Untitled:: Part Three - Phantom Princess

 

Untitled:: Part Three - Phantom Princess

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After the meeting at the Temple, Serena walked over to Darien's apartment. He has to know about this, she thought. I, just have to tell him.

She knocked on his door. Please let him be home. The door opened and Darien appeared before her.

"Great! Serena, you're here! I was hoping you would come by," Darien said.

"Uh, Darien," she said as she walked inside, "I just came from the Temple."

"Really?" he asked, "Did you guys have a meeting? Sorry I wasn't there. I had to work."

"Believe me Darien," she went on, "You're not going to like what I have to say."

Darien gave her a confused look.. Serena motioned him over to the couch.

"You might want to sit down."

***

"What?!" Darien exclaimed when Serena was done with the story. "It can't be! There's no way they could capture the inner planet stones or release the Doom Phantom!"

"That's what I thought," Serena added, "But Raye said that it was all true."

"She's positive that it was real? I mean, that it is, or is supposed to happen?" he asked.

"Yes," she replied, "You know Raye. When she gets that feeling, it's always true."

Darien let out a heavy sigh and sank down into the couch. Serena looked at him with worried eyes.

"Listen, Darien. I want you to know, right now, that there is no way I would ever turn against you or the Scouts. And I would never fight you!"

At hearing this, Darien looked over at Serena. There were tears in his eyes. He reached for her and embraced her.

"I'll never let you go," he told her, as tears rolled down his cheeks. "I won't let anything happen to you. No one will ever take you away from me again!"

"I know you will protect me." Serena said, as her own tears began to fall. "I trust you."

She let go of him for a moment and reached into her pocket.

"Here, I want you to keep this for awhile." Serena handed him her locket.

Darien took it and opened it. The inside lit up and it began to play their song.

"Oh, Serena," he began to say.

"Shh," she told him, "Don't talk. Just listen."

Darien embraced her again. With his free hand, he slowly ran his fingers through her golden hair. He began to hum the melody and Serena joined in with him.

They stood there, holding each other, wishing for this moment to last forever.

"Oh, Serena," Darien whispered in her ear, "I love you so much."

"I love you too," she whispered back.

"You will always be in my heart," he told her.

"And you will always be in mine."

Darien then pulled away and looked into Serena's big blue eyes. "You are so beautiful," he said, and as the soft melody played, he bent his head down, and kissed her.

Suddenly, the earth began to move. Darien and Serena held on to each other as they swayed back and forth.

"What's happening?!" Serena shouted.

"It's an earthquake!" Darien shouted back. "Come on! Over here!"

He led her over to a door frame and they sat down holding each other tight.

"Darien," Serena said, "I'm scared. We haven't had an earthquake in a long time."

"It's ok," he assured her. "I'm here. Everything will be fine."

Within minutes, the earthquake stopped as suddenly as it had begun.

"Phew!" Serena said as she stood up. "I'm glad that's over!"

"No kidding," Darien added.

"I hope there aren't any aftershocks," Serena told him.

"Me too." He said.

***

The night was dark and eerie in Tokyo. The moon was not glowing as much as it usually did. The forces of nature seemed disturbed. No animals or night creatures were roaming about. No. Something, somewhere was definitely wrong. This earthquake had not been a natural phenomenon. It had been created by some other entity, some other source of life.

In and around the area of central Tokyo, something was stirring, something…evil. The ground began to glow, a dark, black wave of light. Soon, shapes began to form out of the glowing light. They looked like shattered pieces of a crystal…from a dark crystal.

The pieces began to move. Slowly at first, then faster as they began to combine together. Suddenly, out of the millions of pieces of crystal, tiny specs of white light appeared. They looked to be pieces of white crystal. Almost like that of a crystal ball. They began to move as well, forming with the pieces of crystal.

The crystals began to rise from the ground. As they combined together in mid air, a shape was forming.

The formation began with two feet, then slowly moved up to two legs. The process became faster as the upper body was formed along with two arms and two hands. The final formation was the head. Dark red lips and large red eyes were painted on the face; and dark black hair flowed down from the head until it touched the feet.

When the formation was complete, the body of a young woman became distinct. A ray of light suddenly pierced through the body. The woman was still for a moment, until her legs and arms began to move. Her whole body twisted and turned above the ground.

Then suddenly, her eyes opened to reveal a darkness and evilness inside like nothing before. And something appeared on her forehead. It was the Black Moon insignia!

The woman broke out into a sinister laugh that made the earth itself shudder. She began to twist and twirl around in the air. With a flash of dark light, a black and red dress covered her body and black shoes formed around her feet. Her long dark hair pulled up into two twisted buns on top of her head.

