Usagi was getting really tired of these curveballs today was dealing her.
She was already overwrought to begin with, having slept poorly thanks to her worrying over the girls, and even when she finally heard from Ami it did little to allay her fears. If anything, Ami's atypically curt "We're okay" over the communicator's text messaging system earlier this morning sounded purposefully evasive, and Luna still hadn't come home to assure Usagi otherwise before she was picked up by Mamoru for their next lesson.
That was when the first oddity occurred.
When she stepped out the door to greet Mamoru, she nearly fell plumb backwards onto the cold cement stairs. Not because she tripped, but because right there - in the middle of her normally blacker than night vision - was the merest pinprick of gold. There was no denying it... she was seeing a color. Usagi would have started rejoicing then and there, the pure and overwhelming hope so strong inside her, but something held her back... and she asked Mamoru, somehow maintaining a tenuous grip on composure, what clothes he was wearing. Because she was sure, so sure, she was looking right at the place where he was standing.
It was him. It had to be him.
But he had answered with a tone of bemusement that it was a light blue button up with black jeans and a matching undershirt, and Usagi had frowned, not a stitch about that attire screaming gold to her. And she knew for a fact Mamoru was not the jewelry touting type. So... what the hell was going on? What was she seeing?
Everywhere Mamoru moved, the little flicker moved as well. She'd tried not to stare too obviously; in fact she spent much of their beginning time together attempting to look anywhere but. Trying to distract herself with other thoughts; with the locket she'd tucked beneath the collar of her shirt when she'd woken up still so full of fear for her friends. But even the cool, normally calming metal against her skin just wasn't enough. In a world of darkness, the small bit of light leaking through naturally attracted attention. It finally got to the point during their impromptu game of hide and seek - there was no way Mamoru was going to convince her it was anything else - that Usagi started utilizing, without even realizing, that glint of gold in her attempts to track him. Not until he pointed out her uncanny ability to always find him, every time.
"You're noisy," she'd lied, with a shrug. Brain racing with wonder and confusion and triumph and concern. So many questions she couldn't even begin to ponder until she was finally away from his annoyingly observant eyes.
But the curveballs continued and the limelight remained, much to her consternation, its focus only shifting once she took her unexpected tumble and Mamoru saw the locket.
"What... where did you get that?" he demanded, the query far more accusing than necessary. As if doubting she could come to possess such nice jewelry. Usagi's hackles were immediately raised.
"Well I didn't steal it, if that's what you're implying!" she retorted, brows crinkling in an angry, obfuscated line straight across her forehead.
Mamoru seemed to be struggling wordlessly, Usagi sensed a quiet tension in the air, but his voice became that tightly controlled mask that concealed whatever his true emotions were. "I wasn't implying anything, I'm... just curious," he said, far too blandly. Usagi still felt like she were on trial for something, but with herculean effort - if he plays nice I'll play nice - she reigned in her temper. Maybe it was just the heat of the moment getting to them; the result of a long afternoon between two tired people. She still remembered that strange hiss he'd made when she bumped into him, like she accidentally brushed a sore spot, and she had definitely noticed from the get go that he seemed... off, today.
"It's mine. Well... I guess in a secondhand kinda way. I found it in the cemetery when..." Oh god. Look at her, mindlessly babbling, about to just casually tell Chiba freaking Mamoru about the time she fought a priest turned youma. Hurriedly rushing to cover her near-slip, Usagi mumbled, "My friend Naru-chan, she knew someone who passed away recently and she wanted to er, visit his grave. And I found the locket on the ground and we couldn't tell who it belonged to, so... I kept it."
"Oh," was all Mamoru said. Still sounding like Mr. Brick Wall. Usagi cocked her head at him, a sudden possibility striking her -
"Wait... do you know who this locket belongs to?"
Her heartbeat began to race against her will, and she tried to hide the potent combination of excitement and horror, that what if -
"Not at all," Mamoru responded smoothly. "I just thought... it's very unique looking. Pretty... on you."
Usagi wanted to shake her head at herself, the star shaped locket indeed a conversation piece that would give anyone pause. So stupid she ever would have thought even for a hair's breadth of a second that Mamoru would have known Tuxedo Kamen. It was preposterous. Her kind, chivalrous Tuxedo Kamen-sama would never associate with a jerk like Mamoru.
