(A/N)
See bottom of chapter for notes.
Big thanks to fallacies, Hecturnus and Fluflesnufaluphagus for beta reading.
"I always wondered if it was a coincidence that when abbreviated Counter Force became Charlie Foxtrot, which is just another way of saying Cluster Fuck."
- Emiya
It was half an hour later as with a hop, skip and a jump, Archer leaped over the gates and landed onto the lawns outside his destination.
Not a lot of people about. Good.
Astralizing himself, he made his way up the marble steps, doing his best to look inconspicuous as he entered the main hall. A guard was snoring lightly on a chair outside one of the wings.
The British Museum, Archer reflected, existed in interesting straits near the end of the 19th Century.
The world had entered steps into the age of reason. Centuries of custom and tradition were brushed aside in favor of exploration, individualism, tolerance and scientific endeavor, which, in tandem with developments in industry and politics, witnessed the emergence of the 'modern world'. The English, the Spanish, the French were all competing to get exotic new drugs, foodstuffs in this global competition for commercial advantage.
At the forefront of it all was the East India Trading Company, which was acknowledged in modern times to be as close as a corporation can get to being a country; a company holding a monopoly so powerful it possessed quasi-governmental powers, establishing colonies, currencies, holding its own courts and negotiating treaties that suited their needs.
It stood to reason that avid collectors and naturalists like Hans Sloane – whose collection later formed the basis of the British Museum – took advantage of the global race of exploration to add to their cabinets of curiosities and learn more about the world they lived in, challenging centuries-old traditions and assumptions in the process. In that period, archeological discoveries profoundly deepened Europe's understanding of historical time, with discoveries hailing from Nimrud, Mesopotamia, Egypt and Rome.
If you were to ask its founder Hans Sloane – avid collector, slave owner, and founder of drinking chocolate – what he thought of the British Museum at the end of the 19th Century, he wouldn't recognize it. Sloane took a universalist approach to his cabinet of curiosities. The modern world was moving towards specialization on all fronts.
If you were to ask Archer what he thought, he'd simply say that the British Museum existed as a dick swinging contest. A place to display Britain's spoils of war, fragments of the countries they conquered, aiming to collect everything whilst masquerading as a guise to give back to the community and educate people around the world.
Amongst other things.
Such were his thoughts as he entered the domed centerpiece of the main hall and frowned.
In contrast to his admittedly low expectations, electric lighting had come to the Reading Room. Elaborately furnished and designed, the circular room was designed with the latest technology in heating and ventilation. Taking inspiration from the Roman Pantheon, the dome allowed for natural light to flow in during the day for relaxed reading. Even at this late hour, a few visitors poured over thick texts brought forth from the shelves that lined the wall — Archer noted a man collapsed in deep sleep, a first edition of Marx's Das Kapital lying open in front of him.
Still, as Archer looked around, taking care not to cause a disturbance, his confusion only grew as nothing out of the ordinary came to his attention.
It should have been here.
It had been – admittedly – a long time since he'd returned, and he couldn't imagine what kind of assignment as a Counter Guardian would have allowed for him to ever visit the place where he spent 4 tumultuous years learning Magecraft with Rin, but for as long as he could remember, the visitor's entrance to the Mage's Association was inside this very room.
And yet there was nothing. No mages, no secret doors, not even the barest hint of a bounded field to ever suggest that it existed in the first place. Just books and texts modern historians would kill to lay their eyes on.
This could be problematic, Archer sighed. Up until then, he'd been operating under the assumption that his presence here could have been explained due to events within the moonlit world. If no such world existed here, then Archer was at a loss. What's my purpose here, then?
"Can I help you?"
Archer turned around, alert. A docent in horn-rimmed glasses gazed critically at him.
"Yes, um…" Archer wondered how best to voice his queries aloud that wouldn't give anything away. "I… was looking for a certain book.."
"I certainly hope so, otherwise I'd have asked you what you were doing in our library." The docent frowned. "Allow me to assist you then. What exactly were you looking for?"
Archer fidgeted. Here goes nothing. "I was wondering if you had a translated copy of the Archidoxis Magica."
The docent blinked.
