Author's note: my spelling check software uses the English of my country (Canadian). Thus I am sorry if many words seem like they are mis-spelled. Other that that, I totally welcome strict and demanding criticisms but kindly own up to it if you make one. I sincerely hope my first story is of passing quality, and I will strive to improve.
PS: Archer doesn't appear in chapter 1. If you are like me and love Archer, feel free to read chapter 2 before chapter 1. It does not affect the flow of the story. In fact you can also read the chapters with the Fate heading and the Campaign heading separately. There is a chronological order but it's not strict.
***Story Begins Here***
Gunshots coupled with sounds of breaking glass. Desperate howls that knew no dignity accompanied the wet crunching of bones. Floating upon a chorus of gang slogans, ripe with loaded obscenities, was a jaded sense of resignation. To Aria Mirai, it was a day like any other.
Lying limp on the long-cracked asphalt of the alleyway, Aria looked up between the run-down walls to either side. The decrepit brick walls, poorly cemented ribs of long-dead structures, had either the generosity or miserliness of leaving her with the view of a single strip of the polluted night sky.
She felt cold, and inched her hands towards the warm, drenched part of her shirt covering her abdomen. Through the familiar reek of trash that was all around, a faint iron-like smell lingered in her nose, coming and leaving like an impatient spirit waiting to take her away. A similar taste appeared in her mouth following a few gurgling coughs, but the pain was dim and dull, overshadowed by her drowsiness and sickening nausea. She wanted to throw up what was left inside her, but she has been starving, and it didn't feel like she had much left to puke. Then the coldness came again, colder than before.
It would have been the same as any other day, except she was going to die. But what did it matter?
***Scene Break***
Aria woke up to the sound of leaking pipes, on a soft mattress, surrounded by a prevailing darkness pierced only by a ghastly beam of light shooting in from the smudged glass high above. She took a breath of the stagnant warehouse air, and let out a cough, but pain shot through her and she nearly bit her tongue. The morphine high was long gone, leaving only a nausea that did nothing to fight the ache from her bullet wound. She felt around her belly, and traced the strapped-down feel to the fresh bandages tied around her waist.
Then she realized her clothes have been changed. She tensed up for a bit at what this might imply, but then let out a relaxed sigh of near indifference. If whoever saved her decided to have his way, then that was that and nothing could be changed. Plus she was still alive, and not that many things mattered more.
All the while outside, the discordant symphony of urban violence played into the midnight. The nerve-wracking sounds of routine mass hysteria was normally something Aria could have easily shut out, but after what happened when she was last awake, it was no longer so simple. Every gunshot she heard was the gunshot that blew through her side. Every angry profanity came from the gangster that fired on her with no reason. Every scream belonged to the same children that were cut apart by crossfire in front of her eyes. Even all the lights in the streets looked like the raging fires that swallowed house after worn-down house...
She opened her eyes again, and the day was still dark. She seemed to have fallen asleep while thinking back on what happened to her. Or perhaps she fell back asleep first, and the sounds of street violence played with her sleeping mind. But either way, even if her recollection was within her dream, it was nevertheless an accurate account for what happened. Bandits and rioters, vicious gangsters all, went into a frenzy and shot anything that moved. Houses were razed, children were killed, and Aria herself was shot and left for dead.
Those punks were really stupid, Aria thought to herself. If they found the morphine on her, they might have made a few extra bucks, or get out a good shot, if they were into it. She breathed nervously and groped her pockets. Then she froze, and swore loudly, her shrill voice reverberating within the walls.
"Shhh! Quiet!"
Aria was startled, the tense muscle around her wound causing her a great deal of pain. She collapsed back onto the mattress, and understood that whoever was speaking in the dark must have been the man who brought her here.
"Do you have my morphine?"
"Lower your voice!" The young man's voice hissed. "And yes I took it. It's bad for you."
Aria became agitated. "Yeah, no shit" As she twitched about, she put a hand on her stomach to alleviate the torturous pain.
"Morphine makes you breath slower, decreasing the amount of oxygen delivered to your body. This effect slowly kills you over the course of about thirty years."
"Thirty years." Aria scoffed bitterly. "I'm going to be dead when I'm thirty."
"Not if I can help it."
"Thank you for the lecture, alright? Here you are dressed up all tidy, like one of those nobles that sell me this crap, and you're telling me to-" Her voice trailed off as she let out a hacking cough.
