Chapter Text
The wind is tang and salt. A brisk breeze kicks up along the shore. Sand stings Michiru’s eyes. She blinks.
“Nobody in their right mind would be on the beach on a day like this,” Haruka says levelly. It’s deep autumn, the opaque waves choppy and uninviting, the scenery dull and dying. A thin layer of dead leaves mix with washed-up seaweed all along the coast.
“I don’t mind.” Michiru’s hand sinks into the sand. “It’s more honest this way. It’s dangerous to be too inviting. So many drown in the break between the waves.”
A wave rushes to meet them, breaking and foaming over Michiru’s hand and stopping just before her knees. They pull back, priming the sand into a canvas. Michiru lazily traces a finger between two rocks.
“Is that so,” Haruka says. Michiru makes what could’ve been a childish act look more like idyll. “Though maybe they shouldn’t have walked in without knowing its dangers.”
Ostensibly, they were here to talk about Sailor business away from prying ears. The excuse wears thin when neither of them are in a hurry to talk about it. The guise of romance was supposed to be just that—a convenient mask to hide behind, nothing more. Anything real was a risk. Something that could cloud their vision. Ruin the urgent purpose they had taken up the mantles of Neptune and Uranus for. Maybe even die.
“It would be easier if they let the currents carry them. They try to swim out.”
The water came in again, softening the line Michiru drew in the sand until there was only a faint indent. Then another wave washes in, wiping all traces of the line out.