"Minako-chan, I can't understand you." "A-and sh-she was s-so angreeeeeee," the blonde sobbed hysterically, wrapped in Michiru's comforting arms. The Sea Senshi helped Minako sit back in the chair and handed her a cup of warm soothing tea. Aino Minako sipped it, slowly regaining her composure and her ability to speak. "Rei-chan? Is she the one you're talking about?" Minako nodded, not quite trusting her voice. "I didn't say anything—I couldn't really say anything—but after the vision she had, I didn't have to. She was so angry, and she grabbed me. I've never been afraid of her before." "Minako-chan, you really didn't expect to keep it from her, did you? She can see the future and the truth. What happened this afternoon was guaranteed to happen one day. The fire hides nothing from her." Minako shook her head slowly, not wanting to believe the older woman's words, but she knew that the Sea Senshi spoke the truth. "I think you wanted her to find out and now you don't know what to do. I understand how you feel—I watched Haruka long before I had the courage to speak to her. But once I did and once we ignored our mission long enough to talk about our feelings, I learned that she felt the exact same way I did. She was just afraid that I wasn't that kind of girl. Maybe Rei-chan feels the same way." "What should I do?" "Just give it some time, then go back to the shrine and tell her how you feel. Seeing it in a vision and hearing the words are two very different things. She was probably just as scared and confused as you were." "What if she never wants to see me again? I know that we're both senshi and that we'll fight side-by-side for at least a thousand more years, but what if she never looks at me again? I can't lose her friendship even if I never have her love." "I don't think you'll lose anything with her," Michiru soothed, refilling Minako's cup. "It's very late, Minako-chan. Do you want me to drive you home, or would you rather stay the night? I can fix up this guest room for you." Minako, who had appeared at the Outers' house on the outskirts of Tokyo, nodded and smiled at the kind offer. "I'll stay; thank you." "Anytime. I'll go tell Haruka, then I'll return and fix up this room for you. Why don't you stay here and think about what I said?" Michiru left the blonde alone, returning to the living room where Haruka was busily entertaining the second of their surprise guests, the Senshi of Thunder. Kino Makoto was much calmer than Aino Minako and been, more confused than hysterically frightened. Michiru only caught the last words, but she instantly knew that Makoto and Minako had the same problem. "And Ami-chan just left. I don't know what I did to make her so uncomfortable all of a sudden." "Maybe Ami-chan is just growing up," Michiru suggested as she entered the room. "Haruka, Minako-chan has decided to stay the night." Haruka nodded as Makoto looked up. "Minako-chan is here?" "Yes. She arrived about ten minutes before you as Sailor Venus, extremely upset. I think you and she have the same problem, if you'd like to go talk to her. The guest room has two beds, if you'd like to stay." Michiru went to get her guests a little food while Makoto went to talk to Minako. As Michiru passed her, Haruka caught her hand. "Who?" "Rei-chan," Michiru grinned. "Ami-chan," Haruka laughed. "Do you think anything will come of it?" "I hope so, for all of their sakes." She giggled as she leaned closer to Haruka, letting their noses touch. "They'll be fine as long as you didn't give Mako-chan any stupid advice." "Michiru! Don't worry; I know what I'm doing!" She kissed Michiru briefly, pulling the sea senshi into her lap. "Besides, my advice should work fine for her; after all, she's after a water senshi, too. You and Ami-chan are very much alike." "Bad girl! Keep your eyes off of those girls." "Trust me, I only have eyes for you." *~*~*~*~*~*~* "Haruka-san!" The blonde smiled at Pluto's shocked reaction. "Michiru wants it, but she's busy finding bridesmaids, so she asked me to come to you. And you may not be her father, but you must have known the king of Neptune, and you are family. Besides," the racer added, a wicked gleam in her emerald eyes, "you look great in a tux." "Haruka-san! Honestly! Don't you feel guilty for saying such things to me? What would Michiru-san think if she heard you flirting with me so openly?" "Setsuna-san, guilt is only a fear of being caught, and I always tell Michiru everything. She'd join me in the teasing of a very beautiful woman, I imagine." Setsuna blushed, having not expected such a compliment from a woman she had seen charm every type of girl under the sun, including most of the Senshi. Her mind returned to the Silver Millennium, and she sighed as she remembered the