"You know, if you're looking for books by Paracelsus I wouldn't start with that particular one, the editor himself expressed doubts as to it being an authentic work."
"Yes, well," Archer muttered, "if it's all the same to you I'd rather arrive at those same doubts on my own time. Do you have such a translation in stock?"
"I'm afraid not. This library is meant for sterner stuff." The docent shook his head. "We don't put much stock into sensationalized matters of the occult."
"Figures." Archer relaxed. At the very least, he didn't seem to have aroused any suspicion. "Then I'd best be off."
"Oh, before you go," at this, the docent took off his horn-rimmed glasses, giving them a good polish with the front of his shirt, "might I suggest visiting the Elgin Marbles in the Duveen Gallery? They're quite a marvel."
"I beg your pardon?"
"It's late, and you'll probably be wanting to head off to continue your research," the docent's eyes narrowed as he put the glasses on again, "but I think you'll find them most illuminating on this moonlit night."
Archer stopped midway to the door, blinking as he mulled over his words.
"... Is that so?" Archer finally said. "I'll be sure to pay them a visit right away. Thank you very much."
The docent nodded, then went on his way, grumbling and cursing about books not being put in their rightful place, leaving Archer in a flurry of thoughts.
Elgin Marbles… Archer shook his head in disbelief. They can't seriously be that full of themselves.
But sure enough, as Archer entered the Duveen Gallery where the marbles were held, he took notice of it at once. Behind a fragmentary series of statues depicting the birth of Athena from Zeus' head, Archer found a bounded field, and behind it a single wooden door.
Archer scoffed, incredulous. Magi. Aspiring themselves to those within the age of Gods. Putting the visitor's entrance behind the east pediment made for an interesting and appropriate aesthetic, he had to admit. But it didn't take away from the fact that it was a decision that took a solid set of balls to come to.
No wonder they'd move it. Archer reflected. After much controversy had been generated regarding the British Museum's hotly-contested ownership of the Marbles, it'd make little sense to continue having the entrance behind an exhibit the world was paying close attention to. The fact that it'd take them nearly a century for the Mage Association to come to the same conclusion was just par for the course.
Steeling himself, Archer carefully stepped onto the podium holding the statues themselves and into the bounded field, and at once the marbles moved, revealing a small pathway to the door.
Dick Swinging Contest indeed.
Bravely, and more than a little unsettled, Archer opened the door.
Outside the Policies Department, two deeply tired clerks stepped out of their office, deep in conversation.
"I'm telling you, we should send enforcers to his workshop at once."
"I understand your position, but at the very least, he isn't being obvious about it. If the situation escalates to the extent that the authorities catch wind, I'm of the idea that we should wait and see if they can handle it."
"Why wait for it to escalate?" The man huffed, "we should nip such matters in the bud."
The blonde fished in her pockets for a cigarette. "Let me rephrase that. Should the authorities catch wind, we'll wait and see if he has the good sense to abandon his workshop and flee. We can take care of the cleanup after the fact. It's counterproductive to what we stand for if we went after every single magus who dabbled outside their lines."
"Like we already aren't already seen as an impediment. Human experimentation. If he's going to do it, he might have the decency to find these subjects from villages and hamlets, not in well-populated towns."
"And disappearances from less populated villages won't draw as much attention?"
The man grumbled, locking the door behind them, even as the blond took a deep drag of the lit cigarette.
"At least it's been slow these days, compared to the week before last."
"Two magi families wiped out with prejudice. One has to wonder what they caught wind of."
"Experiment gone wrong?"
"No, there'd be greater collateral damage around the area. I'd suggest it to be the work of a vendetta but given the families…"
The man reached out for the blonde's fag in her mouth, taking a deep breath of acrid smoke as she annoyedly lit another.
"The Musiks are sniffing about the Einzberns again."
"So what else is new? You'd think they'd get the idea and stop trying after a while. Nothing we can realistically do about it unless one of them takes drastic measures."
"I've heard they're thinking about throwing them a bone."
"Truly? This is the same group of Einzberns we're talking about, right? Not one with a cheerful, bon-vivant brick at the helm."
"The very same. Apparently they're of the mind that if they gave the Musiks just a portion of-"
She tensed, cigarette still wedged in her mouth as she looked around.
