Counting Down Ch. 3
18 May 2016 18:47Author's Note: While others may have different interpretations, it always seemed apparent to me that Sailor Moon utilizes the “Dynamic Timeline” theory of time travel, wherein a time traveler starts changing outcomes the moment they travel back in time. This is why Pluto is not as omniscient as you'd expect.
\o/
“So, wait, your Timer tried to keep track of me when I went back to the future?”
“Yes, and it was disturbing. I thought it was broken!”
Chibiusa smiled apologetically, and nuzzled into Hotaru's shoulder. “I'm sorry I worried you.”
Hotaru simply hugged her beloved friend (though that never seemed quite the right word), and thanked every relevant deity she knew that her destined was real, and not a toddler when they met. But that was a concern for another time.
\o/
As Usagi told her what she knew about Hotaru's fate, Chibiusa stole a glance at her wrist, and her eyes widened. She beheld, impossibly, a new countdown, to a date less than two weeks away.
\o/
When Chibiusa returned to the future for what should have been the last time, her Timer's display flickered chaotically between a blessed series of zeroes, and impenetrable static, just as she teetered between existence and the void. Something was happening in the past to make her present uncertain, and she'd be damned if she didn't turn the outcome in her favor. She would not adhere to a policy of noninterference at the price of oblivion.
\o/
“Your Timer's been showing static every time you've gone back?”
Chibiusa scratched at her cheek and replied, “Well, not every time? Last time it kept jumping between static and zeroes.” She perked up. “Hey, maybe I'll be able to find you there, this time! Now that the biggest bad in the galaxy's been put down, you might survive!”
Hotaru smiled wryly. “Chibiusa... a thousand years without you isn't exactly a comforting prospect.”
Chibiusa blinked at that, then donned the fierce look of one determined to change fate. “Then I guess I'll have to make sure you don't go without me.” She grinned, and continued, “Even prisons allow conjugal visits, right?”
Hotaru choked, blushed, and sputtered, “Chibiusa!”
The aforementioned just laughed.