Hello to all who've ploughed through to the end of this. Normally I try to only let one or two chapters out at a time so that no one gets sick of it but I'm sickof it sitting on my computer. Please, please let me know what you thought of it. Were there any plot holes? Did I go out of character as I described them? Please tell me what made you like or dislike this, I'm begging here! I need to know.
Thank you and thank you for reading.
Draegyn
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The Choices We Make: part eight
By Draegyn
In a night that would change the universe the Ginzuishou, the physical incarnation of Order and the crystal that my people guard, took on mortal form. Its intent was to create a being that would be capable of meeting the approaching danger, of opposing Chaos. It chose me to be the receptacle of its essence that I may bear and nurture a child such as had never before been known.
I gave that child away.
When I learned of the magnitude of my choice I was stricken. It was far greater than I had believed possible. Who was I to make such a decision, I who have shown myself to be lacking in so many ways? How is it possible that I was fit to make such a choice, a choice that would change everything?
And yet, when I did, it changed nothing.
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Pluto did not understand what had happened. In fact she did not understand most of what she had been required to do since the appearance of her princess' enemy and that was unheard of for the guardian of time, she who lived the past and future along with the present. Yet from the moment the Gates of Time had trembled with the force of Chaos' approach her sensitivity to the currents of time had been wrenched from her. No, not then, it had been a thousand years before when a tall form had stepped through the unstable gates and caught the Senshi's magenta gaze with her own.
'The strands of destiny will reweave the pattern torn asunder. You will not interfere in this. Irrespective of your own beliefs you will not only allow it to proceed unhindered by any, even our fellow Senshi, you will play the part that fate has cast for you. Even when it costs you your princess. Do not attempt to keep her bound to us and to our fellow Senshi. It would only delay the inevitable. Endymion and Serenity must unite.'
Those searching eyes were hard as they wordlessly demanded acknowledgement from her and filled with an ache that she could not comprehend. Not then, but she knew at that moment it would only be a matter of time until she did. In time it would be she who bore the signs of grief and weariness. It would be she with the unbearable load of sorrow. Yet she could do no more than nod and watch as her future self once more returned to her correct position in the time stream, the gates closing with a hollow boom that rang of finality. Disorder had run amok in the Senshi's mind. Bare hours before she had felt the future shatter and then reform in a different cast yet shards of memories of that last future remained.
Now, in this time, the past had been burned into her mind yet hints of what could have been remained to haunt her. Endymion could have been so much more than what he had become. No, not 'more' exactly, yet he could have been a king she would have been honoured to serve. Now however he was beyond redemption. Not even Cosmos had the power to resurrect that future. Endymion was evil, that was a truth that she had never questioned and yet it was for her to drive her princess into his arms. She did not understand yet she had obeyed.
She had not contradicted her sister Senshi when they had questioned the Senshi of life, even though Pluto knew more than enough to trust the silver-haired woman implicitly.
She had not stepped in as they alienated Cosmos although she knew that they would be driving her away.
She had not accepted the hand that had been offered to her in friendship, though she knew that if she had she would have been gaining a precious treasure.
She did this, as she had been commanded, and yet she did not understand. Why?
And now, centuries since she had been commanded to this unwanted path, Endymion had been possessed by the very entity that Cosmos had been born to slay. What possible cause, aside from that of destruction, could the union of Serenity and Endymion have served in this time? It had only made the princess vulnerable when she could least afford it.
Pluto straightened in anger. She was the Senshi of time! It was her duty to prevent such debacles. It was her duty to protect Serenity not to hurt her!
Now, her part in the war behind her, she looked to the sky and endured the agony that was ignorance. Around her the Senshi wordlessly gathered, Greater and Lesser, each of them anguished. Jupiter, Mars, Venus and Mercury were little more than cripples as they leaned against their sisters for support.
"He'll have gone after her," Venus spat. Her face was colourless except for a small line of red on her cheek that pulsed rapidly with the blonde Senshi's angry heart.
