Unwilling Tourism (Nanoha x Eventual KH Multicross SI)

[WildCardFool]

AN: Well, here we have our very first interlude, focusing on Fate herself! This was mainly written because it was the end of what I'd consider the prologue, and I also wanted to try writing from other POVs. This interlude, although from Fate's POV, is written in third person. It's pretty short, but overall I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.
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Faust was quiet. When they teleported back to their house, he had immediately gotten to work packing everything away without a word leaving his lips.

When Fate had first met Faust, it had been an almost overwhelming experience. Her memories of before the accident were fuzzy, and afterwards she had been in the Garden of Time with her mother, who was working herself to the bone on important research to help Fate.

Faust had been different. Exuberant where mother was subdued. Smiling where she was frowning. Nearly the polar opposite of her mother as she was now in every way. And also nearly the exact same as she had been before the accident.

Perhaps Fate should have felt something about it. But at the time it had been an observation. Clinical, detached, and filed away for later use, as her other thoughts were. She would stay with him and obey his instructions, because that is what mother told her. And she remembered listening to her mother, before the accident.

As she stayed with Faust and observed him more, she saw sides of him that he only showed when he thought she wasn't looking. A little hunch in his shoulders, a droop in his face, and maybe a sigh every now and then.

Mother hadn't been like that before. But after the accident, it was the same. She would show those same traits when she thought that she was alone.

The accident had changed them all, it seemed. That day mother's research had gone wild. Fate had been told that she had gone into a coma. Even after mother had managed to bring her out of it, there were still aftereffects that she was trying to shake off. Things like her fuzzy memory.

By far the worst of the effects had been her emotions. She remembered clearly what feeling emotions were like. She remembered how her face would change, her demeanor and her attitude shifting at the whims of her heart. But Fate, for all of her memory, fuzzy as it was, could not manage to feel those emotions.

It was a void, a state of permanent zen. When mother yelled at her, she knew that she should feel… was it angry? No, from her memory, when mother yelled at her, it was because she had done something wrong. Sadness, then? But to actually feel sadness… Fate could only remember what it felt like. She knew that she should by all means be feeling sad, but… she just didn't. In fact, Fate hadn't felt much of anything at all.

Mother was working tirelessly to correct this. To bring her back to normalcy… that's why she was sent to Faust. A creation of her mother's, designed specifically to assist her in this research.

Faust didn't like mother though. He didn't try to hide it, but he had problems with her. Fate didn't quite understand it, but emotions were hard to understand like that. She didn't pry.

Still, for all that Faust would rally against mother, he cared for her. The very day after they met, he had taken her out and tried his best to see to her needs. That was something that parents do, right? And Fate had a mother. She couldn't remember having a father.

Faust had looked confused when she had asked, but his answer made sense. And for an instant, just a brief moment, so quick that for a while after she thought that she had been mistaken, she felt something. Too quick and fleeting to identity, especially after so long.

Fate latched on to that moment. She followed Faust's instructions, went to school, and got along with her classmates and teachers. But that was only passing time. Knowledge wasn't bad, and Fate had been excited to start school before the accident.

Now, she wasn't quite sure why. Friends seemed a nebulous concept. Groups of people who talked with each other and… well, did things together. But friends smiled together, laughed together… felt emotions together.

Friends were a thing for later. And she personally thought that Faust's lessons were much more engaging. Magic was a thing of wonder, and Faust had a way of making use of it in ways that none of the other mages quite did.

It was interesting to see him at work, as he was now while he packed. He was chanting under his breath, working some sort of spell while each of his hands danced in the air, manipulating a magic circle of their own respectively. Pots and pans swirled into a storage spell in spirals of multi-colored light. Clothes flew through the air to fold themselves and land in bags that zipped themselves up.

It was utterly mundane, so unlike the destructive blasts of light that she had been hurling not two hours ago. Fate smiled. It was beautiful.

At some point she had begun to look forward to those lessons. For the magic, for the time spent with Faust, and for the way he seemed to come alive in a way that he never quite seemed to elsewhere.

At some point she had begun to feel again. It was slow, and subtle, but she relished it. She couldn't believe that she was even capable of relishing it. She couldn't believe that she had been sad about not feeling emotions.

Faust had seemed sad that they had to leave before she could finish the school year. She couldn't empathize. Not yet. But that was okay. She would latch on to the emotions that she could feel, and trust in the fact that one day she would be able to feel everything again. Both the good and the bad.

But now wasn't the time for that. Fate shook her head and clapped her hands to her cheeks in an attempt to gather her thoughts. It seemed to work when other people did it on TV. Faust looked over at her, an eyebrow raised. The items hung in air, their animation halted while Faust's attention was elsewhere.

"Faust," Fate took a deep breath. "What exactly did that man mean when he called me a specimen?"

Faust's eyes widened. The floating objects lurched, just a little bit, before he regained control. "Well he's insane, Fate-"

"He said I didn't have a heart," Fate cut him off.

Faust frowned. "He said that you're growing one now."

"And now you're listening to him, even though he's 'insane,'" Fate said. "Faust… he wasn't wrong. He could tell, somehow, and I know that he was right."

She could have pressed on. They both knew it. But the ball was in Faust's court. With a single word he could cut this conversation off.

Faust sighed. The amalgamation of stuff lightly touched down on the ground.

"Right… You do deserve to know," He said. "Alright Fate, this is a bit of a long story."

