Story: Hentai Crystal

The strange feeling of general goodness didn’t fade as the day went on, which was pretty amazing considering she was at school right then and she was soooo hungry. Normally she’d get bored inside of ten minutes and then start daydreaming or doodling or trying to see how far she could get without actually doing work before she was noticed. Then get yelled at. That was Usagi’s normal day. In contrast?

She was sitting in class… Daydreaming, doodling and seeing how far she could get away without actually doing any work.

So… On the surface not that different from normal. Ah, but underneath is where things were just a little bit different. It wasn’t that she was bored - okay, so she was bored but bear with me here - but more that she was sort of bubbling under with this weird and new energy that set her skin tingling from head to toe. She felt nice. She felt great! But she didn’t know what to do with the feeling, exactly. Except fidget in her seat and wait for time to pass on by.

Which it did. But time is a bit of a shy traveller. When it’s being looked at it shuffles its feet, but when you’re not paying attention it dashes off without warning. Maybe that’s why Usagi’s gaze travelled around the room before settling on her good friend Naru. The two of them had been friends forever, the good-natured redhead tolerated her far more than any reasonable person ever should. Then again, when had Usagi ever had trouble making friends? Still. She felt lucky to have Naru to rely on since she was such a good person. Not to mention really cute.

Hm? Usagi shook her head a little. Where did that come from? Well. It was true enough. Naru was cute. Adorable, really. Look at her. That face tended to settle naturally into a small, peaceful smile. If she was honest then her best friend was the better catch out of the two of them. Smarter, prettier, just as easy to get on with. It was honestly a little surprising that she didn’t have a boyfriend yet.

Her gaze drifted just a fraction and fell upon one of her newest friends. Ami. The smartest person she would ever probably meet, lost in her environment. Writing things she probably already knew. So quiet. Kept herself to herself to the point it was genuinely surprising to everyone that the two of them started to hang out because what could a nerd like her possibly have in common with a dummy like Usagi?

The answer was: Short skirts, white leotards and magic.

It was quite the sight to behold, this mousy little thing suddenly opening up and letting the world see how beautiful she really was. It was such a shame she was so shy, Usagi knew she’d knock boys over if she had a little more self confidence. Then again, if she had a little more confidence in her looks then would she still be Ami Mizuno? Would she still have the shy, innocent and bookish appeal that made her so… Strangely sexy?

Well, by now Usagi was really caught on board an unstoppable train of thought. Namely, how hot the rest of the team looked in their Sailor forms. She considered them each in turn: Rei’s captivating beauty had made her blush at first sight, and getting to know her personally hadn’t diluted any of that charm or grace, and yet she took her duties too seriously to consider dating. Makoto was both the toughest and gentlest of them all, a soft heart with an iron fist. Although she was amazingly sexy and pretty it was offset by a delinquent-seeming first impression that must make it so hard for her to get any boy to take her seriously. And finally Minako, who at times seemed to take things the most seriously out of all of them due to her greater experience, but other times seemed just as much a ditz as Usagi herself. Yet her every attempt to find love was doomed to fail in the face of those duties she took so seriously…

Usagi slumped forward onto her desk. To others it would seem like she was about to fall asleep, but not a little bit of it. Actually, just this once it wasn’t boredom. She was simply frustrated. Okay! So, she at least was dating Mamoru. What did her team have for their efforts? Nothing, really. Life goes on as normal. What was that term she’d heard Ami use one time? The state of coal? The stale old quote? Something like that, whatever. The point was! Usagi was too much of a good friend to go without getting her friends laid when they (and she) so obviously needed it!

Trick was - actually, on reflection there were three tricks to this. First, her friends were apparently blissfully unaware of how badly they needed a little action in their lives and would probably resist her attempts to change things, at least a little. Secondly, she couldn’t think of any boys that would make good matches. The most crucial part of all was that Usagi was about as good at setting up and executing practical and useful plans as a tree stump.

Then again… She did have a super smart and handsome boyfriend to help her. And he <i>would</i> help her. She was pretty sure she could… Convince him with minimal difficulty.

