Soul Mates
by lady

CHAPTER TWO
Marching Destinies: Darkness Before Dawn

 

The ball began just before dusk and was coming to its climax. The princess’ birthday officially started at 12 o’clock a.m. Then the queen would perform the ritual of bestowing the princess’ new powers to her daughter. It was all for the benefit of the people since the princess actually gained her powers as soon as she turned eighteen even without the queen being present. It was her given right because she was the throne’s heir. From the gardens, with their blossoming flowers and flowing fountains, the orchestra could be heard playing a waltz. The smell of roast and pungent spices from the kitchens wafted in the misty night air and surrounded the four men standing by the giant crystal gates. It was an hour before midnight.

"What are they waiting for?" Drake questioned. "I want to get it over with."

Galen shook his head at this. "Don’t be so impatient. There will be a lot of lives lost when they attack. And the longer they take, the more time we have to get our men ready."

"He’s right," Ashe said. "No matter how much I want to avenge the Outer Senshi, I am not ready to sacrifice anybody else."

Drake hung his head. "I’m sorry. I just feel so frustrated at not being able to do anything to save Hotaru. She was everything to me and I couldn’t save her."

"We know how you feel, Drake," Logan replied. "We feel the same way. But wishing for war is not the answer."

"I understand. It’s just..." Drake gave a deep sigh and walked a few steps closer to the gate. Galen moved forward and placed a hand on his shoulder. It seemed to calm him down.

"What’s that?" Ashe suddenly inquired.

"What’s what?" Galen said looking at his friend.

Ashe moved beside him and pointed to the horizon in the distance. He saw it then. A bright glow, like from a fire, coming at a rapid pace towards them. In the light, numerous small black specks could be seen moving. He knew what it was. It was what they’d been waiting for. The time to fight had come.

"Ashe, Logan, Drake, tell your men nearby to get ready and send someone to alert the ones in the party. We are going to be attacked any minute now. Hurry!"

"We’ll tell everyone in the party." This came from one of the two cats that were suddenly by their feet. "You just go and get ready," the white one, Artemis, continued.

"Thank you." And, with that, Galen was off with the other three to gather their forces. They had to meet the enemy outside the gates to keep the kingdom from being penetrated. The Inner Senshi were to guard just inside and fight anyone who managed to pass the Knights of Selene. They were to open the gates to absolutely no one.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

They stood about a hundred yards from the Moon Kingdom gates. A row of warriors, all in white, with swords gleaming at their backs. The four generals stood in front, the determination, as well as anger, on their faces all directed towards the coming foe.

Galen squinted his eyes to see the approaching enemy better. They were not human, he thought. They looked like monsters from the storybooks that little children read. Bogeymen, witches, and trolls all ugly and deformed and totally evil. They were getting closer. Two hundred yards, he counted. One hundred. Fifty. His hands clenched into fists. He screamed, "Attack!" and the whole row moved forward as one body to face the onslaught.

And so the fighting began.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

It wasn’t going as well as he wanted it to, Ashe thought. All around him, screaming from both creatures and men could be heard. At least they were holding their own, he told himself. Only a few got past them and the Inner Senshi took care of those. Nobody had managed to enter the gates.

Suddenly, the battlefield seemed to echo with the most evil laughter. He looked at Galen to see if he heard it too. His friend was looking in the distance, at the new batch of youmas heading towards them. Then, suddenly, he saw him look up and watched as a shiver ran down his body. Ashe followed his gaze and what he saw made him go pale with fear.

It was a shadow-like being, so large, it dwarfed the whole kingdom. It loomed over the palace with claws ready to strike at any moment. In its palm, it carried a tall woman with flowing red hair, holding a staff with a crystal ball on top. She was looking at the palace with malice in her eyes and from her lips issued the evil laughter that they heard.

