2562/Take a Moment

Take a Moment
Date of Scene:	22 May 2025
Location:	Crystal Millennium
Synopsis:	Future: Crystal Tokyo. After the return from Nemesis, Venus seeks out King Endymion. Usagi was missing, ChibiUsa was corrupt, Mamoru was injured, Nephrite was injured. With all this going on she could use some Kingly advice on how to move forward when they return to their own time.
Cast of Characters:	Minako Aino, Mamoru Chiba
Tinyplot:	Black Moon Clan
Tinyplot2:	BMC: Dimension Future

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Minako Aino has posed:
Nemesis had left it's mark on numerous people. It's only once Mamoru is stable, and the others have been seen to (including herself), that Venus had allowed herself some rest. With a short nap bolstered by whatever caffiene she could find, Sailor Venus left the others to seek out King Endymion in the library. This was where she could find him she had been assured.

The crisp click of heels against the floor ring out as she moves along with her hair fanned out behind her properly brushed and tidy. An odd addition had been made to her fuku as a yellow cape trails behind her which was oddly reminiscent of Kunzite's perhaps.

Upon closer inspection it's a blanket she'd borrowed from the infirmary for a nap. Maybe no one will realize as she looks oh-so-official-ish.

Once she comes to the center of the room she pauses uncertain where to go next so she simply speaks up politely, "King Endymion? I could use a bit of your time, please."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
King Endymion's shade becomes visible standing in front of the monitor bank, looking blankly at it with one gloved hand stretched out over the controls; when he hears the click of heels in the library he turns; when Minako is asking for his attention is when she can see him turning, his cape drifting behind him in a billow of ghostly silk.

"Any amount of time for Sailor Venus," he says with a smile, his hand falling to his side, away from the console. "What can I help you with?"

It's not that he looks more haggard than he did before, it's just that he's less able to pretend right now.

Minako Aino has posed:
The blankape settles around Venus' shoulders again bringing the sides within the easy reach of her hands. Fingers twine into the fabric as she pulls it tight up around her with arms crossing lightly over her stomach so that it wraps around her warmly. She might have been 'okayed' to leave the infirmary but the blanket still felt nice. Comforting. She needed that right now even if in such a small dose.

Looking otherwise composed she flashes Endymion a weak smile as he turns toward her with such a greeting.

"I could use some advice if you have any, honestly. We have to return to our time soon, and Sailor Moon is still missing." Along with his daughter. She almost adds that. Her lips clamp together in a tight line instead as she opts to omit the fact he knew all too well no doubt.

"I'm sorry. I know you're going through so much right now too. You've been through so much more than us though in your experience so I was hoping, maybe..." Venus' eyes droop a bit tired as she lets out a single long sigh. Not defeat, just near exhaustion.

"I need some idea of where to go from here once we get back. I'd normally ask Artemis. He stayed behind in case we needed someone on that end to make it back and to try and cover for us being gone." Much as the Mauan could.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"Don't be sorry, Venus-- Minako. You've always been able to pull through, but I understand that this is bigger than anything you've had to face before." He looks wry. "The same is true for me."

He gestures at an empty chair, indicating she should take a seat if she wants to, and then he sighs. "The only advice I have to give is essentially to keep fighting, keep believing in Sailor Moon, and -- despite the news that's filtered out of the infirmary, please believe in my daughter as well. She didn't forcibly corrupt your Mamoru, so I have to believe she's still moderately in charge of herself."

He crosses his arms and lets his shoulders sag, and he leans against the console like he actually has weight to hold, but his cape hangs straight through it. "But going home is the right call, since... there's precious little left to kill, here. If the Black Moon Clan is still looking to kill, then I'm afraid that's where they'll be headed. You have so many other friends, though -- work with them. Solicit ideas. Get information from every corner before making calls, if you can."

