Ritsuka Fujimaru was used to strangeness. It was one of the many, many!, things you had to get used to when you jumped from "ye, don't care about you, peon" to "you gotta save the world now, good luck" all in the same day. Honestly, he felt like he even got decently good at it. He managed to greet the odd legendary figure met on the way to the mess without stuttering anymore, well, not much.

So, he felt with good confidence that if even him couldn't handle the unease that he felt walking in Chaldea those days, well, he surely could try to say something to someone, and for someone, he meant Olga Marie Animusphere.

"Ehm, Director?" He didn't like being the fidgety one, if only because it fell too good with his old "new guy" vibe. Still, he was right to feel fidgety in that moment, right?

The Director, lying with leisure over a couch that most definitely wasn't in the mess hall a week before, took in her mouth a grape, her features softening with pleasure as she closed her eyes.

"Mmh, so sweet…"

The young demigod whom lap she rested her head on made a soft smile that somehow managed to both make his face even more handsome that it already was and to make Ritsuka feel depressed. He had read about "looks that could pierce hearts", but, damn, his self-respect took a dive around that guy.

"Hey, i am talking to you." The Director opened an mirth-full eye, watching the demigod.

He seemed to shake himself from his thoughts. "Oh, i am sorry. I think i left myself get distracted fro a moment." His pure, azure eyes gleamed with sweet fondness.

"Is that so?" Marie chuckled. "And what could have possibly attracted your attention so much?"

"Something worthy to be looked at…" The demigod whispered, his hand moving almost absented-mindedly over the director's long hair.

"I wonder what it is…" The director looked pleased, but there was mischiviousness in her eyes. "If you get disracted so easily, maybe your standards aren't so high, mh?"

The demigod stopped his ministrations to look at her, the gleam in his eyes turned to mischief of its own. "Oh, but they are." He said. "I was just wondering if you would manage to pass them."

"And the answer is…?"

"Maybe… with a bit of help…"

"Help? And from who? From you?"

"You just have to ask…"

"Is that a challenge?"

"Is that a yes?"

"Mmmh…"

"GUYS!"

Both the demigod and the Director turned to see a red-faced, fuming Ritsuka that, between screaming his lungs out and get the "are you crazy" stares that he was getting in that moment, and having to witness more of that flirty, shameless talk, had decided to go all out with the first and to hell with it.

Except that the stares thrown his way from all around the mess hall made him even redder that he already was.

He coughed. "Director. Can i talk to you from a moment?"

Marie shook herself from staring bewildered. "Ehm, sure." She went back to sit, and turned to the demigod. "Do you mind? Only a moment."

The demigod's soft smile didn't waver. "Sure." He got up, stretching himself and somehow managing to make it look graceful and virile at the same time. Ritsuka made a point of ignoring how the Director seemed bent on eating him with her eyes. "I will go to talk to my countrymen. See you soon, Ritsuka. Director." That last word was underlined with intensity, and accompanied with an intense glance that Marie didn't miss to reciprocate.

Ritsuka mantained his peace as long as necessary for the Director to give her salutations. That went on, and on, and on, with her staring a bit too low than acceptable over the demigod's retreating form.

He coughed again.

"Oh, yes, yes." The Director looked like she was falling from the clouds. She took out a napkin from her clouse and waved at her with it. "Uff, that was hot. What a piece of…"

Ritsuka shot her an esasperate glance, managing shomehow to feel his face become even redder.

"Oh, ehm sorry sorry." The Director coughed, a light pink coloring her cheeks. "So, i hear you. What do you wanted to tell me?" She retook her serious countenance, and Ritsuka felt a twinge of relief to see her back at the way she usually was, even if it was somewhat ruined by how flustered she was.

But enough of that. It was his moment. He had thought long and hard about the words he would use to explain his doubts about the situation there in Chaldea; and now, it was time for him to boldly go on the offensive.

"Ehm, Director. I feel like there is something strange in Chaldea in these days."

And he chickened out and took the longer route. It was still ok, right? Right? He felt something crumble inside of him.

