She had been dreaming lately about death.
She supposed one did that, when one was a sailor soldier, the short-skirted warrior who had to meet the challenge and come out on top. The power contained within her hands was enough to level the tallest building in Tokyo, enough, feasibly, to destroy the enemy that had come knocking on their door. With so much power came responsibility, which was a heavy burden on her shoulders; she had no taste for murder. She also had no taste for defeat.
She had dreaming about death, and now she was dead.
She decided that she probably deserved it, after what had happened. How many weeks had she and her partner chased at shadows, positive that they were doing The Right Thing? The faces blurred in her memory, because she honestly didn't care as to who they had been; merely victims. People they had exploited in their race to capture the sacred relics of their visionary dreams, people who hadn't mattered except for the purity of their hearts.
She no longer dreamt about death, being dead.
She couldn't determine who had been more shocked at finding out; her, or her conscience.
"I'll take her pure heart. But I also need to take it from another first; you! The one that tried to save the world, without soiling your own hands!" The barrel of Eudial's gun loomed above her breast, pinning her with its intent. She couldn't move, not with those words hanging in the air between them. It wasn't possible that she could be a carrier of one of the pure hearts they had been searching for. Not with the blood on her hands, that damned spot that wouldn't wipe clean. "But with your injuries, it will most likely kill you."
It didn't matter. Even if she died, her partner would survive; she hadn't been injured so recklessly by the divine punishment. She would survive, and destroy Eudial easily. She would remember their promise.
"URANUS!"
No...
There; she was running across the bridge, having torn herself free of Eudial's trap. The pure violence of the divine punishment forced the words from her mouth as her partner writhed. “Neptune! Don’t move!” she had screamed, remembering the sting of the assault, burning her body with pain. Leaving her disoriented and weak and defeated, the wind stilled to a whisper.
And yet, Neptune stepped forward again.
Her strangled screams echoed through the cathedral as she jerked and twisted, already bleeding and bruised. But she wouldn’t fall, she would not, she simply dragged her feet onward. Eudial had taken her eyes entirely away to watch the aqua-haired soldier, muttering in disbelief; Uranus had felt nothing but a hollow sense of defeat. She was watching her partner, her gentle lover, completely disregard their promise. She was watching her throw away the future.
Lying helpless, she couldn’t rightfully say that she would have done the same thing.
“Impossible,” Eudial swore, bringing her weapon around.
Neptune stumbled towards her, the faintest sparkles of power tickling her gloved fingertips.
They met each other with desperation plain in their eyes, but only one pulled the trigger.
That was what had destroyed her at last: seeing with her own eyes the glittering power of a talisman; Neptune’s talisman. Even the sight of her partner and lover crumpling lifelessly to the ground at Eudial’s feet didn’t stir her blood; at least in sacrificing herself, Neptune had redeemed her spirit. All Uranus would face was a quick death with nothing to show for it.
When she had thrown Usagi aside, she knew it was her own chance at redemption. She couldn’t continue to live with a second talisman inside of her. Somehow, it would need to be extracted. The talismans were more important than either of them, the sacred objects they had fought so hard—
No. Don’t think about that. Think about what they had saved.
Besides, maybe she would be with Michiru again.
So she had tilted the gun to her breast, and pulled the trigger.
Everything had become fuzzy at the edges, not black as she had hoped.
But even the fuzziness couldn’t mask the brilliance of her own talisman, a curved, deadly sword, rising high above her body. Nor could it drown out the sound of Usagi barely containing her grief as she knelt beside her. At least someone could mourn them.
But the stupid girl kept insisting on giving the talismans back! Amazing. How she could have such faith in herself and the world to believe that she could save it single-handedly…it was beautiful. But it was also a waste. “I don’t care what happens to us, odango atama,” she had sighed, only vaguely conscious. “Just protect the talismans when we’re gone. Protect them, and find the third. Only then will the sacred cup appear, for the messiah.”
“Who is the messiah?” Mars asked, a barely visible smear of black and red within her vision. When they had arrived, she hadn’t known; she had only been relieved it had been classically late. All five girls had an undeniable streak of pity that would have proven fatal against Eudial. She knew it would get them into trouble one day.
“The messiah…is the one who, wielding the sacred cup, can save us from the Silence. With its power, she can drive back the darkness…save the world.” Talking, even staying awake, had been too much of an effort. So she had closed her eyes, meaning to relax, forever.
Now she was dead, wasn’t she? That was the meaning of this darkness that went on without end, lonely and silent. She had prevented the Silence by giving herself up to this eternity of the void willingly. A lonely void, without her.
So she thought about death, because she was dead.
“Haruka, I still like your hands.”
And, later:
“You realize, no matter what, we’ll leave here with the talismans. Fromhere, we’ll ignore each other’s danger, and move on alone.”
“What are you talking about, here of all times?”
Her smile had been bittersweet, secure in the knowledge of their promise. But they had both been weak. They had both given up the future for each other’s arms. Still, Uranus could remember her beating heart as she had raced to find Neptune; she had no misgivings about winning, no consideration for the possibility of losing. She had run to save her partner, who was most surely bait for a trap, and not actually…not really…
“The owner of a talisman is your partner, Sailor Neptune!”
No, she had not actually believed Eudial.
And Neptune, still, had continued on.
“Haruka, I won’t let you die.”
Chikusho…Michiru, everything could have turned out differently. Why did you have to be so selfish? Why did you have to save me? We could have gone into this void together. Now, there was just the silence.
“Haruka.”
And the silence was speaking her name.
She looked up into Caribbean blue eyes that were no longer so deep and rich a colour, shaded by tones of grey. “Haruka,” she said again, smiling. Even death had not robbed her of the brilliance of her smile.
“Michiru…masaka. I thought…after all, we’re…”
“Dead? Not you, my strong Haruka. You’re still just alive, barely. That’s why I can’t come closer to you; we’re still separated, even now.” She lifted her hand, brushing it through Haruka’s cheek; all she felt was a faint cold breeze, and then nothing. “I’m waiting; death is lonely without you. I miss you so terribly; is it selfish to want you here beside me?”
She had shed the guise of Neptune already, clothed in the burgundy and green-plaid uniform of Mugen. What she had been wearing the day they had first met, at the race track; she, the beautiful aqua-haired student, always watching. Would they be able to rediscover one another after death? Retrace those happy memories?
“Why did you forgot our promise?”
Michiru merely tilted her head. “Because I heard what Eudial said. And if you died, while I survived, it would have killed me just as surely as her weapon. I thought…” She smoothed the front of her skirt, straightening her sleeve. Then she sighed. “I thought that this way, even if the mission failed, we would be together at the end.”
She smiled then, lifting her hair off her neck in a sweeping gesture that never failed to stir Haruka’s blood. “Hell is endurable with you at my side.”
Their hands finally met and clasped, and it was warm.
And then, they saw the light coming to meet them.
Leaving the cathedral, Neptune said, “So after all, we didn’t need to sacrifice anyone. Not even ourselves.”
“I guess not. But you’d do it again, wouldn’t you? To save the world?” Uranus asked, watching the sun sink lower below the horizon.
“Any of us would sacrifice our lives for that,” Pluto interjected as she walked past them, entering their helicopter without hesitating. “This world is under our protection.”
Neptune barely nodded, but said, “Of course.” Uranus took her hand and squeezed it, knowing exactly what she meant.
She didn’t dream of death that night.
She dreamt of paradise.
Fin.
