Usagi sighed.
She was sitting on a grassy hill, which was situated next to a big lake. All around, she was surrounded by nature. Green hills, lush forests, clean fresh air. It was a sight to behold, and a sight to make a worried soul happy.
Still, Usagi Tsukino was anything but happy. With a frown, she picked up a small stone from the ground and threw it into the deep waters of the lake.
She glanced over to where she could see the rooftop of auntie's house through the branches of the trees.
Her mother thought she would make her children happy when she told them that they would spend the summer vacation away from the busy city, in the country, away from hectic and stress.
She didn't expect her daughter to gasp in shock and plead with her mother to stay home for the vacations.
True, the summer residence of her aunt (in which they were allowed to stay) was situated in the middle of a beautiful landscape, and under normal circumstances, Usagi would be more than happy to hear that she could spend her vacations in a place like this.
But... there was one simple problem. A problem that had to do with her second identity as the sailor suited defender of love and justice, Sailor Moon.
To make it quick: One of her teammates had vanished. That teammate wasn't a powerful fighter like the others, oh no! She wasn't even one of the Sailor Senshi herself. Still, she was a reliable member of the team, and a great friend.
Luna, her advisor and moon cat companion, had disappeared.
It happened during one of their missions in Juuban. They fought one of Beryl's old Youmas, a remainder of her old army. Deep below the earth of Juuban, it had been able to gather energy until it was strong enough to challenge even the new-powerful Sailor Team, the Outer Senshi included.
After a hard battle, they finally managed to defeat the monster, but... when they looked around, Luna was gone. Artemis told them that he had searched for cover as soon as the Youma had started shooting around its poisonous spikes, but then his head got hit by something hard and he lost consciousness. So he didn't know either where Luna had vanished to.
To Usagi's parents, it simply looked like their daughter's pet had ran away, and they did the usual stuff in such a case: Printing missing posters with Luna's picture on them and asking the people of the neighborhood if they had seen her.
But Luna remained lost, and even though the Senshi searched the whole city for their black-furred companion, they couldn't find her.
Usagi was devastated, and it took all of her friends' efforts to soothe her.
All of this happened almost a month ago. Usagi and her friends still were searching for the moon cat, but then Ikuko Tsukino informed her family about the big news: Her sister had allowed her and her family to spend the summer vacations in her summer residence, just at the edge of just this lake.
Usagi didn't want to go on vacation while she knew that Luna was still out there. But her mother insisted that the change of scene would do her good and help her to cope with everything. Besides, she felt like Usagi should be old enough to cope with it and live on.
But Luna wasn't just any pet to Usagi. She was her best friend.
While Ami, Rei, Minako and Makoto promised her to keep doing their best to find Luna, Usagi felt as if she was betraying her friend. Now she was sitting here, within this beautiful scenery and her feline friend could be anywhere. Who knows what she had to endure just now?
Sighing deeply, Usagi got up from the ground. Tonight, she would ask her mother once again if they could go home early. As she did every evening by now. And she wouldn't stop asking until they were back home again.
She picked up one last stone and flung it into the lake. And that's when something strange happened.
For a very short instance, not more than a second, the dark, murky water of the lake became crystal clear and she could see through it's waters just like through thin air.
And what she saw at the bottom of the lake was more than enough to distract her from her thoughts and make her wonder about her own sanity.
It was a city.
A big, ancient city with massive stone buildings, tall towers and empty streets.
And then, as quickly as the image had appeared, it was gone again and the lake returned to its previous, murky state.
Usagi rubbed her eyes and stared at the lake once again. But the image stayed the same.
"Okay now..." she muttered to herself. "I really should stop watching those fantasy DVDs Rei gave to me..."
She shook her head. It just had to be her imagination. A sunken city? What could possibly be more weird than that?
The answer came as she turned around to walk back to the house.
It was a very weird-looking, diminutive creature with bluish skin, two stubby little feet and no arms. From its round head, two strange appendages that resembled ears were dangling down, and a third, oval protrusion extended from its forehead. It also had a black tail. And it was standing directly in front of her.
As the creature smirked at her with squinted eyes and a mouth that looked like a zigzag line, Usagi took a step backwards in shock. Had she gone completely crazy by now?
Then the strange being opened its broad mouth and exclaimed one single word:
"Wynaut!"
Afterwards, it turned around and vanished among the bushes.
Several seconds later, Usagi was still standing at the same position, trying to tell herself that whatever she had just seen was nothing but a strange dream.
The proof that it wasn't a dream was just in front of her: A trail of strange, round footprints, that lead directly into the forest...
Read the comments on this episode
See other episodes by Shritistrang
(Posted Mon, 05 Feb 2007 16:34)
Questions? Problems? Suggestions?
Send a mail to addventure@bast-enterprises.de
or use the contact form.
らんま1/2 © Rumiko Takahashi
All other series and their characters are © by their respective creators or owners. No claims of ownership of these characters are implied by the authors of this Addventure, or should be inferred.
The Anime Addventure is a non-profit site.