Rebirth of a Nation

by Knightmare Frame Razgriz

"We're surrounded. Outnumbered, outgunned, and more than likely gonna die before the night is out. But even if they are a mighty empire - there's a hundred thousand of them, and millions of us. This is our land, the land of our ancestors; so let's show them the indomitable spirit of the Japanese!" Completed as of 8/20/12.

11. Act 3 Pt 2

Part 2 – "How did we get stuck with a couple dozen Titanics?"

December 3rd, 2017 ATB
0500 hours
Kadena Airbase, Okinawa

The base was once more alive with bustling troops, but unlike every other day, everyone was focused on a single task: preparing Second Prince Schneizel's aerial battleship, the HMS Avalon, for travel and combat.

Kanon was addressing the shipboard garrison, a full company of a hundred and twenty men.

"With the full force of the Japanese blockade facing us, combined with the unprecedented accuracy of the enemy intelligence as of late, we will undoubtedly be facing heavy resistance," the young man spoke grimly. "Now, before anything is said, the JSDF and the BPG are renowned for their ingenuity in warfare; they will undoubtedly attempt to board this ship, with an indeterminate chance of success. Despite any preconceived notions, we must all be prepared to repel boarders – regardless of the risk or lack thereof."

A private in the back raised his hand. "Sir, who of the enemy would even be capable of boarding a ship like this? I've never heard of a unit of the Japanese military with any kind of specialization like that."

"Glad you asked, Private," Kanon answered, tapping a holo-screen behind him. An emblem appeared on the screen – a bat with its wings spread, clutching a hissing snake. "The Special Boarding Unit of the Maritime Self-Defense Force, roughly equivalent to our Navy SEALs. As their name implies, the SBU is tasked with the interdiction and suppression of vessels which are deemed illegal, or the in the case of warfare, hostile. They usually operate and are inserted via Rigid-Hulled Inflatable Boats, or SH-60J maritime helicopters. However, as of late, they've begun adopting several SEAL tactics, such as straight submarine insertions, and even the occasional unconfirmed report of the usage of Portman Aquatic Knightmares. Basically, these boys are jacks of all trades, and we have to prepare accordingly." He swiped across the screen, which switched to a schematic of the ship. "Our primary defenses are sixteen Phalanx radar-operated CIWS cannons, capable of firing four thousand rounds a minute; these are supported by four Stinger missile platforms, which can be remotely or manually operated."

"One of the ship's primary assets is an eight-tube bay of twenty-four Tomahawk cruise missiles; however, these alone pale in comparison to our absolute ace in the hole – twenty prototype ArcLight missiles, capable of striking at any target within twenty-three hundred miles of the launch point." He shut down the projector, and slammed a fist into an open palm. "This ship cannot fall into the hands of the enemy. We have two primary objectives of equal importance: Protect Prince Schneizel, and in the event that this vessel is captured, we must destroy it."

"Keep in mind as well that the Japanese are known to employ electronic warfare devices, so radar may turn out to be unreliable. They also undoubtedly have countermeasures again thermo-tracker missiles such as Stingers. Therefore, all we can rely on in the end are our solid iron sights, and a nice full clip of ammunition. Hooah?"

"Hooah!" the troops replied enthusiastically.

Schneizel watched the briefing with something akin to pride, with a hint of amusement. It was quite warming to see Kanon bonding with the soldiers. His bodyguard offered a final salute, which the men firmly returned, before stepping out of the room to meet the prince.

"Are you sure that it will happen then, Schneizel?"

The prince was slightly perturbed at Kanon's usage of his first name; he only did so when his question was in regards to a subject that he was close to, and absolutely necessitated an answer. "I'm positive. The Japanese will somehow succeed in boarding this vessel, and we will have to confront them."

Same time
JMSDF Submarine Base, Yoron Jima

Takao was excited. Beyond that even – he was ecstatic. High Command had approved a temporary transfer back to his original post in the South Wind detachment, under the command of Tosen Morimoto, just in time for the SBU op to capture Schneizel.

Now, an hour away from their move to the intercept point, the reinstated Petty Officer 1st Class triple-checked his equipment and dry suit, as well as his trusty MP5MOD6. The rest of the unit had been apparently issued MP5A5 submachine guns, basically the next generation of the mass-production MP5. He had only acquired his through special privileges during his time with the SFG.

"You think you're still up to snuff with all the SBU action, senpai?" one of his subordinates taunted. He then barely blinked as his head snapped to the right, narrowly avoiding decapitation by a kunai.

"Try and ask that again when I'm holding Schneizel at gunpoint," Takao grinned back, yanking back the slide of his P226 and letting it snap back into place. He then proceeded up to a raised section of the loading area to brief the men. "Is everyone here?" Doing a mental headcount, he found all one hundred and twenty men present. "Good. I will now begin the briefing for the following operation."

"In two hours, at 0700 hours, Second Prince Schneizel el Britannia will attempt to reach the Japanese mainland from his current position at Kadena on Okinawa. While the majority of his fleet is naval-based and fully seaworthy, his flagship is a bit of an anomaly – an aerial battleship." Seeing the underwhelmed expressions of the men, he smirked and continued, "The regular units, along with the fourth, and unofficial fifth and sixth SBU platoons will be handling any boarding of the regular naval vessels. We, however, will be responsible for boarding that aerial battleship, and taking Prince Charming of the sky prisoner."

There was a unanimous cheer of approval and excitement as he pulled up a few photographs of said ship. "We've been able to ascertain several of the ship's defenses, which are primarily consistent of Stinger platforms, and an indeterminate number of Phalanx CIWS turrets – more than ten, less than thirty – which are meant to deter most aircraft. And despite the very thorough camouflaging," he used his finger to highlight a slight indentation on the top deck, "We've been able to identify vertical launch tubes: eight of them, with a once-again indeterminate number of missiles. We're assuming that they're only carrying Tomahawks, but rumors have surfaced about a new cruise missile program in the Britannian Navy, codenamed "ArcLight". If anyone is carrying these new missiles, then it'll probably be Schneizel.

"Our first priority is to disable these launch tubes, to prevent them from launching a last-ditch missile attack on any allied mainland battle groups or fortifications. After that, it's safe to say that we'll be encountering Royal Guardsmen aboard the craft, as well as a possibility of fighter jets and helicopters, if these two launch corridors below are any indication. The mission objectives will now be delivered in order of group assignment.

"First Platoon will be approaching from below; your delivery will be explained later on in private. Your objectives are to A) Seize the propulsion system housings; B) Secure crew quarters on the lower decks; and C) Secure the remaining areas of the lower decks, with the exception of the hangar facilities.

"Second Platoon will be entering through said facilities. You will be delivered via glider packs, and will A) Secure the primary hangar, and prevent the launch of any support aircraft; B) Secure any immediately outlying areas; C) Secure the middle decks; and D) Locate and neutralize weaponry facilities contained within, and link up with First Platoon personnel once all tasks are cleared.

"Third Platoon will be responsible for the upper decks, and will be delivered by either HAHO jump or helicopter, if we can fool their defenses. You will A) Clear the upper deck and disable any remaining defenses; B) Secure any outstanding facilities on the upper levels; and C) Secure the command deck and control facilities, hopefully taking Schneizel prisoner. If he is not among his staff, then double back to his quarters."

Takao took a deep breath once he finished, and accepted an airborne canteen. "Onboard garrison is estimated anywhere between one platoon and a small battalion. We are all that will be boarding. We will also be boarding in the order just described, so if First Platoon is capable of isolating individual decks, then please do so ASAP. We will be employing standard firearms, but also utilizing flashbangs and tear gas instead of standard fragmentation grenades. Damage to the vital systems of the ship is to be minimized to the best of your ability; we would like to be able to take it and replicate any worthwhile technology that isn't already ours. Rules of engagement are as follows: all armed personnel who attempt to resist are to be given one chance to surrender, and then incapacitated – definition is left to their decision." This elicited a few chuckles. "Unarmed personnel are to be subdued; High-Value Individuals, HVIs, are to be taken alive. Flight crews are to be taken alive. I'd like to say that no one among them is expendable, but I'm just not feeling that merciful at five in the morning." He finished off the canteen and tossed it back into the crowd. "Any questions?" None. "That's what I like to hear. First Platoon, move into the briefing room to receive your "boarding passes". Let's all try to make it back alive, eh gents?"

"Nippon Banzai!"

0710 hours
Royal Britannian Naval Taskforce 301

"This is Kanon Maldini to all ships, anything to report?"

"Nothing thus far, sir."

"Nothing on scopes, sir."

"HMS Los Angeles is sending out a pair of ASW patrol planes, Blue Hound and Flying Fish. Sonobuoys will be dropped shortly."

"Alright, keeps on your toes, ladies and gentlemen. We're still sixty miles out; anything could happen here."

"Roger, Commander."

Kanon stepped away from the comms station, making a slashing motion with his finger to the radio operator, who cut the transmission. Schneizel sat in the center of the room, atop a rather modest throne (if a throne could be described as such). The prince sat lazily, scanning the radar display on the main screen with a discreet attentiveness.

His bodyguard pulled a handheld radio from his belt. "Deck units, anything to report?"

"Not a thing, commander; picture's clear as the blue sky."

"Let's hope it stays that way straight to Tokyo," Kanon sighed, "Keep on your toes."

"Wilko."

"Your Highness, the fleet is being hailed by an approaching vessel!" the radar operators called out suddenly. "IFF is reading as the HMS Portsmouth, an Aegis cruiser."

"Wasn't the Portsmouth with Halsey's 324th?" Schneizel asked in confusion.

"It was on the roster, sir, but we haven't heard a peep out of them since yesterday," the operator replied with a shrug. "Should I patch them through?"

The prince hunched over slightly and steepled his fingers. "… Yes, try and get them on screen." He was dissatisfied as the display shown with the words AUDIO ONLY.

"… I apologize for not being able to speak face-to-face, Your Highness, but we were damaged in our getaway," the new arrival spoke over a crackling connection.

"Identify yourself and elaborate."

