"You're in a few. Important sort of guy." Who: Chiba Mamoru and Tenoh Haruka What: Fashion advice, amongst other things. When: Recently. Where: Haruka's garage. Rating: PG13 for Haruka. The usual pronoun-related weirdness, suggestive content, the occasional minor swear, etc. Status: Complete!
Even the greatest of racers needed to maintain their car from time to time. Haruka rarely trusted anyone else with her 'baby', vastly preferring to work on it herself – she'd sometimes let Han take his hand to it, but that was just because she trusted him. She'd known him long enough, after all.
It wasn't usual for anyone else to come in when she was in the room, so the sound of the door opening made her look up. Who the hell'd want to interrupt her at a time like this?
"Tenoh-san?" Whoever he was, he clearly wasn't used to using the honorifics. Clearly Japanese, yes, but... probably not full-blooded. Something about him did look ridiculously familiar. She just couldn't put her finger on it. "Setsuna sent me. She... thinks you might be able to help me with my dreams."
Haruka nodded, grabbing a rag and wiping her hands off. "I might be able to. Depends on what you're dreaming about."
With any luck, he'd be damned thankful that she was taking the time for him. Most people just got thrown out straight away.
At very least, he was quick to start speaking. "I'm Chiba Mamoru. I'm a medical student in my final year at UC Irvine," she mentally filed that away for future reference. You never knew when you'd need a doctor. "I... dream of a Kingdom on the Moon. A blonde woman begging me to find the maboroshi no ginzouishou. And recently, fighting demons as... a man in a tuxedo."
Now, that was interesting. Haruka threw the rag into the bin, still keeping an eye on him. Could it really be...? Setsuna had mentioned Endymion was around, but... somehow, Haruka had expected him to look a little better. More regal, perhaps. "Prince Endymion?"
It took a moment, but he nodded. It was strange, having two names – maybe in time, he'd become more Endymion than Mamoru... "You've had the dreams too?"
"I've had a lot of them." And she wasn't about to start sharing some of them. There was no point in spoiling some of the surprises for him, even if some of it wasn't exactly related to him. "You're in a few. Important sort of guy."
She wasn't going to bow. He wasn't her Prince – their oath of loyalty was just to their Princess, not to the man she'd fallen in love with. Especially not when he looked anything but royal. "Shame that your fashion sense doesn't improve between the two."
"Hey!"
Haruka chuckled softly. "Don't worry. I don't mean it too badly... I just think you could do with a tiny bit of an image makeover." And dear God, that came out sounding gayer than she'd intended. "I mean... if you're Prince of the Earth, you need an image that says that."
Well. That made some sort of sense. Even if Mamoru was more than a little hesitant about taking advice from someone like Tenoh Haruka. Sure, he was an absolute genius on the racetrack, amongst other things, but... that didn't necessarily mean anything fashion-wise. Unless his girlfriend had intervened on that front.
"You're sure you could handle something like that?" He couldn't exactly judge on what she was wearing right now. Racesuits were all pretty bland and samey, even if hers said TENOH in big letters on the back. "I don't want to cut in on your prep time."
"I'm more stylish than I let on. That's why some people think I'm gay." Couldn't a guy wear a purple shirt without being accused of secretly being gay? It was just ridiculous. "Of course, Michiru helps a lot. Sometimes Setsuna-san does."
Or Rarity helped via Setsuna. She could never tell the difference.
"If you insist..." it was still more than a little awkward. If he was lucky, the dreams would fill in the gaps of his relationship with whoever Haruka actually was - he couldn't see a place for him right now, considering most of the guardians he'd seen were female. He definitely wasn't one of his Generals either, because he remembered all four of them fairly clearly – Zoicite, Kunzite, Jadeite and Nephrite. "You're not going to make me wear a skirt, are you?"
Haruka made a face, for a moment half-considering throwing a World Shaking at him just for daring to bring that up. "You seriously believe what that woman puts out? It was photoshopped, trust me."
Or maybe it wasn't, but that honestly led to even more questions. Like how she'd even come close to taking it, or how she'd seen through the field their tiaras seemed to give off. It was definitely a subject she wanted to avoid.
Okay, clearly sensitive ground. Rita Skeeter was definitely a topic to avoid, which made complete sense – he was actually somewhat amazed she'd not made a big deal of that burlesque club that'd opened up fairly recently. Maybe it'd just not attracted that many celebrities. "Got it. Didn't think you were into that kind of thing anyway."
She had a point in calling Haruka fairly androgynous, but other than that? Completely made up. That was Haruka's story and she was definitely sticking to it, largely to avoid any more risk of being outed. "My advice for you, for now? Lose the green theme before you start looking like a Power Ranger. Prince of the Earth or not, it's a little... cliché."
Whilst it wasn't like she didn't have theme colours herself, she rarely used them to extremes. Navy and gold were nice and all, but... not exactly her favourite things. Largely due to the whole miniskirt issue.
"Makes sense. I guess." Even if Mamoru couldn't understand the problem. He looked good in green! "Maybe I should've asked Setsuna about this..."
It'd definitely be better than asking her. Haruka might've made a point of being fashionable, but she didn't know that much – Setsuna had Rarity to fall back on, so it was a lot easier. And probably a lot fancier. "Just avoid the green, maybe go with darker colours, and Michiru and I won't have to stage an intervention."
This could be the beginning of an amazing bromance. Or a terrible one. Only time would tell.