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Rei had long ago decided that love was not for her. It seemed simple at the time. She was well aware of what people thought of her, the beautiful but strange girl who performed exorcisms, glimpsed visions in fire, and kept crows as pets. On its own, that would not have been enough to convince her. But over the years her visions had become filled with unsettling omens and whispers of evil things to come. And with the fate of the world at stake, what did her desires matter?
The lie she told herself, that maybe someday love would find her in spite of everything, seemed even more remote now that her true identity as a Sailor Guardian had been revealed. But she was tough. She wouldn’t let a little thing like that stop her from doing what needed to be done. The world would be safe from evil, and that would be enough.
It would have to be enough.
That thought, along with pure, fiery determination, had carried her through the first battles alongside the other Guardians. But she had already felt the edges of her resolve beginning to fray as the true difficulty of the mission began to reveal itself. Their enemies were many and strong. It could take years, a lifetime, to rid the earth of the threat they posed. Was she really ready to give up all hope of love for her entire life? She did not know. And then there was the matter of the Princess, a figure she had thought might be nothing more than a story.
Until that Princess was standing in front of her, all shining beauty and golden hair. Maybe she had been a little bit in love at first sight, as she beheld that perfect visage for the first time.
The moment she touched V-chan’s hand, she had seen… something. It had come and gone so quickly that she could not be entirely sure what it was, only that it had stolen her breath and set her heart to racing. A shock of recognition that burned all the way to her core.
But that had been before she knew that V-chan was actually Venus, was Minako. When she was still awestruck like the others by the power and beauty of their newest ally.
Now V-chan was just Venus, another guardian, a decoy Princess only. That shock of recognition had been because Venus was leader of the Guardians.
It was Usagi who was the real Princess. And it had been her ill-fated love that was tied to the destruction of the Moon kingdom, and the way they had all of them been reborn on Earth. That love had been granted another chance.
Rei did not envy them their happiness, not really. But it was a sometimes painful reminder of what she lacked.
On days like today, when she was the only one in the temple and there were no battles or enemies to distract her, she could admit that she was lonely, that she wished fate had in store some passionate love for her, as it did for her Princess. That she wished fervently that there was more to her fate than eternal vigilance and an endless series of battles.
In front of the other Guardians she would deny it to the bitter end. She would throw herself headlong into her destiny and do her best to protect the Princess and this world with the fires of Mars.
But in her heart of hearts, she knew that she did wish for more than that. That was what had brought her here today, to the fire where she could look for signs. She knew she could not control what she saw in the flames, but that did not stop her from trying.
Nor did it stop her from being utterly taken aback when she looked into the fire and, instead of vague and ominous signs, she could only imagine the flames shifting to become Minako’s hair, framing her smiling face with yellow-gold.
The momentary distraction was enough to send her reeling out of her trance almost as soon as she began. Calming her suddenly racing mind was even more of a struggle than usual.
You’re just distracted, she told herself. That was no vision.
She had been seeing things in the fire since she was a child, but those visions were always piecemeal and confused, glimpses more than revelations. Often she merely had the sense of evil approaching or that change was coming, without any detail at all. She knew better than to look too closely at the specifics, and to focus instead on the broad details and feelings that came with seeing.
But this… This was so utterly different, no matter how she tried to explain it away, that she could hardly make sense of it.
Except she could, and that was why she was so out of sorts.
She had seen Minako when she sought her fated love in the flames. If that had been a vision, that could only mean that Minako was her fated love.
Now that she considered it for real, there was something about it that felt right and true. Something that made her want to find Minako right now and find out if it were true, though she had no idea how they would do that. She stopped herself on the way to the phone, feeling suddenly ridiculous.
It was just a vision in the flames, born of idle loneliness. She knew not to take it seriously, but her heart yearned in a way that was completely new to her, as if she had freed something that had been locked away so tightly she had no idea it was there.
She wondered if Minako had felt that connection when their hands first touched, too, or if it was all just her own imagination. She could ask, but the idea of Minako laughing at her silly ideas about true love and, dare she even think it, destined soulmates just made her burn with indignation. It wasn’t as if she had wanted or invited visions of Minako in her golden glory! Sure, things were peaceful and calm now, but there was no telling when another enemy might appear. They must remain vigilant no matter what.
She could feel her cheeks growing hot and knew she must be blushing. Embarrassment choked through her and brought with it her customary self defense: her quick temper.
But there was no one to lash out at. She was alone at the temple today. If she wanted a confrontation, she would need to pay one of her friends a visit.
And she knew just which one it should be.
Except a call to the Tsukino house revealed that Usagi was not home. Reining in her temper, Rei realized she knew exactly where Usagi was most likely to be.