"Ah, how rude of me! This is Lieutenant Commander Shawn Michaels of the Aegis Cruiser Portsmouth. We just managed to escape the harbor in the Philippines a few hours ago; the taskforce was struck at anchorage by a missile attack, which destroyed Admiral Halsey's flagship, and two others; a few hours later, the entire north side of the island came under attack from a massive fighter and bomber raid. We just managed to get away, but our radar and communications suites were damaged by an AGM." Schneizel motioned to the security station, which then directed the exterior cameras to the new vector; sure enough, the cruiser's comms mast was looking a bit worse for wear.

"I see… Michaels, where is your captain?"

"He was aboard the Queen Victoria, Halsey's ship, when it was hit by a sub-launched missile; I was forced to take command and get us out to sea while the local air detachment scrambled to cover our escape."

"Alright then. Did anyone else from your group manage to escape?"

"We're being trailed by the missile destroyers Alaska and California, as well as the amphibious assault ship Longbow. With your permission, Your Highness, we'd like to join your force and make the run."

"Very well. And tell me, did you manage to gather any sort of information pertaining to the naval situation in this sector before you left?"

"… Yes, Your Highness; security officers transferred several secure files aboard before our departure, but I'm afraid that their contents are a little too sensitive to be divulged over the airwaves, even a secure channel. If you'd like to view them, we could send up a helo, and I'll bring them to you personally."

"Do so quickly, Michaels; we could be attacked at any moment," Schneizel conceded, giving in to curiosity.

"Yes, Your Highness; we'll be up in fifteen minutes." The link cut off, and the prince slumped back in his seat, sighing disappointedly.

"What is our current speed and vector?" he requested tonelessly.

"The entire group is moving along at a steady twenty knots, Your Highness; we have to accommodate for all vessels, since differentiation would only serve to string us out and make us easier targets. Our current vector is from South-Southwest One-Nine-Zero, bearing North-Northeast Zero-One-Zero."

"Estimated time of arrival?"

"Undeterred is approximately two and a half hours."

"Oh joy…" Kanon groaned quietly. He then groaned louder as the radar officer reported in.

"Sir… I've got a ghost on the radar," the woman declared hesitantly.

"A ghost?" Schneizel quirked a brow, at which she flushed.

"An area within which no objects can be confirmed, natural or otherwise; I'm getting an area of interference covering a five-mile diameter, approximately ten miles from the edge of the fleet."

"Can we get a report from those ASW planes?" the radio operator took the initiative, already making the call to the amphibious assault ship Thames.

"… This is the Anti-Submarine Warfare Plane Flying Fish, I'm dropping a sonobuoy in the indicated sector," a male southern drawl replied after a short pause. "… I'm picking up motion in the center of the area. Looks like we've got ourselves an enemy sub, ladies and germs." The line then went to static, and everyone scrambled to watch the cameras as a missile rose from out of the water and destroyed the plane.

"This is Blue Hound, I'm moving in to replace Flying Fish," the other pilot reported immediately. "… Holy shit, he's surfacing! And he's launching something- HOT DAMN, WE'VE GOT ENEMY FAST-MOVERS!"

Sure enough, a flight of four Russian Vogel UAVs launched straight out of the top of the larger-than-normal submarine, rising on small rockets as their wings folded out and took over. Every AA gun in the fleet was quickly trained on the four aircraft, which quickly disappeared into a massive cloud of dispersed chaff smoke.

"Smart little bastards…" a gunship pilot snorted as several choppers rose from carriers and assault ships to counter the drone attack craft; they were however unable to stop the quartet of AIM-9X missiles that lanced out from the edge of the cloud, striking several targets in the area – including the ASW aircraft Blue Hound, which fell to the sea in a roaring fireball.

"Blue Hound is down, Blue Hound is down!" someone reported rhetorically.

"Well, technology has officially failed us. Time to revert to our roots! SPRAY 'N PRAY, GENTLEMEN!" And spray n' pray they did, as nearly every gun of every caliber less than 127mm that was capable of being manually operated opened up, sending out a veritable wall of lead that left a myriad of small, whispy holes in the redish-pink cloud.

While this occurred, the crew of the Avalon could only watch as a second submarine surfaced on the opposite edge of the fleet, its forward VLS doors opening up and launching a string of a dozen anti-ship missiles high into the sky. One of them passed a little too close for comfort, and was immediately disintegrated by a short, concentrated burst of 20mm chain gun rounds. The rest, though, arched in mid-flight, and shot down at speeds in excess of Mach 2.

"Supersonic anti-ship missiles," Schneizel breathed in astonishment. "ArcLight is nothing compared to these!" His statement was punctuated by a symphony of explosions across the surface fleet, which resulted in the sinking of four ships, and heavy damage to five more. The Vogels chose that moment of new distraction to emerge, firing on the wounded and finishing them off before falling to the guns of the others. The taskforce now pressed on with twenty-five ships of their original thirty-four, counting the additional four from Group 324.

"… Your Highness, do you still want that information?" Shawn's voice spoke out abruptly.

"Yes, it may have just become imperative to our survival here," the prince confirmed.

"Alright, we're heading up… Wait, what's that below your ship?" Everyone's eyes widened in terror as the cameras swiveled frantically to point straight downwards; eight missiles rose from the waters directly beneath them, and the engineers were incapable of raising the Blaze Luminous before they slammed straight into the underbelly of the airship.

"… No explosions? What the hell was that?" Kanon called out in confusion.

"There's no way that any Japanese submarine could possibly be loaded with EIGHT dud missiles," Schneizel muttered. "Lower decks, report!" They only received static. "Were the systems disabled by the impact?"

"Negative, sir," the communications office shook his head, "Those things came nowhere near any lines or system hubs. It has to be… JAMMING! WE'RE BEING JAMMED FROM INSIDE!"

Kanon jumped on it immediately. "Squads Eight and Nine, deploy to the lower decks and find out what the hell is going on down there!"

"Roger!" A tense minute later, what little color remained in the crews' features drained as the sounds of gunfire filtered in over the system. "We're… Hostile… Units… Estimate… Fifty!" was all that filtered before the jammer blocked them out.

"Fuck," Kanon said simply, in a moment of uncharacteristic vulgarity. "Well, we said that they would board somehow…"

"External jamming detected! Radar systems are inop!"

"What are those things in the sky?" Any more surprises and the crew would die of heart failure before the enemy even reached them. The Avalon, cruising along at two thousand feet, was just below what few clouds floated in the sunny blue sky; from one of said clouds at nearly eight thousand feet came a swarm of shadows, akin to angry hornets emerging from their besieged nest.

"Zoom in, damn it!"

The cameras locked onto the closest figure, and Schneizel could only wonder why he was still working with the Britannian military.

Sixty or seventy individuals kneeled on what appeared to be winged surf boards, the edges of which glowed a slight crimson; the prince recognized the soft glow as that of a Float system, or at least something akin to it. The gliders and their riders jinked and weaved through the air with a deadly grace, flying along at well over a hundred miles per hour; each of the boards had a half-hemispherical wind screen to cover the pilot's face and cause most of the air to pass over their body.

They were headed straight for his ship.

"CIWS isn't responding, there's something going on with the electrical system!"

"It's been awhile since I shot skeet," Kanon said suddenly, reaching over next to the prince's throne and retrieving an M4 Super 90 combat shotgun. He retrieved his radio and gave orders as he strapped on body armor and web gear. "Fourth Platoon, deploy to the observation deck with MGs and area-effect weapons; we've got some pigeons looking to get shot."

"Hooah!"

The guards left the bridge, leaving the crew anxiously watching the cameras and trying to get through to the security teams on the lower decks. Another transmission cut through.

"Your Highness, are you alright? I saw the attack; I'm bringing reinforcements with me!" Shawn declared, eliciting several light cheers from the crew.

"Yes Michaels, I'm fine. Your cooperation is much appreciated in this matter," Schneizel gave a sigh of relief. He switched one of the cameras, and saw an SH-60 helicopter rising from the deck of the Portsmouth, with two more circling the ship in a holding pattern.

'Wait, SH-60s? I don't remember any naval units with those choppers deployed… In fact, I thought the SH-60 was a specifically… Japanese… Variant…!'

By the time this terrifying thought crossed his mind, all scanner systems had gone to black and white fizzling static. "We're being electronically jammed! All internal and external communications are jammed!"

"Hangar personnel reports forty enemy Special Forces units in the main facility! They've locked down the middle decks, we're cut off!"

"Topside guards report that over thirty of those gliders were decoys with Sakuradite bombs! Seventy percent of our automated defenses have been disabled, and VLS tubes one through seven are heavily damaged! Number Eight is the only operational launch unit!"

"The choppers from the Portsmouth have just touched down! Hold on… Reports of gunfire on the top deck! The soldiers are Japanese Special Boarding Units!"

"I hate it when I'm right…" Schneizel groaned uncharacteristically. "We've been outmaneuvered, there's no way we're getting out of this one. Has there been any word from the lower or middle decks?"

"One engineer who escaped reported that the lower security teams were decimated, while there were an estimated ten casualties to the boarders. Hangar deck is completely under enemy control, and they've seized the secondary fire control stations. The upper decks are all that is left, and Commander Maldini's team is facing an estimated platoon of SBU troops."

"Do we have control over any of the weapons systems?"

"We have the manual override to the VLS units, but there's only one operational tube!"

The prince's mind was reeling as he tried to decide the next course of action. He reached into a compartment at the side of his throne pulled out the most recent satellite maps of the Japanese battlefronts.

"… Fire a Tomahawk from the remaining tube to these coordinates," he scribbled down the string of numbers and handed them to the fire control officer, who cross-checked them with his own maps and balked.

"Your Highness…!" he tried to protest; only to be stopped by Schneizel's raised hand.

"At 0733 hours on December 3rd, 2017 ATB, Japanese Special Boarding Unit commandos seized control of the experimental aerial battleship Avalon, and used its one operational launch unit to fire a BGM-109 Tomahawk cruise missile at a target on mainland Japan, after which the system malfunctioned and was rendered inoperable. Several minutes later, this missile impacted the defensive fortifications on the Britannian defensive line "Siegfried", blowing a large hole in the wall and allowing for a breach by the Black Panzer Group and the Japan Ground Self-Defense Forces. Second Prince Schneizel el Britannia was unable to comment on this situation, as he was recently taken prisoner along with his flagship by the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force." He looked to the dock officer, who was writing furiously to record the message, which was then handed off to a messenger.

