Disclaimer: I do not own Fate/Stay Night.

Overwritten

Chapter 7

The little girl gave a small curtsy, before staring at Saber and her Masters with a smug smile that had a vicious edge to it. "Good evening, onii-chan and Tohsaka-san." She greeted. "I am Illyasviel von Einzbern."

"I knew it." Sakura said with a pained expression on her face. "This is going to suck."

Illya giggled at that. "I'm glad you understand that, Tohsaka-san." She said. "Then that means what's coming won't be a surprise, will it?"

Sakura grimaced as Shirou took a step forward. "Hey, wait…!" he began only to be cut off as Illya shrieked a command.

"Go, Berserker!"

The giant roared, the air shaking at the sound as he charged forward. Every step cracked the concrete beneath Berserker's feet, a crude stone axe swinging in one hand. And without waiting for an order, Saber swept forward, moving so fast as to displace the air around her, her invisible sword held low.

Stopping with one foot forward, she slashed upward, diagonally, air exploding in a thunderous boom from the force of impact. Neither Servant gave way, Berserker simply drawing back to strike down once, then twice more. Saber blocked both blows, and then falling back dodged the following two blows before catching the third, gritting her teeth as she locked blades with Berserker.

Illya giggled at the sight, and pointed at Saber with a finger. "Do you really think you can match Berserker's strength, Saber?" she mocked.

Saber narrowed her eyes, and then gave way, forcing Berserker's axe down to one side before sweeping it aside and Berserker's guard open. As Illya gasped in surprise, Saber counterattacked, sweeping her sword horizontally across Berserker's torso. Wind and sparks exploded from the strike, the former violently enough to buffet her Masters, the force behind the blow forcing Berserker staggering back a few steps.

As the giant recovered his balance, he looked up, following Saber as leaped up through the air. The blonde shouted an incoherent war-cry as she arced through the air, her invisible blade rippling with the wind.

Berserker roared his response, raising his axe to block. Wind exploded violently again from the impact, Saber somersaulting over behind Berserker by using the impact of their weapons to propel herself. Landing in a crouch she swung at the back of Berserker's knees, sending sparks flying without effect before jumping back.

Roaring in fury, Berserker wildly swung his weapon as he turned, and then raising it overhead brought it down deep into the ground. Earth and rock exploded violently in Saber's direction, the blonde dodging further back and jumping from side to side as Berserker charged at her, his axe swinging at her.

Finally, Berserker feinted, catching Saber by surprise, not having expected Berserker to be able to feint in his state. She managed to bring her sword up to prevent a direct hit, but the impact still sent her flying through a wall and across an empty lot through another wall. Rolling to her feet, she barely had time to shake her head clear before she dodged by instinct, Berserker jumping down and swinging at her.

Steel shattered as her took a glancing blow, and narrowing her eyes Saber dug in her feet and blocked the next blow head on. Wind buffeted and erupted around the two Servants, and then Saber briefly gave way, and causing Berserker to lose his footing and allowing her to push him back a few steps.

"Release the Wind King!" Saber shouted, unleashing a massive burst of wind as she charged forward, her sword rising in an upward swing. Berserker roared his fury, his axe rising and then falling to meet Saber's blow.

A huge explosion of wind erupted outwards, engulfing both Servants in the whirlwind as the ground around them was torn to bits.

Illya tilted her head at the sight and sounds of battle in the distance before smiling at Sakura and Shirou. "As expected from Servant Saber," she said. "She's giving Berserker a good fight. But it's useless, there's no way she can beat Berserker. After all, my Berserker is the greatest hero of Greece."

Sakura narrowed her eyes. "You're telling us this, why?" she asked. "Normally…"

"Masters would make sure to keep their Servants' identities secret for as long as they can, right?" Illya interrupted before giggling. "Normally you'd be right, but even if you knew about Berserker's identity, it wouldn't mean anything. After all, he's Heracles, the son of Zeus who completed twelve labors and was made immortal for his efforts."

"Heracles!" Shirou and Sakura said in horror, and Illya giggled again.

"That's right." Illya said cruelly. "It's good to see you understand what kind of enemy Saber is fighting. There is no way she can win."

"That's…!" Shirou began, only to pause and glance sharply at Sakura who was putting a ring on a finger. "Sakura, what are you…?"

"It's true Saber's going to struggle against Berserker," she said. "And she probably won't win without going all out, but there's another way to beat Berserker without taking him on head-on!"

Illya narrowed her eyes and scowled belligerently, seeing what Sakura meant. Shirou did too, and he immediately grabbed Sakura's arm. "You can't be serious!" he said. "She's just a little girl!"