Fate smiled and nodded.

 

[loloudbeast]

"Right… You do deserve to know," He said. "Alright Fate, this is a bit of a long story."

Click to shrink...

Called it.

 

[azereath]

Fate is going to need all the hugs after this conversation isn't she. Also I've got to wonder when Faust and Fate disappear from Precia, would she make another fate which would cause Cannon to happen. Then when they return there would be two fates, Nanoha would be delighted

 

[WildCardFool]

AN: Well I won't lie. I wasn't able to finish a chapter for this period. That means that my backlog is now down by one. Which is uh... not great. Also I like completely revised this just before posting it now, so I'll need to pretty heavily rework what I do have to fit. That being said, I feel like the revisions help, so no heavy regrets. That being said, I'll probably have to slow my updating schedule like I mentioned earlier. Maybe once a week? We'll see. Anyways, hope you all enjoy, and as always, feedback is great!
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Dodge, duck, dip, dive, and dodge. The five principles of not being hit by projectiles when you don't want to. They held true and firm throughout mankind's long and storied history of trying to hit each other from afar without being hit themselves, and that hadn't changed much to this day.

The key word being "much."

The thing about aerial combat is, it might not seem to change much at first, but it really opens up so many more possibilities and avenues of attack that you have to keep an eye out, both as an aggressor, and as a defender.

Nothing made this clearer to me than when the swarm of maliciously glowing magical bullets headed my way.

Fate hadn't yet managed to increase their number too much, nor had she gotten the fine control required to really control any individual bullet, but their speed and aim were top notch. Truly, if we were on the ground, I would have had to really dig into the five D's.

It took a slight flex of my mana to shoot myself up into the sky. Fate's eyes narrowed in concentration and she clenched her hands into fists.

The bullets curved, slowly at first, and then more confidently, adjusting their angle to come after me.

I whistled. Certainly the Photon Lancer spell was designed to be modular, allowing for easy modifications like homing capabilities. But I had just covered those not a week ago. I had to test this. I brought my hands together to clap while pushing more power to my flight spell to keep me ahead of the bullets.

It was a good day. Sunny, not too hot, not too cold, and with only a few fluffy clouds dotting the sky. Those few skies faintly darkened, tinting purple as my spell took hold. They changed direction and velocity to swirl around me, thickening into a mass of obscuring water vapor. It was a good thing that my usual suite of protective spells included some environmental protection. I hated being wet.

The clouds also hid the outside world from my own sight, but the magical bullets that Fate employed glowed an unmistakable yellow. They surged forward, but didn't adjust anymore to take into account my newly changed position. When they blazed through the cloud mass the vapor directly in their path fizzed away, boiling and dissipating. The spell began to bring other parts of the clouds in to cover up the gaps, but then the bullets curved again, coming through the mass again at a new angle.

Not inherently homing then, but controlled. And a smart usage of the already existing attack to try and burn through my defence before continuing to come after me. Unfortunately for Fate, manual control of an attack like the Photon Lancer took a fair bit of concentration even after you got used to it. Perhaps with a Device it'd be easier but I couldn't say. I had never used one. In any case, the cloaking spell that I was using did not take up a similar amount of concentration..

An illusion slipped into place over me, blending me into the scenery around me. Costly, hard to maintain, and not quite as effective as I'd like up close.

But we practiced the Midchilda style of magic, and I was already in cover. It was child's play to fly away from the clouds even as Fate kept her focus on burning through my clouds.

I had to take a roundabout, and not to mention slow, approach to reach Fate. By the time I had gotten to her, she was almost done with the clouds. The skies were almost perfectly clear now.

"Alright, I think that's enough," I put a hand on her shoulder. She jolted, turning around with a yelp. I burst out laughing.

Fate frowned, crossing her arms and looking away with a huff. "That wasn't very funny…"

"Right, right, sorry about that Fate... but seriously, we're done for the day. Good work." I ruffled her hair in a now all-too-familiar motion. She hummed, but the frown melted away.

We touched down on the grass and made our way to our camp.

"Alright Fate, go get washed up for dinner. You did all of your schoolwork, right?"

"Yes Faust," Fate called over her shoulder as she walked into the small tent that we had set up as a kind of bathroom.

I nodded even though she couldn't see it. "Okay, I'll check your work later."

This was the compromise that we had reached after Scaglietti had interrupted Fate's school experience so many months ago. Homeschooling, of which I had been wholly unprepared to assist with, such that if Fate's grades fell below exceptional, we would head to the nearest midrange world and settle down while she enrolled in school.

Much to my mixed dismay and pride, Fate's intellect and work ethic shone, and she managed to excel in her academics despite my shoddy teaching and her lack of access to any actual educational aids. Sure it was just kindergarten, but it was still what I considered to be quite impressive.

As long as she continued to take care of her academic studies, I would accelerate her magical lessons. To be honest, as today had proven, she was more or less a fully fledged mage. She knew a wide variety of spells, suitable for most any combat situations, and she was capable of modifying them as she saw fit at will.

Yes, she could improve her technique, power, and judgement in combat. But as far as he actual magical skills went, she was well-rounded and well-versed in the broadest of ways.

No sooner had Fate entered the tent then a chill ran down my spine. There was a pulling sensation on my mind, as if it were trying to float out of my body, before it snapped back into place. I couldn't hold back a shiver. Telepathy was never fun.

"Faust," I heard Precia's voice in my head. I closed my eyes and rolled them.

