Eternally Yours
By Ai-chan
Chapter 4- You are what you can't see
A heartbeat.
And then the park erupted with various screams of denial. "NO!" Rei
and Usagi got up and dashed towards her. Makoto pushed Tux off of her
and crawled towards Minako with him right behind her. Mercury desperately
tried to disengage herself from the shrub she was trapped in. Artemis
got there first. Kunzite was right behind the weeping Artemis. He fell
to his knees beside her. "Murderer!" screamed Artemis, clawing at every
available inch of him. Kunzite did nothing to stop him. It was Tuxedo
Mask that finally pulled him off. Rei turned her tear stained face to
Usagi. "She's barely breathing. I think her neck is broken." "No..."
whispered Ami. "You BASTARDS!" screamed Jupiter, rushing towards Zoisite.
Tuxedo Mask stepped in front of him. Makoto stopped abruptly, looking
at Mamoru confused. "Wha-!?" she started. Tux ignored her and turned
to Jadeite. "Can you help her?" he asked. "I..I.. I think so" said
Jadeite leaning over her. "Don't touch her you piece of filth!" yelled
Rei but Mamoru said furiously "Enough! Let him help her!" "But he killed
her! They sent the monster that killed her!" Mercury cried out. "No we
didn't!" yelled Zoisite. The two faced off, eyes blazing. Suddenly they
heard Jadeite speak. All turned to watch him. His finger was on Minako's
fading sigil. Her fuku was fading in and out, and both of them were
glowing with a diffused golden light. Then very softly Jade whispered
"Bind." Her prone form rose gently and the blood disappeared. "Heal"
whispered Jade, grasping her hands. The golden light around Minako grew
brighter until they were unable to see her. Jade dropped from exhaustion
at their feet. But Minako grew still impossibly brighter. Then suddenly,
in a flurry of gold sparks they saw her levitating on her back in her
princess dress. Her golden hair floated around her like mist and her
sigil burned brightly. Her eyes fluttered open and they were as gold
as her hair. She stared up at those around her, then sat up looking at
peace. She stared at Jade with a warm welcoming smile on her
face. She nodded to Zoi and Neph happily and then her eyes fell on a
stunned Kunzite. She looked at him sadly and reached out her hand.
He reached out his, ever so slowly. Just as their fingers were about
to touch, the beautiful golden light around Minako shimmered out.
Her princess form snapped back to her Super Sailor Venus fuku,
her hair fell back from behind her, her eyes turned back to sky-blue,
and she stopped levitating, falling hard on her behind. "Oww...talk
about a fall from grace. Was I in the tree or something" said Venus
in her usual singsong voice. Then each of the Senshi, the cats
and Tux dog piled on top of her, showering her with hugs. The
Generals smiled to each other. For in that brief instant, they had
seen something in Minako's eyes that brought them all joy. They had
seen recognition for who they truly were in her eyes. And Kunzite
was ecstatic. For Kunzite had seen someone he had thought he would
never see again. The golden-eyed form he had seen had not been Sailor
Venus, not even Aino Minako. He had seen Princess Venus, his Venus
of the Silver Millennium, and she recognized him. And that was all he
truly needed in this world. Kunzite passed out from shock, bliss and
overexertion, landing right next to Jade. Zoi and Neph just sat down,
too tired to do anything more but smile. They would worry about how to
deal with the girls once the Senshi stopped rejoicing. Arguing and
explanations could wait. Now was a time for celebrating. And they had
much to celebrate.
After everyone had poked Minako to see if she really was all right, she
gently pushed them all away. "I'm fine you guys," she stated, laughing
"What are you all fussing about. What happened?" She turned to Mercury
for an explanation and saw the familiar glint in her eyes as she whipped
out her computer. "Oh no! No way Mercury-chan! I am not a science exper-
iment! Will someone tell me what happened?" said Venus looking around.
"Maybe he can," said Rei quietly, pointing at Jadeite, who was sitting
up and shaking his head to clear it. Everyone turned to look at him,
the Senshi regarding him critically. Minako glanced between the two
groups and then said exasperatedly "Will someone tell me why we're
not kicking the crap out of these guys?" "Because he saved you V-chan"
said Sailor Moon tenderly. She recounted quietly what had happened to
Minako, who looked at Jadeite curiously when Usagi had finished. "Why?"
she asked plaintively. "Because we are not the enemy Sailor Venus,"
said Kunzite, who had regained consciousness. "We are here to help."
