Rurouni Kenshin Fan Fiction / Sailor Moon Fan Fiction ❯ Come What May ❯ Chapter 7 ( Chapter 7 )

[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]

Come What May--A Sailor Moon/Rurouni Kenshin Crossover Fanfiction

DISCLAIMER: Characters do not belong to me; they belong to Takeuchi Naoko-sama and Nobuhiro Watsuki-sama (Aren't those two just wonderful?).

*I'm setting this story in the Sailor Moon anime continuity (with a hint of the manga), one year after the Sailor Moon Sailor Stars Season. Usagi and the Inner Senshi are 17 year olds and Mamoru is 23 years old. For the Rurouni Kenshin part of the story, I'm using the anime until just after the "Kyoto Arc" and then I switch to the manga for the "Revenge Arc". As always, if you are unfamiliar with any of these two animes, be prepared for some spoilage, light or otherwise.*

Chapter 7

By: Hime

Updates at himes_fanfiction-subscribe@yahoogroups.com.

~*~*~*~

"Some love lasts a lifetime. True love lasts forever."

-Unknown

~*~*~*~

"As the soldier or wisdom, it's my duty to make sure that Shinnosuke-san passes his entrance exams." Ami exclaimed to no one in particular. The rest of the girls ignored her and instead continued grilling Usagi.

"So how do you know him anyway?" Minako was looking expectantly into Usagi's face. "And where can one get more of him?"

Usagi laughed, Makoto joining her. Even Ami was distracted from her plans at Usagi's joyful laughter. Only Rei was quiet as she watched everyone else, especially Usagi.

"Um, well he's a friend of the family that I'm going to baby-sit for."

"Baby-sit?" Rei exclaimed, surprised out of her wariness.

"Why does everyone repeat that when I say it?" Usagi whined.

"Because who would trust you to look after their kids?"

"That's what I asked." Minako butted in with a smile.

"You know, I took care of Chibi-chibi when she stayed with me. And I had to look after Shingo a number of times." Usagi argued.

"Whatever." Rei dismissed Usagi's claim of responsibility, "Who're you babysitting?"

"I'm going to look after two of Mamo-chan's kendo students."

"So that's how you know their father."

"Un."

Rei nodded to herself and fell silent again. Usagi looked at her friend with curiosity. "Is something wrong?"

"Why does anything have to be wrong if I'm quiet?"

Minako opened her mouth when Makoto nudged her as if to say, 'Don't say anything.'

"Well as long as nothing's wrong." Usagi smiled at Rei. Rei looked at Usagi and shook her head before giving her friend a gentle smile.

"Oh," Minako exclaimed as she noticed the time on Rei's bedside clock, "Study session's over. Time seemed to pass by quickly today, didn't it?"

"That's because you were too busy drooling over Shinnosuke." Rei commented dryly.

Minako rolled her eyes at her friend as she began to gather her notebooks together. Usagi quickly used her arm to sweep all her things into her briefcase before hurrying to her feet and making for the door. She slid the shoji screen open, letting in the strong afternoon sunlight that illuminated her form. As Minako looked at Usagi's silhouette, a strange haze filled her eyes, making everything but her friend's outlined form become misty. From Usagi's body, there appeared to be two glowing strings leading out into the world. Wait, not strings, more thin, something like thread. With a strange feeling of detachment, Minako noticed that the thread made no shadow and Usagi herself seemed to not notice them as she began to put on her shoes. Sluggishly, Minako turned her head to look around her, to see if anyone else could also see what she was seeing, but no one looked amazed or alarmed in the least. And then with heavy lashes, Minako blinked her eyes and the strange feeling that came over her vanished. With clear eyes Minako stared in fascination at her blonde friend but she saw no traces of her earlier vision. 'What the hell was that all about?' she questioned herself breathlessly.

"Earth to Minako. Come in Minako-chan." A hand waved in front of her face and without thought, Minako gave a small yelp and fell over backwards in surprise, hitting her head on the Rei's floor table.

"Oww…" Minako whined, her hands clutching the back of her head.

"Are you alright, Minako-chan?" Usagi asked, rushing from her position at the door to kneel beside her friend on the floor.

Minako looked at Usagi, squinting in an effort to see those threads again, but all she did was make her head hurt even more. Waving her hand, Minako said, "I'm fine, I'm fine."

"It's not bleeding. But it does look like you'll be getting a lump though." Ami said as she checked Minako's scalp. "How many fingers am I holding up?"

"You have to be more careful, Minako-chan." Makoto said to her friend as she leaned towards her with concern. "Do you think you'll need help home?"

"I'm alright! I've gotten worse hits in volleyball practice."

"That's true. Do you remember the time she was drooling over Yamagata-kun from third period and the ball smacked her in the face?" Makoto turned to Ami to comment.

