We do not own "Sailor Moon" nor any of the characters.
"SAILOR MOON ETERNAL"
The 6th Season of the Sailor Moon Saga
Chapter 34
"Swirling Shadows"
Early the next morning, the four Inner Scouts find themselves called to an emergency meeting at Rei's temple by Darien.
"Well, where are they? It's 6:00 AM! Darien's got some nerve waking us up so early and then not showing up!" Rei, a real grump, especially in the morning, loudly explains her frustrations.
"Did he tell you the reason? My conversation with him was very brief." Amy, her nose buried in a textbook as usual, looks up across the little table she and her friends were gathered around.
"Nah, he just said it was something important." Rei sighs, sipping her tea impatiently.
"That's what he told me too, I think." Mina yawns, her face puzzled. "Was that what he said, Artemis? I was so sleepy, I didn't hear it at all."
BIG YAWN! To which Artemis responds in kind.
"Yeah, Mina, that's what he said." Slump! Artemis falls back down to the nice warm radiator beneath him.
"Here's some more biscuits and muffins, gang!" Lita rejoins the group, sliding the door closed behind her. While balancing a tray of goodies expertly, the tall young woman sets it sprightly down before them.
"How can you be in such a good mood so early in the morning, Lita?" Mina yawns again, just now beginning to fix her messy hairbow in her askew hair.
"I love mornings, don't you? Especially when the air is so fresh and leaves are so bright with beautiful autumn colors like they are today." Lita smiles as she gazes out the window, a dreamy expression on her face.
"You had a sleep over with Lizzie last night, didn't you?" Rei smirks knowingly.
"Ye-es." Lita smiles innocently enough.
"And her brother didn't stop by—by any chance—did he?" Mina catches on.
"Well, as a matter of fact, Andrew did." Lita nods. "He brought a movie to cheer Lizzie up since her boyfriend is moving away today. He stayed a while and we talked some after Liz fell asleep. That's all."
"Uh-huh." Rei and Mina exchange teasing glances, though both knew that with such a good guy as Andrew, even easily love-struck Lita was safe alone at midnight with him.
"You guys shouldn't do that." Amy's quiet voice suddenly adds. "Andrew needs his studying time for that big upcoming medical exam. He needs constant study. It's sure to be very difficult." A study-freak herself, Amy sympathized with anyone else's academic endeavors. She advised them to study! Study! Study! Until their brains were ready to melt.
"A-my!" The three girls around her sigh in unison at her.
"Besides, I don't see you and Greg studying all the time." Lita defends her 'love life.'
"Yeah, wasn't that you sipping ice cream shakes together with him on Saturday morning?" Rei raises a brow.
"Oh, you guys saw us!" With a small voice and a big blush, Amy looks down, pushing her large rimmed glasses up further on her nose as if to hide from her guilty truths.
Just looking at her teasingly, Lita, Mina and Rei begin to giggle. Amy soon joins in as Artemis covers his ears. That's when the temple door slides open.
"It's so good to hear you guys laughing! I thought I'd never see you again!" Bursting into Serena-ish tears, Serena rushes into the room, throwing her arms around each of her dearest friends with a good old-fashioned sob.
"Serena, what's happened?"
"Why are you acting like this!?"
"Get a grip, girl!"
"Let go of me, you stupid Meatball head!"
"Don't be so hard on her, Rei." For once, Darien stands up for his whiny wife as he, too, enters the temple room. "After last night's battle, I wouldn't blame her for a few spilled tears." Darien holds Serena, who clings to him most of all.
"BATTLE!?" All four girls shout, rocking a poor, napping Artemis, who falls off the radiator.
Twenty minutes of vivid battle replays, as only Serena could do, in her imaginative and descriptive way later—the group looks to each other in consideration of the event Serena just retold.
"I myself wouldn't have bought all this if Darien didn't back up your story, Serena." Rei says snidely, crossing her arms.
"What? You wouldn't have believed I was attacked!" Serena angrily whines in her high-pitched strains.
"No, we just wouldn't have believed that you single-handedly saved Darien, destroyed the monster and got a brand-new power all while it was thundering outside. Consider me impressed, girlfriend." Mina says, while Amy and Lita nod in agreement. Even Rei was secretly impressed though she would never admit it out loud to that Meatball-head.
"So, what does it all mean?" Lita asks, worry on her brow.
"What is the enemy after this time?" Artemis questions.
"And who is the next target?" Luna asks.
"I wonder, is it something to do with women's jewelry?" Rei asks, intuitively.
"Yes, that does seem to be the one common thread in each attack. Remember, Molly's pendant, Lizzie's necklace, and now Serena's ring. All three Nega-monsters took their form in those colors." Amy puts together logically as she types in all the factors on her mini-computer.
"Then why isn't everyone being attacked? There's loads of jewelry out there." Mina asks.
"Give me your ring, Serena. Maybe there's some kind of evil aura on it still." Rei takes the opal ring before the temple fire, whispering her forbidding chants over it. "No." She comes back to the table, handing Serena the ring. "I don't get anything."
"Anybody got a piece of jewelry? There's only one way to find out." Mina bravely grabs Lita's neck, where a gold studded-with-diamonds cross hung and yanks it in her hands. She roughly gazes deep into the sparkling, though old, gems. She rubs it and shakes the cross about.
"Stop it, Mina! That belonged to my mom." Lita pulls it back, looking at it herself.
"Nope, nothing's happening." Mina comes to the conclusion quickly, then gets another brainstorm. "Maybe it only hits ditzy girls. See? Molly, then Lizzie and then…" Mina grins sheepishly as she grins at Victim #3, who in her own professional opinion, was the ultimate of ditzes.
"If we're going by that scale, Mina, then you're next for sure." Artemis grumbles snidely.
"What?! What, Artemis!? You're gonna get it for that!" Chasing the poor cat out into the hall with a rolled up newspaper, Mina dashes around Rei's room, knocking things carelessly about in her wake.
"Stupid Mina!" Rei calls out, shaking her fist at the departed out the door friend as she gathers up the mess of things scattered about.
"All right, all right! All of you! Get out of here! You've got dance classes, Mina! Lita, you'll be late for the café, and Amy, well, I don't have to remind you." Rei smiles at the one girl, standing all ready at the door, her bookbag packed to go.
"Darien, off to work! Out! OUT!" Rei pushes the hustling gang out the door.
"I guess this meeting's over." Luna sighs at how it was so difficult to have a good conversation with all the gang present.
"Come on, Artemis." Luna drags the smashed like a fly against the wall Artemis out to go scout the town for any sign of the new enemy.
"All right. Now I can go clean up the mess in here—" Rei smacks her hands together and looks down to find the room empty save for one smallish Meatball-headed girl who was hungrily scarfing down the remainder of the muffins on the table.
"Serena?! What are you still doing here?! Go home." Rei orders, pointing her friend out the door.
"Oh, Rei, you're so mean!" Serena starts to sob again.
"Don't start the waterworks again! All right, you can stay." Rei sighs as Serena immediately brightens up.
"And help me clean up this mess."
Serena's smile turns into a lazy frown as she stuffs the last muffin into her mouth and her fingers wave a fond farewell to her hubby walking down the path outside the windowsill.
What are you dreaming of, my ocean maiden? I never liked it when you indulged in that world by yourself without me.
The tall woman named Alex Sokova Starr smiles softly at the woman lying on the bed, peacefully unconscious. Her soft, aqua curls cascade across the pillow like a sweet ocean breeze. Windswept, she lies in perfect dormancy, the sleeping beauty of fairy tales—the tender princess awaiting the awakening from her beloved Prince Charming.
A fairy tale, Michelle, that's all it is. Alex sadly reflects, caressing Michelle's closing eyelids gently. Reality is never so kind.
Once again, Alex's own eyes close tightly as she enters her own world of indulgence—one where fierce battles are fought, where dreams are protected—one where evil is sought out and her hunt for her treasured maiden's star-crossed lover continues.
But, this golden warrior was in frustration that her journey was yet unsuccessful.
"Ugh." Alex grunts, gritting her teeth. She knew that Metallia was out there, that Robin Starr was out there, and yet, they were still invisible to her highly trained senses.
"What's up, Ally? You look all tense." From out of nowhere, Sayer Starr's lyrical voice reaches her ears as she, without even turning, answers him.
