This chapter is a month late. I am a month late.
There's no way around that, unfortunately. As I have mentioned previously, this is the busiest time of the year for me irl. I work at what is ostensibly a holiday lighting company, and this is holiday time lol (sad lol). I'm doing my best to play catch up, but I can't promise any improvements until the end of December no matter how much I wish otherwise. For that, I am genuinely really, really sorry. My patrons especially have been put through some bs considering they go out of their way to support my writing, and here I am delaying things AGAIN.
I would like to thank Sherlock also for putting up with all of this. He carried a lot of the load this time around. We have worked on the outline for the next FtS chapter in the meantime, so that (the outline) will be made available to patrons soon, shortly (kind of) followed by the chapter itself.
Those of you on Discord would know, but in case you've missed it, my current plans after this chapter are:
Fts
HHEX (November)
WNGU
HHEX (if voted for December)
Depending on how well I play catch-up, some items will be moved around. Some patrons kindly commissioned the following chapters for FtS and WNGU, so I will do my best to be as punctual as I can with those while still clearing the monthly guaranteed update backlog, which just so happens to be HHEX usually.
Again, I apologise profusely to you all. I hope you enjoy the chapter, and a big thank you again to Sherlock for his work here.
If you are reading this on , I apologise if any formatting issues persist.
X
The pot on the stove simmered, the distinct smell of cardamom and cinnamon wafting from it as Emiya Shirou lifted the lid off the pot, stirring in double cream, lemon juice, and rosewater before prodding at a piece of simmering lamb that seemed to collapse unto itself in its own tenderness.
Nodding to himself, he went on to the other pot, using a wooden spatula to fluff up the rice within before having a taste.
His lips puckered.
It seemed he overdid the lemon juice.
Frowning, he referred to the bright yellow hardcover cookbook he'd purchased a while back, sifting through pages with deep concentration.
Having found what he needed, he looked through the cabinets, eventually finding the jar of caster sugar and a small bag of a pungent spice named asafoetida, adding a pinch of each condiment into the pot, mixing vigorously over a gentle heat before having another taste.
"I think that should do it," he muttered to himself as he kept flipping back and forth between pages, needlessly triple-checking what had already been done.
He didn't make South-Asian dishes all that often, so it would be a learning experience for him if nothing else.
Turning off the heat, he grabbed two bowls of raita from the counter and made his way over to the dining room.
As small as the apartment was, there wasn't all that much ground to cover, though he still had to pass through the makeshift living room first, casually stepping over the dumbbells that he'd removed from under the sofa bed that morning.
"Lunch is ready," he announced, placing the bowls on the table next to the plates before heading back to grab the korma and lemon rice.
He smirked as he heard the sound of rapid footsteps behind him. His host wasn't wasting any time, it would seem.
Once he returned with the meal, someone was already seated at one of the chairs, expression brightening as she noticed his arrival. It was a young woman dressed in baggy, casual clothing, with dark blue hair cut short and bangs just long enough to rest above her brilliant blue eyes.
"It smells amazing," she praised him, though she looked a little embarrassed. "You didn't have to go through all that trouble just for me, though. The box stuff does the job just fine."
Shirou shuddered.
"It's no problem," he assured her.
He could only eat Golden Curry mix so many times in a week; the mere thought of the stuff packing his cabinets was a frightening one. Putting their meals together himself was more of an act of mercy to himself than it was a favour to her.
He reached over to scoop the curried lamb onto her plate, then watched her try to hide her gleeful smirk as he piled on a little more. She seemed to become aware of her own reaction and quickly snapped back to a more alert expression.
"Right." She coughed into her fist. "It seems there's been another possible disturbance. We're leaving for Bruges after lunch to investigate."
"Of course," he agreed quickly, finally taking a seat and serving himself.
This arrangement between him and Ciel had persisted for close to a year now. He had come to Rome offering his services to the Holy Church as a freelancer – the fact that he wasn't particularly religious didn't seem to phase the blonde priest at all – and had been dispatched to one agent 'Bow'. Ciel had been welcoming enough, easily accepting the reasons for his presence, and insisted that he stay with her for the length of his tenure, saying that it would be more convenient not to have to fetch him at odd hours of the day. In return, he offered to look after the cooking and cleaning, which was really more of a welcome routine than it was a chore.
In the end, cooking and cleaning were usually the most stimulating parts of his schedule. He wasn't even sure why Ciel needed help in the first place; despite her unassuming appearance, she was by far the most overwhelmingly powerful person he had ever fought alongside. Most of their missions felt like a never-ending game of catch-up more than anything to do with their targets. It seemed the most he'd ever done was improve her quality of life and not anything truly helpful to the job.
