Dreams, Made Beautiful by the Dreamer…cont'd…

Dreams, Made Beautiful by the Dreamer…cont'd….

If Ami had appeared distant the day before, she was just as distracted that day. The other Inners fretted over her silence. It was not so much that it was unusual for her to be quiet, but for her not to join in their laughter at jokes, or at least listen to their chatter.

"Ami-chan," Makoto asked as she passed out homemade rice cakes, "would you like one?" She pressed the food forward, and after a moment's hesitation, Ami accepted it.

"Arigatou, Mako-chan."

Makoto smiled as Ami began to nibble at it, watching her friends.

"And there's a new senior," Minako was saying, "and he's actually really nice...."

To which Usagi bubbled: "Ah, Minako-chan! You need to ask him out!"

"I don't know...we're just freshmen.... Do you think he'd...."

And so lunch went much like this, as it usually did when there was peace. It did occur to the others that they should ask Ami how she was, but they believed she needed some space, and they were right. Usagi's black eye was beginning to heal; the edges of the bruise were fading to a sickly yellow, and eventually would return to the normal, pale tone of her skin.

As for Ami, she fidgeted the whole day, anxious to get out of school. Not necessarily because of the sadness, and the desire to escape her friends, but because her mind had latched onto a small mystery, and she wished to unravel it.

"Hi, Minako-chan," Ami greeted as she walked out of the building.

"Hi, Ami-chan! You coming with us to the arcade today?" Minako's eyes were worried, but hopeful. Truthfully, Ami smiled, laughing slightly.

"Gomen ne, I can't today."

Minako began to protest, and then she spotted Makoto and Usagi walking out. "Usagi-chan! Mako-chan! Help me get Ami-chan to come with us!" She waved and shouted. Ami frowned, not liking to be pushed. Minako would try to gang the others up on her.

They'll laugh and try to get me to. I just don't feel like it right now.

Ami was aware of Usagi's grabbing her arm and beginning to drag her along. "Come on! We'll get milkshakes! I'm so hungry!"

Exasperated, Ami sighed, "I can't today! I want to go to-"

"Oooh, Motoki will be there!" That from Minako.

"Minna! I can't!"

"Homework again?" Makoto asked, trying to help Ami pry Usagi off her arm. "You ran out on us yesterday. Is everything all right?"

"Everything's fine. I just need to talk to Setsuna-san."

There were three puzzled frowns surrounding Ami when she mentioned the Guardian of Time. Sighing with a sad smile, Ami continued, "Everything's fine, really. I..." she hesitated. Mention the dream or not? Strangely, she didn't want to share the vision with her friends. Rei might understand, with her own visions, but Rei was at her own school, and not here. "I was at the library, and I found a poem in a dialect I didn't quite follow. I was hoping that Setsuna would recognize it more clearly."

Eyes blinked once, then they looked somewhat more relieved. "If you're sure, Ami-chan?" Usagi asked.

"Very sure, Usagi-chan. Go on. I know how famished you are after school. Go on!" Ami laughed and shooed them along. That she laughed, more than anything else, ushered them away, and after a moment, they were strolling down the street, oblivious to the world.

Ami took her time going to visit. She walked towards the outskirts of Juuban, watching the people rush by her, the cars race along the paved streets. If she listened carefully enough, the rhythm of the city pulsed underfoot, noisy and polluted as it was. Though the streets were usually swept clean, there was always a little garbage strewn in the crannies of the alleys.

Is it me, or does the world seem more real today? More real? How silly. What am I thinking?

At a bus stop, Ami sat and waited, the bus rolling up to the curb a few minutes later, and she rode it out, watching the city become more suburban. By the time she reached her stop, it was yards and flowers lining them. Strolling down the streets here, the pace was slower, though still so close to the gleaming city.

That the house was Michiru's was obvious. It was elegant, with a wide porch and an abundance of flowers neatly lining the yard in geometrical patterns.

But they would look so much prettier if given some room to spread....

A pretty white house, with dark blue shutters, and wide windows to look out of. Ami stepped up onto the long porch, knocked on the door, and nearly leapt back when it was opened instantly by Kaioh Michiru, who was decked out in an expensive formal gown.

