Disclaimer: I do NOT own Sailor Moon and its characters. I only own this fanfic and the plot.
Chapter 1: We Need a Stimulus
Disclaimer: I do NOT own Sailor Moon and its characters. I only own this fanfic and the plot.
Hikawa Shrine, Rei's Room
It was another typical study session of the five girls. The clock had ticked five, meaning it was over. Everyone was packing, getting ready to leave. Everyone, but Ami.
"Aren't you going to go home, Ami?"
"Um, I was planning to stay for a few minutes to finish on this one question. That is, if that's fine with you, Rei."
"No problem at all."
"Thanks. You go ahead, Makoto."
"Okay, then. See you at school!"
As soon as Makoto and Minako had left, Amy shut her textbook. She sighed.
'And I thought she would insist on staying.'
"Um, Ami?" Rei asked in curiosity.
"I'm sorry for all the commotion I'm making, Rei."
"Huh? No, no, I'm fine with that. It's just, not really that usual to see you lying, Ames," Rei said as she sat across her friend.
"I thought they would take it the wrong way if I frankly said that I needed to talk with you."
Rei slightly tilted her head in amusement. "And what is it that you wanted to talk about?"
Ami took in and let out a huge breath before she said, "Makoto and Minako."
"Um, pardon?"
"Makoto and Minako are what, well, more likely 'who' I wanted to talk about. More specifically, it is the relationships between Mako and me and between you and Mina I'm referring to."
"And that means?"
"Sweet Hermes! I know you like Minako, Rei!"
Rei blushed; my, our sweet shy Ami was bold tonight.
"And," Ami's cheeks grew red as she confessed, "I like Makoto."
Rei smiled when she saw the shy Ami again. No offense to the genius but shyness just happened to become one of her strongest traits. But that's that. Rei's sixth sense bugged her that something more big, not that intense or serious as saving the world, perhaps, but big to her personal life was about to be unraveled by Ami. Just what was it? Curious what the genius had in mind, Rei asked.
"But that's not all, is it? You didn't leave behind just to state the," Rei cleared her throat as she heated up, "crushes we have, right?"
"Well, yes. I was wondering if you'd be interested in the plan I've made."
"Plan?"
"I devised a plan so that we could pair ourselves together."
Rei inwardly wondered. What words did just come out of the oh-so-shy Ami's mouth? Pair ourselves together? My, Rei was seeing a new feature of Ami a lot tonight.
"The only problem to the plan is that," Ami dragged, "we're too shy!"
Rei silently disagreed. 'For the moment, you are nowhere near shy.'
"We're too shy to make the first move and those two are too oblivious to recognize the situation," Ami sighed. Rei thought about what Ami had said. Was she too shy? It's not like she did not try to make the first move. She did in fact, give certain signs to Minako. Well, one part of her had hoped that Minako would catch at least one and make the first move: all of which were failures, by the way. Rei silently groaned as her eyebrow twitched. Fine, she was too shy or too proud to do anything. As for Ami, though she had seen rather bold features of her tonight, Ami is practically the incarnate of the word "shy." Ah, hogwash with all that. Rei mentally disregarded their problems.
"So what is this plan of yours?"
"Are you sure you want to hear it? It's neither much of a good nor a realistic plan I'm afraid."
One cannot truly change one's spots, Rei noted.
"Well, my premonitions and our senshi powers don't really fit the category 'realistic,' but they work out well, don't they? Besides, it is your plan. I don't see the catch in listening to a genius's plan."
"Rei," Ami blushed, "I'm not really a genius. I'm certainly not a genius in love, either."
"You might be this time."
Ami looked up at Rei after her last statement. Amethyst eyes met blue ones. Rei let out a laugh. Catching what Rei had meant, Ami laughed along. The warriors of fire and ice laughed together for some time. Once the two settled, Amy was the first to speak up. She mentioned it. And now is the time she has got to say it, right? Ami gulped, let in a deep breath, and let it out.
"You and I are going to pretend that we are seeing each other as lovers."
"Uh, what?"
"Um, we are going to pretend to be lovers."
Silence.
"Oh, I knew it was a bad idea."
Comeback.
