Stand By You

"Even if we're breaking down,

We can find a way to break through,

Even if we can't find heaven,

I'll walk through hell through with you.

Love, you're not alone,

'Cause I'm gonna stand by you."

—Rachel Platten, "Stand by You"

Shirou

She was dragging him around again, but then, he'd grown used to that, was more than happy to let her to at this point. Besides, like she'd said earlier, now it would be his turn to drag her around for a bit. Though he had a feeling that even so, she'd be determined to have her fun.

"Come on, Shirou, this is London, for crying out loud!" Rin Tohsaka raved, half in excitement and half in annoyance that he'd admitted that he wasn't much for dancing or dance clubs. Yet a dance club was precisely where she was dragging him to. "This place is supposed to have a really exciting nightlife, and I'm about to go insane if we don't at least have one night of dancing! Besides, we're celebrating, aren't we?" she added, wearing that grin that Shirou knew by now was usually a bit of a danger sign.

"Ah…sure," he agreed, rubbing the back of his neck with his free hand.

But then he looked at her again, and he saw that her smile had turned more tender: the smile she always reserved special for him. And with that single tail tied into her hair on one side with her black ribbon (abandoning the twin tail look she'd worn in high school), coupled with that red shirt and short skirt, she really was just too irresistibly cute. A pleasant warmth crept up his cheeks, and he found himself looking forward to a night at a dance club just a little more than he had a moment before, grinning back at her in his own resolute way.

"Very well, so be it: you and I'll be the best dancers there then."

And then Tohsaka laughed, falling back into step with him and opting to clutch his arm instead of keep dragging him around.

Shirou raised an eyebrow at her, catching the mockery in her manner of amusement. "What's with laughing at me, all of a sudden?"

Tohsaka shook her head, eyes brimming with tears as her laughter subsided. "Not at you. Not entirely anyway. I just know already that you're a terrible dancer."

Shirou frowned at her. "Hey, I told you, I'm not big on it."

"I know." Tohsaka's smile turned tender again, and she squeezed his arm as she clutched it, only to poke him playfully on the nose. "But teasing you about such things will never get old."

Shirou sighed, the hustle and bustle of the glitzy Soho strip of London flowing around them, even as he felt he and Tohsaka were the only two people who existed for the moment. "No. But that's okay, because I don't mind." And in turn, he gave the special smile he always reserved for her, and she blushed and turned away, looking ahead to their destination.

Still, Shirou was satisfied. That he was the only guy who could get back at Tohsaka successfully for all the teasing she did was pleasing to him in its own way, but of course he would never dream of holding that over her. He enjoyed it more for being able to do it and then politely step back to let her take the reins again. That and he liked that as much as being with her had helped him to face things despite knowing where his own future would lead, having come face-to-face and defeated his future and ideal self, her being with him had tempered her and taken some of the edge off her cooler and more sarcastic nature.

Indeed, the two of them did have something to celebrate, more or less. Earlier today, he had turned down the Mages Association's offer to induct him into their fold, which on the surface probably didn't sound like something to celebrate. But Tohsaka knew him better than that. This turning them down was bringing him a step closer to his own dreams of following in the footsteps of his father, Kiritsugu Emiya, and becoming a hero of justice. Much like Kiritsugu, as good and kind as Shirou always strived to be, and could be just by nature, he'd found that, also like his father, he actually didn't like being bound by rules. That would be all he'd be bound by if he were to join the Mages Association. So really, that choice had been decided for him without even having to really think about it, just like everything else.

Shirou and Kiritsugu of course hadn't been related by blood, but Shirou had always felt that they'd been bound by something just as strong. The man had saved him from death within the raging flames of the great Fuyuki Fire twelve years ago when he'd been little more than five years old, and in the five years that had followed, Kiritsugu had tried his best to raise Shirou as his adoptive son right up until his own death. Even after all this time, Shirou was still saddened to think of that terrible night Kiritsugu had slipped away from his life. That was something that would never go away, any more than the memories he carried with him from fighting in the Fifth Holy Grail War.

One memory in particular, that of a young girl he'd been unable to save….

"Hey."

Tohsaka was giving him a gentle shake, bringing him out of his reverie. Shirou blinked at her, she who had saved his life in that tragic situation by doing all in her power to hold him back while he'd fought her uselessly, crying out against the palm of her warm hand. And of course, she'd had no other choice: he knew now that all that would've happened if she'd let him go was both he and that little girl, little Ilyasviel von Einzbern, would have both ended up dead, rather than just Ilyasviel, as things had played out.

"Are you all right?" she asked him with sincere concern. "You know, seriously, we don't have to go if you're really not up to it."