While passing the napkin over her cheeks, Maries frowned inquisitevely. "What do you mean?"

"Well…" Ritsuka raked his brain, searching for the right words. The first five hundreds were or had to do with lovey-dovey, Director and unproper behaviour. He went straight further, and even then he almost went in tilt. What he meant? What he didn't mean! And what hell she was thinking to ask that!

Calm, Ritsuka, stay calm. "Don't you, you know" He began slowly. "Have the impression that there have been a series of… changes around here recently?"

Understatement of the century.

The Director's gaze faltered. "Ehm… i guess?" She said awkwardly.

She knew it, and she was totally lying. He knew it. He knew it. He knew it.

"You really think?" He snapped.

Bad mistake, as the Director paused, and then dangerously narrowed her eyes. Always the Director, after all.

Ritsuka coughed, but he really really couldn't back down here. He started again. "Listen. I am sorry. I had a strange week, alright? I am just gonna start from the beginning." And hope that you hadn't your brain completely fried by that demigod stud. He made sure to keep the last part strictly in his mind. The Director was well-know for her chair-throwing.

Marie crossed her arms before her chest, puffing. "I am the Director here, you know. I know what happens in my base."

Ritsuka had his doubts about it, but nodded all the same. Chair-throwing. "I am still gonna do it."

The Director puffed again, but gave an affirmative gesture.

Ritsuka mentally exulted, or, well, he would if his nerves weren't about to snap.

"So, ehm." He looked at the surface of the couch for a moment, searching for the right words. Oh boy. That would be hard. Maybe God could inscribe the meaning of life and suffering on the sofa to give him a boast?

Nope.

He started.

"So, we were doing our missions. All as usual. Summoning Servant, going into the Singularities, fighting other Servant. I-i was doing my best, and, well, all was normal."

"Right."

Ritsuka didn't like much that even tone, he hoped for more freaking-out, but he kept going nonetheless. "Initially, i didn't notice that something was changing. I mean, when we summon Servant, it's pretty normal, well, not normal, but acceptable, i guess. Anyway, it's pretty normal to summon people that you would expect. I mean, we summoned Sherlock Holmes!"

He still had his qualms about that, but evidently not so the Director, that just nodded.

"It's a very renowned figure after all."

"Right." Ritsuka wondered how you jumped from the guy that throttled an Iron-skinned lion with his bare hands to a guy that was good to pull up disguises, but that was a digression. A very mentally bad digression. Move on, move on. "So, as i was saying, i didn't notice nothing strange when…"

"You're gonna come to the point one day?" The Director was tapping a finger impatiently.

Ritsuka felt something snap in his head. "I am trying, ok?"

"You're slow."

"I have started two seconds ago!"

"And you should already be at the point. You use too many intercalary. I already told you that. You never gonna find a girlfriend if you always talk like that. You drip awkwardness."

Ritsuka sputtered. "W-what… what does that has to do w-with this? I am trying to be serious here!"

"Me too." The Director replied smoothly.

Ritsuka glared at her, even as he felt his face glow hot.

The Director gave him a little smirk.

Moving on!

"As i was saying!" Ritsuka coughed, trying to regain composure. He was already starting to regret everything. When he replied to the recruitment flyer, nothing of this was mentioned in the job description. Why bound-world-saving heroes didn't get to go on strike, dammit!

The Director cocked her head in a gesture to go on. So he did, thank you very much.

"Some… strange summonings happen from time to time, so i didn't put much mind when we summoned… Chanakya."

The Director arched an eyebrow. "What's the problem with him? He's the founder of political science and economics. He even taught and advised the emperor Chandragupta. He's totally fit to be a Servant."

"Well, yes, totally, i guess. But… his Noble Phantasm is about a genie that can teach five hundred people at once about economics and politics."

The Director rolled his eyes. "So? We put him in work organization. He made a great add to Da Vinci."

"Yes. Yes!" Ritsuka waved his hands frantically. "I… i don't have nothing wrong with it, really. H-He's a great teacher and all that."

