Prologue: August 23, AD 1997

"I gotta go home now, Serena." Rini looked up at her future mother, 20th
Century host, and true friend. "Sailor Pluto said I should." She seemed
troubled.

"But why?" Serena knelt down and took Rini's hand. "Don't you like it here
anymore?"

Rini shook her head. "No, no, I love it here. It's just that..." She
hesitated.

"What is it?"

"Sailor Pluto says it's too dangerous for me to stay here any longer. She said
that one of the guys who kidnapped me escaped, and he might come after me
again."

Rini meant Terrak, DarkStar's only commander left on earth. Sailor Moon and
the Sailor Scouts had destroyed DarkStar and Korak. DarkStar himself had
killed Xerik, which Raye still hadn't gotten over. She probably wouldn't for a
while yet, either.

Malik had returned to the future, with little more than a few words and a
salute. He seemed sweet on Lita, and Lita had apparently felt the same towards
him. Malik had hinted that they might meet in the future, and Serena could
only speculate on where that would go.

But Terrak was still out there, somewhere, and no one knew just where. He
could try something again, and Rini seemed like the perfect target. Serena
realized this, and nodded slowly. "I guess you're right..."

"Serena?"

"Yes, Rini?"

"You're crying, Serena."

"Yeah, I guess I am." Serena caught a tear falling down her cheek. She threw
her arms around the little pink-haired girl. "I'm gonna miss you, Rini."

Rini returned the embrace. "Don't worry, Serena. We'll meet again sometime."

Serena sniffed. "You think so?"

Rini grinned and nodded. "I know so." She dropped her arms and stepped back a
couple meters. She took the Crystal Key in her hand and held it in the air.
"Crystal Key, take me home!" She said.

A thin beam of light flew down from the skies above the pier next to the lake,
and surrounded Rini.

"We'll miss you, Rini!" Mina said.

"Don't forget us!" Lita chimed in.

"Goodbye, Rini!" Amy said in her usual quiet tone.

"Seeya in the future!" Raye called out.

Serena backed up into Darien's arms. He held her tight as they watched Rini
fade into the light.

"Goodbye, Mom and Dad." Rini disappeared into the beam of yellow energy.

"Well," Serena sniffed. "She's back in the future now. Where she should be."

"We made it better for her," Darien added. "And for all of us." He and Serena
kissed quietly, with the Sailor Scouts, Luna, and Artemis looking on.

And not much else happened for two whole years.

PART I: Physical Needs: September 19, AD 1999
 
 

Chapter One - Tokyo

Ashe looked up at the rather complex map posted on the wharf docks. The map's
scale was in metric, so Ashe calculated that the docks stretched across nearly
two miles of shoreline. That was about the limit of its usefulness, though.
The only other thing it had was a listing of a bunch of warehouses and the
current dock assignments.

Ashe turned his head slightly to get a different angle. His wire-rimmed
glasses slid down his nose a bit, so he pushed them back into place. He ran a
hand through his damp, brown hair, and realized he hadn't had a shower for
more than a week. The salty ocean water didn't count, either.

Ashe was not terribly fond of seawater. The only water where he came from was
imported from other planets, so he wasn't too familiar with such large bodies
of water. The ones on Terra were nothing compared to some on larger planets,
but Terran water seemed special to Ashe. He was sorta from Terra, anyway. At
least, one of his parents had been born there. Or, they would be, someday.

Ashe shook out his white trench coat in an attempt to rid himself of all the
salty water. Jumping off the side of a cargo liner probably wasn't the
smartest move, but it was his only possible move given his circumstances.

He had hitched a ride from San Francisco, USA, on a huge cargo ship on its way
to Japan. The boat was modern, for the 20th Century, but it not aged
gracefully. Rust covered the sides of the hull, and the paint for the ship's
name had almost completely chipped off.

Still, it floated, so Ashe smuggled himself onboard. During the day he slept
in a crate filled with women's silk clothing, but at nightfall most of the
crewmembers went to sleep, so Ashe was free to roam about the deck.

The Terran night sky was nearly the exact same as the Lunar sky, except, of
course, for the absence of Terra itself. Ashe stared up at the moon, often
finding himself more than a little homesick. He touched the little key-shaped
amulet around his neck, now regretting the fact that he was a little low on
self-control.

