Chapter 25: "Transgression" XI – UFN Resolution No.1

-Venue of the United Federation of Nations (UFN) Charter Ratification Ceremony-

Today is a busy and important day for the residents on Horai Island. Numerous ships and airships docked at the island, carrying dignitaries and reporters from all over the world.

Just as everyone was getting ready for the UFN Charter Ratification Ceremony, a woman with long, purple hair was being constrained onto a chair in a small, dark room in the Ikaruga, the flagship of the Black Knights. The woman's right arm was held up and tied to the ceiling, her legs tied up with leather belts, and her left arm was tied close to her chest, apparently still recovering from a serious injury. It was the long thought MIA Cornelia li Britannia, 2nd Princess of Britannia.

"I see, you've put her into the cockpit of the Sutherland," a young male voice spoke. It was Lelouch in his Zero costume.

"Please forgive me. Your order was to eliminate everyone, but to do so to a member of the Imperial Family was just…" a knelt down Jeremiah said apologetically.

"That's fine. Well, actually, well done," Lelouch said.

"Lelouch, what are you after with that cursed power of yours?" Cornelia stared at her estranged younger half-brother and murderer of Euphemia sternly.

"My dear sister, I just want to save my little sister," Lelouch answered with no apparent emotion in his tone.

"You dare to say that…!" Cornelia narrowed her eyes. How dare Lelouch said that when he was the one who killed Clovis and Euphemia in cold blood?

"How dare him!" Guilford slams the armrest of his seat. How dare Lelouch tied up the 2nd Princess of Britannia like that?

The Ashford group frowns at the scene. "Hadn't Lelouch learnt that Her Highness had nothing to do with his mother's death already when he geassed her to answer his questions on the rooftop of the Government Palace? Why was he still treating his elder sister like that?" Rivalz asks incredulously, not understanding why Lelouch still treated his elder sister like an enemy after learning that she had nothing to do with his mother's death.

"Because Lelouch has made Her Highness his enemy already the moment he killed Princess Euphemia, not to mention that he had killed General Darlton right in front of her eyes as well," Milly answers, "there was no turning back on that."

"Lulu…" Shirley is simply sad to see that Lelouch was still treating his elder sister like that, especially learning how this came to be due to Charles' maltreatment to him eight years ago.

Nunnally is going to apologize to Cornelia again for Lelouch's rough treatment to her, but the young Empress then remembers what Cornelia has told her earlier about not to take away the cross from Lelouch that would effectively humiliating his pride, and the young Empress simply places her hand over her elder sister's. Cornelia nods to Nunnally with a smile.

"Hold on. So you were onboard the Ikaruga that whole time?" Chiba asks Cornelia incredulously, "Lelouch didn't tell any of us about that!"

"Well, you should know by now how secretive my younger brother was," Cornelia care-freely replies.

'I see, so Her Highness was the fugitive who broke the cell and ran away during the 2nd Assault on Tokyo Settlement,' Ohgi muses as he finally learns the truth about the fugitive whom he thought was Villetta, but turned out to be not.

On the main stage of the international ceremony on Horai Island, representatives of the 47 countries who signed the treaty on behalf of their respective countries all stood and applauded to the ratification of the UFN Charter. At the same time, Guilford was walking in a corridor inside the Area 11 Government Palace, confirming with his officers on the phone regarding the details of the military parade in Area 11 in response to the ceremony that marked the ratification of the UFN Charter. Just as he had finished confirming those details, his phone rang again.

"Yes? Don't worry, if it's about the parade…" Guilford spoke.

"Lord Guilford," a familiar voice came from the other side of the phone.

Guilford's was stunned and stopped walking on the corridor. "Orange?" he said incredulously.

Cornelia immediately connects the dots. "Guilford, don't tell me Lelouch got you to..."

Guilford holds his princess' hands and slightly shakes his head before saying, "Your Highness, I couldn't remember what exactly happened to me either, but when I regained my conscious, my eyesight was severely damaged by the F.L.E.I.J.A. and I struggled to find my way back to you in the hospital on Horai Island…"

"It seems that we have to wait until Gottwald arrives to lift whatever Geass was cast on you to find out what exactly happened," Cornelia frowns, but immediately changes into a gentle face as she looks at her knight, "but I am glad you came back to me… alive."

"Your Highness…" Guilford's tears start to swell in his eyes. "I will be by your side until I no longer can."

The purple princess nods to her knight with a gentle smile.

Back on Horai Island, Kaguya and Tianzi stood at the front of the stage as the representatives of the 47 representatives to deliver final remarks on the ratification of the UFN Charter. "…lastly, according to Article 17 of the UFN Charter, all member nations that have ratified the Charter shall henceforth forfeit their military power permanently," Kaguya, Chairwoman of the UFN Supreme Council and Representative of the United States of Japan announced to the world, "to ensure the security of all member nations, the UFN shall enter into a contract with the Black Knights, a military group that is not affiliated with any single nation."

