Version 1.0 - 9th Aug 1998 -------------------------------------------------------------------- S.I.U. - The Sailor Investigation Unit by DARK DAY FOR ANIME (Mark A Page) Disclaimer - all characters pertaining to the series Bishoujo Senshi Sailormoon and Silent Mobius are owned by Takeuchi Naoko, Kia Asamiya, Michitaka Kikuchi, Bandai, Studio Tron, Kadokawa and Kodansya. All other characters were thought up by me. -------------------------------------------------------------------- Ami walked, happily, along the cold night street, allowing the rain to dance gently on the top of her head. It had been a long time since she dared feel some semblance of a simple pleasure of life. Like walking in the rain. She'd always run for shelter, when the rain would come. But now she LOVED IT! Nobody to tell her what to do, anymore.... Her mother was probably dead, and there were an unknown number of people, out there somewhere, who wanted to kill her or worse. So she decided to do whatever she wanted, now strangely freed of whatever barrier it had been that she had placed on herself.... Desires she'd always had, but had kept hidden under the facade of the quiet intellectual, more interested in study than in life. Well, of COURSE she was SMARTER than anybody else. That was how it was MEANT to be. She was a born GENIUS! They just didn't APPRECIATE her SUPERIORITY to them. She put her hands on her hips and laughed out loud with maniacal joy. "Yes!" She thought to herself. "I am a living legend!" She continued on her way, turning a corner and stepping into a street, lined with expensive town houses, with lots of equally expensive European cars parked outside. Ami stared at the cars, angrily. These bloody yuppie freaks, flashing their wealth so obviously and arrogantly! Her family had been one of the old rich, people who knew how to be wealthy but maintain a modicum of intelligence about putting it on display. She hated these kinds of people, and promptly went from car to car, letting down the tires. When one of the owners spotted her through his front window and came out of his house to remonstrate with her, she decided it was time to show him REAL power. To whit, she changed herself into Sailormercury before his astonished eyes, and thumped him to the ground with a multi-point Mercury Aqua Rhapsody. After laughing maniacally, hands on hips, over the poor bastard's dazed form, she ran from the street into another which was lined with shops, and proceeded to smash the shopfront windows, humming 'Morning Moon' as she did so. Until her stomach grumbled. She stopped as she placed a hand on it. Unfortunately, none of the shops were food shops, and none of the owners who were currently charging at her looked very likely to help feed her LEGENDARY stomach. So, after showing what can happen when one with superpowers learns just a little of self-defence martial arts, throwing the irate owners in every direction, she decided that she might have to find some way to make money, to fill her LEGENDARY stomach. She looked down at the short, blue skirt of her senshi fuku, and at those LEGENDARY legs of hers, and decided that selling herself might just be an option. After all, what man could resist a GOOD LOOKING, nay GORGEOUS young lady like herself with a combination of the PERFECT BODY and PERFECT BRAIN, dressed in a DAMN SEXY blue sailorsenshi fuku? She'd wipe the floor with all the other INFERIOR girls on offer! ----o "Aoi...." Pagan whispered as she paused. She shook her head and turned away once more. "My mother was the same, you know.... She was an obsessive woman, always throwing herself into whatever it was she'd chosen to do with her life.... She was also addicted to more prescription drugs than is possible to name, off the top of your head. I spent my entire childhood having to look after this.... this woman... who had never once shown me an ounce of affection..." She paused. "Who spent all her time getting totally wasted, sometimes even overdosing when things got really bad.... I had to act as her safety valve, even after she was hospitalised.... Right up until the moment she succeeded...." Aoi sank down, sitting on her haunches, one hand up against the wall. Pagan watched her as she clenched her other hand, blood running as her fingernails dug into her palm. "You see? You see this?" She turned to him, holding out her wounded hand and showing the tears on her face. "I can't even cry unless I'm in pain.... I don't FEEL anything. The only opportunity I get to FEEL is when I'm angry. And you wonder why I make myself angry, so often? It's like a drug.... I HAVE to feel angry. It makes me feel a tremendous pleasure.... Not from the control it gives me over others, but the enactment of EMOTION...." She chuckled, bitterly. "Do you