Subject: [FFML] [FFML][Fanfic][SM] Forgotten, 2 of 3
From: "John Lauder" <jlauder121@hotmail.com>
Date: 7/6/2000, 5:48 AM
To: ffml@fanfic.com

Forgotten
by
John Lauder (part 2 of 3)

Comments to:  jlauder121@hotmail.com  or
saturn9@mindspring.com

Thanks,
John

---

The sound of his stomach growling snapped Souichi out of the semi-trance
he had been in.  He looked at the clock, and, like a lot of other web
surfers, thought, *Where the hell did the time go?*

Almost five hours had passed since he had hit the Enter key on his
"Sailor Senshi" web search.  When he got up, he paid the price for
sitting down for too long as the feeling came back into his posterior.

Souichi groaned as the needles assaulted him.  He went to the kitchen
and made himself something to eat.  His stomach was rumbling fairly
loud, so he opted for one of the instant meals.

He sighed as he found himself missing having a maid around.  One of the
first things he had done after he was released from the hospital was hire
a temporary housekeeper.  Having broken bones didn't exactly make raising
a child or keeping up with a huge house easy.

Mariko had been a godsend, and he hated having to let her go.  It was
only a few weeks after he had hired Mariko when he had fully recovered
from his injuries, at least physically.  He had wanted to be totally
involved in Hotaru's life, not push her away to someone else.  She had
been completely understanding about it.

He started to review everything he had found as he began eating.  Most
of the articles reported that the Sailor Senshi had first appeared around
four years ago.  As he reviewed the stories and the dates, he found that
they seemed to follow a pattern.

There would be a series of attacks, usually on an individual, by some
monster, which had been identified as several different terms--daimon,
legume, youma, cardian, droid, according to whatever the eyewitnesses or
victims heard.  The Sailor Senshi would intercede and save them, and the
leader, Sailor Moon, would vanquish this monster.

This would happen numerous times, until some unexplainable catastrophic
event would occur, threatening the lives of everyone.  Then magically,
the Sailor Senshi would intervene, and set things peaceful again.  There
were exceptions, where things would happen with very little notice, as
was the strange case of those snow women.  But for the most part, it
followed the pattern.

It couldn't be officially confirmed, he knew, but one of these
catastrophes involving the Sailor Senshi, he had guessed, was the
destruction of Mugen Gauken.  All he was going by was one of the two
articles about Mugen he had read, which only mentioned that the Senshi
had been allegedly seen near Mugen when the explosions happened.

That, and he had done a bit of speculation with the dates.  The three
events he had found with the most frequency and magnitude were:  the
situation that occurred three years ago, in which worldwide natural
disasters were happening, and the city suddenly went dark;  the black
alien crystal structure appearing;  and when the city was engulfed in
spider webs.

Again, he was only guessing, but if each major catastrophe was separated
roughly by a year, then that would make the Mugen Gauken disaster one of
them.

It was starting to happen again.  He began to wonder about the past,
specifically what truly happened that day at Mugen.  The more he would
think  about it, the more angry and violated he would feel.  Whatever
happened there had robbed him of his life, and now it had taken his
daughter away from him as well.  *Don't start doing this to yourself
again,* he thought.  He calmed himself down by taking a few deep breaths.

Had this been a few months ago, this would have been horrible anxiety
attack.  One thing that had been drilled into his head after the
explosion was the vast amount of destruction.  The police had told him
repeatedly he was very lucky to have survived, and very lucky no one else
had been injured, especially in the surrounding buildings, some of which
suffered minor damage.  And how he was very, very lucky there were no
students in the building.  So, feelings of guilt about the damage, piled
on top of memory loss, piled on top of injuries to recover from and a
baby to care for...it was too much to bear.

It made him all the more determined to find Hotaru.  When he finished
eating, he went back to the computer to try to find anything possibly
linking the Sailor Senshi to him, or his daughter.  Or a green-haired
woman.  It would take a long time to get through even half of it, but
he would get through it.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

"How horrible," a woman said.

