[ galileo's head was on the block
the crime was looking up the truth
and as the bombshells of my daily fears explode
i try to trace them to my youth ]
"Wait right here, Hotaru," said Haruka as she bodily set the girl on a stool. "I gotta go catch Michi before she gets too far. I swear, I'll be right back." With that, the boyish blonde dropped a kiss to Hotaru's forehead and darted out the door of Crown Game Center.
Hotaru was well aware that her job at the moment was to stay still and quiet and pleasant while she waited for the woman she considered her father to make up yet another verbal fumble. However, she thought, it was the fifth time in the last week that something like this had happened. Once at home over a dress that, as Hotaru had learned, DID NOT make Michiru look fat, twice over the color of the new curtains, and once again over the state of the kitchen. And as it was the fifth time, Hotaru's growing impatience with the pair of lovers was completely justified. She nodded and the thought and spun the stool around. Her legs still too short to touch the ground, she had to push off the counter.
Enjoying the moment despite herself, she was almost giggling as she gained enough speed to tumble off and into the arms of the very fortunately placed Furuhata Motoki. He caught her with no difficulty, as this version of herself was no more than nine, physically, and still feather-delicate. She flushed and looked up at him, sliding dark strands of hair from her eyes and pink cheeks. "Thank you." She decided she must have been spinning faster than she'd thought, because she was still dizzy and the world was still spinning around her, her knees resting neatly in the crook of Motoki's arms and her pulse thrumming.
He seemed both distant and close for a moment, looking down at her with concern and something else, like maybe he was dizzy too. Or maybe, said the part of her that was so much older than the rest, this is a moment of perfect synergy, when all the stars line up just right and knock the planets so that everything just spins and spins around itself, in and out like breath, like birth, like death-
But in this time, Hotaru was nine and Motoki was older, the age of the prince she'd sworn to protect.
He seemed to collect himself, and smiled gently at the girl who was once again only the adorable little friend of Chibiusa. It was good that he'd gotten ahold of himself, he reflected, because for a minute he'd really started to space, seeing Hotaru as some keeper of death and destruction and rebirth, directing the traffic of errant souls. How absurd.
"You'd better be careful," Motoki laughed, setting her down with care not to jar her small frame, which had felt much like a bird's, light and small boned, warm with a pulse.
"Thank you," she said, ducking her head to stare at her feet.
"Aw, don't feel bad," he said. "Let me get you something to drink. Sounds like Haruka won't be back for a while, huh?"
At this Hotaru looked back up, trying to bite back a smirk. "If the other four times were any indication, you're right." She climbed back up onto the stool, crossing her ankles and resting her elbows on the counter. "Give me your hardest stuff."
"How's a soda?"
"I guess."
[ and then you had to bring up reincarnation
over a couple of beers the other night
and now i'm serving time for mistakes made by another
in another lifetime ]
Hotaru sipped it through a red and white striped straw, tracing stars in the condensation on the glass.
Motoki watched her, wiping the counter. "So, how's school?"
She wrinkled her nose. "Fine." Outside, the crescendo of Haruka and Michiru rose and fell. It was quiet enough inside the empty game center to hear the arguing of her adoptive parents, which was more embarrassing than she would have thought. She glanced up from her soda to Motoki, who was also listening, but immediately pretended not to be. "Sorry," she murmured. "They do this a lot more than they used to, and it must be driving customers away."
"Don't worry about it. This has been a slow week, and it's not like I haven't heard my fair share of spats. People are in here all the time, looking down and wanting to drown their sorrows. They just aren't old enough for a bar," he laughed. "Besides, those two love each other."
That brought an unexpected comfort to the girl. "You're right. They always have," she said, quietly reflecting on the time she'd known them, from Silver Millenium to now, to the future Chibiusa would make vague comments on every now and then.
"Sometimes you sound older then them, Hotaru," Motoki said, smiling speculatively. "I bet you're an old soul."
Hotaru almost laughed. "I bet you're right."
[ how long till my soul gets it right
can any human being ever reach that kind of light
i call on the resting soul of Galileo
king of night vision
king of insight ]
When the bickering died down, Haruka came and collected Hotaru, smiling and nodding apologetically at Motoki. Hotaru waved behind her as she was led out the door.
Haruka and Michiru went out that night. Probably another so Haruka can make up whatever she's done now, Hotaru said to herself as Setsuna led her back inside. "What will we do tonight?"
"Oh, I don't know. I was thinking of a quiet evening in, some tea." Setsuna headed for the kitchen. Hotaru braced herself. It was always a quiet night in when Setsuna was in charge. She'd have to do her homework and then read...maybe she could convince Setsuna that to let her put in a movie. That might be good, she thought, knowing Setsuna's tendency towards the melancholy, even tears, on these nights by themselves.
