Before I start anything, let me announce this. This will be the last chapter for Code Geass: The Force Unleashed for the year. I'm with family and right now I don't have much time for myself. I'll try to post one last chapter for the My Hero Academia story and revise some of my older work but no promises. Admittedly, I thought that I would have been able to publish up till chapter 26 before the year ended but I'm been super busy this time round. But I'm very happy with the support I've received for this story and how I've been able to write a story that you all enjoy.
Pkd – You make a good point. Shirley had like at least two years to get to know him while Kallen only knew he existed for around 6 months(I think that's how long season 1 was) Luckily such an event would not be likely here as she and him can get to know each other, outside…work.
Thristan – Thank you, I watch a lot of Air-crash Investigation so I tried to make it both good to read but somewhat realistic.
Vein Bloodborne – The thought is an interesting plot device as Lulu gonna have one for political reasons(thought the fact that he would need one at all will piss him off to no end) And happy holidays to you too.
IS6A6E – Sorry about the lack of lightsaber action and unfortunately, there isn't much of it in this chapter either. But I do promise that the next chapter will have no knightmare combat and solely be between people, meaning lightsabers are gonna be used.
Geer123 – Yes, yes they are. They can't expect to enter a country that's slowly becoming a warzone and not have to deal with some serious shit. The paperwork is my way of helping to show the rebellion isn't all guns and battles but paper-pushing and meetings as well. This chapter will have some more Kaguya moments and I'll try to put him Rakshata as well. Also, happy holidays to you too.
Chapter 23: The Strange Happenings
1st October 2020 a.t.b./3 9688 BBY:
Unknown Region:
Milky Way Galaxy:
Earth/Sol-3:
Area 11:
Crash site of Flight IMF-G12:
"Hurry up with the photographing, the sooner that gets done, the faster we can clear the area."
"I got the Black boxes over here!"
"Good, you three! Go help them with that."
"Jesus…" Bart said after a moment. It had only been 2 days since the plan went t down and they arrived in Area 11 but this was the first time they had been granted permission by the Viceroy to see the wreck site. They are situated in the forested area west of the settlement formally known as Chichibu-Tama-Kai National park. The clearing they were in was created by the crash. Though the early snow fall was making it hard to tell as the scars from the incident were covered by the white sheet from nature.
"I know, this is my first plane crash as well." Alfred said as although they had seen their fair share of war and destruction, they had never had the chance to see a plane of that size go down, only the aftermath in passing.
"And clearly not the last. Already 5 others have been shot down all over central Japan." Claudio stated as that was one of the reasons the Viceroy wanted them to stay put and get medical check-ups. Granted it was only military craft being targeted but they didn't know when and where Zero decided that all non-Black Knight aircraft were to be purged from the skies.
"Those cowards…." David seethed. He had been rather angry as of late. "They didn't even the stones to wait for us to meet them in combat." He finished as he kicked a piece of wreckage, they didn't even get here in time to see to the removal of the pilot's bodies.
"As painful as it is to counter that statement brother, only a fool lets his foes gain strength if he has the chance to disrupt it." Edgar said, though he didn't like it any more than the rest of them did.
"Get used to it because this is the reality of the situation."
"My Lord!" The Glaston knights said as one as they saluted the Knight of Nine who had arrived some time before them.
"Save it, I've had to deal with media parasites hunting me down for the past 36 hours because of this incident. We need find out how they even shot you down and where they got such equipment." Nonette explained as she walked up to them. "Speaking of which, as shitty as the reception was, welcome to Area 11." She said, trying to break the ice with a bad joke.
"Can't say we disagree mam. We would have expected such a greeting from the Euros, hell even the Chinese." Bart answered as they all walked into the tent behind them to view over the progress of the recovery.
"Yes about that." Edgar asked as they all entered. "Have they found out anything?"
"Yes, they have found out the sight of the missile attack but we can't follow the tracks due to the early snowfall. But from the size of those tracks, we can say that it was quite a large vehicle firing at you guys." Nonette broke the news to them as she had seen the pictures from the site they found. Whatever was there was long gone and the snow messed with the tracks, making it near impossible to salvage anything of use.
"And because of that, we don't have any knightmares." Claudio finished as they had recovered them but the fall had basically rendered scrap metal. Hell, most of the parts weren't even feasible as spares.