"So what's the problem?"

"Nothing! As i said, i thought nothing about it!"

The Director watched him like he was a fascinating enigma to resolve. Ritsuka made his best to ignore it. Why he felt like having just stabbed a puppy? He was just talking about a Servant, he wasn't even criticizing!

"A-at the moment at least, i thought nothing about it." He plowed on. "And i didn't think much even when after him we summoned Albert Einstein."

The Director nodded, clear admiration in her eyes. "A true paragon of human's scientific thought."

"Yes, totally." He winced to the Director's doubtful gaze. "I am serious!"

"It felt like you want to criticize two of history's greteast minds…"

"I am not…!" Ritsuka stopped himself. If he started screeching, this wouldn't end nowhere. "Listen, please. Let me continue, okay?"

The Director had her "i am gonna have a talk with the doctors about you later" expression plastered on, but still nodded.

Ritsuka pushed down the boulder lodged in his throat. "I thought nothing of those two. It can happen, right? I mean, two times. But then we got Aristoteles."

"A mind that shaped ages of philosophy."

Ritsuka ignored that comment. "And now he follows Iskandar everywhere because he needs to catch up with his studies, he says, and that he needs to learn respect again after all the shenanigans in Asia and the letters."

"A just endeavour."

Ritsuka couldn't take it anymore. "He always reads aloud!" He snapped. "Screaming! Always! All night and all day! And when he isn't doing it while chasing Iskandar around, he does it while he walks around alone! And he always does that! There isn't a place in the base where you can be safe anymore! He manages to arrive everywhere somehow! The only one that hasn't come to complain to me about it was Karna, and only because he's physically unable to do that! Iskandar came to me crying! Crying!"

"I don't see the problem." The Director shrugged. "It's a great chance to learn from one of history's great minds. And even so, i have put eardrums in the mandatory equipment. It's a manageable problem with that."

"Right." Ritsuka repressed the urge to face palm. He had to go door to door to call Servant to come into mission now, since using the intercomms became useless. He had lost count from the times he had almost ended being splattered by armored doors being swung open by over-enthusiastic heroes.

Plow through, Ritsuka, plow through. You can do this.

"Then, we summoned Descartes." He continued.

"Another pillar of our scientific history."

"He changed War room B in a lecture class."

"We needed one."

"Sure, why not. Then we got… Charlie Chaplin."

"Oh, don't start talking bad about him too. He's hilarious, and you know it."

"I am not talking bad about anybody! I am just… oh, forget it. Anyway, he immediately put up a show and he even managed to have a stage set up here in the mess hall. I mean, it's okay, yes, but…"

"Hey, talking of the fevil… it's starting just now! Woooo!"

"Go, strange little man with the hat!"

Ritsuka watched with deadly tiredness the stage at the back of the great hall, and the esulting crowd sorrounding it. It didn't help him that half of it was made up of Servant.

"He got a lot of success with the ancient heroes." The Director clapped as the music began, a pleased smile on her face.

"Yeah, great, that's good. We got the entertainment part covered with him." Ritsuka sighed. "And after him, we got Adonis."

"Oh, yeah." The Director sighed wishfully. Her gaze immediately dashed around the hall, found her mark in two seconds; and she waved with a dreaming smile to the demigod of before. Adonis, in the company of a squad of equally beautiful demigods and demigoddess, waved back with a radiant smile, and blew her a kiss.

Ritsuka felt his sugar level jump to the stratosphere as the Director almost swooned down from her chair, and a thunder bolt of dread as Adonis pointed him to a demigoddess whom he was exchanging words with.

"Hey, that reminds me." The Director leaned toward him cospitorially "Adonis tol me that Meridiana could be interested in you. Check it out."She elbowed him softly, gesturing to the Demigoddess waving at him.

Ritsuka felt his face go on fire. "Not my job description. Totally not." He grumbled, awkwardly waving back. "Anyway!" He shook himsef up, - it helped that the two demigods returned to their business, but he wouldn't ever say that -. "That's not the point and… please, don't look at me like that."

