Technically this should be an interlude, but since I have
this urge to organize stuff I included into the Awakenings
story arc. Up next is the Dark Mercury story arc spanning
four episodes. Then Redemption's Road story arc lasting
eight episodes. Then the EVA/SM/Lavender four ep. arc.
Then the BGC eight episode arc. And etc. etc. Let's just
say this is going to go on for a long time. And even if I don't
get decent C&C or at least a response, I'm starting to enjoy
it enough that I don't mind. But it would be nice. 

Oh, who the hell am I kidding ? 

Please C&C/MST ! 

PLEEEEEAAAAASSEEE !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

PPPPPPPPPPPLLLLLLLLEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAASSSSSSSEEEE !!!!!!!!!!!!!         

Enough with the whining. On with Lavender # 4 !          

Disclaimer:
All SM characters owned by Naoko Takeuchi.
Lavender and Apollo are mine. If you wanna use 
them ask permission first.

C&C and MSTs are always welcome.
----------------------------
// = thoughts
---------------------------
-----------------------------------------

Lavender # 4: Icebreaker

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

Apollo opened his eyes. He felt a little woozy but he attributed that to the anesthetic
in his system. He could see the gloved hands moving away from him through his 
hazy vision. An audible hiss could be heard as he heard the box lock itself again.

The operation was necessary since Apollo needed an implant to be able to avoid 
temporal scans. Usually a temporal scan would look at a temporal signature and 
be able to determine both the past and the future of the individual. Apollo still did 
not have his full memory since Lavender refused to give him full recall of his memories
,assuring him that all he needed to know would come in time, but he knew that to        
perform his duties he must be undetectable to temporal scans. He was interrupted
in his thoughts by Lavender standing up, pushing the black medical box away from
him. 

' Well, the operation's a success. You are now totally undetectable by any Guardian 
of Time or anyone with similar abilities.'

Guardian of Time. A sour thought passed through his head. 

Pluto. The obnoxious little green-haired bi-

' I see that you remember Pluto, old friend.' Lavender said from behind his mask,
amusement evident in his voice.

' How'd you know ?' 

' Your face always go through very interesting contortions when you think of her.'

' Yeah. Strange thing is I don't know why I do that.' Apollo said wonderingly as he
followed Lavender to the kitchen. Lavender wasn't wearing his usual ensemble but
was dressed in a simple shirt and black slacks. The only thing that remained of 
Lavender's guise was his mask. Apollo remembered something about not letting          
anyone see his master's face, but he didn't know why.         

' Memories, Apollo. They'll come out in time.' Lavender said as he picked out a can
of tuna from the cupboard. He fished out a can opener and a fork from the kitchen 
drawer and moved to the small table. Apollo jumped up on the table, watching 
hungrily as Lavender opened the can of tuna. 

' Wait a second, Apollo.' Lavender said as he put one hand to his face, halting the 
cat from pouncing on the tuna in the can. The mask glowed, along with Lavender's
body. The light subsided after a few moments and Lavender laughed as Apollo was 
trying to retrieve his jaw from the table.

Instead of a masked man wearing a shirt and slacks there was a pretty _woman_ in
a shirt and slacks. 

After Apollo recovered his composure, he took a good long look at Lavender, who was
looking back with an amused smile on her face. Lavender was currently a woman, with 
a pageboy hairdo and an attractive face. He noticed the lavender eyes and smiled.

' Still like to do that, Boss.'

' Yeah, never could stop doing that.' Lavender said in a musical and definitely feminine
voice. Apollo remembered that Lavender used the mask to shift into his disguises. He
was trying to remember more when he was presented by a bit of tuna on a fork. 

He decided to just let it be and took a bite. Lavender then took a bite hi- er..herself. 

' I've been out of commision for a long time , Boss, so let me ask you a simple question.
Are you taking woman disguises because you like it or there's some logical reason for 
it ?' He got a bap on his head for that question.

' Of course, I've got a logical reason. It's been awhile since I used my female disguises
and Carlyle decided I need to practice. He set the mask to transform me to female forms
for awhile.' Lavender said as she once again forked a tuna chunk and ate it. Apollo could
tell that she hated it from the tone of her voice.

' Carlyle ? How's he doing ?'

' Same old, same old. He told me you were coming so I stayed around here a bit. And 
he has a job for us.'

' What job ?' Apollo was once more confused. He knew they had duties, but all he could
get from his fried memories were something about mists and timestreams.  

' We're going to do four funerals and a breaking.' Lavender said with a mischievous smile 
on her face. 

' Huh ?'                                                                    

*******************************

Darkness swirled outwards to form the portal as both Lavender and Apollo looked on.
Lavender was dressed in his usual get up this time , the cloak covering his entire body 
below the neckline. Apollo yawned. A whole night of explanations on the Senshi and
he didn't even get to know what they were going to do.      