"I thought you and your brother were going to go rip up your contracts with the recording company." Alex says, her eyes still closed. The growing demands as to where the third of the Three Lights whereabouts was, harried them endlessly. Robin's 'extended honeymoon' excuse was just not cutting it with the agents and producers any longer. The two months had quickly become three, with no guarantee of his return, plus the rumors of a tragic fatal accident had spread like wildfire in the musical community. All this had done nothing to calm their backers' concerns. Terry had decided that enough was enough—for without Robin there could be no "Three Lights."
"We were. But, hell, who really needs Robin anyway? With me as lead singer and Ter as ample backup, instrumentation and all, no one would even know the little squirt was missing. We can arrange our own stuff. So we just left everything as it was." With those unfeeling words, the dark haired rock star sidles up behind his wife. He wraps his arms around her neck in a playful way, hands tugging off her unbuttoned white blouse and sliding across her tight red a-shirt.
"A little cold, isn't it?" Alex, her eyes still tightly closed, comments to him as he nibbles at her ear, his hands now snaking down her back to unlatch her open shirt's brassiere...
"Cold? Hmm? The weather? Oh? What I said about Rob? I thought you didn't even like him." Sayer stops his kisses, looking at her closed eyes with a quizzical smirk.
"No, not that." Alex's voice was quiet and expressionless. "Your touch." Her green eyes snap open, revealing a flash of anger—of pure instinct, stemmed from her knowledge that the soul of her lover was amiss. It was knowledge that went beyond just physical things of this earth.
His touch was not actually cold, just lacked the feeling her Sayer normally possessed behind it.
SLAM!
In the flicker of the wind, the man on her shoulder is slammed away, flipping across the room hard against the apartment wall.
"Ally, what are you—?" Plaintively, Sayer tries to gather himself up from the pile Alex had just thrown him into on the floor as he massages the jaw that was slowly oozing blood down his chin.
"Don't you give me that cra—" Alex stars to say, her eyes blazing in anger.
"Fine. I was told you were a smart one." 'Sayer's' smirking face doesn't even get to finish his statement, as Alex flies across the room with a spin kick high in his gut, sending him catapulting backwards into the hallway of the apartment building.
But the well muscled athlete himself was no wimp. He gets again up and belts her right back with a quick upper punch. The two passionate fighters violently scuffle back and forth with equally matched hits, kicks and throws in the hallway for many a gawker on their high-riseapartment floor to rubberneck.
"See? I told you that young Starr boy had a woman living with him." One nosy old lady from Apt #1203 says knowingly to another resident of the building.
"And a lively one at that. Look at her go at him! Wish I had them gams when I was young!" A second old woman joins in watching the wrestling match, this was the most excitement the neighbor and her even more elderly friend had seen in ages.
"Eee-yyeekk!"
Alex yanks a loudly high pitched shrieking Sayer's long ponytail to land him flat on his back to the floor with a head-splitting, resounding thud!
The wrinkle-faced, bent-over, horn-rimmed glasses wearing old bag throws her own hands intofists, pretending to fight along with Alex's every punch in true wrestling style which she secretly indulged in.
"I'm sure he deserves it. It's probably due to another woman. He looks the type, doesn't he? Too good looking to be good." Whispering tantalizing gossip all the while, their delicate sensibilities weren't harmed a mite, as the old ladies from the surrounding apartments watch in pleasure at the real live fisticuffs' soap opera taking place before them.
"You have to—ugh!—admit that—ergh!—this is almost as good as when we—" Sayer taunts as he rolls atop her, almost slamming Alex unconscious hard pressed against the wall. His strength was unbelievable as Alex knew well the extent of her vigorous starman's incredible energy and usual passionate drive well, having often tested this high performance vehicle from another galaxy's vitality in more intimate circumstances. But even her intense Fighter still held back then and he never attempted to cross over his planetary partner before now.
"Nothing's–ugh–that—oof–good—urgh…Starr." With a bursting flying kick upwards as Sayer ventures to press something cold to her partially exposed chest, Alex knees her would-be husband below his breadbasket powerfully in a kickboxing maneuver that sends him reeling with a flying shove back into the open door apartment.
Standing up and cracking her knuckles together, she huffs mightily, rather invigorated by the strenuous physical exertion. Alex was about to follow her attacker back into the apartment when she hears a loud cheer.
"You go at him, sister!" One old woman shouts across the hallway, pushing her spectacles up.
"Give 'em hell!" Eighty-year-old Mrs. Jones shakes her wobbly cane fist in the air and eighty-three-year-old Mrs. Takawa pounds hers into her aged palm demonstratively. (Too much WWF wrestling shows for this crowd, you could plainly see.)
"Don't worry, ladies." Alex responds civilly enough, brushing the mussed hair from her eyes as if this was just another day. "I fully intend to." Alex smirks at them, rushing back into the apartment, slamming the door behind her, much to the thumbs up and cheering behind of the old women egging her on. This was something a professional racer like Alex Sokova didn't need, yet still she reveled in it, as she produces a golden stick from thin air.
"URANUS CRYSTAL POWER—MAKE UP!"
Transforming in streams of light, Alex becomes Super Sailor Uranus, one woman—one soldier—whose hard-won intimate feelings for another should never dared be trifled with. It took only one touch, one feeling, for her to know this person was not the one who had sworn his soul to her forever.
Dashing into the living room where she was sure he was still laying, Sailor Uranus was shocked to find her assailant gone. Her swift eyes followed the trail of blood leaving crimson stains upon the hardwood floor. It led into the room at the end of the hall.
"Michelle…!" Panicking, Uranus breathlessly flies at a speed beyond the wind to the room where her beloved was defenselessly within.
Smashing the door in with a swift kick, she sees a silvery charcoal wolf-like creature perched over the slumbering aqua female. The strange, other-worldly creature sported a long, thickly glistening, blue-black spiny thorn 'fur' tail that swished about dangerously with the shape of a little devilish arrow at its perilous spiky end. Even more grotesque, the canis lupus type monster turns at her entrance sharply, revealing rows of sharp golden teeth with shining Roman numeral symbols etched across its crystal forehead and around its vicious face in a circular fashion, with yellow-green eyes digitally spinning. And at the end of its long muzzle mouth, in place of a nose was something in the shape of an alarm-bell, with a pierced gold hook hanging from it.
The whole of it eerily reminded Alex of a certain selected timepiece, even down to the 'SSS' initials engraved in antique style across the fob watch wolf's great big silver 'dog tag' nameplate—much like the one she had special made for her mate to adorn his pocket watch gift—that now hung at its neck.
It was indeed a marked resemblance to the engraved pocket watch she had given Sayer months ago for his birthday, because he 'never got the time right.'
"Move away from her, mongrel!" Sailor Uranus' quick mind reels from what this could all possibly mean for her absent husband. But her precise tactical mind focused on the situation at hand. Protecting Michelle was the most important thing she had to do at the moment.
"Youzzzzzz won't shoot your attack aszzzzzz long aszzzzzz I'm in front of her, will you? Zzzzz?" Besides its fancy, clock-hand shaped, tall pointed wolf ears, the creature's hound tongue was in the contour of a time hand. Each of the anthropomorphic wolf's fingers, if you could call long clawed paws that barbed each straight digit with a spiny arrow end like that of a timepiece second hand as well. They were jagged and sharp to a deadly degree, with a dark crystal in one of its clasped furry paws moving towards Michelle's sedated sleeping form.
Pausing to assess the perplexing situation that held her beloved's life in the balance, Super Sailor Uranus angrily eyes the vile wolf creature. She was trying to devise some way to kill the half-man/half predatory carnivore without giving its nasty razor claws or ferocious teeth the chance to harm Michelle.
"If you touch one hair on her head—" Uranus threatens, biding her time. But just then, Michelle seems to begin to stir, drawing Alex's attention away for only the slightest of milliseconds. But it was enough time for the swift creature to lash its muscular sharp spike fur tail out at her—knocking a shoulder punctured Uranus flattened across the room.
Her own blood spills out of her pierced arm and torso side profusely as Uranus dizzily tries to get to her feet, crawling on her knees back into the room she was just tossed from. She finds Michelle still laying there, thankfully safe and sedated yet in her unconscious state.
But the creature was gone.
Hearing the clamor of battle out on the high story balcony, Uranus smiles slightly, her heart lifting inside as she hears a familiar shrill sailor yell come to back her up.
"STAR SERIOUS LASER!"
