Malachite was already home when Zoycite woke up, fully dressed and brushing his hair, still moist from his early shower; he barely reacted to the warm pressure of her lips against his cheek and the tenderness of her arms wrapping around his shoulders. That morning, his ‘ice king’ façade was particularly strong… because, with the truth I’m going to reveal, you might leave me before tonight. She sighed and moved to the bathroom, giving him the look that usually meant he was neglecting her, again.

He held her close as they walked to the Hikawa Temple, enjoying the soft flowery scent from her body and the luscious feeling of her skin, even if it was for the last time. Zoycite looked at him and smiled tenderly, gently brushing a silver lock from his face. “Everything’s going to be just fine, love,” she said, and Malachite really hoped it was true.

They all were silent, watching him; on one side, Luna, Artemis, Darien and the girls, and on the other, Jedite Neflyte and Zoycite. For a moment, they all seemed so young to him.

“We have called you to this meeting in order to discuss a most important affair,” Malachite started, hating to be him in charge of speaking “It concerns both our sides, and it might be the only way to stop the entity.” He might have looked quite formal while saying these words because, when he paused and looked around, even his own crew was staring back at him in awe.

The first General sighed and held on to all of his strength to begin his story:

As you might have been told before, a long time ago, there was an Earth Kingdom; what most of you ignore is that, although it was named ‘Earth Kingdom’, it was not really on the surface of the planet, but rather sharing space with it in another dimension. That, for one, explains why no archaeologist has ever found any trace of its existence. The main purpose of the Kingdom was to protect Earth realm from any invader, since humans on the planet were not prepared to defend themselves. It was ruled by a fair and really wise king, whose name I can not remember; this king had a son, Prince Endymion, and we, Jadeite, Nephrite, Zoisite and myself, were his personal guardians; we were known as ‘The Four Heavenly Kings’ and had devoted our lives to protect our prince. What I mean by saying ‘kings’ is that we were all men back then, even Zoisite.

Anyways, Prince Endymion was engaged to marry the prime minister, Beryl, yes, she was much younger at the time and, no, she was not as ugly. Beryl, in fact, was doing quite well in ruling the Kingdom alongside with Endymion’s father; but the King was an old man and his health had diminished on the last months before the Coup d’état. Yet, we all had our best hopes that Endymion would make a good king himself.

The problem was that our dearest Prince had fallen in love with a certain princess from the Moon Kingdom; under any other circumstances, a union of the sort would have been celebrated and even encouraged. But, on the verge of succession and, given the strange policies of Queen Serenity regarding her daughter’s marriage, the issue soon led to a state of crisis when the King died.

Endymion found himself free to do as he pleased and marry Princess Serenity; and, being such a complete ignorant on the Kingdom’s affairs, he took a trip to the Moon to meet Queen Serenity. Prince Endymion, was, to say the least, quite a catch: handsome, intelligent, brave, and some other qualities we all know he has; so, naturally, the Queen was pleased to marry her daughter to him and only gave him one clause for her permission: To marry each one of the Princess’ personal escorts to each one of the members of his guard. Endymion considered it quite an easy task and returned to his Kingdom with the news.

Not one person was happy with the situation: We four considered it treason, for all it was, our prince had sold us out for some foreign Princess; Beryl was heartbroken and humiliated by the sudden break-up of their engagement, and the people were suffering the consequences of an unstable government. Something had to be done, and quickly. The conspiracy between Beryl and I started about a month after the return of Endymion, what we wanted, at first, was to find a way to prevent that marriage from happening; the word ‘overthrow’ was not mentioned until a long time after. We used to secretly meet in her chambers on that initial phase, no other member of the guard knew about our plan and we intended to keep it just between the both of us. Unfortunately, Endymion’s stubbornness was always one step ahead.

He had his personal guard to escort him back to the moon to meet his princess, and the girls we were supposed to marry; this decision was made in such short notice that neither Beryl nor I supposed the trip would be of any importance to our plan. Once again, we were wrong.

