Sidestory 4
~ Takes place after Chapter 68 ~
Lelouch was going to hate him. He felt sick with the knowledge. Everything that could have gone wrong had. His only saving grace was that Euphy had managed to survive. But that was no thanks to him.
He wasn't surprised that Lelouch had assigned Suzaku and the Knight of Three to Euphy's protection. He would have done the same if he'd been Lelouch. Precious people weren't things that could be replaced. Once they were gone, they were gone for good and Euphy was Lelouch's most precious sister.
He would probably be expelled from the Royal Guard.
He felt sick. His insides were writhing uneasily as he sat staring at his feet in the sitting room outside Euphy's bedroom. It wasn't due to thoughts about his punishment that had his stomach roiling but rather due to guilt and his own sense of pure inadequacy.
Lelouch shouldn't have assigned him as a bodyguard in the first place. He didn't have any kind of experience with it and it wasn't something he'd been specially trained to do. He was a Knight and a pilot.
Even still, he could pick out all of the mistakes he'd made with ease. He should have simply grabbed Euphy and ran instead of trying to herd all five of the Ashford students out of the hotel without grabbing attention. He should have killed the terrorists in the elevator before breaking into a hotel suite on a different floor and hiding the Student Council there. It would have been easy enough to have contacted Lelouch from there using the land line.
And he should have never ever let them take Euphy from him. That had to have been the biggest mistake he'd made, but even now he wasn't sure how he could have prevented it without getting them all shot.
He glanced at the clock, grimacing when he noticed it was quarter after midnight. "Would Lelouch still be awake?" He asked Suzaku. He assumed the Knight would know, considering he lived in the prince's villa.
"Probably." Suzaku replied with a sympathetic smile.
He didn't need sympathy right now. He'd fucked up and no one was accusing him of it. Lelouch at least wouldn't forgive his incompetence. Not after they'd nearly lost Euphy.
"I'm gonna go see him." He said, pushing himself to his feet and revelling in the pain that twinged from his leg wound. It was well deserved.
"Sure." Suzaku nodded. "He'll probably be up for another hour yet."
The Knight of Three only watched him quietly as he went, though it was impossible not to catch the sympathetic wince the Round made. But judging from the conversation he'd overheard earlier between Gino and Suzaku, Gino wasn't exactly in the prince's good graces either.
He limped his way out of the vi Britannia house and walked. Princess Cornelia had bought a house that was close to Lelouch's. In fact, they were on the same street and only a few blocks away from each other.
It took him half an hour to hobble up to the gate of Lelouch's estate where he was promptly disarmed even despite being a member of Lelouch's Royal Guard. He wasn't sure if he was supposed to take that as a message, or if they did that to everyone since he'd only been here once before and that time he'd entered with Edith.
Speaking of the prince's assistant, she met him at the front door still awake alert as though it wasn't the middle of the night.
"Sir Zimmerman." She greeted. "I've alerted Lelouch of your arrival. He'll meet with you shortly. You can wait in the sitting room over here." She said, leading the way through the main floor to a small sitting room decorated with white couches and orchids.
"Was he asleep?" He asked. He'd feel even worse if he'd actually woken Lelouch up for this.
She smiled ruefully. "No. He's in his study."
He nodded and eased himself down onto the couch, feeling distinctly uncomfortable when the woman continue to hover in the doorway.
"Thank you." She said eventually. "If not for your quick thinking, we wouldn't have known about the hotel-jacking until they'd made their demands. Things could have been so much worse. And you protected Lelouch's most precious friends. I'm sure he appreciates it."
He didn't respond, instead glaring a hole through the carpet between his feet. He didn't need gratitude any more than he needed sympathy. Lelouch had set him a task and he'd failed. There wasn't a good thing about it.
Edith left and ten minutes later Lelouch came in. He pushed himself to his feet before sinking to his knee in front of the prince. Lelouch let out a heavy, annoyed sigh in response.
"What are you doing, Lukas?" Lelouch asked dryly, as though this were the most idiotic thing in the world.
"I'm waiting for my punishment, your highness." he answered, stumbling a little over how to address the prince. At the moment, he didn't feel like he had the right to address Lelouch informally.
