Thunder and lightning. Two different words denoting the same entity. Two parts of the same phenomena, separated only by the expanse of time.
Lightning. So bright, almost blinding. Fleeting and transient yet beautiful in its own right. Often, its strike is hidden from sight, yet its flash is prominent enough to brighten every crevice of the sky.
Thunder. Bold and raucous. Thunder is malleable, starting strong, weak, or mild. It can start roaring, then ebb and wane into a rolling rumble. It can maintain its resonance or shift in intensity, frequency, or amplitude.
But, thunder is always preceded and dictated by the accompanying lightning bolts. Because they are, one in the same.
The first time it rained since they reunited after seven years, it started out as a delicate and light drizzle. Suzaku leisurely walked up to the roof to find his best friend huddled under the awning of the doorway, sleeping soundly. It was the first time Suzaku's emerald eyes softened with a foreign feeling. An affection that teetered on the edge of platonic.
Suzaku figuratively tumbled off the edge of platonic into romantic, just as the object of his affections literally tumbled off the backside of a bucking horse.
There just so happened to be a sudden downpour on the day the Equestrian Team was holding their demonstrations for the Ashford Academy student body. Milly Ashford, President of Associated Student Council, had enthusiastically and quite forcefully, offered up the ASC's vice president, (aka: Lelouch Lamperouge) as an abjectly unwilling volunteer for a few of the impromptu horse routines.
When the sudden combination of lightning and thunder striking caused the horse to throw Lelouch off, it was Suzaku who was immediately at his side, gathering his best friend up into his arms to protect and shield him.
At the nurse's station, when some love-struck Lelouch groupie mentioned that the horse was too lowly for the likes of Lelouch Lamperouge, the seed of comparison was planted in Suzaku's mind. Lightning caused the horse to kick Lelouch off. Lelouch caused the horse to kick Lelouch off (as stated by Lelouchfan#513). So, ergo, Lelouch = Lightning? It was juvenile and ill-conceived, sure. Maybe consciously, Suzaku made that silly connection so he could justify watching Lelouch's graceful majesty like a hawk during the assembly. Since the real reason he likened Lelouch to lightening was because Lelouch really was beautiful and striking… he was immensely intelligent and bright. Just like lightning.
It was raining the day he found out Lelouch was Zero. Lelouch was like lightening. He was dangerous, ominous, and fatal and innocent people needed to be protected from him.
It rained A LOT in St. Petersburg. Russia was cold. Just like Lelouch's heart. Just like Suzaku's own.
Lelouch always asked for water while in the throes of mental anguish. Even that unfortunate day they got caught in the sudden rainstorm and were both surrounded by it, fully encompassed in it, Lelouch still crawled up into the fetal position in a puddle of water, writhing and begging Suzaku for water. Suzaku watched dejected yet fully detached. He waited until Julius reestablished himself and they both strode on, the episode washed away by the rain.
Yet, it was the subsequent lightning and thunder they had experienced earlier, that served as a subconscious reminder for Suzaku. As the lingering brightness and rancorous noise faded behind the curtain of a nightmare, Suzaku bolted awake, drenched again, for the second time in the past 24-hours.
Suzaku could hear the rain from the outside of their cell. Lelouch hunched over and asked diligently for some water. Suzaku offered it, along with a futile attempt at choking Lelouch to death. Whilst slowly yet decisively tightening his hands around that pliant and supple neck, Suzaku looked into those desperate amethyst eyes, eyes that STILL somewhere deep down, trusted him, trusted him with something as precious as taking his own life. Suzaku suddenly released his grip, realizing that he just couldn't do it.
When thunder struck that day only a few minutes after Suzaku sat back down to a confused Lelouch, Suzaku recognized just how similar Zero's mannerisms were to Julius Kingsley's. They both strutted with confident purpose and launched into eloquent tirades with gaudy and hyperbolic gestures. Flashy. Like lightning.
Suzaku allowed this infantile and broken version of Lelouch his shoulder to rest on. Any more would have been wrong. No matter how much this innocent Lelouch reminded him, not of lightning, but of his childhood friend. No matter how attractive that concept was, it wasn't reality. It was a notion that Suzaku could not come to accept and it bewildered him that somewhere deep down, he wanted his lightning Lelouch back. But not Zero... never Zero.
When Suzaku struck Lelouch down at the Kururugi Shrine and stomped on his head, his mind was reeling with metaphors, none of which revolved around thunder or lightning. Only sorrow, pain, regrets, deception, and lies.
Lies often burned brighter than the truth. Yet lies were just as fleeting. Extraordinarily bright yet exceedingly transient. The lightning metaphor existed, but had not manifested itself in Suzaku's mind until he laid down that night and contemplated possibly using another extraordinarily bright, cataclysmal, and dangerous phenomenon to counter Zero, Lelouch.
Could Suzaku used FLEIJA against Lelouch? No, against Zero.
