it there. Never worked well in a command structure, and all that. Rei. you wanted him back. Dwelling on the woulds, coulds, or shoulds is the task of an eternity. Leave it be, and be happy that he is safe."
It was her turn to sigh. "I have to call the others. This is the best opportunity we'll have to heal Tuxedo Kamen of his dark hold."
"Ah yes. Healing." It took all his willpower not to add a sarcastic twinge to the word. He grimaced slightly as he tightened the bandage, before tying it off. Luckily, she had taken long enough to get here that he had managed to cover up all his wounds, and, more importantly, any evidence of his non-human blood. While he had long since thought of an explanation for his blood, and even for surviving such a wound, he didn't really want another reason for the girl to be suspicious of him. There seemed to be enough already.
Rei turned her communicator off, her ears aching from the shocked screech Usagi had given off when told the news. She put it away, and turned to her uninvited guest. "Now, maybe you can tell me... the portal you used to get to the Dark Kingdom. Where is it? Even with Tuxedo Kamen rescued, we have to be able to take the fight to them. Without a way to get there, we can't do anything but wait for them to attack us again and again."
"It's... not easy to explain. I didn't need to find a portal, because I don't teleport like you do. I never have. You will have to find your own way there."
"There has to be something you can--"
The Dark Energy that suffused Endymion felt the calling of its mistress. A moment later, the unconscious prince teleported out, leaving behind two people who were suddenly experiencing one of those sort of silences.
Emerald resisted the urge to slap his hand onto his forehead in a gesture of disbelief. How utterly typical. Somehow he wasn't surprised that it hadn't been that easy to steal Endymion. And to think he had been impaled to get that idiot just for this... He blinked, realising he had to watch his reactions with Mars present, and changed his expression from seething indignation to righteous anger and worry.
"We were so close..." Rei whispered to herself, forgetting that he was there. She stared at the empty bed.
"Rei-chan..." He hesitated, trying to think of something suitably sympathetic sounding. "This is bad, true. But there is always, always another day. Today, we almost had him. And tomorrow...?" Tomorrow, Endymion could burn in his own personal hell. After what he had gone through. after being run through, he had no desire to try to rescue the pretentious rose-thrower again.
She looked at him, surprised at the fire in his voice. Finally, she nodded.
"You're right. We will get him back. We will."
He considered replying, but pain had eroded his diplomatic patience. Finally, he nodded to her, turned to leave and find a place to heal.
"You're going out like that?" she pointed to him.
He looked down; his blood-soaked shirt had been tossed before he even got here - the glow of his blood was a little too attention garnering to leave it lying where the Senshi could find. Grimy trousers and scuffed shoes were all that were left of his clothes. He missed his cloak; some helpful park attendant had probably thrown it into the rubbish long ago.
"Don't worry." He looked up at her. "I have some new clothes nearby."
He walked outside, reaching the temple steps before life got that little bit worse.
A portal of dark energy opened five meters away. Two ravens, perched on a nearby prayer gate, took flight at the sight of the unnatural opening. A moment later, a man and a woman stepped out of the portal.
Emerald's eyes narrowed. The woman was a typical youma with a typical human-illusion glamour - typically boring. The man was something far more interesting. He recognised the aura: the person who spied on his battle with Endymion, the one who had left without interfering. He tried to remember what the youma loremaster had told him, and hazarded a guess. "Kunzite, I presume?"
Kunzite nodded. "And you are the person who has caused my queen a great deal of vexation. It wasn't very wise, kidnapping one of Queen Metallia's own, she is not one you should have ever crossed."
"Yes, well, I guess I'm not a very wise man." Avenues of attack and escape were calculated, as he thought of ways to ensure that he wasn't hit in the big target that was his bandaged chest. "If it worried you so, why did you not interfere in my fight?"
Kunzite raised an eyebrow, casting a glance at his silent companion.
Admitting to blackmailable material in front of a youma was a deadman's
path, no matter how much he wanted to congratulate the man on his 'rescue'
of Endymion. It was almost a pity he had to kill him, from the brief
glimpse he'd caught of the prince before Beryl sent him here, the green man
had real Dark Kingdom potential.
To avoid answering, the general looked around. "A temple, isn't it? Why did you bring him here?"
"The dark energy taint reaches to his very soul. His corporeal wounds were nothing compared to the horror of mind control. At a temple, the evil within him could be exorcised." Emerald felt a deep stab of pride at managing to keep a completely straight face during the decidedly hokey explanation.
"A pity," Kunzite noted. "For a moment there, after your foray into the Kingdom, I thought you might be different. But with a speech like that, I realise that you're just another Senshi toady, like Endymion was."
Emerald couldn't help it. He burst out laughing at the absurdity of the insult.
The two birds flapped their wings and cried out loudly, franticly.
