A Rather Pointed Subject

A Rather Pointed Subject
Date of Scene:	03 April 2016
Location:	Earth Court Frat House
Synopsis:	Usagi and Mamoru are tired of Usagi having dark energy horrible stuck in her back and nothing they've tried thus far has worked. Usagi's also worried about Mamoru, and Mamoru's worried about Usagi, and all in all, there's a whole lot of worry. But also cute.
Cast of Characters:	Mamoru Chiba, Usagi Tsukino

---

Today is not a school day.

She thinks.

Right?

Usagi turns and stretches across the otherwise empty bed to blearily check her phone. Yep. Not a school day.

There's a moment, after she's taken a moment or twelve to actually get up, where she holds her place at the edge of the bed and doesn't breathe.

It's there, she can feel it, sharp and pokey and pointy. And at random moments like this, the tip hurts worse than the dark energy.

When the wave passes, she pulls on a t-shirt from the closet. She pulls her loose hair out from it as she gently pads her feet from the bedroom to the living room.

He's sitting, somewhere, she's too bleary eyed to really pay attention, and she just crawls on his lap without so much a how do you do, and snuggles sleepily against him.

"I don't like feeling mean all the time." There's a yawn, and a stretch, before she settles back down, hair liable to tangle around boy limbs or gadgets if not monitored closely. "What if I haven't tried to purify myself long enough?"

He feels her moving toward him before she gets there, so by the time she does, he's already leaned forward and put his coffee and tablet down on the coffee table. When she curls into his lap, it's such a natural fit; one arm drapes over her hip, and the other comes up under the back of the t-shirt. His warm hand settles on her bare skin over the place where the shard's embedded, and the sleepy golden glow of his power takes away the pain, soothes the irritated and inflamed tissue and dulls the nerves surrounding it.

"I'm pretty sure neither of us is a fan of dark energy," he says in quiet amusement, lowering his head to rest the side of his face against her hair once she settles again, carefully moving as little as possible. "But you doing it is a bad idea. I've been thinking about it, and I have a plan, as long as it passes Mercury and Shelby muster."

Mamoru's voice is low, a soothing and metered murmur, despite the matter-of-fact business of his words. "We'll get someone else to purify you, and I'll ride it out with you like I did for Nephrite and Zoisite. It shouldn't be nearly as bad or as long as it was for them, and I can definitely get it down to at least ice-cream-on-a-cavity level for you.

"Then once it's clear of energy and intent, it'll be safer to remove; I can assist Dr. Shelby in the surgery and keep you stable, and immediately catch and fix any damage she's afraid she might do in the process. Just gotta find someone to do it. Maybe Amu."

There's still an itch under his hand, but it's smaller, more subtle. It's closer to a tickle now and she gives a brief shivering squirm before he's done. Other than that, it's a relaxing calm that washes through and muscles that became tight in the area loosen and she sighs and relaxes fully against his chest.

Usagi smiles a bit at his assessment of tolerance for the stuff, her own amusement only obvious by the quick puff of air against his neck. "It's full of disgustingness." Then she sighs and leans up, propping herself on the back of the couch with an elbow while fingers sift through his hair. "Yeah, I didn't think it would work. I can't seem to get it going long enough."

When he's done voicing his plan, her smile is warm and affectionate. "I like that. It sounds good, and has the added benefit of having you there the whole way. I think I'd be less scared that way. I think that was also a factor when I tried."

She hums in thought. "Do you think Amu-chan would? I don't know her very well, but she does seem nice."

Her fingers continue to sift through his hair. "Are you okay? I felt this very strong need to just cuddle you earlier."

Mamoru's head tilts into her playing with his hair after the requisite ticklish flinch at the puff of air against his neck, and even the smirk after it fades. His scalp is warm, warm against her fingertips, and he shivers a little when her hand sifts up against the grain, so to speak, but he's also more relaxed for it, and doesn't move his hands from where they are on her.

"I think she would, if we asked her really nicely. I don't know her very well, but she means an awful lot to Tada-kun, and he's one of the city's best and brightest," he answers, voice drifting a little into laziness as Usagi plays with his hair. His eyes close, too.

