At Ashford Academy things had always been interesting. The school housed terrorists, world dictators, knights of the round and countless other interesting people. Yet that didn't seem to be able to dim the flame of curiosity that spread through the school like fire whenever a new student showed up.

Or maybe it was because the school had been occupied by such interesting people that the knowledge that some new, possibly even more interesting, person sparked excitement and curiosity which spread like wildfire, and the rumors which spread even faster than that.

So Kallen Kouzuki knew, the minute 18 year old Lisbeth ru Britannia introduced herself, that she was going to be another interesting person to add to the school's extensive history, and another interesting person to contribute to another interesting year. The entire classroom was shocked, even the teacher looked a little flustered, when the Third Imperial Princess of Britannia stood before them and introduced herself.

Kallen had heard stories of her, of course, though most of it was believed to be rumors spread by jealous Empresses. Her rank had initially been Fourth Imperial Princess but she moved up after the death of Euphimia, despite the fact that this was an unethical breach of tradition on Charles zi Britannia's part. There were rumors that her mother was Japanese, but most people simply regarded them as byproducts of the emperors other wives who were supposedly extremely jealous of the commoner born Kimmi ru Britannia. They had even gone as far as to claim that her real name was Kimiko but she had changed it to hide her true origin.

Lisbeth disappeared when she was seven years old, the emperor refused to believe that she was dead and wouldn't allow Carline le Britannia (the Fifth Imperial Princess) to steal Lisbeth's title, thus leaving the title of Fourth Imperial Princess open. She was rumored to be the only child the Emperor had ever loved and the one he planned to appoint ruler of Britannia after his death because he deemed Odysseus incompetent.

Kallen didn't believe this, the Britannian government would never allow a woman to rule, even by personal request of the emperor, something that irked her very much. They would probably arrange for her to be assassinated before she could sit on the throne, probably blame it on Japanese terrorists too.

When Lisbeth was five years old her mother had mysteriously been slaughtered, of course, many rumors had spread concerning Kimmi's death, one of them was that the Emperor had murdered her himself, but none of them could be proved, although Kallen suspected that no one had really tried to prove anything. Two years later Lisbeth had disappeared. It was common presumption that the two incidents were related but no one had tried proving that either.

But even after all of this Kallen had never imagined that Lisbeth ru Britannia would look anything like this.

She had waist lengtth, raven black hair which hung around her shoulders and face. She was rather tall for a girl, Kallen would give her five foot nine at least, and she had very long legs. She was thin, but curvy. Kallen could tell that she would have some trouble with the horndogs at Ashford. Her steel colored eyes made Kallen think of General Tohdoh but she didn't dwell on it, the fact that she had made the connection in the first place was absurd.

"Lizzie!" Gino surprised everyone by jumping up and yelling, grinning wildly.

Kallen jumped and gave Gino a look telling him to sit down, when he ignored her she observed Libeth's reaction. She looked completely horrified at first, along with something that Kallen couldn't quite place. But with the next blink of Kallen's eye her expression transformed completely, she smiled kindly and chuckled.

"You shouldn't be calling me that Gino" her voice was raspy and deep, like she had just come off a roller coaster or spent her entire life smoking.

"Why not? I always called you that" Gino titled his head to one side and gave her a questioningly look.

"Yes, when we were kids." she sighed.

"Everyone's a child at heart Liz"

"Yes, you of all people would believe that." the coldness in her tone contrasted the amused smile on her face.

"Mr. Weinberg please sit down. Ms. … Britannia there is an empty seat next to Ms. Statfeld-erm Kouzuki"

Lisbeth walked over to the table Kallen was seated at. She walked with a strong posture and an air of importance, though it seemed to Kallen that it was importance she would rather not be burdened with, and sat in the seat next to her with a grace only a warrior could posses.

Kallen saw a flash of silver out of the corner of her eye but when she tried to see what it was she got a cold look from Lisbeth, prompting her to stop. Kallen asserted that she was not someone to be trifled with and frankly, she didn't want to see what happened when anyone tried.

Once class was dismissed Lisbeth slung her bag over her shoulder and was out of the class so fast Kallen found herself thinking of Suzaku, the only person she had ever met who could run fast enough to dodge a bullet. Gino rushed out after her, not even bothering to pester Kallen with his declarations of love and wedding plans, which came as a relief to her, but it also left her feeling a little empty inside. Some part of her hoped that he had found a new girl to stalk but another part of her (a very very small part she would never admit to) hoped that he would be able to see that if he tried anything on Lisbeth she would probably break his nose.

In the hallways Gino was running faster than he ever had to keep up with Lisbeth, he hoped to god Kallen would never become this fast, how the hell would he be able to corner her after class then? Gino huffed and pushed himself to run faster. If she didn't have such long hair he probably would have lost her ages ago.

