Fic: On Razor's Edge - Chapter 18
Title: On Razor’s Edge - Chapter 18
Summary: Crystal Tokyo has arrived. So has Ando Tanaka.
Warnings: All the feels? (Hopefully?)
A/N: This is the last chapter, only to be followed by an epilogue. Massive thanks to Charlie for being the best emotional sounding board anyone could ever wish for.
The sharp edge of a razor is difficult to pass over; thus the wise say the path to Salvation is hard.
~ verse in the Katha-Upanishad
***
It was the first time in this life that Usagi had shouted at her. The queen had screamed herself hoarse before breaking down in tears, and her husband had been no better. Each word had cut Minako like a blade, and by the end, she found herself hurting worse than she had after her battle with Ace. Cuts in the body would heal, these ones would not.
Minako didn’t have it in herself to point out that really, Ando had just done for them what they needed but couldn’t bring themselves to say. Just a few days ago, back in Takeshi’s and Setsuna’s apartment, even Usagi had said that she couldn’t stand in the way of Ando’s wishes. Now Minako hadn’t, and was paying the price. It was unfair, but no more than what had happened to her sisters, to Ando, to little Aiko. Fairness just wasn’t a factor in their lives, so she doubled down and let them hurl their pain at her. Wasn’t that part of her duty too? So Minako sat quiet, clutching her phone so hard that her knuckles turned white, while Usagi sobbed and Mamoru raged on and on, grief and guilt spurring him on.
Takeshi had offered to go with her, but this was between Minako and Ando. She considered this the last favour she would ever do her friend; trying to convince Mamoru and Usagi that they were not to blame for the disastrous turn his life had taken and that they should make the most of this new world, this new chance. It didn’t matter that Minako hated every second of it, what mattered was that neither Ando nor Rei would have wanted Usagi and Mamoru to feel guilty for dying a death they considered worthy and honourable.
Every few seconds, her phone buzzed, one of her countless alerts going off, telling her what so and so was reporting about the palace. It was her job to check whether the news were what Ando had hoped for: an absolution for the royal couple. The innocence of their magic fully restored by the damnation of his own.
Minako swallowed.
“I THOUGHT YOU CONSIDERED HIM YOUR BEST FRIEND! HOW COULD YOU LET HIM DO THIS, MINAKO? HOW-”
She exhaled and straightened herself. She’d been saying the same things for over an hour, and was running out of different words and phrases. All she said fell on deaf ears, but if she was honest, it would have been the same situation if the roles were reversed. She would never believe Mamoru that he couldn’t have stopped Ando and that this suicide was what he really wanted. Never. And she would never forgive him either.
But she owed it to her dead friend to persist. “Ando wanted this. He wanted you to live in a world where you had a chance to watch your daughter be born, to lead this city, to make the most of this new world. That’s what he wanted.”
She got up, her nerves finally too frayed to continue. Every time she thought of Ando, alone in his last moments, she thought of Rei, thought of Makoto and Aiko, thought of Michiru. So many losses. She hoped that this future of theirs would be worth it.
Making a move to stroke Usagi’s shoulder, she was shocked to find that the Queen flinched and drew herself back, forbidding the contact Minako so craved.
“Right,” Minako whispered, and got up. “I’ll leave you to--- I’ll just leave.”
Mamoru put an arm around his wife. As always, they were united. That at least was good to see, thought Minako, and tried to keep herself upright.
It had been a long time since she’d felt this alone.
“Yes,” Usagi whispered, not meeting Minako’s eyes. “Just leave.”
Correction: since she’d been this alone.
***
Takeshi had broken the news to Umino, Ami, Hiromasa, and Haruka. They’d all met in the private kitchen because it was one of the few rooms the new staffers, the external security personnel and Takeshi’s people did not enter.
The kitchen did not have a TV, so they were spared from watching one of the countless newscasts that detailed how Ando Tanaka had died. One station had managed to film Ando’s suicide; they had a helicopter in the sky, and while Takeshi had seen the gruesome images once, he would rather not inflict them on anyone else. So instead, he told them about Minako’s and Ando’s meeting, and the event that followed.
Haruka had grudgingly nodded, and said, “wouldn’t have thought he’d had it in him,” and left. It was rare praise, and likely not to be offered again. Where she had gone, Takeshi did not know.
Hiromasa had blinked, and not said anything at all before following Haruka out of the door. Theirs was an odd alliance, born out of loss and suffering. Thinking of Nephrite all those hundreds and thousands of years ago, Takeshi knew that Hiromasa would seek solace from a bottle tonight, drinking with Haruka until both reached the blissful point of incoherence.
