War of the Three Shikis [Shiki Tohno, Shiki Ryougi, and SHIKI Ryougi do Heaven’s Feel]

[Zalgo Jenkins]

Wait, sudden realization.
Because Assassin had died, so does that mean Caster can't summon Fake Assassin?

Technically yes, although that might not stop him/her from summoning other Fakes.

It depends on whether everybody else has summoned yet, and whether Caster is either (1) Medea or (2) somebody who can pull off the same level of magecraft as Medea.

This is an AU, so theoretically you might see a Caster capable of pulling off a Fake Servant summoning. Depends on whether Ryuunosuke is feeling experimental that evening, I guess. Because if the serial killer summons Gilles, there's no way that Team Kuuru can summon anything except Cthuhlu.

[Castiel]

Ryuunosuke?
......Waaaiiiiiitttt a sec here, (Checking back to previous page and seeing AU of 4th Holy Grail War).Whelp,never mind me then carry on, carry on.
On Another note, Shikis Vs Cthuhlu ? By the root Make it happen!

[Lycodrake]

By the penisroot make it happen!

This is bad and you should feel bad for having written it in a mostly-serious manner.

[Castiel]

This is bad and you should feel bad for having written it in a mostly-serious manner.

Fiinee, i'll feel mostly bad now in totally-serious-not-joking-manner.

[EVA-Saiyajin]

Very interesting story thus far, quite an interesting idea. Hoping to see more Shiki, though, but SHIKI certainly is interesting. A very...unique summoning. I look forward to reading more.

[Zalgo Jenkins]

Author Notes: Okay, so I'm not really happy with this chapter. And even with the AU, it's been too long since I've reviewed KnK / Tsukihime.

Anyway.

With that being said, I needed to get back into the swing of things after a long dry spell not writing fiction. So I decided to do a lot of writing. This is the result.

************************************************** **********






Shiki Ryougi (female personality)


The pocket game system is scattered on the floor. Two worn-down plastic buttons lie next to springs that have already lost their snap. I look at the rest: grey shards; dull plastic edges that are just jagged enough to leave red marks on your palms when you break them.

Even the screen is plastic. Too malleable to really snap or shatter. It just bent, which left a white line across its surface. The game itself lies in tiny red fragments. Cracked. Like cherry candy that someone’s stepped on.

Tohno sees it.

He shuffles the fragments into a dust pan. Quietly. Looking at me through his wrong, WRONG Eyes like I’ve just done the saddest thing in the world. To myself. Obviously. Not to him. As if he has the right to—

“Are you okay?” he says.

No. No, Shiki Tohno, I am not “okay”. I am exhausted. Adrenaline is eating at my muscles constantly. Murder-hunger that’s just short, barely short, of real pain. I’m aching, and I’m always AWAKE. A couple nicks haven’t healed yet. Souvenirs from SHIKI Ryougi’s stupid, stupid adventure that you’ve gone along with. But MY injuries aren’t the real problem. I’m not sleeping. And it’s all your fault.

“I’m fine.”

“I could get you a new game–“

“It won’t be new,” I say.

He grins. It’s lopsided, and he probably thinks it’s charming in a harassed kind of way. Like he’s being taken advantage of, and he doesn’t really mind, because it’s just the way our funny little life works. Shiki Tohno: fix-it man. He’s used to it.

...Why won’t you just shut up and let me brazen it out?

“I know a guy who sells them mint,” he says.

“It won’t be new, because the ending’s always the same.”

He raises an eyebrow.

“But you always win…”

“And the game ends the same way. So I smashed it.”

His eyes narrow. He gets that far-off look again, looking at me and through me at the same time. He has no right to look at me that way. Like he’s a poet and I’m some kind of vision of perfection. Not myself.

He knows I hate it, even though I’ve never told him. It’s the Eyes. I’ve decided that’s why it bothers me so much – it’s Tohno’s Eyes. He’s looking at me through Eyes that only see Death – red cracks in reality, putrefying flesh, broken bodies. The Eyes are showing him flaws, and he’s NOT. SEEING. THEM.

“There are other games,” he says quietly.

Are you even paying attention anymore, Shiki Tohno?

“I don’t want other games,” I say. “I want this one to work.”

“You want it to do something that it can’t do.”

Fists and stomach and jaw all clench at once. They want to clench; enjoy it. It’s the solution to the hunger they’ve been feeling for days.

I’m across the room before Tohno can move. I slam him into the wall's wood paneling. It cracks. I feel the wall’s impact through Tohno’s shallow chest. I feel the thin, stringy muscles in his shoulders tighten – strong enough to kill monsters, but too weak to keep themselves alive. There’s the odor of Death in them already. His skin smells like Death through his school uniform. His hair smells like Death. Even the shampoo can’t hide it.

“Ow…” he says.

It’s a thin complaint, delivered with the same self-deprecating smile. An oh-there-you-go-again, but-I-guess-I-signed-on-for-this smile. We lock eyes, and he must see the amethyst and turquoise bleeding into mine. The glow. I feel my mouth curling into a smile.

That’s the solution.

It’s all a matter of perspective. And his perspective has been warped.

Carve them out. The Eyes must have Lines of Death like everything else. Carve them out and he’ll be normal. Those pale blue eyes; almost periwinkle, almost white. Like a blind man’s eyes. I know what you’re thinking – that I’m being selfish; that I’m not making sense. I don’t care.

It’ll work because it has to work.

The blade escapes my sleeve with a little click. I grin, and grin, and draw it close to his face as he tries to twist away. Nowhere to go. I watch the hateful, unnatural eyes constrict their pupils when the knife glints.

He says something stupid and ruins everything, as usual.

“We all have to die sometime, Ryougi.”

The knife stops. I don’t want it to stop, but it does. I want to carve the Eyes out, but I’m not listening to my own GOOD ADVICE, and I’ve stopped. It’s stopped.

“Wrong,” I say.

Because you haven’t asked my permission. And I haven’t given it. You know what I do to people who violate my trust.

He’s tense. There is fear there, I realize. But no fear of death. Only fear of failure.

The knife burrows into his shoulder. Toward warmth. It burrows, but it can’t take me with it.