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It’s a pretty common belief that humans have only five senses, but that’s not quite correct. Sure. Sight, hearing, smell, taste and touch are all things humans can do. But we also have a sense of the passage of time, a sense of how hungry or thirsty we are, a sense of where parts of our body are in relation to each other… It’s a much longer list than people might expect and yet for most of them people overcome the restrictions of language and understanding to substitute in one of the standard five senses to explain all of the others: We feel the passage of time. We feel hungry. We feel thirsty. We feel where other parts of our body are in relation to each other.

In a way this leads us to answer a simple question with a rather obvious answer: How do we express something that a non-human is feeling when that non-human is only currently using senses that humans do not have? Answer? Metaphor it up, baby!

So - Within the constraints of metaphor, consider a giant crystal palace that is also the size of your thumb. Imagine there was a demon wandering through this wondrous palace taking a good look around, scoping out the place in the same manner as a person who has just arrived to consider whether to buy it or not. This entity is alien. In comparison to its surroundings, quite unclean. And yet, with each passing moment he becomes more… Natural. As if either it is adapting to the location or, more terrifying to consider, the location is adapting to it.

“Not bad,” the demon may say aloud, following the constraints of the metaphor. “It needs a lot of work done to suit my needs, but I’ve learned to be patient. If I rush in, it might draw attention and ruin everything. Attracting attention now could be disastrous, so I really should be careful.”

And then he comes to four doors, each a different colour. Blue, red, green and yellow. Each is sturdy, protecting in a unique way. The demon smiles and very nearly lays a hand on the nearest to him, the blue door. Then stops.

“No, not yet,” he says. “The corridors beyond those doors aren’t safe to walk down quite yet. It will take a little time, but… In time, I shall visit.”

He turns around, and beholds a much larger door than the others. It has a moon symbol emblazoned atop it, and the door holds wide and open with a short corridor leading into a grand room. The demon strolls down it, admiring the splendour with hands metaphorically held behind his back as he went.

“Not bad!” he whistled. “But it needs a little something extra.”

He lifts a hand, and energy sparkles into it. As if he was holding lightning in his fingertips, as though the very raw powers of creation itself were held within his grasp - And then with a scream of pain, he drops it and the energy seems to shatter like glass.

“There’s more power in here than I anticipated,” he snarls, nursing his nonexistant hand which is suffering from figurative burns. “Another reason to be careful. Should I be careless in using it, this much energy might flay me where I stand.

“Which leaves me with a bit of a dilemma!” he yelled, largely to himself for much like the truly egomaniacal he just loved to hear the sound of his own voice. “How do I learn to use this power without being destroyed by it? Answer: By seducing the silly Sailors one by one and feeding their lustful desires!”

He straightens himself out and approaches the head of the room where he seats himself in the crystal throne that, from this position in this palace, lets him oversee all other buildings… Even if he cannot yet influence them.

“Hrmph,” he grunts. “Physical alterations aren’t safe to try. Making them do things they wouldn’t normally do, also out of the question. For the time being I can heighten their sensitivity and it appears I can direct Usagi’s daydreams in more sensual directions, though I dare not push too hard too quickly or even she might notice something strange.”

It might seem a little strange for a demon to look upon these limitations and smile, but that’s exactly what this one was doing. It had reached for ultimate power, and learned it might be burned by it. But consider: It had been trapped in a tome for years beyond even its ability to count. Now it was in a position where it could influence the universe on a grander scale. That was a big step up in its existence. A significant improvement. Sure, it couldn’t quite do anything it wanted yet but it was still capable of more while in this object than the last. Besides! Wouldn’t it be fun to play within those restrictions to get what it wanted? Turn these so-called heroes into its lustful acolytes, feel the triumph a little and then really cut loose?

My, my, didn’t that sound like so much more fun than simply taking what he wanted? Metaphorically speaking, of course.
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Ami Mizuno was a genius. Certified and undeniable. She could figure out complex mathematics at rates that were comparable to computers, her memory was about as flawless as it was physically possible for a human being’s memory to be and her brain was a genuine medical marvel for its efficiency.

And yet, like many geniuses, she had trouble interacting with what could normally be called her peers. This wasn’t due to arrogance on her part. It was simply that she couldn’t quite understand how other, less smart people thought. Now, it’s important to stress that she would never, ever put it in those terms or anything approaching insulting other people or praising herself; in fact, she would view it as quite the opposite. That there was something wrong with <i>her</i> and not anyone else.