His shoulders drooped as he leaned forward to take his first spoonful of curry.
The gap between them was staggering. A little discouraging, even. He promised himself that he would become someone who could keep up with the Shirokishi, and yet, he could still only manage this much.
So what if he was improving if the gap between them remained as vast and august as it was all those years ago?
"Shirou?" the woman asked, mouth full. She took a second to finish chewing. "Something wrong?"
His eyes widened, only then realising that he was wearing his feelings on his sleeve, then frowned contemplatively.
"To be honest," he started, then hesitated. "I don't think I'll be sticking around for much longer."
She kept silent. He felt obligated to explain himself.
"It's not you," he reassured her, hands held out placatingly. "You've been very kind to me, and I know what we're doing here is good, but it's just…" He looked away, feeling oddly ashamed. "I don't know if it's enough. For me. I feel like I want to do more. I want to do what I can to save people. Not just killing demons."
She hummed in acknowledgement.
"Eliminating the danger prevents the incident. Don't you think so?"
He lowered his head sadly. She was right, of course, but he knew in his heart of hearts that it wasn't truly about doing the right thing. It never was.
"It's selfish of me to say," he muttered.
"I don't think it's selfish," she told him, scooping up another bite. He kept quiet, wanting to hear what she had to say. "Back then, Mario didn't assign you to me just because we're both archers of a sort, you know. When he called me, he told me that we were both cut from the same cloth." She smiled gently. "I know what kind of man you are, Shirou. I'm the same as you in many ways."
Shirou blinked. "Are we?"
"Of course." Ciel nodded knowingly. "For whatever reasons, material or otherwise, you have a need to atone."
His jaw clenched. Traitorously, his mind drifted with pastiches of fires, rubble, screams and cries around him…
"Don't take this the wrong way," Ciel went on, heaping another spoonful of curry into her mouth, "but have you ever considered opening your heart to the Lord? That's why I continue to serve the Church, in the end. It's a way of life that gives direction to those like us."
He sighed heavily.
"... My salvation and atonement must be achieved by my own hands." Shirou finally murmured. "I can't just give it up and leave it in the hands of…" He gestured vaguely.
He carved this path out for himself. No one could lead him to its end but him.
She giggled.
"To follow the Lord is not the same as following orders. I do as the Church tells me because that is my way of being close to Him. Being given direction is something else, Shirou, and it's not something you'll understand unless you've felt it."
The man clenched his spoon tightly as if stuck between taking another bite and simply giving up and putting it down altogether. Ciel reached over the table, placing a gentle hand over his until his grip loosened.
"I found my answers through my Faith, but it's not my place to say that non-believers can't find their answers elsewhere."
The smile that he gave her was a weak one, despite his best efforts to seem unaffected.
"I'll do my best to find mine, then," he acquiesced.
She gave him one last pat before letting go and leaning back into her chair.
"My advice…hm…" she trailed off and touched her finger to her chin. "I hope, one day, you meet someone who does have a clear direction in their life—a direction you can resonate with more clearly than mine, perhaps. If not God, and if not yourself, putting your faith in them could be a start."
He stared at her blankly for a moment. Then a moment longer. He scoffed.
"If it were that easy…"
"I didn't say it would be easy! Now…" she pushed her plate forward. "Seconds, please!"
X
X
"I need all of you to open up your ears because we don't have much time," Chifuyu announced, pulling the data of an IS unit from the computer and sending it to the hologram projector in the middle of the meeting room. "Two hours ago, the third-generation IS Silver Gospel, a joint development between the US and Israel, lost control during a routine demonstration flight over Hawaii. We've received word that it's now left its test airspace in the middle of the Pacific, and satellite imagery has the IS passing through local airspace at a point two clicks off-shore in exactly fifty minutes. Academy personnel will use the training IS to seal off both air and sea routes, and keep civilians from getting in the line of fire." Her eyes narrowed. "Responsibility for the primary objective of neutralizing the rogue IS will be left to you all, with your personal IS."
Ichika felt like he was sinking into himself. It was… a lot. He knew he was supposed to be listening to Chifuyu's briefing—this was important! But it was all so sudden.
He snuck glances at the others in the room. They looked totally locked in right now; no one appeared as unsure as he did.
He supposed it made sense. They were trained for this. They were all groomed for the position of representative candidate for their respective countries and he… was here by mistake. There wasn't any other way around it.
He was out of his depth. It was embarrassing.
"We'll now take any questions about the mission. Raise your hand if you wish to speak."
"Yes." The first to raise her hand was Charl. "When you say it lost control, does that mean the pilot is still inside?"