Rei's eyes narrowed as she rushed over to open the glass pane.
Two opponents was too many.
The green energy beam had punched through the youma before Emerald had fully stopped laughing. Kunzite looked at the dustpile that had been his companion, angered at how quickly it had died.
"You are a very annoying man. I can see why Zoicite didn't like you."
Emerald shrugged. "Being disliked is hardly new for me." His eyes darted around, the lack of white in the orbs helping to slightly mask his glances. Taking on Kunzite would be stupid, especially after the energy he'd wasted on Endymion and on killing that youma just now. If he didn't rest and let his wound heal, he would be in serious trouble.
And he could sense Mars's aura coming towards them - not surprising since they were fighting on her doorstep. If she intervened, things would just get complicated. Mars probably couldn't take Kunzite on by herself, not yet, and if she was killed... Well, he still didn't know if she was right about Serenity's identity. Until he was, he couldn't afford any of the Senshi dying off.
Just teleporting away wouldn't be enough - then Mars would engage Kunzite before the general thought to leave. Action had to be taken, and taken now.
"If you want me, you have to catch me." His hands snapped up, palms outstretched as he turned his head away and screwed his eyes shut. There was a flash of blinding green light.
Kunzite cursed, blinking his eyes. When his eyesight had restored, the green-eyed man was a distant speck on the road below the temple steps. The man was either quicker than he looked, or else he'd used teleportation. The general scowled. If the man thought that teleportation would impress a Dark Kingdom general, he was sorely and foolishly mistaken.
"You don't escape that easily, green man."
Rei ran out of the temple's private quarters. That flash of light had turned a worried walk into a headlong dash. Her eyes widened when she saw Kunzite standing at the top of the temple's steps.
"You don't escape that easily, green man."
By the time the first word of her transformation phrase had passed from brain to mouth, he was gone in the flash of a teleportation effect. She blinked, cancelling her attack. Green man? The Dark Kingdom general must have followed Emerald. And if that smug idiot was half as hurt as those bandages he was wearing indicated...
She rushed forward, reaching the top of the stairs, searching for a sign of which way Kunzite had chased Emerald. Nothing, she had no idea which way to go. Her eyes trailed to a figure in the distance. The figure rapidly grew closer, reaching and then bounding up the stairs, determination apparently overriding the usually clumsy movements. Rei's thoughts of chase were momentarily forgotten at the dread of the figure's inevitable first words.
Usagi stumbled against Rei to stop her headlong flight, gasping raggedly from her marathon sprint. "Where is he? Where is he!? Rei, where's Mamo-chan?"
Great. For once, she actually had to be early! Rei cringed inside as she faced her leader, preparing for the inevitable emotional outcry when Usagi heard the news.
Beryl stared down at Endymion, who was rejuvenating in a Dark capsule. She was, it was safe to say, more than a little angry. Someone had hurt her Endymion. The dark energy would heal him in no time, true, but the fact remained.
Someone had hurt her Endymion. And she would make sure to do far, far worse to that someone.
Kunzite cursed, looking around a deserted intersection. It almost made you appreciate the Senshi. Certainly, they were annoyingly lucky young girls with penchants for ridiculous posturing and speeches, but at least they stood and fought!
His face set into a mask as he summoned a portal back to the Dark Kingdom. There was no point in staying, the man had gotten away. If he fought half as well as he ran away, then perhaps that explained how the man had beaten Endymion so handily.
One thing was certain. Beryl would not be pleased about this.
Emerald smiled, stepping out of the shadows into a forgotten sidestreet. It was endemic, it seemed, for people who chased him to bluster about how he would never get away, how they would find him, blah, blah, blah, ad nauseam. Really; he had six hundred years practice at running away. He'd always been a warrior of the shadows and when it came to avoiding overconfident lackeys like Kunzite, there simply was no effort involved.
The onerous task of freeing Endymion, while a failure, was still over. Beryl and Metallia could rage at him all they wanted; they had no way to find him - the gods knew they'd be wasting their time trying to scry for him. Finally, now that all the distractions were gone, he could get to work.
He brought his hand up, letting a soft greenish-white light glow, banishing the shadows of the small, rubbish-filled lane. Bending down, he reached behind an old bin to pick up the folded clothes he had left there before accosting Sailor Mars. With a grunt, he straightened, leaning against the bin for a moment for support.
His smile faded as he looked at the clothes. It was time to have a little talk with Sailor Moon.
"I hope that Mars was wrong, girl."
His eyes narrowed, looking at his hand as he clenched it to a fist. Green light glowed around the clenched fingers. Slowly, the energy's colour darkened, finally setting into a nauseous shade, so green that in most lights you'd swear it was black. There. One less thing for the Senshi to identify him by.
"For your sake, child, I truly do."
