Hello everyone! Chapter 6 awaits.

Chapter 6: Meetings and Plans

"This is where the pawns of our games end up eventually", Lelouch thought as he walked down the corridor of the Fuyuki city hospital. "Either in a ward or in the morgue"

A doctor wearing a white lab coat was leading the way, finally stopping at a door flanked on both sides by two muscular orderlies.

"Here we are sir" The doctor said as he swiped his id card to open the door. "This entire wing has been sealed off as you requested, the CCTV cameras have been disconnected, also no records are maintained of the patients treatment"

"Excellent" Lelouch nodded his approval as he walked along, his hands behind his back. "And I trust you have been providing her with the best of care?"

"Of course sir" The doctor nodded vigorously. "Our best physicians have been seeing to her treatment around the clock, all sworn to secrecy as you requested"

"I'd like to meet with them before I leave doctor" Lelouch glanced over at the man walking beside him. "Please see to it. I would personally like to take their oath of secrecy on this matter"

"Of course sir, it will be done" The doctor nodded. "But you have no need to fear, a doctor is always sworn to secrecy about his patients"

"All the same, see to it" Lelouch smiled slightly.

"Of course sir, Of course" The doctor nodded vigorously. "Ah here we are"

They had arrived at a large square glass window that showed a large white tilled room on the other side. In the middle of the room they could see a large hospital bed surrounded with iv drips, life sign monitors and other paraphernalia. The sole occupant of the room lay on that bed, with only her head visible above the white sheet that covered her.

"So how is she?" Lelouch inquired, casting a critical eye on the scene.

"She has finally stabilized, but other wise I'm afraid she has a long road to recovery ahead of her" the doctor shook his head sadly. "She has lost a lot of blood, she has several cracked ribs and numerous cuts across her body. And of course there is the missing hand"

"I see" Lelouch frowned. "So I would assume her recovery will take a long time?"

"I'm afraid so sir" The doctor sighed. "She was almost dead when you bought her here, if you had been even a few minutes late. Well, but now like I said, shes out of danger, but not recovered"

"I understand, we have to be realistic" Lelouch said as he turned to face the doctor. "But remember this doctor, I want to be informed the moment her condition changes"

The doctor bowed. "Of course sir"

C.C was waiting in the hospital lobby when Lelouch got back.

"Not good news I take it" The witch said as she got to her feet and followed him out.

"I should have expected it really, with the kind of injury she suffered, its going to take weeks, if not months to recover" Lelouch sighed. "The most we can hope for is for her to regain consciousness quickly and give us information on her servant and that priest"

"She might not be willing to share" C.C reminded him.

"She need not be willing, she just has to be lucid and able to speak" Lelouch countered as they entered the hospital car park.

"How ruthless of you my warlock" The witch said in a mock surprised tone. "Didn't you just risk life and limb to save this same girl from death"

"Stop that C.C" Lelouch said firmly. "You of all people know how I think. I do not wish to harm the girl, seeing as she is out of the running now. But I will not hold back if she has knowledge that will help us in the battles to come"

He pulled open the passenger side door of their car and held it open for her before going around the car to get into the drivers seat.

As the car pulled away C.C patted him on the shoulder. "Don't worry Lelouch, you yourself said the girl is just a bonus, we will mange just fine, with or without any help she can give us"

"Bazett" Lelouch said absently as he turned into the main road. "Her name is Bazett"

Sometime later they pulled up in front of the local school "Homurahara High", and parked across the street.

"Here we are, the war would be halfway won if we just blew up the school" Lelouch chuckled. "Two masters and one potential master out of action. Too bad all the other kids are in the way"

"What's this? The Demon is holding back because he fears for the lives of innocent school children?" C.C was acting surprised again. "Mine ears deceive me"

"Yes well, keep it to yourself" Lelouch grinned back at the witch. "After all I have a reputation to maintain"

"It will cost you"

"Pizza, I know" He finished for her before opening the door of the car and stepping out into the street.

