Cyber Moon: Crystal.

Act 1: Crystal City.

Episode 2: Visitors.

By Razor Knight

Last update: November 11, 2008

As Rei walked home that day, she found something she wasn't really expecting to see. At least not yet.

"Hi mom," the girl in the red Senshi suit said with a smile.

"Hisa?" Rei gasped, "but how..."

"I'm not sure yet, I gathered mana as usual to practice, but suddenly I found myself wearing this suit."

No doubt about it, it was a Senshi suit, Mars' first level Senshi suit. "That means you're Sailor Mars now."

"Huh, but why is the suit so different to yours?"

Rei transformed, then smiled. "Because Senshi have different power levels, I had explained that to you. You're now at the first level, the weaker one, but still strongest than most non-Senshi magic users can dream of being."

"Aww, I thought I would be at Holy level too."

"That would be bad," Mars admitted.

"Huh? Why?"

"Because the quantity of mana this level handles is too much for those who didn't get past the previous forms."

"Oh. Then, I'll have to get stronger on my own, right?"

"I could help you train," Mars said, "when I'm not at work."

"And I can help with that, too," Yuu said walking into the room right then. He looked at the two and chuckled. "She looks almost like you did first time I saw you fight."

Mars nodded. "So, how should we call you?"

"Younger Mars," the new Mars said, "I think it's a good name."

"Yeah," Mars said. Much better than Serenity's guess, at least.

Hotaru saw a couple small kids run by, followed by their mother. She wasn't feeling that bad anymore, these vacations had helped her a lot.

One week had passed since the cruise, and the interrogation had lead them to an uncharted island in-between Australia and Africa. There was a whole clan of mages there, who had been robbing ships and planes for several months. They weren't much of a challenge for two Senshi, truth to be told, and their leader's strongest magic blast had no effect on them.

Their guess had been right, Senshi were too strong now, so they couldn't really hope for a challenge to appear so easily. However, after that island had been raided and the mages were sent to a special prison, they both had decided to visit Europe.

Hotaru was walking through the streets of Paris now, but ChibiUsa had stayed at the hotel. She had no destination in mind, and despite not looking for trouble, trouble found her after a while.

She turned to the group of men following her. She didn't need to ask to know what they wanted, it was obvious from the way they were looking at her. "If I were you, I would run away as fast as I could." She said in the best French she could manage.

"Oh, the girl thinks she can get us all," one of the men said, causing a round of laughter from all the others.

"Ten against one, that's quite unfair," she noted, not bothering with the local language. She called upon her transformation, and smiled at their faces. With this new power level, the Senshi had soon learnt that they didn't need to call upon their transformations or attacks as they always had. Just thinking about an attack made it manifest itself.

"This is impossible, one of those Senshi witches?"

"It must be a Lesser Senshi," another man noted.

Saturn snorted. Yes, the Lesser Senshi, as they were usually called. People who had been born with the ability to manipulate mana, and now that they could do it freely, decided to play pretend and get fake Senshi suits. Their power wasn't really anything worth worrying about, since all the Lesser Senshi she had seen were newbies. Also, they lacked the 'mana gathering' of real Senshi, something Ami had explained to them once. Senshi didn't need to call upon the mana in the air or their planets the moment they were going to throw an attack, they unconsciously gathered it even when they weren't in Senshi form. And if they consciously and actively gathered it... Well, she had twice seen what that could cause, when Mars lost Yuichiro.

In any case, she wasn't a Lesser Senshi, and she was going to show them that very clearly. "Death's Caress."

Eight of the ten men fell to the ground before they could even know what had hit them, and the other two stared in shock at the ghastly figures who had knocked their partners out. "What are those things?"

"She's... She's Sailor Saturn! The real one!" "Yes, you're correct," Saturn admitted, "And you better heed my words and get away from here. I haven't killed your buddies, but they will be out for a while. You're lucky I'm not in a worst mood, or I would throw you all into jail myself."

