"I'm pleased to see you remember. I'm sure the boy remembers too. After all, I've already failed to kill him twice. But if I'm not mistaken, this is the first time I've met the girl with the irregular Servant."
Caster descended, a hooded figure held aloft by a cloak that billowed out into sorcerous wings. With her training as a Magus, Ayaka felt the deceptively gentle caress of Caster's magic settling upon her mind, but this allowed her to fight back against it. Now that she had raised her mental defenses, it would take time or more invasive techniques for Caster to subvert or break them, and Caster only be able to glean her surface thoughts in the meantime. Really, for a Servant who belonged to a class vaunted for containing the greatest Magi of legend, flying and a bit of mind-reading were simply parlor tricks. So far, Caster didn't hold a candle to her sister -
Caster's mental probing withdrew, and the cloaked Servant smiled. "Fascinating. What a talented sister you had, young Sajyou. If only I had the chance to take her as my pupil, Manaka could have become a Magus beyond compare. You lack such obvious talent yourself, but you're not entirely without merit either."
Ayaka cursed herself. It had been a careless thought on her part, but it had given Caster the opportunity to discover her greatest weakness.
"You don't really want to fight, do you?" Caster continued, her voice now sounding melodious and soothing to Ayaka, almost like a mother's. "I'm not unreasonable. Simply give me the Command Spells for your Servant willingly, and not only will I let your friends walk away unharmed, but I will reward you with my instruction in Magecraft. Even a Magus such as yourself would bloom under my tutelage. We'd find your hidden talents, and you would soon become the envy of your fellow Magi."
"That's absurd! A Servant can't be the Master of another Servant!" Rin shouted back.
"Oh, but I can, little Magus," Caster replied. "Am I not a Magus myself? Of course, the removal of young Sajyou's Command Spells would cause her a certain degree of pain, but you'd all keep your lives, and it would truly be a small price to pay for what I'm offering her."
"You… you can't be serious!" Shirou protested. "It's in the middle of broad daylight! There are lots of innocent people in the school! If you start a fight here, who knows how many will be killed?"
"I'm not some heartless monster," Caster said, ever so reasonable amid the madness of the Holy Grail Wars. "Killing so many would be wasteful. Besides, I'm just here to offer you the chance to resolve things peacefully. So what will it be?"
"You aren't seriously going to listen to her, are you, Sajyou?" Rin said beside her.
"Master?" Shielder asked in spirit form.
Ayaka blinked, and it all became clear to her. Caster's words were but a subtler form of enchantment, sweet like poisoned honey.
She shook her head. "I'm sorry, but you're mistaken, Caster. I don't have any hidden talents to hone."
"There's no need to be modest, girl," Caster said, more insistently this time. "With such a bloodline and the feat of summoning a Shielder-class Servant behind you…"
"Even if that's true, if I accepted your offer, I'd become just like the Magi who started these stupid wars."
Caster scowled. "And what of you, boy? Your girlfriend may have rejected my offer, but if you were to offer your Command Spells in her stead, I might be willing to overlook her slight."
"I'm not -" Ayaka began.
"I'm not going to betray Sajyou-san," Shirou said firmly.
"Even to save her life?" Caster pressed.
"Just admit it, Caster: you're only trying to get us to give up our Servants because you know you're in the inferior position," Rin taunted.
"Troublesome children must be disciplined," Caster said, starting to rise into the sky once more. "Since you rejected my generous offer, I have no choice but to exterminate the three of you here and now. Don't worry. I'll find and kill the other Masters at your school later."
Caster's voice echoed above them, rapidly chanting a spell.
"Archer! Stop her!"
Rin's Servant materialized and conjured an arrow, which flew up to pierce Caster… only for Caster's form to shimmer like a mirage before vanishing.
"Did you really think I was foolish enough to show myself in person before so many Servants?" Caster laughed, mocking them from some unseen place. "Farewell, little Magi."
A vortex of fog swirled around them, and in another moment the atmosphere had changed. They were still on the roof of Homurahara Academy, but there was a desolate air to the place, and everything seemed to have a faint bluish glow to it. Rain beat down upon them, but there was a bright light through the thick clouds… showing a sunlit Homurahara Academy, like a strange mirror of the school they found themselves in, its students going about their lunch break, oblivious to what Caster had wrought. Sensing that something was fundamentally wrong about this place, Shielder manifested herself, and began surveying their surroundings carefully, remaining protectively close to Ayaka and Shirou.
"What is this?" Shirou asked.