"We've confirmed that the designated pilot, Natasha Fairs, is not presently in the IS unit." Chifuyu shook her head. "As far as we know, the research team was in the middle of demonstrating the AI backup system when the incident occurred. The Gospel is unmanned."
"Do we know where they're trying to go?" he asked despite himself.
"If we do our job right, we'll never have to find out," his sister shot back immediately. "As it so happens, we're the first on its flight path across the Pacific, and with us being neutral parties as outlined under the conditions of the Alaska treaty, us taking care of this matter over our airspace doesn't come with any notable political fallout." Her eyes scanned the room, frowning. "So it falls to everyone here with a custom IS to intercept and neutralize the Silver Gospel. That includes you, Shinonono."
Houki seemed to have the opposite reaction from his. She puffed her chest out as if excited to be given the opportunity.
The next to raise her hand was Cecilia. "Requesting technical data on the target IS."
"Approved." Chifuyu nodded. "But remember, this is top-secret material from two different nations. Repeating anything discussed within this room from now on outside will have severe legal consequences, including but not limited to a full inquiry and at least two years of close observation. If you all understand—"
BEEP
The hologram shut down for all of two seconds before being replaced by another brief of the same Unit. Only, this one wasn't much of a "brief" at all. Everything from the weapon loadout to the assembly BOM was listed as clear as day.
While the kids were looking on in confusion, Chifuyu whipped her head over her shoulder and shot a furious glare at the bunny girl tinkering with her laptop.
"Who the hell—"
"Oh, would you look at that," Tabane-san noted airily, pretending to be nose-deep in another project. "I've found the dev files. Here ya go!"
The vein on her temple twitched.
"Tabane…"
The purple-haired woman puffed her chest out indignantly.
"Well, ex-cuse me for wanting to lend assistance! I'll have you know I'm like the Panama Canal, baby! Everything IS-related flows through me!"
It was at this point the other occupant in the room saw fit to speak up.
"You certainly have the mouth for it," Shirou-san muttered, leaning against a far wall with his arms crossed grumpily.
"Why you—"
"Shirou!" his wife hissed at him before the jibe could escalate into something more. "Shut it."
He and Tabane did just that right away. Not before turning away from each other with a huff, though. Chifuyu must've been more frazzled by this sudden mission than she led on; this was Ichika's first time seeing her snap at her husband like that.
The teacher coughed into her fist.
"Moving on, beyond the technical data of the Gospel, the glaring issue is that the IS unit is currently travelling at supersonic speeds. Mach two, to be exact. Realistically, our window of opportunity is so narrow that we're only going to have one good shot at it."
"One shot…" Yamada Maya murmured before everyone turned toward Ichika, contemplative.
He shifted uneasily. "What?"
Chifuyu steeled herself. "Ichika, you're taking point on this mission."
"Eh?!"
"Don't look so surprised." His sister barked, ignoring the way his world started spinning in the wrong direction. "Your one-off ability Reiraku Byakuya bypasses an IS unit's energy shields to allow you to deal direct damage to an IS, to the extent that the unit's inherent absolute barrier would have to be deployed as a result. That should be enough to completely deplete its reserves. Once it crashes into the ocean, we can liaise with the U.S. regarding their recovery operations."
"Hold on!" Ichika lurched forward and shot his hand up in the air. "You mean this whole plan is banking on me?"
This wasn't the kind of responsibility he was ready for. He just got here! More than just being a first-year, he hadn't even dreamt of becoming a pilot until recently. He was willing to give all of this a shot because he had to, but give him some time to acclimate, at least!
"Don't be so full of yourself," Chifuyu muttered. "But yes, you'll need to do your part. You have the means to end this as quickly as possible, which means it's the most prudent course of action. I have no desire to send off a bunch of kids into live combat. Trust me when I say I wish there were another way."
Toward the end, her tone softened in a way that would have been imperceptible to anyone save for those who have known her for years. Even still, her sympathies did nothing to quell the indignant feeling swelling within him.
"What about you then?" he asked, head lowered. "No one is stronger than Orimura Chifuyu, right?"
His outburst caught many by surprise. Most of the girls turned their heads toward him in shock, Shirou-san softened his scowl, smiling to himself, and Tabane kept her attention on Chifuyu, who was the only one who seemed unphased despite her usually short fuse.
"My Kurezakura has been out of commission for a long time now, kid," she muttered. "I'm no IS pilot as I am now."
The statement, stated so plainly, sent waves of shock through the present students. Indeed, she hadn't been doing much piloting herself since starting her job at the academy, but to hear it said so plainly…
Still, Ichika's mind was elsewhere.
Kurezakura? Was that the name of her IS?