Setsuna poked her head back out the door. "Why, Hotaru? Do you have a date tonight?"
"No." But Motoki's face swam to the front of her thoughts and she blushed.
[ i think about my fear of motion
which i never could explain
some other fool across the ocean years ago
must have crashed his little airplane ]
"Hey, Motoki," said Hotaru as she dropped her bookbag on the counter of Crown. She was thirteen now, and taller.
He grinned at her. "Hey, Hotaru. Where have you been all my life?"
"School," she said pragmatically, and he laughed. "If you yourself had studied harder, you'd not only know that, but you'd be the head of an important business instead of the assistant manager of a game center." It was their favorite joke that Motoki still worked at the Crown Game Center, and that he probably would forver.
"I'm telling you, Hotaru, I'll get my break any minute now. That fat bald guy over there? He's from a publishing company." Motoki waved in the man's general direction.
Her eyes widened. "Really? That's-"
"Nah. But he has been here all day. Maybe I'll throw him out."
"You couldn't if you tried. He's huge compared to you."
"I'm all muscle, though," Motoki said, flexing his arm.
Hotaru punched him in the arm, giggling merrily as he staggered around. "You pansy." Motoki stumbled around the counter and collapsed at her feet. "Get up." He looked up at her, leaning against her legs and the stool.
"I don't think so. I'm perfectly comfortable right here." He blew sandy hair from his eyes, only to have it fall right back in place.
"But I'm not, my legs are going to fall asleep."
Motoki opened his mouth to comment, and was quieted as a sobbing blonde woman burst through the doors, mascara running down her cheeks. "Minako? Minako! What's wrong?"
Hotaru watched as the young idol threw herself against the now standing Motoki. "It's horrible," she managed, muffled by his chest. "Just horrible." Knowing Minako's tendency towards exaggeration, Hotaru rolled her eyes.
"What's horrible, Minako?" However, her voice was the same calm, serene soprano that all the senshi knew. It was her Hotaru-the-Senshi-of-Death-Destruction-And-Rebirth-Knows-Best voice. It was second only to the Setsuna-the-Keeper-of-Time-Itself-Knows-Best voice, though as she'd gotten older, her propensity for giving advice meant she was moving up in rank.
"He...broke up with me...."
Motoki had peeled Minako off of him by this point, and had her seated on a stool as he desperately searched for something, anything with chocolate in it. She took the opportunity to bury her face in the closest dishcloth. "He broke up with me," she bawled again.
Oh, dear. And Hotaru couldn't recall this one's name. "Everything will be fine, Minako. He's a fool, and you know that. You're beautiful and talented, and kind and loving..." She pulled the cloth away from her and rested the tips of her fingers under her chin, tilting the flushed face up. "...and a wonderful person. Isn't that right, Motoki?"
"Absolutely." He shot them his most golden smile.
"See? Now, how long ago did this happen?"
"Three days a-ago." Minako hiccupped pathetically. "I think I've cried the whole three days."
"Then today is a good day to be done crying," Hotaru instructed. Her eyes deepened as they invariably did when she took the role of watching over and advising the senshi, who were really so much younger than her, and had only lived once or twice-
Minako nodded, and Hotaru continued. "I think you should go home, take a bath, and forget the idiot. You have to be in good shape for Europe next week, don't you?" She was almost jealous for a moment. Though her heart was momentarily broken, on tour in Euope Minako would once again be happy and beautiful and surrounded by love.
"Thank you," said Minako as she stood shakily. "I think I will." She shook out her hair. "Oh, Hotaru, you've always taken good care of us...for being so young," she added for Motoki's benefit. The idol doubted that he knew his young friend would be as ageless as Setsuna if not for her constant rebirths. "And hey, I hear you have romance on the horizon too!"
Hotaru almost lost her composure at that. "What?"
"Haruka told us! A boy's been walking you home, calling you?"
"He's my friend. That's...it."
"Ha! I had many friends at your age, too, then." Minako patted Hotaru's head fondly, and waved at Motoki on her way out.
"A boy?" Motoki questioned when Minako was gone.
"It's not as big of a deal as everyone else thinks it is. I don't want a boyfriend."
"Why not?"
"I dunno," Hotaru said, looking at the mascara stains on the dishcloth. "I just never have."
"You're growing up," said Motoki, much to Hotaru's amusement. "You may soon."
But it's not so likely I'll stay grown-up, she wanted to say. You never know when I'll be needed so much that I have to die and start over.
[ how long till my soul gets it right
can any human being ever reach that kind of light
i call on the resting soul of galileo
king of night vision
king of insight ]
Hotaru made it to her sixteenth, and then seventeenth birthday. In all honesty, she was surprised.