Carlyle lowered his staff, the glow from the onyx tip subsiding. 

' OK, Lavender I already told you what you needed to know. Just get to the blast crater
and signal me with a Fireblossom.' 

Fireblossom ? Apollo wondered what the hell that was. Must be something I forgot 
_again_. Damn this reincarnation business. Carlyle faded from view as he once again
raised his onyx staff.

' It's showtime, Apollo. Let's go.' Lavender said as he walked into the portal. Apollo 
followed and emerged in a dimly lit tunnel. The origin of the light was a total mystery
and Apollo didn't have time to contemplate on that mystery as he heard Lavender 
say ' You'll get to enjoy the sights later, Apollo. We've still got a job to do.'

Apollo was jolted from his contemplation and went to join his master.  

Lavender was definitely not in a talking mood, as Apollo could ascertain from his walk
and his scent. That was fine with him. He really did need to recall his memories and
the silence would help in that.

That was what happened for quite awhile, Lavender walking silently beside him Apollo
wracking his brains to find a sufficiently unmangled memory. The disgusted look on
the feline's face would tell anyone that he was unsuccessful.

Apollo noticed that Lavender was bending down to fit into the cavern. Even though the
cavern was still noticeably getting smaller they continued on, with Lavender bending
a bit every time. 

They stopped when Lavender couldn't bend down anymore.

' Hmmm. It needs clearing. Let's double back shall we.' Lavender said as he turned and 
moved to a bigger part of the cavern. Apollo followed wondering what the hell did he
mean by clearing. The thought jerked a memory in Apollo's head. Something about the
boss being a ...... conduit ? How the hell does the boss being a conduit have any relation
to clearing a cave.

The boss raised his hand. A purple rose appeared as if by magic in his hands. His other
hand dipped into his lavender tuxedo jacket, pulling out a piece of yellow amber. Apollo 
could see a sigil inscribed into the gem as his master held it in his open palm. He 
recognized it as the sign of Uranus.

The gem began to glow and Apollo backed away from the harsh light. When the light 
cleared, he could see a faintly yellow aura around the rose in his master's hand. Lavender
returned the gem into his jacket and held the rose gingerly.

' Apollo, I think you should hide behind me.' Lavender said as he readied to throw the 
glowing rose. Apollo silently complied and went behind his master. He waited and heard 
the faint whish of the projectile being thrown.

THUNK !

' Well, that was - ' Apollo started to say when he was rudely interrupted.

BOOM !

Yellow light bathed the cavern as rubble and debris flew from the source of the blast. 
Lavender's cloak covered both the human and the cat from the shrapnel. Cold wind
blasted into the cavern as the snows outside took advantage of the opening and blew
swirls of white snowflakes into the newly blasted cave. 

After the dust settled down and Lavender wiped the dust off his cloak, he looked down
at his cat. From what Apollo could smell of his scent, the smile on his mask obviously 
reflected what was currently under it.

' World Shaking.' He said before he continued his walk into the snowy wasteland 
presented before them by the new opening. 

Apollo scrambled after him.                                   

*******************************

Apollo now remembered what his boss can do. He can channel energy, _any_ form 
of energy into anything that he touches. He guessed that the amber had been filled
with Uranus energy, though Apollo wondered where the hell did he recharge it. Apollo 
also remembered one of his master's abilities and he was quite curios why they were 
not using it now. 

So he asked.                            
           
' What are we doing walking and not just teleport to where we need to be, boss ?'

' Apollo, your memories are really scrambled it seems. I can only teleport when
I have the specific energy to teleport.' Lavender said as his hand came out of his
cloak, a diamond on the palm of his hand glinting in the weak light. ' Does this look 
like it's been charged ?'

Apollo reacted reflexively. He blinked his one eye three times in rapid succesion. 
He could now see the aura of everything in his line of sight. The diamond had the 
tangible aura of emptiness. It was empty of any form of energy. Amazed at his 
newfound ability, Apollo brought his aura sight to bear on his master. What he saw 
surprised him.

Lavender's aura was like a chameleon, constantly shifting so as not to show it's
true color. 

He blinked three times once again to return to normal sight. Besides he was getting
dizzy from all the pretty colors that his master's aura was throwing off.   

' I think you saw that I'm out of teleport energy. That's one of the reasons.' His master
said continuing his brisk walk. His cloak covered his entire body, so much so that it
seemed as if he was a walking pillar of purple. 

' The second is that.' 

Apollo looked to where his master was looking. He saw a body, perfectly preserved by
the freezing temperatures of the place they were in. He did not feel the cold but he 
attributed that to his magical constitution. They moved closer to the body and he 
realized who it was.

It was one of the Senshi.

