Diamohns are Forever

SECOND SEPARATION

Tuxedo Kamen picked himself up off of the hard ground where he landed. He had no idea how long he had been unconscious. There was nothing but darkness around him. He could faintly smell metal, and moisture. There was the faint scent of ozone in the air, as if there had been a lightning strike, or a short circuit.

Not far away, he heard something move.

He heard the sound of leather on stone, and then the sound of cloth rustling, and then steel and wood scraping across the same stone.

“Who’s there?” he demanded, his voice echoing in the cavernous space. “Show yourself!”

“I can’t,” the voice of Sailor Saturn cut the silence. “There’s no light.”

“Don’t stand up, Saturn,” he told her. “We don’t know where we are.”

“We’re somewhere in a building,” she said. “I landed on some stairs.”

“Keep talking, then,” he told her. “I’ll come to you. This might take some time. This room sounds enormous, and I’m not going to trust my feet.”

“Okay,” she said. “The stairs feel like they have tiles on them, and a metal edge, and some sort of non-skid strip. It doesn’t feel like we’re outdoors. The air’s too still.”

As she spoke, he crawled on his hands and knees towards the sound. Part of the way there, he started to see something: a faint purple flicker. As she kept speaking, it turned into a steady glow. It wasn’t much, but in the absence of light, it was something.

“Keep talking, Saturn,” he said. “I think something is happening.”

“I’m glowing,” she said softly. “A little, at least. Can you see me?”

“I think so,” he said. “Your element is sound. Keep talking, about anything.”

“I have a hand on a rail of some kind,” she said. “It seems to be shaped for decoration. I’m going to feel to the other side of the stair.”

“Don’t go far,” he said. “I don’t want to lose sight of you.”

“I won’t,” she promised. “If I can’t reach another side with my glaive, I won’t go.”

He heard the steel of the glaive scrape across the ground, and then there was a sound of wood on metal.

“I think it’s close,” she said. “It’s less than the length of the shaft away. That means that the stairs are fairly narrow. So, its not the stairs in an office building, or in a store.”

“No,” he replied, steadily crawling. “Stairs in an office building would either be wide, or they would be metal if they were emergency stairs. Stairs in a store would also be wide.”

“I’m on the other side,” she said. “It’s not a center rail, it’s the other side of the stairs. They’re only wide enough for two people, one going each way. There’s a pillar next to the stairs, and it has tiles on it.”

“That sounds familiar,” he told her. “Stay where you are, Saturn. I’m almost there.”

“I can hear your pants and gloves on the ground,” the said. “I know you are very close. What do you think happened to the others?”

“I think they were sent away,” he replied. “Hopefully not alone, but there’s no way of knowing.”

“I think the only ones left were the Moons and Sailor Sol,” she said as he reached her boots and stood up next to her. “That means someone’s alone. I hope it isn’t Sailor Moon. She doesn’t do so well, alone.”

“He didn’t take any pairs together,” he reminded her. “If she’s not alone, that means Kishi Moon is.”

Saturn would have replied, but a woman’s agonized scream suddenly echoed down the stairs, making them both jump.

“That was Sailor Moon!” Saturn cried. She turned and charged up the stairs, heedless of what might be waiting for them.

At the top of the stairs, there was electricity flashing from severed connections. Several wires inside their conduits were snaking around. When Sailor Saturn stepped off of the stairs, all of the conduits turned towards her and started to slither across the floor towards her.

Tuxedo Kamen pulled out his shortened cane, lengthened it, and then twisted the top six inches and drew the sword that transformed him into Prince Endymion.

He headed forward to assist Saturn as she brought down her glaive on one of the of the conduits while another one wrapped itself around one of her ankles. He severed it with his sword, and then picked her up and moved her out of the way of two more of them.

The sound of metal grating on tile made them turn to see something coming out of the dark, around a corner. A metallic creature scooted forward, a bit at a time. It had glowing eyes with letters and numbers in them, and there were buttons on the sides of the eyes. It had a squared mouth with pieces of paper spitting out of it.

