Written by BHart
June 17, 2007

Act LXVI
Back to the Parallel World

Kousagi fell through the portal into the parallel world where she was from. She fell onto some soft dirt.

As she was trying to take in what happened, she realized she was taller now; and older, too. Now that she was in her home world again, she was her true age, 22.

She found herself in some kind of semi-tropical forest. She walked alongside a brown colored river that stank a little. She stopped, trying to figure out where she was, hoping more of her memories would start coming back.

She heard rustling in some bushes nearby. Someone or something was walking around. "Who goes there?" No one responded.

She continued to hear something lurking about. She got nervous, preparing herself to attack anything that might jump out at her. "Please answer me. Just come out and show yourself." No one answered, making her more nervous.

She heard something behind her and wasn't going to take any chances risking her safety. She quickly turned around, using her Lavender Cottontail Fantasy attack, striking the person walking up behind her.

It was a fat, unattractive teenage girl. She had long, dark curly hair. She was instantly killed, falling to the ground and dropping a bag of groceries.

"Oh my God, what have I done? Why didn't she just respond instead of sneaking up on me like that?"

She picked up the dead body and continued walking alongside the dirty river. After about a mile of walking, she could see a town, with people going about their business.

She walked out of the foliage and into the town, carrying the dead girl in her arms. Most people weren't too alarmed to see her carrying a dead body. Murders seemed to be a common occurrence.

She was walking down a narrow dirt road with houses to the left and right. She could hear someone yelling, "Doilyn, Doilyn."

A woman came running up behind her from one of the houses she walked by. "Doilyn! What happened to my daughter?" asked the woman.

The woman had short, brown curly hair, a large nose, and buck teeth. "Come to my house and I'll see if I can help her," said the ugly woman. The woman was relieved to see the bag of groceries that Kousagi was carrying.

"I'm sorry, what was your name?" asked Kousagi.

"My name is La Dona Marci. But just call me Marci."

Kousagi explained to her what happened.

"Well, it sounds like it was an accident. Don't worry about it."

Kousagi was surprised by her response. "What? You mean you aren't devastated?"

"Sure it's sad, but it's okay. It's in the past now."

Kousagi was grateful for her quick forgiveness, but still found it rather odd that she wasn't too concerned about her daughter's death. "I know this may seem like a weird question, but, what is this place called? Where are we?" asked Kousagi.

Marci looked at her strangely. "This is the city of Canalitos, on the Chiqimul peninsula."

None of the names sounded familiar to her.

"Listen, are you sure you're feeling okay? Maybe you should stay here and rest until you feel better," suggested Marci.

"Oh no, I couldn't impose on you like that," replied Kousagi.

"Nonsense; you can stay here with my husband and I for as long as you need. Now that we don't have any children left, we get rather lonely. Our older daughter married a foreigner and we don't see her often."

"Thank you for your kindness."

A week passed by, and Kousagi hadn't remembered anything from her former life. "I haven't seen anything that's jogged my memory yet. Maybe I should start going to other places to see if anything will trigger any memories."

She was sitting down for lunch, eating some bitter leaf soup that Marci had prepared. She hadn't eaten very much of it and was going to lie down to take a nap. Marci erroneously thought she was tired because she had anemia, so she prepared meals with iron in them.

"Where are you going? You haven't finished your lunch yet," said Marci.

"I'm just tired," replied Kousagi.

Marci had an upset look on her face. "You rarely finish any meals. I can forgive you for the death of my daughter, but not eating all of the food I prepare for you is unforgivable."

Kousagi didn't have the heart to tell her that not all of her food was that appetizing. She was also getting a bit tired of Marci's eccentricities and decided it was time to move on.

She explored the city, trying to see if there was anything that she would recognize. She was a little hungry, and decided to walk over to a butcher's shop.

While she was browsing the different kinds of meat, a woman entered the shop, putting down a dead beast on the counter she had been carrying on her back. "How much for this one?" asked the woman.

"I've told you to use the back entrance so that you don't scare the customers with your dead carcasses," replied the butcher.

"Oh yeah; sorry, I forgot," replied the woman.

"Don't worry about me. I'm not grossed out by that kind of thing," said Kousagi.

The woman looked over at her. "Kousagi, is that you?"

Kousagi looked back at the woman who had dark brown hair in a pony tail. She was wearing light metal armor and a short skirt. She vaguely recognized her.

