I was looking for someplace to write down just general snippets, similar to how the questing...
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Short stories and snippets that (probably) won't be continued.
- Thread starter DuskAtDawn
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DuskAtDawn
Of the Thousand Faces
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I was looking for someplace to write down just general snippets, similar to how the questing threads have their respective interest check threads, and I couldn't find anything. Well, no, I found a few, but they all seem to have been made by various prominent authors for their own personal use. I didn't want to make one of those, since I don't write enough to warrant making a thread.
So I decided to make one that the community at large can use, people like me who write for fun occasionally but not frequently.
I'll be posting here, of course, but feel free to put your own aborted stories here too.
So I decided to make one that the community at large can use, people like me who write for fun occasionally but not frequently.
I'll be posting here, of course, but feel free to put your own aborted stories here too.
DuskAtDawn
Of the Thousand Faces
- Joined
- Nov 26, 2013
- Messages
- 2,425
- Likes received
- 12,008
Jack of All Trades, a F/SN fic. Not to be taken seriously.
///
"You're not Heracles."
The statement, delivered entirely without emotion, came from a withered face projected on a glass ball. The ball was held up by one of his family's trademark abominations of life. It called itself "Leysritt", not that the master knew or cared what his creations did in their spare time. Its sister, the one who responded to "Sella", had already left ahead of the young mistress, preparing her destination for habitability. It was a lengthy task, since the family manor hadn't been used in over a decade.
The accusation, true though it was, barely registered with the third (and until very recently final) occupant of the room, whose crimson eyes were fixed firmly on the newest arrival. She knew him. He had never met him, but his face had been seen often enough that he showed up in what passed as dreams for her. The one she wanted so much to like, but needed so much to kill. The young man her father had abandoned her in favor of raising.
Ilyasviel von Einzbern hated that face.
Sort of.
Maybe?
Eh, she'd figure it out later.
The face on the orb spoke up again. "It is not a total loss. If Kiritsugu passed down Avalon as we suspect he did, your servant may not be as unsuited to the Berserker class as he appears to be. He should also have knowledge of the upcoming war, assuming he has not already died." The face frowned. "Though actually getting that knowledge may prove troublesome. Do not try to do it unsupervised, Ilyasviel. Nobody can know what kind of madness took him, as it hasn't happened yet. His mind may... will be a dangerous place."
Again, he might not have said anything at all. All that the silver-haired loli cared about at the moment was the boy in front of her. She opened her mouth, to rage, to cry, to scream, to do all of the above-
"Imouto-chan?"
Everyone in the room went into shock. Besides Leysritt, of course - the homunculus merely stared vacantly forwards, unaware of its surroundings. Berserker shouldn't be able to talk, not so clearly! The young man dressed in school clothes shouldn't even be able to think clearly, much less speak.
"What mystery could cause this?" More curiosity than anger, though elements of both were present in Jubstacheit's musing, the old man's nature as a magus warring with his irritation at the blatant disregard for the rules of HIS Grail War.
"So...you are to be my Master." Ilyasviel was about to affirm and assert her dominance over the one she hated almost as much as her traitor of a father, but he just continued without waiting for an answer, "Good. All is as it should be." Her brother kneeled at her feet, "Once more, this foolish brother, Emiya Shirou, pledges his body and fists to you. Lead well, Master."
It was only as she looks on blankly, unable to respond to such slavish devotion, that she sees the scarred pattern carved into the back of the young man's neck.
///
Five-fold enclose.
Shinji Matou shivered in long-built anticipation. Tonight, finally, he would become a true Magus, defying the fate that his birth had decided to hand him. The single, pathetically inefficient magic circuit that had doomed him to mediocrity flared painfully, but it was easily ignored; anticipation aside, he felt worse every time he tried to cast any of the family mysteries. Here, the only task his circuit had to do was connect vaguely to the intricate symbol his grandfather had constructed on the floor, and the book would do the rest. Simple, easy, and low-risk - his favorite type of ritual, and the type he was best at.