The two men were gone in a few seconds, racing down the street and out of her sight. However, she heard a clapping sound and turned to see two other Senshi there, in their civilian forms. "Oh, I didn't know you two were here."

Chie smiled. "I always wanted to visit Paris."

Saturn noticed something, her powers let her sense the souls of others, and she could see two souls in Chie. She knew what that meant almost instantly. "You're pregnant."

"You noticed?" Chie asked, surprised since her belly wasn't still large enough to be noticeable. "Yeah, there may be a small Lilith around someday."

Saturn flinched. "That's... Nice."

"You look upset," Kage noted.

Saturn returned to her normal form, and nodded as the three started walking away from the men she had knocked out. "Yes, I'm not too happy about some things right now. We're here because I needed to get away from the city for a while."

Kage looked at her. "So, what's the problem?"

"It's quite simple, I want a family too."

Chie stopped walking and grimaced "I suppose seeing us didn't really help your mood."

"I'll get over it, sooner or later," Hotaru said.

"Yeah, I'm hoping that too."

Hotaru looked up to a nearby rooftop. "Chibi, thought you wanted to rest for a while."

"Yeah, but I knew I couldn't leave you alone for too long."

"Hmph. I'm okay."

ChibiUsa leapt off the roof, landing besides the others. "Sure you are."

"If you want something to take your mind off that topic," Kage said, "I know just the thing. We're trying to find clues on a band of rogue mages who make whole seaships 'vanish.'"

"We took care of them," Hotaru said, "they had their base in an uncharted island near Africa."

"Did they have any necromancers there?" Chie asked.

"No."

"Then you've only touched the tip of that iceberg. From what we heard, the true leaders are two necromancers who use the passengers for their rituals."

Hotaru growled. "That is..."

ChibiUsa shook her head. "It's one of the bad things about having the mana flow back as it was before the old Serenity capped the wells."

"And something that I can't allow to be left unchecked," Hotaru noted. "I am a necromancer, too."

"We should team up and look for them," Chie said with a big smile.

"No, you shouldn't get involved, it'll be dangerous."

"Hey, I'm a Senshi too."

"Yes," Hotaru said, "but you've got another life to worry about now. We Senshi are strong, but that baby could get killed before it's born."

"I hadn't thought about that," Chie said, color leaving her face.

"Guess we will have to leave it to you, then. If our sources are correct, then those necromancers are in this city."

"Good, I knew coming to Paris wouldn't be a waste of time," ChibiUsa noted.

"I was sure this had to happen sooner or later."

Serenity looked at Endymion and frowned. "But why... Why does mankind have to be so..."

"It's just the way things work," Endymion said. "Maybe we should send our army there?"

"They're not trained enough," Mako noted. She had been in charge of Crystal Tokyo's army since the city's birth, replacing her now retired uncle. But the army was mostly for shows, as they were expecting no wars inside their city. "And frankly, I don't think it would take more than a handful of Senshi to vaporize those..."

"We won't kill humans," Serenity noted.

"If you're worried that it will affect our minds, then..." Karin started.

"I'm not going to give in," Serenity warned. "Listen, we don't have to do a thing, this is quite a perfect way to show the world we're not going to move out of the way."

"So, we let them shoot?" Rei asked. "That's not good, even if the radiation wouldn't pass through our shield, it could still affect the rest of Japan."

"I'm well aware of that, Rei. But I thought you trusted me."

"Yes, I do, I just don't see how letting them shoot will be a good thing."

"That's because you don't know what my crystal can do," Serenity said with a smile.

"What kind of name's 'Black Hand' anyhow?" Karin mused. "Terrorist groups need to buy better names."

"I don't really think we should be saying that," Rei noted.

Hisako smiled at her friend's stare. "See, I can finally do this."

Hikaru Aino was three years younger than the other girl, and had always seen her as an older sister. And, just like Hisako looked like a small Rei, Hikaru looked a lot like her mother when she was her age.

"You're Sailor Mars now? Cool."

"Younger Sailor Mars," Hisako corrected. "If you practice as much as I did, you will also be a Senshi in a few years."