Said messenger was miraculously able to bypass the enemy boarders and reach an external port, where the paper was shoved into a small remote-operated missive delivery unit, which was then ejected and delivered safely to the secondary command ship of Taskforce 301, the HMS Saint Augustine. During the period between its sending and delivery, the remaining Vertical Launch System silo screeched and ground its gears, opening the tube sufficiently to launch a single projectile, after which the firing port was blocked off by a Japanese combat engineering unit.

A little under twenty minutes later, said projectile impacted against the outer wall of the Siegfried line, completely obliterating a fifty-meter stretch of the fortifications, and allowing BPG assault units to penetrate and seize the position and emplacements.

Back with the Avalon, Kanon came flying bodily through the hatchway, having been tossed in by a balaclava-clad commando.

"As of this moment, the Britannian aerial battleship Avalon is under the control of the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force; all personnel are to cooperate or be subdued and taken to face trial for crimes against the sovereign nation of New Japan. Cooperation will be rewarded with amnesty, and a chance to be returned to your country once Tokyo is taken from Cornelia li Britannian and her forces."

Schneizel calmly stood and raised his hands in a gesture of surrender; any members of the crew not responsible for flying the ship did the same, and were flex-cuffed by two squads of SBU soldiers.

"So I take it that you would be Lieutenant Commander Shawn Michaels?" Schneizel asked wryly as he dropped to his knees and had his hands tied by the first commando. The man removed his mask, revealing evidently Japanese features, and grinned mischievously.

"Petty Officer First Class – also Captain, in the GSDF – Takao Yamashiro, at your service," he laughed.

"Well, Mister Yamashiro, I must congratulate you on being the most duplicitous son of a bitch I have ever met."

"I try, Your Highness. Now if you'll just move over next to your effeminate little friend there, you can watch as my senpai stealthily sinks your fleet, ship by ship."

0740 hours
JDS Soryu, 100 fathoms (600 feet) BSL

The inside of the submarine was quiet; if not for the pinging of the radar and the grinding and clanking of the machinery, it would have been deathly silent.

"What's the status of the enemy flagship?" the Captain, Momochi Shinozaki, asked quietly.

"Petty Officer Yamashiro has taken control of the ship; the surface fleet is in disarray," his second, Commander Genji Koga replied just as quietly.

"Enemy strength?"

"Currently at twenty-one ships."

"Ours?"

"Four submarines and three surface vessels, the latter of which are currently in the mix with the enemy taskforce."

"Tag the IFFs on the friendly vessels and pick out the farthest enemy target in range," Momochi ordered. The small tactical display in front of him updated, with three blue icons appearing amongst the swarm of red. One of the red icons on the opposite side of the fleet from them started flashing, with a small wave radiating from it to signify a target lock. "Fuse for contact detonation and fire for effect."

A single Type-89X wire-guided torpedo launched out of Tube One, flying straight and slightly askew of the direct path towards its target; the projectile was cruising at fifty-five knots, and was currently in passive homing mode. Its path was nearly parallel with the fleet, albeit a bit skewed towards the side.

Then, at five nautical miles from the target, the torpedo swung hard and accelerated to sixty knots.

"Fish is swimming hot, straight and normal," the weapons officer declared impassively, "Three hundred seconds to impact."

This is the part of submarine warfare that everyone hated - the waiting. A torpedo wasn't a rocket; it could only glide through the water so fast with being detected or detonating prematurely.

But sure enough, five minutes later, the connection to the torpedo cut out – signaling impact.

"Dead on; one shot, one kill," the weapons officer declared smoothly, a hint of satisfaction evident.

"Excellent. Load all tubes and select the next three targets in Sector Alpha-Whiskey-Mike," Momochi ordered nonchalantly.

0755
JDS Kenryu

Marcus Ishikawa lowered the periscope back into its housing and clapping his hands together. "Shinozaki-senpai has begun his assault; surface at fifteen miles from the west edge of the taskforce and fire missiles from bays one through eight."

During their seven years sitting mostly idle at Yoron, the Kenryu had been upgraded with as much as could be acquired and fitted to a single ship; advanced sonar and radar, premium countermeasures… And the sub had even been converted from an Attack Submarine into a Ballistic Missile Sub.

With this reclassification came the addition of sixteen VLS tubes, eight added on either side of the middle section. The sub now carried a total of sixty-four Sub-Launched Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles (SLICBMs), which could be exchanged for conventional anti-ship missiles. In this case, the Kenryu carried double its standard loadout of UGM-84 Harpoons; half for the horizontal tubes, and the others for the vertical launch silos.

Now, eight of these Harpoons flew straight and true skywards, passing above the clouds and nearly into low orbit, where they would fall unaided until reaching terminal velocity, at which point their propulsion systems would accelerate them several times past the speed of sound. It wasn't truly a supersonic missile, as Schneizel had presumed; it was really just a more durable warhead to handle the G-forces of such an operation.

A few minutes later, the missiles impacted directly on four ships, destroying them instantly – if not by the initial penetration, then definitely by the following detonation.

"All confirmed kills!" the weapons officer declared victoriously, eliciting actual cheers on this ship.

"Alright, let's drop to sixty fathoms and switch to conventional firing," Ishikawa ordered, settling back in a random chair.

0800
JDS Unryu

"Drone Flight Golf-Juliet is outbound and engaging," the remote systems operator announced.

Like its sister sub, the Unryu had been majorly idle, and therefore received improvements of its own. In addition to the standard sonar and countermeasures package, the vessel had been outfitted with six vertical launching silos – similar in design to the missile VLS units, but for a different purpose entirely.

Aerial drones.

Yes, the recently-acquired Vogel UAVs had been put to use by the submarines just as well. Granted, the sub was fairly vulnerable when it had to surface to launch the aircraft – but they generally operated outside of the central zone of engagement.

One of the remote operators gave a whoop of joy as something on his screen lit up. "Direct hit on enemy carrier, she's going down!"

The other operators cheered in agreement, even as three more screens lit up in similar manners, while a fifth cut to static.

"Golf-India-Charlie has gone down; however, I managed to hit the Dorsetshire on the way down," another man sighed, setting his headset on his station and heading for the small mess deck.

"Well this is actually kind of boring," Captain Masaharu Konbei sighed disappointedly. "I would've expected a bigger fight."

"Seems like Schneizel's really not into this whole shindig," his Britannian Executive Officer (XO) commented idly, currently playing a game of solitaire (with real cards) at his station.

"Anyone up for a game of Drinko next?"

"Nobody on this tub knows Drinko, Peter," his partner, a Britannian-Russian from the Duchy of Alaska, groaned dramatically, "Much less wants to play it in the middle of a damned sea battle. Plus, all anybody drinks around here is that piss-water Sake; can't handle hard liquor like vodka or whiskey."

"I'm sorely tempted to shoot you for dissing Sake," Konbei grunted, "But I'm too friggin' bored." He had picked up several mannerisms of the other nationalities from his mixed crew; but he still liked his Sake. For now, the forty year-old captain settled for pulling up his laptop and linking into the ship's systems; he opened up a Britannian first-person shooter and occupied himself for the next half-hour or so.

0815 hours
JDS Hakuryu

Tosen Morimoto aboard the Hakuryu was directing an operation slightly different from his companions.

In comparison to the rest of the Japanese submarine fleet, his sub had become more of an underwater troopship. All but two of the VLS units had been removed to make space for an extension on the general quarters and mess decks, and the torpedo stock had been cut down to four tubes at five reloads apiece, twenty-four projectiles total. The entire superstructure had been expanded outwards in all directions, with an additional ten feet to the total radius, and the Britannian SEAL delivery system had become a permanent fixture.

All in all, the Hakuryu was a submersible headquarters for the SBU in the Pacific. Right now, Morimoto was briefing the rookie 6th Platoon on their raid on the Britannian aircraft carrier HMS King George III.

"This vessel is now the flagship of this dying fleet, and is the headquarters of an Admiral and a Major General, the commanders of what was supposed to be the relief force," Tosen started, pulling up a general-knowledge schematic of the carrier's decks and general layout. "The King George is manned by a crew of approximately 4,700 assorted sailors, mechanics, martials, cooks, etcetera – each man and woman on this ship is trained in some form of combat. Also, a number of the crew has already been injured, and thusly replaced by active combat personnel from their temporary garrison from the transport planes and ships. Therefore, carrying out the task of seizing this ship alone is summarily impossible."

By now, the near-totally green (new) men before him were tossing their supreme commander some extremely disconcerted looks.

"BUT!" they perked up at the contradiction, "We are not alone in this. Because of an extreme rate of "accidents" and desertion among his ranks on Okinawa, Schneizel was forced to bolster his forces with some of the "friendly locals" – Honorary Britannians. Theoretically, with a single word, we could command this tub." The men were now looking optimistic.

"There's another 'but'," he threw out to the bipolar commandos, "Most of ours were stationed to grunt work – mess deck, cargo hold, and systems monitoring. Also, the 'theoretical' was more like a 'slim to none', since the ratio of Japanese to Britannia on the ship is still barely five to one, and these people have received sub-standard training. We're looking at fighting alongside a mass of Asiatic cannon fodder."

"Just get to the plan, dammit!" one of the men in the back called out.

"Alright, alright," Tosen conceded, smirking amusedly to himself. "The few experienced friendlies in the electrical centers are going to seal off the individual sectors and give you a path of least resistance to the bridge and/or the commanders' location(s). Once both of them are secured and extracted, you'll make the announcement to the trapped soldiers and either get them to surrender, or execute them if they attempt to resist."

Several of the truly green soldiers paled slightly at the latter idea.

The briefing was cut as an officer entered the compartment with a video commlink in his hand. "Sir, Petty Officer Yamashiro for you from the Avalon." He handed it off and left as Tosen placed the device on the small attaché beneath the projector.

The image that came up was Takao Yamashiro, decked out in full SBU regalia, with a Britannian royal cloak around his shoulders; he was sitting back comfortably in a throne, presumably Schneizel's, and had a shit-eating grin on his face. The prince himself was leaning on the wall behind and to the side of the throne, hands flex-cuffed in front of him, and admirably trying to maintain an impassive façade in this situation.

