Millennium Comics and Games
3:23 PM
“Yeah,
and do you have Danger Girl #12?” Serena asked the comic dealer, “I missed
that one.” He produced the comic from the rack of backissues he had behind
the counter and she in turn produced the money.
“Hey, Serena.” Rei called from across the small store, “How do I look?” She was trying on a black tee shirt with the sign of mars emblazoned in red across the front.
“It’s definitely you, Rei.” Serena laughed. She thanked the salesman and took her stack of comics from the table to make room for her friend to put her stuff down.
“I’ll take the shirt, too.” the temple maid pulled out her purse. With that, the two friends took the recent additions to their already formidable comic collections and went to the arcade.
“Hey, Andrew!” Serena said upon seeing him at the counter. The Scouts had known Andrew since their earliest days. Serena had liked him long before she even knew of Darien. Oddly enough, he was Darien’s best friend.
“Hey, happy new year meatball-head. Having the usual?”
“Double chocolate sundae? You bet!” She smiled. He soon landed two of the treats on the table; one for Serena, the other for Rei.
“You guys want game tokens?” Andrew asked, “The Sailor V video game is still here.”
“Sure.” Serena and Rei produced bills from their purses. Andrew took them and exchanged them for tokens while the girls polished off their sundaes.
“I just realized,” Rei smiled, “We haven’t bickered all day.”
“Come to think of it,” Serena smirked, “We haven’t fought in over three months.”
“Or longer.” Rei added. “Wow.”
Andrew brought them the handfuls of brass tokens and took up their empty sundae cups.
Just then a red Volkswagen Jetta flew past the window and crashed down onto its top.
“Did you see that?” Rei looked up at Serena.
“Sure did.” Serena’s blue eyes were wide. “We better go check it out.” She took off her necklace and opened the locket with the golden star on it. The dodecahedrally cut gem inside winked at her. The Imperium Silver Crystal was the root of the power Serena may soon have to unleash.
The two girls raced outside in time to see a black Toyota Tacoma slam down onto the asphalt. People were running and Serena searched for the origin of the problem in the opposite direction.
The creature was humanoid, but had a scorpion’s tail and one hand was a deadly clay. It was now lifting a small Dodge over it’s head to hurl it at the running crowd.
Serena made no waste of time. Instantly, she held up the locket and shouted “Moon Crystal Power!”
Suddenly, a flash of white light surrounded her. Angel’s wings sprang from her back and lifted her from the ground. Her body became transparent energy. She placed the locket at her chest. Ribbons of energy wrapped around her body, materializing into a sleeveless leotard with a blue sailor’s collar and red bow on the chest. The wings exploded in a shower of feathers as energy ribbons wrapped her hands and feet to form white gloves and red knee-high boots. A pleated blue skirt wrapped it’s way around her waist and she arched her back as a red ribbon tied at the small of her back. Finally, a gold V-shaped tiara with a red stone took its place on her forehead.
Rei raised a small red stick with a gold star with the symbol of Mars in the center. “Mars Star Power!” she cried. Fire surrounded her, burning her clothes away and replacing them with a costume similar to the one Serena had changed into. But the skirt and collar were red and the ribbons were purple. Instead of boots she wore red high-heal shoes. The Star Crystal in her tiara was red like Sailor Moon’s.
They stood there, Sailor Moon and Sailor Mars, watching the creature pick up a Nissan and throw it into a shop.
“Stop right there!” Sailor Moon ordered, “I am sixteen years old and would be proud to own any one of these cars, but you would waste and destroy them. I despise waste and vandalism.
“I stand for Love and Justice. I am Sailor Moon. And on behalf of the moon, I shall right wrongs and triumph over evil, and that means you!”
On cue, Sailor Mars steepled her index fingers. “Mars Fire ignite!” A fireball shot from her hands and smashed into the creatures chest. It dropped the new car it had hoisted over it’s head.
Sailor Moon then leapt into action, connecting her foot with the monster’s chin and then sending it reeling with a spinning kick to the head. It staggered back, dazed but soon recovered and fired a wild blast of energy from it’s claw.
The moonchild jumped out of the way screaming. Unlike the other Scouts, she didn’t have the variety of powers to fight with. Funny how sometimes the leader is the weakest one.
Sailor Mars was ready to make up for any weaknesses. “Mars Celestial Fire surround!” She held her hand out, forming a large circle of fire, and then pointed both hands out in front of her. The ring of fire collapsed and she blasted twelve small fiery disks at the creature. The shot cut its legs out from under it and the monster fell backward onto its rear. The negaminion returned fire with a beam from its tail. Mars dodged right to avoid it.
