Chapter Text
He didn’t expect the knock. Not tonight. Not this late.
Mamoru looked up from his book, the quiet creasing between his brows deepening as the sound echoed through the stillness of the apartment. The world outside had long since gone quiet, the kind of silence that felt earned—soft lamplight spilling across the pages in his lap, a half-empty mug cooling on the table beside him. Only the low hum of the heater and the ticking wall clock marked the time.
But the knock disturbed it. A small, tentative sound that was barely audible.
He froze, listening.
Another knock followed. Slower and softer this time. Not urgent, but uncertain. As if whoever stood on the other side wasn’t entirely sure they wanted to be let in.
He sat up straighter, the book forgotten, left open on the armrest. A faint unease stirred in his chest as he crossed the room. It wasn’t fear exactly—just that gnawing tension that comes when something interrupts what was supposed to be a quiet night.
He paused at the door, hand hovering for a second. Then, he turned the knob.
The hallway light spilled in, and so did she.
“Usako?” he said, blinking. His voice caught in his throat, like he couldn’t quite trust the image before him.
Something felt… off.
It had been quiet since Galaxia. No enemies. No resurrections. No impossible choices. Just school, rotations, a shared calendar, and coffee gone cold on the table. Peace had never lasted this long. Which only made her appearance tonight feel heavier, like it belonged to a different lifetime.
Her golden hair was still drawn into her signature twin tails, but messier than usual—like she hadn’t looked in a mirror all day. Strands clung to her cheeks. Her skin was pale, almost washed-out in the hallway light, and her eyes… her eyes were rimmed with the kind of redness that only came from holding back tears for too long. She clutched the strap of her purse with both hands, knuckles pale, like it was the only thing anchoring her to the world.
There was something in her posture, something hesitant. Like she hadn’t fully decided to be there until the moment he opened the door.
He took a breath, slow and careful. Whatever this was—it wasn’t just a late-night visit.
“I wasn’t expecting to see you,” he said again, more quietly this time. The words came out uneven, a slight tremor clinging to the edge of his voice.
Her lips parted like she meant to say something, but nothing came. Just silence, thick and uncertain. When she finally spoke, her voice didn’t sound like hers. It was flat, scraped clean of its usual rhythm—no playfulness, no brightness. Just the dull echo of something unraveling.
“Can I come in?”
It was barely a whisper. Not a question, really, more like a plea wrapped in exhaustion.
Mamoru didn’t hesitate. He stepped aside instantly, as if his body already knew what to do before his mind caught up.
“Of course,” he said, his voice gentle.
She passed him without looking up. No kiss on the cheek. No teasing remark. Not even a glance. No warmth. Just the brush of her shoulder as she walked into the space they had once shared.
The air shifted. It felt heavier. Like even the apartment recognized the absence of her usual light.
He closed the door gently behind her, turning just in time to see her lower herself onto the edge of the sofa—upright, rigid, and foreign posture. Not her usual sprawl with socks tucked under her thighs and one arm flung over the back cushion. She perched like a visitor, like someone who didn’t intend to stay long.
Mamoru lingered by the doorway, then took a slow step forward. The questions were building fast in his chest, but he swallowed them down.
“I thought you had class late tonight—”
“It ended early,” she cut in, her voice flat.
The interruption sliced through him. He flinched, not visibly, but internally. Something was wrong. He could feel it vibrating from her skin like a second heartbeat.
He forced a breath through his nose. “Do you want some tea? I just made a pot of—”
“No.”
He froze. No?
She always wanted tea. Even when she was upset. Even when they’d argued. It was their ritual. A small comfort in a chaotic world. Her declining it sent another chill down his spine.
Mamoru’s jaw tensed. He walked over and sat beside her, careful to leave enough space between them that she wouldn’t feel cornered, but close enough that she could reach for him, if she needed to.
“Usako…” His voice was barely above a whisper. “What’s going on?”
She took a breath, but it stuttered halfway out of her lungs. “There’s something I need to say,” she murmured. “And I don’t know how to say it without… without… hurting you.”
His blood turned cold.
Still, he stayed quiet, listening.
She didn’t look at him. Her gaze was fixed on the window, where the city lights glimmered beyond the glass. Her reflection floated beside them like a ghost.
“Have you ever thought about what it would’ve been like,” she began, her voice quiet and deliberate, “if we never got our memories back?”
The question landed like glass shattering on tile.
