Disclaimer: I do not own the Fate franchise it belongs to Kinoko Nasu and Type-Moon. I also do not own the Megami Tensei franchise, it belongs to Atlus.
Disclaimer: this story is pure crack. Read at your own risk, the author will not take responsibility for instances of RAGE provoked by this work.
Upping the Ante
Chapter 1
The wooden door closed with a solid thump, much to Sakura's approval, before she clicked the lock closed and slid the deadbolts home. The mechanisms themselves were of solid make, both at first glance and from the heavy feel as she turned them.
"So how is it?" Sakura called further into the apartment, after Pixie who'd flown ahead to check it out.
"Hang on, I'm looking it over!" Pixie shouted back.
Sakura shrugged, and then opening a narrow door near the entrance, took her peaked cap off her head and hung it on a hook at the back of the door. Whistling, she did the same for her cloak, and smoothing it out took one of the plastic hangers from inside the cabinet and slid it into her cloak. Smoothing the cloak once more, she hung it in the cabinet, and closing the door stepped further into the rental apartment, unbuttoning her jacket as she went.
"Well," Pixie began, flying from the bedroom into the living room to sit on the back of the couch. "It's clean and well-lit, and I've no complaints about the furniture. But, it's boring."
"Boring?" Sakura echoed, pulling off her jacket.
Pixie nodded. "It's impersonal and faceless." She said. "Then again, this is a rental apartment for tourists and backpackers and other people who'd be staying in town for a while before moving on, and need someplace cheaper than a hotel, so I probably should not judge."
"I see." Sakura said, taking a look around the living room. There was a couch and a couple of armchairs around a coffee table, smaller tables between corners with simple but clean and wholesome lamps on top. A wooden divider split off the living room from the kitchen cum dining room, with three simple but solid-looking wooden chairs around a similar table visible from where Sakura was standing.
Turning back to her 'Best Friend Forever' (BFF), Sakura blinked and turned her head to find the fairy flying back and forth poking at the armchairs. "Comfy enough, I suppose." She said.
"Enough?"
Pixie shrugged. "No place like home, after all." She said, and Sakura chuckled.
"No argument there." She said, heading into the bedroom, Pixie trailing after her.
The bedroom had a bed for two, sitting on a dark brown carpet, with two bedside tables with lamps on them. There was a larger table near the window, to the left from Sakura's position near the bedroom door, with a pair of chairs similar to those in the dining room. Opposite from the windows and on the other side of the bed was a large wooden cabinet.
Tossing her jacket on the bed, Sakura plopped down on the bed, and pushed down a few times. "Not hard, but not too soft either." She said with approval, before doing the same for the pillows. "Alright then, this place doesn't seem so bad."
Whistling, Sakura pulled off her trench boots, Pixie taking them to put them next to the wall. Meanwhile Sakura opened her luggage, an Atlus Inventory X, the latest in a series of solid and reliable travel bags designed and produced by Atlus Company. This one though had been modified by Sakura's associates, giving it virtually limited space on the inside, and making it absolutely burglar-proof.
Pulling out her slippers, Sakura put them on and stood up, placing her luggage on the bed before continuing to unpack. Clothes first, red shirts and black mini-skirts coming out and then carried off to be stacked neatly in the cabinet. Black thigh-highs followed, along with a spare set of trench boots, and spare cloaks and jackets.
There were pyjamas, though she left those on the bed, with a spare set heading into the cabinet.
A series of boxed but unassembled drones from Mitsubishi but again modified by Sakura's associates were stacked up along a wall, while Pixie carried personal items – shampoo, soap, conditioner, toothpaste and toothbrush, etc. – to the toilet. Additional stuff went into the cabinet and bedside drawers, and a laptop found its resting place on the window table before the empty luggage was placed out of the way in a corner.
"Now what?" Pixie asked.
"Hungry?"
"I want pizza!"
"And ice cream?"
"Of course! Chocolate, please!"
Sakura laughed before heading back into the living room, and placed a call downstairs. "Hello," she began as one of the staff answered her call. "Yes, this is Matou from Room 5-12. Can I get a recommendation for a pizza delivery? Yes…yes…five-two-six…nine-one-nine-eight…okay…okay, thanks."
