The Starguild Presents:
a Story of Sailor Moon Expanded...

(status = INCOMPLETE)

The Zodiac Grand Tour - Chapter 3

Story Written By: Berk' Watkins

Sailor Moon Created By: Naoko Takeuchi

"Okay, pal, we seem to have had a breakdown in communication somewhere," Styx muttered darkly as she hoisted a Nemesite guard up by his throat. Her blue eyes gleamed coldly in the streetlights.

"We want to know where the shipment of supplies came from," Isaac's warrior persona, Myrmidon, growled. He held up a palm and revealed the energy emitter there, the emitter began to whine slightly. "I could take your head clean off and divine the information from your spirit..." Being a man in mystical power armor with a threatening mask tended to intimidate people. In reality, Isaac could no more commune with the dead than he could teleport to Saturn.

"St... Saint Louis..." the soldier whimpered.

"Good boy," Styx muttered. She promptly threw him into the bay...a mile away.

The guard skipped several times and finally sank about a hundred meters from shore. He struggled to the surface and began the process of swimming back to land. If he was really lucky no one would ask what he was doing in the harbor when he got back.

Chrysoprase was not a happy noblewoman. She was tall for a Nemesite, and lean. Her frame was like that of a human track athlete, no spare fat and tight muscles. Her eyes were a smouldering red color and her hair was long and black with several, seemingly out-of-place, white streaks in her hair. "Report, Aivouri."

An albino man seemed to melt out of the shadows. "The warriors you refer to as the Black Novas have discovered where our supply depot is."

"Damn..."

"It was only a matter of time, St. Louis was Peridos' capital.

Logistics would dictate that it would still be important, even though you moved the capital to Los Angeles."

The noble nodded and continued to stare out the window of her office that overlooked the harbor. "They are the Black Nova that claimed the greatest Bloodstar warrior of all time. As a nova burns brightly in the heavens, so do they. Soon, however, as is the way of a nova, they too shall fade." She smiled. "Soon, Darkness will swallow them up." She looked into a viewsphere as her ship left St. Louis for Los Angeles, the Gateway Arch gleamed brightly in the sunlight, the millions of crystals they'd had imbedded into its surface refracting the light like a huge prism.

[Isaac + Rene]

Drake looked into the mirror. "Mom, I need to stay here for a little longer." he said sadly.

"You really need to come home soon, Dear," the woman on the other side said. "You're losing your focus."

Drake nodded. "I will.. But something terrible's happening here, and I think my friends need my help." He hung his head.

[more]

"She tried to destroy me," the spirit whispered in the summoner's ear. "I could rid the world of every Nemesite, and she tried to obliterate me." Her form seemed to solidify a little...

"Why would a warrior of Crystal Tokyo want the Nemesites to stay?"

"Simple, they want the Nemesites here. They're laying in wait to drive them away. Once the Nemesites are gone the Senshi and the other nobles will take over. After all, what government is left to contest them?"

[more]

The summoner's eyes flared with mana as she began to put her spell together. "I will call you out of the world of dreams!" she said decisively.

Twilight's ghostly visage grinned behind the sash over her mouth.

"Spirit cast into the Dream and left for dead. Cease your wandering and return to the world which Dreams..." the summoner commanded, energy crackling around the summoning circle in the center of her lab.

Black smoke flowed out of the lines.

Red lightning arced through the cloud as it coalesced.

Twilight could feel her body's mass.. or lack of it. She was still a spirit. She eyed the summoner, her eyes gleaming a solid blood-red. Vengeance thanks you for your sacrifice." she purred.

"What?"

The circle shattered as Twilight used telekinesis to shatter some of the cement *beneath* the floor's surface. "Fatal flaw," she whispered as she rushed at the summoner. "I'm not entirely a demon, so my influence extends past your Barrier, even though I could not physically cross it!"

Her body turned into a sort of black mist that flowed around the mage and into her nose and mouth. The summoner didn't have time to scream as her spirit was obliterated by a creature made of pure hate.

A continent away, Chrysolite's eyes opened wide. She felt as if a great burden had just been removed from her heart. Now why did that feeling, or lack thereof, scare her shitless? A week later, Chrysolite's fears were justified when every broadcasting wavelength on the planet was pirated for 60 seconds.