Makoto looked around at the darkening sky as Ami bowed goodbye to the librarian. After a minute or two of mutual silence, as they walked down the street, she turned to her blue-haired friend. "Ami, thanks for helping me with my schoolwork." She hesitated, then added, "Are you ok? You've seemed a little distracted since I met up with you. If you didn't want to help me, I'm okay with--"
Ami shook her head quickly. "Oh no, Mako-chan, it's not you." She reached into her schoolbag, and pulled out her computer. "Since we're looking for a portal to the Dark Kingdom, I've set my computer to scan for unusual energy patterns or incursions by youma. Today, right in the middle of English, it warned me of several Dark Kingdom energy signatures."
Ami managed to avoid wincing as she drew a breath to continue. Her computer had warned her by blaring out an alarm, which hadn't gone over at all well with her teacher. It had been very embarrassing. "I couldn't investigate it because of school. It's just," she paused. "I hope this isn't a new trend by the Dark Kingdom. What if they always start appearing while we're at school?"
"I guess we start cutting class then!" Makoto laughed at her joke.
Ami didn't. "...Yes. I suppose."
He looked around. A park. Yes, yes, a park was perfect. Except for the chairs and lampposts--
He calmly wrenched the nearest lamppost from the ground, heaving it into the distance. The nearby late night strollers, who had already been looking at him with suspicion, took this as a cue to scream and run away. Parkgoing in this area of town was starting to feel like a bit of a deathsport.
--Yes, except for them, the park was perfect. A wide area, with the only cover being trees - which, like all living things, gave off an aura. An important point, considering how much he would be relying on his mystical senses over the coming night.
He gritted his teeth as he lifted a bench, his wound aching at the effort. After walking with it for a short while, he dumped it. After returning, knocking out a too-brave lawnskeeper on the way, he tossed all the other lampposts and a bin or two until there were no obstructions but bushes and trees nearby.
He nodded, looking around. Yes, perfect. Now that the grunt work was out of the way...
He untied a black ribbon from his wrist, securing it over his eyes as a makeshift blindfold.
He turned around a few times, getting used to the blindfold, before he settled into a wide-legged stance. Now then, what was the tradition for a pretentious 'villain' of these times? Ah yes, a semi-rambling dissertation on how much energy was being collected for their master, and how the Senshi would 'never find me here'. Of course, that usually brought them out of the woodwork.
He thought about it and then shrugged. He could only put up with so much bad theatre. He'd skip the speech, and hopefully get right to the Senshi-coming-out-of-the-woodwork bit. He smiled, flinging his arms wide out, and began to draw in the elemental mana as fast and hard as he could.
"Ami... are you beeping?"
Ami blinked, shaking herself out of a reverie. She reached into her schoolbag, and pulled out her Mercury computer.
"I'm reading an anomaly." She stuck her tongue against the inside of her mouth as her fingers danced across the keys. "This isn't like anything I've seen before from the Dark Kingdom." Two more taps on the computer's keys, and then she turned to her taller companion. "Can you call the others and tell them to get to the park near here? I think we may have something important."
"Sure." Makoto nodded, her face puzzled. "But what are you going to do?"
There was just the briefest flush of embarrassment, before the blue-haired girl pointed to a telephone booth. "I have to tell my mother that I'll be late for dinner."
Sailor Jupiter turned to Sailor Mercury.
"Okay, what is that?"
Mercury blinked, raising herself a little more from the cover the trees provided. "At a guess, I would say that it is the 'horrid monster' that the groundskeeper we found was yelling about."
In the middle of the park stood a humanoid probably clad in grey. It was hard to tell, since it was covered in perhaps a hundred black, ragged ribbons tied to arms, legs, and waist. A dozen strips of the torn cloth covered the face and eyes, leaving only a small slit for the mouth uncovered. Small ribbons wrapped around fingers and hands to create makeshift, tattered gloves.
The night air around the Senshi was dead still. But around the creature, there must have been a breeze: the thing's ribbons swayed and swirled like angered snakes. If that wasn't strange enough, the air seemed to be almost distended, unnaturally warping around the raggedy-man.
It sure wasn't human, and it was sure weird, even for a youma.
Mercury looked down at her computer, then looked back up at the creature, before she returned her gaze to the machine. For once, it wasn't being very helpful. The readings kept spiking and dropping, leaving it hard to make any conclusions. About the only thing she could tell was...
"It's draining energy..."
Jupiter cocked her head up to look around. There wasn't another soul in sight. "Draining energy? From what?"
Mercury took a few moments to answer, as she was trying to make sense of her computer readings. Finally, she looked to her companion. "From everything. The air, the ground... all the elements. It's taking it from everything."
"They don't need to get it from humans any more?" Jupiter shook her head. "We're in trouble."
