The truce between brother and sister didn't last through the evening meal. It started out with some general sniping; apparently her belief that Mizuki coming home meant big changes in her life had given Chibiusa a confidence boost. Seiya sat for a while, unmoved by any of his sister's comments, but Usagi knew her son better than that. She was mentally counting down to the moment when he would bite back, and he didn't disappoint. From that point the meal rapidly degenerated into a shouting match between the two of them until their father called a halt and banished them to their bedrooms for the rest of the night, turning a deaf ear to any and all protests about who started it or whose fault it was.

Usagi sighed, closed her eyes, and leaned back in her chair as the two of them left the kitchen, sullen and silent. She heard the clatter of plates as Mamoru started to clear the table but she didn't open her eyes or get up. For whatever reason this particular verbal brawl between her children had been thoroughly exhausting. She didn't stir until she caught the scent of red wine wafting under her nose. She opened her eyes to see Mamoru holding a glass of ruby-red liquid before her. He grinned.

"You look like you could use this," he said, sitting beside her at the table with a glass of his own and taking her hand. "Now tell me what happened today that has reduced you to this."

So she told him; about Minako and her daughter coming home because Mizuki's powers had come out and Minako felt it was best for the both of them to be close by. "She said that if a new and powerful enemy is coming the girls will all need to be together so they can all gain their powers."

"What kind of new enemy?" Mamoru asked, taking a sip of wine. "And is that what happened to Mizuki?"

Usagi shook her head. "No, there was an armored car robbery in London and Minako wasn't able to transform. She dropped her crystal, Mizuki picked it up, and the rest, as they say, is history."

"Does Chibiusa know?"

"No, I haven't told her," Usagi replied. "Oh, she knows that they're coming home, but not all the reasons why."

"Don't you think you should tell her?"

"I don't know." She pinched the bridge of her nose as if she had a headache. "It's wonderful that Mizuki has awoken and become a sailor soldier in her mother's place, but what if it never happens for Mariko, Akemi and Rio? I'll have gotten Chibiusa's hopes up, and for what?"

Mamoru sighed. "I see your point, but maybe you should let her decide. After all, it directly concerns her."

"Fair enough," Usagi said, drinking some of her wine. "But I'm not going to tell her tonight. She needs to understand that she can not always have her way and break every rule as she goes; the good news about Mizuki would seem like too much of a reward for her bad behavior."

"What rule did she break today?"

Usagi sighed. "She went to see Akemi." When Mamoru opened his mouth she held up a hand to silence him. "And she is, as you were about to say, grounded. Which reminds me I need to call Ami and let her know." She looked at her husband, noticing for the first time the few strands of silver in his hair. She didn't often think about how quickly the years had passed, but on days like this, when she was surely feeling her age, those thoughts came unbidden. When he looked up their eyes met and they shared a private smile, hands reaching across the table and fingers entwining.

"There've been a lot of years," he said, putting her thoughts into words with his uncanny ability to sense her emotions and thoughts. "Do you ever wonder. . ."he began before cutting his words short.

"Wonder what?" Usagi asked. When Mamoru shrugged she squeezed his fingers. "Tell me," she urged.

"I was just thinking about how things were supposed to be," he said, his smile a little sad. "Or how they were supposedly supposed to be. And I wondered what, exactly, was it that changed? You? Me? Us?" He gave his head a determined shake. "Ignore me; I shouldn't be rambling on like an old man."

"I know what you mean, though," Usagi said, laughing slightly. "Everything that we thought was going to happen, expected to happen, remember happening. . ." Her eyes drifted closed. "It's so different now. And maybe none of that was truly meant to be."

"We were. And that's a start."

By Monday afternoon Usagi was ready to throw away everything and escape to a deserted island in the South Pacific. The increase in both volume and intensity of her children's bickering had been bad enough but upon arriving in the classroom that morning to find none of her students prepared for the day's lessons and all of them in the worst sort of teenaged mood had been the final straw. Frustrated with herself as much as with the children she made her way home, thankful that both Chibiusa and Seiya would be out of the house that evening - Seiya at a friend's and Chibiusa at a school activity. And although she wouldn't normally regard it as a benefit she also knew that Mamoru was going to be at work late to attend a meeting, so she had the house to herself for hours. Plenty of time to take care of some chores, grade some papers, and still enjoy herself.

She had cleaned the living room, the entry hall and the downstairs bathroom, and had a load of dirty clothes in the wash when she settled down at the kitchen table to work on evaluating the rough drafts of the latest assignment that a few students had turned in. As she looked through the papers she was pleased to see that one was Akemi's; she removed it from the pile to read first. Her red pen was in hand when she heard a key grating in the lock.

