Chapter 2: The First Steps

"Trace On." Shirou muttered, closing his eyes and placing his hand on the pipe. Slowly, he began making his magic circuit, wincing as pain began to build up in his spine, the pain comparable to being burnt badly by a metal object. The boy began sweating, trying to maintain focus as he activated his magic circuit, mana flowing through, increasing the pain. He began to cry out, the pain becoming too much to bear, before he got an accurate reading on the pipe's composition. The door opened, startling the boy who lost focus and his magic circuit shattered, stopping the magic he was performing. Kiritsugu walked into the shed and stared at the boy. "What's wrong Shirou? I heard you scream just now?" He asked, concerned for his son. The red haired boy just looked at him before shaking his head, trying to hide the pain he recovering from. "Nothing's wrong dad, just practising magic, that's all." He said, hiding his discomfort as he felt the pain slowly fade away. His father just stood there thinking. "Well okay then." Shirou just sighed in relief as his father left the workshop. The eight year old had spent a year trying to figure out how to do magic from old instruction booklets he found in the shed, which served as the boy's workshop. "Okay, let's try this again."

o.o.o

Kiritsugu sat in his chair, wondering what the boy was doing. "Magic shouldn't cause that much pain for a person to scream in agony, unless he was trying something beyond his limits." The man shook his head, dismissing the thought, he'd ignored the boy's pestering so far on teaching him, though that didn't stop the boy from researching on his own. "Unless, he's not using his circuits and is converting his nerves instead." The thought appeared in his head. He knew the boy had natural magic circuits from a checkup through use of structural grasping, not that the man used it all that much, other than to get info on certain objects. If the boy was converting his nerves, he'd more or less be playing Russian roulette with a load more bullets than one. "I'll check in a minute." The man thought, hearing the shed door close as the boy walked back to the main house. "Shirou, come here please." Kiritsugu asked the red haired boy walking past. The boy complied, not really hesitating to comply or ask questions. "Sit in front if me, I just want to check something." The boy did so and the man laid his hand on the boy's back. Using magic, the man scanned his son's body. "It's just as I thought. He's converted part of his nerves, they're healing quickly, but soon his circuits will atrophy." He thought. "Right Shirou. Hold still for a moment." He said, getting ready to proceed with the task. Breathing in, Kiritsugu focused and ran magic through his circuits and into the boy's body, finding the boy's circuits. Shirou arched his back, as his circuits were being filled with magic for the first time. Stopping the magic, Kiritsugu removed his hand and the boy looked at him, relaxing again. "There, you should be able to use your circuits now." Kiritsugu said. The boy tried doing so and was shocked when it worked. "It doesn't hurt anymore, thanks dad." The boy smiled, clearly happy with the result. Kiritsugu just smiled and watched as the boy ran off to try out some more magic. The father felt relieved.
"At least there won't be any accidents." He thought. before launching into a coughing fit. "Damn. Looks like the curse is catching up to me." He thought, the coughing ending. It was a year since he encountered Angra Mainyu, yet the curse was beginning to advance as the first year of retirement set in.

o.o.o

A barren hill... lit by a sunset that seemed dull and yet bright at the same time. The feeling that it brought was one that was unknown and yet familiar to the boy. It was like loneliness but not quite, more of a longing. The boy couldn't place a finger on the word, it was just out of reach to him. "Shirou.." A voice spoke, interrupting his thoughts. There was no one around to say it, yet the voice was familiar. "Shirou..." The voice repeated, it's voice becoming clearer. "Shirou Emiya, wake the hell up!" The boy was slammed out of bed by a teenager with a very strong grip. "Fuji-nee, stop." The boy moaned, groggy from being forcibly awakened. The girl still held tightly onto the boy. "Shirou, cook something," she moaned. "I need breakfast and no one's here to cook me anything." The boy removed himself from her grasp and got up. It had been a week since Kiritsugu had left for some business errand somewhere in Germany, in the meantime, Taiga and Raiga became his caretakers, though it was beginning to be that Shirou was gonna have to learn how to cook, the fifteen year old had no idea how to work an oven and the mafia boss didn't get up until midday. "Fine." The boy sighed, marching to the kitchen. As he grabbed a cookbook, the latest of investments Shirou had from his allowance from Kiritsugu, and searched through to find how to cook omelettes. The eight year old then started preparing breakfast as the teenager moaned and whined constantly from the sitting room next door. After half an hour or so, Shirou sat down with two plates of omelettes next to him, not very traditional but relatively simple to make. "I'm gonna go to the shed real quick then have a bath, just watch TV in the meantime." The boy ordered as he finished his meal and went to the back of the house. Not bothering to hear her response as he made his way to the shed, breathing in the cool spring air.

He opened up the shed and closed the door behind him. Sitting down, he opened a book next to him and began to read. After a few minutes, he lifted up his arm and fired off a mental gun in his head, activating his magic circuits. He breathed and pictured an image in his head. "Trace On." He said, focusing on the simple image in his mind and trying to use his mana to create it. Blue energy swirled around him, forming a short pole like structure and solidifying. Breathing in, he focused more mana and watched as the energy forming the object stopped and dissipated, leaving a small tube in the boy's hands. The boy waited and tightened his grip a little, moaning as the tube shattered upon more force being put upon it. "Damn," He muttered, annoyed that he couldn't seem to get the object right. Gradation Air or more commonly known was the magecraft that allowed mages to create objects out of their mana. As a simple child, Shirou thought this branch of magic was extraordinarily cool, however it was much more work than he originally thought. So far, he could only get the basic structure down, the density being completely non existent, often breaking down as soon as it was created. That was until an idea came into his head.

Running to look in one of the boxes littering the shed, he yanked out a pipe and sat down, running mana through his circuits and structurally grasping it. He found that he was quite talented with this area of magic, something he was proud of and yet was disappointed with. After making sure that all the information was there, Shirou held out his right hand and activated his magic circuits. "Trace On." He muttered, his mind briefly wandering to his dream of the hill, before an idea formed in his mind. "Judging concept of creation. Check. Hypothesising basic structure. Check. Duplicating composition material. Check. Imitating skill of making. Check." The boy was rattling off ideas that formed whilst focusing on his magic, unsure of what he was actually doing. "Sympathise with experience of growth. Check. Reproduce accumulated years. Check. Excel manufacturing process. Check." His rant stopped as his mana gathered and formed the shape before solidifying and fading, leaving him with an exact replica of the pipe that he had lying next to him. His mind racing, he quickly performed structural grasping, gasping as he found that both pipes were the exact same. "No way." He said, taking in the fact that he had just performed projection correctly this time. "Wonder if I could create weapons out of nowhere?" He wondered aloud, before dismissing the thought. "Let's try this again. Trace On." He said, activating his circuits for another round.