Well, this little entry came out of left field, if only because I got a little inspiration and pondered on it for a bit. I had a few ways to approach this little yarn continuation and I'm sure someone else could do a better job. But until then, this will have to do.
And like previous iterations of the Post-Zero-Requiem-Timetravel fics, this one has that particular ability as well. But, like before, it's not as perfect a solution as is in those stories. In fact, its best avoided all together. You'll find out soon enough ;)
As for those who actually left a review for the last chapter.
Shiranai Atsune – As much as the idea sounds attractive, I'm afraid that I'm too committed with my other fanfiction projects to give this little plot bunny its time of day. Maybe once I finish with them, I can go back to this tale. But even then, I might not give this story justice.
Shiun'in Ventus – Yeah, such tales are a bit of a rarity. Ultra-rare to be precise. Heck, the only other story that has Nunnally as the lead is AkumaKami64's yarn that I mentioned in that PM. Hopefully aspiring Code Geass authors could take that as inspiration and do their own spin on it.
Alrighty then, before we get started, let's make sure that my buttocks' legally protected.
Disclaimer: Code Geass: Lelouch of the Revolution as an intellectual property is owned by Gorō Taniguchi, Ichirō Ōkouchi, and Sunrise. I have no claim to any portion of the franchise as my own and simply ask fellow readers to support the official release of the media whenever possible.
Move Two: The ApocalypseIt was the last day of vi Britannia residency of Ares villa. The following morning, Nunnally would be exiled to Japan along with her beloved elder brother as political hostage, as a sign of good will in the Sakuradite Talks in addition to the otherwise neutral nation's part in the Oriental Incident. It would have been so easy for the young girl to convince her brother away from the path that would ultimately produce the Zero Requiem, but the words spoken by Daehoth held too much weight to even consider the possibility.
'IS BUT A FEW, SCANT YEARS WORTH THE COST TO FORSAKE A LIFETIME? A TRUE LIFETIME, CHILD?'
It was just too tempting of a proposition to allow her brother to take up the mantle of rebellion as Zero; if it meant that they would actually live together as brother and sister and not what ultimately resulted from the Zero Requiem. Better yet, with whatever alien powers she had gained, Nunnally might be able to actually help Lelouch in his rebellion against their father and their corrupted Britannia. He may not like it, but in the form of his little full blooded sister Lelouch had gained a trump card that would turn the tide in the rebellion before it even began, far greater than Geass would have given and it would be a position Nunnally will assume no matter his reservations against such an idea.
Yet such thoughts of the supernatural will have to wait for another day in the still distant future, for there is another issue that stood before her. Or rather, said issue knelt before her as Jerimiah Gottwald had offered a proposition that had never occurred before in the previous timeline. Normally, such pledges of loyalty as a knight to any noble house would be pledged to the head of such a house, which in turn would be Lelouch even at a tender age of ten. But why come to her for such a pledge of loyalty? Was it so that she could convince her brother to accept Jerimiah's oath after it was initially refused? Could this have happened naturally if she had not lost both her legs and sight in the original timeline? Or was it the ripples of distortion of the simple matter of time travel that caused this deviation?
Whatever the cause, the effect was clearly and figuratively before Nunnally. Yet, she stood indecisive as she pondered the consequences of such a choice. True, having Jerimiah Gottwald an ally would be a natural boon, but what would replace him in the eventual Purist Faction of what would ultimately become Area 11 in this timeline? Would it be someone of equal skill in the same fields that he excelled at, or better and become an even more troublesome obstacle for Lelouch so many years hence?
It was a burden that someone of Nunnally's age before the venture into the past, let alone one that barely saw their seventh year of life. If only she knew what the right choice was.
'TIS WISE TO GATHER MANY AN ADVANTAGE PRESENTED BEFORE THEE FOR THE WAR TO COME, CHILD.' A familiar, divinely alien voice thundered within their skulls. Nunnally searched the room for where the daemonic god had appeared, only to find the armored elderich divinity to stand against a wall that she had previously glanced past but a moment ago.
"Your Highness!" Jerimiah quickly rose to his feet, his hands moments away from his personal sidearm drawn from its holster, when suddenly he found that he could not move. No matter how much he struggled mentally, his body refused to move as if he had no control.
'HOLD THY PISTOL, BOY.' Daehoth commanded. 'I SEEKETH NARY A HARM UPON THE CHILD.' It then turned its attention towards Nunnally.
