Musical clip again ;)
"So, you know how people are
When its all gone much too far
The way their minds are made

Still there's something you should know
that I could not let show
That fear of letting go

And in this moment, I need to be needed
With the darkness all around me, I like to be liked
In this emptiness and fear, I want to be
wanted
Cos I love to be loved
I love to be loved."--

Peter Gabriel, "Love to be Loved"

Disclaimer: Goes w/o saying, don't own Sailor Moon, never have never will.
Copyright to--well, its fan-fiction, you know the drill.
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He bathed in darkness, thicker than the bleakest unlit night
he'd ever seen. On Nemesis, such nights were common as the planet hid from
the sun, and at times, with its thick clouds, even the stars. An isolated
world, trapping anger and thwarted desires for revenge.

He'd become like that planet. Retreating into himself, divorcing himself
from reality and pulling back from the nightmare that he called reality.

Strange to believe he lay in the crystal palace of the ones who'd once
been their enemies. Yet, Sapphire thought, where else would it make sense
for him to be? Certainly not on the shell that remained of Nemesis, and
he'd been denied the option of returning to the past. Angrily he'd assumed
there was no logic, just cruel fate slapping him when that had happened.

When he'd been told he could not return by the guardian of the gate, he'd
wanted to kill her and rush into the time stream. A momentary impulse,
a sick sudden lapse of judgement on his part. Yet nothing had come of
it. He hadn't even placed one mark on her and she'd flung him off like
a rag doll.

Images shifted around him, but too embarrassed or embroiled in these
tortured thoughts, he kept closing his eyes against the lights. A
persistent gentle hum flowed into him, and as the purple glow
intensified, the outside world began to reach into the shell he'd
created around himself.

"Its been a week. And still his condition has not changed." A voice said. A
female voice, he noted, and one he'd heard before.

"Setsuna, it was not your fault. I don't blame you." His brother's
voice replied.

"I do." She said in a voice as tortured and racked with pain and guilt
as he'd felt. "He's your brother! And I've done this to him..."

"Set, he'll be ok. Mercury said she could not determine any physical
reason for his continued unconsciousness."

"Then why doesn't he wake?" The woman asked. "And when he does,
what will happen when you tell him...that is..." She hesitated.

"We'll tell him together. Set, you shouldn't think he's going to
hate you because of what happened. Of the two of us, Sapphire was always
the more forgiving and lenient. He saw the good in situations and had
the hope I lacked."

"You had hope Diamond. Wiseman used that hope against you, but you
had it. I though you were through recriminating yourself over this."

He smiled. He knew he never really would forgive himself for it. "Then so should you." Through Sapphire's half-open eyes he saw his brother
kiss the woman who'd attacked him. Sapphire eyes flew open
at that, but he shut them and feigned sleep.

"Sapphire!" Queen Serenity's voice said to his left. "I thought
his eyes opened, Diamond, Setsuna!"

"He looks asleep still." Diamond commented from the right.

"Queen Serenity!?" A voice called, faint in the distance.

"Just a minute, Mercury. I'll be right there."The voice said and footsteps
echoed into the distance moving away. The sound travelling disoriented
him, and curiosity took over his desire to sleep.

Light, painful at first, streamed in as he barely opened his eyes.
Through squinted eyes, Sapphire surveyed the room. He could see his brother
lounging against the wall, his head tilted towards a woman with
long dark green hair. Now he was convinced he'd seen right.

"Awake" A girl said to his right, in a voice like the moment after
dusk, when everything is calm and half-shadowed.

He turned and stared into the face of an extremely beautiful young
girl. Large purple eyes framed by the straight black silk of her hair,
nestling in the ivory skin. She blinked at him without smiling,
cautiously tilting her head to the side. "Are you all right?" She
asked him.

"Who are you!?" He said his voice rasping out.

"Hotaru." She replied as she stood. He couldn't be sure of her age.
She didn't look that old, but her manner hinted at a maturity
few ever reached.

