Chapter Seven: Had It All
Keiko hated blondes.
In her experience they could be and often were the most annoying, bothersome, and threatening creatures on Earth to a brunette. Especially, when one of them had latched onto her girlfriend. Not just anyone's girlfriend, mind you, no, that would be too simple, too easy. Nope. It was hers.
HERS!
The lockers on either side of the hallway were always swarming with students at the beginning of the day and of all the personal spaces in all the world to be invaded…Minako Aino had to walk into hers. Keiko rolled her eyes and glared at her miko and the over enthusiastic blonde as they continued the argument they had been having ever since they had "accidentally" crossed paths with the blonde while walking on their way to school this morning, as they always seemed to run into Minako, only ever "by accident", of course these days.
"It is not."
"Minako—"
"Nope, I don't believe it."
"Minako—"
"Nope."
Rei sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose, very much aware that the third headache of the morning since meeting the blonde was springing up between her eyes.
"Whatever." Rei gave up and went back to rearranging the uncharacteristic mess in her locker (for some reason unknown to Rei, her insane sense of organization had packed its bags and taken a holiday and Minako's over ambitious sense of chaos had made her own locker its new home without her approval).
"Aw, Rei!" Minako pouted, jutting out her bottom lip as her eyes moistened on cue and completed the ensemble of a very sad, very deflated blonde that she had been going for. Then she moved in close to the brunette and purred into her ear, "You're no fun anymore, Casanova."
Rei's cheeks reddened at the comment and she was so out of it that the slamming of her own locker door actually caused her to jump a few feet off to the side. When she turned around Rei found her girlfriend leaning against her now closed locker, eyes glaring at her.
Whoops…guess Keiko hadn't heard of Minako's little nickname for her before…don't know how she missed that…
Rei didn't even try to salvage the situation, she just looked down at the floor as she felt her face heat up the rest of the way and take on a shade of much darker red. Beside her, she also felt the blonde stiffen and when Rei dared to chance a glance over at Minako, she noticed that her eyes were closed as if she was expecting someone to hit her or a volcano to suddenly erupt from the center of Tokyo and incinerate them all into nothingness any minute now.
"Well," Keiko started, closing her eyes and making a production of pushing her already flawless bangs off to the side of her face, "This was fun, Minako. We should have a repeat performance another time when we just happen to "accidentally" cross paths with you."
Rei reached out to try and grab her elbow as the girl walked away from her, but Keiko brushed her hand off of her arm muttering only, "See you in class."
The miko watched her girlfriend's retreating back as she walked away, conflicting emotions burning a hole in the center of her chest.
"That sucks." Minako announced from behind Rei, leaning against Rei's locker in the position previously vacated by Keiko.
Rei turned fiery eyes towards the smirking blonde. "Great! Just great! Now she's going to be mad at me for most of the day and not talk to me at all and it's all your doing!"
"Well, you know me, troublemaker and all." Minako said, the playful smirk staying firmly in place.
Rei just glared at her and nudged her to the side so she could get into her locker again, but as one of her hands was trying the combination lock, the blonde stayed it with her own and Rei almost stopped breathing.
She didn't know how she had known the blonde in the first place or even how it was possible for her to have such an effect on her when Rei was happy with and cared about Keiko. But it was always like this. When Minako beckoned, Rei couldn't refuse her.
And it was getting so damn frustrating!
Rei took a deep breath, but couldn't meet Minako's eyes. She just stared into the cheap grey paint like it was the most interesting thing in all the world. The other girl's eyes on her always made her cheeks flush and her body feel hot all over and she couldn't figure out why. She never had this much trouble maintaining control over her own body, not even when Keiko was in one of her mischievous moods and insisted on being all touchy-feely. Rei was the epitome of control. She never showed how she was really feeling on the inside unless she was infuriated and there was little point in holding it in then because whatever or whoever had incurred her wrath most certainly did deserve it.
Another thing that really bothered Rei was how the blonde was able to react to her as if she had known her all of her life, as if her outbursts of temper, blunt remarks, and sarcastic comments were all things she were used to and didn't have to sidestep because she knew how to deal with them in a way that was almost, impossibly…natural.
Them.
They—the two of them—defied reasonable explanation. After all, Rei had only met Minako a week or so ago so how could things feel so automatic, so normal between them so quickly?
Now, there was something she would have expected Mercury to say…
What the…? Who the hell was Mercury? Mercury was a planet and planets couldn't talk and she knew that, so what had made that thought even pop into mind in the first place?
Rei shook her head to clear it, the notion that she really was losing her mind becoming truer and truer as the seconds ticked by.
"Rei." Minako softly called her attention back to her.
Rei swallowed again, this time for courage and dared to meet the blonde's addicting blue eyes. I don't care what she says, Rei thought in her head, I'm not going to listen.
Minako recognized the resistance in Rei's eyes and leaned in close to whisper in her ear, making sure to breathe lightly over the tip of her ear as she did. Rei stiffened, but was having trouble fighting to keep herself in check as the blonde was quickly shredding her control to ribbons.
Minako grinned, knowing full well what she was doing. When she finally spoke she punctuated each word with a breath as if each one were its own sentence, "You. Are. Too. Cute."
Rei's eyes widened and she pushed away from the blonde to look down into the mischievous baby blue eyes staring up at her. Finally, Minako couldn't take it anymore, she laughed. Rei glared. And all was it should be as the first warning bell before classes beeped through the practically empty hallway.
"What's eating you?"
"Excuse me?"
"Not that I usually pay attention to you or anything, but you look down."
"Gee, thanks."
Keiko leaned her head on her hand and glared down into the open pages of her textbook, a virtuous looking portrait of St. Francis of Assisi staring back up at her surrounded by a ridiculously smiling assortment of animals.
Aiko Shizuki sat across from her in the library study area, paying no attention to the books laid out in front of her either.
"What really gets me is that I let this whole thing happen." Keiko complained, pushing her book and its smiling saint away from her as if it had some sort of infectious disease.
"Let what happen?"
"Let Minako get so close to Rei."
A noncommittal grunt was her only answer, but Keiko ignored it anyway and kept going with her woe-is-me rant.
"I mean I noticed how she was acting the minute she asked to walk with us to school that one morning last week, being all coy and refusing to bother us and Rei's insistence that she wasn't because of it and should tag along too. Ever since then it's been like the involuntary Three Musketeers everyday and I hate it." Keiko paused in the middle of her rant to stare at Aiko, "And why am I telling you any of this?"
"Hell if I know. Beats talking to yourself though doesn't it?"
"Hardly." Keiko snipped, indignant.
"Whatever. It's your problem." Aiko huffed, turning a page in her calculus book, uninterested in its contents.
"Oh come on, don't tell me that you don't care who your little blonde angel cares for because I won't buy it."
Aiko froze just then and her eyes hardened.
"And just what do you think you are implying?"