His sister cut off the flow of prana to the circle, and Shinji felt his own reach out to reconnect the link. The energy was almost visible at this point, slowly compacting into physical form. Flesh formed here and there, a vaguely human-shaped hand reaching down to pick up the mask lying at the sorta-feet. It placed the mask roughly where a human's head would be, even as the head finished forming underneath it. The looser gatherings of energy began to form clothes - black flowing cloth that fluttered in a nonexistent wind.
That was the first of three clues that something had gone wrong. Medusa was very much a Grecian spirit, and as far as he knew, the Greeks preferred their clothes in a more sun-resistant white or tan color. And that was assuming the beast even wore any clothes at all; what Medusa had worn wasn't something the storytellers of the time liked to focus on.
The second hint came a second later, when Shinji got a brief second's glimpse before a particular patch of cloth formed, which told him that this form was definitely male. Kind of depressing. Snakes for hair or not, Medusa was said to be quite the beauty, once you filtered out all the unnecessary drama the authors of the epics liked to include.
A voice emitted from under the mask, and Shinji prepared to claim that, yes, he was this creature's master, as his grandfather instructed he establish immediately.
"Dead rapist says what?" "Wha-"
The third clue took the form of a large hunk of metal separating his head from his torso, to the general shock of the room.
///
Bazette Fraga gazed at the forming figure, hoping beyond hope that the ancestral link was enough to call the legendary spearman Cu Chulainn. For the most part, she was leaving it up to luck of the draw, albeit with the deck stacked in her favor. The Clock Tower "Observer" sent to oversee the ritual jotted down some more notes, as did the much better-hidden agent the Church decided to send, clinging on to a dark ceiling corner with his toes in some manner. Did he actually think she hadn't noticed him? Well, whatever. As an enforcer, she could appreciate the phrase "plausible deniability" better than many.
She didn't have long to wait - the ambient energy from her family's graves gained cohesion rapidly, saving the figure time and prana better allocated to more vital tasks. It took only moments to discover that, unless the legends were drastically wrong about the ethnicity of her idol (and she'd know, given how much she had studied these particular ones), she had failed to provide enough of a catalyst. At least she had called the right class, if the big red spear that crackled with dark energy was any indication. It seemed to call to her blood, and brought forth fond memories of beautiful green hills.
Memories that she was fairly sure she didn't actually have. She'd have to ask him about that.
"You seem like a good drinking buddy." The blue-clad warrior noted of his new Master. Crass, blunt, and an Irish statement to the core - if his features weren't so blatantly eastern, Bazette would be sure that he was her idol, the servant of Scathath. "So, you're my Master, eh?"
The Servant Lancer regarded the woman standing in front of him, silently judging her worthiness. The Fraga fidgeted slightly, knowing full well that the person doing the evaluating was leagues above her skill when he was still alive, and now that he was a Heroic Spirit, whoever this is was in a league that she couldn't even touch without Fragarach. And she didn't have any of them on her.
Lancer ignored her nervousness and nodded to himself. "Let's go have some fun. There's gonna be a big brawl soon, right? I wanna get shitfaced on this era's booze before I start fighting."
Bazette grinned in response. "Sure." She waved away the flabbergasted Observer, and noted idly that the Church's agent had left at some point. Good riddance. "Hey, who are you anyways?"
His reply was barely understandable - three different voices layered onto each other and echoed in a maddening cacophany. His mouth moved in ways that hurt her head just to see and left her vaguely confused, unable to remember what she'd just seen.
"Lancer""Cu Chulainn""Emiya Shirou".
///
He didn't recognize the face, but every magus worth their workshop knew the Magus Killer's name. Imagine the luck! A titleless, first-generation magus like him, chosen to fight in the ritual of all rituals, the key to reaching the root of all knowledge!
And there were fewer magi more suited to the situation. His study of the Blue had yielded few results, but they were all practical. All he needed to to was wait for all the participants to gather, and he could turn Fuyuki city into one big bomb, the convenient leylines ensuring the biggest explosion he could imagine. Sure, the Clock Tower and the Church may get pissed, but by that point he would have claimed his prize and he'd be beyond their reach.