All this time, he was under the impression she was the pilot of the—
"Anyways," Chifuyu went on, comparatively unperturbed, "that leaves one part of the plan settled. The issue now is getting Ichika there as soon as we can. Given that Reiraku Byakuya costs a huge amount of energy to use, I'd rather have Ichika and the Byakushiki conserve their energy until they're within range of the Gospel."
She directed her attention to the other pilots in the room.
"One of you is going to have to carry the Byakushiki upon your own IS to intercept the Gospel."
It took a moment for those words to fully register amongst the others in the room.
"E-Eh?"
"Carrying Ichika?"
"Over the ocean?"
"What, like a bridal carry—"
WHAP
"Shut. Up." Chifuyu barked, tapping the attendance book against her palms dangerously. "If you're not going to treat this matter with the gravity it deserves I'm going to ask you to leave the room."
The girls quietened immediately. Way to go, sis!
"So. Back to brass tacks. Which of your IS is currently capable of reaching the highest speed?"
"That would be my Blue Tears!" Cecilia responded swiftly, doing a poor job of hiding her smug grin as the annoyed glares of the other girls landed on her back. "The high-mobility equalizer 'Strike Gunner' has just arrived from England, and it also includes an ultra-high performance hypersensor."
"Hypersensor?" Ichika blinked.
"It helps you keep track and process visual information even while travelling at supersonic speeds." Charl supplied quietly.
"Have you had the opportunity to test it?" Chifuyu asked.
Cecilia's expression fell immediately.
"Err, no," she admitted, "but I do have twenty supersonic flight hours clocked already if it makes a difference."
Chifuyu mulled it over.
"... Well I guess it'd have to–"
"Houki can do it!" Tabane suddenly piped up.
The entire room turned to look at the mad scientist.
"Tabane," Chifuyu looked very tired all of a sudden, "I told you not to interfere–"
"But Chi-chaaan." Tabane wiggled in her seat, pouting. "Think about how long it'd take for an uninstalled equalizer to be equipped onto that girl's Blue Spheres— "
"It's Tears," Cecilia mumbled.
"And think about how much quicker it'd be with Akatsubaki's Fold-out Armour!" Tabane barreled on, uncaring for the way the British representative slowly sat down with the enthusiasm of a deflated balloon. "It's like I said! The entire draw of the fourth-generation IS removes the need for most equalizers altogether: Fold-out armour lets you switch the frame's inherent function in a matter of seconds!" With a flourish, she manipulated the hologram in front of them until a 3D rendering of the Akatsubaki was displayed. "I'll sweep a few armour panels here, here, and here," they watched as sections of the IS' armor folded upon itself, all of a sudden becoming more aerodynamic, "and there you have it! Akatsubaki's moved some of its skill points from defence to speed! It can now keep up with whatever those American guys designed, no problem!"
Shirou's scowl only deepened.
"Be that as it may," Chifuyu gave a wide-eyed Houki a wary glance, "your sister has barely had the chance to take the thing for a test flight. It doesn't matter how fast it can go if she crashes into the ocean face-first."
"Oh, please! It's like riding a bike!" Tabane-san reminded her without missing a beat. "Besides, you really think my Akatsubaki doesn't have some quality-of-life upgrades that make piloting easier? So that my dear Houki can focus on doing what she has to do? Saving the world and all that jazz?"
… Wow. She was being pretty heavy-handed about this. Even he realised as much.
Ichika looked to Shirou-san, who hadn't spoken since Chifuyu told him to hush up. The redhead was glaring at the woman of science with a gaze that was equal parts glacial and unflinching.
And his sister…
He blinked.
Chifuyu had a faraway look in her eyes.
Tabane sighed.
"So many people underestimating my Akatsubaki," grumbled Tabane-san, pouting. "You're all overthinking it! I swear! Jeez. People don't change, do they? I mean, look what it took for people to take the Shirokishi seriously!"
Out of the corner of his eyes, Ichika noticed Shirou tensing, back coming off against the wall. The girls looked confused by the comparison whilst Chifuyu continued to look like she didn't hear Tabane-san in the first place.
"Come to think of it, that time was just like this," Tabane continued after a prolonged pause as if having waited for an interjection and been left wanting. "A loose weapon left out of control over the sea, none able to offer a solution except for me… And yet, there were so many doubters. How could anyone believe in God and not the miracles I offer them at the drop of a hat?"
Ichika remembered it clearly: the White Knight Incident. The first IS the world had ever seen had been launched to intercept two thousand, three hundred and forty-one missiles from surrounding nations that had been hacked and launched at the island nation of Japan. Such a ludicrous attempt at wanton destruction, even beyond the means of the country's advanced MBD systems, was intercepted by the Shirokishi. One swing was enough to eliminate half of them. A particle cannon, the first of its kind, removed the rest as if by magic.