"Yes," Ryo Urawa agreed.  A few days had passed, and the visions of Souichi
Tomoe were getting increasingly intense, to the point where he had felt
physical pain a couple times.

"I really would like to help," she continued, "but if there's going to
be danger, I can't leave my sisters here."

"They'll be safe as long as they are inside."

She wasn't at all suspicious of the boy.  At least, not anymore.  Like
with Naru, he had described in detail an experience she had with the
Sailor Senshi.  An experience involving a dark stick and an
interdimensional hole that had turned her life around.  *But still...*
"We don't even know this man..."

Urawa tried to think of a response, and then knew what would work.  "The
Sailor Senshi didn't really know you either.  But they gave you a chance,
and saved you."  He was about to mention about how the Senshi gave the
same chance to a certain dark blue-haired love of hers, but prudently
decided against it.

The woman looked at him, defeated.  "You're right.  But if anything
happens to my sisters..."  Her expression changed from defeated to quite
menacing.

"As long as they stay away from reflective surfaces," he repeated,
"they'll be fine."

"Fine, then.  So where should we meet?"  Petz Ayakashi asked.

"The streets will be jammed with traffic, so we'll have to walk.  I will
go to Naru first, and then we'll come here, and then go to the Tomoe
house."

She looked concerned, but then she thought about that loving girl's
kindness, and the way it spread to everyone she came into contact with.
She couldn't let that kind of goodness be destroyed.  She nodded, and
they said their good-byes as he left the cosmetics shop.

He felt relieved, if only a little.  The preparations were complete, but
the execution was a different matter completely.  Already he could see
the signs of what was to come.  Several people had that blank stare, and
more than once he had seen an eye flash with a golden light.
Including Petz's youngest sister.

Urawa sighed, knowing he should have told Petz about Cooan.  At least Petz
had not been affected, and knew what to avoid.

A slight pain bore into his head as another vision assaulted him.
"Damn!" he cursed, rubbing his temples.  He saw a little girl embracing
Tomoe.  It was only a minor one this time, and he was relieved.

"His daughter," he muttered.  The story had been played out inside his mind
repeatedly for the last few days.  The loss, the struggle, the loneliness.

Once again, Urawa was getting apprehensive.  Maybe it was wrong to interfere
like this.  Who was he to just to play God with this man's life?

Or was Urawa himself just a puppet being used in all of this?  Maybe it was
wrong that he didn't interfere enough.  Maybe he should just run to Tomoe
now and hold him prisoner in that house, so he doesn't discover those
horrible things.

Maybe.

Despite whatever happened to Tomoe, Urawa had to go down to the place Tomoe
would become trapped in, no matter what.  The evidence about the Senshi
in there would have to be eliminated.  Of that he had not felt the least
bit indecisive.

After some more contemplation, Urawa decided to continue what he had
started.  Tomoe-san would suffer, yes, but in the end he will have
something he's searched and struggled for.  The smile on the man's face,
after knowing so much loss, so much pain, would be worth it.  Urawa
wouldn't be there to see it, but just knowing he created it made all this
seem not as bad.

This ability Urawa had was a huge burden to him most of the time, but
on occasion, it felt like a gift.  All he had to do now was make it
happen that way now...

===================================================================

That night, Souichi Tomoe still had no inkling of where his daughter was.
Things had become fairly quiet, and no further (known) incidents involving
the senshi had occurred (he had considered the news story about
girls losing energy to be of no consequence).

He had exhausted himself in the last few days, wandering aimlessly about
the city, looking for his daughter.  Or a green-haired woman, or the Sailor
Senshi.  He felt relieved that nothing had happened yet, but at the same
time he was distraught.  Souichi had quickly grown tired of the not knowing,
and having leg cramps and foot blisters did nothing to help.  He had
hardly ate or slept, either.