"Ami-chan?" Michiru blinked, startled. "Oh, hello. Come in. Haruka and I were just getting ready to go out...." Michiru frowned and glanced up the stairs. "And they say I take a long time to get ready. Here," Michiru shut the door behind Ami.

She's so elegant....

Michiru had chosen a black satin dress, strapless, and an aquamarine wrap against the spring's evening chill. Her hair was pinned up into a twist on the top of her head, and loose tendrils fell delicately around her face. Glittering jewelry only added to the elegance of it.

"Did you need something, Ami?"

Ami broke her gaze, and nodded. "I need to speak to Setsuna."

"Mm. She and Hotaru are having dinner in the kitchen." And as if to enforce her statement, there was the sound of rattling dishes, clattering against each other. Faintly, Ami smelled food. Italian? Her stomach rumbled slightly, but not noticeably.

Just then, Haruka came rushing down the stairs. "I'm ready!" She announced, running to the closet, and grabbing her coat, slinging it on over a black tuxedo, one of the stylish ones with the high collar that didn't need a tie. "Sorry," Haruka apologized as Michiru shook her head.

"Are you having a concert, Michiru-san?" Ami asked.

"No, not tonight. There's a Noh play at the theatre. Haruka brought me tickets last night as a surprise." Michiru beamed at Haruka, who grinned sheepishly and offered Michiru her coat.

"I thought you'd like it."

"Well I do," Michiru replied, and took Haruka's arm. "We'd better get going. It starts at six."

"See you, Ami," Haruka commented, and Michiru waved as they glided out the door. Moments later, the sound of Haruka's car starting roared into the early evening light, and they were gone.

Ami followed the smell of food and the clattering of dishes to the dining room, where she found Setsuna trying desperately not to laugh, since Hotaru was sitting, bewildered, with a large smear of pizza sauce on her cheek.

"Nani, Setsuna-mama?"

Setsuna could only laugh. "Hotaru-chan...." She made a motion to her face, and Hotaru touched it, the tomato sauce coming off on her fingers, and she began to laugh as she took up a napkin. Setsuna paused a moment and turned, noticing Ami standing in the doorway.

"Michiru let me in."

Setsuna tilted her head to one side, the sweep of her hair falling behind her. "Have a seat." Hotaru opened the lid of the box, and a swirl of steam rose off the pepperoni. "Help yourself." Setsuna said with a wave of her hand.

"Arigatou." Ami glanced around for a plate, and Hotaru leapt up to get one, darting into the kitchen and out again, whipping it out of a cabinet.

"Here you go."

"Arigatou."

"Would you like something to drink?"

"Just water, please."

Hotaru rushed back into the kitchen, and there was the suction sound of the freezer door opening and closing.

"Can we help you with something?" Setsuna asked as Ami stared at her slice of pizza. "You look troubled." Setsuna leaned back in her chair as Hotaru returned, passing the glass to Ami, and settled herself back at the table. "It's not the Princess or Small Lady is it?"

"No, no, nothing like that... I just had a question. It's nothing too important."

"What is it then?" Setsuna was frowning from behind the rim of her glass. It was unlike one of the Inner Senshi to ask for help on a personal level such as this. Though they always wished to work together, fight together, they seemed to have different spheres of personal life; perhaps it was age. And Setsuna had seen the shadows that were gathering around Sailor Mercury, clinging about her. Taking a swift look at Hotaru, she saw that the Soldier of Death also saw the shadows, since she was staring intently, but unobtrusively, as though uncertain what she was seeing. "You wouldn't have come if it weren't important, Ami," she set her glass down on the table, and wiped her lips with a napkin. "You usually don't need any help."

Oh don't I?

"I...well, I don't usually get strange dreams. Actually, I don't remember them that often...but last night...I had a dream, and I saw these words." Ami rummaged in her backpack, which she had set down beside her chair.

Producing the slip of paper she had scribbled on last night, Setsuna took it, unfolding it and looking at it, while Hotaru peered over her shoulder.

'Yo no naka wo nani nagekamashi yamazakura hana miru hodo no kokoro narisheba'

"Murasaki," Setsuna said after a moment.

"You recognize it? I wasn't sure... Murasaki?"

"What does it say, Setsuna-mama?" Hotaru asked as she watched the paper.

"It says, 'Why do we suffer so in the world? Just regard life as the short bloom of the mountain cherry.'"

