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She knew he still needed time to himself, all alone without anybody near him, even her. She’d read all the books on ‘care and feeding of your introvert’ that she could find, and she knew it was nothing personal. Even if she remembered Endymion never withdrawing from her when she was Serenity, not only did Mamoru have a very different childhood and early adolescence, but Endymion could even have been an introvert and she just wasn’t around him enough to see him hiding from court by locking himself in the bathroom.
But there was a puzzle about it. Sometimes, when he was having alone time and he was in his study or on the balcony, she could hear him talking. Talking with pauses, like he was on the phone, having a conversation. Except not having his phone on him was definitely a part of the shut-the-world-out thing, and she could *see* it there, on the table. It wasn’t *every* time, just sometimes.
This time, she heard him laugh, an affectionate thing that sometimes she heard him use with Mako or Ami, but mostly was just with her. Usagi abruptly burned with curiosity, with the desire to burst in on him and ask what was so funny– but this was the one thing she never broke; if he wanted her with him after a little while, he always called her, or came to find her. But she wanted to know! And he was on the balcony. And it had *glass doors*.
Tiptoeing with a lot more subtlety than she’d had as a teenager, Usagi snuck over to those doors to peek down the length of the balcony to see what her fiance was laughing at, and stopped cold.
He was glowing, just faintly, and four figures were out there with him– figures she could barely see, but who had very, very familiar shapes. And capes. They all had capes, like they used to back when they were his guardians instead of their enemies. And they were so easy with him, just– just chilling out, with one of them leaning back against the rail with his arms crossed, one of them sitting on it, one of them perched on the arm of the chair next to him, and one of them sprawled on the porch swing. She stared, and swallowed, and nearly retreated–
–but then stayed to watch with a hunger she didn’t have the concentration to analyze. Every moment of their interaction, of Mamoru’s easy, relaxed body language that he had with her but never with anyone else, every expression on his face… and every bit of the love that radiated from him and overlaid the grief she could practically taste.
She studied him, and then saw his hands, handling stones– no, gems, she realized. And she remembered Hotaru presenting Chibiusa’s Senshis’ spheres to her, once upon a time, and a flare of mingled aggravation and determination blazed up within her.
She’d just have to interrupt.
Flinging open the balcony door and striding out, she pulled her justice pose out and pointed at the boys with one hand on her hip and a righteous scolding on her face before she even opened her mouth.
They all looked like deer in headlights and it was all she could do not to giggle at them. No: she doubled down on the stern and declared, “Boys who keep dumb secrets from their fiancees about things that make them very sad are obstructing the path of love and justice! We can fix this easy, Mamoru-baka! Go make beds! Then we’ll resurrect all you nobly suffering dummies!”
They all stared at her, and she stomped her foot. “NOW!”
Mamoru scrambled.
“Prince, it’s not worth the risk to you and the Princess!” Kunzite’s ghostly form protested as Mamoru finished making the second bed that night. So far he’d used up the guest room bed and the couch, and he was considering the merits of the recliner and the bathtub.
“Did I get rid of the air mattress or did I fix the leak?” he asked absently, frowning and surveying the linen closet.
“He has a point, Endy, even if the two of you are really absurdly powerful, it could backfire pretty badly,” pointed out Nephrite, leaning halfway through the door. “Who knows what kind of boobytraps she put on us? Or on the gems?”
“She did say that whenever we were born we’d automatically get basically owned by her,” Jadeite said, sitting crosslegged on the floor and fiddling with the hem of his cape.
“She’s dead,” Mamoru said firmly, digging in the back of the linen closet. “*Super* dead.”
“What if that means that our being alive is a vector to bring *her* back?” asked Zoisite, inspecting his nails, making the question just casual food for thought.
“First of all,” said Mamoru, pulling out the air mattress and the pump, “you’re not being born. We’re bringing you back to life in whatever weird way we used for Chibiusa’s future Senshi.” He plugged the pump in, then started struggling with fitting it to the valve in the mattress. “Second, she is really and truly super-dead. She didn’t get sealed, she *died*. Technically, yeah, okay, she reincarnated this time? But there won’t be a next time because Metallia basically *ate her* when the Holy Sword wrecked her shit, nice-guy what-a-world what-a-world and all.”
“You really just referenced the Wizard of Oz,” marveled Jadeite slowly.
“Endymion,” Kunzite tried again, this time using a name instead of a title in the hopes it’d have more of an impact. “Our bodies were changed. We don’t have bodies anymore. The gems are all there is. I saw it– when the Princess used the Silver Crystal to try and resurrect you, it brought them back–” he gestured at the other Shitennou “–for a moment, but they died again, and when they did, their bodies turned to dust and left the gems in their place. There are no bodies *to* bring back.”
Nephrite cough-laughed into his hand, then supplied, “What he’s saying is that we’re in your pocket, you’re not just happy to see us.”
“Why would you SAY that?” Jadeite wailed, covering his face.
“Ooh, look at his face,” Zoisite practically cooed, translucent eyes glittering as he watched Kunzite getting ice-cold annoyed, then glanced at Nephrite. “You’re really lucky you *don’t* have a body right now.”
“Guys,” said Mamoru shortly, finger hovering over the on switch. “It’s not up for debate.”
The sound of the air pump drowned out any more conversation.
ONE YEAR LATER
“–so I suggested she do Mulan for Halloween this year and she punched me,” Nik was explaining to Mamoru, slouching down in his seat and gripping his skull through his hair.
“It probably has something to do with the fact that Mulan doesn’t like dresses,” Mamoru suggested around his coffee, taking another sip before putting it down next to his ThinkPad. “It doesn’t matter to her how badass and capable Mulan is if she not only wears men’s clothes to kick ass, but doesn’t even want to wear dresses. Mako *likes dresses.* Why don’t you just suck it up and let her be Belle again?”
“You *are* a beast,” Sander said primly from behind Nik, carrying a lunch tray over and depositing himself in the chair on the other side of Mamoru.
Nik picked up the straw he’d been saving, with the wrapper tip ripped off, and immediately blew the rapper at Sander and got it stuck in his hair.
Mamoru very, very studiously kept his eyes on his computer screen and his coffee in front of his mouth.