Briefly replacing the phone back on the receiver, Sakura then picked it up again before pressing nine for several moments to place an external call. "Yes, hello, I'd like to make a delivery." She said. "Sakura Matou…Room 5-12 of Kashima Residences, at Number 10 Ichihara Street…yes, I see, that's good to hear…okay…okay, what are your sizes…cheese and garlic, fourteen inches…hot wings…five, no eight pieces…regular Coke please…yes, yes…okay…thanks!"
Placing the phone back into its cradle, Sakura returned to the dining room. "Is cheese and garlic good?" she asked.
"Did you ask for ice cream?" Pixie asked, sitting up from where she'd been lying on a pillow.
"There's an ice cream parlor downstairs, twenty-fours open, remember? We saw it when we entered the building."
"Oh right," Pixie conceded with an embarrassed laugh. "How long?"
Sakura shrugged before heading to the cabinet. "Twenty minutes, they said." Sakura replied, pulling out fresh underwear and closing the cabinet doors. "Enough time for a shower, don't you agree?"
"Okay…" Sakura began, lounging on the couch and lazily eating pizza with one hand, dressed only in one of her shirts and a pair of panties. "Objectives, we have two. One, find out if an avatar of Ahriman is for one reason or another trapped in the so-called Holy Grail of this city."
"What do we do if it is?" Pixie asked, sitting on the table next to a plate on which lay chicken wings which the fairy was tearing at.
"Ahriman didn't say," Sakura replied. "But if it is, then obviously we free it. If it's not…then we'll see, whatever it is in the end."
Pixie nodded in agreement. "And the second objective?" she asked.
"Isn't it obvious?" Sakura asked with a grin. "Let's have some fun!"
"Oh yeah!" Pixie said with a grin, and the two shared a laugh.
"Okay," Sakura said as the laughter died down. "Objectives aside, priorities! First, we need to get to a bank, and open an account to deposit all the cash we brought with us, there not being a cult chapter here to support us as we could normally count on. Most businesses probably won't care much if we pay cash up front, and this place certainly didn't seem to mind the cash down payment, but I'd prefer not to get caught in any possible complications caused by constantly paying in cash."
"Would it really be that troublesome?" Pixie asked.
"Not really, no," Sakura admitted. "But it'll be annoying, and I have better things to do in my spare time than convincing the law to go sniff around someplace else."
"True." Pixie admitted with a shrug.
"Next priority," Sakura said. "Get the drones up in the air, that way we can tell if there's anything happening around the city that needs our touch."
"Sounds good."
"Third priority," Sakura continued before grinning. "Find my younger sister, and mess with her."
Pixie snickered. "Isn't she your older sister though?" she asked.
Sakura snickered. "Yeah, she was born first," she said, still snickering. "But she's seven. I'm nineteen…"
Sakura trailed off, snickering for several moments with Pixie. "That's going to make her head whirl." Pixie finally managed to say. "What about your parents?"
"The old man and his wife…hmm, fourth priority then. Come to think of it…I need to call Takao-san, I need to arrange a present, just in case fulfilling objective number one breaks the Grail, which it likely might. If so, the old man needs to be compensated."
"Why does your dad need compensation if we break the Grail?" Pixie asked in confusion.
"Because his family, well, ancestors helped build it, and it is kind of their legacy." Sakura said. "It's a small thing, but it's still theirs. If we break it, we should pay for it."
"A matter of principle?" Pixie asked curiously.
"Not really," Sakura said. "More like fair is fair or something like it. After all, it's not like if someone broke one of my things I wouldn't ask for payment or compensation in one form or another. You get the idea."
"I do." Pixie said with a nod. "Yeah, I get the idea. So, what kind of gift do you have in mind?"
"Hmm," Sakura hummed, before finishing the slice of pizza she was holding and downing it with Coke. "I don't know yet. I'll have to think on it some more. No need to rush."
"I think so too. Next priority?"
