Shieldsman
A Sailor Moon S Fanfic

All Sailor Moon characters the property of the people who have rights to
them.  Don't sue me.

***

2 - First Contact

***

*Some days,* reflected Sailor Mercury as she struggled to get free, *you
just wish you never woke up at all.*

The scene was almost comical in its familiarity.  Mimete had shown up with
a daimon and attempted to take some guy's heart crystal.  The Inner Senshi
just happened to be nearby, and engaged the daimon.

The daimon must have been based off of some sort of pocket knife.  The
female monster's face and body was a deep maroon, a stark white cross
plastered across its chest.  It seemed to have a neverending supply of
knives and swords.

Unfortunately, this daimon, like all of the more recent ones, was much
tougher than the breed they had fought before.  It had already nullified
almost all of the Inner Senshi by pinning them against walls and the ground
with various sharp knives.  Sailor Mars was the only one left, and it
didn't look like she'd be lasting much longer.

As Mercury watched, Mars was pinned down as well.  *You'd think these would
get easier, not harder.*  A sick feeling of dread sunk into her heart as
she saw the daimon throw a knife at Mars's face...and vanished in an
instant as the knife was blasted out of the air by a flash of red.  *Tuxedo
Ka...* "What on earth?"

The flash of red didn't stop at the ground, it ricocheted off it and flew
into the side of a building, and then bounced again, flying high up into
the air towards the roof of a second building where it was caught.  By a
man wearing a breastplate, pants, boots, a headband, and bracers on each
arm, all the same brilliant shade of red.  Tuxedo Kamen stood beside him,
his cloak billowing in the nonexistent wind.

"Who is that?" Venus asked for all of them.  Unseen by anyone, Mars' eyes
brightened for a moment.

As they watched, he placed the shield onto his left arm, where it seemed to
attach iself.  "Didn't your mother ever tell you not to play with knives?"
he called down to the flabbergasted daimon.  He turned to Tuxedo Kamen. 
"Free the Senshi, I'm going to play with the Swiss Army Chick."  With that,
he jumped off the building, singing "Here I come, to save the day" in a
most irritating voice.

He landed on the daimon, his feet driving into her face and causing her to
crash into the ground.  The diamon roared back to her feet, and started
attacking the man with furious swings and strikes of her swordlike arms. 
The man simply weaved and dodged around the attacks, or blocked them with
his shield, interjecting little snippets as he battled.  "You know, if you
get a little more snap on that kick, you might have a better chance of
connecting."

Tuxedo Kamen leapt off the roof and hurried to Sailor Moon's side, freeing
her from the knives the held her down.  She hugged him tightly, and then
the two of them went about freeing the other Senshi.  Soon they were freed,
and stood there awestruck by the antics of the man in red.

"Parry, thrust, parry, riposte, Good!" he cheered as he weaved through a
combination by the daimon.  He ducked under a swing that would have taken
off his head, and reached in to punch the daimon in the gut.  "Tag, you're
it!"  A low attack he jumped over, then twisted to avoid the followup. 
"Not bad, be careful you don't overbalance," he swept the diamon's feet out
from under it.  "See?"  He risked a glance back and saw the Senshi had been
released.  "Could someone please get around to blasting the monster?"

This shook Tuxedo Kamen out of the trance even he had fallen into.  He
turned to Sailor Moon and touched her shoulder lightly, focusing her
attention on him.  "Now, Sailor Moon!"

The young Senshi jumped a little, and guiltily blushed.  "But he's in the
way," she protested.  A bark of laughter came from the combat.

Sailor Moon looked back, just in time to see the man point at one of the
daimon's swords and say "Isn't that rust?"  The diamon looked carefully at
the weapon, and was therefore completely surprised when the man slammed his
shield into her head with a loud clang.  As the daimon swayed on her feet,
stunned, the man jumped away.  "Go for it!"

That was all the prompting Sailor Moon needed, she reached for her spiral
heart moon rod and went through the motions that tranformed her into Super
Sailor Moon and the accompanying "RAINBOW MOON HEART ACHE!"

It was the red man's turn to be astonished as the daimon was blasted to
smithereens.  Mimete took that as an opportune moment to run away,
unnoticed by anyone.