Honestly, his servant was largely irrelevant - so long as he had one, he could claim victory, but it didn't matter which he got. They wouldn't be doing any fighting if everything went well. Still, a Caster could only help. Better yet, his studies showed that the Magus Killer had studied and altered the local leylines in such a way to make them explode recently, for some personal project. Anyways-
"Hmm..." the servant Caster regarded the circle at his feet, then he started. "Ah!" Crouching down, to the bemusement of his Master, "I can fix this!"
Wait, what? "Eh...Ah!"
Emiya Shirou ran a glowing finger around and through the circle on the ground, establishing a connection between the isolated circle and the runes surrounding the room. Every rune surrounding the room. All of them.
Which, given this Magus' particular specialties, were all explosive.
"No, wait-"
Silly nameless magus, you don't get a role!
///
Sochirou was nervous, though he didn't show it. After the glowing lightshow that bonded his student to him, (and made him feel vaguely wrong about having "bonded" with one of his students) his new 'servant' (so very wrong.) had ripped on a rock, knocking it a few inches away and placing it into the perfect circle of pebbles off to one side. How had that even formed? His cursing over his stubbed toe had then caused the circle to glow.
And then another of his students was there from the circle. Who was also Emiya Shirou, only with very prominent guns. Lots of guns.
The teacher felt like he should lecture the newcomer regarding his portable armory, but since he only responded to the name "assassin", he decided it probably wan't a good idea. Between the minigun strapped horizontally across his waist, the rifle slung on his back, and the four semi-automatic pistols hanging from his belt, the young man had a gun for every occasion. And then some.
The living armory turned to Sochirou, who tensed, not really trusting anyone who had more weapons than limbs. He opened his mouth and set the tone of their relationship in five words.
"Would you like some tea?"
If anyone asks, Sochirou did not facefault. Don't believe anyone telling you otherwise.
///
Tohsaka Rin was pissed. Rightfully so, too - her summon almost completely failed, calling the wrong servant to the wrong location, and causing who-knows-how-much in repair costs. At least she actually summoned something. It would have sucked if she was excluded from her ancestor's ritual, just because her clocks were wrong.
Then there was her servant, Archer. She wasn't sure, really, why he struck her as familiar, but he certainly acted disturbingly familiar with her. Perhaps he knew her father, or was from the future. The second option was more likely, considering he had her father's pendant, but she couldn't imagine how many years would be required to bleed off the entirety of prana contained in it. A distant descendant, perhaps, or trusted friend of the family.
The thing that bugged her to insanity was his ignorance of his own identity, though that may be to maintain the timeline so as not to paradox himself out of existence. So she guessed she couldn't blame him. Her ire was almost baseless.
And that just annoyed her even more.
"Master, should we not begin patrolling the battleground?"
"Don't you know the area?" The city couldn't have changed that much over time, could it? Anyone who was close enough to her or her future family to have the pendant she intended to turn into a pseudo-magic crest.
"Maybe, though the geography looks a bit different. It would be best to survey the land."
...And that told her nothing she didn't already know. Damn.
And so, alongside a discontent master, a very confused Tohsaka Shirou headed out the door.
///
Emiya Shirou was having a bad week. Sort of.
Issei was looking at him oddly whenever he did anything remotely traditional, Tohsaka was staring holes in his face with next to no subtlety, Shinji was missing, and Sakura was alternating between worshipful glances and her old beaming radiance. Even Sochiro-sensei was regarding him strangely, and the man was for all intents and purposes a statue from the neck up.
About the only consistent factor, besides all the nameless unimportant students who didn't even rate a character cg, was his garbage disposal of an english teacher, but even she noticed when Sakura had stopped holding back in her cooking. Her last meal was fit for royalty, and unless she had an imaginary friend helping her cook, she must've started around midnight.
It sort of annoyed Shirou; such a wondrous meal, the sort he would have killed in cold blood to help cook. What's more, it was mad precisely to his tastes, as if he had made it himself, only if he was much better at cooking. On one hand, he was kind of flattered that she knew him so well and had stopped holding back to humor him, on the other it was a really good meal and his chef-sense was telling him to one-up her, lest he lose his place in the kitchen.
Shirou's thoughts returned to the task at hand, a heater that any other mechanic would have left for dead. His analysis of the machine showed that any number of parts were flawed or outright unusable. No matter. Even totaled, he could coax life out of the equipment.
