AN:

Greetings to my dear readers! I am pleasantly surprised to learn that this little amateur work of mine actually enjoys readership from all inhabited continents! I thank you for taking the time to read and review my story, and I hope you have thoroughly enjoyed reading it.

I have received several comments concerning other stories of the same genre not being finished. While I cannot be held responsible for those stories and neither can I speak on behalf of their respective authors, I will try my best to complete my own story, for this story was conceived partly due to my own frustration of not seeing a complete story of this genre. I have also chosen to write my story based on the movie version instead of the original TV series because I feel that the movie is more concise, which would allow me to follow the flow of story and write about the views and feelings of the cast with a better grasp.

Last but not least, readers of this story may want to notice that the differences between the original TV version and the movie version go beyond the cancellation of certain scenes and story arcs: there were some parts of the story, character development included, that the writers of the show have amended in order to provide the necessary logical basis for them to continue extrapolating the story into the ensuing Re;surrection movie. As such, you may find certain description of character thoughts, monologues, dialogues and actions differ from your memory of the TV series: I encourage you to notice the nuance and, perhaps even better, to purchase and watch the trilogy movie as a means to show support to the franchise, as well as to allow yourself to once again enjoy the thrill of watching Lelouch's quest in seeking justice for his mother and constructing a gentle world for his blinded and crippled younger sister.

That's all from me for now, happy reading!


Chapter 4: "Initiation" II – The Day a New Demon was Born

-7 years after the war (2017 a.t.b.)-

-Britannian Residence, Tokyo Settlement-

Seeing the old Tokyo Settlement under Britannian rule once again has caused some discomfort among the Japanese audience, but even Chiba is able to suppress the urge to make any negative comment, understanding that Area 11 is already a thing in the past; there is no point to recite old hatred over a mere description of historical fact.

The Britannian police was apparently trying to track down an unknown target running on a highway in the settlement. A change of scene then showed a noble was playing chess with an old man. As the old man struggled, the room doors opened and two Britannian students entered the room.

"Hey! That's me and Lelouch!" exclaims Rivalz.

"You went to bet real money again with Lulu!" accuses Shirley, unhappy to see Rivalz taking her crush out for some not-so-good extracurricular activities.

"That's not my fault!" Rivalz defends himself. "Besides, Lelouch never lost any chess matches. We had never lost money on the chess board!"

"You mean Lelouch had never lost money on the chess board?" Milly quips.

"Well… I got a share of the winnings every time, so I had never lost money on the chess board as well, Prez!" Rivalz insists.

"Oh, some students." The nobleman commented, disapprovingly.

"Oh, a nobleman." Lelouch shot back with an even more disapproving tone.

"I envy you kids for having so much time on your hands… the time for regrets… your name?" the nobleman continued.

"Lelouch… Lamperouge."

Rivalz got close to the chessboard and felt that there was no way the table could have been turned. However, Lelouch simply assured his friend that he could do it in 9 minutes. The nobleman thought Lelouch was bluffing and reminded him that every move must be made within a 20-second limit; Lelouch simply told the nobleman that that was enough time for him while started by first moving his king piece.

"Hmm? Start by moving the king?... Hahahahaha!" The nobleman laughed and thought Lelouch was out of his mind. However, Lelouch just smirked and said no more.

"9 minutes? Wasn't he a bit too… arrogant?" Guilford ponders.

Cornelia, on the other hand, knows that Lelouch was not bluffing; he is merely stating a fact. After all, Lelouch was extremely good at playing chess, second only to Schneizel, who can only be described as being demonically good at playing chess.

Just as Cornelia has predicted, Lelouch easily won the chess match, and what's more, in just 8 minutes and 32 seconds. As Rivalz enthusiastically congratulated Lelouch, Lelouch merely commented that nobles were simply parasites of the society that thrived on their pedigree and privileges. As they went pass the entrance and walked to the car park, the giant television screen on the opposite building blinked and showed the image of Prince Clovis la Britannia, 3rd Prince of the Empire and Viceroy of Area 11. Prince Clovis gave a speech on the recent deaths caused by terrorist attacks and asked for a moment of silence, though his performance was arguably too flamboyant given the sad nature of his speech.

'Oh for goodness' sake… you'd just have to be "the performer" even when giving a serious speech, wouldn't you brother?' Cornelia rolls her eyes as she saw how Clovis gave his speech.

Rivalz and Lelouch were chatting casually on their way back to school, and then a lorry approached them quickly from behind.

"You idiot! Watch where you're going!" Ryohaku Nagata, the lorry driver, shouted as he pressed the horn and turned the steering wheel left to avoid crashing Rivalz' motorbike.

