Kiritsugu awoke to a numb cold and an overwhelming feeling of emptiness. Not the emptiness that he held with him at every waking moment, something more… physical. Real. He was already standing, already dressed. His old black and grey suit.
He was in a dimly lit cement corridor, flickering LED tube lights overhead. Behind him was pitch black, not like the color of midnight but… the feeling that one cannot go back. That he has breached some threshold, and that the darkness was an unseeable path that could not be followed. All one could do now was go forward.
It reminded him of Natalia's old hole-in-the-wall. Some of the stains on the walls were even the same.
Kiritsugu had long since accepted his own death, once when he was barely a teenager, and again right after the Grail War. Knowing that, finally, he had reached the afterlife… it wasn't a good feeling, exactly, but… here he could at least be judged.
He moved down the hallway with a breath of hesitance in his step, the weight of his gun at his side. He hadn't noticed it until now. He kept it in his pocket, continuing forward under the harsh white light until he reached a door, plain and metal.
The darkness had followed behind him, swallowing the path he walked. Kiritsugu's hand hovered over his pistol, but he shook those instincts off. Something about this place was bringing his old self back. He opened the door.
He was on a hotel balcony overlooking a burning Fuyuki, the ring in the sky pouring down blight. Kiritsugu felt his heart tighten, the scene constantly playing in his head in front of him, unavoidable. This was the punishment he knew he deserved, the mistake he had to live with even after he finished living. He—something was out of place. To his left, a woman with long red hair and a billowing white gown leaned on the railing, lazily scanning the environment as she took a long drag from a cigarette.
"Too gloomy," she muttered and the scene disappeared, replaced by a cold, rocky landscape, outstretching to a glowing spectral blue and gold city on the horizon. There was no sky overhead, only the ceiling of a cavern that stretched further than any Kiritsugu had ever seen.
Kiritsugu composed himself in barely a second, squeezing himself into the hard shell he had known for most of his life. Not the Magus Killer proper, but adjacent. Closer than he had been since meeting Shirou. It took himself a second more to relax.
The woman glanced over her shoulder, looking at him for the first time. Her eyes shifted through reds, yellows, and blacks, but they all seemed muted, like a fire on the last of its fuel.
She lifted her hand, another cigarette appearing in it. "Smoke?"
"Thanks," he said, taking it. It tasted like his old favorites. "Kiritsugu Emiya."
She matched his drag. "Aphrodite Pandemos."
Huh.
"I'm going to assume that this is neither a dream nor a hallucination," Kiritsugu said, "and that you're telling the truth."
"Smart boy."
He quickly went through all he knew of Greek myth.
"Why am I meeting you instead of... Hades, I suppose?"
"Because he's dead. Not many of us left, so we have to share the burdens."
He couldn't find the right words that fit into a reply to that. He felt, though, that if he didn't say something now, they wouldn't say another word to each other. "Greek, huh?"
"Again, not that many of us left. Gods, that is."
"I thought you all died a long time ago."
Aphrodite chuckled around her cigarette. Kiritsugu knew on an instinctive, primal level that the sound should have put a smile on his face, but it still rang hollow. "I suppose we did, in a sense."
"So... where am I going?"
Her crimson gaze swept to him. In a heartbeat, he felt his soul be torn apart and then pieced back together again, knocking the breath out of his imaginary lungs. He saw four burning wings, four pairs of burning yellow eyes with them, all searing into his soul. Yellow hearts of pure divine power floated behind Aphrodite, rippling and bending the space around them with Authority.
And then it was gone. She seemed human again. Bored.
"Don't care," she replied. "Not my place to judge you."
He took a deep breath of stale air. "I thought that was what you do, though. Or what Hades did, at least."
"And look where that got him." She smirked, throwing her cigarette stub over the edge and pulling out another. It lit as she put it in her mouth.
"As long as you stay down here, I don't give a shit where you go. As far as I understand it, the heroes have taken to ruling Elysium quite strictly, so you'll have a tough time getting in."
"I wouldn't call myself a hero, anyways."
"Guess that helps you decide where you're going, then."
They each take a drag, looking out over the grey underworld. Elysium shone too bright for him to look at it, even from this distance.
"You care if I hang out here for a little bit?"
"Nope. Told you before, don't care where you go."
They stood in silence for a few minutes as Kiritsugu wrestled with himself. He had questions, many of them. He just had to decide if he would ask them.
Kiritsugu finished his cigarette next, following Aphrodite's lead and throwing it into the abyss. Another appeared, already lit, in his hand. He went through a quarter of it before speaking again.
"So, how do you have time to talk to me?"
Aphrodite shrugged. "I exist in multiple places at once. This doesn't take much thinking."