Takao had an officer's brimmed cap perched on his head, shadowing his eyes, which seemed to glow with just a slightly evil green light. "Ah, tenderizing the fresh meat before sending it to the wolves?" the NCO's grin widened maliciously.

"Everyone, this is my first and best student, Petty Officer First Class Takao Yamashiro," Morimoto introduced, barely hiding his amusement at the 'fresh meat's' terrified and awed expressions. Most of them were between eighteen and twenty-five, so it was understandable.

"Only Petty Officer for the day, actually," Takao corrected casually, leaning forward and steepling his fingers in front of his face. "After that, I'm once more Captain Yamashiro of the Ground Self-Defense Force, the indisputable second-in-command to Major General Ishitora Misato, whom is the most likely man to replace Katase once the old codger finally kicks the bucket." The straight-laced youth gawked at his blatant disrespect for the army's supreme commander.

"Did you have something to report, or did you only call to rub your success in our faces?" Tosen inquired, barely restraining laughter at the situation.

"Oh, just calling to say that I've got Schneizel here, I've captured his airship, and I'm currently heading back to Kyoto to drop him off. And then I'll probably just take the ship and sell it off to the BPG to make some extra cash; they probably have more use for it than us," the man replied airily, tossing his Rising Sun-emblazoned cap out of the shot. "Also, we've got some sympathizers among the crew, in case you need some support; the rest just surrendered, since it looks like no one here really wanted to leave Okinawa in the first place. I'm contemplating taking pity and detouring back there, actually; we could probably run on a skeleton crew and a few of 'His Highness's' technicians."

"Do what you will," Tosen said nonchalantly. "You wouldn't happen to be carrying any WMDs onboard, would you?"

"Fifty-one Tomahawks, ten of which are carrying W-80 nuclear warheads," he ticked them off on his fingers, "And twelve of their prototype long-range ArcLight missiles." The captain perked up.

"ArcLight? As in, four thousand mile effective radius ArcLight?" Tosen inquired excitedly.

"Aye aye, Cap'n," Takao replied lazily.

"… Can I have those?"

"Do you have room?"

"I'll probably have a lot of free space in the sub as soon as these guys are gone…" Tosen whispered, although intentionally loudly. The rookies paled substantially.

"Uh-huh… Nah, I think I'll pass them off to the artillery division stationed in Mie," Takao decided, at which his superior deflated.

"Takao, my dearest student! I ask you one favor after you not once speak or write to me for seven years, and you so easily DENY me?" Tosen wept dramatically.

"Yes."

"Damn you to hell."

"Got that five times in as many minutes from a Britannian Ranger fireteam that I butchered with a wakizashi and a pair of Glocks at Narita two months ago," Takao commented idly, carelessly even. "Even got a present from one of them," he took out Ian's KA-BAR, which was apparently perpetually stained crimson; even the rookies in the back of the compartment turned whiter than sheets at the bloody staining on the blade, even so far as it seemed to have etched into the weapons-grade steel. Disconcerting was an understatement. "But of course, that's beside the point. Have fun, kiddies! Don't go getting yourselves killed now! Even though I really don't like the idea of more than the original four platoons…"

With that slightly cross statement, the communication cut out. The compartment was totally still for a long moment before Tosen clapped his hands.

"Okay! Back to the briefing!"

1000 hours
West Siegfried Line, Gunma-Shinjuku Border

"I'm definitely not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, but…" Lelouch stared at the massive gap where a part of the wall used to be, "… Where exactly did the Tomahawk come from?"

"Southern ocean, sir," an intelligence officer answered evenly. "Joint reports indicate that the SBU and MSDF hit Schneizel's pitch head-on; knocked it straight out of the park. Captured a prototype aerial battleship, which is where the missile apparently originated."

"Ah," he nodded in comprehension. "What's the status of the rest of the line?"

"Do you want military jargon or civvie-speak?"

"Give it to me civvie, I'm kind of out of it."

"The line that crossed Tochigi and Ibaraki just went down; Dmitri came from behind just as the other side hit the wall hard and fast, and they fucked 'em up six ways to Sunday."

"Fun, fun," Lelouch replied idly, tossing a pistol up and catching it by the barrel repeatedly. "How long until we're dancing through the streets of Tokyo?" he asked as he plopped down in the driver's seat of the GAZ.

The officer climbed into the passenger's side. "Well, Cornelia's force is still over eighty thousand strong, so your estimate was pretty much spot-on; we'll be chasing 'em back into the Pacific by New Years. Chances are, we're all just going to be sitting back and sending people out to get killed until the ranks thin on the other side; one last show in Tokyo, and we can all go home and watch as the rest of the world ransacks mainland Britannia."

"I need to remember to distribute blanks to the front lines for the next two weeks," Lelouch made a personal note. "And send some to Cornelia, since she probably doesn't hang onto anything that isn't lethal." He chuckled a bit before his expression turned stone cold. "What word from Indochina?"

"With Schneizel soon to be in our custody, the Toromo Agency had surrendered; Cambodia is under our jurisdiction until the Chinese start barking at us for their territory back, so we have at least until Britannia falls."

"That timeframe should be sufficient," Lelouch nodded in agreement. "We'll confiscate the Avalon and have it moved into the Toromo facilities to begin development and application; although if my suspicions are correct, they might have the research on file already."

"You think that the Agency is responsible for the Float Systems?" the spook asked incredulously.

"Cambodia's been in Schneizel's pocket for six years – if they weren't directly in contact with the processing and production, then they should at least have records of the project."

"Point taken."

"So, we've stormed the outer defenses; we've got a few more trenches to go and then we'll be pounding at the gates. What should we do in the meantime?"

"What else do we do? We do military stuff. BPG/JSDF Joint Military Exercises, anyone?"

1200 hours
Viceroy's Office, Government Bureau

"He did it, I just know it," Cornelia growled as she watched the UAV footage of the Siegfried Line collapsing.

"Who did what, Your Highness?" Darlton raised a brow curiously from beside her.

"SCHNEIZEL!" she roared back venomously, eliciting a flinch from the aged general. "He fired off the missile before he was captured so that he could screw me over and get off scot-free!"

"That seems highly unlikely, Your Highness," Darlton deadpanned. "What would he have to gain from disrupting our defenses?"

"He's been practically vacationing at Okinawa for two months now! He's probably been subverted by some Eleven chambermaid-turned-bedwarmer!"

"I thought that we had agreed on using Japanese, Cornelia," Lelouch's image appeared on her desk's inbuilt monitor.

"YOU!"

"Yes, me. Got anything a bit more eloquent?"

"WHAT- WHO- HOW-?" The Vicerene was stumbling over one confused question after another.

"Called to give you a heads-up that I'll be dropping by sometime soon, to give you the last parts of my little prophesy… And to deliver a gift, since I've made a solemn vow that I won't be seeing Euphie until I kick your ass out of Japan," the young man replied nonchalantly. "Oh, and you should upgrade your system security. Linex? Really? My technicians have taken that as a personal insult."

"Point taken," Andreas nodded from the side, writing himself a note to contact IT about the issue. He clammed up as the seething princess turned her death-glare to him for a moment, before snapping back to the screen.

"And how exactly are you supposed to get in here? No single man can infiltrate Tokyo at this time, much less the Government Bureau." Her tone had taken on a smug inflection.

"You'll find out when I'm once again sitting on your desk or in your garden within the next week," Lelouch gave her an infuriating smirk as the transmission cut out.

"ARGH!" Cornelia shouted in frustration, "I HATE that little bastard!"

"You hate the fact that he's beating you in a war and courting your younger sister," Darlton corrected from his spot next to the balcony doors. "Were the circumstances different, I'm sure he probably would've fit right in with us."

"No… There's something other than the tactics he's displayed so far. Something far more… Cunning – devious even. Official records say that he was an independent assassin before and even while taking over the East Asian BPG offices, right? Pull up the incident reports that those OSI boys found for us," she ordered sternly. Andreas sighed and stepped forward, plugging a PDA into a port on the desk.

"Whatever happened to that Robinson fellow of those two, anyways?" he inquired genuinely. Cornelia froze, with a slight bit of guilt; despite all of the suspicion she had held over those two when they had all first met, they had been genuinely helpful. "I… I'm not quite sure. I haven't heard from them since Narita. I'll have to contact the local branch and ask about a status update."

"Right…" As much as Andreas disliked spooks like the OSI, the pair had been fairly easy to handle; he had shared a drink with them at one point as well, and he could now say that he was honestly concerned. "Here's the files; first report is from Mogadishu, Somalia, in 2015." The image was of presumably locals rioting in the streets, chasing out an entire battalion of Britannian soldiers with nothing automatic weapons and "Technicals", the official designation of the East Africana guerilla-produced civilian pickups with machine guns mounted on swivel posts in the beds. Although their RPGs had also played quite a bit of havoc with Army and Air Force alike; two UH-60 Blackhawks had been lost in the incident, as well as eighteen Delta operators and a company's worth of Army Rangers; several dozen Sutherlands and older Glasgows had been damaged and outright destroyed, but Knightmares were really on the back burner for anything but support roles and escort nowadays.

"A very influential local warlord, Ali-Mohammad Adid, was shot once in the head by what appeared to be a Britannian soldier, who proceeded to fire into a crowd of civilians with a fireteam that appeared from the background. The unknowns retreated back to the Britannian Embassy in the city, and were admitted into the compound like nothing happened. The embassy was razed soon afterwards by angry militia and armed locals, under the orders of the deceased's brother, Mohammad Farrah Adid.

"Within twenty-four hours, Britannians forces in Somalia had either been pushed out to sea or into the neighboring countries – the latter were usually wiped out by more angry locals from those countries. Although the BPG never took responsibility for the hit, or were even implicated, one of their known assassins – one Lelouch Lamperouge, as luck may have it – was spotted in a Britannian military uniform when the recovered surveillance data was analyzed. He seemed to recognize that we knew it was him, since he waved and smiled at the camera without firing a shot."

"So he is the reason why North African operations were set back seven months," Cornelia growled in realization.

