The sun began to set over Mega-Tokyo.  The city shone in the
sun, clean and happy for the first time in its entire life and perhaps
for the final time as well.  Three figures floated in a triad over the
city.  The youngest spoke, "Was it worth it?  Only a single
generation are they spared."

        The middle one said, "Many that now live will die in peace
before doom comes upon this world for a time.  It is enough."

         The oldest spoke, gazing down at the heart of the city.
"Because this has come to pass, some shall live where otherwise
virtually all would die.  Destiny has returned to its proper banks.  
What must be, will be."

          The middle one spoke, closing the topic, "I suspect most of
them could care less about destiny being restored and are just glad
to be alive."

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

Dance of Shiva Chapter 19:  Ad Astra

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

      Madoka, Ryu, and Manami stared out at the city.  "What the hell
WAS that?"  Madoka muttered.

      Ryu lay on the ground, his eyes wide.  "Incredible."

      "Thanks for the brilliant analysis, brother,"  Manami said.

      "I wonder if this means I've been chosen to be a prophet."  He
continued staring up in the sky.

      Manami blinked.  "WHAT are you talking about?"  She and
Madoka both stared at Ryu.

      Ryu rolled over and looked up at them.  "I got kissed by God.
That has to mean SOMETHING."

      "It means you're going out of your mind!"  Manami said.  This is
going to be worse than the time he was convinced he was the
chosen one of the Burundi-Hachis, she thought.  "I'm sure God has
better taste in men than to pick you."  I can't believe I said that, she
thought.

      This was, of course, the cue for another pointless sibling
argument.

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

       Noa was the first of the people in the park to awaken, perhaps
because the inside of a labor isn't a very comfortable place to sleep.
She looked out the window and saw a green and pleasant park all
around her.  Where on God's green earth am I?  She remembered a
most fantastic battle, where she had...no, that couldn't possibly be
real, she thought.  Me, transforming into Ingraman?  That was just a
dream.

       There was something in her lap.  It was a long visor attached to
a rod, with an inscription, 'The Warrior and her Weapon are one.
Speak the word and it shall be done.'  It had been no dream.

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

       Kyosuke stared at his body.  He had the vague feeling he ought
to be a lot more mangled.  As it was, only the tendencies of large
medical staffs towards bureaucracy were keeping him from just
getting up and leaving.  The rest of his team who had been hurt
were equally sitting around while doctors and nurses went nuts trying
to concoct a scientific explanation for the sudden healing of
everyone in the hospital.

       There was a flash of light, and his wife appeared.  "It's over,
dear."

       "What happened?"

       "I have no idea, although..."

       "Although what?"

       "Let me tell you about what I saw at the reactor."

       Most people wouldn't have believed it, but then most people
have had a life in which the hand of God would be abnormal.
Kyosuke was almost surprised this hadn't happened earlier.

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

      Out in the woods, the remains of the Kasuga/Patlabor strike
force sat down in their training grounds and sighed.  "Do you think
Madoka-san is okay?"  Umi asked for the fourth time.  "She ought to
be back by now."

      "We're not turning radioactive, and we didn't see Mega-Tokyo
blow sky-high recently, so I assume she's okay,"  Ohta said.  "My
poor labor...abandoned inside a nuclear reactor.  Are you SURE she
couldn't have brought our labors too?"

      "Even Kyosuke-sama, Madoka-san, and Hiyama-san together
would have a hard time moving both our labours this far.  I'd have
killed myself if I tried to teleport so far with something that big.
Madoka-san had too many people to move."  Umi laid down on the 
ground and gave out a great sigh.  "Is battle always this exhausting?"

       Clancy listened quietly.  If we didn't keep having those run-ins
with gargoyles, I'd have had a lot harder time adjusting to all this.
Even so, this is still bizarre.  I hope John is okay.  Her cellular rang, and 
soon she found out the answer to her question.

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

       Nene slept quietly under a tree as Pluto and Hikaru awoke in
the park.  It was strewn with sleeping people.  Noa had awakened 
in Alphonse, but she was the only one to precede them in
awakening.  Ryouko was zonked on a tree branch.  Wasyuu was
slumped up against the same tree, along with Sasami, Tenchi, and
Youshou.  Sylvie was passed out on a park bench and Anri was
curled up next to the bench.  Meylia and Priss were sprawled out on
the grass and the many Sailor Senshi were strewn about them,
along with their loves.

      Hikaru and Pluto had a good reason to awaken before most of
the others.  They were in the fountain, which displeased both of
them.  They rapidly scrambled out.  Hikaru used her TK to dry
herself off.  That this further doused Pluto was of course, a bonus.

      Pluto said, "You could have done that without getting me wetter,
you know."

      Hikaru clapped her hands.  "It was fate."

      There was a flash of light and a woman appeared, dressed in
garb similar to Sailor Pluto, but with short blonde hair, her staff
tipped with a large purple amethyst.  "Come.  I need you."

       Hikaru blinked.  "Who are you?"

       The woman smiled.  "Sailor Pluto."

       Hikaru blinked again.  "She's Sailor Pluto."

       Pluto laughed.  "I am the last of the Elder Senshi and one of the
two Eldest.  But even I shall pass in time.  Sailor Pluto is dead; long
live Sailor Pluto."

       Hikaru looked between them and cocked her head.  "Is this a
Time Lord thing?"

       The blonde Pluto laughed.  "We'll be appearing on FOX next
season."

      Hikaru blinked

      Pluto sighed.  "That was forty years ago and a different country."

      "Hey, I got the joke."

     "You MADE the joke."

      "Hmph.  Spoilsport.  Anyway, we need to go."

      "For the sake of those your humor might otherwise harm, I will
come."

      The blonde Pluto sighed.  "Have a nice day, Dr. Hiyama."  She
turned to Pluto.  "Ready?"

       Hikaru said, "So, will I have the displeasure of seeing you
again?"

       Pluto smiled.  "I could tell you..." She deliberately trailed off
as she began to glow.

       "But she never tells anyone anything,"  the blonde Pluto finished
for her.  "You should know that by now."  They both vanished.

       Hikaru smiled faintly.  "Indeed I do."  She turned and looked at
all the snoozing people.  "I should let sleeping dogs lie, I suppose,
but first..."  She vanished without benefit of special effects.

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

      Leon shook his head.  Something weird had just happened.  He
looked over at Daley, then realized he had been clonked by a falling
beam, along with Mihoshi.  He dimly remembered the beam was
Mihoshi's fault, though he wasn't sure how.  Then again, maybe this
was just habit kicking in.  They seemed unhurt, though.  The whole
building had gone silent, except for this loud breathing, which turned
out to be Kiyone nearby.

        Kiyone said quietly, "It's over."

        "What's over?"

       "The battle.  Didn't you see it?"

        Leon nodded dumbly.  Something had filled the building,
maybe the city, perhaps the world.  It was a feeling he'd only felt in
snatches before--being hugged by his mother, his first motorcycle
ride, making love with Priss, standing on top of a mountain he had
climbed and looking down on the Kanto plain.  It was exhilarating
and soothing at the same time.  The feeling was fading now, but he
knew something had intervened to end the battle.  "You know,
Mihoshi looks so much like a cute little girl when she sleeps."

        Kiyone nodded.  "There have been times I've wanted to
smother her in her sleep, but then I see her like that, and I know she
means well.  She's just a child, and maybe she always will be.  She
has all the strengths and flaws of a child.  I feel more like her mother
than her partner sometimes, but in the end, she always comes
through for me."  She paused.  "Though sometimes I go through hell
in the interval."

       "Come on, let's get our partners woken up and try and find the
Chief.  If he's alive.  I wonder what he'll say when he sees you."

       "Hmm.  Maybe I should drop by Accounting and pick up my last
paycheck too."  She laughed.  "Probably they'd be even slower than
usual."

       They both laughed.

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

        Goto floated in a starry void.  Where he was, he had no idea.  I
wonder if I'm dead, he thought.  This could be an elaborate
hallucination.  A woman had brought him here, but then she had
vanished.  She had returned with another woman, then vanished
again.  He turned to the woman.  "And who might you be?"

       "My name is Katherine Madigan."  She looked closely at him.
"Goto."

       He smiled.  "You almost make me feel famous."  He looked
around.  "You wouldn't happen to know where we are?"

       "I think Blondie plans to make us an offer we can't refuse."  She
paused.  "Were you behind the 'GENOM Takeover' broadcast?"

       "I don't have the technical skills for such a thing."

       She frowned.  "In other words, you got someone else to do it for
you."

        He smiled.  "Nice to see you are as intelligent as I had been
told."

       "Don't patronize me."  Madigan frowned at Goto.

       "Patronizing the young is a prerogative of the old, and I feel old.
This was my last adventure."  He sighed.  

        There was a flash of light and two women appeared.  Both
wore the uniform of Sailor Pluto, but one was tall with long dark hair,
the other short with a blonde pageboy haircut.  The taller and Elder
Pluto said, "You shouldn't have brought them both to the same
place."

        "I seem to remember someone else was supposed to pick up
the first one, but didn't."

        Silence.

         "Anyway."  The Elder Pluto took Goto by the hand.  "We have
much to discuss."  They vanished.

         Kate Madigan made a mental note for future reference about
these two squabbling.  "So, Godmother, what's the deal I can't
refuse?"

         The younger Pluto smiled.  "I have need of someone with your
skills and talents.  If you accept, you will never see the time of your
birth again."

         "And if I refuse?"

         "I send you back to your own time and you try to explain to
your bosses how you were the only person who got out of GENOM
Tower-Japan alive and explain what happened to Quincy."

         "I have no idea what happened to Quincy."

         "Do you REALLY think they'll believe that?  This assumes, of
course, that you don't go down in the wreck of the GENOM ship as
80% of its assets are nationalized by various nations or have to be
sold to pay the massive debts GENOM will have to rack up to even
start to try to rebuild.  Boomer sales are certainly NOT going to be
looking up."

         "So where AM I going?"

         "They call it the Crystal Millenium.  The year by your
contemporary reckoning would be about 3990 AD or so..."

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

      Far away, in the park, everyone else began to moan and wake
up.  Reunions, meetings, and embraces spread like wildfire.  High
above the park, in space, Aeka blinked, trying to understand what
she had just felt.  Was that a vision of my husband?  Am I
dreaming?  And what's happened to my sister?

       The com screen clicked on.  It was Tsunami.  "Come down to
the park, sister."

       "Park?  What park?"

       Sasami smiled.  "The one where GENOM used to be."

        Aeka nodded and headed for the park..

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

     "So you will need a police chief?  And what do I get out of this?"  Goto 
stood casually in the grey misty void, wishing he had a chair.  Suddenly, 
he DID have a chair, which was rather disturbing.  He examined it 
carefully, not trusting it to refrain from vanishing back to wherever it 
came from.

      "The truth.  That is what you have sought, is it not?  Do you wish to 
truly understand the web and the spider you have been fighting?  And it 
will be a pleasant place to live out your last years. "  Pluto's voice was 
soothing.  "If you prefer, I can return you to the world.  I can find 
another, but I would rather it be you.  None of us are trained in police 
procedures.  We are warriors and healers, not policemen."

         Goto considered his options.  If he went back, there would be 
people gunning for him.  And the riot...had it really been necessary?  
The more he thought about it, the more he was displeased with his 
choice.  GENOM had deserved destruction, but still...  "Why me?"

         "Because you are a very intelligent man.  Because you can be 
plucked out of time without changing the timeline.  Because I admire 
your skills.  We have other options, but I believe you are the best we 
could find for this task.  It will not be easy; the building of Crystal Tokyo 
will take work, and at first, there will be much work for the police until 
our plans come to fruition.  But it will be work of which you can be 
proud."

         "All right.  I'll do it," he decided.  He wasn't normally one for 
impulse decisions, but his curiosity was drawing him onward.  To 
Crystal Tokyo.  To the future.  "So what year are we going to?"

        "2992 AD.  Which will one day be known as Serenity Year 1.  Let us 
go..."

         They vanished in a flash of light. 

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

        Madoka sat quietly by Kyosuke and held his hand.  "I'm just so
glad you're alive and well."

        "Do you know if Hikaru is okay?"

         "I don't know.  I haven't seen her at all today."

        "I'm just fine,"  cut in a voice.  Hikaru appeared and hugged
Kyosuke, who could still manage a blush.  "My EMP idea worked
pretty well."

        "You nearly made the fusion reactor melt down, though."

         Hikaru paled.  "Fusion reactor?  There's a fusion reactor inside
Mega-Tokyo?"

         Madoka nodded.

         Hikaru sat down hard.  "Damnit, I forgot about that thing!  I
nearly destroyed the entire city."  There was horror in her voice.

         "Well, it all worked out for the best,"  Kyosuke said.  "Don't
blame yourself for what didn't happen."

         "Z and X are dead.  That...That's finally over."

        "Good,"  Madoka said.  "You got your revenge."

        "You killed them?"

         "Officer Shinohara duelled X to the death and I could feel Z
die...I guess the three beings were all sort of connected to each
other, parts of a greater whole."

         "So it's all over,"  Kyosuke said.

         "Here's to happily ever after!"  Madoka said

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

       Nameless and bereft of the structure that had given it order and
purpose, IT floated in subspace.  IT lived to destroy, to kill, to
unleash the thousand fears and million nightmares that had given it
birth.  A hundred thousand names fought for control within its mind,
and IT simply floated, an amorphous ever-changing mass in search
of something strong enough for IT to join with.

       Bits of it drifted away, sundering from the mass and siphoning
off into the many beings that dwelt in subspace and lived on the
power of dreams and nightmares.  They took on a darker tone, but
then those attuned to its power were already dark in nature.

