AN: I have not actually played beyond Tsukihime, no KagetsuTohya or MeltyBlood, nor read the MeltyBlood manga completely, so I'm actually pretty in the dark on some of the stuff in the greater expanded universe on that side of the Nasuverse. So people like Jinan, who aren't really covered in detail anyway, may be off. This is some years later, though, so some minor differences ought to be acceptable…

Fate/Far Side: Origami Blades

Chapter 2

Golden Jasmine

"So, he didn't make it in the end," Jinan-sensei said, sighing.

I nodded, still looking around. The clinic I had been given directions to was quite old-fashioned; traditional housing that had been converted into a family clinic, Showa Era decorations and furnishings. It did feel like the sort of place you went to get acupuncture therapy or some obscure form of Chinese medicine rather than a standard physical or whatnot. Of course, it made a bit of sense in this case, as it reminded me of Tohsaka's old-fashioned sort of magus tools. The smell of ground herbs, almost parsley-like, really lent a different sense to the location.

Sougen Jinan-sensei was an oddity too, though not due to anything in particular. He gave off a very mainland vibe, but also had a sense of whimsy to him. That felt off, probably because I couldn't exactly picture Kiritsugu and him having a conversation. My old man always had a sense of dourness to his posture, for obvious reasons. Jinan-sensei was a character, which made the reconciliation in my mind between them very disconcerting.

"He was oddly comfortable, though, and I thought you might have something to do with that," I told him sincerely. Having seen firsthand the sort of damage Angra Mainyu caused, it became more and more apparent to me that short of true magic, there really was nothing that could contain such a curse. The fact that Kiritsugu could even find any kind of peace in the absolute pain he must have been feeling was a miracle all unto itself.

"I highly doubt I contributed much," the doctor said, stroking the odd mustache he had. "The magic afflicting him was…beyond any help, truly."

I nodded, though absently. I understood that…far too well.

"And what of you?"

I blinked back from the haze of memory and stared at the man in confusion. "Well, I mean, it was a few years ago, I'm pretty much okay with it."

The sly look the man gave made me feel a little uncomfortable. "I may be getting old, my boy, but these eyes still don't deceive me."

An odd feeling washed over me, not threatening in the kind of way that suggested danger, but something that did make me crawl around in my own skin for a moment. I could tell without even saying how that this Jinan-sensei had not used magecraft or anything of the sort, but he was somehow still able to see through that first layer of my own, well, oddity, I guess.

Perhaps it was the first time I truly comprehended Kiritsugu's life beyond that of the man who saved me and desired to be an ally of justice. I knew from talk Tohsaka had passed along to me that Kiritsugu Emiya was somewhat infamous as a Mage Killer and blasphemer on the topic of magic, but they were always bits of information that were outthere, not in here, so to speak. Now, with this man who was certainly more aware of the different layers of this world beyond just the one most people saw, I could start to see my old man from a different perspective.

"I'm fine," I told him, shrugging. "Though, if it'll make you feel better, I'll let you know if any problems come up."

He grinned. "Young man, I can already say, I know problems will come up, the type of person you strike me as."

Well…it's not as if I could deny it.

I returned to the Tohno estate some hours before dinner should be started so I could acquaint myself with the kitchen and make sure I could put everything back to where it belonged. I made Kohaku accompany me and point out where she stored things and explain her sense of logic to the kitchen, which I had long ago figured out, was different for everybody in small, incremental ways.

"You know, I really should stay out of your way…" Kohaku said after she had explained the order she kept her cookbooks in.

My eyes instantly narrowed. "You still haven't shown where large pots and pans go, and in what order." I crossed my arms. "No way am I going to blindly grope around in this place, make a mess, and then give you the excuse to boot me out because I destroyed your workspace."

Kohaku's shoulders slumped and she pouted like a chastised puppy. "Whyyyyyy must you make up such stories? I would never do such a thiiiiing…"

I continued to stare, kept my arms crossed, even started tapping on my left elbow with my fingers in a Tohsaka-esque manner.

"Tch, unfair. You must have encountered the overdramatic complaining technique before," the maid said, her tone completely giving up on the pout. "You have won this round, my newfound rival, but you shall not conquer this battlefield entirely without upping your game!"

To that, I reached for the bag I had brought with me from town, pulling out a nice vintage wine I had found in one of the smaller shopping arcade stores.

Kohaku took one look at the date, then swooned to the floor faster than I could put the bottle down and catch her. She laid flat on the ground, despite the dirt it might have acquired—though I had seen her sister Hisui quite diligently scrubbing the floors before leaving today, so I kind of doubted much—and looked as if she were a body prepared for a funeral viewing. "N-N-Nuclear Launch Detected," she moaned.

I stared down at her and the odd choice of words coming from her lips. "I don't understand."

