Ch 16: Matou Hopes

I open my eyes to a white sterile room. A room I don't recognize. A room unfitting of the Matou heir. A place where I don't belong. I try to remember, to recall the events, but all I could recall was that shooting pain. My legs had hurt. The pain was unbearable, but right now I couldn't feel anything. I couldn't feel anything. I look forward, but I see no cast. Why was that?

"My legs…."

Something was supposed to be there, but all I saw was empty space. Nothing. Nothing at all! Nothing at all! Nothing at all! Nothing at all! Who did this to me, Matou Shinji?

"They're gone….."

I scream and yell, but no one comes. My legs were gone. It was pointless, but I couldn't stop. I slam my hands into the stumps hoping that something was there, but…..

"Gahhhh…!"

Even with the sedatives, the pain was unbearable. So unbearable that I wanted to die, but me dying? I didn't want to die. I didn't want to die. I didn't want to die. Matou Shinji can't die like that! To die in such a pathetic way? Without making something of myself? That brat! Rider! Sakura! If only she summoned a better Servant that smug little albino brat would be in my place.

"SAKURA!"

Where was she? That good for nothing "sister" of mine. Of course she wouldn't be here. I'm not jealous of Emiya. The only good thing about Sakura was that vulgar body and I'm sure Emiya isn't even interested in it. That Emiya creep probably prefers them younger. That white haired brat yesterday who ordered me legs to lopped off was dangerous and yet he just follows her up to the roof? Sakura has terrible taste in men, but that isn't surprising. Him? The perfect older brother? I'm certain he only let Sakura hang out with him because she's someone's little sister, because half the time, he's talking about his own little sister. He's so sketchy, and yet Sakura thinks of him as some paragon of virtue? She's really making fun of me. Love really is blind. She's just too easy.

"SAKURA!"

I bet Emiya cheats on the archery range with mage-craft. Aimbotter. He even has the gall to miss on purpose. The fact he's a magus that grandfather put tabs on, he isn't someone who can be trusted. Any good point about Emiya was him only putting on an act, yet, to fall in love with some half-baked act, someone you were explicitly ordered to observe…..

"Yes, nii-san?"

A voice, but no figure in view. It was only a trick of the light. Sakura appears in front of me by taking off her "scarf". Lucky her, to have such a vast collection of such wondrous magical tools, so many of them made from solid gold no less….

"I made some beef stew. Plenty of protein," she goes on to say with a thermos in her hands and sets it by the bedside.

"You're really slow aren't you? Stew isn't something you eat in bed. It's bound to spill on the sheets! I lost me legs and only now you show up?"

The harlot was making fun of me as she takes a seat next to my bedside.

"Yes," is all she says in response as if to confess that my hunch was correct.

"You're doing this on purpose!"

I raise my voice, but she continues smiling. That fake smile she always puts on in front of me. That's how it has always been right? Mocking me behind that smile. Looking down on me.

"It's good to see you so lively. I'm sure that you'll be dis…"

I reach for the thermos to throw at her, but stop myself. Just budging a little, the pain comes back.

"It hurts! It hurts. It hurts!"

It still hurts. She grabs the thermos and opens it up. Taking out a fork, she begins to feed me a chunk of radish, or pretend to. The fork makes its path to my mouth and I have no choice but to open up if I didn't want my cheek to be burned. It's hot. It's hot, but I had to endure. To be fed like a baby, I didn't want any evidence of it to remain.

"Still piping hot. Aren't thermoses amazing?" is her stating the obvious with that smile of hers. At the very least, that smile now was closer to being genuine, though the implications were hardly good.

It hurts. It burns. My throat burns and no words could escape my swollen mouth. All I could do was swallow.

"There's no need to speak. Even if you never recover, I'll take care of you. You belong to me after all. Rest assured, if she knows any better, she won't do anything to what's mine anymore," were the nonsensical words that come out of her mouth. She caresses my cheek in a way a mother would, not like I remember what that felt like. It was annoying. It was annoying. I wanted to brush it off, I turn my neck side to side violently, but she does not stop. Was she that slow or was she mocking me?

"Drop the act," is what I manage to say.

She pauses for a moment. Did I hurt her feelings?

"It's not an act. I actually do like you quite a bit," is what she says as a matter of fact.

Once again, that stupid little act. She was a nice girl, but nice girls are a lie. Being nice is simply a means to obtain, but there was no reason to fault her for that. All the girls at school who were ever nice to me were always after money. Men and women all put on acts to get what they want. That isn't wrong. People using people, exchanging one thing for another. That fact annoys me, but something annoys me more.

"What do you even want from me?" I ask, but she doesn't answer.

I wasn't special. I was ordinary. Sleeping in this bed, being unable to move, I can't run away from that fact any longer. Even though I was born within the Matou, I couldn't become a Matou. Matou were magi, but I had no magic circuits. That was why this insufferable girl in front of me was adopted. To inherit the Matou knowledge and yet, she takes no pride in being a Matou. She takes no pride in being what I could never hope to become. Obsessed more with the Emiya siblings and cooking than mage-craft. She looked forward more to cleaning the toilet than spending time with grandfather. I admit that the Matou mage-craft is not pretty to look at in practice, but to look down on us in that way….Someone as vulgar as her dreaming to be some no name housewife. It was unforgivable.