“Agh!”

Blood splatters. Lots of blood -- but no longer connected to Tohno’s body. Its heat would dissipate long before it reached me. Not literally, but...it's like sunlight trying to reach the outer edges of the solar system.

The knife runs up his arm. It’s his only good arm, the one SHIKI and I haven’t amputated yet. The cut is length-wise and deep. Red spreads over the skin in time with Tohno’s heartbeat.

He’s even paler than usual, and a “k-k-k-k-k” sound comes from his mouth when he decides – too late, too weakened – that I may be serious.

Tohno struggles now; flails around. More blood squirts. I look into his Eyes for fear, but only see the same thing. Misdirected fear. Fear for rather than fear of.

“Idiot. Do you value yourself so little?”

---------------------------------------------------------

I asked Ciel the same question last night. About Tohno; not about herself. She was an abomination; a thing sitting behind an oak desk that needed to die, with moonlight illuminating relatively few Lines. Her unblemished skin marked her as a monster. Another monster encroaching on my territory.

“Tohno values himself, yes. He just values his friends and…family…more,” Ciel said, in that clipped way of hers. She adjusted glasses she didn’t need.

I glared at her.

“’Friends?’” I said.

Ciel smiled. It was small, barely even polite, and her eyes became narrow and alert. Her right hand brushed some imaginary dust off the desk, straying close to the Black Keys she used as paperweights.

“Friends,” she repeated.

“You should have stayed away from him with your Burial Agency jobs,” I said. “You should have stayed away from him period.”

“Hypocrite,” she said.

“I didn’t ask him to—“

She flicked another speck of dust.

“You go with him on jobs,” she said.

“My brother goes with him. I don’t.”

Ciel’s barely-polite smile was gone. Her blue eyes glared over the tops of her glasses. Through a gap in her sleeve where the buttons were fastened, I saw the magical tattoos ripple as her arms tensed.

“You’re both the same to me,” she said.

My own heartbeat quickened at that. Finally. That was Ciel all over – pretense piled on annoying pretense. Fake politeness. Until you went for the throat.

I’ve never felt the need for pretenses. Never understood them.

This is reality: Ciel blamed me for encouraging Tohno to use his Eyes, and now he was dying from them. I blamed her. If Tohno died, we’d both share the same consolation prize: That I would lose control, and Ciel’s keepers would send her to put me down.

Good luck with that.

“I want to make a deal,” I said.

Ciel raised her eyebrows, and smirked. I could taste the condescension. Oh, look. How adorable. The demon-hunting girl thinks that she can offer something I want.

I told her.

She gave me the information I asked for.

Later, when I turned to leave, Ciel caught my arm and demanded to know what Shiki Tohno was to me. Why I stayed with him.

I shook her off, barely restraining myself from putting a knife through her face.

“That’s none of your business,” I said.

“Yes,” she snapped, “it is my business. You’re always saying that your little imaginary friend is your only ‘brother’, so Tohno’s clearly not family to you—“

“Leave me alone.”

“--and I’m a hundred percent sure it isn’t romantic. Not from your end. You wouldn’t understand love if it put a Black Key through your throat. So why?”

I realized that I was grinding my teeth. Digging fingers into the door frame. Why couldn’t I just leave this whining, unnatural woman and--Tch.

“Because he annoys me.”

I headed down the hall. Ciel’s voice followed me, even though I’d slammed the door behind me.

“What? What?! Because he annoys you? What on earth—“

But I was already gone before the rest.

---------------------------------------------

Blood. The smell of blood. Everywhere. Almost enough to cover the smell of a dying young man. Not long now, the smell says. Weeks? Months? The glasses barely work at this point.

His voice is quiet. But the bleeding’s stopped. His arm and shoulder are swaddled in bandages now. Stained red and brown.

And of course, Tohno comes back to my original question as if nothing’s happened.

“Value myself?” he says. “Yeah. I mean…I value my connections with people I’ve known. And memories, I guess. You know what I mean?”

I don’t.

“You always act like I’m torturing myself by being around you or something,” he says. “Okay, look…We’ve had a good run, haven’t we? Fun? I did, anyway.”

I don’t know how to reply to that, either. I think of fireworks, and strawberry ice cream, and math problems in a classroom at sunset. Golden light and warm air.

If you’d just felt fear a minute ago like you were supposed to, Shiki Tohno, none of this would have happened. The Eyes would have been gone. You would have been fixed, just like that…

…No? No. I guess not. You’re not even considerate enough to make it your fault, are you?

Tohno is healing already. He’ll be ready to go out again in the morning.

“I’m going with you,” I say. “I know where the next Master’s staying.”

He closes his eyes. Smiles.

"Okay, but next time,” he says. “SHIKI’s called dibs on this one. I kinda promised him.”

“...Fine.”

Tohno’s eyes open again, and I let him run his fingers through my hair, gummed up with blood. I’ve never understood why he – or anybody – does that. Never been able to feel why, if that makes any sense.

“I have files on the other Masters,” I said. “From Ciel.”

“Thanks. Locations and everything?"

I nod.

"That’ll help a lot," he says.

"Yes."

Sometimes I dream about Tohno finally dying. I dream that I’ll carve his skull open and eat what’s inside, so he’ll stay with me like SHIKI does. We’ll share the body – all three of us – so that SHIKI Ryougi and I can feel the remnants of Tohno’s warmth whenever we switch with him.

Except that in those dreams, it never works.

It’s not supposed to be this way, is it? “Make a dying person’s last days comfortable.” That’s what normal people are supposed to do for each other – like you’re going to create a fake little bubble of happiness and accommodation around them. That’s not life, though. It’s fake. It’s unnatural just like Killing Eyes are unnatural.

But what do I know?





************************************************** ********




Shiki Tohno (born Shiki Nanaya)

“Look at it this way, Tohno: only six more Servants to go.”

“That’s a very creative way of saying that you killed ours.”

“See? This is what I’m talking about. You’re always a glass half empty guy.”