The majority of her days found her doing her homework at the counter of Crown Game Center, or helping Motoki with the little tasks, running down to run his latest draft off at the local copy place. He was getting closer to his goal, a book of poetry. Motoki as a poet still made Hotaru giggle sometimes. None of the other senshi knew his aspiration.
He was almost thirty, but still looked boyish. They made a complementary pair to look at; Motoki with the eyes and smile of a boy and Hotaru who often looked like she had lived forever. In a way, she had.
There were no disturbances in Tokyo, no evil queens or monster trees or youma. Hotaru hadn't touched her henshin stick in years now. Her hands had almost forgotten the weight of the Glaive. Then again, her hands had always been so much smaller than this.
She'd never had a boyfriend yet. They asked, and she shivered, and politely refused.
Motoki still wrote love poems to Reika, who'd left him the year Hotaru turned fourteen.
[ i'm not making a joke you know me I take everything so seriously
if we wait for the time till all souls get it right
then at least i know there'll be no nuclear annihalation in my lifetime
i'm still not right ]
Hotaru rested her chin in her hand as she watched Motoki dissecting one of his works. "Have you heard from them?"
"No. Not yet," he said, offering her a feverish smile. The expression thinned into exhaustion, and Hotaru scowled at him.
"You've been pulling those marathon sessions to get things done again, haven't you?"
"Maybe." He looked back down at his paper. "But you haven't exactly been getting the recommended eight hours either, have you?"
Hotaru quieted. "You know why."
"Setsuna again?"
"Yes." It was one of the bad times of the year again for Setsuna, who mostly drank tea and cried. Hotaru would walk in after school and find Setsuna in the kitchen, blinds closed so that only tepid half-light slatterned into the room, weeping into her teacup. And now, those fits, which had dissolved by dinnertime when Hotaru was a little girl, lasted into the night. Setsuna refused to allow Haruka or Michiru know, but she did let Hotaru sit up with her until the tears slowed to a stop.
"It's not healthy. For either of you."
Hotaru didn't say anything. He was right, she knew that much, but she didn't know how to do anything but sit and watch Setsuna struggle. They had always been the watchers of the group, the observers of the slow moving years. Sphinxes, almost, one responsible for time, the other for death, and when it came down to it, neither knew anything about life.
"I heard you have another admirer. An aspiring biologist?"
"I'd rather have an astronomer. Really, Motoki, you know I don't want a boyfriend." She fixed her eyes on him gravely, the violet hue darkening.
"Maybe he's got a brother, an uncle, a single father. You can take Setsuna, double date..."
Hotaru slammed a pale fist on the counter in an uncharacteristic display. "Motoki!" She dropped the hand back into her lap, frowning at the counter. "I told you. I've told you a hundred times, really. I don't want that kind of relationship."
"You've got nothing to be afraid of. You're so young, you have all the time in the world."
No, I don't, she thought.
[ i offer thanks to those before me that's all i've got to say
cause maybe you squandered big bucks in your lifetime
now I have to pay ]
Hotaru sat in the bathtub, her feet propped up on the edge, her dark hair plastered against her head, her skin flushed from the heat of the water. It really would have been relaxing, except for Setsuna crying softly at the mirror. She'd almost come to accept her adoptive mother's depression as normal. Sighing, she tilted her head back. "Setsuna-mama," she tried, "have you ever wanted a boyfriend?"
Setsuna sniffed. "That's not what's wrong, Hotaru."
"Oh. Well, neither have I."
The woman looked at her, almost surprised in spite of her tears. "Really? And you've had so many chances."
So many chances, chances at love? No, chances at life. So many deaths, rebirths, waking up in a body that was too young for her, growing up a little, starting over because she'd screwed up somewhere, as a senshi, as a person...
Only Setsuna knew that she'd had to be reborn eight times in the distant past of the Silver Millenium, and thirteen more before her first life in Tokyo, when she'd met Chibiusa.
"Well, things never turned out."
"Oh, Hotaru, that's no reason to give up." Setsuna smothered a sob.
"I don't even have to bother giving up. At some random point, one which I can't predict or expect, the cosmic reset button that controls my life, excuse me, lives, that button gets pushed and BAM, it's over." Hotaru swiped her hand at the surface of the water.
Setsuna turned to look at her, crossing her arms under her chest. Her eyes were lined with pink, and her mouth was swollen from the tears. "Well, what if I said that you have exactly seventeen months before that button gets pushed?"
"What?" Hotaru sat straight up in the bath, water rivulets racing down her skin.
"Not just your button, though." Setsuna looked at her listelessly. "It's the Big Button. I suppose you could call it Usagi's button. We start over. After a little sleep, we start over." She looked back at herself in the mirror, tracing her finger along her collarbone. "You get to keep your body though." A laugh. "Isn't that lucky?"
[ but then again it feels like some sort of inspiration
to let the next life off the hook
or she'll say
look what i had to overcome from my last life
i think i'll write a book ]
Hotaru sat on her bed, reeling just a little bit.
