The asteroid -- a remnant of a world destroyed by the Xenian, a seed lying dormant for so long in space -- has finally reached the Earth.
Compared to its brethren in the asteroid belt, it's a small thing, oddly shaped in that it is bedecked on all sides with almost-connected sisters. Very like the petals of a flower, not just in shape, but in color as well -- a pink bright enough to see from miles away covers every inch of pock-marked and cratered rock beneath it. If there was any question that this is the Senshi's destination, that eye-scalding pink should serve as its answer.
They've seen it before. For months now, in gardens, on windowsills, pushing up between cracks in the pavement, appearing overnight on houses and inside drains. And yet, for every one flower they've seen on Earth, there are dozens waiting for them on this cursed rock. Hundreds, even. Thousands. Enough to end all life on the world they just left.
And yet, perhaps the worse threat is not what Fiore is bringing to the Earth, but what he has taken away.
Sailor Moon flourishes her hand and her phone is safe within her subspace pocket.
Venus has just contacted her in the midst of battle informing her she is unable to escape the thrall of flowers.
'Go on without me if I'm not there,' is the basic gist of the texts scattered through fighting and whatnot. 'I will guard your families when I'm done here.'
Sailor Moon looks at her gathered girls, hands firmly in theirs.
Kunzite and Daisuke et al are in the circle they've created. Before the girls begin, Usagi shrugs and beams at the two. "I really hope this works!"
And then, tightening her hands around that of Jupiter and Mars, Sailor Moon gives a warm wink to Mercury.
Your plan will succeed, Ami-chan! ...even if you're not sure it will!
Mars joins hand with Moon and one other person. The plan has already been covered. Everything is ready to go. They need to go now, and there's no longer an option.
She looks at the others in turn, the three other senshi, Kunzite, and Daisuke. She offers each of them a supporting smile, not really having much left to say. She closes her eyes.
"Mars Planet Power!"
Mars glows with red energy, grip tightening on her friend's hands.
Sailor Mercury smiles at Moon in response to her wink. She really isn't confident, but it doesn't matter anymore; this is all they have left, and they have to give it their best.
Gripping the hand of the two girls next to her, she closes her eyes and joins in the call.
"Mercury Planet Power!"
Her own blue energy mingls with the energy of the others around her, as they prepare to teleport to the quiet asteroid not so very far above.
Kunzite is silent, beside Asclepius. There's relatively little blood on his uniform, at least, but his stance isn't quite as straight as it should be, and the bandages reinforcing the just-closed wounds mar the lines of his jacket. He's on his feet by the grace of Daisuke and a dying man, and the aid of Moon and a mooncat -- and he's well aware of the look Mercury gave him and the sound Asclepius made when he didn't back down. But he still has energy to spare; his own, and the stolen lightning of Riventon's false Makoto. He can shield the others a little, buy them a little more time. Maybe with more success. And he has ... well. Something he owes Mamoru. It's the same drive as Moon's firmness, as Mars and Mercury's smile. Whether or not it works, they have to give it their best.
Asclepius indeed made this disapproving sound at Kunzite when he insisted to go up. He was standing there with a worried expression as he looked at all the others. "I'm coming this time. If you need help. Signal. Otherwise. I'll do my best to keep any eye on everyone." he looks back away and upwards a bit as he takes a deep breath. He's used to teleporting now. He's not sure how this one is gonna feel though. He just readies himself to go into space on this... pink asteroid.
---and then the Sailor Teleport is activating-- and away they go!. It does carry Kunzite and Asclepius along with the Senshi as Sailor Moon hoped.
--and then they appear on the asteroid, covered in it's deadly flowers-- but also where Fiore has taken Mamoru to. Hopefully. It has placed them somewhere convient enough to know where to head once they hit the asteroid.
Fields of eye-searing pink as far as the eye can see, and what look like mountains of them surrounding them -- but preliminary scans from afar revealed that they are in fact the 'petals' of the opened asteroid. Everyone with youma senses gets bombarded with a veritable tsunami of 'uh oh' as soon as the group materializes in its bubble, and it looks like a wind blows across the fields of flowers as petals rustle and bend.
There is no wind.
There is an energy surge.
These things are all the warning that the brave team of combined Moon and Earth courts get before the flowers begin uprooting themselves and growing, reaching up and grasping white long-nailed womanlike arms from one bloom in ten, while the others look more like skittering blooming crabs; the benefit to Sailor Teleport is that they're still in the air when they get there, moving at a fine clip and skimming the tops of the flowers.
But the Xenians' job is to prevent them from getting to Fiore and Fiore's prize, and the momentum from the projectile teleport is something that by nature decreases. And as little gravity as there is here, there is still gravity.
It's not long at all before Xenian arms catch at skirts and capes and feet and legs, pulling and gripping; the laughter of the countless youma-girls is a high-pitched cacophony, and their nails are like thorns and barbs.
She feels almost like a pebble being skipped across a pond.
If, you know, the pond was made of sharp, evil teeth and claws and whatever else is biting into exposed legs.
When the teleport stops, Sailor Moon is sent tumbling a bit away from the group, her usual lack of grace compounded by the unfamiliar gravity.
It's not quite the moon...
She stands, and sort of has to fall her way back toward the group, kicking and yelping and biting herself.
Xenian arms grab at Mar's skirt, and one of them takes hold. Once one grapples, the others join in, pulling her away from the others as she lets go of her friends' hands. She doesn't want to drag them down with her, and she has a plan of her own as the evil flower monsters set upon her.
"Everyone gather around now." She's talking to the plant monsters?! "Ready? Here we go! Fire Soul!"
Suddenly, Mars ignites. Fire spreads from her to the nearby enemies, burning anything and everything without distinction. She doesn't have any reason to hold back and avoid property damage here.
A column of fire erupts from Mars, reaching out into space before sending a shockwave of fire across the petal 'ground' she's now standing on.
Mercury stands with her friends, then yelps in suprrise as the grasping hands begin reaching for her skirt and legs. "What the heck," she says, surprised by their appearance. She probably should have anticipated this.
But it doesn't matter, because Sailor Mars is already on the job. Following up Mars' attack, Sailor Mercury holds out her hands to either side, and a torrent of water comes to her call. She whirls around once, and calls out, "Shining Snow Flurry!" The water sinks into the ground, and immediately begins to freeze. It spreads outwards at a rapid rate, freezing everything around them and turning it to a fine snowy powder that just keeps growing.
If there's one thing the Senshi don't need help with right now, it's taking out their aggression on the flowers. Kunzite keeps his attention on keeping Asclepius safe, drawing up shadows and hardening them against clawing hands, until they drop to the ground and his concentration nearly scatters with the impact. Nearly. It's still a good thing that Mars and Mercury are answering with fire and water; it means that there's a clear space for at least a moment, for him to gather himself in. "Think you can clear some of Moon's path?" he asks the staff-bearer. His aim's always been good. And the flowers are less likely simply to eat Asclepius' attacks -- literally.
Asclepius takes a moment to orient himself then----- well the gravity is weird to be sure. At there /is/ Gravity. But then they're beset by lots of scuttling flower-like youma that try to grab at feet. He hears Kunzite and nods. "I can do my best." he says curtly as he watches the Senshi launch thier own attacks. Asclepius is not a combatant. Much of what he can do is decisvly non-leathal and not very strong. Of course. He knows what he can do-- as he let's Kunzite cover him-- which is mostly effectivly. He has to stamp down to the ground with a foot as hard as he can every so often.
He raises his staff, and let's loose a burst of purple energy--- not quite an assault so much as it is like a sudden shove-- attempting to blow some of these things away to do as Kunzite ask, and clear some out of Moon's path.
It's kinda like an energy leafblower in retrospec.
The teleport circle breaks apart and Sailor Jupiter goes down rolling through the pink petals, comes up swinging. The Xenian hands that grasp at her are beaten back in short order by sharp sweeps of her fists, the stomp of a boot.
Sailor Jupiter is not having this shit.
