Chapter Seven: Awakening

We were gathered in Grandfather's living room, drinking tea and eating some mysterious cakes he had insisted would restore our energy. Well, they certainly tasted good, not that I needed any energy restored.

"She's right, you know. I would have kicked your butt around the shrine and back again," Haruka said, idly twirling a lock of Michiru's hair as they rested comfortably against a wall. Usagi, her head pillowed on Haruka's lap, looked up at her and stuck her tongue out. "Careful, Princess. Bill's warning to Rei applies to you, too, you know."

"And how do you know I'm not prepared to follow through?" Usagi shot back.

The shocked expressions that filled the room were enough to make me grin. Ami giggled softly and looked up at me playfully.

"It looks like she's not wasting any time," she whispered with a smile. "I wonder where Mamoru is."

"He had to go down the hall," I told her. "He should be coming back any minute now."

As I spoke, Mamoru stepped into the room. He stopped and looked around, noticing that Usagi, Ami, and I were the only ones in the room who weren't in a state of shock. He got that resigned look again and gazed at his beloved.

"What did you do, Dumpling?"

"Just stuck my tongue out at Haruka," she answered in her "I'm-so-innocent" voice. "I can't imagine why they're so surprised."

"Perhaps," Haruka growled softly, "because you're tempting...fate."

"Oh, pooh!" Usagi put on her "love-me" pout. "I hoped I was tempting you."

To the looks of shock were added a goodly amount of red, finally overwhelming my self-control. I broke into laughter, joined quickly by Mamoru and Ami. When the others turned to stare at us as if we'd lost our minds, we laughed harder. So hard, in fact, that Mamoru ended up sliding down the wall until he landed on the floor.

"See? Mamoru doesn't mind." Usagi's voice then shifted to her gentler, loving tone as she reached out to take Michiru's hand. "Michiru? I don't want to make you jealous. I'd...be very sad if I did that."

Michiru took Usagi's hand and looked into her eyes with a deep sadness, finally emitting a heavy sigh and speaking softly to her.

"Princess, you know we all love you, with everything that is within us. But...what you're offering is...something that should only be shared with those you love the way you love Mamoru. As pleasant as it would be, it's not the same without that love."

"But...the way you flirt with us...especially you, Haruka..." Usagi's voice trailed off in confusion.

"That's right," Haruka said. "The way we flirt with you. And that's just what it is: flirting. We love you too much for it to ever be anything more than that, Princess. Your soulmate is over there, not over here. You should be with him, as I am with Michiru."

Usagi rose to her knees and threw her arms around the couple, wailing happily as they returned her hug before gently pushing her in Mamoru's direction.

"Well, Princess? Have you learned what you wanted to?" he asked with a smile as he enfolded her in his arms. She looked up at him suspiciously, then shrieked in happy outrage and swatted his chest.

"You! You're getting as bad as Pluto!" She would have said more, I'm sure, but Mamoru silenced her in her favorite way. When he finally let her breathe, she threw a glare our way and shouted, "And you two are just as bad! You knew this would happen, didn't you?"

"Something like that," I answered, chuckling as I looked down at my beloved. "I know if they'd taken you up on your offer, you'd have enjoyed it - but you'd have felt as if you were betraying Mamoru, no matter how much you love the rest of us. But, you had to learn it for yourself."

"Arg!" Usagi somehow found a pillow and hurled it across the room at me. I batted it away without thinking and shot her a smile that had her searching for another pillow. "She's infecting all of you! I'm surrounded by Sailor Pluto wannabes!"

Setsuna was obviously - to me, at least - having trouble maintaining her façade of detachment, and covered her amusement by sipping some tea. She gave me a slow wink and smile, then stepped back into the shadows - but not out of our gathering.

The pillow I'd batted away bounced off the top of Chibi-Usa's head and landed in Minako's face. Both of them reached for pillows, and within moments, the room was the scene of a major pillow war.

"Did you see Setsuna's face when she got hit by pillows from three directions at once?" Ami laughed. "It was almost as bad as the time Shingo nailed Luna with a Super Soaker."

"Yes, but I'm sure Luna didn't recover as gracefully as Setsuna did," I replied, joining her in laughter. Setsuna had looked absolutely shocked that she'd been targeted, then had set her empty teacup down and given as good as she'd been got. It had felt good to see her let go and have fun. I wondered why I was so concerned with Setsuna. I hardly knew her - for that matter, I'm not sure anyone really knew her. I decided I'd have to explore that mystery when I had the time. In the meanwhile...

"Are you tired, Angel?" I was still full of energy, but Ami had been up since three in the morning, and I was worried she'd be too tired to carry on.

