Chapter Text
In her bed, Ritsuka looked up at the ceiling and absently rubbed at her hand, where her Command Seals had faded into washed-out crimson. Except for one section. That would be their bullet for Zeus. A pang of sharp pain in her chest made her wince, and she curled onto her side, facing the wall. Breathing in, breathing out, counting the seconds until the waves of pain eased and she could relax her muscles…
The door to the compartment slid open, and Ritsuka sat up. Holmes walked in, slightly ducking his head under the doorframe, and smiled when he saw her.
“How are you feeling, my dear?” he said, sitting on the bed opposite of her as the door closed.
“Fine,” she said. “Tired, but that’s nothing new.”
“You have good reason to be more tired than the rest of us. Don’t be too hard on yourself.”
Ritsuka shrugged. “So, did you come just to check on me?”
“I came to answer your questions about the Black Barrel.”
Ritsuka started, surprised. It was almost like he’d read her mind. Holmes smiled again as she stared at him.
“You have used it twice now, Ritsuka. If you didn’t have questions, I would be concerned.”
“Me in particular, and not Mash.”
He leaned forward. “You know why.”
Ritsuka barked a laugh and held up her hand. “Because it doesn’t just use Command Seals. You and Da Vinci told me it uses life energy. You didn’t tell me what kind, how, or how long. So tell me, Holmes. What is the Black Barrel, and what is it doing?”
Holmes nodded. “Very well. I will tell you as much as I know. As we have told you, the Black Barrel is a conceptual weapon, one of the seven designed by the Atlas Institute that was deemed powerful enough to destroy the world. The gun itself is incredibly powerful, but that means that it requires ammunition just as strong. Command Seals are an immense source of magic energy, but the Black Barrel draws deeper.”
“I felt it. It’s not that the Command Seals weren’t strong enough, it’s that they aren’t inherently linked to life–or death. That’s why it pulls at my life energy, isn’t it?”
“Correct. For the concept of a limited lifespan to be imposed on a being such as a god, there has to be such an anchor. And because you are the ammunition, you are that anchor. But it has to take from you to complete the concept. Do you understand?”
“Every time it fires, it brings me, the concept of me, closer to the concept of death. But that’s only a theoretical way of saying it’s taking off my lifespan.” She clenched her hand. “Why didn’t you tell me before?”
“We could not afford any hesitation, either from you or from Mash. It was my decision, not Da Vinci’s.”
“And no one else knows?”
“I have not told anyone.”
Which, of course, was not to say that no one else had realized.
Frustration crept into her voice as she asked, “How much does it take, then? Days, months, years?”
Holmes shook his head. “We don’t know yet. Based on calculations, between months and a year or two. But it depends on your body, your Magic Circuits, and their reaction to the weapon. We would have to take a thorough assessment, and even then, it is not so easy to predict the future.”
“I won’t thank you for this,” she said.
“I know.” He straightened his jacket as he got up to leave. “It is your choice to continue or not.”
For a while after he left, Ritsuka tried to sleep. And though she did not try to think about the Black Barrel or what Holmes had told her, the feeling came back to her unbidden: The warm steel of the weapon against her palm as she stood behind Mash, facing Demeter–or Aphrodite–together. When it had felt like, as her Command Seals flared, someone had taken something from inside her chest and slotted it inside the barrel. As if she had two heartbeats then, one in her body and one in the weapon, an echo that made her feel sick and empty. But when they fired the shot, when that piece of her went flying in a trajectory to take down gods, it hurt like staring into the sun, and it exhilarated her. Like holding a flame that burned her hands. She hadn’t ever known such power existed in her.
Ritsuka tossed and turned, wanting to forget but not truly wanting. It was absurd, she thought, to be told that the Black Barrel was shaving time off of her lifespan. What did it mean, really? How much did she have left to live? There was the pain, but nothing severe enough to make her think her life was in danger; after all, very little did make her fear in that way anymore. It was something she could not measure. Maybe once Da Vinci took a proper reading and told her in terms of years, she would understand.
