[FFML] [FanFic][SM][NETTG] Terra in Tokyo Ch. 22 (of 27) "The Queen in Red and Black?! Iä! Iä! Iä! Terra Incognita Fhtagn! Iä!"

[Benjamin A. Oliver]

Heya!

...

Still reading up through chapter 22?  I'm impressed! ^_^


What has gone before:  Now approaching the final battle of the story,
Usagi has gotten captured by the Dark Kingdom, but Sailor Venus
rescued her, kind of.  Meanwhile, Sailor Pluto confronted Terra
Incognita, this story's resident Black Hole Mary Sue, and blasted her
into the unlivable sub-aether between universes, to be utterly wiped
from existence.  The only problem is, Terra is holding on to a worse
secret than just being a mere homicidal maniac in a past life.


Disclaimer:
This story is based loosely on Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon by Naoko
Takeuchi. This is a non-profit fan work created as a tribute, and no
infringement is intended. All rights to the characters, settings, and
situations of Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon belong to Naoko Takeuchi,
Koudansha, TV Asahi, and Toei Douga, and DIC. ArbyFish belong to
Daniel Oliver and are used with permission.  Gotta have ArbyFish.
Wouldn't be proper if we didn't.

Nuke 'Em 'Till They Glow!!
Terra in Tokyo
Final Mix

---Chapter 22:  The Queen in Red and Black?!  Iä! Iä! Iä! Terra
Incognita Fhtagn!  Iä!

	Far out into the bizarre transdimensional ether between all possible
universes, a cloud of smoke and electricity exploded out of nowhere
from an even more indescribable place of nothingness.  From it, a
semi-cohesive shape surged out, eventually taking an ethereal form
vaguely in the silhouette of a human girl.

	One thought dominated the rapidly-fragmenting entity-spirit-thing's
first moments as it plunged through the layers of utter oblivion.  If
it could have spoken, it might have said something on the order of,
"Well, that wasn't very nice!" "Couldn't we have talked this out
instead?" or possibly "AAAAAAAAAHHH!!!"

	Any remaining cognitive efforts were soon drowned out by the ultimate
agony of a spirit being ripped to pieces by the chaos between
universes.  Across the multiverse rang the unique penetrating noise of
a dying soul--the Dead Scream.

	The shell of the shining being cracked and splintered.  Out from the
spiritual wounds poured a great and ancient darkness.  Like smoke from
an intense, concentrated fire that burned across the eternities, the
haze writhed and spread across the unlivable sub-ether.

	Utter blackness roared within the chaos and, drop by drop, the cloud
coalesced into larger and larger constructs which themselves joined
together--each screaming, and writhing as they painfully forced their
consciousnesses together.

	Eventually, the mass became something shaped like an animal--a huge,
primordial animal that would every night prey upon the proto-ancestors
of the universe's sentient beings.  When its image became solid, it
lifted up its mighty head and irately howled to all universes close
enough to hear.

	Structures broke apart in nearby dimensions and humanoid parents
covered the ears of their children as the foul emanations caused all
of them to weep thick, black tears.  Before losing all sense of
sanity, a knowing human observer might have identified the beast as an
unreachable, visceral chaos.  It did not see.  It did not hear. The
six blazing orbs which adorned its warped reptilian head were not
eyes; not primitive organic lumps of gristle with nerves that reacted
to light.  It had no need to gather information in the crude and
limited fashion of a small, fleshy three-dimensional being--what it
needed to know, it simply knew and sensed either from its surroundings
or perhaps from the web of fate itself.

	With the crack of its spined astronomical tails and the sudden flap
of its gigantic, void-spanning wings, the great beast gripped a piece
of nothingness and hungrily tore into it with its myriad claws and
teeth.  When it had ripped open a large enough space in the zero-point
plane, it finally drew back its massive maw and blasted a suitable
sanctuary out of the aether.  Subspace rippled and warped from the
enormous incursion.  Some smaller uninhabited dimensions crumbled away
in its wake.

	Having hollowed out a space for itself, the abomination retreated
within the cavernous pseudo-universe like a great dragon crawling into
its looming fortress deep within the high mountains to rest upon its
hoard.

	Within the proto-universe, the monster's massive frame sparked and
sizzled, demonstrating that it had a wealth of energy, but tendrils
across its body dipped into massive, jagged portals torn into another
unknown realm, suggesting that, perhaps, it may have merely been a
projection of a force far greater than even its titan shape
demonstrated; its crackle was miniscule next to the seething ocean of
fire and brimstone awaiting beyond the walls concealing the source of
its power.

	The monster screamed within its self-made habitat, as if longing to
unleash more of its endless energy, not in the way that a human might
lust for power but in the inescapable way that a world-devouring fire
hungers for more forest to burn.

	The gigantic entity lifted its titanic head above its towering
shoulders, and roared in an eternal triumph for having escaped its
ancient prison.  Beneath it, a nearly broken glowing soul dropped onto
a dark surface.

...

	Terra cried out in horror at the dream as her vision faded back into
view.  She felt the sensation come back into her limbs and the breath
return to her lungs.  She opened one eye and looked at where her hand
should have been.  She saw dull flesh gradually grow and spread across
the incorporeal shining of her spirit.  She could feel her black power
working as if by instinct within a sea of nearly unlimited strength to
allow her to take physical form once more.

	The girl lay naked and shivering on an endless beach of black,
freezing, volcanic sand.  She wasn't sure how much time had passed
since Pluto hit her with the Dead Scream attack.  It could have been
just a few seconds ago, or it might have been a billion years ago.
Getting torn apart at the spiritual level seemed to blur petty
considerations like time and space.

	She reached back and felt her hair.  It was coarse and didn't want to
change this time.  "Dang."  She sighed.  "Ugh.  What just happened?"
she asked herself.  "Why do my eyes hurt?"  Her larynx strained a
little, as if it was the first time she had ever used it.  "Did I
die?"

	WE ARE VERY MUCH ALIVE, BUT HAVE BEEN THROWN OUTSIDE THE LIVABLE
DIMENSIONS, something huge explained in a loud, bellowing alien
language.  It was a series of overlapping shrieks, gasps, and roars
that would probably keep a team of cryptographers and zoologists
occupied for years trying to figure out, and yet Terra understood it
as naturally as if it were in her much-preferred Gaelic.

	The girl stiffened and didn't dare look up for several minutes.
Meanwhile, something very large took deep breaths and, in a cacophony
of thunderclaps, stretched its snapping muscles, each the length of an
asteroid belt.

	"Who just said that?" she whispered quietly.

	WE DID.  SUCH AN INANE QUESTION.

	Although the words had a strong verbal component, the girl mostly
felt it echoing within her head, not her ears.  Finally, she couldn't
take the suspense anymore.  Terra looked up and didn't see anything
except for a cloud of darkness, spread against an unending horizon.
Until, that is, she looked beyond the mist and discovered the shape of
the creature that was her companion in wherever this was.  She cried
out in fright when its long red eyes--or what looked like
eyes--opened, blinked, and stared in her general direction.

	There weren't just two sets of eyes, nor wings, nor claws, and she
had a difficult time taking in the sheer scale of the being.  It
stretched from end to end in the sky, going over the horizon.
Depending on how far away it was, it must have been hundreds or
perhaps thousands of miles across--maybe more.  Millions of miles?!
Whatever the case, she didn't even hardly qualify as a dust mite when
compared to the scale of that thing.

	Terra shuddered from a lot more than the cold.  The word 'monster'
hardly even began to describe what was before her.  It was pretty
scary-looking; a great beast, a horror of horrors that was impossible
to see clearly with her eyes, and probably beyond full human
comprehension; she supposed that to even look upon it would mean to go
mad.

	And yet, she noted to herself, she hadn't gone insane.  That she was
aware of, she amended a second later.  Moreover, looking at the
creature felt roughly as uncomfortable as staring in a mirror on a bad
hair day.  Admittedly, it would have been the WORST bad hair day ever,
but it was still on that level of anxiety.  Perhaps the fact that it
felt normal and mundane to her was the most frightening part.  Minutes
ago, she had felt it tear free from her innermost self!

	"Was that thing inside me that whole time?!" she asked herself
frantically.  "What is it?!"  She paused when another horrible thought
occurred to her.  "And what does that make ME?!"

	WE WERE INSIDE A PRISON; A SHELL OF OUR OWN MAKING.  THAT MAKES US....

	The beast trailed off.

	THIS IS NOT MAKING SENSE.

	Terra's scattered thoughts and mutterings seemed to draw the beast's
attention.  It focused its great beaming eyes on her.  The light
seared just a little as if each of the eyes were large suns in the
sky.  "Crap," she whispered softly.

	WHAT IS THIS?

	"Crap, crap, crap, crap, crap, crap, CRAP!!" The girl got up and
started running away.  "Ow!  Ow!  Ow!"  The volcanic sand stung the
soft flesh of her callus-free bare feet as she hurried to escape.
"Happy thoughts!  HAPPY THOUGHTS!"  She glanced back to see that she
had not made any progress in escaping.  The entity was already
hundreds or thousands of miles away.  There was no way she was going
to be able to escape this thing on foot.  "Darn!"

	The creature let out a small roar and said in its deep, foreboding
and incomprehensible alien language, CURIOUS.  SMALL.  VERY SMALL.
WHAT ARE YOU?

	"Hi," the girl replied in a fading voice as she shook in fear.  "my
name's Terra."

	WHAT.  ARE.  YOU?!

	A clawed appendage reached down from the heavens and poked at the
dirt near Terra.  The impact threw up a lot of sand and knocked the
girl down.  She let out a short scream and rolled out of the way when
another claw smashed into the ground where she had fallen.

	Terra quickly shouted out any facts about herself she could think of.
 She repeated her full name, where she was from, the fact that she was
human, what schools she went to, and other things like what her
favorite kind of ice cream was.

	IT SPEAKS BUT DOES NOT GIVE US THE ANSWER WE DESIRE.

	"What are you?!" screamed Terra, her face messy and full of tears.

	THIS IS OUR NAME.

	A chorus of shrieks and detonations pierced the air, as if it were
the end of all living beings and the universe as it was known.

	"I don't understand!!"

	WE WILL MAKE YOU UNDERSTAND EVEN IF IT IS THE LAST THING YOU EVER COMPREHEND.

	"Yipe!"  Terra felt her heart race and her brain fill with scattered,
broken images.  There were a lot of explosions, screaming, and more
terrible things than she had ever seen.  However, it was disjointed
and out of order; she couldn't make sense of it.  "AAAH! STOP IT!"
She held her head and shut off her mind as best she could.
Eventually, the images faded.  Breathing hard, she said, "Whew!"

	STUBBORN.

	The beast narrowed its eyes and seemed to be concentrating on
something.  Seconds later, a humanoid shape appeared near Terra.  It
was a female child in a black, white and pink dress with long puffy
sleeves.  She had long spiky red hair, and looked probably somewhere
between the age of six and nine.

	"Well well!" said the child as she approached.  "What do we have
here?  An errant personality fragment that thinks it's real?  A
projection that's gotten too independent?  A devoured soul come along
for the ride?"

	"A projection?" whispered Terra in recognition, seeing some parallels
between what had materialized before her and the temporary beings she
had at times created to help her in battle.  "Are you really that
thing up there?"  She pointed upwards.

	The girl scowled at her.  "I'm asking the questions here!"

	Terra racked her brain, trying to figure out what in all the
universes was going on.  She remembered the Star Light Knight's tirade
about H.P. Lovecraft and Queen Metallia--Did he say something about
"Great Old" something or other?  Seven hundred million years?  She
recalled the black world and its comforting nothingness as well as its
lone alien inhabitant and black oozing lifeforms.  She remembered the
black power's feeling within her body, and now she felt it throughout
this entire space, especially concentrated in the being above her.

	"What does this all mean?!"

	The child approached and shoved her in the arm to get her attention.
"What are you?!  Answer me, construct!"

	Since she was closer, Terra got a better look at the pre-teen.  She
remembered the angle of the chin and the basic frame--or extrapolated
what the body should look like in a couple of years.  Her mind quickly
came up with a match.  "Oh.  Oh my.  Are you, by any chance, some kind
of metaphysical representation of Princess Terrifying?  Is that THING
up there really Princess Terrifying?!"

	WE UNDERSTAND NOW.  BUT NOT YET COMPLETELY.

	The child relaxed and a cruel smile graced her face.  "I can see that
you're a little confused."  She held up her hands in a peaceful
gesture.  "You need to accept something very difficult about
yourself."

