17 – The Grail's Wish

The summer after Emiya Kiritsugu's death, Arthuria brought herself to visit his grave. Truthfully, she hadn't meant to avoid it for so long. However, when there were four children (and whatever Fujimura Taiga was) in your living space and you had never been anything resembling a parent in your short existence, there was a very steep learning curve to focus on regarding that.

However, they were all in school now. The house ran itself effectively. She had no excuse.

So, she entered the Japanese cemetery with some trepidation. She was surrounded by the ashes of so many dead, so many were dead and it was all her fault in a sense. Just like her homeland. And she had wished to go back and erase it.

She couldn't erase this. Saber didn't even want to try. But she couldn't do any of those things anyway. This was the present day with all of it, all of her mistakes and issues and consequences. All of the universe's mistakes and consequences.

In her time with Kiritsugu, the former King Arthur had come to the conclusion that life was something that you had to live with, for good or ill. It was a nauseating conclusion, but what else could she do? There was no way to actually justify all the nonsense that was comparing the weight of lives. There was only living the one you had without conceit.

And in a way, Kiritsugu had succeeded at such at the very end.

Placing the bouquet on the marker, Saber reflexively smoothed the creases of her suit jacket. "You were an interesting man, Emiya," she told the marker, smiling ever so faintly. "You were intelligent in a way. You were ruthless, cold-blooded, without honor in a stern way. It was… you were impossible to work with, much of the time."

He didn't answer, but the dead did not, as the case would have it.

"You have left me with quite a burdensome few tasks, I must admit. I must find closure, must decipher my own survival, must save your daughter, must keep those children on healthy paths, must keep them from the Holy Grail War… so much to do for a person of some average intelligence."

She scowled at the marker. "How dare you of all people ask me to live, Emiya Kiritsugu. And you are not even asking. You are ordering me, as if you are still my Master, and I a Servant." She tugged on her gloves. "I suppose some things never change."

Arthuria Pendragon almost smiled. "You are lucky I like them, and like a challenge even more."

Sakura was smiling.

Rin wanted to take a picture but was terrified of doing so.

Her sister was smiling. Her sister was laughing. Her sister was alive with color in her face and friends.

She might not have been if it had been any later, she knew.

Rin let the world go on, sitting back and looking imperious and strong. That was what at Tohsaka was. Not that she didn't want to be with the others. She did, she did. She was just observing. That was all.

"You're nervous."

Rin twitched and her hand reflexively lashed out and smacked onto a blond head. "I am not."

She was not. She was just making a decision. Ilyasviel snorted at her, looking smug with red eyes and clothes that looked like they were for children and not dolls.

"Well, I am."

"You do that by yourself."

Ilyasviel muttered something rude. "I'm going to help you, you know. So be grateful. And so will Shiro and Sakura and everyone else. We will make this work and never fight again."

Rin glanced at her. "Is that your way of being supportive."

"I am doing no such thing," Ilya said with her hands on her hips and a scowl.

Rin only smirked in reply. She did not look at her bag, at the letter sealed with her symbol. She only continued to look at Sakura, her hands curled leisurely over each other.

When Shiro's soccer ball nearly hit them in the face, however, both girls forgot the seriousness of the situation and chased him down the yard.

And Saber, walking past down the road, preferred things that way.

A/N: And a really long one to polish it off. Yes, this is the end of the fic "The Little Chicks". I started this unsure of where it was going to end until I wrote it down. And then it exploded. All of you who followed and favorited and reviewed, for good or ill, I can't thank you enough. I'm sorry that this fic was as confusing as it was. In the following two sequels, yes I said two. More detail about Shiro, the background, Kiritsugu and Saber/Taiga will be revealed in "With Growing Feathers" and the consequences of these kiddos deciding nope, not fighting, in "Fly From the Nest". There might even be a oneshot in there somewhere, called, "Chirping". Gonna make all the bird comments.

So I look forward to seeing you guys again soon. Thanks for sticking around.