My strength is my secret.

Every time I race, every time I climb into the driver's seat on the
track, I transform before I hit the starting line.  I've learned how
to control it so my sailor fuku materializes inside the G suit my
sponsors gave me.  I have to: my vehicle is designed for tolerances
that no mere human can aspire to.  And those tolerances are my key to
victory.

But it is always Haruka who steps out of the seat, and for the same
reason every time: Michiru.  She's there with a smile and a hug, and
she'd know in an instant if Uranus hugged her back.  Sometimes her
smile seems forced, though...I fear she may be starting to sense my
transformations.  But I don't know any way to ask her that wouldn't
give it away if she doesn't already know.

I still do foot races on occasion.  Every time, I am tempted to
become Uranus.  But every time, I can feel Michiru's eye on me...and in
the open is a lot harder to hide than enmeshed inside a half ton or
more of machinery.  Fortunately, there are few I face for whom merely
Haruka is not challenge enough.

But the prizes for car races are far more than for foot.  They are my
life.  They are...technically, they are my job.  I'd be broke without
all that prize money.  And I could not win it without Uranus.

I've considered, more than once, just becoming Uranus forever and
abandoning the relatively weak shell that is Haruka.  Uranus could pass
for Haruka, certainly; just tell the pit crews I got a makeover, and
the senshi...well, they'd know the truth before long anyway.  Michiru
would only go along with it if she were Neptune forever...no, forget
it.  Crazy idea.

I've seen it in her eyes.  Michiru *hates* being Neptune.  She's so
much more calm and in control as Michiru; a placid lake as opposed to
the raging sea that comes with her powers.  I'd just be torturing her
by wielding my powers without any of that baggage.  Not to mention the
dangers of accidentally crushing her when she gets frisky.

My strength must remain my secret.

---

My strength is my secret.

Weak, little Hotaru.  A baby, or maybe a child, depending on how old
the magic lets me be.  Physically incapable of interacting with the
world on equal terms...and yet I *know*.  Not only have I had one full
childhood - interrupted when the Death Busters business came to a head,
where I would have died had Usagi not torn my soul out of my dying
body, claiming I was hers to deal with instead of any alien parasite's
- but I remember the Silver Millenium.  Most babies don't mind their
limits because they don't know anything more.

I suppose I'm like Ami, in a way.  Seeing the world go by, knowing you
should be able to do something about the wrongs, but not being able to.
Except she barely understands why.

And I've seen her transform when she thinks she's alone, too.

The others would be alarmed if they saw Saturn.  Even aside from the
question of whether Hotaru can still grow while Saturn deals with
things, they don't fully trust that the evil that plagued me is gone.
And there's the little matter of Saturn being able to destroy the
world.  Which is about due, you know...and which I must stop at all
costs.

A thousand years ago, the Moon Kingdom fell to Beryl's attack, all in
a few days.  A thousand years before that, the Roman Empire began to
crumble, though it took centuries to complete.  And a thousand years
before that...well, what civilization was around then had barely risen
far enough to be considered able to "collapse", at least by today's
standards.  I think we were originally created not too many cycles
before that, made as dieties to protect the people...but over time, our
numbers have dwindled.

Each time, some of the reigning gods sent themselves forwards to the
next cataclysm, leaving the rest to perish.  Only in the last collapse
did the powers that be save themselves at the expense of the people
too.  There are, at least, historical records and ruins of the Romans,
and the civilizations before them.  No trace remains beyond Earth of
the kingdom that once spanned the solar system.

If we allow society to collapse again, even Earth's last refuge of life
would be destroyed.  Maybe the more powerful beings would survive, but
they would be the sole population of a dead, sterile planet.  And my
function is not primarily a destroyer, but a giver of life, only
destroying so that others may grow.  But it is the destruction that is
remembered.

So I monitor the world, sensing when conflict grows too intense.  And
then, Hotaru crawls off somewhere - maybe Haruka and Michiru even
notice her missing, briefly - and Saturn goes off to stop the conflict.
The armies see a woman who radiates power...and then they never
experience anything again.  When it is all over, Saturn returns, and
Hotaru is back in her crib, waiting.

They would never understand.  Saving the world?  That's their job -
despite the fact that they rarely leave Japan.  True, many of the
powerful enemies come here - I'm certain either Luna or Pluto arranged
things that way - but who will save humanity from itself...or from
them?  It has always been the gods who actually start the doomsday
conflicts - and as close as humanity is to having that power for
everyone, it is not there yet.

Perhaps it is for the best that I do not grow too attached to the
other Sailors.  I may have to kill them, someday, so that the humans
who spawned us may survive.  It is always the powerful who must die to
end a conflict.  But I may only be able to succeed if they do not
expect the attack.

Hotaru waits, watching her prey, pretending to nap while Haruka rocks
her gently.

My strength must remain my secret.
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