They've already been to the moon, so teleporting into an asteroid in space isn't quite as mind-bending as it would have been otherwise. All the same, the sight of the endless sea of pink reminds Mako very keenly of just where they are. Sparks begin snapping around her, the air charged from the surge of feeling that rises up within her.
As Asclepius unleashes that blast of energy in an effort to begin carving a path, Jupiter looks toward Sailor Moon and Sailor Mercury for confirmation: "That way? Stand back a little, I'll help cut through--"
All she needs is a direction and she's moving, charging ahead even as electricity crackles around her. "Supreme Thunder--"
Lightning lances down from the airless sky with a peal of thunder. The column of energy catches Jupiter on the move, and she doesn't break stride; it collects around her, flares out from her back and shoulders in great wings. "--DRAGON!"
In a heartbeat, the sinuous shape of a dragon made of pure lightning is roaring through the mass of Xenians. Sailor Jupiter is a small dark shape within its chest, wearing the beast like armor.
The Senshi unleash their full power on the Xenians rising up to meet them, and it is nothing to scoff at. Fire burns at stalks of green. Ice covers pink petals and blue-green skin, shattering them as the ground they sank their roots in turns to permafrost. Purple energy carves out a path in the heart of the swarm, and above the chaos, a dragon soars to rip through the hordes of monsters that would oppose their rescue.
Nothing to scoff at -- but also not enough. This is the Xenian Blossom's home, after all. Fiore's seat of power, the very essence of his vow to destroy the world. They can beat back the waves of youma, destroy even more, but the onslaught does not stop.
They just keep coming.
And coming.
And coming.
Except for a single, suspiciously clear path, laid out right in front of a certain senshi who'd already forged ahead on her own. A path that winds up and over a hill, with a familiar red figure at its crest.
An even more familiar figure rests beside him in a prison of crystal.
She could see, at the end of the path, Mamoru.
Fiore, yes, off to the side.
Other flowers, maybe.
But for her, she only sees the one she came for.
"Mamo-chan..."
Without thinking, Sailor Moon runs down that suspiciously clear path, single minded in her plan to reach Mamoru.
I'm here.
She's running, avoiding what and who she can.
And I did what you asked, I helped save Kunzite, see?
She shares a fault with Serenity. When it comes to Mamoru, to Endymion, she has blinders on.
Mars watches the youma burn around them, glad that they've managed to keep themselves safe thus far, despite being deep in enemy territory. Well, 'safe' is relative. There's 'sleeping soundly at home' safe and there's 'probably not getting blasted right this instant' safe, and considering where they are Mars is happy for the latter.
Then Sailor Moon runs off ahead, towards Mamoru, because of course she does. Of course Usagi Tsukino would run towards Mamoru Chiba across a flowery meadow. Problem is that those flowers are evil and Usagi might very well leave the area that Mars is considering 'safe'. Relatively.
So Mars redirects her efforts. Keeping the princess alive is top priority, even over Mars's own survival. The fire she was once spreading all over the plants begins to die as much of her magic is absorbed into eight orbs currently forming in an orbit around the Senshi of Fire.
"Burning Mandala!"
Those eight orbs shoot forward, spreading more fire across the plant youma, but more importantly they catch up to and flank Sailor Moon. Even at a distance, Mars intends to protect her charge.
Though, focusing on Moon does leave Mars open to more attacks from the plant youma.
Mercury's priorities align quite well with Mars'. She would be giving chase right now, if she weren't taking a brief moment to pause and marvel at the lightning dragon as it dances across the battlefield. "Whoa," she breathes quietly, then shakes her head.
Rushing after the others, Mercury draws even further on her power leaps forward, and slams two flattened hands into the ground. "Frozen Barrier!" she cries, and two walls of ice begin to grow, shooting up out of the ground, chasing Sailor Moon on either side to ensure that the horrible creatures trying to get to her will have to go over or around. Or, perhaps, through, but a five foot thick wall of ice is nothing so simple to pass through.
The closer Usagi gets, the more clearly she can see Mamoru in that crystal-- he's weightless, floating, tattered cape and ragged blackened armor with the metal parts rusted and abraded, just like he looked the very last time Kunzite saw him. He's too-pale, but none of the hallmarks of the headache, of the constant pain, are present. His blue eyes are wide awake and open, and his mouth moves, but neither sound nor bubbles come out, and he looks angry and frightened all at once. One fist bangs soundlessly against the inside of the crystal and liquid prison, and it looks like he's yelling something, gesturing with the other hand-- go back! Take care! It's a trap--!
Just incinerate this thing, just incinerate it all, and you'll find me-- you always do. Get everyone on earth to fire all guns at once and explode into space--
And he's yelling and yelling, and no one can hear him. No one can hear him at all. Usagi and Kunzite are only getting impressions from him, clouded and obscured. Go back. Go back. I'll come back. But not if the planet is destroyed.
Kunzite can't, at present, move as fast as he ought to -- not without risking undoing the healing, and that's not worthwhile. That's fine. That means he can keep his shadows a barrier behind the girls, can keep them from having to worry about what might be coming up on them. He can keep an eye on all of them (so long as he isn't distracted by that magnificent dragon); and he's not doing that kind of damage, he's not going to be a high-priority target himself. Low priority is painful enough, and draining, but the lightning he's carrying will be enough to fuel him a little while yet. And Mars and Mercury are keeping Moon's focus from killing her...
There's something about Mercury's barriers. About the snow before. It nags at the back of Kunzite's mind. It's a good move, on her part, but there's something about it that worries him where her first maneuver didn't, and he can't quite put a finger on it. He hunts back through what they know about the place. Nephrite's injuries -- it won't be long till they've been there as long or longer than he was, and while a number of them are ragged, none of them have taken significant injury here. What were Nephrite's injuries? Broken ribs. Internal damage. Strangled. Broken ankle. Bruises --
The patterns of the broken ribs. The patterns of the bruises.
The information he brought back.
Hell. "Mercury," he calls. "It's hollow." And trusts that she'll put the rest together from that -- and that it'll make more of a difference for them than it did for Nephrite.
Asclepius continues to throw push, after push of purple laced force against the oncoming plants. He can keep this up for a bit, pointing his staff downwind and letting the blasts fly from the mouth of the snake on the staff. He'll look over to Kunzite, make sure he's okay. He'll stay here and try to keep the plants off the others.
There's an impressive dragon-- he squints a little, but does his best to keep his eyes on what's important right now- his current postion and job.
Kunzite calls out it's hollow. What's Hollow, he thinks? He's smart enough not to ask out loud right now at least.
"If you need us to move. Let me know." he says. Because, well. He's not worried about being left behind- he can teleport himself- and Kunzite, along forward if and when the time comes while they handle the backside.
The lightning dragon burns a broad swath through the Xenians - but it's a lot of power to channel, even moreso as it bleeds energy into each plant-monster that has the misfortune to be in its way. As Jupiter reaches that suspiciously clear path, the dragon is unraveling into hundreds of separate streams of electricity, and Jupiter herself staggers to a stop, panting, as the remnants of all that energy chase the Xenian root systems into the ground.
Just in time for Makoto to see Sailor Moon dashing past her towards Fiore and Mamoru.
"Sailor Moon!" Without the slightest pause for thought Jupiter is running again, fatigue disappearing as long strides bring her back to her friend's side. "Don't run ahead!"
Hmm. He supposes that's enough of a welcome for them -- they've tipped their hand, showed the extent of their magic, and their leader has exposed herself. Just as planned.
Well. Except for that annoying green one with the wherewithal to chase after her, the same one whose dragon fried both his first Xenstalk and a good few of his minions here. She'll be dealt with.
Unseen in the chaos unfolding around them, a vine snaps around her ankle and *jerks*, until she's knocked off her feet and dragged backward. Upward. Into a tangle of nooses and knots that bind her arms, shoulders, legs, her throat --
And she is not the only one.