Someone special that wanted to be ordinary. Someone who had everything I wanted. I couldn't understand her at all. I couldn't understand what she was thinking at all. There's just one question in my head.

"What do you even want from me?" I ask again.

I had nothing. I'm not the strongest or the smartest at school. The Matou name was all I had that made me special, and yet I couldn't even practice Matou mage-craft. I was trash. I had nothing. I was nothing. My family was once great, but that ended when I was born. The Matou stopped being special when I came along. All we had were records of the fact we were once special. All those secret techniques I memorized, but could not perform because I didn't have magic circuits. My father, grandfather and Sakura were all laughing behind my back as I did pointless things. I wish to be a magus, but that won't come true as long as I was what I am. That's why I wanted the Holy Grail. That's why I chose to fight in the Holy Grail War.

"You belong to me, that's all," is the truth she speaks.

Ahahahah. More of that nonsense. She was so meek before, but now armed with that confidence, she says it like it is. So all this time, I was the toy. She really was making fun of me. I wasn't born with magic circuits and now I don't even have my legs.

"I must be really fun to mock aren't I? Some worthless normie that doesn't know his place."

"Normie? No, a normie wouldn't be dumb enough to fight in the Holy Grail War," is what she tells me to my face with that crapsaccharine smile.

"Did you just give me Rider to see me fail?..Maybe I should have just died back there. Without my legs, I'm….."

I try to laugh it off, but my eyes became wet. I was less than worthless right now. I had become a burden. That's all I could ever be from now on.

"Don't speak so lightly of dying. Everything ends when you die," were some nice sounding words coming out of her.

"Stop acting nice."

"This isn't something to cry over, but the fact you have something to cry for, something you want beyond yourself, chasing something you'll never obtain, to have hope, I think it's wonderful," was Sakura's nonsense again.

"You think that's wonderful?"

She lays her hand on my forehead. My legs were gone, but I didn't have a fever you dumb broad.

"When I was thrown away, I had nothing, but I didn't die. My world up until then was gone and all that was left was this body. This filthy….…. As long as I obeyed grandfather, I would survive and would simply receive. The pain, the filth, the power, I would receive it all, but that wasn't living.….I had no hopes of my own. Nothing I wanted to take. I once thought it would be fine to let grandfather decide what I needed to be, but you were different."

"Because grandfather expects nothing of me?"

I really wanted to hit her, but I couldn't get up. If I tried, my leg stumps would start hurting again.

"Yet you continued to live, to hope despite being hopeless, to seek something you couldn't obtain. You're similar to senpai in that respect. With or without your legs, is there really a difference from before? You were nothing and are still nothing. You'll live through this. Compared to you, back then, I simply survived. There was nothing I wanted for myself. Nothing to commit myself to…," were words of hers that shouldn't have been sad.

"Those are some words of privilege. If you have nothing you want, that must mean you have everything doesn't it? Haven't you already become what I wanted to be? When was the last time you listened to grandfather anyways?"

It was then the insufferable giggling starts. With her impish smile, the melancholy tone before becomes a lie.

"Yes. I realized quite a while ago that there are just too many things I don't want to lose," is what she admits to my face as she makes that self satisfied expression.

She stands up, sets the thermos to the side and turns her back. It was time for her to leave. It was laughable. It was laughable. So laughable that the pain in my legs no longer registered. My whole life really was a farce.

"Get well soon," were her words I couldn't accept.

Sakura just leaves just like that humming to herself. I still did not understand her in the slightest even after all these years.

I make my through the door, leaving the nameplate inscribed with "Matou" behind me. "Matou", that was the name of my current family. In many respects, my family was flawed, but I'm still Matou Sakura. I dawn my special scarf in a practiced motion, avoiding my long hair. I make my way down the hospital stairs. I pass through the crowded halls and there were a few familiar names. Ayako was also staying here wasn't she? Well, that's another person that won't be attending archery practice soon. More alone time with senpai, no, it's wrong to think like that. The hospital was certainly crowded. Was I partly to blame or was it mostly that witch?

As I make it outside, it was apparent that the day was still young as the sun had barely risen. I walk down the crowded streets and no one notices a thing. It would be a bad thing to be noticed after all. As I look up, a lot of people's gazes were drawn to the yellow tape that adorned a certain office building. I had an inkling who was responsible. I really didn't want to encounter "him".

It won't end well if he notices me, but he isn't one to notice nobodies in the background. I was always a nobody and with the treasured cloth wrapped around me, I was a nobody among nobodies. Would he accuse me of being a thief? Dealing with that person would be troublesome say the least. I was a misshapen, cobbled together counterfeit of him after all. Out of respect for his one friend, that king, the first hero would only accept a single "fake" in this world. All other "fakes" were an affront to his friend.

