Disclaimer:
Sailor Moon and related characters are the property of DIC and
whoever else owns her. Insert your names here:__________. Tolaris, the
Dragoons, and others are the creation of PFC Troy Stanton. Wolf, Muzzer,
Brasck, and others are from my own imagination.

Note:
This series is based on the Sailor Moon V series created by PFC
Troy Stanton. Although this is based on his series, mine may not necessarily
agree or even follow the SMV plot (probably the latter). You will also note
that I use a totally different writing style (i.e. I use some vulgar language.
Mostly in my characters, not the others. Okay, Lita's the exception to that
one since it fits her character so well). I saw a whole side of the SMV plot
that I am trying to see what I can do with. Please keep in mind that I am not
trying to add to the SMV series, but running my own series that branches off
from the SMV series. I still hope that you will enjoy my series, and please
send comments, criticism, and maybe even flames (I probably won't pay too
much attention to those) to TNF927@hotmail.com. You might also want to
note that I used metric measurements to make it easier for the rest of the
world to understand. Hey, the world doesn't spin around the U.S., you
know. (Despite what we all like to think ;)

Special thanks goes to Luna and Artemis for forwarding this to PFC Troy
Stanton, because I couldn't, or was too stupid, to run it by him first. Also I
need to thank Troy Stanton. Without his series, or his understanding and
kindness, this would not have been possible. THANKS TO ALL THREE OF
YOU!

THIS THING IS FINALLY FINISHED! ENJOY!

And onto the first chapter of my story . . .







                  Sailor Moon D
                The New Dragoons
                        
                   A New Ally
                        
                        
                        
             By Todd "Sniper" Foster



"Where is she?" Rei asked with more than a little annoyance, her jet black
hair swaying as she swept the steps of the temple on Cherry Hill. Rei, Ami,
Mina, and Lita had been waiting for Serena for over half an hour and Rei
was becoming impatient.
"Maybe she had another detention or maybe she's studiee . . . No,
forget I said that," Mina said with a sheepish grin.
"Well, whatever the reason I hope she hurries," Ami said, "I have a
Chemistry test in two weeks that I have to study for."
Everyone sighed at that. "Poor baby," Lita muttered under her breath.
Mina put her arm around Ami, "Girl, we have got to get you out more."
They all started laughing when their blue haired friend turned a delightful
shade of red.
Ami was spared from further embarrassment when her
communicator beeped. She quickly grabbed it, "Serena, is that you? Sailor
Moon?" Ami asked.
"Oh, hi Ami. Uh, we have a little problem down here at the park,"
Sailor Moon's voice said. Everyone strained at this.
Ami was the first to speak, "Well, what kind of problem?"
"Lieutenant Marx let another one of his monsters loose in the park,"
there was a loud crack and then Sailor Moon's voice again, "Hey, you had
better watch it, buster!"
Everyone was up and running in an instant, sprinting for the park.
"Sailor Moon? We'll be there as soon as we can," Ami said as she tried to
keep up with the others.


*                                       *                                      *


Sailor Moon stepped out from behind the wall she had been using for cover
when another blast from the monster blew the wall to pieces. Sailor Moon
stumbled and fell from the explosion. Lieutenant Marx started laughing
when his monster began advancing on a dazed and confused Sailor Moon.
Suddenly the monster cried out in pain as a rose slashed its face.
Sailor Moon looked over at who had thrown the rose and cried out, "Tuxedo
Mask!"
"Sailor Moon! Your Scepter!" the black clad figure called out.
"Right," she said and held her hand up to the sky. A scepter suddenly
appeared out of nowhere. "Moon Scepter . . . Elimination!" and it lashed out
at the monster. It struck the monster in the chest and with a loud cry,
vanished. She then turned her attention to Lieutenant Marx, "Your next,
Negatrash."
Marx glared at Sailor Moon, "I would really like to finish this, but
I really must be going."
"You aren't going any where!" a voice called from behind him,
"Mercury Bubbles! Blast!" and the area became shrouded in fog.
"It appears that Sailor Mercury has decided to join the fight," He
turned around to see rings of fire come flying at him from the fog. He just
managed to get out of the way and it singed his cape. "And Mars too, I see."
"Oh, we are all here, pretty boy," and three figures emerged from the
fog wearing the suits of Sailors Jupiter, Venus, and Sailor Moon. Marx
turned around to see three more shapes emerge. Sailors Mercury, Mars, and
Tuxedo Mask came walking toward him, fanning out to surround him.
"I see we have a full house," He remarked. A ball of energy began
to form in his hand. "And now you will all die!"

*                                       *                                      *


High above the city a plane flew over the fight below. The rear cargo hatch
was open and a figure stepped up to the edge, the wind pulling at his clothes
and hair. He looked over at the bulkhead waiting for the red light to turn
green.
It turned green.
With a quick look at the cockpit he jumped out into free-fall.


*                                       *                                      *


Sailor Venus jumped to her left dodging a plasma ball Marx had thrown at
her only to collide with Sailor Jupiter. They untangled themselves in time
to jump out of the way of another plasma ball.
"Jupiter Thunder Clap . . . Crash!" and balls of energy flew from
Jupiter's hand. Marx managed to get out of the way and he watched as the
balls of light hit a tree and exploded. He then had to move again as the tree
fell over. Suddenly he cried out in pain as a rose imbedded itself in his
shoulder. He spun around and hurled a ball of plasma back at Tuxedo Mask.
The plasma ball hit the wall behind Tuxedo Mask causing it to
explode. Tuxedo Mask was knocked to the ground by the debris. He didn't
get up.
Sailor Moon's eyes went wide when she saw her true love laying on
the ground not moving. "Tuxedo Mask!" she cried and ran over to help him.
Marx saw this and sent a plasma ball at her. She never knew what hit her.
Marx let out a smile as Sailor Moon came to rest next to her beloved
Tuxedo Mask.
He then concentrated on Jupiter and Mars who were working as a
tag team. They both let loose on Marx letting their powers combine. Marx
jumped clear and then shot back at the two. The plasma ball landed right
between them and exploded. Mars was thrown nearly seven meters, coming
to rest against a bench. Jupiter was tossed up against a tree like a rag doll
and fell to the ground with blood streaming from her nose and ears.
Mercury looked on in horror as her friends were being systematically
beaten. And then it was her turn. "Mercury Ice Storm . . . Freeze!" and then
a ball of ice came flying at Marx. The ice ball caught the edge of his cape
and froze it solid. At this he made a strike of his own but missed Mercury
by a mile. The two then went head to head and began to duel it out. Attack,
defend, move, countermove. The fight ended after two minutes when a
plasma ball hit Mercury square in the chest.
Marx then turned his attention to Sailor Venus, the last remaining
Sailor Scout. She starred back at him, her blue eyes as cold as ice. If the
Sailor Scouts were to die here today than there was no way to stop it. They
had been in tighter situations before and come out all right. She had no
reason why she couldn't do it this time. But a little voice in  the back of her
mind said that this might be the end. She quickly squashed the voice, she
needed all her concentration to beat Marx, besides, she knew that they
would emerge victorious. She knew that one day they would be the
defenders of Crystal Tokyo, she had seen their destiny, she knew the future.
Then the voice returned. The future is not set in stone. The future is
what you make it. What you saw was one possible outcome of many.
No! I can't think like this! I must succeed! And turned her attention
to Marx only to see that he had made the first move. A plasma ball was
heading right for her. She tried to jump out of the way but was caught by the
edge of the blast and hurled through the air. The world spun around her and
she watched as the ground rushed up to meet her. Her head exploded in pain
as she came to rest next to a boulder. Dazed and defend by the explosion she
forced herself to get up despite the pain and nausea. Pulling her blond hair
that was caked with dust and dirt from her eyes she saw Marx standing not
to far from her, laughing.
Suddenly Marx felt a sharp pain in his shoulders and the ground
came up to meet his face. Venus watched in amazement as the figure
dropped out of the sky and landed on Marx. She watched as he rolled away
from Marx and came up in a crouch with what looked like a shotgun leveled
at Marx. Marx shakily got up and grimaced as the pain from his shoulders
shot through him.
"Who are you?" he wheezed.
The figure's gaze and gun never strayed from Marx as he answered,
"You know me as the 'Assassin'," the figure's deep voice stated. Marx's
eyes went wide with fear as the name registered and was followed shortly
by a loud boom. Marx' eyes went even wider with surprise as his upper
torso vanished in a spray of blood and he fell into oblivion.
That was the last thing Sailor Venus saw before darkness enveloped
her.


*                                       *                                      *


The Assassin stood up and looked at the devastation around him. Trees
fallen, craters in the ground, benches, and walls in ruin. Man. Why do I
always cut these things so close? he thought as his blue eyes surveyed the
scene. He was brought out of his thoughts by the sound of someone
groaning. He turned around and saw Tuxedo Mask trying to sit up. He
rushed over and propped up the black clad figure against a nearby tree.
"Prince Darien? Can you hear me?" He said quietly.
"Yeah," Tuxedo Mask croaked, his hand rubbing his head, "You
don't have to shout."
"All right, looks like you'll be fine," he said.
Tuxedo Mask/Prince Darien looked up at the figure standing over
him, "Who are you? And how do you know who I am?"
"I'll tell you later," the figure promised, "Right now I need to make
sure that the rest of the Scouts are all right."
He walked over to Sailor Moon and rolled her over so she was laying
on her back. The right shoulder of her suit was burnt away and the skin
under neath was scalded red with blisters and some of it was flaking away.
Damn! Second and third degree burns. She must have passed out from the
pain.
He placed his hand on her shoulder and when he pulled it away the
burns were gone. He gently pulled her into a sitting position, careful to not
touch her shoulder. She let out a moan but didn't seam to wake up.
"Princess Serena. Princess Serena, come on, wake up," he said
gently.
"Mom? I don't feel good," Sailor Moon said weakly, reaching for
her shoulder.
"Come on. Lets get you up off the ground"
Sailor Moon opened her eyes and looked around. "What happened
here?" she asked. Then she looked over at the Assassin, "And who are
you?"
The figure smiled at her. "An old friend," he said.
Sailor Moon looked at him questioningly and then saw Tuxedo Mask
sitting up next to a tree. Her eyes went wide as she remembered what
happened to him.
"Tuxedo Mask!" she cried and ran over to him, her shoulder
forgotten.
The Assassin shook his head in amazement. Even after all these
years. She's still impossible to predict.
He turned around and saw Sailor Mercury laying not to far away and
went over to help her.
As he bent over her he saw that her entire chest looked like Sailor
Moon's shoulder had. Scalding red with blisters and flaking skin. There was
also the odor of burnt flesh. He saw that she was breathing shallowly and
was wheezing. He felt for a pulse and found it very weak and thready. She
was in deep shock and would die soon if he didn't do something quick.
He took off her tiara and, disregarding one of his most sacred rules,
placed two fingers on her forehead and concentrated. Her sigil began to
glow brightly on her forehead and then she was swallowed in motes of light.
When the light receded all evidence of the plasma ball hit was gone. She
was now breathing normally and her pulse was strong and steady.
He heard someone come up behind him and turned around to find
a tall figure standing there. He had dark hair that reached his collar and a
pair of steel eyes. He looked to be in his mid twenties and was staring at
him with a cold expression on his face.
"Who are you and what are you doing here?" his deep voice
demanded.
"Right now that isn't important, Commander Tolaris," the Assassin
told him, "First we have to make sure the Scouts are all right and get to a
place of safety. Then I will explain everything."
Tolaris seemed to except this and knelt over Mercury.
"Take her over to Tuxedo Mask and Sailor Moon. I'll go get the
others." Tolaris gently picked up Mercury and headed over to Tuxedo Mask
and Sailor Moon while the Assassin went to get Sailor Mars.
When the Assassin reached Mars she was trying to get up off the
ground but was too weak to stand on her own. He helped her up and brushed
her jet black hair out of her face.
"Are you all right?" he asked quietly.
Mars rubbed her head and answered, "Did you get the licence
number of that truck?"
Mars stumbled as her legs gave out and the Assassin caught her
before she could fall.
"Don't worry, I shot the driver," he said.
She looked up at him in confusion. She looked into his eyes and
thought she recognized him but couldn't place him. "Do I know you?"
"Yes, you do," he told her, "From another life time." This only
confused her more. "Come on. Lets get you back to the others," and started
for the others with Mars using him for support.
When he got Mars back to the others he then went for Sailor Jupiter.
He found her laying next to a tree with blood streaming from her nose and
ears. Oh, shit. He quickly scooped her up, being extremely careful of her
head, and took her to the others.
When he got back he saw that Mercury was up and moving,
checking out the others. He gently set Jupiter down and waved her over. She
quickly came over and pulled out her computer the second she saw the
blood all over Jupiter's face. She started to scan Jupiter and then looked up
at him.
"Thank you," she said quietly.
He smiled at the blue haired girl. "Any time, Ami," he replied, "I'm
going to go get Venus."
Mercury nodded and watched as he strode off to get Venus.
When he reached Venus she was still unconscious and laying face
first in the grass. He gently rolled her over and propped her up against the
boulder she had hit. He started to quietly call her name, trying to get her to
wake up.
When Venus opened her eyes, she saw a blurred image and blinked
her eyes. When her vision cleared, she saw one of the most handsome
people she had ever seen leaning over her. He had an unruly shock of dark
blond hair that was set off by a pair of deep blue eyes. His face looked like
it was chiseled out of granite but it still had a soft quality to it. He was
wearing a pair of fatigues and some sort of silver headband around his head.
He had a wicked hunting knife strapped upside down to his left arm. He also
had what looked like a shotgun strapped to his right leg and some type of
oversized pistol on his right hip.
She was brought out of her revery by the sound of his deep voice.
"Come on. Lets get you off the ground," the figure said.
She took his hand and let him pull her up, feeling the strength of his
grip.
She looked into his eyes and thought she saw something familiar in
them but she couldn't place it. It was something from long age was all she
could remember.
She was brought back to the present by him leading her back to the
others.
When they got back to the others, they noticed that there were some
newcomers with the group. Two cats to be exact, one black, the other white.
The Assassin smiled at them as he recognized who they were. They both
were looking at him with reserved looks.
"Luna! Artemis! Is that any way to greet an old friend?" he asked
them.
They both looked back at him with quizzical expressions. How did
he know our names? they thought. Then they realized who was standing in
front of them.
The white cat spoke first. "Prince Wolf?" Artemis said in disbelief.
"Is that really you?" the other, Luna, asked.
"Yes, it's me," Wolf said.
Sailor Moon looked down at the two cats. "How do you know who
that is?" she asked.
Luna answered her. "He's from the Moon Kingdom," the black cat
said. Then she looked at Wolf. "But, I thought that you died in the final
battle."
He closed his eyes and shook his head. "I wasn't even in the Moon
Kingdom when Queen Beryl attacked," there was regret in his voice, "I was
in the Negaverse at the time trying to figure out when she was going to
attack. When I got there, the place was in chaos. When I finally found out
what all the chaos was about I got back to the Moon Kingdom as fast as I
could but I was too late. The battle was over and the Moon Kingdom
destroyed.
"Queen Serenity had already sent everyone to the future and when
I found her she was too weak to send me with you. Just before she died, she
made me promise her that I would watch over you five and protect you with
my life."
Luna spoke up, "Then how did you get . . . " But Wolf silenced her
before she could finish.
He chocked his head to one side as though listening for something
very faint. He slowly turned around and looked out across the clearing they
were on. He tapped the silver headband around his head and a red visor
appeared around his eyes, similar to the one Mercury used, only his could
do quite a bit more than hers could. He pulled out the oversized pistol and
a pair of cross-hairs appeared on the visor telling him where the gun was
pointed. The pistol was almost 25 cm long and had a barrel 4 cm in
diameter. On the visor Wolf watched as information was presented before
his eyes telling him about everything he saw and what type of threat it
presented. He slowly started scanning the far wood line, panning his head
left and right. Suddenly one of the objects was highlighted and it displayed
threat, composition, and what it was.
It was a Hunter/Scout Drone.
Wolf raised the pistol and moved it until the cross-hairs were on the
drone. Once he had it bracketed, he pulled the trigger. A ball of blue energy
shot from the barrel and flew across the field. There was a small explosion
and then Wolf stood up, holstering the pistol. He tapped his headband and
the visor vanished as he turned to the group.
"I'll tell you guys everything when we get to a safe place," Wolf
said, "I have a Hummer parked just outside the West Gate. Let's go." He
reached down and gently lifted Jupiter off the ground and led the group to
the West Gate.


