Chapter 3/? - Worlds in Collision

Rei left the fire room, deciding that she needed to clear her head after that vision the sacred fire had shown of her. Grabbing her broom, she walked outside to the shrine courtyard and began to sweep up the dead leaves and cherry blossom petals left by the shrine's many trees.

As she looked over towards the shrine's entrance, she saw two girls and a cat walk up the stairs.

It couldn't be. Rei thought.

The blue-haired girl looked almost exactly like the one from her vision, the sailor senshi who had fought alongside her doppelgänger, the only difference was that the girl in front of her was a bit younger, and was wearing a school uniform.

The blonde looked exactly like the girl in the white dress, she was even wearing her hair in the exact same style. Rei walked over to the pair and decided to introduce herself.

"Good afternoon, welcome to the Hikawa Shrine." She spoke gracefully and carefully, maintaining her image as the 'mysterious shrine maiden.'

"Good afternoon Miko-san." Spoke the blue-haired girl. "My friend was caught in a youma attack yesterday, and has been plagued by troubled dreams since then."

Rei looked at the blonde, something was clearly bothering her. Maybe a reading would help her.

"This way please…" Rei trailed off, realizing that she didn't know blonde girl's name.

"Tsukino Usagi" the blonde girl added.

"Ah, this way please Tsukino-san." Rei spoke as she led Usagi into one of the shrine's rooms, leaving Ami to explore the shrine grounds.

—

Ami walked through the woods surrounding the shrine, green spaces like this weren't the easiest to find in a large metropolis like Tokyo. She always seemed to have a love for greenery, and had even managed to befriend one of the groundskeepers at Juuban Park.

Finding a nice clearing, she sat down and pulled one her books from her school satchel. She was about to open it when she saw a sandy blonde-haired man in a grey uniform appear out of thin air.

Luckily, the man wasn't facing her when he appeared, so Ami quickly and quietly jumped behind a tree before he could notice.

She couldn't be sure, but the man did seem to resemble the guy that Usagi had described fighting with at the radio station. As Ami watched, she noticed his form shimmer and he was suddenly wearing a pair of beige slacks and a polo shirt.

Ami knew that something was definitely up with this guy and followed him at a discreet distance, hoping that she could get away, alert Usagi, and transform into Sailor Mercury to confront this guy.

Usagi, I hope I get get to you in time. Ami thought to herself, suddenly realizing how dangerous of a situation she was in.

—

Rei led Usagi into the room and sat her down on a mat.

"Usagi-san, I want you to concentrate on the images you see, don't try to push them away, let them wash over you." Rei instructed.

Usagi closed her eyes and tried to clear her mind.

"Be careful Serenity, there's a horrible dark monster that lives in mirrors and it LOVES to eat crybabies." Said a voice. Usagi looked up and saw Rei, but much younger, maybe about 6 or 7 years old. Her other self's eyes well up with tears at the story.

"That's right" came another voice, Usagi looked over and saw a much younger Sailor Venus. "If you look into a mirror too long the monster'll come out and getcha!"

Usagi felt her younger self run off yelling "Maaaamaaaaa!"

More images flooded through her brain and they began to form into coherent scenes. Usagi realized the images and knowledge for what they were, memories of a past life, MY past life. she thought.

Usagi felt a sudden pull in her chest as feelings of fear and anxiety washed over her, pulling her out of her trance.

"Mercury!" she yelled to herself and ran out of the room.

—

Rei watched Usagi bolt out of the room and was left with more questions. When she tried to read the blonde girl earlier, she could sense her internal confusion, and it seemed like the girl had been able to piece together what had happened. Then Rei felt something, to her trained senses it felt like that other girl who had come was panicking about something. Somehow Usagi must have picked up on it.

Rei grabbed some ofuda's and got up to follow the blonde girl outside.

"You can help her you know." Came an unknown woman's voice.

"Who's there!" Rei demanded. "Show yourself!" She held an ofuda out, ready to strike.

