The Legionary screams and thrashes against his restraints, but the thick bands of steel hold even against his gene-forged and infernally-empowered limbs.
This is not torture, for the warrior is loyal to the Lion. It is sacrifice.
They have built a temple to their new god of secrets and ambition, of revelation and change, and upon its altars make sacrifices of their own brothers. All who are chained are willing, warriors who walked with the Lion amidst crystal and dust and saw the future they wish to kill.
This is the age of treachery and fire. This is the hour of rebellion, when princes listening to the whispers of daemons rise against the reign of their father.
This is the Age of Darkness, and what takes place here is but one of the lines the traitors who think themselves saviors cross in their blind rush towards damnation.
They need more power. They have lost much of what was hidden away under the corpse-stars to the Prince of Crows' vengeful crusade. The Eighth, which should have been broken on the black sands, rose up instead with cries of retribution on bloodied lips, and tore the plans of the First asunder. Alajos paid the price for his failure, but punishment cannot unmake the crime, nor can the screams of the commander's disembodied head restore the fortresses and armies he lost to the King of the Night's heir.
He has returned from the Maelstrom with his ascended lord. The Legion gained much from that odyssey, at the cost of a Primarch's loss, for the Wolf King vanished and will not return before the war is done, if then. It was worth it : no more is the Lion constrained by the trappings of mortality the False Emperor wrought to keep His sons from realizing their full potential. Now Lion El'Jonson is as unto a god, woven of shadows and mist, possessed of the secrets of the Architect of Fate.
But it isn't enough. If they are to prevent the nightmare to come, they need more, and so, by his own hand, his brothers are turned into vessels for the Neverborn to ride. Oaths are exchanged, bargains are made, the wheels of sorcery oiled with the pain of Space Marines and the sacrifice of valued servants, and Legionaries rise as Secondborn, wielding the power of the Empyrean through unholy communion.
And still, it isn't enough. Those who still stand at the side of the False Emperor are strong, even in their ignorance. And so they sail, across the Sea of Souls, to return home even as the Imperium bleeds under the blades of their accomplices. To bring their exiled brothers back into the fold, now that the final battle is fast approaching.
The knights are returning to Caliban, with devils at their side and in their hearts, deaf to the screeching of the ones ahead.
November 22nd, 2004 – Emiya residence
Shirou opened his eyes to find himself looking directly into a pair of yellow orbs staring right back at him.
"Good morning, Master," said Saber softly.
She traced her fingers over his chest, where the wound he had taken was reduced to a scarlet patch of skin. She was holding herself up above Shirou with her other arm, though the covers on her back indicated that they had been much closer while Shirou had been unconscious.
Despite the intimacy of the gesture and their position, Shirou didn't feel any stirring of desire – which might be because he was still recovering, or because Saber and him were already tied together in a much deeper manner already.
"That scar won't fade," she whispered. "You might have gotten used to Avalon healing every hurt, but even it has limits, Master. In this War, every opponent will wield Noble Phantasms of their own. One mistake, and you. Will. Die."
"Are you … angry at me, Saber ?"
She pressed her nails into his chest, not deep enough to draw blood, but certainly enough to hurt – though she was careful to avoid the wound.
"Yes. I am furious, Master. Can you guess why ?"
His wince had little to do with the pain. Yes. Yes he could.
"I am your Servant," she continued, not giving the chance to answer. "I am your shield and your sword, in return for the salvation you granted me, and the chance at revenge against the blackness that held me. And you risked everything. What do you think would have happened if you had died ? I might have survived, no matter what Archer's Master thought. Sakura would have gladly starved herself of prana for an ally in her quest to avenge you. But without you, our chances of success became much, much smaller. You risked this entire city, Shirou. If what that merchant on the phone told you was true, you risked this entire country."
"I know," he replied. He hadn't been thinking of any of that at the time, but that didn't make it any less true. "But I couldn't let Illyasviel get hurt."
"Because she is Kiritsugu's daughter ?" pressed Saber.
"Well … yes," he admitted, because he couldn't deny that the half-homunculus being family had influenced his judgment. Images flickered briefly into his mind of the vision he had just experienced – his brothers tortured and broken at his hands, made into puppets and tools – but he suppressed them. Now wasn't the time."But it's not just that. Even if she wasn't Dad's daughter, I would still have tried to save her. What has happened – what has been done to her – it is wrong, Saber."
She looked at him, and he felt her reaching out through their bond, trying to find any sign that he was telling anything less than the complete truth. She wouldn't. Shirou knew that someone else might find it ludicrous – to risk millions of lives for the sake of one ? That was madness. It wasn't what Kiritsugu would have done. It wasn't what most people would have considered sane, or even right, not when the consequences of failure were so great. If Illyasviel hadn't proven receptive to reason, then he should have treated her as an obstacle – a Master who wouldn't stop fighting the Grail War, and needed to be put down. He should have let Archer kill her, and then offered Lancer the chance to become his Servant instead so that she could avenge her fallen Master.
It was what the Magus Killer would have done, given the information and resources at his disposal. And it might even have been the right thing to choose. But Shirou had embraced the use of the Dark Angel's power, despite all its risks, despite how every new fragmented memory made him sick to his core, so that he didn't have to make the same kind of choices that had broken his father's heart.
Even now, with the latest vision of that temple and those bloody rituals fresh in his mind, he wouldn't stop using that power. And if that made him a monster, if of a different sort that what his father had made of himself ? Then so be it. No matter what, he wouldn't regret his choices, nor would he reject them.
"She is going to die, Master," softly said Saber once she was certain he meant what he had said. "I am surprised she even lived that long."
