The alarm went off, waking Usagi from her peaceful slumber… again. After hitting the snooze button for the third time, she had finally woken up enough to realize that….
“Oh, no!” she cried as she leaped out of bed and rushed hurriedly for her school preparations. “I’m late! See you later!” Once she had finished everything, she was out the door and dashing for school in another futile attempt to beat the clock.
On her way to school she was passed by two other students who seemed to be late, both wearing light brown school uniforms that appeared to be from a different school. Regardless, they were headed for the same school as she was.
“Come on, Ryo-chan!” the tall girl shouted to the equally tall boy running along side her. At a glance, she guessed that they might be siblings from their similar features. “We’re almost there!”
“We would’ve been there a lot sooner, Mako-chan,” he replied, “if you hadn’t forgotten to reset my alarm clock after you tripped over the cord and unplugged it! You also forgot to set your own alarm as well, so now we’re both gonna be late!”
“I’ve already said I was sorry!” she snapped back. “You don’t have to rub it in!”
“Sorry. Maybe we should save our breath for running?”
“Good idea,” she answered as they both sprinted ahead again and out of Usagi’s sight.
“It’s a miracle!” Artemis said to Luna from atop Usagi’s house. “The sunspots have vanished! Everything is back to the way it was.”
“Still…,” Luna added quietly, “it’s rather sad…. Their friendships and the times they had together have also been lost….”
“It’s all right,” he replied, turning to gaze at the clear blue, morning sky.
“Huh?” she asked, glancing up toward Artemis.
“They’ll meet again,” he said confidently.
“That’s right,” she agreed and smiled.
Usagi continued to run, passing the Hikawa Shrine as she always did. As she dashed by, a raven-haired young priestess paused from sweeping the shrine grounds and glanced over toward the blonde girl dashing by only for a moment. After she disappeared from view, Rei went back to her sweeping chores.
Across the street from Usagi, another blonde-haired girl waited at a bus stop for the bus that would take her to her school. As Usagi dashed by, Minako gave her only a brief glance before spotting the bus approaching her stop.
At school, Usagi and Naru went to see how they did on their exams. As usual, Usagi came in dead last, while Naru made twenty-second out of fifty. Way out in front, scoring a perfect and one point away from a perfect, respectively, were two of the three new transfer students to Juuban: Mizuno Ami and Kino Ryoku.
Just as if the thought of her was a summons, Usagi noticed the blue-haired girl walking past behind them.
From his spot away from everyone, Ryoku sat watching the crowd gather to see what they had scored on their exams. The various expressions on their faces, whether joyful at their high marks, or disappointed at their failures, were occasionally interesting to watch… especially if someone began to overreact. Those occasions were entertaining.
As Ami walked past him, something about her caught his attention, besides the fact that she looked identical to his old girlfriend, Keiko. At the same time, Ami stopped abruptly, as something about the boy she had just passed caught her attention.
Ryoku glanced over at Ami and gave her a considering glance. The memory of Keiko was no longer as strong as it used to be, since he had decided a while ago to let her memory rest in peace. It wasn’t just the fact that she looked identical to her that caught his eye, though. It was something else…. Something that he just couldn’t put his finger on….
Ami glanced back over her shoulder at Ryoku. There was something about him that seemed to get her attention. Sure, he was really cute, but there was something… more than just that. She couldn’t really explain it, and she was usually very good about explaining things….
Simultaneously, Ami and Ryoku gave each other a small smile. Ami then turned and continued on her way as Ryoku turned back to watching the crowd examine their exam results.
“If I’d only studied a little harder…,” Usagi moaned miserably at her poor exam grade as she and Naru walked home from school. “You’re eliminated!” she growled as she fiercely crumpled up her exam and tossed it behind her over her shoulder as Naru watched with her mouth hanging open in surprise. The crumpled ball of paper sailed through the air and landed on the head of a tall black-haired guy behind her.
“Hey, that hurt, Meatball-head!” he remarked as he picked up her crumpled exam, straightened it and looked it over. “A thirty?” he exclaimed in surprise. Usagi yelped in embarrassment as she saw who was looking at her test score. “You need to study more, Meatball-head,” he told her as he lowered the exam to look at her through the dark sunglasses he wore.
“None of your business!” she growled as she snatched back her exam, then stuck her tongue out at him. “How rude!” she grumbled as she and Naru walked away while Naru laughed at her indignation
Mamoru removed his sunglasses and glanced after the girl. “Strange girl…,” he muttered to himself, then grinned.
“Say, that guy was kinda cool,” Naru remarked with a grin as they continued on their way home.
“What? That stuck-up jerk?” Usagi retorted indignantly.
“Oh, come now, Usagi-chan,” Naru admonished. “He could be the guy of your dreams.”
“Forget it!” Usagi countered. “I’ve got a dream.”
“A dream?”
“Yeah. A dream to find this great guy who’d protect me whenever I’m in trouble. That’s my dream.”
A strong, cold wind blew over the frozen Arctic wasteland. It blew across ice and snow, over the desolate remains of a demolished stronghold of evil. A cloaked figure stood on the grounds of the remains and overlooked the destruction and silence.
“It was just as I predicted,” the man said certainly to himself. “Beryl was defeated by Sailor Moon and her Silver Crystal. Not to mention by her friends and teammates: the Sailor Scouts. It was a fatal mistake to underestimate them, as she now knows.”
He kicked away a small fragment of the shattered crystal ball that Beryl used to gaze over an untold number of times. A frown of distaste curved his mouth as he recalled an image of her giving her commands as she waved her hands around it, so certain that in the end she would be victorious. The shard clinked along the ground until it hit something, making another interesting clinking sound.
“Oh-ho! What do we have here?” the man crowed in cheerful surprise as he hurried over toward the object he had just discovered.
The object was a large, man-sized crystal, covered in snow. As the man brushed off some of the snow at the top, he could see a familiar face, twisted in agony.
“Well, well, well…,” the man murmured softly, as if he were whispering to the crystal’s occupant. “How the mighty hath fallen. Do you remember me? I was smart enough to leave before I could get caught up in Beryl’s losing battle with the Sailor Scouts. I knew better, and now here I am; the only survivor of Beryl’s abortive quest to rule all. If only she were wise enough to know when to wait, when to use everything she had, when to strengthen what she did have, she might’ve won.
“But, now look. The Dark Kingdom is now but a memory, and a fleeting one at that. Our legacy is gone. All our glory, blown away like so much dust in the wind. I can’t let this continue. You will see; I will succeed where Beryl had failed, because I will not underestimate my opponents: the Sailor Scouts.
“I will watch them. I will watch from the shadows, learn their strengths and weaknesses and I will strike when I have prepared for any contingency and victory is assured! Maybe you will be there, maybe you will not. It will all depend…,” he said and he reached within his cloak and pulled out a long dagger from a sheath at his belt, “…on how long it will take you to break free from your prison.” He reached back and plunged the dagger into the crystal, causing numerous cracks to form around the hole he had created.
“There,” the man said as he sheathed his dagger. “That’s all the help I can give you. The rest will be up to you. Take as much time as you need to break free. I’m in no particular hurry to initiate any of my plans. I do not have the necessary requirements for my assured victory yet.”
The man turned and began to walk away. “I do hope to see you soon though. Your help would be greatly appreciated, though unnecessary for my triumph over the Sailor Scouts.” Just before the man vanished into the snowy winds, he tucked a wayward strand of short red hair back behind the hood of his cloak and laughed quietly to himself.
To Prologue: The Return of Sailor Moon