But the brightly focused lightshow was soon followed by a returning attack from the enemy, just as blinding.
"WATCH ZZZZZ HANDSZZZZZZ SPINNING ZZZZZZZ!" The detestable mongrel growls the like energy blast as it oozes out the slippery words, disgusting drool dripping to the ground as it does.
Injured Uranus manages to stand and was almost at the balcony, though she wasn't able to move as quickly as she would've liked, due to the nasty wound in her side. Nonetheless, she was still moving extremely fast as her eyes dart out to the balcony's sun drenched sky.
KA-BOOMM!
The two warring powers meet in a violent explosion of light, knocking Sailor Uranus back into the apartment and onto her knees. She gets back up right away, now racing out into the balcony through the smoke and rubble of the railings, in spite of the pain.
For him she would run through fire, for him she would give everything—even if it meant her own death.
And there he was, her lover on the ground as she dreaded, lying still and crumpled up in a pile near their high rise apartment's balcony edge.
Super Sailor Star Fighter's dark curls and long ponytail were askew, dirt and rubble shrapnel mangled in blood over his handsome face which was badly scratched up.
"Fighter!" Alex hurtles across a fallen balcony edge, flying to him. She was just about to take hold of him as he begins to stir.
"Ally…" Star Fighter whispers beneath the rubble—but it was not uttered from the lips of the Super Sailor Star Fighter Uranus was rushing towards. Her eyes flit to the origin of the sound and there, another Super Star Fighter lay prone, battle worn and injured, much the same as the other.
The watch creature had again morphed into its target victim. But now, it had turned into a mimicked Super Sailor Star Fighter, this time somehow knowing to copy-cat the gender-shifting identity of Uranus' lover in the battle melee.
One was her Fighter, her injured Sayer Starr, who needed her help. And the other was a shameless fake, trying to manipulate her feelings enough for it to carry out its evil deeds.
"Get up, both of you!" Pushing those emotions aside like a true soldier, Uranus commands the two black leather uniform garbed fighters, who both slowly rise to their feet. Each nursed an injured body part as they look up to her with a question.
She was scrutinizing as she walked in front of them both as if surveying a police line-up.
"U, I'm the real one!" One Fighter claims, standing up as this Star Fighter clenched his teeth manfully at the bruised temple and ripped up cheek that pained him.
"What?! Come on, Uranus! You know it's me!" The other Star Fighter's scratched, swollen eye socket winks at her through the throbbing black eye and busted ribs side he was holding hunched over.
"Did you think you could fool me so easily? Wasn't one try enough for you to know I can't be deceived?" With those final words, Super Sailor Uranus sends a smashing punch into the gut of one Fighter—the one who had just called her 'U'.
The one whose totally shocked, totally floored dark blue eyes were actually the ones of the true Star Fighter she had fallen in love with.
Down the real Sayer goes, his face in utter shock as he sinks down to his knees on the ground, spitting up red blood from the blunt force impact of Uranus' fierce sucker punch.
But in that split second of triumph, that short moment of which the true assailant thought his trickery was complete on her, savvy Uranus uses her honed racing speed to her advantage.
Spinning on her high heel upon the other navy haired young sailor soldier now, Uranus breaks several teeth with a swift blow right in the face. This dark haired Starlight's jaw cracks as well with her relentless pounding direct left fist, for Uranus' raw knuckles were steeled with anger as the false Fighter's purplish blood trickles down from his broken nose and disfigured mouth.
Fast and furious Uranus reaches for the sky the next second later with a wild ferocity driven by her need to protect her pure heart's love:
"URANUS SPACE SWORD BLASTER!"
Ripping her sword from its sheath, Super Sailor Uranus screams low and long her passionate planetary power, her blade glowing as violently red with anger, tempestuous as her stormy soul. The untamable wind she owned, powering her talisman's steel, laterally slices the screeching in surprise fake Fighter's form, right below the Sailor Starlight's exposed navel, directly in two.
Uranus' confidence that she got the right one was rewarded as his gutted and halved two parts flicker from sleek and handsome (though more than a bit blemished after her livid fists were done with him) back to that of the now severed in two, disgusting black wolf whispering in a low growl at her.
"He warned me about facing about you…Uranus…zzzzzz." Its now foaming, pointed arrow tongue slithers out one more time before ceasing to breathe. Just as those words melt away—only a shadow was left to escape into the deep earth it had come from.
Uranus races to the edge of the balcony as her slit eyes follow its descent down, wishing she could follow the shadow to where she knew Metallia's lair would be. But at the moment she had no way to do so, especially in the condition she was in.
Uranus grunts in pain, holding onto her bloody side. She knew just how close that battle was. She glimpsed the power behind the enemy increasing—as if learning from some insider knowledge somehow.
But the element of surprise was her saving grace—this time.
"Thanks for the save, U. But I think you enjoyed slicing me in half a little too much, didn't you?" Fighter's silky voice notes with a smirk as he holds his own pounding gut she had caused, looking up at her with a pained squint.
"Immensely." Sailor Uranus smirks back, meeting his eyes. My bright eyed, real life wolf.
She runs a gloved hand over his scuffed up hair, glad for his scratched and bruised, but otherwise intact, still beautiful features.
"Geez, Ally. How'd you know for sure it wasn't me? That Fighter was a dead ringer!" Star Fighter asks, touching Uranus' bleeding side lightly as he does, admiring his fellow sailor soldier's exposed finer points.
"I didn't." Uranus smiles wickedly down at him. "Figured I'd get rid of at least one nuisance, either way." She tosses back nonchalantly. "What took you so long to get here?"
"You sure know how to hurt a guy—ergh—after he's been dry-gulched attacked by a psychopathic wolf watchmonster!" Star Fighter touches a ginger hand to his sharp claw swiped, red striped cheek that just narrowly missed gouging his eyes out. "On top of that, I had the devil of a time lock-picking the double latches you just installed on our patio's sliding glass door that my frugal partner probably wouldn't have wanted me to just shatter, right? This place is gonna cost enough to repair." Smirking at his economical bride as he gazes around the expensive scene of the bashed walls and broken furniture brawl, Fighter shifts his weight. A follow-up chuckle tried to disguise his painful legs after the mimic 'him' had whacked himself with a steel guitar to the calves earlier. That was when Sayer went back to collect his personal saxophone in the studio after Terry and he had ripped up the contracts with Mr. Pym, officially dispersing the Three Lights with no reason other than 'artistic differences.'
"Too bad Ter had to leave me there alone to rush back to Susie. Can't blame him for that, but…talk about a solo steel guitar…Get it? So low? Ouchy." He pulls a bad pun saucily on the side, rubbing at his bluish black PVC pleather lower legs that were undoubtedly of a similar shade, pounding beneath Fighter's sailor uniform tight thigh-highs.
"Good thing for my trusty sax being a pretty hefty defense weapon, too. And the fact I'm still pretty fast at reaction time and recovery helped, even in my civilian form—ungh." Sayer had a fair share of self confidence and pride in blowing his own capable horn.
"Since I was its target this time, I'd guessed it figured I'd come back home immediately after it lost me back at the studio where my doppelganger first attacked in the sound room."
"Why didn't you?" Alex asks as she de-transforms from Uranus as Star Fighter follows suit before her eyes.
"Saw a pretty girl on the way, of course." Omitting to mention that he selflessly didn't wish to lead the albeit good-looking negamonster right to the place where his woman and her vulnerable cousin were, Sayer teases his philandering penchant as an excuse. But in reality, he instead tracked the creature, as Fighter, from rooftop to rooftop, despite his own painful clobbered leg muscle injuries. It led him to the Three Lights' penthouse suite anyway, though it posed a bit of trouble breaking into due to Alex's defensive perimeter precautions.
"I should've figured that." Sailor Uranus smirks as she detransforms back to civilian clothes – or what was left of her shredded unbuttoned blouse, hanging loosely around her battered and bruised torso.
Watching Sayer Starr materialize from Fighter back in his now natural male form again, too, Alex shares a mutual smile with her fellow 'perfect soldier.' These teasing banters were Sayer and Alex's own brand of "sweet whispered" words.
But the looks in their eyes were enough to show the fear and relief and love the other felt, as they manage to wearily stand together in the blazing sunlight, the calming wind whistling softly through them both.
