A/N: Okay, before anyone complains, this was written with no beta to help me correct it. If I had thought to write this without the post first... well, that's a whole different ballpark, I can say safely.
Anyway, the thought process I had when coming up with this was along the lines of "what if someone inadvertently allowed travel outside of one world for participation in a Holy Grail War in another world?" Of course, I have a habit of trying to go overboard with things... but this is one thing I'll do my best not to go overboard on, for any reason.
*ahem* I intend to limit this to up to the end of the AU Fifth War, with a possible epilogue on the way after that. In any case, this story is going to have a prologue here, and a table of contents right before it, just to be fair.
Okay, I'll stop talking, and I'll get to typing up the story here. I'll have to hand out scripts to the different actors and all that... so here we go!
Prologue
It was the sound of tires screeching that told Shirou that something was wrong.
The ten-year old boy was getting groceries for the house when he saw something out of the corner of his eye. He saw what appeared to be a girl that was a year younger than him with black hair and regal robes being led by a man wearing mostly white over his body, a bandanna over his head and a nodachi swung on his left hip, while unaware of the fact that they were jay-walking. Naturally, because he wanted to at least warn them about what was going on by them walking in the face of traffic, he rushed after the pair and had just gotten to where he saw them when he heard tires screeching from his right.
It was a very delayed time in which things moved so slowly it wasn't even funny, but finally, the semi-truck hit him with the comparable force of an atomic bomb blast. By the time Shirou knew what had hit him, he felt his life fade right before his eyes, the last of his borrowed time leaving him. He didn't know how long the sensation lasted, but it was time that he felt he shouldn't have wasted before dying, and yet waste it he did.
...Or so he was lead to believe until he saw a man appear in front of his field of vision and said seven words that would change his life forever. "What is it that you wish for?"
Doctor Loctus Khan Schwarzwald was a man of many talents, but he was also a man of many eccentricities, not the least of these was that he was considerably insane. He also found a perfectly scientific way to travel between parallel worlds just last week, and was doing his level-headed best to stay sane, if only because of circumstances he'd like to avoid.
...Mind you, it wasn't working all that well, but at least the local hospitals were able to let him recover from his insanity at times. It was a benefit of working with other doctors to help life flourish, to be able to at least get something called medical insurance to pay for medication to heal his body and mind, if only because he didn't have enough of the local currency to not rely on the system to help pay for his expenses.
At any rate, he was walking down the road when he heard the screeching of tires, making him turn his head to the left and see what he had hoped it didn't mean: a vehicle hitting a civilian. He had hoped to avoid seeing such a circumstance, but this time it was unavoidable, so he had to do what he could to offer the civilian some peace for the next life.
As he made it to the crash site, he had heard the sounds of sirens coming towards the area, so he decided to make this quick for the civilian. As he made it to the person, he noted that it was a little boy of around the age of ten, someone who was considerably too young to die in this day and age. The boy had red hair, and his eyes were a coppery color, though they were losing focus for the real world. He felt that the boy should be, by all rights, dead... but he could tell that dead he was not yet.
Making sure to appear within the boy's field of vision, Loctus said to the boy, "What is it that you wish for?" It never hurt to ask the question that would change the lives of so many people, but he didn't know the boy's wish, his desire above all else.
Strangely enough, the boy didn't wish for anything for himself, but instead, after a few moments, said in a pained voice, "I wish to make the people around me smile with great joy."
Loctus, shocked out of his insanity for good this time, was at a loss for words but not for actions. He began doing an energy transfusion treatment based on what he knew of this world and how the citizens used energy, and had just finished when he heard the ambulance arrive, ensuring that the boy would live long enough to make it to a hospital bed at the very least.
"Doctor Schwarzwald!" yelled a medic that had come out of the ambulance, "What happened here?!"
"It was almost a hit and run," Loctus replied stoically, not looking up from the boy. "Fortunately, the boy's barely hanging on, and we have to get him to the hospital immediately!"
"Yes, sir!" the medic called back as he went to get a stretcher ready for the boy, not even noticing that Loctus was taking a blood sample of the boy from the pool of blood that had formed.