"I'm not a noble, that's for sure. I don't own any gangs."
"Then what's with all the big talk?"
"Never mind that. You're hurt, and should rest."
"Just what do you want?"
"Take care of you." There was a creepy seriousness to his voice.
"Huh." Aria scoffed. It would be a ridiculous idea, seeing how stupid he sounded. She stopped talking back, and closed her eyes to sleep.
***Scene Break***
The dull greyness of noon beamed into the warehouse as the young man opened a tiny crack in the doors. Strings of light spiked out from the door's edges, flash-lighting the dust that floated all around. Aria would have still slept, but the squealing of the door woke her up. Scrubbing her eyes, she rolled her legs off the mattress and slowly sat up, prodded by the nagging pain in her side.
"The hell do you want?" She was annoyed. This man obviously wanted something, and Aria was tired of trying to guess. Maybe she was being ungrateful, but so what? Here was a guy who has stripped her while she was out cold, said weird things, and is now keeping her in a dark room like looted furniture. Who wouldn't be upset?
No answer from the silhouette in the leaking light. A stupid, awkward boy, that's what he had to be. If he's not a noble, then he must have looted and read a book or two. He's probably a rat a like herself, living in a dark corner of the city fringe, prying some kind of trade that has kept him alive till now.
Aria stood up and slowly made for the door. "This is the last time I'm going to ask. What exactly do you want from me?"
She saw nothing more than a stir from the man; apparently he still didn't get the point. "I'm going to leave," she declared, "so it's your last chance to fess up. If you don't talk straight, then I don't owe you anything."
Even as the man began to make his motion to stop her from going out, Aria turned around at gave a hard stare at the air around him. A small burst of flame popped in front of the man's face, and he staggered back several steps. Aria made for the door, as fast as her injured body would allow. She counted on the creep being surprised at her being a mage; usually a flash show like this against unwary strangers would slow them down enough for her to get away.
"Wait!" The young man was up on his feet in an instant, showing no signs of shock. An unusually commanding tone weaved its way into his meek speech, compelling Aria for a moment to stop in her tracks.
"If you are sure you want to leave, I cannot stop you. But I strongly advise you not to at this time."
"Why?" Even as she asked, Aria wondered if she should have just ignored him and walked out instead.
"You will not believe this, but there is a war that is going on in the world outside."
"What?" Aria couldn't believe her ears. Time to just turn around and leave, she thought to herself. More words on this weirdo would just be a waste.
The streets outside were quiet under the dull grey sky, but Aria did not find them empty. The cracked asphalt was strewn with pieces of broken bodies, bones and innards crushed beyond recognition. As the strange-talking man followed her outside, their eyes stopped at the only pair of living souls in the tableau. Perched on a massive piece of rubble carved out from the roadside ruins, a lean, gaunt women stood beside a red-haired young man, about as old as the one on Aria's side.
The redhead fixed his cold glare on Aria and the man behind her. At a light gesture from his hand, the lean woman charged forward, brandishing her bladed gauntlets. Her eyes was glowing a bright red, and her mouth hung half open, as if unable to contain the ruthlessness within her. Aria reacted quickly to her murderous intent, casting a burst of exploding air in front of the assailant in the same way she did in the warehouse a minute ago. But the weak pop of fire did little to slow the attacker down, and the killer's fist was now but a hair's length from Aria's head.
A pistol headshot from Aria's tailgater had the dangerous woman briefly stunned. "Get away, now!" He shouted, grabbing Aria by the wrist and giving her a tug. Aria's reactions were fast, and did not miss the beat as she did an about-face and raced down the street, with her twice-time life-saver running closely behind her. Pain shot through her body, but she instinctively suppressed it and kept on. An explosion rocked the avenue behind them, but they did not look back. They ran for several blocks until the man told Aria to stop and step off the road. Again he spoke with his clipped and commanding tone, and the thought of contradicting him never crossed Aria's mind until a while after she did what she was told. Probably the wound is dulling my senses with pain, she thought. It took all her effort to push the terrible pain to a corner of her mind - she simply didn't have the energy to bicker with the creep.