"She's Berserker's Master!" Sakura said. "And she's not 'just' a little girl. She's an Einzbern homunculus, and if she can power Berserker that appearance is probably a first-class deception…!"

"You don't know that for sure!" Shirou insisted, turning a shocked Sakura to face him, and grabbing her by both arms. "I won't let you attack her, Sakura!"

Illya giggled at the sight. "You should listen to her, onii-chan." She said. "I'm not as much of a child as you think I am." She paused, smiling viciously as she visibly flared her prana and with it her command spells which flared across her body and even through her clothes. That stopped the argument between Shirou and Sakura cold.

"You were saying, sempai?" Sakura asked.

"T-t-that's…." Shirou stammered out, staring at Illya in disbelief.

Illya giggled as she pulled out several strands of her hair. "Well if you want to play, I can play with you while Berserker finishes off Saber, Tohsaka-san." Illya said. "Oh, and you might want to step aside, onii-chan. I like you, so just wait for me to kill Tohsaka-san and Saber and then we can go home together!"

"Eh?"

Illya smiled viciously as she unleashed small birdlike constructs made from her hair. They flew at Sakura, prana flaring at their beaks before firing out a volley in her direction. "Move sempai!" Sakura shouted, shoving Shirou forward while falling back.

The volley blew deep gauges into the ground where the two were standing on just moments ago, the small, wireframe birds banking as they bombarded Sakura. Illya giggled and laughed before turning to Shirou. "Stay down onii-chan," she began. "If you don't, you'll get hurt, though I can always repair you afterward."

"What?" Shirou said, staggering to his feet from where he'd fallen on his rump before glancing at Sakura, who jumped forward, corkscrewing through a volley and past the birds. Landing on her hands, she somersaulted forward, twisting her body to land in a crouch.

"Everything is an equation of numbers in varying degrees." She said, her mystic code – a platinum ring with a small diamond set on top – flashing to life. She dodged back as the birds opened fire, dancing around and past the volley, then turning and jumping back further while working her hands as though weaving something in-between her fingers. Illya narrowed her eyes at the sight.

What is she doing?

"Eighth Degree: Archangel!" Sakura shouted, opening her arms and fingers, and then crossing the former in front of her. Illya and Shirou's eyes went wide as strings seemed to fly from her fingers, spooling out into the air.

"No," Shirou noted. "Not strings…strips of…something, inscribed with numbers. I don't know what they mean, but I can see…a…pattern, in the numbers. What do they mean?"

Sakura swept out her hands, fingers working in minute movements like a puppet master, the inscribed strips moving in an enclosing fashion to entangle and entrap the birds. They touched…

…and the strips disintegrated, the lesser mystery crumbling against a more profound one. Sakura grimaced as Illya laughed. "Is that the best you can do?" she asked. "How pathetic!"

Illya swept out an arm, her birds flying around to attack Sakura from three different directions. Sakura dodged, acrobatically weaving her way around the shots, pivoting and turning and jumping around, when a fourth group attacked and forced her into the earlier three groups' line of fire.

"Sakura!" Shirou shouted in alarm as Illya smiled in triumph and Sakura's eyes widened with desperate alarm. Magic circuits visibly flashed as she reinforced both her body and clothes alike as best she could, and then she was staggering as she was hit from all sides from Illya's attacks.

Blood splattered onto the ground as Sakura collapsed, blood pouring from dozens of wounds all over her body, staining her clothes and pooling beneath her. Her reinforcement managed to keep them from hitting any major organs, but her legs muscles were shot up, rendering her helpless.

"Just die already!" Illya shouted in frustration, again sweeping out an arm, her birds regrouping and sweeping around for another attack. Sakura gasped at the sight, eyes wide with fear and pain, and then she glanced sharply at Shirou as an arrow forced the birds to scatter.

"Sakura!" he shouted notching another arrow to a bow, and taking aim, shot at the birds who scattered before reorienting to attack him.

"I can't move!" Sakura shouted, struggling to do so, only to collapse once again with a gasp of pain as her ruined leg muscles gave way.

"You helped her…she's that important to you, is she?" Illya asked softly, almost sadly, causing the two magi to glance at the little girl with more than a hint of surprise and confusion. It only deepened at her veiled posture and expression of dejection, her eyes faraway. And then she blinked, her entire appearance turning harsh and unforgiving. "Fine! Then die together if you're so important to each other!"

The birds began to fly around to target Sakura and Shirou alike, the latter's expression hardening as he prepared to stand his ground. "Sempai!" Sakura shouted. "A bow's not enough, you need something that can them all out at once, unless you want to shoot von Einzbern."

"Any other ideas?" he shouted back, edging towards her as the birds reached the peak of their turn and swept towards him.

