Introduction: The other night out curiosity I decided to browse through the Sailor Moon fanfics to see if there were any stories that dealt with Pluto being reclassified as a dwarf planet. As a Sailor Moon fan, I've excepted that reclassification and I had to wonder if other people felt the same way. Anyway, it turned out that there were at least a few humorous stories that dealt with Sailor Pluto's reaction to her planted being reclassified. I read most of them and added some to my list of favorites. And that very same night I decided that I'd take a break from my current projects try my own hand at doing a similar story. So here's this one-shot that I ended up piecing together this afternoon.
Disclaimer: I do not own Sailor Moon.
100 Slides of Pain
The night had grown very late as Setsuna Meiou typed away on the computer in her room. She paused for a moment to look at the clock on her wall. It was just a little after 1:30 AM. If it were any other night, Setsuna probably would've shut off her computer and gotten ready for bed. But she couldn't go to be on this night, not until she finished what she was working on. This was the night when she would finally be ready to execute her plan for revenge.
It all began on a fateful day back in 2006 when the scientific community had decided that Pluto, the very planet that represented Setsuna's power as a Sailor Senshi, was nothing more than a dwarf planet. Nothing but a single meaningless piece of rock that just happened to have an orbit in Earth's solar system. In the beginning Setsuna simply brushed this reclassification off. After all, she knew for herself that Pluto was a true planet, and no conclusion from a bunch of nameless astronomers was going to change that. Had things simply ended with the declaration of those clueless scientists, there would've been no issue, but that declaration was merely just the beginning.
After the news of Planet Pluto's demotion came out, the other members of the Sailor Team began to tease Setsuna about it. In the beginning Setsuna merely laughed it off, but after awhile it quickly began to wear thin, especially during battle. Haruka was the worst out of them all, of course. It was the name-calling and all the short jokes that really got under Setsuna's skin. Before the whole dwarf planet thing, the green-haired guardian of time never thought that a short joke could ever be applied to someone of her height, but Haruka had found a way. Over time it started to get a little worse and worse. It was when Hotaru finally started cracking jokes about the dwarf planet classification when Setsuna finally snapped.
But Setsuna didn't throw a tantrum or anything like that. Behavior like that was far too beneath her. Instead she remained calm and collected, and began trying to figure the best way to get back at everyone. Then one day while she was at a coffee shop, Setsuna overheard a group of college students complaining about a long and boring lecture that a professor of theirs had forced them to endure when the prefect idea finally came to her. On that day she began to craft her exquisite plan for revenge. She started by finding the one lecture hall in all of Tokyo that had the most uncomfortable chairs and arranged a date with the owners when she could use the hall for an entire day. For her plan to be fully effective, Setsuna needed as much time to pull it off as possible.
After she had booked the lecture hall, Setsuna had made some rather creative modifications to the doors and some of the chairs. With the hardware aspect of her plan taken care of, Setsuna began work on the heart of her scheme. She had taken care of the notes for her lecture the night before. All that was left was to complete the presentation itself. With just a few more keystrokes, the green-haired time guardian finished the final slide. She then went through everything again and added the flashiest transitions and effects she had to the presentation. After performing a test run on the screen to make sure everything was just right, Setsuna took a triumphant sip from the glass of wine sitting on her desk. Everything was finally ready.
It was a little after 7:00 AM on a Saturday morning as Haruka Tenou drove her yellow Ferrari through the city streets. Her lover, Michiru Kaiou sat in the seat next to her simply looking at the passing scenery. Their adopted daughter, Hotaru Tomoe sat in the back reading a book of horror stories. Haruka never totally understood how Hotaru had gained such a macabre taste in literature. Though she assumed that it might have something to do with the fact that Hotaru's biological father was a mad scientist, not to mention the girl's power to destroy an entire solar system.
"I hope we're not running late." Michiru spoke. "Setsuna really stressed that we had to be as this place by 7:30."
"We'll be there in plenty of time." The blonde tomboy assured her. "Though I don't know why we have to be at some lecture hall on a Saturday morning."
"I'm sure Setsuna has a very good reason." Michiru assumed. "It did seem like it was important."
"Well, I'm sure we'll find out whatever it is Dwarf Girl wants when we get there." Haruka replied.
"You know, maybe we should cut out all the jokes about Pluto being called a dwarf planet." Michiru suggested. "I don't think Setsuna really appreciates it."
"C'mon Michi, Sets knows we're just kidding around." The blonde told her.
"I don't know. Lately it seems like that kind of talk irritates Setsuna." The aqua-haired girl replied. "I mean you don't see it on her face, but…"
"Okay, okay. I'll consider laying off on the dwarf planet stuff." Haruka told her. "You gotta admit though, some of that stuff really is pretty funny. Remember that joke Rei made the other day about Sets becoming the eighth member of the seven dwarves?"
