A hundred small habits that neither of them have ever thought about before become apparent after living together for even a short time. Past life memories of being a warrior at the edge of the galaxy haven't really prepared Michiru for dealing with the vague everyday tension over who is meant to be doing the washing up and where exactly the right place to store plastic bags is.

Michiru, coming home with groceries, catches herself noticing with mild irritation just what a messy pile Haruka always leaves her shoes in, and has to laugh at herself.

"I was about to get angry with you for not being a neat shoe-remover," she tells Haruka, still laughing slightly. "I'm afraid I seem to have become middle-aged."

"I thought one was meant to get to have a bunch of sex before the domestic argument stage," Haruka says, and then frowns. "Sorry, I shouldn't have."

Michiru shrugs.

"I think we need a rota for housework, by the way," she says, and dismisses the vivid new mental image she's just been granted of the two of them stretched out on their sofa, naked, tangled together. Perhaps if she's just matter of fact enough, middle aged enough, she can escape her own wants.

Michiru dresses slowly, adjusts her new uniform, inspects herself in the mirror. It isn't a bad uniform, all things considered; she likes it rather more than the old one.

Opening the door, she comes face to face with Haruka leaving her own room.

"Very nice," Michiru says. "The skirt wouldn't have suited you nearly as well."

"It suits you, though," Haruka says. "Are you ready to go and be a model student?"

"Always," Michiru says.

They share a smile that's only a little uneasy.

The building seems more convincingly like a school now than the last time they were inside it, with a steady stream of students making their way through the doors, though only slightly. Really it seems most like some kind of corporate head office, all glass and steel, and Michiru knows that the moment she stops blocking it out she'll be able to feel the sense of wrongness setting off alarms in her head.

There's something deeply strange about the fabric of this place. Not the bones and walls of the building but something far deeper. The main question in her mind is whether it's chance or design.

She smiles and laughs with Haruka, following the flow of students their age up crowded escalators. Starting school again might in other circumstances seem like a step back towards normal life, but not this school, not now.

They go to work.

It really is so conveniently easy to get lost in a new school.

"No, arts," Michiru explains. "I think I have a theory of music class at..." she fumbles through her bag.

"Well," the janitor says, "there's no classrooms here. I think you'll find the music department is on the third floor, miss. Just go down there and to the right, then take the lift."

Satisfied, he turns away and carries on with his work. Michiru slips along the corridor and then pauses, bending over as if tying her shoe laces, until he's gone. Then she eases open the door marked staff only and slips inside.

There isn't time to check thoroughly now, but it's good to begin to get a sense of where they can go for information. This is obviously a monitoring centre for security feeds, though why the door wasn't locked she really can't imagine. Someone is considerate, or just doesn't care.

She takes a quick mental inventory, and slips out again.

It's time to get to class now. She has a model student to be, or to impersonate, or whatever it is she's doing.

"How was school?" Haruka asks with a grin.

"It certainly is something," Michiru says. "It might be a remarkable place to study if one wasn't constantly wondering if it was evil."

"Yeah, I know. It's also pretty creepy, though." Haruka shrugs off her school jacket, hangs it over a kitchen chair. "Have you ever seen such a clean school? Do you think they throw people out for dropping food?"

"It is all a little mechanical somehow," Michiru agrees. A model school full of model students.

Haruka, digging through a drawer in her own room, laughs. She's changing, and the door is open. Michiru turns away towards the window, lets her get on with it.

"And they don't seem to have very good security. I suppose they may not be as worried about the usual problems as about other things." Michiru sighs. "Or we may just be jumping to conclusions."

"We'll see." Haruka steps out of her room, buttoning up a fresh shirt. "I think I'm going to take a ride. Come along?"

To sit on Haruka's bike, pressed close to the curve of Haruka's back, is as close to feeling like flying as Michiru has come. It feels far closer than sitting in the cabin of an airplane, breathing recycled air and watching the world fall away as though it were just a film. If she closes her eyes now the world might really fall away, and there would just be wind, and the rumble of the engine under them, and Haruka.

Perhaps this is what Haruka likes about it.

