Chapter Thirty-five: The Witch's Maw

(*)

Assassin planted a seed, and it began to sprout roots of pale, black-veined flesh almost immediately. They dug into the floor of the cavern, burrowing into stone and beginning to climb the walls like ivy. He raised one clawed hand, and split open skin as thin and dry as burned paper, letting a few drops of black ichor fall on the thing. The growth rate increased, the cavern rumbling as stone split wider beneath the surface, prompting small tremors.

He smiled, and the expression tore the skin of his face as it always did. The pain made the smile wider.

(*)

Saber was King Arthur, the wielder of Excalibur, the sword of kings that could shatter armies with a single swing. It gleamed in her hands, a hungry darkness that devoured everything around it, like she was holding a black hole in her hands. It told the universe: I have crushed nations beneath my boot, and I am stronger than I was then. Kneel or die.

Archer was Gilgamesh, the king of heroes, first and mightiest. The light he emitted was not so brilliant as the perfect radiance of his adult form, but it still shone brilliantly enough to outline half the mountain in gold, vanishing only where Saber's darkness countered it. It told the universe: I am the barest fraction of what I will one day be, and my power can still shake the heavens. You are nothing before me.

Rin Tohsaka was a human, and she had never felt more human than at that moment. She looked back and forth between them, and said, "We should run away." It told the universe: Oh, shit.

She grabbed Shirou's arm and sprinted for the tunnel, only to be intercepted and dragged herself by Rider, grabbing up the two Masters as if they weighed nothing and darting down the tunnel at bullet speeds.

This was just about fast enough to avoid the first explosion.

(*)

Kirei Kotomine poured the tea, and Ilya was a little sad that this wasn't the most surreal thing she'd ever seen.

She knew Shirou had come for her, she could feel the bridge of mana that linked them forever, two halves of a whole (It was a pretty good bridge even though he had refused to have sex with her because of 'morality.' Ilya had known from her efforts over the War to follow 'morality' that it completely sucked, but it wasn't until that moment she had come to fully understand just how much. The big handsome doofus was lucky she loved him). She could taste the power of the Servants that fought against and alongside him, for they were a part of her as well. She suspected Rin was probably around too, though that hardly mattered.

Because all of it was overwhelmed by the swirling abyss of hunger she felt inside the girl sitting across from her, sipping at jasmine tea and smiling gently. Logically, she and Sakura should have been evenly matched. Both were Holy Grails, both containers of magic to hold the awe-inspiring power of the Servants and channel them into the ritual. But this delicate, terrible thing that smiled at her and gently reassured her everything would be okay… she wasn't a being of logic. She was the manifestation of primal, twisted, hunger from some primordial pit of chaos before life had begun. Everything that had made prehistoric man huddle in caves around the fire, so he wouldn't have to face the dark.

Ilya's gaze slipped, involuntarily, to the Greater Grail. Something pressed against the black skin of the central sphere, and it looked far too much like a hand for her comfort.

"Don't worry," Sakura said reassuringly. "It won't get free yet, and we'll be ready before it does. Saber or Archer will be part of us soon, and Rider is very likely to follow immediately after. Then, Shirou and Rin will be here, and I'll explain everything."

"Or, you could explain everything right now, because you're creepy," Ilya muttered. "Besides, I think I figured it out already."

Sakura's eyes glittered. "Then why do you still look so worried?"

"Because it's insane."

"The world is insane. If you want to fix something so utterly broken, what option is there but the most extreme? Mankind has had thousands of years, and done nothing but make things worse. They desperately call out to gods that either don't exist, don't care, or actively seek to hurt them. What kind of parent does that to children?" Sakura said, her tone maddeningly calm. "And it is always the children who suffer the most, Ilya. Don't think I haven't noticed the irony that we are only in a position to save this sad, broken little world because of how thoroughly it has abused us. Our own families, warping us, twisting us, treating us like lumps of metal to be forged into daggers for their use." She smiled, somewhat sadly. "Thrown into the fire again and again, only to be taken out and beaten when the pain has softened us enough to be malleable. But in the end, it made us stronger. Don't we owe something to every girl who went through what we did, only to shatter before she became something new? To the Makiris consumed by Zouken's madness? To the Einzberns who rotted away to become the Grail, just like your mother?"

Ilya felt ice run through her veins. "You can't scare me by knowing things," she lied. "I know that's just Angra Mainyu whispering to you. And that's why you're walking right into what it wants, and not even thinking it's a problem!"

"It is barely aware, much less sentient, Ilya," Sakura said gently. "There's a great deal of information contained within. Every soul it has touched has left an imprint. But the central consciousness hardly even exists. It can't control me anymore than a hurricane can command people to stay in its path."