Quite a tragic thing, isn’t it? Other people around her behave in ways that she can’t help but think of as irrational, or they miss things that she finds trivial or obvious. An unchallenged genius is an unsung tragedy, especially when they don’t have friends to back them up.

Ami had friends. Ami was lucky. It was an amazing change, it really was. She never knew how unhappy she was before, doing activities that still gave her pleasure like reading or revising or studying… But doing it alone, with nobody else to talk to or spend time with. Now? Now her interests were expanding, growing. Friendship with them had shone a light on her life when she didn’t even know it was dark to begin with. Even though she couldn’t quite understand them, and they often couldn’t understand her… It didn’t matter. That was what made it a real, lasting friendship.

So keep that in mind, when the fire alarm suddenly blared throughout the building. She felt as much panic as the rest of them. But she did not hurry. She did not trip, which Usagi did and managed to land on Naru in a rather, ahem, embarrassing position, but above all else she did not let her panic control her.

“Calm down, everyone!” Miss Haruna said. “Hey! Pipe down a moment! This is probably just an unscheduled drill to see how we all do, so come on and follow me to our practised safe area!”

Now, most of the students were quite happy to be away from lessons for a little bit. Break up the monotony of school life a little, does wonders for the student’s weary soul. Not so much Ami. Though she would hardly complain, because rationally safety was a major concern, she would rather be doing the study work right now. So instead she performed an analysis of the situation.

To begin with: There was no drill planned for today. She’d long ago determined the “random” pattern from purely observation. There is no such thing as a truly random event, there is always a pattern. Especially if computers were involved. There was not supposed to be one scheduled for today, and in point of fact it had only been about two weeks since their last drill.

That by itself was not particularly suspicious. Circumstantially suspicious at the very worst, reading into patterns that might not be there at all. However…

“Hey,” Usagi whispered. “Is that a new teacher by the gate taking names? He’s yummy!”

Yes, on reflection she might very well agree that he had some attributes that one might describe as… Handsome. Except that this was highly irregular. What should happen for any fire drill is that an appointed person takes note of who is supposed to be in the building, acknowledges that they have evacuated and then ticks them off the list. Having a staff member taking names as they left the grounds was hideously unsafe.

Also, the fact that he had a pentagram emblazoned in gold on the back of the clipboard was just a <i>touch</i> suspicious. Call her crazy, but that didn’t quite seem like it would be issued for that sort of reason, and…

“Hrm… Does the fire alarm sound different to you?” Usagi asked. “It was a sort of ‘whoop whoop’ before, but now it’s more like ‘whah, whah, whah’. Did they install a new alarm, do you think? It’s really annoying, I wish they hadn’t!”

You know, sometimes that girl really did surprise her with what she noticed. Ami allowed herself to enjoy a small moment of pride in Usagi for noticing something that she hadn’t - at least not consciously, maybe she unconsciously noticed the difference and started trying to work out why she was suspicious, but who could say? - even if she hadn’t quite realised what was obviously going on quite yet.

“Distraction,” Ami whispered. “Please cause one.”

She ducked down to tie her shoe, just in time to hear Usagi go “Huh? What? What did you - Yipes!”

Probably best not to dwell on her friend and leader’s clumsiness. Instead, Ami ducked into a now empty classroom, unnoticed by the other students and withdrew her transformation pen. Something else to set her apart from most ordinary people, and in a way above them as well, but to her it was a duty. Responsibility. Sailor Mercury. Strategically speaking, more of them should be transforming but her mist powers would give the others the ability to slip away and transform, not to mention the fact that she could use her computer to investigate the truth about what was happening just now. Ami Mizuno withdrew her pen and uttered a simple transformation phrase -

And unknown to her, the moment that she did so a figurative blue door flew open and the corridor behind it became temporarily traversable by a certain demon.

1. On the surface Sailor Mercury is no different. But now the demon can influence her as much as Usagi.
2. She’s changed a great deal externally, but the change only lasts while she’s transformed.
3. The demon assumes control over her body, and merges with her mind while transformed.
4. The demon has temporary access to Sailor Mercury but is more interested in preparing than acting. It’s playing the long game.
5. Something else