Meiou Setsuna. Also known as Sailor Pluto, also known as the Guardian of
Time.

Setsuna is regarded by those who know her as a calm, collected, icy-cool
woman with a professional demeanor and a rather severe devotion toward her
duties.

Which, given the nature of said duties, is understandable. It's not exactly
good policy to skive off when your job is to protect the flow of time
itself.

Taking all that into consideration, one can therefore excuse the erratic
behaviour exhibited by Meiou Setsuna on October 27, 1985.

And November 5, 1955.

And November 12, 1955.

And September 2, 1885.

And September 7, 1885.

And October 21, 2015.

And a seemingly infinite number of points between and beyond...

======================================

"STOP FUCKING WITH THE FUTURE!!"

by The Eternal Lost Lurker

Based on:

"Bishoujo Senshi Sailormoon" by Takeuchi Naoko

and:

"Back to the Future" (c. 1985, 1989, 1990 Universal Studios)

and other copyrighted intellectual properties

used without permission

not for profit

===================1===================

The whole thing began one hundred years, one month, and just shy of three
weeks in the past.

Or it began thirty years ago minus a few weeks.

Or it began thirty years in the future minus six days.

Except it didn't begin at any of those times. It began two seconds ago. But
it didn't necessarily begin then, either.

That's just the way things go when any millisecond in the infinite span of
time can count as your present.

The best way to avoid a massive clusterfuck would be to say that, to at
least one part of the world, it was 1:20am on October 27, 1985, when one of
the biggest headaches Sailor Pluto had ever experienced began. As was
typical of a being whose existence reaches all points in time
simultaneously, her headache reached in both directions along the timeline,
and only grew worse the further into the past it went.

And it all started with a shaggy mutt and a heavily modified sports car.

Pluto was minding her own business in the nonlinear, infinite ether where
the Gates of Time resided, contemplating the past, present, and future as
only she can. She knew that in what was nominally the "present", it would be
another seven years before she'd be required to slip back into the
timestream. She knew that it could also very easily happen tomorrow, or
yesterday. She knew...

...that something felt very, very wrong just now.

And then, with a triple sonic boom that nearly blew her off her feet, a
silver shape flashed past her.

"What the HELL?!"

There was another series of booms, and the object vanished.

Frowning, Setsuna invoked the power of the Garnet Orb atop her staff.
Infinity rewound itself, and she was able to get a closer look at the
intruder. She stared.

It was a DeLorean sports car, the low-chassis kind with the gullwing doors,
and had some massive modification to the rear--something that looked
disturbingly like a small nuclear reactor. Inside the car, there was a large
dog.

The flow of non-time snapped back into motion, and Pluto was forced to dodge
once again as the DeLorean zipped past.

Then there was a series of sonic booms, heralding the appearance of the same
car from multiple directions: with a teenager behind the wheel, going the
other direction; with an old man and the dog, going farther ahead than the
first trip, the old man again, without his dog, making a return trip, then
forward again, this time with two teenagers with him. The teenager,
returning to the "present" and vanishing, the old man and one of the
teenagers going back a short distance, the old man and that same teenager
coming from further ahead to disappear into the present, and more; Pluto was
hard-pressed to dodge the incoming barrage of DeLoreans which nearly ran her
over in the void between and beyond time. She could swear that a few of
those cars had been *flying*, and the barrage abated with one particularly
percussive flash of light, high above her head, which heralded a final,
airborne DeLorean, crackling with electricity, disappearing with a rather
disconcerting crack that was different from the sound made by the rest.

Once the sudden storm of sports cars subsided, Pluto blinked her eyes,
coughed, and peered hesitantly into the mists around her. She then strode
over to the Gates and leaned against them absently, rubbing the bridge of
her nose.

"What the hell was THAT all about?"

======================================

Irritating though it was, it actually took Pluto a few minutes to figure out
just what was going on.

Once she did, though, she was not a happy camper.

As Pluto, it was her duty to prevent unauthorised temporal transit--in other
words, she was supposed to keep ignorant people from going back and forth
through time and mucking things up.

