Shizuki had made sure to include the postscript ‘Give the henshin pins to their new owners, I await my own generation of senshi guardians.’

Convenient for her. Only her.

……

"Chiharu?" Yoake asked, knocking on the door. "Chiharu, it’s passed noon. Get up, we need to talk."

"I didn’t do it," a tired voice muttered.

"Chiharu, this is important."

"I’ll do it later."

Yoake sighed. Passing on the duty of the senshi of time to someone who never cared about it.

"Lemme sleep."

"Chiharu, it’s kind of a present."

"Then it’s not going anywhere, is it?"

For a moment, Yoake contemplated giving the henshin stick and the orb to her son Aaron. But… there was something disturbing about him. He was a perfectly normal boy… well, his hair was a bit long for a male. There was just something about him that made his violin music and his painting utterly creepy. Yoake couldn’t’ place it, but every painting, every song seemed like a necromancy incantation.

She shook her head. Senshidom went to the women unless it was somehow impossible. She was sure of it.

Yoake opened the door.

"Fine, I’m up," Chiharu said, knocking the covers off. She swiped her pale sea green hair out of her face and grabbed her headband off the floor.

"You sleep with those in?" Yoake asked, staring at her daughter’s eyebrow piercings. She’d never advocated them and she resented the fact that something like that looked good on her beautiful wholesome daughter.

"Of course, mom," Chiharu said. "What’s this all about?"

"You remember the stories about Sailormoon?" Yoake asked.

"Yeah," Chiharu said, wondering why her mother got her up for this. "So?"

"You’re inheriting more than just a fashion company," Yoake said, handing the henshin stick to her daughter.

"Wait, you mean it’s real?"

Yoake nodded. "I know I can trust you to take this up."

"Whoa," was all Chiharu managed.

There, that wasn’t so bad.

"This mean I can sleep in later?"

……

"Well, Tommy’s perfect for what she’s gonna get," Kasumi said, smirking. Originally she’d named her first daughter Tomoe in honor of Seishi, her rival but, deep down, friend.

Kasumi had gotten a great job offer in Germany, despite her young age. Unfortunately, even though Japanese was the main language in the world now, there were still countries that couldn’t pronounce it worth a damn. One of those countries happened to be Germany. ‘Ryuu’ was easy to pronounce. ‘Kasumi’ got a bit bungled with pitch and stress, but ‘Tomoe’ completely failed to cross the language barrier. Since Tomoe was two, Kasumi gave up and let the kids—including Tomoe herself—call her Tommy.

"What do you mean?" Ryuu asked as he set the table. Kasumi’s sharp and domineering personality hadn’t changed. She may have been happier than ever in her life, but she refused to lose control of even the littlest things in her life. After marriage, Ryuu immediately became a stay-at-home father. Not that Kasumi wasn’t home enough for her children.

"I thought I told you…" Kasumi said wistfully. "Remember the talk, a long time ago, about Seishi giving me a gift?"

Ryuu nodded. He didn’t let Kasumi see he was slightly hurt as she so casually mentioned Seishi. She was jealous, it was easy to understand. Somehow, after three hundred years, he still mourned his first love.

"It was Tommy," Kasumi said. She waited until the blank, confused expression to lave Ryuu.

"Oh." He said, smiling. It explained a lot. Especially why Tommy looked like Seishi, at least, she did when she was little. All the children had been different when they were little. Aya still fenced, Utako was loud and good and wholesome, and Tomoe… Well, Tomoe dressed normally.

"I’m not sure about Aya, I doubt she’d care."

"I hope she doesn’t take it the way she did the fencing," Ryuu said, disappointed. His little girl was so skilled at it. It had hurt when she said she didn’t want to it anymore back in Junior High.

"I’m worried about Utako," Kasumi said.

"Me too," he concurred.

"I mean about her being a senshi."

"Oh, right," Ryuu said. He worried about his little girl. She’d been athletic and full of happiness and energy. She’d been a normal kid that came back with scrapes on her knees and grass stains on her jeans. She constantly had bugs in her hands and twigs in her hair. Where had he gone wrong? When did his little rascal turn into the quiet, creepy, nasty type? When did she have the need to talk back or steal things or break mirrors? When did she… when did she get so creepy? "She’s a bad influence on Tommy."

"Well, so far Tommy’s fine and she’s grown up with Utako as long as Utako’s been a live," Kasumi blamed herself for Utako. She’d told the children to see the ugly and bad, to balance things. She vowed never to let her children become her sister. Never. She shivered at the memory, shocked as she felt Ryuu's arms around her.

"It wasn’t your fault," he said.

"I know. I never knew telling her to be careful would have such an effect. Kasumi had told Utako about seeing ugly things everywhere, warned her about flaunting beauty. Utako smashed a mirror and commented that if she reminded Kasumi of Megami so much, she might as well just grab a knife right then and there. The two didn’t speak much after that. "Maybe it’ll help her," Kasumi said.

"Technically no one’s really complained," Ryuu said. Utako had OCD. She stole things. They were tiny, useless things, though. She took paper clips, staplers, lighters, matches, rubber bands, marbles, cards: useless junk. Her bookshelf was crammed with books containing stories or documentation on strange sex acts. Ryuu had made the mistake of looking in one once while cleaning Utako’s room.