"Why are you here Daehoth?" Nunnally demanded in such a regal tone that Jerimiah found alien upon a child so young. "Why here? Why now?"
'I COME AND TAKE MY LEAVE AS I NEED, AS I PLEASE, CHILD.' Daehoth answered. 'IF THY WISHETH A CAUSE, TIS BE THAT I HAVE COMETH BEFORE THEE WITH AN APOCALYPSE UPON THINE VENTURE.'
"Apocalypse…?" Nunnally was confused from the words that Daehoth had used.
'AYE, CHILD. THINE MUSTETH BE FAMILIAR WITH THINE SCIENCES' LAWS OF CAUSALITY.' Daehoth answered. 'THAT TIME SHALT ENDEVOUR TO PRESERVE THE EVENTS THAT TRANSPIRE EVEN NOW, TO PRESERVE THE ORDER OF EVENTS BUT A SCANT FEW MONTHS, SEVEN YEARS, EIGHT YEARS HENCE. ALL I HATH DONE UPON THIS CONTINUUM IS THE PRESERVATION OF THINE OWN ABILITIES OF BINOCULAR SIGHT AND BIPEDAL MOBILITY AND THE RIPPLES OF DISTORTION THAT RESONATE THEREIN.'
It took only a moment for Nunnally to ponder and understood the gravity of Daehoth's words before she spoke. "T-Then what is the meaning of my traveling to the past?!"
Such a revelation did not escape Jerimiah's ears, even if he was helpless to perform an action due to whatever Daehoth had done to his body.
A hearty, devilishly divine chortle resonated within their mortal minds as the source of the laugh, Daehoth, countered. 'THY MUSTETH BE STEEL OF WILL TO OVERCOME CAUSALITY, CHILD! UTILIZE THINE SHARPNESS OF MIND AND RIGITITY OF SOUL TO BEND CAUSALITY UNTO THINE OWN DESIRES, CHILD!'
And that was the unspoken challenge, Nunnally realized, that Daehoth neglected to mentioned when she took the deal. Although she was sent into the past with sight and legs restored, of memories to future events still fresh in her mind in order to prevent the Zero Requiem, time will still conspire against her soulful desires to save her brother. If she was not careful in how she acted, time will continue as it had in the original timeline to its penultimate tragedy.
'WITH APOCALYPSE IN MIND, CHILD, THINE KNOWETH THE ANSWER.' Daehoth made but a simple gesture to return true motor control unto Jerimiah. 'THE FIRST STEP.'
"But how-" Suddenly, Nunnally had pulsed for lack of a more appropriate mortal word. In that moment, she knew what to do to wrestle the timeline away from the Zero Requiem, and in effect the revelation of her first ability. She knew what to do, but the consequences of her new ability caused her to pause as she went before Jerimiah.
"Y-Your Highness, what do you speak-" Nunnally hushed him before Jerimiah could utter any more.
"All will be revealed soon, but first I want you to answer honestly." Nunnally then inquired. "If you knew that your pledge of loyalty to vi Britannia will cause you to not only lose your nobility and prestige, but to revolt against everything you hold dear and close to your heart, to gain a new strength at the cost of terrible and unimaginable pain, will you still….consent?"
Almost without hesitation, Jerimiah answered. "Yes! To redeem myself and to honor your late honorable mother, I will consent no matter the cost!"
"Even if it means your very humanity?" Nunnally cautioned.
"Of little consequence, your highness!" The young princess found Jerimiah's stubborn wiliness unsettling. Still, he would find out the true gravity of his choice soon enough.
"Then Jerimiah Gottwald, Nunnally vi Britannia commands you to RECALL." The moment the order passed Nunnally's lips, foreign memories flooded Jerimiah's mind as the two iterations of the same person of past and future, original timeline and altered, merged as a single individual.
Barely an eyeblink later, Jerimiah Gottwald recalled everything from the Second Pacific War and the creation of Area 11, the Shinjuku Massacre, the debut of both Zero and the Order of the Black Knights, the Black Rebellion, the rise of the United Federation of Nations and ultimately the Zero Requiem. His eyes then fell upon Daehoth. "Your Majesty, what is that thing-"
Then, it has begun. As Jerimiah pulsed, he collapsed to the ground. A burning pain enveloped his body as if it were drenched in the fires of the inferno itself, his lungs struggled to recover a breath that was long lost. The terrible pain of his own body ripping itself apart, replacing his biological organs with the synthetic and expelled them from his body as little more than viscera, blood and gore as they ripped through his very skin. It took all the willpower Jerimiah had gained from years of military service not to howl in inhuman anguish as his cybernetic eye, the eye that held the Geass Canceller, pushed his natural born left eye from its socket in macabre protest. The armored eyepatch on which protected the eye ripped through bone, skin, and flesh as it grew not unlike a macabre weed. Blood and bile flowed from his lips as if he suffered the torturous death of conscious vivisection at the hands of an unseen, supernatural and malevolent force that fed upon his deformed anquish.
