AN: I know it's a bit early for another chapter, but I'm on vacation for a few days so I was able to get one out for you.

Chapter 23: Deep Aqua Mirror

February 20, 8983

Queen Serenity leaned forward on one arm, trying desperately to hide her boredom as one of her stewards introduced yet another petitioner, a scrawny man who worked in one of the shops near the Temple of Serenity. He bowed deeply and began to speak, telling her something about unusual activity among the Cult. Very few petitioners were allowed to see Tranquility anymore, and rumors had it that the god was no longer present in his greatest temple. He was out, searching, stirring his Cupids to some great task, and it had most of the merchants below the temple worried.

"What is he searching for?"

The man shrugged. "I don't know, Majesty, but he is not on the Moon. We think that he might have been visiting his new temple on Earth."

Serenity considered his words, wondering if his information was important. Perhaps the Cupids were involved in Michiru's vision of the end of the Silver Millennium, or maybe Tranquility was simply investing some time in a new temple. He had been the father of the Earth Royal Line ten thousand years earlier, so the primitive Earthlings had always held a special place in his heart. Before the queen could decide how to respond, a flash of garnet light filled the throne room. Serenity looked to the side, shocked to find the Queen of Pluto standing by her throne, garnet eyes wild with fear and something else, something much worse. Setsuna, wearing a long, tight black dress covered in tiny gems that resembled the one she had worn at the ball on Ganymede, grabbed Serenity's arm with her free hand, waving her Time Key as both of them vanished in another flash of garnet light.

The steward stared at his queen's empty throne for a moment, shrugging as he turned back to the gathered supplicants. "It seems that Her Majesty has been called away to a very important meeting with her senshi. Please excuse the haste of her departure and all of you will be first in line tomorrow when the throne opens for supplicants."

Serenity pulled away from Setsuna as they appeared in her bed chambers, the dark queen leaning her staff against the wall and staring out the window in silence at the Earth hanging low in the sky. "Aren't you at a meeting on Titan right now?"

"I was," Setsuna whispered, her voice choked with what sounded like tears. Concerned, Serenity stepped forward and touched Setsuna's shoulder, lavender eyes widening in shock as the dark queen spun in her arms and embraced her, tears falling on her shoulders as a curtain of dark green hair fell over her arms. "Ser . . . her vision. It was terrible. I saw everyone dead . . . Serenity dead! Then I saw you dead and me leaning over your body . . . and then Sailor Saturn lowered her scythe. Ser, it's really going to happen. Everything is going to end and you're going to die!"

Serenity backed toward her bed, sitting down and pulling the sobbing Plutonian into her lap. She had never seen Setsuna so defeated, so hysterical, and she had no idea how to deal with the dark queen's desperation. "Se, you said that you were going to stop it with the other senshi. What changed in one week that frightened you so?"

"I have been Sailor Pluto through fifteen incarnations over the last ten thousand years and I have never seen a vision so clear and detailed, especially from such a young Sailor Neptune. Ser, what am I going to do?"

"You'll find a way," Serenity whispered, running her fingers through Setsuna's long green hair, soothing her like she had years ago, when she found out that she was pregnant and Setsuna decided that the king of the moon persona had to die. It was the last time the Plutonian had cried in Serenity's arms. "You have to go back to your meeting, Se. You can't just teleport halfway across the solar system in the middle of a Full Council Meeting; the others must be worried about you."

"I don't care," Setsuna whispered, raising her head from Serenity's shoulder. Teary garnet eyes met concerned lavender, and Serenity's arms tightened around the older woman. Setsuna's lips met hers in a passionate kiss, the dark queen pushing her back onto the bed as her hands began to wander across the queen's body. Serenity gasped something incoherent as she tried to push Setsuna off, moaning in surrender as the taller woman's knee landed between her legs.

Setsuna, we can't!

I don't care, she hissed back across the mental link they shared, the link that had been all but dead for the past fourteen years. By the gods, I saw you dead. I saw me, holding your body. I just need some reassurance that you are alive. Setsuna frantically pulled on the top of Serenity's sleeveless dress, sliding it off her lover's slender body and tossing it carelessly to the floor while her hands reacquainted themselves with the queen's breasts. It's been so long.

Serenity moaned as Setsuna broke their kiss, moving down to suck a nipple into her mouth. "Se . . . Se I want you so much, but don't you realize how hard this is going to make everything?"

"Nothing can be harder than staying away from you for fourteen years."

Serenity raised her head and cupped Setsuna's cheek in her hand, smiling as the woman leaned over her again. "I love you."