Yet he was not willing to return home until this was resolved.  Things had
been stirred up inside him again as he studied these Sailor Senshi.  He
felt as if he was very close to a revelation about his past.  Souichi
hoped it wouldn't end in a crashing disappointment yet again.

But now it was time to sleep, and as he had done almost every other
night, Souichi stared into a picture of his wife.  Hotaru's mother.  His
dead wife and Hotaru's dead mother that he didn't remember.  *Why was
there only this one picture of her, a portrait of her by herself, and
none with me?  Was I that unsentimental back then?*  Souichi grit his
teeth, fighting back the tears again.

Even after he moved from this house, he had always kept the picture of
his lost wife by his bedside, hoping it would bring about some memories,
but it didn't.  He couldn't remember anything about her--their courtship,
their wedding, her giving birth to their daughter.  Not a single embrace,
smile, kiss, tear--just nothing.   The dream he had the previous night
was the only thing he remembered of her.

The people at the hospital had not given him any information as to the
cause of Keiko's death.  He was too busy looking after Hotaru to pursue
the matter.  Since Hotaru was so young, he concluded that his wife had
died in childbirth.

Unable to help it, his mind conjured an image of his wife lying in a
hospital bed, the sheets heavily stained with her blood, her eyes still
half open.  Souichi shuddered at his masochistic imagination.

He put the picture down, and thought about all that he had read about the
Sailor Senshi in the last few days.  They certainly had become a huge
phenomenon.  The news stories had led him to a plethora of web sites
about the senshi.  They had a huge, huge fan following.  Hundreds of
sites were dedicated to them.  Although some of it got repetitive, he had
to admire their enthusiasm.  It took a while, but he had found a few
sites with a lot of useful information in the form of pictures.

The same pictures of the Senshi dominated most of the fan sites, which were
usually copies from the stories in newspapers or magazines.  He
immediately copied as many as he could, and found that he recognized two
of the nine senshi.

Sailor Chibi-moon had been the one he had seen recently, speaking from
inside the moon.  Around that time Hotaru had been gotten noticeably
upset, crying more than usual.

But Sailor Pluto--she was the one who took Hotaru.  It had taken a few
minutes of staring at the one picture of her he found, and trying to
remember what that woman looked like.

It was the same hairstyle, and the same hair color, there was no mistake
about that.  There was something different about her, a few subtle
differences, but the hair and the basic features were essentially the
same.  Unfortunately, there was hardly any information known about her,
since she rarely appeared.

There was really nothing too personal known about any of them--Sailor
Moon was the clumsy but compassionate leader, Sailor Neptune the elegant
one with the powerful water attack, Sailor Mercury the "smart one".
Unfortunately for him, he needed to know their true identities, which no
one else seemed to know.

Souichi could only take a limited amount of comfort in all the adoration
and gratitude they received.  His daughter was now in the company of
these girls who swore to protect the planet from invaders.  But at the
same time, he couldn't help but think that these same invaders would go
straight after the senshi first.  And straight to Hotaru.

As he turned the light off, another disturbed thought came to him.
There had been no mention of a Sailor Saturn, yet there seemed to be a
senshi for every other planet in the system.  And the fact that Hotaru
had been taken...

He had refused to even think about the matter any further; there was no
way Hotaru could be a senshi.

*She's too young.  What, is she going to crawl around with the sailor
outfit and short skirt over her diaper, fighting evil?  No.  Absolutely
not.*

*But what if--what IF--*

He shook his head.  "No."

Souichi fell asleep. An hour passed.

Again the apparition of Neherenia appeared.  She floated over to his side,
looking at the picture of his wife, the earthly mother of the one called
Sailor Saturn.

There was little time for this.  Soon they would try to come after her
to rescue their weak prince and princess.  Whether they succeeded or not,
she was determined to do plenty of damage to exact her revenge.  She
touched his forehead, and this time she would be a little more direct.
She would not show him the truth...only lead him to it, so he would
discover it for himself.

