Fateful Day

Nova’s Tale – Part 1

It has been said that in everyone’s life some rain must fall. That maybe true for most people but lately it has seemed to be more of a monsoon season around here. You wouldn’t think that I wouldn’t have problems or any trouble being a member of the royal family but I daily look at the torrents of the flood in my life. In just six years of life, I have lived more than most people would live in a lifetime but sometimes I would have like to just be a little boy without a care in the world but that’s not that way things happen. I guess that I should be happy. Serenity is more mother than sister and Serena is more than my niece. I love them both with all my heart probably because they are the only people that accept me as myself. You see, I was born with powers and understanding beyond … well … beyond anyone that I have met but power, knowledge or even wealth is no cure for unhappiness or even a companion for those moments of solitude. Serenity calls me remorse every now and then but she always takes me in her arms and comforts me when I am feeling low. Serena is always there to play with me and try to take my mind off what I must do someday. You see; I’m a being brought forth by the universe to determine its fate or fates. At the present I serve Order but I have seen some turn their backs on their calling and decide to serve Chaos.

Unfortunately, one of those people happens to be my sister. No, not Serenity, she would never turn herself away from the light to embrace the darkness. The sister I’m talking about is one I never met. Her name was Beryl and she turned from the light about a month after the Negaverse killed my brother-in-law. I don’t think that even Serenity knew of the love that Beryl had in her heart for Haru or what his lost would do to her mind. Haru was a prince of the planet Uranus and, from his portraits, a fine example of a man that anyone could have known. I think that Serenity is trying to pattern me after him but I have my own agenda. He came from a small family, just his parents and a younger sister that I met when I was two. She was a beautiful young girl but with a certain trait of becoming a tomboy when she gained a few years. When I first saw her I knew that she would be a part of my life but it wasn’t until she left that I determined that she would be a part of the upcoming battle against evil. I guess one day I have to search for her again but something inside of me tells me just to bide my time and everything will work out in the normal course.

My thoughts are driven today by the idea of creating a force of true men and women that will give their very being for the side of good. I have the wealth to finance such a force but I think that if the spirit is not in their heart that they will flee at the first sight of the enemy. The Negaverse is a force beyond the imagination of the common person so what I need is uncommon people. The force has to wait because Serenity has me visiting the Earth. Serenity believes that the royal family must make its presence known on the planets that are ruled by the Silver Kingdom. Earth is considered a minor house in the hierarchy of ruling houses but its position near the seat of power gives it more opportunities for royal visits especially since we maintain a large portion of our army on the planet because of the limited resources of the moon. It was my turn to visit that blue world that orbits our home. In fact, this visit will be first one that I have taken by myself. Serenity always travels with Serena and myself but she thinks that I’m old enough to handle myself as the situation warrants. She has great faith in me and I don’t want to fail her in my mission.

It’s just a simple visit to renew the oath of fealty from the Earth to the Duchy of the Moon through the Silver Kingdom and Serenity thought that since the oath was originally given to the Grand Duke of the Moon, well, it would be appropriate that I was present to receive the oath. I’m the Grand Duke. The first one that graced the moon for over a thousand hundred years since the first Grand Duke ascended to the throne of the Silver Kingdom to become its first king. Why only one Grand Duke since then? A logical question and the only answer would be that I’m the first male born to the royal family since the fourth king; my father was born five hundred years ago. Don’t ask me the reason that almost all, except for my four paternal royal ancestors and me and they were born long ago, that has been born to the queens has been female but that’s one of the mysteries of life. The first king ruled the Silver Kingdom until seven hundred years ago when he was killed in an accident. All the kings of the Silver Kingdom has met with accidents before their fragile bodies failed them. My father ascended the throne after the Negaverse killed his father but we didn’t realize it was they at the time. It wasn’t until I started investigating the past that I discovered the truth. When my father died he left the kingdom in the charge of Serenity, his first daughter by his first wife. He was married seven times and I’m the offspring of his last marriage. In his will, I was given the Duchy of the Moon as my inheritance and all its holdings including all the minor houses that pledges fealty to us. Serenity has been accepting the oath in my steed but this year she wanted everyone to know that the Duchy of the Moon was once more aligned with the Silver Kingdom.