"Oh please, don't play dumb with me. Your obstinate tough act is easier to see through than plate glass."
The furious glare Aiko was giving her would have killed a weaker minded person, but Keiko stuck to her guns.
"The simple fact is that what is making my life a living hell day in and day out is something that you want and that I would be glad to get rid of with a little help."
Aiko broke eye contact with the other brunette and turned back to her book, though she wasn't really reading the words down on the page.
"I don't make deals with backstabbers." She finally replied angrily.
"Hypocrite!" Keiko accused.
"Medusa!" Aiko growled back at her.
They were at a standstill, a snow covered pass where neither wanted to step foot and give way first.
Then finally:
"Fine, be that way."
"Fine."
There was a short silence as the girls again pretended to take an interest in the textbooks they'd brought to their free period to study, but like before, neither brunette was really paying much attention to them. Aiko was halfway through reading a sentence she had read about five times and her mind still refused to compute when Keiko started it up again.
"I'm just saying," She began as any good diplomat would: with an objective statement leading into a logical plea bargain that they could both benefit from. "That I am having a hard time with all of this."
Aiko regarded her silently for a few minutes, dark eyes looking her up and down and making the girl across from her slightly uncomfortable. Then she did the unpredictable, Aiko smiled.
"Well…who wouldn't, I mean, you're not supposed to have to share your girlfriend with other people, right?" She agreed.
Which was how Keiko knew she was winning. The other girl never smiled, not even on good days.
Keiko grinned.
"Right, which is why I would like to ask for your help. You see, I've noticed how you pine over her, Minako I mean. You don't try to be obvious about it and I don't think anyone else has noticed, but I have."
Aiko just sat there, her eyes wide and her mouth open slightly as heat rose in her cheeks at being called out on her "secret" crush.
"How?" She asked, dry mouthed.
"It shows in your eyes and in how they look at her all of the time as if expecting her to notice you when she absolutely refuses."
"How do you know she refuses?" Aiko became indignant, but Keiko held her ground.
"Because most of the signs you're giving her, albeit a little stalkerish, she would have to be blind, dumb, and deaf not to notice and all of those things we both know she isn't." Keiko reasoned.
Then Aiko became silent as Keiko paused, thinking how to better phrase her continuing argument in a way that was both nonthreatening and persuasive at the same time.
"What if…"
Then she stopped at the look on Aiko's face and had to rethink her strategy to save herself from the inferno she could see ready to boil over if she used the wrong words.
"Okay, scratch that—"
"Are you always this annoying in the morning?" Aiko sighed, messaging her temples and trying to will away the blush she could still feel on her cheeks.
"Are you always this angry in the morning? No, wait, my bad; you're like this all of the time!" Keiko shouted, at the end of her rope with the other girl.
"Take that back!"
"I will not!"
"FINE!"
"FINE!"
As the echo of both of their angry voices receded, a heavy book was plopped down on their study table causing both girls to look up into the beat red face of the librarian, Sister Abigail.
Aiko swallowed hard as the woman stared them down. Keiko turned her head, confirming the undeniable truth, that yes, they had attracted the attention of all of the other girls in their study period and the eyes of every table were focused squarely on the two of them. Among the onlookers were Chizuko Oneda and Hatsu Urameshi. Recognizing them and a good many of her other classmates, Keiko had the decency to blush and bring her hand up to cover her eyes, but their slack jawed, bug eyed gapes—as well as those of most of the other curious bystanders—miraculously focused elsewhere when Aiko pinned them all with a glare that clearly said she could find out where they all lived and do something about it if they decided to make this a topic of discussion in the halls.
"Girls," Sister Abigail began, pushing her glasses back up to the bridge of her nose and crossing her arms in front of her chest, "What do you have to say for yourselves before I send you both down to the Monsignor's office?"
Aiko just stared down at the table as if she could burn a hole right through the sixty year old wood.
"Nothing, just punish us." Keiko sighed; face still tinged a mortified pink from the base of her neck to her forehead.
Fifteen minutes later…
"What on Earth are you looking at now?" Aiko asked from her chair, very much annoyed as Keiko not just moved, but bounced over to another bulletin board in the hallway outside of the Monsignor's office.
Keiko's blush had disappeared and her index finger was fixed on her chin as she read the paper on the board aloud:
"Attention all Students and Teachers, please be notified that the person listed below is missing. If you or your classmates have any information concerning his whereabouts please call the Tokyo Police at the number shown below. Hm, this kid isn't that much older than we are."
"Who is she?" Aiko asked, only half interested, "Anyone you recognize?"
"He," Keiko corrected, "Is a sophomore at St. Gerard's Boys Academy and he's been missing for almost a week. His name is Hisao Shimotsumaki. You know him?"
Aiko shook her head in the negative and leaned back on the bench until her back was resting comfortably against the stone wall.
"I don't know him either, but I just hate bulletins like that. It's so sad to think that someone is out there, could be bleeding or dying, and no one can find them."
"Think of it as natural selection hard at work in the modern day."
A devilish smile came to Akio's face, but Keiko was horrified.
"I can't believe you just said that!"
Aiko only yawned, covering her mouth with her hand, "Believe what you want to."
"I will!" Keiko returned, not having anything else to say to that.
Suddenly, the door to the Monsignor's office opened and Sister Abigail's head peeked out, her squinting eyes daring the girls to continue their high pitched conversation.
"Sorry." Keiko conceded, her face reddening again.
"You two better be or if you're not, you're going to be soon." Sister Abigail stepped out of the room and held the door open, "The Monsignor will see you both now."
Keiko cringed, but Aiko looked like she couldn't care less about where they were going. Sister Abigail glared at them both.
"Alright, in," She ordered.
Aiko stood up and walked in first leaving Keiko to follow her reluctantly as the door was closed behind them.
"Five Hail Maries and a Saturday detention? Who gives out punishments like that?"
"Well, obviously the Monsignor." Rei, cut in, realizing as her girlfriend's frustrated eyes narrowed at her that it was the wrong place to be the voice of reason.
"Old balding coot that he is…" Keiko fumed, turning away from Rei back to the rest of their lunch table.
Minako Aino, Chizuko Oneda, and Hatsu Urameshi all sat across from Rei and Keiko at the rectangular lunch table, all three of the girls dividing their attention between their food and Keiko's rant about her morning. Minako was leaning her arms against the table, not interested in her tray or the miserable state sanctioned lunch that she'd been served on it. Instead, she was staring at Keiko, patiently waiting for the girl to finish with her tirade against the useless bureaucratics of their school before she could add her two cents on the situation.
"At least it's only five Hail Maries and not five more detentions—" Minako began, but didn't get to finish.
"Blondie, I am not in the mood right now for your "words of wisdom" or your sarcastic turns of phrase. You close your mouth right now or I swear—" Keiko said, pointing her tapioca spoon menacingly in Minako's direction to finish the threat her words couldn't.