The creature turned its blindfolded head to stare directly at them. "You may be right," Ami agreed.
Well, these two weren't who he was hoping would turn up first. He considered retreat, and then discarded the idea. Chances were that no matter where he went, the leader would be fashionably late. It seemed like you only encountered Sailor Moon first when you didn't want to. Here was as good as anywhere to stand and wait, and it wouldn't do his image as a nasty youma any good if he ran away.
He stalked towards the Senshi, the silence of the moment broken by the black cloth strips fluttering around him. Before he was halfway there, they were out in the open, spouting a speech - a bad one, even by their standards.
He started to jog.
At a quarter of his original distance, Jupiter brought forth her lightning, searing against his blackish green energy shield, warping and crackling around him. There was that moment, that smallest moment of hesitation as the Senshi saw their first attack fail. His lips drew back from his teeth slightly in a snarling smile.
Yesssssss...
He pushed himself forward, dark bandages whipping around him, as he ran.
"He's spotted us."
"How? He's wearing a blindfold!"
"Perhaps the blindfold is just a ruse," Mercury suggested.
"Ruse or not," Jupiter noted as the humanoid started to walk towards them, "we gotta stop it."
The two Senshi leaped out of their cover, landing shoulder-to-shoulder, on an angle so that their backs were slightly touching against each other.
"For disturbing the peace of late night lovers' strolls," Jupiter began.
Mercury picked up the speech "And for defiling the very elements of nature, Sailors Mercury,"
"And Jupiter,"
"Will not forgive you!" The Senshi finished the sentence together.
The youma didn't seem intimidated. In fact, as soon as the girls were finished, it sped up, from a walk to a slow jog, its blinded face staring directly at them.
"Alright," Jupiter scowled, "if that's how you want it." Her tiara crackled with elemental magic as she called for her lightning. "Supreme Thunder!"
The electricity arced at the youma, sizzling and crackling as it washed against a sickly dark energy shield. The shield flickered slightly, the lightning's light giving it a lighter, almost green shade, before her attack petered out.
In response, the youma began to run, aiming itself right at her.
Jupiter hesitated, trying to decide whether she had time for another power attack, before settling with a defensive stance.
Mercury hesitated, her arms halfway through the opening stance for calling her fog. Was the youma blind, and using other senses to navigate? Perhaps smell or hearing? If it was, would her attack do any good?
Time ran out, the creature's fast gait destroying the distance between it and its opponent. The youma rose its hand, palm forward. Jupiter's eyes drifted to it, her muscles bunched as she started to leap out of the way of what would probably be some sort of magical attack.
Horribly bright light flashed from the palm, a searing white that held the faintest lime corona. For a moment the darkened park, ill-lit due to the removed lampposts, glowed brighter than day.
Jupiter gasped, stumbling, her vision reduced to dancing black spots against white. She blindly stumbled to one side, trying to get out of the way of whatever follow-up the creature might have. Although she could not see it, the creature hesitated too, shaking its head as it kept its dark shield up for protection- obviously its blindfold had not completely saved it from damage.
"Sailor Jupiter!" Mercury desperately gathered her powers; the youma was affected by its own blinding power: that meant it really could see with that blindfold on. Still, their assailant had protected its eyes with its cloth, it would surely recover its eyesight, or whatever it had, before Jupiter did. "Shabon Spray!"
There, two could play at that game. Now, it would be blind as well.
Stars danced in his eyes, disrupting his special sight. He stood there, his shield protecting him, as one-by-one the stars supernovaed, dying out to leave him with the comfort of darkness.
The cold tendrils of Mercury's attack poured over him, pawing at him, sending an involuntary shudder through his frame. For now, just for now, he ignored it, as he tore ribbons from along his waist and legs.
Mercury looked at the beast with confusion, as she started to sneak her way towards the blinded Jupiter. Why had it ripped at its clothes like that? Was it some sort of sign of frustration?
Her stomach sank slightly as the youma turned its head, unerringly zeroing in on her companion. It could see. It could see through her fog.
"Sailor Jupiter, look out!"
He dashed forward, the ribbons in his hands swirling patterns through the dead air of Mercury's mist.
Jupiter's first attack was clumsy, useless, truly blind desperation. The second, made while still off-balanced from the first, came closer but did no better. The third was never completed, as black cloth wrapped tightly around her wrists and legs and mouth like steel-twined rope.
Mars could have burnt off the bindings. Venus had her lasers. Mercury could have frozen them until they were brittle. But Jupiter - the only one who could consistently beat him in hand-to-hand combat - Jupiter could not power through these bonds so easily.
As she overbalanced, her tightly wrapped arms and legs trying desperately to break free and flail, he stepped back, ducking into a balanced crouch. There was a breathless second, and then the ponytailed brunette fell to the grass, her slowly-clearing eyes narrowed in rage and embarrassment.
