AHEM… I do not in anyway shape or form own any part of the Code Geass series.

Prologue

Standing here on the shrine-like platform within the Thought Elevator, I haven't the faintest clue what it's really name is; it is just a platform in the middle of an endless expanse of clouds with a large planet looming overhead. It has power though, more power than any man could ever dream of, locked within its vast empty space.

Before me stands Emperor Charles Zi Britannia, in a long, purple, button-up coat, and his consort, Marianne Vi Britannia, in a rather plain, light brown dress. The fools think that they can call themselves my mother and father, even after everything they did. After abandoning Nunnally and me, casting us out, denouncing us, leaving us in Japan during the invasion they planned and executed. Worst of all they feel like they could speak to him as if I was still their loving child. It had been eight long years since I've seen that man as my father, and to see my mother happy, smiling, a willing collaborator in the twisted schemes of that man makes me sick.

I am Lelouch Vi Britannia, their son by birth, but now I know how much more I truly am. I am Lelouch Lamperouge; the older brother of Nunnally and Rolo Lamperouge, Zero of the people, a Geass user, a user and betrayer of friends, a man that has forged himself in so very many mistakes. Here and now, if I can do nothing else, I will destroy them and all that they stand for.

I faintly hear someone approaching from out of the misty clouds behind me. Whirling around, I find myself facing both C.C. and Suzaku as they walk slowly towards me. The frustration and anger that had been welling up inside of me at my parents, gladly used this new outlet to vent as I spit, "So, I take it you have recovered your memories, C.C., all according to the plan?" I feel a painful pang of remorse as she uncharacteristically bows her head at my biting remark.

Charles continued his monologuing about how everything in 'The Plan' was going smoothly, while at the same time the details of the plan finally came out. I listen absentmindedly as I watch the two new arrivals intently to find out why they specifically they were there, figuring it would not be hard, I was probably the person that knows both of them best. C.C. seemed withdrawn, but unlike when she lost her memory and left me alone in this hell we had created, it was not because she was afraid but more like she was unsure of what she was doing.

Though I can clearly see the confusion on Suzaku's face, there is a spark of defiance in his eyes. I can only hope that my former friend would be willing to put aside our mutual hate for each other to stop this travesty. Neither Nunnally and Euphemia, the two people we fight for, my precious sisters, would have wanted a world like my parents dreamed of.

Suzaku's voice, full of anger and frustration. drew me from the painful memories, "What are you doing here your Majesty?"

"I am building a new world. A world that Nunnally and Euphemia would be proud of. And now that we are all assembled. we can commence. C.C. I will fulfill my part when we are done here." Charles' voice sounds like an echo as it booms out over the vacant space of C's world.

I watch as Charles lifts his hand. There on his palm was the mark of Geass like the one upon C.C. forehead, and it glowed as bright as a hadron cannon. Before I could do anything, the mark upon C.C.'s brow began to emit a glow just as powerful as the one upon Charles' palm until everything was lit with a eerie, violet glow.

As soon as my eyes began to adjust to the light, it vanished. Looking around franticly, I can see the clouds and sky around us falling like shards of glass from a shattered mirror, leaving behind a layer of gears and pistons; machines like the inside of a knightmare. I see it then, there behind my parents is a vile-looking cord going up to the planet in the sky that they call god.

I can vaguely hear Marianne whisper in an awed voice "The Sword of Akasha is slaying god…" as her husband walks forward to join his mark with C.C.'s.

I understand, it all makes sense now, they called that planet god, not for the first time, but this time put in perspective. God in C's world is the collective unconscious of mankind, and if one were to destroy that it would be the destruction of all drives, hopes and dreams of mankind. Something like that, it was pointless. To destroy hope and drive, what would that truly accomplish but to destroy the world's ability to move forward?

I hear Suzaku urgently whisper from behind me, "Lelouch what was your reason for wanting to control the world, was it truly for Nunnally sake?"

My lips quirk at the irony; what my parents wish to destroy was going to destroy them in turn. Taking one long stride forward to address the Emperor and his consort, I explain both to them and to Suzaku and C.C., "I have fought to protect everything I ever wanted to protect. Now it seems I must stand up again to protect something that this time no one else knows needs to be protected."

I smirk as Charles smiles condescendingly at me and inquires in a patronizing tone, "And that is Lelouch?"

"I reject you, and I reject everything you believe in. Why do people lie? It isn't only because they struggle against each other, it's also because there is something that their seeking. You now want a world without change. How stagnant, you could hardly call it life. The same as a world of memories, just a world that's closed and completed, that's a place I wouldn't want to live in."

As I finish speaking. I hear C.C. gasp. I can easily assume why, she herself was a creature of memories. She had long ago forgotten what it meant to feel, and only recently had she started to feel anything again. Now she realizes that this plan might strip everyone of that, even though it would grant her the death she foolishly wants. Though it is well hidden, she at least was not unfeeling enough to subject people to what she had felt.

I watch dispassionately as Marianne steps forward, and in that voice only a mother could use asks, "But Lelouch does that mean you are rejecting me?"

