ATTACKS:

• Star Serious Laser: Fighter’s most commonly used attack. A concentrated beam of white-blue light blasts her enemy from a sharply raised hand.
• Nova Star Strike: Fighter flings a few of her cards into a shape that resembles a pentagram around her enemy. When she speaks the word strike, the five points of the star activate a white-blue electric wall that surrounds the enemy prior to obliterating them.
• Nova Grand Cross: a beam of light manifesting in her hand as a sword with her Star Yell acting as a ‘handle’, Fighter swings it in a cross motion, the resulting wave of white-blue light capable of hitting four targets at once.
• Star Fusion Hurricane: The strongest attack at the moment. Raising her Star Yell with both hands, she projects spirals of white-blue energy that form a cage-like sphere around her, reeling in her enemy at the same time until she lets go. When she does, the enemy’s thrown back in a powerful explosion capable of either obliterating them if they’re a homunculus or making them lose their transformation if they’re an enemy Guardian or Knight, briefly knocking them out in process. This attack takes her entire focus, making her vulnerable and needing a few minutes to recover after it’s performed.

ABILITIES: she shares most of these with the rest of the Starlights at varying skill level and levels of comfort using them.

• Gender Manipulation: While, being a Sailor Guardian, she’s biologically female, she can shift to a male form at moment’s notice and is extremely comfortable as either. This ability aided her well during her first visit to Earth and continues to do so now.
• Immobilization: Her galactic themed cards allow her to immobilize a living being for a brief period of time.
• Projection: The cards also allow her to project images of objects and people that are easier to show than to describe.
• Sensing: She’s able to sense other beings with true Star Seeds. While much weaker than Healer and Maker, she’s still aware enough to be drawn to powerful energy like that of her Queen, Neo Queen Serenity, and Neo Sailor Moon.
• Singing: Her ability to sing is a power in its own right, enabling her to find anyone she puts her mind to when intentionally used as a power. The major drawback is that, while she’s searching in this manner, she’s vulnerable to being discovered by unfriendly forces, putting her and those with her into unnecessary danger.
• Flight and Teleportation: Able to summon a pair of large wings on her back, she can fly. She’s also able to instantly teleport from place to place while transformed.
• Enhanced Strength/Combat Specialist: Physically the strongest among the Starlights, she’s also the most athletic, spending hours in training keeping that up. She still can use her non-magical attacks like Star Fighter Kick and Star Fighter Punch, and she’s particularly good in hand to hand and sword combat, having specifically trained as a palace guard before awakening as her moon’s Sailor Guardian. This ability serves her well as first line of defense for her Queen and teammates.

Raised on the moon Fighter and planet Kinmoku of Oshmantus planetary system, Youko never really encountered politics until she came to Kinmokuseian court. While her family was old nobility, they were also a line that was ruined a long time ago, and many counted their title mere formality. It was why Youko always preferred to earn her way through skill and not paying much attention to actual nobility unless she had to. Her training as a guard for Kinmoku palace was one of her earliest interactions with upper class. As it were, she was charismatic, good with a sword, and really good in a fight, which meant she spent hours on the training grounds instead of stuffy ballrooms and functions she considered boring. There was no need for her to attend those, at least, not until she was noticed by young Princess Fireball for her skill and asked to join her ladies-in-waiting.

It had taken her some time to find her place. Youko had no idea why, but she worked best when she was eventually paired with two girls from the moons Healer and Maker once the latter joined the Princess’s circle - the former was already there - and they seemed to look to her whenever it came to command decision. She didn’t quite notice how, but she became the leader of their little unit even before she tapped into her moon’s power by accident to awaken as Star Fighter, her moon’s Sailor Guardian. That position only solidified when it became clear that those two girls were the other Guardians - Star Maker and Star Healer, respectively.

That awakening meant she also had to get at least some actual training as a lady-in-waiting. At first, that title was in name only, Youko allowed to hang out on the fringes of the group acting as their personal guard, but now, that changed. She tolerated that training only because she needed it to stay in the Princess’s circle. In reality, Youko felt more comfortable in a guard’s uniform than a lady’s dress, all things a lady had to know escaping her as fast as other ladies attempted to teach her. At least the training she needed and insisted on doing as a Sailor Guardian was a relief. It was necessary, and it was going to save their lives one day. She didn’t relish being proven right when their system came under attack from Sailor Galaxia and her forces.

That was the start of trial the likes of which they never experienced before. Their world was destroyed, their Princess fled, and they had to abandon their system to follow her, because none of them would have it otherwise. They didn’t have powers to restore stolen Star Seeds to their owners, either, so they had to kill Galaxia’s Phages and subordinates that were created after their Star Seeds were stolen. Youko tried to shield the others from that, if only a little, but all of them were hit hard by that journey.

The Princess’s trail led them to Earth and the Sailor Guardians protecting the planet. Despite herself, Youko’s laser focus on the mission faltered when she met Sailor Moon during their time as pop idols in attempt to find their Princess through their song. Sailor Moon’s light was like that of her Princess, and, because of that, Youko allowed herself to be distracted and to draw on that strength until their Princess returned to them. Perhaps she had drawn too much, because one thing she didn’t count on was growing to genuinely admire the other Sailor Guardian in process. She had to deal with that, too, but she didn’t, not entirely. She’d been interrupted by Sailor Wars, which meant she had to count Earth’s future Queen as an ally and someone to be protected.