That was what Ayaka wanted to know too, and she felt fear seize her. She had never seen thaumaturgy of this level performed before.
"A… Reality Marble?" Rin gasped.
"Uh, that's not helping."
"No. A Reality Marble is a type of Bounded Field that overwrites the World with one's mental landscape," Archer explained. "This is not a true Reality Marble, which would be entirely cut off from the World, but an illusory space created by Caster that mirrors the World. But don't assume that just because this world is fake it can't be deadly."
"You seem awfully knowledgeable on the subject for a Servant," Rin said suspiciously.
"It must have been something that I picked up," Archer shrugged. "But I would advise that we not dawdle -"
"How right you are!" Caster cackled as she appeared once again in the sky, silhouetted against the light of the real Homurahara Academy, a staff in her hands. Sigils appeared across the length of Caster's wings, and violet orbs of light gathered in front of each sigil. "And since you're now in my mirror world, there's no need for me to worry about collateral damage!"
"Master, take cover!" Shielder shouted urgently. Of course, there was no cover on the rooftop except directly behind her Servant's shield, so Ayaka found herself huddled there next to Shirou, who was at least not foolish enough to attempt an attack on a foe who was clearly out of range. Meanwhile, Archer had taken hold of Rin, and was leaping away with her toward the schoolyard below.
There was a rain of light from the sky as glowing magenta beams of energy fired from each of the sigils on Caster's wings, so intense that the center of each beam appeared nearly white. But the barrage was more like a bombing run than anything else. Chunks of concrete erupted from the rooftop wherever one of the beams struck, and it was also so bright and loud that Ayaka once again found herself practically paralyzed with fear. Her breathing was rapid and shallow, and she tried to cover her ears, but it did little good. She knew that if she stepped out from behind Shielder for a moment, Caster would annihilate her on the spot. Once again, she questioned her own sanity at allowing something as stupid as pride and rivalry to sway her back in the Church. Really, she should have headed back there and surrendered her Command Spells the morning after the fight with Berserker instead of plunging deeper into the madness of the Holy Grail War.
It seemed incredible that Shielder was still standing after this. Ayaka's perception as a Master told her that a direct hit from one of Caster's beams of light would even be enough to end most Servants. None of the beams had hit her Servant directly, thanks to Shielder's massive shield, which showed no sign of breaking even after taking so much punishment from Caster, suggesting that it was some sort of Conceptual Weapon. But even with the shield and considerable Magic Resistance, Shielder wouldn't be able to hold off Caster forever. Even if Shielder could fight Caster at range, she would be leaving not one but two people whom she was duty-bound to protect defenseless.
What were Rin and Archer doing now anyways? Did they just run away? But they couldn't escape from Caster's Bounded Field, could they?
"Incoming!" Shirou said suddenly, and he pushed Ayaka flat against the rooftop. Shielder heeded his words as well, dropping onto a knee even as she still held up her shield against Caster. A projectile flew overhead, and for the briefest of instants Ayaka saw it, a metal arrow that seemed almost twisted into a helix, before streaking onward to Caster.
The aerial Servant saw it coming, and uttered a single word in a language that Ayaka could not understand, "Μαρδοξ!" Caster wrapped her wings like a cocoon around her, and in the next moment the projectile struck. There was a sound like shattering glass, followed by a huge explosion, which left a hole in the side of the false Homurahara Academy. When it was over, there was no sign of Caster in the sky.
"Is…. is… she dead?" Ayaka stammered.
"I don't know," said Shirou, helping her to her feet, "but we can't stay here. Archer wasn't aiming at Caster."
"Caster is still alive," Shielder said. "Not only would this Bounded Field have likely dissolved if she had died, but I can still sense her presence nearby. But Shirou is right. We need to get off this rooftop while we still can."
They darted down the stairs to the fourth floor of the building… only for the door to lock itself behind them.
"Running like rats now, are you?" Caster's voice snarled through the halls. "No matter. Much as I would like to discipline you personally, I must deal with that Archer. But allow me to keep you entertained in the meantime."
There was a clattering sound, and skeletal soldiers began to materialize from the ground around them. Unnerving as that was by itself, like something out of a horror film, the skeletons weren't quite human either. Instead of proper skulls, all they had were jaws, with two rows of wickedly sharp teeth, and some of their bones ended in spiked protuberances too. They were a cheap sort of familiar, fragile golems armed with crude swords, but they were far beyond the crow familiars Ayaka could produce for herself. Clearly, Caster planned to overwhelm them with numbers.
Ayaka didn't want to die, so fighting was unavoidable. Steeling herself, she pushed Shirou between herself and Shielder.
