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Sailor Mönch, of Popcorn!

"From...from earth?" Eye going wide as she peered up at the tall person with the...very unique eyes and...eras? Hands mothing up to cover her mouth, Mönch's world exploded for the like, sixth time this week. "Are you a magical space mermaid?"

And then they were calling out to a yellow space demon elf! Amazing! (The senshi of bananas?) And there was a grey person? Casting magic?! That turned a whole area around them into a black and white movie? (The senshi of film noir?) And then possibly the fanciest person at the party (the senshi of fanciness?) started talking like they were reasoning something out, and Mönch came to an even more exciting revelation.

Turning to the friendly space mermaid, she asked, eyes sparkling, "Is this an escape room? I'm really so bad at them, this is going to be great!"

It took enough effort to keep herself from flinging her arms out and adding sparklefingers to nearly ever word. Thankfully the cure for that was literally, right in front of her. Picking up a paper cup and a tea bag, Mönch took a look at the label and beamed at the senshi who'd offered them. "Are these handmade, that's so cool! Thank you! Are you the senshi of tea?"

If she was, maybe they could be snack senshi friends? Refriendments?Refreshfriends? No...that one would have to be work-shopped further, but she was sure she could make something out of it eventually!

Arcalís, DSS of Adversity

Once upon a time, Arcalís had not entirely seen the Moon Palace as a real place where real people made real decisions that had real impacts on the lives of likewise real people. His star had not been close enough to Earth for Queen Serenity’s rule to shape much of anything about life on Arcalís or on Madriu. Certainly, she’d reached out to them sometimes, but even on the rare occasions when Arcalís had ventured into the Sol system—usually with the Nameless, after paying them to kidnap Lex so he could breathe some free air—the Moon Kingdom had been more like a story that people told to children to keep them from misbehaving.

Don’t commit any heinous atrocities or eat sweets before your dinner. Queen Serenity will come out here with her Silver Moon Crystal and she’ll get you!

Some Mauvian had given him a senshi phone; he’d found his way to them after his run-in with Esme’s reincarnation, with the Chaotic aura signature and the cracks in his chest and forehead. Said Mauvian had also fitted him with a ring that allowed him to pass himself off as human when he powered down into Lilitu. They’d helped pull some documentation out of……gods only knew where, honestly? Lilitu couldn’t read any of it at the time, but they’d assured him that it all said he was a citizen of the country he’d found himself in, that he had the right to access healthcare (and seriously, what had gone so wrong on Earth that access to healthcare was ever in debate as a basic right of sapient beings? Did people here also believe that fresh water was optional for people to stay alive??), and that he would be fine.

Except for the part where Lilitu was alone in a city that he didn’t know, on a planet he’d never visited before Chaos had cut the star he called home off from the rest of the universe, and he could barely read anything. Sure, he’d been trying to work on that after finding his way to a branch of the city’s library, but he was still alone, and he only had money when he managed to steal it from someone else.

Part of him had come tonight because he’d understood the words Moon Palace in the message that Sailor Ganymede had posted about……whatever this all was. An attempted break-in, apparently? Certainly nothing like Arcalís had imagined things might be on Earth’s moon, but……well. Everything he’d heard in the stories had fallen a thousand years ago, he supposed.

An even more prominent part of him had come tonight because there had been the promise of people. Of not needing to be alone.

Arcalians had never been meant for loneliness. A thousand years of it had been bad enough. At least in that situation, Chaos had taken everyone from him: his mother and father, his siblings, his grandparents, his aunts and uncles and cousins, his friends, his Mauritz, his Lex (hopefully, he had died rather than surviving a thousand years under similar circumstances but Chaos had still cut them off from each other), his people (both the native Arcalians and the Arcalian-born Madriuans whom Lilitu had fought alongside while they’d struggled for their own liberation).……

Somehow, the loneliness felt worse now. Standing in the ruins of somewhere that must have once been quite beautiful, surrounded by people yet feeling completely isolated. Out of the group, Arcalís only recognized Grieve (who didn’t seem to have changed any) and one of those guys who’d always been in some strange rivalry with the Nameless (Pyrrhus). Two of the humans present might have been reincarnations of Airan and Xingyi Kurogane? But with his back pressed tight against a corner, Arcalís caught himself shivering. It felt like what he’d always wound up feeling after spending too much time around Mauritz’s friends, especially Hexa, his best friend and right-hand man.

Forcing himself to take a deep breath, Arcalís threw himself away from the group and down a corridor. If people wanted to find something that was creating the barriers, they wouldn’t manage that by standing around and talking at each other. Some room that looked like a library stood out. Maybe Arcalís wouldn’t be able to read anything in here either—after all, why would the Moon Kingdom have had any texts written in Arcalian?—but being around the books felt soothing.

He didn’t know if anything here would point toward where to go. Certainly, he didn’t think that any sort of generator for the barrier would be in the library. But maybe there would be a map? Or some schematics of the Moon Palace that they could consult for an alternate route and/or a path to where any alleged barrier-creators could have been?