Though... a tiny little part of herself had to admit, it maybe wasn't fair to refer to him like that anymore. Mamoru wasn't anywhere near as much of a jerk as he used to be. Memories of his recent behavior filled her mind, the unwavering encouragements and the solicitous manner in which he would jump to her side, any and every time she fell.
She touched the locket reflectively, accepting his arm up.
He thought it was pretty on her...?
Usagi had his locket.
Usagi.
How. The hell.
Of all people...?
Mamoru fairly stalked through the lobby of Azabu Apartments, his head down and countenance stormy, signaling to all to clear a wide berth. His gait remained single-minded as he slid unseeingly into the elevator and punched the button for the topmost floor, one of the few perks he'd allowed himself upon turning eighteen and coming into his inheritance. Well, that and the Ferrari. But he refused to let his mind stray much beyond its current predicament -
Tsukino Usagi had his locket.
Surely fate had a twisted sense of humor. He loses it in battle only for it to reappear round the neck of the woman who, once upon a mere week and a half ago, was one of his least favorite people? C'mon.
He dearly wanted it back; it had great sentimental value to him. But there was really no plausible - no decent - way of going about that, short of stealing it away from the odangoed blonde in the dead of night. And there was no way he'd ever stoop so low. So... apparently it was hers, for now.
He grimaced onerously, and the grimace only grew when he exited into his hallway and spotted the newspaper tucked beneath his door, the front page headlines yelling in thick bold font 'Mayhem at Midnight! Monsters Strike Again'. He could also spy a grainy, zoomed in picture of himself just beneath that ridiculous caption, cane drawn and poised for action.
Oh, lovely. Paparazzi.
Mamoru bent over and snagged up the paper at the same time as he unlocked the door and slipped into the apartment, completely ready to chuck the offending item. He did so hate when the paparazzi and the reporters got involved; it was a danger not only to himself but them as well, and worse, those he cared about should he be followed and his identity go public. Motoki, Dr. Chiryoshi... strangely, an image of Usagi flitted through his mind right then as well, but Mamoru chased it with a closer look at the article. Underneath the main story was another smaller speculatory piece that caught his eye.
'Sailor Moon: MIA?' it read, then proceeded to explain in layman terms the happenings of the battle, and the mysterious absence of Tokyo's now legendary heroine.
MIA indeed. Mamoru would be lying if he said he wasn't worried about where Sailor Moon had gotten off to. There was a little unwelcome part of himself that spun worst case scenarios with dread... What if she was severely injured? Or captured by the Dark Kingdom? But no, her Senshi would've been far more desperate and broken up had their leader gone missing, and for all intents and purposes it had been a rather vanilla encounter with the three Sailors last night. He told himself he shouldn't buy into the newspaper's hysteria, fear-mongering was an exploitative favorite of theirs, and probably Sailor Moon was just recovering like he still was from that awful debacle downtown. She'd rejoin the fray soon enough.
The tiny, insistent niggle of doubt was why Mamoru left the newspaper on his coffee table, instead of in the garbage where he normally disposed of such drivel.
Usagi wasn't home long before she suddenly found her room full of Ami, Rei, Makoto and Luna, who greeted her charge with an exuberant leap, lick and nuzzle. They sat in the middle of the floor in a circle, so close their knees were touching, and Usagi reveled in having them all back in her life again.
What wasn't heartening was hearing about the results of the battle.
"Tuxedo Kamen-sama ran off with the fourth Rainbow Crystal?" Usagi's gut gave an unpleasant twist as she listened to the other girls lambaste his character.
"The blue one, yeah. You know... I don't care how many times he's helped us in the past. That's low. If he's stealing our Crystals, he's not on our side. Simple as that," Makoto glowered. "I can't believe he got away with it again!"
"I agree," Luna sniffed from Usagi's lap. "Before, he was an unknown. Now, we have to consider him an enemy."
Usagi's heart sank further. It just wasn't right. Why didn't they feel as certain about this as she did? "But... there must be some reason he's collecting them. I mean... he's not giving them to the Dark Kingdom right? That means he's not bad!"
"There are many kinds of 'bad', Usagi," Rei said gently. "Not all of them are as obvious as sending monsters and terrorizing people."
"I don't believe it," Usagi declared firmly, shaking her head and ignoring the much aggrieved sigh from the cat below. "He's not our enemy. He must have a good reason. I know it."
