I keep mentioning her name -- and here she comes. This is what you get for messing with the protectorate of the Guardian of Time...

And it's still dedicated to Jill-chan, because it's about her beloved Dimando-sama, and that's just the way it goes sometimes. HIYA, COOKIE-CHAN!

________________________________________________________________________

The White Prince of Nemesis, Patriarch of the Black Moon Family, stood before the jakozuishou's building in the twentieth century, observing the scene unfolding before him. Or rather, he floated. The Senshi... they were protecting Saffir-otootochan?! Why would they do that, unless he was a part of them..?

He shook off his suspicions, hating himself for entertaining such thoughts. How could... how could he doubt his brother again, after going through so much to get here now, to be with him..?

As if he could sense his presence, Saffir suddenly looked up from his conversation with the two Senshi near him, the green and the red skirted pair...

Demando felt a jolt run through his entire being as his eyes met and locked with the dusky sapphire blue that belonged to his younger brother. The other half of himself.

He did not hear Saffir say it, but he saw his lips form the word that he said so often.

His heart tightened, but on the outside, his demeanour was cold, hard. Unforgiving. His outer shell was unyielding, just like the diamond for which Demando was named.

However, Demando must have been a flawed diamond -- for but a second later, he suddenly sank to the ground, and ran forward, throwing his arms about his younger brother.

Black Lady turned in shock, looking away from her little collection of Sailor Senshi under her domes. She gazed long and hard at Demando, her eyes narrowed in anger.

The Sailor Senshi themselves raised their pained eyes, looking to the scene before them. Sailor Moon almost smiled. From what had gone on, what with Black Lady attacking Saffir because of his 'betrayal,' the Senshi never would have expected Demando to greet his brother so lovingly.

ù Ç ™

Demando almost choked on his tears as he clutched the smaller man to his chest. He didn't understand why he was so grateful to be able to hold his little brother again, but there was something there, something peculiar.

The voice of his doppelganger rang through his clouded mind as he held Saffir to his chest, only just hearing the sobs coming from the blue-haired youth.

Saffir's arms finally stole about his brother's waist, as he continued to weep. Demando felt how wracked with sobs his brother's body was, and he felt his heart wind up painfully with regret and pity. Saffir -- he must have been so incredibly frightened, to be sobbing like a child here in his arms.

Even though he didn't know where that internal voice was coming from, he suspected that it was right. Saffir had obviously believed that something awful was going to happen to him, and he had come here with the terrible knowledge that he was, quite possibly, going to die.

Saffir pulled back slightly then, bringing Demando back to Earth with a bump. "Oniisan," he croaked.

Demando's violet eyes suddenly widened in abject horror as he realised what had happened. His anaemic-coloured hands moved up to his younger brother's ashen features, the bandage wrapped about his forehead. "Saffir-kun," he breathed, his voice barely above a whisper. "What happened to you..?"

He sighed, swallowed painfully as he looked with those wide, honest eyes into the violet of his older, much adored brother. "There was an... accident."

"An accident?" asked Demando suspiciously. Behind them, there was a shriek as Black Lady was hit by something. Then a loud voice rang clear across the street, heralding the arrival of the esteemed Tuxedo Kamen.

Ignoring all this, Saffir only had eyes for his oniisan. "Demando-oniisan, something terrible is happening here..."

His heart chilled as he saw more tears leak out of his brother's eyes -- there was just something indefinitely tragic about seeing a grown man cry. Even if Demando usually saw him as so much more younger and more fragile than himself anyway, he still found it particularly poignant to see Saffir weep.

Demando put a hand to his head, and pulled the blue-haired youth closer, almost cradling him against himself. "Saffir-otootochan, it's all right. I won't let anything happen to you... you're safe now..."

