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Set after this

...And, in a second flicker, they appeared somewhere white.

Of course Sylvite looked around. She might have been desperately trying to find a way to save her own life as well as Ganymede's, but that didn't mean she wasn't curious about what this place was, or what was happening to her right now. The walls were cracked white stone, and the architecture was different than anything she'd seen before.

Just the colors compared to her outfit made her feel out of place here.

Was this one of those dead worlds she heard senshi talk about sometimes? It definitely looked old, but it didn't quite look dead.

For one thing, on a pedestal in front of her, there was this mist that was glowing and shifting in a way that seemed almost deliberate.

There was also definitely a person here. She was in a white dress and holding a staff and her aura was even stronger than Ganymede's had bee, so strong that it made Sylvite's head spin. It was like Laurelite's aura, maybe, except it was Order, so it burned.

Under other circumstances she would've been scared, but so much had already happened tonight that she didn't know how to feel anymore.

She took half a step back, towards Ganymede, who was the most familiar thing about any of this. "Does this work?" she asked. "Is this that safe place?"

Was she going to live, or not? The not knowing was starting to get to her.

Ganymede was not expecting the Moon, but that was inarguably where they ended up.

She sank to her knees again as soon as their surroundings registered as familiar, too tired and weak to remain standing. In her Eternal form, she looked marginally less disheveled, if only because her clothing wasn’t stained or torn, and the faux wings at her back were intact. But she was pale, and thin, and bruised, her eyes glassy from fever.

Rarely had she felt so much relief to be on the Moon. Ganymede took a settling breath, willing herself to remain conscious long enough to see this through, though she ached to see Valhalla and her family.

For now, there was the Code, and Cosmos, and the pink-haired General.

“She saved me,” Ganymede answered, though the Code had not spoken to her. She liked to think her words carried some weight, given who she was. “I was a prisoner of the Negaverse, kept in the Dark Kingdom for—”

She didn’t know how long it’d been; Ganymede shook her head rather than estimate. The length of time didn’t matter. What mattered was that she was free.

She was free.

“She saved me,” Ganymede said again, her voice more firm this time. “They’ll kill her for it, if they can get their hands on her.”

“I felt you,” the Code said simply. “Your starseed. It’s tainted, but you must already know that. I spent time in the Negaverse.”

It was a bit odd, to assign an ‘I’ to itself; the Code was more than a person, but with everything else that needed to happen tonight, there probably wasn’t really time for an extended history lesson. Not when Ganymede looked so ill. Not when they didn’t know what Metallia could do. Her influence probably couldn’t reach the Moon.

Probably.

“The Chaos seeps into you. Taints you. Changes you. You have a starseed that can be purified, though. You could be free of it. Tonight.”

Cosmos watched quietly; she didn’t seem to relax but she listened to Ganymede. She trusted her.

Purification was a choice, though. She couldn’t force it on Sylvite–who at least sounded like she disagreed with the Negaverse. It was practical to leave it, now. They’d kill her, or worse, if she’d stolen a Princess from them.

“You have in you something I need,” the Code continued. “I need people willing to protect the Moon. I need someone who understands what the Negaverse can do, and I need someone willing to make sure it doesn’t spread. Cosmos can release you from Metallia, and I can give you the power you need to protect yourself. To follow your own path. I won’t conscript you like she would. If you want to be out of this war, you can. You don’t have to fight anymore. Cosmos can burn out that Chaos and you can start over without it. Or, I can give you new purpose. I can give you the power to keep fighting. For yourself. For what you believe in.”

At this point, Sylvite knew that the Negaverse was bad. She knew that whatever they'd done to her starseed probably wasn't great. She definitely didn't care about being their perfect little soldier anymore. She'd stopped being that when she'd pulled Ganymede out of that cell.

The Negaverse didn't like traitors. She knew that, too. They didn't like when people questioned them, and she was way past that point, now. They'd send her head rolling for what she'd done, and she'd already tried purifying once tonight to get away from that fate.

The glowing ball of light didn't have to talk for too long at all before she was willing to try it again.

It was the second part of what it was saying that made her blink and stay quiet for a couple of seconds, trying to think things through.

She had a choice.

She could be totally free of the war. She didn't have to join Order, which she already knew could be almost as messed up as Chaos was. It was almost tempting.