"This won't take long, take care of things on your end and we'll meet back at the church later"

"You leave all the hard work for me" C.C groused as she slid into the drivers seat and put the car into gear.

As she drove away, Lelouch turned and began to walk up to the school gates. His plan was simple at this stage, find out as much as he could about the magus called Emiya. He had waited until after school hours to avoid alerting the two masters already inside the school. As he really didn't want to be caught in another battle so soon.

He came up to the lone security guard, a man of middle years, at the school gate and locked eyes with him.

"Let me pass. And forget about this meeting afterwards"

"Yes sir" The guard saluted as he opened the gate.

An hour later Lelouch was walking down the corridors of the main school building, returning from a very productive meeting in the principals office, when he felt it.

A presence, not quite heroic spirit, not quite magus and not quite human. And it was right behind him. Whatever it was it was invoking completely irrational feelings of revulsion and hate from inside him. Lelouch spun around to face the source of the disturbance, and found a teenaged girl with purple hair standing at the end of the corridor watching him.

Sakura Matou, he recognized her from the surveillance footage. One of the possible master candidates for the Matou clan. What was she doing here? Had she recognized him as a servant? Even so, what was the reason for this girl giving off such an aura? Even if she was a master she was only human, but what he was feeling from her right now was anything but.

Even as these thoughts crossed his mind, the girl started coming closer step by step, until a moment later she was standing right in front of him. Her purple eyes were looking at him unblinking, with an expression Lelouch could only describe as...hungry.

"I'm sorry" The voice was wrong too. On the surface it was the voice of a young girl, but, he couldn't shake the feeling that someone else, someone much older and male was talking in tandem with the girl.

"When I felt you so close, I couldn't help myself. I had to see you for real"

Not very comforting words. Not that anything about this situation was comforting in any way. This girl was definitely not your average magus. Something about her screamed inhuman. Even more inhuman than the code bearers and the heroic spirits.

"You are Sakura Matou are you not? Or am I mistaken?" Lelouch carefully tensed his body, preparing for trouble. The question was double worded, he knew who the girl was, but he didn't know what else the girl was.

"You are very perceptive your majesty" The girl said, her lips smiling. But again the smile was wrong, it wasn't a young girls smile. It was as if a much older, much more malicious man was smiling through the girl.

"I have always wondered what it would be like to meet someone else who had to bear the same burden as I. It's good to know that you are not alone in the world, even for the likes of me" The girl sighed almost happily.

"Good bye for now your majesty, I will be eagerly anticipating your victory"

With those last words, Sakura Matou collapsed bonelessly onto the floor.

Sakura woke up later in the school infirmary and, when questioned by the school nurse, had no recollection of how she ended up there. Lelouch had carried her there, not knowing what else to do, and had told the nurse he had found the girl passed out in the corridor.

He now stood next to the infirmary door watching the nurse fuss over the girl, having come to the conclusion that she had passed out from overexertion at after school sports. Still, it hadn't been without a stroke of luck coming his way. He had checked the girls left wrist and found no command seals. So now he knew who the Matou master was. But that didn't explain the strange behavior of the girl. From both her strange words and the feeling she gave off as she was speaking, it was obvious that something was not as it seemed with her.

"First the grandfather and now the granddaughter" Lelouch thought to himself. "The Matou family really is a collection of mysteries"

As he stood there musing, two figures burst into the room. One was a redhead dressed in boys version of the school uniform. As for the other, she was a young woman in her early twenties with short brown hair and large brown eyes, dressed in a traditional Japanese gi and carrying a shinai of all things. Both of them wore identical concerned expressions on their faces as they moved to the girls bedside.

"Sakura! Are you ok? What happened?" The boy was the first to speak.

The girls response was to turn an interesting shade of crimson, as she mumbled something along the lines of, "I'm fine sempai"

The next instant the boy was elbowed aside by the shinai wielding woman as she enveloped the Matou girl in a hug and assured, or rather declared, dramatic voice and all, that her that her "Fuji-nee" would look after her in her hour of illness.