When she finally stopped and turned around to face him through narrowed eyes he crashed into her, failing to stop in time to prevent the collision. They both toppled to the ground, Gino falling down on top of her, leaving her trapped under him in the middle of the school grounds.

She tried to push Gino off of her but was only successful in rolling him over due to the fact that Gino was made completely of muscle and she only had the use of one hand. They laid down next to each other, panting hard and trying to regain their breath.

"Why…were you…running after me?"

"Why were you running away from me?"

"You didn't answer my question, Gino"

"You didn't answer mine, Lisbeth."

Lisbeth sighed and rolled over to face him, propping herself up on her elbow. Gino did the same and they sat there and glared at each other for a good minute before Lisbeth spoke.

"For your information I needed to get to the bathroom but thanks to you I wasn't able to"

"You're lying"

"Am not"

"Are to. If you wanted to go to the bathroom you should have just stopped, told me so, and I would have told you that the bathrooms were the exact opposite way you were going"

"I was going to the dorms, idiot"

"You're so weird. It shouldn't matter which bathroom you go to. Unless you got your period or something" Lisbeth eyed him suspiciously before sniffing and saying in a calm, cold voice Gino knew that she usually reserved for her father or people of political importance.

"I don't have to justify myself to you"

"Then don't" Gino said, standing up and dusting himself off, and holding his hand out for her.

Lisbeth eyed the hand suspiciously for a while, like she was afraid it was plotting some trap against her before she took it a whole minute and a half after it had been extended to her and got to her feet, hastily letting go of it to brush herself off and run a hand through her hair which Gino had to admit looked like a very tiring task.

"Hey, I mean, I know you really don't want to be asked this but…where'd you go? Everyone thought you were…" he seemed incapable of finishing the sentence so he made a slicing motion across his throat and then shuddered.

As far as she could remember she and Gino had always been pretty close friends, Lisbeth was an only child, and technically speaking she didn't really consider her step-siblings her real siblings, and so it was nice to have a friend close by. Gino's father was an important member of the government thus, automatically, Gino was always around the palace and he and Lisbeth had immediately become friends. When she disappeared Gino had been heartbroken.

The way the mind of a child works is strange sometimes, and at that particular time it caused Gino to believe that she had run away due to the fight they had recently before her disappearance, Gino could not, for the life of him, remember what they had been fighting about but he knew it was something major because as he was leaving she didn't give him a hug or even return the "Goodbye" he said to her in a small tiny voice. It was a drastic change from the almost in tears hugs and pleadings for him to stay that he usually received.

None of the adults really seemed to notice this, not a single one, and that really had been the turning point for him. That was when he realized that as much as he wanted to believe that both his parents loved him and each other and that they were a perfectly normal and happy when the truth of the matter was that neither of his parents ever gave the time of day for him or each other. His father was always busy with work and his mother was busy with her 'gentlemen friends' as he had learned to call them.

The only person he had confided this to was Lisbeth and her response was to say that his family was simply and plainly dysfunctional and it was a byproduct of the pressure and strain that came and accumulated with having to worry about whether or not the use of a fish fork for the salad course is appropriate because you had dropped your other fork and you knew that there would be a fish course later on in the evening, which Lisbeth deemed completely stupid and a meaningless waste of her precious cache memory which she would rather fill up with more important matters, such as whether or not the sakuradite in Japan was enough reason to bully, and possibly start a war, with the aforementioned country.

Gino, as a child, was often tormented with headaches from Lisbeth.

If only he could remember what it was they had fought about, maybe she was still holding a grudge because of it, if that was the case if he could remember what it was he would try and set things right. But no matter how hard he tried to remember what it was they argued about the answer seemed to slip away farther and farther.

Lisbeth had remained expressionless throughout his timidly asked question, even after he had mentioned her death, nothing in her face revealed what she was thinking, let alone what she was planning to say/do. It was something about her that aggravated a lot of people, especially her enemies, her flawless ability to remain calm and expressionless even during a disaster. There was only one time where he had seen her lose control and he didn't want to think about that incident, it made him shudder all over just thinking about it, although he didn't remember too much because he was only five at the time but it was gruesome enough to leave an expression.

Ever since then Lisbeth had never once lost her cool, Gino sort of understood why she acted like this, there were people who hated her everywhere. He even overheard his own mother gossiping with the rest of the empresses about the death of Lady Kimmi and the fate of Lisbeth after this, something Gino tried not to think about. There was even a point where his mother had gone as far as to warn him not to get too 'chummy' with Lisbeth, Gino ignored his mother's warnings of course.

He knew Lisbeth, and Lisbeth was no terrorist.

