Not only could they be frauds, but not all of her future selves were the kind of person she'd like to be.
There were any number of timelines where Crystal Tokyo was an example of everything it proclaimed to be against. Oppression, tyranny, and domination. There were also timelines where she grew bitter and sought every means possible to destroy Crystal Tokyo.
So she had to be careful. If she followed their advice then she could very well be condemning this world to one of those tyrannical Crystal Tokyos. On the other hand, they all came from for separate time lines. Whatever she herself did now, they would be unaffected.
Such was the nature of the universe, infinite variations all existing at once.
One could never change one's present by going back to the past. All you would find is that you were the impetus for one of an infinite number of branches. Eventually, unless you moved forward to replace one of your alternates (either taking their place after an accident, or killing them yourself), you would come back to your own time line.
All travelling in time was, was in fact, travelling through alternate dimensions. It HELPED, in small ways one to make plans or study, but it was always possible that some small change in your timeline rendered all you learned useless.
Pluto understood that. Meaning those other Plutos, if such they were, were understood that. That meant they were aware that her own actions would neither help nor hinder them.
Which brought up the question, were they the kind of people that wanted to help someone avoid mistakes? Or were they the kind of people that thought it was funny to damn people to hell. And, of course, even if they WERE acting in good faith. Was this an instance were some difference between their timeline and hers made their information unreliable?
She turned to the Time Gates with the information provided her and scanned forward. The Antares gateways did show some activity as time went on, but she couldn't tell if it was a prelude to an attack, or just some natural fluctuations. She would have needed Ami for that, a mature Ami come into her full power and intelligence.
Looking to see Crystal Tokyo in ruins didn't help. She didn't know for certain if it was destroyed because she went back or because she didn't.
She took a brief moment to avoid continuing her thoughts to "go back in time" to warn another Setsuna about the coming threat in time to stop Mihoshi's wish giving, and then returned to consider her own timeline's problems.
After another couple of side trips "back in time" to have the harem end up in Usagi's control among other solutions, for other timelines, she finally came to a decision. A hard one.
She couldn't change her present. Which meant she couldn't prevent the senshi from becoming infected. She couldn't cure them or free them without the remote. The current robo-girls were reluctant to let her have the remote for fear that her plan would cause more harm than good. The agents she could have employed to bring the remote to her were converted, and the robo-girls alerted to her plan. She couldn't get it herself without falling to the effects of her timeline and joining the other girls.
The only plan she had left to help her timeline was the plan that the robo-girls had come up with. Fix the programming. And that was that.
Perhaps the Pluto of another timeline(option) would have contacted another agent, such as the aforementioned Yohko Mano, or series of agents. And, upon recovering the remote run her plan and cure the girls. But this particular Pluto, in her frustration and desperation overlooked it.
She sighed as she saw Jupiter approaching the Time Gates and meditated a little to place the discussion with the other Plutos deep into her mind and lock it away behind the mental barriers she put everything else.
"Pluto!" Jupiter was saying. "They gave me the remote, let me in..."
****
Little more than four hours later, Pluto was teasingly trying to seduce Ranma into "mastering" her. She was having about as much luck as the other robo-girls. At least the programming hadn't made to where they needed sex, like some sort of pokewoman, or else they'd all REALLY be in trouble.
"Ranma seriously needs to lighten up," Setsuna said as the martial artist left the room in a puff of smoke.
"You got that right," Nabiki said, exasperated. "Give it a few days and then you'll start to understand how frustrating it is."
"We've all been trying to get him in the sack for like a month now," Ukyou agreed. "We tend to end up going to each other. Which is why Natsume and Kodachi have broken the connection for the moment."
"Well, perhaps we won't have to worry about that for much longer," Pluto said. "Ami?"
"Very interesting, Setsuna-san..."
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(Posted Tue, 31 Dec 2002 00:22)
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