Mamoru froze, the words catching him mid-breath. His brow furrowed, not out of confusion, but defense. His mind scrambled to keep up, to understand where she was going with this, why she would ask that now .
He blinked, once, then again. “I mean… I guess I wondered,” he said cautiously, his voice slower now, more careful. “A long time ago. Back when everything still felt… new. But not recently.”
His gaze searched hers, trying to meet her where she was—trying to read the storm that hadn’t yet broken on her face.
“Why?” he asked, and this time the word came softer, almost hesitant. Because deep down, he already knew he wouldn’t like the answer.
She let out a short laugh, but there was nothing light in it. Just air and ache. It cracked halfway through, like her voice couldn’t carry the weight of it, and then it was gone, swallowed by the room.
“I think about it all the time,” she confessed, eyes fixed on some invisible point beyond him. “About who we were before the past came back to claim us.”
Mamoru felt something shift inside him—low and slow, like a drop in temperature. His stomach tightened, cold curling in his gut. He chose not to interrupt.
“We hated each other, remember?” she went on, the corner of her mouth twitching upward—but it wasn’t a smile. Not really. More like the ghost of one. “You were cold. Dismissive. Mean, even. And I was loud and dramatic and constantly in your way. We couldn’t stand each other.”
She paused, her fingers curling in her lap, twisting together in a slow, anxious rhythm.
Across from her, Mamoru flinched, just slightly, but it was enough. Her words landed harder than he expected, dredging up images he’d long since buried. The sharpness of their earliest days. His short replies. The way he’d rolled his eyes when she spoke, dismissed her with quiet disdain because he didn’t know how else to protect the fragile walls around him.
She had annoyed him, got under his skin, yes.
But he never hated her.
Not even close.
Somewhere along the way, she stopped being a disruption, and became the reason he looked forward to anything at all.
Her kindness. Her warmth. Her refusal to give up on people, even when they didn’t deserve it.
Even when that person was him .
“And then one day,” she said, her voice quiet but steady, “the universe rewound us like a tape and said, ‘Surprise, you're soulmates.’ And we just… accepted it. Like it was a fact. Like love was inevitable.”
“Usako…” He turned toward her more fully now, reaching gently, but her hands stayed clasped in her lap. “You’re not just some destiny I accepted.”
“Maybe not consciously.” She finally looked at him, and the pain in her eyes was a punch to the gut. “But don’t you ever wonder if we’re just… acting out a script someone else wrote for us?”
His mouth opened, then closed. He wanted to say no. Wanted to tell her she was wrong. But the words felt fragile in the face of her unraveling.
“Opposites attract,” he offered weakly, but the second it left his lips, he regretted it. It sounded hollow. Cliché. Insulting, even.
She didn’t respond. Just stared at him for a moment too long, then turned her gaze back to her lap.
“I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately,” she whispered. “About whether you would’ve chosen me… if we met as strangers. If it was just you and me. No past lives. No prophecies. No golden destiny lighting the way.”
Her words hung in the air, like something she’d been carrying for too long, finally set free.
Her voice cracked, barely holding. “And I can’t help but wonder if I’ve… stolen that choice from you.”
Mamoru felt it like a punch to the chest. A hollowing. The kind of ache that leaves you breathless, not because you’re hurt, but because the person hurting is her .
The air seemed to thin around them. He tried to speak, he needed to, but nothing came. Nothing that would make it better.
“Don’t say that,” he said finally, low and uneven.
But it wasn’t enough. Not even close.
Silence pressed in, dense and sharp, the kind that filled every corner of a room and left no space for air. It wasn’t angry or cold—it was waiting. For something. For him. For her. For the next word that might break everything open.
She blinked rapidly, lashes trembling, and a single tear slipped down her cheek. She didn’t brush it away, she just let it fall.
Like she didn’t believe she deserved to stop it.
Her voice trembled, soft but steady enough to land like truth. Her chin quivered, barely noticeable, but enough to betray the effort it took to stay composed. She was unraveling quietly, carefully, even as she forced herself to speak.
“I want you to be with me because you choose me,” she went on, barely holding herself together. “Not because you’re supposed to. Not because a thousand years ago, someone decided we were meant to be.”
Mamoru opened his mouth, but the words caught somewhere behind his teeth. Nothing made it out.
Not
I do choose you.
Not
You're wrong.
Not even her name.
Because for the first time, he wasn’t sure words were enough.
