Note: Writen as a Tuxecret Santa 2013 gift for mars-reiko on Tumblr.

"Sailor Venus!"

The shout rang out through the mostly empty halls, its echo followed by the click of red heels on imported Venusian marble.

The few present infirmary workers quickly moved out of the way of the angry soldier stomping her way to a particular room, clutching their white headdresses to their heads in fear of being barrelled over. Mars couldn't find it in her to pay them much heed, them or their ridiculous Mercury-native headwear. She was far too busy hurriedly scanning room numbers on doors to both sides of her, angry at each shiny plaque that didn't display the number she had barely managed to extract from a stuttering and far-too-nervous doorman. Honestly, it wasn't as if she was trying to look intimidating. But circumstances were dire and there was no time for dilly-dallying and useless protocol and why couldn't the inhabitants of this silly palace on this ridiculous moon ever understand-

-there.

"Venus, you idiot!"

Several of the white-capped heads huddled around the bed shot up as the unexpected visitor burst into the sickroom. The blonde one on the pillow didn't react save for a prolonged and dramatic groan, making the attendants turn back to her worriedly and immediately explode in a chaotic chorus.

"Lady Venus, are you in pain again?"

"My lady, are you dizzy? Nauseous, perhaps?"

"We should look at your blood pressure again, just in case."

"Lady Venus, look here please – let me check your vision."

Mars met the wide eyes of their bedridden victim and read the desperate, if mute, plea in them: Help me.

Why should I? You brought this on yourself. But she forced down any such retorts. Now was not the time for bickering, and besides, such a childish display in front of palace staff would hardly be becoming of two of the Queen's senshi (the leader and her second-in-command, no less!).

"If your head is troubling you, Lady Venus, we can easily-"

"Stop it! Stop fussing over her like that!"

Her outburst prompted a rapid drop in volume.

"She'll be perfectly fine. We've both had far worse than this." The last was said a bit more calmly, some semblance of peace having been achieved in the overcrowded room.

"You can go now. All of you. I will stay with Lady Venus."

Seeing some of the attendants still hovering in indecision and not exiting the room fast enough for her taste, Mars grit her teeth and squeezed out, "if her condition changes I promise to inform you immediately."

As the last of the staff scurried out of the room, Mars finally got a decent look at the patient now fidgeting on the standard infirmary bed, and experienced a particularly strong case of déjà vu.

The famed red ribbon was gone from her hair to make way for a snugly wound covering of fresh-looking white bandage. Several other parts of her were bandaged, from what Mars could see, and (what she was willing to bet would come to bother the senshi of Venus the most in the following weeks) most of her left eyebrow was singed off, giving her face and amusingly uneven look.

From what Mars had managed to gather in the short while since it had taken place, the whole thing seemed a fairly close repeat of last month's troubling incident, with such slight differences as the weapon involved and the type and extent of Venus' injuries.

The report of the attempted attack had not come to her first –as she felt it rightly should have, considering her position as Venus' second-in-command. But no, she'd had to hear it from gossiping gardeners, of all sources – and then she'd had to inform Mercury and Jupiter herself, to ensure the Princess was under sufficient protection. She'd trust no one but the senshi with her safety at the moment. Just thinking of how poorly the matter was handled made her blood boil, but she managed to reign herself in until she finally heard the door close behind the last exiting medic.

"I was worried sick!"

Upon seeing Venus' remaining eyebrow raised, momentarily stopping to consider her most recent actions and handling of the infirmary staff, Mars reconsidered this statement. "…when I first heard you were hurt."

"Stop making such a racket, Mars. I have a monster of a headache. And you look like a child about to throw a tantrum, stomping and yelling. It's very unbecoming, wouldn't you say?"

Mars felt her already reddish face warm some more as she became aware of her angrily flustered stance. Doing her best not to show this to the annoyingly smug bedridden Venus, she slowly unclenched her fisted hands and took several deep breaths before proceeding.

"Well, maybe you wouldn't be having one at all if you hadn't felt the need to bodily throw yourself on a Jovian detonator. What were you thinking? This is even worse than that last stunt you pulled when you landed yourself here last month."

"The Princess was far too close to the blast radius to be safe. You would have done the same. Any of us would have. I just happened to be the senshi in the vicinity."

It was all true, of course. Not one of them would hesitate to lay down her life for the Royal Family of the Silver Millennium. And none of them had been there when it had mattered – none of them, save Venus.

