This is the same vein as "Three Little Birds" "My Cherie Amour" and "The Lost Pleiade"...so basically, it's a Crystal Tokyo fic, with kids.

I thought it should stand alone.

Jadeite came and woke her to tell her what happened, but Rei was already awake, and she already knew.

She had already dreamed it.

She lifted her head off of the pillow, still heavy with the sleep clinging to her like fog. "How is she?"

He took a short breath before answering; he had never been eloquent with description, especially when it came to something so emotionally raw. "Bad."

She slid out of bed, groping in the dark for her clothes. "I have to go to her."

Her hands scrabbled for discarded clothing—they really had to stop leaving it all over the bedroom if they wanted the girls to grow up with any sense of pride in their personal belongings—and came up with a pair of jeans that seemed clean enough, but she couldn't button them. Throwing those aside, she grabbed another pair, wondering if there was a dress code was in this situation, if these were too bright and casual, but those wouldn't close, either. She threw them with more force, knocking over a vase balanced on the dresser, spilling water and flowers over the dark wood surface. A single word escaped her lips and flew across the space, rebounding back to her as the tears started spilling out of her eyes and down her cheeks like a downpour.

"Rei." He grabbed her and pressed her face to his chest: her rock, pulling her back from the brink, again. She broke in his arms, clinging and sobbing as her breath came in jerky gasps; breaking now so she wouldn't break later.

She couldn't break later.

Once she had sufficiently calmed down, he found a dress for her to wear, another one lying carelessly on the floor, and she brushed off some dog hair before sliding it over her head. At the last second, she shrugged on an oversized sweater, pulling it shut and tying the sash to hide her midsection. Of course, it didn't work, but she couldn't think of any other method at the moment.

Her girls were waiting for her at the bottom of the stairs, and for once, neither were bouncing or talking, two things that they particularly excelled at. Rei's heart crushed as Clio tentatively stepped forward and wrapped her arms around her leg. "Mommy?"

She was past the point of popping into an easy squat; instead, she lowered herself carefully into a sitting position onto the last stair. The rottweiler, Pai, loped over and stuck her huge head out for a pat. "Mommy?" Clio repeated, moving closer, inch by inch, until she was leaning against her mother's side.

Jadeite locked eyes with her, and nodded. So he had told them, then: no wonder about their reaction. She mentally berated herself for sleeping through this, and leaving him by himself to explain such a complex incident to minds too young to comprehend. Whatever he had said had stuck, because the girls had remnants of hopeless confusion in their eyes. "I have to go to the Palace," she started out, gulped back the tears that threatened to spill over again. Even through the time and distance, she could still feel the weight of her sister's crushing pain. "I have to go see your Aunt."

Callie—usually fearless—grabbed Rei's arm in a vise grip. "Is Auntie OK?"

She pulled Callie's head close and planted a kiss in her ebony hair. "She will be, baby. We'll help her be OK."

She dropped her mother's arm and charged up the stairs like a miniature tornado. "Wait here. I have to get something."

Clio was still stuck to her side, and had let Pai squeeze in, too. Rei watched her daughter gulp heavily and avert her eyes, internally building the courage to speak. She was more sensitive than her twin sister, more likely to react to suffering by bearing the pain alone, quietly, until it consumed her. Much like her mother, Rei thought ruefully. Her question was hushed to a whisper. "Is our baby going to die, too?"

That nearly did it, and Rei had to wait until Jadeite dropped down to sit next to her before she had the composure to answer with any confidence. "No." It was all she could let out without her voice cracking.

"Ours is fine," Jadeite answered for her, his hand reaching down and squeezing hers. She didn't know whether he was trying to convince their daughter, or himself. Either would do, but neither seemed likely.

Clio tilted her head and stared at them, wide-eyed. "How do you know?"

Her sister saved them from answering; she barreled down the stairs, her old mint-colored teddy bear clutched in her hand. "Mommy, you can take Green Bear and let Evander borrow him. Just make sure he gives him back, OK?"

Rei smiled despite herself; Callie was fastidious about the barter system when it came to her toys. Nephrite had stepped on and broken a new crayon once, and she was still looking to collect on it, even if it was just the lame white one. "I will."

"When are you coming back?" Clio said, already preparing for her mother's absence by leaning against Pai's bulk.

"Later. You might be sleeping by then, so give me your goodnight kiss now."

Her daughters rushed into her embrace, their dark hair mixing her own, the black locks indistinguishable. It was a long time before she released them. "OK, now go upstairs. I have to talk to Daddy."