"…there's a chance, no matter how small, that some of the small and petty people involved in this war would be chafing at how…narrow, and restricting their oh so great and noble calling is." Sakura said after several moments. "If that's the case, we should find them, and see what we can do to help."
"A rotten apple, eh?" Pixie asked with a smile.
"I prefer to call them visionaries," Sakura said with exaggerated pomposity. "Seeing as they'll be leading their people to a new golden age of peace and progress."
Pixie cackled at that. "Peace and progress, huh?" she asked.
"Close enough," Sakura said with a laugh. "Freedom more like, and the beginning at least, of a desire to take action against the injustices of a rotten and unworthy system that needs to be torn down and be born anew, like a phoenix from the ashes."
"Poetic," Pixie said. "Well, no matter what, it's going to be a fun time."
Sakura snorted with amusement, and bit into a slice of pizza. "Yes," she said. "I think so too."
"I hate banks."
"Why do you think I didn't go in?"
"Because you'd cause a scene?"
"There's that too." Pixie said with a grin, and Sakura rolled her eyes while Pixie settled down on her shoulder, the fairy having lazed on a tree branch while her friend was busy in the bank.
"Anything interesting happen while I was busy inside?" Sakura asked.
"A cat thought I'd make a good snack."
"Did you kill it?"
"No, I just gave it a bit of an electric shock." Pixie said primly. "It thought better of the idea and stalked off. Apart from that, no nothing special. Just lounging around, though the air could be fresher."
"Well, I can't blame you for that, you did grow up in the Pixie Forest, after all."
Pixie nodded, sitting relaxedly on Sakura's shoulder while making their way down Fuyuki's streets. At first glance it would seem unnecessarily attention-catching, but typically the crowd mentality of people meant that the vast majority just took Sakura and Pixie as simply another passerby and gave them no more attention than they did other passersby. A few noticed Pixie, but again, most of those just dismissed her as just another one of the strange accessories favored by the young these days, and those that did not didn't want to cause a scene, and simply let it go.
"Now what?" Pixie asked.
"Go back to the apartment?" Sakura asked back. "We've got to get those birds in the air, and while all we have to do is assemble them, at this rate it'll be dinner time before we're finished."
"Yeah well, if you'd woken up earlier this morning, that wouldn't be a problem. Same for the bank; the earlier you come, the shorter the lines."
"Hey, you slept in too!" Sakura shot back. "And besides, it was way past midnight when we arrived in this city, to say nothing of going to sleep."
Pixie fumbled for a bit, and then sighed. "Fair enough, I suppose." She said. "Let's get some ice cream along the way though. If nothing else, something cold and sweet should help calm us down."
"I…that's a good point."
"Alright then!"
Saber blinked and looked around a few times.
"What's wrong?" the albino woman walking with her looking curiously at the blonde Servant.
"No," Saber said after a moment. "It's nothing. Something…elsewhere…elusive."
Irisviel von Einzbern raised her eyebrows at that, and then her eyes narrowed. "Could it be," she began. "You sensed a Servant?"
Saber was silent for a few moments, and then nodded slowly. "That could be so." She admitted. "But if so, then it didn't seem to have noticed us, or even known that we were here. Certainly, I cannot sense them now, or indeed, if we are being followed or spied upon."
"I see." Irisviel said, and after a moment brightened up. "Well, maybe they were just looking around, like we are? I mean, I know magi are really serious and focused on their lives' work, but, who's to say there aren't exceptions?"
"I defer to your expertise in this." Saber said with a smile, and Irisviel beamed at her.
"Alright then," she said. "What do we do now?"
"That's completely up to you." Saber said. "You wished to see the city, and here we are. No matter what you choose to do, Irisviel, I will accompany you."
"Really, Saber…!" Irisviel pouted. "You should loosen up you know, and enjoy yourself some more! Especially since we have the entire afternoon to enjoy town!"
Saber just smiled at the homunculus. "So long as you are happy, then I am happy." She said. "Perhaps you'd like to have your lunch now, it is past noon after all."