Mars felt an additional guilty weight settle somewhere in her chest. She had failed at what was supposed to be her most sacred duty. Her first priority at all times - and she had simply been elsewhere. Forgiving herself would take a while, Mars knew, and would perhaps never be entirely complete.

"Besides, I'm the leader," Venus continued after a brief pause, "It's my job to protect the Princess, more than anyone's. I'm supposed to shoulder most of the responsibility, it's only right. That's simply how it was decided."

"Yes, but what about…"

What about me? She had been ready to say. Biting down on the words that carried feelings far stronger than was at all advisable seemed a wiser choice.

"Wasn't there another way to handle the situation? There had to have been! Think before you jump in like that, you can't just throw your life away every time there's even a whiff of a threat. You're too important to be as disposable as you've been acting lately."

Too important to me, again went unsaid.

"You shouldn't question the actions of your leader so openly, Mars." There was a dangerous, cold glint in Venus' eyes now, but Mars couldn't stop herself either way. How she hated that title, what it represented and especially all that Venus used it as an excuse for. It infuriated her, and tipped her over a definite edge.

"You silly, stupid child. You think the others haven't noticed your ridiculous eagerness to throw all concern for yourself to the wind? Do you want to be a great, heroic martyr that much? What would I have done, had you been seriously hurt, or…" she trailed off, then cleared her throat as subtly as she could manage (not fooling anybody, from the look on Venus' face), "…or worse?"

"You would have taken up your duty of leading the senshi in your leader's absence."

"Fine then, but if you refuse to care about yourself it doesn't mean that the rest of us do. Your senshi don't want you gone. I don't want to lose you. Don't I have a right to be even a little selfish in this?"

"None of us have the right."

Venus looked…disappointed. Mars had seen that look a few times, but it had never been aimed at her. And for a moment she felt it as a scorching in her chest, unpleasant and nothing like the driving burn of the Flame she so readily channelled.

"We are the Sailor Soldiers of the Silver Millennium. Each of us knows her duty."

Venus' words sounded so mired in conviction it seemed impossible to ever doubt them. It was true, of course. And how rotten of Mars to think like this, when she had it so much better than many - when she wasn't for all intents and purposes exiled to the furthest planets in the Solar System; or stuck guarding a Gate outside of normal time or space, forbidden even from receiving visitors save the Queen herself; or asleep for what all hoped would be forever, yet still spoken of with endless fear and sometimes even hate, warded against like a curse or an evil eye…

"You're right." She swallowed, bringing her raging feelings under something resembling control. "We can't afford selfishness. There are much greater things than us at stake."

Venus gave her a brief nod of approval. An almost distant, professional look had drawn over her face like a curtain, firmly signalling any and all discussion of personal feelings to be over. There were, as always, more important matters at hand.

"That detonator shouldn't have been there. Something of its power is so far outside normal threat levels…"

"This is the fourth incident we've had in the past year, and the second one in as many months," Mars noted, "I'd argue for reassessing our threat levels and adjusting expectations accordingly – I'm afraid things will only get worse before they get in any way better. Mercury mentioned something about analysing past week's port and transporter records, but I, uh, might've interrupted that when I sent her and Jupiter off to comb the Inner Palace Chambers."

"The Queen and Princess are our main concern, as always, but we will need clues, traces, patterns - anything Mercury can give us. We've got too many big public events soon, we can't afford any slip-ups. Especially at the ball. A masked ball! I'm seriously tempted to petition the Queen to simply cancel the whole thing."

"You know she'll never agree to that. It'd make our job too easy. Besides," Mars smirked, "I thought you loved balls and parties. The more extravagant, the better."

"I do, of course. But despite what it may look like to outsiders, I never party on the job. As you well know."

"I know," Mars confirmed with a tinge of sadness. "When was the last time you weren't on the job, Venus?"

"Hm, I think it was sometime around the grand ball in honour of the 200th anniversary of the Saturn Accords, so, you know, about a decade?"

Venus forced a smile, as did her companion, but both faltered quickly.

"I'm afraid of what's coming. And I can't be. I'm the leader. I'm who everyone is supposed to look to. Even if the Palace comes crumbling down around our ears - especially then."

The mask had slipped slightly again. It seemed more and more evident to Mars, in these tiny, not even everyday occurrences, that whatever the utterly devoted senshi of Venus wanted her to believe, the two of them did indeed share a very particular bond - and whatever her feelings might have been, they were far from one-sided.

"Well, I need to have all the answers. Know what's going to happen. And I don't. Of course I don't, it doesn't work that way. And yet even people who should know better forget and then have the gall to seem disappointed when it turns out I can't just peer into a lit match and recite the major events of the next five years."

