For the One I Love
Chapter Four
"Slipping Back"
"He actually did it..."
Chibi-Usa stood rooted to the ground horror stricken, gazing up at where Seiya had vanished.
"That complete idiot!" Haruka howled.
"What does he mean?" Minako looked around anxiously. "To prove we create our own destiny? Going back to a time where Mamoru and Usagi aren't together?"
"Seiya's convinced that if they'd have met earlier, before those two got together." Yaten pointed to Usagi and Mamoru. "That he would stand a fighting chance."
"What, that's ludicrous!" Rei fussed.
"What on Earth does he plan to do exactly? Force Usagi's past self to fall for him?" Makoto turned to Taiki, who shrugged.
"I have no idea." He shook his head at her. "I have no idea what goes through that idiot's skull half the time."
"Whatever reasons," Ami interrupted. She had noticed how uncomfortable Usagi was becoming at the conversation. "The point is Seiya is gone and we need to get him back."
"Well, what do we do? Minako asked no one in particular.
"I'm going home." Everyone turned to look at Usagi as she said it. "I just- I'd like to go home for a while." No one objected, and she turned to go in silence. Mamoru paused for a moment, then cocked his head in her direction before walking away himself.
"Oh, Usagi." Rei said quietly.
"I'm going too." Chibi-Usa sprinted after Mamoru, who was now escorting Usagi away with his arm wrapped around her waist.
"We should leave them alone for tonight I think." Ami suggested, a few nodded.
"This is all your friend's fault." Haruka seethed as she watched the three of them walk away. She directed her malice towards Taiki and Yaten. "It always is."
"Now hold on a minute." Taiki began angrily.
"Enough." Michiru said sternly, more so to Haruka. "Bickering between us is not going to solve anything. We're allies now. We need to come up with a way to solve this, together."
"Rei-"
Rei nodded at Setsuna, already knowing what she was about to ask. "Let's head over to my place. We can fill in Usagi and the others later."
OoOoOoOoOoOoOoO
Everything was dark. Seiya laid sprawled across a cold surface with his hand clutched tightly to the key. He kept his eyes shut tightly as light began to warm the backs of his eyelids. Gradually the distant sound of a city grew louder around him. Dazed, and certain he hadn't done more than get lifted into the air just to come crashing down, he cautiously opened his eyes to see where was. "Am I really…"
"Uh, dude, are you alright?" A man dressed in a purple shit and jean shorts came up to him. Seiya looked up at the man and then around him. He was sitting in the middle of a small shopping area, the one he had been at moments before except the, "Closed" signs from before now read, "Open."
"What year is it?" Seiya asked. The guy looked at him highly concerned.
"1993… did you hit your head or something man? If you want I can call someone-" Seiya jumped up from the ground not listening.
"1993? I, really did it? Three years ago… Usagi must be, fourteen?" He shook the guy's hand excitedly. "Thanks! I'm okay, er, just had too much to drink is all." Seiya swiftly took off, leaving the man scratching his head.
Where Seiya was going he did not know, but he felt a sense of freedom. Here he was in the past, where no one knew of him as Sailor Star Fighter or the famous singer Seiya Kou, and the best part of all, Mamoru and Usagi were not together.
He ran down the streets against the many onlookers, and before he realized it, found himself in front of her house. He started up at her balcony as he had done the night of their school festival, what felt like so long ago.
"Can I help you with something?" Seiya swung around to the voice of a young boy. He had short brown hair and blue eyes. In his hand was a school bag, and he wore a nametag which read: Tsukino Shingo.
"You're Usagi's brother?" He asked.
"Oh, you know Usagi. She's not home right now. I think she might be out with her friends." He said. "But let me go check."
Seiya's heart started to race. "Ah, err…" Before he could protest, Shingo was already inside the house calling his sister's name. A few minutes later, he returned empty handed. "Nope, she's not home."
"R-right… thank you anyway!" He stammered nervously.
"Wait!" Shingo called back as Seiya exited their front gate. "Don't you want me to tell her you were here?"
"No that's alright, I'll see her later!" He called back. "Seiya, you idiot." He thought to himself as he walked back down the street. In his excitement, he momentarily forgot that coming back to the past would mean Usagi also wouldn't know him. He didn't even want to imagine how she would have reacted to Seiya approaching her so familiarly. "I'll have to meet her all over again… first I need a place to stay."
SMACK! "Ouch!" Without paying attention to where he was going, Seiya rammed into something solid, causing him to stumble down to the concrete. He looked up to see a small, blonde female figure on the ground across from him, holding her head.
"Owww…" She said with a strained voice.