All at once, it seemed like their cause was hopeless. The enemy had doubled in number and there were no more knights to call for reinforcement. With that thought, Ashe looked back towards the battlefield. It was then that he saw them. They were walking towards him and his comrades, Endymion’s Royal Guard, and they didn’t seem aware of the fighting around them. They were wearing gray uniforms instead of their usual black ones and they didn’t turn to acknowledge him when he shouted their names. They were heading towards the palace gates where the Inner Senshi waited.

In between fighting the enemy, he watched while the ladies opened the gates for the Royal Guard. Their joy in seeing them alive was plainly written on their faces. A youma appeared before him just as he saw the senshi embrace their respective partners and he was distracted from the scene for a few minutes. The next time he managed to look, it was to see Nephrite holding a short blade covered in blood while a bleeding Jupiter looked at him with betrayal in her eyes. The rest of the senshi were also lying on the palace grounds with their life’s blood pouring from their wounds. It was too much for him to take. He screamed and started running towards the four men standing inside the gates.

He heard footsteps behind him and wasn’t surprised when Galen overtook his lead. Drake and Logan were soon also running beside him. They reached the palace gates in moments and faced the men who used to be their old friends and were now their new enemy.

"I don’t know what you’re up to but your not stepping inside the palace," Galen warned.

Kunzite laughed at this, "And who’s going to stop us? You?"

"Who else?" Galen replied and leaped towards him with his sword slicing forward. Everyone else paired up for the fight. Ashe to Nephrite, Drake to Zoicite, and Logan to Jadeite.

"Why, that’s all I want to know?" Ashe asked of his enemy. "Why did you kill her when she loved you?” He saw uncertainty and what seemed like regret appear in Nephrite’s eyes for a second. It was gone so quickly, he couldn’t be sure he actually saw it. Then Nephrite drew his sword and no more words were uttered.

It was a long, drawn out fight. They were evenly matched in skill and in magic. But Ashe had been fighting for more than half an hour and was quickly tiring while Nephrite was fresh for battle. In the end it was inevitable that the villains triumphed while the forces of good were annihilated. At the last moment, Ashe searched Nephrite’s eyes for a reason. They were standing close together, almost in an embrace, before Nephrite pulled his sword from Ashe’s chest where it was embedded. He fell to the ground. He put his hand on his wound and tried to stop the bleeding. It was a futile effort. He was dying. He still didn’t understand. He looked at his murderer.

"Why?" he asked with his last breath.

He died looking at his enemy but his last thought wasn’t for him. As darkness engulfed him, he remembered his love’s beautiful face and welcomed the chance to be with her once more. His mind whispered, "Michiru."

______________________________________________________________________________________________

Silence reigned in Usagi’s apartment for a few moments before Ashe finished. "After we die, the dream sequence starts all over again." He rubbed his hand over his face as if to wake himself up. "It didn’t stop until we came to this city. Then we knew our search was almost over."

"That’s incredible! You got all this information from a dream," Usagi said, looking stunned. "But it’s so detailed, it must have taken a long time to piece together."

"Not really," Galen replied. "You see, the longer we had them, the more detailed they became. It also helped that we shared the dreams and talked about them often. It somehow made it more real."

"Is that what brought you two together? The dreams?"

"Actually, no." Galen replied. "I was born in Japan and my parents immigrated to the United States when I was about four. I went to UCLA to take up Criminology and that’s where I met Ashe who was an exchange student."

"That’s right," Ashe continued. "My father was Japanese and my mother American but I was born in Korea. My mother liked to talk about her birthplace so I grew up imagining what America must be like. When my parents died in a car accident, I decided there was really nothing holding me to Korea. I applied to the exchange student program for the U.S. and was accepted to go to UCLA to take up Criminology."

"Ashe and I shared the same course program so we saw each other a lot. We became fast friends and decided to share an apartment near the school."

"We were on our last year in school before the dreams started. I had them first and then, about a month later, Galen started having them too. I woke up one night when I heard him screaming and discovered him thrashing about in his bed. I thought he was just having a regular nightmare until I heard him say the Outer Senshi’s name. Can you imagine how I felt?"