think.... that gives you an excuse.... for the way you behave?" Pagan asked, carefully. "I don't know why I'm telling you this.... I just.... I just.... Who the hell else can I tell, you know?" Pagan stepped over to her and knelt down beside her, placing a hand on her shoulder. "I really don't think telling me this will help you salvage your reputation, any...." "Oh, you...." Aoi lifted her unwounded hand to slap him, then wrapped it around him and started to bawl. Pagan, surprised by this sudden turn of events, didn't react for a good minute or so. Then, for some reason unknown to him, he held onto her, trying to calm her. "Being a crybaby doesn't suit you at all, you know?" He mumbled as she slowly settled. Then she pulled herself away from him and stared into his face, feeling a tremendous sense of madness overwhelm her. She clamped her mouth over his, passionately, and was elated to find him responding in kind.... "Yes, you two be that way." Mhaere whispered to herself as she stood, quietly, outside the doorway of the room, planning the moment when she would barge in on them.... ----o Part Twentynine Psychosis Rift ----o It was some time later, as Kaji watched the ambulance taking Hotaru/Saturn away, that he realised that neither Aoi nor Pagan had returned. Nor was Mhaere anywhere to be seen. He turned to the old priest, who had also been helping co-ordinate the medics and police investigators that had arrived in bulk after Kaji's calls for help, standing next to him. After glancing in the direction of Mars, who had turned out to be Hino Rei, the granddaughter of the priest, sitting sullenly some distance away in the care of one of the investigators that were now combing the grounds of the shrine, along with the two talking cats, he queried the old man. "Where did officer Kikotsuka and that naked guy get to?" Rei's Grandfather turned to him, surprised by the question. Uhh... I'm not certain. I sent Kumada-san to look for them and the red-haired Caucasian girl...." He paused for a moment. "Strange, you know.... The three of them... Just fell out of thin-air...." "I know. I saw it, myself." Kaji rubbed his chin as the old man paused, trying to gather his words together in his mind. "I've.... seen a lot of things in my life. I was a soldier during the war, you know.... I served as part of the home defence force because of my training as a priest." He paused. "Because of that, I had been sent to remote places where the spiritual emanations have culminated in a long succession of strange events, some I'm not sure even happened.... Lights in the sky.... Haunted old buildings.... Monsters in the wooded valleys...." He paused again. "But.... I've never seen anything, not even in all my years as a priest, to match what I've seen today." Kaji smiled, nodding. "I know what you mean. It hasn't been one of my good days, either. And I get the distinct impression that it isn't going to get any better." He reached into his pocket and pulled out a packet of cigarettes, opening it. "What do you think it was, some kind of worm hole?" The old man rubbed his chin, considering Kaji's question seriously. "I've seen wormholes, before. I was once called upon to seal one up at a construction site when beasts from another realm started making their way through. Very dangerous event... Quite a few people were hurt." He nodded. "Yes, it certainly wasn't a wormhole, but I have seen this kind of thing before." He turned to Kaji, who had lit a cigarette that was hanging from the side of his mouth. "You seem to have a very open-minded attitude to these things, officer." "I've had to." Kaji chuckled, blowing smoke into the air. "I'm a member of the Sailor Investigation Unit. I look into the affairs and events involving your granddaughter and her friends." Kaji looked back over at Rei. "I take it you had no idea she WAS a Sailorsenshi?" "No. No idea at all. She's going to get a right scolding when I get an opportunity." The old man thought it over for a few moments, only then realising the ridiculousness of his words. "What can I do or say? She's been running around, these last few years, trying to be some kind of superhero. I've always pictured myself in those terms.... The priest who runs about the country, exorcising spirits and demons, left, right and centre.... I shouldn't have expected her to be any different. After all, there are elements in her personality that are very much like mine." He smiled, shrugging. "Oushou! Oushou!" The sound of Yuuichirou's voice rang across the courtyard as he approached the pair, running. They both watched as he came to a screeching halt in front of them, trying to catch his breath. "I'm sorry.... I found them.... Those three that fell from the sky...." He leant down on his knees, puffing heavily. "I'm just