"Diamond, he's awake!"Setsuna exclaimed as she grabbed his brother's
arm. "Perhaps I'll leave you and your brother alone...Sapphire,
I am glad to see you are well!" She smiled, and exited the room.

Sapphire, puzzled at her genuine relief after attacking him sighed.
Things confused him, but he'd get over it. He turned to see the
other girl, but to his surprise she'd vanished.

Diamond sat on the edge of the bed and helped Sapphire to sit up.
"Finally returning to the world I see, Brother? Enjoy the vacation?"

"Something's different about you." Sapphire said to Diamond, noting
the odd tone in his brother's voice. "That was her, wasn't it...the
one that hit me."

"She apologizes. She was just doing her job...her old job."

"I remember going to the Door of Time, to go to the past, and she
said I couldn't, and then she attacked me...so why was she cuddling
up to you? Did you sweep her off her feet with your charm?"

Diamond sighed, looking slightly embarrassed. "Believe me, she feels quite bad about that. And I think it was more the reverse."

"So will she let me go now?" Sapphire asked. "You've talked to her?"

Diamond frowned and pushed a strand of hair back from his younger brother's
eyes. "Listen, Sapphire, I know this is going to be hard for you
to understand. You've been asleep for a couple of days. And in that
time some things have happened."

"Are you avoiding the question?"Sapphire muttered.

Diamond closed his eyes, looking down at his knees and smiled.

"You know me too well. The Gate of Time has been destroyed."

"WHAT!?" Sapphire spat. "What nonsense is that!?"

"Its true. I was there when it happened...all Time stopped, and
Setsuna, that is Sailor Pluto and I, we were forced to restore it."

Sapphire just stared wide eyed at his brother.

"So, the time door is no more. The good news though, is that..."
Diamond colored a bit. "I'm getting married."

Sapphire coughed, and almost choked. That was about the last thing he'd
expected to hear. As Diamond fed him some water,
Sapphire attempted to regain his composure. He wouldn't have
been more surprised if Diamond had told Sapphire that all along,
he'd been Sailor Moon. "TO WHO!?"

"Setsuna." Diamond said. "Not right away, but--"

"I see." He stared at his brother. "I am happy for you. You
seem at peace."

"I am. And I want you to be. Here, in this city and this time."

"That's not what I want. "Sapphire insisted. "I don't
belong here, but perhaps you wouldn't understand."

"If you're speaking of love, I think I do understand now. And
you're not in love with Prisma."

"How do you know?" Sapphire argued.

"Because I know you. You're not." Diamond shrugged. "You can't love
what you do not know. Its easy to fall for an image or to think
if someone offers you their heart you can take it. But that is
not love."

"Suddenly, you're the expert."Sapphire said swinging himself out of the
bed.

"I wouldn't say that. But I'm still your big brother. I still
know somethings you don't."

"You can keep them to yourself then." Sapphire exited the room. He
had no destination in mind, he just felt too much anger at the
situation and his brother to stay before he said something he'd regret.
Irritatedly he stalked down
the beautiful crystal halls. They all looked so much alike, that
in short order he lost any sense of where he was. Seeing a door
leading outside into a garden, he pushed through it, staring at
amazement at the greenery. Here in the midst of the heavy floral
scents, the kaleidscope of colors on the plants he could forget
he lay trapped in this crystal curse they called a city.

He wandered into the heart of the small garden, drinking in the air which
seemed earthier, muskier and much more refreshing than the too clean air
of the palace.

"Are you lost?" A soft voice asked him. He turned to see the girl
he'd seen before. She seemed younger than he'd realized before when
he'd glimpsed her. Perhaps she was about 11 or 10.
She sat on a stone bench, her back propped against
a tree's curved bark, a book open on her legs which were pulled up almost to
her chest.
She stood out against the white of the bench, as she appeared to be dressed
almost entirely in black. A form-fitting one piece leotard of a soft silky
fabric covered her, with short dark forrest green shorts over it. Not, he
thought, the usual attire of those of Crystal Tokyo who seemed to run around
in Sailor Suits. At least, the ones he'd seen so far besides the Queen.

