[yeah. looking to the bottle again]

... it's more than enough, considering we're practically strangers.

Passing, even.

[. . . why'd you have to take my cigarette.]

... fair enough.

[hm... considering the alcohol again.

has he been drinking too frequently lately?

... pretty often anyway.





it's been really crappy lately.]

There's also currently a younger version of Archer--Shirou from another timeline in which I was killed and he ended up in the care of the person who murdered me on my couch, injured. It's been a difficult situation.

[which I should probably stay sober for...]

And there are still people who would say that killing him would be the better option. Especially since he could be volatile since being told that what he knew for the past nine years to be a lie...

[hence the no sleeping.

... actually, no.

digging for his pack again.]

Kotomine Kirei was a dangerous, sadistic man. And that is the man this Shirou was raised by after a traumatizing murder of the person who took him in after and already traumatizing event a year prior.

He's not stable in the least, and thus people in my world view him as a threat to the people, but more closely, to me.

[lighting up a THIRD cigarette, speaking mechanically and shortly]

... he shot a bullet from a gun that once belonged to me at Tohsaka Rin, a girl from another timeline of my world. That bullet could have been one to severely injure or even kill a magus using all of their power. Thankfully, the bullet missed.

Beyond this, Matou Byakuya, from the same timeline as this Shirou, is most familiar with him and could probably explain what he is capable of. For me... anyone with the surname Kotomine is someone that cannot be allowed to act independently. Even if he were once Emiya... or maybe even moreso for that.

For now, the situation's manageable.

If he proves to be more of a danger...

[trailing... off.

but less from not wanting to say it and more because it's been said too often, he's too familiar with the concept of having to kill family for the Greater Good.]

. . . as I said before. That has always been the case.

[loser Kiritsugu loses everything and no one is surprised]