Prana flowed from his fingers, finding the places where the 'experiences' altered the blueprint that the original 'form' provided. The energy shored up these gaps, sharpened edges, and realigned gears. The heating coils were restored to an untarnished sheen, frayed wires mended themselves, and connections were re-established.
It was hardly a permanent solution; the original design was flawed and would inevitably degrade again. Not before the prana dissolved, of course, though; he was reanimating a corpse, and Gaia was very attentive to feats of magic that defied death and quick to correct them too.
Ah, well. Shirou wasn't the type to leave work unfinished, and he'd promised to fix the thing. If that meant defying logic and nature to keep his promise, so be it. He'd pump as much as he could into it, mask the repair job as best he could to delay its eventual demise. In any case, he'd tell Issei to replace it before it died again; this wouldn't work a second time. He'd get to the music room equipment tomorrow - it was starting to get late, and there was that weird foreigner that was constantly wandering around drunkenly at night. He didn't want to meet her again, or that blond asshole he caught following Sakura that one time. Besides, Sakura was probably at his house; she spent more time there than at home these days, and he didn't want her looking too closely at his shed.
It wouldn't do to drag the innocent girl into his path, paved alongside the river Styx. Death was a close friend to any magus, but he was family to the Emiyas and their kin. Almost as much a part of their lives as odd circumstances. Emiya Shirou really should have been more surprised when Emiya Shirou appeared in front of him, but really, it was just life as usual. The drunken foreigner stood behind the doppleganger, staring blankly at him.
Of course, his attention was drawn back to the male of the duo when he materialized a giant fuckoff spear of DEATH, somehow changing into blue spandex. The spear got a cursory glance, while the spandex prompted pants-shitting fear.
"If you mention youth, I will ram that spear where the sun doesn't shine."
The deadpan threat was responded to with irritation and confusion, but Shirou meant every word he said - completely outclassed he might be, but to keep certain things from infecting his world, his life was a small price to pay. Japan was insane enough as-is.
The girl/woman/convincing trap (it's not paranoia, it's experience. Don't ask.) looked perplexed. "This guy? This is Emiya?"
Okay, from what Shirou knew about his father, this could only be bad. He began to make his circuit, hoping against hope that he could strengthen his wrench enough to fend off the unholy stick of metal held by his oposite. Warily, he replied, "Adopted, yes. Who asks?" Sure, it seemed stupid to make small-talk with himself, but damn it he was Japanese. The only time he'd be rude was to foreigners who spoke no Japanese. And this foreigner spoke Japanese.
"Lancer, just kill him. You know, assuming it won't paradox you out of existence or anything. He's killing himself anyways, claiming that name with that level of magecraft."
Finally unleashed, the warrior formerly known as Shirou boot-to-da-head'd the student currently known as Shirou hard enough to crack his head open on a lightpost. The potential concussion was ignored in favor of the spear shooting toward his stomach, and Shirou, once more on his feet, rolled away from the strike. Scrambling to his feet, Shirou slowly backed away from the suddenly-giddy man, unwilling to turn his back on him. The next two strikes were avoided by a combination of luck, drunken swaying, and a body unsuited to using a spear.
The third hit home, but skidded off one of his ribs, leaving a deep gash from his sternum to his side. At this point, the foreigner decided that watching a superhuman warrior fail to kill a pathetically weak magus was too embarrassing, and a quick swipe of the hand sent a sheet of wind to knock the student off his feet. Only, he jumped at just the right time, the force - strong enough to blow away someone who had good footing and magical defenses - found itself utterly overkill, blowing Shirou a good quarter mile away. In the direction he was heading originally, his home.
Where, through sheer coincidence or luck, he fell through the roof of his shed, breaking his fall, avoided the dozens of sharp metal bits littered around his workshop, and landed, bloody-side-first, on the small summoning circle used ten years before.
Fate shall not be denied, no matter how much reality wishes to fight it.
"I ask of you, are you my master?"
The unconscious body did not reply.
"Oh, goddamn it."
Fujimura Shirou was not amused.
