7/22/00 (22 July, 2000 or July 22, 2000) Hi!!! This is the seventh part, and I’m proud of my new story. It’s making a lot more sense than the other, or at least I think so. E-mail me suggestions or something at: smtradingcardcollector@yahoo.com. Go to my website (which I should be updating soon) at: www.geocities.com/smtradingcardcollector/index.html. See ya there! A New Princess R: Chapter Seven The next morning was pretty hectic. First, Andi and Poll started bothering me about what me and Daimen had talked about the night before, then they started asking when they could go to school. “How old are you guys?” I asked. “I’m seven, almost eight, and Andi’s five, almost six. Right Andi?” Poll looked at his little sister. She nodded. “Wan’ go school,” she said stubbornly, crossing her arms. “Okay, we’ll register your two after school today. In the meantime, we’ll send you over to Serena’s place and have Rien watch you two today.” I sighed and borrowed Daimen’s communicator. “Serena?” I called into it. “What’s up Bunny?” she asked, her face appearing in the cover. “Can you have Rien watch these two today? He’s not registered in school yet, right? I would stay home and watch them, but I’ve got some tests today that I can’t miss.” “Sure, Bunny. Have Artemis bring them over. He knows where we are.” “Thanks!” The cover went blank, I returned it to Daimen, and then I woke up Artemis and sent him with the two munchkins. Later, after a grueling day at school, I found out that Artemis has brought them back to our apartment an hour before he was supposed. The apartment was a mess. There were toys I had never seen before littered all over the living room, and I didn’t even want to think about the kitchen. “Andromeda! Tranquility! Get over here right now and explain what this mess is!” I hollered. Artemis cowered in the corner. The two kids came barreling out of the kitchen, Andi doused entirely in flour. “What happened here?” I bellowed, pointing at the living room. “And why aren’t you with Rien?” “He fell asleep, so we tortured Artemis to get him to bring us home,” said Andi, matter-of-factly. Poll cringed. “Then we played with the toys we brought back with us, and then we wanted to make a cake for Daddy because he had a test today too.” “And why did he fall asleep?” I asked. “Because Poll used his Sol-P toy to hypnotize him. Rien didn’t have his Terra-P toy to protect him, since Terra-P is still being fixed. And Luna-P went with Rini to school, and my Nova-P was here.” Andi pointed to the two balls on the chair. One was green and one was red. “Poll?” I asked, giving him a look. He nodded. “Rien wouldn’t let us go outside to a park,” he whined. “Because Rien doesn’t know where the park is, Poll. If I find out that you do that to him again tomorrow, you are grounded. And, I’ll have Chronos send you home, got it?” Poll started to cry. Andi looked at me, tried to smile, and said, “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to, but Poll’s idea sounded better than staying inside.” Then she, too, started crying. That was the moment Daimen picked to come home. “I’m ho-” he started. Then he saw me glaring at a crying Poll, Andi doused in flour crying, and one big mess in the living room. He turned to Artemis, who related the whole story. “Poll, Andi, stop crying and clean up this mess,” Daimen said. Andi immediately stopped, perked up because her dad was home, and grabbed the green ball. “Nova-P, Kitty Magic! Clean up my toys!” The green ball, which I now saw had a face on it and the sigil of the Stars in bronze, made a poof of smoke, and then half of the toys in the living room were cleaned up. Then she went into the kitchen and did the same thing. She came back and announced, “The kitchen’s clean, and the cake’s done, but Poll can clean the bathroom and dining room.” Poll, who had finally stopped crying, sighed, picked up his red ball with the gold sigil of the Sun, and said, “Sol-P, Kitty Magic! Clean up my toys!” The ball made a poof of smoke, and the living room was clean. We heard him do that twice more, once from the dining room, and once from the bathroom. “Now, Poll, we are going over to Serena’s place, and you are apologizing to your cousin, got it?” I said. He nodded. The four of us, plus two floating balls and a white cat, made our way for a little over eight blocks and reached the house where Serena, Darien, and their kids were staying. Apparently, the other scouts moved in with their ‘sisters’. There we discovered chaos. Big time. Serena was pacing like a mad-woman, up and down the hall. Darien was with Rien in the living room, who was still asleep, glowing a light yellow. Rini was trying to use her Luna-P to fix it, and Luna was just sitting in a corner. Artemis joined her. I nudged Poll forward. “Sol-P, Kitty Magic! Wake Rien up!” A poof of smoke, and some yellow dust, and Rien woke up. He wasn’t happy at all. “Poll, I swear to the gods, if you do that to me one more time just because I don’t know where the park is, you’re going to be sorry you ever heard of Terra-P, got it?” he said. Poll nodded and started crying again. He flung himself at me. After all, he was only seven. “Who’s Terra-P?” asked Serena as she came in. “And when did you four get here?” Daimen and I sighed, and then explained the whole thing to Serena and Darien, with Rien, Poll, and Andi adding things in. “And, we have Terra-P, as well as Diana and Earth Jr.,” said a voice from behind us. Pluto stood there, a floating, white ball behind her, and two cats in her arms. I had already met Diana, but none of us had met Earth Jr., also a gray cat, slightly darker than Diana. “Junior! You made it!” said Rien, giving the cat a five with his paw and