"We hereby accept the contract," Zero responded, "In exchange for UFN funding and personnel involvement, we, the Black Knights, shall henceforth be the UFN's shield to defend every member nation and the sword to oppose any external foe!" The TV screen then rolled out the list of major staff members of the Black Knights, putting Zero as its CEO, Xingke as its General Commander, Ohgi as the General Secretary and Tohdoh as the Chief of Staff, Joint Staff, as well as the other members of the Black Knights with their new titles. As the list rolled down, a "Supporting Officer for Internal Sanitary" title was listed to be Shinichirou Tamaki's official title within the ranks of the Black Knights.

"Supporting Officer for Internal Sanitary? What kind of title was that? Hahaha…" Milly laughs out loudly as she hugs herself to prevent herself from falling due to laughing extremely hard, "I'd never imagine that there's such a grandeur title for… hahaha!"

"Hey! What's your problem with that?" Tamaki yells, "That's a cool title I got from Zero! Isn't it, Ohgi?"

"Huh? Well… that is…" Ohgi doesn't want to break the truth to his old friend that his title was nothing more than a euphemism for "cleaner", but he doesn't have any better words to come out of his mouth at the moment.

"It's a very unique, one-of-a-kind title that no one else had," Kaguya cuts in and smiles at Tamaki, "needless to say, it highlighted your actual importance to the Black Knights and showed your capability, as an officer, within the ranks."

"See! I knew I was important!" Tamaki's nose goes up high. Even the UFN Chairwoman has acknowledged his unique title and actual importance in the Black Knights publicly!

What the proud and simple Japanese man hasn't realized is that everyone, except the clueless Tianzi, are trying their level best not to let out their laughter. 'Tamaki, you are indeed the stupidest man I have ever known,' Kallen muses as she too is trying her best not to let out her laughter. She regrets not seeing her name on the list, but Tamaki's stupidity is just too funny for her not to laugh at.

After Zero's declaration, Tianzi, the last Empress of the Chinese Federation and now the Symbol of Unity of the United States of China, continued to lay out the guidelines of the usage of UFN military forces. "Disturbances in this world are caused by military powers of disparate nations. UFN shall only use military force in accordance with resolutions passed by its Supreme Council," she then closed her folder upon finishing her part.

"Good job, Tianzi! You did great!" Kaguya praises her young friend for her calmness in her very first public speech broadcasted globally.

"It's all thanks to you, Kaguya!" the young Chinese girl smiles happily, "thanks to you, I could stay calm when speaking in front of so many people and so many cameras!"

"It was a splendid performance, Tianzi!" Nunnally also congratulates her Chinese counterpart. After Nunnally has ascended to the throne, the two empresses have become good friends since they were introduced to each other by Kaguya.

"Thank you, Nunnally!" Tianzi smiles back at her Britannian counterpart.

Next to Nunnally, Cornelia gently gazes at the three young girls who now rule the world together with Margaret Walpole, President of EU. 'Who would have thought that the once cruel world dominated by my merciless father and my treacherous younger brother is now run by four gentle and kind young ladies? Euphy, can you see us from Heaven? The world has truly become a gentler and kinder place for all people that you have always wanted.'

After Tianzi had finished her statement, Kaguya continued. "And with that, I shall now lay before you the first resolution," Kaguya said before turning 180 and faced the seated representatives of the member nations behind her, "the territory of the United States of Japan (USJ) has been illegally occupied and trampled over by a foreign power. As the USJ representative, I hereby request the UFN to send the Black Knights to rectify the situation. All those in favour, please rise."

As Kaguya finished her statement, all UFN representatives stood up in unison, showing their unreserved support to freeing Japan from Britannia's grip.

"Those in favour are in the majority," Kaguya announced as she turned back to the cameras, "hence, under UFN Resolution no.1, UFN hereby requests the Black Knights to go forth and liberate Japan!"

"We hereby accept the request," Zero responded as Kaguya finished her part, "So be it. Under UFN Resolution no.1, our first operational objective shall be…" Zero then raised his right hand up dramatically before pointing towards the Far East island nation, "…Japan!"

The crowd cheered. This would be the first assault anyone had launched against Britannia, the current hegemon of the planet, in a long time!

Among the audience present, only Kallen, Cornelia and Villetta did not attend nor watch the ceremony live on TV because all of them were being imprisoned or confined by either Britannia or the Black Knights.

"The ceremony seemed to have gone great! I should have been there!" Kallen says with great regret, "Only if I had checked my Guren's energy status before I went off to fight General Li in the Chinese Federation…"

"AHA! But if that's the case, your Guren wouldn't have got the upgrade from us," Lloyd says, "so they were merely gives and takes."

"Earl of Pudding, you…" Rakshata is about to burst out again at the mentioning of her baby being defiled by her archrival, only to be stopped by Cecile.

Cornelia feels strange when she sees how the people were cheering when UFN decided to invade Japan. On the one hand, her Britannian patriotism has made her to be mentally repulsive to such insolence against her own country, but on the other hand, having gone through so much during her incognito search for the truth about Euphemia's berserk actions in the SAZ ceremony had allowed her to interact with non-Britannians on a daily basis from the opposite perspective of what she has always had as a Britannian princess and high ranking general, thereby enabling her to understand their plight and sufferings due to Britannia and the resulting anti-Britannianism.