Truth be told, thinking of that little girl again created a slightly nauseating and melancholic turn in the pit of Shirou's stomach. After all, there had been something about that girl that he'd wanted to know more. She'd called him, "onii-chan", which on the one hand could have been just the harmless term for "mister" from a child like herself…yet he'd felt there had to have been something more to that. For one thing, her name suggested she'd been German by birth, which meant that Japanese had to be her second language, which meant she was less likely to be aware of the double-entendre meaning of the term "onii-chan", that it more commonly held the translation of "big brother" in other languages (though something in their first encounter with her had also told him that she'd been more like an older girl stuck in a young girl's body). But then if it were the case that she'd been calling him "brother", then…why? Even with something so insubstantial to go on, Shirou had somehow felt from the moment he'd met her that he'd been connected to her in some way. But regardless even of that, everything had screamed at him to jump off that stair railing and save her from the blond demon of gold that had once been Gilgamesh, King of Heroes. But he would never know now: all he would have was the regret that a girl, while so threatening at first, had been so pitifully helpless in the end, crying openly for the death of her Servant, Berserker, at the hands of Gilgamesh, only to have that bastard slice her eyes out, leaving her weeping blood, and then her heart—

Shirou swallowed back the pain, that scream that had echoed in his heart and clawed its way out of his throat when she'd been killed. Why? Why had it been so sad? Why had he felt…like he'd been reliving Kiritsugu's death…watching her die…? Why had he in fact been reminded of that air of sadness that Kiritsugu had always carried with him…imagined him crying openly, even, at such a death…? Why had that been so…?

In the end, Shirou had seen that Ilyasviel had needed saving…and he hadn't been strong enough….. Maybe if he'd still had his Servant, Saber, at the time…if he'd even just been strong enough to have kept her from getting ensnared by the enemy Servant, Caster….

He still wasn't strong enough, but he wanted to believe he was stronger at least, than he'd been in that moment, when he'd seen the one thing that had caused him such pain, because it was something he'd never wanted to see happen again since coming through that terrible Fuyuki Fire:

People dying, people suffering, and he powerless to stop it.

His free hand clenched into a fist, but he found a smile for Tohsaka's sake. "It's nothing. I just got lost in thought is all. I'm fine." He ignored how much he'd reminded himself of Kiritsugu in his last moments with those words, saying he was fine.

Tohsaka frowned, even pouted a little, maybe thinking that if she used her old wiles on him it might jerk him out of the funk he'd suddenly fallen into. Actually it was like those moments early on in their getting to know each other, during the Grail War, when she'd reprimanded him for being warpedly convinced that he was a person who didn't really deserve to seek happiness for himself, only for others.

She raised an accusatory eyebrow at him. "You wouldn't be trying to fool me, Shirou, would you? You should know by now that never works."

"No, really, it's nothing." Shirou took a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Just nerves, that's all."

"Hm." Then her smile for him came back. "Well, don't worry so much about it. I'll be with you, you know."

"Yeah, I know."

Yet something in the way she looked at him suddenly struck him (and quite movingly so), that in her usual way, she'd figured everything out already and here she was letting him off the hook after all, and that telling him she was going to be with him…carried a bigger meaning beyond being with him for a little dancing at a club.

Jeez, he really was a terrible idiot.

Rin

Damn it, he really can't dance.

But Rin wasn't going to mope about it. She'd told him to "shut up and dance with me", and that was enough to at least make him willing to try. And at least he seemed to be having fun, and wanting that for Shirou Emiya was something that would never change for Rin.

So she couldn't help but smile as he awkwardly did his best to keep up with her amidst the crowd of ravers. Well, actually, he was kind of cheating in that he was just kind of shuffling his feet back and forth to the beat, leaving it up to Rin to do all the hip-shaking. On the other hand, she could also tell that he was rather enjoying the act of watching her work her curves. And she, in turn, rather enjoyed what she could do with her curves.

So as the beat to the song they were dancing to sped faster and faster, Rin let herself get lost in the music, and reveled in the freedom she felt, the freedom of having found a way to leave her father's house without having to break the magical ties that bound her to the name of Tohsaka. She had admitted once to Shirou during the Holy Grail War that being within the Bounded Field that had surrounded her family's house in Fuyuki had been rather isolating in its personality: not keen on letting people in, but once it decided to let someone in after all, wasn't keen on letting them go either.

Not like the Bounded Field that his adoptive father Kiritsugu had put on the Emiya house: a warm, welcoming Field that invited people to come and go as they pleased, so long as they meant no harm to those who dwelled within. Barring Heroic Spirits clad in blue and wielding spears.

Ah, what a distant memory that all was.

The music reached a fever pitch. Rin dared to open her eyes, and at first was disappointed to find that Shirou had quit dancing altogether and was just watching her with his hands in his pockets. But then he had that smile for her, that one that he wore just for her, and suddenly Rin stopped too even as the music crested its peak, and she stared at him, mouth a little dry.

And then she quickly looked away as the song ended and the music changed, making a show of waving at her face as it flushed with the heat of the dance floor.

"Okay," she panted, catching her breath. "I guess we could step outside…for a bit of air now…."

"Sounds good to me," said Shirou agreeably, and taking her hand, the two of them walked together up the stairs to the street above, emerging from the underground club. Noticing a few seedier male clubbers watch them, particularly Rin, and in a very lecherous way to say the least, Shirou tugged her a little closer to him as a precaution.

Rin let it slide though. She knew he knew that she was perfectly capable of taking care of herself, after all, she hadn't achieved the kind of magic she had without any sort of admirable level of effort. Even before becoming a Master, she'd single-handedly defeated one of the creeps behind the mass murder of all those kids during the Fourth Holy Grail War. For Shirou, this was all just his thing. She'd quickly come to learn to expect it of him when he'd made it perfectly clear, unflinchingly, to the Servant Lancer in the Fifth War that he wasn't to get "chummy" with her in the brief partnership they'd forged to defeat Caster. Looking back on it though, Rin had come to realize that in that moment Shirou had become much more a man than a boy, and that had rather pleased her upon reflection.

