Disclaimer: I do not own any characters, names, and any copyrighted material used in this work. This is a fanfic, period. Everything belongs to their respective owners. Comments and constructive criticism are all very much appreciated.

Shadowed Sisters

Chapter 1

Luviagelita Edelfelt opened fire with her Gandr, her crest a familiar numbness in her arm as she thinned out the ranks of the undead surging across the derelict Central European village. A moment later and an explosion lit up the night sky as entire sections of the village went up in flames. A few more shots and the last of the undead went down, and the blonde turned in time to see her partner for this venture walk out of a shadow.

High-level Einzbern alchemy allows for the transmutation of space-time itself and in conjunction with the Sixth Imaginary Element allows for spatial teleportation within an unknown limit.

"Are you enjoying unlocking my mysteries, Fraulein Edelfelt?" Kirsche von Einzbern asked, divining what was going on in Luvia's head.

"Sorry, but I couldn't resist." Luvia said with a wave of an arm. "I'm just awed – and perhaps a little jealous – considering that the ability to transmute phenomena in place of matter is something only master alchemists are capable of."

"Then perhaps you'd be pleased to learn that I'm not nearly as good as I appear." Kirsche said before dodging another one of the undead which had jumped down from a nearby building. "Without Imaginary Numbers spatial teleportation without a Lesser Ritual would have been impossible."

"That makes sense." Luvia said as she killed the undead with a reinforced kick after Kirsche had tied it down with silver wire. "Sorcery traits are 'special features' which allow for mysteries that would not otherwise be possible. In your case that would be High Thaumaturgy – special teleportation – that makes use of shadows as a medium."

"That is correct, although it wouldn't be proper to discuss this matter considering magi tradition." Kirsche pointed out before pulling a Glock and putting armor-piercing rounds through several more of the undead behind Luvia. "Let's go; the objective is still a good distance away."

The sound of splintering wood filled the night air – now redolent with the stench of smoke and burning flesh – as Kirsche kicked down the door leading into the warehouse. A silver-haired vampire lounging in a jeep looked at the two females as they entered. "You two are late." He said.

"Herr Enhance…" Kirsche said before Luvia could give her own stinging rejoinder. "…you neglected to inform us that this village was…an outpost shall we say, of the enemy."

Enhance waved it off and gestured for them to get into the jeep even as he started it up. "I figured that if you couldn't get through those punks, then you wouldn't survive the next part of the plan anyway."

"Quite…" Kirsche agree before getting into the vehicle followed by a fuming Luvia. The blonde's mood didn't improve and only worsened when the vampire literally drove through the wooden barricade leading out of the warehouse and violently drove out of the dead village and down the rough country road.

"Couldn't you have teleported us directly to the target's vicinity instead?" Luvia grumbled as Enhance gleefully drove the jeep without a hint of concern for road safety. Kirsche just shook her head.

"…too risky." She said. "Dead Apostle Territorial Fields are serious business. If we're lucky we'll be scattered in pieces across the terrain. And if we're not…we might end up materializing inside a solid wall. Ever heard of nuclear reactions? Gas is fine, as the molecules are relatively diffused and are easily displaced. Liquids and solids are different…let's just say that it wouldn't be very safe to suddenly try and materialize mass at unquantifiable speeds within undefined parameters. It won't be pretty Fraulein."

"That's putting it lightly." Enhance agreed. "Nukes are crude, but they're damn powerful. I wouldn't want to get caught in the middle of an accidental mushroom!"

"Mushroom…?" Luvia echoed blankly, and Enhance cackled. Kirsche stayed silent.

"Nukes create mushroom-shaped clouds when they go boom, little lady!" he explained. "That's why it's called a mushroom."

"Oh I see…what a quaint euphemism…"

"We got company!" Enhance shouted, and the two magi turned and spotted a pair of chimera-like creatures ripping after them on leathery, bat-like wings.

"I'll take care of them real quick." Luvia said while pulling out her gems only to be preempted by her companion.

"Save your gems for the enemy fortress Fraulein." Kirsche said before turning to Enhance. "We might need them more by then…Herr Enhance, do you perchance have any heavier armaments with you?"

"Hey what do you think of me?" the vampire shot back offended. "There should be an RPG down under the seat."

"Danke…" Kirsche said before pulling out a heavy case and opening it pulled out an RPG. "…come to little sister, yes?"