As for Villetta, she frowns with a tint of anger as she recalls the unpleasant memory of being confined by Diethard, the man who shot her down to the sea, in the Ikaruga. However, she has to admit that it was precisely because Diethard had confined her that she did not have to make the difficult choice of fighting against the man she loves or against her own country, which she still loves. 'Damn you Diethard! It seems I have to thank you for relieving me from facing a difficult dilemma,' Villetta snorts as she sees the image of that vile man on the screen.

"What's wrong, Chigusa?" Ohgi notices his wife's displeasure and asks her concernedly.

"Oh nothing, just some less pleasant memories suddenly popped up in my mind, but I'm fine now," Villetta said.

"It's okay to vent it out, Chigusa. I will always be by your side," Ohgi is still a bit worried about his wife.

"Alright, I will when it comes up again," Villetta smiles lovingly as she places her head onto Ohgi's shoulder, causing the Prime Minister of Japan to blush a bit.

"Hear me, Zero!"

Sadly, the cheer didn't go on for long as all the monitors across the world were suddenly hacked, and Charles zi Britannia, the 98th Emperor of Britannia, appeared on the screen with a confident smirk as he bellowed his bass and belligerent voice to the entire world.

"Wha…?" inside the Zero mask, Lelouch was utterly shocked, 'what the…?'

"Switch to the auxiliary line! Cut the link, damn it!" Diethard immediately instructed his subordinates to disconnect the line to prevent the Emperor from hacking the broadcast system. However, the staff found out that there was no way to stop it as even the auxiliary line, on top of all 14 external pathways, were hacked.

"Zero! Do you really think you have prevailed over me?" the Emperor ridiculed the masked leader.

'Impossible! How did he get out of that strange dimension?' Lelouch was still in utter shock and confusion as to how the Emperor got out from the supposedly sealed strange dimension with eternal dusk. Back on the stage, Kaguya stared at the monitor as Tianzi hid behind her, frightened by the sudden appearance of the towering Britannian Emperor; core members of the Black Knights were all staring at the screen with anger, listening to what the Emperor had to say.

"However, it matters not," Charles continued as the world's attention focused on him, "EU, once a superpower comprising one-third of the world, is dead. That means the little charter that you drew up dissects the world into Britannia and the pitiful dirt that is not. It makes things clear and simple: whoever won in this war shall control the entire world," as the Emperor spoke, the screen shows a world map that is gradually being coloured either blue or red, showing the territories controlled by Britannia and UFN member nations respectively. A few parts of the map are left uncoloured, showing territories still controlled by the EU and a few other independent nations such as Australia, the Middle Eastern Federation and the Kingdom of Zilkhstan.

Zero took a few steps back as the Emperor spoke, which perplexed Tohdoh. Why did Zero seem intimated by the Emperor? Shouldn't he have already anticipated that big moves such as forming the UFN and launching a full-scale assault on Area 11 would have prompted a response from the leader of Britannia?

"Very well, Zero. Come at me. Will you win everything? Or will you lose everything? That's the very nature of war," the Emperor continued, before raising his right fist into the air and roared the imperial battle cry at full volume:

"ALL HAIL BRITAN~NIA!"

"All Hail Britannia! All Hail Britannia!" The Britannian soldiers participating the military parade at Yokosuka military base in Area 11, oversaw by Guilford, all cheered and chanted the imperial battle cry at the lead of their glorious emperor.

On the other hand, on Horai Island, Tohdoh raised his right arm into the air as well, holding a katana and chanted "Nippon, Banzai!"

"Nippon, Banzai!" the Japanese at Horai Island started to chant as well.

"All Hail Britannia! All Hail Britannia…!" "Nippon, Banzai! Nippon, Banzai! Nippon, Banzai! Nippon…" both sides started to get aroused by their respective patriotic chants.

Tohdoh didn't understand why Zero was intimidated by the Emperor back then, but now he understands as he is finding out that he doesn't understand another thing that has just happened on screen. "How did the Emperor get out of that sealed strange dimension?" the eminent Japanese general asks incredulously, perhaps as incredulous as how Lelouch was on screen.

"Could it be that the footage was pre-recorded?" Rivalz suggests.

Kaguya thinks for a moment. "It could be. The preparatory work for the formation of UFN had gone on for months, and it would be impossible that Britannian intelligence knew nothing about such plans well in advance. If Emperor Charles knew Zero was Lelouch from the beginning, then it would be quite easy for him to predict Lelouch's every move and had that footage prepared well in advance. Notice that the Emperor never mentioned 'United Federation of Nations' or 'UFN' in his speech, which would be the most unpredictable part for a footage that was recorded in advance based on predictions built on gathered Britannian intelligence."

"Or, the Emperor did have some backup plans up his sleeve to get out of that strange dimension in case something went wrong," Rakshata adds.

"Big Sister, which do you think was the more probable?" Nunnally is interested to see how her elder sister thinks. Having been separated from her father for years, Nunnally is curious to know how would her father actually do in such circumstance.

"I'd say father had some backup plans to escape from that strange dimension," Cornelia says, "he might not look like it, but I once heard my mother saying that father was an extremely careful and thorough man, and that was how he survived and prevailed in the last struggle for the throne and got crowned as the 98th Emperor." She then turns to the former Knight of Three, "What do you think, Lord Weinberg?"