"A waka?"

"Yes. Ami, you say you saw this in a dream?"

Ami was twisting her napkin in her fingers, and not looking up. "Hai," she replied softly, and met their eyes. "Murasaki. As in the 'Tale of Genji' Murasaki?"

Setsuna nodded, and leaned forward on the table, placing her elbows on the top, and lacing her fingers together, placing her chin on them thoughtfully. "I assume you've read it?"

"A modern Japanese translation. A couple years ago."

Setsuna tapped a finger against her cheek, and Hotaru asked, "Don't we have that in the library?"

Biting her lip, Setsuna nodded. "Yes, in paperback. Two copies, actually, one in the Heian dialect."

Ami's head popped up in interest. "How did you get one in...oh." She blushed. "Of course you can get one from the 11th century."

Setsuna laughed a little, shaking her head. "No, nothing like that, Ami. Just a lucky used book shopper one day. The Heian dialect is different than that of modern Japanese. There are still many similarities, but over all, it would be like Middle English to Modern English. The sounds are there, but the syntax, and the vocabulary," she waved a hand. "different. It's natural you wouldn't get it just at first glance. Don't worry about it."

"We were told about the Heian period in school," Hotaru ventured, swallowing the last bit of crust from her pizza slice. "Shikibu Murasaki wrote the 'Tale of Genji', and it is believed to be the world's first novel. Sensei was pleased to tell us that the world's first novel was written by a woman." Hotaru grinned, glad to contribute to the conversation. "Maybe I should read it."

"Ah..." Setsuna paused, her glass halfway to her mouth. "Maybe in a year or two, Hotaru-chan."

"Why?" Hotaru asked, puzzled. "I read lots of big books. You never stopped me before."

Setsuna didn't look too happy, but Ami guessed it was Genji's infidelities. Of course, Ami herself had been little older than Hotaru, but still.

Hotaru settled herself into her chair, and looked at Ami. "What were you dreaming about, to see a waka in your sleep?"

"Oh, just a small dream. I was at a river, and I saw the words on paper. I probably saw them before, and forgot. You know all the psychological dream interpretation of the subconscious mind. I've read so many books, I've forgotten what I've read, and now I'm dreaming about it." Ami tried to pass it off, and was aware that the other two didn't really buy it, but were not rude enough to say so.

"Well, if that's all," Setsuna began, letting herself trail off a little, allowing Ami to continue the conversation if she so wished. Unsurprisingly, Ami remained silent, and began to eat her piece of pizza, which was beginning to grow cold in the air.

Hotaru broke the dawning silence. "How is Chibi-Usa-chan?"

Ami looked up, and chewed a little. "Fine, last I saw her. I haven't been to Usagi-chan's in a couple days, but I'm sure she's doing fine."

"And the Princess?" Setsuna asked.

Ami became very still, and looked at her plate, and the moment hung like a droplet of water on the blade of a leaf. Slowly, it fell. "You remember the earthquake two days ago?"

"Two of my lamps broke," Hotaru told her. "Fell off the shelves."

"I was taking Usagi-chan to the library, and some of the casing fell off the building. She broke her wrist when she fell, and has a black eye."

Ami heard Hotaru suck in her breath, but Setsuna was better accustomed to judging her reactions, and made no movement. "An accident, Ami-chan," Setsuna told her gently. "She's all right, I take it, since we were not informed immediately?"

Ami nodded miserably.

"An accident, Ami-chan," Setsuna repeated firmly. "An accident."

Looking up, Ami saw her face very grave. "Yes." She looked at the clock to escape Setsuna's watchful garnet eyes. "It's getting late...Mom's home evenings today. I really should get going. Thank you for the pizza."

"Do you want a ride back?"

"No, that's okay. There should be a bus soon, and it's not so dark yet."

"You're sure?"

"Hai, arigatou."

Setsuna and Hotaru watched her leave from the door, silhouetted by the porchlight. Ami's head was down, eyes diverted from the space before her. "Hotaru-chan?"

"Hai, Setsuna-mama?"

"I sense something of time around her. But it is unclear. Do you feel it?"

Hotaru nodded. "It is death."

"Hers?"

Hotaru stepped closer to Setsuna, as Ami disappeared from their vision. "It hovers, but I do not believe so. It...echoes. Like an illusion. And it clings to her shadows."

Will the dream come to me again? Will I see the kami again?

With trepidation, Ami looked at the bedcovers she had unrolled. She did not even know if she wanted to see the vision again, though it occupied her mind incessantly.

Kami was beautiful. And she called me Kanashimi. Sorrow. Do I wear my feelings so plainly on my face? Or is she seeing into my mind, and acting on my own thoughts? Gods, how this makes me wish I have read Freud.

It was with a sigh of resignation that she took up her literature book, always saving the stories for the last thing to do before sleep. It was a habit, in hope that the tales of distant eras and places would wander their way into her dreams, and make them good ones. This time, though, the distant place her mind took her was so real it was surreal, a painting breathed into life.

And so it was that she fell asleep, her cheek on the open leaves of the book, and the letters exposed to the light of her lamp.

Energies floated and danced in the darkness that swallowed her. It also seemed that candles floated in the water, and long ebony hair that was not her own writhed like seaweed before her eyes, tangling in the silent water of the depths. The light of the candles leapt high, dancing in her sight, and they rolled on the waves that she moved though with thought. The light was drowned in the darkness of the water, but only until she surfaced, and felt herself again, and air filled her and she breathed again.

I did return, as I hoped and feared....

Only now, her place was not standing beside Kami, and she did not know where she was. Again, she wore her school uniform, short sleeved and with her loafers. Sitting on a futon, she pushed back covers, and stood on the tatami mats of rushes that lined the floor of the room. Light emanated through the paper screens that were the walls, illuminating the black silhouettes of both crane and willow tree.

As bright and light as the day had been, it seemed that the night in this place was equally dark. Only her soft footfalls echoed in the silence, and none of the bustling of a home was heard there. Into this hanging silence, a song began to rise, lilting and with rhythm, breathing like the wind on the grass. So Ami followed this sound, and slipping in through the cracked shoji door, found a small lamp lit in a nearly empty room. Kami sat at a koto, her fingers wearing picks, and plucking the instrument, summoning the tune and chant that Ami did not know.

Her robe was dark, except for a bright whiteness against her pale skin, and the single lamp flame cast dying suns of shadow into the crevices of the room, creating deep hollows in the contours of Kami's face.

"You play beautifully," Ami told her when the strings stilled.

Kami hesitated, hand on the strands of silk. "I've been playing since I was very little. Someday, I wish to play above the clouds."

Above the clouds?

"Do you play koto, Kanashimi-chan?"

"No, gomen ne."

Ami, feeling odd standing while Kami remained kneeling at the koto, came and sat down across from her, arranging her uniform's skirt to settle around her knees.

"A pity. Here, only father can play. There are only the servants, otherwise. It would be nice, to have people around."

"Where is your father, since he can't join you playing?"

Kami shook her head. "He is here. But father is ill. That's why we moved from Miyako. The priests believed that the air is better here, and the sickness will leave him."

Judging by Kami's sad face and eyes that lingered on her koto, Ami judged that she disagreed with the priest's decree. "You don't think so?"

"I don't know medicine," Kami demurred, lashes lowered. "How can I know what priests do not? They intervene with the gods."

There was really nothing Ami could say to her about such a thing. If this was a dream, then it would make no difference. If real in some sense, then how could she intervene and change the course of this girl's destiny? The images here were of the past...one from a future time may not alter the course of history, though those in the past may ever alter the future.

"Kami...-chan, what is 'above the clouds'?"

Kami laughed, and there was a stir of wind, accompanied by a ringing wind bell, a furin, outside Kami's door. "Kanashimi-chan! Shame on you! I speak of the emperor's court, where the shining ones dwell! They live above the clouds, above all this." She gestured at the tatami mats, the koto, the shoji and the screens, the flickering lamp. "Father has been to court, and he told me how they look and dress! He even brought me a copy of 'Genji Monogatari', that everyone now reads. I wonder if all the men are so dashing there." She looked shyly at her koto, and covered her face with her sleeve. "So sorry. I fear I will grow to be an old maid. I want to care for father, yet...I still dream of court. It is said that those who are gifted in poetry and song may succeed there, and help them to gain favor in the eyes of the emperor. Would that not be grand? To sit at court?"

"That's why you practice your music and writing, isn't it? Hoping to go to the court?"

"Oh, yes. But..." she looked sad. "I should not say it, for fear of ill-wishing. But I mean no harm by it. I mean to stay with father only until he passes into the land of Amida Buddha. Then..." her eyes became full of dreams and hope as she spoke. "my father's sister...I will go live with her, at her house in Miyako, and hope to enter through good connections." She blushed in the shadows, and hid her face in her sleeve again. "But I have high dreams. I know they may not ever become real, yet I still have them. Is that not what is most important?"

Images of her own nightmares filled Ami's mind; she remembered when she had been forced to face them in her own home, when lemures sent by the Dead Moon had invaded, trying to steal her dreams.

And is that not what I am fighting again, right now? Only this time, the nightmares are created by my own mind, not by some outside force. And maybe that makes them all the more viscous.

Kami was watching her expectantly out of her pale purple eyes, and Ami was aware that she had a confused look on her face. She wished she could hide her face behind her sleeve the way Kami had, but knew she could only lift her hand to her mouth in a blush as she usually did, her habit. Startled to touch cloth, silken cloth, Ami stared.

"You dressed much more nicely this night, Kanashimi-chan," Kami commented, tilting her head like an uncertain bird.

Blinking, she held her hands out before her, and found they were covered in long sleeves, cuffed at the ends, much like Kami's. Light blue, so very light it was nearly white, slipped over increasingly deepening layers of darkness, merging to a indigo so deep it was like the darkest depths of the ocean.

"What do you call your style?"

"Nani?" Ami was bewildered. "My style?"

"Yes, your dress. This is my nightwear, but when we went to the river, I wore my mother's Chrysanthemum Rain. She made the pattern long ago, and I changed it a little, for better style today."

"I don't know what to call it."

Kami took this very seriously, tapping her finger to her chin. "Well, then we must name it! Ah, Kanashimi-chan, it is water, surely! You must call it Whitewater! Yes, I like it. Whitewater. It suits you. Oh..." she paused. "Unless you don't like it. Of course you don't have to call it...."

Ami laughed lightly, waving a hand to stop her. "No, no, Whitewater is fine, and Chrysanthemum Rain was lovely."

"Ah. Arigatou." Kami seemed very pleased. She began to idly touch the silk strings. "It grows so late. I am glad you came to visit. Ah! Kanashimi-chan! I have an idea! Come look!"

Gathering her robes up around her, Kami scrambled in her very unladylike yet still strangely graceful way. Ami clambered after her, used to chasing down Usagi or the others. Kami had rolled open the shoji, and was looking out over her yard, which was filled with fireflies.

"They like the trees just before the wood to dance, and marshes, since there is water. But see how they come dance here? Is it not pretty?"

If the darkness within the house was illuminated only by the lamp, the outdoors were lit only by fireflies, wheeling and spinning as they fluttered around the open courtyard.

"Very," Ami murmured as the yellow pinpoints blinked on and off.

"Kanashimi-chan?" Kami gasped.

"Kami-chan? Kami-chan!" Ami tried to reach for her hand, but suddenly there were fireflies streaming at them, sending their lights dancing and rolling around them as she tried to push her way through the blinding swarm. "Kami-chan!"

I have to help her! Henshin! Henshin yo!

"Mercury Crystal Power! Make...."

It was as though she drowned, and she fought with the tide of dreams, trying to swim her way through the moment, to stretch back to the instant she was torn away, to hold on. Too late, her fingers faded through the air, and the dancing flames washed over her vision, taking her back to her world, to gasp up out of the dream, sending her book in a slide to the floor.

I know this is no natural dream. Kami does not mean to hurt me. It's something else. Something sad and dark. Next time, next time I go back, and I have to go back, next time, I'll go back, and I'll ask her what is haunting her. Rei-chan. Rei-chan knows how to banish evil spirits. Something is hanging on Kami, and I will free her of it. I don't know how or why I am the one to do it, but maybe, just maybe, if I can, I can prove to myself that I am worthy to be the Soldier of Water.

Well, that ends chapter one…hope you're enjoying so far…so, don't forget to review! Reviews are good! Fic authors slave away for a good tale, and the don't hear reviews? That's so depressing! And this fic is depressing enough.

Ja ne!

-Queen