2730/Not Very Yelly Actually

Not Very Yelly Actually
Date of Scene:	02 August 2025
Location:	Crystal Millenium
Synopsis:	Mamoru wants to know why Kunzite and Nephrite did the exact opposite of what he said, and they tell him, and you know what he completely forgot some vital information that changes the whole context. There is more personal growth for all three.
Cast of Characters:	Mamoru Chiba, Kazuo Saitou, Nephrite

---

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
It's about an hour after the fight finished. Oh, maybe an hour and a half. Mamoru's been busy! He went running after Riventon, had an argument with him, walked back across Crystal Tokyo while magically texting Usagi, the Senshi, and the Shitennou all about his fight with Riventon and the upcoming sequel, and then...

...then he went and had a talk with Neo Queen Serenity.

He still feels a lot of things about that talk.

He also has a bottle of extremely high quality Bishonen akazake to show for it, as well as his brother's life.

"Hey," Mamoru calls, sticking his head in the room where happy confused people are making sure everyone has food because no matter how confusing things get people are gonna be hungry. "Kazuo-kun, Masato-kun, I need to borrow you two for a minute."

He goes out the door to wait in the hall.

Kazuo Saitou has posed:
About forty-five seconds later, Kazuo is also in the hall. "I've never cosplayed as a library book before," he says to Mamoru, before glancing down at Mamoru's hands. No visible bruises. That's sort of a good sign, since if they existed, Mamoru's repaired them.

Nephrite has posed:
He slips out not a few seconds after Kazuo does, still taking it easier and still nursing the last drink he made himself-- mostly ice and a sip or two left, now. Masato still looks a little tired, but it's undercut by mixed emotions.

Relief, and... Riventon.

"Interest free borrowing, I hope." He murmurs.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"Only in your case," Mamoru tells Masato soothingly, reaching with his free hand to pat the other boy on the arm, sliding Kazuo a look like 'interest'.

But he holds that hand up. "Nope, before more joking, please tell me what you didn't have time to tell me. About the crystal. On the ship. With the sword."

Kazuo Saitou has posed:
Kazuo attends thoughtfully to the ceiling a little down the hallway at Mamoru's comment to Masato...

... and then brings his attention back to Mamoru again, far more serious. "When we were dealing with the Sisters, I learned how to detect and identify the energy patterns that were letting the crystal earrings support and control their bodies. When you called out, I checked - and the same pattern was there, greatly enlarged. The body that Death Phantom was using was animated through the crystal; if there was somehow enough of him there to exist without the crystal as a conduit from his primary self, it would have been depowered by the crystal's loss enough for us to deal with that bit of residuum permanently. If we were stranded - I'd refueled a similar ship before to an extent; with the people and resources there, we could have built a safe space, figured out fuel and solved the problem of returning to normal spacetime. Easier said than done, but doable with the resources we had. He'd armored the crystal, but not perfectly, not with the distraction his carrying on conversation while also attacking us and constantly reassembling himself created. So there was a momentary opening for Nephrite."

Kazuo bows his head a little, rueful. "I apologize for not realizing that you'd be concerned and finding a way to make contact before you were out of my reach. That would have avoided the problem."

Nephrite has posed:
Masato has to take a moment to think back over things, reaching back to the earliest moments in the chaos that led to those decisions. The easiest point to start with, he thinks, is when he wrested some control of the ship from Wiseman.

The manner of his possessing of the control panel was certainly a personal one, and while it had given him many insights, it had also left him vulnerable and he'd paid the costs.

He nods to Kazuo's explanation, of the nature of things-- the puppeteering of the local body, and the need for severing it's strings.

"By that point, I had already established control over most of the ship, and I was able to resist him on that front. I got lashed to hell by the energy the thing was throwing at me for my troubles, but I had my finger on the pulse when he used that thing to accelerate us into hyperdrive, so to speak." He inclined his head. "With previous information I had, and seeing that body reform again and again while there were fluctations of that energy pattern, I arrived at the same conclusions as he did. Just... more painfully."

He grimaced. "I knew cutting power was necessary either way, because with the damages, we were compromised to the point of needing to drop out into regular space before the ship completely came apart. I could see people disappearing through depressurised sections, Sailor MErcury was holding large sections together on ice and willpower. Just cutting the cables to the crystal may have stopped us, but it wouldn't have provided us an opening to deal with the proxy body. We may not have gotten another one before we lost people, or worse."