She'd break free, of course. Only a fool would be smug enough to think a downed Senshi was to be no longer considered in the fight. But for now, she was sufficiently... inconvenienced.
v\v/v
Diary Entry, Lady Jupiter. 20:16 05 September, 2499. Encrypted for personal use only.
I'm terrified.
I watched as they buried Kenji today. He was supposed to have an easy job; lookout at the city's edge. He didn't worry about a cloaked man approaching him, didn't think twice about the danger of challenging the stranger. He was too trusting, even for this town, and now he's dead. The fiftieth of my Royal Guard to be killed at Emerald's hands, and I'm scared.
I'm scared, terrified of what I might become. I can feel the anger bubbling inside of me, I just want to lash out. I want to hunt Emerald down to the ends of the Earth, and I want to hit him, pound him, pour my power through him until even that vampire screams for no more. I want to kill him.
The man can't be tracked with scrying, Mercury still hasn't found a way to overcome his hiding abilities with science - pure or magically aided. One minute he's in Europe, the next it's the Americas. It's so damn frustrating - he's a man who can hide in an empty room, and he's got an entire world to sneak around in. It's been, what, two hundred years since the...
Two hundred years? My god, has it been two hundred years since the Ice already? I can't believe I...
...Anyway, the Senshi are just about the only ones left who remember Emerald from before. He was abrasive, arrogant, and all too ready to put others down, but damn he was handy to have on your side. Even back then, people weren't calling him by his 'superhero name'... what was it? The Crystal Huntsman, yeah, that was it.
Everyone else, good and bad, called him the Wraith. Gave me the willies the first time I saw him melt out of the shadows - I came this close to mistaking him for a youma, and electrocuting him. Huh, if only I had. He's the worst thing we could hope for - an assassin who can't be soul-healed, who sure doesn't die easy, who's as immortal as us...
That's the problem. Pluto warned us when we were setting up the city, she said that immortals needed to find purpose, needed to find something to obsess over. She was right, I can see it in the others. Ami's taken the pursuit of science to stupid levels, Mina hasn't stopped to rest since we got out of the Ice, and Rei...
I don't know what the hell Rei does, but I know she does something.
I want to give into the anger. I really want to. But if I did, I'd be just like him. Always hunting and plotting and dreaming of someone's death... chasing a wraith in the shadows of the world.
Hell no, I can't stomach that idea. If this city can discard anger, then so can I.
But I'm not going to mourn any more of my own either.
Computer: New standing orders for the Guard. No-one is to approach the energy vampire known either as the Outsider or Emerald, without express command from myself, Neo-Queen Serenity, or one of the other Senshi. Avoid at all costs, except in cases where human life is at stake. From now on people, he's in Lady Mars's jurisdiction. All new data on the man should be turned over to her as soon as possible. End new standing orders.
Well, you wanted him Rei, and he's all yours. Although why you'd want that--
Oh wait, damn... stupid recording. Computer, end diary log.
v\v/v
The youma, or whatever it was, stood, shivering slightly in the cold fog. It turned its head slowly, too slowly, until its cloth-covered eyes were staring right at her. Then, it slowly rose its right hand and pointed at her. Just pointed, it didn't make any threatening move or other gesture. But when the ribbons around its wrist stopped fluttering around, and started pointing at her too, she couldn't help but feel a small shiver up her spine.
No enemy, let alone one that covered its eyes like it was blind, had ever been able to see through her fog before. And it had already incapacitated Sailor Jupiter, a far better fighter than her. She might be in some trouble.
"I wouldn't be adverse to some aid right about now," she whispered, backing away so that she could keep some distance between her and the creature.
The creature cocked its head, and grimly smiled.
Emerald grimly smiled, doing his best to keep from shaking. Mercury! It just had to be Mercury, didn't it!? Things couldn't be easy, Moon couldn't be among the first group to turn up. No! That would have been something good, and nothing good ever happened to him!
Argh. He knew that the girl he faced wasn't quite the Senshi of Ice yet. He knew that this quite chilly, if relatively ineffective fog was her only offensive magical attack. He knew that he could break her in half without even breaking a sweat. Logically, he knew he had little to fear from her.
But all his instincts knew, was that this was Mercury.
It was all he could do to keep his pointing finger steady.
For all the gods' sakes, why couldn't Sailor Moon hurry the hell up and get here!?
Sailor Jupiter furiously strained against her bonds. If nothing else, she hoped that her struggles would take the man, the youma's, whatever the hell it was's attention away from Sailor Mercury.
She let out a muffled shout which, unfortunately, the creature completely ignored. Mercury, bless her, was still calm. But Ami's only attack had already proven useless, and if the others didn't come soon...
