To love a sword

Beta read by Shigiya and Paragon of Awesomeness

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--Home-

To say this day had been a disaster would be an understatement. 

He and Yui nearly got crushed to death by a meteorite that strangely looked like a stereotypical alien spaceship, Rito failed to confess to Haruna and instead the impact sent him stumbling onto her — only to get pummeled by the meek-looking girl — and he missed his rendezvous with Saki.

That thing had been a vehicle of sorts, Emiya knew that for a fact as he'd been able to identify every single nut, bolt, and piece of wiring on it, but couldn't grasp anything beyond that. It felt human but very foreign at the same time. Fortunately, despite not being able to obtain any information of value from it from it, there had not been not a single living being inside… 

After that, everyone who was still at the school had swiftly been asked to return home and let the authorities properly dispose of whatever that… thing was in the first place. Both he and Rito returned home with messy hair, dirty clothes, with the latter also having a large red fist mark on his cheeks.

"We can both agree to never talk about what happened today to Mikan." His brother said dejectedly, slumping from both the pain and the embarrassment of what happened.

"Whatever," Emiya rubbed his temples. "She'll find out about the crash from the news. And your face will tell her enough about what happened with Haruna."

"Is it that obvious?" 

"Always has been." 

They took off their shoes and walked inside the living room where they saw Mikan already relaxing on the sofa wearing her everyday clothes and munching on some taiyaki.

"Ah, let me guess, things didn't go very well with the confession." She stated, turning her head to the TV which was showing the local news. "Don't worry Rito, you can try again next time. Hopefully the moon won't fall on the Earth when you do."

Both boys decided it was best for them to not talk about how close he and Yui came to knocking on death's door. The anchorman talked about how there were no students present in the buildings, probably a lie given by the principal to prevent any public panic.

Rito sat next to the kitchen table, slumping his head on it.

"I wrote a love letter a week ago and wanted to hand it over to her. She was waiting for something at the gates and I thought that it was the ideal time to confess or hand over the letter. I went so far as to check my surroundings every second and even my footing… but before I could get her attention the meteorite came and the shockwave knocked me forward." He said, scratching his cheeks. 

"And so you fell on her and got your hands all over her body, again." Mikan guessed what happened next, far too familiar with her brother's clumsy nature. "Maybe we should visit a shrine and get you purified. I'm afraid that you have been cursed with bad luck or something."

"I will try it out as well, hopefully, it'll work for me." Emiya said.

"It's not funny you guys! Now she'll hate me for real! I couldn't even exchange a single word with her while Nii-san over here just had a full-blown conversation with her about some random book this morning. It's not fair…" 

To see his brother casually walk up to Sairenji and to even hit her on the head as a joke before having a friendly conversation with her about a shared hobby was something Rito couldn't imagine himself doing, ever. 

"Both of you can make friends so easily that it's not even a challenge."

Mikan tilted her head in confusion, "But aren't you friends with the other boys in the football club? Also that creepy guy, Saruyama? Yeah, you especially hang out with him a lot." 

Since Rito was gifted with sports like football and even had a strong passion for it that rivaled his enthusiasm for gardening, he got along with the other players quite easily. They even won a tournament last year against other schools in the region.

"Yeah, but all of my friends are boys. I have zero female friends…"

"They probably are scared to come near you because of your… clumsy nature," Emiya added, grabbing a soda from the fridge. "Which you admittedly can't blame them for. And I don't have that many friends in the first place; Haruna and I just talk about books or cooking from time to time. As for Kotegawa Yui, she probably hates my guts due to my constant napping during classes, while Rin just sees me as a potential sparring partner and an easy way for the team to win tournaments."

To his surprise, Mikan just glared at him with squinted eyes. 

"You have the opposite problem as Rito… All of your friends are girls!" 

Rito nodded at his sister's words. 

"It's true, Nii-san. And you didn't even mention all of them; you also have lunch regularly with Momioka and Sawada!" He accused while pointing his finger at him, and now Mikan joined his side and did the same thing.

