1 ♤ voice.

[swordedpast]

Well, everything's back to normal, or what passes for it around here. Isn't that right? So I've got a question.

Don't take this the wrong way, but I don't usually care much what others think. The only one worth listening to now is myself. But some of you guys have been here a lot longer than me, so I thought I'd ask.

What do you make of the claims about the destruction of the worlds?

That's quite a subject, I know. Feel free to take your time in answering.

Comments

[voice]

[doesnotgetit]

So you're saying that you, Rin, Saber... everyone and every weird thing on every floor could be fake?

[She actually pauses to think about that.]

... I don't know. I think it could be worse... I could just be living in a void of nothing. Or not living at all. [Which is what she'd be doing if it wasn't for the administrators dragging her out of the Moon Cell.] It's complicated, trying to figure out how to feel over that possibility.

[voice]

[swordedpast]

...!

[His breath makes the faintest sound of stifled frustration on the other end of the line.]

Heh. I forgot that naive people like you think death is the worst thing that can happen to someone.

[He tries to brush it off, move on to other subjects.]

It wouldn't make sense for everyone but one person to be fake. But I wouldn't be surprised if some of us were plants like that.

[voice]

[doesnotgetit]

... Death is one thing. Complete deletion of your soul is another.

[Her voice is unusually soft, a bit unsure... it's obvious this isn't something she really enjoys talking about.]

I guess that does make some sense. But still, I wouldn't want to think about that too much. It could lead to too much paranoia.

[voice]

[swordedpast]

What's it they say...? It's not paranoia if they really are out to get you.

[He's trying not to respond to the first thing she said. He's trying to keep calm and ignore it and move on and--

--no, he can't do it.]

Jeez, I didn't think a soul could be deleted.

[voice]

[doesnotgetit]

It can - if it didn't really belong to anyone in the first place. If it was just some copy of a real soul.

[voice]

[swordedpast]

Heh, then the real soul's still out there wherever it is, so it doesn't count.

[Why is it something more like relief than disappointment that he feels? Weird.

But...if that's true, and the worlds are still out there, it means that killing Shirou is still the only way. That's probably how it should be.]

You had me wondering for a moment there, but it doesn't matter after all.

[voice]

[doesnotgetit]

...

[The other end of the connection is silent. It didn't disconnect, because there's the incredibly faint sound of the labored breathing of someone trying to keep themselves together, but...

Oh. Wait. Now the other end has disconnected. Sorry, Archer.]

[voice]

[swordedpast]

Wha...

[That breathing snaps him out of it. It snaps him out of his wistful fantasies of self-destruction and throws him back into a place where he can review everything he just heard and realize what it really was he said.

You idiot, she was talking about herself--!

Oh. Now he gets it.]

Hakuno!

[But there's no answer.]