It was once their Princess was restored to them that Youko found out why she went to Earth specifically. Their lady believed in the legends she learned. One of those legends led her to the Solar System in search for the mysterious Light of Hope, their Princess drawn here by the power visible throughout the galaxy the moment the future Neo Queen Serenity took her true love’s hand in promise of eventual marriage. Disbelieving Youko though had been, it seemed that her Princess’s belief paid off. Sailor Moon was surely that Light of Hope… possibly even the one with the ability to end this conflict before it took more lives.

To this day, Youko wouldn’t know if she was grateful to the ill-fated journey to the Sagittarius Zero Star on which they accompanied Sailor Moon because it left her with unfinished business on Earth. She would never know what happened, for she died well before Sailor Moon reached her goal. She never brought it up, deciding there was no need because she remembered no details. All that she could recall was that when they were reborn per wishes of Sailor Moon and their Princess, so was their world. Things went back to normal as if Sailor Wars never happened. She didn’t know about the others, but she couldn’t move on that easily, no matter how happy it made her to have her world back and seeing her Princess become Queen.

At first, she buried herself in restoration of her world and Kinmoku, like others had, but it was not enough. Their Queen’s decision to help Earth’s new rulers once peace was achieved on Kinmoku and they could all sense their ascension to their throne was a relief. No, she had to be honest with herself. It was an escape - from herself and demons she didn’t know if others had that haunted her since Sailor Wars ended.

Earth was just like she remembered it, but there were plenty of changes Youko was unprepared for. The peace enveloping the planet with appearance of Crystal Empire and Elysion was overwhelming. The presence of Neo Queen Serenity, who at first utterly replaced the girl Fighter came to admire for her kind heart and warm inner light, was even more so. The more time passed, the more she felt adrift, desultory in her duties as ambassador aiding her Queen in reassuring panicked Terrans that there was nothing to fear from them. She could tell the rest of Galactica felt much the same, but she also felt that for her, it was worse.

She could blame that peace for her early admiration for Sailor Moon growing into full-blown obsessive crush on Earth’s Queen, and for a while, she did blame that peace for it because there was nothing for her to do as who she was. It really was no wonder Healer accused her of betraying their Queen’s trust in the heat of their most recent argument, it must’ve been precisely what it looked like. While her usual outlets helped, it was not the same, and years of what felt like directionless drifting did not help, for all that she tried to focus on helping Galactica’s members to keep themselves together. She couldn’t be effective in that with her own self adrift, and perhaps, her trying to do that when unprepared for it herself made things worse for everyone in the first place.

If she was honest, Youko might have to thank Spectrolite, now known as the Saturn Knight, for giving her the necessary shove in direction of pulling her shit together. Peace wasn’t in her nature. She couldn’t handle it without also having a clear purpose in her capacity as Star Fighter. She just didn’t expect that purpose to become retrieval of one of her closest friends and teammates from the clutches of their new enemy and investigation of rumors that Sailor Galaxia was also part of this Dark Alliance.

Dividing duties as they made sense among the remaining Starlights due Healer’s capture, Youko used that time to pull herself out of the emotional abyss she ended up in, focusing on new mission with the same zeal she had been on Sailor Wars. Their teammate needed help whether she acknowledged it or not. For that to happen, Youko needed to deal with her own demons, including the mess she made, first.

It took her teammate‘s getting corrupted for Sailor Star Fighter to screw her head on straight.

Okay, it was nothing that dramatic. She wasn’t as absent-minded or focused on chasing after Earth’s Queen as Healer suggested during their fight, so she knew precisely what’s been going on ever since they came to Earth. What she didn’t know was why they were still here in the first place, and that’s when it all went wrong. Though she was glad to check up on their distant friends at first, things on Earth seemed slow, steady, and peaceful enough that Fighter was losing herself the longer they stayed. That was the only justification she could come up with.

Youko flicked the practice sword she borrowed from the training salle to the side in a salute and moved into a fighting stance, going through the paces of a workout unfamiliar to any member of Crystal Empire who could chance upon her in this area of the wellness wing of the Palace. The point was that Fighter thrived on action, on need for fast, on the spot decisions, and rush of battle to be effective. She was lost in constant peace, and more so since Sailor Wars ended. That conflict pushed her to her limits, and now, she found peace time… lacking.

Finding out about resurgence of Dark Alliance was almost a relief. She could do something about that, and she could help Maker train their Queen as a Sailor Guardian if that’s what was really wanted, because she wasn’t going to go easy on them. With all love and respect she had for her ruler, Youko would be the first to say if they were better prepared before Galaxia came to their world, things might have turned out differently. They would have been stronger, and maybe there would’ve been no need to look for their Queen in the first place.

All that was needless justification, however, and Youko didn’t need that. She had her fill of stupidity from herself to last several lifetimes. What she needed was a plan to rescue her teammate and others from Dark Alliance, to weaken its reach preferably before it made to Kinmoku and Galactica’s other systems. She already knew that asking these opponents nicely wouldn’t work. It wasn’t how the magic of both their Queen and that of Sailor Moon worked. They had to want it. That meant -

“That means we need another plan,” she said aloud, eyes flicking toward the entrance of the salle as she heard footsteps not her own, sword going down as she studied her company, fully alert but blinking sweat out of her eyes. She wasn’t surprised that someone came looking for her in the end because they always had. How long did she spend trying to beat sense into herself this time?

She didn’t know and really, didn’t care.

“Come to teach me a lesson?” She moved her sword into the ready stance, leaving the person an out from potential bout if they wanted it, but clearly indicating she wasn’t finished yet. “I probably need one, honestly.”