"Euphy is safe and unharmed. My friends are safe and more or less unharmed. The rest of the hostages are safe and unharmed. What exactly do you need to be punished for?" Lelouch asked.
"I failed to prevent Euphy and your friends from going into a dangerous situation. And I was separated from Euphy. Hell, she was practically handed over to the terrorists on a silver platter. I fucked up. I failed." He insisted.
There was a long silence before Lelouch spoke. "You're actually a bit of a masochist, aren't you? I thought that might be the case back when we were both still in Basic. Do you remember that time I lost it during unarmed combat practice and you never said anything in criticism?"
He nodded. He did remember that. It was the first time Lelouch had ever genuinely attacked him. He wasn't sure what kind of mental loophole Lelouch had run himself through to get him to that point, but it had been a little scary to see normally composed Lelouch so out of control.
"You laughed it off saying that Hector used to hit you way harder." The prince continued. "That was a warning sign, wasn't it?"
He couldn't tell if Lelouch was angry with him or just annoyed.
"You won't be satisfied if I just send you back like this, will you?" Lelouch asked and finally it was a question he felt he could answer. He nodded mutely.
He wouldn'tbe satisfied if his mistakes were swept under the rug just because he was friends with Lelouch. He'd always known that he couldn't remain just Lelouch's friend forever. That there would come a point in time when the line would have to be drawn between fiend and subordinate. As a friend, Lelouch had the right to simply forgive him. But as Lelouch's subordinate, he simply couldn't. It would set a standard and make Lelouch look weak.
"Fine." Lelouch said sharply as he began unbuttoning his jacket. Even at this time of night, Lelouch was fully dressed and looked like he could step out into a press conference or an audience with the Emperor without delay. "Stand up."
He did as he was told, his leg twinging painfully as Lelouch removed his cufflinks, setting them on top of the discarded jacket before rolling up his sleeves. He didn't expect the punch Lelouch threw at his face to actually hurt much, so he was surprised when it did. Either someone had been teaching the prince, or he was genuinely angry.
"Lelouch!" A woman's voice screeched from the door as he staggered back a step from the force of the blow. He looked quickly to the door to find Lelouch's wife staring at them aghast in a white terrycloth robe. "What are you doing?"
Lelouch let out a long, slow breath as he flexed his fingers. "Abigail, this doesn't concern you. Go back upstairs." He said calmly without even looking at the woman.
"Like hell, I will." She retorted angrily. "Do you even know how much he means to Euphy? Restrain yourself for her sake at the very least."
Well, he wasn't sure exactly how much he meant to Euphy at the moment. It was easy to cling to someone when you were scared and he still vividly remembered the way she'd defied his every insistence and struggled out of his grasp. She was probably still mad at him.
"We had an agreement about you keeping out of my business, didn't we?" Lelouch asked with a frown. Whatever the agreement was that they'd come to, it was enough to shut her up.
She glared but held in the rest of her tirade. "Good night then, Lelouch. And you, Lukas."
It was strange being addressed by her. He'd never spoken to her before, though he knew that Euphy contacted her almost every day by phone. "Good night, Princess Abigail." He said, bowing politely despite the state he had to be in.
Lelouch waited for her to go before continuing. "I'll be honest with you, I'm more angry that you came here for something so ridiculous than I am about the hotel jacking. You are only one person and I've put you in charge of protecting five of the people most important to me. I understand when you're outnumbered that there's nothing you can do. Your restraint and inaction likely saved them, rather than provoking the terrorists. So I don't blame you. Now, forget about this and get the hell back to protecting my sister!"
He grimaced. "I understand. Good night, Lelouch."
It was vindication of a sort, though it still did nothing to quell the guilt burning a hole through his chest. Even if Lelouch forgave him because the odds hadn't been stacked in his favor, it didn't change the fact that he had failed. He would have to do better. From now on he would have to ensure that he never made a mistake again. If he did, he'd ask Lelouch to remove him from Euphy's guard detail. He would have to prove that he was worthy of the honor of protecting Lelouch's sister.
AN: Hope you enjoyed another snippet of sidestory. Don't forget to leave a review.