The Director kept the shit-eating grin for a moment yet, before rolling her eyes. "I don't get what's the problem is." She said, crossing her arms and frowning. "We summoned a couple of differently oriented Servant. So what?"

"It's more than a couple!" Ritsuka pointed out with a hiss. "Half of the gym section has been transformed into a complex of studies and laboratories! They are unstoppable! It's a invasion of egg-heads from all across time! We're all doomed!" Here, he had gone and snapped. But it was reasonable, dammit! Reasonable! Resonable!

"Ok, calm down, Ritsuka. Take a deep breath. Good. Now another, good. Feel better?"

He nodded, panting. The Director's way of managing freak-out always managed to amaze him. Not so much when he was the one in need of it, but, hey.

"And they never stop." He murmured, eyes wide as terrible memories returned once again. "They never stop discussing, arguing, asking, blabbering, studying, talking. They never stop." He turned to look at the Director. She flinched at his haunted eyes. "Al Kwarizmi entered in the middle of the night into my room for a week straight. A week straight! I had to have Caster put a seal on the door. He was unstoppable. He was deep in thought, he said, but then how the heck he managed to open all my locks?! And now i have the terror that as soon as i fall sleep someone will come babbling about mathematics. I cannot take it anymore!"

"Ehm, you sure you aren't taking this too seriously?" The Director looked between uncertain and spooked.

Ritsuka watched her for a moment, thoughts of running away screaming flashing in his mind.

"Ritsuka. Calm down. Take a breath, ok? Another. Good."

Ritsuka let out his breath. Alright, he was feeling better now.

"Director, i feel like you aren't giving this the importance it deserve." He said, now composed once again. "I mean, away from me to under stimate the weight of these great minds in humanity's development, but don't you feel that the Servant of Chaldea should have more… bite?"

"Ehm, maybe?"

Ritsuka felt a return of freaking out, but pushed it resolutely back. "When we summoned Poirot, he immediately got into a argument with Holmes and after it he was so insulted that he shut himself in one of the room, and came out only two days later. Then, when i tried to have him into a mission, he got back ache while getting up the stairs to the Rayshifting and had his back blocked for three days."

The Director squirmed on her seat. "Ehm, i am sure that it has been just a coincidence."

"And then we tried summoning again and we got Hitl…"

"Alright alright!" The Director threw her hands before her, stopping him in his tracks. "I get it. Something is slightly off with our summoning process." She narrowed her eyes suspiciously. "Incidentally, about that last one?"

"I noped out immediately and sent him back."

"Good." The Director sighed in relief. "Anyway." She took her serious composure back. "Yes, we had a series of… bizzare summonings, but there is no need to panic. We still have a considerable militar might and we're clearing Singularities one after the other, are we not?" She gave him a smile, challenging him to prove her wrong.

Ritsuka felt a vein pop on his forehead. "That's because…" He said slowly. "We summoned a guy in a bat suit that is doing all the work by himself!"

"What."

"I don't know!" Ritsuka snapped. "I cannot understand who this guy is! It's just a buff dude wearing a bat suit! He defeated Tiamat by spraying her from a tin can! He not even killed her! She's down in the prisons! I didn't even know we had a prison!"

"Ehm…" The Director recovered quickly from her bewilderement. "Ehm." She coughed. "I guess that there are some unconvential Servant helping us."

"The last five Singularities… he cleaned them up all alone. We have all the Round Table in a cell, all roped together like sausages. And in the next cell, there is the Queen Mary's Revenge with all its crew. And don't ask how it got there."

The Director almost fell down from her chair.

"And you didn't know it, didn't you?!" Ritsuka pointed an accusatory finger against her. Marie was speechless. "And i even know why! It's a certain demigod, isn't? You go all lovey-dovey, and Ritsuka has to do everything around here!"

He wasn't sure if laugh or cry at the Director's completely bewildered expression. She looked like a mix between a robber caught with her hands in the money and a beached fish.

