Today was Sunday, Sakura noted dully as she finished washing the dishes from her breakfast before sitting back down at the table in her causal clothes. Which meant no archery practice, no school, and no going over to Senpai's place.
Just another horrible day at home.
Sakura would sigh but she was used to this state of affairs.
The doorbell rang.
Sakura got up to answer it, her Servant following behind her in Astral form, ready to see if it was the police trying to track down Shinji again.
If it was a door to door salesmen or missionaries… Grandfather had a special fate for them.
Apparently, one of them had interrupted a delicate experiment a century ago and he enjoyed teaching the rest the error of their ways.
Nobody annoyed grandfather and got away with it.
"I'm really tempted to kick down the door," a young voice said from the other side.
"Yeah, that would be cool," a familiar voice said. But why would he be here? "But we don't want to harm the innocents here so let's kick down a different door."
"Oh good. I wanted to try that at some point. It looked pretty cool in the movies."
Sakura hastened to throw the door open while it was still on its hinges to gaze upon the two people outside.
One was a pretty kid with golden yellow hair. The other was her Senpai.
But they were Servants, Sakura realized in shock as Medusa materialized behind her, black robe over armor and lance already drawn. Senpai was a Servant.
He was a Heroic Spirit.
"Greetings Ma'am," the younger of the two boys, the one with the golden yellow hair, at the door said with an easy smile. "We're just two heroes wandering through. We were wondering if Zouken Matou is home? We would like to offer him a serving of 'kill, destroy, and burn'."
"And 'stab'," the Servant that was Shirou Emiya added in, his voice and expression dispelling any doubt that it was just someone who looked like him. "We just want to help remove some evil as heroes of justice."
The younger boy nodded in agreement. "That too. Oh, and as Overseer of the Holy Grail War, I feel it is my obligation to make the war fair. Only one Master per family and his Grail War is long over. Is he home?"
Unfortunately, Sakura hadn't been paying too much attention to their words, too busy processing the shock of seeing her Senpai as a Servant and Heroic Spirit.
But it made sense, Sakura realized as she finally accepted it.
Shirou Emiya was a hero. Sakura knew that. So why would it be surprising that her personal, amazing hero was on the Throne of Heroes?
It really wasn't. Senpai was a hero and heroes go to the Throne of Heroes. She just hadn't considered it that way before.
It looked like Senpai had managed to achieve his childhood dream and become a hero.
At the realization, Sakura felt a mixture of amazement for the great feat he had accomplished, happiness for him to have succeed in his goal, disappointment at not summoning him, scorn at him ignoring her misery for so long, and her usual anger at someone else being happy.
But she had learned to shunt away all of her usual negative emotions and bottle them up inside. The positive ones too.
Unless she was with Shirou, human Shirou, at his home. Then she let the good ones come out.
What would it be like for Senpai to be at her home? For her to let happier emotions emerge from her shell every day?
At the thought, Sakura felt a brief spurt of intense envy towards the unknown Master that had summoned Senpai as their Servant. Who got to come home to him on a more regular basis.
Sakura chided herself for feeling that. And Medusa was her friend so it was bad of her to wish she hadn't had summoned her and instead summoned someone else.
Besides Sakura would just die if Senpai saw her in the pit where she had summoned Rider, now Lancer.
"Sakura?" Servant Shirou asked with concern in his eyes. "Are you alright?"
"Yes," Sakura squeaked as she was reminded that the two Servants had asked a question. "Um, sorry, what was the question again?"
"Is Zouken home?" the boy repeated. "If he isn't, we'd really like to know where he is."
"Um, he is," Sakura answered, now wrestling with the belated shock from people politely knocking on the door to try to kill Zouken Matou. Usually if they were here for him, they were either already dying or busting the door down before dying. "But I don't think you should-"
be here. Please, Senpai. You can't die. My heart will break if you die.
Sakura didn't believe that anyone could kill Grandfather. Not even a Heroic Spirit would be able to defeat him.
Was it correct? No, though admittedly, it would be much harder than killing any other Master. Did Sakura believe it? Yes. Years of torture and submission under his hand had resulted in Sakura believing that Zouken was untouchable, unharmable, and unkillable. No one could defeat him or survive opposing him. That would be impossible.