"And it's scary that you think that's true," Ilya countered. "Or even if it was true, that it will remain true after it's born and grows beyond the current constraints. Or especially that it will remain true after you… you…"

"You can say it," Kirei whispered, and the reverent joy in his tone made the chill in Ilya's veins crystallize into a glacier.

"You want to make it God. Are you insane?!" Ilya hissed in defiance, because when you were afraid, the only response in her mind was to get angry enough to make the fear shut up.

"Insane? I'd prefer 'inspired,' myself," Kirei said. "More than I could have ever imagined. Uniting all life within Angra Mainyu, turning all souls into a single, gestalt entity. And then sending that entity, the collective will of all mankind, through the door to Akasha. Ultimate power and ultimate knowledge. Perfect enlightenment granted to a being with the power and intellect to fully absorb it. Can you imagine the result?" he chuckled. "Of course not. Nobody possibly could. It's beyond us, and that is as it should be. Each human mind, no matter how powerful or cunning, will only be an infinitesimal fragment of the being we create. A true God, omnipotent and omniscient. A being that can redefine the universe, and grant a place and a role to every lost soul. Be proud, my child. You have been chosen to be one of those holding the pen when the Second Book of Genesis is written. And while our new world has taken more than seven days to come to fruition, technically, I feel like the extra time spent perfecting it will produce a final product far superior to the current model."

He'd really said it. He'd said it out loud. Ilya felt her stomach churning; somehow, even though she had worked it out on her own, not having it said out loud made it less real. That giant, hideous, hungry thing. And they wanted to make everyone in the whole world nothing more than a part of it. And that was only phase one.

Yes, it was an inspired plan. But Ilya didn't think it was proper to say out loud in polite company what it had been inspired by, which was 'batshit insanity.' Even if Angra Mainyu was not clearly the most awful thing she had ever seen, who could legitimately look at everyone in the world and say 'Yes, mashing them all together is a good idea?' Any gathering of people was only as 'good' as the loudest, most forceful person in it, and anyone who thought otherwise was either an idiot or an idealist, which was basically the same thing in Ilya's world view.

But of course, there was one other thing that needed to be brought up, although Ilya suspected she knew the answer.

"And when Shirou and Rin get here, what do you think is going to happen?" she asked. "They'll sit down to tea with us and calmly agree to be eaten by a dark god?"

"First of all, Ilya, you're being extremely close-minded," Sakura said gently, her tone that of a chiding mother. "Is it a 'dark god' just because some of the components are what you consider 'dark?' Can something be born evil? What we're seeking to create is not Angra Mainyu, but an entirely new being born using Angra Mainyu as but one piece of billions. You can't assume it will be evil, because there has never been anything like it."

"I can assume quite a bit, considering it is in fact a giant shadow monster that is leaking lethal curses into our world without even being born," Ilya said. "You can dilute poison as much as you want, it's still not good for you."

Sakura sighed. "I really thought you'd be more understanding regarding what we're hoping to accomplish."

"And I really thought you'd answer my question."

Sakura sighed slightly. "I obviously would prefer your scenario, yes. Shirou and Rin are reasonable people. They want to help others as much as I do, don't they? So with some lucky, they'll be willing to join with us. There are great things we need to do, and every asset will help," she said softly. "But this work is too important to be stopped, and they are very stubborn. If they refuse to help us… well. Sometimes salvation must be force-fed."

"Assuming, of course, they reach us at all," Kirei said, and Ilya felt a little slimy just listening to how happy he sounded.

"Well, in that case, the debate will admittedly be a little one-sided," Sakura admitted.

Ilya narrowed her eyes. "Shirou and Rin can handle anything you have to throw at them. Wait and see."

(*)

"God, we can't handle this," Rin said as another explosion shook the mountain. "Our heaviest hitter left at the door, and we have no idea where we're even going. Or what we're going to do when we get there."

"We destroy the Greater Grail," Shirou said, keeping pace easily beside her as they sprinted through the tunnels. That kind of pissed her off; she was channeling mana into her limbs, but he didn't even need to. Apparently plugging yourself into a living magical battery did wonders for the endurance. Ilyasviel was going to be so smug about that if they saved her.

When. When they saved her. Rin Tohsaka was not about to let one more murder happen in her city because of this pointless goddamn ritual. They were going to get Ilya out alive and they were going to save Sakura. She didn't have a clue how, but they were going to.

"Oh, sure, that will be so easy," she snapped, because she couldn't let Shirou know she didn't have any ideas. He might start to think he was in charge.

"I didn't say it would be easy. But Rider and Archer must have some way. We just need to get there and let them," Shirou said.

"You think a Servant will willingly destroy the thing that keeps them in the world, Emiya?"

