|
|
|
Dawn broke on the Neo Silver Millenium, pale light glistening off the facets of the crystal city. Neo Queen Selenity leaned against her bedchamber window and gazed out at her kingdom, taking care not to muss her halfway pinned odango. Taking a step back from the glass, she closed her eyes in contentment spun around joyfully . . . and knocked over a fragile blue crystal vase.
Needless to say, she winced. “Che . . . I hope that doesn’t wake . . .”
“Mmm?” Someone under the blankets murmured. Selenity winced again, and began to sneak away from the crime scene, white silk rustling.
“Usako?” the puzzled voice called out again. King Endymion threw the bed sheets off, looked around the room, and saw only the shattered vase. This time, he winced.
“Ita . . . that was my favorite vase,” he muttered, and began to rise from the bed. Before he was halfway up, however, he was tackled by a mass of white and gold that yelled, “Ohayou, Mamo-Chan!” He fell back on to the bed with a bounce, the triumphant Selenity weighing down his chest. She grinned down at him with mixed amusement and innocence. At once he feigned an angry expression.
“Did you break my vase?” he asked suspiciously. She blushed.
“Well . . . I . . . er . . . um . . .”
“He smiled. “That’s okay.” He ruffled her hair as she sighed in relief.
“Anyway, Usako, what are you doing awake at this hour? The sun’s only been up for a few minutes.”
She fumed. “You’re not the only one who can get up early!” Selenity leaned closer too him as she said it, her hair falling down around his face.
“Ba-ka,” she teased, and kissed him good morning for the 703720 time since their marriage in that April, on that very day, 1,928 years ago.
From the summit of the crystal spire, a flock of doves flew off for the center of the city, a circular park named in honor of Sailorgalaxia. One such dove, as it sped overhead, dropped a long, white, angel-like feather that spiraled down past a pair of bright silver eyes belonging to a tall schoolgirl with short brown
hair.
“Kirei . . .” she whispered, and caught the feather between her fingers. She quickly glanced around and furtively stuffed it into her schoolbag.
“Nee! Nee! Tsukiko-Chan!” a girl with long platinum blonde hair tied back in a large purple ribbon waved to Tsukiko. She ran to Tsukiko, who was vigorously waving back.
“Kaze-Chaaan! You’re laaaaate!” she taunted Kaze as she arrived, panting.
“Well,” Kaze huffed in her soft voice, “I lost my schoolbag and had to find it.” She then held up the elusive bag, as if she had conquered several large giants and an ogre to get at it. Tsukiko looked at her watch, unimpressed.
“We still have to wait for Mo . . .” and she was engulfed in a big bear hug.
“Ohayou, Minna-Chan!” Momoko, a girl with spiky blonde hair and big blue eyes squealed in delight. She then dove for Kaze.
“Guesswhatguesswhatguesswhatguesswhat!?!” Momoko exclaimed.
“What?” Kaze inquired.
“Chicken Butt?” declared Tsukiko.
“No, but close!” Momoko replied with a grin. She then held her hand up for silence and the girls paid rapt attention. “I GOT A LETTER FROM ELOKIN!!!!!!” Many gleeful shouts commenced.
“She can send letters now?” the bewildered Kaze said.
“It appears so,” Tsukiko chuckled. “What does it say?”
“Here’s the best part!” Momoko announced. “She says she’s coming back!” Tsukiko leapt up into the air.
“Finally! She’s free!” she exclaimed. In the process, she glanced at her watch and noticed that she was about to be late for school at Sekai Modo Gakuen. A small gray cat skittered off as the three girls ran off in a cloud of dust and gleeful shouts.
A young woman with very long, wavy blue hair stared out of a window, paying rapt attention to the changing shapes and colors of what little light there was at the bottom of the ocean.
“Chrysobera-Sama?” A male voice echoed throughout the marble chamber. The lady, clearly annoyed, looked away from her window and faced the voice’s source, a young man with blue hair tied back into a ponytail and gray eyes.
“What is it, Ganymede?” she said in irritation.
“I . . . when should I start, Chrysobera-Sama?”
She sighed. “I don’t care. Start now. Just go, Ganymede."
He bowed deeply and promptly left the cold blue chambers of Chrysobera, who had returned to her window as if entranced.
“Nee . . . nee . . . Momoko-Chan . . . nee!” Tsukiko prodded Momoko as she whispered to her. Momoko turned from taking her messy notes and turned to her friend.
“Nani? I’ve got to pay attention or Ushino-Sensei will fry me!"
“I know you’re allergic to cats,” Tsukiko went on without notice of her friend’s irritation, “but am I seeing things, or is there a cat on the ledge?”
