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"I'll be a mole, but I refuse to hurt them. They are innocent. Acubens turned to Tsui as she spoke, nodding as though that was her final word on the subject.

"They think we are all being lied to. That we're on the wrong side of this war. They have one goal: to covert us to Dark Mirror Senshi. That's how they will save us. The three I know won't attack unless attacked themselves, at least not that I've seen." She now turned to Victoria, her temper, to her surprise, dying down as she acted on what she felt she needed to do. "Both times I was approached to corrupt, I walked away and they let me go." Acubens decided to leave the wrestling match with Lesath out... that had been a mutual want to fight, not a search for blood. "I understand no one likes the Dark Mirror Court... some of you have more reason to dislike them than the rest of us." Acubens motioned the Kallichore and Albali. "They won't be purified. They are too strong in their convictions. It's like trying to save members of a cult. They'd rather die. But we can use them. We can utilize their knowledge of the Chaos. Use the fact that they want to save us. Ask them questions about the Chaos when they approach you. What's in it for me? What do you even want? If you have more specific questions, as them. To save you, they will go to great lengths. We do not need to fight them."

And then the temper that she was so proud of keeping under control was brought back to life. She whirled to Sessrumnir, eyes a blaze. "Yes." Was her angry answer. "But I have a job to do here. It's the ones who are so firmly grounded in convictions that I worry about. Black and white will kill you, not grey."

Ganymede. Acubens screwed up her face and drew herself up, some animal instinct to make herself look as big as possible.

"Did I ever once say I believed them? Did I ever once say that I definitively know they are right? If you recall, what I said was we have no direction and they do. Fight, they tell us, and we do. But for what? I'm not the first with those questions, and I won't be the last. If they use us, then I say use them back! Manipulate their want to save us and use it for our own gain. Out wit the foxes I say." And then she turned from Ganymede, looking to Polaris, locking eyes with her. Forgive me, Teacher...

"Saving is their word. I use it because corrupt doesn't ring true in my ears. Corruption is done under false pretenses. They truly do believe that we are lost lambs and they are the shepherds that will lead us to light! And yes. Yes I speak softly of them. Yes I love them." Run. Run away and never return. But Acubens was locked in place and her mouth kept moving because she had to say this right here, and right now while everyone listened because in the end she loved the pain of being shunned. So shun me. Make me a pariah and let me wallow in my happy misery.

"Yes, I might have even been the lover of a Dark Mirror Senshi in a happier time. But I can't know that now. Now I... we have work to do here. Never forget that the Dark Mirror court were once, long ago, members of this court. Members of our court. If we slay them... if we harm them... we are no better." Her chest puffed as she finished, whole body shaking with adrenaline. Finally she looked back to Ganymede.

"At least I can admit my faults little girl."

"What the - look, girl," Aster said, probably too high to be at this meeting. "When they say they want to save you, they really do mean corrupt you. You know, like, brainwash you, just like they've been brainwashed in their corruption. Brainwashed into thinking they are right and serve some kind of higher and more noble purpose as they go about causing trouble. So yeah, they think they have direction and are doing something good, but don't be fooled by them for an instant." All this talk of brainwashing had Aster's mind running. Maybe the government was behind the Negaverse? Or maybe Aster should keep her mouth shut and put her conspiracies on a GeoCities page like everyone else.

"You love them? Oh please, get the ******** out of here," she hissed, tossing her hands up in the air. She turned to the nearest Senshi next to her - Albali - and whispered. "Can you believe this girl? She said she 'loves' the DMC. Gotta be a crazy b***h for that, right?"

“Bravo! You can admit to your faults!” Ganymede said as he clapped his hands together in sarcastic praise. “Join the club, Sweetie. You’re not the only one capable of taking a good, hard look at yourself and admitting where you’re wrong.

“Now, if you’ll take the time to remember, I’m not for slaying people,” he pointed out, frowning back at Acubens and rolling his eyes at her uttered “little girl,” as if that should offend him somehow. “Maybe you were deaf to what was going on earlier, but I was arguing a peaceful solution, along with a couple of others, just like I told you the last time you and I talked. Just because I can acknowledge that the DMC are bad news doesn’t mean I want to kill them.”

But then it was just like her to ignore everything but what she wanted to hear, he thought. Hadn’t that been the very issue when they’d last faced one another? He said something, she heard what she wanted, he got angry, they argued, and in the end he just walked away.

“I don’t care what you meant by using 'save' as your term of choice so much as I care about how that comes across to people,” he told her. “Not everyone here has good stories to tell about the DMC.”

Here he spared a look for a couple of his Jovian friends, the two he knew to have been most affected when Princess Ares and the DMC had first risen.

“For some of us, it’s a lot more personal than it is to others. Maybe it is to you, too. I honestly have no idea. I’ve not had many bad experiences with the DMC. Just the one, but I’ve heard enough from the people who matter to me to know how I feel about them.”