"I know," Setsuna whispered. "I love you, too."

"What's going on? Haruka? Rukaze? What are you talking about?"

The Uranian princess turned back to the table, facing the Queen of Saturn and shrugging. Meika pulled her fellow queens into a huddle near the table, letting her eyes meet each woman in turn before she began to speak. "This is Haruka, the princess of Uranus, and she has been visiting our planets with the other senshi, pretending to be the son of one of the War Queens. Rukaze is the name she was using. She's married to Michiru."

"Two women aren't allowed to wed," Yumemi argued, dark eyes wide as she absorbed Meika's information. Asakaze and Rikuriko exchanged a heavy glance, both of them having accepted their daughters' decisions, both of them turning to Amami and tilting their heads, silently encouraging her to accept her daughter's choice, as well.

"Rei and Minako have been lovers for months," Rikuriko replied. "That's why she won her henshin stick from me, because I told them that they couldn't be together. Makoto and Ami are lovers, too, and just as determined to be together as our daughters are. I don't think there's any point in fighting them on this."

"What about the Ancient Law?"

"That doesn't really matter, Yumemi." Meika, thinking back to her conversation with Makoto, reached down and gently took Amami's hand in hers before she continued. "Three thousand years ago the senshi married each other frequently, and the world never ended. Our daughters have studied the prophecies and they are certain that there is no danger to the Silver Millennium if they were to wed. Haruka and Michiru are married, and nothing has happened yet. We can't argue with their decisions, since they are the current senshi, and I don't think we should try to stand in the way of their happiness."

Amami glanced over her shoulder at her daughter, the petite woman standing inside the protective circle of Makoto's arms, completely at ease with the Jovian. She smiled at the scene, remembering her own youth with Meika and the love they still shared. The Queen of Mercury smiled as she turned back to the group, acceptance in her ice blue eyes as she gently squeezed her lover's hand. "I don't think we should tell Shousha."

"Or Setsuna," Asakaze added. "She would never condone their marriage." The other four queens nodded, accepting Asakaze's decision, even Yumemi reluctantly bowing her head. Asakaze turned around and led the queens back to the group of senshi, smiling gently at the waiting princesses. "Well, Haruka; welcome to the Full Council meeting. We've decided not to tell Shousha and Setsuna about you, but I'm sure one of them will return shortly and figure it out on their own."

Michiru glanced up at her wife, reaching up to brush a stray strand of blonde hair away from Haruka's intense emerald eyes. "Wearing a dress and with your hair like that . . . you don't really look like the same person, Ruka. But your eyes give you away. Can you change their color?"

"My eyes are always green."

"Not when you're angry," Rei replied, crossing her arms over her chest. "They turn this stormy blue color."

"When you're scared or surprised they go grey," Serenity offered.

"When you're embarrassed they turn a kind of blue green color that's much lighter than your normal shade," Makoto added, Ami nodding beside her.

"When your lust overwhelms your judgment, they turn gold." Haruka glared at Michiru, but the siren just giggled. "It's true."

"How is it that I didn't know these things?"

"I didn't know that my eyes turn a sapphire blue until you told me. I'll get a mirror in my bedroom so that you can see your eyes while I'm making love to you. It's really the most beautiful shade of gold."

Haruka couldn't hide her blush at Michiru's words, the other princesses mumbling and looking away as Serenity coughed to cover her own embarrassment. "Maybe you can make your eyes change color by tapping into one of those emotions," the Moon Princess suggested.

"Not lust," Asakaze amended dryly, pink eyes dancing with amusement as the blonde's blush only darkened. "I'm not sure the rest of the table could handle a horny Uranian."

Michiru's teal eyes widened as Haruka's memory of Uranus kissing her flew across their bond at the Venusian's words, followed an instant later by the shock and embarrassment her wife had felt at the time. "She did what?!"

The women turned to Michiru in confusion, having never heard the gentle senshi raise her voice at all, a rainbow of eyes watching Haruka as she hung her head in shame and slowly backed away from her wife's fury. "I didn't encourage her. She just jumped me."

"Haruka! What did you do to entice Uranus to kiss you?!"

"Nothing! I swear! Michi, we were talking about the end of the world, I promise! And I wish you luck in preventing a goddess from doing anything she wants!"

Michiru sighed and wrapped her arms around Haruka again, resting her aqua head on her wife's breasts as her anger evaporated. "You're right. I'm not angry at you, my love. I would be angry at her, but I know you too well to think that your patron goddess considered her actions, even for a second, before jumping you."

