It was at a feast honoring the newlywed Prince and Princess that Kunzite found himself on a balcony with Minako's pale-haired friend. It was dark out and the feast was in the garden, under the stars and the full light of the moon, with candles and people coming and going beneath them, servants moving restlessly to keep the guests fed and happy.

Kunzite moved up next to the young man at the rail, a wine glass dangling precariously from his fingers as he leaned and looked over the party below.
"Nice night," the young man commented, sending him a furtive side glance.
Kunzite nodded and watched Minako laughing with Princess Jupiter, who seemed much more amiable than when Minako arrived. He was glad that they were accepting her back so quickly. Although. . . . He looked over at Princess Mars, who was standing silently by a tree with Jadeite and ignoring his fluttering about her. She was, instead, looking at Minako in a clandestine, uncertain way. He wondered what she knew about why Minako had left. She would not speak of it to anyone, and he only imagined that the other senshi knew because the Queen would have told them. She had drawn terribly into herself since her vision of Minako's misfortune, becoming quiet and pale. Jadeite, ever since the senshi and their Princess had come down several months ago, had been barraging her with his cheerful personality and an insane optimism that Kunzite believed he would never have developed but for the withdrawn princess' presence. He had seen, in his previous brooding observations, small, appreciative smiles that the princess spared Jadeite – and had noted the way his friend's eyes lit with elation at each small, positive reinforcement of his efforts. It was an ambiguous courtship, but Kunzite had seen the dark princess' smiles becoming more and more frequent – and more and more affectionate.
He looked at the Princess Mercury, who was talking to Princess Serenity, holding her hands earnestly. From Zoicite's tall, proud posture behind her, Kunzite knew something was up. He narrowed his eyes as Serenity paused in astonishment and then threw herself on her Senshi of Water and Wisdom. He couldn't help smirking as Serenity announced something to the people surrounding them and a mass of laughing party-goers converged on the couple.
"Wonder what that's about," the young man commented, not two feet away from Kunzite.
Kunzite turned lazily to look at Minako's friend through narrowed, unfriendly eyes. The young man looked away quickly and Kunzite dropped the glare. "They're getting married, I'd imagine, from the reactions." He saw Minako give Ami a careful hug and took a sip of his dwindling wine. "I can't say I'm surprised. They were the second couple made out of our lot." The wine must have been loosening his tongue, because he suddenly felt a wave of affability towards this young man. "See that couple by the tree? Princess Mars and that General? I'm not sure they know it yet, but they are quite a pair. The third pair is that brown-haired couple: Princess Jupiter and my friend Nephrite."
There was silence for a moment as Jezibiah picked the couples out. "What about Venus?" His voice was soft and casual, but there was an important underlying question.
Kunzite looked down at the bundle of gold now sitting by one of the banquet tables with Nephrite and Jupiter, round and beautiful with his child. "She left," he replied simply.
"In town, once, the younger girls were bothering her about men and she told them that there had been one, but she wouldn't say any more. I remember though – the look in her eyes was hard to forget." He paused and added quietly, "That was the day I realized I didn't have a chance with her."
Kunzite snorted bitterly. "No one has a chance with her. She's bad luck."
"Someone did," Jezibiah bit out abruptly. "Someone had her and I'd like to skin him alive for what he did to her. Leaving her like that."
Kunzite stared at him. "What?" It was all he could manage.
Jezibiah looked back at him, righteous anger twisting his features. "She says the father is honorable, but I don't believe her. I don't think he's going to do anything about that baby – he hasn't so far, has he?"
Kunzite stared at the boy a little more, becoming annoyed, and then turned deliberately back to the view and shrugged. "Maybe he had good reason. And maybe," he spat out before Jezibiah could add anything else, "she left him."
Jezibiah shut his mouth with a snap and stood turning this over in his head for a minute. "We still don't know what happened," he said carefully.
"Exactly," Kunzite triumphed. "So we don't know who is to blame."
"I still don't think she would have done anything very bad."
Kunzite snorted. "You don't know her very well."
"I know her well enough," Jezibiah rounded on him. "You seem determined to make her into some monster, and you'd better stop!" It was a warning.
Kunzite allowed all of the bitterness and anger wash into his eyes as he stared down the presumptuous boy. "I was with her before any of them had even met," he pointed down to the party in the general direction of his friends. "And I think I know the leader of the Sailor Senshi a bit better than you do." He poured the remains of his wine negligently over the rail and stalked out, blinking a bit at the shrill cry from below.
"My dre-ess!!"
He refrained, admirably, from smiling, but had the decency of grimacing in the darkness of the hallway.