"Here. This has your name on it, Wolf. It must belong to you." Her 'initial U' ruby ring glinting in the sunlight, Alex stoops down to pick up the discarded silver pocket watch the dark creature had left behind. She clips it to his chest pocket button, rubbing her strong fingers expressly over the attached dog tag that had 'SSS' engraved upon its back before pressing its silver crown latch release to silently read the inscription beneath the open half hunter cover's inner lid.
'For My Friend, Sayer Starr Sokova.'
Alex tenderly touches her left hand to her claimed mate's bruised cheek, thankful it was deliciously ruddy warm this time as Sayer's sparkling eye catches light upon the lucky horseshoe, initial U encircled ruby ring he had given his lover for her birthday what seemed ages ago.
"And my heart belongs to you…my Red Riding Hood." Proud to wear her last name, Alex's ruby-red-reflecting-in-the-blue-eyed partner answers meaningfully with one warm hand placed over hers he kisses against his cheek, the other held passionately to his full heart as his teasing chin gestures to her tight red a-shirt tempting form a well. "Thanks for saving the day…even if these abs are gonna need some major rubbing down with your special ointment later, U. Legs, too." With a sexy, though wincing wink, Sayer then lurches forward towards Alex a bit, sucking in the badly bruised center gut she had pummeled earlier as his bashed calves buckle beneath him.
"Okay, you old granny. Get in bed and strip down everything that needs a massage. Right after I check on Michelle, I'll bring the stuff." Throwing back over her shoulder her own loose reference to the old children's tale, Alex licks her dry lips and shakes her head at his contagious silliness.
"'The better to taste you with, my dear.'"
Even though Uranus had been having some reservations of their relationship status of late due to the new battle, she was unable to halt the communicable smile the crazy man brought her now, despite the overwhelming anxiety and stress just endured.
Side by side, the two battle worn lovers limp back into their battered apartment, sliding the balcony glass door shut and locked as a large crystallized mirror somewhere far deep within the earth blinks out its periscope through it, spying upon them.
But this day, the side of good had won, as the small dark shadow wolfishly swirls down into the murky cavern, writhing in agony that the sailor soldiers in tandem had caused it together.
"The shadow was defeated yet again. Your conditioning obviously made no difference, boy." King Pearlrellion's smile was almost triumphant in its snideness.
"Only because it was a double of my…of a stupid person who all too often lets his arrogance get the better of him. And Sailor Uranus—even I must admit, though it pains me—is a force to be reckoned with, to which, right now, I will gladly oblige."
The male form of the Sailor known as Star Healer, evil intent raging in his eyes, steps towards the dark mirror, fully intending to pass through to challenge a battle, and in his own arrogance, assuredly defeat, that Sailor Soldier to whom he held a crossed-over, personal grudge against.
"Stop, my young heir! I command you to halt!" Queen Metallia's raspy voice calls from nowhere and everywhere at once.
Robin, indeed, does pause in his stride, but one flash of those brilliant green eyes was enough to show anything but quiet obedience.
"You do not command me, old woman. I do as I please!" The man in black leather had his own raspy voice and shouts back in disdain at the order, as he takes another step towards the mirror.
"SILENCE!" Showing more patience with this young man, than with anyone before in her endless existence, Queen Metallia in her vast evilness, was not a force to be trifled with—or questioned. But then again, perhaps proving his relation to her, neither was Robin. He didn't quiver in fear one iota, as anyone else would—that included Queen Aquamarianna and even King Pearlrellion. They shivered at Metallia's ferocious display.
Maybe seeing his bravery in her forceful attack as promising, maybe seeing his bitter arrogance as a reflection of herself, Metallia softens her stance a little. She decides on a different tact—not wanting to be at odds with her precocious heir.
"Take this advice to heart from an "old woman," young one. Do not show yourself before your victims. Not yet. I have found that fear of an unknown evil strikes deeper into the soul than any known." But still, with these easy words, Metallia continues on with a last warning of exactly who was in control here. "And remember, you are MY heir. But I am still the true master." With that parting reminder, Metallia's wicked light fades and with it, the mirror in front of Robin.
"As yet." Robin mumbles under his breath. Aquamarianna and Pearlrellion exchange glances at his bold words and actions to suit as well. Robin merely flipped his hand and another mirror, another gateway into the bright world, opened at his powerful whim. He had a longtime fight to settle with those particular Sailor Soldiers…
"Young Prince!" Aquamarianna suddenly rushes forward, grasping at Robin's departing arm. "Please, please do not anger her Majesty, the Queen." She lowers her eyes as if she believed Metallia was still listening in.
"And what do you care if I do?" The silver haired man stops, considering her for a moment. This female's eyes, her blue eyes and similar hair color reminded him of someone—someone very important out there…
"She has great plans for us—for all of us." Aquamarianna gives a glance back to her sulky husband, trying to appease his jealousy and yet, there was something so…attractive about this young heir. Aquamarianna with her womanly intuitions sensed something far more than striking fear in the hearts of those soon to be at their command. There was something out there that struck fear in even the omnipotent Metallia concerning this handsome young man and the outside world…
"Then I will stay. Until I decide when I should go—and no one else." The Heir arrogantly announces, striding away into another dark crevice within this evil lair.
Spending the past few days since Serena's reported attack in deep meditation, she had utilized her telepathic abilities in search of some hint as to their newest enemy.
Rei Hino sits perched tense in with her legs tucked beneath her, Japanese style. Her bright red temple uniform was tucked beneath her as she holds her head high—her eyes closed and directed at the small flickering flame before her.
"Akuu na teki mite tai deru ima jiyuu hin hi no hi no hou you aku na teki mite tai deru ima…Fire is light, flame is sight…"
Over and over, the young temple priestess speaks her native tongue, chanting for the evil enemy to show themselves to her in her fire. But as yet it was to no avail. The flame remained small and unyielding in its mysteries to her.
Frustrating! It's so frustrating! I know the enemy is drawing near! I can feel it! The enemy—the enemy is…
Rei focuses her eyes on the embers of the fire, snapping them tightly shut as she concentrates hard…harder…harder yet, almost on the verge of a breakthrough she knows, when—
"Hi there, Rei! I don't mean to disturb you or anything, but, just thought you might want some more herbal tea. It's just the way you like it. Two heaping spoons of pure sugarcane ground up exactly like—"
A cheery Chad slides in a tray of tea and cakes, knowing nothing of the torment on Rei's overwhelmed soul. He only wanted to cheer her up, especially from the grumpy mood she'd been in. But—
"Chad! How many times have I told you to never bother me when I'm in here meditating?" Her chants dashed, Rei could feel her reading already slipping away as she vents her anger at Chad. He shrinks back at her ferocious response.
"NEVER!" Rei explodes, her fiery temper getting the better of her as she jumps to her feet, physically shoving the poor man out the sliding paper door of the temple.
"Leave me alone, okay!"
Chad sheepishly looks down as he is rejected once again. Man, I was only trying to be helpful. Chad sadly sighs as he picks his broom back up. Rei, sometimes I wish I didn't love—Chad, about to smack his broom on the ground to punish it for this world's cruelty to unrequited hearts, stops midstream and still manages to connect the broom's bristles to Serena's head.
"Owwwie!" Serena sings, rubbing her head.
"Oh, sorry, Serena!" Chad says apologetically. He had been thinking over his non-existent relationship with Rei and hadn't even noticed Serena coming up the steps.
"That's all right, Chad. How's Rei? Mina stopped by before, and said she's been meditating all morning! So I was worried!" Serena tries to peek through the paper wall of the temple, but cannot see her moody friend.
"All morning? She's been at the sacred fire almost straight for days! Like, she doesn't eat or sleep much anymore. Sheesh. I'm like, totally worried for her, too, Serena." Chad, like, says in concern, he, too, looking to where Rei was within the temple. They see a flame break out, flickering as both he and Serena jump up at the sudden shouting voices—and then a high-pitched shriek…
Minutes earlier…
After chewing Chad out majorly this time, Rei sits back down in front of the fire. But she was no longer able to concentrate on it, no matter how hard she tried.
Chad…I'm sorry, guy. I guess you were just trying to be nice. I shouldn't have been so mean. But this enemy has gotten me all tensed up. Still…I shouldn't have taken it out on you. It's just you always pick the worst moment.
Rei thinks these things as she shakes her head at her shaggy haired friend. (Thankfully, it had grown back quickly, though not at its usual length since Chad had returned from that monk shrine he was studying at in the mountains. That is, after Rei had a long chat about his sequestration with her gramps.)
