Revision as of 11:36, 19 October 2016

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
The apartment's pretty subdued-- it's not that everyone's out, it's more that some people are, and nobody's really come over at the moment, and the people who are left are generally quietly doing things by themselves. It's Jadeite that tells Makoto that Mamoru's up on the roof fussing with the garden.

The sky's overcast, and while it's humid at street level, the breezes up at this height make it actually rather lovely, climate-wise. The air smells like rain, and the sounds of the city are muted almost to the point of inaudibility. Mamoru's got a tarp spread out and a wheely cart with potting soil and planters and pots of different sizes, and he's in shorts and an undershirt and big garden gloves, determinedly potting a bunch of brilliant blue verbena from flats. There's a tightness around his eyes that isn't usually there, and a preoccupation that indicates the work is the last thing on his mind. He's quite smudged.

Makoto Kino has posed:
With the little box she got at the chocolate festival tucked carefully under her arm, Mako emerges from the roof access door and stands for a moment, taking in the sight of the developing garden, feeling the brush of the wind against her skin and the things that it murmurs inaudibly to her.

"Hey," she says after a moment, voice mild but clear enough to be heard. "I brought you a present from the chocolate festival. Want it now, or should I put it on the table for the next time you take a break?"

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Mamoru glances up and smiles; the tightness around his eyes goes away, but the preoccupation does not. "Hm--? Oh man, chocolate? Breaktime is officially now," he says, standing up and cracking his back a little as he stretches. He takes off the gloves and drops them on top of the rolly-cart, then reaches for the towel and bottle of tap water he's got up there, doing the sort of splash-dab this counts as a clean face thing that is de rigeur for playing-in-the-dirt Mamorus. "A whole chocolate festival, huh? Probably a good thing I missed it."

(He's watching himself interact. He seems to be doing it right.)

"If you want some lemonade, I think someone brought some up a while ago, it's--" He glances over at the umbrellaed table, and the lemonade has long since had its ice cubes melt, so that it's lemonade at the bottom of the pitcher and cloudy water at the top. "...okay, maybe a little more than a while ago. I guess it really /is/ breaktime."

Really there's just something a little off about him. Not not-him, just...

Makoto Kino has posed:
She glances toward the lemonade pitcher, then back to Mamoru, smiling fondly. "It's okay," Mako promises, holding out the little box. "I'm good. Here, for you. Sorry it's such a little box, it's what I could afford." Her smile turns slightly rueful as she says it, self-deprecating.

And then Makoto pauses a bit, still holding out the box until he takes it, regarding him a little more hesitantly. Something off. Not unfamiliar, more like... it's hard to say. But something's happened.

"I went with Naru-chan," she says presently. "There was a monster, because of course there was. Probably best that you missed it, yeah."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
His hands curl around the box almost reverently, and it's very nearly a little-kid smile Mamoru gives Makoto. "Thank you. So much. It's my favorite and it's from you-- don't ever be sorry, even if it's customary--"

The air winds around them like a large cat, tugging at Makoto's hair and ruffling Mamoru's, drying it on the back of his neck; the silence is clean, up here. He looks down at the box in his hands after a second of hesitation, like he was about to reach out and hug her and decided against it at the last second, some kind of mixed caution and self-awareness. "Poor Naru. Wraiths messed her up badly enough the night before last that I had to go in and fix it. That was something-- neither of us wanted to have to do, but-- I had her permission. That if she was that badly off, she wanted me to. It was just harder than it should have been, because a lot of me was missing, too."

Here he looks up and away a little bit, distractedly. "I'll be fine soon." A quick glance back and a quick of a smile, corner of the eye and corner of the mouth. "And chocolate is one of the tried and true methods of fixing Mamoru's head, so Makoto is a wise and clever and prescient imouto-sama."

He gestures at the table, then, and glides past Makoto -- brushes against her arm on the way, smudgy skin to skin, and there's a bright warm flash of gold guiltily latching on ever so briefly before he sits down, himself, pretending he didn't just do that.

That box is getting OPENED.

Makoto Kino has posed:
That brush of gold, of contact, finds Makoto as Mako as she ever is - a little worried, but steady, rooted like the oak that is one of her symbols and might in fact be visible from the roof if the other buildings of residential Uminari don't block it from view. She winces a little in sympathy over Mamoru's explanation of what Naru has been going through. "No wonder," she murmurs, and shakes her head a little. "She's been having a rough time lately, hasn't she?"