"To save Sakura, yes," Rider, unseen, whispered in her ear, nearly sending her sprawling as she half-tripped over her feet in shock.

"Don't do that! Can you imagine how stupid we'll all feel if one of us dies because they twisted their ankle or something idiotic like that?!" Rin snarled. Yes, anger. Stay angry, because you can't be scared if you're angry, and if you were logical, you'd definitely be scared right now…

"What is that?" Emiya asked, stopping dead in his tracks to look at something on the wall.

Rin was in a hurry, and she didn't have time to wonder about whatever rock Emiya had found so interesting, but…

But it's almost pitch black down here. We can only see anything at all because Sakura wants us to, she thought, noting the pale, flickering torches of blue fire that someone had thoughtfully set up to lure people into obvious traps while also not really providing enough light to navigate comfortably by. So what stuck out so much?

She walked over to the wall and knelt beside Shirou, as he reached out a hesitant finger. She slapped his hand.

"Hey!"

"Don't touch it, doofus. You don't know what it is," she said, looking at what he had found. A section of the wall, rough gray stone like the rest of the tunnel, had gone bone white with streaks of black. That wasn't odd by itself, certainly a mountain could have more than one kind of rock in it. But the white section looked… oddly moist, considering how dry everything else was. The air under the mountain was shallow, dry, and hot, like an old desert tomb. So why was this patch of stone almost glistening in the pale light? "And it looks damp, so it's probably sticky. With your luck you almost pressed your hand into acid or something."

"No, I don't think so it. It isn't melting the rock or anything, it's… growing?" Shirou said, his tone confused. "I think it's some kind of plant. But it smells…"

"Like human blood," Rider whispered. "It isn't a thick scent. I'm impressed you noticed."

"Do I want to know how you noticed?" Rin asked dryly.

"Experience," Rider said without a hint of emotion.

"So a blood fungus. That's great. I'm so happy that Sakura has been gardening," Rin said. "We should…"

"Rin," Shirou said, pointing at the wall and tracing his finger along it, letting her eyes follow. They widened.

They were at the outer edge of the growth. And the further along the tunnel they went, the thicker it got. A few dozen meters further along, and it coated the whole wall, the smell growing so strong that Rin could detect it, like copper dust and rotting fruit. Not just blood, but decay…

"Assassin," Shirou said softly, "was like some kind of living puppet. They stitched together Servant corpses and animated them. Do you think this is like that?"

"Necromancy. And a kind I don't recognize. But what's the point? It doesn't seem to be doing anything. I'd sense if it was trying to take our souls or something, and if it's poisonous it isn't doing a very good job. Some kind of an early warning system? Well, joke's on them, because we introduced ourselves by ripping a hole in the mountain..."

"It is my garden. Welcome, friends."

A shadow moved, further down the tunnel, so perfectly blended with the darkness it was if a piece of the cavern air had solidified and moved. Something that might have been an arm if it had been shorter and bended a different direction moved, and a white skull gleamed at them.

"Hassan was not a warrior. But he understood how to make an impression," Assassin said, and then he was fully visible; the lights in the tunnel had not grown brighter, it was more like he had become darker, so black he now stood out clearly against the gloom. "Now then. I am the Gatekeeper to the chamber of the Grail. I know the answer, but I suppose I should ask for the sake of appearances: do you come to my Master peacefully? Or do I see a pack of brigands before me?"

Something about the way he spoke, the subtle mockery under a voice as dry as an open grave, sent a chill down Rin's spine. "Depends. Is she willing to give us the brat and come out to get some sun? Living down here can't be healthy for her, and she knows I worry."

Assassin chuckled, and then the only sound was metal being drawn from a sheath. The blade glimmered in the pale blue, a piece of perfect artwork in contrast to the stunted thing that held…

Them?

It wasn't a blade, it was two blades, a long katana in the larger, clawed hand, a kodachi shining silver-white in the other, neither as long as the weapon Assassin had wielded at the manor. And the blades were not the same, but something about the way he stood, the angle he held them…

No. No, no, no… she wouldn't. She didn't… Rin thought, her blood running cold.

Emiya created the swords, Kanshou and Bakuya appearing in his hands like they had come to her Archer, her real Archer, so many times. The expression on his face was stony, but the rage in his eyes was all-consuming. He'd noticed too.

How could he not? Emiya, Archer's swords in his hands and Archer's skill running through his limbs, had instinctively taken on the same stance Assassin now stood in.

Behind the white skull, a pair of eyes opened, gleaming gold, and the satisfaction in them was almost palpable. "You have his blades. I wonder, will your blood and flesh be as nourishing as his when I devour your corpse?"

