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

Different Fates

Chapter 4

"Remind me again how we got into this mess?"

"It was a card game wasn't it?" Sakura Tohsaka replied to her friend, who was busy altering the doors into their motel room and fusing them into the wall itself. "Back during Countess Grimmelschaussen's birthday party a couple of weeks ago, and we somehow managed to end up playing with a couple of Enforcers related to the countess' family. The problem is they were wagering their assigned duties off. If I remember right, their supervisor blew his top when he found out."

"But since this was just supposed to be an investigative mission about a minor heretic conducting some kind of Human transmutation experiments…" Anika Freiin von Derfflinger said while walking up to Sakura's side. "…we still ended up going here."

"And now we're boxed-in." Sakura concluded, staring out of the grimy window at the cloaked figures hobbling up and filling the road leading up to the poor excuse for a hotel that the rundown Spanish village had. Thumping came from behind them, along with muffled shouts of bewilderment and frustration. "What the hell are these things?"

"That's something we'll have to find out." Anika said, loosening the sword scabbarded at her waist. "Later…our first priority is getting out of this place and reporting back. Something tells me that this goes beyond mere Human transmutation."

Sakura nodded, also loosening her sword. Much like Anika, she carried a long-sword, a birthday gift during her tenth birthday three years ago. And much like Anika, she was if not a master, at least a low-end expert in its use. She swallowed dryly. "Anika…" she said softly. "…have you ever killed anyone before?"

The baroness didn't reply at once. "No…" she said just as softly a few moments later. "…I haven't. Father says that the first time is the worst, but you'll eventually get used to it."

"I don't want to have to get used to it." Sakura said sadly. "But…"

"Yeah I know…" Anika replied with a nod. "…right now our duty as magi is to survive, and to report back to the Clock Tower that things have gone very wrong here. And to do that, we'll have to cut our way out."

Sakura sighed and nodded, before taking a few steps back and pointing a finger at the window and the surrounding walls. Her crest flashed to life and prana gathered at her fingertip. "You go first Anika." She said. "Your fire magic should clear us some breathing room."

"Good point…" Anika said and her own crest flashing as she tensed. Sakura took a deep breath and opened fire, her personal variation of the Gandr incorporating a spatial instability factor in place of the typical debilitation curse. A result of her research into the Imaginary Numbers, the imploding rounds tore up the window and the surrounding wall.

With an incoherent shout, Anika leaped forward and out. Forty inches of cold steel bisected one of the cloaked figures as she landed in the midst of the crowd, flames erupting around her feet and exploding outwards. Guttural and inhuman screams rang out as cloth and flesh were turned to ash, blackened bones falling to the smoking ground.

The Derfflingers were metallurgists. Their magic was focused on the smelting and forging of iron, steel, and metal, and as such they usually possessed an affinity for either or both fire and earth, their mysteries focused on precise control over heat and matter. Anika had an affinity for fire, and she wielded it with the flair and ease to be expected from her bloodline.

None of that mattered to the young baroness, kneeling on the ground with a sword held in her hand, frozen from having slain for the first time in her life. Even if the blackened skeletons around her were only remotely humanoid, it still had an effect on her. "Anika…!" Sakura shouted from above as the singed and angry mutants swept towards her, elongated limbs and tentacle-like fingers reaching through dirty cloaks from the street before her and from the hotel behind.

The baroness blinked, and then with another incoherent shout she charged forward into the crowd, cold and honest steel flashing in the dim light of the few streetlights and cutting limbs and splitting heads and bodies with extreme prejudice. The enemy wasn't Human, not anymore assuming they were Human to begin with, and even if they were, magi did not fear death.

And they most certainly do not fear to deliver it.

Or at least they shouldn't…but the baroness was a swordswoman, and one of the first things that had been taught to her as a swordswoman was that if one sought to wield a sword, then one should be ready to kill when the time came. A sword was a weapon, nothing more and nothing less, forged to kill and to spill blood. Only someone who understood and accepted that truth would be allowed to learn how to use a sword, much less wield it.

Only they could bear the responsibility that came with it.

The mutants poured from front and back, slick and inhuman ichor splashing around and onto the ground as the baroness cut her way down the street. But her back was exposed.

She would be overrun in a few moments, even sooner if not for the awkward gait and locomotion of the mutant things. Another of the creatures was bisected from shoulder to hip as Sakura jumped down, and quickly rising she swung two-handed as she turned full circle. Corpses and ichor fell around her, the mutants from the hotel lobby briefly falling back, spitting and gurgling unintelligible curses at her.

And much like Anika, Sakura froze as realization sunk in like a blow to the gut. Thoughts swept through her mind a mile per minute, and just as the mutants from the hotel regained their nerve she blinked as she came to the same realization as Anika did.

The enemy wasn't Human. And even if they were, she was a magus and a swordswoman to boot.