He looked at his friend appraisingly. "I looked at Galen carefully then and tried to compare him to the people in my dream. It surprised me that I never noticed his resemblance to my best friend and commander. It was his hair that threw me off. You see, the man in my dreams always had his hair flowing freely at his back while I’d only seen Galen with his hair tied, like now. But, when he slept, his hair was spread all over his pillow. The resemblance was uncanny then. They looked like twins, only in different clothing and environment."

Galen smiled at this. "When I woke up from that nightmare, I found Ashe standing by my bed looking stunned. It was nothing compared to what I felt. I had just woken up from a dream where I saw his double die from a friend’s hand and now; here he was, standing beside me, very much alive. It took me a moment to get reoriented with my surroundings and to know that this man was my friend and schoolmate, not the warrior from my dreams. It reassured me that I wasn’t going insane."

"Well my thoughts certainly didn’t reassure me," Ashe put in. "I couldn’t sleep a wink after that and, the next morning, I told Galen we had to talk. We decided to do it that evening."

"When Ashe told me about his dream and I discovered we shared it, I didn’t know what to make of it at first. Then he told me he believed that they weren’t just dreams but memories. He said we must have lived those lives somewhere in our distant past and forgotten about them. The dreams must be a way of making us remember."

"We had a lot of other theories but none of them made sense. We finally gave up trying to understand and went to sleep. We had the same dream that night and every night since. But, like Galen said earlier, the more they were repeated, the more detailed they became. Soon it felt like we were living two separate lives, one in the Moon Kingdom and one on Earth. It was very unsettling."

Everyone lapsed into silence once more; the two friends thinking back to the time when this whole thing started while Usagi wondered what it would be like to know everything about her life in the Moon Kingdom.

It was turning dark outside by this time so they decided to finish the discussion over dinner. They went to an Italian restaurant and had finished ordering when Usagi asked.

"How long did it take before you figured out you had to do some searching?"

"Well, after that school year, we finally graduated and started a small business as partners. We opened a firm where security for other businesses was handled. We also taught basic self-defense techniques to executives who needed it to protect themselves from people who envied their positions. The firm picked up quickly and, soon, we had more customers than we could handle. We ended up hiring a lot of people just to keep up." Galen looked up when the waitress brought their order. He waited for her to finish before continuing.

"Anyway, our business involved searching for people who might be a potential danger to the firms we were dealing with. When we figured we needed to search for you, about two years ago, we used these parts of the business to get started. As we already said, it failed and the rest you know."

Usagi nodded and continued eating while sorting through her thoughts. They had given her a lot of information in the past few hours and she took the next few minutes to try and sort it out before asking any more questions.

The meal had already been cleared and they were drinking coffee before she came up with one.

"So it was the Royal Guard’s fault that the palace was attacked?" Usagi asked. It was such an incredible tale, she almost didn’t believe it.

Ashe nodded. "We assume that’s what happened but we’re not sure because we died before it actually occurred."

"I see," she replied. "I’m also a little confused about something in your story, Ashe. You said the Inner senshi were happy to see the Royal Guard and that they embraced them. Was it because they were Endymion’s friends and therefore allies of the Moon Kingdom?"

"They were more than friends, Usagi." It was Galen who answered, a slight smile turning the corners of his mouth up. "They were soulmates. Two halves of a whole meant to be together throughout eternity. I wouldn’t have been surprised if they all got married after your wedding to the Prince." He paused and the smile disappeared. "Only the battle finished all that."

"I just can’t believe it," Usagi exclaimed. "The Senshi and Beryl’s generals in love! It’s like saying the sun revolves around the earth. It’s impossible!"

"That’s how we felt when we saw them kill the Senshi. I mean, they were our friends and we knew how much they loved those ladies." Galen shook his head.

With a far away look in his eyes, Ashe spoke softly, "Even now, after a thousand years, I still wonder why they did it. How could they have succumbed to the dark power of Queen Beryl?"

"I guess we’ll always wonder," Usagi agreed.

"I don’t think so," Galen put in, sounding mysterious.