Minako Aino has posed:
Sailor Venus had to admit it was a little awkward talking to an older version of someone she knew who was not just a Prince at this point, but a King. An adult. The fact that it was just his astral projection (or hologram? She wasn't sure if it was scientific, magical, spiritual or some combination of all of the above) instead of his physical body. It was odd all around. It's a bit of relief when he calls her by her real name, and offers for her to sit. Pride or not she wasn't so stubborn as to refuse sitting in the state she was in currently.

With the blanket still tugged tight around her she moves toward the chair to drop into it with an unintentional sigh as the weight moves off her feet, and she can just relax for a few moments.

"Of course I'll fight." There's no question there at that and her smile of amusement makes it obvious he had no need to fear that she would give up. The blanket is squeezed just a bit tighter at the rest.

"No, I don't believe that at all. I know Usagi. The only reason she would give in to darkness is to save someone she loves, and even then, she'd be fighting it. Plus, having *been* on Nemesis..."

The shudder that runs through her is obvious, and unintentional, and she drags her feet up onto the chair to just curl up a bit as her mind drifts back to how that awful pressure and presence felt. "I'm the most seasoned out of all of us and even I had trouble with that... thing. I can't imagine ChibiUsa was able to. So it makes sense to me exactly what happened," she explains with a firm nod. In her mind it was ChibiUsa became corrupted against her will, and Usagi went after her because that was her daughter. There was no other explanation.

"There's going to be a lot to do back in our time. With the Black Moon Clan back there, I may have to body-double for her until we can find her again. That's not even mentioning reassuring her parents that she's okay."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"We don't know if Usagi-hime accepted darkness or not," says the King, looking down at his hands. One corner of his mouth turns up. "Getting her back for calling me Mamochan-sama..."

He's an adult, he's a thousand years old, he's a king, he's under unimaginable stress and wracked with grief and feelings of uselessness, helplessness, and it shows in the way he's standing, just for a fraction of a second. Just long enough for Minako to see.

"I'm sorry, the idea that she even could become corrupted is sobering. But I know I can trust them with each other," he finally says. "And I know I can trust all of you to get them back, and to come back, and-- and help me wake my wife, to fix this, it's still possible to fix this, I can still feel her--"

An exhalation that's like a sigh heard round the wasted world, and the King straightens. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't put this on you, not when you came looking for help. Were you asking in general, or if I have specific insights into what they'll do? Because-- I haven't seen what your Mamoru has seen. I truly don't know what to expect from them. A perpetual kindergartener filled with the kind of corruptive power that Death Phantom used against the people of Crystal Tokyo, five hundred years ago...? Keep her happy."

Minako Aino has posed:
Sailor Venus shifts in her seat to sit upright a bit more when he speaks of Usagi-hime with eyes widening as she realizes what she had implied. "I hadn't meant... I've been tainted by dark energy before, but never accepted it. I know it's a vastly different thing. I don't think she would accept it either. Just that she would definitely go after ChibiUsa--"

What he adds takes a moment to set in. Her hand claps over her mouth with a look of sheer amusement. "She called you that?" Oh, girl, getting her flirt on! If anyone could understand that it would be Minako. The brief bit of levity dies down when she notices the tension in him. It wasn't the same as being physically there but signs of exhaustion, feeling helpless. Those she knew all too well.

"We'll get them both back safely," comes her stern assurance while her hand drops away from her mouth now to entangle again in the warm confines of the purloined blanket. "Including your Usagi." For a moment she looks askance to the doorway considering something that had come to mind not long ago, and now again resurfaced. "If the other Senshi were available instead of having to protect the castle and people I know they would be able to find a way to wake her. ... If you'll let me, I'd like to try to give her some of my energy before we leave. It won't be enough to wake her, but maybe it'll help her heal some on her own in the meantime."

The rest she falls silent to consider very seriously with her eyebrows knit together. There was no kidding or joking in her now. "I know our pasts aren't the same. You've already given me some ideas though. Keeping her happy is a good idea in more ways than one. If she's happy then perhaps it'll help us to reach her through the darkness, too."