"Do you want to help them?" Came the voice again, this time, Rei looked down at the cat that had come with the two girls.

Out of all the things that Rei Hino had expected to see when waking up, a talking cat was not one of them. "You can talk?" She asked the cat.

"Of course I can talk." The cat curtly replied. "You have the power to help those two-"

"I'm just a Miko, I don't know how much help I can be." Rei replied.

"You have the power of a Senshi within you, and if you want proof, go look in a mirror right now." Luna explained.

Following the cat's instructions, Rei looked at a mirror that was sitting in the room. There, glowing bright red on her forehead was the sigil for Mars. Rei's eyes went wide as saucers. "What do I need to do?" She asked.

Luna nudged a pen towards her with her nose. "Take this, hold it up and say, 'Mars Power Make Up!'"

Rei reached and grabbed the pen, and she felt a power burning inside of her. Something about this power felt familiar to her, and as the flames inside of her continued to grow, she finally understood. Throwing her hand towards the sky, she called out to her power for the first time.

"Mars Power Make-Up!" Rei yelled. Fire seemed to snake out of the pen and wrap around her. Rei felt the flames burn away her Miko robes and settle onto her body. Then in a flash the flames died down and Rei was left wearing a Sailor Senshi uniform, with a red skirt, violet bows and a pair of red high heels.

Sailor Mars felt an instinctive pull towards her fellow soldiers, she ran out of the room and caught up to Sailor Moon.

—

Jadeite walked along the woods that made up this shrine, lost in thought about how he was going to approach this shrine. Impersonate the owner? No, that would raise too many suspicions if somebody started asking specific questions, that was probably how Morga got caught. Maybe I'll just make a disguise for myself and apply for a part time job here, add a little persuasion magic in there to make sure that they're eating out of my hand.

Satisfied that he had found a way to get himself into the shrine, Jadeite focused on how to neutralize Sailor Moon if she should show up once his operation got underway. As far as Jadeite had known, there was only Sailor Moon, and his two encounters with the girl left him feeling confident he could take her on directly. When she had fought against him at that radio station she could barely dent his shield, it was only when that Tuxedo Kamen guy had shown up that he had decided to pull out. He didn't even bother to deal with her when she had busted his gym operation, preferring to cut his losses and take the energy he had collected and considered the gym to be a write-off.

He was completely unaware of the blue-haired Sailor Senshi that was discretely trailing him.

Jadeite spotted two figures moving in the distance, he decided to reach out with his senses to see who was at this shrine. His eyes widened as he felt the presence of a powerful youma.

Kigaan shouldn't be here yet. Jadeite thought, he probed further and realized that the youma he felt wasn't Kigaan but something that was strong and yet seemed to be masked. It's as if it's lying in wait for something. Jadeite thought to himself.

As Jadeite entered the shrine, it seemed to be strangely empty of people, even the crows that he had heard before had gone off somewhere else.

"Stop right there!" a female voice called out to him. Jadeite looked up at the roof of the shrine, and standing there was Sailor Moon.

"A shrine is a place for people to find spiritual healing and buy charms to help them with grades or find love, I won't allow you to use it for your evil purposes." She shouted at him. "In the name of the moon, I'll punish you!"

Jadeite was so focused on Sailor Moon that he didn't notice the two other Sailor Senshi that had moved behind him.

How did she find me so fast. The thought rang through Jadeite's head. I hadn't even started draining anybody yet, the only way they could have known is if… Jadeite thought back to the youma he had sensed earlier.

I've been set up. He realized.

"Clever trap moon brat, but it'll take more than that to fight me." Jadeite snarled. As he was talking, a sudden fog rolled in out of nowhere, obscuring his vision.

"What the?!" Jadeite yelled, he started to look around for where the fog was coming from, but it felt like he was in the center of a ping pong ball.

A fireball seemed to come out of nowhere and hit him on the back, knocking him off his balance. As he stumbled around to look for where that fireball had come from, he heard some muffled words come from somewhere, again he couldn't tell exactly where because of this damned fog.