"No, not that way!" Kallen exclaimed.

The lorry then sort of crashed at a construction site, and Rivalz stopped his motorbike not far away and wondered whether it was his fault the lorry crashed.

"That was you!?" Kallen and Rivalz look at each other as they recall what happened on that day.

"Geez… we almost got hit by you! It was a close one," says Rivalz.

"Seems like you guys have known each other already before we had the welcoming party?" giggles Milly, trying to allay the shock of her two friends.

The scene switched to showing General Bartley Aspirus, a portly and bald man wearing a monocle, walked through the corridor with apparent impatience. 'We have to retrieve it at all costs! That thing…!'

Back to the crashed lorry, a certain greenish sparkle appeared, but then disappeared quickly. Lelouch decided to get closer to have a look; he briskly approached and climbed onto the top of the lorry. Suddenly, a female voice pounded into his mind with a swift froze of time, 'I have found it! My…' However, before Lelouch could find out what that voice was, Nagata set the lorry into reverse, making Lelouch fell into the cargo and got trapped. Nagata quickly shifted gears and drove the lorry away from the construction site.

Rakshata is amused. "So whoever took this video could also record people's thoughts as well? Like mind-reading?"

'That voice… it sounded so familiar!... was that?...' Kallen muses.

Nagata tried to escape from the pursuing Britannian army by driving the lorry towards the ghettos, but seemingly to no avail. Seeing this, Kallen took off her hat, got off her seat and went to the back of the lorry cargo. Right before the Britannian VTOLs were ready to shoot the lorry, they were being stricken down by a slash harken, and immediately after that, a red Glasgow was revealed and jumped out from the back of the lorry cargo.

"Crap! These guys are real terrorists!" Lelouch freaked out.

"You fellas know full well what this badass mother can do!" exclaims Kallen.

However, before Kallen could wipe out all the pursuing Britannian VTOLs, a more advanced blue Sutherland was airdropped by the Britannian army, and the pilot of the Sutherland was none other than Jeremiah Gottwald. "An over-the-hill Glasgow is no match for a Sutherland, not to mention a filthy Eleven who spurns the compassion of our glorious Emperor!" ridiculed Jeremiah.

Several miles before, another Sutherland jumped in front of the lorry and started shooting, forcing Nagata to turned the lorry to the left. The pilot was revealed to be Villetta Nu. "Hmm… simple-minded fools."

Back to the fight between Kallen and Jeremiah, Kallen tried to shoot Glasgow's left slash harken to attack Jeremiah, but it wasn't functioning. As Jeremiah's Sutherland was about to launch an attack with its right arm metal bar, Kallen quickly decided to sacrificed her Glasgow's left arm and shot it towards Jeremiah's Sutherland, buying enough time to escape from the losing fight.

"Ok… did Villetta and Jeremiah purposefully arriving late to avoid facing the fact that they are racist bastards!?" Chiba explodes.

"Wait! Chigusa has changed already! What's past is in the past!" Ohgi quickly comes to his wife's defense.

"It's actually funny that Lelouch, who would become the most notorious terrorist of all times, freaked out when being caught into a terrorist operation," comments Cornelia, before she turns her eyes to Kallen. "Lady Kouzuki, have you received any formal training on how to pilot a knightmare frame prior to piloting the Glasgow?"

"Err… not really, we'd only got the Glasgow for a short period of time, and I just read the operation manual to teach myself piloting it," replies Kallen.

"I see… despite the Glasgow being an old model, you fared well in your fight against a much more advanced Sutherland, piloted by an ace pilot such as Lord Gottwald no less, and was decisive in getting rid of the malfunctioned left arm to buy your time to escape. Had you received formal training with our instructors, you would have certainly become a member of the Knight of the Round in no time." Conrelia praises Kallen.

"Err… thanks?" is the only response Kallen could think of in respond to Cornelia's high praise.

Meanwhile, when Lelouch was trapped in the lorry cargo and was thinking of ways to get himself out of the sticky situation, Lloyd suddenly appeared on screen and smiled knowingly towards Bartley. "AHA! You screwed this up – you could have easily retrieved whatever Prince Clovis and you were secretly working on, but you let the terrorists go, so that you can find their hideout and wipe them out as well." Lloyd pointed out before turning his head to Cecile, his assistant. "Congratulations! Your reasoning was spot on!"

"AHA! My first screen appearance!" cheers Lloyd.

"Ours, Lloyd." Cecile corrects Lloyd.