"What?"
"Didn't you feel that?" She asked, still alert.
"Feel what?"
"That presence." She waved a hand around her. "I could have sworn…"
The two felt around, retracing their steps for a moment, before giving up.
"Either the Department of Spiritual Evocation is trying to summon Malphas again, or we need to hit the sack."
"... Supper?"
"I could do with a Welsh Rarebit."
"Right in one."
And just like that, the two clerks made their way off.
"Did you hear about what's going on in America?"
"I don't give credit to such rumors, this place's complicated enough as is."
"It's not a rumor at all! Patrick told me he'd caught sight of them in…."
The two turned a corner and the corridor returned to silence once more.
Behind the door, listening in, Archer materialized once more.
That's interesting.
For gossip and knowledge of going-ons within the magical community, the department of policies was always a good place to start. Despite Lorelei Barthomeloi ruling over them with an iron fist in his time, one could not fight the human condition: people always talked, and information was always there to those wise enough to pay attention. Sure enough, Archer had hardly made his way outside the department before he already caught on to the two clerks' gossiping over a smoke. It seemed some things never changed.
He looked around the empty office. Lavishly furnished, it seemed to be where paperwork was processed. The equivalent of entry-level grunt work.
Fantastic.
Quickly making his way over to their desks, he picked up a stack of official-looking reports and started leafing through them. When he found nothing of import, he opened the desk drawers, rifling through stationery before opening another.
It was only as he was halfway through the contents of the second desk before a memo caught his eye.
Einzberns, Matous and Tohsaka convened for negotiations with the Director – Please refer to documents pertaining to 'Z' in Archives for further details.
Archer reread the memo over and over again, before setting the papers back, deeply troubled.
Einzberns, Matous, and Tohsakas… In short, the Three Great Founding Families. That they were convening to meet with the director of policies could only mean one thing.
And if his hypothesis was true, Archer was in a whole different sort of pickle.
He went back to spirit form, making his way past magi burning the midnight oil as he arrived at the Archives. Checking that the coast was clear, Archer opened the drawer marked 'Z' and rifled through until he found the folder on Makiri Zolgen.
Opening up the dossier, his eyes widened.
Plans of Holy Grail Wars were laid out in disturbing detail. From the first one in the 1800s, to the second one in the 1860s, documentation was laid out of every servant and participant, with detailed notes taken of the wars' events. Every catalyst used, every betrayal, every alliance, every noble phantasm unleashed, every intervention by the wars' overseers, Archer had struck gold.
But this was strange for a number of reasons. Archer had been reliably informed that the secrecy regarding the Holy Grail War he'd participated in with Saber was due to the fact that the founding families didn't want the association possibly tampering with the ritual.
And now here he was, holding a written report on both wars that had happened as if it was the most natural thing in the world.
Archer wondered what it was that led to the families involving the Mage Association in their quest to brute-force the way to the root in this reality he was summoned to.
It has to be an external threat, Archer hypothesized, a threat big enough that they'd involve the Mage Association for legitimacy and protection from further tampering. But just what could they have been concerned about?
Archer flipped through the pages, raising an eyebrow at one page detailing someone's summoning of Odysseus before finding what he was looking for: plans for the next holy grail war.
In between proposed participants and a possible new location, he took a look at the proposed year.
1920.
And that confirmed it. He had an inkling of a suspicion when he wasn't able to sense a grail that anchored him to this reality, but this was the final nail in the coffin:
Whatever his purpose in arriving in Victorian London was, it wasn't to fight a grail war.
This was a task given to him as the agent of the Counter Force.
Archer felt conflicted. On one hand, the fact that he wasn't fighting in a grail war was a bit of a relief. He didn't think his master was in altogether the right state of mind to participate, especially as a public figure and a non-magus besides. Granted, Ciel had taken his usage of a mightily altered Caladbolg II in the dungeon remarkably well, even if Archer had tapped more into his own reserves in consideration, but Archer wasn't about to take that chance. Besides, it seemed as though his master had a lot on his mind already.