He gestured to Kazuo. "He's right. I felt the opening appear. Rashmi said it was a choice of despair, and I was the closest to act on it. Riventon and Kazuo right nearby for any fallout. I thought we would have a better chance stranded in regular-space time, with various means between us all-- Kazo-kun's experience, even Haruka-san and I using cosmic winds to push if we had to. But also, I suppose I was relying on the Time Key as a last out."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"Hhhhh it's okay, panic is good for me," Mamoru says to Kazuo and puts a hand heavily on his shoulder, half leaning. And he listens to Masato then, and it takes him more than a handful of seconds to run through all of it to make sure he understood and retained it all, and here in this place he can't get the shiver of the Fade over how much easier just touching someone for the images and understandings always is but how glad he is in this moment that he's having to work through words instead of feelings.

He focuses and frowns and mentally replays the last sentence before just sort of... closes his eyes. "I forgot about the Time Key."

A moment of silence for the prince's dignity as he flushes with embarrassment, taking a step back and letting go of Kazuo to drag his hand down his face. He HEAVES a mighty teenaged sigh, then smiles.

"Really well done, you guys," he says frankly. "I mean not that you asked my opinion. But-- I hope it's okay, that I asked, that you answered, just now. I was just-- I was shocked, at the time. But this is okay right? You can ask me to account for myself too..."

"...hey look what Her Majesty gave me when I told her about Riventon!" he finishes disingenuously, and he holds up the bottle of extremely high-end red sake with the now-ancient revived brewery's label on it: Bishonen. He holds it up like he's on an infomercial, one hand gesturing one hand holding. "We're definitely saving it until we get home. Maybe even until after I break my brother's stupid face."

Kazuo Saitou has posed:
"Is that why you prescribe it for us so often?" Kazuo inquires lightly, but it's with folding his arm up to rest his own hand on Mamoru's. Making sure that the spirit of the words comes through, that Mamoru in his current state of mind does not veer off down some ill-omened path chasing some flicker of nonexistent shadow.

Masato gets his chance to do his own explanations, and there are small nods given back to him in turn, checkpoints at which he confirms Masato's getting his points across. And then - Mamoru frowns. And closes his eyes. And confesses.

That moment of silence for the prince's dignity is literal on Kazuo's point, because he only stares at Mamoru for a moment. And glances sidewise at Nephrite. And blinks at Mamoru again.

"You've had a lot to keep track of," he says finally, instead of how did you manage to forget about --. Thankfully. "And yes. It's okay. That's the kind of thing we should be doing - the asking and the answering. Thank you for doing the asking."

-- then Kazuo has something else to blink at. Twice.

Mamoru really does look like an infomercial model. right then, and Kazuo finds himself in the deeply-unusual-for-him position of not being entirely certain this is actually happening.

Nephrite has posed:
"And look, man, I'm not gonna pretend like I didn't roll some <<fat dice>> on that call. You have every right to grill me about that. It was the least shit of several shitty choices, and I made it for everyone, including you." Masato admits very quietly, and very informally, as if to further signify that it is Masato's feeling.

All the logic in the world doesn't make him feel terribly better about the startled, horrified noise and face Mamoru made on the ship. After all, the Shitennou once thought they were acting in Endymion's best interests, against his wishes, and that turned out horribly. This isn't the same, and he knows trust isn't in doubt, but there's not nothing there. The bottle of alcohol is eyes with relief, colouring him again after the blanching he'd taken on.

On the back of all of this is Riventon's crap, any brotherly stings are being brought out all the more. "Not quite as shitty as Riv's choices, granted. That bottle's a mercy." He sighed.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
There's warmth from Mamoru in the shared touch on Kazuo's shoulder, over a base of 'too many emotions, call back later'. But there's the confession, and Mamoru's growing death by embarrassed blushing his face is so hot his neck is prickling, and then Kazuo tells him that yes, that was a good protocol, and he looks a little mollified because yay he did something right.

Then Mamoru looks at how hard Masato's in favor of the alcohol and what a relief it is for him, and Mamoru decides to talk to Masato about that later; it's just a thoughtful expression, but Kazuo can probably interpret it.