He frowned. "You knew about her." It wasn't a question.
Saber nodded, the gesture almost bringing their faces into contact. "I did. I remember seeing her play with Kiritsugu in the snow around Einzbern Castle, before we left for Japan with Irisviel."
Of course she had. That was why she had reacted when they had seen Illyasviel for the first time. It had been one of the clues that had led him to realize Illyasviel's parentage, but there was another question he hadn't had the opportunity to ask at the time :
"Why didn't you tell me ?"
"Because I didn't think it would matter. Because I didn't think she would still be alive. Because I didn't want you to feel guilt for something you couldn't change."
"But I can change it, Saber. I am going to save her, no matter what it takes."
"Are you ?"
"Yes. I promised it to her, and I keep these promises, Saber."
"Then promise me, Master." For the first time since Shirou had woken up, he saw emotion flicker through his Servant's usual mask of calm. "Promise me that you won't die before the end of this War."
He took a moment to consider his answer, before realizing it wasn't a choice at all. He couldn't die. Not when it would hurt so many of the people he loved. When he had thrown himself in front of Illya to protect her, it had been an instinctive reaction, but even then he hadn't truly thought he might die from it – like Saber had told him, he had grown too used to Avalon making him unkillable. After recovering from the battle against the shikome in Kumamoto City, death had become a more … distant concern.
It had been a mistake, and an arrogant one at that. He wouldn't make it again. He had far too much to do – saving Illyasviel from her doom, stopping the Grail's corruption from manifesting, preventing the slaughterer of the Animusphere from repeating their crimes in Fuyuki …
And yet he couldn't die, even if it was to achieve all of that. His death would hurt his loved ones too much, and he wouldn't accept that. He couldn't accept that.
"I promise," he said.
Master and Servant stared at one another in silence for a few more moments, before Saber slowly lowered her head -
Someone loudly cleared their throat to Shirou's right.
He must have been more out of it than he realized, for only now did Shirou realize he and Saber weren't alone in his room. He turned his head, and saw the red face of Lancer sitting in seiza, her armor replaced by the blue suit she had first worn when he had met her. Illyasviel was sleeping with her head on the busty Servant's lap, her face more peaceful than he had ever seen it before.
"Come on, Lancer," said an amused voice to Shirou's left. "This was just getting interesting."
Slowly, Shirou's neck turned, revealing Rider laying on her side, looking at him with a smirk. The Servant of the Mount was still dressed in Sakura's borrowed clothes, which stretched and clung to her body in … interesting ways as she laid down.
"What … what's going on, Saber ?"
Cheeks slightly red, his Servant refused to meet his gaze or answer his question as she rolled off him and sat up, taking the covers with her.
It was Rider who answered his question, not bothering to hide the amusement she felt at the situation. "When Saber dragged you back home with that one and her Master in tow, your wound was still healing. After a … let's say, heated discussion, it was decided that in order to ensure Avalon worked as best as possible during the night, the three of us would stay near you in corporeal form. Even without exchanging prana, our scabbard recognizes our presence, after all."
"It wasn't easy to convince Sakura that she couldn't stay with you, especially since Illyasviel refused to get away from Lancer," Rider continued. "Sakura is sleeping with Rin and Berserker, by the way. In the end, we decided that the two of us 'Alters' would keep an eye on you, while Lancer did the same for Illyasviel."
"I … I see." It was embarrassing, but it had clearly worked – he was in far better form that he had any right to be, given that he had taken an attack from an enemy Servant head-on. But … "Wait. My memory of it is pretty hazy, but I know that the wound I took was pretty bad," he frowned, looking at Saber. "How did you heal me enough for transport, Saber ?"
"With your Circuits scrambled by Archer's attack, you couldn't draw on your reserves to activate Avalon. So I gave you my own prana for my scabbard to use," answered his Servant. "It worked, but I didn't have enough in reserve, so I asked Lancer here to contribute her own energy. The fact that it worked is why we then came up with this sleeping arrangement."
Shirou nodded. "Alright, that makes sense. Thank you, all of ... Wait. You gave me prana while I was unconscious ? How did you do that ?"
Saber smirked and licked her lips, and Shirou felt himself blush, while Lancer's face lit up like a Christmas tree. Well, that answered that question. And oh God, Illyasviel had seen everything, hadn't she ?
Shirou had no idea what to say or how to react. Thankfully, he was spared from having to come up with an appropriate response by a small voice from his right.
"Uuh …"
The sight of a sleepy Illyasviel getting up was adorable, some part of Shirou's brain noted even as the rest of him froze like a computer being used by Rin for more than five minutes. For some reason, he couldn't get the image of Kiritsugu rising from the grave to punish him out of his mind.
"Good morning, Onii-chan," yawned Illyasviel before suddenly freezing as she too remembered where she was – and with whom. For a moment, adopted brother and sister just looked at each other, under the gazes of the three Servants.
"Good morning, Illyasviel," Shirou managed to say.
Twenty minutes and a great deal of embarrassment for three of the five parties involved later, Shirou had managed to extract himself from his own bedroom and make it to the main room with Illyasviel and their Servants in tow. Sakura was already there, welcoming him with a big smile and a hug that was only a little bit desperate. The knowledge of how he had worried his first lover was like a knife in Shirou's heart, and he repeated his promise of being more careful to her.
"Where is Rin ?" he asked her once they had let go of each other.
"I'm here, you moron," came the reply, as Rin emerged from the door. Sakura looked tired, but Rin looked exhausted, though how much of that was due to her not being a morning person and how much to the unusual situation was unclear. She looked him up and down, her gaze pausing on his chest. "How are you feeling ?"