The first thing we found upon our arrival to the Moon Kingdom, was that our weddings were already prepared and our brides-to be, not so eager about it themselves. As it was, our prince had tricked us.

Zoisite, was the first one to accept; he acknowledged the intelligence of the Princess of Mercury and was quite content to marry her. Jadeite accepted second, more out of loyalty to our prince than to any feelings for the Princess of Mars. As for Nephrite and myself, we never accepted; Nephrite openly refused, even if he actually liked the Princess of Jupiter, just because he always had these strong beliefs about freedom. As for myself, well, let’s just say that my interests had always been with… another person, other than the Princess of Venus; and it was that, and my own loyalty to Beryl, what led me to return to Earth Kingdom, soon after my marriage with the Princess.

That was the time when we finally discussed the possibility of a Coup d’etat to overthrow Endymion. Nephrite, who had chosen to follow me back to earth, immediately agreed and, together, we convinced Jadeite and Zoisite to our cause. The rest, you all know it: we first took over Earth Kingdom and then trashed the Moon, getting killed in the process. But Queen Serenity had been wise; for our wedding gifts, she gave each one of us a crystal that bound our energy with that of our particular princess: The Guardian Stones. When we were reborn, the places of our births were the same places where our Guardian stone had fallen, and, according to the legend, when we recover it, we will become the ‘Four Heavenly Kings’ once again, and take our place as guardians of the inner planets…

* * * * * * * *

“You’re not saying we must actually marry these girls??” Jedite protested.

“I would rather die, before letting that happen again,” Malachite retorted, clenching his fists tightly and doing his best to hide the burning sensation in his gut. “We must not repeat the same mistakes over and over. Besides, this time things are different.” He looked at Zoycite, who just stared to the ground and bit her lip. Forgive me, love, he thought, noticing the anger boiling inside her green eyes.

“So, we must go and find the stones.” Neflyte nodded thoughtfully. “And what are we supposed to do with them once the mission is over? Because, frankly, I don’t want to leave the Negaverse.”

“I believe the wisest thing will be to destroy them after we get rid of the entity.” While saying this, the grey eyes were fixed on the black cat.

“You can’t do that!” and, as expected, Luna reacted. “Those crystals are your destiny!! And ours!!”

“Malachite’s right,” Darien interrupted her claims. “We must not repeat those mistakes, if it is their wish to destroy the crystals, I will not hold them back; They were supposed to be my personal guard after all!”

“Well, the first thing is to go get them, wherever they might be,” said Artemis to pacify both sides. “Once we got this entity destroyed, we can make a decision on what to do with the crystals.”

“In order to activate their power,” Malachite exchanged looks with the white cat, “both the Sailor Scout and her guardian must retrieve it together.”

“Then, we’re going to travel,” Mina said with a smile. “And we’re going to get those crystals.”

The other Sailors just agreed, as usual, eager to help.

“But, there’s something I don’t get,” asked Lita. “How come you expected to go on without telling us the whole story after the training mission?”

“The training mission…” Malachite sighed. “The training mission was an arrangement between Queen Beryl, Artemis and me: At the time, we had no idea of how you five were going to turn out; all we knew was that we had to avoid any attempt to force an alliance like it was done in the past. When we got notice of Sailor V, we immediately established contact with Artemis; and, after many negotiations, we got to an understanding; that was, if we trained you well enough to resist any attack from a real enemy, the story of the Guardians would never be mentioned to you and we could keep our freedom. A faultless set up was designed, that would position us as your enemies and made you believe you were actually fighting for your lives; with that, you would have no other choice but to learn how to defend yourselves. The system we created was so perfect, that we took advantage of it to train our younger troops as well; giving the result of two Generals knowing what was really going on and two Generals actually believing that it was a real mission. With that, it was impossible for you to notice the lie, and you fought hard and well, and so did Jedite and Zoycite: in the end we had two soldiers ready to face the worst and five, fully developed, Sailor Scouts.”

“But eventually, we had to find out the truth…” Amy commented.