"Well…" She blushed, looking everything but to him. It was a first, but Ritsuka wasn't in the mood to cult about personal victories. "It's just… we were going so well. I only… took a little break. That's all." She trailed off.

Ritsuka tried to actually register that admission. Taking a little break… from… saving humanity… Chaldea… Director… Something fizzled in his brain.

Awkward silence.

"E-ehm, anyway, it doesn't matter!" The Director tried to return on track, or getting away from it, with admirable, even if awkward effort. Ritsuka was unsure if admire or pity her. "We're getting through Singularities, are we not? That's what it matters! Whoever is that is doing it. That man with the bat costume or not, that batm…"

"Please, don't."

The Director flinched and stopped, putting up a pout. "What am i gonna say to the next Board? They're gonna shut us down and put all the budget on that bat-guy." She collapsed on the table, covering her face with a hand. She remained like that for a moment, before shaking herself up. "Alright, ok, listen." She started. "Maybe i have gone a bit out of the loop, i admit it." She waved a hand at Ritsuka's glare. "Ye ye. But we still have all the other Servant, right? I mean, we still are relevant, right?"

Ritsuka gazed at her.

Marie gazed back. "Please don't say what i think you're about to say."

"He took them."

"What?"

"That bat-guy. All the weapons of the anti-heroes Servant and a lot of the heroes' too. He said that they were too dangerous to keep them so armed."

"But… but…"

Gilgamesh passed by, chasing a guy in a bat suit.

"Give me back my Key, you heathen!"

"You held this power for too long, evildoer. I will keep until you learn to follow the law."

"I am the law, dammit!"

The Director watched them go for a moment, before turning to Ritsuka. He shrugged with the air of a man that had already given up.

"Half of the Servant had their Noble Phantasms confiscated. The other half has gone on strike against the people always making noise or they have been swept in and started studying or they are passed out for lack of sleep." Ritsuka listed impassively.

"I was asking myself why…" The Director let out a chuckle. "…the mess was so empty now." She chuckled again, or better, she tittered in a very little healthy way.

Ritsuka didn't feel she could blame her.

Let's plow through, shall we?

"So, me and Romani have tried to recalibrate the summonings. We ended up with a bit of people."

"A-and?" Marie looked ready to burst in histeric laughter.

"Well, we got the great-great-great-grandfather of Gilgamesh." He gestured smoothly for an old guy that looked like a dried tree during a particularly bad day, seated at a table close by. He downed by a tankard as big as a barrel, and all around him there were the fainted forms of Heracles, Darius the Third and Ishtar. "He out-drank all the heavy-weights, the Kings and even the demigods. After single-handedly drinking all our forniture of alcohol. Even that of the infirmary. The pure one." The Director raised a finger. "He saw the Flood." The Director made an "ow" expression.

Ritsuka continued. "After him, we tried with something more familiar: Camelot."

"Y-yes, we have a lot of experience with that, i guess."

"We got the castle's accountant."

The Director blinked. "Ehm, i am not sure i…"

"He said…" Ritsuka felt the fatigue catching up to him. "That there was so much heroicdness in that place that a bit has to have rubbed off on him."

"I-is that how it works?"

A little guy with a big book and big glasses and a nervous air passed by. "Master, have you seen the King per chance? He needs to review this accounts immediately!"

Ritsuka waved vaguely. "Try down in the academy wing. She was trying her luck with botany the last time i checked her out."

"Oh, thank very much… wait, he said her?" He trotted away, mumbling to himself and with the Director's bewildered gaze on his back.

"He drew up my taxes." Ritsuka said. "And Chaldea's accounting is better than ever."

The Director let out a small, hysteric chuckle.

"Up next." Ritsuka steadied himself. "Hulk Hogan."

"Excuse me?"

A giant with a wide blonde mustache soared by through the air in a mighty dropkick. "For freedom, brother!"

Vlad The Third left out a wailing as he was struck by the glorious hammer of righteusness.

Ritsuka didn't even bother to look. "After that, Mitsuhide Akechi. Got closer with this one, i admit it."