"I agree with your analysis, Your Highness," Gino respectfully responded, "His Majesty was always a careful man, and I could not even recall an instance that His Majesty had made any tiny mistake when I was serving as his knight."

'Indeed, or else he wouldn't be able to fool you all about that bitch's "death" and his true intention with the wars he waged against other nations,' Anya muses under her poker face expression, fuming at the thought of the woman who had stolen her life up till very recently and tricked Lelouch into a merciless monster.

As the soldiers on both sides were chanting and aroused, Lelouch was panicking upon the Emperor's sudden reemergence. 'The Emperor has returned…' he mused as he entered his room on the Ikaruga.

"Uhm… welcome back!" a timid C.C. stood up from the bench in the room and greeted her new "master", but Lelouch was too consumed in his thoughts that he did not notice it.

'This isn't good. Not good at all. I have to rescue Nunnally at once!' Lelouch's took off his mask as his mind was running at full speed, arguably over its biological speed limit, 'I have Cornelia in my hand… no! He doesn't care about hostages!'

Nunnally, Guilford and Kallen all frown at Lelouch's mentioning of exploiting Cornelia to achieve his own goal: the fact that he so casually used his elder sister, who has proven herself under the effect of Geass to be innocent of the death of Marianne, as a tradable hostage to get what he wanted was simply abhorrent. Cornelia, however, is unfazed by it; she has already guessed that Lelouch would consider exploiting her for his own ends, and that he would immediately abandon the idea after realizing that such tactic would never work against their merciless father, arguably the person who Lelouch inherited the mercilessness from.

Lelouch's train of thought continued to speed. 'How about Jeremiah and Rolo…? No! Geass doesn't work on him! Should I reveal to the world that Zero is actually Lelouch vi Britannia? But the Black Knights would crumble if its leader were to be revealed as a prince of the enemy nation! Even if I could somehow rescue Nunnally by then, it would be meaningless if no country is willing to accept us!' "Tsch! What should I do?" Lelouch hissed out, finally overloading his inward-thinking capacity that he needed to spit the last bit out as words.

Ohgi, Tohdoh, Chiba and Tamaki once again frown at the scene. They have already learnt how little they meant to Lelouch after they have watched the truth behind Zero's disappearance amidst the Black Rebellion, and so they already have their expectations better managed than last time to hear Lelouch's rather rough thoughts. Together with how this disc revealed the true colours of Suzaku, the Black Knights are now a bit more tolerant to Lelouch than last time around since it is clear that Lelouch at least cared about someone wholeheartedly and had helped the Black Knights to survive and rise up against Britannia, whereas Suzaku seemingly only cared for power and prestige and had frustrated the Black Knights all along the way. It still stinks them, though, when they see once again how Lelouch cared for nothing about Japan but only the welfare of his full-blooded younger sister.

"Um, master, I kept this last piece so you could have it," C.C. was holding a plate with one slice of pizza left on it, "You left without having breakfast and must be hungry. So please, if you…"

"SHUT THE HELL UP!" Lelouch turned back violently with an enraged face and smashed the white plate into pieces, sending them plus the slice of pizza onto the floor, causing C.C. to screech in fear and fell onto the ground. Her left ring finger was scratched by the broken plate pieces and started to bleed, some blood spilled onto the floor. This brought Lelouch's mind back to normal as he realized that he had just hurt C.C.

Lelouch reverted back to his usual self and started to walk towards C.C., however the poor girl was utterly frightened and kept apologizing while hiding her head behind her raised crossed arms, eyes shut. "Forgive me, Master! I'll clean it up at once!"

"No, leave it there," Lelouch put down his mask on the floor, kneeling down before C.C. and grabbed her leg arm while looking at her left ring finger, "Be careful now, you're bleeding," he said gently.

"Huh?" C.C. was confused, but quickly affirmed her "master" that she's fine, "I'm okay. I get cut up all the time," she muttered in a soft voice.

Back in the Area 11 Government Palace, Suzaku was walking out of a doorway and turning left in a corridor, holding his phone. It showed that Lelouch was calling him. At the same time, Lelouch was standing next to his command seat in his room in the Ikaruga to make the call, while C.C. sat obediently on the bench, gazing her "master" innocently. A bandage was wrapped around the wound on her left ring finger.

Most in the audience frown at the scene, but for very different reasons.

"Man, this is the first time I see such an impatient Lelouch," Rivalz sighs, "I have never seen him like that in school or in the bingo hall we frequented back then."

Milly also frowns. She may like to get Lelouch into "difficult" situations with her pranks and all the unreasonable Student Council President orders, but to see Lelouch being stressed out like that is certainly not the "frustrated Lelouch" she wants to see.

Cornelia is not happy to see how her brother acted, but she says nothing, for she also understands the stress Lelouch was under when the safety of Nunnally was in peril. 'To be able to push Lelouch into such difficult situation… father was indeed a master of strategizing and manipulation,' she muses with a tint of anger as she thinks back how the 98th Emperor cold-bloodedly cast Euphemia away and never cared for her life, as well as how his handling of Marianne's death had estranged her once favourite half-brother and still favourite half-sister from the purple princess.

