Chapter One
Usagi grinned at her friends anxiously, and feeling her heart beat strangely in her chest. She had woken up with the strangest sense that something important was going to happen, and that she was going to be right in the middle of it. Her senses had failed her before, of course, and nothing had been out of place today to give any clue toward the meaning behind the strange sense of foreboding. After all, the day she’d met Luna had felt just like any old day. It was because of this thought that she forced a happy smile to her face, and tried hard to brush away the uncomfortable feeling. Ami and Rei had both wanted to take a short break after their strenuous school day and the three of them had headed instinctively to the arcade. The young blond entered the sliding glass doors, flanked by her closest friends.
The inside was bustling with summer life, each seat filled to near capacity as the late July air blew in front the doorway behind them. Strands of black and blond hair mingled in the oncoming breeze before the doors slid resolutely shut behind them. The uncomfortable breath lodged in her throat, fueled by anxiety as she wished silently for an answer she felt unable to receive. It was too much to ask, as each of them continued to jibber in their high-pitched, school girl voices. The arcade could only offer so many answers to a question she didn’t know.
Her eyes scanned the packed rows, sure to see a familiar someone sipping coffee at the front bar and talking casually with his best friend. Under normal circumstances, she never sought the poor man out to have a verbal spat, but today was different. She needed to get rid of that weird feeling growing within her, and a fight would work just as well as any distraction. She was rewarded with the familiar sight of his heavy black locks reflecting the afternoon sunlight, and beside him another head of blond. How very predictable the man was, and how freakishly boring sometimes. It was true, the object of her eternal torment was a very good looking man with brains and cash and a killer smile, but that didn’t mean you couldn’t set your watch to him.
Directly behind him, lodged into the first booth like shower mildew, sat a group of pristinely dressed students from Azubu University. Their haircuts were all according to the latest styles, clothes pressed and fit to perfection, and identified by a club patch emblazoned on their left shoulders. Even the sight of their snobby, upturned little faces caused Usagi to shudder with displeasure. It was the ever present fan club that seemed welded to his side every time he stepped out in public. One could almost hear the drool hitting the table as each pair of greedy, glittering eyes watched his every movement. Conspiratorial whispers ruffled against the regular afternoon din; daintily manicured hands lifted to mask their secrets. The young school girl tried to hide her obvious disgust at the ‘elite’ group of ravenous fans as she strolled familiarly toward the front counter.
“Motoki-onii-chan!” She called good naturedly, waving to one of her best friends in the whole world. The blond college student glanced up, grinning ear to ear and whipping out his notebook.
“Three double cheeseburgers, one bacon Swiss, hold the ketchup, two bar-b-que beef burgers, large fries each with two cokes, a 7up, lemonade, and a tropical freeze slushy.”
“I got 3 regulars, 1 Jimmy, no juice, 2 cowboys, shoelaces, 2 liquid crack, a fizzy water, a sourpuss and a frozen Jamaican.” She gave the thumbs up sign and he blew at the tip of his pencil expertly in reply. “How was your day?” He asked conversationally as the burgers where flopped onto the grill. She shrugged non-committaly and settled herself on the counter to wait.
It was a routine day; the girls would somehow find a place to sit among the crowds while Usagi had an order shoot-out with the arcade manager and then waited for it to be filled. The complete normalcy of their earlier actions did little to relieve the sense of foreboding curled into her chest, but she brushed it aside resolutely. Now was not a time for doom and all those other useless things. The crowds around them seemed to quiet down the tiniest bit at the appearance of the blond, as if waiting for the fireworks to start as she settled herself into a stool a few down from his. She didn’t meet his eyes; there was no need to put forth any effort to gain his attentions. He had, since they met, been unfortunately drawn to her for all the wrong reasons. His dark blue eyes rose from the painfully obscure drink like clockwork, and signaled yet another epic battle had begun.
“Only ordering for yourself today? The others might get hungry.” He taunted darkly, leaning back in the stool. Usagi pointedly ignored the ensuing laughter as the crowd immersed itself in the beginnings of another fight. The small group of girls crooning over his every word giggled wickedly at the clever remark. Usagi did her best to ignore the snide comments whispered from the side lines, and focused sharp, predatorily eyes on her arch-rival.
“Oh, don’t be jealous Mamoru, some day your poor, undeveloped stomach might be able to handle solid food.” Mamoru blinked in surprise at her witty comeback, mind whirring into action as they slid into a typical daily fight.