With a cold look I sneer at the pathetic woman that thinks she is the mother that raised me, "Do you agree with his majesty?"

I watch the woman I had once called mother as she talks on about how we all can be together again, even those that have died. I can feel my face harden as she confirms what I was most afraid of.

"As I expected you both believe that this world will be best for all but you forget that forcing your good intentions on other is no better than an evil act. Look at what you did to Nunnally and me; you abandoned your children in a foreign land." Lelouch roared.

"But we did that to protect you"

"Then why did you not call off the invasion?" I feel a jolt of pleasure as Marianne recoils as if struck, but I continue as if nothing happened, "The plan was such a priority for you both that it did not matter if we died you just said it, we all could be together again. All that is left to you is self serving excuses. You don't give a damn about anyone but yourselves and the future you want to experience!"

I glare at the monster when Charles cuts me off, "The Ragnarok connection is the future. The gentle existence Nunnally spoke of…"

Yelling to be heard over the odious man in front of me as visions of the F.R.E.J.A. destroying the Area 11 Consulate flash through my mind, "STOP IT! The world you want would only be kinder and gentler for you, the world my sister wanted was one where people were kind to strangers they had never met before."

I lean forward, hiding my face from view as Charles laughs a deep, almost evil laugh, "There is nothing you can do about it. The connection is struck. It is over."

Straightening up, I take the contact out of my eye as I glare into Charles' eyes. Charles just sneers at me, "Your Geass power has no effect on me or on anyone else here Lelouch, do not be a fool."

I smile, though I can not really put my finger on why, but I do as I reply, "Ah but there is someone else here Charles. This is C's world, and in C's world is the collective unconscious of all mankind, and as you always say not all men are created equal."

Charles pales and yells furiously, "You can not defeat god with the power of the king, boy, only the Ragnarok Connection can destroy God."

"I don't intend to destroy God. This is a request. Yes, now I know who I really am. God, Collective Unconscious! Please, don't stop the march of time! Because what I want is tomorrow." I can feel the power of geass rush through me as the birdlike symbol of geass appears in the overhead planet.

A mighty snap fills the air as the Sword of Akasha shakes violently, then a faint noise little more than a whisper on the wind seems to blow through my mind speaking in millions of different voices at once, "For the future to keep moving, we must go to the past."

And with that, all that remains in the world of C shatters like the clouds and sky earlier, leaving nothing but darkness and the sensation that I was being pulled away…

****G's G****

Looking down at the darkness. They could barely discern the spirit of Lelouch Lamperouge as it made it's way back in time as it was sent it. They knew that They had made the right decision.

Sending the young man back in time was the best option, for he was the only one that truly wished to change themselves for the better. The others present were either set in their ways and firmly believed they were in the right, or they felt despair and regret but had given up on trying to change their own paths, but this one he had a burning need to fix what he had done and what he had become that reached out to even Them.

He would stop his parents and free Them from this fear of destruction, of the destruction of human will. For while the foolish couple below did not understand; They were everyone that had died. They were every desire. They were every hope. They were the will of mankind, an entity that by its very nature had become mankind's God.

The boy would do everything he could to save Them, to do better than he had last time. They knew though that such change even when wanted would be hard for a single man; as such They had decided to send someone back with him to serve as a reminder. There were a few that wished to be sent, and They had been hard pressed to pick one.

They eventually decided the best choice, the one choice would go back remembering who they were at their death, everything after that moment until the choice offered to them to go back became apart of Them and not the youngling. The chosen would serve as a reminder to Lelouch Lamperouge of who he had become, and what exactly he stood to lose if he lost his way again.

As the second soul disappeared into the time before, They beamed brightly, knowing that if They still possessed a human form, They would be smiling at the display of loyalty their choice had shown in their determination to help Lelouch Lamperouge.

*****G'sG*****

Lelouch realized he was moving, it felt like Suzaku was dragging him down that hallway towards Charles all that time ago… He couldn't see, couldn't move, and all he could hear was a faint whispering. He strained his ears, but he could not make out any words.

Then, all of a sudden, he felt his head hit something hard, and his eyes shot open. Quickly taking in his surroundings as he tried to blink away the pain in his skull, he realized he was not even close to being in the Thought Elevator anymore. He was in a the bay of a large truck filled with machinery that looked hauntingly familiar, but he had no idea where exactly the truck was.

Trying to shake off the pounding ache in his head, he stood up to look around. He stopped short upon hearing a door slide open behind him. He quickly jumped behind a large pod-like container, rationalizing that most militaries at this point wanted him dead either for being Zero or for being Lelouch Vi Britannia.

However, the voice that reached his ears made him freeze, "Can you enter the tunnel through the Ozibo route?"

It was Kallen's voice; there was no doubt in his mind. Not only that, that exact phrase was the first thing that he ever remembered hearing her say.

Shaking off the memory how her standing up to the rest of the Black Knights for him that swam unbidden to the front of his mind, he started to wonder if this was all some elaborate dream he had been sentenced to by his parents as punishment for defying them, if he had possibly failed in stopping them. No sooner had that thought crossed his mind than he again heard the chorus of voices from the deep recesses of his mind, "For a future, we must go to the past."