Sakura lowered her face as she thought for a moment, every second critical as the wireframe birds swooped in to take them down. She didn't doubt that this time the birds would hit something critical, and that would be all over for her.

If only I had the Tohsaka Crest!

"I've got it!" she heard Shirou shout, and she looked up to see Shirou discarding his bow before holding his hands out in front of him. "Trace on!"

A golden lattice took shape in his hands, catching Sakura and Illya's attention. Golden lightning crackled across the lattice as orange filled in the empty spaces, growing darker, more solid and real with every passing moment, and then with a flash of light Shirou was holding an object of black-lacquered wood and metal. Raising it to an eye, he quickly took aim and pulled the trigger.

Illya's birds went down in a hail of black metal, the clicking of Shirou's repeating crossbow a buzzing sound in the background. Illya gasped and her eyes went wide in shock, that an obvious projection would be able to take down her birds so easily.

More than that, Shirou's posture and the way he handled the weapon showed that it wasn't the first time he'd used it. At least, that's how it looked, and his following actions certainly reinforced.

With neither word nor gesture from Illya, the remaining birds dispersed, regrouped, and then focused fire on Shirou. He jumped back, avoiding the first volley, dodged the second to the side, returned fire, dodged again, returned fire, and then rolling forward crouched beside Sakura while opening fire. He slowly rose to his feet stepping over and standing protectively over her as he kept the birds scattered and steadily picked them off.

"Are you alright?" he shouted.

"Not…really…" Sakura said slowly, looking up at him with a puzzled expression, though he couldn't see it. "Thanks for asking."

"Hang in there." Shirou said. "We'll get through this, but don't worry: I'll protect you, no matter what."

"That's a von Einzbern." The rational part of Sakura's mind shrieked. "No matter how much potential your unique gift has, until you fully realize it, you're no match for her, any more than I was. We cannot win this battle. We just can't."

The less rational part of her mind, however…

Sakura Tohsaka sighed as the history teacher droned on, lecturing on the doings of the fledgling Japanese middle class during the early Ashikaga Shogunate. She looked out of the window from the corner of her eyes, at a clear blue sky dotted with puffy white clouds, of the sort that people see shapes in.

History was a subject better studied on a different day than one as bright and cheery as this.

She blinked, and glanced down at the quadrangle, where an upper class was going through a physical education class. Some were doing gymnastics while others were running around. She was about to look away, when someone caught her eye.

A boy, with red hair and a determined expression that could be seen all the way from her classroom on the higher floors. He was trying to perform a high jump but from the look of things it was too high for him.

And he was doing it from the wrong direction to boot.

Sakura was very tempted to laugh, but her upbringing – calm, demure, modest and composed, the very image of perfection as one of the Tohsaka Clan should always be – held her back. However, she couldn't stop watching either.

At first, it was just for entertainment value, a sideshow to keep her mind from growing too sluggish at the mechanical teaching method of the history teacher. But as the period dragged by, and the entertainment value waned, she still kept watching.

It was insane.

It was stupid.

It was pointless.

The bar was too high. There was no way an amateur like most students were could make the jump.

He could simply adjust the bar. If it had been, she would have done so long since. It was unlikely it was the PE teacher who'd set it, so no one would probably care if she did.

And it wasn't like there was anyone else trying to do the bar jump. He could just as easily stop, and join the others.

And even if he succeeded, what would he gain from it?

He kept on trying. Over and over again, refusing to give up, pressing on despite the pressure of repeated failure, to make it over the bar, and stand on the other side on his own two feet.

The bells rang the end of the period, and with the rest of her class Sakura rose and bowed to the teacher. She did so again to the next teacher, and as her next class began she looked back out the window, expecting nothing of it.

He was still there.

Everyone had left, but he kept on going. He kept on trying.

He just would not give up.

Two more periods passed, until at last, as morning classes came to an end…

…he stood on his own two feet, on the other side.

"I wanted to know more about you." Sakura thought, watching as Shirou ejected the spent ammunition drum, traced a new one into existence, and slotted it into place before opening fire again. "I wanted to know the kind of person who'd keep on going, chasing after what others would have told him was impossible, who'd never give up no matter how difficult the way in front of him was."

She blinked and gasped as Shirou staggered, bloody wounds opening up on his back. "Sempai!" she shouted.

"I'm fine!" Shirou snarled, forcing himself to stand, to send prana burning through his magic circuits reinforcing his body against further hits. "This much is nothing. So bring it on, Illyasviel!"

"In the end, that's just who you are: someone who never gives up."

I want to be a hero of justice.

"You're chasing after an impossible dream, something that can never possibly become real."

Dad said I should practice whenever I can, though apart from these spells there's no other magic I could do.

"And yet you keep going, chasing after your impossible dream, because that's who you are, that's what you want, and no matter how uncertain the future you can see is."

