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Through a Glass, Darkly (Chapter Four: Breakfast and Planning)

title: Through a Glass, Darkly (Chapter Four: Breakfast and Planning)

author: Bill Hartwell
rating: teens
fandom: Bishoujo Senshi Sailor Moon, Aa! MegamiSama!
characters/pairings: Usagi/Mamoru, Rei/Makoto, Ami/Fred
disclaimer: If you recognize it, and it’s not from Knights in Tarnished Armor, it’s not mine.
author’s note: I know it's taking a while on this, but after the last chapter, I had to take a break to mentally regroup.
word count: 5,000

Rei sat where she could see the door to the upstairs rooms. She'd had very little sleep the night before, and had had to fend off Makochan's questions more times than she wanted to think about. Now, she hoped that she'd have a chance to make things right--or at least make a start at it. At least Usagi and Minako hadn't dragged themselves downstairs yet, so she was spared the headache of dealing with their questions, too.

A little after seven, Ami and Fred appeared. This time, she watched carefully as they crossed the bar to join her, noting how they held hands like an old married couple, yet he kept glancing at Ami, as if amazed that she was willing to give him the time of day, let alone anything else. Despite his apparent focus on Ami, Rei noticed that he had that familiar hyper-awareness of his surroundings, the way so many trauma survivors back home did. He didn't appear to be aware, yet he always managed to be just barely out of reach when a flailing hand passed too close, or turning to look at Ami just in time to avoid being hit by a falling mug, and so it went, all the way across the inn. By the time Ami and Fred reached the table, Rei found herself wondering just how many years he had been a prisoner. His defensive responses were so automatic, it was as if he had grown up with them.

"MacManus-san," Rei began, then paused, holding her breath and reaching out to restrain Makoto when she saw Fred tensing at the sound of her voice. Yesterday, she'd just assumed he was a typical spoiled American who was taking out his frustrations on everyone around him. Knowing what she knew now, though, she could see what she should have seen right away--and knew she would have seen it if he were a woman. Even his anger was a defensive response, a way to keep potential threats far enough away they couldn't hurt him, and she had, she knew, marked herself as a threat with the first words out of her mouth when she had seen him. She glanced at Makochan and shook her head. As much as it galled her, she knew she had to do this, and she couldn't explain it to Makochan any better than she already had. She took a deep breath and tried again. "MacManus-san, I would like to apologize for my behavior yesterday. It was inexcusable. I ask only that you give me the opportunity to demonstrate that what you believe about us, as a group, might also be true of me."

Fred's eyes registered surprise, then suspicion. Rei could pretty well guess that he was wondering where she was hiding the poisoned dagger. She could understand his suspicion, but at the same time, it hurt to see it coming from anyone other than a youma. She felt Mako shifting and shook her head. "No, Makochan. MacManus-san is right. He has every right to be suspicious of me, considering how I treated him yesterday." She looked at Fred and added, "I can not guarantee that my temper will remain under control at all times, but I will do my best."

Fred turned to whisper to Ami, who whispered back. The exchange continued for several rounds, until Ami's voice became just loud enough to hear across the table as she hissed to Fred, "The catch is that if she hurts you, I'll pound her into next week, and she knows it!"

Rei really did have to find out just how long he'd been a prisoner. Worrying about what the catch is, to an apology, of all things, was something Rei had only seen in the most beaten of her clients. At least he seemed to accept Ami's words at face value. That had to be a start.

"Wow. The tension is thick enough to cut with a chainsaw," the blonde who'd met them at the door yesterday--Sally, was it?--said. "So, who's in the mood for food?"

Ami looked up at Sally and nodded. "We'd like some breakfast. Whatever you have available would be good."

"I know what Fred likes," Sally laughed, "but what about the rest of you? I'm not sure if we have any pickles other than sauerkraut, and we usually serve that with lunch and dinner, but we do have all the usual Western breakfast items."

"I'll have whatever Fred's having," Ami said. She laughed when he gave her a worried look and teased gently, "Don't worry, love. If it's too much for me, I'll just put it on your plate."

"Oatmeal will be fine," Rei said. "And tea, if you have it."

"What kind?" Sally asked. "We have a decent selection, mostly black teas. And what would you like with your oatmeal? Milk, honey, fruit, anything else in particular?"

"Honey sounds good, and a pot of English tea." Rei nudged Makochan. "Well?"

"Oh," Makoto jumped at the nudge. "Do you have pastries?"

"Oy, do we have pastries!" Sally laughed. "Anything from cinnamon rolls to cake. Just name it, and we probably have it."