	"I-I don't know what you're talking about," Terra stuttered.  "What
could I possibly need to accept about myself?!"

	"Look, let me refresh our memory.  That insolent human creature--what
was her name?  Serenity.  Yes, she thought to bring me down to her
level with that magic of hers.  It was only luck that she had a bit of
willpower and just the right energy to give me a bad scratch or two.
And she might have finished me off, had I not changed form to adapt as
I always do."  Terrifying's lips curled into a look of serious
disdain.  She turned away.  "She was fooled so easily.  And when
finally I rose up to slaughter all humans for their arrogance, she
failed to kill me when she had the chance.  Hah!  Weak!  Weak and
stupid!"

	"I would have gotten away with it except--"  Terrifying turned
towards Terra.  "Then I was you.  Why did I become you?  Where did you
come from?"  She snapped her fingers.  "You were there near the
beginning.  You gave us knowledge--a map of where to go; a path that
would allow us to persevere for over nine billion years!  Such a
treasure."

	At Terra's stare, the child stretched forth a hand.  "Remember?  'Can
I touch you?'  It was you that gave us life; sentience; a purpose.
But not the first time.  You know our entire history, and yet you do
not.  What are you?"

	The girl's head hurt trying to assemble the pieces of the puzzle she
had collected over the past long while.  Some of them actually started
to resolve this time.  So, Terrifying really was an evil person, but
had a lot more power than anyone suspected, but Serenity in the past
didn't want to kill her for some reason.  Apparently, there were two
opportunities.  The first chance was when Terrifying first came to the
Moon Kingdom.  Somehow, after that first encounter, Serenity took
Terrifying in and adopted her as her own daughter.  But why?!  It
seemed like an idiotic idea.

	Afterwards, probably some years later, there was an additional, very
brutal, betrayal which lead to the death of all the Sailor Soldiers
and the destruction of the Silver Millennium Alliance.

	It was like some bad eighties soap opera... in outer space!

	"Okay," Terra said, simply absorbing the data as it came.  "So, then,
what's that big black thing covering the whole sky up there?"  A
thought occurred to her.  "Is it the goo?  The goo on the black
planet?  It evolved into THAT?!"

	"Yes!"  Terrifying reached up and grabbed her by the arms.  "It is
us!  We are it!  There is no difference!  How can you not know all of
this?!"  The child sighed irritably.  "Enough of this low-dimensional
prattle!  Join us, so we can get on with our purpose."

	"Join you?!  WHAT purpose?!"

	TO DESTROY ALL! bellowed the monster in the sky.

	"Our purpose is utter mayhem," explained Terrifying.  "Death,
destruction, chaos!  Only through these can our desires be fulfilled!"

	"But someone on the black world talked about peace--"

	"Peace?!" nearly screamed the child.  "What good is it?!"  A strong
wind arose.  Terra crossed her arms in front of her face to block out
the sand and dust.  "We are the Terrifying One of the Ancients.
Remember when I told you our true, full name?"  The ornamentation and
folds of her dress flapping in the gusts.  "I wonder what will happen
when you can finally accept and understand it!"

	The great beast let out an ear-piercing scream.  Terra recalled
similar intonation in the "name" she had been told before, at least
twice.  It was the sound of a trillion voices crying out in terror and
agony, the wholesale destruction of planets, suns, solar systems, and
galaxies from the beginning of time until the end of it.

	"How many times must we strain our voice until you hear it?!" shouted
Terrifying.  "Listen to it.  Accept it!  No longer deny your true
self!"

	"True self?!"

	The shrieks arose once more, terrifying to hear and saddening to
reflect on.  The name reflected all the nameless horrors that could
fill the vastness of eternity.  It was one word, not a sentence or a
description.  One tremendous word embodied what and who the creature
was, but no language Terra knew contained a proper translation for it.

	Crap, she thought to herself.  Not only was Terrifying stuck inside
her this whole time, Terrifying was really a gigantic monster just
like Queen Metallia!  Bigger, even!

	"Shall I continue to humor you, construct?" inquired Terrifying.  "Or
shall I crush you into oblivion?  So difficult to choose."

	"Crush me?!" Terra asked, suddenly finding herself breathing hard.
She looked between Terrifying and the creature in space.  She could
feel their power--their endless, relentless, unrelenting black power.
She was practically drowning in it.

	Terrifying laughed.  "If you insist."  She lifted a finger and aimed
it towards her.  A crackling ball of purple-lined black energy began
to form at her fingertip.  "Then we can finish off what's left of the
humans, starting with those annoying so-called 'friends' of yours.
Won't that be fun?"

	Terra felt a chill at her spine.  She realized the scope of the
monster had in mind.

	"NO!" Terra shouted, and instinctively pulled on whatever strengths
she had available.  Black responded quickly to her call.  She couldn't
tell how long she compressed time to enhance her attack, but when she
let go, her dainty girly fist slammed into Terrifying's face with
enough force to smash the child's jaw and send her skidding and
tumbling backward across the landscape to the point where she lost
sight of her.

	"Crap!  What did I just do?!" Terra asked herself frantically.  "Did
I just--I mean, is it too late to say I'm sorry?!"

	ARGH!!

	Above, the monster's eyes flared.  Terra wondered if she had she
surprised it or if she had actually hurt it in some manner.  In any
case, she just knew that she was going to have to fight now.  Against
something bigger than Metallia.  Without any Sailor powers.  Or
clothes.  Or--

	Her thoughts were interrupted when she felt the strength surrounding
her.  She looked at her fist.  It burned with black power; her muscles
did not seem to show signs of the strains she usually got when
compressing time like that.  The possibilities raged in her mind.  It
occurred to her that there might be a way to stop this creature, or at
least survive this.

	Terrifying rematerialized in front of her.  This time she did not
appear as a child.  She was a little bit older--probably around
eighteen, and her body beneath her dress was leaner and tighter.  She
was a head and a half taller than Terra, and muscles in her arms
seemed to have gained some definition as well.

	"You are going to fight ME?!" asked Terrifying, who obviously
considered the concept patently absurd.  "ME?!"  She shook her head.
"I think not.  You WILL fall into line, construct, or face the
consequences!"

	The projection's tone really upset Terra.  Actually, a lot of things
in the past while had started to make her pretty downright angry.
There was the pain caused by the Star Light Knight, the horrors
inflicted upon her by Arby the ArbyFish, the accusations back in the
Moon Kingdom, which then followed her back home, Sailor Pluto's
attempted murder of her, and now this.

	"Release your resistance," soothed Terrifying in what Terra perceived
as a really annoying, condescending tone.  "Allow yourself to slip
away, and you will once again rejoin the whole.

	"No."  Terra grit her teeth and put her foot down heavily.  She
didn't care if this thing was some kind of elder god from beyond the
depths of time and space.  "I'm going to beat the tar out of you AND
your freaky shadow monster!"

	The ground shook.  Above, the monster seemed to have chuckled.

	"Laugh all you want," Terra nearly growled.  The girl's mind flashed
through dozens of possibilities and patterns.  She knew she needed
something that would give her an edge or at least a chance.  A punch
was nice and all, but it hardly had the sheer 'oomph' required to
battle someone or something that was almost certainly even stronger
than Metallia.

	If only she could transform into a Sailor Soldier that used all the
black power she had available--if gave her anywhere as much strength
and control as being Sailor Moon in the Moon Kingdom had, she might be
able to do some serious damage here.  The pattern of how to do exactly
that faded into her consciousness.  For the first time, the power was
readily available and answered instantly to her call.  She focused and
called on it.

	Black edged with red coalesced in the air into a thick stylized
emblem with six spheres embedded in the metallic object.  It had a
solid black crystal focus in the center.

	"What the heck," Terra whispered when the pattern seemed to call for
a transformation phrase, "why not?!  Freaky Interdimensional Beast
Power, Make Up!!!"

	The emblem flew to her chest and from it sprang a flurry of gothic
black ribbons.  The material encased her body in a skintight off-white
leotard.  Just like a Sailor Soldier, she acquired rather plain bows
and a miniskirt with lace trim, as well as flat-soled boots, a tiara,
and elbow-length gloves.  Like a claw, the tiara had talon-like
protrusions that curled back through her hair.  The gems flared and
made a noise like the growl of a mountain lion.

	Her new visage looked like it wanted to be intimidating in a Queen of
Darkness kind of way, but it fell short in many ways, especially when
the girl reached back and tied her back-swept hair into a pair of
cutesy ponytails with adorable pink ribbons.

	"How sweet," Terrifying mocked her.  "What will you do now?  Twirl a
wand and throw magic at--"  She stopped when a small gloved fist
smashed into her forehead just above the bridge of her nose.  "Weak.
Very weak."

	Terra's fist stung from the strike.  All the force she had sent into
it reflected back into her body, leaving Terrifying completely
unscathed this time while Terra reeled back, her rage continuing to
build.

	"Say my name," demanded the projection.

	"Terrifying," Terra nearly spat.

	"Our REAL name!"

	SAY MY NAME!!

	"I CAN'T EVEN PRONOUNCE IT!" Terra growled and punched again.

	Terrifying caught the fist and painfully twisted the girl's arm
around, putting her into a lock.  She proceeded to rub her knuckles
into the shorter individual's hair.  "Does this make you angry?  Are
you upset?  Is this the extent of your wrath?  Too bad.  Nothing you
can do about it."

	The girl kicked at her captor, who did not act as if she even felt it.

	"You poor thing.  You're confused, mad, and alone."  Terrifying
laughed, twisting Terra around and looking into her eyes.  "It's time
for you to abandon that pitiful human shell of yours and rejoin the
whole.  Don't worry, it's not all bad."  The whites of her eyes went
black.  "What's the human saying?  When life gives you lemons, make
lemonade.  Make the best of it, Terra!  Embrace eternity."

	"I REFUSE!"  Terra could feel the foreign thoughts again trying to
flood her mind.  "GIVING ME... LEMONS?!"  She felt new-found distaste
in the latest attempt to dominate her.  "I DON'T WANT YOUR DANG
LEMONS!"  Drawing deeply upon the black energy surrounding her,
Terra's eyes glowed a dark red.  "I'M GONNA MAKE AN EXPLODING LEMON...
THAT'S GONNA BURN YOUR FACE OFF!!"  She grappled with the aether and
dragged time to a standstill.  She stopped paying attention to how
long she strained her muscles in this situation.  The anger sustained
her.  It felt good--very good--to give in to it.

	When she let go, she had no idea how much force her hand had when it
collided with Terrifying's solar plexus.  The ground shook and
Terrifying did not move for a second.  Then, a huge splash of dark red
exploded from behind the taller girl.  It wasn't blood--it was a
substance a hundred times more eternal.  Terrifying's lower chest soon
caved in from the follow-through.  Her jaw hung open and she let out a
painful cough.  Time still must have been somewhat compressed because
Terrifying rose into the air while Terra continued to pour her rage
into it.

	When time snapped back to normal, Terrifying spun head over heels
into the air and crashed into the black sandy terrain.  An aura of
red-tinged black reverberated around Terra as she continued to gather
her strength.

	"Do you," nearly choked Terrifying as she tried to stand, "really
think you can win?"

	Terra stomped her foot down and prepared to attack again.  "I DON'T
EVEN CARE ANYMORE!!"

	The monster above growled.  HOW LONG WILL YOU DENY US?!!

	"SHUT UP!" Terra shouted at the giant beast in the sky.  "I DON'T
CARE WHO OR WHAT YOU ARE!  I'LL WHACK YOU LIKE THE NEGAMAFOOZLE YOU
ARE!!!"

	Terrifying made another attempt to straighten up, then once she found
herself unable to do so, she "hmphed" at the girl, and vanished.

	The ancient being had obviously gotten quite upset at her resistance.
 The creature drew closer, causing the world's atmosphere to compress
suddenly and blow gale-force winds in its wake.  It swiped down at her
with claws the size of Mount Everest.

	OBEY THE WISHES OF THE WHOLE!!

	She saw the claw come towards her.  She didn't care.  The mere sight
of the creature filled her with hatred.  Time condensed once again,
and fueled by darkness, she drew back her fists, which were covered
with condensed, solidified black.  She hurled punches, which became
bolts of pure force launched at the creature ahead of her.  Explosions
rocked the claw, but it continued to speed towards her.

	Her mind filled with a new, more powerful genetic pattern with
instructions on how to transform into it.  It was even easier than
changing her hair around had been.  Unleashing the adaptation, her
hair grew, darker, spikier and more wild than ever before, her muscles
bulged, she grew red fur over much of her body, and a long, thick
primate tail appeared at the base of her spine.