On the other hand, this was shaping up to be one of the most infuriating tasks that the Counter Force had ever assigned him. Other than to stick with the boy, the Counter Force had seen fit to leave him to his own devices. Now, as maddening as it was, this was actually par for the course in terms of Counter Force assignments. Many a time Archer had been in similar situations not knowing what to do, thinking "not this shit again". But at least when he was dispatched to carry out assassinations, wars and the like, the reason why he was sent there quickly made itself known by nature of the job.
This, however, was proving to be far more troublesome.
Just why was I sent here? If all it took was for me to save the boy, then why am I still here?
And why the hell did you see fit to give him command spells?
He racked his head for any memories of the Phantomhive family he could recall. Maybe Ciel grew to be someone important.
But he drew a blank.
Whoever the Phantomhives were, they didn't grow notable enough in Archer's reality for him to recall.
He was still mulling over a possible explanation to his own current existence when a chill ran down his spine.
Hurriedly placing the dossier back in the alphabetically marked filing cabinet, he went back into spirit form, sprinting out of the Mage Association in a hurry.
Screaming.
Back in the manor, his master was screaming.
When his master didn't respond at all through his mental link, Archer expected the worst as he burst into his room, Kanshou and Byakuya in hand. Instead, he found his master huddled inside his blankets, trembling like an leaf in the midst of a hurricane.
"Master. Are you alright?"
"GET AWAY!" He shouted.
Archer looked around, and upon seeing that there was no immediate danger dismissed his swords in a huff.
"Master." He forced his voice to sound soothing. "It's your servant, Emiya. You are no longer inside the cage. You had a bad dream. You are amongst your family. Your servant is by your side."
He watched as his master's trembling subsided, enough for him to peek out of the bundle of blankets warily.
"Do you want to talk about it?"
His master shook his head. Archer could see the whites of his eyes as he shook.
"They're all dead…" he murmured, voice small, "they're all looking at me."
Archer sighed.
"Should I get you some tea? I find chamomile helps in going back to a dreamless sleep."
The Earl, still bundled, mumbled something unintelligible.
"Speak up, Master."
"... milk." He whispered. "With honey."
"I'll be right back then, Master."
And that was how Archer found himself five minutes later, watching his master take slow sips of milk and honey he acquired from the kitchen. He'd been wary about encountering any other servants, but it'd seem they were asleep in the servant's dormitories.
"... Emiya."
"Yes, Master?"
Fortunately, or perhaps disconcertingly, Ciel Phantomhive was already starting to look more like his usual sour self as he stared at his teacup with a frown.
"... what did you put in this?"
"Milk, honey and nutmeg." Archer muttered. "I'd add a dash of brandy to it too, but I don't think our hosts would appreciate me raiding their liquor cabinet."
The teacup was set down in a clatter.
"Emiya." His master bit out, "I gave you a simple enough instruction: milk with honey. Two ingredients, nothing more. Was it so difficult to follow my orders, or do you feel some sort of perverse satisfaction by flagrantly subverting my authority?"
"Subverting your-" Archer paused, barely stopping short of cursing, "Master. I simply thought that nutmeg would add a certain je ne sais quoi to the drink, and that it'd work better as a nightcap."
"I don't care." Ciel insisted. "When I say I want something, if you have any respect for me at all you'd do it. It's not unreasonable to want something done a certain way especially after explicitly spelling it out, is it?"
If I had no respect for you at all, I'd follow your instructions to the letter and nothing more, Archer thought darkly as he rubbed his temple in annoyance. It's only because I care that I do this.
"My apologies, Master, are you telling me that it doesn't taste good?"
At this Ciel Phantomhive paused, returning his gaze to the empty cup.
Archer hid his smirk.
"... it's not how Gramps would have made it." His master remained petulant.
"Yeah, well, I'm not Tanaka." Archer took the teacup and saucer away from Ciel in a huff. "Milk, honey and nutmeg is a good enough combination, and I won't have you complaining about it."
"... at least give me the choice to add the nutmeg on my own next time." Ciel muttered as he tucked himself back into bed.
"Of course, Master."
As Archer set the cup and saucer down on his master's nightstand, he felt a small hand grasp his arm. Emiya turned to regard his master's wide blue eyes.
"Did you find what you were looking for?"
Archer pursed his lips.
"I did."