"I'm fine." He said.

She nodded and continued reading.

He frowned and wandered over to her. "Thanks, I suppose."

"Your welcome." She replied without looking up.

He sat down. She puzzled him, because he had thought the only ones
inside the palace were the Queen and her "Guardians". "Do you live here?"

"In a sense." She said. She didn't sound annoyed, but her short answers
indicated she preferred reading to talking to him. He noticed the title
of the book. Some ancient comic book, he noted, which destroyed the
ultra serious impression she'd been making on him.

He smiled at that, laughing a bit.

She looked up at him curiously, and he noticed, a bit shyly. "What is it?"

"I thought you were studying, you seemed so intent." A child indeed,
he thought. A bit of normality in this strange palace.

"Oh." She put the book down, and swung her feet off the bench, and half-turned
toward him.

"So how long have you been here?" He asked.

"I don't know." She replied. "At least a week."

"Don't know...." He mulled that for a second, but then reasoned he himself
did not really know how long he'd been out. Yet the answer bothered
him with its strangeness. He decided not to push her on it, because
children at her age usually had a poor sense of time. "So, do you
live here or did your parents just bring you to visit?"

"I assume I live here." She replied.

"So others do live here beside the Guardians and the King and Queen."
He stated more to himself.

"No, though I suppose, if Setsuna,
Diamond and you are here then it is true."

"She's not a Guardian??"

The little girl shook her head. "She was, of the Time Door. And I..." She trailed off her eyes unfocussed. "I spend my time asleep."

"Asleep?" he asked puzzled. Her quietness drew him in. Perhaps,
he wondered, she too had been an enemy taken in by these Crystal Tokyo
people. If so, they had something in common.

"The destruction of the Time Door pulled me from my sleep. I can't
say where I was or how I got here, or why I am here." She offered
this explanation knowing it raised more questions than it answered.

"I don't know why I'm here either." He said lightly. "Who does? Better
to know where you are going."

She smiled. "And where are you going?"

He shrugged. "I have no idea. I wish I could go back to sleep."

She nodded in agreement. "Unfortunately, we cannot sleep forever."

He tugged a flower loose from the plant behind him twirling it in his hands.
"So its true, that the Time Door does not exist? That there is no way to
return to the past world?"

"So I've been told." She sighed. "My best friend is trapped back in time, and may cease to exist since her mother is trapped here, forward of when she should be. I wonder if that is why I appeared? I do not know. The first thing
I thought, when I reappeared, was to see her. And she wasn't here.
So SHE did not lie to you."

"Who?" He asked confused. He'd gotten lost in her quiet sweet voice,
and watching her dark purple eyes as she'd spoken. He found it odd that
a girl so young could speak so intelligently.

"Setsuna. If she said you could not go back, then you cannot."

"When she "told" me, as you put it, the Door was fine."

Hotaru shrugged. "I know very little of the Dark Moon Attack. Actually,
I was just reading about it." She indicated the comic on her lap.

In some wonder he pulled it from her and stared in amazement at the
pictures and story. "But that's not what happened!"

"These things always exaggerate." She smiled. "Serena found one with me
to read too." She slid a small book over to him. "I found it hard to
read about myself."

He looked over at her, and she smiled. The transformation shocked him.
She'd been beautiful before, but like a doll, distant and not quite
alive. The smile made her human, and warmed her features in a way
that made him catch his breath. He completely forgot whatever he'd
been about to say just staring at her.

Luckily, he found a distraction and a new topic when the sounds of music, pulsating and loud, emanated into the small garden.

"What's that?" he asked her, glad of an excuse to keep talking after
hitting the first natural pause in their conversation. He was not
used to dealing with children, least of little girls, and least of
all precocious little girls with an oddly adult way of speaking.