Yeah, Chad, you're my friend. Rei smiles to herself, remembering when the good for nothing lout had first appeared just outside on the temple steps. Then, how he had come into his own as her grandpa's assistant, really doing a good job here, even though, as she had come to discover, he didn't have to. He had means well beyond that of a simple temple assistant, especially as one who is kicked around by this temple's caretakers.
But he stayed on, year after endless year, doing all the hard jobs that gramps couldn't anymore—everything for him, actually.
And for me, too…Rei softly smiles, recalling the many times he'd done the simple caring things like bringing her tea or doing her chores or…
Rei suddenly sticks her hand into her red pleated pant pocket. Her searching fingers were rewarded as she pulls out a long pale blue string and ties it in her hair.
I remember when there was a time, much like this, when I was deep in meditation, that you came and cared enough to give me this ribbon to tie my loose hairs back so they wouldn't be scorched by the fire. Smiling at the string from his own robe—that day so long ago, Rei hears a jingle above the doorway threshold. She gazes at the source of the noise, and discovers her red, gleaming pottery pendant in the shape of a bird which she had given to Chad last Christmas. It was the one her cousin Kengo had given her when she was just a little girl. She had come to cherish it. But now, it no longer just reminded her of her cousin, but also of another unshaven brown-eyed man who had dove straight into the bottom of the river that day, a few months back, when they were all at picnic by the lake. They were enjoying some summer swimming when Rei had, in distress, discovered her treasured necklace gone from around her neck. It was Chad who had with determination, kept on searching everyday for almost a week. He knew how much the trinket meant to Rei and he wanted to find it for her.
And he did. It was removed from its chain, but he had found the red bird in the monstrous river. It was unbelievable and he returned it to a pleased Rei. She felt now, that she didn't show her appreciation enough then.
Rei removes the ribbon from her hair, takes the pendant from the doorway, and strings it on it. It was a small symbol of the dreams of a young girl, melding with the hopes of a young woman as she ties it back into her hair—the crimson bird sparkling against her raven locks.
"Lovely hairpiece, where'd you get it? The local flea market—or maybe just from a man who has fleas?" Snickering, Rei barely has time to turn at the voice, sarcastic and oh-so-familiar from behind her as it begins to speak again.
"Zen ryou taisan!" ("Good spirits, begone!") Her evil double chants, it parodying her own curse ("Aku ryou taisan!"). It had the same results on Rei, paralyzing her in meditation as an evil spell paper lands on her forehead. This Rei, replete in temple kimono, down to every last detail, save for the shimmering red bird tied with a string in the real Rei's hair, reaches out to claim that, too…
But no evil spell could outdo Rei's powerful intensity. She was determinedly setting her mind against it and breaks loose from the curse just in time to let out a screech and a sliding kick. It knocks her attacker flat, as some embers of the fire scatter in the resulting shuffle.
There was smoke everywhere as Serena arrives. "Rei?!" She chokes, coughing, and is suddenly hit unconscious by an unknown attacker's fist before she can even register it.
"Rei, who's hurting you!?" Chad throws the door wide open, ready to face down any intruder and beat him within an inch of his life if he so much as looked at Rei the wrong way.
But, as the smoke clears, Chad could clearly see just who the attacker was…
"Rei? Rei, there's like, two of you." Chad says in shock, banging his own head to make sure it was still working. He thought maybe it was just him, but the fierce look on Rei's face—both of their faces—told him this was really happening.
"Well, aren't you brilliant, surfer boy?" Rei, the bad one, snidely replies and reaches out with another Japanese spell paper towards…
"Chad, watch out!" Rei warns, throwing herself between the two. The evil Rei takes the opportunity to grasp the red decorative bird from Rei's hair, yanking some with it and the blue string holding it on.
"Ouch!" Rei cries out in pain as some of her hair is tugged out. Her double grasps the shimmering red object triumphantly and cackles hideously as it glows with energy. The fire at its side flares up so violently, its flames reach the temple's low ceiling, scorching and burning everything in the room it touches.
"Chad! Get Serena out of here!" Rei manages to say as it surrounds her and forces Chad away from the temple as he rescues Serena's fainted form.
"Ahhhhhh!" Rei shrieks, suddenly too close to the spiking flames as she feels herself sizzling with heat when a strong hand grabs her arm. Thinking it Chad coming to her rescue, Rei lets it pull her—but instead of being dragged outside, Rei finds herself being led deeper in towards the raging inferno by something—not a hand—more like a…
"Bird's talon?" Rei's mind feels fear biting at her as she looks up through the smoky air to find a pair of beautiful crimson wings outstretched, shielding her from the flames. The red flying creature, once a good-luck token from the gods of one of her childhood stories, was not anything good nor luck certainly. Nor was it anything God would have sent down. It was, underneath those gorgeous wings, an abomination. It was hideous with the beak of a fowl, with piercing birdlike eyes squinting at her, but with the face and form of a human. It was a chicken like cross between human and beast, all aglow and blood red.
"AHHHHHH!" Rei kicks at it, but the beast was powerful, holding her down with razor sharp claws.
"Energy…!" It squawks out, pressing a dark crystal to Rei's struggling chest…
When suddenly, a cloudburst of water sends the monster shrieking away in pain—cold water was apparently the enemy of this fire bird. And Chad amply provides the cold water with a hose. He doused the burning temple quickly, then gave the fowl beast all the water pressure he could muster.
"Take that, ugly!" He calls out as he does so.
"Chad…" Rei whispers, feeling slightly energy drained. She watches the creature slash out in squawks of anger and swiftly it takes to its wings, shooting out of the temple "cage," soaring high into the sunlit sky.
It was about to make a killing swoop on this loathsome man who dared wet its magnificent wings…
"CHAD!" Rei's scream could pierce through anything with its ferocity. The sound, loud and pointed enough to even wake Serena from her dazed, unconscious state, and just in time for her to pull brave Chad (who was heroically standing there, poised to whack the monster with his broom) out of the way.
But the broom gets disintegrated at the monster's swooping claw, just missing Chad by mere inches. Serena and Chad both dive out of the way, but next time they would not be so lucky, Serena and Rei both knew as they look upwards, seeing the crimson bird soaring around for it's second, and no doubt final, killing swoop…
"Ready, Serena!" Rei dashes out to where Serena and Chad lay on the ground.
"I'm ready, Rei!" Serena dusts herself off in determination, jumping up and motioning her hand over that feather shaped heart locket attached to her dress bow.
"MOON ETERNAL MAKE UP!" Serena elaborately transforms into Eternal Sailor Moon. White wings, golden skirt, white boots—she was an impressive sight to see, but it was not Serena/Sailor Moon that Chad's attention was turned upon.
"MARS CRYSTAL POWER MAKE UP!" Rei calls, not caring that Chad was there watching anymore as she changes over from tough temple priestess into even tougher Super Sailor Mars.
Rei was never afraid to share this secret with Chad, but the opportunity just never came up before—not until today.
"Rei, you're like—like—like—" Chad stumbles over the words as he gazes in awe at his raven-haired beauty even more than before.
"I am Sailor Mars!" She announces proudly.
"And all this time I thought you were only some gorgeous karate chick!" Chad sits on the ground dumbfounded at his new, exciting discovery.
"Gorgeous, yes! But only? I'll show this overgrown bird that fire is my racket! And no one messes with it but me!" Sailor Mars runs directly in the path of the swooping bird, pointing a flame arrow at it.
"MARS FLAME SNIPER!" She shouts, her flame arrow straight and true, but the bird dodges to the left. It wasn't enough to completely get out of the way of the blazing energy beam though.
SCREEEEEEECHHHHHHH!
The bird makes a horrendous sound. Its wings clipped, it falls to the earth with a smashing crunch. But it was still moving, not with the same speed, yet it gets up, glowing with energy, preparing for another attack.
"Now, Sailor Moon!" Mars calls out, believing in Serena, believing that Sailor Moon could destroy the horrible thing that threatened not only her and her home, but Chad, too…
"SPARKLING FULL MOON SILVER RADIANCE!" Eternal Sailor Moon takes her cue, bolstered in the fact that Rei had faith in her newfound abilities—her light and her brilliance shined with the moon's beams. Feathers swirled, and enveloped the red bird.