After what felt like fruitless hours of closing her eyes without sleeping, she got up. Mash would probably be training or reading records right now. Although it felt like urging herself toward an unpleasant chore, Ritsuka pushed herself out the door.
She found Mash alone in a small room, examining the Black Barrel. At first, the sight of the weapon made her hang back out of sight, repelled. Though it had appeared to glow when they had used it, here it was dark, seeming to pull the light in. And as Mash leaned over it, her form small against the unfolded barrel, Ritsuka held back the urge to drag her away from it, fearing that it would swallow her whole. But it was not her, after all, who was in danger from it.
“Hey,” she said, stepping closer.
Mash looked unsurprised to see her, and when Ritsuka searched her expression, there was perhaps, if it were not her imagination, the barest suggestion of guilt.
“Doing maintenance?” she asked, gesturing to the Black Barrel.
Mash nodded. She turned away from the weapon, but did not collapse it back into her shield. She simply stood there, shoulders slightly withdrawn, waiting for Ritsuka to speak.
She had not wanted to confront Mash, but here, it felt like her options had all been narrowed.
So she sighed and said, “Holmes talked to me. I know, or at least, I’m starting to understand what it means to use the Black Barrel. You know.”
It wasn’t a question.
“How long have you known?”
“Since we used it against Demeter.” Mash brushed her hair out of her face. “When I felt the weapon in my hands and the connection you made to it, I knew. And when you passed out for so many hours, I knew it had to be more than just the magical recoil.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“I was waiting for you to ask.”
“And you didn’t think this was something I should know? Even though it concerns me–my life.”
Mash put one hand on the Black Barrel with a faraway look in her eyes. “I wasn’t sure.”
“You said you knew.”
“I didn’t know what it meant. I wasn’t sure what to do.”
Mash turned back to Ritsuka and stepped closer, reaching for her shoulder. Ritsuka drew back.
“Are you angry?” Mash said softly.
“Yes.”
“Are you angry at me, senpai?”
Ritsuka closed her eyes, but the Black Barrel behind Mash still seemed to hover in her mind’s eye, an imprint on reality that yet bordered on unreality. What had she come here for? Instead of a burning heat in her chest, she searched and found only a cool detachment.
“I don’t know,” she whispered. “How do you want me to feel?”
She felt Mash take her hands and pull her closer–closer to the Black Barrel, until cool metal met her hands. She shivered and kept her eyes closed.
“Are you afraid?” Mash said, laying her hand on top of Ritsuka’s.
Ritsuka shook her head, but her flesh crawled to be so close to the Black Barrel. Its ambient magical energy felt less like a spell waiting to be activated and more like a consciousness that would come to life when called… Perhaps it was the influence of the Divine Core and parts of the gods that made it up. It didn’t feel hostile, but it hungered .
She pulled away from the barrel and from Mash. Mash looked at her, resting her hand on the Black Barrel as if it were her pet–or rather, a guard dog which she held at heel. Ritsuka smiled nervously, lips drawing up to show her teeth.
“It’s okay,” Mash said gently. “It won’t hurt you now.”
“But it has. And it will.” She hesitated. “This doesn’t bother you at all?” That it’s killing me a little bit, every time?
Mash clasped her hands together. “I know you must find it unpleasant, but we need this weapon to win against the gods.”
“I know! I know that better than anyone.”
Mash’s expression softened. “Senpai, of course it bothers me when you are in pain. If there were another way to do all this…”
Meaningless comfort, that was what it was. Why do you say that? Ritsuka wanted to ask. The implication that she had to smile and bear it, was that not what Holmes had implied as well? It is your choice to continue or not. As if such a choice existed.
“If there was, we’d know,” she said with a sharp smile. “Don’t pretend like there is.”
“You are angry at me.”
“What makes you think that?”
“Senpai…”
“You should have told me!”
“I didn’t know what to do–”
“Why? Why didn’t you? You could have come to me.” Ritsuka scoffed. “I should have been able to trust you.”