Nunnally tried to hold a brave face against what Jerimiah now suffered. She knew that the unnatural ability of Recall not only merges the minds, the memories of those of the original timeline to the altered, but also puts them at their peak physical condition to best utilize those memories. Even if such abilities were synthetic for augmentation, they were still regained in the most brutish of supernatural manners.
Yet even she had a limit when she turned her tear-drenched eyes towards Daehoth. "Please! You must be able to-"
"D-do-o-o-on't! Y-yo-o-o-our Ma-a-a-a-a-jesty-y-y-y-y!" Jerimiah protested in a sharp hiss, even as the bones in his fingers were replaced with Sakuradite-enriched digits, the skin of his hand and palms ripped open to expel the now useless body parts. "I….I-I-I-I-I mu-u-u-u-u-u-ust!"
Nunnally could do no more than wait for the process to conclude and ponder as to why the physical could not be as rapid as the mental. The logical side of her, however, regretfully argued that a quicker process would more than likely kill him.
An eternity later, Jerimiah was now his augmented, cyborg self as he picked himself up upon unsure legs of a body that was both familiar and alien, breathing an air that was too thin to keep him sane of the trauma experienced. Surrounded by the horrific pool of blood and viscera of the transformation no less as such tissue and organs slowly died from mere exposure alone. A macabre symbolism of an abandonment, a loss of humanity.
'GIRD THYSELF, CHILD.' Daehoth advised Nunnally. 'GREATER AND TERRIBLE CHOICES ART BEFORE THEE. EACH MORE PAINFUL THAN LAST.'
"Must it always be this painful?"
'TREASURES OF THE EARTH AND THE MIND ART WORTH THE SWEAT UPON THY BROW, THE BLOOD FROM THY WOUNDS, CHILD. FOR THINE ART THE FRUITS OF LABOR AND THE VICTORY BROUGHT ALL THE SWEET AS MILK AND HONEY.'
Jerimiah then knelt before Nunnally, though not without an uncomfortable grunt as a sign of still immature familiarity with a body both familiar yet new. "Allow me to bear the burden, your majesty. As proof of my loyalty to you and your brother."
It was then that Nunnally decided that she would never again use her Recall upon her friends, allies, and loved ones ever again. The horror that they had to experience for her sake was too much for the young girl to bear.
Instead, it will be reserved for those who would stand against her brother, her enemies. Enemies that she was sure would die horrifically when used. And she would not have wanted it any other way.
Wow…..that got dark quick…. Real quick. Well, if that wikia entry is correct, it's pretty much par the course. And a quick shout-out to SiliconOverlord27 for bringing light to it in Chapter 9 of the fanfic "Like A Wish" ( s/11864574/9/Like-A-Wish ) that arguably gave rise to the above chapter.
Anyway, isn't Daehoth's version of the "future memory inside past self" Geass power rather squick and terrible? It's almost Cenobite worthy if Orange's own ordeal is evidence. Meaning that older Code Geass characters who find themselves in their past lives would be a hyper rarity, if ever, so Nunnally has precious few allies she can console and conspire with to counter the Zero Requiem. Certainly a rock and a hard place if one thought about it.
Though, with the memories Daehoth gave her, it's probably something Ohgi might find himself on the receiving end if he's not careful.
And yes, I kinda cheated a bit with the whole causality thing since it gives an author an excuse to use the same scenarios as with the canon series to alter so as to not go heavy into the alternative "what if" thoughts that would keep historians up at night. A bit lazy, but I'm sure a good author would be able to work out some good dramatic tension then "though they may have avoided their canon tragedy/death, it doesn't meant that it wouldn't happen down the road" that would realistically make Nunnally a paranoid wreck.
Still, it'll be a while, if ever, when I add in new content for this particular story idea. I'm sure some of you will have an idea of what to do in the meantime *hint, hint*.