"Is there anything that concerns me?"
He went through all of the information he'd gotten again.
No grail war. Mage association involved with the three families. Counter Guardian assignment with no instructions given.
Archer shook his head.
"No, Master. My assumptions were wrong. You're safe on that front, at the very least."
"Good." And with that, his master extinguished the lamp at his bedside, and Archer made his way to the window, opening it to see the vast expanse of the gardens outside.
"Where-" his master coughed, "where are you going now?"
Archer frowned. "Master. We've discussed this. I'm preparing the manor for tomorrow, of course. You need to have some place to work in, don't you?"
His master hesitated.
"Can you… stay? At least until I fall asleep again?"
Somewhere outside, an owl hooted mournfully.
Archer gently closed the window with a sigh.
"Of course, Master. I'm not going anywhere."
He was delayed for another twenty minutes, enough that Archer had to cancel his plans to prepare breakfast for the Midfords if he was to complete his task. But even then, taking a final look at his master dreaming peacefully under the covers, he felt a curious sense of satisfaction all the same.
Right, Archer leaped off into the night, back to work.
The two of them were back in the carriage after bidding the Midfords goodbye.
They watched as Lizzy, held up by an ever-boisterous Alexis, waved as they pulled out of the driveway. Ciel half-heartedly waved back, before settling into his seat with a huff, tensing as he noticed his servant impatiently staring back.
"... I think we'd better have that talk now." He finally said.
"My thoughts exactly."
Ciel sighed. "Right. Get it over with."
"Ok." Archer crossed his arms, pinning his master under his steely gaze. "This goes without saying, but I don't approve."
"My engagement is not something for you to approve of."
"Master. I agreed to your decision to live on as your brother because I was under the assumption that you had no family left, or at least no one who would be able to tell the difference." Archer ground out. "Now I find you have an aunt on both sides, cousins, a caretaker who has raised you all your life, as well as a fiancee. This is untenable. It is a house of cards that will fall at a moment's notice. Lizzy, at the very least, deserves to know who she's seeing if you're serious about marrying her."
Ciel looked out the window at the cows grazing.
"I understand that it's not ideal, but it's a small sacrifice to make."
"What it is, is cruel." Archer muttered. "Not only to the girl who thinks her fiance's returned from the grave, but to you as well, master. An engagement is not something you can or should inherit. I'd go so far as to say it makes a mockery of the idea of matrimony itself. Do you even love her?"
His master squirmed in his seat, twiddling his fingers here and there.
"I… I love… I will love her." He decided. "Eventually I will grow to love her and give her what she deserves."
"What she deserves as your wife is the truth and nothing but the truth. She won't appreciate her relationship with you being built on lies."
"There is no relationship with me."
Archer raised an eyebrow.
"What she believes," Ciel went on, "is that she's continuing what she had with Ciel Phantomhive. A relationship she's nurtured for years against one she barely invested time into… I see no reason for her to object to our current circumstances"
"There's plenty of reason." Archer felt the need to point out. "Number fucking one, you're not actually your brother."
"What does it matter?" His master retorted. "My brother's never coming back, and she'll never get the chance to see him again." Despite having just woken up, Ciel looked deeply tired all of a sudden. "And she would have been happier to see him return instead of me in the first place. Do you think she would be as happy as she was last night if I told her who I really was?"
Archer resisted the urge to groan. "You give her too little credit. What I saw for myself last night was that Lady Elizabeth is a strong girl, and there is no doubt in my mind she'd react with the proper amount of grace to the news you're not actually Ciel. Master, make a good decision for once and make her happy. Give yourselves an opportunity to start things afresh. Give yourselves an opportunity to be happy."
"She is happy as things are." Ciel's tone was clipped. "If this is part of my duties as the Earl of Phantomhive, if this is the life my brother is to live, I shall accept it without question."
"A duty-" Archer sighed. "Master. King Arthur married Guinevere out of duty and to unite the kingdom under him. Guinevere married Arthur out of duty as well. Now I'm not saying that they didn't eventually learn to love one another, or that they didn't maintain a good friendship throughout it all, but I'm sure you're well aware of how it ended. Calamity. The complete collapse of Camelot."