Shirou charged, low and fast, his weapons crossed in front of him to allow both to be driven home in a single cross-thrust. Rin was behind him, a gem in her hand suddenly bursting into light so brilliant that it was like the sun had fallen into the tunnels with them. Despite this, Rider was still a shadow as she slipped along the ceiling faster than both of them combined, a striking snake in motion.

Assassin chuckled, and the cave walls exploded inward around him, the scent of blood and rot that permeated the caves growing instantly from merely unpleasant to so thick Rin could barely breathe.

(*)

Gilgamesh had to admit that he had exemplary taste in women. This one was an absolute treasure if you judged her solely by how terribly good she was at murder.

He had started off with the usual tactic; he had a collection of thousands of weapons, and so a dozen swords fired were hardly an imposition. They were magnificent treasures, each one, weapons that could kill an army. He knew this because he had used (would use?) them to do exactly that.

She knocked them away with one swing.

The blade in her hands wasn't a sword. A sword, however wonderfully forged, was a thing of beaten metal. She held liquid darkness, a massive bludgeon of pure, brutal force that extended out from the physical blade to make it appear as if she was holding a piece of the night ripped out of the black sky. It didn't even have to touch his treasures to shatter them; the ground quaked beneath where she swung it, and the arrows he fired were smashed aside like they were no more than tin knives, instead of Noble Phantasms.

"Huh," he said, watching as she took a step that shattered the stone beneath her boots, his weapons having barely slowed her charge.

He reached into the vault, grabbed at a piece of cloth that was as insubstantial as fog in the night air, and vanished.

"That won't help you," Saber said, almost gently; her lips were set in a bloodthirsty smile, but her eyes were cold and focused as she spun on her heel, lashing out on pure instinct. The blade of black light left a trail in the air as it cut down, tearing through empty space… and then, through space that wasn't empty as they slashed the shroud in half, destroying the ancient magic behind it without visible effort.

It did not, however, strike Gilgamesh, because he was intelligent, much faster than he looked, and above all very lucky. Unfairly so, to be blunt. And so when he realized she had managed to spot his path of retreat through nothing more than combat instincts and a desire to kill him, he had left his grip on the shroud and dove for cover with agility that would have been impressive in a trained acrobat. He rolled, came to his feet, and spun on his heel with a dancer's grace to fling the pair of daggers he had palmed in the same moment he'd grasped for the shroud.

Yes, throw. That was something else you wouldn't have noted by looking at him; he was stronger than any ten humans combined. He didn't need a magical portal, or even a bow, to be a proper Archer. He just needed something to use as a missile, and there was no shortage of those at hand. These were minor treasures, more notable for their beauty than their killing potential, and certainly would not defeat Saber. But that hardly mattered; the daggers were flung with speed and accuracy that would have made Assassin jealous, and were aimed at two mutually exclusive targets; her neck, and her left knee.

Saber could most certainly block them both. He had no illusions regarding either her speed or her ability to repel projectiles. But if she tried to do it with that massive, energy-coated sword, from this range, she would cut her own head off. The black light vanished, and she released a burst of mana into all her muscles, moving so quickly that the far smaller, purely metallic blade appeared to be in two places at once as it spun to intercept both knives at once.

And then Gilgamesh did something he knew was stupid, but she would never see it coming, and that would be so fun.

Kris Setan Kober was a silly weapon; it was powerful and dangerous, a weapon that could pierce any armor and grant skill to the unskilled, but it was cursed as well. Those who wielded it fell prey to ambition and impatience, making foolish decisions out of stubborn pride.

It had never had any real effect on Gilgamesh. He chose to believe that this was due to his natural power and the resistance to magic his many treasures granted him, and anyone suggesting it was because he was already stubborn, foolish and impatient would not be suggesting it twice.

And certainly, Saber didn't seem to think the decision he had made was foolish or impatient, because he drove the cursed dagger into her stomach with a mad grin, the weapon guiding his hand with grace and skill he had never earned. "I really have trouble with you someday?" he asked, twisting the weapon, black mana sparking around the enchanted blade. "I clearly wasn't wrong. I grow up to be a dolt."

She looked down on him in shock, and pain… and smiled, grabbing onto his arm and pulling the dagger in deeper. Blood welled up under the armor, and she said, "You do. And after seeing this, I know you started as one too."

Her free arm, holding her sword, blurred as it swung in at his head.

(*)

Rin coughed out dust and something she really hoped wasn't organic, pushing a heavy stone off her back and taking Emiya's hand as he pulled her to her feet. "The Hell was… th… oh…"

And then she trailed off, because there were some things she just wasn't prepared to see.

The walls and ceiling of the tunnel had been ripped apart, leaving them in a single, large cavern. It had not collapsed in on itself because something was holding it up, and 'something' was the only way she could think to describe it. A thick, pulsing coating of that black-streaked white flesh, covering the ceiling and walls, growing into the rock, interlinking all over the massive cave clearing like the root system of some colossal plant. This close to the source it was all glowing faintly as well, lighting up the darkness and letting Rin see more clearly where it had all originated.

