= = = R = = =

When I wake up, I’m alone. I sit up slowly, realizing how incredibly hot it is, my head aching. Jadeite’s jacket and shirt are lying here. I scan the beach and notice him a short distance off, waist-deep in the water. While his back is turned, I dress, feeling a flush of embarrassment. It made sense at that moment, but now it’s hard to fathom. I remember his tears, and his suffering…and feel better immediately. I watch him out there…wondering what he’s thinking. He looks happy. As he should. As Nephrite should look, too. Where the hell is Nephrite anyway?

I get to my feet and look around, shading my eyes from the fierce sun…but Neph is nowhere in sight. The boat is still out there. But then, he hardly needs it. Although, after yesterday, my own energy is still fairly low. I’m not sure if I could teleport now.

“Good morning.”

Jadeite has noticed me, and calls a greeting, wading toward me with a slightly shy smile. I stare like an idiot…fixated on his bare pale chest.

“You’re going to burn out here,” I say aloud, as if it were my consideration for him making me stare.

“That would be a pleasant change,” he comments, grinning.

I smile back, but scan the horizon once again, getting annoyed.

“We ought to get out of this sun. I can’t think where Nephrite has gone.”

Jadeite’s face grows more serious.

“Nephrite is here? I thought I dreamed it.”

“No. He and I brought you here. We got you out.”

“Thank you,” he says quietly. He sits down on the sand, cross-legged, quiet for a moment. As I join him, he watches me curiously. “Who are you anyway? What’s your name?”

“Rachael. I’m…” What am I, anyway? It’s hard to understand, much less explain what I’ve become. “I’m…Nephrite’s…student, I suppose. He’s training me.”

Jed cocks an eyebrow at me, partly in confusion, partly in innuendo.

“For what?”

I smirk at him, blushing.

“To fight,” I clarify. “And I’m not doing too badly either.”

“To fight whom?” Jed asks, his smile gone again.

I exhale, annoyed by the thought. I try to explain to him Nephrite’s plan, to return to the past and change things. This leads to a much longer explanation about how much time has passed since Jed’s imprisonment, and how Nephrite came to ‘die’, and what I know of the falling of the Dark Kingdom.

When I’ve answered all Jadeite’s questions, we both sit quietly, reflecting. I glance at him, something striking me for the first time. There is no evil in him. He would seem to be ‘cured’.

“Jadeite-sama?” I ask, distracting him from his thoughts. “May I ask you a question now?”

He nods, looking at me curiously.

“Do you remember your childhood?”

He looks slightly pained, but nods again, before turning his glance from mine…looking out to the ocean.

“I remember it all now. The earth. The moon kingdom. Endymion…my prince. Beryl enchanted us…turned us against him.”

“How do you remember?” I ask him slightly desperately. “Nephrite will not. He can’t think of it. There’s too much pain…”

“I know. But I broke through it. I came to a point where I welcomed pain…just to assure myself that I was still alive.”

I touch his arm in sympathy, my thoughts full. If only Jed could talk to Nephrite about this. Surely he could convince him…since he won’t listen to me.

“Please…would you tell him? I’ve tried, but he gets too angry with me.”

“Tell me what?”

I spin around, startled, to find Nephrite standing grinning behind us, looking like a model in his crisp white shirt…his auburn hair flaming in the sun, floating in the breeze.

“Nephrite!” I complain, holding my pounding heart. “You scared the hell out of me.”

“You’d make a lousy sentry, Rachael,” he tells me generously, his eyes on Jadeite. He extends a large hand, helping Jed to his feet. They shake hands a moment, their eyes wide with emotion. “How are you, Jadeite?”

“Fine. Thank you.” Jed regards Nephrite so searchingly, almost devouringly, plainly intensely grateful to see him again.

“Nephrite-sama. Can we please get out of here?” I interrupt, my head nearly splitting. “This sun is killing me.”

“You’ve met my stalwart servant, I see,” he teases, inclining his head at me.