"Can we choose someone else?" Kasumi asked.

"Kamala’s pregnant," Ryuu said. "And in India. Yohko’s gotta be there with her when the baby comes." His mother had never told his sister about being a senshi. Not to Ryuu’s knowledge. And she was going to be a grandmother soon… there was no way in hell that branch of the family tree could receive senshi powers.

"True," Kasumi said.

"Can you imagine anyone else but our daughters wielding the powers?"

Kasumi sighed. "No." Tomoe might dress strangely, Aya might not get grades like her naturally over-achieving mother, and Utako was…Utako. Still, they weren’t murderers or traitors, or dirty like Solana. When they had boyfriends they were nice, kind, and responsible. Even with the strange people Utako went off with she never did anything they never consented to.

"Better get it over with then, huh?" Ryuu asked.

"Yeah."

……………

The Morinos gathered their children in the living room.

"We’ve always promised that this day would come," Kasumi said. She’d always told her children she planned to pass on the powers of the planetary senshi to them someday. That way they’d know they had responsibility ahead of them, and they’d learn to be strong and good. Or she’d give the powers to someone else if she felt they were too corrupted.

"Or threatened," Utako muttered.

Kasumi took a deep breath and ignored her daughter. "Tomo—Tommy, I never told you who your mother was."

"So?" she asked, confused. She’d been told Kasumi had acted as a surrogate mother when pregnant with her. "Does that really matter, Mama?"

"She was famous. She was the last Sailorsaturn. She gave her life to save the universe."

"And you said we shouldn’t be suicidal maniacs," Utako muttered.

"Utako!" Ryuu scolded. He preferred quiet, aloof Utako to sardonic, glaring Utako. But she was only like that when her parents weren’t addressing her.

"It’s yours by right, as well as the powers and talisman that come with it." Kasumi handed the stick to Tommy.

"She was my real mother? Seishi? Lady Tranquility?"

Kasumi nodded, thankful Utako hadn’t added a comment about it.

Tommy just stared at the pen. "Can I try it out?"

"Just the outfit," Kasumi said.

Tommy closed her eyes. She let the words just come to her. "Wandering Star Saturn Arcana…"

She looked down. Her usual leather and fishnet and metal was gone. Instead she was in a skimpy sailor fuku. In her hand was a tall staff topped with and impressive double-blade.

She smiled, then stopped. Something was weird. She reached up and checked her piercings. They were all still there. The chain connecting her lip piercing and ear cuff was gone though. It was probably a good thing. Getting that caught n something in a battle would be trouble. Her nose piercing seemed to have turned into a small stud, probably for the same purpose.

She touched her head. Her hair was still normal—well, not normal, but still hers—or lack there of. She brushed her hand at her hair. Her braids were still there. Her crew cut was still there.

"Wow," she said.

"Why does she get the spear?" Aya asked.

Utako said nothing, but smirked. She knew how much her sister loved sharp objects, and had a hidden collection in her closet.

"It’s a glaive…I think" Tommy said, no reproach at all in her voice. In fact, she almost failed at laughing out loud about how much Aya must envy her.

"Aya, you get this," Kasumi said, placing a blue-white fan in her daughter’s hands, along with a similar henshin stick.

"It’s great, mama, but we have A/C."

Utako burst out loud. Unlike when she laughed at her parents, this was happy and genuine laughter.

"It’s the kourinosensu. The Fan of Ice," Kasumi said.

Aya tested it on her face, "I think it’s broken."

"Looks like we loser kids can’t even work a fan right for our parents," Utako said sardonically. She loved to mock how none of them had been anywhere near images of their parents’ expectations for them; and how much her parents hated it. "I guess we can’t get anything right, can we?"

Kasumi glared daggers at her daughter, who grinned slightly.

"This is yours," Ryuu said, handing Utako the Ryuunome and her the stick of Jupiter. This should keep Utako quiet. Maybe she’d think better of her parents after this.

"A marble?" Utako spat, offended. "What, I lost my marbles and you found them? That’s such a lame joke! Süsser Christos! I bring home a bunch of junk and a stapler and you think I’m retarded or something."

In her rant, she dropped the Ryuunome. Aya didn’t like it when Utako tried to fight with their parents and politely picked up the marble, screaming when it was suddenly no longer just a marble.

She stayed there, kneeling on the ground, staring in awe at the drag sword. A dragon hilt with a perfect green eye, lightning making up the serrated blade... She felt the power surging though herself and the sword. She’d never held a better weapon. Not even when she’d gone to the Green Isles with her friends and held a battle-axe.

Utako was rendered speechless. She delicately picked up the fan, bring it up the her face and closed it. There was a white blur and suddenly it rained plaster and ice on her hair and a hole in the ceiling was covered in ice. "…oops," she squeaked. She was defeated. She’d screwed up.

Aya smiled at the blade still.

Utako looked sheepishly at her parents. They’d given her such a great gift. At this one moment in time, she wasn’t their abandoned middle-child they never understood and expected unreciprocated greatness and admiration from. She was their daughter. Truly. For now, she actually felt a strange feeling in her chest towards them. "I love you guys," she said, a meant it.

Kasumi wiped a tear away. Utako had meant it.