They come to a halt by the sea, pull their helmets off, breathe in the warm wind that carries the sea with it. The high buildings of the city lie behind them, casting their late evening lights out onto the water; in the small harbour waves they don't become a reflection but something more abstract, surreal. Michiru would like, she thinks suddenly, to paint it.

She pulls her hair back from her face, feels the wind tugging it through her fingers, and realises that just here, just in this moment, she feels almost free.

"I always figured," Haruka says, pulling her out of her thoughts, "that if I just drove fast enough, if I kept going far enough, I could get away."

She laughs.

"Stupid, right?"

"Oh, I don't know," Michiru says with a smile. "I suppose that depends on what you wanted to get away from."

"As if I even knew," Haruka says.

She turns, and looks up at the city skyline. Further along the coast, almost by the water, the black star of Mugen academy hangs, a hole ringed in by light.

"Do you still want to run?" Michiru murmurs.

"Hm," Haruka says. She looks away, doesn't meet Michiru's questioning gaze. Her eyes are somewhere on the horizon, and Michiru is suddenly afraid of something she can't even put words on.

But then Haruka exhales, drops her eyes to stare over the harbour wall, down into the sea at their feet.

"Not alone, anyway," she says, so low that Michiru almost misses it.

The dream slams into her mind with such force that it feels like it knocks her awake. She's on her feet before she knows what's happened, but it's too late to escape from the message; the dream-images still hang there in her mind, fully formed. They don't fade, or unravel, or sink back down into the depths. They demand her full attention.

She knows now where their mission is going to take them.

Making her way quietly out into the living room, she finds Haruka already there, looking tired.

"Did you see?" she asks.

"Yeah."

"People will die."

Haruka's mouth twists. "People are already dying."

"People who are still... people."

"I know that," Haruka says, a little too loud. "Fuck! I know that."

They sit together, side by side, as close as they can get. There is nothing to say that they don't both already know. There are no conversations to have that they haven't already played out. Can we, is it really right, are you OK, you know what this makes us.

"I thought it had gotten too quiet lately," Haruka says.

They are weapons, and they already knew it. They are the ones who do what it takes.

Slowly, it gets lighter outside.

Eventually they sleep, still pressed together.

In public they have their roles. Haruka and Michiru are very close, a little eccentric; their relationship is ambiguous. They flirt with each other. They flirt with everyone else.

Uranus and Neptune are hard and efficient. Their teamwork only gets better. They don't hesitate to take the necessary actions. Their world hardly contains anyone other than the two of them.

In private the edges haven't been smoothed over yet.

Haruka doesn't sleep well just now. Michiru wakes up sometimes and hears her opening and closing cupboards in the kitchen, hears her footsteps in the hall.

Eventually she gets up too, opening her bedroom door just as Haruka steps out of the kitchen.

"Hey," she says softly. "Would you like to come in for a bit?"

Haruka hesitates, and then she dips her head slightly, expression grateful. "Yeah."

They sit on Michiru's bed, not quite touching.

"It's fine," Haruka says, "until I have time to think. How do you do it? You just vanish. I never know where you go..."

Into the sea, into the past. Michiru sighs, watches Haruka's hands fidgeting. She seems to attract people who can't sit still.

"I don't do any better than you do," she says. "I just hide it. You said it. I hide myself."

It's safest, and it's a habit of her upbringing. It isn't necessarily any better than Haruka's urge to run, though.

Haruka is watching her with an unreadable expression. What is she thinking?

Michiru gives her a small smile. "I come back, though," she says, and wonders if it's true.

But it seems to have been the right thing to say. Haruka's shoulders relax slightly, and Michiru realises just how tense they've been all along.

Maybe she can come back.

"Hey," Haruka says, almost under her breath, "you'd better."

The air between them seems to get thinner - she feels something close to lightheadedness. They're sitting very close, Michiru realises. She could just move a little, so...

"Hey, what... Michiru..." Haruka says, breathlessly. "Are you sure?"

Michiru has no idea if she's sure. It depends, she thinks hazily, what the question was really about. And she doesn't dare ask.