We were sitting in some very prickly bushes. The Tohasaka mansion loomed over us, a weird amalgam of Japanese and Western influences – slate roof, white paneling, latticed windows, and lots of angles. The trees had been trimmed like overgrown bonsais. Clumps of leaves alternated with cleared sections on the branches. Birds were singing in some of them. It gave the appearance of privacy without the reality…though the drapes were all closed.

SHIKI drew a finger through the air. Little sparks snapped. He’d come just near enough to the boundary field to annoy it, but not close enough to trigger an alarm. He didn’t flinch at the sparks.

It reminded me of when we were kids – SHIKI would hold his own hand over a candle at dinner like it was nothing, just smiling at you until you could smell the skin cook. I would always pull the candle away, and the smile would widen.

Old habits, I guess.

“So these Arias,” SHIKI was saying.

“Huh?”

“Arias. The little haiku thingies that magi cast their spells with.”

“Technically, haikus have a different verse structure than—“

“Stabbity-stabbity-stab.”

“...Right. Forgot your hatred of poetry. Go on.”

SHIKI unzipped his backpack and pulled out what seemed to be a wall scroll. Its offwhite silk and minimalist illustrations of birds would've made it look suspiciously similar to the Kakemono in the comics section of the Fuyuki public library, if not for a message painted in SHIKI’s handwriting. (Of which I could only catch “Bring it, punk,” before he rolled it up again.)

“So these haiku thingies,” SHIKI said with greater emphasis than before, “They can be anything, right? Like, anything that would qualify as poetry or music?”

“I think so.”

SHIKI dug into the backpack again. It was one of those giant hiking packs – the one he’d used to steal the articulated skeleton from the science room a year before. Now it was practically empty, and he almost disappeared into it like a mole digging for worms.

“What about death metal?” SHIKI said.

“What ab—huh?”

“Ooh. How about Slayer? Or Possessed? If a magus can blow stuff up with dinky little haikus, that shit would be nuclear.”

“I…don’t think it works that way.”

SHIKI emerged with a package. It was wrapped in silk and tied with a red cord. This, he attached to the scroll.

He threw the package – scroll now attached – right through the bounded field. A short, but intense, surge of panic shot through my stomach when I thought that he’d tossed something magecrafty through.

Fortunately, whatever was in the package was mundane. It didn’t trigger an alarm.

The package hit the Tohsaka front door with a slightly metallic kshlunk.

“We should capture one and find out,” SHIKI said.

“You lost me.”

SHIKI rolled his eyes.

“Capture a magus,” he said slowly, as if he was talking to a five year old, “and make it listen to death metal to see if it explodes.”

“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever—“

“Tokiomi Tohsaka has a daughter, right?”

“Yeah…Wait. No. No-hoho. No. We are not forcing a little girl to listen to death metal after we—“

“Hsssht! He’s coming out!”

Three door-bolts clunked in a row, and a man in a double-breasted burgundy jacket stepped out. Looked around. Stared at the package. The guy had a goatee, pocket handkerchief, and a ribbon tied in a bow around his neck.

“It’s the KFC guy!” SHIKI said.

“Shh!”

Tokiomi Tohsaka passed a jewel-headed staff over the scroll and package. Probably checking for malevolent magecraft.

Apparently there wasn’t any, since he picked the scroll up and unrolled it with a fwop. A (tweezed) eyebrow rose as Tokiomi’s read the scroll’s message. Slowly, his head tilted to one side, and then the other.

“…’Course, we would need to be far enough away from the music experiment to not get vaporized…” SHIKI was muttering. “Maybe a time delay boombox? Do boomboxes even have a time delay…?”

“Are you going to tell me what the scroll’s all about?” I whispered.

“Old formal-looking stuff is like catnip to these people,” SHIKI said.

“I don’t follow.”

“Remember when you took my sister to that stupid festival? The one with the fireworks?”

“You didn’t…” I said.

“Picture that, except with closer fireworks, less incest subtext—“

“W-we’re not even related!”

“--and more AWESOME.”

I looked again at Tokiomi Tohsaka. He’d laid the scroll down – sparing it a final, confused glance – and had started unwrapping SHIKI’s package. Metallic sounds came from the inside as its contents shifted.

“Please tell me you didn’t—“

But my plea came too late. Something in the box triggered with an ominous spooooing!

And then, an explosion.

Tokiomi Tohsaka had just enough time to furrow his brow before the shockwave tore through his burgundy suit, pocket handkerchief, ribbon bow tie, and disturbingly tweezed eyebrows.

Windows shattered. Splinters from the front door blasted in all directions. A piece of Tokiomi’s cane flew over our heads.

Tohsaka’s jewel – which, the saner Ryougi sibling had warned me, contained prana – lit the air like it was gasoline. A firestorm flashed, and then dissipated. The change in atmospheric pressure shook the entire front of the mansion.

Tokiomi Tohsaka lay scattered across the yard, extremely dead.

“That…was much easier than expected,” I said.

“WOOOO! Mail bomb for the WIN!”

“Anticlimactic, almost…”

“Did you see that, Tohno? DID! YOU! SEE! THAT?! BAM! That was some Ted Kaczynski shit right there!”

SHIKI alternated between hopping in place and performing pelvic thrusts. I should mention that the four biographies of Ted Kaczynski -- a.k.a. The Unabomber -- on SHIKI’s bedside table were, in fact, the only books he’d ever read voluntarily.

“Ha!” he said. “Ha! In your face Tohno! In. Your. FACE! Remember what I’ve always said about the Unabomber Manifesto?”

“Seventy-one times, yes.”

“…’SHIKI’, I said to myself, ‘this guy has his shit together.’ And you disagreed for some reason. Well, what do you have to say now, Mr. ‘Ted Kaczynski was a danger to himself and society’? Huh?”

“Do you really want me to answer that?”

But SHIKI’s victory dance had already progressed from pelvic thrusts to jazz hands. Things usually had to run their course at that point.

“Who da man? Who da -- Oh, hey. Souvenirs.”

“Put Tokiomi’s finger down, SHIKI.”

…At which point SHIKI started his customary voice impressions of me, which sound like a whinier version of Shinji Ikari with a Kansai accent. And a lisp.

