A/N: Hi, it's been a reallyyyy long time since I published anything here. I started writing on this site at the start of 2017, and now it's already ending. I'm sorry for the few requests I hadn't attended to. Though I'm not quite sure if people are still reading my works here. I was very busy with life and with my studies the whole time I've been away. But here's one of my new shots at the CLuCLu couple.
The Night After the Requiem
The soft gust of October wind was sweeping the tree branches outside the lonely palace of the Britannian Empire. While the whole world was celebrating over the fact that the evil emperor is dead, his faithful subordinates took his real body to one of Britannia's secluded properties –an abandoned mansion near the West coast of Europe. At the moment, only four people were at the mentioned place: the supposed dead emperor, the grey witch, Orange, and the girl with no memories.
The place was dark and the room was only lighted by a dim candle that sways at the lulling of the wind.
"Tell me… a story," a quiet yet authoritative voice commanded C.C.
The grey witch looked at the lying form of her accomplice. His raven hair was draped in the whiteness of his pillow, black bags were found below his eyes. Unknown to the world, Lelouch's real body was sent to this abandoned mansion owned by the empire.
Despite the help of the Code, Lelouch's regeneration process was still slow given that he was stabbed repeatedly at his heart, a sensitive part of the human body, and he wasn't much of a physical person in the first place. A day or two will take before the Britannian boy will completely heal from all his injuries. Meanwhile, C.C. made a mental note to slay Suzaku the next time they meet. She didn't expect that the Eleven would be so brutal in executing the Zero Requiem.
Lelouch felt the bed at his right side move and a warm comfort laid next to him. He could barely make out the ceiling of the room. The only sense that was active of him at the moment was his sense of smell. The air smelled of honey and vanilla and the weird scent of pepperoni. He felt the warm comfort shifted beside him. A soft hand was caressing his hair, he swore he could fall asleep any moment.
"What do you want to hear?" someone asked.
"Any…thing."
"Hmm, that's quite a broad of a genre to choose from."
When he didn't reply, the lady continued.
"Many, many years ago, there was a doctor who loved a florist."
Florist…
The word made him thought of tulips, roses, and the sunny days he spent with his siblings at the palace.
C.C. saw his violet orbs moved a bit to her direction which implicated that he was listening.
"In the small town where they live, tons of flower shops were found. The people were good folks men, the ones who would beam at you when you pass by the crowded street."
Lelouch didn't believe people like that existed. Then suddenly, a quick image of a girl with really long brown curly hair flashed in his mind. But it was too fast to go away.
"The florist's shop was the smallest shop in town. Compared to the others, she sold very few species of flowers because she was the one who would grow them in her own garden. In spite of this, she sold the prettiest flowers, especially carnations, in the whole town."
Lelouch shifted a bit, facing her. This was the biggest movement he did when they arrived. His face wasn't anymore that pail. C.C. draped her arms around his neck and she could smell the lavender soap Jeremiah used to wash his master.
"The doctor loved going to the florist's shop to buy the same flower over and over again. He would always buy white carnations. In fact, he never missed a single day.
'Your lady must be the luckiest person in town,' the florist would always say.
Afraid to confess his feelings, the doctor would timidly smile at her and would take the white carnation he bought.
The doctor was only three years older than the florist. Despite her youth, the doctor always wondered at how she was already a married woman."
She felt Lelouch shifted some more and as if to tease, C.C. stopped her story for a few quiet minutes. And she heard the Britannian boy let out a groan.
So she continued.
"The first reason why the doctor would always visit the florist everyday was so that he could give her the medicines for the bruises she would always get from her husband. Despite her situation, the florist was a happy lady, and there was no single day the doctor had not pondered at how she could shine and smile like she did when her life is unlike the pretty flowers she sold.
Every day, the doctor goes to the florist's shop. And every day, the florist would offer him flowers for free in exchange for the medicines he got. The florist would say, 'Please give them to the lady you dear most.'
But the doctor was a kind man. He had not once accepted her flowers for free knowing how much they would have cost her income. Instead, he would buy a piece of carnation that he would later just hand to the little girls on the street because he had no lady to give it to.
Except from her.
The act made him happy and contented even at the help he could give least to the lady he adore most.
But one day, the doctor visited the florist's shop only to find it close for the very first time. That same day, he saw horses and chariots coming from all directions. Some families were fleeing from the town. The village, it seemed, was in hysterical panic to know that they have been afflicted by an epidemic. It did not take long before the doctor saw dead bodies on the street. Gross black marks were found in them.
As it turned out, the epidemic came from Asia and transferred to most of Europe and America through merchant ships."
C.C. shivered at remembering the sight of dead bodies lying on the street.
"It was a bloody sight of mortals."
She felt Lelouch swallowed.
"The doctor was a kind man. But when the townspeople with those gross black marks held him and asked for his help, he couldn't help but shove them away. He was afraid. He was afraid because he heard of the epidemic too. But he was more ashamed than he was afraid. When he came to his senses, the next thing he did was to run towards the direction of his beloved florist. But it was too late. He was too late. She was lying dead in front of her house, amid the flowers she grew herself, they were at full bloom. The florist was embracing a bouquet of carnations, ugly marks found in her milk white skin."
"It was… a disgusting site. Her appearance filled with black, black marks all over. Flies hovering above her head, her opened mouth. And he could just stare at her at a distance. Not even mustering the courage to pick one carnation a few feet away from him to give to her for the last and only time.
Everywhere he went, there were dead bodies, and dying people. Those who would greet him happily when he was on the crowded street of the town."
C.C. stopped for a moment and held unto him closer, trying to feel his heart. Making sure it was beating. Still beating. And in a very low voice, she continued.
"Then just like you, he met someone who gave him a curse. It was the Geass to not be afflicted by any form of illness. And for the first time, he was not afraid. He tried to help those who could still be saved. But none of them was able to survive. Men, women, little children. He saw them lying lifeless on the street. And he couldn't do anything to save them."
She felt Lelouch swallowed.
"What happened to… him afterwards?" Lelouch asked in a low voice.
C.C.'s golden orbs stared at his purple ones for a very long time as if weighing if she should give him the answer or not. For a moment, he thought that she was also trying to find the answer from him.
She stayed silent for a few quiet moment, and she tightened her hold on him as if the fabrics of Lelouch's clothes would save her from remembering something she didn't any more want to remember.
In a whisper, she said… "The Geass giver loved him. Rather too deeply. Because they were the same, because he was alone."
Nobody spoke. A quick gust of wind entered the room and the near window suddenly snapped open, and C.C. has to get up to close it. The sky was empty of stars tonight but the moon was looking big and lonely. It was shining so bright. Its faint light reveled on her green locks, trying to make them look more enchanting than they already were.
"Did he… love her too?"
She looked at his direction and he was already sitting, holding his chest a bit. Violet orbs staring right at her very soul. C.C. smiled at the sight of her banished prince.
"Who knows?"
-Fin
A/N: So, how was that? I'm not really sure about this fic. But please do leave a review. I appreciate them a loooootttt than you think.