Anime Addventure Homage Second Take

Edited: 10/4/2020 - Finally had a chance to back over this and  make the corrections Hiryo had pointed out.  Probably too late to matter, but there you are.

Hey Everybody! So it is the seventh, and the question about whether or not you all would like to see me take up some of the old Anime Addventure round-robin type stories has been decided. Since it was not a weighted poll, you all can see the results on that thread page, but here it is anyway. With a three percent lead on its nearest opponent, it has been decided that you all would like to see what I can do with them. Which I am happy to give you.

Remember, I might not continue this experiment in months, which are not so Harry-dominated as I expect September (no Stallion of the Line does not count as a September release LOL) and October to be. In HP dominated months though you can expect three of these episodes at a minimum. A further note: since I am not building on past episodes, most of this one is original, the rest is a mix of several different episodes. The non-original stuff will be underlined. I also change the wording of the choices at the end in order, in order to give a bit more detail. {in this manner I will also show where the thread might go} With that being said here is the first, so-called restart point I chose, the one called Setsuna’s Fault, Vimesenthusiast-style!

Episode 1: It Began with A Vision and Monster Soda…

A shining star. A city of diamond-like beauty. A crystal jewel on an otherwise ravaged world. The Great Freeze had come, but Crystal Tokyo stood, inviolable. The people within, unchanging, united in purpose and fealty to the House of Serenity, served by the Sailor Soldiers. A future, where what remained of humanity would no longer be plagued by the negative emotions and desires which had plagued them, driven them like cattle. Instead, all were happy, all in their right place, all where they should be, with no violence, no wars and nothing changing the status quo. A perfect future.

As Sailor Pluto, the Soldier of Time stared at the image in front of her, she should have felt fulfilled. Her life’s work, the task she had been mandated to follow her entire life since the fall of the Moon Empire. This image in the Gates of Time, however, was not a representative of an assured victory. Instead, it was still only a possibility. Worse still, as Pluto watched the odds of Crystal Tokyo coming into being was decreasing, something was wrong.

It wasn’t a direct threat though, she knew that. No, a direct threat could be dealt with in the ‘now’ rather than show up as a percentage in the Gates of Time. This was some random factor being added into the mix sometime during the Sailor Scout timeline. Like a pebble in a pond, this random factor had changed things. “A Chaotic Element, then. Again…” Pluto intoned, her voice ending in a long sigh before she gestured with her staff to the side.

At her gesture, a large sofa slid out of the side of the room housing the Gate of Time, followed by a side table. She checked inside and was relieved to see that the coffee and snacks she had remembered should be there were. It was always hard to keep track of them, especially after Chibiusa started to come back to spend time with her parents before they technically became her parents.

“Honestly that girl, treating the timestream likes it’s just as easy as hopping on a bus to another city or something,” she grumbled, flopping down into the sofa, sighing as the sofa moved under her, the computer inside shifting to both be comfortable and support her perfectly. “And she steals my munchies wherever she can find them too.”

Once properly caffeinated, and with a bag of chips to one side and a Monster Soda in hand, Pluto, or Setsuna as people knew her out in the rest of the world, turned her attention back to the Gate of Time. As she did, the image of Crystal Tokyo, overlaid by the percentage screen, disappeared, to be replaced by hundreds of smaller images. “Right, let’s get to it then.” This wasn’t the first time Setsuna had to deal with a Chaotic Element cropping up. It wouldn’t be the last and she had a system.

First, find the problem in the comfort and safety of the Gate of Time. Second estimate the severity of the threat. Third, if the threat was large enough, remove it. Whatever it was, however she had to. Sailor Pluto was a soldier with a single mission, a single goal given to Setsuna by her Queen. She would not, could not fail. No matter what.

Later – hours and other measurements of time had no meaning here – Setsuna sighed, setting down the wine glass she had shifted to some time earlier. It had taken her a while, but she had finally been able to narrow down the anomaly causing the issue and boy was it a doozy.

