Title: Overture
Author: Amarylis Cemetery
Rating: PG13
Disclaimer: All Sailormoon characters belong to Takeuchi Naoko and Toei, etc.; this piece of fan-written fiction intends no infringement on any copyrights.
Fandom: Bishoujo Senshi Sailormoon
Pairing(s): Usagi/Mamoru
Word count: 2274
Feedback: Would be lovely. But I'm not going to hunt you down if you don't.
Summary: (AU, U/M) Aware of her status but not of her past, Usagi struggles against the Dark Kingdom, unwilling to allow the senshi into her heart. Will she succeed on her own, or will she be forced to accept their help - and their friendship?
Notes: Beta-ed by Nell. The book referenced in the story is The Illustrated Guide to Crystals by Judy Hall. Usagi's apparent aversion to all things metaphysical does not reflect on me, so please don't get angry at me for it. It just fit with her, you know? So, uh. Yeah. Anyway, the first section of this was a lot of fun to write. : D I liked it very much. Hee.

Chapter Seven:
Stagnancy

Usagi moved through the following week on automatic. Her days were filled with Ami, Luna, school, and the arcade, when she acted like any normal girl would. Her nights were filled with relentless searching, battles, and aching wounds, when she let loose her anger. No matter what she did, she could not find the elusive 'Fire General,' nor could she find anything on the Silver Crystal, whatever that was.

Her hands clenched around the handle of her school bag. Frustrated with her slow progress, she felt like throwing it down an alley somewhere, but dutifully refrained. Absolutely nothing had turned up, and it was, quite frankly, driving her mad. Although sorely tempted to throw a temper tantrum, Usagi composed herself as she tried to pay attention to Ami, who walked by her side.

"Usagi, are you okay?"

She flinched, knowing she'd been caught. Usagi kept her eyes lowered as she laughed off Ami's concern. "Yeah, I'm fine. Just a bit tired." She did, however, manage to give her friend a dazzling smile.

Ami eyed her unbelievingly, frowning. "If you say so."

Usagi's hands tightened ever so slightly. She hesitantly started, "I think... I think I'm going to go home now. I need to finish my school work and maybe take a nap. Since I'm tired and everything." She felt inexplicably guilty about abandoning Ami like this when they were supposed to spend time together, but Usagi really wanted to read through the books she'd gotten on stones. "Maybe we could go some other time?" she added hopefully.

"All right," said Ami, and though Usagi wouldn't look her in the face, she definitely sounded disappointed.

"Well, in that case," Usagi continued brightly, "I expect to get a call from you soon, Ami. I'll see you later, okay?"

Ami consented, bidding Usagi goodbye. She waved as the blonde turned a corner to head home.

She briskly returned home, her face set with determination. She had to find out what it was the man had been after. Of course, she could've tried to ask Luna as Sailormoon, but she assumed that Luna would expect her to know already, as she was the 'Princess' guardian.' It was something important, though; she knew that instinctively. But what its significance was remained unknown. It was times like these that Usagi wished she could contact the Queen.

As she turned the final corner to her home and the sun was nearly set, her ears caught the faint sound of footsteps behind her. Normally, she wouldn't find it strange, but she'd been on edge for days - not to mention the fact that the rest of the area was completely deserted. Tensing, she sped up, and cringed as the footsteps quickened.

Breaking out into a full run, she ducked between two of the houses, behind the trash, and peeked out. The footsteps slowed, then stopped. Usagi held her breath. Someone was murmuring to himself quietly, but still out of her view. She cursed inwardly and made her way to the opening of the narrow passage.

Unfortunately, true to form, Usagi stumbled on the edge of something (which she later realized was a cardboard box that was sticking out too far) and, though she didn't fall, alerted her pursuer.

"Shit," she hissed softly, pressing her body against the building wall so she almost thought she was a pancake. A small part of her was kicking herself for swearing.

To say that she was surprised when she saw Mamoru's face peer down the alley was an understatement.