"Yes, I am Kousagi. Who are you?"

"You don't remember me? I am Huntress."

"Huntress? That name sounds familiar. Ever since I got back here to my home world, my memory has been taking a long time to come back."

"Then we'll just have to fix that. I'll tell you everything about you and your friends."

"That would be great."

"Come over to my place. You have to tell me everything you've been up to since you've left," said Huntress.

They arrived at a house made of stone, with a roof made of palm tree leaves. "Here we are," said Huntress.

There were cardboard boxes lying around the house, and a stack of at least 10 fantasy novels lying on a table. "I see you like to read a lot," noticed Kousagi.

"Yeah, I do a lot of that in my spare time."

"Why are all these boxes lying around? Did you just move in?" asked Kousagi.

"No, we're actually moving out soon. They haven't finished packing everything yet."

"The movers?" asked Kousagi.

"No, my husband and his family; they've been helping him pack up our belongings."

"What about you?" asked Kousagi.

"I don't have time to pack, I have other obligations."

"Like what?"

"Sometimes I read these library books and sometimes I go to the movies with some friends of mine while the rest of them are working."

"Oh. I see. Don't you think you should help them since a lot of this is your stuff?"

Huntress briefly thought about it saying, "Why? I don't see a reason to. They've got it under control."

Kousagi didn't want to bother explaining work ethics to Huntress.

There were piles of dirty laundry lying on the kitchen floor and dirty dishes piled up in the sink. Some food had been lying out for days.

Kousagi picked up a piece of paper that read, "Althea's Magic Castle, by Brandy Wight Rockwood." There was one paragraph written underneath the title of the story.

"That's a story I started two years ago but never finished," explained Huntress.

There were many other unfinished stories and other projects lying around. They varied between stories, wedding invitations and business cards.

"Why don't you finish any of these projects you started?" asked Kousagi.

"I don't have a lot of time. I'm usually too busy reading all these library books. But enough about me; what have you been up to?"

Kousagi explained everything that had happened to her up until this point.

"Wow, you've been through a lot. I'm glad you made it back in one piece."

"I still don't remember a whole lot about my home world. Could you help refresh my memory?"

"Sure thing; I'll start with the basics. You are back on your home planet known as Alexander. You fled here from the evil organization known as Traliz."

"There were Traliz warriors who followed me to Earth."

"Yes, they were trying to subdue you and use your powers for their own ambitions. Luckily, they failed."

"What's happened since I've been gone?"

"The same as usual; the war between the council of princesses is still ongoing. They are still fighting over who should be the true moon princess. It's an ugly mess."

"But isn't there already a moon princess?" asked Kousagi.

"Oh my, you have forgotten a lot, haven't you? Sailor Moon, her family and her cohorts died a long time ago in the uprising of the council of princesses. You see, there is more than one moon. There is a sailor soldier for each moon in the solar system. There's a power struggle going on to determine who will rule all moons. Some of the members of the council of princesses have killed each other off, but many still remain. You must be careful; once they know you're here, they'll come after you again," warned Huntress.

"They must be stopped. But I can't do it by myself," said Kousagi.

"You have many friends who are still fighting against them. The daughters of the sailor senshi are joined against them."

"They do sound familiar. Where are they?"

"I don't know. They are keeping a low profile now-a-days. The council of princesses seeks their death."

"I must find them. Will you help me?" asked Kousagi.

"We need to get off this small peninsula. We need to cross over the northern isthmus named Lomas," explained Huntress.

"Great, let's go as soon as possible."

Huntress hesitated for a moment saying, "There is a problem. There are three fat ass giants guarding the entrance to the Traliz continent at the end of the Lomas isthmus. I was on an errand to escort a foreign dignitary there, to work with our group against the council of princesses, when the three fat asses confronted me. I was outnumbered and had to retreat. In the confusion of it all, the foreign dignitary ran off and hid. I came back here, trying to figure out what to do next."

"Well, there are two of us now. Let's fight our way to the Traliz continent."

"It will be much easier with two of us."

"By the way, where is your husband?" asked Kousagi.

"He is on the Traliz continent with some of our allies, forming a stratagem against the council of princesses. When we cross over the isthmus, we can start looking for them."

"Sounds like a great plan," said Kousagi.

"Come here and look at this photo album with me. This should definitely jog your memory of our friends."

After a while, Kousagi started remembering more of her friends. They started making preparations to cross the isthmus.

..to be continued..