Chapter 4: Tokyo Park
Usagi licked the top of her 'double fudge brownie with vanilla' ice cream cone as her other friends ordered what they wanted. Her thoughts wandered off to the battle that they had just ended. 'I wonder if anyone else noticed the black mark on her forehead. Hmm. Even if I was imagining things I'm going to tell Luna about it when I see her. It was really freaky.' She quietly laughed as she remembered how relieved Mirage looked when she discovered Matt to be fine. 'Man those two are a match made in heaven. I hope they get together. They would be so cute!!' She looked up from her halfway gone cone as Rei walked up with a small banana split. Usagi smiled at her best friend as the girl took a seat on the grass beside her. "You know Rei. I was thinking. Or more like wondering. Did anyone else see something really weird when we were fighting today?" Rei shrugged and stuck her spoon into her dish. "I dunno. This may sound really lame but I thought I saw a mark on Mirage's forehead. I plan on asking Phoebes and Dimoes when I get home tonight." Usagi jumped up and almost spilled her ice cream on the front of her blue blazer. "That's exactly what I meant. So you saw it too!! Why didn't you say anything?" Rei bit down on a piece of banana and swallowed it quickly. "Cause, Usa-chan. What if we saw something else? What if it wasn't a symbol?" Usagi shrugged in agitation. For once she was doing the most part of the thinking. That was starting to happen a lot more. Her grades were going up too. It was just weird. "What if it was?" "What if what was?" Ami strided over to the girls holding a small vanilla ice cream cone. Rei shook her head and finished off the vanilla in her bowl as she moved on to the chocolate. "Nothing." Usagi growled at her friend in frustration. "I think I saw a mark on Mirage's forehead during our fight with that woman." Mina walked up and took a drink of her root beer float. "Maybe you did. Maybe you didn't. There is only one real way to find out." Makoto stuffed a candy into her mouth as she jogged over to the small group. "We shouldn't bring her into danger. What if we are wrong? She could end up getting hurt." Usagi tossed the remains of her ice cream into the garbage bin. "But what if we are right. Look lets do this. We will keep her around and invite her to do things with us. If something happens then maybe she will show us that sign again. If not oh well. Good company. I'll have Luna do some sort of research or whatever on her. Okay. That way we aren't running any huge risks." The group of girls nodded in agreement. As they continued to talk two familiar voices rang out from a short distance away. Mirage and Matt were both running at top speed to get up the top of the hill. Mirage was the first to the top. Her breathing was heavy and her white blouse was unbuttoned on the top, her hair was slightly disheveled and her face had a couple little dirt streaks across it. Matt's appearance wasn't too different. His golden hair was dirty and was no longer spiked in short barbs of hair, and his shirtsleeve was slightly torn, as were the pants he was wearing. But neither Mirage, nor Matt seemed to care what they looked like as they trekked towards the girls, with grins on their faces. Usagi and the girls jumped up in 'shock' as they saw their friends. Rei was the first of the girls to speak. "O My gosh!! What happened to you?!" Mirage smiled and brushed her bangs out of her face. "We ran into an evil lady and the Sailor Scouts saved us. I got to meet Sailor V!!!!! It was great." So the girls asked questions they already knew the answer to and Matt answered them all as Mirage lay down with her head on his knee and fell asleep.