"Of course he will," Uranus agreed, "With the power of Chaos inside him? He'll go after her and then he'll be back to finish Earth off."
"No," Venus disagreed, her loathing blatant. "The bastard will capture Serenity and then he'll go after the queen. He'll use the daughter to torture the mother and then he'll destroy every last speck of dust that bears some relationship with the kingdom. It'll be the Reckoning all over again only this time it will not be we who brings it down upon Lunarian soil and it will not be invaders who feel the power's edge."
None argued with the certain woman. It seemed all too likely to each of them, Pluto among them, however a glance at the Starlights showed no such certainty. Ocean-blue eyes did not avoid her searching magenta gaze and in them the Senshi of time found not hatred but grief. An awe-inspiring sorrow the like of which Pluto had seen but once, in her future self, and still she was ignorant of the cause.
"Endymion is not Chaos," Starmaker stated coldly and the faces of all three Starlights were closed.
Starfighter's voice was abstracted as she murmured, "Destiny and fate were her midwives. They were present for her birth as they are now, can you not feel their web tightening around their favourite child? They will not relinquish now what they have strived so long to ensure."
"And what's that?" Venus mocked weakly, "The creation of the ultimate evil? Chaos was not enough for them…"
"No," Pluto interrupted finally. "No!" she repeated more strongly. "Their intent is and has always been to create a union that will endure beyond time and death… and I have done my part, may Ser… Usagi forgive me."
"What?" Jupiter and Uranus spat together. "You wanted this?"
"Be still!" Starfighter lashed out. The Senshi fell silent at the raw emotion in their Warrior sister's voice. "We three," the Starlight motioned to her two fellows as she continued, "Have felt the truth of Pluto has just told you from the moment Cosmos set foot upon your moon."
"You don't care that the greatest Senshi that will ever be born is at the mercy of an amalgamation of the two greatest abominations of all time?" Venus growled as she pulled herself upright. The scar on her cheek was a crimson brand as her fury warred with her weakness. "You don't care about the utter wrongness of what you're saying?!"
"What's done is done Venus!" Saturn stated coldly and within her dark eyes Pluto saw the understanding that they all had sought from the moment that Endymion's intentions had become known. Saturn nodded slightly to Pluto, a silent admission to the elder Senshi's admission, before she straightened her small form. "But for now we must return to the moon, the queen will wish to see us and we are no longer needed here."
Venus looked to argue yet again but the eyes of the Greater Senshi blazed. Finally they had reached the end of their patience… or, Pluto thought to herself as a wave of disquiet writhed in her gut, perhaps they knew something that Pluto and her sister Soldiers did not.
Then she, too, understood their impatience. For and endless moment the universe seemed to teeter on a knife's edge and unconsciously the guardian of time held her breath lest she be the one to tip the balance. Then, as slowly and unstoppably as an avalanche, all that was changed. For the briefest instant existence sang and she who was attuned to time's currents felt their eddies become a raging torrent. A universe that had been knocked askew and lost its way returned to its rightful path as a weal in the timeline that even she had been ignorant of was healed.
"What the Hell was that?" Jupiter's down to earth question broke the following silence.
Pluto attempted to break herself free of the abstraction which remained with her with little success. While her sisters muttered shocked questions vertigo assailed her as the future changed and changed again in her power's perception. What could be was unknown to her for the first time in her service as Senshi. Potential future after potential future raced through her mind's eye, none the same yet a single constant prevailed. As the future exploded into infinity and Pluto battled for her sanity in a maelstrom of possibilities the common factor in each future provided her with the lifeline that she needed to endure the time-storm.
A steadying hand touched her shoulder and power that refused to be denied drew her back to the waking world. Magenta eyes met understanding brown and Pluto wordlessly thanked Starmaker for her aid.
A glance around her showed that her companions had fixed concerned eyes upon her. "What happened?" Neptune enquired gently.
Pluto opened her mouth and yet no words emerged. How could she explain a fundamental change in the nature of time? She hunted for words and yet none were adequate. In the end she said simply, "Time has been set free."
