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lanymme · 10 months

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Forgot to include the scenario sorry!

I'd love if they were present together in the Storm Border post Lostbelt 5, having learned about ORT and losing Musashi. The danger may have passed and they're moving on, but there's an emotional weight still pressnt and a sense of loss. It would be nice to see Kiara's softer side attempting to comfort and support Ritsuka

(Kiara is the main servant I use for everything, so at least for me she was present through all of that and helped kill Zeus)

Oooh! I really like this one (the first part of the ask was F!Ritsuka and Kiara). Sadly, I haven’t actually finished LB5, but I tried to be as loyal to the spirit of it as possible.

As written this is mean to be Canon-compliant (i.e. nobody remembers Kiara) but I might be willing to do a version that’s compliant with Karuṇā canon if people want that.

Oh yeah, and CW for the hunting and naturalistic death of animals (phantasmal species, not real ones.

Without further ado:

— — — —

The shadow border is dead quiet.

It is not a place of levity. It is what’s left, after the death of Chaldea, their home. It’s the only thing left, after almost three years of struggle, after the death or Romani Archaman and Leonardo da Vinci and

What it is, is a place of hope. Or, perhaps more accurately, of perseverance. A cramped, uncomfortable place, stuffy with loss, but a place where people who have faced death together for years (and Director Goredolf) live in solidarity with one another, cry on each other’s shoulders, make jokes and talk about inconsequential things, or about memories, as they have done for a thousand thousand years: as—hopefully, if they can keep holding on, if they can weather another storm—people might do for a thousand thousand more. So long as they still hope, as they tell stories of the dead. So long as they persevere, as they eat imperishable rations.

But hope for what? Perseverance to what end?

Now they know.

Now, they know.

And so it’s quiet. Quiet like it would have been if they had not made it to the Shadow Border.

And Ritsuka Fujimaru, worked so hard to be the former last master of humanity, now the last once again, is not speaking. Is barely eating. Barely moving.

For the past two days, as they have driven across silent salt flats that were once the Russian Lostbelt, she has been curled up on bed, has barely stirred, except to eat and drink what Mash brings to her, to go to the bathroom, to thrash in her almost-sleep.

In hushed whispers, some of the remaining staff say that everyone has a breaking point. Living with heroic spirits as they do (have done), hamartia is a concept as familiar as death.

One so kind is ill-suited to the task ahead of them. The very thing that let her survive is now turned agaisnt her.

It’s all so terribly cruel.

— — — —

It’s dark. The only light is a pale patch of thin moonlight slanting in to the floor. The only sound is the drone of the Shadow Border’s engine, its steady progress rumbling through the bones of its passengers.

Her ribs hurt from lying down, and after several minutes of continued pain she turns over, facing the wall.

She killed all those people so she could live. It’s that simple.

There wasn’t time to weigh humanity—Proper Human History now, she supposes—against the Yaga. She couldn’t fold, couldn’t die, couldn’t leave everyone without hope, just because she couldn’t make a decision in the time alotted. So she had decided: this will not be that does me in. Many have tried. It will not be you. She’d swallowed her feelings.

Ivan had demanded to see her resolve. To look him in the eye as she… but he had gotten desperation instead.

Her hands start to shake again.

That dark spiral in her thoughts, tugging at her—she can’t resist it anymore.

She doesn’t turn away this time.

Has Okita Souji, man-slayer, killed even a fraction many people as she? Has Altera so completely wiped a civilization from history?

Her mother, for all that she is, has never done anything so…

She starts to scratch her arm, short blunt nails clawing against her skin.

Selfish. Selfish. She’s a mass-murderer now. So many lives for her own…!

She whimpers and curls in on herself. Hates herself for it.

As long as you don’t hurt anyone and you’re willing to work together toward the Grand Order, everyone is welcome.

People are counting on her to do it again. And again.

How can she look them… look anyone in the eyes when. When.

She can’t do it.

But Doctor Roman… Da Vinci… she has a duty. She can’t, she can’t leave it undone.

Her vision starts to tunnel. She’s not getting enough oxygen, even though she’s breathing faster and faster.

She can’t. She can’t do anything.

She doesn’t want to hurt anyone, she never wanted to hurt anyone ever again and now—

Somebody else… if somebody else could take this duty she’s worked so hard at, that has crushed her shoulders…

There’s nobody else left. She would never push this burden on anyone else.

But surely somebody… somebody…

Please. I don’t want to do this. Please.

She rages and squirms in the dark, heart tearing, pain consuming her, until eventually she tires herself out, and begins to drift off.

Distantly, in the back of her mind, she thinks she hears something—a chime, a clink of metal, a whisper of cloth.

The wordless call of something unseen as she slips into dreams.