Out from the thick of battle spring these vines for everyone on the asteroid, hiding behind the masses of Xenians until they cannot possibly be avoided. Mars is snared under the arms, hoisted above her flames to the same trap that holds Jupiter. Likewise is Mercury captured -- she made the mistake of touching the ground on this asteroid of deadly plants, and she pays for it when they haul her into the air by her wrists and bind her with her friends.
They can't make any foolish goes at self-destruction with their allies so close, can they?
The vines snap up Asclepius's staff before they reach him, wrenching it from his hands so he can no longer decimate their numbers. Then, looping around like a twisted living cyclone, they circle both him and Kunzite and snap inward. The Shitennou is an expert defender, but even he cannot stop an attack that comes from within his shields. This is behind enemy lines -- no measure can fully protect the Princess. Not here, where every step could be lethal.
A point Fiore proves when the tendrils on his back unspool, shoot at lightning speed towards Sailor Moon, and draw her in to him by the throat.
Fiore smiles.
"You came," he says, faux surprise coloring his words. He's sure to talk especially slow, what with her oxygen supply cut off and her precious 'prince' tantalizingly unreachable. "How noble, when you could be using your powers to protect that planet you love so much. I suppose you finally reveal where your priorities lie."
More Xenian hands and thorned white vines burst from the rock beneath her, circling her legs and heaving her arms skyward, tearing into her fuku as they bind her torso. The hold on her throat is eased, she can breathe whatever passes for atmosphere on this alien rock -- but it is not a mercy.
She cannot scream if she cannot breathe, and he thinks a silent, dignified death too good for her. He comes up from behind, seizes her jaw with one hand, and forces her to look upon her allies and the approaching Earth above her.
Mamoru is hidden from her completely.
"Do you see that?" he yells, indicating the sea of youma, the spires of green where her allies fought, the dim blue light of the dying planet. "This is your fault. All of it. If you hadn't stolen Mamoru from me, none of this would have happened. Your friends, your planet -- they're all going to die. Because of *you.*"
She gets that sense, that feeling, from Mamoru.
Nothing is guaranteed in this life, and she's pretty sure they've used more than their fair share of luck.
Jupiter's beside her, the way is paved clear by a wall of ice and fire. Victory may come ea--
"Hrk!"
That is the sound of a Moon Princess getting strangled by a vine.
She thinks, maybe, he'll try to kill her before she can even make a retort against his rant.
It's hard to think clearly when there's a dimming field of vision.
And she's glad for this lack of air when white vines and hungry hands grab at her, sharp thorns digging and cutting her skin. Whe she is able to breath, it's a painful venture as the repeated pressure digs the thorns deeper into her ribs.
She cries out when he grabs her jaw and forces her attention elsewhere, but the stinging in her eyes isn't from any wound.
If she's experiencing this pain, she knows the others must be as well.
She does look at them, and at the planet, but for once she doesn't believe any of this is her fault. Not in the way Fiore believes, especially.
"You're wrong." It's also not easy to speak when someone has your jaw in a vice-like grip. She turns her eyes back to him, then tries, hard, to look just beyond her field of vision. "I never stole him. I was his before I was born. And even if this was the first life, I still think I would be."
This time when she looks at Fiore, there's pleading in her eyes. "Let them go. Let the planet go. You'll kill him if you don't."
Usagi can't see him, but everyone else can, since they're facing Moon and Fiore, and Endymion's floating in that liquid in the enormous crystal casing.
His eyes are glowing gold.
He's in no pain. He's in no pain for the first time in months, the last few weeks of which has been progressive hell. He's watching Fiore entangling and hurting people he cares for deeply, people he loves, and using his name to do it. Treating him, again, like an object to be won. A prize. Not a person, not for a long time. Not for nearly twelve years. And he's helpless. Again. He's trapped. Again. He's been so drained of power, of energy--
--but on Earth far below, on his planet? His other friends, and their friends and allies, are all fighting now. They're all fighting for their lives and the life of his planet, whose screams are mitigated by distance, whose death throes are mitigated by those friends' efforts.
He's studied gemology.
He knows about weak points, he knows about cleavage and about stress points and about where to fracture if he can just find the right place. The way he looks now-- the appearance of his henshin-- it's a reflection of the state of the Earth's heart. But he's alive, and his mind is clear and his thoughts coherent, completely, for the first time in over a month. And all the people Fiore is hurting-- not one of them sees him as an object, not one of them doesn't respect his ability to make choices and decisions and do something about it if he becomes aware he can't.
He can't save anyone from in here.
Both bare hands touch the inside of the crystal, and he closes his eyes, and he prays, and he begins methodically exerting pressure on the stress points. His lips are moving, one phrase, repeated over and over. His mind gives reassurance from his heart, through the bond his soul has with the people who can hear it. You're doing well. Keep going. Don't worry. I won't do anything stupid, but I'll be able to help you soon. Hang in there.
The tiniest fissure appears, a crack in the crystal, soundless in the strange atmosphere.
Mars is snared. She poured everything into covering Sailor Moon, and she knew she was leaving herself undefended. Everyone else apparently had the same idea. Bad news for Sailor Mars.
As she's lifted up into the air, fire surrounds her and tries to burn away the vines, but they keep coming, too fast for her to do anything about it. Once her friends are brought close, her fires die down. She'll be causing more damage to her friends than the Xenians at this point.
She grits her teeth, looking at Sailor Moon being constrained and forced to watch the planet. Obviously in pain. Mars can't stand it.
"Leave her alone, you creep! You have no right!"
She's seething, in her futility.
Sailor Mercury turns at Kunzite's call. Hollow!? This is something she would have liked to know much, much earlier. She looks down with a growing sense of horror, just as the vines breach the ground and reach up to ensnare her. Mercury gasps in surprise as she is hoisted aloft, then squirms to try and free herself.
She glances towards her allies, but everyone's similarly bound. With a wince of uncertainty, she looks back towards earth. Well, at least she left a contingency in place.
Not a good one, though.
"Leave us alone, creep!" she calls out, mirroring Mars' call. "Jupiter, you can break free of this! These vines aren't nearly as strong as Riventon's bindings!" When left without the ability to do magic, she falls back on encouragement.
Kunzite's body's pulled against Asclepius' by the vines, and the impact's hard enough to force an involuntary grunt of pain. He doesn't think anything important tore back open; he's not graying out, anyway, and that's all he has time to check right now. Gray eyes close, and he tries to concentrate.
Shadows dissipate from the area around the group, recur around himself and Daisuke, a close and tight shell cloaking them. He remembers those thorns.
After that, he lets his eyes open again. Not looking at Usagi. Not even looking at Mamoru. Trying to get a clear look at one of the other Senshi -- if there are any of them he can see clearly, from where he and Daisuke are bound. Mercury's call gives him the answer.
He cannibalizes the lightning he's carrying, and pulls from it the strength to project one more shield like the one he and the healer are under. Letting Jupiter's mad duplicate give her one inadvertent gift: a measure of protection against the plants' thorns and their capacity to drain. It won't last long, and with this many of the plants this close, it may not be enough. But if Jupiter's enough to make a distraction --
It gives Moon time, to try to make one more chance at breaking through to Fiore. It gives Endymion time for whatever it is he's trying to do.
If the two of them make it through this, then everything else will be all right.
One moment, she is running alongside Sailor Moon, ready to attack or to protect as she may be needed.
The next, the ground breaks apart under Sailor Jupiter's feet and her ankle is snared, yanking her back into a snarl of entangling vines.
Is this how Nephrite almost died? Somewhere in the back of her mind, the thought flickers into being, and Sailor Jupiter bares her teeth in a furious snarl. She'll pour voltage into these things until they fry--
But before she can act on the thought, she and Mars and Mercury are all lashed together within the vines. She has no choice but to let the charge that's begun to gather die; it's that or electrocute her friends. No good.
"Don't hurt Sailor Moon!" She can't use lightning, but Mercury's cry of encouragement reminds her that she still has her strength, and Jupiter throws every bit of it into fighting the vines, thrashing and straining with all she's got without caring if thorns tear into her skin. "How many times do we have to tell you--!"
