High above the Earth, near the moon, a rip appeared in the blackness of space and a pin point of light moved though the hole. The light dropped towards the blue planet below with frightening speed.

Goulburn, NSW, Australia, 2002

At that moment, a blue eye peered though a telescope pointed towards the rising dusk lit moon.
“What the hell is that?” whispered a voice in wonder.
The eye kept watch through the lens at the rapidly growing light until it became clear that it was coming straight towards the ground. A trickle of sweat ran from the viewer’s eyelid onto the lens. “...What ever it is, it’s headed right for us,” whispered the voice again as a hand reached up to wipe the lens. After a few more seconds of watching the light move in its inventible descent to apparent oblivion, the boy rose to his feet and ran out the door, stopping only to pick up the black laptop and backpack sitting by the stairs.
As he past the living room, the boy called, “Mum, I’m going out, I’ll be back for dinner.”
After hurriedly opening the front door, he was gone, sprinting down the main road.

Within twenty minutes, Wade stopped to catch his breath. Brushing the dark blond hair out of his eyes, he looked around to see that he was standing in light scrubland. The nearest part of the small city was out of sight almost ten kilometres behind him.

Opening the bag, Wade pulled out his binoculars and lifted them to the moon. As Wade moved the lens closer to his eye, he caught a bright object that appeared to be aflame bearing down on him. The binoculars dropped from Wade’s shaking hands as he stared in pure shock at the grey-white craft moving towards him. The craft slammed into the surface, kicking up clouds of dust, bounced along the ground and then finally skidded along the dry parched landscape, shaking the ground like a minor earthquake.

Wade stood in the ship’s path unable to move. ‘It’s going to hit me. It’s going to hit me...’ He lifted his laptop in the vain hope of it protecting him from the coming impact. Suddenly the ground stopped moving and the dust settled to the ground. The ship was less than a metre away, creaking until it was fully motionless. He stood staring at the metal hull, gripping his laptop tightly. For a few moments, all that could be heard was the rustling of the faint wind and the loose leaves blowing across the ground. With a sigh of relief, he loosed his grip on the computer before he burst into soft laughter “I’m alive. It stopped.”

After he had calmed down, Wade had a careful look at the hull of the ship. Reading the black text painted on the side he muttered, “‘USAF’? The US Airforce? I guess that they are working on black projects after all” He peered closer to the window where the cockpit would be, trying to see inside the strange spacecraft, “But what the hell is some black project of the US Airforce doing crashing into the Australian wilderness? Couldn’t keep those aliens contained?” Wade said with a chuckle.

After walking around to the back of the shuttle he saw a small control pad. He reached up to press it then paused, his hand hovering over the pad. ‘What if there is someone in there?’ he thought with hesitation. Wade picked up a fallen branch from the ground then pressed the pab with his free hand. As he heard a sound from the door he jumped back and lifted the branch.
Slowly the rear airlock ramp lowered to the ground. Wade aimed the branch towards the opening, ready to swing it at whatever was inside. Hastily he called out, “Hello? Is anyone in there?” Nothing greeted him but silence. Nervously, he made his way into the shuttle. As he crossed the outer airlock, the ramp closed up behind him.

Cautiously Wade moved towards the front of the craft. Opening another door, he gazed in wonder at the cockpit before taking a step towards what he presumed to be the helm.

Wade looked at the control panel as he sat at the helm. “I wonder how this thing flies.”
Without warning a voice responded, “Helm controls for standard operating is automatic. Manual control is handled by this control node.” Wade saw that a small number of touch buttons had lit up while the voice was speaking.

“A computer?” asked Wade, still unable to believe that a spaceship hidden from the world by the US Airforce had almost hit him. “Voice activated?” Wade looked around the cockpit for the source of the voice. After hearing a short beep, he asked “Status?”
Wade waited, not expecting a reply. Just as he was about to leave, the voice replied in an unemotional voice, “Warp Core has been damaged beyond repair, temporal drive damaged, micro-fracture to starboard nacelle, minor damage to all support systems.”
Wade’s jaw dropped as he realized that it was real. ‘This thing has a warp core and temporal drives?’ thought the shocked boy as he took in what he had just heard, “So you mean that the ship can’t leave the solar system, and I might end up stuck to the back wall if I go too fast?”

“Affirmative.”

Wade looked out the cockpit windows for what seemed like hours trying to work out what he should do. “I can’t just leave this thing here. Someone might find it and who knows what would happen. It’s probably not meant to be invented for hundreds of years. But I can’t risk taking off. The stress might tear the hull apart.” Before long, Wade’s choice was made for him.