When she got to the game center, there was still no sign of Usagi. But there, shouting exuberantly at a crane game that was not cooperating with her, was Minako.
Rei halted just inside the door, momentarily taken aback. There was no reason for it. Minako liked to play games just as much as Usagi did, so it wasn’t unusual to find her at the game center. But for some reason, today it felt like fate.
She lingered there long enough that Minako noticed something. Rei burned with memories of the fire as Minako turned and, in a perfect repeat of the vision, smiled in greeting.
“Rei-chan!” she called, and Rei knew she was lost. There was no resisting. She went and joined Minako at the claw game.
By the time they parted ways and headed home for the night, she was miserably certain of one thing: even if she was wrong about what the fire had showed her, and the whole ‘soulmates’ idea that had somehow become lodged in her brain… she definitely had a crush on Minako.
She was tempted to consult the flames again when she got back to the temple, to seek guidance or an answer to the question that had been burning in her mind the whole way home. What do I do now?
But she resisted the urge and went to her bedroom instead. Flames and visions and foolish questions had brought her to this point; she was not going to rely on them to get her out of it.
No, she was going to figure out all on her own what she would do next.
By morning, she had it. She would do nothing. She would go back to her ordinary life and her duty as a Guardian, and forget about this nonsense about fated love and soulmates, because aside from the ties that bound Endymion and Serenity into each other’s orbit across vast distances of time and space, there was no such thing.
That resolve did not last long.
Tough as she tried to be, the truth was she wanted to love and be loved. She wanted to look into the fire one day and see that red string that would bind her irrevocably to another person.
If her fate was to be the lonely and isolated guardian of Mars, she wanted nothing so much as to fight against that fate—even above and beyond her desire to recover her memories, protect her Princess, and save her home. But she would do her duty every time, too.
It was Minako that undermined her resolve every time. Minako of the golden beauty and the fierce vigilance, who made Rei’s heart skip a beat on the rare occasions when she gave a genuine smile or laugh. The Guardian of Love and Beauty certainly lived up to the beauty part of her title.
But Rei would surely never find out about the other part, because she wasn’t foolish enough to go seeking something like true love’s kiss based on something she had glimpsed in the fire.
Too bad the harder she fought it, the more thoughts of it began to intrude upon her mind. Fantasies, desires, and what-ifs crept in any time she let her guard down, replacing her customary lonely isolation with giddy daydreams about Minako.
Daydreams that sometimes even seemed more like memories. She imagined them together in armor, fighting side-by-side against a foe she could never quite remember. She relived conversations she thought they must have had, in beautiful gardens with the Earth hanging in the sky overhead. And she dreamed, perhaps most dangerously, of what might one day be, of what they might hope to be to each other. More than once, she came gasping out of a trance with tendrils like red ribbons spiraling before her eyes.
All she had to do to find out was tell Minako the truth. But somehow, for all her loneliness and longing, that thought terrified her more than the most dangerous battle.
She had only her imagination and herself to offer Minako, and could not help but feel how meager these offerings were.
It seemed to her that there must be something greater out there for Minako in all her glory than an outcast girl like Rei who hoped to find love when she looked into the fire.
And besides, there were enemies to fight and battles to win. When was there time for more than silly daydreams?
Rei thought her crush on Minako would fade over time, and take with it her wondering about past lives and soulmates. She was wrong.
She also thought she had done a good job of hiding the ridiculous ideas the fire had put into her head—and the ones her imagination had kept in steady supply after that. As a point of fact, she thought she was very good at keeping secrets in general. And she might have been good enough to convince most people, even among her friends.
But she was wrong about that, too. She might fool some, but she wasn’t good enough to fool Minako.
Minako was actually very patient about it. It was weeks before she finally confronted Rei.
Rei had half been afraid of this, but she had thought if Minako confronted her it would happen somewhere public, like the game center. What she had not expected, and would not have expected in a million years, was for Minako to show up at the temple on another cold and lonely afternoon and seek her out in front of the fire.
She was so deep in her trance at the time that she actually failed to notice Minako’s presence until she opened her eyes and stood up. When she turned and saw the other girl standing there, she was so startled she nearly jumped out of her skin.
It would have been mortally embarrassing, except it did not seem to faze Minako at all.
“I know you’ve been avoiding me,” Minako told her. Simple. Straightforward, the way she could be sometimes, when she was leader of the Sailor Guardians and not Minako the schoolgirl who loved to play video games and forget all her troubles.
“I— what? No I haven’t!” Rei insisted, but even she could hear how hollow her words sounded.
“Well, I think we should talk anyway,” Minako went on. Worse, she strode into the room and headed straight for where Rei was standing.