"Don't worry about that, we have some spare gloucesters that we hand supply you with but I suggest you have Earl Asplund upgrade them first." Nonette recommended to them as she had spoken with the rather oddball noble before she left and after she got the update on the progress of her knightmare, she asked him if he could her a favour.
"The terrorist knightmares are that impressive." Bart asked her, wanting an honest opinion from an officer higher ranked then them and clearly the better pilot.
"That and more, especially their aces it seems. They pilot the custom frames you must have been reviewing." Nonette reminded them as she didn't want to see such talent struck down just because they didn't know what they were walking into.
"So…when do we get to work?" Alfred asked her, eager to get down and busy. They had an foe that needed to be stop and not much time to do it.
(Meanwhile in the north of the country – Near Morioka)
"Keep up the heavy fire!" One of the GINNs called out as they stood on a ridge and fire down at an imperial convoy.
"Move in! Tear those knightmares apart!" Another called out as three moved in for the kill, pulled out their blades and engage the sunderland protection detail. "K-3, keep you position, your our rear watch."
"Sir!" The fourth replied as he stood on a higher point of the field, surveying the surrounding area and combat areas.
'Things are going smoothly, this convoy wasn't expecting us today. Good thing we switched up the attack schedule.' Suzaku thought to himself as he cut down his fifth sunderland. They had been tasked with strangling the northern imperial bases of supplies by attacking their supple convoys. This was a smaller one as it only had about 12 trucks but the 11 sunderlands just made them too good a target not to attack.
"Sir, enemy bird are inbound, ETA 40 seconds." One of his men reported as he paused to look north-east and like the trooper reported, he could make out 7 attack choppers heading towards them but they were still pretty far out, around 4300m.
"Are they? Hmmm" Suzaku replied as he took a moment to read the situation. "That's faster than normal. They must be shaping up. Have the anti-air unit deal with them. Focus on the objective, we can't let those supplies get through to the northern imperial bases." He ordered as he went back into the fray. He preferred this kind of battle rather than leadership roles, that was Lelouch's thing.
"Sir!"
"This is getting easy." One of the pilots joked over the comms as they fought with a sunderland armed with a silver lance.
"Careful, pride comes before the fall young one" Another warned him as he dodged a blow before he stabbed the offending knightmare in the arm and ripped back, severely damaged the enemy unit.
"Young one? You're like, 6 years older than us." The third one joined in as she just used her rifle to keep the enemy pinned down before she took aim for the trucks. They didn't stand a chance.
"6 years more experienced than you." The second one countered with a chuckle as he severed the head of an enemy knightmare, forcing the knightmare to automatically eject the cockpit block.
"There goes another attack chopper. How many is that this week?" The first one asked as they all paused to look up and saw that the choppers, though now less than 3500m from them were busy dodging the wave after wave of anti-air missiles and gun fire. Some were not so lucky and had been hit already.
"About the sixth. At this rate, we'll have a baker's dozen by the end of the week." One of them said as they looked to the site, though one of them started to act odd.
"Yuko, you alright?" The elder one asked as he turned his machine to face him but got no response. So he moved closer to investigate, maybe his radio was damaged.
"Yuko?-What the hell!" The man started but had to pull himself as the pilot tried to cut him in half. He was able to avoid the first slash but it cost him an arm, the arm holding his sword.
"Yuko, what are you doing? Stop!" The other pilot yelled at him as he turned to try and fire on the rogue unit but the traitor beat him to the draw and blew holes in his armour, causing his frame to blow up before he could even eject.
"Alert, K-11 has gone rogue, I repeat-K-11-!" The elder reported over the radio as he tried to go for his rifle but suffered a blow to the left leg, throwing him to the ground.
"Hmmm?" Suzaku asked as he turned to face that side of the battlefield and what he saw shocked him. 'Oh Lord, what is he doing!' he thought to himself as he raced over the rogue unit to try and get the thing to stop before any more of their troops wound up dead "K-11, halt immediately!" But all he received from the rogue unit was gunfire which he had to avoid.
"Shit, he isn't stopping, guess I have no choice." He thought to himself as he got in close and pulled out his second blade. He got passed the knightmare's guard and before it could counter, he cut the unit in two by the waist. 'That'll keep him.' "K-2, K-5. Detain him. He is to have no human contact." He ordered two other machines that had not ended up damaged by this act of betrayal.
"Yes sir." One of them replied as they both moved to grab the upper half of the machine but not before disarming it of both arms to ensure the pilot could fight back.