It was Tabane's very own creation. The event that catapulted her into a life of infamy.
But why bring it up now? This felt like more than petty boasting. He was… perplexed. What was going on here? Was she saying this fourth-generation unit was as much of an achievement as the world's first IS frame?
…
No. What was the point behind such a boast anyway?
Ichika was in the middle of pondering this when Shirou raised his hand.
"... I have a question." He suddenly spoke up.
"Eh?" Yamada-sensei blinked. "Mister Orimura, I know we're allowing you here on a technicality, but I don't know if we can really answer anything confidential—"
"Oh, it's fine!" Tabane waved her off, making a great show of looking magnanimous. "It's natural for someone to be curious, and given the IQ of who's asking, I encourage him to ask many more—"
"Where's Tatenashi?" He interrupted.
Yamada blinked.
Tabane scowled.
Ichika and the others exchanged confused looks. "...Tatenashi?"
"Tatenashi…" Chifuyu looked stumped for a moment before collecting herself once more. "Tatenashi Sarashiki is currently in Russia. Vladivostok. On official business in her capacity as a Cadet Representative."
"Can't you call her back citing a national emergency?" Shirou pressed, looking oddly worried. "I mean no offense, but I'd feel better if someone with her experience was here to handle it instead of—"
"And how do you imagine that going with the Russians?" Chifuyu snorted. " 'Hi. Sorry to interrupt. I have to borrow your cadet representative to salvage a rogue IS belonging to the other side of the Cold War.' The entire reason why we're handling it is to avoid ruffling geo-political feathers."
"You're not saying you can't." He pointed out.
"Sorry," Ichika raised a hand, looking lost, "who's Tatenashi?"
Chifuyu and her husband locked eyes for a moment longer before Chifuyu eventually broke first.
"She's your senior." She muttered shortly. "And unavailable to help right now. So it's come to you all to handle this. Tabane, how long do you need to adjust the Akatsubaki?"
Tabane broke out into a broad smile. "Give me two minutes, and I'll have Akatsubaki ready to go!"
"Very well. Orimura and Shinonono will intercept and shoot down the target. The operation begins in T-minus thirty minutes. All personnel shall begin preparations immediately." Chifuyu clapped her hands. "If you've got nothing to do, help them move equipment. Orimura, Shinonono, prepare your IS. Get to it!"
Ugh, she got real serious real fast.
As Ichika looked around, he noticed that everyone else had already found something to do.
Shirou-san pulled away from the wall and started making his way to the door. The action earned him the eyes of those present.
"I'll leave you all to your business," the man told his wife, expression complicated. "I'm a civilian, after all. Sorry for imposing."
"Shirou," Chifuyu murmured, looking oddly abashed.
"It's fine, Chifuyu." Her husband put up a smile, patting her on the arm lightly. "You know me. I'll find something to do in the meantime."
He turned towards Ichika, expression serious.
"Good luck out there."
And with a final lingering glance towards Houki, Shirou departed.
For a moment the room was silent.
"What are you all waiting for, Golden Week?" Chifuyu barked, all no-nonsense once again. "Get moving!"
"Yes Ma'am!" They chorused, and Ichika hurriedly made an effort to look busy, opening up the Byakushiki's console for the pre-flight check. He sneaked a glance towards his sister, watching Tabane work her magic on the Akatsubaki with an unreadable expression.
It occurred to him at that moment, watching Tabane summon four floating arms to work in tandem with the madwoman operating on intricate machinery, that nothing was stopping his sister, that great beacon of strength and sheer power, from having her IS repaired by her best friend in front of her.
And if it had occurred to a numbskull like him, it would surely have occurred to his sister.
And Tabane.
…
"Ichika!"
He nearly jumped, turning towards the voice. "Y-yes?"
"Yamada-sensei told me to give you a rundown of high-speed combat," Cecilia stated importantly.
"Oh." Ichika blinked. "Sure. Thanks."
She beamed. That was nice to see.
"So. The basics." Cecilia put a hand on her hip, struck a pose, and began to explain. "So, high-speed combat hinges upon the hypersensor. And what the hypersensor essentially does is—"
"It's like the world is moving in slow motion." Rin piped up suddenly from behind her. "At least for your first time."
"Don't interrupt me, Lingyin! Now, as I was saying–"
"The important thing is not to rely on your Ignition Boost." Charl cut in, having appeared out of nowhere. "It depletes your energy levels twice as fast."
"I was getting to that! That comes later! And the additional danger of high-speed combat is—"
"Your relative velocity makes you take significantly more damage from ranged weapons." And on cue, Laura arrived with the finisher.