But then he tenses a little at the question and has to force himself to relax again. "I'm fine, yeah. Just Fiore showed up again, trying to get me to come with him. He had me and Mako-chan and Kunzite trapped. Kunzite teleported us out, so I really am okay now."

Usagi likes his reactions when she does this. He's like a big grumpy cat that doesn't like many people petting him, but the ones he does allow to do so, it's just awesome. One of these days, she just wants to spend a lazy after noon doing nothing but this for as long as he'd let her, just to see his faces.

"She was really amazing, that thing she did? She was very protective of Dance Partner." She nods, and continues the hair play.

Usagi sighs at the mention of Fiore. It's a slow, almost sad thing. She knows there's a story there, but now doesn't seem to be the time to ask.

Instead, she continues to sift her fingertips through his hair. "When I'm back, I'm gonna kick his butt." Her voice is soft, conversational. Almost sleepy even. "Kick it so hard he'll go 'oh noes, I have no more butt!' And then whack him so hard he sees Jesus." She gives him Very Serious eyes that are teasing all the more for it. "Do you know how hard you have to be whacked to see another species' god, Mamo-chan?"

Then, direct subject change. This isn't too out of the left field for her, but this time it's on purpose. "But in the mean time! What were you doing because I made you a very, very comfy and cozy chair? Were you being smart and nerdy?" Why yes, her eyes are hopeful as she bites her lip. "Can I watch?"

The subject change is sudden enough Mamoru's left squinting one eye at Usagi, trying to track the conversation. "Um," he says, then blinks both eyes open. "Oh. No. I was on tumblr. I'm considering asking Luna and Artemis very nicely if they'd like to be internet famous. Some newb started up a new kitten gifs blog and they're really good and I'm a little jealous."

There's absolutely no teasing in his face. He really is a little jealous of the popularity of a brand new rival kitten blog.

Mweeheehee. Mission accomplished!

Usagi gasps and sits up on his lap. "But Mamo-chan, that's still nerdy! Just on the geeky spectrum!" She pouts at him. He's holding out!

And she decides she must try to help!

She taps her chin in thought. "Luna likes to fool people into thinking she's cute and fluffy. Which she is, of course, but with claws. And if you get her the good fish! I'm sure she'll help! And then Mamo-chan will have the bestest kitty blog ever again."

On Mamoru's bed, Luna sneezes herself awake. She looks around with bleary eyes.

"Sushi-grade tuna, check," says Mamoru decisively, slouching further into the couch and placing his hands low on Usagi's hips, settling comfortably, assuming she's more or less welded to his lap now and eminently okay with this. His fingertips trace light and tiny patterns on her hips, absent and idle.

But he's still thinking, and it's not about the kitty blog. "I'm going to get in touch with Amu tomorrow and ask her. We can tag Dr. Shelby afterwards," he tells her, looking up and focusing on her, blue eyes to blue. So serious! "You don't like feeling mean, I don't like you hurting. We have a workable plan. We can get this taken care of and move on."

There's a pause, and he finally says very softly, "You partly did that to get the tracker on her, didn't you. That was brave and clever, Usako. I'm sorry for getting short with you. I mean-- please don't do it again. I promise I'm not going to put my chest in the way of swords. I talked to Neph a little and suggested something and he thought it was a good idea -- you and me practicing dodging. Might get it stuck in muscle memory that way, so you don't panic and I don't panic. Sound good?"

Usagi settles further, fingers working and petting through his hair. She leans her forehead against his for a moment, happy and content to just breathe him in.

She pulls back, just, settling her weight against his thighs. "It's highly disconcerting." She's mostly positive she used that word right. Still, she smiles and presses her lips against his forehead. "It'll be okay, Mamo-chan. We'll make the plan work."

Usagi bites her lip. "It...wasn't the first thought that popped in my head." Even with a shard of dark energy, she can't lie about things like this! So unfair. "I would have been sharp with you, too. Well, more than I was." A peppering of kisses against his temple, because she's still feeling bad about being so mean!

She gasps when she pulls back, delighted. "Dodging lessons? That sounds like it could be fun! Will it be like paintball? And the person with the least amount of paint wins?"

