The characters here are trademarks of their respective owners. I am not expecting any money from any story I write, and therefore am not taking any money away from the copyright holders. This series is an official sequel to my "Divided Destiny" series, which was at-the-time an unofficial sequel to my "Let The Punishment Be The Crime" story. Confused? It's understandable, as knowledge of those stories is basically required to enjoy this one, though the important stuff will likely be covered here anyway. Thanks to Lady Jupiter (LadyJupiter@SailorJupiter.com) as her works inspired me to write fanfiction in the first place, and also to His Lordship Chaos (hislordshipchaos@hotmail.com) even though I've run out of specific reasons why to mention here. :) I'm a huge Jupiter fan. That will become obvious as you read this and other stories by me, they are mostly Lita-centric. I will be using the NA dubbed names. Why? Because the previous part of this tale used NA names and this IS its sequel. This fic features the Scouts and Ken in Lady Jupiter's "Jupiter Knight" World where Ken is Lita's protector, Jupiter Knight. I have been given permission to do so. Also, it takes place before her "Remember When?" series and obviously after my "Divided Destiny" series. My other/future fanfics can be found at my "Writing" page at http://www.muskoka.com/~summertn/writing.html and probably anywhere else you got this fic from. This story was originally aimed to be a bit more humourous than its predecessor, but slowly switched towards duplicating it fairly well. Oh well. Divide By Zero Part Four - Old Flames by Scott "Cyclops" Summerton Last Revised Thursday January 27th, 2000 --------------- "Your old boyfriend?" The newcomer smiled. "I'm honoured that you remembered me so." Sailor Jupiter glared at him. "Freddie! I'll kill you!" "Of course you won't, but we can at least see what you've got." "I wish looks could kill since you would have been dead long before I even opened my eyes!" yelled Jupiter Knight. Sailor Jupiter backed him up. "Go to hell creep!" Freddie's eyes flicked with momentary madness. "I already have... Now it's your turn..." Suddenly Sailor Mercury's visor loudly cracked down the middle causing her to shout a wide-eyed "What?!" which was summarily drowned out as her pocket computer exploded in a shower of sparks which lit up the dusk evening. When she opened her eyes she suddenly felt like she was submurged up to her nose in water, yet was still standing just outside of the temple entryway. Sailor Mars suddenly shouted as if she was singed by flames licking at her from every angle. What must have been a column of fire surrounding her body was curiously contradicting Mercury's plight. Sailor Venus on the other hand merely clutched at her eyes and stumbled backwards, shouting "I can't see, everything's so bright!" Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask both reacted as if they were being forced to the ground, as if the future responsibility of leadership was literally oppressing them with added weight to their shoulders. The Jupiters started to shake mildly as if being electrocuted, a new experience given the nature of their powers. Both struggled to remain upright as they fell to their knees. While the lunar cats were seemingly ignored, Sailor Pluto stood unmoving, apparantly frozen in place forced to watch it all. "Now that you're all paying attention," began Freddie, "I'll explain a few details to you." He began walking about the courtyard looking at the subdued Scouts. "I know who you all are, and I know of your battles with the Negaverse. I know that as of late, those battles have been laughable, for the opponents you've faced were culled from peoples' dreams. The fact that some were from pleasant dreams and others from nightmares merely amplifies this fact." Sailor Mercury, craning her neck to speak properly, wanted to know what he was getting at. "What does this have to do with you?" He smiled at her. "It's rather simple. During this harvesting the Negaverse came across me in my personal hell. I learned that every time my 'punishment' repeated, both Lita and her nice friend Ken here had an invigorating dream. A feel-good experience if you will. When they offered me the chance to leave the dream and reenter the real world, my answer was instantaneous." Sailor Jupiter's eyes widened in fear. "You mean...?" Freddie nodded with a dark smile. "They were so pleased to discover my potential based on my hatred towards you for putting me in that nightmare, Lita. They infused me with Negaenergy, and I'd be a general if the position wasn't below me." This time Sailor Moon battled her fear as she fought to stand. "You're the... new... Negaverse ruler?" His laugh sent a shiver down everyone's spines. "Hardly. Their currant doctrine to the monsters is 'the beatings will continue until moral improves.'" He shook his head as if embarassed. "My rank would be something around