Many people don’t understand the significance of having a separate Duchy from the Silver Kingdom but there is a major advantage to it. A house has certain powers unto itself that is denied a kingdom. The Silver Kingdom is driven by the power that it gain from the people but a house, even a minor house, derives its power from the law of Kanly. These laws were established over ten thousand years ago and govern what is permissible for houses especially for houses that are aligned with each other. The oath of fealty binds a lower house to a more powerful for protection and resources and the major house gains prestige from its aligned houses. In essence, they support each other and it’s sometime easier to have a house help another than wade through the bureaucracy designed to provide the most good to the most people. I could help any of my aligned houses without a single thought about how it appears to others. My word is law and all the houses obey that law. So that’s why I’m going to Earth by myself. Earth needs a great deal and I have the resources to lift them up and in that process help my house. Well, by my house I actually mean me since I’m the only member of the house. Serenity and Serena don’t belong to any house and neither did the kings as House Moon actually voted against the formation of a kingdom. Hey, don’t look at me but I understand why the First Grand Duke voted against the formation of the Silver Kingdom. He didn’t want for the solar system to form one government because it couldn’t derive the same power of the houses but when he was approached to be its first king he accepted for he loved the people and thought that he would have a son to give the duchy to in due time. Sorry ladies but Kanly laws prevent a female from accepting the mantle of leadership for any houses but those laws were written when humanity was in the ‘stone age’ but it may have some validation when they was first put to paper but truthfully I think that one was written to exclude some of our most brilliant people from ruling a house. Take my sister for instance, she has shown all the planets that she can raise two children and rule her kingdom and ruled it wisely if I may give her my assessment of her skills.

I decided that I needed to travel to the Earth in my personal yacht. I designed and oversaw the construction of this small vessel over four years ago but the power it possesses would be the equivalent of the largest battleship that any planet could deploy. It was actually the first thing I designed after I made my wealth. I was the exception to most two years old child. I was born with the full knowledge of the universe and I used that knowledge to its fullest before I was eighteen months old. Back to the yacht, it’s the fastest object in the sky as it can make the trip to the Earth in a little over half an hour. The first voyage of the ship was to take Serenity to Mercury and it took under five days to reach that planet. Currently, I’m designing a faster ship but it’s still in my head, as I haven’t put it to paper yet.

You can’t really think very much on such a short trip so I just went over the oath and my response. I would meet with Prince Vada of House Earth and his family. Serenity and I have made some decision that will help develop the natural resources of the Earth and help the Silver Kingdom. Trade seemed to be a good way to develop an economy but to achieve that goal, Earth needs a large infusion of currency. That’s where I come into the picture. I will provide the necessary financial resources, as part of my duty, and the Earth will profit by the selling of certain natural resources that has been recently discovered. Earth would gain the profit instead of mining companies from Mercury or Mars.

I have grown to like the people of Earth. They are rather forceful in nature but they have little deceit in their makeup. Makeup, I wonder how that word came to my mind. Serena and me were just sitting around the other day reading an ancient Venusians tome when the words, “Nova Prism Power, Makeup”, force themselves into my mind. When I shouted the words I changed in appearance. I became a being by the name of Sailor Nova. Serena heard me and shouted a similar phrase but using the moon’s name and became Sailor Moon. It was a disturbing transformation for both of us but we developed a better understanding of what we will become in the future.

I devised an amulet and endowed it with the essence of the moon to help Serena become Sailor Moon. It takes a lot of your personal energy to transform but I used artifacts of my own design to aid in the other’s transformation. Others, you may ask, yes, others, I made transformation pens for all the other Sailor Warriors that will come in the future. I knew each one by their power even though I have never met them or rather met them in person. I have seen them all in my dreams at night and even in waking dreams during the day. I know everything about them and at the same time I know nothing about them. They are mysteries to me but I know that they are close to coming into their full power. Serena and I are the first of many but I realize that it will be many years until my family is whole.

I started to open some official dispatches and letters that Serenity wanted me to review when we started the descent into Earth’s orbit. I pushed them to the side vowing that I would go over them on the return trip, if I have time. The journey to Earth was uneventful and I could see the assembled crowd that came to greet my vessel. No one on earth or even in many generations had the experience of a Grand Duke coming to their world especially one that is their liege lord. The yacht came to a smooth halt as the landing struts took all the force of deceleration. I waited a few minutes as my personal bodyguard exited the ship to make sure the area was patrolled.

When I received the all clear from the Captain of the Guard, I proceeded down the ramp to Earth. Prince Vada personally greeted me at the bottom of the ramp. With him were his young son, probably around ten years old but every bit a prince. His name is Darien and as I touched his hand, I knew that he would fight at my side in the future. I see him at my side against the Negaverse and protecting Serena in a distance future time. I don’t how these visions come to me but they usually come true in due time even though I have very little control over them. He will lead my troops in battle. I think that I have to get him to the moon as part of my personal bodyguard so I can keep an eye on him. A rather unique honor for one so young but I need to keep him close to me. I’ll have to discuss his future with his father. I have to find some title and lands would be appropriate for a young man that will be a constant companion in the future. I guess that I can make Prince Darien a squire that would give him access to me. I’ll talk to Serenity and we’ll work out some way to have him near when we’ll need him.