Immediately, she regretted her words. Mash’s eyes were wide in hurt, and Ritsuka’s heart clenched.
“Do you feel you cannot trust me, senpai?” Mash asked quietly.
“That’s not what I meant.”
“Then what did you mean?”
“I… I’m frustrated. I don’t know.” Ritsuka sighed and ran a hand through her hair. “But in this, you should know better, of all people.”
Mash was quiet as she said, “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have kept quiet.”
She was too genuine to provoke further anger, and Ritsuka felt the fight in her fade as fatigue won over frustration. So what if they were trying to comfort her with half-truths and apologies? What did it matter at this point? They were the only ones wasting their breath. What she wanted now was only to understand.
“Why couldn’t you talk to me about it?”
“I thought you might hate me, if I was the one to tell you.”
“Hate you?” Ritsuka shook her head. “Did you really believe that?”
Mash’s expression was somber as she said, “In our encounter with Aphrodite, she made me believe so.”
Of course. Aphrodite’s mental attack. Ritsuka thought back to that deep darkness, drowning as she watched her own body trying to fight her friends. It wasn’t something she wanted to remember.
“I see. I’m sorry.”
“It isn’t your fault, senpai. I was wrong for thinking that way.”
“No, it’s not your fault. And it isn’t mine. Don’t blame yourself, Mash.”
Slowly, Mash came to Ritsuka, who let her approach. Putting her arms around Ritsuka’s arms, Mash leaned her forehead against Ritsuka’s and on habit, Ritsuka cupped the back of her head.
“I wish you’d believe in me a little more,” Ritsuka murmured. “And let me trust you a little more.”
Mash was silent, her eyes closed. For a moment, Ritsuka allowed herself to sink into the embrace, but her eyes landed on the Black Barrel behind Mash, quiet and waiting.
“Why aren’t you scared of–of it?” she asked.
“I don’t know.” Mash lifted her head and looked at Ritsuka with a curious expression. “Why does it scare you?”
“It’s my life that it’s taking off. What other reason do I need?”
Mash smiled hesitantly. “But you can bear it. And, after all, isn’t it worth it?”
Ritsuka stared at Mash, who looked at her with no hint of irony.
“Isn’t it worth it?” she echoed. “Worth my life?”
“To kill gods, to wield this kind of power.” Softly, her hand came up to rest on Ritsuka’s chest, above her heart. “It’s something no one else will know but us. Something special only we share.”
She caught Mash’s wrist, not knowing what she would do, wondering if Mash would feel how cold her fingers were. She felt cold all over. She took a step back.
“Thank you, Mash,” she forced herself to say with a smile as she released her grip. “I’m going to go rest now.”
When she walked away, trying not to hurry, it felt like there were two pairs of eyes on her–and two beings who hungered. For a while, Ritsuka walked up and down the halls, hardly even sure where she was going. Whenever she heard footsteps ahead, she turned back, and she did not enter any of the rooms on the side. The blood rushed in her ears, drowning out all thought, and she would have preferred to let it stay that way, but when she stopped for a moment to rest against the wall, Musashi found her.
“Hey Ritsuka!” she said cheerfully, then paused, looking at Ritsuka’s face. “Are you okay?” she asked in a concerned tone. “You look tired.”
Ritsuka laughed weakly. “I’m okay. Just recovering from the fight with Aphrodite, I think.”
“I’ll walk you back to your room.”
She let Musashi lead her back through the winding passages until, before she knew it, they were in front of her door. She pressed a hand to the lock and it opened, the door sliding open. Tired as she was, it wasn’t until the door closed behind her and she sat down on her bed that she noticed that Musashi had followed her in.
“What?” she said innocently as Ritsuka stared at her. “It looked like you had a lot on your mind. I thought you might want to talk about it. Otherwise, you know, you have a habit of keeping quiet.”