“Yes, but it was unintentional, and we broke our part of the deal as well.” Neflyte smiled sadly. “We were not supposed to ever be seen by you again, or any of your friends for that matter.”

“Well, the important thing is that we’re all on the same team now,” claimed Serena. “And if we work together, we can beat whatever comes our way.”

“So, when are we leaving?” Raye asked, looking at Jedite.

“As soon as possible, tomorrow would be enough time for us to prepare,” Malachite finished “For now, I suggest we end this meeting.”

* * * * * * * *

Jedite was leaning on the archway when they walked out of the temple together, yet, quite spaced out from each other; Zoycite just gave him a half smile when she passed by, while Malachite simply ignored his presence. The blond General just sighed and walked back to his room; the way things were, his dear friend would be single before the week was over.

He tried to relax by playing his saxophone; music had always been his passion, it provided a safe way to escape from reality. And going back to that place in Mumbai was something he didn’t want to face for the moment. He was in the middle of his favourite blues, when he noticed the girl standing on his doorway; there was so much worry in her big purple eyes, that her expression suddenly reminded him of a child who just had been lectured. He laid down his sax and reached out his hand to her. Raye just ran to his side and hugged him tightly.

“It’s O.K.” Jedite reassured the girl, stroking her raven hair.

“Jedite?” she asked shyly. “Do you like me?”

“Of course I do.” He gently held her face, tilting it to look at him. “What kind of silly question is that?”

Raye just smiled.

“We’re friends now, aren’t we?” The blond man held her close. Please, Raye, don’t get any ideas… he begged silently.

* * * * * * * *

Molly stared at her boyfriend, sick of hearing the same story over and over; at first it had been Serena telling her to go talk to her mother, to call the police, not to be afraid for Sailor Moon would always protect her… Like I haven’t figured it all out yet, she thought. Of course she knew Serena’s little secret, she had known it for about two years. It had all been a matter of putting two and two together; the hair, the way she always knew when to go rescue her and, of course, the events on that fateful night. That had been the main reason why she decided to go her separate way when they finished junior-high. And, now, her boyfriend, Kelvin was giving her the exact same lecture.

“… We don’t know if it’s him or just some madman, you might get hurt,” he insisted, while she just silently took another sip from her juice.

“Aren’t you jealous?” she finally asked. “I mean, there’s a small chance that the man of my dreams has come back from the dead.”

“Of course not, Molly.” Kelvin gave her a tender smile. “I know you love me; that’s why you’re here with me, and your happiness comes first anyways…”

She just smiled back at him. Such a sweet boy…she thought, gently holding his hand under the table. But her mind wandered back in time to the night when she tried to steal the gem from her mother’s safe; she had been so sure about her love back then, that she was even willing to betray her own blood for him. Would I do the same for you, baby? she silently asked to the boy in front of her. Do I love you that much?

“He used to live up the hill, didn’t he?” Kelvin asked.

“I didn’t know for sure,” Molly sighed, not liking the way the conversation was turning. “He never, actually, invited me over there.”

“I’ll go there,” he said, and she realized he wasn’t a boy anymore. “If he lives and he wants you back, you’ll be free to go; but if not, well, at least you’ll still have his memory... like you always had.”

“There’s no need for you to do that!” the red-head cried. “It might be dangerous.”

“But I need to do it.” Kelvin squeezed her hand. “It’s been four years since we’re together, and every single day I can feel you wishing I was him. And I can’t be him; first of all I’m like ten years younger, I’m not rich and, Heaven knows, I’m not even half as handsome. But I love you as much or even more; but I guess that’s not worth it to you.”

She just turned her gaze to the floor and released his hand.

“You’re worth a dozen of him, Kelvin,” Molly whispered. But he’s the one that I want.

* * * * * * * *

Zoycite ran a hand through her hair, doing her best to hold back the tears. Just when she thought things were starting to get better, that their relationship was actually going somewhere, Malachite had to crush it all with such a shocking revelation. And it wasn’t being a man on her past life what bothered her; it was the fact that, in six years of sleeping together, he had never even bothered to talk to her about that. “I loved you back then as much as I love you now,” was all he said before she walked away.