carefree tomboy princess who had looked up to her so long ago. "I was not invited to your last wedding." "What?" Haruka's green eyes widened, and Setsuna realized that Uranus did not remember very much of her past, especially not her illegal wedding. She probably didn't remember much about the end of the Silver Millennium. "Haruka-san, how much of the Silver Millennium do you remember?" Haruka shrugged. "I remember Michiru a little, I remember falling in love with her, and I remember being a princess. I think I remember you, too, Setsu-chan. But everything else is a little fuzzy." The Guardian of Time smiled at the old nickname. "And your parents? Any part of your incredible, prophecy-worthy insane rebellion against the laws, customs, and traditions of the Silver Millennium?" "Wasurenai no desu. What happened?" Setsuna shook her head sadly, wishing that she could be more honest with her senshi friends and family. "You know I can't tell you what you don't remember, Haruka-san. Unless you are meant to know, you would not benefit from me telling you." "And Helios?" Setsuna looked up sharply at the soft words, at the pain in the mother's voice. "You . . . Helios? Haruka-san?" "Would you have denied me the knowledge of my own son, the only child I will ever have with Michiru, the proof of our undying, eternal love? Would you?" "How do you know about him?" "We met him," Haruka whispered. "When we were in Elysion, the very end of the Silver Millennium was very clear to me, but that has since faded. Helios let it fade. I don't even remember how we conceived him. All I can remember now is that you helped save him. I remember that he did not die and you know why." "Haruka-san, try to understand. I have the power to destroy the timeline that we are in, the one taking us to Crystal Tokyo, and I cannot use that power for fear of changing everything. You of all people know that even the best intentions can hurt or kill the ones we love." Haruka winced at the reminder of her wish, but Setsuna had to make sure that she understood. "Haruka-san, I had no family back in the Silver Millennium and I lost the only woman I ever loved, the woman I would have given my life for if she would have allowed such a sacrifice. Your mother died birthing you, and you turned to me as the only woman strong enough for you to look up to. I loved you like my own daughter then, and I waited centuries for all of you girls to be reborn. And now that you have, I have a real family for the first time in my long existence. All of the Senshi are my family, and I couldn't stand to lose any of you. Please don't ask of me what I love you too much to refuse." Haruka nodded, taking her friend's hand. "Okay, Setsu-chan, I won't ask you about our past again. Will you be the father of my bride?" Setsuna nodded. "Okay." In her mind, where no one alive could hear, she added, "you have no idea how appropriate that is. But not you, my favorite Outer. Maybe I'll tell all of you one day the truth of the Silver Millennium and those of us who loved and lost at the end of that great kingdom." Her mind wandered and fastened on her last memory of Kaiou Tsuyu before the King of Neptune died. "Her father died not long after your mother did. You thought it meant that Destiny had a special plan for the two of you." "And?" Setsuna laughed at her eager young companion. "If you two had not defied all of the laws and traditions of the Silver Millennium and some older to create Helios, the Golden Crystal would never have had a protector and Earth as we know it would not exist. Go on, now; your fiancée wants to speak to you." Haruka, a bit stunned by the revelation that she and Michiru managed to save Earth by defying the orders of the Silver Millennium, left, knowing without a doubt or a second thought where her lover was waiting for her. Setsuna slowly walked to the window and stared at the scenery outside, at the tress whipping in the breeze, at the clouds floating lazily across the sky, waiting. The peaceful, lazy scene outside was a marked contrast to her roiling emotions and the turmoil inside that she was barely able to contain when Haruka begged her for answers with those brilliant green eyes. "You're the one keeping their memories from them. You buried their memories when the Senshi died in the Silver Millennium and you only released what you could not keep from the ginzuishou." "Yes, Hotaru-chan. It's better for them if they don't remember the end of the Silver Millennium. We all did things, horrible things, letting the future happen when we knew the carnage and bloodshed that was to come." "I remember, Setsuna-mama, and you can't blame yourself for all that death and destruction back then. You may have seen it, but you knew from the moment you picked