Emiya Shirou stepped out the door of the Kyudo Club with a smile on his face. It might not have been the way he'd intended to spend his evening, but that didn't make finishing any less satisfying. Shinji hadn't seemed himself, though, like something was bothering him.
Getting him to talk about his problems was always a bi- Shirou stopped dead, train of thought cut off. There was an immense, shimmering dome over most of the school's courtyard, inside which...
There were two mages farther from him, trading levinbolts that splashed off of invisible shields in swirls of blue or black, and on the side nearer, three... people... involved in a lethal fight.
One, very obviously female and dressed in a tight, revealing costume dark enough to seem black in the poor light, dropped under a slash of the second's sword with a contortion that made him wince to watch, spreading her heels apart in a split even as she ducked almost low enough to kiss the grass. The third, tall and mostly hidden under a flaring cape that might or might not have been the same color as the woman was wearing, stepped up behind her and nearly spitted their mutual foe with a thrust from a weapon that Shirou would have called a yari, if the blade weren't too large and noticably off-center.
Sakura skidded to a halt a few meters away and braced her hands on her knees as she gasped for breath, but she had eyes only for the dual combats going on within the dome.
Shirou's eyes widened as, having looked away from the nearer fight at the sound of her footsteps, he saw something she couldn't. "SAKURA! WATCH OUT!"
She turned to look at him, then flinched as something blurred by her only a few inches from her side and banged off the blood-red spear in the hands of the tall, wolfish-looking man who had been about to strike her down from behind. A moment later there was a second blur, and the man in the cape was standing between her and her attacker. "#I think,#" he said, though Shirou didn't speak enough English to really follow the words, "#that you had better leave, Mister Setanta.#"
The spear-wielder didn't really move, but he nevertheless gave the impression of a man who had just received a very unpleasant surprise. "#And why'd you be thinkin' that, then?#"
"#Any number of reasons. Starting with the fact that I very much doubt Kotomine wants you dead just yet.#"
If that statement had been meant as negotiation, it certainly didn't work. "#Well if that's the way of it, then you can take your thoughts, aye, and himself's too, and stuff them up your self-righteous gobshite's arse!#"
There was a flurry of motion as the spearman lunged, which ended with the him folding almost in half around a kick that picked him up and knocked him tumbling. "#Fuck you, too, then,#" the other said mildly, and threw what looked for all the world like a business card at him.
Sakura gasped and paled, and then the world exploded.
That was too good a finishing line to pass up. ^_^
Sakura reacted like that because, at this point, Caster's had to set up all of his heavy magics to draw directly from her reserves - since his, well, just aren't up to it. They're not gentle about it. The spell was just one of his thunderbolt jutsu, but Shirou was at pretty much ground zero and had no idea what to expect, so it came across as more impressive than it was.
While Shirou and Co. are distracted, the Riders have been at about equal honors - Medusa's stronger, but Temujin's just plain more skilled - and Rin has been proving that youth, natural talent, and spare batteries can just plain outdo old age and treachery. Pretty soon, she'll finish and start handing out fire support, which'll be all that's needed to decide between the Riders.
Lancer will try and hit Sakura with a throw, and prompt Shirou into a 'dramatic self-sacrifice' bit.
After that... likely cut to the Emiya compound. We'll see how it works out, ne?
Ja, -n
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"Puripuri puripuri... Bang!"