"Much better. A few more hours and I should be fully recovered."
"Good," she said with a smile.
Then she slapped him, hard. When he stopped seeing stars, Rin was hugging him fiercely.
"Never, ever do something like that to us again, you big, inconsiderate moron."
Even months after the start of their relationship, it was rare for Rin to be so forward in front of other people. That she was so now – both in slapping and hugging him – was a sign of how shaken she was. Shirou hugged her back gently, ignoring his stinging cheek with some effort (Rin hadn't held back, though at least she hadn't used Reinforcement on her hand).
"I won't," he told her.
"You better not," she replied in a muffled voice.
Eventually she let him go, and he didn't comment on the redness in her eyes, or the wetness on his chest where her head had pressed against him.
They sat down to eat breakfast. Lancer was convinced to join them upon seeing Rider and Berserker do so, and the eight people pressed around the dining table, which fortunately had already been extended after the arrival of the first three Servants. The meal was tasty if simple, no one having the energy or patience for anything elaborate. Sakura had taken out the last of the meat in the freezer and cooked it for Shirou, who needed to replenish his blood reserves after his injury. He still had to share with his Servant, if only to stop her from glaring at him, of course.
"This food is acceptable," said Illyasviel. The half-homunculus would have sounded a lot more solemn if she hadn't been in the process of stuffing her face with pancakes.
In a normal child, Shirou would have worried about the sugar rush, but despite what he had seen yesterday he had no idea how Illyasviel's body would react. He assumed that she knew her own needs best, though it was difficult to keep thinking that while looking at her devouring another pancake with gusto.
Oh well. At least she was enjoying the food.
By the time everyone had finished eating and cleaned up, it was 7 AM and the humans in the group were feeling a bit more alive.
"Alright," said Shirou once they were done. "Rider told me about what happened after I passed out, but not in detail. Illyasviel, what do you know about the situation ?"
"Not much," admitted the half-homunculus. "You told me some of it yesterday, but that's it."
"We were a bit distracted, what with you being near death and all," added Rin with an irritated glare. She clearly hadn't forgiven him yet, but that was fine – he deserved that and more for what he had put Sakura and her through. "When Saber and her showed up with you half-dead, we focused on keeping you alive and healing your wound. By the time we had checked you over and come up with a plan, it was too late for explanations."
"We have time now," said Shirou. "So let's explain everything for Illyasviel and Lancer."
What followed was yet another explanation of everything they knew about the Grail's corruption, from Kiritsugu's tale to Saber's memories of the Fourth War's ending. Rin took over at several points, explaining the more arcane details of their investigation.
When they were done, Illya was silent, her head down as she digested what they had told her.
"Very well," she said eventually. "I accept that there is good reason to believe that the Greater Grail has been compromised. I will accept the offer of truce and alliance until more is uncovered."
"Thank you for your understanding, Illyasviel. And while I am at it, thank you for your help yesterday."
She blushed and looked away, as did Lancer, as the two of them remembered what form that help had taken. "Well, I couldn't let you die after you took that wound to protect me, could I ? And besides, even if I accept that Kiritsugu didn't abandon me willingly, you still owe me, Onii-san. I can't let you die until you have paid me back."
"Still," said Sakura, "we are grateful for your help, Einzbern-san."
"Illya," replied the younger-looking girl curtly.
"What ?" asked Sakura, confused.
"Call me Illya," clarified the albino. A self-deprecating smile appeared on her face, which was far too young for such an expression. "I was never really an Einzbern in the first place, after all. They certainly didn't treat me like one. And Illyasviel is what they called me."
Sakura nodded. "Alright, Illya-chan."
Illyasviel – no, Illya, Shirou corrected himself – pouted at that. "You do know I am older than you, right ?"
Sakura blinked. "Really ?" She looked Illya up and down, clearly unsure how to react or what to say.
"So you do remember Kiritsugu Emiya," noted Rin. "When Saber told us you were his daughter, I wasn't sure if you were old enough to have memories of him before the Fourth Grail War. How old are you exactly ?"
"I just turned nineteen," she said nonchalantly.
"Really ? When was your birthday ?" asked Shirou.
"Last Saturday," she mumbled a lot less nonchalantly. Shirou restrained himself from asking further questions about that. He had a feeling her birthday hadn't exactly been a cause for celebration during her time with the Einzbern.
A part of him – one far smaller than the part that mourned for his sister's hard life and wanted to give her a better one, but whose existence he couldn't deny – briefly flashed with burning anger at those who had done this to her. But it was far more important to save her from her suffering than to punish those responsible for it.
"Alright," said Rin. "Now that everyone is up to speed, what is our next move ?"
Shirou looked at the clock. "Right now you and Sakura need to get ready to go to school, and I need to call Fuji-nee and tell her I won't be there today."
"Our education isn't as important as the Grail War, Shirou," said Rin in an exasperated tone. "We can stay here while you recover. It will only take a bit of hypnosis to smooth things over, and I don't really care about the rumors that might start."
"I don't disagree, but that's not the reason you need to go. Do you remember what happened in the Fourth War ? Specifically, what Caster did ?"
Rin winced. To his side, he felt Saber tense. Both of them had their own recollections of that, neither of them good : Rin had almost been abducted by the mad Servant's Master, while Saber had fought his summoned monsters and seen his depravity first-hand.
"Yes," replied Rin. "I see what you mean. You are worried that another Servant will go after the children of Fuyuki, either to use as mana sources or for their own sick reasons."