Rin wished it wasn't.

Caster hung there, over the one surviving tunnel deeper into the mountain. Or at least, it was something that had once been Caster. The face, the delicate features were recognizable still, but they were warped, broken, her veins jet black and pulsing visibly under skin that had grown even paler than when the Servant was alive. Her arms and legs were gone, the limbs ending not in stumps but in webs of fleshy tendrils that merged into. Her eyes were closed… no, not closed, Rin noticed with a shudder. They were just gone, flesh having grown over them and sealed them permanently shut.

Assassin stood beneath the pulsing, human shaped mass of flesh, and said, "I am the gatekeeper. She is the gate. My Master put quite a lot of work into her, so I hope you enjoy the effort."

"Is that Caster?!" Shirou asked, horror coloring his expression. "Did… did Sakura…"

"She put a piece of dead flesh to good use. This is the result of my Master's exemplary combination of Makiri bio-magecraft with Caster's wand crafting, animated by the power of the Grail. You'll find it a fascinating construct," Assassin said, his tone warm and cheerful in contrast to the desiccated voice speaking the words. "Albeit, only briefly."

"Don't touch anything, Emiya. Stay away from the walls," Rin murmured, standing so she was back-to-back with him. Let Rider deal with Assassin. We focus on staying alive through whatever this thing starts to do. Hear me, Rider?"

Rider responded in the most logical way: her chain spike lashed out from the shadows at Assassin's face. The black Servant snapped his smaller blade up, batting aside the weapon, sparks striking brilliant in the gloom as metal impacted metal, and Rider followed her weapon, her foot slamming into his raised arm as she spun the chain around herself to strike him again from another angle…

And the abomination lining the room's walls screamed, and the glow it was exuding grew so brilliant Rin found herself nearly blinded. Makiri magecraft, the binding of spells to flesh... Caster's spells? Magecraft from the Age of Gods, inscribed into flesh grown from Servant corpses and the essence of the Grail...

Oh God.

"Emiya! We need to get out of here!"she screamed, grabbing his hand before he could do something stupid like try to charge, and pulling him toward the cave's exit. Rider was fighting Assassin, he wouldn't be able to just ignore her. They had a clear run, but…

We're not going to make it. The tunnel was barely a hundred meters away, with mana in her legs she could clear that in five seconds, but she didn't have five seconds. The light had gathered together into spheres of technicolor fire, so brilliant and thrumming with so much power Rin could have accurately stated where each one was with her eyes closed. If she used every gem in her arsenal, she might have been able to offset six or seven such blasts.

There were twenty.

"Emiya, I…"

"Jump!" he shouted, wrapping an arm around her waist and leaping. Things were moving too fast for her to tell him this was stupid, unless he was planning to clear half the cave in a single bound. I mean, I know from experience he isn't even a very good jumper, and… why is he glowing?

He had twisted in mid-air, his hand extended, and he shouted, "Rho Aias!", just as the first blasts hit in the space they had just been. The bolts exploded in expanding waves of burning light that slammed into the shield burning before Shirou's palm…

And very suddenly, Rin found that the two of them were moving a lot faster.

(*)

"They're getting closer," Ilya said, and tried not to sound sadistically pleased about it because she was a lady. There was a time she would have mocked Sakura shamelessly, but she had grown up a lot over the last two weeks. "They're going to beat you, you know. You're going to lose and your plan is crazy."

She hadn't grown up that much.

"Oh, Ilya," Sakura said, infuriatingly not infuriated. "I know you don't agree with me, but there's no call to be a child about it. You're supposed to be older than I am."

"I am older. I'm also petty. This is allowed because I'm not a doll, and I can choose to have some flaws if I want to. Also you kidnapped me, and you're… you're making demons and flesh monsters and ending the world!" Ilya said. "When I talked to you about free will I assumed you were going to fight your grandfather, not end the world!"

"Fix the world."

"No! No, end! All the people will be dead, and part of some… some monster, and none of it will work how you think it will!" Ilya snarled. "And of course you had to do it now. You had to wait for when things might have actually started going right for the first time since-"

"Since your parents left you?" Sakura asked. Her tone was very gentle.

"Don't."

"Since that winter day they left you behind in that castle. And they came here to Japan without you to fight a War that didn't mean anything," Sakura said. She sounded very sorry, and Ilya had never hated anyone more than she hated her at that moment, with pity in her eyes. "And they never came home, did they? And for a long time, you thought it was all your father's fault. Then maybe you thought it was your mother's. But the truth, the core of the issue, is that this is not a world that cares for children, Ilya. You had it worse than many, but better than more than I care to consider. Do you realize how sad that is, Ilya? That there are people in this world with worse lives than us?" Sakura asked. "How can you not despise a world like that? How can you look at your life and not be willing to do anything to spare another little girl something like that?"