Mamoru sleight-of-hands his entire hat out of nowhere with his free hand, then tucks the bottle inside and vanishes the hat the same way it appeared. "Yes, but it's a mercy that'll wait until we're not like-- very soon going to be time traveling, and I'm going to have to fetch Riventon from the spaceship when it's time to go. Her Majesty didn't want me to beg. She-- she's--"

The prince shakes his head, smiling, and he reaches up to scrub at his face tiredly with both hands. "I felt so very, very, very young. You guys I felt so young." He huffs out a breath, finally. "And I am so mad at Riventon. You don't get to use your brother's murderer's favorite toy and expect him not to feel betrayed."

Kazuo Saitou has posed:
"And half again that when you surprise him and his people with it." Kazuo passes a hand down his own face, and gives Masato a rueful look.

If nothing else, Mamoru's hopping on the Riventon discussion train again means that Kazuo teases him not at all about being indeed so very very young.

Nephrite has posed:
Masato is half grateful, and half disappointed, when the bottle is tucked out of sight again. He shares Kazuo's rueful look with a grim, weighted sorrow. He wears it openly, deflated, perhaps a little hurt, and lined with many concerns. If there is anger and outrage, it is buried deeper in him. The foremost thing is worry, and grief.

He has already dropped the pretenses of pretending he doesn't care about Riventon. He has also already admitted to himself that he completely failed at keeping distance between them, because he had missed him, and because for better or for worse, that idiot feels like family to him too-- and not just as an extension of Mamoru.

"Betrayal isn't even the half of it," Sapphire eyes drop into his glass, and he tips back the last of his mocktail, "I guess there's still some stupid part of me that keeps waiting on him to..." He shakes his head to trail off. Several things could be said.

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"He's not going to turn away from it. I need you to hear his arguments during the fight, Neph, so you know where he's at. I'll show you both his arguments from just now, in a bit, if you want, but-- he's not going to let it go without a lot more than an intervention. He thinks dark energy is his birthright, like our powers are ours. He thinks it's what makes him special. I don't know what to do. I've never known what to do. With you three," Mamoru points to Masato, "We had your consent for purification from when you were capable of giving it, when you were ready and willing, and you've all stayed away from dark energy since. But with Riventon... I am not the boss of him. Which he reminded me loudly."

He shifts his weight. "We should find everyone and set a gathering time to go back, or find out what time someone else may have set. I don't think everyone has comms."

Kazuo Saitou has posed:
"If it wasn't stupid for Izou to have hope about Saphir," Kazuo says to Masato, "then that part of you isn't stupid, either. Excessively hopeful? Maybe. But he's Mamoru's brother, and for that I'll hold out hope for him to the last moment. In case he finds something that makes him change his mind, or even hesitate - then it'll help to have someone ready to catch him."

A beat. "Besides. If one of us is ready to catch him at any given moment, then Mamoru and the rest of us can try new ways to yell at him. Or punch him in the face." He pauses. "Or give his coworker thank-you presents for her help in front of him. This city has an Endymion for a co-ruler, there must be good chocolate somewhere. I wonder which would be more effective. Giving her a box and not him, or giving both of them 'thank you for helping' presents but making hers three times the size of his."

Possibly he is trying to induce someone to send him to go handle setting and publicizing the roundup time. Possibly he just needs a nap.

Nephrite has posed:
It's a small nod that follows, and he is at least bolstered by the fact that they are all just as tenacious and stubborn-- because there will be interventions, whether Riventon wants them or not. There will be pressure, and support, and every stop pulled out. They will not give up on him, but they will also stop him if need be.

He knows that, if Mamoru is saying he doesn't know what to do, the outlook is bleak.

"Yeah. After we're done here... show me." He lifts his eyes to Mamoru first. "As a former colourful megalomaniac with some wild ideas and way too much heavy-handed magic to play with, I'd at least like to clock him where he's at, now."

His tongue clicked as if there were a bitter taste on it. He turns a look to Kazuo. "Get her couveture, and get him compund chocolate. He'll recognise the chemical insult."

Mamoru Chiba has posed:
"I like the idea of getting Glimmer more chocolate for helping than Riventon," says Mamoru, then pauses, then puts his hand on the wall. "Hey, you guys start that, I gotta go find Chibiusa. I-- I gotta find Chibiusa I just realized she has to stay--"

Oh. Well. "Earth Crystal Power, Make Up!" he says, and with an improbable capetwirl from a cape that only fades into existence halfway through the motion, he finishes henshining and teleports.

No interest for the first six hours.