"Oh good!" Irisviel gushed, clapping her hands like a child. "I've always wanted to try Japanese sushi! But, it's supposed to be really expensive though, and while it's not like I can't afford it, I wonder what Kiri would say if he finds out I spent so much on a single meal…"
Saber smiled indulgently at Irisviel, who continued to worry about whether or not to indulge in an expensive Japanese lunch before coming to a decision. "Let's go, Saber!" Irisviel said, already dashing away. "Let's go look for a sushi restaurant to have lunch at!"
"Yes, Irisviel."
Tokiomi Tohsaka silently brooded as he walked away the Matou mansion, this short visit at the request of the current Matou head stoking negative sentiments from early in the previous year, and had already begun to simmer down. And then this visit, and for reasons all too reminiscent of the root of those negative sentiments.
Apparently, someone had broken into the Matou mansion during the previous night, and had escaped despite Byakuya's – unstated but without a doubt feeble – attempt at stopping them. The man had apparently been knocked unconscious in the process, and had also been seriously injured, evidence of which Tokiomi had seen with his own eyes, with the man's pained and clumsy movements.
"But then again," Tokiomi thought darkly. "What did I expect? If that pathetic excuse for a magus had been more adept, then Kariya's abandonment of his family would not have been such an issue, and I wouldn't have had to give Sakura to their family."
The thought of his daughter brought a pang to Tokiomi's heart, and a flare of anger. Sakura was supposed to be safe. Sakura was supposed to receive everything Tokiomi was duty-bound not to give her, despite deserving them. Sakura was supposed to become the heir to a great and noble lineage, and achieve a name for herself when she otherwise she could not.
All that had been for nothing.
If not for the Matou having apparently done everything it could, to the point that the previous head, Zouken Matou had died facing his assailant, Tokiomi would have had them expelled from his territory, for failing to not just fulfill their promises with regard to his daughter, but also for letting her be kidnapped. As it was, the death of the last true magus the Matou could boast to have and their subsequent ruination, was sufficient punishment.
Let them look upon us in envy, remembering that they were once our peers and allies, and know that their ruination is their own fault, for failing to protect and cherish that which was of us and was given to them in trust – a trust they failed to uphold!
And now apparently someone else had broken into the Matou mansion, and had even managed to breach their workshop before Byakuya had noticed them, and then escaped no doubt having stolen a portion of what legacy the Matou were now unfit and incapable of inheriting. "No doubt," Tokiomi thought. "The damage to the defenses inflicted by last year's assailant were poorly repaired, if at all, with Zouken dead and Byakuya a poor excuse for family head and magus alike. Too inviting to pass up, no doubt, to an intrepid magus looking to salvage anything useful from the ruins of a once great and noble lineage."
Not that Byakuya had allowed Tokiomi to actually enter the workshop, instead telling him to find what evidence he needed to investigate the matter – dislike the task Tokiomi might considering Matou's failure but duty was duty, be it as magus, father, or as the Second Owner – from the intruder's trail through the house outside the workshop. Truth be told, Tokiomi could easily have pressed the matter, and Byakuya clearly knew it, from the sheer terror he'd shown when Tokiomi had expressed a desire to enter the workshop himself.
But he hadn't.
For one thing, though Matou had fallen, and much of his respect for them had gone for their failure, they had once been allies and peers, so while pitiful in context, he still respected them to an extent. And for another thing, pathetic excuse he might be, Byakuya was still a magus. And with Zouken dead and Sakura…gone, he was now the Matou magus. And together with the first reason…out of…professional, respect, no matter how hollow it might be, Tokiomi had not pressed the matter.
And…
…on a selfish note…
…to see what should have been Sakura's…
Tokiomi closed his eyes, and took a deep breath as left the Matou property, to stand on the sidewalk, waiting for his chauffeur to bring the car around. "Kirei-kun," he thought, reaching through his telepathic link with his apprentice.
"What is your bidding, my master?" Kirei Kotomine responded in kind.
