Serena's mother glared over her cup of coffee at the plain white clock attached to the wall at the back of the kitchen. How does she do that? she wondered in annoyance. Forty minutes ago, she lifted her head, opened her eyes, looked up at me, and said that she was awake and getting up. But she know from experience that Serena was most certainly not awake and probably snoring away in her bed.
Lifting herself reluctantly away from her breakfast, she sighed. With an evil gleam in her blue eyes, she remembered her mother's solution to a similar problem she had had with her older sister. Emily must have been about fifteen at the time and was just as tardy as Serena. At least no one had to wonder where Serena's lateness came from! She remembered her mother filling up a big bucket full of ice cubes and water and dumping on her unsuspecting sister's sleeping form! What fun it had been to hear Emily howl in surprise and scream her indignation.
The tall blue haired woman stared down at a bucket, resting quietly at the foot of the stairs. She planned to thoroughly scrub the upstairs floors today. She shook her head. Would it really do any good? Dismissing the idea reluctantly, she thought, But if that girl keeps it up...
With the expectation of finding her daughter still fast asleep in her bed, she opened the door and gasped. "You're awake!" she uttered in disbelief. Not only was Serena awake, but she was dressed and studying of her math textbook.
Serena looked at her mother's priceless expression and smiled. You know seeing both Mom and Luna's totally whacked out expressions in one morning almost makes it worth getting up early. Wait until Miss H sees how good I do on her pop quiz today! "Oh, hi Mom!" she said acknowledging her silent, stunned parent.
Nodding in the direction of her now closed text, she said, "I had a feeling Miss H would spring one of her killer math quizzes today, so I thought I'd might as well be prepared." She kept her expression blank as her mother nodded, utterly dumbfounded. Serena saw the time on her desktop clock and jumped to her feet. "Gotta run, Mom, or I'll be late for class!" Without waiting for her mother to respond, she flew by her mother in a blur of blond pigtails and blue fabric.
Serena sped down the street all the while envisioning Miss Haruna's shocked features as she figured out how good Serena did on her math test, when the realization of where she was headed shocked her back to reality. She skidded to a halt just before the offending crack in the sidewalk that had already tripped her several times. With her hands perched aggressively on her hips, she glared hostilely down at it. "Oh no, you don't!" she scolded, "You're not going to trip me up today!"
"What's the matter, Meatball Head?" asked a familiar, sarcastic voice, "Blaming the sidewalk for your coordination now?"
Serena shot him a dark scowl. "I'd rather talk to the sidewalk than a jerk like you!" She stuck her tongue out at him to accentuate her point. "Besides, I was trying to convince it to trip you instead!" In a blur of blond hair and blue fabric, she was gone leaving Darien to stand in her dust.
Darien simply shook his head. "If that girl got any more ditzy, she'd forget how to tie her own shoelaces." So caught up was he in his thoughts of Serena and her oddities that he forgot the crack in the sidewalk. His shoe caught in the offending crack and his tall frame went tumbling to the ground. Great, this is so humiliating! I think the Meatball Head's klutziness is contagious.
Miss Haruna smiled in pleasure as the students groaned. They always groaned at the mention of a pop quiz. She looked to Melvin and chuckled a bit, even he looked panicked. Stayed online all night again, did you Melvin? she asked herself. She looked over to Serena, expecting her to look as if death was quickly approaching. Instead, the pigtailed teenager sat calmly at her desk. She was still fumbling nervously with her pencil but wasn't looking as she usually did, like a caged animal desperate to escape. What is going through that girl's head? Could she actually have studied? The redheaded teacher was a little disappointed. Serena's excuses to get out of quizzes were the most creative in the school, great to tell at lunch in the teacher's lounge. I guess I won't have any for the others to laugh about today!
She sat down at her desk and quietly watched the students work. She raised an eyebrow at the sight of Serena actually working hard at the quiz. I must be in the twilight zone... To her utter shock and amazement, Serena was the first student who finished the quiz. She proudly walked over to her teacher and handed over the quiz.
"Here you go, Miss H," she said with pride, "I think you'll be impressed." She then proceeded to return to her desk and pull out her history book.
The only thing Miss Haruna could do was grade the test. I am impressed. She actually got a few right, and she also tried to do the incorrect ones. Usually she leaves a majority of them blank. Adding up the total, she shook her head wearily. She noticed Serena staring at her hopefully and she gave the girl a warm smile of congratulations. How could I disappoint her after she tried so hard? With her customary read pen, she marked a large "55%" on the right hand corner of the page. Well Serena, you tried, just not hard enough!
The bell rang loudly for lunch and Serena dashed quickly out of the classroom. I have to hurry! she thought to herself. A firm hand clamped onto her shoulder, from behind, stopping her.