As she expected it explained nothing to her friends but before frustration could grow the Warrior who had saved the guardian once did so again.
"She means that something has happened to increase the variability of the future exponentially." Starmaker looked meaningfully at her fellow Starlights as she continued. "Before this the stability of the timeline decreased as its ability to change increased and an equilibrium had been formed which meant that although time was robust it was almost perfectly uniform. A new force has now been added to the equation, one which will provide the stability that the timeline requires to evolve into a more flexible entity."
Pluto nodded. "Apparently Fate and Destiny have arranged for a little more give in the timeline to make their job easier." More than one of the Senshi listening frowned and opened their mouth to comment. Whether it was to ask for a clearer explanation or what it was that could have triggered the alteration Pluto never learned for once more her universe went mad.
The world was twisted by unnatural magic and a scream of agony echoed though her mind. She staggered only to collide with the unsteady form of one of her sister Senshi. A torrent of pain inundated not only her but also her sisters and their voices melded in an unholy wail as the tried to expel the sensation that had been thrust upon them in any manner available.
Power. Blood. Chaos.
A silver strength that they had not noticed was a part of them faltered and dread hit them with the force of stars colliding. Pluto forced her eyes open. The Starlights had dissolved in three showers of light, leaving the Planetary Senshi to find their own way to the source of the weakening silver power. It took the unsteady soldiers less than a second to remember the colour of the power that had devoted their lives to serve.
"The queen!"
Venus' eyes narrowed. "He went after her," she hissed and without further ado she vanished in a swirl of orange power. Eyes widened in horrified understanding and elemental strengths roused and the wielders translocated themselves to the Moon. Even as Pluto was about to blindly follow the significance of the Starlights absence registered and she knew then that she was about to go to the wrong power. It was too late to alter her destination though and with a cry of anguish she felt her magic sweep her away.
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Venus paced the length of the chamber with a quick, impatient tread. She felt as if she were suffocating which might be due to her recent torture or it might be because of her current helplessness. Relief that her queen was well and unthreatened warred with the chagrined realisation that her lack of forethought and left her no avenue of aid to bring to her princess. Her princess who, even as the blonde Senshi did nothing, was being torn apart by the most loathsome monster Venus had had the misfortune to meet.
"Where are they?" she snarled in frustrated fury. In her mind she was planning in detail the torture she would inflict on Endymion, be he Chaos or no, for the heinous act he had perpetrated.
One of her teacher's pale eyebrows lifted in stinging rebuke. "If you had not acted so precipitously perhaps you would know. Instead you allowed your judgement to be undermined by your emotions. A Senshi cannot afford to allow her hatred to rule her as you have done…"
Venus felt as if the dark prince himself had struck her in the stomach. "You believe that this is my fault…?" How dare he? She had devoted her life to ensuring that Endymion would never again threaten the queen and everything she had ever done had been to that end. She had done all within her power to see that Endymion would be de-clawed… and she had failed. Her hatred of Endymion was laid bare and she finally saw what that hatred had concealed: inadequacy.
Suddenly she felt her nervous energy leave her in a rush and Artemis was forced to leap forward to catch her as her legs gave out beneath her.
"I've failed," she whispered, "Great Serenity, what kind of pathetic excuse for a Senshi am I?"
Artemis' expression softened somewhat. "One that, for the most part, does her name proud."
Venus felt the scar on her cheek keenly as her face flushed in shame and memories of a day long passed yet never forgotten returned as clear as if they had been made the previous day. "No, this is the second time Endymion has gotten past me to threaten those who I am supposed to protect. He should never have gotten within a league of the queen on the day of the Reckoning and he should never have learned that the princess even existed." She fixed Artemis' blue gaze with her own. "I'm supposed to keep them safe and yet I cannot protect them fro…" She fell silent, unwilling to finish.
"You cannot protect them from him," Artemis spoke the words for her.
