Another creepily weird short fanfic by me…oh well, I’m just plain crazy, everyone who’s ever met me knows that!

So what’s this one about? It’s a little thing I made up about Jadeite, and gave his death an odd twist. I had fun doing it, though, and that’s what matters, right? It goes through the episodes from the end of Rei’s first episode, to the last one in which Jadeite graced us with his presence.

Sailor Moon is the property of Naoko Takeuchi, the lyrics of ‘Quiet’ were written by Billy Corgan, and the quote below is from the New International Version of the Bible.

________________________________________________________________________

It had been one of those days. You know the type – go out, try to instigate a plan in the booming and highly lucrative field of religious fanaticism, then get busted by two – no, sorry, make that three now – teenage girls running around in short mini-skirts.

A bit of humiliation never hurt anybody.

But then again, Beryl was very good at hurting people. And given it was to her that Jadeite had now to answer, moving to Mexico was beginning to look like a good life-insurance measure.

As Jadeite stared through the gate at Tokyo, he grimaced. Beryl was not going to be happy. Okay, rephrase that. Beryl was never happy. Beryl was just going to be more pissed off than was normal.

He felt a presence beside him, and he sighed. He knew who the strange youma-woman was – she never seemed to leave him alone.

"What is it, Tetis?" he asked with a touch of impatience. She smiled slowly.

"I was hoping I could…spend some quality time with you later on this evening."

Jadeite rolled his sapphire eyes. This was not a particularly unusual proposition. "I’m sorry, Tetis. I’m afraid I’m going to the kitchen now to hack off my head with a big knife."

He left in a rather irate mood, and teleported to his own quarters. Once there, he wandered into his laboratory, and he smiled as he inhaled the lovely smell of undiluted hydrochloric acid. He just loved this – when he had been human, he had had to be so careful with his chemicals and the like. But not now he was a semi-immortal being, thanks to the bitch-queen from Hell, he never had to worry about mundane little details like what would happen is he was standing too near the equipment when mixing caesium and water.

After he pulled out one of his journals from the packed bookshelves, he threw himself down in his favourite, worn armchair. He conjured a pencil from thin air, and began to write furiously about his hypothesis on his latest experiment. He also used the opportunity to bitch about the Sailor Senshi – three of the little jerks now! Unbelievable!

At least in here it was quiet. No annoying youma, none of Zoisite’s obnoxious mood swings, the la-de-dah of Nephrite’s stupid stars, and thankfully, none of Kunzite’s sedating-type lectures. Jadeite didn’t give a damn if he was the eldest and most wise of the four kings – he could still put a room of insomniacs under in less than five minutes of one of his lessons.

Enjoying the solitude, Jadeite closed his eyes, and leaned back in his chair.

He wondered what that soft music in the chambers near his was. He thought about the origin of the sound, and realised it must be from Zoisite’s rooms. The plucking of the guitar strings was really beginning to bug him – he really wished someone hadn’t given Zoisite that Earthen stereo system.

Then it hit – a huge amount of racket pounded through the walls as additional guitars, drums and heavy bass hit in. Jadeite winced, and wished he could get his hands on the person who had let him have that accursed machination. Probably the young man’s so-called teacher.

He managed to cope with it for a grand total of two more minutes, before he slammed down the pen and stormed over to Zoisite’s entryway. He pounded on the ornate wooden doorway for an additional minute, before Zoisite opened the door with a lazy smile. "All right, all right, you don’t have to knock down the door, you know."

Jadeite shuddered at the sight of the young upstart – he was beautiful, but completely sadistic. His gaze alone was enough to set someone on edge. He had probably learnt the technique from Kunzite – along with many other little tricks. "Could you turn that damn music down?!" he shouted, and Zoisite winced at the note of angry hysteria.

"What was that? I can’t hear you, I think my music’s too loud." He was goading him – Jadeite could see damn well that Zoisite could hear every word. Zoisite smiled in that oddly friendly way he had, and looked behind him. With a mental impulse, the music decreased in volume, and Zoisite stepped backwards inside, indicating the inside with a sweep of an elegant hand. "You look worn out. Haven’t you been sleeping well? Why don’t you come in, rest your weary feet."

Jadeite felt uneasy at this hospitable behaviour on the part of his lesser comrade. "Why?"