Minako just grinned and leaned her chin against one of her hands, batting her eyes at the miserable brunette and giving her a look that said that she was going to have more fun with this later. Rei recognized the waiting mischief in the blonde's eyes and glared at her in warning, but Minako ignored it.
"Well, Sister Abigail is British," Chizuko tried to redirect the attention of the group to her and away from the surly blonde who so loved to cause Keiko trouble. "Perhaps, they do things differently in their private schools over there."
"Yeah, but she isn't the one who gave meated out the punishment." Keiko wagged her finger at Chizuko, "Weren't you listening at all, Chiko? Monsignor Soseki has been living in Tokyo all of his life. He was the monsignor when my mother went here, for Christ sake, he's practically a dinosaur."
"Or a fossil." Minako quipped with a cute little smile.
Keiko's eyes narrowed at the blonde and she was about to open her mouth to tell the blonde what she could do with her "fossil", but Rei cut in before she could get the words out.
"Yeah, he has been here quite awhile." Rei said, pushing her salad around on her plate with a plastic fork, "My grandfather used to tell me stories about when my mother went here and how one time, the monsignor even punished her for skipping to class."
"No kidding?" Hatsu leaned forward, wide eyed.
"Hmm, that does seem a little overly strict." Chizuko commented, leaning her chin in her hand.
"Was her punishment as stupid as mine?" Keiko asked, still in a pouty mood.
Rei shrugged and took a sip of her water. Out of the corner of her eye she could see movement as she drank, and when was finished, she glanced down the table to see Aiko Shizuki take the empty seat next to Keiko. Her girlfriend looked up once to acknowledge the other girl's presence, but looked away just as quickly without giving Rei enough time to read anything into the action. When Rei looked back across from her, Minako's eyes met hers, letting her know that she'd seen something there too.
Aiko set her tray down and spread a napkin over her lap, immediately digging a fork into her plate of rice.
"Aiko, you must be hungry." Hatsu commented watching the girl devour her food in silence. "First you earned a detention in morning study period and then you survived Hidei sensi's math exam. That takes energy."
Aiko glanced up at her, but didn't verbally respond to the comment. Then Keiko cleared her throat, subtlety never having been one of her better qualities, and smiled in a cattily at Minako as Aiko blushed over her food. Minako, for her part, looked slightly confused, her expression mirroring Rei's as she looked between the three of them.
Ugh! Things were so much less complicated when I used to eat alone, Rei thought, watching as her girlfriend's smile diminished some and was replaced with a flat line across her face.
"So…Minako," Keiko began, not bothering with the smile this time. "How's the personal life going for you?"
Aiko choked and Minako smiled without missing a beat, "As well as I want it to go. I can usually find someone to fill my lonely nights and when I don't want anyone I don't worry about it."
"Well, I just thought I would try to help you out, you know, introduce the new girl at school to some of the single people in our year."
"I don't need the help, that is, unless you're offering?" Minako finished with a suggestive wagging of her eyebrows.
Rei found herself having to physically restrain her girlfriend from crawling up on the lunch table that separated her from the blonde while both Hatsu and Chizuko had expressions on their faces varying in degrees from very amused to quietly mortified. Aiko just sat, staring dejectedly down into her plate of food.
"Jeez, Keiko, I didn't know you had such a temper." Minako continued, her smile widening into an incorrigible grin that she didn't even try to contain.
Rei looked across the table at her, giving her a another glare that didn't have any real threat behind it.
Keiko stood up, fighting to control her voice and the blush that seemed to be popping up a lot on her cheeks these days, "I didn't until YOU forced your way into my life."
"Awww, Keiko, now I get the impression that you don't like me."
And with that, the blonde's grin became absolutely predatory.
Keiko looked around her at the other people in the cafeteria, a few of them that passed by giving her strange looks because she was just randomly standing instead of sitting and eating her lunch or talking to her friends. She knew she was seriously being provoked. It was the blonde's way with her as it was with everyone, to play with them like a cat with a mouse, but she just had the most vehement reaction to it of anyone else.
And she sure as hell knew why.
Sighing, she gave Minako a withering look and then sat down again. For awhile after that, Keiko was doing pretty good on the temper checking, that was, until Rei shook her head at her.
"What was that for?"
"What was what for?"
She must be losing it. That was it, Keiko was losing her mind. She wanted to cry, scream, shout, yell, laugh…any of it. All of the sudden she felt extremely tired.
"What was that look for?" She asked again in frustration.
"What look?"
Rei was confused and it was a look on her that Minako personally found very endearing on her.
"The one you gave me when you shook your head at me just now?"
"I don't know what you're talking about. I don't remember giving you an odd look."
"But you shook your head at me?"
"I did." Rei conceded, sure that she had at least done that much.
"Why did you do that?"
"Well…bcause I thought you overreacted to…uh…" Rei's truthful confession died on her lips as the angry look on Keiko's face amplified and her face reddened.
"You did not just say that!" Keiko said, her voice sounding a little wobbly. "You did not just defend her to me…"
Rei swallowed and looked across the table at Minako. The blonde had brought her hand up to her forehead and was using it to prop up her head against the table refusing to meet Rei's or anyone else's eyes. This—and many other clear clues—told Rei that her choice to continue to be her truthfully blunt self was a dangerous one in the face of her girlfriend's emotional upheaval.
"I've had a horrible day and…I-I was just looking for a little bit of sympathy and you…"
Keiko couldn't finish, she was too unsteady. Instead, she stood up, left her tray there and fled the cafeteria. Minako kept her head propped up against her forehead as Rei just sat there, never having had any experience with a relationship like this before, and was at a loss as to what to do.
"Go after her, dunce." Aiko said, now leaning against the fair wall behind the table, narrowing her eyes at Rei.
Minako looked up and narrowed her eyes at the brunette causing her to look away from her. Rei swallowed and stood up, leaving her tray too as she silently left the cafeteria in search of her girlfriend.
Minako raised her head and took a drink of her water. To be fair, she had been trying to get a reaction out of the brunette, but not one like this and she felt sort of…guilty about it. The table was quiet until Hatsu decided to voice what they were all collectively thinking.
"Poor Keiko." Hatsu said.
"Yeah," Chizuko agreed, putting her hands behind her head, "Rei has a lot to learn still."
Goddamn it!
He felt like shit!...And his head…who the hell had convinced him to drink last night and why had he listened?
Hisao groaned as he stretched out in the darkness of the room across the cold stone floor, not coherent enough to remember how he'd gotten there or to know even where he was.
"Ugh!" Hisao moaned as he braced his hands on the floor and tried to turn his body around to get up onto his knees.
There was a dark presence that Hisao was beginning to recognize in the room as he began to adjust to his surroundings. The room was cold and the floor was concrete. Everything was pitch black and there was almost no light. Somewhere around him he could hear dripping and there was a strong stench in the air of dampness and mold that reminded him of being in a basement only ten times worse. So…he was in a wet cyber cop version of hell then, only he wasn't alone.