"Inform Assassin," Tokiomi commanded. "And your father, to be watchful for a Master with the following description: a woman apparently in her thirties, wearing a red cloak over a black, double button-down jacket and mini-skirt, with matching thigh-high socks and trench boots. The woman had long dark hair, about shoulder-length, and sported a peaked cap in red with gold trim. Such is the description of the previous night's intruder in the Matou mansion, and there is the possibility that she is a Master taking advantage of an opportunity to acquire secrets and mysteries from a fallen family."
"I hear and obey, my master. And I too shall be watchful for this individual."
Tokiomi nodded, and cut the link. For several moments he just stood there, outside the gaping hole in the wall where once the Matou property's gates stood. And then turning, he stared at the mansion, and sighing, the man's eyes and face softened in a way that would have shocked those who knew him had they seen it.
I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I wish I could have chosen better. I wish I could have protected you better. I'm so sorry, Sakura. Daddy's so sorry.
"Thank you for your patronage!" the delivery girl said cheerfully, and tipping her hat at Sakura.
"You're welcome!" Sakura returned the girl's gratitude with a smile of her own, and politely closed the door. The moment it was closed though…
"Note to self," she said loudly, heading back to the bedroom. "Go to grocery, and buy some fresh stuff. This is very unhealthy to say the least, and it's a pain on the wallet."
Pixie stared at Sakura as though she'd gone mad. "Sakura," she began. "I know much our budget is, and the idea that you, someone the Demon Summoning Program would rank at level seventy-one with the stats to match, would be bothered by something like an unhealthy diet, is a very bad joke."
Sakura gave her little friend a dirty look. "Okay," she said, while beginning to lay out their orders on the window table. "Point taken about our budget. But, about my health in general, and speaking of the Demon Summoning Program, if my health goes south, it'd manifest as penalties on my stats, and be proven by my weakened abilities."
"It's not like you eat fast food on a regular basis anyway." Pixie grumbled, taking a shrimp roll and beginning to chomp it down.
Sakura pinched the bridge of her nose, and with a sigh decided to let it go. Taking and breaking apart a pair of chopsticks, she took her box of pork fried rice with shrimp dumpling toppings, and sitting back on a chair began eating her dinner.
After a few bites, Sakura reached forward, and tapped a key on her laptop's keyboard. The screen flashed, showing on several rectangular icons the drones' images and other sensor readings across the city.
Sakura and Pixie had spent most of the afternoon and much of the evening assembling and testing the drones, followed by the control and communication systems, before sending them out into the night. While most of the drones' systems and hardware were normal and purely technological in nature, the sensor suites and part of the drones' protections incorporated specialized magical components that allowed them to see through or at least detect the presence of magical barriers, and to home in on hotspots of supernatural activity among other features that wouldn't be found on the market model.
Truth be told, magic and the supernatural were all but an open secret by now, only the governments of the world and even people in general just preferred not to really address the situation. At least, in the world where Sakura grew up, that is. Here, in her home plane, supernatural society made a point of principle keeping separate and secret from the mundane world.
How long that would continue to last, though…
"Hmm?" Sakura blinked, before tapping at another key and focusing on a single drone.
"What's wrong?" Pixie asked.
"Drone Number Five's picked up a magical signature." Sakura answered. "It's homing in on the signature, entering visual range in…four minutes, and forty seconds."
"Servant, you think?"
"Hmm…"
Sakura ate in silence, but at the three minutes and eight seconds mark, the drone picked up another magical signature. "I really think those are Servants." Pixie observed.
"If they are," Sakura said, speeding up her pace. "Looks to me like the first battle of the war is about to start."
"Going to jump in?" Pixie asked with a grin.
Sakura scoffed but didn't quite deny it either. "Maybe," she admitted. "At the very least, I'd like to get mobile, the better to take advantage of any situation we could and would want to take advantage of. Besides, we'll have to introduce ourselves sooner or later anyway."
Pixie hummed and nodded, she and Sakura quickly chomping down their dinner as the drone finally entered visual range and maintained a safe distance between itself and the targets. They were a blonde woman in a white winter's coat and hat, along with another blonde woman in a dark-colored business ensemble.
"Which is the Servant do you think?" Pixie asked, biting down on a sweet bun.