"Sajyou-san?"
"You're no good in a fight as you are," she said as the skeletons started to close in, steadying the hand with her mother's ring of Witchcraft. In spite of her best efforts to control it, her fear began to creep into her voice. "If you want to be useful, just summon Saber already… hurry…"
"I can't sense him through the Bounded Field!"
She fired dark plumes at the nearest group of skeletons, shattering them as if they had been struck by shotgun pellets at point-blank range. "Then use a Command Spell! What are you waiting for?"
"Right!" He held out his hand, and one of the stigmata on his hand flared a bright red. "Come, Saber!" There was a rush of wind, and the knight clad in blue and silver materialized. The force of the wind blew the skeletons back, and in the next moment Saber had pressed the advantage, cleaving through several skeletons with a single sweep of his invisible sword.
"Don't wait to call me next time, Master," Saber chided.
XxX
With two Servants at their side, Caster's skeletal warriors didn't stand a chance. Saber cut a path ahead, while Shielder provided cover from the rear, and Ayaka got in what shots they could. Of course, Shirou wasn't satisfied with just summoning Saber, so he seized the opportunity to grab a broom that had spilled into the hallway from a supply closet, presumably when the building had been rocked by the explosion caused by Archer's projectile, and Reinforced it so that it could function as a makeshift sword. Ayaka had to admit, Shirou wasn't lacking in courage, putting himself on the front line with Saber, but it was born from the same stupidity that had almost gotten him killed against Berserker. No matter how many more skeletons were conjured, Shirou pressed on without hesitation.
Of course, it would have been too simple if Caster's skeletons were all that they had to worry about. The fake school had seemed eerie from the outside, but on the inside it was an alien realm. Sometimes, corridors seemed to loop back on themselves. Some stairways didn't lead down at all, but opened into yawning voids that led into other dimensions, threatening to swallow up the unwary, and occasionally smaller Bounded Fields would block forward progress, forcing them to backtrack to find another route. Ducking into a classroom and then leaving it might bring one to a different floor or wing of the building than the one they had entered from. All the while, wave after wave of skeletal warriors rose from the ground, and eventually Ayaka could feel exhaustion setting in. That had been Caster's plan all along, wearing them down in her funhouse if they escaped her initial bombardment, so that they'd be easy prey when they emerged. That the building occasionally shook, causing dust and occasionally parts of the ceiling to fall, showed that Caster was still busy fighting Archer, but that was hardly reassuring. Either way, the victor would try to kill them, and perhaps Caster or Archer would bring down the whole building down on them soon, turning it into their tomb.
"This is hopeless!" Ayaka cried.
Suddenly, Caster shrieked.
The false world of Caster's Bounded Field seemed to fracture around them, and it began to dissolve, fading away like a bad dream. Ayaka found herself back on the rooftop of the real Homurahara Academy, with Shielder, Shirou, and Saber by her side. Rin and Archer were there too, as if they had never leapt down into the schoolyard. Of course they hadn't. All of that had been in Caster's illusionary space.
Caster was still aloft above them, but she was struggling to maintain altitude. Her cloak had been slashed, and there was a wound on her side that kept bleeding in spite of her attempts to heal herself.
"Curse…you…" Caster coughed.
"Quiet, witch."
"Huh?" Ayaka said in confusion, before turning to see who had spoken to Caster. Perched atop the stairwell that led down from the roof, there was a man in a black draped in a black mantle. He wore an expressionless gray mask with a pattern like a tattoo on it that hid his entire face, but wild red hair could be seen behind it.
"Witch? Is that what you call me?" Caster raged.
"You would prefer that I call you Medea of Colchis?" the masked man asked with a cold laugh. "Be that as it may, you will always be the Witch of Betrayal."
"You…" Caster groaned weakly.
"Get out of my sight and lick your wounds," the masked man said pitilessly. "I'd kill you here and now, but I too do not wish to see this place become a battlefield."
"Hah… A pretty speech… But this isn't over…. I wonder… how long will it be before you are betrayed too…" Caster dematerialized into magenta wisps of light, and was gone.
"You saved our lives," Ayaka said to the masked man. For him to have fought Caster successfully, he had to be a Servant, but she couldn't get a read on him at all. "Why?"
"I was just passing through," the masked man replied. "My Master does not know that I am here, but I decided that stopping Caster was in our best interest. You're welcome."
