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Gaea
The screams of the others were the first things to register as the separate realities became one. The distance between the groups further complicated matters by making the screams overlap and become muffled in the clearing. As the two warriors of Uranus, Jupiter and Mars were trying to determine what was happening, they were brought back to their own little nightmare at Cronos' parting words and a scream from StarHealer.
"Devii!"
Sailor Uranus spun back to face the edge of the woods, watching the gray-haired warrior disappear into the trees. She started running after her, idly noting Mars falling into step behind her. She already knew that Jupiter would be of little help against Cronos, she had come mainly for the children. Seeing the red-haired warrior come up on her side, Uranus frowned. "Why did she grab Devii?"
"Why does a madwoman do anything she does?" Mars ran past the blonde, chanting something under her breath. The trees that had been marked with her power earlier suddenly burst into flames, cutting off the trail that the green-haired woman had been following. "You may as well stop running now, Puu. There's nowhere for you to go!"
Cronos created another path, pulling Devii into the pocket reality behind her and leaving it open for the others to follow. "Are you quite sure, Imari? I could always go pay a visit to your dear Larissa." She stopped at the edge of a small pond, spinning to face the others and pulling Devii off of her feet. The green-haired woman knelt next to the young alien and placed her free hand on her neck. "Or I could always send this little one to her."
"Take your hands off of her!" Healer yelled, stopping a short distance away. Mars came up on one side of her, flames dancing around her hands. Sailor Uranus was on her other side, sword poised and ready to strike. "She isn't a Senshi, she's just a child. Let her go."
Devii had stopped struggling with the older woman almost from the start, allowing herself to be pulled along. The weapon she had been carrying had fallen from her hand at the edge of the clearing and now that they had stopped moving, she was trying to remove another one from the bag at her waist without the green-haired woman seeing. If she was lucky, the others would keep her distracted long enough to take the safety off.
"Senshi? Is that what you call yourselves? Hmm." Cronos grinned at the gray-haired warrior. "Yes, I see now. You're related to this one."
Healer could tell what Devii was doing, even from a distance. She was silently thanking Seiya for insisting that the pink-haired girl be trained along with their own kids. "That's right. She's my sister's child. Please, just let her go."
"I don't think so, alien. So nice to see you again, Imari. It has been far too long. And there's Rosa's double. I had hoped I'd get to meet you, ever since my children told me of Venus' twin. I wanted to see if you were as mad as our own Uranus." Cronos released Devii's arm she had been holding and quickly grabbed the other one that held the energy weapon. "But it doesn't look like I'll get the chance."
Devii watched helplessly as the weapon in her hand fired.
StarMaker watched in horror as the rocks crumbled away from the cliff, taking her daughter with them. "'Tomi!" She started running toward the cliff, only to be pulled back by Lysithea.
"You can't help her, Taiki," Lysithea replied, holding the other woman back. She saw the younger StarMaker running for the cliff as well, but could do nothing to stop her. "'Shirou, no!"
Venus lunged after Chibi StarMaker, only to be knocked back by an attack from Gaia. The redhead laughed as the younger alien jumped off the cliff. "Two down, three to go!"
"Lysithea, let go of me! Those are my children!"
Lysithea pulled the redhead over to the injured blonde, using her powers to shield them all as Gaia fired another attack. "Taiki, you can't help them!"
Venus waved off the other woman's help, standing and glaring at the redhead. "Stop this, child of Mars! Don't let them die!"
"What do I care if they die? It's not like they're my family, after all," Gaia replied. She smirked as she increased the intensity of her attacks on the trio.
Mercury grabbed StarFighter's arm as the darker-haired woman ran toward the cliff's edge. "No, you-" Her attention was pulled to Saturn as the younger Senshi sprouted wings. "-can't ... you can ...? What the ..."
"The Sol Senshi from our world can fly," Fighter replied, pulling her arm free. She heard more screams echoing down from the spire. "No ..."
"Go, aunt Seiya." Chibi Moon appeared, holding an injured, but unprotesting Triton. She placed the other woman down, collapsing to her knees beside her. She had caught Fluri inches from hitting the rocks and had only barely kept them both from falling into the ocean. "Saturn already went."
Fighter hesitated only long enough to see Mercury running to the two younger women. Turning toward the clearing, she saw Rosalind struggling to keep the earthquake from tearing the island to pieces and Elara using her powers to keep a forest fire from raging out of control. There was no sign of the others. Sending up a silent prayer to any diety that was listening, the black-haired singer ran toward the spire.
