Disclaimer: Never was, never is, never will be mine to own!

Summary: Usagi is kidnapped and stolen away to another dimension. While the Senshi struggle with the unexplained disappearance of their beloved leader, Usagi must fend for herself against a vindictive witch queen in a high stakes battle for her future. Problem is... she can't remember who she is. Post-Stars AU.

Author's Note: Wanna hear a crazy story? So a long, long time ago - we're talking like twelve or thirteen years ago here - I had this really detailed, really intense Sailor Moon dream that incorporated fairytale elements such as Alice in Wonderland, Hansel and Gretel... It was so cool. And ever since then, I've thought, why don't I make this dream into an actual story? Well... life has a tendency of getting away from you, and there was still too much I had to iron out, that I put it on the back burner and kinda forgot I left it there. NO LONGER! The muse came back to bite me in the butt, and before I knew it I was brainstorming like mad. This story is going to be really different from any I've written before on here. There will be a lot of original characters, and some of it is going to dabble in very dark territory. Some may like it, and for others it may not be your cup of tea. That's okay... my feelings won't be hurt if you decide to turn back at any point! But I hope you'll give it a chance. There are a lot of twists and turns in store. At the end of the story, I'll tell you all what the real dream entailed. Some stuff was pretty weird xD

"The Castle of Lethe"

By AngelMoon Girl

Chapter 1: "Down the Rabbit Hole"

Usagi rolled over onto her back and yawned loudly, enjoying the pleasant state between sleep and wakefulness as her mind began the slow ascension to reality. It was that wonderful feeling of knowing she had gotten a full night's sleep, with every part of her rested and refreshed; ready for the new day. She stretched out her arms and legs, far as they could go as she waited for her muscles to give that satisfying pop. Instead, the bun-headed blonde heard,

"Yeouch!"

Usagi opened her eyes and grinned coquettishly. She glanced to the side and saw her beloved, now wide awake with a firm grimace in place as he rubbed at his abused appendage.

"Sorry sweetie."

"I think you crushed my nose back into my face!" Mamoru said, with a pained chortle. He pressed against it in various experimental ways.

"Want Nurse Usagi to make it all better?"

Usagi flopped onto her stomach and leaned in close, inspecting the damage. She smiled even wider as he pulled a pout and began to lay it on thick, clearly relishing in her undivided attention.

"I don't know... this one might require a gentler approach than Nurse Usagi usually gives..."

"How's this?" Usagi whispered, placing a very ginger kiss upon his bruised nose. She followed it up with a series of butterfly kisses, trailed down his neck, and across his collarbone. Mamoru narrowly avoided a lusty moan, still trying to feign grievous injury.

"I suppose... if you were to keep going..."

"A little further down?"

"A little further down..." Mamoru nodded, closing his eyes in eager anticipation. "Yes... then that might just... do the trick..."

"Oh Mamo-chan?" Usagi murmured, around lips that were mercilessly attacking the sensitive skin of his belly button.

"Hmm?" Mamoru whimpered.

She flicked her tongue over the pelvic bones that arched like an arrow to his sweet spot, but paused just before the good part, which was indubitably frustrating. He groaned for real this time.

"You're about to be late for work."

Mamoru whipped his head toward the clock and swore vociferously, with a word Usagi wouldn't have dared repeat in respectable company. She cackled as he flung himself out of bed and began racing around the small bedroom, throwing on clothes and dragging a comb through his mussed raven locks. Usagi settled back against his pillows, just watching.

"You're mean, you know that?"

"Why am I mean?" Usagi whined playfully, knowing full well why she was.

Mamoru turned on her with a cocked brow as he buttoned up his shirt. "Because you sit there on this beautiful sunny Monday morning with utterly nothing to do but tease me with your wanton wiles-"

"And very naked body," Usagi added, pointedly looking down herself with an approving nod.

"-very hot, very naked body," Mamoru agreed, now also admiring her languid figure, "while I prepare to go to work! It's not fair!"

As if to stress the point, Mamoru snapped his belt before slinging it around his waist, the sound like a whip crack on the air. Usagi smirked.

"You could always play hooky with me."

"Don't tempt me, Usako." Mamoru leaned forward as he tucked in his starch white shirttails. His dark eyes like moon-kissed midnight stoked the fires of desire not yet cooled in her belly. It took every ounce of willpower not to jump him then and there. "Or we might just have to page the pretty nurse from before back in here..."

"She's good at what she does, isn't she?" Usagi demurred.

Mamoru's countenance went soft as he soaked in the hills and plains of her features, like committing every facet to memory. He reached out and stroked her cheek, this moment suddenly more intimate than those they had just shared previous. "There's no one better. You don't just heal the physical. You soothe my soul, Usako. I'd be lost without your light."

Usagi blushed, the bashful incarnadine creeping quickly across her cheeks. She reached up and squeezed his nose.

"Yeouch!"

"Go to work, Mamo-chan. Before you dawdle so long, they make you intern to be a janitor instead of a doctor!" Usagi chuckled, affection lurking in the shallows of her reproach. Mamoru laughed, taking that as his cue to depart.

"Keep that up, one day you'll have even Chibi-Usa quaking in her boots!"