"Mako-chan!" Minako sat up and yelled in dismay.

"She's alright now." Makoto said in quiet satisfaction. The rest of the girls giggled while Minako gave the tall brunette a dirty look.

"Well if you're alright, I have to go now. I told Mama I would clean my room when I was finished with our study group."

"Clean your room!" Minako said loudly before clutching her head in slight pain.

"Yes, I told Mama I would so I have to go and do it." The rest of the girls looked at Usagi in some amazement but Usagi ignored it and smiled at them happily. "Well, I'm off then." She gave them a wave and turned back toward the door.

"Ah!" At Rei's startled yell, Usagi turned back to look at her friend.

With an accusing finger pointed in Usagi's direction, Rei yelled, "You're wearing your shoes in my room!"

~*~*~*~

About fifteen minutes later, Minako was lying on her bed with an icepack under her head. 'Hmm, well sometimes Mom's not so bad.' She thought to herself. When she had come home telling of her accident, her mother had sent Minako straight to bed with an icepack, even though it was around four in the afternoon, with strict orders that if Minako needed anything, just to call out for her mother. 'Probably bored to death with dad on his business trip that she wants to mother me to keep busy.' But Minako wasn't put off by her thoughts. She just sighed with content as she took a drink out of the cup of juice her mother had just given her when a white cat jumped onto the bed, jarring her.

"Hey watch it! I almost spilt." It was really interesting to see a cat roll its eyes. Minako sat up, put her drink down, and gave the cat a measuring look. Artemis grew a bit alarmed at his charges perusal of him.

"What?"

"Something weird happened today. Something weird with me and Usagi."

At Usagi's name, a black cat jumped onto the bed as well. "What, what happened?" The black cat was extremely worried.

"Calm down, Luna. Nothing bad. Well I don't think it was bad, I mean…really how bad could-"

"Minako!" Both cats yelled at the same time.

"Alright, alright! Geez. But let me finish before you start asking anymore questions alright?" Both cats nodded to her. Minako almost smiled when she saw the white cat's tail drift protectively around the black cat. 'He has it so bad for her.' Even though Luna was now staying with Minako and Artemis because she got into a fight with Usagi, he was still happy to have her around.

"Okay, so I was at Rei-chan's today and when Usagi was standing in the doorway, when something funny came over me. I saw something like a thread coming from Usagi and going to who-knows-where. I looked to see if anyone else could see but it seemed like it was only me. Usagi didn't even seem to notice anything attached to her so I wondered what was I seeing."

The two cat's looked at each other for a moment before smiling, Artemis with pride and Luna with relief. "It was nothing for you to worry about, Minako-chan. What happened was a growth in your natural powers." Artemis said with a wide kitty grin.

"Hun?"

"Let me explain. As you get more experienced with your powers, you will begin to no longer need to transform to access your powers and abilities. You being able to see that thread is proof that you are becoming more and more like your former self as a Senshi of the Silver Millennium."

"Hun?"

Artemis sighed before starting again. "Okay, you see in your last life, you never needed to transform in Sailor Venus to use your powers because eyou always was Venus. Even when not in your uniform, you could still shoot off your laser or have your love-chain appear. It's only in this lifetime that you need to transform to use your powers because now you are human. But as you acquire more experience fighting and such, you will start to revert back to your last lifetime. What you saw today is an example of what's to come." Artemis then gave another proud grin. "It's no surprised you're the first of the Senshi to get a new power and be able to us your ability in your civilian form. You have been a Senshi longer then the rest of them. Eventually you will not need to transform to use all your powers." Then Artemis lost his grin as a frown settled on his face. "But I think you're starting too early. This should have happened years into the future. I can't understand why you would start now."

"Perhaps," Luna butted in, "this is because of all the battles the Senshi had to fight for four straight years, five if you count the year they had to relive."

"So it's like I'm in an RPG? The more battles we have, the more experience points I get, and the more experience points I get the more I level up as a warrior?"

Luna sweatdropped at this remark but Artemis, used to her remarks, just nodded.

Minako's reaction was succinct and to the point. "Cool." She thought about what happened today and asked, "Okay but what was that new ability I just gained?"

Artemis smiled and said, "Strong emotions, like love and hate, leave a trace of themselves. As the Senshi of Love, what you just saw was the thread of love. You have the ability now to see a person's thread that connects them to their soul mate."

Minako's face fell a little and she gave a little pout. "What's wrong, Minako-chan?" Artemis asked.

"I thought a new power would be a bit more cooler. You know, like a new energy missile or something like that."

After Artemis recovered, he shouted, "You're the Senshi of Love, not the Senshi of Firearms!"