There was a pause.

"Oh, are you waiting for me to respond?" I asked.

Precia didn't deign to respond beyond transmitting a cold tingle down my spine. "Fate has been coming along well, it seems," she continued.

I nodded. "I'm quite proud of her. She's growing up into a very kind and smart girl."

Precia grunted. "And her magic?"

"Well she's becoming quite the well-rounded mage," I answered. "In time-"

"I see," Precia cut me off. "You have two months."

I looked around. No, the sky was still clear. There was a slight breeze, and the leaves in the trees near our camp were swaying. I could hear the birds chirping. "I'm sorry? I don't think I heard you," I stuck a finger in my ear and swished it around.

Hmm… I don't think my hearing improved much from that. Maybe I had some sort of tinnitus?

"Two months to get Fate combat ready. Wherever she is then, I will start assigning you tasks to do."

"I see," I didn't need a mirror to know how flat my expression was at the moment. "Dangerous tasks?"

I could almost hear Precia's shrug. "Perhaps."

Knowing that Precia couldn't see me, I cycled some mana through my body and turned, whipping my fist at the nearest tree. It fell over, conforming to the shape of my fist as easily as if I were punching memory foam. The fucking nerve of Precia, after simply discarding all responsibility of us, to waltz on in and demand that we risk our very lives for her… I wasn't mad. I was seething.

"Devices," I bit out.

"Pardon?"

"Give me the knowledge to make and maintain Devices, and then give us access to the resources to make them," I said. "It would increase the likelihood of our success, as well as the speed that we can finish these tasks at. More importantly, if you're going to send us on life-threatening missions, the least that you could do is properly equip us you-"

There was a sense of narrowing in the psychic link. As if my mind was being pushed through a tube. Pain washed over my world, and then white. I fell to my knee and clapped my hands over my ears. The ringing didn't stop. I slammed my hands against nearby trees for support and pulled them back to beat at my ears, leaving running red handprints in the trunks.

And as white began encroaching on the edges of my vision, I saw red. Anger seemed to replace the blood surging through my veins, and my teeth ground against each other. I make a request for just the bare tools needed to use magic to its fullest, a perfectly reasonable request considering the utter lack of support that we had seen so far, and she was trying to beat me into submission?

"Fate is your daughter!" I growled. I had never given a shit about my own lack of a Device. I had gotten along fine so far. But Fate was literally a child. A child.

I only had a sudden darkening of my surroundings and the faint smell of ozone as a warning before lightning lanced down the sky and hit me dead on. In the back of my head the pain ramped up, and something inside of me noted that I really shouldn't still be standing at this point. "Don't you dare call that thing my child!" Precia roared in my head. It was the first time I'd ever heard her really raise her voice. Be angry, yes, be violent, also yes… but really raise her voice? Never.

Fate came out of the tent, one hand pressing a towel against the side of her face. "Faust? I heard- Faust?!"

"Get away, Fate! It's not safe right now!" I shouted.

The towel dropped from her hand. "But Fau-"

"You heard him Fate," Precia said. Fate could obviously hear her now. She stopped, dead in her tracks.

"Moth-"

"FATE!" I roared. There was a sizzling sound, and the smell of cooked meat was beginning to waft up. "Get away! NOW!"

She stumbled back, barely catching herself so as not to fall over. On her face was a twisted expression. Fear? Sadness? I couldn't tell, there was too much red in the way. It was only the set of her mouth that I could barely make out.

That hurt. It hurt a lot more than the physical pain I was somehow shrugging off. And just like that, my anger towards Precia disappeared for the moment, completely overshadowed by an instant of mind numbing regret. That was one moment too long.

Then the pain hit me like a truck, the anger no longer there to keep it at bay. I don't remember what happened after that. Just screaming that had to have come from me, seeing blood that had to have been mind, and… then nothing. Blessed relief.

I had but an instant of that before another torrent of pain took over my senses. I could barely make out Fate kneeling by my body, but my entire brain seemed on fire from a mass of information being shoved into it. This was nothing at all like the earlier information transfer I had experienced. This was designed to hurt. That sparked some anger, but it was smothered by the pain before I could do more than acknowledge it.

"Fine. Your wish has been granted. That should have granted you Device meister knowledge as well as the information to one of my bank accounts. However, keep in mind that you do not have the right to demand anything from me. I can make your life as painful as I desire at the drop of a hat," Precia snapped, her breath heaving. From exertion? Emotion? I couldn't tell, I wasn't in any mind to try and tell, and the communication dropped.

I didn't have the strength to get back onto my feet. I stayed splayed onto the ground, a puppet with my strings cut.

 

[V3LITHIUN]

I reallly hope you will get the chance to kill this woman. The "fate" she receives in the original timeline was too tame in my opinion.

 

[Kassogtha]

It's a shame this isn't seeing more traction, it's really good! It ought to get more interaction. Says the eternal-lurker
But seriously, well written, compelling characters taking the plot in interesting, novel directions? Sign me the hell up!

Though Precia does dearly need a smack around the head with a quickness, hopefully this incident won't sour the lovely family dynamic with Fate and Faust too much.

 

[azereath]

Nice chapter, and its good to see fate get more emotional, but what did Faust tell Fate from last chapter

 

[Allec Maddas]

It's a shame this isn't seeing more traction, it's really good! It ought to get more interaction. Says the eternal-lurker
But seriously, well written, compelling characters taking the plot in interesting, novel directions? Sign me the hell up!