up that Time Staff that Balance set certain rules that you cannot break. As Sailor Pluto, you can only watch but never alter." "I know," Setsuna sighed. "It doesn't matter, anyway. After what happened back then, after Serenity's birth . . ." She trailed off, tears gathering in her garnet eyes, refusing to let her sorrow leak into her voice. "After that, and after my beloved's death, I just stopped caring, I think. I can watch and I don't feel anymore." "But you still love our princess, Setsuna-mama." Hotaru might be out of High School, but sometimes she let her childish persona shine through, sparkling deep in her dark purple eyes. "I've seen you protect her, and I've seen you look at her. And you came back in time from the future to save her daughter, to save Chibiusa." "I didn't exactly come back in time, I returned here after I saw the damage Galaxia would do to the time stream if I did not bend a few rules and return to this time and place. But, yes, I do love Serenity—Usagi-chan, Chibiusa . . ." "And the former Queen of the Silver Millennium," Hotaru finished, her voice soft and shaking with tears. "How much did you love her?" "More than any senshi had the right to love her," Setsuna whispered, knowing without a doubt that if she did not end the conversation soon she would not be able to hold back her tears. "I love . . . I loved her more than my own life, than my duty and destiny, but I was denied the choice granted to every other Senshi. I was denied the right to die by her side. She wouldn't let me die with her. She forced me to go on living alone, to wait millennia for anyone I knew to be reborn." "Because she knew that you loved someone else just as fiercely as you loved her. Who, Setsuna-mama? Who else could you possibly love that much?" "Usagi." The voice came out as a whisper, a sigh, a breath so soft she doubted that the purple-haired girl had heard her. She couldn't say anymore, knowing that if she opened her mouth again she would break Queen Serenity's trust and reveal that which must remain secret for all time, beyond the bounds and rules of Balance. "I think you love her more than we do, more than we can, and I can't figure out why. What is she to you Setsuna-mama?" Setsuna clenched one fist by her side, a motion that did not go unnoticed by her senshi companion. "More than you can ever know. She's my princess, as precious to me as my queen." "Will you ever tell her?" Setsuna looked over her shoulder at the thin girl, and Hotaru took an involuntary step back at the pain and despair in those tear-sparkling garnet depths. "No," she whispered, the weight of the Universe resting on her sturdy yet frail shoulders, the fear and responsibility threatening to overwhelm her at any moment. "Never." Hotaru, frightened by that small glimpse into Setsuna's soul, backed out of the bedroom, suddenly wondering just what had happened to Meiou Setsuna in the Silver Millennium to scar her so. Setsuna stood there long after her adopted daughter left, long after the sun sank below the curving horizon, long after the memories of her life as the Queen of Pluto faded back into her mind with the rest of her memories from the past, present, and future. Tears were streaming down her face, but she never wiped them away, still standing there hours later as the stars and planets rose, Uranus and Neptune hanging near each other in the star-studded sky. Moonlight filled the sky, and she stepped onto her own private porch, looking over her shoulder at the crescent moon, golden Venus hanging near its bottom point, Mars a fiery red spot opposite the Moon, Mercury vanishing beneath the horizon, Jupiter and Saturn hanging above Uranus and Neptune. Fuzzy Neptune was so faint that she had to strain, even with her enhanced senshi vision, to see it, but her own planet was invisible. She could sense it in the sky, calling to her, begging her to return to the peace and solitude her rocky planet offered, but she resisted the call. There was nothing for her there but more tears and more pain, and there was someone still on Earth she had to protect. She could not fail her beloved's daughter. She could not fail her . . . no, she would not even think it. She had no bond to Usagi, beyond the love she bore toward her lover's child. Her dead lover's child. Tears filled her eyes. Sighing, briefly wondering why all of the planets were displayed for her to see, Setsuna turned away and returned to her room. She stretched out in her bed, pulling the dark blanket over her slender, shaking form, knowing that there would be no peace for her that night and that she would never be able to relax and enter dreamland. She cried silently all night, but she never fell asleep.
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