thusia | (no subject)

[Yes, it's quite nice in comparison to his. He sits in the other chair and takes a deep breath.]

...Alright. I'm going to tell you about this kid for a minute, and you can't argue until I'm done. Okay?

[it's not like I have the energy for it]

Kotomine Shirou.

Yeah.

[a pause, then he starts. he's been rehearsing this all day!]

During the fourth holy grail war, Kotomine Kirei became allies with my brother. Kirei helped Kariya usurp the position of head of household, and we signed Tohsaka Sakura back to her mother when it was over. After that, Kirei never really went away. He was at our place more than his, so I'm completely sure he never had a son.

A year later, he told us he'd found Emiya Kiritsugu. He left to "visit", and we let him. If we hadn't, he'd have just gone through us and left anyway. He came back the next day with Shirou. The kid just stared at everything for a good six months. He ate and slept and went to school, and he followed Kirei, but he didn't really... interact with anything, not even Shinji-- that's my son if you didn't know. They're the same age. But then one day he just kind of woke up and started smiling at everybody. He insisted Kirei had saved him from the fire at the end of the war, and he copied everything that guy did.

He's been like he is now ever since then. But he's not... I think there's a big part of Shirou that's confused. It was like he was-- like he was a plain white piece of paper, and he became like Kirei because Kirei was the strongest colour around him. But even so, sometimes he does things that don't make sense. He tormented Shinji, but then he'd get beaten up protecting someone from the bigger kids on the playground. When he was ten he nearly got hit by a car rescuing a cat. Kirei wouldn't do that.

And then last night I had this recurring dream that's usually this fucked-up nightmare. Only Shirou walked into it somehow, and at first he was shooting at me and stuff, but when I told him Kirei's always inside, he went in and you know what he did? They made dinner. He went and pulled some Kariya and Shinji out of my brain and they all sat around and ate and talked about normal stuff. And he talked about how he thought it'd be easier to say goodbye when he could see it coming.

[rubs at his face, groping for words now that he's run out of script]

So, what I mean is--

I just--

Look, I spent seven years with that kid. I packed his lunch every day, I made sure he went to school when Kirei went on trips, and I bandaged his stupid reckless face when he went out of his way to do something dumb and heroic all of a sudden. So I think I'm equipped to say that he wold have suffered a lot less if he'd never been rescued, but I can also tell you that whatever you did in that year, it must have really made an impact. When I asked Kirei about you, he just said you were "someone who couldn't save anything". But I think a Shirou who only knew Kirei wouldn't do the stuff this one does. So as somebody who's watched him grow up too, I should've realized you must really, really love that kid.

So... I'm sorry for being an asshole about it, and I hope you'll keep all that in mind when you look at him. He's really not all bad.

[. . . I'm sorry. this former mage killer is staring at you as if you've been jabbering at him in Greek this whole time.

does... not get apologies often.

unsure what trickery this is...]

[there's something of an attempt to speak, except then he pauses. closes his eyes and reminds himself to breathe]

--after what happened with the Grail... for me, in my timeline... after that disaster that was caused because I rejected that corrupt Grail... I searched... and searched... and searched... endlessly. Just for anyone else alive. My hands, my knees, my clothes were burnt and there was nothing but heat and flames, ashes and burnt bodies.

I'd just been ready to give up all hope, and that was when I saw him, laying on the ground, mostly dead. He was reaching to the sky and his hand was falling, so I grabbed it.

And he was alive.

And he remained alive. I was able to get him out of the flames, but the one who was saved then--

[cuts self off as the voice that had been steady though rough throughout the recount wavers the smallest amount]

My wife died in that war. My daughter, the Einzberns refused to allow me to reclaim or even see after the war. If I hadn't found Shirou then, maybe what you think of my character would have been the reality of it.

Guess there's really something about kids, eh?

[leans back a little, finally relaxing some]

Part of me has always hated Kotomine Shirou. I'd think that maybe with the old man gone, if that family hadn't been with ours I could have kept that whole world away from Shinji. Actually, I'd been thinking of taking of him and moving to, oh, some place in Europe. But then that kid showed up, and Kirei told me to watch him, so we couldn't go anywhere. So I've blamed him for all of that. And it's still true that it's because of him that we stayed. And he still had a big hand in warping Shinji, so I can't ever forgive him.

Someone really ought to kill him for good, that's true too. But even if someone gave me the means to do it, I wouldn't want to do it myself. It's because I'm a coward, but it's also.... you know. Seven years. He was small once.

If you're asking me to kill him...

No. I want to see what happens without his "father" here. Maybe whoever he was before will wake up...

And then he can remember that a year after he was taken from the fire that killed everyone and everything around him, the person who took him from that fire was killed by the person that he called "father" for more nine years.

[tone is flat, laying out the facts.

pauses a bit, again.]

I won't apologize for hitting you. As you now understand, the idea of leaving anyone in that fire--let alone a child, was and is something I was and am not willing to do. But if you asking for me to give him more pain, then you'd might as well ask me to put the bullet to his skull as well. It would be more of a mercy.