It, with a final screeching squawk, faded into nothing but a shadow, leaving only Rei's crimson kiln porcelain pendant still hanging from the string she put it on just a few moments ago.
"Wow, that was like, wow! We're in some sci-fi flick! You guys are great!" Chad jumps up, not one bit weirded out by Rei's revealing her alter-ego as a Sailor Soldier. He seemed like, he was like, quite pleased with the fact.
"Here, Rei." Chad scoops up the pendant and jogs it over to Sailor Mars. "You are just so cool." He bubbles at the thought of his Rei being beautiful warrior, Sailor Mars.
Gratefully accepting the pendant, Mars ties it around her neck. "Don't be blabbering this to everyone now, Chad." Rei's smiling demeanor hardens again. After all, her image must be kept up. "It's a secret."
"Got it, Rei, uh, got it, Sailor Mars! Yes, ma' am, sir!" Chad stands at attention but his happy, unshaven face was still smiling brightly.
"I'll talk to you later, Serena. We'll discuss things then, okay? Get out of here now!" Rei's twisted lip gazes at the destruction the creature caused upon her temple. "And just look at the mess you made with all that water from the hose, Chad! How am I gonna explain this to Grandpa? How am I going to explain to him the drenched flooring?" Rei complains as she detransforms. Her hands were on her hips as she surveys the tattered burnt out room before her.
"But really, after all, it only needs a little cleaning and replaced floors. Chad can do that. Get to work, Chad! I want this place tip top clean before Grandpa gets home tomorrow! Let's go! Let's go, lazy moron!" Rei orders, wiping her hands together.
"I think she likes you, Chad." Serena coos, seeing, during the battle just how much Rei cared for this brown-haired man.
"Like, really, Serena?" Chad asks hopefully as he rushes to fetch some boards to patch up where the fire had scorched.
"Definitely, Chad! She only beats up on people she likes the most!" Serena says, knowing this from experience.
"Wow! Like, way cool! Thanks, Serena! I mean, Sailor Moon!" Chad calls. "I think I feel a song coming on!" He starts to sing as he works. Rei covers her ears and Serena rushes away to safety down the steps. She had to see the others about this newest turn of events.
"I see your red dress beautiful—you rage like an inferno! Oh-Ohh!"
Rei shakes her head at Chad's new "song." (If you were kind enough to call it that.) She gazes down at her porcelain bird and wonders of its significance in all of this. Why would the enemy take its form?
Who is this enemy anyway? What do they want—
Rei starts to ask herself when suddenly a flash—a moment's psychic vision whisks her above the planes of her troubled mind.
Clouding smoke. A man in black. A collapsing tower. A shimmering green jewel blinking out of existence. Darkness approaching.
Her purple eyes snap open again and she feels her head exploding. They're all signs of what is to come, I know it. How do we stop it? How do we prepare?
Rei's heart aches as she gazes out the window at the noonday sky. Chad's happy strains could be heard out the window still and, for once, Rei wishes she could lose herself in them. His simple idiot voice somehow comforted her battleworn ears.
There was a storm again that night. It was a violent one which seemed suddenly to appear from nowhere and everywhere at once. It was the kind of storm that even Lita, mistress of the elements, did not like.
I should've felt it coming on. But it just smacked in all of a sudden! Lita presses her hand to the window, feeling the condensation on her fingertips as a streak of green lightning sizzles through the sky.
Lita doesn't flinch despite the roaring thunder accompanying it. It's almost…unnatural…I wonder why Serena called the Scout meeting for so early tomorrow morning.
Lita calmly considers the thought, though the friend rushing to her side at the window doesn't take the clamoring storm outside quite as lightly.
"AHHHHHHH!" Mina shrieks with each clap of loud thunder, grabbing onto Lita's arm for support and protection from the raging elements.
"Mina, it's only the thunder. You're getting as bad as Serena, you know." Lita teases her with a chuckle, though she, too, deep inside, was a bit frightened by, not so much the storm, but some force that seemed to be at the source of it.
"I know, Lita." Mina makes a pouty face at her best friend's insult to her bravery. "I'm just worried about Kenny and Andrew out there. They're supposed to pick us up for our hot double date out on the town tonight!" Mina fiddles with her new dress she had just bought especially for tonight's outing.
"I'm worried, too. It's even beginning to hail. Andrew's a good driver, but…maybe we should call it off, Mina. The boys might not have left yet—" Lita responsibly, though the thought of breaking any date with her beloved Andrew was tough, picks up the phone to cancel.
"What?!" Not quite as responsible, Mina was NOT going to forego her date on account of rain. She grabs the phone receiver and smacks it back down. "It's only a little rain. It'll probably be over by the time we're ready. Come on! Let's get you dressed! You sure wouldn't want Andrew to see you in that!" Mina sings, referring to the, well I have to say, ugly old t-shirt Lita was donning.
"Out of the way, Artemis! I will transform this tomboyish girl into a sparkling lady of elegance!" Mina yanks Lita along into the bedroom, nearly stepping on and shoving away with her foot, Artemis who had just appeared from the room, awakened from his leisurely nap by the loud clap of thunder.
"Mina!" Artemis screams as he is tossed aside like an old rag. "That girl will never change." Artemis shakes his head, finding a nice warm spot on the radiator and curling up again, covering his ears from the noises outside—and inside the bedroom, too, as Mina jabbered on and on. But still, he was glad he was in the safety of the house, sheltered from the pounding torrents outside.
"I hope Luna's safe indoors as well…though she's never scared of thunder…" A clap of thunder just then causes Artemis to leap into the air before looking around to make sure neither girl saw his cowardly behavior.
Once inside the bedroom, Mina whisks her friend's less-than-complimentary tee off and tosses it carelessly to the floor. Immediately, Lita scoops it up, tenderly folding it and placing it carefully on the dresser.
"What's with you and that shirt anyway, Lita? I always see you wearing it, though I don't know why. It looks all tattered and beat up! And way too small for you." Mina, in her blunt honesty, idly chats as she styles Lita's eternally ponytailed hair into something a bit more feminine.
"This shirt?" Lita lifts it up, holding it out in front of her with a reminiscent smile. "My daddy gave it to me when I was ten. Just before he and mom left for the airport. Kind of a going away present, I guess." Lita runs her hands over the green sequins in the shape of a big four-leaf clover across the front. "That was the last time I saw them." Lita fights the tears as she hugs the shirt to her cheek.
"Oh, Lita..." Mina says softly, her heart aching for her orphaned friend. "I'm so sorry." Mina whispers, not able to imagine what her life would be like if her parents were dead, even if her Mom worked all hours and didn't want her to be an idol, and her Dad wasn't home all that often either on account of his military post. They were still always there when she needed them, with a helping hand, kind word or some advice, especially over her difficult teenage years. This was something Lita had missed out on entirely, living on her own for so long.
"Poor Lita." Mina sighs at the cruelties life had to offer. She was determined, now more than ever, to be the best friend Lita could ever hope for. "Well, don't worry. It's not all that ugly. Really, especially when you wear it, 'cause that color matches your eyes. It kinda even looks nice, all bright and festive of your Irish heritage. Clovers are lucky charms there, right?" Mina tries to make up for her insensitive blunder, gazing upon a second reflection at the shirt full of memories, with a nod of beaming approval.
"Four-leaf ones, yeah. Thanks, Mina." Lita brightens up. She was a strong girl with a strong will, just like her dad taught her to be—to know what was right from wrong, and smile.
'Daddy's little girl has a pretty smile as bright as this lucky clover! So, keep smiling while we're gone, Clover.'
Keep smiling. Lita. Cause he and Mom are both looking down on me now.Reminiscing of her beloved father's final words to her after he gifted her with the special t-shirt, Lita now smiles at the treasure in her hands. "That's what Andrew said, too. I've got 'a pretty smile'…"
Memories of old good times transform into thoughts of sweet new ones with a very special boy. Lita held the faded shirt up, recalling the day a few months ago when Andrew had surprised her with a bouquet of flowers in celebration of his acceptance into an elite medical course in college. He had caught her cleaning her apartment wearing this favorite shirt.
"He said I was beautiful—naturally beautiful. Because I don't ever need make up like most other girls—my smile is bright and pretty." Lita sighs at her boyfriend's perfection, remembering Alex's words, too, from that Christmas nearly a year ago when Lita and Andrew just started dating. Has it been that long?
"For who you are—that's why a man should love you."