Click to shrink...

I would like to second this. I don't post every offen but this is a very well written and entertaining story.

 

[WildCardFool]

Nice chapter, and its good to see fate get more emotional, but what did Faust tell Fate from last chapter

Click to shrink...

Well I'll likely be covering that exact scene later on in a flashback. That being said, it's not exactly a spoiler to tell you a factual summary of what Faust told Fate. It'll most likely enhance your experience if you don't read this spoiler, but in case you really can't stop yourself...

Spoiler

It was basically a very concrete and factual summary of Fate's conception, as it were. The truth.

Spoiler: More Detail

Precia was a researcher looking into Dimensional phenomena. There was an incident and Alicia ended up dying while Precia herself got a respiratory disease, likely tuberculosis. In Precia's mad desire to get Alicia back, she fell on Project Fate, and well, the rest is history...

 

[WildCardFool]

AN: Well here we are again. Looking like we're gonna be moving forward with an update once/week schedule. As far as the actual story goes, we're approaching canon now. Granted canon has been shot the fuck out of water by now, but you'll likely be seeing at least some familiar things as we do this. This was kind of a hard choice, given the last chapter was at 2 years before this one, but there wasn't really anything in those two years that I wanted to cover in any large detail, and I don't want to be one of those guys that just writes about literally everything just because. Anyways, yeah, look forward to the next chapter! It's another interlude lol, but will probably help shed some light on just how quickly things are going off from canon.
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Fate and I appeared scant inches above the ground. As elegant as our entrance was, we flopped bonelessly to the ground, heaving in great gulps of air. I managed to tilt my head to keep an eye on Fate. This was the first time that she had been back here at Precia's mobile hideout, the Garden of Time, since she had been teleported away into my care.

Bardiche powered down, the staff returning to its standby form as a yellow jewel embedded on Fate's glove. In the two years since I had finished making the Device, she had practically never let it out of her sight. Some might call it paranoid, but I begged to differ. My own Device, a pair of gloves that I hadn't named just yet, was always kept similarly close by.

Precia's missions had indeed been dangerous. In fact, they had continued to escalate until we got to our current state. Our last mission had culminated in us leaving amidst a flurry of sirens and magical attacks being thrown our way. We had been pissing off some people, mostly in high places, and it was coming back to bite us. Thanks to that, there was simply nowhere near the mission site that was safe enough to drop Fate off while I reported to Precia. I hadn't exactly had time to look for one either.

As we walked through the building, we began to near its core. The huge double doors leading to Precia's sanctum struck me yet again as wholly unnecessary. Nobody else came here except Fate and I, and Precia wasn't the vain type to begin with. It was probably a holdover from whatever the Garden had originally been, but its origins were still a mystery to me.

Fate was looking around with wide eyes and an open mouth. Personally, I couldn't see the appeal. The Garden of Time was enormous, and very, very empty. And it was everything you'd expect from such a place. Dimly lit, sparsely furnished, and entirely too cold. The architectural style being so Victorian didn't quite help out.

The doors swung open creakily, making plenty of squealing as I forced them open. It seemed like nobody had maintained them in a while. The smell in the room hit us like a punch to the face. It wasn't body odor or anything that was Precia's direct fault. For all of her tendency to focus on research, she still paid enough attention herself to use magic to maintain basic hygiene.

But anything else? Probably not. It was dusty, dusty, dusty. I wouldn't have been surprised at all if someone told me that this building was haunted.

"So this is where mother lives…" Fate covered her mouth and nose with her hand. "Is she taking care of herself…?"

In all likelihood… no, Precia wasn't. From what I remembered Precia had a respiratory disease, likely tuberculosis, that she had almost been killed by because she refused to get treated for it. I had seen her coughing up blood enough times to more or less corroborate that.

Before I had been cloned, I would never have wished that on anyone. Before, I would have felt concern for Precia. Before, I would have been able to assuage Fate's worries and emphasized with her.

Before.

I shrugged. "Precia is a grown woman, Fate. She knows what she's doing." For better or for worse…

"That being said, when you grow up I hope that you keep your own house cleaner than this," I laughed. It resounded throughout the empty room, quickly revealing how hollow it really was.

Almost on cue, the doors on the other end of the room squeaked open and Precia rushed into the room, clad in her purple Barrier Jacket and holding her staff.

I took out the book that she had requested, but she waved it off immediately.

"There is a shipment of Lost Logia that have been recently discovered on a frontier world. They're called 'Jewel Seeds,' and look like this," she waved her staff and created an image of a blue diamond-shaped jewel with a pulsing red center. "There are twenty one of them in total, and I have reason to believe that these are the key to completing my research. They seem to hold immense amounts of magical power, acting in a manner similar to hypothetical perpetual motion machines."

At those words Fate perked up, and I could see her restraining herself from speaking and acting up.

"I've taken it upon myself to divert their transport," Precia continued. "It's crashed on an unadministrated world, so although the Jewel Seeds have spread out, there should be no real opposition to you collecting them. You have access to whatever you may require to finish this mission. Do not disappoint me."

Precia didn't even give us time to say anything before waving her staff again. The Garden faded in a haze of blue, and when it cleared away we were in a quiet forest.

I recognized this. Jewel Seeds… an unadministrated world… This was Earth. This was where a story of meetings and bonds would begin.