Umino had kissed his wife, tears brimming in his eyes, and had very politely excused himself to make a phone call, leaving Ami and Takeshi the only people in the room. They were sitting at the big, ordinary, normal-people dining table, except that there were too few people, and even so, none of them was what one could consider normal anyway. Takeshi cleared his throat.
Ami wiped a tear from her eyes.
“I feel it keeps getting worse,” she finally said. Not one to waste words, Takeshi didn’t reply and instead nursed the glass of vodka he’d found in one of the cabinets. For decades, wine had been his drink of choice, but tonight he’d needed something stronger. Ami surprised him when she got up, fetched herself a glass and poured more than the customary two fingers for herself too. She raised it, gave it a solemn, contemplative look, and whispered “to Ando”.
Takeshi matched her. “To Ando.”
***
Even with the many new people in the palace, it was still easy to walk in uninhabited wings, amble down solitary corridors, and avoid human contact when one wanted to.
Minako very much wanted to, so her steps lead her down the passages that were still marked yellow on that map of Umino’s. She was walking towards the heart of the palace and entered the throne room through a hidden door.
It was empty, and eery, and the walls were still scorched. She crossed the room and came to a stop in front of a blackened wall behind the throne. She outstretched her hands and touched the wall. It was warmer than the others, as if Ando’s and Rei’s fire still lingered here. The dungeons in which Rei had died were just underneath the throne room. It was weird to think that this palace, grown out of the desires and ideas of Usagi and Mamoru, held dungeons directly underneath the throne room. Perhaps it said a little more about all of them than they’d previously considered.
Theirs was a life of power and entrapment, time and time again. They’d had happy moments, perhaps even some happy years, but never in this room. She drew her hand back and looked at it for a long time; it had come away black.
***
Early the next morning, when the sky was still dark, a plane landed at Tokyo Haneda airport. Its passengers emerged, tired but excited after the long flight. They quickly boarded the buses that would bring them to the terminal where they’d retrieve their luggage and either return home or to their hotels.
One passenger did not share the excitement and made her way down the gangway more slowly. She was only carrying a small weekender bag, and had no luggage to retrieve later. Dressed in a simple but clearly expensive black coat and matching pants and flats, a cashmere scarf tied neatly around her neck, she looked ready for a funeral. But then wasn’t she always?
At the foot of the stairs, she was met by a vaguely familiar face. It had been a long time.
“Hello Hotaru,” Umino greeted her and took her bag from her hands.
The young woman looked around; not finding whom she was looking for. “Setsuna was to come and pick me up.”
“I know,” Umino said and began walking, offering Hotaru no other choice but to fall in step beside him. If anyone minded that these two civilians did not board the last of the passenger buses, or side-stepped the security personnel, nobody said a thing. Hotaru looked over her shoulder; nobody was paying them the slightest attention. Was this magic or sheer luck?
“She told me that you’d be arriving here today.”
Hotaru focused on the man who’d come to meet her and gave him shrewd look. “She told me that you’ve been asking for me to do so.”
“I have,” Umino replied simply, holding open a door for her. They entered the building, a mass of grey corridors and absence of people. “Take my hand, please,” he said and offered it to her. Hotaru complied, and before long, they were standing in a deserted park. Behind them, the palace loomed.
Hotaru looked around. No people, no lights, just the crystal and the stars. No Setsuna, and no Haruka either.
“Do you have any news on Michiru?”
Umino walked over to a metal bench and sat down. Hotaru followed him, but wiped dew from it before sitting. She shivered deeper into her coat and scarf; with her thin leather shoes and thinner nylon socks, she wasn’t dressed for a surprise meeting in the winter air.
Umino looked at the palace, taking a moment to answer her question. “Mamoru and Hiromasa believe that Makoto is still alive under the crystal, so the same theory could be extended to Michiru.”
“But you don’t think so?” Hotaru asked, wondering whether Usagi and Setsuna had realised why Umino had insisted she come here. She had figured it out the second Setsuna called to let her know her presence was wanted. There was only ever one reason she was called after all.
“Doesn’t matter,” Umino said. He looked tired and worn, but not defeated. Given his best friend’s gruesome death just a few hours ago, she considered this a strange surprise.
“What matters then?” she asked and pulled a pair of black leather gloves from her coat pockets, slipping them on. They’d be a while.
Umino leaned back. “Did you know I wanted to become a professor before all of this started? Philosophy. I could lose myself in books and thoughts for days.” He smiled absent-mindedly, that allegedly so brilliant mind of his straying back.