Kariya, her uncle, had driven that lesson home for her.
"I am Gilgamesh, King of Uruk, owner of every treasure of mankind," Gilgamesh smiles at Sakura, letting his fair youth shine through. "I think I can manage."
"And I'm here to help," Archer Lily mentions. "If you would let us in, we'll take care of him right away."
"But grandfather can't die," Sakura wrung her hands like she was helpless in a doomed situation.
This was her last chance to save Senpai. Because Zouken, after defeating these two, would go after mortal Senpai. If they existed, Grandfather wouldn't leave a threat to him live. He might kill them first or pull their strings like a puppeteer until they were no longer a threat.
Or just eat them like he had to numerous women in Fuyuki in order to sustain his long life.
"We have immortal killing weapons," Archer Lily mentions, dropping two copies of Harpe out from thin air into his hands.
"And I have plenty of pesticide," Gilgamesh dropped a box of 'Worm-a-cide' from a glowing golden circle into his hand.
"But, but-" Sakura protested, scared for the health of her Senpai, even if he was a Servant.
"Want any help?" Medusa Lily asked, her cloak vanishing to reveal a few pieces of armor over a tight body suit.
"Lancer!" Sakura cried, spinning around towards her friend.
The two heroes on the front porch looked at each other and shrugged.
"Why not?" they said in unison.
With that, Medusa Lily tugged Sakura away from the door, leaving enough room for the two heroes to come in.
"Thank you," Servant Shirou said, smiling brightly at Sakura.
Sakura blushed lightly even though she knew he wasn't the Senpai she was used to. Yet he was Senpai. From the future.
It was confusing, Sakura decided amidst the chaos of dozens of thoughts and emotions swirling together. Senpai was Senpai and now there was another Senpai who was Senpai too.
"Master," Medusa Lily said, tugging on Sakura's arm a little and drawing her back from her chaotic thoughts. "You should leave the house. It won't be standing after the fight."
"Most definitely not," Archer Lily wrinkled his nose in distaste at the smell. "We'll have to dig through everything to find every last trace of him."
"Heh heh," Gilgamesh Lily chuckled nervously. "And I'm not very good at limiting collateral damage yet. Actually, I don't think I ever learned or will learn how to refrain from collateral damage."
Sakura just nodded somewhat absently as her mind was still reeling a little from all the surprises dumped on her one after another and Shirou being a Servant yet still smiling like that at her.
Archer and Lancer stared at Gilgamesh with a flat look.
"Uh, I'll pay reparations?" he asked uncertainly, wondering what he was supposed to do to geet them to stop looking at him like that.
Hero Shirou sighed.
"Start learning control," he advised. "Wouldn't want to save a town only to destroy it in the midst of your fight, would you?"
"I will!" Gilgamesh Lily protested indignantly. "But I'm a Lily Servant. I haven't learned that yet."
"Will you destroy everything or not?" Lancer Medusa said flatly.
Gilgamesh thought for a second and looked away.
"If I destroy it, I can pay for it," he mumbled.
"Money can't fix everything, but it can replace possessions." Shirou said with a put-upon air. "That being said, we might as well write everything here off. I don't remember much, but Zouken should be a pretty powerful magus."
"So if your older self dealt with him, how did he do so?" Gilgamesh asked curiously as he started walking down the hall.
"Mostly, he ran," he admitted. "Zouken rotted everything that attacked him and was able to piece himself back together. I think his body was killed several times if I remember right, only for him to reform his body from any worms that survived. And even when he didn't have enough worms left to form a body, he still lingered around through any Crest Worm that survived. But if we use the right weapons over every worm we see, it should damage him badly. Possibly enough to…"
As the two Archers walked down the hallway towards the door to Grandfather's basement discussing battle strategies, Lancer started pushing Sakura to the door.
Sakura not really knowing what to do, let the smaller girl push her.
Should she run back and stop Senpai?
But Senpai was fulfilling her secret fantasy. He was saving her from Grandfather.
But she didn't want Senpai to die.
She had to stop him.