Alarms sounded with flashing alert lights illuminating the interior of the shuttle. “Incoming aircraft detected.”

Wade looked at the screen, which now showed the aircraft flying into the area. “Crap. RAAF F-111’s. I hope they’re not here to...” Wade watched closely as the lead jet released a bomb from its undercarriage. “...Shit... Computer. Take off. Maximum safe speed.”

The shuttles thrusters powered up, lifting the ship a few metres off the ground as the bomb slammed into the ground in a near miss kicking up a large cloud of dust and dirt. Within the dust cloud, the shuttle edged forward and then shot off into the sky.

The shuttle slowly climbed higher and passed the fight of RAAF F-111 jets. Wade willed the shuttle to move faster, but knew any faster could cause major damage. On the screen before him, Wade saw a small spark as a sidewinder missile left the wing mount of one of the jets.

In a ball of fire, the missile exploded just a meter from the starboard nacelle. The explosion ripped a hole into the side of the drive causing flames and fuel to trail out the rear of the nacelle. Another missile exploded among the cloud of leaking fuel, igniting it. The resulting blast acted like a rocket, forcing the shuttle to double its speed.

Alarms began to sound throughout the cockpit as messages scrolled over the screens. “Inertial dampers offline” reported the computer through the loud drums of the rocketing shuttle.

The last thing Wade saw before blacking out was the image of the rapidly growing moon and a rainbow coloured rip opening next to it.

Sailor Pluto stood in front of her charge, the Time Gate, watching as the threads of space-time moved within its doors.

While watching the images of possible futures and possible pasts flash past, a small rip appeared in the view near the moon, then just as quickly as it appeared, the image was gone. Pluto tapped her Time Key to the gate, causing the images to move backwards until the rip was shown again. Watching closely, Pluto saw a small dot in the middle of the rip appear and edge it’s way though the Space-Time hole.

“The destinies may split once more. There is not much time.” Pluto looked to the gate, considering a number of possible futures.

Wade slowly opened his eyes as the shuttle slowed into orbit around Earth. Ignoring the cuts on his hands and arms, Wade pulled himself up to the pilot’s chair.

“Computer...” asked Wade, still trying to catch his breath. The computer beeped in response. “What happened?”

“The shuttle has travelled through a vortex of unknown origin with possible temporal and dimensional properties,” stated the shuttle computer.

“Uh huh”, Wade said as a slightly confused look crossed his face, ”So I am in some other time, in some other universe?” He thought about that for a moment before adding, “Is there anyway to go back through?”

“Affirmative, matter travels through the vortex both ways. Scans detect massive gravimetric distortions within the inner sectors of vortex. The chance of surviving a return trip is estimated at 2%.”

Wade looked shocked at the low chance for a safe return, sinking back in to the chair he mumbled, “2%? I am not going to take that sort of chance.” He looked out the window at the planet below. “Earth? It might not be home, but I guess it will have to be. Computer, scan the planet and prepare to land.” Wade heard the beep of the computers acknowledgement and waited.

While he was waiting, Wade picked up his bag. A black laptop fell out as the bag opened, crashing into the floor. Quickly opening the small computer, Wade could see the screen and keyboard shattered. “Ah, damn. It’s useless.” He opened the case and removed the small hard drive. “Computer. Recover any data on this drive,” ordered Wade as he placed the drive into the computers input slot. “And wake me up when the scan is complete.” He then entered what passed as sleeping quarters, a small cargo bay, and tried to fall asleep on the floor.

A while later, Wade was woken by a soft beeping tone from the computer. Rising from the cold floor of the cargo bay, Wade asked, “Yes? What is it?” groggily.

“Scan complete,” stated the computer.

“Scan complete? Is that all? What did the scan detect?” Wade cried, almost shouting, as he thought, “I think I am going to have to try and reprogram this thing.”

“Landmarks match prior scans of Earth within a 1% margin of error. Unknown energy signatures have been detected in three locations.”

A map of Earth appeared on the screen with three flashing dots. Wade moved his finger over them as he thought where they would be on his planet. “London, Tokyo and the North Pole? This sounds familiar somehow. I know I’ve seen readings like that before. But where...” Wade watched the map in deep thought, his eyes always returning to the dot over Japan. “Computer, set a course for Japan.” Wade felt the shuttle drop out of orbit and pierce the atmosphere above the island chain below. “Is there some way to hide the shuttle?” he asked as the atmospheres friction slowed the shuttle to jet speeds.