Tears welled in her eyes. "I'm Senshi," she whispered, "And I'm still not strong enough to stop him. I'll never be strong enough…"
"You are not expected to be…"
"But he's mortal! A mere human and yet he toyed with me as if I were a child. He ripped my power from me without a thought and I could not stop him when he stripped me much less when he used my princess to satisfy his perverted lusts." Her mind shied away from the memory of her power being wrenched from her, even the humiliation of being debased by the dark prince was preferable to reliving the hell that had been inflicted on her for those short and yet unending moments her Senshi calling had been stripped from her. She shuddered unconsciously. "What good am I?" she whispered in despair.
"With a judge so harsh as you are upon yourself, my Venus, what good would any of us be?"
Venus opened eyes that she had not even known that she had closed and stared into twin pools of silver. Queen Serenity reached out and gently cupped Venus' cheek and the Senshi felt her monarch's endless compassion and empathy in that slight touch yet she still turned her face away.
"I'm sorry, so very sorry my queen. He's out there somewhere with the princess at his mercy and she hurts and it's because I could not keep her safe from him…"
The hand at her cheek inexorably forced her to look back. "Not even the crystal could have kept them apart, it informed me of that itself."
Venus pulled away from Artemis and the queen unsteadily and shook her head in denial. "No! She is your daughter, she deserves someone better than that monstrous bastard."
"You mean that you believe that I deserve someone better than Endymion for a son-by-marriage." Venus flushed when she realised that that was exactly what she had meant. For all she had revered the absent princess as a child and anticipated her return as an adult, her queen would always come before the incomprehensible woman that her princess had become.
"You're right," she admitted, "I do. You are worth a hundred of her, Greater Senshi or no."
Serenity chuckled sadly. "I am honoured that you believe so but if I were ever to shoulder her burden then I would be crushed beneath its weight. For all the idiosyncrasies that your sister Senshi have described to me, the truth of Cosmos is so much more. Her concerns as those of realties while mine are solely of our people…"
"Which to me is of more value," Venus insisted. She straightened and faced her queen directly. "I am a Lunarian woman who is more than honoured to serve as Venus' Planetary Senshi in your court. I have laboured for you and beside you as I have with your daughter and I believe that while she knows of sacrifice and duty she does not know and will not ever understand what it is to be of the White Moon. If not for her own sake then for yours she should have denied whatever was between her and the Terran prince."
Venus raised her chin and resolutely commanded her legs not to tremble with weakness as she awaited for the rebuke that must surely be hers for speaking in such a manner. Artemis regarded her inscrutably from behind the queen until with a sudden frown his attention turned to something only he could hear. Venus paid no attention to her teacher's abstraction, her focus on the Silver Queen.
Serenity's eyes seemed to stare inward rather than at a specific point. "One thousand years ago I gave her away. Had I kept her perhaps it would be her, not I, that you would now be so stalwartly defending… or perhaps nothing would be different, we will never know now. One day ago I allowed her to leave me once more, this time because had she stayed she would have challenged me to change, to evolve and to become more than I could bare to be. So I let her go, admitting to the both of us that she had surpassed me and that I feared her." The woman paused for a moment and then her eyes focused on Venus'.
"One thousand years ago her absence was the goad that made him strive beyond mediocrity and her presence now spurs him on to even greater heights. He would never even think of declining the challenge that her very existence issues to those around her. How can he not be worthy of her?"
Venus frowned. "If he's so worthy of her then why did her screams echo in our minds?"
Serenity's smile became a bitter twist of the lips. "It does not necessarily follow that a great man will be a good one, my Senshi. I like it even less than you." A hard light came to Serenity's silver eyes and Venus sensed in the monarch a tangle of emotions akin to her own. Silver and blue exchanged a wordless communication that spoke of centuries of a common enmity which events had now frustrated the possibility of any closure. At her queen's urging and denied the release of vengeance, Venus did the only thing that would allow her to remain unbroken; she stopped hating the prince.
However, her personal vendetta aside, Venus' responsibility remained. "What he did to the inner Senshi and I is nothing to even the echo of what he is inflicting on her. We have to find and stop him."