///
8 Shirous, 8 different stories, 8 different distortions. None of the servants are the canon versions of Shirou, nor is Master!Shirou, though he is closer than most of the rest. Statwise, all the servants have abysmal scores, for the most part. Caster has A ranked luck, Berserker has B endurance, and Lancer has a surprisngly high rating in Magic, though it's useless until his illusion gets broken. This was intended to be more a war of the Masters than of the Servants. Each has a backstory that I'd intended to write, but I eventually gave up on this one. I only got Rider's written down; Fate/Light Fingers. I may post it if I feel like it sometime.
///
"You're not Heracles."
The statement, delivered entirely without emotion, came from a withered face projected on a glass ball. The ball was held up by one of his family's trademark abominations of life. It called itself "Leysritt", not that the master knew or cared what his creations did in their spare time. Its sister, the one who responded to "Sella", had already left ahead of the young mistress, preparing her destination for habitability. It was a lengthy task, since the family manor hadn't been used in over a decade.
The accusation, true though it was, barely registered with the third (and until very recently final) occupant of the room, whose crimson eyes were fixed firmly on the newest arrival. She knew him. He had never met him, but his face had been seen often enough that he showed up in what passed as dreams for her. The one she wanted so much to like, but needed so much to kill. The young man her father had abandoned her in favor of raising.
Ilyasviel von Einzbern hated that face.
Sort of.
Maybe?
Eh, she'd figure it out later.
The face on the orb spoke up again. "It is not a total loss. If Kiritsugu passed down Avalon as we suspect he did, your servant may not be as unsuited to the Berserker class as he appears to be. He should also have knowledge of the upcoming war, assuming he has not already died." The face frowned. "Though actually getting that knowledge may prove troublesome. Do not try to do it unsupervised, Ilyasviel. Nobody can know what kind of madness took him, as it hasn't happened yet. His mind may... will be a dangerous place."
Again, he might not have said anything at all. All that the silver-haired loli cared about at the moment was the boy in front of her. She opened her mouth, to rage, to cry, to scream, to do all of the above-
"Imouto-chan?"
Everyone in the room went into shock. Besides Leysritt, of course - the homunculus merely stared vacantly forwards, unaware of its surroundings. Berserker shouldn't be able to talk, not so clearly! The young man dressed in school clothes shouldn't even be able to think clearly, much less speak.
"What mystery could cause this?" More curiosity than anger, though elements of both were present in Jubstacheit's musing, the old man's nature as a magus warring with his irritation at the blatant disregard for the rules of HIS Grail War.
"So...you are to be my Master." Ilyasviel was about to affirm and assert her dominance over the one she hated almost as much as her traitor of a father, but he just continued without waiting for an answer, "Good. All is as it should be." Her brother kneeled at her feet, "Once more, this foolish brother, Emiya Shirou, pledges his body and fists to you. Lead well, Master."
It was only as she looks on blankly, unable to respond to such slavish devotion, that she sees the scarred pattern carved into the back of the young man's neck.
///
Five-fold enclose.
Shinji Matou shivered in long-built anticipation. Tonight, finally, he would become a true Magus, defying the fate that his birth had decided to hand him. The single, pathetically inefficient magic circuit that had doomed him to mediocrity flared painfully, but it was easily ignored; anticipation aside, he felt worse every time he tried to cast any of the family mysteries. Here, the only task his circuit had to do was connect vaguely to the intricate symbol his grandfather had constructed on the floor, and the book would do the rest. Simple, easy, and low-risk - his favorite type of ritual, and the type he was best at.
His sister cut off the flow of prana to the circle, and Shinji felt his own reach out to reconnect the link. The energy was almost visible at this point, slowly compacting into physical form. Flesh formed here and there, a vaguely human-shaped hand reaching down to pick up the mask lying at the sorta-feet. It placed the mask roughly where a human's head would be, even as the head finished forming underneath it. The looser gatherings of energy began to form clothes - black flowing cloth that fluttered in a nonexistent wind.
That was the first of three clues that something had gone wrong. Medusa was very much a Grecian spirit, and as far as he knew, the Greeks preferred their clothes in a more sun-resistant white or tan color. And that was assuming the beast even wore any clothes at all; what Medusa had worn wasn't something the storytellers of the time liked to focus on.