hand. It was the strangest thing I had ever seen a cat do. Rini jumped up and gave Diana a big hug. “Pluto, are you sure that it’s okay to bring him here, and Terra-P?” “Of course, Young Prince. They’ll be here tonight.” Pluto gave a wave, and then disappeared. A chorus of “Huh?”’s went throughout the room. The four kids just smiled to each other. “Okay, let me get this straight,” I said. “Each of you has a floating ball that looks like a cat head, right? And they’re all named something -P, right? So, who’s Terra? And Sol? And Nova?” “You’ll find out tonight, Aunt Selene,” said Rien, grinning. Andi and Poll started jumping up and down for joy, while Rini giggled. I sighed. I guess that I would end up taking Artemis’ advice tonight. “Well, since we’re all confused, why don’t you four stay for supper?” said Serena. “Darien and I were going to make chicken curry.” I started to choke with laughter. “What’s so funny?” Serena demanded. “Do you remember the time I made chicken curry for Rini’s school party?” I asked. “You helped, remember?” That set Serena, Darien, and Rini off. Daimen gave me a perplexed look. When I calmed down, I explained it to him. “Okay, Serena’s parents, who were mine for awhile, were going to make chicken curry with Rini for a party at her school. But they got this business thing at the last minute, so I ended up doing it, after a big fight with Rini. I made it first for me, Darien, and Rini at Darien’s apartment. Serenity kept trying to help me, but the directions she gave me were different from the ones on the recipe I had, so the curry looked horrible. It tasted the best though,” I added as an after thought. “Well, what ever this looks like, it’ll taste good too. It’s Lita’s recipe,” said Darien, as he and Serena went into the kitchen. The four kids and I stayed in the living room. Daimen got up to look around. “So, are you four ready for tonight?” I asked them quietly. They nodded eagerly. “Mommy, do you think that we can go to the Moon Palace too?” asked Andi. “We hardly ever go there. Please?” One look at her eyes made me give in. I wasn’t exactly ready to face it, but if they all wanted to go, majority would win, or so I thought. I guess I wasn’t exactly a parent yet. “Okay. All four are going, right?” I asked. They nodded eagerly, except for Rien. “I don’t know. I don’t think Mom and Dad would like that too much,” Rien replied. Rini smacked his arm. “Don’t be a spoil-sport! We can go. If they say no, we can use Luna-P and Terra-P to get out.” Rini grinned. “Guess what Bunny? You have one too!” “One what?” I asked, suspiciously. “P-Ball!” “I do?” I asked, still suspicious. “Yeah. You have, um, four actually,” said Poll. “Four? Oh really.” I raised my eyebrow at them. “And why is that?” “Because you wanted one for your past self from the future, so you had Hermes, I mean, Amanda build you four, one for each kingdom,” Rien explained. “And you had me bring them with Terra-P. That’s why it was being fixed, so Amanda could send yours along with mine.” He turned to his ball. “I hate this stupid phrase,” he muttered. “Terra-P, Kitty Magic! Bring out the four for my aunt!” The white cat head made a poof of smoke, and in the place of the smoke were four balls: a black one with Earth’s sigil crystalline, a white one with the Moon’s sigil silver, a yellow one with the Sun’s sigil gold, and a purple one with the Stars’s sigil bronze. “Mommy, , meet Earth-P, Artemis-P, Apollo-P, and Omega-P,” said Andi. “So, these are all for me?” I asked. “Yup! Mommy uses them to hold her scepters, staffs, and something else. What was that?” asked Poll. Andi shrugged. Rini looked confused. Rien smiled. “She uses it to hold the other three, depending on where she is,” he explained. “I suggest that you have Artemis-P hold onto the others until your secret is out.” “Well, okay. Artemis-P, Kitty Magic! Hold onto the other three P-Balls!” In a poof of smoke, only Artemis-P was left. When I looked into its eyes, I noticed a tinge of brown, green, and purple in the blue. “Cool.” Everyone laughed. “What’s all the laughing about?” asked Daimen as he reentered the room. “Mommy got her Artemis-P today!” exclaimed Andi. Daimen raised an eyebrow at me. I pointed to the floating white ball behind my head. “Daimen, I was thinking. After all the stress of today and your tests, why don’t you stay at the apartment tonight and relax, and I’ll take the kids out for a while. What do you think?” I asked, hoping that I could act convincingly. “Well, I don’t know. You had tests today too, and you discovered the little problem today, so shouldn’t you relax?” he asked me, worried. I smiled. “No, that’s okay, really. Besides, I want to have some time to get to know them. And I’ll probably have Rien and Rini to help me out, if Serena and Darien don’t mind having a cozy night at home together, just the two of them.” “I say, go for it!” said Serena. We turned, and there she was, listening in to our conversation from the doorway. “Darien and I need some time to talk anyway. C’mon. Dinner’s ready.” The six of us followed Serena into the dining room. Darien was already there, with the meal on the table. We all sat down, helped ourselves to some curry, and began to eat with a passion. Well, everyone except me did. I didn’t feel too hungry right then. In between Serena’s bites of food, she explained what I had proposed to do. “Sure, that’s sounds great,” Darien agreed. I smiled, then picked at my food some more. Daimen touched my arm. “Buns, you okay?” he asked quietly. “Yeah, I’m fine. I don’t know, I’m just not hungry I guess.” I shrugged, then tried to have a few more bites of dinner. I couldn’t eat because I was too nervous about the upcoming excursion.