Zoisite lounged against the doorway. "Why indeed? Don’t you like me, Jadeite?"

He snorted. "Let’s just say your reputation precedes you, Zoi-kun dear. I’m afraid I must decline whatever offer you just made me."

The verdant eyes darkened slightly. "Excuse me? What’s that supposed to mean?"

Jadeite quirked a crooked smile in his direction. "I think you know – surely you’re not that thick."

Surprisingly, Zoisite did not instantly lose his slender grip on his temper. "So glad you’ve noticed it."

He felt slightly uneasy as he regarded Zoisite. He was sleepy, and his head was aching, yet he decided he might as well take up Zoisite’s offer. If he didn’t, he knew Zoisite would just turn up his stereo again, and he wouldn’t get an iota of sleep.

Zoisite let him into to the outer rooms of his chambers, the darkly decorated rooms dim in the gloomy light of the Dark Kingdom. "So nice of you to drop in, Jadeite-sama." He indicated the table in the next room, a huge oak construction capable of seating six. Jadeite took a seat, and Zoisite tossed him a glass, pouring him a glass of what was probably Nephrite’s favourite wine. He sat in the chair, and smiled oddly at him.

Jadeite sighed. "Zoisite, may I be so bold as to ask you a rather indelicate question?"

The younger, effeminate man smiled over the rim of his glass. "So suspicious, little Jadeite…what’s weird about two kings sharing polite banter over a glass of another king’s wine?"

"You saw right through me," muttered Jadeite, more to himself than the man with the coppery-blonde tresses. "Look, Zoi-kun, it was real nice seeing you, but I only came here to tell you to turn off your stereo – I can hear every note through the walls, and frankly, I don’t want to hear it."

Zoisite seemed to be chewing on something, and when Jadeite looked closer, he saw what suspiciously looked like gummy worms. "How did you get those?"

The young man looked at the bag that appeared in his hand, and smiled lightly. "From Earth – surely you know that the Moon markets have been out of commission for oh…about a thousand years."

"I noticed," he replied dryly. "It’s you who tends to miss the simplest of things, you know."

Zoisite’s eyes narrowed, but his smile never left his face. "I must plead guilty as charged."

Jadeite almost spit out his wine, he was so startled to hear the vindictive little king admit a weakness. "Am I hearing things?"

Zoisite laughed – there was a definite edge to the sound. "It’s just that admitting a weakness to a man who gets trounced by a bunch of little girls is hardly ground-breaking – wouldn’t you agree, Jadeite-sama?" There was a degree of mocking in the way he carelessly used the honorific – Jadeite knew that is was rare for Zoisite to use the term ‘sama’ in reference to anyone besides Beryl and Kunzite, no matter how far above him they ranked.

He shook his head. "Zoisite, don’t get involved in things you know nothing about."

"On the contrary, Jadeite, I hear much of your…progress," he seemed to trip over the last word purposely, and Jadeite felt anger build up in himself. He had to wonder why Zoisite had directed his not inconsiderable skills in annoyance from Nephrite to him.

"From your beloved, ahem, ‘sensei,’ no doubt," replied Jadeite evenly. "Though he seems to be teaching you a lot of things that are, shall we say, out of the curriculum?"

Zoisite smiled. "Why, did you want me to teach you some of his tricks?"

Jadeite shuddered inwardly at the thought. "No, I’ve already been taught them."

The younger man’s head snapped up, his verdant eyes narrowing to malicious slits. "Excuse me?!"

He almost laughed out loud at the fierce indignation on the younger man’s face. He almost regretted winding him up, but now that it had begun, he wasn’t going to be the one who backed down. "Relax, dear heart…the last person I would like to get involved with would be your beloved Kunzaito-sama – you can have him."

Zoisite pursed his lips with malicious precision. "What, is he not good enough for you, Jadeite?"

"I never said that."

"You implied it."

"You’ve been reading the dictionary?"

The verdant eyes flashed emerald fire. "Yes, I can read."

"Fancy that. And here I was, thinking you were illiterate…"

Surprisingly, Zoisite had not blown up, despite his warning comments to the contrary. "And what gave you that idea?" he asked softly, his eyes holding a definite warning.

"Surely you know – the code of conduct. If you could read it, you would see it clearly states no teacher is to become ‘involved’ with a lower ranking student…now, why does that seem to fit you so well?"