The man in red stopped himself from gaping and shot an amused look over at
the five Senshi.  "You've picked up a few tricks," he chuckled.

"Who the hell are you?" Venus demanded.  Murmurs of agreement were given
from the other girls.  Sailor Moon was conspicuously silent, as she knew
what was coming.

Tuxedo Kamen responded.  "Sailor Senshi, may I introduce Crimson," the man
in question grinned widely.  "A Shieldsman."

Crimson made a mocking bow and stood, spinning his shield on one finger as
he came up.  His grin had become that of one who was enjoying himself
immensely.  "Hello ladies, miss me?"

***

"Stop that!"  Mars snapped at the quivering Crimson.  Who gasped, took one
look at her face, and went off into a new round of laughter.  "Honestly!" 
Mars said to the other four girls, and tried to ignore him completely,
which was quite a task, since he had just fallen on the ground and was
banging his fist against it.

"Oh gods," he panted as he caught his breath.  "You should have SEEN your
faces."  He started to laugh again, and closed his eyes in an effort to
stop.  "What a classic moment."

"It's not every day a man jumps off a roof and starts battling a daimon for
us," Mercury pointed out.

"I'm feeling unappreciated here," Crimson complained.  "It's not like you
all were doing such a great job of dealing with the Swiss Army Chick
anyway."

"Do you have to use that word?" Mars demanded.  "It's disgusting."

"What, chick?  THAT," he jerked his thumb over his shoulder, indicating the
remains of the daimon, "was a chick."  Crimson made a sweeping motion to
indicate the Senshi.  "You however, are women.  Girls.  Young ladies would
probably come closer."  He grinned innocently at Mars.  "These distinctions
are important, you see."  Crimson suddenly became serious.  "Look, we need
to talk.  And I'd really rather do it in our normal forms."

"Why?" 

"Because," Crimson began, and winked at Tuxedo Kamen, who suddenly burst
out in laughter, "those fukus are driving me nuts.  I'm far too easily
distracted by a pair of nice legs, and five pairs of them are beyond my
capabilities."  A new voice interrupted his continued foray into the realm
of lechery.

"Crimson, be nice."  

The man in question froze, and turned slowly to the source of the voice. 
"It can't be," he breathed.  "Pluto?"

The green haired woman smiled faintly at him from a few steps away. 
"Hello, Crimso-".  She was cut off as she was sweapt up into a hug and
twirled around.

"ONEECHAN!"  The other Senshi looked on, amazed, as a laughing Crimson
whirled around with Pluto in his grip, and as she hugged him back just as
fiercely, her smile wider than they had ever seen before.  "I'm so happy to
see you I never thought I'd see you again I was so happy to see the others
that it never occured to me that you might be here too and it's so great to
see you it's almost like old times again and..."  He stopped babbling and
set Pluto down with a slightly disgusted expression on his face.  "What is
it about you that turns me into a six year old?"

Pluto smiled kindly at him and patted his cheek.  "It's part of your charm,
Crimson."  Crimson imitated an expression of surprise.

"I have charm?" he wondered out loud.  "What a distressing concept.  All
that hard work down the drain."  Even Pluto groaned at his comment.  "Hey,
you set me up for it," he defended.

Sailor Moon looked up at the chuckling Tuxedo Kamen.  "Was he always like
this?"

"He was worse," he told her quite seriously.  "I don't remember much, but I
distinctly remember that I had to prevent myself from throttling him three
times a day."

***

"Thanks, Oneechan," Kaneda said as the group entered Setsuna's apartment. 
"I don't think my place would have been the best for this."  At her
quizical look, he responded "do the words 'bachelor pad' mean anything to
you?"  As he face registered understanding, he followed up with a grin and
a "think worse".  He was rewarded with a small smile.  "I remember when it
took me weeks to get one of those out of you." 

Setsuna looked at him with a bit of shock.  "So THAT's what you boys were
doing," she said.  "I thought you all had gone insane all at once."  She
paused for a minute.  "Especially Verdant."

Kaneda snickered.  "It was his idea."  She gave him another suprised look,
and he elaborated.  "He was convinced you had a nice smile, and recruited
all of us in his scheme to get one out of you."  He smiled a little sadly. 
"You two made a nice couple."  He grimaced as the smile was wiped off of
Setsuna's face.  "Oh hell, Oneechan, I'm sorry."