Why was he being targeted all of a sudden?

These two kids were banding together to bully him out of nowhere. If Rin were to know about this, she would probably not be able to stop laughing like a loon for at least a few hours. 

"Shirou, if you want to convince us otherwise. Then tell us the name of a single male friend you have in school." Mikan challenged him, crossing her arms while waiting for his answer. 

His sister continued, "And no, you can't choose Tanigo-san as your friend. He is the school janitor and from what Rito told me, you just help him out clean up particularly bad messes  a lot."

Instead of retorting them, Emiya went quiet as he tried to come up with someone. The blurry image of a boy with spectacles who he used to hang out with in a distant past surfaced in his mind. Another figure appeared, this one much clearer as he remembered him after seeing Shirou Emiya and Rin interact with him. But they were people he had long forgotten, and didn't count in this scenario due to being literally in a different life. 

Yeah… he couldn't answer the question.

"Okay, let's forget this and backtrack a bit. Risa and Mio have lunch with me because they never bring their own lunch and always mooch off of what I have. They're basically deadbeats who don't bother cooking for themselves anymore or buying any food." 

He regretted sharing some of his tonkatsu back then. They never stopped bugging him for more ever since that time. The only reason those two didn't come and beg him for more today had probably been because of their club activities, Risa was a somewhat active member of the tennis club and Mio regularly helped around the library.

"Complains the guy who intentionally packs extra food every day," Mikan commented, unimpressed with his explanation. "You even brought them both a cake of their favorite flavor for each of their birthdays last year."

"If I didn't know better, then this would look like you flexing your friendship with those girls," Rito added. 

Emiya's eyebrows twitched, these two had ganged up on him. And here he had beem thinking that his sister would take his side on this at least.

"I need a shower," he said, feeling the need to just forget about everything that happened and relax for the night. 

"Ah, let me prepare the bath—"

"No, it's alright. I'll do it myself while I shower. I'll prepare the bath for Rito after I'm done."

With that said, he made a beeline toward the bathroom. Opening the door he removed his clothes before dropping them inside the washing machine.

"Oh, I nearly washed this." 

The envelope given to him by Rin from Saki, even after everything that happened, was still in pristine condition without the slightest scuff, stain, or rip on it. He suspected that Rin would hound him again tomorrow as she did today, claiming that almost getting hit by a meteor was no reason to keep 'Saki-sama' waiting. Maybe, he should just pay the rich girl a visit instead and get this whole ordeal over and done with. Let her thank him if he couldn't convince her that he wasn't the one to rescue her all those years ago and then they could just move on.

After turning the faucet on and waiting for the bathtub to fill up, Emiya took a shower and thoroughly rinsed every part of his body. As he was washing his hair, he gazed in the mirror to see the same few strands of white hair on his head. Since he wasn't pushing his body beyond its limit constantly, didn't trace weapons to the point of feeling his circuits burn, and was not wandering around the scorching sun for years, not much about his appearance changed since he was a child despite his early start in Tracing and Magecraft in general. 

"I don't know if this is a good thing or not." 

That was Emiya Shirou's face in the mirror, yet at the same time, those eyes did not belong to the boy he saw during the Grail War. There was no fire in them, burning with the desire to become a hero who could not understand the impact of such a broken dream, no innocent joy or even a spark of naivety left in them. They belonged to a cold-blooded monster who slaughtered countless humans in the past, one who had to contest against God-like beings while wielding blades that did not belong to him. 

A Faker.

Those eyes were… tired. He was tired.

He swept his hair back over his head, donning a hairstyle similar to his past self. It felt weird to look at this face, maybe even a bit morbid, and styling his hair like this helped him feel more like himself. 

Closing his eyes, he gathered his thoughts before laying inside the bathtub, enjoying the warm water across his body. 

KNOCK! KNOCK!

"Shirou? Are you still in there?"

Emiya sighed, "Yes, Mikan," he answered. "Is there something you need?"

"Just wanted to make sure the water was warm. Apparently after that meteor hit there have been some weird problems around Sainan where many electronic devices suddenly stopped working. I forgot to check the heater beforehand."