"Bingo," Andreas replied nonchalantly. "Next incident – Paris, December of 2015. French capitol building is seized by a terrorist group calling themselves the "Knights of the Round," and using Britannian military weaponry. The building is held under terrorist control for three days and two nights, until the French Special Forces, in cooperation with a foreign unit of the German GSG-9, eliminated the bulk of the terrorists. Their leader fired a single shot the entire time he was in charge; his shot killed the French Secretary of Defense. Information dredged up later by the government pegged the "terrorists" as a South Britannian PMC, hired by someone in the Britannian Parliament to stir things up a bit to give the Army an opening to launch an invasion. Although war wasn't officially declared until just before this shit storm we're in here started, we were pulling sabotage strikes and raids on each other for months after the incident."

"Did we really do it?" the princess asked with a bit of confusion.

"Nope; our own investigation indicated that the contract request that was sent had a forged signature of a member that we had already executed for treason, and the money along with it was from a completely untraceable account somewhere in the territory of Mexico. Also, the "leader" apparently wasn't on the PMC's payroll, either; Special Forces raided their headquarters and got a complete roster of the contract. It all matched up, except that after octuplet-checking the records and footage, their reports were one man short. The Department of Defense soon after received a letter, taunting us for our idiocy, which was worded quite eloquently – in German, and signed with an alias that was later connected to Lelouch Lamperouge. The letter was somehow destroyed, though, along with all copies, so we couldn't bring it to the French even if we wanted to."

"He's a sly little fucker, alright…"

"It gets better," Darlton smirked a bit – he actually had to admire the kid for this kind of high-profile shit. "Hong Kong, Chinese New Year, 2016; Panamanian freighter was detained and searched by port authorities, who uncovered a cache of several million Britannian pounds' worth of our assorted small arms and anti-tank and Knightmare weaponry, which upon interrogation of the cargo supervisor was revealed to be supposedly delivered to local insurgents in order to stage an uprising along the east coast and soften it up for a Britannian invasion; coincidentally, we actually were planning to deliver a few special operatives via submarine and civilian ships in the approximate timeframe; but nowhere near enough for an invasion. Nevertheless, defenses were tightened, and the operators were all caught before they could make it to their assigned posts."

"So all of his past operations have just been screwing with us," Cornelia summarized.

"Yep; the weapons were all actually cheap, inoperable reproductions, manufactured by H&K for an anonymous buyer, who was apparently connected to some of their BPG-associated supervisors. We only found this out a few months ago, while we actually still had some semblance of control over Germany," Darlton wrapped it up, unplugging the PDA and sliding it back into his pocket. "Basically, this kid's just as good a ruthless killer and sly dealer as he is a solid commander."

"… I need to tell Euphie," the Vicerene suddenly jumped up, speed-walking for the door.

"She already knows!" Andreas called out just as she left the room; her head popped back through the doorway incredulously.

"WHAT?"

"Yeah, she actually requested all of this information herself about the time we were at Narita," he shrugged. "Looks like she knows enough to do her research and not fall blindly in love."

"… I'm still going to have a talk with her about this," Cornelia grumbled.

"I'd be worried for your mental health if you didn't."

"You're becoming more and more like Guilford used to be every day, you know that Darlton?"

"Someone needs to fill his shoes, and I certainly wasn't the only hard-ass general in the army," Andreas shrugged.

1400 hours
JASDF Kyoto Airbase

The Air Self-Defense Force could only stare in awe as the massive white, gold and blue flying battleship descended over the central tarmac, with several SBU soldiers dropping from the lower hangar bay to help secure the ship. Ishitora waited inside the main aerodrome complex, and motioned for his Komatsu's driver to move in as the boarding ramp hit the deck.

The LAV rolled up into the respectably large hangar deck, where Takao was perched on a stack of crates, looking down upon the assembly of captured scientists and technicians. They were reporting one by one to a panel of the SDF's own specialists, who were recording their specialized fields and then dismissing them to different areas for further analysis and interrogation by their Japanese counterparts.

The entire line was down to half a dozen as the jeep came to a stop.

"If you're about to say that you burned your paperwork, you'dbetter not get out of that car!" Takao called out as Ishitora exited the vehicle.

"I didn't, I didn't…" the general sighed disappointedly. "They had Ken watching me in your stead. Little bastard was your second, wasn't he?"

"If he took my position, then he still is," the Captain grinned proudly. "Glad to see that I trained him so well!"

"I'd have you executed if only for making me work," Ishitora grumbled, flexing his fingers, "I was signing those damned requisition forms all fucking morning while you were off shooting people!"

"I only shot seven people, for your information."

"You still got to shoot people! I haven't shot anyone since Narita!" the superior officer whined childishly. "At least I managed to shoot a text to R&D about my Tank-Harken idea…"

One of the scientists remained perked up at the mention. "Oh, please!" the man scoffed, "Those boorish, bulky things carrying Slash Harkens? That'd be like putting a mono-directional machine gun on a rock and trying to use it to stop an advancing army."

"Lloyd, keep quiet!" A young blue-haired woman beside him cuffed his ear, "We're completely surrounded by the enemy, and there is absolutely nothing stopping them from killing you!"

"Only me?" the white-haired man smirked, "And what about you, Cecile?"

"I'd use your body as a shield," the woman, Cecile, gave a deceptively-cheerful smile.

"… I like you two," Ishitora declared suddenly, advancing on the pair. He pressed in close and moved his face a nose length from Lloyd's, examining him. He then switched to Cecile, who flushed and backed away slightly. He was then grabbed by the collar and jerked backwards by Takao.

"Stare at the man all you want, but you're making the lady uncomfortable," he admonished firmly, at which the general pouted childishly. "Names, ranks and fields of specialization?"

"Lloyd Asplund, chief engineer of Prince Schneizel's Project Camelot team," Llyod greeted cheerily. "This young thing here is Cecile Croomy, my assistant."

"AND second-in-direction of the project," Cecile added, giving his shoulder a "light" shove.

"Project Camelot…" Takao mulled over the name, pulling out his phone and sorting through his numerous e-mails. "Ah, yes! Intelligence report from Lelouch. Knightmare development, was it? More mechanized cannon fodder for the "glorious" legions of Britannia?"

Lloyd's expression was completely affronted. He made several overly-dramatic scoffing noises and then fixed Takao with a creepy stare. "Good sir, the Lancelot is far more than just some scrap metal Sutherland for you to shoot at," he declared haughtily, "It is the closest thing to a complete man-machine interface that this world has ever seen!"

"I don't give two shits if you could make the damned thing space-worthy," Takao snapped, "We're fighting a conventional war, without Britannia's blasted "miracle machines". Give me an anti-tank rifle or a rocket launcher and fifteen minutes to find a spot, and just about any soldier of mine can kill it – case closed," he added firmly as Lloyd opened his mouth his protest.

Cecile was frowning slightly from beside her boss at the captain's harsh attitude, but then thought about what he must have seen machines such as Knightmares do to the people of his country.

"Knightmares no longer hold any place in war," Takao continued, "Because if a man isn't willing to go and fight on a field of battle, face-to-face against his enemies, then he clearly isn't worthy to be representing his country in the first place. We will have none, and we shall crush our enemies in their own scrap coffins." He then shrugged off his jacket bearing the MSDF insignias, and accepted his worn GSDF coat, at the same time unsheathing his KA-BAR and examining the blade. "We will fight, and we will bleed, and a number of us will die. But we will do it honorably, for the restoration of our country." With this final declaration, he sheathed the blade, executed a sharp about-face and marched out, immediately being swarmed by a staff entourage that was presumably delegated from Ishitora.

The general in question sighed. "Forgive my companion… He bears strong feelings on this matter. He was but seventeen when his home, his family, and his friends were cut down mercilessly by Glasgows."

"There's always a sob story…" Lloyd rolled his eyes, only to retrieve a punch to the head from Cecile that would've knocked out any normal man.

"Two reasons: one, that was extremely insensitive; and two, they're still holding guns, you idiot!"

"Yes, well," Ishitora now spoke wryly, "I suppose I'll have to interview the two of you for myself; get in the car." Lloyd and Cecile complied, albeit with varying levels of uncertainty. As the latter climbed into the vehicle, she turned and glimpsed Takao standing outside, supervising operations revolving around the Avalon. He caught her gaze, and offered an unsettlingly blank stare in return. The blue-haired woman shuddered and slammed the door shut as the driver reversed out of the hangar complex, just as a trio of CH-47 Chinook helicopters landed on the pads outside; Everyone was taken by surprise as the first exploded, and the other two disembarked a small company of Britannian Delta commandos.

"Well this is unexpected," Lloyd offered cheerily; Ishitora whipped out a pistol before the man could blink, and had it pressed to his forehead.

"Where is the tracker?" he demanded calmly.

"Tracker? I know nothing of this tracker of which you speak," the scientist replied calmly. His eyes then whipped to the side, at which point he threw himself and Cecile to the seats, narrowly avoiding the hail of gunfire that shattered the window.

"You really don't understand the gravity of this situation, do you?" the general asked quietly. "The Avalon lead the choppers to this location, but with that beacon on you, they've orders to silence you. You think that anyone in the Britannian military is just going to let Schneizel's top scientists walk off with us is they have the option to deny us?"

Cecile looked at her boss, panic visible in her eyes. "Lloyd… I don't want to die!" she whispered in terror. "If we can live, then I want to live!"

Lloyd was glancing at his lap with a look of betrayal. "Those bastards…" he hissed.

"And now they have this vehicle marked," Ishitora continued nonchalantly. "Our only chance before they call in a naval air strike is for you to shut off that beacon so that we can escape into the tunnel network."

Lloyd, after one final moment of hesitation, took a small blinking disk out of his pocket, along with a compact Glock 21. The driver looked and started reaching for his machine pistol, but was stopped by Ishitora, who watched as the scientist tossed the device out the window, and shot it several times in the air. He then stood and moved partway out of the window, leaning on the car as he fired several rounds into an advancing crowd of Britannian commandos.

"Well, that's good enough for me," the general commented, climbing over the seat and standing up to take control of the roof-mounted swiveling .50 caliber machine gun.