When the shitennou had returned, Setsuna had carefully relayed all information. There’d even been files. Hotaru was fairly certain that there was only little she didn’t know about the man on the bench. Brilliant student, huge family in Kyoto, loved his maternal grandmother who had often sent him socks she knitted (all the colours of the rainbow, but the files indicated that he preferred the ones in yellow and blue), fell for Ami but took a long time to really get to know her, mildly allergic to strawberries, had considered physics for a while but then decided on philosophy, liked Ayn Rand, detested Nietzsche, and so on.
So she nodded, a tiny gesture that didn’t do the truth any justice.
“There’s a verse in the Katha-Upanishad. If Ando were here, he’d tell you that it inspired Somerset Maugham’s novel The Razor’s Edge. It was… he loved that book,” Umino said, his voice drifting off for a moment. Ando had carried that book with when he’d travelled the world. Umino had fished the battered and burned copy out of the ruins of the east tower while they’d been there to regrow the crystals and to repair the palace. He pulled it from the pockets of his old duffle coat and offered it to Hotaru, who accepted it.
“First page,” Umino instructed and Hotaru flipped the charred book open. A photo of Rei Hino fell into her hands. The senshi was wearing her miko uniform and looked straight into the camera. The smile was not on her lips, only in her eyes. Rei’s eyes had been the most wonderful violet. Hotaru still remembered that as little girl, she had admired Rei the most. Like Michiru, Rei was all poise. Unlike Michiru, whom Hotaru loved deeply, Rei was gentle. She ran a finger over the picture and then carefully placed it in the middle of the book before returning to the first page.
“The sharp edge of a razor is difficult to pass over,” she began, “thus the wise say the path to salvation is hard.” In a handwriting that was all edges and corners, someone had scribbled you don’t say next to it. A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. Ando Tanaka’s cheek had been the first entry in his file. It was closely followed by the words ‘highly self-destructive’ and ‘dangerous’. As it turned out, Setsuna’s first assessment had been spot on.
“Nobody has expected it to be this hard though,” Umino eventually said. “And both you and I know that it doesn’t have to be this way. And for what it’s worth, I think Michiru knew that it shouldn’t be.”
Hotaru closed the book and handed it back. Umino carefully stored it in his pockets once more.
“That was a low blow,” she admonished him softly. Michiru had been both friend and mother to her, and she wouldn’t let anyone use her for emotional blackmail.
“It’s called the truth,” Umino replied with a tired smile. “Nobody ever said it was fun.”
“I cannot do what you want me to.”
“No, you don’t want to,” Umino corrected her. “But that is neither here nor there. I have not asked for you to end this because we are--- because we lost so many of our own, even though that alone would be an excellent reason.”
“Why then?” Hotaru indulged him, not pointing out that he had not yet formally asked her to do anything, not that adherence to protocol was an issue in this case.
“We can turn the crystals into homes, hospitals, schools, and even a palace, but we cannot stop them from growing because the silver crystal is trying to heal this world. The volcano underneath the palace was the first, but not the last. Michiru encountered another one and died while putting it out. There will be many more in the months to come, and eventually, we will not only live in a crystal city, but a crystal world. At some point down the line -- I estimate 70 to 80 years, it’s hard to be precise -- it will become uninhabitable. Granted, that is a long way off, but it’s coming anyway. And with only six senshi left, already including Serenity, there quite simply isn’t the manpower to bring about the final bout of healing.”
Hotaru opened her mouth, but found herself without words. Umino continued, pushing his round glasses back up his nose.
“Mamoru will not be able to help, either. I don’t think you’ve ever been to Elysion, but it’s a wonderful place. Or rather, it was. It’s drawing on the golden crystal, of course, same as Mamoru’s life force. And as more and more power is needed to keep this planet from burning out from the inside, the less is left to sustain Mamoru’s life. Quite simply, he won’t be able to help because he’ll be long dead by then. That is why Little Lady won’t be born. That is why Serenity’s line will end. I don’t need to tell you what that means for this planet.”
He got up, his tale told, his yarn spun. “So, really, as you can see, this is not about whether you want to do something or not. It is only about what needs doing.” He smiled down at her. “In a way, everyone has been right about Serenity being our one and only chance, her and Endymion both. But not in this life.” He looked at palace, tall, dark, and forlorn against the sky. She stared at him, this dishevelled, boyish man; the only one who’d read the signs. “In this life, we never had one.” Storing his hands inside his pockets, he wandered off, calling to her over his shoulder.
“Goodbye, Hotaru. I am sure we’ll meet again.”
