Subject: [FFML] [sm][dark] Death of the Void ch.3
From: "Sera Luanma" <seiyalover12@hotmail.com>
Date: 11/5/2001, 4:25 PM
To: ffml@anifics.com
Reply-to:
krislenz@tampabay.rr.com

Moonset on the Horizon
Chapter 3 in Death of the Void
By Sera Luanma

Standard disclaimer applies - They belong to Miss Naoko, not moi.
Hope you enjoy this chapter and the stuff it's leading up to.
http://kristi_8.tripod.com/choice.html

---

Multi-colored rainbows glinted across the room as the beautiful
diamond sparkled, as if in conjunction with the brilliant
sunlight. Dawn had burst over the horizon not moments ago,
blinding the senshi with its beams. Blinding them from the
figure that lay crumpled in the middle of the room, the carpet
around her stained deep crimson with heart's blood. Blood that
lay long cold around Usagi's dead body.

The senshi had waited an hour before venturing into the room.
Their self-excuse was that they were waiting for the Outers,
but in truth, no one wanted to face up to the still figure
whose wound still seeped every now and then. Like the bleeding
and broken heart it was.

Now they stood at the doorway, shock still written across their
faces in deep, clear lines that any onlooker could read and
interpret like a book. They just couldn't understand the body
that lay in front of them. The innocence they had left told
them that if they just closed their eyes and walked away, the
figure would turn into a smiling Usagi, waving her hand at them
as she tried to get to class on time. Society ingrained this
innocence that in itself is just the first lesson in looking
after only yourself, something Usagi had never done.

The threads of an all too tiny universe were coming together for
a spectacular encounter. The fate of all the senshi knew was to
rest on a not too distant future moment when the Child of the
Void would be re-born for the thousandth time and commemorate an
ancient anniversary date. The Child could cast her dice with the
lot of mortals, or she could turn her back and let the universe
self-collapse onto itself. For each time she was re-born, the
Child either cared too much or cared too little. What the senshi
didn't know is that this form was their best bet for survival.
They had been tested and found somewhat lacking to be the Child's
companions and protectors.

Yet they didn't know their failure or the rising evil. All they
knew and cared about at this moment was the limp figure of a once
proud princess.

---

"What are we going to do with the body?" Ami asked with her ever-
practical manner.

"That's cold," Makoto hissed. Out of all the senshi, she was the
one to take this the hardest. She was feeling the deep ache inside
her as she beat her heart and soul into submission and tried to
ignore the hot press of tears against the backs of her eyelids.
The death of her Princess, the only person she had had left to truly
care about, was now dead, and that blow was the final one to an
already unstable mentality.

"I was only-"

"Don't say a word! You were all against her from the beginning. She
died because of us! Because you people wanted this to happen. She
already had a fucking death wish and you just took advantage of
that! Let me tell you something, senshi," Makoto said with venom
laced words, "*My* princess was the woman who showed me my Path.
She will *always* be here!" She pounded on her chest. "She will
never rot in you memories or become an unwilling martyr while I
still hold some small seed of life in this shell of a body!"

Makoto summoned her henshin pen and slipped it between Serenity's
hands. "As long as she is dead, no longer will I bear the name of
Jupiter's Chosen." And with that, Makoto brushed past the stunned
senshi.

A faint melody was heard in the quietness of the sun-splashed room.
It was eerily familiar...yet somehow smug. And then Minako found
herself alone on a barren and weed filled plain. Inside a walled
in circle, there looked to be the remnants of a once well tended
garden. That same haunting melody as before was slipping past her
ears, teasing and taunting as it made her turn around. Minako found
herself overlooking an expanse of water with a small silver pillar
in the center. Minako could faintly make out a blurry figure atop
the column, one that radiated light. She started to walk towards
the cliff's edge and found herself on the brink faster than she
could blink.

'Moonrise...moonset...moonrise...moonset...
You stand at the brink and bet
What melody do you sing when you're falling...
Falling'

All Minako could see though was that angelic figure with her dress
fluttering in an unfelt breeze, humming to herself as she watched
sparkling streams of blood gush down the sides of the pillar.