"Not even the Ginzuishou can locate him now," the silver-haired monarch replied in sorrow. "And I forfeited the right to any bond I might have shared with my child long ago. We have no way of finding them."
"Actually Serenity that is no longer so," Artemis re-entered the conversation with a sudden passion. Both women stared at him in surprise and he bared his teeth in grim satisfaction while he stalked past them and hurled the chamber doors open. Then he stepped aside to reveal the Moon Kingdom's Senshi escorting a single stranger.
The stranger stepped into the light and Venus blinked in awe. So this was Galaxia? The signs of Chaos' tenure in her body were gone yet her time in its possession had left its mark. She stood, slightly bent, the weight of the galaxy on her shoulders and her arms hanging limply at her sides while something dark dripped from her fingertips. For all of her power she looked so weary. Serenity's eyes widened in recognition and hope only to fall again at the sheer pity contain in the Warrior's face.
"Galaxia…?" she whispered. For the first time in Venus' memory Serenity's calm façade was shattered.
The Senshi blinked and struggled for words. "Sister…" She trailed off and raised her hands, palm upward, in supplication. All near paled when the movement presented trails of drying blood for all to see. Even as they watched rivulets of the viscous liquid moved pass her elbows towards her upper arms. From the entrance Jupiter swore softly but Galaxia paid no heed. "Cosmos… your daughter… she was… Chaos, he…"
"He?" Mars snarled and Venus, too, felt a memory of her old hatred. Within her a cry for justice arose and her Senshi's magic coiled in readiness. Galaxia's keen gaze moved to her and the Warrior of the Greater Kindred frowned. Venus felt her own power silenced by a greater strength.
"Be still!" Galaxia's voice snapped in an unknowing echo of an ebon-haired Starlight. She turned back to face the horror-stricken queen with an impervious poise. "Serenity of the White Moon, we of the Greater Kindred summon you and the circle of Soldiers whom you rule to stand witness. How do you answer?"
Stand witness? Venus frowned in confusion. Her liege drew the rags of her composure about her yet the recovery was fragile. Her silver head nodded in acquiescence.
"So be it!" Galaxia announced and her power rose in a surge and engulfed them.
Between one moment and the next Venus found herself deposited with her sister Senshi on the Moon's surface. Disorientated, she stumbled but quickly regained her equilibrium and straightened to examine her surroundings. It took less than a second to identify her surroundings. It was, after all, where her nightmare had begun a millennium before. Slowly she turned to face what she knew in her bones would be there.
The prayer pillar rose from the ground with covered by the debris that had encased it during the Reckoning. And below it, his sinister, dark eyes watching them with black pleasure, the shadowed form of their nemesis crouched. The three Starlight Senshi flanked him and even though the presence of Chaos was blatant in his carriage, Venus would never think of him as other than Endymion.
His armour was gone without a trace and leaving him in only the simple, pitch guard uniform that had been under it. The sleeves were rolled up to his elbows and the blood that glistened there contrasted sharply against his pale skin. The same blood that covered the ground at his feet and that dripped from a lonely crystal sword that was struck in the stone. The blood that even now pooled beneath a form covered in a black cloth at the monster's feet.
The blood that came from her princess.
So shocked were they that none acted on the fury that grew within them. For an ominous moment silence reigned as Venus and her fellows absorbed the scene. Their Greater Kindred looked on impassively yet Venus did not even acknowledge their presence. She fought to remember that her hatred would destroy her rather than the object of the emotion yet it was a losing battle. Her inner war was abandoned at the sound of a body falling. Serenity knelt on her hands and knees, her eyes transfixed by the unmoving form wrapped in what must have been the prince's black cloak.
"How?" the normally melodic voice was hoarse with pain as it addressed the golden Senshi who had summoned them. "How could you allow this Galaxia?! She was your sister!"
The being that was both Chaos and Endymion did not allow the Warrior to answer. "Don't blame her Serenity. She had no more choice than the rest of us in this. We simply played out the course that you had chosen."
