"Daddyyyy~" came a voice that was much too loud and excited for the small body that contained it, followed by the sound of tiny feet running on the wood floor.

Usually, this was music to Shirou's ears. One or both of the twins happy and excited and running to greet him or show him something or ask him for something or maybe even all three. Today, however…

"Rin, what are you wearing…?" Shirou asked, blinking a few times to make sure he wasn't seeing things.

"Daddy helped me!" the four-year-old replied, going over and climbing up into Shirou's lap.

"Daddy helped…?" even Shirou sometimes got confused with who the twins were talking about. Although, he usually understood more often than most people. It was just that at the moment he was still shocked at the pink frock with large white polka dots and purple tights with small pink polka dots that his oldest son was wearing…

But, at least now he probably understood what the tiny set of magenta shoes were doing at the door.

"Oh...right. Daddy helped. Of course he did." Shirou rolled his eyes, now that the mystery was solved. They'd tried to get the boys to use different names for each of them, just to avoid such confusion, but only Yukio seemed to have picked it up. The younger twin would often refer to Shirou as Papa.

"Heee~" Rin grinned wide and hugged Shirou around the neck. "Daddy's sweaty…" Rin wrinkled his little nose.

"Helping people is hard work sometimes, but very worth it~" Shirou said and kissed Rin on the top of the head, causing him to giggle.

"But, Daddy smells like smoke." Rin pushed the issue.

"I was smoking~" it wasn't as if it were a secret that Shirou liked his cigarettes! And it wasn't a lie, he had been smoking! Just…

"Not that kinda smoke! Daddy's silly~" Rin reached up to paw his little hands through Shirou's hair, which wasn't exactly a new thing at all. Rin was a very hands-on kid. But, his tiny hands came away with some black stuff on his little fingers.

Shirou's eyes widened a bit. Soot!? Dammit…

"Uhh…" he took out a handkerchief and began to wipe off Rin's hands. Much to Rin's dismay. He disliked being cleaned off...even if it was just his hands. But as long as it wasn't his face, he was generally cooperative, even if a bit frowny.

"Where's Yukio?" Shirou was very much hoping to distract his little son.

"Yuki! Yuki's with Daddy. He's pretty, too~" Rin answered, trying to reach up to Shirou's hair again. He probably had more soot up there. He'd thought he'd gotten it all before he came in!

"Mephisto!" Shirou called out, his tone a bit annoyed. He knew Mephisto was aware that Shirou was home, there was no way he wasn't! Was he hiding?

"Yes, darling~?" Mephisto asked, rounding the corner with Yukio in his arms. The youngest boy was wearing a white frock with large pink polka dots and magenta tights with small purple polka dots. Solving the, at this point not-so-baffling, mystery of where those pink shoes next to the magenta ones at the door had come from.

"Why are you using our sons as dress-up dolls?" Shirou asked, raising an eyebrow and using his stern face that...admittedly nobody ever paid attention to. Least of all Mephisto.

"I don't know what you're talking about, Shirou. It's a parent's job to make sure their children are well dressed and look nice." Mephisto said, in a tone that said he knew very well what Shirou was talking about and didn't care.

"They're boys." Shirou pointed out.

"That's extremely closed-minded of you. Surprising, actually, given the circumstances." Mephisto said with an indignant sniff.

"What are you talking about? What circumstances?"

"You know very well what circumstances. Those which can't be named in the presence of two such sweet little darlings as these~"

Shirou sighed heavily, "Mephisto…"

"It isn't entirely my fault, anyway. While you were away playing with a soot demon-"

"It wasn't a soot demon, it was a giant Basan! You said it was just going to be an Ashimagari. It would be easy and fast, you said. I should've known you wouldn't have sent me out just for something like that."

"Well, now that we've established that your bad luck is your own fault, can we get back to talking about these wonderful outfits I found for the boys~"

"My fault!"

"Yes, we just established that, Shirou-koi, please. Calm down. In fact, you'll be so proud, the boys picked these out themselves~"

That did stop Shirou. He blinked a few times. "What? They did?"

"Yes. It seems they've inherited my sense of style~"

"They're not related to you…" Shiro reminded, eye twitching.

"Which proves nurture is more potent than nature, after all~"

Shirou sighed. This was a losing battle. "But, why would they have picked these out?"

"Well, as I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted before-"

"Rudely!?"

"We were passing by a boutique that had several nice outfits in the windows, when Yukio pointed out this cute little ensemble~" Mephisto said and bounced Yukio, making him giggle and reach up to fix his oversized glasses, to emphasize the outfit in question.

"Are you sure he pointed it out? All by himself?"

"Of course, Shirou. And he was so excited to try it on~! And he looked so cute in it, I just had to buy it for him and let him wear it home."

"I'm skeptical of this. And it doesn't explain Rin." Shirou said, attempting to make the boy in question stop attempting to climb him like a tree before he gave up and let Rin climb away.

"Well, when Rin saw Yukio so excited for his outfit, he wanted one of his own. So, I got him one, too. They match~"

"They clash. It all clashes." Shirou deadpanned.

"I should've known better than to expect you to see the beauty and adorableness here. You never did have any taste for style."

"How long have they been wearing these?" Shirou asked, deciding to ignore the style comment.

"All day~" Mephisto said, happily. "Now, go take a bath. You're filthy and you're getting poor Rin's cute outfit all dirty too."

"Poor Rin's outfit?!" he'd nearly been burned alive and Mephisto was worried about a dress?!

"Of course. It's new and it's adorable and I want the boys to be able to wear their outfits to the barbecue tomorrow~"

"What barbecue?"

"The one I set up while you were avoiding being roasted by a chicken~"

"That's not funny." Shirou frowned.

"You never had the best sense of humor, either." Mephisto lemented with a sigh and went to pick up Rin. "It's a good thing you're so pretty, Shirou~" he said and took the boys into the other room, both of them looking over Mephisto's shoulders to wave at Shirou.

Shirou sighed before he began to get up from the floor. Well, he supposed it could be worse. Mephisto could've decked them out in outfits that were not only anime-inspired but had enough anime logos and character faces on them that they were basically walking advertisements for the shows.

Like that time last summer…

Shirou shuddered at the memory and headed to go take his bath. He was halfway undressed by the time he thought to wonder if this was what it meant to be whipped...