***
The door opened softly. Takeshi turned around in the strange, new bed his assistant had picked out for him that he couldn’t bring himself to care about. The empty vodka glass stood on the bedside table; it had neither brought the solace nor the anaesthesia he had secretly hoped for. Without a doubt, Haruka and Hiro had been more successful, but then he’d stopped long before the alcohol impaired his judgement. He was needed here. Mamoru might call for him, or---
The sound of someone stepping out of their shoes was easily identifiable to his trained ears and the soft footfalls told him that his nighttime visitor was approaching the bed. In the darkness, he could make out a slim, familiar figure.
He sat up and pulled Minako into his arms.
Her stained hands left black traces on his pyjamas, sheets, and finally, on his skin.
***
Hotaru was still sitting on the bench when the first rays of sunshine crept across the horizon. By the time the sun fully claimed the day, the slight young woman was replaced by a stern, serene soldier with a glaive in her hands.
Before long, she was joined by the Guardian of Time and Space.
Together, the two women looked at the palace. It gleamed in the sunshine.
“There is no guarantee that the same won’t happen again,” Pluto said. It always looked better during the day. More stately than imposing, more architecture than wilderness. More hope than defeat.
“That is not for me to consider,” Saturn replied, feeling the weight of the dying world on her shoulders. Once she had been called, no matter by whom, she was bound to her duty. Umino had of course known that, but where from, she could not fathom. “You know what my task is.”
“You think there is no saving this world?” Pluto’s voice still held some hope because Setsuna Meioh had not given up yet. She’d been willing to sacrifice her relationship for this new world, believing that somehow, miraculously, the world would right itself despite its injuries.
Saturn knelt down and touched a gloved hand to the ground. She closed her eyes. For a moment, the palace shone golden, not silver, but the Soldier of Silence paid it no heed. Hers was a choice entirely in black and white.
“No.”
“I will not be allowed to warn them,” Pluto said, coming as close as she ever would to rage against her fate.
“Of course not. But you will know, and perhaps, you can help them.”
Pluto twirled her staff in her hand, her mind aglow with all the different scenarios, the risks, the possibilities. The things she had already seen, and the ones she never would. “Whom? The Terrans? Serenity and Endymion up on the moon? Jupiter and her child? Venus and Kunzite secretly down here?” The words escaped her against her better judgement. Oh, how she hated to be human sometimes, fallible, guileless. How much easier it would be to go through life without these burdens. The next time, she would not make certain mistakes again, would not allow herself to indulge once more.
“Don’t be bitter,” Saturn admonished as if reading her mind. “We have choices, we have destinies. And you and I, we have to put the latter before the former. Always. But don’t forget one thing: perhaps our destinies lie in trying again until the world is whole. Until they get it right.”
Pluto considered this for a moment. “I watched him burn,” she offered as a result.
“And?” Saturn replied, wondering where this was going, while knowing it wouldn’t change anything. There were only a few more minutes left, and then everything would begin anew. She could feel the Glaive becoming heavier already. Its powers were calling to her. This planet, and the Queen that was to rule it, deserved better. She deserved all of her senshi, and perhaps, her senshi deserved happiness. Either way, this tained orb had no chance of surviving. Better to bring about a new time; perhaps it would be the blessed one they had all been hoping for.
“It wasn’t--- I knew so little, Hotaru,” Pluto finally said.
“You had not seen this before.” Saturn was surprised, not only by being addressed with her civilian name, but by the fact itself. Even she sometimes forgot that Pluto was not omniscient, merely an observer. And like all observers, there were things Pluto noticed and events she did not.
“I had seen him burning on the moon, all those years ago, but not here.”
“You will know more the next time,” Hotaru said. Next time. Another life, another chance. This rebirth had allowed her to grow up free and loved, no metal heart, no cyborgs, no Mistress 9. Perhaps the next life would return her to all of this, or it would see earth cured long before it was tainted.
It was all possible.
Little Aiko might carry a different name and be born on the moon.
Little Lady might roam planets and play in the sun, aging slowly, but without fail.
Zoisite might never be Umino, but steer gently from the background anyway, his mind never not at work.
Pluto might find love, or she might not.
Neptune and Uranus would be together again, in the distance. Of that she had no doubt.
Destiny.
The senshi and their shitennou might be more than the pillars aiding Serenity’s and Endymion’s love story. Who knew? She did not. It wasn’t hers to know.
So the two women stood in silence for a moment, against the backdrop of the palace they had paid for in love and blood and hope. Saturn raised the glaive.
“I will see you in another life, my friend.”
“Farewell,” Pluto whispered, and the world went black.
