Hotaru had not eaten much that night. She was worried, scared, and bewildered. In return, her parents were not only worried about their future but about Hotaru as well. She was already weaker than most children, a price she paid for her power to heal. But something else worried them as well. Since the Sacred Mirror had cracked, she had not taken her hand from her transformation wand.
“Hime-chan,” Haruka finally said.
“You need to calm down.”
Mirchiru reached over and gently
pried the girl’s fingers from her hensin pen. She sighed.
“Hotaru, you’re leaving the imprint
of Saturn in your palm.”
The girl shrugged and leaned against
the table, hands on her forehead. Her eyes saw horrific things. She said
softly,
“Oh Kami-sama, these things prey on
me like lions. Though I have this power within my blood please let me never
need to use it…”
Hotaru
stood on a planet’s surface that was black and seemly void of life. The only
feature she could see was a single pyramid, solid black. A tall figure stood by
the entrance as if guarding it. He was male and undead. The color of his skin
was a light blue. Engraved in the center of his torso, almost like a tattoo was
a red mark with two black serpents intertwined.
“Welcome,
little one,” he greeted her. She glared at him. He continued, “First the
Thundercats invaded my world and then your Sailor Senshi.”
“Where
are they?” she asked simply. He laughed.
“Don’t
you mean, little firefly: Where’s Haruka-papa? Where’s Mirchiru-mama? And oh
yes…where’s Setsuna-mama?!”
Saturn
glared and tried not to charge. She clutched her hands into fists and had her
gloves not been covering her fingers, the knuckles of her hands would have
turned pure white. The deep violet of her eyes burned in her face and she
looked around.
People
were unconscious but she could see the evil that was threatening to invade them
all. She had prayed against this but she now saw no other way out. She could
not allow this evil to leave this planet. And there was one way alone to
prevent that. A way that she alone had the power to follow-thru with. She felt
her eyes cloud with tears and she fought to keep them in. Very slowly, she
opened her hand a bit. Closing her eyes, the tears left her tear glands and
made twin tracks down her cheeks. She whispered two simple words that carried
the cold breeze of death.
“Silence
Glaive…
Haruka lifted Hotaru from her chair and cradled her in her hands. Mirchiru gently took the child’s hensin wand and tucked it into her belt.
“Haruka?”
“Yeah?”
“Will she be alright?”
“I think so, Mirchiru.”
“Are you sure?”
“No one’s sure but I think so. She probably needs some sleep. Just something to get her mind off of the Sacred Mirror.”
Mirchiru nodded. The two adults carried their little one up to her room and gently placed her on a bed. Haruka sat by the girl while Mirchiru put the child’s wand into the hidden drawer on her dresser that her ‘Haruka-papa’ had carved and decorated for her.
As the adults left, Haruka turned off the light. At the darkness, the senshi of silence shuddered as her nightmare turned as dark as the air around her…
The
mummy backed up. Although he did not outwardly admit fear, he had seen that
blade before and he could barely whisper its famous nickname,
“The
scythe of the Goddess of Death.”
“Yes,
Mummy,” Saturn raised it above her head and said softly,
“I was
afraid it would come down to this but I see now that there is no other way out.
By ending this world, I will stop the spread of your evil. And so…in the name
of Saturn, the Planet of Death, I will release the ultimate power of
destruction.”
Instead
of cowering as most would, this being laughed.
“Don’t
mock, Mumm-ra, little one. I know as well as you do that the power of
destruction is a doubled edged saber. If you release it, you shall die as
well.”
“There
is no other way.”
“What?!”
“I
will not allow you to make my family and Princess suffer. The Thundercats are
not only my allies but also my friends. Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, Mars, Venus,
Mercury, and Jupiter are not just fellow senshi but family. I will not let you
torment them as you wish.”
“You
don’t have the nerve, violet firefly.”
“Haruka-papa,
Mirchiru-mama, Setsuna-mama, Rei-san, Ami-san, Minako-san, Mako-san, Mamo-san,
Usagi-san, Lion-o-san, Tygra-san, Cheetara-san, Panthro-san, Lynx-o-san,
Bengali-san, Pumyra-san, Snarf and Snarfer-san, and…WilyKit-chan,
WilyKat-chan…I hope you get away. I hope you realize that I love you dearly.
Never forget that.”
She
looked to Mumm-ra. Lifting her blade, she said gently in an almost silent
voice,
“Death,”
Mumm-ra
gasped. She couldn’t, he thought. She can’t!
“Reborn,”
“You
fool!” he screamed. “Are you going to give up your life for those imbeciles?!”
“REVOLUTION!”
Immediately
following she slammed her blade down. Black clouds covered the sky and then
suddenly, huge ribbons of night black shot down, splitting the ground on
contact. She looked up as the ribbons began to tear the life of the planet
apart. It would end. She saw her parents then. And for a brief second she heard
them.
“Hime-chan…”
“Sayonara.”
And
with that, she ducked her head, felt a final rumble and then seen from the
farthest distance of the universe, the planet exploded into a pile of dust and
rumble, leaving behind no sign there had ever been a planet…
“NO!”
Hands grasped Hotaru’s shoulders and shook her. She screamed again but then heard that familiar, almost masculine voice…
“Hime-chan! Wake up!”
Hotaru’s eyes flew open. Haruka was on the edge of her bed, shaking her desperately. She clutched her, shrieking,
“Haruka-papa!”
The older girl clutched her ‘daughter’ as she shook. Hotaru wondered, despite her fear, where or when that was. Those names seemed familiar and yet alien. She looked up at her parent. Haruka looked at her. Tears trailed from the child’s cheeks and she said,
“The inner senshi, Haruka-papa. They need to know. I doubted it before but I know now. The darkness is coming and we need to stop it, no matter the cost.”
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