It rained the night Lelouch asked Suzaku to be his Knight of Zero. They had defeated Charles Zi Britannia, had denied Ragnarok and accepted Zero Requiem and the fight against Schneizel's world. C.C. had officially gone to find them an escape vehicle although Lelouch presumed her to be more likely on a mission to find pizza.
That was the first night Suzaku and Lelouch fucked. In that cave, with pouring pellets of rain and hail drowning out their panting and moaning. Lelouch screamed Suzaku's name at his peak as a bolt of lightning simultaneously lit them both up. Suzaku saw every detail of Lelouch's cum face and he fell madly in love with it, with Lelouch, with Lelouch's ideals, and even with his running analogy. Suzaku reached his peak just as the thunder from that same bolt of lightning started to rumble.
Suzaku finally shared his analogy with Lelouch as the raven-haired male lay entwined in Suzaku's arms.
"You know Lelouch, I've always likened you to lightning."
"Lightning?"
"Yeah, like a lightning bolt."
Lelouch instantly understood why. Not surprising in the least.
"If I'm like lightning… you, Suzaku, you're just like the accompanying thunder to my lightning bolt."
Suzaku was confused at that. Also not totally surprising.
"How do you figure that?"
"Well. People fear me now and they will fear me much, much more. My lightning strike holds all the energy necessary to destroy, to burn, to kill, obliterate. You though, you're going to use your bold voice and your booming presence to instill justice and peace in the world. You, without any means of violence, will be the resounding pillar of stability in the world."
Suzaku, still incensed about Euphy and Zero, was totally and completely focused on Zero Requiem, accepting his role valiantly without any complaints.
They worked together to bring down Schneizel, as seamlessly as two sides of the same item, concept, or ideal. As two separate and different strings woven together to make a fine garment. As separate as gold and silver melded together to make a beautiful ornament. As hydrogen and helium fusing together, bright like the sun. As light and sound, melding together to form a majestic thunderbolt.
Suzaku and Lelouch rode their horses around the newly sanctioned 'Exelica Gardens V2' as Emperor of the world and his (pronounced dead) Knight. Only two weeks remained before that fateful, fatal date.
They had seen the storm clouds on the horizon and neither had cared in the slightest. When the downpour started, they rode through it until reaching their destination. Suzaku tied both their horses up to a couple of trees and they sought shelter in the Gazebo and comfort in each other's presence.
Suzaku watched mesmerized as drop after drop of water cascaded down the raven icicles of Lelouch's hair. He drew Lelouch into his arms and looked deep into those piercing eyes just as they were lit up by a lightning bolt. Beautiful. He was so beautiful. Suzaku felt suddenly possessive, an urgent need to consume and preserve at the same time. Consume that milky flesh yet preserve its flawless pallor from blemishes… from scars… from death. Suzaku hugged Lelouch close and finally voiced what he had been dwelling on and suffering over for the past few months.
"Lelouch, I can't… I love you, you're so beautiful and perfect and you deserve to die but then… so do I… Lelouch how…h..how can thunder exist without lightning? Why would you even go against nature and separate the two?! They… we… belong together. Lightning and thunder."
Lelouch clung just as strongly to Suzaku as the latter did to him. Suzaku could feel Lelouch's smile on his neck, but even more astounding, and an indicator of how truly close they were, was how Suzaku could feel the sadness and resignation from feeling the curvature of Lelouch's lips on his neck. Then Lelouch placed kiss after kiss on the brunettes neck and all Suzaku felt was love. The love that Lelouch conveyed to him that he shared equally back. And pain. The pain that came from knowing that Suzaku was scheduled to snuff out the bearer of such emotions. Then Lelouch spoke.
"Standing up there, Suzaku… will be my final act as Emperor. It will be my final lightning strike and its brightness will permeate space and time, etching itself permanently into the minds of everyone… the dead, everyone living, those not even in existence yet. And you, you will be the stalwart reminder, using your thunderous voice and presence to radiate continuously as an eternal remnant of my lightning bolt."
Suzaku was suddenly glad that he and Lelouch were drenched beyond belief. It made those few errant tears less noticeable as they made love, again and again in the pouring rain.
On that final day, it was sunny and bright yet everyone was struck in awe by the lightning and thunder. Only a few saw and felt the rain drops... Kallen, Nunnally, and of course, half the cause of the rain itself, the remaining thunder… Suzaku*.
END.
*The other half of course was the lightning, Lelouch. And of course the tear drops were the rain and of course the actual cause of the rain/tears was the death of Lulu (half) and Suzaku's killing of Lelouch (other half). HalfSuzaku(thunder) + HalfLelouch(lightning) = Rain/Tears. Yeah. I'm weird, I like to deconstruct everything into simple equations. Like this
(Suzaku x Lelouch) + Jynova(Depressed) = SAD SAD STORY. BLAH. I'm sorry.