Sailor V gasped when she saw the young alien in the stasis pod, her face covered in deep scratches. She felt tears sting her eyes as one of Cronos' warriors passed a hand over a crystal on the side of the chamber.
Techi frowned slightly. "According to this, the after-effects of the spell are gone. She ... she should be okay now. But her face ..."
"Just get her out of there," Tsuki replied. "Physical damage can be dealt with later. We have to get off this island."
"What about these others?" StarHunter asked, frowning.
Jadeite shrugged. "They said they found them with us. I don't know who they are, I've never seen them before."
Nephrite was standing at the edge of the chamber. He refused go anywhere near the crystal coffins. "They're ... the humans ... from the Dark Kingdom. The ones Beryl said were too valuable to kill. She ... she made me seal them in those things."
V wiped the tears from her eyes and turned to look at the other coffins. They were of similar design to the one that held Mi-ko, but were obviously made of different material. Where hers was see-through and light blue, these were opaque and blood red. Only the fact that they were glowing showed that they had power. "Open them. Everyone is leaving this island today." A tremor ripped through the island as the walls of the chamber cracked. "Hunter!"
Chibi StarHunter nodded, grabbing Tsuki and running for the exit. Most of Cronos' warriors, Aura, Kinmoku and Orion had already been taken down to the shore. The princess had insisted she be allowed go with V, the older Kinmokunai only agreeing after Tsuki revealed her powers.
The red-haired warrior glanced back once and saw the two Shitennou once more using their powers to create an energy barrier to hold back the falling rock. The purple-haired warrior she was running with suddenly stopped, nearly causing the younger woman to run into her. "Zavi, what-"
Hunter pointed further down the passage to where the ceiling had collapsed, blocking their escape. "Time to find another way out." Another tremor shook the cavern, causing the rock walls of the cave behind them to collapse. "Kuso!"
StarFighter reached the spire and had to dodge fiery blasts coming from someone that looked a hell of a lot like Mars, but could see no sign of her friends or the other godesses. "I am so tired of this island," she replied, ducking into an opening in the side of the spire.
"You and me both."
Fighter jumped at the voice and dropped into a defensive stance. "Aevor! How could you-" She stopped when she saw a battered and bleeding, blue-haired man. Cursing in her native language, she ran over to him. "Wh-what happened to you?"
Aevor hissed as the black-haired singer started looking over his injuries. "I ... I finally stood up to her. Mother Cronos has lost it. I ... I didn't want to believe the truth, but ... she's been manipulating us so long, it ..."
"Stop talking so much, will you? We can kick your ass for what you did later. Right now, we need to get you past the firestarter and to a healer."
"Firestarter? That ... must be Gaia." Aevor tried to stand, only to have Fighter push him back down.
"Are you trying to kill yourself?"
"That's my daughter. I ... I can stop her."
Fighter frowned slightly, then helped the injured man to his feet. "I seriously hope you're right. I have no desire to become extra-crispy." She helped him out of the opening and noticed that the red-haired warrior had moved back to firing attacks on the other side of the spire. "How can you stop her? You can barely stand."
Aevor grimaced a little as they came around the edge of the spire. "Just watch," he replied, smiling slightly. He could see flames dancing around the younger woman and a wall of fire pounding against something at the edge of the spire. Using Fighter's arm to hold himself steady, the blue-haired man pulled himself up to his full height. "GAIA!"
The red-haired warrior spun at the sound of her name, the flames vanishing instantly at the sight of her father, battered and bleeding, but alive. "D-Dad .." Her view of the older man was cut off as a warrior in bluish-purple landed in front of her and black flames slammed into her.
Papillon glared at the red-suited warrior as she was knocked off of her feet. "I ..." Fighting the urge to send the redhead over the edge of the cliff, she channelled her anger into an attack on the spire. Tremors rocked the island as the spire cracked, weakening the wards around the island. The black butterflies she had sent into the spire earlier, started pouring out through the crack.
As the island stopped shaking, Saturn landed beside Fighter. "Remind me to never make your nieces mad," she replied. She moved to check Aevor's injuries, quickly healing the worst of them.
Gaia got back to her feet, glaring at the purple-suited warrior. "You ... you should be dead."
Papillon glared at the redhead. "If not for the fact that my brother can fly, I would be, thanks to you." Black flames swallowed her hand as she raised it again. "If you try to hurt anyone else, you'll be the one that dies today."