Minako sighed dramatically and spun around as the confrontation ended, returning to her seat. "Great. I'm the avatar of love and beauty and the woman who dresses like a man gets a kiss from a goddess before me! How completely unfair!"

Rei took her own seat and leaned over to her soul mate, amethyst eyes narrowed. "If Aphrodite ever dared to touch you, I would rip her hair out by the roots," the Martian hissed, her voice dark and completely serious. Minako reached out and caressed her lover's cheek gently, accepting her overprotective nature with that simple gesture.

"Back to the matter at hand," Makoto began, trying to banish the image of a Rei versus Aphrodite cat fight from her mind, "try changing your eye color, Haruka."

The blonde sighed and narrowed her eyes in concentration, bringing to mind the fury she had felt when Michiru told her that Kazan would have been her husband if Haruka never landed on Triton. Her eyes darkened to a stormy blue-grey color, removing all lingering resemblances to Rukaze. "How's that?"

"Good. Try not to make eye contact with Shousha very much. Has Setsuna seen you since Serenity's Presentation?"

Haruka nodded, staring at her hands thoughtfully. "She's the one who gave my talisman and sent me out into the Silver Millennium. She hasn't seen Rukaze, however, and as long as everyone refers to me as Haruka, my secret should be safe."

Serenity returned to the table, her senshi following her as Haruka assumed her seat on the senshi side of the table. "I know why Shousha ran out, but where did Setsuna vanish off to? It's not like her to leave a meeting, no matter how disturbing that vision was."

Michiru picked up her mirror again at Yumemi's observation, teal eyes glaring at the silver surface. "I wonder if I can use this to see her." She concentrated on her fellow senshi, remembering the shock in those garnet eyes an instant before Pluto vanished, willing the mirror to show her the present. There was some resistance, but Michiru had gotten used to fighting to force her visions to obey her, so she pushed through that wall of darkness. Michiru felt a flash of power flow through her form, washing over her like cool waves across a beach, and the mirror's surface suddenly changed. She stared at her talisman for only a second before squeaking in shock, dropping the mirror onto the table once more.

"What?" Haruka, the only one sitting beside the aquanette, leaned over to see what had shocked her wife, chuckling at the sight that met her eyes. "Way to go, Setsuna."

"That is not something we should be watching! It's private." Michiru reached for her mirror to break the link, but Makoto's callused fingers snatched the talisman away before she could touch it.

"How private?" The Jovian looked into the mirror, Rei and Minako leaning closer in an effort to distinguish the image. All three women nodded in approval, Minako tilting the mirror so Ami could see.

The Mercurian's face turned a color strikingly similar to Rei's hair, Ami covering her mouth with her hand in something between shock and embarrassment. "We should not be watching that," she whispered.

"Shouldn't be watching what?" Serenity's innocent blue eyes strained to see over the rim of the mirror, the five queens on the other side of the table also leaning forward curiously.

"You can't see it," Haruka replied, reaching for the mirror. "You're far too young."

"Haruka! Don't talk to me like I'm a child. I demand to see that mirror." Minako plucked the talisman from Makoto's fingers, nervously turning it toward her princess. Serenity's eyes widened at the image of a very naked Queen of Pluto leaning over her equally naked mother, Setsuna's hand somewhere between Serenity's legs while her long green hair covered both of them like a veil. Serenity arched her back, lavender eyes wide as she screamed something, the princess blushing and looking away. "Oh. I think I'm too young to see that."

Asakaze reached out and turned the mirror toward the queen side of the table, all five women nodding in approval. They were too old to bother with embarrassment, though none of them had expected to see their fellow senshi in a bed with their queen. "Setsuna certainly has good taste," Yumemi observed, the other queens nodding. Michiru leaned over the table and grabbed her talisman, banishing the image as the blush finally faded from her cheeks.

"I don't think I'll ever look in on Setsuna again," the senshi of the seas murmured.

"You know," Asakaze began, breaking the silence that had suffocated the room, "I heard a rumor once that Setsuna and Serenity were an item before the last Queen Serenity died. It seems that the rumors were true."

"Why would Setsuna leave this meeting just to go to the Moon and jump the queen?"

"Because of the vision I showed her," Michiru replied, surprised that her wife did not understand. "She saw Queen Serenity's death; worse, she saw that she had survived when everyone else died. If that had been you and me, what would you have done?"

"I would make sure that you're still alive in the most intimate way possible," Haruka replied without hesitation, understanding dawning in her blue-grey eyes. "Oh, I see. Do you think she'll return to the meeting?"