'What was that all about? Was he a spy? Then why wait for such a moment?' Suzaku thought to himself as he tried to make sense of this. How could a traitor infiltrate their ranks so easily? "No matter, I got a mission to complete." He resolved to finish his internal debate another time as they still needed to destroy the remaining supply trucks and their escorts, which had taken the confusion from the friendly fire to regroup, meaning that he'll be here longer then he would have liked.
(Later – Black Knight Northern Honshu Command)
"And that was what happened." Suzaku finished his report of the incident as he sat back down. He was with the BK high command in one of their numerous secret bases spread across Japan. This one was also underground and built like a bunker complex, making it more than ready to withstand just about any form of attack their enemies could throw at them. Right now the group were in the main meeting room of said complex.
"That…is indeed troubling." Leila said after taking a moment to think. Ever since their meeting with, the leaders of the Black Knights had opted to remove their masks and hoods in private meetings if they felt like such.
"Yes, I was under the impression that all troops were vetted without their knowledge to weed out potential spies and informants." Lockon thought aloud as he stroked his chin.
"They are," Suzaku replied before he pressed a button on the keypad in front of him which showed the pilot's in question records on the large screen mounted on the wall. "I pulled the pilots file. There was nothing in it to suggest he was capable of this."
"Speaking of, what were the losses?" Warwick asked.
"[Sigh] He turned on his squad and was able to fire on three of them as well as anyone who got close. Two didn't make it and the third along with nine others have been transferred to the medical division for treatment. She won't see active combat for at least a month." Suzaku reported as he had to personally escort the injured. One never really did get used to the injuries fire and shrapnel could cause.
"Unfortunate. But the best we can do right now is find out, why one of ours turned." Zero threw in his opinion, he was the only one that still opted to wear his full gear, helmet included and was the one who was seen without the least.
"What are your orders?" Akito asked from his place standing guard behind Leila's seat.
"Have him transferred to III(Imprisonment, Interrogation and Intelligence). They'll get the answers out of him soon enough." Zero ordered coldly. And for good reason, their III division was trained to get info by any means allowed by international law and were well versed in exploiting loop-holes from said conventions. If your sent there, you will spill you guts….sooner or later.
"Yes sir." Akito responded as he radioed the order down to a trooper standing guard outside the room.
"Now onto other matters. What of the status of our northern raids?" Oscar asked, speaking up for the first time in the meeting.
"We've been successful so far in routing 4 different convoys in the past three days." Kallen reported as she the screen changed to a map of northern Honshu with the areas where they found and destroyed convoys marked.
"We've also been successful in stationing troops near the city of Ninohe. With this new establishment, we now have both the men and means to cut off the main rail line the colonials are using to supply their Hokkaido and northernmost Honshu bases by land." Liu Mei added as she used her own keypad to highlight the location she was talking about. This was good as it placed them in a favourable spot for future operations.
"Yes and because our spies have reported that they don't have enough ships to just send supplies by sea, this will help our northern units since the enemy will be short on supplies." Tierra stated as now it'll that much harder for Hokkaido to properly function under colonial rule, meaning more leg room for them.
"We've also been able to set up supply hubs outside of Kanto thanks to our overseas front companies and allies." Warwick reported as thanks to Kyoto, they had really been able to properly function as a growing fraction and trade imports and exports without anyone being the wiser.
"Where?" Zero asked.
"The first one is located in Oga. Its small but it should suffice for the foreseeable future." Warwick reported as the map changed to a satellite view of the small town. It was mostly abandoned but most of the facilities were good for use. It helped that they didn't build more structures and just internally reinforced the damaged ones as to not stick out too much. "The second one is Kuji, the local imperials don't even know what's happening in the ghettos or the surrounding countryside. The local populace and resistance groups have given their favour and most of later are requesting to join." The next view was for the small but important town of Kuji, which had a relatively small imperial presence outside the naval base for naval flotilla stationed there.
"And what of Kyoto?" Leila asked.
"Their shipments of GINNs are already well underway to completion. As to who they'll gift such machines to? That is up to them. The JLF is first name to pop into the mind, isn't it?" Zero replied as he had just seen to the safe shipment of the supplies via one of the many subway routes they had cleared for their use.
"That is true. And because of our friendly relations with them, we don't have to worry too much about the more radical members getting their hands on them." Suzaku added in as it was great that he could speak with his father every now and then. Sure he couldn't do it in public since as far as the world is concerned, Genbu was dead and him calling him would just cause issues for the both of them.