To pursue life, for onesself… and, perhaps, for those one cares about… is one of the four essential truths of the realm desire.

She sees Patxi, gun thrown to the side, holding desperately to a Krichat’ as it bucks and bellows and tries to nick him with its poisoned horn.

To cling to it desperately, even when it causes suffering to onesself, to others, is the beautiful greed bestowed on all living beings.

She watches him pull out a long, cruel hunting knife to stab deep into its side. It spasms and cries out.

Its foot kicks desperately against his leg, tearing flesh and fur.

For one, triumph: for one, disaster. This is what is meant by “good and evil are difficult to measure.”

Weakening, the creature falls.

Far across the mountains, its young wait in the cold dark of a den for their parent to return.

Patxi pulls the body of their mother onto his shoulders, and trudges through the snow, leaving a trail of blood from the beast on his shoulder and from his own leg.

Such suffering is the proof of life.

She sees Patxi in his house, krichat’ strung up to bleed out into a bucket while he bandages himself.

Is it sinful to survive a fight to the death for the sake of one’s own desires? Does that change if one’s family is bigger than another, if one is happier than another? If one’s cause is rationalized and the other instinctual?

She sees Patxi knocking on a door with food in hand, stepping inside to see his mother.

The Krichat’ pups: one still and cold, one striking out into the blizzard. The others eat their sibling, still waiting for a parent that will not return.

Everyone is chasing their own desires. Everyone wants to survive. It’s just that the result of that is death. Who can be called the responsible party? This is the way of living beings.

Patxi stalks through the woods toward the sound of fighting. A coalition of Krichat’ surround two figures, red-orange and black and purple, poised for the kill. He watches, and after a moment, shakes his head and raises his rifle.

It is said that the Buddha taught flesh-eating creatures to eat plants, soul-eaters to feast on the recently dead: that the gift of bodhi freed others from suffering, from causing harm to one another. But what of those who remain?

Kadoc takes Anastasia’s hand outside a palace, and they nod to one another.

A coalition of starving Krichat’ surround two figures, red-orange and black and purple, poised for the kill.

Patxi stalks through the woods towards the sound of fighting, of voices yelling. He sees them, and counts bullets, and thinks of money. He hesitates.

They are not so lucky.

He watches, for a moment longer, and then shakes his head, raising the rifle to his shoulder.

A female Yaga points the silent oprichniki forward, and Atalante’s arrow tears out her throat

Ivan the Terrible bellows, and thunder flashes in the sky, as a blizzard rages on and on.

On the bleached earth, the stars twinkle in the sky, and in them a woman holds the planet in the palm of her hand.

…And their struggling pleases me greatly. So live, and suffer, so that I can bear witness to it. Suffer and kill for those you love, and for yourself.

She smiles down at all living beings with a bodhisattva’s merciful gaze, as they are wracked by turmoil and strife, striving toward the horizon, towards happiness, towards sadness, towards pain and release, clutching comforts to themselves and watching them crumble away into time.

And in particular, on one small girl, in a ship on land, curled up in her bed.

She holds them all to her breast, watching, waiting.

And if you must continue to close your heart to the Dharma… if you must continue to tempt me by clinging tightly to your heavenly desires despite everything… yes, if you must have someone to blame… consider for yourself...

She looks down from the stars, and sees six white trees growing, reaching out past the sky.

Why does one world’s survival depend on the death of another? Who decided that?

Ritsuka starts to fade, slipping away from the dream.

And Master. Always remember. If you truly decide to turn away from your path…

The white world and its white trees are stained, black and magenta, wriggling outward to cover its surface.

You may always find your comfort in the palm of my hand.

The last thing to fade from her awareness is the terrible, beautiful sound of a woman’s laughter.

— — — —

In the morning, Mash knocks on the door, before sliding it open. To her shock, Senpai is sitting up in bed. She smiles when she sees Mash, that familar weary glow that has seen them through time and time again.

“Hey.” She smiles, ruefully. “Thank you, Mash, for always taking care of me.” There’s an anguished resolve, a straightness in her spine as she stands up, and Mash blinks in surprise. “Sorry about the last couple days. I’ve made up my mind now.” She smiles, and reaches out her hand, and Mash will always, always take it. “Let’s keep facing things. Together.”

“Of course. I’m glad you’re doing better, Senpai.”

That hand squeezes her own.

“Me too, Mash. Let’s go get some breakfast.”

As they set out again toward a journey filled with terrible suffering, with disappointment, with joy, without end, the faint scent of incense and crushed flowers follows them out of the room.

Behind them, the door clicks shut.

#really proud of this one honestly #ficlet requests #ficlet #my writing #ritsuka fujimaru #kiara sessyoin #sessyoin kiara #fgo #highly suspect nuns

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