I followed Cornelia through the halls of the palace. After the incident at the Lake Kawaguchi Hotel Resort, Cornelia had confined me to the palace. "Please Cornelia, I'm missing school, and the school festival is coming up. There are things that I have to help out with to get it organized. You have kept me here for five days now."
"You are not leaving until I say so. Besides, we have to finish the party preparations for your birthday. It is in a couple months, and you will officially be accepted in the royal family." She turned around to face me. "Unless you can give me a good reason for letting you return to school, you will not go back to school."
"What if I looked into getting my own knight?" Cornelia's face showed complete shock. "I mean, I know that I have defensive training and all but…," I trailed off.
"I never thought the day would come when you would suggest that." My elder half-sister smiled. "Very well, you can go back to school once you have a knight."
I smiled and thought for a moment before speaking again. "I already have an idea of who my knight could be."
"Oh? Really, who would that be?"
"Suzaku Kururugi," I stated flatly. I started to turn away, but then Cornelia spoke.
"Absolutely no-," however, I did not let her finish.
"He really cares about me and wants to protect me. I know that he will take important care in keeping me safe." I began to walk away from her. "I don't know if there is anyone that is more perfect for the job than him."
"We'll see."
"Come on Suzaku. Hold him down."
"Dammit Suzaku! Cut it out!"
"Milly, don't you think it would be better to have you help with getting Lelouch changed?"
"Sorry, I can't. I'm busy dealing with Annie."
"Milly, stop it! Leave me alone!" The Student Council President slipped on the Playboy style cat outfit. "Milly, I'm not wearing this."
"Stop it! I'm not kidding."
"Sorry Lelouch, but it is Madam President's orders."
"Yeah, like you're not enjoying this at all."
"Will you hold still, Annmarie," Shirley asked.
"Will you leave me alone?"
"No, like Suzaku said: Madam President's orders."
"Milly, Shirley, stop." Shirley finished drawing cat whiskers on my cheeks. Rivalz placed cat ears on Lelouch's head. The door to the club room opened and revealed Kallen.
"Good meowning," Milly said.
"Good morning… I guess."
"Kallen, come save me from Milly and Shirley." When Kallen saw how I was dressed she held a hand up to her mouth to try to hold back her laughter. I stood behind the rack of cat related apparel in a white Playboy styled leotard with a cat tail extending from the back. I had white tights and a white garter on my left leg and white gloves that went past my elbows on my arms. White cat ears were on my head, and white heels on my feet. Milly, at some point, had gotten a light pink collar with a bell on it around my neck. "Kallen, it's not funny."
"Actually it is because I know that you would never wear something like that."
"Kallen," I whined.
"What is all this, anyway?" Milly giggled.
"Well, what do ya mean? Didn't we tell you? It's our welcome party for Arthur."
"Sounds like fun," Kallen said nonchalantly, but I knew she was being sarcastic.
"Well, classes are postponed. We might as well have some fun, right?"
"I set some stuff aside for you, Kallen," Shirley said. "Take your pick." Milly was trying to get me out from behind the clothes rack Shirley indicated, but my hands firmly grasped the top bar.
"What? For me?"
"She doesn't need a costume." I peeked over the rack at Lelouch. "You're already wearing a mask, right?" Kallen glared slightly.
"You really are a riot, you know that? You oughta be on television."
"What do you think, Miss TV Star?" Rivalz held out his hand as if he was pointing a microphone at Shirley who had just walked over to help finish getting Lelouch ready.
"I thought she meant Lelouch," Suzaku said.
"Quit joking about that. The whole thing is a huge pain in the butt. We have been hounded with questions, day and night. Even in the bath; we haven't been able to leave school grounds in a week."
"At least you weren't confined to a palace by your older sister."
"So that is where you were? Look, Madam President, not that I don't feel for you guys, but why can't we leave?"
"That's the price of friendship. If I go down, then we all do."
"That's a little dark." Milly got one of my hands to let go of the rack. "Right Suzaku?"
"I'm glad." I looked at Suzaku. He appeared to be holding back tears. "That we could all be together again, you know? Like this?" Rivalz jumped over Lelouch.
"Aw, come on. We're supposed to be unwinding here." Rivalz wrapped an arm around Suzaku's neck, and the two of them toppled to the ground.
"Suzaku! Are you okay?" I finally came out from behind the clothes rack, the bell at my neck jingling from my movement.