But she knows she wants to kiss Haruka, right now, before it's day time again and everything is polished and decided and all of the edges are hidden again and all she can do is feel an irrational ache when it's other girls that Haruka smiles at even as she makes a joke out of it.

So she nods.

"Yes."

Haruka leans forward, hardly any distance at all, just a little dip of her head. Their mouths meet.

The pit of Michiru's stomach fills with a radiating heat, sending out sparks through her body. She reaches out for Haruka, pulls her closer as they kiss, slides her hands over the muscles of Haruka's back, feels the response. They're body to body, sliding awkwardly down into a horizontal heap on the bed. Michiru finds herself on her back.

Haruka, looking down at her, seems momentarily stunned. Then she laughs, face flushed, shifts over Michiru, gives her a moment to breathe.

"What about you?" Michiru murmurs. She doesn't know what to expect, doesn't know what this is to Haruka. She knows what she should want it to be and isn't sure that the reality of what she wants matches.

"Mm?" Haruka says, bending down to press her lips to Michiru's shoulder where her shirt has slipped.

"What do you-mm-want?"

"I want this," Haruka says. "I want," and Michiru, suddenly afraid to hear too much (or was it too little), to let Haruka say anything that she'd feel awkward about the next day, kisses away the rest of the words. Haruka doesn't object, gasps as Michiru's hands catch in her hair, leans in to press the length of her body against Michiru's again.

"Oh," Michiru says, slides her knee up between Haruka's thighs, her leg pressing against the point where they meet. Haruka lets out a low, urgent noise, shifts her hips closer, and Michiru slides her hands up the back of Haruka's legs, over loose pyjama fabric, feeling the warmth beneath it, settling over her backside, pressing, rubbing. Haruka kisses her again, fiercely, with more urgency than grace. Her hands are on Michiru's sides, slipping under her shirt, curling against skin, dipping down to her hips, teasing along the edge of her underwear. Their breasts are pressed together, and the movements of Haruka's body against hers are enough in themselves to make Michiru flush with pleasure.

They roll sideways, sprawl across the bed, face to face, still close. Their legs seem to have gotten tangled.

Michiru gives Haruka a long, questioning look, slides a hand down between them, hooks a thumb over the waistband of her pants.

Haruka, who might just be blushing, nods, a small, quick movement. If Haruka's fans could see her like this... well, for all she knows, perhaps some of them can. But she doesn't think about that any more. Haruka has moved closer again, is easing a hand under Michiru's pyjamas, unsteady fingers working downward, across sensitive skin, brushing lightly and uncertainly against her clit. Michiru groans, slides Haruka's shirt up, pausing to gasp and brace herself against a flare of pleasure as Haruka does something good, one finger flicking against hypersensitive skin. Then she lifts further, pulls away the white cotton that's been covering Haruka's breasts, bends her head to them. They're gorgeous - Michiru can't resist running her tongue over a nipple, closing her mouth around it.

"Oh, fu..." Haruka gasps.

"Good?"

"Good."

Haruka's hands move a little erratically - she's making small, half-gasped noises, though she's the one with her fingers pressed into Michiru's body. Michiru reaches down, places her hand carefully over Haruka's, guides it. Here, and here - like this.

She's going to come, she can feel it building, spreading through her, tensing her, curling her toes into the sheets and arching her back. "Here," she breathes, leaning back against the bed, and places Haruka's hand just right, shows her how hard, how fast - releases her, and lets Haruka take her gasping and shaking over the edge.

Haruka, lifting herself up on one elbow to bend over her, is breathing hard. Her hand is still resting between Michiru's legs, motionless, and she's watching, lips parted.

Michiru reaches for her, but Haruka shakes her head - nervous?

"Too much?" Michiru murmurs.

"I can just... uhn..." Haruka kisses Michiru, takes her hands, draws them up towards her chest. Michiru runs her fingers over Haruka's breasts, cups them, draws her nails lightly over them. Haruka is touching herself, Michiru realises. She realises that she'd like to watch, too, but that might be for another time. If there's going to be another time.

She leans in to Haruka, presses lips to her mouth, to her throat, kisses her between her breasts, stretches a hand up to comb through Haruka's short, messy hair, to trail fingers down the back of her neck.