"I see," he narrowed his eyes. For such a thing to happen the same day and around the same time as the crash despite it not hitting anywhere near an electrical, he might need to investigate further. "Everything is fine, I repaired the sockets and most of the wirings around the house a few weeks ago. They won't break down so easily."

"Okay, don't spend an hour though, or else Rito will fall asleep while still dirty."

"Sure, sure." 

After their through-the-door conversation, he relaxed his head and closed his eyes again. Maybe it was the lack of sleep or the incident, but his eyelids started feeling heavier. 

Woosh!

It felt like the air suddenly became less humid, drier, and warmer. The only sounds being that of the blowing wind inside an empty landscape. 

Emiya woke up to find himself sitting on top of a barren hill surrounded by a myriad of weapons in every direction. Clouds of dust blew around him, giving the area a feeling of emptiness and desolation. The dense dark clouds that blocked all light with giant spinning gears that represented his becoming a machine. Summoned constantly for eons to fight wars and battles all across time with one singular goal — eliminating all threats to humanity.

A glorified cleaner and nothing more.

It felt so real, like he was back there waiting for the next summons. 

"..."

His eyes went to look at his hands, bigger hands, more calloused, with darker skin, wearing the same clothes and armor. It felt real, far too real for comfort.

Dread slowly crept on his face no matter how hard he tried to deny it. Was all of that really just an illusion of freedom Alaya had given him?

The phantom feeling of shackles tightening around his neck and limbs made that dread turn into despair. 

"Rito… Mikan…" 

He tried calling for them in a last-ditch effort, looking around for a sign of their presence. Yet, all he was met with was the same sight of endless swords. e stood alone inside the Reality Marble. The man tried to move but his legs felt like they were rooted in place, his heart beat loudly as he began hyperventilating. 

"No…"

Was this reality?

"It can't be…" 

Everything up until this point, nothing but a false dream?

Emiya could not accept this, he didn't want to believe it. He was broken enough as it was, Alaya pulling such a cruel joke on him would just snap that thin thread of sanity keeping him from losing himself.

"Nononono…"

All of those years, the happiness he felt, the comfort of a life free from killing and slaughtering — all of it flashed before his eyes. 

His teeth clenched as fury clouded his eyes. 

Bzt!

A static noise happened in front of him, it was foreign and unrecognizable. Maybe it was out of his chaotic emotions, or after being faced with the reality that everything was fake that Emiya lashed out.

"Trace, on!" 

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Splash!

"—!?"

Fiery amber eyes snapped open, each strand of muscle in his hand with Kanshou held firmly in his grip tensed as to stop it from moving any further. For what he found in front of him was not the collective unconsciousness of mankind, but a single figure he was holding up against the wall.

His other hand grabbed onto something soft and smooth, a sensation that felt oddly familiar for some reason.

'An enemy?'

That was his first thought the moment he saw her.

Long and smooth pink hair, light-colored skin, and a curvaceous, almost perfect hourglass figure. A woman who reminded him of a certain Queen of Connacht. Though the bright turquoise eyes broke that thought in his head. They looked at him with surprise and shock.

This girl wasn't a Servant, nor was she human.

"Who are you?" Emiya demanded, still rattled from what he'd just awoken from. 

"U-Um," she stuttered, then her eyes went down and saw his hand on her breast and his body so close to her that they could feel each other's breath. Instead of showing fear, anger, or embarrassment, much to Emiya's surprise, she gave him a smile, a warm and kind smile. 

"Hi!"

He had no words, his piercing eyes glared at the girl without showing the slightest trace of confusion — nothing but a cold stare that promised nothing but pain. His hand that had groped her breast reached to grip her shoulder, continuing to push her against the wall.

But even after all of that, she just curiously looked at his sword and gasped in wonder.

"Wow, that's a beautiful sword! Can I touch it?" She said without a smidgen of fear in her voice, acting bubbly and excited. 

Somehow not concerned that the blade she was admiring was resting right on her neck.