Akechi Mitsuhide passed running by.

"Get a taste of your own medicine, little bastard!" Screeched Oda Nobunaga while chasing him with a burning torch.

"She's chasing him from five days straight." Ritsuka commented. "We had to put down five great fires until now."

"Fucking dammit, Nobunaga. Watch where you swing that stupid thing."

"Six." Ritsuka deadpanned. There was a stage where even despair felt like nothing? Maybe he was close to enlightenement.

The Director just watched with abject horror.

"Then, we used Servant already summoned to try and summon more." Ritsuka gestured toward a close table. "We got Hassan'i Sabba The Last."

Hassan of Serenity, Hassan of the Hundred Faces, Hassan of the Cursed Arm and King Hassan sat there, all glaring daggers at a little guy in a ninja suit.

"Ehm, i guess that last assassin attempt was better left untried, ehm." He said awkwardly. "More drinks, please! Put everything on my tab!"

Ritsuka didn't even stop to check the Director's reaction. "We tried moving on modern history. We got Stanislav Yevgrafovich Petrov." He gestured toward a serious-looking dude in a soviet uniform.

The Director fell down from her chair.

"Ye." Rituka nodded. "The guy who saved the world, No Noble Phantasm though."

The Director's raised finger appeared from beneath the table. "That's not fair! He totally deserves one!"

"Agreed." Ritsuka plowed through. "Then we tried with something more sure to success. We interviewed a brigade of Servant and tried to find someone they could know."

"That sounds like scraping the barrel." The Director managed to return on her chair with titanic effort. The hysteric reaction had left its space to gloom and doom. Ritsuka didn't feel she could blame her.

He grudgingly nodded. "We got a young hero named Shirou. We tried summoning and…" He waved toward another table.

EMIYA and Young Shirou sat there, their heads clutched between their hands, each with a half-empty drink before them, listening to a version of them with round glasses blabbering something while moving through documents and a visual presentation.

"A timeline version where he became an accountant and saved milions by founding a health research."

"What's up with the fricking accountants!"

Camelot's accountant came by and greeted the blabbering Shirou, that replied enthusiastically.

"They became fast friends." Ritsuka completed. He felt desolate, and judging by the eyebags, the Director wasn't far.

"Hey."

They both jumped, and turned. Gilgamesh's great-great-great-grandfather was sitting at their table. He watched them both somberly. "You looked like you could get a drop. Here." There was a swish and somehow two big mugs appeared before both. Ritsuka managed only to blink before the Director threw herself over both with a muffled thanks.

"My Noble Phantasm." The old man said to Ritsuka's blank gaze. "Unlimited Booze Works."

"Moving on." Ritsuka sighed. "Afterward, we got Gandhi."

"Violence solves nothing."

"Dio."

"Wryyyyyyy!"

"Santa Claus."

"Stop ripping me off with all your little girls!"

"Inigo Montoya."

"I am Inigo Montoya. You killed my father. Prepare to die."

"Artoria when she was a baby."

"Nghè!"

"Sigmund Freud."

"I am telling you, mister Jekyll. I could cure you!"

"Leave me alone, goddammit!"

"And my grandmother."

"Did you eat today, Ritsuka?"

"Yes, Nana. Don't worry."

"Thank god."

The Director was almost sprawled over the table when he finished, ten empty mugs around her and the eleventh in her hand.

Ritsuka gave her a moment. He needed one too.

"There's someone, anyone, that can fight?" She eventually asked, tomb-like voice coming from somewhere inside of the messy hair covering her face.

"Well… our last try was with another timeline, and… maybe they can fight?" Ritsuka felt dirty.

"Who?"

He just gestured. "A timeline where everyone of Camelot are rabbits."

A brigade of rabbits in armours and coat of arms marched disciplinately by. A rabbit with a golden crown led them.

"To me, my rabbit knights!" He declared, waving a little sword. "We are off to fight unjustice, right wrongs and munch on snacks!"