It had to be one of the children; they tended to be careless and always in a hurry with the door. She stood and left the kitchen, prepared to unleash a barrage of questions about the apparent change in plans. She was very surprised, then, when the door swung open and she saw her husband. Whatever she might have said - whatever greeting she may have planned - fled her mind as soon as she got a good look at him.

His lips were compressed in a tight line and his skin was ashen. The hand that held his keys was trembling (at least that explained the clumsiness with the lock) and the other was holding so tightly to the handle of the briefcase that the knuckles were white. She must have made some sort of sound then, because he looked up and she saw his eyes, haunted and afraid. She hurried forward, took the briefcase and set it down then put an arm around his waist, steering him to the living room.

"Usagi. . ."

"Shhhh," she said. "Whatever it is it can wait."

Mamoru's arm went around her shoulders and squeezed her tightly. "No, it can't wait. It may already be too late."

Alarmed by what she heard in his voice Usagi pulled back and looked up into his face. "What? What happened?"

Mamoru sighed and leaned against the wall, sliding down it until he was sitting, long legs sprawled out. Usagi knelt beside him; he reached out with one hand and cupped her cheek, caressing her temple with his thumb. She took that hand in one of hers, not flinching when he gripped her fingers tightly enough to hurt.

"There's trouble coming," he said finally. "The kind of trouble we haven't seen in a long time." He relaxed his grip on her hand and smiled slightly. "Do you remember why I took the research job with this particular lab, even though I had better offers?"

"Of course I do," Usagi replied. "We discussed it endlessly at the time. Is it. . . Has something happened related to that?"

Mamoru closed his eyes and grimaced. "The worst thing possible. Dr. Tomoe's research has disappeared. All of the physical files and the computer records. Everything."

Usagi felt as if ice was congealing around her heart and slipping to the pit of her stomach. She opened her mouth to speak but no words came out, only a strangled sound from deep in her throat. She took a deep breath to steady herself, slipping from her knees to sit on the hall floor.

"Is there -" Her voice came out as a croak; she cleared her throat and started again. "Is there a chance of a mistake? Maybe something was just mislaid."

Mamoru shook his head. "No chance. I have good reason to monitor all of those files, and I didn't make a mistake. Someone wanted to get their hands on that research, and now they've succeeded." Usagi opened her mouth but he held up a hand and forestalled her. "I know that it's possible that whoever did this was interested in Tomoe's legitimate genetic research, but. . ."

"But what?"

"The only way to know which is the genuine, legitimate research and which is connected to the Death Busters is by duplicating the experiments." He struggled to his feet and helped his wife to hers, keeping her hand in his. "There's more we need to talk about, but suddenly I'm starving."

Usagi mustered a laugh and was surprised at how genuine it sounded. "I wasn't expecting you to be home, so I didn't do anything about dinner." She sighed. "I was going to spend the evening grading papers."

Mamoru moved toward the kitchen. "I'm sure there's something we can put together; leftovers and such."

"A fourteen year old boy lives in this house, Mamoru. There are no leftovers."

He paused and glanced at Usagi, one eyebrow raised. "Pizza it is, then," he said, and she was relieved to hear the laughter in his voice. It didn't make the coming problem any less serious, but it helped to make her feel better.

An hour later they were at the kitchen table, which had been cleared of her student's papers and the remains of their hastily improvised dinner. In their place sat Mamoru's briefcase and an assortment of files, all a testament to the guard he had kept on Tomoe's research for the last few years. He was talking about a series of computer simulations that he had created in an attempt to predict the results of many of the experiments without the risk. Usagi quickly got lost under the barrage of technical jargon and let her mind drift, nodding her head whenever it seemed appropriate to do so and waiting for him to get to the point.

"Two years ago I set up an internet sniffer program," Mamoru was saying, grabbing her attention. "It was keyed onto certain words and phrases to alert me anytime someone online was taking an interest in Soichi Tomoe. Most of the searches it located were harmless, but this person -" He pulled another file out of the briefcase and laid it open before her. "Aaron Henderson - American, billionaire, medical doctor and chemical engineer."

Usagi quickly skimmed through the information in the file; at a quick glance this Henderson certainly seemed to be the sort of person to take an interest in Tomoe. But stealing the research files and planning to use them? "Do you think he was responsible for this theft?" she asked, closing the folder and sliding it back across the table to Mamoru.

"I don't think anything right now," he replied, pushing a hand through his hair. "I'm just saying that he's the only person I've been able to identify who has shown a consistent interest in Dr Tomoe, and his research, over the last two years."

Usagi nodded and shifted some of the other papers around. "OK, so for two years now you've been tracking internet searches that might conceivably be connected to Tomoe. What's all the rest of this about? The computers simulations and -" She shrugged. "And the rest of it?"

