|
|
Kageshirou slowly opened his eyes when he heard voices raised. The first thing he realized was that he was, in fact, alive. The second thing was that he was back on the Av'Nai. He didn't have to do a lot of thinking to remember what had happened. When he saw Tavek collapse, he fought his way to his feet and ran toward him. Meiya had still been alive and had grabbed his foot as he ran past, knocking him down and making him drop the baby. Thankfully, the child landed on one of the Guards' bodies and hopefully wasn't hurt, but the redhead didn't have time to check as his step-father aimed his weapon again.
Chibi StarMaker kicked his hands until her feet were free then kicked the weapon out of his hand, just as the shot he fired grazed her already injured shoulder. Had she not moved, the blast would have caught her in the neck. Pushing herself to her feet once more, she grabbed the weapon from the nearest body and saw him do the same. But before she could get a shot off, the doors opened again and Van and one of the Hseti came running in. Van immediately tried to intervene, but the Hseti blocked him at every opportunity. Meiya used Chibi Maker's distraction at their arrival to try and take another shot. However, the weapon was out of power, so he resorted to using it as a club. Chibi Maker managed to get one shot off from her own weapon before the older man struck her in the head. But no matter how much Kageshirou thought, he couldn't remember if the shot actually managed to hit anything.
"Hey, you're finally awake. I'm surprised you slept this long with them carrying on like that."
Kageshirou turned to his side and saw Tsuki sitting by his bed, smiling slightly. "What are they yelling about?"
Tsuki sighed, glancing toward the closed doorway into the next room. "Apparently, one of the men that came with Urani is an Orion assassin. He killed Meiya after he knocked you out, then killed the Hseti he claims was trying to stop him. They're trying to figure out if he really was, or if he just got in the way."
"He was trying to stop him. I don't know why, but he was." Kageshirou watched her as her eyes became unfocused for a moment and knew she was talking to Urani. The voices in the other room stopped yelling and he knew it would be only a few moments before their parents came into the room. "Tsu ... the others, are they ..."
"The baby you saved is fine. They're trying to figure out who his father was and see if there is any family, since Lin didn't have any. The others got off with minor cuts and bruises from various run-ins with Military stragglers, but ... Tavek ..."
Kageshirou nodded slightly and closed his eyes. "I know, I-"
"Tavek," Tsuki continued, as though she hadn't just been interrupted, "has this nice big red spot on his chest where there used to be a hole. And still would be a hole if it wasn't for that creepy Vexan lady."
Kageshirou's eyes flew open. "He's alive?" He tried to sit up, grabbing at his side as pain shot through it. Ribs were definitely cracked, if not broken.
Tsuki pushed the older redhead back down and frowned at him. "Yes he is, but no you can't go running off to check on him. You have four broken ribs from where you fell on some guy with armour ... or was it where the Hseti fell on you?"
"It was where the Hseti fell on him, after he landed on the guy in armour."
Tsuki grinned slightly at the look on 'Shirou's face as she moved so he could see the other bed in the room. "Thanks, 'Vek. 'Shirou, do you really think Dema wouldn't put you two idiots in the same room?"
Tavek smiled a little from where he sat, propped up on the small medical examination bed. Mahret was standing beside him, checking readouts on the computer and either didn't understand Tsuki's comment or was ignoring it. On the purple-haired man's chest, there was a bright red spot where the weapon had struck him, just to the right of his heart. Tavek slowly reached up and touched the edge of the red place. Even though his wounds were closed, he wasn't completely healed. The nanomachines Mahret had used to try and save his life, had stopped functioning the moment Tsuki started using her powers. And because the younger woman still did not have her full powers, she was unable to completely heal the damage. "I'm just glad that Meiya was a bad shot. And even with Mahret's help, I'd be a goner if it wasn't for your little sister. Although it was the creepiest feeling in the world."
Tsuki made a face at the purple-haired man, then turned back to Kageshirou when she felt his hand on her arm. She smiled at the look on his face. "Don't bother asking me to heal those ribs of yours yet. Dema forbade me from using my powers for the rest of the day after I ... kind of ... passed out."
Kageshirou frowned, glancing between Tavek and Tsuki. "You ... passed out?"
"Yes, she did." Mahret grinned when the youngest redhead jumped and turned to look at her. "Thought I'd face Court Martial for having three injured Imperials."
"Two. I'm not an Imperial," Tavek replied.