Rage boiled in her chest, angry that she'd thought he was the Fire General come to track her down and kill her. More than that, though, she was embarrassed that she'd overreacted so much, but she blamed it on the Queen's training. Still, her fists clenched and she swung her bag at his head, barely missing.

"What do you think you're doing?" she cried, trembling with fury. "Why are you following me? Are you a stalker or something?"

Mamoru, still ducking from her attempt to injure him, glared. "I was making sure you got home okay!"

"Oh, please," Usagi scoffed. "I don't need a babysitter. I can handle myself. You have no right to protect me or whatever it is you're trying to do! It's creepy!" She was painfully reminded of her own stalker tendancy (at least, concerning him), but roughly pushed the thought to the back of her mind. This was getting just a little insane.

He backed away from her. "I just wanted for you to get home safely." He glanced down at the bag she still clutched tightly in her hand. "Though, apparently, you have an idea of how to fend people off." The amusement in his voice only further fueled her anger.

"What, you think this is funny?" she hissed into his face, drawing herself up to her full height and advancing on him. "I should get a restraining order, or something! You can leave me alone now, you - you creepy, stalking pain in the neck! I don't need your help, and I certainly don't want it!"

There was some emotion that flashed across his face briefly, before it went blank. Usagi felt a little guilty as she realized she'd hurt him somehow, but the shame and indignity still colored her mind, too angry to really feel sorry yet.

Huffing, she turned away and headed home, unable to say another word to him. I don't need someone to watch over me, she grumbled in her mind. The whole guardian thing is wearing on my nerves! First Luna, now Mamoru. What's next - Ami's going to realize who I am and not let me out of her sight? She seethed, pride wounded. Why doesn't anyone get that I can protect myself?

Ignoring the soft, trailing steps behind her, Usagi stalked up to her house and slammed the door behind her.

It wasn't too long until Usagi left her home again. She excused herself from dinner by telling her mother that she needed to do studying at the library, quickly changed out of her school uniform, and gathered her notes from previous visits. With a quick farewell, she started off towards the nearest library, the bag with her supplies slung over her shoulder.

When she arrived, she nodded to the woman at the counter and made her way towards the back of the building. After setting her bag done, Usagi wandered down one of the aisles, stopping about midway, then glanced over the book titles. Finding one she hadn't seen before, she picked the book out of the row, swiftly putting the book's neighbors in her mind so she could return it to the same spot.

She flipped through the book as she walked back to her table, frowning as she scanned some of the pages. She sat down with a thump on her seat and scowled. The book was mostly metaphysical stuff - though, a lot of the other books had been, as well. Still, she kept flipping the pages, rolling her eyes at the 'Crystal Love' section.

Soulmate stone? She snickered in her mind. Her eyes glanced over the pink stone (named kunzite) and both jade stones (jadeite and nephrite, respectively), before she moved onto the next page. Stopping momentarily to marvel at the picture of an amethyst geode, she once again turned the page. Usagi raised a disbelieving eyebrow at the healing stones pages, before shaking her head and concentrated on looking for the phrase, 'Silver Illusionary Crystal.' She did have to admit, though, that the rose quartz and selenite was rather pretty. Usagi wasn't very fond of the golden beryl, however.

As her eyes landed on the divination section, Usagi gave up, flipping to the back of the book in hopes of an index. She breathed a sigh of relief when she found it, and instead looked through there. She skipped the brown stones completely, knowing that it was a silver crystal she was looking for. To her disappointment, there was nothing even remotely close in the white or clear stones, and dejectedly looked through the rest of the book.

Sighing, Usagi stood and returned the book to its former place. That was no help, she thought to herself, mildly depressed. That's the, what, seventh book I've looked through? There aren't many left. With a sigh, she resolved herself to the idea of having to go look in the bookstores for something appropriate.