So absorbed in looking for clues, Arcalís spectacularly failed to notice that he wasn’t alone. Not until he fumbled a step and crashed headlong into someone else’s chest.

“Oh, I—” He gasped, shivering with nerves. “I’m so sorry, I wasn’t…… I didn’t mean…… I’m sorry?”

Sailor Chibi Eupheme, Senshi of Weightlessness

“The Moon!!”

There was no reason to announce where she was, but Eupheme was literally vibrating with excitement.

“I have successfully escaped my responsible adult and, as champion arm wrestler, am here to save the day!” she crowed proudly, hands on her hips as she stood at least a foot shorter than most everyone else there, but she was only nine-years-old, so she was allowed to be small. She didn’t even know half these people, but that was okay! They probably knew her from her brilliance at arm wrestling, but understood the importance of modesty.

Which was 1000% why she wasn’t going around announcing that, as a Moon Princess, she clearly knew how these moon things worked.

“Here, let me try,” she insisted, exuberating confidence as she skipped past the others and their searches for maps and keys and whatever else.

“Open sesame!”

Hmm. That didn’t work. “Abracadabra! Alohamora!”

Chibi Sailor Aquitania of Courage

Yasmeen was excited. Had been since she first Awakened the day before. First, she became a magical girl and defeated a monster, then she got her magical tools from an adorable Mauvian, went to the library like a good little girl and promptly hopped onto her new senshi phone to start figuring out how it worked. The big button would take her to her homeworld in space, the lunar icon would take her to a palace on the Moon, there were contacts, and an icon for a database.

Which apparently had a bit more information on the weird weather phenomena that Destiny City had been experiencing lately. At which point she'd received a message saying that a bunch of other magical people were going up to the Moon two nights later, when the moon was full, and they were going to go looking for answers.

The moon. It was exciting. It was magic and space and she was right in the thick of it, figuring out how to save the world from a giant world-eating snake! Sure, there was a strange ache behind her breastbone and in the back of her mind to go to Aquitania, wherever that was, but the Moon was apparently a rare treat that nobody really had good access to. Some other day, she promised herself, she'd see Aquitania.

At which point, her mother had come to check in on her, and in her panic at being caught with an unfamiliar cell phone, she'd shoved her new senshi phone into a weird alternate dimension she could apparently access, and retrieved the senshi phone only after her mother was reassured that Yasmeen had arrived safely.

Still, Yasmeen had spent the next two days excited, figuring out what to bring on an expedition to explore the Moon Palace. Writing supplies, obviously, a sketch pad, a couple water bottles and some snacks (it was unclear how long they'd be up there), and an open mind. Hopefully, someone else would bring healing magic. Her senshi phone came equipped with a flashlight app that negated the need for an alternate light source. Satisfied with what she'd packed, she'd pleaded going to bed early on account of being sleepy, and, once properly tucked in, had pulled out her pen.

"Aquitania Power, Make-Up!" Warm ribbons and light wrapped around her, and left her in her costume, and, one button press later, hey, presto, on the Moon!

Looking around, she spotted a familiar-looking tail (Realta), and hurried toward it, snagging a strawberry cupcake on the way. Before she could say anything, she realized that the Mauvian was concentrating on the oddly thick moonbeams edging the room. Which were apparently preventing further exploration.

Aquitania frowned, looking at the moonbeams. Labyrinths and mazes could be solved by walking along the walls with your hand on the wall, right? And a lot of things had seams, sooo...

The chibi senshi put out her hand to the barrier until her hand met resistance, and then began walking along the barrier, feeling for holes or seams, someplace that the barrier might not be perfectly sealed, or perfectly whole.







Sailor Aberdonia of Papyrus

The one thing Aberdonia hadn't really planned to do with his Friday night, so soon after the trip to Aberdonia itself, had been a trip to the Moon, where he'd never been before. And yet, here he was. With his subspace still geared up for interstellar travel. Or, well, intra-solar-system travel, since he wasn't leaving this star system, and had yet to do so.

But it sounded like a lot of other people were going, so he was trying to figure out how to gracefully go to bed early when Yasmeen pled an early bedtime. Which...was a surprise. She didn't ask for those anymore, really. Especially not on a weekend. When she could've gone to a friend's house for a sleepover, or stayed up late writing or reading or drawing, or begged him to watch a movie or TV show with her. But their mother had gone to tuck Yasmeen in, and Khaz had told his mother that he was going up early himself. It had just been a matter of Powering up, and tapping the moon pearl that had come hanging from his senshi phone, gleaming softly almost like a piece of the moon itself.