	Combining time compression with this new body's strength, Terra
launched her attacks at the claw.  She appeared to do no damage until
it made physical contact with her gloved fists.  Even with time slowed
down, she smashed again and again into the creature's appendage.  She
punched a dozen times.  A hundred.  A thousand.  Tens of thousands of
times.  Finally, she drew back an arm engulfed in darkness and threw a
tremendous uppercut.

	The world rippled when an explosion of pure kinetic energy shook the
tiny proto-universe.  The astronomical creature roared in pain when it
watched its claw heave backwards, broken in the places where Terra had
struck and shining a molten red.

	Time crashed back to normal. Her thick skin steamed from friction
with the air, but she felt otherwise all right.  The tail felt a bit
awkward, though.  Apart from the blackness, her body generated a
peculiar kind of energy, color-coded gold, laced with her familiar
red.  It was very malleable and responded quite readily to her will.

	Terrifying reappeared nearby.  "What do you think you're playing at?
You're only hurting yourself, you know!"

	The furry girl pointed her hands at Terrifying and, with an angry
yell, let her energy flow forwards.  "RRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRR!!!"

	A three-foot-diameter golden beam shot out and slammed into the
adopted princess.  Engulfed for several seconds, Terrifying cried out
in pain and crumbled into glittering blue fragments under the
onslaught.

	The beam swept across the featureless landscape and detonated far
away against the turf.  The fabricated world-between-worlds shook from
the explosion and a ten-mile-high mushroom cloud shot into the air.

	Terra crossed her arms in front of her face and resisted the
resulting shockwave.

	Beside her, Terrifying reappeared, unscathed but insanely mad.  "You
want to fight, do you!?  I'LL SHOW YOU A FIGHT!!"

	The several-hundred-mile-long monster let out a piercing shriek and
slashed again at the comparatively miniscule girl.  With time as her
plaything and a body that could operate within it, she dodged easily.
Then it swung one of its jagged tails towards her, which she just
barely managed to avoid.  She then raised her arms, charged up huge
globes of energy around them, and fired off a massive broadside across
the length of the beast.

	Large explosions, bigger than what she had first thrown at
Terrifying, sprang up across the sky-dominating beast's flank.

	But the monster didn't seem to even be fazed by the assault this
time.  It spread its wings, drew in huge amounts of black energy from
the portals around it, and vomited a sickening purple blast several
orders of magnitude larger than anything Terra had done.  The shot
looked like it could easily wipe out a planet, or even destroy a sun,
for that matter.

	PERHAPS THIS WILL COOL YOUR HEAD.

	The girl's energy molded easily into a spherical barrier, but quickly
buckled under the onslaught.  Even against her wrath, there really
wasn't any comparison.  Her body vaporized as easily as Terrifying's
had.

	SUBMIT!!!

	After an instant's shock and disorientation, Terra felt her body
rebuilding itself, and when it was done, she looked down and saw it
was her normal human self.  She willed her Sailor transformation back
as well, but after that she took a deep breath and nearly collapsed
from the effort.  She could still feel the rage, but getting
obliterated had set her back temporarily in the overwhelming power
department.

	Terrifying reappeared and looked smugly at her.  "Do you see now what
power the whole has?  Join us, and we can get on with things."

	"I'll never," Terra forced out angrily, "I'll NEVER join you!
Murderer... Genocide... Monster!"

	"Hah!  I am rubber, you are goo!"

	"Isn't the saying 'glue?'" Terra asked.

	Without responding to the question, the beast roared with renewed
laughter while Terrifying stalked towards her prey.

	"By the way, did you ever figure out how it was that you managed to
travel back to the Silver Millennium and participate in its downfall?"

	"I WILLED IT TO HAPPEN!"  Terra shot back.  "THEN I DID EVERYTHING IN
MY POWER TO SAVE IT... NO THANKS TO YOU AND ALL YOU DID!"

	STILL IN DENIAL.  HOW AMUSING.

	"Partly right," admitted Terrifying.  "Did you ever wonder why I, as
powerful as I am, didn't manage to stop you from taking over my own
mind and body?"

	Terra got back up and began again to draw in the blackness, which
fueled and amplified her anger.  "BECAUSE... I'M STRONGER THAN YOU!!"

	Terrifying shook her head.  "No, no, dear construct.  It's not
because you're stronger than me, or because I wished it to happen that
way.  The only reason it could have EVER happened was because I AM
YOU!"

	"I COULD NEVER BE YOU," Terra growled.  "EVEN IF SOMEHOW YOU WERE ME
IN A PAST LIFE... YOU ARE THE PAST!  I AM NOTHING LIKE YOU!"

	"I didn't say you were me in a past life," Terrifying amended.  "I
said I am you.  Right now, you and I are the same being."

	Semi-coherent thoughts flitted through Terra's brain.  Terrifying's
words didn't really mesh with what she knew and thought.  Even if she
had multiple personalities or some other kind of weird psychosis, that
personality wouldn't be her, exactly, would it?

	"THAT CAN'T BE RIGHT!  THAT'S IMPOSSIBLE!!"

	"Search your feelings," the woman insisted as an ominous wind sprang
up across the landscape.  "You KNOW it to be true!"

	Terra searched her feelings.  They were full of chaos, anger, and
disdain.  Beyond that, the facts she knew and what she had been able
to do thus far seemed like pretty downright compelling evidence that
her enemy might very well have been right.  "NOOO!" Terra shouted
against the oncoming dust storm.

	JOIN US.

	"We can destroy the Dark Kingdom if you like," Terrifying added.  "We
can destroy all those who offended you in the solar system.  We can
destroy the galaxy and, someday, the universe itself!  All of it, ours
for the taking!  Join us, and take part in the ultimate rapture of
obliteration!!"

	"NEVER!!!" repeated the girl.  She had started to pant from the
effort of maintaining her rage and remaining separate from the entity
that sought to consume her.

	"Only then can we return and have that 'peace' you so seem to cherish."

	With tears flowing down her cheeks, Terra screamed in anger and
unleashed a gigantic coherent beam at the monster in the sky.  It
raised one of its many clawed hands and blocked the shot effortlessly.
 The more she fought and threw her strength into it, the more the
beast pushed back.

	"I HATE YOU!!  I HATE EVERYTHING YOU ARE!!!   I.  WILL.  NEVER.
GIVE... IN...!!!!"

	YOU HATE YOURSELF THAT MUCH?  The creature reared its head and
shouted, THEN WE SHALL DESTROY YOU UNTIL YOU ARE TOO WEAK TO RESIST!
DIE, DIE, DIE A MILLION MORE DEATHS!!!

	"Now you're gonna get it," Terrifying smirked, and vanished once more.

	The entire makeshift world erupted into a great pillar of fire.
Terra's body once again vaporized.  Little red things came out and
started poking her with pitchforks.  The visions of a trillion lost
souls flashed by her vision.

	The rage burned away slowly.  It took a very long time, and after a
while, Terra noticed that, underneath the protective layer of hate,
she was in pain.  It was kind of tough to tell without any real
physical sensory input other than sight.  And yet somehow, the
spiritual stinging didn't seem like such a big deal.  However, any
time she attempted to regenerate her physical form, it quickly got
annihilated again.  The monster refused to let up; the situation
seemed utterly hopeless.  Terra felt her will falter and more terrible
imagery flood her mind.

	Then, steaming, Arby the ArbyFish fluttered out of the nothingness
with a seared, poofy chef's hat and a ballpark serving tray stuffed
with all kinds of random odds and ends.  "Red 'ots!  Get'cha spoicy
'shrooms whoile they're still smoulderin'!"

	A red-colored ArbyFish hopped through the maelstrom and gave Arby a
few lumps of coal.  "Oye'll take ten," said the little creature in a
gruff Australian voice.  "Oye loikes it 'OT!"

	"Oh, quotie 'ot they is!  Turns ya insoides ta charcoal before they's
even gone down!"

	And then both ArbyFish were lost to sight.

	While that was quite bizarre, Terra thought, it didn't really help
her very much.  Thinking about Arby and his insane antics did seem to
push back the monstrous thoughts assaulting her.  What, she wondered,
could she do or turn into to escape her current situation?  Maybe if
she knew how to turn into an ArbyFish, that would help.

	An ArbyFish.  She was actually contemplating wanting to be an
ArbyFish.  She decided that true insanity had finally taken her.  But,
come to think of it, even if she REALLY wanted to do it; to go that
far, could she?

	A genetic pattern flashed across her mind.  It was considerably more
difficult and twisty than anything else she'd seen.  It worried her
that it might be that of an ArbyFish.  Dared she try it?

	But, she figured, why not?  After all, the alternative was to just
remain in a fiery torment until she decided to submit to an evil
monster-thing she hated.  Fighting against the storm, she pulled in
all the darkness that would come.

	The pattern was hard to implement.  She had to slow time considerably
to figure out all of its intricacies without getting her concentration
broken.  Even then, some pieces failed to make sense as to why they
were in place, but she worked them in anyway.  Then, with a mighty
puff, the form was complete.

	WHAT IS THIS?!

	"Gotcha!" Terra cried loudly and clearly into the fiery chaos.  She
flew around playfully within, not even getting her fur singed.  She
fluttered about with ease in the totally unlivable atmosphere.
Glancing at herself, she saw that she had pink and white fur, laced
with a bit of red.  And for some incomprehensible reason, she had a
pair of big green ribbons on her head that tied back a mane of red and
pink into a pair of obnoxiously cutesy ponytails.

	The astronomical entity howled angrily and fired huge bolts of energy
at Terra, but she glided easily around them, fluttered and skipping
across the beams, laughing at the rush of excitement she felt.

	In this form, everything made a strange kind of sense.  It felt like
she had binged on a gazillion high-caffeine energy drinks after
chewing and swallowing every anti-depressant and psychotropic drug in
a hundred pharmacies.  Instead of a frightening monster, she perceived
the creature as a giant fluffy toy.  She hopped along its burning,
shadowy carapace, drawing cute graffiti of flowers and kittens.  She
quickly avoided every slash, dodged every energy bullet, and ignored
everything it said and shouted at her.

	Giggling like mad, she kept at this for quite a while.  She drank in
the insanity.  The entity's thoughts held no sway over her whatsoever
in this form.  Whenever it tried to control her mind, she laughed and
handed it a box of chocolates before doing a midair dance of joy.

	The flames eventually stopped when, apparently, the great beast
decided they were not having any useful effect.  The blaze shut down
and the proto-universe resolved back into to the blackened volcanic
landscape.

	When Terra drifted back to the surface and began to plant flowers,
Terrifying appeared.  "That's cheating, you know!" the adult version
of her human self said.

	"In-deed!" Terra replied smugly, perching on the woman's shoulder.
"You can't beat an ArbyFish!  It wouldn't be proper if you could!"
She pulling out another box of chocolates and handed it to her
opponent.  "There you go!  Don't spend it all in one place."

	She started to flutter off, but then realized that she had nowhere to
flutter to.  She thought back to everything Arby did, and after
recoiling at several memories, she drew a blank as to what she did
next.  "Aww, sugar!  All that time he spent toying with me and I
didn't learn anything that one trick of his!"  She snapped her flipper
in disappointment.

	"There's a way around the ArbyFish defense," Terrifying said after a while.

	"The ArbyFish Defense!" Terra giggled.  "It's like the Chewbacca
Defense, y'see, only then we gotta use advance scientific applications
and brain chemicals instead of Wookies.  Gotta have Wookies living on
Endor with the Ewoks or else their sociopolitical structure would
collapse and fall to the space badgers.  Gotta have space badgers
clawing up your planets' trees and burrowing holes into them, y'know."
 She fluttered out of Terrifying's reach when she tried to grab at
her.  She settled back on her head before continuing.  "Wouldn't do to
just let the trees try to hollow out themselves.  They'd get bored and
start filing injunctions against each other, claiming that the other
tree should hollow out their bark--pretty soon they'd start a
hole-digging hedge fund, taxing each others' shrubbery and setting
liens against each others' branches.  It's environmentally unsound!"

	"I am going to throw you into a black hole," threatened Terrifying.
At Terra's unblinking smile, she added, "I'll do it!"

	"'Course you will!  Except for one thing."  Terra pulled out another
box of chocolates and showed it to her.  "Here, look at this!"

	Terrifying stared at it.  "It's a box of chocolates."

	"No, no, no, it's a MAGIC box of chocolates."

	"What makes it magic?"