A little sigh, and Mako wanders over to take a seat herself, still watching Mamoru as he peels open the little box. Wavers a little over whether or not to ask what happened, ends up deciding to grill Kunzite or somebody later. For now, she offers another smile. "You're welcome."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Rooted. Someone else's roots to help him climb back out, to help him reassemble, to help him remember how to re-grow. That was the guilt: he knows that. And he knows he should just ask. But there's an element of-- it's only time he needs, it's only patience, he can do it himself-- but all the same, those connections are so necessary for the fragile parts of him. He glances up from his fingers fussing with the box's ribbon, and he looks nothing but wry.

Mamoru comes clean all the time, doesn't he? He doesn't hide things. Not now that he has people to not hide them from. People depend on him to be dependable, so if he's less so, then they need to know. (He should come clean to Makoto.) He almost says something, then looks down again and startles at the prettiness of the chocolates in the box. "Jeez," he says, eyes wide. "They're art!" He looks up quickly. "Do they have competitions? You should put your chocolates in a competition there. I mean, not the medicinal ones probably, but the ones without magic in them--" A beat. "--and if I can eat your art I don't feel at all bad about swapping visual aesthetics for gustatory."

It is with supreme relish that Mamoru puts the whole first chocolate in his mouth. And then holds his hand in front of his mouth while looking away from Makoto to say, "Lacrima got me. Usa and Kunzite saved me. But she drains identity. It comes back. But I'm still a little--"

His eyes flicker toward her uncertainly, and he chews.

Makoto Kino has posed:
Competition? Makoto looks briefly surprised at the question, and then thoughtful. "They might," she allows, "I didn't really look for that. I'm not sure I'm up to that level, anyway, not without cheating with your roses." A quick flash of laughter in her eyes, for a moment. "I'll make you chocolate any time you want it. But I refuse to call it medicinal. Nothing described with that word has ever tasted good."

She folds her arms together, resting them lightly against the edge of the table as she contemplates the idea of someone able to drain identity. "...That doesn't sound good," Mako observes, mouth curving into a bit of a worried frown. "But if you're recovering, then I suppose it's all right." A beat. "I wonder if the rose chocolates would help at all. The magic was yours originally..."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"Oh chocolate always helps," Mamoru says, eyes twinkling as he lets his hand drop, because he's swallowed. The others he'll savor, one by one. And hide them from Usagi until he's finished. There aren't, after all, that many -- and Mako didn't make them. So many logics.

"But I'm okay on energy and magic. I was channelling it into me almost as fast as she was taking it from me-- and when they got her off me, I kept pulling it up until I was okay. It's just that I also shoved what she hadn't eaten of my sense of self into the ground, into the trees and air and -- everything -- and it's been more complicated than I thought finding it again. And then there's waiting for the rest to come back, which is actually faster. She'd gotten at Kunzite earlier, so at least I knew what to look at."

Makoto Kino has posed:
She tries to follow, really she does. Some days, Makoto just doesn't quite feel equipped for the world of strangeness that she lives in now. Today is one of those days. "I don't quite get it," she admits. "But I guess if you and the guys do, that's good enough."

There's a discomfort there nonetheless, one that isn't focused on Mamoru particularly. Mako has looked away, gazing off across the garden and the work that he'd been doing when she came up. Plants and flowers are always soothing. "The thing at the festival was minor, compared to all that. Fortunately. Naru-chan was standing right next to me when it hit her. We beat it up after - I met Cure Flora, she mentioned you and the princess."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Cure Flora. "She's a sweetheart. Her fairies nag," Mamoru says after a second, and then he reaches halfway across the table-- but his hand stills; he's unsure of cues. He can't read this one, right now, without looking; he can't, because Makoto's hand is out of reach. He's trying to focus. He's getting in his own way of it. "I'm glad Naru was up to fighting with you," he says, then trails off.

There's a pause. "I called Serenity to calm her down a little. Cure Flora, I mean. I thought maybe they had some things in common, and it seemed to be right... "

Then it snaps in his face. Makoto just called Usagi 'the princess'.

He reflexively called her Serenity after that.