"What agony you will soon face, Souichi Tomoe."  She laughed, and it was
not a mere chuckle this time, but a hearty guffaw that Professor Tomoe
once might have made.

She disappeared, and Souichi began to dream again.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

...a lonely little girl, with dark hair...just like Keiko...*who is
she?*...*could it be...*...

...an explosion...

...*Hotaru!!!  No!!!!!!!!*...a futile scream...

...*I can save your daughter's life.*...

...a loss of control...*someone is controlling my body*...

...a hidden bunker...inside the house...

Souichi came awake, pulse racing wildly.  He took a moment to catch his
breath, and then immediately reached for the pad and pencil he kept by
the bed, next to Keiko's picture.  Frantically, he scribbled down
everything he could remember from the dream.

It had been neither more vivid nor disturbing than any of his other
dreams, but the content this time had been very different.  Usually in
the more intense dreams he was in the hospital, or trapped inside a
building, and Hotaru was usually still a baby.

She looked so sad in the dream.  He thought it was a premonition of
things to come, having no idea it was a remnant of the past.

The last part about the hidden bunker he remembered the most.  He could
still see someone that looked like him, but wasn't him, pressing a button
on a wall near what used to be the nursery.  This led to a very dimly lit
room that appeared to be a laboratory of some sort.

He stretched for a few seconds, got dressed, and then, uncertainly, he
decided to go see if this hidden room did indeed exist.  He wouldn't be
surprised if it had;  he had the impression that his work had been an
obsession in the past.  He might need to use it, in the future, should
he decide to start working again.

The end of that hall past Hotaru's old room looked as normal as any other
part of the house.  The wall was dominated by a landscape painting.  He
looked under the painting, and sure enough found a small button near the
left edge after feeling around a little bit.  He pressed it.

He expected the wall to move to the side, or something like that, but
what happened was a complete surprise (the first of many for Souichi).
The wall, including the picture, simply disappeared, and the hallway
continued for a short distance, ending in a door.

His brow furrowed, now more curious than surprised.  He reached forward
and felt around where the door had been, making certain what he had just
seen was real.  Carefully, he made his way to the door, and opened it.

The room was larger than he expected, and had very little lighting.  He
stood on a walkway that overlooked what was without question a scientist's
laboratory.  *All this time, I didn't know it was here?*

He could see several long tables with an endless number of empty test
tubes strewn about.  There was strange piping that seemed to snake around
the entire room.

Beyond that, there wasn't that much equipment out in the open, besides
some beakers, centrifuges and hot plates.  Off to the sides he could see
the storage lockers, which probably contained some more equipment.

After looking around the room from the door, he felt something familiar.
It was the scientist in him, that part of himself he hadn't realized was
still there despite the accident.  All that knowledge of genetics and
physics that was inside of him, that he had abandoned.  Wanting to create
wonderful new innovations by manipulating strands of DNA, and wanting to
share this knowledge with others.  It was strange, how that knowledge was
still inside of him, yet most everything else was lost.  He had felt a
little more like Professor Tomoe again.

His curiosity now fully awakened, he eagerly made his way down to see
what the old Professor Tomoe had worked on.  Within a couple minutes he
had found something unusual.  There were no written notes lying around
anywhere, nor any written directions, procedures.  Either the old
Professor didn't want to leave any evidence around, or had an extremely
good memory of what he was working on.

Tomoe opened one of the storage lockers.  Inside there was some standard
lab equipment--goggles, white lab coats, pipettes, again no notebooks or
paper or anything like that.  In another locker there was some very
foreign equipment he couldn't recognize--a long white tube that looked
like a fluorescent light, a metallic case full of egg-shaped holes, and
a silver ring about three inches in diameter.

He picked up the ring and examined it.  A tiny inscription on it stated
it was the property of some odd-sounding company called the Death Busters.
There was a switch on it, which he turned on without thinking about the
consequences.  The ring began to vibrate.

