Disclaimer: I do not own the Fate franchise it belongs to Kinoko Nasu and Type-Moon.

Transposition

Chapter 4

Rain fell from a leaden sky, pouring heavily down on burning ruins. Steam hissed as the rain fell, water evaporating as it struck searing-hot stone and metal, flames spluttering as the water soaked into their fuel and drowned them into inactivity.

Smoke rose in grey columns as the fires died down, and then subsided themselves as smoldering fuel was doused and cooled by the rain. A boy stumbled through the ruins, his clothes singed and blackened, burns dotting patches of exposed skin, his eyes and face alike blank from his experiences.

Coming to a halt, the boy stared blankly ahead of him for a moment, and with a weak whimper collapsed, crumpling backward to fall with a muddy splash on the ground. He lay silent, breathing weakly as he stared up at the leaden sky, uncaring of the rainfall on and around him, and splashing into the blackened ground.

And as he lay there, he remembered. He remembered the flames licking at his skin, the baking heat of the air around him, and the screams and the wails of the dying.

He remembered walking through the ruins, struggling through a sea of fire in the dead of night, all conscious thought swallowed up by a base, animal instinct to survive. All that mattered was going forward, to make one shaky step after another, to keep going no matter how much it hurt, no matter how much easier it would be to simply give up and succumb.

And he remembered how there were others in those flames, and how many of them noticed his passing. He remembered their cries and pleas, how they begged for him to help them, and to not leave them behind.

And he remembered ignoring them, remembered leaving them behind, remembered how he left them to die, putting his survival over theirs.

And he would never forget, all his life.

But in that moment, as he lay helplessly in the mud, with no knowledge of who he was and where he had come from, all that he could think of was that he was alive. He was alive. He'd come this far, through all the pain and suffering, and lived to see another day. He was alive.

He was alive.

But now that he'd done this much, the effort to go so far, to reach this point, finally caught up to him. It was enough, wasn't it? And he'd left behind so many to die to get here. Now…now…

…maybe it was his turn?

Slowly, the boy closed his eyes, his breathing growing weaker, finally allowing himself to give way to the temptation to just let it go. He felt the rain continuing to fall on and around him, the cooling air and the muddy ground stealing the warmth from his body, but it didn't matter anymore. All that was left was to wait for death to come for him in his turn.

For a long time, there was only the sound of the falling rain and the growing coldness, but then there came a new sound. Slow, heavy footsteps, splashing softly on the muddy ground, coming closer and closer with every step. Despite having decided to accept his fate, the boy weakly opened his eyes as the footsteps came to a halt beside him, and beheld the empty-eyed visage of a man with dark eyes and hair staring down at him.

Mud splashed as the man fell to his knees, tears and rainwater mixing on his face, twisted with a desperate smile. It was the smile of someone who'd found what he was looking for, the smile of someone who'd suffered so much and was finally being saved from his torment.

Why?

Why would that man smile like that in a place like this?

Why was that man smiling at him like that?

Why?

Slowly, the boy closed his eyes again. He barely registered the man's movements, the warmth spreading slowly through his body, the pain and the weakness draining away, and the man pulling him into a crushing embrace.

When next the boy opened his eyes, he would be lying in a warm hospital bed, dressed in clean clothes, bandages wrapped around his body and over his injuries. And moments after that, realization struck.

He was alive. So many had died, but he had survived. He had survived.

Shirou opened his eyes, and he gasped explosively, forcing air into his lungs under his own power. For a few moments he just lay there, breathing heavily, and then with a groan forced himself up on his elbows into a slouch.

The sound of something light yet hard falling to the ground beside him caused Shirou to glance in its direction, and he blinked as he picked up a large ruby attached to a silver chain. As he held it up, he seemed to remember something, a girl's voice speaking firmly in a foreign language, and unreal light washing down from above.

"What…who was that?" Shirou murmured, lowering the jewel before wincing and grabbing at his bloody chest.

As he did so, he remembered the man in blue with the red spear, and how he had chased Shirou down before stabbing him in the heart. "That was…" Shirou muttered before forcing himself to get up, leaning against the wall immediately afterward. "No…"

Shirou looked down at his bloody form, and at the blood – his blood – spilled on the ground. "I…should be dead." He said softly, rubbing his aching chest, the pain slowly but surely going away. "I should be. Whoever or whatever that was, I'm sure they stabbed my heart. But…why am I still alive?"

Shirou blinked, and holding up the ruby on the its chain again remembered the girl's voice and the light that came with it. "Who was that?" he asked again as he lowered the jewel. "And…did they…did she save me?"

Shirou kept leaning against the wall for another moment, and then with a grunt of pained exertion forced himself to start walking away, tucking the jewel and its chain into a pocket.