"No, no, no," Rei hurried, "I didn't mean it that way, Ami! I was just surprised, that's all."
"You sure?"
Rei gave a nod.
"Okay, then," Ami continued and told Rei. The plan was simple: they pretend to love each other in order to make the other two jealous.
"It's not bad; it's typical."
"Is it?" Ami blushed.
"But complex at the same time. We're trying to make two people jealous at the same time!"
"Well, yes, of course."
"And I like it."
"Yes, I understand it's not good and," Ami looked up, "What? Really?"
"Really, Ami. But I wonder."
"Wonder?"
"What if those two are oblivious enough to actually think we are crazy for each other and we do end up together?"
"I actually haven't thought of that possibility."
Rei blinked.
"Oh, dear. You're right, Rei. What if that does actually happen? What do we do then?" Ami panicked.
Rei knew she had to do something to soothe Ami, but frankly, she hadn't a clue to what to do. Altogether, Ami was quite "new" tonight, so Rei had no idea how to deal with the current situation. Now that she thought of it, Ami never really panicked. Perhaps in times of the near end of a battle, she would show slight signs of fear, but never of hysterical fear. Ami was the cool type that stayed rational. Panic was more of Usagi's role. Ah. Perhaps then she should react to Ami as she would to Usagi. Rei groaned, 'Oh well, here goes nothing.'
"Ami?"
"I, uh, yes?" Ami's stuttering stopped.
"This is going to hurt."
"What? Ow!"
Rei reacted. And she reacted well: she hit Ami on the head, fooling herself that she hit Usagi and not Ami. Now that Ami feels the pain - Rei couldn't ignore the guilt she felt when she saw Ami's pained face, mind you - Rei spat out whatever advice she had for the both of them.
"Ami, I'm really sorry that it hurt, but at least now you can hear me out."
"I would've done so if you just called my name, Rei. I'm not Usagi."
'So that's what Ami's whining sounds like,' Rei noted to herself.
"Er, sorry again. Anyway, if our plan goes hay wire and those two prove they are a bit thicker than we had hoped," Rei paused for a moment. If Minako really doesn't get the "hint" for the last time, what should she do? The thing she was delaying from the start she knew she liked Minako. That. Rei's eyebrows burrowed. 'I hope neither my pride nor my shyness gets in the way that time,' Rei thought. Rei looked at Ami's curious gaze. She smiled softly, gave out a defeated sigh, and slumped down next to Ami; she had stood up earlier to hit Ami on the head. "Rei?" Ami called. Rei leaned her head on the side of the bed and looked at a particular picture on the wall in front: a picture of her and Minako together.
"We have no choice but to make the first moves, Ames."
Ami didn't reply. Instead, she followed Rei's gaze and looked at the presumably same picture, one of Rei and Minako in it. Each in her school uniform, Minako had hugged Rei for the picture. Ami noticed Rei's expression was slightly off; dare she say embarrassed? 'Yet,' Ami thought, 'she seems happy to be like that.' Ami recalled a picture of her and Makoto that they took on the very same day. Makoto had her arms encircling Ami's neck from behind. Ami remembered how hard she tried not to blush too much and how happy she was to be in that pose. To be that happy, her plan had to work. If not, Ami realized, what Rei had said was true; their last choice was to make a move first. Boldness really is a necessity in love, Ami noted. Ami let out a laugh. Rei tilted her head in question.
"Funny isn't it?" Ami said as she kept laughing, "We faced all sorts of danger from Beryl to Chaos, and yet, we're scared to tell our feelings to our very friends."
Rei thought of it and joined Ami's laughter. "Well, isn't that ironic?"
The warrior of fire and ice laughed a good laugh and spent the next few hours carefully drawing out the plan to win their loves. They didn't go over every single detail, but enough to have a back-up plan for almost every possibility. The result turned out it would take at least four days - if longer, a week - for the plan to succeed. Once finished, Rei couldn't help asking Ami where her ideas came from. Frankly speaking, she was once again awed at the genius's broad range of possible romance scenes.
"Oh, I," Ami blushed, "read a few romance novels these days."
"Are you sure you read only a few?" Rei sniggered.
"Rei!"
Rei's, and soon later Ami's, laughter echoed in the shrine that night.