"Why you—"
Ah. This was happening again.
Tuning out his friends' squabbles in front of him, he focused his attention back on the Byakushiki's console.
He'd have to ask his sister about it another time, then.
X
X
Shirou dabbed at his forehead, sweat dripping down his brow under the sweltering heat of the sauna. Having followed the locals in sitting squarely upon his towel laid neatly on the seat, he sighed, resting his arms over his knees, a feeble attempt at preserving whatever modesty he had left. Not that anyone in the bathhouse seemed to care; no one he'd encountered so far seemed conscious of each other's nudity.
Case in point with the two teens sitting a tier above him, engaged in rapt conversation he tried in vain to tune out.
"... I can't have this conversation again," one murmured, "I already told you. He's not worthy because he refuses to kill anyone, even when it is the best option. Being worthy means being able to trust yourself to make the hard decisions."
"What's so hard about killing people? One can argue for someone like him, it's the easy option. It's a stupid reason why he can't lift the hammer."
"It's the official reason. It's documented."
"Doesn't make it any less stupid–"
The door creaked open, and a middle-aged man entered the wooden room, flesh sagged and rubbed raw, giving a polite nod to the rest of the room before proceeding to ladle scoop after scoop of water from the pail over the coals, much to Shirou's growing concern.
"You see, a better reason for his unworthiness would be that everything he's done, all those lives he's saved, he's done so out of guilt. Uncle Ben and all that, his greatest failure. He's compensating. It's not the right reason to be heroic."
"And what exactly is the 'right' reason?"
"... That it's the right thing to do, I guess?"
"You do realize one can have multiple reasons for doing something, right? As poetic as your idea may be, it doesn't make a lot of sense in practice."
"We're talking about a hammer made for Gods. It probably operates on a whole different logic from us."
"... Well shit, if you're going to pull that excuse again, then why are we still discussing this–"
He'd had enough.
Shirou stood, squinting amidst the sudden wave of heat as he collected his towel, wrapping it around his waist as he exited the sauna, entering one of the shower stations and rinsing his sweat away.
This was a strange situation from top to bottom, wasn't it?
He had come to Germany to break up an illegal operation. What he found was a Japanese superstar leading some kind of strange, military equivalent of a summer camp.
And now he was at a bathhouse with that superstar.
What was he gaining from this, exactly? He'd gotten what he needed. He shouldn't have stuck around the way that he had. And yet…
Shirou turned off the tap, taking a moment to admire the wall's hand-painted majolica tiles before heading towards where the thermal pools were ostensibly located, eyes roaming across the various Roman friezes and frescoes that adorned the walls.
At the entrance, a stone-faced attendant boredly gestured toward the linen trolleys filled with used towels and slippers.
He sighed. When in Rome, he mused.
With much more composure than he'd thought he could summon, he deposited his towel and slippers into the trolleys and stepped into the area where the thermal pools were located.
As the unspoken protocol dictated, he gave the barest of nods to the few patrons still there as he passed by, making his way towards an alcove with a pool that was conveniently free of people.
Without much fanfare, he sank into the pool – warm, waist-height, underwater benches carved from its circumference – and sighed, allowing his gaze to trail up towards the skylight.
He'd read somewhere that the dome was the heart of the Friedrichsbad – a soaring, vaulted ceiling of marble and limestone, supported by ornate columns and arched supports that radiated outwards. Mosaics depicting classical scenes lined the walls underneath it, ending with intricate stucco work and gilded accents that lined its arches.
For a long while, Shirou sat, eyes up, taking in all the details, lazily watching as whatever light that entered the skylight travelled across the walls.
"Why are you just standing there?" he muttered, not bothering to look over his shoulder.
There was a pause, then the footsteps resumed
Orimura Chifuyu shuffled to the side until she was within his line of sight. She did a good job of appearing unphased by his strong senses, but her posture was that of a startled cat nonetheless. Her eyes kept darting between him and the water, scowling as she pushed her arms tighter against her bust.
"...You just stay over there, okay?"
"That's my plan," he quipped, not looking at her in her current state of dress more than he had to.
She didn't appreciate the sarcasm, but it was enough to let her ease up. She lowered herself into the pool as far away as possible, right up to her neck.
They shared a tense few moments of silence.
"How was the brush massage?" Shirou asked, for the lack of anything better to do.
He heard her mutter something.
"I can't hear you." He admitted.
"... I said it was fine." She repeated, louder this time, enough for the sound to reverberate above them.
"I know they offer 'soft' and 'hard' options," he went on conversationally, "but the soft massage was already pretty brutal, in my experience."
"..."