"Is... is Petz all right?" he asked, almost fearfully. His voice was slightly muffled, as he did not look up from where his face was buried "She looked after me, oniisan! I know you think she was a traitor, but she helped me and-"

The long hand of the shiro no oji suddenly began to stroke the ao no ojiâs head, a small smile playing at his thin lips. "It's all right, Saffir. I understand. I've spoken to Petz, and she asked me to protect you... and protect you I will."

"Why do you listen to that traitor?" hissed a voice from his side suddenly, and he turned to face the source of that voice. Saffir stiffened in his arms, but did not say a word.

"I hardly think this is any of your concern, Black Lady," replied Demando coldly, giving the pink-haired woman a polar glare.

She sneered at him with her next words. "Are you blind, Prince? You are harbouring a liar and a thief there, beneath your cape! He's just manipulating you, lying to you -- and you're too damned blind to see it!"

"We're all entitled to our own opinions," remarked Demando dryly, giving her another icy glare. "Now, I don't mean to sound like a dictator here, you must understand; but when I want your opinion, Black Lady, I'll give it to you."

Her lips tightened, and she frowned. "Prince Demando-sama, must you be so blind?"

"ChibiUsa-chan!" came the cry from behind her, and she rolled her eyes.

"Oh, not THIS again," she snorted. She turned back to the assorted Sailor Senshi, and instantly engaged them in battle.

Demando ignored this -- even though he was definitely fond of Sailor Moon, he knew he didn't have to worry about her. She was young, powerful, and here was someone who needed his help.

His face was still ashen, his breathing laborious. Demando's eyes widened in alarm as he realised this. "Saffir-otootochan?" he asked, almost on the verge of panicking.

His eyes were closed, his chest moving up and down in an irregular fashion. Demando frantically touched his cheek, his forehead, trying to determine if he were warm to the touch, or cold, or something...

The White Prince sank to the ground, cradling his brother carefully in his lap as he did so, panic obvious on his face. He almost wished the Senshi would come help him -- or even that baka moron, Tuxedo Kamen.

"Demando!" called a voice from behind them, and Saffir's eyes opened, almost in utter disbelief.

"That is...?" he whispered in an aggrieved tone, his eyes becoming deeply shadowed.

"Shush, otootochan," he said softly, smiling down at him softly -- and anyone who had met the White Prince of Nemesis could have sworn that it was not Demando that they were seeing. The sovereign was not well known for his caring and concerned nature.

Saffir shook his head in agitation, wincing as he did so. "That's Petz, isnât it?" he asked, distress easy to see in his dark, dusky eyes. "Demando-oniisan..?"

The Prince turned to look to the woman coming up behind them, and he felt his brother struggle beneath him. Demando's arms tightened around Saffir as he gave the woman a frown, intermingled with confusion. "Why are you here?"

Petz ignored the question, and moved to kneel beside the royal pair, her concern for Saffir only. She smiled faintly as she ran a finger down one cheek, and Saffir closed his eyes, seeming to find some solace in the woman's presence.

"He's very ill," Petz said softly, not taking her verdant gaze from the fallen prince. Demando started at the sound, realising that it was directed at him.

"He is..?"

Petz brushed a loose strand of hair from her eyes, almost sounding angry with her next words. "He was not fit to come here today, Demando -- you realise that? He risks his life for you, again and again." She sounded almost bitter as she added, almost as an afterthought, "I can't see why."

Maybe he would have resented that comment, if he hadn't been so worried about his brother. "What do you mean, again and again?"

Petz laughed -- though not with any real humour. It was a short, almost barking sound. "Oh, didn't you know? Your dear advisor, that fascist bastard Wiseman did this to your brother." She surveyed the damage once more, and laughed, this time sarcastically. "Nice guy, huh?"

Demando felt sick. The Wiseman hadn't told him that he had hurt Saffir... and especially not this badly! As Demando looked him over with rising nausea, he realised that he must have attacked Saffir with magic -- how unfair! Saffir was no mage; he had little interest in magic, of any kind. The Wiseman knew that, which must have been his reasoning behind launching such an offensive on the ao no oji.