"Hooray for Arthur the Rabbit King! Hooray!"

Ritsuka felt like a piece of crumpled paper. "After all the Artorias, Mordred has finally snapped, and now go around in a bunny suit, trying to get accepted by them."

Mordred in a pink bunny suit approached the rabbit squad.

"Mordred? For the milionth time, we don't have any places remaining at the Round Table! And i have already two hundred and fiftyfour sons! And this group is rabbits only!"

"…i brought snacks."

"The King reconsiders! Mordred, you're in. Bedivere, get out."

"Aw, nuts."

"They are… combative?" Ritsuka glanced at the Director. She didn't seem very convinced, if the wide-eyed, haunted look said something. "I mean, they take no shit from anybody."

"My King, look! It's Ozymandyas, the arrogant pharaoh!"

"On your guard, you villain! We shall avenge the people you exploited!"

"Mph, foolish rodents, to think you can take on the mighty…"

"We're not rodents. We're lagomorphs."

"Whatever. To think you can takn on my majesty and…"

"Lagomorphs. Learn your history, dickhead."

"HOW THE FUCK DID YOU CALL ME?!"

"Sir Lancelot! To you the honor to dispatch the foe!"

"Right away, my King!"

"I AM GONNA BURY YOU…wait, is that a rocket-launcher?"

Ritsuka didn't even flinch as the heatwave of the blast made his hair flutter. "For some reason they are heavily armed with modern weaponry."

The Director buried her face in her arms. "How?" She just asked.

"They found a genie's lamp during a journey and Bedivere mispelled the second wish."

"There's a lot to mispell there…"

"He has a bit of a speech impediment."

"I am foffy." Bedivere, or, better, Rabbivere, said, now seated at their table while Gilgamesh's great-great-great-grandafather gave a mug to him too.

Ritsuka vaguely thought that it was starting to become a large family.

"They took control of our food store and we can't take them back. Romani has gone to try and make them see reason, but it have been two days ago, and by now i think they have eaten him or something."

The Director seemed to deflate. Ritsuka felt that he should be a bit satisfied - he had managed to make her see the dreadful state of things, but somehow he felt like the only thing really accomplished here was streaming misery.

"Well, maybe they can fight?" he tried, barely believing he was actually saying it. How it came to him being the one trying to be encouraging?

"My King! There's that vacuum cleaner again!"

"Argh, that's terrifying! Retreat! Retreat!"

"Or maybe not." Ritsuka corrected himself, following the general retreat of the rabbit brigade with his gaze.

The Director slammed down the tenth empty mug. "We're finished…" She slurred, looking already shit-faced. "Weeeee'reeeee finished!" She complained aloud. "They're gonna shut us down!"

Ritsuka wanted to encourage her, but his strenght failed him. What was the point? Chaldea was at its end. The only consolation was that they could rest assure. Hopefully, the bat-guy would save the world. Hopefully. Well, not like they could hope for anything different. It wasn't like all the scientists they managed to summon could find an equation to save the world.

Einstein came barging into the mess hall.

"Guys! We found an equation to save the world!"

The general attention was on him instantly. Ritsuka frowned, trying to understand the secret meaning of those words. One of the wall exploded.

"Mortals scum!" Bellowed Solomon while he barged in, followed by his army of Demon Gods. "How did you manage to find the only thing that can defeat us? No matter! We won't let you stop our great endeavour!"

Ritsuka and Marie watched him, both blank. "Eh?"

"Mph, you have your work cut out for you, you demon." Gilgamesh's great-great-great-grandfather said grimly, getting up. He raised a gnarled hand. "To me, power of the Flood!" A tidal wave gathered behind him.

"Brothers! Give me strenght!" Hulk Hogan ripped his shirt, muscles bulging with power.

"You're not taking my grandchild!" Ritsuka's grandmother screamed, wielding a buzzing chainsaw.

"Another evil-doer to defeat." Bat-guy said, seeminly coalescing from the darkness, deeper shadow between shadows.