Back out in the open air of the night though, she was glad to feel him relax a bit, and opted to go from holding his hand to holding his arm instead. "Thank you for humoring me, by the way," she told him with an appreciative kind of nuzzle.

Though Shirou went a little red as he still did on occasion when she became particularly physically affectionate, he'd learned to hold back a little less over time when it came to responding to it, and with a chuckle under his breath, he gave her a kind of nuzzle back—not one that anyone not watching closely would notice, in fact it was barely there at all…but Rin noticed it, and that was enough. It would take tiny steps, coaxing him out of that shell of his. Or covering of hedgehog quills, whatever you wanted to call it. After all, he still addressed her by her surname in his reserved way.

But then she noticed that whisper of pensiveness that had fallen over him before they'd reached the club fall over him again, all the more confirming her suspicions that he had something dark and heavy eating at his mind. She bit her lip, thinking painfully of Archer…her cool and sarcastic Servant from the Holy Grail War…and Shirou's…

…very possible future self.

"Shirou…you know…if something's bothering you…well…you know I won't think any less of you for it," Rin told him, trying to sound casual. "I know that's never your biggest concern—what people think of you, that is—but even so…everyone feels that way sometimes, that they have to look better to other people even when they don't feel like they are."

Shirou looked sidelong at her, and this time he gave a chuckle that was far brighter with genuine amusement. His previously pinched brow relaxed, and Rin was briefly reminded of that moment she had bid Archer farewell, and the promise she'd made to him. In the two years she and Shirou had been together though, she had begun to see that while the battle for her wasn't a losing one, at the same time the results she could conceivably achieve with keeping her promise to Archer would be to ensure things at least met halfway. After all, Shirou had proven himself to be even stronger than Archer just in being able to accept what was ahead of him even though now this time he knew where he'd probably end up.

And here, Rin would be a fool in her own way and do what she could to hold him up no matter how hopeless things still could get.

Meanwhile, Shirou tugged her close again as they walked along a quiet side street in search of something to eat.

"It's fine, Tohsaka," he told her, trying to reassure her. "I…I was just…thinking…."

"Yeah?"

"Remembering, actually."

"About the War again?"

They had spoken about it briefly when they'd gone to Glastonbury the day before and seen the final resting place of King Arthur, the true identity of Shirou's former Servant Saber, despite her being female.

But though they had spoken of how they had both respectively taken to their experience in fighting the Fifth Holy Grail War, they had only touched on what it had been about it that had made them better people in a positive way. The negative, they had carefully avoided.

And Rin thought she knew why.

"Is it…Ilyasviel…you were thinking of?" she asked quietly.

After all, there had been natural tension between her and the Einzbern girl from the start, simply out of their each representing two of the First Three Families. Even so, Rin couldn't help the coldness in her heart for that girl having melted away at seeing her die the way she had, so cruelly at the hands of none other than Gilgamesh, the self-proclaimed King of Heroes…no one should have to die like that, mage or not. And truth be told, while she had always tried to live as a person of conviction, who acted with the belief that what she was doing was right on the whole, and smart to say the least, as she had desperately held Shirou back while he'd struggled against her to try and leap to Ilyasviel von Einzbern's rescue, that had been just the second time she could clearly remember being legitimately angry with herself (the first being of course when Archer had betrayed her to feign allegiance to Caster so he could strike the witch down when she'd least expected it).

Even so, Shirou certainly wouldn't be alive if she hadn't done what she'd done. In the situation they'd been in, neither of them could have saved Ilyasviel.

Shirou, after giving her question some weighty thought, finally said with a heart still heavy with guilt, "If only…well, if we'd had Saber on our side still…I could've…we could've…." He shook his head, every inch of him going tense again. "It doesn't matter. What's done is done."

"Hmmm." Rin watched him close again, biting her lip, uneasy at how hard he was trying to sweep something like this under the rug. She wanted to coax him into talking about it more, but something was still holding him back.

Good grief, why was he still such an idiot sometimes?

Shirou

He started going over it in his head, wondering what Saber would tell him if she could. Two years after the fact, and he found himself wishing desperately that he could speak with her one more time. Or Archer even…his very possible future self.

No, he didn't think what that man would have to say would be of any help. Then again, maybe even he had changed. And besides, he existed outside of time, which meant he existed very presently, as a Counter Guardian. Strange though, that he didn't even have the power to summon his own future self for a conversation. One of those "the universe has a strange sense of humor" things.

He remembered listening to Tohsaka as she'd told him how everything had happened in destroying the corrupted Greater Grail at long last. How Archer, called forth for his duty as a Counter Guardian, had rescued her from suffocating underneath the cursing weight of the spreading Grail, how Saber had activated her Noble Phantasm, Excalibur (revealing her true identity as King Arthur, despite her being female), how she had shined with golden light before bringing her sword down magnificently, obliterating the evil of the Grail in one swift strike. And then how Rin had bid Archer farewell—though she wouldn't go into detail about what the two of them had discussed, if anything. Shirou had a feeling that they had probably discussed something along the lines of his own fate, but he didn't pry. He didn't need to, and Tohsaka wanted to keep that to herself, which he respected.

He wished he could've seen that though, Saber destroying the Grail, that shining heroic moment. Still, for the time he had spent with her, however brief, he would always admire her and be grateful to her for what she had done for him as his Servant in the Grail War.