My mouth shut with a click. A swarm of butterflies and other assorted creatures seemed to have swept through my head.

Earth.

I hadn't really thought about it too much recently. Part of me knew that even if I did manage to get to Earth, it wouldn't be my Earth. My friends likely wouldn't exist, my family probably wouldn't exist… but it was still Earth.

And being here brought all those memories back. My childhood, the friends that I had made… Going to school, being with my family through good and bad times… It hurt, just like it always did. But time was truly the ultimate medicine, and it didn't hurt as much as it once did. Truth be told, during these four years most of their faces had gotten blurrier than I remembered. Little features lost.

Was this person's hair black or brown? Was this guy taller than me? … This was their name, right?

And to be honest, I felt more pain over the loss of those memories now, than I did at the loss of their presence.

"Faust?" Fate pulled on my arm. "You're crying..."

I blinked and felt moisture trailing down my face. "Ah, yeah, sorry about that. Just… just some memories."

With a huff I brought my hands up to furiously rub the tears off of my face. "Right!" I clapped. "Precia seemed pretty enthusiastic, so hopefully this'll be it!"

"Mother looked like she hadn't been taking care of herself," Fate put her hands on her hips and huffed. "Hopefully after we get these Lost Logia we can go back to how things used to be."

Fate had gotten much more expressive over the years. At this point, I wouldn't hesitate to place her among the other girls her age. Which, that age being nine years old mentally, meant that she was pretty damn expressive. It suited her much more than the nigh-emotionless doll that she had come to me as.

"How things used to be?" I raised an eyebrow.

"Mn!" She nodded, a wide smile breaking out across her face. "Mother used to always smile and laugh. She wouldn't have hurt a fly!"

"Huh…" I rubbed the back of my head. To be honest… I didn't quite buy it. By all accounts she might have been a nice enough person, I guess. But she went off her rocker after Alicia died, and it didn't really seem like there was anything else to it.

It was insensitive, I know. Alicia was her daughter, her pride and joy. But… well, really? Tons of people lost loved ones every day. It wasn't pretty, it wasn't nice, but it didn't excuse Precia of going on to perform terribly inhuman cloning experiments, particularly on a random ass guy off the streets like me, and then fucking abuse a girl like Fate for not being exactly the same as Alicia.

Granted in this universe she had seen fit to shunt Fate over to me instead. But really that was just because it was easier for Precia, and neglect was abuse, right? That had been the first time Precia and Fate had seen each other since Fate had been shipped off like last week's laundry. It was literally the first time in years. And Precia hadn't seen fit to acknowledge Fate's presence with even a sideways glance.

"Maybe you can…" Fate said.

"Hm?" I turned around. Fate was poking her fingers together and looking at the ground. "Sorry Fate, I couldn't hear what you said. Could you repeat that?"

She shook her head furiously, twin tails whipping through the air. "It was nothing."

"Right… Well, let's look around and…" I looked up from Fate and trailed off. While there had been a forest in front of me, behind Fate and I was a clear view of a city skyline. "Okay, looks like there's a city right there. We'll just head on in and see what's up, I guess."

We had apparently appeared in a park, so it didn't take too long for us to start seeing people. Fate and I had applied illusion spells to change our clothing to match what was common for our age. Casual wear for her, and business casual for me. We still drew looks thanks to our ages and Fate's blonde hair and Caucasian features.

I had been pretty confident in where we were by dint of knowing that all of the Jewel Seeds were around Uminari City, Japan. But seeing all of the Asian people and the clearly Japanese writing everywhere made it pretty clear that we were in Japan.

A quick application of a translator spell, an essential tool in any travelling mage's repertoire, and I was able to figure out that we were indeed in Uminari City.

How convenient.

That being said, this was more or less the extent of what my knowledge could give us. It had been about five years now since I had began my existence. The previous me hadn't really been a hardcore Nanoha fan, and to be honeset I had never been the type to memorize things about the setting to begin with.

"Faust, what are you doing?" Fate asked me as I stood in front of a city map.

"Well by all accounts, the Lost Logia should be around this part of the country. At least, that's what we know so far," I said.

Fate had had Bardiche cast a simple mana detection spell that would give the general location of where magic is. Normally this is a pretty useless spell, meant more for practice and not having practical value thanks to its imprecision. But this was the perfect place to use it. Earth had no other mages, so the Lost Logia would be pretty much the only sources of mana. Even so, the area returned was about 50,000 square miles. Roughly a third of Japan.

"And because of that," I gestured, "we need to establish a base. You didn't think that we'd just breeze through this and collect all twenty one Jewel Seeds in a day, did you?"

"..." I stared at Fate, who stared back.

"No?" She sheepishly said. We both knew that that wasn't true.

I laughed. "Well, let's get settled in Fate. Even though your mother asked us to hurry that's no reason to be sloppy!"
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There was something to be said about the power of a routine. In the past couple of years of adventuring that Fate and I have experienced, there was so much variation that it seemed impossible to establish one.

The closest we got was the procedure of setting up a base after we got a relatively long-term mission. Set up identities, procure some of the local currency, get a place to sleep, so on, and so forth. But even this wasn't exactly a routine.

"But… why?" Fate tilted her head.

I sighed. "Fate, we've been over this. School is good for you."

"For friends?" She asked.

I nodded. Well, that was certainly part of it. Fate would never have a normal childhood, but I'd still like her to have at least a little taste of what it was like while she still could.