"By Zeus, I hope not," Makoto replied. "I don't know if I can look her in the eye without blushing ever again. She's going to know that we know."

"If she's still secretly Serenity's lover, doesn't the Ancient Law hurt her as much as it hurts us? Wouldn't she be happy to see it gone?"

"I'm not sure, Ami, but we'll have to worry about that later. For now, we might as well continue the meeting without them. Haruka, you need to have a look at this time knot." Minako pushed her copy of the image down the length of the table to the other blonde, hoping that the warrior would have a suggestion on how they could stop the coming darkness.

"Se?"

"Hmm?"

"When I asked you to stay after I saw Michiru's vision, you refused."

"I know. I shouldn't have. I understand now the turbulence in your soul that led you to call me. After what I saw . . . I just had to touch you, to make sure that you were still here and still okay." Setsuna ran her fingers through Serenity's unbound silver hair, amazed at the soft, silky strands. She let her fingers dance across her lover's breasts again, offering a gentle squeeze and smiling as the queen gasped and leaned into her touch. "You're still as beautiful as I remember."

"You're still as wild as I remember," Serenity replied, reaching up to wrap her arms around Setsuna's waist. "Your hair is all tangled."

"I don't know why yours isn't." Setsuna leaned over the queen, kissing her gently before running her hand down to Serenity's thigh. "I guess I haven't been trying hard enough."

"Se! Se, you have to go back to your meeting."

The Plutonian rolled her eyes as she pushed herself up on one arm, slipping the fingers of her free hand into her lover. "Are you sure about that?"

"Se! You can't . . . aaah . . . you can't use sex to get what you want."

"I can if I'm good at it," the older woman retorted, wrapping her lips around one of the smaller woman's nipples as she thrust into the queen. Serenity arched into her lover as a finger danced across her clit, moaning as she pulled Setsuna closer. "See?"

"You can stay for a little longer," Serenity whispered, smirking. "Cocky bitch."

Shousha leaned against the mirror in the washroom, unable to erase the image of her own death from her mind. Tears still leaked from her teal eyes, but she was too tired to cry anymore. After emptying the contents of her stomach, she had gone to the sink to clean her face, but her own empty eyes stared back at her from the glass, mocking her. She was going to die, alone, and a failure to her queen and princess. She was going to die as she lived, alone, unloved, and useless.

You aren't!

Shousha jerked as the words echoed in her mind, glancing around the small room for the owner of that achingly familiar voice. "Kazeko?"

You aren't unloved, and you are never alone.

"Kazeko," Shousha breathed, surprised to find that she had any tears left to cry. "I miss you so much. Why did you leave me?"

I had to. I'm sorry.

"Minako said that you never loved me and that's why you left. Kazeko . . . is she right?"

Shousha felt the ghost of a kiss on her brow, in the same spot that Kazeko would kiss her to calm her when they were younger, and the Neptunian smiled. Of course not. She was proving a point. You must let your hatred for my daughter go, Shousha. If you cannot forgive her, then I can never appear before you again. Please, my dearest love, let your anger go. Give her the love I never could.

Shousha sank to the floor, not caring that she might wrinkle her dress, letting her head fall into her hands in defeat. "I don't know if I'm strong enough to forgive."

I believe in you. Shousha felt Kazeko's presence fade, leaving her alone in the cold washroom once more. She pushed herself to her feet and turned back to the mirror, taking a hand towel and wiping the last of her tears from her face. She checked her dress and makeup, fixing her jewelry and hair before turning to the door. Maybe she could be strong, if it meant that she would one day see Kazeko again.

Haruka looked up from her examination of the time knot, freezing as the Space Sword whispered something in her mind, her eyes flashing gold as she grunted in pain. Her face paled and she gripped the edge of the table as something drained her power for a moment, leaving her gasping for breath and visibly shaking.

"Haruka!"

"I'm okay," the blonde whispered, closing her eyes as she mustered what remained of her strength, grateful for Michiru's hand on her shoulder keeping her upright. "I thought you said you didn't have the strength to leave the sword."

I don't. I had to borrow some of yours.

Haruka growled something rude in Uranian, sensing her mother's apology while the other women in the room stared at her in confusion. "What was so damn important that you felt the need to drain me dry?"

I had to talk to Shousha. Don't be angry at me, Haruka; it was for a good cause. She's on her way back.

Haruka sighed and raised her head, forcing her eyes to change back into the stormy blue color she had been holding for the past few minutes. "My mother's soul is bound to my talisman, and she thought it would be a good idea to pop out for a visit to Shousha."