Makoto snorted. "Help?" she said cynically, "then why did you send that
big ugly to finish us off. If that's the kind of help you can regularly
offer, no thanks." "That's enough" said Tuxedo Mask. "I trust them. They
have no aura of evil around them and they had plenty of times in which
to kill us but they didn't. Plus, I met Kunzite in civilian form and he
didn't try to hurt me. Instead he gave me back my memories." The Senshi
continued to eye the Generals, mentally weighing the pros and cons.
Finally it was Minako who spoke. "As leader of the Sailor Senshi, I speak
for us all. We welcome your help. But we still do not trust you. Make one
false move, one hint of treachery, let it be known that we will hunt you
down like rats. But for now, a compromise." She extended her hand to
Zoisite, who was closest to her, and shook it. The rest of the Senshi
followed suit, Kunzite and Makoto, Rei and Jadeite, and Ami and
Nephrite, all the Senshi extremely wary of them. "Well," said Sailor
Moon brightly, "if we're all working together we better go back to our
civilian forms before we draw anymore attention." She looked around at
the rest of the Senshi, each who wore a different looks of amazement on
their face. "What?" she continued, her costume shimmering back into her
cute little green skirt and white sweater set. "It's not like they don't
know what our real names are or anything." said Usagi, adjusting her
skirt. Tuxedo Kamen followed Usagi's example and morphed back into Mamoru.
The Generals looked at each other and then looked to Kunzite, who just
shook his head in mock exasperation. In a blaze of scarlet-gold, silver,
brown, and emerald the girls were looking at four very handsome young
men. Ami blushed and looked down, Makoto's fierce expression turned into
one torn between rage and infatuation, Rei's mouth dropped, and Minako
kept staring at them impassively, though her cheeks gained a bit more
of a coral color. Mars sighed finally and said "We can't stand around
here all day" and in a shimmer of red they were staring at Rei in blue
shorts and a red-flower print tank top with matching red sandals. Jared
gulped. The other girls shrugged and in a sparkle of gold, green, and
blue, Ami, Makoto, and Minako were standing in front of them, each
decked out in summer attire. "Well" said Zach, uneasily. "Umm" said Ami,
looking around abashed. "UG! C'mon Generals. We've got to find someplace
to talk," said Rei, utterly disgusted with having to speak to them.
"Uh, Rei-chan" started Luna. "WHAT!?" said Rei her eyes blazing.
"Well," said Luna, shrinking away from her heated gaze, "perhaps we
better learn their non-general names so we don't attract unwanted
attention." "Oh all right" said Rei, looking slightly embarrassed.
"C'mon" said Nate, "We can all go to my house, it's probably the
most private place we can find." And he started walking out of the
park, the other generals behind him. Behind them were Usagi and
Mamoru, off in lala love land, and behind them, the Senshi and
the two cats, in deep conversation. It was definitely an odd procession.
"Damn it!" Domitric swore loudly. His brilliant scheme to frame the
Generals had been a total failure. Instead the two teams were working
together. It was back to plan B. Domitric considered his options.
Finally, he decided to have Vega carry out this particular part of the
plan. He didn't know if he could trust Rehn around his angel, and he
didn't want to have to find out. Vega, being female, was the obvious
choice for this part of the mission. But first he decided he'd be
better off waiting. Domitric figured that by waiting, he would give
the Senshi's distrust and suspicions time to grow. Domitric didn't
stop to consider that maybe it would have a reverse effect. He was
too busy imagining life with Minako by his side. He smiled to himself
with uncontainable glee.
"Wow," said Makoto involuntarily, gazing up in awe. They had arrived
at Nathan Stanfield's mansion. After their three mile, silent trek through
downtown Tokyo, they had arrived at the gates of an extravagant mansion.
Nathan used voice activation/identification to open the gates. Even Ami
was impressed by the technology and Rei had to physically drag her from
the security cameras. As they walked up the drive, they passed
immaculately tended gardens and a lush lawn. Rei couldn't help being
appreciative of the leaf-free grass, and bet Nathan had never set his
hands on a broom before to take care of an unceasing supply of dead
leaves. As they entered the house in a silent awed procession, Usagi's
stomach gave a huge, monstrous growl, causing Zach and Jade to whip
around looking for an intruder. Usagi grinned embarrassedly and said "Uh,
sorry I haven't eaten since breakfast." "USAGI!" said Rei, exasperated,
"that was an hour ago!" Nate smiled and led the way towards the kitchen.