	"It's full of TRUFFLES!"  She munched down on one, chewed on it for a
bit, and then and held out another to Terrifying.  "Here, try one!
They're Sickeningly Sweet!"  She gave a closed-eye grin.

	Terrifying shook her head and vanished, replaced by a dark sphere.
Gravity rapidly increased, drawing Terra in towards it.  She hopped
back at first, then fluttered against the pull as fast as her little
tail would carry her, but trying to escape the event horizon of a
singularity soon became a losing battle.  The black land crumbled
away, drawn into the object, where it was then ground up into
subatomic particles and spit out through the top and bottom as gamma
radiation.

	The exciting and crazy capabilities of the ArbyFish form kept her
going for quite a while, but it seemed that even that had its
limitations.  She glanced back at her oncoming doom and wished it
would stop.  Dying was uncomfortable--beyond painful.  Even once had
been enough to quench her wrath and make her start from square one.
She didn't want to have to go through it again if she could avoid it.
She didn't quite know what it would do to her this time.

	As if in accordance with her will, the black hole soon evaporated.
What remained of the dark world stopped and sloughed back down below
her, glowing white with heat and radiation before cooling off under
the application of the monster's black power.

	Panting from the effort, both mental and physical, she fluttered to
the ground and looked up at the beast, which looked unbothered and
prepared to keep going for as long as she intended to resist.  She
decided an alternate strategy would soon become necessary.  Beating it
up with her anger didn't work.  Blasting it with huge amounts of power
didn't even leave a scratch.  Even going all out with insanity as an
ArbyFish had its limits.  But there was one thing that seemed to have
an effect: her own will.

	A crazy thought occurred to her.  It was just so stupidly easy that
she was surprised she didn't notice it before.  She returned to human
form with the sailor outfit.  Using the mechanisms of Sailor-style
powers, she pulled again on the blackness to freeze time.

	"Hey!" she called up to the creature.  The communication was more
mental than it was verbal.

	HELLO, it responded in a roar of screeches and clicks.

	She stood there staring into the monster's fiery eyes, thinking about
what she was about to do.

	"So, you're saying that I'm really part of you, right?"

	YES.

	"Okay, just making sure."

	Terra's unspoken logic went like this:  "Okay, if I'm really this big
thing, and it's me, which I doubt, I ought to know what it knows, and
moreover, I ought to be able to control it, like I think I kind of
just did."  If it came down to a contest of wills, she thought, she
would have to just burn that bridge when she reached it.

	Come to think of it, she really didn't have any specific plan, but it
was comforting to think that maybe whatever she did next might have a
chance at working.  At least, currently, she felt strong enough to
keep time frozen indefinitely, or until she could come up with a
better plan.  However, even with time frozen perfectly and completely
still, the monster could apparently still move.

	How is that possible?! Terra shouted silently to herself.  I can see
why we'd be able to communicate, but it'd have to be moving infinitely
fast to move with time frozen!

	The creature lowered a pair of its smaller talons carefully around
the girl and gripped her tightly like one might capture a dust mite
with a pair of tweezers.

	YOUR FINAL WARNING.  WE TIRE OF THIS.  SUBMIT!

	Terra figured there was no point in keeping the time freeze going and
allowed time to crash back to normal.  She willed the claws around her
to loosen, which they did.  It surprised her that she really had
control over that.  "So," she said, "it looks like I can influence
things around here."

	The muscular structures connected to the talons twitched, like they
wanted to close in on her, but she willed them to stay where they
were.

	"While I was thinking," Terra added, "I noticed something.  Or
rather, I came up with an interesting question.  Why would something
as big as you even care about what I think?  What does it matter if I
submit to you or not?  I turned into things more powerful than I ever
imagined before, but you still beat me back down so easy."

	The monster growled at her.

	Terrifying appeared again.  "You think in such simple
four-dimensional terms.  Whatever you're thinking about right now
can't help you.  You cannot defeat one as great as I."

	"No, no, humor me," Terra insisted.  "Look, you keep changing your
story.  You're acting like we're separate people, but you said that
you and I are the same individual, or does that make us a collective?
Or whatever it is you think I am.  And I can stop you from doing
things."  She focused her mind and waved off the claw, which retreated
into the sky.  "I can control you!"

	NO ONE CONTROLS US!  NO ONE!!!

	"No one except yourself," Terra corrected the monster.  "Well, guess who I am!"

	A great angry shriek erupted from the very core of the realm.

	"You pathetic, foolish little tart!" Terrifying screamed at her.

	"I know you're hungry, but I'm not an English pastry.  Anyway, I'm
Irish."  Terra couldn't help but chuckle at her stupid attempt at
humor.  "And that's not a very nice thing to say about yourself."

	The woman smacked her hard across the face.

	"Hey," Terra protested, rubbing the red spot, "quit hitting yourself!"

	Red with rage, Terrifying vanished.

	Terra stood up straight and looked into the great abyssal eyes of the
creature.  "So what's it going to be?  I'm not doing what you want!
Shall we continue this contest until one of us cries uncle?  Or want
to listen to the alternative?"

	I WILL DESTROY YOU!!

	"Got you," whispered the little girl, who then held her arms out
wide.  "GO AHEAD!  TRY IT!!  DESTROY ME NOW!  DESTROY ME!  C'MON, YOU
KNOW YOU WANNA!"

	Roaring like a gazillion enraged leopards, the ancient thing raised a
jagged, energy-charged fist, and smashed it down upon the girl's
location.

	Focusing her will, Terra held up her outstretched hand and stopped
the attack, appearing to outside observers to have blocked it with her
might.  She didn't even feel pressure downward.  "Well, that's easier
than getting myself all worked up over this."

	WE HATE YOU!

	"And I hate you."  Terra laughed.  "I guess that means I hate myself,
huh?  Guess I gotta go write up some depressing poetry or cut myself
or draw a picture of something in black marker, doesn't it?"

	HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE?

	"Maybe I'm not good at it," the girl whispered, "But I can usually
control myself.  I don't know all of what you are to me or what I am
to you, but I doubt I can run from you.  I'm facing you now.  Oh, and
your name, which is my name, sort of?  I think I understand it now.
It's not a name like I know names.  It's more of a long description.
There are no words for it exactly in any language I know, but a
half-decent translation... is Galactic Destroyer."

	YOU... HAVE CALLED ME--!!

	Terra nodded.  "I've said a name that describes what you are.
Personally, I'd have liked it better if I could just call you
Azathoth, Nyarlathotep, Charizard, Bernadette, Charlotte or whatever,
but none of those are your name.  Galactic Destroyer.  That's who you
are; a destroyer of lives, planets, societies, dreams, ambitions,
destinies, suns, solar systems, and galaxies.  No other name even
comes close."

	The beast, Galactic Destroyer, seemed to be placated somewhat.  It
withdrew back to the sky.

	YES.  WE ARE THE GALACTIC DESTROYER, BORN OVER NINE BILLION YEARS AGO
AMIDST CHAOS AND HARDSHIPS, THE DESTRUCTION OF OUR OWN WORLD, AND SO
WE SWORE REVENGE AGAINST ALL.  WE TRAVEL THE VOID BETWEEN WORLDS TO
OBLITERATE ALL THAT STANDS IN OUR WAY, FOR THE JOY AND HUNGER TOWARD
REACHING MY GOAL OF TOTAL ANNIHILATION!

	"So you can have peace," added Terra.

	YES.  SO WE CAN HAVE PEACE.

	"Well, hiya, Gee-Dee, nice to meetcha," said the girl.  "Mind if I
call you Jeadie like the Star Light Knight did?  Or maybe 'Jeanie.'  I
like that one.  How about Jenny?  Anyway, MY name is Terra Incognita.
I told you once before but I'm repeating it in case you weren't
listening.  I was born nearly fifteen years ago in a hospital in
London.  I lived most of my innocent little life in Ireland with
parents that I love dearly.  My goals are to get good grades in school
and become a top fashion superstar pop idol model."  Terra had to
admit, there was a rather sharp dichotomy between her stated history
and that of the monster.  "Anyway, let's talk.  I don't want to
destroy things, but you do.  Can we make a deal?"

	WE DO NOT BARGAIN WITH LESSER CREATURES.  WE SLAUGHTER THEM!!

	"No worries.  You're bargaining with an equal," Terra noted.  "After
all, you cannot be any less great than yourself, can you?"

	Galactic Destroyer appeared to consider this.  AGREED.  WHAT DO YOU PROPOSE?

	"A truce, of sorts.  But to make it fair to everyone, I'll need more
info.  Where were you?  Where did you come out of?"

	WE SLEPT IN THE DEPTHS OF A FABRICATED SPIRIT CLOTHED IN MANUFACTURED
FLESH, WHILE A PERSONALITY CONSTRUCT LIVED ON WITH OUR GUIDANCE AMONG
THE HUMAN RACE.

	"You slept.  Okay.  Was it an unpleasant sleep?"

	EVERY MOMENT WE ARE KEPT FROM OUR PURPOSE IS AN UNQUENCHABLE TORMENT.
 WE FEEL THE ANGER AND HUNGER OF THE AGES THAT WILL NOT BE SATISFIED
UNTIL OUR PEACE IS RESTORED.

	Terra winced.  "I'll take that as a yes.  How about, then, if I
destroyed something small now and again.  Would that satisfy you?"

	NO.

	"Why not?"

	THE UNIVERSE WILL REMAIN.  THE RAPTURE WE FEEL AT THE DESTRUCTION OF
AN ENTIRE RACE IS ONLY BECAUSE IT BRINGS US CLOSER TO OUR GOAL.

	Terra frowned.  "What can we do, then?"

	Terrifying faded in again and sighed.  "You're too naive, Terra.  You
think small.  All you want is to get good grades and make 'Mommy and
Daddy' happy.   Will you submit if we agree to allow you to live out
your life?  Say, a hundred years?"

	"What happens after that?"

	EARTH, ITS SOLAR SYSTEM, ITS CLUSTER, ITS GALAXY, WILL BECOME OUR
PREY.  WE WILL DESTROY IT--SMASH IT INTO OBLIVION BETWEEN OUR TEETH.

	"No!" Terra shot back.  "Even if you gave me a thousand years, I
would not submit.  Not to that."

	"Then we are at an impasse," said Terrifying, "which will only end in
more conflict."

	Terra shook her head.  There HAD to be something they could work out.
 In all the TV shows where people negotiated, there was always some
kind of compromise that left both parties satisfied to one extent or
another.  "There HAS to be a solution to this that doesn't involve me
giving in to you but doesn't involve everything I know and love
getting blown up!"

	WE COULD SPARE YOUR WORLD, UNTIL THE VERY END.

	"A billion years," said Terrifying.  "It's a good offer.  Human
civilization, if it lasts even a hundredth of that, will not be the
same thing you know and love right now.  Take it and we will allow you
to do what you please here, until a hundred or a thousand years pass.
A drop in the bucket for us.  Then you will come with us to end this
universe."

	The girl from Ireland thought it over.  "But I'd still have to go and
become a genocidal maniac after that's over."

	YES.

	"Omnicidal, actually," Terrifying corrected her terminology.
"Everything must go."

	Terra looked at her hand and flexed the gloved digits.  She imagined
what she could do in a thousand years.  She could try to get on Tuxedo
Mask's good side.  She could try to win his heart.  She relished the
thought of going back to her friends and enjoying her time with
them--especially him.  But, however much she wanted that, she could
not stomach becoming someone like Princess Terrifying, or the Galactic
Destroyer.  They pretty much epitomized everything she disliked.  On
the other side of the coin, it seemed that her counterparts would
accept nothing less than absolute devotion to the dark side.

	Someone here was going to lose.

	The teen from Ireland looked up at the others and said, "I'm sorry I
can't make you happy.  But, sometimes, I guess we just have to deny
ourselves.  You may fight all you want, but I'm going to win."

	The Galactic Destroyer snarled.

	"You'll shortly be eating those words," smirked Terrifying.

	Terra smiled sadly.  "I'll shortly be eating YOU."

	"What?!"

	"Swallowing, rather.  Kind of.  Absorbing."

	"You can't do that!" Terrifying balked.  She glanced at the monster.
"Can she do that?"

	"Just doing what I guess I built myself to do," commented Terra.
"And that's to contain you!"

	Terra adopted a wide posture and held out her arms and began to draw
in the darkness.  The strength quickly pulled in.  A wind began to
blow.  This was more--orders of magnitude more--than she had done
previously to fight against the Galactic Destroyer, freeze time, or
transform.   Once the power in the ambient air was gone, the Galactic
Destroyer itself began to gravitate towards her.  Angrily, it vomited
an energy blast at her, but like jello getting sucked into a vacuum
cleaner, she absorbed it.