"What the--"  He dropped the ring, and watched in awe as it floated in
the air.  After several seconds, it stretched itself into an elliptical
shape, becoming a portal large enough for a person to step through.  The
center began to give off a deathly white glow, which lit up the entire
room, and then disappeared quickly.  In its place came a strange cloud,
black on the edges, but on the inside was the image of a room that looked
similar to the one he was standing in.

Souichi stared at the portal, eyes wide with wonder.  There was likely
danger on the other side, but he just had to see where it led.  Before
he did, though, he took one of the long metallic rods (another strange
item) from the storage cabinet.  His heart was pounding as he stepped
through.

When he got to the other side, he immediately took a defensive stance,
holding the metal rod like a sword (as much as he could, since he had no
fighting skills or training).  He turned in a circle, eyes darting, to
get his bearings.

The portal slowly closed, and reduced in size until it was nothing but a
small silver ring again.  It dropped to the floor, making a noise that
seemed like a loud boom in this place that was way too quiet.  He picked
the ring up and stuck it in his pocket.

The room he stood in now was very similar to the one he just came from.
A rather dimly lit room, although this looked more like a classroom than
a laboratory.  There were several desks and a chalkboard, which was
currently erased.

Souichi walked around the desks, which were bereft of any contents.  He
cursed as he nearly tripped over a stray pen.  When he picked it up, he
found the words "Mugen Gauken" engraved on it.

"Impossible," he said.  He couldn't be in Mugen, it was completely
destroyed!  *No, it's just a pen, it doesn't mean anything...What then,
some hideout?  For who?  For what?  Am I underground?  How could any
underground structure remain intact after those explosions?*

His mind couldn't stop itself from the deluge of thoughts.  Wherever this
place was, the authorities had obviously not discovered it, since nothing
looked like it had been searched through.

At the front of the classroom was a large desk with a scattered mess of
papers on it.  The name tag on it was his own.  He sat down and began to
read.  Most of it looked to be brief reports, which used some strange
vocabulary--pure heart crystals, talismans, Holy Grail; these were things
that apparently were being searched for, with very little success.  None
of the reports were particularly lengthy, so they gave no useful
information to anyone who wasn't already intimate with whatever this
project was.

He also found the same names listed again and again:  Viluy, Eudial,
Mimete, Tellu, Cyprine, Kaolinite.  Just who these people were, again
was not obvious.  The most he could guess were that they either were
students or some kind of assistants.

Tomoe continued to read, and found that he didn't like where this was
going.  The Sailor Senshi were mentioned several times, and not in a
positive light.  They had been referred to as roadblocks, obstacles,
enemies.  And if the Senshi were supposed to be agents of justice, the
good guys, then whatever had happened here, whatever he had created here
was not exactly a charity organization...

He would have to worry about that later.  After more skimming, he decided
there was nothing of worth here, and was more confused than anything.  All
he had really found were more strange terms--dark messiah, daimon, words
that had nothing to do with physics or genetics.  This sounded more like
a religious cult.

There were two doors that led from the place.  Through the back right
door was a corridor with doors on the right side, the first one with a
curious sign on it.  The left half of the sign definitely said "Witches",
but the right side of it looked as if it had been torn down.  On the
floor he found several smaller signs with numbers on them.

The Witches room was fairly large, and divided into several sections.
In front of him was an open space where there were several chairs and a
curious looking mat with several colored dots on it.  To his right was
a small lab area, which was nowhere near the complexity of the one back
at the house.  The back part of the room appeared to be an office area.

That's where he was headed.  There were five small sections, and only
two of the five desks contained a computer.  He opted for the larger,
more sophisticated-looking one, and switched it on.  Just where exactly
the power was coming from was beyond him.

After a minute or so, a logon screen appeared.

"Welcome to the Death Busters organization.  Authorized Personnel only.
Place palm in scanner to verify identification..."

"Scanner? Where?"  He looked around the machine for it, and it was oddly
placed behind the monitor.  He pressed his hand down on the large hand
shape, and waited.