There was silence for a moment, wherein Usagi guessed the girls were exchanging helpless glances, but she didn't care. That Tuxedo Kamen was their ally was a stance she would never sway on. Mercifully, the topic shifted away from the mysterious masked crusader and his loyalties. She didn't want to spend their precious time together arguing. Unmercifully, it proved to be just as difficult a revelation to stomach.
"You were that badly affected?" Usagi frowned, very concerned by the news that she hadn't heard much from the Senshi after the battle because they were all sleeping off the incredibly draining effects of using the Crescent Moon Stick to not just defeat a youma, but change it back into its original human form. Luna had stayed to watch over them at Makoto's, as that was the closest but also least likely home in which they'd have to face any questions. It terrified her that they'd been rendered so magically but also physically weak afterwards.
"Let's just put it this way, if a youma attacked again today I think I'd have enough power in my magical reserves to transform, but I'm really not sure I'd be able to defeat it," Ami sighed by way of explanation. Usagi gulped, praying to every deity out there that it never came to that. She could tell from the moment the girls arrived that they'd shuffled slowly, and seemed less energetic than they had been only yesterday. They were burnt out.
Makoto must have realized Usagi was slipping into a rather dark state of mind after the direction their conversation had headed, because she suddenly slapped the floor with two hands which started Usagi right out of her melancholy and everyone else present as well. "OH! And Usagi-chan! We didn't even tell you the most shocking part!"
"What!?"
"The fourth Crystal holder? It was Reika! You know... Motoki-chan's Reika? The one he mentioned in passing last week!? Like... she's real and she's gorgeous and I honestly think I might just die!"
"It's not fair," Usagi lamented, chuckling as she listened to Makoto continue to spew her woes, but somehow... amazingly... she wasn't anywhere near as devastated as Makoto. Maybe it was the accident, but she felt like she had a new perspective now. She was happy for Motoki. He deserved someone kind and smart and beautiful.
Unconsciously, she touched the star locket that hid beneath her shirt. She hadn't taken it off since getting back.
"Hey..." she interrupted gingerly. "There's something weird I wanna tell you guys about..."
Mamoru grunted, putting all of his focus into his bad shoulder, the fingers of his opposite hand splayed across it and pushing with near agonizing pressure as he tried to channel his powers. A thin bead of sweat trickled its way down the side of his face... distracting him. Mamoru cried out in frustration. He lashed out at his wall and gave it a good punch - which only served to spread the pain to his knuckles.
It was no use.
He had no control over his healing abilities. They truly did just seem to come and go as they pleased, and it was maddening, maddening to an utterly immeasurable degree, to sense that power within himself but never be able to tap into it of his own volition. Times like these when the consequences of his alter ego lifestyle ached and burned and throbbed with brutal passion, he longed for nothing more than the satisfaction of being able to chase the hurt away with only one touch, that quick and unattainable relief...
But he had never learned, all these years, ever since he first discovered the ability while at the orphanage. He had healed a little girl who skinned her knee, the warmth leaking like liquid gold from his fingertips and into her body, sealing up the injury like it never even happened. In recent years, he'd been able to do the same for victims of youma attacks, usually just small cuts and abrasions that they perhaps never even knew they possessed because they were caught up in the shock of the moment, and once they came out of that adrenaline high the wounds were nonexistent. But it was only ever when the powers wanted to flow from him... never when he purposefully called them forth.
He could have sworn he felt some transfer into Usagi when he shook her hand that first day in the garden...
But it's not like he could have asked her if she felt any different, now, could he?
TO BE CONTINUED...
Author's Note: And the plot thickens! :D I'm very sorry to all who hoped the cliffhanger from last chapter was leading into The Big Reveal... I would be a horrible author if that scene DIDN'T happen, but, there are still some things that have to play out first so I must beg your patience for just a short while longer... ;)
In the meantime, most gracious thanks to the outpouring of reviewers from last chapter! I was so very excited to hear from each and every one of you: Moon Bunny, phillynz, Serenity Red Eclipse, Syulai, Asj Johnson, karseneau1, TropicalRemix, TaelarNicole, Princesakarlita411, Roxypockets1, Jenbunny, moon romance, Ruk, PowerStealerRogue, TinkStar87, NikkiBC, MyIndy13, and Daire123.
Big kisses to all you loves!
AngelMoon Girl