*** End of Chapter 18 ***
Summary: Crystal Tokyo has arrived. So has Ando Tanaka.
Warnings: All the feels? (Hopefully?)
A/N: This is the last chapter, only to be followed by an epilogue. Massive thanks to Charlie for being the best emotional sounding board anyone could ever wish for.
The sharp edge of a razor is difficult to pass over; thus the wise say the path to Salvation is hard.
~ verse in the Katha-Upanishad
***
It was the first time in this life that Usagi had shouted at her. The queen had screamed herself hoarse before breaking down in tears, and her husband had been no better. Each word had cut Minako like a blade, and by the end, she found herself hurting worse than she had after her battle with Ace. Cuts in the body would heal, these ones would not.
Minako didn’t have it in herself to point out that really, Ando had just done for them what they needed but couldn’t bring themselves to say. Just a few days ago, back in Takeshi’s and Setsuna’s apartment, even Usagi had said that she couldn’t stand in the way of Ando’s wishes. Now Minako hadn’t, and was paying the price. It was unfair, but no more than what had happened to her sisters, to Ando, to little Aiko. Fairness just wasn’t a factor in their lives, so she doubled down and let them hurl their pain at her. Wasn’t that part of her duty too? So Minako sat quiet, clutching her phone so hard that her knuckles turned white, while Usagi sobbed and Mamoru raged on and on, grief and guilt spurring him on.
Takeshi had offered to go with her, but this was between Minako and Ando. She considered this the last favour she would ever do her friend; trying to convince Mamoru and Usagi that they were not to blame for the disastrous turn his life had taken and that they should make the most of this new world, this new chance. It didn’t matter that Minako hated every second of it, what mattered was that neither Ando nor Rei would have wanted Usagi and Mamoru to feel guilty for dying a death they considered worthy and honourable.
Every few seconds, her phone buzzed, one of her countless alerts going off, telling her what so and so was reporting about the palace. It was her job to check whether the news were what Ando had hoped for: an absolution for the royal couple. The innocence of their magic fully restored by the damnation of his own.
Minako swallowed.
“I THOUGHT YOU CONSIDERED HIM YOUR BEST FRIEND! HOW COULD YOU LET HIM DO THIS, MINAKO? HOW-”
She exhaled and straightened herself. She’d been saying the same things for over an hour, and was running out of different words and phrases. All she said fell on deaf ears, but if she was honest, it would have been the same situation if the roles were reversed. She would never believe Mamoru that he couldn’t have stopped Ando and that this suicide was what he really wanted. Never. And she would never forgive him either.
But she owed it to her dead friend to persist. “Ando wanted this. He wanted you to live in a world where you had a chance to watch your daughter be born, to lead this city, to make the most of this new world. That’s what he wanted.”
She got up, her nerves finally too frayed to continue. Every time she thought of Ando, alone in his last moments, she thought of Rei, thought of Makoto and Aiko, thought of Michiru. So many losses. She hoped that this future of theirs would be worth it.
Making a move to stroke Usagi’s shoulder, she was shocked to find that the Queen flinched and drew herself back, forbidding the contact Minako so craved.
“Right,” Minako whispered, and got up. “I’ll leave you to--- I’ll just leave.”
Mamoru put an arm around his wife. As always, they were united. That at least was good to see, thought Minako, and tried to keep herself upright.
It had been a long time since she’d felt this alone.
“Yes,” Usagi whispered, not meeting Minako’s eyes. “Just leave.”
Correction: since she’d been this alone.
***
Takeshi had broken the news to Umino, Ami, Hiromasa, and Haruka. They’d all met in the private kitchen because it was one of the few rooms the new staffers, the external security personnel and Takeshi’s people did not enter.
The kitchen did not have a TV, so they were spared from watching one of the countless newscasts that detailed how Ando Tanaka had died. One station had managed to film Ando’s suicide; they had a helicopter in the sky, and while Takeshi had seen the gruesome images once, he would rather not inflict them on anyone else. So instead, he told them about Minako’s and Ando’s meeting, and the event that followed.
Haruka had grudgingly nodded, and said, “wouldn’t have thought he’d had it in him,” and left. It was rare praise, and likely not to be offered again. Where she had gone, Takeshi did not know.
Hiromasa had blinked, and not said anything at all before following Haruka out of the door. Theirs was an odd alliance, born out of loss and suffering. Thinking of Nephrite all those hundreds and thousands of years ago, Takeshi knew that Hiromasa would seek solace from a bottle tonight, drinking with Haruka until both reached the blissful point of incoherence.