It was a mildly amusing, and rather cute, spectacle for the watching Lelouch. This was the kind of thing that used to happen far too often during his own school days back at Ashford. The Matou girls plainly obvious crush on the equally plainly oblivious boy along with the antics of the young woman were weirdly reminiscent of how his own friends in the student council used to act. Thinking about his old school friends was bringing up a host of memories, both amusing and, he admitted to himself, endearing.

"Innocent days" Lelouch thought to himself. "It was only later, after I had lost it for good that I realized that Ashford was one of the few places where I had been happy. Even with the endless bore of classes and Milly and her ridiculous festivals" He felt his lips quirk upwards slightly. "Even the festivals weren't so bad. Not that I'd ever admit that even under pain of death"

"But now half of us are dead and the other half marked for life by war" He was thinking of Nina, who had to live with the knowledge that she created the weapon that was used to kill people in their millions, and Kallen, who had a river of blood on her hands by wars end. "The war started and waged by me. At the very least I hope that Milly and Rivalz found happiness at the end"

Even as these thoughts were going through his head, the redheaded boy was turning towards him, having picked himself up from the floor where he had landed after being elbowed.

"Hello, sir" The boy spoke up brightly. "I want to thank you for helping Sakura, it was really very kind of you"

"No thanks necessary, just doing what anyone would do" Lelouch replied pleasantly. "You are Shirou Emiya are you not? I remember you from that bar you work in"

"Oh, ah, yes" The boy scratched the back of his head. "I kind of remember you too. You stopped by a couple of days ago"

"Thats right. It was a part time job for you I take it"

"Yeah, my parents are deceased and I kind of live on my own, so I have to manage"

"I see" Lelouch nodded in sympathy.

"Shirou!" The voice of the young lady erupted from behind them. "We need to take Sakura home and give her plenty of rest"

"I'm really ok Fuji-sempai" A timid voiced Sakura protested from behind her.

"Nonsense, you need to take it easy Sakura. Don't you worry, Fuji-nee will take care of everything. Shirou" She yelled in the same breath. "Find a way to take her home" That last one was a command, and Shirou immediately leaped to obey.

"Hai Fuji-nee, do you mean her house or mine though?"

"Yours of course! Where else can we see to it that she gets her rest? And thank you so much kind sir! For coming to the rescue of our poor Sakura" Those last words were addressed to Lelouch. This young woman's words seemed to almost trip over themselves when she was speaking, so eager to get out.

Lelouch, unphased by the sudden shift in attention towards him, bowed and gave the same polite answer he gave Shirou. Which produced the same awkward head scratching reaction. Then, on impulse he asked them how they intended to take the Matou girl home. And when he found out that non of them had a car between them, he offered them a lift.

Several minutes of protesting later, the offer was accepted, and Lelouch excused himself to step out into the street and flag a passing car, politely requesting the motorist to hand over his vehicle.

Soon enough they were all piled into the car and Lelouch was driving them in the direction of the Emiya residence. He knew the address already, having looked it up on Illyasviel's behalf, but listened with half an ear to Shirou's directions so as not to appear suspect.

On the short drive over, he learned a lot about the trio. For one, the young woman was called Fujimura Taiga, and was their English teacher as well as teacher in charge of the Kendo and Archery clubs. Sakura had been staying after school for archery practice, while Shirou had stayed because he had been asked to repair a broken air conditioner by the class president.

The Emiya residence turned out to be a good sized Japanese style house situated in the suburbs, not far from the Matou residence. When Lelouch turned the "borrowed" car into the drive and parked, his three passengers invited him into the house, and when he accepted and stepped inside, it somehow turned into an invitation to stay for dinner. His attempts to protest were overruled by a vote of three to one, with Taiga waving her shinai in his face for emphasis, though he was sure, well almost sure, that it was unintentional.

