"I can always find time to work later, it doesn't bother me," she said. Did he really think she was more concerned about working than his health? "But...I apologize for what happened when I left the lab. I never really stopped to think about how the past affected you, since I could remember so little of it myself." She looked down. "You were hurting, and I didn't even see it."

"It's fine," he said, attempting to brush off her concern. Deep down he was touched that she would worry about him, but another part of him didn't want her to. He was a Shittennou, he was supposed to be strong yet he was reduced to being in a hospital bed. 

"I trust Hermes is fine?"

Mercury looked away, still not sure how she felt about the situation that had risen between herself and Hermes.

"He and I...had a talk. He's going to be transferred back to the IT unit as a full time worker in a week," she said. "It's for the best, I think... We just don't look at things the same way."

He raised an eyebrow at the news. "I'm sorry to hear that." He looked down, hands in his lap. He somehow felt responsible for it, as if it was his fault.

As if picking up on his thoughts, Mercury sighed. How was she supposed to tell him this? She barely understood her own thoughts.

"Zoisite, I... I didn't send him away because of you. What he did was wrong, but it also made me realize something about myself. I, um...." She turned red and tried to steady her breathing. "I know that we were....together in the past, and I didn't regret that at all, interplanetary scandal or not." Mercury looked at the floor. As long as she wasn't staring into his eyes ,she could speak. 

"But in this life, I had convinced myself that we were different. Just because something happened once doesn't mean the same thing will happen again. But maybe...we weren't as far apart as I assumed. When we started working together, I realized that I was once again, um... a-attracted. But...I wasn't sure if you returned those feelings, so I tried to pretend they weren't there at all." 

She paused, bracing for whatever response he was going to have about her roundabout confession of her reborn crush.

He snorted at the mention of interplanetary scandal. If any of them had been found out...but they had died before there had even been a chance of that happening. Some part of him still wondered if they had lived, would they have stayed together if they had ever been found out, or would their duty have pulled them apart?

She was still attracted to him? 

He felt his brain grind to a halt. Had they really lost all of this time? 

She said attracted, not love. Did she still love him, or was this a purely physical thing for her? 

"I never stopped loving you," he admitted, his voice still hoarse.

"R-really?" Her expression brightened, and then Mercury seemed to realize how desperate she sounded. She blushed harder, unsure how to respond. "I just thought that...you wouldn't like me like this, you know?" He was very much the same man form the Silver Millennium, but she was different. She was no princess, she was Ami Mizuno, born on Earth and raised completely differently. Her past was still just bits and pieces to her.

"I don't know if I can live up to the standards she set for you. I don't want to disappoint you..." She'd give them another chance, but having it fall apart because she wasn't good enough would hurt so much.

"There are many ways that you are different and many ways you are the same. I always vowed that I would love you, ever part of you and I still do," he said, conviction in his voice. It was true; no matter how she changed, he would always love her and want her. 

"I will always love you." He sat up, reaching for her, drawing her close to his body as he kissed her gently on the lips. 

They would start over, but he could see that they would have a very bright future.