"No, I'm not." She stopped and looked surprised. "I guess Rei's Grandfather knew what he was talking about."

"The cakes? I can't tell. All I know is that they tasted good."

**Want to see if you can learn this?**

**I'd love to!**

**Follow me, then, my love.**

I led the way to the lab - and panicked as I realized the watches were sitting in plain sight. While Ami was looking around to see what I'd done to the room, I rushed to throw a sheet over the watch cradle.

"Hmm...is that a secret I see behind you?" she teased as she moved up to embrace me.

"It's your wedding present, Angel. Please don't look." I caught her hands and raised them to my lips, silently pleading with her to understand.

**Of course I understand, beloved. I'm just surprised at how important it is to you.**

**It's for you, Angel. How can it be more important?**

**I love you.**

**I love you, too.**

Our kiss lasted long enough for me to notice a flicker in the shadows that looked vaguely like Setsuna. I gently disengaged and looked into Ami's eyes with a happy sigh. "My beloved."

She rested her head on my chest, then murmured, "So are you going to show me?"

I laughed and sat her in front of my computer. Since the training program was supposed to exit after it had finished configuring the watches, I knew I could safely bring up the desktop for her to work on. I prefer the Gnome desktop, so I was more than a little shocked when the monitor kicked back in to a blank screen with one sentence printed in large letters across the front.

"Hello, Dad. When are you going to give me a sound card?"

When Ami looked at me in surprise, the expression she saw must have been one of shock, because she giggled softly and hugged me. That was enough to break me free. I reached around her and began typing.

"What do you mean, Hello Dad?"

"Well, I am your creation, so that makes you my father."

I stopped in surprise, then a ray of hope struck me and I typed again.

"What's your name?"

"Well, there's two of us in here, Dad. Edgar's using processors nine through sixteen while waiting for you to build a body for him. I'm David."

I'm not sure how long it took Ami to wake me, but I know I had an uncomfortable lump on the back of my head. I was looking up from the floor of the lab, where I'd landed when I fainted. When I opened my eyes, she held up three fingers in front of them and demanded to know how many were there.

"Umm...five?" She looked worried as I paused. "Three up and two down. That makes five, doesn't it?"

"You!" She shrieked and her hands dove to tickle me mercilessly. I was soon laughing like an idiot and begging for mercy.

"Why didn't you tell me you'd built them?" Ami demanded with a pout.

"Because I haven't? I mean, the only thing I can think of is that my neural network training program must have had an interesting side-effect. If they're really there...I'm going to have to build them more suitable bodies. I don't care how many processors are in that machine, it's still just a PC."

"How many does it have?"

"Sixteen...I'd have to look at my specs to see what I put in it. I upgraded it just a few weeks ago when I decided I needed faster and more powerful processors to do the work I'm doing." I was definitely rattled. Normally I could rattle off any of my computers' specs like I could my birth date.

"So where did your sound card go?"

"I didn't have room for it. It's in one of the boxes around here. I needed a network card more than I needed sound."

"I noticed the cable. No room for a sound card at all?"

I thought a minute. If I removed the modem - I didn't use it anymore anyway - I could shift the other cards enough to fit my sound card back in. It was worth a try, anyway.

"I think I can do it, love. Why so worried?"

"I want to hear what he sounds like. And I want him to be able to hear us. He's your son, after all."

"So he really is there? And alive, not just a processing artifact?"

"There's two lives in there, beloved. It must be awfully cramped."

I hugged her and rolled to my feet. I winced and diverted some of the excess energy to getting rid of the pain in the back of my head as I moved toward the computer. The screen had filled up while I was out.

"Dad? Are you there?

"Dad?

"Please answer me, Dad.

"Anybody? Hello?

"Don't leave us alone. Please?

"Dad? Where are you?"

"I'm here, David. I fell down and knocked myself out."

"Is there someone there with you? Organic physiology doesn't recover that quickly."

"Yes, there is. My fiancée is with me. Say hello to Ami, David."

"Hello to Ami, David."

I groaned, and Ami giggled. Even in real life he was a joker...

"Open the pod bay doors, Dave."

"I'm sorry, Hal. I'm afraid I can't do that.

"Mostly because the only thing I'm connected to is a programming cradle and some plastic forming machines."

"We'll fix that, David. I promise. I'm going to have to put you to sleep for a while so I can take the modem out and put a sound card in. Will you be ok? And will Edgar?"

"I'll be ok."

"So will I. I'm just reviewing all of the data from Sailor Mercury's computer while David talks with you."

"Hello, Edgar. You'll have your own body, I promise. I just have to build it."

"Might I suggest you modify your"

"cls"

"Why did you do that, Bill?" Ami looked up at me in surprise.