"Beryl doesn’t give a damn," replied Zoisite haughtily, and Jadeite snorted.

"Yeah, probably because she gets it from Kunzite anyway."

He heard the sharp intake of breath from his vis-à-vis, and instantly wished he could reach out and take the words back. This did not bode well for either of them.

Trembling violently with withheld anger, the young man hurriedly stood, the chair falling over backwards in his haste. "You take that back," he hissed venomously, for all the world sounding like a cobra about to strike.

Jadeite shrugged, outwardly cruelly confident, inwardly uneasy. "First you give me the CD."

Zoisite’s anger dissolved into complete bafflement. "What?!"

He had to laugh. "Yeah, all this over a stupid CD." With a flick of his wrist, he telekinetically took the CD, and turned towards the door. "Oh yeah, and Zoisite?"

The man gave him a look of pure malice. "What?"
Grinning, he hurriedly stepped outside and slammed the door. "I hear Kunzite enjoys his ‘private conferences’ with our beloved queen!"

It was a good thing he closed the door. Zoisite’s pretty little head had just made Jadeite into a potential pin cushion for his nasty ice crystals.

As he returned home, Jadeite threw the CD against the wall, suitably pissed off. Zoisite was someone to be treated with kid gloves at the best of times – he should have known better than to get the delicate man riled. His obnoxious temper was legendary in the gloomy Kingdom…and he knew he had been pushing his luck. Zoisite rarely managed to contain his temper that long.

He sighed, throwing himself into his chair. He picked up the CD he had taken off Zoisite – though he had no doubt Zoisite would be able to obtain a new copy with little difficulty. He thought a second on destroying the thing with a psychic energy blast, but…

He looked at it, and sighed. He had a portable CD player lying around, amongst his junk that littered every available surface of his chambers. He stood, and walked into the storage room. After about ten minutes of foraging, he found the device. He snapped the CD in it, and for some reason, hit the random button. The chords of a song rang out into the room, the distinctive sound of alternative rock. It wasn’t the same song Zoisite had been tormenting him with, but it was bad enough.

He looked up and blinked when he heard the words.

That was…what? A reflection of his own life? Jadeite shook his head in mild amusement at his own strangeness. There was nothing unusual about the song…just coincidence.

"be ashamed of the mess you made my eyes never forget to see behind me"

"Don’t be stupid," he muttered to himself. "It’s just some pathetic mortal song written by some screwed up human with too much time on his hands."

He reached over and snapped it off. It was giving him a headache.

________________________________________________________________________

Failure. Again. A stupid amusement park…a stupid plan, admittedly, but…

Three bloody Senshi. Three very effective roadblocks…and a swift punishment from Beryl for his trouble.

It hadn’t been as bad as he first thought it would be. He was still alive, though the worth of that was still under debate.

Jadeite sighed, and looked around the room with weary eyes. All he wanted to do now was sleep…a little sleep was all he needed.

He couldn’t be bothered getting undressed. Chances were that Beryl would want to see him in a few hours, anyway. So he simply laid his head on the silken pillow, and closed his eyes.

"NEPHRITE!"

His eyes snapped open at the shriek from the corridor beyond his chambers, and he sighed. The voice was easily recognisable as Zoisite’s distinctive tenor. He cursed roundly under his breath, wondering what crisis had just erupted. Things were strained between those two kings at present – simple immature games, from what he could tell. Nephrite was having fun in the earth realm, looking for the strange ‘ginzuishou,’ while it was technically Zoisite’s job. From the sounds of things, Zoisite didn’t appreciate the gesture one little bit.

Jadeite shuddered at the thought of crossing the vindictive, beautiful man. Zoisite’s temper was only occasionally life-threatening, but he had friends in high places. One in particular.

He closed his eyes and tried to ignore Zoisite’s yelled obscenities, and the low murmuring from Nephrite in reply. It was at times like this he really wished Beryl had let him install that Jib Housing noise control insulation. This free in-house entertainment was not exactly his idea of a good time.

The argument, thankfully, seemed to be winding down. He was just glad that Kunzite hadn’t decided to put in an appearance – to descend from yon high to mingle with the commoners. He wondered what Kunzite’s problem was, anyway. He was as cold as ice, restrained and aloof. According to him, he was so far above the rest of them, they weren’t even worthy of even a few seconds of his time.