*                                       *                                      *


Wolf pulled the military spec Hummer to a stop in front of the abandoned
cathedral that Tolaris called his home. Before Tolaris another person from
the Negaverse had occupied the cathedral. He had been one of the
Negaverse's greatest generals. His only flaw had been that he had fallen in
love with a human, a close friend of Serena's. His love for her had
ultimately led to his death by rivals that were seeking nothing but power and
their own advancement.
He had come to this abandoned cathedral in hopes of avoiding the
palace politics and allow him to destroy Sailor Moon and the Sailor Scouts
unhindered by rivals that were trying to disgrace him. Or kill him. He had
turned the cathedral from a condemned building into a fortress.
The cathedral now had several sub-levels and had a security system
that would even impress the United States Secret Service (or the Gestapo as
some have called them. Usually those who were being chased by the USSS).
The cathedral could defend its self against almost any attack from the land
and air.
Tolaris walked up to the door and placed his hand on a plate that
was next to it. The door opened and he led the group inside. He took them
to the large living room and motioned for everyone to have a seat. Wolf,
carrying Jupiter, went over to the couch and gently laid her down. When he
turned around, he saw Mercury standing in front of him. She had a
concerned expression on her face.
"Wolf. We have to take her to a hospital. She has a serious
concussion and if she doesn't get medical attention soon, she'll die," her
voice was cracking.
He looked into those blue eyes that were misting over and his heart
went out to her. He looked around the group and saw the same expressions
on their faces.
"Ami, can I see your computer?" She looked at him dumbly, but still
handed over her computer.
He took it and started punching keys and then he handed the
computer back to her when he got the information he wanted. He then took
off Jupiter's tiara and placed his hand on her forehead. He closed his eyes
and concentrated. The room filled with a bright light and everyone shielded
their eyes from the glare. When the light receded, they saw Wolf with his
hand still on Jupiter's head. He looked very weak and his hand slid off of
her forehead.
He sat heavily on the floor as Mercury went over with her computer
to see what he did to Jupiter. What the computer told her left her in shock.
The concussion was gone and everything was normal. It was as if nothing
had ever been wrong in the first place. The only anomaly was the deep sleep
she was in.
A soft light enveloped Jupiter and then she reverted back to Lita.
Mercury looked over at Wolf as he regained his strength. "How did
you do this?" she asked in awe.
Wolf's clothes shimmered for a moment and when they solidified
again he was dressed in a pair of jeans, T-shirt and an olive-drab jacket that
gave him the look of a street thug. He looked up at the group around him.
"It's time I told you where I come from. Only one other person knew
this story. She was your mother, Serena," he said looking over at Sailor
Moon.
She looked back at him blankly. "How?"
Now everyone was confused. Wolf could tell by the expressions on
their faces. 
He stood up and said, "Let me go lay Lita on one of the beds and
then I will tell you everything." He lifted the sleeping burnett off the couch
and headed for the bedrooms.
When Wolf had disappeared down the hall Tolaris turned to the two
cats, "Can we trust him?"
Luna answered him, "Yes, we can trust him with our lives. He was
Queen Serenity's most trusted advisor."
Tolaris let out a moan, "Great. A politician."
Artemis started to chuckle lightly, "She didn't say 'political advisor'.
Wolf was Serenity's military advisor."
"Like I said. A politician."
"No, you don't understand. Wolf never wanted the position but
Serenity forced him into it. His reputation as a strategist and tactician were
legendary. He was much more at home leading men in battle than he was as
a council member. Hey Luna, remember the Oltech Offensive?"
Luna thought for a moment, "That was during the Antell Wars
wasn't it?"
"Yep, that's the one." He turned to Tolaris to explain, "During the
Antell Wars Wolf had lead a small division of troops during all three wars.
His team took the fewest casualties of all the divisions, that's percentage
wise, mind you, that we sent to help the Antolls. And his team saw the most
combat too.
"Anyway, at one point they were ambushed coming out of a
mountain pass and for all intent and purposes, should be dead. Somehow he
punched a hole in their lines and got out through that. Once they were clear
of the ambush he turned around and ate the Kolbech platoon alive."
"That's one of his more famous battles," Luna commented, "He ra-"
"Isn't it amazing how people manage to blow things way out of
proportion?" Wolf asked, interrupting Luna.
Artemis looked up at him. "What do you mean?"
"Well first off, my winning the Battle of Molbon Strait was pure
luck. The person directing the Kolbech's artillery screwed up and dropped
the artillery on their own lines that made a hole large enough for us to get
through. Now, I wanted to keep moving and find a place to set up a good
ambush but my second in command convinced me to turn around right there
and wipe them out. Fortunately for us they were still disorganized from their
own shelling and the fact that we made it through their lines. They didn't
stand a chance and we took them by storm.
"That battle was one piece of good luck after another. We didn't lose
one person in that battle. Now, that was luck," Wolf pointed out.
"Wolf, you're too modest," Luna said.
"Hey! It's the truth!"
Tuxedo Mask changed the conversation, "You were going to tell us
about yourself?"
"Huh? Oh, yeah. You can all change back to your normal selves
since this story will take a while to tell." Wolf looked on as the Scouts and
Tuxedo Mask reverted back to their normal selves.
When they were all their normal selves, Wolf began his story. "I was
born in a small village in the country that is today called North Korea 2,000
years ago. I grew up in the village learning how to farm and spent my days
in happiness. Then, one day, while I was out in the rice patties I was
swallowed by a bright light and then I passed out.
"When I awoke, I found myself in a small cell in what I would later
learn was the Negaverse. I pounded on the heavy doors but no one paid any
attention to me. I swore in Korean and what little Cantonese I knew but it
was to no avail, they just ignored me. The only contact I had with them was
when they brought me food. About once every week or so they would take
me out into a large yard with several others from Earth. I found an old man
who spoke Cantonese and became good friends with him. He was a scholar
and knew many different languages. It was through him that I learned Latin,
Arabic, Hebrew, Japanese, and Russian. I also learned the reason why we
were there. Queen Haltyha, Queen Beryl's mother, was looking for worlds
to concur and when they found Earth, they took people from all over the
world back to the Negaverse for study.
"During these months I studied the grounds that we were kept on
looking for any possible way to escape. I also conferred with several of the
other prisoners to see what they knew and thought about escape. Several of
them had been there for years and had lost any hope of escape but I did find
a few. There were four of us. One was a Roman who had been sent to
Palestine to enforce the Emperor's will. The second came from the Arabic
peninsula and was one of the Sultan's bodyguards. The third was a ninja
from Japan. He had been brought there about the same time as I. And then
there was me, a sixteen-year-old boy from a small farming village. And it
turned out that I was the best warrior of the group even though I had not yet
completed my martial arts training.
"We studied the grounds and found several possible ways to escape
and we made our plans.
"The next week we made our escape. When the guards took us out
for our exercise, we rushed them and made a run for the guard shack on the
far side of the exercise area. The Roman and Arab never made it. One was
taken down by an ice crystal and the other by several large spikes. The ninja
and I made it to the shack and took out the guard taking his sword and the
staff that was leaning on the wall. With both of us armed we made our way
to the main gate.
"At the gate we found thirty of the installations best troops waiting
for us and having nothing to lose we charged them. We both fought very
well but the ninja was eventually killed by a kick to the neck. I kept on
fighting against impossible odds and was holding my own until there was
this tremendous explosion that sent me flying over the compound walls.
"This time when I awoke I found myself laying on an operating table
with what I presumed to be a doctor of some sort leaning over me. He said
some thing to me in Moltith, the native tongue of the Negaverse, and I found
myself answering him in the same language. He told me to get up and I did
but I had no control over my body. It was like someone else was in control.
I also felt this darkness in my soul that I kept fighting to try to gain control
of my body. This battle waged on within me for months but I was never able
to gain control from the evil.
"The explosion had badly destroyed my body and I should have died
but the doctors were able to repair all the damage with something similar
to bionics. They used a compound similar to the synthetic polymimic alloy
that they use to make Symipas and replaced most of my right torso and all
of my right arm with the stuff. They also had to replace my left leg, the right
side of my head, and my left arm below the elbow. One of the advantages
of using the alloy was that they were able to preset the bionics into two
different forms using my brain as a computer to make all the calculations
for it because the programing would have been impossible to preset into the
bionics themselves. One of the things that they later discovered was that I
had the power to shape the alloy into any shape I wanted.
"While they were doing this, they brainwashed me and made me into
Queen Haltyha's personal bodyguard, which I performed exceptionally well
at I'm sorry to say. During this time I was constantly fighting the
brainwashing and occasionally I would gain control for a few seconds. As
time went by these battles became more and more fierce until eventually my
body broke down and I became uncontrollable. During this fighting I
discovered that I had a very special power. A power beyond anything that
the Negaverse had ever seen. I found that I could control atoms at the
subatomic level.  I could manipulate matter.
"During one of the battles I was having with the evil it took a
physical form. Somehow I let loose a shockwave that vaporized everything
for twenty-five kilometers. How I survived I do not know for the next thing
I remember is being back on Earth in the Himalaya mountains."
"You're the one who destroyed the palace?" Tolaris said in shock,
"No one was able to figure out how that happened. Rumors had it at
everything from a rouge denizen with the power of reflex, to an atomic
warhead. I don't believe it."
Ami looked over at Wolf with a puzzled expression on her face.
"How have you survived all these years?"
"I think it has something to do with the bionics and my ability to
manipulate matter. I'm able to rejuvenate the cells of my body which kind
of makes me immortal you could say."
"Then how did you defeat the evil?" Rei asked.
Wolf smiled, "I was just coming to that.
"While I was in the Himalayas I was still fighting for control of my
body and went into hiding so I couldn't hurt anyone.
"Then one day a young princess found me and took me back with
her to her kingdom. Her name was Princess Serenity. Your mother Serena.
She brought me before your grandfather and he helped me overcome the
evil. The evil is still in me but now I have complete control of my body and
soul. I have never had another conflict within me and will never again have
one. The Imperium Silver Crystal allowed me to nearly destroy the evil but
I still have access to its powers. This allows me to draw energy from both
this universe and the Negaverse. Similar to what the Imperium Silver
Crystal does now that Captain Raijen fused the crystal with his own life
crystal."
Serena took off her locket which contained the Imperium Silver
Crystal and looked at it with awe. "The Silver Crystal draws energy from
the Negaverse too?" she asked in amazement.
"Yes, it does," he told the blond.
Serena started to twirl one of her ponytails that went down to mid-
calf and continued to stare at the crystal. After a long time she closed the
locket and put it back from where she had pulled it.
Her big blue eyes studied Wolf's face for a minute. "Can you tell me
about my mother? I don't know much about her," she said. There was
sadness in her voice. "I don't remember much from the Silver Millennium."
"I would be happy to," he said.
"I met your mother when she was about your age and she was a lot
like you back then. She had an unending curiosity and was very intelligent,
like you."
Rei let out a laugh. "Ha! Serena? Intelligent? That is the stupidest
thing I have ever heard in my life."
Serena glared at her and stuck out her tongue.
Wolf continued as if he hadn't heard her. "She also had a knack for
making friends and getting into mischief. Your grandfather took me in as
his own and I grew up with your mother. I began to think of her as a sister
and was very fond of her. She caused a lot of trouble and I was usually the
one to get her out of it. Anyway as we grew up, I completed my martial arts
training and taught them to her when I had finished. In turn she and her
father taught me how to use my own powers to their greatest potential. Even
though I am still learning to this day.
"As we grew out of our teens and became adults Serenity began her
training to take her place as the ruler of the Moon Kingdom and I found I
had a knack for military tactics and strategy. So I enlisted in the military and
began my climb to the top. I moved up the ranks quickly and soon found
myself as the commander of the entire Special Operations Division. Shortly
after I became the commander Serenity's father became very ill and I
resigned my commission to help him and Serenity through the tough times
that lay ahead. During this time I became active in the intelligence
community and set myself up as the Royal Family's personal bodyguard.
You wouldn't believe how many people saw this as a chance to dethrone the
monarchy and call it their own.
"After Serenity's father died and she became Queen I joined the
intelligence division and was placed in charge of everything that involved
the monarchy. It was during this time that Serenity met Raijen and Serena
was born. It was also about the time the rest of you were born too. As you
five grew up I began to do several things at once. I was running all
intelligence operations concerning the monarchy and the Negaverse while
at the same time I began to train Serena, Mina, and Lita in the martial arts.
"When we learned that Queen Beryl was going to attack, Serenity
made me her chief military advisor and put me in charge of getting the
Sailor Scouts ready to fight when the time came. This was some six years
before the Negaverse finally did attack so it gave me plenty of time to get
you all up to speed.
"During this time Serenity was under a lot of pressure. Not only did
she have to worry about raising a daughter, which was a full time job as it
is, she had several domestic and foreign problems along with three scandals
in the parliament. And on top of all this was the impending invasion of the
Negaforce. She was becoming an emotional wreck and I ended up
kidnaping her twice to get her away from all the stress that she was dealing
with.
"It was on one of these unplanned vacations that we realized how
thin our intelligence on the Negaverse was and we decided that we needed
some first hand intel. We both agreed that I should be the one to go.
"One week later I went to the Negaverse and found the place in
chaos because Beryl had just launched her attack on the Moon Kingdom.
Once I figured this out, I returned as quickly as I could but it was already
too late. The battle was over. The Moon Kingdom was gone and Serenity
had sent everyone to the future except for me. I stumbled around in the ruins
for some time and eventually found Serenity. She was very weak and didn't
have the strength to send me to the future with you. She made me promise
that I would go to Earth and wait for you. That was the last thing she said
before she vanished." Wolf's voice was starting to crack. "She just
vanished," He said quietly.
After several minutes of quiet he began to speak again, his voice
more in control, "After she vanished the Imperium Silver Crystal shattered
into seven fragments and flew off to Earth where they were passed from one
generation to another until Beryl tried to retrieve them. After that I came to
Earth and waited for you to appear."
There was a short silence and then Ami spoke, "What did you do
after you came to Earth?"
"I basically bounced around the world living the life of a person at
each point I lived at. I got to take part in many great parts of history. I
participated in all three Crusades on both the side of the Arabs and the
Europeans. I also took part in Feudal Japan and several other events in
Eastern Asia including WWII, Korea, and Vietnam," he said. He thought for
a moment reliving some of the memories of that undeclared war. "God, that
war was screwed up.
"Any ways, after Vietnam I got interested in computers and have
been on the forefront of computer and software, mostly games and flight
sims, ever since."
"Wow!" Serena said with awe in her voice, "You design video
games?"
"Yep. For both console and PC. And occasionally I will design an
arcade game."
Ami asked the next question, "Do you design any thing for the
Mac?"
Wolf looked over at the blue haired girl with a horrified expression
on his face. "Hell no! The Mac OS is way to constricting. And besides,
Mac's generally don't have the processing power for 3D rendering and
computational fluid dynamics modeling, which I use a lot as the flight
model for my flight sims."
"What games have you created?" Serena asked. She was really
interested in the gaming part of his job.
Wolf smiled at her. "Somehow, I knew you would ask that question,
Serena."
"Are you kidding?" Rei said, "Video games and manga are her
whole life!"
Wolf mouthed an "Okay" as Serena and Rei got into another one of
their infamous fights. There was a loud crack of thunder that sent both girls
diving for cover.
"Thanks," Wolf said to Tolaris for breaking up the girls fight.
Tolaris grinned back. "No problem. I just love doing that." Tolaris,
being from the Negaverse, had a unique power like all the denizens of the
Negaverse. Some could create plasma energy.  Others could throw spikes
made from any variation of materials, any where from wood to crystals.
Tolaris' unique power was that he was able to manipulate the weather. He
had found this to be quite useful in breaking up fights between Serena and
Rei since they both hated thunder and lightning.
Serena peeked her head out from behind the chair she had used for
cover and glared at Tolaris. "Don't do that! You know how much I hate
thunder!"
"Sorry," he said, "It's still the fastest way to break you two up."
Serena glared at him as she sat back down next to Darien.
Wolf smiled to himself at the exchange between the two. "Do you
still want to know what some of the games are that I made, Serena?"
Serena's eyes lit up when he asked her that. "Yeah!"
"Yeah. I would like to hear what some of the games are that you
made," Ami said
Rei looked over at her with a shocked expression. "I didn't know
you liked video games?"
Ami's faced started to turn red. "Actually I like the graphics more
than the games themselves."
"Well, let's see. I was on the development team that eventually lead
to the original Microsoft  Flight Simulator even though I didn't personally
take part in the actual design. Just the concept. I also created many of the
games that were made for the Atari and Nintendo. I have also been involved
with most of the games currently out for the PC in one way or another. And
I have made two games that are now considered classics, Death Wish, which
was the first 3D first person action game, and the original Sailor V."
Serena's jaw dropped when she heard the last one. "You created
Sailor V?!"
"Well, kind of. I got the original idea from someone else. Someone
we all know," then he added, "Well, know of."
"Really? Who?" Mina asked.
"I'll give you a clue," he said. Then he turned to Serena, "Can you
tell me the ten end bosses in Sailor V, Serena?"
Serena looked at him as though he had asked her a stupid question.
"That's easy," then she rattled of the ten bosses without having to think. As
Mina heard the names, her eyes began to bulge. She looked over at Artemis
and saw the same expression on his face.
"My gawd," she said when Serena had finished, "You designed
Sailor V after me!"
Serena and Rei gave Mina a weird expression. "What?"
Mina was starting to get excited. "When I was operating as Sailor V
those names you just read off were the names of several Negaverse warriors
that I took out," then she looked over at Wolf, "You really did pattern that
game after me, didn't you?"
"Yes, I did," he said matter-of-factly.
Then she pretended to get angry. "Then where are my royalties?!"
and she threw a pillow at him.
He batted the pillow aside. "Hey, take it easy. There's five million
dollars sitting in a couple of different bank accounts that you can claim
when you turn eighteen."
Everyone's jaw dropped when they heard that.
"Did you say five million dollars?" Mina asked in disbelief.
Wolf nodded. "That's the royalties plus 2 percent that I owe you."
Everyone just sat and stared at Wolf in disbelief. The thought of
having five million dollars was making Mina's head spin. The silence lasted
until Lita walked into the room.
"'And the silence was deafening'," she said when she saw how quiet
everyone was.
Everyone suddenly looked over at Lita with startled looks. No one
had heard her come into the room. Ami got up off the couch from next to
Tolaris and pulling out her computer, headed over to Lita. As she started to
scan Lita to make sure that she was all right Lita gently pushed her away
saying, "Don't worry. I'm fine."
"I don't care what you think," Ami said, approaching her, "Now
hold still so I can check you out."
"Yes, Dr. Mizuno," Lita said as she put up with Ami's examination.
When Ami finished, she looked over at Wolf. "I don't know how
you did it, but any evidence of Lita's concussion is gone."
"I already told you how I could do that," he said in response.
"You said you could rejuvenate your own body," Ami pointed out,
"You didn't say anything about being able to do the same to others."
"I told you that I could manipulate matter," he explained, "That
doesn't mean just my body. I can manipulate any matter. Everything from
stone to living things."
The others were beginning to see just how powerful Wolf's "talent"
was. If he could create things, he could destroy things as well. If the evil in
him ever resurfaced, even for a second, Earth, and everything on it, could
just cease to exist. And their might not be any way to stop him.
"What else can you do?" Serena asked between yawns.
Wolf looked over at the clock hanging on the wall and decided that
everyone should get some sleep. "Tell you what," he said to the group, "Lets
get some sleep and I can answer your remaining questions in the morning."
With that everyone split up and headed to their rooms as it was very
late.


*                                       *                                      *


Somewhere in a part of space and time known as Neven, a massive army
was preparing for battle. Thousands of beings moved about readying to
work their trade. Death. Huge portals opened and several advance teams
vanished through them.
They were preparing for an invasion.


*                                       *                                      *


After Mina changed into her nightgown she lay down on the bed and starred
up at the ceiling in the dark, the events of the night swirling through her
mind. After several hours she fell into a fitful sleep and dreamt. She dreamt
about Wolf.


*                                       *                                      *


Darien looked down at Serena as she slept with her head resting on his
chest. It always amazed him how quickly she fell asleep and wished he
could do the same. The events that had transpired throughout the evening
robbed him of sleep. The near destruction of the Scouts weighed heavily on
his mind and he wondered what he would have done with himself, having
to live with the knowledge that he had failed his fiends and his one true
love. Failed to protect them, and Earth.
Then his thoughts turned to the stranger who saved them all from
being destroyed. He wasn't sure what he thought about Wolf but in his heart
he knew that he would trust him with his life although he didn't know why.
And that bothered him. He was not accustomed to trusting in people blindly.
In fact he didn't trust very many people at all. At least not until the Rainbow
Crystal had allowed him to finally find out who he was and what his
purpose was.
"Mmmm . . . Why do I have to take these lessons, Mom?" Serena
mumbled in her sleep.
Darien looked down at her and wondered what she was dreaming
about. Perhaps she was dreaming about what part Wolf had played in her
past, he thought as he drifted off to sleep.
While he slept, dreams came to him and revealed his memories of
Wolf.


*                                       *                                      *


"I really don't trust him," Tolaris said to Amy as they lay together in bed.
Ami looked up at him through he crystal blue eyes. "Why?" she
asked simply.
Tolaris let out a sigh. "I really don't know," he admitted, "Something
about him just doesn't sit right with me. It's like I know him from
somewhere, but it was on the wrong side of the barrel."
Ami looked up at him questioningly.
Seeing her expression he elaborated, "It was like we were in some
sort of argument or something and there was only one weapon between us
with me on the receiving end."
"Oh," she said, "I don't know why, but I trust him. Maybe it's because
Luna and Artemis remember him. Or maybe my subconscious remembers
him and that's why I trust him."
"Well you may, but I don't. And I won't trust him until he proves it
to me."
On that note the two of them drifted off to sleep where Ami's
memories of Wolf would reawaken.


*                                       *                                      *


The fire spat and crackled at Rei while she meditated on the events that had
transpired. She meditated on how Wolf would influence their lives and
whether it was good or bad.
As she meditated memories of the Moon Kingdom began to surface
and she began to understand just who Wolf was and what he meant to the
Sailor Scouts. She remember long workouts as Wolf prepared the Scouts for
battle, teaching them basic strategy and tactics that would make them fight
better as a team. She had the faint impression that there were more Scouts
than just Mercury, Mars, Jupiter, and Venus, but couldn't make them out.
Then she realized that everything the Scouts knew about fighting
came from Wolf and that he had become more than their teacher to them.
He had become a second father to them all.


*                                       *                                      *


Lita was the only one in the group who slept without dreaming. Her
memories of Wolf had reawakened while her concussion had healed. And
she knew what he meant to her. Wolf had been her source of moral
judgement and reason as well as the father that she never had for he had
died shortly after she had been born.


*                                       *                                      *


As the other slept, Wolf was in the living room and sat quietly in thought.
After several hours he decided to go home to get some sleep.
He stood up and focused on the nearest wall. The wood grain of the
wall began to distort and form into a whirlpool that began to get wider until
it was 3 m in diameter. Than the center began to open up showing a room
beyond, but it wasn't the kitchen that lay on the other side of the wall. Wolf
stepped through the warphole into the bedroom on the other side.
The warphole collapsed leaving the wall unmarked as if nothing had
happened.


*                                       *                                      *


Wolf stood at the balcony thinking about what he knew was to come. The
thoughts had robbed him of sleep, so he was looking out from the balcony
of his house in the High Sierras in California. Below him was a panoramic
view of beauty. He knew that he alone wouldn't be able to save the Scouts,
and ultimately, the Earth.
"Serenity," he called softly, "Where are you when I need your
guidance the most?"
He looked out over the mountains, not expecting an answer.
"I am where I have always been, my brother," Serenity's voice
replied, "in your heart."
Wolf looked around him trying to find out who had said that. It can't
be Serenity, he thought. She has been dead for a thousand years.
The sound of sweet laughter filled the air. "My dear Wolf," she said
to him, "Have you forgotten everything Father has taught you? No one really
dies. They all live on in the hearts of others. You should know this better
than anyone else."
Wolf let out sigh and sat on the deck. "Serenity?" he asked the stars,
"How will we survive? Even I wont be able to save them. We aren't strong
enough."
"Yes you are," she soothed him, "One of the first things you taught
me was that it isn't how strong you are physically. It's how strong you are
in your heart. You mustn't worry. One of our greatest champions will come
to your aid shortly."
Wolf stood and looked to the stars. "Who? When?" he called, but no
one answered him. There was only silence.


*                                       *                                      *


Lita got up early, and after putting on some clothes and made her way to the
kitchen to make some coffee. She rummaged under the counter for a
moment until she found the coffee maker and set it on the counter. Taking
the coffee pot she filled it with water and dumped it into the coffee maker.
Then she set out to find some coffee that took her a couple of minutes to
find. She found it in the back of one of the cupboards since Tolaris didn't
drink coffee and no one who drank it was around often enough for him to
have it on hand. She scooped in some grounds and add a few of her
seasonings to the grounds before letting it brew.
Done with that she went out into the living room and took a seat so
to think about what she was going to serve for breakfast. She was really in
the mood for omelets but decided against it since she liked them spicy and
Tolaris' digestive track didn't agree with spicy foods. After a few minute of
deliberation she headed out into the kitchen as the coffee would be ready.
She got out a mug and began to pour herself some when she heard
a voice.
"Can you pour me a cup?" Wolf asked as he walked into the room,
"I haven't had some of your coffee in a millennia."
Lita reached up for another mug and asked, "But I thought that you
didn't like coffee?"
"I don't," he admitted, leaning on the counter, "And that's because
I have yet to find any that compares to yours."
"Why, thank you," she replied to the complement as she handed him
the mug, "Be careful. It's hot."
Too late. He had already taken a sip.
"Bloody Hell!" he cried as the hot liquid burnt his mouth. "You
could have warned me a little sooner," he called as he grabbed a glass and
poured himself some water to cool off his mouth.
"Sorry," she said as she smiled at him, "I take it you were in Britain
at one time?"
He looked over at her with a puzzled expression on his face.
"What?"
"When you cried out, you spoke with a British accent."
"Oh," he said as he took a more careful sip of the steaming coffee,
"The first English speaking country I made it to was England in the early
1600's," He explained and then thought for a moment, "And I was there
again in '67 on extended assignment with the SAS. I was a US Navy Seal
at the time."
He smiled to himself as he remember some of his times as a Seal.
Lita saw the smile on his face. "What's so funny?" she asked as she
sat down on a stool opposite him.
"When I was a Seal I was the only Seal who had his pilot's wings.
They all joked that I hated jumping out of planes so I flew them instead. I
was fixed and spin wing qualified and was often 'volunteered' to fly us out
of the target area if the mission went to hell. Usually it was whatever
aircraft we could find. Flying out of enemy airspace in a flying crate was not
my idea of a good day," he commented.
"Do you still fly?" Lita asked.
"Sure, that's how I got into the fight yesterday. Flew an AV-22
Osprey over the city at high altitude and made a HALO jump," he
commented.
"Halo?"
"High Altitude Low Opening parachute jump."
Lita looked at him in shock, "You sky dived into the middle of a
fight?!"
"Sure," he said nonchalantly, "Released the canopy six meters over
Leftenant Marx's head and landed on his shoulders. Pumped an XR-18 sabot
round from my shotgun into his chest and sent him to meet his maker.
Turned his chest into mush."
Lita made a face like she was going to be sick, "Sorry, but I really
didn't need to hear that before breakfast," she commented.
Wolf laughed, "Don't worry. When you have lived as long as I have,
stuff like that won't bother you anymore."
"I hope not."
"Come on! What did you think when Mercury gutted that guy?"
"I honestly don't know," she said into her coffee, "I was busy trying
to keep my lunch down."
"You'll eventually get used to it."
She gave him an expression that said: Yeah, right!
"By the way, what's an AV-22 Osprey? I never heard of it before,"
Lita asked to change the topic of the conversation.
"Ask Mina," he said, "Her father flew in the JSDF and she still keeps
up on aviation advances."
"Really?" she asked in surprise, "She never mentioned that before."
"Probably because her father was killed in a midair when she was
eight."
"What are you talking about? Her father's still alive."
"That's her stepfather. The only reason she refers to him as  father
is to humor her mother. She still hasn't forgave her for remarrying."
"Man. I thought I was the only one who had lost a parent," she said
to the counter.
Wolf reached over and put his hand on her shoulder. "Please, don't
tell anyone. Mina will have my head on a stick if she finds out that I told
anyone that."
"Sure," she promised, "How did you find out anyway?"
"It's my job to know those things," he stated.
"Know what things?" asked Mina as she walked into the kitchen and
headed over to the coffee maker that Maze had modified to make hot
chocolate. Maze had nearly electrocuted himself to do it but he did it.
"Nothing of great importance. Why?" he said into his mug.
"Just curious," she said as she got her hot chocolate going. When she
finished she grabbed a stool and sat down next to Wolf, who was still
leaning on the counter. "So, what was the discussion about?"
"Women in the military," Wolf said jokingly.
Wolf could see that his attempt at humor was lost by the look on
their faces.
"That was almost as bad as Serena," Mina commented as she went
to get her hot chocolate.
"And good morning to you, too," Wolf retorted.
"He was just telling me about how he went skydiving into the fight
yesterday," Lita said to get the conversation going again.
Mina raised an eyebrow. "Skydiving?"
"Yeah, he said he jumped out of an, uh, Osprey was it?" she replied,
looking over at Wolf for confirmation.
Mina looked over at Wolf in disbelief. "A V-22 Osprey?! You
jumped out of a V-22 Osprey?!"
"Actually it was an AV-22," he corrected.
"What?! It was armed?!"
"Wait a minute," Lita interrupted, "It had weapons? And what's a
V-22 anyway?"
"It's a small transport aircraft that the US Military developed that
could function as both a plane and helicopter," Mina explained. She saw the
blank expression on Lita's face and asked for a piece of paper and pencil.
"Okay," she started again, "It looks a little bit like those little commuter jobs
that fly out of Tokyo International," Lita shook her head in understanding
as Mina began to draw. She drew a boxed out plane that narrowed at the end
into a horizontal stabilizer with twin tails. She then drew a pair of strait
wings on the plane and added two engines to it. But instead of drawing the
engines slung under the wing close the fuselage, like a normal plane, she
drew them on the end of the wings. But they were way out of proportion to
the rest of the plane. They were huge! And then she drew the propellers.
They almost touched the fuselage they were so big!
"What is that?!" Lita exclaimed as she looked at Mina's mutant
airplane.
"That," she said, gesturing at the crude drawing, "is a V-22 Osprey.
"The engines can pivot to the vertical so that the propellers can
function as rotors allowing it to take off and land like a helicopter, that's
why the propellers are as big as they are. When it gets off the ground it
moves them to the horizontal and flies like a normal plane. This gives it the
flexibility of a helicopter with the speed and range of a plane," she
explained to Lita's satisfaction.
"Weird airplane," she commented.
"Yeah, it is," Mina agreed, "But as far as I know, it hasn't gone into
production yet."
"It went into production last year," Wolf stated, "I bought the first six
off the line and use them for a shipping company I own, and on occasion
contract them out to the American CIA for some of their covert operations."
"And that's why it's armed, right?"
"Yeah," Wolf admitted, "They carry a Hughes 30 mm chain gun on
a swivel mount in the starboard pod and six Stinger air-to-air missiles in the
port pod."
"Whoa! A Hughes 30 mm chain gun? What do you plan on taking
out? M1A2 tanks?" Mina commented.
"Actually," he responded, "I planed on taking out Soviet T-80U Main
Battle Tanks and ZSU-23-4 anti-aircraft guns. Both of which could end a
mission quick."
Lita asked, "Wouldn't be dangerous to take out the AAA since they
would be shooting back at you?"
"Normally, yes. But the Hughes has a maximum range of almost
three kilometers, well outside the ZSU's firing envelope."
"Great Zeus! Your carrying a piece of friggn' field artillery!"
"No," he corrected the brunette, "Field artillery is usually 100 mm
or larger. The reason the Hughes is so deadly is because it uses APDU, that's
Armor Piercing Depleted Uranium, shells. Because they're made of uranium
they're denser than the armor of most tanks and slices through it as though
it were butter. The only armor that can stand up to it is the active armor of
the M1A2 Abrams that the Americans use. But even that takes serious
damage after a couple of hits."
They were looking back at him blankly, not grasping the power of
the APDU shells.
"Okay, the APDU shells can punch through 30 mm of solid steel
without a problem. It takes a normal steel jacketed round that is 150 mm in
diameter or larger to do the same thing and the APDU is only 30 mm in
diameter!"
Lita and Mina were beginning to grasp just how powerful the
Hughes was. But Lita remembered the sabot round that the M1A2 uses that
were smaller than 150 mm and could take out anything. "But what about the
sabot rounds that the M1 uses? They're smaller than 150 mm and can do the
same thing."
"Very good," Wolf was impressed, "But sabot rounds are in a
different class than standard rounds. A sabot round is 105 mm and doesn't
actually explode when it hits. It basically looks like a 60 cm long cylinder
with fins on the back that's made of a solid piece of depleted uranium. It
basically just punches a hole in the armor where it enters and leaves the
tank."
"Then how does it destroy the tank if it doesn't explode?" Mina
asked.
"When it punches through, it creates a huge vacuum inside the tank
that literally sucks the crew out the exit hole and causes the rest of the tank
to implode."
Both girls had horrified expressions on their faces at the though of
being sucked through a hole 10 cm in diameter.
"'Morning," Rei said as she walked into the kitchen and went over
to the stove to make some tea. She didn't notice the look on the girl's faces.
"What," they said in unison.
"I said, good morning," Rei replied.
"Oh, sorry. Good morning." Lita said.
"'Morning, Pyro," Wolf commented.
"Will you stop calling me that?" Rei said as she took a seat next to
Lita.
"Pyro?" Mina asked.
"Yeah. I've been calling her that ever since I walked in on her when
she was practicing and was nearly fried for my efforts," he said, "Had to run
back to me quarters butt naked because she turned my clothes to ashes.
Been calling her 'Pyro' ever since."
"I would've liked to have seen that," Mina said with a smile.
"Ha!" he cried, "I would like to see you run half way across the
palace in your birthday suit."
"Sorry," she replied, "I'm not really into streaking, thank you."
"Gee, I don't see why not. You seem to be into everything else," he
said coldly.
Before Lita or Rei realized what was happening, Mina's arm was
extended and Wolf was sprawled out on the floor. When they figured out
what happened they started to laugh hysterically.
"Could you two be any louder?" Ami asked as she walked into the
room with Tolaris. When they saw Wolf on the floor they stopped in mid-
stride.
Tolaris took a quick look and said, "This is going to be good. I can
feel it."
"I'll give you a hint; I made a comment about Mina's behavior,"
Wolf said as he got up off the floor.
"Ouch," they said in unison.
"A word of advice," Wolf said to them as he rubbed his jaw, "Don't
piss her off. She's got one hell of a left hook."
"I can imagine," Tolaris commented.
Ami sat down in one of the chairs at the dinning room table. "So,
what's for breakfast?"
Lita turned around on her stool to look at Ami. "Actually, I haven't
decided yet. Any suggestions?"
"Yeah," Wolf said from the door, far from Mina, "I'll make
breakfast this morning."
Lita rolled her eyes. "Oh no. I can see it now."
"Excuse me," Wolf said offended, his accent becoming noticeable,
"Are you implying that Her Royal Majesty's personal chef can't cook?"
"Ooh, a Brit," Ami said from her chair. She had always liked British
accents.
Lita looked at him with a raised eyebrow. "You were the Queen of
England's personal cook?"
Before he could reply he heard a squeaking sound and the faint
scratches of feet running across the floor. "Oh shit," he said.
A little mouse flew between his legs and made a bee line for the
porch door.
"I've got it!" someone called from the hall. "No, he's mine. I've got
a better angle!" a second voice called. Before Wolf could move, two black
and white streaks flashed passed his legs.
Suddenly his legs were taken out from under him as a crystal spider
the size of a dog burst into the room in hot pursuit of the two cats and
mouse.
"This is going to be one of those days," Wolf said from the floor
once again, "I can tell."
Everyone broke out into a fit of laughter.