Shirou woke up slowly but surely the next day at the crack of dawn. For some reason, he couldn't remember what had happened over the past three years, nor why he had to wake up at the crack of dawn. He figured that something wrong occurred that made him somewhat like a computer that was wiped clean of its hard drive storage, only for someone to finally figure out how to reset the storage back to a certain date, though he didn't know what was going on.
As soon as he realized that he needed to know what happened, the door to his room opened and in walked a doctor, one that he felt like he saw before but couldn't put his finger on where. As soon as the doctor made his way to his bedside, he heard the doctor ask, "Tell me, young man, how do you feel?"
Shirou, unaware of why the doctor was speaking like that, asked, "Who... are you?"
"Ah, you must not remember what happened yesterday due to the trauma of almost dying," the doctor replied. Looking out the window, he heard Shirou let out a gasp of shock before continuing, "I am your primary doctor while you are staying in this hospital, Loctus Khan Schwarzwald." Turning to face Shirou again, the now identified Loctus was about to continue speaking when he noticed that Shirou was hyperventilating, most likely from what he was remembering.
"I... almost died?" Shirou asked when he finally calmed down enough to talk again. It really was that hard to believe, him almost dying because of something that was beyond his control, but it had occurred.
Still... "How did I almost die?"
"You ran in front of a semi-truck," Loctus supplied for Shirou, "and you're lucky that I was in the area to give you a chance to recover easier. No matter the circumstances, what you did was stupid, and yet it was as if you had to do it." As soon as Loctus finished that part, Shirou nodded his head, though he wondered one final thing before allowing himself to go back to sleep.
"Where is my family?" Shirou asked almost sleepily.
Loctus, at this point, put an amused smile on his face and replied, "I was actually going to ask what your name was, so that you could help us find who all is in your family."
With that out of the way, Shirou replied, "It's Shirou. Shirou Senzu." Closing his eyes and feeling ready to fall asleep, Shirou asked, "Could I please get some sleep? I need to make sure I get my rest for the rest of the time I should be asleep."
"Certainly, mister Senzu, I'll let you get more sleep," replied Loctus as he walked out the door, making sure to keep it closed for Shriou's benefit.
It was a week before Shirou would get visitors, and he had finally gotten his memories from the past three years sorted out from where they were in his head, so much so that he wondered if he should go back to his birth parents or not. He knew that he was born a Senzu, so it would make sense that he would die a Senzu, but apparently that wasn't the case.
Still, he didn't know what to do with this nagging feeling that he shouldn't abandon the man that took care of him for so long on his own, and that this would be an important time to stay with the man he saw as his father. If anything, the messages his mind was giving him were too confusing for him to handle at the moment, so he decided to leave them be for now.
Finally, there was a knock on the door, and his doctor came in with a group that Shirou recognized as his family. It was a time of great relief, especially as the family was really worried that he had died those three years ago, though Shirou couldn't help but ask something that was on his mind regarding his mother.
"Mom?" Shirou started his question.
"Yes, Shirou?" his mother responded.
"Why is your belly getting bigger?"
"Oh, Shirou," his mother replied, "You're about to get a little sister, like what you always wanted."
Shirou was about to ask what that meant when he finally figured out what happens when a man and woman love each other very much. With that, he at least had the decency to blush, given the fact that he recalled how "The Talk" went last he had it explained.
Before much more could be said, Shirou saw a familiar figure from the last three years at the doorway, the man that did his best to be a father in the absence of Shirou's real family. Motioning for his family to move out of the way, he said to his parents and siblings, "Guys, in case you wanted to know who was taking care of me for the last three years, he's at the doorway. I think it would be good to let him in, alright?"
Turning to see who Shirou was talking about, the Senzu family saw Kiritsugu for the first time in their lives, and they wondered how he managed to take care of Shirou all that time he was away from the family. If it wasn't for the fact that Shirou seemed to trust the man with his life, they would've tried to kick him out of the room, and that option had lost appeal because of Shirou being the nice guy towards someone that could very well have kidnapped him... except that it seemed to be a false idea to begin with.