Musashi sat down on the opposite bed and faced Ritsuka expectantly, and she thought back to the morning–had it been morning? She had been in and out so much the past few days that the hours blurred together, and being underground meant not seeing sunlight, or whatever passed for sunlight here, inside Earth. Ritsuka laughed, pressing her fingers to her temple.
“I don’t know. I might not want to talk about it.”
Musashi smiled softly at her. “You know, Ritsuka, I like to think I’ve known you for a relatively long time now. We might not have always have had the most time together, but I’m familiar enough with you to know when you have a burden that you’re trying to carry by yourself. Let me listen.”
Ritsuka took a deep breath and let it out. “You’re right. I… I think I need advice on something. I don’t… I don’t understand what’s wanted of me. Everything has been so much, and I’m starting to find out that it’s taken much more from me than I expected. I’m beginning to fear tomorrow. I’m starting to feel like a coward.” She looked down at her hands, clenched in her lap. “I don’t want to feel this. I say that, but I don’t even know how I should feel. I’m just…” Ritsuka sighed. “Sorry, I don’t know what I’m saying.”
Musashi’s voice was kind. “Don’t be. It’s hard to put words to things like this.”
Ritsuka thought for a minute, and the silence was comforting.
“Should I be human, or should I be strong, invincible, undefeatable? I know what they tell me they want, but I know what the world needs. Who does… Who do they see me as? I know what I have to do, but I’m hesitating.”
“Are you hesitating because you don’t know how to do it, or because it’s going to be hard?”
“I don’t know. The latter, I think. I know what it will take from me, and how. I just don’t know how much… but maybe that doesn’t really matter. It’s a price I can bear, but I think I’ll slowly grow to hate it. Most of all… I don’t think they understand the cost on me. And the fact that they can be so resolute while I’m the one that’s wavering, I hate it. I hate myself for questioning if I can continue when I know that I have to.”
“Well,” Musashi said, “who says you have to?”
Ritsuka laughed bitterly. “Are you kidding? When could I have ever stopped? How could it possibly be right? I don’t have that kind of choice.”
“You do.”
Ritsuka narrowed her eyes at Musashi, whose face was determined.
“You don’t get to decide if I have a choice or not,” she said harshly, heat creeping into her voice. “It’s been decided from the beginning, when I started everything.”
“You’re wrong. It’s been a choice every time. Every time you journeyed to a new place, made new friends, fought a new enemy, it’s been a choice. It’s always a choice, Ritsuka.”
“A choice? Is it a choice to do everything just to survive? When everyone is pushing me to be the hero the world needs!” Blood roaring in her ears, she got up, and Musashi mirrored her. “You don’t understand! You don’t understand what I’m losing–”
“You’re right, I don’t understand. So tell me, and I’ll listen.”
“I–” Ritsuka faltered. “No.”
“You always try to take on everything yourself.”
“It’s something only I can do.”
“Even though it’s hurting you?”
“I don’t have a choice.”
“Then stop everything,” Musashi said, frustratingly calm. “Give up. Run away.”
“You know I can’t!”
“To pretend that you don’t have a choice when there are others who are choosing every day is an insult. You’re deluding yourself if you think you have only one path to follow.”
“Then tell me what my choices are,” Ritsuka hissed, jabbing Musashi in the shoulder with a finger. “I can fight, and live, or I can roll over and die. That’s it, isn’t it? You don’t understand because you’re a Servant –”
Musashi’s eyes flared with anger, and she grabbed the front of Ritsuka’s shirt and pulled. “ I may be a Servant, but when did you start making distinctions like that?” she growled. “‘Some nerve you have to call yourself a Master when you’re just a second-rate mage,’ that’s what I should say, right? But you are a Master, a damn good one, and I am a Servant, and unless you get some sense into your head, that’s all this will ever be. Some collections of mana and someone to pull the trigger.”
She released Ritsuka. “I thought you knew better. You think I don’t know what it feels like? To wonder if the only thing I can do is fight, if tomorrow is always more losing things I care about, losing parts of myself I won’t even know are gone, losing everything I ever knew. To wonder if I’ll ever find my way back, if I’ll disappear for good someday. You don’t know what I feel.” Briefly, a shadow seemed to pass across her face.