       Under normal conditions, IT might have wandered for millenia
until something arose to give IT a new birth.  But conditions were not
normal.  SHIVA had been a creation of science, a machine.
Machines can and usually are duplicated.  Walyn had been too wise
to entrust his revenge to a single machine.  The first law of
computers is to ALWAYS make backups.

        Somewhere in subspace, KALI came on line.  Its emergent
mind became a beacon for IT, which began to drift towards the
being.  It would take years for the mindless IT to find ITs way to
KALI, but then....a new dance would begin with a new dancer.

        For the dance of destruction goes ever on as does its
competitor, the dance of life, two partners joined in the great spiral
of time.

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

       Within that spiral, another dancer stood with her new
companions and friends.  Linna was wrapt in flames of joy.  For a
time, she stood with Urd, Belldandy, and Skuld, and they simply
smiled at one another.  Words could not express what they felt, so
they used no words.  Finally, though, a thought took her and she had
to speak.  "So what do I do for an encore?"

        They all laughed heartily.  Finally, Urd said, "You have three
choices.  First, you could choose to stay with us, joining us in our
duties.  You are our sister now, born in earth, cleansed in water,
passed through the fire, and dancing in the wind.  Long have we
awaited you, and joyfully we would welcome you to stay."

         Belldandy spoke next.  "Or you could return to your friends.
They too have need of you and would welcome you.  Your abilities
would be limited, though much greater than they were before your
rebirth, for we are forbidden to use our full power upon the Earth,
except under special circumstances."

        Skuld was the third.  "Or, if you chose, you could become a
normal human once more.  To be one of us brings heavy duties as
well as powers.  Not everyone wants such power.  The choice is
yours."

         Linna didn't even need to think about it.  "I think I'll take
Belldandy's option.  I'm not ready to say farewell to the Earth yet."
She paused.  "You will be able to come visit me, right?"

         Belldandy smiled.  "Of course.  You'll watch over my children
for me, won't you?  I..."  Her voice saddened for a moment.  "I
couldn't even say goodbye to them."

       "Of course I will."  Linna suddenly realized she knew who all of
Belldandy's children were and where to find them.  They had shared
much when they had performed the great rite.  "So how do I go
back?"

        Skuld said, "I'll take you.  I'll come back later and we'll figure
out what your best travel method is."

        Belldandy removed an earring from her ear and pinned it to
Linna's ear.  "I won't be needing this.  This is a limiter earring.  It
will keep your powers at a low level.  Don't remove it without orders 
from
Kamisama."

        "Or a good excuse,"  Urd said.

        "This is why Urd is STILL only Second Class,"  Skuld said.

         Urd humphed.

         Skuld took Linna's hand and suddenly, Linna found herself
rising out of the fountain in the new park.  Everyone was milling
about, and no one even noticed the two of them.  Skuld smiled,
hugged Linna and vanished, dropping into the water and out of sight.
Linna swiftly realized how cold the water was and leaped out of it.
"Iya!"

        Many people turned.  Linna spotted Priss and ran over to her.
"Nene, get over here!"  she ordered.

        Priss just stared at Linna.  "You're alive.  You're really alive.
In fact, you..."  She stared at Linna's forehead.

        Linna smiled.  "No more inferiority complexes for me, thank
you."

        Priss hugged Linna tightly as Nene ran over.  "What, what?"
Nene asked.

        Linna dragged Nene into the hug.  "Where's Celia?"

        Nene pointed over to one knot of people.  Tenchi, Ryouko,
Aeka, Celia, Sasami, Meylia, and Macky were all talking to each
other by one tree.  "Yo, CELIA!  GET YER ROYAL BUTT OVER
HERE!"  Nene laughed.  "I'll bet she thinks you said that."

        Celia started, turned, and saw Linna.  She ran over.
"Linna...you're really alive?"

        "Yeah.  Gotta find a new boyfriend, though."

         Celia laughed and joined the group hug.  "We've won.  It's
finally over...the battle we've fought all these years."  She looked
around.  "Nene...was that you?  I felt this presence and..."

        Nene smiled shyly.  "I bet I really confused Ryu."  She laughed.
"Yeah, it was me.  I can hardly believe it was all real.  I just wish my
boyfriend was here."

        Ryu and Manami popped out of nowhere.  "Nene...Umm, I
need to talk to you."

        "Please tell this idiot he was NOT kissed by God, okay?"
Manami said.

         "You weren't kissed by God,"  Nene said.

         "If they throw me down the well, like they did to Jeremiah, I
can just teleport out,"  Ryu mused.  "Not that I want to be a prophet,
but..."

         "See!  Even Nene agrees with me!"  Manami said.

         "You were kissed by a goddess,"  Nene said.

         Ryu nodded.  "Right.  That leaves a lot of potential divine
beings..."

         Nene walked over to Ryu and wrapped her arms around him.
"The only goddess I want to see you worshipping is me."  She kissed
him, and soon he realized he wasn't going to have to start wearing
sackcloth and ashes.

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

       Jonny sat quietly in the living room of the Quest family Florida
base, watching CNN.  Strange reports were coming in from all over
the world, inexplicable healings, repairings, fires going out for no
reason, sudden truces.  It was an outbreak of peace on a global
scale, fragile, but a single moment in which the world took its
mandated five minute break from the usual round of disasters.

         There was an outrushing of air behind him and two familiar
hands settled down onto his shoulders.  "Hi, darling."  Hikaru kissed
him.

         He laughed and pulled her over the couch and down on top of
him.  "So what have you been up to THIS time?"

         She sagged a bit.  "The bomb...I didn't think about
how...about...Mega-Tokyo has a fusion reactor and..."

        "..."  He hadn't thought about it either.  "Hikaru-chan, I didn't
think of it either and..."

        She began to cry and cry and cry without ceasing.

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

        Kanuka McClaine raised her glass of wine, "To Chief Goto.
May his spirit rest in peace.  We shall not forget."  She, her
husband, Asuma, Noa, Shige, Hiromi, Takeo, and Ohta were dining
at Noa's restaurant, now fixed thanks to...the Miracle, as some
people called it.  It had fixed everything, but it didn't bring back Goto
from wherever he had vanished to.  From what little they had been
able to piece together, he had probably been blown to bits by a
missile into his hotel room.

        Ohta raised his glass, "And to all those who have fallen in
pursuit of their duty.  We will never forget."  They all took a sip.  The
meeting was mixed with joy and sadness.  They had triumphed, but
at a cost.  No one had ever died in the old days.  Some of them
were dead now, and their leader was gone.  He had shaped and
reshaped their lives in ways big and small.  It was a time to
remember him and the times they had spent together.

         John McClaine listened quietly.  He was an outsider, and he
knew it.  He would never quite fully be a part of his wife's old circle
of friends.  Each of them had developed new interests, new
connections, a new life, but for all of them it was rooted in the
experiences they had shared, experiences he had not had.  And yet,
it was a beautiful thing to watch.  Most of his old friends were dead
now.  Something had happened to him in his past.  After adulthood,
his life had started to become a death curse, it seemed.  He had lost
his first wife, his children in yet another terrorist disaster.  Every
vacation became a disaster.  Kanuka had pulled him out of all that.
She had changed his life and made him want to live again.  If being
with her meant listening to people talk about things he didn't know
about or understand for hours, praising a man he barely knew, it was
a small price to pay.  The kids will never believe this story, though,
he thought.

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

     Washuu put down the glass of Altairian wine.  She and Youshou
were seated in her lab's special film viewing room, with floating
plush chairs, each with its own wet bar and a stadium sized screen.
The screen flickered and turned black.  "Now you see where the plan
for that trial chamber came from.  My uncle designed those tribunal
rooms for the Third Galactic Empire."

       Youshou thought for a moment.  "I suppose you must have a lot
of valuable historical information and films and pictures and other
things stashed away in your collection."

        Wasyuu smiled.  "What will you give me for them?"

         Youshou laughed.  "I'll talk to Father...if he doesn't kill me on
my return."

        Wasyuu sighed.  "My one regret from all this is I never did find
out what I most wanted to learn."

         Youshou cocked his head.  "What?"

       She paused for a moment, then said, "Shiva may have had one
of my relatives in captivity and I'll never know now, unless he shows
up.  He's probably dead.  One of Shiva's creations was possessing
him...if that was him."

        "The fellow who looked like Mihoshi?  Wallace, I think?"

         She nodded.  "Yes."

        "He did look rather like your son might have, when he grew up."

        Wasyuu started.  "How did you..."

        Youshou smiled.  "Like you, I always know more than I let on."

        "Like how you and Tsunami planned for you to be 'trapped' on
the Earth for 700 years."

        Youshou nodded before he realized he'd just been suckered.
"How did you find THAT out?"

        Wasyuu smiled, "That would be telling."

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

       Meiko Morisato sat quietly at her computer waiting for the
phone to ring.  She was working on a report, but really she was
waiting for some news of her parents.  Her sister Keiko didn't know
anything, but if Mom hadn't been the one who teleported her into
Meiko's bed, then who was?  It had been two days since the Great
Tokyo Riot, but she still hadn't heard anything.  The cops had no
proof of their death, none of her relatives knew anything...but they
hadn't called either.  Deep in her heart, she feared the worst.

        There was a knock on the door.  She got up, fear warring with
hope in her heart.  There was a woman at the door, dressed in a
rather nice business dress.  The headband marred the effect
somewhat, though.

         Meiko said, "Um, hello?"

         The woman smiled sadly.  "Hi, are you Morisato Meiko?"

          She nodded.  "Yes."

         "I'm your aunt, Yamazaki Linna.  Your mother and father sent
me.  Can I come in?  I have some news for you."

         Many people would have been nonplussed when someone
they had never seen before showed up claiming to be their aunt...but
then most people haven't seen their relatives turn into turnips and
bunny rabbits among other things.  Meiko invited her in.

***********

        Chief Todo finished writing out his resignation papers.  He had
had enough.  When it came down to the crunch, I folded, he thought.
Not that many people could have done any better...I'm too old for
this.  I don't want to spend the rest of my life looking for the
boogeyman over my shoulder.  Something entirely bizarre happened
two days ago, and I don't know if I really want to find out.

         He looked around his cubicle in one of the Government's
office buildings.  With ADPolice HQ totally trashed, they had moved
him here.  He knew they were planning to sacrifice him to the
masses.  ADPolice takes the blame again.  Too bad we can't take
the credit for...whatever happened.  The Miracle.  There were
reports of everything from broken toasters fixing themselves to
people rising from the dead.  He could almost believe that last part.
Lieutenant Yamano had gotten her leg blown off right in front of him.
Two minutes later...whatever happened happened, and then she had
a new leg.

         There was a knock on the door.  He yelled, "Come on in."

         The door opened and Romanova Nene walked in.  "Are you
really going to resign?"

        Chief Todo blinked.  "Has someone been reading my mind?
This was supposed to be a secret."

       "Leon's got a big mouth, I guess."

        How the hell did Leon find out?  I don't REMEMBER telling
him, Todo thought.  "The ADPolice are a wreck and I don't have the
strength to rebuild this organization.  I'm too old for this and I've had
enough.  I feel like someone's been playing games with me, and I
don't want to play if I don't know the rules.  With no clue as to what's
really going on, I just...I just want out of all this mess."

         Nene nodded.  "Do you REALLY want to know what's going
on, Chief?"

        He cocked his head.  "You know something about all this,
Romanova?"

       "I was part of it.  Some of this will sound crazy, but I think you
deserve to know."

       "Right now, I'd almost be willing to believe Leon was the tooth
fairy.  'Sock it to me.'"  The last sentence was in English as he
quoted a show that had been old when he was young.

       Nene cocked her head.  "Eh?  What does that mean?  What
about socks?"

        He laughed.  "Tell it like it is."

        "Okay, it all started with this alien scientist..."

        Chief Todo never did figure out if Nene had gone mad or if this 
was just a practical joke.   Or if it was somehow the truth.  He soon 
decided he didn't really want to know for sure.  Life was much simpler
after his resignation.  And that was what he decided he really wanted.  

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

       The funeral was over.  Kyousuke stood and gazed upon the
gravestones.  Every one of them was an accusation.  The moment of their
death was burned into his mind.  Over and over, he kept thinking there had
to have been some way to prevent their deaths.  He had been so stressed
out that he didn't think about using his time travel power at the time,
and now...he was afraid to.  Afraid he'd just make it worse; that power
never quite worked right for him.  

       Madoka stood by him, a hand on his arm, silently supporting him.
She wouldn't accuse him, he knew.  She was too busy accusing herself.  The
family hadn't condemned him for the deaths; everyone knew what they were
risking.  But he just couldn't stop.  He didn't know how.  He couldn't be
as callous about it as some of the other survivors seemed to be; he'd seen
war, but it had been different, probably because he had been a war
correspondent, not a warrior himself.  

      He nearly fell down from shock when a hand landed on his shoulder.
Whoever it was had approached so silently that he hadn't even suspected
they existed, nor could he feel their mind.  As he got older, he had begun
to sense people without having to see them; he'd never really gotten good
at telepathy, but he did have the mind sense that was part of it.  

      Spinning around, he saw a man he hadn't expected to see.  His name
was Jonathon Quest, Hikaru's husband, who Kyousuke had never gotten along
with.  He didn't need psychic powers to know why; Jonathon (Kyousuke never
thought of him as Jonny no matter how many times Hikaru called him that)
was jealous of his old relationship with Hikaru.  Why he was so silly when
it had been decades ago, Kyousuke had no clue.  It wasn't a burning,
raging jealousy, but it tended to come out at bad times.  Like every time
they met.  "I need to talk to you."  His voice was serious, different than
it usually was when they met.

