Saber was thrilled that as a Servant, she could get rid of the effects of a rather nasty hangover. Her Master, not so much but at least her alternate was nice enough to share a hangover cure.

It was a relief that her alternate went by a different name, because it made it easier to figure out who was who.

Mordred found Arieen a total riot, and eagerly ate up stories of how she had created an entire kingdom far, far away from the legend of Camelot. Her people loved her, and called her king regardless of what her actual gender was. It was as if Arieen was the twin sister she had never had.

And she wouldn't deny she had the biggest grin on her face during the mock spar they had with their swords. It was so noisy it even drew Ruler's attention, as they were doing it in broad daylight which was a big no-no for a Grail War.

Arieen took one look at Ruler, before she damn near died laughing.

"What, exactly, is so funny?" said Jeanne sourly.

"The last time I was in a Grail War, that absolute nutcase Gilles de Rias mistook Arturia Pendragon as you...despite the fact her bust size is at least two sizes smaller!" explained Arieen, cackling.

Arturia glared at her. It wasn't her fault that Avalon kept her from aging, and as a result her bust was so small!

While she had regained Excalibur and Avalon, she kept Avalon put away until needed, since she did want to age up a bit. After all, there was no point in hiding her gender anymore.

Jeanne and Mordred stared at her.

"Say what now?" said Mordred.

"Okay, so in the Fourth Grail war I was an observer of, some absolute creep summoned Gilles de Rias as Caster. From what I can tell the guy was just a psycho serial killer who got off on pretending to be a Magus with zero clue of the Moonlight World. The Grail must have been grasping at straws to summon the last Master or something," Arieen started explaining. She had asked Kiritsugu about that and he was more than happy to tell her what he knew of the matter. "Anyway the one who summoned Saber, aka Arturia Pendragon, apparently ran over him after the first real battle of the Grail War and he was ranting and raving over how she was the 'holy maiden' and how he'd 'save' her since he believed she had lost her memories."

Arturia was horrified, as was Jeanne. Mordred, however looked close to laughing her ass off.

"How the hell did he mistake her for a woman famous for being martyred after a war against England?" said Mordred, laughing.

"I know, right?" said Arieen grinning. "If that wasn't hilarious enough, I actually knew the real Jeanne before that point and helped her fight against England, because hell, why not? It was full of stuck up prudes who would have burned us at the stake the second they found out our actual gender. She was usually the one to drag my drunk ass back after a good fight!"

Jeanne looked like she had a migraine of sorts, as the memories of her alternate self filtered through.

"Arieen, why in god's name are you here?" said Jeanne.

"Family vacation, to see if the therapy dear old dad has been going through is sticking properly," said Arieen promptly.

Arturia made a face.

"I still wish you wouldn't tell people I was a hermaphrodite to explain your conception."

"It's a simple explanation for why we both get drunk whenever the subject is brought up, and you did fit the definition of one thanks to Merlin."

"Question...is it even allowed for outside observers?" asked Kairi.

Jeanne had a pained look on her face.

"Officially no. Unofficially they're already part of the Moonlight World and it's not like them being here would actually affect anything. Especially considering Arieen isn't even human...and neither, I suspect is her father at this point."

"Wait...what do you mean not human?" asked Kairi.

Arieen had the biggest grin on her face as her wings lifted off from her back. Arturia reluctantly followed suit, as she still wasn't quite comfortable with losing her humanity.

Mordred stared.

"How?" said Mordred.

"Wild Hunt," shrugged Arieen. "I survived long enough that my body only needed the chance to fully transition to full faerie. After that, I spent most of my time in and out of the human realms in a drunken stupor. Well, that and banging Scathach."

Jeanne sighed in exasperation.

"Where is Scathach anyway?"

"She got a new pair of apprentices, and is off on a year-long training session with them," said Arieen. "Merlin is off to act as a judge for the final trials of three squires attempting to become knights, Waver is in Clock Tower playing teacher with Gray, and Dad was the one to suggest a family vacation, just the two of us."

"Wait...Waver, as in Lord El Melloi the second? That Waver?" said Kairi.

Arieen stared at him.

"Wait...are you telling me that idiot actually went through with buying Kayneth's title in this alternate?" said Arieen. Kairi nodded. Arieen looked to Arturia.

"I know, I know...we'll swing by England to bug him for a few days," sighed Arturia.

It said volumes of how well they had progressed in therapy that Arturia could guess what Arieen wanted to do without being told.


Illya didn't know whether to laugh or be creeped out the day she found out that Shirou's Servant apparently had an obsession with Arturia.

From what little Shirou could understand thanks to the dreams shared between him and Archer, his alternate had summoned "Saber" in his Grail War and had effectively fallen for her.

The second Shirou realized that his alternate had been adopted by Kiritsugu instead of Arieen, the first thing he did was call his older sister and profusely thank her, because he had seen Kiritsugu's attempts at teaching Magecraft.

Arieen had to ban him from teaching, and he now stuck to teaching the younger knights how to act as proper mercenaries and the importance of double checking a contract...as well as making sure of the exact situation you were walking into.

He couldn't count the number of times he had avoided walking into a mess of a situation that later boiled down to "Magus and Wizards were in a pissing contest over research/turf". Most of the time it was easier to make an anonymous floo call to whatever Ministry controlled the area, tell them what exactly the wizard was researching and watch the fall out as the Aurors had a quiet 'chat' with them.

Considering the sort of avenues most Magus used in their research, it was an almost guarantee that if the Ministry were alerted to the situation they would step in and basically throw enough fines to make it not worth the effort.