Drawing his hand back, the black-haired boy drags his hand down his face. "Usa, I mean. Luna announced her as Serenity. It's not my fault--"

Makoto Kino has posed:
That brings Mako's eyes back to Mamoru, widened a little in a moment of surprise and confusion. Then she shakes her head, offers a lopsided smile of reassurance. "It's not exactly secret any more, is it? Her or you. You both know too many people for it to be a secret." At least within magical circles, and not so much even that, lately.

"Flora seemed nice," Makoto goes on. "She mentioned she's kind of new to this whole thing; we traded phone numbers. She puts out enough flower petals to make me start to feel inadequate." A hitch of a laugh follows that comment, chuckling at her own joke. Maybe there's a grain of truth in it, though, because then she looks down. "I just wish I'd been more on the ball. Naru-chan said it was okay, but..."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Mismatched discomforts. Mamoru lets out an unsteady laugh, then reaches up to mash the heel of his hand into his forehead and drag his hand through his hair thereafter. "Oh. I thought you meant-- see, Usa's still having trouble with Serenity. She doesn't-- I think maybe she doesn't like who she was. So she's not-- she doesn't want to-- she doesn't realize that she's just part of her? And everything's weird. I didn't-- I mean, she showed up as Moon and then henshined and then just dropped them all and was Usa, I'm not gonna tell her what to do. And-- her dad knows now, and I don't think he's gonna tell her what to do either, and everything's-- really confusing."

He laughs again, and this time he covers his face with both hands. "I'm rambling. I'm sorry. I'm trying to track it all, myself. And then I'm just-- I'm sorry." It's laughing, and it's apologetic laughing, and it's resigned, and it's not in danger of getting out of control, but it's clear he's fishing around for anything resembling how to converse properly. But then he does reach over, more, holding his hands out and open in front of Makoto.

"You're in good company. Or bad company maybe. Feeling inadequate. But you're not, you know. She's like I was last year, except worse, and except more unfair because she can't even try to jump away and because she's not jumping on grenades on purpose. I think something's going to happen. I think Kunzite thinks something's going to happen, with her. He's keeping an eye on her too. Everybody is. And still, things like this keep happening. It's not your fault, and besides, someone else being there also helping -- if you don't know them -- can be very distracting. And if something happens in the middle of a lot of civilians, that's even worse. Just always do your best and sometimes your best one day is different from your best another day. And then you're done with that day and there's another one."

Makoto Kino has posed:
What Mamoru is saying brings Makoto's eyes back up to up again, listening; he brow creases slightly. Oh. Her lips form the word without quite making the sound. It takes her another moment or two to come up with any more of a response.

"...I didn't know that," she admits quietly, faintly troubled now for a different reason than before. "About Usagi-chan. I didn't realize... it seemed to me like she was doing it really easily. Maybe too easily. Like at the skating party, towards the beginning of the year - she kept falling and then, poof! Princess." Mako's eyes have gone a little out of focus, remembering. She draws in a breath and lets it out again. "To be honest, it kind of creeped me out. Now that I'm thinking about it, though, that was quite a while ago."

A beat, and then Makoto cracks an apologetic half-smile, and reaches across the table to place her hands lightly in Mamoru's where he's holding them open in front of her. "Maybe I've been part of the problem, without realizing it."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"The henshin," Endymion says, just putting his thumbs lightly over the backs of Makoto's hands. "The henshin is easy. The memories, the idea of her, the idea of her being the same soul -- that's not. She uses the transformation when she can't help it -- like when she takes out the Ginzuishou -- or for reasons like skating better or having any tolerance for alcohol at all; it seems like she's showing off a pretty dress and then putting it away." It's not that his tone is sad, or resigned; his face is maybe a little pained, but it's not disappointment or disapproval.

He laughs a little uncomfortably again and glances away, and his hands don't let go Mako's, but there's no intrusion of his thoughts or feelings: there's only the warm glow there always is at the back of his presence. "I'm not pressing her. I accidentally did, when Flora was here. Because Flora called her Serenity, and-- I thought-- she'd introduced herself so. But she didn't. And she felt like she disappointed me. And I was disappointed, but not in her."