Which is precisely what the idiots with the DeLorean had done, repeatedly.

And yet, just as she was about to step into the timestream and take control
of things--by force if necessary--somehow, *somehow* the two idiots managed
to fix the mess they made of time, and in some places, left it just a bit
better than they found it.

"Well, at least they're being somewhat responsible about it," Pluto
muttered, sighing as she watched the car vanish again in another time, and
the counterpart of its occupant rush up to the counterpart of its inventor,
setting off another chain of temporal violation.

And then, they were off again--well, the boy was, anyway.

Pluto continued to watch events for a while, frowning, then nodded
satisfactorily as the long, drawn-out nightmare of temporal violation seemed
to come to a conclusion. One man displaced temporally was acceptable, if he
was careful and avoided damaging the timeline. The boy was back where he
belonged, only minor damage had been done to the timeline as a whole, and
most importantly, the blasted car was destroyed.

And Pluto hadn't even had to lift a finger.

She was so busy being relieved that the crisis had been averted that she
didn't notice the flying steam engine until it knocked her ass over
teakettle.

Her last thought before she blacked out to the sound of triple sonic booms
was, *Why me?*

======================================

Pluto stood resolute, waiting. It would come any minute. She had to be
ready.

And then, there it was. Three sonic booms, a loud whistle, and...

"Dead Scream."

A flash of crimson and violet, an explosion, and a mighty crash.

A heavily modified steam locomotive ploughed cowcatcher-first into the mists
of infinity, skidding on its belly along the ether, sliding to a stop mere
millimetres from the booted toes of the Guardian of Time.

The train's doors opened, and a man with wild silver-white hair dressed in
nineteenth-century finery stepped out, glancing around nervously. "Clara?"
he called. "What's it say on the control circuits?"

"It's spinning like crazy, Emmett!" a woman's voice called from inside. "I
think the crash broke it!"

"Your time control circuits aren't broken," Pluto said crisply, drawing the
man's attention.

He blinked, stepping out of the train onto the mists below, surprised to
find them solid enough to stand on. "Who are you?"

A woman in a purple dress and hat leaned out of the train, and blinked.
"Emmett? What's going on out here?"

Pluto stepped closer to the train, staff held in a moderately threatening
manner. When she spoke, it was with cold precision, a sharp, inflexible
glint in her scarlet eyes. "Emmett Lathrop Brown. I've been waiting to speak
with you for one hundred years, although I had no knowledge of you until
about fifteen minutes ago."

The wild-haired man blinked. "I'm afraid you've lost me, miss--"

"I am the Guardian of Time, the sworn protector of all points between the
beginning and end of eternity, Sailor Pluto." Here, she levelled his staff
at him, the Garnet Orb flaring brilliantly crimson. "Order your family to
gather all possessions and vacate the time vehicle. Now."

"Now wait just a minute, miss!" The purple-clad woman--Clara--stepped down
from the train, a haughty expression on her face. "Who do you think you are
to tell us what--"

"I believe I already explained that," Pluto cut across her.

"I'm afraid I don't quite understand what's going on here," the man
sometimes known as "Doc" Brown admitted.

"Let me clarify," Pluto began. "On October 27, 1985, at 1:20 am Pacific
time, you conducted a time travel experiment which propelled a DeLorean and
your dog one minute into the future. Later that same morning, your
assistant, Martin McFly, used the same vehicle to travel to November 5,
1955. His trip was an accident, and would have done significant damage to
the continuity of time, but by some miracle, you were able to patch the
holes your machine created without my intervention.

"However, you then proceeded to use the vehicle again, this time to travel
into the future. You then returned to the past to bring your assistant with
you to a time he should not have witnessed, to alter an event which was
destined to occur. This was no accident, but rather, deliberate tampering
with time.

"It was my error for not stepping in to prevent that incident, but I assumed
that you would return to your own time, in which the future was still
unwritten, and the flow of time would resume uninterrupted. I had hoped
there would be no further incursions of this nature.