So he was a Servant. His manner of speech irked Ayaka, reminding her all too much of a certain arrogant prick that she knew. She didn't believe that it was a coincidence that the Masked Servant had shown up either. But whose Servant was he then? Perfect as he seemed for someone like Shinji, there was no way that Shinji would send a Servant to help her after her rejection of him this morning, not without being there himself to get her to grovel for his aid. The Masked Servant had claimed to be acting independently, but if one part of his story was clearly false, why should she believe that either?
"Keep fighting amongst yourselves if you want," the Masked Servant said, turning to leave. "It won't be my fault if you bring down this school with you in the middle of the day."
The Masked Servant departed, disappearing into spirt form.
"Do you care to explain yourself, Archer?" Rin fumed. "You tried to kill Emiya and Sajyou!"
"I simply took the shot when the opportunity presented itself. They were doing such a good job of drawing Caster's attention, and you said yourself that they are our enemies, didn't you, Rin? We could have eliminated two Servants and two Masters at once."
"Quiet!" Rin snapped, and to their surprise, Archer complied. "If I still had another Command Spell…. Just go, Archer. We're done here for today."
Archer scowled, but once again obeyed, returning to spirit form. In turn, Ayaka nodded, prompting Shielder to dematerialize as well, but Saber could not return to spirit form, and so remained on the roof with them. He did dematerialize his armor though, revealing some of Shirou's casual attire beneath it.
"So… does that mean we're not enemies now, Tohsaka?" Shirou asked hopefully.
"Of course we're still enemies! I just… can't agree with what Archer did there. Caster's retreated, so there's no more reason for us to work together."
"You're not a bad person, Tohsaka-san, and your Servant must be pretty battered by now. He was already injured from Saber. If you'd just work with Sajyou-san and I..."
"Why would you want to, Emiya? My Servant just tried to kill both of you. I'll kill you myself if I find you out alone without your Servant. Really, I'd be doing you a favor. Some Masters would torture you first, but I promise you I'd make it quick."
"It's scary how you can joke about that so light-heartedly Tohsaka-san."
"I'm not joking!"
"Of course not," Saber said, nodding with a bit of a grin.
"Ugh! Why do you have to have Archer's attitude too? One of him is more than enough."
Saber shrugged.
"And what do you think of all of this, Sajyou-san?" Rin asked. "Are you still going to persist with this nonsense of an alliance between us?"
"No," Ayaka said, shaking her head. "It was a mistake to even ask. I'm sorry." She didn't have the energy to argue with Rin now, and she knew it would be unwise to trust Archer not to try to kill them again.
"Sajyou-san?" Shirou asked.
"See, Emiya-kun?" Rin smiled. "Your partner's smart enough. What do you need me for? All you have to do is listen to what Sajyou-san tells you. So I'll let the two of you go for now, but don't expect any more favors from me. We'll leave the roof one at a time, so we don't attract too much attention all at once, got it."
"Yeah," he said, deflated.
XxX
The lunch break was nearly over when Ayaka descended from the roof. It had seemed like it had been much longer, but she still had to attend class after everything that had happened… on an empty stomach, no less. Ducking into one of the restrooms, she saw she was a mess too, with disheveled hair and a number of scrapes from the misadventure in Caster's false school. She did what she could to tidy her appearance, but Misaya, or just about anyone else, would know that something had happened. The others would probably just assume it had been bullying though.
"Hey, Sajyou-san!" a voice called out.
"Isemi-san?"
"I've been meaning to catch up with you, Sajyou-san. Thanks for earlier."
"Oh… Shinji… right…. It was nothing."
"Are you okay, Sajyou-san? You look shaken."
"I'm fine," she lied. For a moment, her mind flickered back to the Masked Servant, and then she turned her gaze to Isemi. She blinked. No, that couldn't be. Aside from having red hair and being male, Isemi had nothing in common with the Masked Servant, and she sensed nothing different about him than any other human. It just had to be stress getting to her.
"If you say so, Sajyou-san. But if anyone's giving you problems, just let me know."
"Um… thanks," she murmured.
"Tch… You're putting the moves on Sajyou-san again?" Matou Shinji snarled as he came down the corridor. "I thought we discussed this earlier, Isemi-kun."
"We did."
"You're insufferable. But say, Sajyou-san, you look a bit worse for wear. I'm willing to overlook this morning. If anyone's bullying you, I'm the only guy you need to protect you."
"Just drop the act, Shinji," she said tiredly. "We both know what you're really after, and my answer is still no."
"Oh, really? That's how you're going to play this, Sajyou-san? We really must discuss whatever it is you think I'm hiding then."
"No."
"Give it a rest, Matou-san," Isemi said. "She's made it clear she's not interested."