“Good to know I’ve always been your bedroom toy,” she answered.

Not knowing where to go, she walked trough the park trying to calm down. Good thing it was still morning, and she had plenty of time to worry about where to spend the night; for one thing was certain, this time she wasn’t going back to his bed.

The female General sat down by the lake, not noticing the man who had appeared behind her.

“Mademoiselle Claudel,” said the familiar voice of Ace Darcy.

She turned around and smiled politely, a little bit ashamed that he had to see her face all swollen from crying.

“Officer Darcy.” Her voice came out a little raspy. “What a surprise…”

Ace sat down beside her and took a deck of cards from his pocket.

“I’m off duty today,” he said with a smile. “I was just taking a walk, but now that I found you, would you like a card reading?”

“A what?” Zoycite chuckled in amusement. “Don’t tell me you’re a fortune teller on your spare time.”

“Could be.” The man winked at her. “Besides, if you’ll excuse my nosiness, you look in bad need for some cheering.”

Zoycite just sighed as he handed her the deck.

“Scramble them seven times, then place your left hand on top of the deck and concentrate,” he said. She had never been much of a believer; but there was something incredibly familiar about that man. She played with the cards; the little game was making its purpose of distracting her. After a few moments of concentration, she handed the deck back to Ace, who placed some cards before him.

“Let me see.” He narrowed his eyes a little. “There’s a man, a foreign man, someone from a distant land… Arabian, perhaps?”

“Turkish,” Zoycite replied, more entertained than surprised. “From Istanbul.”

“Hmmm, it says you’ve been together for a while.” Ace rubbed his temples as if he was concentrating very hard “And it says that he loves you very very much.”

“Now, that’s a complete lie,” Zoycite sulked. “The only one he loves is himself and maybe, a little bit, Nef… His best friend.”

“Really?” he asked “Cause, frankly my dear, the cards say that he’s completely in love with you, just that he can’t show it very often; it says he’s a very shy person.”

She just sighed and shook her head.

“The cards say that he’s the one for you,” Ace insisted.

“What? You work for him or something?” she pouted.

“I’m just telling you your fortune.” He smiled sadly at her, as if he had a pain of his own. “Most people, though, just believe what they want to believe.”

“He keeps on hiding things from me,” Zoycite said, glad to let it all out. “I don’t think he sees me as his partner, I feel more like his accessory.”

“You’re not.” Ace looked straight into her eyes. “Believe me, you’re not.”

* * * * * * * *

Darien walked home by Serena’s side. Destroy the crystals… change their destiny… regain their freedom…Thoughts were echoing in his head. Why shouldn’t they have a choice? Why couldn’t all of them decide their own destiny? Why didn’t HE have any choice himself? Not that he disliked the idea of spending eternity with the nice girl by his side; it was that sometimes he wondered what would have happened if things had been any different, and, as much as he wanted not to think of it, his mind travelled back to a conversation he had four years before.

He had just finished his training in the Negaverse and was ready to go back to earth. The decision of training him separately had given Darien a sense of confidence that he wouldn’t have gotten other wise; during those six months his strength and skill had increased considerably. When the mission was over, he had convinced Queen Beryl to let him stay for another couple of months; at the time, he had been watching over the scouts disguised as the ‘Moonlight Knight’ and getting an extra training, avoiding his destiny for a little while. But all good things come to an end, and it had been the night before he was forced to return:

“Why?” he had asked Malachite, who had been his trainer for the past months. “Why won’t you come with me and become the guardians? It’s your destiny!”

“Says who?” the older man retorted.

“The legend! You must be by the side of the sailor Soldiers... Just as I must be with the Moon Princess.”

“Even if it is true, even if we are bound to become guardians eventually,” the silver-haired General appeared to be illuminated by some kind of inspiration, “We will not surrender that easy, we will stand and fight it until the end… Besides, I do not believe in absolute destiny.”