With a snarl she aimed and fired Gandr, tearing the mutants behind her apart. And with a shout of her own she ran towards her friend, cutting down mutants in showers of ichor. As bodies fell twitching to the ground, somehow Anika and Sakura came back-to-back, and the two friends shot smiles at each other over their shoulders.

Let's win this.

"There's no end to this!" Sakura shouted some time later, probably no more than twenty minutes at the most but feeling like hours to them. The street behind them was covered in ichor and corpses, and their hands and blades alike were filthy.

"There…!" Anika shouted as she stabbed a mutant through the mouth, and pointing at an alleyway a few steps away. She kicked the corpse off of her sword before gutting three mutants with one swing. "We'll lose them in the alleys, and they're narrow enough that they can only come at us single-file! Hopefully they're smart enough to realize how stupid that would be!"

"Good idea!" Sakura shouted back as split one mutant's head in half.

Anika responded by pointing a finger down the street. Her crest flashed once, and a lance of pure heat erupted from her finger and ripped through air and bodies alike before lasing a molten hole through a wall at an intersection several meters further down the street. Corpses fell, torsos vaporized while other mutants screamed and clutched badly-burnt limbs.

Sakura and Anika shouted as they charged for the alley, cutting down everything in their path. As Anika ran into the narrow path, Sakura pulled out a clear gem and cut her finger along one of the facets before throwing it behind her. "Compress…!" she shouted before she turned and ran, her boots skidding briefly before she regained her footing and getting away.

And just in time too, before the compressed space violently destabilized, the blood-coated gem landing in the midst of the mutants pressing in. The gem flashed as it compressed space with a radius of one meter around it into an area only as large as the gem itself. And when Gaea's rules reasserted themselves, they did so violently.

Sakura swore colorfully as she narrowly avoided getting crushed as stone houses just behind her collapsed into the alley between them and the street behind them, and drowning out the dismayed and angry shouts of the mutant villagers.

She turned a corner and came up short as she found Anika interrogating an old man – a clearly Human old man – while pinning him against the wall with her sword against his throat. Sakura restrained herself, waiting until her friend was done.

"The old man says that the villagers didn't use to be like that." Anika finally said, and letting her sword drop. "He also says that he's the only normal person left in this place, and that they only tolerate him because he stays out of their way and…well he's the village drunk."

"And you believe him…?" Sakura asked with a raised eyebrow, and Anika rolled her eyes.

"Give me some credit here…" she said. "…I was using mental interference to see if he's telling the truth or hiding something."

"Why not just rip the information from his head?" Sakura asked back, and this time it was Anika's turn to raise an eyebrow.

"That coming from the person who said 'magic is a heavy responsibility and not something to be abused'…?"

"Hey it's true!" Sakura protested. "And there are extenuating circumstances right now."

"Point…" Anika conceded as Sakura warily took a look around and above them. "…anyway I wanted to give the old man the benefit of a doubt, and well, my Spanish needed some practice anyway."

"What's the old man's name?"

Anike asked the old man. "He says his name is Pedro, but he forgot his last name a long time ago." She said, and then paused as the old man continued. "He says it doesn't really matter, as his family was killed a long time ago."

"Ask him what those…fish things were."

"Fish things…?"

"Have you seen what they looked like under those cloaks?" Sakura asked, and both girls shuddered in horror. If not for their hunched postures, they'd have towered over Sakura and Anika both, as was obvious from their elongated limbs and stretched torsos. Along with other evidence – bulbous, fish-like eyes, tentacle-like or webbed extremities, pale and scaly skin, and very obvious gills (which apparently made most of them incapable of Human speech) – they were clearly built to live in water, and were quite inconvenienced on dry land.

Anika turned back to Pedro and asked Sakura's question. The old man surprisingly laughed before nodding and explaining in Spanish, which Anika translated for Sakura. Apparently the village used to be just another fishing village, until the fish stocks ran low. As the village entered hard times, an outlandish ship captain came to the village, and somehow convinced the villagers – against the local priest – to conduct some kind of ritual that summoned a 'horror' from the sea.

Soon afterwards, the fish came back, along with gold in the form of alien trinkets and pieces that the villagers sold for money. The villagers began to worship the monster that had appeared from the sea during that night, murdering the priest and turning his church into a temple and brought with them a new 'prayer'.

Ia! Ia! Cthulhu Fhtagn!

Anika didn't translate, not that it could be translated anyway, the inhuman words triggering a defensive reaction from the two magi's magic circuits. "Words have power…" Sakura murmured worriedly.

"And I'd wager half my inheritance that those words are not something even magi should be messing with." Anika replied just as worriedly.

"Mein Gott im Himmel…" Sakura said, wiping at her brow. "…what have we gotten ourselves into?"