Umino had kissed his wife, tears brimming in his eyes, and had very politely excused himself to make a phone call, leaving Ami and Takeshi the only people in the room. They were sitting at the big, ordinary, normal-people dining table, except that there were too few people, and even so, none of them was what one could consider normal anyway. Takeshi cleared his throat.
Ami wiped a tear from her eyes.
“I feel it keeps getting worse,” she finally said. Not one to waste words, Takeshi didn’t reply and instead nursed the glass of vodka he’d found in one of the cabinets. For decades, wine had been his drink of choice, but tonight he’d needed something stronger. Ami surprised him when she got up, fetched herself a glass and poured more than the customary two fingers for herself too. She raised it, gave it a solemn, contemplative look, and whispered “to Ando”.
Takeshi matched her. “To Ando.”
***
Even with the many new people in the palace, it was still easy to walk in uninhabited wings, amble down solitary corridors, and avoid human contact when one wanted to.
Minako very much wanted to, so her steps lead her down the passages that were still marked yellow on that map of Umino’s. She was walking towards the heart of the palace and entered the throne room through a hidden door.
It was empty, and eery, and the walls were still scorched. She crossed the room and came to a stop in front of a blackened wall behind the throne. She outstretched her hands and touched the wall. It was warmer than the others, as if Ando’s and Rei’s fire still lingered here. The dungeons in which Rei had died were just underneath the throne room. It was weird to think that this palace, grown out of the desires and ideas of Usagi and Mamoru, held dungeons directly underneath the throne room. Perhaps it said a little more about all of them than they’d previously considered.
Theirs was a life of power and entrapment, time and time again. They’d had happy moments, perhaps even some happy years, but never in this room. She drew her hand back and looked at it for a long time; it had come away black.
***
Early the next morning, when the sky was still dark, a plane landed at Tokyo Haneda airport. Its passengers emerged, tired but excited after the long flight. They quickly boarded the buses that would bring them to the terminal where they’d retrieve their luggage and either return home or to their hotels.
One passenger did not share the excitement and made her way down the gangway more slowly. She was only carrying a small weekender bag, and had no luggage to retrieve later. Dressed in a simple but clearly expensive black coat and matching pants and flats, a cashmere scarf tied neatly around her neck, she looked ready for a funeral. But then wasn’t she always?
At the foot of the stairs, she was met by a vaguely familiar face. It had been a long time.
“Hello Hotaru,” Umino greeted her and took her bag from her hands.
The young woman looked around; not finding whom she was looking for. “Setsuna was to come and pick me up.”
“I know,” Umino said and began walking, offering Hotaru no other choice but to fall in step beside him. If anyone minded that these two civilians did not board the last of the passenger buses, or side-stepped the security personnel, nobody said a thing. Hotaru looked over her shoulder; nobody was paying them the slightest attention. Was this magic or sheer luck?
“She told me that you’d be arriving here today.”
Hotaru focused on the man who’d come to meet her and gave him shrewd look. “She told me that you’ve been asking for me to do so.”
“I have,” Umino replied simply, holding open a door for her. They entered the building, a mass of grey corridors and absence of people. “Take my hand, please,” he said and offered it to her. Hotaru complied, and before long, they were standing in a deserted park. Behind them, the palace loomed.
Hotaru looked around. No people, no lights, just the crystal and the stars. No Setsuna, and no Haruka either.
“Do you have any news on Michiru?”
Umino walked over to a metal bench and sat down. Hotaru followed him, but wiped dew from it before sitting. She shivered deeper into her coat and scarf; with her thin leather shoes and thinner nylon socks, she wasn’t dressed for a surprise meeting in the winter air.
Umino looked at the palace, taking a moment to answer her question. “Mamoru and Hiromasa believe that Makoto is still alive under the crystal, so the same theory could be extended to Michiru.”
“But you don’t think so?” Hotaru asked, wondering whether Usagi and Setsuna had realised why Umino had insisted she come here. She had figured it out the second Setsuna called to let her know her presence was wanted. There was only ever one reason she was called after all.
“Doesn’t matter,” Umino said. He looked tired and worn, but not defeated. Given his best friend’s gruesome death just a few hours ago, she considered this a strange surprise.
“What matters then?” she asked and pulled a pair of black leather gloves from her coat pockets, slipping them on. They’d be a while.
Umino leaned back. “Did you know I wanted to become a professor before all of this started? Philosophy. I could lose myself in books and thoughts for days.” He smiled absent-mindedly, that allegedly so brilliant mind of his straying back.
