Disclaimer: As far as I know, I do not own Code Geass or Warhammer 40k. If this changes at any time, I would appreciate somebody letting me know.
Chapter Eleven: The Age of Terra
?
The Warp
The daemon had no time to look surprised before CC cut him into ribbons with her saber. Euphemia twirled her staff, strategically firing off beams of light that disintegrated any Warp-spawn they struck. The two women stood back-to-back, surrounded on all sides by a respectably-large horde of daemons and assorted Warp creatures.
"Are you sure you can't use that area attack?" CC asked in exasperation.
"At our present location," Euphemia shot back, "I'll draw even more daemons to us if I use it!"
A Khornate daemon roared in triumph as he looped a hand around CC's sword arm. The look of smug satisfaction gave way to confusion as, no matter how much of his strength he used, the thin limb refused to yield.
"You really think a small fry like you can harm me?" CC asked, slightly insulted.
Before the daemon could react, CC twisted his arm around. A wet snap, followed by a howl of pain, was heard as the daemon released his grip. He cradled his wounded arm, now bent at an unnatural angle. CC looped her free arm around his neck and kneed him in the back before throwing him over her hip and onto the ground. With the same look one would give an insect before snuffing out its life, CC crushed the daemon's head with a savage stomp.
"Now," CC turned towards the daemons, brandishing her saber and speaking in a low and menacing voice, "Any of you still think you stand a chance?"
The daemons turned around and ran away. Euphemia visibly relaxed the grip on her staff and the psychic energy around CC's saber dissipated. The soul fragment the daemonic horde had sought to devour reappeared, floating down into CC's outstretched hand.
Georgian Coast, Atlantic Line, Britannia
2025 a.t.b, Year 5 of the Great War
Along with devices such as the longbow and the repeating rifle, the Knightmare held the title of the most feared weapon of its era. First pioneered by the Holy Britannian Empire, the introduction of the Knightmare frame radically altered the state of modern warfare. Controlling by far the most and richest deposits of Sakuradite, Britannia fielded high-performance melee-oriented models that unfortunately proved quite power-hungry. Other nations scrambled to catch up but, lacking significant Sakuradite deposits of their own, focused on developing lower-performance models geared towards ranged combat.
With the rise and fall of Lelouch vi Britannia, the Demon Emperor, came a radical shift in the international balance of power. With the abolition of the Numbers system, Britannia entered an economic recession that left it unable to adequately maintain its massive army. When the Battle of Mt. Fuji destroyed much of Japan's Sakuradite supply, the market price of the precious superconductor skyrocketed. Left with only their own, rather poor, deposits of Sakuradite, Britannia was forced to mothball huge numbers of Knightmares.
Britannia's rival hegemons, the Euro Universe and the Chinese Federation, saw an opportunity in Britannia's dwindling military and economic strength. Despite the best efforts of the United Federation of Nations, the two superpowers descended upon the weakened Holy Britannian Empire in hopes of claiming its lands and the rich natural resources contained within for themselves.
On April 1, 2020 a.t.b., barely two years into the reign of Nunnally vi Britannia, the Great War began.
Though its Knightmare forces had dwindled to nearly nothing in the two years between the death of the Demon Emperor and the outbreak of the Great War, Britannia still maintained a sizable conventional army. Under the leadership of brilliant generals such as Cornelia li Britannia and the ever-enigmantic Zero, Britannia's army actually won many early battles. However, the onslaught from two directions proved overwhelming, and Britannian forces continued to lose ground.
Following a bloody rout at Kasserine Pass, where the Euro Universe introduced the much-feared Panzer-Hummel Ausf. B, Britannian engineers scrambled to design a cheap and energy-efficient Knightmare specialized for ranged combat. They began at a severe disadvantage compared to their counterparts, who had designed such Knightmares for years. A design submitted by a team under Lloyd Asplund and Cecile Croome was eventually chosen, and the Empress herself granted them unlimited budget and resources to make the proposal a reality. The resulting Knightmare, officially designated the "Matilda," was well-armed but thin-skinned and prone to catching fire.
Though derisively nicknamed the "Zippo" by its crews, the new Knightmares proved a devastating surprise at the Battle of Tobruk. Britannian forces were eventually forced to abandon the city, but they inflicted a dear toll on the opposing European force. Deployment to the Chinese Federation front followed several months later, with the Matilda and the aging Gun-Ru meeting for the first time in Manchuria. The Matilda easily slaughtered its Chinese counterpart, and Britannian forces advanced all the way to Canton before a vigorous counterattack finally drove them back.