"..."

Just what kind of ridiculous situation did he find himself in?

The former Counter Guardian was beginning to think that he almost got assaulted by a pervert in his bathroom.

"So… Can I touch it?" 

"No!" Emiya denied her vehemently before taking a deep breath. 

He needed to stay calm and composed. That dream had a bigger impact on him than he expected. He could still feel his heart beating like a war drum, and the huge amount of relief he felt when he found himself back here nearly made his knees buckle. Unfortunately, this joy did not last long, as this unknown female entity just had to show up out of nowhere in his bathroom.

That neither party involved in the current situation was wearing any clothes did not bother him, not when this 'girl' clearly wasn't human. Though he was a bit uncomfortable with how close they were, especially with her thighs touching his — but he ignored them for now in favor of more pressing concerns.

"Answer my question; who sent you here, and what are your motives? I will not let you move till you give me an answer."

"Hehehe, you're funny!"

Her voice was quite melodic in Emiya's opinion, but he remained focused.

"I fail to see the humor behind my words. I'm not playing any games with you; tell me who you are and what you're doing here or you'll sorely regret coming into my home."

Did this girl not know that her life was in his hands? Or most likely, she possessed a weapon or defensive capability of some kind to negate any attack on her being. That was the only logical reason he could come up with.

'Or worse, she's some sort of Apostle-like being who can regenerate from simple wounds.'

That was worrying, he scoured his Reality Marble and chose a different weapon for each scenario. She had teleported into his house, a feat of magic that very few, very powerful Magi, were capable of. Maybe if it was a form of space distortion magic or even an illusion, he could strike her swiftly if she even tried to use it again. 

Emiya berated himself for not having inscribed a boundary field around his entire house instead of just the shed. To have a security measure that would alert him from any intruders was crucial and he hadn't done it. 

Understanding the seriousness behind his tone, the pink-haired girl finally gave him an answer.

"I'm Lala!" She introduced herself. "Lala Satalin Deviluke from Planet Deviluke!"

Emiya's mind went blank.

"Are you joking?" 

"Lala Satalin Deviluke from planet Deviluke!" Lala repeated cheerfully "See, I have thi—"

Just as he was in the middle of processing the information and taking in the possibility of her indeed telling the truth… his eyes caught a tail-like member with a pointed tip behind the girl coming straight at him.

'A sneak attack!'

The hand that had been holding her shoulder moved quickly, as he snatched the tail and held it firmly in an iron grip. Just about when he was about to continue his interrogation, Lala did something that further threw his senses out of the window.

"Aaawwwww~!!!!" She moaned loudly.

What?

He was so caught off guard that his hand released the tail. Lala's arms wrapped around his neck while using him as support as her legs became jelly. 

His mind was in complete chaos right now. What the heck did he just do? Did she…

"Y-You pulled… too hard… hng! Please, be more gentle… next time." She said in between her panting.

Next time? Why would there be a next time!? He was only trying to interrogate a suspicious intruder who claimed to be an alien! And for reasons he could not explain or understand, grabbing her tail just made her go all weak.

"This… this isn't worth it." He said, dismissing his sword before sighing. 

Unfortunately for him, his troubles did not end there when he heard the footsteps of someone rushing to the bathroom. 

"Shirou! Is everything okay? I heard something weird!"

What answer could he give her? She would never believe that an 'alien girl' suddenly teleported inside of his bath for no reason and also had a very sensitive tail which he just happened to pull in too hard and make her experience what looked like an orgasm. 

Emiya felt dirty from his actions.

This was no threat.

"It's nothing, you can go back." He told his sister, while gently pulling Lala away from him. "I'll be out in a bit, you can call Rito to take his bath."

"...Alright, if you say so." She walked away a few seconds later.

He left the bath, grabbing his clothes and throwing them to the girl's face. While keeping the towel for himself, which he wrapped around his waist.

"Put those on and follow me."