"Too far for a detailed reading…" Sakura muttered, tapping on the screen and shaking her head before sitting back and continuing to eat. "If I had to say…I'd say the lady in the suit."
"What makes you say that?"
"Instinct," Sakura replied. "That, and the fact that if the lady in the suit was the Master, and they could afford dressing their Servant in such…luxury, as the other lady is wearing, then they'd dress similarly themselves. Magi are a proud and vain bunch."
"I see." Pixie said. "But, what if we're meant to think that way, that is, the Master knows that and is trying to take advantage of the fact?"
"Hmm…" Sakura hummed. "That's…a good point…and it could also be the Servant naturally appears like that, a Caster maybe…"
Sakura trailed off, silently finishing her meal and enjoying the black gelatin sweet drink that came with her order. She watched as the Master and Servant approached the waterfront, an area clogged with warehouses and factories, and Sakura narrowed her eyes. "This smells of an ambush." She muttered.
"I think so too." Pixie said. "Assassin maybe?"
Sakura didn't say anything, instead manipulating the controls and ordering another drone to the area, though it'd take several more minutes for the second drone to arrive. As the first drone widened its area of operations, Sakura noticed something.
"Someone's hiding…over…there…"
Manipulating the controls, Sakura raised an eyebrow as the drone identified the presence of a tall, dourly-dressed blonde man, standing next to a silvery blob on top of a tall building next to a large, relatively-clear area. Said man was clearly waiting for the women to arrive, and Sakura snorted in understanding.
"I see." He said. "So that's how it is."
"Huh?" Pixie said.
"He – that man on the roof – must have drawn those women there for a fight, probably by leaking his Servant's aura to draw them in." Sakura explained. "And it's a good location for a fight too, this late and in that area, few if any people would be present, having gone home for the night and all that."
"I see." Pixie said. "But, what's that silver blob thing?"
"Mercury, maybe…" Sakura muttered. "A magic device of some sort…I don't know."
Drinking her sweet drink, Sakura watched along with Pixie as the women entered the chosen battlefield, and a tall and rugged man appeared out of nowhere. "Oh wow," Sakura said, magnifying the image. "He's not bad looking at all, if somehow looking rather…pouty."
"Against your exes, what do you think?" Pixie asked with a grin.
"Ha, ha, very funny, not going to answer that."
Pixie shrugged and turned back to the screen. The pre-fight talks were quickly concluded, and the battle was joined. "Saber…" Pixie muttered. "Lancer…and an invisible sword…interesting…hmm?"
Pixie turned to follow as Sakura quickly walked to the toilet, and then shrugging returned to the screen. Sakura emerged about a minute later, but then to Pixie's surprise, didn't return to the laptop.
Instead, she approached the cabinet, and opening it took out the same jacket she was wearing last night. Slipping it on and buttoning it up, Sakura swept from the bedroom to the entrance, where she took out her cloak and hat.
Returning to the bedroom, she draped the cloak on the back of her chair, and placed the hat on the table. Pixie had already retrieved Sakura's boots and several utilities to be worn at her belt, earning her a nod, and continued to watch the fight between Saber and Lancer while putting Sakura put said boots and utilities on.
"…did you see that?"
"Looks to me like Lancer's spear – well that one at least – can cut through magic armor, like the one Saber uses. Interesting…so her armor isn't…completely, there, it's…magically-generated…but so is she…what are the limits of that spear's power though…curious…"
"We're heading out?" Pixie asked.
"Yeah," Sakura said, issuing new commands to the drones, and then checking on the map where the fight was taking place. "There…"
Getting up, Sakura pulled her cloak over herself, and fastened the right collar over the left. And then placing her peaked cap on the head she nodded at Pixie. "Shall we go?" she asked.
"Yes!"
A/N
For those of you who couldn't get the reference, Sakura's luggage is literally the embodiment of a PC's inventory, which is (usually) unlimited in space. There are other references/shout-outs, though I think I'll leave those for the readers to find.
Well, that's a wrap, next chapter the Golden NEET and Broskander show up and the battlefield turns to chaos (no pun intended).