"OK, how about honey buns?" Makoto suggested. "You should probably bring a plate of them, while you're at it. Usagi and Minako aren't very functional when they first come down."

"Gotcha," Sally said, nodding. "A plate of honey buns, a pot of English tea, coffee, oatmeal, and two orders of Fred's usual. It'll be a few minutes." She studied Fred and Ami for a few moments, then asked softly, "Fred, do you need me to hunt down Q?"

"Q?" Fred jumped and looked at Sally for a few moments, as if trying to grasp what she was saying, then nodded. "Good idea. If anyone would have a clue about this place, he should."

"Q?" Ami asked, looking quizzically at Fred. "I'd have thought you'd be able to come up with any gadgets we'd need."

"Not that Q," Fred laughed. "Our Q is a couatl, from the jungles of Kled. He's as close to an expert on dreamlands as any of my people know. Q isn't his real name, but it's what we call him, because no human can pronounce his real name. Edgar?"

Fred--no, Edgar, Rei had to remember that Edgar also lived in Fred's body--emitted a strange sound that was a mixture of reptilian and avian noises. Meanwhile, Ami was typing on her computer. She looked up from the display, confusion in her expression.

"I can't find a reference to Kled," she said.

"Not surprising," Fred said. "It's a region of the dreamland Q comes from. It's near the city of Hlanith, on the same continent as Dylath-Leen and Ulthar."

"Wait a minute," Rei said, recognizing two of those names. "Are you trying to say those places are real?"

"As real as this place," Fred said. "The problem with dreamlands is that they are as real as the belief of those who dream them. And that particular dreamland has had nearly a century of belief, from thousands of people--if not more--to sustain it. That's an awful lot of power, producing an awful lot of reality."

"So, if he comes from there," Rei asked slowly, considering the awful possibilities, "how much can we trust him?"

"As much as we can trust a cat," Fred said. "Q's one of the good guys. His people have been around for longer than that dreamland, by at least a couple thousand years, and they have always been protectors of humanity."

"Are you talking about me?" A voice entered Rei's mind. When she glanced around the table, she saw that everyone had heard it. Hovering above them, descending to coil around an empty chair, was a creature that looked like a gigantic rainbow boa with the most beautiful rainbow-colored wings she had ever seen on anything. Once it had settled on and around the chair it had chosen, the creature nudged Fred with its nose and emitted a mental snort of laughter.

"Yes, featherhead, we are talking about you," Fred chuckled as he scratched between its eyes. "You should have told Sally you were close to shedding, silly. You know Quella's going to be worried about you until you're over it."

"No worries," the creature said. "So what kind of pickle have you gotten yourself into this time?"

"Someone's created a dreamland, all for me," Fred grumbled. "And dragged these ladies into it, even though they weren't its intended target."

"Are you sure about that? It's been my experience that if someone is dragged into a dreamland, it's never by accident. Even if we don't know why they're here, there is something about this place that they need to deal with, or they wouldn't be here."

Fred pinched the bridge of his nose and groaned. It looked to Rei as if he very much wanted to bang his head on the table.

"Q?" Ami asked. "We know part of the reason we're here is because Skuld-sama took advantage of this dream to bring us here so I could meet Fred, in order to grant wishes that the each one of my friends made on my behalf."

Rei swallowed and shifted uncomfortably. That didn't help her guilt feelings any, being reminded that their presence here was due to the wishes she and the others had made, which had had nothing to do with Fred, despite her blaming him for their presence yesterday.

"I see." Q rustled his wings, dropping a few feathers as he did. Rei found it amazing that, even close to shedding, he looked so beautiful. If he looked this way now, what did he look like when he was at his peak? "What can you tell me about this dreamland?"

"So far," Ami started before Fred could speak, "we know that this dreamland is a copy of Fred's home world, except that the version of him in the dream is still married to the woman he was married to before he died, and he is the emperor of the planet."

"Ouch," Q commented. "Doubly a nightmare, then. It sounds like either someone really hates you, or they're trying to teach you a really hard lesson. Either way, it sucks to be you. All right, I'll see what I can find out. I take it you're staying here while you're in this dream?"

"Yeah," Fred muttered. "At least I know this place is sane."

Q let out a hiss, and his mental laughter was almost loud enough to be painful. "When you think Herzwesten is sane, I know you're in trouble. Hmm. Maybe I won't run off quite yet. I see Sally's brought me a treat."

"Move your butt, scales," Sally teased as she pushed past Q's chair to set a tray down on the table. He poked her with the tip of his tail, and she swatted it playfully, then began distributing breakfast, including a whole piglet for Q.

