Okay everyone, this is my first fanfic, meaning you will likely find errors, spelling mistakes, large gaps between updates and other irritating details here, especially since English is my second language. This is a test, not much more.

However, I will correct any and all mistakes I find if you report them to me, preferably using the review function.

Also, I am terribly sorry about writing such a cliché story, but I always enjoyed Familiar of Zero crossovers and I have played over 600 hours of Skyrim, so at least on the Skyrim side there will probably be few lore errors.

Blimey, I almost forgot the boring disclaimers:

I do not, in any way, own Familiar of Zero/Zero no Tsukaima or The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. All credit goes to the people responsible. They are awesome and their respective creations hold a special place in my stony, cold heart.

The beginning may or may not be borrowed from a very good fanfic I read a while back; if you find out which one, honorary mention for you in the next chapter! (Or the chapter I'm writing when you discover it, you never know)

Also, in this very chapter there is an Easter egg of sorts concerning assassins named in numerals and space elves in the 41st millennium. If you find out where it is and what it's from, honorary mention to you in the chapter I'm currently writing!

Also, this is a work of freaking fiction. Don't try any act described within at home. You have been warned…

Chapter one: The Summoning

It is a well-known fact that in accordance to the most fundamental principles of geometry there must exist an infinite number of alternate universes. Just as an infinite number of two dimensional squares must be arranged together to create a single three dimensional cube it follows that all alternate universes must be arranged side by side in order to create a truly fifth dimensional object.

In one of these universes, on the planet known as Nirn, on a continent known to its habitants as Tamriel, in the province of Skyrim, the Fatherland, Keizaal, home of the Nords, a certain alchemist and farmer of a certain glowing and noisy root was currently facing down a sabre cat. The farmer in question, a Dunmer named Avrusa Sarethi, was as most farmers not a fighter nor a competent mage, but she drew the small elven dagger she kept under her dress, called upon her ancestors to protect her and charged the beast.

Said beast had already, together with its companion, slaughtered the only guard currently protecting the farm.

Though the guard was mortally wounded early on in the attack, he was a Nord and battled on with the knowledge that Sovngarde would welcome a warrior who had died whilst protecting the innocent from a fearsome beast. Thus, he had decapitated one of the sabre cats with his greatsword before slumping to the ground and leaving the mortal plane behind.

Sadly, this meant he could not help with the second cat.

Avrusa avoided the lashing claws as best she could, but the beast was close, and in a tight spot her dagger would not be of much use when she was mauled by the sabre cat.

The worst thing wasn't that it was probably going to kill her, but that it would then go after her sister, who lay with a bite wound in the left leg right behind them. Nothing that a potion wouldn't heal, but right now the potion lack was very evident.

As she contemplated this, the sabre cat charged her. Staying calm, she jumped out of the way and managed to score a shallow gash on its front left paw, sealing the fate of the cat. She always kept that blade sharp and, most importantly, very poisonous. This victory was short-lived, however, since a jolt of realisation surged through her. The blade might be poisoned, yes, but it was a slow poison, made from Imp stools and slaughterfish eggs, and it would take a minute at the very least for the poison to kill the cat when injected through such a superficial gash.

She had one thought in her head as the sabre cat turned in mid-air, something she had no idea they were able to do, landed on its four paws and growled at her.

"Azura save me."

Almost sixty meters behind her a sound, like the snap of a finger, was heard. A single crossbow bolt flew towards the beast, then the world suddenly exploded in a freezing, unnatural cold for an instant, and she was overcome with happiness. She knew only one in this area who bothered to craft those intricate bolts, and he was right on time. It had been a while since she asked for those jazbay grapes, but someone like him was probably very busy.

As the unnatural frost subsided, the sabre cat fell to its side, definitely dead, and a large amount of noise approached. Avrusa turned around to greet her saviour, having already deduced who it was.

A man, at least two meters tall if not more, clad in black armour with ominous spikes and an otherworldly red glow, and holding an equally black, spiky and glowing mace and a mismatched shield looking like a collection of discs affixed to dwemer metal, came into view as his companion followed close behind holding her thanes enhanced dwarven crossbow.

The man dropped the mace and removed his helmet, showing a ragged, Nordic face with a jaw like an anvil, a large scar across his eye, a stubby beard and short hair, red as fire.

"Avrusa, are you alright?" He said with a calm but resonating voice, like he was the only one standing in a small cave, the result of him using his Thu'um on a near daily basis.

"Yes, now that you're here. I can't imagine how things would have gone hadn't you showed up."

"Bad, probably, they usually do," The man replied remembering a certain incident early in his career involving a fellow adventurer and a badly aimed projectile. That was when he had begun taking restoration lessons. "However, I came here to deliver these to you."