What would you do if I said you have exactly seventeen months?
Seventeen months was both forever and no time at all. But she had the time to plan things if she liked. Plan for a trip, plan to get a boyfriend if she liked.
The thought of a boyfriend was too much, even now.
And then she thought of Motoki, who had become as good a friend as Chibiusa, better maybe because he lived in this century. He deserved to know he only had seventeen months, so she would tell him. What would Motoki do with-
Motoki only had seventeen months. Hotaru knew she would make it to the Future, but would he?
He would, even if she carried him there herself. He had to. She wouldn't allow anything else, even if she had to face down death itself, her senshi form with Glaive in hand-
She was almost in tears despite her determination. The sudden uncertainty of Motoki's existence in future years was too much. Her head hurt, her eyes hurt, was this what Setsuna felt all the time?
The time on her clock radio read 2:11.
It was so late, but Hotaru was beginning to think her heart was going to burst from her chest in a display of light and sound. She couldn't find the why either, just the quick, hard memory of falling into his arms when she was nine, and how he'd smelled like sunlight but she'd never realized it until now.
At 2:12, Hotaru was dressed.
At 2:13, she was out the door without explaining to anyone.
At 2:15, she was running down the damp streets to Crown Game Center.
[ how long till my soul gets it right
can any human being ever reach the highest light
except for galileo
resting soul
king of night vision
king of insight ]
Her eyes were good in the dark, and it took her very little time to reach the dimmed building. The lights were out, and it was past two in the morning, but she'd been so sure that Motoki would still be there. She stopped, leaning against a lightpost and sucking in the air. Her hair had dried from the bath, and she inhaled it too, the strands sticking to her cheeks and mouth. It tasted clean like the air, and the air was so clean, with the scent of a recent rainfall, that it hurt her lungs. Her inspiration was fading, the brilliant ache in her chest just fading to an ache, and she felt the tears, Setsuna's tears, startup behind her eyelids.
"Hotaru?"
The light exploded from her chest into her fingertips and legs.
"Hotaru, it's late. Or early, I guess."
She looked up at him, for once looking like a teenage girl with shining eyes and parted lips. He was stunned.
"I was worried you wouldn't be here," she said. Her chest hurt.
"I stayed late to work on one of my latest. I really think that this one might break through. Hotaru, what's wrong?" Motoki looked at her with his sweet boyish eyes and tentatively reached out to touch her shoulder.
"Nothing. Nothing," she gasped, and began to try and compose herself. She pushed her hair from her face and breathed deeply, wondering if he stilled smelled like sunshine.
They stood in silence for a few minutes, until Hotaru had caught her breath.. Then, she spoke.
"Motoki, what would you do if I said that you had exactly seventeen months left?" She looked at the ground as she said it. "To...live."
"Is this what you were so upset about?" His eyes were suddenly serious. "Hotaru, is something wrong? Are you sick or something?"
"No," she said, surprised. "I'm not." For once, she realized, she wasn't.
"Right. Then, I guess I'd just try to live them out to the best of my ability." He flashed a dangerously somber smile at her. "And hope to do better next time."
Hotaru held back, resisting the gravitational pull of him, resisting so hard that it hurt. "I want to do better this time, Motoki." She ducked her head in a gesture he hadn't seen since she was nine and apologizing for falling off his stool. "I want you to help me do better."
"Hotaru, what are you saying?" He looked so confused-
so she kissed him. She took two even steps forward until she was pressed lightly against him, and tilted her head back, covering that wondering mouth lightly with her own. She was shaking, her hands just barely on his shoulders but tensed so tightly that they shook harder. His lips didn't move beneath hers, and she pulled away, afraid.
"I'm sorry, Motoki-"
"Is this what you really want, Hotaru?" His voice was so low that it made her knees start to buckle. "You want it to be me?"
"More than anything ever, I think, more than I want anything, please, Motoki, please, I want-"
And so he kissed her back, cradling her slight frame and even rocking her a little bit as he opened her lips, slid inside her mouth that was so eager and desperate to learn. For her, it was more than heaven itself, and her hands relaxed until she could bring them up to his face. He still smelled like sunshine, she thought, and he tasted of it too.
They broke apart briefly as Hotaru took a shuddering breath, burying her face in the curve of his neck. Sunshine and ink and rightness. This time, she'd get it right.
[ how long
how long
how long
how long? ]
---
Notes: I took liberties with ages, with history, with Sestuna's mental health. It's poetic liscense. If you want, consider this slightly AU. "Galileo" belongs to the Indigo Girls, and the crew belongs to Miss Takeuchi. I bet I spelled that wrong. Not mine, anyhow. Although Depressed!Setsuna is begging me for a sequel. She doesn't like to cry so much.
the crime was looking up the truth
and as the bombshells of my daily fears explode
i try to trace them to my youth ]
"Wait right here, Hotaru," said Haruka as she bodily set the girl on a stool. "I gotta go catch Michi before she gets too far. I swear, I'll be right back." With that, the boyish blonde dropped a kiss to Hotaru's forehead and darted out the door of Crown Game Center.