*                                       *                                      *


Serena woke up to the smell of something good cooking.
She sat up and took a deep breath to get an idea of what was
cooking. She smelled several different things but couldn't place all of them.
Lita must have gotten some new recipes, she thought.
She reached over to wake up Darien but she found his place on the
bed empty. She frowned for a moment until she realized the shower was
running.
Then the water shut off and after a minute Darien walked out clad
in only a towel. "Good morning, Meatball Head," he said as he kissed her.
"Good morning to you, too," she replied with a smile.
"What do you think Lita decided to make this morning?" Serena
asked, "It sure does smell good."
Darien stopped for a second and took a deep breath. "I don't know,"
he commented, "But it smells like she learned some new recipes."
Just then Serena's stomach made its presence known with a loud
rumble. "And my stomach says it's time to eat."
"Well, you might want to get dressed and showered before you go
out there," he said as he threw a towel her way.
The towel landed on her head as she was getting up and it covered
her eyes. With a loud squeal she crashed to the floor after tripping on one
of her pony tails that went down to mid-calf.
Darien shook his head in amazement. I had to fall in love with the
epitome of the blond stereotype, didn't I.


*                                       *                                      *


"Breakfast is served," Wolf said as he came into the living room.
"It's about time," Mina said as she got up from her seat in one of the
chairs and headed for the dinning room.
"Whoa. You just sounded like Serena when you said that," Rei
commented as she too got up.
Mina stopped in her tracks and turned to look at her friend. "Don't
ever insult me like that again," she said with a quirky smile on her face.
"Hey," Rei said in return, "What are friends for?"
Mina threw her hands up in surrender and headed for the food.
"This is going to be one hell of an interesting day," Wolf commented
to no one in particular.
"You're telling me," Lita replied as she passed him.
"Any more comments from the peanut gallery?" Wolf said jokingly
to Tolaris and Ami.
Tolaris shook his head. "Not from us."
"Whatever," Wolf said, "Now get in here and eat before it gets
cold."
Tolaris and Ami quickly moved into the dinning room. When they
got inside they were amazed at the number of choices there were at the
buffet Wolf had set up. Ami and Tolaris could only name about half the
items on the table. What surprised Tolaris was that there were some
Negaverse dishes on the table.
"Wow," Lita exclaimed, "These omelets are good. Wolf, you and I
have got to compare notes."
"Gladly," he said with a smile.
Tolaris and the others filled their plates and took a seat at the table
to eat. As they ate the discussion started up and most of it was directed at
Wolf. He told them more of his past and some of the experiences that he
had had over the years. He told them stories of the Silver Millennium with
Luna and Artemis throwing in comments from time to time. He also told
them of some of the places he had been to after he had come back to Earth.
Ami asked, "What made you decide to reveal yourself when you
did?"
Wolf looked down at his empty plate and decided that he should tell
them the truth. "I decided that it was time because you are all going to face
a trial that you wouldn't be able to survive on your own. Soon you will all
be put to the test. Stretched as far as your abilities will allow you. You will
all come up against a force that dwarfs anything that you have ever seen
before. You will soon form alliances with people that you previously
considered your enemies. More than ever the fate of Earth hangs in the
balance. If you don't succeed, than not only will Earth fall, but the
Negaverse as well. And to succeed the Scouts will need more power and
strength than you alone can provide."
The others around the table looked back at him with blank
expressions on their faces. They had no clue what he meant by all that but
somehow they knew he was right.
"What's going to happen?" Lita asked.
Wolf sighed to himself. "To tell you the truth, I don't know. All I
know is that you will need more than my help to survive."
Everyone was silent as they let what they had been told sink in.
"Good morning, everyone," Serena said cheerfully as she walked
into the dinning room. Darien appeared behind her but said nothing when
he noticed how quiet everyone was.
Everyone's head snapped around and watched as Serena made a
beeline for the buffet. When they had all figured out what was happening,
Ami looked at her watch and looked up in surprise.
"Oh, my god," Ami remarked, "It's not even ten o'clock, and
Serena's awake.
"Hey," Serena said in response as she shoveled food onto her plate,
"I can get up whenever I feel like it."
Mina leaned over toward Rei next to her and whispered, "Twenty
bucks says the smell of food woke her up."
"No bet," came the whispered reply.
Darien got a plate and started to get some food before Serena ate it
all. "What were you guys talking about?" he asked.
Lita answered him. "Wolf was telling us about some of the things he
did in his two thousand years of life."
"Oh?" he raised an eyebrow, "Anything interesting?"
"Yeah," Mina quipped up, "Did you know that he was at ground
zero when the Americans dropped the atom bomb on Hiroshima in 1945?"
"What?" he said in disbelief, "How the hell did you survive that?"
"I turned myself into a seven-ton piece of lead and waited out the
blast," he said. He was talking as though it wasn't that big a deal.
"I'll believe it when I see it," Darien commented as he sat down with
his food.
"Idiot," Wolf admonished, "You'll never forget the sight of people
and buildings turning to ash in a tenth of a second. Right after the blast the
area was unnaturally quiet. I still have nightmares about that day."
"I can believe it," he replied honestly, "So, what else have you
done?"
Ami jumped in. "He has traveled to most of the world and was even
with Christopher Columbus when he set out to find the western rout to India
and ran into the Americas instead.
"Just where have you gone?" she asked Wolf.
"I have been everywhere, except Siberia and the Antarctic," he
replied.
"Whoa," Lita gasped, "And how many languages do you know?"
"One thousand three-hundred ninety-five languages and thirty
thousand plus dialects."
Everyone's jaw dropped at that.
"Holy shit!" Lita exclaimed.
"Are there even that many languages in the world?" Ami asked.
"Some of them are from the Negaverse," he offered in explanation.
"How many exactly do you know from the Negaverse?" Tolaris was
curious to know.
Wolf thought for a moment. "About thirty-four and two hundred odd
dialects."
"Nyete Monthu?" Tolaris asked.
"Onthel, se dettle," was Wolf's response.
Tolaris was impressed, not only could Wolf speak Monthu, but he
spoke it with a Northern Plateau accent.
"Uh, what did you two just say?" Serena asked around a mouthful
of bagel.
Mina looked over at Serena and answered for Tolaris, "He asked
Wolf if he spoke Monthu and he replied 'Yes, fluently'. What impressed me
the most was that he replied with a Northern Plateau accent, one of the
hardest dialects to figure out, let alone learn. It makes learning English seem
easy."
Mina could speak several languages and even a few from the
Negaverse. Monthu was one of the first ones she picked up and she could
speak it as though she had spoken it her whole life. She even understood the
Northern Plateau dialect even though she couldn't speak it.
"Wow," Serena said. It had taken her six years to learn English
because it had so many exceptions to the rules and was constantly changing
as it became more widely used around the world. And she still had a hard
time understanding it at times.
"English?" Tolaris asked. He had never heard of the language
before.
"Oh, that's right. The Negaverse hasn't run across English yet. As
hard to believe as that is," Wolf remarked.
"Excuse me?" Rei asked.
"The Negaverse has never run into an English-speaking person
before. Even though they're popping up everywhere. Hell! It's even
creeping up in France! And they hate every other language in the world.
They won't even acknowledge your French unless you speak it with the
right accent," Wolf explained.
"That is odd," Ami remarked, "Especially since English is the
closest thing there is to a universal language. Your chances are pretty good
that you will find a person who speaks English before any other language."
"Well, odds tend to run against me," Tolaris remarked.
"Not all the time," Ami reminded him.
"True," he admitted, "I ran into you, and fell in love."
"I would say that's debatable," Mina said, putting in her two cents.
"I think it's fate," Wolf added.
"Well, whatever you think, it happened," Darien put in.
"What is this?" Serena exclaimed, "Philosopher's week?
"I mean, it seems like every conversation I've been in this week has
become a debate on philosophies and I haven't been able to follow a single
one!"
Rei put her hand on Serena's shoulder. "Serena, for you, that's par
for the course."
Serena stuck her tongue out in reply. Everyone at the table sighed as
Serena and Rei got into another of their infamous fights.
Wolf looked over at Tolaris, "If you would be so kind."
"I would be happy to," and the crack of thunder rang out in the
room.
After a minute Serena and Rei felt it was safe enough to come out
of their hiding place under the table. As they took their seats they glared at
Tolaris.
"Hey, he asked my to," he replied in defense while pointing at Wolf.
Their gaze never wavered from Tolaris for several minutes.
When the conversation picked back up and everyone seemed to have
finished, Ami suggested they move to the living room. No one debated the
issue and they all moved out, leaving their empty plates where they were.
Out in the living room they all found a seat, the conversation picked
up where it had left off with Wolf telling them stories from his past and
other things. Eventually the conversation came back to the present and what
Wolf did when he wasn't making computer games.
"Let's see," Wolf said in thought, "I play racket ball and volleyball.
What else do I do? I write stories and play a few instruments."
"Really?" Mina and Rei said in unison when they heard that he
played some instruments.
"What do you play?" Rei asked.
"I play a little guitar, some viola, and a little flute," Wolf replied,
"But I mostly use a synthesizer for most of my music."
"Cool," Mina said when she heard the last one. She also played the
synthesizer and was very good at it. Everyone said she should make a
recording and send it out to the local radio stations and see how it did. They
all thought that it would do really well and were still trying to get her to do
it.
"Yeah, I can go get it and bring it over if you would all like to hear
me play."
"Forget the concert," Mina said, "I just want to look at the
hardware."
Wolf started to laugh at that. "You sounded just like Serena when
you said that."
"Hey!" Serena cried, "I do not sound like that."
"Yes, you do," Rei said to the blond.
"I do not!" Serena rebuked, she was starting to cry, "And why do you
guys always pick on me?"
She started to cry and everyone covered their ears to block out the
horrid sound.
Darien immediately took Serena into his arms and tried to calm her
down. "It's okay, Serena. They weren't trying to pick on you," Darien
soothed.
After a few minutes she stopped crying and looked up at Darien,
"Are you sure they weren't picking on me?" she asked between sobs.
"Positive," he replied.
"Okay," she said and started to calm down.
Everyone let out a sigh of relief when the noise stopped.
"If everyone doesn't have any objections, I'll go get my synthesizer
and we can play a little music," Wolf offered.
"How long will it take you to get it?" Mina asked.
"About thirty seconds."
"What?" Mina asked in disbelief, "Is it already here?"
"No," Wolf replied, "Watch."
He concentrated on a point in front of the group and a warphole
began to form. The others looked on in awe as the hole widened and they
could see a room on the other side. Wolf stepped through into the room on
the other side and soon disappeared as he moved out of view.
Soon he came back into view pushing a cart that held several boxes
of equipment. After coming back through the warphole it collapsed behind
him and he pushed the cart over to the corner and started to unload the
equipment.
After a moment he noticed everyone in the room was starring at him.
"What?" he asked like he didn't understand what was going on. Which he
didn't.
Ami spoke up first, "What was that?" she asked indicating where the
warphole had been.
"And how did you do it without setting off the alarms?" Tolaris
asked.
"I created something similar to a miniature black hole," Wolf told
them, "That's why it didn't set off any alarms since they are calibrated only
to detect wormholes created by the silkworm crystals."
Ami was intrigued, "How does it work?"
Wolf went back to setting up his equipment as he gave Ami an
explanation. "I created a tear in the fabric of space-time that allows me to
jump from place to place in an instant."
"Space-time? Then you can travel through time as well?" Ami asked
making some jumps of logic.
"Theoretically," Wolf admitted, "I don't have enough control to do
that yet. I did do it once by accident, and I would like to keep at that
because of the implications it has." Wolf was lying to them because he
didn't want any of them to get any ideas. He could easily travel through time
and could even travel to any place and time to within a tenth of a second.
Say you wanted to go to the corner of Tenth and Main in New York City on
September 20, 1853, at 9:30 A.M.. Wolf could get you there within a tenth
of a second of the actual time.
"Implications?" Serena asked, "What does that mean?"
Wolf stopped working for a moment, "Okay, say I went back in time
and said hello to someone as I walked down the street."
"Yeah," Serena said telling him to continue.
"Now, say that person was my great-grandfather and my saying 'hi'
to him causes him to look at me and miss seeing a girl walking in the other
direction."
Serena nodded understanding. She was following what Wolf was
saying, for the moment.
"Okay, now, if I hadn't said 'hi' to him than he would have noticed
the girl and eventually married her, but since I did, he didn't notice her and
never saw her again for the rest of his life.
"Now, what would that mean?" he asked the blond.
Serena sat back and put her chin on her hand as she tried to figure
out what that all meant. She started to absent mindedly play with her
ponytails.
"Any ideas yet?" Wolf asked after a minute.
"Hold on, I'm still thinking," she said.
"I know," Rei commented, "I can see the smoke rising."
Amazingly Serena ignored her and kept on thinking. After a few
more minutes she gave up. "I don't know. What does it mean?"
"It means that my great-grandparents never met and therefore I
would never be born because they never met and had my grandparents. You
follow?"
"I think so," she said somewhat unsure. Then realization dawned on
her and she let out a gasp. "Oh, my god," she exclaimed, grasping the
consequences.
"Oh, my god. She can think!" Rei exclaimed sarcastically.
This time Serena heard Rei and stuck her tongue out at her.
Everyone let out a sigh as Serena and Rei got into another of their
fights. After a moment everyone decided to ignore the two and went back
to their conversation.
After a minute they put an end to their fight and watched as Wolf
finished setting up his synthesizer. He finished plugging in the last of the
cords and then ran a quick diagnostic program. Satisfied, he powered up the
machine and watched as all the readings came up. He was set.
"Any requests?" he asked.
Rei's hand shot up. "Gone Away, by Offspring," she called.
"You got it," Wolf replied.
He played with a few controls, and he was set.

The sound of a drum beat filled the room, keeping a steady rhythm.
Then after a moment the beat picked up and an electric guitar was added to
the mix.
A few moments later the tempo slacked off leaving the guitar with the bass
drum keeping the beat.
Wolf waited a few seconds and then added his voice.
"Maybe in another life,
I could find you there.
Pulled away before your time,
I can't deal it's so unfair."
Then the beat picked back up and the chorus kicked in.
"And it feels,
And if feels like,
Heaven's so far away.
And it feels,
Yeah it feels like,
The world has grown cold,
Now that you've gone away."
The music went on for several seconds before it slowed again for the next
verse.
"Laying flowers on your grave,
Show that I still care.
But black roses and Hail Mary's,
Can't bring back what's taken from me.
I reach to the sky,
And call out your name.
And if I could trade,
I would.
Then the chorus started again.
"And it feels,
And if feels like,
Heaven's so far away.
And it stings,
Yeah it stings now,
The world is so cold,
Now that you've gone away."
The music mellowed for a time before picking up again.
"I reach to the sky,
And call out your name.
And if I could trade,
I would.
And it feels,
And if feels like,
Heaven's so far away.
And it feels,
Yeah it feels like,
The world has grown cold,
Now that you've gone away."
Then the music went on for a time before dying.

When Wolf had finished everyone gave him a round of applause.
"Thank, you. Thank, you," Wolf said somewhat smugly. He knew
he was good, and didn't hide it.
For the next two hours, Wolf accepted requests and played some of
his own selections, a lot of which was New Age and Soundtracks. Every so
often Mina and Rei would lend their voices for some of the songs that Wolf
couldn't do because he was a bass. They found out that Wolf liked Enya and
several others. His taste in music covered quite a bit. Pretty much everything
except rap and heavy metal. One of his favorites was Nevermind Me, by
The Mighty Mighty Bosstones. He did this so well, his audience could have
sworn the Bosstones were in the room with them.
Mina and Rei were also impressed with Wolf's synthesizer. It
produced sounds so close to the real thing that telling the difference was
impossible. Had it not been some of the New Age, which showed some of
the synthesized aspects, they would have thought that it was all prerecorded.
When he was done, Mina and Rei came over to check out Wolf's
machine while the others broke off into their own conversation. After a
minute, Lita was struck by the normalcy of the situation. It was as if Wolf
had always been there. They had really just met him last night, and he was
already part of the fold. One of them.
After a few minutes of thinking she decided to go out into the
kitchen and clean up Wolf's fabulous breakfast. She found herself thinking
that she could get used to this arrangement.
Two hours later found them all in the living room. Darien and
Serena were on the couch having a discussion with Tolaris and Ami, who
were on the love seat. Luna was on the coffee table putting in comments
every now and then, and Lita was sitting over in a recliner deep in a Tom
Clancy novel with music from Wolf's synthesizer providing background
noise. Over in the corner found Wolf, Mina, Lita, and Artemis, all of whom
were playing with Wolf's synthesizer. On the whole, it was a pretty good
day.
"What are you using for your base line computing?" Mina asked.
"Five 700Mhz Alpha chips provide most of the modeling equations
for the instruments, with three 300Mhz Pentium II processors providing the
multimedia and output computing," Wolf replied.
Mina's eyes bugged out at the mention of so much computer power.
"Whoa."
"What?" Rei asked, "Is that good?"
Mina just looked at her. "Ami would kill for this thing. There's more
processing power in that thing than most corporations have in their
mainframe computer systems. This thing is probably second to only a Cray
computer system. And Crays are the most powerful computers in the
world."
"Correction," Wolf said, "Cray III's are the most powerful
computers in the world. This thing has more processing power than the
original Cray supercomputers." There was a great amount of pride in his
voice.
"Whoa," Rei said as she grasped the power of Wolf's synthesizer.
"Cool," Artemis commented from his spot next Mina on the floor.
Everyone looked at him dumbly. They had total forgotten that he
was there.
"What?" he asked when he saw their expressions, "Did I grow
another leg or something?" He looked himself over to make sure that he
hadn't.
The three shook their heads clear and went back to their
conversation.
"Anyway," Wolf said slowly, "With this I can accurately model any
instrument, and by putting it through a Bose stereo system, I can get sounds
so close to the real thing, it's nearly impossible to tell the difference."
"Wow," Mina remarked, "How many instruments can you emulate
at the same time?"
"I've had five hundred instruments going at the same time," Wolf
replied, "but I'm pretty sure that I can do well over two thousand."
Mina's eyes bugged out again. She had never heard of so many
instruments being used in a live concert, let alone a synthesizer. And this
thing modeled the instruments too! Most other synthesizers used recordings
of the instruments in order to play the music. The only ones that weren't
recorded were techno and synthesized instruments.
"Can you show me how to work this thing?" Mina asked. She really
wanted to give Wolf's toy a whirl and see what it could do.
"I would be happy to," he said with a grin, "Just come around to this
side. Rei, you and Artemis can come and look too."
All three got up and came around to the other side. Mina sat down
next to Wolf with Artemis over her shoulder. How he stayed there without
falling off when she moved her arm or anything Wolf had yet to figure out.
Rei came up behind them and looked over their shoulders'.
On the main board were several slides and dials, along with some
readouts. Above all that was a computer screen that was thirty by sixty
centimeters. On the screen it showed several more slides and buttons with
tons of readouts, most of them bar graphs and analyzers. Mina was able to
make out what most of the stuff was but Rei was completely lost. What
puzzled Mina and Artemis the most was how to manipulate the slides and
dials on the screen. They didn't see a trackball, touch pad, or keyboard
anywhere. All there was beside the slides, dials, and screen, was the keys
lining the front of the synthesizer. Those keys looked like a piano's keys and
were used to make the music. They worked like a piano with the exception
that the synthesizer's could be used to play several instruments at once.
"Okay," Wolf said, starting the lesson, "Your volume, reverb, and
tones, are controlled by the slides and dials on the front. Everything else is
done with the screen.
"This monitor has a touch screen that allows you to manipulate the
slides and menus. You can select the type and number of instruments you
want to use by touching a few of the buttons on the screen," and he
demonstrated by touching some of the buttons and bringing up some menus
that allowed you to select the type of instruments, number of each, and a
selection of optional prerecorded songs and clips that used the instruments
that you had selected.
He quickly setup some of the instruments and played a short piece
of music. When he finished, he turned over the controls to Mina. He
coached her through the setup and then she played a short piece by Enya.
Wolf was impressed by how quickly she picked it up. She made only one
mistake that would only have been noticed by a trained professional, which
Wolf was. He congratulated her and then asked her to play Aphex Twin by
Polynomial, to see just how good she was.
She took a moment to setup the synthesizer, and started to play.
Everyone listened as Mina gave a flawless performance that impressed
everyone in the room. Her hands flew over the controls at a speed that
impressed even Wolf. She was playing the instrument as though she knew
every circuit in the device. Her playing was inspiring as everyone stopped
what they were doing and listened to the music. Somehow they all knew
they were seeing a master at work and wanted to appreciate every second.
As Mina finished, the room broke out in applause. She blushed and
bowed from her seat on the floor.
"Mina," Rei said from over her shoulder, "We keep telling you to
record your work and send it out to the radio stations."
"Oh," Wolf broke in, "That's another thing this can do. You can
record tapes and even write audio CDs."
"Cool," Rei said, "You could put that feature to use, you know,
Mina."
"Oh, Get off it!" Mina cried, effectively ending the debate before it
really started.
"Any other comments?" Wolf asked jokingly.
The look Mina gave him said to drop it.
"Okay," Wolf said slowly while turning his head away, "Guess not."
"Do you guys want to do anything else?" Artemis broke in, trying to
get things going again.
Suddenly a black blur took Artemis right off Mina's shoulder with
a yell. Mina let out a scream as Artemis' claws tried to find a grasp and
ended up tearing Mina's shirt and catching a little skin that left welts as a
mark of their passage. Luna got off of Artemis as he lay on the floor looking
like a white furball.
"What was that for?" the injured cat asked from his spot on the
floor.
"Payback," Luna said as she began to preen herself, "for that prank
you pulled in the ally the other night."
"Do I even want to know?" Serena asked from her seat next to
Darien.
"No," came the response from the two cats.
"If you will excuse me," Mina said as she got up, "I'm going to get
a new shirt."
Luna looked over at the blond just noticing the torn shirt. "I'm sorry
for wreaking your shirt, Mina," Luna apologized.
Mina smiled back at the black cat. "Don't worry about it. This isn't
the first shirt that was ruined this way. And besides, I'll find a way to get
back at you," she said with a wicked grin.
Luna involuntarily cringed at the thought.
"Luna," Wolf said as Mina walked out of the room, "It has been nice
knowing you."
The cat glared back at him. "Thank you for the vote of confidence,
Prince Wolf," she replied sarcastically.
Mina smiled to herself as she went to get a new shirt.
When she got back she saw that everyone was gathered around the
center of the room trying to figure out what to do this afternoon.
"I say we go to the arcade!" Serena called out in excitement.
Everyone let out a sigh at this statement.
"Serena?" Rei asked, "Can't you think of anything else besides video
games?"
Serena just stuck her tongue out in return.
"How about we visit the Museum of Fine Arts?" Ami offered,
"There's an exhibit of ancient Persian artifacts on display that I've been
meaning to see."
Everyone starred back at her as though she had wanted to go
skydiving without a parachute. Her face turned a delightful shade of red as
she sat back in her seat.
"Why don't we go over to the Dragoon Headquarters," Wolf offered.
The way he delivered it was not a suggestion.
"I don't think that would be a very good idea," Tolaris stated, "We
are not exactly welcome guests in the Negaverse. Especially after our last
visit."
"Trust me," Wolf replied, "You all must come. It could quite
literally mean life and death." He concentrated for a moment and a
warphole began to form.
When it was finished he addressed the group. "You won't need to
change into the Scouts for this."
"If we don't change now, we won't be able to turn into the Scouts
once we get into the Negaverse," Lita told him.
"Yes, you will," he corrected her, "You all draw power from the life
around you, even each other. In the Negaverse, you can't draw power from
the life there because it is not from this universe. But, I can. And you all can
draw energy from me."
"You mean you act like a converter?" Ami asked.
"Yes."
Wolf stood up and headed toward the warphole and motioned the
others to follow. Reluctantly the others rose and followed him in.


