This takes place between chapter's 9 and 10, Miyu and Illya are 17

A Typical Morning

Two young women, one Asian and one albino, awoke in the bed they had shared the night before.

"Illya," the Japanese girl asked all of a sudden, "how did all of this happen?"

"What do you mean, Miyu?" asked the albino.

"It's been a long time since we first met, almost seven years, but part of me still feels like none of this is real," Miyu explained. "I'm... I'm afraid, Illya. I'm afraid that this-you, and Chloe, and Rin and Luvia, Ruby and Saphire, the others... that all of this, your love and friendship, our adventures, the joyful experiences I had in the months after we collected the cards and the life I've lived ever since you all rescued me... My brother's wish upon the Holy Grail..." She paused. It was clear that this somewhat painful for Miyu to admit. "Even now, years later, I can't help but fear that it's all just some dream or illusion that I'm experiencing and that at any minute I'll awaken from this fantasy and once again I'll simply be a little girl trapped in the Ainsworth's castle, convinced of her own lack of humanity, with only sessions of torture and her eventual sacrifice or else disposal to look forward too as the best case scenario."

Illya responded to Miyu's confession by pulling the other girl into a tight hug. "Miyu," the albino said, "I promise that I'm just as real as you are, that everything else is just as real, and that all of that is far behind you."

"I know, but-"

Illya interrupted the other girl with a kiss on the forehead. "You shouldn't think like that," she said. "It's all behind you, you're safe now, we're all okay, so..."

"You're right," Miyu answered. The divine blooded girl returned the affections of her homunculus companion. "I did think about it though," Miyu said after a few moments, "that if, if they had been right, and I was just some object meant to grant the wishes of others-"

"Miyu," Illya interrupted

"If it was true, I know it's not, but if it was true," Miyu explained, "I'd want to belong to you and grant your wishes."

"Well the only wish of mine that I'd ever want you to grant is to be your own person," Illya replied, "because you're a million times more valuable as my friend than as a Holy Grail."

"Granted," Miyu answered with a smile.

"Now, I'm a Holy Grail too," Illya said in a joking tone, "so if you're granting my wish it's only fair that I grant yours in return."

"Then I wish to always have your love and friendship" Miyu requested without hesitation.

"Granted," the lesser Grail replied.

"I love you, Illya."

"I know."

The two girls continued to hug for a moment. "I need to get home," Illya said after a moment. She sat up and adjusted the shoulder of her pajamas. "If Kuro realizes that we're having a moment without her..."

"Yes," Miu answered, "she had the most impressive fit last time that happened."

"I wouldn't call it a fit exactly," Illya explained, "but she doesn't like to feel left out, you know?"

"No one does," Miyu said, "to be honest I'm not quite sure I'd have reacted differently if you two had had a such a moment without me." Miyu was silent for a moment, then in concerned seriousness asked: "You haven't, have you?"

"Of course not," Illya replied with the straightest face imaginable.

"Illya..."

"I do need to get going though," Illya said, "seriously, I snuck out last night to come here and Chloe can't cover for me forever." Irisviel and Kiritsugu were out of town on what they had said was business, once more leaving Sella in charge, and the maid was much more strict on when, where, and how the girls were able to sleep over at each other's homes than Illya's mother was. Miyu didn't quite understand why.

Shortly after Illya left, Miyu herself got up. After bathing and getting dressed she went to her home's kitchen. She'd volunteered to provide a cake for a fundraiser event taking place tomorrow and she wasn't sure if she had enough eggs. She found the Kaleidostick Saphire mumbling to herself in the kitchen, for some reason.

"Sapphire?" She asked, "are you alright?"

"Oh, of course, Lady Miyu," the stick answered, "I've just received an inter-dimensional call from my younger sister, Opal. She's found a Master-oh, sister, that's my Master."

"You have a younger sister?" It was somewhat of an odd thought, that there would be more such artifacts out in the world.

"Oh yes, though she was made a few years after Ruby and I contracted with you and Lady Illya," Sapphire explained to her Master. "She's been on an important mission for Lord Zeltretch on a distant Earth for the last few years and is finally making progress on it."

"Well, give her and her Master my best regards in their task," Miyu concluded, a platitude that she had learned to apply. She then checked her refrigerator. It looked like she didn't have enough eggs after all and would have to go purchase some.