"We just don't appreciate you as much as we should, do we, Mars?"

"No, you absolutely don't. And don't think I can't see your sniggering from here, you're not very good at hiding it, you know."

Letting out a long-suffering sigh, Mars glanced at her communicator. Several indicator lights were blinking at her already, demanding her attention.

"I need to get going. You should rest. Senshi healing or no, that thing did a number on you, and we can't have our great leader out of commission in these increasingly tumultuous times, eh?"

"Don't worry. This won't keep me down for too long. Besides, I can help, even from here. And I always sleep with one eye on the peeler."

Mars couldn't help but groan at the mangled expression. Venus tried looking quite innocently baffled at her reaction, but lasted no more than a few seconds before grinning at the wonderful exasperation she'd caused.

"That is completely wrong and you know it," Mars growled, "I can understand interplanetary language difficulties and I am completely aware the translation matrix takes a lot of time to get used to, but we've been here for years now. You really have no excuse."

"Why would I need an excuse? It works every time. Instant mood-lightener, courtesy of Venus."

"Well, I'm getting out of here before you try to lighten my mood some more."

"Fine, you old grump. Come by later and bring me some reports, paperwork, gossip, anything. I'm already bored and you haven't even left."

Mars merely grunted in what was presumably confirmation and closed the door behind herself. Only then did she allow herself a small smile. What a completely ridiculous, frustrating person. Wouldn't change her for the world.

"Maybe just drop in on me to chase the healers away again, before they drive me up the wall!"

The shout was slightly muffled by the door, but the pleading tone was unmistakeable. Mars felt her smile grow as a wonderful idea formed in her mind. The grin stayed on her face all the way to the head medic's office, where she gave strict instructions for Lady Venus to be treated with the greatest and most doting care the infirmary could provide.

By the time Rei took note of the familiar twin blonde braids of the intruder bouncing behind her, lunch break was almost over. If she intended to make it to her geography class – of course she did, she had an image to maintain, after all – she would have to handle the situation quickly and efficiently. Turning on her heel, she made a quick grab for the girl's arm and dragged her into a conveniently private corner of the yard.

"What are you doing here, Minako?"

"Shhh, not so loud! And it's Yuki today, gorgeous exchange student from Okinawa, here to see about available volleyball and/or ballet programs!"

Rei could only roll her eyes at the increasingly elaborate alter-egos Minako kept coming up with for these visits.

"Minako, you can't keep sneaking into my school like this! Disguise Pen or no, one day you'll get us into trouble, and if my reputation suffers because of your ridiculous –"

"I have to take every chance I get, Rei! After all, I might not get many more."

The statement hung heavily in the air between them, sombering the mood instantly. Minako hadn't meant it like that, surely (although with Minako it was hard to tell: dangerous seriousness lurked in the most unexpected of statements). Whatever the intent, inevitably, their minds stormed to the same conclusion.

The atmosphere had been changing in the past months, growing taut and slowly crawling towards its final snapping point - and their future, the one they had fought to ensure so many times over the years, the one Setsuna had told them so little and yet so much about. Rei felt it most of all, and more and more often, when long hours spent in front of the Fire weren't enough, found herself itching to talk to Michiru, get the older girl to sneak another look into her Mirror to confirm they were on the right path - just in case. She never got quite as far as actually doing it, though – some key part of trust was still missing, something that would allow her to rely on someone other than herself in matters of seeing, something she'd always considered to be her job.

By the time she snapped her attention back to the matter at hand, Minako was already talking.

"…after all, you're graduating soon, and then where'll I sneak in? I can hardly embarrass you in front of your co-workers if you stay at the shrine. They all know me too well. Perhaps they've even gotten used to me - hm, we can't have that."

Minako's sudden bounce to cheeky cheerfulness (and her evil grin) didn't seem even slightly forced. It was eerie, sometimes, how quickly Minako could flip that switch nowadays.

Due to so much practice over the years , Rei thought - certainly not even slightly bitterly. She had been no older than thirteen at her start as Sailor V, a girl far too young for what had been heaped on her shoulders even then - and what was wrong with Rei today, where were these persistent gloomy thoughts coming from? Minako was right here in front of her, being her completely uncontrollable self and needing to be handled as quickly as possible. And running her mouth again.

"You know, I'm actually here for a very good reason! Not that seeing you and threatening to ruin your oh-so-perfect "reputation" isn't reason enough. I'm performing at a concert tomorrow afternoon. I'd really like you to come. You haven't been to one yet and…"

…was Minako sounding shy? Impossible. It was surely some sort of trick, a part of her grand plan to get Rei to agree with whatever Minako wanted her to.