"The Grand Ball. They decided to have one for my return, your recovery and
for Serena of course. Not that a reason was needed, since
Neo-Queen Serenity like parties." Hotaru kept her eyes focussed somewhere
on her knees, not looking at him.

"Neo-Queen..and Serena...aren't they the same person?" He said, his
eyebrows drawing together.

Hotaru risked a glance at the strange young man beside her. She
both wished he would leave and that he wouldn't. She'd never had
such a reaction before in her memory of all the lives she'd ever lived.
Why did his presence make her heart speed up? She remembered from her friend
Rini something called a "crush." Did she have one? Was it possible
to form one so fast?
For some reason such things had never entered into Hotaru's life. Perhaps
being raised by someone possessed, and suffering from illnesses put a damper on that part of her development. She colored when she realized she'd
forgotten to answer him because she'd been so lost in analyzing her
own reactions.

She stood putting her book under her arm. "I'm sorry. They are
but not now...a time travel accident. Serena travelled here as
Sailor Moon, to battle the entity that stopped time. But something
went wrong...an accident. "

"Accident?" He repeated. He paused thoughtfully, mulling that over.
As he did, the music grew from faint to persistent. The sounds of
voices babbling drifted over into the garden like an auditory stream of
pleasure. Laughter poured into the air, light and infectious.

"That really sounds like quite a party." He commented, feeling
a strange tug to watch it. The few celebrations he had seen
as a child sounded a bit like this, but he'd never experienced
one as an adult. They were all distant memories.

She nodded. "Would you like
to go see?" she said the last shyly, avoiding eye contact. "I felt
too tired, and thought I would not go, but if you want.." she stumbled
then a fit overtaking her.She felt the energy build around her, as
the pain shot through her body of her bones expanding rapidly.
She fell to the ground, her book sliding under the stone bench.

"What's wrong?"He said as he knelt to raise her up.

She shook her head as her shaking began to still. "Its a disease I have. Comes and goes..." She shut her eyes to concentrate. "I get weak. Someone
else can show you the party. I had better rest." She sounded a bit
disappointed. Luckily the clothes she'd been wearing were made of a
stretchy fabric so that the two inches she'd grown only made it stretch
tighter. The shorts however which had come to just above her knees
now hit midthigh.

Sapphire didn't realize the transformation. He picked her up, easily. "Ok, if you tell me where it is, I'll take you there. You helped me earlier, so its the least I could do."

She blushed slightly, staring at him. "I do not want to trouble you!!"

"Not at all. You'd be doing me a favor actually. I don't know anyone besides
my brother and I'm not sure we're speaking just now. Besides, I'm
not used to parties because I rarely attended even the few ones we threw
on Nemesis. So I'd need your help to know how to behave." He said this
gently, a man to a child.

She colored slightly. "I'm afraid I do not know either. This would
be my first Crystal Tokyo Ball."

He laughed slightly at her expression. "Still, you sound as if you know
these people better than I do."

"I used to know them. In many ways they are strangers to me too." She
replied.

"Then all the more reason to stick together." He stopped before the
doors that led in to the Grand Ball Room. Inside he could see
colored lights flashing off a faceted ball as spotlights randomly
zipped through the pulsating crowd of people. In the center of the
room he could see the ones he knew as the Sailor Scouts, all dancing
in a group together. Their hands waived wildly, somewhat in tune to
the music (some with more grace than others), as they shook to the music.

"Never Give up...La la la la" The words jumped along with the rhythm as the door opened automatically, and he stepped in. He paused looking
at the scene feeling vaguely disoriented at first.

"Perhaps you should put me down?" She suggested. "I think I could
stand now."

He gently set her down, surprised to see that she was taller than he'd
thought. In fact, in the shadowy lights of the dancing area he thought
she seemed older than he'd estimated. A few years older, perhaps,
around 13, not 8. His eyes scanned her body, noting that she had
a shape that hinted at a woman, unlike the neutral shape of a child.

He frowned at the theme of his thoughts, wondering what had
gotten into him.