Endymion stared at it in horror, and in even more horror at the bloodstains around the mouth.

“Let’s get out of here!” he cried, gripping Saturn’s arm.

“NO!” she cried out. She leveled her glaive at the approaching monster, a look of determination on her lovely face.

“Silence Glaive Surprise!”

A wave of almost visible sound emanated from the tip of the glaive. It hit the approaching abomination directly, causing it to vibrate and fall apart, spitting sparks, coins and charred bits of paper and chewed up money.

The two fighters looked at one another, and then they turned in the direction of the screams, which continued to echo through the building.

They crossed a darkened area, with pools of blood and pieces of people painting a grisly story. There were scrapes in the tile that indicated that there were more of the monstrosities that Saturn had just destroyed, but there was no sign of them.

They climbed another flight of stairs, with the screams growing louder and then fading off, to be replaced by broken sobbing. The sobbing faded after a while, leaving them with no way to locate the source.

“Endymion,” Saturn finally said. “You are bonded to her. You can find her. I don’t care if we have to climb to the top floor. You lead the way.”

Endymion nodded, and then closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, he turned to Sailor Saturn.

“Upwards,” he told her, and then headed for a nearby stairwell.

Halfway up the stairwell, they heard a metallic scraping sound behind them. They turned and saw one of the same creatures from before at the bottom of the stairs. It seemed to be having difficulty negotiating the stairs. They hurried the rest of the way up the stairs, to the top.

As they got to the next set of stairs, it started twisting under their hands and feet. They heard Sailor Moon scream again, the cry of a woman experiencing something out of a nightmare. They started running up the stairs, desperate to reach her.

It seemed to take forever. At every floor, they heard sounds of something mechanical running around, or something that sounded even worse: labored breathing and the sounds of flesh dragging across tile. The higher they climbed, the more numerous the sounds were.

They had to stop and catch their breath. The screaming stopped while they were resting, replaced once again by sobbing. They bent over, gasping, until they caught their breath, and then they continued on.

As they reached the last landing, the screaming started again. This time, it wasn’t echoing as it had before, it was much more direct. It was coming from very close by. They came out of the stairwell to find themselves faced with something they would never have expected in their wildest dreams.

The monstrosity occupied what had once been the reception area of an executive office. It was a mass of misshapen flesh. It looked like someone had taken several dolls and melted them together, only these were dolls made of living flesh, and the resulting combination had a terrible kind of awareness and intelligence. It turned towards them on its multiple legs, still wearing pieces of suits and sheer hose. It looked at them through eyes nearly concealed by tangled hair.

They separated as it looked them over, Endymion raising his sword so that it was clearly visible, and Saturn lowering her glaive so that the blade was leveled at the creature.

“I’ll get this,” she told Endymion. “You go get Sailor Moon.”

She circled around, making the thing face her. Endymion waited until it was not paying attention and headed towards the source of the screams.

The creature started to turn towards the direction Endymion had taken. Saturn jabbed at it with her glaive to get its attention, and then attacked as it turned back towards her.

“Silence Glaive Surprise!”

She held the glaive steady while the sound waves made it shake, making certain that all of the attack was directed at the monstrosity in front of her. She kept herself steady while the creature shrieked and its body was shaken apart.

Sailor Saturn stepped away from the steaming mass of flesh and organs that used to be a dangerous monster, and then headed to follow Endymion.

She found him facing off a human-sized version of the creature that had teleported them away from Tokyo Tower. Behind it, tied to an x-shaped platform, was Sailor Moon. She was stripped from the waist down. She still had on her tiara, but her gloves were shredded at the wrists, and bloodstained. There was also blood around her ankles.

Saturn moved around the confrontation, trying to get to her princess, who was watching the whole scene with disbelief on her face.

As Saturn was about to get around the creature, it lunged in her direction. Without thinking, Saturn brought the glaive down on it. The head of the glaive only delivered a glancing blow, but the shaft of the glaive caught it squarely on its head.

The creature collapsed with a cry. Endymion rushed past it and started releasing the restraints holding Sailor Moon.

