Act 2, Scene 2
Mamoru stood backstage inside the auditorium, sifting through old costumes and putting up recently cleaned ones, trying to arrange them in some type of logical order. The place had been left in a mess before he came to the school, and he still simply hadn't gotten around to fixing the problem in some areas. It was something to do while waiting
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"What man art thou that thus bescreen'd in night
So stumblest on my counsel?"
Stepping further out, it was as if he had removed a mask, which he also motioned with his hands leaving his face.
"By a name
I know not how to tell thee who I am:
My name, dear saint, is hateful to myself,
Because it is an enemy to thee;
Had I it written, I would tear the word."
Unsettled slightly by his choice of emphasis, Minako simply held it to play into her next few lines. ...where the mark of Venus would have been...
"My ears have not yet drunk a hundred words
Of that tongue's utterance, yet I know the sound:
Art thou not Romeo and a Montague?"
With those the many references to names, the conversation pricked at her memories of the masked man with many of his own. Despite the distraction, she continued, and hoped that perhaps her honest feelings would help her along in Mamoru's eyes. Almost failing to hear the reply, she came to her next somewhat late, but acted with appropriate concern as she glanced between the unseen door behind her and the Romeo below.
"How camest thou hither, tell me, and wherefore?
The orchard walls are high and hard to climb,
And the place death, considering who thou art,
If any of my kinsmen find thee here."
Approaching the balcony, Motoki's body became to climb it after tossing away the textbook, somehow managing to equally combine desperation with playful carelessness. However, his lines held also a distant, out of place bitterness.
"With love's light wings did I o'er-perch these walls;
For stony limits cannot hold love out,
And what love can do that dares love attempt;
Therefore thy kinsmen are no let to me."
Minako glanced to the audience, and behind again, before turning to the Romeo reaching out to her, all but to the top. "I would not for the world they saw thee here." The worry in her voice had become much more real than it should have been.
"I have night's cloak to hide me from their sight;
And but thou love me, let them find me here:
My life were better ended by their hate,
Than death prorogued, wanting of thy love."
His hand motioned over his cloak of a body, then gestured to the on-lookers. Leaning in, he placed it on Minako's cheek, pulling her forcefully to his lips. Had it been the true nature of the man, she might of been dazed or confused, but in this manner, she was simply infuriated. With his lack of balance, Minako had little trouble shoving him quickly down into the short fall towards the ground. "By whose direction found'st thou out this place?"
Motoki's face bent into wickedly amused laughter as he still lay on the ground, pushed up only enough to rest on his palms.
"By love, who first did prompt me to inquire;
He lent me counsel and I lent him eyes.
I am no pilot; yet, wert thou as far
As that vast shore wash'd with the farthest sea,
I would adventure for such merchandise."
Landing with a sickened glare, she grabbed the man by the pink collar of his shirt and leaned into his face. "Thou know'st the mask of night is on my face," Minako pointed out. It was the last she would have of this game with the man who was acting nothing like her old crush. "What do you think you're doing?"
"Lady, by yonder blessed moon I swear that tips with silver all these fruit-tree tops --" Laughing again, the man was jerked upwards and shaken roughly. Suppressed no longer, his aura became a great darkness, a contrast to the bright, golden light of Juliet. "That's at least twice you've thrown me down, Minako-chan." Gently, his hand went to brush against her beautiful hair, as she looked on, angry and unsure of what to do.
(OOC: ...possibly the longest post height I've reached on here. O_o; And it hit the character limit by a lot, multi-post~ ^^;)
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Full of self-doubt, mixed with the confidence that Minako could more than handle things for herself on the acting stage, she moved to the edge of her seat but talked herself into remaining there. Rei sat and watched Motoki, her spiritual sense examining him and her violet eyes studying every move that he made. The printout that she held with this scene's lines was quickly crumpled into Rei's fist as the false Romeo grabber her lover by the cheek and forced her lips to his own. Her head lowered, her breaths became more rhythmic, and her teeth grinded against one another as she tried to suppress her seething rage. I should have expected something like this from some MAN that's friends with CHIBA-sensei... She did little to hide her own emotions, but still kept herself seated thinking that Mamoru would stop his little friend from forcing himself onto one of his students.
When Mamoru did nothing, Rei couldn't hold back much longer. Minako threw him off the balcony, and seemed to be taking care of the lecherous male her own self. Her snarl turned into a smirk as she watched her Mina-chan grab the bastard by his half-buttoned shirt and pull him to her face to question him. But once her psychic gifts detected the evil aura coming from the stand-in actor, she could care less what Chiba-sensei did to her...protecting Minako was the only thing on her mind. Taking a half-glance to see where the Drama instructor sat, he was in the middle of a row of seats, dead center of the stage. Rei, however, had been sitting on the first seat next to the aisle, partially for the added leg room as well as distancing herself from her professor and fellow classmate. There would be little chance of Mamoru making it up to the stage before her.
Standing up and quickly walking to the stage, Rei's temper flared as she watched Motoki running his fingers through her lover's golden tresses, Minako with a look of uncertainty in her eyes. "This has gone on far enough," Rei snapped at the dark Romeo. "Don't you address Minako so casually," she said seconds before she balled a fist and slugged him upside his head. "And don't you dare lay a hand on my Mina-chan again, forcing yourself onto her when she obviously doesn't want you to!"