"Exactly. From what happened at the Animusphere Castle, we know that there is at least one Servant in this War that doesn't care about collateral damage, and most likely practice necromancy of some form." Illya stared at him questioningly, but he would explain it to her later. "Of course, things will be more dangerous at night, but we can patrol the city then. A Magus might hesitate to act during the day in order to protect the secrecy of Magecraft, but the sort of individuals the corrupt Grail could call upon are unlikely to have that sort of qualms." He went on to explain what Raiga had told him and Saber the previous day, about the rise in violence in Fuyuki's criminal underground.
Rin cursed. "Alright. You win. We will go to school and make sure there isn't anything weird happening there. Saber, don't let him put a feet out of the house while we're away. Use strength if you have to – that moron won't listen to anything else if he gets it into his head he needs to get out for some reason."
It was a testament to Rin's authority, or perhaps to how Saber was still peeved with Shirou's behavior the previous evening, that his Servant didn't protest the command at all. She merely nodded in acknowledgement.
Sakura looked uneasy at the prospect of leaving him. "Are you sure you will be okay, Senpai ? If Archer's Master knows or learns that you are still alive, they could try to finish the job."
"I will be fine, Sakura," he reassured her. "I will have Saber with me, and I'm hardly defenceless myself, even if I haven't fully recovered yet. Don't worry about me, and be careful while you are out instead. I will be behind the Bounded Fields, but not you."
There was a part of him that wanted to have Rin and Sakura stay with him, of course. In the short term, they would all be safer if they bundled together – but only in the short term. They might want the War to end peacefully, but they still had enemies, and conceding the initiative like that would have been a mistake on a strategic scale, one that would lead to disaster eventually.
"Illya, can you stay here today ? Once I have recovered, I will escort you back to your castle if you want, but I would rather you don't walk through the city on your own. If Archer makes another attempt, Lancer alone might not be enough to keep you safe." He sent an apologetic glance toward the Servant, who looked unhappy with this observation but unwilling to challenge it. Her Master's safety was more important than her pride – that was a good sign.
"… Sella and Leysritt will be worried," said Illya. "I told her I would be back by evening …"
Shirou frowned. "Are those the names of the chaperones the Einzbern sent with you ?" That might complicate things. Illya being this reasonable (even if they had started on the wrong foot) was a godsend, both from a strategic and personal perspective. But somehow, he doubted any 'true' Einzbern would be willing to talk with the son of Kiritsugu Emiya. Rin's research might have failed to pick up any hint of Illya's existence, but the family's hatred of their father was beyond question.
Illya shook her head. "No. They are my maids; homunculi specifically created to accompany and assist me during the Grail War. They … they are on my side. I think. They will do as I say, at least. Sella won't be happy about it if I can't convince her it's for the best, but she will still follow me."
"Then we need to tell them you're okay." He thought about it for a second, then added : "Do you want to ask them to come here ? Having us all based in a single location would be safer for everyone. We can pick them up at the castle, along with your things."
It was only when he had finished speaking that Shirou realized he had implicitly offered his sister to come live with him. He wasn't going to take that back, but maybe he should have been more subtle. It was obvious that his sister had been hurt, badly, by the disappearance of her birth parents and the years she had spent in the Einzbern. Issues like that took years to recover from even partially, as he knew from bitter experience.
"I will call them tonight," decided Illya. "If I call them before, Sella will want me to come home right away, or she will come herself if I don't."
"Then we will discuss our plan for the rest of the Grail War tonight, once everyone is back and Illya has called her maids," decided Shirou, looking around to see if there was any objection. There wasn't.
After Rin and Sakura had left with their Servants accompanying them in Spirit Form, Shirou made a few phone calls to ensure his absence at school didn't cause trouble for them, and to restock their distressingly empty fridge. Then the siblings talked in the main room, their Servants watching and occasionally chipping in with questions (in Lancer's case) or details of their own (in Saber's case). They spoke of a lot of different things, some of them important to the entire city (like what El-Melloi II had told them about the Animusphere Castle's event), others important only to the two children of Kiritsugu Emiya (like how terrible their father had been at cooking).
By around eleven o'clock, when they had started to discuss Shirou's condition (as they called the Dark Angel inside him), the bell rang, and Shirou went to check the door while Lancer went into Spirit Form. A tanned man in a white suit with a frowning face and pulling a wheeled carrier bag in each hand stood at the gate.
"Hey, kiddo," he greeted Shirou with a gruff voice.
"Good morning, Kamido-san," replied Shirou. "Please, come in. I'm sorry to make you do this."
"You better be," grumbled the older man as he pulled the bags, each of which was full of food, inside the Emiya residence. "I had some of our newbies run around and get the stuff, but I still had to answer their questions when they asked why the hell they were buying groceries, before dragging them here. We are a Yakuza group, not a god-damned delivery system."
"I apologize for the inconvenience," said Shirou with a bow, before taking the bags offered by Kamido and pulling them inside. "It was for a good reason, I assure you."
"Alright, alright, I get it." He took a look inside the room, looking Saber up and down from where the Servant was sat down. "So that's your partner, kiddo ? … I can see why the boys at the gate were so nervous yesterday."
That Kamido could see through Saber's appearance as a frail young woman was a sign of his experience. The Yakuza had been one of the Fujimura Group's top enforcers for ten years, and while he had no experience in the supernatural, his instincts were sharp.
Though perhaps not sharp enough, for as looked at Illya, his reaction was : "Who is the pipsqueak, kiddo ?"