Hikaru giggled. "That would be nice."

Minako had been looking at the two for a while. They were at the backyard of the Aino house (which, like most of the houses owned by the Senshi in Crystal Tokyo, was a bit too big to be called a house, but a bit too small to be called a mansion,) and she was curious as to what Hisako could do. "I want to see what you can do, Hisako."

"Right, aunt Mina." Younger Mars saw Minako vanish and reappear right besides her. She knew that wasn't teleportation, since Minako was the only one who could move at speeds that neared that of light. "Not going to transform?"

Minako smiled at that, summoning a melon-sized light ball in her right hand. "I don't need to do that, my power as a normal human is higher than that of a Guardian Senshi."

"I didn't know that," Younger Mars admitted. "Okay then, Flare Gun!"

Minako was surprised by the attack, but not injured at all. Rei herself, when at her first level of power, was able to channel a small quantity of mana into a fire beam. That was called the Fire Soul, and had looked quite impressive back then to her. But this girl... She was shooting many small bolts of fire, in a rapid flurry, and had she not been at the level she was, Minako would've been quite hurt by it. Moreso, she wasn't stopping. "Okay, that's enough."

Younger Mars stopped her attack, and looked at Minako. The woman wasn't affected by the attack at all, yet Hisako herself... She fell to her knees, panting. "Mom's right, I shouldn't overdo it."

"Yes, she's right," Minako said, "throwing out all your reserves in one barrage isn't a good idea, unless it's your only choice left."

A light beam hit Younger Mars from the side, and she turned to frown at Hikaru. "Hey!"

"Just wanted to see if I could knock you out."

Younger Mars chuckled. "I barely felt the hit."

"Wow..."

Minako smiled. "Hikaru, you're quite untrained yet to affect a Senshi with your 'attacks.' You'll have to wait for a few years before you can gather enough mana to actually harm Senshi with them."

"And by then, I may be a Twilight Senshi," Hisako noted.

Minako didn't argue with that. She could feel something about her, something she couldn't quite place, but she knew she would be surprised if Hisako didn't reach Twilight level by next year.

As for her own daughter... She had a slower start than the young Mars, but she was learning fast as well. Without real enemies to fight, though, she really didn't know how fast they could reach the higher levels.

With Hotaru around, finding necromancers wasn't too hard a task. They had located the base, hidden in the outskirts of Paris, in a cave that didn't look suspicious at all from the outside.

The two Senshi had an easy time sneaking in. Guards weren't outside the cave, which helped its harmless looks, but by the time they were detected, they were already at the core of their 'hive,' and most of the necromancers were scattered around the cave.

"This will be my only warning," Hotaru said, looking at the two necromancers. A man and a woman, both looked almost the same, and both had the same hair color. "You are going to pay for your crimes, that's a given. But the choice is yours, you can go to jail, or you can pay with your lives."

"And who might you be, little lost girls?" the woman said. True, these two girls had blasted through most of their ranks, but they had yet to see the true force of their army.

"Who might I be?" Hotaru mused. "I thought I was quite famous," she added as she transformed, "none other than the Senshi of Death, Sailor Saturn."

"And I don't need to help her against you two, but since you ask, I'm Princess Serenity."

The man laughed. "No matter who you are, you can't fight death itself!" As he said that, he rose his hands, and countless undead creatures started crawling out of the cave's ground.

"Death itself?" Saturn chuckled. "Poor, delusional, unexperienced fool." She looked at the undead crawling her way with detached interest. "I may not share your methods, I may not turn the recently deceased into mindless drones, but I can still affect such abominations."

The female necromancer took a step back as she realized all the undead had turned and were now crawling towards them. "No! This isn't possible!"

Saturn turned away as the impossibly large crowd of undead cornered their two 'masters.' "Let's go, we're done here."

ChibiUsa followed her out of the cave. "But what about all those undead?"

"They were created by those two, and will disappear with them," Saturn said, still visibly upset.

