Adrian Tymes wrote:

Now, to the rest of the list: we've done Makoto, Ami, Usagi, and
arguably Haruka.  Anyone care to do the same theme on the others (and
maybe a full spamfic on Haruka while we're at it)?  Hotaru might not
even need to deviate from canon...

Well, this has probably already been done somewhere, but:

---

"I know you're there," she said calmly.

Well! This was new. Oh, she wasn't the first to sense me; far more people are
sensitive to ... beings ... like me than you might think. Sometimes they've even
come and talked to me, though not often.

No, ashamed as I am to admit it, the concept of a talking cat... freaked me out.
Talk about 'turnabout being fair play'.

"Please, answer me," she said, urgency clear as clear in her voice as in her aura
and tail movements. "I need your help."

"Who are you? What are you? What do you want?" I said. I winced afterwards. I
didn't mean to be so harsh: after all, I didn't want to scare her off, talking cat
or no. She was obviously no demon, unlike that ... that _thing_ that had been using
my home to...

I broke off that train of thought as she answered. "My name is Luna. I'm an advisor
to the Sailor Senshi. And, as I said, I need your help."

"I am sorry, Miss Luna," I said (a little bitterly); "I have problems of my own to
deal with. I have little enough power of my own; I cannot spare any to help these
Sailor Senshi of yours."

"If you mean the demon outside, that's the very problem I -- and the Senshi -- need
your help with," she said, looking around the room in an effort to catch a glimpse
of me. "They're not powerful enough to defeat him on their own."

I knelt down in front of her, to make it easier -- she hasn't yet figured out how
to see me, you know, but she keeps trying even now. No one ever has, but I suppose
it's possible. I used to wish, sometimes, that I could make myself visible. Maybe,
if I could have -- but of course it doesn't matter anymore.

"You want to coordinate an attack?" I asked her, hopeful. "I'll do anything you
need."

Luna jumped up, flipping in midair. I _felt_ it when the wand appeared. You know
how simple and utilitarian they look on the physical plane? On the astral,
they're... beautiful. Majesty expressed in magic...

I'm sorry. Being dead, I've found, tends to make me wax poetic, and not too well,
at that.

Luna's voice brought me back to the real world, or as close as I could get, anyway.
"I don't know if you can pick it up or not, but touch it and say 'Mars Power, Make
Up!'"

I reached out my hand to take it, and was only slightly surprised to find that I
could. I don't remember saying anything, though I suppose I must have -- and then
its beauty and radiance surrounded me, _changed_ me...

And I fell to the ground, arms outstretched to catch myself, and almost died again
of shock when I felt -- not sensed, but _felt_ -- the old wooden flooring beneath
my hands, dusty and aged, but still familiar.

That was the first time. Since then I must have felt that light a thousand times,
but it's still as wondrous and as wonderful as it was then. Luna says that Usagi might one day even be able to bring me back permanently with the Silver Crystal.
But until then, to be able to smell the sakura in bloom, to embrace a friend, just
to breathe -- even only on occasion -- is...

... heaven.

---

<frowns> There's got to be a better way to write that last bit that doesn't sound
so awkward. Then again, the whole thing sounds that way. Or is it just me?

--
Aponar's Stolen Tagline of the Period-Between-Bootups-or-Logins

The gene pool could use a little chlorine.
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