"But Faust," Fate said. "We'll only be here until the mission is over."

"You have a point," I shrugged. "But this is an unadministrated world. We're going to want to keep the flashy magic to a minimum during the day and around the public. And we don't even know where the Jewel Seeds are. We can't just lounge around at home when we're not looking."

"But… school is during the day."

I shrugged again. "I mean, yes, and that's why I'll be searching for Jewel Seeds at night. You, Fate, will be on-call in case one happens to surface during the day."

Fate narrowed her eyes. "You'll call me if you find one at night?"

"Well, it depends on what time at night it is, but- Ow!" Fate had stepped forward and pushed her head into my side. Not fast or hard enough to be a headbutt, but enough so that she was making her displeasure known.

I rubbed the slightly aching body part, wincing. "Alright, alright. Wow, what happened to the girl who used to hang on to my every word? Is this your rebellious phase Fate?"

She pouted and walked into her room. The door swung closed as if she slammed it, but then slowed right before actually closing fully so that it didn't make a huge bang.

It took a bit more effort than I'm exactly proud of to stifle the laugh that that got. Rebellious phase my ass. At least… so far. My mind drifted to the thought of a teenage Fate in the heights of the rebellion so typical of that age, before I shuddered and pointedly did my best not to think about that.

To help distract myself I looked around our new place. This would be, more likely than not, the last time that we could make use of Precia's resources, and we were lucky enough that she seemed to actually want the Jewel Seeds enough to give us access to said resources.

The original me had blanched at blatant shows of extravagance and luxury, but that didn't stop me from shamelessly taking advantage of the provided resources to comfortably house Fate and I. We were in one of the nicer parts of town, where most people had not only fairly large houses, but also yards and fences. Pretty affluent families were probably the major of the local demographic.

Our place was smaller, but no less comfortable. It felt… weird, being back on Earth, and it was now sinking in just how different things still were.

See, this Earth was still in the early 2000s, so technology wasn't exactly where I remembered it. It wasn't like I was unused to this. Different planets all had differing technology levels, TSAB administration or not. Even more so when you considered the frontier worlds I had spent a year heavily exploring, which could barely be considered even inhabited.

But this was Earth. An Earth that still used flip phones, bulky computers, and with a culture of widespread internet usage still largely in its infancy.

It felt weird, as alien as it did familiar. At that thought something of a burden loosened in my heart. Even if this was Earth, it wasn't… my Earth. The thought had occurred to me before, but only now was it really sinking in.

A ring of our doorbell shook me out of my thoughts. I headed over to the front door, joined by Fate who seemed to show no signs of still being even remotely upset.

"Hello?" I asked as I opened the door.

I was met by a rather large family of five. There was a moment as we paused, Fate and I taking in all five of them, with the oldest child looking to be of college age even as the youngest was a girl around Fate's age. I took a discrete look at the parents. Impressive.

Meanwhile I was pretty sure that they were eyeing Fate and myself, our ages, and making all sorts of connections.

It only took us an instant to realize the breach in manners that we were committing though.

"Hello, I'm Takamachi Shiro and this is my family," the man who I presumed the dad to be said. He was tall, with black hair and a pretty sturdy build. The guy was built. "We noticed that you moved in next door, so we thought that we would welcome you."

Shiro held out a cake with the words "Welcome" written on it in frosting.

Oh, that was pretty nice of them. It looked homemade even. The name was a bit familiar, but I thought it was because his first name was Shiro.

I accepted the cake with a bow and we continued the introductions, starting with our family. The cover story was that I was an orphan who had moved to Japan after Fate's mother had become indisposed. I was a bit worried that they would ask about my career, considering that I hadn't thought about that part yet. Thankfully Shiro and Momoko, his wife, seemed to latch on to Fate and the school that I was planning on enrolling her in instead.

"Oh my, that's the same school that Nanoha is going to! And the same grade, too!" Momoko held a hand to her cheek. "Nanoha, why don't you introduce yourself?"

Wait.

Nanoha?

Oh. Oh shit. Oh fuck. Shiro Takamachi wasn't a familiar name because of the Shiro part.

Nanoha Takamachi.

"Hello! My name is Takamachi Nanoha!" The little girl, Nanoha fucking Takamachi, approached Fate and held out a hand. "It's nice to meet you Fate!"

Well. Shit.

 

[loloudbeast]

Butterflies butterflies butterflies…

 

[azereath]

you cannot escape the friendship monster, though has Nanoha got rising heart yet? as if I remember correctly in the original fate arrived after the first few jewel seeds got activated.

 

[WildCardFool]

you cannot escape the friendship monster, though has Nanoha got rising heart yet? as if I remember correctly in the original fate arrived after the first few jewel seeds got activated.

Click to shrink...

No, this is pre-Raising Heart. Which will have even more off the tracks fun lol.

 

[Pinklestia]

No, this is pre-Raising Heart. Which will have even more off the tracks fun lol.

Click to shrink...

The Si is an idiot, isn't he?

 

[Lifeandlice]

The Si is an idiot, isn't he?

Click to shrink...

Im not sure i get where you're coming from, what makes ya say this?

 

[Pinklestia]

Im not sure i get where you're coming from, what makes ya say this?

Click to shrink...

Nanoha is very nice.

Her family may be scary ninjas but want to make her happy.

 

[azereath]

Im not sure i get where you're coming from, what makes ya say this?

Click to shrink...