       "About?"  

       The brief glance at Madoka was enough of a clue for her, though not
for Kyousuke.  She said, "I'm going to go see how Manami and Kurumi are
doing.  I'll be back in a few minutes."  She walked away quietly before
Kyousuke could protest.

       "Hikaru borrowed an EMP device from me for use in the...recent
events.  Now, she's feeling guilty about it because it likely contributed
to the near melt down of the fusion reactor here in Mega-Tokyo.  I'm not
feeling too good myself because I didn't think of that either, but I'm not
the problem.  She's feeling very guilty, and..."

       I know how she feels, he thought.  She remembered that at the
hospital, but I...She left before I really started thinking about
everything that had happened.  "You want me to come cheer her up."

       Jonathon looked embarrassed.  "Or something.  She's feeling
pointlessly guilty.  You can't know the future.  Everyone makes mistakes;
the important thing is to admit them and deal with the consequences.  Not
to just...wallow in it.  And she's wallowing, and when Hikaru wallows,
I've NEVER been able to get her to stop."  He sighed.  "There aren't too
many people that Hikaru will listen to when she's in a funk, but I was
hoping that you and Madoka would come and talk to her."  His voice was a
little strained now, and he kept looking at anything but Kyousuke.  "She
needs her friends."

       "I'm not exactly a source of cheer right now,"  Kyousuke said
quietly, glancing back at the freshly dug graves.

      "Well, maybe your wife will feel up to it," Jonathon said.  He
turned and walked over to Madoka, leaving Kyousuke to stare at the
tombstones.

      He's right, Kyousuke thought.  We don't know the future, but I
just...The faces swam into his vision.  Each of them laughing, what they
had looked like as children.  He shook his head, trying to drive the
images away.  Hikaru, you have no reason to feel guilty, he thought.  No
one died because of any mistakes you made.  Of course, she must be feeling
the exact same thing right now, he thought.  

     He glanced over at Jonathon, who was talking quietly with Manami and
Kurumi and Madoka.  Why didn't Hikaru come with him, he wondered.  Is she
that broken up?  She was, he realized.  Hikaru was like that; very
emotional.  If he felt this bad...

     I can't help the dead, but I can help the living, he thought.  He
walked over to Jonathon and said, "Let's go."

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

       Aeka and Manami sat on a bench in the small park inside Tokyo
University.  "I'm sorry I tried to strangle you, daughter.  I just...I
just..."  She twitched.  "Funaho-san did too good a job of teaching
me etiquette."

         Manami laughed faintly.  "You did a very good job of passing it
on to me.  This would never have happened if I hadn't come to
college on Earth."

        "Well, we all do wild and crazy things when we're young.  Some
of the things we all did in college...If Father found out, he'd nail us
upside down on the outside of the Palace for a week."

        Manami blinked.  "Like what?"

        A head suddenly stuck itself up through the bench.  It was
Ryouko.  "Like the time she snuck Tenchi into our dorm after visiting
hours were over and we had to dress him up as a woman to get him
out of the building."

         "Couldn't you have just teleported him out?"

         Aeka slapped her forehead and muttered something.

         Ryouko's eyes glinted.  "That wouldn't have been any fun, now
would it?  Besides, I think Aeka-chan LIKED seeing Tenchi dressed
up in her clothing.  You should see the games they play in their
bedroom."

         Manami blushed.  Aeka stared hard at Ryouko, "And how would
YOU know?"

          "I taught you some of them."

         Aeka howled and tried to grab Ryouko, who teleported a few
feet away and ran with Aeka in hot pursuit.  Tenchi walked up now.
"NOW what are they up to?"

         "Did they really dress you up as a girl to sneak you out of their
dorm room, Dad?"

         Tenchi sighed.  "Let me guess, the lime sherbet incident
came up?"

          "It happened more than once?"

          Tenchi slapped his forehead and sighed.  "Okay, here's the
whole story.  It all started when their dorm got a new Manager..."

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

      Celia's housewarming party for her new penthouse also had to
function as a going-away party for Tenchi and company, for they
didn't dare risk staying any longer for fear the Emperor would come
looking for them with a fleet again.  It was the party with the highest
quotient of scarily powerful people that the Earth had seen in a long
time, or would see in a long time.

        Tenchi and his wives took the opportunity to spend some last
moments with their children before returning home.  "Yes, Mom, I
promise I WILL not wear that outfit next time I see Grandfather,"
Manami promised for the fourth time.

       "She'll borrow one of Priss' outfits instead,"  Nene said.  She
was sitting between Ryu and Manami on one couch, while Tenchi
sat between his wives on a facing couch.

        Ryouko laughed.  "I'll give you my priceless Chalcedonian
Diamond if you do that, Manami!"

        Aeka paled.  Tenchi laughed.  "I don't think that would be too
wise."

       "Hey, Priss is royal too.  We can tell Grandfather that it's the
royal costume of Earth's royalty.  How would he know?"  Ryu said,
smiling.

        "He's not insane, Ryu,"  Aeka said.  "There's never been a
royal line that dressed like that."

         A bell pinged, and Wasyuu appeared.  "Actually, it's exactly
identical to the royal garb of the planet Gerontia."  She pulled down
a diagram and produced a pointer.  "You see, if we look at these
eighth dynasty wall paintings..."

        Ryouko began to laugh.  Aeka blushed.  "A royal family
ACTUALLY dressed like that?"

        Ryouko said, "No, that's a copy of the album cover of the
second album of a cleegery band named Gerontia from Orion XI.
They're all ex-royalty, but then Orion XI is smarmy with ex-royalty."

        Wasyuu humphed.  "Spoil my fun, will you?"

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

       Across the party, Celia and Usagi were trading stories while
Priss, Macky, Leon and Mamoru were playing pool on Celia's new
pool table.  "So then Priss and Linna start arguing over which one of
them actually killed the third boomer.  Priss claims she blew its head
off, while Linna is arguing she cut off its legs.  Meanwhile, we're
waiting for the smoke to clear, when suddenly, Linna gets blasted
across the room by an energy blast.  The third boomer is still alive.  I
manage to kill it, and finally the smoke clears.  There's dozens of
boomers.  We panic and all open fire like maniacs while Nene runs
and hides.  More smoke.  When that clears, we realize we just
mowed down dozens of mannequins.  We even found the one that
Linna had cut the legs off of the previous time and the one that Priss
had blown off its head.  Luckily, we didn't have any witnesses or we
would have been pretty embarrassed."  She paused and watched
Leon bounce a shot off all four sides of the pool table without
actually hitting anything but the cueball.

       Priss laughed.  "Nice going, Mr. officer.  I guess you learned
that at the Police Academy?"

      "Nice setting me up too."  Macky sank the six, then the four,
then missed his next shot.

       Leon fumed quietly as Mamoru carefully lined up for a shot.

        Usagi said, "Go, Mamo-chan, go!"  She danced about him,
waving fans.  Naturally, he missed the shot, unable to concentrate.
She frowned.  "Did I distract you?"

        He smiled.  "It's okay.  Just go do that to Priss when she takes
her shot."

         "I'll just stay back here with Celia and get out of your way."
Usagi went back to Celia.  Priss breathed a big sigh of relief and
took her shot.  She sank the cueball.

         Leon smirked.  "Nice going, Ms. idol singer.  That's a pool cue,
not a microphone, by the way."

         "Har, har.  At least I sank SOMETHING."

         Usagi sat back down by Celia, "At least your mannequins
didn't come to life.  Mako-chan and I went to this tailor to get fitted
and all the mannequins had demons in them, but we didn't know
that.  We're getting fitted, and it's like, SO boring.  I was really
tired, so I fell asleep.  I didn't wake up until Mako shook me awake.  The 
reason she did that was that one of the mannequins was trying to
strangle me with a tape measure.  So then..."

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

       "So are you going to be a boy or a girl now, poppa?"  Hotaru
asked Haruka.  Haruka wasn't really her poppa, but she had come to
use the affectionate nickname during an earlier period of her life and
it had stuck with her.

        "I don't know.  I'm sort of used to being a boy now, though I
ought to be a girl.  I seem to be able to change back and forth.  I
always could, but I guess I forgot that all those years.  This will
simplify one thing, though..."

         "What?"

         "Having children.  Although, given that in forty years, Michiru
and I didn't have any children..."  He stared at his hands as if he expected 
to find some secret written there.  Perhaps he just couldn't read it very 
well.

        A voice spoke from nearby.  "That's because the crystal
rendered you all infertile during those forty years.  To be more
precise, it rendered you largely unchanging, which precluded
pregnancy, one of the biggest of all possible changes."  It was
Setsuna.  She sat down by Hotaru.  "How are you feeling?"

        "As good as I ever do.  So the crystal did all that?"

        "To be more precise, Usagi's will through the crystal.  She
willed it to save you.  It chose to interpret that in its own way.  It's
not fully sentient, but it bears the mark of its creators."

        "The five ruling wizards,"  Hotaru said.

        Setsuna nodded.  "Especially Serenity and Vulcan, for it holds
a part of her soul and he forged it."

        "I guess we'll have a time of peace now,"  Haruka said.  "Or is
the usual round of missions about to start again?"

        Setsuna smiled.  "Enjoy this indian summer while you can.  A
time of darkness is coming, but you will have a few years to prepare
before the deluge."

        "It never ends, does it?"

        "Wait until you're my age."

         Haruka shuddered.  "How do you keep your sanity?"

         Someone blonde and impish shouted across the room, "Who
says she has?"  She would come to regret that in days to come.

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

       Time passed and people flowed around the rooms.  Priss found
herself playing poker with Usagi, Sylvie and Anri.  "I bid five hundred
yen."  Pair of twos sucks rocks, she thought.  Better than nothing, I
guess, though.

        Usagi had a smile the size of Mount Olympus.  "I raise you
2,500 yen."

        Anri thought hard.  "I see your bid and raise you twenty yen."

        Sylvie looked at her cards.  "I'd never guess you two were
sisters."

         Usagi cocked her head.  "What makes you say that?  I bet
we'd look a lot alike if Priss did up her hair like me."

        Sylvie looked at her cards again and frowned.  "I fold."  She
turned to Usagi.  "You play cards like Mom, except for the not
cheating part, while Priss doesn't."

         Priss shook her head in confusion.  "Wait, are you saying one
of us cheats?"

         "No, no.  Mom cheats, but other than that, she and Usagi play
the same way, unlike you."

         Priss looked at her cards.  "I see Anri's raise and...hmmm."
She thought a moment.  "So how do I play?"

         "With Usagi, I can just look at her face and know what she
has.  With you, you could have anything.  You always frown at your
hand, no matter how good it is, while Usagi wears her hand on her
sleeve, so to speak."  She looked down at her cards.  "You always
underbid, too.  Even when you have a winning hand, I don't think
you ever realize it."

          Priss looked at her cards.  What the heck, maybe I can bluff
Usagi.  She grinned.  "I do, do I?  I'll raise 2000 yen, then.  That
should make up for my underbidding."

         Sylvie scribbled something on a scrap of paper.  "Open this
after Anri bids."  She passed it to Priss.

         Usagi looked carefully at her hand.  "Hmm.  I'll see you and
raise you 100."

         Anri looked at her cards.  "No way.  Fold."

         Priss read out the note from Sylvie, "Anri folds."  She looked
up.  "Did you read her mind or something?"

        "Anri plays cautiously.  I knew that would scare her off."

        "Am I that predictable?"

        "Poker is a microcosm of the soul.  Anyway, It's your bid,
Priss."

        Priss looked over at Usagi.  "I raise you 2000 more."

        Usagi sweated.  "2000 MORE?"

        Priss nodded.  "Ready to give me all your money, sis?"

        Usagi sighed.  "Fold."

         Priss laughed and scooped up the money.  "You left out one
thing, Sylvie.  Sometimes I go for broke, especially when it seems
like I can't win.  I'm most dangerous when cornered."

         "What did you have, anyway?"  Usagi asked as Anri began to
shuffle the cards.  "I had four Queens."

        "Pair of twos."  Priss said, smirking.

        The resulting scream nearly shattered the nearby window.

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

       Youshou and Meylia sat in a quiet corner and talked.  "So
you've decided to stay here a while?"

       Meylia nodded.  "I want to spend some more time with my
grandchildren in peace while I still can.  I'm not quite ready to play at
being royalty."

       Youshou smiled.  "It can be a rather dangerous game at times,
and deadly at others.  You will come when Nene comes, though,
won't you?"

        "Celia and Macky will be going then as well, right?"

        Youshou nodded.  "And the others.  There will be many people
for Father to meet.  Perhaps he'll even like some of them."

       "Is he really that bad?"

       "No, but he doesn't like to be defied, and this will only remind
him of past...actions of like kind."

       Meylia cocked her head.  "Like what?"

       "Well, there was the way I ended up coming to Earth.  You
see..."

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

      Kiyone frowned as Mihoshi took her shot.  This time it was a
bank shot off one end of the table, a lamp, and a bottle of wine.  She
sank the six and the four, though.  Unfortunately, she also left a hard
to remove stain on the brand new carpet.  Leon sighed.  "Celia's not
going to be happy."

       Linna laughed.  "She shouldn't have told Mihoshi about this pool
table, then."

       Mihoshi's second shot bounced off the eight-ball and flew into
the air, clonking Kiyone in the head.  "Sorry!  I didn't realize your
head was there."

       "OWWW!!!!"

