Disclaimer: All publicly recognizable characters, settings, etc. are the property of their respective owners. Only the original characters and plot are the property of this author. This author is in no way associated with the owners, creators, or producers of any media or franchise that is depicted within this story. No copyright infringement is intended, as there will be no profit made from this story by its author. The only places that this author has personally posted this story are on Archive of Our Own, and on Fanfiction*net; anywhere else that this story appears, is a duplicate created by parties unknown and without the express permission of the author of this story.

xXx Aoi Takes a Stand xXx
xXx Ch. 01: Failure to Communicate xXx

xXx June 30th, 1987 xXx

A woman with mossy brown colored hair and darker brown eyes stood inside the room of her 4 month and 27 day old daughter. This woman bore the Zenjou Family's Magic Crest, meaning she was the current head of that family. Unfortunately, those were her only Magic Circuits that were actually good for anything, and they only really allowed her to do one very specific thing.

Aoi Tohsaka, current head of the Zenjou family had never actually understood why her family had developed a magecraft that was only really useful to the female members of her natal family as it would allow them to modify both their magical and physical biology during a pregnancy so as to give birth to a child who's potential as a Magus is optimized provided the father was themselves a Magus.

The main reason Aoi didn't understand the reason her family created this form of Magecraft, is it would cause whoever bore the crest to become pregnant, whether she wanted to or not, every single time she had unprotected sex, unless she was already pregnant. Normally that wouldn't have been an issue since Aoi absolutely refused to have intimate relations with her husband without such provisions now that he had the heir he had wanted her to give him.

Unfortunately for Aoi, it seemed she had rather lousy luck during one such encounter recently, as she was most definitely pregnant. She hadn't even realized that was the case until she noticed the Crest had switched from it's 'get Aoi pregnant' mode to 'make the best baby possible' earlier this very morning. That meant she had no way of actually knowing how long ago the child was conceived.

As she stared into the crib that her infant daughter slept in, Aoi's facial features took upon themselves a look of resolve. While Aoi wouldn't be able to utilize Magecraft the way her husband did on account of the fact that what Od she could generate almost always came from the Magic Crest, she could utilize Formalcraft, and was rather gifted at the art. That meant she actually knew more about the ritual used to summon a Servant in the Grail War than her husband did, since it utilized a Formalcraft array as the basis for the entire procedure.

A sly grin appeared upon Aoi's face. She now knew what she could do if her husband decides to do what she fears he might very well do. Even if she had no way of stopping her husband from banishing one of her children from his family, she would make him pay for it if he did do that. The real question however, was if he did cast either one of her children aside, who Aoi would have to slaughter to get that child back.

"Your Tou-san has never noticed it, Rin-tan, but your Kaa-chan is far from the placid meek woman she pretends to be," Aoi explained to her adorably cute baby daughter.

xXx April 8th, 1992 xXx

Aoi Tohsaka had just dropped her eldest daughter off at the home of one of her friends from preschool. Rin's attendance at a preschool had oddly enough been the idea of her husband rather than anything that Aoi demanded he do. One of the few blessings that came from his idea was that it allowed Aoi to move about more freely than she otherwise would have been able to do, as she no longer had to keep a constant eye on Rin to ensure she didn't do anything in her fledgling attempts at Magecraft that would get her killed since the first lesson any would-be Magus would learn is to only perform Magecraft experiments that might blow up in one's face inside the comfort of their personal workshop where that Magus would be safe from those who might try to steal their research.

Amusingly, since Aoi had managed to successfully hide the fact that she was a practicing Magus, at least in terms of Formalcraft, from pretty much everyone she had ever interacted with, no one believed her to have any understanding of what it was her daughter was trying to achieve with her efforts, which is why Aoi was believed to be the safest option for making sure Rin doesn't blow herself up by doing something foolish with her training mystic code.

As for why Aoi's maternal activities lately seemed to focus entirely on her eldest daughter. That was because approximately a month prior to the current date, her dickwad of a childhood best friend dropped off the face of the earth without any notice. Which meant the only viable heir to the Matou family in terms of potential as a Magus, had disappeared as well.

Aoi didn't know what it was that caused him to disappear like that yet, but she did know it had given her bastard of a husband the opportunity to do what she had predicted he would do the day she first realized she would be giving birth to a second child.

"Wow, that is a rather frightening expression for someone as beautiful as you to have upon her face," a voice that Aoi had never heard before in her life told her.

Aoi frowned at that statement for a moment before looking for the source of the voice. When she found the one who had spoken, her jaw all but hit the floor. It took her a second to marshal her thoughts before she was able to ask, well demand really, "Your eyes, what do they do?"

"I beg your pardon?" the boy asked in a bemused manner. His eyes widened after a second and he pointed a finger, first at Aoi, then at himself, while saying the word "Muffliato" when he indicated each of them.

He then immediately sat down in the seat opposite from Aoi, and said, "Okay, what I just did will make it incredibly difficult, though not impossible, for someone to actually eavesdrop on our conversation. Now, what makes you think my eyes do anything beyond what perfectly normal eyes would do?"

"Your eyes are an odd shade of green, and you seem to be wearing Mystic Eye Killers," Aoi remarked.

"Okay I'll ignore that last word for now, and instead ask what the heck Mystic Eyes happen to be?"

Aoi simply stared at this person in numb shock. Eventually Aoi's shock cleared and she said something that surprised her, "I'm going to permanently geld that damn vampiric troll for this, even if that is the only thing I ever do that has any worth as a Magus."

"Are seriously telling me that there was a vampire that thought it a good idea to sire a member of the stupidest magical species in existence?"