Shaking his head, Demando tried to push back some of his anger -- he knew from personal experience that it clouded his judgement quite severely. Like the time a stray comment from his brother had caused the White Prince to turn on him viciously, scaring the Hell out of all three of those present in his audience chamber at the time. He, Esmeraude, and Saffir...

He couldn't understand where these thoughts were coming from -- but I could have told him.

ù Ç ™

Yes, I saw what had happened, from my own vantage point near Demando's personal UFO. I stood above the group, floating near the Nemesian starship, and I watched. I felt as if I were bonded in part to my past self -- but my paranoia was growing. I allowed myself to have a short laugh at my own expense, at my own paranoia. How on Nemesis had Saffir-kun lived like this? I couldn't stand the uneasy feeling of mistrust gnawing at my thoughts for even a few minutes; yet, Saffir must have spent his life with this apprehension.

But why did my paranoia grow unabated? Simply because I was still here. The agony of losing Saffir was still here. Surely, if the timelines had been altered, I should be gone, because if Saffir never died, then the mourning, half-crazed Demando should never have come about...

"The past, it's not changed yet," and my heart sank. I knew why; there was still one obstacle to be over come.

He had come the last time from out of the blue, from behind me. Still, I had seen him -- the Wiseman had been reflected in my brother's fearful gaze.

Where was he now? He hadn't waited this long the last time he had destroyed my brother. Why was he letting Demando entertain Saffir's so-called "lies"?

The whole absurdity of the situation was really beginning to frighten me; why was I still here?

ù Ç ™

Saffir reached with one of his trembling hands to take that of Petz, and she smiled down at him, tears shining briefly in her eyes. "Hey there, sunshine. What have I told you about over-exerting yourself?" He chuckled with a great deal of pain, and she shook her head. "Now, now Saffir-sama -- laughter isn't always the best medicine, you know."

Shaking his head again, he finally managed to choke out an garbled sentence. "Petz... you can't be... why are you... you're in danger..."

Demando absently stroked his brother's hair, looking upwards to see Black Lady struggling to hold off all five of the Senshi simultaneously -- but that was only due to the fact that Tuxedo Kamen would just not leave her alone. Then he looked to Petz. "Do your sisters know you're here?"

"No," she replied shortly, and then she sighed. "They wouldn't have let me come... and Saffir-sama was right, I shouldn't be here. I said I'd wait for him... but I just couldn't."

Saffir laughed again, before launching into a coughing fit, all over his brother. Demando rolled his eyes, and remarked kindly, "Brother, do you mind? When you cough, you're supposed to cover your mouth."

He nodded, and still, adoration for his brother shone in those dusky blue eyes. "Gomen nasai, oniisan... but Petz... it's so like her, not to listen to what someone tells her to do..." He laughed again, once again moving on into an uncontrollable coughing fit.

Rolling his eyes for the second time in less than a minute, Demando smiled benevolently at his sibling. His brow furrowed slightly as he realised that Saffir's eyes had fallen shut, and though his breathing was very soft, it was extremely laboured.

Petz looked up at Demando. "I think we need to get..." Her voice suddenly faded away as her slender hand shot upwards, to cover her mouth in horror.

"What is it, Petz?" he asked, irritated. The last thing he wanted was this woman getting all melodramatic on him. "Come on, spit it out," he demanded, eyes flashing with the beginnings of a severe temper tantrum.

With a shaking finger, Petz used the hand not covering her mouth to point at Demando's upper half. Annoyed, he looked downward. "I hardly think this is the time for you to debate my fashion sen-"

His own voice faded away as he noticed the fine spray of tiny red dots that coated his jacket. "N-nani..?" he gasped, smearing a finger through it as he did so. "Blood..?"

"It's Saffirâs -- he must have coughed it up on you a second ago," said Petz, her voice deadened and emotionless. "The Wiseman's attack... it must have traumatised his internal organs..."

