Zoisite wanted... to die in beauty.

Yes, but there had been no talk of being reborn in ugliness!

Okay, the gray military uniform that Queen Beryl had assigned him while he was still under the influence of the Dark Kingdom admittedly wasn't a trendy piece, and it had always clashed with his penchant for romantic light pink, but WHAT he was wearing now, when he woke up in this strange bed, in this strange apartment, defied all his imagination.

What kind of fashion disaster was this?!?

A lilac chino, WHITE socks, a black, tight turtleneck - okay, that was just about acceptable - but THEN, to top it all off... that horrible, grass-green jacket???!!!!

Although... as he looked at himself in the mirror, the outfit seemed quite familiar to him... suspiciously familiar, even, and so did the apartment. Had he been here before? At least somehow connected or something like that. The room looked clinically clean. Not a speck of dust on the floor. Everything was spotlessly clean. The walls looked almost freshly painted in their boring white.

This was definitely the home of a man without any sense of aesthetics or taste! Someone with a stick up his butt. Mhm.

Before Zoisite knew it, the bedroom door opened, and a blond man in exactly the same outfit he was wearing stood in front of him. What was going on? In what crazy parallel universe had he landed?

"Jedeite?"

Zoisite looked at his former comrade in surprise.

"I thought you were punished with 'eternal sleep'?!"

Jedeite gave him a meaningful smile in response.

"Yes, I was. Don't you know what that means?"

Zoisite critically examined his counterpart from head to toe and crossed his arms, pouting slightly.

"Honestly, I have no idea... maybe that we're doomed to simmer in a fashion hell forever?!"

Jedeite looked down at himself with a mischievous grin and shrugged slightly.

"This outfit has nothing to do with the form of 'hell' we've landed in."

Now Zoisite was slowly getting curious.

"Spit it out already. Where on earth are we?"

"In Tokyo. Azabu-Juban, to be precise. Nice apartment, don't you think? Just a bit small for the three of us, to be honest."

"For the THREE of us????!!!"

A nasty suspicion began to dawn on Zoisite. After falling asleep in Kunzite's strong arms, he had heard a strange, warm light. Voices reached him, telling him things like "it's not over yet" and "you still have an important task to fulfill." The next moment he found himself here. It seemed impossible, but it felt like he was now on the side of... the good? And not alone. If Jedeite was here, the brunette couldn't be far away either.

Oh dear.

"You mean we've ended up among humans? And... Nephrite is here too?"

Jedeite's diabolical grin gave him the grim confirmation, and Zoisite turned pale as a sheet.

"I still have a score to settle with you, Zoi!" boomed a voice threateningly from the other end of the bedroom door. Jedeite just giggled and grinned even wider.

"This is going to be fun! Ever since you landed here with us, I've been looking forward to your reunion. You really messed up Nephrite with your stupid stunt... tsk tsk, it wasn't nice at all how you set him up with that little redhead, Zoi!"

"Stay out of it, Jedeite!" Zoisite hissed at him, but fell silent when the bedroom door opened again, and Nephrite appeared in the doorway... in exactly the same awful outfit as the other two. Green didn't suit him at all. Especially not in the face, supported by this threatening gesture. Fists clenched, that man really didn't bode well.

"This has to be a joke, right?!" Zoisite couldn't believe what was happening. Was this a dream? Had Beryl not killed him after all? Was this no reality? And why? Why did he suddenly have a completely new memory alongside the experiences from the Dark Kingdom in his brain?

"No, this is no joke, and you idiot better come up with a sincere apology quickly, or I'll personally send you to Nirvana!!!"

With this threat, Nephrite crossed the room in a flash and already had his hands firmly around the former General of the Dark Kingdom's neck. With an extremely angry face, Nephrite squeezed tightly, making Zoisite gasp desperately for air.

"You worm don't deserve to be reborn here! You idiot tricked me. For that, you'll suffer forever-"

"Nephrite! That's enough! Let him go NOW!!"

Gasping, Zoisite fell back onto the bed as Nephrite loosened his grip like on command. Apparently, there was someone else in this apartment whom the curly-haired ex-villain obediently listened to like a well-behaved puppy. Painfully, Zoisite rubbed his neck and then slowly looked towards the door.