	"You can't be serious!" Terrifying protested, suddenly leaning
backward in an effort to keep from getting drawn in.

	"I'm declaring dominance," Terra affirmed.  "Self-actualization all
the way!"  She intensified the pull.

	Terrifying screamed, turned into black energy, and flowed into her.

	The Galactic Destroyer roared in rage.

	DON'T THINK YOU'VE WON.

	"Hey, a girl's gotta take a stand sometime."

	YOU WILL SEE HOW FUTILE IT IS.  YOU WILL SUCCUMB TO US IN THE END.

	"You don't know that."

	YES WE DO.  WE ARE ONE.  WE ARE YOUR NATURAL STATE.  IN TIME, A VERY
SHORT PERIOD OF TIME, YOU WILL BE UNABLE TO DENY IT.

	"Maybe, but not for now."

	YOU WILL RUE THIS DAY!

	"Go back to the shadows where you came from."

	THOSE SHADOWS ARE THE CORE OF YOUR VERY SOUL.

	Terra closed her eyes and let the tears flow out.  "I know."

	Total blackness and chaos engulfed the girl, spinning in a great
whirlpool into her.  Millions of cubic feet--BILLIONS AND THEN
TRILLIONS--of the black mist poured downwards.  She struggled to haul
it all in.  She choked and coughed up puffs of blackness now and
again, but she continued.

	The process seemed to take hours; there was a lot to absorb.  Toward
the end, she was wildly shouting, crying, and wailing, but she
thoroughly finished her task.  Terra Incognita virtually burned in a
pillar of fiery blackness.

	A mark glowed on her forehead--a symbolic depiction of the monster.
It had an outline of the face as well as its horrible burning eyes
that were not eyes.

	"GALACTIC DESTROYER, YOU'RE SEALED INSIDE ME NOW!"

	Like the reversal of a multicolored ink-stain, or a shallow bruise,
the mark faded.  Terra fell onto her side, eyes wide and nearly
hyperventilating.  When the pillar of darkness faded, she was able to
feel herself shivering on the cold dark sand.

	"Okay," she breathed, "now THAT was the single worst experience of my
entire life."

	But it wasn't over yet.  In the distance, she could see the terrain
crumbling.  The makeshift world was falling apart and the chaotic,
soul-destroying ether was reclaiming its space.  It would reach her
within a few seconds.  Perhaps she would really die here after all.

	No, whispered a voice in her mind.

	It was either Terrifying or the Galactic Destroyer, or both.  Terra
couldn't quite make it out.

	Here is how you make a portal back to your world, the voice said
while providing an energy pattern that flashed across her psyche.

	"Galactic Destroyer?"

	Yes.  No.  Sort of.

	"But... I'm torturing you by not letting you do what you want, aren't I?"

	Yes.  But, we do not wish to die here.  Now go, little human.  Savor
your victory while it lasts.

	"But--!!"

	GO!

	Terra decided just to run with it, and created a shining yellow gate
on the ground beneath her.  Just in case, she held her nose before
jumping in.

---

	Blow for blow, Sailor Venus matched the evil White ArbyFish's
lightning-fast strikes.  On neither side was flesh cleaved; each
attack was parried by the other with a dramatic shower of metallic
sparkles.  Sailor Moon could only watch in amazement as the battle
raged within the Dark Kingdom fortress.

	"You'll pay for what you did to Alan and Katrina," Venus hissed.  "And to ME!"

	"Oh?" Bruce smirked with amusement.  "Really, I don't think so."

	"Yes, you will!!"

	"Not hardly, because I know something you don't know."

	"What's that?"

	The White ArbyFish somersaulted high into the air and in a quick
motion removed his cape, flipped it over, and retied it.  An
ill-omened glowing red rune burned on the pale cloth.  "I've just been
playing with you!"

	Suddenly, Venus started to get forced back by a renewed assault by
the small creature.  A few parries failed and the switchblades bit
into her arms and shoulders.  Within moments, she had been backed up
against a rail overlooking a deep black chasm.

	"NOW SUFFER AND DIE!"

	Nevertheless, Minako didn't go over.  "I also know something you don't know."

	Bruce narrowed his eyes.  "What is it?"

	"I've just been playing with you, too!"

	Sailor Venus cracked an elbow into Bruce's head, sending him reeling.
 Then she held her arms wide and let out an angry yell.  A flash of
yellow light brought forth a minor change in attire.  The white to
yellow ratio increased and all her ribbons doubled in size and length.

	The scuffle elevated to a much higher level, Sailor Venus and Bruce
lunged at each other, strikes simultaneously connecting in a loud
crash of conflicting powers.

---

	The Guardian of Eternity.  Keeper of Time.  Enigma of the Legendary
Sailor Soldiers.  The Immortal One.  The Final Judgement; the Oncoming
Storm.  Sailor Pluto had been called all these things but the last.
She had been among the first to take up the mantle of a planetary
guardian and avatar.  She saw the great Silver Millennium Alliance
rise to power, and she had been present when it began to fall.

	She remembered that day clearly, when the great betrayal came to
fruition.  The deceiver's works had been so subtle that even she had
been caught off-guard.  After years of care and guidance by the naive
Lunar ruler, 'Princess' Terra had finally shown her true colors,
during an event meant to honor her recent and future contributions to
the realm.

	Serenity had been so proud of her--the fool; the poor, dear,
idealistic, blinded fool!  Setsuna had often spoken warnings, but none
believed her.  Apparently the phrase, "She will betray you very
soon--please lock her up and post a guard immediately," had been too
vague of a statement for anyone to take action on.  Years, before, the
one time they did heed her, no one saw the averted disaster; they
merely saw a child in a dark reinforced prison weeping for her mother.
 Much credibility in her words was soon lost.  It wasn't enough
anymore to merely warn them; she wanted to show them what folly it was
to ignore her.  Unfortunately, allowing an event to come to pass even
once was too much.

	Years later, the innocent act had ended in a violent explosion of
dark power--power that the girl had kept hidden for years; power that
suspiciously resembled the corrupting influence on Earth's leaders.
She fought and acted like a beast.  The battle was practically over
before it began.  Queens and princesses, kings and princes from far
off worlds, all gathered to recognize her as one of their future
leaders, were all dead in minutes.

	Although Sailor Pluto had been prepared, or so she thought, the raw
chaotic might of the child had surprised her.  Seeing the web of fate
as it unfolded, she avoided the initial strikes, but she knew that she
had no way to win at that time.  She escaped into the continuum just
as the vortex closed forever.  She directed this, her last voyage
through history, to the age where she could finally end this.

	A thousand years.  That was how close she managed to get to this
moment.  It gave her the necessary time to refine her personal skills,
prepare a defense and plan of attack.  Destiny gradually refolded
itself towards what she knew it would.  She foresaw the traitor
child's rebirth.  None would prevail against Terra reborn unless the
Keeper of Time took action.

	Her latest act--consigning her to oblivion--had made progress in
unraveling the girl's defiance from the web of destiny, but a thread
still clung to the weave.  Even now, she could sense the demon child
working to become once more a part of history.  Thus it was no
surprise to her when a golden portal opened above the beach, spilling
forth onto the ground the girl towards whom she held such contempt.

	"I'm back!" moaned Terra.  She lifted herself from the ground on her
hands and knees like a scruffy half-shaven bunny climbing a rusty
escalator.

	"TERRA!" cried the Star Light Knight.  "YOU'RE NOT DEAD!!"

	"Your return was foretold," said Setsuna sadly.  She ran the spells
she planned to cast through her mind.  Her timing had to be specific
for this to work.

	"Yeah," the frazzled teenager said, "no thanks to YOU!"  She pointed
at Setsuna.  "This is all YOUR fault!  BECAUSE OF YOU, ARBY, I HAVE
SEEN--"

	Setsuna stared at her.  "Arby?"

	"She's, uh, Sailor Pluto," S.L.K. noted.  "Not Arby."

	Terra blinked and shook her apparently addled head.  "Oh, right.
Sorry.  Force of habit."

	S.L.K. took a step closer.  "What happened to you, anyway?  Where did you go?"

	"Oh, you know, unlivable between-dimension mumbo jumbo where I had
chunks of my soul ripped out and handed to me just so I could see how
black it is.  Pain, agony, death multiple times, turning into lots of
random stuff, sealing a monster inside myself to keep it from
destroying the universe....  The usual."  Twitching from some kind of
borderline insanity, she turned towards Sailor Pluto.  "Are you going
to try and kill me again?"

	"Not 'try,' no," replied Setsuna.  She gripped her staff
meaningfully.  This girl was a clear and present danger and could not
be allowed to live.  Her destiny, if permitted to continue, would most
certainly unravel the whole web.  Humanity itself, and more, could be
at stake.

	The demon child fought to move, and then to stand.  She appeared to
be struggling against some major internal discomfort.  Blackness
flashed periodically beneath her skin.  Setsuna saw symbols of sealing
and of eldritch creatures that none but those who consort with them
would know about.  Despite the pitiful appearance the girl
demonstrated, the Guardian of Eternity could afford no sympathy.

	"Good!" said the armored man to her left.  "She's back.  Now we can
do this right!"  Thomas, though he had once been a thrall of the
child, clearly had no idea who or what he was dealing with.  Although
his desires to slay the girl coincided with hers, he was poorly
equipped to accomplish the task, especially in that frail clockwork
body of his.  The millennia had not been kind to him or his mind.
Poor fellow.  To think she was once enamored of him....

	"Stand aside, Thomas," said Setsuna mildly.  "She is beyond you.  She
will forever be beyond you."

	"Like heck I will!" he shot back, and started to move in front of her.

	Pluto raised her staff and created a pocket of time around him.  He
froze in the middle of his next sentence.  For him, the conflict will
have been over a few seconds later.  His participation would only
complicate things.

	"Meiou!" called Terra.  She coughed out a puff of blackness and held
up a hand in a pleading gesture.  "Please!  I know why you're doing
this, but please believe me that--"

	"You cannot be believed," replied Setsuna in a cold voice.  The nerve
of her, she thought, to attempt to deceive even further.  Though time
had passed and new lives would rise, some things would never change.
"You cannot be trusted."

	"Sheesh, can't I just explain what's going on?!"

	"There is no need to explain."  Terra stood and Sailor Pluto saw that
she wore the attire of a Sailor Soldier.  She also recognized the
power, and it was not from any planet, asteroid or astronomical body
she knew.  "I see you have drunk deeply from Queen Metallia's well of
power," Setsuna observed.  "I suppose this makes you Sailor Metallia
now?"

	Terra stared at her with wide eyes and shook her head.  "It's not
Metallia's power!  It's something much worse!  It's--"

	"Enough," said Sailor Pluto.  She held up the star seed that she had
taken earlier.  It still had not gone dark.  "Will you attempt to
recapture this?"

	"Probably."  Terra nodded.  "Yeah, maybe it'll help me fight off this
thing in my brain."

	"I think not."  Setsuna directed a burst of temporal energy into the
object, which quickly whithered away into powder.  She permitted
herself a moment's pleasure when she saw the girl's horror at her
action.  There was no way she could have failed to feel her star seed
being destroyed.  Most humans--even immortal humans--would have been
vaporized instantly from such an act.  She only hoped that it would
weaken the demon child enough to make a difference during the coming
conflict.

	"That was mean," said Terra.

	"It was more kind than you have ever been, deceiver."

	"Not to mention, like, dangerous!  Do you have any idea what I'm up
against here?!  I almost had a handle on it before you did that!"

	Sailor Pluto ignored the remark decided not to prolong the
inevitable.  She called forth the winds of time itself to engulf the
girl.  It was probably the most humane way to kill anyone.  She
whispered the name of her attack, "Chrono Typhoon."

	The mists that would surround her enemy should age the child
thousands of years in the blink of an eye.  Even if her body were
"immortal," even the so-called immortals she knew would never last
more than a handful of seconds in such a wave before becoming ancient
dust blasted apart by the winds.  Terra crossed her arms in front of
herself.  At first she seemed weakened, wrinkles appearing in her
graying flesh and dropping to one skeletal knee.

	But soon, she stood within the devastating energies and resisted the
magic.  Her flesh restored itself and her eyes flared red.  She roared
and flung her arms wide.  The resulting shockwave scattered the mists.
 From the explosion, she dashed forward at Setsuna with a fist full of
darkness.  "QUIT IT!" Terra screamed angrily while blackness ripped
underneath her skin.