With an oath, Uranus lunged through the group of Soldiers and towards the man, Venus acted a fraction of a second after her only to find herself pulled to a halt be a thin hand. Venus looked at her captor to find Galaxia shaking her head.
"We must not provoke him, his only equal lies at his feet, leaving us inadequate to the task. For the sake of everything living, we cannot interfere now."
"We can't just leave her to stand up to him alone!" Venus hissed back, furious. Not far from her she saw the Starhealer and Starmaker restraining Uranus while Starfighter gave her own whispered commands to the other, unhappy Senshi.
Galaxia did not relent. "That it is what it means to be of the Greater Kindred," she murmured, "Serenity knows this and whether she also understands that in this time and place she must live it, does not matter. She owes a debt to her daughter and this is her payment." Venus frowned but surrendered.
Ignoring the dissention between the Senshi, Endymion leaned forward, across the shrouded form of their fallen princess and snarled with a fury that took Venus' breath away, so passionate was he. "You made me, foolish woman, your actions set me on this path and now you've got to live with it. You have lost her… then again," he sneered with pure scorn. "You never had her did you? For all that the almighty Ginzuishou entrusted you with her, you gave her away. You self-righteous bitch, you've lost and I've won!"
"You believe this to be a victory?" Serenity asked incredulously. Finally she looked up and all could see the crystal tears that poured down her pale cheeks.
"Oh yes," he breathed in exultant triumph. A soft sigh that came from nowhere and, while silver eyes widened, his dark eyes became startling indigo. With care, he moved slightly and gently unravelled the cloak from the princess' still body. Even when it was completely untangled from the naked and bloodied form of Serenity's daughter, the monster still held it as if it were fragile.
He looked over the assembled women, Senshi of a kind all, and smiled grimly. The cloak fell from his hands to reveal what had been protectively nestled within. "The victory goes to me Moon queen. 'Tis my daughter who will rule after you and 'tis her hand that will be upon the Ginzuishou." Exposed to the hostile and barren environment, protected only by her sire's power, the newborn whimpered and in answer her mother sighed a second time. Venus blinked and with baited breath looked at the abused body more closely. There, almost imperceptible yet growing stronger by the second, were signs of life.
Cosmos lived!
Tearing her eyes away from her unconscious princess she glared at the monster. He smiled, satisfied with the pain that he had provoked by his deception. He motioned peremptorily for the queen to come to him and when she did not power that was an alloy of Endymion and Chaos and yet more than both roused like quicksilver and coerced the queen to her feet. Silver limned her briefly as the Silver Crystal entered the battle of wills but it died almost as quickly as it came, leaving the queen at her foe's mercy.
"Your lover is wiser than you are Serenity," Endymion jeered when she stood before him. "But then," he added, "We have already discussed just how much the fool you are have we not?" She flinched yet instead of heaping more verbal abuse upon her, Venus was surprised to see him carefully pass the sleeping babe to her.
"Her name is Chiba Usagi and into your care I give her. Do yo accept?"
The queen nodded dumbly.
"Witnessed," Starfighter proclaimed clearly and Venus nodded in hasty confirmation, followed quickly by the rest of the Moon Kingdom's circle of Senshi.
Galaxia voice seethed with satisfaction, "Witnessed and may she bring joy to your realm."
"I am sure she will." Serenity cradled her like the precious treasure she was, the child's sire forgotten the moment she was placed in her grandmother's arms. Or perhaps not… whether it was in concern for the child in an airless environment or from fear that she would be taken back, as soon as the young Usagi was secured Serenity vanished. One by one her Senshi bowed hurried farewells and leaving the prince's oppressive presence until only Venus and the Greater Kindred remained, thus the confrontation ending anticlimactically.
Venus looked at Endymion strangely. Such a generous act was beyond him. The weight of her gaze caused him to turn in her direction before he dismissed her as unimportant and knelt next to his lover once more. Galaxia squeezed her arm in a warning that Venus did not need.
"Why?" she asked simply.
Galaxia smiled sadly. "Even he is not so cruel as to inflict a child with a father such as himself."