not as fit as I used to be." "And?" Kaji sniffed with impatience. Yuuichirou looked up at him, shrugging. "They're having an argument." "They're what?" Kaji raised an eyebrow. "Well, I have to say, that shouldn't be too difficult where Aoi is concerned." ----o "What do you mean, take Pagan but not me?" Aoi stood at the far side of the wardrobe room, hanging onto Pagan's arm. Not long before, Mhaere had made the pretence of barging into the room as Aoi and Pagan were beginning to get, for want of a better term, a little excited. What followed was a comical scampering of the two to the opposite ends of the room, babbling some apologies for not seeing her immediately. When, of course, Aoi noticed it was Mhaere, her territorial side took over, and she was back across the floor and in between Pagan and Mhaere like the Great Wall of China. "Look, I can't have anyone else getting involved in this, and I'm certainly not having YOU involved.... Not with the powers you posses.... It might only make things worse than they are, now." Mhaere sighed, adding to her memory the fact that she should never, again, let Pagan out of her sight, especially within 100 miles of Aoi. "Look, girlie.... I don't HAVE any powers, understand? I'm just normal people. And anyway, we have to get back to my house, otherwise those girls will take Ami.... I can't have her ending up in the hands of some psycho cult type of group, not after having finally bagged a senshi like her...." Aoi clutched onto Pagan's arm, VERY tightly. "Besides, you're after Pagan, yourself. I'd be stupid to give him over to you." "Since when have YOU shown any interest in him? Relations between the two of you have been fairly cool up until now...." Mhaere shook her head. "No, you're just distracting me.... Pagan wanted proof of Lysithea Caprice's activities, and I must give it to him, regardless, because what Lysithea is doing is more dangerous than any of us realise." "She's right." Pagan nodded, looking at Aoi, who looked back up at him. He sighed. "If what she says is right, Lysithea is planning to open the barrier between Earth and Nemesis.... I've known him for years.... I can't believe he would do such a thing... Use the Coven in this way.... But I have to see for myself." Aoi looked deflated. "You prefer to go with her, without me?" He swallowed, sweatdropping. "Actually...." He started, but didn't get an opportunity to continue. Chuckling to herself, Mhaere clicked her fingers, and both she and Pagan faded. Aoi watched in disbelief as their forms became mere shadows, then dissipated. "You...." Aoi clenched her fists, angrily. "YOU BITCH! I'LL GET YOU FOR THIS!" ----o Shimazaki leaned back in his seat, staring at the office ceiling, thinking to himself. There really didn't seem to be anything more he could do, right at this moment.... His one and only remaining witness/suspect to the killing of the Sailorsenshi Kino Makoto, Doctor Mizuno, had been murdered in the holding cells of the station, and the killer had escaped, somehow, dashing away at the speed of light, too fast for even the Duty Officer at the time to see.... He considered the "invisible girl" who had taken off with both Mizuno's daughter, Ami, who had also presented herself as Sailormercury, and that damned Kikotsuka woman.... But it just didn't seem right.... Why try and kidnap one and kill the other? Surely, if you wanted to silence both, just kill both. The office door opened and he turned to greet Abe, who entered, smiling. "Hey, Shimo-san, guess what?" "I'm sure you'll tell me, anyway. What?" "Kaji's found Kiko-san, safe and well.... And a couple more Sailor girls. Ain't that great?" Shimazaki rolled his eyes. "Yeah, I'm just over the moon. Was one of those Sailor girls Mizuno Ami?" "Sorry, he didn't say. But one of them was badly wounded.... Had to be taken off to hospital. I heard she was Saturn, of all the ones that could have been found." "Shee...." Shimazaki bit his lip. "Handle with care, lest you set off the end of the world." "Hmm." Abe nodded. "Anyway.... Where's Go gone? I've been looking for him." Shimazaki gestured to the empty office. "As you can see, he ain't here. As to where he's gone, your guess is as good as mine. He scarpered almost as soon as he'd told us about Mizuno's death. Dunno where." Abe nodded. "Strange that.... Your boss told everyone to keep their mouths shut about that, for up to two hours after it occured." "Yeah, but Katarin's Major Crime. He'd know straight away as part of his job...." "Who told him? Your boss certainly didn't, and he wasn't anywhere near the holding cells at the time.... I just seemed strange." "Maybe someone told him. I dunno.... The old man has kept both Katarin and me away from this, cos of our work on the Kino case." ----o "You're sure