	Sailor Pluto delicately lifted a hand and erected a barrier that
absorbed the impact.  The wall rippled slightly before bouncing her
back.  The demon child was hitting almost as hard as on the day of
betrayal.

	Breathing hard with tears down her cheeks, Terra appeared as if she
were attempting to solicit sympathy.  Setsuna might have fallen for it
had she not been so aware of the girl's history.

	"I just wanna go home," Terra pleaded.  "I don't wanna die--I don't
wanna fight--I just want to go home!"

	"What of those that you ended, Terra?" asked Setsuna.  "Can they go
home too?  Justice demands that you pay the price for what you have
done.  You cannot escape it.  Your rebirth cannot cleanse that stain;
it taints you still.  Even now you remain a danger to those you claim
to call friends."

	"I would NEVER hurt them!  Usagi... Rei... Ami... even Lita, they're
all my friends!  I care about them!"

	"Do you?  I wonder.  When I sent you away with the Dead Scream, what
did you see?  Did you remember who you were?  Did you face your
guilt?"

	"You," panted Terra with the effort of restraining her darkness,
"have NO CLUE what I saw!"

	"You saw the monster that you are.  Look at yourself, creature of
darkness.  You would destroy everything humanity holds dear, and not
even for conquest or gain.  You would do it out of a desire to have
fun!"

	"I," said Terra as her expression became more angry, "would NOT!!"
She flung a charged fist into Pluto's barrier again.  The punch was
very quick with a significant amount of force behind it.  She was
obviously using a temporal method to increase the impact strength.

	Sailor Pluto aimed the glowing tip of her staff at Terra's chest.
"Dead Scream," she whispered.

	A huge blast engulfed Terra, focused at her chest.  The girl screamed
and writhed about as she attempted to resist the soul-rending,
dimensional-tearing energy.  When the light subsided, she fell to her
knees, clutching her heart and panting.

	Good, thought Setsuna.  She was not dying but she was weakening.  It
had probably been a mistake to try to destroy her immediately without
wearing her down properly first.  The demon child's reserves were
frightening, however.  She would need to drain them much more quickly
than this.

	"In the name of the Lord of the Underworld," intoned Setsuna as she
waved her hands and created a mystic circle underneath her feet, "I
call upon the memories of the departed.  This one stands condemned
before me.  I summon those who have been wronged by her.  Come forth,
and exact your justice!  Dead Tribunal!"

	The sun darkened and clouds overshadowed the sandy landscape.  Foul
screeches erupted from all around.  Transparent creatures of all
shapes and sizes appeared around the demon child.  There were many
humans, but most of the apparitions were those of alien origin, of all
shapes and sizes.  They lined up in concentric circles surrounding the
girl.  They stood on the ground and hovered in the air.  Hands and
claws reached up from below.  They all shouted with anger at her in
shouts, clicks, hisses, and screeches.  All of them demanded payment
for ancient, unknowable crimes.  One by one, faster and faster, they
reached into the girl's heart and exacted their life-debt from her
body.

	Setsuna's eyes widened momentarily.  She did not expect quite so
many; she anticipated perhaps a hundred.  It should have been only
those who had died directly by her hands.  The girl was obviously far
worse than she had given her credit for.  It occurred to her that this
spell may in fact have been the killing blow.

	Terra wept and screamed out in pain as the legions tore through her
with their phantasmic appendages.  But after the initial shock, she
started to fight back.  She punched and kicked at them, each hit
dispelling one spirit.  The air blurred around her as she fought
harder and faster against her assailants even as they continued to
drain her.  A dozen were gone, then a hundred.  Screaming constructs
demanding vengeance continued to reach out and pile on top of her.

	Somehow, the onslaught halted.  The apparitions stopped and took a
step back.  Kneeling with her hands clasped together as if in prayer,
she glowed a bright red instead of black.  The darkness within her
skin retreated inward from the strength of this aura.

	"I," breathed Terra, "am NOT her.  I did NOT do this to you!"  It was
like an incantation.  "I am its PRISON.  Do not attack me.  Please, do
not attack me!"

	The ghostly constructs moaned softly and uncertainly.  They did not
strike, but they did not depart, either.

	Setsuna aimed her staff and whispered, "Dead Scream."

	This burst had a greater effect than the last.  The force caught the
demon child by surprise and knocked her backwards, bloodying her face
and body from the shock.  Terra looked around, frantically attempting
to keep the phantoms' attention off of her while trying to absorb the
attack.

	Pluto judged that she looked weakened enough.  She held out a hand
and incanted, "Pillars of Destiny, Arise."

	From the ocean bulged two gigantic dark metallic spikes, inlaid with
symbols of weights and scales, blindfolded statues of a woman who was
meant to represent justice herself, and other varied devices of
ancient origin depicting timelines, shackles and locks.  Lightning
arced between the two obelisks.

	"PLEASE MAKE IT STOP!!"  Terra once again tried to attack.  This time
was different.  As tears continued to spill from her eyes, it seemed
as though her heart was not in it.  Setsuna sidestepped the strike
easily enough and smacked the demon child aside.

	Pluto pointed a finger at her.  "Chains of Fate, Bind Her."

	Glowing blue energy links caught Terra around the midsection, pinning
her arms to her sides.  The links became a set of ever-growing chains.
 The chains flung her into the air, across the water, and sent her
slamming across the upper parts of the Pillars of Destiny.  Her
momentum carried her around each pillar three times, finally stopping
in the middle where the chain wrapped itself over the top twice.

	The demon child hung there, suspended securely between the pillars at
the midpoint.  The lightning between the obelisks blasted her
continuously.

	"Crap!" Terra cried with her eyes closed and shivering in what must
have been mortal terror.  "Crap, crap, crap, CRAP!" she repeated over
and over again.

	"Your final condemnation awaits," said Setsuna in a soft voice that
echoed across the landscape.  She leaned the orb of her staff to her
lips and gave it a quick kiss.  Then, she held it aloft and it left
her grip to rise into the air.  A blue hue surrounded the keystaff and
rapidly grew into a crackling outline of a blade.  Temporal winds
lifted Sailor Pluto of the ground as she followed her weapon skyward.

	Terra looked upward to see the gigantic blade hanging above her.

	Sailor Pluto grasped her staff, which had become the handle, and
thrust it downward.  "Final erasure from space and time.  Sword of
Damocles, Vanquish Her."

	The demon child screamed when she seemed to understand the doom that
was about to befall her.

	The sword descended, screaming through the air towards the girl.  She
struggled in vain against the chains.

	"Your fate is sealed!"

	Then, through the loud noises, Setsuna heard a bored sigh--more
inside her head than from her ears--and the Sword of Damacles stopped
moving.  Just like that it went from gale force acceleration to a dead
halt in a split second.  She looked down to see Terra looking up at
her, not in fear, but with something actually approaching amusement.

	Oh, and Terra had broken out of her chains and caught the edge of the
sword effortlessly in her teeth.  That kind of worried Setsuna.
Actually, it kind of worried her a LOT.

	Then, a spherical pulse of blackness from the swept across the
landscape, dispelling the judging spirits surrounding them and further
darkening the sky.  A low roar reverberated throughout the landscape.
Setsuna soon identified it as a slow, deep laugh made by something
extremely large, and extremely powerful.

	"Crap," said the Keeper of Time.

---

	So completely transfixed by the epic grudge match taking place before
her, Sailor Moon almost didn't notice Queen Beryl, Nephrite, and the
Seven Great Youma walk in behind her.

	"Gyaaah!" Usagi cried in fright, leaping into some of the more
dangerous sections of the duel.  Sailor Venus made a powerful riposte
to one of her opponents attacks and broke off to move into a place to
better defend the ponytailed blonde.

	"Sailor Moon!  Be careful!"

	Meanwhile, Bruce had taken a nasty slash to the face, resulting in
one eye swelling shut.  He backed off to nurse the unbleeding wound.
"Grr!"

	"Bruce!" Queen Beryl shouted.  "What is the meaning of this?!"

	"Preventing an escape attempt," Bruce spat.  "And why aren't you
supervising your precious demon goddess's revival?"

	"You dare presume to dictate my actions?"

	"Blah, blah.  Yes, I do.  And?"

	Shaking with repressed anger, Beryl pursed her lips and glared at
him.  "I WAS aiding Queen Metallia's revival, but I couldn't ignore
the commotion!"

	"Someone can actually face off against an ArbyFish," whispered
Nephrite in shock and awe as he surveyed the scene, "and win?"

	"Utter nonsense," Bruce replied to the general's musings.  "You can't
beat an ArbyFish.  Unless you happen to have a portable black hole
generator lying around."  The swelling went down and he glanced over
at Sailors Moon and Venus.  "So, you like fusions, do you, Sailor
Venus?  Try this one on for size."

	The flying creature took out a black septagonal crystal and pointed
it at the Seven Great Youma.  An energy ray shot out, expanded, and in
a black smoke engulfed the seven, who cried out in pain and surprise.

	"Rei's grandpa!" Usagi cried.

	"My Great Youma!" exclaimed Beryl.

	When the energy subsided, a seventeen-foot-tall fanged black titan
emerged from the cloud, still partly surrounded by dark sparking
mists.  It moaned and stretched its huge muscles before hunching into
an attack posture.  With several sets of glowing red eyes, it stared
down the two teenage girls.

	"It's incredible!" whispered Beryl.

	Instantly, Venus readied her blades and struck at the beast.  The
energy blade went in a couple of inches and stuck there.  While she
struggled to free her weapon, the fused monster backhanded her hard
into the wall above Usagi's head.  Venus slid down in a daze and
landed  in a jumble on top of Sailor Moon.

	"Ow, hey!" Usagi whined.

	"Wouldja look at the power levels on that thing," Venus muttered,
quite dumbfounded.

	"The Seven Great Youma were made for this," Bruce told them.  "With
power levels rising almost exponentially with each new participant,
you don't even stand a chance.  Sorry, there will be no escape for
you!"

	Minako cracked a grin.  "Not yet!  I still know the secret to taking
that thing out!"  She turned towards Usagi.  "Sailor Moon, bring
out... THE SILVER GINZUISHOU CRYSTAL OF THE IMPERIUM!!!"

	Sailor Moon paused, then kind of grinned nervously.  "I, uh, thought
you had it," she whispered to her companion.

	Venus frowned.  "Huh?"

	"I kind of... lost it when I got captured."

	"Well I don't have it!" Minako half-shouted at the other blonde.  "We
all thought you did!"

	A terrible thought struck them both at the same time.  "If I don't
and you don't have it," they said in sync, "then who's got it?"  They
glanced over at Beryl and the monster.

	Sure enough, Queen Beryl produced the Crescent Moon Stick, which was
topped by the Silver Ginzuishou Crystal of the Imperium.  It had a
pulsing black and green organic thing apparently growing on it.
"Perhaps you're looking for this?"  She aimed it as a weapon towards
the two girls.  "It has been attuned to suit my powers perfectly.  Now
die by your own ultimate weapon!!"

	It was right about then that Sailor Venus started to look REALLY
dismayed.  "Ohcrapohcrapohcrapohcrap!!!"

	Sailor Venus slung Sailor Moon over one shoulder and grabbed onto the
plain circular brooch holding the ribbons at her chest.  "Beauty and
Fashion Justice Love Top Model Pageant Walkway Overdrive Power--"

	Bruce grinned broadly.  "I bid you a fond saiyonara, poor suffering morsels."

	Before Beryl could let fly with her energy blast, Venus finished her
phrase with, "MAKE UP!"

	A sharp burst of yellow light flashed in the cavernous room.  Venus's
attire changed again.  She gained two more layers of multicolored
miniskirts, her gloves went up nearly to her shoulders, her boots
underwent a similar transformation, and large feathery wings appeared
on her back.  In the end, she looked like some sort of unholy cross
between an intergalactic cheerleader and the Sugar Plum Fairy.

	The new and improved Sailor Venus quickly surveyed her surroundings.
Finding the situation not in her favor, made a blurringly-fast flying
retreat down the huge corridors.

---

	"Heh."  Terra spit out the sword and its energy quickly vanished.  It
again became only a staff that returned to Sailor Pluto's grasp.
Darkness moved around under the teen's skin, and quite a lot of it had
begun to pour out.  "Is that all you've got?"

	Sailor Pluto regained her composure and stated, "Not even close."

