Irisviel von Einzbern was flustered as she worriedly rushed from one side of her bedroom to the other. The luxurious looking bedroom was messy as the white haired woman was hurriedly packing clothing into a large suitcase.

"Oh no, oh no, it's so late!" She fretted, her white and gold gown wrinkled from having hurriedly put it on when she awoke. "Why didn't Kerry wake me up?"

Having finished packing, the woman's entire body heaved as she tried to zip up the overstuffed pack. Gripping it with both hands, she wobbled dangerously back and forth as she rushed out of her room. Along the way, several of the homunculi of the house glanced at her with faint confusion as she rushed up to a staircase.

One of the maids, a Sella-type, gained a look of horror as she saw Irisviel heave back.

"Wait, mistress!" She shouted, raising a hand, featherduster poised to attempt to stop the lady of the manor.

Too bad she already knew from her experiences with Irisviel that it wouldn't be enough.

"Kerry! Wait up for me!" Irisviel wailed, swinging with her hips as she threw the suitcase over the stairwell. A brief shout came from below as Irisviel hauled herself over the bannister as well in a smooth motion. "Don't leave me behind!"

Her hair fluttered as she plummeted, but her fall was broken as she came crashing down on top of her suitcase.

The bag, strained due to how stuffed full of clothing it was, gave up and spewed forth its contents around the entrance. In the aftermath of the disaster, Irisviel was the only figure that wasn't covered with the ornate dresses and underwear she favored. Up above, looking even paler than usual, the Sella-type homunculus was gripping onto the railing of the staircase. The house cleaner trembled as she took in the mess that Irisviel had created.

Loyal maids couldn't kill her masters.

That was the only thing staying her hand.

"Ilya!" Irisviel was sitting on a particular large pile of clothing as she looked at her daughter happily. "Where's your daddy?"

Ilyasviel von Einzbern giggled at her mother's happy expression. The little girl had green and brown paint on her cheeks along with camoflauge wear. She plucked at a lacy bit of cloth that had landed on the green canteen at her side before she finally spoke up.

"You're sitting on him!"

"Oh?" Irisviel looked down.

Kiritsugu Emiya groaned, looking up at her with a look of dismay. Only his face, similiarly marked up in the same paint as their daughter, could be seen all the clothing that covered his body.

"Good morning, honey!" She smiled. "Let's go on our hunting trip!"

- Scene Break -

Zero Phantasm

"The Importance of Family! - Part I"

- Scene Break -

"It's going to be so amazing, Ilya!" Irisviel exclaimed, a wide smile on her face as she spun with her daughter held up in the air. "We'll roast marshmellows and sing camp fires-"

Kiritsugu carefully cleared his throat.

The Sella-type clone shot dark looks at the trio as she brushed past them again. The broom gripped in her hands was moving in a blur as she swept up the shattered vases that had fallen over in the mistress's latest antics.

"Like WOuOH! WOuOH! WOuOH! YEI! YEI!" She swayed from side to side in a faux dance, delighting her daughter.

Ilya happily laughed at her mother's antics, bringing the smiling woman into a hug.

"Iri," Kiritsugu spoke up, finally drawing the attention of both Einzbern women. His expression was grave and terrible. "We're not going on a hunting trip."

Irisviel came to a stop.

"Not a camping trip...?"

"We're going on a fox hunt!" Ilya pumped her tiny fist up in the air. "I get to carry the bullets!"

Irisviel frowned. Immediately setting Ilya down on the ground, she hiked up her dress and rapidly moved towards Kiritsugu, who suddenly found the wallpaper in the room quite fascinating.

"Kerry." She spoke the word with an ominous tone, leaning her head to the left. "Why are you taking our daughter out shooting at her age?"

Kiritsugu looked to the right.

"It...uh, builds character."

Irisviel leaned her head to the right.

"You said there would be marshmellows."

Kiritsugu looked to his left.

At this point, the Sella-type homunculus stopped her pretenses of cleaning and stood next to Ilya. Both of them stared as Irisviel kept trying to look at Kiritsugu and the latter keep looking away from his wife.

"Want a lick?" Ilya wondered, pulling out a popsicle and unwrapping it.

The Sella-type maid's eyes widened.

"Do you really mean it?" The maid asked in a breathy voice. The little miss' kindness struck deep within the heart of the homunculus. "Can I have a lick?"

The long hours of back breaking labor...

The near heart attack inducing moments of suicidal stupidty from Irisviel...

The near misses with death from when she had to be live target practice for Kiritsugu...

The constant displays of skin she had to present Lord Acht; dressed in so many fetish outfits...

