Welcome to Gaia! ::

The night air was crisp. The sun had just finished setting, the sky still had a faint pink hue. It was staying light out for longer and longer. It was a benefit and curse. Night meant better cover; the lighter it was outside the easier it was to spot the young, charcoal-colored senshi. The light also meant that young Sailor Chibi Ixion could be out much later. In his civilian form, the kid would tell his parents that he was going out to play at a friend’s house. As long as it was light out and not too late, his parents didn’t mind much. It was when it got dark that they would start to worry. The weirdos came out at night. Unknown to the Colts, Sam was one of those ‘weirdos’, just not the type they would have expected.

Chibi Ixion was out on patrol, wandering through the wooded part of a park. He had biked to ‘hidden’ spot in his civilian identity. His bright red bike was chained up to a skinny tree. The boy wandered away from it, walking slowly between the trees, keeping a vigilant look out. He felt the presence of a powered individual nearby. Each step he took was quiet and careful. When he came to clear spot, he peeked between the branches. In the distance, he saw another Sailor. At least what he presumed to be another senshi; the outfit was right.

The other senshi looked familiar. In all the chaos that had happened in the last month or so, Ixion had seen more and more senshi out on patrol. The boy was sure he had seen the fancy steel blue fuku somewhere before, in passing. Whether transformed or in his civilian form, Ixion was not much of a talker; he didn’t often bother to introduce himself.

But, the young senshi was burning with questions. His soft brown eyes watched the other senshi for a few moments. She was a super, her outfit and her powerful aura told him so. Ixion fished out his rusty-colored senshi phone. Glancing down at it, his stared fixated on the ‘Home’ button; now was his chance to ask all his questions. Surely, an experienced Super Sailor could answer his questions about the phone.

Ixion took a deep breath and gulped. ‘Here goes nothing’, he thought to himself. The boy walked out from the cover of the woods and approached the other senshi. He walked up behind her, head held high. To his surprise she wasn’t much taller that he was; she looked much taller from a distance. His gloved hand found her arm, his phone was held tight in the other, and he gave her a light tug.

“Excuse me, Lady?”

Ixion looked from Perseus down to the cell phone in his hands. “I was wondering, if you knew anything about these kitty phones?” The boy held his phone up, letting it lay flat in his palm as he offered it to the girl.

“I don’t think it works”. There was a tone of frustration in his voice, his brow furrowed as he stared at the phone.

“I keep pressing that middle button, but nothing ever happens, what’s it suppose to do?”

Eyes wide open, Ixion watched Perseus very closely. He took mental notes of what she was doing in order to scan herself in; his mouth formed a perfect little ‘o’. ‘So that’s how you add people’ he thought to himself. “Cool.” Why hadn’t he thought to try doing that before?

“It is really? Stupid button never does anything for me.”Ixion smiled warmly at Perseus.

“Ixion.” A white gloved poked his own chest. “I’m the senshi of coal.”

His entire face lit up at the suggestion of seeing something cool. Bobbing his head back and forth, he shook it to acknowledge the quest. More than anything in the world, Ixion wanted to see what the button could do and what magic it contained.

Gripping onto Perseus’s hand, Ixion took a deep breath before shutting his eyes tight. Even though it wasn’t necessary to hold his breath, he wasn’t sure about what was about to happen. His eyes were shut as tight as possible; his cheeks were puffy as he held in all his air.

It happened it what felt like an instant. Ixion felt like his whole body had been lightly shocked, it was tingling with the sudden rush of cool, crisp air. Did it get brisk all of a sudden? He could have sworn it was sunny and light out just a moment ago. Afraid to open his eyes, he kept a firm grip on Perseus, waiting for her to tell him it was safe to look.

When Ixion opened his eyes, and left out his breath gasping, he was amazed at what he saw. The ruins of Perseus were like a wild fantasy place. There was so much to take in, Ixion dropped Perseus’s hand and spun around trying to take in everything at once. “This place is amazing.”