"I was wrong."

Doc was gaping openly at Pluto now, while Clara was frowning. Their two
sons, Jules and Verne, had come out of the train to see what the commotion
was, their dog Einstein in tow.

"Your vehicle was stolen, and the thief used it to cause extensive damage to
history. You and your assistant again took matters into your own hands,
again just as I was about to return to the flow of time to correct matters
personally. By some miracle, you succeeded in restoring the proper timeline,
and then..." She trailed off meaningfully.

"I got struck by lightning," Doc said.

"You got struck by lightning," Pluto repeated calmly. "Your past self and
your well-meaning assistant contrived to extract you from your temporal
misplacement--commendable, though they need not have bothered, for I would
have personally removed you from the nineteenth century myself--and,
amazingly, only managed to cause minor damage to the timestream--" Here, she
glanced meaningfully at Clara, "--in their efforts to rescue you.
Ultimately, your assistant was returned home, but you remained in the past,
and the time vehicle was destroyed.


"I would have been content to allow you to remain in the past, as your
presence there was not harming the timeline in any significant manner, and
you had expressed a desire to remain. However, I was most...displeased to
discover that you had constructed *another time vehicle*." She glared at the
flying steam locomotive. "I believe that you can appreciate my position as
Guardian of Time, Doctor Brown. I simply cannot allow unauthorised temporal
incursions of this nature to continue. I was caught off-guard by the initial
incursions, and was unable to intercede directly. However, now that I have
your attention..."

"What, you're planning to kill us or something?" Clara asked derisively.

"No," Pluto replied with a shake of her head. "I simply intend to destroy
your time vehicle. I will then personally transport you to an era of your
choosing, where you will remain for the rest of your lives. You," she said
with a cold look at Doc, "are to refrain from constructing a time machine
EVER. AGAIN. If I ever catch you building another one, the next time I won't
be so lenient." The Orb pulsed blood-red at this pronouncement. "Do you
understand me?"

"Y-yes...yes, ma'am," Doc said, swallowing nervously.

Pluto nodded. "Now, remove your things from the train, please."

The two boys hurried into the train and came out with two large bags and a
cardboard box suspended on a device Pluto knew should never have existed in
the time from whence the family came. "I'll also be confiscating THAT," she
replied, pointing at the hoverboard.

"Awww," Jules and Verne whined in unison.

"Now, boys...the lady's right," Doc said with a resigned sigh. "It doesn't
belong in our time, after all."

Pluto quirked an eyebrow at that, but let it slide. "Is that everything?" At
the family's nods, Pluto raised her staff again. "Dead Scream."

The Browns flinched as a whirling orb of energy smashed into the time
locomotive, obliterating it in a heartbeat. "Now," Pluto said with a small,
cold smile, "Where can I drop you nice folks?"

======================================

Pluto slipped back through the Gate into the ether of infinity, satisfied
that once again, she had prevented the destruction of history. Her job could
be incredibly boring at times, but the periods of excitement more than made
up for it.

She glanced at the pink Mattel hoverboard tucked under her arm, quirked a
smile, and had just started to place one booted foot into the pink nylon
strap when...

*SHOOM*

A telephone booth slammed into the mists, crackling with electricity. Two
grungy-looking teenage boys stepped out. "Whoa, this place is like,
acid-trip city," the dark-haired of the two said.

His companion nodded. "Way weird." He then noticed Pluto. "Dude! Check the
BABE!"

"Excellent!"

The Guardian of Time's left eye twitched.

"Hey, baaaabe, is this, like, England? We wanna find some place called
Stonehang or something..."

Pluto felt her headache returning. "Please explain how two imbeciles like
you managed to travel to the Gates of Time. Before I throw you back wherever
you came from."

The two boys looked at one another for a long moment.

"Gates of Time?" the blonde asked.

"Dude, did you EVER dial the wrong number," the other replied.

And Pluto longed for a bottle of Tylenol...

===================tbc?===================



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