"Yet." Kakyuu let a small smile cross her face as all four of them spun to face her. She stepped completely into the room, letting the door close behind her, as her smile faded. She looked from her oldest to her youngest child, then to Tavek. "Once the three of you are cleared to return to Earth, you are never leaving the planet's surface again, is that understood? And no buts, Commander Kryshta. As of this moment, both you and my son are being retired from the Fleet. I wouldn't even have put either of you on a ship, except I thought it would keep you safe from Meiya. That son of a Wiboar had better be glad he's dead, or I'd make a gift of him to the Emir of Ogel IV."
Kageshirou paled as he listened to the older woman rant. "Aren't Ogeli cannibals?"
Tsuki nodded, turning slightly green. "Yes. And they eat their victims alive."
"Sounds too good for the former Lord Consort, your highness." Tavek grinned a little as the former princess stopped ranting and turned to look at him. "You should have turned him over to the 'feds', let them see what a real alien menace looks like. I hear they like to dissect things. After experimenting on them."
Kakyuu grinned. "I knew there was a reason my son likes you." She chuckled slightly as both young men blushed, then walked over to Kageshirou's bed and gently hugged him. "I've already asked Saturn to take care of those ribs once we get back to Earth. She said there was a situation at the mansion and she couldn't leave to come up here right now."
Tsuki frowned. "Is everything okay?"
Sighing, Kakyuu stood and moved to hug Tavek. "Apparently, there was a fight between Venus and Moon and now Venus is moving out of the mansion. Saturn didn't say what it was about, but I have a feeling I know."
"Uncle Seiya," Tsuki replied. She sighed when she saw her mother nod. "That's all they ever seem to fight about."
"They've fought before?" Kageshirou asked, frowning.
Tsuki nodded, turning back to face him. "Oh yeah, they fight all the time. Kind of like Shi and Mi-ko, though. One will snap at the other over some little comment, they'll argue for a few minutes, stop talking to each other for about ten minutes, apologize, then five minutes later, all is well again. It was an almost daily routine between either Moon and Venus, Venus and Mars, Mars and Moon or all three of them. Usually Jupiter wouldn't get involved unless they disturbed one of the babies."
"Apparently this fight was a lot worse than their usual arguments. Saturn said that she feared that Venus would actually attack Moon." Kakyuu rubbed at her forehead for a moment, then turned to Mahret. "Any idea when they can leave yet?"
Mahret nodded as she glanced over her readouts again. "Princess is free to go, but Prince and Commander must stay one day. Want to monitor wounds."
Kakyuu nodded. "Alright, then. Tsu, let's go find 'Rani and see if we can't figure out what the Earthlings are fighting about now. 'Shirou, stay in that bed until Mahret tells you you can leave. Same goes for you, Tavek. I've already had a very worried Sailor Kinmoku on the comm. once today. I don't want to have to tell your mother that you hurt yourself by Not. Following. Orders." She grinned at the sheepish look on his face. "Besides, your father and Nami are waiting outside and I'm sure she'll be here any moment. Taiki went to the shuttle bay to meet her."
"Why would she take a shuttle? I thought she could teleport," Tsuki replied.
Tavek chuckled slightly, then winced at the pain it caused. "Normally, she can, but ... Nami's about to get booted out of her status as 'youngest' child."
Kakyuu stared down at the coffee cup in her hands and frowned. After verifying that Meiya was dead and his supporters locked up, she had returned to Earth with the children to find that not only had Venus moved herself and her kids to Jinia's, but Michiru had already returned to France with her kids and the Shitennou and Jinia refused to ever set foot back inside the mansion. "But ... what happened between you? How did ..."
Minako sighed, idly stirring her own coffee. "How did it get so bad? Easy. Because she is who she is, we've been following her every command for years. She wanted us to be with Mamoru, so we were with Mamoru. She wanted us to live in the mansion, so we lived in the mansion. She wanted us to become friendly with the Government, so ... so we were at the White House." She downed half the cup in one gulp, then sighed again. "No ... we wanted to be close to her. We wanted to convince her that she should change her mind and become the Queen she was born to be. Instead, we watched her become weaker and weaker."
"Are you sure that you want to move out, Minako-san?"
The blonde looked at Kakyuu and nodded. "I'm positive. Things are never going to change if we all just sit there and do nothing."
Kakyuu sighed. "But if you just talked with her-"
"No, Princess. There are things that can be fixed through discussion, but this is not one of them. Usagi ... is sick and the longer we ignore it, the worse it's going to get. But no one's going to realize until they take a step back and stop seeing her as the 'Invincible Sailor Moon'." Minako sighed, brushing her hair back from her face. She had spent most of the time since her return from Gaea, thinking. Seeing her other self in a position of power had made the blonde question if she would ever be able to lead the others like Pandora had. If she could stand to watch as her lover's mind was taken from her. If she could survive centuries, thinking that her children were dead. If she could ever order the death of one of her friends because they could no longer control their powers. She wasn't sure that she could. And it made her question why. Why had their Queen died before she could save them? And was the same thing happening to Usagi now?