"Kazeko's soul is in your talisman?"

Haruka shrugged, leaning back in her chair as she felt her energy slowly returning. "I don't know why or how, Meika. She just is. I haven't been able to sense her or talk to her since the Moon, but she apparently felt that she needed to talk to Shousha today."

Meika opened her mouth to ask about the former Uranian queen again, freezing when the doors to the chamber opened, Shousha returning to the meeting at last. The Neptunian stood in the doorway for a moment, teal eyes narrowing as she glared at Haruka's back, but she returned to her chair in silence as the queens watched her and the senshi tried desperately to ignore her. Shousha glanced at Setsuna's empty seat beside her, raising one eyebrow. "She isn't back yet?" Her voice was calm and steady, as if she hadn't run out of the room in horror or sobbed in the washroom for almost half an hour.

"No, Mother," Michiru replied, pointing at a section of the time knot while Haruka typed something on the computer embedded in her part of the table. "We've been comparing the time knot to my vision while you were gone."

"When did she get here?" Shousha turned her gaze to Haruka, the darkness in her voice not quite as filled with hatred as it had been when she was arguing with Minako, but her dislike for the young Uranian was still clear.

"Just after you left," Michiru replied, the chill in her voice warning her mother to leave the blonde alone.

Shousha felt Yumemi's hand on her arm, silently begging her to return to the matter at hand and ignore the Uranian's presence, but she ignored the warning. She looked at Haruka, Kazeko's daughter, for the first time in fourteen years, and she found that she was disappointed. The blonde's short blonde hair was shades darker and significantly shorter than her mother's golden locks had been, and she was clearly either very tired or very weak, leaning on her arm and trembling almost imperceptibly. Her eyes were not the intense, brilliant emerald that Kazeko's had been, but a stormy blue-grey color, a washed-out shade that hardly suited the future queen of Uranus. Kazeko had died to create a strong daughter, a powerful senshi, but the child in front of her did not resemble that description at all. Shousha had seen an ounce of that strength fourteen years earlier at the Presentation of Serenity, but this woman was nothing like the girl who had bravely promised to protect her newborn princess in front of the entire court.

"Why are you here? I thought you were off gallivanting through the solar system."

Michiru felt Haruka tense at the question, knowing that Shousha had not identified her yet, but her very voice could give her away. Without looking up from her computer, Haruka adopted the most feminine voice she could manage, keeping her words soft and emotionless. "Setsuna told me to be here today when she handed me my henshin stick and talisman a month ago."

"Setsuna? You didn't run away on your own?"

Haruka did look up then, careful to keep her eyes a stormy blue color as she tilted her head to the side. "Why would I do that and leave my people in the hands of a man who could never rule them properly?" She pulled the time knot back to her part of the table, returning her attention to the image as she broke eye contact with the queen. "Setsuna told me to leave until the meeting. I'll be returning to my world soon."

"Now that your curiosity is satisfied, can we return to the meeting?" Asakaze's words were hard, like they had been when she was the commander of the Inner Senshi, with a hint of irritation in her tone. Shousha sighed and nodded, turning back to the image of the time knot floating above the table before her.

"So, what have you decided to do about that vision?"

Haruka glanced at Minako, gesturing for her to explain their plan, preferably with as few details as possible. "Well, we found a book of ancient prophecies while we were out on one of our training missions, and we think that there is a forgotten power that can help us defeat this darkness that is calling Sailor Saturn."

"What prophecies?"

"We think that they are ten thousand years old," Ami replied, fiddling with the data crystal inside the pouch beside her planet crystal. Were they going to show the queens the prophecies? Would that revelation endanger their mission to collect and activate the Planet Crystals? She had to trust that Minako and Haruka knew what they were doing. "Most of them were vague but there was one that seemed similar to Michiru's vision."

"This darkness . . . it's related to the sun, somehow," Haruka murmured, watching as a report from Hikari scrolled across her computer screen. "There has been a noticeable increase in sunspot activity over the last twenty-one years, even though the sun normally completes a full cycle in only eleven years."

"The Sun? Is it Calling?"

"It seems plausible," Haruka replied, glancing sideways at Ami's question.

Ami waved her hand to summon her Mercury Computer, tapping into the Mercury Weather Monitoring System and staring at the results of her query. "Wow. Yes, the solar wind has been increasing steadily for two decades as the number of sunspots have grown to unheard-of numbers."

"What does that mean for us?" Rikuriko, queen of a planet of war, had never studied the sun and had no idea what effects solar wind and sunspots would have on the worlds of the Silver Millennium.