"I would like to say that I'm sorry," Kiritsugu said from his place at the doorway, "I didn't know he still had family alive, and I took him away before he could be identified to having living relatives." With that, he walked on in and sat on a chair that was near where Shirou's bed was, making sure to have view of the family and the one that had been his son for three years. "I don't know how I can possibly make up for stealing your loved one away, but know that my time was limited since the Fire of Fuyuki happened, and I wanted to save someone from ground zero that day."
It took a few minutes of processing the information, but Shirou's father had apparently come to a decision regarding the whole mess. "It's fine, and I permit Shirou to make the final decision on where he stays for the time being."
"Honey?"
"Ichigo, trust me, Shirou's been with this man as his son for so long now, it won't hurt to let Shirou determine who he gets to stay with for now. Besides, he'll have every right to switch between the two places should he need to do so."
"Alright, Honda, you win," Shirou's mother, Ichigo, relented. She didn't know what it was about Kiritsugu that set her off, but at least Shirou had full control over who he stayed with at any interval, and that was enough to soothe her nerves.
"Wait, did you guys move while I was out of the house?"
Looking at Shirou, the rest of the Senzu family could tell that he was confused about the living arrangements, so they decided to deal with the situation immediately.
As it would turn out, the Senzu family had already lived next to the Emiya residence, so living arrangements weren't an issue.
The real issue, however, came from another source altogether. This source...
"Wait, WHAT DO YOU MEAN HE'S FRYING HIS NERVES WITH A FAKE CIRCUIT?!"
...had to do with Shirou's Magecraft training, something that Ichigo had been adamant about properly picking back up on. As it turned out, the Senzu family was a hybrid of magical talent and weapons mastery to an insane degree, so of course Shirou had to have access to his circuits.
Now, Ichigo was always a firm believer of teaching children right the first time, but she didn't know what was worse: Kiritsugu's firm belief that Shirou shouldn't have to do with Magecraft or Shirou insistently using a fake circuit that could easily fry his nerves.
Some habits were hard to break, after all, that being one of those habits.
Soon, things would go to be normal enough, though the family history sessions were a bit strange to say the least. It was lucky of Shirou that he didn't find them boring to begin with.
Loctus was considering his options carefully. He could go to Lucrecio and possibly face torture and/or execution for leaving his student behind, or he could continue to be a wonderful medical doctor in a more technologically advanced world, neither without some disadvantages.
Then again, considering that he became the family doctor of the Senzu family, he would need to at least consider how this would affect the family if he left all of a sudden. Besides that, he had to ensure that Kiritsugu didn't die some time that was inconvenient for everyone, even though Ichigo was concerned for Shirou's training under the man.
However, he needed to find out what the situation back in Gaia was like, so he decided to give it a week before leaving for a short time. That way, his career here would be kept safe, and nobody would have to worry about him for until he came back.
Besides, he already earned his vacation time for a while, so that was a benefit.
Loctus then decided to check his schedule. He realized that this would be the last time that he could take appointments for until he got back from his trip.
Determining that this would be for the best, he decided to give himself the week for helping his patients, and then leave in exactly a week. He still needed to get forgiveness for destroying those notes on The Process....
Then it hit him. 'Shit, I forgot about that! I gave Shirou complete exposure to The Process when I was treating him during his stay in the hospital!' Well, at least he had a reason for Lucanor, his old student, not to hate him, if what he knew was true that is.
Then again, Lucanor wasn't known for forgiveness all that much, but it would do to know what could help him lean towards forgiveness.
Loctus sighed. This was going to be a long week.
A/N: Well, that wraps up the prologue for now, hope you guys like it. I just hope that I didn't screw this one up... at all. If anyone wants to know what this thing called "The Process" is, I'll explain in more detail later, because I don't have all that much time to do so at the moment.
Anyway, I'll speak with you all to answer questions when I get the chance to answer, now won't be the time due to circumstances. If you have any complaints, let me know, alright?
Also, before you ask, my reason for the name of the story will be known later on. I sincerely hope that you guys stick around for me to explain it.
Thanks for reading.
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Originally Posted by Xamusel
