Author's Notes: This Sailor Moon story is based on the manga
(the MixxZine version) and is told from a first person point of 
view.  If I told you what issue or what character, it would ruin
the story.  Although, you can probably figure it out on your own.

Disclaimer: The characters and general story outline presented
here belong to Naoko Takeuchi and MixxZine, but the
perspective and feelings are all mine.




Before the End


This phantom bus scheme is not going well.  Queen Beryl will
not be pleased that I have yet to find the Sailor Scouts.  I have
captured many girls, but none possess the aura of power I would
expect of those warriors.

Time for another stop and, I suspect, another failure.  Will I never
find these Scouts?  Wait, that girl.  There is something about her,
a spiritual presence and something else, something almost familiar.
Her long raven tresses and brown eyes do not at all resemble the
two Scouts I have seen.  And yet, her movements are graceful
and, I can sense a warrior dwelling beneath the calm surface.

I reach out to her, forcing her to come to me.  Impossible,
she's trying to resist me.  But, I am stronger.  As she walks
towards me, not of her own volition, I see fear in her eyes.
For some reason that I cannot explain, that fills me with such
anger and sorrow.

Bah, I don't have time for this.  "Come on," I order her.  "Get
on the bus."  She complies, collapsing at the back of the bus.
But then, I have given her little choice.  Why do I have this
strange wish that she had come of her own free will?

It is time to return to the Dark Kingdom, to my mistress
Beryl.  As the bus travels towards the warp that will take me
there, my thoughts dwell on her.  She is but a human girl, I
try to tell myself.  And yet, I know that she is much more.
She must be, to consume my thoughts this way.

A cry breaks into my thoughts, the cry of some foolish woman.
Good, another hostage for Beryl, another toy for Mettalia.
I wonder fleetingly if the fool knows what she has just thrown
herself into, before I turn to look once more upon HER face.
There is a moment of disorientation, as there always is, when
I enter the warp field.  When the bus finally emerges, the foolish
girl who latched on earlier is nowhere to be found.  I should be
concerned.  I should find her.

I use that as an excuse to stop the bus at the outskirts of the
castle, but in truth there is another reason.  I know that I
should take these captives to Beryl immediately, but I cannot
stand the thought of her touching the raven-haired beauty I
have captured.  So, instead I unload my passengers, treating
them with as much care as if they were rag dolls.  But not her.
With her, I am almost gentle.

It is strange, this feeling.  The sight of her stirs something within
me.  I can neither explain nor describe it, but it frightens me.
I reach for her, and as my fingers brush her soft hair, I feel a
strange tingle.  An image springs to my mind of this girl, yet
not this girl.  She is laughing, and I, I laugh with her.  The
sound of this laughter is not the mocking laughter that
abounds in the Dark Kingdom.  It is filled with mirth and
joy.  Who is this girl?  Who is she to me?

But, before I can discover the answers, before I even
understand all the questions, they are here.  With the appearance
of Sailor Moon and Sailor Mercury, my Dark Kingdom training
takes over.  I grab the girl and pull her roughly before me as a
shield.  The quick movement causes the girl to stir and wake.
Her struggling distracts me, but not so much that I cannot
freeze Mercury's fog.

Then Sailor Moon throws her tiara.  By some instinct I do
not understand, I force the girl aside.  I could have used her
as a shield, but chose instead to protect her.  Why, I do not
know.  Yet, it seems I did not need to worry.  It is child's play
to catch the tiara.  But wait. Noooo!  It was a trap.  That child
tricked me.  She will pay for that.  I hurl dark energy at the two
Sailor Scouts.

Suddenly, Mercury flings something at me.  I begin gathering
my defenses when I realize she was not throwing the object at
me, but rather the girl.  I turn, as much as I am able, to that
beautiful girl.  My eyes widen in awe as she begins to glow,
softly.  I gasp in realization as the symbol of Mars shines brightly
on her forehead.  In the mere seconds -- or perhaps it was even
less than that -- in which her transformation takes place, my
memories return.

I remember long walks in the beautiful gardens of the Silver
Millennium as we talked of a future together.  I recall dances
in the great ballroom and sweet kisses under an earthrise.  Images
of the day I taught her to ride a horse and the time she made a
surprise visit to my chambers flow like quicksilver through my
mind.  Every memory of every moment we ever spent together
burn themselves into my mind.

Then she is before me in all her glory as Sailor Mars.  How could
I have forgotten you, my love?  She begins to chant, and I see in
her eyes that she has forgotten me too.  "Aku Ryo Tai San!" she
screams.  Is that what I am to her, an evil spirit to be banished?
And perhaps, despite everything, that is what I have become.
For,as I see her fire coming to claim me, and I know that her
heart has not forgotten my betrayal.

I could fight.  I could defend myself.  I could try to make her
remember, but I do not.  It is best that she never know.  I have
brought her enough pain.  I will bring her no more.  If she does
not remember now, then she shall never remember.

The last thought I have before her flames consume me is that at
least I had the chance to see her once more, touch her once more,
before the end.

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