Then the black-haired upperclassman, blue eyes earnest and warm, and maybe still a little more Endymion than Mamoru but clearly in the process of equalizing, looks steadily back at Makoto. "You're not part of the problem," he says firmly. "But you can help better than I can. You knew her when she was small, you grew up with her, laughed with her, protected her, played with her. I think she's afraid of Serenity being a real person. I think she's afraid of being also-Serenity, because her clearest memory is the Fall. If you can remember more than that-- share it with her. You and the other girls. Make Serenity real, make her not scary."

Makoto Kino has posed:
"I can try," Makoto says, but she looks and sounds uncertain. "I don't remember all that much, though. Just little bits and pieces, and a couple of dreams now and then."

Her hands remain resting in his, but she ducks her head a little, shoulders hitching as though she's trying to draw in on herself. "It's not the same as what it's like for you. You're Mamoru Chiba and Endymion both, but... the Jupiter from back then is someone I don't know. The princess, either. It's not that I'm afraid of her, but I don't really know her."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
Mamoru brings Makoto's hands together, and he's smiling at her, head tilted a little bit and eyes crinkled at the corners. "You're a lot alike. I think Ami and Minako are the most different, really, and I know the latter is because she carries scars none of us do, and some of them are scabs, and some are still bleeding. But you and Rei-- you especially-- are the most like you were.

"You're a protector, and you love beauty and home and green growing things, and you're passionate and loving and lovely, and you care so much it hurts you sometimes. You're funny and sweet and strong and graceful, and the most loyal of friends, and you never hesitate to cut to the truth of the matter and insist on it, unwavering and solid.

"Yes, your lives are different; yes, here, you've had such heartbreak and pain; you had to go it alone for so long until you met Usa-- but your soul is the same. Your heart is the same. And with a heart like that, is it any wonder Neph fell head over heels for you all over again, even across the darkness? You're more than she was, just as you're more than you were when you were ten, or six. But-- she's not a stranger to you. You see her in the mirror behind your eyes every day."

Silently, then, with that same smile, small and a little crooked and gone a little sad, the prince lets go Makoto's hands and sits back. "And Serenity's no stranger to Usa, either. It's just that she sees her as other, as alien and incomprehensible, as frightening somehow. And she distances herself from that. I know there are some things she remembers; we all got some memories back bit by bit as we found the palaces-- but she doesn't see them as hers. And if she doesn't like her-- she's part of her. And it's different from not liking some things about yourself. Because she has the same soul."

Makoto Kino has posed:
The self-conscious blush rises slowly over Mako's cheeks as she sits quite still and listens to Mamoru's glowing description of her, the comparison of her past life to the present. There's a smile halfway tugging at the corners of her mouth - not displeased, it's just very clear right now that she honestly does not know how to respond to hearing herself described in the terms he's using. At all.

When Mamoru lets go of her hands, one of them automatically goes up to rub awkwardly at the back of her neck. "The thing is..." she begins, hesitating as she tries to grope for the right words. "I get how she feels. It's not exactly the same for me, but... even though we have the same soul, that doesn't make that Jupiter's memories feel like mine."

As her hand drops back to her lap, she lets out a sigh. "It bothers you," she says, regretful and a little apologetic now. "I'm sorry. I know what it's like, feeling like there are parts of you that don't fit. It'd be best if Usagi-chan never had to feel like that. I just don't know how I can help her get past it when I'm not there either. I can't just tell her not to feel how she feels."

Mako looks down at her hands, lying loosely in her lap as she speaks.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"It's all right," says Mamoru with little smile, eyes crinkling at the corners again. "If she asks, or if you notice something or see an opportunity-- things will work out, I'm sure of it. As long as she eventually comes to terms with-- as long as it eventually stops bothering her, making her feel uncomfortable, then I won't be bothered anymore. Even if she never really feels like that's all hers, that's okay, as long as she eventually isn't scared or upset by it."

There's an awkward little laugh. "Maybe I'm just more fussed by it now because of the state of my own head. But that's getting better." And then he grins, bright and sudden, and it's real. "And chocolate absolutely helps. Your timing is amazing."

Makoto Kino has posed:
The grin gets an answering smile, only a little bit lopsided, and a warm, quiet laugh. "You're welcome," Mako says again, and lets the rest go for now in favor of lighter and easier topics. "So when are you going to show me what you've been doing up here with the garden?"