Stein's Code

Chapter One

a/n This takes place near the end of the first season of Steins Gate and near the end of the first season of Code Geass. I'm going to use the real names of products, like Dr Pepper instead of Dk Pepper, so if I cause you pain by using terms like google, well, then you're a wimp.

Martha: You step on a butterfly, you change the human race.

The Doctor: Then don't step on any butterflies. What do you have against butterflies?

"Hey, Okabe," Daru said, sitting at his computer. "What's the deal with the Butterfly Effect? Have butterflies done anything since we started sending D-mails?"

"That's just an expression for unexplained consequences of time travel," Kurisu interrupted.

"Yeah, but what does that have to do with butterflies?" he asked. "Why not just the Time Travel Effect?"

"First of all," Okabe answered, "because that name is bland and horrible. Second of all, it was based off of a poem by a famous Chinese philosopher who dreamed he was a butterfly, and when he woke up he thought he was a butterfly dreaming he was a human."

Kiresu raised an eyebrow. "And that has to do with time travel because..."

"Changing world lines can be very disorientating."

"So, basically what you're saying is that you have no idea, and Daru should just look it up."

"No, Assistant, that's not what I said at all."

"Already googled it," Daru said. "Huh. So I guess it's from a story about someone who killed a butterfly while hunting dinosaurs."

"While time traveling, I assume?" Kurisu said.

"It wasn't in Jurassic Park."

"So killing dinosaurs didn't bother anything, but killing a butterfly did?"

"Makes sense," Okabe said.

"Oh, don't pretend you know what you're talking about."

"No, really. The dinosaurs went extinct. The butterflies didn't."

Before Kurisu could respond, the door opened. "Tuturu!"

"Mayuri, you're back!" Okabe said. "Did you get the Dr Pepper?"

Mayuri smiled sheepishly. "Sorry, they were out again."

"What? Blast it all!" He pulled out his cell phone. "Hello? Yes, it's me again. Akihabara seems to be under siege. What? A world wide shortage? It's worse than I feared!"

"Yep, I guess that darn Organization is making its move," Mayuri said, setting the groceries on the coffee table. "I did find another soft drink that's the same color called Coca-Cola. I'm sure there are intelligent people who drink that, right?"

Okabe shook his head. "Mayuri, there is something you need to understand about this world. No one intelligent drinks Coca-Cola, we put Mentos in it."

She frowned. "Does that make it taste mentier?"

Okabe stared hard at her. "You're telling me you've never done the world famous Coke-Mentos experiment before?" He threw his head back and laughed. "The Dr Pepper shortage must indeed have been the choice of Steins Gate! Assistant! Fetch the Mentos!"

"First of all, I'm still not your assistant, and second of all, there is no way you're doing that in the lab."

"It's an experiment, and this is a lab. I fail to the the problem."

"It will make a mess! Do it in the sink, or better yet, go do it in the bathtub."

Daru looked up. "Could you say, 'Do it in the bathtub,' again?"

"Not a chance. Do we even have any Mentos?"

Okabe hesitated. "Daru?"

Daru shrugged. "Beats me."

Okabe sighed. "This is a sad day for science. Wait, if we send Mayuri a D-mail to an hour ago..."

"I could just get some next time I go out," Mayuri said. "It's no trouble."

"And I'd rather not mess with the timeline for something frivolous," Kurisu said.

"Frivolous? This is science, woman! Science!"

"Anyway," Kurisu said, "on an infinitely more important subject, we've been having some very mild weather recently."

"It was nice and sunny today," Mayuri agreed.

"Too sunny," Daru said. "I'm not going outside before sundown until September."

"By the way, I heard some people talking about Princess Euphemia today, Okarin," Mayuri said. "They said she's building a special neighborhood or something. It sounds really good."

Okabe rolled his eyes. "Look, you can follow Her Moe-jesty and all the other nearly benevolent dictators all you want..."

"We have other nearly benevolent dictators?" Daru asked.

"But I draw the line at believing in them."

Kurisu made a cough that sounded suspiciously like treason as she closed the window. "What sounds good about it?"

"Well, the opening ceremony is going to be at a big stadium full of people, and they're all going to be Elevens, so we could go."

Okabe sat down on the couch. Her Moe-jesty was a misnomer. The Sub Viceroy was really the Good Cop to Her Moe-jesty's Evil Sister's (Temporary Name) Bad Cop. "Oh, I just want to be friends with all of you!" she'd say, and then the Viceroy would appear looming in the background, saying, "Because you don't want to be friends with me."

Still, there were plenty of Elevens who swallowed the show, hook, line, and sinker. Mayuri had been a Euphemia fangirl ever since she knighted an Eleven, even though Sir Brownnose was really an Honorary Britannian like Kurisu. All the same, if Okabe didn't go with her, she'd just go by herself.

"Daru, hack into the royal mainframe and discern what sinister plot lies under this, so-called 'event.'"

"Or I could just google it," Daru replied. "Yeah, I'll google it."

"Fine, if you're content with the propaganda."

"Huh, okay. Tomorrow morning, ten a.m., stadium by Mount Fuji, opening of the Special Administration Zone."

"Special Administration Zone?" Okabe repeated. "Why would they call it that?"

"Because it's a zone with a special administration? I don't know. Ah, here we go. Special zone, special rights, special Olympics-wait, full citizenship rights?"

"Wait, what?" Kurisu looked at the screen over Daru's shoulder. "No way! You get equal rights with full-blooded Britannians just by living there. Okabe, if you lived there, you could go to college!"

Okabe perked up slightly. Despite the Britannians' professed love of the concept of survival of the fittest, they slanted the game in their favor every chance they got. The budget of Eleven schools was spit and buttons with fifty people to a classroom and four hour school days.

But despite it all, Okabe thrived in that environment. While few in his graduating class were much more than literate, Okabe taught himself calculus, the scientific method, relativity, quantum mechanics, chemistry, theoretical physics, everything a mad scientist might need to know. He had always assumed that higher education was forbidden to him, but now that the opportunity presented itself, did he really want to go?

"Christina."

"Not my name."

"The D-Mail and I assume the untested Time Leap function only when one of Mr. Braun's CRTs is on, correct?"

"Yes."

"And we still don't know why, correct?"

"I assume it takes the place of the lift, but honestly we still don't know why it only works when the microwave spins the wrong way. I swear, sometimes it feels like a tornado hit a junkyard and built a Knightmare."

"And who's to say that's all there is?" Okabe asked. "Perhaps the house down the street holds some key component? The time machine can therefore not be moved from the lab, and, therefore once more, neither can I."

"But can we still go see the opening?" Mayuri asked.

"Sure, why not?" he said. But with a boring name like Special Administration Zone, he doubted it would be anything more than dull.

He didn't say anything, though. Mayuri was excited, and he didn't want to ruin it for her.

WWW

a/n This is my first attempt at a crossover. I feel like I should have some Code Geass characters here, but they would just be following canon, and really, who reads fanfiction for the canon rehash? I was going to come with a better title, but then I saw how many other Code Geass Steins Gate crossovers there were.

On a more serious note, I will get the names wrong. Everyone has first names, last names, and nicknames, and I'll do my best to keep straight who uses which, but if you see any obvious errors, let me know. Also, I know that Mayuri refers to herself in the third person, but that just sounded weird in English, so I'm having her talk more like she does in the dub (which is excellent, by the way, and I usually hate dubs).

On a Code Geass note, I noticed that none of the main characters actually lived in the ghettoes, so I'm going to have to assume that they're really poor areas with lousy schools and no Dr Pepper. Or at least not a lot of it. I mean, let's not get carried away here.