The second hint came a second later, when Shinji got a brief second's glimpse before a particular patch of cloth formed, which told him that this form was definitely male. Kind of depressing. Snakes for hair or not, Medusa was said to be quite the beauty, once you filtered out all the unnecessary drama the authors of the epics liked to include.
A voice emitted from under the mask, and Shinji prepared to claim that, yes, he was this creature's master, as his grandfather instructed he establish immediately.
"Dead rapist says what?" "Wha-"
The third clue took the form of a large hunk of metal separating his head from his torso, to the general shock of the room.
///
Bazette Fraga gazed at the forming figure, hoping beyond hope that the ancestral link was enough to call the legendary spearman Cu Chulainn. For the most part, she was leaving it up to luck of the draw, albeit with the deck stacked in her favor. The Clock Tower "Observer" sent to oversee the ritual jotted down some more notes, as did the much better-hidden agent the Church decided to send, clinging on to a dark ceiling corner with his toes in some manner. Did he actually think she hadn't noticed him? Well, whatever. As an enforcer, she could appreciate the phrase "plausible deniability" better than many.
She didn't have long to wait - the ambient energy from her family's graves gained cohesion rapidly, saving the figure time and prana better allocated to more vital tasks. It took only moments to discover that, unless the legends were drastically wrong about the ethnicity of her idol (and she'd know, given how much she had studied these particular ones), she had failed to provide enough of a catalyst. At least she had called the right class, if the big red spear that crackled with dark energy was any indication. It seemed to call to her blood, and brought forth fond memories of beautiful green hills.
Memories that she was fairly sure she didn't actually have. She'd have to ask him about that.
"You seem like a good drinking buddy." The blue-clad warrior noted of his new Master. Crass, blunt, and an Irish statement to the core - if his features weren't so blatantly eastern, Bazette would be sure that he was her idol, the servant of Scathath. "So, you're my Master, eh?"
The Servant Lancer regarded the woman standing in front of him, silently judging her worthiness. The Fraga fidgeted slightly, knowing full well that the person doing the evaluating was leagues above her skill when he was still alive, and now that he was a Heroic Spirit, whoever this is was in a league that she couldn't even touch without Fragarach. And she didn't have any of them on her.
Lancer ignored her nervousness and nodded to himself. "Let's go have some fun. There's gonna be a big brawl soon, right? I wanna get shitfaced on this era's booze before I start fighting."
Bazette grinned in response. "Sure." She waved away the flabbergasted Observer, and noted idly that the Church's agent had left at some point. Good riddance. "Hey, who are you anyways?"
His reply was barely understandable - three different voices layered onto each other and echoed in a maddening cacophany. His mouth moved in ways that hurt her head just to see and left her vaguely confused, unable to remember what she'd just seen.
"Lancer""Cu Chulainn""Emiya Shirou".
///
He didn't recognize the face, but every magus worth their workshop knew the Magus Killer's name. Imagine the luck! A titleless, first-generation magus like him, chosen to fight in the ritual of all rituals, the key to reaching the root of all knowledge!
And there were fewer magi more suited to the situation. His study of the Blue had yielded few results, but they were all practical. All he needed to to was wait for all the participants to gather, and he could turn Fuyuki city into one big bomb, the convenient leylines ensuring the biggest explosion he could imagine. Sure, the Clock Tower and the Church may get pissed, but by that point he would have claimed his prize and he'd be beyond their reach.
Honestly, his servant was largely irrelevant - so long as he had one, he could claim victory, but it didn't matter which he got. They wouldn't be doing any fighting if everything went well. Still, a Caster could only help. Better yet, his studies showed that the Magus Killer had studied and altered the local leylines in such a way to make them explode recently, for some personal project. Anyways-
"Hmm..." the servant Caster regarded the circle at his feet, then he started. "Ah!" Crouching down, to the bemusement of his Master, "I can fix this!"
Wait, what? "Eh...Ah!"
Emiya Shirou ran a glowing finger around and through the circle on the ground, establishing a connection between the isolated circle and the runes surrounding the room. Every rune surrounding the room. All of them.