“If it means turning myself into a human vacuum, I’m really not interested. Who knows what all the junk food does to your brain –no wonder you’re so stunted.” His grin was wicked and cruel as the group broke into uproarious laughter at her expense. She just shrugged, unaffected by the low blow to her grades. It was one he pulled every day, and to be perfectly honest, Usagi could only hear it so many times before becoming bored with the same old insult.
“That comment made no sense coming from someone who only drinks coffee -no wonder you’re such a bitter, uninteresting person.” The shot did little to amuse the girls in booth 1, nor did it even fizzle against the giant titan known as Mamoru’s Pride. He shook his head methodically, standing from the seat to swagger over closer to her; long, lean body sprawling against the counter beside her. It was causing the breath to lodge painfully in her throat to have him so close. The fact that she could lean forward and actually touch that perfectly sculptured chest hardly helped the fact, and she found herself swallowing whatever insult might have come to mind.
“Oh yes, I’m so boring, aren’t I? That must be the reason why I have one of the highest GPA’s in the university, unlike you, or the fact that I have my own fan club, unlike you. But you must be right, Odango. You’re just a ridiculous, ditzy little peon and therefore must have a personality, right?” The words whipped a cold winter’s wind directly into her chest as the crowd laughed cruelly from behind. Instead of the usually vicious jab to the grades, he’d gone directly for the jugular and attacked her at the weakest point. Her eyes flashed furiously, but her heart sunk in despair.
“I am interesting, I’m at least human!” She screeched in his face, angry and hurt at the way he tore her down from the inside out. The triumphantly arctic grin that coated his face then froze her blood and caused her fingers to clench tightly at the seat cushion below her.
“About as human as some infantile doll, maybe. You’re about as original as a manufactured American heiress without the good looks. And lets face it, Odango, when the face is all you have, and you don’t even have that, you’re suddenly just like every other vapid little middle-schooler who can’t function on days she doesn’t get her Sailor V time.” His eyes flashed like the frosty, dead snow of December in the moonlight as he straightened himself and turned to reclaim the seat he’d left behind. “Yup, I’m intrigued.”
“Mamoru!” Motoki growled warningly from the grill, angry words lost in the lime green apron tied to his front. Given the strange picture the tall, blond man made, Mamoru's answering look was less than intimidated.
Usagi barely registered her friend’s stern voice in the humiliating aftermath of his cruelty. She’d always prided herself on her fun-loving, outgoing personality. It wasn’t something often seen among the calm, collected people of Japan, and everyone seemed to like her for it. But to hear that she was just like some heiress (whatever that meant, it had to be derogatory) crushed what small bit of self confidence she had. Her head hung low in defeat, unable to refute his words. She remained silent, afraid if she spoke her voice would crack and betray her secret.
Had the dashing young man even bothered to look in her direction, he might have been rewarded with a few simple tears streaking down her pale, shaking face. He didn’t care. Usagi felt herself shiver helplessly at the thought. The only thing he bothered to deal with was his schoolwork, his job, and making her feel lower than dirt. Well, once again he’d accomplished his goal for the day. As if by design, Usagi found herself awkwardly picking at the lint on her school uniform, pretending not to exist.
“Usa-chan, you ok?” Motoki prodded near silently as the tray with their food was set before her. She simply nodded, and stood wordlessly to return to the others. It would have been stupid to even offer a resistance at this pointless, she just wanted to get to the booth and eat her food without any more problems. Knowing the girls were watching from the back, she moved swiftly down the aisles and refused to even raise both blue eyes to meet his as she left.
Motoki felt the anger rising in his chest as he watched her go, faintly noting the snobby college girls in the first booth comment on her hair and clothes. He had been watching her walk away every day for a year and a half now, and it seemed she gave in a little more quickly each day to the taunts, the viscous jabs, the cold eyes of his best friend. Everyday her shoulders hung a little lower, her eyes lost a little sparkle, and her usual spitfire personality faded. It was something he had been trying to help her work through, but it seemed nothing was working.
“Motoki, can I get another?” Mamoru queried from the other side of the counter and the usually personable man shot him a glare that promised slow, painful mutilation should his best friend unwisely choose to ignore his demands. One shadow black eyebrow lifted curiously at the look, though he didn’t appear otherwise effected by it.
“No. Not until you go apologize.” The arcade manager turned his back resolutely on the shocked heart throb, too angry to say anything else. He’d been standing on the sidelines long enough. It was time Mamoru got taken down a peg or two –even if his best friend was the one to do it.