Her lips quirked to the side, and she gave a single, exhausted giggle. "You know, a long time ago, when the Negaverse found me, I wanted to be a Knight. I didn't know the word for it, but I knew there were magical people out there, trying to do what was good."

She'd always wanted that. She'd always wanted to be strong enough to help. Even now, she was trying to keep on living so that she could keep on trying to make things better for people, so that she could keep trying to do the next right thing.

For a long time now, she'd pretended that the Negaverse was that, but it wasn't. She'd gotten caught up on things that had happened years ago as justification, but it was time to move past that.

It was time to make a different choice for herself.

She nodded and then knelt down in front of the pedestal, like people did in the movies when they were swearing fealty.

"Things got weird. I got misguided, I guess, but I'll do it, now. I'll try to protect the Moon and the Earth. I'll fight for myself, and for others, and for you."

She folded her hands over her knee and glanced up at the woman, Cosmos. She was definitely still nervous, and she wasn't sure what she was getting into, or what her life was going to look like in a couple of minutes, but she was as ready as she was going to be.

Ganymede said nothing else, simply sat there and watched.

It wasn’t her choice to make. Really, she didn’t know that there was much of a choice to begin with. If the General wanted a normal life, she wouldn’t get that in Destiny City — or anywhere, so long as Metallia kept spreading her influence. A normal life meant powerlessness in the face of Chaos. Ganymede didn’t know that many people would choose that once they’d had their eyes opened to the war.

Silently, Ganymede returned Cosmos’s nod. She’d not had the opportunity to watch Cosmos purify anyone, but knew that it could be done. To a certain extent, it touched all those bitter, fraying nerves that prevented Ganymede from extending her trust. Protecting the Cauldron was an important duty that should not be ignored, yet Ganymede could not help her own misgivings — that someone so powerful remained so distant, while they all suffered and died.

All this talk of good...

Ganymede didn’t know that she believed in that anymore. There wasn’t much good anywhere, just pain and loss. Even as the Chaos was removed from the General’s starseed, and she became someone unsullied and new, hope was a difficult thing to muster.

Cosmos was quiet for the first few seconds, maybe more because she’d used a bit of energy, or maybe because she didn’t feel like it was really her place to speak. She’d helped facilitate this only in the sense that she had energy to spare. If Ganymede had been in any better condition, it was likely the honor would have gone to her.

The Code spoke, because if she was going to be a Knight of the Moon, it knew they’d need to be acquainted.

“You’re in good company,” it answered, but only spoke for itself. “I am the Code. The source of power for Knights. You are ‘magic now’. A Knight. Worth trusting with a piece of myself and a part of the Moon. You’ve had a rough night, but I think it was all worth it. Nectaris will be fortunate to have a protector.”

They’d been fortunate enough already to swap an enemy for an ally; now she just needed to settle in.

The Code could send a piece of itself to her Wonder, she could find a place to hide it, to protect it, but it was reluctant to give her that task tonight–especially since Ganymede seemed like she’d have been better off getting treatment on Earth.

“I want to talk with you, about all things, but I don’t know if tonight’s the night.”

The Code had no eyes, and yet it seemed to be looking to Ganymede.

She was the only one among the group that had useful experience on Earth; the Code would stay on the Moon and Cosmos was needed at the Cauldron.

There were only so many answers they could give for someone bound again for Earth.

The more that the people, or the ball of light, the Code, talked, the less that Nectaris felt like she knew. They were saying that she wasn't on Earth, that there wasn't enough time to answer her questions right now, that she needed to go home.

They were saying she'd saved someone.

She could feel that these people were powerful, though, powerful and good. Somewhere in the back of her head, she could feel a powerful warmth almost rolling off of them.

When that man had pinned her to the wall and put one hand over her mouth and the other one inside her chest, she'd been scared. She didn't feel scared anymore.

This felt different from all that. It felt better. She was still missing a couple of pieces to the story, she was pretty sure, but she'd bet there.

Maybe she'd get there after they got Ganymede some medical attention. That seemed like the most important thing right now.

"Okay," she said, standing up and stepping away from Cosmos and the Code, towards the injured woman. "We can talk about all the stuff later. Let's go home."