The anomaly’s name was Ranma Saotome. Male – at birth anyway – a martial artist of the Anything Goes School of Indiscriminate Grappling, a name Setsuna had previous experience with in the form of its Grandmaster. Any relation to the pervert was enough to get on Setsuna’s bad side, especially given what he could do with ki. But Ranma was a different problem. First of all, he wasn’t a pervert. At least not in most of the timelines she had seen. And the ones that he did, well, there was a pervert, and then there was being a player and Ranma was never one without the other.

Second, Ranma was what was called a Chaotic Locus. These were people who, for some reason even Pluto had never understood, attracted problems and chaos like a magnet did iron filings. More and more problems would grow around them as they age, the effect there throughout their lives. And as a martial artist who routinely – in nearly every timeline she studied – gained conscious access to his ki at a young age, that was a VERY long life indeed. A life equal almost to that of the Sailor Scouts when they awoke to the power of their planets.

Third, Ranma was a Chaotic Locus, the same age as the Inners were. Girls who were, to a woman, man-hungry a good deal of the time. And here came Ranma, a young man with an admittedly excellent body who might well be around nearly as long as they could be? That was a recipe for trouble right there!

And whenever the young martial artist interacted with them, it seemed to spiral into ever-larger changes. More and more chaotic factors grew together, throwing the timelines in an ever-spiraling chaotic storm. But at the bottom, it always started with Ranma interacting with the Sailor Scouts. Sometimes innocuously, sometimes in more flagrant ways. From playing ‘hunt the bunny’ with a young Usagi, to being Makoto’s old senpai or Rei’s fiancé, everything would spiral out from that one point of contact.

“Although that one with Rei and Ranma being a couple was interesting. Who knew that having another man around stealing his thunder would force Tux-boy to grow a pair and start fighting alongside the girls?” Setsuna mused aloud. “I’m going to have to remember that, see if I can work that into the proper timeframe.”

Right now, however, Setsuna had a problem. That problem being Ranma Saotome. If left unchecked, the future could go in any myriad ways. The best of them, if again left unchecked, had Crystal Tokyo becoming real only 35% of the time. The rest… well, they were worse. Sailor Robogirls via a Techno-virus? Sailor Catgirls, with a Ranma Bond? Sailor Slaves? Lust Dusted Sailors?

“So the threat is extreme, even if some of Ranma’s interactions can be viewed positively in the short term. And simply letting events take their natural course is impossible. That means direct intervention is required.” The choices of how to deal with the threat to Crystal Tokyo were thus clear to Setsuna, as she sat back and drank her wine. As she thought, she idly flipped through the various timelines once more, adding in the question of what would happen if she interfered thusly…

Flik!

"EXTERMINATE! EXTERMINATE!" said the squad of "pepper pots" as they rolled forward.

"Dragon SLASH!" called out Ranma, sending a roiling dragon-shape of chi towards the group.

"Mercury Aqua Rhapsody!" "Jupiter Oak Evolution!" "Love and Beauty Shock!" "Uhm, Jaffa Zat'niktel!" said Daniel Jackson, figuring when in Rome and all that.

Flik!

“Nope!” Setsuna jerked out of her thoughts, cursing, but before she could change the timeline’s image again, she saw the cause of that particular timeline…

"I am the Doctor," introduced the girl.

"Isn't the Doctor a man?" asked Jack O'Neil, checking his UNIT database on his PalmPilot.

"There were complications in my last regeneration," said the girl, sighing heavily.

"It ain't my fault!" insisted Ranma.

"I didn't do it," said a blushing Hotaru.

"I didn't mean to!" insisted Minako.

”Right, note to self, check the Anti-Time Lord protective sphere around the solar system. They can interfere in every other dimension all they want, this one is Queen Serenity’s and that’s the way it will stay damn it!” Setsuna growled making a note and standing up to pin it on the inside of the door to the gates. It would be a bitch, but it had to be done. If The Doctor was showing up like that when Ranma was involved, there was the possibility of him getting involved otherwise too.