"Okay, that was pretty amusing." Michiru admitted with a small chuckle. "How about that time Mina handed Setsuna those marbles she found and said that they were Pluto's moons?"
"Oh yeah, that was priceless!" Haruka laughed.
After a few more moments, the trio made it to the university campus where Setsuna had asked they meet her. As soon as Haruka parked the car, the three of them immediately headed for the lecture hall. When the entered the auditorium, they found Setsuna standing by the podium wearing an elegant white lab coat. Of course everything seemed to look rather elegant when Setsuna was wearing it.
"Thank you for coming." Setsuna greeted with a calm yet very serious expression. She then pulled out a cardboard box from under the podium. "Before you move to your assigned seats, put your cell phones in this box."
"Seriously?" Haruka asked.
"Just do it." Setsuna ordered somewhat sternly.
Haruka looked at Michiru and Hotaru for a moment and shrugged. They decided to play along in the end and went over to put their phones in the box provided to them.
"Now then, go and move to your assigned seats." Setsuna told them.
The trio looked and saw that three of the seats in the two front rows had cards with their names written on them taped to the front. Five of the other seats in that same cluster also had cards with the names of Usagi and the Inners.
"Hey! How come I'm seated two seats away from Michiru?" Haruka asked.
"Because I don't want the two of you distracting one another." Setsuna explained. "Now go sit down."
Michiru sat down in her assigned seat in the second two seats away from Haruka's right. Hotaru meanwhile sat down in the seat right in front of the blonde.
"These chairs seem pretty uncomfortable." Michiru remarked as she squirmed around a bit in her seat.
"Yeah. They're like rocks." Hotaru agreed.
"Sets, what the heck is this about?" Haruka asked.
"You'll find out when the others get here." Setsuna answered. "For now, just keep quiet."
Almost on cue, Usagi and the four Inner Senshi entered the auditorium. As soon as they arrived, Setsuna instructed them to hand over their phones and sit in their assigned seats. Usagi ended up sitting on Haruka's right, while Rei sat in the chair between Michiru and Usagi. The remaining three took the last three seats in the front row by Hotaru.
"Well, we're all here, Dwarf Girl. So what's all this about?" an impatient Haruka asked.
"Little cracks like the one you just made, Haruka are the very reason why I asked you all to come here this morning!" Setsuna snapped. "I'll admit that when the news about my planet being classified as a dwarf planet came out, I had a little bit of a laugh just like the rest of you. But things have gone too far! It seems that Pluto has now become one big joke to you all."
"We're sorry, Setsuna." Usagi told her. "None of us ever meant to upset you."
"Yeah, I guess we just got carried away." Makoto added.
"I'm afraid it's too late for a simple apology." Setsuna told them. "The only way to correct this behavior is to reeducate all of you on the kind of planet Pluto actually is."
With that, Setsuna pulled out a small remote from her pocket and caused the projector in the room to flare to life. Appearing on the screen was a blue slide with the title, Pluto: The Shining Gem on the Edge of the Solar System.
"A PowerPoint presentation? Seriously?" Haruka exclaimed as she rose from her chair.
Setsuna pressed another button on her remote. The sound of heavy metal bolts suddenly emanated from each door in the large room. Haruka and the others suddenly became unsettled by what was happening.
"I think you'll find that escape using normal methods is impossible." Setsuna informed them. "And…" her garnet rod appeared in her left hand, "if any of you attempts to escape this room using your powers, I won't hesitate to send any of you back to the ice age."
The color instantly drained from the faces of Setsuna's captive audience. On some level they were sure that the green-haired time guardian was probably bluffing, but they didn't want to take the chance. Haruka immediately sat down and kept her mouth shut.
"Now then," Setsuna began as she stepped behind the podium, "we have a lot of ground to cover. So I suggest you all pay close attention."
With that, Setsuna began a long detailed lecture on the glory of Pluto and how it was an indispensible cog in the machine that was Earth's solar system, pointing out how the small planet played a vital role in certain celestial alignments. She then got into the history of how the human race had first discovered Pluto and how they barely had any idea about what they had truly found. By the time Setsuna got to the twenty-fourth or twenty-fifth slide of her presentation, Haruka looked at her watch. Somehow, the lecture had been going on for a little over five hours.
"This is sooo boring!" Usagi quietly whined. "I'm starting to get a headache."
"There's gotta be a way out of this." Haruka responded.
"You know, I could just turn into Sailor Saturn right now and destroy the world." Hotaru suggested. "It'd all be over in like a minute."