Anika turned back to Pedro, who continued his story. To their horror, they learned that again the fish vanished along with the gold, and then the priests of the cult demanded Human sacrifices…women specifically, who would give birth to the half-Human half…something hybrids that infested the decaying village around them.

And apparently, Pedro's mother was among the first of those sacrifices.

Anika asked another question, and then she turned back to Sakura. "He says there's only car in the village, and it's owned by the mayor or something who lives in the suburbs." She said, and dragged the old man along the alley.

"Suburbs…easier to get out from there, the main road would probably be watched, and a car would be faster." Sakura murmured.

"And I can alter its frame to make it more useful." Anika concurred cryptically.

"Can you drive?" Sakura asked.

"Can you?"

"I can drive just don't ask me to park."

Anika chuckled. "Same here…" she said.

"Why are you bringing him along?" Sakura asked with a nod at Pedro.

"Testimony…" Anika said. "…apparently once the Human women in the village were no longer useful, they began tricking or abducting random women from all over the place and bringing them here."

"Mein Gott…"

"Yeah that's what I thought too." Anika agreed. "I get the feeling that this is bigger than it appears. Come on, and watch your back."

"I have to, I'm the rearguard remember?"

The three Humans hid behind a bush and stared across the road at the parked car in front of the mansion (the only well-kept building in the whole village it seemed), a pair of hybrids standing guard at the door. Pedro murmured a suggestion, and Anika translated.

"I don't know…" Sakura replied but her tone meant differently. "…what do you think?"

"This seems too easy." Anika said, and then she spoke to Pedro. "Alright I think we should go around to the back. If this is a trap, then they'll probably be waiting for us there, flanking around the mansion when we go for the car."

"And then what?"

"You thinking what I'm thinking?"

Sakura made a disgusted sound. "A preemptive attack…?" she asked. "Fine by me, these things give me a very bad feeling. I've no problem getting the jump on them. And then what?"

"We take the car and get the hell out of here!"

"Right, let's move!"

The three Humans crept away from the mansion until they were out of sight, and then crossed the road to circle back to behind the mansion. Surprisingly, no mobs were there. Just a wooden outhouse guarded by more of the hybrid things. "Well that was a waste of time." Anika said with a twitch to her eye.

"Not really…" Sakura said. "...I say we go through the house from the back, surprise and kill the guards in front, and take the car."

"There's a bounded field around the house."

"What?"

Sakura made a few gestures with her crest flashing, and then she subsided with a curse. "Damn it…" she snarled. "…we just sank in deeper!"

"We circle around." Anika said but to Sakura's surprise she drew her sword. "But first, I want to see what those bastards are guarding in that house, and why that fake priest the cult has entered the outhouse as we were arriving."

"I don't know…" Sakura said. "…it seems awfully risky to me."

"Maybe…" Anika said with a shrug. "…but we need to know as much as we can."

"I say we leave it to the Enforcers for when we report back."

Anika shrugged while pulling her compact crossbow from behind her waist, the mystic code's arms unfolding and the drum magazine sliding a cartridge into place. "I'm curious…" she said.

"Anika…" Sakura began but it was too late. The baroness rose and fired, prana pumping into the crossbow and flash-forging the powdered raw material in the cartridge into a superheated bolt that blew steaming guts from one of the guards all over the wall behind him. As the other guard threw an alarmed glance at Anika, she fired again, two spent cartridges falling smoking to the ground even as she ran forward, stowing her crossbow behind her.

Stepping past the corpses, she kicked the door down and found the priest speaking to two Human women, one of whom looked quite ragged. The hybrid stared at her in surprise before drawing a ritual dagger. Steel flashed in the lamplight and the priest's arm fell to the ground. Bone or cartilage broke as Anika bashed the priest's face in with her sword's pommel, and as the priest slammed against the back she stabbed him through the gut deeply, severing the hybrid's spine.

"You think this is funny, don't you monster?" she snarled, and the priest spat at her.

"You no idea what you mess with, Human." He sneered, and then Anika backhanded him hard, breaking the hybrid's jaw before she pulled her sword back and beating the hybrid to death.

"Try not to hurt yourself Anika…" Sakura said while untying the two women. "…what the hell?"

As soon as she was untied, the ragged-looking woman had grabbed at the priest's dagger on the floor, and promptly stabbed herself. As Sakura and the other prisoner clutched at her, she managed to gasp out a few words. "It's…already too late…" she gasped. "…it's in me…"

The woman stiffened and then collapsed, Sakura striking a nearby wall in anger. "I'm too young for this." the thirteen year-old said angrily even as Anika shot the badly-beaten priest through the head with her crossbow.

"You're not the only one." Anika said before checking the other woman over. "Come on, let's get out of here."