"Ehhhhheheh," she went from groaning to giggling, "just that Akiha-sama loves a good alcoholic beverage every once in a while."

"I see." Well, I'm not sure if I would keep that much for such a thing…I was mainly thinking of cooking with it. But it was good to know. "You still need to show me where you keep the pots and pans."

A much put-upon sigh rose from the floor. "Fiiiiine."

I went with a very Western pork-loin dish this time around, since the architecture of the house was very Western and I figured that the family was used to that kind of food; I wanted to impress them on their home territory, after all. If I was allowed to continue cooking, I'd branch out into other dishes then.

"Maybe I should fire my current cook and hire you instead; you said you were currently jobless," Tohno-san said, smirking, though she was eyeing Kohaku the entire time.

The maid returned the look with a shot-through-the-heart mime and another swoon. She did not, however, get a chance to fall to the floor, since she and her sister Hisui actually sat at the table this time as I acted as server. I wondered if the sisters had ever had food prepared for them in this fashion ever before.

"Truly, this drink is also wonderful," Tohno-san said, finally turning her gaze to me. "You need not have spent so much on our account, though."

I had ended up not using all of the wine, because Kohaku continued to pop her head in to spy on my work and I wound up distracted enough that I didn't make use of all of my preparations. I had a feeling that was the entire purpose. Anyway, the remainder ended up in our glasses, and Tohno-san especially seemed to delight in sipping at hers in between taking dainty bites from her plate.

Hopefully dainty because she ate that way, not because she disliked the food.

"It wasn't that bad," I said, shrugging.

"Still," Tohno-san continued that line of reasoning, "I think it might have been in excess."

I thought about explaining the intricacies of the dish I had made, the requirement that it truly marinade in a seasoned wine an important factor, but brought myself up short. I didn't really need to explain such things to Tohno-san, and the way Kohaku kept watching me like a hawk, I had the suspicion that she would somehow use anything I said about my cooking against me or to further get a lock onto my style of preparation and have ways to counter it.

Hmmm. This girl was quite a danger, wasn't she?

"Well, consider it an omiage? I am intruding upon your hospitality and not only are you caring for me, but you've shown me to Jinan-sensei. It seems like a proper response, no?"

Tohno-san seemed to relent at that, giving me a faint curling of her lips into a smile. "I suppose so." She gave a faint huff, looking down at her plate. "Nobody has ever really thought to do that here…"

She said the last bit in a much quieter voice, and I frowned. Kohaku had mentioned a brother Tohno, though he apparently was traveling Europe, and I wondered at this how much he phoned home or kept in contact. I really hoped I hadn't stepped on a land mine here. "So…no need to worry. I'm glad it was a good choice, at least."

"Yes…a pleasant taste. Your palate is very refined." Tohno-san considered this, then glanced to Hisui. "Do we still have some of that 1914 around?"

The quiet maid gave quite possibly the first sense of expression I had seen from her: her eyebrows shot up into her fringe, then immediately came back down into what could only be described as worry. "Well…yes, Akiha-sama…though—"

"I'll hear nothing of it!" the Tohno family head declared. She glanced my way, and I felt a rising sense of terror creep up from possibly as low as my ankles. "I think we should break that out to even the score!"

Er…

I glanced to Hisui, who, despite the anxiety that clearly bubbled in her expression, bowed and stood from her place at the table to acquiesce. The fact that this stoic figure was giving such an expression only hastened that rising dread, and I glanced to Kohaku for support.

The maid beamed up at me. That sort of expression that you imagine on, say, a very pleased wild predator before it pounced on a helpless meal.

A fox. That's right. Foxes had those expressions.

I gulped. I couldn't handle liquor very well; that's one of the fringe benefits of using it all up in the meal preparation and not as part of the course itself. This would not bode well if I wasn't careful.

Maybe the time had come to test whether Reinforcement worked on my stomach.

Thankfully, I think it was my own cooking that saved me. The heavy nature of the pork meant that I was operating on a full stomach when the alcohol started coming in. Within two hours, I still only felt marginally tipsy and had managed to mime drinking the last cup given to me since the others were too inebriated to notice.

Of course, my meal hadn't really saved the others. Hisui was out, flat out, within twenty minutes, and Kohaku had taken to energetically stumbling around the room by the turn of the hour, asking philosophical questions like, "Is there such a thing as organic alcohol?" Tohno-san managed longer, sitting in not-quite-quiet dignity for that first hour, though by the second she was more like Fuji-nee after a long bout after hours with coworkers.

By which I mean, absolutely hilarious.

"—So then she's caught 'n the hallway with every'n staring out 't her in the first place!" Tohno-san had put her free hand up as if to give a parade wave, though her drunken mannerisms made it overly exaggerated. This classmate of hers apparently evoked the kind of ire from her that rich people did from Tohsaka.