As I was a "fake" myself, I could never adopt such way of thinking despite the compulsions. No, in fact, I quite liked "fakes". That desperate and deliberate attempt to be real, I could not help but admire such a thing. My feet patter on the uniform slabs of concrete. My shoulders brush against the current of bodies, but no one pays attention. From the streets to the bridge, I take in each and every little identical nut and bolt. Every car I see, delivering people to their workplace was a copy. Advancement is built on replication and preservation. Prototypes are nice, but it is the mass produced copies that change this world. I make my way to school, but it was a long trip. I glance at my mass produced watch.

"Five minutes until school starts…."

Even though I started my day early and didn't visit the Emiya home, according to the time everyone else kept, I was going to be late for school wasn't I? I run and run. Almost an hour and I'm at the gate. I was late for certain. Not like there is a student council president to scold me, because he's in the hospital.

"So late…."

At the entrance, I see that familiar fluff of red hair. He was waiting for me. How wonderful, but the conversation was taken to a place I didn't want it to be.

"She's still alive isn't she?" is what he asks of me.

"I didn't touch her, but hopefully she learned her place last night," was the truth I confess. I didn't touch that insufferable little doll because I didn't get a chance because….

"Thank you," were words he didn't have to say.

We part ways. We were both late for class. As I enter the halls and pass by the classrooms, it was clear that quite a few people were absent. Well, the Holy Grail War was underway after all. My brother had tried gathering mana for Rider last night before meeting that white haired doll. Ayako and a few other students were hospitalized for that reason. I should have followed him. I feasted at the temple, which was why the student body president wasn't here either. To think that a Master was one of the teachers at school. It really was regrettable, though Caster was in fact responsible for a lot of hospitalizations herself.

There was one thing that was off, but I brushed it off.

I didn't see Miyu at all today, but there were quite a few days when her side job as an underground doctor took precedence. Maybe she was called over by Raiga again to treat people that couldn't be treated in a regular hospital? It was only the other day Taiga got injured. After all, in this Holy Grail War, I wasn't the only person sending people to the hospital. The yellow tape that draped a certain office building I walked past was evidence of that. The understaffed hospital was brimming with patients when I visited my brother, so it wouldn't be strange for Miyu to be called upon. For someone like her, for people with goals, school was of secondary importance.

Some of my earliest memories at the Emiya residence was that small frame hunched over a thick biology textbook. That small girl, even younger than me back then had something she wanted to be. She had a goal to aim for. In some ways, she had already achieved her goal in her work as an underground doctor. School in the end is a place for children to figure out what they wanted to be before they became adults.

Miyu. The perfect little sister. The perfect little daughter. A rarity that must be protected.

Emiya Kiritsugu, the late father of those two I had never met. The late father of an aspiring doctor and a superhero. Even though I never met him, I only had positive feelings for that man. His name was familiar in a way. It's a shame he isn't around anymore.

Lunch period comes once again and I meet up with that aspiring superhero at the rooftop once again. With the Holy Grail War underway, it was obvious that his patrols would get more aggressive and school becoming less important, yet for him to still come, there had to be a reason. It was clear he was going to interrogate me. It was then I realized that I was too careless. He stands before me with those tired eyes of his. In his eyes, something was missing.

"Where's Miyu?" is what he asks of me.

My heart rate rises. I miscalculated. It seems I was getting too arrogant. The world never reacted in a way I wanted, so even after getting power, why would that change?

Sakura's room was quite plain, but it was unmistakably a girl's, but right now, chained to the wall were two white haired figures. I had answered Sakura's summons and became her Servant under the alias of Rider. Right from the start, I knew that my Master wasn't a regular girl, for a regular girl wouldn't have summoned something like me. In every age, there are pitiful girls. Pitiful sisters. I stare at the two mature homunculi and watch them as I was ordered to. Don't let grandfather touch them. These women were hostages for Berserker's little Master.

The homunculi maids say nothing and I say nothing to them. I could tell that to them, the little Einzbern Master was more than just someone they served. It wasn't something they were coined to feel. Looking back, despite that little white haired girl's arrogance and hubris, she had rushed back home in a panic when her home was mentioned yesterday in that small skirmish. That loyalty was certainly something that was reciprocated. From what I overheard from Sakura's "grandfather" if he could be called as such, the maids were Einzbern "failures". The little Master the maids served presumably was the "success". They had a concept of "family", but that shouldn't be surprising.

I and my sisters were born from wishes. The three of us, the deification of men's desires for perfect "idols". Right from the start, we were existences that were both envied and coveted. In that way, we never got to live as humans did. These homunculi were the same. Coined from fine molds, too perfect to be the humans they emulated, it was only natural for the world to reject them like the world had rejected us. I could only see tragedy for them at the end of this war. Even though the age of gods had ended, the world did not change. After all, there are still idiotic asses that follow the carrot on the string like Shinji.