Demando decided not to ask where she had gotten her medical knowledge from, and stood, picking Saffir up with ease. "Saffir-kun... wake up," he said softly, as he tried to make the stirring man stand on his two feet while still leaning against him. "Can you stand?"

"Why don't you just teleport him to a hospital or something?" Petz almost shouted, leaping to her feet. "Don't you realise? He's dying! He needs to be seen to now!"

Demandoâs next words were filled with scorn. "Petz, I would have expected better from you! Don't you realise that taking Saffir-kun through another magical displacement like that surely will kill him? The magic will disrupt his body functioning as his molecules are rearranged and transported to a different timespace... and it will kill him, given that he is barely hanging on as it is. We'll have to walk." He sniffed slightly, not able to ignore his aristocratic upbringing. "Rudra save me, if I'd ever thought I'd be reduced to such primitive means of transport."

"What are you talking about?" asked Petz in a shaking voice, wincing at the sound of an explosion from behind them. "Why can't we teleport?"

"The magic would be too much of a shock to his system, which is already devastated by the power of the jakozuishou...we can't afford to risk exposing him to such levels of negative energy again."

His voice was decisive, final -- and even though her heart begged her not to, Petz nodded. Yet she was too heartsick to speak.

"Come on, help me!" Demando said impatiently, balancing Saffir rather precariously on one side of himself. "Support his other side, and try to make him walk."

Petz moved to him, awkwardly putting his limp arm about him. "Can't you just carry him, Demando?"

"Where's the nearest hospital?" he asked, ignoring the comment. "Or the nearest phone -- that's what they used to communicate here, back in the twentieth century, right?"

Saffir opened his eyes for a moment, and suddenly began to gag slightly. Demando stopped instantly, looking to him with alarmed concern. "Saffir-otootochan..?"

He really began to cough then, and Petz winced at the sound -- it honestly seemed like he was hacking up his lungs or something.

"Oh, you three aren't leaving so soon, are you?" came a mocking voice, and to their surprise, Black Lady appeared before them, her cerise eyes narrowed and caustic. "Oh, you can't quit the party yet -- it's only just started."

Petz took a step backward, leaving Saffir completely under Demando's care. The White Prince tightened his grip on his brother, glaring at the woman. "Some party, Black Lady -- I don't think even Adolf Hitler would have found this fascist gathering very entertaining."

"Fascist? Really, Demando, that's not a very nice way to talk about your authoritarian style of leadership," came a voice that made Petz wince, Demando growl deep in his throat, and the half-conscious Saffir begin to shake, ever-so-slightly.

"Wiseman," said the Prince, his eyes narrowing. "I had been wondering when you would show up."

Funny. I had been wondering exactly the same thing myself.

The Wiseman smiled -- or at least, it sounded as if he were smiling. "Prince, I'm shocked. Are you harbouring this traitor?"

"He's my brother," Demando snapped, and the Wiseman laughed.

"He's a fool -- see, he even ran to his traitor paramour. Traitors are a weak, spineless bunch; they must stick together to gain that mystical 'safety in numbers.'" The Wiseman laughed again, and then, his voice hardened. "But there is no time to waste on such frivolities -- we must deal with the traitor. Weed the garden before it can come to seed, so to speak."

Demando shook his head, almost dazed. He then turned, and almost shoved Saffir at the woman, who practically fell over under his weight. "Hold on to Saffir for me, will you?"

Turning back to the Wiseman, he purposely stood between the floating advisor and the standing pair behind him. "What are you doing here?" he asked carefully, trying to sound unbiased. He knew from experience that the Wiseman, despite being lower than those he advised, had a discourteous habit of placing himself and his own opinions above that of his superiors.

The Wiseman's hands moved languidly over the crystal ball he was so very rarely without. "I have come to carry out your brother's sentence."

His lips tightened. "And who gave you permission to do such a thing?"