' Boss, I thought you told me the Senshi we-'

' They are. The Ginzuisho molded reality. It created new ones for the Senshi. This is 
a pocket dimension, so the bodies remained.' Lavender kneeled beside the Senshi. 
Jupiter guessed Apollo, judging from the green fuku. She had brown hair tied up in a
pony-tail. She had a nice enough body, judging by human standards. Her skin was 
white as the snow surrounding her, a sign of her death. Rigor mortis had set in a long 
time ago and she was frozen into place. Apollo wondered what they'll be doing with 
the bodies of the Senshi anyway. He watched his master as the gloved hands began 
to glow an eery light. Only the sound of the wind howling and the whispering of the 
words of power could be heard as the cat's master began his work. 

Lavender touched the body tenderly, held it carefully taking great care in straightening 
thebody up. The rigidity gave way as Apollo saw the magic work on the body.The gloved
hands ran up and down the body, removing the frost returning the skin back to a tender
glow.When Lavender was finished the body seemed to be newly dead, the breath of life
seeming to have left the corpse only moments ago. A beatific smile played upon the lips
of the dead Senshi, moved there by the gloved hands and set by magic.                        

' Something a mortician taught me a long time ago.' Lavender said in response to the 
unspoken question, as the glow from his hands dimmed. ' Now to finish the masterpiece.'                         

He laid one of his gloved hands on the Senshi's bosom and ribbons of light exploded from
it encasing the Senshi's body. Apollo agreed totally with his earlier assesment that the 
Senshi had a nice body. She really had a very _nice_ body. If he was human he'd be 
drooling. The ribbons materialized into a white robe, making the body more angelic in 
appearance. As a finishing mark, Lavender brought the Senshi's hands up to her chest, 
clasping into them one of his trademark purple roses.                                                  

Three more bodies and the ritual was repeated three times more, always ending with a 
purple rose being put into their clasped hands. Apollo wondered why the hell where they
doing this. If the Powers That Be wanted to give the bodies a funeral, why not just teleport
the bodies to a Haven ? Haven ? What, by the Seven , is a Haven ? Apollo thought to 
himself as they continued to trudge towards an unknown destination. And what are the 
Seven ? Powers That Be ? Apollo's mind started to really hate this reincarnation thing.

But before Apollo could have a nervous breakdown from the information overload, his master
stopped and he followed suit and promptly lost his jaw to the ground.

Before him was a very big, no , the bigggest hole in the ground he had ever seen. It's called
a crater, you idiot, said something at the back of his mind. He promptly told it to shut up as
he followed his master down it.      

*******************************

Apollo looked down at the humongous crater that was formerly the center of the Dark
Kingdom. 

' Are there any bodies down there ?' The feline asked as he followed his master down
the crater, who was doing remarkably well in scaling down the crater wall.

' No. This was ground zero. Only objects with high magical protection and wards could
survive the blast.'

' Like that.' Apollo said as he finally saw a human sized crystal near the center of the
crater.                                               

' Yes. Like that.'   

When they finally reached the bottom of the crater, Apollo saw Lavender materialize another 
rose and pull out a ruby. He could faintly see the sigil of Mars inscribed on it. Red energy
seemed to arc from the gem to the rose surrounding it with a ruby-tinged aura. Then Lavender
threw it into the air. Moment's later a ball of fire lit up the sky.

That's a Fireblossom, said some part of Apollo's mind. Seconds after the explosion, air 
shimmered around a spot where cat and master stood. Carlyle appeared with the four bodies
that Lavender had prepared ealier surrounding him.
    
' Good work, Lavender. Now see to Jadeite. I have to bring these to a Haven.'

He once again dissapeared as quickly as he appeared. Apollo remembered something vaguely
about him not getting caught by Pluto as the reason why Carlyle always seemed to be in a 
hurry. Apolo shrugged the thought away as he heard his master calling.

' Apollo, think you can crack this crystal ?' Lavender said, running has hands along the length
of the large crystal 

' How ?'

' Your power blast.Think you've got enough juice ?'          

Power blast ? What power blast ? He noticed himself beginning to glow. 

' Yes, I think so.' A voice, not his own but he knew it was, replied.

' Then start cracking.' Lavender said as he backed  away.

A blast of silver and black energy slammed into the crystal moments later. 
 
*******************************

He was alone. 

And it was dark.

Oh so dark.

That was all he knew the darkness and the feeling of being alone. 

Isolation.

Oh yes, there were moments when he didn't feel alone. Yes, those were
the moments he savored. 

The brilliant white light, dispelling the darkness momentarily. But for that
moment he tasted freedom. For an instant, yes , but freedom still. 

Hope surged within his heart and he tried to break free. But he was too
weak, not strong enough to break the barriers around him. And then the
darkness was back.

But he didn't give up. Once in awhile the light would come back and
he'd try to break free. He still wasn't strong enough. That's why he 
bided his time waiting for the light, hungering for freedom. 