"Serena, where ya going?" asked Molly, confused that she wasn't heading for their usual lunchtime spot. "Did'ja forget your lunch or something?"
"Sorry Mol," answered Serena, "I've got something to take care of." Disentangling herself from Molly's grasp, she made her way out of the school. "Talk to you later, Mol!"
The pigtailed teenager ran quickly to the back of the school, near the gym, where it was still deserted. Good, I got her fast enough so no one will see me! Lifting her hand, she pronounced the words to activate her transformation, "Moon Prism Power!" With the glow of her transformation around her, Serena considered her next move. Maybe if I get a head start on Pyro-Dweeb, I'll be able to figure out how to stop her!
As Sailor Moon, she jumped onto the roof with an agility that still surprised her. She figured she'd have time to stake out the schoolyard before the Negaverse Monster started her rampage. The sight before her startled her and she froze in panic for a moment. Before her stood Pyro-Head and Jadeite, obviously contemplating their plans for the lunch hour attack. I can't fight them both here? What do I do?
Then her two foes noticed her presence. "Well what do we have here?" sneered the Negaverse monster, "A Sailor brat?"
"I have no time to deal with you now, Sailor Moon," declared Jadeite. Before Sailor Moon could react, a pulse of dark energy crashed into her and sent her flying off the roof. With the force of an oncoming train, she landed painfully on the ground. Neither luck nor skill had been with her this time, and she clutched at her knee painfully. AH... I think it's broken. What am I going to do? Where are Mercury and Mars? I should have told them what I planned to do...
A group of students soon formed around the fallen Sailor Scout. She looked up in panic at all the concerned faces until a small, familiar person pushed her way through the crowd.
"Hi Mol!" Sailor Moon said, smiling weekly. "I told you I had something to take care of." She shuddered as a wave of pain overtook her.
Molly gasped in shock as recognition dawned in her mind. "Sailor Moon? Serena, is that you?"
Two figures watched the chaotic scene below, hiding in a tall tree to avoid detection. Students gathered around the ambulance as Sailor Moon was put onto a stretcher and rolled carefully onto the emergency vehicle.
Two girls stood near the tree, chattering in amazement at the lunch hour's events. "Did you hear?" said one dark haired girl with excitement. "Serena is Sailor Moon!"
"I can't believe it either. I mean SERENA being Sailor Moon. She's so klutzy!"
"I know, Sailor Moon is the Champion of Love and Justice; Serena hasn't passed a math test all year!" The two girls giggled at their unkind musings and moved on to get a closer look at the scene.
"I wonder what caused her to fall off the roof so violently?" asked a blue suited figured perched gracefully on a limb of the old tree.
"I don't know," growled her companion, "but when I get my hands on her, she's toast. Of all the harebrained things to do!"
Sailor Moon opened her eyes and looked around. She found herself in a hospital bed, her injured leg set in a cast and in traction. Oh this is just great, another trip to a hospital. I'm getting rather tired of this place.
"Serena?" asked a tearful voice. Sailor Moon was startled by this and checked to make sure her transformation hadn't reversed itself. "Serena, are you okay?" her mother said, running up to the bed and hugging her daughter tightly to her.
"Umm...I'm sorry. I don't know what you're talking about..." began the Sailor Scout but was interrupted by a reproachful look from her mother.
"Oh don't you start that routine with me, young lady. Your friend Molly told me what happened. She was just as surprised as I was that you've been Sailor Moon all this time!"
Sailor Moon gasped and pushed her way out of her mother's arms. "You know?" she asked in amazement, "MOLLY told you?"
Her mother nodded tearfully and dabbed at her eyes with a hanky. "To think, I had to be told something so important from my daughter's friend... That my very own daughter wouldn't confide in me..."
Oh and what was I supposed to do, come home one day and say `Guess what, Mom, I'm Sailor Moon, so you'll have to get used to my bad grades. I'm too tired to study?' As if! But the tears sliding down her mother's cheek made her feel like a heel and Sailor Moon began to cry.
"Oh Mom, don't cry. I couldn't tell you... What if..."
"But you could've been hurt and I wouldn't have known, Serena!" her mother insisted.
"I just didn't want to worry you, Mom!" her daughter answered in an attempt to find an adequate explanation.
"Oh and it's better for me to find out this way, when you're hurt and in the hospital?"
"Mom, this was just an accident. I'll be fine."
"Fine? You have to stay this way for six weeks and you think you'll be fine? And all that physiotherapy afterwards the doctors are talking about?"