Then again many aspects of Lisbeth reminded him of Lelouch, he didn't know him too well but he didn't think he'd become a world dictator and be assassinated by a figurehead he himself had created and once portrayed. He remember when they were kids, Lisbeth had always said that Lelouch was her favorite younger brother, Gino always assumed that it was because he was the closest to her in age, other than Euphimia, but Lisbeth had always found Euphimia's optimism annoying. She found optimism, in general, quite annoying. She believed in realism she said. It took a while for Gino to realize that she was way too mature for her age.

Gino had never met Lelouch as a child, Lady Marianne lived in a different area of the palace than Lady Kimmi but from what Lisbeth said he assumed he would like him, but of course the Lelouch Lisbeth knew was the one before he had witnessed the death of his mother and had been exiled, thus causing him to swear to himself that he would defeat Britannia.

He wondered where Lelouch was right now, he wondered whether he was angry at himself for not fulfilling his vow.

As Gino went over this information in his head and tried once more to remember why she could be angry at him Lisbeth was doing nothing but observing him, as if trying to decide whether or not to trust him. Then she got a look on her face that she got when she was calculating stuff and was thinking very hard, a look of deep concentration which involved her eyes becoming slightly glazed over and chewing on her lower lip.

"I don't…remember" she said finally with a slump of her shoulders and a tilt of her head towards the floor, as if she was ashamed.

But as far as Gino could remember Lisbeth was almost never embarrassed, never. It was almost inhumane.

"Really?" he asked and she nodded.

"Really. I don't' remember much of anything these days, some days I can't even remember where I am when I wake up. Other days I can even remember when I was one and Cornelia dropped me on the floor in the dining room" she sighed, nothing in her voice revealed that she was lying but Lisbeth was a very good liar, Gino had learned.

Gino regarded her with curious eyes, she was still looking at the floor, and playing with one of the buttons on her shirt. She was also still chewing on her lip, something she only did when she was worried about something. He decided, for the time being, to trust her, and if anything should come up to prove that she was lying he would question her about it.

So as response to this Gino pulled her into a tight embrace. Lisbeth stood, stiff as a board, shocked by this gesture. Gino could tell it had been a while since anyone had shown her any form of affection. Gradually, Lisbeth relaxed and wrapped her arms around his waist, burying her face in his neck, she was tall enough to be able to do that.

"Thank you Gino" she said into his uniform.

"For what?" genuine surprise laced his voice.

"I don't know" it took a while for her to answer.

Gino didn't say anything else, he didn't really want or need to. They hugged each other in the middle of the school until Lisbeth pulled away and looked Gino in the eye.

"Gino. If I don't get to a bathroom soon I'm going to pee in my…"she looked down "skirt" she gave him an apologetic smile and a shrug of her shoulders.

He grinned at her and picked her up, racing towards the girl dormitories. They both probably looked quite interesting, running through the school, Gino getting envious looks and thumbs up sings from the boys and Lisbeth receiving jealous, angered looks from the girls. Once he dropped her off she ran inside, disappearing with a flash of black hair.

"I'll wait here" Gino called after her.

"Uh-huh" she yelled back.

Gino sat down on a ground, closing his eyes and resting his head on the wall behind him. He sat like that for a while before he was disturbed by a shadow engulfing him, blocking the sun from his face. Gino opened a single eye and found Kallen glaring suspiciously at him.

"Yes Miss Ace? Can I help you?"

"You seem friendly with the new girl"

"I've known her since I was kid. But don't worry, my heart beats only for you" he grinned at her and watched her roll her eyes, he even detected a possible smile but that was impossible, this was Kallen Kouzuki after all.

"Hey listen, do you think it would be possible to have Lisbeth join student council? You know there's the rule about how you have to participate in at least one club? She doesn't really believe in any organized sports and I don't really think she'd fit in anywhere else."

Doesn't believe in organized sports? Who the hell is this person? Kallen thought to herself as she heard Gino's blabbering.

"Well sure, but-"

"Great! Thanks so much Kallen!"

Kallen had been made President of the student council, she hadn't really meant for it to happen but with both Milly AND Lelouch gone, someone needed to take the role and Rivalz had graciously declined the offer, so the only one left to take the spot was Kallen, she made Rivalz the Vice President though, because he deserved that much at least.

"What are you doing here Gino?" Kallen added a sigh, even though she sort of already knew the answer.

"Waiting for Lisbeth. You should be the one to tell her about student council though, she'd probably get mad at me. She opposes any form of current government that isn't communism I think"

What the hell? Kallen blinked just as Lisbeth came barreling out of the building.

"Wrong Gino. I oppose any form of government that isn't democracy and I am against both communism and fascism, I think both have their faults, though I regard fascism more disgusting than communism. In short, I'm an anarchist. Now, tell me what?" she eyed Gino suspiciously and then gave Kallen the same courtesy.