After following his instructions, he led her to his parents' room to keep her away from Rito and Mikan's eyes. Adding a quick bounded field around the room for privacy, Emiya wanted to make sure that not a single word of their conversation would escape the area. Though his skills with such things were nothing special — some would even call them crude and pathetic — they did get the job done as far as normal humans were concerned. His knowledge and performance in fields of magic outside what he knew already were below average. 

None of his senses were acting up, this girl didn't seem to pose any threat as he now knew her weakest point. Not that he was waiting for one, but if a fight were to break out, he could kill this Lala girl in an instant and not have his siblings bear witness to any blood. 

He did stop by his room to pick up other clothes for himself, now he wore a simple white shirt that ended up accentuating his muscles, and regular black pants. His hair, still dripping wet, was pushed back just like his old hairstyle. Right now, he currently stood in front of the alien girl who called herself Lala Satalin Deviluke.

The fact that her name contained both the name Satan and Devil was not lost on him. The possibility of such her being a Demonic entity was something he didn't want to believe. But with her looks, he could pass her for something akin to a succubus.

"Um… can I have something to drink? My escape was quite chaotic and my throat feels very dry." Lala asked, making Emiya ponder for a bit. 

"…Fine, give me a few seconds." 

The bounded field also served a secondary purpose to signal him if anyone tried to escape. But this was proven unnecessary when he returned with a glass of water with Lala peeking under the bed and leaving her naked butt on full display.

Did she only wear his shirt?

"What are you doing…" he asked dryly.

"Ah! I'm looking for that sword of yours. I thought you must have hidden it somewhere but I can't find it!"

"Are you planning on using it against me?" At least that would be a first, he never had someone use his Traced weapons against him, mostly because he could dismiss them anytime.

"No no no no, I want to take them apart and study them!" 

He wasn't going to question that.

"Right, well here is your water. Now get up and stop showing that butt of yours."

"Thank you!" She said cheerfully before chugging the contents of the glass.

Meanwhile, his eyes were glued to the extra appendage that was attached to her back, the ending in a heart-shaped spade wiggled around almost hypnotically. Now that he had a closer look, there was no stinger or sharp end on it, so he privately admitted he did overreact a bit back there.

"Puah! Now I feel refreshed! Thank you!"

Good for her.

"Now that I have your… undivided attention, let's go back to what you mentioned before. You called yourself an alien?" He asked, leaning against the wall and crossing his arms.

He was no stranger to beings from other worlds. As a Counter Guardian under the command of Alaya, he'd witnessed a lot of things that would make any regular human go insane. From facing Beasts capable of slaughtering the likes of Heracles, and catching a glimpse of Alien gods or powerful beings from different worlds. Heracles himself was the bastard son of a Machine God sent by Chaos from another Universe to colonize another planet. 

This girl in front of him did not fit the initial image he had in his mind of an alien. She wasn't a Type, god, or a Beast. She looked to him like just a regular human girl… with a tail.

Then again, looks-wise he could put her up there with the likes of Medusa when it came to beauty.

"Yep! I guess you, Earthlings, can call me that! But in my perspective, you are an alien." That was an interesting way to look at things, though he supposed she was right about that. "And what's your name?"

"Why should I give you my name? You barge into my home while I'm bathing unannounced, and expect me to act like a perfect host? You should be glad that I didn't end up cutting your throat there."

His attempts at intimidating her just proved to have the opposite effect as she began laughing cutely at him. Damn his younger appearance! Emiya knew that having the face of his younger self would come to bite him in the ass at some point!

"You talk just like my daddy!" Well wasn't that comforting to know? At least he knew she wasn't laughing because of his teenage face. "You really are funny!" 

"I don't like your attitude."

"I do!" 

Was this girl going to behave annoyingly cheerful this entire time? There wasn't a single trace of malice or deviousness in her eyes. Unlike Rin who smiled every time but secretly planned to shoot you down with a barrage of Gandr, this alien felt like she had no such hidden feelings.

"It's Shirou… my name is Yuuki Emiya Shirou." The entire name was always a bit harder to say. His mind always went back to nearly calling himself 'Archer' whenever he felt tense.