And Tohsaka too. He owed her his life in so many ways as much as he did Saber. Even Archer, he liked to think. After all, if he was going to learn to like himself, he'd have to take the bad with the good, much like that awful-tasting medicine Kiritsugu used to give him as a child.

Yet…as far as that tiny regret that still haunted him concerning Ilyasviel von Einzbern's death…he couldn't seem to put into words how he struggled with it…not without breaking down completely. And he'd already told Rin that he was the way he was so he wouldn't break. That only left him with the choice to hold it back, to bury it, to let it be the only thing it could be to him that wouldn't destroy him and feed his dream to fight for a world where no one cried.

Like Kiritsugu Emiya had wanted to do once.

Such musings stirred melancholically in Shirou's head as he sat up later that evening in his green pajamas with a cup of hot tea in his bright green mug, alone at the kitchen table with the light on in the little apartment he and Rin shared. After they had gotten home from grabbing a bite to eat, the two of them had decided to call it a night. But now here he was, at two in the morning, wakened by a nightmarish reliving of that horrible moment Gilgamesh cut out Ilyasviel's eyes and then run her through with a sword, leaving her crawling around, crying for Berserker while she bled out…only for the whole castle to go up in flames, and for Shirou to find himself once again reliving that horrible night twelve years ago, and the fire that destroyed whatever small life he'd had before crossing paths with Kiritsugu Emiya…the Fuyuki Fire….

It had been years since he'd had that nightmare, back when Kiritsugu had been alive, the only person he felt he could really talk to about it.

Unable to go back to sleep, he'd come out here with the hope of easing his wakefulness, not wanting to bother Tohsaka while she slept. After all, she'd been working so hard at her schoolwork for the Clock Tower lately, and this was the first break either of them had had in a while. That was part of the reason he'd ended up humoring her and going along with the whole "go out dancing" thing, because he saw it made her happy, and of all the people in his life for whom he'd wished happiness, being with Tohsaka when he could make her happy…really did make him genuinely happy…for his own sake.

Heaving a sigh, he looked up at the ceiling and leaned back in his chair, clutching the warm mug of tea but taking not a sip. Tohsaka's matching red mug caught his eye as it sat unassumingly in its spot in the cupboard, and suddenly Shirou found himself not feeling quite so bad.

That and he suddenly had a small craving for strawberries niggling at the back of his mind. He smacked his lips just a little and then at last took a sip of tea, letting the warmth of it settle pleasantly in his stomach, whereupon his mind moved on to what he might make for breakfast for the two of them later on.

While pondering this, he traced the grain line in the wood of the table with his index finger, and for a while he was content to sail on a sea of a memories and nostalgia…late nights like this, where he and Kiritsugu would speak of things, whether it be his nightmares, or nothing all that important really in the grand scheme, yet somehow very important because of the feeling of light happiness attached to them, of just being with the man who raised him like he was his own child…and then those breakfasts, just the two of them, followed by Fuji-nee—or Taiga Fujimura, the daughter of the man from whom Kiritsugu had bought their house in Miyama Town—doing her best to fill in that empty space that Kiritsugu had left behind when he'd died….

Yes, Shirou had lost people, and he had watched people die without being able to do anything to help them…not Kiritsugu, not Saber, not Ilyasviel…and even so, there had always been someone there who'd wanted to tell him that he wasn't alone…Fuji-nee…and Tohsaka….

Quietly he gave a laugh under his breath, as something beautiful bubbled up inside of him as he thought about these things. Really? What had he done to deserve such wonderful people in his life, coming and going…or staying…? But maybe that was another part of why he liked Tohsaka so much. She didn't tiptoe around him when it mattered. She had vowed that she would make him enjoy the life he had, or she'd basically beat him up over it. Or something like that.

When he thought this, he just cracked up completely, not caring that to an observer he might seem like someone slowly going insane. As he finished off his tea, he thought again of Kiritsugu, how he used to crack up over things like saying, "If you're going to enjoy something, you should enjoy it to the fullest." And though that ache came back again, that ache that he could talk again to people like Kiritsugu, or Saber, or even learn more about Ilyasviel, somehow he was happy at the same time, happy that he was alive and able to remember wonderful people that inhabited a world like this.

"Ilyasviel…von Einzbern…what a cute little sister you might have been to someone," he mused aloud, content to abandon logic just for the moment. Maybe it was that whole "brother" thing with him that she'd clearly been attached to.

And then, before he knew it, there were curious drips of water falling into his tea, and then he realized why his cheeks suddenly felt so cold, why his vision blurred….

What...? Am I really…crying…? God, I haven't cried in years….

He gave a gasp as a sob made its escape….

No…why is this happening…? I was…feeling kinda good a moment ago…why am I…crying like this…? Stop….

He breathed in deep and tried to put a stopper to it, but instead he hiccupped another sob and more tears came. Desperately, he wiped at his eyes, choking back his cries, resigned finally to burying his face in his hand—

"Shirou?"

Shirou gasped again, and looked up to find Tohaska had been watching him from the entrance into the hall.

Peering at him as she stood there in her cat pajamas, her hair disheveled from being crushed against her pillow, she said, "Shirou…are you…crying…?"

Rin

There was another time in her life when she had watched this boy—now a young man—from a distance when he hadn't realized it. That fool had been doing high jumps until the sun set, outside their junior high school. And here he was, being a fool again, as he quickly tried to hide the fact that he'd been crying, always trying to be valiant.