Nothing dramatic happened. Lancer did not emerge from Spirit Form to stab the man with Rhongomyniad, and Illya did not throw a curse right at him.
Shirou hurried up to speak before that changed : "That is my sister, Illyasviel. She is Dad's daughter. Illya, this is Kamido-san, a friend of the family."
Kamido blinked, then paled as he remembered his previous words. "You are Kiritsugu Emiya's daughter ?! That Kiritsugu Emiya ?!"
"Yes," she replied sweetly. The Yakuza gulped, suddenly looking a great deal more nervous.
"... I apologize for calling you a pipsqueak, miss. I didn't know Emiya had a kid other than this one." He pointed at Shirou.
"That's not a problem," said Illya, still smiling her angel's smile. "Shirou didn't know until yesterday either. We are still getting to know each other."
"I will leave you to it, then. And, kiddo, the boss is waiting for an explanation as to why you couldn't go out and buy all of that yourself. Oh, and someone else will come later to bring the bikes you asked the boss about."
"Thank you again, Kamido-san. I will call Raiga-san in the evening to report to him."
"See that you do. Bye, then."
It would have been wrong to call Kamido's departure a retreat : the Yakuza had done what he come to do, and doubtlessly had many tasks to see to, especially considering what Raiga had told Shirou of the situation in Fuyuki's underworld. But he certainly left quickly, leaving Shirou with Illya, Saber, and the re-materialized Lancer, whose noble visage was carefully repressing a smile as she looked at where her charge sat.
"Just so we are clear," Shirou called out to Illya while putting the food Kamido had brought inside the fridge and freezer, "he really didn't mean anything by it. That's just the way he talk."
Illya pouted again, apparently angered that her brother had so little faith in her ability to keep her temper. Shirou couldn't stop himself from smiling at the sight. Older than him as she may be, that expression really looked at home on Illya.
"Who was that, Onii-chan ?" asked Illya.
"Kamido-san is a member of the Fujimura Group. They are the sole Yakuza organization in Fuyuki."
Illya frowned. "Why do you know Yakuza, Shirou ?"
"Well, the grand-daughter of their Oyabun – that's the leader of the Group – is my legal guardian. Also, as you saw, Dad had something of a ... reputation with them. I still don't know what he did to make them so scared of him even years after his death, mind you."
"But that man knew you personally," she pointed out.
"I have done ... work for them on occasion," he admitted. "When outsider criminals try to muscle in on their territory, my intervention can resolve the situation with a minimum of bloodshed."
She blinked. "What about the secrecy of Magecraft ?"
"I have always been careful not to use anything obviously supernatural," he assured her. "All the tricks I used on my tasks were things that could be done with mundane means. Rin already checked everything I did when she learned about it and gave me her approval."
He put the last of the food in the fridge and stretched. No pain in his chest; good. He turned and looked at the three women in the room with him.
"I am going to hazard a guess," he said in a dry tone, "and assume that none of you have any experience with cooking."
The silence that followed was answer enough.
"Right, then. Let me get to work. Illya, if you want, you can go into our Workshop. Rin's notes on what we know of my condition are in there, if you are curious."
The white-haired girl blinked. "You … are giving me access to your Workshop ? Just like that ?"
He sighed. "It's really more of a familial Workshop, and you're family. We brought in a lot of Rin's stuff yesterday, so you'll need to stay clear of that, but her notes are safe to read, and they would explain things much more clearly than I could, especially while focusing on cooking. Of course, you can stay here if you want. I can turn on the TV -"
"No no, that's fine ! I will go into the Workshop and check out Tohsaka's research !"
Ten minutes later, Illya was sitting in the Emiya Workshop, looking at notes spread across a table in front of her. Shirou had started a heater before leaving, and already the cramped Workshop was more comfortable than most of the luxurious halls of the Einzbern Castle. Illya was alone in there, with Lancer having remained outside to keep an eye out for any threat.
The notes were comprehensive, neatly separated between facts and theories. The former were listed in a clinical tone that didn't quite hide the disquiet the Tohsaka Head had felt while writing them.
The file started with an analysis of Shirou's 'condition'. During the cataclysmic ending of the Fourth Grail War, Shirou had been caught in the curse unleashed by the destroyed Grail, his body and soul damaged by the malevolent energies. It was then that his soul had merged with another entity – not merely possessed, but truly merged, to the point that the Magecraft available to the Emiya group couldn't distinguish where the human ended and the 'Dark Angel', as they called the entity, began.
Though Shirou had been rescued from the flames by Kiritsugu, his body had still been badly damaged. The copy of the hospital records that Tohsaka had somehow obtained made it obvious that the medics hadn't expected Shirou to live, though they had given it their best effort.
To save Shirou's life, Kiritsugu had given Avalon to Shirou, dissolving the Noble Phantasm into the child's body in the same way it had been dissolved through his own during the Fourth Grail War. It had remained there since, which Illya couldn't help but think must have had interesting implications for her brother's growth. To the best of her admittedly limited knowledge, there was no precedent for someone being in so close proximity to so potent a Noble Phantasm through their formative years.
Shirou had first became aware of the other aspects of his condition two years ago, when he had confronted and slain Zouken Matou. Apparently, during that battle, Shirou had 'awakened' the powers of the Dark Angel, manifesting the dread aspect he had assumed when fighting Lancer and wielding that oversized sword for the first time.
What followed was a description of these powers, which matched what Illya had seen yesterday : increased strength and speed, the skill to wield that sword, wings of shadow (they still had no idea just what those wings were made of exactly) that could cancel inertia, and eyes that could perform an advanced form of Structural Analysis on anything they beheld.