Haruka says something Michiru doesn't hear, throws her head back, and it's her turn to come, body jerking against Michiru's, breathing in loud gasps. Michiru holds her, smooths her hair, kisses her forehead.

"Feeling allright?" she murmurs, when Haruka relaxes against the messy sheets.

"Mnn," Haruka says.

They lie together, still tangled, and just breathe. But they can't do that forever.

Michiru rolls over, stares at the ceiling, feels threads of worry beginning to work themselves through her thoughts again. She stopped caring for a while there but now she realises all over again that she doesn't know the rules or even what game they're playing.

She wonders what time it is.

She really needs to shower.

Michiru sleeps badly, but still isn't sure when Haruka left the room. By the time it's morning, though, she's alone in her bed, and she can hear Haruka moving in the kitchen again.

By the time she actually gets up there's tea and juice waiting for her on the kitchen table, and Haruka is nowhere to be seen.

She sits and stares out the window, lets the tea help her back into the world.

Before she's drunk half of it, Haruka is back, kicking the door shut behind her and shrugging off her bike jacket.

"Good morning," Michiru murmurs, and Haruka flashes her a grin that makes her forget to worry for a moment.

Nothing feels terribly wrong here, she thinks, tentatively. Although that might just be because it's day again, so they know who they're meant to be.

They make their way through the day.

They don't do anything differently, although sometimes a word will sound different, feel different - a gesture that's always been there will stick out, highlighted by the night before.

It's just after school that they feel a new kind of threat stirring, making Uranus and Neptune restless, and they know that it's started. They follow the pull of it, map out the shape of their dream.

At a temple, a girl is pinned to a wall; her friends are trapped too, just a bunch of schoolgirls anyway, no-one can help her.

It's hard to watch, but that's what they do. Michiru sits behind Haruka, hand resting on her shoulder as a reassurance as much for herself as for her partner. They're well hidden.

They stay that way until the end, move only as much as they have to.

It is impossible to react in a way that seems appropriate to holding someone's heart in your hand, judging it, so they try not to react at all. Uranus examines it, face focused and emotionless, and when she shakes her head, Neptune doesn't let her expression shift an inch either. No irritation, no relief.

Michiru is reminded of her earlier impulse to dismiss the whole thing as petty - and she's reminded of where that impulse came from. She probably wasn't wrong. Time is still a valid concern; so is distraction.

Everything they have to do has come closer again, is pressing in on them, giving them less and less space.

All the same, when Haruka comes to her room and stands in the doorway, waiting for a signal to take a step forward or back, she smiles, reaches out to her.

They are the closest of partners. Partners help each other out. With their insomnia, their frustration, their fear. They do everything they can.

Perhaps it really is that simple. Or perhaps, for now, there are still things they don't quite dare face head on, to name out loud - not when they mean it.

She does know which it is, but for another night, she's willing to pretend.

By the time there's another attack, more senshi have caught up with events. Yes, Michiru realises, she did know them; but they've always been at a distance, never this close before. She's watched them from far away, from the edge of everything - but not too closely, even then, because her job was to look outward, not in.

They're a different kind of being, a different kind of warrior, and she is instantly unconvinced of Sailor Moon's ability to let anyone die, however necessary it might be.

Michiru doesn't think she dislikes them, as such; she just isn't sure their worlds can be easily connected, or that they should be.

Neptune and Uranus will be better off doing this their own way. Sailor Moon doesn't change that.

They do their job, and go their way.

There still isn't room for anyone else.

It's all going faster and fast, Michiru feels. Time is twisting and compressing and tugging them forward. There's really no way to control it.

They lie together, close in the darkness of Michiru's room. It's fast becoming their room - only never out loud.

Haruka's arms hold her a little too tight.

"I wonder how long we have," Haruka says - half a question, but not a real one. There's really no need to ask until what.

Michiru shakes her head, shifts closer, smooths a hand over Haruka's hip. "I don't know."

But they know - can tell by the way their dreams change and clarify themselves.

It's just that it isn't long enough.

[fin]

End notes: Title is taken from a song by Kent with the same title; the lyrics of the song are a substantial part of the inspiration for this fic.