Cecile was curled up on the floor of the vehicle, behind the driver's seat, clutching her head – desperately trying to block out the gunfire all around her.

"ISHITORA!" a voice crackled loudly over the radio stored on the dashboard, "STOP THE FUCKING CAR AND LET US IN!"

The driver calmly slammed on the brakes and swerved hard, tossing the other occupants forward; Lloyd just barely managed to avoid being thrown from her perch on the door. All heads snapped to the back as the trunk hatch opened, and three SDF soldiers threw themselves into the back.

"DRIVE!" Takao shouted.

"How the hell did you catch up to us?" Ishitora demanded from the MG.

"The Mega Cruiser I was in behind you got shot to hell!" the captain shouted back, removing the rear window pane and allowing himself and his two comrades to shove their rifles out and fire at a pursuing Humvee. "And how the hell did these guys all get here?"

"Air drops!" the driver called back, swerving hard left and right to dodge shots from an Apache gunship. "We had to disable the air defenses temporarily, or else that fancy flying battleship you idiots flew in on would've been blown to several million very tiny pieces!"

"So who forgot to turn them back ON?"

"Probably some triple-agent Honorary Britannian! A lot of them have families that were taken hostage by the military in order to ensure their loyalty to Britannia, and someone probably caved."

"One man…" Takao shook his head in amazement, "One man can cause all of this."

"One man was responsible for giving Britannia their current homeland, it's not that surpri- FUCK!" one of the riflemen in the rear tumbled backwards, clutching his bleeding shoulder, "MEDIC!"

"Is anyone here even remotely trained in medicine?"

"Cecile!" Lloyd ducked his head back in, "Get off the floor and save our new employers!"

"But-!" Cecile choked back in shock.

"IF THESE PEOPLE DIE, THEN SO DO WE! NOW GET UP AND SAVE THAT MAN!"

The woman was taken aback; in the many years that she and Lloyd had worked together, he had never honestly yelled at her before. She tentatively glanced over the seat at the downed man, and turned white as a sheet; she fell back into her fetal position, her body wracked with sobs.

"Shit!" Lloyd cursed, "CECILE! This is SO not the time!"

Through her sobs, the blue-haired woman managed to choke out, "I-I'm hemophobic! I-I j-just can't s-stand the sight of B-BLOOD! I-it's why I dropped out of m-medicine and took up robotics!"

Takao slammed his head against the side panel in frustration. "This is NOT in my job description! I was specifically told by my recruiter that EVERYONE I would work with was FINE with blood!"

"I didn't tell you that!" Ishitora snapped back in exasperation, "Now do something to calm her down and get her to save Shin!"

"I haven't had to calm a woman down since the Hammelburg Incident, goddammit! And I was completely unsuccessful, even then!"

Ishitora ducked from his perch and grabbed Takao by the collar, shaking him violently as he roared, "YOU WILL FOLLOW MY ORDERS AND YOU WILL FOLLOW THEM TO THE LETTER! DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR?"

The captain was substantially taken aback, but shouted back a "SIR YES SIR!" before vaulting over the seats; once he was crouched low of Cecile's sobbing, prone form, he was once again struck by the gravity of the task ahead. "Dammit... Onee-chan was always the gentle one," he muttered sadly. He placed a hand on the woman's shoulder and spoke softly, "Cecile? Cecile, listen to me." Her sobs subsided slightly as she glanced up at him, her eyes still brimming with tears. Takao internally cringed, but carried on strongly, "I'm not going to force you to do anything. I can't force you to do anything. But you just need to know that if this man dies, he will have died saving your life – and despite being able to do so, you did not save him." Even as she quivered further, he carried on boldly.

"You are a competent and capable woman, Cecile. We've been seeking you out for months, and it was pure coincidence that you were aboard the Avalon. We're prepared to offer you anything that you can possibly seek materially, but at this very moment – my men are giving their lives for you. Not just because it is their duty, but because you are innocent. And I know that very few people can stand by and watch good men die without doing a damned thing about it."

"So I'm asking you, Cecile Croomy – as a fellow soldier and a good person – and I'm asking you as a commanding officer having to watch his men die… Please, save him!" Takao was really getting into this thing, even though inside, he was thoroughly disgusted with having to pull a guilt trip like this. "Save him for his country! For his comrades, and his family! … And I beg of you, save him for me."

Cecile… Was honestly, genuinely moved. Even though she could tell it was a ploy, she could see a genuine hint of desperation in his eyes – which sharpened as the man in the back cried out in pain, clutching his shoulder desperately. The second man had hit the deck, and had used the soldier's sleeve as a tourniquet; but it was obviously a temporary measure, to stem the massive blood rush that would soon kill him.

It was at that moment that Cecile managed to swallow her fears, even as yet another volley of bullets crashed through the windows, whereupon Ishitora replied by filling the attacker with hot lead. "Somebody get me a first aid kit!" she ordered quietly, shakily pulling herself over the seat. Takao allowed himself a soft smile as he ducked low, reaching around the front passenger's seat to retrieve the kit from beneath the paneling.

A high-power sniper round then pierced through the door, slamming into the dash just in front of Takao's face; shrapnel flew, and he gave a startled and pained cry as three pieces passed over and through his face – one leaving a deep gash across his upper right cheek, another implanting itself just below his left eye, and the third scratching his cornea of the same eye. "SONOVABITCH!" he swore loudly, squeezing his injured eye shut – further agitating the wound – and groping around for the tin box. He finally located the handle, and tossed the kit back before staggering forward and smashing his head into the reinforced interior. "Kami motherfucking DAMMIT!"

"Takao!" Cecile cried out in concern.

"I'm fine!" he snapped back, "It's just a flesh wound! Fix him!"

The scientist was about to protest, but withheld it and looked back down to her current patient. She opened up the kit and sifted through its contents, whilst addressing the soldier. "There's no anesthetic in the kit, so you're going to have to tough it out and stay with me, okay?" she said softly. The man nodded, his eyes squeezed tightly shut while still clutching the wound location. "I'm going to sow it up and then wrap it tight. When I say, you need to slide the bandage down slightly and expose the gash, okay?" Another nod.

She blanched at the amount of blood that had soaked the makeshift tourniquet, but looked at the injured Takao in front and shook it off with determination. She threaded the needle and looked down. "Alright, now just take it slowly…" He nodded weakly and slid it down, biting his lip hard as it dragged over. Cecile placed the needle on the skin, and with a deep breath, pushed it through. The man gave a slight whimper, but otherwise remained conscious and coherent. She slowly started stitching up the wound, a little bit staggered but otherwise cleanly. When she reached the point where the bullet was stopped at the bone, she pulled out a pair of tweezers. "I'm going to have to remove the bullet now. Do you want something to bite down on?" He gave a weak nod.

The second rifleman, who had resumed firing out of the back window as the car made its way out of the base and onto an open highway, caught one of his empty shell casings as it was ejected. He let it cool for a second, and tossed it to Cecile. "Shin, bite the bullet!" he called back as his rifle began chattering once more. Cecile raised the brass casing and lowered it slowly over his mouth, whereupon he unclenched his teeth just enough to clamp back down on the closed end tightly. The brass crushed easily, but remained otherwise intact; he didn't have enough pressure to bite through it.

She probed around in the wound gently, occasionally eliciting a slight twitch. Once the prongs finally clamped into the end of the squashed 5.56mm round, she worked it out slowly and then released it with a slight jerk. Placing the bullet into the open med kit, she finished stitching up the wound and gave a warm smile.

"You did great, Shin," she told him softly. The young man, barely twenty-five, offered a weak smile and then finally allowed himself to fall unconscious. Cecile wiped away any lingering blood and then wrapped it in gauze, just tight enough to soak up anything that might leak out, and staunch any bursts should a stitch pop.

Takao, currently clenching a piece of rubber torn from the butt stock of a rifle tightly between his teeth, offered her a congratulatory grin. When a rocket impacted nearby with enough force to throw everyone not sitting off of their feet, his features twisted into an annoyed scowl, and he stuck his head out the window.

"Goddammit Ishitora, how long does it take for a fifty cal to scare off ONE FUCKING GUNSHIP?"

"This motherfucker refuses to go down and DIE!" the general shouted back in agitation, letting off another long burst; he missed by a mile.

"Get out of the fucking turret," Takao growled impatiently, "I can't see shit out of my left eye, and I can still shoot better than that!" He then looked at the other scientist, who was still attempting to shoot down an Apache gunship with a Glock pistol. "Lloyd, David isn't beating Goliath with a nine millimeter versus five centimeter-thick armor; get inside and make sure that Cecile doesn't relapse."

Everyone swapped positions, and the driver pulled a few evasive maneuvers while Takao expertly loaded a fresh belt into the machine gun. He yanked back the action, which snapped into place with a sharp, metallic ringing, and he trained the sights on the AH-64 that was pursuing them.

"BURN IN HELL, MOTHERFUCKER!" he cackled madly, the MG chattering quickly as the .50 caliber rounds lanced through the air; the first few shots of the stream missed, but Takao quickly reoriented his aiming pattern, and soon enough, the rounds were chewing through the relatively thin skin of the chopper's front. Within seconds, the pursued party watched as blood splattered across the inside of the windscreen, and the helicopter began spiraling out of control; it fell in a wild twirling frenzy from a thousand feet, and hit the ground, exploding spectacularly as the fuel tanks were impacted.

"WOO! How ya like me now, BITCH!" the captain hooted joyfully. Lloyd looked on impassively, and at the end, turned to Ishitora.

"Does this happen often?" The response was a shrug.

"Usually it takes a good hard rock soundtrack and a knife… But I guess that several hundred rounds of fifty-cal BMG works too." They were both startled as Takao started to spasm, and then fell out of the turret position, crashing over the seats in a wince-worthy fashion and landing in a crumpled heap in the back; he was clutching the side of his face and groaning lowly in pain. Ishitora saw a small stream of blood leak out from behind his hand, and immediately pointed it out to Cecile.

The woman gasped in alarm as the captain started to spasm wildly, his groaning getting louder and the bleeding getting worse.

