Prelude to Darkness, Prelude to Light
Read Me

M is for Mars


The reason I chose to do write this Read Me, something I've never done before, is simple: this story is complicated!  Plus I'm such a slow writer that I needed a reference point so that I could remember what the hell I was planning to do with it.  :)  God help us all.  I'm writing a Read Me.  Oh boy.  Well, here goes nothin...

Let's begin at the beginning, shall we?

1. Time lines
   A. The MAIN time line, and the one from which the title comes, is just prior to the formation of Crystal Tokyo.  I'm selecting year 3016.  Don't get into an argument about how long they slept and yadayada, because I just picked a year, ok?  I'm not interested in being as technical as humanly possible.
    B. The SECOND big time line is the Silver Millennium.  I do hope, my dear readers, that I don't need to explain when that one is.  :)  You'll know when we've gone Silver Millennium by the lines of "@-" symbols.  I did it the same way in Cycle of Our Souls, and I decided to stick with what works.
    C. The THIRD time line is much, much smaller and is merely peppered here and there throughout the story.  It's denoted by italics because it's generally the memories of various characters.  Most of it takes place in 3015, just after the Awakening, but sometimes one will take place between 2005 and 2015, during the Great War.  You'll understand when a flashback is set, so don't worry about it.  :)
    D. Just so you know, this is the FIRST TIME any of this stuff has happened; the whole SailormoonR story line DOES NOT exist.  Rini was never sent back in time, and the Black Moon Family has attacked neither Crystal Tokyo nor 20th century Tokyo.

2. Characters (and the names they go by)
    A. I use Japanese names in both the Crystal Tokyo and Silver Millennium time lines.  For the flashbacks, dub names will be used.
    B. You may have gathered by now that the Black Moon Family are characters in this story; however, they are GOOD GUYS.  That's very important to remember.  :)  In all three time lines of the story, the Black Moon Family is good.  I'm not talking about the Sisters here; just Dimando, Rubeus, Saffiiru and Esmeraud.
    C. The Dark Kingdom Generals are back!!  Yay!  In all three time lines they're GOOD GUYS, so don't get confused about that, either.

3. Plot
    A. What I'm trying to do with this story is explore the origins of Crystal Tokyo and the Black Moon Family.  The latter have always fascinated me, and I wondered what would drive people to Nemesis, of all the hell-holes in the Universe.  In that vein, I've tried to craft a story that spans the Silver Millennium, present, near future and Crystal Tokyo, all in the hope that somehow we'll get an idea of how an Utopia was created from ashes, and how enemies were created from friends.

So I guess that pretty much covers everything.  I wish I could write a nice, simple three-part epic type thing.  You know, one part would be Silver Millennium, another present and near future, and then a third for Crystal Tokyo.  Sorry, guys, but I just can't do things that way.  I hope you enjoy the story, and be sure to send me feedback!


Part I
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