*                                       *                                      *


The eight of them stepped out of the warphole and looked around them.
They stood in the middle of a large area of concrete that resembled a huge
parking lot. The girls and Darien recognized what they were standing on, an
airport. But something didn't seem quite right. On their left were eight huge
reinforced hangers with a control tower next to them and on their right were
some taxiways leading out to the three runways, each one 3 km long and 1
km separated each from the next.
Then it hit them.
The place was deserted.
Serena spoke up, "Where are all the airplanes?"
"There aren't any," Tolaris answered her, "This base has been
deserted for nearly fifty years." He looked over at Wolf. "Why did you bring
us to Kothic Air Base? There's nothing out here but 400 km of desert and
barren wasteland in every direction. We are a long way from civilization."
Wolf smiled at that. "Actually civilization is all around us. Welcome
to the new Dragoon Headquarters."
"Wolf, I hate to break it to you, but the place is a ghost town," Mina
said from his side.
"Wrong. There's a huge complex forty meters below us that
stretches ten kilometers in any direction and then goes down another forty
stories. When this place was built, it was going to be used as a research
facility that would hold an entire city of  people in complete isolation. It was
intended to be the advanced research and development center for the
military, totally secret, and that is why they built an airfield on top of it."
Wolf explained.
"So you're saying that this place was intended to be like Dreamland
out in Nevada, USA, right?" Ami asked.
"Yep, same thing. Only this place was closed before they were able
start using it."
Lita leaned over Ami's shoulder, "What's Dreamland?"
"Yeah, what is it?" Serena quipped up.
"Out in the middle of the desert in Nevada there is a secret military
installation that is officially disavowed, but everyone knows it is there. They
test the newest and latest in aviation technologies and other weapon
systems. The place has the tightest security in the world and the guards have
orders to shoot first and ask questions later," Ami told the group, "Many
even believe they have a UFO there."
"Oh, they do. They do," Wolf said, almost to himself.
"How do you know that?" Darien asked with a little sarcasm in his
voice, "Were you on it when it crashed?" Everyone let out a laugh at that.
"No," he said, "I was the manager of the program that recovered the
UFO in 1947 up until 1963."
Everyone looked at him in disbelief. They were still having a little
trouble believing he was 2,000 years old because he only looked like he was
twenty or so.
"Come on. Lets get inside. It will be dark out soon and we don't
want to be out here when the nocturnal predators come out," he said as he
headed for the control tower.
Rei came up and walked next to Wolf. She had a worried expression
on her face. "Are you sure we shouldn't change into the Sailor Scouts? After
all, we are in the Negaverse."
Wolf put a hand on her shoulder, "Rei, You don't have a thing to
worry about," he assured her.
They stepped in the door to the control tower and took a quick look
around. The place certainly looked like it had been deserted for fifty years.
All the paint on the walls was gone (if there ever was any), cracks covered
the walls and wiring hung from the ceiling. Wolf led them down into the
basement and Serena almost went down face first but Darien caught her. He
led the group over to one wall where he waited.
"What are we waiting for?" Lita asked.
As if in answer a section of the wall opened and they saw a large
elevator beyond. It looked big enough to fit forty people. About big enough
to fit a shock team in there, Tolaris thought. 
"All aboard," Wolf said with a sweep of his hand and everyone got
in the car.
When the doors opened, they saw a long hallway that was only wide
enough for them to enter single file with Wolf in the lead. As they headed
down the hall Wolf turned around and started walking backwards so he
could give the group some instructions.
"Now, when we reach the end we will enter a small room one at a
time. Inside there will be a door in front of you with a plate sticking out of
the wall next to it. You will be asked to state your name and then have a
fingerprint and retina scan to verify that you are who you are. And if they
ask you any questions answer them truthfully. After that the door will open
in front of you and you go into the foyer where I will be waiting for you. Got
that?" there was a chorus of 'yes', "All right. See you on the other side," and
went through the door.
The girls started talking quietly to themselves as Darien and Tolaris
stood quietly with their thoughts. The more Tolaris looked around the more
he was impressed by the security here. He guessed the hall they were
standing in had some sort of X-ray detector installed in the walls and that
they were probably not in the main part of the complex but still above it. He
was brought out of his thoughts as it was his turn to enter the room. 
Inside he saw that the 1.5 m x 1.5 m cubical was featureless except
for the two doors, the plate next to the door in front of him, and the lights
in the ceiling.
Then a voice said, in English, "Please state your name and place
your right hand on the plate in front of you while looking strait ahead."
Tolaris placed his hand on the plate and looked strait ahead.
"Tolaris," he said and then felt a tingling in his hand as it was scanned. Next
he saw a soft light as the retinas of both eyes were scanned.
"Please tell me about the two pins in your right leg." It was not a
request.
"I don't have any pins in my legs," Tolaris replied baffled.
"Thank you," and the door in front of him opened. He stepped out
into the foyer and saw the others standing around talking to each other about
what had just happened waiting for him. He looked around the good sized
room and saw a person sitting behind a bank of monitors in the far left
corner and in the back another door. He guessed it was an elevator.
"Come on," Wolf said with a wave of his hand, "I'll show you the
Command Center," and headed toward the door which was indeed an
elevator.
Ten minutes later they entered the gate to the Command Center.
They stood in a smaller room just outside the command center. The far side
was a glass wall that let you see into the heart of the Dragoon Headquarters
with a sliding door that had a double cipher lock on it. Wolf walked over
and punched in two separate codes. The door slid silently to the side and he
entered the room with the others in tow.
"Attention on deck!" someone yelled and everyone jumped up and
saluted.
"Damn it! This ever happens again and you will all be written up!"
Wolf yelled while waving everyone to continue about their business. He
glared at one person, an avian, in particular. He was probably the one who
called everyone to attention.
The Command Center was huge and bustling with activity. The
visitors were amazed by how crammed it was in the room. What impressed
them the most was that people made way for them, saluting to Wolf and
Tolaris who returned them and nodding to the girls and Darien. They saw
people of all sorts of species. Some with wings and some looking more
natural in the water and everything in between.
The room was huge, 30 m x 30 m, and contained a large screen in
the front that displayed a map of the Negaverse. Around the room were
computer terminals and desks, each with three or four people around it.
Wolf slowly led them around the room explaining about everything that
went on in the room.
After making a circuit around the room that took fifteen minutes he
stopped one of the yeoman and asked him where the OWl was. "Owl?" Amy
asked Tolaris. "Officer of the Watch," Tolaris explained, "We call them
OWl for short."  The yeoman pointed to the glassed in room in the middle
of the command center. Telling the yeoman thanks, he headed for the center
of the room. When he got to the smaller room, he punched in another code
and the door to the room slid open. Tolaris was very impressed with the
security of the new headquarters. This place was more secure than the
original Dragoon Headquarters.
There were five people standing around a table and they all came to
attention when they saw Wolf and Tolaris. They both returned the salutes
and one of the group broke away and headed toward them. Mina was about
go and hug him but thought that it would be inappropriate.
"Wolf , good to see you," he said and then turned his attention to
Tolaris, "It's been a while, boss," he said with a smile.
"It certainly has Maze. It certainly has," Tolaris replied taking his
friend's hand, "And don't call me 'Commander', I'm retired." Then he
noticed the third bar on his uniform, "And I see you're the Lieutenant
Commander now. Tell me, who's the Commander these days?"
"You are, sir," Maze answered, "When you killed Shar-Tei they
frocked me to Lieutenant Commander and then you left leaving me to try
to save the Dragoons all by my lonesome."
Maze shrugged, "Anyhow, officially your on extended assignment
with the Sailor Scouts but in reality you're shirking your duties and having
fun leaving me to run this outfit with his help," he remarked sarcastically
pointing his thumb at Wolf.
"Well, excuse me for saving your ass," the cyborg retorted.
Tolaris looked at the two with a questioning look. They both broke
into grins, "It's a long story. We'll tell you later," Maze replied.
He just shook his head, "I should never have left the Dragoons to
such idiots," he commented to himself.
Wolf let out a laugh at that, "This is the smoothest the Dragoons
have run since Captain Raijen himself ran the place."
Maze looked over at Tolaris, "He's right you know. Wolf has proven
himself as a worthy commander. Most of us have even forgiven him his
incompetence as Commander."
Ami spoke up. "Did you say Wolf commanded the Dragoons?"
"Yes I did, ma'am," Maze said, "He's Tolaris' predecessor."
Tolaris looked up at this, a skeptical expression on his face.
"He'll tell you later," Maze said, "I'm sure you all remember
Captain Whisper and Lieutenant Ra'vel," he said indicating the green haired
woman and avian standing at the end of the table, "And I'm sure you two
remember the Scouts and Darien."
"How can I forget?"  Whisper said starring icily at Lita. Lita
swallowed as those cold eyes bored into her. Whisper still held Lita
responsible for the death of her husband and it seemed that she would never
forgive Lita for what was in truth an accident.
Maze cleared his throat, breaking the moment, "Anyhow, Captain
Whisper, actually Lieutenant, but everyone calls her Captain anyway, is
head of Base Security and the fledgling Psi Division, and Lieutenant Ra'vel
is head of Intelligence. That covers all Intel sources that we use and the
Computer Maintenance Division. And I would like to introduce to you
Lieutenant Muzzer, head of Operations, and Lieutenant Brasck, head of 
Special Operations," indicating the other two people in turn. They both
nodded their heads in acknowledgment.
Muzzer was tall, easily the tallest in the room, with bright red hair
framing an angular face offset by a pair of steel eyes that gave a menacing
look about him. He had the physic of a runner while depicting the strength
of a body builder. It was hard to see how he came up through Operations
because he easily stuck out in a crowd. When you worked out in the field,
you had to blend in with the people around you. Darien figured he probably
played the part of ignorance and found the information he needed from
listening to people around him who thought he couldn't understand them.
He decided that Muzzer was not a man to cross or offend if you valued your
life. You were likely to just disappear.
Brasck on the other hand was just the opposite. He was short (Serena
beat him for shortest person in the room by 2 cm), heavily built as though
he made up for his vertical height by being pure muscle. His arms and legs
were like pistons. He looked as if he could crush rocks with his bare hands,
and he probably could. He had close-cropped white hair and violet eyes that
made him look quite a bit older than he actually was. He had a magnetic
personality but was known as one of the toughest commanders to ever lead
the Special Ops team. He had several scars on his face and arms and he
carried them with honor. The guy made Rei shiver. If looks could kill . . . 
"Well," said Maze, "Now that the introductions are done, lets take
a tour of the facilities."
"Sounds fine to me."
"Cool."
"Alright," came the responses.
"Okay, then. Lets go," and he motioned the group to head out.
Just out side the small room Mina stopped Maze.
"Sorry I didn't get a chance to say hello back there," Maze said in
apology.
Mina wouldn't have any of it. "Shut up and kiss me."
And that he did, giving her a deep, passionate kiss.
"Very nicely done, Leftenant Commander," Wolf said, breaking the
two up.
Maze let out a groan. "What did I do now?"
"You just managed to destroy your reputation in all of . . ." he
brought up his arm and looked at his watch for dramatic effect, "twenty
seconds. I'm impressed. Very few people could have managed such a feat
in so short a time."
Maze let out a series of curses that were quite imaginative.
Mina was smiling at Maze's swearing. "Oh, and what reputation
might that be?" she asked Maze.
Wolf answered for him, "He's a ladies' man. But kissing you in front
of the entire command center, Maze just announced that he is now a one
woman man. He has now discredited any notion that he will be available to
the female community for the seeable future."
Mina looked over at Maze. "And why didn't you tell me about this?"
"If you were going out with a Goddess, would you tell her that you
had that kind of reputation?" he asked her.
She just rolled her eyes in disgust. "Men!" she exclaimed as she
headed over to the others.
Tolaris came over after noticing Mina walking away. "I take it Maze
just ran into his mid-life crisis," he commented when he reached Maze and
Wolf.
"You could say that," Wolf replied.
"What did I tell you?" he said to Maze with a stupid grin on his face,
"I told you this would happen if you got involved with her." Tolaris loved
rubbing things in whenever he got the chance.
"Yeah, very funny," Maze replied sarcastically.
Wolf and Tolaris broke into grins at Maze's expense.
"Okay," Maze said, "You can quit ribbing the Lieutenant
Commander so that we can get on with the tour."
"Sure thing," Tolaris grinned.
"You guys go ahead," Wolf said, "I need to get down to Intel and
check on some things. I'll meet you guys at the O' Club at say, 2000?"
"Okay," Maze replied, "That will give us three and a half hours. See
you then."
Wolf nodded at the two and headed for the exit.
"Don't forget, it's your turn to buy!" Maze called after him.
"Blow it out your rear!" Wolf called back.
"I give up," Tolaris said in defeat.
"Oh, come on. We aren't that bad," Maze said in defense, "Lets get
the others and start the tour."
Tolaris just wondered how the Dragoons had stayed alive as long as
they have under these two jokers' leadership.


*                                       *                                      *


"Hey! Over here!"
Maze, Tolaris, Darien, and the girls had just arrived at the O' Club
when Wolf spotted them coming in the door. He waved them over to a table
that he had reserved and produced some menus for them to look at.
"What is half this stuff?" Serena asked after taking a look at the
menu. She couldn't make out what language half the choices were written
in, let alone know what they were.
"Native cuisine," Maze replied to her question.
She still had a puzzled expression on her face. "Anyone mind telling
us what this stuff is?"
"You don't want to know," Wolf said, "Trust me."
"Okay," Serena said slowly and went back to looking at the menu.
What wasn't written in the local tongue was written in English. She was
able to tell what everything was because that was the one part of English she
had picked up quickly. Food.
"Hmm . . . The Prim Rib sounds good," Lita said from her seat next
to Wolf.
"I suggest the Bar-B-Q Ribs," Wolf told her, "For some reason the
cooks can't get the Prim Rib right."
"Very well. The Bar-B-Q Ribs it is," Lita said making up her mind.
"Everyone else know what they want?" Wolf asked the group.
Everyone said they were, and Wolf called over the waitress. When
the waitress left they started to all talk at once. And as Wolf had expected,
it was about what they had just seen.
The new Dragoon Headquarters was more like a city rather than a
base. It was as if someone had taken Boston and put it underground. And
what was really neat was the roof of the huge cavern. It had a holographic
picture of the sky above the surface. It was so realistic that everyone had
thought that they were actually aboveground instead of one hundred eighty
meters under it. The only building that touched the roof was the Main
Dragoon Building in the center of the city. It was also the largest, nearly a
kilometer on each side. And this place was a city in all but name. There
were several malls, movie theaters, stores, homes, everything needed to
make a city except for one thing, farms. They had to bring in food and other
raw materials from the outside, and as far as anyone could tell, there was no
way to get anything except by the elevator they had came in through. And
that was much too small to supply Wolf's Lair, as the group had learned the
Dragoon Headquarters was called.
The city currently housed more then twenty thousand people, most
of whom were supporting the Dragoons in stores and such, in a place
intended for five hundred thousand plus people. This gave the place an
empty feel to it. Even though some places were almost as crowded as
Tokyo, the rest of the place had an almost deserted air about it. They also
noted that their was a huge public transportation system running under the
city. The trams were the only way to get around because there were no
automobiles of any kind. The only other way was by foot, and that was
impractical in a place of this size. They also noticed that most of the
buildings were residential, and that the majority of these stood empty.
They also saw many parks and other recreational areas. They even
saw a couple of schools. This place was clearly supposed be a self-contained
society, complete with families. The size and scope of Wolf's Lair clearly
impressed.
Each person found several things that interested them in particular.
The museums and libraries caught Ami's attention, with Mina and Rei
impressed by the concert halls and shrines that served all the different
religions. The gyms and male community held most of Lita's attention,
while Serena went wild over the restaurants and malls. Tolaris and Darien
took a some what broader view of the city and liked it as a whole.
After everyone decided what they were going to eat, the
conversation and questions began in earnest.
"How did you find this place?" Tolaris asked.
"I didn't," came Wolf's reply, "I was on the planning committee that
worked out the details of this place seventy years ago."
This prompted a question from Ami. "What were you doing in the
Negaverse?"
"Let's see," Wolf said in thought, "I was collecting intel on
everything here that could eventually be a problem to the Scouts when they
surfaced. I also ran interference on anything that I saw as a potential
problem. You know quite a bit about my operations in that regard
Commander."
"What?" Tolaris asked in confusion.
"Does the code name ASSASSIN mean anything to you,
Commander?"
Tolaris looked at Wolf sharply. "Yes it does."
"And what was it that the ASSASSIN did that brought him to your
attention?" Wolf prompted.
"About thirty years ago there was a string of assassinations that
basically wiped out all of the high-ranking Generals. That's how Jedyte
came into power. Anyway, Palace Security had originally been put in charge
of the investigation because the first General had been killed in the Throne
Room right in front of Queen Beryl and her court. The only thing that
PalSec was able to come up with, was the direction the blast had come
from. They weren't even able to pinpoint the exact point the shot was fired
from.
"The other thing they weren't able to figure out was the type of
weapon used. It was something no one had ever come across before. It
turned General Rehn into a puddle of blood and tissue mass. They had to
clean him up with a sponge. The largest part of him we recovered was a
two-centimeter piece of bone. If he hadn't been killed in front of three
hundred denizens, they wouldn't have been able to identify him.
"After two more Generals were taken out in the same manner, Beryl
turned over the investigation over to us. We only came up with as much
information as PalSec had. Put on real good terms with the Queen, given her
reputation. After five more assassinations we started to cal this guy the
Assassin, because he was performing perfect assassinations that were the
envy of the every assassin in our ranks.
"To this day we still don't know who that was," Tolaris concluded.
Then he sat back in thought for a minute. Suddenly something clicked and
Tolaris looked over at Wolf in shock. "By Raijen! You're the Assassin,
aren't you?"
"Very good, Commander," Wolf congratulated him, "I took all eight
of them out with a compressed shockwave moving at Mach 8."
Mina's jaw dropped when she heard this. "Mach 8?" she asked in
disbelief.
"What?" Serena asked, "How fast is Mach 8?"
"About four thousand kilometers per hour," Wolf replied. Now
everyone's jaw dropped.
"Jeez!" Rei exclaimed, "No wonder he was incinerated."
"I'm surprised he wasn't outright vaporized," Ami commented, "An
air mass moving at that speed would be in excess of two thousand degrees
centigrade."
"They were only in contact with the shock wave for a hundredth of
a second. Not long enough to incinerate them."
"Nice," Lita remarked, "And we are all discussing this before
dinner?" She turned around and looked for the waitress. "Hey! Waiter!
Come over here a minute!" she called out.
"Alright," Wolf said in resignation, "I can take a hint."
"Nevermind!" she called out to the waitress who just threw up her
hands in disgust.
"Man," Wolf said to her, "For someone who wants to open her own
restaurant, you sure are rude to the waiters."
"And I'll cuss out the cook too, if those ribs aren't any good," she
replied with a grin.
"I can imagine," Wolf said to no one in particular.
"Are we done with the dead and rude manners," Darien asked, "or
can we get on with some real conversation?"
"How does that image on the roof work?" Ami asked to change the
topic of conversation, "Do you use projections or something like that?"
"What? Oh, no, the ceiling uses a photo synthetic layer that creates
the images," Wolf answered, "It's thousands of times clearer than any
projection we could have used."
"A photo, what?" Serena said in confusion.
Wolf smiled at her, "Do you know how a chameleon changes the
color of it's skin?"
"Uh, not really," Serena admitted.
Ami knew that Serena would never in a million years be able to
understand it, so she put it simply so Wolf wouldn't have to get into a really
big explanation that would totally loose her. "It basically changes it's
color," Ami explained.
"Thanks," Wolf replied, deadpan. He knew what she was doing, and
he felt that she was insulting his intelligence. He was going to give the same
response Ami had given, but she had beaten him to it.
"Oh," Serena said trying to figure out how it could do that, "How
does it do that?"
"If I tried to explain it, I would loose everyone at this table,
including Ami. Trust me," He said with a grin.
"Okay," Serena said slowly and looked down at the table.
Just as the waitress came out with their dinner, Wolf sensed
something was seriously wrong. "Everyone, down!" he yelled as he dove to
his right, taking Lita to the floor with him. Everyone froze in confusion for
a split second before they too, dove to the floor.
But Rei was a shade slow. There was a deafening boom and Rei
found herself flying across the room. She crashed into the wall and promptly
lost consciousness.
As the smoke and dust settled, the room filled with the cries of the
wounded and living. Wolf slowly got up off of Lita, pushing the table that
had landed on top of them aside. He looked at the destruction all around
him, and then started to hack and cough as the smoke and dust got into his
lungs. He felt something grab his leg and looked down see Lita had grabbed
it in an effort to pull herself to her feet. He reached down to lift her up, but
stopped when a sharp pain shot thru his left arm. He looked down and saw
a long sliver of glass sticking out of his shirt. A dark stain was spreading
around the tear. Carefully grabbing the shard of glass, he pulled it from his
arm. As soon as it was out, blood flowed freely out of the wound. He
quickly tore off his sleeve and used it to staunch the bleeding.
Finished, he pulled Lita to her feet and looked her over to make sure
she was alright. Aside from some smudges, a few cuts and scrapes, and a
bruise on her right cheek, she appeared to be okay. He realized she was
trying to say something when he saw her mouth moving but she wasn't
making a sound.
"We need to get the others," she yelled to him, but she was as deaf
as he was.
Wolf merely nodded in acknowledgment, and started shoving stuff
aside to find the others.
The first person he found was Mina. He would probably have missed
her completely if his hearing hadn't returned after a few minutes. He was
moving a large section of counter that had blown away from the bar, when
he heard a shriek. He immediately stopped and when he did, so did the
shrieking. He found a piece of wood to hold up the slab so he could move
around to see if he could find the person under it. Moving some rubble away
from the base of the slab found a leg sticking out from under it. Now that
he knew how to move it without hurting the person under it any more than
he already had, he moved the counter out of the way.
He found her trying to sit up now that she was no longer pinned to
the ground. She had a nasty gash on her right arm and several cuts and
lacerations, but otherwise she seemed to be okay. He reached down and
tried to help her up but accidently grabbed her arm where the gash was. He
apologized and quickly moved his hand. When she was sitting up he asked
her if her leg was broken.
"No, I don't think so," she said, determined to stand even if it was,
"Now help me stand up."
Against his better judgement, he helped her up. She seemed to be
able to walk okay, except for the slight limp she had from the counter. She
started to rub her leg trying to get the feeling back and asked, "Have you
found Maze, yet?"
He shook his head. "No, you're the first person I've found. Lita's
looking elsewhere, maybe she found him," he replied hopefully
"Will someone get us the k'vesi out of here?!" someone yelled from
under a pile of rubble not too far away. And judging by the language, I'd
say that's Maze, Wolf thought.
They noticed a hand waiving from the rubble and quickly started to
clear away all the junk to get at whoever was underneath it.
"It's about k'vesi time," Maze grumbled when he was finally free.
"Help me get Tolaris out of here," he commanded as he began to move
more stuff out of the way. Wolf and Mina quickly jumped in, because by the
sound of it, Tolaris was in big trouble.
When they finally got the Commander out they saw that he needed
medical attention quickly or they were going to lose him. His legs were
leading away from his body at unnatural angles and were broken in more
than twenty spots. Wolf was doubtful he would ever walk again, if he
survived. There were also six places were various pieces had pierced his
body like spikes. Maze quickly reached down and tried to find a pulse. It
was hard, but he eventually found it, it was so feint. He looked up at Mina,
tears starting to form in his eyes.
"Get out side and see if the medics are here yet," he told her. She
nodded and started to get out of the building as fast as she could. "And tell
them to hurry!"
Maze turned around and started to talk to the unresponsive
commander. "Come on! Stay with me, you k'vesi asshole! C'mon! Don't
leave me Tolaris! There is no way in the ice storms of Inferno I can lead
these people myself!" and he continued to try to get some response from
Tolaris.
After a moment, Wolf had to turn away from the scene. He loved
Tolaris like his own son. Even though he had treated him like scum while
he was Commander, he had seen something in Tolaris that could save the
Negaverse and the Scouts. That was why he had made sure that Tolaris
would be his predecessor. He had known that when Raijen had created the
Dragoons, he had intended it to be an instrument of peace, not the
instrument of destruction it had turned into after his death. And Wolf had
seen in Tolaris, a quality that many of his predecessors had lacked. An
undying faith in Captain Raijen's codes of ethics and responsibilities. He
had seen Tolaris as the savior of this universe that was permeated by evil.
And he couldn't look at Tolaris in this condition.
"Oh, my god," Serena breathed when she had found the group and
seen Tolaris. She quickly turned away as her stomach heaved. She fell to the
floor sick from the sight.
Ami appeared around a pile of rubble and saw the group. She
couldn't see Tolaris and feared the worst. "Tolaris?" she asked, her voice
cracking. Wolf saw her and took her in his arms. She tried to get a look at
Tolaris, but Wolf kept moving in the way. "Damn-it! Let me see him!" and
she tried to shove him out of the way, but he just held on. Finally she broke
down and collapsed in his arms. They just stood there for several minutes
with Ami sobbing into Wolf's chest, until the medics came in with Mina
and Lita.
The medic immediately saw Maze leaning over the Commander and
shoved him out of the way. He immediately assessed Tolaris' condition with
one word. "Shit." He was definitely from Earth. He pulled out a hand-held
radio and spoke into it. A minute later, several more medics came in
carrying a back-brace. As they hurried to get Tolaris to the hospital, Wolf
looked over Ami's head at Lita and Mina.
"Either one of you found Rei yet?" he asked.
Mina just shook her head, answering for both of them.
"Wolf," the medic interrupted, "What's the Commanders blood type,
sir?"
Wolf thought for a moment. "Alpha negative," he replied.
The medic cursed again.
Wolf knew that tone. The medic had been in his Seal team when he
was a Lieutenant. "What is it?"
"Sir, we don't have any blood of that type in stock," the medic
explained, "It's extremely rare so we are going to need a donor or the
Commander isn't going to make it."
"No!" Ami cried when she heard the medic. She broke away from
Wolf and grabbed the medic. "You will save him or I will personally drain
every ounce of your blood," she hissed at him, her eyes flaming.
The medic looked back into her eyes, and for the first time in his
life, felt true fear. He tried to struggle free of her grip, but she was too
strong, even for him. And he lifted weights daily.
Quickly Wolf, Lita, and Mina finally managed to pull Ami off the
medic. The medic fell to the ground, gasping for breath.
After Ami calmed down some, Wolf asked Mina if she would try to
find Rei.
"Are you sure you can handle her?" she asked, indicating Ami.
"Yeah," he replied, "We can manage."
"Okay," she said hesitantly. She wasn't sure if the two of them
would be able to stop Ami if she lost it again. She turned away and started
to make her way thru the wreckage and medics that were now running
around trying to get everyone out of the building. After ten minutes of
searching, she finally found Rei slumped in a corner, unconscious. Quickly
she bent down and tried to see if there was anything serious. She didn't have
Ami's knowledge of medicine, but she figured that the bump on the back of
Rei's head was an indication that Rei was in serious danger.
She quickly turned around and looked for a medic. She didn't see
one immediately near her so she started to yell. "Medic!" she cried as loud
as she could, "I need a medic, now!"
After a moment an avian appeared next to her. "What's wrong," she
asked. She didn't notice Rei on the floor and didn't see anything serious
enough with Mina to warrant all the yelling.
"It's not me," Mina said when she saw the look in the medic's face,
"It's her. She's unconscious and I think she really hurt her head."
"Okay, let's see what we have here," the medic replied, as she began
to look over Rei. Something about the unconscious girl didn't seem right
her.
She looked up at Mina. "She's human, isn't she."
"Yes."
"And you too, I take it?"
"Yes," Mina replied again, "My name's Mina. And hers is Rei."
"Orderly Jorus," the medic replied in greeting. She remained leaning
over Rei, doing a rather thorough examination before even attempting to
move her. When she felt the lump on Rei's head she promptly decided
against moving the girl at all.
She turned in the general direction of where the other medics were
working and called out in a series of loud clicking sounds. Finished, she
looked at Mina and thought for a moment. "Mina . . ." she said in thought,
"You're the LC's girl, aren't you."
Mina just nodded her head in acknowledgment. She wasn't sure
what LC meant, but she was pretty sure that the orderly was referring to
Maze.
"And she's one of the Sailor Scouts?"
Again Mina nodded. She wasn't all that sure about telling Jorus who
exactly Rei was. She didn't completely trust any of the denizens, aside from
Maze and the others.
Jorus chirped something under her breath. Mina got the impression
that it was a swear. Jorus turned around and called out again. This time
there was an instant reply. Four other medics appeared as if they had
materialized from thin air. Two of them were human and they immediately
went to work to get Rei out of there. They strapped her down the back-brace
the other two medics had brought, and carried her away. Mina stood there
and watched her friend being carried off.
"Is she going to be okay?" she asked Jorus, who was standing next
to her.
"I think so," she replied, "But I can't be sure. I don't know much
about humans."
It was a small comfort, but she took it anyway. She headed back to
where the others were and found that Tolaris had already been taken out.
Wolf signaled that they were heading out so the medics could do their work
unhindered. When they made it out of the building they noticed that the
exterior of the building was literally untouched by the effects of the
bombing. Then they noticed all of the injured laying in the street with
medics running around trying to sort out the more seriously injured from the
lightly wounded ones. In the middle of all the mess they noticed a green
haired women making her way toward the group.
"Wolf," Whisper said when she made it to them, "Where's the
Commander and Maze?"
"Their both at the hospital," he told her, "Tolaris was seriously
injured, and Maze had to go to act as a blood donor."
"Great," she growled, she wanted to hit something, but the only
things immediately around her were wounded, "Just k'vesi great! Our entire
command and control structure has been taken off at the head! Heads are
going to roll for this!"
Wolf wasn't listening to her ramble. The only thing he did in
relation to her was to put up mental force field so she wouldn't
inadvertently hurt someone. Something wasn't right about this situation, not
that their current situation was normal anyway.
"I am going to interrogate every person who knew where you were
going to be. I'll do it even if I have to fry some brains to get some answers!"
Whisper continued.
Finally Ami had had enough, and exploded, "All you can think about
is your security failing?! You aren't even worried whether Tolaris is going
to die or not! I should rearrange your priorities!"
This really pissed Whisper off and she made for Ami's throat. The
others, minus Wolf, tried to keep the two from killing each other. After a
moment, Wolf had had enough. He spun around and let loose. "Shut up, the
both of you!" yelled in a voice that made everyone around him freeze, even
the medics, "We have bigger problems than your egos! We have a bomber
on the loose in the city, and all you two can think about is your own pathetic
problems! Now shape up or I will personally put you two in the brig! Got
that?"
They both nodded their heads meekly. They both knew he was
serious and so did the others. Mina saw something in his eyes that made her
shiver.
"Wolf. What is it?" she asked.
Wolf had turned away and was starring out across the crowd. "The
bomber's still here," he said as he scanned the people.
"What?! Where?" Ami called angrily. She wanted to tear the person
who had done this to pieces.
Wolf ignored her as he continued to search the faces. Finally he
found what he was looking for. On the other side of the street was a figure
leaning against the lamppost. Unlike everyone else, he had the look of
satisfaction on his face. He was the one who had planted the bomb.
"Everyone get down to Southeast Park. I'll try to head him in that
direction," he ordered as he began to move toward the figure.
"Where is he?" Whisper demanded.
"Just do it!" Wolf ordered as he bolted. The figure had noticed he
was spotted and had started to run down an ally.
They just stood there as Wolf flew over the injured and medics as
though they weren't even there. When he clipped one of the medics he
didn't even apologize, he just kept running.
"Come on," Whisper called, and started to run as fast as she could
for the park.
Not sure what was going on, the others followed and changed into
the Sailor Scouts on the way.