        Kiyone chased Mihoshi around the room with her pool cue.
She whapped Mihoshi in the head.  "Oh, I didn't realize YOUR head
was there!"

       Leon watched them run.  "Does this count as a forfeit?"

       "Good question."  Linna thought for a moment.  "So what's
going to happen to the ADPolice?"

       "I wish I knew.  GENOM-Japan has been nationalized, and the
rest of the corporation is getting pressed pretty hard worldwide.  A lot
of dirt all floated to the top of the sewer at once, so to speak.  The
remaining boomers..."  Leon trailed off.

       "They what?"

        "They've organized a political party and they're agitating for
citizenship.  Also, we've had no boomer crime or malfunctions
since...the Great Riot.  ADPolice hasn't really had anything to do.
Whatever happened seems to have fixed all the boomers.  ALL the
boomers.  We're talking world wide.  There hasn't been a single
boomer rampage on Earth in the last two weeks.  It's a good thing,
because our organization is in chaos.  We'll be repairing our
headquarters for months. "

      Kiyone chased Mihoshi right out the door of the room.

      Leon said, "I'm glad my partner and I don't have those kinds of
problems."

      "I just hope they don't kill me when I'm working with them."

       "You're joining the Galaxy Police?"

       "I might.  I'm going to train with Kiyone and Mihoshi for a while.
I can hear the strings being pulled as we speak."  She laughed.  "I
won't be too far away.  They're assigned to this solar system for a while 
again.  Being Knights of Jurai as well as Galaxy Police has its
advantages."

        Leon thought for a moment, trying to figure out how to ask.
"Linna, did I..."

        She nodded.  "Yes."

         "What are you?"  His voice was light, but Linna could sense it
had taken a lot of effort for him to get the words out.  She was
getting used to it.  No one quite knew what to make of her.  Some of
them had seen things they didn't understand.  She had died and
come back.  They didn't know what to make of her.  Sometimes she
didn't know either.

       "I'm your friend, Linna Yamazaki.  I'm not the same as I was,
but I'm still as human as you.  I may wander around with glowing
things on my forehead sometimes now, but so do half the people at
this party."  Linna laughed.  

        Leon looked around, then said quietly, "I know.  I don't know
what to make of all this.  I'm just an ordinary guy whose girlfriend is
a magical princess.  One of my ex-partners is an alien, Nene's ...I'm
not even sure WHAT Nene is anymore either, and..."

        Linna nodded.  "I know just how you feel.  I felt like that
before...I learned what I truly was.  What we all are."

        Leon looked quizzically at her.

        "We're all part of the same dance, Leon.  A dance that has no
ending.  We may change our roles in the dance, but we're all still
part of it.  Even after we die, we will dance on.  And every dancer is
just as important, just as wonderful in the eyes of the Most High as
the next.  It doesn't matter if you are high or low, for the last will be
first and the first will be last."  I sound like a Kung-Fu master, she 
thought.  Or a minister.

        "I just don't know how Priss and I can..."

        Linna walked over to Leon.  "She loves you.  Believe in that.
Know that she needs you.  She may be able to kick off the head of
boomers now, but she needs you.  You can give her something no
one else can.  Just because a person doesn't need you to physically
protect them doesn't mean they have no need for you at all."

         "I want to believe that, but..."

         "Then do it.  Believe.  She wants your love, give it to her.
Don't worry about who can kick whose butt and how fast.  You can
never have enough power to protect everyone, to perfectly achieve
your goals.  If you worry about power, you'll only slowly wear away
your soul like water lapping at a rock.  Besides, I'm sure Wasyuu
can help you if you're really worried about that."

         Wasyuu stuck her head in the door.  "Looking for a power
upgrade, Leon?  Good!  I could use a guinea pig for a few
experiments..."  She ran over and started to drag him off as Linna
laughed.

         Priss never did get a straight answer on why Leon had purple
hair for a while or why small metal objects sometimes flew across
the room and stuck to his arms and legs.

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

    Ryu sat on his bed in his dorm room with Aeka.  "Sorry the place
is such a mess, Mom."

      Aeka smiled.  "Your mother's half of the room was just like this
back in our college days."  She paused, as if she expected a certain
someone to make a rebuttal, but nothing happened.  She continued,
"I'd almost be disappointed if it wasn't."

        She got up and walked over to Ryu's desk, picking up a photo
from the desk.  It was a shot of Ryu with Nene.  She was standing,
holding a hunting rifle, with one foot on a boomer head.  They both
looked pretty silly in safari outfits.  "You're going to have a hard time
getting this past Father, you know."

        "He wouldn't expect any less from Ryouko's child."  Ryu sighed.

        "Father likes Ryouko, though he won't show it.  The problem is
the nobility.  Father has to take them into account.  Ryouko at least
had the advantage of being vastly powerful and highly qualified to
be the future Emperor's champion."  She put down the picture, then
hopped up onto the desk, surprising Ryu.  Normally, his step-mother
would never sit on a desk like that.  It wasn't...It wasn't her thing.
She had grabbed a pillow off his bed to sit on and another one for her
back as she leaned against the wall.

       "It could easily be hundreds of years before I inherit.  Nene will
have plenty of time to become all powerful, or whatever.  And you
saw what she did."

        "She was a vessel for powers greater than herself."

       "It didn't all leave her, though.  By the time I even have to think
about the throne, she'll be a lot scarier than she is.  Plus, she's got
Grandma building her some scary stuff."  Ryu got up, walked over,
and sat down next to Aeka on the desk.  "I think she'll hold her own."

        "And we've got to find you another bride."

        Ryu sighed.  "I don't know where we'll find someone who gets
along with Nene the way you do with Mom.  I mean, not that Nene is
hard to get along with, but..."

        Aeka cocked her head slightly.  "You think we get along well?"

        Ryu turned his head to face Aeka.  "You two may act
sometimes like you hate each other, and maybe you did once, but
it's ALL an act now.  You just act like that because you don't know
how else to deal with each other."

        Aeka smiled faintly.  "Good thing I didn't go into Acting, I
suppose, then."

        Ryouko NOW stuck her head through the wall to make a
comment, but got a pillow in the face before she could speak.  A
pillow brawl was soon in progress.

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

       A car quietly pulled up at the base of the hill on which sat the
remains of the Cherry Hill Temple.  A woman stepped out alone and
quietly walked up the hill.  Even in the depths of amnesia, she had
not forgotten this place, merely chosen to ignore it.  Yet, it called her
back.  It was part of a chapter in her life that she had closed, but not
closed well.

        She could hear her grandfather's voice, happy, sad, crying,
screaming, laughing, all around her.  She looked about the burnt out
ruins and felt his presence.  Not his ghost, but her memories of him.
He had died during the Millenial Riots.  Five labors had rampaged
through the temple.  They had knocked down the walls, slain her
grandfather, and doused the sacred fire, though it had melted one of
them to slag.  Unfortunately, in the process of dousing it, the labor
had knocked some of it out of its pit and set the rest of the building
on fire.

        For a year, she had plunged into a pit of despair.  She had
slowly been drifting away from the temple life before that, due to
college and the time pressures of her Senshi life.  After the riots,
there was no temple to return to.  She had raged against the gods,
raged against herself for not being there.  She couldn't even
remember why she hadn't been there when her grandfather needed
her.

         Her friends had done their best to comfort her, but they hadn't
been successful.  She couldn't stand to go near a temple anymore,
for it reminded her of her grandfather's death.  The kamis he had
served had let him die, she felt.  Looking back on it now, she could
see she had been a complete idiot, but at the time, it had seemed
logical.

        A chance encounter with her uncle had set her on the path she
followed.  He gave her the comfort she needed and the assurance
she desired.  It had been a slow uphill road.  She had turned back to
the faith of her childhood.  For a time, she had been uncertain, but
then one day...

                                                  *         *       *

        Rei waved goodbye to Yuiichiro.  He had to get to work.  It was
hard for the two of them to get by, but she was determined to make
the effort.  Her parents would have helped her out, but she didn't
want charity.  She sat in the coffeeshop and nursed her coffee.  If I
finally get a recording contract, then I can pull my own weight in this
partnership.  They were both working at a bookstore right now.

         He had changed, but so had she.  What worried her, was that
he had changed for the better, while she felt like she had changed
for the worse.  I'm just drifting, she thought, then silenced the
thought.  I have a job.  I have a boyfriend.  I've finally got a solid
lead on getting a record contract and then I can do what I really want
to do.  Sing.

       "If I had some idea what I wanted to sing about," she muttered.

       A woman said, "Are you Hino Rei?"  She was tall and gorgeous,
her oddly spikey brown hair contrasting with her more conservative,
though luxurious clothing.  Rei blinked again when she realized the
woman had a blue tattoo on her forehead.

       "Why yes, I am.  Do I know you?"  Maybe we went to college
together, Rei thought.

       "I represent Saint Brigit's Academy.  I understand you attended
the T&A Academy and you got your bachelor's in Music?"

        Rei nodded.  "Yes.  I'm looking for a recording contract right
now."

        "Would you be interested in becoming music director for our
chapel choir?  According to your old instructors at the T&A, you
helped organize several school festivals and performed as well.
Your instructors at the university spoke highly of you as well.  We're
just getting started, so we can only pay you 3.5 million yen a year,
but..."

        Rei stared.  That much for a starting position with no
experience?  Doing something she liked?  "I'll take it.  When do I
start?"

       The woman smiled.  "I'll tell Sister Hanako you want the job.
She'll be very pleased."

        "Sister Hanako?  My old music teacher from T&A?"

        The woman nodded.  "She's teaching music for K-3 now with
us.  T&A was destroyed during the Millenial Riots, so the Bishop is
organizing a new school.  I'm not sure why we changed names,
but..."

         "Whatever.  When should I come by?"

         "Come by tomorrow morning at ten."

          "I will."  Rei gave thanks to something.  She wasn't quite sure
if it was God or the kamis or what, but this was a blessing from
Heaven.  She didn't even stop to ask herself how the woman had
known to find her here, or why she didn't see her again after that
meeting.  She didn't want to look this gift horse in the mouth.

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

        That had tipped the balance.  She had slid back into
Catholicism by inches, and found it fit her.  The things that had
taken her away from it had fallen out of her life or didn't seem so
important anymore.  She had begun to dream again, and to see
things.  Slowly, a sense of being chosen settled upon her. 
Once, she had left the Church because she didn't agree with it on
several important issues.  Now, she felt that she could make it
change to agree with her.  Perhaps this was an act of colossal ego.

       However, she was right.  Things had changed and she could
take some of the credit for it.  Her faith grew and with it, mountains
could be moved.  The Third Vatican Council had been her triumph.
Twenty years of effort paid off.  She almost couldn't believe it was
real. She had fought monsters, working for the Sacred Office in the
shadows, defending humanity from things they preferred to think of as
imaginary.  She had argued doctrine in the halls of the Vatican and had a
screaming match with a Pope, though that was not a moment she chose 
to remember as one of her triumphs.  Her ordination had been the most
glorious moment of her life.  Becoming a bishop was important to her 
life work, but the ordination had been the key.  That was what she had 
been fighting for.  That was one of the crucial reasons she had originally 
left.  She had always wanted to be a sacred warrior, to be a champion of 
her faith, but it had been denied her.  Only men could be priests.  Instead 
of staying and fighting for what she believed in, she had sought another 
way, some way that would accept her and give her
what she needed.  For a time, she had found that with her grandfather, 
but then that had been stripped from her, in more ways than she even 
understood at the time.

        There was talk of her becoming Pope now, though she knew it
would be many years before that happened.  That she was a priest
was enough for her.  To be Bishop was good, but it was not power
that she had sought in all her spiritual wanderings, it was to find a
faith that accepted her and her strivings.  She had found that now.
She had fought for her beliefs and won.

       She looked around the wreckage of the temple, walking towards
the chamber of the sacred fire.  She didn't regret her time here,
anymore.  It had given her the confidence and strength she had
needed to fight the fight that had consumed two decades of her life,
the fight for the soul of the Church.

       She stepped into the old chamber of the fire, now open to the
sky, one wall cracked in half.  There were the remains of a recent
fire in the old fire pit.  Some bum, perhaps had lit his own fire where
once the kami had dwelt.  If I had never been a shrine maiden, I
would never have become a Bishop, she realized.  Ironic.  I had to
leave, in order to fully be present.  My faith had to die, in order to
live.

       Something caught her eye.  A hand mirror that someone had
abandoned here, in the place where sacrifices were typically placed,
sitting in the pit.  She walked over and picked it up, and gazed into a
face she had not seen in thirty years.  It was the woman who had
hired her for Saint Brigit's Academy.  "Hello, Rei."

        She nearly dropped the mirror.  "What in..."

        "You may think of me as an angel, if you like.  Or a kami."  Her
eyes twinkled.  "Or perhaps a saint, if you prefer."

        Rei frowned.  "Don't play games with me.  Saints don't typically
show up in mirrors."

        "What, you can't see your own reflection?"  The woman's voice
was soft and musical.

        Rei laughed faintly.  "I'm not that much of an egomaniac."  She
paused.  "So why have you come back?  Have you come to claim
some favor for what you did for me?"

        "I'm not here for your eldest child, if that's what you're
wondering."

        "I don't have any children."

        "Yet."

        Rei blinked.

         "Go to your old bedroom."

         Rei asked, "Why?"

         "Trust me."

        Rei was not a trusting person, but some part of her instinctively
knew she could trust this woman.  She went to her old bedroom.
The floor was caved in.  Someone had converted it to a firepit.  A
bum was sleeping by the fire that burned low in the pit in the middle.
She could almost sense a presence.  "My bedroom..."

