Evil Anonymous. Rei's story

[Ebiris]

It's not very impressive, is my first thought upon entering the meeting
room at the Civic Hall.  A thinning grey carpet covers the floor, while
the peeling eggshell painted walls are covered in various posters
encouraging a healthy lifestyle and advertising drug addiction
hotlines...

No, not very impressive at all. I can see most of the group is already
here, though, if the circle of occupied chairs is any indication.
They're those crappy blue plastic chairs that public buildings like this
seem to have in abundance. I've never seen them anywhere else, at least.

The people, though... they look like another story.

The guy with his back to me, he doesn't look too big, but unless that
blue bodysuit has padding, he's probably the most muscled person I've
ever seen. I suspect the extraordinarily spikey hair is some sort of
overcompensation for his short stature, though.

Funnily enough, both the seats next to him are vacant... I turn to my
companion, and see he is uneasily looking at the remaining two empty
seats, and doesn't seem all that enthused about sitting there.
Shrugging, I dismiss it and go take the seat on the muscled guy's left.

Opposite me, I can see a young woman smiling earnestly at me. She's
different from the rest of us, I can tell that right away. She has a
sort of boundless optimism and cheerfulness... kinda reminds me of Usagi
in her better moments, which are becoming more common. Aside from the
odd markings on her face, she looks rather unremarkable, but my
spiritual senses can definitely tell she's someone special.

"Well, it looks like we have a new arrival today!" she says cheerfully,
as if my being here is somehow a good thing. I dunno, I suppose I'm
better here than out there destroying Tokyo... "Now," she continues,
"Why don't we all introduce ourselves to our new friend? I'll start."
Standing, she points at herself, as if I didn't know who she was
referring to, "My name is Belldandy, and I'm the coordinator of this
group," she smiles to the person on her left, indicating them to
introduce themselves.

Not bothering to stand up, the girl in that seat waves lazily to me.
"Yo, name's Ryoko," she drawls. Looking at her, I am vaguely unsettled
by those slitted yellow eyes... they remind me a little of what my eyes
were like earlier...

The girl sitting on my left is next, and she copies Belldandy's
mannerisms and posture exactly as she says, "My name is Ifurita." She
seems nice enough, although despite her imitation, I get the impression
she is a lot more distant than Belldandy.

The guy on my right growls out in a low voice even before Ifurita sits
down, "You may address me as Vegeta, Prince of all Saiyajin, puny
human!" Funnily enough, he doesn't bother to stand or even look at me.
Everyone else looks vaguely uncomfortable, but no one comments. I just
shrug it off. He can be the Grand Punjab of Timbuktoo for all I care.

"Hi, I'm Mamoru," the person I entered with waves uneasily at me.

And the last person is a young woman in a scandalously tight bodysuit
with an eye popping display of cleavage. It's kind of distracting,
really... "Hi there, I'm Nancy," she says cheerfully enough.

Everyone is looking at me expectantly as Belldandy speaks. "Well, now
that you know about all of us, why don't you tell us about yourself?"
she encourages me gently.

I take a deep breath. This is it, the reason I came here, after all. I
stand up, taking the time to meet the eyes of everyone here before I
begin. "My name is Rei, and I was possessed by an ancient evil goddess
of unimaginable power."

There is a muted smattering of, "Hi Rei," coming from the others before
Belldandy speaks. "Why don't you tell us about that?" she asks.

"Well... it happened fairly recently, and it really turned my life
upside down," I say, fingering a strand of my bone white hair, "I've
been having a lot of trouble dealing with it, and Mamoru-san," I gesture
over to the college student, "told me about this group, and how it has
helped him, so I figured I should come along."

"Come on, girl," Ryoko says roughly, "Give us details!"

"Ryoko-san!" Belldandy shushes the girl, sounding slightly miffed,
before smiling genially at me, "Take your time, Rei-san. We all
understand how difficult things like this can be. Why don't you start at
the beginning?"

The beginning? That's a tough one. Do I tell them about that Silver
Millenium thing the cats keep talking about? I think I recalled a memory
or two from there when I was on the Moon, but it could have been
Metallia-sama - DAMMIT! Metallia, *just* Metallia. Ugh, I hate how I
still sometimes call her that in my head, thank god I was able to catch
myself before saying aloud around the other girls... Anyway, those
memories could have been Metallia playing tricks on me... Probably best
to stick with this life.