He pushed the oak-paneled door in and motioned for everyone to come inside.
Upon entering, everyone let out exclamations of amazement and Usagi's
mouth watered. She walked into the brilliantly lit room with her eyes
agog. "I've never seen so much food in all my life." she said in amaze-
ment. "Help yourself," said Nate, smiling good-naturedly. Makoto said
cynically, "Better not tell her that, you'll be restocking the entire
kitchen by noon." She looked towards Nathan with a humorous grin on her
lips, then coughed and looked down angrily as she realized who she was
joking with. Usagi opened a cupboard tentatively and then flung it wide
open, her eyes alight. The cupboard led into a pantry the size of a
bedroom, with rows upon rows of every type of food imaginable. Chinese,
Japanese, American, and many other cuisines were in front of them. Every-
one couldn't help but laugh as Usagi began stockpiling food at an
alarming rate. Gradually everyone trickled toward the pantry, and the
refrigerator. Minako pulled down a large saucer and filled it with
cream and put it on a tray for the cats, along with 13 different
morsels of fish and a spoonful of caviar. Artemis swooned in delight
as he saw the tray and Luna sniffed haughtily at it, but followed
Minako's progress assembling it with a careful eye. Finally, when everyone
had loaded his or her plate up, they set off towards the patio.
They were seated and began looking uneasily at each other. The cats
silently lapped up their cream but watched the two groups with a
cautious stare. The Generals sat on one side of the table, the Senshi
sat on the other. Mamoru and Usagi sat in the middle of the two groups,
across from each other.
Everyone dug into his or her food, except Minako and Nathan, who didn't have
anything. Nathan stared at each of the girls critically. Minako stared
off across the lawn, in deep thought. Finally, after a polite stretch of
time, she said "How did you get here?" "You mean why aren't we dead?"
said Jared, looking up and grinning. "Umm yeah, Jadeite, that." said
Minako, staring at him. "Hmm perhaps we better divulge you with our
names. You sound a bit odd calling us by our General names. I'm Nathan
Stanfield," said Nate and then pointed to each of the other men, in turn,
introducing them. "Okay, umm yeah, but back to my original question,"
said Minako impatiently, " Why aren't you dead?" "Well we were dead,"
said Zach, looking up from his plate, "but someone brought us back."
Ami and Minako's eyes narrowed and Kenneth could almost see the name
they were about to spit out. "No not Beryl" he said hurriedly. "She's
good and dead and that's the way it should be, the ugly hag," he
continued, "someone you are well acquainted with but who's name we
promised not to divulge. Be assured that she is a friend, a very good
friend of yours and ours." He smiled encouragingly, but the girls didn't
seem convinced. "All right, fair enough," said Ami pushing her plate
away, "but if you didn't send that monster than who did?" "A woman and a
man named umm Vega and uhhh Reek? No, wait that's not it...umm...oh
I got it, Rehn. Vega and Rehn." said Jared triumphantly. "Okay that
doesn't really clear a lot up for us. Who are they?" said Rei, setting
down her fork. "We don't know, but we know they set off that monster and
we know that they had it planned and we know that they can teleport. And
that's all we know. So far." said Zach. "How did you heal me?" said
Minako quietly, "and why did my clothes change? What did you do to me?
Why could you do that to me?" Jared stared straight across the table at
her. "Because you and I have a special bond Minako. Our power stems from
the same basic source, light." "No-" started Minako but Jade interrupted.
"Yes, I know, your powers are based on love and beauty, but they are also
light based. Love and light go hand in hand." "All right so we have the
same power source, sort of, but that doesn't explain why you could help
me. Hell, Usagi could have healed me if that's all we needed was a shared
power source. Why could you heal me?" "Because we share so much more than
a power source Minako. We have a bond that is unbreakable,' said Jade,
smiling warmly. Minako looked at him, completely confused. Jade looked
at her and said very carefully "We share a life force, Minako-chan."
"Wha-" started Usagi in utter confusion. Minako was mesmerized by Jade's
clear blue eyes. Jade sighed and said very plainly,
"Minako-chan, I'm your brother."
*************************************************************************** |