"Oh, Nice to meet you Shirou! I'm so glad you gave me your name, I hope we can get along well from now on!"

The image of a certain Tiger from Fuyuki was coming back to him. Lately, people from his past kept popping into his mind more often than he would have liked, considering how difficult it was for him to truly remember them.

"Are you here to invade this planet?" He asked directly, wanting to verify if she indeed was a danger to humankind.

"No, that's Daddy's favorite hobby, but I don't like doing that." 

Well wasn't that just plain scary… So there was a being out there comparable to a Type that liked to conquer planets? Or maybe she was talking about another advanced civilization with an enormous army capable of space travel, and her father was probably a high-ranking member or something. He preferred the latter possibility.

Emiya had no idea just how similar the Earth he was living on now was to the one he was more familiar with. The Mana was richer here, so it probably had a conscience, but whether this world went on a similar path that led to the planet to send out what was basically a distress call to their neighboring celestial bodies to come and kill all of humanity, he didn't know. He certainly hoped not, as after living all these years in Sainan, he still had yet to come across any sign of a single Magus. 

For Mana to exist meant that there had to be a group of people using it.

Coming back to this girl… yeah, while she was an alien there was absolutely zero chance of her being sent here to kill mankind. This person she called her father on the other hand, sounded far more worrisome.

"Then why are you here?"

"I'm being chased," Lala informed, making Emiya's eyes narrow.

Chased? Now that was unexpected.

"When I escaped I thought I would be safe if I came to this planet, but my pursuers damaged my ship and managed to trace my teleportation coordinates here." She explained in a slightly bitter voice. "I was forced to teleport again, or else I would have been taken away on their ship. I only managed to escape thanks to this bracelet."

Emiya noticed the silver bracelet on her wrist; it looked like a generic bracelet most girls would wear as a fashion trend. With a giant heart in the middle connecting to a creature's face below. It was completely silver and was a bit weird looking.

"And that bracelet...?" He carefully retreated backward from whatever this was. 

'I'd rather not be teleported to a random place.'

"Ah! Its name is Pyon Pyon Warp-kun, a teleportation device that I made!" Lala announced proudly as she held out her wrist to give him a better view of it.

Emiya feels his headache increase to a minor migraine. That was one of the dumbest names he ever heard in his entire existence for a device capable of performing a feat of magic so very close to True Magic itself. Pyon Pyon… Warp-kun… this naming sense, even someone like Berserker could come up with something better, and that monstrosity of a Servant was only capable of roaring most of the time!

He decided to fight his paranoia and approach to have a better look at the small accessory. 

"To think this little thing is capable of teleportation…" 

Rin would have a field day if she were to get her hands on this thing. No, she would be over the moon, beaming with euphoria to be in possession of just an artifact. Maybe he could count it as a powerful mystery.

He tried to go a bit further and made the grave mistake of analyzing the object with his magecraft.

It was painful.

"Argh!" Emiya grabbed his head, hearing nothing but static noise as his mind couldn't bring itself to understand what it was trying to analyze. It was made of materials he could find on Earth, possessing not a single trace of magic and being purely technological. But it was the technology itself that was giving him such a headache — there was far too much information… nearly an infinite amount of data forcing itself into his head before he put a stop to it. That bracelet was far beyond anything he had ever seen in any of his deployments. Even humanity a thousand years in the future didn't come close to reaching such a realm of mastery… It was a horrifying revelation. And this girl had apparently built it with her own hands?

"Shirou!" Lala became worried and came to his side. "A-Are you okay?"

He waved his hands, telling her to not worry.

"It's nothing… Your bracelet was far more complex than I initially expected." He said, promising to never do that ever again. "Tell me though, why did you end up in my bathroom of all places?" 

"Well..." Lala acted sheepishly, scratching her cheeks while avoiding any eye contact. "I can't specify the destination where it will warp me to, so I randomly showed up here."

He didn't want to bring up his luck for every misfortune, but this one was very hard to ignore.

Curse his E-rank luck!