"Have you ever heard any creature make so much noise?" A man grumbled to himself, "Who knew humans were so whiney."
"Who's there?" Hisao started to yell, but the loud sound aggravated his headache and the last few syllables dragged out into a pitiful whisper.
"Pathetic." The voice groused again, the one word reply emanating from somewhere in the darkness.
Hisao growled, but couldn't find the energy in himself to fight back against the statement.
"Our Queen must be losing her edge if she sees any sort of worth in you."
A short haired blond man leaned against one of the four walls of the room, his face and part of his chest shrouded in the completeness of shadows where the naked human eye could not see him .
Hisao groaned again, pressing his head into the cold concrete beneath him and praying to whoever would listen to stifle his headache. He could feel the pendant on the key chain connected to his belt pressing into his stomach. It was uncomfortable.
He finally managed to get himself into a half sitting, half laying position.
"Who are you?" He asked a second time.
"It doesn't matter," the man said, "You'll be dead before it matters, but if it makes the quality of your life that much better then I might as well tell you. My name is Jadeite and you'll be serving under me from now on."
Hisao rubbed at his eyes to try and clear the fuzziness from his vision, but in the murkiness of the room it was hard to really see anything.
"What…What do you want from me?" He sputtered out, his mouth dry, his body dehydrated and throbbing while his mind was still angry at being in the custody of this obviously strange man with a possible fetish problem and confused as to how he got anywhere near him.
The last thing he could remember was he had been in the school about to pull off his most impressive episode of breaking and entering to date and then nothing…he couldn't remember anything else. Somewhere along the way he'd blacked out and now he was…he was…somewhere underground, maybe?
Jadeite watched the teenage boy as he began to crawl across the floor, his ancient eyes trained in centuries of seeing into just such darkness. Knowing that he shouldn't waste anymore time, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a small glass vial.
"I want nothing to do with you, to tell the truth." He said, "but my queen has other plans for you, so we're both just going to have to deal."
There was a small popping noise as he released the stopper from the vial and moved closer. His foot falls echoed in the darkness and Hisao instinctively tried to move away from the sounds, but his body's response was sluggish at best, and Jadeite had stopped beside him before he was able to move. The sharp sole of a military boot slammed into his chest and Hisao gasped painfully as the air was pushed out of his chest and he couldn't breathe.
"Please…don't"
Jadeite knelt down onto his free leg and grabbed the boy's chin with his other hand, forcing the boy's mouth open. Then, without warning, the contents of the vial were poured down Hisao's throat. He choked, but swallowed most of it. And that was all it took.
He couldn't see himself, but he could feel his body changing. Bones broke and knit themselves into a foreign anatomy, skin ripped and stretched, clothes tore. He tried to scream, but it came out as an echo of a scream, a contorted animalistic like sound. Jadeite jumped back watching the creature take shape from the boy. He was not, however, very interested by the pair of claws that took the place of hands, and four spry legs on each side that took the place of two legs, or of the exoskeleton that took the place of the human form. He just watched long enough to know that the creature they had wanted had now taken shape and then he dematerialized into the darkness.
The sad reject of evolution breathed heavily on the floor, just getting used to a new set of lungs that had not belonged to the human boy it had been. Scraps of clothing were strewn across the floor. Beady dark eyes could now see through the darkness. They searched around for the man who had changed them, but he was nowhere in the small concrete room.
Laying across the floor, still strung onto one belt loop, was the pendant his sister had given him still on his keychain. Beady eyes stared at it, as if recognizing it from some far off hazy place for the first time. Moving sluggishly, a huge claw moved over to clamp around the object, but it snapped in two between them. The newly formed creature let out an agonizing howl at the life it knew it had lived somewhere else. At the world it had been forced to leave behind. It was something new now, something alone, and alien to all life forms on Earth. Something wretched. Something that would not be accepted by mankind.
The beady eyes had translucent eye lids and tear ducts to moisten them, but could form no tears to mourn the life it had lost. What was it? Did it even have a name now? Who had it been?
The claw tightened around the splinters of wood it crushed as the creature sobbed, still laying prostrate along the floor like a lost human child.
Most of the chores around the shrine she'd finished after they had come home from school and now Rei was in the kitchen preparing a tray of tea for them drink while they studied while Keiko had gone to her room and had presumably already started studying.
Rei poured the hot water from the kettle into the teapot with the tea leaves to let them steep for a bit before she reached up into one of the cupboards by the stove and retrieved two small black tea cups. Keiko was standing in the doorway, leaning her head against the wooden frame and watching her girlfriend's agile movements as she went about her tasks.
"Are you really sorry about what you said today?" She ventured.
Rei swiveled around, teacups still in hand. Her eyes widened when she saw Keiko and then went back to normal size as she set the teacups on the counter and moved over towards the pantry.
"I thought you were going to get a head start on Modern Japanese Literature?"
Keiko's tone remained calm as she pushed off from the door and stepped into the kitchen, "You're not answering my question, Rei."
Rei opened the pantry door and reached in, pulling out a small box of cookies they could snack on with their tea. Keiko moved forward and bent down, pulling a small painted plate out of a drawer and setting it on the counter as Rei opened the bag and avoided her eyes. Then with a certain formality, Rei began placing cookies individually on the plate, arranging them into layers of circles one by one.
Keiko growled. She hated being ignored. Without warning, she grabbed Rei's arm and turned her around to face her. Rei sighed, blowing frustrated air through her lips. She couldn't even find peace in her own home.
"What do you want from me, Keiko?" Rei snapped, without meaning to, "I spent basically the rest of the lunch period apologizing to you and by the end of the day you still couldn't look at me without narrowing your eyes. I'm surprised you were even able to see the stairs on the way up here."
Keiko didn't answer her, instead she brought one of her hands behind Rei's neck and brought her down into a kiss. Once Rei responded, the kiss morphed into something less than gentle, but still compassionate as their mouths and tongues became one. By the time they separated for air, Rei had forgotten what they had been arguing about in the first place. They rested their foreheads against one another, basically breathing one another's second hand exhalations. Keiko stared up into Rei's eyes, searching those violet depths for something, anything that would tell her that she and Rei shouldn't be with one another. Anything that would tell her that Rei didn't share her feelings, that she'd maybe made a mistake is choosing a girl who hadn't seemed to even have noticed her before their brief interlude at the drinking fountain when all Keiko could do every day was brood over the stoic miko, but all she saw in those eyes was compassion for her and exhilaration.
Then why wasn't this easier? If it was meant to be, if it was right, then why weren't things easier between them? Why did she and Rei always have to fight like this over such small things that didn't seem to matter? Maybe it was because Keiko didn't trust her yet.
She had issues with trust in relationships, Keiko would be the first to admit to it. Since her last girlfriend, Harumi—then a senior—had cheated on her and left her to die a merciless emotional death, she hadn't trusted many people. Not even some of her friends, whom she suspected had known what had been going on, but hadn't told Keiko what they knew for fear of upsetting her when they hoped that the situation would just work itself out on its own.