"Scanning...Access Authorized...
Welcome, Professor Tomoe.  "

He did a quick survey of the peculiar operating system, and the first
thing he found were several online journals, with the same names attached
to them as he found on the desk in the other room.  The only one missing
was that one name that began with a "K", he had forgotten it already.

If the memory sizes of these journals were proportional to the amount of
work these "Witches" actually did, then Eudial had accomplished the most,
and Mimete the least.

He opened up Eudial's file, and found the most recent entry.  It indicated
that two "talisman holders" had been found, and soon a plan to capture
them would be executed.  Below the text were pictures of them with their
names.  On the left was a boy with sandy blonde hair, although the name
of Haruka sounded more like a girl's name.  On the right was a
green-haired girl by the name of Michiru Kaioh.  *More green hair, so
unusual.  But she is beautiful,* he thought.

There had been no entry on whether or not the mission had been successful.
He read the entry before that, which seemed to scream out at him.

FOUR OF THE SAILOR SENSHI IDENTITIES FOUND.

"Sailor Senshi?"  The line had been in a 16-point font.  There were more
pictures, of two blonde girls, younger than Haruka Tenoh and Michiru
Kaioh.  They had been identified as Sailor Moon, Sailor Venus, Sailor
Uranus, and Sailor Neptune.  There was no printer so he tried to memorize
all their names and faces as much as he could.   *Usagi Tsukino...Sailor
Moon...Usagi Tsukino...Minako Aino...Sailor Venus...*

The section had gone on to indicate that she had also found the probable
identities of three of the other Senshi, but still nothing on Tuxedo
Kamen.

A dark thought then occurred to him.  Maybe it was this weird place
having an effect on him.  The Sailor Senshi had been all about obscurity
and mystery.  Perhaps if he threatened to expose them, they would give
Hotaru back...

"No, don't be stupid," he chided himself.  There was nothing else of note
in Eudial's file.  He searched through the other's journals, but all they
seemed to be doing was plotting against each other.

After doing more searching, he finally found something else interesting:
a hidden file called "Mission Statement".  There were a lot of legal
terms in it, but he had gotten the gist of it, much to his horror.

The Witches 5 was an organization of women that worked with Professor
Tomoe, although it wasn't clear who had hired who.  Together they were
known as the Death Busters.  Their mission was to search for the Holy
Grail, which was created by bringing 3 talismans together.  The
talismans were inside the pure heart crystals of selected individuals.
When the crystals were extracted from them, the person would...

"What?!!!"  The words used were a bit more sophisticated, but it still
meant the same thing...die.  And he was the leader of all this?  He
began perspiring, and covered his face with his hand.  *People murdered,
because of me? If anyone ever finds this place...*

He read on, not knowing that the only ones killed during the whole thing
were the Death Busters  themselves.  Once the Holy Grail was found, the
one who claimed it would have an unending source of power.  But the right
person to handle the Grail had to be found, and none had been available
at the time, according to the statement.  Professor Tomoe was responsible
for finding this "dark messiah".

When the dark messiah wielded the Holy Grail, then their true master,
Pharaoh 90, would be brought to the world to conquer it.

"This can't be true...this is all...a lie..."  he tried to convince
himself.  Then he remembered the articles he had read.  Daimons
extracting crystals from victims.  It was mentioned several times.  Yes,
it definitely did happen.  *But why...why would I take part in this?*

He found it was becoming difficult to operate the mouse, as his hand was
shaking so hard it was practically vibrating.  But he kept at it, trying
to find anything else.

After even more searching, he found a strangely named file he had
overlooked.  When he tried to open it, the system asked for a password.
When his third attempt failed, a message box popped up.

"Password authentication failure.  You're getting forgetful, Tomoe.  To
override, place palm on scanner to verify identification."

He glared at the nasty operating system, but obeyed its instructions.  A
final box came up.  "Loading DARK MESSIAH..."

A text file came up--a report entitled "Dark Messiah", with his name
attached to it in several places.  There were several pictures included
in the report.