She turned a scream of frustration into another attempt to distract the ribboned creature. This was so humiliating. It was one thing to be blasted by some youma or another; but to get trussed up like a helpless pig was, well, just plain embarrassing.
She just hoped none of the others laughed when they turned up.
Mercury cautiously took one step back. The youma took one step forward to compensate. She edged a little to the right, to get a little closer to the cover of a tree. In reply, the youma shook its pointing finger in a no gesture, before it turned and pointed at the furiously struggling Sailor Jupiter.
Mercury frowned slightly. So that was the way it was going to be. The body language had been unmistakable; Mako-chan's life was forfeit if she tried to use the cover to get a better position. It didn't use its eyes to see, so her fog was useless. And he'd already beaten Jupiter, so a direct physical confrontation would be unwise. There had to be something else she could do.
Slowly, she raised her hand and activated her battle computer, the blue tint of the glasses covering her eyes in an instant.
The creature cocked its head, seemingly content to keep the impasse, as she fought with her computers to give her something, anything that could be used against it. But again, the data contradicted and fluctuated, leaving the readings useless. It was almost as if the creature knew how to fool her scans.
After a few seconds, the creature moved its head again, staring into the distance, before it turned to her and started to walk forward. Her time was up, she realised as the youma balled its hands into fists, preparing to strike her down.
"Hold it right there!"
There was something wonderfully instinctive about those dramatic moments in fights, where someone new would enter the fray, announcing themselves in as self-glorifying a way as possible. You had to all stop and look at their entrance. You just had to.
But when you felt their presence before they entered the park, it took all the fun out of the playful 'oh-my-goodness, who-threw-THAT-to-stop-my-devastating-attack?' type questions. The future's Mars could still do the sneaky entrances to him - hells, he had the sneaking suspicion that she enjoyed it. But as for this...
He quietly sighed. How banal.
Oh well. Best to play along.
The youma turned to face the new arrivals.
As if on cue, Mercury's fog dissipated, allowing a single moonbeam to shine dramatically on the last three Sailor girls, who stood flanking each other - Moon in the middle, Mars on her right, and Venus on the left.
"Tying up innocent young girls is plain wrong (not to mention, Kunzite did it once too, so it's getting a little old!) For the Moon, I--"
"Why?" the youma interrupted, in a hissing, rumbling voice.
Sailor Moon blinked, losing her rhythm. The youma weren't supposed to interrupt the speeches. "Uh... what do you mean 'why'?"
"Why is it wrong?" The youma folded its left arm across its chest, resting its right elbow against it, the hand supporting its chin. "Do you claim that, for example, if a consenting female chose to willingly engage in bondage, that her partner is not to be forgiven?"
A millennium and a mile away, a green-haired woman sighed, resisting the urge to bury her head in her hands. Here we go. He couldn't resist it, could he? He just couldn't let one speech slip by without a commentary.
The Senshi collectively blinked, feeling the situation slipping from their control. Mercury, surprised by the youma's sudden gregariousness, blinked as the shock diverted her mind from analysing their opponent for a moment, allowing her to realise something about its costume.
"Er..." Moon began, before she shook her head. "Wait a minute. Sailor Jupiter isn't going to just go around playing kinky stuff with someone with your fashion sense. I bet she wasn't consenting at all!"
"Granted," the creature agreed, settling its arms by its sides. "Even so, it seems somewhat cold to me, to kill someone because they broke one of your petty moral hangups. Do you go breaking the legs of your milkman if he gives you cream instead of yoghurt? Were you not hugged enough as a child?"
"I would never break someone's legs," Moon protested, baffled by the youma's tactics. "Why are you saying these things about me!?" Tears shimmered in her eyes as she tried to hide the hurt.
"Don't listen to him, Sailor Moon!" Mercury urged. "See there, under those cloth strips - that's the same uniform that Jadeite and the other leaders were wearing!"
"He's one of the Dark Kingdom's leaders," Venus realised, looking at the ribbon-obscured jacket.
"Typical youma," Mars noted, pulling out an ofuda, "when it's outmatched, it tries to insult its way out of trouble. Well, we're not going to sit here and let one of our own be treated like this."
"Ah," the youma noted, raising its hand again as it settled into an attack posture, "time for general unpleasantness."
"Everybody, be careful and keep your distance!" Mercury shouted to her companions. "It's very dangerous in close quarters, but I don't think it has any long-range attacks!"
The youma moved its pointing hand slightly to the right, turning the palm of its tatter-gloved hand forward. A moment later, a sickly dark beam shot out, exploding through the unfortunate tree that Mercury had previously eyed for cover.
As bark and tree chips rained down on her, Mercury cleared her throat. "I guess it might have long-range attacks too," she admitted ruefully.
"Well, so do we," Venus noted. "Crescent Beam!"