“You think there’s only one way forward, but who have you talked to? Who have you asked? When I say you can give up, I’m not trying to be cruel. There is not only ‘forward’ or ‘stop,’ do you understand? Maybe I don’t understand what you’re going through. But if you just allow yourself to wait for a moment and let the rest of us catch up, we can look for answers. You’re backing yourself into a corner, and I want to help .”
Ritsuka felt her anger drain away, and in its place was just an emptiness in her chest. All of a sudden she felt terribly, terribly tired. She sat down on the floor and sighed, dragging a hand down her face.
“It’s too late,” she said. “I can’t choose anything else. Even if you tell me there are choices, I only see one in front of me.”
And you’re wrong about one thing, Ritsuka thought bitterly. I’m not the one holding the gun.
“Then give up. Give up , that is what I am telling you right now, run away and hide and come back another day.” Musashi came down on one knee in front of her, taking her right hand gently. “You’re burning yourself up, Ritsuka. What will you do when there is no fuel left? Let yourself go into someone else’s hands for once. Let me help. We all want to help you.”
“You can’t help me. This is something only I can do.”
“I won’t stand by and watch you walk into your fate blind. Tell me what it is that is hurting you.”
Ritsuka turned away. “I can’t.”
“Why?”
“You might think to destroy it.”
“And if I do?”
“It’ll be more than my life that we stand to lose.” Ritsuka pulled her hand away. “There is nothing else I can do, and certainly nothing you can do.”
“And if there is, and if I tell you there is?”
“I won’t believe you.”
Her voice was soft as she said, “And if I beg you to reach out?”
“I can’t. I won’t.”
“Ritsuka…”
Her voice was so soft, gentle, and forgiving that Ritsuka almost gave in. She clenched her jaw, holding back the words that threatened to spill out. Take my burden from me, was what she wanted to say, the one thing she could not allow herself to say. Musashi’s eyes were on her, and Ritsuka knew she was watching the struggle play out on her face. The distance between them was close enough that were she to drop her head, surely it would rest on Musashi’s shoulder… But at the same time, the distance was infinite. It took everything she had to hold herself completely still, and the seconds passed. She can’t help me. Ritsuka schooled her face to a distant coldness and contempt.
“Just leave me alone,” she said roughly, cursing herself inwardly.
Musashi’s face twisted, and at first, Ritsuka mistook it for anger. But it was pain, and by the time she realized this, Musashi was already rising, walking past her, and she could not bring herself to turn and reach for the hand from which she had so callously withdrawn. At the doorway, Musashi paused.
“I always admired that recklessness of yours, the way you faced danger with open eyes even as you trembled in fear. But this isn’t it. When did you change, Ritsuka?”
When the door closed behind her, Ritsuka choked down a sob, clenching fists to her chest and curling up with her back to the bed, holding it in. Just a little longer, she said to herself, just until we defeat Zeus, until Kirschtaria, until the Foreign God, until until until until until. She retched, bent over the floor, but nothing came up. Why did it hurt so much? This burning in her chest that felt just like it had when she shot the Black Barrel, like a red-hot blade lodged between her ribs, making it hard to breathe. Something that ate and ate and hungered still, with no regard for how much she had left.
When the tears exhausted her, she could not find the strength to return to the bed. The hard floor hurt, but pain was a secondary consideration now as Ritsuka wondered what she had lost without knowing.
“I don’t know what I’m losing?” she whispered. “I’m lying. I know. I know. I know.”
As she drifted between consciousness and sleep, Ritsuka felt as though she floated ceaselessly on a cold, dark, and vast ocean. If there was one comfort to be had, she thought quietly to herself, it was that one day, it would end. In restless dreams, she remembered and experienced, again and again, loading her life force into the chamber, feeling the click of the rotation tear something away, something she hadn’t known she had until it was gone in frayed and fragmenting edges.