“Affirmative, the shuttle may be hidden behind a holographic projection.”

Wade nodded to himself, “Activate the hologram and lock onto that energy signature. Transport me somewhere close to it.”

The computer beeped before Wade disappeared into a shower of light.

Azabu Juban, Minato, Tokyo, Japan, 1994CE

Wade looked around as the shimmering of the transporter disappeared to find that he was standing in the middle of a short alley. He picked up a newspaper from a nearby trashcan. His eyes moved to the only part he could easily understand.

“1994? Eight years back in time as well as a new universe?” Wade thought as he read the date. Putting the paper back on the pile, he turned the corner to see a tall structure atop a nearby hill. “Tokyo Tower, that makes a good reference to find my way around.”

As he started walking towards Tokyo Tower, Wade heard a scream of panic coming from behind him. Wade had enough time to turn around before he ended up flat on the ground. Looking up, Wade saw the young blond haired girl that had ran into him. The girl’s hair style seemed to remind Wade of something as he pushed himself to his feet. “Meatballs? No.. that’s not it. Dumplings? No. Odango.” Catching sight of a black cat arrive behind the girl, Wade saw a flicker of gold on its forehead. “A black cat as well? Why does this seem familiar? Maybe that cat is going to start tal..”

Wade’s train of thought was cut off by the girl bowing profusely as she kept repeating the word, “Gomen”. Scratching his head as he tried to remember what ‘gomen’ meant, Wade’s eyes went wide as he saw the girl’s brooch. He suddenly felt faint as the word “impossible” slipped from his lips. That brooch, that hair. Then that black cat with some sort of gold logo on its forehead beside her. Wade unconsciously stepped back, trying to form words.

“Ah... Anata no namae wa Tsukino Usagi desu ka?" asked Wade with some difficulty, hoping he had just asked if her name was Usagi.

She stopped to look at Wade, shocked that he knew her name. “H..hai..”

Wade’s jaw dropped as he backed away again. “S-Sailor Moon...” he stammered, still slowly backing away. A moment later, he tripped over his own foot and came tumbling to the ground.

Usagi shot Luna a surprised look as lifted her hand towards her brooch. The schoolgirl muttered “youma” quietly while the cat approached Wade and gazed at him. Wade tried to push himself away from the cat as the feline jumped onto his chest. Luna stared into Wade’s eyes. The boy shivered under the strong stare of the black cat.

“I don’t like this energy I feel from him,” stated Luna as she jumped back to the sidewalk, “I don’t think it’s a youma, but I feel something dark about him.”

The girl nodded and pulled the brooch off the red bow on her uniform. She lifted it into the air, “Moon Prism Power...”

Wade pushed himself to his feet and stumbled towards the building, “M.. me? Youma? H.. hang on there..” He saw a light grow out of the brooch to envelop Usagi and turned to run as the words “Make Up!” echoed out of the light.

Sailor Moon emerged from the light of her transformation in time to see a shower of sparkling lights cover the fleeing boy and then quickly fade away, taking the boy with them. Sailor Moon lowered her moon wand with a confused frown crossing her face, “I didn’t even get to say my speech.” cried the senshi with a dejected look. Besides her, Luna sighed and shock her head. “Ahhh... I’m late.” realised Moon in panic. She started running as light once again covered her. All thoughts of Wade left her mind as Tsukino Usagi resumed her morning rush to school.

On the other side of the street, a girl wearing the grey of a brand new T*A uniform watched the rushing odango haired girl. “I feel like I’ve seen that before...” she muttered to herself before walking in the other direction.

Sailor Pluto tapped her talisman against the gate, stopping the images with its doors. Lifting the Garnet Orb towards the sky, Pluto paused for a moment. ‘This is not good.’ thought the guardian of time, ‘This is not supposed to happen.’ Pluto was visibly shaken by the portal that had opened near the moon and the object that had passed through, “The timelines are unravelling!” yelled the temporal guardian into the winds around her. She could only see three options before her, none of them particularly favourable to her.

“It is either this or the loss of Crystal Tokyo. Either way, changes are going to happen. But the risk...” Pluto looked back towards the closed doors. “The risk is just something I’ll have to accept.”

Sailor Pluto held the Time Key high into to the air and whispered “Dead Scream”. A ball of violet energy left the Garnet Orb and moved into the sky. Pluto moved her staff a fraction to the left and said, this time yelling, “Dead Scream”. A tornado like wind developed around the top of the Garnet Orb as the violet/black energy gathered. A massive second ball left the Orb to follow its smaller partner.