"Okay, well, to start with... I'm Sailor Mars."

No shocked gasps greet this statement. Everyone is still patiently
paying attention, waiting for me to tell them at my own pace. Well,
except Vegeta, I think he's trying to get to sleep...

"Yeah... I'm one of the sailor suited girls who fight for love and
justice and protect the peace. Anyway, I've been Sailor Mars for a few
months, ever since I met Usagi and Ami. I'm good friends with all the
other Sailor Senshi, really, they're the best friends I could ever ask
for. Without the support they've given me, I don't know if I could have
gotten through the past few days..."

"Just friends?" Ryoko interrupts, "don't you have a boyfriend or someone
to help you? I don't know how I'd survive without my Tenchi..."

"Ryoko-san!" Belldandy again chastises her.

I blush, pushing my index fingers against each other, "Well... there is
someone... special..." Damn, how did we get on this topic?!

Ryoko nods approvingly, "Well, tell us about him, then."

"We're not here to gossip about her love life, Ryoko," Ifurita says
calmly to the feline-like girl.

Ryoko just shrugs, unapologetically.

"Uh... actually... it's a 'she'," I say in a small voice.

"Oh ho!" Ryoko chortles, "It's like that, is it?" she leans back in her
chair, seeming extraordinarily smug for some reason.

"Just ignore her, Rei-san," Nancy says, shooting a glare at Ryoko, "It's
a perfectly valid lifestyle choice." I can't help but notice with the
way she's leaning forward, her breasts could pop right out of her outfit
at any moment...

I close my eyes and count to ten, trying to find some focus. "Anyway,
yes, Minako has been very supportive and understanding about the whole
thing..." Even though I'm still freaked out by how she was willing to
kill all those people for me... "But, I should be telling you about what
happened to get me in this situation to begin with."

I think I've lost what I was talking about... where was I, anyway? Oh,
yeah. I'm Sailor Mars. "Right, I'm Sailor Mars, and I've been helping
the other senshi defend Tokyo from the Dark Kingdom for the past few
months. It was pretty simple, really. We'd just fight a youma every
couple of days, and if things got too tough, Tuxedo Kamen," I gesture
towards Mamoru again, who waves shyly in response, "Would show up and
give us some help. But lately things have gotten much more serious. We
found out that Usagi was the Princess we were searching for, but then
Mamoru-san got kidnapped and brainwashed to fight against us."

Mamoru just laughs nervously and scratches behind his head, but everyone
else seems to ignore him. It's odd how he seems to be lacking in that
dramatic presence he used to be so famous for...

"Well, he gave us a bit of trouble, but we fixed him quickly enough,
though he didn't help us much after that. Kept complaining about his
broken hand..."

"Hey! I was incapacitated, really!" Mamoru protests, and I really can't
help but glare at him for that. Come on! I've healed way worse injuries
in far less time than he spent lazing around the temple, constantly
asking to get some juice or have his pillow fluffed... it really did
shatter the illusions I held about Tuxedo Kamen...

Coughing delicately, I speak up in the 'too sweet' voice I like to use
when I'm pissed but don't want to broadcast it. "Yes, when we rescued
Mamoru-san, I got slashed across my side," I indicate the area on my
left torso, "by an energy blade that cut about two inches into my flesh.
A few days later I was back fighting youma while he stayed laid up in
bed for a week."

"My hand was broken!" Mamoru insists petulantly. Geez, what a wimp.

"Yeah, whatever," I reply, massaging my forehead. "So, when we purified
Mamoru-san, Beryl - she's the main lackey of the evil goddess I
mentioned earlier - tried to teleport him away, but I stopped that. The
next youma attack a few days later had four of them arrive at my home,
and they seemed focused mainly on killing me. We'd never faced that many
youma, but we did really well, actually. In retrospect, I suppose that
was bad, since I got really cocky afterwards..."

"Are we going to get to the part where you became evil any time soon?"
Vegeta's growling voice intrudes on my monologue. It's odd how someone
can speak in such a low pitch, yet still be so obviously whining.

