Taboo

Time has no beginning, middle, or end. It is as infinite as the universe itself. Always flowing, always expanding… Human minds cannot even begin to comprehend the true meaning of the word "infinity". Even I, the guardian of time and space, would be hard-pressed to find the words to describe it.

Eternal? Never-ending? Forever?

No, those aren't quite right.

Lonely -- that's the word I would use. Like the others, it has its strengths and weaknesses, but I think "lonely" comes closest to describing the feeling of "infinity", if not its exact measurement. That can be shown by the seemingly simplistic figure-eight symbol used in mathematics -- a rather brilliant model of infinity, if I do say so myself.

But to understand infinity, one must first understand loneliness.

Imagine it. I dare you. I dare you to imagine loneliness -- and not that artificial state of being alone you call loneliness, but the "true" loneliness. One can be alone, and not be lonely, as I am sure you are well aware. No, true loneliness is much deeper than that. I should know.

Oh, how I know…

Can you feel it? No, I imagine you can't. You are too loved to ever feel true loneliness. I know you might have felt what you thought was loneliness, especially during your younger years, but at least you had her, your soul mate, to comfort you. Yes, that's right. You probably didn't know it at the time, but she was always with you, always in your heart. That's the way soul mates are. You were never truly lonely.

Only alone.

As for me, I knew what true loneliness was. Guarding the Gates of Time was a solitary job. Nobody ever visited me, nobody ever loved me… Loneliness was the only emotion I knew.

Yet, I didn't really mind. After all, I had no idea what I was missing. How could one possibly miss something they never even had? My feelings were perfectly normal, as far as I knew. I thought it was the way everybody felt. Love, happiness, joy… They were foreign terms to me. I vaguely knew what they meant, but I didn't truly understand them. All I knew was my duty and my loneliness, and I was fine with that.

I still remember the day Queen Serenity assigned me to my post. It's funny how I don't remember anything before that, though. I suppose it was a blessing in disguise. If I had kept my memories -- memories of friends, lovers, and family I would never see again -- I doubt I would have been able to keep my sanity for long… In any case, I digress.

It happened on the night of a huge ball held in honor of the founding of Silver Millennium. All the royal families of the planets were there, including yours, invited despite the fact that the Golden Kingdom had refused to join with the rest of the solar planets under Queen Serenity's rule. I remember seeing you briefly that night, although I know you don't remember me. You were only a chubby four-year-old at the time, concerned only with stuffing your face with rich chocolate and playing tag with your handsome guardians. I, on the other hand, appeared to be around the age of nine or ten, although in reality, we were born only a few months apart. Apparently, Plutonians grew at an accelerated speeds, or at least that's what they said when I asked about it.

It was because of that reason I was chosen to become the guardian of the gates. None of the other Sailor Senshi were old enough to handle the job at the time. Saturn hadn't awakened, Uranus and Neptune were only toddlers, and the yet-to-be-born Princess Serenity's guardians were still babies themselves. I was the only logical choice.

Was it luck? Or a curse?

I never did decide.

Pulling me away from the celebration, the queen lead me to her private throne room and informed me of her decision. I was to become Sailor Pluto, soldier of the underworld and guardian of time and space. The queen didn't give me much of a choice in the matter -- none at all, actually -- but I was honored to be chosen for such an important duty and readily accepted my destiny.

After I transformed, Queen Serenity told me of the three laws of time. The first was never to allow time travel. The ability to travel to different eras was to remain secret, known only by me and the queen herself. The second was never to leave my post. I needed to guard the door, protecting the sacred time warp from unwelcome invaders. And the third, and greatest taboo of all, was never to stop time. To do so, I would pay the ultimate price - my life.

And so I lived my life according to those laws, the perfect, solitary guardian of time. I never even thought of breaking them; the thought never crossed my mind. After all, what use would I have to play with something as important as time itself? In retrospect, I assume that is one of the reasons why the Gates of Time were cut off from the rest of the world. Without temptation, there was less of a chance of me doing something to seriously jeopardize the time flow. It was a smart move on the queen's part.