"Let me guess, your clothes were either burned, you traveled naked, or your device didn't teleport them with you."

Lala nodded, impressed by his deductions.

"Wow, you guessed correctly! It only teleports living units aside from itself, and things like clothes are not counted so..."

That thing must have had a sense of humor, given how it teleported its creator into an occupied bathroom. Maybe it had a mind of its own and was just trying to do her a favor by bringing her to one of the few truly sensible inhabitants that Sainan had, as this city was filled with more perverts and/or idiots than he liked to think about. He could also imagine the nightmare that would ensue if she were teleported into the middle of the ocean or thousands of meters deep underground. Those scenarios would guarantee certain death for the girl.

"You said you're being chased," Emiya continued with narrowed eyes. "Why?"

"Ah... It's because..."

The girl looked uncomfortable talking about it judging by how she fidgeted in her place.

"Not going to tell me?"

"…Sorry, I just don't know how to explain my situation to you. It's a bit complicated." 

He nodded, "As long as you aren't some sort of war criminal or mass murderer."

"I promise I'm not!" She said confidently.

"Alright then..." Emiya nodded in acceptance, sighing before taking a seat next to her on the bed. "Sorry about grabbing your tail, by the way. I thought it was a stinger or weapon of some kind."

"It's okay!" Lala showed him her wiggling tail. "Daddy does use his as a weapon, but I can't do that!"

Her dad sounded more and more dangerous the more she described him.

"So what now?" He asked, wanting to know what she wanted exactly. "I'm pretty sure I can't ask you to just leave. You want something from me, don't you?"

He knew how these conversations would go, Emiya had them thousands of times and he could already predict her answer.

"I just want your help to escape my pursuers… I promise you that I'm not a bad person or anyone dangerous. I just wanted freedom for once, and I decided to leave everything just for a small chance to escape. I… I never thought I would get this far, so I just need to carry on a bit longer before I can truly be free. Please, I beg you, help me." Lala pleaded, her words were sincere and without falsehood.

They struck a chord in what was left of his heart. The desire to be free… wasn't that what he desired as well? Peace, freedom from his shackles from Alaya, a dream that came true due to an unknown miracle. Now someone else desired the same thing, a person to which he could probably relate to their current situation to at least some small degree.

Could he just throw her out of the house and let her fend for herself? Yes, yes he could do it.

He was under no obligation to help her in the first place.

But a part of him did not want to do that. Not out of misplaced desire for heroism or anything like that, but a part of him that kept reminding him that he was no longer a Counter Guardian. A small shard of the old Shirou Emiya still lived inside of him, and he just couldn't accept the idea of turning a blind eye to her situation.

"…Just this once." He whispered, clenching his hand as he felt that forgotten yet familiar feeling of purpose come to his heart. 

He wasn't a hero, he was only doing this once and nothing more.

The pink-haired alien blinked, appearing to be taken aback by his statement before her eyes widened. "Ah! You will?" She asked with a hopeful smile shining on her face.

"Don't get all excited. I'm just doing this to get rid of you for good and nothing else. Either way, whether I throw you out or take you in, I'll have to deal with these issues regardless." He wasn't going to act delusional and expect no trouble to come his way; he knew how the world worked, and he would at least make sure that neither of his siblings would get involved.

"Oof!"  

Emiya felt the air get knocked out of his lungs as the girl jumped at him for a hug a second time. 

"Oh thank you! Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!" Lala squealed joyfully, her breasts pushing themselves onto his chest and she even had her legs wrapped around his waist.

He would never admit it, but hearing someone thank him like that warmed his heart.

In a move that surprised even himself, he returned the hug as well.

"Yeah yeah, now get off me. I just showered… And get your tail away from my face."

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The next 5 chapters of Snafu, Harry Potter and my 3 other Fate fics (Fate Coiling Sword and To love a sword having 3 chapters) are already available on my P@treon. With 4 more Broly chapters at /NimtheWriter. Also, I post monthly commissioned arts on each story, already posted a few on an Archer's Promise, Broly and Snafu.