"Huh," he replied, taking another drag. "Do you do this for everyone?"
"Not all the time. Sometimes I get bored. Tired of it. Need a break or whatever. But I'll come back every now and then." She smiled, another beat of warmth frozen over and calloused. "Call it love, I guess."
Apathy. That was the word dancing just outside of Kiritsugu's head. The dissonance of an apathetic goddess of love was an uncomfortable soul-sound. He let it go before he could think about it any longer. Clearly it wasn't something she wanted to elaborate on.
"So you're doing it for me on a whim?" he asked.
"Yes. More or less. Sometimes I pick out specific people that sound interesting," she hums, "I haven't seen a 'Mage Killer' like you in about… 70 years, your time? She was interesting enough."
"Lana Nazarova. I read Natalia's papers on her when I was training."
"She's somewhere out there," Aphrodite gestures over the balcony. "You can go and get an autograph from your predecessor, if you'd like."
"Nazarova was a deranged murderer at best. Her kills had no purpose beyond 'proving she could'. I don't idolize someone like that."
The goddess laughed. "Anti-heroes and 'just causes', hm? I thought you were more jaded than that. But I guess that means you still have some surprises left."
Kiritsugu's brow creased slightly. "That sounds like a judgement."
"Not in an official capacity. Besides, I'm only judging whether or not you're interesting to me."
He raised an eyebrow. "Well?"
Aphrodite pondered, tapping her chin. "You're dull, but you have potential. Drab, but relatable."
Kiritsugu let a small smirk cross his lips. "I was thinking something similar about you."
"Rude. Arrogant, if you know my legends." There was some edge in her voice, but barely any that represented a true threat. "But fair enough."
Kiristugu nodded and turned his attention to his cigarette for a few seconds. He had forgotten his melancholy for a moment there, but the silence let that heavy blanket fall over him again.
"You're willing to offer judgement off-the-record, then?"
"If I feel like it."
He spent a moment longer trying to figure out how to word his question, the one that had been haunting him for years of life and followed him into death. "How did I… do?"
Aphrodite rolled her eyes. "I don't know, Kiritsugu. How do you think you did?"
"I… feel like a failure."
"What does it matter?" she asked, tapping his cigarette on the railing. "You're dead."
"I screwed up so much of my life."
"Join the club," she muttered.
"I—"
"You've already judged yourself. If you want my opinion to tell you if you were right or wrong, forget it. That won't help you. It's not that easy, anyways."
Dismissive as it was, Kiritsugu understood that Aphrodite was starting to get annoyed. He didn't push further, not immediately. Another few moments passed in silence.
"I feel emptier than I thought I would. The smoke goes right through me."
Aphrodite chuckled, some actual humor in her laugh. "Well, you are missing most of your guts. That helps. You can still taste, though—do you care for wine?"
Kiritsugu let a small smile touch his lips. "On occasion."
On his answer, Aphrodite shifted the world around them with a brush of her hand. A table shimmered into existence with a ripple of maroon, two leisurely chair-and-a-halfs appearing on opposite sides. The back wall, once containing the door he entered through, pulled closer to the table, and a brick fireplace broke through the concrete and built itself into place. Lavish red curtains and ornate wallpaper sprung from nothing and wrapped this tiny world in warmth and luxury.
It was something that Kiritsugu had seen the lords and ladies of magus society do more often than he'd like, but this felt notably less gaudy. More as if Aphrodite was inviting him into one of her own rooms than if someone were trying to show off their skills and wealth.
The moment Aphrodite took the cigarette from her lip it disappeared into nothingness, and Kiritsugu just then noticed that he no longer had his.
"One vice at a time," she muttered, seemingly more to herself than her guest. To Kiritsugu she said, "Preferences?"
"Red, please."
The goddess sighed. "Good choice. A new bottle, then."
As Aphrodite sat down, leaning back casually, a dark, opaque bottle popped into existence on the table, accompanied by two glasses. The glasses filled themselves, one pushing to Kiristugu's side and the other blinking into Aphrodite's hand.
"Well? Sit down. Drink with me," she commanded, levying him with an annoyed glance.
Kiritsugu pulled his mind back to the present and sat across from her, taking up the glass. She offered hers and, with a soft clink, they both took a sip.
The former assassin's lips turned slightly downward at the taste. It tasted like a high-quality dry red, but… "Why is it salty?"
"You think wine is easy to come by? Only Persephone could grow anything in this forsaken place. These are what's left of Hades' old stock. Made with the tears of the damned."
Kiritsugu peered at the red liquid in his glass. "Huh. Really?"
Aphrodite smirked. "It adds a bit of humor to the whole thing."
"Does it?"
"One could say that I was responsible for damning many of them."