As the war ground on and casualties soared into the tens of millions, Britannia was confronted with an increasing inability to replace combat losses and flagging morale back home. A surprise attack on its Midway and Pearl Harbor bases had destroyed much of Britannia's naval presence in the Pacific, and rumors persisted that the Chinese Federation was massing for an invasion of the Britannian homeland. On the eastern coast, the invasion was already happening. For months, successively larger European invasion fleets pounded the coastal defenses of the Atlantic Line. With each failed attempt, the Britannian military diverted ever-larger numbers of troops to reinforce the line, which currently stretched from Maine to the southern tip of Florida.
The souls manning the portion Atlantic Line on the Georgian coast, weary and exhausted and battered from months of constant fighting, mustered a newfound energy when the transport of Nunnally vi Britannia suddenly showed up on their landing pad.
Though her years as Empress of Britannia had taught her to hide her emotions well, Nunnally vi Britannia nearly burst out in tears as she surveyed the scenes before her. During her inspection of the Atlantic Line fortifications, she had seen thousands of Britannian soldiers from all walks of life. In the rare instances she saw the face under the helmet, she saw boys and girls as young as sixteen fighting in a war that had broken fully-grown adults. She saw gaunt faces with dark bags under their eyes. She saw starving soldiers, many barely able to hold their rifles and some thin enough that their ribs protruded. She saw wounded soldiers suffering due to lack of adequate medical supplies. The officer escorting her could not possibly be any older than twenty, but his haunted and haggard look made him appear many years older.
The five years that the Great War had raged for had largely numbed Nunnally to such sights. She hated the fact, but she could not deny it. She had toured countless bases on every front, many times coming within miles of enemy lines. What got to her was how the soldiers handled their situation. No matter how exhausted or how starving, they always stood a little straighter when she passed. Some may have done it out of fear, but she sensed that just as many did it out of loyalty to her vision of peace.
"Incoming!"
The next few moments turned into sheer agony for Nunnally and her unusually-sensitive hearing as missiles rained down on the Atlantic Line. She could see soldiers and Knightmares running left and right as VTOL craft struggled to take off amidst bombardment. Missiles landed amidst troop formations, leaving craters in the ground and body parts raining down. A nearby building took a hit and was reduced to smoldering rubble.
"Get down!"
Nunnally felt somebody slam into her as a Knightmare passing nearby took a hit. The resulting explosion annihilated the mech far too quickly for its ejection system to have kicked in. Nunnally screamed in agony as the shockwave ruptured her eardrums and tossed her out of her wheelchair and into the air. As she clamped her eyes shut, she could feel several bodies landing near and on top of her. Another missile landed nearby, and the resulting dust cloud blocked the rest of the scene. The Empress passed out as the second shock wave hit her.
Nunnally awoke several minutes later. The first sight to greet her was the hollow stare of the Lieutenant that had guided her through the base. From the horrific injuries on his and surrounding bodies, Nunnally could easily deduce that the officer and several of her bodyguards had thrown themselves over her and used their bodies as a shield from shrapnel. With great effort, she managed to push the bodies off of her and sit up. Her wheelchair had not been as lucky as she, and she doubted it would work in its present state.
Instead, she crawled towards the shattered windows, taking extra care to avoid the shattered glass that littered the floor, to see the battle raging outside. A group of Matildas had managed to assemble into a firing line. Though she couldn't hear anything, the shaking ground told Nunnally that the blocky Knightmares were attempting to suppress the European landing forces and their naval support. The mechs' crews had fallen into a rhythm with their shoulder-mounted 105mm howitzers, the first cannon of the left-most Matilda being ready to fire as soon as soon as the second cannon of the right-most Knightmare had fired. The disposable four-cell missile pods that took the place of their forearms fired as quickly as hangar crews could deliver fresh launchers. VTOL craft roared overhead, ready to intercept the enemy's air support as well as harass their naval fleet. Infantry had taken cover anywhere they could: behind sandbag barricades, behind bits of wrecked building, even amongst the legs of Matildas.
Without her hearing, Nunnally failed to notice as several Britannian soldiers approached her from behind. Noticing the stream of dried blood starting at Nunnally's ear canals, the Britannian squad leader made his presence known by kneeling down beside her. Nunnally turned to face him, her eyes looking straight into his helmet's eye-pieces. The Staff Sergeant produced a notepad from one of the pockets on his body armor and a pencil from another. He hurriedly scrawled something down and turned it towards Nunnally.