"Hope so. That little rascal never was a good listener. Wonder where she gets that from!"

Mamoru made a flamboyant show of ducking out. "No idea! Byyyyeee! Love you!"

"Love you too!" Usagi called. She giggled to herself as she listened to the hurried sounds of her boyfriend cobbling together lunch before he bolted out the front door. It really was a great feeling, not having anywhere to be or anything to do today. Well... she did have a few applications to hand in. Mama and Papa had been hounding her to get a summer job, but as Usagi so succinctly put it, "I just got out of hell... I don't want to go right back!"

She might have been dragging her heels, but Usagi knew... it was time to be an adult. Last month, she, Ami, Minako, Makoto and Rei finally graduated high school. She still wasn't quite sure how she passed - probably a lot of it could be attributed to Ami's tireless efforts to keep her grades afloat - but she did, and now the world was hers to claim. She was freshly nineteen years old and every possibility was open to her - if only she knew what she wanted to do.

Usagi frowned grumpily. Well... she knew what she wanted to do. Lay in bed all day and eat sweets until her Mamo-chan was home to cuddle with. But those activities wouldn't earn her a living, nor the blessing of her future husband, so it was with grudging acceptance that the girl planned her day of traveling around dropping off job applications.

After a nap, of course.

One last little nap wouldn't hurt anything.

oOo

Usagi ended up dozing until almost noon. That was when she decided it was probably high past time to get up and be a functioning human, so she washed, dressed, and fed herself, giving one last cursory perusal of the applications. She knew there wasn't going to be any mistakes - both Mamoru and Ami edited them for any grammatical errors - but it helped jumpstart her brain into firing on all cylinders. After, she called her Mama to assure her that no, she wasn't dead, she just overslept again at Mamoru's and would see her in a couple hours, and yes, she promised to be there for once for dinner.

"Your Papa and I are starting to forget what you look like, Usagi!"

Ikuko's voice was humor laced with exasperation, and no small measure of motherly concern. Usagi was fully aware she and Papa weren't exactly thrilled with the fact that their daughter had taken to sleeping over most nights at her boyfriend's apartment, but after she hit eighteen, there wasn't much they could do to stop her. She was legally an adult now, and she wanted to be with her beloved, as much as possible. Now that they had become intimate, it was almost painful to be apart from him for even a single night.

"I really mean it, Mama. I'll see you later this afternoon!" Usagi said, hoping her massive eye-roll didn't translate into her tone.

"Okay. Be good, honey. Love you," Ikuko imparted, and Usagi had to smile at how heartfelt her mother always sounded, no matter how frustrated she was with her errant teen daughter.

"I always am. Bye, Mama. Love you too!"

Usagi hung up with a guilty sigh. She really should try to be better about going home more. Maybe they would be okay with Mamoru coming there?

Usagi caught herself with an incredulous snort. Yeah - over her Papa's dead body!

She gathered up her belongings and leisurely made her way into the city. Her first stops were to the local bakery (where she left off an application and picked up a scone), the yakitori stand (where she left off an application and picked up a ginnan stick), and the ice cream parlor (where she didn't leave off an application, but did pick up a chocolate cone because she was feeling rather peckish). Feeling proud of her efforts today, Usagi also decided to visit Motoki at the arcade ("Why on earth didn't you apply here!? Nobody knows these games better than you, and you know I could always use a hand!"), bum a free milkshake off him ("I could pay you in those, you know. No, no, I'm serious. Free milkshakes. It would be an employee perk!"), and ended up walking out feeling pretty sure she'd just solved her summer job conundrum.

Usagi whistled a cheerful little ditty as she ambled through the park, contemplating on the spoils of her day. She envied her friends for having such clear ideas of what they were going to do with their lives before the rise of Crystal Tokyo... Ami was planning for Germany in the fall. Makoto interning at a restaurant. Rei kept busy with shrine duties and Minako had signed on for a couple photo shoots. In fact, she had even gone so far as to send out copies of her vocals CD to any agent she could find in the phone book! They were all already so far down the path to fulfilling their dreams. Usagi felt pale in comparison. But she refused to let that thought get her down - after all, today was a good first step in the right direction. She couldn't wait to tell the girls of her success!

Like reading the track of her mind, Usagi's phone suddenly went off. It buzzed in the way only a message would elicit, and as Usagi pulled out her bright pink Nokia she saw Minako's number flash across the screen.

What are you up to, girl? Come hang with us later?

Usagi bit her lip and fumbled with the tiny keys, still new to this whole 'texting' thing. She mostly found it annoying, never having much luck with computers - that was Ami's department! - and often answered with more tact than she intended. Mercifully, the girls understood her technological woes.

Just as she had sent No, Minako speed-replied with Awww, why not!? before Usagi even had a chance to explain herself. She huffed, slowly pecking about needing to see her parents and wishing Minako would just frigging call her when a sudden snap in the bushes drew the blonde's attention. She froze, pausing in her typing. Her eyes darted about the deserted area, noticing she had stopped along the edge of the duck pond...

Yet there were no ducks in sight.

