Thirty-Fourth Projection

[wontdieifkilled]

[Audio; Action for Violet City]

[Now that the weather has cleared up, Shirou is outside and laying down on the grass, near the pond on the northern edge of town. After thinking for a while, he decides to muse a bit.]

You know...I've never had a mother figure before. I don't remember my birth mother. I had a father figure and a big sister figure, but that was all I had growing up. I used to try to ignore this day when it came, because there was no point in observing it and there was no point in dwelling on it.

So to finally get one now...it's strange. It just feels different. I'm eighteen years old -- though I guess I'm still seventeen back home -- and now I have someone who I should have had all my life.

Well, better late than never, I guess.

[Video; filtered to Irisviel]

Hey, I sent you a package. Did you get it yet?

[Said package is a brand new umbrella. It's pure white, with silver trim, and it's high-quality.]

Comments

[video]

[riastrad_ridire]

[Lancer didn't say anything for a minute, leaning his head on his hand with a bored look.]

...Had one mother, two fathers, and a friend close as a brother. Of all of them, I haven't seen my mother since I was younger than you.

What's got you on a subject like that?

[video]

[wontdieifkilled]

[Shirou wonders about "two fathers." He's just assuming that he had a stepfather, though.]

Today is Mother's Day. That's why.

[video]

[riastrad_ridire]

[Yes and no. Shit was weird.]

...Okay, seriously now. Do you people just sit around throwing knives at a calendar and assigning holidays to wherever they land?

[video]

[wontdieifkilled]

...Uh. I think this one was started by an American. I know they had a big women's rights movement at the start of the last century...

[video]

[riastrad_ridire]

I don't think I'll ever get over how weird as hell the world is now.

[video]

[wontdieifkilled]

What's wrong with setting aside a day for mothers?

[video]

[riastrad_ridire]

You need a specific one?

[video]

[wontdieifkilled]

Well, it's impossible to make a mother feel beyond special year-round. People just don't have that kind of time, energy, or money. So they go above and beyond on Mother's Day.

[audio]

[hurtitselfinconfusion]

Parents and things like them are overrated.

[audio]

[wontdieifkilled]

[Uh-oh.]

What's that supposed to mean?

[video]

[riastrad_ridire]

That's weird, kid. It's like taking a day to appreciate that hey, you have a set of functioning vital organs. It's there, you know it's there, and you'd be lost without it.

[Spoken by the guy that picked a fight with someone twice his age because the guy talked shit about his mother.]

I guess I just don't get why there's a specific time to be grateful for something you should be happy to have all the time.

[audio]

[hurtitselfinconfusion]

Exactly what it sounds like!

You say you should've had a mother all your life? Ha! They're for idiots who can't take care of themselves. Useless.

[video]

[wontdieifkilled]

Well, it's not like it hurts anybody. And it makes mothers happy. So, why not?

[video]

[riastrad_ridire]

I ain't complainin', kid. It's just weird.

[audio]

[wontdieifkilled]

So what do you expect children and infants to do? Fend for themselves? That's downright unreasonable.

[Annoyance rising. This here is a daddy's boy.]

[video]

[wontdieifkilled]

I'd say it is what it is. It's not like anything will change if we wonder why.

audio;

[ex_cashcow493]

Um, Shirou, it is nice to see you speaking this way of her, but why have you made your feelings so public?

[ Saber's exhaustion might be easy to pick up on either through her voice or the fact she's clever enough to stick to the audio call. ]

You are eighteen years of age as well? I knew I was your elder, but I did not know you had become a man.

[audio]

[hurtitselfinconfusion]

[Contemplatively,] Infants... I guess they still need infants.

[Then, quickly,] But parents are useless otherwise! All adults, really. They can pretend to like you, but in the end they'll just abandon you or hurt you!

[video]

[riastrad_ridire]

[Shrug.]

So what's her name?

audio;

[wontdieifkilled]

Why not? I'm not ashamed of my feelings, and I was just sort of hoping someone could listen.

[He notices, but waits for the right time to bring it up.]

Well, uh. I was seventeen when I got here, and I've been here for well over a year.

[audio]

[wontdieifkilled]

No. You're wrong about that. I've seen otherwise with my own eyes.

[Spoken rather vehemently.]

And should you really be talking about adults like that to someone who just said he's eighteen?

[video]

[wontdieifkilled]

[Shirou looks surprised. He'd clearly expected Lancer to already know.]

Irisviel.

[audio]

[hurtitselfinconfusion]

Oh, you think so? Because I've seen otherwise with my own eyes.

[A pause.]

...What does being eighteen have to do with this?

[video]

[riastrad_ridire]

[>Lancer
>knowing things

You can only choose one, Shirou.]

...huh. Probably shoulda seen that comin'.

[audio]

[wontdieifkilled]

Then those were just bad parents, that's all. No more, no less. Good parents exist.

...Eighteen is the age of legal adulthood. Once you turn eighteen, the law stops treating you like a minor and starts treating you like an adult.