Ilya happily smiled, dazzling the maid with her goodnatured aura.

"You look like you need this, Sella." Ilya declared, handing the maid her popsicle. "I hope you like it!"

Even as Sella tightly gripped onto the popsicle, eyes shimmering with joy, she made two declaration in her hearts of hearts. First was that she was going to lay claim to the singular name of Sella from now on; no matter how many of her clones she had to crush before it was unconquested. Secondly was that...

"I will kill for you from this day forth, mistress." Sella pledged, going down on one knee before a confused Ilya. "Just tell me who to annihilate and I will move the heavens and earths themselves for you!"

Ilya blinked in confusion.

"'kay!" Ilya went back to happily smiling, not really understanding what Sella had meant by her words.

Ignored in the background, Irisviel was currently hogtying Kiritsugu with strings of ether.

- Scene Break -

"Yay! I love camping!"

Irisviel was wearing a hardy looking set of outdoors gear. With a large backpack and overly large hat with a lantern set on it, the woman only exposed her arms and legs in her button up flannel shirt and khaki short combo.

Kiritsugu, looking something frayed at the edges, was wearing the same type of outfit.

"Why are you here?" He bluntly asked the maid lingering in the back. Still dressed in her outfit from the mansion, she kept the largest backpack on her shoulder. Riding on her shoulders was a gleeful Ilya, who was eagerly looking around the woods around them.

"I have sworn my soul to Mistress Ilya."

"See, Ilya? This is why we make friends in this world!" Irisviel smiled, wagging a finger as she decided to take the opportunity to make a Life Lesson.

"To carry our stuff?"

"Of course! Indoctrination is the way of life for the Einzbern!"

"You are wise beyond your years, Mistress Irisviel."

"Go mom!"

The three women laughed in eerie synch, causing a shiver to race down Kiritsugu's spine.

"I'm...just going to go on ahead and scout." The man muttered, not at all fleeing from the Einzberns. It was more of a tactical withdrawal. "Bebacklater." He mumbled his words as he raced into the darkness of the woods.

"Bye, papa!"

Ilya's words made the other two women coming out of their laughter.

Quirking her head like a confused bird, Irisviel blinked her vivid red eyes as she looked around like she had seen something.

"What's wrong, Mistress Irisviel?"

"Uh...nothing, I guess." Irisviel deferred, shaking her head as she looked over at Ilyasviel and Sella with a smile. "So, let's go ahead and set up a fire pit!"

"Ooh! I thought daddy was going to do that after he scouted?" Ilya asked, but Irisviel shook her head.

"No, marriage is a partnership, honey." Irisviel rolled up her sleeves as she glanced around the clearing. "Both sides have to give as good as they get!"

"Oooh, is that why you two make those funny noises at nig-"

Sella gently covered Mistress Ilya's mouth.

Thankfully for Ilya, Irisviel was in the midst of hyping herself up. Finally seeing the best spot, she cracked her knees and brought her hands forwards. Magical power began to visibly erupt from her body.

"This is the power of our love!"

The explosion could be heard from several miles away.

- Scene Break -

"A man, a woman, and an amorphous blob of mercury walk into the woods. - Part I"

Both humans were dressed like they had walked out of a middle ages production. Ruffles were prominent for the woman's dress shirt. The man wore a dark blue jacket that completely covered him.

"Lord El-Melloi, may I ask why we're in such a dreadful place?" The woman coldly asked. Her name was Sola-Ui Nuada-Re Sophia-Ri and she was the reluctant fiancee of the male. Nominal male in her eyes. "Do you hate me so much that you want to throw me to the Einzbern's wolves?" She continued with a sneer.

The man, Kayneth Archibald El-Melloi, flinched like she had slapped him.

"Of course not, my beloved!" Kayneth declared, grandly gesturing at their surroundings. "I've brought you here to simply show you that your previous misconceptions about myself were incorrect, that's all!"

"Oh?" Sola pressed.

"I will no longer run away!" Kayneth bravely stated, gripping his hands. "For you, I will take on the world! The beasts of Einzbern forest, powerful and dangerous, shall dye my Mystic Code in your name!"

At his feet, his loyal Mystic Code, Volumen Hydragyrum, quivered as it lapped at its master's feet.

"So you brought me all the way out here just because I called you cowardly?" Sola asked, tone sharp as her eyes narrowed. "Are you some kind of loser? That duel was weeks ago!"

"But...!" Kayneth stammered. "I couldn't get my paid time off from the school until..."

Sola slapped her forehead.

"I'm done." She softly declared. "You're insane. Why couldn't I have been married to the Matou Family in Japan? At least they're freaks in the bed room."