When the shitennou had returned, Setsuna had carefully relayed all information. There’d even been files. Hotaru was fairly certain that there was only little she didn’t know about the man on the bench. Brilliant student, huge family in Kyoto, loved his maternal grandmother who had often sent him socks she knitted (all the colours of the rainbow, but the files indicated that he preferred the ones in yellow and blue), fell for Ami but took a long time to really get to know her, mildly allergic to strawberries, had considered physics for a while but then decided on philosophy, liked Ayn Rand, detested Nietzsche, and so on.
So she nodded, a tiny gesture that didn’t do the truth any justice.
“There’s a verse in the Katha-Upanishad. If Ando were here, he’d tell you that it inspired Somerset Maugham’s novel The Razor’s Edge. It was… he loved that book,” Umino said, his voice drifting off for a moment. Ando had carried that book with when he’d travelled the world. Umino had fished the battered and burned copy out of the ruins of the east tower while they’d been there to regrow the crystals and to repair the palace. He pulled it from the pockets of his old duffle coat and offered it to Hotaru, who accepted it.
“First page,” Umino instructed and Hotaru flipped the charred book open. A photo of Rei Hino fell into her hands. The senshi was wearing her miko uniform and looked straight into the camera. The smile was not on her lips, only in her eyes. Rei’s eyes had been the most wonderful violet. Hotaru still remembered that as little girl, she had admired Rei the most. Like Michiru, Rei was all poise. Unlike Michiru, whom Hotaru loved deeply, Rei was gentle. She ran a finger over the picture and then carefully placed it in the middle of the book before returning to the first page.
“The sharp edge of a razor is difficult to pass over,” she began, “thus the wise say the path to salvation is hard.” In a handwriting that was all edges and corners, someone had scribbled you don’t say next to it. A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. Ando Tanaka’s cheek had been the first entry in his file. It was closely followed by the words ‘highly self-destructive’ and ‘dangerous’. As it turned out, Setsuna’s first assessment had been spot on.
“Nobody has expected it to be this hard though,” Umino eventually said. “And both you and I know that it doesn’t have to be this way. And for what it’s worth, I think Michiru knew that it shouldn’t be.”
Hotaru closed the book and handed it back. Umino carefully stored it in his pockets once more.
“That was a low blow,” she admonished him softly. Michiru had been both friend and mother to her, and she wouldn’t let anyone use her for emotional blackmail.
“It’s called the truth,” Umino replied with a tired smile. “Nobody ever said it was fun.”
“I cannot do what you want me to.”
“No, you don’t want to,” Umino corrected her. “But that is neither here nor there. I have not asked for you to end this because we are--- because we lost so many of our own, even though that alone would be an excellent reason.”
“Why then?” Hotaru indulged him, not pointing out that he had not yet formally asked her to do anything, not that adherence to protocol was an issue in this case.
“We can turn the crystals into homes, hospitals, schools, and even a palace, but we cannot stop them from growing because the silver crystal is trying to heal this world. The volcano underneath the palace was the first, but not the last. Michiru encountered another one and died while putting it out. There will be many more in the months to come, and eventually, we will not only live in a crystal city, but a crystal world. At some point down the line -- I estimate 70 to 80 years, it’s hard to be precise -- it will become uninhabitable. Granted, that is a long way off, but it’s coming anyway. And with only six senshi left, already including Serenity, there quite simply isn’t the manpower to bring about the final bout of healing.”
Hotaru opened her mouth, but found herself without words. Umino continued, pushing his round glasses back up his nose.
“Mamoru will not be able to help, either. I don’t think you’ve ever been to Elysion, but it’s a wonderful place. Or rather, it was. It’s drawing on the golden crystal, of course, same as Mamoru’s life force. And as more and more power is needed to keep this planet from burning out from the inside, the less is left to sustain Mamoru’s life. Quite simply, he won’t be able to help because he’ll be long dead by then. That is why Little Lady won’t be born. That is why Serenity’s line will end. I don’t need to tell you what that means for this planet.”
He got up, his tale told, his yarn spun. “So, really, as you can see, this is not about whether you want to do something or not. It is only about what needs doing.” He smiled down at her. “In a way, everyone has been right about Serenity being our one and only chance, her and Endymion both. But not in this life.” He looked at palace, tall, dark, and forlorn against the sky. She stared at him, this dishevelled, boyish man; the only one who’d read the signs. “In this life, we never had one.” Storing his hands inside his pockets, he wandered off, calling to her over his shoulder.
“Goodbye, Hotaru. I am sure we’ll meet again.”