Which, given this Magus' particular specialties, were all explosive.
"No, wait-"
Silly nameless magus, you don't get a role!
///
Sochirou was nervous, though he didn't show it. After the glowing lightshow that bonded his student to him, (and made him feel vaguely wrong about having "bonded" with one of his students) his new 'servant' (so very wrong.) had ripped on a rock, knocking it a few inches away and placing it into the perfect circle of pebbles off to one side. How had that even formed? His cursing over his stubbed toe had then caused the circle to glow.
And then another of his students was there from the circle. Who was also Emiya Shirou, only with very prominent guns. Lots of guns.
The teacher felt like he should lecture the newcomer regarding his portable armory, but since he only responded to the name "assassin", he decided it probably wan't a good idea. Between the minigun strapped horizontally across his waist, the rifle slung on his back, and the four semi-automatic pistols hanging from his belt, the young man had a gun for every occasion. And then some.
The living armory turned to Sochirou, who tensed, not really trusting anyone who had more weapons than limbs. He opened his mouth and set the tone of their relationship in five words.
"Would you like some tea?"
If anyone asks, Sochirou did not facefault. Don't believe anyone telling you otherwise.
///
Tohsaka Rin was pissed. Rightfully so, too - her summon almost completely failed, calling the wrong servant to the wrong location, and causing who-knows-how-much in repair costs. At least she actually summoned something. It would have sucked if she was excluded from her ancestor's ritual, just because her clocks were wrong.
Then there was her servant, Archer. She wasn't sure, really, why he struck her as familiar, but he certainly acted disturbingly familiar with her. Perhaps he knew her father, or was from the future. The second option was more likely, considering he had her father's pendant, but she couldn't imagine how many years would be required to bleed off the entirety of prana contained in it. A distant descendant, perhaps, or trusted friend of the family.
The thing that bugged her to insanity was his ignorance of his own identity, though that may be to maintain the timeline so as not to paradox himself out of existence. So she guessed she couldn't blame him. Her ire was almost baseless.
And that just annoyed her even more.
"Master, should we not begin patrolling the battleground?"
"Don't you know the area?" The city couldn't have changed that much over time, could it? Anyone who was close enough to her or her future family to have the pendant she intended to turn into a pseudo-magic crest.
"Maybe, though the geography looks a bit different. It would be best to survey the land."
...And that told her nothing she didn't already know. Damn.
And so, alongside a discontent master, a very confused Tohsaka Shirou headed out the door.
///
Emiya Shirou was having a bad week. Sort of.
Issei was looking at him oddly whenever he did anything remotely traditional, Tohsaka was staring holes in his face with next to no subtlety, Shinji was missing, and Sakura was alternating between worshipful glances and her old beaming radiance. Even Sochiro-sensei was regarding him strangely, and the man was for all intents and purposes a statue from the neck up.
About the only consistent factor, besides all the nameless unimportant students who didn't even rate a character cg, was his garbage disposal of an english teacher, but even she noticed when Sakura had stopped holding back in her cooking. Her last meal was fit for royalty, and unless she had an imaginary friend helping her cook, she must've started around midnight.
It sort of annoyed Shirou; such a wondrous meal, the sort he would have killed in cold blood to help cook. What's more, it was mad precisely to his tastes, as if he had made it himself, only if he was much better at cooking. On one hand, he was kind of flattered that she knew him so well and had stopped holding back to humor him, on the other it was a really good meal and his chef-sense was telling him to one-up her, lest he lose his place in the kitchen.
Shirou's thoughts returned to the task at hand, a heater that any other mechanic would have left for dead. His analysis of the machine showed that any number of parts were flawed or outright unusable. No matter. Even totaled, he could coax life out of the equipment.
Prana flowed from his fingers, finding the places where the 'experiences' altered the blueprint that the original 'form' provided. The energy shored up these gaps, sharpened edges, and realigned gears. The heating coils were restored to an untarnished sheen, frayed wires mended themselves, and connections were re-established.
It was hardly a permanent solution; the original design was flawed and would inevitably degrade again. Not before the prana dissolved, of course, though; he was reanimating a corpse, and Gaia was very attentive to feats of magic that defied death and quick to correct them too.