The blonde began idly stirring her coffee again and looked up at the two women sitting across the table from her. "They have to see her, not as our Princess, but as a human. A fragile, sick, frightened, human."
"Frightened? What is she frightened of?" Kakyuu asked, frowning.
"Everything. She's lost Sarah-chan once, lost her father, lost Chiba-san and now she's lost Shi-chan and Seiya-chan. She's scared of losing anything or anyone else and is trying to tighten the reigns," Jinia replied. She glanced toward the living room where Hikari and Urani were making a place for Minako and her kids to sleep. "I don't think she actually realizes that she's hurting people by doing that."
Kakyuu's frown deepened. "Hurting who?"
"Seiya-chan for one. He told me on Gaea that he was tired of the constant ups and downs in their 'relationship'," Minako also glanced toward the living room, smiling a little when she saw Rei and Hiko sitting with the younger children. "And now that she doesn't have him, she's trying to control his kids."
Sighing, Kakyuu followed the gazes of the other two women. She saw Urani, still in female form from the meeting, talking with Ishtar as they put blankets on an air matress. Tonight had not been the first time Usagi had asked Jinia to bring the kids back to the mansion, she had been trying to get them back ever since they moved in with the teacher. After learning that Jinia was expecting, Urani had refused to return. "I guess that's one reason he was so depressed." She turned her attention back to her coffee. "I had hoped that, at last, they would all have a chance to be happy. Things have always been so hard for them. And my insistence that we return to Kinmoku only made them worse."
"What? How can you say that, Princess? No, life hasn't been a fairy tale, but ... there is no way of knowing that life would have been better here." Minako frowned, placing one hand on the redhead's arm. "If you had been here ... you wouldn't have your children."
Kakyuu smiled sadly, placing her hand over the blonde's. "We would still have them, but they would have human parents, not aliens. They would have grown up on a planet that isn't at war with the Hrrrrunai. They wouldn't have had to be trained to fight. They ... wouldn't have had to ..." She felt arms wrap around her shoulders and glanced over to see Tsuki put her head on her shoulder. "How long have you been listening?"
"How long have you been talking?" Hikari smiled a little from the doorway and moved to put a hand on Jinia's shoulder. "This isn't a time for worrying about the 'what-if's' and the 'should-have-been's'. We are what we are. We are Senshi. Senshi are born to fight. But all that responsibility does come with some pretty good benefits as well."
"Like?" Jinia asked, raising an eyebrow.
Urani chuckled slightly from the doorway as she watched Ishtar move to hug her own mother. "Hikari-san finally learned to teleport from ship to ship on her own."
Jinia paled and looked at her daughter. "You didn't go to ..."
Hikari shook her head. "Don't worry. I just went back and forth from Kakyuu-hime's ship to Seiya-oba-san's. Although, once, I think I missed and wound up on Kaish-oba-san's. I didn't know she was that obsessed with plants."
Kakyuu chuckled slightly. "If you had spent as many years as Kaish did without ever seeing a plant, you'd be slightly obsessed with them too." At the confused looks, the redhead let a sad smile cross her face. "Kaish was the reason I escaped Kinmoku the first time. She shielded me from an attack by Galaxia herself. I ... we all thought that she had died on Kinmoku, but she didn't. She was already pregnant with Devii at the time and had gone into her male form to protect her, but the attack removed his StarSeed, revealing that he was a Senshi. Galaxia was apparently fascinated by a male Senshi and forced him to become one of her warriors. When she realized that Kaish couldn't fight in that form, she ... had him imprisoned in her palace at the Zero Star. He was kept there until Galaxia was defeated."
"That answers a few questions about her. Mainly why I've never seen her go male," Jinia replied. She glanced up at Hikari and smiled. "Remind me to ask 'Kaa-san if the garden on the family estate is still in good shape. When your aunt comes back, I want to take her to see it."
Hikari smiled a little and nodded. "Okay."
Urani frowned at the fleeting image she got from Hikari. 'Why do you think they're dead?'
The green-eyed girl jumped and glanced up at Urani. 'I ... it's been so long, I ...'
'I was missing for seven years and I'm alive. Aunt Kaish was missing for a lot longer than that.' Urani smiled at her, then walked back into the living room. 'Do not be so quick to give up hope, cousin. I have a feeling that things are about to change.'