        "Don't you recognize your old friend?"

        "Should I know this guy?"

       "I'm not talking about the guy."

        Rei stared into the fire, and she saw visions.  It had been so
long...hurt and confused during the riots, the sacred fire had burned
out of control, devastating the old temple, but then had repented of
what it had done.  For decades, a series of bums had tended it,
keeping it alive barely.  Inch by inch, more of the temple was
consumed to keep it alive.  Its time was running out.  There wasn't
much left that was flammable that could be moved without wrecking
equipment, even with the bums bringing in garbage.  I wonder what
the best way to move a fire through Tokyo is without causing it to go
out, she thought.

        She looked again at the battered old man who lay asleep by
the fire.  The fire whispered to her.  He had been an executive once,
then Genom had driven his company into bankruptcy and
successfully blacklisted its employees.  His wife left him with his
children.  He lost everything.  A few days later, the Kanto Quake had
destroyed his home.  He had found himself here, and for nine years,
he had lived by his wits and tended the fire, taking over from the
previous tender, who had been slain during the Quake, which had
further wrecked the temple.  We could use a good business
manager for that bookstore chain, she thought.  Brother Godai was
not cut out for business, much as I keep trying to pretend otherwise.
She gently shook the sleeping man awake.  Saving souls was her
business, and business was good.

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

       April 30, 2035

      The Emperor of Jurai sat upon his throne.  His wives lurked to
the left and right of the throne, smiling enigmatically as usual.  He,
on the other hand, was frowning.  I wonder if there's something in
my genes that causes all my descendents to make my life difficult.
He glanced over at Funaho.  "Shouldn't they be here already?"  he
whispered.

       Her lips barely moved, but he heard her clearly.  "There was an
assassination attempt in the transport shaft."

        For a moment, anger flashed in his eyes.  He couldn't blame
the council for being opposed to this marriage.  It would wreck some
of his own plans, and only Ryu promising he would let his father
choose his other bride had gotten the emperor to even consider
approving this engagement.  Assassination, however, was going too
far.  Whoever had tried this would find out that those under the
protection of the Emperor of Jurai were as sacrosanct as he was.
"Why didn't you tell me?"

         "I just found out."

        Various nobles milled about, whispering among themselves.
One of them was likely to blame, the Emperor thought.  They're
undoubtably whispering about how an offworlder made the Emperor
wait, and what a shame it is and the like.

        The doors slammed open at the far end of the hall and an
angry, elaborately dressed red head stormed in, followed by Ryu,
Manami, Sasami, and Ryouko.  The nobles whispered among
themselves, speculating on what would happen next.  One or two
took a moment to appreciate the clothing the woman, who they
presumed was the potential bride of Prince Ryu, wore.  She had
been dressed well, even if she was an outworlder.

         Nene stormed into the middle of the room.  Funaho began to
speak.  "Greetings, offworlder.  Welcome to..."

         Nene shouted, "WHERE THE HELL IS DUKE RYALIN?  THAT
MONKEY TRIED TO HAVE ME KILLED AND I WANT HIS HEAD!"  Her face 
was red with uncharacteristic anger.

         For a moment, the room went silent.  No one had screamed in
the presence of the Emperor during a formal audience in two
hundred years.  The last person who did it was still in exile on the
frozen world Dryco III.  Excited whispers of speculation spread like
wildfire.

         Ryouko quietly pointed to a blue haired man in elaborate dyiljo
robes.  "There."

         Funaho said, "No one is allowed to raise their voice in the
presence of the Emperor."

         "No one is allowed to try to kill me!"  She stormed over to the
Duke.  "I'm challenging you to a duel.  NOW."

         The duke blinked.  "Insolent child.  You have no proof, nor am
I honor bound to fight a duel with an offworlder woman for any
reason."

          Ryouko laughed.  "In other words, you're guilty as hell, but you
think we can't prove it and you're too cowardly to fight her."

          "I will not be addressed in such manner!"  The duke said.

          "Going to challenge me to a duel, your ugliness?"  Ryouko
asked.

          The Duke paled.  Then Tenchi and Aeka entered, dragging a
huge blue-skinned reptillian man, marked with the three green
tattoos on his arm that identified members of the rather illegal, yet
well patronized Assassin's Guild.  Tenchi tossed the man down onto
the ground.  "Speak."

        The man pointed Duke Ryalin.  "I swear before the sacred body
of the Emperor that he was the one who hired me."

        The Duke frowned.  "Will you take the word of a ruffian and an
outworlder over the word of a Duke of the Realm, descended from
the Twelve servants of the First Emperor?"

         Sasami spoke quietly.  "I will."

         Tenchi said, "I will stake the honor of my line upon her word."

         Misaki had been watching quietly.  She turned to face the
duke.  "You stand accused before the throne by a Prince and
Princess of the Imperial Line, bearers of the Sacred Blood.  How
would you be tried?"

          The Duke frowned.  None of the options available to him were
good.  Still, there was one way out, even if it was humiliating to fight
such a one.  "The young whelp challenged me to trial by combat.
So be it.  Name a time and place."

          "Right now."  Nene said.  "I have a busy day planned and I
want to get this over with."  Sasami whispered something in her ear.
"The Royal Dueling grounds."

           A gasp ran through the audience.  None could even enter the
Royal Dueling grounds unless they possessed Royal blood or
belonged to the three highest ranks of the nobility, descended from
the Twelve.  The Duke laughed.  "And how do you propose to enter
without breaking the law?"

        "I am Nene of House Romanova, heiress to the Sacred line of
the Romanovs, Emperors of all the Russias, Grand Dukes of
Moscow, Grand Princes of Russia, Kings of Poland, Defenders of
the Sacred Faith and Protectors of the Patriarchate of Moscow.
Shall I pile more titles on you, or is that enough for you?"  Nene
smiled.

         Everyone turned to look at the Emperor.  He quirked his lips in
a smile.  "I extend a royal welcome to Her Most Royal Highness,
Princess and Heiress of House Romanov.  Be ye welcome in this
place.  By Imperial Decree, I acknowlege your right to enter the
Royal Dueling Grounds and the validity of your titles within the realm
of Jurai."  Chew on this, Ryalin.  You've been causing me trouble for
a long time, he thought.  I just hope she's a lot tougher than she
looks.

          The crowd soon adjourned to the viewing chambers to
observe the duel.  The Duke concentrated and assumed battle garb,
preparing for the battle.   Nene shouted something in an alien
tongue few of those present understood.  The air shimmered around
her and a red and pink battle suit appeared around her from
subspace.  She shouted something else and a shimmering white
blade appeared in her right hand as the duke summoned up a sword
with his master key.

        The audience stared in awe.  Someone whispered, "The
Radiant Hawkwings."  Tenchi blinked in total surprise.  He glanced
over at Ryouko, Sasami, and Aeka, who had now joined them, then
over at Ryu and Manami.  Ryu was smirking

         He sidled over to Ryu and whispered, "Are you doing that?"

         Ryu whispered back, "Not all that glitters is gold."

        Tenchi blinked, then laughed.  So it just looks like one, he
thought.  It's not like there's a really good way to tell.

         The nobles watched nervously as Nene proceeded to charge
the duke. The swords met and his shattered to bits.  Nene then
kicked him across the dueling grounds into the wall.  A spray of laser
fire from her left hand sent him scampering.  For about twenty
minutes, she chased him around the room.  Sword strokes that
missed him cut huge holes in the floor.  Finally, she trapped him up
against the wall.  "Yield, or die."

        The Duke contemplated dying, but he couldn't muster the pride.
He hung his head in shame.  "I yield."

        The nobility stared in shock.  Duke Ryalin had never been
beaten in a duel before.  Who was this Princess who had come
before them?  No one had known her homeworld, but now
speculation ran rife.  Servants were sent scampering to consult
Galactic Atlases.  Already the rumor was spreading that she was
from some off shoot of the house of Jurai.  It was not otherwise
possible that she could wield the Radiant Hawk Wings.  Perhaps she
was not an outworlder at all.  The political wheels began to turn.
Nene would face no more significant opposition.  She had reached
the eighth row and been promoted.

        The Emperor smiled.  Perhaps this will work out better than I
thought.

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

      March 1, 2036

      It was a cool day in Mega-Tokyo as the new city council was
sworn in.  Priss, Leon, Celia, Nene, Linna, Ryu, Daley, Manami,
Kiyone, Mihoshi, Anri, Meylia, and Washuu sat in the audience of
the ceremony.  Washuu looked at her watch, then whispered to
Meylia and Anri, "Does that guy ever shut up?  He's been going for
thirty minutes now."

      "He didn't know how to shut up back in 2018 when he was just a
TV anchorman.  He hasn't learned yet, I guess,"  she replied.

      Taiki finally finished yammering.  "And so, it is my pleasure to
yield my office to the first woman to serve as the mayor of Mega-
Tokyo."  He turned to the blue-haired woman who was sitting near
him.  "I present to you, Mrs. Udaigaku Noriko.  Please step
forward, Udaigaku-san."

       A brief investment ceremony followed.  "How does it feel to be
the first female mayor?"  Taiki asked.

       "It feels good.  This is a great day for all boomers as well."  She
turned to the first of the new city councilbeings.  "Hakubi Sylvie,
please come forward."

        Syvlie stood up and her friends and family went wild with
applause.  She stepped forward, one small step for a woman, one
giant step for boomerkind.

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

       October 31, 2040

        Keiko fled down the alleyway.  Three half-human figures were
in hot pursuit.  She would have cried for her mother, but her mother
was gone.  I hope Aunt Linna got my call, she thought, or these
things are gonna get me for sure.

        Her pursuers were...well, it depended on who you were as to
what they looked like.  To an ordinary human, they looked like three
tall men in ratty clothing.  Keiko, and others who possessed the
Sight, could see them as they truly were.  They were horrible twisted
monstrosities, ten feet tall, with deformed misplaced features, extra
limbs and horribly sculpted muscles in the wrong places.  Their red
eyes shone darkly and their flesh was a hideous shade of purple.
They were fomorians, the ancient enemies of the Tuatha de
Danaan, and they still stalked the world hunting those who bore the
blood of that ancient line.

         The irony of this was that they were actually chasing the wrong
person.  Keiko came from a bloodline of great power, but was no
more a descendent of Danu than David Letterman.  However, since
the formori were unused to encountering the children of other
goddesses, they assumed the power she bore had to be granted
from Danu.

       She rounded a corner and three more formori, these a trio of
twisted females with batlike wings, long fangs and long stringy black
hair bound into braids, lurched forward.  They bore long scourges
made from barbed wire and spiked balls.  Only by diving, rolling on
the ground, and leaping to her feet once she was past them was
Keiko able to avoid being immediately flayed by them.

        Six pursuers was NOT twice the fun of three.  She managed to
emerge from the alleyway into more open ground.  Of course, this
was naturally a graveyard, not a fun place to be with six monsters
chasing you on Halloween night.  The fact that six more fomorians
were waiting here didn't exactly make Keiko's day, either.  She
turned and bolted at a right angle.

           More figures loomed in the darkness ahead of her.  She
swore and gathered the power that lay within her.  With it, she
managed to leap up onto the roof of a nearby mausoleum.  Maybe
they won't spot me, she prayed.  A few seconds later, she realized
there were MORE people up here.

        She was about to scream when she recognized them.  Four
knights in shining armor stood near her on the rooftop.  She gave a
sigh of relief.  "You got my message!"

        Linna laughed and looked towards the six approaching
formorians.  "Geez, there's only six of them.  I was expecting more
from your message."

        Keiko pointed off into the mist.  "There's more of the damn
things over there!"

        Nene turned and looked.  "Those aren't formorians."

        The five figures Keiko had spotted earlier moved forward
across the graveyard toward the masoleum as the six formorians
finally reached it.  As they came closer, she recognized them.  Ryu,
Manami, Meylia, Anri, and Sylvie charged forward, garbed for battle.
The fight was a foregone conclusion.  Evil magic was no match for a
combination of Jurai Power, High Tech, White Magic, and Divine
Power.

       This time.

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

<Voiceover, female>

      Once upon a time, a faerie prince exiled himself to a little bitty
backwater town in the far reaches of his father's kingdom, for the 
jealous faerie nobles hated him and his mother, and he tired of this.  He 
lived in the tiny little town for centuries, for the faerie are a long lived 
race, you see.  It was a town full of mortals, and he fell in love many 
times, and had many children, but rarely did he ever tell them what he 
truly was.  

      The problem with marrying mortals, is that mortals die, and to watch 
your loved one age when you do not is a tragedy for both of you.  One 
day, the woman he loved died, and he retreated from the world, hardly 
speaking or acknowleging his two daughters.  One of his daughters 
was kind and understanding like her mother, and she took care of her 
father in his grief, finding comfort from comforting him.  The second 
grew wroth, for like her father, she had no stomach for ill treatment.  
She left in a rage, swearing never to return.  

      She wandered the world around the town, and finally found a man to
love.  She knew not her faerie heritage, nor the power that lay within
her.  There was no need for magic in her life, except the magic of love.

      One day, her son grew strong and tall, and went to study with the
sages of a larger town.  From them, he learned many crafts, and the 
power within him stirred.  He had a vision, a vision of a world in which 
magical golems would free the masses of their tiresome labors and 
leave them free to create beautiful art and to learn all that was learnable.  

     Yet, he lacked the materials he needed to build his golems, so he
went to the local merchant's guild and offered to share his knowlege if
the merchant would pay for materials to build the golems.  The Guild
Master agreed, and they began to build many wonderful golems.  