you're not interested? I mean, have a look at me. I'm cute, sexy and I wear a bitchin' sailorfuku...." Mercury hung from the arm of the embarrassed salaryman who, nevertheless, found the concept of bedding a Sailorsenshi attractive. "Ahem.... I'm sorry.... I have to go HOME to my WIFE and KIDS. Now, if you will excuse me...." He tried to pull himself away from her, but she was determined. "Aww... Come on, I need the money and I'm hungry. You just don't like me, do you?" She batted her eyelids at him. After swallowing, and nervously peering at everyone who was staring at them as they walked past on the busy city street in the middle of the nightclub district, he shook his head. "Really, I'm sorry, Miss Sailormercury or whatever you wish to call yourself.... I'm not into.... Not into..." His eyes bugged as she loosened the bow on the front of the fuku, putting a greater amount of cleavage on display. He only just managed to tear his eyes away. "No! I'm sorry! Now, please, let me be on my way!" He wrenched away from her, much to her surprise, and started to walk away. Mercury was furious. "YOU DICKLESS BASTARD! I BET YOU'RE FUCKING IMPOTENT! AND YOU'RE UGLY, TOO, YOU OLD BASTARD! I WAS GIVING YOU AN OPPORTUNITY TO RELIVE YOUR YOUTH AND YOU GO AND DO THIS! WELL, SIT ON THIS, EUNUCH-SAN!" She gave the salaryman the bird and tromped away, arms crossed, bundling anyone who dared get in her path aside. "Damn. Maybe I'm not as saleable an item as I thought...." She paused. "What am I saying? I'M DAMN GOOD! He just had no TASTE!" And with that, she started laughing maniacally. Then her stomach grumbled. She paused and put a hand to her belly. "Ahhh.... I wanna eat...." She turned to her left, and started to drool as she spotted the cafeteria. In seconds, she was jammed up against the window. "Oooohh.... Fooooooood....." She started to shiver as she watched the patrons downing cakes, coffee, liqueurs and such. "How dare those people in there eat in front of the great SAILORMERCURY! MERCURY AQUA RAPSODY!" What followed was not pretty. ----o Hotaru opened her eyes to the pale, anemic, white-walled silence of the hospital room, and the eyes of the young woman who had killed herself, only hours before, in her presence. Hotaru blinked, trying to focus her dazed and confused mind on the equally dazed and confused face of Miyuki. "You.... contrive to return to the light...." Miyuki mumbled. "And force me to come with you...." She swallowed, rubbing a hand on the side of her temple to which she had held her gun. Hotaru momentarily looked around the room, trying to work out why Miyuki was being allowed to visit her.... Here, inside the emergency ward of the local hospital. The silence that filled her private room was louder than she could bear. There was nobody else in sight. Just Miyuki, looking frailer and more frightened than Hotaru could imagine the girl ever being. She came across as someone who was used to comfortable absolutes and resolutions.... Anything that harboured in between rattled her. To be brought back to life, after attempting to kill herself to get away from Hotaru must have come as something of a shock. "I.... just didn't.... want you to... die..." Hotaru croaked, feeling drained of all her energy, helpless as a rag doll underneath the patently inadequate covers of the hospital bed, feeling the unpleasant sensation of tubes and monitors, hooked up and running into her arms and nose. It astonished her to think that she could ever reach this poor condition, simply by exercising her own powers. That and the wound that had been delivered, courtesy of Miyuki and her gun. Miyuki studied her, with the casual eye of a predator studying its prey, trying to size them up and decide whether to move in for the kill. "I could kill you now, you know?" She said, flatly. "Kill you, and there wouldn't be a single thing you'd be able to do about it." Hotaru met her gaze. "Would... you?" She coughed, feeling a tight, burning sensation in her chest. She didn't want to look down to see the wound that was causing the discomfort. The look on Miyuki's face when her eyes were lowered to that part of her torso was enough to tell her how bad things were. "I... take it... that I survived... the operation...?" "My aim has never been poor. I have always killed with every deliberate shot. With you, I aimed to kill. And I failed. It is that simple. Your heart was merely grazed, your lungs suffered most of the damage." Miyuki paused for a moment. "But then, you really don't need to know the full extent of your injuries, do you? As far as your concerned, if it hurts, it must be bad. All of your kind think the same way." "What... is different.... about me?" Hotaru coughed again, feeling more discomfort. Miyuki didn't answer, staring at her. Hotaru