Shirou shouted incoherently, firing from the hip as he shot Illya's birds to pieces, blood dripping down onto the ground and onto Sakura. He staggered as hit after hit struck at his body, but he refused to go down, somehow shakily holding his ground as his limbs and torso alike were reduced to a bleeding mess.

"Sempai," Sakura whispered, and then raised her voice. "Sempai! Sempai, stop this already! Use a command spell and have Saber get us out of here. Anymore and you'll die!"

"There's…no…way…I'll…ever…give…up…!" Shirou ground out, blood streaking down his face from where a hit on his forehead had left a heavily-bleeding wound.

"Sempai!"

And then it happened: a direct hit struck Shirou's right knee, not quite separating his leg but mangling the knee and causing the boy to collapse right beside Sakura. But even then, he refused to give up.

As the birds swarmed in a great circle around them, Shirou forced himself to sit up, pushing Sakura behind him, and aiming at the approaching Illya with one hand. "Humph," Illya scoffed. "You're not going to shoot me, onii-chan. That's not like you. What seems like you though, is going this far for the Tohsaka spare, and a rebellious one at that. Talk about pointless, onii-chan."

"You're…you're not the one who decides that." Shirou gasped out. "And she's not a 'spare'. She's Sakura Tohsaka, and she's my friend. I don't know why you want to spare me and kill her, but I won't let you do that. You'll have to go through me first."

"And the rebellious part?" Illya asked. "You never said anything about it."

"It's no business of yours."

Then we became friends, and I followed your example, chasing after what I wanted instead of what other people wanted for me, being who I really am instead of being someone other people expect me to be, and heading for the future I could see instead of the one others saw for me.

Illya sighed. "Fine, fine," she said. "I still think she's not worth risking your life this far like you've just been doing, but if it makes you happy, then I'll let you bring her along. I'll even repair her like I'll repair you. Just use your command spells to have Saber commit suicide first, and then we can go."

"What?" Sakura gasped.

"You can't be serious!" Shirou exploded.

"I can't?" Illya asked, tilting her head curiously. "Why not?"

"You expect me to just give up?" Shirou asked incredulously. "When Saber – who put her trust in me and Sakura to be her Masters – is still bravely fighting your Berserker out there?"

As if to punctuate Shirou's words, an explosion followed by a frustrated roar erupted in the distance. "Worse, you expect me – us – to just betray her and stab her in the back like that?" he demanded. "There's no way I'm giving up, or betraying Saber!"

Illya was silent, somehow managing to appear imposing and implacable despite her frail form. She glanced at Sakura, and narrowed her eyes. "And what about you Tohsaka?" she asked. "Don't you have anything to say? Seeing as you're someone very important to onii-chan, maybe you can talk some sense into him."

Illya paused, also narrowing her eyes. "And," she said. "It's not like you're not the kind to stab people in the back, are you?"

Sakura shamefacedly looked away at that, the barb striking deep no matter what reasoning she had for going behind her sister's back. "Sakura…" Shirou said softly, and she glanced at him. She focused on his eyes, hard and determined, as they always were when he was faced by a challenge.

"There's one way we can still get through this, but it's risky, and there's no guarantee Saber will get here in time. They're just too close."She telepathically said to Shirou. "But, it's our only chance now. If you can tell Saber to get us out of here with a command spell, then yes, we should be able to get out of this."

"And if it doesn't work?" Shirou asked in kind, through the link between them that shared Sakura's prana with Shirou and thus Saber.

"Then…" Sakura thought before pausing, linking a bloody hand with Shirou's free hand. "This is as far as we go I guess. At least, neither of us will die alone."

Sakura and Shirou shared a glance and turned to a scowling Illya who had realized her decision the moment their hands came together. "Neither of us," Sakura said, lifting her chin defiantly. "Are giving up, Illyasviel von Einzbern."

Illya grit her teeth in frustration, eyes all but glowing. "FINE!" she said, raising a hand high, execution-style, Sakura's fingers squeezing hard on Shirou's who squeezed back just as hard, the latter able to pull the trigger and put arrows through Illya's body. "Then just die already!"

Dying with a friend…doesn't sound too bad…

A/N

I decided to focus on Shirou and Sakura vs Illya (plus fleshing out how Shirou and Sakura's relationship), as Berserker vs Saber would basically be both sides ineffectually chopping at each other and wrecking their surroundings. Invisible Air is a C-rank Noble Phantasm, and it's not getting through Berserker's skin no matter what. And I don't want to reveal Saber's true identity this early.

In any case, without getting wounded by Cu like in canon, plus stable energy backup from Sakura via Shirou, Saber should be able to stalemate Berserker.