Momoko’s eyes were doubtful. “On the 37th floor?”
Tsukiko nodded vigorously, and Momoko turned to face the empty ledge. She raised an eyebrow.
“Tsukiko-Chan . . . are you trying to trick me?”
Tsukiko’s face, however, looked genuinely surprised. “Demo . . . demo . . . it was just there!”
Momoko giggled softly. “You’re crazy, Tsuki-Chan!” she clucked affectionately, and returned to her notes.
“I did too see it!!” fumed Tsukiko, a bit too loudly.
“Hateshinai-San? Is there something you would like to add to our discussion today?” the middle aged graying man inquired. Tsukiko cast her eyes down is
embarrassment.
“Can you answer the question I just asked?”
“Erm . . .” Tsukiko searched her mind desperately for an answer. They were talking about the Sailor Senshi disbanding, right? She sucked in some breath. “The Sailor Senshi were disbanded about 1000 years ago, after the predicted attack by the Black Moon.”
Ushino smiled, and she knew that she missed it. “I’m sorry, Hateshinai-San, but we’re discussing why they were disbanded, not when. Can anybody else give me such an eloquent answer?”
Momoko glared at Ushino with the fury of Hell while several students laughed and a single hand shot up. A girl with short pink hair, sky blue eyes, and a gentle expression began to answer.
“There was no longer a need for the services of the Sailor Senshi. The kingdom had no enemies anywhere in this galaxy, and still has none. Today the Senshi all lead normal lives, living up to the their dreams as they were never able to as Sailor Senshi.” She sounded as if she had swallowed the textbook. Momoko whistled.
“Very, very good, Hanano-San. Perhaps you can teach Hateshinai-San here a few things. You two will pair up to create a 1000 word minimum essay on the current whereabouts of the Sailor Senshi. This project, which Hateshinai-San here will receive no one else’s help on, will be due this time next week,” and with that little speech, the cocky teacher returned to his lecture.
Tsukiko almost started crying. She hated projects! Especially pointless ones like this! Momoko reached over, squeezed Tsukiko’s hand, and winked. She passed her a note that read, “At least you don’t have to do it alone. I’ll introduce you to someone who can help the work go by twice as fast! Gambatte, Tsuki-Chan!” Tsukiko smiled widely at her friend in thanks, and then looked over at the girl who would be her partner. She was busy reading the last few pages of her history book.
Kaze milled around outside Sekai Modo Gakuen, waiting for her tardy friends. She looked at her watch impatiently. What could be keeping them? She thought, and sat down on a vacant bench. She stretched, very sleepy all of the sudden, and looked around for any other people she might know. There were a few scattered groups of students waiting for a ride, a good looking man that appeared to be waiting for something, and a half grown gray and black striped cat.
Kaze yawned. I guess a little nap wouldn’t hurt, she thought, and curled up on the bench.
“Hanano-San!” Tsukiko cried as she left her short detention, dragging the sacrificing Momoko behind her. The pink haired girl turned around and faced them with a gentle smile.
“Hateshinai-San?” she inquired. Tsukiko shook her head.
“Call me Tsukiko. If we’re going to be working together, I think I’d like to get to know you better.” She put her hand on the girl’s shoulder in a warm gesture. “This is Momoko-Chan. I know Ushino-Baka said that we weren’t supposed to get any extra help, but she says that she knows someone who can help our work go by twice as fast!”
Momoko did a quick bow that the proper girl returned. “I am Hanano Izumi,” she said, smiling widely. She must not have very many friends, Momoko thought when she saw how happy Izumi became. Tsukiko grinned brightly, oblivious to Momoko’s wise conjecture.
“Come on,” Momoko said while patting Izumi’s back. “Walk with us today.”
“Yeah,” Tsukiko added. “I bet Kaze-Chan is upset that we’re late!”
“Che! We forgot about Kaze-Chan!”
“She probably feels neglected.”
Izumi walked between them happily as they exited into the conservatory hallway of Sekai Modo Gakuen.
The two that are one . . . an anguished voice flickered across her unconscious. A high laugh broke out amidst the pain.
Apocalypse . . . silence . . . stillness . . . nothing, a sinister whisper played through her mind, accompanying the strange, insane laugh. She then saw the fall of a unique angel, with 3 pairs of gorgeous, transparent wings.
Soon it shall all come together . . . revelation and oblivion, and she saw from the deep darkness a flash of bright light against a pair of eyes, one red and crazed looking, one blue, gentle, and pained.
As the angel falls . . .
The daylight hurt as she opened her eyes.
“Wha . . . where am I?” Rei muttered in annoyance as she stood and dusted herself off. She noted the tall tree that she had been sleeping under.