"Hey, no one interrupted YOU, Vegeta!" Surprisingly enough, it is Ryoko
that comes to my defence.

Vegeta mumbles something about, "A grand tale... millions dead... huge
explosions... Prince of all Saiyajin..." I don't really get all of it,
but I guess he thinks his story is better than mine.

Like I care. Giving Ryoko a grateful smile, I resume my story.

"Anyway, Usagi put up a shield to protect Tokyo, and we found out where
the Dark Kingdom was based, so we started to plan our attack. But before
we could carry it out, they broke down the shield and attacked in force.
There was a portal disgorging loads of youma directly into Tokyo, and a
lot of people had already died..." I feel a little bile rise in my
throat. I had promised both Usagi and Minako that I wouldn't let anyone
die, and that was where I broke it. But compared to what came later...

"Are you alright, Rei-san? Do you want a glass of water?" Belldandy's
soothing voice breaks my reverie.

I shake my head. "No, I was just thinking of the promise I made... It
doesn't matter now..." Not really. If that was breaking the promise,
what I did later was pissing all over it. "Well, we killed a few youma
before reaching the portal, and we could see all the youma arriving
through it. I knew we didn't have much time, so I formed a fireburst
over the youma to distract them before I tried to seal the portal
closed. I..." For some reason I can't look at anyone right now, though I
can see my hands are making a mess of wringing my neatly pressed skirt,
"I blew it. Really badly."

Man... bad doesn't begin to cover it, really... I had felt how strong
and evil she was earlier in the day, before the attack, but for some
reason I still thought I could handle it. Idiot. "I knew Usagi could
have sealed it with her Crystal far more easily than I ever could," I
say, although it's more like I'm talking to myself than telling the
others, "But I didn't want her to risk it. *I'm* supposed to protect
*her* dammit! But... but I was too weak. I would have said Metallia was
too powerful, but since we did beat her in the end, it's obvious that I
was too weak..." I trail off in disgust with myself, mussing my hair as
I rub my head to relieve some of the stress this talk is giving me.

"What was it like?" Ifurita asks after I'm silent for too long. She
sounds dispassionately curious, I guess my story is interesting, but not
enough to personally involve her...

"It was like... an infinite darkness..." Yeah, whatever that means... I
don't think I'll ever find words to really describe what I went through,
"I was just trying to seal the portal, but I got Metallia's attention,
and she... she came into my mind... There were a lot of strange and
frightening images there, and I got knocked out pretty quickly. But
after that... we were linked.

"I woke up later on that day. Usagi had sealed the portal after all,
though it put a lot of stress on her, at least she never got affected
like I did. I... I knew something was wrong with me right away, all my
spiritual abilities were out of whack, but, I refused to accept there
could actually be something really wrong. I just wrote it off as stress,
or Metallia playing tricks on me," I sigh, "Maybe if I'd told the others
what was going on, we could have avoided what happened. But I was too
proud...

"We knew there wasn't much time left, so the next day after Usagi had
recovered, we immediately teleported to the Dark Kingdom. I was feeling
uneasy the whole time, but when we arrived on the Moon, that's were it
really went to hell..." Funny, looks like everyone, even Vegeta, is
paying pretty close attention. Guess I can tell a good story...

"Well, pretty much as soon as we arrived, Metallia got right inside my
head..." I shiver at the memory, "It was awful, but... I was able to
shake her off, somehow. Maybe she wasn't trying seriously right then. My
abilities were still off, and I know I was acting paranoid and strange,
but none of the other girls really made a big deal of it. I suppose they
were trying to be understanding and supportive, but it probably would
have been best if they'd just hogtied me the minute I started acting
weird..." Of course, if I asked them, Usagi would probably think I was
trying to get her involved in some kinky lesbian sex game... and I'm
kinda worried about how Minako would react...

"The whole thing was horrible, but I kept forcing myself forward,
thinking I could resist them no matter what they tried. But when
Metallia finally got serious, I never stood a chance. She snatched me
away with no effort, and then..." Dammit, why do I have to cry at a time
like this! I furiously dash away at my tears, I'm not a weakling, I must
be strong!