Next to Cornelia, Nunnally also frowns in sadness. 'Big Brother was really worried about my safety… I really shouldn't have been fooled by his mask when I was on the Damocles…'

'So Lulu really did like C.C…' Shirley feels devastated. Was that the reason why Lelouch never asked her out again after he had come back from that underground Geass facility?

'It seems the writing was on the wall a lot earlier than I thought,' Kallen grits her teeth, 'C.C. won and I lost…'

Guilford looks at the screen and inwardly does a comparison between Lelouch and the knight's liege. 'Back in the Black Rebellion, when the news of Princess Euphemia's death broke out, Her Highness didn't lash out her fury onto us; quite to the contrary, she contained her anger well and made all the necessary arrangements to ensure that we could properly fight against our enemies, and only after that had she isolated herself on the rooftop of the Government Palace to unleash her fury at Zero, who was directly responsible for Princess Euphemia's death. It was for this reason that even after she passed out after being severely injured by a geassed General Darlton, we were still able to function perfectly and eventually prevailed in the Black Rebellion,' the loyal knight to the 2nd Princess of Britannia then shakes his head in disapproval, 'In contrast, Lelouch simply unleashed his fury to whoever was physically closest to him, not realizing the consequence of doing so. He also abandoned his own army during the Black Rebellion with little hesitation, however justified it was for him to do so. Lelouch might be the smarter of the two, but Her Highness is definitely the more self-controlled and respectable one to follow.'

On the other side of the auditorium, the Black Knights Group is having a bad feeling about seeing Lelouch's name appearing on Suzaku's phone.

"No way, Lelouch was going to…" Ohgi frowns as he realizes what is probably going to happen on the screen next.

"Yes?" Suzaku answered the phone. Lelouch seemed to be shocked by Suzaku's voice a bit, but quickly recovered. "Is that Suzaku?" he asked.

"Lelouch," Suzaku answered, standing in front of a tall column situated at the centre of the rebuilt rooftop on the Area 11 Government Palace.

"So… have you seen the news?" Lelouch decided to use the news to guide the conversation to where he wanted it to be without revealing himself as the masked leader of the military power that had just contracted with the UFN as its sword and shield.

"About Area 11 becoming a battle field again? Yes," Suzaku answered.

"Wouldn't the Tokyo Settlement also be at risk?" Lelouch asked, getting one step closer to where he wanted the conversation to go.

However, what came next threw Lelouch off the rails completely. "That's your decision!" Suzaku bellowed as he finally unleashed his frustration accumulated since Zero's reemergence in Area 11, "Lelouch, are you the current Zero?"

Lelouch paused for a moment, and then narrowed and finally closed his eyes. "Yes, I am Zero," instead of keep lying his way to save Nunnally, the raven-haired boy decided to tell the truth for once.

Lelouch's answer triggered Suzaku, the latter's face instantly became infuriated. "What business does Britannia's enemy have with me?" the Knight of Seven asked coldly.

"Please, save Nunnally!" Lelouch said in an imploring tone, "the Emperor has been using her as hostage to try to lure me into his trap. That's why I've had to operate in secret. Please, Suzaku! You're the only one I can turn to now!"

Just as the two were speaking on the phone, some Britannian air units led by a Logres class Floating Battleship were flying over the Government Palace.

"He sold us out again, and for the same damn reason like last time!" Tamaki barks as he sees Lelouch voluntarily revealing his true identity to Suzaku for a rather private reason that would not do any good to the Black Knights.

"Tsch… so even though after having gone through all those that had happened, he still trusted that bastard more than us," Chiba spats at the sight of Lelouch colluding with Suzaku behind the back of the Black Knights again. She doesn't understand: why did Lelouch still trust Suzaku after what Suzaku had done to him after the Black Rebellion?

Villetta, on the other hand, is slightly amazed by the friendship between Lelouch and Suzaku. "For as much as Kururugi and Lelouch betrayed each other, it seems that when everything went south, Lelouch still instinctively saw Kururugi as the last resort for help. Their bonds were actually much stronger than one could imagine," The silver-haired First Lady of Japan comments.

"Well, that just tells you that Lelouch was still a better guy than Kururugi," Rakshata adds, "quite on the contrary, Kururugi was treating Lelouch as a total enemy, without a trace of their friendship left."

"I agree," Tohdoh succinctly expresses his views on this matter. Next to him, Chiba doesn't say anything, which means she tacitly agrees with Rakshata and Tohdoh as well – she would have voiced her opposition if she disagreed with Rakshata's observation.

"…!" Ohgi begrudges his wife's observation that leads to Rakshata's conclusion that Tohdoh and even Chiba, however reluctantly, have agreed to. How could the damned guy who exploited his relationship with Villetta be a good guy, especially when compared to Schneizel, the man who selflessly helped them to fight against Lelouch in the Battle of Mt Fuji?

Gino listens to the conversations among the members of the Black Knights, and then he realizes something. 'Was that the reason why Suzaku eventually betrayed Princess Euphemia's ideals and switched sides to help Lelouch instead?'

Despite Lelouch's imploring voice, Suzaku remained unfazed. "Do you think I would entertain your request?" the Knight of Seven responded coldly.

"I… I don't think so," Lelouch conceded, but then went back to panic mode, "even so, you are the only one I could turn to!"