Archer sighed as he sat in the Tohsaka mansion's living room's couch. Turning his head, he glanced at his Master, who was staring, arms crossed over her chest, out a window into the night outside.

"Nothing like Rin at all," he thought to himself, noting the sleeveless, black, printed shirt and dark-colored shorts Sakura wore, a dark-colored sports jacket lying thrown over a nearby armchair. "And still so very like her."

"I'm appalled." He said. "You used one of your most valuable jewels just to save a witness. Sakura, I'm sure you know the rule when it comes to witnesses is to shut them up, permanently if necessary. And yet you…"

Sakura ignored him, her thoughts elsewhere as she stared out into the night. It's not that she wasn't listening though, just subconsciously filing away what her Servant was talking about for later.

Sakura laughed at a joke told by a friend, but noticed something as she glanced out a window in passing. "What is that?" she asked.

"It's a PE class."

"I can see that!" Sakura replied shortly at the cheeky question, the other girl grinning and sticking her tongue out at Sakura. "I meant that."

By that, Sakura was referring to a redheaded upperclassman trying to manage a high jump that was clearly too high for his level…and from the wrong direction to boot. "I don't know." Sakura's friend answered. "Maybe he's doing it as a dare or something? I don't know why else anyone would do what he's doing."

"I see…"

Sakura looked out the window again, and watched for several moments more as the boy continued what he had been doing. Eventually she lost interest and moved on, thinking the boy would do so as well after a bit.

He didn't.

Twenty minutes later, and he was still at it, and still was an hour later. It was stupid and should have been treated as such, but…

…that expression on his face...that air of determination around him, as though even though the boy already knew it could not be done he'd still try and somehow do it regardless...

...and he eventually did.

"Hey, who was that upperclassman anyway?"

Sakura blinked, and then turned to face Archer. The Servant stopped speaking mid-sentence, caught off-guard by the cold expression on her face. And then she blinked and smiled, and looked way as her smile turned strangely bittersweet.

"Stupid?" she echoed. "Maybe it was. I don't regret it though. If I had to do it all over again, I'd do the same thing."

"But why?" Archer asked. "I mean I know he's a schoolmate of yours but is that really enough of a reason to use something so valuable as that jewel from earlier to save his life?"

"So I should have just let him die?"

"Yes." Archer replied bluntly. "He was already dying when you found him, stabbed and left bleeding out by Lancer. A lost cause by all accounts, and instead you squandered a prized jewel and all the prana it had for him."

Sakura glared at Archer. "Human lives should not be so cheaply treated!" She vehemently said much to his surprise. And then in the next moment she smiled sadly and looked away again. "Well, they shouldn't be. And neither should efforts meant to save them. But, the world doesn't work like that, does it?"

Archer was at a loss for words. "Well," Sakura said. "I don't regret it, and there's point in crying over spilled milk. Even if we killed him – not that I will nor will I let you – we won't get back the prana used to save his life. So let's leave it at that."

Silence fell between them for several long moments, and then Sakura sighed before turning back to the window. "Earlier you asked why, didn't you?" she said. "Well, I have two answers, but I don't know which is the right one. It could be both, either, or even neither."

Archer could only stare, and Sakura took his silence as indication to continue. "First, maybe this heartless angel isn't as heartless as she thinks she is." Sakura said, the bitter smile on her face something Archer could only stare at. "Or maybe, she's even more selfish than she thinks she is."

Sakura was watching as the rest of the track and field team were practicing, when a swallow swooped down towards her. Raising a hand, the bird winged over to perch on a finger.

"Oh wow," one of her friends said. "Birds really do like you, don't they?"

"I guess they do." Sakura replied absentmindedly. It wasn't just a bird though it was actually one of her familiars. And it was telling her how Shirou had been roped into – and willingly again – doing someone else's chores for them just so they could idle away someplace else.

In this case, Shirou had to clean a classroom all by himself, and from what her familiar said, he was surprisingly cheerful while at it.

It was stupid and incomprehensible, and yet…from what she'd seen and heard of her sempai ever since she'd started looking into him after watching him try that high jump months ago…

"He's just that kind of person, I guess." Sakura thought, raising her hand to let her familiar fly off. "He may be too nice for his own good, but…it's not bad."

Sakura didn't say any more after that, just staring out the window in silence as Archer looked down in thought. "Why do they always fall for that idiot?" he asked himself. "And why do they always have to be this…difficult? Rin always pretended she was colder and crueler than she really was, and Sakura…"

Archer sighed as he let the thought trail off, and glanced at the counterpart of the hapless girl he remembered. "This girl," she thought. "That smile and what she just said says so much about how she really is, and yet, also raises more questions."

Archer briefly closed his eyes, and sighed again. "Maybe," he thought to himself before shaking his head. "No…I shouldn't…"

Archer sighed. "Even if we let it go," he said. "Lancer won't."