“For what? That little brat has done nothing but earned what she got. If she didn’t like it, she shouldn’t have fought back.” Mamoru bit out coldly, not liking the way Motoki was siding with that whiny little blond kid from the Jr. High.
“She hardly fights back at all anymore because of you! Now go say you’re sorry.” Mokoti’s stern brown eyes found Mamoru’s icy blue. Had Mamoru not known his friend at all, he would have assumed that the green apron was merely a disguise for who was in reality a cage fighter. He’d never seen the usually fun-loving young man actually angry before, let alone the emotion burning a permanent crease in the usually smooth forehead. Sure, they had fought every once in a while, but in all seriousness? Motoki? “I’m not kidding, and I’m not giving it up, Mamoru-kun. Go apologize, right now.”
The sudden sound of the chair legs clawing at the floor caused the hair on the back of Usagi’s neck to stand up straight. She had just settled herself in beside the other four and was consciously minding her own business as Rei gushed on and on incessantly about boys –Mamoru in particular. Her heart couldn’t honestly handle the conversation, given what she’d come here for today, and what had just happened at the front of the room. It was that tooth-shattering noise that caused her big blue eyes to scan the room furtively in search of who had caused it. To her horror, Chiba Mamoru was already stalking his way toward the back with all the dark grace of a movie star villain. The aura about him was irritated, but lazy, eyes focused on her, but perpetually bored. The other groups in the room quieted down enough to hear what would pass between the two of them. She quickly averted her eyes, wishing the ground would open and swallow her whole instead of have to face him after such a stinging retort as the last one.
“Odango,” he began; his voice a low, gruff sound that grated against her eardrums. She didn’t bother to look up at him. She didn’t even bother to breathe. Her pale face was still shaking slightly, though he didn’t seem to notice her obvious discomfort. Such a thing would never matter to a man like him. Rumor had it he spent every weekend with a different girl just so he wouldn’t have to get emotionally involved. Such a man didn’t have messy things like feelings. That was what made his following words so utterly painful. “I’m sorry, k?”
She closed her eyes as the same December storm blew frigid ice into her heart, and caused her to shiver in pain. She hated Motoki right then, that he would think some fake apology would fix everything. There was no doubt in her mind that was exactly what had happened at the front counter. Her ‘big brother’ was probably holding something ransom to make him do it; like that stupid black coffee or some such nonsense. Her mouth tightened into a hard line as he stood there for a moment longer. Maybe he was waiting for her to accept his ridiculous words as the truth. If so, he wasn’t as smart as everyone pegged him to be. His sharp black shoes turned a moment later and he began walking toward the front; fueling her pent up anger and giving her the guts to stand up again. Usagi no longer hesitated at the rage rushing up from the pit of her stomach. It was too much, and the lie he’d just thrown at her carelessly had tossed her over the edge.
“Mamoru-baka!” She screeched angrily, throwing herself to her feet as the young man turned to glare contemptuously at her. She didn’t even think anymore as her hands grabbed the first thing they could and threw with a deadly accuracy only she could muster when he was close. The bar-b-q burger splattered all over his clothes, coating them in thick brown goo as the first feeling expression of rage broke across his face. “If you think some pathetic attempt to say sorry to me is going to get you that stupid cup of coffee from ‘Toki-onii-chan, you’re out of your friggin’ mind!”
Mamoru could only stare as the 5 foot nothing pipsqueak shrieked bloody murder before allowing the rage to sink back into the calm sea of emotions he kept under lock and key. Almost disinterestedly, he eyed the goopy damage with disgust and no small amount of irritation. The sauce from her burger was now dripping down his black shirt onto his shoes and the floor, looking all the while like some demented form of blood from a black and white movie. His dark, steely blue eyes rose from the mess at his feet to clash against her gaze heatedly.
“What? Your pathetic excuse for a brain couldn’t come up with something better than to throw food like a barbarian? I hope you know you’re paying to clean these now.”
“Go screw yourself!” She shot back, hardly taking the time to react to his previous statement. The girls gasped in shock at her words as his eyebrow rose in amusement.
“I understand you’ve had no experience in the matter, but just FYI, that’s impossible to do given human anatomy.” Heat seared her cheeks at the sudden mental image and she sputtered helplessly, forcing the thought from her mind. Why, WHY did he have to DO that?! “And I hope you also know that you just cost me a damn good cup of coffee just to sound like an idiot again. If you wanted to do that, you should have just opened your mouth like any other time.”