It sounded absurd, even to him a man that could bend anyone to his will, but if he had truly gone back in time, the possibilities of what he could do were endless. He could save Shirley, Rolo, innocent Nunnally, sweet Euphemia…

If he really had really come back in time… Then it hit him, and he looked around the truck frantically. There was Kallen getting into her old Glasgow, but he only had eyes for the canister he was hiding behind, the canister that should be hiding a wounded and tortured C.C. inside.

It was torture as he waited, watching Kallen jump out of the back of the truck to start fighting Jeremiah and the rest of the Blood Purists. He brushed off his worry for Kallen, knowing that she had come through fine last time.

Once she had sped off in her Glasgow, he immediately leapt from his hiding spot and got to work on the capsule. He had opened it easily last time, but then again, he had not even wanted to open it last time it had just opened before him and now getting a look at the complicated control panel that had to be the controls for the pod itself he could not help the annoyance that swelled up inside of him. In a fit of indignation, he punched the control panel then watched in shock as the capsule let lose a hiss and the dome pulled back, revealing C.C..

As his witch spilled out onto the floor, everything between them flashed through his mind as he sat down and pulled her onto his lap. She had been his one and only confidant for the last few months, the one that helped him harden his heart so that he could accomplish his mission.

Then she had disappeared, lost within her own mind, and try as he might he had not been able to help her. Bitter rage had filled him at his own predicament, rage that he then unleashed on her only moments before in the thought elevator. While tenderly caressing her cheek with one hand, he used the other to undo the bonds on her arms.

Now he realized how foolish he'd been to lash out at her. He ran his fingers through her hair as he pondered all he had to lose, his friends, his family, and, worst of all, himself. If this was true, he was going to fix everything this time; he would never let himself become like his father again.

As the interior of the truck got darker, he realized that they must have started their underground driving. Last time after they crashed they had been found by Suzaku, and, though he held out hope that Suzaku had no more memory of events then Kallen did, Suzaku had been there with him in the Thought Elevator, and thus there was a possibility that he would remember and that was more of a danger.

No, there was too many things he knew now that changed the potential of every decision he made in the beginning of the Black Rebellion.

He gave C.C.'s face one last look before gently placing her on the floor of the truck. Getting up, he started to look for anything he could find, anything that would help him. He remembered that last time he took a communicator from the truck and knew that he would probably have to do that again, but for now, he was looking for anything helpful that he had missed last time.

It did not take him long to find the radio. He couldn't help but notice, however, that while there was a lot of machinery in the truck, most of it was useless, or he had no idea what it was. What he did find was a locker. Of course, it was locked because, as he thought, 'Well, what else would it be?' Scavenging through the loose machinery had earned him a quarter inch thick metal plate from what he guessed was a Burai's arm; he figured it would work fine as a crowbar.

The locker broke open in the screech of metal grinding on metal. He chided himself for both his lack of upper body strength making it take so long and for forgetting his physics. After putting all that force on the wedge, when the locker finally opened, he fell against the wall of the truck and then onto the ground with a heavy thud.

Scrambling to his feet, he listened to see if the driver noticed. When the truck kept its course and the door to the front of the truck never opened, he looked in the locker. Rather shocked at what he found, he started taking anything he thought might be useful. Neatly placed on two racks on the door were two pairs of handguns. On the shelf at the top of the locker were a few extra rounds for the handguns. Most importantly, just below the shelf was a uniform of the average Britannian soldier along with the standard field bag filled with the standard first aid supplies, a pair of frag grenades and a white smoke grenade.

Casting one look to make sure C.C. was still asleep, Lelouch shucked off his school clothes, folded them to put in the bag later, and started to dress as a Britannian Soldier while forming a plan in his mind. This was the one precise thing that was the cause of everything that had truly gone bad in Shinjuku. Suzaku. Suzaku had shown up and attacked him, stalling him until other soldiers had shown up. Those others had decided that he needed to die, and that caused even more problems. It had all culminated in the truck exploding, and he, himself, only just escaping. Suzaku has shown up in the Lancelot routed Oghi and the rest of the terrorists and almost captured him. No, he was already working out as many plans as possible for every possible situation for his encounter with Suzaku, whether his old friend remembered or not.

Putting one of the guns on his belt, he threw the other into his new bag on top of his clothes. Turning towards C.C. as he started pulling the helmet over his head, the entire truck jolted then stopped abruptly. As he flew forward, Lelouch cursed whoever let him redo this, thinking that they could have at least let him get the blasted helmet on his head first before they threw him headfirst into the ground again.

As he crashed in a heap next to C.C., he noted that one of the side doors had opened in the crash. Scooping up C.C. in his arms, he jumped out of the truck, ignoring the helmet on the truck floor, and looked around. Everything looked the same as last time, and he could not see Suzaku anywhere. Taking off in the same direction as the first time, he hoped that Suzaku was missing because he had not shown up yet, and not because he remembered everything that happened and had gone off to do something stupid like usual.