Bartley frantically asked what Lloyd wanted, to which Lloyd replied that he would like to participate in the operation to obtain data. Cecile asked what was being retrieved from the terrorists, to which Bartley hesitated before informing both Cecile and Lloyd that it was poison gas that he was trying to retrieve.

"I wonder why he had been so hesitant in answering my question?" the present Ceciles can't help but to wonder again.

Elsewhere, the Captain of Prince Clovis' Imperial Guards was ordering some Honorary Britannian soldiers to find the poison gas stolen by the terrorists. As the Honorary Britannian soldiers dispersed, Nagata, wounded by the gunshots fired by Villetta earlier, was letting the lorry to enter an empty building before the lorry hit a large burrow and halted. In an attempt to have himself being found by his comrade, Nagata pushed a button and opened the lorry cargo to reveal the poison gas container.

Not far away, an Honorary Britannian soldier immediately spotted the poison gas container and proceeded to inform Clovis' Royal Guards. "Soldier 404 has sighted the target." The operator reported. "Great, let's go and retrieve it," ordered the Imperial Guard Captain.

Soldier 404 was quick to see Lelouch approaching the poison gas container, and the soldier sent an impressively difficult flying spin kick to knock Lelouch down. "Stop the mindless killing!" warned Soldier 404.

"Wait! I'm not the one…" Lelouch tried to explain, but was cut off midway by the soldier, "Planning to use poison gas! Don't play dumb with me!"

"Get off from me…!" Lelouch bellowed, trying to kick the soldier off before the soldier jumped back himself, "I'm not here by choice. And if that's poison gas, it was made in Britannia, wasn't it?"

"My god, you are… Lelouch?" The Soldier asked surprisingly as he took off his helmet. "It's me, Suzaku!"

"You… have become a Britannian soldier?" Lelouch couldn't believe his eyes.

Rakshata is again amused by how things turned out. "So a Britannian prince wanted to obliterate Britannia while the son of the last Japanese Prime Minister joined Britannia as a foot soldier, and got numbered as soldier 404… isn't that such an 'error' that shouldn't be found in the pages of history, like the infamous 'Error 404', i.e. 'Page not found'?" she laughs.

"And what he did was so Suzaku, unwilling to listen to others while taking drastic actions that may hurt others," chides Kallen as she shoots a glance towards Zero. "He was such a 'Knight of Error'."

Inside his mask, Zero can do nothing but to sigh. "'Error 404'… I thought I was doing the right thing, but…"

On the other side of the auditorium, Tianzi is surprised. "Wow, Suzaku could fly very high kicks, and he was spinning like a top!"

"Yes, that cousin of mine might not have much in his head, but he had definitely packed a lot in his muscles," says Kaguya.

Zero can only mentally shake his head and thanks his mask to prevent others from seeing his rolled eyes.

As Lelouch and Suzaku were having their not-so-enjoyable reunion, the poison gas container suddenly opened, with strong light beaming out. Suzaku immediately pushed down Lelouch with a piece of cloth covering the latter's mouth and nose. However, instead of poison gas, it was a young girl with lime-coloured hair and golden pupils in a white straightjacket that emerged from the container.

"What!? That was C.C.?" Kallen can't believe her eyes. "So it was her that Prince Clovis had been keeping as a secret all that time?"

Cornelia frowns. 'So that's C.C…', she then blinks in realization and rages, 'don't tell me that this girl… brother Clovis, so you were also seeking this evil Geass power for yourself?'

"So that's how C.C. and Lulu met…" whispers Shirley.

"Feeling jealous?" Milly smiles with a knowing grin.

"…No! It's not that Madam President!" Shirley panics, "It's just that Lulu had never showed any interest in dating other girls, and this C.C. was not a student at Ashford, I have always wondered how Lulu met her in the first place…" Shirley speaks with decreasing volume and finally looks down with her face redden.

"Ah… such youth." Milly looks at her orange-haired friend with a smile.

Lelouch and Suzaku untied C.C. when Clovis' Imperial Guards suddenly appeared and cornered the three of them. The Imperial Guard Captain ordered Suzaku to kill Lelouch, but contrary to everyone's expectation, Suzaku refused to comply with the order, and was then shot by the Captain for disobeying the order. As the Imperial Guards were about to proceed killing Lelouch and retrieving C.C., Nagata used his dying strength to pressed a big white button, causing an explosion. Lelouch and C.C. promptly escaped.

Back in G1, Clovis didn't take the situation well. "If knowledge of her gets out, I'll be disinherited… As Clovis, 3rd Prince of the Empire, I command you: Destroy Shinjuku Ghetto! Leave no one alive!"

Upon his order, the Britannian Army went all out and started destroying buildings and killing innocent Japanese in the ghetto. Clovis smirked as he saw the destruction and killing progressed well.