Servant. That’s the word of course. Much simpler. Much more accurate. I bite my tongue, holding back indignation.

“Yes, alright,” Nephrite agrees. “Let’s get back to civilization, shall we? Maybe then Rachael will be quiet long enough for us to talk.”

= = = N = = =

Back at the resort, we take some time alone. Jadeite gets his own room, and Rachael is indeed quiet, apparently absorbed in thought. I wonder how much she discussed with Jed. There already seems a bond between them. How she brought him back to life from that state he was in, I don’t understand…but I am intensely grateful. I haven’t thanked her for it yet, however. I’m not certain how I can.

I take another long sip of the ice-cold drink in my hand, pondering. No one spoke on the journey back here. You’d think Jadeite would be full of questions. Rachael must have answered them. He seems…so different. And yet…familiar as well…in a way I can’t express. As if I dreamed it, but can’t remember. He’s not the man I knew…but I feel like he’s an old friend.

I pass a hand over my temple, noticing that my head is aching savagely. I must have had too much sun this morning. I call to Rachael to bring me something for it. She does, then sits nearby watching me, intensely enough to be disturbing. I’ve heard it said before that a woman’s silence is deafening. I realize now what that means.

“What is it, Rachael?” I ask her, annoyed in advance.

“I was just wondering…what you’re planning. If you’re still set on going back…or if maybe you’ve come to your senses.”

I glare at her, at this last choice of phrase. She knows better than that. Is she spoiling for a beating?

“I haven’t changed my mind. And you’d better watch your tone.”

“I don’t think it’s fair of you to involve Jadeite in anything you’re planning,” she insists, her tone just the same, defiant. “He doesn’t suffer from any of these delusions that you do. He’s happy. Can’t you just let him live his life?”

“None of any of this is your business,” I remind her, growling slightly, feeling nearly pushed to the limit. “And he’ll do as he chooses. I won’t force him.”

“I don’t want you to ask him,” she tells me angrily. “Because he’s bound to feel obliged to you. And that isn’t fair. I don’t want him involved in any of this madness.”

“Who is he to you, that you should speak to me this way?” I demand, nearly shouting. “You don’t even know him!”

“I do know him. Better than I know you, anyway,” she states sullenly. Then her eyes narrow. “He remembers, you know. He remembers what you don’t. The time before Beryl. When you fought together…for Endymion. He’s not a pawn to a woman who’s been dead for ten years!”

Rage overwhelms me…blinds me. My one thought is to stop that voice. I raise my hands and hurl energy viciously. Rachael deftly jumps aside, as I’ve trained her to do – the energy bolt searing into the sofa, the room rumbling with thunder. I try again, but she ducks successfully, the glass sliding-door behind her shattering explosively. She screams, covering her head against the flying glass.

“Nephrite!”

Jadeite has materialized into the ravaged room, standing between myself and Rachael who still cowers slightly in the pile of broken glass.

“Have you lost your mind?” he demands of me, eyes wide with disbelief.

“Get out of the way,” I order him, returning my eyes to Rachael – still filled with cold fury. She stands up tall now, losing her terror, emboldened by Jadeite’s presence.

“You can go ahead and kill me, but it won’t change the truth. And you know it’s true. Why won’t you face it? You’re just a coward, that’s all.”

I rush at her, no longer content with a mere attack…wanting to kill her bloodily, with my own hands. But as I reach her, grabbing her shoulders, Jadeite leaps at my back, knocking me down, and all three of us fall to the floor, wrestling amid the shards of glass. They turn against me, Jed and Rachael, struggling madly to hold me down. I manage to slide my grip from Rachael’s shoulders to her throat, squeezing tightly, intent on throttling her.

“Tell him, Jadeite! Tell him how he served Endymion, ” Rachael begs, pressing down on my shoulders while Jadeite tries desperately to pull my hands away.