Ciel stared at him, wholly unamused.
"... just, out of curiosity, who do you see as Lancelot in this scenario, if I may ask?"
Archer flinched.
He'd walked right into that one.
"Not me, Master." He finally said. "If anything I'm Tristan."
The Archer that denounced the king with blunt words and abandoned him in time of need.
"... right." Ciel's eyes narrowed. "So it's not enough for you to be a philandering pansy of a knight, you also had to be Welsh?"
… yeah, he'd walked right into that one too.
Archer sighed. "I just want it stated for the record that I don't approve."
"Your opinion is noted." Ciel looked exhausted. "Now can we please talk about something else?"
Despite this, the carriage descended into a sort of tired silence as the two watched farmers amidst their crops.
"... you were an embarrassment last night."
Archer sighed.
"My apologies, Master, it's been a while since I became a butler."
"I'm more inclined to believe that you were never a butler at all." Ciel muttered. "The mistakes you made last night were basic."
"At the very least, I defended your honor." Archer felt the need to point out.
"Don't try and escape the fact that you probably had a hand in instigating the entire thing." Ciel barked. "I'm not an idiot, Emiya. Edward can be a bit much, but don't you dare try and say that you didn't goad him on."
"Yes, well… I'll keep on learning." Archer waved him off. "Sorry, Master."
"Yes, you'll learn exactly how to conduct yourself," his master's eyes narrowed, "because you'll learn from me."
Archer blinked.
"What?"
"Gramps isn't coming back anytime soon, and we're going to be presented to the Queen in a matter of weeks. I can't afford you making an ass out of yourself in Buckingham Palace." Ciel mused. "There's nothing for it: I'm going to educate you on how you should conduct yourself as my butler.."
Fuck me running. Rebuilding the mansion at night, training to be a butler by day…
"Yes, my master."
His master seemed satisfied for but a moment before something else occurred to him.
"... Oh. You're also going to have to tutor me as well."
"Tutor you?"
Ciel sighed.
"My brother received a full education in preparation for his becoming an earl. Horse riding, shooting, fencing, music theory, history, latin, and so on." He recounted. "I'm not hiring a Governess to teach me, so it'd have to be you. Are you up for the task?"
Fuck me senseless. Rebuilding the mansion by night, tutoring the master and training to be a butler by day…
Not for the first time, he wondered just who he'd pissed off to be in this position: forced to teach Latin of all things to his veritable devil of a master.
Archer sighed.
"I'll teach you the basics of what I know." Archer allowed. "You can't expect me to be as good as a governess when it comes to certain things."
"I know." Ciel nodded. "When the manor's up and running again, I'll consult with one for further matters."
And that was that.
The visit to the Mage's Association had proven one thing: Archer had avoided a grail war this time round, but he was beginning to wish for it all the same. At least a grail war would be over quickly. Now though, he could see the coming weeks stretched out in front of him like an expanse: hours of mutual tutoring, housework, pandering to his master, barbs flung here and there and rebuilding the manor by night; it was going to be exhausting work.
And yet, some traitorous part deep within him smiled. If one looked at it from another point of view, here he was retracing his life in Fuyuki before it all went to hell. It'd been a long time since he'd ever had some semblance of a civilian life, and unbidden, his thoughts wandered to memories of managing and fixing Kiritsugu's estate when he was gone, making meals with Sakura, taking care of another unmanageable house guest…
At the thought of Taiga Fujimura Archer grew wistful.
Maybe this wouldn't be so bad after all.
It wasn't long now, and the two watched as the ruins of the Phantomhive estate came into view.
"Hey… Emiya."
Archer looked up. "Hm?"
The carriage slowly pulled over to a stop in front of the manor.
"I'm also going to set up my own toy company. I look forward to you helping me on that front too."
And with that, as if he didn't drop another bomb for Archer to settle, Ciel Phantomhive exited the carriage.
That small traitorous part within Archer died screaming.
Groaning, Archer put his head in his hands.
And so my watch begins.
Prologue done!
Happy to see that people are enjoying this. Have a lot planned ahead, cannot wait to get to those plot points.
Archer not being Sebastian will have consequences. BIG ones.
Next up: Archer and Ciel's domestic life.