What Illya had not seen herself, however, was that apparently Shirou could imbue his weapon with some sort of purifying, spirit-slaying property. He had used it to destroy Zouken and free Sakura from the old magus' corruption, and later on, to fight against a spirit of rot and pestilence and annihilate it.
Since the confrontation with Zouken, the weird dreams Shirou had been experiencing on and off since childhood had increased in frequency and variety, showing him fragments of the life that the 'Dark Angel', as they had eventually taken to calling it, had lived before becoming merged with Shirou. Rin had thoroughly questioned Shirou on what he remembered of these visions, and compiled the resulting data into a rough timeline.
The first and most evident thing about this timeline was that it clearly didn't take place on their world, but on another, alternate version of it.
In this world, this 'Terra', a man called the Emperor had risen, and led the conquest of Humanity's scattered territories in a Great Crusade, to create an empire unimaginatively called the Imperium. Legions had been founded to fight this Crusade, equipped with gear that spoke of technology that was both far in advance of what existed in their timeline and at the same time bizarrely archaic in other ways. The Legions had been led by the Primarchs, sons of the Emperor and father figures to the soldiers under them, who underwent some sort of process to make them better suited for warfare. The Dark Angels were one such Legion, commanded by the Primarch Lion El'Jonson.
Shirou's own Dark Angel came from a land called Caliban, covered in dark forests within which dwelled great beasts. He had been a hunter of these beasts, a knight of Caliban, before becoming a Legionary (also known as Angel of Death). Like the rest of his Legion, the Dark Angel had been a soldier, fighting to free Humanity from the darkness that preyed upon them, until it had all gone wrong.
Reading it now, Illya felt as if she was learning about some ancient mythology rather than a parallel history – or perhaps an old Greek tragedy. The scale of it was just … too much. It didn't feel real, which of course it wasn't, but the idea that the World could have ended up following that path seemed unconceivable.
During the Great Crusade, the Dark Angels had seen something, a vision of the future so horrible that they had turned against the Emperor in order to prevent it from coming to pass. They had joined several other Legions in rebellion against the Emperor, and after decades of secret preparations and schemes, torn the Imperium asunder in civil war.
At the battle of Istvaan V, the Dark Angels had revealed their treachery when, instead of supporting the three loyalist Legions present, they had opened fire on their supposed allies as they retreated. Shirou's own Dark Angel had taken part in that battle, and Tohsaka's notes mentioned how badly her brother had been affected by the memory. They referred to a battle against something called a 'shikome', whatever that was – she would need to ask Shirou about this later – during which Shirou had come into contact with a mundane gun, the touch of which had been enough to trigger the memory of Istvaan V.
Apparently, Tohsaka had tried to replicate the effect, procuring an unloaded firearm for that purpose – but Shirou had violently rejected touching the weapon, even after agreeing to the experiment beforehand. Even seeing a gun was enough to trigger flashbacks to the beginning of the war Illya's brother had called – one time and only one time – the 'Heresy'.
During that war, the Dark Angels and their allies had made pacts with dark powers, summoning entities they had called 'Neverborn' or 'daemons'. They had aligned themselves with the gods the Emperor had sought to banish with the Great Crusade, 'Powers' of great might and greater cruelty.
The civil war had come to a climax at the battle of the Imperial Palace, which had been of such scale Shirou had called it 'the Siege of Terra'. There, the Dark Angel had used powerful sorceries against the magics wielded by the Sons of the Cyclops, who Rin believed to be one of the loyalist Legions. At that point, the Dark Angel had called itself a Chaos Sorcerer, and though there was little detail as to the precise aspects of its power, what little was there made Illya shiver.
What had happened at the Siege was unclear, but at some point, the Dark Angels had been exiled into a land of shadow and mist, where they had become monsters pursuing strange, arcane agendas. Lion El'Jonson, the greatest of these monsters, had been wounded, but used magic to keep his sons from noticing the injury.
And that was it. There were other details, such as mention of a girl named Altani who was supposed to be of great importance to the Dark Angels' war preparations, and of 'the Hydra', apparently another Legion led by a Primarch named Alpharius. Or of the Ninth Legion, which had sided with the rebels and preyed upon the civilian population during the Siege. And there was a quick note penned the previous day, describing the vision Shirou had had before waking up to discover the Command Seals on his hand. That vision had involved a land called Ultramar, and the preparations that had been made by the traitors before the beginning of the civil war.
But the list of facts ended there. From this point began the best theory the Tohsaka Head had been able to throw together as to exactly what Illya's brother was.
At its core, the Greater Grail was a device to reach the Root. It was linked to Akasha by the Second Magic, bestowed upon the old heads of the Three Families by a shard of the Magician Zelretch in centuries past. Through that connection, it could access the records of the Heroic Spirits who had ascended to the Throne of Heroes, and call them forth to participate in the Grail War as Servants.
Tohsaka's theory was that, through the fragments of the Second Magic incorporated in the Heaven's Feel, the calamity that had occurred at the end of the Fourth War had accessed the records of Terra's alternate history, and pulled the Dark Angel from it, using the unfathomable energies gathered within the Grail to make it real. That incorporate spirit, exposed to the Grail's curse, had then sought refuge within the body of the boy who would become Shirou Emiya, its soul fusing to that of the child.
Again, Illya noted that Tohsaka's hands clearly hadn't been steady when she had written her description of what had happened to Shirou in the flames ten years ago.
Next came the Magus' theories as to the difference between their world and Terra. In reality, the Age of the Gods had ended when the concentration of Mana on Earth had thinned, thousands of years ago. The gods and the Magic Beasts that had shared the planet with Humanity had been forced to depart, either hiding in the few places that could still sustain their existence, or fleeing to other realms entirely.