Have to agree here, The SI is not an idiot, I don't think we have any kind of set dates for when the cannon Series begins so the SI wouldn't know them. Like it was explained the internet does not really exist yet, so no google maps, no entering persons name and getting their entiry personal history from Facebook. In todays world we are really spoiled with the number of ways to gather information. Short of knowning exactly how her family name is spelt, it would be difficult to even find them in the phone book, assuming Japan had the equivalent of Yellow pages at this time.

taking that fact that this is an SI that is trying to be realistic as posisble in this setting outside of plot convience, what are the odd of buying a house right next to the main character.

 

[Pinklestia]

taking that fact that this is an SI that is trying to be realistic as posisble in this setting outside of plot convience, what are the odd of buying a house right next to the main character.

Click to shrink...

He has access to two super computers that he build himself. Internet was already a thing in 1994 and there are computers databases he could hack if he wanted to.

But anyway my point on him being an idiot is getting scared of Nanoha of all people. As in a Nanoha who is not a trained mage yet.

 

[WildCardFool]

He has access to two super computers that he build himself. Internet was already a thing in 1994 and there are computers databases he could hack if he wanted to.

But anyway my point on him being an idiot is getting scared of Nanoha of all people. As in a Nanoha who is not a trained mage yet.

Click to shrink...

To clarify here, he wasn't scared of Nanoha. He was just really really shocked at what had happened. Kind of like an "Oh shit, oh fuck, what the hell is even happening."

As far as Devices go, his own isn't actually one of the higher end intelligent ones. It's functional, but that's about it. More on that when it becomes relevant (in a fight probably lol). Everything went into Bardiche, which is as high standards as it was in canon. Even so, yes, it... probably could have hacked into the internet? Not entirely sure ngl, because even as an AI it's not truly truly sentient, and it's entirely specialized on assisting Fate with magic casting. Assuming it could have... why would he? It doesn't really matter where Nanoha is, it's not like he's going to hunt her down or anything.

So yeah, hope that cleared some stuff up.

 

[WildCardFool]

AN: So yeah. Nanoha interlude! Recently I've been trying to work on the actual quality over quantity, so the next couple of chapters are probably going to be a bit shorter than y'all might be used to. Please bear with me, I have hopes that it'll improve the readability of the chapters. Also a reminder I guess that all of my chapters, Interlude or not, are from a character's point of view. They are people, they can be (and sometimes are) wrong about things or at least biased in generally untrue ways.

I bring this up because I think Nanoha's character is going to seem a little different to some people here. I drew more from her manga version than I did her anime, and well, she's still the same kind girl at heart. So... yeah. Enjoy and give any feedback on how I did.
________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Nanoha Takamachi was your average girl. She had a loving family, good friends, and did all of the normal things that girls her age did. Her grades in school were good, great even in STEM classes, and while she wasn't among the most popular kids in her year, she had yet to find anyone at school bullying her, or ever just disliking her.

In many ways, she had not just an average life, but a good life. And she was aware of this more than anyone. Nanoha knew the satisfaction of working hard to achieve your goals. Nanoha felt the warmth of the love her family had for her and the affection of her friends.

The present was fine, almost perfect even.

But Nanoha Takamachi felt like an outsider. Her parents treated each other as if they were still in the honeymoon stage of their marriage, and as much as that brought life and joy to their household, Nanoha couldn't help but feel distant from them. Her siblings were not only far older than her, but they got along well and spent nearly all of their free time together. Even more distance.

Nanoha had friends, of course, two best friends even. Arisa Bunnings and Suzuha Tsukimura. But for all of their friendship, there was still yet more distance between them. Arisa and Suzuha were both from extremely rich families. The Takamachis weren't poor, but with such a gulf in their socio-economic status, there were times where it truly felt like Arisa and Suzuha lived in a different world entirely.

Life was almost like a dream, a see-saw that swung rapidly between nearly utopian bliss, and nightmarish isolation. And Nanoha knew that she shouldn't really be taking these things so personally. No matter how bad it got, she knew that everyone was still there for her. It wasn't as if they intentionally left her behind.

But that was just it, wasn't it? Intentional or not, they had left her behind.

Average little Nanoha, the girl who kept wanting more. Average little Nanoha, who was not only lagging behind all of her loved ones, but unable to even begin keeping up.

It was a blessing and a curse to be surrounded by so many wonderful people. People that Nanoha knew would go on to do great things, either for the world at large, or just for the people fortunate enough to be touched by them. People that made Nanoha curse herself for not having such a goal, people that made Nanoha feel inadequate, insignificant…

Thankfully it wasn't usually like this. In fact, more often than not, Nanoha really did feel like the girl everyone knew her to be. Average, yes, but with a good heart, and happy to be with her loved ones. The times when she really felt down were few and far between.

Life was, for better or worse, advancing, yet remaining at the status quo all the same.

Nanoha hummed, not really paying attention as the teacher once again started talking about all of the different careers that their school subjects would help them out with. It was a talk that had always made her anxious, especially on a bad day like this one was shaping up to be, but at the moment her attention wasn't on herself.

Fate Testarossa sat by the window, to the side and in front of Nanoha herself. While everyone else had something akin to expressions of consideration, Fate wore one of apathy. Complete and total apathy.

How did someone even have that kind of expression? Even the kids that always played around look at least worried. Was… was Fate an airhead? Nanoha knew that Farin, Suzuka's personal maid, was a natural airhead.

