AN: First of, a big thank you to everyone that either reviewed, faved or added to their alert lists.
A little later than I would have liked, but better late than never. Writing this chapter gave me no small amount of trouble, but I think that in the end it turned out okay. Could have definitely been worse...
I've been thinking of writing a completely new prologue after ArnaudB's review. I'm not really pleased with it as it is, and as he pointed out there are problems with it. I'd like to thank him again for taking the time to write such and extensive review. Also please check out his FSN fic Tricolor Swords, it's a good one.
Disclaimer: I do not own anything. The works used are the properties of their respective owners.
After healing the wound on Shirou's arm to a level that was satisfactory and putting him in his room, Archer went to the roof to contemplate on how to proceed. The more time he spent on recalling things, the more he remembered. For now he mainly focused on the war, what he knew of the other Masters and Servants, and their capabilities. Other things would have to wait until after the war was resolved.
The war for the tainted Grail. It would have to be destroyed, and to do it they would need to go to the Greater Grail under Ryuudou mountain. But Ryuudou was Caster's stronghold at the moment, guarded by that damnable bounded field and Assassin. To take it they would need at least one ally. Tohsaka Rin was the most obvious choice, she had allied with Shirou in almost every war he had ever participated in. How to do it though still remained.
He took out the necklace he kept. The one thing he had as a memento even after death. He had never managed to express his gratitude to her for all she had done for him during his lifetime. Therefore he had tried to help he as much as he could whenever he was summoned as her Servant, and try to get her to lighten up some. That and it was way too much fun to mess with her not to.
His smile turned to a frown when his thoughts turned to the other Masters. Illya, daughter of Kiritsugu, his sister and Master of Berserker. No easy life, living under Acht's influence and being told her father betrayed the family and left her.
The true Master of Rider, Sakura. To summon Medusa without a relic said more about her situation that anything else. If he could, he would do all in his power to make sure both were saved. Surely Shirou would as well if he found out. Again the problem was how. Archer had a few ideas but Sakura's situation especially was a hard one to do anything about due to the crest worm, and Zouken, at least until later.
Of course one of the biggest threats would be to be recognized as a threat by Kotomine too early. Gilgamesh and Lancer were in no way pushovers, and could very well threaten his plans. This was his greatest chance to put things right, to gain salvation, and nothing would be allowed to threaten that. Caution was the best offence as well as defence at this point.
Kotomine must have known by now that six Servants had been summoned, and there was a chance he would tell Rin. Rin not wanting to be left behind would then summon her own Servant at the earliest convenience. It would be best if Shirou could gain her allegiance before that, so they could provide her with the relic to summon Arturia. There was a chance she would be summoned even without the relic, but best to be sure.
In any case, for all his foreknowledge he could not predict everything. Focus on one thing at a time, slowly working towards the goal, and dealing with any obstructions that came up would have to be their tactics for now.
Shirou woke early as always. He lay staring at the ceiling for a while, recalling the events of the previous night. He had summoned his Servant, but things had not gone at all as he had thought they would. Instead of summoning the legendary king Arthur he had summoned his future self, only to have to defend as the Servant attempted to kill him. His thoughts turned to the injury and he noticed that the previously crippling pain in his arm was reduced to a dull throbbing.
Leaving the bandages on for now he flexed his arm around to test mobility. Almost no pain, and enough mobility to not be a problem. Even he with his limited knowledge knew this to he unnatural. Perhaps Archer had done more to help him after he passed out? He resolved to ask after he'd gotten something to eat, so he made his way to the kitchen.
When he was about to enter he stopped. It smelled of food, and he heard someone humming some vaguely familiar song inside. As he checked it turned out to be Archer in the kitchen, making breakfast, wearing a pair of jeans, a muscle shirt and Shirou's apron. This unexpected sight cleared any lingering sleepiness in Shirou's body with its absurdity.
"Good morning, figured you'd be up soon so I took the opportunity to cook some breakfast. We have a lot to accomplish today after all," said Archer as he heard Shirou enter.
"Good morning" Shirou answered automatically. "It looks and smells good. I suppose I shouldn't be surprised considering your identity."