Asclepius is about ready to unleash another energy push--- and starting to tire out--- he's not a wealth of an energy pool like some other people here--- when vines finally wrap arund the staff and yank it from his grip. It's a hard yank--- and he tries to hold onto it for dear life-- but the moment the vines wrap around his body and pull him away it's all but gone as he curses loudly. "Crap!"
He frowns as vines wrap around him-- though Kunzite seems to do something to protect from the drain. He frowns at Kunzite as he winces. "Crap." he repeats more lowly.
He looks at Sailor Moon but then also at Mamrou after. It's mouthing... something....
....'I need a shower..?'
'...Topple the Tower?....'
Asclepius defintitly can't lip read.
"Arrogant to the last," Fiore says, the deranged spark in his eye giving way to a crooked, feral smile. "I wonder which of you will beg for mercy first."
Sailor Moon might as well have said nothing about the planet, or about Mamoru's life. It's clear he did not hear it. What hope do words have of getting through to him, when he and the Xenian are one and the same? If he had heard, and if he had believed -- would she have allowed him to stop?
By now, everyone should know that answer. Even those once pulled from the darkness themselves. Perhaps they know it better than anyone.
All around the hillside, single Xenian hands, grasping and pale, shoot up from the dormant pink flowers. The vines binding the Senshi and their allies flash with red -- Sailor Moon and Fiore erupt in blinding light -- and little by little, their life energy slips from their bodies. Into the hands of those that would destroy their home.
It is painful for all, as slow and excruciating as they deserve for standing in the way of his cherished promise to Mamoru. But it is Sailor Moon's agony that he relishes most; it is her screams he most wants to hear as she watches her friends die before her, one by one. And so he draws out her torture the longest, each thorn digging into her skin millimeter by millimeter, so that she may live to see the Earth crumble away.
A laugh tears from him at that thought, harsh and violent.
"Of course you would think that Mamoru was meant for you," he screams, over the rush of magic that pulls the life from these six bodies. "You've had everything handed to you. You've never had to suffer before. You've never known what it means to be *alone.* Why shouldn't the world bend over backwards to give you everything you want?"
"Do you even know what Mamoru went through back then? What *I* went through? Can someone like you even begin to understand?" he continues, and his rage builds with every word. "Mamoru was the only thing I had. The only kindness I've ever known. Do you know what it feels like to have no one care whether you live or die? To be so alone that no one would even *know* if you disappeared? Have you ever known even an inkling of that pain? Have any of you?!"
Whatever it is that the ragged and wild gold-eyed prince has been muttering, whatever it is that caused that crack, it works--
As Fiore's ranting and beginning to drain the people he loves, those eyes flare bright and Mamoru shouts something inside the crystal and shoves, and it shatters all of a sudden, the liquid inside it splashing out in all directions. Dripping and holding his breath-- his lungs full of whatever that liquid is, if he tries to breathe before he moves all he'll be able to do is cough-- the sodden boy leaps at Fiore's back and wraps his arms around the horrible white Xenian arms and around Fiore's shoulders and around Fiore's chest, clinging to him like a spider monkey.
(It's not until his wet head is pressed against the side of Fiore's that he lets himself exhale, water from a drowned man's lungs, and coughs deep and racking.) Half a second later he screams out, raw and hoarse, "ANSWER HIM I'M MAKING HIM LISTEN! HE'S IN THERE WE CAN STILL STOP THIS! HANG IN THERE!"
He's shifting as he starts coughing again, feet braced on the ground behind Fiore; his one arm curls and squeezes tight around Fiore's midsection and his other hand comes up and locks Fiore's head in place, pressed against his own. All the raging wild power of the dying planet in the sky shines through his eyes, his hands-- not burning, not destroying, but fighting nonetheless: fighting to force Fiore's fettered mind open and give it freedom to listen, freedom to feel; fighting to keep back the choking pink mist; fighting to keep the Xenian at bay for as long as he can until Fiore finds the reasons to fight on his own.
Thorns dig into Sailor Jupiter's skin as she fights the grip of the Xenian vines with all her strength; some of the vines tear from the force of her struggling, but it's no use. More replace them, draining the energy from her until she can't move at all, can do nothing but watch Fiore's raving.
(New neighborhood, new school, but it doesn't matter; the rumors have made it to Seishou ahead of her. Teachers watch her with suspicion, and none of her classmates will look her in the eye.
She walks home alone after school, and no one is waiting to greet her.)
"Yes I have!" Jupiter roars in answer, green eyes bright with stinging tears. "You're not the only one who knows what it's like to be alone! Before I met Usagi-chan, I didn't matter to anyone! I could've disappeared and nobody would've cared!"
Her body feels as heavy as lead, the strength leaving her as the Xenians take her energy - just like the one in her apartment did. Ami and Nephrite and Mamoru came to check on her then; a year ago, there would've been no one to even notice anything was wrong, and the realization at the time brought her to tears.
"The person who saved me from that was her!" Makoto cries out with as much strength as she has left, hoping for all she's worth that whatever Mamoru's doing will be enough to get the words to Fiore through the Xenian's control. "So please, don't - don't you dare take her away!"
Does Rei have any idea what it's like to be alone? Do any of them? Is Fiore kidding?
"Do you really think you're the only one who has ever suffered? Do you really think you're the only one who has ever felt pain? Look over there! Look at that planet! There are so many there who are alone, who have suffered, do you really think you're the only one? You should be reaching out... but instead you're just going to kill a bunch of people who are just as wounded as y--"
Red lightning courses through her, and she gnashes her teeth shut. She doesn't cry out, but she does grip the thorny vines that bind her, hisses to ensure that the air that comes out of her mouth is not a scream. Don't let them hear you scream. She bleeds, she hurts, she is getting ever weaker, more exhausted. It's killing her, as intended, and after one long surge she is nearly at death's door.
Breathe in, breathe out, it's all she can do. She can't even open her eyes right now, and the lure of sleep is tempting, but she hears Usagi, and she hears her screaming. Duty forces herself awake.
"Don't you ever really stop and think about what you're doing? You keep talking about how alone Mamoru is, do you really think that killing everyone he cares about is going to change that?"
Mars hesitates after saying that, because if she angers Fiore too much it might be the last thing she says... but... what else is she going to do? It's better push her luck and take a chance at death, than to just sit and wait for it to inevitably come.
"Don't you see you're just creating more pain? Don't you see you're just spreading your misery to others? If you do this... you'll be exactly what you hate. I can't believe that you want that."
She doesn't scream, she managed to avoid that, but is she crying? Nah, surely that's just sweat and blood. She wouldn't be crying. That's ridiculous. Her voice cracks, but that's just because of physical damage. That's all.
Mamoru breaks out, saying there's hope, and Mars's mind is racing. Jupiter speaks, and afterwards Mars speaks up again.
"Fiore, stop this! This isn't you, and you know it! That evil plant has been manipulating you! If you keep listening to her, she'll destroy everything you love, and then you really will be alone! You still have a chance to stop this! Please!"
He tries. He tries the best he can. But it wasn't enough in the apartment, and it isn't enough now. The shield on Jupiter goes first; it's enough to protect her from some of the damage she'd do herself by fighting the vines, but not all of that, and once they start in on her in earnest, he can't hold it. Not at a distance. Not while he's holding another.
He can slow the drain on Daisuke and himself for a while, fighting the vines for their energy. But here in the heart of there power, there are thousands on thousands of flowers, and only one of him. He tries to shelter Asclepius most of all -- the healer's energy is more precious than his own -- but the Xenian knows where he's injured. The wounds are patched more than healed; even shifting the vines to put pressure on them causes enough pain to weaken his shield sharply. Thorns are ... almost unnecessary. But indulged in all the same.
At least he burned the last of the energy he was carrying, rather than letting the red lightning drain it along with his own.