EU forces have breached the defensive walls. We're holding them off the best we can, but we need to get you to safety.
Nunnally nodded, motioning towards her ruined wheelchair. The soldier responded by squatting down, and another soldier helped her climb onto his back. After several seconds of shifting her weight around, Nunnally nodded and the soldier slowly stood up, his arms looped around his back and behind her knees for support. After taking another second to make sure they wouldn't stumble, the squad leader nodded to the others and they headed for the exit.
Their escape was cut short by several EU soldiers bursting through the door. Caught by surprise in such close quarters, Nunnally's would-be rescuers didn't stand a chance.
Pinned underneath a dead body for the second time in so many minutes, Nunnally found herself staring down a dozen gun barrels. The European soldiers seemed to talk amongst themselves for several seconds, most likely wondering what a civilian girl was doing amongst the Atlantic Line. Finally, one seemed to recognize her. Even with their faces hidden behind goggles and facewraps, Nunnally could clearly see their surprise. Most likely unable to believe their luck, the enemy soldiers hesitated.
That hesitation proved fatal as a pair of lanky arms grabbed one of the soldiers from behind and snapped his neck. The remaining soldiers whirled around to face the new arrival, but he had already disappeared. Nunnally's eyes widened as a lanky figure flashed into existence behind another soldier, clamping one hand over his mouth as he broke the soldier's spine over his knee. He picked up another European soldier and threw him through a wall—a solid concrete wall, Nunnally had to add—before picking up his first victim's body and using it as a shield while riddling the remaining opponents with the soldier's assault rifle.
It was when the figure walked up to Nunnally and knelt down in front of her did she finally get a good look at him. His disguise was cobbled-together but effective: clothing one could buy from any discount retailer, a scarf wrapped around his head, and dark sunglasses. He placed a finger in front of where Nunnally estimated his mouth would be and disappeared in a flash of light.
A feeling of triumph welled up in Private Odessa Stilling's chest as the Panzer-Hummel Ausf. B ground to a stop and exploded. With Britannia's Knightmare forces lagging behind technologically and numerically, tank hunter infantry like Stillings had figured more and more into the Empire's military doctrine.
"More of them incoming!"
Stillings crouched back behind the rock, signaling to her loader/spotter for another rocket. She slung the bulky launcher back over her shoulder, with only long practice preventing her from braining herself or her companion. As she lined up the nearest Panzer-Hummel Ausf. B in her sights, she heard the distinctive thunk of an anti-armor rocket sliding home followed by a tap on her shoulder indicating her loader was out of the backblast radius.
Stillings tried to ignore the cut-off screams over her radio as one of the European Knightmares pivoted around and riddled one of the camouflaged Britannian positions with its waist-mounted machine cannons. A Matilda, caught too far forward by the sudden enemy charge, managed to annihilate one of the Panzer-Hummels and heavily damage another before the enemy Knightmares' 88mm arm cannons blew it to pieces.
The unfortunate Britannian Private nearly voided her bowels as another of the European Knightmares turned to face her. She snapped off a shot in panic only to witness the rocket bouncing off the Knightmare's thick frontal armor. Both her and her loader closed their eyes as the Panzer-Hummel's machine cannons fired, but the pain never came.
Stillings opened her eyes to find a tall, lanky figure standing between her and the enemy Knightmares, the large-caliber rounds hovering in midair inches from his body. The Panzer-Hummels hesitated for a split second, as if unsure of what to do, before renewing their bombardment. Hundreds of machine cannons shells, and even several of the 88mm shells, streaked towards the new arrival only to stop just before reaching him. Then, to the Private's amazement, the shells slowly flipped over in midair and screamed back towards the Knightmares. The enemy scatted, but they were only able to delay their destruction by mere fractions of a second.
Before Stillings could thank her savior, he disappeared.
Morale amongst the EU troops shattered at the news of a new Britannian weapon capable of intercepting their gunfire and sending it back towards them. The defenders of the Atlantic Line easily drove the demoralized troops back into the sea. As the enemy fleet pulled back, a freak typhoon swallowed up all but a handful of ships that would carry news of their devastating defeat back home.
Though Nunnally ordered a full-scale search for their mysterious rescuer, no trace of him was ever found. However, the mysterious figure would reappear on multiple battlefields in aid of beleaguered Britannian forces. He would eventually receive a name, derived from the etching he'd leave on the battlefield, apparently as a calling card.
Thus began the legend of the Aquila.
