Rei, lost in her own lonely thoughts, never noticed when she passed by the Crown Arcade. After all, she passed it every day either when heading home or when she met her friends for a snack. Heading home from her visit to the nearby bookstore in an unsuccessful attempt to find a new book on astrology she had heard about, Rei wasn't paying that much attention to the people in the window of the diner until her mind registered who she had seen. She stopped still, the pedestrian behind her swerving just in time to avoid hitting her, her mind trying desperately to process the scene. She turned around, eyes flying to the window, and she gasped. "Ami-chan . . . Mako-chan . . ." Makoto and Ami were sitting in the customary senshi booth, sipping their drinks, no books in front of Ami (which was very strange), just staring at each other. Every now and then, one of them would smile or laugh, then the other would, then they'd just stare some more. The silence said it all. Rei could sense the love binding her friends, even without her psychic abilities, and she felt her heart twinge. She felt a warmth on her cheeks, and she reached up, her eyes straying away from the pair in the window. Tears. Rei fell against the side of the building utterly silent, as tears ran down her cheeks. She had never felt such a painful loneliness fill her, and she wondered why seeing her friends together made her cry. "Rei-san?" Rei looked up as Setsuna knelt beside her, and the Senshi of time recoiled from the pain in her young friend's gray-purple eyes. Something in those depths reminded Setsuna of the fire in the young Princess of Mars just before the end of the Silver Millennium. "Why? I was happy once, Setsuna-san. I remember being happy. But it was so long ago and it's fuzzy and I don't remember who. Why does seeing Mako-chan and Ami-chan together make me sad? I should be happy; I want to be happy again." Setsuna looked up into the window and a strange smile spread across her face. "I wondered if they would ever get back together again. They've been very close friends for a very long time." "Back together?" Rei looked up, her voice a soft whispered hinting at something much darker underneath. Setsuna remembered that darkness, too. "They . . . they were lovers in the Silver Millennium?" "You all had lovers. You don't think you senshi could be the guardians of love and justice if you never experienced love, do you?" Rei shook her head, angrily wiping away her tears. She was getting more and more angry with every word that came out of Setsuna's mouth, sensing a truth abut the Senshi of Time she had never suspected. "But Serenity and Endymion remember their love. Why wouldn't we?" "Their love was destiny, Rei-san." "And mine wasn't? I didn't find my soulmate? I don't deserve to remember being happy? I don't deserve to be with my lover ever again? I think you should explain yourself! Now! What about Haruka-san and Michiru-san?" Setsuna couldn't help but smile at the memory of two rebellious princesses, never sensing the trap she was falling into. "Oh, yes. They were lovers back then. We had so much trouble trying to keep them apart; eventually we gave up." "And they remembered it." Setsuna, never expecting a trick from the miko, quickly answered the question. Later she would berate herself for letting her guard down around the younger senshi; she was getting far too old for mind games. "Yes, because they were destined, too. Serenity and Endymion were meant to one day have Small Lady, and Michiru-san and Haruka-san already . . ." She trailed off, staring into two very powerful and calculating lavender eyes. "Do Haruka-san and Michiru-san also have a child? Is that why they remember and we do not?" Setsuna flinched, shying away from the most direct answer, finally realizing that path Rei was trying to lead her down. It was a path she could not take. "They do not remember everything. None of you do, except Hotaru-chan. She's been reborn so many times that I couldn't . . ." "Again with the trailing off, Setsuna-san," Rei whispered, her soft voice very, very dangerous. "Why don't you tell me what happened back then?" "It's against the rules," she murmured unconvincingly. "Why don't you break them?" "I don't break the rules." "Why not?" "I just don't, okay? Not anymore." "Are you the one that's keeping us from regaining our memories of the Silver Millennium? Is that one of those rules you won't break, releasing our memories? You would do this to your friends? You would do this to your fellow senshi? You would do this to your princess, the only daughter of your dead Queen Serenity?" The last words hurt the most, but not for a reason that Rei could ever fathom. Setsuna shot to her feet, dark tears in her red eyes. "I would never do anything to hurt Usagi! She means more to me than . . . than you could ever understand! You and the younger senshi don't love her half as much as I do—you couldn't! You don't know what you're talking about!" she cried, almost running away from the younger senshi. Rei watched her go, wondering what else the Senshi of Time was hiding. Mars stood back up, straitening her clothes, looked at the diner, and smiled. Ami and Makoto were always glad to see their friends, and even their impromptu date would not make them chase her away. Her mind made up, Rei entered the familiar diner.
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