The man knelt and opened his backpack, which had costed him a small house's worth of gold and a load of services to the college of Winterhold before the resident alteration teacher and the enchanting professor joined their forces and enchanted the bag to hold any item, no matter how big, as long as the weight was not too much. He then retrieved a small bag, tied together with a string attached to a label on which "Jazbay for Avrusa, 20" could be read. Giving the bag to Avrusa, he retrieved his crossbow from his follower and placed it in the backpack before closing it and standing up.

"Thank you, this will be extremely useful for the next harvest!" The alchemist was suddenly dragged back from her calculations of the probable increase in produce next harvest season by the groan of her sister, who still lay behind her. Before she could ask him, the man was already on his knees beside her, a healing spell spreading a warm glow from his hands to her sister's leg.

"There, that should do the trick. I would also suggest a potion of Cure Disease, but I know all too well how effective your potions are."

Avrusa was about to answer when a blast suddenly threw her off balance, hitting her head on part of the fence which surrounded her cabbages. The last she saw before darkness took over was a green oval, likely a portal of some kind, swallowing up the Dragonborn.

-IN ANOTHER UNIVERSE, SLIGHTLY EARLIER-

A man in his early fifties with glasses, balding brown hair and a surprising amount of muscle hidden under his mage robes was instructing his second year students how to cast a spell both simple and extremely complex; Summon Familiar. As he supported himself using his long wooden staff, Jean Colbert watched the students summon their familiars.

Nothing really surprised him except for the near unbelievable summon of a blue wind dragon, but then again miss Tabitha had always had magical power dwarfing most of her fellow students, and the salamander Kirche had summoned. He might hold a small grudge towards the girl due to her slacking off on many of his lessons, but even he couldn't deny that she too was a fire mage in her own right. He could only hope she didn't go down the path to destruction…

Ah, he had lost himself in old memories again, and so he jolted back up, trying to stay awake. He had been working through the night on his new creation, so the sleep deprivation was very much noticeable.

He raised his voice.

"Alright, has everyone successfully summoned their familiars?"

His question was met with mostly affirmative nods and murmurs, but then Kirche spoke up. "Not quite," She exclaimed with a smug look on her face, "Louise hasn't done it yet."

The student body, most carrying or standing beside an animal by this point, divided to let a small girl through. Her name was Louise, Louise Françoise Le Blanc de La Vallière. Her pink hair glistened somewhat in the sun and she wore a confident grin that didn't quite reach her eyes. However, this was not the reason the students divided so easily, or the reason they gave the girl more space than any other had got. Colbert could almost smell it in the air.

Fear.

They feared this girl, but apparently not enough to stop the chattering that rose up from the students.

He couldn't quite make out whole sentences, but he heard the words Blast radius being mentioned several times as well as Zero.

That was quite enough. He raised his staff and, out of old habits, summoned a large flame straight up into the air. The noise died out, and he nodded to the pinkette standing in the middle, one of his best students, especially in theoretical assignments.

The girl braced herself, and then started her chant. It was long, and more complicated than the modified ones usually were. He was impressed, she didn't call for anything specific like the more wisecracking students usually did, but asked for something magnificent, whatever that may be. A good tactic, and hopefully one that wouldn't end in disappointment like so many others had. Colbert knew all too well how many hardships the girl had gone through, and he'd hate to see her expelled for failing to summon anything.

The crowd tensed as the girl finished her chant, expecting a large explosion to occur, but they were not prepared for this. A blast of extreme strength shook the very academy to its core and threw back nearly everyone standing in the courtyard, except for Colbert, who cast a protective barrier between the Vallière girl and the centre of the explosion she had cast before being blown off his feet himself. Remarkable, such magical power, yet sadly so little control.

As the dust settled, the students rose once again to stare at the place where Louise had cast the summoning spell. As if for some sort of dramatic effect, the dust seemed to stay there much longer than was necessary. However, once the dust did settle a man stood there.

Many of the students were caught off guard by his extremely menacing armour, black as night and with a red, fiendish glow, as well as his height, huge bulk of muscle and the fact that the helmet looked remarkably like the beak of an eagle, just as it was about to eat the lamb it had captured…

Colbert stood in shock, thinking as quickly as he ever had long before when he was a battlemage. "That is not human, at least not entirely. A demon? Why would Miss Vallière summon something like this?" Just as he thought that, the man removed his spiked helmet. A human, definitely a human judging by the ears (and lack of demonic horns), but still. A human, summoned as a familiar? That had not happened in millennia, if ever.

However, the professor was jerked out of his thoughts as the man recognized the body language all too well. Careful, slow movements, ready to charge at a moment's notice; this was a warrior, and judging from the way he looked, an experienced one. The man scanned the surrounding area, most of the students shaking when they came under his stare. Those were the silver eyes of a predator, born to hunt.

When his gaze had met everyone, he spoke, and his speech resonated of the academy walls until it sounded like ten men speaking.

"Where am I," The man asked no one in particular and yet everyone, "And why am I here?"