Sometime Lelouch sat cross legged on the floor of the Emiya residence, with Taiga sitting across from him. The two were swapping stories while dinner was being prepared. As soon as he gave his consent Shirou had retreated to the kitchen, with Sakura following, the purple haired girl insisting that she was fine now and needed no rest. Now Taiga was telling him about the city and her work, Lelouch having introduced himself as a Britannian come to Fuyuki on business. He learned that Taiga was a frequent visitor to the Emiya residence, having served as surrogate parent to Shirou since his adopted father passed away. Her grandfather, Raiga Fujimura, was taking care of Shirou's finances at the behest of his deceased adopted father. But the boy was, according to her, "Stupid stubborn", and insisted on working for his upkeep at a local bar.

"He reminds me a bit of an old friend of mine" Lelouch smiled. "He was also what you might call "Stupid stubborn", and drove me to my wits end"

Taiga grinned at him. "Seems we have that in common Lelouch-san, one stupid stubborn kid each to put up with"

"True, though if Shirou is anything like my friend, I'm sure that despite all the stubbornness and stupidity, he has a good heart"

"I heard that" Shirou grinned as he stepped into the room. "Dinner's ready. Come on Lelouch-san, you'd better dig in before Fuji-nee eats everything up"

Indeed, said woman was already on her feet and moving at the mention of the words "ready", and "dinner", pausing only to whack Shirou on the head with her shinai. It didn't look as if she ever parted company with that weapon.

Dinner was a pleasant affair, with all four of them sitting around the traditional Japanese table and devouring the food set before them. Lelouch, who had been subsiding entirely on a diet of pizza till now, found that the variety and excellent taste of the dishes before him was doing wonders on his appetite. Not that he needed to eat as a Heroic Spirit, but he enjoyed good food as much as the next man. And endless days of nothing but pizza to look forward to can make an impression.

During the course of dinner, Lelouch learned that Sakura often came over in the afternoons to help Shirou around the house and cook dinner. With Taiga coming over to help them eat it. Despite Shirou's claim that his parents were gone and that he lived alone, these three seemed to have made an impromptu family, and seemed to enjoy each others company as well as take comfort in it. It reminded him of how things used to be with himself, Nuanally and Sayako at Ashford before he started on his road that ended at the Throne of Heroes. This house, and these people, gave off that same homely feeling.

Indeed, Lelouch found himself actually enjoying himself as he engaged in small talk with the teens and Taiga. Listening to their stories about their day to day lives and telling them stories about Britannia and other places he had traveled to.

Sitting here in this happy little gathering and watching Taiga laughing at his stories as Sakura wiped soy sauce from Shirou's chin, it was easy to forget that the Holy Grail war was raging outside. It was easy to forget that one of these teens might become a potential master at any moment and turn hostile. That one of the Masters already in the war had asked him to find as much information as possible on the same teen, it was so important to her that she had been willing to part with the name of her servant to get that information. And how Sakura, whose voice and sweet and happy now, had spoken to him in a very different voice, or how the innocent smile that gazed her face now had been very different before.

On the street outside the Emiya residence, a little way down the road, a van was parked that appeared to be empty. However in the back of the van a Britannian man with blonde hair and military bearing was training a powerful telescope on the Emiya residence. Aimed at the dinning room window where the outlines of four people were visible.

"She is in the house, what do you want me to do?" He spoke into the earpiece he wore.

"Keep monitoring her, don't stop until she goes to her house" Ordered an authoritative female voice through the speaker.

"Understood"

With that the Britannian went back to watching the house, and half a city away, Nonette Enneagram switched off the comm unit and turned to face the former earl standing beside her.

"Are you sure about this girl Eduard? We are going through a lot of trouble for this one girl. I'd hate to be disappointed"

"I'm sure" Eduard Grayspire, former earl and current master, answered her. "I talked with an associate of mine in the clock tower who knew the former head of the Tohsaka clan quite well. According to him Sakura Matou was born Sakura Tohsaka, and that she was adopted by the Matou, because their own heir didn't have any magic circuits. Rest assured, she is the Matou master. She is the only choice"

"The girl seems to follow a routine, and she almost never deviates" The former Knight said. "We have spent enough time observing, it's time to act"

"So we take out the girl first and knock the Matou out of the war"

"Yes, about that" Nonette looked slightly amused. "I've been thinking about what you told me. About the command seals and how a master can loose their servant. And I have changed the plan"

"..." Came the shocked response of her companion.