"Take cover here," he told her, climbing through the broken front glass of a long-abandoned eatery. Aria followed behind, carefully avoiding cutting herself on the jagged glass. The chairs and tables inside have long been looted clean, leaving only the half-broken counter near the door. Aria helped herself to it, propping herself against it in near collapse. She suddenly felt a compulsive agitation that was separate from the pain of her injuries. Realizing the source of her discomfort, she turned back towards the strange man.
"Give me my shit, won't you?"
The man answered with a parade of horribles. "Morphine is a depressant chemical that breaks your kidneys, lowers your breathing, increases pressure in your head, and poisons your blood to lethal levels..."
"Fuck you." Aria moaned, slipping into her uncouth alley-speak as she sank down on the ground. She has been trying to quit for a while now, but she had a craving coming on. She couldn't fight it on her own, but nor did she want to go to this big-talking bastard for his problems.
"...it is highly addictive, making you consistently break your promises to yourself to quit. It induces euphoria, compelling you to introduce the substance to what few friends you have made without forethought. It makes you unable to use magic, and hence unable to save people around you." His tone was cruelly factual, expounding on everything his apparent victim did not want to face. Finally to rub it all in, he added, "nevertheless, if you absolutely order me to give it back to you, I will comply."
"Are you done?" Despite her best efforts to sound indifferent, the remark came out in sobs.
***Scene Break***
In spite of the chaotic gang rivalries that raged nightly in the streets of the slums, the modest hideout went on unmolested for the next two days. But to Aria Mirai, a world of hurt was already with her, right on the scavenged mattress where she lay. The withdrawal symptoms started with a terrible nausea, but quickly ramped up to the feeling that her innards were ripping themselves apart. The mysterious man watched over her, cleaning her sheets by the hour as her body continued to expel fluids of all kinds. All the while she simply lay there, sometimes kicking her legs involuntarily, phasing in and out of coherence and consciousness, and feeling a sense of shameful gratefulness whenever lucidity returned. For the entire time the man went about his caretaking, never once flinching at the obviously distasteful task.
"Sorry, your name again?" Aria asked weakly for the third time on the same day, as a tantalizing shred of clarity paid her mind another brief visitation.
"Heinz."
"Heinz." She managed to roll the name on her tongue before the pain in her abdomen exploded once more, the chemical imbalance mixing in with the hurt of bullet trauma. Heinz gave her his hand, and she squeezed it as hard as she could. As the pain slowly abated, her tired body collapsed into sleep once again.
***Scene Break***
Aria held a gun in her hand, the rare kind used only by the bodyguards of the most powerful nobles. Thunderous shocks echoed all around her, and chunks of cemented ceiling crashed down not far from where she hunched. Then there was an ominous buzz and another explosion. Figures emerged from an adjacent building; but with a deafening sound and a burst of fire and smoke, the poor bastards had their skins coating the cracked pavement. Opposing figures emerged from another structure across the street, and the heads of several of them promptly exploded.
She had to do something - she could not stand watching people die. She tried to cast spells somehow, around the gun-totting gangsters firing on each other, so that all their weapons would melt in their hands. But her magic just wasn't strong enough - it was as if her intervention had no effect at all. As the structure continued to slowly collapse piece by piece, she jumped out a broken window, and into the rubble-filled street. She landed behind an odd barricade of strange bags. The oddly-dressed gangsters crouching behind the silly wall turned around at her and simply nodded stoically, as if all emotions have been stripped from their eyes. As she struggled to make sense of her surroundings, she heard a sickening crunch from behind her. She turned around, and saw that someone behind her has been shot dead, lying face-up with a bullet hole neatly placed in his forehead.
Aria ducked down in alarm. How did the bullet find its way to the man behind her, without having hit her first? Then it occurred to her that the gunmen around her weren't greeting HER at all - they were addressing the now-dead man behind her. Confirming her haunch, the crouching gangsters turned around and cast startled glances at the body of their slain leader, their gazes passing right through her.
More gunfire; men from a different gang charged down the street, and were mowed down as soon as they came into the open. Aria waved and screamed at everyone around her, and even tried to tackle a few. But her voice and touch went right through everyone, as if they ... as if SHE was a spectre.
She dreamed on, a mute witness to troubling scenes that she struggled to understand.
***Scene Break***
Aria woke up in a fresh robe the next morning, greeted by a body full of aches. But as she lay there quietly, keeping her eyes closed for a measure of peace and respite. She soon noticed that the spiking bursts of agony and spasms did not return, and she exhaled loudly with a sense of relief.