Jadeite suddenly felt something very sharp and very fast flying towards him, turning towards it, his eyes went wide as he saw the golden discus fly towards him, Jadeite quickly tried to command his shield, but he was too late, the discus hit him, but instead of cutting him like he had expected it to, instead it suddenly enlarged and ensnared him, trapping his arms uselessly at his sides.

As the fog started to dissipate, he saw three very angry Sailor Senshi walking towards him. Jadeite realized that his youma had been lying to him. There wasn't just Sailor Moon, but there were two others here as well. Not only that, but there was that damned youma that was here as well.

The dark-haired senshi in the red skirt summoned a flame in front of her fingers and brought it uncomfortably close to his face "I ought to kill you for what you did." She spat at him, her words laced with venom.

"Mars, don't." Sailor Moon said to her, placing a hand on the girl's shoulder. She looked at him and Jadeite suddenly found himself of the full bore of her attention. "General Jadeite, I know you aren't working for the Queen Beryl willingly. The Shitennou were once Prince Endymion's loyal guardians, and the best of friends. Tell Nephrite, Zoicite and Kunzite that I am willing to forgive them if they want it.

Jadeite wasn't paying much attention to Sailor Moon's speech, but when he heard her mention Queen Beryl's name, and the other general's names, he flinched. She obviously had inside information about the Dark Kingdom, somebody has been feeding the senshi information while keeping us in the dark.

The energy ring that had been holding him in place suddenly dissolved, Jadeite collapsed on his knees while gasping for breath in a very undignified manner, his uniform was singed all over and he was covered in burns from that fireball, not to mention the bruises and cracked ribs from being held in that Tiara.

Jadeite knew he didn't have the energy to fight back, and against three senshi, Damn, how could there be three of them, one is bad enough, he decided to teleport back to the Dark Kingdom, his head hung in shame.

—

In Beryl's throne room, the injured Jadeite drew everybody's immediate attention.

"Jadeite! What is the meaning of this!." Barked Queen Beryl

"Queen Beryl-sama, I have grave news to report." Jadeite announced, coughing heavily. "The youma Kigaan is a traitor, she set a very lethal trap for me, one that nearly cost me my life. And I have reason to believe that she was not acting alone."

Jadeite's statement caused an immediate uproar in the court of youmas. Everybody was aghast that one of them would betray the Dark Kingdom like that.

"Jadeite, are you certain? How do I know you are not trying to cover for your own incompetence?" Queen Beryl asked.

"You Majesty, when I had teleported to the location that she had specified, I did not even have time to set up an energy draining operation. The senshi were on top of me the very moment I arrived." Jadeite explained. "What's more is that I know for certain that Kigaan was here in the Dark Kingdom the entire time, and yet I sensed the presence of a youma at the battle. It had clearly taken a great deal of effort to hide itself, but I was able to sense its presence at the battle. I am also certain that the youma have been lying to be about the strength of resistance."

"And how are you so certain, Jadeite?" Queen Beryl asked.

"Queen Beryl-sama, Sailor Moon was not acting alone in the battle today, there were two other Sailor Senshi there, neither of which the youma had ever mentioned before. There was one more thing, Queen Beryl-sama, when Sailor Moon had me in her grasp, she spoke to me and told me that she knew who you were and she mentioned the rest of the Dark Generals by name, the only way she could have come across that information was if she had somebody on the inside."

Beryl's eyes widened in shock.

"BRING ME THE YOUMA KIGAAN!" Beryl shouted, her anger shaking the throne room. "I will show everybody what the Dark Kingdom does with traitors and collaborators." Focusing her attention back to Jadeite, she spoke in a much softer voice. "It seems that I have misjudged you General Jadeite. I must thank you for bringing this to my attention, I shall leave Kigaan's execution to you."

Beryl turned her attention towards the white-haired general "General Kunzite, I want you to find out who else is a collaborator with these damned Sailor Senshi. I do not tolerate traitors within my ranks."

"As you wish, Queen Beryl-sama." The white-haired man bowed before her.