But Fate didn't seem like it. Farin always gave off the impression that she wasn't terribly focused on anything, almost floating through life. Fate felt sharper.

As the new girl, she had been mobbed with questions.

"Where are you from?" One classmate asked.

"Why did you transfer in the middle of the year?" Said another. He was pushed out of the way but yet another classmate

These questions ranged from the mundane to the outrageous. The teacher had to eventually interrupt and calm things down. But the entire time this ruckus had been going on, Fate had been calm.

Fate answered questions one by one, and even if she couldn't quite keep up, everyone around her hung on to her every word even as they spat out more questions. Maybe sharp wasn't the best word to describe her. Unyielding? Sturdy?

Nanoha couldn't quite blame them, even as she hung back with Arisa and Suzuha, who were pitying Fate for the onslaught of attention she was under. Fate was exotic. Demeanor aside, her appearance was enough for most. Blonde hair? But Japanese good enough to pass for a native speaker? And her last name…

Even so, this wasn't why Nanoha was so fixated on Fate.

The bell rang and everyone emptied out of the room. Fate was one of the first to leave, but Nanoha and her friends were following close enough to keep her in their sight.

Most of their classmates walked home on their own. Some even took the bus, if they lived far enough.

"Fate!" A voice cried out from the school's entrance. Fate's father, a man by the name of Faust. He didn't look old enough to be her father. Father's were supposed to be mature, maybe on the taller side, like Nanoha's own father, or her friends'. Faust looked more like Nanoha's brother, Kyoya. A little older perhaps, but close enough in age for the difference to be negligible.

As soon as he appeared it seemed like Fate changed. Just like that. Her face was still as blank as ever, but she picked up her pace and spread her arms as Faust grabbed her in a one-armed hug, the other ruffling her hair. "How was school today kiddo!"

Fate mumbled something, but it must have been funny because Faust broke out in laughter.

"They get along well," Suzuha noted.

Arisa huffed, turning her nose up to the scene. "I suppose so, but you'd think that her dad could be a little quieter. There are still people in school!"

"That's true," Nanoha said. "But school is over now, and most of the clubs are sports clubs."

Around them, other groups of students were having similar conversations.

This was probably why Nanoha focused so much on Fate. As, dare she say it, stand-offish and blank as Fate was, she seemed to have a truly close connection with her dad. Nanoha had seen them when they had first met. While Faust had opened the door and was talking to Nanoha's parents, Fate herself was almost hiding behind Faust, the back of his shirt clenched in one hand. At the time it had made Nanoha stifle a smile.

Now, seeing them together like that made her feel… icky.

There was this creeping sensation inside of her chest, like something was crawling around her heart and constricting around it. Tighter, tighter, and tighter yet. Squeezing until she couldn't ignore it. Whispering in the back of her head. A snake, living alongside her heart.

Fate, a girl able to face the future without fear. Fate, a girl exotic and so clearly different from anyone else that Nanoha knew. Fate, a girl who had a close relationship with a loving father, close enough to make such a spectacle nearly every day after school.

Tighter. A stray thought popped up in Nanoha's mind, one so small and absurd she almost felt like it couldn't have been one of hers. It was strange, how she was able to breathe fine despite how tight her chest felt.

She looked over at Arisa and Suzuha, but the two had already started to talk even as they walked right next to Nanoha. Tighter.

Nanoha Takamachi was a girl who prided herself on her heart, as much as one could take pride in such a thing and remain genuine in it.

Nanoha Takamachi was a girl who had never disliked anyone, let alone hated them.

Nanoha Takamachi wasn't sure if she had room in her heart for Fate Testarossa.

 

[T. T. Circe]

Why there isn't reaction like this
Is more fitting

 

[Thalton]

...uh oh.

 

[azereath]

That feeling Nanoha is called Jealousy, you won't know hatred until you feel like your special after getting raising heart and then find out Fate is a magical girl as well

 

[KafkaExMachina]

*sigh* I'm not sure what I expected. I mean, this story was hard enough to read due to the crippling lack of agency via magically enforced slavery the SI is stuck under, but there were lighter parts to make up for it. I still had hope this wouldn't be a Cerberus Circus.

There's trope subversion, then there's character alterations that kind of ruin the point of the franchise it's in. It's cool, the best authors are masochists-by-proxy, even if there is a balancing act involved (lookin' at you, Sword of Truth series - even before it got really preachy). Personally, I find the current twist to be... distasteful.

Seriously, if you are already having problems enjoying writing the series and don't really like the MC anymore, setting things up so that they are even more hopeless and grim isn't the way to go. Magically turning Nanoha into somebody else in order to make things even more complicated wasn't, in my humble opinion, needed.

Hope spots are important, and Nanoha is a walking Hope Spot Orbital Bombardment Platform. Also, Nanoha and Fate's relationship is one of the things that prevented the Bad End - not only because Nanoha was a genuinely decent person, but also because she had agency. Something you SI is severely lacking in at the moment, and one which he is probably incapable of getting out of without some serious help or massive authorial fiat.

Making an already horrible situation worse and deciding to make the nicest artillery piece in anime into a kind of rotten and bitchy person? That's a seriously hard sell.

 

[XulaYuki]

re making pokemon moves with device be cool
Imagine Geomancy but max out all your stats
there also those Balka cartiagde device
maybe u can make extra mana storage with SCIENCE like nuclear fusion but magic