"…I would really appreciate you being there." Full-on puppy dog eyes were being employed at this point. Minako was sparing no ammunition today – why was this one concert so special, anyway? And why was Rei letting her get under her skin again, with such painfully obvious ploys?

Rei had to admit she felt a bit bad for never attending a Minako Aino concert before, especially since the others had all shown such support and enthusiasm for their friend's career. Why? She didn't quite know, or didn't want to know. Jealousy? Of Minako, of her success? Of the crowds who got to share in Minako, when Rei didn't? Well, not the way she wanted to…

But there always seemed to be something in the way, some new duty, a battle or an enemy.

"Of course I'll come," she blurted out, then found herself continuing, "and we could go have dinner afterwards. I mean, if you want to."

Where had that come from? From trying to get rid of a nuisance, to inviting a girl out to dinner in all of five seconds? Get a grip, Rei.

"A date, Rei?" The grin widened on Minako's face with such speed and intensity Rei felt slightly dazed. This was far harder than it was supposed to be.

"Well…they don't feed you, do they? After the concert? You're probably hungry and - I guess it could be? If you want it to be. A date."

Her daze was only compounded by the peck she felt on her lips shortly afterwards. She hadn't even had a chance to respond in any way before Minako leaned back and resumed her bouncing.

"Ah! I knew it!"

"What? Knew what?" Rei felt her daze slowly melting into confusion. The school bell rang, but somehow it didn't seem to register as it perhaps should have.

"You are much more fun to kiss when not possessed by an evil centuries-old spirit!"

"Oh, for the hundredth time, Minako, I never kissed you!"

What confusion was left was quickly clearing away – few things were quite as anchoring to Rei as Minako poking at her when she definitely shouldn't be.

"But you wanted to! Admit it!"

Well, that Rei really couldn't deny. Not to Minako's rather fascinating current expression and…whatever it was her eyebrows were doing.

"M-Minako!"

"Ye-es?" She answered in a breathy voice, her face inches from Rei's.

"…I'm late for class!"

—

The concert wasn't too big of an affair and Minako was only one of several performers, but when the lights turned orange and she strolled onto the stage as if she owned the thing, it became perfectly clear who the true star of the evening was going to be. The crowd reacted accordingly, Rei among them, knowing how unlikely it was that Minako or anyone could pick her out.

"Everyone has a special person who brings a spark - or even some flames, for you lucky ones - into their lives. I'd like to dedicate this next song to those who bring that extra bit of warmth into our day."

There was no way Rei could miss what was meant, of course, yet it was general enough not to cause trouble for anyone involved and to seem like a perfectly average crowd-pleasing sentiment. The song that followed it was standard modern pop fare with a catchy rhythm well-suited for dancing, but the audience ate it up. Rei wanted to scoff, but couldn't quite manage to put her heart into it.

If she confronted Minako about her antics, she would probably exclaim something about being the Godess of Love and therefore entitled. Rei groaned in advance, then tucked her head further in and hoped her blush would subside by the time she went backstage to meet her… date.

—

Minako snuggled closer as they walked, deaf to all muttered protests and (half-hearted) warning growls. Personal space obviously ceased to be relevant to her once the temperature dropped below a certain limit. Rei counted off a few more slightly clumsy and de-balanced steps over the slippery ground and decided it had been long enough - she could stop pretending she minded the girl half-draped over and half-hanging off of her.

"You're always so warm, Rei. I'd be careful who I cuddle with, if I were you. It's a dead giveaway."

Rei most certainly did not cuddle, but she had an inkling this would become completely untrue if Minako had her way. So she didn't feel arguing was in her best interests at all.

"Oh? I should be careful, should I?"

"Yup. Wouldn't want any old ingrate to learn the identity of the Senshi of Flames, would we? Oooh, think of the blackmail potential…"

"I see only one ingrate here. And I think I'll risk it." Rei smirked down at the recently-acquired blonde extension of her hip. "By the way, I noticed the songs in your set were all rather…amorous. Seemed a lot different from the tone of the rest of the acts, to be honest."

"Well, I have to stand out, of course. And as the Goddess of Love it is only appropriate. I am flattered you paid so much attention to my lyrics, Rei."

"I simply felt it would be only fair of me to listen carefully, in order to be able to offer you my expert opinion and help you in these key career-defining times."

"I'm glad to have you here with me, then, in these very challenging career-defining times."