A shadow-shrouded woman chuckled from every recieving system on the planet. "I am Eris Twilight, and I have come to reap a bitter harvest. On this day I declare war on the inhabitants of the planet Nemesis, within one Standard Terran Month not a single member of the Great Houses will be breathing. St. Louis, on the North American continent will be the first city to be cleansed."

"I sense irony in the future..." Rene murmured as she turned off the television. She looked over to the youma. "You up to keeping Twilight out of St. Louis?"

Chrysolite nodded. "There are Terrans there too, someone like her may forget that..."

"Or simply not care..." Drake appraised.

Isaac stood up from the chair he'd been sitting in and headed to his workshop. "If we're going out after her, I suggest we get ready.

My armor's ready to roll."

The others nodded.

"We meet back here in two hours," Rene said coldly.

Everyone went off to prepare.

"Honey, I want you to stay here with 'Auntie' Damia until I get back, okay?" Rene told her daughter. She kneeled down and kissed her daughter on the forehead, grinning and tousling her hair for good measure.

Damia Lee was an elderly woman who's hair had gone pure silver instead of the funny brownish-gray so many people seemed to get as they aged. She smiled and nodded to Rene and put her hand on Laura's shoulder. "Be careful..." she said softly.

"I will," the Senshi of Destruction said with confidence.

Isaac latched a piece of armor into place over his left forearm and clenched his fist as additional pieces unfolded from inside and fastened the piece of armor to the rest of the suit and over his hand to form a true gauntlet. He reached over to the workbench and looked at the final piece of the suit. A mask that covered the lower half of his face, yet leaved his mouth uncovered. He pressed that onto his face and felt it adhere.

Myrmidon looked at himself in the mirror and nodded.

Drake put the bones from a turkey into the trash and washed his hands in the sink. "And the condemned man shall enjoy a hearty meal..." he muttered darkly.

Chrysolite pulled on a pair of dark trousers and tucked her gray muscle shirt into it. Then she retrieved her belt from the bed and put it in place. She tugged on her boots and tucked her pants into them. She stood and stamped her feet into place firmly. Then she retrieved her uniform jacket, slipped it on and buttoned up the front. Finally, she pulled her gray cloak from the back of a bedside chair and draped it over her shoulders, fastened in place with a Seal of Solomon cloak pin.

"You ready?" Styx asked from the other side of the door.

"Yes," the youma said quietly.

[Chrys & co to St. Louis!!!]

[more]

Isaac's armor whined as it climbed to full power. "Here comes trouble," he warned.

"You've come to see this blight of a city get sucked down to the Ninth Circle?" Twilight sang out as she bounded over the hill. She was dressed in an all-black jumpsuit and cloak, with a deep hood pulled up over her head. Her face was concealed in shadow but the twin, red lamps of her eyes were the perfect calling-card.

"You have delusions of demonhood now?" Chrysolite shot back. She unfastened the pin holding her cloak in place and handed it to Drake. "Drake, I know her very well. She'd handle this like I would if I were going to destroy this city. If I put my mind and power to it, I could probably set off all the gas lines.. But I wouldn't exert myself like that," she warned. "There's a bomb somewhere, probably atomic..."

"It's a Mana Harmonic Detonator to be exact!" Twilight bellowed.

Drake frowned. "Resonate the crystals in a mana containment device, when the crystals finally shatter the mana is released in a raw state..." He turned very pale.

Chrys, Isaac, Drake and Styx realized what Twilight had done at the same instant: the Nemesites had turned the Gateway Arch into a massive mana battery, encrusted with crystals.

"The hum is hypersonic. They won't notice anything beyond a headache.. Until a thousand Nemesite shadows get flashed into the walls," Twilight boasted, "But then again, how long will the walls stand?"

She stood at a distance, pondering...

"Oh who cares? The pulse of radiation and heat traveling at the speed of light? The compression wave at hypersonic speeds? DEAD IS DEAD!" she roared, eyes flaring even brighter, illuminating her face in a hateful light.

