Author's Notes

I'm baaaack~

Lancer's tale left Team Mordred much to think about.

Despite the sob story, they were guiltily relieved at Gilgamesh taking the initiative to take out Berserker. It meant one less wildcard to worry about, but they'd clearly be the next targets of Gilgamesh's boredom-killing murder spree.

With everyone's allegiance to the 'let's-kill-Gilgamesh-together' cause nominally secured, a palpable tension filled the meeting room. Between Lancer and Archer, Sakura and Rin, Shirou and Illya, Saber and Rider, everyone had a score to settle, and they'd have to face each other down the line for the Grail.

Mordred didn't care.

What she cared about was getting everyone on the same page, standing in the room's midst to get everyone's attention.

"I've something to get off my chest, lads. I lied about why I was summoned as Ruler. The Holy Grail's corrupted."

This didn't immediately register in everyone's minds, receiving a mix of,

"What?"

"Excuse me?" and,

"That's impossible!" from her allies.

Mordred continued, "Archer can attest. That Devil's spitoon will destroy the world if anybody wishes upon it, nobody's going to win this rigged Grail War." Everyone turned to Archer, whose folded arms and stoic silence couldn't hide the pinch of consternation his expression betrayed.

"Archer, it can't be, right?" Rin's skepticism was understandable, holding onto a sliver of hope that the wishing device people killed and died for wouldn't blow up in their faces.

A bedridden Lancer coughed before piping up.

"There's certainly something fishy about it. Kotomine said something about summoning Angra Mainyu, tearing out my little master's heart to do so." This had Illya doing a double-take, dumbly staring at Lancer's revelation of her supposed fate had Gilgamesh succeeded.

Sakura, though oblivious to the workings of the Grail War, empathetically shared in everybody's sorrow (also Shinji's death, probably). Rider was unsurprised, everyone else occupied with the implications of Mordred's revelation.

Mordred, no stranger to being screwed over by the Grail, looked at her crestfallen Father.

"Father? You were there, any idea on what happened in the last Grail War?"

The spotlight shifted onto Saber.

"As I fought Gilgamesh, Emiya Kiritsugu commanded me to destroy the Grail against my will. Gilgamesh talked about mud from the Fourth Holy Grail War granting him a human body. I initially wrote it off as his usual, inane rambling. But…"

Mordred spoke, "I read up a little the Fourth Holy Grail War. Didn't the Fuyuki City Fire coincide near its end? That's probably what'll happen again. Why else do you think I was summoned here?"

The table's contents jumped with a slamming fist.

"I can't accept this!" Everybody flinched at Rin's smoldering temper, nothing Mordred didn't expect as a mage hailing from a family obsessing over the Holy Grail across generations. As Illya, Shirou, Father and Sakura all descended into solemn moodiness, Mordred simply wanted to leave them be.

She'd sooner fight an army than stay to sort out the problems of hormonal kids.

"Food for thought," she said before leaving the silent room.

Mordred blinked, having fallen asleep to be transported into a void in her civilian clothes.

Was this some sort of dream?

Nothing but a colorless expanse as far as she could see, lacking even a horizon to give Mordred the impression of standing on solid ground. In this mental world, the only other item in existence was a fancy mirror standing before Mordred.

"Damn, if this is my mind, maybe I'll hold back next time someone calls me 'empty-headed'…

Nah, I think I'd just beat them up anyway."

Looking at the mirror, Mordred's reflection stared back while donning her battle armor.

And in the mirror's background was a hellish scene ripped from Mordred's past.

Blackish clouds floated amidst the crimson sky, the ground littered with corpses and wrecked steel, chipped swords jutting skywards like grave markers. A column of light pierced the heavens to cast its light upon Excalibur, the holy sword standing atop the massacre's aftermath. Rivulets of blood dribbled down the hill, fouling the air with a coppery odor even on Mordred's end.

Camlann.

Tensing up upon witnessing her resting ground, Mordred asked, "Who the bloody hell are you?"

Her reflection chuckled in response, and Mordred already wanted to deck her reflection for the smugness she carried herself with.

"Let's just say I'm the real you. The real you who's buried beneath the mask of civility you wear in public, dumbass. I'm here to remind you of what really matters, killing Arthur.

Wasn't your entire existence devoted to killing him, razing everything he stood for after he spurned us?"

"I know. But," Mordred deflated, "at Camlann, my heart just felt empty before I died. Everything fell around us, people were senselessly dying left and right, Father was turning away from me. It just…

I don't know what the hell is it I want anymore, but…" Mordred's face fell into her palm, shivering upon recalling all the ordeals she'd survived.

"I don't fucking know, but I think…

I think I want to be more than who I was then, forever stuck in the shadow of Father's legacy. He created something for himself, but after tearing everything down, what've I created by myself, for myself? Nothing!"

With this, her reflection grimaced and swung her hand out at the hellish background.

"Creation? Who gives a rat's ass?! Arthur betrayed us! Abandoned us! Killed us! Sowed the seeds for his own empire's downfall! What else is left except ridding ourselves of him?!"

Mordred was seething now, lifting her head to shove her finger at the mirror.

"If you're my subconscious or whatever, you'd know this.

It's. All. Over! I kill Father, I kill my last connection to the past, the only person who ever mattered to me, for better or worse!"