Shall I play my role in this second-rate drama to the very end to the best of my abilities?

Sakura glanced at him curiously. "What?" she asked.

"If he finds out that the witness is still alive," Archer said, neutrally watching as Sakura's eyes widened in alarm and realization. "Then…"

Archer trailed off as Sakura turned and ran for the doorway, grabbing her jacket as she passed by. "Let's move it, Archer." She shouted.

"No."

Sakura stumbled and nearly fell, turning her head to look at him over a shoulder in disbelief. Archer stared back, his face set with uncaring determination, though inwardly he was resigned at how this was going to play out.

"What do you mean no?" Sakura asked, half-turning towards him.

"I mean it, no." Archer said, sitting back in the couch and crossing his arms over his chest. "There's no need for either of us to take action to save that schoolmate of yours, in fact I'd even say doing so would be a wasted effort. He might already be dead by the time we reach him, and even if he isn't, to really keep him safe you'll have to take custody of him. In short: he'll be a burden, and one I refuse to take or let you take."

Sakura gaped, wide-eyed at him. It would have been funny had the situation not been so serious. After a couple of moments, Sakura pulled herself together, and glared at Archer. "Right," she ground out. "That's your entitled opinion and I respect that. But I'm also your Master, and we are going to save Emiya-sempai, and I am ordering you to get off that couch and come with me to keep Lancer from finishing the job!"

"I refuse to accept those orders."

"Archer!"

Archer merely smiled at the increasingly-petulant reactions, a smile that went out like a light as Sakura raised a hand, her three command spells glowing. "Don't make me do this, Archer." She said.

"You wouldn't."

"By the power of the command spell…" Sakura began, a command spell flaring before vanishing.

Some things just never change.

Shirou came home to a dark and empty house.

That's wasn't surprising, though. It was late, far later than even when he worked overtime at his part-time job in the city. So he couldn't really expect either Taiga or Rin to wait for him before eating dinner, much less going home. Taiga might not live too far away, but Rin lived across the city.

They did however, leave a covered plate of food and a note for Shirou on the dining room table. Shirou took it in a glance despite the dark – it was rather short – and ignoring the food, slumped wearily against a nearby wall. Things being what they were Shirou had understandably little appetite.

He didn't know how long he sat there in the dark, head bowed as he thought about everything that had happened earlier in the evening. The battle between those two…people, in the school's quadrangle. Getting noticed and then chased down by one of those two combatants. And then getting stabbed and…

…well, he clearly wasn't dead, but…he should be. He just knew he should be dead. And yet here he was.

The weight of the jewel in his pocket hinted at why that was the case, as did the barely-remembered memory of a girl speaking in a foreign language with that strange light. Was that a magus? Was what he heard a spell? A spell that saved his life, but if so, why?

Shirou would probably have asked more questions as he thought about the events from earlier, but the sudden burst of killing intent that saturated the house caught him by surprise. And worst of all, he recognized it.

It was the same killing intent from the man in blue who'd stabbed him in the heart.

"He followed me here?" Shirou gasped, trying to get to his feet only for his legs to give out under him and send him sprawling on the ground. "I need a weapon, anything!"

Scrambling around in desperation, it took only a moment for Shirou to find and pick up a rolled tube of paper with thin metal plates on the back. Despite the situation, Shirou found himself smiling at a painful memory from the previous night.

"Ta-da!" Taiga said playfully while holding up a movie poster with her hands, and caused Shirou to jump to his feet in surprise. "They're old movie posters! I brought them over for…ah!"

"That's not what I meant." Shirou said as he swiped the poster away, and rolling it up, made to strike Taiga with a shout.

Too slow…the moment he began to move, Taiga had recognized what he was doing and swiping up a still-rolled poster preempted Shirou. There was a clang of metal, and the rolled poster Shirou was holding fell to the ground.

"What was that?" Taiga said with a grin, as Shirou grit his teeth in pain and glared at her. "You're still ten years too young to be challenging a kendo veteran like me!"

"That's not the point." Shirou ground out. "Are movie posters supposed to be hard like this?"

Taiga jolted, and then recoiled in embarrassment. "Oh sorry!" she said with a nervous and flustered smile. "This was the limited edition with iron plates on the back."

"IRON…?"

Sitting to one side of the dysfunctional (surrogate) siblings, Rin yawned at their usual antics. "Dinner's getting cold." She deadpanned.

"It can't be helped." Shirou said with a small smile, tightening his grip on the poster. "All that's left to go to from here is up. Trace on."

Shirou closed his eyes, shutting out the searing pain of prana flowing through his body, and focused only on the poster in his hand. "Components, analyzed." He said. "Fundamental Structure, analyzed. Composition, reinforced."