Clio made one last stop before following Callie and Pai up the stairs. "Can you take this, too?" she said tentatively, holding out the crayon drawing she was working on, with a smiling sun prominently featured, and what looked like the dogs. She had given Critter a few hundred extra teeth.

Rei tucked the picture into her pocket, grabbed Green Bear, and leaned into her husband for one last kiss. "I'm sorry, I know I'm going to be angry later. I can't help it."

He nodded and ran his fingertips down her face; out of the corner of her eye, she saw Clio watching them closely. "I know."

"I love you."

"I know that, too."

She appeared in a flash in the hallway outside of the Palace infirmary, intending to find someone to get briefed first. Her nightmare had been full of blood and red pain, but they usually tended to be overdramatic, and she wanted to get the facts straight before barging in like a disheveled torpedo.

She turned a corner and found Makoto sitting in the hallway and staring blankly at the opposite wall, her infant daughter sleeping in a carriage parked nearby. She jumped up. "Oh, Rei—"

"How is she?" She interrupted, falling into Makoto's warm embrace. The auburn curls that fell around Rei's face smelled like vanilla and oranges, and she tried to inhale as much of it as she could before returning to harsh reality. She could stand there and hug Makoto forever.

Makoto shifted uncomfortably, her emerald eyes filling with tears. Good thing Clio wasn't here, because between the two of them, they could have the hallway flooded in no time. "Resting, I guess, and a little bit medicated. I don't know, I didn't really go in long, I—it just…" She gestured helplessly to the tiny newborn, wrapped and tucked snugly in a pink blanket. "The baby would, it didn't seem right to—"

Rei tightened the belt on her sweater. "I understand."

Makoto eyes were pained as the last few words tumbled out of her. "It's not fair."

She grabbed the taller woman's hand and squeezed it with the same desperation that Clio had, earlier, and instinctively tucked Green Bear closer to her body. "It's not."

Makoto turned away and busied herself by checking the baby, who hadn't moved in the least. "Not damned fair. You would think that there could be something that we could do, we do everything else for this damn world and everyone in it…we've fought some seriously scary shit and now that it's over…" She sighed. "I guess even we still can't prevent some things."

"No," Rei echoed. As far as they'd come, as many miracles they performed, it was still out of their ability to rewrite the rules. Only Serenity could do that. And Pluto. And sometimes Saturn. But only if they had a good reason, and the small tragedies of life were not enough, even for Senshi.

Makoto slid her arms under the sleeping baby and put her against her shoulder. "I hate this. I wish there was something I could do." Atalanta stirred gently, but didn't wake.

Rei sat down, absently rubbing her stomach. "Tell me about it. Where's Nephrite?"

"Putting the girls to bed. We didn't tell them yet, did you?"

"Yeah. I think they're still confused." She turned Green Bear over in her hands, rubbing her thumbs over his worn nose. It had been a gift from someone, she couldn't remember who, and he was so worn and loved that parts were beginning to turn gray. Callie usually slept with him next to her head on the pillow; Clio preferred curling up against Pai. Rei knew that she slept better with her face tucked in the crook of Jadeite's neck. They all had their comfort objects.

Makoto wasn't done rationalizing. "I can't believe it happened again."

"These things happen."

"I know that. Why did it happen to her? Again? She wanted it so badly."

Rei didn't have an answer for that, but she did notice that Makoto was looking tired and drained as she paced nervously with her baby daughter against her shoulder. "Go home, Mako. You look like you need some sleep."

She smiled and rubbed Atalanta's tiny back. "And I'm making you crazy with all of my nervous energy."

"All right, I'm not gonna lie. That too." Rei pressed her hands to her back and stretched her spine, trying to crack the vertebrae. "Get some rest, for once."

Makoto carefully positioned Atalanta back in her carriage. "I'll try. Night, Rei."

"Good night." Once Makoto was gone, she stood and opened the door to the infirmary.

Zoisite was coming out, just as she was going in. "Oh! Goddess!" she said, trying to recover from the shock as she grabbed him in a fierce hug. "How are you? Are you OK? Is Ami OK? Is she awake? Can I—"

She felt his body relax under her death grip. "It's OK," he said, answering all and none of her questions.

Rei gulped down a choking band of pain in her throat, and reached in her pocket to press something against his side. "Clio drew you a picture."

He slid a hand down and took it without breaking their embrace. "Thank you." She felt hid body shudder against him slightly, and she clenched her teeth and reminded herself that she could not break.

"Dad?" They broke apart at the sound of Evander's voice, and turned to see him being led down the hall, holding hands with Serenity. Her white dress and the ends of her silver hair fluttered behind her as she strode down the hallway, and you would have to look closely to notice the signs of duress that dotted and marred her perfect image. A few too many hairs were poking out of one bun, and the rims of her eyes were red like cherries in snow. Evander looked sleepy and confused. "Daddy, are you crying? Are you sad?"