His current problems disappeared, however, when he breathed in the salty sea
air. The vast Pacific Ocean represented a clean slate for him. A chance to
forget his past problems and start anew.

But he couldn't do it. He couldn't just abandon his title. He was a Dilate of
the Star Hunters, one of the most powerful groups in the entire galaxy, and he
had a reputation to uphold. Once a Star Hunter, always a Star Hunter, or so
the Codex said. Besides, he believed he was about to be part of something big.
The Codex of the Star Hunter spoke extensively about the Avatar, about his
complicated past, and his ultimate future. Ashe had this little tingle in the
back of his skull, and it made him believe he might manage to find the Avatar
and make the galaxy right.

"Hey!"

Ashe turned around quickly and saw a very large man with a neck the
approximate circumference of a redwood and a crowbar right around the same
proportions. "How the hell'd you get onboard?"

Ashe reached slowly into his coat. "Hitched. You guys really need to watch who
let on your ship."

"Stowaway, huh?" The man held the crowbar like a Medieval Terran broadsword.
"The Captain just hates stowaways, you know. And you know what we're supposed
to do with stowaways if we find one?"

Ashe added a twinge of sarcasm to his voice. "Offer him a drink?"

"Not quite." The crowbar lunged at Ashe, with the man loosely attached. Ashe
saw this coming. Literally. He sidestepped the clumsy swing and drew a
sharp-stemmed rose. He reared back and slammed the rose directly into the back
of the man's neck. Instantly the man fell to the ground with no twitch, no
sound, and no pain. A bead of blood trickled from the tiny wound and ran down
his neck.

Ashe retrieved the rose, cleaned it off as best he could, and placed it back
in his pocket. The strange rose that gave Ashe a few odd but useful abilities
fed on, of all things, sentient souls. He couldn't quite understand the logic,
if there was any, but all he knew was that once every few Terran months the
rose needed a soul or it would wilt and die. Ashe was only too happy to
accommodate. It kept him in practice.

Ashe dragged the heavy body across the ship's deck and tossed it over the
side, so as not to alert the other crewmembers onboard. A thin trail of blood
followed the path, which gave a pretty accurate description of the man's fate.

A day after this little incident occurred, the ship arrived in the harbor
outside Tokyo. However, it would not dock until its missing crewmember showed
up. Ashe ended up with little choice but to toss himself overboard and swim
the last couple miles to shore. He believed that the rose gave him the
strength to swim such a long distance.

So there he stood, drenched in salty water, freezing cold, and trying to
figure which way he should go. He was looking for the 12th District and a
corporation he had never heard of in his studies of 20th Century history.

Still, the company's logo of the black star and circle was unmistakable. It
was the pattern on the cover of the original Codex of the Star Hunter, the
basis of Ashe's thoughts, feelings, and very life.

There was another Star Hunter on 20th Century Terra. Ashe had to find him.
 
 

Amanda Saris tossed and turned in her bed, in a vain attempt to get a full
night's sleep. But, tried as she might, she laid awake through all hours.
Tokyo never seemed to shut up.

She felt so out of place in such a large city, where everything was so
different, and everyone spoke a language she could hardly understand twenty
words of. She missed her old home of Mission Viejo, which was as quiet as a
graveyard compared to her current residence.

However, on the second level of a twenty-story high-rise apartment in the
middle of one of the busiest cities in Asia, it was never, ever quiet. Cars
passed by in a steady wave, honking back and forth at each other all night
long. Sometimes Amanda felt like opening the window and screaming "SHUT THE
FUCK UP!" at them all. But it wouldn't do any good; they most likely didn't
understand a damn word of English.

So she stuck her head under her pillow and attempted to ignore the sounds
outside.

Until she noticed the black flying orb.

Amanda suddenly sat up in her bed. She had seen something totally out of place
in her room. Most small black balls didn't fly in the first place. A small
flying black ball in her room was very inappropriate.

Now Amanda was usually pretty brave. She was exceptionally strong for her
small size and once knocked out her old school's varsity quarterback for
giving her butt an unwarranted pinch. The little prick thought he was so high
and mighty being the quarterback, he figured he could just have any girl he
wanted. Amanda didn't go for jocks at all, and she had made that point
painfully obvious to him.

Amanda glanced around the darkened room. She looked at the curtains, which
allowed a small amount of light in from the street outside. She saw the tiny
black ball fly by, silhouetted by the street lights outside.