"Here is what we are going to do. First we have to determine if her servant accompanies the girl on her trips to school and this boys house. Then we send Assassin to launch an attack on the Matou residence. This will prompt her to send out her servant to counter the attack. But, it will also separate the girl from her servant. Then when she is alone without her servant to protect her, we grab her and force her to give us her command seals. This way we have two servants to our cause, and have taken out an enemy master as well"

"..." Eduard was still speechless.

"Oh, shut your mouth man, you look like a goldfish" That jolted the man into speech.

"Are you mad? Assassin isn't a frontline fighter! And the Matou are a founding family, they'd have gone for a knight class. Besides, we already have a servant, and you want to risk loosing him just for the off chance of gaining another one? All we have to do to win the war is to kill the other masters. We start with the founders and then draw out the other three in turn, there is no need to try something so risky just so..."

"Silence" A single word from Nonette stopped the monologue.

"Good, now listen to me Eduard" She started talking in a calm but firm voice. "First, I know Assassin is no warrior, but he is what we have to work with. Second, he doesn't have to go toe to toe with the enemy servant, he just has to keep them occupied while we take the girl. Third, this is war Eduard, and in war you have to move decisively if you seek to gain anything. Besides, you yourself said that Assassin is a stealth oriented fighter, and the Matou servant is most likely a combat oriented one. If this plan works we will have a stealthy servant and a combat servant working for us. A well balanced duo like that will open up many more options than your original plan"

Before Eduard could answer, another voice beat him to it.

"It is a well thought out plan" The disembodied voice of the Assassin said even as the servant materialized to stand next to Eduard. "It risks a lot and hopes to gain a lot. I have no complaints about carrying it out master, I believe I can keep this enemy servant at bay without actually engaging in a serious battle"

Eduard sighed and rubbed his temples with his fingers, he knew when he was overruled. No matter how much he protested every member of their little group was more likely to take their orders from Nonette than from him. After all she was the former Knight of Nine, one of the heroes of the true Britannia. The only person he had who was really loyal to him was his servant, and if even the masked killer was siding with her, then he was truly left with no choice. Besides, now that he was thinking about it, her plan did have a lot of promise, except that it risked so much. Maybe that was what came with being a knight and battlefield commander, she was ready to make gambles that he, a noble wouldn't even dare dream about.

"Very well, very well. I'll be the first to admit that I'm a mage first and solider second. You are a much better tactician than me Lady" He nodded at Nonette. "Lets do it your way"

"Good, in fact there is no point in wasting time. Lets do it tomorrow"

Eduard sighed again, well the good news was that his servant was the only thing this woman was calling on him to risk on this mission.

"Of course you have to join the assault on the girl. You are the mage, so it's up to you to handle the transfer of command seals"

"Shit"

It was well into the night when Lelouch finally left the Emiya residence.

He had promised Shirou and Sakura that he will return to have dinner with them again and assured Taiga that he will be sure to drop in at her dojo soon to check out her Kendo skills. As he put the stolen car in gear and drove away, he couldn't help but feel that things have gotten even more complicated with the Matou family. In addition to the creepy grandfather he now had Sakura to figure out as well. But the day hadn't been without its good points. He had learned a lot from the school records, and he had found the time to ask Shirou some questions in private. He now had all the information he needed on the boy. It would certainly be interesting to see how Illyasviel would react to what he had learned.

Lelouch couldn't help smiling as the car sped along the Fuyuki streets. The grail war was like a chess match, a seven sided chess match. He looked forward to seeing how his opponents would play...

At the Kotomine church, the resident priest was pacing his study, his hands clasped behind his back and head bowed, when he was interrupted by the sound of a footstep behind him.