"'for better or worse'?! Listen to yourself, you daft wench! Nothing else matters! We were never meant to be here. The Great Holy Grail War where we came from, we no longer exist there!

We're simply ghosts, Mordred. Arthur's all that mattered to us - "

"THIS ISN'T JUST ABOUT US ANYMORE!

God, it was never entirely about us!" Mordred's fists balled up so tight her knuckles cracked, gathering her thoughts before answering her reflection.

"I rebelled because Father didn't understand his people anymore. I was swayed by my hatred to destroy everything he stood for, if only to build something anew atop Britannia's ashes. Father's now learning to find peace with the mistakes he's made, I can't be so immature as to keep trying to settle a vendetta which'll never bring me peace."

Reflection!Mordred simply scoffed, "'Peace'. We both know neither of you will find closure unless we eliminate our source of emotional turmoil, and lift that."

Mordred's reflection pointed back at Excalibur, bloodied but unblemished. And despite the holy sword beckoning like a forbidden fruit begging to be plucked, Mordred's gaze hardened at the heavy cost.

She planted a fist on the mirror, asking, "What if I kill myself, hmm? What if I erase myself as this timeline should've been, one without my influence?" This had reflection!Mordred breaking out into guffaws, throwing her head back with hearty laughter at the asinine suggestion.

"Puh-lease. We both know despite your self-loathing for being 'Arthur's dirty homunculus offspring', you'd never go out in such a cowardly way." Mirroring Mordred by placing a fist on the surface dividing them, Mordred was mentally taken aback at the malice in her own eyes, her reflection's voice lowering into a malicious whisper.

"You're denying me, Mordred. You're hurting me, just as you hurt yourself. Letting Arthur live?" Mordred's reflection spat on the bloodstained ground, swinging out her hand to gesture at their magnum opus.

"It's what the Greater Grail wants. It's what we want. Hell, it's what Arthur wants, someone else to rule in her place. Why deny everyone's wish?"

True.

It seemed everything around Mordred was egging her on to kill Father, and perhaps a part of Mordred wanted Father dead.

And yet…

"So what. So fucking what? Who the fuck are you to tell me what I want?

I don't need anything or anybody to give my life meaning. It doesn't matter if you, Father, the World or God himself tells me who I should be. I've a nasty streak of disobedience and rebelliousness.

Besides, haven't you heard? Wish-granting has quite the habit of going awry, aren't I continuing the practice by screwing everyone's wishes over?" Pulling away from the mirror, Mordred couldn't contain the smirk stretching her cheeks out. Hell, perhaps her reflection's smugness was spot-on.

Didn't mean she didn't want to punch her doppelganger, especially when reflection!Mordred's expression contorted with disdain.

"Then enjoy what remains of your pathetic life with these 'friends', Mordred, and wait for them to turn on each other. Just wait to die when Arthur wishes you out of existence." Wincing at her doppelganger reflecting hatred she no doubt possessed in her past, Mordred deflated at trying to be the better man.

This was… wrong, somehow.

Admiration of what Father had achieved, love for the people she ruled over, and a lifetime of worship was ruined by parasitic hatred for what Father had become, alien and emotionless.

There was no way it was all hatred inside her, was it?

Then an epiphany dawned upon Mordred.

"Hold on, why are you, my subconscious self, calling Father 'Arthur' instead of 'Father' like I almost always have?"

Reflection!Mordred blinked dumbly, using the same trite reasoning.

"Like I said, I'm your subconscious - "

"Yeah, yeah. But before betraying him, I've always respected Father and addressed him as such. Why aren't you?

Hell, if so, why haven't you addressed Father as 'King' even once?" Mordred remembered her painful last words being 'Father', almost always using it to address her King nowadays.

So why was her subconscious self, supposedly representing everything Mordred desired, insolently calling Father by his name alone?

"Are you really me?"

Mordred's doppelganger merely stared, her distant gaze belying the thoughts running through her mind in an attempt to answer Mordred, eventually deflating in resignation.

And reflection!Mordred started to giggle.

"Oh, you wound me, Mordred. You were brought up to ensure Arthur's fall from grace. As a homunculus, didn't it occur to you that your training began even before birth?"

A blur caught Mordred by the neck, registering it as reflection!Mordred choking her through the one-way mirror. As reflection!Mordred stepped into Mordred's world, her super-strength forced Mordred down on one knee, strangely unable to pry her doppelganger's hand off.

"You detest being treated like a woman, yes? Here, you're but a silly little girl who's forgotten her purpose, so you'll share a girl's strength as I remind you." Indignation flared up within Mordred's heart even as it sank from the realization, her doppelganger's gaze possessing a familiar slyness.

"Even in my womb, I made sure you'd come into this world possessing the potential to become the strongest knight. I ensured a shadow of my past self would live on inside you to watch Arthur die, my child, my weapon, my property." Reflection!Mordred smiled at the dawning horror in Mordred's expression.

"No…"

"Yes.

My hold on you transcends time and space, Mordred, and you've forgotten your purpose. But don't you worry, dear…" Snapping awake from her dream, Mordred stared down at Shirou as he clutched his solar plexus, his crumpled body lying beneath Mordred's feet. Mordred's hand lifted on its own accord, the extra Command Spell given by Rider lighting up ominously.

Mordred was a prisoner inside her own body.

" … mother Morgan is here."