Hotaru was well aware that her job at the moment was to stay still and quiet and pleasant while she waited for the woman she considered her father to make up yet another verbal fumble. However, she thought, it was the fifth time in the last week that something like this had happened. Once at home over a dress that, as Hotaru had learned, DID NOT make Michiru look fat, twice over the color of the new curtains, and once again over the state of the kitchen. And as it was the fifth time, Hotaru's growing impatience with the pair of lovers was completely justified. She nodded and the thought and spun the stool around. Her legs still too short to touch the ground, she had to push off the counter.
Enjoying the moment despite herself, she was almost giggling as she gained enough speed to tumble off and into the arms of the very fortunately placed Furuhata Motoki. He caught her with no difficulty, as this version of herself was no more than nine, physically, and still feather-delicate. She flushed and looked up at him, sliding dark strands of hair from her eyes and pink cheeks. "Thank you." She decided she must have been spinning faster than she'd thought, because she was still dizzy and the world was still spinning around her, her knees resting neatly in the crook of Motoki's arms and her pulse thrumming.
He seemed both distant and close for a moment, looking down at her with concern and something else, like maybe he was dizzy too. Or maybe, said the part of her that was so much older than the rest, this is a moment of perfect synergy, when all the stars line up just right and knock the planets so that everything just spins and spins around itself, in and out like breath, like birth, like death-
But in this time, Hotaru was nine and Motoki was older, the age of the prince she'd sworn to protect.
He seemed to collect himself, and smiled gently at the girl who was once again only the adorable little friend of Chibiusa. It was good that he'd gotten ahold of himself, he reflected, because for a minute he'd really started to space, seeing Hotaru as some keeper of death and destruction and rebirth, directing the traffic of errant souls. How absurd.
"You'd better be careful," Motoki laughed, setting her down with care not to jar her small frame, which had felt much like a bird's, light and small boned, warm with a pulse.
"Thank you," she said, ducking her head to stare at her feet.
"Aw, don't feel bad," he said. "Let me get you something to drink. Sounds like Haruka won't be back for a while, huh?"
At this Hotaru looked back up, trying to bite back a smirk. "If the other four times were any indication, you're right." She climbed back up onto the stool, crossing her ankles and resting her elbows on the counter. "Give me your hardest stuff."
"How's a soda?"
"I guess."
[ and then you had to bring up reincarnation
over a couple of beers the other night
and now i'm serving time for mistakes made by another
in another lifetime ]
Hotaru sipped it through a red and white striped straw, tracing stars in the condensation on the glass.
Motoki watched her, wiping the counter. "So, how's school?"
She wrinkled her nose. "Fine." Outside, the crescendo of Haruka and Michiru rose and fell. It was quiet enough inside the empty game center to hear the arguing of her adoptive parents, which was more embarrassing than she would have thought. She glanced up from her soda to Motoki, who was also listening, but immediately pretended not to be. "Sorry," she murmured. "They do this a lot more than they used to, and it must be driving customers away."
"Don't worry about it. This has been a slow week, and it's not like I haven't heard my fair share of spats. People are in here all the time, looking down and wanting to drown their sorrows. They just aren't old enough for a bar," he laughed. "Besides, those two love each other."
That brought an unexpected comfort to the girl. "You're right. They always have," she said, quietly reflecting on the time she'd known them, from Silver Millenium to now, to the future Chibiusa would make vague comments on every now and then.
"Sometimes you sound older then them, Hotaru," Motoki said, smiling speculatively. "I bet you're an old soul."
Hotaru almost laughed. "I bet you're right."
[ how long till my soul gets it right
can any human being ever reach that kind of light
i call on the resting soul of Galileo
king of night vision
king of insight ]
When the bickering died down, Haruka came and collected Hotaru, smiling and nodding apologetically at Motoki. Hotaru waved behind her as she was led out the door.
Haruka and Michiru went out that night. Probably another so Haruka can make up whatever she's done now, Hotaru said to herself as Setsuna led her back inside. "What will we do tonight?"
"Oh, I don't know. I was thinking of a quiet evening in, some tea." Setsuna headed for the kitchen. Hotaru braced herself. It was always a quiet night in when Setsuna was in charge. She'd have to do her homework and then read...maybe she could convince Setsuna that to let her put in a movie. That might be good, she thought, knowing Setsuna's tendency towards the melancholy, even tears, on these nights by themselves.