Outskirts of Salt Lake City, Britannia
2026 a.t.b, Year 7 of the Great War
Cornelia li Britannia stared blankly at the clock as it struck midnight. The digital display below read April 1, 2026. The Great War had officially reached its seventh year since the April Fools' Offensives, the simultaneous landings in Kyushu by the Chinese Federation and the surprise attack on El Alamein by the Euro Universe that began the war.
She was tired. Tired of all the fighting, all the death, and most of all, she was just tired. Under her leadership, the remnants of the Britannian military on the west coast had stalled the Chinese advance at the California-Nevada border for nearly two months. Then the enemy launched a surprise offensive into Alaska and annihilated the defending army when they attempted a counterattack at Anchorage. Gilbert G.P. Guilford, commander of Britannian forces in Alaska and Cornelia's husband, was among the dead.
"Who would have thought this day would come? The day the Witch of Britannia herself desires nothing but an end to the fighting?"
Cornelia whirled around in her chair, whipping her handgun out and putting five rounds into the intruder out of sheer reflex. Her eyes widened as she found herself looking straight at the Aquila himself. His outfit had evolved over time, from something straight out of a thrift shop to clothing that would have to be specially-made. His clothing was close-fitting, his tunic largely hidden under a bulletproof vest and shoulder pads and his pants tucked into knee-high boots. The vest and his helmet was nicked and dented from multiple bullets striking and apparently bouncing off. A mask hid his entire face save for his mouth and chin.
"I see your reflexes are sharp as ever," the Aquila remarked, spitting out the bullet he held between his teeth and dropping the four he held between the fingers of his right hand.
"Aquila," Cornelia's eyes narrowed, "What do you want?"
"The Chinese general can sense your army is nearing its breaking point. He plans to attack you at daybreak."
"Why are you helping us? What can you possibly stand to gain?" Cornelia yelled.
"I too believe in your Empress' vision of peace. Should Britannia fall, the Euro Universe and the Chinese Federation will rip one another apart over the spoils. Perhaps in preventing this, I can obtain some absolution for sins of the past."
Cornelia's eyes widened.
"Are you…"
"No," the Aquila cut her off, "That man is dead."
Before Cornelia could ask any more, the Aquila disappeared. The flap to her tent flew open seconds later, and an officer with several soldiers behind him poked his head in.
"Ma'am, are you all right? We heard gunshots."
"I'm fine," Cornelia muttered, waving the officer away.
True to the Aquila's word, the Chinese army attacked Salt Lake City at sunrise. As the overwhelming force approached Britannian lines, an ominous rumbling filled the air. Though the skies were completely clear, lighting rained down amidst the enemy army, annihilating huge swathes of infantry, reducing Knightmares to dust, and battering aircraft out of the sky. By the time they finally reached the Britannian fortifications, the Chinese army was significantly weakened and demoralized, but still more than large enough to overrun the city's defenses.
Outskirts of Salt Lake City, Britannia
Ninety-Six Hours Later
Cornelia's coughs only furthered her agony as the shattered bones of her ribcage shifted. Bullet holes riddled her front, blood staining the front of her bulletproof vest and running down to pool on the ground. She felt lightheaded from the blood loss as flashing shapes danced in front of her eyes. She was no medic, but it didn't take much to see that only a major hospital had any hope of saving her. Even if the medevac arrived in time, she wouldn't survive the trip over. The corpsman kneeling down in front of her knew it too and did the only thing he could: dosing her with morphine to ease her suffering.
"What's your name, doc?" Cornelia asked, the pain now subsiding.
"Hospital Corpsman, Third Class Ted Kreiger, ma'am," the corpsman replied.
"Well, Corpsman Third Class Kreiger, how are the soldiers?"
The corpsman peeked out over the barricade for a second before returning to Cornelia's side.
"They've broken through, ma'am. Our Matildas IIs are raining hell on the Chinese."
"Good…" Cornelia trailed off.
On April 5, 2026 a.t.b., slumped against a sandbag barrier on the outskirts of Salt Lake City, Cornelia li Britannia breathed her last.
The Aquila's howl of anger and despair was heard throughout the battlefield as he descended upon the Chinese army with an animalistic rage. Thousands of soldiers were immolated by his mighty psychic flames or crushed or horrifically melted as shocked Britannian forces looked on. Their morale shattered and driven insane with fear, the Chinese army turned around and ran, only to be trapped within a ring of fire. The screams of agony as pillars of lightning and fire descended amongst the trapped soldiers, melting and turning to glass everything they touched, would haunt the few who survived the battle for years to come.