Ashe looked at his friend questioningly, "Do you know something we don’t?"

"I have a theory. But, before I tell you what it is, I’d like to know what Usagi remembers about the Moon Kingdom."

"Not much, I’m afraid," Usagi apologized. "When we discovered I was the Moon Princess and Mamoru was Prince Endymion, I remembered giving him my star locket just before he joined in the fight. I felt scared as I watched him go. My mother, Queen Serenity, told me..."

"Did you say your mother? But how? She died in the final battle to save us." Galen asked looking totally confused.

"It’s true, she died in the final battle, but, somehow, a part of her was left in the Moon Kingdom." She looked at the two men to see if they understood. They both wore bewildered looks on their faces. She sighed, "I guess I should start at the beginning."

So Usagi spent the rest of the night telling her companions about the revival of the Sailor Senshi. How they defeated Beryl’s generals until only Kunzite was left. She talked about Mamoru’s capture by the Dark Kingdom and the Senshi’s efforts to find a way to destroy it.

"We finally found a possible entry into the Dark Kingdom but it divided into numerous caves. Luna and Artemis decided to investigate one while the Senshi looked into another. The five of us run into trouble right away. Kunzite was waiting for us near the entrance and he wanted the Imperium Silver Crystal. He was very strong and none of our attacks seemed to be doing any good. Finally, I lost my grip on the Moon Wand and it went flying towards him. He saw his opportunity and reached out to grab it but, before he could touch it, the wand erupted in a brilliant flash of light and it somehow teleported us to the moon. The next thing I remember is waking up on some ruins and seeing what looked like a miniature hologram of my mother. She said she was Queen Serenity’s spirit and that we were in what was once the Moon Kingdom. She then proceeded to tell us about the final battle."

Usagi took a deep breath and stood up. They were back in her apartment by then and she walked through the open patio doors. "I remember envisioning myself standing on a balcony while Queen Beryl floated a little distance in front of me, her giant shadow behind her. She was going to attack me but Prince Endymion was suddenly there and he stopped her. After he refused Beryl’s offer to rule the Dark Kingdom beside her, she made the shadow create some sort of windstorm which caught Endymion and started dragging him away. I didn’t want to be parted from him so I jumped into the wind and reached out to him. The shadow blasted us before we could actually touch and we both died."

Usagi slowly closed her eyes, seeing the events unfold behind them as she related the story. "My mother witnessed our deaths and she couldn’t accept it. She used the Imperium Silver Crystal to send all of us, both good and evil, to the future where we were all reborn without any memories of the Silver Millennium. With all the strength she had left, she sent her two cat advisors to guide us if the Dark Kingdom ever managed to rekindle the past and start spreading evil again. The cats only retained enough memories to find the Inner Senshi and train them. Their only mission was to find the Moon Princess and to protect her and their home planet at all costs."

Usagi took another deep breath before looking at Galen. "And that’s all I remember. Like I said, it isn’t much."

Galen nodded his head. "At least you gave an ending to our story," he said. "We now know for sure how we ended up on Earth at this time."

Ashe was more curious. "What happened when you got back to the cave? Was Kunzite still waiting for you?"

"Yes he was. He was attacking Luna and Artemis. And when the Senshi tried to stop him, he turned his powers on them. Remembering that he was partly responsible for the destruction of the Moon Kingdom, I blasted him with the crystal. He couldn’t stand against its power. He joined the rest of Beryl’s generals in hell that day." Usagi looked up to see if Ashe was satisfied with her answer. He apparently was so she continued. "Anyway, that’s the end of the four of them. We don’t have to worry about them anymore."

"No we don’t but, that’s not the end of them," Galen put in.

"There you go again." Ashe sounded exasperated. "What behind all these mysterious comments? Are you ready to tell us?"

"Yes, I am," Galen affirmed. "You see, ever since we’ve been having these dreams, something’s been bugging me about that final fight with the Royal Guard. It’s only been this last year that I’ve finally figured out what it was."

"And?" Usagi said, sounding expectant.