"Oh-kay." Aoi mumbled. She then grinned impishly at him and asked in a totally overplayed curious tone of voice, "You do realize you aren't in whatever reality you originated in, right?"

"I'm starting to, yes." was the boy's response. "Since I can safely assume magic, or whatever the local name for it might be, exists in this universe given the fact that vampires apparently exist here, can I ask you where the local magic district happens to be?"

"There is no such thing in this reality," Aoi admitted. After a moment she sighed and said, "Okay, perhaps something like that might have existed in this variation of reality at one point in history. Unfortunately, there are only two people currently alive who I can think of who are capable of true magic…"

"This reality sucks balls if there are only two other people in the entire world capable of magic."

Aoi frowned for a moment, before standing up and saying "Come with me."

"Oh-kay."

xXx Twenty Minutes Later xXx

"I really am going to need to invest in a vehicle one of these days," Aoi remarked after catching her breath, "I am not anywhere close to the level of fitness I would need to be in order to perform a walk like that on a regular basis."

"I'd be more than happy to help you get into shape," the boy remarked.

"While I would be more than happy kill my husband for his betrayal, I am still technically married," Aoi remarked in the same tone of voice she used when punishing Rin for getting caught with her hand in their literal cookie jar. The lesson she was trying to instill in Rin by forbidding her from getting cookies from the jar herself, is not what most parents would have been teaching a child.

The boy snickered, "Forbidden fruit is even more succulent than that which isn't forbidden. The trick is always to get at it without being caught by the one who forbade you access to it in the first place."

"Well, at least you learned that lesson without me having to use the same method I'm using for my eldest daughter. Unfortunately she doesn't seem to want to learn stealth and guile just yet."

The boy sighed as he admitted, "The only way a child that is as young as yours must be, would learn such behavior at such an age, is if it was as a survival tactic. That is how I learned it."

"Oh dear," Aoi remarked. "You must lead a rather interesting life to have need of such a skill as a survival mechanism at a young age."

The boy tilted his head to the side, before saying, "Okay, I suppose that particular proverbial curse would have applied to my life."

Aoi snickered at that for just a moment before placing her palm against the wrought iron gate that they had been had stopped in front of for some reason that the boy couldn't comprehend right up until that instant. His newfound comprehension resulted from the fact that he could now see the absolutely gorgeous building that sat behind the gate, and he also now had a slightly better understanding of the situation he was in.

"There are no words to describe how much fail went into the creation of the defenses of this building," the boy remarked in a completely deadpan tone of voice.

"I have to ask what it is you just tried to compare the defensive bounded field around my ancestral estate that led to you saying what I would have considered an unforgivable insult if I didn't already know you aren't from this reality?"

"I'll assume the phrase 'bounded field' is the local term for what the magical community in my reality referred to as 'defensive enchantments.'" When he got an agreeing nod from Aoi, he said, "Well I'm able to feel the ebb and flow of magical energy in this reality it would seem. I can tell you right now that this bounded field is a pale imitation of what I would refer to as a Fidelius charm."

"That word sounded Latin…"

"That is because it was Latin," the boy admitted. "Almost every single one of my spells, can be activated with at the absolute most, three latin words forming a short sentence."

"Inside! Inside!" Aoi exclaimed in what sounded like near panic as she pulled the gate open for them.

Shrugging helplessly the boy did as asked, with Aoi quickly following after him. She then turned and essentially slammed the gate shut. The boy's eyes widened and he asked, "Okay so what did I say that caused that reaction?"

"I'm one of the few Magi in this city who likely understands the absurdity of what you are telling me you can do. For the record, what you refer to as magic, would officially be referred to by the term 'High-Thaumaturgy' in this reality… or at least it is something with frightening similarities to such a concept."

"Okay, if you could do me the favor of explaining the differences between normal Thaumaturgy, High-Thaumaturgy, and what the people of this reality refer to as Magic, I would greatly appreciate it as it could very likely help me understand where I fit into this reality."

Rather than answer him, Aoi began making the thankfully short trek to the front door of her ancestral home went inside. This caused the boy to growl in annoyance, more because he was beginning to realize Aoi was planning to make it very hard for him to ignore how sexy she actually was. It annoyed him because he had no idea yet whether Aoi was simply the newest poster child for the "hell hath no fury" tagline, or if she was a black widow.

While he was contemplating that, the boy pulled a rather horrendously designed leather pouch from around his neck, and opened it. He then turned it to face the ground, and said, "Present all contents."

Aoi had stuck her head back out of the door in time to witness this boy's use of possibly revolting fashion accessory she had ever conceived of. Her eyes widened once it was done disgorging it's contents, "How could you do something so cruel as to use a living creature as a clutch bag?"

"Huh?" the boy frowned.

"It burped…"

The boy threw his head back and laughed. "If you happen to have a piece of fruit, as in actual fruit, handy I can show you one of the first things the magically empowered citizens of my reality learn how to do. That will likely explain to you just what the difference between our two realities really is. You'll be very surprised."

Aoi sighed and just walked back inside the building. The boy followed after her as soon as he gathered the few possessions he was apparently allowed to bring to this reality by whatever sent him here. He wasn't happy with the loss of his broom or his treasured map, but at least he had the cloak and his preferred wand even if nothing else.

xXx Chapter Concluded xXx

Author's Note: While Zelretch will more than likely be blamed for this situation by everyone who learns of it, he isn't actually culpable here. Yay! I used a fancy word, have fun looking that up if you don't know what it means as I don't plan on telling you.

This was intended to be a response to Quatermass' Aoi Takes a Stand Challenge. Unfortunately I can't seem to focus longer than one day at a time these days… don't ask me why… I will be trying to get a story that lasts longer than one or two chapters though.