He could hardly believe who he saw.

"Epheios?"

The sandy-blond man leaned casually in the doorway and, unlike the other three, was dressed in a military uniform with a black cape lined in red. He was also armed with a rather impressive sword... and he had a friendly face. At least for now.

"Hello Zoisite. Long time no see, right?"

Zoisite knew the man all too well. Even though their last encounter was in the distant past, about a thousand years ago, he had sworn eternal loyalty to the younger brother of Prince Endymion, just like the other members of the Earth's royal family. Until... yes, until Queen Beryl, together with Queen Metalia, took possession of him and the other three top generals of Elysion and filled their brains with lies and false memories. Unfortunately, that had worked all too easily back then and again in this life, as Zoisite had to admit at that moment when Epheios gave him an encouraging nod.

How crazy all this was. Suddenly, Zoisite felt guilty for all his actions in the recent past... and deep shame gripped him as he realized what terrible things he had just done at the Starlight Tower.

Oops.

"Damn!" he blurted out. He didn't have to explain anything to the others. They all knew what had happened. That was clear as crystal when he looked into their faces.

'Oh, fuck!'

"That's one way to put it, but that doesn't help us much now, Zoisite."

Epheios walked towards him with royal dignity while the other two bowed deeply before him.

"Master, we know that under Beryl's influence we were simply not in control of our senses. Our behavior towards Endymion and the Sailor Warriors is unforgivable."

Jedeite remained silent while Nephrite voiced his apology to the Earth Prince. Epheios sighed and then looked at Zoisite.

"Right now, things are really hitting the fan. Zoisite, you did quite a job."

Zoisite knew exactly what Epheios meant, but he was still highly confused.

"How do you even know what happened? You weren't there!"

The blond Earth Prince looked at him for a long time before finally starting to explain.

"I have ways of observing events without being physically present. Thanks to the guardian of the Golden Crystal, Helios, I've been able to connect with Endymion's subconscious and learn about the great danger he's currently in."

It dawned on Zoisite... but of course! Epheios's special talent had been, even back in the Silver Millennium, the ability to dive into other people's minds, read their thoughts, and - in particularly severe cases - restore memories to order.

"So, it was through the dream world in the current time that you were able to contact Endymion?"

Zoisite concluded dryly and received an affirmative grin from his former commander.

"Something like that, yes... unfortunately, he barely has any good thoughts left; most of his mind has already been filled with lies and false memories... but there's still hope to bring him back."

"And what does this hope look like, exactly?"

Zoisite was genuinely confused. Once you were in the clutches of the Dark Kingdom, you could - quite obviously - only get out through eternal sleep, meaning if you fell out of Beryl's favor, or through murder - as Zoisite had done with Nephrite. You also needed a bit of luck to be reborn. Then it would work. But what did Zoisite and the other two generals have to do with it?!

"We have another ally who has offered us help. Apparently, someone still owes Helios a favor."

Epheios noted casually while examining his perfectly manicured nails.

"But explaining that here would be far too complicated. Let's move quickly, we have an appointment."

"Wait! Whose apartment is this, anyway?"

The question had been itching at him all this time. He had to ask it now.

"Why, Endymion's, of course," said Jedeite without batting an eye.

"And how is it that our boss's reincarnation has such terrible taste in clothes?!"

"Don't ask me, he has dozens of this outfit in his closet. Even in different sizes! He's worse than that Donald from Duckburg."

Nephrite just shrugged and turned from a bewildered Zoisite to his actual boss's deputy.

"Well, Epheios, let's get going then."

"Uh, where exactly are we going?"

The tall blond man first looked at a still confused Zoisite and then spoke to his three generals, who now looked quite repentant in the wardrobe of his - in this life - best friend and finally grinned slightly mischievously.

"Since I unfortunately don't enjoy royal privileges in modern-day Tokyo, I work in an arcade alongside my studies. It's the ideal place where we can meet our two other allies without attracting much attention. Jedeite already knows the place like the back of his hand because he works in the kitchen there daily, and Nephrite has been helping out in the café upstairs since his rebirth. By the way, I have something very special in mind for you."

The broad grin on Epheios' lips did not bode well, Zoisite was quite sure of that.

He sighed. He had already been reborn in ugliness once. It could only get worse.