Knock, Knock.
"Forgive my intrusion sir but I have a message for you." A regular office worker apologised as she walked into the room and saluted the group.
"Speak." Tierra gave permission, he hoped this was important.
"Sir," The worker said before she dropped her salute and delivered the message. "Dr. Chawla and her team have arrived."
"They're early." Lockon noted, last time he checked, they weren't due for another two weeks.
"Yes, they are. I wonder…" Zero said as he stroked his masked chin in thought.
"Sir?" Akito asked him to get his attention again.
"Have them escorted to the meeting room on floor 5. I'll be there shortly." Zero ordered the officer worker.
"Sir!" She replied as she saluted again and quickly left the room.
"So…what do you think?" Suzaku asked his long-time friend.
"She wants something, from the reports on her habits and skills, she would have not put herself at risk by coming here if she didn't have a damn good reason." Zero replied as they both knew that even meeting with them was a risk since the federation didn't want to tip their hand just yet. Plus if she was caught by the imperials, she either be forced to work for them or be killed.
"Do you think she wants one of the GINNs?" Alleujah asked as this wouldn't be the first time, they already had to deal with several previous incidents with people trying to steal them. Mostly it was the more radical resistance groups that they had already refused to work with for obvious reasons.
"No, she'll never go for the common models, she wants one of the more unique models to study." Zero said as everyone present knew he was talking about their own machines, the ones that might never see mass production due to their edge on the battlefield.
"Yes but the question still remains," Leila started. "Is she doing this for herself….or under orders from someone else."
"You don't think that…" Kallen started but paused when she realized it wasn't impossible, but highly unlikely.
"It's a pretty solid theory. The current Indian administration has been snugging up the Lower ranking Eunuchs for the past year or so. I can't think of another way of making themselves look useful be delivering to them a solid design breakdown of one of our machines." Liu Mei explained as they had discovered that bit of info from spies and the dark web. When you thought about it, it made sense. Sure the federation's apathy, greed, incompetence and cruelty rule over India has made them extremely unpopular but at the end of the day, politicians were notorious for being just as bad. It was possible that the current Indian 'ruler' didn't care for his people and was looking out only for himself.
"…But as of now, we don't know which of those sceneries we are facing. Our best bet is to observe, note and counter when the time is right." Leila stated as she got up from her seat and made way for the door, Akito falling in step behind her.
"Quite right Leila, but we are getting ahead of ourselves, yes?" Zero said as he followed her lead and got up from his chair, the rest following suite as the meeting was over. "Let us meet with her first and see what it is she wants out of this."
(Tokyo Settlement – Tokyo Royal Art Museum)
"We will open art week with the dedication of the Tokyo Royal Art Museum. It was originally going to be christened the Clovis Memorial Museum of Art but our public relations department thought it best to change it in light of Prince, I mean Clovis' crimes." The Art curator explained to Princess Euphemia as he led her through the newly completed building. She was accompanied by Guilford as her sister wasn't taking chances with her safety.
"Yes, that was the sensible move, the last thing we need to something that will only add fuel to the fire." Euphemia said she wore a different set of attire then what she normally, opting to wear her official wardrobe along with a jacket due to the snowfall making things quite chilly.
"A wise observation, you highness." The Curator replied as he continued on with the tour. "That is why we are so grateful that you took time out of your busy schedule to judge the art for the tonight. You will be the one who will pick the first place winner from among these submitted works."
"Oh, this one's nice." Euphemia complimented as she paused to look over a painting of looked like to an Edo-era country home. "I particularly like this painting." The artist really captured the scene with the excellent brushwork and colouring.
"It's regrettable that out investigation has found that the artist for that work is one quarter eleven." The curator explained to her as he didn't even bat an eye at the work for something as foolish as who the artist grandparents were. Something the princess didn't appreciate.
"Then perhaps it shouldn't have been displayed here in the first place." Euphemia replied with a frown as such information didn't mean anything to here but clearly it did to their host.
"Well it's a delicate balance with our public-!" The man tried to smoothly explain but he was cut off when the princess held up her hand as a sign for his silence.
"Spare me your excuses sir, you mean to inform me that you have no intention for this wonderful piece of art to be here because of the artist's grandparents?" She asked him, making it clear that she was not very pleased with his excuses. "But you also have to have it here so you don't oust yourself and this establishment as discriminatory?" She asked him another question that they both knew he wouldn't answer lest he just bring himself trouble. "As far as I'm concerned each and every artwork here stands an equal chance of winning. Who their artist are and how much number blood that have in them is irrelevant." She finished as she walked right on by past him, aiming to view the art without a guide such as himself.