[more]

[dividing forces]

Chrysolite clenched her fists tightly, energy arcing around her hands. "Are you ready, Twilight?" she asked.

"I was born ready," the monster rasped.

All nine circles of Hell broke loose.

Energy flared around Chrysolite as she raced towards her opponent.

She created a sword out of some of the energy she was channeling and swung it right at Twilight's head.

Twilight ducked under the swipe and unleashed a concussion blast at Chrysolite's chest. The blast was partially absorbed by the energy writhing around her like a thick, second-skin.

The youma, nevertheless, went flying.

"You've gotten sloppy without me," Twilight muttered, her sash suddenly lashing out and wrapping around Chrysolite's neck like a vice.

"You need my killer instincts to survive..."

The youma glared angrily, her aura flaring brighter as she neared her limits. {Why did I have to hibernate while the rest of my family got stronger?} she wondered. She growled in pain as she hit her mana threshold. Any more power was going to hurt her a she used it. Her aura shifted and hardened into blades, cutting away at Twilight's sash.

Chrysolite dropped to the ground bonelessly, mouth hanging open in a silent scream. She managed to manipulate the energy field around her, slowing her fall. She bit through her lower lip with her upper and lower fangs from the pain of the effort.

The field flickered out.

"I'm still going strong. Is it just me, or are you just about done in?" the woman in black said in dark humor. She let out a cruel laugh.

Chrysolite whimpered as the sash returned, wrapping around her neck and dragging her towards the monster. She looked up at Twilight, spitting out a mouthful of tin-tasting blood. She holes in her lip were only just beginning to close.

"All tapped out..." Twilight mocked.

A single tear came from the corner of Chrysolite's garnet-red, right eye and down her cheek. "Forgive me, Makoto..." she whispered.

Twilight raised her head up so that they were looking at each other face to face. "Now.. you will die..." Twilight purred.

Chrysolite's faced screwed up into a look of anguish as she reached out and grabbed Twilight by the throat.

Twilight let out a blood-curdling scream as her life-force began to ebb from her body, and flow into the youma. Her hands reached up, deforming into monstrous claws as she dug into her assailant's hands.

Chrysolite began to cry like a lost soul as Twilight's struggles slowed.. and then ceased. "This is the only way," she whispered.

The flames in Twilight's eyes faded out.

Her skin paled to chalk-white.

Her eyes rolled back.

Her flesh seemed to.. become thinner.

The corpse of Twilight dropped to the ground.

Chrysolite dropped to her knees, her face buried in her hands.

She'd betrayed her promise to herself... She'd betrayed the trust of Serenity... She'd betrayed her own soul to her darkest powers...

Perversely, her body had never felt better. Power roared through her veins. New pathways were searing in her mind. She could feel the pulse of the planet itself in her mind.

She growled softly as she drug herself back to her feet. "Got to ignore it..." she muttered, "All coming too fast..." She winced at her own voice, it sounded too loud in her ears even though she was speaking only a bit louder than a whisper. She took an unsteady step and pulverized a nearby wall when she under-adjusted and went sailing. Her powers had gone into overdrive, but she had no time to think about what that meant. She fought her way back to her feet and tore off after her friends. She had to get to them before the bomb went off!

"WIDE-ANGLE!" Isaac bellowed, opening fire with beams from the palms of his hands. Not that two energy beams were going to do much to a pack of Droids as numerous as his foes.

The Droids kept coming.

Drake put both hands in a ready position and waited patiently, energy gathering.

Styx called up a sphere of destructive energy and waited.

"Geosplitter," Drake muttered, slamming his hand, fingers held rigid and down, into the ground. The ground, as advertised, spilt open and swallowed several Droids whole.

"Death knell..." Styx said in a tired voice, throwing a sphere of destructive energy. More Droids were destroyed in the pyroclasm that was the Deneb Senshi of Destruction's trademark.

"I feel, somehow, inadequate," Isaac remarked. He sat down on an old park bench with a dull, metallic thud.

Styx and Drake made short work of the Droids and noticed that Isaac had left the fight. It wasn't hard to miss the man in the blue armor sitting on a nearby park bench. Considering that one of the fights that Twilight had picked with the Nemesites when she'd first arrived had reduced the park to cinders, it was hard to miss *any* bench.