The Chinese Federation soon came to regret killing Cornelia li Britannia. Having been given a martyr to rally behind, the Britannian army launched a massive counterattack that would nearly drive the invading armies back to the coast.
It was too little, too late. Within months of the Battle of Salt Lake City, the armies of the Euro Universe would stand on the doorstep of Pendragon.
?
The Warp
CC's lungs gasped for air as she returned to consciousness. No oxygen actually existed within the Warp, by at that moment, CC so desperately wanted air in her lungs that her lungs inflated anyway. She fell to all fours, gasping heavily as she shook off the nausea. The soul fragment hovered for several seconds before joining the dozens of pinpricks of light that now swirled around CC. The green-haired immortal could feel the nausea subsiding as the soul fragments projected a calming aura.
Though hardly deserving of the title anymore, the Great War remained a dark time in CC's extremely long memory that she would rather forget. When the fighting began, they had only begun exploring the extent of their psychic abilities. Despite years of intense practice, usually in the form of fleeing through a warzone, they could only predict and catch so many incoming rounds at once before something slipped through their defenses. By the time of the Aquila's emergence, they had been shot, burned, maimed, and blown up dozens of times. No matter how quick, death via a Panzer-Hummel Ausf. B's 88mm cannons was a fate CC would not wish on anyone. Then there had been a time, before the UFN stepped in and put a stop to it, that all three sides deployed white phosphorous…
CC collapsed again as a new wave of nausea slammed into her. No matter how painful, at least death via promethium flame was mercifully quick.
"Will you be all right? We can stop for a while if you wish," Euphemia stepped forward and placed a hand on CC's shoulder.
"No," CC firmly insisted, batting away the comforting hand and staggering to her feet, "I'll be fine. It happened thousands of years ago. Chaos always brings change, and all the suffering and bloodshed caused by both the Great War and the conflicts that followed would be more than repaid with the wonders of the Age of Technology."
"Do you really believe that?" Euphemia asked pointedly.
"I think I sense another soul shard nearby," CC whirled around and hurriedly changed the subject.
Golden Throne, Sanctum Imperialis
Thirty-Six Hours After the Ikaruga's Appearance
As Tech-Priests of the Magos Biologis scrambled around the desiccated corpse of the Emperor of Mankind in desperate search of any life-signs, the leaders of the Black Knights currently present had gathered in a huddle for a last-minute strategy meeting. Their escort of Archangel Knightmares and Psychic Special Warfare operatives formed a circle around them, making it abundantly clear that they were not to be disturbed for anything short of a Chaos God manifesting in the Imperial Palace itself.
"I've just received word from Field Marshal Barros. The 1st Army Group has just completed landings on Mars," Suzaku reported, "The 2nd and 3rd Army Groups are approximately eighty percent disembarked, and the 4th's landings are nearly seventy-five percent complete."
Though Captain-General Caius Quintinus maintained a respectful distance from the three immortals' meeting, he still turned an ear towards the proceedings. Shortly after CC departed for the Warp but before the strategy meeting, Suzaku had given him a brief rundown of the Black Knights organizational structure. Four Army Groups represented forty million men and women. There was a time when the Imperium lost that number of Guardsmen daily, but those days were long past. For the defense of Terra, every Imperial Guard regiment mattered.
Caius Quintinus was aware that the Black Knights' total population was quite tiny, especially compared to the Imperium's crowded Hive Worlds. From the tone adopted by the three leaders, he could gather that the forty million troops represented a significant portion of their total military might, if not their total population. What he didn't know was that the entirety of the Black Knights' civilization, tallying in at just a hair over five hundred sixty million souls, couldn't even adequately staff an Administratum Departmento.
"Field Marshal Schwer informs me," Kallen's voice filtered over to Quintinus' ears, "that approximately half of the 5th Army Group and a quarter of the 6th are on Mars. The 7th and 8th have arrived in orbit and will be kept in reserve."
If the battle for Mars went badly, the Black Knights would potentially be dealt a blow from which they would never recover.
Black Knights Dreadnought Pendragon
Edge of the Terra System
"Captain, long-range sensors have picked up a massive disturbance in the Warp."
A deathly silence fell over the Pendragon's bridge. Only one known fleet with sufficient size to generate such a disturbance was known to be currently heading for Terra. The moment they had all dreaded was near.
"ETA?"
"Twenty-four hours, Captain."
"Set the clock. Inform the rest of the fleet."
A/N: Will Lelouch awaken in time? Who will answer the hue and cry in humanity's darkest hour? Why am I talking like some sort of movie trailer announcer? Answers to come!