***
The door opened softly. Takeshi turned around in the strange, new bed his assistant had picked out for him that he couldn’t bring himself to care about. The empty vodka glass stood on the bedside table; it had neither brought the solace nor the anaesthesia he had secretly hoped for. Without a doubt, Haruka and Hiro had been more successful, but then he’d stopped long before the alcohol impaired his judgement. He was needed here. Mamoru might call for him, or---
The sound of someone stepping out of their shoes was easily identifiable to his trained ears and the soft footfalls told him that his nighttime visitor was approaching the bed. In the darkness, he could make out a slim, familiar figure.
He sat up and pulled Minako into his arms.
Her stained hands left black traces on his pyjamas, sheets, and finally, on his skin.
***
Hotaru was still sitting on the bench when the first rays of sunshine crept across the horizon. By the time the sun fully claimed the day, the slight young woman was replaced by a stern, serene soldier with a glaive in her hands.
Before long, she was joined by the Guardian of Time and Space.
Together, the two women looked at the palace. It gleamed in the sunshine.
“There is no guarantee that the same won’t happen again,” Pluto said. It always looked better during the day. More stately than imposing, more architecture than wilderness. More hope than defeat.
“That is not for me to consider,” Saturn replied, feeling the weight of the dying world on her shoulders. Once she had been called, no matter by whom, she was bound to her duty. Umino had of course known that, but where from, she could not fathom. “You know what my task is.”
“You think there is no saving this world?” Pluto’s voice still held some hope because Setsuna Meioh had not given up yet. She’d been willing to sacrifice her relationship for this new world, believing that somehow, miraculously, the world would right itself despite its injuries.
Saturn knelt down and touched a gloved hand to the ground. She closed her eyes. For a moment, the palace shone golden, not silver, but the Soldier of Silence paid it no heed. Hers was a choice entirely in black and white.
“No.”
“I will not be allowed to warn them,” Pluto said, coming as close as she ever would to rage against her fate.
“Of course not. But you will know, and perhaps, you can help them.”
Pluto twirled her staff in her hand, her mind aglow with all the different scenarios, the risks, the possibilities. The things she had already seen, and the ones she never would. “Whom? The Terrans? Serenity and Endymion up on the moon? Jupiter and her child? Venus and Kunzite secretly down here?” The words escaped her against her better judgement. Oh, how she hated to be human sometimes, fallible, guileless. How much easier it would be to go through life without these burdens. The next time, she would not make certain mistakes again, would not allow herself to indulge once more.
“Don’t be bitter,” Saturn admonished as if reading her mind. “We have choices, we have destinies. And you and I, we have to put the latter before the former. Always. But don’t forget one thing: perhaps our destinies lie in trying again until the world is whole. Until they get it right.”
Pluto considered this for a moment. “I watched him burn,” she offered as a result.
“And?” Saturn replied, wondering where this was going, while knowing it wouldn’t change anything. There were only a few more minutes left, and then everything would begin anew. She could feel the Glaive becoming heavier already. Its powers were calling to her. This planet, and the Queen that was to rule it, deserved better. She deserved all of her senshi, and perhaps, her senshi deserved happiness. Either way, this tained orb had no chance of surviving. Better to bring about a new time; perhaps it would be the blessed one they had all been hoping for.
“It wasn’t--- I knew so little, Hotaru,” Pluto finally said.
“You had not seen this before.” Saturn was surprised, not only by being addressed with her civilian name, but by the fact itself. Even she sometimes forgot that Pluto was not omniscient, merely an observer. And like all observers, there were things Pluto noticed and events she did not.
“I had seen him burning on the moon, all those years ago, but not here.”
“You will know more the next time,” Hotaru said. Next time. Another life, another chance. This rebirth had allowed her to grow up free and loved, no metal heart, no cyborgs, no Mistress 9. Perhaps the next life would return her to all of this, or it would see earth cured long before it was tainted.
It was all possible.
Little Aiko might carry a different name and be born on the moon.
Little Lady might roam planets and play in the sun, aging slowly, but without fail.
Zoisite might never be Umino, but steer gently from the background anyway, his mind never not at work.
Pluto might find love, or she might not.
Neptune and Uranus would be together again, in the distance. Of that she had no doubt.
Destiny.
The senshi and their shitennou might be more than the pillars aiding Serenity’s and Endymion’s love story. Who knew? She did not. It wasn’t hers to know.
So the two women stood in silence for a moment, against the backdrop of the palace they had paid for in love and blood and hope. Saturn raised the glaive.
“I will see you in another life, my friend.”
“Farewell,” Pluto whispered, and the world went black.
*** End of Chapter 18 ***