He's holding on to consciousness more by will than anything else when Fiore spits his rage --
(Sleeping on the floor of his cousins' room. Waking into one of the seizures, a bad one, that left him gagging on a mouthful of blood from where he'd torn the inside of his cheek open. The other two were whispering, laughing, and he couldn't focus enough to understand. Not the words, not why they were dressed the way they were. You didn't wear shoes inside. You didn't wear shoes to bed.)
("He hurts himself when he has a fit," the older of his cousins said. The younger, still a year older than Kazuo, nodded. "He does. We saw.")
(When the first kick was aimed at his face, he understood about the shoes. He didn't understand where he knew fighting for his life from. But he knew he'd been eight then, too.)
It hurts to draw a breath deep enough to talk. That doesn't matter. "I had nothing." His voice is lower than the girls'; he doesn't have the strength to match Jupiter's savage bravery, Mars' intuition and passion. But he holds on. "No kin. No home. Nothing left in the world. Mamoru gave me a family. And when I made the same mistake you did, when I trusted a voice that promised me everything and used me to hurt him instead -- Usagi gave me that family back. My brothers and I -- we were all that alone. And without her, without both of them -- we still would be."
Asclepius can feel that drain and he winces, and cries out--- and the only saving grace is that Kunzite right now is burning energy to stop it from going full force which keeps him concinous and pointed for the moment. He doesn't like this at all. Asclepius can't heal death.
He sort of tries to fight the vines but this just serves to drive thorns deeper into the arm that's not smooshed up against Kunzite as he grits his teeth.
He listens to Usagi's speech... Jupitier's impassioned plea. Mar's own statement-- as he looks between everyone here. What can he possibly add to this?
Mamoru breaks free, eventually, Claiming he's still in there. He knows Fiore's been 'controlled' this whole time. But.. is it too late?
"All you're doing is bringing more hurt. Making more people without parents or friends-- like-- like this!" he stammers.
"Mamoru isn't alone anymore. You don't have to be either!" he calls out. But it's all he can really say.
"Dammit...." he mutters under his breath. He can't /teleport/ like this.
Her throat is raw from screaming.
She's not strong like Jupiter. She's not stubborn like Mars. She's not smart like Mercury, who'd find a way to avoid getting in this mess.
She looks over at Ami, who is unconscious in her vines.
She's also not smart enough to get knocked unconscious...
Fortunately with Mamoru's tackle (go, honey, go!) it's far easier to concentrate as the energy drain lessens.
She's able to breathe without screaming now.
Her mind flashes to another life. Does she know what its like to be alone? To have no one around who cares? She almost did, but she cringes away from the memory of tempered steel and her own hand.
Besides, do past lives count here?
Does she know what he went through? Any of them? Of course not. She knows of it, but has never experienced loneliness to such a devastating extent.
But she can never understand how anyone could look at the people who came with her today, at the boy they came here for, and their friends and allies below... How could anyone look at them and not see someone amazing?
She beat up so many people in the last school. Why did they let her in here?
How could they not see someone so incredibly strong and so very feminine?
I hear that miko curses you if you look at her wrong. Scary!
How could they not see someone with such fire, so much passion?
She always has her nose stuck in a book. She's so smart, and she just loves to rub our noses in it.
How can they not see how generous she is? How shy and so very caring?
Watch out. He's the prince's Monster. I hear he eats children in their sleep.
Someone so willing to put the lives of everyone he holds dear before his own?
He wants to be a vet. He wants to waste our money on something trivial, when he could do something better with his life. He is no son of mine.
Someone who would drop everything to help people he barely even knows?
Chiba did it again. Did you see? He practically pushed that girl over when she bumped into him. The guy's a jerk.
How could anyone, anyone, look at him and...not fall in love?
~*~*~*~
She starts crying hours before her father comes home. When he does, her poor mother, heavy with her second child and already stressed to her limits, is trying to calm her daughter down. But she won't.
Her father, who just came home from reporting on a mysterious car crash that just won't leave him alone, pulls her in close and tight, thinking about the little boy only a few years older than his little girl.
---
She's not as cheerful. Her parents suspect it has to do with the impending baby. Maybe she's jealous. Maybe she's afraid her mother won't come home. So many maybes, but none of them are right.
That's okay, though. She doesn't know why herself, either. And she does try to be happy!
---
Her baby brother is born. Papa lets her carry the roses, because she's a big sister now.
She hears crying.
When she finds the boy, she wants to hug him. So she does.
She wants to give him a flower, so she does.
And for the first time since that random day some days ago, she is so incredibly happy.
This sad boy, who gives her a smile that's mostly in the eyes, brightens her world more than any hug ever could.
This sad boy sparks a kindling glow in her soul, one that will never be doused. For years, it's this glow behind every smile, every laugh, when she doesn't even know the glow is there.
She vows, as Papa finally pulls her from the room, that one day, she's going to marry that boy.
There's a shattering of crystal behind him, about the only thing that could draw his attention away from the delicious agony unfolding before him. Fiore doesn't have a moment to turn his head before there's a powerful grip on his shoulders, a familiar voice in his ear. And a pressure against his mind that sends him flying into panic without really knowing why.
"What are you doing?!" The voice of the Xenian mixes with his, overpowering it, until he is nothing but an echo beneath her shrillness. His grip on Usagi does not loosen. "Stop this at once! Let go of --"
(-- this is the first time Mamoru's held him since he came back. Why would he want him to let go? --)
Like clouds split apart by golden light, the mist recedes truly for the first time in months, and Fiore can no longer feel the Xenian lurking in the back of his mind. There is no presence there to twist his desires; no laughing undercurrent to his thoughts of devotion and friendship and promises. No creeping tendrils to wrench his heart away. For once, he is completely alone -- and he is glad for it.
Then the ones he has trapped begin to speak, and whether by some alien power or by Mamoru's empathy, it is like he is viewing each of their stories firsthand, sharing in the loneliness he thought only he knew.
(A tall girl eating lunch on her own, pretending she doesn't hear the whispers across the courtyard. Walking home to an empty apartment, making food she'll share with no one.)
(A brainy girl receiving her latest perfect score, wondering when the next accusations of cheating will be lobbed her way. Leaving the test for her mother to see, only to find a schedule of the next practice exams on the counter in its place.)
(A quiet girl with fiery eyes, sweeping her grandfather's shrine and feeding the crows that are her only friends. Telling her classmates she won't use her powers to find their lost keychains and cell phones, receiving only judgmental glares in return.)
(A boy who's always known his heart's passion, caring for the sick and injured animals that crossed his path. Standing up to his parents' plans for him and seeing the disappointment and rage flare up in their eyes.)
(A boy with white hair, being abused by his family when he can't fight back. Growing up into something he isn't, doing terrible things because this is his duty, he has served Her since ancient times.)
(A little girl, with curious little buns and pigtails, giving a rose to a crying boy. And that little boy, with eyes as deep and blue as his planet, offering that rose to his only friend as he leaves.)
(That friend making a solemn promise. A promise on a rose that came from the heart of one sweet, warm, loving girl. The girl that saw all these people in their sadness, reached out to them, and told them they need no longer be alone.)
Fiore can only gasp.
"That...was you?" he whispers, his voice catching on his words. "The rose that Mamoru gave me...it came from you?"
The Xenian on his back lashes out, tossing away the battered body atop it as violently as its able, no regard for his injuries or weakness -- but it is too late. The red that covers his body is fading, the glow disappearing from Fiore's tear-filled eyes, and the vines binding Sailor Moon and all her allies vanish into nothing. Moments later, it is only Fiore that stands on that pink-covered hill -- not the half-Xenian creature hellbent on tearing the Earth apart piece by piece, not the menacing figure in white that wreaks havoc wherever he goes. Just Fiore, in the black he wore so long ago, with one speck of noxious pink lodged directly over his heart.
"Fools! You think you can stop this now? This boy's body is mine -- in a moment, his mind will be mine as well. Strike him down, and another like me will rise from the thousands of my sisters surrounding you. You have no chance. None of you do. Your world is already dying, and you cannot save it!"