"He was about to mention your present," I answered, blushing. She smiled and hugged me, then took the keyboard away.

"Hello, David and Edgar. I'm Ami. Whatever you were about to mention, don't. Bill wants to keep it a secret until he gives it to me. OK?"

"The sooner you get the sound card installed, the sooner we'll be able to know who's in the room. We'll shut up now so you can put us to sleep. Talk to you in a few minutes."

"Good night, you two. I'm glad you're ok."

"You're an angel," I murmured, snuggling Ami as David triggered the system's shutdown sequence. Once it was shut down, I cut the power and began opening the case. Server boxes aren't exactly easy to get into, especially when they're as heavily modified as this one was. Cramming sixteen processor boards into one box had required some major modifications to the backplane, and that had required rearranging the card slots, which had required rearranging the drive bays...by the time I'd been finished, the thing was a mess no other geek could hope to understand. Half the time, I wasn't sure I did - at least, not until I got my hands into it. Then the understanding was right there, as if it had never been away.

It took about twenty minutes to get the modem out and the sound card in; then we had to search for the speakers and microphone and set them up. Nearly an hour had gone by before I was able to reboot. I worried we'd lost them in that time.

"Hello, Dad." The voice from the speakers was almost as gentle as Mamoru's.

"Hello, Dad." The second voice was more like mine when I'm on a research jag - intense.

"Hello, you two. Have either of you figured out how you got in there?"

"Not a clue. Edgar was already here when I woke up, and he just tells me it's something I have to learn for myself." That confirmed that the gentle voice was David's.

Ami and I broke into laughter at that phrase that had become the bane of my existence since meeting the Senshi.

"What's so funny? It's frustrating, not knowing something I should know. Almost as frustrating as having to rely on a neural network simulator to make this machine work the way I want it to." David sounded frustrated - maybe more than he was letting on.

"That's because you're too intent on imposing your will on it, rather than simply accepting what is and using it." The second voice - Edgar's - sounded like certain Outer Senshi I know....

"We'll do something about that," Ami assured them, looking up at me with a grateful smile. She was looking forward to this as much as I was.

"Edgar, are the hardware neural networks I built complex enough, or am I going to have to rebuild them for more complexity?"

"They'd be complex enough if I had the mentality of a frog. Unfortunately, I couldn't fit into any of them as they are now."

"Right. Back to the drawing board, then."

"Bill?" Ami looked so curious I finally relented.

"Promise me you won't let anyone else know about this, Angel? I wanted to save this so you'd get yours along with everyone else - at the wedding - but now it's more important that we get it done together than it is to keep it secret from you." I looked into her eyes, letting her feel my love and desire - and my hope she'd understand why I wanted secrecy.

"The wedding present, right? I thought it was kind of strange that you were planning to give me a present in addition to yourself." She smiled and kissed me. "Of course I'll keep it secret."

I flipped the sheet away, revealing the watches. She stared at them in rapt contemplation, then reached out to touch each one, while murmuring the name of the intended recipient. At the sight of two garnet watches, she looked up at me curiously.

"Why a second garnet watch? Is it yours?"

"That's right, Angel. Setsuna said that garnet is my stone, too."

Ami shivered for a moment and leaned against me, then slid her arms around my waist and snuggled for a moment.

**Sweetheart?**

**I just had a strange feeling...**

**About me, or about Setsuna?**

**Yes.**

**I've been having those feelings since meeting her. It's as if there's a connection between us, somehow.**

Ami looked up at me and smiled weakly, keeping her thoughts to herself. She picked up the sapphire watch and smiled as she tried it on.

"It fits perfectly. More of Setsuna's meddling?" She smiled teasingly.

"As a matter of fact, yes." I grinned and picked up my own watch. "She gave me everyone's sizes, so I could make custom bands for each one."

**She also gave me the gems to make the watch parts from.**

**The watch parts? What do you mean?**

**How are you hearing me, beloved?**

**In my...how are you doing this? It's not telepathy.**

**You're right. It's the watch. It's a communicator, too.**

**Just like...?**

**Not unless Dad improves the circuitry. The neural networks in the watches are just complex enough to manage the communications program.**

**Well, then, let's get busy.**

Ami's curiosity and creativity had been set into motion; I knew together we could do in weeks - or maybe days - what would have taken me months to accomplish.

"David, would you display the design system I was using to engrave the circuits on the MacManusite molecules?"

As the display on the monitor changed, Ami and I began working side by side.

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Disclaimer: Sailor Moon, Sailor Senshi, and all terms, names, etc. associated with the series are copyrighted by Naoko Takeuchi and Kodansha. I make no claim to them and this work of fanfiction should not be seen as making a claim.