Chibi StarMaker landed a short distance away from where his sister was threatening the other woman and looked at the quickly cooling crystal cocoon that had formed around the three older women. "Easy enough to deal with," she replied, firing an attack at the place where the crystal had melted from the spire. The cocoon began to crack, then shattered as Venus, Lysithea and StarMaker all fired attacks from the inside.
StarMaker ran over to her oldest child and pulled her into a hug. "Don't you ever jump off a cliff again."
"So taking up bungee-jumping is out of the question?" Chibi StarMaker smiled a little as her mother rolled her eyes, then ran over to hug Papillon.
Lysithea and Venus each grabbed one of Gaia's arms tightly. "Don't even think about trying to run, young lady," Venus replied.
Gaia shook her head, lowering her gaze to the ground. Another tremor shook the island, this one stronger than the last. The cracked spire crumbled, breaking the wards on the island and sending chunks of crystal toward the gathered Senshi.
The designers of the crystal coffins had built in a fail-safe. If the power ever stopped flowing in, the coffins would open immediately. Techi silently thanked the unknown designers as not one, but all five red coffins opened, quickly followed by the lighter blue one.
"The passage to the shore is blocked! I really hope there's another way out of here," V replied as she helped as many of the people out of the coffins as she could, hoping that Hunter and Tsuki had made it out. The Shitennou were still using their powers to hold the falling rocks off of all of them.
"There is. We'll have to go to the surface and find our way from there," Techi replied, helping a delirious blond to his feet. Once he was sure the other man was okay, he motioned for them all to follow him. "Come on, this way!"
Sailor V, five very groggy adults and one clingy teenager followed Techi from the room, the two Shitennou close on their heels. "Wait a minute," the former actress replied. "If the power's been cut off, that means that the spire's gone. If the spire's gone, then the wards are broken, right?"
Techi nodded stiffly as he led them past a partially collapsed wall. "Yes, but what-" His reply was cut off as the blonde grabbed his arm and teleported him and the teenager out of the tunnels.
Quickly catching on to the blonde's words, the two Shitennou gathered the other five sleepers into one group and used most of their remaining energy to teleport all seven of them to the island's surface. As soon as they appeared in the clearing, both half-demons felt dizzy and would have collapsed were it not for their companions grabbing on to them.
"-does that ... Wow, that was ..." Techi looked at the blonde in admiration, even as another tremor shook the island. A gasp from behind them caused him to turn. As soon as he saw Rosalind and Elara, he hid behind the blonde and Mi-ko.
Elara was staring at the newest arrivals in shock. She was still slightly stunned anytime she could witness one of the dimensional travellers teleporting, but that wasn't really what had made her gasp this time. It was four of the people standing between what must have been the two missing Shitennou. In particular, one woman, with long black hair. "L-Larissa?"
The woman with long black hair turned to face the brunette and smiled. "Hello, Elara."
Devii watched helplessly as the weapon in her hand fired. She had no control over her actions as she continued to fire at her aunt and the two goddesses. No matter how hard she willed her hand to stop, her fingers continued hitting the firing mechanism. She couldn't close her eyes or look away from the sight of the three adults lying at the edge of the small clearing. She couldn't even scream her frustrations as the green-haired woman laughed in her ear.
Cronos laughed as she used her powers to manipulate the younger woman beside her. "This is wonderful. I have finally found another precious child I can turn into a heartless killer. I think, after you're finished with these three ... I shall send you after that bitch Venus. With her gone, no one can stand in my way."
"Think again, old woman."
Cronos started to turn to the source of the voice, when a long sword pierced her back, barely missing her heart.
Mars gasped as the pocket reality they had entered shuddered once, then vanished. They were still in the forest, next to what seemed to have been, until very recently, a pond. They were still standing, poised to strike Cronos, only she lay on the ground, a sword in her back.
Devii finally felt the scream rip from her throat as her body was finally allowed to obey her commands. Closing her eyes, she flung the weapon away and scrambled to her feet. She felt arms grab her and tried to fight them off as she backed away from what she was sure was a horrible scene.
"Child, stop screaming!"
StarHealer grabbed Devii and pulled her away from the woman that none of them had seen appear. "Devii, it's okay, it wasn't real. Whatever you saw, wasn't real."
Sailor Uranus still felt like she had cobwebs in her head as she glanced around the very small clearing. She, Mars and Healer had all been frozen in place as Cronos had twisted Devii's reality into something that had apparently terrified her. It took her several moments to realize that Cronos was now lying on the ground and that there was another woman standing in the clearing with them. She looked at the newcomer and gasped. "Usagi!?"