It was not a common occurrence, to see no wildlife nor even park-goers on a beautiful day such as this, and it immediately set Usagi's nerves on edge and her senses on high alert. She turned off her phone without bothering to finish her reply, and stuffed it back into her pocket. The bushes fluttered and creaked again.

"H-hello?"

A shrill giggle issued from out of the thicket, like that of a child. Usagi took a tentative step closer.

"Who's there?"

She caught a hint of color as someone laughed again, their mirth literally shaking the bushes.

"Now you see me, now you don't!"

Usagi furrowed her brow, inching forward once more. It definitely sounded like a little kid, but why would they be all the way out here, without supervision? Not wanting to scare them, the nineteen year old inquired gently, "Are you playing hide and seek? You know, you really shouldn't stray so far away from your Mama-"

A burst of what can only be described as electricity slammed into Usagi, square in the chest. She felt herself being tossed into the sky, then somersaulting through the air until she slammed into a tree with an agonized groan. She struggled mightily to recover, every breath like white hot knives licking at her throat. Usagi gasped as the perpetrator of her attack finally made themselves known, and it was definitely not a child.

Usagi wasn't quite sure what this creature was. It looked like a deranged monkey, but not quite, because it had wings and was now floating a few feet above the bushes. On its scraggly brown fur were random tufts of red, the most prominent a tear-shaped patch right in the middle of the creature's forehead. Its eyes were cold and beady; bloodthirsty, rather like the hue they so resembled. Usagi was immediately disgusted.

"Monster!" she choked out, scrambling for her transformation brooch, exceedingly grateful she always kept it on her person. Her fingers connected with cool metal and without any delay, she raised it high. "MOON ETERNAL... MAKE UP!"

It had been so many years since she last uttered that phrase - since Sailor Senshi were even needed at all - that Usagi prayed to God she still possessed the ability within her. To feel the familiar ribbons of superhuman power wrapping around her was like a full-bodied sigh of relief, and Usagi embraced the metamorphosis into her famous alter ego like one would an old friend. Within moments, barely the blink of an eye, Eternal Sailor Moon appeared where once a battered and unassuming teen lay. Reinvigorated by the Silver Crystal's strength pulsing through her veins, the woman leaped up.

"What are you doing, ruining a tranquil afternoon such as this! You are a disturber of the peace - and in bad need of a surgical zoologist. I, Sailor Moon, will punish you... in the name of the Moon!"

The strange red monkey-monster let out another cacophonous shriek that might have been a poor attempt at mirth. Even Sailor Moon had to cringe, and she was used to her own pitch registering off the decibel scale.

"Now you see me, now you don't!" the creature repeated, and its body shimmered corporeal then transparent a few times, before disappearing completely. Sailor Moon started, on her guard. Then she remembered, perhaps now would be a good time to call for some back-up...

The bun-headed heroine tugged out her communicator, but before she even had time to punch in a summons for aid, a second bolt of electricity smacked into her hand, sending the communicator spinning away. She hissed as the assault to her appendage had left a residual burn, but didn't wait to be surprised again - she dove in the direction her communicator had flown, only to find it smoking in the dirt -

Totally fried.

"Now you see me, now you don't!"

Sailor Moon whirled around, coming face-to-face with the leering monster.

"You bastard!" she ground out, taking a swing. The wings lifted this aberrant being just out of her reach, but Moon kept up the pursuit, refusing to let it get the best of her. Part of her felt like this must surely be a test, Luna just ensuring her future Queen's skills were still up to par, because why this now, out of the blue? It made no sense, but as Sailor Moon mentally conceded - enemies rarely did.

She hesitated when her opponent flickered away again.

"Show yourself!" she demanded, standing her ground. "Fight with honor!"

Apparently there was little honor among monsters, because Sailor Moon was hit with another attack, ironically received in the back. She collapsed, utterly winded, clutching at her sore spine.

"Now you see me, now you don't," came the familiar cackle, drifting lazily down from overhead. Sailor Moon grit her teeth and darted for her eternal tier, hoping this creature would be confused by her hand motion, perhaps assuming she was still tending to her wounds. The ploy played off; there was a screech of distress as Sailor Moon shouted her Crystal Power Kiss attack and sent it sailing toward the monster. She fought her own injuries to gaze up into the sky, and was perplexed to find that once again, the weird ape-like thing was nowhere to be seen. Was it hurt? The woman even wondered briefly if maybe, just maybe, it had been a weaker monster - some sorry cast-off from a previous foe - and that it had been destroyed...

And she then wondered nothing at all, as a blinding explosion of sizzling pain wracked her vulnerable figure, on and on and on until Sailor Moon slipped unconscious under the unexpected attack, right into the grip of the creature she had so valiantly attempted to beat off only moments before. Its ugly face morphed into a vindictive smile, crimson eyes beginning to glow.

"Now you see me, now you don't... let you leave we won't, won't, won't!"

To Be Continued

Author's Note: So... what do you think? Are you intrigued? I'd love to hear what you all thought, especially if you have any theories as to what's coming next. Next chapter will introduce our slippery new villain, and follow Usagi as she wrestles important questions such as: Where - and who - the heck is she? *eyebrow waggles*