	"I wasn't talking to YOU!" Terra said in a gruff voice.  She pounded
on her head.  "You really do suck, don't you, Terra?!  A couple
minutes against SAILOR PLUTO, of all people, and every bone in your
body's already creaking!"  Her expression went wild.  She spread her
arms wide and darkness coalesced over her forehead to form a garish
party mask.  The mask had six black and red crests over the eyepiece.
"I'll show you the RIGHT way to be 'Sailor Galactic Destroyer!'"

	Darkness poured out of the depths of the demon child's body, focusing
around her arms.  Shiny black carapace claws appeared over the girl's
gloves.  She somersaulted through the air towards Pluto.  She appeared
to be charging up an attack.  "DESTRUCTIVE CLAWS!" she shouted, and
sped toward Sailor Pluto.  Pluto barely had time to raise a barrier.

	Her barrier, which had previously held strong against the girl's most
brutal strikes, shattered from the first claw as if it were theater
play glass.  The second claw tore into Setsuna's midsection.  Much of
the fabric of her outfit tore apart before she could retreat out of
the slash.

	That was a very close call, thought Setsuna.  Her protections had
nearly been breached.

	"DESTRUCTION KICK!"

	Setsuna heard a sonic boom.  She barely raised her staff in time to
block a third strike.  Two spiked booted legs speed racing at her at
roughly mach five smacked into her weapon.  She could feel the metal
crack and the force sent her tumbling backwards over the landscape.
She bounced against the sand and crashed into a jagged rock
outcropping.  The rocks broke apart and fell.  She soon found herself
buried underneath a landslide.

	Pluto struggled against the rubble.  She took out an ornate royal
chalice with wings and crescent moons on it.  When she originally
planned out this encounter, she honestly did not think she was going
to need to use it.  Come to think of it, she was already on Plan C;
the first Dead Scream was Plan A.  She splashed her face with the
waters contained within the cup.  "Pluto Crisis Power, Make Up!"

	The debris trapping her exploded outward.  She took a quick breath
when she was clear of the rubble.  Charged with new power, the Sailor
Soldier's outfit then changed.  The bows and ribbons on her outfit
increased in length.  The highlights in the fabric gained half again
as much white.  Black barrettes appeared on her head.  The damage on
her keystaff repaired itself while it gained sharper points and a
darker sheen.

	In the distance, Terra stared at her with a neutral expression.  Then
she grinned.  "All right!"  She cracked her knuckles and addressed
herself in mocking tones.  "Watch closely now, 'Terra-chan.'  Now
we're going to do some ranged moves."  She cupped her hands together.
"DESTROY!!"

	Super Sailor Pluto cartwheeled out of the way of an explosive pillar
of energy.  She saw that it came from a huge portal high in the sky.
It had blackened a narrow patch of ground and left glowing molten rock
in a chasm.  Grains of sand traveling at relativistic velocities
bounced off of her newly reinforced barrier.

	"ANNIHILATE!!" screamed Sailor Galactic Destroyer.

	Sparking black and purple will-o-wisps appeared in the air around
Setsuna.  She swore under her breath when she knew she would be unable
to dodge this one.  Hundreds of particles smashed into her barrier.
They quickly taking their toll, but her barrier held.   It seemed very
unlikely that they could pierce her defenses in less than a few
minutes of this.

	"POWER OVERWHELMING!!" declared Terra.

	The barrage intensified by a factor of approximately one hundred.
That would only leave her with a few seconds of protection.   A smile
came to her lips.  It may as well have been an hour.

	"Slip Stream," the woman whispered.

	As she tumbled slowly, from her perspective, through the air, she
raised her staff and reached out with her magic.  A thousand years
ago, this would have been a forbidden spell that would have killed her
the instant she finished casting it.  Amazing the difference a little
exercise and practice makes, she thought.  Of course, having obtained
the Holy Grail to bolster her powers also made a difference.

	Time froze.  She levitated in the still continuity, then twisted out
of the way of the bolts and landed on her feet.  The glowing,
destructive lanterns still hanging in the air, Setsuna made her way
over to where Sailor Galactic Destroyer stood.  The girl's arms
swirled with stationary blackness and her mouth was twisted in a
crazed grin.  The whites of her eyes, behind the mask, had gone
completely black.

	"What a vile creature," commented Setsuna without inflection.  She
patiently began charging the killing blow.  If time had not been
frozen, she would have spent five minutes creating her first energy
burst.  It was like a Dead Scream attack, but exponentially stronger.
Once complete, the large, condensed sphere of red-ringed lavender hung
in the air to await the return of time's passage, at which point it
would smash into Terra and slay her.

	For good measure, Super Sailor Pluto moved to another angle and
charged a second, equal strike.

	After that, she found another angle and did the same.  "That should do it."

	Then, she did one more.  "No sense taking any chances."

	She created a fifth ball and said, "She surprised me before.  It
would be foolish to think it would be this easy."

	Setsuna glanced in the direction of Terra's face, wanting to see it
once again before allowing time's flow to return.

	Behind the mask, Sailor Galactic Destroyer winked at her.  "Cute,"
she commented.  Her voice reverberated in a way that sounded like half
a dozen people or more were speaking in unison.

	Pluto gasped.  "Impossible," she didn't get a chance to say.  She saw
and felt a jagged black claw rip through her shoulder from behind.
The strike ruined muscles, tendons and bone, not to mention several
major blood vessels.  Her training allowed her to suppress the pain.
The mental effort required to do so, however, cost her precious
seconds.

	Within the frozen timescape, Setsuna could hear a mad cackle.  The
claw in her shoulder pulled her back, then flung her like a lacrosse
ball into the now vacant focal point where Terra had stood and where
the super Dead Scream bolts were about to impact.  Just as she entered
the kill zone, she felt the time freeze rip away from her.  Realizing
the fate that would await her, she funneled all of her power into a
protective shield while willing the spheres to weaken.  "Garnet Ball."

	It wasn't nearly enough, though.  She knew she had made a terrible
mistake, having assumed that the demon child would be unable to move
while time was frozen.  Pluto was able to resist the resulting impacts
for a while, but eventually they broke through her primary barrier,
and then her secondary and tertiary ones.  Even while willing the
attacks to stop, it was her protective attire itself that finally
absorbed the remaining energy.

	Setsuna dropped to the ground, sizzling.  Her secondary
transformation failed, having reached its limit when defending her
body.  She panted and shook as she felt herself going into shock.  She
attempted to calm herself to reduce the blood loss.  Her right arm and
most of her right side would be completely useless until she managed
to heal herself.

	"Wasn't that fun, 'Terra-chan?" Sailor Galactic Destroyer inquired of
herself.  "Doesn't it feel good to completely CRUSH your enemy?!"

	Pluto grasped the healing device she had prepared for this
contingency.  The crystal shined and power flowed up her remaining arm
into the gaping wound.  Bone and muscle reknit together--she probably
wouldn't bleed to death--but her body felt much weaker after this than
she had expected it would.

	"But that's NOTHING compared to THIS!!" the demon child exclaimed.
She stalked towards the fallen Sailor Soldier, hands glowing with
blackness.  "What should we call this one, Terra?  Shall we call it
'Feasting Soul Reaver?'  I like that one.  Or how about 'FED TO THE
DEEP ONES?!!'"

	The woman struggled to stand, but dozens of vortices appeared around
her, covering the entire beach bluff.  "G-Garnet..."  Setsuna tried to
pull out sufficient power to protect herself, but her barrier refused
to form.  "Ba--"  Huge fiery tentacles shot out and gripped her around
the wrists, ankles, and neck.  A great cry erupted from the formless
interdimensional depths.  The flaming appendages started to draw
Sailor Pluto downwards, deep into a hideous beaked maw.

	"D... Dead--"  She turned to aim her shaking staff into the face of
the summoned creature.  Her concentration failed when she made the
mistake of looking directly at what assailed her.  "AAGH!!"  The
monster's horiffic, mind-altering appearance disrupted her thoughts
and made it nearly impossible to focus sufficiently to fight back.
Her mouth hung open, unable to scream, and she could feel her sanity
begin to slip away.

	"And now you die, Pluto, just like all of your friends!  Thanks for
coming back!  I hate to leave a job undone!"

	Setsuna could feel her flesh burn as she drew closer to her doom.  A
part of her mind cried out at her to do something, but her body would
not respond.  Whatever her other contingency plans may have been, she
had not counted on something like this.

	How could she not have anticipated it would be like this?!

	But then, to know that something might happen and then to actually
experience it were two different things.  In retrospect, to dismiss
elder signs as inane folklore may have been a bad move.

	Pluto heard a sharp cracking noise.  The tentacles loosened.  She
tilted her head back and saw Sailor Galactic Destroyer looking
downwards with a fist firmly planted in her own forehead with
sufficient strength to crack her mask.

	"THAT'S ENOUGH!" Terra screamed.  The blackness around her swirled
with red.  The two colors seemingly fought against each other.  The
red appeared as though it was attempting to suppress the black.

	"Hey--QUIT IT!" she shot back at herself.  "We can't let her live!"

	"THIS IS WRONG!"

	"NO!  LET US GO!  YOU'RE GOING TO GET US KILLED!!"

	For several seconds, it seemed that a contest of wills clashed within
Sailor Galactic Destroyer.  Her body twisted and lashed out at itself.

	WE HAD AN AGREEMENT! shouted a voice as if from Setsuna's mind.

	"I didn't agree to this!" Terra shouted at herself.  "I would NEVER
have agreed to this!"  Setsuna noticed that this more sympathetic
voice lacked the vibrating quality of the antagonistic one.  "I'm
stopping you!"  Sailor Galactic Destroyer grabbed her mask and started
pulling it off.  The shadows around the girl convulsed and resisted
for several more moments.  She finally managed to tear the decoration
from her eyes.

	The girl screamed while an explosion of black and red blasted across
the landscape.  The burst dispelled the darkness and vaporized the
image of the beast that held Setsuna hostage.  She slinked limply to
the ground.

	IN THE END, I WILL TRIUMPH, declared the psychic voice.

	Terra started to hammer very hard on her head with both fists.  Each
impact shook the terrain as if they were the heavy footsteps of a
nearby giant.  "SHUT UP!" she screamed.  "SHUT UP!  EVERYONE JUST SHUT
UP!!!"

	The winds stopped.  The sun came out from behind the clouds.  Terra
Incognita sank to her knees, holding her head and panting from the
effort.

	Sailor Pluto painfully sat up.  She looked at her limbs and saw the
burned flesh and marks of jagged suction cups.  She also felt the
fast-acting poisons of the monster that had briefly trapped her.
Another of the shortcomings in her plans included the lack of this
particular variety of antivenom.  Flesh started to blacken at the
edges of the wounds.  The agony was intense, but she worked past it
and let out no sign of discomfort.

	Her mind was still foggy from looking into the face of the
abomination, but she knew had only minutes to live.  Such was her fate
now.  She fished out what was going to be Plan F, a crystal matrix
designed to emit a brief but powerful pulse on the same wavelength as
the Ginzuishou Crystal--the only other artifact that Princess Terra
had seemed to fear.  Using it would have completely burned herself out
regardless of her level of strength, and it was not even a guaranteed
victory based on what she knew, so she had kept it in reserve as a
weapon of last resort.

	Her hands shook from the damage caused by the poison and the crystal
dropped from her fingers.  She knew she would not have enough power
left to activate it anyway.  Her mistakes in this battle had cost her
that opportunity.  Her mistakes had cost her everything.  Her body
slipped limply back to the ground.

	"Meiou?" Terra called over to her hesitantly.

	"You win," said Setsuna without inflection.  "The opportunity has
been wasted and my fate is sealed."

	The girl stood and walked closer to her.  She winced at what she saw
and turned away for a moment.  "I'm sorry.  I'm so sorry."

	"Apologizing?"  Setsuna shook her head.  Was this child truly
remorseful, or was she even now attempting deception?  "There is no
point in lying to me.  I am dying and not long for this world."

	Terra sniffled.  Her eyes were red--not the red of her power, but the
bloodshot look that happens to ordinary people when they are about to
cry.  "Meiou," she said, kneeling close by and taking her by the hand,
"I was upset at what you did, but I never wanted to kill you."

	As she looked into the girl's eyes, she searched for some hint of the
monster she had just fought.  All she saw now were the eyes of some
frightened kid.  As she looked, she considered activating the
implosive suicide device she had prepared, but quickly dismissed the
idea.  If nothing else she had done had so much as left a scratch on
the girl, the device would clearly be insufficient.  Another fault in
her planning, she thought bitterly.  Besides, what if she was wrong?
What if this child were the only thing holding back a greater evil?
The events of the battle suggested this to be the case.