"I don't get no respect," Q grumbled, while laughing. "No respect at all. And to think that your people used to worship my people as gods."

"You're lucky I don't treat you like I treat some gods I know," Sally shot back with a grin. "But I don't like the smell of barbecued snake. Or the smell of burnt feathers."

"See what I mean? No respect." Q laughed.

"S-s-s-SNAKE!" Usagi screamed, from about three feet behind Rei's chair.

"Snake? What? Where?" Q asked, making a big production of raising his head and looking around as if searching for the cause of Usagi's scream. It didn't help much that he was still in the process of swallowing the piglet, so its hindquarters were hanging out of his mouth, held in place by a set of fangs that would have looked more natural on a rattlesnake. After making a show of looking around, he stopped and turned his head upside-down as he peered at Usagi and asked, "Oh. Did you mean, me?"

Makoto fell out of her chair, laughing. Rei had to bite her tongue to keep from joining her. Ami buried her face in Fred's chest, but Rei could see from the way her shoulders were shaking that she was laughing just as hard. Fred simply raised an eyebrow and asked, deadpan, "Have you considered trying for your school's opera club?"

"Buh...you can talk?" Usagi stared at Q in shock.

"Something like that," Q answered. "I'm afraid I can't reproduce the sounds of your human languages, but as long as you can receive my mental communication, it serves the same purpose. Please excuse me a moment." With a final effort, he got the rest of the piglet down. "There. Much better. I find that people don't pay nearly enough attention to what I'm trying to say if I'm still eating while talking."

"Would someone please tell me what's going on?" Usagi sounded as if she were on the verge of hysterics. Over a snake, of all things! Rei couldn't decide whether to laugh or yell at her.

"Q's agreed to help us learn more about this dreamland," Fred said. "He's our resident dreamlands expert, so Sally suggested we consult with him. Q, since we haven't gotten around to it yet, the lady who just tried to pierce our ears is Neo-Queen Serenity, also known as Usagi. The lady who's rolling on the floor is Makoto. The one who's trying to decide whether she has any hearing left is Rei. The beautiful nymph in my arms is Ami. And the blonde coming toward us right now is Minako. They're all from the same world. In fact, they're all their world's equivalent of my Knights."

"That explains why they're so familiar," Q said, with a faint sardonic tone. "And they're the real deal, eh? Much more interesting than the dream versions I've run into over the last ten years."

"Dream versions?" Rei asked, wondering as she did if she really wanted to know the answer.

"Uh-huh." Q rotated his head back upright and turned from Usagi to Rei. "I've seen versions of you that range from fairy princesses to...what is that human term...oh yes, nymphomaniacs, that's it...in dreams from all over Fred's home world. It's fairly common for characters from popular fiction to end up in people's dreams, though. It's not so often that I run into real counterparts to fictional characters. It kind of figures there'd be a god involved."

"I think Skuld might be a bit miffed if she heard you call her a god," Fred laughed.

"God, goddess, whatever. You mammals all look the same to me."

"And he says we don't give him any respect." Fred poked Q. "So, do you need anything special from us?"

"Nah. I'll just poke around the way I usually do, and if I find anything interesting, I'll look you up. Do you know what the time ratio here is?"

"Not yet," Fred said. "As of yesterday, Ambrosius said no time had passed back home, and he didn't know what time, if any, had passed in their world. That's one of the things we were going to ask him today."

"That would be useful to know. If it's the same rate as my dreamland, it would be 168:1, which would give you a month or two here before anyone back in Laputa would start worrying about you. If the rate is greater, you'd have more time to work with."

"Trust me," Fred grumbled. "Even a month would be too much, if not for who I'm spending it with." He looked down at Ami with the kind of adoration Rei usually saw only between Usagi and Mamoru. It was hard to reconcile that with the fear she recognized now, but then again, she had to admit that love could cut through almost any obstacles.

"Uh...," Minako said hesitantly, while staring at Q, "are you all having a conversation with...."

"With me, yes," Q said, while uncoiling from his chair and rising into the air above the table. "And I'm off. I'll let you know what I find." With that, he faded from view.

"Would someone like to tell me what's going on?" Minako asked as she sank into a chair and reached for a honey bun."If I'd known you were going to have a meeting before I got down here...."

"It wasn't planned," Fred said. "Rei and Makoto were already here when Ami and I came down. Sally asked Q to stop in because he's our resident dreamlands expert."

"So that snake..."

"He's not just a snake," Rei said. "He's a couatl." She turned her head to look back at Usagi, who was still standing where she had been when she screamed. "And what about you, Usagi? Are you going to just stand there, or are you going to join us for breakfast?"