"Still thinking about the mystery servant?" Gilgamesh smirked as he prowled into the study.

"I see he had caught your attention as well" Kirei stopped his pacing to regard the King of Heroes. "Lancer told me how you covered his retreat"

"I admit he intrigued me" Gilgamesh said as he collapsed into the couch that sat at one corner of the study. "Most servants would take the opportunity to get rid of an enemy master, this one went out of his way to rescue one"

"Not quite, he knew she had lost her command seals. He knew she was out of the running. But he still saved her"

"Ho ho, even more intriguing. Maybe he was after something as trivial as information, even if she no longer has her servant, she knows his strength and weakness. Not to mention" Here the King of Heroes grinned. "She knows your strength and weakness Kirei"

"Thats what concerns me" Kirei admitted. "He recognized me. He called me by name. And now he knows I have an "undue interest" in the grail war" His face turned grim. "Even if Bazett never survived or told him nothing, he and his master now count me as an enemy"

"Who is his master? You should know after all"

"I have no idea" Kirei admitted. "They never introduced themselves to the church. And now I'm sure they never will"

"No matter, I'm sure we will meet again as the war progresses. It's only a matter of time"

"Very probably" Kirei agreed. "Still I wonder what he plans to do with poor Bazett"

He smirked at Gilgamesh's raised eyebrow. "I talked with him remember? Whatever reason he had for taking the girl, I know for certain it wasn't out of the kindness of his heart"

"He has no idea about the grail war. He also has no idea about magecraft beyond the bare basics" Lelouch snapped into the phone. "How many times must I repeat myself? Shirou Emiya is as likely to summon a servant as the prime minister of Japan"

"But he has to summon!" The girl was getting downright irritating. "He has to enter the war!"

"What is your obsession with this boy? He is just an average mage who I'm sure you never met before in your life" Actually he had asked the boy if he had ever met her.

"That is non of your business!" Illyasviel von Einzbern snapped. "I want you to help me see to it that he summons a servant"

Lelouch sighed and looked across the room at C.C, who was laying in bed again, listening to the conversation with a smirk on her face, no help there at all. He turned back the the speaker phone and asked the obvious question.

"Assuming I do help you add another pair of enemies to this already raging war, what is in it for me?"

"Well, I can eliminate other enemy servants on your behalf, you know how strong Berserker is"

"Miss Einzbern, defeating the other servants is a goal we both share, its hardly adequate payment for what you want me to do don't you agree?"

"Fine, what do you want then?" Illya demanded.

"As a matter of fact, I can think of something that would be adequate" Lelouch smirked at the phone.

Later after he had hung up and and gone back to reading through the piles of printouts that contained all the information on the war that they had gathered so far, C.C decided to speak up.

"You are terrible with children Lelouch"

A wordless growl was her only response.

"Still you were very eager to agree to her plan"

"What do you mean" Lelouch spun his chair around to look at her.

"Didn't you just have dinner with that boy? Now you plan to turn him into our enemy and drag him into this war"

"I had dinner with them, and helped them get that girl to the house, because I saw the opportunity to learn more about two people who are relevant to the war. Granted the people were nice, and the food was delicious, but I knew I couldn't afford to get too close to them. They were after all potential enemies"

"It seems I'm always dragging you into situations that require you to lie to people. Good people at that. In the end you end up getting alienated and despised" C.C said in her usual monotone, but Lelouch had learned long ago to read her moods.

"I wouldn't worry about it" Lelouch smirked. "Being alienated or despised makes no difference to me. After all, the only companionship I need is right here"

He was rewarded by her Cheese-kun plushy hitting him in the face.

end of chapter 6

Not much action in this chapter. But it gives a glimpse of what the main story arc will be, and sets the stage for the action packed chapters that will follow. This chapter also showed what became of bazett after the rescue. I felt it was a bit inappropriate if she just simply recovered after taking that kind of damage. Please tell me what you think of the direction the fic is going.

Also I want to say thank you to all you guys who read this and encouraged me to keep writing. Its much appreciated. :)