He wanted to tell her that she wasn’t just some name etched into the pages of a myth. She was everything . She was the woman who danced barefoot in the kitchen while brushing her teeth, who cried at commercials she'd already seen, who always stole the last cookie with a triumphant little smirk.
Fate had nothing on her.
Nothing on the way she made him laugh when he forgot how, or how she pieced him back together without even knowing it. Day by day, moment by moment, she didn’t just make him believe in forever—she became his reason to believe it could exist at all.
But none of it made it past his lips.
It all lodged in his throat like stone.
And then she said it.
“Mamoru.”
Not Mamo-chan . Not the nickname she always used, the one that wrapped them in softness and shared history.
Just his name.
Mamoru.
The sound of it, spoken in that quiet, aching voice, cracked something open inside him. It reached deeper than he was ready for, past memory, past logic. He couldn’t remember the last time she’d called him that with so much space between them. Stripped of endearment, stripped of nostalgia. Just raw.
“I think we should take some time apart,” she finally said.
It came gently. Carefully. But the softness didn’t soften the blow.
He blinked, disoriented. His body went still, like his brain hadn’t fully registered the meaning behind the words. The words hit like a slap to the face—sudden, sharp, and impossible to ignore.
“What?” he asked, though he heard her perfectly. The question wasn’t about clarity. It was about how this could be happening. Now. Like this.
“I’m not saying forever,” she rushed to add. “I just… I need space. And I think maybe you do too. Time to think. To really ask ourselves if this is our choice… or just destiny’s.”
“No.” He shook his head, moving toward her before he realized he had. “No. Usako, no. I don’t need time. I need you . I gave you that ring because I chose you. Not because some past life told me to. Not because of fate, or reincarnation, or a future we haven’t even lived yet. I chose you .”
She stood, slow and stiff, like the decision had taken root somewhere deep in her bones. Her hands shook as she unclasped them from her sides, fingers curling like they didn’t trust themselves.
He rose with her, heart pounding, desperation clawing up his throat. “Please,” he said, his voice cracking. “Don’t do this. Not like this.”
Her eyes filled, brimming with guilt.
“I’m sorry.” Her voice shook now, barely more than a breath, thick with guilt.
Then she reached for the promise ring—the delicate silver band he had spent weeks picking out, the one with the pale pink heart-shaped gem she once said reminded her of a spring sunrise. She slid it off her finger with reverence, cradling it in her palm like something sacred. Like something already broken.
“I just… I need to know who I am outside of all this,” she whispered. “Outside of us. Outside of destiny. And maybe…” her voice faltered, “maybe you do too.”
He reached out, placing his hands gently on her shoulders, fingertips barely grazing the fabric of her sleeves—like she might disappear if he touched her too roughly. His thumbs hovered just shy of her collarbone. “Are you scared? Is this just nerves? Because we can talk through this. We can—”
“No.” Her gaze didn’t waver. “I’m not scared. I’m clear. I just don’t want to wake up someday and wonder… what would’ve happened if we weren’t reincarnated lovers with a prophecy and a daughter from the future. What if none of it had happened? What if it was just us? Would we still be here?”
“Usako—” he began, but she was already speaking again.
“And if you meet someone else while we’re apart…” she said, eyes flickering downward for the briefest moment. Then back up. She winced, like she could feel the words tearing something loose as they left her mouth. “I’ll understand.”
He stared at her, stunned. For a moment, it didn’t register. Then his heart split wide open.
“You think I want someone else?” he asked, breathless.
“I think…” She took a step back. Her lips quivered. “I think you don’t know what you want yet. Not really. Not without everything we’ve been told. Not without all the stories and the silver crystal and the promises we never made ourselves.”
The silence that followed settled like snow. Cold, muted and final.
And suddenly he saw it—clearer than he ever had.
All the cracks. The ones he’d brushed off. The quiet way she’d withdrawn when he talked about future plans. The far-off look in her eyes during nights that used to be laughter. The way she never asked about venues. The way she always hesitated before saying yes to things they used to dream about.
“You’re leaving me,” he said, his voice low, bitter on his tongue. The words tasted like betrayal, like something sour he couldn’t swallow. “After everything we’ve been through?”
She didn’t answer. Not with words.
Just a slight shift of her weight, and a look that didn’t reach him.
His breath hitched—and suddenly, he wasn’t in this room anymore. He was everywhere they'd been, all at once—every version of them that had ever fought to survive.