"I don't feel so good," Usagi groaned, but she did sit between Rei and Ami. Rei had to suppress a smile as she poured a cup of tea for Usagi and handed it to her.

"Here. This will help." As Usagi took a sip, Rei added, "Maybe now you won't drink so much, ne?"

"I don't understand," Usagi complained. "Isn't alcohol supposed to taste bad?"

"If all you're used to is sake, yes," Fred said. "I don't understand how anyone can drink it."

"This is your idea of breakfast?" Ami asked, looking at her plate. Rei had to agree with her. It looked like there was steak and potatoes, and she wasn't sure what else, but it looked to her more like a farmer's lunch than anything you'd expect for breakfast.

"Yup," Fred answered with a grin as he began to eat. "This and coffee will keep me going for most of the day."

"So," Minako asked, while pouring herself some tea, "what do we have planned for today?"

"More questions for Ambrosius," Fred said, "waiting for the ID cards Carl is making, and scanning the local airwaves to see what more we can learn about this world. Anyone else have any ideas?"

"Breakfast," Usagi mumbled. Nobody seemed to have an answer for that, so they settled in to finish off what was on the table.

# # # # # # #

Ambrosius turned to Skuld, who continued to study the image in his scrying pool. "Are you sure this is necessary?"

"Millions of lives depend on it," Skuld said. She looked across the pool at him and shrugged. "At least this gives him a point of brightness in this horrible dream."

"What would you have done if this dream hadn't happened?"

"There's always a way," Skuld laughed. "This just happens to be the way it worked out in this universe. I do have to admit, the easiest one was the universe that both of them lived in. I didn't have to do anything in that universe. Their daughter took care of it all herself."

"Now," Ambrosius growled, smiling, "I think I understand all the people who say I give them a headache."

"Aren't you just so lucky?" Skuld shot back with a laugh. She returned her attention to the pool. Seeing she wasn't inclined to talk, Ambrosius joined her.

# # # # # # #

"Rei?" Fred asked as he leaned back in his chair after the table was cleared and more coffee and tea delivered. He paused a moment, considering his question and how best to ask it. "Do you require the Great Fire for Seeing, or will any fire do?"

Rei jumped, apparently surprised that he was addressing her directly. She apparently didn't understand that he was able to bury his feelings - at least enough to do those things he had to do. "I, uh, well, it's easier with the Great Fire, but if I have to, I can use another fire. The fireplace in my room should be enough. What do you need?"

"Anything you can pick up," Fred said, with a sigh of relief. "At the moment, I wouldn't even try to guess what might be important, so whatever you pick up is bound to mean something." He studied Minako, Makoto, and Usagi for a moment. He couldn't think of a thing they could do until Carl got back with those fake IDs. "Minako, Usagi, why don't the two of you get to know people around here? This place opens on to so many universes I can't count them all, so you're bound to meet some interesting people. Makoto, they're likely to need someone big and imposing with them, in case they meet someone who doesn't understand the idea of free women. What do you think?"

Makoto looked up and growled under her breath as she saw Usagi bump into what looked like a small giant. In a flash, she was out of her seat and at Usagi's side.

"There we go," Fred said. "Ambrosius doesn't allow any real violence, but still, there's enough excitement to keep them busy." He looked at Ami and asked, "Do you think you and Edgar can search out the stuff he picks up off the air, see what you can find that might be interesting? I'm going to do some net diving and see if there are any systems I can find that will give us useful information."

"We can do it," Ami said, pulling out her computer. "How can I get you if I need your attention?"

"Just tell Edgar," Fred said. "He knows how to send me a recall."

Ami smiled, leaned into Fred, and gently kissed him. "Be safe, love."

"You, too," Fred said, returning the kiss and holding Ami in a loving embrace.

# # # # # # #

Fred drifted in the net and shook his head, disappointed by how primitive it was. He had expected something more like the network back home, but this was like traveling through the internet the way it was back in the 80s in the US. He kept his actions to the minimum necessary for getting around, and constantly monitored the load on the nodes he traveled through, to make sure he didn't accidentally overload one and crash it.

Not only were the nodes absurdly underpowered, the network itself was lacking. He couldn't get any better than ten megabytes of transfer speed on the best links, and was stuck below one megabyte on most of the links. By the time he got anywhere interesting, he felt as if he had been swimming through tar the entire way. He couldn't believe that the subspace network he relied on so heavily back in his own world didn't seem to exist in this world, and all he had to work with was the old-fashioned wired network that had existed before the first of his children had Awakened. Once he got out again, he was going to have to ask Edgar if he had found any traces of the subspace network that should have existed if his dream counterpart had achieved his level of computer advancement.