"But your highness-!" The curator tried to save face but he was once more cut off but this time but the hand that gripped his shoulder hard enough for him to wince.
"Her highness as spoken, if you wish to keep you post, I suggest you hold your tongue." Guilford informed the poor man. Making sure he knew that he knew that it was more than his job he could lose if he dare to talk back to royalty.
"Y-yes, of course. Shall be take a look at the other works on display?" The curator suggested as he took out his handkerchief to wipe away the nervous sweat that had formed on his brow from Guilford intensive glare. The knight let go of him and roughly brushed passed him to continue to stand by Euphemia's side.
"Thank you, Sir Guilford." Euphemia thanked the man as they resumed to tour the place, the curator gone as he could see he wasn't welcome.
"It was nothing, princess. Your sister had always wanted to you to become more assertive. I can see that you are well on your way." Guilford complimented as he was quite impressed by how she handled the situation. Did he share her views? No, he did not. But did he respect her? Without a doubt.
"I'm just going what I know to be right. If only sister could see that." Euphemia stated it was quite common for the two siblings to argue about the treatment of numbers and the general state of affairs with the empire.
"Yes…well her highness has always been….headstrong. But I'm sure that you and her will come to a compromise soon enough." Guilford suggested as he hoped they would see eye to eye soon.
"Let us hope so." Euphemia said as they paused again to view another painting. This one was a portrait of her father and the reigning ruler of the empire. Though if she didn't know any better, she would have said the artist captured him just right-down to the uncaring eyes and air of apathy and wrath he seemed to always emits.
(Same time – Black Knight Northern Honshu Command)
"Welcome Rakshata Chawla. Forgive the delay but it took some time for the message to reach me during a meeting." Zero greeted as he and his commander walked into the meeting room. This was the room designed for entertaining guests as was well decorated and furbished, unlike the main one. Three out of the four walls were also made from multiple sections 350mm bulletproof glass all held in place by extremely tough steel framing. The clear view windows did give them a view of central plaza of the complex.
It was quite a view since the underground facility was designed to have plants, vines on some walls and areas for flowers and grass. The view itself was to both impress and intimidate potential partners as one could also see the dozen or so knightmares parked down centre along with the many armed guards.
"Are you Zero?" The tall and rather beautiful dark-skinned Indian women asked. She was accompanied by two others who seemed to be lab assistants or aides.
"Indeed I am. We were not expecting you so soon." Zero replied as he held out his hand to give her a greeting to which she responded in kind and showed that also had a grip on her.
"And is the 'we' the group you brought with?" Rakshata asked as he pointed towards the others with a smoking pipe.
"Yes. They are my personal troops or top commanders." Zero answered as he gestured to the table so that may all sit down and get down to business.
"I see, well I say this Zero. You run quite the operation here." Rakshata stated as she sat down along with her aides. If Zero was a lesser man, he might have taken offense to her not being impressed with that they had here but he had long since stopped caring about such things and had gain a talent for politics and negotiation.
"You didn't answer the question." Tierra noted.
"Because I chose not to." Rakshata replied but the glare she received from the purple haired man was a sign that she wasn't amused. "Oh fine, I wanted to see my Guren in action. It's not every day that my best creation yet gets such rigorous exercise."
"…Well I can tell you that your creation's pilot knows how to handle her machine." Zero said as he gestured towards Kallen who had taken the seat to his left.
"Oh, so you're my child's pilot?" Rakshata asked her, making the women feel uncomfortable from both her gaze and the fact she referred to her creations as children.
"Yes." Kallen answered simply as to try and end this. Rakshata kept her gaze on her for another few tense moments before she blinked and looked away.
"…Alright then, so long as she knows what she's doing, I don't really care as to who is the pilot. On the other matter," Rakshata stated as she turned her attention to the masked leader. "Is it true? That you have your own knightmares?"
"Yes it is, the Black Knights produce most of their own heavy equipment, including knightmares." Liu Mei answered for their leader.
"Well that would explain why the order Kyoto put in for four Gekka's was withdrawn." One of the aides noted.
"So tell me, what are the specs of these knightmare of yours?" Rakshata asked him, eager for information.