She aimed and fired, a bloodcurdling shriek filling the air as the RPG took out the monster with ease. "Well that's that." She said as she began taking potshots with her Glock. "At the least short of the ancestor coming out to play, this shouldn't get any worse."

Enhance actually groaned and glared over a shoulder as a roar echoed across the air. "You just had to tempt Murphy, did you?" he said as both magi noticed the impending arrival of a swarm of mutant bats. At the same time the chimera dove down on them with a triumphant shriek and ignoring Kirsche's potshots…and was blown apart with a single shot from Enhance's own gun.

"Watch it!" he added. "Bat swarms coming in fast!"

"I don't think so!"Luvia shouted as she shakily rose to her feet and threw a gemstone with a reinforced arm and shouted a spell in Finnish. The resulting blast of wind tore the mutant bats apart…and buffeted the jeep and nearly blew the Finnish magus out of the jeep.

"Pull me in Einzbern!" Luvia shrieked as she was caught in the nick of time by Kirsche. The other woman rolled her eyes before doing so.

"Please think before you act next time, Fraulein."

"Alright, alright…" Luvia said grumpily as Enhance began to slow down. "…why are we stopping?"

"We've reached the edge of the core territory…" the vampire explained as he halted beside a pair of rusted iron gates and shut the vehicle down. "…it would be safer for us to walk."

Kirsche and Luvia alike nodded the latter a bit more enthusiastically. "Fraulein Edelfelt…" Kirsche asked while replacing her ammo clip. "…I mean no offense but do you not find you attire rather…counter-productive in combat situations?"

Luvia glared at her companion and eyed her attire: a collared and long-sleeved white blouse, black vest, tie, and pants. A black overcoat and functional if fashionable – by mundane standards – boots rounded it out: plain and utilitarian attire for a spell-caster. "Perhaps…" she conceded coolly. "…but as a member and more importantly heiress to the House of Edelfelt it is my obligation and privilege to be as elegant as possible whenever crushing the family's foes."

"I see."

"You ladies can discuss fashion later." Enhance said with a roll of his eyes before entering the forest beyond the gates – if it could be called that given that all the trees were dead and petrified – and leading the way towards the castle beyond. The two women followed, and it wasn't long before they found themselves staring at the ruined castle standing at the edge of a cliff over a freezing lake.

"There are probably guards…" Enhance said redundantly before spreading his wings. "…and V said that I'd never be a gentleman. I'll make a distraction, and the two of you sneak in. Don't forget: that piece of shit ancestor is mine. The rest is fair game."

Without another word the vampire flew off towards the castle, and it wasn't long before alarm bells could be hard and the distant sounds of battle could be heard. "Let's go…" Luvia said, and Kirsche followed and extended a transparent (from the inside) dome of shadow to mask their approach along the causeway.

"That Enhance sure did a number on these…whatever they are." Luvia observed as she inspected the corpse of a castle guard. As she stood up she noticed that her companion had since disappeared and had taken her shadow with her. "Einzbern…? Damn it Einzbern, where are you?"

The spell-caster phased through a shadow and quietly crept down a corridor towards where according to the fragile and less-than-completely reliable maps the Einzbern agents had provided was the astronomy chamber. Why the ancestor would choose to keep it in such a place was beyond her, but this was neither the time nor place for such a question.

The sound of marching boots reached her and she quickly hid herself in a convenient alcove. More guards rushed past her, and then from outside came the sounds of battle: a woman screaming in pain, angry roars of an unknown man, and Enhance's laughter.

I'm glad to hear that he's enjoying himself.

Kirsche continued on her way once the guards had passed by even as an explosion on a lower floor rocked the castle. As she entered the astronomy chamber she paused and looked around…and then stepping forward ducked and rolled towards the opposite wall. She looked up from where she knelt and spotted a chimera-like vampire morph into a scantily-clad redhead.

"Well, well…" she said as she flexed an arm that would probably have taken Kirsche's head off if not for her combat instincts. "…what have we here? One of the traitor's magi lackeys?"

"I don't have time to deal with you." Kirsche said as her eyes spotted the vial the Einzbern elders had commanded her to acquire, sitting in a globe full of clear liquid in one corner. She pressed down on her shadow with a hand and extended it in a pentacle-like fashion around her. "Instead I'll have you play with my family's soldiers instead."