"Then?" Ryoko prods gently, showing none of the brashness she had
earlier. I don't want sympathy!

"Then she broke me," I say simply. I don't think I'll ever be able to
tell anyone about what I did in that dreamscape... It would be easy to
just lay the blame at Metallia and say she made me, but I remember it so
vividly. I remember how *satisfied* I felt after killing my two best
friends... my girlfriend... I never want to feel that again, but the
memory is always there. Every time I see Usagi, I see myself tearing
into her already violated body with savage glee. Every time I see
Minako, I see her proclaiming that she really loves Usagi, before I give
her the same fate. And grandpa... Oh, god... I know my real grandfather
would *never* act like he did in that vision... but I can't help feeling
uneasy around him.

I swallow, trying to lubricate my suddenly dry throat so I can continue.
"She made me swear loyalty to her, then sent me to destroy the Shrine I
grew up in. By then, I was only too happy to do anything she asked. When
I arrived at the shrine, Mamoru-san was there, and he tried to stop me.
He didn't do a very good job, though. I knocked him out really quickly,
then took him back to Metallia as the Shrine started to burn around
me...

"Then Metallia just cut me loose, sending me to do as much damage to
Tokyo as I liked, while her youma gathered energy. I was like a demon...
I remember taking such joy in the destruction I wrought..." I hold up my
hands, and tiny flames appear in them, "I know how dangerous fire is,
but... I never thought my powers could cause such total devastation. The
police tried to stop me, but they never stood a chance..."

Looking around, I can see thoughtful expressions on everyone else's
faces. No doubt they can all relate to what I'm saying. It's why we all
came here, after all. "Then Minako called me on my communicator. As soon
as I saw her face, I felt hatred rise up inside me. I wanted to kill
her, so I told her where she could meet me...

"She came to our school, which I had already destroyed while waiting for
her. I attacked her... but she refused to fight back, which threw me
off... Metallia kept telling me to kill her, but she kept saying she
loved me... I felt like I was being torn apart by the conflicting
desires inside of me. Usagi appeared as well, and tried to reason with
me, but I was half mad. She used the Crystal to drive Metallia out of my
head, and that's when everything came crashing down around me.

"I couldn't even remember how many people I killed... there were so
many. I had become the same monster we had sworn to defend the world
against. Worse, really... I had done far more damage by myself than the
rest of the Dark Kingdom combined by then. I just wanted to die, since I
knew I didn't deserve to live."

I can't help but chuckle, albeit a little bitterly, at the memory of
Minako and Usagi trying to convince me it was okay... And there was my
first real kiss with Minako as well... "My friends wouldn't accept that,
though. They were quite vehement about it not being my fault... I can't
really believe them, but it's nice that they care...

"Anyway, after that, we fought Metallia, and won. And... somehow,
everything had been put back to normal. All the things I destroyed, even
all the people I killed... I was kind of in a state of euphoria then,
but it's worn off..." I sigh, "Even if no one else does, I can still
remember what I did..."

"Heh, it's odd... but I actually feel kinda better for getting all that
off my chest..." I say, managing a weak but genuine smile.

"Rei-chan!"

Huh? Usagi?!

"Rei-chan!"

The meeting room seems to dissolve around me, and all of a sudden I'm
blinking and rubbing my eyes back at the Shrine...

"Rei-chan, about time you woke up. Honestly, sleeping in the middle of a
study session," Usagi smirks at me, no doubt glad to be the one giving
the lecture for once.

I just look at her blearily as I try to make sense of that weird dream,
prompting her expression to become more concerned. "Are you alright,
Rei-chan?"

I look at her concerned face, then at Minako next to her, giving me a
warm look filled with love. Makoto walks in with a plate of cookies, and
Ami distractedly snatches one as she concentrates intently on her math
book. Herb is reading Sun Tzu's Art of War while idly petting Nian.
These are my friends, and I know I can depend on them. I have to make
sure they can depend on me.

"Y'know what, Usagi," I smile at her, "I think I will be."

[Anastasia]

Okay, getting past my low grade bitchy fit at seeing a mega crossover...

Heh. I enjoyed reading this, and it showed how Rei is trying to get over what happened to her, down to dealing with Metallia...sama.