"Shut up. Shut up. Shut up," Ilya said, but she couldn't work any venom into it. That was probably because all of the venom was in her heart, burning away with a cold hatred. She wasn't even sure who it was aimed at. Sakura, who just… just wouldn't stop, or even bother to be sadistic. Angra Mainyu, who was so clearly whispering into her ear that Sakura might not even realize which of her thoughts were her own anymore. The Makiris for turning Sakura into this thing, the Einzberns for making Ilya the thing she was, Mama and Papa for never coming home...

And then, the cave lit up, a sound like a million thunderclaps going off at once resounded through it, and a wall exploded inward. Which, Ilya had to admit, was a damn good way to make one stop noticing their personal issues.

Ilya very nearly dove for cover on sheer reflex, and even Sakura looked more genuinely shocked than Ilya had ever seen her, even before she was crazy. Kotomine might as well have been carved from stone for all the reaction he showed.

Shirou and Rin stepped through the smoke and rubble. He had a pair of swords, the blades Archer had used so often, in his hands, and the chest Sella had brought with her strapped across his back. Rin held three gleaming gems between the fingers of one hand, and on her other arm the crest of Tohsaka glowed with aquamarine light. Both of them were bloodied, burned, and bruised, and their faces looked pretty much exactly like the sort of people you would want to run away from if you met them in a dark alley. Not least of which because the alley wouldn't be very dark anymore when they started glowing in it.

"Hey, everyone. I just got sent skidding down a rough stone hallway riding the shockwave of an explosion. I'm upset," Rin said.

(*)

Rider fell down the ceiling, vaguely hoping that Rin was still alive. If she wasn't, she had really, really failed her last Command Seal. Unfortunately, the priority for 'protect Rin' at the moment was not stopping her from flying down a tunnel wrapped in a magical shield.

It was making absolutely sure that nothing in this room followed her out of it.

The thing that had once been Caster screamed again, magic beginning to gather in toxic blooms of darkness that dotted the wall of flesh, and Rider took the chance to move. It was not as fast as the real thing, just a mindless animal lashing out madly, and that meant she had a moment while it gathered magic. Rider could make a lot happen in a moment. She moved, so fast a mortal eye would have seen little but a violet shimmer in the air before they died.

Assassin's eyes were not mortal.

The ragged, skeletal thing, half-cloaked in the bloody scraps of a kimono, moved with the grace of a dancer and the speed of a striking scorpion. He spun on an axis, both blades slashing in at alternating heights, forcing Rider to halt her own charge to meet his swords with her own weapon, the shriek of metal on metal outweighing even the screams of the abomination coating the walls. But that was okay too, because the real need…

"You seek to close the gap. Make the beast slay me with its spells while you dance away?" Assassin asked conversationally, pinning her chain to the floor with his shorter blade while his longer katana slashed in at her stomach.

Rider was not a conversationalist by nature. She responded by flipping forward over the swing, a standing front flip professional gymnasts would have killed to be able to perform, and kicking him in the face. He dove backwards with the strike, robbing it of most of the impact, but he had to pull his blade from the ground to do it, and she sent the chain whirling immediately, one spike flying forward at his eye. He tilted his head just the slightest degree, the blade skipping off his mask, and he smiled.

"A good plan. It won't work."

Caster screamed again, a shriek that would have shattered glass, and the spell gathering fired at them. Blooms of dark fire lashed out, a hundred individual bullets descending like a hailstorm. Rider leaped, diving between the shots with a grace that seemed impossible even to those seeing it with their own two eyes.

They turned to follow her, weaving around Assassin. He didn't even move a muscle, just stood and watched with open glee.

Bastard, she took the time to think, and then there was no time to think, there was just motion. The Rider class could resist magic, to a certain degree, but to just sit and take the spells of a Caster was folly indeed. She hit a wall and ran up it, the fleshy coating oozing black ichor where she stepped, the creature's own spells slamming into it as they sought her. A shock of pain ran down her spine as one struck her shoulder, another her thigh, but she ignored the pain and continued to flee, trailing destruction behind her. One hand, unseen thanks to her sheer velocity, moved up to her face.

She reached the apex, the very top of the ceiling, and shot down like a bullet between the remaining black flames, continuing to ignore the pain as another struck home and burned through her magic resistance. She didn't care anymore. Even if she died now, it wouldn't matter, because Assassin was before her, and her blades were leading the way, and he could block it if he wanted, but he was going to die right now. He just didn't know it…

Two blades snapped up with laser precision, turning her spikes aside. She would have wagered anything that such a parry was impossible at the speed she was attacking, but it hardly mattered.