Kiristugu couldn't help but chuckle at that. "The easiest mages to get my hands on were the ones who were in love."
He felt his stomach turn as the wine hit it. He hated what he just said. But, much like his actions in the past, there was no taking it back now.
"To love is to be vulnerable," Aphrodite mused, taking another sip.
Kiritsugu thought about Iri. Thought about what the word 'vulnerable' meant to him then. Thought about what it meant to him now.
"If a soul were consumed by the Holy Grail, would it ever arrive here?" Kiritsugu asked, nearly causing Aphrodite to snort as she took a longer pull.
"You really made some jumps to get to that question, Kiritsugu. Let me get to my second glass first, at least." She sighed, leaning back again and letting her glass float beside her. "The Holy Grail, or whatever you call it, is not nearly significant enough to keep souls away from here forever. Your wife is either here or will end up here eventually."
He smiled. It was a small smile, of course, but he did. "I'm glad to hear it."
"If I may offer one official judgement upon your soul," Aphrodite waited for him to nod before continuing. "You fucked that one up."
"Right." He took another sip of wine. The saltiness wasn't growing on him, per say, but it did warm him.
"You're not the first one, and certainly won't be the last. There's no real point to worrying about it anyways."
"Then what should I do with the official judgement upon my soul?" Kiritsugu asked.
Aphrodite shrugged. "Frame it, maybe? I don't know. Apologize to her for being a distant, emotionally-unavailable killer?"
He chuckled emptily. "Certainly on the top of my list."
"You also cheated on her."
"Yeah."
They both stopped to finish off their wine glasses.
"I expected death to bring… some kind of closure."
"If only. The underworld is just a place. All it does is give you somewhere to be. It's easy to get away from your screw-ups here, if you can distract yourself well enough."
"Is that why you're here?"
"Yeah," Aphrodite answered without a pause.
Again, Kiritsugu thought to pry. It was a curiosity that he wasn't used to. Something caused this goddess to change from one of the most volatile, powerful goddesses in Greek mythos to what she was now.
But again, he held off. They both had things they regretted. It seemed like she had already gone through his memories, but was courteous enough not to bring them up without him touching on the subject first. If Aphrodite wanted to talk, she would.
Besides, he had the feeling that pushing for more was a quick route to either having his soul erased or not seeing her again.
Not seeing her again?
Where did he get the idea that she would come back from? He was just a dull, self-loathing soul.
"But that's irrelevant." Aphrodite's glass disappeared and she stood, stretching. "I'm socially drained, so I'm going to return to the main me, drink four more bottles of this, and pass out for anywhere between a night and a decade."
Kiritsugu sighed, an unexpected apprehension overcoming him as he glanced back out over the underworld. "Four of those can put you out for a decade?"
Aphrodite shrugged as Kiritsugu stood. "Depends on the vintage, and Hades didn't exactly label them well."
"Fair enough." They stood silently for a moment, not quite looking each other in the eye, until Kiritsugu offered his hand. "It was a pleasure to meet you, Aphrodite Pandemos."
"Strange. Most people call meeting me a moment that ruined their lives, but I'll take 'a pleasure'." She took his hand, returning the shake. " You were… interesting enough."
"That's an improvement from 'drab'."
"Well, when you weren't wallowing in self-pity, you had your moments."
Kiritsugu let a small laugh escape, before looking to the only door in the room. "I suppose that's my exit?"
Aphrodite nodded. "It is. Don't get too comfortable, though. You'll be coming back here regularly."
Kiritsugu raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"
"I did say you were interesting enough, didn't I?" Aphrodite smirked. "It's not often I have actual interesting conversations with the souls of the dead. So yes, I will be bringing you back for my entertainment."
He gave her a small smile. "I'll look forward to it, then."
"You do that."
There was no grand exit. No flurry of movement or fireworks of magic. Aphrodite Pandemos was there one moment and gone the next.
Kiritsugu looked over the expanse of the underworld, alone. But, for the first time in awhile, he was excited to move forward.
Authors' Notes:
Endy: So. This idea sprung from a fun Discord back-and-forth of "which are the two most dead inside characters we can find, and what happens if we stick them in a room together." It was an absolute pleasure to write these two wallowing in apathy, because holy shit, I'm tired. If you want to see more of my writing, see my profile (primarily Afterlife) or the Circe chapters in The Saga of Shirou's Summons. Thank you for reading!
Pallan Minerva: Sometimes you just wanna be completely hollow from the inside out, you know? Thanks to Endy for being a cool dude and not going "no FUCK you" when I said "alright, it's your project now, have fun". Much appreciated! And, of course, thank y'all for reading. Do give my guy here some love with follows, favorites, and reviews, will ya?
Ending theme: Lullaby of the Leaves by George Olsen