Looking at her, he said, "I think the generals you fought were not really Endymion’s Royal Guard but beings that are similar to clones."

"What?!" Usagi and Ashe both exclaimed.

"Like I said before, it was hard for me to believe that they would do any harm to the Inner Senshi, let alone kill them, so I was watching Kunzite carefully when we fought that last time. I noticed that he was using a different attack than usual. I’ve never fought him before but I’ve watched the Royal Guard practice when I visited Earth. Even though I was tired then, I thought I had the advantage since I knew his way of fighting. I was wrong. This Kunzite was using a totally different power. His attacks came out in the form of dark energy and that, in itself, was already strange."

"Yes, Nephrite was doing the same thing," Ashe was quick to put in, "but I thought it was because they were under Beryl’s power."

"True. I believed that was the reason at first, but, add to that the fact that, when I managed to wound him before he delivered the final blow, he bled green blood."

Galen paused to see if they were following his line of thought. Ashe looked like he was close to connecting all the puzzle pieces in his brain while Usagi was starting to look glassy-eyed. They had better continue this discussion tomorrow, he thought. Usagi must be close to overloading her brain circuits with all these new information. He quickly finished his explanation.

"I know very well that human blood comes in only one color and that is red. So I concluded that those generals who murdered the Senshi were just look-alikes and not the real ones."

"But you’re not absolutely sure, right?"

He was expecting that question from Ashe so he had a ready answer. "I wasn’t sure until Usagi told her story, but now I am."

"Would you care to explain that statement? You lost me somewhere."

Turning to Usagi, he said, "I think that can wait ‘til tomorrow. Usagi looks like she’s had enough for one day."

Gratitude filled her face when she heard this. "Thank you. I can’t keep up with you two. You must have computers for brains."

"Don’t worry," Galen said, standing up and heading for the door. "You just get a good night’s sleep and we’ll see you tomorrow around ten."

Ashe followed his friend to the door and waved goodbye before closing it.

Usagi had more than enough for one day. She barely finished preparing for bed before lying down. She was asleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Saturday morning brought more sunshine and cool temperatures. Usagi woke up feeling well rested and ready to face another full day. She glanced at the clock.

"9:45!!! I forgot to set my alarm clock!" she exclaimed. "They’ll be here in fifteen minutes."

She jumped out of bed and quickly made it. The shower was her next destination before hurriedly changing and putting her hair up in the usual buns. No sooner had she put the last pin in place before the doorbell rang.

"Good morning," she greeted the two guys as she ushered them in.

"So," Galen started, "are you ready for more surprises or are you still recovering from last night?"

"Nope. My batteries are all recharged and ready for whatever you’ve got planned."

"That’s good," Ashe said, "’cause I can’t wait to hear what Galen has to say."

"Well, if you’ll both sit down, I’ll show you what I’ve discovered."

Galen took the briefcase he left on the side table when he entered and opened it to reveal some folders. He gathered these in his hands and leafed through the papers contained in the first one.

"Last night I said I wasn’t sure that my theory about the fake generals was correct until I heard Usagi’s part of the story." He glanced at his audience to confirm this and they both nodded. "You see, for the past year, ever since I doubted the authenticity of those generals, I’ve been using our computer system in the office to search for the Royal Guard’s present day counterparts. And I found them."

"You found them," Usagi repeated, "and they weren’t the ones we fought?"

"No. That’s why I was sure after you told us you destroyed them. The men I found are all alive and well and living in North America."

"Tell us what you found," Ashe said eagerly, a gleam of excitement in his eyes.

"It was pretty easy to locate Kunzite. After all, Kenjo is not a very common name. The other three presented me with a more difficult case. Anyway, after a lot of analyzing and guessing, I finally discovered who they were. I found that they all have at least two things in common. One, they are all prominent individuals and, two; they are all wealthy in their own right.

"That doesn’t come as a surprise," Ashe commented. "Being leaders in their former lives, I wouldn’t expect anything less."