“I must have fallen asleep,” she grumbled, mad at herself. Then she remembered.
“Oh no . . . the vision . . .” her voice trailed off into a trembling whisper. Her eyes darted to the crystal spire across the city.
“We have to gather again, Rei quietly told herself as she remained focused on the tower. She reached unconsciously into her purse, fingering the Henshin Wand that she always kept with her out of sentiment. But she didn’t feel the tingling warmth that she usually felt as she came in contact with it. It felt . . . cold. Like another Senshi’s Henshin Wand.
Rei immediately became alarmed. She pulled the wand roughly from her purse and held it high above her head. “Mars Crystal Power, Make-UP!” she called out in defiance of the unsettling feeling in the pit of her stomach.
Absolutely nothing happened.
“MARS CRYSTAL POWER, MAKE-UP!” she shouted with more force. The light in the wand flickered and sputtered for a few moments before it went out forever.
Izumi, Momoko, and Tsukiko were coming up the conservatory walkway of their school when the chain broke on Tsukiko’s medallion. It rolled across the walkway and into the bushes.
“Onore!” Tsukiko cursed the unruly chain. Momoko and Izumi stopped and stared at Tsukiko. She turned a bit red.
“Um . . . haha! My medallion fell off,” she explained to her friends. “You should go and meet Kaze-Chan now, she’s probably having a fit.” She gave them a farewell wave. Momoko smiled, leading Izumi away. “That always happens . . .” she explained.
Tsukiko knelt down and crawled around, sifting her fingers through any suspicious looking clumps of grass.
“Excuse me.”
Tsukiko jumped and looked wildly around for the source of the voice.
“Down here,” a half-grown tabby cat with gray and black stripes and a silver star on his forehead said.
“Oh. Gomen nasai, Mau-San,” Tsukiko apologized for not noticing the elite inhabitant of the Mau planet. The cat nodded, accepting her apology.
“Is this what you’re looking for?” He asked, tapping a dark blue medallion with a silver colored crescent moon on one side, the blue dusted with small silver stars. Tsukiko’s eyes lit up.
“Arigatou!” she exclaimed, attaching it to its chain. She then began to stand up to leave.
“Wait a minute, please. I need to talk to you about something,” the cat said, his green eyes focused on her silver ones. She hesitated for a moment, knowing her friends were waiting for her, but sat back down across from the cat. He cleared his throat.
“My name is Cosma, and I have been looking for you for a few months now.” He explained, shifting his weight to his left back haunches.
“Me?” Tsukiko laughed. “Why me? I’m nothing special.”
“You are one of the twelve Cosmos Senshi chosen to protect the Neo Silver Millenium now that a new evil has surfaced from the inside.”
For a moment Tsukiko said nothing at all, regarding the obviously mistaken Mau with an air of confusion and doubt.
“Are you sure about that?” she asked him slowly, not wishing to stir up any conflict.
“Yes. Positive,” Cosma said with absolute confidence. Tsukiko stood up.
“I don’t think . . .” she began, but she was interrupted by a piercing scream from outside the school. Something from deep within Tsukiko welled up, a mixture of fear, concern, and the urge, the need to fight, to protect.
“You are,” Cosma said, and silver light gushed forth from Tsukiko’s body.
“Rei-Chan, your visions have always been right before,” Selenity told her nervous friend in the conference area of the Crystal Palace. “We must . . .”
But she never finished her sentence. Her body went ramrod straight in pain and she let out a bloodcurdling scream at the horrendous feeling of her power as a Sailor Senshi being ripped from her body. Her power, visibly flying out of her soul in a beautiful fountain of pink light, converged in the heavens. All of this lasted only a few seconds, but for Rei, it lasted eternity.
“Usagi-Chan!” she shouted, and caught her friend as she collapsed.
In the space between Tsukiko and Cosma a new source of light began to form. From this burst of pinkish light there came a silver pen tipped with a pearl that was encrusted with diamonds. On the pearl there was the symbol for Cancer embossed in silver. The pen glowed with a gentle silver light. Tsukiko took the pen from the air, and felt a warm, tingling feeling travel up her arm.
“What do I do?” she asked Cosma. He smiled an odd, cat-like smile.
“Say, Cancer Cosmic Power, Make-Up.”
She held the pen high above her head, as she has seen in the movies about the Sailor Senshi.
“Cancer Cosmic Power, Make-UP!” A stream of silver light seared forth from the pearl of the pen. Her street clothes melted away and were quickly replaced with ribbons of silver light that wrapped around her torso, wrists, and feet. They changed into her white fuku, short gloves, and brown colored sandals. From the ground circles of ice came up and spun around the top of her legs, shoulders, and forehead. They changed with a flash to a silver skirt, collar, and tiara with a pearl encircled with diamonds. Very pale and long blue ribbons came down from her collar and the back of her skirt. For a moment she posed against the background of a stream of stars and a tiny crescent moon.