"That piece of shit!" Chiba growls. "He killed all the Japanese simply because he wanted to keep his dirty little secret? How dared he!"

The Japanese audience don't take it well either: Kallen looks like she is about to punch through the screen; Tohdoh and Ohgi have deep frowns on their faces. Kaguya is hugging a terrified Tianzi to calm her down.

Zero, however, is the most shocked. 'So it had nothing to do with fighting terrorists… I was just being sent out that day to kill innocent people?' Zero can't believe he actually followed that order that day, and is cursing himself with his fists clenched. 'Just how stupid and naive I was?...'

Meanwhile, Lelouch and C.C. were running for their lives through a dark alley. C.C. tripped her foot and fell down, but Lelouch nevertheless unleashed his anger unto her, "What the hell are you? This chaos is all your fault, isn't it? Not only that, Britannia even got Suzaku…!" C.C. simply stared at Lelouch and did not respond. They then reached a staircase of an abandoned warehouse, where some Japanese were being shot down by Clovis' Imperial Guards; Lelouch and C.C. ducked and stayed silent, waiting for the Imperial Guards to leave. With the worst of luck, however, Lelouch's mobile phone rang. Lelouch immediately switched his phone off. However it was too late: the Imperial Guards caught C.C. and cornered Lelouch.

"Huh? That jerk! He hung up on me! I can't believe it!" Shirley was pissed as she was walking in Ashford Academy.

'Oh my god! I am sorry Lulu!' The present Shirley is frightened to see that her call had put her darling Lulu into a live-or-death situation.

"…Recorded." Anya takes a photo of Shirley's frightened expression.

Milly and Rivalz also cringe. 'To think such an innocent call would put Lelouch into such a lethal situation…'

The Captain threw Lelouch against the wall. "What an appropriate location for a terrorist to meet his end."

"You scum!..." growled Lelouch.

"Still, you did well for a student, but that's to be expected since you're a Britannian. Unfortunately, my clever young friend, you have no future." The Captain spoke as he pointed his gun to Lelouch, ready to shoot.

"He mustn't die!" C.C. screamed as she struggled to free herself from the Imperial Guards holding her, and hurried herself in front of Lelouch as the captain shot. The bullet flew right through C.C.'s forehead, and she collapsed onto the ground, bathing herself with her own blood.

"Impossible!" Ohgi exclaims. "She was a member of the Black Knights and we had seen her around, alive!" Tohdoh, Chiba, Kaguya and Nunnally are all shocked at what they have just seen on screen. There is no way anyone could have survived a direct headshot, so how come they had interact with C.C. at a later time? Tianzi, not having met with C.C., simply buries her head into Kaguya's chest again to avoid watching the bloody scene.

Lloyd, Rakshata and Cecile are shocked as well. "Is there a medical or scientific possibility that she could have survived that shot?" Lloyd turns to Rakshata and Cecile. Both women shake their head.

Cornelia frowns and asks Kallen, "Are you sure that this is the same girl who gave you these blue-ray discs?" to which Kallen nods, although Kallen too has a rather shocked expression on her face. Guilford frowns as well, not understanding how that could be logically possible.

As the Captain was making up a reason for reporting the death of C.C. to his superiors, Lelouch was shaking, cursing his doomed fate, "How can this be happening? First Suzaku was killed… then this girl… and now I'm about to die, before I've had a chance to do a single thing with my life."

Suddenly, the supposedly dead girl grabbed Lelouch's right wrist with her left hand, seemingly sent Lelouch into a metaphysical dimension with nerve-like strings connected to his body.

"Oh my god! She is a zombie!" exclaims Tamaki. Milly and Rivalz are too shocked to decide whether to respond to Tamaki's rather stupid exclamation.

"You don't want it to end here, do you?" came C.C.'s voice.

"What?"

"You appear to have a reason for living."

"That girl? That's impossible!" Lelouch was shocked, not understanding how this could have happened.

Nevertheless, C.C. continued. "If I grant you power, could you go on? I propose a deal. In exchange for this power, you must agree to make my one wish come true. Accept this contract and you accept its conditions, while living in the world of humans, you will live unlike any other. A different providence, a different time, a different life. The power of the king will condemn you to a life of solitude. Are you prepared for this?"

Among the numerous images that flew through Lelouch's mind, an image of Emperor Charles and his cult-like underlings briefly flashed through.

Nunnally frowns. 'Big brother, father and brother Clovis were all having something to do with this… just how much do I not know?'