*                                       *                                      *


In other parts of the city, several people began to converge on the figure that
Wolf was chasing. They moved quickly so they wouldn't be late to what
would soon be called the first skirmish between enemy forces and kick off
what historians would call the Timelines War.
And they were determined to see that they started off with success.


*                                       *                                      *


"What direction is he going to come from?" Mina, who had now changed
into Sailor Venus, asked.
"I would say . . . from the South gate there, between those two
statues," Whisper replied. She looked over her shoulder and noticed that
Tuxedo Mask wasn't with the group. "Where's the Cape Boy?"
"Eleven o'clock, thirty meters. He's on the lowest branches of that
tree," Venus replied.
Whisper looked slightly to her left and there he was, right where
Venus said he would be. "Does he read minds?" she asked herself. He was
sitting in a perfect spot for an ambush. He would be able to see Wolf and
the person he was chasing long before they could see him. This gave him
the perfect opportunity to get the drop on whoever it was that Wolf was
chasing.
"I don't think so," Venus replied.
"What?" Whisper asked, startled.
"I don't think Tuxedo Mask can read minds," Venus said.
"Oh," and went back to watching for Wolf and his companion.
After a minute passed, Mercury called out. "Have 'em. West gate."
"Damn," Whisper muttered under her breath. She looked over to her
left and saw them running. They were going to pass right under Tuxedo
Mask's position. How does he do that?
Wolf was running fast. Easily keeping pace with the bomber. He had
spent the last ten minutes running through the streets and allies of Dragoon
Central. He had moved so that he was herding the bomber into the park so
that the Scouts could take care of him more easily. Now that he was in the
park, he was wondering where the Scouts were. If they weren't quick, he
would have to try to take this guy down himself. And he didn't particularly
like that idea.
Suddenly, Tuxedo Mask landed right in front of the bomber. Seeing
his rout blocked, stopped short.
"Going somewhere?" Tuxedo Mask asked.
The bomber just gave him a cold glare, and looked over his shoulder
to size up his situation. Wolf had stopped about three meters behind him,
and was pulling out a large knife.
"Gee," Wolf said with a grin, "We seem to be stuck between a rock
and the proverbial hard place, don't we?"
For the first and last time the bomber spoke. "You might beat me,
but you will never win the war," he said with cold confidence.
"Oh, really?" Wolf said mockingly as the place filled with a thick
fog.
The bomber saw this as his chance to escape and started to run for.
That is, until the gloved fist smashed into his face and knocked him to the
ground.
"Don't even think about it," Mercury said menacingly as she
dragged him to his feet, "You mess with my boyfriend, and we are going to
have some words."
She let loose with a series of punches that the bomber was able to
block after a moment. He saw a gap in the girl's defenses and went for it.
He threw a punch in the direction of her head, and when she moved to avoid
it, he spun around in a round house kick that sent Sailor Mercury crashing
to the ground. He dropped into a fighting stance when he saw the four others
emerge from the fog as Mercury started to get to her feet. Seven to one odds
were not good for his health. Too bad he didn't realize one of them was
telepathic. His head suddenly exploded in pain and he fell to his knees. He
screamed once and collapsed to the ground.
Wolf rushed up and tried to see if he was still alive. He wasn't. He
glared up at Whisper as she emerged from the fog. "Bloody Hell!" he cried,
"We needed him alive so we could interrogate him!"
"Well, too bad," she said as she turned away and started to leave.
The throwing star that flew past her face made her change her mind. She
immediately dropped into her fighting stance and looked around her to see
who had thrown it. As the fog dissipated, she saw three people moving
toward her. Now the little jerk's friends have decided to play, she thought.
Everyone saw the three coming at Whisper and looked around to see
if there were more. There were nine.
"Shit," Wolf said as he dropped into his own fighting stance, his
knife still drawn. The others noticed the new players and started to back
toward each other. They kept moving back until the were arranged in a
rough circle, each facing two opponents. There was enough space between
them so that they could move without hitting each other.
Sailor Moon was really worried. "What are we going to do?" she
cried, "There' so many of them!"
"Fight?" came Wolf's reply.
She looked back at him as though he was nuts.
"Do you see any where to run?" he asked her. They were surrounded
and didn't have any where to run. Wolf quickly looked over his shoulders
to see where everyone was. Then he realized Tuxedo Mask was missing.
Where the hell did Cape Boy go?!
"Alright, who's ready to rumble?" Jupiter asked, her aggression
taking control. She didn't have to wait long for an answer as one of the ones
she was watching took a swing at her with his staff. She grabbed hold of the
staff and ripped it out of her opponent's hands. She immediately made good
use of it as though she had used it for her whole life. Her opponent crashed
to the ground. His leg broken in six places and a huge welt on the side of his
head. She had moved out of reflex, where did I learn to do that? Then she
remembered Wolf's training. She had learned to use several weapons. I
wonder how Mina's doing with her knife.
Venus was doing quite well with her stiletto. She had already gutted
one of her opponents and was currently in the middle of a knife fight with
the other one. They slowly circled each other, occasionally making a thrust
or gab, looking for the other's weakness. Venus flashed out and made a long
slice in her opponent's fore arm.  The wound oozed a dark green, almost
black, blood. She reviewed the rules of knife fighting in her mind. Go for
the arms and legs. Slash at the chest if the opportunity presents itself. The
goal of knife fighting wasn't to outright kill your opponent, it was to make
him bleed until he passed out from blood loss. Only go for the neck or gut
if your opponent has left himself wide open. But her opponent didn't give
her the chance. She was obviously up against a pro. She could tell by the
way he moved. He thrust out at her and she blocked it, but not without him
nicking her shoulder.
Then the two went head to head. Their arms intertwined in a blur of
motion that lasted for two seconds before they broke apart. A burning
emanating from her leg told her that she had violated the first rule of
fighting. Get in and out as quickly as you can. Never stay within range of
your opponent's reach any longer than necessary. They went at it several
more times. Each time they came out with another cut or two. She
immediately prepped herself for a drawn out fight. This fight wasn't going
to finish any time soon. This was going to be a battle of the wills. Whoever
could keep from passing out the longest won.
When Sailor Moon saw her two opponents come at her at the same
time, the first thing she did was hide behind Wolf's who was just to her left.
"What do you think you're doing?" he growled at her. He really
didn't need this. He didn't have time to fight and protect Sailor Moon at the
same tome. "Get out there and fight!" he yelled as he shoved her in the
direction of her opponents.
She stood dead still for a moment, shaking in fear. When they both
rushed her, she turned and ran as though her life depended on it. "Help me!"
she cried as she ran around like an idiot. Some of the intruders stopped and
starred at her as she ran past. They had never heard of a warrior who was
that scared. It went against everything they knew.
Suddenly she saw a rose heading strait for her head and dove for the
ground. "Is it safe to come out?" she asked as she uncovered her head. She
was starring at a pair of black pants. As she looked up to see who it was, a
hand in a white glove came into her view.
"Need some help?" Tuxedo Mask asked as he pulled her to her feet.
She quickly looked behind her and saw the two goons who had been
chasing her on the ground with roses sticking out of their chests.
"Uh," Serena stammered, "I guess not."
Meanwhile, Mercury was on a rampage. She threw a punch at the
first of her attackers that crushed his larynx, and eventually killed him as he
slowly suffocated. She then went after the second one with a passion. She
went after him almost blindly, letting her rage fuel her. She sent blow after
blow that had him thinking of only getting out of her range to fight another.
He already had a broken arm because of the power of her blows. At the rate
this was going he was going to die in about twenty seconds if he didn't get
out now. He saw his chance and bolted.
"Mercury Ice Storm . . . " he heard from behind him, "Freeze!"
A ball of ice leapt from her hands and flew right at him. The last
thing he felt was being slammed in the back by something hard and cold.
His body instantly froze into a giant ice cube. It shattered when it slammed
into the low wall that had been partially destroyed in the fight.
Finished with him, she went over to Whisper to give her a hand.
Whisper sent one of her attackers flying through the air and he landed right
in front of Mercury. Mercury brought her leg up and ground the heel of her
boot into his neck until there was a satisfying crunch.
Whisper was using more brute force than she would have liked, but
this guy seemed to be psi-mute and was unaffected by her mental attacks.
So she had to do it the old-fashioned way. A good old street fight. The only
weapons being your hands and feet or what ever you could get your hands
on. No rules. Anything goes. She noticed one of the bodies was carrying a
symipa. She made a lung for it and immediately found the activation switch.
The symipa was a cylinder about 20 cm long that was made of a polymimic
alloy. When activated, it extended into a 2 m long staff with the strength of
titanium. There was only one recorded incident of a symipa ever breaking
in a fight.
With a liquid sound the symipa extended to its full length. Now she
was ready to take on this loser. She didn't have lots of training with the
symipa but was able to use it fairly competently. All of her experience was
from using wooden staffs for the symipas were used exclusively by the
Dragoons. It was a bit heavier than what she was used to, but was more than
able to make use of it. She moved in on her opponent and moved the symipa
in several wide arcs that he was easily able to avoid. She quickly began to
herd him around into a position that he couldn't get out of. He stumbled
over a staff that was on the ground and found himself against a wall.
Whisper brought the symipa up and came down on it as hard as she could.
Instantly the staff appeared in his and he brought it up to block the blow.
The two connected and the staff snapped in half. She continued the
downward path und struck his head. He immediately fell to the ground,
unconscious.
Whisper stood up, breathing hard. The symipa suddenly felt heavy
in her hands and she let it fall to the ground. She looked over and saw that
Venus was the only one still fighting. She saw Wolf and got a look at the
two bodies at his feet. One didn't have a head. She looked back at Venus to
keep from throwing up.
Venus circled her opponent, somewhat slower than she had at the
start of the fight. Fortunately he was doing worse. His head was starting to
spin from the loss of blood and he moved with the slight uncertainty of
someone who was drunk. Venus lashed out and cut deep into his thigh. He
staggered for a moment before they went back to circling each other.
"Man," Wolf said from next to Whisper and the others, "Has she
forgotten everything I taught her? She should have finished this long ago."
Instead of letting the fight drag on, he walked up behind Venus and
told her to watch what he did. He came strait at Venus' opponent and
moved like lightning. He used his knife and cut into the attacker's arm.
There was the grate of metal against bone as the knife nearly severed his
arm off. Wolf spun around, and changing his grip on the knife, drove it up
into the base of the guy's skull. He jerked once and then fell to the ground,
dead long before he hit.
Wolf pulled the knife out and wiped the blood off on the corpse's
clothes. He walked up to Venus and looked her in the face. "The next time
your in a fight like that," he said to her, "You kill them the first chance you
get."
She merely nodded to him and sat heavily on the grass, exhausted.
Her arms and thighs were covered in various cuts and gashes. Fortunately
none of them were deep and most of them had stopped bleeding. Then she
smiled to herself. That had been her first knife fight and thought she had
done fairly well. "I still did pretty well, didn't I?" she asked, pride in her
voice.
"Yes," Wolf conceded, "You did very well. But there is definitely
room for improvement."
"I personally think she did exceptionally well," a voice said.
Everyone froze and spun around in the direction the voice had come
from. What greeted their eyes made their hearts stop. More than twenty men
stood their dressed the same way as the people they had just fought with.
This day was just getting worse and worse.
"Whisper," Wolf whispered, "Call base security."
Whisper let out a brief telepath, SOUTHEAST PARK. In minutes
this place would be swarming with Dragoon Security. All they had to do
was stay alive that long.
Venus swore under her breath as she immediately came to her feet.
She was in no mood for more fighting.
"Now," the same figure said, "I hope you enjoyed your warmup,
because it's time for the main event."
"Solar Rays! Penetrate!" and a solid beam of light flashed over the
Scouts heads. It cut through three figures, leaving large gapping holes in the
corpses. Two more beams streaked out, taking down six more.
There was a blur of motion and a beautiful girl landed in front of the
group. She was facing the attackers and the others could only see her back,
but that was more than enough. She was wearing the uniform of a Sailor
Scout. To bad no one knew who she was, not even Wolf. Wolf got the
impression that she wasn't an actual member of the Scouts. Her uniform
was the biggest clue. Instead of having one dominant color with different
color trim, like the Scouts, It was one color. She still had the white body suit
and gloves, but everything else was a bright yellow-gold. She also was
wearing the knee-high boots that Sailors Moon and Mercury wore, but hers
were white with the same yellow-gold trim as the rest of her suit. She also
had blond hair with darker highlights mixed in that made her look
absolutely stunning. And imagine what the rest of the package looks like!
Wolf found himself thinking. 
"There," she said, "I believe that improves the odds somewhat."
With a cry, she jumped into the middle of the remaining intruders
and started to kick some serious butt. She fought with a style that none of
the others had seen before. She had already taken down two more by the
time the others came to their senses and jumped into the fray.
Even Sailor Moon got into the act this time and was giving the best
performance of her life. She easily took on three at a time and had them all
on the ground in about three minutes. Mercury and Jupiter found themselves
right in the middle of five people and went at it. A few minutes later they
were the last ones standing. "Oh, yeah," Jupiter enthused, "We are good!"
Venus found herself taking on two of them and was rocking the house. They
weren't even in her class! Whisper and Tuxedo Mask were fighting as a
loose pair. For the most part they were fighting alone but would fight as a
team when it was appropriate. Between the two, they took down four
intruders.
Wolf backed up and found himself back to back with someone. He
glanced over his shoulder and noticed that it was the new Scout. "Care to
dance?" Wolf asked.
"I would love to," came the enthusiastic reply. That settled, the two
wasted however came near them. The two worked together as though they
had been fighting together since the beginning of time and soon found
themselves out of opponents. Each and every person had been wasted.
Wolf turned and looked at the mysterious Scout who he had fought
with. This was his first real look at her and he found himself feeling
something he hadn't felt in the longest time. She had a beautiful set of
brown eyes that made her face glow. He found himself getting lost in those
bottomless eyes of hers as the others gathered around to find out who this
new Sailor Scout was.
Sailor Moon stepped to the front of the group, after all, she was the
leader of the Sailor Scouts, airhead that she was. "Who are you?" she asked.
She smiled at the group. "I, am Sailor Sol," she replied in
introduction.
"What happened here?!"
Everyone spun around to see who it was. Dragoon Security had
arrived.
Wolf turned back to Sailor Sol, but she was gone.


*                                       *                                      *


"Hey, Wolf! You coming?" Rei called to him. She had just been released
from the hospital shortly after they had won their fight. Everyone had been
so worked up by their victory that Rei had convinced everyone that they
should go out and celebrate. Everyone was going except for Ami. She was
going to the hospital to stay with Tolaris. He was still in critical condition
and nothing would be able to pull Ami from his side.
"In a minute," Wolf called from the balcony of his quarters in
Wolf's Lair. It was huge, taking up the top floor in one of the housing
buildings on the East side. Everyone was staying with Wolf because his pad
was so big that they all had more than enough room to fit them all. They had
turned three adjoining bedrooms into sort of mini condos for each of the two
couples, with the others getting one of their own. They were all off of the
central livingroom and kitchen with diningroom.
Wolf looked out over the city and was lost in thought. He was
wondering who Sailor Sol was and was trying to sort out his feelings. When
he had seen those eyes of hers, he knew he would never be able to get her
out of his mind. He had shut himself off from others for so long that he had
forgotten what it felt like to feel like he did. It's like being a teenager all
over again, he mused.
After a few moments, he pulled himself away from his thoughts and
went with the others.
They ended up in one of the local clubs that Maze had suggested.
They could hear the music from out in the street and it looked like this was
one of the wilder ones.
"What have you gotten us into?" Wolf said to Maze.
"A whole lot of fun!" came the reply as they went in.
The place was definitely swinging and the music was turned up to
a point that it almost became deafening. Mina immediately got into the
swing of things and dragged Maze out onto the floor. Serena grabbed Darien
and followed Mina's lead.
"I am going to get a drink," Wolf yelled to the remaining two girls
and headed for the bar.
Lita's eyes lit up at the idea and called after him, "Wait up! We're
coming with you!"
"We?" Rei asked.
"Of course," Lita said as she grabbed her arm, "Now lets go." She
then preceded to shove her way through the crowd, moving to the beat of
the music. When they finally reached the bar they found that he had already
gotten a beer and was looking out over the throng of people, most of whom
were human. His feet were tapping to the beat of the music when the two
came up next to him.
"What's the house specialty?" Lita asked him.
"Bloody Mary," Wolf replied without thinking.
Lita got the attention of the bartender and asked for a screwdriver.
She hated Bloody Marys.
"Got an ID?" came the bartender's reply.
Lita cursed and turned away, no longer interested.
Rei smiled and asked for a Coke.
"House rules," Wolf told the brunette, "You have to be over twenty-
one."
Lita muttered something acidic and started to check out the male
community.
The bartender got Wolf's attention and asked who was paying, Wolf
told him to put the two ladies on his tab and went back to looking at the
crowd.
"So," Rei asked, "Now what?"
Wolf was looking at someone who had just come in the door. He
drained the rest of his beer and replied to Rei absentmindedly. "Find a dance
partner," Wolf said as he shoved off from the bar and made his way through
the bodies.
Someone caught Lita's eyes and she yelled out. "Hey you! Wanna
dance?!" she yelled as she disappeared into the crowd.
Rei just shrugged. When in Rome . . .


*                                       *                                      *


"Would the Lady care to dance?" Wolf's deep voice asked, his accent thick.
Jessica Winston turned around and saw a tall man looking at her
intently, his blue eyes full of warmth. He had a strong face that showed off
his stunning eyes. He was dressed in a simple pair of white pants with a gray
button-down, short-sleeve shirt that hid his athletic build. The only part of
him that marred the handsome look was his unruly shack of dark blond hair.
She thought that it gave him a boyish good look that she found she liked
very much. And he only looked to be about twenty or so. Not far off from
her seventeen years.
"I would love to," she replied, her voice soft and gentle.
Wolf looked her over and liked what he saw. She was almost as tall
as he was, and had blond hair that was mixed with strands of a darker blond,
almost brown, that framed her face, radiating beauty. She was wearing a
short black dress that only worked to enhance her beauty. Her legs were
long and slender with a body that clearly showed that she worked out
regularly. But the thing that held his gaze were her eyes. They were dark and
soft. They held nothing back as Wolf became lost in those magnificent eyes.
They held his attention so well that he almost didn't hear her reply.
Wolf offered her his arm and she took it. His eyes never left hers as
he lead her out onto the dance floor. The others moved aside when they
realized who was coming through, but he payed them no attention. His
world had narrowed down to the beautiful girl in his arms and nothing else
seemed to matter.
As they reached the center of the floor the DJ was about to start his
next song. It was a slow dance number. Soon the sounds of "Winds of
Change" filled the air. The two began to move together, the music leading
them on. Wolf's eyes never left hers as he found himself serenading her, his
voice singing the lyrics to her with all of his heart
 Jessica found herself wishing the moment would last forever.
Wolf's voice touched her soul, making her feel like she had never felt
before. Their world consisted of only each other, nothing else carried any
meaning. It was as if they were taken to a higher plan, the music leading
their souls on.
Gradually, the people around them stopped to watch the two. Their
movements were beauty itself as they glided across the floor. Soon they
were the only two dancing as all the others stood back to watch them. They
knew they were seeing something extraordinary and wanted to just feel the
moment. The image of beauty frozen in their minds for all time.
Eventually though, the music ended and they found themselves
starring into each others eyes, reading their souls. They knew they would
never forget this moment. It would remain with them until the day they died.
Wolf gently led her off the dance floor. As the people who were watching
made way for them, the moment slowly faded into memory. It would always
be remembered by those who had seen the magic of the moment.


*                                       *                                      *


Serena and Darien watched as the two left the floor. Their hearts touched
by the scene.
"That was beautiful," Serena said to him. The power of the moment
had brought back memories of similar times with Darien in the Moon
Kingdom. Mostly balls at the palace, and parties for visiting delegations.
But her most cherished memories weren't from any of these, they were from
the rare moments were they had been with close family and friends. This
place reminded her of several of these. Surrounded by friends.
"Yes it was," Darien agreed. He too was reminded of those times
that he most cherished.
"Come on," Serena said, pulling on his arm, "Let's find the others."
Lita looked across from her seat at Wolf and Jessica as they sat not
too far away from them. They were busy chatting. "Damn, he's good," Lita
remarked.
"What?" Rei asked with a grin, "You pissed because she bagged
someone who was better than the one you got?"
"Oh, shut up," Lita snapped, "He was looser, okay?"
"What's up?" Maze asked as he and Mina took a seat.
"Lita's pissed that she didn't get as good a catch as that girl with
Wolf did," Rei said with an impish grin.
Lita just glared at her in return.
Mina turned around to get a look at Wolf's friend. "Maze," Mina
said around a smile, "With your all encompassing knowledge of the female
community, ever seen her before?"
Maze glared at her for a moment. "I have killed people for less," and
then turned to get a look, "Nope, must be new."
"Ha!" she cried and hit him in the arm, "So you admit it!"
"Hey, back down," he said rubbing his arm, "You haven't exactly
been the model of solitude, yourself."
Mina's face turned red and she looked away guiltily.
"Below the belt," Lita commented.
"Hey," Maze said pointing at her, "You should be talking."
"Your right!" she replied smugly, "I would have hit much lower."
Maze let his head fall to the table in surrender.
"Someone's having a good day," Darien said as he came up to the
group with Serena.
"Don't worry about him," Mina said, patting Maze's shoulder, "Lita
cut his ego down to size."
"Lita strikes again," Serena commented as she took a seat. "Who's
Wolf's lady friend?"
"No one knows," Rei told her, "They do seem to be getting pretty
friendly, though."
Lita was grinning. "Can someone say, 'understatement'?"
Maze brought his head up from the table. "Hey, he's a big boy now.
He can take care of himself."
"Tell that to Artemis," Mina remarked.
"Wha?" Serena was lost.
"I'm intrigued," Maze said with a smile, "A story about Wolf I
haven't heard before."
"Let's see . . . it had to be about the time we were celebrating
Serena's thirteenth birthday. Wolf had decided that he would get cute and
got Serena a 'surprise' present. I forget exactly what it was, but it scared the
hell out of Serena and she knocked over the cake. Now this was a really big
cake, and the whole thing landed right on top of him. Wolf almost died
laughing," Mina said, smiling, "Artemis spent the next three weeks trying
to find a way to get back at him. Wolf wasted him on every attempt. All
Artemis was doing was cause more grief for himself."
"Now that," Maze quipped, "I can believe. Wolf's one of the biggest
pranksters on base. I know six people who have tried to get back at him.
Each and everyone of them was foiled by Wolf."
Rei let out a laugh. "I take it your among that group?"
"Let's just say, it wasn't one of my greatest moments."
Serena changed the subject when she noticed Wolf leaving with his
friend. "Wonder where Wolf's going?"
Mina glanced at the exit in time to see them leave. "His apartment?"
"Mina," Darien asked, "Do you think of anything other than sex?"
"Well," Serena said, "I'm going to find out." She got up and
disappeared into the crowd before anyone could stop her.
Darien shook his head. "I had better pace her so she doesn't get into
any trouble," he said as he rose to leave.
"Here," Maze said and tossed a thin data pad at him, "It has a map
of the city in it so you find your way home."
"Thanks," he said and disappeared into the crowd going after
Serena.
"Why do I have this feeling that this going to turn into a disaster?"
Maze asked no one in particular.
"Easy," Rei replied, "Serena's involved."