"They want us to be saved...?" Oberon finally spoke up. He had been content sitting in the back, listening to things he didn't truly understand with Eos, whom he considered a friend. But hearing the things that the senshi named Acubens was saying... he didn't understand.

"Are... we doing something wrong? Was there something that... that happened? Something that we did?" he asked, primarily in the senshi's direction since she'd been the one to voice her opinion. He was confused, maybe even a little scared. He did his best to put on a brave face and stand tall in the face of danger, but he was still only eleven... he was still just a child.

Yeah, the other senshi with the flower was saying that their version of 'saving' was just corruption... but... why did the DMC think they needed to be saved in the first place? He didn't like thinking that he'd done something wrong and not know what it was!

Acubens growled deep inside of her throat. And then that growl grew louder, until it was a roar. Then louder until finally a battler cry. Like something out of a cartoon, right before a serious power up. "Nobody is ******** listening to me! I know! Do you think I'm an idiot! I know it's a lie! I know they are darkness and we are light! I know! Alright, I get it, I know! And while I may have wanted, at one point, nothing more than to know sweet darkness myself, because it was a hell of a lot better than fumbling around with no one to help, I've grown up! I've realized that they are evil and we are good. And targeting me, telling me to leave when all I want to do is prevent more bloodshed, then you are failing at your job as my team mates. Miserably! You could not fail harder. Every sing senshi who corrupts is a failure. Ever life lost is a failure. Every sing life you fail to save is blood on your hands. And every single senshi you bully like you are clearly doing to me now is a life you have failed to save. Another black mark on your record." Stop. Run. Go home. Never power up again and hide from this whole thing. You're an idiot. A fool. So stupid that you can't even be considered intelligent life anymore.

"We are fighting for the same team. Do you think that I have thought of nothing but saving my family? My friends? Saving in the real sense, the sense that they can walk out of their houses and not worry about dying. This is why we fail at our jobs, people. We don't support one another." Channel Lenka. Do it now!

"Just as the jedi counsel failed to recognize the duality in Anikin, we fail to see the war in each other. Because the counsel did not see and protect Anikin from the darkness within himself, he fell to darkness and death. It's just like how we failed to save our own. Will you stand here now, and see another of your kind pushed into darkness by those she should be calling her friends?" Animal. Single celled life form who knows nothing but swim around and exist. Stop talking, you imbecile. You will be hurt. You will bleed and no one will help you.

"Stand up and grow some balls. We all have darkness is us. We all have thought, at least once to ourselves, how good it would feel to be bad. It happens. But it's what we do when that darkness arises that marks us as good. That we refuse the evil, the need to harm and kill, and turn our faces to light that makes us good. Have I not suffered enough, feeling lost and alone, lied to by the people I thought would want me as family and not even being able to be angry at them because they think they are right? And I can't even save them?"

Ganymede again. She could feel it. That dangerous point where her temper threatened to detenate, exploding within her so catastrophically that she'd fail to be able to let it out and she'd faint. Control yourself. Control your temper.

"I'm trying to grow, Ganymede. I'm trying. But when people tell you to shut up and leave when all you want is help and to help others it's hard." Toxic yellow eyes fell on Aster.

She lowered her voice only so Ganymede could hear her now. "Why do you have to broadcast our fight to the whole room? Do you need an audience? I don't listen very well. I know. And I over react. And I'm mean. And I am a cry baby. I'm a drama queen and I hurt people who only want to help me. Please don't make this worse for me. You don't like me. Fine. I understand. But just... Leave me alone? Please? It hurts when... always. It always hurts. I'm always hurting. Do you have to make it worse?" Hot. Her eyes were too hot. Leave. Get out... I'm stuck! I can't move! It's... no. Don't cry...

Too late.

"Hmmmm...."

Kailash still wasn't budging. And people were still talking. Though she wanted to continue shouting across the room, she also was half-way listening to what was being said about these DMC f*ckers.

Casually, she nudged Irene, though the nudge was actually more for the animal in her arms. "...So... um... there's a dude I wanna have ya meet... though... cat... ya kinda already know him too... and I'm pretty sure he's gonna freak when he see ya."

The cat was still doing her job, and though she was intrigued, she didn't open her eyes to take a look. "Well, is it something that could wait until after the meeting?"

Once more Irene was nudged. "Ya wanna go meet him?"

Though he had been paying attention to the vast amount of information and the varying sides of the arguments, the teal-haired young man had managed to notice something. As a rather brutish blonde towards the other side of the room shouted out for a certain Kailash to go see her, a messy haired man towards the other edge of the room seemed to react in an annoyed manner.

Since he was able to multitask, he kept his ear open for the information while approaching this messy haired Page. Nysa paused in step only when he was a respectable distance from the other.

In an inquiring tone, he asked "Kailash?" He paused for a moment before glancing towards the crass blonde. "It would seem as if a young lady would appreciate your company." He smiled at the practical stranger. "Might I ask if she is a friend of yours?"