Seeing all the images, Lelouch had made a decision. "Yes! I hereby accept the terms of your contract!" Two gears interlocked, and Lelouch's mind went back to the real world.

Lelouch stood up. "Say…how a Britannian who detest his own country should live his life?" he asked with a calm yet somehow dangerous tone.

The Captain replied, "Are you some kind of radical?"

"What's wrong? Why don't you shoot? Your opponent is just a schoolboy. Or have you finally realized?" Lelouch continued:

"The only ones who should kill… are those who are prepared to be killed!"

Zero stiffens at hearing that statement. 'That's exactly what he told me in the throne room, right before executing the final act of the Zero Requiem! Did Lelouch plan it all from the very beginning?'

A red, bird-like sigil appeared in Lelouch's left eye. "Lelouch vi Britannia orders you, DIE!" As Lelouch threw his left arm up and then to the left dramatically, the red sigil then flew into the eyes of the Imperial Guards, seemingly twisted their intricate nerve system. The Imperial Guard captain's eye glows in red.

"Hahahahaha… Yes, Your Highness!" was the captain's only response, all while all Imperial Guards pointed their guns to their necks, fired and killed themselves.

Everyone in the audience gasps to see how the Imperial Guards obliged to Lelouch's command and so happily killed themselves. "So that's the power of Geass?" asks Gino.

"Oh no!..." Tianzi once again flinches and closes her eyes; Kaguya promptly hugs her little friend.

For a moment, Lelouch seemed shock at what happened to the Imperial Guards, but his face quickly turned into narrowed eyes and an evil smirk, whispering to the dead girl who granted him this new power, "Thank you." An explosion then took place behind Lelouch, prompting him to turn his head back. It was Villetta in her Sutherland.

"Why are all the Imperial Guards dead?" Villetta mumbled as she scanned through the area on her Sutherland. Seeing that Lelouch was the only person alive, Villetta quickly pressed the loud speaker button and demanded, "What happened here? Why is a Britannian student in a place like this? Answer me!" All Lelouch gave was a deviant look, and Villetta shot a magazine of bullets that flew pass all sides of Lelouch's upper body, in an attempt to force an answer from the deviant boy. Lelouch did not flinch at the slightest.

"Impressive." Tohdoh comments approvingly.

Milly, Rivalz and Shirley, being private citizens not involved in military affairs, all flinch as they see what happened; Kallen, on the other hand, is once again amazed by how daring Lelouch was. '"The only ones who should kill are those who are prepared to be killed", huh? So you are really ready to be killed the moment you had killed those Imperial Guards?'

Cornelia, while still being mad at Lelouch for his crimes against Euphemia, also feels small amount of proud when seeing her younger brother's exceptional courage in this. 'That's my boy, Lelouch, facing perilous situation with dignity and pride.' "What do you think, Guilford?"

"I think it was a pity that Lelouch had never been on our side," comments Guilford, "he would have brought great victories and enviable achievements to the Empire had he been working with Your Highness."

"Indeed… how sad things had turned out that way due to my father's foolishness," Cornelia sighs.

Lelouch fired up his Geass again, this time facing the Sutherland. "I order you to come out. At once!"

However, that didn't work. "Who the hell do you think you are to order me?" Villetta spat.

"I see. It only works with direct eye contact." Lelouch realized. He decided to change tactics. "My name is Allen Spacer, my father's a duke."

"A duke?" Villetta was moved by this new piece of information.

"My ID card is in my breast pocket. After you have confirmed my identity, I'd request your protection." Lelouch continued lying, smoothly.

Villetta bit the bait and came out of the pilot pit. "Keep your hands up in the air, I'll take out your ID," Villetta landed and kept walking towards Lelouch. Lelouch smiled.

"Now then, hand your Knightmare over to me." Lelouch ordered Villetta as the Geass sigil flew into her eyes, twisting her nerve system.

'No… Chigusa!' Ohgi can't help but whines about his wife falling right into Lelouch's hands, despite knowing that she was still an enemy at that point.

'Her greed for prestige and power made her fell for Lelouch's trap… but to be fair, who would have thought that a seemingly harmless schoolboy would have possessed such terrifying, mind-twisting power?' Gino muses.

"Understood. The activation code is XG21G2D4," Villetta said with a monotone while swirling the keys with her right index finger, before throwing it to Lelouch.

The scene then blurred and after a while, Villetta regained her sense, realizing that she was standing idly in an abandoned warehouse, and her Sutherland was gone. "What the?..."

"So that was how the treacherous emperor gained this evil power known as Geass?" Chiba asks, disdain fully present in her voice.

"It seemed so," chimes in Cornelia, "that was indeed the day when a new demon was born."