When it became clear there was no retort nor rejoinder forthcoming, he sighed, giving her his attention once more.
"There are other pools, you know," he remarked, "if you think you'd be more comfortable somewhere else…"
"I still have questions!" she retorted, arms crossed indignantly. "Why do you think we're here, exactly!?"
The stare he gave her was blank and uncomprehending. The longer he went without saying anything, the more she became visibly uncomfortable.
"We're here," he said slowly, "to have a bath."
SPLASH!
Orimura stood to her feet and marched over to him with a scowl. She stood right over him; he pressed himself against the wall of the pool and cranked his head away despite his efforts to keep his cool.
"I didn't realize I was dealing with a comedian." She hissed.
"I'm serious." He muttered, still looking away. "I think we've both said what we needed to say. All of this is just extraneous. Why don't we just mind our own business and just enjoy the rest of our evening?"
"I still have questions for you." She muttered, eventually taking a seat beside him. "What possessed you to do something as stupid as infiltrating a foreign military base? If you're not a spy, that means you're just a moron."
Shirou turned his head back to frown at her.
"I'd rather be wrong and take action than be right and do nothing at all," he declared. "What if those kids really did need help?"
"Then it would have nothing to do with you," she answered, expression glacial. "Who do you think you are? Vigilantes like you do nothing but get in the way."
"It's something I had to do." He tried.
"'Had to'?" She repeated, incredulous. "No one has to do something so stupid."
He looked like he had a comeback ready, but instead, his chin dropped down to his chest, his wetted bangs covering his eyes. She left him to his silent contemplation for the few seconds it took for him to find his words.
In the end, it seemed he'd have to share this with her too.
"My name wasn't always Emiya Shirou." He eventually said, expression rueful. "I can't remember my actual name. There was a fire where I'm from—Fuyuki—back when I was young. And you have to understand, this wasn't some case of someone leaving the stove running for too long, this was a big fire. A lot of people died, my birth parents along with it. You might have heard of it?"
"Vaguely." She muttered.
"Well, the long and short of it was, I was saved from the rubble by someone who later became my adoptive father." Shirou's eyes turned unfocused. "I remembered him being… happy, happy to have saved me. It's a smile I remember to this day."
He opened his mouth to continue, but paused, taking a conscious glance at the stone-faced woman beside him, and took a breath.
"As far back as I could remember, I always wanted to smile like that."
Admitting this came with a faint sense of embarrassment, but Orimura didn't comment, expression unreadable as she waited for him to continue.
"When I was young, I made a promise to my father on his deathbed," he revealed. "His dream was to be a hero. Someone who could save people. I took that dream as my own; I promised him I'd be one in his stead. There's no way I could look the other way and betray it."
"If you want to save people go be a doctor or something," she told him bluntly, but not unkindly. "Come to think of it, if you're so determined to derive your sense of identity from something bad that happened to you when you were young, then go be a fireman. Save people from fires. Make your life come full circle. All this cloak and dagger isn't the way to make a difference. You should know that much, at least."
Instead of arguing with her logic, he smiled at her. It was an apologetic thing. She didn't expect it and leaned away from him as if losing her balance.
"The issue is I could do more than that," Shirou admitted. "What with my… abilities, it always feels like I can do more. Like I should do more, with what I've learned."
"Just because you can doesn't mean you need to, does it?"
He huffed. "I do feel like I need to. Being one of the only survivors from that fire," he paused, searching for the right way to put it, "I feel like I need to make the most out of my new life. That me living instead of all those other children who died that day was a good thing, because I eventually grew up to save people." He admitted.
"At this point, I feel like this is the only way that I'll ever deserve to be happy."
She didn't move. She didn't speak. For a moment, Shirou thought that she would let it be.
Then she grabbed him by the hair and pulled his forehead up to hers.
"Where do you get off thinking you deserve to be happy?" she muttered, her voice barely a whisper yet close enough for him to hear crystal-clear. "No one on this earth deserves anything, much less being happy. Do you think it's something so transactional? That you can do a good thing and get good things in return? No. There's no predetermined set of rules one must follow to obtain happiness. I deserve to spend my life fighting and killing until I, too, drop dead like a good little soldier. That's what I was made to do. Do I have any right to ask for anything more than that?"
He recoiled, but couldn't move back due to her handle on him.
"You—"
"A normal life was beyond me," she continued, refusing to let him get a word in. "My brother, too, but I saw an opportunity for a semblance of a normal life and I took it. I clawed my way toward it until it finally came to me and I didn't let anything or anyone stop me. I wanted something that would make me happy and I went for it, what I 'deserved' had nothing to do with it. You can take your gung-ho happiness nonsense and shove it."
She let him go.