"Six weeks?" Sailor Moon exclaimed, "I don't think so!" Oh great, the same day is going to repeat itself for six weeks. I swear I'll go insane! She started to get out of bed, lifting her leg out of the sling that held it immobile. How am I supposed to save Molly with this leg?
There was a knock on the door that distracted Serena and her mother from further contemplating the issue. "Sailor Moon, we'd like to ask you a few questions!"
Sailor Moon flashed her mother a stunned look. "THEY know?" she asked, hoping it wasn't true.
Her mother shot her an angry look in response. "Oh and do you think I told them? Serena, of course, they know. How do you think I found out that you were brought here?"
The blond teenager groaned. "Oh Mom, I never meant for you to find out this way..." The knocking at the door became more insistent and the injured Sailor Scout decided it was time to try and find a way out. Cringing at the pain coursing up her body, she unhooked her leg from traction and lowered herself to the floor.
"Get back in bed this instant, young lady!" her mother commanded. But Sailor Moon had better things to do, like avoiding a hundred reporters at the door. I'm never going to save Molly this way... What time is it anyway? Gasping with the pain of moving her injured leg, she made her way to the window, hoping to find an avenue of escape. Pulling the curtains open, she leaned heavily on the windowsill to support herself. She was almost blinded by the flashing of what seemed to be hundreds of cameras as reporters and fans alike tried to capture a glimpse of the legendary superheroine.
"They're all there to see me, aren't they?" How can I face all those people?
Soft hands on her shoulders gently pulled her away from the window. Her mother nodded quietly and helped her patiently back into bed.
The door burst open and a handful of reporters pushed their way past the police guarding the door and into the room.
Sailor Moon and her mother shielded themselves from the flashes of the camera, covering their faces with their forearms.
"Sailor Moon, how did your mother react to you being a Sailor Scout?"
"Sailor Moon, how long have you been a Sailor Scout?"
"Were you ever planing on revealing your secret identity?"
"What are the identities of Sailors Mars and Mercury?"
"Do they attend the same school as you?"
"How will their deaths and the deaths of your classmates affect your fight against evil?"
The last question echoed cruelly in Sailor Moon's mind and the world began to spin. So I failed my friends again? The school has blown up and they're all dead? The questions continued in a blur around her. She barely heard her mother admonishing them for revealing her friends' death, scolding them for bothering an injured teenager.
Sailor Moon covered her face with her hands and began to sob. Through her tears, she heard her mother order the crowd out of her room.
"Get out of here! Quit bothering my daughter! You should be ashamed of yourselves, bothering a teenaged girl like that! Just get out of here!"
She pushed the last of the reporters out the door and locked it behind them. Seeing the anguished form of her daughter quietly sobbing in the bed, she ran over to her and wrapped comforting arms around her. "I'm sorry about your friends, Serena. I was going to tell you when the time was right. I didn't think the police would allow all those people in here..."
The girl simply cried in her mother's arms, tears of defeat. Can't I do anything right? What am I going to do now? How can I save stop a repeating day with six weeks in here? Sailor Moon wrapped her arms around her mother's waist and held on as if for dear life. "What am I going to do, Mom? What am I going to do?" Her body, exhausted from the day's events, surrendered to blissful oblivion in sleep.
Her dreams plagued by the school repeatedly blowing up before her eyes, Serena barely heard the calls for her to wake up.
"How can you expect me to get up now, Mom?" Serena groaned, trying to go back to sleep.
"I woke you up forty-five minutes ago, young lady," shouted her irritated mother, "That's why I EXPECT you to get out of bed!"
Serena's eyes snapped open and she looked around the room. "I'm in my bedroom!" she gasped in surprise. She looked down at her leg and threw the blankets off. Her leg looked normal, no gashes or cuts, no cast! "I'm okay!" she cheered smiling happily up at her mom. "The day's repeating again!!"
Her mother's darkening glare cut her revelry short. "You'll be a dead teenager soon if you don't get your butt out of bed and ready for school."
"I'm up now, Mom. I'll be down in a sec!" Serena readily agreed. She watched as her mother angrily closed the door behind her. "Phew, I almost blew it there."
The previous day's events caught up with her and Serena's good mood faded. She yawned and wiped some stray hairs out of her face. "I can't go to school again! And do what, get more people killed?"
She grabbed the chair at her desk and wedged it securely under the doorknob. I'm not going now... I need to think and rest. Crawling back into her still warm bed, she grabbed a pillow and covered her ears with it. The sounds of the world around her became muffled and she sighed in contentment. Mom's going to make a lot of racket trying to get me out of bed, but I don't care. I just want to sleep for a while and think...
The knocking started at the door a short time later, but was deaf to her teenaged ears. Serena dozed quietly for the first time in days, knowing that the only danger would be her mother...if she could get in before the end of the day.