      The wizard was happy.  He had a beautiful wife and two happy
children, a boy and a girl.  His golems were like children to him, and he 
had hundreds of those.  Yet, not all was well in the kingdom.  The wizard 
spent too much time in the lab, and his wife never saw him.  She thought 
he loved the golems more than her, so one day she ran away.  That 
shocked the wizard, and he began to look around him.

      He saw that not all was well in the land.  Some of the merchants
were arming his golems and using them for conquest.  They did not 
follow his instructions closely, and some of his golems had badly drawn 
runes, so they went mad.  What he did not know was that some of the 
members of the Merchant's guild were inflamed by greed and power 
and consumed by the demons with which they had been consorting.  
The power of the great god of destruction, Shiva, was upon them, and 
they saw that the wizard must be eliminated before he could fight them.  
So one of them slew him.

       What they did not understand is that it is not wise to meddle in
the affairs of wizards.  He had seen his fate coming and cast a mighty
spell.  He gifted his children with his powers and his wisdom.  It would
fall to them to save his children, the golems, from the power of Shiva.

      Shiva's followers grew in strength in the towns of the fringes of
the great Faerie empire.  His avatars came, bearing his power and
aiding his servants.  They invoked Shiva, and he destroyed a great
city for them, then they came in to 'help repair the city' with their new 
golems.  Soon, everyone was dependent on them and they ruled the 
city in all but name.  Many lands fell under their dominion, yet the great 
Faerie emperor did nothing, for his lands were vast, and he had almost 
forgotten the very existence of the province Shiva's followers ruled.

      The wizard's daughter, however, could not forget.  She took the
power that her father had given her and his wisdom and went to his 
forge.  She forged gleaming suits of magical armor with which to do 
battle against the Merchant's guild, which now called itself DEMON.  But 
she had no warriors to wear her suits, so she went out into the streets 
of the city.

      She found a street urchin with a heart of fire and took her away
from her petty street fights and gave her a cause to fight for and mighty  
weapons with which to fight for it. She found a dancer in the wind and 
gave her wings with which to fly.  A clever and beautiful sorceress, who 
was also of royal blood, though she knew it not, heard her call for help 
and came to the wizard's daughter, passing every test she gave her.  To 
her was given further understanding of the powers of machines, of how 
to trick the golems and other mechanisms, and to see with magical 
sight.  Though they often made fun of her, they all knew it was her 
wisdom which often guided them to victory.  

*********

     "And I suppose you also spun straw into gold in your spare time, eh,
Nene-chan?"  A female voice cut in.

      Nene was sitting on a large plush bed covered with sheets of golden
satin.  In her lap sat a young girl with long red hair like Nene's and
soft brown eyes.  Like Nene, she was dressed in an elaborate striped
kimono with all the colors of the rainbow.  She had a golden bow in her
hair, while Nene was wearing a golden tiara upon her brow with a ruby 
set in it.  Nene started at the voice and looked up.  "Priss-chan!"

      Priss winced faintly.  Only Nene could call me Priss-chan when I'm in 
combat gear.  She was wearing loose black pants and a heavy long
sleeved dark tan jacket.  Her hair was tied back in a pony-tail, and her
face was marked with long black wedges along her cheeks.  A metal rod 
sat in a holster on her belt on her left and a large nasty looking pistol on 
her right hip.  "Telling your daughter lies about the good old days, eh?"  
She walked over and knelt down facing the little girl in Nene's lap.  "And 
how are you today, Himeko?"

      Nene laughed.  "Like you were any better when I heard you telling
Samantha about how you used to kill five boomers before breakfast and 
all you needed was your bare hands.  You said you just used a hardsuit 
so the rest of us wouldn't feel inferior."

      Himeko laughed and reached over and hugged Priss.  "Hi, Auntie
Priss!  Been fighting monsters again?"

      Priss laughed.  "Hey, at least my lies are more plausible than
yours, Nene-chan."

      "Killing boomers with your bare hands is plausible?  I don't THINK
so."  Nene laughed.  

      Priss picked up Himeko, "You want to be big and strong like me when 
you grow up and not flimsy like your mommy, right, Hime-chan?"  She 
walked over to the window with her 'niece.'

     They both stared out the window as Nene got up and walked over to
them.  Tiny specks of light shone in the blackness of space.  A small
blue, white, and brown planet slowly receeded in the distance.  Himeko
laughed, "I'll contribute to the team with my brains and good looks!"

     Priss and Nene both laughed.  "Your mommy taught you to say that,
didn't she?"  Priss asked Himeko, who nodded happily.

     Nene stood by Priss' side, looking out the window at the retreating
planet.  "I can't believe we're not going to fight this."  She gestured,
and her cup floated over to her from the bedside table.  She drank 
deeply, suddenly thirsty.

     Priss sighed and reminded herself not to swear in front of the child.
"If I had my way, we would.  I don't like running away, but Celia doesn't 
think we can win."

      Nene nodded. "We've evacuated as many people as we could.  If only
we'd been able to kill it back then..."

      Priss forgot about the child and swore anyway.  "We did kill it,
Damnit!  Things are supposed to STAY DEAD WHEN YOU KILL THEM!"

      "Even if Shiva is dead...I guess we didn't get all his children..."

       As they watched, they could see the ice creeping across the face of
the planet as it slowly shrank to a speck in the distance.  They would not 
see the world on which they had been born again for over a thousand 
years.

       They would always wonder if there had been some way they could 
have prevented it, could have saved their city, saved their world.  The 
time would come when it would bloom again, but that task would fall to 
other heroes.  To them would fall other duties than sleeping under a 
crystal mountain 'til that day.  It was time for them to enter upon the 
rewards for their years of labor, years of battle and despair.


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

Easter, 3000 AD
Year 8 of the Crystal Millenium

       Queen Serenity watched her fleet moving through space on the
viewscreen.  She sat in the command chair of the CMS Yamato.
She laughed a little, just thinking about it.  Too bad we don't have a
wave motion gun, she thought.

        Senshi Mars quirked an eyebrow.  "What's so funny?"  She
paused.  "You should be down on the Earth where you're safe."  It
was about the sixth time she had said that in as many hours.

        Queen Serenity turned to Senshi Mars.  "I will not send others
to fight in my stead.  I am the Queen.  It is my duty to risk my life for
my people."

        Senshi Mars frowned.  "Do you not trust me to command your
fleet?"

        Queen Serenity blinked.  "Of course I trust you, Mars.  I just
can't stand to sit on the Earth and fret while my friends and my
...subjects are putting their lives on the line for me.  A Queen's duty
is to fight for her people, not to make them fight for her.  If I stayed
on the Earth, I'd be chewing my nails down to the bone and eating
the entire contents of the Royal Refrigerator.  Well, if we had a
refrigerator."  She laughed.  "I wish Ami-chan would make it a higher
priority."

         Senshi Mars looked around, but the rest of the bridge staff was
faking deafness and made no comment on that.  Perhaps they
hadn't noticed.  None of them probably knew what a refrigerator
WAS.  Undoubtably they all thought that if Queen Serenity wanted a
refrigerator, then she should have one.  It made Mars uncomfortable
sometimes.  These people almost worshipped them.  They didn't see
Usagi and Rei, they saw Serenity and Mars, walking goddesses on
Earth.  If we told them to cut off their left hands, they probably
would.  They're twenty times worse than my husband was at his
most obesiant.  She sighed.  But she would use them.  Things had
gotten bigger than she had ever imagined.  We're leading a fleet, a
nation...a world.  I hope we're up to it, she thought.  At least I had
some experience, unlike the others.  This is a bit larger than a
Bishopric, or even the Papacy, though.  She sighed.  "I'm sure Ami
will get on it when she has time."

        "Well, we have bigger fish to fry."  Dark things, twisted flying
reptillian horrors, amorphous masses, tentacular monstrosities from
HR Giger's nightmares were swarming towards them.  There were
hundreds, thousands, maybe millions.  And behind them, driving
them on was a huge shimmering gelatinous mass, constantly
shifting in color, probably the size of a small moon.  When the
creatures moved too slowly, it caught up with them and absorbed
them.  At least in a vaccum, their voices would not carry as they
howled hideous death cries.

         Mars swore mentally.  "All we needed was a few more months
an Odysseus and Mercury would have figured out how to extend
the Great Shield."

          A voice spoke nearby.  "Last time, it took one of the Five
Ruling Wizards sacrificing herself by joining with the shield to make
it large enough to protect the entire system."  Pluto had arrived.

         "I will go, if I must,"  Serenity said.

          The bridge crew stared, clearly in shock at the concept.

          "There is more than one way to skin a cat.  You will need
help.  With the aid of the Juraiians, it can be done."

         Mars sighed.  "Yes, but that...whatever the hell that thing is,
it's cut us off from Jurai.  Not that we have anything functional capable
of sending messages interplanetary distances.  If only Funaho hadn't
died during the Great Ice..."

         Serenity said, "If wishes were horses, every little girl would
have that pony."  She laughed.  "We've faced incredible odds
before.  This can't be any worse than that horde from Gunbuster,
and they beat all of them with one mech!"

        "This isn't an anime, U...Serenity."  How can she be so
cheerful?  Mars wondered.  Maybe she just doesn't understand.  She
thinks Good always triumphs over Evil, just like in those animes.  I'd
give my left eye for a few of those characters showing up now,
especially the ones with their own fleets.  If only we had more time
to prepare...It would have helped if we'd all studied engineering in
college too...Ami and Steven and Umino are the only ones of us who 
know anything about science, and sorcery wasn't exactly available back
when we went to school.  Mars sighed.  We didn't exactly plan this
well.  We just sort of lived our lives day to day with this vague
knowlege we'd have to rule the world one day but not really thinking
about what that meant.  We just went from crisis to crisis, but that's
no way to do something this big.

       Pluto said quietly.  "Actually, there is a way to send
interplanetary messages from Earth."

       Mars spun around, "Why the hell didn't you tell us this before?"

       Serenity watched the creatures on the screen.  She turned on
her crystal radio.  "This is Serenity.  Left wing, rise and attack them
from above.  Right wing, drop below and attack from below.  Center,
move forward and engage.  Now."  Her voice was strong and
confident.  For a moment, Mars couldn't recognize her old friend at
all.  It was if she had vanished completely and been replaced by
someone else.  Then she turned to Mars and whispered, "Set
phasers on kill."

         Mars would have laughed if she wasn't busy being pissed off
at Pluto who just kept smiling enigmatically at her.  A thought struck
her.  "Wait, doesn't the Galaxy Police have a patrol ship in this
sector?"

        "The Galaxy Police fled this sector after the Year of the Comet,
just like everyone else. There hasn't been a GP ship here since then.
However, blood calls to blood."

         The fleets began to engage.  To Mars' surprise, monstrosities
began to explode by the dozens.  Shafts of white light vaporized the
creatures, and the fleet moved on.  Two ships were destroyed by
some of the tougher creatures, but for the most part the creatures
were dying in droves.

         Serenity gave a great gasp.  "No..."  She began to cry.

         Mars cocked her head.  "Why are you crying?  We're winning."

         "They want to die...if only I'd realized that before."

         "I don't understand."

          "We're winning because they're not fighting.  They'd rather we
kill them than face that thing.  It's like someone driving down a road,
chasing someone with the wheels just behind them, for millions of
miles.  If you run into a knife weilding maniac, you take your
chances with getting sliced up, because you know the truck will
probably kill both of you anyway.  The poor things...they just want to
live.  That's all."  Her face hardened.  "This abomination must be
destroyed."  She activated the radio.  "Cease fire on the creatures.
Ignore them and move in on the...uh...giant thing that looks like
Jello."

        Sadly, almost no one in the fleet had any idea what Jello was,
but they got the idea anyway.  Mars stared at her.  "You're crazy!
We have to destroy these things before they get to Earth!"

         "They can't outrun us.  We can always go back and weed out
the troublemakers.  We have to stop that thing."  For a moment, her
voice was filled with anger.  "It devoured all their homes.  It has
been herding them before it for a millenium.  Entire generations born
to run for their lives.  IT WILL END HERE."

         Mars paled.  Even I don't get that angry much.  "As you
command."  Sometimes, I think she does this just to drive me
insane.

       The fleet obeyed her commands.  She was Serenity, and if she
had commanded them to attack each other, they would have done it.
It deeply disturbed Mars.  Serenity didn't seem bothered at all.  It
was the right thing to do.  Of course they did it.

        The white crystal ships slid through the horde, which largely
ignored them.  Serenity had been right.  They fled on their way,
leaving the white ships to open fire on the creature.  It was like flies
attacking an elephant with homicidal intent.  A tentacle of
gelatinous mauve lashed out and sucked in a ship, crunching it.
Serenity winced.  "The fleet's not going to be enough."

         Mars sighed.  "You're going to use the crystal."  She paused.
"Let me help you."

         "The crystal won't be necessary."  Pluto said quietly.

         Mars sighed.  "You could have told us we didn't have to attack
those things, you know."

         "Some things have to be experienced to be truly learned.  To
be truly understood."

          "We must look like horrible nightmares to them,"  Serenity
whispered.  "Poor things.  They probably think of us as things that
must not be..."

          "So how do we beat this thing, oh great wise one who plays
her cards close to her chest?"  Mars asked sardonically.  Pluto still
doesn't tell us everything, even after all we've been through, even
after saying she would.  Sometimes I want to kill her.

         "The reason I didn't tell you about how to send an interstellar
signal is that I already sent one a thousand years ago.  It just arrived
at Jurai a few weeks ago, and the main Juraiian battle fleet is
already on the way."

          "You know, we'd have worried a lot less if you TOLD us that."