Ami glanced up from her computer, concern in her sapphire eyes. She looked at her mother first, seeing that Amami understood the coming disaster, silently begging the older woman to answer. Amami sighed and leaned forward, scratching the back of her neck nervously. "When there are very few sunspots for an extended period of time, the amount of solar radiation is decreased and the planets experience small ice ages. There was an extended period of solar quiescence hundreds of years ago that caused an ice age on Earth and stressed the force field generators on the other three inner worlds. When there are a very large number of sunspots, radiation from the sun and solar wind increase, warming the planets more than usual and tearing at their magnetic fields. If this trend continues, not only will our technology on the inner planets fail to block the radiation, but the magnetic fields of our worlds and moons could be torn away. We might survive on the moons of the outer planets, but Mercury, Venus, Earth, the Moon, and probably Mars would be destroyed."

"How long do we have?"

"Years," Ami replied, running a few quick calculations in her head. "Probably decades. The sun should settle down on its own in less than thirty years if this is a normal extended period of solar activity. If this is caused by some evil force . . . then I suppose we have until the end of this time knot."

A somber silence spread across the table, the senshi realizing that they were no closer to defeating the darkness than they had been before, each of them silently wishing that Setsuna would return and offer any answers.

The door to the chamber swung open, revealing a young servant girl, the child clearly intimidated by the presence of so many queens and princesses. Two guards dressed in the livery of Triton Palace escorted her across the room to Shousha's side, the queen accepting a data pad from the servant. "What's this?"

"A transmission just arrived for you, Majesty," the servant replied, her voice soft.

Shousha touched the edge of the data pad to activate it, watching as a message from her palace scrolled across the screen. Her teal eyes widened at the words, having to read it for a second time to realize that it wasn't a trick. "How many ships?"

"Hundreds," one of the guards replied. "There seems to be one flagship and at least six capital ships, each with at least ten battleships in attendance and each battleship carries up to three dozen fighters. We don't know how many fighters each capital ship can carry, but our best estimate is somewhere near two hundred."

"I have to go at once. Prepare my ship. Have they contacted us yet?"

"No, Majesty. They won't reply to our hails, either. We don't have enough ships to fight a force of that magnitude."

Shousha nodded as she stood, finally remembering the other women in the room. "If Setsuna returns, please tell her that I am sorry I have to leave so abruptly, but a rather large Uranian fleet has just appeared above Triton and I need to go handle the situation." She glared at Haruka, accusing the princess's absence for the warships gathering around her world, but the blonde never raised her head, clearly unconcerned with the fate of her planet's cosmic neighbor. Grumbling something in her native tongue, the blue-haired queen strode out of the chamber, two guards and a trembling servant at her heels.

As soon as the door closed, Haruka looked up guiltily and smiled at the Queen of Saturn. "Yumemi, does this computer have interplanetary communications capability?"

"Yes; why?"

"It's entirely possible that I left Jupiter this morning and went to see Ono Hikari about the political situation on Uranus. She might have told me to speak with my goddess, who might have given me some very interesting information and useful advice, and I might have gone to the War Council meeting this morning to depose my father."

"Koshu is no longer the king of Uranus?"

"Um, no, Meika, he isn't. The War Queens were going to vote to dybhaiht him today—that word means both behead and depose, and I'm still not sure which meaning Takeda Keiko intended when she sent the notice—so I appeared in the room and told him to step down. I have formally announced my intention to claim the throne of Uranus, and I will be crowned two days after Michiru's birthday when the four moons are in the sky."

"What does that have to do with warships around Neptune?"

"Well, Michiru's distress pulled me out of a very important meeting where I was busy reassigning my entire fleet to posts above every planet in this solar system, in close orbit around the sun, in the asteroid belt, and in the Kuiper Belt. I might not have gotten around to sending messages to every palace warning them about the hundreds of ships that would shortly appear in their skies."

"Is that why you are dressed like that?" Michiru reached over and gently touched the silky material of Haruka's dress, her fingers dancing across her wife's breast as mischief sparkled in the depths of her sapphire eyes.

"Yes," Haruka replied, reaching up to grab her wife's hand reprovingly, stormy blue eyes giving way to emerald shot through with gold. "I dress like a man because I feel like it, but sometimes I do wear dresses. For an appearance before the War Queen Council, I asked Hikari for suitable feminine attire." She leaned forward and kissed Michiru's nose, both of them completely oblivious to queens staring at them across the table and the princesses desperately looking anywhere else. "Your eyes are blue."