I might not be able to teleport myself through the territory, but I can teleport things or people in using myself or an ally as a reference point.

The vampire shrieked in outrage at being so looked down, and leapt forward even as white-uniformed homunculi armed with halberds teleported through her shadow and moved to attack as well. As the vampire and the artificial Humans fought each other, Kirsche approached the globe and pulled out a satchel with several other vials.

First she introduced an indicator which would identify the general properties of the fluid within the globe, followed by several other reagents to filter out said properties and obtain data to work out a neutralizer. Meanwhile all around her the homunculi and the vampire continued to fight and wreck the astronomy chamber. More than once the vampire came close to her, only to be driven back for her life by heavy rhenium alloy blades.

Finally the neutralizer was finished and was introduced, although it would take some time to complete the reaction. The spell-caster stood and turned her attention from the smoking and fizzing fluid in the globe to the battle around her.

The vampire had taken out three of the homunculi and was wearing down the other two. Kirsche frowned, and then coming to an impromptu decision, tossed something into the globe and halted the neutralization process. Then she pulled out her Glock and taking careful aim, put a bullet into the vampire's head.

She went down like a sack of mead, and was promptly cut to pieces by the homunculi. Somehow Kirsche knew that it wouldn't be sufficient to put the vampire down for good…but she'd already thought of that. With a gesture the homunculi backed off…and Kirsche used her wires to throw the globe down onto the vampire's 'corpse'. Stone, flesh and bone hissed and burned, while blood boiled into vapor as Kirsche used another wire to pull the vial towards her.

After cleaning it up with a piece of cloth, she looked sharply at the window at a nearby explosion and nodded at her homunculi. "Let's go." She said as she slipped the vial into a pocket, and then nodded. "We have one more thing to do before we can go help Fraulein Edelfelt out."

Luvia was tired and running low on prana. And still the guards – vat-grown creatures similar but in a very crude fashion to Einzbern homunculi – swarmed at her. She must have killed over a hundred of them by now, but there was just so many of them.

She threw a gem and bought some time with a firewall before running through another doorway…and just as quickly backed out and jumped down a stairwell as more of the obscene things poured out of the hallway. She staggered as she landed, but it wasn't so bad. She ran down a hallway, using Gandr to take down what few guards were in her way…and finally ended up surrounded in the entrance hall.

She sighed wearily and drew herself up while drawing what few gems she had left. "So this is it, I see?" she said. "Alone and abandoned, this is where I fall? Alright then…I am Luviagelita Edelfelt, heiress to the House of Edelfelt! Rejoice worms! You have the unworthy honor of fighting to the death…!"

"That is all very interesting…" Kirsche interrupted Luvia while walking out of a shadow next to her, followed by a pair of Einzbern homunculi. "…but it's hardly necessary."

"You…!" Luvia thundered with an accusing finger. "Where have you been all this time?"

"The objective has been achieved."

"W-what…? You used me as a distraction!"

"You will be compensated."

"Why you…!"

With a chorus of roars the guards closed in, and Kirsche gestured. The two homunculi charged into the ranks of the guards coming from the castle interior direction, and reaped a bloody harvest with their heavy blades. At the same time Luvia threw her gems at the guards blocking the exit and blew them to bits. "We can talk later." Kirsche said while using the surviving guards in that direction for target practice. "Let's get out of here."

"What about Enhance?"

"He can take care of himself."

As if on cue Enhance chose that moment to drop in from the ceiling, his face cut and his clothes stained with ash and blood, but otherwise unharmed. A moment later and the ancestor dropped in opposite Enhance, in his full vampire form: a tall and lanky Humanoid with bat-like but feathered wings, armored scales across critical areas of the body, and demonic claws and horns.

Rather stereotypical really, but Luvia couldn't help but shiver at the malevolent aura and power the being emanated. "You girls got what you wanted then?" Enhance asked over a shoulder but didn't take his eyes off his enemy.

"That is correct Mein Herr."

"Good…" he said, and then he tightened his grip on his weapons. This time both Kirsche and the other ancestor's eyes widened visibly as Enhance unsealed his own power as a Dead Apostle Ancestor. "…now get out of here before you get hurt. Things…are going…to get very interesting around here."

"Let's go…" Kirsche said. "…now!"

"No complaints this time!" Luvia concurred as they both broke and ran, light and explosions erupting from behind them as the castle was blown apart by the destructive power of two ancestors facing off in a battle to the death.