[more]

"I don't think Twilight will be bothering us any more..."

Chrysolite said as she approached.

"Chrys.. your eyes..." Styx said in shock.

"What?"

"They've gone from garnet-red to blood-red!"

The youma shook her head slowly. "Can't be helped.. I had to.."

Drake came up to the youma and put a hand on her shoulder. "I can guess. Don't worry these kids with the details," he whispered.

"It came from disrupting Twilight," the youma evaded.

The others nodded.

"Okay then," Styx said, pulling Isaac to his feet. "We've got a bomb to stop!"

[more]

Isaac let out a yelp as a small spark of energy shot out of the device and crackled along his armor.

"You okay, Isaac?" Styx asked.

"No harm, no foul, Rene..." the Magisci said quietly, more of his attention diverted to the bomb than to anything else.

Unseen to all, the crystal in the center of Isaac's armor's chest glimmered briefly.

[aftermath]

"Twilight knew..." Chrysolite whispered. "The Nemesites are about to begin their final assault on Crystal Tokyo.."

Rene and Isaac shuddered.

"No Tokyo," Isaac muttered. He was developing a splitting headache.

"No victory..." Rene finished. She revved her powers to maximum again, armor plating replacing her 'normal' Senshi uniform. "Can we get there in time?"

Chrysolite nodded. "I think I can do one of Drake's space-fold spells..." She smiled. "Interdiction fields don't work on dimensional spells like that.."

Her two friends stood up.

"Let's do some damage then..." Styx whispered.

"Once again through shot and shell..." Isaac mumbled.

Chrysolite adjusted the fit of her cloak and looked out from under the cover of the rock shelf she and her friends had arrived under. Only days before, a folding spell like the ones Drake had used would have left her dangerously tapped out.

Her powers had increased exponentially.

"Nemezite crystal ships as far as the eye can see. You think you two can handle getting to the city while I raise a little Hell?" the youma asked.

Styx grinned and nudged her boyfriend's armored shoulder.

Isaac, though he seemed a bit distracted, nodded. "I'm set..." he said distantly.

Chrysolite nodded and faded into the background.

A shadow slowly crept across the ground, behaving like a slightly faster-than-normal shadow.

Isaac's armor whined as he shifted power from the crystal to added mobility. "I can keep up if you run," he commented.

Styx nodded and peered out from behind the cover. "On my mark."

She tensed slightly.

"One..."

"Two..."

"THREE!" they shouted at the same time, leaping out from behind the rock and being as obvious as possible.

The Nemezites aimed to please.

_/ Blackened, Metallica, ...And Justice For All \_

The shadow unraveled into the youma dressed in the trappings of the long-lost Guardians of Earth. She looked up to the crystal ships above and frowned deeply. It wasn't hate, it was anger that drove her onward. They would be driven away, not obliterated. It was time to remove them with force, not terror.

She walked up to the highest point of the ground in the area and wove a spell around herself, pulling an eerily familiar sword out of a hyper-dimensional pocket. A sword made of a red-stained metal with an odd, star-like pattern forming its crossguard and pommel. "I have bested the Demon of Hate!" she bellowed. "I have bested she who bested the best among you! WHO SHALL FACE ME?" The sword burst into flames, casting off centuries of corrosion and staining, to reveal the dull gray and black metals beneath. It wasn't a pretty sword, but it would certainly do the job it was designed for.

The Nemezites responded with a horde.

The youma nodded and whispered, "So let it be..." She held the ancient weapon en garde and waited for the right moment. She jumped out of the way of the first Droid as she began to form the lines of a spell in her mind. She kicked a Nemezite in the teeth on her way down as the first syllables came to her lips. "Feared at the Dawning, bringer of Flames, raging across the dry plains, uncontested in eons past. Mastered by science, embraced by magic. I call you down from the heavens to exact righteous justice!" she called out, pointing the sword straight up.

Lightning flashed out of the sky and arced among the soldiers, causing many to howl in pain and drop to the ground. Many of the Droids didn't drop, they simply disintegrated on the spot.