*                                       *                                      *


Serena tried to move as quietly as she could so as to be able to hear what the
two were saying. She had followed Wolf and Jessica to Glory Park not too
far from the dance club. The two were walking slowly down the path next
to the pond talking quietly to each other.
"Damn, I can't hear a thing from here," Serena whispered. She
decided to try to move closer and tried to stay down under cover as she
moved. She followed them halfway around the pond before the two decided
to sit down on a bench.
Serena moved closer.
She stopped when she got as close as dared and tried to listen but
didn't hear anything. She parted some leaves so she could see what they
were doing. They weren't doing anything, they were just sitting there,
holding each other. "Come on," she whispered, "Do something!"
"Serena, can't you just leave them in peace?" a quiet voice asked.
Serena jumped and turned around to find Darien kneeling next to
her.
"You watching them too? She asked after her heart slowed down.
"Actually," he whispered in reply, "I'm watching you."
"What, you don't trust me?" she asked.
"I just don't get why you can't let those two have some privacy, is
all," he answered her.
"I want to know what they're doing."
"Serena," Darien said, "Would you like it if someone was spying on
you?"
"I am not spying!" she hissed at him.
"Then why are you sneaking around?"
"Uh . . ." she didn't have an answer.
"Come on. Let's go and leave them in peace," he said, tugging on
her arm.
Serena jerked her arm back. She managed to lose her balance and
fell into the pond with a squeal. Darien quickly pulled out a soaked Serena.
Serena just stood there dripping wet and shivering. 
"Alright, time to go," this time she didn't resist.
Jessica's head flew around when she heard the splash. "What was
that?!" she had thought they were alone.
"Serena falling in the lake," Wolf replied without looking around.
She looked at him with a puzzled expression. "Wha? How?"
Wolf smiled at her. "She's been following us ever since we left the
club," he told her.
"How do you know that?" she asked.
His smile grew even bigger. "Secrets of the trade, my dear. Secrets
of the trade."
"Yeah," came her response as she looked out at the park again. Then
she looked down at her watch. "Oh, my god. I have got to go. I need to be
awake for school tomorrow," she said as she stood up.
Wolf rose from the bench as well. "Would you like an escort home?"
Now she smiled at him. "Thanks for the offer, but I'm just around
the corner. I can make it," she leaned over and gave him a kiss, "Thanks for
the splendid evening."
And with that she left, leaving Wolf starring after her. He turned to
head home.
Then a thought came to him. I didn't even get her name! He spun
around to call after her but she was already gone.


*                                       *                                      *


Serena walked up behind Lita who was leaning against the wall in the hall
watching the living room. Her hair was still dripping wet from the shower
she had taken after her unintentional dip in the pond.
"What ya watching," she asked quietly as she looked into the living
room to see what was going on.
"Nothing really," came Lita's reply, "Just trying to figure him out."
Wolf was sitting over in the corner playing aimlessly with his synthesizer.
He had a far off look in his eyes that clearly said he was lost in thought.
"What do you think he's thinking about?" Serena asked after
watching him for a few minutes.
"Probable that girl he met at the club tonight," she replied, still
watching Wolf.
"She really got to him, didn't she?"
"I would say so," Lita said as she turned around and headed for her
room.
Serena took her place and watched Wolf play. Notes filled the air,
some of them parts of songs, others just stuff he was making up as he went
along. All of it reflected his mood. Serena listened to the music, reading the
emotion that they carried. They were almost dream like. They told of great
love and longing. They were both uplifting and sad at once.
Then Wolf began to play a song, and sang.
It was Wind of Change.

Wolf began to whistle in tune with the guitar. He whistled for several
moments with the guitar in the back ground. It was a slow, soothing, tempo
that set you at ease. Then he added his voice.
"I follow the Moskva
Down to Gorky Park
Listening to the Wind of Change
An August summer night
Soldiers passing by
Listening to the Wind of Change"
He began whistling again. Keeping the tune
"The world is closing in
And did you ever think
That we could be so close, like brothers
The future's in the air
I can fell it everywhere
Blowing with the Wind of Change"
Then the drums made themselves known as the beat picked up slightly.
"Take me to the magic of the moment
On a glory night
Where the children of tomorrow dream away
In the wind of change"
Serena let herself be carried away by the music as the next verse began.
Remembering the dance she had watched. The memory flooding her senses.
"Walking down the street
Distant memories
Are buried in the past, forever
I follow the Moskva
Down to Gorky Park
Listening to the Wind of Change"
Then the chorus began again.
"Take me to the magic of the moment
On a glory night
Where the children of tomorrow
Share their dreams with you and me
Take me to the magic of the moment
On a glory night
Where the children of tomorrow
Dream away in the Wind of Change"
The others began to assemble at the opening to the living room as they
heard Wolf sing. His voice flowing from the depths of his soul. His voice
full of passion. It spurred everyone on. Moving them with the music.
"The Wind of Change
Blows straight into the face of time
Like a stormwind that will ring the freedom bell
For peace of mind
Let your balalaika sing
What my guitar wants to say"
Then Wolf broke out into a guitar solo that made the music seem to pulsate
with life. Everyone watched as he played, his eyes closed, completely lost
in his music. He was playing with a passion that none of them had seen
before. And it moved them with him.
"Take me to the magic of the moment
On a glory night
Where the children of tomorrow
Share their dreams with you and me
Take me to the magic of the moment
On a glory night
Where the children of tomorrow
Dream away in the Wind of Change"
Then it was quiet. Wolf began to whistle the tune of the song with the sol
guitar. Everyone was quiet as the music slowly faded into their memories.
They watched Wolf for a moment as he sat at the keyboard, silent. He kept
his eyes closed and sat there immersed in the feelings his playing had
awakened.
Slowly everyone began to head back to their rooms. Wolf stayed
where he was at his synthesizer.


*                                       *                                      *


Slowly Sailor Sol backed away from the open slider on the balcony of
Wolf's quarters. She had heard his playing and it had played on her feelings
of what had happened this evening as well. She had found herself lost in her
feelings and memories. Reluctantly she left. She was unsure of what this all
meant to her and had to find someplace to think it through. She didn't know
how it would affect her mission to help the Scouts. Her whole world was
being turned upside down and she didn't know what to do. She leapt over
to the next rooftop and disappeared into the night.


*                                       *                                      *


The major marched into General Riech's command post and made his way
to the map room. The guard posted at the entrance recognized him and
waved him through. The major walked in and stood to the side, waiting for
the General to notice him. The General was a tall, opposing, woman who
carried the air of total authority about her. She took command's from no one
and expected her subordinates to do as she commanded without delay. She
was known as a mover. Her plain green uniform was unadorned by medals
or traces of rank. She was recognized by everyone and had no need of
medals to show others who she was.
Riech spotted the man entering the room and looked up from the
map table. "What news do you bring from our scouts on Earth and the
Negaverse?"
The major collected himself before giving his report. "General," he
replied in respect, almost awe, "Our scouts on Earth have remained
undetected and report that the planet should be fairly easy to invade."
"Never," Riech interrupted, "assume that a target will be easy to
take. Those who do will always be defeated."
The major stiffened at the reprimand. "Yes, ma'am," he continued
to give his report, "Our scouts in the Negaverse report the same with one
exception. One of our teams has failed to report in as scheduled and we are
counting them as a total loss. They were assigned to a location known as
Wolf's Lair. It is the command center for the so-called Dragoon Legion that
went underground one standard year ago."
"Very well," the General said in dismissal, "It seems that we have
some adversaries worthy of the title."
The major made his way out of the room, eager to get out of the
woman's presence.


*                                       *                                      *


"Hey, Serena! What ya doing?" Molly asked as she caught up to Serena in
the hall on her way to Algebra. Summer vacation had just ended two weeks
ago and they were now freshmen at Cover High School.
"Not much, why? What're you doing?" Serena replied.
"Going to Algebra," Molly said with disgust, "Have you heard about
that new girl in school?"
Serena shook her head. "No, who is she?"
Molly shrugged. "I don't know. All I know is that she's just got here
from America. Her father is in the Air Force or something." She spotted
someone walking down the hall. "See, there she is."
Serena looked over and saw the girl Wolf had been dancing with the
other night. "I've seen her before," she commented to herself, "What's she
doing here?"
Molly looked at her. "You have? Where?"
"Hi, ladies. You talking about Jessica Winston?" Melvin asked when
he came up next the girls.
"Is that her name?" Serena asked, "What else do you know about
her?"
"Well, she is from America and her father is in the U.S. Air Force,"
he replied cheerfully, "She's a senior and is the talk of all the gossip chains.
She is especially sought after by most of the senior guys. But she seems to
be ignoring them."
"Oh," Molly stated, "She something of a recluse?"
"I don't know," Serena said, "But here she comes."
And sure enough there she was. Coming right at them. She was
wearing the standard required school uniform and had her hair done up in
a pony tail.
"Hi," she said cheerfully when she reached them, "My name's
Jessica. You can call me Jess, Jessie, or whatever."
"Just don't call her late for dinner," a short red headed kid said from
next to her. Serena thought he looked vaguely like Wolf.  He reached out his
and shook Jessica's hand. "Scott Wong. My friends call me Wolf."
"Hi," she replied somewhat shyly, "Jessica Winston."
Serena made some jumps of logic and glared at Wolf. "What are you
doing here?" she scolded.
"Nothing really," he replied with a grin, "Just killing time between
classes is all." He turned his attention to Melvin. "Did you find that driver
I needed for my modem? I've been looking everywhere for it and have came
up with nada."
"Yep," he replied to Wolf, "Found it on someone's ftp site last
night." He took a disk out of his pocket and gave it to him. "All you have to
do is unzip it and your ready to get up and running on the net."
"Alright, you are the man," Wolf said with admiration, "We still
having that network game on Saturday?"
"Yes," Melvin replied, "Three o'clock at David's house. You
coming?"
"I think so," Wolf though for a moment, "I might be a little late. I
have a doctor's appointment I have to go to first."
"Sure thing. Are you going to be able to attend our Internet Club
meeting next Wednesday?"
I'm not sure yet because I don't know what I will be doing next
week," Wolf replied, "I will try though." He spotted someone out of the
corner of his eye.
"I'll see you guys late," he said to them. He turned to Jessica. "Nice
meeting you," he told her.
"You too," she replied, still somewhat shy.
"See you all later," he said to the others and left the group.
"Bye," they said as they watched him go. Half way down the hall
they heard him yell out, "Hey Jeff! We still on for that party Friday?!"
Jessica turned back to the others. "Who was that?"
"Only one of the most popular guys in school," Melvin replied,
"Girls are already trying to nail him down for the Senior Prom. The
competition is fierce, I hear."
Serena leaned toward Jessica. "And I think he likes you," she said
slyly, "You had better catch him while you can." Too bad you already did,
and don't know it, she thought.
"I don't know," she confessed, "I might be seeing someone else."
"Really?" Molly asked, "Who is the lucky man?"
"Uh, I would rather not say," shy said shyly, her face flushed
somewhat, "He doesn't go to school here, and I doubt you would know
him."
"Try me," Serena said with a mischievous grin. Molly had seen that
look on Serena's face before. It was on the rare occasion when she knew
something others didn't.
Jessica blushed for a moment. "I," she stuttered, "I don't really
know." Her face had turned red.
"Ooh," Molly cooed, "How romantic. A mystery man."
"Uh, yeah," Jessica said uncertainly.
Melvin was just standing in the middle of Serena and Molly
fidgeting. He didn't look all that comfortable with the conversation.
Molly turned to Serena. "Don't you think that's romantic, Serena?"
Serena thought it over for a second, recalling her fantasies over
Tuxedo Mask. "Yes, I think it is."
Serena looked up at the clock on the wall and panicked. "Oh, my
god! I'm going to be late for class!" she cried and bolted down the hall.
Their were angry calls and swears as she bumped into people running down
the hall as fast as her legs could move her.
Jessica and the others just starred after her. "Does she ways act that
way?" she asked the two.
"That's Serena for you," Melvin sighed, "Heart of gold, but a total
airhead when it comes to anything."
"Yeah," Molly added, "She has never been on time for anything in
her whole life. She'd probably be late to her own funeral."
"Got to love her though," Melvin commented, "She may be the
epitome of the blond stereotype, but she is one of the best friends you will
ever find." He thought for a moment. "If you make it past the stupidity and
clumsiness," he added.
Jessica just gave them a strange look.
She turned back in time to see Serena crash into the double-doors at
the end of the hall. Serena fell to the floor in pain. Everyone in the hall was
looking at her sprawled out on the floor. Jessica stood there with a worried
expression on her face. And she's the leader of the Sailor Scouts?



*                                       *                                      *


General Reich stood over the map table trying to figure out the best way to
take the two worlds.
"What do the estimates of their militaries look like now?" she asked
the group of advisers standing around her.
The Major swallowed before taking a brief look at his notes to
compose his thoughts. Every time he was in the woman's presence his
throat went dry from fear. He cleared his throat before beginning. "On
Earth, their forces are in a state of peacetime readiness. When we attack, we
will have a window of about four days before their forces will be able to
respond to us effectively. Their nuclear weapons will be taken out of the
equation gust before we begin our attack so that all they will be able to
respond with will be conventional weapons. The energy shields we use
should be able to protect us for a while. This will give us an added edge.
"In the Negaverse it is much the same story with the exception of
that the denizens there have energies that they can use as weapons. Some of
them are strong enough to equal any nuclear device that they have. Those
will be the most dangerous people to watch for. Other than that, they have
weaponry that about equal Earth's. With the sole exception of their air
forces; they are less advanced and inferior to even our own aircraft."
Reich nodded as she took all that in. "What about the air forces of
Earth?"
The Major looked down at his notes. "Their aircraft tend to have a
higher performance then our own, but they lack shielding. The same goes
for their land forces."
Reich nodded again. "Very well," she said in dismissal, "You may
now leave."
As the Major left, Reich found herself contemplating the chances of
their success. Earth looked like it would be the harder of the two to take.
She looked at her watch and saw that she needed to leave for her daily
briefing to the Emperor.


*                                       *                                      *


"Hey, Serena!," Lita called from Rei's house as she saw her walking up to
the group, "How's the nose?"
"It still hurts," the blond complained as she rubbed it.
Mina looked at the two. "What happened?"
Lita started to grin. "Serena came tearing down the hall between
third period. She didn't know that the double-doors were locked and
plastered herself to the door." She started to laugh and Mina joined her at
the sight of Serena glued to a door.
"Hey!" Serena cried, hurt, "It's not funny, that hurt."
"I bet," Mina kidded her.
"Do you guys think that we could skip this stuff before we have a
crisis on our hands?" Wolf asked as he came around from the back of Rei's
house.
Serena jumped in surprise and spun around. "Where did you come
from!"
Wolf smiled at them. "I warped in just now. Sorry about startling
you," he apologized, "So, what were you guys talking about?"
"How Serena plastered herself to the double-doors at school," Lita
said with a grin.
"Ooh," Wolf winced, "I saw that. It looked like it really hurt."
Everyone looked at him. None of them had seen him there.
Serena thought for a moment and made a rare jump of logic. "So
that was you, wasn't it?" Serena leered at him.
Wolf threw up his hands. "Guilty as charged."
Serena gave him a puzzled look. They still didn't know just what
Wolf could do. If being able to live the lives of several people at a time was
one of the things he could do, then he could probable do a lot more.
"Just how long have you been Scott Wong?" Serena asked.
Wolf answered almost immediately. "Ever since you were in
kindergarten."
Everyone looked at him. "Just how long have you been watching
us?" Ami asked.
"Since the day you guys were born," came his reply, "All though it
became a little hard to keep an eye on all of you when Mina started working
as Sailor V."
Mina smiled sheepishly. "Yeah, I guess I moved around a little."
"A little?" Wolf said in disbelief, "You racked up enough frequent
flyer miles to take everyone here to the Bahamas twice a year for the rest of
your lives! And those are just the legit flights!"
Luna's eyebrow went up at this. She turned and glared at Artemis.
"Legitimate flights?" she asked, dripping venom.
Artemis rubbed the back of his head while grinning nervously. "We
had to sneak on to some flights, okay?"
"Some?" Wolf responded, "Try fifty-three."
"Artemis!" Luna cried as she hit the cat upside the head, "You're
supposed to be setting an example for these girls, not corrupting them!"
Artemis cringed at the hit. "She made me do it!" he cried, pointing
at Mina.
"Me?" Mina laughed, "Don't even try to pin this one on me,
Artemis. You can dig yourself out of this one on your own."
Artemis started to slowly back away from Luna. Her eyes looked as
though she was about to kill. "Hey, take it easy Luna. It's no big deal. You
don't need to do anything to me. Take it - AAARGH!" he cried and bolted
as Luna made a lunge for him.
Everyone broke out into laughter as Luna ran off after Artemis. The
two ran all over the place before Luna finally managed to bag him when he
ran into one of the post holding up Rei's roof. The two vanished in a furball
with Luna hissing and Artemis calling out for her to stop.
After a minute the two broke up leaving Artemis on his side with
several cuts and bruises. Mina came over and gently picked him up off the
ground.
"Poor baby. Did Luna beat you up?" she asked with a grin.
Artemis let out a moan of pain. "Shut up, you," was his reply.
Mina sat back down and started to look him over to make sure none
of his injuries were serious. She looked up at Wolf. "Just what were you
doing at the High School anyway?"
"Chasing down a hunch," he replied. He didn't bother elaborating.
"And what was that hunch?" Mina prompted.
Serena answered before he could say anything. "He came to see
Jessica," she stated with a grin.
"Jessica, who?" Lita asked.
"Remember that girl he was dancing with at the dance club the other
night?" Serena asked. Lita nodded yes. "It turns out she's a new student at
our school."
Lita knitted her eyebrows. "Really?" something didn't sit right with
all of this and she wasn't sure what it was.
"If she's here," Ami asked, "why was she in the Negaverse?"
"That's what I'm trying to find out," Wolf said, "And I can only
come up with two explanations. One; she is very bad news. Or two; she's
Sailor Sol. I'm betting on the latter."
"What?!" they all said in unison. "Are you sure of that?" Mina
asked.
Wolf shrugged. "It makes sense. Sailor Sol was sent here to help us
which means she would have to stay close to us. It explains why she was in
the Negaverse."
"How did she get to the Negaverse in the first place?" Ami asked,
"We need a silkworm crystal or one of your warpholes to get there. As far
as we know, she doesn't have access to any of those."
"Maybe she can open her own warphole like Wolf," Rei offered.
"Possibly," Wolf allowed, "The thing is, we won't know until we
can ask her or she reveals herself to us. Either way, it could be dangerous."
"Dangerous?" Serena asked with big eyes. She didn't like the sound
of that at all.
"He's right," Ami confirmed, "We should decide carefully on what
we are going to do about this."
"Ami's right. We should all give this some serious thought," Luna
said from her perch on Ami's shoulder, "Even you, Serena."
"Hey!" she started to protest.
Wolf interrupted her before she could get going. "Do you mind? We
need to figure this out."
Serena took a breath and sighed. "Yeah, I guess so."
"Thank you. Anyone have any suggestions?" Wolf asked to get
underway.
"Why doesn't one of us ask her if she's Sailor Sol?" Serena asked.
Serena wasn't known for her subtlety.
"Dolt," Rei remarked, "What would you say if she wasn't? How
would you explain it?"
Serena grinned sheepishly. She hadn't thought of that.
"I thought so," Rei said after a moment, "Now keep your mouth
shut." Serena stuck her tongue out in response.
"Hold on a sec, Rei," Mina interrupted, "She might have something.
The only problem with it is that none of us would be able to do it because
she could identify us. We would need someone else to do it."
She looked over at Serena and Wolf, who were standing next to each
other. "What?" Serena asked when she saw the look in Mina's eyes. Wolf
raised an eyebrow.
Lita was thinking and glanced at Mina. "The Disguise Pen?" Lita
asked.
Mina turned to look at her. "Not a bad idea, but no," Mina remarked,
"I was thinking Wolf should do it since he can apparently impersonate
another person better than Serena can."
"Hey!" Serena called in defense, "I can act just fine thank you!"
"Sorry, Serena," Wolf said apologetically, "She has a point. You're
still not that hard to identify when you're in disguise. Too much of your
personality shows through.
"And besides . . ." suddenly Wolf turned into what looked like a
statue made of mercury. He began to change shape until he had turned into
this little guy shorter than Serena and turned back to a normal shade of
color. He was now several centimeters short of Serena with a thin frame. He
had dark hair that was cut very short to his scalp. He was also dressed in a
simple pair of jeans with a sweatshirt that said "Life Sucks" on it. "I can
turn into someone so different that they have a totally different personality.
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah," and he started to do a little jig. Even his voice had
changed.
Serena and the others were starring at him as though he had come
from Mars. When he noticed the looks he was getting, he froze in mid-
move. "What? It's just me," he said as he looked at them.
"Whoa," was the only thing Lita said as the others still looked at him
in shock.
"Can you make yourself look like anyone?" Serena asked in
disbelief.
"Sure," he replied. He again turned into liquid metal and changed
shape. This time he solidified into Serena. "See," Serena's voice said, "I can
look like anyone I want."
Everyone was looking back and forth between the two Serenas. They
couldn't decide who was the real one. "Uh, which one of you is which?"
Lita asked.
They both struck a pose and spoke at the same instant. "I'm the real
Serena," they both said. They then turned to each other and started to shout.
"No you aren't! I am!"
"No, I am!"
"Are not!"
"Are too!"
After a few more seconds they both broke down and started to cry.
Everyone covered their ears at the horrid sound. "Oh, no!" Mina
cried, "Not two of them!"
After a moment Lita was able to think up a way to distinguish the
two. "Oh, man," Lita complained, "I forgot about the cake I left in the oven.
I have to go get it."
With a speed that defied physics, the Serena on the left was on her
feet and standing in front of Lita. "Can I come?!" she said in excitement.
Lita looked over Serena's shoulder at the imposter still sitting on the
ground. "Busted, Wolf," she called with a grin.
"D'oh!" the Serena on the ground cursed. Wolf quickly changed
back to his normal self and got up off the ground. "Man, that was really
cheap, Lita."
Lita's grin got even wider. "It worked, didn't it?"
"Anyway, what did you guys think?" he asked.
Serena was looking around dumbly, having no clue as to what had
just happened. "What?" she asked in confusion.
"I am very impressed," Luna said from her spot on Ami's shoulder.
"I have to agree with Luna. That was very good," Mina remarked.
"Well," Artemis said, "looks like you're the one who's going to
confront her if we decide to do this."
Wolf thought over how he was going to do this. After a moment he
decided he was going to have to wing it. He would have to take the
opportunity if it presented itself. Their was no way he would be able to
orchestrate something like this, it was just too delicate. He would be relying
on his judgement and instincts.
After a moment he spoke up. "I'm going to have to do this be feel.
There is no way I can do it any other way. You guys are going to just have
to bear with me."
He noticed that Ami looked as though she was in deep thought. He
had a bad feeling about where her mind was going.
"Wolf," Ami said after a few more moments of thinking, "You said
that you could manipulate matter. That means you would also have to be
able to 'see' it right? Sort of like read it?" Wolf nodded in acknowledgment,
not liking where she was heading. "That means," Ami continued, "that you
could theoretically read her mind, correct?"
Wolf made a sigh as he thought about how to answer this. "Okay,
I'm going to have to explain some things about myself so that you will
understand why I won't do that. First off, I could read someone's mind if I
need to. The thing is, I live by some very strict ethics that I have imposed on
myself. Violating anyone's privacy is at the top of the list. That means I will
not use any of my abilities to alter anyone's mind or body. Unless it is an
extreme emergency. Like Ami when she was hit by Leftenant Marx's plasma
ball. I will not use any powers that I have to kill, injure, or subdue anyone.
I will not violate them or any such activity. Because if I do, no matter how
unlikely, it is possible that it will corrupt me and bring out my dark side.
Something that I can never allow to happen. Too much is a stake to risk that
happening."
Everyone watched him for a moment letting what he had just said
sink in. After they thought for a moment, they nodded in understanding.
They knew that he would never abuse his abilities. That was why he had
never told them of it before now. He didn't want to have any of them
thinking that they could rely on him to do everything. It could have
corrupted them and Wolf. He wouldn't allow such a thing to happen. It
dawned on them that the only reason he had revealed himself to them, was
because they would soon need his abilities to survive. It was the only
explanation that would allow him to take such a chance.
Rei came down from her perch on the porch and came up to Wolf.
Putting her hand on his shoulder, she said, "Don't worry. You will do what
you feel you have to do and we will support you no matter what. You have
become very important to us. And none of us will jeopardize that trust and
friendship."
Wolf looked down into her eyes and saw understanding there. He
glanced around at the others and saw the same understanding in their eyes,
even Serena's. He thought he could see a hint of the princess that was
behind those blue eyes of Serena's and smiled. He looked back into Rei's
eyes. He reached up and placed his hand her shoulder as well.
"Thank you. I now know why you were all chosen to be the
protectors of this universe. Your unwavering friendship and trust in each
other and others are what will allow you to survive and prosper. Thank you,
again."