Zoisite hurriedly brushed off a few stray tears and tried to smile; Rei couldn't even bring herself to do that. "No, I'm just…I really like this picture Clio gave me. Want to see?"

A fellow five-year old's drawing wasn't doing much to impress Evander. "Aunt Serenity said that I'm going to sleep over at Rini's house tonight."

He bent down until he was eye level with his son. Just like her twins were smaller versions of herself, Zoisite's son could be his double, right down to the way they chewed on their lip when nervous. "Yeah, your mom's going to stay here tonight, and I'm going to stay with her."

"We'll have fun," Serenity assured the boy. "Uncle Dimi will let you climb the high tower and see the whole city, and then tomorrow morning we'll all make cinnamon snails. They're still your favorite, right?"

"I guess," Evander muttered. "As long as there's no raisins."

"There will be no raisins," Serenity assured him, as serious as any proclamation she had passed down.

Rei took the opportunity to slip through the door of the infirmary, and then into Ami's room. A small lamp illuminated the room, but it still was mostly in shadow. She was lying on her side, facing out at the city lights of Crystal Tokyo far below, seemingly asleep. She felt herself move to the bedside. "Ami?"

Ami's eyes fluttered open, her eyes still glassy with medication.

"Ami?" Rei whispered again, leaning closer. Ami tried to smile and failed.

"You came."

"Of course." She grabbed her hand, a little harder than she had intended.

Ami's pale hand stroked the top of Rei's as she swallowed. It was several long moments before she could get the words out. "Guess we're not having twins anymore."

Rei reminded herself that she could not break, not right now, but she very much wanted to. It was their private joke, even since that lazy afternoon when they split a bottle of wine on empty stomachs, and then staggered home to have uninhibited sex with their husbands ("Where"? Rei had asked the next day, in a hushed whisper. Ami had leaned over and spoke out of the corner of her mouth, "Bathroom floor. You?" "Hallway. The girls were playing outside with the dogs.") and found themselves expecting a month later.

Ami had been overjoyed; her last pregnancy had ended in the premature birth of her stillborn daughter, and it had been years before she could talk about it without tearing up. Serenity still did. Rei had been dumbfounded; the sacred fire had not mentioned her having any other children besides her twins, and to hold something back as monumentally life-changing had her convinced that it was some big cosmic joke. But then she spent the next week in bed, sleeping off exhaustion that never went away and periodically vomiting, and wondering if the fire ever told her the whole truth.

It had not told her this, either. That was the job of her nightmares.

When Makoto and Minako both had daughters that winter, within a month of each other, they had joked about starting a new Senshi team: four girls born in one year, just like them. Rei couldn't sense the gender of her child, no matter how hard she tried; she suspected this was going to be another surprise, like his or her very existence in the first place.

It took several deep breaths before she could look up. Ami was drained: her usually raspberry pink lips faded to beige, her eyes strained and distant, her face sagging into lines of exhaustion. Rei opened her mouth to say something, anything that would hold off the coming tide of pain for even just a moment longer but nothing came out, and she watched helplessly as the despondent woman dissolved into hopeless tears.

"Ami," she finally croaked, rushing forward and enveloping her sister's head in her arms. Ami clung to her while she sobbed, her breath hitching so hard that it wracked her body with spasms.

She couldn't tell Ami to stop crying. How could she tell her that, when she couldn't do it before, either? She couldn't tell her that it was OK, because it wasn't. She couldn't tell her anything right now, because how could she? Rei had lain down that evening to take a nap, her baby alive and safe inside of her, and Ami's had died while she was bleeding and terrified.

Finally, Ami's tears ran out and she leaned back on her pillow, exhausted. "Sorry," she mumbled, scrubbing at her face. Rei pulled a tissue from the bedside table and pressed it to Ami's face.

"Don't apologize. Don't you dare." Her anger was back, and it came out in her voice.

"I know," Ami sighed, gasping a little. "I thought I was done crying after Serenity came to see me."

Rei reached and picked Green Bear off of the floor where he had fallen, and clenched his stuffed arm hard enough for her knuckles to turn white.

"Minako was afraid to come in," Ami continued, pushing the saturated tissue across her nose. "I think that she felt guilty that Cherie was born, I guess. That girl," she let out a small chuckle, too thin to qualify as a laugh. "What is she thinking? She shouldn't feel guilty about that." She looked up at Rei with her blue eyes still covered in sadness. "I wouldn't wish this on anyone."