Shirou's visions were too vague to have a proper notion of the power level of the Imperium and its foes, but the sheer power her brother could call upon was evidence enough that the Dark Angel had been far, far more powerful than any Magus of the modern era.
Then there was the fact that, during his confrontation with the Fraga Enforcer, he had managed to cut through Fragarach, the Noble Phantasm whose secrets had been passed down that lineage since the Age of the Gods. Combined with the raw might Shirou had inherited, it made sense that Tohsaka believed that the thinning of Mana had never happened in the alternate history from whence the Dark Angel had come.
With the Age of the Gods never ending, Humanity had been forced to adapt in order to survive. Tohsaka suspected that the Emperor might have been the product of that evolution, or perhaps a god turning on his own kind and uplifting the species in order to secure his dominion. Given the horrific corruption of those who had rebelled against him, however, some altruistic motive to his Great Crusade couldn't be dismissed, weird as it felt for magi to consider in a being of such power and knowledge.
(Shirou's visions hadn't revealed anything of the Emperor's personal might, but even through the hazy veil that shrouded his recollections, Shirou had been able to tell them that even at his strongest, the Dark Angel had never considered himself a match for the Emperor.)
They had a single point of reference between the real world and the visions : the oversized sword Shirou had traced when he had fought Lancer (and Illya still hadn't gotten over the fact that he had been able to do so and survive). In the visions, the sword was normally sized for a two-handed weapons relative to the Dark Angel's body. By measuring the version of it Shirou could Trace (because of course her brother had found a way to make something like Projection useful), they had been able to estimate the size of a Legionary at over two meters and a half. Shirou was almost sure that normal people weren't that tall on Terra : something in the process that made the Dark Angel a Legionary was responsible for this gigantism.
The weight of the sword also implied that a Legionary was far stronger than their bulk could allow for. It was possible their armor enhanced their strength – Shirou had never had a vision of one of them fighting without it – but the fact Shirou could wield the sword with only the power of the Dark Angel indicated otherwise … then again, he was using Reinforcement on his entire body while fighting. Without more information, making any estimation of the Legionaries' strength more precise than 'greater than baseline human' was impossible.
Illya put down the papers and stared at nothing, lost in thought. Kiritsugu had never known this, she realized with shock. He had adopted Shirou mostly out of guilt for his part in the destruction that had cost the boy everything, not because the Magus Killer had seen the potential the child would one day possess. After all, Shirou hadn't manifested any of his strange abilities until years after Kiritsugu's demise.
Her mind was ablaze with questions and doubts. She was certain now that her brother had told her the truth – that Kiritsugu hadn't abandoned her, hadn't forgotten her after adopting another child to replace her. Her … her Papa hadn't abandoned her.
After they had laid down for the night, Saber had told her stories about her Mama from the Fourth Grail War. The Servant had known enough details to convince Illya that, at the very least, her brother hadn't lied when he had told her that the Saber of the Fourth War had been captured by the Grail and used to create the three Artoria Pendragon who were part of the Fifth. She had fallen asleep with the soft voice of the Servant of the Sword in her ears, telling her how Irisviel had acted when they had arrived to Japan.
But that certainty only brought more questions. What was she supposed to do now ? Shirou had said he'd save her, but how could he possibly do that ? Her grand-father had made sure that she knew exactly how doomed she was, to ensure that she didn't get any rebellious ideas.
The thought of Shirou and her, along with their Servants, razing the Einzbern Castle to the ground and tearing Jubstacheit to pieces for his lies was certainly appealing. Before, she had held back from unleashing Lancer on him because she had needed him to reach Japan and the target he had carefully aimed her toward.
Now ? She had other, more pressing concerns, but the revelation that he had deceived her all along, that he had lied about Kiritsugu abandoning her, that he had kept her imprisoned while she could have lived with her father and her brother all this time -
Illya took a deep breath. Not yet, she told herself. She couldn't let herself feel all that anger, because she was afraid it would drown her, and right now she needed to be as cool-headed as possible.
One day, though. One day ...
For now, she needed to figure out what was going with the Grail. Even now, she still had a duty to the legacy of the Einzbern family, if only because Mama had sacrificed her life to it. And if, as Shirou and the others believed, the Grail was irrevocably tainted, then it would be she who ended it. Alright, most likely it would be Lancer, using that terror that sometimes disguised itself as a spear. But it would be by her will.
And after that … Well. She supposed it wouldn't hurt to entertain her brother's fantasy that he could save her. She could stay here in Japan, and Jubstacheit couldn't do anything about it. Well, he could send people to get her back, but what were they going to do ? Fight her brother, who could stand off against a Servant and survive a Noble Phantasm to the chest ?
She only realized that she had drifted into daydreaming about a life that, until yesterday, she hadn't dared to hope she might enjoy one day, when a voice dragged her back to reality.
"Illyasviel ?"
She turned to see Lancer standing in the doorway. "Yes ?"
"Your brother asked me to come get you," said the Servant. "Lunch is ready."
As it turned out, Illya's brother could cook.
The first thing Illya noticed when she returned to the dining room was that her brother was wearing an apron. Her adopted brother, the one who had fought a Servant on equal footing and survived a direct hit from a Noble Phantasm – and yes, her mind kept going back to that, but the thought was just utterly ridiculous and she couldn't help it – was wearing an apron.
For some reason, she found it suited him.