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"The mundane, so easy to manipulate. You don't belong with these people. There's still a chance for you, a purpose. A place of importance, not servitude, not --" In the distraction of his own rambling, he noticed Rei's attack all too late, falling backwards and unable to speak again very quickly from the strike against his jaw.
Minako's hand went to stop Rei from going any further, pulling her back and away by the shoulder. Despite disbelief, she easily recognized the ghost from her past. "Leave him alone. Now. He's got nothing to do with us." The order wasn't to Rei, but to whatever had its grip on Motoki.
Recoiling, he rubbed the side of Motoki's face, leaving a small but easily noticed trail of blood. "Doesn't he?" Motoki's body stumbled forward, "That's what it was always about, wasn't it? You were always, looking somewhere else. You never find real love, you play around, no wonder you're so good at it! And yet, when it comes to me, your destined lover, you just continue to --"
With an angry shout of "Sailor V Kick!" she knocked the body flat on its back before it had a chance to come near again, the legs flying a good distance into the air from the force of his landing. The unnatural presence slowly faded away, Motoki's only sign of life being the rise and fall of his chest. Emotionally racked, Minako looked ready to burst into tears and fall on her knees. "Play dead."
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"Destined lover, my..." the girl began, so infuriated that she did not stop to think what anyone else would think, as she did with her earlier slip of calling the girl my Mina-chan moments ago. Before she could finish, Minako pushed her aside enough to dart out with a powerful kick that sent her assailant flying across the stage.
Her spiritual sense no longer detecting the dark force, her attention immediately turned to the damsel in distress as anger quickly gave way to concern. Holding the blonde tightly, she softly spoke to her. "Mina-chan...Are you okay? Don't cry...I'm here..."
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As she calmed herself, Minako lowered her arms slightly, looking over the miko's back as Mamoru tended to his friend. While Mamoru wasn't a healer per se, he knew something about traditional medicine and could at least treat the minor wounds with his weaker school of magic. "A concussion, no doubt, but you missed his nose." The Wizard's hand hovered over Motoki's face with a light glow. "He, wouldn't... Motoki would never do that on his own." It was all the professor could think to say at first.
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Though as a Seer she was well aware of the dark presence that inhabited Motoki's human form, Rei had no reason to disagree with Chiba-sensei but still did not want to fully agree with him, either. She had no idea what this person was truly like, and was hesitant to blindly take Mamoru at his word. Instead, she sarcastically added in partial agreement "One thing's for certain. He definitely won't ever try that again..." Likewise, it was all she could think to say.
That was about all the attention she chose to spare for her professor or the young man whose head she had buried one of her fists into. Her thoughts were exclusively on her Mina-chan, who was much more important and much more in need of being comforted.
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Mamoru simply shook his head, "Don't worry about it, I might have throttled him myself. Should I bother asking who that was?"
Minako hesitated, and didn't have much time to respond to begin with, as Motoki's eyes fluttered awake. Walking yet closer, she leaned over him, "I didn't hurt you, did I?"
Confused, Motoki could only remember falling before he came on stage, and the strange feeling of something he couldn't name. "What happened?"
Mamoru could have thought half of the truth on his own well enough, but he simply looked back to Minako after hiding his magic away. His hand went up in half a shrug before she joined in, passing it to her. "You fainted after I kissed you." The blonde smiled, amused. "I didn't think I was that good..."
Blinking, Motoki shook his head slightly with a blush, "Oh... That does make me lightheaded sometimes." His blurry vision looked up at the balcony, then across the stage to the turtle escaping the small basket in the direction of his master. "Kamekichi!" Stumbling up, Motoki scooped the little animal up and put him back in his place. "Don't worry about me, it's dangerous outside! You could get lost, and dry out, and I wouldn't know where to find you, and..."
Mamoru rolled his eyes, simply glad things didn't turn out any worse than they did. Standing, he brushed himself off lightly and turned to the all but empty seats of the auditorium. "Miss Tam? Are you okay?"
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"Motoki, you might as well have Dr. Tam look at you, so get 'Kamekichi' and come along." The blonde man was already carefully making his way down with the basket. "You two," he addressed the other girls, "we'll discuss the play later, something's obviously a little more important at the moment." He gave a knowing smile to Rei in the midst of his seriousness, "Take care of Aino-san, won't you?"
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After his little post online a few weeks back, she had been debating whether her professor knew about her affair with Minako and was toying with Rei, or if he really was as clueless as he eventually claimed to be. Assuming that either he knew or knew enough to put the pieces together, the girl hadn't bothered trying to hide things around him...her insistance on the casting for Romeo and Juliet was enough as it was. She especially didn't care about such trivial things when seeing her Minako in such pain, as that blocked out all other rational thought.
She looked down to avoid Mamoru's glance, and noticed that he left his Drama book lying on the stage. Rei resisted the urge to throw it at him, her mind too preoccupied with Motoki and "Number Five Thousand" to bother with Chiba-sensei. She instead picked it up with one hand as to return it later, allowing her other to find Minako's shortly thereafter to give the girl a small bit of silent comfort.
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