Grumbling about annoying assholes who mess where they didn’t have to, Setsuna returned to the sofa flouncing onto it and idly clicking another timeline.

Flik!

"Oh! Oh! Yes! Ranmaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!"

Smooch smooch smooch. "Mako-chan."

Staring, Setsuna realized she would have to start interfering long before the Sailor Scouts and Ranma were teenagers. There was absolutely no freaking way she'd have been able to keep Ranma in Nerima. None. Well, all she had to do was shift things again and...

Goodness gracious Makoto was more flexible than you'd think. Normally very strong individuals lost a great deal of flexibility. She was also very responsive apparently, once Ranma found that space along the collarbone - she was WRITHING and not in the manner of pain.

“Gods of fire and darkness, if the Sailor Scouts get even a hint that Ranma can, can do that to them, I’ll never keep them apart. No matter how much chaos or other girls they’d have to go through,” Setsuna whispered, her eyes wide.

Flik!

"Oh yes! YES!"

"Gak!" said Sailor Pluto, it took a lot to embarrass her but this was managing it. She could feel herself responding to the image, shivering in shock and more than a bit of arousal at seeing herself in Makoto’s place. With a wave of her staff, that timeline was copied out into a viewing crystal for more… in-depth perusal later.

And yet, even as she did so, Pluto could feel her emotions shutting down, her thoughts becoming colder as she thought of how to deal with this problem. Ranma was a clear danger to the future of Crystal Tokyo and thus had to be eliminated, no matter her personal thoughts on the matter. “Thus, my choices are to try to control Ranma’s interactions with the Sailor Scouts, remove him the instant they start interacting or remove him further back in his own personal timeline. I cannot make small changes. Small changes still put him too close to the Sailor Scouts, and once in Tokyo, there is no way to keep them apart.”

“But I must both remove the Chaotic Locus and make certain I do not create a temporal paradox. Chibiusa can get away with that since the paradox resets itself every time she returns to the future. But I cannot do the same,” Setsuna finished her musings as she stood up and paced, scowling as she did so, more of her mind being brought to bear on removing this problem in any way possible. Finally, she made her decision. Setsuna would:

1. Reluctantly Kill off Ranma via introducing a Random Event in his path in the hopes it will separate him from the Sailor Scouts and Nerima in general. {will lead quickly to Wonder of Zero}

2. Work the problem so that Ranma Saotome was actually going to be more help than a hindrance. Control the chaos and it is chaos no Longer, right? …Right? {Only one episode to build on, more of a parody and Sailor Moon bashing and excuse for lemons}

3. Pick a specific place in time before Ranma interacted with the Senshi and remove him to another world personally. No muss, no fuss. Let someone else deal with his chaotic nature. {crossovers galore, perhaps a way to connect to other Anime Addventure threads?}

4. Manipulate the Gate of Time to find the perfect solution, no matter how long it will take, working back from the current time frame. Who cares if The Gate of Time was never designed for this level of manipulation? {Time travel like Setsuna’s Fault/Time Lost}

End Episode 1

Hope you enjoyed this little blurb. This will be a weighted poll and will end on the 12th. I want to see if I can get four episodes like this out this month. My choice naturally will go to the first one, which will eventually lead to Wonder of Zero. If you have any questions about the choices or where the story might go ask in your review here, and I will answer.

Oh, and a sitrep for those who wish for one: Stallion of the Line was updated. Bhaalson Remodel is a little under halfway done, but I should have it off to the editor on the 11th at the latest. I have most of it written in DNS, adding in Khalid’s stutter, names, syntax, and format stuff is time-consuming, since I also make other changes and add stuff, but it is easier to do in small blocks of time and I should be able to use DNS time to get ahead of the Small Story Poll choice, whatever that might be.