She waved off his apology.  "It's fine, Kaneda.  It still hurts to think
about him sometimes."  Kaneda nodded sadly.  They made their way into the
living room.

"I miss him too.  I miss them all."  He suddenly laughed.  "I woke up this
morning an only child, and this evening I've got eight brothers, a
sister-in-law, and incredible powers."  He spread his arms in a 'why me'
gesture.  "Not your normal day."

The Inner Senshi and Mamoru had been watching the exchange silently. 
"Excuse me?" Ami interrupted.  "I believe you have some explaining to do?"

Kaneda looked a bit embarrased.  "Sorry about that," he apologised, and
snagged a piece of floor, sitting cross-legged.  "I guess I should begin on
explaining who," he paused, "and WHAT I am."  He took a deep breath and
slowly let it out.  "Where to begin?"

"How about at the beginning?" Makoto offered.

Kaneda's eyes gleamed.  Setsuna and Mamoru exchanged a glance and sighed -
they knew what was coming.  "In the beginning," he intoned in a deep voice,
"all was darkness and..."  He was cut off as a pillow from Mamoru impacted
with his face.  "WELL SHE ASKED!"

Makoto leaned over to Ami and whispered, "This is going to be a long
conversation."  Ami smiled lightly and nodded as Kaneda started again.

"I was the youngest of eight brothers who were known as the Shieldsmen.  We
were distantly related to all the royal houses except for that of the Earth
and the Moon.  It was near my fifteenth birthday that we discovered our
powers, and our links to each of you."

"Links?" Ami asked.

Kaneda pulled back his sleeve and showed them his right bracer, and the
symbol for Mars on it.  "Each of us was 'attuned,' for lack of a better
term, to a specific royal house." He nodded at Setsuna.  "My eldest brother
Verdant was linked to her.  Then my twin brothers Auric and Navy were
linked to Uranus and Neptune, respectively."  His eyes narrowed.  "Hey," he
drawled, "are they awake too?"

"Yes, they are," Usagi told him.  Her expression told him she didn't think
much of them either.

"Still full of themselves, I see," he chuckled.  "Well, some things never
change.  Anyway, Azure was with Mercury, Tanger matched with Venus, and
Jupiter's was..." he paused and began to think heavily.  "I can't remember
his name...I know we always called him Pinky..."  Matoko blushed slightly.

"Rose," Setsuna supplied softly.  Kaneda shot her a look of gratitude.

"Indigo was with Saturn," he glanced at Setsuna again, and she shook her
head slightly.  "And yours truly was with Mars."

"But what did that mean?" Ami asked.  "What did this 'link' do?"

Kaneda smiled ruefully.  "In most ways, it's like those two," indicated
Mamoru and Usagi, and quickly amended his statement as Rei started to blush
and look angry, "but not quite as personal."  Rei relaxed slightly, but
continued to glare at him.  "I know when Rei transforms into Sailor Mars
and I know when she needs help, both in and out of her Senshi form."

Minako looked at him in amazement.  "You're a bodyguard?"

"What was it Verdant said?" he asked himself.  "Oh yes.  'The Senshi
protect the Solar System, the Shieldsmen protect the Senshi.'"  He spread
his arms arm to indicate them all.  "More like batmen.  You WERE royalty,
after all, and even in the Silver Millenium there were people who held
grudges against the royal houses."  He begain ticking things off on his
fingers.  "Shieldsmen had to be excellent fighters, to protect you from
mortal dangers.  When it came to the supernatural, our job was essentially
to watch your back, and jump in when we were needed." 

Rei gave him a dark look.  "In other words, all you're good for is getting
in our way and being a nuisance."

Kaneda glared right back.  "Not quite.  I'm good for getting in THEIR way,
and being a nuisance.  Accept it, Rei.  There's nothing you can do to stop
me this time.  I'm going to keep my oath, whether you like it or not. So
don't even try."  Kaneda had stood up and was about to continue his tirade.
 His face was dark with anger.