ChibiUsa understood what her friend was feeling right now. "You're not like them, Hotaru."

"I'm not? I used those monsters, too."

"But you don't create them yourself. Your wraiths aren't real souls, are they?"

Hotaru had already turned back to normal, and the two were out of the cave now. "No, of course not."

"Then you're not like them, Hotaru."

"It was too easy. Wish there was something worth fighting against."

ChibiUsa flinched. "Hotaru, I thought you had learnt from the past. Never say something like that."

It only took a week for the Black Hand to shoot their nuclear warheads straight to Crystal Tokyo. The world was sent into a frenzy, it had been several years since one of those weapons was airborne, and now there were a dozen of them.

Still, Crystal Tokyo had sent word to other countries, to make sure none would interfere in this matter. Serenity was standing on the palace's roof, looking at the sky, with many of the Senshi surrounding her. "Here it comes."

"Serenity, are you sure about this?"

"I've already told you to trust me," Serenity said, then looked up. Yes, she could see the missiles clearly now. She looked at them for one second, then smiled and turned to leave. "It's done."

"What, but those things are still..." Jupiter started.

"Don't worry," Serenity said. Just then, the nukes all hit the shield, but none exploded. They all fell to the ground outside the city, some of them bouncing once before stopping their flight harmlessly. "The threat is over."

"What did you do?" Mars asked.

"I simply took away their power," Serenity said, "Plain projectiles of metal and plastic aren't that threatening for our city, or any other city in the world."

As Serenity left, the others wondered if her crystal's powers had limits at all.

Next morning, ChibiUsa and Hotaru were walking through the streets of Madrid. The pink-haired woman suddenly stopped as they walked by a bar, her enhanced hearing picking something up. "Mom's on TV," she simply said before walking into the bar.

"... And the Queen of Crystal Tokyo declared, after the incident, that she wasn't going to let groups like the Black Hand threaten her or her people. She has proven, however, that an attack to Crystal Tokyo is simply out of any army's reach right now."

"That Queen's really something. Sitting in her cozy palace while the rest of the world rots away."

Hotaru looked at ChibiUsa, noticing she wasn't too happy with that comment. "Chibi..."

"I know, let's get out of here," ChibiUsa said, but as she walked out, she noticed something out of place. "No damn way."

Hotaru looked up too. It wasn't supposed to be dark at noon, so what... She realized what it was that blocked the sun. A massive spaceship. She remembered these things, and also recalled Kyma's words... There were three, as far as they knew, and the Senshi had, in different eras, destroyed two of them. "They apparently love getting blasted to pieces."

Serenity looked at the monitor which showed an outside view of the darkened Crystal Tokyo. "The Kh'sun, I never thought I would see them again."

"If they shoot their Terraformer at us, our shield could be blasted through," Mercury noted.

"There's no need to wait," Mako said.

"What do you mean?"

"Here's what I think. We sneak a couple Senshi into each one of those ships. We send them all out of orbit, then we have them explode up there."

"But I can't tell where the main one is," Ami said, "moreso, this time it's not just three cities being targeted. There's at least fifty of those around the globe."

"Wait, Mako's plan may be just what we need," Terry noted, "we can try getting the info on where their main ship is from one of the smaller ones."

"And then what?" Minako asked. "We can't possibly teleport all the way to wherever they are, can we?"

"You easily forget I'm still around," Pluto said as she appeared in the room. "I know their main ship is hiding somewhere near Neptune, but I cannot pinpoint its location. However, once that piece of information is known, I can teleport as many Senshi as we need inside their main ship."

"If we destroy the mothership," Endymion noted, "the smaller ones should surrender. Moreso, if they're like the ones we fought before, most of the Kh'sun are in that mothership."

"If the smaller ships don't surrender, then we'll have to blast them out anyway," Naru noted, "but it's still worth a try."

Of course, the aliens hadn't begun their attack with their strongest weapons. Instead, they were sending out scout ships, along with some bigger ones. The Senshi saw that and knew this would be a long fight even if their powers had improved exponentially since last time they fought these aliens.