admiral if such a thing existed in that place." His pacing brought him before the still motionless Pluto. "As for this green-haired witch, I thought I had eliminated her already, what with her powers of time surely affecting the repetition of my nightmare. However, I underestimated you. That will only happen once I'm afraid." Sailor Jupiter looked to the ground as she gritted her teeth through the pain of the attack, though what she saw startled her. Both she and Jupiter Knight were kneeling in wet grass from the rain that had fallen earlier that day. If she and Jupiter Knight were in fact having electrical current forced through them then the results would be much more drastic than they were. She screamed to her friends, for regardless of the discovery she was still affected by it. "You're not really being attacked, it's just an illusion!" Freddie's eyes glinted with madness once more. "Oh no?" He snapped his fingers. Sailor Mercury truly entered a Tantalus-like state where no matter how she moved she could hardly keep her nose above water to allow proper breathing. Sailor Mars was surrounded by form-fitting flames swirling about her body. Sailor Venus' upper torso was encased in a block of pure white light which followed her as she fell to the ground. Freddie looked to Sailor Moon and Tuxedo Mask as the gravity in their area increased tenfold. "Others have tried this, correct? This time it's flawless." Regardless of the immense pressure, both managed to remain on their knees while fighting the onslaught. Sailor Jupiter was thankful that the bolts of chain lightning that struck her and Jupiter Knight propelled them onto the dry steps of the temple. She was forced to scream however as the lightning continuously coursed through their bodies. Luna and Artemis were thankful they were being ingnored, yet the increased feeling of helplessness was perhaps intended to occur because of this. Besides, Freddie needed an audience to witness his greatest moments, and with Sailor Pluto literally turned into a stone statue, the cats would have to do. "The mighty Sailor Scouts and their male partners, all helpless at the hands of an all-mighty foe. Surely Sailor Mercury could free you all if she wasn't preoccupied with trying to breathe. Or perhaps Tuxedo Mask could save the day by throwing a red rose at my face. Oh, wait, he's too busy fighting the pull of gravity not 10 feet from me." He laughs again. "Your tortures are to last lengthy durations you know, like mine did. Your fates have not yet been sealed, but I'll have plenty of time over the years to..." "Stop your chaotic ranting and face me man to man!" Freddie smirked at Jupier Knight who had interrupted him. "Just to make it fair, how about 7 on 1?" He snapped his fingers once more. The battle was on. Just as quickly however did the Scouts realize how outclassed they were. If any had doubts, they were cast aside when Freddie laughed off Sailor Mars' ward when she attempted to dispell the evil inside him. Freddie laughed again as his head turned ever so slightly from the impact of a Venus Crescent Beam while saying "Your foe is omnipotent and yet you still struggle on? Courageous but stupid." With the cast of his hand, Sailor Mars erupted into flames within seconds. A small flaming torch fell to the stone where she stood. "RAYE!!!" screamed Sailor Moon as she witnessed it unfold before her. "You killed her!!" Freddie's eyed practically beamed insanity as he looked to the flickering torch. "Oh, she's not dead..." "He's right." came Sailor Mars' voice inside the heads of the heroes. "M-Mars?" feebled Sailor Mercury. "I don't know how, but he turned me into the fire on that torch!" "But, how are you speaking to us?" asked a bewildered Sailor Jupiter. Freddie answered for her. "She's one with her Great Fire now." He smiled. "What fun would it be if she couldn't communicate telepathically what with her being uncapable of speech?" "You monster!" screamed Sailor Venus as she lunged towards him with a Sailor V kick straight out of her earlier crimefighting days. Freddie waited for the impact and smiled when it came. What fell at his feet was a solitary glowbug, flashing repeatedly as it scurried away from the would-be admiral. Tuxedo Mask started forward, brandishing both a rose to hurl and his cane. "Venus?" he asked aloud. "She's alright." came Mars' reply. "She's the bug, but I think only I can communicate with her." Freddie confirmed her suspicions. "Now do you understand?" "Understand what?" shouted Tuxedo Mask as he stalked forward yet again. "Tsk Tsk." admonished Freddie. "You should really stick to the shadows where you belong." He snapped his fingers once more. And Tuxedo Mask melted into the shadows at his feet. "DARIEN!!!" exclaimed a now hysterical Sailor Moon. "Serena, Serena, he's ok, he's just inside the shadows like Freddie said." reassured Mars. "But I need him back..." she proclaimed weakly. Freddie could only smile at