Jezibiah fell into step beside him after a moment, but Kunzite didn't stop him. "Are you the father?" he asked softly, tightly.
Kunzite didn't reply, but led Jezibiah into the deeper hallways of the palace. He stopped before a pair of bronze doors and turned on the younger man. "What kind of girl do you think Minako is?"
Jezibiah took it as a challenge. "A sweet girl. Kind and caring, full of life and joy and . . . and . . . sadness."
Kunzite stared at him until Jezibiah's gaze faltered, then turned and opened the doors. "Come."
Jezibiah looked up and followed him through into a great room, over to the side where Kunzite worked a few glittering controls, then turned to look at Jezibiah. "Yes, but only partly. Minako is a warrior and a leader. She has responsibilities and honor and pride – like me. And that's why I fell in love with her." He turned to face the center of the room and pressed his hand to the panel. An image flickered up in the center of the room and Jezibiah shrank closer to the wall and Kunzite. The room was filled with a great dark archway and figures were coming out of it, four of them. Something about the way they moved – the purpose and pride – frightened Jezibiah.
Four young women emerged from the darkness and paused, breaking apart in a smooth, practiced motion. Two went either way and the blonde in front held her sword high, face hard and eyes sharp as the fourth dropped slightly behind her, pulling down a blue visor. An unfelt wind ruffled their hair and the hem of the blonde's short skirt.
Then everything froze.
"The girl in front is Minako, Sailor Venus. Behind her is Princess Mercury. To the left is Jupiter and over there is Mars. The Inner Senshi, the Moon Princess' royal guards." When Jezibiah remained silent and stunned, Kunzite explained. "This room is a memory machine, built by the Plutonian royals for the Prince's recent marriage – as a present. This is my own memory of a fight by the senshi." He let it play and the setting changed – Minako shrank and Jezibiah was looking out over the center of a dirt-packed battle arena, royal flags and banners hung all around. A great ugly beast was in the center and it was slightly misty, as if a dissipating fog. He saw a line of fire flash through, closely followed by a blast of electricity and blurs of red and green. A wind blew the last fragments of mist away and he saw a glowing yellow line wrap around the creature's hand and the girl on the other end tugged. More electricity and suddenly the beast grew in the room and he could see Sailor Venus running, leaping at the thing's back, and saw in horror that it turned as she reached it and spat something at her. . . . and that she kept going, skewering it, and as it fell, her face was melting. . . .
The scene changed, but it was a still-life. A room with a mahogany bed, windows open and curtains billowing slightly in a breeze. A man with platinum hair lay on the bed, unconscious, and the Princess of Mars was crumpled into herself on the side of the bed, being comforted by the Moon Queen herself. There was blood on the butter-yellow covers.
"Minako's room, when she ran away. Mars saw what had happened, but none of us were told. That man," his voice tightened and Jezibiah looked at Artemis, "was her guardian and most trusted friend. I don't know what he did, but it was hard for me not to kill him when I saw him at the wedding." He switched the machine off and turned to Jezibiah, but didn't look at him. "At that festival, when I woke up and she was gone, I felt like a fool. I had talked about . . . love and," he gave a wild half-laugh, "marriage . . . as if she would agree with me." His gaze, again impassive, met Jezibiah's. "I guess she wasn't over what that bastard did to her, because she ran away from me. I never thought she would run away from me, because I loved her. . . . and I had thought that she loved me. But."
They stood there together and didn't look at each other for a long, long while.
Kunzite finally moved toward the door. "That is who the Princess of Venus is, make no mistake."
For a brief moment, Jezibiah's mind threw up an image of Minako wrestling a boar to the ground and snapping it's neck, but he just as quickly denied it, sweeping it from his thoughts as promptly and irrevocably as he would flick a bug from his sleeve. He shook his head, once, as if to clear it, and was certain in his decided stand. "You're a liar and a rapist." He was trembling with righteous fury. "And you better shut up before I have to make you."
Kunzite looked at him and blinked, strangely disappointed. He had been hoping . . . what? That this man would be sympathetic? Understanding? That he could make a friend?
Stupid. Stupid, dumb, insane. Anger and hurt boiled in his stomach, mixing and making him sick. He'd just put his heart out, his pain, and had it spat upon.
When would he learn not to trust people?
Kunzite turned without speaking and strode out, down the hall and out of the castle, heading away from the party. He didn't know where he was going, exactly – just that he wanted to get away from people for awhile. And so he strode, tense, into the dark, holding tight to a strip of red cloth in his pocket, as if it would somehow save him.