Adins Presents
A Totally Unnecessary Re-Write of a Sailor Moon Fanfic that he Never Even Finished
My Four Kings CRISTAL
Oh Lord yes, it's that time again. I know I teased a re-write of "My Four Kings" over two years ago by posting a bogus introduction declaring the story to be "COMPLETE!" without even having started writing it at the time (and there was some mention of muffins as well), but for the first time in, well, ever, I'm not actually lying about the state of completion of "My Four Kings CRISTAL" when I say the story is done. All 26 chapters are sitting on my hard drive right now. So why not post the whole thing right out of the gate? Why did I only post the first few chapters? Well because when I say it's done I mean there are 26 chapters written all of about 3 paragraphs each…
See this time rather than writing at the speed of thought and getting myself tangled in a more ugly mess of threads than a pair of denim cut-offs, I decided that I would plot the whole thing out FIRST, then go back and, you know, actually write the story. Isn't that a wild idea? I wonder why that particular thought never occurred to me before now. Couldn't possibly be because I resolutely declared that I knew what I was doing the first time around and that making it up as I went along couldn't POSSIBLY be the absolute worst approach to writing a novel-length fanfic. Nope. Admittedly, my approach to the original "My Four Kings" was not sufficient to tell the story I eventually envisioned. Grabbing characters and story ideas, set pieces and scenes and tossing them into a literary food processor to see what came out the other end only worked for so long until one day I forgot to close the lid and made a royal mess of my word kitchen.
But enough about my past failings as a competent storyteller; let's talking about my most recent failing: "My Four Kings CRISTAL!" Oh, were to begin? I shall now take questions from the floor of the internet:
Q. Why are you writing a new version of "My Four Kings?" Why don't you finish the original version? I thought it was going fine! Are you that insecure that you can't even see a self-admitted failure through to completion? The old Adins would say "Screw it! Let's have some more dick jokes!" and just get it done. I thought you were much more charismatic and handsome in those days…
First off, it should be noted that the original "My Four Kings" started off as crack!fic. I was in college and I was more or less channeling my experiences into the characters of the Shitennou to tell a funny, aimless story about four roommates who couldn't quite get their act together. As we all know the story eventually takes a more serious turn and to be honest it's because it's hard to be funny all the time. But even though this re-write owes a lot to Sailor Moon Crystal, I was very much aware of how super-duper-serious that show tended to be pretty much every episode. So with that in mind, I still intend to be comedy-forward with "My Four Kings CRISTAL" (Henceforth M4KC because OH MY GOD what a stupid title…) but there will be a significantly expanded focus on the main plot arc which is of the rather serious variety. And overall the quality and cohesion of the original story was fairly lacking, mostly because I didn't plan anything and the first major revision I did back in 2013 probably made it worse.
Q. How exactly does Sailor Moon Crystal influence M4KC? There were a lot of people who hated that show. Am I going to hate this story now? Am I going to hate you? Why are you forcing me into these emotional pockets?
Well for one Crystal reenergized my interest in Sailor Moon as a whole. You all know I like to pull a disappearing act every few years. I have no excuse; sometimes I just get bored with whatever I'm obsessing over and have to leave it alone for a while. However, seeing the Shitennou again and getting even just the tiniest slivers of new dialogue and personality traits (and those oh-so wonderful and hilarious titles that the Pastel Knights received – "Nephrite, the Knight of Intelligence and Comfort!" HAHA! How the hell does that jive with my booze-swilling socially ineffectual Nephrite?) was enough to kick me into gear. With that in mind, Crystal presents all the characters, not just the Shitennou, as quite a bit more, um, shall we say subdued compared to the way I write them, so I thought it would be fun to see if I could make my versions of the characters fit Crystal's mood. Since Crystal had 26 episodes I decided a good chapter length to shoot for with this re-write would also be 26 and yes, M4KC is more or less divided down the middle at chapter 14 by two specific story arcs. Ain't that a hoot?
Since it's now been announced that Crystal will continue into the Infinity Arc and presumably all the way through Sailor Stars, I'm using the Manga continuity so no more wacky AU and head-scratching as to when or where this story takes place. Also, despite my excitement that Crystal introduced a few new scenes of Shitennou dialogue and showed them all interacting as a team together at one point, I'm well aware of the fact that there wasn't a whole lot of character on display in those moments. For better or worse the Shitennou remain characters one step removed from complete blank slates, so I will continue to go back to the well of the Classic Anime, PGSM, SeraMyu, and certain well-established fanon tropes to flesh out their personalities. Rest assured Nephrite is still the vocal center of most crude humor, but now maybe it's because he's intelligent enough to know that humor eases tension and provides a level of comfort in otherwise painful circumstances.
Q. Is this a Senshi/Shitennou 4x4 romance fic now that Crystal kinda-sorta made it canon? On that same topic, when people on Tumblr talk about how much they love a certain fictional relationship they sometimes refer to themselves as "trash." Why is that? Isn't love supposed to be beautiful? Or is this some sort of wabi-sabi-esque abstract philosophy about the beauty of imperfection and decay? Like that scene in "American Beauty" of the plastic bag dancing in the breeze? Can you please help me? I'm terrified of Tumblr.
On one hand I'd like it to be a story about the relationships of the Senshi and Shitennou because I know how many people enjoy those stories, but I'm lousy at writing romance for one couple. Five (including Mamoru & Usagi) would be ludicrous. Also, as much as I enjoy reading those kinds of stories, I'm not personally a shipper; mostly because I don't like getting caught up in 'ship wars, but also because I don't think the whole "Miralce-Romance-for-all" angle makes a lot of sense. One predestined magic power couple is a good story. Five of those couples are, uh, nice? But also lazy. Add to that the fact that the only concrete example of what might be considered another truly romantic couple in Crystal is Venus and Kunzite, so yeah; I'm not 100% on board. That being said, I did touch on the majority of the now-canonical pairings in the original "My Four Kings," so that plot point will come up in one form or another.
Q. I don't have any more questions. I was only told I only needed to prepare three and I don't like to over-achieve. You got anything else, or can I get my gold star and leave now? Man really I hate these meetings…
Finally, and this one is will definitely be a tough pill to swallow for fans of the original "My Four Kings" (including myself), but to make the reworked plot of the story flow the best way possible, I unfortunately had to remove the character of Ares / William Shatner the Dog. I tried my damndest to make him work, even going so far as to have Helios transform into a dog instead of a Pegasus for some contrived reason (feel free to steal that idea for your own use), but it just wasn't happening. I therefore dedicate this re-write to the memory of that capricious canine. Let it forever be known in the halls of legend that he was, indeed, a good boy.
So that's about all the nonsense I intend to spout off for the moment and I'm sure everyone still reading is anxious for me to shut the hell up so they can get on with the business of reading about their four favorite misfits again. You know you could just click the button to go on to the first chapter, but I do thank you for reading this far into the introduction anyway. I'm glad I have an audience who appreciates the effort I put into legitimizing my efforts and being a literal apologist of myself.
So if you're new to the story or if you've been here since day one and just want to see how I hacked apart and duct-taped the original back together and cleverly called it a re-write, pull up your VIP seats at the bar, crack open a High Life on the house, and welcome back to the Four Kings Bar & Grill because it's been a long time coming and we all deserve a drink!
Or twenty-six…
-Adins