Setsuna poked her head back out the door. "Why, Hotaru? Do you have a date tonight?"
"No." But Motoki's face swam to the front of her thoughts and she blushed.
[ i think about my fear of motion
which i never could explain
some other fool across the ocean years ago
must have crashed his little airplane ]
"Hey, Motoki," said Hotaru as she dropped her bookbag on the counter of Crown. She was thirteen now, and taller.
He grinned at her. "Hey, Hotaru. Where have you been all my life?"
"School," she said pragmatically, and he laughed. "If you yourself had studied harder, you'd not only know that, but you'd be the head of an important business instead of the assistant manager of a game center." It was their favorite joke that Motoki still worked at the Crown Game Center, and that he probably would forver.
"I'm telling you, Hotaru, I'll get my break any minute now. That fat bald guy over there? He's from a publishing company." Motoki waved in the man's general direction.
Her eyes widened. "Really? That's-"
"Nah. But he has been here all day. Maybe I'll throw him out."
"You couldn't if you tried. He's huge compared to you."
"I'm all muscle, though," Motoki said, flexing his arm.
Hotaru punched him in the arm, giggling merrily as he staggered around. "You pansy." Motoki stumbled around the counter and collapsed at her feet. "Get up." He looked up at her, leaning against her legs and the stool.
"I don't think so. I'm perfectly comfortable right here." He blew sandy hair from his eyes, only to have it fall right back in place.
"But I'm not, my legs are going to fall asleep."
Motoki opened his mouth to comment, and was quieted as a sobbing blonde woman burst through the doors, mascara running down her cheeks. "Minako? Minako! What's wrong?"
Hotaru watched as the young idol threw herself against the now standing Motoki. "It's horrible," she managed, muffled by his chest. "Just horrible." Knowing Minako's tendency towards exaggeration, Hotaru rolled her eyes.
"What's horrible, Minako?" However, her voice was the same calm, serene soprano that all the senshi knew. It was her Hotaru-the-Senshi-of-Death-Destruction-And-Rebirth-Knows-Best voice. It was second only to the Setsuna-the-Keeper-of-Time-Itself-Knows-Best voice, though as she'd gotten older, her propensity for giving advice meant she was moving up in rank.
"He...broke up with me...."
Motoki had peeled Minako off of him by this point, and had her seated on a stool as he desperately searched for something, anything with chocolate in it. She took the opportunity to bury her face in the closest dishcloth. "He broke up with me," she bawled again.
Oh, dear. And Hotaru couldn't recall this one's name. "Everything will be fine, Minako. He's a fool, and you know that. You're beautiful and talented, and kind and loving..." She pulled the cloth away from her and rested the tips of her fingers under her chin, tilting the flushed face up. "...and a wonderful person. Isn't that right, Motoki?"
"Absolutely." He shot them his most golden smile.
"See? Now, how long ago did this happen?"
"Three days a-ago." Minako hiccupped pathetically. "I think I've cried the whole three days."
"Then today is a good day to be done crying," Hotaru instructed. Her eyes deepened as they invariably did when she took the role of watching over and advising the senshi, who were really so much younger than her, and had only lived once or twice-
Minako nodded, and Hotaru continued. "I think you should go home, take a bath, and forget the idiot. You have to be in good shape for Europe next week, don't you?" She was almost jealous for a moment. Though her heart was momentarily broken, on tour in Euope Minako would once again be happy and beautiful and surrounded by love.
"Thank you," said Minako as she stood shakily. "I think I will." She shook out her hair. "Oh, Hotaru, you've always taken good care of us...for being so young," she added for Motoki's benefit. The idol doubted that he knew his young friend would be as ageless as Setsuna if not for her constant rebirths. "And hey, I hear you have romance on the horizon too!"
Hotaru almost lost her composure at that. "What?"
"Haruka told us! A boy's been walking you home, calling you?"
"He's my friend. That's...it."
"Ha! I had many friends at your age, too, then." Minako patted Hotaru's head fondly, and waved at Motoki on her way out.
"A boy?" Motoki questioned when Minako was gone.
"It's not as big of a deal as everyone else thinks it is. I don't want a boyfriend."
"Why not?"
"I dunno," Hotaru said, looking at the mascara stains on the dishcloth. "I just never have."
"You're growing up," said Motoki, much to Hotaru's amusement. "You may soon."
But it's not so likely I'll stay grown-up, she wanted to say. You never know when I'll be needed so much that I have to die and start over.
[ how long till my soul gets it right
can any human being ever reach that kind of light
i call on the resting soul of galileo
king of night vision
king of insight ]
Hotaru made it to her sixteenth, and then seventeenth birthday. In all honesty, she was surprised.
