AN: This is my first ever fiction, please go easy on me. Any grammatical mistakes you find and have the patience to correct, please write a review or send a PM.
English is not my first language, mistakes should be expected in expression or meaning if not in grammar (those I try to correct swiftly).
Thank you for reading this.
I always believed the I will accept death the same way I have accepted life, calmly and indifferently, as an intriguing, unsolicited gift. I believed so!
Yet what is this hellish landscape all around me then?
'Could this be a dream?' Accepting it as such would be easy. After all how else could this be possible?
Alas this idea must be discarded near instantly as pain unlike any I previously experienced assaults my every sense. My skin burned, my muscles shredded bones shattered and lungs full of something that is most certainly not air. I couldn't move nor breathe, merely able to use my still functional eyes for perception.
I do not know how long I lay there, surrounded only by flames and rubble. I couldn't even fall unconscious for some inane reason! The pain was subsiding somewhat now, along with all feeling in my limbs. My nerves most likely so burned out that no signals of distress could be sent to my brain.
'Perhaps there was a fire in my apartment?' 'Perhaps I died and this is purgatory?' Many such thoughts ran through me as I was forced to lay there, conscious and frightened.
In the end though my salvation had arrived. It came in the form of a man in a trench coat with eyes that could only belong to something without soul or life within... that is, until he laid those empty empty eyes on me and teared up. Could I still feel my face and make expressions, undoubtedly I would be slack-jawed in shock at the considerable emotion appearing on this vacant man's profile.
He lifted my arm slowly with care, looking into my eyes with feelings I could not decipher. There was a flash of light and his gaze saddened for a moment before brightening up again. This time a much brighter light shined and in near an instant I felt all of my body again. Along with a strange, indescribable sensation of warmth and safety as he hugged me. In that moment I could perceive my entire body slackening… then I finally fell into blissful unconsciousness.
I returned to awareness in a very different place compared to the infernal surroundings from last time. A pure white room. I lay in a bed of the same shade.
The only colorful items were the flowers in a white vase, on a white nightstand… indeed it was a hospital room. I couldn't say I had much experience with them personally up until now but I certainly remember watching enough medical dramas to make the connection.
I took a closer look around the place but nothing particularly stood out. I tried to stand up but stumbled off the side and fell onto my knees. Grabbing the metal railing at the head of the bed I managed to stand, but something was not right. Many things weren't at this point of course but this was different. My body didn't feel… correct in a way I was used to. I looked at myself for the first time since this began, then very nearly fell on my backside.
I was short! I was less than half the height I was used to. Coming to strange conclusions I needed to verify, I started searching for a mirror to take a look at myself with. I found one in the nightstand next to the bed. I was surprised. I looked nothing like myself. My hair was a strange shade of rusty auburn and my eyes golden.
Also more importantly I looked probably five or six years old! My mind whirring with ideas I barely noticed the opening of the door. Turning around swiftly I fell on my back as my new body couldn't keep up with my thoughts.
The man who entered was the same one who saved me. I couldn't make out the details then but he looked like a skeleton now, malnourished with hollow cheeks and bags under his eyes, his hair standing up in all the wrong places.
We started for some time then, both of us analyzing the other. He was the first to break the silence.
"My name is Kiritsugu Emiya, I want to ask you a few questions." I nod and the man now identified as Kiritsugu Emiya drags a chair into the room from what I can imagine is the hallway of the hospital.
"I understand your confusion, but there are some things I must know." He says with a serious air around him. Who even talks like this to a child? Not that I am but I certainly look like one. I just nod my head with an expression of confusion. He takes this is a sign to continue.
"What is the last thing you remember?" He asks softly and I somehow feel compelled to answer truthfully.
"I was... in a fire. Everything around me was burning, I was also burning." I answer with as much as I can remember, my body flaring up in phantom pains from the burns now absent from my skin.
"I see. What is your name, child?" He questions but I have no answer. My old name I would've blurted out easily now somehow not coming to my tongue. My mouth moved but no sound came out. Who am I actually? My memories, now that I concentrate on them feel extremely strange. I remember places and all the things I learned, but no matter how hard I concentrate no faces come to my mind, no names surface in my thoughts. I rationally understand that this is indeed unnatural and strange, but somehow still accept it. It is an indescribable feeling of helplessness and I barely hold myself back from falling unconscious as my head starts pounding. I put both my palms on my temples and try to push as a soundless scream escapes my still sensitive vocal chords.
Kiritsugu sensing my growing pain snatches one of my arms and the same light I witnessed last time sparks to life on his hand in a strange pattern before he pulls it back as if burned. I couldn't really form coherent thoughts at that point and simply fell unconscious once again, barely half an hour after waking up from the last time.
My third time waking up in another completely different place. This time however I felt much more invigorated, nearly jumping up from where I woke up from, the only thing holding me back is the fact that I didn't want to repeat the accident of falling on my back once again.
Thus I slowly surveyed my surroundings and came to the conclusion that right now, without a doubt I am dreaming. An endless field of grass, a perfectly blue sky with puffy white clouds dotting it in a few places, gigantic silvery gears of unimaginable magnitude suspended above that perfect sky, ever so slowly turning in different directions.