“How did you do that? My phone doesn’t do this when I press the button.” Ixion brought his phone out again, and looked down at it longingly. “How do I…. tune it?”

Sugary brown eyes shifted from the phone to Perseus, gleaming with curiosity. “We all have a home? ... I remember that.” He paused, trying to remember the events of the last month. “From that dream place. Some big voice said they were gone.” The young senshi’s expression was mixed of curiosity and sadness. As he looked around at the wreckage of Perseus’s home planet, he couldn’t help but wonder what might have happened to the planet Ixion.

Moving away from Perseus, Ixion wandered over to what must have been a fountain. The dark stones had a faint design etched into it. Picking up a piece of the rubble, he held it up to his face. It had part of a bright blue design on it, similar to Perseus’s sheath. Light reflected onto Ixion’s face, giving him a faint blue glow almost as if he was about to tell a creepy ghost story. But he just looked back towards the girl who brought him here, “What happened to it? What used to be here?”

All sorts of questions were popping up into his head, Ixion hoped Perseus would have the answers.

“Oh.” Ixion was a little crestfallen. He suspected that his questions about the cosmos, life, and the destruction of their planets wouldn’t have been answered, but he was still disappointed.

Following Perseus, he continued to bombard her with questions about her planet. “There was a Queen? Like the Queen of England? Was she old? Older than you? Where'd she go? Did all planets have Queens? Do you think mine did?”

The questions were non-stop. Every time Ixion saw something new and interesting, he rushed to check it out and examine it. The winding staircase itself caught his interest. “Where does this go?”

Ixion didn’t bother to wait for much of an answer. Like a lot of kids, he loved to slide down the banister. The boy hopped up onto the stone railing and began to slide down, leap frogging over the small sections that were missing.

“WEEEEEEEEEEE.”

“An adventure!” Ixion shouted it out with glee. The chance to discover brand new things, or new ancient old things, was overwhelming. The boy didn’t know where to look first.

He ran ahead of Perseus, frolicking about with an abundance of energy. One moment he was standing by the fountain, running his gloved fingertips over the water, then another moment he was examining the plant life. Picking up a tendril, Ixion held it up to his face to look at it closely. There was nothing particularly special about that plant. It was almost identically to something that might be found on earth in a lush rainforest. Not that Ixion had ever been to a rainforest, but he assumed that the plant’s bright color and leaves were similar the vines that Tarzan swung on. No, definitely not that special, Ixion concluded.

Dropping the vine, the boy moved onto his next target, the market stalls. Skipping over to each one, Ixion picked up various objects, each one he lifted up to show Perseus. Most of them were common enough objects, vases and house wares, or jewelry decorated with ever silver. Picking up on necklace, he handed it to Perseus without saying a word, just smiling at her.

“We could play a game!” Ixion rushed over to the next stall and went behind the counter. The counter was more or less just like the others. The stall had decaying fabric as a roof, pitched up like a tent. A brightly colored blue woven mat was laid out on top of the counter; the merchant’s wares were haphazardly tossed out on top of it. Ixion’s boots made a sickening crunch on something as he teetered around behind the stall. Turning to look behind him, Ixion saw a funny hat sitting down on the moss pile of rocks.

“Persey! How do you think this would look!?” Ixion picked up the hat and moved to put it on his own head. Underneath that hat was he decrepit skull of the former merchant. Ixion was standing on the last remains and dust of a Perseusian.

Swallowing hard, Ixion looked down on where he was standing. It was mostly covered in rumble and mossy plant life, but there were a few noticeable fragments of bones.

“Oh.” The boy didn’t scream, like some children might. Instead, he simple shuffled to the side, watching his step carefully to make sure he didn’t step on anyone else. “I’m sorry,” he said solemnly. It was an apology directed to the merchant’s bones and not the living Perseus. With his head bowed, the boy moved to Perseus’s side. His gloved hand latched onto hers, “Visions? Of what? Like ghosts?”