By the time her watch signalled ten, Usagi had looked through two more books (both of which were fairly thick), with no success. She slammed the cover of her last book shut, teeth clenched in aggravation. Without even bothering to put the book back, she grabbed her bag and stormed out, ignoring the tired woman at the front desk. She then ducked into an alleyway and transformed into Sailormoon without skipping a beat.

Sailormoon shoved the bag in the holding place she kept her weaponry (which currently only consisted of the crescent wand, so there was a lot of space left) and hopped up ledges to reach the roof of the library. She bounced off of the roof and landed on another, glancing down into the spaces between for unusual activity.

A part of her was glad it was a Saturday night, as she headed into the more populated areas of the city. Not only did she not have school the next day, but she would be able to stay out later without alerting her parents. That, and she'd be able to sleep in a little the next day before returning to the library.

Another part of her was annoyed, she decided, as her eyes caught the scene of two people groping each other in a dark alley. More people were out now, and she nearly sighed as she remembered that Saturday nights were always heavy with youma activity. Not that there was much she could do about it except fight back, Sailormoon acknowledged, lips twisted into a semblance of a grin.

Suddenly, her bun covers shook, the screams of another victim reaching her ears. With a sigh, she tapped the edge of her mask and sped off to destroy the youma.

Tiredly, Sailormoon leaned against the tree behind her, panting as the last of the dust faded away. The girl who'd been attacked had run off the moment she was able to, so Sailormoon didn't have to worry about her, at least. But she didn't really care about that right now, almost too exhausted to think straight.

She took off the mask and rubbed at her eyes, trying to tear up a little to soothe the hot dryness away. Unsuccessful, she replaced the white mask over her face and fought to keep her eyes open. She rubbed her cheeks and pushed herself off of the tree, deciding that this would be a good time to return home. And sleep, she thought vaguely. Sleep would be good.

Laughter filled her ears. Sailormoon tensed. A dark, malicious intent was laced in the sound. God, I don't have the energy for this. Dammit. Annoyance bubbled up in her chest, fueling her if only slightly.

"You should never let your guard down," a voice chided after the laughter ended.

Sailormoon scowled, recognizing the voice as belonging to the so-called Fire General. "Oh, please," she said, scoffing. "You purposefully waited until I was too tired to fight back. It has nothing to do with my guard being down." She could see his silhouette down the path, probably a good five hundred feet away from her.

"You're smarter than you look," he admitted. "But no matter. You won't be able to get away this time."

"This time?" Sailormoon laughed derisively. "I've never run from your minions. I've always won, and you know it."

"Attack." His voice trembled with anger (and most likely shame), causing youma seeming to materialize from nowhere.

Sailormoon cursed, retreating into the shadows as the monsters made their advance. She backed into something hard and stiffened, jumping away quickly as claws aimed for her head. Swearing, she ran down the path, too spent to fight back. As protection, she removed her tiara, letting it form the donut-like frisbee. She held it like a circular dagger, ready to attack hand-to-hand but without the energy to throw it.

She hadn't gotten far before a youma made a swipe at her. She bit her lip as the sharp claws just scraped through her armor and into her back, throwing herself to the side. As she rolled to a stop, she jumped back onto her feet.

Unfortunately, she was a little too slow, and another youma threw a dark ball of energy at her. She nearly screamed as the dark lightning laced through her body and fell to the ground when it wore off. She raised her eyes from the ground to see no less than four youma advancing on her again, and she ducked behind the closest shrubbery.

Oh, god. She screwed her eyes shut, hand gripping the tiara so tight that it cut through her gloves to dig into her skin. Someone, I need help. I need help! Sailormoon cursed herself as she realized she'd left the communicator in her school briefcase, which was currently in her room at home. Somebody, help me, she pleaded, feeling the energy drain from her in the few seconds that she had left. The youma would attack any second now, and -

A gurgled, unearthly sound came from behind. Surprised, she turned to peer out of the spaces between the leaves.

There was a man in a top hat and cloak fending off the youma.

And winning.