But temptation did arrive eventually, in the form of an adorable little girl with cotton candy hair who had found the entrance to my realm. She was as lonely as I was, an outcast princess with no power, and we bonded instantly. There was a connection between us -- one much stronger than simply a soldier's love for her princess. Small Lady was my only true friend, the only person who reached out to me and understood me. With her around, I finally understood what it meant to be human.

I loved her so much.

Almost as much as I loved you.

Yes, you, the handsome king who arrived a short time later looking for his daughter. I had often watched over you, as well as the others, in the time stream over the years, and felt somewhat of a kinship with you, due to your tragic past, but it was nothing compared to seeing you in the flesh. Maybe it was long dormant hormones, or perhaps it was something deeper, but I fell in love with you right then and there.

It was silly of me, I know. I cannot tell you how many times I tried to deny my feelings for you. You were married to your soul mate, our beautiful queen, and I wouldn't dare try to destroy your happiness. A love between us could never be.

Yet, I admit, I indulged in fantasies. When one stood at the Gates of Time with nothing but the ever present mist of the time warp as entertainment, one's mind did tend to wander. I liked to imagine what it would be like if Small Lady was my daughter and you, my husband. It was my fondest dream, but also my greatest torture.

Do you know how difficult it was for me? To love somebody who belonged to another? To watch over you from afar, knowing my secret dream would never come true?

The guilt was unbearable. I knew it was wrong to love you, yet I did. How could I not? You were the most handsome man I ever laid eyes on, an aura of nobility and kindness surrounding you like the light that surrounds our queen. It was no wonder she fell in love with you. I could hardly blame her, not when I was guilty of the same crime myself. She would have been blind not to see your beauty, both inside and out.

I suppose I should have been jealous of her, the queen of your heart, but I wasn't. Not really. It's difficult to muster hard feelings toward someone with such a loving and forgiving heart. Much like how I could see how she could fall in love with you, I see why you fell in love with her.

You two were soul mates, two pieces of the same puzzle. I knew I could never compete with that.

And so that was why I did it -- for you, Small Lady, and the queen.

Perhaps I'm confusing you. I admit I'm rather confused myself. I mean, isn't love supposed to be selfish? Shouldn't I have been happy when the Black Moon family attacked Crystal Tokyo, causing your beautiful queen to be encased in a coffin of crystal? It was the perfect situation. I could have done nothing and become your new queen. That was the future I saw had the queen never awoken from her sleep. My dream would have come true. We would have been the family I had always wanted -- you, me, and the little girl I already considered my daughter in heart.

Yet, instead of doing nothing, I allowed Small Lady to steal one of my keys and go to the past, hoping she could find some way to save her mother, despite the fact I knew the chance of that was next to nothing. Of course, I scolded her when she returned to the Gates of Time with Sailor Moon, Venus, and Tuxedo Kamen in tow, but secretly I was proud of her. She was willing to go through so much trouble to save her mother, and I had a feeling if you hadn't also been injured in the attack, you would have done the same thing, laws of time be damned. That was how much you both loved her.

That was when I realized what I had to do. No matter the cost to me or the time stream, I would protect you all, the three people I loved most in the world, because you belonged together. Without her, you would both be lonely. I never wanted you to feel that pain.

And so, I broke them. Systematically, I broke all three taboos, knowing the price of such a crime, but willing to pay that price, as long as you were happy. I wish I could say I was doing it to save the world or something noble like that, but honestly, in my heart, all I cared about was you, Small Lady, and the queen.

I did it all for you.

Now the air is still, and I can feel my body slowly being overcome with rigor mortis. Time has stopped, if only for a moment, but for me, it will last forever.

I want to remember this moment for eternity…

Endymion, you scolded me for breaking the three biggest taboos and therefore sacrificing my life in the process, but that isn't true. What I did was minor compared to my biggest sin, the secret I've kept for so long.

The biggest taboo was not stopping the flow of time.

The biggest taboo was loving you.

Aishiteru, Endymion…

DISCLAIMER: Sailor Moon is the property of Takeuchi Naoko.

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Boy, I didn't think I would ever get this story posted. I first got the idea for this fic about two years ago, but I was never satified with any of the drafts I wrote. This is actually either the second or third draft of Taboo, and even though I am not entirely pleased with it, I believe this one was the best version of the bunch. I hope you enjoyed it.