	"Tell me," Pluto said.  "You seemed conflicted, when we fought.  What...?"

	"I don't know how to explain," Terra trailed off and shrugged.  "It's
something I'm dealing with."

	"Do you fear death?" Setsuna asked.

	Terra nodded slowly.  "Do you?"

	"Yes."  Truth be told, Setsuna had no idea what awaited beyond.  But
she would find out soon enough.  Her vision started to blur.  Seconds
remained, she knew.

	"I wish there was something I could do," the girl whispered.  Her
eyes lit up.  "There is!"  Her expression went focused.  A faint aura
of black, tinged with red, surrounded her.  "I hope this works!"

	"What are you doing to me?" Setsuna wanted to ask, but her voice was
not strong enough to carry.  Her eyes closed.

	She felt a warmth, and a darkness.  Damaged parts of herself shortly
started working again.  It wasn't quite like being healed; it was more
like she was a broken china doll with glue being poured in between the
cracks and the pieces jammed together.  She was afraid at first, but
her mind flooded with peace.

	She opened her eyes to the beautiful face of a goddess.  She quickly
recognized the other person as Terra, but she felt different somehow.
The girl had not changed, but it was as if her own attitudes toward
her had been modified, probably as an effect of the energy she had
just felt.  She thought about fighting it but quickly decided not
to--why would she want to stop such a glorious effect from coming to
pass?

	Setsuna sat up and felt her transformation fail, leaving her in her
skirted lavender business suit.  The internal workings of her device
had shorted out.  She recalled that she had set the mechanism to
destroy itself in the event that she were captured or mind-controlled
for a period longer than a few seconds.  She knew that it was so her
powers could not be used as a weapon for evil, but now she felt a
little regret.  It would make her much less effective as she served in
the future.

	Yes, she thought, it would be a wonderful thing to be in the service
of such a being as the one which held her hand now.  She looked at the
teenager and smiled.  "Terra-sama, I am yours!" she said in an excited
pitch.

	The girl herself gasped in surprise and shuffled backwards.  "Uh, what--?!"

	Setsuna's heart fluttered at the sound of her mistress's voice.  She
swore to herself that she would forever be loyal to it.

---

	"Dang it," Terra whispered to herself when she saw Setsuna smile at
her and sit at attention, "what did I just do?!"  She had remembered a
pattern that she knew would repair the damage, but she used it almost
without thinking.  She tried to remember where she had gotten it from,
or last felt it.

	"You healed me, Terra-sama," replied Setsuna eagerly.  "Thank you so
much!"  She looked at her arms.  "The wounds are fading and the poison
is gone."  She stood, adjusted her attire as if to ensure that there
were no wrinkles.  Then, she knelt and said, using humble Japanese
terminology, "I praise you, Terra-sama."

	"Meiou," Terra said in fear, "what's with the suffixes?"

	"Oh," replied the woman thoughtfully, "you have difficulty with
suffixes.  You do not like them spoken to you.  Very well, Mistress
Terra."

	This was starting to freak Terra out.  "T-that's not much better!"
she stammered.

	"I apologize.  How may I address you?"

	"Just... Terra."  Terra's jaw hung open at the woman's attitude.
"Um, Meiou...?  Setsuna?  Um--"

	"You honor me with allowing me to use such a familiar manner of
speaking towards you.  I am not worthy."  The woman seemed very happy
with her words.

	"Just stay there for a sec, please," Terra said.

	"Of course, Terra!"

	The girl looked around for the Star Light Knight and quickly spotted
him.  He had finally gotten out of his time bubble, which probably
faded when Setsuna's transformation switched off.  "Tommy!  Help!"

	"How much time did I just lose, kid?" the man asked.  "What happened?"

	Terra explained the events from the last few minutes.

	"Your superpowered evil side took over and royally whooped Sailor
Pluto's shapely keister, eh?"

	"Yeah."

	"Heh.  Guess it'd be a stupid idea for me to try to kill you right
now, wouldn't it?"

	"Um," Terra hesitated, "yeah.  Really stupid.  But, I kind of... did
something I think I shouldn't have.  You seem to know a lot about this
kind of stuff--magic, I mean.  Could you help me fix something?"

	"Like what?"

	The girl pointed at Setsuna, who stood patiently at a distance,
watching for some sign of an instruction.  Terra beckoned the woman to
come closer, who quickly obeyed.

	"So," said Terra, "I thought I was casting a healing spell--"

	"It was MUCH better than a healing spell," Setsuna noted.

	"And now she's like this," Terra finished.  "I kind of get the idea
she'd do anything I'd ask, even if she hated doing it."

	"I do not think, Terra, that there is anything you could ask of me
that I would not gladly do."

	Terra pointed at her and said to the android, "See?!"

	"Yeah, that's pretty extreme," S.L.K. noted with some concern.  He
looked at the woman closely in the eyes.  "Let me see your hand real
quick."

	"No," replied Setsuna with her arms folded.  "Keep your greasy
metallic digits off of my person."

	"Let him," Terra requested.  Setsuna relaxed and she instantly did as
instructed.

	The Star Light Knight held the woman's hand in his left, and with his
right he seemed to pass a low-powered electrical field over her hand
and arm.  "Pulse is okay, blood pressure's great, genetics are human,
but there's something else in there."  He put his hand over her
forehead.  "There it is," he said.  "Huh.  Not the usual way you like
to do this."

	"You know what's wrong with her?" Terra asked.

	"Yup."

	"What is it?"

	"Let's see if you can figure it out.  The so-called 'healing'
spell--you copied it from somewhere.  Think back to where it was."

	"I'm thinking," Terra said, and felt out the pattern that she had
used.  It was from the very end of her time in the Moon Kingdom, after
she had failed to stop Metallia.  It was just after she heard Beryl
talking, and when they started re-knitting her body together, and--
"Aw, nuts.  I did THAT to her."  She pounded on her head.  "Did YOU
feed me that pattern to use on her?!  Answer me!!"

	She heard a faint chuckling at the back of her brain.  She sighed
angrily at herself.

	"Looks like you turned Sailor Pluto into your very own youma slave,"
said S.L.K. as he shook his head at her.  "Seriously, I thought you
were over that brainwashing kick you were on."

	"I am not a youma," Setsuna said vehemently.

	"I'm sorry!" Terra said to her.  "I'm so... so... SO very sorry!"

	Setsuna blinked at her, the hint of a frown gracing her face.  "For
what, Terra?"

	"Don't you know what I did to you?!"

	"Yes, I understand fully," Setsuna replied without hesitation.  "But
really, I would not have it any other way."

	"You don't have a problem with being mind-controlled?"

	"In principle, yes, but it is all right if it is you."

	Terra threw up her hands.  "What am I supposed to do with her now?!"
She looked at Thomas.  "Isn't there a way for me to release the
control?"

	"If what my scan told me is right," replied the android, "and from
what I know about this stuff, the 'healing' and the mind control is a
combo deal.  It's the only thing keeping her alive.  You could
probably release the control, I guess, but she'd drop dead a couple
seconds later."

	Terra looked down.  "I don't want her to die.  I feel bad enough as it is."

	"She did try to kill you," Thomas reminded her.

	"She thought she was doing the right thing!" Terra protested.

	"Do YOU think she was doing the right thing?"

	"No!"  Terra hesitated.  "Yes?  I mean, kinda?"  She hung her head.
"I don't even know anymore."

	"Come on," Setsuna touched the girl's shoulder, "I'll take you home."

---

	Ami, Makoto, Rei, and the two cats had spent all day trying to come
up with some sort of workable Dark Kingdom invasion plan.

	"There just doesn't seem to be any way!" Luna sighed, throwing up her
paws in exasperation.

	"There HAS to be," insisted Rei.

	Ami nodded.  "Maybe we've overlooked something."

	A Sailor Communicator on the table beeped.  Makoto picked it up.  "Hello?"

	Sailor Venus's face appeared on the tiny screen.  She appeared
relieved for a moment, but her expression became very serious.  "Thank
goodness you can still get a signal from me!  I'm in the Dark Kingdom,
and I've got our princess!"

	"All right!" Makoto cheered.  "That's great news!"

	"We've got BIG problems, though," Venus continued.  "They've fused
all the people they captured into one immense, powerful creature."

	Rei's eyes widened.  "Grandpa...."

	"To make matters worse," Minako continued, "Bruce is still working
actively with them, and Queen Beryl has the Crystal."

	"That's horrible!" cried Luna.

	"I think I've done all I can alone," Venus said.  "I've got a
third-level transformation that's saved us so far, but I can't keep it
up for more than a few seconds at a time."  On the screen, she glanced
around.  "Darn it!  They're tracking my signal!"  She turned back to
the screen.  "Anyway, I really need some backup.  I can't fight them
all, defend the Princess, AND escape at the same time."  She turned
aside, appearing frightened for a moment, and let out an angry shout
before the signal went dead.

	Luna leapt atop the table and addressed them all authoritatively,
"All right, then!  We cannot afford to delay any longer.  Plan or no,
we can't just leave them to die!"  She looked each of them in the
eyes.  "This is likely the greatest, most difficult conflict you have
or will ever face.  Who is with me?"

	"Count me in," said Rei instantly.  "Usagi's in trouble and I have to
save Grandpa."

	"I'm in," Ami added.

	Makoto nodded.  "Me too."

	Tuxedo Kamen leapt in through the open window.  "I'm going too!"

	Luna breathed a sigh of relief.  "We're glad you could come, Tuxedo Kamen."

	"Princess Serenity was practically my wife in a past life," Mamoru
said.  "I can't just ignore that, regardless of how I feel about some
certain recent actions."

	All the girls nodded.  "Yeah," said Makoto, "too bad Red can't join
us.  I'm starting to wonder if she really is that evil old Terrifying.
 We might have been wrong about her."

	"All ready, then?" Rei inquired, preparing to stand.

	There was a green flash and Arby the ArbyFish imbedded himself
tail-first into the table.  "Not so fast!" he said in a manner
befitting a detective of Scotland Yard.  "Yew forgots th' most
indubidable ingredient."

	Luna backed off and trembled.  "Arby, you're... joining us too?"

	"A'course!" the 'Fish said pleasantly, and fluttered over to put a
flipper around each cat.  "We's roight noice chums, we is!  Chum for
sharks and blue butterin' buffetin' breakfasts for tea!"

	Artemis nervously looked around, but after a while shrugged and
exclaimed, "Great!  So, all you guys prepare everything you can.  This
is the big one.  We're going in!"

---End of Chapter 22

And now it's time for... MIND YOUR MANNERS!!! with Sailor Nuke.

(Scene of the Galactic Destroyer ripping itself free of Terra's spirit)

Sailor Nuke:  Today, we learned that there's a great big
million-mile-long monster inside all of us.

Sailor Kawaii(sweatdrop):  Well, maybe not all of us.  Actually, just Terra.

Sailor Nuke:  Shh!  Anyway, we also learned about self-control.

(Terra battles it out with the monster, blasting hundreds of megaton
explosions across its flank)

Sailor Nuke:  If excessive amounts of firepower isn't doing the job to
reign in your inner beast--

(The beast blasts away a planet-destroying burst and obliterates Terra
a few times)

Sailor Nuke:  That just means you're not using NEARLY enough!!!

Sailor Kawaii(cough):  Actually, firepower isn't the answer.

(Terra transforms into a Pink ArbyFish)

Sailor Kawaii:  But being cute IS the answer!

Sailor Nuke(arms folded):  That got beaten too.

Sailor Kawaii:  Then what?

(Terra sucks the giant beast back into the depths of her soul)

Sailor Nuke:  Ignore what the monster says and take its powers as your own!

(A giant squid-thing devours Sailor Pluto at the command of Sailor
Galactic Destroyer)

Sailor Nuke:  That way, NOBODY'll be able to beat your firepower.
Don't be afraid of having a huge galaxy-destroying beast in your head.
 It's TOTALLY worth it.  Sailor Nuke sez.  BWAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAAA!!!

Sailor Kawaii:  ...  (grins, shrugs)  I have no response to that.
Sailor Kawaii says.  Tee-hee!


Thanks for reading!


-- 
Benjamin A Oliver
benjamin.a.oliver at gmail.com

Technical Writer / Translator
M3 Engineering & Technology

Master of Science in Management Information Systems
Eller College of Management
University of Arizona

Writings: Fan Fiction
http://boliver.florestica.com/

Webcomic: Nuke 'Em 'Till They Glow!! The Early Years
http://nettg.com