Mamoru

Usagi Tsukino had promised to call. That is simply what is expected of a person with terrible driving skills who takes their boyfriend's Ferrari on a day trip to the beach. Especially with Chibiusa riding along. It was their day to catch up with each other, this being Chibiusa's first visit in a year and a half. I probably would have worried if I had sent her on my old tricycle. My phone had remained silent all day. I pushed this to the back of my mind. She probably forgot to charge her cell.

Then the harsh sound of my phone vibrating on the kitchen countertop rang through the apartment. I walked calmly to the phone, not wanting to sound like I had been waiting for her call. The caller I.D did not, however display her name. It was from an unfamiliar number. I figured she must have borrowed a phone from someone.

"Hello?"

"Hello. Is this Mamoru?" The voice on the other end of the line sound choked and hoarse.

"Yes."

"This is Ikuko."

"You sound a bit different Ms. Tsukino."She inhaled so deeply I could hear it on the phone.

"I have to speak to you." She dissolved into tears. Chibiusa, who I know admired you very much, she was killed in a car accident. This morning." I said nothing. I thought of my parents. The words I had heard before. My brain went through all the emotions, and decided simply to not pick one at all.

"Usagi is alive. For how much…" Ikuko dissolved into tears again. "We don't know how much longer. She's at Central Hospital. I understand if you can't handle coming."

"No, no, I'll be there."

Ikuko hung up. I searched frantically for the keys to my car. Fifteen minutes later I was no closer to finding them than I was when I started. Then my currently useless mind remembered that Usagi had the car. The pain of losing my beautiful bright red car was something I could process. It wasn't even mine; it was my father's, his pride and joy. Or so I was told. I don't remember anything about them. I spent the long motorcycle ride trying to convince myself that I was really pissed off about the loss of my car. Somewhere inside though, I knew I didn't really care.

...

When I arrived, Minako and Rei sat on a sofa in the waiting room. The ICU wait area was much more lavish than the other areas. Minako gave me a hug, which I was awkwardly forced to return, while Rei just continued to stare at the opposite wall. Minako's face was streaked with tears, while her friend seemed to have a reaction similar to mine. "No one but family is allowed in there. She's in a coma. I think they'll let us in soon." Rei said, more to the floor than to me. Minako scooted closer to Rei to make room for me to sit. I had never been particularly close to Usagi's friends, but obviously they thought I needed them. Maybe I did.

Rei's prediction didn't prove true. My pre-med training had given me enough sense to know arguing with doctors would not bring us any closer to seeing her. The three of us sat there in a silence that would have been awkward under any other circumstance. For at least an hour. I still wasn't even sure this was real.

Makoto Kino came rushing in ninety minutes later. She gave Minako and Rei a hug, then sat down in between them, pushing me to the very end of the couch. The remaining members of the Tsukino family walked silently in to the room.

"You can see her now, if you'd like." This meant she had been moved from the ICU. This meant she was at least, alive. I felt Mrs. Tsukino would have mentioned if her condition was otherwise, seeing as she was the designated bearer of bad news.

Her little brother, Shingo, led us down a long hallway to her room. Rei pushed open the door, slowly, wincing when it creaked. A nurse stood over her, changing her IV's. "She is in a comatose state. Honestly, her odds aren't great. I am truly sorry."

That's when I saw her. Her recently cut hair was neatly arranged on the pillow and the blanket was tucked underneath her arms. There were several large bandages on her head. "Looks like she has internal brain damage." I whispered to no one in particular. Her friends solemnly nodded and continued staring at her, because there was nothing else to do. I wished I could be alone, to watch her without being watched by others. She looked peaceful, but so unlike herself. She would never sleep like this, never look like this at all. Where was she really? Here, or somewhere else, or nowhere at all?

It was me who gave her the car. Some things can shake you out of your state of shock. This was one of them. It was all real now, it wasn't going away. It's better to curse the universe, than to blame yourself. I suddenly began crying, something I hadn't done in years. . Minako and Makoto looked politely at the floor. Rei looked me square in the eye. "It's not your fault. You let her have the car, sure. She crashed it. It sucks that it happened, but you didn't do it. It was fate. The crystal saved her before, it can do it again. "

I was silent. I didn't hate myself any less, but at least they weren't angry. I didn't want the people who love her as much as I do to be blaming me for this. I turned and left. I had decided she wasn't there, but maybe she'd come back.

…

I didn't go to class the next day. People describe misery a lot of ways, but isn't a feeling easily conveyed. I had split myself in two, each hating the other, the one who wanted to keep going without them, and the one who said to stay behind. Minako called me every few hours, but I didn't answer. She told me to come and visit, Usagi would be back, but I couldn't bear to give myself false hope. God, I was so selfish.

It was three days later when I finally decided to get out of my apartment and try to keep going. For Chibiusa, she wouldn't want me to throw everything away because she was gone. I was pondering why the crystal hadn't saved her as well. I wanted to turn back, but pressed on. Halfway to class, my phone rang. I resolved to answer it, because that was part of what going on entailed. An unfamiliar number appeared. Last time I answered a call from a number I didn't know, look where it got me. Right as the phone was about to stop ringing, I brought it to my ear. "Hello?"

"Hello. It's Setsuna. I need your help. I think together, we can bring them back." With that I stopped dead in my tracks in the middle of the street.

"I'm listening."