He's long since forgiven her, so the plethora of tiny kisses is pure bonus, and also a little silly; Mamoru laughs and almost tickles Usagi to distract her away from doing that, then decides anything that might make her reflexively jerk in any direction would be seriously dangerous for her spine. Instead he just splays his hands wide and warm against her skin and sits up a little to steal a brief kiss.

Then she's pulling back and gasping, and there's a flash of alarm that flickers briefly behind his eyes before he sees the delight on her face-- and then he laughs all over again. "Yeah actually, but not paintball, those shots hurt. Sponges maybe. We need to get someone else to throw them, because we also need to work on working with each other."

There's a pause, and Mamoru says only slightly louder-- just loud enough for Luna to be able to make out from where she is on his bed-- "It might also help if I joined the Senshi training, at least. And given some of the situations at D-Point, it would help A LOT if our two teams started training together sometimes, so we know who can cover what in any given scenario."

Something about what he just said makes him shift a little; there's the distinct impression that he thought of something that he's putting off thinking about-- but it doesn't have the same quality as any of the bad things he's been putting off thinking about. Just something a little unhappy. And he clears his throat and blanks his mind and says cheerfully, "Either way, though, giant sponges for washing cars. Full of paint. Huge splats."

Usagi gives a very happy hum into the kiss, brief though it is. When it's done, she's more comfortably sprawled.

Then she's happily wiggling. "Paint sponges! But Mamo-chan, we gotta practice on each other once in awhile!" Her voice lowers into a conspiratorial whisper. "It's the laaaaaw." Her voice returns to normal. "Maybe some of the girls? I'm sure they'd like to throw things at me. And maybe some of the boys!"

Luna has been awake for awhile, unable to drift off again after the sneeze. She's smaller than Usagi and about twelve times as stealthy, so she's curling around his shoulders to laze as she answers. "That may be a good idea. And if it works out, we can see about the others joining, as well. On occasion when they're not training themselves."

Usagi furrows her brows in mild concern, petting his slightly worried face. But then he's distracting her again with promises of messes and his pretty smile! She wiggles again! "Yes! The hugest of splats! We should test to make sure they wooooork."

"You don't," her boyfriend answers Usagi with an overabundance of dignity, "want me throwing paint at you. Neither do I. It'll get in your hair and then you'll be mad at me."

Then Mamoru laughs and noses Usagi's nose with his own, thumbs continuing to trace light patterns over her skin. "Don't you think we'll get enough testing done when we're actually using them for real? Not a lot can go awry with a sponge full of paint that isn't meant to..."

One of his hands does, however, come up to scritch at Luna's chin; he leans his head against her and ruffles her fur. "I'm glad you think it's a good idea," he says honestly. "We meant to actually train together ourselves, before everything happened, but amidst all the goings-on we really didn't get a chance. And there's a lot that can go wrong just due to not knowing what your allies can and can't do."

Usagi turns up her nose. "You just don't want to walk away from that test covered head to toe in paint while I am totally paint free."

She giggles against his noes nuzzles and relents. "Okay, okay, I suppose you have a point. After all, water balloons would be more fun for fun throwing."

Luna ' eyes nearly roll out of her head at the sudden yummy scritches. "Hmmm." She shakes her head with the pretense of settling her fur down. "Knowing everyone's strengths and weaknesses would be beneficial to all."

"Well, you should probably get dressed, then; didn't everyone want to go see about some sale or other today? And I'll get in touch with Sky Jack, and introduce him properly to Kunzite and get a meeting set up with Tada-kun and Hinamori-san, then we'll join up with you guys in town..."

He curls his hand around Usagi's back again and leans up to kiss her.

Then Mamoru takes his life in his hands by cuddling Luna's fur with his face and murmuring, "Smart moon kitty, kind moon kitty..."

She shrugs. "I guess. Can't I just go out like this?" She grins as she says it, because even she knows not to go out in just a shirt!

She's happy against the kiss, almost as though there isn't a shard of dark energy near her spine. And that's saying something!

Luna rolls her eyes as she's faced. In revenge, she starts slicking some of his hair back with cat tongue.