The youma swung the sword back down into a fighting position and smiled. "Anybody want some more?" She noted she'd missed a good chunk of the legion with her spell. "I guess so," she said idly, as if she were going to go work in her bookstore in the old days. She waded into the press of bodies, a shell of hardened energy holding off the attacks of people she didn't want to deal with yet.

"ENOUGH!" a woman roared over the fight, the Droids all backing off. "If you want a fight you will have it. I demand that you return my father's sword to me!" the woman shouted as she waded through the halted Droids to Chrysolite.

"Perdos was you father? I most sincerely apologize for the monster that killed him," the youma remarked. She lowered the tip of the sword to the ground and rested her weight on it. "What makes you think you deserve this sword though?"

"It is my birthright."

Chrysolite frowned slightly. "You are from Clan Bloodstar, the most warlike Nemesite family. You believe in nothing more than bloodshed, am I correct?"

"An over-simplification of our tenants, but it will do..."

Chrysolite nodded then. "Then I propose a deal to you: When you can defeat me, you can have this sword."[more, fight scene here]

Isaac skidded to a halt, his armor's boots digging up gouges in the blasted earth as he stopped. "HERE THEY COME!" he shouted, tapping the crystal in his armor for 110% power and readying his weapons. His armor began to whine in a tone that began to climb slowly out of the subsonic ranges...

Styx nodded and held both arms, bent slightly at the elbows, out in front of her. She murmured in a non-human language as a field of dangerously chaotic energy began to form in the eight inches that separated her palms. "Cry Havoc!" she roared, the energy held in place by her mind flying free of constraints and lashing out everywhere. Energy reached out and wherever it touched a Droid, nothing remained save dust.

Mana started to crackle around Isaac's fists, and then up the arms of his armor, licking at his face mask and then down into the torso. The armor plating itself began to vibrate at the stored energy being stored in the subsystems. the armor reported.

"FULL POWER!" Isaac roared, routing all the power he could draw from his source and capacitors into the palm-emitters. The huge, blue-hued blast tore through the enemy lines and shot off the curve of the planet, coring a Nemesite Crystal Ship in orbit. His armor let out a hideous, metallic shriek as he dropped to the ground like a felled tree.

Styx could only pause for a moment to check on her fallen comrade before the Droid armada between her and Crystal Tokyo descended on her again. She slammed her right forearm into several, sending them off on ballistic courses towards their comrades. She created an energy sword in her left hand and sliced through several more. Several Droids finally got through her defenses and started doing their best to point the alien Senshi into the laser-blasted ground.

One Droid had taken a monkey wrench and wedged it against her throat as others held her arms and legs. "I wonder if a Senshi can survive a broken neck?" the monkeywrench-wielding one wondered out loud as she smiled, revealing dozens of needle-like teeth. She developed a rather curious expression on her face when her skin turned blue and a plume of mist flowed out of her nose and mouth. "W-wha-what?" she stammered as her lips froze.

"Freeze and break," a male voice said as the other Droids stiffened and dropped away. They all struck the ground and shattered like glass except the one with a grip on Styx's neck. The man who had spoken reached down and grabbed the Droid by the throat.

"B-Black..." she stammered.

"Silence," he commanded, eyes flaring blue for a moment.

The Droid flash-froze.

Styx saw the Magisci dressed in black pants tucked into black, boots polished to a military shine. A loose-fitting, blue shirt with short sleeves to accommodate a pair of armguards was worn over his torso. The armguards were brilliant silver with the black etching of eastern dragons wrapped around them as if in flight. "Isaac?" she asked in surprise.

"Yes," he said distantly. His attention shifted immediately behind her. "Approaching Droid..." he said without emotion.

Styx whirled around and blasted another one. "What's happened to you?"

Isaac thought about it for a few moments. "I don't know why I didn't see it. Do you know what a Starseed is?" he asked as he pointed at a Droid and flash-froze it.

"The physical representation of a Senshi's power?"

"Exactly..." he replied, as he grabbed hold of the shorter woman and jumped straight up, out of the way of a long-distance attack from a Nemesite warrior. "The core of my armor was a Starseed, and I didn't even know it... Overcharging it.."

