It had been an average day at the Game Center. Motoki stood at the counter, dying of boredom. Normally he tried to move around and help people who were stuck on some of the games, but he had been presented with very few opportunities to do that. So the most he could rely on to break up the monotony was waiting for some kid to redeem their tickets at the prize counter.
That is, until he saw Mamoru enter through the doors. With any luck, maybe he could keep him company for a bit to help the time go by faster. It wasn't until his friend got closer that he realized something was wrong. His fallen facial features were a dead give away.
"Hey, Mamoru, what's up? Everything okay?" Motoki asked his friend.
"Uh… no." Mamoru said honestly, "Look, I need you to close the arcade early today."
"Um… I could probably go on break a bit early if you need me for something, but I can't exactly-"
"No, it's not you, it's… the building. I need it."
"What on Earth are you talking about?" Motoki questioned.
"Look, I just need you to trust me, okay?" Mamoru pleaded.
"No, that's not okay!" Motoki responded, "I put up with a lot of crap and secrets from you, but you can't just walk in here and tell me to do something that could get me in trouble and expect me to just go with it."
Mamoru paused for a moment, looking anxiously toward the entrance, "Alright, fine, you want the truth?" He asked, to which Motoki simply nodded in response, "Alright, here goes. I'm Tuxedo Mask." Mamoru said in a hushed tone, "Usagi is Sailor Moon, her friends are the Sailor Guardians, and they have a supercomputer hidden in the Sailor V arcade game that they need to use to track down one of their friends. And you have about a minute and a half to get everyone out of here before Mako comes in and forces them all out."
Motoki stood in stunned silence for a good while before he was able to finally speak again "You… you're not joking…" He finally choked out.
"No. I'm not."
"It all makes sense now. You randomly disappearing for days on end and showing up with bruises and-"
"Listen, buddy, I promise I will explain everything later. But for right now…"
"Right! Right!" Motoki said, "Um, attention everyone!" He announced to the patrons of the Game Center, "I'm sorry, but we're closing early due to an emergency! You will all have to come back tomorrow!"
Some customers were more respectful than others, but ultimately Motoki was able to get them all to clear out, before switching the sign to 'closed' on the front of the center.
"Alright, you're good everyone." Mamoru said into his communicator, and mere moments later, Usagi, Rei, Minako and Makoto along with their cats came walking through the front entrance.
"Uh… hey, everyone." Motoki said awkwardly.
"Out of my way, Furuhata." Makoto said darkly, pushing past Motoki and heading straight for the Sailor V arcade machine.
"Um… is she…?" Motoki began to ask Mamoru.
"Ami was taken by the enemy." Mamoru explained, gloomily.
"Oh, I'm sorry." Motoki asked, "Is there anything I can do to-?"
"You've done plenty already. Just go get some rest." Mamoru said to his friend.
…
"How do you make this damn thing work!?" Makoto cried in frustration, pushing every button on the Sailor V arcade cabinet.
"Luna's the only one of us other than Ami who can work that thing, Mako." Rei explained calmly, "Just leave it to her."
Makoto backed up and allowed Luna to jump onto the machine. The feline instantly got to work.
"With any luck, I'll be able to triangulate her position from her computer." Luna explained, "Only issue is that it needs to be activated for that to work."
"Is there any other way you can track her?" Makoto asked, desperately.
"Maybe. Trust me, Mako, I'll do everything I can to find her."
"Alright, thank you." The Guardian of Thunder said sincerely, before turning to her friends, "In the meantime, we need to talk about what we're up against."
"What do you mean?" Artemis asked.
"We can't go easy on them again. The next time we run into them we take them down, hard and fast. And Sailor Chaos? She's mine." Makoto said, definitively.
"You mean Naru?" Usagi said meekly.
"What?" Makoto asked indignantly.
"Her name is Naru."
"Well, to be honest with you, Usagi, I don't really care what her name is right now." Makoto shot back, "All I care about is stopping her from doing any more harm."
"She needs our help!"
"She doesn't want our help!" Makoto rebutted, "You weren't there. She was toying with us, enjoying herself."