"How selfish are you?" Suzaku was fed up with Lelouch. Why did Lelouch think that the Knight of Seven would help him after he had killed and exploited the Knight of Seven's one true love, and then had the said Knight of Britannia on the run like a laughable clown?

"I know! But I only… I only… have you to turn to!" Lelouch admitted his selfishness, before finally, for the first time, giving up his pride and begged his friend as tears swelled up in his violet eyes, "Please! Please… protect Nunnally!"

"I… I have never seen Lelouch begging people like that," Rivalz is shocked and surprised to see how vulnerable Lelouch was when he pleaded Suzaku to save Nunnally, "he was always the confident guy who simply smirked through any problem he faced…"

"Lulu was in a very desperate situation…" Shirley feels bad for the boy she loved, "I have never seen him like that…"

"Big Brother…" Nunnally is also sad to see how her prideful brother actually threw away his pride to beg Suzaku for help, another proof that he cared about her well-being more than anything else, his gigantic ego that not even his father could have bent included.

"It must be the recoil of being too smart and always in control of the situation," Cecile observes, "since His Majesty was exceptionally smart, he could solve most problems, even the very difficult ones, all by himself. With Geass, he could even force others to do whatever he wanted. However, if neither his intellect nor his Geass power could solve the problem, as in this situation His Majesty Emperor Charles had put him into, then he would quickly feel an immense amount of frustration because inside his mind, he would feel powerless, a feeling that smart and capable people would have little experience in dealing with when compared to normal people, causing the former to panic and fall into despair much more easily and severely than the latter in comparison."

Everyone in the audience thinks for a while and agrees with Cecile's reasoning. It could indeed be said that Lelouch was much less experienced in handling failures, frustration and being powerless than most others thanks to his incredible intellect and his cheating Geass ability. In this regard, Emperor Charles was undoubtedly the true master of scheming and strategizing, easily putting his demonically clever and capable son who possessed a dangerous supernatural power into a real fix, with no good solution to the situation except to gamble on his already severely tarnished friendship with Suzaku.

"Well, there is a reason why His Majesty's His Majesty," Gino concludes, "hence why even someone as smart, capable and charismatic as Prince Schneizel had never been able to pose any real threat to His Majesty's rule and tight grip on power."

The screen then shows a flash back from eight years ago, where a small Lelouch was carrying an even smaller Nunnally on his back with a small Suzaku following him behind, walking pass a devastated wasteland filled by dead bodies and burnt trees.

"Oh no!" Tianzi immediately covered her eyes with her hands: even though the young Symbol of Unity of the United States of China has seen the SAZ massacre scene previously, a scene where piles of dead bodies lying around on a piece of wasteland is simply too much for her to take. Next to the frightened girl, Kaguya immediately tends to her younger friend and consoles her by gently patting her back, even though she is also sad and upset to see her dead countrymen rotting on that piece of wasteland. 'May you all rest in peace,' she muses quietly in her mind.

"That's terrible…" Cecile is also shocked by the scene. Three small children were left on their own to walk through a devastated wasteland filled with dead bodies? Next to Lloyd, Nina also cringes at such a cruel scene.

"Nunnally, that's…" Cornelia asks intently.

"Yes, those were Suzaku, Big Brother and I after the Britannian army had torn the old Japan apart," Nunnally confirms, "my old wheelchair must have been destroyed during the bombing."

Cornelia tightens her fists. "Only if I could find you all earlier…"

"That's eight years ago, Big Sister, and the situation was too chaotic for you to find us, so please don't blame yourself on this," Nunnally gently holds her elder sister's hand, looking into her indigo eyes.

"I won't lose you ever again," Cornelia pulls Nunnally into her arms and holds her younger sister gently.

"Where are we going? Are we getting moved to another place again?" child Nunnally asked her brother meekly.

"It's one of the Kururugi homes," child Lelouch lied, "this time, we're heading to the main mansion."

Child Suzaku stopped and looked around the ground: there were dead bodies scattered everywhere: men, women, children, and even babies.

"Keep walking, Suzaku," child Lelouch said, seeing child Suzaku was standing still while gazing at the dead bodies. However, child Suzaku was too shocked to move.

"Keep walking," child Lelouch simply repeated without turning his head back nor paying attention to any of the dead bodies lying on the ground.

Child Nunnally frowned. "What is this strange smell?" she muttered as some pungent smell went into her nose.

"We're going by a garbage dump. Right, Suzaku?" Child Lelouch kept lying in order to hide the inconvenient truth from his darling little sister, turning to child Suzaku for some much needed endorsement. However, child Suzaku simply stood still and started to weep at the sight of the numerous dead Japanese lying around him. Seeing this, child Lelouch walked back to child Suzaku.

"What's wrong, Suzaku?" child Nunnally asked as she heard child Suzaku's sobbing sound.

"I… I… I…" child Suzaku couldn't finish his sentence as he was overwhelmed by the feeling of guilt, tears falling down his cheeks: all those people die because child Suzaku killed his father by accident, thereby sending Japan into chaos!

Suddenly, child Suzaku felt a hand rubbing on his cheek. "…Nunnally?" child Suzaku looked back up at the blind young girl.