*                                       *                                      *


The woman moved quickly down the streets of Tokyo. She wore a pair of
faded blue jeans with a baggy sweatshirt that hid most of her frame. She had
dark hair that went down to the middle of her back and scanned the crowd
with a pair of dark eyes that saw everything. She moved with a steady
measured pace and carried an air of superiority about her. Over her left
shoulder was a backpack that contained several pounds of plastique
explosives and several other goodies of destruction. If you looked closely
you might have noticed the outline of a Berretta 9 mm semiautomatic pistol
tucked in the small of her back.
She took her next right and her objective came into sight. The
Supreme Allied Command East Asia Headquarters. She turned into the ally
that was next to the building and saw that her three compatriots were
already there. She nodded to them and immediately opened the outside
pouch of her backpack when she was sure that no one could see her. She
pulled out her Berretta and screwed on the silencer she had pulled from the
pouch. Finished, she shouldered the backpack again and nodded to them
signaling that she was ready.
"Okay," one of the others spoke up. He was obviously the leader of
the four man team. "There is one guard in the lobby. We eliminate him and
use his security card to gain access to the restricted area. Once in, Joel and
Miguel will take up covering positions while Brook and I head down to
secure storage. After we have retrieved the objective we will all make our
way to the rear exit on the South side of the building. You all know your
escape routs from there." He looked at each of the members of his team.
"Good luck."
Joel and Miguel nodded in return and did a last minute check of
their MP5 submachine guns. Each had an integrated silencer that eliminated
almost all sound from the weapons. Brook had her Berretta while their
leader, Ja'kel,  carried something more exotic. He carried a shortened
plasma rifle that had been specially made for covert operations. It was just
over 30 cm and had an extendable stock. With an effective range of nearly
3 km, it was a favorite of assassins. The series he carried had been modified
for close combat conditions. It could fire one shot at a time or be set for
fully automatic. The power cell had enough energy for nearly 300 shots.
With their weapon checks completed, they concealed them and
headed out onto the street. After entering the ten story building, Joel and
Miguel fanned out to cover the lobby while Brook and Ja'kel walked up to
the single security guard sitting behind the desk. They were all looking
around the room, watching for anything that could be considered a threat.
"Excuse me," Ja'kel asked the guard, "We were wondering if you
could . . ."
Brook had pulled out the Berretta and fired two rounds into the
guard's forehead. There was no sound except for the clinking of the spent
cartridges hitting the tile floor. Moving quickly, they moved around to the
back of the desk and pulled his security card. Brook lifted him out of his
chair and stuffed him under the desk where no one would see him unless
they came around and looked under the desk.
Done with that, she moved over to the secured door on the other side
of the room where Ja'kel was using the card to gain entry into the hall
beyond. The lock beeped it's acceptance and released the lock on the door.
Ja'kel pulled it open and motioned his team into the hall beyond.
Once inside, they moved quickly with Ja'kel in the lead. He had the
plasma rifle in front of him as he moved quickly but silently down the hall.
At the end they took the hall to the left. Fortunately the building was fairly
empty as it was after hours in the building. There was only the security
personnel and night watch in the building.
They did not have to worry about any of the security alarms as Joan
had unleashed a predator into the computer mainframe the previous
evening. The program kept close watch over all the security systems and
prevented them from signaling any kind of alarm. It also looked at all
security cameras and watched for any image that would alert someone that
intruders were in the building. If it found a feed that showed the team, it
replaced it with a picture that had been taken earlier of when the hall was
empty. If it had to it would create a digital image of the person that was in
the frame but not part of the team. Usually that person would be killed by
the team. What made this program so amazing was the fact that it was a true
artificial intelligence. A program of this complexity had never been seen on
the face of the planet. This thing was definitely alien. It had not been
created on Earth.
The team moved deeper into the huge complex and took the elevator
down to the second sub floor. The elevator opened into another hall that
ended with a security guard that was behind a piece of 9 cm thick bullet
proof glass. When the guard saw the people emerge from the elevator he
moved to trigger the alarm. Ja'kel saw this and fired two rounds from the
plasma rifle. Two orange spheres raced down the hall. The first one caused
the glass to shatter into a thousand pieces and the second exploded when it
hit the guard square in the chest. The guard's upper body just vanished,
leaving a pile of dismembered arms and legs on the floor. Strangely there
was no blood.
As the team approached the sealed door they could smell burnt flesh
but ignored it, staying focused on the job at hand. Brook moved up to the
door and removed her backpack. She reached in and removed some of the
plastique that she was carrying. Moving quickly she placed the explosives
at the edges of the door and placed several detonators in it. Moving back
from the door she armed the trigger.
"Fire in the hole!"
There was a deafening explosion and smoke and dust filled the
corridor. When the dust settled, the door had been blasted into the hall
beyond. With Joel and Miguel staying behind to cover them, Brook and
Ja'kel moved down the corridor. Moving swiftly and silently down the
corridor, they made their way to the last door on the right. They forced the
door and found themselves standing in an enclosed room with a single door
on the opposite wall with a keypad next to it.
"Your sure the stolen code will work?" Ja'kel asked nervously. If
they couldn't get into that room their mission was a failure.
"Don't get yourself tied into a knot," Brook scowled as she moved
to the lock, "The code will work fine. It's only sixteen hours old. They
haven't changed it yet." In confirmation of her statement, the door swung
open after she finished putting in the code. "After you," she said as she
stepped back, a smug grin on her face.
Ja'kel entered the room and took a quick look around. The only
thing in the room was a computer terminal on the far side. Over the terminal
there was a large window that let you see into the heart of the mainframe
computer system. And this was the only terminal that had unrestricted
access to the system. There was nothing to prevent them from getting into
the system.
Brook moved past Ja'kel and sat down at the terminal. Reaching into
her bag she pulled out three CDs. The only difference was that these CDs
could hold 50 terabytes of information. These three CDs represented all of
the storage space in the mainframe system. She inserted them into the three
CD-ROM drives and launched a program she had inserted with the AI. She
watched as data was copied at a rate that was measured in gigabytes per
second. After five strenuous minutes the screen signaled that it had finished
copying the database. She took out the CDs and placed them the reinforced
cases they had come from. These CDs were now very valuable. They
contained all the information on the various militaries in the world that the
U.S. military had.
"Come on," she said as she shouldered her bag, "Let's get out of
here."
"I'm more than happy to," came Ja'kel's reply. He didn't like the
idea of being stuck down here with only one way out. They quickly moved
down the corridor and caught up with Joel and Miguel. Silently they got into
the elevator and took it up to the ground floor. Just before the door opened
they tried to hide as much of themselves as they could in case someone was
waiting for them on the other side.
It opened into an empty hall. Taking a small sigh of relief they
moved on. Two seconds before they made it to the door leading into the
lobby the alarm sounded.
"Attention all security personnel! There is an intruder in the facility!
Repeat, there is an intruder in the facility!"
Ja'kel swore under his breath and charged the door. He crashed into
the door nearly ripping it off its hinges. He was greeted by six MPs with M-
16 rifles. Moving with a speed that defied logic he flung himself to his right
while shooting with his plasma rifle on full automatic. He was able to take
down two of them before they could react. He hit the ground on his side and
slid across the polished linoleum.
He watched the events in slow-motion as they happened.
He saw one of the far guards had his M-16 pointed right him and he
tried to bring his plasma rifle around to shoot. He knew he wouldn't make
it in time and watched with a strange detached feeling. He knew his life was
going to end and found himself watching the events with a calmness the
disturbed him. It was as though he was watching someone else. Suddenly he
saw the MP's head vanish in a spray of blood.
He glanced toward the door he had come from and saw Joel and
Miguel firing their MP5s at the remaining Military Police. He watched as
the other three were cut down with ease.
When the firing stopped Brook ran over Ja'kel and knelt over him.
"Are you all right?" she asked.
"Yeah," he said breathlessly as they pulled him to his feet. He felt
like he had just run 20-km, sprinting the whole way. The fight had only
lasted three seconds but he could have sworn it had taken at least a minute.
Brook pulled on his arm. "Come on," she said urgently, "We have
to get out of here before more of them show up."
Not arguing the point with her, he ran as fast as he could for the
door.
The second they hit the street they moved as quickly as they could
while trying to blend in with the surroundings. They spread out to keep from
being overly obvious. After a few minutes of brisk walking they formed
back up once they were sure they weren't being followed. They were wrong.
"And just were do you think your going?" a voice said from the
shadows of ally they were in.
They immediately pulled out their weapons and brought them to
bear. Their eyes were constantly moving trying to pick out who was there.
A lance of yellow light struck out and destroyed Miguel's MP5. As
the weapon was torn from his hands it almost took his arm with it. The other
three shot back in the direction the beam had come from. They used the few
seconds that their firing gained them and burst open the door to the
warehouse next to them. They dove into the darkness beyond.
"What the hell was that?!" Venus asked as she came out of her spot
behind the dumpster she had used for cover. The part of the dumpster that
had taken the brunt of the attack looked like it had been hit by a large piece
of molten lava.
"Looks like some type of plasma rifle," Wolf replied as he moved
to the door their enemy had disappeared into. The others made to follow.
"Hold it," Venus said, "Mercury and I will go around to the other
side and see if we can draw them into a crossfire."
"Lets do it," Mercury replied and took off with Venus.
"Who wants to go first?" Wolf asked the other three.
"Uh, you can," Sailor Moon said from her spot behind Jupiter.
"Wuss," Wolf remarked. He pulled out his oversized pistol and
moved for the door. "Lets hope they're not covering the door," he said as he
let the gun lead the way in. Just as he was inside far enough for his body to
be just inside the door he was heralded by a stream of bullets. He jumped
back out the door as fast as he could and fell on his back.
"Oh, my god," Sailor Moon cried out, "Are you all right?"
"I think so," was Wolf's response. Then he tried to get up and a bolt
of pain shot through his left arm. "Oh, shit!" He rolled over and got up using
his right arm, which was a little difficult with the gun. He held up his arm
and saw that their was a stain of blood on both sides of his arm. The bullet
had passed right through.
"My god," Mars exclaimed. She moved to help him but he waved
her off.
Wolf closed his eyes for a second to concentrate. When he opened
them again he moved his left arm experimentally. Sure that it was working
right, he tapped the silver headband he wore. A pair of visors appeared over
his eyes. "IR," Wolf commanded and the visor displayed a thermal image
of everything in his field of vision.
He moved back over to the door and moved Jupiter out of the way
as she was making quick glances to see if she could spot the shooter. Wolf
moved next to the door and was just about to move when gun fire exploded
on the other side of the building. Using the distraction he flung himself
through the door way. The visor quickly picked out the gunman and he fired
multiple shots at him. He was sure at least two shots had connected as the
gunman was now flat on the floor.
One down, three to go.


*                                       *                                      *


"There," Mercury said as she saw the door. She and Venus had ran around
the back of the building to see if they could get the intruders into a cross
fire.
Venus saw it and made to open it. "Damn," she hissed, "It's locked."
"If you want to wait a moment I can pick the lock," Mercury replied.
"Ami!" Venus exclaimed, "How the hell do you know how to pick
locks?"
Mercury shrugged. "If you know how a lock works. It's pretty easy
to pick it."
Just then they heard gun fire coming from the other side of the
warehouse.
"Screw it," Venus said, "We're going in the fast way.
"Venus Crescent Beam . . . Smash!" Venus exclaimed as a beam of
yellow light leapt from her finger. The beam hit the door and blew it off it's
hinges.
"After you," Venus motioned toward the door.
Mercury moved up and took a quick look into the building. She
didn't see anyone. She knew they were in there somewhere, so she moved
quickly through the door and found cover behind some crates. She was
about to motion for Venus to move in when the area around her exploded
in gun fire.
She hit the floor and tried to keep as far behind the crates she could
get. She listened for a moment and realized that whoever was shooting the
gun, wasn't shooting at her. Several flashes of light lit up the warehouse
around her.
Then out of nowhere a figure hit the ground next to her and slid
across the floor until they hit the crates behind her. Mercury looked at the
person as the person scrambled up beside her taking cover.
"Mind if I share this barrier with you?" Sailor Sol asked with a grin
on her face.
"How did you get in here?" Mercury asked.
"Came in through the ventilation ducts on the roof," was Sol's
response.
More gunfire raked across their hiding spot.
"That does it," Sol growled, "This guy is really beginning to piss me
off." She laid down on her back and braced herself by putting her foot
against a crate that was pushed out a little too far. She pushed against it as
hard as she could and slid out from behind cover with her arm extended
toward the ceiling. Two bright flashes of light jumped from her hand and
blew a large section of the roof support loose. The large section of I-beam
crashed to the floor, crushing the gunman.
There were several beams of light that came from the door and
lanced out at a pile of I-beams that the two remaining intruders were using
for cover. When she was sure the two she was shooting at were under cover,
Venus leapt through the door and took cover next to Mercury.
"Guess who's here," Mercury said.
"I know," Venus answered, "I saw her drop in from above those
crates stacked over on the left."
Venus looked past Mercury and saw Sailor Sol hiding behind some
pipes. She raised her hand with three of her fingers extended. On three, she
mouthed. Sol nodded in understanding and got into position.
Venus began to count down. 1 . . . 2 . . . 3! She and Sol burst out
from behind their hiding spots and fired at the pile of I-beams.
An orange streak flashed by Venus' face and she dove for the
ground. She came up and started shooting in the direction the shot had come
from and saw that Sol was firing in the same direction.
Suddenly a large force collided with her and dragged her out of the
way of a plasma charge that hit right where she had been standing. She
looked up at the person who had pulled her out of the way and saw Wolf's
face right above her.
"Do you always stand out in the open like that?" Wolf asked,
"Because if you do, you won't be around here very long."
"Oh, shut up," Venus retorted.
Both of them raised up from behind the crate they had used for cover
and launched their attack at the person with the plasma rifle. Two yellow
streaks and one blue ball of energy hit the gunman at the same time. He fell
to the floor.
Mercury had tried to circle around to see if she could get to an angle
she could use to sneak up behind the two remaining gunmen when
something out of the shadows collided with her and sent her crashing to the
floor in front of the door. Mars and Jupiter jumped over Mercury in hot
pursuit of the person who had run Mercury over.
After a moment Mars and Jupiter returned empty handed. "Sorry
guys," Mars said apologetically, "Whoever that was vanished before we got
out there." They both stopped to pick up Mercury.
Wolf turned to Sailor Sol. "Thanks for helping us out," he said.
"No problem," she replied with a grin.
The others began to gather around Wolf and Sol.
"Who do you think those guys were?" Sailor Moon asked.
"I don't know," Mercury answered, "But I think that this will answer
quite a few questions." She held up a CD that was inside a silver case.
"Can I see that for a second?" Wolf asked. He still had his visor on
and wanted to do a quick scan of the CD. He took it and held it up in front
of his eyes. His visor displayed several readings as it scanned the CD.
"Jesus," Wolf breathed after a moment, "This thing must hold at
least fifty terabytes."
"What?!" Mercury exclaimed in shock, "Can you visor read what's
on it?"
Wolf shook his head as he handed the CD back. "No, my visor can
only tell how much data it's capable of holding. We need a computer to read
what's on that thing."
"The mainframe at the cathedral?" Venus asked.
Mercury shook her head. "It doesn't have any way of reading CDs.
We'll have to use my computer for this."
"Then let's go check it out," Jupiter stated.
There was general agreement from everyone.
"Well," Sailor Sol said, "It looks like my job is done here, so I think
I'll see you guys later." She then turned and headed for the door.
"Jessica," Wolf called out, "Wait!"
Sailor Sol stopped dead in her tracks. She thought about continuing
on out the door, but when she stopped, she had given herself away. Slowly
she turned around to face the group.
"How did you . . . ?"
Wolf smiled. "A lucky guess."


*                                       *                                      *


Tolaris stared down at the lunch in front of him. He was convinced that the
food they served in hospitals were meant to kill people, not nourish them.
He frowned at the food and pushed it aside. His body was covered with
bandages and a cast on his right leg. With all the time that he had spent
laying in bed, it was beginning to drive to drive him crazy. A man could
only take this kind of boredom for so long before they went insane.
The door to his private room opened and one of the guards that stood
outside put his head in the room. "Commander, Wolf is here and would like
to see you, sir."
Tolaris waived for him to let Wolf in.
The guard's head disappeared and Wolf walked in with a bag in his
hand. He had a smile on his face that threatened to make Tolaris' mood
darker than it already was.
"How are you doing today, Commander?" Wolf asked pleasantly.
"Unless you have a reason for being here, I wouldn't mind seeing
you turn around and walk back out my door," Tolaris said darkly.
"The food's that bad, huh?" Wolf commented.
"This stuff, I won't dignify it with a name, isn't fit for pigs. If I got
the fraise right."
"Snagged the third wire," was Wolf's reply.
"And what does that mean?" Tolaris asked.
"Oh, it's a Navy term," Wolf commented, "It refers to the third
arresting wire used on aircraft carriers to drag planes to a stop before they
go over the side of the deck. Catching the third wire is considered a perfect
trap."
"Oh," Tolaris said distractedly, "Any reason you wanted to see me?"
"Yep," came Wolf's overly joyful reply, "Ami says she wont be able
to come in herself today because she's trying to crack that CD we found at
our last fight.
"And most importantly of all," Wolf said as he held up the bag he
had brought in, "I have brought you some real food. How does some steak,
with a side of baked potatoes and Caesar salad, sound to you? Lita prepared
them herself."
Tolaris smiled for the first time that day. "Wolf," Tolaris said as he
reached out for the food, "You have just made a friend for life."
Wolf cleared the food off the tray that Tolaris had put aside and took
out the meal Lita had prepared him. As Tolaris dug in, savoring every bite
as though it were his last, Wolf took a seat in one of the chairs against the
wall.
"By the way," Wolf said as he watched Tolaris eat, "Lita says you
owe her big time for this."
"Whatever she wants,"Tolaris said between bites, "She's got it."
"I would watch what you say," Wolf commented to him, "Lita can
be as devious as a politician when she want's to be. She might ask you for
something you'll regret down the road."
"Logged and noted," Tolaris replied, "What else has been happening
around here. Ami won't tell me much because she thinks it will distract me
from healing. And Maze is the same way. Can't get a word out of him."
"And I think they're right on that count," Wolf commented, "but I
think we are about to stumble into something big, and it's going to blow up
in our faces. Big time."
Tolaris gave him a quizzical expression. "I don't understand."
"Okay. Let's start at the beginning and I will give you a rundown of
what has happened so far," Wolf explained as he settled in.
An hour later he had told Tolaris every that had happened since the
bombing of the restaurant. Tolaris had listened to him quietly, only
interrupting when he needed clarification. When Wolf had finished, he
began to ask him questions.
"What has Whisper found on how the bombers got past security?"
was Tolaris' first question.
"She has nothing concrete, but thinks she has some leads and is
trying to run them down," Wolf replied.
"Okay, any idea who these people are?"
"No. All we know is that they aren't from here or Earth."
"Next, have you guys been able to track down who this Sailor Sol is,
and where she comes from?"
"We did track her down, but we haven't had time to question her
thoroughly yet. We only found out who she was three days ago."
"This CD you guys found. Have you been able to read what's on it?"
"Again, no. Ami tried to read it on her computer, but couldn't even
read the thing. She's down in Intel now. We had to turn her loose on the
base mainframe to see if she could do anything with it. She says it appears
to be something from the military on Earth because some of the encryption
has United States Military coding in it. She hasn't been able to see
everything on it yet, but thinks she can have it decrypted within the next few
days."
Tolaris thought for a moment. "Do we any idea what they are here
for and what they are doing?"
Wolf stopped to think that one over. "Well we have no concrete
proof on what they are doing here. The only connection between the two
events is that the intruders were the same species. Whisper thinks that this
is some sort of terrorist movement, but most of Intel and I think that these
could be a precursor to something larger. I have Ra'vel and the rest of Intel
running down something that I think will prove that we are looking at the
opening moves of some type of war. And I have this feeling that this is
going to be on a scale we have never seen before.
"But that is not why I came here. I know we are in for some rough
times ahead and we need you to help us. I have already talked about this
with Ami and Maze, although it took three hours and two bottles of my best
whisky to get him to admit this. Maze is not going to be able to handle
running this organization by himself. He doesn't have the experience or
training to run this place during a crisis. You're the only one who has that
the experience and training to run an organization of this size."
"You won't be able to get me released from this place until the
doctors decide that I am fit to walk out the front doors," Tolaris pointed out.
"And that brings me to why I'm here," Wolf said. He pulled his chair
closer to Tolaris and looked sternly into his face. "I am not proud of what
I'm about to ask you and in all honesty, I don't want to even do it. We need
you or this boat is going to sink with all hands aboard. You are not able to
help us in your current position. You have to be in perfect health to be of
any help to anybody."
Tolaris interrupted him. "The docs say that I'm going to be here for
at least another month. So get to your point please."
"I can heal your wounds and have you walking out those doors by
tonight," Wolf blurted out, "I need your consent before I can do anything
though."
Tolaris was looking at Wolf in disbelief. "That's impossible, and
you know it."
"Actually," Wolf replied, "it is possible. You will be sore for a few
days, but you will be able to carry out your duties as Commander of the
Dragoon Legion."
"Wolf," Tolaris said, still not believing him, "even if you could heal
me, I'm not familiar with any of the systems on this base and I can't
effectively lead anyone until I do."
"I can fix that too," came Wolf's quiet reply.
"How can you do that?" Tolaris commented.
Wolf straitened up and stared at the Commander. "I will heal you by
reconstructing all the damaged tissue in your body, and then implant all the
things you need to know about this facility and how to run it in your mind."
Tolaris looked into Wolf's eyes with nothing short of awe. "You
really can do those things, can't you?"
Wolf nodded in reply.
"You wouldn't even have told me about this if you didn't have a
very good reason, would you?" Tolaris asked.
Again, Wolf nodded in reply.
"Is this going to be as big as you think?"
Wolf was silent for a moment. "I think I'm understating this whole
thing."
Tolaris swore under his breath. The room became silent for the next
several moments. Each waiting for the other to say something.
Finally Tolaris spoke up. "Okay, lets do it."
Wolf moved over to him. "All you have to do is close your eyes and
relax," Wolf told him as he put his hand on Tolaris' forehead.


*                                       *                                      *


General Reich was in a foul mood when the Major entered the central
command room. She was looking through several reports on their military's
current readiness. Half of them were not even ready to move to the staging
areas, let alone invade an alien planet.
The Major stood quietly along the side until The General noticed
him. He had felt the mood of The General as soon as he had walked in the
door. It was as though the room had dropped below freezing as soon as he
passed through the doorway. He hated being in the same building as The
General. The fact that he had to report to her personally made him want all
the more to be as far from The General as he could get. He would have
taken a position in the Military Garrison if it meant he could get out of this
woman's presence.
After a few minutes The General took notice of the Major. "What's
your report?" General Reich said. It was not a question.
The Major forced himself to swallow before he started. He did all
he could do just to keep his voice from quivering as he spoke. "All recon
teams have reported back with zero casualties, with the sole exception of
one unit. Team 73 ran into a group of fighters that call themselves the Sailor
Scouts. All but one of the members was KIA. The lone survivor made it
back with sixty-six percent of the data they had originally recovered from
their objective. Fortunately they had all the codes to shut down all the
known nuclear weapons in their area of operation. We are now able to shut
down all nuclear weapons on both Earth and the Negaverse. All required
intel on both planets has been gathered. The operation may begin at your
command."
"What do we know about these Sailor Scouts?" General Reich
asked.
The Major looked down at his notes for a second. "What information
we have on them comes from sources in the Negaverse. Apparently the
Negaverse tried to invade Earth twice in the last one thousand years. Both
attempts were stopped by the Sailor Scouts. From what we can tell there are
five members to the team. They are all girls between the ages of 14 and 15
Earth years. That is all we know," the Major concluded.
The General stared into the Major's face. "You will find as much
about these Sailor Scouts as you possibly can. I also want all the intel you
can find on this Dragoon Legion as well. Dismissed," The General
commanded.
The Major saluted, made an about face, and promptly left the room
as quickly as he could without running. He heard the General snapping
commands as he made his way out. "I want all units ready to launch in
thirteen cycles! Now get your forces in gear and ready for battle as fast as
you possibly can! Now move it!"
The Sailor Scouts and Dragoon Legion had just over a month to
prepare for an invasion.