"Rally to me, my rabbit knights! War most terrible is upon us! But we will prevail!" The Rabbit King declared, raising golden Excalibur while riding a Panzer Tank Tiger.

"Hooray! Hooray for the Rabbit King! To battle!"

"You too, Bedivere!"

"Aw, nuts."

Solomon looked undanted, power burning around him like the flames of a star. "Foolish, humans and rodents, you stand no chance against…"

"Lagomorphs."

"Lagomorphs." Solomon didn't break stride. "You don't stand a chance against our supreme power. Disappear, together with humanity. Forever!"

A tremendous power was released, smashing against the assembled heroes, but still they stood firm, blocking it like a dam against a raging torrent.

Ritsuka and the Director watched. The Director took a long gulp, then passed the mug to Ritsuka that did the same, all without breaking vision.

"Argh, he's strong!"

"Hold on!"

"We cannot block him forever! Someone do something!"

"Leave it to me!" The Rabbit King took out a lamp. "Genie! My third wish! Put this dickhead into the trash!"

The genie, sporting very suspicious rabbit-like features, emerged in a blaze of light and thunder.

Still, Solomon smirked. "Foolish mortals. What do you think that this lesser spirit can do against…" POW! "Ow! My nose! He punched me in the nose! Not cool, man! Hey… what do you need that toilet for? Oh god, put me down. Put me… blubblublub… oh god!… blublublub… i am drowning…! Blubblublub… alright alright, i surrender! I won't erase humanity! Oh god! Please stop!"

And so, the mighty Solomon, that incidentally wasn't Solomon but a demon with his face, fell in defeat, and his army was scattered to the four winds.

"We won!"

"Yeeeeeaaah!"

"We saved humanity!"

"Yeeeeeaaah!"

"Bedivere, you're still out of the Table."

"Aw, nuts."

"Let's party! CONGA!"

"PEPEPEPEEEEPEPEPEPEEEE!"

And so the celebrations, under the form of a conga stretching its way through space and time at the beat of Southamerican music, began.

Ritsuka and the Director remained there, dumbfounded.

"More drinks?" Gilgamesh's great-greatsire asked, and handed a mug each.

The Director took it, then watched it silently for a moment. "You know what? Screw it!" She said suddenly. She downed it down in one gulp. "We saved the world! Let's partyyyyyyy!" And with those words, she threw herself straight into the thick of the party, where Adonis and company waited for her.

Ritsuka watched her go.

Gilgamesh's great-something sat at his side. "Thinking, mh?"

Ritsuka whimpered something.

"Do not worry. We're gonna have peace now. Because we are rabbits."

He blinked, registering those words. He turned to the old man. Only, he wasn't an old man anymore, but an old rabbit with thick whiskers and eyebrows. "You're a rabbit too, you know." He said, taking a bit gulp from his mug and smiling.

"Eh?" Ritsuka watched himself. Thick fur. And his hands were paws. And his face had whiskers and long ears and he was… he was… "EEEEEEEEEH?!"

Ritsuka woke up screaming.

In a panic, he turned left and right. The rabbits! The rabbits!

No rabbits. He was in his room at Chaldea.

"I-it was a dream…!" He said, panting. Relief hit him like a cold shower. It wasa dream! Thank god! Or not? Was he supposed to not be happy to have the world saved? By rabbits? Maybe? Oh, god.

The phone ringed.

Ritsuka freezed, a very cold kind of premonition running through him. He gulped. He recognized whom the number belonged to. Slowly, he grabbed the phone and pushed the reply button with trembling fingers. "D-Director?"

There was silence from the other end for a moment.

"We shall never speak of this to anybody and never again, alright?" The Director's voice was shaking.

Ritsuka nodded stiffly. "Agreed."

Another moment of silence.

"How the hell…" The Director's words trailed off. "Forget it! Good night!" The call was cut out.

Ritsuka listened to the beeping for a moment, before lowering the phone.

Rabbits…

"Oh, forget it." He said. No more of that. No more!

He dived under the pillow and threw the pillow on his head. Good night!