She was right of course, as Alex usually was. I can feel it. Andrew really loves me because he accepts me for all I am—just for being me. And that's another reason I love him, too. Lita caresses the green sequin clover, shimmering its assent to her heart's final choice—that indeed Andrew was the right one at last.
"You know, it's so funny but Kenny said almost the same thing! He said:" Mina puffs herself up for her best guy impersonation, but it was still really sad, "'Sunshine!'—he calls me 'Sunshine'! Isn't that sweet?!" Mina says, interrupting even herself in her busy mind. "He said, 'Sunshine! I like it when you sparkle.' Ahhhhh! Isn't he wonderful?! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you for introducing us to each other, bestest bud in the whole world!" Mina sings, finishing Lita's hair with a flourish. Oh well, it was a ponytail still, just fancied up with a streaming green bow as the two girls hug.
"Look! Look! See what Kenny gave me!" Mina runs to her jewel box, dumping the contents to the poor battered shelf and sifts through the junk until she finds what she was hastily searching for.
"What is it?" Lita says incredulously as Mina proudly produces a large medallion of a goldy orange sun. Its face smiled with a winky, jeweled golden eye.
"A choker medallion of course, silly!" Mina attaches the gaudy object, no doubt won at a fair she and Ken had attended not so long ago, to her neck choker proudly. Hideous for certain on most, it suited Mina somehow. Lita knew why Ken would give it to her. Mina and the bright sun had a lot of the same qualities—especially right now as she smiles and winks in the mirror at her pendant, making Lita smile in the same way.
DING DONG.
"Ahhh! They're here!" Mina screams, rushing to the door of the bedroom. Wait, wait! Stop Mina, check your hair in the mirror first! Mina stops, fussing with her long blonde hair as her ears suddenly pick up a strange sound—it was her own voice! Somewhere down the hall and Mina unconsciously moves her fingers to her unmoving lips to make sure by some chance, she was not speaking or throwing her voice or something…
"Who's downstairs?" Lita asks suspiciously, learning to be on the defense after living alone for so long, when her ears pick up the same sounds. She quickly pulls on her t-shirt over her dress again, ready to rumble, long skirt or no.
Mina's voice was bubbling, though her mouth was tightly shut beside her. Lita's own voice jauntily was telling Andrew how nice he looked and that they should get going before the slowed rain started again.
"TROUBLE!" The two voices from inside the bedroom at once call out. Mina fumbles to open the door. "Hey, my gloves are slippery!" This gave Andrew, Ken and whoever they were greeted by just enough time to slip out the door.
"Hey! Wait for us!" Mina calls, racing down the hall. Lita's long stride reached the door and flung it open first to find a wall of hail suddenly pelting down in her path. But determined, Lita steels herself and without a second thought to her lovely rose black dress or her fixed up hair, she dashes out.
"Where are you going?!" Artemis, who just now woke up from his kitty snooze, shouts at Mina's high heels over the deafening thunder and hail in the front doorway.
"To get my date! He got away!" Mina whines as she chases Lita, who was chasing the group of four secured-under-an-umbrella, while she and Mina were being rained upon.
"STOP! You shameless boyfriend pinchers!" Lita yells at the top of her lungs.
"Stop, Kenny! That me is just a dumb blonde floozy!" Mina shouts, nearly skidding to her soaked bottom on the slippery sidewalk.
"Huh?" Ken and Andrew exchange looks at the two wet rats of girls shouting to them. Then double-take to the double copies pristinely dry next to them. They again look at each other in puzzlement.
"Lita?" Andrew cocks his head, squinting through the rain. He was sure he had heard Lita's voice.
"Mina?" Ken cocks his head the other way, trying to see through the torrents to the one calling his name.
"Don't listen to them. They're probably just some girls no doubt jealous of my popularity." The dry Mina says haughtily.
"Yeah, Andrew. Let's just keep going." Lita, beneath the umbrella next to him says uncaringly.
"But they're getting wet, whoever they are. The least we could do is offer them an umbrella." Andrew says humanely as they reach his car. He pulls out another spare umbrella from the glove compartment.
"No! Let's just go." Phony Lita strongly shoves the surprised Andrew into the car.
"Now wait a minute, Lita—" Ken protests, thinking his old friend was acting a little strange since they had picked them up.
"We said, just go!" Fake Mina shouts angrily at him. Her eyes were dark as she glances over her shoulder at the two girls coming up towards them from behind.
"Lita would never act this way!" Andrew quickly pulls himself out of the car, just as the drenched real Lita and Mina make their appearances before them.
"STOP or they both die!" Lita—the evil one—suddenly realized the gig was up. She grabs Andrew's and Ken's necks each in her powerful hands.
"Give me that!" Dark eyed Mina shrieks, grabbing the sun pendant, ripping it off the real Mina's neck, choking her with the orange ribbon it was attached to. 'Mina' transforms before their eyes into a hideous monster. Its topaz gemlike head was in the shape of a sunburst, the beams around her arms and torso sharp and hot and pointed.
"It was easier this way! Just as the chosen one said it would be if we take these weaklings as hostages!" The bad Lita flashes a smile a moment before one hand shoves Ken into the sun monster, its spikes burning holes instantaneously into his suit jacket where it touched. Then 'Lita's' freed hand reaches out towards a shocked real Lita and rips a hole right in her T-shirt, tearing the tattered green sequined clover out along with the emerald pendant in the same shape, holding it up triumphantly in her glistening green hand. Andrew had bought that emerald brooch for Lita when she had said that her favorite old top had gotten ripped, and he thoughtfully bought the pin for her a few months back on White Day, 'to patch your favorite t-shirt up.'
How dare you take the form of my lucky Clover, Nega-creep!?
Fake Lita then transforms into a sparkling green leprechaun woman, wearing nothing but a kelly green top hat with a big four leaf clover sticking out its brim and matching iridescent emerald clover wings. Blindingly shimmering sequins cover the rest of her entire glowing green body.
"Lita—coughßwhat's going on!?" Andrew, still clasped in the green monster's grasp, asks the girl before him, gasping for air as the leprechaun monster squeezes his neck tighter.
"Andrew!" Lita calls out, fear for him in her eyes. "Let him go, monster!"
"Be givin' me all ye'r love energy, or I be destroyin' ye'r pot o'gold, lassie!" The clover green sequin monster announces with a definite Irish brogue accent.
"And I will scorch this one for the fun of watching the fireworks, child of Venus!" The sun monster threatens, as well. Both creatures produce out of nowhere suddenly a dark energy-zapping crystal in their gleaming hands. The nega-creeps, in unison, each reach out towards Mina and Lita's hearts.
The two girls exchange glances with each other.
"I don't think so, you unlucky Leprechaun!" Lita, with two powerful arms, grabs the green creature and flings her over her shoulder whilst pulling Andrew away.
"Eat pavement, Sunbeam!" While her attention was momentarily occupied with Lita's sudden attack, the evil sunburst is shocked by Mina's high-heeled kick and volleyball style double hurl pop on the chin. It knocks her backwards as Ken falls to the ground, choking, but all right.
So it was a face off now. Two versus two, as Lita and Mina stand protectively over their boyfriends.
The two monsters get up, angrier than ever from the indignant attack of these two humans—and they didn't even look close to giving up.
"What do you say, Mina?" Lita asks, knowing the same question was soaring through Mina's head.
"No choice, Lita." Mina was, after all, the leader of the Inner Scouts, and in the end, the hard choices all came down to her. She knew what they must do to protect lives…
"VENUS CRYSTAL POWER…"
"JUPITER CRYSTAL POWER…"
"MAKE UP!"
As one, the two girls transform, lightning and thunder exploding from an atom and beams of crescent light exploding into a cascade of stars. Andrew and Ken watch from the rain soaked ground in amazement at the revelation flashing in sailor beauty before them.
"I am Sailor Jupiter! You'll pay for these crimes to cute boys, Monsters! I'll hit you so hard, you're gonna be numb!" Super Sailor Jupiter stands tall and threatening, punching a fist in her other palm.
"And Sailor Venus will give you divine punishment filled with love!" Super Sailor Venus announces, pointing an accusing finger at the two creatures.
"VENUS LOVE AND BEAUTY SHOCK!" A single heart explodes with light, aimed at the sun monster, who dodges it expertly.
"Are you really the shining one the Master spoke so highly of?" The very sarcastic words sizzle against the raindrops, hitting the sun creature. "No studio would ever sign you up."