“Oooh,” he said. “Don’t touch the severed body parts, SHIKI! Don’t play around in Kohaku’s lab, SHIKI! Stop distilling nitrate from fertilizer, SHIKI! We are NOT hanging that police sketch of the Unabomber over the mantelpiece, SHIKI—“

“If you’re finished…”

“Sweet, sweet vindication.”

I rolled my eyes, which did nothing to dampen his manic grin.

“Are you—“

“Yeah, I’m done.”

“Okay,” I said. “Let’s…Wait. What are you doing?”

Unfortunately, it was pretty obvious what he was doing. SHIKI practically skipped up to the house, stabbing through the Bounded Field without breaking stride. Generations of layered magecraft crumpled inward like aluminum foil in an oven. SHIKI stopped at the doorbell – and, incidentally, right on top of the former owner's torso – and rang twice.

“Hey! Wait a minute--!”

But I was too late to do anything but arrive beside SHIKI.

More footsteps from inside. The splintered door opened, following a skewed course thanks to the bent hinges. A man with blond hair, a modern outfit, and red eyes glared down at SHIKI.

This…wasn’t good. The man felt incredibly, suffocatingly powerful. He glowed with Prana like some kind of magical nuclear reactor. And if he was hiding Lines of Death anywhere, I couldn’t immediately see them.

The Servant sneered down at us. My brother, in turn, made a point of looking down at the Servant’s snakeskin pants. I elbowed SHIKI before he could start cackling.

“What are you mongrels…? Oh.”

The Servant noticed the remains of his former Master. His sneer deepened.

“Tch," he said. "Typical. And I suppose you two killed this worthless—“

SHIKI’s manic grin dissolved.

He replaced it with a grim scowl that looked a LOT like his sister’s. SHIKI’s voice lowered until he’d matched Shiki Ryougi’s gloomy tone as well.

“Girl scout cookie, Mister?”

The imitation was perfect, like he’d just offered the Baked Goods of Despair. The Servant’s eyes narrowed into red slits.

“Nah, just fucking with you,” SHIKI said. “We’re the guys who killed your Master here. Wanna make a Servant contract with us?”

SHIKI emphasized the point by poking Tokiomi a few times. Half-charred flesh alternately crinkled and squelched. Fluids and viscera oozed out like jelly from a donut.

The Servant’s fingers twitched. The air seemed to shimmer a little around him, until I could see the outline of armor. I decided to give it five seconds before grabbing SHIKI and running like a sonofabitch.

Four.

Three.

Two.

“Ho-oh? That’s your game, mongrel? Well, I’m not surprised that you would seek out the Golden King, greatest of humanity’s heroes, and I admit that you’re amusing...Hm. You. Boy. I see from your panicked expression that you understand the virtues of obedience and submission much better than Tokiomi…”

His gaze moved from me to SHIKI. It lingered there.

“…and as for the girl…”

“I’m a guy, bro.”

The Servant squinted at SHIKI, as if looking for something. He must have found it, since he smiled. It wasn’t a pleasant expression.

“Ho-oh? A male personality? Succulent. Naturally, I’ll sample the female body you inhabit in such a deliciously tomboyish fashion. Your brother can wait on us with wine and dates—“

“…Yeah, never mind,” SHIKI said.

“What did you say?”

I looked from SHIKI to the Servant, and back again. Mentally rehearsed drawing the blade from my pocket while I looked for something – anything – on the Servant’s body that resembled a dot or line.

“C’mon Tohno,” SHIKI said.

My mouth was dry. Limbs hollow. Heart hammering.

“So we’re…” I said.

SHIKI grabbed my sleeve and pulled.

“Leaving,” he said. “Guy’s an asshole.”

“I think he can hear you, SHIKI.”

“Not only can I hear you, but I’m already planning your unpleasant demise, offal,” said the Servant.

Aaaaand that was my cue. I grabbed SHIIKI’s hand and started pulling. Unfortunately, he dug his heels in and turned back.

“Offal?” SHIKI said.

“It’s like minced liver or something,” I said. “Run.”

Rather than wait for a response, I yanked for all I was worth. SHIKI pinwheeled almost a hundred eighty degrees before stumbling after me. As we scrambled across the front lawn, I made the mistake of looking back – and saw the air warp as a thousand glowing blades pushed into our reality. Scythes, and barbs, and glittering spikes.

“Dude called us pâté?!” SHIKI shouted.

Something shrieked like a rocket behind us.

I realized that the Servant had started firing just before the area exploded in light.





************************************************** ***********





SHIKI Ryougi (male personality)


We were running through dry heat. From the explosions, mostly. Shockwaves passed through our bodies. The kind you feel when you’re standing a few inches from your new DeathByDecibels1050 XXL speakers and start banging your electric guitar against a wall at two in the morning. Okay, the shockwave part was pretty cool, but the rest – the smell of burning gasoline and sulfur, cuts from ricocheting pavement, ringing ears – not so much.

“Say again?!” I shouted.

“I just think you could stand to have more positive role models than Jack the Ripper and the Unabomber, that’s all!” Tohno yelled.

I threw up my hands in frustration. Dodged a freaky-looking Noble Phantasm that was chanting in Latin. A bunch of pedestrians got mulched. It felt like a warm, sticky shower. Picture your most epic waterpark experience ever, and then add carnage.

Well, more carnage, I guess. (Summer in Fuyuki. Awesome time to be a kid.)

“Kaczynski went to Harvard, Tohno! Harvard!”

“He lived in a shack in the woods!”

“To be close to nature!” I said. “Like that Walden guy!”

“DUCK! AXE!”

I did, and boy, was Tohno right to warn me. It was a thick, golden block that looked like a key. Except car-sized. Annnnd…BAM! Six wrongful death suits and a couple million in property damage to my right.

“…Pretty sure Thoreau didn’t kill people with mail bombs,” Tohno shouted.

I considered this.

“Yeah,” I yelled. “Thoreau was a pussy.”

“That’s not exactly what I was getting at—“

And then, something hit him. Hard. There was something unreal about it – the projectile actually went through him. Front to back. Like time stopped.

I wheeled around. Tossed my knife into ripping position.