"My mother once taught me that a warm touch is good for tears!" child Nunnally said with a bright smile on her face.

The Japanese audience are shocked by the scene. On the one hand, the scene reminds them of the horrors and devastation they have experienced firsthand right after the war eight years ago, but on the other hand, the scene of three small children finding their way out of such a horrific situation has caused the group to pity those children, even if two of them were Lelouch and Suzaku. Ohgi, a former teacher, automatically feels bad for Lelouch, Nunnally and Suzaku, and even Chiba, the hardheaded anti-Britannian Japanese woman, has her maternal instinct activated and feels bad for them, temporarily forgetting her rage and hatred against Lelouch and Suzaku. Villetta, an actual mother of an infant, also has her maternal instinct triggered and feels bad for the three young children who were left to themselves across the devastated country of Japan.

"That's horrible…" Shirley feels sad to see so many dead bodies lying on the ground. None of the history lessons she took in school had ever told her that!

Kallen also bites her lip. 'So that's what Lelouch, Nunnally and Suzaku had been through right after the war eight years ago. While I still have my mother and onii-chan to rely on, they had no one but only themselves to rely on…' the scene touches a soft spot in Kallen's heart and she suddenly feels bad for the three of them as she gazes at the current Nunnally and Zero. 'It was the Emperor's fault that things had become that way, causing so many tragedies happened in the last 8 years!' the red-haired beauty hisses quietly.

"To think that Lelouch and Suzaku had gone through such horrible places at such a young age…" Rivalz is shocked as well. "No wonder Lelouch was always so cold and cynical about the society and things in general…"

"I think this scene has also provided some clues on why Lelouch acted in his way while Suzaku acted in his," Milly observes, "you can see that Suzaku was gravely saddened by all the dead bodies lying around him, while Lelouch paid absolutely no attention to those dead bodies and focused only on taking care of Nunnally and Suzaku. This mirrors how Lelouch and Suzaku treated others: Suzaku, at least before Princess Euphemia's death, was extremely concerned with saving others, an example being saving a falling woman during his first ever battle on the Lancelot in Shinjuku that actually impeded what he was doing; whereas Lelouch cared for basically no one except Nunnally and Suzaku, as shown by the numerous scenes we have seen so far on the two discs that Ms C.C. gave us."

"I see… an astute observation, Lady Ashford," Guilford chimes in, "both of them have suffered from this traumatic experience and shaped their respective sociopathic personalities, one obsessed with saving everyone even at the cost of his own life, while the other cared for no one except two people on Earth."

Zero also thinks for a while as he listens to Milly's observation. 'She's right, Lelouch never once paid any attention to the dead bodies; he only focused entirely on Nunnally and me. What a fool I was in not realizing this sooner, causing Euphy and the SAZ participants to be dragged into Lelouch's schemes and suffered in the most tragic way…'

"That seems like PTSD," Cecile observes, "I see where the two came from now."

"PTSD?" Tianzi is confused by the term. She can understand each and every letter Cecile has just said, but when the four letters get together, she has no idea what the blue-haired beauty is talking about.

"Post-traumatic stress disorder, also known as post-traumatic stress syndrome, Your Majesty," Cecile explains to the young Chinese girl, "it is an emotional condition that often follows a very traumatic event, particular one that involves actual or threatened death or serious bodily injury to oneself or others, which creates intense feelings of fear, helplessness, or horror."

"Wow, you know a thing or two about human psychology too?" Rakshata is surprised at how well-verse Cecile is in something that has nothing to do with Knightmare Frames.

"I had to provide support to the pilot of the Lancelot, so I always tried to squeeze some spare time to read about human psychology," the blue-haired beauty replies, "I have downloaded a digital copy of the Encyclopædia Britannica onto my laptop, and I read it whenever I have some free time."

"AHA! My assistant is an all-rounded person indeed!" Lloyd is proud of how knowledgeable his blue-haired assistant is, even in areas he sees as totally unrelated to the development and operation of Knightmare Frames.

Most in the audience take a moment to digest what Cecile has just said about Lelouch and Suzaku possibly suffered from PTSD due to their traumatic experience as children, save for Tianzi, who is too young to understand what Cecile has just talked about; and Tamaki, whose brain size is too small to process what Cecile has just talked about.

"Well, I can see how Suzaku fit into the description of PTSD that Ms Croomy has just mentioned," Gino starts, "we have learnt from the first disc that Suzaku killed his father, Prime Minister Genbu Kururugi of Japan. The incident seems to be an accident from how it was shown to us, but then since he applied and joined the Britannian army as an Honorary Britannian soon afterwards, I think we can assume that he did not receive any help from anyone to recover from such devastating experience."

"And we now know that he walked through the wasteland filled with dead bodies," Milly picks up from where Gino has left off with a tint of guilt on how she got angered by Suzaku earlier without knowing this background story of his, "those dead bodies were probably such proof of the result of Suzaku's childish and impulsive actions; he was deeply traumatized by what he saw on that piece of wasteland that day."

"That's probably where his obsession to save people came from," Guilford observes, "and also how he was so adamant about following the rules up till the end of the Black Rebellion, as shown respectively by how he saved a woman falling to her death during his debut in the Lancelot in Shinjuku and how he chose to obey His Highness' order to drag Zero to death at the expense of his own life."