Ayaka sighed a bit in relief, silently thanking Isemi-san.
"Fine. Be that way, Sajyou-san. I'm sure there will be others who will appreciate my friendship when I offer it!"
XxX
Any gossip about her disheveled appearance that afternoon seemed to be drowned out by the buzz about the handsome blonde foreigner who had come to visit the school. He seemed well-mannered enough, but he had been asked to leave and come back after classes were over if he had any business there. Other girls seemed to be busy debating who was more of a heartthrob, Isemi-san, or Saber-san.
Ayaka wasted no time in leaving at the end of school, and made sure that Shirou didn't hang around either, lest he become a target. They met with Saber outside of the campus, and then headed back to Shirou's residence. Sakura and Fujimura-sensei joined them later as well.
"So I spoke to Kuzuki-san during the lunch break," Fujimura-sensei said over dinner. "He really did put you on a project together. Be that as it may, I still don't want any funny business while she's over here! And you, Saber-san! If you wanted a tour of the school, all you had to do was ask. I could even show you next weekend!"
It sounded like Fujimura-sensei had her own funny business in mind to Ayaka. But really, what Ayaka was focused on was eating enough to make up for missing lunch, not that gorging herself was difficult with all of the good food on the table before her. Sakura still didn't seem particularly happy with her presence, but she was quieter about it tonight.
Fujimura-sensei also inquired about Ayaka's scrapes, as it was her duty as a teacher to intervene if any of her students were being bullied. However, Fujimura-sensei didn't press the matter when Ayaka told her it was nothing.
After dinner, Sakura and Fujimura-sensei left Shirou and Ayaka to "study", but in reality no work was done on Kuzuki-sensei's project, for they were busy planning their next move. Caster was wounded, and thaumaturgy on that scale was incredibly costly, even for a Servant. It was likely that Caster would be driven to desperation to restore her mana, and that they could see an spike in unexplained "gas leaks", which had started shortly before the Holy Grail War began, throughout the city as she preyed on civilians. If what the Masked Servant said was true, and Caster was indeed Medea of Colchis, she would also be sure to seek revenge as soon as she was recovered, and would probably try to simply level Homurhara Academy next time. Normally, an obvious place to look would be along the leylines of Fuyuki city, but in their anemic state, they would be of little use to Caster. They would need a more tangible lead.
The Masked Servant was another unknown. While he had helped them against Caster, it was impossible to know his true motives, though they could assume that he was affiliated with a Master at the school. That either meant Shinji, who Ayaka now firmly believed to be acting as the Matou Master, based on his advances toward her, or a hitherto unknown Master at their school, a concerning possibility in its own right.
Lastly, Rin was still hostile to them, though neither of them truly wished to fight her, and Archer would make any alliance with her problematic. Misaya and Illya were also still out there. One of them would be sure to act soon, to finish what they had started.
But in the end, the two allies were too exhausted to head out that night or make further plans, and Ayaka let sleep claim her.
Author's Note:
This chapter took longer to write than the last one, because I pretty much rewrote it after deciding I wasn't happy with its first iteration. Also, my schedule will be getting busier as school resumes, so please do not be alarmed if the pace of updates slows somewhat. I have a much better foundation to build this story upon than its previous version, and all of your support, from reviews, to favorites, to follows helps give me motivation to keep writing it.
The battle at the school is an early plot point in both Fate and Unlimited Blade Works. Prototype features this as well, with Caster using her magic to turn the school into an alien realm, which is the rationale for her tactics here. I drew further inspiration from Caster's Bounded Field in Episode 12 of the UBW anime and Kayneth's descriptions of his defenses at the Fuyuki Hyatt Hotel in Fate/Zero. Logically, being a Magus from the Age of the Gods, any defenses Kayneth can make, Caster can do better and in a fraction of the time. But while Caster is indeed theoretically able to create a Bounded Field on the scale of a Reality Marble, though not a true Reality marble itself, doing so is stated to be very costly, even for her, so don't expect her to be pulling the same stunt twice here.
Yet as much as things remain the same, other things change. Blood Fort Andromeda does not appear at school. Rin still hasn't cemented an alliance with Shirou. And as other Masters and their Servants make moves overnight as Shirou and Ayaka sleep, further divergences will arise in the next chapter. But of course, aspects of F/SN's three routes, and Prototype-exclusive plot elements will continue to echo throughout the story as well.
And again, if anyone who's reasonably knowledgable about the Nasuverse wishes to become my new Beta reader, please send me a PM.