"Kaneda!" Setsuna's voice cut through his anger like a knife.  "Stop this."
 He relaxed and slumped back to the floor, and held his head in his hands. 
Setsuna turned to look at the other Senshi, and they could see a fire in
her eyes.  "His duties are just as important to him as yours are to you." 
She turned her eyes on each of them, and in turn, each backed down, until
she came to Rei.  For a long moment, the two locked stares, until
eventually Rei nodded and sighed.  "Please, it's late.  Go home.  You can
talk later.  Give him a chance to adjust."

Mamoru and the Inner Senshi got up and left the apartment, while Kaneda
remained on the floor.  Setsuna showed them to the door, and then came back
to the young man.  "Why didn't you tell them all of it?"

"What, that I DO have one offensive power?  One that costs me my life to
use?  Oh, yeah, that's going to go over well."  His voice switched into a
parody of a game-show host.  "Congratulations, you've not only gained a
guardian angel, he's a living bomb too!"  He looked her in the eyes.  "Can
you imagine their response?  They'd kill themselves to stop me from
fighting, because they'd be convinced I'd use it."

"You wouldn't?"

He was silent for a long time.  "I would, if I have to.  But I hope that
day never comes."  He stood and went to gaze out her window at the moon. 
"I wish my brothers were here.  I feel so...incomplete without them."  He
closed his eyes and fought the tears that wanted to come.  "But they can't,
can they?  Only those of us alive at the end can come back, and they were
long dead."  He felt a hand on his shoulder.  

"It's not only that, is it?"  Kaneda nodded, and stared out the window some
more, remembering the girl who just left.

"No, it isn't.  She's exactly the same.  The same fire, the same caring. 
I've only seen her for a few hours, and she's the same person."  He turned,
and Setsuna saw the tears in his eyes.  "It hurts, Oneechan.  It hurts to
see her again, and know that things can't ever change."  He sniffed, and
straightened, laughing half-heartedly.  "I can't deal with this right now. 
I'm going to go and get really, really drunk."

He turned and walked to the door, leaving Setsuna behind.  He stopped
halfway through it.  "Hey, Oneechan."  She turned and looked at him.  "Did
you really tattoo 'Born to Senshi' on your backside like Verdant said?"  As
she blushed furiously, he chuckled.  "Thought so."  He turned and walked
out of the apartment, closing the door behind him.

"Oh, Crimson," she sighed, and shook her head a little in dismay.  "Things
can change."  She continued staring out the window, lost in her own
memories of a time long past.

***

Kaneda sat in the park, reading a physics book and enjoying the afternoon
sun.  Every so often he would curse, and flip a few pages forward or back
in the book.  He wore a blue long sleeved shirt that covered the bracers he
now constantly wore.  As he was reading, a shadow fell over him and he
looked up into the faces of Ami, Matoko, and Minako in their school
uniforms.  "Hiya girls, what can I do for you?"

The girls exchanged an uncomfortable look and then finally Matoko spoke. 
"Can you tell us about them?  The others?"

"You don't remember them?" he asked.  The girls shook their heads.  "That's
depressing, in a lot of ways."

"You seem to have more memories than almost any of us," Ami commented.

"I only remember things about the people who were close or important to me.
 My brothers.  Endymion.  Oneechan.  Mars."  He shot them a rueful grin. 
"In fact, all I know about you is what my brothers told me," he chuckled
slightly.  "And some of their stories weren't the most flattering."

"That's more than we know," Minako said softly.  "We remember barely
anything.  I...we're hoping that if you tell us about them, we might
remember."

Kaneda nodded, and was silent for a long moment.  "OK...well, the first
thing you should know is that all of us were pranksters.  We loved playing
tricks and jokes on people, and making them laugh.  It wasn't anything
mean, or nasty, it was just honest fun."  He smiled widely, and made a
sweeping gesture.  "We just thought you all took yourselves too seriously."

"So they were like you?" Minako asked.

"Oh no," Kaneda answered quickly.  "I'm the smart aleck, as you've probably
figured out.  Each of us had a sort of specialty.  Pinky, for example, was
so quiet and unassuming, and would pull these harmless little pranks that
were so sweet.  You could never stay mad at him, no matter what he did." 
His eyes misted a little.  "He was such an innocent at times, too.  Once,
someone tried to get close to you, Jupiter, in the hopes of getting some
royal secret.  When Pinky caught him, he gave up everything, more out of
guilt for betraying Pinky's trust than because he didn't want to be
punished."  