No. There is one who can save it. And after all he's done to her, there is one thing he can do to make things right.
Fiore reaches up, grips the Xenian, and with a scream to wilt the flowers around him, tears it -- roots and all -- out of his weakened heart.
"Mamoru!" He falls to his knees, casting away the shrieking Xenian, his body already going cold. "Quickly -- she can beat it -- save the world. But there's not much *time* --"
Sailor Moon falls to the ground. Not overly hard, but she takes a few seconds to catch her breath.
The Xenian's taunting doesn't discourage her, and even before Fiore tears the darn thing from his chest, she's already determined to not let that prediction come to pass.
"Don't worry, Fiore. She won't win."
Her crescent wand is in her hand, the crystal glittering within it's circle.
"Can't you use escalation instead of the raw crystal? It's safer for you..."
Safer, yes, but less power.
Right now, they need all the power they can get.
The wand falls away and the crystal floats between her hands.
All the power.
Closing her eyes, her short fuku is replaced by a long dress, flowing without wind, even in a climate with not much in the way of atmosphere. The crystal blossoms into a lotus.
She closes her eyes and tilts back her head, letting loose the power of her soul.
Fiore rips the thing out of his heart, and Mamoru's on the ground over there, unsteadily pushing himself up and looking on in a combination of pride and horror. He fought it off. He's dying because of it. He starts picking himself up to go over and see if there's anything he can do-- the lightest touch, a brush of fingertips to the dying alien boy's temple, and a blood-red rose hurled bitterly at the Xenian Fiore had torn from his flesh--
--and then the words register, and he looks up, and the Earth looms large and larger in the sky as they approach it, and his eyes widen again. No glowing gold there: only the blue that matches that enormous marble in the sky-- and Usagi's moving in his peripheral vision, and it's a punch to the gut. He knows what it'll do. And he knows--
--he knows she has no choice.
This time they don't have the support they had at D-Point, all those souls, all that energy.
the feeling of that silver and gold thread snapping
NOT AGAIN.
"Help her EVERYONE HELP HER--" Mamoru cries out in desperation, and he pushes himself up, tattered and staggering, and he coughs again-- but he gets his balance, and he moves in a half-lunge to take Usagi's shoulders and support her.
Just that touch, the purity of her open soul, washes away the pain of the earth in a flood of silver, and the ragged trainwreck of his henshin lights with renewed energy: once again Endymion is by Serenity's side, standing tall and strong in blue and gold and silvery steel, a rock for her to brace against. "Everyone--!"
Mars, released, drops to the ground, collapsed. The draining has stopped, but moving still hurts. She shouldn't, ideally, be moving, but when is life ever ideal?
Moon arises first, and she still hasn't given up. She's still willing to fight. No, more, she's opening up her heart, bearing her soul, all the way while holding nothing back. If she does it like that...!
No, now's not the time for doubts or weakness. She has to have faith in her princess, have faith in Sailor Moon, and more than that she needs to support her. It's not enough to just sit by and let her carry everything alone.
Mars moves. She shouldn't be able to, and the way her body shakes as she rises to her knees shows it, but she's just too stubborn to listen to silly things such as 'human limits'. She stands, trudging past the fallen plants, marching as quickly as her battered legs will allow, which isn't very fast.
She collapses, to her knees, mere feet away from Sailor Moon, but this is close enough. She reaches out to offer a supporting hand, to whoever needs it, and sits up, bravely.
All of her feelings, all of her will, wells up within her, becoming energy, becoming magic. The times when she was outcast, and the times her friends accepted her... the times when she was ridiculed, and the times when she was praised... The death of her mother, and her rebirth as a senshi.
She knows pain. She understands loss. She also knows love, and passion. Everything she was given, everything she was shown, and everything she was born knowing but forgot... all of it is given to Sailor Moon, to support her and empower her in this desperate moment.
Maybe they don't have the support they had before, but they've also grown stronger since then. Mars hopes that will be enough.
The vines give way and Sailor Jupiter drops, just barely managing to get her hands underneath her to half cushion her fall. In the next moment she's struggling up again, forcing her drained and exhausted body back onto her feet, moving to Mercury where the Senshi of Wisdom lies limp and unconscious.
She's leaning over Mercury as she sees the Silver Crystal bloom into the shape of a flower, and her eyes widen with dismay and alarm as she understands everything that means.
"Usagi-chan--!" She bites back the protest. How many Xenians just on this asteroid? How many more already on Earth? How many of those giant stalks, reaching for the planet's core?
Mercury is down, Venus and most of the Shitennou stuck earthside, and Serenity needs every bit of power they can give her. Moving stiffly, Jupiter hoists the unconscious Sailor Mercury and makes herself move, one determined step at a time, towards where Sailor Mars is kneeling, until she can sink to her knees next to her friend with Mercury cradled between them.
(A little blonde plunks down next to her, looking at her lunch bento like she hasn't had a decent meal in weeks; Mako towers over her even more than she does most of the other students, but those bright blue eyes aren't intimidated in the slightest.)
Here on her knees, Sailor Jupiter reaches for every last bit of power left to her. She reaches for all the strength of thunderstorms and green growing things, to the guardian oak that's reached its roots deep into residential Uminari, to her guardian planet and its dozens of moons and all the stars that lie under the auspices of Jupiter. She reaches deep, gathers all of this into her heart with all the love and steadfast courage she can muster, and she pours it all out to her princess.
"Jupiter Star Power!"
Endymion's given an order. Kunzite would have to be bleeding a great deal more than he is not to follow it.
But there's one thing. A breath of a moment.
Fiore is close by Serenity and Endymion. Kunzite has farther to travel than Mars and Jupiter, is no quicker than they. But he catches himself up by the alien boy, and kneels down beside him -- something flickers into existence in his hand that is not a sword, and he presses it into the hand that just cast away the flower, folding Fiore's fingers about it. Smooth stone, carved in a stylized version of the heart he just freed, and perhaps just lost. Something that began as a plant and became part of the Earth, full of all the colors of roses.
Something so that, even while the rest of them turn to Usagi, Fiore is not for a moment alone.
"Hold on," Kunzite says to him quietly, and does not waste energy on getting up again. They are, after all, right there. His prince, and --
The girl who turned to his prince's pet monster and wept on his shoulder, because it was so terribly unfair that even an animal should die. The girl who leaned her head against the monster Beryl made of him, because she believed there was still something left of him worth saving, because she was sure that there was enough of him left not to hurt her. The girl who fell asleep leaning against him, because the flowers and Mamoru's pain had worn her down so much she nearly drew on the Crystal only to buy time.
The girl without whom his prince's life would be empty darkness and ash, no matter how bright the rest of the world became.
He's exhausted, drained, held together by threads; but just as his prince not long ago poured the last of his power into weaving those threads, Kunzite pours himself out in turn, taking everything left to him, cleansing it of doubt or uncertainty or worry till that faith and trust and love is for a moment nearly as pure as Usagi's silver; offering it up to Endymion, and through him to Serenity.
Asclepius is freed when Fiore rips the Xenian from himself along with everyone else. He hits the ground and when Kunzite goes running to cover ground he frowns and teleports himself over. He'll worry about staves later as he tries to deal with all that in his head...
Hearing others thoughts- his own included is difficult. There's somethings you don't talk about to others, because you belive what you're going through is less important than what someone else is going through. He wonders if that was pulled from his mind just now or..... if it's something heard when he smashed into Mamoru that one time.
He'll worry about that later. It isn't important right now. There's something horrible happening but amazing happening all at once.
He frowns. "I'll do my best." words he always means.
He's wondering what Kunzite is doing. Nrg-- he wants to-- try to make this better, but he can't do both of these at once. He looks back to Princess Serenity as he adds his own thoughts, and feelings and magic to this power, hand outstreched, glowing that soft purple.