"It is enough that he possesses her mother," Starfighter added quietly as she and her fellow Starlights came up behind them. Without a word Galaxia nodded at Venus and released her before going with the Starlights to their fallen friend's side. The awesome strength that was Endymion-Chaos wove an intricate net and infused strength into his sleeping mate.
"Mamo-chan?" It was a sleepy whisper that dashed whatever remaining hopes Venus might have had about convincing her princess to shun the Terran prince.
"Usako." His reply was a murmur that caressed the recipient.
In that moment of vulnerability Venus, the Senshi of love, sensed the bond between the two. Until that moment she had been unable to believe that he could care for the princess but, her mind unclouded by hate or preconceptions, the emotion between the two… between… Mamoru and Cosmos was undeniable. Venus hung back from the small group, unable to join them, unwilling to leave them.
"It's done?" the weakened Senshi asked as she struggle upright.
"Aye," Galaxia agreed, "Done and witnessed."
"How do you feel Odango?" Starfighter murmured anxiously.
There was a small chuckle in the voice as she replied. "Sore. I understand why nature takes its time now, hastening a pregnancy hurts!"
"What did you expect?" Starmaker retorted, "You didn't give your body time to adjust, it's no wonder that there was so much blood!"
Cosmos grunted as Mamoru helped her to her feet. "What can I say?" She paused, winced and pressed an unsteady hand against her stomach.
"You are free, that is all that matters," Mamoru stated as Starhealer handed him his abandoned cloak and he wrapped it around his lover.
"So it is," she agreed and leaned into his embrace.
Cosmos' fellow Warriors watched the couple kiss in appreciation until Starhealer hissed to Starfighter, "How long can they keep that up for?"
Cosmos broke the kiss and leaned her head on Mamoru shoulder as she chuckled softly. "Fine," she sighed, "I can wait…"
"I don't think I can," Mamoru interjected, surprising Venus by revealing the promise of a sense of humour.
Cosmos merely kissed him softly once more and then pushed herself away from him. "Make yourself useful instead and get my staff!"
"As my lady commands."
Leaving her to the care of the Starlights he strode up the remaining steps to the Prayer Pillar and, without a qualm, reached into the substance of the marble monument and withdrew a winged staff. He was about to return to the small group on the platform when a thought struck him. With a smooth movement his free hand seemed to draw the obsidian blade of Chaos from nothingness and implanted it before the pillar in the same place that his lover's crystal sword had waited for a millennium.
Deliberately he looked over to her and Venus was not surprised to realise that he had not forgotten her presence. "This is for Chibi-Usa and her alone. Anyone else who tries to draw it… well what happened to me when I wielded Usako's blade will be nothing in comparison. Spread the warning Venus."
"I will," she agreed quietly, aware of the eyes of five Celestial Warriors focusing on her. "And, now that she has no more need for it, you will take Serenity's crystal sword I presume."
"It was created for her protection and that is what I intend to see that it does."
"I think that's what it wants too, otherwise why else would it have allowed you to mark it all those years ago?"
"Perhaps…" He raised an eyebrow at her. "Are you being civil to me Mina-chan?"
"Don't get your hopes up Chiba-san."
"Ah."
Venus touched the scar on her cheek. "I'm just taking responsibility for my actions. It's not only because of the queen that we are where we are. This moment is due to the consequences of our own choices as well as hers. I never gave you a chance Mamoru but I don't think it would have made a difference if I had however…" she paused and turned to Cosmos. "I also never gave you a chance princess, not really and I'm so very sorry for that." She smiled painfully. "I know that there is nothing that I can do to make up for the pain I caused you but for what it's worth I was wrong and I apologise."
Cosmos nodded with a wistful smile. "I understand and I wish we could have been friends Venus."
"So do I Serenity. So do I."