         Pluto smiled.  "You'd have relied on them too much if I had."

         Space suddenly twisted in hundreds of spots around the huge
oncoming creature.  Strange organic ships of interwoven crystal and
wood appeared.  The viewscreen blinked.  The communications
officer, a young girl named Moemi, said, "Incoming call from those
things that just appeared.  Should I put it on the viewscreen?"

          "Make it so,"  Serenity said, then smiled faintly.

          Mars grumbled quietly as the screen came to life.  Priss's
smiling face was on the screen.  She was dressed in Juraiian
battlegarb with a tiara upon her forehead.  She looked almost the
same as the last time Usagi saw her, except for a few flecks of grey
in her hair.  Queen Serenity said, "PRISS-CHAN!"

         Priss smiled.  "This is Admiral Priscilla S. Asagiri of House
Serenity.  Request permission to help you kick some giant monster
ass.  So did this thing crawl out of your garbage can or what, sis?  It
looks like some leftovers evolved into a new life form."

         Serenity threw back her head and laughed.  "Like that
meatloaf you made?"

         Priss winced.  "Hey, Leon liked it."

         "Sometimes people lie when they love you, you know.  How
many years did it stay in your refrigerator?"

         "It's probably STILL there.  So what the hell is this thing?"

         "It has no real name, but legends call it the Devourer of
Worlds.  It's generally considered one of the larger spawn of
Azathoth.  Or possibly vice versa.  Azathoth is rather overrated."
Pluto smiled faintly.

          Priss nodded.  "Right.  It won't detonate in a solar system
levelling explosion if we just shoot it repeatedly, will it?"

         Pluto stared off into space for a moment.  "You may fire when
ready, Gridley."

         "Who the hell is Gridley?"

         Pluto sighed.  No one ever gets my jokes, then they complain I
have no sense of humor.

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

3056 AD
Year 66 of the Crystal Millenium

      A single note erupted through the still morning air of Crystal
Tokyo.  The entire city began to reverberate, buildings chiming like
bells.  A huge ship the size of a football stadium appeared from
nowhere, drifting towards the huge palace at the heart of the city.

        Queen Serenity looked up from the meeting she was
conducting with her trade advisors and smiled.  "The Juraiian
ambassador has arrived."

        Andrew Blackhawk, the Minister of North Columbian Trade
blinked.  "You can tell from just that?"

        Her lips quirked in a smile.  "You have to know these things
when you're queen."

        He nodded solemnly.  She laughed more.  He must have taken
me seriously, she thought.  "Arrange to have the ambassador
greeted.  Properly."

        "Properly?"

        "She's very strict on being properly addressed by her full titles
when she makes a grand enterance, or she becomes very unhappy.
You remember what happened when the Trantorian ambassador
became very unhappy?"

       "Was he the one who drank rat poison as a gesture of
defiance?"  Rumiko Munanga, the Minister of Oceanic Trade, asked.

        "No, that was the Centauri ambassador, I think,"  Queen
Serenity said.  "Anyway, I need to go change into formal attire.
Andrew, go tell the chief of protocol that the Juraiian ambassador is
here."

         Andrew did so.  The chief of protocol, also known as Luna,
assumed her human form and set the wheels in motion to prepare a
proper reception.  While they waited for the ambassador's shuttle,
she went to the computer banks and printed out the complete list of
titles and scanned it.  Nothing new since the last time I went over
these, she thought.  She headed for the courtyard where the shuttle
would land.  Artemis joined her, looking dapper in a white tuxedo.  "I
see they're bringing out the big guns for this one," he said.

         She smiled.  "Well, if they put YOU in charge, you'd probably
show up in a T-shirt and hack up a hairball on her as she got out of
the shuttle."

       "Can I?  Please?"  he asked teasingly.

        "Not in this lifetime."

         The honorguard of twenty pikemen was ready.  Not that
pikemen had any real military purpose, but pikes are more
impressive than wands and neuronic whips, which they also had.
Various courtiers, officials, and nobles were present, as was Makoto.
I hope Queen Serenity arrives in time, Luna thought.  She did,
running in at the last second as the shuttle began to descend.
Endymion was right behind her, walking swiftly, yet seemingly
effortlessly.  "Am I on time?"   Queen Serenity inquired, now decked
out in one of her most radiant dresses.

        Luna smiled.  "Just in time."

        The shuttle, which resembled a log, as drawn by Pablo Picasso
with help from M.C. Escher, landed and the door opened.  Two guards
stepped out, followed by a beautiful red haired Juraiian princess.
Queen Serenity whispered to Luna, "Remember, get her titles just
right or she'll be really displeased.  The last time they messed that
up...well, I think that planet is still trying to put their palace back
together."

        Luna nodded  "I welcome you to the planet Earth in the name
of Queen Serenity the First of the Crystal Millenium, High Queen of
the Ten Worlds, and in the name of King Endymion the First of the
Crystal Millenium, High King of the Ten Worlds.  Be ye welcome in
this place for as long as you desire to stay.  High Queen and High
King, I present to you, Her Most Regal Highness, Consort to his
most Imperial Highness, the heir to the Throne of Jurai, ..."

        Luna droned on and on.  She was good at this.  It took ten
minutes to list all of the ambassdor's titles.  She finally concluded
with, "...and Baroness of Barnard's star."  She took a deep breath.
"We greet thee and bid thee welcome."

        The red haired ambassador was tapping her toes impatiently.
"You forgot something."

         Luna panicked for a moment.  Surely the woman can't have
ANOTHER title.  I know I got all the important ones.  I followed the
protocols...heck, I wrote the protocols.  "I did?"  Great, she thought,
what did I say THAT for?

       "Well, let's see.  Two things.  First, you completely omitted my
hereditary titles.  I am Empress of All the Russias and Grand
Duchess of Moscow, not that either of those exist anymore.
Secondly, you left out my NAME."

       Queen Serenity could only barely restrain herself from laughing.
Endymion had to prick himself with one of his own roses to stop
himself from collapsing onto the ground laughing.

        Luna paused.  She was truly embarrassed.  "I wasn't sure of the
proper mode of salutation for that, actually."  It was a vaguely
plausible lie.  Actually, she had completely forgotten her name from
the strain of remembering all those titles.  "Hakubi-Masaki-
himesama, correct?"

         Her voice was cold.  "That is not correct."

         Luna paled.  This was not good.  She looked at the palace. I
bet this place breaks even more easily than the Sirian palace did.
"How would you like to be addressed?"

         A large smile lit up the Ambassador's face and a twinkle
entered her eye.   "As Grandma would say, "Please call me Nene-
chan!"

         The Earth shook from the weight of face-faulting courtiers.

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

3990 AD
Year 998 of the Crystal Millenium

      Dr. Gregory Stingray bowed to Queen Serenity VIII.  "I must
depart, back to my studies and my duties."

      Queen Serenity bowed.  "You know I rely on your prescience
and your skills to guide me.  I eagerly await your return."  Her hair
was long and white, done up in the traditional double 'odango' style,
as it was called, though no one knew for sure what an 'odango' was,
other than this hair style.  It had been instituted by Serenity I, and
what was good enough for her, was good enough for her
descendants.  "Have you yet been able to discern whether or not
Seiya will be able to successfully father a child by me?"

       He frowned.  Five years of being her Prime Minister and he still
hadn't quite been able to get into her head that Astro-history was
only useful for predicting bulk behavior, not the fortunes of
individuals.  Only when he had gained that insight had he been able
to make the crucial breakthroughs that had converted Astrology into
a precise, though probabalistic science.  She hadn't ever quite
grasped that aspect of it either.  "Such a task is more fit for medical
examiners than for a mathematician and sociologist such as myself,
my Queen."

       She pouted.  "In other words, you don't know."

       "Astro-history is not a useful tool for family planning unless one
has thousands of children like the legendary King of Siam."

       "Siam is a myth for children.  Everyone knows it didn't really
exist, nor were its monarchs reknowned singers if it did exist."  She
sighed.  "I never have time to sing anymore."

       "You were the next in succession, your majesty.  I am proud to
serve a monarch who put her duty before the pleasures of monastic
life."  Serenity's real name was Miki.  She had been intended for the
Monastery of the Holy Song, dedicated to Saint Rei, but after three
years, she had to leave the monastery after a series of duels and
accidents slew her two older sisters and her older brother.  He
pretended to check an appointment calendar.  "Ahh, I see you are
scheduled to attend a choral performance by the Ladies of the Holy
Song next Monday.  Perhaps they would not mind if you joined them
in their performance.  It would have to be anonymous, of course, but
I'm sure the royal Imposter would not mind taking your place in the
audience so that no one would know."  He punched a few buttons
and scheduled the performance.  He had to displace a few
ceremonies, but they were all pointless anyway.

        Serenity blinked.  "I had forgotten about that.  Yes, that would
be most excellent.  Make it so."  She paused.  "You will come, won't
you?  You've never gotten to hear me sing, and..."

        She prattled on.  He smiled and  nodded and made affirmative
noises.  Finally, she said something that cut through to him.  "We
need to start planning the Millenial celebration.  Of course, the true
Millenium doesn't start for eleven years, but the Crystal Millenium
will reach its end in two years.  I've been thinking of a name for the
next Millenium.  I believe we should appoint a committee."

        "I see you are aware of the distinction between the old
Christian calendar and the one we now use for secular purposes.
Part of your monastic training, I assume?"  Sometimes she surprises
me, he thought.  It's times like these that I can see your parents in you
and know that you truly spring of the royal line.  The times when you 
show there's more to you than frills and royal parties.  I wish they 
happened more often.


         She nodded.  "Of course, given that Dionysius miscalculated
anyway, this actually should be 3994 AD, not 3990 AD, because
Herod actually died earlier than Dionysius calculated.  In addition the
next millenium doesn't REALLY begin until the zero zero one year,
because there was no year zero.  So it's actually about to be a new
millenium in seven years, not ten or two and no one knows but me,
and maybe you.  Most people, even in the Church, don't think about
that, you see."  She smiled.  "We'll just keep it our little secret,
okay?"

         "Of course, my queen."  Sometimes you surprise me, he
thought.  Every so often, the ancient blood suddenly surfaces and
you surpass my expectations.  If only it happened more often.

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

       Dr. Stingray sat in his office and sent off the final memos.  He
was getting old and getting tired.  A pair of hands settled down onto
his shoulders.  "Boo."  The voice was soft and gentle, betraying no
hint of her age.

       Dr. Stingray spun in his chair.  "Hello, Amy."  He stood up and
hugged her.  "Back from Finis Astra already?"

      She nodded.  Dr. Amy Stingray was short, with short black hair
shot through with gray.  "The preparations are in place.  The
construction crews and terraformers are at work.  Finis Astra will
make a beautiful world for the Galactic Encyclopedia."  Amy had not
returned alone.  Her chief assistants were with her as well.

       "If we don't die of boredom out at the edge of the Empire,"
Monica Nichols said.  She was blonde, though her hair was turning
gray.  "Why on God's green earth did you pick such an isolated world?"

       "Would you prefer the Juraiian border?"  Greg said.  "We need
this project to be safe.  You don't think I'd send Amy into danger,
would you?"

        Captain Priscilla Hakubi-Masaki nodded.  She was tall with long
reddish-gold hair, dressed in a Juraiian military uniform.  "My
relatives are in the middle of kicking in each other's skulls.  We'll be
lucky if the empire survives this civil war.  And if Jurai falls, the
Galactic Federation will finally collapse, and if that happens..."

        She didn't have to finish the sentence.  "That's what the
Enyclopedia is for.  We have to preserve all the wisdom of the
Crystal Millenium for the future.  With that wisdom, our descendants
will rebuild better and stronger than we were able to build.  This has
happened before, but the last two times, so much was lost.  This
time, things will be different.  That's why we have formed the
Society of the Senshi of Wisdom, why we all took the ancient oath."

        They nodded.  A tiny band of elite scholars and warriors, such
as the Crystal Millenium was not capable of producing anymore.
They formed a conspiracy.  A conspiracy of hope.  None of them
knew that Dr. Gregory Stingray was keeping secrets from all of them
but his wife...

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

       Dr. Stingray had not become Prime Minister purely through
merit.  He had been recommended to the office by his secret
collaborator.  The Crystal Palace was riven with intrigue, but he and
his ally had yet to lose their secret to anyone.  She appeared that
evening when he and his wife were finally alone.  Her hair was short
and blonde.  She carried a long staff tipped with a glowing amethyst
and she wore the uniform of the special warriors of the Crystal
Millenium.  Her name was Sailor Pluto and she was over 2000 years
old, the only living human to remember the beginning of the Crystal
Millenium and the ages that came before it.  She was the one who
had unlocked his own powers of prescience, weak as they were, and
had given him some hints that had lead to the critical breakthroughs
in the development of Astro-History.

        Amy frowned.  "What are you doing here?  We don't have any
more children to give you."  She had never forgiven Sailor Pluto for
taking her children Sylia and Matthew to the future, though she knew
it was necessary.  Pluto could convince a Juraiian that going without
bathing for a year was necessary, she thought.

       "Your children are well.  I promised you that they would be, and
I always keep my promises."  Pluto sighed.  "I am sorry, for what it is
worth."

        "I just...I know I won't have more children."

        "Sarah thought that as well."  Pluto smiled.  "Don't be so
certain."

       She turned to Gregory.  "The preparations are ready.  I have
initiated three people, and there will be more.  The Inner Senshi will
be ready to watch over your 'Outers'.  We will ensure that the
Stingray Plan succeeds."  Her voice became a little less controlled.
"It will succeed.  It must."