"Finally," Milly sighed exasperatedly.
"That's what's so refreshing about Suzaku though."
"Yeah, though once in a while, you just want him to get a clue, you know?" Rivalz squished Suzaku's cheeks.
"Oh, sorry about that."
"Rivalz stop that!" I pushed him away from Suzaku.
"Hot damn…" Rivalz looked my body up and down. "Why don't you wear clothes like that more often?"
"Because, I'm already hounded by people for being a princess. I don't need to give them another reason to stare." Suzaku sat up, and I hid behind him. "I don't like feeling so revealed in front of others."
"You look sexy like that though."
"I don't care." Suzaku turned his head to try and see me.
"Annmarie," he whispered. I leaned my head over his shoulder a bit. "You are sexy in that." I hit Suzaku's arm. He laughed. "Well, you are."
"I expected to hear something like that from Milly or Rivalz, but I didn't think I would hear you say it."
"Do you not like me saying it?" The blush, I'm sure I already had, grew darker. I hid my face in Suzaku's shoulder. He laughed again. In the time that Suzaku and I had been talking, Milly, Shirley, and Rivalz had gotten Lelouch changed completely.
"Let's get this party started," Milly shouted. "Hit it, Nina." Nina pushed a button on the stereo next to her computer and music started to play. I walked over to the corner of the room where the cat jungle gym we had spent the week before last building was located. Suzaku followed me over.
"What's wrong?" I looked at Suzaku and shook my head.
"Milly just gets on my nerves sometimes."
"I take offense to that," Milly piped up from across the room. I stuck my tongue out at her, and she did the same. Everyone around us laughed. Arthur tapped me with a paw. He looked up at me. I picked him up and scratched behind his ears, and he purred. I leaned my head on Suzaku's shoulder. Suzaku leaned his head on mine. I smiled but then heard him grimace.
"Arthur…" I shooed the cat away. "Why does he bite only me?"
"He bit you once before and acquired a taste for your flesh." Suzaku got up from my shoulder and looked at me. I did the same to look at him. Arthur jumped out of my arms.
"That's disturbing."
"But you love me anyway." He rolled his eyes. I smiled. Suzaku placed both of his forearms on the wall behind me respectively on each side. He leaned forward and kissed me. I placed my hands on his cheeks. Suzaku licked my lips, asking for entrance. However, I didn't let him and broke the kiss.
"Annmarie…" I shook my head.
"Not now, Suza-" He took the chance I hadn't meant to give him. He stuck his tongue in my mouth as he recaptured my lips.
"Looks like we have a pair of kitties that are in heat."
"Milly, shut up!" I glared at the blonde.
"Then, don't have public displays of affection."
"If it bothers you, then don't look." I grabbed Suzaku's hand, and we went into the hall.
"Why'd we come out here?"
"Do you wanna keep kissing or not?" Suzaku smiled and nodded just before he kissed me again.
"Thanks for coming with me, Annmarie."
"It's no problem. I knew the way, and I was gonna be coming over today anyway."
"But won't Suzaku be mad?"
"No, he's busy today with work."
"Oh, I see," Milly said. She knocked on the door in front of us. The door opened to reveal a woman with brown hair tied back in a ponytail with maid's clothes on.
"Princess… Annmarie," she said when she saw that there was someone else with me. I had told her before to not use my Japanese name since the woman was Japanese. She was Kallen's birth mother. "And who is this?"
"My name is Milly Ashford. I'm the Student Council President at Ashford Academy. Is Kallen here?"
"Yes, one moment." Kallen's mom turned around. "Mistress Kallen. Mistress Kallen," she called.
"Madam President," Kallen said as she came down the stairs. "Annmarie?"
"I just dropped by to give you something."
"Huh?"
"Where shall I show them to? The parlor?"
"We'll be in my room," Kallen said harshly.
"As you wish."
"Oh, I heard you had a friend down here." I brought my gaze to further up the staircase and narrowed my eyes at who I saw. "I was sure it would be a boy, out all night and missing school. Not to mention all your visits to the ghetto. You are lucky your father is back in the homeland. No fighting one's blood, is there?"
"You're the one enjoying dad not being around here, aren't you," Kallen shouted back at her stepmother. Everyone turned towards Kallen's real mother when we heard something crash to the floor. A now broken vase was scattered on the tiles with water and flowers spread throughout the mess.