"Ah, Tohsaka…sorry, did I wake you?" he asked, trying to shake it off, hastily wiping at his eyes with the inside of his wrist.

Rin shook her head. "No, I just woke up and was thirsty. But I see you're awake too." She crossed over to the table and sat down across from him.

"Well, I made some tea. Did you want some?" Shirou asked, no hiding the wateriness in his voice, even as he tried to.

"No, it's fine," Rin tried to say, but when she tried to reach for his hand, he got up and started making her some tea anyway, pulling her red mug from the cupboard, the one that was something of a "partner" to the green one he was currently drinking out of.

At this, Rin couldn't help a small, low growl, frowning ever so faintly. She could see it in the set of Shirou's shoulders now, that same resoluteness that Archer had carried, that tautness, that cold holding back that had translated into a coolness to match her own. A man who had been a veritable jerk from the very beginning, and yet…and yet….

They had gelled so well together.

And no matter what, they always would.

Because she loved the spirit of this foolish man, with all his dogged perseverance, no matter what the incarnation.

And her heart pounded now, faster and faster, in a growing, fierce fury, because she felt that same frustration that she had with Archer, coupled with that same desperation with which she'd appealed to him to be her Servant again…so he wouldn't have to go back to suffering endlessly as he had been before…so she could save him…his final words coming back to her:

"Look after me. As you know, I'm a bit hopeless…."

After that, there was nothing but her legs pushing her to her feet as she got right back up from the table and came up behind Shirou, and she felt his gasp of surprise run through her as she slid her arms around him and hugged his warm, lean body tight to her.

"Stop it. Just stop it," she scolded, fighting back her own tears, hearing his pounding heart through his back as it was pressed against her ear.

Shirou went very still and quiet then, and then she heard the sound of him gently setting her mug aside on the counter and switching off the stove as he'd been preparing to boil more water in the kettle.

"Forgive me…Tohsaka…" he croaked.

"I think I've lost count…how many times I've told you…you deserve to be happy far more than you think you do," Rin said, her voice muffled by his green pajamas. "But…well…you deserve…to be sad too."

"Eh?"

"You can cry if you need to, idiot! That's what I mean…of course. Ugh, what is it with men thinking they can't let themselves cry…?"

"Because strong men don't cry."

Even though his voice still cracked, there was a true note of teasing in Shirou's voice then, which earned him a shove from Rin. But it was a "love shove", and she knew he knew that.

"But I already know you're strong, whether you cry or not, so you might as well cry if you want to. Or at least…tell me what's got you feeling like this. Come on. You owe me. After all, you got me crying once."

Shirou took a shaky deep breath and then said, still trying to hold back despite everything. "I guess…I just can't help feeling sad…over what happened to that little Ilyasviel…and that saddens me even more because…I didn't realize how terrible I'd always felt about it until I started thinking about it again earlier tonight…when we were out…."

"Ah…so I had it right. More or less."

"I just…I still wish…. When I think of it, I still felt that…pinch of regret in my heart…not over what I tried to do…but…just that I…couldn't…do it…and I feel like…when I lost that fight…I was…losing my father all over again…."

"Your father Kiritsugu?"

"Yeah. And I wish I knew why I felt that way. I feel like I'd have known…and now I wish…there'd been time…but then I guess, I wouldn't have thought of it if I had saved her…except that she did mention that she was interested in getting to know me…and she kept calling me…'big brother'…. Why? Why was she…? I'll never know…and for some reason…not knowing hurts…."

He began to shake again, and before he could try hiding, Rin gently turned him towards her and took his face in her hands. She was trembling too, she soon realized, and for all her talk of telling him he shouldn't be ashamed to cry at least in front of her, she was a little afraid of the depth of her own feelings, how much it affected her to see him like this. Just so, she confronted it, for his sake, even as he looked back at her with golden-brown eyes brimming bright with tears, wearing a heart-rending expression of pure anguish that was indeed painful to look at.

"Why does it hurt, Rin?" he asked her, addressing her by her given name for the first time.

Rin swallowed, for a moment crushed by the weight of her own sadness at this exposed wound he'd managed to keep hidden for so long, laid bare and on the brink of driving him mad, combined with the way he'd called her "Rin" at last…it was so much like Archer that she was reminded of that last goodbye all over again.

But she did seriously think through his question, recalling her own tears shed in the aftermath of the death of her father, the great Tokiomi Tohsaka. She remembered the horrible whispers that had went around too, that the man she had loved as she would a favored uncle, Kariya Matou, the only decent blood kin of the Matou she could ever remember meeting, had allegedly killed her father in the Fourth War, only to strangle her mother as well, leaving the kind and sweet Aoi Tohsaka as nothing but a brain-damaged shell of a person who would follow her husband in death not long after…even if it had only been that poor Kariya had been driven into a corner because her father's true murderer, that fake priest Kirei Kotomine, had set him up….

And all the while…Rin's little sister…Sakura….

Man, where do I have room to talk? I mean really? I force Shirou to fess up…and here I…I still haven't had it in me to tell him that Sakura Matou is really my…little sister….

But then she had her answer for him.

"Because it isn't fair no matter how you look at it…" she told him intently. "You say she called you 'big brother', and now you'll never know why. And that reason could be anything…the possibilities are endless…but…you'll never know any of them as the truth…and that truth could have been so wonderful to know…. And Ilyasviel…well…." She sighed. "I won't lie, I thought she came off as a bit of a brat, but…in the end…she was tormented horribly, and…nobody deserves what she got. Except maybe the bastard who did it to her, which was almost what he got from you." She blinked tears out of her own eyes but tried to give him a smile of encouragement. "What you wanted to do for her…was the right thing to do…but…not the smart thing, because…."

