Much had been damaged in Destiny City Memorial Hospital over the years. Some accidents were tiny, like rooms being set on fire mysteriously, but others were more severe, like when a great explosion of power decimated a wing of the hospital where those still trapped in comas during the sleeping sickness disaster were resting. The news broadcast it as yet another tragedy on top of more tragedy. The poor hospital had been beaten and bruised. Each time the management attempted to rebuild, it seemed as though yet another tragedy was waiting in the wings to unleash the newest batch of financial terror.

It was for perhaps this reason that the destroyed ward left in the wake of Nehelenia and Alexandros’ deaths was still closed off. Beams had been set up, the beginnings of fresh wiring, cans of unopened paint, stainless steel poles propped against half-built walls. It was a graveyard of construction. Tarps hung like ghosts across where the exterior walls should be. Even with all the broken pieces and missing doors, the hospital was not short on mirrors.

Eternal Sailor Ares slipped into the closed down corridor with little problem, coming out of the very mirror that had once been in her own hospital room. The air was stale, but the sounds of activity just down the hall echoed against the smooth linoleum floors. A breath shuddered in her chest. “Breathe,” she coached herself. “Breathe.”

All this time, and Ares had never come to the place where her King and Queen died, or where her Captain and the Captain of the Cavaliers had died too.

The damage caused by the dual destruction of the Black Kingdom crystals had done a number on the hospital. The immediate aftershocks took the lives of a handful of people, including Hector and Aphrodite. It was a place that Ares had nightmares about for months afterward. She had been sleeping in that very wing, kept in a room far from the blast by pure chance. In her weaker moments, she whimpered and prayed for a chance to go back and die with her Queen. Then those sad spots passed, and Ares forced herself to focus on the mission at hand.

Now she was back in the place where it had all ended.

Ares stood in the spot in front of the mirror for a long time, her hand twitching at her side. She waited for as long as it took for her hand to stop shaking. There was a time limit here, and the Senshi of Smoke had to remain focused. It took longer than she would have liked.

Hollow footsteps echoed across the empty room. Ares pushed back plastic curtains and tarps until she found herself standing in the room where her Queen had taken her life. “I’m losing them,” she said to the open air. “I’m losing their trust and their faith. If you were here, this wouldn’t happen -- but you’re not. I have to accept that.” The Senshi of Smoke closed her eyes.

This was a place that held power. This was the last place that the crystals of her lost kingdom had been used. It was a kernel of a hope, but it was all that she had.

“You told me once that I only had to ask for help and it would come,” she said again, stepping toward the center of the room. “Well, I’m asking now. I’m asking for guidance. I’m asking for purpose. I’m asking for the help I need to steer the Blood Moon Court to the right path.”

A pulse beat in the room. Ares gasped, fell to her knees. Gray eyes fell open, flickering across the room. She was alone. Another thud of pressure ricocheted in her chest. The Senshi of Smoke began to cough, clutching at her throat. It was as if someone was sticking a hand through her rib cage and squeezing her heart. Another pulse. Another beat. Ares was on the ground, one knee curled to her chest.

As her vision went hazy, Ares could feel herself standing up and crossing to the mirror at the corner of the room. Her knees were gelatin, and her heart raced so quickly that she could barely breathe. Through fuzzy vision and a clouded mind, Ares stared blankly at her reflection in the mirror until a shadow fell over her. She lifted one hand to the mirror’s surface, pressed her palm flat against it.

And then something pushed back.