Something clattered to the floor behind her, abandoned during her mad scramble. Her mask gone, Rider looked into Assassin's eyes from less than four inches away. He tried to raise his weapons, slashing at her neck and waist simultaneously while her own weapon lay extended, the spikes harmlessly embedded in the ground, but his limbs did not obey; Unlike Rider, the Assassin class had no magical resistance to speak of. Beneath the black wrappings, his think black flesh was already beginning to turn the grey of stone. It would take him some time to fully petrify, but for the moment, he was slowed.

Vulnerable.

Rider's flesh slithered, her eyes the chill gaze of a serpent, and her hair snapped around her of its own accord. An arm far stronger than it should have been on someone so seemingly delicate slammed up, driving itself into Assassin's chest up to the shoulder. She hated this; to let the beast out. To stop being Medusa, and become nothing but the Gorgon. The monster of legend, the beast with eyes of stone and striking snakes for hair, a flesh-hungry thing that devoured its foes whole when they dared enter its rotting lair.

But as her arm erupted out the other side of Assassin's back, his withered, oozing black heart in her hand, she couldn't deny it had a few advantages.

The corpse-Servant smiled at her, his eyes fading from gold to empty black pits. His teeth were coated in black blood, and his limbs slacked, dropping his blades to the floor, but he didn't seem to notice or care.

"It… feels… so good…"

She squeezed his heart, crushing the half-formed thing, and shoved him off her arm in disgust. He never reached the floor.

Fleshy tendrils snapped out from the walls, wrapping around him and dragging him into the sick thing that was all that remained of Caster. Assassin laughed, and laughed, his body refusing to acknowledge his own death as he was drawn toward the main body of the disgusting thing. The face and torso of caster split in half, revealing a bed of shadowy tendrils lining an empty black void that seemed to go down forever; not a darkness so much as the absolute absence of any substance. A hungry, grasping maw that would never be filled.

It drew Assassin in, and before it closed on him, Rider saw something swirl within it. A formless, empty thing that somehow registered to her mind despite all physical senses telling her there was nothing there.

She gazed into the abyss, and felt it looking back at her.

All. The. Evils. Of. This. World.

The half-living thing screamed again, this time a roar that would have sounded better-suited to a lion than anything with a woman's face, even if that face was now split in half with a bottomless dark pit in the center. And in the roar, she heard words. The voice that spoke them was not Caster's. Whatever was speaking, it had never been human at all.

A voice that sounded like a thousand murderers chanting in unison, mad and hungry and filled with agony they wanted to share with the world, said, "Argon Coin."

Assassin was dead, but Rider could still hear him laughing as the cave began to shake.

(*)

Sakura blinked. "There was a door, sister dear. I know we left out a little welcome mat for you."

"The tunnels were confusing, and your welcome mat tried to kill us. We decided to let ourselves in," Rin said. "Sakura, you look terrible in black. Kirei, you look terrible alive."

"Ilya. Did they hurt you?" Shirou asked gently, unhooking the case on his back and setting it down so he could kneel to look Ilya in the eye. For a moment, the world was right again, as his voice just melted away every last bit of fear and self-loathing and every negative emotion in her heart except the usual hate she felt for Rin. And then that shining joy was snuffed out by the reminder of what was in the room with her.

"Shirou, you have to leave. Now. You too, Rin. Get out of here, now!" Ilya snapped. "She's worse than I thought. She needs me alive, but the two of you are…"

"Hush, Ilyasviel," Sakura said calmly. "They're my honored guests. Everything is going to be all right."

"Of course. I'm sure that's why you used the reanimated corpses of dead heroes to guard your doorstep against us," Rin said.

"Not against you! Never you, I love you both," Sakura protested. "I want you to be here. I wanted you to be here for the moment it all comes together. Assassin may have gotten a bit overzealous, but his target was always dear Rider. As much as it pains me, her power will be needed. There is so very much to do."

"Sakura," Shirou said, his tone low and soothing still, which was certainly impressive considering this was not the sort of scene most people could be soothed by, "you're not making any sense. This… place, that thing back there, it's done something to you. You have to come with us, we can try to find a way to help you."

"Kirei, you can stay here if you want," Rin said sweetly. "The décor suits you. A dark cave full of slime."

"I will miss you when the world is remade, Rin," he said, his tone almost warm. "I always enjoyed how poorly you took being tormented. Little cruelties are often my only joy, save when I find time to indulge in larger ones. In a just world, I suppose, that means I would never have been born."

"Kirei," Sakura chided him.

"Milady, I did take care to specify that this is only in a truly just world. You have made it more than clear that this is not such a world."