"That’s what I thought." Galen looked down at the folder in his hand. "These folders contain their profiles. First, Kenjo Fukuda. On paper he’s just an ordinary government employee but you won’t find his name under any department. If you dig deeper, you’ll find that he’s an operative for one of the government agencies."

"Like the FBI?" Usagi wanted to know.

"The company Kenjo’s working for is more obscure than the FBI. They handle the high-risk operations that could change our country’s future from peace to war. As far as most people are concerned, they don’t exist."

"Knowing Kenjo, he’s probably involved in the strategic planning part of the operation."

"Right again, Ashe. He’s presently in charge of all operations, though, and answers only to one other person. As you can imagine, he’s very well paid and keeps his money in Swiss banks. He could hardly squander it and still keep a low profile, after all."

Moving to the next folder, he continued, "Secondly, we have Nephrite. He’s known as Nathan Sanada, a wealthy entrepreneur in the food business. He is behind the Gekko Corporation, which owns a chain of restaurants that specializes in Japanese cuisine. They have branches all over North America as well as Europe and, of course, Asia."

"I should have known he’d find a way to make money out of his love for cooking," Ashe laughed. "If Zoisite is anything like I remember, he’d be doing something that doesn’t put him so much in the limelight. He was always the quietest one in the group."

"Being quiet could be an asset in his profession. He’s a famous novelist. He mostly writes science fiction but has been known to produce detective stories once in a while. His last ten novels have been bestsellers and have sold millions of copies. He’s very popular but rarely makes any media appearances. He owns a mansion in Victoria where he writes without worrying about any disturbances." Galen took a drink of the soda, which Usagi had served during his recitation, to soothe his dry throat. He leaned back in his chair. "Does that sound like Zachary or what?"

"I knew it!" Ashe exclaimed.

"You’re talking about Zachary Kurata, aren’t you?" Usagi asked.

Galen nodded his head. "That’s right. How did you know?"

"I read a book once called ‘Moonlight Destiny’. The plot and the characters in it sounded so familiar but I couldn’t pinpoint the reason why. Later, after I’ve read it a second time, I realized that the author seemed to be talking about the time of the Silver Millennium and the hero and heroine sounded like Endymion and myself. I looked at the author’s name so I could find more of his work and see if I wasn’t imagining it. Most of his books were situated in the same local as that of ‘Moonlight Destiny’ and many of the characters could be people I knew from the Moon Kingdom."

"He must have discovered his true identity then to be able to write about his past. That could work in our favor, or against it, when we contact him."

"What do you mean?"

"I’ll tell you later, Usagi. First, let’s find out what Jadeite’s up to this days." Galen opened the last folder on the coffee table. "Tell me, have you ever heard of the Gin Construction and Design Company?"

"I have," Ashe replied. "They’re one of the largest development companies in North America and are known for their innovative designs on buildings and houses as well. They’ve recently branched out to the European market and are thinking of going into the Asian market next."

"Very good. The owner of Gin Construction is none other than our good friend Justin Tanaka. He’s also dubbed by People Magazine as one of the ten most eligible bachelors in the United States along with our other friend, Nathan Sanada. He’s been known to enjoy going to parties. If you can’t find him in one, he can probably be found working in a construction site his company is presently undertaking. He said in an interview once that he likes to leave his ‘personal touch’ on the projects he’s involved in. I think he just likes to build things, period."

"Do you remember all the gadgets he used to make back then," Ashe reminisced. "I can’t think of a time when I saw him sitting idly doing nothing. That is, until he met Rei, of course."

"Rei and Jadeite," murmured Usagi under her breath, "talk about unlikely pairs."

"Did you say something, Usagi?" Galen inquired.

"No. Nothing," she answered, shaking her head. "So, what are we going to do with all this newfound knowledge?"

"We’re going to find the Royal Guard, of course," Ashe declared.

Usagi looked at Galen to confirm what she was afraid was the truth. She didn’t exactly want to see the nod he gave her. I lied to him, she thought. I’m not at all ready for what they’ve got planned.

to be continued...