"Hmm, getting a little cocky are you? Well it's true that few can match my cooking skill. Fewer still amongst the heroic spirits. A pity the war isn't a cooking contest," Archer stated somewhat proudly.
With that they proceeded to eat in relative silence. It was understood that business were to be taken care of after meals, not during. Sakura and Taiga didn't join them as it was Sunday. Sakura very rarely joined on the weekends and Taiga had something to take care of today, which is the main reason why Shirou chose yesterday night to perform the summoning ritual. After the very tasteful meal they took care of the dishes, and returned to the table.
"Let's get started then. I have some plans and ideas for the war that need to be discussed, but first we'll deal with questions we might have and get that out of the way," said Archer.
"Did you heal my arm after I passed out yesterday? For that matter, I guess it was you who put me in my room," Shirou began.
"Yes I did. You can remove the bandages now, they'll only be in the way otherwise. I myself though wonder what enabled you to do the summoning ritual. In every other version of these events that I've been able to remember so far I've never been summoned by you. Frankly speaking you shouldn't even be capable of magecraft at this point in time, only that bad imitation of it by using your nerves as pseudo circuits,"said Archer.
"Hmm, strange. Though I guess I would've probably made little progress had I not found Kiritsugu's journals,"answered Shirou.
"Journals? To the best of my knowledge he never left any. At least neither I nor countless other versions of us did. Must be one of the differences for this dimension I guess. Can I take a look at them later?" asked Archer.
"Sure,"said Shirou as he started to remove the bandages. "It's a little fuzzy but last night, before I passed out, you said something about making me into a Hero right? What did you mean exactly?"
"I'll start at the beginning then, so you understand the situation. During my lifetime I went around and saved people. I appeared in conflicts all over the world, just trying my best to save everyone I could. I once ended up in a situation where I couldn't save a group of people by any means available to me, and I prayed for someone, something to save them. Alaya heard my request, and offered to save them, in return I would serve as a defender of mankind after my death"
"At the time I thought this was a really good deal, not only would the people in front of me be saved, but I would be able to save countless others even after my death. In the end though I was regarded with suspicion by those I had saved. After all, who would do such a thing without requiring something in return. So my life ended when I was betrayed by those I had saved, and I ascended to the service of Alaya, also known as the will of humanity." Archer paused to assemble his thoughts.
"In essence, for saving those one hundred people I had sold my soul, and given my eternal servitude after death. Being a Counter Guardian, as we are called, is not a pleasant thing. Unlike the "true" heroic spirits we retain some of the memories from when we are sent, and we only get sent when humanity as a whole is threatened. A clean up crew, always arriving after tragedies have already occurred. We then simply erase everything in the area from existence, often killing countless to save humanity as a whole," he continued.
"I've killed millions to save billions, and I'm tired of it all. But, should you manage to be recognized as a Hero in your lifetime you will ascend as a "true" heroic spirit, and since they have a higher er, authority, than Counter Guardians, and only one instance of a soul can exist in the Throne at the same time, I, or the me in the Throne currently will be released from service, and either destroyed or assimilated by the "true" one,"Archer concluded.
Shirou sat silent and tried to take this in. Archer voice had lacked the same conviction that it had carried yesterday, but the strong emotions still carried over the bond. During the speech he had almost felt as if it had happened to him, like he had been there but something still stopped him from remembering. This was getting quite frustrating.
"Ah, I feel like I can almost remember the things you told me about, but it's like it's just outside my reach. Anyway, you're telling me to become a heroic spirit on my own right? How am I supposed to do that?" Asked Shirou.
Archer just arced his eyebrow slightly before answering. "Why, you have a heroic version of yourself in front of you. Just do as I say and I'll make sure you don't mess up too badly," said Archer with hints of a smirk.
"Ha ha ha, very funny. Guess stand up comedy is not a future career choice"
"Hey, I'll get you back for that you know," Archer said. "Let's focus on the war for now though, but I do have one more question. What wish do you have that made you participate in this?"
"Preventing potential casualties isn't good enough?"