"Oh, I know, but I still don't like you treating yourself so poorly. You're special and unique, and it isn't your fault you don't fit into a world so cold and cruel. Is it the fault of a puzzle piece if the creator gives it no place in the final picture?" Sakura asked. "I shall not tolerate you treating yourself like a monster."

"Sakura... I think maybe we don't understand what you're talking about," Shirou said, his tone the soft and gentle wordplay of someone who secretly seemed to hope he was dreaming. "We thought… well, we were under the impression, at least, that Kirei had done something to you. We know he was at the Matou manor. He did something to Gilgamesh, something that let you attack him when you came after us earlier…"

"I was truly shocked that one survived. He is full of surprises," Sakura said, shaking her head fondly.

"Sakura, please. That kind of talk? Acting like… like all of this is normal? You're talking about killing people like it's normal!" Shirou said. "That isn't you. I know you. You can't stand to see anyone else hurt. You… you stay after school to clean up the archery dojo so nobody else will have to. You wake me up every morning even when I don't need it, and you make me teach you how to cook, and… and… how can you act like there's nothing worth saving in this world? You. Your life. The people you cared about. None of that is worth anything to you?"

"No… it was all lovely, Shirou. I look back at you as a bright spot in my life, and while I know you never loved me, I most definitely loved you. I still do, albeit not in the same way. I can't afford to think of one person as more important than everyone else," Sakura said, her tone calm and accepting. "But worth saving? Shirou, did you ever ask Rin what was happening to me every other moment? Did she tell you what she found at Makiri Manor, Shirou? What she found in my room? In the basement?"

Shirou turned to Rin, his gaze questioning, and her face visibly paled, even as she set her jaw. "Nobody is saying you haven't suffered. But we've fixed the worst of it, haven't we? Zouken is gone. Shinji is… is gone. The worst is over, Sakura. Please, you need to…"

"The worst happened years ago," Sakura snarled, showing anger for the first time they'd spoken to her. "The worst was when I was a little girl, and my father and mother sold me, and the only person who told me everything would be okay died, Rin, he died alone in the dark and grandfather fed his corpse to the worms while I watched, and the people I loved most in the world never knew any of it, Rin. They never asked, Rin, because they were so caught up in their own pain, they couldn't even think to care. And it didn't even matter, because even if I had tried to tell anyone all it would get them was a death. Alone. In the dark." Something around her hissed, shadows coiling like a pit of vipers. "And that is why things aren't going to be all right. Because when a sickness spreads that far, the only thing you can do is amputate. Healing hurts, Rin. But trust me: extreme measures are the only way."

Every shadow in the room was moving now, even the ones not wrapped around Sakura herself. Something growled, as the darkness of the Grail bubbled up, straining against the orb that contained it. Standing behind her, Kotomine smiled the smile of a monk at prayer, even as blood began to flow from his ears and nose, his skin paling two shades in agony his face did not show.

Something was eating him from the inside. And he was smiling.

"Emiya…" Rin said softly. "A fight is coming to come of this. Kirei is tougher than he looks, but… Sakura, I don't know what she is. If the brat gave you some kind of superpower, now would be the time to try it."

"I actually don't know. I haven't had time to try it out yet," Shirou murmured back. "Projection is easier, but…"

"Oh, of course you don't know. Ilyasviel, please tell me you have an instruction manual for your creepy…" she turned toward Ilya.

Her eyes widened.

Slowly, everyone in the room followed her gaze, turning toward Ilya… or rather, where Ilya had been. Because apparently, while Sakura had been explaining her philosophy and everyone had been understandably focused, Ilya had chosen to pick up the parcel Shirou had brought for her, and walked out of the room.

"Did she just leave while we were saving her?!" Rin snapped. "I hate her so m-"

A black and blue blur, so fast Rin could have mistaken it for a Servant, charged between Rin and Shirou into the tunnels. A drop of blood struck her cheek, moving so quickly it actually stung a little, and that was what she needed to shock her into motion; she took off a at a sprint, following Kirei as fast as her legs could carry her.

Shirou and Sakura, now alone save for the eerie black and red light of Angra Mainyu, turned to face each other.

"You know, Shirou… there was a time when being alone with you was all I ever wanted," she said. "But now, I'm afraid you're in the way. Ilya is needed. And you… well, you were going to have to join our new god sooner or later."

"I'm not going to let you hurt her, Sakura. I'm not going to let you hurt anyone. Not even yourself," Shirou said, stepping into a combat stance, one blade slightly forward, the other held back close to his chest.

"You wouldn't be yourself if you said anything else… senpai," she said, her smile warm and fond. "I'll always love you."

She pointed at him, and the shadows around her coalesced and snapped out, a hundred spears aiming at his heart.