*                                       *                                      *


"I don't know if we are going to be able to learn anymore about them then
we already know," Whisper commented to the group that stood around the
main table in the "Tank".
The "Tank" was a large room in the heart of the command center
that was shielded against all forms of electronic and sonic eavesdropping.
The walls of the circular room were 2 m of solid concrete with a gap in the
middle that was filled with a vacuum. This prevented any sound waves from
escaping the sealed room. The room was impenetrable.
Around the circular table in the middle of the room stood Lieutenant
Whisper, Lieutenant  Commander Maze, Lieutenant Ra'vel, Ami, Mina,
Serena, Rei, Lita, and Darien. They had just been going over all the
information that they had on the people who had infiltrated Dragoon Legion
Headquarters and the military installation on Earth.
"Have you let Chovisky loose on the one that survived?" Maze
asked.
He was referring to Ja'kel. After taking three direct hits from Sailors
Venus, Sol, and Wolf, he somehow had survived. He was currently in the
maximum security wing of the hospital. Even though he was severely
injured, with all the doctors saying he wouldn't survive for twenty-four
hours, he continued to live and was growing stronger. No one knew how to
explain this and they were now saying he would be fully recovered in two
weeks. He was already awake and able to answer question, even though he
wasn't talking.
"I wouldn't let that animal loose on anyone," Whisper growled.
Pavel Chovisky had been the head of the KGB's interrogation team during
the height of the Cold War. Few of the techniques that he used were
considered humane, or even civilized. Most of them were considered
barbaric and unethical. Many thought that Pavel derived great joy in
inflicting pain on others. The guy gained a reputation as a sadist. Even many
denizens found themselves trying to hold down their lunch when they saw
this man in action. The Soviet KGB had trained him well.
There was a loud clang as the sealed door leading into the room. The
first one to enter was Wolf. The next person to come through the door made
everyone's jaw drop to the floor. It was Commander Tolaris in full uniform.
"You will put Major Chovisky in charge of the prisoner's
interrogation," were the first words out of the Commander's mouth as he
made his way to the head of the table.
Whisper snapped to attention. "Yes, sir."
Tolaris took his seat at the head of the table.
"Since we have everyone here," Tolaris stated, "We might as well
as turn this into an official departmental head meeting."
"Uh, sir? Can you wait five minutes for General McCruger and
Admiral Kolinsky to get here?" Wolf asked.
"General McCruger and Admiral Kolinsky?" Tolaris asked, "Do you
mind telling me who these people are?"
"Oops, sorry about that," Wolf apologized, "I forgot to tell you about
the remodeled command structure."
"Well, we have five minutes so why don't you go ahead," Tolaris
said.
Wolf moved over to a set of controls recessed into the table. He hit
several keys and the lights in the room darkened. In the middle of the table
a holographic project came to life.
"Okay, here is what the command structure looked like before the
Dragoons were forced to go underground," Wolf motioned at the hologram
that was hanging in mid-air. It read:

        DRAGOON LEGION COMMAND STRUCTURE

CAPTAIN [RAIJEN (DECEASED) SOLE HOLDER OF THIS RANK]
COMMANDER [TOLARIS]
LIEUTENANT COMMANDER [MAZE]
LIEUTENANT
LIEUTENANT (JUNIOR GRADE)
MAJOR
CORPORAL
PRIVATE (THIRD CLASS)
PRIVATE (SECOND CLASS)
PRIVATE (FIRST CLASS)
CADET

Wolf hit a few more keys and the image was replaced by a new
image. "This is what the command structure looks like now," Wolf
commented.

        DRAGOON LEGION COMMAND STRUCTURE
CAPTAIN [RAIJEN (DECEASED) SOLE HOLDER OF THIS RANK]
COMMANDER [TOLARIS]
|
|
|-----DRAGOON LEGION COMMAND
|     LIEUTENANT COMMANDER [MAZE]
|     LIEUTENANT
|     LIEUTENANT (JUNIOR GRADE)
|     MAJOR
|     CORPORAL
|     PRIVATE (THIRD CLASS)
|     PRIVATE (SECOND CLASS)
|     PRIVATE (FIRST CLASS)
|     CADET
|
|
|-----DRAGOON AIR COMMAND
|     GENERAL [MEGAN MCCRUGER]
|     BRIGADIER
|     CAPTAIN
|     COMMANDER
|     LIEUTENANT COMMANDER
|     LIEUTENANT
|     LIEUTENANT (JUNIOR GRADE)
|     ENSIGN
|     CADET
|
|
|-----DRAGOON STELLAR COMMAND
      ADMIRAL [JONATHAN KOLINSKY]
      COMMODORE
      CAPTAIN
      COMMANDER
      LIEUTENANT COMMANDER
      LIEUTENANT
      LIEUTENANT (JUNIOR GRADE)
      ENSIGN
      CADET


"As you can see," Wolf explained, "The Dragoon Legion has been
divided into three branches. Dragoon Legion Command is really just the
original command structure. It's tasks remain the same as they have since
the Dragoon Legion was founded. Dragoon Air Command is really just an
air force attached to the existing Dragoon structure. The same applies to the
Dragoon Stellar Command with the exception that all operations dealing
with space have been turned over to Stellar Command. That covers any
thing dealing with satellites and such.
"They all fall under your command with someone working as a
department head," Wolf finished up, "Any questions?"
"Is the Air Command flying out of Kothic Air Base? Because those
runways look like they haven't been used in decades," Tolaris asked.
"No," Wolf replied, "If we had used the existing air field, it would
greatly increase the likeliness that we would be discovered. The aircraft fly
out of hidden airfields scattered around us up to one hundred fifty
kilometers away. After the meeting we can take you down there to see just
what they do." 
There was a loud clang as the sealed doors opened again. General
McCruger and Admiral Kolinsky walked in.
"Sorry, for being late," General McCruger apologized, "We were not
aware there was a meeting this morning."
General Megan McCruger was of average height and had a body to
kill for. She was dressed in a flight suit as she had just come back from a
proficiency flight. On the left breast of her flight suit was the emblem of the
Dragoon Legion and just under it was a label that read; Air Command. The
name tag under that read; General Megan "Loser" McCruger. Her emerald
eyes scanned the room, looking over the others in the room. She pushed a
strand of light brown hair out of her eyes as she did so.
Admiral Jonathan Kolinsky was tall with dark brown eyes and a
head of blond hair. He was dressed in full uniform with several ribbons on
his chest. His uniform was Navy blue with gold trim on the shoulder boards.
Above the medals was the Dragoon emblem with Stellar Command under
it. He carried himself with dignity which gave everyone the impression that
he was from a very powerful family. Old money they say. Everyone in the
room instantly hated him.
They both moved toward the table and came to attention, saluting
Commander Tolaris.
Tolaris returned the salute. "At ease," Tolaris commanded, "This
meeting is something that came up about five minutes ago. As you already
know I'm Commander Tolaris."
General McCruger and Admiral Kolinsky introduced themselves to
Tolaris and the others.
"Well, lets get this show on the road. Please be seated," Tolaris said,
"As most of you probably already know, a bomb was set off here in
Dragoon Legion HQ some six weeks ago. The same people who planted the
bomb also made a raid on one of the United States Military installations in
Tokyo on Earth. One of the members from the raid on Earth was captured
alive and is in the high security wing of the hospital suffering from multiple
wounds."
"That's an understatement," Mina grumbled under her breath.
Tolaris gave her a sideways glance before continuing. He turned to
Maze. "Lieutenant Commander, could you please give us a report on what
we know?"
Maze swallowed before standing up to address everyone. "What we
know of these people is very little. We know they are not from Earth or the
Negaverse. We know that because their biology is of a silicon base. We
have never seen anything like it."
"Impossible," Ami commented.
"Our forensics confirm it," Maze stated, "These guys are silicon
based life forms."
"Interesting," Tolaris commented, "Do you know anything else
about these people or their activities?"
"Not at the moment," Maze confessed, "I have Lieutenant Muzzer
running down some leads. We think that they may have hit other
installations of military importance here and on Earth."
Wolf leaned over to General McCruger and whispered something
into her ear. Tolaris saw their little discussion. "Do you have something to
add General and Wolf?" Tolaris asked.
"Uh, yes sir," McCruger replied, "I have been doing regular recon
flights over several key military installations. Shortly after the bombing
here, we noticed that several other installations have been going into
advanced states of readiness. We think that this may confirm the Lieutenant
Commander's suspicion about other installations may have been hit by the
same people."
Suddenly the control panel in front of Ami began to beep for her
attention. It managed to get everyone else's as well. "What do you have
there, Ami?" Tolaris asked.
Ami was looking down at the display set into the table in front of
her. "When we captured that guy after hitting the US installation in Tokyo
we found what looked like a CD. I ran it through my computer but was
unable to read it. I recognized some of the coding as US military and ran it
through the mainframe here to see if it could break the coding. It looks like
it just did." Ami hit several keys and the holographic projector came to life
showing the same thing Ami was seeing on her display. "Wow, this is some
pretty serious stuff. I would guess this CD is a copy of part of the military
installation's mainframe. We have troop placements, readiness updates,
supply information . . ." The list went on and on. Finally Ami saw
something that grabbed her attention. She highlighted the information so
everyone could see it.
"This appears to be part of a launch code for the nuclear arsenal.
Shit!" Ami swore. This caused everyone in the room to instantly panic. Ami
never cursed. "These are just the launch codes. Whoever made this probably
copied the entire database. That means they also have the disarming codes."
"So what?" Maze scoffed, "At least they can't set them off since
they don't have the launch codes."
"Maze, what's the first rule of invasion?" Ami asked.
Maze was quiet so Wolf answered for him. "Eliminate your
opponent's most dangerous weapons to either level the playing field or give
you the advantage." Wolf turned to Tolaris. "We're looking at the opening
moves for an invasion."
The room was silent as everyone began to agree that they were soon
going to find themselves fighting for their survival. "Alright. We will hold
daily meetings to keep everyone updated on the situation. That will be all."
The meeting was over.
Everyone got up to leave the room except for Serena, she was sound
asleep in her chair.
"Unbelievable," Rei commented.
Darien took hold of her shoulder and gently shook her. "Come on,
Serena. Time to wake up."
Serena woke up and looked around at everyone blankly. "Wha? Did
I miss something?" she asked sleepily.
"Only everything that was important," Rei said crossly.
"Oh, shut up," Serena retorted.
Wolf came up next to Tolaris. "You want me to prepare everyone for
surrender now, or wait for the demand to come through?" Wolf whispered.
Tolaris just looked at Wolf like he was nuts.
"Okay," Wolf said slowly as he turned away from Tolaris. He caught
up with Admiral Jonathan Kolinsky before he walked out the door. "Jon,"
Wolf said quietly, "I want you to get the battle groups ready for deployment.
I think we're going to need them before this thing is over."
Jon nodded his understanding and ducked out the door.
"Hey, Wolf," General McCruger said as she came up next to him,
"you guys heading down to Flight Central?" She was referring to Carl's Bad
Air Base, the primary Dragoon Air Base.
"Yeah, why not. It's about time they saw they rest of the
installation," Wolf replied.
"Great," Megan commented cheerfully, "I'll go down with you. Oh,
by the way. The BB2 is due in at 2000."
"Oh, man," Wolf exclaimed, "I totally forgot. No, I didn't forget, I
lost track of the time." He looked down at his watch. "That's in two hours.
Lets head down there now."
Wolf turned to the group and called for their attention.
"I want to show you guys some other parts of the instillation," Wolf
stated, "If it's alright with you guys, I'm going to show you Carl's Bad Air
Base. The whole base is underground so you are going to see some pretty
interesting stuff."
"Sounds exciting!" Mina called from the back of the group.
Wolf smiled at her. "I knew you'd like it. Do the rest of you want to
come along?" Wolf asked.
There was general agreement from the group so they headed out.
"Can we get something to eat?" Serena asked as the group made
their way toward one of the transport tubes scattered around the city.
"What? Food?" Wolf asked in amazement. Then he looked down at
his watch and saw that it was almost six o'clock in the evening. "You guys
want to get something to eat before we head over to the base?"
"Yes!" Serena exclaimed. She was starving.
"Is your stomach all you think about?" Rei snorted.
Serena began to pout. "I'm hungry, okay?" Serena exclaimed, "You
don't have to be so mean, you know?"
"Will you two zip it?" Wolf said, "I really don't care to listen to you
fight all the time."
Both looked down at the ground in shame. "Sorry," they said.
"Thank you," Wolf said and headed out the door.
Serena and Rei stuck their tongues out at each other as they all left
to get something to eat.


*                                       *                                      *


Jessica leaned against the balcony of her apartment and looked out over
Wolf's Lair lost in thought. She kept coming back to her feelings toward
Wolf, as mixed up as they were. She couldn't get him out of her mind and
it was starting to drive her crazy. She never in her entire life thought she
could fall so hard for someone. The truth was she wasn't prepared for it and
that scared her. She didn't know what to do. Love was not in her job
description. What she did didn't allow for it. She would easily out live
anyone she tried to make a relationship with. And she tried to isolate herself
from that kind of pain.
Wolf had cut right through all her barriers and gone strait for her
heart. She knew that she would live far longer than he ever would. And she
didn't want to have to live with the pain of his loss. It would eventually
destroy her.
"My child, what bothers you so?"
Jessica turned from the balcony to look at the ghostly image of a
Hawk that was perched on a coat rack just inside the sliding door.
"What's happening to me Phoenix? I don't understand anything I'm
feeling," she asked the bird.
"It's Wolf, isn't it?" he asked.
"Yeah," she sighed.
He spread his wings and glided down from his perch to land on the
railing next to her. "You must follow your heart, it will never lead you
astray."
"I don't even know what my heart is saying. How can I follow it if
I don't understand it?"
"It will tell you when the time is right."
"But how-" but Phoenix was gone. She looked over the railing to see
him gliding of into the distance.
"Some help you are," she mumbled as she moved to sit in one of the
chairs on the balcony.
Just as she was getting comfortable she was interrupted by the sound
of the door bell sounding.
"What now," she said as she got up to answer the door.
She reached for the door nob and opened the door a little bit. Wolf
was standing on the other side.
"Hi," he said.
"Uh, hi," she replied, caught totally off guard. Wolf was the last
person she had expected and she had no idea what to do. Her mind had gone
blank.
"I was wondering if you might want to join us for dinner," Wolf
wanted to know.
"Us?" Jessica asked. She found that she was disappointed they
wouldn't be alone.
"Yeah," he said as he moved out of the way so she could see the rest
of the group in the hall, "We're going out for some Mexican and then going
over to the main airbase to look around. I wanted to know if you wanted to
come with us."
She thought it over for a moment and decided it would be better than
sitting around the house all night. "Sure," she said, perking up at the idea of
spending time with Wolf, "Just let me grab a few things." And she
disappeared from the door.
"I think you just made someone's day a whole lot better," Mina said
from next to Wolf.
"How so?" he asked.
"It's painfully obvious, stupid. Jessica's in love with you," Mina
stated.
"I'm not to sure of that," Wolf replied.
"How dense can you be?!" she exclaimed.
"You would be surprised," Wolf replied with a smile.
From the back of the hall Megan listened to the two talk and found
herself becoming extremely jealous. She looked away to keep anyone from
noticing. Wolf is mine, damnit! she thought. She had had her eye on Wolf
ever since she had met him two years earlier. Even though she had never
told him how she felt, she was determined that she was the only one who
could have him.
"Ready," Jessica said as she stepped out the door and shut it behind
her.
"Great. Let's go," Wolf said as he lead the way.


*                                       *                                      *


"Holy shit."
"You could say that," Megan stated in reply to Jessica's observation.
They were all standing in Carl's Bad Air Base. What they saw made
everyone stand in awe. Stretched out before them was a huge airbase.
Bigger than even Kothic Air Base sitting atop Dragoon Legion
Headquarters. The place had to be at least ten kilometers wide, and the
whole thing was sitting underground. The ceiling was well over one hundred
meters over their heads and there wasn't a single support in sight. At both
ends of the four runways were huge openings that led to the outside world.
With the runways only taking up about half of the cavern the rest was taken
up by hangers and what looked like a good sized town. Buildings were
everywhere and it looked to be a self supporting city much like Wolf's Lair.
"What's the largest aircraft you can take in here?" Mina asked.
"We can take a Condor and still have tons of room to spare," Megan
replied.
"Jesus!" Mina exclaimed.
The Condor was a Russian made transport aircraft and it was the
largest aircraft in the world. It was almost 150 m long and had a wingspan
of almost twice that.
"Over on the left there you can see the hangers and aircraft facilities.
Fuel, weapons, and maintenance facilities are also located there," Megan
said, beginning their tour, "Over on our left we have what we like to call
Downtime. We all basically live over there and hang around when we aren't
flying or on alert. Come on, I'll show you what we fly."
She led them over to one of the hangers and let them in. What they
saw inside amazed them. Sitting in the middle of the hanger were four
fighters. The fuselage was clean and blended into the huge delta wings at
the back. Toward the nose of the plane was a large canard. Mina thought it
vaguely resembled the SR-71 Blackbird. About halfway out on the wings
were two huge engines with a large vertical stabilizer on each. They looked
at the bubble canopy and could see the two seats inside.
"This is the F-1 Vampire," Megan began her presentation, "It was
designed with the help of Wolf and some of the best designers from Earth.
It operates with a crew of two; one pilot, and one weapon systems officer.
It is powered by two Rolls Royce J-220 engines each putting out close to
1,000,000 lbs of thrust."
"Holy shit!" Jessica exclaimed, "What do you plan to do with this
thing? Launch it into orbit?!"
"Actually," Megan replied somewhat peeved at being interrupted,
"That is exactly what it was designed to do. The Vampire can operate intra-
or extra-atmosphere. We also have this same plane operating with the
Dragoon Space Command. First and foremost, this thing was designed as an
air-superiority fighter. It has a top speed of Mach 31.5 at 200,000 ft. Mach
4 at sea level. The airframe is rated at +/- 30 G's."
"Excuse me," Ami interrupted, "But how can the pilot survive those
conditions?" A 150 lbs pilot would weigh 4,500 lbs at 30 G's. No human
could survive that kind of pressure.
"We use acceleration compensators to cut the G forces by seventy-
five percent. So if the pilot pulled thirty G's, he would only experience
about seven G's," Megan explained.
"You mean you've developed artificial gravity?" Ami asked in
amazement.
"Yes we have," she stated.
"Hey," Jessica called from the rear of the plane, "Are these thrust
nozzles on the engines?"
     Megan led the rest of the group to the rear of the plane so that they
could see what Jessica was looking at. On the rear of the engines were three
large paddles that were connected by heavy duty hinges.
     "Those are the thrust vectoring paddles. They can move so that they
can divert the exhaust in three dimensions. This allows the plane to turn
tighter and do some aerobatic maneuvers that no other aircraft can do,"
Megan explained as they all looked at the huge paddles.
     "Hot shit," Jessica stated, "What else can this thing do?"
     "It's armed with a wide range of weapons; AIM-92 Howlers for
ranges between fifteen and six hundred miles, AIM-9XC Advanced
Sidewinders for one to twenty miles, and an M35 six barreled particle canon
for ranges up to three miles. The Hughes AGP-104 radar can track up to
seventy hostiles at a time, and attack sixteen of those with fire-and-forget
weapons. The ground-attack variant can use any smart or dumb weapons in
our inventory. Conventional and nuclear," Megan concluded.
     "Hey, Meg," Wolf called, "Why don't you let them into the cockpit."
     "Sure," Megan replied, "Why not."
     She called over to one of the technicians to bring over a ladder. He
dutifully got a ladder and set it up next to the cockpit. He then scrambled up
it and opened the canopy. It rose up in one large piece much like the one the
F-16 Fighting Falcon does. After the technician came down Wolf was the
next one to head up. He dropped himself into the pilots seat and began to
power up the systems. When he finished he got out of the seat and
positioned himself on the right side fuselage so that the others could get in
and he could point out the major systems.
     "Who's first?" Wolf called down to the group.
     "I am," Mina called out and climbed up the ladder, "Where do I put
my feet?"
     "Here, here, here, and here," he told her pointing to each spot in
turn. There were only a few places you could put your feet to prevent
damaging the skin of the plane. Mina stepped on each spot in turn and
levered herself into the pilot's seat. The low canopy rails didn't help her
any. They just barely came up to the pilots hips when seated.
     "Whoa," she commented after settling into the seat, "What's with
the canopy rails being so low?"
     "So you have an unsurpassed field of view. Look around you. You
can see more of the sky around you in this thing then in any other aircraft
ever made," Wolf stated.
     Mina looked around and realized he was right. You could see more
in this plane than you could in even the F-3s, the Japanese variant of the
American F-16, that her father had let her sit in when he would take her out
to the airbase.
     When she finished looking out, she looked into the cockpit itself.
She only saw two Multi-Function Displays along with the side-stick
controller and throttle, which were studded with buttons. 
     "Where are all the instruments!" she exclaimed.
     "This puppy uses a neural interface and holographic projection
system. The MFDs, stick and throttle are all there for backup purposes. You
fly the plane and operate all the systems by thought," Wolf explained, "Give
it a try. Power up all the systems except the engines. All you have to do is
think them on."
     A quick thought passed through her mind and suddenly the plane
came to life, all except the engines. The MFDs came to life and holograms
popped up in front of her eyes.
     "Wow!" she exclaimed.
     "See?" Wolf commented, "Nothing to it. You operate all the systems
just be thinking about it."
     They were interrupted by a pair of Vampires taking off, the roar of
the engines causing everything to tremble. Mina looked through the open
hanger doors and watched the two fighters take off in formation. With out
realizing it she had activated the radar and was sweeping the Vampires. The
planes were highlighted and information about them was displayed. Speed,
altitude, course, bearing, and IFF information.
     Wolf looked back and saw the holograms floating in space.
     "See," he said with a grin, "Nothing to it."
     "This is too cool," Mina stated.
     Over the next half hour he took the rest of the group through the
cockpit. The only problem was when it was Serena's turn. She almost
caused the entire plane to short when she tried to turn all the systems on.
Needless to say it left everyone laughing with Megan nearly going ballistic
at the possible damage Serena almost caused. The fact that this happened
to be Megan's personal plane didn't help any.
     "I think we're finished here," Wolf commented as he helped Serena
down from the plane.
     At the bottom of the ramp Serena hid behind Darien because she
feared Megan would rip her head off if given the chance.
     "When did you say the -72 was coming in, Megan?" Wolf asked to
get her attention.
     "What? Oh," she looked down at her watch, "In about ten minutes."
     "Let's head over to the runway so we can watch it land," he
suggested.
     "Alright," Megan agreed, "C'mon everyone. Were going to go watch
our newest aircraft come in."
     A few minutes later they were all standing next to the taxiway on the
parking ramp to watch the plane come in for a landing.
     "What type of plane is it?" Jessica asked.
     "It's an SR-72," Megan replied.
     "Don't you mean an SR-71?" Mina asked.
     "Nope. Wolf's team of designers totally redesigned the SR-71
Blackbird and came up with the Blackbird II. It looks the same on the
outside, but on the inside it's a whole new beast. State-of-the-art electronics,
improved materials in the skin and substructures. It's basically the ultimate
incarnation of the most successful reconnaissance plane ever made," Megan
replied with pride, "And here it comes."
     As the group watched the opening of the cavern they saw a sleek
black shape come gliding through. Only one word was able to describe what
the plane looked like; speed. The blended-body design made the plane
appear as though it was designed by nature rather than man. The clean lines
of the plane were broken by only the canopy for the cockpit which was
made as aerodynamically sleek as possible. The huge delta wing took up the
entire back half of the aircraft with two monstrous engines imbedded
halfway out in the wings. Two huge aerospikes dominated the circular
intakes making the plane appear faster still. The two huge vertical
stabilizers completed the plane. This thing was definitely built for the sole
purpose of being the fastest flying aircraft in the sky. No plane could match
its speed and no missile yet built could catch it. It was the ultimate
incarnation of speed.
     Jessica's words said it all. "My gawd," she said in awe struck
wonder as the plane flared just before touching down. They all watched in
silence as the plane slowed and then began to taxi toward the group. The
pilot brought the plane to a stop only feet from the group, leaving them to
look up at the plane towering over them. The engines shut down and then
the canopies came up so that the pilot and RSO (Reconnaissance Systems
Officer) could get out of the plane. Several plane crewmen came running up
to the plane with a set of stairs so that the two crew could get down from the
plane. Several other mechanics placed chocks under the wheels and began
servicing the plane.
     The pilot and RSO walked over to the group dragging their helmets
and other flight gear behind them. They both came up to Megan and saluted
sharply.
     "General," the pilot reported, "I am pleased to report that the
mission was a success. All ten sites were overflown with zero casualties.
Ghost 2 should be on final with 3 and 4 five and ten minutes out
respectively."
     Megan returned the salute. "Nice work," she said, then turned to the
group standing with her, "I want you to meet Commander Tolaris and the
Sailor Scouts."
     At the mention of the Commander's name the two pilots went
ridged. They hadn't realized that the person in front of them was the
commander of the Dragoon Legion.
     "At ease," Tolaris said to them, "Why don't you tell me a little about
your plane here?"
     The two crew members gladly started to show the group their plane,
giving them a very thorough presentation. While the others walked around
the plane, Wolf and Megan stood aside and kept an eye on the entrance to
the cavern for the other three planes to come in. Everyone's piece of mind
was shattered when a huge explosion rocked the cavern.
     As the second SR-72 had glided through the entrance all had looked
like it was normal, but the second the mains touched the runway, the right
engine exploded in a fireball that engulfed the plane and everything around
it out to forty meters. Everyone could feel the heat of the fireball as they
watched in horror. They saw two objects go flying out of the fireball, and
as they arched through the air, two chutes popped out and brought them
gently to the ground.
     Megan spun around to the ground crew and started to shout orders
left and right. Soon huge yellow fire trucks were racing out onto the runway
to put out the fire. The group of visitors moved out of the way as the place
became a flurry of activity with Megan as the director.
     "I want them to put that fire out ASAP! . . . Move everything indoors
and lock them down! . . . Activate the emergency airstrip! I want some place
for those other two planes to land! . . . Where are the ambulance crews?! I
want those two pilots in the hospital now!"
     As the commotion continued, a private from the command center
came running up to the group of spectators.
     "Commander!" he called out over the noise.
     "What is it?" Tolaris asked as he turned to the private.
     "We are getting reports of massive gravity and time disturbances
from the Denlik Badlands and Central Siberia on Earth!" he shouted as he
reached the group, "We think they are dimensional portals opening!"
     "Shit!" Wolf exclaimed. His worst nightmare looked like it was
coming true.
     "Uh, what does that mean?" Serena asked naively.
     "Invasion."

               To Be Continued . . .