"But, the Black Moon clan. The only real insights we have on them are those crystals that power them, the fact that they keep being 'brought back to life' in some creepy way. They claim to want revenge and just destroy but they must have some other *goal* that they're working toward..."

Venus blinks, a single breath sucked in.

"Oh. Oh, that's right. When we were on Nemesis in their Prince's bedroom he had a... A kind of holographic shrine to Serenity."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"I didn't think she could get corrupted at all, given what her power is," the King admits very quietly, "and maybe she can't. I almost hope she can and did, given Nemesis itself, and how she would suffer if she had to stay there-- there's no easy hope." He looks up from where he'd been contemplating his hands again, and his gaze is sharp. "But there's hope. If your Mamoru says she's safe, then she's safe."

There's the faintest hint of a smile at Minako's amusement-- it is funny that Usagi-hime was flirting with him.

King Endymion politely glosses over 'if the Senshi were available they could wake her up' when he's the one who historically has been able to give her the energy to do so, but-- he can definitely understand Minako's drive to try doing something, anything, to help, and he's incredibly grateful for that, and for the fact that she's probably right about it helping. "Please, if you can get through the crystal that holds her stable, please," is all he says.

He listens, though, and then gets this look on his face of incredulous dismay. "Really??" he asks, and it's not like he's asking Minako-- that's a plea to whatever he prays to. Probably the Earth. "Then it's very good that Small Lady has stolen your Usagi away, is hiding her from them."

Minako Aino has posed:
Sailor Venus wrings her hands together in her lap as she sits curled up in such an unladylike way. Feet on the furniture, blanket around her, talking about such very serious things.

Of course even she knew it was usually Mamoru that could heal Usagi, but then again... Often times in her own experience it was Usagi that could save Mamoru. They took turns. It did make her feel better to try and help though; she felt far less helpless that way.

"Of course, I'll give it a try." If anything it would at least help give some sense of hope--That precious word even Endymion was currently clinging to.

His reaction to the news of what she'd seen on Nemesis is met with tightly pressed lips as she gives a firm, solemn nod. "That's total creepy stalker behavior, and that's coming from someone who has had a stalker before." And it *was* good she was being hidden. This does cause her to pull a face as she knows what she'll have to do back in her time.

"It'll make what I need to do all the more dangerous in our time, but at least I'm aware of it. It's no wonder our Mamoru was able to withstand so much. Even then he was protecting her."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
There's a nod, and then the flicker of a slightly lighter expression. "I'm sure," the King agrees with a wry look, "he knows how to dodge."

Endymion's quiet for a moment, regarding Minako, and then his expression is still subdued, but affectionate. "No matter how dangerous, I believe you'll rise to the occasion. You always do. And-- punch their prince for me, at least once, if you get the opportunity?"

Finally, the King says, glancing at the monitor screens again, the ones that show a blasted Tokyo, a blasted Earth, dying and still trying to gasp for life, "If you want to haunt the monitors until it's time to go, I can show you how to use the system. It's pretty intuitive. Or-- you can sleep in here, if you need a nap after that. The alarms will go off if anything changes for the worse or if we're attacked again."

Minako Aino has posed:
Sailor Venus raises a fist from the confines of the blanket with a firm nod of agreement. "I'll Venus Kick him so hard his ancestors will feel it!" That was more than a given. She had a grudge against this guy now in more ways than one.

It's when he offers to show her how the monitors work that she carefully extracts herself from the tangle of blanket she'd gotten herself into so that she can step toward the screens. "Show me how it works, and then *you* go get some rest. You're not really hiding how much you're pushing yourself. Get some rest while you can. You've got us here, and your Shittenou to cover for you."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
There's a moment of shock on the tired King's face, and then a slow bloom of warming realization that Venus is right, he does have his Shitennou. "Maybe they can even give the Senshi a break..." he practically whispers.

But Venus is getting up, and Endymion has controls to show her. The smile's a little more pronounced now, and his shoulders are a little straighter. "I'll rest when you've got this down," he says, and then moves back over to the console and starts showing Minako how to work it.