Rei felt warmth flooding her face at the barely-hidden honesty in the first half of Minako's words. She cleared her throat and snuggled deeper into her scarf.

"So, tell me, just how accidental was your "forgetting" to invite everyone else? Was this all part of some master plan to get me to pay for dinner and then act as your human heater on the way home?"

"How could I have possibly planned this? You were the one who asked me out. Ah, here you are," Minako cut off any responses by rapidly detaching herself from Rei, glancing meaningfully at the long steps leading to the Hikawa Shrine, and then, equally meaningfully, turning her back on the bus stop.

Rei sighed.

"Would you like to come up for some tea, Minako?" she ground out.

"Oh, I'd love to! And then I'll be just in time for the bus at 11:50, without having to wait out here in the cold when my socks are already damp. You're a lifesaver, Rei!"

"Minako, there's a bus every ten minutes. 11:50 is more than two hours from now."

Her protests fell on deaf ears. The bright red bow that could barely be seen through the fog and fresh snowfall seemed to be bounding up the shrine steps already.

Minako froze, then turned back suddenly, covering the short distance she'd walked with a quick dash, and planted a light kiss right on the freezing top of Rei's nose.

"What are you-?"

Grinning widely at the shocked expression on her face, Minako drew closer again and made the kiss a proper one, cutting off any more confused splutterings on Rei's part.

"See you at the top, Rei!"

"Minako, wait-"

But she was already halfway up the steps, quickly disappearing from view in the rapidly thickening flurry of snowflakes. Rei huffed and made her way after her as good as self-invited guest, grumbling at the cold slush soaking through her shoes.

—

She found Minako in front of the shrine's entrance, looking rather pensively at a snowball slowly melting over her gloves. Rei wasn't sure what she felt more: relief that something had distracted Minako from her very obvious snowball-ambush plans, or worry over what had flipped her mood so completely. She strode purposefully to the other girl, dusted the snowy remains off of her gloves, then took both Minako's hands in her own.

"What was it this time? That last winter when we escorted the Princess to the mountain estate on Mercury, and the huge snowball fight we got into with the guards after early morning drills?"

Minako nodded, frowning, still looking slightly lost. But she threaded her fingers through Rei's as best as she could and held on firmly. Taking this as an encouraging sign, Rei continued.

"I know, I thought of it too. And thinking about how things went last time, when the memories float up, not only the bad ones - it does make me worry. We have our duty and I think we've all always known that this meant we'd never really get a chance at, well, normal things. Or most of them, anyway. So when I thought about it and after I asked you out, it occurred to me that maybe this…us…might be a bit too normal for what we get to have."

"Oh no, I don't think I'm worried at all, Rei." Minako spoke quietly but with a great certainty, and Rei found herself taken aback.

"You…aren't?"

"We are Usagi's, yes, and Sailor Moon's senshi. The Princess' Inner Guard. Soon Serenity will call for us and we will answer without hesitation, you and I both know this."

Rei nodded, patiently.

"But in the time we have left, I think I would like to try being yours. If only for a little while."

The entangled fingers between them were a source of pleasant warmth, even through their snow-damp gloves.

"Before…" Rei started, but was quickly cut off.

"Back then, it didn't work out. We never had a chance, or maybe we never took one for ourselves. Now…well, we are and yet we aren't the same people. Things are certainly different and will continue to be so, Usagi will make sure of this."

Of course she will, the ridiculous, loveable pest .

"It is one of the things she loves fighting for most, after all. Giving everyone another chance and a choice. Just because something was a certain way once, doesn't mean it has to be again. I think…"

Minako paused, and Rei found herself feeling slightly uncomfortable, as she always did when faced with an honest, serious Minako baring her feelings. None of her standard responses were appropriate here, so she preferred to let the girl before her gather her thoughts, holding onto both her hands tightly.

"I think there's no grand plan and pre-written destiny we have to blindly obey anymore. We know the goal we are making for, yes, but the rest we can choose for ourselves. And I'd like my destiny to have you in it."

Rei found herself smiling and couldn't think of a better response to the unexpectedly blunt statement.

"I wouldn't mind that at all, Minako."

Her own smile was met with a surprisingly gentle one on Minako's face, and then with an equally gentle kiss. Rei felt a calm flooding over her and a sense of something finally settling into place. She nuzzled closer to the other girl, then tugged them both towards the entrance to the shrine.

"Come on, let's get inside and get these wet things off of us, I'm freezing."

"Wow, you sure move fast, Rei."

"Minako, you're ruining the moment!"