"I can't believe you used me as a distraction!" Luvia raged as she and Kirsche got into the jeep. Kirsche ignored her in favor of turning the vehicle on – Enhance had 'conveniently' left the keys in the jeep – and driving out of the territory.

"As I said you will be compensated." She said once they were on their way back to safety, and handing her a sealed envelope. "And in any case the objective was achieved, and we're out safe. There is no point in further recriminations."

Luvia scoffed but said nothing. After a moment she tried to open the envelope, only to be preempted by Kirsche who placed a restraining hand on her hands. "Please don't open that here." She said with a clearly-perturbed expression on her space. "Folded space is rather…tricky to say the least."

Luvia raised an eyebrow at her statement but declined to comment in favor of putting the envelope away in a pocket. "No offense…" she began instead. "…but considering how familiar you are with mundane weapons and vehicles, don't you think there's anything wrong with a magus with those kinds of 'skills'?"

Kirsche smiled a rare smile at the old argument. "They have their uses." She said. "And I've said it before and I'll say it again Fraulein: I am not a magus, I am a spell-caster."

"Right, right…"

Kirsche closed the doors leading into her and her sister's wing of the Einzbern Castle. The elders had been officious and crotchety over the report she'd given about her most recent mission with the Edelfelt girl and (this time at least) with the infamous vampire Enhance.

Sighing she removed her coat and hung it in a nearby closet…and was promptly floored by a purple projectile with silver hair that latched onto her midsection. "Welcome back Kirsche!" the little girl gushed, and Kirsche blinked before smiling and patting her elder sister.

"I'm back sister."

Illyasviel von Einzbern immediately scowled. "Don't call me that you impertinent child!" she said faux-angrily. "It's Illya!"

"Alright…but only if you get off me..."

"Okay." Illya said cheerfully before doing so, and Kirsche immediately stood up before heading to her rooms. Illya followed, the siblings chatting inanely while the younger of the two changed to casual house-wear. The difference between the siblings was stark: Kirsche was buxom and dark-haired, with a reserved and cool air about her, while Illya was…slender with silver hair and exuberant and childish.

No one would be able to tell that the young woman who looked to be in her early twenties was only fifteen and the little girl was actually eighteen.

"So…?" Kirsche asked. "Did you miss me so much or do you have something to show off?"

Illya giggled and gestured while seated on Kirsche's bed. Kirsche raised an eyebrow and slowly raised her head as her eyes took in the silently watchful giant that towered over Illya. "I knew that grandfather was ambitious…" she said with a weak laugh while coming closer and kneeling down to Illya's level. "…but I never expected something like this. So this is Hercules…"

Illya raised both hands and felt her sister's face. "What's wrong?" she asked, and Kirsche's face fell.

"You'll die." She said softly, so soft it could barely be heard. The resulting silence was profound, broken only by Berserker's breathing as his Master caressed her younger sister's face.

"I know." Illya finally said. "But I don't mind. I'm your older sister aren't I? When Mama and Papa are gone, it's the elder sibling's job to take care of the younger one. That's why…no matter what it takes, I'll grant your wish."

Kirsche was silent, and then forced herself to be at least bittersweet about the whole situation. "I…but what about our brother?" she asked, and Illya's hands briefly froze.

"We'll see." She said, and Kirsche smiled knowingly before reaching up with a hand and taking one of Illya's own and squeezing it.

"You want to meet and know him at least." She said. "Alright…in that case it's the younger sister's turn to be cool. I'll see what I can do over that matter."

Illya giggled. "It doesn't suit you Kirsche." She said. "That kind of talk really doesn't suit you."

Kirsche scoffed and got to her feet. "Maybe…" she said. "…but that doesn't mean I won't do what I just said I would do."

Illya smiled and looked into Kirsche's eyes for a long moment. "Alright then…" she said. "…if you say that you can do it, then I'll believe in you. I'll hold it to you, sister."

Kirsche just smiled. Challenge accepted.

A/N

Time-skip ten years to just before the Heaven's Feel, and a vampire hunt. For Enhance that is…Einzbern just wanted the serum which the vampire used to become a vampire to begin with, and Luvia was hired as backup (the Edelfelt are technically mercenaries in canon).

Next chapter we'll have Illya and Kirsche arriving in Japan, and after that: mind screw/plot twist.