"Because I wasn't strong enough." Shirou shut his eyes before he suddenly pulled Rin into his arms and hugged her so tight it almost hurt, but Rin somehow didn't care as he started weeping outright, with his face buried in her shoulder, his tears soaking through her pajama top.

Actually, she felt a cathartic relief flood through her, and she wrapped her arms around him again and returned his embrace, stroking his back and holding him as best as she could. There were no words she needed to speak. She only had to keep her ears open.

"I…I can't stand it," he finally admitted, gulping. "Things like what happened with Ilyasviel…I can't stand that happening all over again…but I have to, because I'd rather risk a walk through Hell than let it all pass…I'll never be able to avoid getting involved…I have to get involved…because I never want to see such terrible things happen again…not when I have two feet I can walk on and two hands I can work with…."

"Ah well, I'll be walking in Hell beside you, remember, so it won't be as bad as before, right?" Rin pointed out to him.

Shirou laughed again, and though it was hoarse and still full of tears, Rin happily heard a true smile in there. "Yeah. Yeah, you're actually scarier than Hell."

Rin gave a squawk of indignation, but before she could retort, Shirou added gently:

"But you're far more fun than Hell too."

"Oh come on…being more fun than Hell isn't that hard to be," Rin grumbled.

"And nicer than Hell," Shirou went on stalwartly. "Nicer than most people. Than most people give you credit for. You're a genuinely good person, at your core. I've always liked that about you. From the very start. Remember?" He drew back and looked at her, still smiling the smile she'd heard emerge in his voice, that special smile that he always had. Just for her. "Even when you're trying your damnedest to kill me," he joked, referring to their brief little fight-to-the-death scuffle during the Grail War, for it seemed he knew deep down that like always, she'd have found a reason, in the end, not to kill him after all.

Rin outright pouted at this, but only for a moment, for she did indeed remember. "Hey, I could've seriously killed you back then, you were completely pissing me off."

But then Shirou grinned a grin that was terribly reminiscent of Archer in his cockiness, at which point Rin had to do the rare thing and admit defeat.

Her shoulders slumped. "Just being the way you are though…that in and of itself made you a very hard person to kill. After all, I wouldn't have even bothered to give you to the count of three…if I'd really wanted to kill you," she added, giving him a cocky grin of her own.

"Ah well, thanks for being willing to admit I'm right for once," and then, before Rin could speak, he leaned over and touched his lips to hers.

For a golden moment, neither of them moved, and Rin could only quakingly relish in the warmth of him touching her like this, the feel of him and his breath, before he slowly withdrew, opening his eyes.

"And for being the way you are," he whispered, tucking back her hair. "Don't ever change. You're your very own brand of sweet." He hugged her to him again.

Rin returned his embrace again, her smiling turning more affectionate as he murmured beside her ear: "Thank you…Rin…for everything."

"Hm," said Rin, closing her eyes, her thoughts swimming with both Shirou and Archer, and felt calm, felt like both were speaking to her in that sentence, united in a single spirit.

So she replied to both in turn: "Of course…Emiya."

Shirou

In the dream, it was snowing. Snowing in a winter forest, and Shirou was wrapped up in a long black coat, a coat he had never before worn in his life, and he had the tiny hand of Ilyasviel von Einzbern in his. The two of them were walking together in the beautiful white snow.

And then Ilyasviel spoke to him, in a voice as small as her hand, wearing her coat and hat of purple: "Onii-chan, will you be okay now?"

Shirou looked down at her, and met her red eyes, which looked back up at him with adoring sweetness. He smiled for her, but also frowned in bemusement. "Will I be okay?"

"Yeah. Ilya just wants to make sure, before she heads off." She beamed at him.

"Ilya…?" Shirou shook his head. "Well, yeah. I think so."

"Are you sure?"

"Well, I'll probably still be sad sometimes, but I won't be lonely."

"Because you have Rin."

"I…. Well, yeah."

Ilyasviel shook her head. She really was very cute. It really hit home now, more than ever, how much Shirou would've liked to have gotten to know this girl, if only for a moment like this.

And then she stopped, and when Shirou stopped too, she took both his hands in hers and looked hopefully and happily up at him. "Ilya might not like Rin very much, but she knows one thing: she won't leave onii-chan. Ilya's glad for that. So…onii-chan, you don't have to worry about Ilya…anymore…because Ilya found what she was looking for too." She squeezed his hands in her tiny ones. "It's okay. Really." She beamed very brightly for him.

Right before she threw her arms around his middle and squeezed him tight, before looking up at him and saying, only a little sadly: "I'm sorry we didn't really get to talk, but even so…Ilya got her answer." She nodded. "I'm very happy, Shirou," she promised him softly. "Don't you worry about that." She tapped him playfully on the nose with her tiny index finger, and the gesture was somehow quite endearing, to say the least.

And then the sweet voice of a woman that Shirou didn't recognize called out over the rising winter wind.

"Ilya…!"

Shirou and Ilyasviel both looked up, and Ilyasviel let go of Shirou and hurried on ahead without him, waving her small arms to two figures further ahead, indistinct except for what appeared to be a woman in white and a man in black.