She may have let Harumi go because she had been unfaithful to her, but Keiko couldn't be without Rei.
That wasn't a question. No matter how much they quarreled, she needed her like a black market drug. There was just something about the other girl's dark charms that seemed…alluring and otherworldly, so mysterious and enticing that Keiko just couldn't resist them, not even when she tried (and try she had in the beginning way before the miko had ever known she'd existed).
"What?" Rei asked, with a half smile as Keiko continued to stare at her in silence. "Is there something that I can do for you?"
Keiko mentally made up her mind and lunged forward, bringing her mouth back to Rei's and pushing the other girl's back up against the counter. Their lips and tongues merged with a sense of urgency on Keiko's side that Rei had to try to keep up with. Meanwhile, Keiko's hands slid down Rei's shoulders to her breasts, where they stroked and caressed, causing Rei to make small sounds that didn't sound like they'd come from her at all. Keiko smiled into their kiss, and leaned back slightly to meet Rei's flustered eyes.
"I love you, baby." She said, the emotions reflected in her eyes showing that she meant it.
It was the loudest whisper Rei had ever heard pass anyone's lips in this lifetime and it rang in her ears as she lowered her head again and initiated another dizzying kiss. Taking the initiative sparked Rei to take some new ones. She reached around with one hand and pulled Keiko to her by her waist and trailed the other one down her thigh beneath her school uniform skirt, a glimmer of a feeling at the back of her memory reminding Rei that she had done this before with someone else, she just didn't know who.
The kiss got more heated and Keiko released what sounded like a groan as Rei's hand found the hem of her underwear. Then Keiko pulled away from her and Rei stared at her confused, but Keiko just grabbed her arm and yanked her down the hallway and into Rei's bedroom. Damn. Was she glad that grandpa always ran his business errands for the shrine in the afternoon. Rei didn't think she'd ever been so grateful to the old man for anything in her whole life.
Keiko pulled Rei into her own room so fast that she didn't even have the time or the personal freedom to shut the door after them and before Rei could say anything about it, her girlfriend had pushed her back onto her bed.
Rei was sprawled out staring up at the girl standing above her. She didn't think she'd ever seen anything or anyone look so beautiful in her life to date. Keiko was breathtaking in her breathlessness. Her girlfriend leaned down and gave Rei a quick kiss, promising more when she stood back up and until her ponytail and began to undo the buttons on her uniform shirt. Rei watched the movement of her fingers as each button was undone and the material fell away to reveal smooth creamy white skin and the dark burgundy lace of a Keiko's bra.
Keiko noticed the deep blush coloring Rei's cheeks and the heat in her gaze as it roamed over her breasts and smiled deviously, "See something you like from down there?"
She was teasing. Just leaving Rei hanging on her every movement for her own pleasure. The little sadist—a beautiful sadist—Rei corrected in her head. Rei wasn't want to be toyed with though. If she wanted something, she took it.
Rei growled and leaned up wrapping her arms around Keiko and pulling her down onto the bed, quickly reversing their positions so that the other girl was beneath her. Keiko let out a small sound of anticipation as Rei spread her legs so that she could lay between them, then brought her mouth down to cover the thin material of her bra and one of the breasts yet underneath it. Keiko arched into the wet heat of Rei's mouth as Rei's restless hands moved around her back to release the clasp there.
Once the offending article of clothing was out of the way, Rei bent down again and took the other breast fully into her mouth, worshipping it with her tongue.
"Yes, Rei…" Keiko breathed as she placed a hand on the back of Rei's neck, encouraging her, "That's it, baby…"
It was like Keiko's body was on fire and Rei was the flame stoking her entire being into one blissfully twisted inferno.
Rei backed off of the breast she had been favoring and kissed the skin in between Keiko's breast, looking up at her with what Keiko would have described as complete and utter naughtiness had it been anyone else's eyes staring into hers.
"Why are you stopping?" Keiko asked, her breathing still labored.
"I had to look at you." Rei confessed, an endearing hint of awe in her eyes.
"Well, stop it." Keiko huffed, trying not to blush now of all times. "You've got work to do."
Rei couldn't help it, she laughed and buried her face in Keiko's soft skin to muffle the sound as her girlfriend's frustrated sigh sounded from above her.
"Do I?" Rei asked innocently, having recovered herself.
Keiko's eyes widened as she slapped Rei playfully on the arm, "You're being a bitch!"
"Am I?" Rei asked.
Then as if to emphasize the question, she licked a path from between her girlfriend's breasts up to her collarbone where she ended the caress in a sucking kiss. With the utmost dedication, her mouth moved to Keiko's neck where she covered her throat with her mouth and laved at the sensitive skin there with her tongue.
Keiko sighed contentedly, but she wanted more of Rei. She wanted that delicious mouth other places on her body.
Without hesitation, she pushed Rei up by her shoulders. Her girlfriend stared at her confused at the interruption, but Keiko pumped her hips up into Rei's causing the other girl to let out a stifled gasp and lean her head back as she mimicked the gesture with more force. Then there was no stopping Rei. Looking down into Keiko's eyes, she ground herself into the other girl's center, moaning as the Keiko rocked with her. Rei moved slowly, at first, as if feeling out the movement, and then with Keiko's encouragement, they moved faster and easily together as if they were made for the act.
Keiko raised her thighs and squeezed Rei's hips between them, making the space between them just that much smaller as Rei moved with her. It occurred to her, then, even as she was rising on the cusp of excitement herself, that Rei had never done this before and she had no idea how to curb her desire to draw out both of their pleasure. Between the two, Keiko was the more sexually experienced, and she was going to have to make good use of that experience.
Rei moaned into her ear, a pitiful, frustrated sound, as she ground into her harder, searching for her release. Keiko forcefully pulled Rei's head back and kissed her, firmly, determined to slow her eager girlfriend and make this experience the best she could for both of them. Then without warning, Keiko flipped them over, surprising Rei.
Rei stared up at her with a look of confusion and some fear, but Keiko kissed her again to reassure her and began to pull at the buttons on Rei's blouse. Not in a patient mood right now, she ripped at the buttons and pulled the garment completely open, exposing Rei's breasts to her eyes. With the same impatience as she had done away with the shirt, Keiko disposed of the bra and the rest of Rei's clothing before descending on her.
Rei didn't know what to do. She didn't know what to do or even if she should be doing anything about the myriad of sensations and feelings that were running through her as Keiko's mouth devoured her body starting from her breasts and stopping to lave at her belly button. She looked own then, not knowing what to expect, but Keiko certainly knew what she wanted.
Before Rei could ask what she was doing, Keiko's mouth had descended between her legs. The miko jerked beneath her, all coherent thoughts fleeing her mind as she gave herself to this new, wonderful sensation.