Shirou opened his eyes and brandished his makeshift weapon in front of him. "Now, let's…!" Shirou began to say when a dark figure dropped down behind him.

Shirou turned his head, and narrowly dodged a blow that would have taken his head clean off otherwise. He was sent sprawling, and the food on the table spilled on the floor, but he was alive.

"Honestly," the man in blue growled. "And I went to all the trouble to make it painless too. Stay dead for good this time, brat!"

He stabbed forward with his spear, but Shirou skidded back onto his feet, avoiding getting skewered yet again. Undeterred, the man in blue pressed the attack with a series of stabs and slashes that Shirou clumsily parried, each blow striking with enough force to stagger him, the boy barely able to stay on his feet.

And then he was sent flying by a kick through a door, out onto the backyard. Scrambling away and to his feet, Shirou ran for the shed even as the man in blue jumped out after him.

Smirking, he flanked Shirou and kicking him in the flank sent him flying with a shout of pain to slam hard against one of the shed's walls before falling to the ground. At the same time, unnoticed by Shirou, a trio of symbols faded into view over a hand and down an arm. Clutching at his side, Shirou coughed and glared at his enemy, and then his eyes went wide as the man in blue threw his spear at him.

Somehow, Shirou avoided it, the spear stabbing into the ground with enough force that had it hit it would undoubtedly have pinned Shirou against the wall. Shirou was now again on his feet, only to be kicked through the shed's door in the next moment.

Shirou coughed and gasped on the floor, gingerly clutching at his side and belly. As he regained his breath, he turned his head, and gasped, wide-eyed at the man in blue crouched in a relaxed fashion in the doorway, spear held relaxed over a shoulder.

"Give it up." He said in a suffering tone. Something about that just made Shirou's blood boil, the pain vanishing in a blaze of adrenaline.

Shouting angrily, Shirou lunged at the man in blue who dodged back, graciously letting Shirou get to his feet before counterattacking. He struck once, twice, and then three times. Shirou blocked all three, but the third shattered his weapon into glittering shards that quickly crumbled into dust and had the man in blue briefly surprised, allowing Shirou to take a couple of step backs.

In the next moment though, the man in blue had fallen into a stance, his spear aimed squarely at Shirou's chest. "Checkmate." The man in blue said with a grin. "Sorry kid, but this is the end of the line. Shame…you might actually have been the seventh."

Unknown to Shirou, who had his back to it, a magic circle carved into the shed's floor was beginning to glow. Arcane symbols, lines and circles glowed softly as motes danced in the air above, while the symbols on Shirou's hand and arm flickered in sympathy.

Shirou grit his teeth and clenched his fists as he stared down the enemy in front of him. "Die…?" he thought. "I'm going to die here? Damn it…! I can't die here! Not like this…not when I haven't done anything yet…not without having saved a single life…not without having changed a single thing! For my ideals…dad's ideals…not like this!"

At the thought, the symbols on Shirou's hand and arm flared bright and hot, as did the summoning circle behind Shirou. The man in blue and Shirou alike shielded their eyes from the light flooding into and out of the workshop, both turning toward the summoning circle to see prana coalescing into a petite, armored form in the middle.

And not just them: the light flooding out of the shed was easily visible a good distance away to anyone within line of sight, including Sakura and Archer as they closed in. "What's that?" Sakura asked in surprise.

There was a blast of wind, and with a cry the man in blue was sent flying out from the doorway and tumbling across the yard beyond. Shirou was also buffeted aside by the blast, and landed hard against a wall. As he lowered his arms, having used them to shield his face, he speechlessly regarded the person standing in front of him.

She was a girl of average height, wearing a dress of blue and white with rune-engraved plates of steel over her chest, torso, and skirt, heavy gauntlets covering her hands and forearms. Her blonde hair was tied back in a bun, bright green eyes regarding him coolly.

But that wasn't what struck Shirou the most.

That she was beautiful there could be no doubt.

No, what struck Shirou the most was the air that surrounded the beautiful girl. Though Shirou had never met anyone like her in the past, he just knew the only way to describe her was...'regal'.

Yes, here was someone used to command and being obeyed without question, and yet despite a part of him instinctively distrusting such an absolute existence, he knew that this girl was one who would never abuse her authority, and would only ever use it as it should be used.

How? How did I know that?

"Servant Saber," the girl said. "Here I stand by your summons. Answer me: are you my Master?"

A/N

Some things just will not change.

Still a short fight, but again, Shirou vs. Lancer is pretty cut and dry so no need to dawdle here like with the earlier Lancer vs. Archer fight. Some character development, but for the most part still stations of the canon. Don't worry, we'll get past those soon enough. For one thing the Rider isn't Medusa, so you can expect stations of the canon won't be applicable once they start involving (and develop from) the Blood Fort.