Except Zoisite – well, if he was to believe the rumours whispered about Beryl’s palace, and what Zoisite himself had implied. He would have thought Kunzite would have better taste, but…

Each man to his own, he thought, and winced at the dull thump the other side of the wall. Obviously, things had reached a head out there – and from the sound of it, some poor youma had bit the blast of Nephrite’s foul temper. Those stars were distinctive.

Then he heard the return of Zoisite, obviously still annoyed about the something or other that they had been arguing about earlier.

Jadeite sighed, pulling the pillow over his head. He couldn’t understand why these jerks couldn’t have their arguments out of his earshot. He was obviously not going to get any real rest now.

________________________________________________________________________

Chalk up another one for the forces of evil – on the loser board, that was.

Okay, all things considered, a cruise ship was not exactly the crème de la crème of evil schemes…but as to how the damned Senshi had followed him there…it was incredible! Either they really did have a trace on him, or they were just phenomenally lucky.

He couldn’t cope with more of this. And obviously, neither could Beryl. She had just threatened him with eternal sleep if he didn’t come through for her and kill those damned Senshi.

He rubbed his eyes tiredly, trying to concentrate on the books lying open before him. It would help if he had had any sleep these past few weeks, he thought. But in between planning this and that, and dealing with the usual interruptions and cacophony all around him, he had no peace of mind, and no sleep.

"All I ask for is a decent night’s sleep…and a little bit of quiet," he muttered to himself. He rested his head on his arms, and-

A dull knocking caused his head to snap up. Someone was at his door.

Sighing heavily, Jadeite dragged himself to his feet, and went to answer the door. He instantly found himself face to face with the Lord almighty, Mr cool Kunzaito-sama himself.

"Lord Kunzite," he said dryly, looking at the man with barely disguised distaste. Kunzite stared at him stonily, his silvery-blue eyes as emotionless as ever. "What can I do for you?"

Kunzite continued to look at him, and said in his deep, silky voice, "I hear you’re having problems with your little mission to earth, Jadeite."

Jadeite rolled his eyes. "You know about that? Gods, you’re onto it today, Lord Kunzite. Your sources get better everyday."

The tall man with the platinum hair allowed a crooked smile to grace his otherwise frigid features. "I was thinking about offering you some advice there, my friend."

"The day I want your advice, I’ll ask for it," he snapped. Then something hit him. "What do you care, anyway?"

Kunzite looked down for a second, then turned his emotionless eyes on the younger man. "I don’t like to see Beryl destroy the lives of perfectly good kings," he said, and with that, he turned on his heel and left.

Jadeite watched him go, slightly unnerved. He knew that deep down, Kunzite must be able to feel something, otherwise he wouldn’t touch Zoisite with a ten foot pole. Getting entangled with someone as emotionally unstable as Zoisite meant he had to feel something for the strange man – otherwise, why would he bother? There were plenty of other things to sate his lust with.

Cursing, he realised that he should probably not waste his time with these stupid tactic books, and just go to Tokyo. Kunzite had done him a favour, by not letting him fall asleep.

But still, he could have used some peace. A little bit of silence…for just five minutes…

________________________________________________________________________

No bonfire tonight. Not that he had ever truly believed the Senshi wouldn’t rise to his challenge. Still, it would have been fun to reduce one really big city to a lot of tiny little ashes.

Now, though, he had failed just that little bit too often. It was a pity, really. He could have had some fun with the Senshi, now that he knew who they were. But Beryl had promised him eternal sleep.

He smiled inwardly at the irony of this "punishment." But he couldn’t let Beryl know.

So he called out in protest, looking suitable freaked out by the prospect of moving his residence to the frigid, silent regions of the ethereal plane of eternal sleep.

Jadeite allowed himself a small smile as he felt the fingers of cold magic filter into his prone form. He let his scream die away, looking suitably shocked and distressed at the indignity of turning into a titan’s token paperweight. But inside, he did not feel the way he told Beryl with his anguished cries.

This immense pain – it was sweeter than he would have previously believed. Because of what it promised him.

Finally, at last, Jadeite would get some peace and quiet.

What do you think, hmm? Wanna tell me what you think? Go ahead, you can reach me at luna_dreamscape@hotmail.com.