Mei -Awakening- Shadow. Black. Hate. Obedience. Laughter. Hurt. Blood. Hate. Obsession. Hate. Darkness. Eyes. Eyes watching. Mouths laughing. Teeth. Black. Emptiness. Exultation. Revenge. Attack. Light. Laughter. Heat. Music. Wonder. A scream. Clarity. Pain. Acid. Cold. Dark. Dark everywhere. ~*~ She was crying again, softly now. SHE was crying. The thought was simultaneously wondrous and terrifying. He reached up, touched her face, and stared in surprise at the wetness on his fingers. She caught his hand between her own, pressed it to her cheek. Her eyes were full of pain as she watched him, and some part of him sensed something deeply wrong with that. He tried to remember why she should look so sad, and after a moment of futile thought, gave it up. ...He couldn't ...remember, somehow. ...Everything fuzzed together, blurred and twisted images he thought he should recognize. He brushed his fingers across her cheek, tracing the tears barely visible from his vantage point. ...Vantage point? ...His head lay against her shoulder, his right hand palm up on the ground between them. His left hand touched her face. ...His legs... Where were his legs? He struggled to sit up further, but her hand on his chest held him. ...That was funny, somehow. ...That a child could hold him down, he, the strongest... Wait a minute. ...He was strong, wasn't he? Wasn't he? He furrowed his brow, tried to move his foot. ...Couldn't. ...Couldn't even feel his foot, or his leg, for that matter. He blinked. "I... I can't move my legs." The girl above him bit her lip, smoothed the hair back from his forehead. "Shh. ...You don't need to worry about that. Just relax. ...You'll be able to feel them again soon." Reassured, he relaxed against her, looked around. It was... dark. "Where are we? ...Are we dead?" She gave a strangled sob. "No. We're not dead. You're _not_ dead." She said that last with a peculiar sort of vehemence. He felt, rather than saw, her head jerk sharply. "Not dead..." He blinked again. ...She seemed distraught... He tried again. "Who are you?" The girl gazed down at him with more sorrow than he'd thought possible in so small a frame. "...You remember nothing. ...Nothing..." And she started crying again. He shifted helplessly against her. "Should I?" he whispered, touching her face again. "Is there something I'm supposed to remember?" He felt her stiffen through her sobs, and when she spoke again her voice was surprisingly steady. "No. ...only. ...Only that you're free. You're free." He closed his eyes then, felt her arms go around him. "I love you," she whispered into his hair. ...And that felt... right, somehow. Proper. He tested the words on his tongue. "...I love you," he echoed, and was more than a little surprised by her reaction. She responded by tightening her arms around him, so strongly that he groaned as his ribs protested. ...Were they broken? ...How on earth had that happened? As his strangled breathing continued to falter, she released him. "I'm sorry," she whispered. He opened his eyes, looked up at her face. Her eyes were brimming with tears, but that wasn't all that he noticed. "Why is it getting darker?" She blinked rapidly, and another tear spilled down her face. "Just that time of day, I guess." He smiled and closed his eyes again. He felt... warm. He let his muscles go limp. The girl whimpered faintly and touched his face. "Don't leave me. Please, don't leave me. Not when... Don't leave me alone... ...Mamoru..." Her head fell until it was resting against his chest. His eyes flickered open, though he could see nothing, now. "What did you say?" "Please," she said again, voice muffled against his chest. "Please don't leave me." "Not that. ...The other thing. What you called me." She pulled away, and he assumed she was looking at him in the darkness. "Mamoru." "That seems familiar. Familiar, yet not..." He tried to smile, despite his deepening unease. Her voice was fragile, glass eggshell falling as she asked, quietly, "...What about ...Endymion..." "Endymion," he repeated, tasting it. "Endymion... Is that who I am?" He felt her nod again, felt a cool hand on his brow. "Yes. ...You are." ...Then, "You can't see, can you?" "No," he replied truthfully. "It's very dark in here." When she said nothing after a moment or two, he spoke again. "What's your name?" "Tsukino Usagi." His silence must have bespoken his puzzlement. "...Sailormoon. ...Odango atama." "I..." he began. ...She shushed him with a finger to his lips. "At least I tried. ...You might remember my other name. I was called Selenity." And he remembered. Remembered that there was something to remember. "Selenity," he breathed. "Is it really you? ...After all this time, is it really you?" He felt her nod, bend her neck so she could kiss his forehead. Another tear trickled down her face, hanging between them before finally splashing against his forehead. He tried, really tried to see her, and thought he could make a lighter shape against the darkness. "And I am free?" "Yes," she whispered. "You are free. ...I love you. I always have." There was something _soft_ in her voice. Something both familiar and foreign at the same time. He closed his eyes again. He reached up to touch her face, fingers tracing what his eyes could not. "...I'm sorry. ...I think I need to sleep a little. ...Will you be here when I wake up?" She gasped at that, then firmed. "Of course. Just... rest." He smiled, and she touched his lips with one finger. And he let go. In the instant of crossover, when his soul was finally free of the broken shell that had housed it, he knew. "Oh, Selenity," he whispered. "What have I done?" He tried to reach her through her pain. "Selenity. I love you. Makenai, Odango." And then the light took him. ~*~ "Shit." Chiba Mamoru sat up in bed. "Always the same. ...Like that other dream... ...There was another one, wasn't there..?" Mamoru shook his head, laughed at himself. He swung his feet out of bed, wincing at the cold. (My legs? I thought...) He stood up, went to the kitchen, and set the percolator. What he needed was caffeine, lots of it, and fast. ~*~ He glanced back. ...The odango atama was still watching him with a slightly puzzled look on her face. ...He himself didn't know why he'd been nice to her just now. ...He just hadn't _felt_ like teasing her. Odd. Very odd, actually. He shrugged, and kept walking. - Author's Note(s) - This story is a(n abashedly) sappy excuse for a fanfic. Personally, I think Usagi-chan would be far better off with a certain pyromaniac, and I don't mean Tasuki(though that might be entertaining...). A friend of mine, a tried-and-true Chiba hater, said that maybe she didn't hate him so much after this. (...Maybe she was being kind. Correction, I know she was. ...But thanks all the same, eh, K-chan?) Also, you probably noticed that this isn't quite how it happens in the manga or in the anime. ...This is _my_ way of writing the scene. Nyah. (be-daa!) ...Call it creative license. ...or something. (Creative plagiarism? ...Now _there's_ an oxymoron...) And if you thought I invented any of the characters or basic story structure contained herein, (insert novelty-type curse line here). All credits, thanks, obeisances and oaths of fealty go to to Takeuchi-sensei. Ja, -Mei (Ara. ...Is it just me, or was that 'note' longer than the actual story? ...ah, the conceit.)