She gave Green Bear another squeeze.

"Are you OK?" Ami whispered. "You must be scared."

Rei wobbled unsteadily. How like Ami to be concerned over her at a time like this.

A light, tentative tap at the door brought her back to the moment. "Can we come in?" Serenity said softly, poking her head though. "Evander wants to see you, Ami."

Ami straightened up, hurriedly wiping away remaining tears. "Of course you can. Come here, baby."

The Queen led the small boy through the door, and he ran to his mother's bedside, limbs flailing. "Mommy."

If that word hurt Ami then, she didn't show it as Evander crawled up on the bed and wiggled his way up to her side. She pulled him close, pressing her face into his sandy curls and closing her eyes as she held back more tears. "I love you, I love you, baby."

Rei set Green Bear next to them, and Evander reached for the bear and pulled it close. "This is Green Bear," he said simply, his voice full of awe. "This is Callie's."

She smiled at him. "Callie wants him to stay with you for a while. Can he?"

Evander pushed the bear under his chin and idly sucked at one of the ears. "Yeah."

"Good." She leaned over and kissed Ami's head one last time. "Try to rest, OK? I love you."

"I love you," Ami murmured, her arms still wrapped around her son. Zoisite slipped in the open door, and with a nod to Rei and Serenity, slipped in bed next to his wife and pulled his family into a crushing embrace.

"Ow, Daddy, you're hurting me!"

The last thing they heard was his muttered apology as they quietly exited the room.

Serenity grabbed her arm the moment they were out of earshot. "Rei, are you OK?" She moved closer, rubbing the small of her back. She could tell the Queen's heart was breaking, and that she had to make sure that at least someone that night was going to be fine.

Her outburst was unexpectedly hilarious, with grand sweeping arm motions and the first word coming out in a falsetto crack. "YES! I am fine! Everyone keeps asking if I'm OK, but really, it doesn't matter how I am because Ami needs to be OK, not me! And I'm sorry that I'm kind of freaking out right now, but I can't help it, and even if I could, I think I would still be freaking out, so help me!"

The Queen let out a long breath and let a small smile push across her face as she grabbed both of Rei's hands and pushed them against her stomach. "Yeah, now I know you're OK. You only yell at me when you are."

"I'm not yelling!"

"You're kind of yelling," Serenity said, still smiling. "And I ask because you're pregnant, and I don't want you laying awake all night scared to death that this could happen to you, too. Because it won't. I know it."

"You don't know that," Rei sighed, rubbing Serenity's palms over her abdomen. There was a tightness underneath that had nothing to do with the twenty-week-old fetus inside of her. "I didn't know this. I didn't know. I couldn't see it coming…"

Serenity frowned. "You can't know everything, Rei. This is not your fault."

In some ways, she knew that, but she wasn't ready to let herself off the hook yet. "I'm worried about Ami. This—" She searched for words. "This isn't fair."

"I agree," Serenity said, her gaze following to the floor. "It's not. So tomorrow we'll be there for Ami, and the next day after that, and the next day after that. We'll get her though this, and we can, and she'll be all right. She will. We can do this for her."

"I know that." She did. "I wish we could give her what she wants."

Serenity's eyes started to glitter with fresh tears. "We do give her what she wants. We love her."

"You're so hopelessly optimistic."

"I know," the Queen said, pulling Rei down the hall with her. "I have to be."

The girls were asleep when she returned to her home, feeling like an ocean that had just been emptied to a desert. Jadeite leapt off the bed when she appeared in their room, and accidentally hooked his foot under Critter's sleeping form and nearly fell. Rei laughed at him, and it felt good, but he didn't return her smile.

"How are they?"

She started peeling off layers. "Not good. I don't know if I helped any."

Now he was searching the floor for clothing, kicking the dog out of the way to reach a jacket that was half-under the bed. "I have to go. I want to make sure he's all right." He held up one shoe. "Why the hell don't we clean this place up? Our shit is everywhere—it looks like a fucking mess." He threw the shoe across the room, and Critter instinctively chased after it. "Critter, quit it!"

This time, she was the one holding him steady, her arms around his neck as he tried to control his erratic breathing. "I'm sorry," he said thickly, running a hand down her hair. She squeezed him harder. "You were supposed to be angry, not me." He pressed his palm to her stomach and rubbed gently, and she wondering if he was trying to calm her, or himself.

"It's OK." She felt a tiny movement inside, like a popping soap bubble, as the third person in the room reacted to its father's touch. "It's normal to be angry."

"I know."

Rei pressed her forehead against his as they knelt in the middle of their bedroom floor. "I love you."

"I know that, too."