"I'm coming! Wait for Ilya!" Ilyasviel called out to the two waving strangers, and then over her shoulder, she called back to Shirou, "Thank you, onii-chan! For everything!"

"But…." Shirou reached out a hand, somehow feeling a piece of himself leave with this mysterious little girl whose death he had been unable to prevent and had haunted the edge of his memory for all of this time. But then the wind kicked up, just as he was trying to get a good look at the woman in white and the man in black…the man in black had a particular sense of familiarity about him…and he began to wonder, as tiny Ilyasviel ran up to the man and the man scooped her up into his arms….

Then the air grew thick with snow, blanking Ilyasviel and the man and woman out of view, and by the time Shirou's vision cleared…they were gone, leaving nothing but the pure world of white behind….

"Ilya…" Shirou murmured, but he lowered his hand, knowing then in his heart that whatever had become of little Ilyasviel von Einzbern in death, she had found a peace there that she had been seeking for a very long time.

Much like Kiritsugu….

Then he wondered again, only to decide…

…Well, I'll never know for sure, but…maybe that doesn't matter after all….

As the light of dawn broke over the world, Shirou blinked open his eyes, becoming first aware of the warmth of Rin in his arms as he held her, along with the tranquil sense that he had been relieved of a pressing burden.

The two of them had ended up falling asleep together like this on the sofa in the little sitting room of their apartment, after talking for a little while about this and that, like where they might start first on the journey Shirou would be embarking on with her at his side. They still had a lot of planning ahead of them, and…there was time too. Shirou liked the idea of that very much. Even if things still ended horribly for him, even if this time, Rin had to be there to watch…even if he ended up making her cry…she was with him now, and he would cherish that.

He smiled at the look of Rin asleep on his chest, with her mouth just slightly open. Then he very carefully slid her out of his arms and got up from the sofa, tucking the blanket they'd pulled out around her and resting her head on the pillow. Then he left her a note on the kitchen table before he pulled on his trousers and a sweater and tiptoed out of the apartment with his wallet and keys in his pocket.

Down the street, he arrived at the little market in search of something special for breakfast, the idea of strawberries back on his mind. He'd just found them and was looking over each one carefully in making his selections when a high-pitched, gushing voice called out:

"Sherou!"

He already knew who it was before he looked up, but he looked up and smiled anyway, because whatever Rin said (and he knew she had her many, many reasons), Luviagelita Edelfelt—or "Luvia"—wasn't that bad (she was the reason they had a roof over their heads after all). A little too grating at times for his taste, but perfectly agreeable…in small doses. And not a bad person to have for company if one was ever lost in the city of London (though of course he'd always pick Rin over anyone else in the end).

"Good morning, Luvia," he greeted, answering her enthusiastic wave with a subtle one of his own.

"Now, now, really, certainly you can refer to me as Miss Luvia now, as I see your Master is nowhere to be found at all," said Luvia, fluttering her eyelashes in a gesture of outspoken flirtation.

She very nonchalantly flipped her mass of curled golden hair done up in blue ribbons, and though for her today was a "casual" day, that just meant that she had abandoned her usual ostentatious dresses for a simple frilly white blouse trimmed in blue with a short blue skirt with blue knee socks and saddle shoes. She had a basket of her own, but she appeared to be shopping at the market for show more than functionality, being an aristocrat. No doubt she had someone going about doing the serious part of the shopping, actually obtaining ingredients for cooking food that she probably wouldn't cook either.

Unless she were to try to impress a young man like Shirou.

In a moment of tact, Shirou carefully ignored her insistence on him calling her "Miss Luvia" as some kind of power-playing pet name without coming off as being an ass about it. "It's good to see you out and about on a Saturday," he said amiably.

"And you," Luvia said with equal cordiality. But she returned to flirtatious form quite quickly. "Ah, how wonderful you must find it, having a bit of extra time on Saturdays here. After all, as I understand, Saturdays are a half day of more school for you in Japan, yes?"

"Mm-hm. But that doesn't mean there isn't something we can't learn." Shirou gave her a grin that was all innocence as he selected a few more strawberries and then moved on to find some cream to go with them. Maybe he'd fold them into crepes while he was at it too.

Luvia followed him, of course, flouncing gracefully along, like a chipper swan. "Making a special breakfast, are we?" she teased. "Such luxurious taste that Miss Tohsaka has."

"Not really," said Shirou. "And this isn't all that expensive." He found a packet of crepes on his way to the dairy section. He grinned again. "See what I mean, about learning something?"

Luvia's smile faltered and she gave him a faint frown. "You mean by implying that you're making your Master a special breakfast of your own volition?"

Shirou clucked his tongue with sincere sympathy. "There's no need to be disappointed."

But still, Luvia pouted while Shirou picked out cream for the strawberries. After watching him a moment, she quietly made the suggestion: "Scones with clotted cream and tea might be nice instead of crepes. It's the pinnacle of how the English do tea, and equaled only by a hearty breakfast of fried eggs, beans on toast, diced tomatoes, and mushrooms, being that scones and tea is more of an afternoon tea thing…I still recommend it, if only for taste."

Shirou looked at her and considered her advice a moment before thoughtfully stroking his chin and looking over what he had so far. "Well, I still like the idea of the strawberries…and I can't speak for my pastry-making skills for baking scones since I haven't tried that yet…but I'm sure I can get some ready-made fresh-baked ones…." He smiled at Luvia. "Thanks. I'll add those." He slid the packet of crepes back with the others on the chilled stand.