"Before I do that, there is something I wanted to ask you." Zero replied with an condition, something that wasn't out of the blue as these kinds of things happened all the time during talks.
"Go on." She said as she took a drag from her pipe and breathed out the dark could.
"Why did you come here? If you were so interested in our GINNs, you could have ask for one to be shipped to India. Instead, you're here." Zero asked as he laid down a fact that he found odd. "Why is that?"
"Call it curiosity." Rakshata answered him with a short reply.
"That's not an acceptable answer." Tierra counted, looking less pleased then he did a moment ago, though the man rarely ever did look pleased, just content.
"Calm down Tierra, there's not need to get upset." Lockon stepped in before Tierra really lost his temper before he turned to face their guest. "But I do share his sentiments, that wasn't really an answer so I'll be blunt." He stated as his gaze turned serious as well, losing his usual playful gleam. "We you sent here by the Federation, Indian administration or some other source?"
.
.
.
"An answer, if you will." Leila informed her as all three foreign scientist had yet to respond but it did look like they were having a silent conversation through their eyes.
"I don't think you'll like the reasons." The other one, the skinny one spoke out this time.
"As in…more than one." Suzaku noted as he leaned forward in his chair.
"Yes."
"Surprise me." Zero stated, he wished to hear their story and see if they were worth his time. He also covertly used his powers to read them for even the smallest of little white lies.
"The first one was as I just said. I was curious as to how you were manufacturing such high spec knightmares and was hoping that with you aid, I could upgrade my Guren to new heights or even construct even better children in the future." Rakshata begun to explain. Her answer made sense as their tech was much more advanced than anything else currently in service.
"Reasonable…" Zero started as he turned over her words in his mind. "And the second?"
"I was sent here but not by my puppet government or the Eunuchs. I was…to put it bluntly, recruited." She revealed the second reason for her unexpected trip to the region. This part really caught his attention as there weren't many players he could see the blonde scientist willingly working for so it must have been important.
"Recruited? By whom?" Leila asked. There was no way she was working with the imperials otherwise she wouldn't be here. Maybe the EU? They certainly could afford someone of her talents.
"By a fraction within the Federation government that wants your aid." She revealed as she actually put the pipe down, showing that this was serious as she almost never put that thing down.
"…Interesting…You have my attention." Zero said as he too leaned forward. He was unaware that the federation had an opposing factions strong enough to recruit her without anyone being the wiser.
"How familiar are you with the inner workings of the Chinese Federation as a whole." She asked him, wanting to gauge his knowledge of international affairs.
"I know that the country is the sole 'communist' state to ever exist, I know that it's a load of crap and that the federation is merely a Chinese controlled Asian empire, I know that the so called communist country has the highest levels of Deaths, Fertility, Infant Mortality and Illiteracy and the highest levels of poverty and crime. I know that the nation's wealth and land is strictly controlled by the corrupt and very greedy Eunuchs." Clearly she didn't think he say as so much as it took a while for her to gather herself after that little short promo on why the federation is considered the old man of the three superpowers, despite being the youngest of the three.
"Then you must know that not everyone in the federation government wishes for this to continue. The current Empress is actually quite the humanitarian." Rakshata informed them, though she had never even been to the Vermillion Forbidden City or met the empress, hell she had never been to China. What she was telling them was what she was told when they approached her.
"The puppet empress. The girl's fifteen and she's been on in power since the Eunuchs killed her parents over a decade ago." Zero brushed off as it was quite well known in international circles who was really running the show in that country. The empress was never seen outside the palace and rarely gave vocal appearances for announcements.
"You have proof of this?" Rakshata asked him, surprised that he would say such a thing. Sure their deaths were suspicious there was never a connections, even circumstantial.
"Yes, but it's quite obvious. Prior to the deaths of the former Emperor and Empress, the Eunuchs never had as much power as they do now. It's also known that the emperor was a man of honour and wanted to rule for his people, not over them. Then out of the blue one day, both he and his wife are gunned down in the street and the Eunuchs suddenly have no contender." Zero explained to her what most of the political savvy members of the world already knew.
"And the proof?" Rakshata asked again, what he said was a scenario, nothing more.
"I don't have it on me if that's what you're thinking but we managed to get access to the banking records for one of the Eunuchs. We know that he paid for the legal defence for the 'assassin' and afterwards, paid him enough money to move to Finland." Zero revealed to the group as the only ones on Earth that knew that information were Suzaku and Nunnally as they dug up that little info nugget when he was investigating the Chinese to see if they would prove to be good allies.