She levitated back down to earth, just beneath the place where she was formed. She looked around with her evil red eyes. "The dark energy that created the earthquake somehow revived the remains of the Dark Crystal and Wiseman's crystal ball and formed me. But I don't feel it anymore. It must have come from somewhere other than earth."

She closed her eyes and searched through her mind. "Ah, yes! The dark energy came from the moon, Europa," she thought out loud. "Yes, that will do nicely for the dark crystal base."

She searched through her mind again.

"Hmm, I see. So, Saban, you are the one who sent that dark energy. I think I'll pay you a little visit. I'll need your help to open the Dark Gate and release my creator, the Doom Phantom! For I am his servant, the Phantom Princess!"

With that, she let out a wicked laugh and disappeared into the void.

***

The phone rang at Darien's apartment. He leaned over the couch and picked it up.

"Hello?" he said into the receiver. "Oh, hi Raye!" There was a pause. "Yeah, we felt the earthquake…What? Now? At this time of night?…Okay, we'll be right there!"

"What was that all about?" Serena asked.

"Raye said she picked up some negative vibes from that earthquake and she's calling a meeting."

"What?!" Serena exclaimed. "At this time of night?!"

"That's what I said, but Raye said that she might meditate with the Fire and she wants us all to be there."

"Okay," she sighed, "I hope it's nothing serious."

"Me too," Darien said as he put his blue jacket on. "But, I've been getting a weird feeling too. I don't know, but it seems familiar, somehow."

As he said this, he opened the door and waited as Serena stumbled to put on her shoe. When she realized what he had said, Serena got a surprised look on her face. Could the negative energy be from Saban? Raye was saying that the nega-vibes she felt weren't coming from earth…No, it just couldn't be. There's no way he could…

"Hello! Earth to Serena!"

Serena shook her head. "What?!"

"Hey! Glad you made it back to reality! Now, come on, let's hurry up before the Scouts start worrying."

Darien put his arm around Serena's shoulders and pulled her out the doorway. He started humming the song from Serena's moon locket while Serena worried about the meeting.

Oh, I'm probably just worrying too much. There's no way Saban could get off Europa. And even if he did, we could beat him. No, I won't bother telling Darien about it. He would just get even more worried.

With that, Serena began to feel a little better and even joined in with Darien in humming their favorite song. She put her arm around him and hugged him as they went down the elevator. She felt something jabbing at her side.

"Eww, what's that?" she said as she pulled away from Darien and looked at his coat to see what it was that had jabbed her.

"Oh," he said as he reached into his coat pocket and pulled something out. "It's your locket. I just wanted to carry it around with me."

"Oh," she said with a smile. "Thanks."

They walked down the street, arm in arm, towards the Temple. They felt as if they didn't have a care in the world.

"Raye, are you sure you're just not over-reacting about this? I mean, nega-vibes from outer space? Come on! Doesn't that seem a little ludicrous to you?

Lita was being very impatient tonight. She had been hoping to spend an evening with her new boyfriend, but Raye had called on the Communicator and told her to come over right away.

"Lita," Amy began to explain, "Doesn't being a princess from another planet and fighting monsters from the Negamoon seem a little ludicrous to you?"

"Well…"

"Come on," Amy said, "You know this could be important. And besides, I'm sure you could go out with your boyfriend tomorrow night."

"Yeah, I guess you're right," Lita said as she fiddled with her necklace. "He is so dreamy! He looks almost like my last boyfriend. Only cuter."

On hearing this, everyone let out a sigh.

"Oh brother," murmured Luna, "not again."

There was a knock at the door. Raye jumped up and ran over to it. "Who is it?" she shouted. No one answered. Raye got a confused look but said it again. "Who is it?" Still no answer.

She looked at the Scouts, "That's funny, I could've sworn someone knocked on the door."

"Maybe you should open it and see," suggested Artemis.

"Okay," she said as she grabbed her broom. "But I'm taking this just in case."

She opened the door and looked out. Everything was dark except the porch light and the two street lamps down by the road. Raye gripped her broom. "Is anyone out here?"

"BOO!"

"AHHH!" she screamed as she closed her eyes and held tight to the broom. Suddenly, she heard a laugh. She opened her eyes to see Darien holding on to the other end of the broom.

"Scared you, didn't I?" he said and laughed again.

"That wasn't funny Darien! I might've hit you with this broom and hurt you!"

"With a broom? Come on! Just admit it. You were scared, weren't you?"

"Alright! Yes! I was scared! You happy?" she growled and pulled the broom out of his hands.