He remembered the way Beryl had looked into his eyes, cold and triumphant, when she turned him into a weapon. The feel of chains tightening around his mind, the shadows he couldn’t escape. And then— her . Usagi. Standing in front of him with tears in her eyes and hope in her voice, whispering his name like it was a spell. She’d reached him when nothing else could. Her love had shattered the curse.
And that should’ve been the end of it.
But it wasn’t.
Then Demande.
Mamoru could still feel the fury in his blood when he saw the way that man touched her—like she was something to own. He remembered the tremble in her voice when she said no, when she pushed back. But it wasn’t just her strength that saved her—it was them . The bond between them. A bond so deep, so untouchable, that even obsession had no power over it. She had chosen Mamoru. Again and again, she chose him .
He saw her now—barefoot and glowing—as she stepped in front of Pharaoh 90, knowing she wouldn’t survive. He remembered how time seemed to fracture, how the scream roared through his throat, helpless and primal. The space she left behind had been more than silence—it was a void, a wound. A hole he didn’t think he’d ever crawl out of. But somehow— somehow —she came back, and they found each other again.
And then Galaxia.
God. Galaxia.
He remembered the silence of death. The cold, endless void. The absence of breath, of color, of light. And yet, even there—he felt her. Calling him, loving him, mourning him. That love had crossed galaxies and lifetimes and death itself.
It brought him back .
His hands clenched at his sides.
“We survived it all,” he said, the words thick with disbelief. “You brought me back from brainwashing, from death , Usako. We died for each other, and you chose me. When someone tried to rewrite the entire timeline, you still found your way back. When the universe took everything from us, we held on.”
His voice cracked.
“And now… you're choosing to let go?"
She bit her bottom lip, hard, as if pain might keep the tremble away. Her shoulders were rigid, every breath a struggle between restraint and collapse.
“I’m trying to do the right thing,” she said, her voice barely holding. “For both of us.”
The words landed like a betrayal, even though she meant them as mercy.
Mamoru’s throat tightened. His pulse pounded in his ears, and something in him snapped.
“And what if you’re wrong?” he said sharply, the desperation in his voice rising before he could reel it in. “What if this is the biggest mistake of our lives?”
She flinched like he’d struck her. The tears spilled instantly. She brought her hands to her face, but they did nothing to hide the ache in her expression.
He stepped forward without thinking, closing the space between them, and wrapped his arms around her.
She came willingly—collapsed into him like the wind had gone out of her. He held her tightly, almost too tightly, clutching her like she was the one dangling off the edge of a cliff, as if letting go of her now would mean losing the ground beneath his feet.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered into his shoulder, the words breaking against him. “I love you. I always will. But I need to let go.”
His chest caved around the words he couldn’t say. His eyes stung. Every part of him trembled with the effort of keeping her close, of not letting go. As if holding her was the only thing keeping him from falling apart completely.
She stayed there for a long moment. Long enough for a small, reckless part of him to imagine she might stay. That she might lean back into him and say she didn’t mean it. That love would be enough. But then, gently, she eased out of his embrace, her touch reverent and sad, like she was saying goodbye to something holy.
She held the promise ring again, and looked at it for a long time, running her thumb across the band like it held the weight of a thousand lifetimes. As if she could still feel everything it once meant.
Then, with careful hands, she placed it on the table.
Slow and deliberate.
Like she was laying down not just a piece of jewelry, but a part of herself—a symbol of who they had been, and the life they thought they were building.
Mamoru stared at it, unblinking. It looked too still, too final. Like it might shatter if he breathed too hard.
A lump rose in his throat. He almost reached for it—to stop her, to say something—but his body stayed frozen.
She moved to the door in silence. No words. No glances back. Just the quiet scrape of her shoes as she slipped them on. She paused only once—to look around the apartment. But her gaze was distant, as if she were already gone. As if everything around her had turned into a memory.
“Goodbye, Mamoru,” she said softly, her voice frayed and final.
The door clicked shut—soft, final, far too loud for something so small.
Mamoru just stood there, rooted to the floor staring at the space where she’d stood, where she’d cried, where she’d loved him. His breath came in short, uneven bursts. His fingers twitched, and his entire body screamed to chase after her.
To stop her. To fight .
But he didn’t.
Because when Usagi made up her mind… there was no stopping her.
She had asked to be let go.
And Mamoru, for the first time in any lifetime, had no choice but to let her.