'Fallen soldier
What song do you hum
Apocalypse or blood
Life coming undone'

Minako took another step, the figure turned and all Minako could
see was those cold lapis eyes boring deep into her inner being and
not stopping when they ripped her apart. Minako cried out in pain as
the billowing hurt radiated outwards to the tips of her fingers and
the nails on her toes.

'Moonrise...moonset...moonrise...moonset...
Betray the fallen oh soldier,
What sword to be borne weeps
Thine enemy to be crossed?'

Minako stepped forward, her sub consciousness screaming that she was
one foot away from nothingness.

Another step.

Minako now had one foot on ground and the other resting in the updraft
from the steep cliff below. Then she took the last step. The plummet
went on and on...But all Minako could see were those sapphire eyes
and hear the tune that would drive her mad.

---

"She's angry." Minako suddenly said, snapping out of her daze.

"Of course Mako-chan's angry, Usagi was her everything." Ami mumbled.

Minako spoke softly, "Not Makoto, Her." She pointed to the
innocently shining body. "Moonrise, moonset eight times." Minako's
eyes suddenly got wide. "Eight lunar years. It's a warning, we will
die and the Earth will be barren and lifeless because She will hold
back her blessings. Only blood will appease her. The only question is
whose..." Minako trailed off.

"How do you know?" Ami asked quietly, truly scared for the first time
in a long while.

"My dream...Right when Mako-chan left...a vision..." Minako's voice
got faint and her eyes glazed over, as if she was looking at a far
away site that no one else could see. She softly hummed a nameless
melody. "'Moonrise...moonset...moonrise...moonset...What melody do you sing
when you're falling...moonrise...moonset...moonrise...moonset...What
soldier weeps for thine enemy crossed?" Minako looked up for a second
at the others and most stumbled back in surprise. The soft cerulean eyes
of Minako were now a hard crystalline blue. The sound that came out of
her mouth a voice from the dead. "Dream oh soldier whilst thou know how
and weep thy angel for a long dead moon hanging like a milky eye from
thine raven hair deep in thoust sky..." She gave a toothy smile and then
all that remained was Minako humming that endless tune.

Stillness fell on the assembled senshi. Minako snapped back to reality
and took a couple steps forward, in the direction of Usagi's body. She
bent down and caressed her strangely pliable hand. She kissed the little
ring on the middle finger and whispered into the smooth pink shell or
Usagi's ear, the words being softly spoken in her ear. "All I ever wanted
was to be next to you. To hold and love you. Even when I was blind, I had
your eyes and when I was lost, it was only in your diaphanous gown. Your
song is the one I'll sing when I'm plummeting into you."

Minako slipped her henshin pen into Usagi's hands, right next to the one
of Jupiter. She did not even notice when the blood began to creep up
her legs. Only when it caressed her inner thigh did she hear the screams
of the other senshi. Minako turned and they watched with horrified eyes
as the cocoon of blood swallowed her.

---

"No! She has taken Minako too!" Rei wailed.

At that moment, the bloody cloak slithered off of Minako's body and
seeped back around Usagi's prone form. Rei gasped as she stared at the
almost sad woman that stood in front of her. She had long reddish-blonde
hair and her lips seemed even deeper, like twin rose petals covered in
fresh blood. But it was her eyes that were the most changed. They were
silvery-blue and held nameless places and faces that had no name. Yet,
when she spoke, it was like hearing the barest whisper of Usagi in her
mouth.

"I will stand with the senshi no longer. May you go where you please and
come where you wish. And I hope you find peace. Because when you sleep,
and when you die in battle, you will find only Her. And she isn't ready
to forgive...or forget."

And with that, what will be known in history only as the Parting, had
happened. More threads coming together in the picture inscribed in the
web of Fate.

---
To be continued...


~Sera Luanma
http://kristi_8.tripod.com/choice.html


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