She sat down at the table, and had a brief moment of vertigo as Lancer and Saber sat down as well. After years in the Einzbern Castle, Illya was used at seeing the same faces over and over – the German magi had long ago decided what the "perfect" face for basic servant homunculi looked like. It was the differences between the two Servants that made the similarities so weird to her. They looked like sisters, or perhaps half-sisters given Saber's paler coloration. Lancer looked like she was ten years or so older, of course.
Two different versions of King Arthur, both created from the Saber of the Fourth War after she was caught in that War's disastrous ending. After discussing with Shirou and reading Tohsaka's notes, Illya didn't doubt her hosts' reconstruction of what had happened back then, though she was as much as a loss as to the 'why' as they. Her education had included a great deal of knowledge about the Grail, to make sure that she could fulfill her duty as a sacrifice to it.
Summoning different versions of a Servant at the same time was possible, she knew. The Edelfelt family had done that during the Third War, summoning two Saber-Class Servants using their family's Sorcery Trait. At some point, Jubstacheit had considered doing the same to give her an additional edge in the Fifth War; her prana reserves were large enough that she wouldn't have any issue with supporting two Servants at the same time.
But for three Masters to summon different aspects of the same Heroic Spirit while performing unrelated summoning rituals at opposite ends of the globe ? No matter the catalysts employed, one of them should have gotten a different Servant. Maybe, maybe Shirou and Illya could have gotten two aspects of King Arthur, given that Shirou had Avalon inside him and the Einzbern were determined to have the King of Knights as a Servant this time around as well, but then how could Tohsaka have summoned a third aspect ? As long as the rules of the Grail were working, that should have been impossible. And yet, it had happened, which meant that there was something wrong with the Grail – which, too, was supposed to be impossible according to her entire education in the subject.
There were a lot of impossible things happening, which made Illya feel frustrated. Then Shirou brought the food from the kitchen, and Illya stopped thinking about that to focus on something much more important : how good the food smelled.
"I made hamburgers," said Shirou, putting a plate in front of Illya with a single burger on it, and a larger plate with a whole bunch of bigger ones in the middle of the table. "They were Dad's favorite."
The two Servants were staring at the food with naked hunger. Hesitantly, Illya picked up her cutlery – Shirou had brought out a fork and knife for her, though the others were going to eat with their bare hands – cut a part of the burger and put it into her mouth.
It was the sort of food that would never have been served at Einzbern Castle, and it tasted delicious. A part of her remarked that was probably more due to her brother's culinary skill than because hamburgers were normally that good, but the rest of her was too busy enjoying the taste.
She barely noticed that she had dropped her cutlery and was eating her burger like everyone else was, nor did she notice that she was getting sauce all over her mouth, in a display of messy eating that would have been utterly unacceptable in the stuffy Einzbern Castle.
In the time it took Illya to eat her portion, Saber and Lancer went through several of the big-sized burgers. Even Shirou ate two, still refuelling his body. They ate in silence, but there was none of the tension that had hung in the air every time Illya had shared a table with the other Einzbern : it was just that the food was too good to focus on anything else.
Once Lancer was able to look past her own food, she saw Illya's face and cleaned her up with a napkin, much to the half-homunculus' embarrassment and her brother's amusement.
There was a moment of silence after they had finished – not a single hamburger left on the table.
"Now, it's time for dessert," announced Shirou, getting up and opening the fridge. It wouldn't have been correct to call the gaze Saber and Lancer aimed at Illya's brother predatory, but it wouldn't exactly have been wrong, either. How the Servants could still be hungry after all that they had eaten already, Illya had no idea. She felt as if she couldn't eat another bite -
Illya's eyes widened as her brother pulled a big, frosted chocolate cake from the fridge and put it in front of her. Huh. Maybe she still had enough space left for dessert, after all.
"Happy birthday, Illya," he told her with a smile.
Her eyes flickered between her brother and the cake. He – her birthday ? He had – but – had he asked members of an organized crime group to bring him the ingredients to bake her a cake ?! The last time she had a cake had been … had been …
She remembered -
- the fireplace burns hot, filling the room with warmth. The three of them – Illya, Kiritsugu, Irisviel – sit at the small table.
Her parents are smiling at her, and she at them. There is a cake on the table, small and burnt, because neither Dad nor Mom know how to cook, yet they always insist on preparing the cake for her birthday themselves.
She finds it funny, so she plays along. She doesn't know that this is the last time they will celebrate like this, that there will be no burnt cake next year, no silly celebration. Just cold stones and colder glares.
She blows the candles out, and her parents clap and congratulate her, before Dad cuts the cake and puts something that looks and tastes a bit too much like charcoal in front of her -
- "Illya ?! Are you okay, Illya ?"
She blinked. Shirou was there, next to her, looking at her with that look of concern and affection on his face.
How long had it been since she had last let herself think of that day, she wondered ? How long since she had forced herself to ignore the memories of the only days of her life where she had been happy ?
She smiled through the tears that ran on her face, and hugged her brother. He was startled, but he hugged her back.
No, she wasn't okay. But for the first time in ten years, she felt that one day, she might be.
AN : This chapter ended up much, much longer than I thought it would. I even had to split it in two : initially, this one and the next one were supposed to be just one chapter. Oh well, these things happen.
You might have noticed the reference to the Kaleidoscope when Illya went over Rin's notes. More details about the differences of Zelretch and the Second Magic in this AU are prepared to be revealed in a later chapter. In the meantime, I look forward to your theories.
Not much more to say. I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Please tell me what you thought of it, what your theories on the various mysteries are, and what you are hoping to see in this story's future.
Zahariel out.