Cosmos sighed and then shrugged the cloak of her shoulders. Before the heavy black cloth hit the ground a slender hand scooped it up and a single shake rid it of the filth that coated it. The Senshi of life straightened, her clean, pale skin softly glowing, while the dust and blood that had coated her vanished as if it had never been. The black cloak she held clashed with the folds of the golden swathes of material that draped about her. Her silver hair spilled in from two heart-shaped buns and the crescent on her brow bloomed into an eight-pointed star. Sapphire eyes bid her a wordless goodbye and Cosmos turned her back on the past.
Mamoru moved to her side and she reached around to pin his own cloak in place before taking back her winged staff. He gestured and the crystal sword flew to his hand as if going home. Blue clashed with blue and their cloaks billowed around them despite the stillness. Their forms wavered and the cloaks dissolved into a storm of feathers and without a backwards glance they launched themselves with heave of their powerful wings.
Venus watched after them, the angel of purity and her dark mate, as they shrank in the distance.
"We need to go if we don't want to lose them," Starhealer interrupted her reverie, "Farewell Venus."
Venus turned the four remaining. "You're going with them? Not back to Kinmoku?"
"I think we all agree on that," Starmaker agreed.
Starfighter smiled wryly at Galaxia. "You and the Odango are going to need all the help you can get to keep that one out of trouble. So if you don't mind…?"
"Be my guest," the golden Senshi answered with a smile. "I think you might be correct. Aside from that of course is that they are going to be wretched company until…"
Seeing the elder Senshi grope for words Venus snorted. "Until they get past the honeymoon stage?"
"Exactly," Galaxia sighed. "Ah well, we must be leaving. Fare thee well Sister."
"Farewell Galaxia."
"Ditto for us Mina-chan," Starhealer told her and her sister Starlights nodded, Starfighter's slightly cool manner thawing somewhat. Then, without waiting for her reply, magic roared and where they had stood four stars shot through the sky towards the stars.
"Good-bye," Venus whispered and she too disappeared, leaving the grey landscape unbroken bar a single strip of darkest black where another blade awaited the moon princess that would wield it.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
And so they left, never to be seen on the White Moon again. Of us all only Pluto and Saturn met them again, first when the group entered Limbo to seal the Gates of Time and the Gates of Death. It was at that time that the fragile friendship between my daughter and Pluto blossomed and the tenuous understanding Saturn possessed of Endymion strengthened. In times of need since then it is those two of all my Senshi that are the ones that are summoned to render assistance.
Yet at that time, they, like the rest of us moved on as best we could. The inner Senshi recovered fully from their torture, a testament to the strength of the four. Pluto dealt with the consequence of perceiving a mutable future while both she and Saturn attempted to adjust to freedom. Uranus and Neptune remained for the most part unchanged, however, the presence of Cosmos will not leave anyone the same. I believe that it was my granddaughter more than anything that saved us all. Her father left Chaos in his wake as a matter of course before he merged with the fundamental essence of entropy and her mother's absence left a hollow in my people that would never be filled.
My daughter was… is a part of us and that cannot be denied, particularly when the truth of her parentage began to spread. Still she is Cosmos and her duties could not be denied thus the void remains unfilled. It was a new world, one in which there was no certainty. A very fearsome thing. I believe events would have taken an ill turn after that if it had not been for one thing.
The constant that Fate and Destiny had brought about.
The one immutable that could never be changed.
No matter what choice had been made in the past and would be made in the future they would be eternal. Endymion and Serenity, Chaos and Cosmos or Mamoru and Usagi, they would remain locked together in an eternal cycle of love that would never be possible to break. And my Chibi-Usa is a physical symbol of that love for my people.
Many times have I questioned my actions throughout that time. I have asked what if? Should I? Might it? We have the freedom to choose our own destiny now, for the workings of Fate and her sister are so distant as to be unfelt. The future is now a wealth of possibilities yet for me it is unalterably fixed. I credited this world we live in to a choice Riath made but maybe I am lying to myself. Maybe I could have said no, even after her choice, but it would have amounted to nothing. For all of the decisions I made, world shattering as they proved to be and the pain both I and others suffered as result everything is different but nothing has changed.
Endymion has my daughter and he will always have her.
It is the truth.
It is immutable.
And so shall it be.