“Mars, get down!” Sailor Moon shouted. Mars hit the pavement in time for a ball of lightning to flash over her and barely miss the creature. It backed off to analyze the new threat.
“Sailor Jupiter?” Mars looked back, “I thought you were hung over.”
“I am.” Jupiter replied. Her collar, skirt, boots, and tiara jewel were green, contrasting sharply to the pink ribbons. The pulled back brown hair was a little messy and her green eyes were somewhat glazed.
“That explains your aim.” Mars smirked as she got up. “How’d you find us.”
“I was going to the arcade. I heard the commotion and came.”
In the background the monster finished analyzing Sailor Jupiter and leveled its claw at them.
Mars and Jupiter dodged in separate directions. “Jupiter Thunderclap zap!” and the softball-sized ball of lightning flew from Jupiter’s hand again. This time, the shot caught the scorpion-thing in the shoulder and spun it around.
“Now, Sailor Moon!” Jupiter cried as she landed hard on her shoulder.
The Moon Scepter was a powerful weapon in the moon princess’s hands, but it was too unwieldy for such fast-paced close combat. The best times to use it were those like right now when the opponent was weakened and the Scepter had enough time to charge.
With the cry “Moon Scepter Elimination!” the familiar beam of cohesive light struck the creature and vaporized it. Its ashes collected in a neat pile.
“Totally moondusted!” Sailor Moon shouted, jumping up into the air.
The Moon princess smiled. Her long wait for action had paid off. She hoped it was worth it.
“Thanks.’ Serena quipped. She, Lita, and Rei scampered up the mansion’s stairs to Amy’s room.
“Hey.” Amy greeted them. She was tacking up a poster of Albert Einstein sticking out his tongue. “What’s going on.”
“We just seriously dusted a negamonster.” Rei blurted out.
“We picked up a sample of it’s remains.” Lita, totally sober with excitement, handed the tiny vial of gray ashes to Amy. “We were hoping you could analyze it for us.”
“I hope this doesn’t get in the way of my studying.” the Catholic’s accent laced her words as she pulled out her blue minicomp. “I still have to study socio-economics, bio-chem, english lit, and Spanish.”
“We don’t go back to school for another two days, Ams.” Serena said using her nickname for Amy.
“That’s not as far away as you think.” Amy defended her rabid study habits as she poured some of the ashes into a small dish.
A thousand years ago, during the Silver Millennium, the planet Mercury was the most technologically advanced in all the Moon Kingdom. The schools and universities turned out alumni of incredible intelligence and wisdom. The research facilities produced marvels of technology almost like clockwork. Amy’s minicomp was no exception. It’s simple keyboard was easily manipulated with one hand. It could perform over twelve hundred functions with incredible rapidity; from simple calculations to subatomic analysis to subspace variability.
“This is way weird.” Amy’s eyebrows drew together. Her computer screen displayed a helical chain, pointing out things of interest.
“Is that its DNA?” Rei asked.
“Huh?” Amy continued typing, “Oh, no. It’s a matrix.”
“A what?” the three other girls asked at the same time.
“A matrix.” the blue-haired girl repeated. “I noted that all of the negamonsters, cardians, and droids had a helical molecular make-up. I took the liberty to label the obviously unnatural substance that these creatures are manufactured from a matrix. I still have samples from almost every monster we’ve fought.”
“So what’s so weird about this one?” Lita asked.
“Aside form the fact that I’ve never seen it before,” Amy said, “it’s trihelical.”
“So?” Serena shrugged. She was off in a corner looking at Amy’s posters.
“Well, who ever made this one is a master at it. A third helix can add exponentially to the monster’s ability. It appears the maker was not using the full potential the triple helix offers.”
“Like speed limits to a sports car.” Rei’s violet eyes didn’t move from the small screen.
“Exactly.”
“Do you think they did it on purpose?”
“They would have had to. If they’re this good at it they know what they can do. This was a warning if anything else.” Amy stood up and went to her bed and lifted the mattress. There were over a hundred small vials filled with ashes of various colors. Each one had a color-coded label. She placed a green label on the newest sample. “What did it look like?”
“Well.” Serena smirked, “It was kind of a scorpion-thing.” And Amy scribbled that in.
“So what are we looking at, exactly?” Rei asked.
“It appears to be a new enemy, and a powerful one at that.” Amy told her, “I’m going to run some more tests on it to see if I can find any clues.”
“Is this not way cool?” Serena grinned, “Our first enemy of the new Millennium.”
“Actually, the Millennium doesn’t start until two thousand one.” Amy corrected.
“Oh.” Serena said after a long pause. Then she put her hands on Amy’s shoulder, “And while I’m here, can I see your research notes for your project?”
“You,” Amy groaned, “are unbelievable!”