wondered if the girl was thinking.... She knew, through the probing of her mind, that Miyuki was more than a deep thinker, the opposite of her cold and sullen exterior. But her thoughts were askew, in a way that Hotaru could not even begin to fathom. "Yes. What is different about you?" Miyuki pulled her pistol from her jacket and held the business end up to Hotaru's face. The Saturn senshi almost wet herself on the spot. "I could kill you, right here, right now. Nobody would know who did it, because they wouldn't be able to catch me. Understand? I'm too good for the piss poor security guards the hospital hires. I'm too good for the law itself. I get away, every time, with what I've done." "Does it.... make you feel good..?" Hotaru croaked, "Does it fill you... with a sense of thrill? A thrill... that is lacking... in the rest of... your life..." She coughed, feeling drool run down the side of her mouth as a shiver ran through Miyuki.... An almost uncontrollable anger, building up within her. She hated the sensation of emotion. It disturbed her thoughts. "Shutup, and shutup now. I won't say it again. I am not some benevolent enemy that has a 'good' side that can be convinced of the right moral position to which you and your kind subscribe." Miyuki bit her lower lip to hide the sneer that tried to cross her face. "I know you sailorsluts better than you think.... I've had experience with you, before." Her trigger finger trembled. "Not only the way you hurt Kimi, by exposing her mother to the law, forcing her to kill herself to maintain the family honour.... And, Kami knows, that is more than enough to punish you.... No, it is the two-faced nature that exists amongst you...." "What... are you talking... about?" Hotaru peered into the barrel of the gun, the entire scene washed with a sense of surrealism. Miyuki's finger continued to tremble, like she wanted to silence her one time mistress.... Hotaru wondered whether she should try to calm the girl by entering her mind, once more, but decided, considering the effect that had on Miyuki the last time, she'd probably end up with a bullet through the brain that much quicker. "I'm talking about those traitorous bitches.... The ones you call Uranus and Neptune...." Miyuki spat the names like they were venom. "Do you realise for how long they have been working against you? Do you realise their culpability in the death of your comrade, Jupiter?" Hotaru was too dumbstruck by these words to give her an answer. Miyuki nodded. "No, I can see you don't know. How does it feel to have been so totally betrayed?" "I... don't believe... you..." Hotaru could feel tears coming to her eyes. Was Miyuki trying to deceive her? No. There would be no point, and someone like Miyuki didn't do anything without a point. But surely, creating some fantasy with which to base her contempt for Saturn was enough of a point, a reason.... But the more Hotaru thought about it, the less likely that seemed. "Yes. You do." Miyuki's tone became flat and lifeless, once more. "There is no alternative. You now face a situation that is beyond your control and understanding. That is why you Sailorsluts are in the appalling state you are now. Do you know where your friends are? Apart from Mars, I think not." Miyuki lifted the gun away from Hotaru's face. "I know... where some of them... are..." Even as she said it, Hotaru didn't sound so sure of herself. Miyuki shook her head and replaced the gun in her jacket, looking tired and pale. "What did you do to me? How did you stop my death? My dying?" Miyuki started to wander around. "How did I get here? This hospital...." She gestured around the room. "I feel... I can feel Kimi.... I can feel her, alone, in the darkness.... Where is she? Where has she gone? What is her destiny?" She leant herself against the far wall, at the edge of Hotaru's vision, and slowly slid down.... "Dione.... is searching... for her... longtime friend. Are... you going... to allow her... to meet the... destiny you foresee?" Hotaru rasped. Miyuki sat on the floor holding her face in her hands, making not a sound. "Understand... Iapetus... Understand why... I saved you..." Hotaru watched as Miyuki vanished, in silence. The rushing winds of eternity, in its infinite silence, blowing through the room in all its terrifying magnitude, settling, replaced by the normal sounds of the hospital. Hotaru sighed, and closed her eyes. END OF PART 29 -------------------------------------------------------------------- Next Chapter - "Bad Karma" _________ / @ \ DDFA (The Right Dishonourable Mark A Page) / / ^ ^ \ \ ayanami@merlin.net.au /\ Chief Propoganda Officer, Keeper of \/ \/ the Tapes and Co-Founder of the Saitou-chan \___________/ Appreciation Society - Adelaide Japanese /_/ \_\ PU Animation Society