"So what do people do?" He asked.

She smiled. "I remember a few parties from--" She paused and then
chose a word. "Before. Usually, they dance in a group or sometimes
with one person, or circulate and talk to others."

"So who are all these people?" His head glanced from one end of the room
to the other.

"I am guessing they are the people who live in Crystal Tokyo."

"I thought no one entered the palace except the Guardians?"

"You're here." She pointed out. "As a safety measure, that I think
is likely true. On occasion though, Queen Serenity prefers to have
that rule lifted. She feels to do otherwise would insult the populace.
And Mercury confirmed that exposure to the heart of the Crystal Tokyo
would not affect anyone in the space of a few hours. "

His face paled. "Exposure to the heart of Crystal Tokyo?"

Her eyes widened as she realized that perhaps no one had told him.
She had only been here a week, but Mercury had summarized their
entire known history for her in that time. What Mercury had not said,
Hotaru's precocious knowledge simply supplied. One of the facts about
life in the Crystal City had been the effects of living inside the
palace and the zero growth effect. Simply put, the Sailors and the
Guardians did not age, because the energy of the palace altered their
genetic structures. This information, she'd been told, they kept
secret from the general population. They couldn't hide that they didn't
age, they just hid why exactly that occurred.

"How long exactly have you been here? Why do you know these things and
I don't?" He asked.

"Before I was reborn, I was Sailor Saturn and for that reason, they revealed
things they reveal only to guardians even though I am not one."
She said. "I've only been here a week or two really." She'd actually
only been alive a week. Somehow she decided not to mention that
as again, that strange precocious knowledge hit her.

He backed away from her. "You didn't tell me you were a guardian."
He looked suddenly angry. "You're one of them!" He felt as if he'd been
betrayed, thinking he'd found someone he could relate to, only to
have her turn into--he paused. Not the enemy, but certainly not
someone on his side of the line he felt existed.

"I'm not. As I said, I was Sailor Saturn in a previous life." She
shivered. "If you would rather not talk to me, I can manage on my own.
I'm not that weak."

He frowned and disappeared into the night. He stumbled halfway across
the garden. Looking down, he realized it was another comic book like the
one she'd been reading. TO his surprise, her face seemed to be on the
cover--or enough like her that it had to be her.
He frowned as he read through the events of her battle as Saturn. What
she'd experienced being possessed like that, and hen, the awful capturing
by Galaxia. His own battle seemed so small and insignificant compared to
that.

A noise made him look up. "Sapphire?" Hotaru said. He stared
at her, his eyes inadvertently trailing up her rather long legs
clad only in the skin-tight black fabric of her body-suit. Had
she been wearing that before? The shorts she'd had on now seemed
to be barely covering any of her legs, and the fabric which
had been dark and opaque before now seemed more like a fine mesh
of black that just barely provided decency. She appeared to
be carrying the shoe's she'd been wearing in one hand.

She blushed as she saw him reading about her.

"You?" He said softly.

She nodded as she fell again. This time, there was no mistaking
the change happening to her. Suddenly, she seemed to grow again,
the fabric of her shorts ripping slightly as she rapidly unhooked
the fastenings. The body suit she wore now seemed to be too
short, not reaching all the way to her ankles or her wrists.
And what it did cover it seemed as much cover as a shadow.

He colored and looked away, as he removed his jacket and
without looking handed it to her.

"Thank you." She said. He turned around as she stood clad only in
his jacket, which came to her thighs and hung off her arms.

He stared at the beautiful young woman in front of him. Minutes before,
she'd been a little girl, he thought. A little girl so fascinating
he'd wished she'd been older--but now that it happened, he rapidly
found himself wishing she were not. The change startled him too much.

"What's going on?" He said.

She shook her head. The motion sent her hair, which now reached
halfway down her back, flying around her face.. "I don't know...but I'm scared. Everytime I appear, and grow, it is because something bad
is going to happen. My form responds to the dangers...and I've never grown
this old before, on my own."