She could return to her moon once a week, and once she realized that, Sailor Europa began to form a hypothesis she dearly wanted to test. There did not appear to be any rule saying that the moons were barren – simply that civilization had ceased, mysteriously, a thousand years ago. The scout knew from exploring her homeworld that there were greenhouses on the moon that were more or less intact, even if all traces of vegetation had turned to dust centuries before.
There was no soil on Europa, from what she understood. Though she by no means pretended to be an expert in agriculture, the setup at the palace looked like it was meant for aeroponics. She did her research, and while she did not think she stood a chance of repairing or even replicating the complexity of the Europan system, devising one of her own took a few weeks of work but it looked like it would be good enough to grow a few things.
She chose hardy seeds, vegetables and flowers, for variety, and packed the whole contraption into a single bag. Water would be the hardest thing to transport to Europa, but, the senshi realized – it was an
ice moon. She had no shortage of water.
She arrived on Europa in one of the lower levels of the castle, and dragged the bag along the smooth stone floors until she reached the ancient greenhouse. It was bright and temperate, warmed by light and heat reflected by the gas giant. This was quickly becoming one of her favorite rooms in the palace, and not only because of the ornate stained-glass panels that made up the ceiling and walls.
The senshi did a perfunctory look for ghosts, and seeing none, got to work assembling her jerry-rigged aeroponics device. She’d had an easy time putting it together and taking it apart at home, but here her perfectionism ramped up to a whole new level, and she labored over every join and delicate knot, every curve of the hose. If she messed anything up, it would be a whole week before she could come back and check on her progress, and that would mean a whole week of valuable growing time lost if the device failed to work.
With the basic scaffolding painstakingly in place, Europa got to her feet and stretched. Her knees, elbows, and knuckles all popped satisfyingly. “Water,” she said simply.
There was a door at the far end of the greenhouse. Europa braced herself for the cold and stepped outside just long enough to scoop up several chunks of ice – enough to fill the reservoir in her scaffolding and water the plants until she could return.
When she went back inside, she was no longer alone in the greenhouse.
Rows of some foreign, golden grain stretched towards the ceiling in the nearest planter. Across the aisle, a tangle of squashes and fruits grew suspended like organic chandeliers.
Approaching the senshi of the deep was her familiar past self, a few years older than she’d ever seen her, glowing ribbons trailing in an invisible breeze and followed by a younger girl with long, dark hair. This girl also had the look of one of the archaic senshi. In the present, Europa took a step closer, watching the pair of teenagers as they stopped to sample berries from a rambling vine.
“Oh, Europa,” the younger girl was saying, only to be quickly cut off by the elder scout.
“I told you,” smiled past Europa. “You can call me Signy.” The younger girl nodded.
“Signy,” she said, as if she found it strange. “Alright. Signy. This room- we haven’t got anything like this on Callisto.”
The present Europa took another step towards them, keeping careful listen. So her past self’s name was Signy, and this younger senshi was from Callisto – she would have to remember, to look for a Callisto when she returned to Destiny City. “I could arrange to have a master glazier visit you,” said past Europa, waving for the younger girl to follow her. They disappeared around the corner of the high stalks of grain. The present senshi tried to follow, but the vision faded, leaving her holding six chunks of ice to her chest.
Suddenly, she was aware of just how cold she was. “s**t!” she exclaimed, rushing to drop them into the reservoir. The front of her uniform was soaked, and she had to place the seeds in their baskets with shivering fingers.
Europa took a last look around the empty greenhouse, and then leaned in close to her haphazard scaffolding. “Grow for me – please?” she asked the seeds. They were hundreds of thousands of miles from home. It seemed foolish to even ask. At any rate, what was done was done. She would find out if her endeavor worked in a few weeks.
She gave the seeds a smile, picked up her bag, pulled out her phone, and headed for home. After all – watched grass didn’t grow any faster.
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