“Son of a fucking bitch! I’m gonna mount your eyes on popsicle stic—ack!”

Tohno’s hand clamped on my shoulder, and spun me back around. Toward escape.

“Keep running. I’m fine.”

“ShitfuckingcheatingassServantbastardsonfabitch—“

“I’m fine, SHIKI.”

Tohno’s voice cracked, and I noticed that the front of his shirt was glistening. Throbbing. Stained a deeper, wetter black. Oh, shit. That…that was a lot of blood. That was—

“Calm down!” he yelled. “I have a plan. Almost there.”

“Calm down?! Calm—fuck! You’ve got a hole—“

“Almost there.”

“WHERE?!”

“There.”

He pointed to a mansion with round towers clustering around it, like a collection of beehives. Ivy had climbed all over the outside walls. Except for the largest towers, all the windows looked choked off and tiny. Brick and slate and metal. Thick. Solid. Like a prison. Iron bars guarded the basement-floor windows.

“Bounded Field ahead,” Tohno said. “Dot stab. Now.”

I looked for one. Found it. Stabbed. The air distorted where I pressed my knife through. The Bounded Field broke. It stung like a balloon popping in your face after you've spent hours in the cold.

Tohno staggered to the door.

Something screamed in the sky.

For a second, I thought it was a fighter jet. It wasn’t. Picture a golden triangle floating on four solar-sail-panel-things. Its windows glowed green. Something about the light reminded me of ghosts, or that stuff you see in bogs. Foxfire. The light looked like it was shining through fog. Except there wasn’t any fog. Two smaller, equally shiny pylons ran parallel to the main triangle. Their edges looked like razors.

Not. Good.

“Oi, Tohno!” I said. “He’s got a freaking X-Wing!”

Tohno’s eyes widened when he saw it. He gave up trying to knock, and Line-slashed the door instead. It disintegrated.

A man with gray skin, whitened hair, and a really messed up face stared at us from the living room. Something was crawling under his skin. Something WRONG that made me want to carve him up.

“You a Matou?” Tohno said.

“Uh…yes…Kariya Matou. What's this all--?”

“Great,” Tohno said. "Summoned yet?"

“No…”

“Oh. Well, you’ve got about thirty seconds before the Servant hovering above your lawn decides to stop toying with us.”

“And?”

“And nukes the house.”

The pale guy with parasites – Kariya Matou, I guess – looked over Tohno’s shoulder. Saw the X-Wing. Noticed that the weapons raining from the sky were slooowly creeping forward from all sides. Most of them weren’t even Noble Phantasms, just random weapons. The house was surrounded by metal rain, and the eye of the storm was getting smaller…and smaller…and smaller…

Tohno had been right. The golden son a bitch was toying with us.

“MONGRELS! YOU ARE UNWORTHY TO STAIN THE LEAST OF MY TREASURES WITH YOUR FILTHY BLOOD! CONSIDER YOURSELF PRIVILEGED! IF MY PATIENCE HAD NOT BEEN EXHAUSTED, I WOULDN’T PERMIT EVEN THESE MUNDANE TRINKETS TO SOIL THEMSELVES UPON YOU! SCUM! DOGS! SAVOR THE SLOW APPROACH OF YOUR DEATHS!”

“…My life is a neverending cycle of torment,” Kariya muttered.

Tohno sagged to the carpet. He stumbled up a moment later. Almost. He couldn’t quite get upright, and ended up crawling onto a maroon sofa instead. Something squeezed in my chest when I noticed he’d left bloody footprints all the way up to the couch.

I grabbed Kariya Matou by the collar and shook. Hard.

“You!” I said. “Summoning Circle! Now!”

Almost mechanically, Kariya started pushing aside a porcelain-tiled table. Good. Floorspace. I tossed some chairs into the next room.

“Yo, Tohno!” I said. “You still bleeding?”

“Yeah…”

“It would help if you bled over the circle. ‘Kay?”

Whitening lips curled into a smile.

“‘Kay…” Tohno said.

Aw, fuck did his voice sound weak. Shit.

“Never mind,” I said. “New plan: bandage that up.”

“But—“

“NOW, TOHNO! IF YOU DIE, THEN SO HELP ME I’LL WISH YOU BACK TO LIFE ON THE GRAIL JUST SO I CAN CHOP YOU INTO LITTLE BITE-SIZED PIECES AGAIN.”

I spun around, looking for a willing blood donor. Not finding any, I volunteered Kariya.

“Augh!”

“Suck it up, pussy. And bleed a little to the left. I ain’t got all day.”

“You know, we could always just surrender and let that Servant take you two,” Kariya said.

“Yeah? Well, I could always just stab your face to death.”

Outside, I heard the thud-thud-thud-thud of swords burying themselves in the grass. It sounded a little like helicopter blades.

Kariya was about halfway done with a circle. A SINGLE circle. The inner ones weren’t drawn yet. Not a rune in sight, either.

“Hurry up!”

Kariya narrowed his eyes. Well, okay, he tried to narrow his eyes. The right one kept pulsing, pushing the eyelids apart.

“Summoning Circles are complicated—“ he began.

“Gimme that.”

I grabbed Kariya’s arm. I tried to remember what I’d learned from fingerpainting on Kohaku’s walls as a kid. It had taken a LOT of paint to get the hang of it. Nine bunnies’ worth.

“That’s a new carpet,” somebody said.

“WHOTHEF--?!”

I whirled around.

The jolt faded when I saw the speaker – it looked like dried apple with the color bleached out. Smelled like maggots. It was looking at me with black eyes. And I’m not talking dark here. I mean black. Like eightballs.

I could sense a thin connection of prana between the thing and Kariya. Like tiny silver chains.

“You,” I said.

“The name you’re groping for is ‘Zouken’, boy.”

“Ciel told us about you. You’re the guy who organized this contest.”

The thing leered and leaned on its knotted cane. I mopped Kariya’s bleeding forearm over the carpet, hoping for something sorta-kinda circle-shaped.

“My family helped create the Heaven’s Feel Ritual, yes,” said the thing.

“Your family rocks.”

“Ryougi,” Tohno whispered.

