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Perhaps the best place to go at night when you had supernatural powers was the roof of the observation deck on Destiny Tower. There, you could see the entire spread of the city below your feet, the endless lights and each one signaled someone who belonged to someone else. So where, exactly, did a lonely and lovely young woman fit into the web of social entanglement? Simply, she did not truly belong, and it was more glaringly obvious than a simple language barrier.

It wasn't hard to understand what Ray wanted when he'd patted her on the head and given her some lame task involving the capture of star seeds. Because it looked incredibly urgent that he was wearing his nice tie and that small bottle of cologne she knew he kept in his sock drawer? She'd bristled knowing he was going to be with that girl Stephanie, but there was nothing to say. Ray Gordon didn't see her as anything other than a child, and never would.

So it was with a brooding mind and foul mood that Wiseman's Lady eyed the city below, dreamily contemplating snuffing out each and every light one by one. It was always so comforting, to think of death and oblivion. "One by one, all the lights go out."

A normal person might have been surprised at the glamorous and dark queen who was suddenly there and spitting like a nasty cat. Black Lady had, however, felt her presence at the base of the tower and now it was almost overwhelming. The dark power radiating off the Queen of the Negaverse was greater than any she had felt in this place so far, save her Wiseman and against the Lady's own crystal power it was like two suns in each other's gravity - drawn in then trapped. Wiseman had warned her to be careful, that there were some things even he could not entirely protect her from. Apparently, Beryl was one of them. Evident was the sudden hardening of the young woman's jaw and her eyes went harder than diamonds before she turned, black gown swirling around her like an ocean of elegance. The words when they came, however, were in Japanese.

"Incredible. You got the name right, but not much else. I can't understand why you were worth a warning, if that is the best you can do, Beryl." Dismissal was curt in the turn of the Lady's head, her face as cold and hard as the metal they stood upon. In her mind, this queen was not even worth the title, as they were all pretenders. Nehelenia, Beryl, all of them queens grasping for empty, phantom thrones. There had only been one queen in this world, and that was the Queen of the Moon. Why pander to the ego of a pretender? Black Lady saw no need, for all that she had been cautioned. Foolish children never did listen to their elders, and for all her power and cool dismissal, she was quite a child still, evident in how her hands were also fisted tightly at the mention of a Serenity's death.

She would not flinch. To flinch now would be the worst mistake, the biggest shame she could ever bring to the name given at birth by her beloved mother. Instead a grim smile etched itself into Black Lady's face and bored eyes were turned to her attacker. The only movement she allowed herself to alleviate the pain and anger raging inside her head and threatening to spill out every pore was fingers tangling in the glimmering pink of her wrap, nails stretching the fabric near its tearing point. To Beryl, it would look only as if she were preparing to strike out physically, which was beneath the princess entirely.

"It must be nice, to discard whole chunks of history that displease you. I wish I had the skill myself, to eliminate such distasteful things. As it is, I remember that it was Serenity who killed you last you met. And oh yes, I've changed." The smile twisted and turned onto the sorceress from Earth. "Your power is flawed, Beryl. Flawed and broken, if you do not recognize what stands in front of you." A pale finger reached up to the wound that had been inflicted at the hands of the dark queen and rubbed it on her fingers before holding them up to be seen. "You claimed to love Endymion so much, yet when his own blood spills in front of you, you don't recognize it. And I'm the stupid one? Ironic." It was a confusing speech, changing tenses and making cryptic remarks to a long-dead prince that meant so very much to both women standing warily opposite each other.

The unbloodied hand came down slowly and grasped the hand of her weapon, though the face was as yet turned inwards towards its wielder. Smiling to it almost childishly, blood smeared itself into the black crescent adorning its face in the center scrolling causing an eerie light to shine briefly before dying. "So you simply came to kill me? I told him you Negatrash weren't worth spit when it came to any truce. How sad that I was right." It was truly distressing, to know that for once the Wiseman had been wrong and she had been right. Well, she had warned him! Almost as an afterthought, a hand came up to linger on the brooch at her throat before dropping. No. If she was going to survive in this world, she would do it on her own power!

Pain burned through her chest and with every ragged breath it only fanned higher and higher. It wasn't hard to breathe though, simply strained from the shot of dark power straight through her lungs and harbored there to hamper and torture. There was no wet gurgle that indicated internal bleeding, and for that she was grateful. Modern hospitals would have a hard time indeed healing this child in a woman's body, granted by magic, born far in the future. Drawing in a burning breath, the young woman straightened her back and vanished her weapon with immense pride. There was no business fighting in the queen's own territory, not if she couldn't truly even hold her own on the neutral streets of the city. If only she had her crystal power! But that was not an option, and not worth any consideration.

"Daughter of Serenity, but also daughter of Endymion and that is far more important. I don't need a prince to save me, I'm quite capable of handling myself, and I'm certainly not here to take over 'your' Earth." Well, she wasn't. Black Lady had never been entirely sure of Wiseman's goals or motives and thusly could not speak for her protector and mentor. It seemed fairly important to Beryl that she think herself a queen, and it was so laughably typical that she would have laughed, if only the pink-haired woman could find the breath for it. Coughing to try and alleviate some of the pressure, the hairstyle bobbed as she shook her head. "I hate the senshi, they don't belong here, they're all pretenders. They have to go."

This impassioned speech was unusual, but it was all she could do. The pain in her lungs was nothing compared to the one she felt with any thought or memory of her previous existence and the rage burned through her blood and turned onto a more convenient target than the Queen of the Negaverse. It was foolish to pick large targets, after all.

There had been a moment, a very long moment, when she'd almost done the unthinkable and tried to actually reach the sealed power of her crystal, sleeping deep inside the corrupted body. But doing that was not only futile, it would destroy all the carefully-laid plans Black Lady had for her future. Certainly none of them involved her ever using that moon power ever again. She didn't know what would happen if she did, and Wiseman would be furious. So let this savage queen think her weak if need be, all that mattered was that one person knew her true power. One person appreciated her. Wiseman loved her, though he wouldn't ever tell her. It was clinging to this thought that she laughed hoarsely, bitterly.

"Who wouldn't want a Moon Princess? We're valuable, even weakened. You say one of my names to the senshi, and they spend weeks chasing their tail, asking me over and over if I'm their damn princess." The malice was evident and hate radiated out of her every pore. "They can't even recognize the true Moon Princess from a false one, not a one of them senses that I am virtually powerless!" Her voice was frenzied now, almost crazy in its maniacal rant. "Have you been to the moon, Beryl? There's nothing there. Nothing but ruins and the remnants of a long-dead queen who certainly would never welcome me! My name now is Black Lady, and I belong to the Wiseman for whatever use he has of me. If you want to know, ask him." Lightly her fingers touched the pendant at her neck, her mind all but ready to jump and call the name that would undoubtedly summon him to her side in an instant. But not yet.

"All I know is what I want, and what I want, is to find out what happened. I don't want to rule anything, I just want to know who has been reborn. And when I find them, I will eliminate them." Murder glinted in the eyes of the once-gentle Princess of Crystal Tokyo and she laughed almost desperately. "Would you object to this, O Queen? I have a hard time believing even you would turn down even a weak help. Unless you'd like for them to be reborn? I can perhaps oblige for a time." Only a time. Time was all she ever had, it seemed. Past, future, present, all tangled together in a web that was unraveling faster and faster and sending her spiraling into screaming insanity.