I stand up carefully to not disturb the imbalance between my body and mind and look around once more. The scenery is the same surreal image I saw lying down. A few gentle gusts of wind blow my hair alongside the grass, it is an extremely comfortable feeling. I look up into the sky once again and I notice something missing, there is no sun. Wherever I observe upwards, only those gears are there above the clouds and light seemingly comes from the entire sky at once, like It is always midday.
I decided that I had no choice but to look around this place so I used the tried and tested method when dealing with lucid dreams and imagined myself flying. It worked, to some extent. I could fly as if it was natural and my mind somehow didn't reject my body here. There were limitations however and anywhere I went sideways there were only more plains of grass. No matter how fast and in which direction I imagined myself flying there was nothing else.
Upwards was even stranger, I could reach the clouds and fly above them, but those gears were always the same height away. From the surface they were seemingly just above the clouds but when flying above the clouds they were just as far away. I couldn't will them to come down and neither could I will myself to them, It simply didn't work even when I tried.
So I sat down on the grass and started thinking about my situation. The fire and hospital, that Japanese man Kiritsugu Emiya showing up and questioning me. Last time I fell asleep naturally I was in my college room in Europe. I had just finished studying for the exam the next day and I was tired.
"I remember these things clearly so why can't I recall what happened after?" I shout my thoughts aloud in this empty dreamlike world. I am confused and scared still, yet I have no choice but to move forward now, the answers to my questions do not lie in this place.
Thus I laid down on the grass and closed my eyes once more. I fell asleep near instantly and woke up in the hospital bed I fell unconscious in. Strangely I could still remember everything I did in my dream. I usually forget my dreams after waking up.
I looked around and found the man who saved me and asked for my name was still sitting on his chair, Kiritsugu Emiya was reading something that looked like newspaper, except those were not English letters but rather Chinese or Japanese. I didn't study them but I knew what they were. He also looked at me the moment I turned towards him. He had a gentle, almost pitying look in his determined eyes that were so empty before.
"Do you want to be my son?" He asked bluntly and I could only stare at him with an incredulous look.
"Didn't you want to ask me something important before?" I tried to derail the conversation.
"It is of no consequence now. Tell me boy do you know what magecraft is?" Magecraft? As in magic? "Indeed. Although you shouldn't confuse the two. I am a spellcaster." I must've asked that out loud.
"Spell...caster? So you're basically a wizard?" My question led to Kiritsugu suddenly and inexplicably laughing out loud. It wasn't a happy one though, this was filled with grief and sorrow.
"A wizard huh? I could only wish I was one… although perhaps not even that. A spellcaster and magus is to a wizard what a dirty puddle is to the ocean. No, I am no wizard and I hope to never see or meet one. Anyway we have went off the topic here. I shall ask once more, do you want me to adopt you?" He asked slowly as if gauging my reaction.
'What about my parents? My relatives?' I wanted to ask but if the hell I woke up in was any indication as to the fate of my family… then I am alone now. Alone in an unfamiliar world with self proclaimed mages and with a body more than a decade younger that it should be. What choice do I even have, not recalling even the faces or names of my parents and family. Moving forward, such is my only option!
"Yes!" I answer decisively with a single word, befitting of the body I currently inhabit. Kiritsugu smiles tightly and stands from his chair, beckoning me towards the door.
The hallway outside is empty, only from a few rooms could conversation be heard and I see a few nurses running around in another wing from a window. Kiritsugu somehow sensing my confusion answers my unasked question.
"When I brought you in you weren't too injured. A few burns along your arms and a concussion. They put you in the least crowded ward, you would've been released after you woke up had I not come by." How is that possible? I remember intimately how my skin and muscles were burned up in that fire, how my bones were broken in places I didn't even know I had them… perhaps this magecraft he was telling me about is true?
My musing was interrupted as we were reaching the receptionist's desk. The woman had her long black hair in a ponytail and wore a professional nurse outfit. She was typing away something on her computer. Also that PC looked ancient, probably something from the 90's. Kiritsugu and I walked up the her and she looked at us in disinterest.
"Excuse me miss, I would like to discharge my son." Kiritsugu said in a neutral voice.
"Please wait here for a moment, I shall bring the papers." She walked into the room behind the desk and came back a minute later with a few papers. "Just fill these and he's free to go." She handed the papers to Kiritsugu before going back to her work.
Kiritsugu looked at the papers and filled out what he could. Then he turned the paper towards me and gestured to the empty space where I assume my name would be, they were all still in Japanese. Actually now that I think about how can I even understand them… another mystery for later I guess.
I merely looked back at him and shrugged in what must've seemed like disinterest, but was in fact meant in a way that I have no clue what It says. Kiritsugu either understood or misunderstood me because he looked around before writing something down and giving the paper to the receptionist. She glanced over it quickly before looking at me in slight pity then shushed us away.
"I have purchased a traditional house in the northern part of Miyama city. It is quite large so we should have no problem settling in. You must have many questions. I promise I shall answer them once we get there, Shirou Emiya."
Indeed you are right my new father Kiritsugu. My questions are many and all the answers I got until now were merely scraps that led to even more questions.
'Shirou Emiya'… why does that sound so familiar?