The majority of her days found her doing her homework at the counter of Crown Game Center, or helping Motoki with the little tasks, running down to run his latest draft off at the local copy place. He was getting closer to his goal, a book of poetry. Motoki as a poet still made Hotaru giggle sometimes. None of the other senshi knew his aspiration.
He was almost thirty, but still looked boyish. They made a complementary pair to look at; Motoki with the eyes and smile of a boy and Hotaru who often looked like she had lived forever. In a way, she had.
There were no disturbances in Tokyo, no evil queens or monster trees or youma. Hotaru hadn't touched her henshin stick in years now. Her hands had almost forgotten the weight of the Glaive. Then again, her hands had always been so much smaller than this.
She'd never had a boyfriend yet. They asked, and she shivered, and politely refused.
Motoki still wrote love poems to Reika, who'd left him the year Hotaru turned fourteen.
[ i'm not making a joke you know me I take everything so seriously
if we wait for the time till all souls get it right
then at least i know there'll be no nuclear annihalation in my lifetime
i'm still not right ]
Hotaru rested her chin in her hand as she watched Motoki dissecting one of his works. "Have you heard from them?"
"No. Not yet," he said, offering her a feverish smile. The expression thinned into exhaustion, and Hotaru scowled at him.
"You've been pulling those marathon sessions to get things done again, haven't you?"
"Maybe." He looked back down at his paper. "But you haven't exactly been getting the recommended eight hours either, have you?"
Hotaru quieted. "You know why."
"Setsuna again?"
"Yes." It was one of the bad times of the year again for Setsuna, who mostly drank tea and cried. Hotaru would walk in after school and find Setsuna in the kitchen, blinds closed so that only tepid half-light slatterned into the room, weeping into her teacup. And now, those fits, which had dissolved by dinnertime when Hotaru was a little girl, lasted into the night. Setsuna refused to allow Haruka or Michiru know, but she did let Hotaru sit up with her until the tears slowed to a stop.
"It's not healthy. For either of you."
Hotaru didn't say anything. He was right, she knew that much, but she didn't know how to do anything but sit and watch Setsuna struggle. They had always been the watchers of the group, the observers of the slow moving years. Sphinxes, almost, one responsible for time, the other for death, and when it came down to it, neither knew anything about life.
"I heard you have another admirer. An aspiring biologist?"
"I'd rather have an astronomer. Really, Motoki, you know I don't want a boyfriend." She fixed her eyes on him gravely, the violet hue darkening.
"Maybe he's got a brother, an uncle, a single father. You can take Setsuna, double date..."
Hotaru slammed a pale fist on the counter in an uncharacteristic display. "Motoki!" She dropped the hand back into her lap, frowning at the counter. "I told you. I've told you a hundred times, really. I don't want that kind of relationship."
"You've got nothing to be afraid of. You're so young, you have all the time in the world."
No, I don't, she thought.
[ i offer thanks to those before me that's all i've got to say
cause maybe you squandered big bucks in your lifetime
now I have to pay ]
Hotaru sat in the bathtub, her feet propped up on the edge, her dark hair plastered against her head, her skin flushed from the heat of the water. It really would have been relaxing, except for Setsuna crying softly at the mirror. She'd almost come to accept her adoptive mother's depression as normal. Sighing, she tilted her head back. "Setsuna-mama," she tried, "have you ever wanted a boyfriend?"
Setsuna sniffed. "That's not what's wrong, Hotaru."
"Oh. Well, neither have I."
The woman looked at her, almost surprised in spite of her tears. "Really? And you've had so many chances."
So many chances, chances at love? No, chances at life. So many deaths, rebirths, waking up in a body that was too young for her, growing up a little, starting over because she'd screwed up somewhere, as a senshi, as a person...
Only Setsuna knew that she'd had to be reborn eight times in the distant past of the Silver Millenium, and thirteen more before her first life in Tokyo, when she'd met Chibiusa.
"Well, things never turned out."
"Oh, Hotaru, that's no reason to give up." Setsuna smothered a sob.
"I don't even have to bother giving up. At some random point, one which I can't predict or expect, the cosmic reset button that controls my life, excuse me, lives, that button gets pushed and BAM, it's over." Hotaru swiped her hand at the surface of the water.
Setsuna turned to look at her, crossing her arms under her chest. Her eyes were lined with pink, and her mouth was swollen from the tears. "Well, what if I said that you have exactly seventeen months before that button gets pushed?"
"What?" Hotaru sat straight up in the bath, water rivulets racing down her skin.
"Not just your button, though." Setsuna looked at her listelessly. "It's the Big Button. I suppose you could call it Usagi's button. We start over. After a little sleep, we start over." She looked back at herself in the mirror, tracing her finger along her collarbone. "You get to keep your body though." A laugh. "Isn't that lucky?"
[ but then again it feels like some sort of inspiration
to let the next life off the hook
or she'll say
look what i had to overcome from my last life
i think i'll write a book ]
Hotaru sat on her bed, reeling just a little bit.