The creature flung itself backwards, barely falling its way out of being hit by the attack. As soon as its shoulders hit the grassed ground, it used the momentum and its hands to flip itself into the dark cover of the unlit trees.
"Well handled," its voice whispered out, echoing off the trees so much that it was hard to pinpoint the creature's position. "No hesitation. Will you hesitate now, to follow me here?"
"It's a trap. It's got to be." Venus looked to the others. Mercury nodded, agreeing.
Mars shrugged, trying to squash a tiny, nagging voice in her head. The way the youma spoke, beneath the harsh tones of its voice was a timbre that seemed familiar. "What are we supposed to do though? We can't just leave him in there." She pointed a thumb at the dark copse as she looked at the others.
Mercury tapped her visor, before she sighed. "I can't get a fix on the youma."
"I could burn the trees down..."
"No!" Sailor Moon shook her head. "We can't do that, we can't destroy this beautiful park. We'll just have to go in, and be extra careful."
They looked at her, and nodded, before they turned as one and entered the grove.
"Can you see him?" Mars asked, her muscles taut as her eyes scanned the darkness.
Sailor Moon squinted, trying to see in the shadows. Dark hands wrapped around mouth and arms, inhuman strength immobilising and mutifying. For a second, nothing, and then the starting of something - a painful buildup of energy. Before it could be noticed by the others, it was gone. And so was she.
"No, I can't." Mercury answered Mars. "Sailor Moon, perhaps you can--" She turned to look at her leader, only to find no-one there.
"Sailor Moon!" Venus cried out, staring at the empty spot.
"She's gone." Mercury looked at her computer, resisting the faint urge to hit the malfunctioning machine. "The youma must have teleported her somewhere."
"Oh great. So what do we do now?" Mars wondered.
"Mrfph mrr mrph!" Jupiter suggested loudly from the clearing, pointedly nodding her head at her bonds.
It was like ice-hot acid. It burned from her skin inwards, seeping through her nerves, washing amongst her blood, lancing into her bones, seeping into her marrow, before it all rushed outwards: bones, blood, nerves, skin, beyond.
It hurt. It... it hurt!
She felt the arms and ribbons wrapped around her loosen, and then release, giving her a moment to see grey skies, before the interaction between their powers reached critical point, and their energy exploded. Their bodies catapulted apart, mixed energy streaking from them like blood from the wounded.
Silence.
Silverish-white and darkish-green energy arced around their fallen bodies, slowly seeping into the greyish, dead ground.
Silence.
"What do you mean you can't find her!?" Jupiter showed her frustration by tossing the balled-up rags that had tied her as far away as possible.
Mercury didn't look up from her computer. "The youma teleported out with Sailor Moon. Since it didn't open a portal like the others of its kind seem to when transporting more than one person, I have no real idea where to start looking. All I can tell you is that she doesn't seem to be in the general area." She looked up then, but still didn't meet her teammates' eyes. "I'm sorry."
"Is she... You don't think she's in the Dark Kingdom?" Venus breathed, voicing all their worries.
"More like we're afraid she's in the Dark Kingdom," Jupiter muttered, thinking the others couldn't hear her. She shook her head. "She'll be okay, she's always okay. Right, Sailor Mars?"
Mars didn't answer for a moment as she looked to the smog-screened sky. There had been something horribly, horribly familiar about that youma. The way it spoke, not so much the voice but the way it spoke down without using contempt... She couldn't get rid of a cold fear in her soul.
"...Of course she'll be alright. She'll probably wail so much that that youma will put himself out of his misery."
His eyes snapped open.
Unsteady moments later, he stood over the unconscious Sailor Moon. Had it been Serenity - 'his' Serenity, she would have been awake too. But this was a fourteen year old girl, unprepared for the pain that was to come.
He slowly untied his blindfold, and looked down at her. In her right hand lay her crescent weapon, the current house of the dread crystal. Why it was in her hand was unimportant to him - either she had called it consciously before the energy flux, or it had come on its own, to protect its mistress from its enemy.
Either way, it was there. That was what was important.
He closed his eyes for a moment, before opening them again. He knelt, his right hand curling, the arm cocking as he narrowed his eyes.
Oh gods. This was going to hurt. This was going to really hurt.
His hand snatched the silvery-white gem, the dead air wooshing from the speeded grab. As he brought his hand up, socking his elbow so that it looked like he was going to punch the ground, the ginzuisho reacted. Light poured from between his fingers, sizzling and raging as it fought against his own energy. Around his neck, hidden beneath black bandages, his green crystal thrummed, glowing brightly, erratically, in raging counterpoint to its mineral cousin.
He snarled, building up the dark energy in his hand, as he felt the ginzuisho's fell-light seep beneath the cloth strips covering his fingers. Building his energy would make it all the worse, but he had to subsume the ginzuisho's blinding glow, to make sure there wasn't too much silvery-white light for him to...