She opened her eyes, saw that Heinz has fallen asleep on the floor beside her, and took a good look at him for the first time. His long black hair tangled in a mess around his lean head, and his rounded chin was tucked towards his neck. He looked young; younger than her, perhaps just over twenty. Aria thought back to the last several days, and blushed inside.
When Heinz woke, he got to his feet in a few blinks. Even fresh from sleep, his grey eyes looked energetic and radiant.
"How do you feel?"
"Better..." Aria managed a faint but sincere smile. "...thanks."
"You did it." He extended his hand.
Aria took it, and dragged herself up. The feeling of airborne mana around her felt stronger than ever, and she knew that she won't be missing what she put behind.
"I, uh, don't know what else to say." Aria tried to put on her usual aloof face. "I owe you this, I guess."
"I suppose." Heinz chuckled good-naturedly. "True, that it would be impossible to quit it yourself and survive. I found no syringes on you, so I knew you were already trying." He shrugged. "Anyhow, that's behind you now."
"Why did you save me so many times?" She hasn't seen a nice person for quite a while, and she still had the urge to feel slightly suspicious despite all that's happened.
"I guess I have the same wishes as you." Heinz shrugged again. "I don't like to see people die from wars and struggles."
Aria frowned. War. Again with that word. "Why do you keep saying that? There is no such thing as war anymore. The concept died before you were born."
"Oh, no." Heinz looked up solemnly. "There are still wars, fought in places you can't readily see."
Aria felt inclined to take his words seriously, but it was hard to grasp. "I've read a bit of history here and there, and I know that ever since the Omega Event, war has become impossible somehow. You must have heard of that story too, right?"
"War has become impossible." Heinz repeated her words thoughtfully. "Do you know why they say that?"
Aria looked at him and widened her eyes, inviting Heinz to elaborate.
"When scholars talk about wars," Heinz continued, "they mean a series of deadly conflicts that put thousands of lives on the line at once. People think that's no longer possible today, because humanity has been reduced to clumps of survivor settlements centred around their former cities. People only say that wars are impossible, only because it doesn't seem possible anymore to kill large groups of people at once in an organized or routine fashion."
"Basically," he continued, seeing Aria's struggle to understand. "if two gangs had a million people each, and fought each other, there'd be a war. But since gangs don't involve more than a few hundred people, there can't be wars."
"Right, I get that." Aria nodded. "Because not enough people can be killed for the same reason at the same time."
"Precisely. But that's only what people THINK." Heinz paused and let his words sink in. "But the truth is, in the face of a source of magical power you haven't heard about, the lives of everyone in the world dangles by a thread."
"There's a mage that can kill everyone in the world with a spell?" Aria thought she could understand and perhaps imagine what Heinz was saying, but she still could not believe her ears.
"Not a mage." Heinz shook his head in a matter-of-fact manner. Glancing around to make sure no one snooped outside of their shelter, he lowered his voice and spoke with deadly earnest.
"Not a person, but an existence known as the Holy Grail."
"What's that?" Aria opened her mind as much as she could, as she prepared for stranger and stranger stories.
Heinz rubbed his chin, seemingly thinking of a good place to start. "You've heard of the Association of Mages?"
"No, not really."
"It means exactly what it sounds - an organization of mages. You can think of them as a gang, except their members are found in every city of the world."
"That's a big group of people. How come I've never seen even one?"
"They hide themselves for safety. As you know, most people don't know magic, and would likely hurt a mage out of paranoia. This group wants to make sure that not too many non-magic users become aware of magic, just so that magi can be kept safe."
"Makes sense." Aria understood, but she didn't see where it was going.
"But," Heinz continued, "preservation is not their greatest goal. The greatest goal of any mage is to become so well-versed in magic, that his or her very existence can come face-to-face with the ultimate truth." Seeing the confused look on Aria's face, he elaborated. "People in the association believe that there is some entity, beyond our imagination, that provides a cause for the universe and everything within it. Everything there is, including people, things, ideas, and events, are believed to be born out of this mysterious entity, and are believed to return to this entity after they disappear from the universe. Typical magi want to see this entity for themselves, and through its infinite knowledge, attain great power."
"So it's like a spirit world."