Fred studied the system he was in, and learned it was a system that held the data of an old DSS regional office, now controlled by the Imperial Guard. He began copying data, automatically re-routing his trace so that it went through the Wisconsin State Patrol headquarters in Madison. As he had expected, his copy operation tripped an alarm, and the system operators began tracing his entry route. He knew they couldn't get past the state system to find him, so they would waste a lot of time trying to find whoever in the State Patrol had invaded their system.

The copy operation took long enough that he was able to spawn a sub-process to continue it while he explored the lines out of that system, to see where in the Imperial network they went. Again as he expected, the system had been locked down as soon as the alarm went off, so all he was able to do was determine that it was connected to other regional systems, as well as sub-regional systems, such as the state and local police agencies that reported to the Imperial Guard. He made a note to come back after they were calmed down some, so he could check out the other systems it was connected to. Once his copy finished, he dropped out of the system and opened his eyes, back in Ambrosius' place.

# # # # # # #

Ami studied the videos Edgar had been capturing from the local television stations and shook her head with disgust. It looked so much like what she imagined television would have been in the Dark Kingdom that she felt faintly nauseous. All the programs praising the Empress, with a few here and there that mentioned the Emperor, almost as if he were an afterthought, reminded her of the way the followers of Beryl fawned over her. On top of that, the programs that didn't directly concern them were still little more than propaganda, like in that awful "Starship Troopers" movie from a few years ago, that had disgusted her by its theft of the name of a perfectly good book for the sake of spouting the producer's own twisted view of the world. She was close to calling Fred back, just to give her a way to escape the flow of garbage, when he opened his eyes beside her.

"You look like you just ate a bowl of natto," he said, while smiling. "What's up?"

"It's no wonder you think of this as a nightmare," she replied, leaning against him with a sigh. "I've been watching some of the TV shows Edgar's been capturing, and it's awful! It's like the Dark Kingdom, without the youma."

"Amichan," Fred said as he stroked her cheek gently, "I'd go through any nightmare if I knew you were waiting for me on the other side."

Ami sighed softly, love and fear mixing together as she thought of what they'd have to face, both to free him of this nightmare and to find their way home. She pressed into his hand and whispered, "I know it's impossible, but I wish we could have met without you having to face this."

"So do I, love. So do I." Fred leaned forward and kissed her gently, then asked, "How is everyone else doing?"

Ami looked around, embarrassed at having forgotten the others. OK, Usagi, Minako, and Makoto were over by the stage, apparently caught up in the band that was performing. The last she'd seen Rei, she had been heading for the stairs. Ami gestured at the three by the stage and said softly, "They look like they're doing OK. Rei was going upstairs when I saw her last. She...," Ami paused and thought of how to explain. "She seems to have taken my warning to heart. The look in her eyes when she was watching you before she left, it was as if she wanted to punish herself for yesterday."

"Well, that makes one of us," Fred sighed. "I don't want her to punish herself. I just want her to think before she leaps to conclusions. Of course, for someone as hot-tempered as she is, that may be punishment enough."

Ami laughed and poked Fred's chest gently. "You! I don't dare tell her that, you know. She'd blow her stack!"

Fred grinned and nodded. "Mmmhmmm. Aren't I just so terrible? I do have good news for you, though. I looted the datastore at the regional Imperial Guard computer." He shook his head. "It's a MacManus, but it's one of the brain-dead models. As far as I can tell, none of this version's systems have ever Awakened. Either that or they've been put down as soon as they did. I hope it's the first. Nobody deserves to be killed as soon as they're born."

"How much of your special talents rely on them being alive?" Ami asked, thinking of what she'd seen Fred and Edgar do so far.

"The Network does, that's for sure. It takes living souls to create the subspace network we use." He hugged her as he thought some more. She smiled as she realized she could not only tell he was thinking by the look in his eyes, she could feel his thoughts, as if they were her own. "And if his version of Edgar isn't alive, he's not going to be able to use his Ravenfield as effectively as I can. I'm sure if we spend some time thinking about it, we can come up with more areas where the lack of living computers will handicap them."

Ami's communicator beeped. She pulled it out and answered. "Yes?"

"Ami? Is Fred with you?" Rei asked.

"Yes," she answered. "What is it?"

"Would you both come up to my room? I've seen some things in the fire that I need to talk with you about."

Ami looked at Fred, who nodded, while she felt his mental barriers slamming into place. Damn. I've got to find some way that he can keep himself open to me, at least, when he's shielding like that. "OK, Rei. We're coming up."