It was direct in a way that set Rei’s heart racing, even though there was no good reason for it.
“Talk about what?” There had to be some way to get out of this conversation. Rei just needed to find it.
Minako stopped walking and fixed her with a knowing gaze and that so-sweet smile. “I’ve seen the way you look at me lately, Rei-chan,” she said. “And I wondered what the reason for that look was.”
Rei flushed to the roots of her hair. Minako grinned and went on, “But then I wondered if maybe I already knew the reason for that look.”
“I—” Rei fumbled for words, her thoughts racing too fast to communicate. Surely Minako was not trying to say that those fantasies and glimpses of an imagined past life—a past connection—were not so imaginary after all.
Minako waited for her. Rei waited to spontaneously combust.
“I saw you in the fire,” she blurted out. “When I was seeking a vision of love.” She finally found the explanation she sought. “But that’s just because you’re the Guardian of love—” She could feel herself blushing, knew how hollow this excuse sounded. “But then…” She found she could not say it out loud. It would take a lot more outrage to get the actual words out of her.
“My memories began to awaken before the rest of you, remember?” Minako asked. Her voice was gentle but it was enough to stop Rei in her tracks.
“From the moment I saw you, I remembered what we had been,” she murmured, her voice the only sound beyond the fire’s faint crackling. “That there was a time when we were in love. But you didn’t. And I… I didn’t want to force anything, or assume that things would be the way they were before.”
“That was another life,” Rei agreed. But it was a half-remembered life that filled her with equal parts longing and curiosity. She wanted to know more about all of it, but especially about who she had been—and who she had loved. “It doesn’t have to be this life.”
She wanted to kick herself as the words slipped past her lips. Why are you still trying to talk yourself out of this? she thought, with the mental sensation of flailing wildly. She came here just to tell you it’s not all your imagination!
She realized too late that Minako had been walking steadily closer. In fact, she was completely oblivious until their hands were clasped together, fingers interlacing.
“It doesn’t have to be this life,” Minako agreed. “But what if we want it to be?”
For a moment Rei could hear nothing beyond the rush of blood in her ears. Surely she had misheard! But as she fought her way back to calm and Minako did not disappear, reality began to sink back in.
“If we want it to be,” Rei echoed. They were so close together, she could think of nothing beyond the blissful inevitability of kissing Minako. So she did.
She had never kissed anyone before. Not romantically, anyway. So she was painfully aware that she really had no idea what she was doing.
But it felt good and sweet, like the warm breath of a fire on a cool morning.
And Minako leaned into it, surging sweetly against her until Rei ached with happiness. It was as if something had finally clicked into place inside her, where there had only been a puzzle before. That kiss felt right in a way nothing had before.
She wanted to do it again.
For the first time in her life, she knew who she wanted to spend her days beside. She knew who would understand her, who would not be put off by her strangeness, but rather attracted. Someone who shared her secrets and her responsibilities. Whether soulmates were real or not, they were matched, the two of them—because what was romantic love without the fire of passion?
It was one thing to understand it. Experiencing it firsthand left her breathless as she and Minako slowly parted.
But Minako’s hands still gripped hers firmly. Rei had the sense that Minako wanted to hold on forever, to reclaim whatever bond they had carried with them through the centuries and into this lifetime. She had the sense, too, that she would be happy to let that happen.
Even the look on Minako’s face right now was arrestingly adorable. Rei could have looked at her forever.
She was interrupted in this goal as Minako tugged her hands free, but only so she could throw her arms around Rei’s neck as she flung herself into Rei’s arms and tried for another kiss.
Unfortunately, Rei had anticipated none of this, and instead of a second glorious kiss, they went tumbling to the floor in an awkward heap. But at least they were both laughing as they sorted themselves out—and Minako at last claimed her lips in another kiss, this one more heated than sweet.
There was a fire there, and no way to deny it.
Eventually they lay side by side on the floor, arms still wrapped around each other. They would have looked ridiculous had anyone happened to walk in at that moment. But no one did. And with just the two of them, it felt right. Rei felt comfortable in her own skin in a way she seldom had before.
“So, what now?” Rei asked at last. She had yearned for this love for so long, she did not quite know what to do with it now that she had found it. They were still so young, and they had so much yet to do, to protect. So much danger yet to face.
Minako clasped her hand and held it tight. “Anything we want.”
It should have sounded ridiculous, but it didn’t. They were Guardians from another world, who had found each other again across lifetimes and in the face of great danger. Suddenly, anything really did seem possible.
And yet, in the moment, her desires were very simple. “Can we just stay here for a while?”
Minako sat up to look down at her, her gorgeous eyes filled with some emotion Rei could not quite name. “Yes,” she breathed, and bent down for another kiss.