"Yes, but not in the loose sense talked about in common language. This spiritual world is not some invisible realm with fairies that a good mage can tap into. This spiritual world, if it can be called that at all, is so much more enlightening and far removed from common life, that anyone who manages to see this entity could obtain enough knowledge to change the world however he or she wanted."
Aria's eyes lit up cautiously. "So those magi are trying to find something that'll let them grant their own wishes?"
"Exactly." Heinz gave a vigorous nod. "That entity they seek is called the Root, and the general name of any means for a mage to reach the Root, is called a Holy Grail."
"Where does the 'war' come in?" Aria asked, making an effort to return to the original topic of discussion.
"One of the greatest sufferings of Man is the drought of imagination..." Heinz caught himself in the middle of a dreamy declaration, and carried on with a straight face. "It is nearly impossible for a sane mind to conceive of how to create a Holy Grail. Furthermore, most Holy Grails supplied by the imagination of a mediocre mage will fail flat out. Therefore, it is much easier for the common mage to find and hijack someone else's Grail, rather than making their own. This is where war arises. Many mages will fight over a handful of Grails, out of sight from the rest of the world. If a war is a conflict that puts more than thousands of lives at risk, then this can be called a war because the stakes are as high as what Man can conceive. A winner of the war may be able to wish away millions of lives, or even the very natures that allow us to exist."
"And I guess they are fighting over Grails even now?"
"They are. And in time, someone will win."
"But if the winner makes a good wish..." Aria suggested, trying to sound hopeful.
"Do you know what has happened the second last time someone won a true Grail?"
Aria was silent. She was afraid to know.
"The world went from the green and blue planet your grandparents knew, to this grey ruin that you see now."
So the whole world as it is, came from someone's wish? Aria was speechless and she reeled in shock. So the misery in the slum-dwellers that she lived amongst, the pointlessness of their lives, and the gang-ruled society around them, were all arbitrary things wished on a whim. How could this be believed? Perhaps Heinz didn't know what he was talking about? But deep down, she somehow knew that he told the truth.
"Can you make sure that nobody ever 'wins' again?" Aria asked.
"That's impossible. The best you can do is to win it yourself the next time."
"How would you win?"
"The rules of engagement are simple. Form an army of two, identify the Grail, fight for it, and win it."
"Army of two?"
"Yes, an army of two, with a master and a servant. That's the tradition to honour the Grail."
Aria's eyes narrowed. "Army of two, master and servant... so THAT's what you're here for. You've planned this all along, didn't you?"
Heinz opened his mouth to speak, but could not form words at length. He tried to look away, then forced his head to turn back. He found his voice eventually, but it sounded markedly more timid.
"I'm sorry." Heinz lowered his head. "It's just that I... really wanted to fight alongside you, because I think the two of us can win. But I know I have no excuse for having kept you in the dark, and I accept your rejection of my offer as the punishment I deserve."
"Nah, I'll do it." Aria stood up and put her hands on his shoulders. "You've helped me so much, I owe you this." She caught herself inching closer to the big boy, and pulled back a step with slightly flushed cheeks. "You're giving me something to do, anyways."
There was an awkward silence, and Aria started again, this time more hesitantly. "You've been good to me and all… and I think you're a good guy…"
"I'm not as great as you think..." When Heinz stopped saying complicated things, he looked like nothing more than an awkward, twenty-year-old boy.
"Hey, don't get me wrong, I'm just saying you're a good guy." She cleared her throat and tried to look away. "Anyways, I'll be your servant."
"Actually, you'll have to be the master." Heinz stated matter-of-factly. "I am not a mage, so I can't be a master."
"Oh... but I don't know exactly what to do."
"That's okay." Heinz assured her. "We can think of what to do together."
"Okay, then it's settled." Aria extended her hand to Heinz, ready to seal their contract with a handshake.
"Are you sure? You don't even know what my wish to the Root is."
"I'm sure." Aria grabbed Heinz's hand and shook it. "But tell me anyway."
"I want the world to come back together, and undo some harm done by the past Grails."
"Good enough for me. I think I'd want the same." Aria sat down with a faint, sincere smile that had a healthy mix of determination. It didn't matter that she didn't know what she was getting herself into. Even if it's something as far-fetched as saving the world, or something as grim and gritty as fighting a war, so long as Heinz can start her off on a new life, she would work hard for that.
He also seemed really smart and reliable... but Aria tried not to think about it too much.