Her jaw dropped as yet again, the unfeeling man before her blatantly and mercilessly shredded her. It hadn’t been so bad in the beginning. Their spats had been nothing but childish. But she had used them as a stress reliever from the Youma, the grades, other Senshi, and anything else she could think of. After some time they had become more venomous and more hurtful.
Especially now, she thought mournfully, most especially now.
The rage built in her chest at the thought of him feeling so secure, so controlled in his little mathematically engineered world of perfection that he felt the inane need to squash what tiny bit of self esteem she had, to crush forever how she saw herself. As it was, she hadn’t even been able to look in a mirror for weeks, had stared listlessly onward as Rei drug her in and out of mall shops to find yet another model outfit. Usagi never bothered to try them on anymore, everything made her look young and foolish and nothing ever looked good on her scrawny, short form.
“You are SUCH a cocky, egotistical, rude JACK OFF!” She screamed, scrambling over everyone in the booth to chase him down half way through the arcade. He just watched her coming with those expressionless, winter eyes of his; uncaring, unmoving –a solid barrier in her world that would seemingly never move and never resolve itself. “I don’t know WHY I bother even talking to you, because I already know what you’re going to say. You’re about as predictable as a city bus! The only thing that ever changes is how much of a cold bastard you are!”
He scoffed quietly at the accusation, hardly bothering to shift his feet in response to the short spitfire before him. Her blond head barely hit mid chest, yet she was standing as if she could look him straight in the eye. Well, he mused quietly, the little girl was finally getting a little more backbone. This could make round two a bit more interesting. He didn’t bother to weigh the options of a second fight, but slid into form like a snake simply shedding it’s skin.
“I would much rather be a predictable, ordered human being than some chaotic, crack induced idiot flitting around the place like it’s always high on something.” His snide remark was met with a low growl as she reached forward to prod him in the chest heavily.
“And at least I’M not so self-righteous as to assume that anyone younger than me is somehow lesser than me!” He regarded the short schoolgirl gloweringly, noting that she was pathetically young and almost painfully childish. Maybe if she was lucky, she’d get smart about her lack of intelligence, but until then he’d simply have to educate the poor, stupid child. That irritatingly smug smile crept over his face, causing her blood to boil.
“And at least I’m not wasting oxygen that smart people could be using,” he stated heatedly, eyes flashing in the afternoon sunlight. Frustration gave way to heartache and she grunted angrily, pounding a fist against his chest though it didn’t even make the large man blink.
“Why did I EVER let myself fall in love with you….” What had begun as an aggravated screech, died suddenly on her lips as she realized what she’d just hollered blatantly to his face. One jet black, pristine eyebrow cocked amusedly and a grim smile of the executioner stretched languidly across his perfect lips. Usagi unconsciously stepped backward, blanching violently till her whole frame seemed to grey.
“Fallen in love with me, hu?” he chuckled to himself quietly. The bustling arcade had gone deathly silent beneath the confession and now waited on baited breath to see what would happen between the two of them. Some of the regulars had assumed that this day would eventually come. They were decidedly split on what exactly would happen once it did, but none had any doubt in their mind that at least one of the combat-ees would fall for the other.
Usagi was horrified that her traitorous mouth had given away the secret she’d kept safely hidden between the pages of her diary, the folds of her heart, hoping that over time it would quietly erase itself. She was frighteningly aware that at any point during the next comment, she would simply lose consciousness and flop haphazardly to the floor in a final display of pathetic immaturity. She tried to hold herself steady, but the terrified shaking of her limbs gave evidence to her fear of the older, much more sophisticated man before her. Her heart felt like lead in her chest, pulling into herself so the next comment wouldn’t completely destroy her. It was a fruitless act, one that she was sure would make her laugh bitterly someday at her own stupidity.
“What a sad, sad little confession.” His eyes searched her coldly, demeanor even farther distant if that were possible. “You’re just like them, aren’t you? Just some simpering little girl with ‘hopes and dreams’ that one day the great Chiba Mamoru would look at you and suddenly see something worth loving.” His bitter laugh ripped whatever had been nestled in her chest and crushed it beneath steel boots coated by the spikes of ice in his voice. “Newsflash, blondie, you’re 6 years younger than me, have a mind that any 3 year old would kill for, and you’re too scrawny to be tempting even in the slightest. I couldn’t ever love you, and chances are no one else could either.”
He didn’t even bother to watch long enough for her to race from the arcade in a flurry of tears and sobs.