"Takao…" she said quietly, "I'm going to need you to move your hands so I can see the damage." His single green eye turned towards her, shimmering with raw pain, but he slowly complied. She gasped in shock at the damage; a small noticeable slice ran across his narrowed eye, and the gash below it made for an effect similar to crying blood. "Oh, Takao…" she whispered, tears welling up in her eyes. Behind her, Ishitora's gaze was hard, with a bit of sorrow underneath.

"Patch him up; we'll be at a way station in ten minutes," he said firmly. Everyone else moved into the front seats, with the general taking shotgun, and Lloyd being sandwiched between Takao's riflemen.

Takao's single good eye squeezed open, and he tried to offer her a collected grin; the effect was lessened substantially by the blood dripping from his mouth after impacting his face on the dash. "Heh… Don't go crying over me now, little miss Brit… After all, I'm… Just that bastard that kidnapped you… Got your own guys shooting at you…"

"Quit talking and save your strength!" she hissed, a few tears spilling over. "You're going to be fine…"

"Yeah, right… Only one good eye, and my career is basically over…" he chuckled, then hissed in pain from the jarring movement.

"Is your career all you ever think about?" she whispered sadly.

"My career is saving the lives of hundreds of thousands of innocent Japanese every day," he said weakly, his voice cracking from dehydration. "All I want… Is to see my countrymen… Free…" He gave a hacking cough, a little bit of blood spattering across the front of Cecile's uniform, "I'll do whatever it takes… Down… With… Britannia… *cough* Long… Live… Japan…" He then fell unconscious. Cecile panicked, thinking he was dead, and fell onto his chest, sobbing uncontrollably.

'Why am I feeling this way?' she thought between fits of crying, 'WHY? He took us prisoner… Made us betray our country… So why does this hurt so much…?' she paused suddenly when she felt his heart thudding slowly in his chest, and gave a gasp of joy. She then suddenly took note of the sticky liquid staining her face, and immediately realized that it was tears.

She swiped a finger across her cheek and pulled it away, staring at the viscous crimson liquid. 'And why don't I feel anything anymore?'

She then realized that Takao was still bleeding. 'SHIT!' She fumbled for the bandages in the kit; the gash on his cheek was fairly deep, but it would scar over in the next few days. The one below his eye, however…

"Does anyone have any anesthetic?" she asked suddenly, glancing up at the other occupants of the LAV. The soldiers looked at her oddly, but Lloyd, surprisingly enough, pulled out a syringe with a vial of clear liquid inside.

"See, I have this condition…" he scratched the back of his neck sheepishly. Cecile wordlessly snatched the syringe and looked down sadly at the unconscious man; she then plunged the needle into his neck, where the anesthetic dispersed through his system from the top down. His breathing evened out, and he lay motionless.

She then took up the needle and thread, and proceeded to stitch shut the gash beneath his eye, careful to avoid catching it on his eyelid. Once she finished, she shut the box, and sat motionlessly over him, staring down on his neutral features forlornly.

In front of them, Lloyd leaned forward and stretched his hand out to Ishitora in a 'gimme' gesture; he had exchanged a few words about the current situation with the general outside, over the chattering gunfire. Ishitora now owed him five hundred yen, which the man begrudgingly slapped into his open palm.

1430 hours
Waystation Kilo-Bravo, 20 miles outside of Kyoto

Ishitora and co., minus Takao and Cecile, walked into the command center of the observation post, which above ground was disguised as a small seniors' home.

"What's the status of the airbase?" he demanded, turning immediately to the OIC. The man offered a salute with one hand, whilst tapping away on a computer with the other. A panel of screens behind him lit up, displaying several angles of Britannian commandos being hauled away at gunpoint by SFG operatives.

"The base was quickly secured as soon as the focus was shifted onto your vehicle, sir," the man replied simply. "Any pursuers were eliminated; all others killed or captured."

"Any damage to the facilities?" At that point, the OIC sucked in a deep breath.

"… None to facilities, but those ArcLight missiles that you had taken away to be examined? Those were all destroyed." The officer stood blankly as Ishitora's fist slammed into a computer panel, showing the smoldering remains of the assembled missiles. The screen shattered on impact, and the general pulled away a bloodied fist; he nonchalantly picked out the shards of glass and wrapped it up with a roll of bandages that he pulled from his pocket.

"I see," his eyes narrowed, "Is that all? No damage to the Avalon?"

"Thankfully none, sir."

"Well at least it's not a total loss, then…" Ishitora sighed.

"Although the ship was confiscated by the BPG." Another screen was smashed, and the bandages were reapplied.

"What gives them the fucking right?" he hissed dangerously.

"General Katase's orders, sir; he said that we hold no use for such a weapon in our current state of organization. The BPG, however, will be able to press an offensive against Britannia, whereas we, having forsaken the right to wage war in the eyes of the world, are incapable of doing so; therefore, the technology would be of better use to them."

"So, he's in their pocket then, huh…" Ishitora muttered, glaring off into space as he stood deep in thought, unconsciously palming the pistol at his hip. "Don't bother reporting to him about the scientists, then; he might find out, and he might not. I don't give a damn."

The officer was taken aback by the order. "A-are you sure, sir?"

"Yes. I have a hunch that the General might be losing sight of our goals in this theater." He wordlessly exited the room, leaving the poor conflicted OIC fumbling around, deciding whether or not to reach for the phone.

While this went on, Takao lay forlornly on a Red Cross cot in the infirmary, the upper left side of his face covered in a gauze pad, held tight by bandages. He gave a dejected sigh and reached over to the crate beside the cot, which currently held his P226 pistol, custom engraved with the spread-winged gargoyle of the SBU.

Cecile entered tentatively, glancing around outside and then inside to make sure that no one was watching. "… Takao?" she said hesitantly. The captain looked over, a brief glint appearing in his eye – surprise? – before he placed the pistol on the table.

"Miss Croomy?" he intoned blandly, fixing her with an equally blank stare.

"I… just came to see how you are doing," she explained shyly, a small bundle hidden behind her back.

Takao quirked a brow. "What've you got there?" he asked slowly.

"Just… something I picked up in the garden," she revealed the bundle, which held pure white flowers.

"… Sakura blossoms," he said breathlessly, "I… I haven't seen any since my family home was destroyed, seven years ago…" Despite his very best efforts, a lone tear slipped from his eye. Cecile handed him the bundle, which he accepted shakily.

"Yes, well…" Cecile replied sadly, "One of the gardeners apparently knows you, so he thought that you'd appreciate it." She turned to leave.

"W-wait…" Takao called out weakly. She stopped and turned to see him holding the flowers in one hand, looking at her with a pitiful visage full of sadness, "Thank you for the flowers. P-please… Stay with me? I-I'm just so lonely here by myself…" he admitted.

The young woman was surprised, and blushed furiously. "… I suppose…" she replied hesitantly, tentatively approaching the cot next to him and perching on the edge.

The two sat in silence, not at all unpleasant, until Takao spoke up. "I suppose I should probably thank you for patching me up in the jeep, eh?" he chuckled weakly, "The medics say that I probably would've been worse off if you hadn't stopped the bleeding; apparently holding it off for as long as I did, I was about a minute away from going into shock from blood loss."

Cecile's blush returned full force. "O-oh, it was nothing at all… Just doing my duty, as you said…"

Takao shifted upright, abruptly clutching at his head in pain when he doubled over; Cecile jumped up and set an arm on his back to support him. He put a hand on her shoulder gently.

"No, it wasn't just 'nothing'," he assured her firmly; her cheeks glowed brighter. "You rose to the occasion and saved the lives of my men, as well as my own. You rose above and beyond," he offered her a gentle smile, which she unconsciously returned with one of her own.

They both seemed to ignore the fact that at the time, he had very effectively and deceitfully manipulated her; it was semantics at this point.

"And Takao…" she said shyly, "For what it's worth, I apologize for what Lloyd said earlier. He can just be such a distant, insensitive idiot sometimes…"

Takao simply chuckled. "It's fine. Ishitora is my superior, and he's a lot like that. Those two will probably get along just fine."

Cecile's thoughts immediately strayed off elsewhere. She then blurted out boldly, "W-well maybe you and I can get to know each other better…" When he quirked a brow, she waved her hands negatively and elaborated, "S-since we'll probably be working together!"

Takao's head tilted slightly as he examined her features, and he then grinned slyly. "Oh, I see… "Get you know each other better", huh?"

"THAT'S NOT WHAT I MEANT!" she shouted indignantly, her eyes squeezing tightly shut. When she opened them, he had moved closer, to the point where their faces were a few meager inches apart.

"I believe that it's common courtesy for the patient to thank his doctor properly, no?" he whispered huskily, reaching up and cupping her cheek gently. Cecile dipped her head low, her cheeks now a deep velvet color.

"You don't want me," she replied sadly, "I'm just a lowly, unattractive assistant…"

"Unattractive?" he asked incredulously, "Have you looked in a mirror… well, ever? You're gorgeous!" Cecile let out a high-pitched squeak as he pulled her down on top of him. He chuckled warmly, which made her smile and giggle a bit. "And as for that 'lowly assistant' thing, just a little military education – "Adjutant" is basically synonymous with "Ranking Officer's Little Bitch"." She giggled more, and was soon laughing loudly. He was still laughing, and after another minute or so, they both finished and took a few deep breaths to collect themselves.

Cecile by now was fully aware of her current (and very compromising) position, but she now found it to be actually quite comfortable. "I could get used to this…" she sighed blissfully, settling further into his chest.

"Oh? So you like to be on top, do you?" he grinned mischievously, "I'll keep that in mind." Cecile then registered the hand that was currently resting on her backside.

"Down, boy," she smirked, feeling oddly… empowered. "I saved your life; you've got to do something for me before we can… operate on even ground," she whispered seductively. This time, Takao's cheeks darkened slightly, before he grinned broadly.

"Oh, you and I will get along just fine…" he whispered back, nipping at her earlobe slightly; she snapped out of her previous haze and squeaked.

"CE-CILE!" Lloyd's call came from the hallway in a sing-song voice, "OH WHERE ARE YOOOOUUU?"

"Bastard…" Cecile and Takao hissed lowly in unison. She looked down at him and with their faces a mere two inches apart, said, "I… Guess I'll see you around."