"What the hell...." Amanda said. She quickly jumped out of bed and wrapped her
sheet around her. She wished now that she wore something a little more than
just her underwear to bed. She started for the door, and reached out to grab
the handle and get the hell outta there.

The black ball swept right across her eyes and stopped only a few inches from
her nose. Amanda squealed and fell back onto her bed. The ball was made of
some kind of shiny liquid, Amanda found, as it splashed into a thousand tiny
drops against the air. She watched with wide eyes, mesmerized at the beauty of
the thing, but petrified at its power.

The black drop pulled a small arc and shot straight into Amanda's gaping
mouth. She gagged as the thing flew down her throat and to all parts of her
body. She felt like every last cell of her being was on fire. She screamed in
pain.

And then she started to change.

Her white lace bra melted away, replaced instantly by a black, four-pointed
star. It nestled between her breasts and plunged a cold, steel blade into the
middle of her chest. Amanda lost her breath at the sensation, and nearly
blacked out.

Moments later, she wished she had.

From the star flew hundreds of tiny white ribbons. They blazed around her
torso and fused in the middle of her back, forming a solid white,
tight-fitting blouse. A sailor's neckerchief, much like the one the girls at
the schools wore, appeared from behind her and locked itself into place around
her shoulders and down to the star.

Amanda's boxer shorts also melted away, as a long piece of black cloth flew
from the darkness and wrapped around her waist. It folded into a skirt and
fused with the bottom of the blouse. A smaller piece of cloth shot between her
legs, covering her most vital area like a bathing suit.

A pair of white gloves flew from the skin on her elbows and blazed down around
her fingers. A couple of small ballet-type shoes melted into place, as two
more ribbons wrapped around her shins and ankles. A small bow held these
ribbons in place on her legs.

A heavy leather belt dropped loosely around Amanda's waist, with a gun of some
sort holstered on the left side.

A small tiara with the same star as on her blouse appeared on her forehead and
stuck in place with a tiny needle. The pain was too much for Amanda; she fell
into darkness as the transformation ended.
 
 

The moment Amanda Saris blacked out, two other peculiar events occurred at
about the same time. In Washington D.C., a small, classified pulse weapon
activated itself with an imbedded computer virus. Deep within the Pentagon,
the gun swiveled on its base, pointed more or less straight upwards, and fired
a pulse of plasma energy up through the ceiling. The blast flew straight up
through each of the Pentagon's floors, and out into space. Several minutes
later it slammed into a huge, seed-like object and knocked it out of its
trajectory. The object lost control and flew away from the earth.

A few months later it would burn up a million miles above the surface of the
sun.

Meanwhile, the Pacific ridge plate shifted three inches to the east, causing a
tiny earthquake. It measured only a 0.4 on the Richter Scale, not affecting
any cities much, but it was enough to perform its task.

Hundreds of feet under the city, a small laboratory began to topple into
itself. A scientist within the laboratory dove beneath a table, but realized
he was going to die anyway. He felt a little disheartened that he wouldn't
have the chance to see his daughter grow up, but even more so that he wouldn't
get the chance to witness the Silence. He, his assistants, and the lab were
quickly crushed under tons of falling rubble.

How these events happened was anyone's guess.
 
 

Jonathan Soren smiled as the readout on the Kisenian seed and The Death
Busters' laboratory displayed their fates. "Maybe now we can avoid that mess
with Fiore and Mistress Nine. I still would like to have that Grail, though."

Soren looked out the window of his office, on the hundred thirty-third floor
of the NeoStar building in downtown Tokyo's 12th District. He sat at the end
of the long, black table in the office and began to type on his laptop.

09.13.99 The earthquake and the plasma discharge occurred right on schedule.
With the Kisenian and Tomoe out of the way, I have removed any troubles the
Scouts might come up against. I must make sure they live long enough to
experience the Great Circle. It's up to me now to make sure they survive until
the initiation.

"The Avatar of the Veiled must be protected until his time arrives," Soren
quoted aloud to no one. "Only then can he realize that he is part of the great
circle. Codex, Chapter Two, verses one and two." He closed the laptop and
turned his chair to return his view out the window. "I know there are two more
Star Hunters out there, somewhere. All they have to do now is find me."

Soren's golden eyes flashed behind his silver-rimmed sunglasses.

"Finally this millenium gets interesting..."

Click to go back to the Fanfic Center