“Sorry! Sorry! I’m hurrying, Tohno! I just—I need distractions, okay? Stay awake. You hear me? Just stay—KARIYA, STAY ON YOUR SIDE OF THE CIRCLE OR I’LL CRAM THE PRUNY OLD GUY WHERE THE SUN DON’T SHINE! GOT IT?!”

Tohno pointed at something. His finger was fucking pale. Albino pale. Polar-bear-in-a-snowstorm pale. Or maybe I was exaggerating to myself. I hoped.

I spared a look at Tohno’s chest. Okay. Bandaged. Compressed. Okay. Good.

“That rune,” Tohno said. “Isn’t Ansuz supposed to be on the other side?”

“The what now?”

“Ansuz. At least…um…I think it’s Ansuz. Or is that a really messed up Laguz?”

“How should I know?!” I shouted. “I saw it in an RPG once!”

Tohno just kind of looked at me for a while.

“…Carry on, then," he said.

Outside: thud-thud-thud-THUD-THUD…

“Aaaaand done,” I said. “Get chanting, worm guy.”

Kariya gave me an angry, squirmy-eyed glare, but he did what I’d asked.

“Shut. Shut. Shut. Shut. Shut. Five perfections for each—“

“Hurry it up, buddy.”

A thunk-thunk-THUNK-CRRRACK! came from the hall. The swords must’ve hit the door. I heard the loud clank of breaking glass.

“Thousevenheavenscladinatriplicityofwordscomepastth yrestrainingringsandbethouthehandsthatprotectthe—Oh, fuck. Trinity. Trinity of words. I need to start—“

“GOOD ENOUGH! GET ON WITH IT!”

“…balance,” Kariya finished lamely.

Nothing happened for a few seconds.

Swords started flying through the windows. They embedded themselves points-down in the carpet like a creeping bamboo forest. Only metal. And sharp. And bamboo forests don’t really creep.

Come on, come on, come oooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnn….

The room got chilly. Everything started to get red – like the time we’d summoned Assassin, only it wasn’t just a red light in the room anymore. The room glowed red, as if the light was coming from the furniture, and the floor, and us.

A lightning bolt shot from the floor to an overhead chandelier. The wiring went nuts. Sparks everywhere. The fumes smelled like brimstone and bubble gum.

Voices were chanting in hollow tones. I heard horses screaming somewhere. It reminded me of that slaughterhouse I’d visited for my eighth birthday. Clocks sprouted on the walls like mushrooms. Car-sized spiders dressed like mimes crawled up the ceiling. They had human faces, except that spider mandibles were growing out of their regular mouths. The mandibles held pencils. Number three pencils. Because being special snowflakes is how the Forces of Darkness roll, I guess.

The Summoning Circle fizzled.

A tower of lightning blasted through the roof. Shrieks. Moans. The sound of dentist drills.

I hadn’t managed to cover my eyes in time. Stumbled around blind. My vision took a while to go from white, to orangeish, to normal again.

First thing I saw was that the clocks and spider-pencil-mimes had vanished. Second thing I noticed was the Servant.

He wore a red jacket , black shirt, black bracers, and boots. All leather. And white hair. The hair stuck straight up, as if he’d decided that hair gel was for pussies, and had gone directly for cement. The Servant’s jacket had a fluttery-dramatic cape thing in the back, just to hammer home that this guy was trying waaaay too hard.

Oh, and apparently “tanned” just wasn’t good enough for him. Nope. Dude was orange.

He looked at Zouken. Looked at Kariya. Furrowed his brows. Noticed the creeping barrage of swords, including one that had landed a couple inches from his feet. Looked at Kariya again.

“Okay…” he said. “Somebody really messed up this summoning.”

“Oi,” I said.

The Servant’s gaze snapped to me. I cleared my throat.

“So normally, I’d be pissed that I’ve apparently summoned an extra from Blade Runner, but I ain’t picky at the moment. There’s a Servant outside. Get fighting,” I said.

“You aren’t my Master,” he said. “And as far as wardrobe goes… Kimono. Cool jacket. Combat boots. Pick one.”

He swung back to Kariya. Dodged a scimitar.

“Can I get some background here, uh, Master?”

“The whackjob’s right,” Kariya said. “We’ve got a really angry Servant outside who shoots swords. I think he has some kind of jet fighter, too.”

“X-Wing,” I clarified.

Kariya rolled his eye. Singular. The other one was busy spazzing out.

“He shoots swords?” the Servant said.

“Yeah. Gold armor, crazy monologues…”

“…too much hair gel…” I added pointedly.

“…and I’d appreciate it if you could kill him before he fillets us all,” Kariya finished. “If it’s not too much of a burden on your busy schedule.”

The leather-clad carrot-with-muscles sighed. His shoulders slumped.

“My life is an unending succession of—“

“Don’t. Even. Start,” said Kariya.

The Servant glared at Kariya. Kariya glared back. A worm-shaped lump moved under Kariya’s skin, paused under his cheek, and took a bite that we could hear through Kariya’s nostrils. Followed by a contented squeak. And chewing.

“I didn’t even feel that,” Kariya said. “You know, because they already ate my nerve endings.”

“…Point,” said the Servant.

“On the bright side, we already killed the golden Servant's Master, so he’s probably running low on Prana,” Tohno said from the couch.

“Well, that’s something, I guess,” Kariya's Servant said.

Swords sparkled into existence in his hands. Two of them. The Servant stepped through the wreckage of the windows, looking up at the golden X-Wing and its batshit crazy driver with an expression that seemed less like bloodlust than waking up with a hangover.

“I am the bone of my sword…” he grumbled.

Long story short? Tohno was right. The Servant had been burning through limited Prana reserves after we’d killed Tokiomi. And/or he was hilariously overconfident. Watching the fight, it seemed like a little of both.


--------------------------------------------------------------

Later...


“So what now?” Kariya said. “Are you proposing a deal?”

“Technically, we’re not Masters anymore,” Tohno said. “So you don’t have anything to gain by killing us.”

“Except satisfaction,” said the Servant. “Don’t forget satisfaction.”