Because I honestly don't know what else to do about the situation. My experience and what I am shows that I'm more familiar with severing or taking people's lives than mending them. In fact, I worry that I would make the situation worse if I were to do anything.

He could get better away from influences like Kotomine Kirei, but as for waking those memories...

...

[sits for a moment, thinking, then responds in a quiet, uncharacteristically calm voice]

If someone offered you the chance to forget everything that ever hurt you in exchange for you becoming a monster, would you take it?

[... watching him evenly]

According to some, including yourself, I am already a monster.

You aren't Kotomine Kirei.

... no. Just the opposite, in fact.

Fair enough. You know what my answer would be.

But take it from the other side. You believe so strong, so incessantly that something is one way and someone tells you it is completely the opposite of everything you believe in, your own very self is a lie because you lived for so long being built on those lies--what do you do?

Honestly I can't imagine it would be that much worse than the rest of my experiences. But that's me. For Shirou, it would be horrible. But if you don't think it's worth it, then you're just making the choice for him, right? You're saying that being a monster is a better end for him than being a human being with emotional wounds.

But even if he stays a monster, it's not like he doesn't have that pain. He's just repressing it.

I did not say that. I believe the pain could be worth it, but it will hurt and I am more than familiar with that terrible of pain.

But what I'm trying to point out--with Kotomine... with anyone of such a volatile nature... the moment you tell them or show them that their beliefs are wrong, they will lash out. And more than likely, they will lash out at the one who either delivered the message or the one who represents the truth of their false beliefs, possibly even both.

Because if they can do that, then no one can say differently to them. Because it is that much easier to be a monster than be in that level of pain and loss of self.

I know that! I'm most likely not important enough for you to bother knowing anything about, but just because I've never been a hero or a monster doesn't mean I haven't seen them. There's a reason I was a drunk.

Now I said I couldn't kill Shirou, but if I have to be the one he kills, that's fine. I was trying to die in the first place. If you're too scared of him though that's your problem.

I shot my father in the back six times, I purposefully shot down the plane the woman I called "mother" was attempting to land, inside the Grail I chose to kill the representations of my wife and daughter--all of these because if I had not, then tens, hundreds, thousands, billions of people would have died instead.

Tell me. What am I most afraid of when you bring these things to my doorstep and lay them at my feet?

I don't--

[cuts himself off before he can say something really nasty, and heaves a frustrated sigh, dropping his face into his hands]

I don't understand you. I've just always sat there and let things happen... I didn't even try to save anybody. Not really. I just hid from it and said "there's nothing I can do" and "it's someone else's fault" until it got so bad I chose suicide over dealing with it. Try to imagine that-- realising you don't get the option anymore when you're dead. It was the worst part of dying. But I woke up, and I keep meeting these people who help you for no reason, and who say I must be a better person than I think.

So I have no idea what I'm doing and I don't get people, but I don't want to sit still anymore. So I can't really care what you're afraid of when it's my family on the line. If someone has to die, I'll revive them and try again.

[will just be... taking a moment to breathe and rub a hand over his face as well. the harsher expressions falling back into a softer one, completely sharing the misery of his guest--perhaps more]

That's exactly what it is I'm afraid of.

You tell me that Shirou... some part of this Kotomine Shirou remembers being Emiya Shirou, and the first thing I think to myself is "Will I have to sacrifice another of my family--Emiya Kiritsugu's son--to ensure that the monster he has latched onto doesn't stay where it can hurt others?"

Because that is the life I lived... back home. Back there, I had a hand in a lot of terrible situations, believing myself correct--and in a lot of ways, possibly so. Being right or doing the right thing... that's not an easy life at all. I was glad to die, if only because if I lived I feared another would have to die instead.

Here... since dying... getting back what pieces I have lost even while others railed at me for being the cause of such misery--I was able to regain my wife, my daughter, my son... and then the possibility--no, the reality of losing them over again...

... if you ask other from similar worlds as ours... the fate of Emiya Kiritsugu is often the same. He is killed. And so is his family. I don't want that for me, or my family, anymore.

Then what do you think should be done about him? Some choice has to happen. Doing nothing is a choice too.

Three choices are more than I usually get.

[said flatly, almost cynically, but wearily looking away]

Break him and remake him, kill him permanently, or do nothing. Those are the options.

I know I'm capable of the second. I know a youkai who has cheerfully volunteered to assist with the first. The third... isn't something I could do.

[. . . god, Kiritsugu, you know the answer just by your own nature, don't you]

I'm not going to tell him anything if you say not to. That's a mess it isn't my business to force you into.

[you're not exactly the most formidable when it comes to interrogation, though]

... I need some time to think it over.

[hey I don't expect Shirou to want to know]

...That's fine. He's not going anywhere for now. His apartment is 2F if you want to avoid it. Mine's 2H.

... thank you.

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