Wade paced through the shuttles cockpit rambling. “This... This can’t be happening. It’s impossible. I can’t handle this... It is just too much. Why me?”

“Please rephrase the question,” stated the computer.

Wade stopped in his tracks and looked at the console. “Computer. Shut up. You’re not helping.”

“Please rephrase the request,” repeated the computer.

Wade appeared as if he was about to explode, “Computer. Disable vocal subroutines.” Wade sat down as the computer beeped its acknowledgement. Breathing heavily, he began to claim down. “Alright... I’m stuck in the past, in a different universe. Sailor Moon is real. If she’s real, then the other senshi must be as well...” Wade tapped on his broken laptop resting on the main console, he scanned across the displays and saw a bar indicating that everything that could be recovered from the laptop had been. With a smile he looked up, “Computer, scan all data recovered from the damaged drive and show me all files related to ‘Sailor Moon’ and ‘Time’.”

A moment later the computer beeped, drawing Wade's attention to the screen. ‘One file located’ was screwed across the screen. After pressing the text, a small grainy image appeared. The image was of someone older then Sailor Moon but wearing a similar outfit. She had long green looking hair and her skirt and collar were black. Wade slapped his forehead, “Of course. Sailor Pluto, the Time Gate. Computer. Set a course for Pluto and engage at full speed.”

Twin spheres of violet energy moved through space, each gaining power as they travelled through the cold, dead depths towards the bright star in the center of the system. They changed course slightly as they plunged through the depths of Jupiter’s thick atmosphere.

The hologram surrounding the shuttle dropped as it pushed its way out of Earth’s gravity. Wade saw the moon come into view from below the horizon as the computer angled the shuttle towards the distant tiny planet on the fair side of the system. ‘I hope that show was right and there really is a Time Gate on Pluto.” thought Wade with a sigh as he looked out the window.

Pluto’s energy slammed through the asteroid belt, obliterating large numbers of tiny micro-asteroids as they moved among the giant rocks. The powerful spheres of energy continued though the inner Solar System disturbing the atmospheres of Mars and Venus.

Together they swept around the Sun and turned towards Earth and the moon.

As the shuttle picked up speed from its damaged sublight engine, Wade stared in wonder at the twisting dimensional rip nearby. He could not believe that the glowing multicoloured tear could be powerful enough to cross dimensions.

While he was watching the tear in wonder, Wade felt the shuttle start to rattle. The shaking increased as a massive sphere of violet energy came closer to the shuttle and into his view. The energy sphere quickly moved over the shuttle. Wade watched, wide-eyed, as the shuttle-sized mass of energy shot through space towards the dimensional rip.

The rip moved out of view as the shuttle turned away from the moon. Then he saw it; the second sphere of energy, moving towards the shuttle. For a moment a bright rainbow light washed over Wade’s view as the first sphere crashed into the rip. As the light faded away, the other sphere was so close that Wade thought he could reach out and touch it.

Wade sat transfixed as the energy hit the shuttle. The helm console exploded in a shower of flame and shrapnel, throwing Wade out of the chair and into the rear bulkhead. One by one, the shuttles systems began overloading as the power spiked, and a power conduit above the cockpit overloaded, spraying superheated sparks all over the room. Wade cried in pain as some of the sparks burnt into his unprotected legs.

The shuttle stalled before being jolted backwards and spun out of control towards the nearest gravitational source. The Moon.

Sailor Pluto watched though the Time Gate as the shuttle listed towards the moon. She tapped her staff and a new portal opened between the shuttle and the moon’s surface.

Moments later, the shuttle entered the time portal. Its flash was overshadowed by the multicoloured explosion blasting out in all directions from the dimensional rip.

When the light had faded, the rip, the portal, and the shuttle were gone.

“You realize what you have done, don’t you?” came a booming voice from behind Pluto.

Pluto turned slightly towards the voice and nodded. “I do. It was the only foreseeable solution that had highest chance of bringing Crystal Tokyo.” She turned back to the gate to see the shuttle passing through the temporal winds within the passage.

“No, you have just destroyed this timeline...” replied the voice. Pluto turned back with a worried look. “...And began a new one.”

Meiou Setsuna dropped to her knees before the gate as her fuku disappeared.

As the shuttle left the temporal passage, a bright white light left the gate covering everything in the universe.
“I hope my past self knows what to do,” was the last thought in the timeline before the universe shattered.