“No, the one bleeding to death on our couch seems relatively okay,” Kariya said. “And the psycho could probably make a mess before we got her. Or him. Or whatever. Let’s see what they offer us first.”

Tohno’s breathing had become a little less ragged. He was still on the couch, but at least he was propped up. His regeneration had kicked in. Slightly.

“Okay,” Tohno said, “I’m no negotiation expert, but I think it would be helpful if you told us what you want out of this War first—“

“How about you just give us your Servant?” I called from the kitchen.

“…Though on the other side of the ‘kill them now’ issue, the psycho did cut my arm open and use it like a crayon…” Kariya said.

Normally, I would have taken exception to that, but I was too busy digging through the Matous’ freezer.

“No! Seriously!” I said. “Listen. Just stay with me on this: First off, you’ve got a Servant. Right? Secondly… Oo! Fudgesickles! -- Secondly, I need a Servant. So it’s perfect.”

Something glittery and sword-shaped started materializing in the Servant’s hands.

Tohno sighed.

“Let’s try this again,” Tohno said. “You want to win the Grail War, so you’ve obviously got a wish. Let’s start ther—“

“Dude! Duuuuuude! Tohno!” I said. “You should see the basement. Some chick’s doing kinky shit with worms.”

Kariya stiffened.

Looking back, if I’d been a leeetle more attentive to stupid stuff like other people’s emotions, I might have noticed that Kariya's Servant had ALSO tensed up. Which meant that he was probably ticked off, too. Which wouldn’t have really made sense, you know? Because he’d supposedly known the Matou family for five minutes.

That's only looking back, though. But hey. Live and learn.

Tohno winced. And looked a little confused.

“Their, uh, lifestyle choices aren’t our business, Ryougi.”

“She’s like eleven,” I said. “I swear, this is right out of To Catch A Predator. Except worms.”

“You ordered American TV channels without my permission again, didn’t you?”

“…No?” I said.

Tohno gave me one of his looks. It was paler, and more exhausted, and somehow more disappointed-looking than usual.

I held out my hands.

“No, I swear,” I said. “Honestly! I didn’t--Okay, yeah. Yeah, I totally did. Pffft. Ahahaha. But seriously. Grade schooler getting funky with worms. That’s messed up juju, Tohno.”

I looked to Kariya.

“Your wish,” I said. “Uh…does it, um, by any chance have anything to do with putting worms on kids? ‘Cause I think you can do that without a Grail. Just saying.”

Two pairs of teeth gritted. Master and Servant synchronized.

Zouken, meanwhile, gave this weird laugh that sounded halfway between a guy dying and leaves rustling.

At this point, Tohno tensed up. And honestly, he was starting to look a little creeped out by the situation. His hand was inching down to his knife.

“SHIKI…” he said quietly.

“Inquiring minds want to know,” I added.

And that did it. The worms in Kariya’s skin went berserk. Wriggle, wriggle.

“I want to save her from that!” Kariya roared.

The worms in his throat added an extra angry gargle.

“Oh,” I said. “Ohhh...um, I’m no expert, but wouldn’t it be easier to open the door and carry her out?”

“SHIKI,” Tohno said a little more loudly.

“I mean, she’s right there, y’know. It’s like thirty steps. Max.”

The creepy-shriveled-apple man smacked his cane on the ground. Hard. Old, musty-looking silk robes fluttered, sending the scent of decay wafting my way.

Zouken cleared his throat. It sounded like sandpaper.

“The girl is undergoing training to use the Matou magecraft,” he rasped. “Kariya is deluded enough to want to save her from this, because he’s a coward who ran from his inheritance and can’t stomach the results…”

Kariya’s jaw clenched. And if looks could kill…

“…I’ve agreed to indulge Kariya’s pathetic sentiment if he wins the War,” Zouken continued. “Now kindly sit down and shut up while your elders are trying to negotiate, boy.”

I blinked.

Considered.

"...Say again?" I said.

"I told you to keep quiet while your brother--"

Stabbed.

Zouken’s black eyes widened for half a second before I jabbed the knife through his dot.

My pulse raced. Hunger. Hunger and satiation, sweet swelling RELEASE as I smelled the maggoty stench of life drain from Zouken Matou. Wrong. Wrong, wrong, filthy, foul, thing that needed to DIE like Nrvnqsr, and the original Tohno heir, and Akiha, and the psychic, and that creepy stalker Leo, and every other abomination needed to be stabbed, and stabbed, and stabbed until their body fluids were squishing out all over the floor--

Squick.

Squelch.

Sclick.

…Yessssssssssssss…

Okay, I admit that I only stabbed Zouken’s dot after a little creative surgery.

I stood up. Hopped onto the couch. Wiped a piece of worm guts from my hair. It had the texture of melting rubber, and smelled like mucus.

“Okay, guys,” I said. “I’m good.”

The rest of the room was quiet, staring at me. I looked up.

“What?” I said.

Tohno recovered first. Long experience, I guess.

“Whatdidyoujust—?!“

“Kariya wouldn’t give us his Servant because he wanted to save the worm chick, right?” I said. “Zouken wouldn’t let him. Stab. Done.”

I turned to Kariya.

Twiddled my fingers in a “gimme” motion.

“Your turn. Command seals. Hand 'em over.”

Unfortunately, Kariya was too busy retching up blood and other fluids. And worms. Lots and lots of worms. Fat, wrinkled, dead little cylinders. Lying in a froth of human blood and saliva.

The Servant looked at his Master for about two seconds. And then--

“Sakura!” the Servant shouted.

He started down the steps.

“So your Master looks like he’s dying right now,” I said. “New contract time?”

The Servant spared just a second to poke his head through the basement door.

“Kid, I’d rather make a contract with Shirou Emiya.”

He disappeared into the gloom. Judging from the flisk—squelch, he’d probably cleared the entire stairway in one jump, and landed in worms.

Tohno was giving me the look again.

“Eh, don’t worry,” I said. “He’ll come around eventually.”

“Shouldn’t you be just a little worried about the girl?” Tohno said.

“Her? Naaaah. Her life force smelled strong enough. She’ll probably be fine when the worms leave. I think.”