Looking around after the flash of light faded, he spotted a number of faces he recognized from the last meeting of Order. They were crowded in a big space, some of them snagging food and drinks from a table almost groaning under its weight of food. No fruit or veggies, though. Shame, really, though there were some sandwiches, which, after a moment of looking, he snagged and wrapped in a large napkin a few cucumber sandwiches, plus a couple water bottles. Fuel for later. There was also a note, offering $500 for proof of infiltration of the Moon Palace, from someone calling themselves "Princess Ganymede." No idea what she'd look like; he'd only once seen one of the senshi calling themselves prince or princess.

It looked like there was a library underneath the vines, and a stone with a hole in the top of it. It looked oddly like the stone from Sword in the Stone would look like, if it were real. Both looked like interesting avenues to explore.

But he should at least say something to people hew knew.

Making his way over toward Aruna, he gently tapped her shoulder. "Hi, Aruna, good to see you." Gesturing over toward the stone, he added, "I'm going to go check out that stone, be back shortly."

Turning around, Aberdonia made his way to the stone that, unbeknownst to him, had held the Sword of Silver Millennium, and began examining it, curious to figure out what it was.

Deep Space Super Sailor Madriu

Madriu hadn't really expected anyone else to end up here, when most of the group seemed happy to test the barrier physically, one way or another. So he was more focused on his surroundings than on any potential other people.

Which meant that someone crashing into his chest definitely made him start, and he instinctively reached out to catch whoever it was, steadying them with hands on their shoulders--

And then he looked.

And saw.

And suddenly, it didn't matter where he was, because of who he was looking at.

It couldn't be, surely. Not after a thousand years. Surely he was long gone, passed back into the cycle of reincarnation--surely he hadn't suffered the same awful fate of watching his world dwindle. It wasn't fair. It wasn't right, if he'd had to suffer too.

Except....those familiar ears. That particular uniform, though it was a version he hadn't seen in quite some time. A glittering crown of thorns, and flowing pastel rainbow hair, and--and those eyes. So familiar. So longed for. Right here in front of him.

".....Anthy?"

It was soft. Tremulous. Desperately, achingly hopeful.

Many of the other people around seemed really hyped to be on the Moon, and Nectaris couldn't really blame them. The Moon was awesome. Nectaris herself hadn't actually seen this part of it before. It looked less like her Wonder, or her friends', and more like the little room with the Code in it, with the marble and everything.

This was like a courtyard, though, with plants and everything. It was cute. It was fun. She would have a hundred percent hung out here for a tea party.

Her attention was drawn away from that, though, and towards where everyone else was also looking. There was a giant light barrier. That was hard to miss, and she was obviously immediately curious about what was behind it.

Also, Ganymede was offering good money for trying to bust through it. Nectaris liked Ganymede and probably would've done her a favor even without the bribe, but, like, she also wasn't gonna say no to something like that.

Nectaris stepped forwards. She knew some of the other people here from her recent interviews, but the people who she went up to were the other Moon Knights she saw around, Amarynthos and Ephesus.

"We're Knights here, right?" she told them, after a long second of puffing out her cheeks in thought. "Would you think that would give us, like, a that key to get through, or at least an advantage or something?" She paused for a second, watching the light ripple over her hands.

"I mean, I know it's more complicated than that with the Code and everything," and probably more importantly, with the Moon Knights not being around when any of this had been built, "But it's gotta be worth a shot, right?"

She reached out and pressed her signet ring into the barrier.

Tempesti’s face flushed slightly as Thalassa spoke, “Oh, no these spices aren’t anything like that. I just combined them because I like the taste. I mean. I’m not trying to get anybody pregnant.” She hoped sincerely that her tea blends didn’t count as sexual harassment to her new acquaintance.

The senshi felt the flustered blush vanish immediately when he began to describe her past life, all color draining from her face as a pit formed in her stomach.

That wasn’t her. The Empress.
Not really her.
Not the most recent her.
That was the bad her.
Not her.

The memories she’d recovered were more vague impressions than anything concrete, but she knew that wasn’t her.

A few deep breaths in a semi-successful attempt to steady her voice.

“It sounds like you might have met someone…older than my most recent incarnation. I remember...almost nothing. But I wasn’t her. Not last time.”

The pit expanded, pulsing and contracting, threatening to pull her into the hazy mire of fear and shame from a life she couldn’t even put a name to.

Not here.

Not now.

That was a problem for later.

She clawed her way back to her companions.

“I’m- I’m going to try to get past those plants if you two are interested in joining me.” She suspected that Thalassa was far more interested in the snack table than anything else in the Moon Palace, she couldn’t exactly blame him.

Making her way toward one of the overgrown pathways, she carefully examined the vines before attempting to squirm into what appeared to be an opening wide enough to accommodate her.

Fang, Eternal Senshi of Chrysocyon

Fang narrowed his eyes at the magical barrier, humming lowly in thought. He hadn't yet said anything to anyone, content to let the babble wash over him while he pieced together the scraps of information they had.

... Well, may as well do some information-gathering himself, right? He stepped forward and licked it in a spot outside the range of Pyrrhus's magic, then attempted to gnaw at it with his teeth when it didn't seem to taste bad.