If that didn't work, a bullet to the head via a sniper's rifle generally did.

Kiritsugu looked more amused than anything when he heard the situation, while Archer had a surreal expression on his face seeing his adopted father alive.

Illya was one thing, but Kiritsugu had died several years before the Fifth Grail War.

"So apparently the Tohsaka master has summoned a certain Saber Servant," said Sakura amused.

"Please tell me it's not..." said Shirou.

"It's her," said Illya, laughing.

Shirou groaned, as Arieen had been very clear about her encounter with "Saber" in the last war. Arturia was nice enough, but even Merlin was surprised at how much she had mellowed out since her death.

"Well, I suppose it could be worse," said Shirou.

So far the Grail War was going about as expected. The other Masters were clearly taken aback by the fact that three of the seven had apparently banded together.

Merlin was highly interested in the presence he sensed in the church, and was planning to investigate that sooner rather than later. Arieen had spoken about the other Servant who had fought in the fourth war, and he suspected Gilgamesh might have survived as well.

As it was, Sakura's Servant had unfortunately been knocked out of the running quite early. The twin Rider Servant were famous, but not to the same level as Berserker was. They had the misfortune of running into Herakles, who was under the control of the Matou master early on, and had barely helped their Master escape.

At the moment, Herakles was the biggest headache because they were well used to Saber's mindset. Unless Rin used a command seal on her, she was unlikely to attack them from the shadows. Assassin had been taken out by Archer, thankfully.

Besides, they were all eagerly awaiting Saber's reaction to seeing Merlin there.

Some time later...

Shirou was so glad that Tenebrae fully embraced technology, because even Archer was gleefully taking pictures of Saber's flat-footed reaction to Merlin's presence.

He was sure there was going to be a lot of fun to be had when they dragged Archer's tanned ass back to Tenebrae. Arieen was rather vocal that her father needed someone who could help her 'loosen up' (read: get laid).

If it mean tossing her fan boy who was so besotted he became a Counter Guardian just to see her again, well Shirou had no issues tossing the fan boy. He would happily use the same method he used to deal with Arieen's sex life.

Not his problem so long as he didn't have to hear the girl talk. At least he had Waver to commiserate with.


Arieen looked at the form of Sieg and knew the poor kid had gotten the short end of the stick. Before Jeanne could basically dump him on some random farmer, Arieen spoke up.

"Jeanne, we all know this kid is more likely to get drawn into this war one way or another. Why not let us watch over him to insure he figures out what he wants to do, rather than leave him with the farmer?"

Jeanne looked at Arieen. Arieen stared back.

A defeated look on crossed her face.

"Is it too much to hope he can leave this war behind him?"

"Jeanne, he has the heart of a literal heroic spirit inside of him. There's no way he'd live a normal life," said Arieen gently. "Hell, the second the Einzbern find out about his existence, his life would be screwed either way. They'd definitely salivate over the idea of having homunculi with the powers of a Servant in their bloodline."

Jeanne did not dispute this. Arieen was completely correct, and the one who created Sieg had gotten his knowledge of the subject from the Einzbern. How, she had no idea and she wasn't prepared to ask. The fact they hadn't killed him for it yet was bad enough.

While there was no way Sieg would be able to live a normal life, they could at least give him a fighting chance to survive the war, or find out what he wanted to do with the life he had been given.

"I thought you two were on vacation?" asked Jeanne.

"There is no way a proper knight would be able to leave someone like him alone, especially considering the circumstances," said Arturia. "Until he joins either faction, he's a rogue element. Besides, someone has to show him how to use a sword properly."

Arturia felt some empathy for Sieg. He hadn't asked to be created, and she saw some of Arieen in him. Though in his case, he was far less driven.

Understandable, considering Arieen had memories of an entire lifetime before waking up in Camelot as Arturia's son.


In Fuyuki...

The fact that Rin came to them for help in rescuing Saber was a bit surprising. Hearing the full story cleared a lot of how Arturia of all people was kidnapped at all.

"So the priest thinks he can use Saber to lure the rest of us in and deal with Archer?" said Shirou baffled. "I mean, I guess I could see the logic behind that, but why does he think we actually care what happens to Saber?"

Rin glared at him.

"So you're not going to help?"

"Oh we're going to help," said Illya.

"It's just that we're mostly doing it to find out what the logic behind this was," said Sakura, clarifying matters.

"The fact it gives us a chance to possibly lure Gilgamesh of all people to Tenebrae is a major bonus," said Shirou helpfully.

Rin froze.

"Gilgamesh? As in the King of Heroes, Gilgamesh?" she said slowly.

"As in the Archer from the last war," said Shirou. "Apparently he's still around, not surprising considering he's living in the church with a former Master from the last war."

Rin's face was twitching. Archer considered it very entertaining to watch her head implode.

"WHAT?!"

"Do you mind keeping it down? I'm trying to play here!" said a voice annoyed from the living room.

"Can it, Rapunzel!" Illya shot back without even looking.

Rin's face twitched even more when she felt a magic curse being shot in her direction. It hit Illya directly, turning all of her hair a bright fluorescent orange. Illya didn't even bat an eye.

"It's not coming off until you stay celibate for a week!" the one in the living room called out.

Shirou sighed, and held his face in his hands.

"Why, of all the people to act as our final judge, did it have to be Merlin?" he groaned.

Rin fired a Gandr at him. And then at Archer for good measure, because the ass was clearly laughing at her and her predicament.