“It’s true, Nephrite…listen to me.” He stops trying to fight me…calms his voice quickly, trying to catch my eye. “Listen. Look at me. Try to remember. We were friends…comrades…we trained together…fought together…since we were boys. Try to think…please. You know it’s true.”

The pain is so great that without thinking I release Rachael to hold my head in both hands, screaming…bending down, curling up like an infant…every cell alive with torment.

“It’s Beryl doing this to you. Tormenting you, even from the grave,” I hear Jadeite urge me through the haze of agony. “Fight her. Fight for your memories. She can’t keep them from you.”

“It’s only pain, Nephrite-sama,” Rachael calls to me, tears in her voice. “You told me so.”

“That’s right,” Jadeite encourages, “You can beat it. Remember your goodness…you’re stronger than her evil. Fight her.”

Images flash through my head…myself, writhing just this way…Beryl towering above me, sneering with sadistic pleasure.

“I love you, Nephrite,” Rachael tells me softly, close to me, her hair brushing my face, her tears falling on my cheek. “And Naru loves you. Remember her. Think of her.”

Naru-chan springs to my mind…and I see her above me, as Rachael is now, crying just the same. I knew agony then, and thought nothing of it. I bore it, for her.

“Naru…,” I mumble, trying to focus on her.

She reaches down to caress my face, to wipe away her tears and my own. “Please, Nephrite…remember who you are…do it for me?”

My heart twinges at her touch…I’d forgotten what she conjured in me…strength, courage…a desire to do right. An echo of a self, long forgotten. The pain recedes a moment as I cling to this…remembering. I begin to see images…faces oddly familiar…and faces I know well, but strange. Kunzite, laughing with good humour. Even Zoicite, smiling without a trace of malice. I see an older woman, bending to kiss my cheek. I see a life-time of study and training. I see Jadeite, just as he told me – a fresh-faced boy, playing at swords with me. I see myself, kneeling before a podium, trembling with honour…and above me, Endymion – a face I’d forgotten…but that I’ve seen since…at that doll show. That dark-haired young man. My heart had known him. And he knew me too. My lord…Endymion.

“How could we fail him?” I find myself weeping. “We turned on him…fought him. How could we do that?”

“It was Beryl,” Jadeite’s voice floats in my mind. “She enchanted us. Stole us from him, and made us forget. And she herself…enchanted…blinded to all but evil…by Metallia. You remember?”

“I remember,” I echo, fists clenched in hatred and fury…thinking of it all…all the pain and destruction…innocent people. Shame roars through me, so deeply, I cannot open my eyes.

“It’s not your fault, Nephrite,” Rachael says softly, as if reading my mind.

I look sadly at her, watching me worriedly, kneeling in glass.

“You’re bleeding,” I tell her hollowly.

“So are you,” she answers, touching a spot on my arm where blood is dribbling down. I stare at it morbidly, wishing there were more. How can I live, knowing this? Knowing I betrayed everything I ever held dear?

I look up to catch Jadeite’s eye, nearly pleadingly, wondering how on earth to go on. He doesn’t speak, but seeing him is a comfort, and a torment…a vivid memory of my life before it was stolen from me.

“Zoi and Kunzite,” I say aloud as they spring into my mind.

“Dead,” Jadeite sighs, following my thoughts, mourning with me. “Why them and not us?”

“It isn’t fair,” I growl. “It isn’t right. We have to do something. Who knows why we were spared. But we have a second chance, and we’re going to use it to change things.”

“How?” Jed asks.

“We will go back. We’ll go back, as I planned. There’s nothing we can do here.” I feel better as resolution grows strong in me. “We’ll return first and undo Naru’s suffering, and then find some way to help the others. I can’t live like this…without at least trying to help them.”

“I’m with you,” Jed says with quiet passion.

I glance at Rachael speculatively, remembering our argument of minutes ago. She looks miserable but resigned. And as my eyes meet hers she shrugs slightly and ducks her head in submission.

“I’m with you too.”