Title: Crystal Power
Author: AriallaZarinth
Chapter Two: Decisions, Decisions (the Golden Crystal)
Email: crystalstarr89yahoo.com

Sestuna stood in front of the Time Gate, still looking the same as she had on her eighteenth birthday, all but her eyes. Those haunting eyes showed too much wisdom for a teenager; however, this was explainable...Sestuna was now thousands of years old.

Those aged eyes watched a young boy, around the age of three, walk with his mother through the lush gardens of Terra. A few locks of his ebony hair fell into his ocean-blue eyes; a trait that at the age of three was "adorable" but later in life would help his face become "simply irresistible". He was Endymion, Prince of the Earth.

Setsuna looked down at the case in front of her, studying the Golden Crystal as it lay innocently with its companions. So long she had been watching the worlds, and yet still only one Crystal -- her Crystal -- had been bonded. She bit her lip and moved on to her other final candidate for the Golden Crystal.

A young girl, about five, brought her mother a small already-wilting flower. Her flame-coloured tresses hung limply against the mud-stained white of her tunic. Sparking green eyes looked compassionately at her slowly-dying mother. Her father was out, working for whatever money he could get at whatever cost. She was Beryl, a woman destined for power: that much was clear.

Setsuna blinked her eyes out of focus, one hand resting lightly on the glass case hovering nearby. The Time Gate swirled, many pictures forming a patchwork quilt on its surface. Sestuna irritably waved them away, one part of her mind held the doors of the Gate open as she turned into the mists.
The Golden Crystal gleamed in the light. Who to give it to, she wondered. The Time Gate would not show her the futures of either way; the knowledge of the future as it would have been with a different Crystal Bearer than the one she chose would always be denied.
Sestuna knew her father Chronos was tired of watching the Gate; he watched from afar, true, but his duty would not be done until she gave each Crystal to its appointed Soul, and Sestuna would not need to be guarded from any knowledge.

She hid the Crystals again, deep in the mystical mists of Time. She slumped to the ground, hugging her knees to her chest. A single tear slid down her smooth, ageless cheek.

One of the images in the Gate magnified, and Setsuna turned her head to peer at it. She watched emotionlessly as Beryl's father backhanded her, sending her flying across the room. The girl glared hatefully at her father through a barrage of tears, resting against the wall next to the bed that still held her now-dead mother.
That glare promised revenge.

In that moment, Setsuna made her choice. She wiped her eyes, called forth the Crystals and selected the Golden Crystal. She touched the Garnet at her neck, morphing with a few words to her senshi alter-ego. Sailor Pluto waved the Time Staff, calling up a picture of Queen Gaia of Earth sitting in a parlor with her son, Endymion.

Nodding satisfactorily, Pluto let the Mists take away the image, and she walked through the gaping black abyss to Earth of the Silver Millennium, secure that her father would watch the Gate while she delivered her burden.

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Gaia gasped as a figure appeared in the shadows in front of her. The person stepped out; it was a young woman with green hair and reddish eyes. She bowed, holding a great white staff.

"Queen Gaia."
"Who are you? How did you get in? How do you know me?"
"And your son, Prince Endymion. I am the Keeper of the Time Gate, and that is exactly how I got in and how I know you. Calm down, your Highness, I mean you and yours no harm. In fact, I have come to bestow a great honor upon your son."
"You are the fabled Keeper of Time?" Gaia blinked stupidly.
"'fabled'? I suppose so." The corners of Sailor Pluto's mouth twitched. "Please, Endymion, come here." The child crept from behind his mother's chair to stand in front of the stranger. "My gift to you, Endymion, Crown Prince of Earth, is the Golden Crystal." Sailor Pluto brought forth the shining Crystal. "Its essence is tightly entwined with earth and nature, as is yours." 'As is Beryl's, though not in this way.' Pluto thought wryly. She quickly murmured the words of bonding, as if she wanted to skip the important part of the ceremony. "Now," The Crystal shone, magic flared, and the Crystal left Pluto and floated in the cup made by the boy's outstretched hands. "You are one."

The Crystal's light dimmed, then faded all together. Endymion let it rest in his palms for a second, then it disappeared. Without knowing what he was doing, he had put it into a space pocket all its own, to wait until he had need of it.

Pluto bowed to Endymion. "Earth Prince, Crystal Holder." Then to his mother: "Queen Gaia." And teleported.

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Gaia stared at her son a moment in silence.

"Do.. do you feel any different?"
"Yes'm."
"Could you explain how?"
"No'm."
"Where did the Crystal go?"
"Away."
"Why?"
"Don't need it now."

Gaia stared at her son in wonder, amazed at his sudden knowledge.

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Far away in the Mists of Time, Setsuna selected the next Crystal and began her search for its Soul.