Sailor Moon Reflections 09 : Chibi Moon

She's at the arcade, watching her mother stuff her face. It's comical really, the sight of her mother, a short blonde with almost impossible hair, cramming more ice cream into her mouth than should be humanly possible. Yet there is something oddly comforting about it, something strangely normal.

She sighs.

The others are there too, and they're all sitting at the same table. Beside her, quiet as usual, but comforting nonetheless, sits her best friend. She's lavender and violet, and gentle, sombre eyes. She might not speak much, but her silence says a lot. It asks her why her smile never reaches her eyes, or the corners of her lips.

She never says a word back. Her own silence, well, it says enough.

She laughs half-heartedly at some, off the cuff joke, but her smile, for once is real. It is nice, she thinks, that they are friends. Not guardians, princesses or soldiers. Just friends, real friends, the kind she's always wanted, the kind she'll always want. The kind she never has back home.

The conversation drifts, rolling along in a gentle mist of words and looks, traded over cups of coffee or glasses of soft drink. Eventually it turns to the future and she cringes. They all look to her, smiling, asking her if she could tell them just a little bit about the future. Not enough to change it, of course, but just enough to let them know.

Only two them don't ask, one because she knows, and the other because she doesn't want to know. Violet and crimson, burned into her soul.

Should she tell them, she wonders, how it all ends up?

Should she tell the priestess that her love is pointless? That a thousand years from now her mother and her father will still be in love, and she, the priestess will never be more than a friend. That one day that fire inside of her will die, leaving only the ashes of regret, and smouldering sorrow as darkly beautiful as an obsidian star.

She looks out the window.

It is raining softly, little more than a drizzle to be honest. She spots a pair of emerald eyes looking past the window, past the buildings and the people, and to the clouds beyond. She can see the thunder in those eyes, the strength.

Which is why she'll never say a word about the storm that she screamed into being, a storm that threatened to tear down the very parapets of Crystal Tokyo. A thousand years of training will be enough to master the ebb and flow of nature, to bend the warp and weft of seasons to her will. But it will not be enough to overcome death. Instead she will remain forever young, a spring blossom, chained to youth as her love passes slowly but surely from autumn to winter, his life fading away, a rose no longer in bloom.

She shivers.

It is cool inside the arcade, almost cold, a result of a number of factors, the storm, the broken air conditioning, the fact that it is winter. Across from her, a blue haired girl sits. She isn't shivering, she doesn't even look cold instead her cheeks are flushed, warm.

But that warmth won't last forever. Little by little the warmth will leave her, stolen bit by bit by countless small sorrows until only the ice, the frost of winter remains. And then, when the flush in her cheeks is only a memory, when she can't even remember the last time she smiled, only logic, cold and cruel will remain.

But perhaps, perhaps that is better than the fate of the girl beside her. How do you tell someone that the only person they've ever loved, will ever love, is dead, and they won't ever be coming back? How do you explain to someone that in saving a world, they've consigned their heart to an eternity of loneliness? How do you tell the senshi of love that she'll never find it for herself?

"You seem troubled today."

For a moment, just as she meets her friend's crimson eyes, she is lost, drifting in a sea of probability, drowning in an ocean of a thousand alternate destinies. The moment passes.

"You know why," she whispers back.

Her friend just smiles back, but the smile is a sad one. "Yes," she replies. "I know."

But does, she wonders, does she really know? Because if she did, how can she stand it, how can she bear it? How can she see her future, a thousand shifting centuries of duty, and still remain sane?

She smiles, closes her eyes.

The others are chatting now, discussing the future but in more mundane terms. They are talking about children, about how many they want, about what they'll name them, and much to her mother's embarrassment, and to her chagrin, when they'll be having them.

She imagines.

She imagines a face. A face with elegant features, and eyes the colour of cobalt, framed with aqua hair. The face belongs to a child who will never be, to a dream, which a thousand years of technology and magic can never make real.

Her best friend laughs.

It is the most beautiful sound she's ever heard, and one she's never heard in the future. In the future, her best friend never speaks, never says a word. Silence alone accompanies her, ominous and deadly. A thousand years of misunderstanding and distrust have done what no enemy ever could, and given birth to the Destroyer.

And then she hears her mother's voice. She opens one eye and smiles. One day her mother will be a queen. She will stand, tall and elegant, perfect in her cool, austere beauty, revered for her wisdom, worshipped the world over as fount of peace and love. But for now, just for now she is something else entirely. She is a gangly teenager with a mouth full of ice cream and chocolate topping smeared around her lips. She is clumsy and she is klutzy and she is a billion other things that a queen should never be. She is perfect just the way she is.

"Hey, squirt, what are you thinking about?"

"Just thinking," she says, smiling a small smile, a real, genuine smile. "About how perfect everything is right now."

Author's Note

Yay! I've managed to churn another one of these things out. First things first, let me just say that Chibi-Moon is not my favourite character. The little spore ( to use the dubbed term ) tends to pop up whenever they have a plot hole to fix or need an enemy to fight. Be that as it may though, she is interesting. I've always wondered if Crystal Tokyo is so perfect, why she keeps coming back. I don't buy into the whole "to train" thing for even a second. No, I think she comes back for another reason, and this is my stab at that reason. As for Chibi-Usa / Hotarua… I don't think there's any of that in here, but if there is, well, I'll leave it up to you guys to decide, though I tend to lean against that ( mainly cause Saturn is like a billion times cooler than Chibi-Moon ).

As always, let me say, I live off feedback. So, drop me a line, tell me if you think it was good, bad, whatever, just say something ;;.

To All Reviewers : Thanks heaps for you continued support. You'll be happy to know that the hand is feeling a lot better than it was, and it was a lot easier typing this than it was typing the earlier part. As for doing one on Mamoru… let me think about it.