"I'm all for blowing up the world if it'll get us out of this." Haruka agreed.
"Hey!" Setsuna interrupted, causing them all to flinch. "I heard that, you three! Hotaru Tomoe, if you even think of using your powers to destroy the world just to get out of my presentation, I will use my powers to put each and everyone of you in a time loop! Taboos or not, I swear to god I will pull a Groundhog Day on all of you!"
"Sorry, Setsuna-mama." A rather frightened Hotaru told her.
"Now then… I seemed to have completely lost my place." Setsuna continued. "So I'll start over from the beginning."
Haruka and the others all groaned as Setsuna took her presentation back to the very first slide. More time passed as Setsuna went over the material she had just gone through. As the lecture continued, Setsuna talked about the influence that her precious planet had on modern culture. She then began to painstakingly go into every single reason why the astronomers were incorrect on their classification of Pluto as a dwarf planet. Haruka and the others weren't sure how much more of the presentation they could take. Even Ami began to lose it as the mind-numbing lecture dragged on, and she had the highest tolerance for lectures and PowerPoint presentations out of everyone in the group.
By the time Setsuna got to the sixtieth slide, her audience began to doze off even with their uncomfortable seating. The green-haired time guardian was prepared for this eventuality though. Each time a member of her audience started to drift off she pressed a little button on her podium that would activate a device in each seat and give the others a tiny electric shock that would jolt them awake. Usagi and Minako were the ones who were shocked the most. By the time Setsuna finally got to the ninetieth slide, Usagi let out a loud sneeze that caused Setsuna to pause.
"Oh dear… I seem to have completely lost my place." Setsuna told them. "So I'll start from the beginning again."
The other senshi let out another loud groan at this news. Rei and Haruka cursed out Usagi a bit for causing the ordeal to start all over again. Setsuna then began to go through each and every one of her previous slides for a third time, taking Haruka and the others to the very limit of her mental endurance. After what could've been a millennium, Setsuna finally reached a slide with the words, "the end" written in big white letters.
"…That concludes my lecture." Setsuna finished. "I hope you've all learned something from this."
With that, the sound of the doors being unlocked echoed through the room. The other eight Sailor Senshi got out of their chairs stretching their backs and necks after sitting in their rock-hard chairs for an eternity. After they collected their phones they left the lecture hall to find that the sun had already begun to set. The gentle breeze felt refreshing after spending practically an entire day inside of a stuffy lecture hall.
"That was brutal!" Minako declared. "I'm never making fun of Pluto again."
"I don't even want to hear the term, dwarf planet again for as long as I live." Ami told them.
At that point, a familiar pair of black and white cats with crescent-shaped marks on their foreheads approached them. The group instantly recognized them as Luna and Artemis.
"There you all are!" the black cat, Luna spoke as she walked up.
"What the heck are all of you doing here?" Artemis asked.
"We just finished getting the PowerPoint lecture from hell from Setsuna." Haruka explained.
"Oh dear. Is this about the whole dwarf planet thing?" Luna quickly deduced. "I told you all to stop making fun of her about that."
"Luna, we've all learned out lesson for tonight." Minako told her. "Now if you and Artemis value your lives, you'll save us the lecture. We've all had enough of that kind of crap for the day."
"C'mon, Michi. Let's get out of here." Haruka told her aqua-haired lover. "It's been way too long a day."
With that, Haruka got into her car with Michiru and Hotaru and drove away from the university as fast as the speed limit would allow. It wasn't very long before Hotaru began to doze off in the back.
"Well Michi, you were right… again." Haruka sighed. "I should've laid off on the jokes about Pluto."
"We all took it too far." Michiru replied.
"Man! My neck's killing me from having to sit in that goddamn chair all day." Haruka declared.
"If you like, I can massage it for you when we get home." Michiru offered.
"Think we could do a few 'other things' while we're at it?" Haruka asked with a cocky smirk.
"I'm sure that can be arranged." Michiru replied with a wink.
FIN
Author's Note: So there you all have it. Probably not my best work, but it was a fun little story to do. I hope everyone enjoyed reading it. I apologize if any of the characters were OOC or if I had gotten any other details wrong. This is only my second attempt at a Sailor Moon fanfic (I deleted my first for various reasons). I'm not sure how this story is going to fit into my Moon and Cat project, but I'll work it in somewhere.
On a different note, I currently have a poll going on my profile page to help me decide weather or not I should to a Sailor Moon/Godzilla crossover where Sailor Moon meets Mothra (poll will be close by January 2nd, 2015). I'd appreciate any votes on that pole I can get.
Please review and let me know what you think.