"Oh dear, what have I done?"
"What's wrong with you?"
"Forgive me, milady. Forgive me."
"Can't you do anything right? Besides selling your body, that is."
"Leave her alone!" Kallen's step mother looked to me. "You have no right to speak to her that way."
"Nor do you have the right to speak to me that way."
"I have a higher status than you ever will."
"Only through adoption, Princess Eleven."
"Stop calling her that."
"Tch, you all aren't even worth my time."
"Bitch," I muttered under my breath.
"Milly, Annmarie, come on." We followed Kallen up to her room. When we got inside, Kallen said, "Annmarie, are you okay?"
"I'm fine," I said as my throat tightened.
"No, you're not." Tears fell from my eyes. "I know you hate being called that." Kallen gestured to the table to the right side of the room. Before Kallen sat down, she went to the far corner of the room and grabbed a stuffed rabbit. She handed it to me. I grabbed it and wrapped my arms around it tightly. I sat down next to Milly.
"You have a stuffed animal, Kallen?"
"No, it's hers. She just keeps it over here because she comes over a lot."
"I see… Quite the complicated home life you have, isn't it?"
"So what was it you wanted to give me," Kallen asked.
"My grandfather asked me to pass this on."
"You mean the principal?"
"Yeah," Milly answered, placing a blue envelope on the table. "Your transcript since middle school; I figured I better give them to you off of school grounds."
"So my secret's out then, isn't it? That I'm actually an Eleven and Britannian half-breed… That was my step mother down there, the one that called Annmarie…" Kallen saw me biting the tip of my thumb. "Annmarie stop before you hurt yourself."
"Oh, sorry," I said after I moved my hand away. "I didn't notice I was doing that."
"Then your real mom…"
"My real mother was that klutz of a maid that knocked over the vase."
"And your father, is he the head of the Stadtfeld family?"
"My mother is such a fool. In the end, she wound up a servant. She doesn't have any real skills, and no matter who is ridiculing her, she could just laugh like it's nothing. She didn't have to choose to stay in this house, you know? She's just clinging to some old lover who's jilted her."
"You really hate your mother don't you?"
"I don't. I just find her depressing."
"Well, this is getting a little heavy. Imagine the wife and the daughter and the other woman all living together."
"It could be worse. Three squares meals and a roof, right? I mean, it's not unbearable, most of the time anyway."
"That's good. Still, some things in life we can bear on our own, but when you add them all up, they eventually break you. Oh, don't worry. I won't lie. I'm always hungry for secrets, but I would never talk about this."
"I still can't believe you teared up, Suzaku. So embarrassing."
"It's called honesty. Agh!" Suzaku was bitten by Arthur. I lightly hit the top of the cat's head until he let go of Suzaku's hand.
"Besides, guys who are more sensitive than ones that are rude like you are, Lelouch, are better."
"Whatever you say, Annmarie. You're lucky the Black Knights were there to save you. Otherwise, you wouldn't be here right now. That's all I can say."
"If they wanted to catch criminals, they could've just joined the police force, you know? Why don't they, I wonder…"
"They probably don't think the cops are up to the job. I tend to agree."
"The police may not be that affective right now, but they could evoke change from within."
"Yeah, but in the process, they get all tangled up in red tape and bureaucracy."
"If they had done everything in their power to change things, that might hold water. As long as they don't, it's just self-righteous posturing."
"Self-righteous posturing?"
"And what constitutes evil in their eyes? What standards are they using? It's nothing but self-satisfied gratification."
"You still can't deny they got Annmarie back to you." Suzaku gasped slightly. The door slid open, and Shirley walked in.
"Oh, it's just you three in here."
"Anyway, I guess I gotta go back to the base pretty soon. See you around, Shirley. Come on, Annmarie. I should get you home as well." Suzaku winked at Shirley.
"Later," Shirley said. As Suzaku and I walked down the hall, I said:
"Are you trying to give Shirley a chance to ask Lelouch out?"
"Yeah." I sighed. "Was that bad?"
"Do you really think Lelouch is the kind of person to date someone?"
"He isn't?"
"Not really. He has Nunnally to worry about."
"But Sayoko could watch her if he went out for a couple hours on a date. Besides, I bet Nunnally would be happy if he were to date someone, especially if it was Shirley." I rolled my eyes.
"Okay," I sighed.