"Bonded it to you. Well then, welcome to the ranks Isaac," she said cheerily.

"I think I'll have a nervous breakdown about the whole thing later, right now I think I'm going to have to do.. THIS!" he roared as blue flames began to whirl around them both, acting as a sort of shield. A Droid capable of flight had thrown several throwing-blades at them. The blades fell into the flames and shattered into harmless bits of frost on contact. "prominence," he muttered, the shield of icy flames flaring away from him and at the Droid, turning her from a flying Droid to a falling ice sculpture.

He finally landed, and set Styx down.

"Nice work..." she appraised.

"I'm paying for it," he said softly. "I'm accessing things I shouldn't be this early.." He glared at something behind Styx. That something let out a shriek and froze in it's tracks. "We're out of Droids.." he remarked. "And I'm out of power...." His new uniform reverted to a suit of heavily-damaged armor as he dropped to his knees and then fell forward, unconscious.

Styx groaned softly and struggled to get back to her feet. She noted that her uniform had reverted to the more Sol Senshi-like uniform of her low-power mode.[more]

Sailor Jupiter walked outside the main wall of Crystal Tokyo, making note to the damage for future reference and observation. She was quite surprised when a boulder of marble shifted to one side, under the power of a gray-jacketed arm.

"CHRYSOLITE!?" the Senshi shouted, rushing over.

"Makoto?" Chrysolite asked, looking up at the taller woman as she helped her to her feet.

"Welcome back to Crystal Tokyo, Chrys," the Senshi said. She smiled and draped one of the youma's arms over her shoulders. "Though I'm afraid we're going to have to do a little house cleaning before tourists would consider it a nice place to visit..."

The youma tried to laugh, but ended up wincing and losing the humor she needed to laugh. "I think I hurt something inside..." she noted.

"You want to see Ami?"

Chrys shook her head. "I'll be fine in a bit.. The healing factor's working better than it used to..." She tried to take a step forward and almost fell.

"Lean a little more on me, I'm not gonna break."

Chrysolite nodded. "You okay?"

"I'm fine. How about you?"

Chrys took a deep breath and smiled when nothing felt sharp and broken inside. "Other than the fact that I'm going to be gray and brown all over for a while.. I think I'll live." She smiled weakly. "Being a demon has fringe benefits..."

They crossed what had once been the threshold of the Great South Gate and were headed towards the palace. Neither had enough power left to teleport.

"What a mess..."

"As soon as Serenity has recovered, she'll get everything fixed up."

Chrys thought about that for a moment and nodded. "I'd suspect it'll take a lot of time..."

"Not really.." the Senshi of Jupiter remarked.

Shards of crystal and marble began to float into the air and reassemble into buildings.

"Timex..." the youma whispered.

Makoto giggled. "We're probably two of a handful of people that would get that joke..." She adjusted Chrys' arm on her shoulders. "How are you doing?"

Chrysolite tried standing on her own. "Much better," she said evenly.

The Senshi smiled and nodded. "Good..."

"Mako.. I..." Chrys took a deep breath. "I missed you..." Her ears blushed green and she tried hard to look anywhere but at the woman near her.

"I kinda missed you too..." the Senshi admitted. She put a hand on the youma's shoulder. "Chrys.. I gotta come right out and say it..

I..."

The awkward silence was deafening.

The youma nodded. "I can understand if you don't care for me like that..." she whispered. "All I've ever wanted is to be.. home.." she admitted. "Wherever you are.. that's home to me."

Makoto shook her head in bemusement. She turned to face the shorter woman and kissed her slowly on the lips. "Welcome home, Chrysolite..." she said softly.

"...." said the youma. The green blush that had started at her ears spread to the rest of her face. "Uhhhhh," she mumbled. She blinked several times and tried to get her brain screwed in straight again.

"I had some time to think about things," Makoto admitted. She draped both arms over Chrys' shoulders and pulled her close. "I'm not going to make any guarantees about wether or not a physical relationship can last between us." The Senshi blushed slightly. "But.. I'm kinda.. curious..."

Chrysolite chuckled and hugged the taller woman. "Ah... curiosity," she murmured, "I think I can handle that." She smiled and stood on tip-toe to return.