Rei was in a box, her conscious, logical, cynical self—the one that was always in charge—had been stuffed into a box and the walls were closing in on it with each and every stroke of her girlfriend's tongue inside her. It was almost as if she were split into two halves: one part of her rising higher and higher, freed from the restrictions of the world as the other half remained grounded, confined to its ever shrinking space.
Rei's eyes were closed shut.
She could feel that part of her continuing to rise while the real her was being suffocated as walls closed in. Her breathing hitched, her lungs froze, and her body stiffened and tightened all over as half of her rose to heaven while the other half of her struggled to breathe.
Keiko rose to lean on her elbows and licked her lips. Then she crawled up beside Rei. Her girlfriend's face had relaxed and she was barely breathing, a sign that Keiko had, indeed, out done herself. When Rei's violet eyes opened though, there was something in them that hadn't been there before and Keiko couldn't tell what it was and that scared her.
"Rei?" She called to her, as Rei stared up at the ceiling and her body began to suck in air again.
It was almost as if she was lost. And Rei felt as if she was trying to come back to herself from some other world. Part of her had struggled, part of her had clung to the walls, refusing to let it go just for pleasure while the other part had surrendered itself to what it had been feeling so easily that the shear speed with which she had given in had surprised her and even frightened her.
"Rei?"
Rei glanced over at Keiko as the other brunette touched her face gently with her fingers.
"Are you okay? You seemed really distant."
Rei continued to breathe. Even though she was back on the ground, her body still felt like it was floating on water and she couldn't force it to move in anyway so long as the feeling consumed her.
Not even to form words.
Rei blinked her eyes and managed a half smile to put the other girl at ease. Knowing that a first time was always a little disorienting, Keiko was resigned not to push Rei because she knew there would be many more times after this for them. Instead, she leaned forward and kissed Rei gently before snuggling into her like she was the only place she ever wanted to be.
A half hour or so later, Keiko extracted herself from Rei's arms. Making sure she was asleep, she leaned over and kissed her girlfriend tenderly on the forehead, then she stood up, got dressed, and discretely left Rei and the shrine behind.
"Whew!" Minako sighed as she closed her locker door and leaned her forehead against the cool metal.
The end of yet another Friday. Thank Kami for the end of the week. That was all Minako had to say. Too bad though her weekend had to be sullied by the fact that two of her teachers had wanted to hold her after to make sure that she was adjusting to their new curriculums. What did it take for these people to understand that she was new, she was not dumb.
It was then that she caught the side view of a figure coming towards her. A very blurry, unhappy looking brunette figure. Minako wasn't particularly surprised when the figure got close enough for her to recognize her as Keiko Oshida.
Though the girl was making a v-line for her, Minako held her ground and gave the brunette a friendly smile as she stomped to a stop beside her locker door.
Minako had known this was coming. No girl shared her girlfriend with another and didn't have reservations about it or grievances with it…especially if that girl just happened to be Aino Minako with her past history of torrid teenage flings and sticky dressing room affairs.
Being Venus, she was many things, but Minako was not naïve when it came to matters of the heart. She knew it would only be a matter of time before the pot would boil over and she would have to contend with Keiko without her forced politeness and silent loathing.
The storm was here and Minako was finally out in the forefront of it. Well, bring it on then, Minako mused as she took how the other girl looked, I don't care.
The brunette's cheeks were flustered, it looked like she had run here, from where Minako wasn't sure, but taking in the girl's frazzled appearance and the slightly off kilter look of her usually straight brown hair, Minako was betting that it was somewhere with sheets and an equally warm body to warm them with or a floor…or a wall, all of the above would fit the bill.
Minako's outward smile faltered a bit as she let that thought sink in.
A bed, a floor, or a wall where Keiko would be with her Rei, where she couldn't be. Where her Rei would be kissing, holding, caressing, loving, and fucking someone who was not her. It wasn't a very pleasant mental image and it was beginning to make her sick to her stomach the longer she pictured it.
But she couldn't let on that she was bothered by that right now. This girl, this conflict she had known was coming had to be resolved and taken care of before it got out of hand or worse and Rei found out about it.
Before Keiko had caught her breath and could say anything, Minako began to say what she knew the brunette would want to hear.
"I'm not out to steal your girlfriend, Keiko." Minako said, "Rei and I are friends, nothing more."
Once Keiko did catch her breath, she did something that Minako, for all of her intuition, hadn't really expected.
She retaliated.
"Do you know Rochelle Kasunumi?" Keiko began as the blonde's eyes across from her widened and she finished before Minako could even open her mouth to answer the question posed to her, "You should. You were both in a relationship that lasted almost nineteen months and as she tells it, you did steal her."
Minako's eyes closed and she swallowed the dryness in her throat that was making it difficult for her to talk, but still couldn't bring herself to say anything in return. It was true, she knew it was. God, did she ever know.
Had she forgotten who she was already? The details of her life were spread far and wide in headlines and articles across the world. All someone had to do was type in the pass code to their internet connection and there all of her mistakes and triumphs would stand naked on display for anyone and everyone to see. How could she have been so stupid to have thought that circumstances would change for her just because she had been forced to take on the mantle of a normal life?
Minako kept her eyes closed and resigned herself to her emotions; reigning herself in at the last second, but Keiko must have noticed the change in her because when the blonde dared to open her eyes again, the other girl was looking at her with a look edging on regret.
If she'd come across any article on her and Rochelle, then Keiko must have known that it had ended badly and now Keiko was trying to make up for it by feeling guilty, no, by showing that she was feeling guilty over it.
"Just—", The brunette began shakily; a certain desperation in her voice now, "Just don't take Rei away from me. Please. She is the world to me. It doesn't exist without her in it."
Well, who gave her to you anyway?
Minako wanted to ask it, was dying to ask it, to lay everything out on the table for this girl: about her past life, about her and Rei, about how they can't exist in a world and be apart because they are basically opposite parts of the same person…but she didn't. She couldn't. Not because of the limitations of any cosmic law, but because it probably wouldn't do anything for her outside of getting her a one way ticket into one of Tokyo's more prestigious mental hospitals.
Instead, Minako didn't say anything. She just nodded and looked away, determined to maintain some semblance of dignity even as her heart was breaking.
Keiko acted like she had wanted to say something more, but she couldn't get the words out. Instead, she just turned and ran out of the building leaving a nearly empty school and a very conflicted Minako behind her.
They had been selfish people back then, living selfish lives in an unselfish time. They didn't deserve to survive what was to come and they hadn't.
Mars swallowed, and stared at the corpses that littered the floor of the room they had so courageously defended and for what? None of it mattered anymore. No matter, Rei had seen this moment a thousand times over in her dreams since she'd been twelve and had come to the moon for the first time. She knew what she had to do.
"Jupiter," Mars called her comrade's attention away from the door they had barricaded that was being stormed by Beryl's troops from the outside, "I need you to help me."