"One of the school rules is that every student has to participate in one school club and Gino here thought it would be a good idea for you to join student council" Kallen attempted to keep her cool, like Lelouch always did, despite the fact that she was encountering the most intimidating person she had ever come across.

Lately Kallen found herself trying to be more and more like Lelouch, she admired him so much it was surprising she hadn't tried to be more like him beforehand. She was probably one of the only people, apart from the current Zero and Nunnally (who Kallen suspected of knowing the truth), who knew the extent of what he had done for the world. Thanks to him the world was a better place and although the world could never be perfect, the leaders of the world were at least attempting to make it better.

Lisbeth regarded her from head to toe and then gave her a disapproving look.

"It is okay to set other people as your personal criterions; it is not okay, however, to become a conformist as a result of it because that would make you a hypocrite. To set a criterion for yourself, especially when it's in the form of a person, does not mean you turn into that person. No, on the contrary, it means that you examine their faults and attempt to become better than them. Do you understand what I'm saying Kallen-chan?" she had rattled this all off in Japanese, though they were living in Japan, most of the students at Ashford Academy spoke English, regarding the Japanese language as one for the numbers, but now, after the war, people had started to learn the importance of one another's languages and the Britannians had began to grasp the idea of a Japanese language and culture.

What a Britannian Princess was doing speaking Japanese so well was beyond Kallen's line of imagination. And the fact that she had called her Kallen-chan completely infuriated her. Who does she think she is anyway? And why the fuck is she calling me a conformist?

Gino blinked, he knew some rudimentary Japanese, although most people had converted to English after it had been declared as the international language used for negotiations and meetings. He didn't understand most of what Lisbeth had just said but he knew by the shocked and enraged look on Kallen's face that she wasn't complimenting her hair. He laughed nervously and tried his best to repair the situation.

"You say such weird things sometimes Liz. Anyway wuddya say?"

"About?" she had gone back to English now and turned her head to give Gino a blank look, completely ignoring a fuming Kallen behind her.

"Student council"

"Oh" Lisbeth gave Kallen a quick glance, a contemplative look on her face, and seemed to muse over the subject for a while before giving her answer. "I'd be honored to be a member of student council. But this is only because I've read the brochure and the rest of the clubs seem quite ludicrous, and plainly, stupid."

"Oh, please excuse my dereliction. It was not meant to offend" she gave Kallen a knowing look before returning to Gino. "I would like to make a small request on my behalf though, if it isn't too overbearing of course. I think it would be unjust for me to join the student council without the other member's approval, I'd hate for them to think of me as bumptious."

"And if they don't approve?" Kallen asked with an arched eyebrow.

"I shan't not thrust my unwanted presence upon them, if I do that I believe the rest of the year will be quite unpleasant for both parties you see, and I quite dislike unpleasant situations" she shrugged her shoulders as if it didn't matter much to her, and Kallen never really suspect much else.

Kallen thought about this for a minute, Lisbeth obviously looked like she had much to offer, and she could probably be a great Treasurer, in replace of Rivalz who really didn't do much in the first place. She recalled the math period where she hadn't seemed to be paying any attention to the teacher's lecture but answered every single question correctly without the need to use any paper for calculation, she seemed to be doing it all in her head which was amazing in itself.

The same situation happened in every other lesson, she would draw, read Edgar Allan Poe under the table, map out blueprints for some sort of machine and still answer every single question without ever looking up from what she was doing. Kallen considered asking her how she did it but then she remembered the look she had received when she first caught a glimpse of what she now knew to be a gun.

The way she presented herself and spoke created a problem for Kallen. She reminded her too much of Lelouch and in the end, questions would be unavoidable. Not to mention that she was still quite irritated with her because of her remark earlier, even if she had apologized in her own way.

In the end Kallen decided that she would present her at the next student council and take a vote, and if she was in she was in and if she was out than she was out. Although Kallen got the feeling that Lisbeth would only make trouble if any teachers attempted to force her to enroll into any other ludicrous clubs.

Plus Gino looked so happy about the return of his friend that she couldn't bear to dampen his spirits because that was just the kind of person Gino was.

She relayed the voting plan and Lisbeth nodded in approval, a small smile appearing on her lips.

"Well you can guarantee my vote Lizzie!" Gino said enthusiastically and winked at Lisbeth, this seemed to make her go cross, though it wasn't for the reason Kallen expected it to be.

"Gino! That completely goes against the point!" she seemed horrified.

"Why?"

"You must set aside our past relationship and take this seriously for once" she scolded him "you cannot simply vote for me because I am your friend. You must have a reason to vote for me, Gino, or else this could be considered an awry election! I would even go as far as to say that the results could end up being baneful"

"Okay okay. Sheesh! I'll vote for you because you're such a nerd, sound better?" he gave her joking smile but she rolled her eyes and glared at him, before sighing.

"I suppose it's a start"