Silver light streaks out from Serenity's crystal, bolstered by red, green, white, purple, gold -- and the deadly fields of pink stand no chance. From the petals of the asteroid that tower over them like mountains, to the expanses of blossoms they stand on now, the Xenians fade first into half-corporeal outlines of light, and then into sparks that dissipate like rainbows in the morning mist. Somehow, they are made beautiful in death by the Ginzuishou; the only one with the nerve to scream is the first blossom herself, flung away from Fiore, impotent. And she is silenced even before the asteroid is cleansed of her children.
The rock beneath them is barren now, but that is only one threat beaten. How many more Xenians are already seeded in the Earth below? How much power does the Princess need to save the world she came to love so much?
The world where she met her friends again --
-- where she fell in love --
-- where there are so many people living and laughing and loving, depending on her to see another day?
For a moment, it seems like it may not be enough.
Already there is one too late to save.
Spattered with green across his torso and arms, an alien boy lies in stillness much too perfect to be sleep. His eyes are half-lidded, dull. His face frozen in an urgency that will never fade. It is difficult to say how much life was left within him when Kunzite knelt over him, but now, the hand that cradles his glittering stone is cold.
As the asteroid streaks closer to the earth, shielded by a silver glow even as it breaks apart, Princess Serenity gathers up all that strength and love around her. Even Mercury and Venus, one unconscious and the other on the planet below, she feels their strength.
Emboldened, she turns the focus of the crystal toward Earth, the silver light shooting away from the asteroid and toward the earth. She can feel the Xenstalks, the flowers, she can sense their roots. They burn, twisting in the earth, turning from poison to nourishment as the entire planet is filled with the cleansing power of the Ginzuishou.
Everyone she loves will be safe.
Nobody will die alone today.
She will do what she's been longing to do for weeks, months, to save their planet and cleanse his soul.
Ev--
Her eyes snap open.
"I'm sorry..."
The crystal shatters before her as the last petal, the last root is dissolved.
Ribbons. Silver and gold shatters.
A piece of scrap metal falls to the ground.
Dressed for a lazy nap on a lazy Saturday, a matching tank top and shorts set of pyjamas littered with tiny cartoon bunnies, Usagi Tsukino collapses.
"Usa--" starts Endymion, voice cutting off as she falls like a marionette with her strings cut, and his throat won't work, his lungs constrict; he feels it snap--
--they all feel it snap, that silver thread twining with the red of fate, connecting them all to her. The backlash burns, and Mamoru's mouth tastes of blood and ash and emptiness. It rips from his throat then, a raw and broken shock he doesn't even hear. A sound Kunzite has heard once. A name.
"USAKOOOOOO!!"
On his knees in the red-brown ore dust of the tiny piece of asteroid on which they all remain, floating in space, kept alive by the atmosphere created by the Senshi's powers, a young prince who spent so many years of his life alone, thinking that the only people who accepted him were gone forever, cradles the blank-eyed body of the girl who first saved him from that hell. Who first brought him out of the tower he'd erected around his soul over many years of solitude. Who first told him 'of course you're my friend'. Who first found him on his island--
It's rare that he cries in front of more than a select few people. It's very rare that he cries where more than one can see.
It's silent.
He holds her to his chest, and the glow from his hands is dim, is desperately given, is flung uselessly into an abyss because he can't reach her where she is. He can't reach her. He can't feel her. He can't find her light--
It's the barest whisper. "...Usa... please..."
Mars didn't hold anything back. She put everything she had into helping Usagi, hoping, praying, that she wouldn't need to burn herself out.
Everything is will be fine. It's working. Just have faith.
The world is being cleansed, and Mars can feel the corruption and darkness being uprooted from the Earth below. She can almost see it.
Just have faith. It's working. Everything will be fi--
'I'm sorry...'
Mars heart stops. She feels that snap. She shrieks. The girl who was too stubborn to scream at her own pain is now screaming at the loss of her princess.
No, it can't be. Mars rushes forward, reaching past Endymion to grab Usagi's arm. "Usagi-chan! Usagi-chan! Wake up! Wake up!"
Her grip tightens, grief overwhelming her. This is too much. Did they really lose her? Sure, the planet is safe, and the people below are... but... Serenity is...
This, finally, really is too much. Rei can't stop her heart from breaking. The first person who made her feel like she was welcomed, who treated her like a friend, who bound their friends together... that person is gone. This is too much. She can't stand it. She closes her eyes. She allows herself to weep, because Usagi is worth at least that much.
"... come back... please..."
"Usagi-chan!"
There is a truth that Makoto has understood since she was ten.
She watches the crystal shatter, sees the princess's gown fade into pajamas, sees Usagi fall right before her eyes but it doesn't compute, her mind refuses to make sense of it as anything more than a collection of abstract images.
The truth is that life is fragile and uncertain.
She'd poured every ounce of her power into Serenity, but somehow Sailor Jupiter finds it in her to scramble towards where Usagi has fallen, where Mamoru is holding her and silently weeping. This can't be it. They brought Mamoru and his knights back from the darkness. They came back from the North Pole. It can't end like this.
The truth is that the people you love can disappear before you even know it.
"Usagi-chan..." Tears stream down Jupiter's face. "Come on... open your eyes..."
As long as the two of them lived. As long as she lived.
He's held to that for a long time; and now it's broken, too.
Later, he will sit awake for hours, tearing the past apart, trying to untangle it enough to find places where he could have done something differently. If he'd tried to shield Mercury rather than Jupiter, would she have stayed conscious, could she have calculated Serenity a more efficient way to use her power? If he'd pushed harder with Takashi earlier, might things have fallen out differently, would they have had Frost Knight to lend them something? If he'd moved to prompt Venus, rather than hanging back and letting her bruised heart heal at its own pace --?
No matter how hard he hunts, he will never find answers. And that is later.
He does not have strength to rise, but like Jupiter, like Mars, he moves anyway. Not contesting the girls for a place by Usagi. Never trying to draw his prince away from her. But setting a hand on an armored shoulder, where the back of Endymion's mind might register it by weight, if nothing else.
He does not try to trigger the prince's empathy, does not risk touching his skin. He is not the one Endymion is seeking after. And he will not risk distracting him from any faint trace that might remain.
Did they do it...? Is the world saved...?
He doesn't know-- and then it all breaks...
'I'm sorry'. And then there's nothing-- things breaking- spiraling down to the ground and his eyes go wide and he looks around frantically, because something sort of snaps there and there's this feeling of dread and horror that isn't really familar to him.
His eyes are searching-- looking for his staff-- thinking 'maybe I can do something. maybe I can fix this!'--- but he has no idea where it went right now. Would he even find it in time?
He quickly moves over to Kunzite's side. "Nrg...I can't... do anything... to help her..." he says obvious sadness, frustration--- tears begining to form along his eyes because this is very much a thing he can't help fix.
All he can do is hope and pray right now.
It's in the glitter of crystal dust that he appears: first a shimmer, nothing more than an outline. A trick of the light born from a burst prism and too many tears. Even the words on the wind, however familiar, may be nothing more than illusion.
"Mamoru-kun...everybody."
And yet, as they look on -- if any of them can tear their eyes from Usagi -- the shimmering form gains substance. Balls of light float gently from some unseen place in the sky and gather, solidify into the face that has been their bane and their terror for months now. But without the cruelty, the hunger, the paranoia that tugs his lips downward and dulls the depths of his eyes -- can it really be the same face at all?
For the first time, everyone sees the face of Mamoru's true friend.
"Mamoru-kun," Fiore repeats, taking a step closer to the somber scene of mourning in front of him. "I am so -- so sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen. I never wanted to cause you any pain. I never wanted to cause anybody pain."
All he wanted was a safe return to the days he'd spent with him in peace. A warm afternoon, a gentle breeze, a sunset over a rainbow of wildflowers. A day they could be together in a world that was kind to them. A smile, a laugh, knowing that they are not alone, and that they never will be again.
