continuing from here takes place July 16th - cw: mild self harm


Alone again in her empty world, everything was silent except for the thudding, steady beat of her heart. Any need to show some semblance of put togetherness disappeared along with Captain Borax, and it was all Hestia could do not to fall to her knees. With shaking, stumbling steps, she made her way back to the little café and all its supplies, pain killers included. It wouldn’t be good to go back too soon after him. Probably wouldn’t be good to give him too much time to mess with the area they left from, either.

She’d have to call for someone to pick her up, and she knew who it would have to be and she hated Borax all over again. A little bottle, a little spoonful later, followed with a long drink of tea that should have probably been water instead. Who knew how hearthfire tea would interact with the Earth drug, but also, who cared? It didn’t take long for the pain to ease back and for Hestia to drowsily not care about anything at all.

Right up until a clumsy swing of an arm sent an urn, a treasured survivor of a thousand years of wreckage, crashing to the floor. After staring at the pieces of broken clay on the floor, the senshi finally did fall to her knees, despair welling up and bursting out into ugly sobs that wracked her frame, violent and fit to break her apart because it wasn’t just some piece of broken pottery. It was a whole broken history and it was breaking with her. The terrible, unwieldy, violent, angry her.

She deserved this. She’d done this to herself and a captain with a <********> was the consequence of her actions, not the cause. Hestians weren’t supposed to seek violence. They weren’t supposed to to be angry, let alone hate. Hestians didn’t have enemies, but simply the opponents of circumstance. They didn’t judge. They acted in service to a person or purpose not…not whatever she thought she’d been doing tonight. What had she…

Why was she…

The comfortable fog, momentarily pushed back, steadily filled in the gaps of thought until the only show of recrimination left was in the steady press of her hand against a broken piece of pottery. Dully, she watched the blood well up and wondered why she didn’t just lift her hand. It’d probably hurt quite a lot later on?

It took awhile to lift her hand, with tears long dried and on knees that will ache for it later. When she finally moved it was to reach out and grab something glinting amidst the broken clay, An exquisite little glass bottle, sealed with a cork. Holding it up, Hestia thought she saw movement within, not liquid but maybe smoke.

Not thinking, she opened the bottle and watched the wisp float up.

Not thinking, she stood up and tried to follow it as left the building.

Not thinking, she stumbled and fell once. Fell twice. And continued to follow.

Not thinking, she stood in front of the massive basin that held the All Flame and instead of the barely there little ball of light she’d tended for years now, she stood in front of a huge bonfire of a flame. Magnificent. Terrifying. Warm.

The steady, rhythmic rasping of hundreds of brooms across marble filled her ears, and the scent of incense flooded her nose, far richer than what she’d ever managed in her pale attempts at imitation. It was a vision but it was more. Was it the drugs? Or maybe the wisp. Dazed, Hestia wanted to look around this more detailed piece of her past but found herself unable to control her own perspective. She felt herself opening her mouth and…

“To serve, to tend, to clear the way,” Hestia heard herself intone, voice younger, softer, so full of pride and uncertainty. “Let all burn cleanly. Let all burn brightly. Lead all to shine amongst the stars.”

She knew this oath and the recognition seared across the fog of her perception. It was the Keeper’s Oath. She had really…she was finally…

Hestia felt the burden of years start to peel back, all her memories until now limited to that of a civilian initiate. All her world’s guidance limited to…

And then she noticed the henshin pen in her hands, the Mauvian sitting among the other Keepers, witnessing the ceremony. She saw the more ornate, special robes that draped her body. Mostly black with that under layer of crisp white. The red trim. A Keeper’s uniform but so much more. It wasn’t her modern uniform but it was. It was her uniform.

Her world was finally allowing to her to see her past life as a senshi. She would finally have chances to see what she’d done as a senshi. She would know the rest of the rules. The full expectations for Sailor Hestia as she should be.

A thousand years ago and today, her heart beat against her chest with increasing power and excitement. It was time, it was finally…

“It’s time.”

Hestia’s head turned to see the semi-familiar face of one of her instructors.

“What should I do next?” A question, eager and heartfelt, then and now.

“You’ll get the details on your journey, you’ll be taking slower transport in order for you to adjust and receive guidance from the Mau.” The Mauvian gave a small gesture at the mention, and her hand waved back, unsure. “But for now, Keeper Hestia, it’s time to pack. Don’t focus on goodbyes, we’ll all be thinking of you daily and tending your fire. The whole world will be with you. Always.” Was there a certain pity in those words?

“I’m…leaving?” She didn’t want it to be a question, but it came out a questioning little warble. She could feel the upset of this ancient, younger her.

“Hestia’s place is to serve others, not to serve Hestia. And someone out there needs you, badly. Someone always will.” She was leaving that night. She was never coming back.

Hestia felt her heartbeat stagger and stutter.

"May you burn ever brightly."

The vision shattered as her knees once again hit the ground, the wisp dissipating into nothing. The warm tide of fog rose and fell, rose and fell and eventually, in a moment of coherence, Hestia willed herself back to Earth, and found herself in an alley not too far from where she’d last fought. For one, horribly panicked moment, she scrambled at her senshi phone, incoherently afraid that somehow the homeworld app would be gone. That she’d left without thinking and she wouldn’t be able to go back ever again. But it was still there, even if out of reach. It was still there. She could go back. It was okay.

Oh, she was crying again, wasn’t she?

In her periphery another wisp of some sort appeared and she didn’t question its presence at all. This one didn’t try to lead her anywhere, though, simply swirled around her wrist and then up into her hair, exploratory while the senshi sat staring at her phone, eyes vacant. Eventually a second phone came out. A contact was called.

“I need help. Now.” A location was sent.

In the dark of the early morning, Hestia listened to the sound of her own breathing, steady despite the tight, clenching fist of despair that had taken grip of her chest.