This time the light came back. Not exactly the light, but with a darkness
interwoven into it. And it came back again. 

And again. 

And again.

This time, with all that was left of his strength, he pushed.

And pushed.

The light came back and he pushed.

Then his world exploded into the light and he embraced it with open
arms.

Then when the light retreated, the darkness went along with it.

What he saw was a masked man, a cloak of fine lavender cloth covering his body,
wearing a wide brimmed hat. The mask was smiling at him for some unknown 
reason. Then a voice from behind it spoke.               

' Hello Jadeite. I have an offer for you.'

*******************************
2 Months Later
*******************************

' Hey, Keiichi, do you have the new Fushigi Yuugi manga ?' Usagi asked excitedly
of the blonde store clerk. Usagi had found this new manga and anime store a month
ago and she delighted at the fact they were selling at quite low prices.                  

' I think I have one....let me see.' Keiichi said as he bent down, Usagi flinched. For
that moment, he seemed to look like one of her old enemies,watsisname....yeah,
Jadeite. But Jadeite was long gone right ? 

' Here you are , Usagi, the newest copy ! ' Keiichi said with a smile. He couldn't be 
Jadeite, if he were Jadeite he'd be declaring his evil plan or something. 

' Thank, Keiichi. How much ?' Usagi said pulling out her purse. Lucky she just got
her allowance. Usagi said goodbye to the clerk and went out of the store, still
contemplating her question. 

He really did look a bit like Jadeite. Maybe..........

'Naaaah.' Usagi said to herself as she began reading her new manga.

*******************************

Jadeite breathed a great sigh of relief as Usagi left the store. It's a good thing that
she thinks I'm dead, though Jadeite as he returned to polishing the glass case 
filled with manga. It would have been nice to serve the prince once again, but a
deal was a deal. No interference. Period. No buts. No argument.                                    

He looked up from his polishing when he heard the bell ring, a sign that someone
entered his store. He saw a very cute woman enter, a wide smile on her face.

' Hello, what can I -' Jadeite began. Then he noticed the purple rose on the woman's 
hat. In the short time that he was acquainted with his mysterious benefactor, he had
picked up on the man's quirk of dressing up in women's clothing and having something
noticeably purple on his person. He really disliked that, but hey, the guy gave him a 
chance at a new life so if he was like Kunzite , he could live with that. At least he didn't
laugh like him.

' Hello, Lavender. Nice of you to visit !' Jadeite said as he welcomed the newcomer.

' So how's business ?' Asked the woman as she looked aroun the store. A few months
back Lavender had given Jadeite the capital for a business and a list of choices of the 
type of shop he wanted to manage. Since he really didn't want to do laundry or dry 
cleaning so he settled for the manga store. 

' It's definitely up. Especially when my main customer comes along....' He said nervously
trying to bring upo the fact that Usagi's frequest visits really made him nervous.  

' Don't worry, Jade-chan. She won't recognize you. I've made sure of that.' 

' How did you....'

' I've been watching.'
                             
' Oh. Anyway, Lavender, I seem to haven't thanked you properly yet for what you did....'

' Don't thank me yet. I still have to get you in the Endymion's good graces.'

' What ! You mean-'

' Yes, I'm thinking of reintroducing you, since you seem to have recovered quite nicely.
Though you do have to wait awhile. I still have to check things with some people.'

' You mean I can serve again ? As Endymion's Guardian ?' Jadeite asked hopefully.

' Just wait.I haven't confirmed it.'

' Thankyouthankyouthankyou. You've done so much for me already. I really can't tell you 
how grateful I am. I'd do anything  to repay you !' Jadeite said as he gestured his hands 
around wildly to make his point.

' Weeeell , if you put it that way.......how about a discount on the Rayearth tapes ?' 
the woman said with a smile, a mischievous glint in her eyes.
_____________________________

Well, as I said before please C&C and MST !

Sorry about the delay on the Synopsis List Review....
It's hot here near the equator, so I have to constantly 
wear my Nabiki Tendo outfit;i.e. loose t-shirt and shorts.
I'm racking up the electric bill with the airconditioning....
Anyway it'll come out, don't worry. 

____________________________________________________________
' Writers are the torchbearers of civilization. We're set in a corner only we
can illuminate.Some of us are searchlights, able to cast a beam into the 
far reaches of the human soul.Some of us are candles , barely able to 
sustain a glow against the darkness. Nevertheless the words I write 
are important, because light is additive. Another's light  doesn't diminish
 my own. Our lights together make us stronger.'   
                   - (After much paraphrasing and reaaranging) Roger Martin  

' ... there's a hell
  of a universe next door ; let's go '
                                e.e. cummings ' Pity the Busy Beast Manunkind '

' How can a person live in a world where she can hear voices only she  
can hear and visions that only she can see ?' 
                                                         - (Paraphrasing) Shirley Jackson                                   

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