Seiya shifted on the ground so he was sitting next to her. "Hey are you alri- heh!" He stopped mid sentence after seeing just whom he bumped into. The small figure looked up at him with giant royal blue eyes, her golden blonde hair done up in dumplings. "Usagi!" He couldn't stop himself in time. The shock of seeing her this soon, and this young surprised him.
"You know me?" Her voice sounded strained. Something was wrong; her usual beautiful eyes were red and puffy, as if she had been crying for hours. Seiya couldn't help himself. He stuck out his hand and ran his fingers along her soft pale cheek. Slowly, he brought his other hand up to her eyes and wiped away her sadness.
"Usagi…"
OoOoOoOoOoOoOoO
"Hoho, you wanna say that again louder?!" Yaten was standing, his fist shaking as he looked Haruka in the eyes. Taiki lazily held him back by the tail end of his shirt.
"Alright, midget." Haruka smirked.
"Why you!"
"Oh please…" Makoto flipped her body over a pillow, staring at everyone upside-down. Minako sipped on some soda in the corner of the room, flipping the next page in her magazine. The only one's still trying to carry on any form of civilized conversation were Setsuna and Ami.
Even Michiru seemed to be at her wits end. "What made me possibly think we could come up with a solution together without this nonsense?" She exhaled loudly.
"Sudden lapse of craziness." Minako remarked nonchalantly, flipping another magazine page.
Haruka and Yaten were still going at it when the temple doors flew open. Chibi-Usa stood in their opening, looking extremely worried.
"Chibi-Usa-chan?" Ami asked, surprised to see her.
"What's wrong?" Hotaru saw how troubled she looked.
"Usagi's sick." She said. "She started to complain about a headache, then she went to bed with a slight fever."
"She's been really stressed lately." Rei replied, but Chibi-Usa shook her head.
"That's what we thought, but she's not waking up. Why? What's he done?!" They all knew the 'he' she was referring to was Seiya.
Michiru turned to Setsuna. "Could there really be vibrations this predominant already?"
Setsuna thought about it for a moment. "Normally no, but-"
"Vibrations?" Yaten questioned as he grudgingly sat back down.
"Think of them like ripples." Setsuna explained. "As Seiya interferes in past events, his actions will ultimately change things. These changes will cause ripples to spread out from his actions, touching us here. However, usually when this happens they're so minute we wouldn't feel anything."
"Then why are we?" Minako asked.
"Normally, it would take a lot to cause any sort of true ripple we would actually feel. Just visiting and even living in the past for a period of time wouldn't cause any real harm. However, considering whose timeline Seiya's directly trying to tamper with, things are much more precarious."
"You said something earlier," Taiki spoke up. "about there being major consequences, and about how dangerous this was?" Setsuna nodded. "Is this what you meant?"
Michiru, Setsuna, and Haruka all looked at each other frowning. "Yes, and no…" Michiru said somberly.
"Based on the goal of Seiya's time jump, whose timeline he is interfering with, and where exactly in the past he is tampering with, Seiya not only has the possibility to interfere and cause small changes, but has the potential to change our current reality as we know it."
"Wait- What?!" Taiki half rose from his seat. Yaten remained seated beside him, but his mouth fell slightly open. "You're telling me he actually has the ability to change our reality? How is that possible?"
"You mean… that's only if he somehow succeeds in his goal, right? Getting Usagi to fall for him instead? Because that would change things here." Yaten asked hopefully, knowing it wasn't likely to happen and therefore needing not worry about it.
"No." Haruka said flatly. "By interfering in Usagi's timeline, he's basically interfering in who has control over this planet, and then some."
Taiki opened his mouth to speak, promptly closed it, then buried his head in his hands. "…Lovely. So, what's next?"
"First, let's go see Usagi-san." Setsuna stood from the temple floor. "I'd like to try and gauge the severity of what we're dealing with."
"Setsuna…" Chibi-Usa cooed from the doorway. "What happens if we can't get Seiya to come back? What'll happen to Usagi? Can one person really re-write history?"
Setsuna didn't respond for a few seconds. "Small Lady," She tried to be gentle. "you know as well as I do, what can happen when someone tries to re-write history."
Like a vision from a bad dream, memories came flooding back to the child's mind. An attack on her home, people running and screaming, bright flashes of light, and a mad prince laughing as Crystal Tokyo fell into nothing. Her mother, seemingly dead.
"I don't want any of that to happen…not again."
"And we won't let it." Hotaru took her friend's hand.
"Alright." Minako closed the cover of her magazine, finally glad to be doing something besides arguing. "Let's go."