Fate/Stay Night Fan Fiction ❯ Escaping Fate ❯ Nocking the Bow ( Chapter 5 )

[ X - Adult: No readers under 18. Contains Graphic Adult Themes/Extreme violence. ]

AN: For those unfamiliar with the game, chapter-length sequences from the perspective of someone else are always told in interludes.

Escaping Fate
Interlude 4-1
Nocking the Bow


When she got past the initial jealousy, Sakura had to admit that it was adorable.
Shirou had apparently spent all afternoon training and Rin had spent most of the day inspecting the boundary field surrounding Ryuudou Temple for an anomaly that both had come to the dinner table tired and sore.  Usually they were up and about after such activities, but today everyone had opted to join Yumi in front of the television and watch a movie.
Taiga had been the first to submit—unsurprisingly—and was to one side, sprawled in a fashion that looked completely uncomfortable and lightly snoring.  Rin had been next, lulling into Shirou’s shoulder even as he poked her a couple of times in the ribs to keep her up.  Then Shirou had succumbed an hour later.
Now they lay there in a pile in what looked like a very intimate position, Rin half sprawled atop Shirou like a blanket.  Sakura wasn’t sure she wanted to wake them, though, if they were so tired.
Looking at it made her sad.
She was aware of the chemistry between her sister and Shirou.  There was attraction there, both ways, and Sakura had for the longest time felt so jealous of her sister for it.  For many things.
But there was also an awareness there, on her sister’s part, that Sakura herself knew, and the both of them had come to the realization.
Shirou was far away from the both of them.
It was an inscrutable sense.  Shirou was certainly there, laughed and smiled and got angry and everything else with them.  But his eyes were always on the horizon, always off to the distance.  The same feeling had permeated Saber’s presence when she had been here, and now it was beginning to fully form within Shirou as well.
It made her sad because it was a sign of their parting.
Surely, Shirou would live his life.  It might even fill Rin and Sakura’s life as well, may be a part of them until they died as well.  But already, something had formed that said he was beyond this existence, that he was going to reach for someplace they could not follow.
That sense was beautiful, but it was lonely too.
She wanted Shirou to reach it, but she was going to be sad when he did.
Sad that he would leave them both behind.
So Sakura watched, and she hoped that in the meantime, she could fill his life as much as possible.  She hoped her sister would do the same.  Even if that meant she had to watch them be so comfortable with each other, she would do so, and hope these adorable moments would be good memories for him.
Yumi had left the television since the movie ended, though a new film was playing and keeping the lull of energy the same.  Sakura wondered if Yumi, tired from the day’s activities as well, had gone to bed already.
The way Yumi had acted, though, once the film was done…really hadn’t been tired, though.
When she was done replacing the dishes into their places in cupboards and drawers, Sakura went to check on Yumi.  Her room, however, was empty when she knocked, and none of the rooms nearby were occupied either.
“The dojo, perhaps?”  Sakura could not think of a reason why their charge would be there, unless Takumi Hoshino had already convinced Yumi to join the Archery Club.  Still, even that was no reason, since Shirou and Sakura’s archery gear were both stowed in their rooms and Sakura was certain Yumi would not borrow them without permission first.
When Sakura made her way to the dojo, though, she spotted the open door to the shed.
Sakura was not a practicing magus.  But she still had the awareness, even if it was distant in her consciousness.  When confronted with the absolute truth of the matter, she could bring it up and it would become plainly obvious.
She remembered years ago, coming across the same insurmountable proof.
There was no flow of prana, but there was a circulation.  When Sakura stepped into the shed and saw Yumi’s hunched-over form, she could see the magic willing itself to escape, like a caged animal within a container.
Like worms crawling through her body.
Pushing that thought aside, Sakura said, “Yumi?”
The girl startled, and from her lap one of Shirou’s bokutou fell.  The wooden sword clattered like the gong Sakura imagined going off now in Yumi’s head.  “S-S-Sakura-nee.”
It was the first time Yumi had addressed her as such.  For a moment, Sakura could not even respond, because it both made her heart soar and broke it at the exact same time.
“I, um…” Yumi stuttered and Sakura could not help but note it was the most animate she had ever seen the girl.  “Well, um…yes.”
Sakura tilted her head.  “Yes what?”
“Uh…well.  I…don’t know.”  Yumi seemed to realize she was not making any sense.  “Is there something you, um, wanted?”
Sakura wondered at that.  She thought she knew why Yumi was doing what she was.  Sakura was terribly familiar with it, after all, and now that she knew Shirou’s motives, she thought it was not a far leap to apply them to Yumi as well.
Shirou’s dream, to save.  To be an ally of justice.
“Why are you doing this?” Sakura asked.
Yumi was silent for a long time, her eyes darting about, almost as frantically as a REM state sleeper.  
It was enough to make Sakura a little dizzy.
“To help,” Yumi said, finally.  “I just…don’t know how.”
Sakura watched the girl carefully and considered.  She understood the implications and reasoning.  It was not too far from what Sakura herself felt like, though unlike Rin, she was aware she could only support Shirou from the sidelines.  It made her feel helpless, but…
Her magic was unsuited to help.  It was merely a tool of sealing and destruction.
“You know why you can’t do anything, right?” Sakura asked.
Yumi blinked at her.
“You have a closed circuit.”
Yumi nodded, slowly.  “Nothing comes out, no matter what I do.  I can see what I want to do, but I can’t get there.”
Sakura sighed.
It was probably wrong.  Dangerous.
It was also selfish.  To help Shirou.  Yumi might even harm herself in the process.
But…
She was reminded of high-jumps.  And never reaching them, no matter how much one tried.
“Counting.”  
Yumi blinked again.
Sakura settled down next to the girl and picked up the dropped wooden sword.  “Magic flows through my circuit when I count down from a number.  Like how you think of kanji in your head when someone brings up words?”
Yumi nodded, sitting down as well.
“You will learn about it in math class, but, I imagine, um, imaginary numbers.  Numbers that only really exist in theory.  I shape them.  That’s how I start the flow of magic out.”
So, she decided, if Shirou was going to reach an imaginary place and Yumi was going to pursue it…
She had no right to stop them.  
If she loved them…
She would help them surpass it all.  That high and far away bar.