By now, the Scouts had come to the doorway to see all the commotion. "Oh, come on, Raye," said a voice from behind the bushes. Serena popped up right in front of Raye. "If you could've seen the look on your face when Darien jumped at you, you would've died laughing!"

"Shut up, Meatball Head, before I knock you upside the head with this broom!"

"Okay, okay, I'll be quiet," Serena promised. She looked over at Darien and he gave her a wink.

"Now, come on inside, you two, so we can find out what Raye has to say," commanded Luna. Serena, Darien, and Raye could here laughing as the Scouts walked back inside.

Raye glared at Serena and Darien and then stomped into her room.

"Whoa, do you think Raye is really that mad at us?" Serena asked.

"Of course she is," Darien told her, "But she'll get over it. She always does."

He smiled at her then took her hand and led her inside.

***

"Okay, everybody, just sit down and I'll tell you why I called you all here!"

Raye was standing at the head of the table and not at all pleased. It would take her awhile to cool down after what Darien and Serena did to her.

The Scouts and Luna and Artemis got in their places around the table. No one said a word as this happened. They did not want Raye to get even more angry than she already was.

"Okay, is everybody ready?" Raye asked. Everyone nodded their heads. "Good, then let's get on to the matter at hand. As you guys know, for the past couple days I have been sensing negative vibes from somewhere other than Earth. Well, ever since that earthquake, I have been sensing that same energy, but stronger and more evil. Amy and I have concluded that the earthquake we had today was created by that dark energy."

"What?!" The others shouted. Everyone, except Amy and Raye, all started to talk at once.

"Quiet!" Raye shouted.

Everyone covered their mouths and said nothing more.

Amy reached into her pocket and took out her Mercury computer and began looking over the data.

"Well," Amy began to say, "I have also recently figured out that right after the earthquake, something made a time dilation in central Tokyo."

"What do you mean?!" they shouted

"See, something happened shortly after the quake that made time slow down in downtown Tokyo. I can't explain it really, but that's what happened."

Everyone was confused at this point. They didn't know what to think.

"Well, since no one has any ideas as to what this might be, I'm going to go talk to the Fire and see if it can give me some answers," Raye told them.

The Scouts nodded their approval and told Raye that they would wait here until she was done. They all began to talk about the strange dark energy as Raye walked into the Temple.

***

"Oh, Great Fire, please here me and answer my questions. Where did this dark energy come from and who sent it? And what happened after the earthquake that made time slow down?"

Raye sat in silence for what seemed like hours. She was almost dreading the Fire's reply. She was afraid of what she might see.

The Fire began to dance around. An image appeared inside.

Raye looked up to see the same figure of a man in that same dark place. But then she saw what looked like a planet. Or was it a planet? The image switched again but to another view of it. It was in front of something…something much larger.

Oh, my goodness! Raye thought. It's not a planet! It's one of Jupiter's moons!

The next thing she saw was a wave of dark energy flowing from the moon of Jupiter to Earth.

So, that's where it came from!

The image faded and the Fire danced around again. Raye was getting nervous. The Fire only did this when something terrible was about to be for-seen.

Another image appeared. This time it was in Tokyo! Raye looked on in horror as she saw the formation of the remains of the dark crystal and Wiseman's crystal ball. She saw the woman that was created and the Black Moon insignia on her forehead.

That can only mean one thing. She was created from…

Raye's thoughts were cut off when the image of the woman faded and many others kept playing over and over.

She kept seeing the man, then the moon of Jupiter, then the woman…the man, then the moon, then the woman. It kept playing over and over.

Raye was troubled by this because it had never happened before.

This must be really bad!

The images switched again. They kept playing over and over again. But this time, they were showing Serena disappearing in the beam of light, then her as Princess Serenity with the Black Moon insignia on her forehead, and then her with the Silver Crystal, facing Darien as Prince Darien.

Raye became more frightened as the images kept playing and getting faster each time. All of the sudden, the Fire raged and exploded outward. Raye was thrown up against the wall by the force of the Fire. The images disappeared and the Fire was still.

Raye pushed herself up from the floor. She was not burned, but bruised by the impact with the wall. She was breathing heavily, almost to the point of hyperventilating.

There was a noise and the door to the Temple flew open. Everyone rushed in to see if Raye was all right.

"Raye! Raye, are you okay?!" Serena rushed up to her and tried to help her stand up.

"I'm fine, really." Raye was breathing a little easier now.

"We heard a noise and then a thump against the wall. We thought something bad happened to you," Artemis said, still a little worried.

"Don't worry, I'm alright. See," she stood up straight, by herself. "I'm fine. You don't have to worry about me."