her words. "How true you are..." Sailor Moon's complextion became completely pale, resembling a light grey. What was worse was that her costume was following suit. She then simply lay down on the ground as if waiting to die. Sailor Mercury and Sailor Jupiter scrambled to her side. "Sailor Moon!" shouted Jupiter. "Mercury what's happening to her?" Mercury looked up from her computer. "She's literally wasting away! Without Darien she's practically giving up, like her heart stopped being able to love!" Jupiter began pleading with her fallen leader. "Sailor Moon, please don't give up, come back to us, we need you!" Sailor Moon, now completely greyscale, merely mumbled. "But I need Darien..." Sailor Mercury shivered as she watched the stone Sailor Pluto begin to flicker temporaly. As she turned to face the enemy she mentally prepared herself. Would she be turned to ice if her attack were to fail? Calling forth her Shine Aqua Illusion blast of water, she found her answer. She became not a block of ice, but instead a 'block' of ice water, somehow sustaining its shape regardless of its lack of a container. Sailor Jupiter began to fight back tears as she witnessed the damage her oft-mentioned old boyfriend was causing. "Freddie stop this!" she shouted. "This is crazy!" "Crazy?" balked Freddie. "As in not fitting within reality?" He walked towards the two Juptiers. "Reality, my dear, is defined by the last man standing." As she threw a roundhouse kick designed to snap his neck on contact, she realized her feet were rooted to the ground. Literally. "Expecting to become a bolt of lightning, Lita?" asked Freddie. "Not this time afraid. Instead you're a literal Jovian Oak, if those ever did exist that is." Freddie granted her curse a bit of leeway when compared to the rest however, as her face, albeit now made of bark, remained fully functional within the tree so that she could view the misfortunes of her friends. The remainder of her body was that of any other young oak tree however. Freddie now turned to his final opponent. Jupiter Knight. After only a single missed swing of his sword, Freddie swatted the young man to the ground and placed the blade to his throat. His confidence wavered as the insanity finally took full precidence. "You want to know why Sailor Pluto's monitor malfunctioned last week? It was me. You want to know why you and Lita had nightmares lately? It was ME. You want to know why that blast back in the park extended your mental transitions into each other? You were to suffer for as long as possible. Know who was responsible?! IT WAS ME!!" Sailor Jupiter watched in horror as she witnessed the water block hover above the torch. Also, the glowbug apparantly was moving against its own will as the shadows where Tuxedo Mask last stood began to overtake it. Sailor Moon's eyes were now closed and her breathing was shallow, and Freddie seemed ready to impale her boyfriend's neck with his own sword. Freddie spoke aloud so the cats, unable to do anything, could also hear him. "You realize that the water and torch will cancel each other out, causing both Mars and Mercury to die. Same for Venus and Tuxedo Mask since a glowbug in the shadows would cast the shadows away and suffocate said insect." He looked towards Sailor Moon. "Your Moon Princess will die on her own of course, and Kenny-boy here will die the old fashioned way." He looked to Sailor Jupiter. "As for Lita, I'm sure she'll enjoy being an oak on the temple grounds here for a few hundred years." A wistful look overcame his face. "I'll spare you all if she takes me back however." He smiled, almost genuinely. "If Lita joins me then everyone will live." Regardless of the terrifying ends they were facing, everyone save the unconscious Sailor Moon mentally screamed their refusal to the terms. Naturally only Mars could hear it all, but she quickly relayed the information to Sailor Jupiter, pleading with her to instead give more time to Jupiter Knight to mount an offensive of some sort. Sailor Jupiter remained silent however until she saw Freddie raise the blade preparing to drive it through Jupiter Knight's throat. "STOP!!!" she screamed as tears begin running down the ragged bark that was once soft flesh. "I... I'll do it..." TO BE CONTINUED END PART FOUR --------------- Easily my cruelest cliffhanger yet. His Lordship would be proud. :) Someone out there surely has that Dec 26/99 ASMR zip and is witholding it from me. It's a huge conspiracy, I know it... Here's my contact info: Scott "Cyclops" Summerton http://www.muskoka.com/~summertn thrawn27@hotmail.com, sjs3@hotmail.com and summertn@muskoka.com ICQ - 7383852, AOL IM - DarkCanuck Please also visit: A Sailor Moon Romance (www.moonromance.com) Lady Jupiter's Dream House (www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Temple/9286/) SailorJupiter.com (www.sailorjupiter.com) Curse of the Fanboys! (carnage.fanfic.org) Began and Completed Thursday January 27th, 2000.