Fate-in time

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Fate-in Time Side Story: Chaldea Alternative Records Chapter 5: A Tingling Feeling.
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urprisingly, Shirou had not needed Lily to lift a finger in order to hunt down the Beast that had mortally wounded him in another timeline. Instead, he'd safely defeated the Beast from a distance and didn't bother going in close, a red hound streaking across the dim horizon.
Lily opened and closed her mouth, utterly stunned at the development. In fact, she was gradually beginning to realize that perhaps the reason why she'd seen the Shirou of another time line suffer a mortal blow was because of protecting her child self.
"Something wrong?" Shirou asked her after stepping down from the overhead tree.
"Nothing," Lily deflected, trying her best to compose herself, but failing because her eyes kept getting drawn back to the over-sized black bow in Shirou's left hand.
He noticed. Of course, he noticed. He nodded solemnly towards her. "This is my bow," he introduced. "I fire magic swords from it," he explained it childishly so that even a toddler could understand, but Lily wasn't listening.
'Magic sword' wasn't going to cut it. She wasn't the ordinary child Arturia who'd simply nod and agree with such an explanation. She was a Heroic Spirit summoned in her time as a teenager and presently assuming the form of her younger-self in her dreams.
She knew what kind of weapon that twisted sword had been. It was a Noble Phantasm. It had to be, and it had reeked with the intent to seek and slaughter. Perhaps it was a family heirloom. It had to be. All too soon, she began to recall what Sir Ector had told her about House Ashton before its assassination. It was a noble family said to hunt Monsters, Beast Hunters.
Clearly, Shirou was doing his House proud even as a child, but what ate away at Lily more was trying to imagine what Shirou had gone through in order to wield a Noble Phantasm with such potent bloodlust. It was saddening just to imagine.
The murder of his entire family, came to Lily's mind, causing her to purse her lips.
"Hey, if you don't like looking at my bow, I'll get rid of it," Shirou called out in concern while dismissing his bow with a flick of a hand. "See, it's all gone so you don't have to be so nervous. I'm sorry if I frightened you in any way. It wasn't my intention."
Lily quickly shook her head. This was ridiculous. She was the mentally grown one, and she was the one being comforted? Get yourself together Lily! She clapped her hands to her cheeks, startling Shirou who's attention was solely focused on her.
"I wasn't scared," she huffed. "I was just thinking about things was all."
Shirou frowned. "Thinking about what?"
"That it's not safe to go into the forest right now, and that you probably shouldn't be alone," Lily grabbed Shirou's hand and began leading him along. Shirou must have suffered through a lot already. Lily realized that going back to the scene where one's family was murdered was definitely not healthy.
"But-"
"No buts!" Lily puffed up her cheeks and glared in a way that she knew always worked against Shirou. Expectedly, his resistances began to wane before he allowed her to drag him back to her home in Bristol.
The two walked in silence before Lily realized that she couldn't help her growing curiosity. She wanted to verify if her conjecture of what had happened in the memory of her childhood self was true.
'Hypothetically,' No. Too big of a word for someone her age. "Hey Shirou," she began instead. He looked over towards her. "If you saw me in danger, what would you do? Y'know, just asking."
Shirou didn't even blink an eye. He didn't even show an ounce of hesitation. He looked Lily right in the face, and with the least regard for his own safety, he spoke to her in a tone as if it were only natural.
"No matter what, no matter the cost, I would save you."
He smiled. It was that same smile of relief that the Shirou of her childhood-self's timeline had used when he'd suffered a mortal blow, not knowing just what sort of impact it was having on Lily's mind.
On every Arturia's mind.

Chaldea Alternative Records.
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hen Lily blinked her eyes open from her dream, it was to the sound of crows desperately flapping their wings in order to escape a collapsing section of a forest.
Lily sat up in confusion, only to see a furious Saber Alter punching down a tree with her sheer magical power. "…!" the tree shattered into splinters. "The damn fool!" Saber Alter looked incensed.
"A-Are you alright?" Lily called out meekly. Her designated sleeping spot was the closest to Saber Alters, meaning that they were within speaking range.
Rather than answer, Saber Alter scoffed and walked away, unwilling to speak, but it wasn't the same for her counterparts. Blue Saber and Lily's Lancer variants all had deep creases over their brows before Blue Saber decided to share her conjecture for Saber Alter's behaviour.
Like Lily had expected, her counterparts had chosen to directly Hunt the Beast rather than let Shirou deal with it like she had. Similar to Lily, they all witnessed for themselves what Shirou was capable of, but at the same time, events had happened in the same as child-Arturia's timeline.
Blue Saber and the other Arturia's had been over confident with their skills. They'd grown complacent and had underestimated how unaccustomed they were to fighting in a weakened child-sized body against a foe that could kill them with a single strike.
Of course, Blue Saber and the other older Arturia's didn't need any real help, but all it took was a single moment to slip up. For all of the older Arturia's including Saber Alter, their Shirou's had appeared by their sides fully intent on taking the blow for each of them. Fortunately, it was then that the older Arturia's used Mana Burst and stopped the Beast's attack long enough for Shirou to make a Noble Phantasm that had killed the Beast.
To Lily, the recounting of events sounded like a happy ending; however, to the other Arturia's, it was a wake-up call especially to Saber Alter who'd come the closest to having Shirou decapitated by the Beast in her arrogance of her own abilities.
What irked Saber Alter the most was that Shirou had been willing to die on her mistake. She couldn't understand why, nor wrap her head around the sequence of events. He was a fool. A bloody fool who'd smiled at her in relief just because it appeared as if she'd be safe when he clearly would not be.
Another tree fell in the distance, reduced into tiny splinters.
Wisely, Lily gave her older counterparts their space for the time being.