They both came from warrior cultures where death by one's own blade rather than surrendering to a stronger enemy was considered an honorable end to an honorable life. The Jovian would understand. She had to.
Rei stretched out her arm, handing her sword—a sword that her ancestors had forged in the fires of Mars and had carried into battle for hundreds of years against their nation's enemies—to the brunette standing across from her. Jupiter took it, but didn't move to help her right away. Instead, her conditioned sensibilities got in the way of her warrior instincts and she stared at Mars with doubt clearly visible in her green eyes.
"Are you sure you want to do this, Mars?"
Rei seemed to consider what she was about to do for a moment, then she nodded and Jupiter approached her as the Martian removed her armor in preparation for what was about to happen. Standing there in just her red training tunic, the soldier in Rei felt truly vulnerable for the first time in years. Jupiter swallowed and met Mars' eyes as bravely as she could..
"Tell Mina…" Here Rei faltered, the mental image of her lover's red rimmed blue eyes and disappointed frown all too familiar to her, causing a bitter smile to come to her face. "Tell Mina that I died with the truth of my convictions. Tell her that I died just as I lived: with pride."
Jupiter nodded and flexed her abdominal muscles while moving to bend her knees so she could brace her body as Mars closed the last few feet that separated them and stood in front of her. Instead of appearing as scared and anxious as she felt, Rei patted Jupiter's cheek, causing an annoyed expression to fall over her friend's features and Rei couldn't help it, she smiled.
"Thanks, Jup. It's been fun."
If this had been any other day in their lives, Jupiter would have rolled her eyes at Mars patronization of her, but there was too much moisture behind them and now just didn't seem like the time, so she simply nodded as Mars grabbed onto the shoulder straps of her armor. As Rei stood against the point of the short broad sword Jupiter was cradling against her belly, her breathing came out in quick, intense bursts like someone about to jump off of a twenty story building. Jupiter steadied the sword hilt back against her abdomen, the opposite point just inches away from the unprotected mark beneath Rei's ribcage, just below her breasts where the farthest corner of her heart continued to beat, restless and alive.
As Rei hesitated and stared down at the blade poised to run her through, Jupiter's hands began to shake and her eyes lost some of their hardness. Rei made a halfhearted attempt to slow her breathing, but it wasn't working.
"Ready?" Rei asked, not sure if she still was or not.
"Ready." Jupiter grunted, every muscle in her body trembling beneath her armor.
Rei tightened her grip on the leather straps of Jupiter's armor and pulled. She didn't look down, didn't want to, but she felt the sword tip slide the first few inches through her skin and into her chest. Jupiter tried to help her by pushing forward from her knees. The Martian gasped in pain and stopped the forward movement unable to continue to push herself forward as the steel entered her, inch by inch, but Jupiter knew she couldn't leave her like that. The Jovian grit her teeth and pushed as Mars pulled weakly until the sword was buried to its hilt in her chest and she was all but laying on Jupiter's shoulder.
Leaning heavily against Jupiter, Rei's breathing was now coming out in short, pained gasps as it continued to shallow. Green eyes filled with tears as she felt Mars' grip slip from her armor completely as the Martian's last breath tapered out almost like it was something like a sigh and her body began to slowly slid out of the Jovian's embrace.
When Rei's body finally hit the floor, Jupiter noticed two things through her blurred vision: one, Rei's face looked almost peaceful in death and two, the senshi of Mars had gratefully closed her eyes to meet it.
As Jupiter swatted at the budding moisture in her eyes with one hand, she knelt down to the floor and retrieved the sword slowly from Rei's chest. There was a damp squelching sound as the steel was wretched free and a cistern of blood flowed after the metal as it retreated, breaking into steaming tributaries that ran down the Martian's abdomen and careened off of her bare sides onto the marble floor.
Jupiter wiped her nose with the leather bracer on her wrist, leaving a trail of red that begun just above her upper lip and stretched halfway across her left cheek as she let out a shuddering breath.
The senshi of Mars was no more.
Rei shot up in her bed, gasping for breath. She looked around rapidly for a few moments, at first not even recognizing her own room, and then trying very hard to figure out what she was doing laying in her own bed in what appeared to be…the sunlight was shining through her window and it couldn't be morning because she was dressed in her uniform already so it had to be…the late afternoon.
But really, wherever she was, was the least of her worries right now.
Rei reached up and felt her chest, her hand resting just below her left breast, the continual beating of her heart beneath bone and skin somehow making it easier to breathe again. Yes—she inhaled deeply and held the breath in for a couple seconds before releasing it in a burst of fleeing air—she was, indeed, breathing.
That had been the most vivid nightmare Rei had experienced in a long time and she was in no hurry to relive any of the feelings that were still running through her, causing her to sweat and goosebumps to break out all over her skin . Faces and names of people she didn't even know swam around in her head, confusing her even more. She couldn't have imagined them all. Rei could be one to utilize artistic talents, but she didn't usually make things up in her mind. It just wasn't her nature to do that and even if it was, she wouldn't have created a scenario where she took her own life and why? She had no clue. It had to have been a dream, no, a fucking nightmare and she had no wish to relive it anytime soon. All she wanted to do was forget the feelings and the images. Once she did that she could be at peace again.
Rei leaned back against the headboard of her bed and let out a deep breath. Why was she in bed in the middle of the afternoon? She had come home from school, grandpa'd been out, that much she remembered, then she'd made some tea and Keiko had initiated an argument and…oh…yeah, that was why she was in bed. Rei lifted the sheets and looked down at her nearly naked form. Yep, that indeed was why. A slight blush came to Rei's face as she remembered everything they'd done.
But where was Keiko?
Rei stood up and grabbed some clothes from her dresser, determined to shower before grandpa got home and she had to explain why she looked like she'd taken a roll in the hay. The old man would shit a brick when she told him, but she very much doubted that when it came down to the wire, he would do anything more than hug her and say she was growing up so fast…it just wasn't a conversation she ever wanted to have with her grandfather. Ever.
Rei scurried into the shower and by the time she was done, Keiko had ascended the steps to the shrine and was slipping inside the front door, volleying back into her comfort zone and back to her Rei.
Minako laid her head against the lip of the porcelain basin she was submerged in, watching the steam rise up from the water towards the ceiling lights. A hot bath was such a small consolation after such a long day.
Funny how the events that took place over no longer than a ten minute span of time could make someone want to be a million miles away from themselves, extended, as if they were another person entirely.
The blonde sighed and closed her eyes against the heat rising from the water, letting the sensation carry her away to another place and time.
She'd heard the clanging of metal against metal and the dull, wet sounds of sharp objects as they plunged through flesh and Venus' heart had begun to beat faster. She was running down one of the many corridors of the Moon Palace, her armor, face, skin, and blonde hair streaked with the blood of her enemies and even some of her own, she was sure.