"I see," I had said, agreeing, still contemplating how to wrest the latest bottle Tohno-san had taken out of her other hand. The once I had tried earlier, it had been like it was affixed there with superglue.

So, by hour two she was pretty much a revolving door, rotating between fits of giggles and loud exclamations every minute. I managed to finally tear the drink in her hand away, though its contents were at that point two-thirds gone. Also, she certainly had quite the grip.

"Eheheheheh," Kohaku half-snorted, half-giggled from behind me. "You wiiiiiin."

I wasn't really sure what she was talking about anymore.

It was still early, not even ten at night, though I couldn't exactly see any of them recovering at this point. I tried figuring the logistics of picking Hisui up from her place on the couch, making it to her room, then getting back and retrieving Tohno-san next, but I was rather afraid another bottle would make it into her hands by that point. Too, I wasn't sure where Hisui's room was. "Kohaku…you wouldn't be able to get your sister to bed, would you?"

"Totally not," Kohaku said from her place on the floor. I'd just left her there from the last time she had stumbled. She claimed the coffee table had attacked her.

"Okay then," I said, turning back to Tohno-san. The girl returned my look with a blushing face and a rather zoned expression. I resisted the urge to pinch her cheeks. "Tohno-san, I should take you to your room."

She frowned. "I will not tolerate jokes about my phy-seek."

What.

Kohaku giggled again from the floor.

"You, quiet," I said. "You, up you go," I turned back to Tohno-san and curled her arm around my shoulders at the same time as curling mine around her waist. "I promise not to make jokes about your body."

"Promise?" she said, pouting.

Whoa. That sort of expression plus those words should be banned in seven prefectures. Actually, it reminded me a bit of Illya, which, huh, I get it. In hindsight, it becomes so apparent that she had weaponized such a thing to make me dance to her tune. "Promise."

"Okay."

She was not quite as resistant in walking then, and I glanced to Kohaku, who had somehow managed it back to her feet. "You, stay there with your hands and feet where I can see them." I know that made no sense since I was going to be leaving sight of them, but the warning was still true.

"Roger!" Kohaku said, planting herself into a seat. "I'll be right here, in this chair, and not move an inch!"

"Don't forget to breathe," I told her.

I half-pulled, half-guided Tohno-san back to her room, though the stairs took us a good ten minutes to traverse. Again, she revolved between giggling fits and making exclamations of how patronizing it was to be held this way.

"Want me to carry you like a newlywed bride instead?" I offered.

"Feh, you wish it could be so easy."

I couldn't help but grin at the rejoinder. Something about it reminded me of home, and I had to remind myself that I actually didn't know these people all that well. They were just…

A little too much of a reminder, I guess.

"Don't look like that, I was joking," Tohno-san said. I glanced to her and she was frowning again. "I dun mean to hurt feelings or anything."

"I know." I grinned. "You must joke like that a lot, though."

"Feh," she again gave an unladylike snort. "Not. Like nii-san could be bothered with this."

Well, I guess the hurt expression I had must have transferred into her voice. I gave her a little shake at that. "I'm sure he's fine. He'll probably have his fill of adventuring and then come back home and settle down."

"Probably forget an omiage while he's at it," she muttered.

I managed to pry her door open and swing us both into her room. Tohno-san stumbled face-first into the bed, then refused to move from that position. "Er, I should go help Kohaku and Hisui too."

She nodded in place, her voice muffled by the comforter. "Goh ahwed."

I felt though, like I had somehow brought her thoughts to darker places, so I should somehow get her spirits back up. Or at least, redirect that energy. So I made it back to the door before saying, "And Tohno-san? I would never make fun of your physique. You are quite a beautiful woman, what with the long, smooth legs and the nice arch of your—"

Laughing, I ducked out of the room when a pillow went flying my way. Then tripped against the frame and crashed to the floor just outside.

Maybe I was a little more tispy than I gave myself credit for.

I made it back to the living room where we had been drinking and found Kohaku now sprawled out on the floor again, the chair she had been in tipped over directly behind her, indicating how she had ended up in such a position.

"I failed in my task, sir!" Kohaku said before giggling again.

Hisui gave a snort in her sleep, and I sighed.

Just like home.

Origami Blades: Golden Jasmine, End

The legal drinking age in Japan is 20. However, it is pretty easy for minors to purchase alcohol due to the fact that the kids of the family are often the grocery shoppers of the family and it becomes habit for places to let the kids purchase the liquor in their parent's name.

Omiage is a form of gift-giving in Japan that one does in a variety of situations, including intruding upon a person's hospitality when you come over to visit. It is somewhat akin to American Southern Hospitality or the like, though perhaps a little more nuanced.