Tohno staggered to his feet. My stomach fluttered just a little bit when I saw him wobble, but he steadied himself eventually. He shook his head. Started walking to the door…

“We’re going,” he said.

“But—“

Tohno grabbed my hand and yanked. It was surprisingly forceful for a guy who’d nearly bled to death. Score one for supernatural bloodlines. He pulled me to the door.

I looked over my shoulder toward the basement.

“So this has been great!” I shouted. “Call me when you change your mind…Oh, and you might want to give the kid some more age-appropriate afterschool activities. Might I suggest a death metal concert?”

By that point, Tohno had already dragged me halfway across the cratered lawn.



----------------------------------------------



“Look, I’m sorry," I said.

We were at home again. Tohno reclined on his bed, turning over a broken button from my sister’s game system in his fingers. Over, and over, and over. Moonlight shined in through the curtains. Tohno was looking off into the distance, his stare reflected in the lamp’s eggshell surface. He did that a lot more these days. Staring at nothing.

At least Tohno seemed a little healthier now that he’d eaten and rested; that wasting look had retreated. But it wasn’t gone.

He still smelled like Death. Cloying, and sugary, and rotting from the inside. From the Eyes especially.

“It’s fine,” Tohno said.

I could almost hear my sister’s voice: It isn’t “fine”. Nothing’s “fine”.

“Okay!” I said. “I admit it, all right? It’s all my fault! Happy?! Look, it may seem hypocritical, but you should call me out on all my stupid, stupid, bullshit—“

Tohno touched my shoulder. Once. Lightly. My face heated up, and I found myself inspecting the linen sheets. Finely woven, dense threads. He could do that to you sometimes.

“You’re my brother,” he said. “It happens.”

“But—“

“And the mail bomb idea was…Well, okay, it showed a pretty disturbing aptitude for domestic terrorism, but it was smart. So calm down. We’ll figure this out.”

I scratched the sheet with a fingernail. Swish. Swish. The fibers barely registered as separate threads. Too close together.

“…You know why I do it, right?” I said quietly.

“Act like a one-man manzai act on crack? Yeah. I know.”

“Wow, Tohno. Allow me to rescind your supportive brother of the year award.”

His fingers brushed through my hair. Ruffled it. They felt a little stronger now. Firmer. But that sweet, decaying smell…

“I know why you do it, and I appreciate it,” Tohno said.

“…Thanks. Sorry.”

“You’re welcome. And it’s fine.”

There was something else. Butterflies jabbed at my stomach, prodding me to leave it alone and bring it up at the same time. You try to tell yourself that there’s no point anymore…but that cuts both ways, I guess.

“Um…about that festival night. The one with the fireworks.”

Tohno tensed. Yeah, he remembered.

“What about it?” he said.

“Remember the, um.”

“The…what?”

“That holding-hands-and-leaning-against-each-other-cheek-to-cheek-while-you-watched-the-fireworks thing? With my sister?”

At this point, Tohno was basically frozen.

“Um…I can explain that,” Tohno said. He didn’t sound convinced.

“Yeeaaah. I was kinda…Well, that was actually me for a second. The personality. Erm. For a lot of that night, actually. Right,” I said.

Those freaky-pale blue eyes widened into freaky-pale bowling balls. His cheeks didn’t seem to know whether to blush or turn white. More the second, probably. Still kinda short on blood.

“What?!” he managed.

“Uh, yeah. And it was…okayish, I guess? Yeah. Weird, but…um. Nice.”

He stared at me for a good ten seconds.

“...Seriously, Tohno, I’m fucking with you again. Holy shit are you gullible.”

Strangled noises. Answer unintelligible.

“…But apparently you put the moves on my sister,” I continued. “So that’s gonna end badly for you.”

“But—“

“Fortunately, you’re all injured and stuff right now – thanks to something that we’ll both agree, in the interests of me not feeling guilty and you keeping your organs, is no longer my fault. Convenient, huh?”

I gave him my sweetest smile – the one that the administration had refused to print in the yearbook before I’d threatened anatomical rearrangement.

“Uh…yeah,” Tohno said at last. “Convenient.”

He rested a hand on my head again, a little more tentatively. I didn’t give him any more grief that night. Just listened to the sound of his pulse, the trickle of blood flow, until I fell asleep.

That look on Tohno’s face when I mentioned the festival night, though?

Totally. Worth it.
















…But seriously, it had been me at the festival.

[shiningphoenix]

Hilarious and win.

[Siriel]

I should be raging at the powerlevels and deus ex machina.

But I was busy laughing.

[Ergast]

Someone pisses off EMIYA when he would be all for making a contract with Shirou instead of with said someone...

Proceed.

[Rafflesiac]

This I enjoy.

Very much.

[Zalgo Jenkins]

I should be raging at the powerlevels and deus ex machina.

For what (little) it's worth:

Aside from the fact that it's crazier this way,

SPOILERS

the Shikis should have failed at multiple points along the way. At best, Tohno was hoping that the Matous had already summoned, and he could somehow finagle a fight between Gil and the Matou Servant. The situation unraveled in the way it did because somebody's manipulating the Grail System.

[Kelnish]

This is pretty good. I like the part where its funny.

[Mattias]

Humourous Ryougi is always worth it.

[Andaeus]

Every moment of that was hilarious, except when it was wonderfully creepy.

I would think SHIKI's tune might change once he noticed EMIYA has all the sharp and point things. Regardless, any future interactions will be a treat.

[Kyte]

We need more dark comedy in the world.

[Flere821]

Ahaha oh wow, this is BRILLIANT. It took a while, but things later in the chapter made the slow-ish start worth it

[dragonwarz50]

I... I... What?

That sums my thoughts about this megachapter.

[chew]

Glad to see you're back. No one writes this stuff like you do.

[Fafnir]

I laughed, but couldn't help feeling your skill is wasted on writing crack.

[Altima of the Gates]

We need more dark comedy in the world.

I dunno, I see more than enough of it that it doesn't really seem like there is a lack.

As for the story, kind of hard to follow, like Velsper's are sometimes, and a little too much of the "TM characters on acid" schtick, but I guess its entertaining....somewhat.