Timeline

Even by crazy fanfiction standards this is gonna be a weird one. I'm going to explain the timeline for this AU and my rough overall ideas for the story. I'm not going to mess with the weird imperial Britannian calendar so all dates are in normal calendar. There's going to be a summary of this at the bottom if exposition isn't your thing.

17th century: (Point of Divergence from Code Geass Timeline) something like the IRL timeline involving the English Civil War takes place. Parliamentarian victory leads to the Commonwealth of England, and after the death of Oliver Cromwell, and a bastard son of the previous royal line is invited to take the throne, one Ricardo von Britannia.

Early to mid 18th century: Things get closer to our original Code Geass timeline. Royal absolutism is restored and the Church of England becomes a tool for Britannian monarchs to increase their power and start the system of royal polygamy.

1781: George Washington is killed by shrapnel at Yorktown. The American Revolution is quickly swept up after this point, although the so called "Colonial Problem" of how to manage increasingly unhappy subjects is on many noble's minds.

1789: The Bastille is stormed, the French Revolution begins in earnest.

1799: French forces form the Parthenopean Republic in the Two Sicilies, bringing French control down to the toe of Italy, and an invasion soon wins them Sicily. Sanfedist forces hoping to restore the King of Naples are brutally crushed and King Ferdinand IV of Naples is killed.

1804: Napoleon is crowned Emperor of France.

1805: The Battle of Trafalgar proves indecisive and incredibly destructive, and a storm that followed crushed both fleets involved to the point of making naval invasions almost impossible for both parties.

1806: Napoleon establishes continental system, and Sicilian separatists begin contacting the Britannian government in hopes of breaking free from French control and economic exploitation.

1807: With Napoleon's forces tied up defending the Confederation of the Rhine and beating back the Fourth Coalition, Britannian forces are invited to seize Sicily and establish a Britannian governed Kingdom of Sicily ruled in personal union by Emperor Charles, in exchange for considerable sovereignty. The Peninsular war begins as France invades Iberia.

1808: Pro-monarchist Sicilians join the Britannian military, Britannia even allowing recruitment of women to bolster the defenses of the island, incapable of devoting too many resources to it. A young Sicilian woman named Marianne has such talent she is eventually invited to London to potentially join the Royal Guard, and Emperor Charles does his thing.

1809: Lelouch vi Britannia is born in the royal court, and Emperor Charles sees an opportunity to secure his holdings in Sicily, and sends the boy to be raised in by his mother in Italy. France crushes Iberian resistance and signs a peace with Britannia, ceding Sicily and previously Dutch colonial lands in exchange for an end to Britannian interference on the continent.

1810: Russia declares war on the French, anxious to put an end to the revolution and to strangle Polish nationalism in its cradle by crushing the French Duchy of Warsaw. Austria and Russia join forces to do battle with France, and Spanish colonial territories begin to break free.

1812: After another rendezvous with Charles, Marianne gives birth to Nunnally. Britannian forces seize the moment and begin wars to annex ex-Spanish and Portuguese colonial possessions. Britannian positions in east Asia are reorganized under the Ashford Indies Company, including previously Portuguese Macau and Dutch Dejima, a trade settlement in Nagasaki.

1813: Napoleon wins at Leipzig, but realizes that the French Army is too small to press an offensive. He negotiates at the Treaty of Prague and guarantees a peace to secure his new holdings, as well as fair territorial gains. The French Empire stretches from Iberia (discounting Gibraltar) to Poland.

1814: Austria rebrands as the Empire of the Danube, and plots with the Ottoman Empire to prevent further French encroachment into the Balkans.

1819: Marianne is assassinated while visiting the Britannian Court, and Nunnally is crippled by shot and blinded by the trauma. Lelouch confronts his father but concedes before he can be banished. He is sent back to Sicily, escorted by one of his mother's guards, Jeremiah Gottwald.

1820: The Ashford Indies Company collapses without support from Marianne.

1821: Napoleon falls ill with an unknown disease and his condition deteriorates rapidly. One of his last orders before a regency is declared is to cripple the power of French puppet states and balkanize them to prevent revolt.

1822: The Senate takes control of day to day operations of France, but cannot decide on a successor to Bonaparte.

1824: Lelouch begins to take control in Sicily, advised by Gottwald.

1825: Greece declares independence, France joins them in fighting the Ottoman and Danubian Empires. The modern day.

The world at a glance: Britannia has colonial hegemony in the New World, and has a massive lead in seizing land in Asia and Africa, and can project influence into the Mediterranean through Gibraltar and Sicily. France rules great portions of continental Europe, but the death of the bed-ridden Emperor Napoleon could send it flying into chaos, as nationalism simmers just beneath the surface, and the French generals doing battle against the Turks and Danubians cannot match Napoleon's skill. Britannian forces are largely focused in their new colonial holdings and in India, where Britannia looks hungrily in all directions, at Indochina, Afghanistan, Persia, and even China herself. The Industrial Revolution has begun in earnest, and Britannia hopes to keep the secrets of such inventors as the eccentric Earl Asplund to themselves.

Italy itself: All of Italy, discounting Sicily, is in the French sphere of influence, from the Alps to Calabria, and parts of Italy are ruled by France directly, such as Savoy and Rome, while the rest is puppet states. The Pope has limited sovereignty and rules in just the Vatican. French rule has fomented nationalism, and the peninsula seems primed to revolt, like many other portions of the French Empire.

So… what the hell was all that for, you may wonder? This is an extremely bizarre story idea of mine. Instead of being Lelouch of the Rebellion, liberator of Japan, this Lelouch will be of the Risorgimento, unifier of Italy. Or at least, that's one of his goals. If you didn't know, the Risorgimento was the process of Italian unification, and you can see how the stage is set. I know this idea is basically going to be long form crack fic, but I don't really care.

TL;DR: Code Geass AU where England wasn't invaded by France, although France still rules much of the European continent. Napoleon's just about to die, which will probably throw France into chaos, and Lelouch, the ruler of Britannian Sicily (the island off the coast of southern Italy, basically the thing the Italian boot is kicking), hopes to exploit such an opening to unify Italy, alongside usual Lelouch scheming. Expect a focus on Lelouch, military stuff, possibly not much Geass, hopefully a little like Lelouch of Britannia? (but of lower quality, in all likelihood)

…. Sounds crazy now that I wrote it all down, actually.