[Special 005: Voice] Drafted Again
[She makes this post as Sailor Mercury, because she'll be fighting in that form and it's best to be upfront with the people who'll be her allies.]I've been drafted. I think I went once before, didn't I? I hope that I aquitted myself well. I also hope to be able to fight alongside everyone else this time
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So when he hears her voice over the journals, his attention is instantly piqued. He opens it and takes a look...
... What? That is most certainly not the Doctor Mizuno he knows. Vibrant blue hair, outfit in equally bright tones of blue and white, a golden, jewelled headband...]
... D-Doctor Mizuno? Is... Is that you? [Everything was so topsy-turvy lately that Robert had started doubting his sanity, so this isn't exactly helping matters.] What... what happened to you? [... Is this some sort of strange pre-war ritual she's doing?]
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I'm sorry for surprising you.
[What might be even more surprising is the fact she carries a sword. OK, then.]
Please call me Sailor Mercury.
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Robert is confused, but more than anything he's almost sad.]
... Sailor Mercury. Like... Like the planet? Or the element? [That question is a sad little attempt to rationalize what he's hearing. Not that her mannerisms or outfit seem to suggest either a small planet or a silvery-white metal.
They suggest a warrior.]
... They're... They're making you go to fight. [Robert's tone is small, distant.] You're a d-doctor. You shouldn't be fighting. You sh-shouldn't be anywhere near that... that barbarism. It's... it's disgusting. Abominable. [Robert's voice drops into a soft mumble.]
... w-will you be alright? [It's a stupid question. She's going to war. Wars are never alright, never. But he asks it anyway, because he can't bear the thought of losing another person.]
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I'm sorry, it's probably saying a lot at once.
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... you... you are a... soldier?
[Robert has to stop to breathe, and think. Think about what this means. What the implications are. What is Doctor Mizuno, now? Who is Doctor Mizuno? Which part is the real part?
Is it this one?]
...
D-Docto - ... ... Sailor Mercury. [He falters. He can't help it. He can still see Ami under all that. It's not like Sergeant Lightning Farron, where she just exuded terrifying, where she looked like she belonged on a battlefield stained with blood like all the other barbarians. Ami? Ami didn't look like that. Ami looked like she belonged in a Terran institution of learning.
And yet... yet, she was a soldier. She was a soldier before she was even a doctor.]
... How. [It's not even a question. It's more a statement of resignation.]
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It was something decided in our past life. We fight to protect the planet and its people from its enemies.
[She does not, which would be notable to those who knew the senshi, mention guarding their princess.]
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As it is, Ami... Sailor Mercury says things that Robert can barely fathom. "Decided in our past life". Enemies that would attack a planet.]
... Y-you... ... [Where do you even begin? What do you even say to somebody when your entire perception of them gets yanked out from underneath you? Ten minutes ago Robert was worried Ami was going out to die, and now he doesn't know if Ami hasn't died already, in a more metaphysical way.
He tries to organize his thoughts into something approaching coherent.]
... s-so. You fight... I assume with, with weapons.
... Why can't you reason with these... these enemies? [Never before has Robert met an enemy incapable of being reasoned with. He has no idea that there are some that exist that are essentially beyond reason.] Why do you need to fight, and kill?
... [And this last question. It's clawing at Robert and it comes out more painfully, almost accusingly, because Robert ( ... )
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It's because I believe in what we all sacrificed for. I decided that I want to fight with my comrades this time, too.
I don't want to fight needlessly. But there are times it becomes necessary.
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... War is never necessary. [Even as Robert says it, now - now there's that seed of doubt. Like a cancer cell. He wants to excise it if only for his sanity.] ... It can't be. It's... it's fundamentally, ethically, morally wrong. Everything about it. [He's talking to himself now, and not Ami. He has to convince himself of this, convince himself he's right. Convince himself that this isn't Ami.]
... You... you could t-tend to the wounded there, couldn't you? [Pleading. He's pleading with her.] ... Not get involved in that despicable business. Just... let those hideous imbecilic excuses for scientists fight their own thrice-damned battles.
Why did it have to be you?
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[She thinks of Sayo as soon as she says it. She'll be able to help her now.]
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... And Ami did this, did something like this all the time back at her home. It made Robert sick. It made him sick to think about Ami doing that, because it was just... It was something that seemed, by all definitions, not to be Ami.]
... there are "incompatibilities". You're at more risk than... than those others, who were drafted. [Robert can't help how dead his voice sounds. He can't even really muster up any emotion externally, but inside he's crying again. Where are you, Ami? Have you already gone to die on the battlefield? And will you ever come back?]
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She'd almost lost everything as a result. Her compassion, her feeling, her friends.]
I know the risks. But right now, I don't have a choice. It's the Malnosso sending us. It's better if I go in condition to be able to fight, rather than resisting and being already tired or hurt from their droids.
[Yeah, she's been mallynapped before.]
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She needs her strength. ... to... to be a doctor, if nothing else. To protect the wounded.
He'll comfort himself with that thought, and try to use it to push down the image of blue hair stained with red blood.]
... I... I suppose you have a point.
...
Please, Doctor Mizuno... don't l-lose touch with yourself, out there.
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[Not again, not now that she knows how important it is and now that she knows what else she lost: innocence, purity, ideals, cleanliness.]
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I... I just... I never thought you could... be a soldier.
... it just wasn't... something I expected. [Robert's tone is... disappointed.
He isn't sure what he should feel. Common sense tells him to be afraid, to be angry. It's a violation of his pacifism, of the penal codes of Terra, of everything he espouses... But he can't bring himself to totally reject Ami, and finds that he doesn't really want to anyway.
... Still, this part of Ami... this glaring sore on her formerly-immaculate self... she'd hidden it from him, until now. Knowing that hurt a little - especially since Robert could barely fathom why.]
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[Which was exactly why she'd kept it; she'd been afraid it would trouble him. And she hadn't wanted him to believe she was insane for claiming to have power.]
But, it's something we promised to keep secret.
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