CHAPTER 3

Disclaimer: (I don't own Sailor Moon).

—Crown Arcade Center—

It was mid afternoon when Motoki finally saw his best friend walk in through the doors of the arcade. Like clockwork Mamoru would come straight to the arcade after his morning classes to get his dose of much needed caffeine and a break before heading back for his evening classes. It goes without fail that every time he walks in, all female eyes would immediately gravitate towards him. You'd even hear the occasional group of fan girls giggling and sighing over him, not that he ever paid any attention to it all.

"Hey Motoki, the usual please," Mamoru said. Before he even had a chance to settle down on to a stool at the counter, a cup of steaming hot black coffee was placed in front of him.

"Man, you look awful. Did you pull an all nighter or something?" Motoki questioned.

"Yeah, you can say that," was his short answer, focusing on drinking all of his coffee.

Mamoru couldn't sleep very well last night. He kept tossing and turning in bed, worrying about a certain blond haired guardian. You could see slight bags under his cobalt blue eyes and his usual neatly styled raven hair was unkempt. As for the clothes he was wearing, you'd think it was due to his tiredness that he had dressed the way he did in his olive green jacket and lavender colored pants, but it just so happened that that was his style. It was a mystery why such a handsome man had such horrible fashion sense.

"Refill please, Motoki," Mamoru requested while pushing his now empty cup towards his friend.

"You know all this coffee isn't healthy for you. Have you even had anything to eat today?" Motoki asked, taking the coffee pot from the warmer and pouring him another cup. Mamoru shook his head.

"I didn't have time to eat breakfast today and the lectures ran later than usual." Of course the reason why he didn't have time for breakfast today was because he woke up late. With all the restlessness last night he finally went to bed late this morning and ended up with only 3 hours of sleep. Luckily he woke up in time to just make it to his first class.

"Here, eat this donut in the meantime while I go and make you a sandwich." Motoki said, placing a white powdered donut in front of Mamoru and then heading back to the kitchen.

As Mamoru stared at the pastry, a memory flashed in his mind of the first time he met, or rather bumped, into a certain golden haired odango.

FLASHBACK

Mamoru was leisurely walking to the arcade when, as he was going around the corner he felt a small, warm body suddenly collide against him with a small squeak upon impact. As he was trying to catch his balance he noticed a pair of golden odangos at his chest level. Then as those odangos moved, he saw two long golden ponytails move with them. It then clicked in his mind that he was staring at a person's head and that the golden odangos were in fact hair that was fashioned as such. He was going to apologize and ask if the girl was okay until the person looked up at him, and he lost all train of thought. Bright blue cerulean eyes looked up at him, a bit dazed from the collision. He felt his heart skip a beat. Looking into those eyes, it's as if he's seen them before. He couldn't help but feel as if he knew this girl.

"Oh no! My donuts!" the petite girl suddenly exclaimed. It was then that Mamoru snapped out of his trance and looked down further and saw donuts scattered all on the floor at their feet. The girl crouched on the floor, pouting over the loss of her donuts. Then she looked up at him and glared.

"You ruined my donuts!" she accused, standing up to her full height and crossing her arms. Of course her full height barely reached to the top of his shoulder. He saw now that she was wearing the Juuban Municipal High School uniform, and looked pretty cute in it too. Now the next words out of his mouth are completely uncharacteristic of him, and to this day he questions why he had insulted and teased her from the start.

"From the look of your bag and the few remaining donuts on the ground, I'd say you've had plenty of donuts already, Odango," Mamoru sarcastically stated. As soon as those words left his mouth, he mentally face palmed himself. Why? Why did I just insult her? Am I nervous? As Mamoru was mentally berating himself it seemed that the girl got over her initial shock from his insult.

"For your information, I was going to share these donuts with some friends of mine," she stated while picking up the few donuts on the ground and placing them all back in the bag.

"You know it's rude to insult someone's hairstyle, especially to a stranger. My name isn't Odango...you jerk!" she said huffily, as she walked around him and threw away the donuts in the nearest trash.

END OF FLASHBACK

From then on he would always run into her either at the arcade or on the street sidewalks. He happened to find out that her name was Tsukino Usagi from his best friend, since he was curious as to how Motoki knew the blond and would always be found talking to her and her friends at the arcade. Mamoru found himself always picking fights with her, although not serious in nature. It was more like childish bickering and banter, he did like to see her flustered.

Now, how was it that he knew of Usagi's other secret identity? It was pretty simple. During one of the earlier battles before the other guardians had appeared, Sailor Moon was fighting the youma on her own in a park. Not used to handling her power, she had fainted under the exhaustive use of the power. He, as Tuxedo Mask, had caught her before any harm could befall her and in that moment she had de-transformed back to her civilian self.

To say he was shocked at her true identity was an understatement. The klutzy blond odango that he knew and loved to tease and pick fights with was the one and only Sailor Moon? He guessed that it shouldn't be that much of a shock since both did seem to have a lot of compassion to help others. But what are the chances that the girl he felt he had a connection to was also the guardian soldier who he also worked along side with by chance?

Just as he was contemplating on what to do, Usagi started to stir. At that moment he decided to quickly place her safely on a park bench and hide himself since he knew she wouldn't know how to explain her de-transformed self in front of him. And as he had guessed she was pretty rattled to find herself not in her uniform, and was frantically looking around the park to see if anyone had saw her. From that night on, he found himself paying extra close attention to her whenever they were in battle. He felt that it was fate for him to have met her both in her civilian and soldier form, that maybe it was his duty to protect her.

As he was reminiscing all this and nursing his coffee with the occasional bite to his donut, the arcade doors opened and signaled for more customers. It was around this time that his little bundle of energy would come in. He kept his back turned to the door and waited expectantly for the daily taunts to begin. But when a minute passed and no sweet tinkling voice reached his ears, he knew something was wrong.