Minako gave a flippant wave to her cat and fell back on her bed to lie down once more. 'Hm, threads of love, hun?' She smiled happily to herself before a thought wiped it off her face. 'Wait a second; Usagi had two threads coming from her. If one is suppose to be connected to Mamoru-san, then who's the other thread connected to?'

~*~*~*~

"ACHOO!" Ryu sneezed right onto his notes. He sniffled a couple of times and looked down at his yellow pad with some disgust. 'That sneeze came out of nowhere. I better not be coming down with anything, I have too much things to do to get sick. I better have Chagashi-san give me orange juice in the morning instead of coffee for the next few days.' As if his secretary could read his thoughts, Chagashi-san poked her head into his office.

"Ryu? You did say you wanted to get to the bank before it closes, didn't you?"

Ryu took a quick glance at the clock on the wall before standing up so fast that he knocked his chair over. "Yes! I did have to get to the bank. Thank you for reminding me."

"Hey, that's what you're ever efficient secretary is for. Now remember that when it's time to give me my raise." She gave him a smart salute and left him to clean up.

Soon enough, Ryu was on his way, an umbrella swinging off his arm as he walked with hurried steps to his bank. It had been raining unpredictably recently and last time he had been caught in a downpour. Now he was prepared for any rain that would come his way.

With a quicker gait, Ryu reached the door of the bank in time to see one of the employees start to lock it. With pleading eyes and hands, the worker laughed and with a wide gesture, opened the door for Ryu. With effusive thanks, Ryu ran in and went to get a deposit slip from the holders placed along the wall. Still laughing over Ryu's display, the employee was about to lock the door once more when three men wearing ski masks over their heads and clad entirely in black shoved their way into the almost deserted bank, grabbing the worker as a hostage. All three displayed impressive shotguns, something quite illegal for them to have, though it didn't seem to bother them at all.

In a calm voice, the man at the front said, "Everyone, put your hands in the air. This is a stickup."

~*~*~*~

"Can I go home now?' Ryu asked patiently, a blanket draped over his shoulders like a cape. The paramedics had given him one even though he hadn't been hurt or cold, mumbling something about shock. In fact, no one had been hurt except for those three who had tried to rob the bank.

The uniformed policeman gave Ryu a blank gaze and saw the blanket before realizing that the man asking the question must be one of the witnesses to the whole event. "I'm sorry sir, but could you stay for a little longer? We need to ask you a few more questions on what just happ-Hey you! Yeah you! Don't cross the yellow line!" And with that, the police officer went to deal with a crowd of curious onlookers. Ryu hung his head and sighed. It felt so good; he did it one more time. Suddenly a pair of black dress shoes entered his line of vision. 'Hopefully I can just answer his question and go home already.' Ryu frowned. 'Hmph, they didn't even let me call the twins to let them know why I'm not home yet.'

"Are you sulking?"

Ryu's eyes widened. 'Oh no, it can't be.' He thought to himself even as he inhaled some cigarette smoke. Quickly, he brought his head up to look at the man standing before him. White collared shirt, crisp black pants, a matching black jacket, and a cigarette in his mouth. The man's golden eyes watched with calm amusement as Ryu's pupils dilated with shock.

"Hello Battousai. What kind of trouble did you get into now?"

~*~*~*~

Author's Notes:

MWAHAHAHAHAHA! *calms down as her cat starts to run away* Ahem. Well I hope those who have been waiting for this chapter enjoyed it. I hope to have another chapter out before August, but we'll see how it goes. Don't you just get a kick out of Saitou? And if you haven't figured out that Saitou was the one who gave Ryu such a shock, sorry. Then again, how could you guys not know it was Saitou? Saitou isn't my favorite character but his interactions with the rest of the Kenshin-gumi are hilarious! You should see the scene in which he and Ryu are talking and-then again, why not just what until the next chapter to read what happens. Heeheehee, I'm such a tease… ^_~

Notes:

Just a note about the Banks in Japan: Actually from what I know, banks are usually closed on Saturdays in Japan but in my story I needed the bank to be open so it is.

"You're wearing your shoes in my room!": Just for those who didn't know or were confused by this line, in Japan, it's customary to take one's shoes off before entering the person's home. Or there's a spot right inside the entryway where you can take your shoes off and store them somewhere. It's the same in Hawai'i because of the heavy Asian influence here. Seriously, we make you take your shoes off before coming into our homes, which I think makes a lot more sense then stepping onto our nice carpet with your dirty shoes, but I digress…

Battousai: Kenshin's shortened nickname of "Hitokiri Battousai". He acquired the nickname during the revolution when he was employed as an assassin. "Hitokiri" means person cutter (roughly) or manslayer. The "Battousai" is for the type of sword style he used to do the killing. During the series, Saitou always calls Kenshin "Battousai".

Hime

5/23/2002