“Go and help your friends now, they need you,” Cosma said to Sailorcancer, and she ran out the door and into the courtyard of Sekai Modo Gakuen. She was met with the scene of crumpled bodies all around the yard, a single man with blue hair and gray eyes still standing. There seemed to be a concentration of energy gathered around his hands.
“Um . . . hey, you. Stop that,” Sailorcancer stammered, looking altogether unprepared. The man’s head snapped around toward her.
“Who are you?” he asked, not entirely unaware of her appearance of a Sailor Senshi.
“I am Sailorcancer, soldier and protector Zodiac’s fourth house,” she started, words coming to her. “In the name of ice and the stars, prepare to suffer!” she exclaimed, pointing at him. He remained unmoved, but the energy seemed to disappear from his hands. He looked at her intently, as if trying to extract something from her face.
“And what do you think you can do about our presence here?” he said. She stood there for a moment, welcoming the rage that came over her.
“Freezing!” she began, ice spiraling around her from the ground and gathering around her hands, held high above her head. “CATATPULT!” She finished, hurling her load directly at the man. It made contact with him, and he fell to the ground with blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. Strangely enough, he smiled. Cancer looked at him defiantly, ready to strike again any moment.
“Release them,” she growled, pointing to the bodies of Izumi, Momoko, and Kaze as well as everyone else.
“Ganymede,” the man coughed. Cancer stared at him in confusion. “What?”
“You deserve to know what I’m called. I’m Ganymede,” he said, standing up. With a wave of his hand he faded out, awakening the victims in the process. Cancer stood there for a moment, baffled at this man’s behavior. Noticing that the people were getting up, she fought the urge to go to her friends and ran away from the scene.
A few moments after the battle, Tsukiko ran out to her friends, two of whom were still down. Kaze was just getting up, dryly coughing.
“Kaze-Chan!” Tsukiko exclaimed. “What happened?” she put her arm around Kaze’s shoulders in concern.
“I don’t know. I looked around for you guys and I suddenly felt sleepy.”
“Did it hurt?” Tsukiko looked fierce, and Kaze wondered why, but didn’t think much of it. She nodded slowly.
“I knew that I was in pain, but I couldn’t do anything about it,” she said sadly. Tsukiko patted her on the head.
“I . . . I know this will sound silly,” Kaze said, looking at Tsukiko seriously, “But . . . I think that I was saved by a Sailor Senshi.”
Tsukiko smiled. “I don’t think that’s silly at all.”
That’s my first episode everyone! I hope you liked it! Here are a few footnotes for the Japanese impaired and for those who were just wondering:
-I used Selenity in place of Serenity because I think that Takeuchi Naoko meant to use Selene as a basis for Usagi in the first place.
-Che means Damn, Ita means ouch (It was his favorite vase, for crying out loud!), Baka means stupid or idiot (awww! She hasn’t grown out of insulting him!), Nee means “Hey!”, Kirei means pretty, Nani = what, Demo = but, Sensei = Teacher, Onore literally means “Bastard!” or “Damn you!” (She was mad at it!), Arigatou = Thank you, Sekai Modo Gakuen is New Window Academy (It is made almost entirely of soundproof glass, BTW ;] ), Gomen nasai = I’m very sorry/please forgive me, and I think that’s it.
-Hateshinai Tsukiko means Everlasting or Endless Moonchild.
-Uchuno Momoko means Cosmic Peach Girl/Child.
-Yureru Kaze means Swaying Wind.
-Hanano Izumi means Flower Fountain.
-Ushino-Sensei means Cow Teacher ^_^
-Ganymede is one of the moons of Jupiter.
-Chrysobera is a false Beryl (originally, she was a former ally of Queen Beryl who was seeking revenge. Silly, nee?)
-Nee also means right ^V^
-At the end of the name: -Chan means close friend, -Sama is goddess/queen/person I greatly respect, and
-San is Mr./Mrs./Miss.
-Oh, and Gambatte means Good Luck!
THANK YOU very much for reading my story, and look for new episodes in the future. Hopefully, I can churn out 2 or 3 a month (If I get up off my lazy butt! It took me about three months to write and revise this episode ;^_^;). I promise that there will be more action in the next episode. This one was for introductions, important information about the original Senshi and . . . erm . . . about how Chrysobera treats Ganymede!!
You can email me with comments, good or bad, at [email protected], or
[email protected]
THANK YOU!!!!
|