"That's not really her! It's not any of them! It's-!"
"I don't care! We treated them with kid gloves, and look where it got us!" Makoto shouted, "Ami could be dead for all we know!"
"She's not. They wouldn't go through the trouble of capturing her just to kill her." Rei interjected.
"Until they get what they want from her!" Makoto replied angrily.
"Mako, we can't just-" Usagi began, before being cut off.
"You're in no position to tell me what I can and can't do! You weren't there!" Makoto all but screamed, pointing directly at Usagi.
"I told you! I tried! But Haruka and the others, they-"
"They stopped you? Let me ask you something, Usagi. Can you honestly tell me you did everything you could to get through them and get to us?" Makoto asked, "Or did you hold back? Because you would rather let us keep getting hurt than do what has to be done!?"
"I… I…" Usagi stuttered, her eyes welling up with tears.
"Alright, Mako, that's enough!" Rei said, approaching the auburn-haired guardian.
Suddenly, Makoto felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned to see it belonged to Minako, who was looking at her with pleading eyes.
"Can you join me outside?" The Guardian of Beauty asked, "Please?"
…
Ami didn't know where she was. She felt like she had been wandering forever. But when she looked around, all she could see was darkness.
"Hello?" She asked, timidly.
"Can you believe her?" Ami heard from a distance, in a voice she could've sworn belonged to Usagi. She began to make her way towards the source. As she got closer she was able to make out what appeared to be the visages of her friends, shrouded in darkness.
"Guys? Guys! I'm here! I'm-!"
"How stuck up can you be?"
Ami stopped dead in her tracks.
"'Oh, poor me, I got a ninety-one because I finally took my nose out of a book for once', gimme a break."
"She thinks she's so much better than us, just because she gets good grades."
"No… no I don't, I-"
"Yeah, even though that's literally the only thing she's good at."
"Oh I know! I mean, how many times have we had to bail her out during a fight? Talk about a weak link!"
"Honestly Mako, I don't know why you decided to date her."
"Yeah, well, I honestly just felt sorry for her."
"What?"
"I mean, she's just so pathetic, how could I not? But I've gotta be honest, I'm really reaching the end of my rope with her."
"Mako… no… I…" Ami choked out, grasping at her chest and collapsing onto her knees as tears began to fall from her eyes, an icy cold feeling filling her entire being.
"That's right. You are alone. You will always be alone." She heard Reign's voice say from the aether.
"No… no… it's not…"
"You know it's true. They could never understand you."
"They could never…"
"No one could ever love you."
"... ever… love me…"
"However… that doesn't have to be so." Reign said, appearing in front of Ami and kneeling down to her eye-level, "Join with us… help us rewrite this world… show those who shunned you the error of their ways."
"Yes… yes…" Ami said, looking up towards Reign. Wispy shadows began to protrude from the ground and wrap themselves around her. As they did so Ami's thoughts would continue to twist and bend. The pain that came from years of isolation all coming to the surface at once. No friends to call her own, her mother constantly gone, even her own father wanted nothing to do with her. How could she have let herself believe Usagi and the others would be any different? How could she have been so stupid?
"And it all starts with the Golden Crystal."
"The Golden… Crystal…"
"I need the code, Ami."
"The code… right… the code is…"
"This is Ami, she's the really smart one." Usagi's voice would chime from the darkness.
"What?" Reign asked, confused.
Suddenly, the black void around the two of them morphed into the Crown Game Center, visages of Ami's friends appearing as well, replaying a scene from years ago.
"And the cat with the crescent bald spot is Luna!"
"Aw, how cute!"
"That… that's right." Ami said, slowly standing back up as the icy feeling in her chest would fade, "They do love me… they accept me for who I am…"
The blue-haired girl pulled out her Crystal Change Rod, "You can't trick me Reign! I'll stop- ah!" Ami screamed as she was electrocuted by black lightning from Reign's hand.
"Yes, yes, that's very cute. But let's not forget who's in control here." Reign began to inspect the memory, "You recalled this upon being asked the code, so something here must be important."