The four Humans – Anika, Sakura, Pedro, and the last woman – ran around the mansion, the baroness shooting the surprised guards with her crossbow. Shouts erupted from down the street. "I've had enough!" Sakura shouted angrily, unleashing a murderous barrage of Gandr into the crowd.

"Good, keep them busy!" Anika shouted while using reinforcement to rip an iron fence from the ground and slamming it against the car. "Beginnen umwandlung…!"

"What the hell are you people?" the other woman asked as a magic circle flashed into existence on the car, metal warping and the air around it rippling with heat as wicked-looking spikes and scythes sprouted over the vehicle.

"Witches…!" Sakura shouted. "Just call us witches…the good kind!"

"I don't care if you're the bad kind, just get us out of here!" the woman said, clambering into the car at a gesture from Anika, Pedro following after her.

"Sakura…!"

"I know!"

"Lassen sie Feuer mein Instrument zu sein…!" Anika hissed, one arm sweeping outwards in a cutting motion. A thin blade of heat swept outwards and killing most of the crowd, bisected corpses falling to the ground as Anika ran into the car.

"Let's get out of here!" Sakura shouted as she floored the accelerator, Anika firing another beam of heat through a window at the cult priestess standing in the mansion doorway. The priestess somehow managed to deflect the beam to the side, losing an arm and destroying a part of the mansion's front in the process. The priestess' scream of pain was quickly muffled as Sakura drove through a small crowd of the hybrids crowding the road.

"Sorry…" she said as she shot a hybrid hanging onto her side of the car at point-blank. "…well no, not really…"

As their stolen vehicle – slick with the blood of the fallen - drove through the desolate suburbs and thence to freedom, the two friends shared a look before giving relaxed sighs and smiles.

They made it.

"You two were insanely lucky." The older magus said to Anika and Sakura. The three of them watched from a hill as the village burned before them. The Enforcers had swept into the village without mercy, killing and burning relentlessly.

More of the foul things had vomited up from the waterfront, only to be killed when the Enforcers used desiccant gas, leaving the waterfront covered in corpses, corpses that were tossed into the flames. "Fortunately this place was only a minor outpost of the cult, so they didn't have anything heavy to throw at you. The more powerful warlocks and witches of the cult would take nothing less than a fifth-rank magus or an equivalent to take down."

"I guess we really got lucky there." Anika said.

"We really did." Sakura agreed. "I'd rather not repeat the experience."

"Rest assured it won't." the older magus assured them. "As I've already told you this entire matter is a triple A-rank secret, and the fact that two thirteen year-old sixth-rank magi barely managed to escape to tell the tale has caused something of an uproar among the higher-ups, and your Prussian princess and her family has been making a lot of noise too. Rest assured, the ones involved have been sanctioned."

"Well that's encouraging." Anika said with a shrug.

"Divine Beast DAGON eh…?" Sakura murmured thoughtfully. "I wonder why the Ancestor Sumire hasn't been stirred up, considering that the sea is her domain…well a part of it at least."

"Who said she hasn't?" the older magus asked.

"Eh?"

"The Twenty-first Ancestor is our ally in this matter…" the man explained. "…much like the Twentieth Ancestor is the ally of the Church in…the Burial Agency's purview."

"I see." Sakura said with a nod.

"An alliance of convenience…" Anika murmured. "…why don't we just kill the damn thing? Doesn't Atlas have something? No, scratch that I'm sure they do."

"They could…" the older magus agreed with a nod. "…but we have to find DAGON first. And also, as it is a Divine Beast, using an alchemical super-weapon against it would have a side-effect comparable to a super-volcano erupting or other calamities on such a scale."

Sakura looked uncomfortable, but Anika was undeterred. "I'd say the cost is worth it…" she growled. "…considering what the cult is capable of."

"The proper authorities are in agreement." The older magus said. "But as I said, we still have to find the monster…"

"And depending on where it is…" Sakura concluded with a nod. "…the proper contingencies have to be prepared."

"Precisely…"

Sakura sighed and shook her head. "It's been a tiring three days." She said. "Right now I just want to get back to London and get this matter behind me."

"I agree."

"Ah of course…" the older magus said sympathetically. "…I'm forgetting how young you two are. My apologies…once we're done here, we'll return to the Clock Tower."

"Another debriefing probably…" Anika grumbled.

"And then back to normal." Sakura said. "I can't wait."

"I agree."

A/N

I'm back…sorry for the wait, but my hard drive crashed.

Back to Sakura, a bit over the top and borrowing a lot from the Cthulhu Mythos and the film Dagon (which I do not own), but I didn't want a clichéd vampire hunt to introduce Sakura's new abilities. She uses a long-sword by the way, or if you want to get technical a hand-and-a-half sword (a sword meant to be used with either one hand or two).

Well that's all for now I suppose, the next chapter or two will be focused on Sakura and then we go back to Rin and Shirou.