What would you do if I said you have exactly seventeen months?
Seventeen months was both forever and no time at all. But she had the time to plan things if she liked. Plan for a trip, plan to get a boyfriend if she liked.
The thought of a boyfriend was too much, even now.
And then she thought of Motoki, who had become as good a friend as Chibiusa, better maybe because he lived in this century. He deserved to know he only had seventeen months, so she would tell him. What would Motoki do with-
Motoki only had seventeen months. Hotaru knew she would make it to the Future, but would he?
He would, even if she carried him there herself. He had to. She wouldn't allow anything else, even if she had to face down death itself, her senshi form with Glaive in hand-
She was almost in tears despite her determination. The sudden uncertainty of Motoki's existence in future years was too much. Her head hurt, her eyes hurt, was this what Setsuna felt all the time?
The time on her clock radio read 2:11.
It was so late, but Hotaru was beginning to think her heart was going to burst from her chest in a display of light and sound. She couldn't find the why either, just the quick, hard memory of falling into his arms when she was nine, and how he'd smelled like sunlight but she'd never realized it until now.
At 2:12, Hotaru was dressed.
At 2:13, she was out the door without explaining to anyone.
At 2:15, she was running down the damp streets to Crown Game Center.
[ how long till my soul gets it right
can any human being ever reach the highest light
except for galileo
resting soul
king of night vision
king of insight ]
Her eyes were good in the dark, and it took her very little time to reach the dimmed building. The lights were out, and it was past two in the morning, but she'd been so sure that Motoki would still be there. She stopped, leaning against a lightpost and sucking in the air. Her hair had dried from the bath, and she inhaled it too, the strands sticking to her cheeks and mouth. It tasted clean like the air, and the air was so clean, with the scent of a recent rainfall, that it hurt her lungs. Her inspiration was fading, the brilliant ache in her chest just fading to an ache, and she felt the tears, Setsuna's tears, startup behind her eyelids.
"Hotaru?"
The light exploded from her chest into her fingertips and legs.
"Hotaru, it's late. Or early, I guess."
She looked up at him, for once looking like a teenage girl with shining eyes and parted lips. He was stunned.
"I was worried you wouldn't be here," she said. Her chest hurt.
"I stayed late to work on one of my latest. I really think that this one might break through. Hotaru, what's wrong?" Motoki looked at her with his sweet boyish eyes and tentatively reached out to touch her shoulder.
"Nothing. Nothing," she gasped, and began to try and compose herself. She pushed her hair from her face and breathed deeply, wondering if he stilled smelled like sunshine.
They stood in silence for a few minutes, until Hotaru had caught her breath.. Then, she spoke.
"Motoki, what would you do if I said that you had exactly seventeen months left?" She looked at the ground as she said it. "To...live."
"Is this what you were so upset about?" His eyes were suddenly serious. "Hotaru, is something wrong? Are you sick or something?"
"No," she said, surprised. "I'm not." For once, she realized, she wasn't.
"Right. Then, I guess I'd just try to live them out to the best of my ability." He flashed a dangerously somber smile at her. "And hope to do better next time."
Hotaru held back, resisting the gravitational pull of him, resisting so hard that it hurt. "I want to do better this time, Motoki." She ducked her head in a gesture he hadn't seen since she was nine and apologizing for falling off his stool. "I want you to help me do better."
"Hotaru, what are you saying?" He looked so confused-
so she kissed him. She took two even steps forward until she was pressed lightly against him, and tilted her head back, covering that wondering mouth lightly with her own. She was shaking, her hands just barely on his shoulders but tensed so tightly that they shook harder. His lips didn't move beneath hers, and she pulled away, afraid.
"I'm sorry, Motoki-"
"Is this what you really want, Hotaru?" His voice was so low that it made her knees start to buckle. "You want it to be me?"
"More than anything ever, I think, more than I want anything, please, Motoki, please, I want-"
And so he kissed her back, cradling her slight frame and even rocking her a little bit as he opened her lips, slid inside her mouth that was so eager and desperate to learn. For her, it was more than heaven itself, and her hands relaxed until she could bring them up to his face. He still smelled like sunshine, she thought, and he tasted of it too.
They broke apart briefly as Hotaru took a shuddering breath, burying her face in the curve of his neck. Sunshine and ink and rightness. This time, she'd get it right.
[ how long
how long
how long
how long? ]
---
Notes: I took liberties with ages, with history, with Sestuna's mental health. It's poetic liscense. If you want, consider this slightly AU. "Galileo" belongs to the Indigo Girls, and the crew belongs to Miss Takeuchi. I bet I spelled that wrong. Not mine, anyhow. Although Depressed!Setsuna is begging me for a sequel. She doesn't like to cry so much.