"I also have proof that all the other top Eunuchs sent him the money for the hit and were involved in a lot of corruption prior to this that they went through a lot of trouble and dropped a lot of bodies to cover it up. My best guess is that they were afraid the emperor was catching onto them and decided to kill him first." He finished, laying all he knew onto the table.
"So those greedy fools have always been slime-balls." Liu Mei said with a smile, though to her team and leader they could see that she was seething on the inside at the knowledge that those greedy bastards intentionally ruin her homeland just to better then own lives and line their pockets with more and more money. Money that should have been used to better the lives of the people.
"I'll say that's giving slime a bad name but yes, that's the jist of it." Zero joked as he confirmed the girl's thoughts.
"Then it was a wise move to contact you. The group that approach me, they claim to be people loyal to the empress, not the Eunuchs. They wish to install her into power, actual power and to eliminate the Eunuchs from power." Rakshata explained to them, fully confident that they would be of use for her new employers, which meant India as a whole will see much needed reforms sooner rather then later.
"So they want our aid?" Kallen asked since that was what this boiled down to.
"Yes, in exchange they are prepared to help with funds and other means. They also agreed what if they succeed, they'll ensure that if you do as well that the two nations will be on good terms which opens the way for trading and defence agreements." She answered as she was already briefed on how to negotiate with the Black Knights, things in the federation were not moving as her employers would have liked and needed reliable allies as soon as they could get them. They were even willing to allow her to put Hong Kong for trade if need be as the city has always been an international hub for business.
"Hmmmm…that's a lot of a faith for them to put in me, seeing how they know nothing about me." Zero remarked as such level of trust….was too good to be real, something must be going on that he wasn't aware about.
"They actually do, the Empress may not be the leader as that would draw the attention of the Eunuchs but she is an active member of the group." Rakshata clarified for them.
"How?" Suzaku asked.
"The empress is close friends with Kaguya Sumeragi and-" The scientist started but they already heard all they needed to see where this was going.
"And once she found out about who we are, she knew we were trustworthy enough to be of aid to close friend." Suzaku finished for her as he could see his cousin doing something like that. 'And if we do offer our aid and succeed, this would naturally put the new government in our debt, I forget how smart my cousin has become sometimes.' He thought to himself as he had to actively remember that she had years to turn herself into a politically adapt individual to have made it was far as she has.
"Yes, that's the conclusion I came to as well." Zero added as this seemed like a godsend. And though he was a sceptical person by nature, he was also smart enough not to look a gift horse in the mouth.
"So, do we have an agreement?" Rakshata asked as he seemed that the conditions were quite favourable to them.
.
.
.
"I believe we do. Alleujah, why don't you escort our friends to our personal hangar so that they can get to work?" Zero answered as he took her hand and gave it a firm shake to seal the deal.
"And you sir?" Kallen asked Alleujah escorted their new partners out of the room.
"I got to make a call to Kyoto about this. I would have thought that would have informed us beforehand." Zero answered as he would have thought they would have sent him a message beforehand to alert him to this deal.
"Sir! We just received a letter from Kyoto." An aide said as they knocked on the door for the meeting room.
"Looks like the message was just late." Lockon laughed as that just to be convenient timing.
(Later in the Tokyo Settlement – Tokyo Royal Art Museum)
"Sub-Viceroy, is it true that no eleven companies were used in the construction of the museum?" One of the journalist present asked as he stood up from his seat.
"That is a matter we are currently looking into. As such, I cannot give you an answer at this time." Euphemia answered, though she didn't think that such a thing should have mattered-she knew this wasn't the time for place to air such views.
"Louis from Interstate. Your highness, there have been rumours going on lately that your close to choosing your knight. Is this true?" Another asked as they stood up.
"A knight." Euphemia repeated, surprised that information had already leaked to the press. She only had one or two conversations with her sister about in the past couple of months.
"Ladies and Gentlemen, we ask that you please limit your questions to those related to the museum only." The art curator answered for her. But even though the mad said this, many took this as a chance to ask her questions about her personal life and affairs since she rarely went out without her sister's protection detail, just having Guilford with her after the hotel jacking was the result of her begging her sister to not have an entire platoon guard her.
'This is going to be a long day.' She thought to herself as he really wanted to rub her head since she could feel the headache coming on.