Ah, well. Shirou wasn't the type to leave work unfinished, and he'd promised to fix the thing. If that meant defying logic and nature to keep his promise, so be it. He'd pump as much as he could into it, mask the repair job as best he could to delay its eventual demise. In any case, he'd tell Issei to replace it before it died again; this wouldn't work a second time. He'd get to the music room equipment tomorrow - it was starting to get late, and there was that weird foreigner that was constantly wandering around drunkenly at night. He didn't want to meet her again, or that blond asshole he caught following Sakura that one time. Besides, Sakura was probably at his house; she spent more time there than at home these days, and he didn't want her looking too closely at his shed.
It wouldn't do to drag the innocent girl into his path, paved alongside the river Styx. Death was a close friend to any magus, but he was family to the Emiyas and their kin. Almost as much a part of their lives as odd circumstances. Emiya Shirou really should have been more surprised when Emiya Shirou appeared in front of him, but really, it was just life as usual. The drunken foreigner stood behind the doppleganger, staring blankly at him.
Of course, his attention was drawn back to the male of the duo when he materialized a giant fuckoff spear of DEATH, somehow changing into blue spandex. The spear got a cursory glance, while the spandex prompted pants-shitting fear.
"If you mention youth, I will ram that spear where the sun doesn't shine."
The deadpan threat was responded to with irritation and confusion, but Shirou meant every word he said - completely outclassed he might be, but to keep certain things from infecting his world, his life was a small price to pay. Japan was insane enough as-is.
The girl/woman/convincing trap (it's not paranoia, it's experience. Don't ask.) looked perplexed. "This guy? This is Emiya?"
Okay, from what Shirou knew about his father, this could only be bad. He began to make his circuit, hoping against hope that he could strengthen his wrench enough to fend off the unholy stick of metal held by his oposite. Warily, he replied, "Adopted, yes. Who asks?" Sure, it seemed stupid to make small-talk with himself, but damn it he was Japanese. The only time he'd be rude was to foreigners who spoke no Japanese. And this foreigner spoke Japanese.
"Lancer, just kill him. You know, assuming it won't paradox you out of existence or anything. He's killing himself anyways, claiming that name with that level of magecraft."
Finally unleashed, the warrior formerly known as Shirou boot-to-da-head'd the student currently known as Shirou hard enough to crack his head open on a lightpost. The potential concussion was ignored in favor of the spear shooting toward his stomach, and Shirou, once more on his feet, rolled away from the strike. Scrambling to his feet, Shirou slowly backed away from the suddenly-giddy man, unwilling to turn his back on him. The next two strikes were avoided by a combination of luck, drunken swaying, and a body unsuited to using a spear.
The third hit home, but skidded off one of his ribs, leaving a deep gash from his sternum to his side. At this point, the foreigner decided that watching a superhuman warrior fail to kill a pathetically weak magus was too embarrassing, and a quick swipe of the hand sent a sheet of wind to knock the student off his feet. Only, he jumped at just the right time, the force - strong enough to blow away someone who had good footing and magical defenses - found itself utterly overkill, blowing Shirou a good quarter mile away. In the direction he was heading originally, his home.
Where, through sheer coincidence or luck, he fell through the roof of his shed, breaking his fall, avoided the dozens of sharp metal bits littered around his workshop, and landed, bloody-side-first, on the small summoning circle used ten years before.
Fate shall not be denied, no matter how much reality wishes to fight it.
"I ask of you, are you my master?"
The unconscious body did not reply.
"Oh, goddamn it."
Fujimura Shirou was not amused.
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8 Shirous, 8 different stories, 8 different distortions. None of the servants are the canon versions of Shirou, nor is Master!Shirou, though he is closer than most of the rest. Statwise, all the servants have abysmal scores, for the most part. Caster has A ranked luck, Berserker has B endurance, and Lancer has a surprisngly high rating in Magic, though it's useless until his illusion gets broken. This was intended to be more a war of the Masters than of the Servants. Each has a backstory that I'd intended to write, but I eventually gave up on this one. I only got Rider's written down; Fate/Light Fingers. I may post it if I feel like it sometime.