"What?! How do you know this? Who is this 'Master' anyway!? Sounds like some arrogant jerk" Venus exclaims, insulted. But the creature only cackles.
"BLINDING SUN BURN!" Her only response, sizzling a beam from its two fire orange red eyes to which Ken pulls Sailor Venus out of the way—just missing scorching her legs.
"JUPITER OAK EVOLUTION!" Sailor Jupiter angrily shoots her power at her Irish green nemesis. But the female leprechaun's sequined body shifts holographically, her see-through clover wings spinning a shield against the energized leaves hitting it, and bounced them back towards Lita's direction instead.
Seeing this, Jupiter throws herself in front of a defenseless Andrew, who catches her hit body, holding on tightly.
"Lita! Lita! Hold on!" He shakes her in panic.
"I'm…all right..." She tries to steady herself as Andrew helps her up, wanting to help her in this fight.
"Venus, what do we do!?" Jupiter asks her friend as they now stand back to back. Andrew steadies Jupiter, while a hole burned suit, but unshaken, Ken had taking a fighting stance at Venus' other side, holding out his umbrella like a bat ready to swat the attackers.
The four watch in defensive fear as the two monsters seemed to be conspiring their powers together threateningly in the pouring rain across the sidewalk lane.
When the evil sun monster reflects its beams on the green sequins, the light reverberates on it until it seemed charged with a nuclear type energy. The green leprechaun creature now glows with atomic energy and aims its sights at the group, its emerald Irish eyes glowing hideously rather than smiling.
"SEQUIN REFLECT NUCLEAR BOM-" Its thick accent starts to shout, fully prepared to unleash its deadly power. If not able to gather their energy, they must at least rid this despicable world of two of those pesky Sailors and their shine…
"VENUS LOVE ME CHAIN ENCIRCLE!" Super Sailor Venus sings out suddenly, utilizing yet another of her powers, bravely grasping the unsuspecting sun monster and wrapping it together with the nuclear sequined creature on the verge of exploding.
"JUPITER THUNDERCLAPS ZAP!" Jupiter pitches a glowing ball of pressurized energy, smashing it into their two wrapped up enemies. The two sizzling energies, coupled with just the right amount of natural wide pressure, shorted each other out. Their green and orange electric lights sizzle down in the power surge.
"There! We did it!" Sailor Venus happily claps, but the congratulations were too soon. The two monsters, on their knees, slowly begin to recharge, drawing energy from those glowing black crystals. Venus looks to Jupiter, her partner, and sees that she was in no condition to fight any more.
"So what do I do?" Mina's mind screams for tactics. But still, in the pounding rain's dreariness, Venus could see that if her powers, even if combined with Jupiter's, were not enough against these new enemies, then she should evacuate the group and call for back-up…
"SPARKLING FULL MOON SILVER RADIANCE!" The sky suddenly clears, revealing the shining full moon above, casting away the gloom in its brilliant aura.
"Sailor Moon!" Venus and Jupiter look up with grateful smiles, knowing their friend, their princess, was close at hand.
"WHAT?! This wasn't in our contracts!" The sun screeches out as the silver streams of white light and soft feathers cascade around the evil pair.
"THIS IS BLARNEY!" The unfortunate leprechaun woman's clover wings lose a lucky leaf or two to Eternal Sailor Moon's swirling luminosity, until only the golden sun medallion and the torn out piece of Lita's clover sequined shirt with the emerald pin on it clatter to the wet sidewalk. Two dark shadows in conjunction melt away into the rain soaked pavement.
The abrupt storm was suddenly over.
"Just in time, Eternal Sailor Moon!" Venus sings, hugging her winged friend.
"I was so worried about what happened to Rei this afternoon when Artemis called on the communicator—I panicked! So here I am!" Eternal Sailor Moon smiles sweetly—the power she just emitted was almost unbelievable to have come from such a sweet young face. But after tonight, Andrew could believe anything.
"Are you all right, Lita?" He asks in concern. Surgical student Andrew Hansford examines, with medical knowledge and loving care, her wounds from battle.
"I'm fine." Tough Sailor Jupiter says, blushing at the secret she had kept so long from him, now so bluntly revealed.
"I'm not taking any chances. Let's get you back to the house." 'Doctor' Andrew scoops his patient up, tenderly carrying battered Super Sailor Jupiter back towards Mina's house, looking down at her with caring compassion in his eyes.
"You don't mind then? I mean, that I'm a Sailor Soldier?" Lita asks meekly, peeking up through her messy bangs as she detransforms in his arms.
"Of course not, Lita. I love you for you—no matter what. Besides, Sailor Jupiter is pretty darn awesome!" Andrew, smilng, his mind spinning still from the events of the night, knew this honestly as truth in his heart.
"Here, Lita. I think this was yours." Serena picks up from the sidewalk the four-leaf clover emerald pin and all the shredded fabric t-shirt bits she could find. She helpfully tries to fit it like a puzzle piece back into Lita's thoroughly trashed, drenched, stretched out, green clover sequin favorite shirt. "Maybe you can stitch it back up again?" Eternal optimist Moon offers.
"At least the emerald pin Andrew gave you is still looking good, secured on it." An empathetic Serena comments, handing that remaining part of the shirt to her as her tall friend goes past in Andrew's arms.
"Thanks, Serena. Maybe it's time to retire the old thing." Lita smiles sadly, then gets lost in Andrew's smiling Irish eyes at her, trying to cheer her up.
"I think you're so talented, and artistic, and beautiful inside and out, Lita—you'll be able to remodel all the pieces to be just as meaningful as a choker or a sash, or a floral ribbon, perhaps, with the pieces you have left of your gift from your folks. In fact, I have a great idea for it! I think it would be perfect for that very special 'something old' from the time-honored old rhyme for our…at our wedding." Andrew's honest declaration turns more timid and gentle at the end when the blond young man realized he was actually speaking the words aloud of his open heart's proposal confession to the wonderful girl held captive in his strong, sure arms.
Blushing, with averted eyes affixed on the green pendant he had given her, Andrew pauses his stride to kneel them both to the ground to pin on Lita's now thoroughly wet black rose dress' bodice the special lucky four-leaf clover emerald pendant that meant so much to them both.
"Oh, Andrew! Did I hear that right? For our wedding?! Do you mean it?! Our wedding…This four-leaf clover worked! I'm so lucky…" Dreamy-eyed Lita didn't know if she was going to laugh or cry at her long-time heart-throb's sudden revelation. Every inch of her was only beaming from ear to ear that dear Andrew now not only knew everything about her Jupiter secret—but he wanted to be even more part of her once lonely world.
"No, I'm the lucky one. If you'll have me, Lita?" Hopeful, more sure than he ever had been that he had found the right partner who wanted the same things as he did in life at last, Andrew asks tenderly of the true-hearted friend.
Lita was the only girl for him now as the medical college student pops the question in genuine tones as he dabs at her dripping auburn bangs along with her wet with happy teardrop eyes with his handkerchief.
He then wipes the last of the raindrops away from her bare shoulders before wrapping a warm arm around as they walk down the street, officially affianced in a lightening fast engagement.
I think Ken would understand that YOU are my new dreamy rainy day man, Andrew…
"What happened to Rei, Serena?" Both were yet unaware of the little romantic melodrama being played between the raindrops before them, Mina asks Serena as she trots alongside her fellow blonde friend.
"I'll tell you later." Serena answers, not wanting to interrupt Lita and Andrew's apparently tender moment with talk of battle. Especially not after what they'd just been through.
"Hey, Sunshine!" Ken's voice comes from behind. "Here." He chucks a gleaming gold thing across the now moonlit sky. It lands perfectly in Mina's athletically trained hand.
"Thanks, Kenny-boy." Mina whispers into his brown eyes.
"Look how bright Venus is up there in the sky tonight." He says with a smile.
Mina was glad that he, too, accepted her role as a guardian as the two of them stay outside a little longer than the others—just watching the bright stars shoot by in the dark night sky.
HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY!
Whether you're a Mom yourself or just the lucky child of one of God's most beautiful, selfless, generous creations of motherhood, we wish you a wonderful and blessed day to spend together with those you love! ^0^
God bless my dear Okasan and all Mother's everywhere! :)
Thanks for reading! Love to hear your reviews of this adventure chapter!
HarukaKou