"No. You forget that the bond works both ways. I can feel your determination to win this, and that can only mean you intend to have some wish granted."
"Well... In the journals I mentioned I found out about Illya," Archer looked a little take aback by that. "I found out that Kiritsugu had tried to get her back on some of his journeys, but had been unable to. I thought of trying myself, but if he couldn't do it I most certainly couldn't either. So I thought if I could make a wish, I'd definitely save her" Shirou said with a small smile. "If I can't even save my sister, how can I expect to fulfil my goal of saving everyone"
"Hmm, you know, that is more mature than I would expect from a little brat like you. I'm even starting to feel that getting summoned here may not have been so bad after all. But just so you know, you may have a chance to meet her sooner than you'd think."
"What do you mean?"
"Illyasviel von Einzbern is the Master of Berserker after all."
"What! You mean I have to fight my own sister in this war? Ugh, things just got a lot harder than I thought it would."
"Heh, seems that you really are unprepared. Illya is not the only Master you are familiar with."
Shirou shivered as if a bucket of ice cold water had been poured over him. He almost didn't dare ask, but he knew he had to. "Who else?"
"You really have no idea? I thought that at this point you'd reached a level of structural analysis you could use on humans considering how developed your circuits are. Anyway, did you seriously think that you were the only magus living in this city?"
"Well I can use it on humans, but..." Shirou trailed off, looking slightly embarrassed.
"Wha...?" Archer started, then he burst out laughing. "Hahaha, oh I see. Shirou-chan getting embarrassed about peeping. Ah, youth. I've almost forgot how it was to be a teenager. Anyway I presume you have not checked out Sakura then, out of respect for her privacy or something like that?"
"Of course not! How could I violate her trust like that? That's just sick!"
"Calm down now. If anything Sakura would be thrilled if she found out you thought of her that way. I can just imagine her putting it in her diary "Sempai likes my body, I wonder if he'd take me to bed in the future. I better make sure to wear pretty underwear from now on just in case" or something like that," Archer's smirk grew as Shirou now looked like a tomato.
"As I said before, more people you know of are part of this war. Sakura is one of them," At this point Shirou's face regained it's normal colour. In fact he might even look a bit pale. "The Matou family is an old one. In fact they, the Einzberns and the Tohsakas were the ones to construct the grail almost 200 years ago."
"Tohsaka... You mean to say that Tohsaka Rin and Shinji are also part of this?" At this Shirou grew even paler. The school idol Tohsaka Rin was a Master. The world truly is a small place sometimes.
"Yes. You are also familiar with Kuzuki-sensei I believe? He is currently Caster's Master." Archer continued to drop the bombs, completely unconcerned for Shirou's mental health.
"That's what, four people, excluding me, that have some relation to the war that either attend or teach at my school. Anything else you wish to drop on me?" Asked Shirou warily.
"Hmm, now that you mention it, I did mention this is the first time I was summoned by you right?" After getting a nod from Shirou he continued. "Of course I had another Master the other times, namely Rin. I wish for you to go over to her house today and get her cooperation in the war."
"And how the hell am I supposed to do that? I just go over there and ask "Hey, do you want to team up with me?" not bloody likely!" Shirou burst out.
"Don't worry, I have a plan. But first we will go over to the overseer for the war so that you can present yourself as a participant. Better to get it over with sooner rather than later. By the way, I don't know if you've read about him in those journals but his name is Kotomine Kirei" At this Shirou paled even more" And he currently control two Servants, but don't worry, he probably won't try anything today so just try to be your usual stupid self and everything will work out" Archer finished with a smile, that grew even wider as Shirou paled further.
Archer stood and made his way to the hallway, with a very reluctant Shirou trailing behind him.
How much more awkward this day could get, Shirou did not know. But he guessed that by the end of it, little would phase him any more. But it could have been worse. At least with Archer he had an overwhelming advantage.
"Off we go!" Shirou heard Archer yell out jovially in front of him. Deciding to not be outdone by his Servant he too cried out an "Off we go!" as they made their way out to the street.
End Chapter 2