"The awakening of the dark messiah draws very near, even with the Holy
Grail in the hands of the Sailor Senshi.  The only remaining key is to
obtain enough energy from pure heart crystals to empower her.  The leader
of the Sailor Senshi, Sailor Moon, was not able to fully utilize the
power of the Holy Grail.  Once our messiah awakens, we will take rightful
possession of the Holy Grail, and summon our true leader Pharaoh 90 here.

"Which will at come at no small cost.  Kaolinite has been recently
revived, but will not be able to use her powers for a time.  The eldest
of the Witches 5, Eudial, has been reported as missing, and presumed dead.
I have requested that Mimete take over her duties.  Her motivation is
questionable, but her power and deviousness cannot be denied.

"The vessel for the dark messiah, the professor's daughter, Hotaru Tomoe,
is becoming a bit of a problem, however.  A twelve-year-old human girl
is not the ideal container for our messiah, but she is the only possible
candidate.  We are closer to discovering the source of the girl's strange
hidden power.

"She is becoming more and more resistant, wanting to spend more time in
the outside world.  But as the messiah gains more power, Hotaru will
continue to suffer from fits of weakness, and become more and more
isolated.  It is very fortunate for us that the inhabitants of this
planet choose to fear, persecute and ostracize those who are different.
Soon she will be unable to function on her own.

"Also, the Professor Tomoe himself is becoming a problem.  Even though I
possess complete control of his vessel, he is completely aware of our
activities, and repeatedly attempts to retake control.  He needs constant
reminders that it was us who saved his daughter's life after that foolish
experiment he performed killed her.  This thing humans refer to as guilt
is a very effective weapon."

He stopped, and for about a minute he simply sat there, frozen.  The same
words kept sounding off inside his head:

*suffer from fits of weakness...*

*isolated...different...persecuted...*

*foolish experiment killed her...isolated...persecuted...killed her...
killed her...killed her...killed her...killed her...*

Inside the file were the pictures of Hotaru, the same image of her as
in his dream.  There were two of them; one as herself, the other more
dimly lit with her eyes hidden.  Only the eyes, that look of utter misery
and loneliness written clearly in her was enough to push him over the edge.

*Papa, why did you do this to me?* the picture seemed to say.

Souichi sunk into the chair, hyperventilating.  With the full realization,
the full impact of what he had done, the scream came.  A scream very
primal, very feral, erupted from him.  It was a scream that would drive
Ryo Urawa to tears.  Souichi buried his face inside his hands and wept
uncontrollably.

It had gone on for quite some time, and then he began pulling at his hair.
The computer's screen saver had come on, a simple black screen with a
small Witches 5 logo on it.  He could see his horrified reflection in the
monitor, which soon distorted itself into the image of a strangely
beautiful woman.  Evil laughter echoed all around him.

"Who are you?" he asked pleadingly.

"How miserable you must feel, Souichi-san," the woman taunted in a low
voice.  "Your daughter, killed because of you."

"No, I could not--"

"She has had to endure many sacrifices because of your actions," she said,
not wanting to reveal anything further.  "You do not deserve to get her
back."

Souichi's response was to just hide his face from his tormentor.

"Oh, you poor, poor man, I'm afraid I can't leave you like this.  I can
relieve you of your suffering."

He looked hopeful for only a brief moment, then shook his head.  "No.
I deserve all this, after what I did.  Now leave me alone."

Another laugh assaulted his ears.  "You don't have any choice in the
matter.  Your existence is just like everyone else's.  Insignificant.
You will all be trapped in my world...including your daughter..."

"What?  No, don't go near Hotaru!!"

"Too late.  You will be trapped down here forever."

At that, the monitor shattered outward, and from it emerged a woman's
hand.  The hand grabbed the silver ring from the man's pocket, and took
it back inside the monitor.  One of the shards went flying into Souichi's
eye.  He cried out at the momentary pain, until the possession took over.
His broken soul was too weak to resist.