All of that is lost to them now. In desperation, he let an evil in, and for all the forgiveness in the world, there is some damage that can never be reversed. The rolling fields of flowers will remain a dream; their friendship goes to rest here, where he committed so many atrocities in Mamoru's name.
But there is one last thing he can do. To make sure he is never alone again.
Fiore smiles, holds out both hands as if he's cupping water -- and there appears a true lily. White, fresh, iridescent with the light it sheds. The summation of his soul in a flower. The last trace of Mamoru's first friend, before he fades away. The gift of his life.
"This is the last of my energy," he says, incorporeal tears falling from newly gentled eyes. "Please. Give it to Sailor Moon. She saved me -- you saved me, Mamoru. Again."
How funny, that so long ago he promised to return with many flowers, when all he needed to give was one.
At first, with his guardian's hand's weight on his shoulder and his chiurgeon's tears falling in silent grief, with the girls in close and trying to wake their princess as if she only slept -- as if the poisonous blooms she removed were replaced by a bower of perfect fairytale blossoms framing her still, pale body, awaiting only a kiss to bring her once more to joyous, brilliant life --
Mamoru looks up and stares blankly at the coalescing figure.
The face he hasn't truly seen for more than seconds at a time, now freed of even the torment behind his eyes in those moments, is so much more familiar than it was. Is so much more real, though it belongs only to a spectre. This, too, is something of which he has painfully familiar experience. Fiore's essence, so very much more Fiore than the stolen boy who came to enact revenge on his planet for sins it never committed-- there's a dull relief, that that gentle spirit should survive in some form, even if his reality has turned to ash and dust.
But then Fiore's words register, and it's as if Mamoru were coming up from underwater, waking from an unrelenting nightmare of drowning forever. (Part of him feels guilt even for that: with everything Usagi has won for him, with everyone he cares about now, who cares about him, with the release of the imprisoned parts of his soul, with love surrounding him, with all the love that she's given so freely and all the well-wishes for happiness for him and for the girls and for everyone she's ever cared about -- he knows he wouldn't be able to grant her wish, knows he wouldn't be able to be whole or happy without her, ever.)
The words tear at him, but there is no contest. There's never been any contest, when it comes to her. Eyes brimming with tears he tries to hold back (why? why would he try to hold back? he can't), Endymion reaches up to take the pure lily from Fiore's ghostly hands. It's a real thing, as solid as it is ephemeral, like the dreams their lives are sometimes made of.
"Thank you," he whispers, heart already broken, but breaking over and over even as it's handed hope. The flower is cupped in one hand, and he brings it to his lips--
--pure white light pours into his mouth from the lily, the nectar of a life's essence, the trade of a life for a life. The deep magic, and deeper. In his hand, the lily transforms into a rose; he places it in Fiore's still-outstretched hands, and he bends his head to kiss his princess' cooling lips. His princess, Usagi Tsukino. The light glows bright, brighter-- the shape of a lotus, ghostly in the air between her chest and his, and
those fields of flowers
@};--',--'-,--
they live on in dreams: dreams of laughter, dreams of sunlight and a world free of pain, the best parts of the best dreams, the paradise earned for the virtuous fallen. Reality may not have been what aeons of mythology and poetry have painted it to be, but it was close, and a breath of it is released every time a perfect red rose is conjured from nothing. If anything could bring some semblance of those dreams into reality, with symbols and with sacrifice, with wish and will...
Mamoru pulls back, glittering specks of light still on his lips and still on hers, and on her, they multiply, floating and scattering and dancing, a thousand thousand points of light drawn in toward the ghost of the Maboroshi no Ginzuishou that still rests in the air above Usagi's chest.
On Earth, in a Tokyo office building, a man clutches at his chest and staggers in the middle of a presentation.
"Excuse me, I have to..."
He rushes to the bathroom, not sure why his heart is breaking.
On Earth, in a newly renovated house, a woman clutches at her chest as she gives a startled gasp. The cat on her lap begins to yowl, the sound suspiciously like crying.
She's crying, too, but she doesn't know why.
Or why her heart is breaking.
So instead, because she's a mother, she holds the cat and comforts her like a crying child.
"It's okay, Luna. Everything will be okay. She'll be home soon."
The cat just cries harder.
On the jagged remains of an asteroid, in the arms of people she loves, Usagi isn't aware of the pain around her.
Usagi isn't aware.
Usagi...isn't.
And then a lost boy gives what is left of himself. His gift comes on the petal of a flower and is delivered by the lips of her beloved.
And now...
Usagi...is.
The crystal forms as her body warms. It spins, gently, weaving back together bonds that had been broken with the petals of a lotus flower, stronger now.
(On earth, a man who had escaped to the restroom can breathe again. A woman and a cat breathe out their relief as the heartbreak leaves them.)
The scrap of metal reforms, becoming harder, stronger for the break. Four jewels, for four girls, twinkle in place around the golden star.
Finally, the lid clicks open and it's an audible noise. Inside the compact, a golden ribbon curls around where the crystal will lay.
When her finger twitches, the crystal dissolves only to reappear nestled in an unearthly metal and those gold ribbons, shielded by four gems for four girls.
When her eyes flutter open, she's not even aware she had died.
"Oh." Her voice is as soft and faint as her breath. "I thought I...oh, I'm so happy. I wasn't ready to leave."
Rei's eyes remain shut. She doesn't see Fiore, at first, but she feels him. She's aware. She opens her eyes, to see his ghostly image. Happy, healthy, at least in spirit, even if it's far too late to save his life, at least she can tell herself that his soul was saved.
Then, an offering is made, and Rei can barely believe it. She watches, quietly, hopefully. The miko knows full well what's in that flower, and what it means, even before Fiore says it.
Her gut, tightly knotted, begins to loosen just the tiniest bit. Her grip adjusts, loosening and then pulling away. Life returns, and relief doesn't even begin to describe what she's feeling.
She pushes Usagi on the shoulder. "You dummy! Don't scare us like that!"
A gloved hand wipes at her face. "Welcome back, Usagi-baka."
Mars wants to yell at her. She really really does, for how much she was hurting, but she's just so happy that she just doesn't have it in her.
The first whisper of Mamoru's name is enough for Kunzite to lift his head. They all of them know something about souls, know something about existing past the body's end. In some ways it's no consolation; death is still a division. On one side, the person is knowable. On the other, somewhere else, somewhere that none of them remembered.
There is some victory, then, in knowing that Fiore died clean.
But if Usagi was right, that the crystal was her soul -- then if the crystal is shattered --
The Dark Kingdom taught Kunzite a great deal about setting thoughts aside, about not thinking them, not until it's safe. He does that now. Wraps that speculation away wherever his emotions rest in times like this one; only waits and watches and listens, empty.
He does not understand, therefore. None of what happens. Not until Usagi draws a breath, and finds those terribly soft words.
He finds only one. "Fiore."
Sometimes... sometimes all you can do is hope. and wish. and wish and hope and various in betweens and that's all Daisuke is doing right now. Even if he had his staff... even if he had some sort of stronger power... would it matter right now? No, not in a time like this.
Fiore appears. He blinks merely once. 'not possible.' his brain says. 'possible' his heart says. He blinks again. He watches the act, what happens, what said and he understands it. He wants to say something-- but his mouth doesn't open.
It isn't time for words. Mamoru goes to Usagi's side and a miracle happens. He'd heard things described in the North Pole-- he wasn't there himself.
He wonders if it felt a little like this now.
Another rose from Mamoru. A Mamoru who's surrounded by love, who cries from happiness instead of loss. A Mamoru who will never know the pain of loneliness again.
In the end...isn't this all he ever wanted?
When the prince looks up from his princess, there is no more Fiore -- even his body has vanished now, for what once tainted by evil can withstand the Ginzuishou's light? But, in his place, something else remains.
A glittering pink stone, washed clean of all blood, warm to the touch. A rose, given in gratitude and forgiveness, a gift before a long and unknown journey, just as before.
A promise, made between friends, that this is not the end.