Gingerly, Shirou rubbed his head, watching as Orimura sank deeper into the water, refusing to comment, but looking reflective of her overreaction nonetheless.
"I think I hit a nerve," he said gently.
"Really? What gave it away?"
He visibly deflated. "You're right. I'm—"
"Sorry?" she cut him off, visibly unimpressed.
"Hah." Shirou's eyes closed pensively. "Yeah. I guess I'm… out of sorts. I have been ever since the White Knight incident."
She made a strange face.
"What does the Shirokishi have to do with anything?"
Maybe it was a strange thing to bring up out of nowhere. Just because it was always on his mind didn't mean it would be true for others. He gathered his thoughts.
"I had a future in front of me. After college, I was going to explore the world, maybe go somewhere like the Middle East and do my part in saving who I could. But in the middle of my studies, the incident happened, and…" he gestured weakly, before rubbing a palm over his eyes.
"The pilot—whoever they were—set a tough example to follow, nevermind this tenuous state of world peace we're currently living in." He admitted. "I guess you could say it's led to a bit of an inferiority complex. How can I say that I want to live my life saving people if a single person could do it better than I ever could? I'm jealous, I feel terrible about feeling jealous, and I admire them. It's the strangest thing, for an entity to be a representation of my goals as well as my obstacles preventing me from achieving those goals."
Orimura frowned, searching his face as she pursed her lips, in deep thought.
Shirou chuckled. "I'm sorry, that makes it sound like the pilot's essentially everything in my eyes, doesn't it? I think I mean to say—"
"I'm the pilot."
…
For the life of him, he couldn't remember what he wanted to say next. There were no thoughts. All that remained was confidence that he had misheard her.
"I'm sorry?" he asked.
"I'm the pilot," she repeated quickly. Hotly. "Of the Shirokishi."
He blinked, then blinked again. He shook his head and put his hands out in front of him.
"Wait. No. I think I heard you say—"
She slapped his hands out of the way.
"You're an idiot," she told him, sneering. "Didn't you go off on some self-righteous spiel earlier about not putting 'entertainers' on pedestals? Take your own damn advice. Sorry to break it to you, but I had no desire to be anyone's hero. There were no grand ideals for me to follow and I certainly wasn't clamouring to be put in that position in the first place. There was a threat that had to be dealt with, I was in the right place to lend a hand, and Tabane gave me her suit. There's nothing more to it. If you're disillusioned with me now, tough. You'll be better off for it."
She ended her sentence with confidence, but it wavered as his intense, unrelenting gaze seemed to stare right into her soul. She pulled back further.
"And that's private information, by the way. If I ever get word of you blabbing about it don't think I wouldn't do the same with whatever…"
As she rambled, probably led to do so by the late-onset panic of what she had revealed in the heat of the moment, he soaked in every detail of her body as if for the first time. The complexion of her flesh, flushed red. Her posture, so quick to jump from skittish to absolute confidence. Her piercing eyes that had caught his own from the very first moment they met.
She was serious. This wasn't a joke. She had revealed the identity of the one he gave everything to chase. And it was her.
He understood it better now. From the moment they'd met, there was something about those eyes that he envied, but he couldn't place why. That sense of justice, of duty… it was just innate to her, wasn't it?
It was, without a doubt, a look that fit the White Knight quite perfectly.
"W-what is it?" she stuttered, his extended silence getting to her. "Speak up."
Only, now, the White Knight wasn't what he knew it to be. And that was okay.
"Do you regret it?" he asked.
She glared at him.
"What kind of animal do you take me for—no, I don't regret it," she snarled. "What kind of person would I have to be to regret it? It was either do something or do nothing. But even still…" she kissed her teeth. "I made that decision. I don't regret that decision. But I'd be lying if I said it hasn't brought me a whole lot of trouble. It's a pain in the ass, you know. Because I did what I did, I'm stuck here instead of being at home with my brother. And you're a fool for wanting that life for yourself."
Again, he was silent. Observing her. She could only scowl back in a poor effort to stave off the awkwardness she felt after her words failed to elicit any sort of visible reaction.
The sense of awe dwindled away, replaced with something else, something no less magnificent and all-consuming that he, for the life of him, couldn't place at the moment.
He smiled gently.
"It's not wrong to save people," he told her softly. The insistent tone of his previous remarks was gone, now more chiding than argumentative.
"I know that." She murmured, face flushed as she brought her knees against her ample chest. "But sometimes… sometimes I wish that I was never in that position in the first place, that I never needed to."
To that, he had no response.
And thus, the two sat, little between them but water, in a silence that was no longer uncomfortable, together underneath a skylight that just began to reflect the gloaming of dusk.