Throwing her arms up into the air, Sola stormed off.

"Noooo!" Kayneth screamed in loss, chasing after his intended. "If you want to spice up the bedroom we can use the tentacles of my Mystic Code, Sola! The tentacles!" His voice emphasized the word in another wail.

The Mystic Code quivered in place for a moment.

'Oh why cannot my love realize that shrew does not love him?' Volumen Hydragyrum morbidly thought. 'You're too good for this word, Kayneth.' The Mystic Code began to drag itself after the pair of magi.

'However much it pains me, I will stand by his side until he realizes his folly.'

- Scene Break -

"The Importance of Family! - Part II"

Kiritsugu Emiya sighed as he ran his hand through his hair, resting against a tree. In the distance he could still see the plume of smoke rise up from where he had left his family behind. Aware that any game in the area had been scared off long ago, he set down his oversized backpack.

He grinned as he looked at the gun parts stuffed inside the bag.

"Kerry! Kerry, are you there?"

Kiritsugu panicked as he quickly zipped up his bag. Slinging it over his shoulder, he walked around the tree.

"Iri, I wasn't even thinking of going hu-"

The maid blandly looked at him.

"Thinking of doing what?" She wondered, quirking her head.

"Why are you calling me Kerry." Kiritsugu demanded, answered her question with another question.

"Mistress Irisviel said she trained you to react on hearing that word." Sella responded, quirking her head. "It seems to work."

"Dammit." Kiritsugu cursed, browing wrinkling at the ominous sounding statement. "You don't get to call me that."

"Why not?"

"Because I hate that name!"

The blank faced maid merely intensified her stare. Both of them spend a silent minute exchanging gazes.

"How about Kerrytugu?"

"Denied."

- Scene Break -

"Welcome back, honey!" Irisviel merrily sang as Kiritsugu and Sella entered the clearing. The majority of it had been blown inwards into the earth, allowing dreadful flames and the howls of the damned and dying to reach up from the depths of the earth.

It reminded him of Fuyuki.

It gave Sella traumatic flashbacks to the last cosplay night with Lord Acht.

Irisviel had somehow managed to knock over enough trees over the pit of flames and had a large deer roasting over the open flame, held up by the trees.

Ilya was prodding at a puddle of black mud that was rising from the depths with a stick.

"Do these count as marshmellows?" She wondered, even as Kiritsugu smoothly walked over towards her and picked her up, carrying her away from the ooze.

"No, it's nasty, terrible stuff." He replied.

The mud, rejected once again, sadly skulked out into the woods.

Irisviel idly hummed. "It wasn't that bad..." She trailed off.

Kiritsugu gave her a flat look.

"You would."

Irisviel grinned. It was not an entirely friendly smile.

Sella casually reached over and pressed her entire body against its side, flipping the deer over so it could get evenly roasted. Summoning a string of water from the air itself, she send it stabbing into the depths of the animal.

"Dinner is now served." Sella chimed, sensing the temperature through her water whip.

"Yay! Let's eat!" Ilya cheered, hopping up and down eagerly.

- Scene Break -

Songs were sung and meat was devoured. The sheer amount of meat that Irisviel had consumed disturbed both Sella and Kiritsugu, but both of them figured she needed something to replenish all the magic she had used earlier that day.

"It's time to go to bed, Mistress Ilya." Sella announced. The declaration made Ilya look up at the maid through her eyelashes poutily.

"But it's so ear-eee..." Her defense was cut off by a massive yawn. She looked somewhat ashamed as she hung her head. "You win this round."

Irisviel chuckled as Sella picked Ilya up and took her to their tent. The woman was currently pressed up against Kiritsugu as they both looked at the smoldering embers of the pit she had blown out earlier that day.

"What's wrong, Kerry?" She asked, focusing on the look in Kiritsugu's face.

Kiritsugu instantly glanced down at Irisviel. Internally he winced as he reacted to that accured name again, but he didn't show it as he responded.

"...nothing."

Silence lingered for a few moments.

"...I'm sorry if I messed up your trip." Irisviel contritely looked down at the ground. She pulled away from the man, hiding her expression with her long locks of hair. A thick note of pain was in her voice as she continued. "That's why you lied to me, right?"

Kiritsugu felt his mouth go dry. His thoughts began to run about, rolling over each other in their panic to escape his lips as Irisviel clutched at herself. However, no matter how much he tried to project his words, his lips stayed closed.

"I see."

Unable to vocalize, he did the first thing he could when he saw Irisviel stand. Standing upwards, he embraced the woman from behind, resting his face in her hair. The woman squeaked, blushing red as her husbands arms wrapped around her.