She screamed as he untied her and tried to pick her up. Her struggles made him drop her and crawled away backwards as he reached her again.

Sailor Saturn ran over to her and dropped down to one knee.

“Sailor Moon!” she said urgently. “We have to get out of here! Can you walk?”

“Saturn?” Sailor Moon said incredulously. “Is it really you, or is he trying to drive me mad?”

“It is me,” Saturn said. “Can you walk?”

“I don’t know,” she said. “I hurt so bad.”

“Let Endymion carry you out of here,” Saturn said. “I have to keep these Chaos creatures away from us.”

“Endymion?” Sailor Moon asked, looking past Saturn at him, kneeling there. “I’m sorry. I thought you were him.”

“Let’s get you out of here,” Endymion said. He pulled his cape off and held it out to her.

“Wrap yourself up in this,” he said. “I’ll carry you out of here.”

Hesitantly, Sailor Moon reached out and took the cape from Endymion. She wrapped it around herself and allowed Sailor Saturn to help her to her feet.

She cringed when Endymion approached her but a groan from behind him decided her. She pressed herself into Endymion’s arms, keening in panic.

Endymion picked her up and the two of them retreated out of the room and down the stairs as quickly as they could.

The trip down the stairs went more quickly than the trip up. Halfway down the stairs they remembered, the building rippled, warped, and bent over like a melted candle. The three of them clung together while the building moved, and then they climbed out of an opening that developed in the wall when the building folded.

On the street, the asphalt was rippling like the surface of the ocean. They stared in amazement as a man in a business suit swam past them, as though the asphalt was water. They looked across the street and saw a tree walking down the sidewalk a though it were human.

“We have to go!” Saturn cried, pointing to where a car was advancing on them as though it were a cat stalking a mouse.

“Right!” Endymion gathered his legs under him and leapt away from the stalking car, heading in the direction that Sailor Saturn knew would lead them to Chiba House.

~*~*~*~*~

When they landed in the yard at Chiba House, Endymion handed Sailor Moon to Sailor Saturn. He headed into the house, detransforming as he went. Saturn pulled off her tiara, and then reached to remove Sailor Moon’s locket. Sailor Moon looked at her, and then looked around, and reached to remove the locket herself.

She had just detransformed when Mamoru came back out of the house with a grim look on his face.

“There’s no one here,” he said. “I know that I might be acting before I think, but I believe our best course of action is to leave the city. Hotaru, you get some things together for you and Usagi. I’m going to leave a note and then we’ll get out of here.”

“Mamoru, you aren’t thinking clearly,” Hotaru said. “Aster and Haruka-papa put things for everyone at the Akita house. I just need to get Usagi something to calm her down, that’s all.”

“Get it,” Mamoru said. “I’ll bring one of the cars around.”

“I’ll leave the note,” Usagi said tremulously. “I have an idea.”

She moved hesitantly away from both of them, and then staggered towards the solarium that led her into Chiba House.

Inside, Mamoru and Hotaru found her at the whiteboard that they kept notes on. She had drawn the outline of a house, and she was in the process of drawing a dog with a curly tail. Luna, Artemis, and Diana were all sitting at Usagi’s feet, looking up at her with concern.

Luna turned towards Mamoru.

“What happened to her?” Luna asked him. “She’s not acting like herself.”

“Leave it alone, Luna,” Mamoru said. “We’ve had a bad day.”

“I was just wondering,” Luna objected. “You don’t have to be hostile.”

“I’m just tired,” Mamoru said. “We need to get out of the city.”

“We’ll be waiting on the front porch,” Luna said. “I’m pleased that Lucinda sent the infants south where they’ll be safe.”

“Now we need to be safe,” Mamoru said. “Usagi, are you ready?”

“Hai,” Usagi said. “I think I’ll sleep the whole way there.”

“Let’s go, then,” Mamoru said. “Hotaru’s going to get you something to help you sleep.”

“Okay,” Usagi said. “I don’t think I want to dream.”

TBC