"I just explained all of that. Weren't you listening?"

"Yes!" Usagi exclaimed, her attempt to sound indignant spoiled by a giggle. "OK, fine! No, I wasn't listening, but you know how I am about anything to do with science."

Mamoru grinned. "Yes, I do know how you are - completely hopeless." He leaned closer to kiss Usagi, and she responded with enthusiasm. For a few stolen moments the whole world shrank to their small kitchen, and his lips on hers, his fingers gently stroking her cheek.

Mamoru broke the kiss with a groan and touched his nose to Usagi's. "Hold that thought," he whispered. "Although when I've finished the explanation you may not be in the same mood." He leaned back in his chair and scrubbed his face with his hands. "OK, here's the short version. I've been writing and running an extensive series of computer simulations in an effort to safely duplicate Tomoe's work. If I can just find the key to the process I think I can create some sort of early warning system that can alert us if anyone, anywhere in the world, re-creates the daimon pods. And we can get to them before they actually start heart snatching."

"OK," Usagi said. "I follow you this far. But that would be a very good thing, so why do I sense some hesitation on your part?"

Mamoru sighed. "Because there's a catch. There's always a catch."

"I figured there would be."

He stood up and started to pace. "Yes, but this is no ordinary catch," he said, stopping and resting his hands on the back of his chair. "All the programs and simulations can only take me so far. I'm at the point now where I need to physically test the possibility." He paused and took a deep breath. "And to do that I need a previously snatched pure heart crystal."

Usagi felt her eyes widen and her jaw drop. Whatever she had been expecting it hadn't been that. "You won't need it permanently, though, right?" she asked, making an effort to keep her voice light. "I'll get it back, won't I?"

"I won't use yours," Mamoru replied, his voice tight and angry.

"You damn well will," Usagi snapped, all pretense of humor and playfulness gone. "I'll not ask any of my friends to make a sacrifice that I wouldn't make first. And as for tracking down any of the other, completely innocent, victims get that idea out of your head, now."

"That idea never entered my head."

"Good." Her jaw was clenched and her chin jutting out, determined. Mamoru was irresistibly reminded of the stubborn girl he had first known and fallen in love with, and he knew there was no point in further argument. He also knew that despite his desire to protect her that Usagi's heart crystal offered him the best chance of succeeding. And if what they feared came true success was vital. He slid back into the chair and reached for her hand. "If there were any other way. . ."

She gripped his hand, hard, her fear transmitting itself through that clasp. "I know."

The doorbell rang, startling them both. Then again, and again, a sense of urgency loud and clear in the jangling sound. Usagi stood and left the kitchen, making her way to the front door. If it was one of the children ringing the bell because of a forgotten key she might have been tempted to infanticide.

But it was Ami. Ami looking disheveled and slightly ragged, not at all like her usual self. She also looked terrified. "Usagi -" she whispered, blinking back the sudden surge of tears in her eyes.

Without a word Usagi took her arm and brought her inside, closing the door and quickly steering her to the kitchen. Ami opened her mouth to speak again but Usagi shook her head. "Tell it once and be done with it," she said as they entered the kitchen.

Mamoru surged to his feet when his wife and her friend entered the room. He was just as shocked as Usagi had been by Ami's appearance, but when he would have helped get her to a chair Usagi shot him a look and whispered "Wine. Brandy. Something."

He all but ran to the drinks cabinet in the living room and poured two fingers worth of brandy into a glass, getting back to the kitchen just as Ami all but collapsed into one of the chairs. He pushed the brandy into her hand and she gulped it, coughing and sputtering. Some color returned to her cheeks, though, and after a deep breath she seemed to recover some of her composure.

Usagi noticed and released Ami's hand, sliding into the chair beside her as Mamoru came to stand behind her. "Better?" she asked. When Ami nodded she went on. "OK, what happened? It had to be something pretty extreme to get you in such a state." Then a horrible thought occurred to her and she went pale. "Akemi?"

Ami shook her head. "No, Akemi's fine. I'm fine. As far as I know everybody is fine. Except for the patient that was brought into the emergency room just about two hours ago." She closed her eyes and a tear slipped out and glided down her cheek. "I was supposed to be leaving at the end of my rounds but they called me in to look at this man."

"What was wrong with him?" Mamoru asked, an odd feeling of premonition settling in his stomach.

"He was unconscious and had a very thready heartbeat, but no other signs of a heart attack. And there was a strange mark on his chest like nothing any of the other doctors had seen. It was roughly shaped like a star."

Mamoru and Usagi locked gazes over her head as Ami said "It looked like he had been heart snatched."