"Kerry..."

- Scene Break -

Sella's lips quirked slightly upwards as she glanced out into the clearing. The master and mistress both wandered back towards their tent, holding hands and smiling at each other.

"...Sella?"

Turning her back towards the clearing, the maid saw a sleepy looking Ilyasviel in a puppy dog hoody and paw print pattern pajama.

"What are you doing?" Ilya wondered, ears flopping on her hoody.

Sella walked up to her and took her hand, leading the two of them back towards their tent.

"Ah...merely taking care of some dirty business." A true maid ensured there was no dissonance in the home, after all. The numbing spell should stop affecting Master Kiritsugu's jaw in about an hour.

Sella wished the man's words were as sweet as his actions.

"Sella?" Ilya broke the silence. "How did you manage to get a break to follow us?"

"A maid has her ways."

- Scene Break -*

In an undisclosed location in Castle Einzbern...

"All the food in the world isn't worth this!" Saber cried, trying to hold her a super short skirt down with both hands.

Her opponent, an old magus concealed by thick shadows behind a giant desk, continued to gestured at her with an armored gauntlet.

"Hahah! Mighty Wind! Mighty Wind!" Acht's voice warbled as he lashed the blonde maid with gusts of wind. While the attacks themselves did nothing to the woman wearing the black lacy outfit, it was strong enough to cause dangerous amounts of skin to be exposed with the flapping of the skirt.

It was like practicing magecraft and getting a wonderful show at the same time.

Acht loved it.

"Waaah! Get back here soon!" Saber squealed, trying to sway away from the attacks.

It was unfortunate that Saber hadn't learned that Instinct always lost to Base Lust.

"The Importance of Family! - Fin"

- Scene Break -*

"A man, a woman, and an amorphous blob of mercury walk into the woods. - Part II"

Kayneth sulked on top of a stone. In the distance he could see Sola happily eat in front the light of a warming campfire. Behind her, a tent was already set up as well. Looking around him, the magus only saw his Mystic Code and patches of rough, rocky ground.

"I'm hungry."

His stomach growled.

Volumen Hydragyrum swelled, looking almost shocked to the magus' eye. Before the man could even question it, the blob of mercury rushed deep into the woods. Kayneth rose to his feet in surprise as he heard a yip of pain.

His Mystic Code slithered back towards Kayneth. Within its depths were several chunks of meat, along with a fox tail.

"...waah!" Kayneth bawled, rushing up to Volumen Hydragyrum. He wrapped his arms around the ball of mercury. "Without you I'd have nothing!"

'There, there, Kayneth.' The Mystic Code warmly thought, reaching a tendril up to feed a hunk of meat to the magus. 'No need to cry. I'll always be with you.'

In the depths of the slime, a piece of black mud began to slowly and steadily taint the mercury even as neither magus or Mystic Code noticed it.

'Always.'

"A man, a woman, and an amorphous blob of mercury walk into the woods. - Fin"

- Scene Break -

"Einzbern Consultation Room!"

A cozy looking classroom with only two women were shown.

"Welcome to a new era in history!" Irisviel, wearing a pink kimono, clapped her hands merrily as she proudly lifted her chin. "This is the Einzbern Consultation Room, deliverer of all your dreams..." She spun before stopping in a pose with her pointer, index, and ring fingers hovering over her eye in a W shape. "...with wishcraft wielding wives!"

"That's amazing, teacher! So hip and edgy!" The other was a brunette in bloomers and a white shirt. Her high ponytail swayed from side to side as she gestured at their surroundings. "But does all of this count as 'new'? I think there's been at least two other versions of this done before!"

"Don't worry, Zecchan!" Irisviel tutted, looking the part of a noblewoman as she covered her lips. "After all, we have bloomers on our side! Bloomers are justice!"

Strangely enough, Zecchan actually looked a bit annoyed.

"But...I think someone already did that." Zecchan's weakly trailed off, especially when she saw how Irisviel's hair was floating up in an invisible updraft. The other woman's expression was shadowed, but something about her warned Zecchan to try to entertain her before all was lost.

"Uhm...ah...er..."

Zecchan never was the fastest thinker, unfortunately.

"I'll curse them!" Red markings ran up Irisviel's neck from within her kimono. The woman shook as she continued to rave. "I'll curse them all to death! Then we can be the only ones together in the world!"

Zecchan silently stared as Irisviel picked up a nearby desk and began to slam it against the blackboard. She glanced out towards the fourth wall.

"Uhm...I'm kind of shy, sorry. Look me up if you want to study English, though!" She apologetically bowed as she ended this segment.

End