"No…" Ami cried as Reign analyzed her precious memory like they were watching a TV show, her still being stuck in place by the dark energy.
"Hmm… ah, I see." Reign said, looking at a calendar behind the front desk, "The day when you first met her… that's the code, isn't it?"
"Stop it…" Ami pleaded.
"How sweet. I must thank you for your help, Miss Mizuno. Maybe when you wake up you'll be more cooperative." Reign remarked before blasting Ami with energy, rendering her unconscious.
…
"What do you want?" Makoto asked, having stepped out of the Crown Game Center with Minako.
"Seemed like you needed some air." Minako replied.
"I'm fine."
"You're freaking out."
"Of course I'm freaking out!" Makoto shouted.
"I get it. I do." Minako said, "But you need to calm down before you do something you regret."
"Oh, please, don't you dare get on my case. We both know if this were Rei you would be the exact same way."
Minako was stunned, "How… how do you…?"
"Does it matter?" Makoto asked, "You know I'm right."
Minako pondered her friend's words for a moment. She was still confused as to how Makoto had come to learn about her feelings for Rei, but that was something she could deal with at another time.
"Y'know what? You're right, Mako." Mina said, "I would be a total wreck if something like that happened to Rei. Or any of you really. I would probably lash out the same way you are." Mina stepped forward and locked eyes with Mako, "And I would trust you to be the one to stop me from doing something stupid."
"You… you don't understand… none of you could." Makoto said, leaning back against the wall.
"Well… then help me understand." Mina said, sincerely.
"I… I was supposed to protect her." The taller girl began, her eyes welling up with tears, "I promised her I would protect her!"
"Mako, this is not your fault." Mina said, reassuringly, "Risk comes with the job, Ami knows that, she-"
"She came to me last night, sobbing, because she was so scared of doing this again." Makoto said bluntly, "And I told her that I wouldn't let anything happen to her and I… I failed. I failed her."
"Mako…"
"She must be so scared…" Mako said, tears rolling down her face, "... if she's even…"
Suddenly, the green-eyed girl would find herself pulled into a hug by her friend, "Mako, listen to me. Ami's strong… a lot stronger than I think even she realizes. She's okay, I know she is. And I don't think she's scared at all. You wanna know why?"
"W-why?"
"Because she knows you would never break your promise. She knows you're gonna save her."
"You think?"
"I know."
Mina would simply stand there, holding the taller girl, giving her a moment to recollect herself, before suddenly they heard the Game Center door open, and broke their hug to look at Rei, who had stepped out of the building.
"Guys, Luna's got something!"
The three girls dashed back into the building and up to the arcade machine, "Did you find her?" Makoto asked, desperately.
"I think so." Luna said, "I'm getting a signal from her computer, I'm triangulating the position now!" The computer pinged, indicating the final result had been delivered, "Got her! She's… oh no…"
"Where?! Where is… oh my god." Makoto said in shock. The group all looked at the location on the screen in stunned silence, with only some light gasps being thrown into the mix, until Usagi finally managed to choke out the name of the cursed location in question.
"D-Point."
I can only apologize for long waits between chapters so many times but... sorry. I really wanted to get to a point where I was uploading at least once a month, but I've really been in a slump since the beginning of the year. And obviously this story is really important to me, it's basically the culmination of everything I've written thus far and I really want it to be good. Which has kind of paralyzed me in a lot of ways when it comes to writing/editing it.
Not to mention it feels like the weeks just fly by (it really does not feel like it's been three months since the last update). Regardless, I know I'm making excuses, but all this is to say I really do appreciate everyone who has stuck with this story despite the long waits between chapters. And I really will try to start updating at least once a month. I know I've said that before. And if we're being real here, I'll probably say it again, but I promise to try.
Anyway, onto our normal chapter notes stuff.
Why has Reign set up shop in the Dark Kingdom's old hideout? And how will the Sailor Guardians brave the site of their own demise to save their comrade?
Come back next time for Chapter 11 to find out. But until then, thank you once again to everyone who has kept reading this story.
And please please please let me know what you think of the story thus far, Reviews are very much appreciated. And until next time, take care everyone (: