A bit of an alternate version of the conversation in episode 74: Defeat Rubeus! The Battle in Space. You know that one where Usagi turns herself over to Rubeus like a badass? That episode always gives me big Usamamo feelings even though they barely speak in it, and I needed a version where he was the one talking to her instead of Artemis and Luna.
"Do you question me as an honest man should do, for my simple true judgment? Or would you have me speak after my custom, as being a professed tyrant to their sex? "
- Much Ado About Nothing, William Shakespeare
He only meant to comfort her.
He has tried not to confuse her since the breakup, tried to keep his hands to himself, and aside from the one time she nearly died, he's been mostly successful, much to his own misery. When he saw her there standing on the balcony, though, shoulders hunched and shaking, he couldn't help himself. He knew he shouldn't, but the guttural cry that had torn through her earlier had torn through him, too.
"Usa?"
It is not Usako, but it is not Usagi, either. She always winces when he calls her Usagi, and he has to admit it feels strange on his tongue. He has never called her that.
It seems to work, because she doesn't jerk away from him like she had half an hour earlier. Instead, she leans into his touch, and he's reminded why he doesn't do this. It would be so, so easy just to pull her into his arms, take some of the pain away. He could put an end to at least some of both their heartache, right now, if he wanted to. When she turns to him and he can see the shine of tears on her cheeks, he almost does. He is so, so tired of seeing her hurt.
"I can't do this," she says quietly.
"I'm not sure I know of anything you can't do."
Her answering look says liar. She holds it for a long minute, wary of him, and then turns her head back to the Tokyo nightscape.
"I can't keep losing everyone again and again," she says. "It's too much."
Her shoulders droop, but she doesn't start to cry again. Instead, she fixes her eyes on the full moon, high in the sky.
"I have to save them," she says. Her mouth is set in a hard line, her brow furrowed.
"We will."
"I won't let it happen again."
"I know you won't."
For a moment she looks at him with such a soft look of adoration that he can't bear it. He doesn't deserve that look. There is so much strength in those little hands she'll reach for her friends and save the whole world instead. All he's done is say the quiet part out loud.
Then, a look of shame crosses her face - she looks down and packs the expression away, brushing some imaginary dust from her skirt. He opens his mouth to say something, and she winces a little, as though she's waiting for him to scold her for letting him see, just for a moment, that she loves him.
Oh, Usako.
"Usa-"
"Please don't," she cuts in. Her voice is shaking. "There's...there's so much happening. I can't hear how much you don't love me anymore. Please."
".. I wasn't, Usa. I didn't come out here to hurt you."
"Then why did you? I thought...I thought -"
She slams her eyes closed, pressing her lips tightly together. "I thought you'd be mad at me, because I yelled at Chibi-usa."
He takes a deep breath, turns around and closes the sliding door behind him to stall for time to think of what to say. He isn't...angry with her. He knows why it happened. He knows that Chibi-usa appeared and then he left her, he knows that her friends went to save Chibi-usa and she lost them too. He's seen the anguish building up in her for weeks, with each time she tries to reach out to him and fails, and he uses spending time with Chibi-usa as an easy alternative to saying something harsh to her again.
It's really just as much his fault as it is hers.
"I don't think you should have," he says carefully, and she flinches. "But I understand why you did."
Her expression becomes unreadable then, and he watches as her fists ball at her side. She stares at the spot in the sky where the UFO disappeared, eyes hardening, and draws a wet breath.
"I almost...I almost feel like turning over the ginzuishou and Chibiusa just to get them back. If she...if she hadn't come here...this place would have stayed peaceful. We were finally living normal lives, just like - But no, she had to fall out of the sky and take everything!"
The last word is ragged and thick, and her voice breaks on it. A few more tears slide hot down her face, and her knuckles are white where they've come up to grip his balcony railing. She's squeezing it so hard it has to hurt.
The worst part, though, is the bitter edge to her voice. Through more than one lifetime she's always been an infinite well of hope, that mythical thing that he sometimes only believes in because of her. The well seems dried up now, and it makes his insides feel hollow.
"You don't mean that."
"Of course I don't!" she cries, wheeling around to face him.
"She's so little and she needs me and of course I'm not going to do anything that would hurt her. I know she hates me. I even understand why. She came all the way here to ask for my help and I'm just...not strong enough. I'm not the hero she thought I was. I lost all of them. But that isn't her fault. It's mine."
"Usa-"
"I failed as a guardian, as a friend, as a princess. Somehow I failed the person I love the most so badly that I -"
Usako dissolves before she can finish the sentence, and that is the end of his ability to not hold her. He doesn't remember reaching for her, but the next thing he's aware of is Usagi sobbing against his chest. He rubs her back automatically, presses a kiss to the top of her head without even thinking.
"I'm sorry, Mamo-chan," she gasps. "I'm so sorry. Whatever I did I never...I never meant to. I love you. I would never hurt you on purpose."
I love you. I would never hurt you on purpose.
He has to slam his eyes shut and swallow down the cry of grief that nearly tears itself from his throat. After a moment, when he's sure he can talk again without giving himself away, he opens his eyes to her wide, sorrowful ones.
"Usa, you didn't...you didn't do anything."
"I must have."
"You didn't," he sighs, running a hand through his hair, looking off into the night instead of at her, because every nerve in his body is screaming out to just tell her. It's a stupid, selfish thing to even think of, because she doesn't have time to be distracted by him. The girls' lives depend on it.
"You didn't fail," he says quietly instead, letting his arms fall away from her. She doesn't move away. "You are so astonishingly powerful that a little girl from the future traveled through time to ask for your help. Do you understand what that says about you?"
"But-"
"No. No buts. Just because ...some bad people with access to monsters and a shitty... ex boyfriend have breathtakingly bad timing doesn't mean you're a failure. You're the most powerful woman on the planet. Maybe in the universe. If you decide you're getting your friends back, then you will."
He knows it's a mixed message. I don't like weak girls is ringing in his ears and he knows it's ringing in Usa's, too, by the way she's begun to look at him like he's a puzzle she can't quite figure out. He's given something important away that's going to make everything more difficult later.
That, he decides, is future Mamoru's problem.
"Usako," he begins, carefully, deliberately. "All you need to know right now is that I believe in you, and nothing that has happened means I don't care."
"...Mamo-chan?"
For a minute the words hang between them. He lets himself live in the way her breath catches and her fingers curl into his shirt, in the way her eyes drop to his lips and his stomach twists with want. This could be the moment, if he let it. This could be the instant his willpower collapses, and he falls back into the arms of his princess to beg forgiveness against her lips.
It could be, but it isn't.
Instead, as gently as he can, he takes a step back from her.
"You should get some rest. I'll talk with Luna and Artemis, see if we can come up with a plan."
Usako offers him a smile. It's a shadow of her usual one, but it still makes his heart feel a little lighter. They can do this. They're going to get the girls back, and then - then maybe...well. Maybe he can make this better than it has been, at the very least.
"I think...I'm gonna stay out here for a minute. If that's okay."
There is an odd look in her eyes. Later - just a few minutes later, in fact - he'd realize she already had a plan, but he was too distracted at the moment to notice. Instead, he nods, squeezes her shoulder, and turns to go back inside.
"Mamo-chan?"
He turns.
"You weren't a shitty boyfriend."
A huff of disdain escapes him.
"You weren't. Every...every second of it was my favorite thing in the world."
The soft look is back, and this time, he allows himself to return it. She's only had him, only ever him, in this life and the last. Literally anyone would be better. He's broken her heart again, and again, and again.
"You've never had anything else, Usa."
"Doesn't matter. It was perfect."
And despite what he says, she's right. It was.
Maybe, if he finds some answers, some day it can be again.
Have you ever stared at something so long that it started to lose meaning? I really hope this was worth reading, because I have lost all perspective on it. I really wanted to write some good old fashioned breakup arc angst in an episode that I could read a dozen fics about. Please let me know if you liked it! Loves to you all!