"I guess so," Takao replied with a hint of disappointment. "And hey," he added, wrapping his arms around her, "Don't take crap from anybody, you hear?" He pulled back slightly and kissed her forehead; Cecile blushed once more, which faded as she reluctantly moved out of his embrace and off of him.

"Get well soon," she whispered to him as she stepped out. She came face-to-face with Lloyd as she rounded the corner, and promptly slugged him in the stomach. "And damn you to hell," she said as she walked away.

The white-haired scientist miraculously managed to tense the muscles in his abdomen as the punch came, and just narrowly avoided being floored. As he recovered and coughed from the lack of oxygen in his lungs, he looked around the corner at the single door in the hall, and moved to open it-

"If you open that door, I cannot guarantee the continued presence of your head," a male voice grunted from inside. Lloyd wisely and ruthlessly killed off any thoughts of investigation, and chased after Cecile.

Inside, Takao allowed the slide on his pistol to snap back into place; his only loaded clip rested on the crate beside him. "That'll teach that fucker…" he growled.

2000 hours
Undisclosed Location

"This could all end right here, Jonathan."

"Rot in hell, motherfucker," OSI Agent John Robinson spat through several shattered teeth, along with bleeding gums and a swollen cheek.

"All you need to do is answer a few simple questions for us, Jonathan," the shadowed individual said emotionlessly. "Five simple questions, and you can go right back to your wife and daughter."

"I'm not telling you Japanese bastards jack-fucking-SHIT!" the agent roared for what felt like the hundredth time. "So you can go FUCK YOURSELVES!"

Another individual, whose visage was also shrouded in darkness, darted out from another corner and slugged him hard across the face. "SPEAK, YOU WORTHLESS BRITANNIAN DOG!" he roared frighteningly. Still, the OSI operative remained impassive.

A third man walked out of the shadows. "What will it take to make you speak?"

"Just fucking kill me, assholes. I won't tell you anything, as I have said for the past two months."

A new man entered the room, wearing a hooded sweatshirt with the hood drawn over his face, and carrying a sleek silver briefcase.

"I have the serum, as requested," he spoke in a normal voice, in comparison to his modulated comrades. He set the case on a table in the corner, and opened it up; inside was an injector, with a syringe filled with a black-speckled grey liquid. "Solution RH-337-B; termed by the original Britannian scientists as "Refrain", and renamed by our own people, "Nostalgia". Not the most original, I know; but we were on a schedule." The man slipped on a pair of sterile white gloves and picked up the injector.

"This is your last chance before we resort to more… Questionable methods," the first man explained.

"Here's a tip; go to the local pharmacy, ask for something called 'Viagra', and it'll help you to GO FUCK YOURSELVES!" Robinson declared boldly and venomously.

The man with the injector grimaced. "I really hate my job," he grumbled, plunging the injector into the agent's arm and squeezing back the trigger. Robinson's vision became hazy, and he soon lost consciousness.

"At least this one drops the victim on their feet," he offered.

"I still hate having to do this. I'd rather have beat him until he talked; much more humane," the gruffer man protested.

"This version is much more effective than the others," the chemist explained. "And since we have an antidote this time, it'll be all the more ruthless in the end."

"… This is the most ungodly cruel thing I've ever seen."

"It's necessary."

"That's what Charles said."

Robinson's Subconscious

"John… John! Wake up honey, you're going to be late!"

Robinson slowly opened his eyes, staring up at the ceiling of the brightly-lit room; it was his bedroom… In his home… In Detroit.

He looked forward and stared into the angelic features of his loving wife, Sophia. Her long brown hair hung down, framing her heart-shaped face, full lips, and stunning blue eyes.

"Where…?" he muttered, sitting fully upright and glancing around the room; everything was where it was supposed to be, at least from what he could recall. "Is this real… Or was that all… a dream?"

"What are you talking about, dear?" Sophia asked pleasantly, her eyes closing lightly as she gave him a heart-melting smile. "Have an interesting dream?"

"Japan… We invaded Japan, seven years ago… What year is it?" he asked, looking around for his phone. The touch screen smartphone rested on his bedside table, and he pulled up the calendar; April 22nd, 2010 ATB.

"Must've been quite the dream," she laughed heartily. "Come on, sleepyhead; you're going to be late for work!"

Robinson unsteadily moved out of bed, his body feeling odd; he moved to the bathroom without saying a word to Sophia, and shut the door quietly, staring into the mirror.

When he was in Japan, he was thirty-seven; his body looked thirty again.

"John, is everything alright?" Sophia asked genuinely, peeking into the master bath with a look of worry.

"I-it… Must've just been a vivid dream," he hesitated, his mind split into two conflicting truths – trapped in Japan, or back home in Britannia.

Sophia smiled softly. "Well I'm here if you want to talk," she planted a kiss on his cheek.

It felt so real…

It felt so good…

Fuck the Japanese.

John smiled, and pulled his wife into a hug. "Thanks, Sophie." He spotted his suit hanging in its usual place and pulled it on, somehow knowing that he had taken a shower last night. "Is Michaela awake yet?"

"Yes, she's downstairs having breakfast," she replied cheerily.

"Great, I'll be down in a bit," he kissed her cheek, and straightened his tie, "I need to get my gear together." Sophia nodded and stepped out; John reached into his closet and removed the DNA-lock safe box where he stored his more… lethal gear.

Beretta M92F pistol – check. Four-inch switchblade – check. OSI identification codes and identification card – check.

He stored everything on his person, and retrieved his briefcase; within seconds, he was down in his stunning modern kitchen.

His five year-old daughter, Michaela Angela Robinson, was placing her cereal bowl in the sink. "Daddy!" she cried happily, running towards him. He smoothly picked her up and raised her high above his head, laughing along with her.

"How's daddy's little girl this morning?" he chuckled, setting her down on a stool at the breakfast bar.

"I'm good!" she replied, giving a toothy smile that made his heart melt, much like Sophia's; like mother, like daughter, apparently. He was pulled away as the landline rang.

"Honey, it's Joe!"

Joseph Banks, his long-time partner. John smiled as he took the phone from his wife. "Morning, Joe – what's up?"

"Robby, hey! Listen, the boss called me this morning. He says that we're getting a week off before we get shipped off for our next assignment."

"Really? That's great! Hey, you wanna come over and help me finish up that tree house for Michaela?"

"Sure man, Bridget is working double shift at the hospital; I'll be over in ten." Joe hung up, and John placed the phone back in its cradle, turning to Sophia with a wide grin.

"Guess who has the week off?" he said in a sing-song voice. Sophie gave a squeal of joy and leapt into his arms.

"Honey, that's amazing!" she laughed melodically.

"Yep! Joe and I are going to finish Michaela's tree house, and then I was thinking that we could send her over to the Carson's so that you and I could spend a little time together…" he wiggled his brows suggestively, and she blushed and swatted his shoulder, giggling.

"I think that can be arranged…" she said seductively.

John couldn't have been happier. Maybe Japan really was just a crazy dream…

Then he woke up.

2005 hours
Reality

Robinson woke up in that same dark room, feeling every bit of pain that he had before. The four men still stood around him, looking at him expectantly; the chemist that had become number four was holding an empty injector, loaded with a different serum.

"Well?"

John shook his head violently, desperately trying to bring back his home; but it wouldn't come. He was fully struck by the fact that he had been drugged. "Wha… WHAT THE HELL, YOU BASTARDS?"

"Nostalgia," the gruff man answered calmly, "A variant of the drug Refrain, that you yourself were helping to peddle to the Japanese people. Instead of creating mockeries of the good ol' days, hoping that it would be correct, Nostalgia directly taps into your brain chemistry, more effectively examining and replicating your happiest memories – down to every last sight, smell and sound. Although you can also affect the illusion; but it just adjusts to your actions according to your personal memories of the people involved, and their personalities."

"You sick fuckers!" Robinson hissed, "Toying with peoples' memories, and then just yanking it away!"

"Oh, but that is where Britannia and Japan differ, Agent Robinson. We have no intention of trying to push this product off on anyone else; it is purely for interrogation purposes, and is created in the smallest dosages possible. The difference with your situation here… Is that we can make whatever you saw a reality; with slight time differences of course, but I'm sure that your wife is just as attractive at thirty-six."

John froze up on the spot. "W-what do you mean, "a reality"? How could you possibly do that?"

"We can set you free. We can get your family out of Britannia and to a peaceful foreign region of your choice; and you never have to see any of us again," the third man explained. "We can even give you your best friend back."

"B-Banks? He's ALIVE?"

"Alive and quite well," the chemist stepped in. "He was captured in a raid on the OSI warehouse in Osaka; and he's been quite cooperative. He knows that you were captured, and he just wants you back."

"Joe…" John muttered in shock. "… And you say that you can guarantee my family's safety?"

"Absolutely. The BPG agents working with us have already located and approached them; they're just waiting on your word. Sophia's been waiting for you since you left for your long-term shift three years ago; she hasn't so much as touched a man since then."

"Sophie…"

"Little Michaela is on Christmas Break; she's the top of her seventh grade class."

"Michaela…"

"Your adopted son Aaron made a special wish as he blew out his sixteenth candle, at his mother's request; he wants his dad back."

"Aaron…"

"And Joe is waiting in the next room. All you need to do is answer FIVE. SIMPLE. QUESTIONS."

Jonathan Robinson finally cracked. "Alright…" he sighed, "I'll talk."

End Chapter

End Note: Holy flying shit; longest chapter to date… I think. I would've gone for 20k, but I got the feeling that I probably already lost the attention spans of a lot of people by 15.

OOCness about! It is intentional. That is kind of a given by now.

Final pairings for anyone who particularly cares: Lelouch/Euphie(/Milly), Rai/Kallen(reviewer request), Takao/Cecile. Problems, haters? I believe that Robinson summarized my sentiments in that regard with his fourth "Eff you" statement (courtesy of a Helsing comedy spinoff that I cannot think of the name of at this moment).

This was a biggie. Locations where this was written include but are not limited to: Ted Steven International Airport, Anchorage, Alaska; 20,000 feet above Fargo, North Dakota, en route to Minneapolis; and of course, my current location, Casey Lake, Northern Michigan.

Read and Review!

-KFR