        He sighed.  "The Stingray Plan.  It sounds so egotistical.  Dr.
Gregory Stingray, savior of the world.  Well, worlds."

        Pluto smiled.  "I chose you because I knew you would not have
volunteered for this job.  Power is best left in the hands of those who
do not seek it.  Your legacy WILL be carried on.  I promise you that.
You have sacrificed much.  It will not be in vain.  I know what was,
what is, and what must be."  She paused.  "I have known you before,
and will know you again.  To you, this gift is always given.  I rejoice
that finally you can put it to good use."

        "But you still won't tell us who we were."

        "Sometimes you must know of your past lives in order to live
your present ones.  If I were to tell you who you once were, it would
only depress you.  I will simply say that we were friends and to see
you alive once more brings warmth to this old heart."

         Amy looked out the window.  The beautiful city of Crystal
Tokyo spread out around her as far as the eye could see.  It was
vast, hundreds of miles across.  Much of what had once been known
as Japan was now one huge city, a shining beacon in the darkness
of space.  "It's hard to believe this will come to an end."

        Greg sighed.  "In five hundred years, this will all be a ruins.
Twenty five thousand years of darkness and rule by the things that
lurk beyond the Galactic shield.  That's what I predicted.  I'll give my
soul if I have to, to prevent that.  I just wish I could have found a
way to reduce the anarchy to less than a thousand years, but the
numbers just...it's like they're taunting me when I try."

        "There is only so much that ANY of us can do.  My predecessor
could not save the Silver Millenium anymore than you can save the
Crystal one.  It MUST fall.  All things come to an end in time.  But
from the ashes, new life will grow."  She winked.  "I'll try to make
sure they name the next one the Stingray Millenium."

        Greg threw a pillow at her.

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

        And so the cycle began anew.  It was an ending and a
beginning, for any ending we chose to a story is arbitrary.  Every
ending begins new stories, and every beginning ends an old one.
History never repeats itself, but it rarely produces something
very new, either.  The old stories happen over and over, with new
actors, or with old ones in new roles, for we hunger for stories to
guide us in our lives, to teach us the steps we must walk.

         Through eternity, we dance, changing partners and returning
to old ones, learning, loving, and living forevermore.  Yet, while the
dance never ends, this story must end somewhere, for tale-telling is
but one beat of the dance.  Dance then, wherever you may be, and
may the Lord of the Dance lead you home, for Love without end
awaits you at journey's end.  Shiva's dance is over, but yours is just
beginning.


************
Sabre Prime Says:

[Cut to a huge ballroom in which a riotous cast party is going on.
We can see Ukyou in the background whacking Biles in the head for
not putting her in this story, along with a lot of other characters, who
have formed a line for this purpose.  We can see Macky crawling
around on the floor looking up people's skirts and being energy
blasted by most of the women.  We can see Hikaru dancing on a
table with Kyosuke, while Madoka and Jonny Quest are about to
mallet both of them.  Celia Stingray steps out of the crowd and
takes center stage.]

Celia Stingray:  This week on Dance of Shiva, we learned that...

Nene:  [appears in front of Celia, blocking the camera's view of her]
That I got a cute alien boyfriend and got to live over a thousand
years and FINALLY got to kick some butt!

Priss:  [leaps out of the crowd and lands in front of Nene]  That I got
a cuter boyfriend than Nene, who wasn't made up by the author,
unlike HER boyfriend.  I also got to become more powerful than
Nene and lived at least as long as her.

Linna:  [punts Nene and Priss off screen]  Oh yeah?  Well, I'm now
dating a god and I'm immortal and ALL powerful!
HAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!!!!

Celia:  [puts Linna off screen]  While they're busy bragging, I'll just...

Biles:  [runs in front of Celia]  Whahaha!  I finally wrote a long epic
that wasn't a lemon story!  And more important, I FINISHED IT!

Celia:  [mallets Biles]  As I was saying, this story is an epic of the
human soul.  It's easy for us to forget that the Hero, or in this case
the Heroines' journey is a voyage of the soul and discovery of the
self, that results in...

Ryu:  Really cool original characters like me!

Manami:  [shoves in next to Ryu]  And me!

Meylia:  [stands on both their heads.  Camera pans up to her]  And
me.

[They are run over by an army of 'sailor clone' sexaroids, lead by
Rachel Yamazaki and Ursula Anderson.]

Ursula:  Don't forget us!

Lt. Shinohara:  [charges in]  Ahah!  There they are!  You're all under
arrest!  We know all about what happened on that space station!

[She chases the sexaroids off screen.]

Celia:  Anyway, this story is about the paths we walk through life and
why we should not despair in a world that often seems...

[Aeka chases Ryouko right over Celia.  For some odd reason, Aeka
seems to be wearing a punchbowl for a hat and is drenched with
some liquid.]

Aeka:  COME BACK HERE!

Celia:  [from the ground]  To be populated by idiots.  [Macky helps
her up.]  Thanks, brother.

Macky:  Guess what!

Celia:  What?

Macky:  In Jurai, it's okay to marry your sister, which means...

Celia:  [whips out the mallet and pounds him flat]  I'm going to have
to make a lot of use of this.  [turns to audience]  Anyway, this story
does have a moral, but I think I'm going to get flattened again if I
don't shut up now.

[We see Wasyuu standing over Celia with a cord attached to an
anvil hanging from the ceiling.]

Wasyuu:  Hey!  Don't I get to use this?

Celia:  Hang mistletoe on it and announce it's Christmas.  That
should give you a chance to use it.

Wasyuu:  That would never work.

Celia:  Hmm.  Try standing right here.  [draws an X on the floor]

Wasyuu:  [moves over]  Like this?

Celia:  [pulls the cord and drops an anvil on Wasyuu, squashing her
flat]  Exactly.  Thanks for being a guineapig for my experiment.

Wasyuu:  [standing behind Celia.  We now see Celia squashed a
plushie of Wasyuu]  Let me return the favor.  [shoots Celia with a
Boy/Girl gun]  I see it now!  Another Ranma/BGC crossover, but this
time...

[A now male Celia chases Wasyuu off screen with a mallet in hand.]

Wasyuu:  Then again, maybe you'd make a better Akane...

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

Author's afterword:

         Dang.

         This thing is HUGE!  I never meant it to be that way.  I NEVER
mean it to be that way.  It just happens.  This is the longest story I've
ever written.  Big beyond my wildest dreams of it.  Especially since it
was originally going to be maybe 200K at most.  However, it started
snowballing out of control, moving from a simple action/adventure to
a rather complex interweaving of four major series (BGC, Tenchi,
Sailor Moon, and Patlabor), and tons of other lesser ones, from
important roles to cameos(KOR, Marmalade Boy, Maison Ikkoku,
Foundation (Sort of ^_-), AMG, and many others.)

       I hope this story doesn't get too preachy, but if it does, oh well,
I think my message is worth preaching :P  The stories that we tell
express how we view the world and how we think it should be at the
same time.  Every story can be compared to a sort of mental virus
that tries to infect you with its ideas so that you'll pass them on to
others.  I hope you all got pretty sick from this one ^_-.

        I have pretty strong religious beliefs, but this is the first time
I've tried to write a story that really incorporated them.  (Well,
aspects of them).  I owe an especial debt in my religious thinking to
CS Lewis, who remains my favorite religious writer of all time.
Several of his essays express ideas that have critically shaped my
thinking and this story.  I especially recommend one of his more
obscure essays, "The Weight of Glory".  This essay deals with an
often neglected aspect of Christian doctrine, the immortality of the
soul.  Christians proclaim it, yet we rarely think about the
consequences of such a doctrine.  What does it really MEAN for
souls to be immortal?  How should this effect our priorities?  Our
sense of our own importance and that of others?  How are we
preparing ourselves for eternal existence through our actions in this
life?  Death is not the end of life, merely of the briefest stage of it.

         A second major theme I tried to explore is that of death and
rebirth.  One of the messages of Christianity is that we must die and
be born again.  But this is not a once and for all process.  There are
many deaths (beyond just physical death)   and many ways in which we 
must come to live again.  It's always terrifying to let go of a stage of our 
life, a treasured possession, a goal that we have sought.  But if we cling 
to things, then the waves of life will drown us instead of carrying us 
onwards.  Celia and Priss both have this lesson to learn, along with 
Meylia, Anri, and Sylvie.  For a time, vengeance sustained them, but they 
had to learn to let go, or die.  Anri and Sylvie died, indeed, and only lived 
again through the wisdom of another, rather than their own
strength.  We must die many little deaths, in order to avoid the big
death from which there is no returning, the death of the soul, the
fires of hell.

        One might ask how a devout Catholic can write a story full of
goddesses, reincarnation, humans ascending to divinity, magic, etc,
etc, etc.  Three major comments come to mind.  First, this is not
intended to be a portrait of the world as it is in a literal sense, which
I hope is obvious ^_^.  Part of it being fiction is that it's not true in a
literal sense.  Goddesses are not part of my real theological outlook.
I'd happily find a place for Belldandy, though, given the choice. ^_-.
Secondly, While I do make some major theological, philosophical,
and religious points which I would apply to the real world, I'm dealing
with a lot of fictional universes in which some assumptions counter
to my real world beliefs are established elements.  Japan has a
different set of religous and philosophical assumptions than mine,
and I tried to remain true to the stories' use of these elements, while
twisting them to my own purposes, of course.  Thirdly, there is no
point #3.

       I hope that finally I've written a story that will enable Usagi's
fans to understand that I DO like her ^_-.  I've gotten a lot of flack
from various people over the years who think I hate her, but really
she's one of my very favorite characters of all time.  She only has a
bit part in this story, since the real focus is on the four Knight Sabres
as the central characters, and secondarily on my original characters,
but I think I've showed her at her best in her many aspects here.
Usagi is one of the most Christlike figures in all of animation, more
purely adhering to the law of love than virtually any other fictional
character I can think of.  Usagi has the love that can move
mountains.  Her love has power to soothe broken hearts and heal
wounded souls.  I cried like a child at the end of the Sailor Moon R
movie.  I won't spoil the moment for those who have not seen the
movie, but truly she is awesome in her love, her sadness, and her
power.  When she cries, I cry.  She shines with the power of
innocence and love.

         Three other characters in this story also help to exemplify the
power of innocence and love.  One of them flies freely like Usagi,
the other two are wounded, but find some healing as the story
progresses.  They are also three of my favorite characters of all
time.  The first is Nene Romanova.  She is the soul of the Knight
Sabres.  Unwounded by past injuries, she retains the faith and hope
of a child, and some of the flaws of a child as well.  Of course I had
to give her the cool alien boyfriend :).  She'd make a great Inner
Senshi, because she has hope and faith unspoiled by 'adult
responsibilities and worries'.  She is the happiest of the Knight
Sabres and the one I'd most likely be able to deal with in RL without
going insane :)

          Then, there are the two wounded souls, wounded by their own
ability to love.  Priss exemplifies love wounded by past suffering.
Priss is torn apart by internal wounds because each time she has
opened herself to love, something has gone wrong.  She burns with
firey passion but because of the wounds she has suffered, she often
burns others with her internal flame rather than warming them.  Until 
she heals her own wounds, she will often be more dangerous to
herself than to others, unable to fully use her own strength.

         The other wounded soul is Hikaru.  I will tell the full story of
what happened to her eventually.  I have the story about one third
done.  Hikaru, like Priss, seeks vengeance, though she has had
more time to heal her wounds than Priss.  On the other hand, she
has suffered something worse than Priss ever has.  I don't put my
characters through suffering easily, and to put Hikaru through this
was painful.  I don't write anything dark easily--even making
imaginary people suffer is difficult for me.  It's because I often think
of them as real in my unguarded moments.  I just hope there isn't a
real Hikaru out there gunning for me now :)  She too finds healing in
this story and lets go of vengeance, the victory that devours the
soul.

         The power of love is another major theme of this story.  It
brings healing to the soul and food for it as well.  Love and Hate are
the same side of a coin whose other side is Apathy, and it's far too
easy at times to move between them.  Still, even love is not an all-
potent value.  It can send people down the path of destruction as
well as along the road of healing, and I tried to show that too.  Still,
this world needs more love and compassion, with whatever dangers
might attend that.  If we could all learn to love like Usagi, or even
just like Nene, this world would shine with five billion lights.

         Finally, I hope you enjoyed my original characters.  Ryu,
Manami, and Meylia all have a special place in my heart, and I hope
they've found room in yours.  Ryu and Manami were at the core of
the original story concept and while this monster rapidly outgrew that
concept, they grew to fit the expanding story.  I also enjoyed all my
minor original characters, like Lt. Yamano and Lt. Shinohara.
Eventually, I plan to do a solo story for Lt. Shinohara and develop
her more.  Indeed, I have lots of stories planned for this universe.
You'll be seeing lots more of everyone and all this weirdness :)

          Well, enough ranting.  I want to extend special thanks to
everyone who has preread this monster.  I owe especial thanks to
Jeff Hosmer for his many constant suggestions and letting me link
this to our Z continuity.

        I also owe especial thanks to all the creators of these series,
who have no clue what I've done to their creations ^_-.  I can't even
name half the creators and artists and voice actors and whatnot, but
they've given me a wonderful ride of the imagination and I thank
them all.

        Well, time for me to go.  I have to go help Queen Serenity with
her new computer system.  She can't find the 'any key' again.

<WHAP>

       Perhaps I'll be reporting to Ami for medical help instead.

        God bless you all, and may the Lord of the Dance be your
partner in the Great Dance of Life.


                                                             John Biles
                                                             Huntsville
                                                             July 29,1997