The oath ceremony would take place in two days so Prince Vada decided to have Darien so me the planet and all its wonder. For a home world of humanity, I can’t see how they could leave this beautiful blue world. The most plentiful feature of this planet is the large amount of free water on its surface. Other than two moons around Neptune and one around Jupiter, free water on the surface is extremely rare. Mercury has a large amount of underground water inside its hot crust. Vast caverns lay beneath the surface protected from the blaze of the sun with a layer of rock that reflected the heat outward from the life giving fluid. On most of the other planets, water was in form of ice or some pools deep underground that are guarded by the populace.

Darien is a wonderful companion once he got over the fact that he wasn’t dealing with a six-year-old child. Within a couple of hours, he was talking to me as one of his close friends. He was very protective of me and twice placed himself between a potential problem and me. The problem usually involved a person that tried to get my attention for a solution to their problem. If they knew me they would not have tried to press themselves on me. They are Prince Vada’s subjects and I would never make a decision that affected his right to rule the planet. The rest of the journey was uneventful but I could tell that Darien held himself as my protector while in his care.

I also grew very fond of one of my bodyguards that I acquired when I landed. Jadeite is one of the old guard detachments from the House Moon’s garrison. Earth and Mercury are the only planets that maintain the old Kanly forces to protect the ducal family. Jadeite pledged himself in body and soul when he met me. I accepted his vow and he joined my party as my escort. Jadeite brought with him his three brothers. It’s strange, none of them look alike but he explained that they are brothers in name only. The old captain of the Kanly guard had adopted them as his heirs when he would pass from this world to the next. I brought all the young men into my service. They are intelligent and resourceful and I see that I can build my future force around them as its commanders.

The oath ceremony went well and through my talks with Serenity, we decided upon to make Darien a squire of the House Moon and a courtier to the Silver Kingdom’s court. This way he would have access to me as a noble of the house plus gain access to Serena and Serenity as a member of the court. We decided that at the age fourteen was a good age for him to take on his added responsibilities but until that time he was to enjoy the income from a small estate located outside Earth’s capital city. He will be well off until he joins us on the moon. Prince Vada was overjoyed at his son’s rise in position and called a day of thanksgiving for his good fortune. Well, another day won’t hurt me.

I decided that I needed to review some of the material that Serenity sent with me so I asked Jadeite to retrieve the parcel from the ship. Jadeite brought the package back and we started to open the material to see what Serenity wanted me to review. Jadeite helped me in this endeavor because he had become a trusted friend in the three short days that we have known each other. I looked over the official dispatches while Jadeite reviewed the letters and other packages. In one of the packages was a holocube from my cousin, Ameri, who had married into House Venus. She was a royal princess so was destined to have a long life probably outliving her husband by many centuries. Being a member of the royal family is tough because of our lifespan. When you know that it is possible for you to live hundreds of years, well, daily life loses some of its meaning.

Jadeite placed the holocube in the viewer and I glanced at the holograms projected above the cube. The first ones were Ameri and her husband in a garden, probably the main garden of their palace. The next picture took my breath away. It was a simple picture of a young girl, maybe no more than five, with Ameri. This girl has to be her daughter, Mina, who was born about three months after Serena and me. She still possessed some of her baby fat but she was losing it gracefully and I could tell that she would be a beauty when she was in her teenage years. I also realized something else; Mina was destined to be Sailor Venus, the Sailor of Love.

A vision came to my mind of Mina and me next to each other in bed. She leaned over and kissed me while saying, “Good night, my love.” She then kissed a ring on her hand that I recognized. The ring was the King’s Ring that the first king used as an engagement ring for his queen. It was the ring that all the head of House Moon used for their brides. My mind was confusion, Mina, bed, engagement ring, how do they all fit together? I can’t determine what the future holds for me but I realize that on this fateful day that I have seen my future. Mina appears to be a large part of that future as my wife or lover but I also realize that she can’t be more than a couple of years older in my vision than now. How can we fall in love so soon when we have never met? Well, I guess the universe will get us together if we are fated to be man and wife. “Jadeite, before I forget, can you have someone have this hologram painted and placed it in my cabin?” Jadeite didn’t question me but took the cube to Prince Vada’s portrait painter and had the picture reproduced by the next morning. He propped the portrait on the table so I would see it when I woke the next morning. As the sun’s rays poured through the window, it lit the painting and I saw in all her beauty the girl that is destined to be my strongest supporter and my soul mate. I don’t know what the future would hold but I think that I can get through all right if I had her by my side.

So end part one of Nova’s tale. The next part is the events that lead up to Mina’s voyages to the moon. A sequel to My Prince is next on the agenda. Be sure to stay tune for Nova’s Tale Part 2, Love’s Journey.