The skies of Crystal Tokyo soon filled with explosions, but Serenity was worried. If the situation was the same everywhere, then there would be countless losses for both sides. The pilots of those ships weren't the true evil, after all, but how could they find the true enemy?

"I'm going in now," Mercury said.

"I can't let you do that, Ami. If something happened to you, then..."

Mercury looked at Serenity for a few seconds, then realized the other woman wasn't going to let the matter drop. "Nothing is going to happen to me."

"But you have to think about your baby."

Mercury shook her head. "I'm the only one who can interact with their computers, Usagi. This is no time to be thinking about this when the world's sake..."

"Ami, can you really be so cold?"

"Cold?" Mercury laughed humorlessly. "Damn it, Usagi, I thought you knew me by now."

Serenity realized something... This wasn't the usual Mercury, the strategic thinker, she had only seen Mercury act like this when she was really worried about what could happen. "I... Understand, but I can't allow you to go there."

"You can't stop me from going, either."

"I know."

And then Mercury knew what her friend meant, just as Serenity turned around. "Serenity..."

"I can order you to stay here, Sailor Mercury, but the final decision to obey is still yours," Serenity said without turning to look at her.

Mercury looked down, then smiled. "Yes, you're quite right," she said before vanishing.

Serenity looked up to the sky and smiled. "I just hope we both made the right decision, Ami."

Jupiter tossed one of the bigger ships into two others that were rushing at her. It was much easier now, they could fly without their airboards, and their enemies weren't strong. She had been hit by at least a dozen of those ships, but still had to feel any damage.

She looked to the left and saw a group of five ships heading straight for her. She smiled and clasped both hands together. "Time to stop playing nice." She recited the words in her mind, and the attack was unleashed. Jupiter Thunderstorm Barrage.

A dozen lightning bolts shot out of Jupiter's hands, each striking through several of the ships before fading. She smiled then noticed something and looked up in shock. "Is the ship... Freezing?"

Mars floated to her. "Yes, Mercury's in there."

Jupiter blinked at her, then looked up again, noticing the small bluish spots that were appearing under the ship were tracing a route to its center. "So we'll be done here soon."

"I hope so," Mars said. "I'm not a fan of dogfights."

Mercury had gotten a warm welcome as soon as she had appeared into the ship. She had a hard time dodging the blasts that came from all directions at first, and that's why she had chosen to deep-freeze any group of soldiers that came to stop her. As a Senshi, the weapons these aliens used were nothing but minor nuissances, but she knew Serenity had been right, at least partially. She wasn't going to let anything hit her.

She kept pressing on, her path clear to her, as she could 'hear' the ship's main computer. However, her initial plan was to manipulate it from a distance, but she found she couldn't do that now. It was 'speaking' to her in an unknown language, and she could only listen from afar, not 'talk' back to it. So, she had to try the old, manual approach, even if that meant blasting into the bridge.

But as she reached the bridge, she saw something was guarding its entrance. A group of green-hued, strange androids, at least four meters tall, and they had only one green 'eye' on top of their triangle-shaped head. "I see, just like those robots the other Kh'sun had..." She, however, wasn't worried at all about these. Androids were computers. And computers were her speciality.

Instead of attacking her, the androids all turned around, blasting a hole into the wall. Mercury saw a group of very astonished aliens inside, and they were all looking at the androids.

"What are the D'ned doing?"

"I don't know, sir, they're not responding to our commands anymore."

Mercury smiled. It only took her a few seconds to mimic their language, a skill she hadn't really used as much as she would have liked to in the past. "This ship is now under my control, as are your robotic guards. Anyone moves a muscle, and I'm going to freeze this whole room solid."

The aliens all froze, partially surprised that the woman could speak their language, and partially worried that she would actually do as she had said. Well, most of them did, but one of the creatures in the far side of the room reached for (his? her?) weapon. But it never got to use it.