She'd just come from the throne room where she and Mercury had found their princess, hunched over the body of her beloved Earth prince, both of them bloodied and unmoving. But they hadn't had time to weep or even to be angry at how things had turned out for not long after their arrival a band of Beryl's soldiers had barged into the room and attacked them. The two of them had managed to defeat most of the unit, but it had not been enough to save their kingdom nor had it been enough to save Mercury from her wounds.
But Venus had survived and since all was now lost, no matter what any of them did, she was making her way to where Jupiter and Mars had secured a last stronghold against the hordes of invading enemy soldiers. There she would fight until her last breath had left her body and darkness would finally come and take her away forever. It didn't matter now. Nothing did anymore. All that she wanted was to die fighting side by side with her stubborn lover.
If they had to die in the name of a cause that was dead already, then they would do so together.
The sounds of fighting and dying faded away as Venus got closer, a sure sign that Jupiter and Mars were still holding off the enemy in one of the Palace's many drawing rooms, but they would not be able to do so forever. No…their princess was dead, the queen had disappeared along with Pluto to the gods only knew where, and the Outers had yet to arrive from their far away posts to defend what was left of the falling kingdom. The world as they had known it was ending and they along with it were set to vanish into oblivion.
It was only a matter of time.
A final cry came from the room as Venus neared it and she recognized it as Jupiter's strong voice. Speeding up, the Venusian ran as fast as her feet would carry her over the short distance to the room. However, when she reached the doors, she saw what she had not been expecting.
The floor was littered with black armored corpses. Kneeling by one of the bookcases was Jupiter, breathing heavily as she leaned against the wood and cradled a gaping hole in one side of her armor. But what literally stopped Venus' heart in her chest was the sight of Mars laying as though in a deep sleep, her armor perfectly arranged and her arms laying at her sides in a relaxed manner on top of a stretching pool of blood.
Venus didn't bother to hold back the tears as they formed and flowed freely down her cheeks. She was thinking, only moving as she scrambled across the room towards Mars' body.
"Rei? Rei!"
Venus raced her hands over her lover's armor and could find no hole, no vital mark in it where a death blow could have been served and yet blood was still rolling in waves out of her cold form. Then she spotted it, the blade resting at Rei's side. Venus recognized the sword to be her lover's, the steel of it still wet with Mars' blood. Suicide was it. But why?
"She wanted me to tell you…that-t…she died with p-pride." Jupiter rasped out the words, as a wave of pain slammed through her weakening body.
Venus wanted to scream. She wanted to beat her fists into her lover's chest until her heart began to beat again, but no matter how many times she violently shook Rei's form or pushed on her or called her name, she could not bring her back. Minako had dropped to her knees and was now sitting on top of Rei, her arms wrapped around her dormant shoulders, her face buried in the Martian's neck as she sobbed unintelligibly, unable to form words.
Jupiter sat, her breathing still labored, her ailing body still slouched back against the bookcase, and watched. Venus tried to speak, but her words were interrupted by hitches as her body fought its way back from emotional desolation.
"Wha—ahha—what hap-pened?"
"She wanted to die with honor. It was the only thing that still seemed worth defending to her now that this entire place has gone to hell."
There was a silence—an eerie thing in a room filled with so many dead—into which they simply existed, and played no parts. Minako didn't say anything.
Finally, Jupiter continued:
"I redressed her in her armor so that she may not be so vulnerable to the hordes of the damned once they overtake us. I know that would be what she'd want. Will you not fight?"
Venus didn't answer, just buried her head deeper into Mars' pale neck.
Jupiter gasped in pain, as she clutched at her bleeding side.
"Coward…" The Jovian spat out weakly, watching Venus as she hunched over Mars' body through silted eyes. "She died as much for you as she did to escape them."
Venus wouldn't deny it. She was a coward, a selfish coward who would do anything to be a million miles away from where they now were, in hiding with the woman whose corpse she now clung to in her arms. She would rather live. She would rather live a lifetime of peace and watch this whole blasted kingdom burn to the ground than fight for it ever again.
The badly splintered doors that Jupiter had once again barricaded gave a frightful lurch as more soldiers tried to break through them from the other side. The Jovian stood, hunched over from her wound.
"Brace yourself." Jupiter whispered with the last of her strength, "They're coming."
Venus didn't move. She didn't even care. All she wanted to do was curl up into a ball and forget everything, to try to think of this as just a bad nightmare and nothing more, but she couldn't. Instead, she just clung to Mars stiffening form and waited as the wood holding Beryl's army back began to crack more and more with each bombardment.
Swiftly, the end would come and she was ready for it. Back then, back in the days before they had to fight for their lives, before everything had been broken, they really had had it all.
Minako sprang out of the water, gasping for air. At some point she'd slid down into the bath tub and not even come out of her memory. She sputtered and wiped the excess water out of her eyes as her breathing began to even out.
"Mina?"
Minako looked over to where Artemis was standing halfway through the crack in the door, looking up at her, concerned.
"It's nothing, Artemis." Minako said, wiping her eyes again. "I just—remembered something, that's all."
"You were underwater." Artemis said, hopping up on the basin beside her.
Despite the seriousness in her mentor's voice, a smirk curled its way onto Minako's features.
"What were you going to do, jump in after me?"
"I was considering it, yes, but then you came up for air and I had to remind myself not to give into the urge to strangle you. Just what do you think you were doing?"
"Doing a little deep sea exploring." Minako quipped, splashing water at him as he sprang back from her. "You want to join me, it's great fun."
Artemis coughed into his paw, "No, thank you."
There was nothing but steam and a comfortable silence between them until Artemis, as concerned as ever about Minako's well being, said what needed to be.
"Why were you really under the water, Minako?"
"I just slipped." She said, narrowing her eyes at him. "My life may suck, but I have no plans to end it myself anytime soon. Even I know better than that."
Artemis nodded, relieved. "What did you remember? Something new?"
Minako bit her lip as the image of a prone armored form and pools of blood on a marble floor flashed back into her mind. "Yes, it was new."
"Do you want to talk about it?" He asked, laying a paw on her shoulder.
"No." Minako replied, shutting her eyes and leaning back against the porcelain again. "That would just make it more real."
"Love in its fullest form is a series of deaths and rebirths. We let go of one phase, one aspect of love, and enter another. Passion dies and is brought back. Pain is chased away and surfaces another time. To love means to embrace and at the same time to withstand many many endings, and many many beginnings—all in the same relationship."
-Clarissa Pinkola Estes-
Author's Note: Hey all. Hope everyone liked the chapter. And if there is any doubt, I promise things will get better for Rei/Minako. Things are a little tough right now, but there are always a few rough spots to hobble over before our beloved main characters can stumble into each other's arms and make mad/passionate love on a bed, chair, couch, floor or wall somewhere. ;] Whether you loved or hated this chapter, let me know by giving me some feed back so I can continue to make this story the best that I possibly can for you guys. Ciao and thanks for reading. :]