"I don't need permission to execute a traitor," snorted the counsellor, brushing off Demando's protest quite easily. "And isn't it wonderfully convenient that he has brought with him another fugitive?"

He heard Petz's intake of breath easily, but he didn't care for her safety. Or if he did, it was only out of his burgeoning love for Saffir. Demando instantly stepped back to his brother's side, taking the semiconscious prince into the safe circle of his arms again. "I won't allow you to do anything so unfair," he said coolly. "If you insist, my brother could be trialled -- but he is innocent until proven guilty."

The Wiseman's displeasure radiated in waves of invisible negative energy towards the three of them. "You are wrong to feel this way -- however, I doubt you will object to my carrying out her sentence," he remarked dryly. To the shock of everyone in the vicinity, family members and Senshi alike, he released a strong bolt of energy from the crystal ball.

It was from that point on that Demando's life seemed to move in slow motion.

Saffir's eyes snapped open as he heard the cry of his brother and his lover. Demando felt his struggles, yet was held spellbound by the power of the jakozuishou zooming towards one member of their pitiful group.

He couldn't honestly say later exactly what had happened. Saffir had pulled himself free from Demando's arms. He couldn't remember seeing him do it, but he must have thrown himself before Petz at that same moment.

For Saffir took the full intensity of the blow himself.

Even the Senshi had stopped warring with Black Lady to watch the unfolding drama, their mouths wide, eyes horrified.

Black Lady smiled.

I winced.

"And that surprises you, Demando?" came a voice from my side. I didn't turn to face the owner. I could recognise the voice without needing the face to confirm it.

"Somehow, Sailor Pluto, it doesn't surprise me," I replied softly, as Petz's scream echoed around the now silent street. The Wiseman, I supposed, was smirking underneath that hood of his. Certainly, it sounded as if he was as he turned to Black Lady to say "Come, Black Lady. Demando -- leave the traitor, and don't worry about that mistress of his. We have killed the source of the corruption in your court; now there is nothing to stop your dominance of this worthless planet."

I sighed. "I suppose that's it then, ne?"

The green-haired Senshi didn't answer me immediately. Instead, she chose to look over the scene in silence for a moment longer. "I suppose so."

I gave the garnet orb atop her time key a brief glance, then I turned back to the little melodrama laid out on that tiny stage beneath me. "So, what happens next?"

She didn't reply, so I turned to repeat my question.

I never did, however. For as silently as a shadow, Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Pluto had slipped away.

ù Ç ™

Disbelieving, Demando shook his head. "It's impossible! This is ridiculous!" His voice cracked as he went on, shaking with the shock of what had just happened to his own flesh and blood. "It can't be," he denied vehemently, though inside, his heart was tearing itself into tiny shreds, his guilty conscience working in every way to torture him. "He and I... we're blood, we are brothers... we can't be taken from one another! We are the last members of our Family!"

Petz's self-righteous anger was both touching and annoying ö she glared at the shiro no oji, her eyes wide and filled with tears. As she spoke, the dam holding them there finally broke free. "How can you just stare at him like that?! Can't you even cry for what youâve done to your own brother?" she demanded harshly, and her tears still fell. Her voice dropped as she looked to the ashen visage of the lifeless prince. She whispered in an tormented voice "Saffir..?"

Staring down at the silenced, yet oddly peaceful face of his otootochan, Demando sighed before suddenly turning those eyes upward, to look towards Petz with a pained expression on his face. "Shouldn't I try to be strong for him, even though he is gone...?" He bowed his head. "Is it not weak to cry?"

As Petz watched in her own grief, Demando cried. He held his brother to his chest like a child, his tears silent yet relentless as they coursed down his cheeks.

I wept with him.

______________________________________________________________________________________

Hokey-dokey... that's part two, with an epilogue to follow... and note: the song lyrics quoted here are from The Smashing Pumpkins' song entitled "The Beginning is the End is the Beginning." If you can, you should listen to it... personally, I love it, and it does seem to fit the story fairly well... :P