His fist plunged down into his own ill-lit shadow. Not the best of shade for such a manoeuvre, but it would do. After a moment, he pulled his empty hand out, leaving his enemy's crystal... somewhere else.
The energy around his hand didn't disappear, however. The seething mix fluctuated, pulsing and crackling as white and dark, dark green fought each other with sabres of minuscule lightning. Desperately, he spread the energy, letting it travel down his arm and onto his torso.
He could really do without losing a hand right now.
Finally, the flux ended, as the conflicting powers reached their mystical critical point. And for the second time that day, his body was flung across the landscape from the backlash. Desperately he fought the black fingers of unconsciousness that were closing around him, his teeth grinding at the effort. He had to stay awake, he had to stay...
"Do you have anything yet?"
Mercury rolled her shoulders, trying to get rid of the itch in the small of her back. Even with her face almost literally buried in her computer, she could feel her teammates' stares. Finally, she turned to her friends, and shook her head. "My scans are just not making sense," she admitted. "They could be one hundred metres away, or one hundred dimensions." Her brow creased slightly to add to her determined expression as she added, "I can work it out. I just need more time."
"She might not have that time!" Jupiter threw her hands into the air in frustration.
"Alright," Venus cut in, "we know you can do it, Sailor Mercury. The rest of us should spread out, look around. If they are only a hundred metres away, we'd be idiots to not at least try to find her."
"...ueen Sere..."
The dark faded, awareness sparking slightly, a dull glow against the black of unconsciousness.
"Neo-qu...enity..."
Her eyes screwed up slightly, trying to entrap the moment of bliss, free from the pain and hurt, safe from...
"...please,...queen, you ...awaken."
Her mind rebelled at the constant intrusion, desiring a return to the wonderful numbness of sleep. Then, she remembered. She remembered the pain.
With a gasp, she opened her eyes, shooting up from her lying position. She stared down at herself, horror quickly dimming to confusion. Her Senshi suit was slightly shredded, but besides that... "I don't understand; I... I felt..."
"Pain." The word was clipped, spoken in a quiet voice.
She whirled to face the speaker, her hand tightening around the handle of her moon wand, drawing comfort from its weight.
A knight in crystalline armour stood looking at her. The man's armour was
pale lime - almost white, in fact, and Sailor Moon couldn't help shake the
feeling that it would be glinting if only there was enough sunlight for it. Despite wearing a solid chunk of mineral for protection, the knight still
looked fightworthy. The only thing that wasn't quite storybook about him,
besides the absence of a Great Big Sword was the two-sizes-too-big grey
cloak that hung around his shoulders.
The eyeslits of his full-face helm were too narrow and shadow-filled for her to see his eyes, but she still picked up a sense of anticipation in the man's stance. "You felt pain, pain unimagineable," the knight began again. "And now you wonder why you feel fine."
"Who are you?" She frantically looked around, trying to hang onto the threads of her composure. "Where are we?" The faintest hint of a whine tinged her voice as she realised that this probably wasn't Earth. "What happened to that other guuuuyyyy!?"
The man bowed at the waist, his left arm falling to rest on his back, the other sweeping forward to rest against his stomach in a classic courtier's pose. "A good name for me might be..." he cocked his head as he rose from his bow, as if to think about it, before continuing, "the Green Knight. As to where we are," he paused, looked around, and then looked straight at her eyes, "well, I'm afraid that depends on you. I need your aid, Sailor Moon, in vanquishing an evil being."
Sailor Moon looked around again, to make sure the bandaid guy wasn't around, before she looked back to the Green Knight. "Vanquish? Ah... who did you need help 'vanquishing'? Beryl? That bad fashion guy that just attacked me?"
The knight shook his head. "Oh no. And here I thought it would be obvious. No, if you are who I believe you to be, then I am afraid that the evil I seek to destroy," a gauntleted hand rose to point at her, "is you."
The ginzuisho oriented itself, glowing brightly as it channelled off the killing energy of its foe. It floated there, nowhere in the middle of somewhere, confused. At best its intellect was doglike, dull, only suited to interpret the wishes of its wielder in the best way possible.
Finally, after millennia, it had been reunited with one of the blood, one of the line it had been created to serve. It had purpose again, it could serve. But now it was alone again, in some nameless dimension with no way to return to its mistress.
Oh, it had the power. There was no doubting that; it most certainly had the power. But without a hand to wield it, a steady mind to guide it, it couldn't find her. The crystal glowed, as distressed as its pseudo-mind could get.
It was alone.
Ghostly fingers cradled the crystal, as a glowing face stared into its reflective surface.
"Come," the spirit of Queen Serenity of the Silver Millennium whispered, "my daughter has need of you. Now more than ever."