"Endless Winter." Mercury looked around and nodded. These creatures weren't dead, but they wouldn't be bothering her anymore. She looked at the computer, while having the robots stand guard around her. "Now let's see where the real enemy's hiding."

Serenity was still looking up, but if what could be seen from the outside was any sign of how things were going, then she had worried in vain. The center of the ship was now a bright cyan color, she could sense the magic of that attack from where she stood. And as she stared up, she noticed someone had appeared behind her. "Welcome back."

"You look happy, Serenity."

Serenity smiled. "Yes, I'm glad you're okay."

Mercury nodded. "It's done. I know exactly where their main ship is."

Serenity noticed something and looked up. "It's leaving."

Mercury frowned. "The main ship is calling the others back. We need to act quick."

"We... There's no we in this," Serenity said.

"What do you mean?"

Serenity looked up again, and mentally called all the Senshi to their meeting room, or War Room as the Princess had nicknamed it. "Come with me and you will find out."

"They're leaving, huh?" Hotaru said as she looked up, amused by the aliens' sudden escape. How could a ship that big move so fast, anyway?

"You look better now."

"I've told you I've done a lot of thinking, and... I realize I shouldn't be upset about what I don't have, about what I can't possibly have. Instead, I will focus in what I have right now. I've walked a long road from the Hotaru I was at the beginning to now, and... If I start hating everyone for having what I don't, I know I will go back to being like that, sooner or later."

"I'll never let you go back," ChibiUsa said with a smile. "But I wonder... When exactly did you start liking me?"

"Now that's one subject I've given a lot of thought to," Hotaru said. "I guess it was... When I kept you alive during the fight against that Messiah creature. Somehow, the link was forged then."

"But you didn't tell me back then..."

"I couldn't, not until you saw it in my own dreams. I feared I would alienate Usagi... Or you."

ChibiUsa sighed. "Yeah, I wasn't quite sure what to think about it, at first."

"But I don't really care about that, I just want to be with you from now on."

"Serenity called all Senshi back. You think the others went there?"

"I don't know," Hotaru said. "Should we go check what she's up to?"

"Are you really sure you can return there already?"

"As long as you're by my side, I don't care where we are."

ChibiUsa blushed. "That's so... Corny."

"But it made you blush," Hotaru said with a giggle.

ChibiUsa smiled as the two looked at the sky again. It was good to finally see her in a good mood again.

"You can't do that, Serenity."

"And who is going to stop me?" Serenity asked.

"It's dangerous," ChibiUsa said, "I agree with Rei, going there on your own..."

Ami frowned. "I can see your point, Serenity. You're going to destroy them from the inside."

Serenity looked hurt. "Ami, you should know better than that. I'm not so heartless as to kill off a whole race, even if their crime is unforgivable."

"Then what are you going to..." ChibiUsa stopped. She knew the answer. "You're going to do what Terry did back then..."

"Good guess," Serenity said. "So, Setsuna, shall we leave?"

"I still think it's dangerous," Rei noted, "I can't allow you to expose yourself like that."

Ami smiled. "You can order her to stay here, but the final decision to obey is still hers."

Serenity nodded. "You're right."

"Let's go," Pluto said, and the two vanished.

Serenity looked to both sides of the corridor. "I see... This brings back memories, doesn't it?"

"Yes," Pluto said. "But they should be here already."

"That is, because they still don't know we're here, and they will never know."

Pluto was, once more, surprised by the power Serenity had. She still remembered the time when Galaxia was around, and how powerless she had felt back then when facing her. All things considered, if she didn't know what kind of person Serenity was, then she would feel even more powerless than ever. "Are you ready?"

Serenity nodded. "The Kh'sun are a plague, but even then, I can't kill them. However, where I'm sending them to... I won't be able to save them, either."

Pluto blinked to adjust her sight. One moment they were inside the ship, the next, they were in space. But they hadn't moved at all, no, the ship had vanished. "Serenity..."

"Let's go back home, Setsuna."

"... Of course," Pluto said, and the two vanished.

A/N: The Kh'Sun finally sunk. And yes, I know my puns are bad.