4th October 2020 a.t.b./3 9688 BBY:
Unknown Region:
Milky Way Galaxy:
Earth/Sol-3:
Area 11:
Black Knight Kanto Command
"How's the upgrades holding up, Q-1?" One of the mechanics assigned to zero unit, a man by the name of Taisei Yoshida asked as Kallen ran through some tests in an underground bunker.
"Pretty good, the machine feels much more fluid now. Like an extension of my body." Kallen replied as she flexed the Guren's right hand and though it was still a bit bulky, it moved much smoother then it regularly did.
"For any warrior, that feeling with their weapon is a must." Suzaku stated from the observation box above the room.
"Indeed. The parts you supplied proved to be as high quality as I suspected." Rakshata complimented as she and her aides run through all the data the unit was creating for them.
"Thank you but I'm waiting for when you can grant the Guren wings." Suzaku answered as the Guren was the only one of the Zero squad that they couldn't easily modify for flight.
"That…will take time." Rakshata informed him. "The tech and fuel your machines uses is different from conventional models, including my own. It'll take time for me to properly analyse them to match them up perfectly with my child."
"Zero-sama!" An officer worker said as they run into the room and saw the presentation. They at least had enough shame to blush and looked down at their own feet.
"What is it?" Zero said from his seat on the other side of the room. He was looking through some memos the financial department wanted him to review so he left the knightmare testing to others for the time being.
"Sir, the raid on the covey moving through Oshu." The non-combatant started as he pulled out the report that had just came in.
"Yes, did they fail?" Zero asked without looking up from his laptop as he kept on working.
"N-no sir, they completed the mission and destroyed 11 supply trucks and stole 2 but one of the soldiers sir, she turned on us." The worker said as he read over the report again to be sure. The news of such an action caught Zero and everyone else who could hear it, attention. This was the second traitor in less than a week?
"What!" Zero said as he looked up from his laptop, he was not in a good mood and this news wasn't going to help with that.
"Sir, she killed her entire tank crew and fired on our men. Casualty counts are still coming in but we so far know that 11 of our people were killed and around 19 more injured." The non-combatant relayed to them as he read the figures that the report in his hand had. Zero wordlessly reached out his hand and the man got the message and quickly placed the report into his leader hand so that he could see it for himself.
"And the traitor?" Zero asked as he read through the report before passing it along to Suzaku so that he could review it as well.
"They managed to capture her before she could kill herself sir, she's been transferred to III for now." The man replied as he handed him the second report that the III sent in to confirm the transfer of the prisoner to their custody.
"Good. Keep her there and isolated from human contact. I'll be one my way immediately." Zero said as he got up from his seat and powered down his laptop.
"Sir?"
"I'm going to the III," Zero said as he made his way for the door. "I don't know what's happening but I'm going to find out…one way or another."
And that is that, the last chapter for this story for 2019. I admit, I planned for more to happen in this chapter since in the summery I wrote prior with the chapter points-there was much more planned, but once I start to actually write down the parts, I realized that was really reaching my work cap for this chapter. One thing I wanted to happen in this chapter was another demonstration of the force but alas, that'll have to wait till chapter. It is because of this unexpected turn of events that I must apologise to IS6A6E as it doesn't look like there will be the lightsaber action I promised in the next chapter but the one after that.
I tried to keep the chapter somewhat close to the cannon line of events but of course I purposely changed some things. One thing is that the country is experiencing early snow fall as I know snow doesn't typically fall in Japan in early October but this is decision I made that will play into the narrative, plus snowy backgrounds always look more dramatic than most. Make things look more bleak but also peaceful in a way.
I also tried to show that this take on Euphemia is not the same girl from cannon as she isn't afraid to speak her mind but is aware enough to know when to hold her tongue since in my opinion, her two biggest flaws was that she wasn't brave or confident to be more open with her views on matters and often just didn't answer or went along with the flow-even if she didn't like where this flow was going. The other flaw was that she was prone to be impulsive and too emotional, she never really stopped to really think about a lot of her actions and their consequences, especially (something she herself admits in episode 20 of R1 as she knows that her impulsive nature can come off as selfish even if she doesn't mean it to and is only trying to make things better.) in my story, she's still passionate and caring to the fault but she is also patient and smart enough to take a break to look at the situation, think about what she wants and how to go about it.
One last thing, for those who didn't pick up on it, Euphemia's official wardrobe is fashionable business like attire she wears from time to time whenever she's out and about or when she is busy with her duties as sub-viceroy.