"Yours are gold," Michiru purred, leaning forward into the hand caressing her cheek.

"Guys, cool the hormones please." Minako leaned forward and glared at the blonde sitting at the other end of the table, one pale eyebrow raised. "We still have a meeting to finish. I suggest you call the palaces and tell them about the warships you are sending, then we need to discuss your meeting with your goddess."

Haruka sighed and leaned back, returning to her computer. The five queens sitting across from her leaned over their own computers, visibly disappointed that the show was over, sending messages to warn their palaces to expect Uranian warships. Haruka opened a line to the Moon Palace, telling them to expect a fleet of ships commanded by Ono Hikari by the end of the day, adding the electronic signature of her palace before closing the communication. She requested a status update from the War Queen Council, sighing as numbers scrolled across her screen. "It looks like nearly half of the Lower Chiefs are requesting major repairs for their ships that were stationed in the Kuiper Belt. Yumemi, are any of your space docks open at the moment?"

"How many bays do you need?"

"Enough for a hundred or so midsized warships. Probably some of their fighters, too, but nothing large."

Yumemi shrugged as she opened a query, tapping her fingers thoughtfully. "It seems that the shipyards of Rhea are empty right now. They can accommodate all of your ships." She glanced up from her computer, one eyebrow raised. "If you sent a fleet to every planet, who is commanding them?"

"The War Queens."

"Who did you send here?"

Haruka bowed her head, running her fingers through her blonde hair. "There's a distinct possibility that I told Takeda Keiko to bring her flagship here and take command of her father's fleet."

"Why would you do that to me? Her father is a perpetual thorn in my side despite our close relationship."

"Yes, well, I needed the rest of my fleets to guard the other planets. You'll like Keiko; she's like her father but significantly more bloodthirsty."

"Great," Yumemi replied dryly.

"Haruka, are you done sending your messages?" The Uranian nodded, closing the communications once more. "Good. What did Uranus say to you?"

Rei glanced up eagerly at Minako's question, leaning forward and staring down the length of the table, amethyst eyes sparkling. "Before or after the kiss?"

Haruka's head shot up, grey eyes wide in shock as Michiru's anger pulsed along their bond for just a moment. "Are you trying to get me killed?" Rei chuckled and sat back down, ignoring Minako's irritated gaze. Haruka turned to Michiru, shame in her pale eyes, and the Neptunian smiled, kissing the scar on her wife's palm.

"Tell us what your goddess said."

Setsuna rolled over and pulled Serenity into her arms, ignoring the slender woman's tired protests. She wrapped one strong arm around her lover's waist, burying her face in the silver hair she had missed so much. "Did I wear you out?"

Serenity grinned and glanced over her shoulder, lavender eyes shining in the dim light. "Perhaps. Are you feeling better?"

Setsuna nodded, cupping one of Serenity's breasts in her free hand, absently playing with her nipple. "Yeah, I am. The vision still bothers me, but I know that we can prevent it. I won't let you die, Ser."

"I know you won't, my only love." She rolled over to face her lover, dislodging the hand caressing her breast, and stared up into Setsuna's garnet eyes. "I can never let you go again. Not after this. I'm not entirely sure I can let you out of this bed."

Setsuna grinned and pushed herself back onto her arms, leaning over Serenity again. Just before she leaned down to claim her lover's lips, a dark spot outside the window caught her attention. Curious, she looked up, eyes widening in shock. "Ser, when did you order a giant fleet?"

"What?" Serenity leaned up and looked out her window, slipping out of the bed and staring at the sky. "Setsuna, what kind of ships are those?"

Setsuna grabbed her black dress the floor, slipping it over her head and running her fingers through her tangled hair before grabbing the white dress from the foot of the bed and handing it to her queen. "Those look like Uranian ships."

"Why would Uranus send a fleet here?"

"I don't know, but I have a feeling that I need to return to the council meeting on Titan. You need to get out there and deal with those ships."

Serenity slipped into her dress, adjusting the silky fabric before walking over to her vanity and her brush. She returned her hair to its usual style, pulling Setsuna into the chair in front of the mirror so she could brush her lover's dark green hair. As soon as they were both presentable, Setsuna grabbed her Time Key with one hand and Serenity's arm with the other, both of them vanishing in a flash of garnet light.

AN2: This meeting is going to take a while. I'm sure you've guessed that by now. But next chapter Setsuna and the senshi get to have it out about the book of prophecies they found on Earth. Also, I brought Serenity to Titan for a reason (not just to say "don't kill Hotaru") and you'll see that next chapter, too. And yes, the point of this chapter was the relationship between Serenity and Setsuna, so hopefully you enjoyed.