"You're welcome, Sherou," said Luvia, still with some of her playfulness, but also a little more humility than normal.

"I'll even tell Tohsaka it was your idea," he added over his shoulder.

"Mmmm, I don't know if that would be wise," said Luvia, clearly trying to sound casual as she shrugged. "That might ruin her appetite."

"Ah." Shirou sighed. "It's too bad the two of you can't get along."

Luvia raised her eyebrows at him. "You know why though, don't you? Or at least, part of why."

"I have an idea," said Shirou, thinking back to the hand-to-hand match—and a rather brutal one at that—that Rin and Luvia had had the other day. "But honestly…Tohsaka has nothing to worry about with me."

It was Luvia's turn to sigh. "Yes. Unfortunately, you're right about that." And though she glanced up at him again with her smile, it was a look laced with melancholy and bittersweet resignation. "And as I understand it, you have no plans to join the Mages Association. Is that correct?"

"Yeah, that's right," Shirou admitted. "But how did you…?"

This time Luvia was back to her mischievous ways. "Oh, I have my sources." She winked and then gave Shirou a kind of slap on the shoulder in good jest. "Well, good luck to you both!" she crowed and then pirouetted off, laughing almost as insanely as Rin sometimes laughed.

Which to Shirou only served to further support the theory that the Tohsakas and the Edelfelts were somehow distantly related. Just so, unlike Rin, he knew he would miss Luvia and her antics when they left London to pursue heroics in the wide, wide world.

After he finished getting the breakfast things, including more tea to go with their scones and clotted cream, he returned to the apartment, checking the mail while he was at it and glad to find a letter from Fuji-nee mixed in. Rin would like that, as she had no one to get mail from for herself from Fuyuki.

Upstairs, he found Rin had rolled off the couch and was sleepily making an attempt to remedy her aversion to the morning with the brewing of some coffee. She had his green mug washed out, ready and waiting beside her red one, and was just drowsily pouring coffee into each when he sidled through the door with all the foodstuffs he'd bought and the stack of mail sandwiched in his teeth.

"Good morning," he greeted happily after he'd divested himself of the mail, to which she replied, "Coffee first."

Chuckling, Shirou shrugged it off and set the grocery bag on the table before coming around and dropping a small kiss on Rin's temple. "My lovely Sleeping Beauty," he murmured in her ear, which happily coaxed a smile out of her, despite her usual morning grumpiness.

Her mood improved when he intimated to her what he had in mind to make for them for breakfast, and did her part after sloshing back her coffee by putting the ready-made scones into the oven just to get them nice and warmed up again. Then she got dressed while Shirou made the tea (sloshing back his own coffee before rinsing out both mugs), and when she came back out it was just in time for the two of them to sit down and split the scones, spreading halves of them with clotted cream and taking bites of the melt-in-the-mouth combination in between dipping the strawberries in more cream.

"This is nice," said Rin as she stirred cream and sugar into her second cup of tea. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," said Shirou, tracing his own mug of tea with his forefinger as he watched her with his cheek leant against the palm of his other hand. "But you know…it won't always be like this…. We'll have to go to some pretty awful places…."

"Well, we were talking about walking through Hell, weren't we?" said Rin primly. "Obviously I'm not expecting it to be nice like this…."

"You sure you still wanna come with me?"

"Are you sure you've practiced enough Projection Magic to warrant traipsing about the unknown saving people?"

Shirou rolled his eyes, but he still smiled. "I'll never know until I get out there, but I'll always want to be better than I was before."

"And you wouldn't have it any other way." Rin shared his smile as she took a sip of her tea. Setting her mug down, she said, "And I wouldn't either. I'll follow you into whatever Hell you decide to invade first with all your heroic humility and subtly."

"Hm. Invading with humility and subtly. I like the contradictory concept. Well then. I guess there's no persuading you otherwise, any more than there is for me."

"Stubborn through and through, we two."

As Rin winked at him, Shirou had a sudden rush of hope that flooded him to his very heart, sending it beating just a little faster. And he thought again of Kiritsugu, and sincerely hoped that for all the trouble his father might have gone through that had led him down that rather sad path of trying and failing at the dream of becoming a hero of justice, that he might have at least had a loving companion as wonderful as Rin was to him at his side. He wanted to believe it. He knew without ever having to ask, perhaps because Kiritsugu had been strong enough to save Shirou from Hell…that he too had done his share of walking through such a place, over and over again.

And really, the idea of facing that Hell again…didn't seem so bad, when he knew he would always have that reassuring squeeze from a warm hand at his side that said, "You're not alone." That thought in and of itself was pleasingly paradisal, and after that it wasn't that hard to figure out that finding a piece of Heaven in the depths of Hell was far better than enduring a personal Hell in the safe cradle of Heaven.

For the moment, he reached for Rin's hand, and she took his as he remembered the last thing he'd said to Kiritsugu before he died:

"All right, then I'll be a hero for you. You're an adult now, so you can't do it anymore, but I still can. Just leave it to me…."

And then the way Kiritsugu had smiled, that smile of his that had always seemed like a small miracle.

We'll do it together, Kiritsugu. Rin and I. We'll make it happen.

With the way Rin smiled at him, he was certain of it. Now more than ever.

THE END