Matoko broke in.  "He sounded like a wonderful man."

Kaneda nodded.  "He was.  He was this huge, giant of a man, that dwarfed
even you.  But he was so gentle and honest.  I remember once, when you told
him you liked this one flower, he went and picked almost a whole field of
them, and plastered your living quarters with them.  He said that you
didn't get their perfume out of your things for weeks, and all he had to do
was mention the flower's name and you would blush furiously."

"Lilacs," she breathed.  "They were lilacs."

"We have recall," he chuckled.  "Let's see...Azure.  Azure was a planner. 
He would come up with these huge, elaborate schemes for a joke, that would
never go off quite as he planned.  They were as much a joke on the
executors as the victims."  He suddenly guffawed.  "Oh, there was this one
time..."  he proceeded to describe a prank that involved whip cream, tomato
paste, a lot of cats, a gong, and chewing gum.  By the end, all three girls
were stuck in a giggle fit.  "...it took me weeks to get the gum out of my
hair."  

"He was this small, nervous man, who seemed ready to explode at any moment.
 His uniform looked so ridiculous on him, because he was so darkly tanned
and had the brightest orange hair you'd ever seen."  He paused.  "But when
he was scheming, he was like a force of nature.  Once he set his mind on
something, he was impossible to stop."  He looked over at Ami.  "Does that
help at all?"

Ami shook her head, her frustration evident.  "It does sound familiar, but
it's not coming to me."  She sighed.  "Do you remember anything more about
him?"  Kaneda was silent for a very long time.  "Kaneda?"

"I remember his funeral," he finally answered, his voice a little hoarse. 
"He was the first of us to die.  He had heard about a plot on your life,
and set up one of his schemes to draw out the assasin.  He should have
known it wouldn't work, but everyone went along.  It was going along fine,
until the very end, when he found out that there was a second assassin. 
The idiot didn't even remember to transform when he took the guy on.  He
managed to delay him long enough for the guardsmen to arrive, but it had
cost him his life."  Kaneda hung his head.  "I remember seeing you standing
over his grave.  You placed something on it and walked away."  He looked
over at Ami, and saw tears in her eyes.  "Damnit, I keep on bringing up
things that should have stayed forgotten."

Ami shook her head again.  "No, I remember him a bit now.  I remember
seeing the part of him that no one else ever saw.  The part that took as
much joy in the execution as the planning.  The part that would cry any
time someone even accidentaly got hurt because of him."  There were tears
in her eyes, but she was smiling a little.  "Thank you, Kaneda."

"What about Tanger?" Minako asked.  She wasn't sure if she wanted to know
now, but she knew she would regret not asking.  Kaneda burst into laughter,
shocking them.

"Tanger, now HE was insane.  He was about my height, but had this huge
shock of black hair, that just sort of jutted out at all angles.  You would
just wind him up and let him go.  He once did a ten minute monologue,
completely spontaneous, about the merits of dental floss.  You used to make
him gag himself at times, because if he didn't you'd never be able to get
any work done.  I never saw him at rest, he was always working on making
you or somebody lighten up.  He was Serenity's favorite jester too." 
Minako had a strange smile on her face, and she was mouthing the words
'dental floss' over and over.  

"There was another side of him, too.  When there was trouble, you always
knew it, because he would simply 'turn off.'  One second he could be in the
middle of some elaborate story, and the next he was calm as death itself." 
Kaneda paused.  "Do you want to hear the rest?  I know how he died, too." 
His voice told them that he'd rather not go there.

Minako gave him a harsh look.  "No, I don't want to think about that.  I've
heard enough."  She softened a little, and placed her hand on his knee. 
"Thank you, Kaneda, as well."

"No problem," he dismissed.  "I'd think they'd like it if you remembered
them."  

The girls thanked him again, and said their goodbyes.  Kaneda watched them
walk off, and returned to his physics book.  "I know I'd like it if she
remembered me."

Unbeknownst to him, or the others, another pair of eyes was watching
Kaneda.  "I do, Kaneda. I do."