Haruka Tenou: I didn't need Koshu and Haruka to fight. I needed Koshu to realize that the people of Uranus were never his and step down willingly. As for the War Queens, I took some time to flesh them out because I spent so much time on the inner senshi's families that it only seemed fair. Also: surprise! Early chapter.

petiyaka: Haruka is still playing both roles; her identity will not be fully revealed to everyone until after Michiru's birthday celebration.

Hawkefan: Thank you. When I originally wrote this story (in 2004 maybe?) I glossed over the other couples and focused solely on Haruka and Michiru. After writing dozens more fanfics (and this crossover that has a big focus on Rei/Mina) I realized how much I wanted to write the other couples, as well. Hence this rewrite (which is, by the way, already three times as long as I anticipated in April). I spent quite a few days trying to decide how to include Uranus as a member of the pantheon before I posted my rewrite of In the Darkest Forest, and I realized that having a god sans the reproductive organs that Cronos so kindly removed with his scythe would not make for a very powerful figure. However, turning that god into a woman who now has both the feminine and masculine perspectives fits Haruka and the people of her world perfectly. Having Artemis as her partner is also quite fun, especially since she was often quite cruel to men for various reasons in mythology and Uranus doesn't care for them much, either.

Alex: The War Queens are a fun bunch of personalities to write, especially since you have all become familiar with Hikari. Having one slightly homicidal Keiko next to the very traditional Mari and Hiroko openly flirting with Sanae gives the meeting depth and shows that these powerful people are still just women, with their own friendships and personality traits.

Lylian: I'm glad the war queens were such a hit. Now that they're out among the planets to protect from the still-unknown threat, we'll see them a bit more just as the families of the inner senshi will continue to make an appearance.

Poseidon's Wrath: Jealous Michi in this chapter, but of course she's very forgiving because she knows that it wasn't Haruka's fault or intention to seduce her goddess. I hadn't decided until I wrote the scene whether Haruka would appear at the council meeting, but I thought it might be better for her to start to take command of her world than for them to suddenly begin to get out of control. There's enough of Uranians searching for their missing queen in CoL: Blood of the Rose (which is due for a minor update sometime after Kazeko is done) so I decided not to go there again. And, as usual, I used Rei to poke fun at Haruka's feminine appearance, since Haruka didn't have time to change her clothes, she just came when Michiru needed her.

Meneldur: The senshi have now found two tombs, both on the worlds of the warriors, because a warrior would not want to be buried anywhere except home. Haruka knows that she would want to be buried on her own world no matter where she died and that her pacifist wife would not consider the matter to be that important, so she knows that her past incarnation had to have died on Uranus. As for Meika being the first to recognize, Haruka, it makes sense if you remember that the only time she's been off Oberon since the Presentation was her fight in the Ganymede Invitational. The queen of Jupiter could hardly be anywhere else except at a fight of that magnitude, and the people who have met Haruka before don't seem to have any issue recognizing her. One of the reasons the senshi have been visiting the other worlds (other than the planet crystal quest) is to let the queens become accustomed to their relationships. Rikuriko and Asakaze have known for a month, now Meika knows, and Amami and Yumemi accept it in this chapter. You'll see very soon now the actual reason for the senshi marriage ban; though it probably won't surprise anyone who has read Kazeko, it will be the ultimate shock for the senshi.

Hikari might only be Haruka's fake mother, but she certainly fills the role nicely. She also gets to see Haruka's insecurities, ones that even Michiru would never be able to help her with. Sometime during Uranus's conversation with Haruka, she tell her senshi how to unlock the full power of the planet crystals. Besides telling Haruka that she will be Uranus's last senshi, the scene is incredibly important to the story, and Haruka knows it. She isn't sure how to do what she needs to do, but she has the first bit of information she needs. Once she has her planet crystal, she'll tell the other senshi what she discovered. Since Haruka (in the anime) seems to have the ability to go from talking about something very serious to flirting without missing a beat, the conversation between her and Uranus seems appropriate. The threesome between Uranus, Artemis, and Athena was one of those scenes where you get to see me trying to decide which of the two should be Uranus's permanent lover. Then, of course, she got to have fun in her temple (watch for a fun news story about that later). Also, if no one noticed, all of the War Queens were named after actresses from the musical, as well as Haruka's past incarnation Nao (and Michiru's, Yuuka). Tiny moments of fun for me.