The expression on his face was like everyone else's, (well, almost everyone
else's) blank and hollow.  The familiar golden glow flashed in his eye.
The monitor seemed to repair itself, and he stared into it.
"Beautiful..."

Gone now was the torment he felt.  Gone now was the father in him, the
anguish he felt for Hotaru, the horror at making her suffer.  Gone now
was the amnesiac, the one longing to get his life back, the craving for
his lost memories.  Gone was the curiosity, the need for discovery, the
scientist in him.

Nothing else mattered but the reflection of that beautiful woman.  He
wished to stay down here forever.  He would not leave.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------

In another place no stranger than Souichi was now lying in, two girls
carefully wandered down a corridor.

After the Sailor Teleport ring had been broken, Sailor Chibi-Moon and
Sailor Saturn had found themselves trapped inside an unending corridor.
They were now scouring the strange spider-webbed walls, looking for any
kind of secret door out of this place.

They were now exchanging stories, each telling the other about how much
their lives changed;  Chibi-Moon with her experience with the Dead Moon
Circus and Pegasus, Saturn with her newfound family in the other Outer
Senshi.

It was a welcome distraction from the tension they were feeling.  Also,
though the thought remained unspoken between the two, this might be the
last time they might be able to really spend time together, as Chibi-Moon's
uncertain fate loomed over her, and the dangerous consequences
of Saturn's powers.

Chibi-Moon hesitated before she asked her next question.  "Hotaru, how
much does your father know?  He has lost his memory, didn't he?"  A sad
expression darkened Sailor Saturn's face.  Chibi-Moon saw a glimpse of
the old, lonely Hotaru in those eyes, and immediately regretted asking.
"I'm sorry, you don't have to answer that."

"No, it's okay.  It's something I'm going to have to face sooner or
later, once the prince and princess are safe.  Papa doesn't know anything.
Pluto took me away when she found the distortion, and only told him I would
be safe with the Sailor Senshi."

"Why would Puu do that?" the pink-haired senshi blurted out.  Then she
looked at her surroundings, and thought of the events of the past few
days, and knew.  "You will go back to him, won't you?"

Saturn looked uncertain.  "I don't know what's going to happen.  How will
I explain how I've grown this much in only a few days?  How do I tell him
that I am the senshi of destruction, who can destroy a world by just
saying three words?"

Chibi-Moon took Saturn's hand, seeing how this was tearing her friend
apart.  "I'm sorry, I didn't think of that."

"And there's the whole thing with his past life," Saturn continued,
although now she definitely sounded more like Hotaru.  "The less we tell
him, the more he's going to ask about it.  I don't want to see him hurt
again.  He's been through enough as it is."

Saturn felt her eyes begin to water, and she fought against it.  Then,
Chibi-Moon began to fade again.  "But I can't think about that right now,"
she said, shaking her head.  "We have to find your parents first.  It is
our duty as Sailor Senshi, remember."

"Right," Chibi-Moon agreed.  She felt guilty for the pain her friend was
going through, and it was all being done to protect her and her family.
She hoped things would work out for them...not just Hotaru and her father,
but the other Outer Senshi as well.  She noticed the joyful expression on
Hotaru's face as she spoke of them.  It would not be easy for either one
of them to give Hotaru up.

"Here, I think I found it," Saturn said excitedly.  There was a hidden
lever on the impenetrable wall.  She pulled the lever, which opened up
a small section of wall just large enough for them to slip through.
They found themselves in the rear part of a grand throne room.  A huge
spider web design dominated the wall behind them.

Neherenia was standing there now with her back to them, gloating over
her possession of the helpless prince.

They could see the image of Usagi climbing through the thorns in
Neherenia's mirror.  Even having faced this evil before, Chibi-Moon found
that she was not afraid, but angry.  The two youngest senshi looked at
each other, and nodded.  They made their way to Neherenia as she
continued to torment the princess.

End Part 2

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