"What happened?" asked Lita and Mina together.

"Well, I was watching the images in the Fire. Then it went berserk and threw me against the wall."

"Tell us what you saw," said Luna. Darien helped Raye walk into her room and lie down on her bed. Amy got out her computer and readied herself to type.

"Okay," Raye let out a sigh. "You're not going to like what I have to say."

Everyone sat down and gave her their full attention.

"Well, the lady that I told you was in my dream and my vision, I saw her again and this time I saw what she looked like! But you will never guess how she got here."

Raye began telling them how the woman was made and about the Black Moon insignia that was on her forehead.

"No way!" everyone shouted.

"She was created from the Dark Crystal and Wiseman's crystal ball?" Luna asked

"Yes," Raye replied. "I know, it sounds weird."

Amy typed all the information into her computer. "Well, I think I know how she was created," Amy said as she kept typing.

"You do?" the Scouts exclaimed.

"Yes. You see, that dark energy that was emitted somehow revived the power of the Dark Crystal and Wiseman's crystal ball. When the pieces awoke, they combined together to form that woman."

Everyone was shocked. It was a little unbelievable, but they new it had to be true.

"Raye," Amy began to say, "did the Fire show you anything about where the dark energy came from?"

"Oh, yeah! I almost forgot! Gosh, I guess I'm still pretty shook up by that explosion. Well, the Fire showed me that the dark energy was emitted from a moon…"

Oh, no! Darien gasped. Please, no! Not…

"…and it was one of Jupiter's moons."

"No!" Darien shouted as he jumped up. Serena looked up at him. She had the same thought.

"What's the matter, Darien?" asked Mina.

Darien ignored her question. "Raye, did you see anybody on that moon? Anybody at all?"

"Well, yes, why do you ask?"

"Do you know who it was?"

"No, all I saw was the figure of a man…"

"Oh, no!" Darien ran his fingers through his hair and began pacing the floor, the whole time saying "no, no, no, it can't be!"

Serena got up. She walked over to Darien and grabbed his arm. He put his arms around her and just held her. He kept muttering, "It just can't be true! He just can't be able to do that! It just can't be!"

"Will somebody please tell us what's going on?!" Amy shouted.

Darien looked at her and the rest of the Scouts. He let go of Serena and they walked back over to where the gang was sitting. "That man in your vision," Darien told them, his voice quivering, "was Saban."

"Saban!" everyone else but Serena shouted.

"But I thought Saban didn't have any powers," Lita said.

Darien replied, "He only had powers that his evilness gave him. The only thing I can think of is that his anger and bitterness towards me and the rest of you has grown so much, his evilness has grown too."

"Which means that he is even more powerful than he was when Beryl was around," said Mina.

"That's right," Darien told her. "And now, he has found a way to release his energy away from Europa. Which means…"

"Which means that probably soon, he will find a way off of the moon!" exclaimed Amy.

"Unfortunately, you're right, Amy," Darien said with his head lowered.

"And now, we must face him again."

"Well, we can beat him!" shouted Lita as she jumped to her feet. "He may have gotten stronger, but so have we!"

"It's not that simple," said Luna. "He has the dark power running through him. That is more powerful than your own powers."

"Luna's right," Raye added. "We can't jump ahead of ourselves. We need to think this thing through."

While everyone was discussing this, Serena and Darien kept quiet. They new what it meant if Saban ever got off of Europa. And then, there was Raye's vision of Serena turning evil, and the inner planet stones being taken.

"Hey, guys." Serena spoke up for the first time.

Everyone quieted to listen to her.

"What about Raye's vision of the inner planet stones being stolen and me disappearing and turning against you?"

Everyone pondered this question. No one was sure as to how Saban and that woman would take the inner planet stones. They were heavily guarded. Not to mention the fact that if they were taken, that scout would disappear when the stone did. And then there was the vision of Serena becoming part of the Negamoon family. This was hard for them to believe.

"Don't worry, Serena," Darien said as he put a hand on her shoulder." We won't let them take you. I promise, I'll protect you."

"And so will I!" everyone shouted in unison.

Serena looked at everyone and smiled. "Thanks, you guys. I don't know what I'd do without you."

"Well, I think it would be best if we all went home and got some sleep." Luna said to them as she got up and stretched. "Then we can come back over here tomorrow and figure out what we're going to do."

"That's a good idea," said Artemis as he yawned and stood up.

The Scouts said "good night" to each other and walked at into the night, each going their separate ways.

Darien offered to walk Serena and Luna home.

As the Scouts walked home, they were not aware of the intensity of the evil that was about to take place on Europa. None of them were prepared for what would come the next day.

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