"And it can be argued that Lady C.C. had brought such traumatic memories that Suzaku had tried so hard to bury deep into his memory back when she sent those shock images to him, causing him to run rampage on his Lancelot on the Narita Mountains and remained paralyzed well after the Battle of Narita had concluded," Cecile adds as she recalls that time when she accompanied Suzaku to go see a military doctor after the Battles of Narita and Yokosuka. Back then, the military doctor merely suggested that Suzaku might have subconsciously compared himself to his well-known father, the last Prime Minister of Japan before Britannia's occupation of the Far East island country, and felt insecure from such comparison, but the scene that has just been shown on screen reveals that the real cause of Suzaku's excessive attention to discipline and the extreme way he weighed the value of human lives was due to a more deeply-rooted reason than what the military doctor had diagnosed during her consultation session with Suzaku.

"But then what about Lelouch?" Ohgi snaps out from his short-lived sympathy for the plight of child Lelouch and recalls how the raven-haired boy had exploited his relationship with Villetta and threatened her into submission, "unlike Kururugi, Lelouch seemed pretty cool about all the dead bodies around him and had no problem navigating through the wasteland. He certainly couldn't be excused from what he did to Chigusa… I mean, Japan, right?"

"I'm sorry, Prime Minister Ohgi, but I think there was more to that," Cecile tries to politely explain to the Prime Minister of Japan that he is wrong.

"But…" Ohgi tries to insist his view.

"Lelouch was basically traumatized in the opposite way as Suzaku," Kaguya cuts in before Ohgi can finish his sentence, stunning the tall Japanese man, "just as Lady Ashford has observed, when Lelouch walked pass that piece of wasteland, he paid absolutely no attention to those dead bodies and focused only on taking care of Nunnally and Suzaku. So when Suzaku suffered from a flood of empathy to others to a point where he cared nothing about himself, Lelouch suffered from a drought of empathy to others to the point where he cared about no one else besides Nunally and Suzaku. They may have exhibited different symptoms, but the fact remains that they both had been traumatized by what they have been through as children with zero help offered to them."

"Chairwoman Sumeragi is right! There was no one to help Lulu!" Shirley exclaims, "He was on his own when trying his best to protect Nunna from all these sad things…"

Shirley's words strike a chord in Nunnally's heart. The young Empress has always known that her elder brother had always tried his best to keep her away from anything undesirable of the slightest, and while she was one of the three children who went through that piece of wasteland, her blindness and her brother's kindness had prevented the same kind of trauma that struck Lelouch and Suzaku, albeit in opposite ways, from striking her. The discussion among the audience so far and Shirley's heartfelt words hit Nunnally so resoundingly, tears start to fall out of her eyes before she even realizes it.

'Huh…? Why am I…' Nunnally is perplexed by her own tears for a few seconds before she realizes what the feeling surging up her mind is. 'Oh, Big Brother, you… you really… just how much more do you want me to owe you…'

"Nunnally…" Cornelia pulls the sobbing Nunnally into her embrace. She may be able to remain her stoic exterior thanks to years of military training and life as a general of the Britannian army, but deep inside her heart, Cornelia is also experiencing emotional fluctuations after listening to the discussion going back and forth in the auditorium.

On Suzaku. Back when Cornelia saw how Suzaku handed Lelouch to her father not asking to vindicate Euphemia's innocence but for a position among the ranks of the Knights of the Rounds and thus effectively abandoning his previous allegiance to Euphemia, she was inflamed by such insolent act of the personal knight of Euphemia-turned-Knight of Seven. This has remained the case until she sees how Suzaku was apparently enraged by C.C. lifting Lelouch's memory seal and let Lelouch's Geass power of absolute obedience to "run wild in the world", showing that the seemingly treacherous knight was still loyal to her tragically killed younger sister, at least up till that point of time. Now that she has seen how Suzaku had become what he was, she finally understands why the two were attracted to each other. 'I see… Kururugi's a broken boy, and it was completely understandable why he was attracted to Euphy because someone as compassionate and empathetic as Euphy was simply the sunshine he had frantically searched for in his entire life. As for Euphy, her gentle and kind nature simply pulled her close to a boy whose empathy had overflown while being in a compromised societal position… they do make a fine Romeo and Juliet pair,' the purple princess, however, is still perplexed by the unsolved question of why Suzaku ultimately decided to betray Euphemia's ideal and sided with Lelouch's world-conquering gambit, which ultimately led to his premature demise in the Battle of Mt Fuji. The scenes that have been shown so far simply do not explain why that was the case.

As for Lelouch, Cornelia simply feels even guiltier of not insisting on a full and complete search for him and Nunnally right after the end of the war between Britannia and Japan eight years ago. She still cannot forgive Lelouch for killing Euphemia and Darlton on an emotional level, but her familial duty as Lelouch's elder sister is a separate matter from the ill feelings she had with Lelouch ever since he killed two of the most important people to her. She can feel nothing but sadness as she gets to see, directly, the traumatic experience Lelouch had gone through that made him what he was eventually.

"So it's the Emperor's fault after all," Rakshata comments after observing and listening to the discussion that has just taken place among the members of the audience.

"Are you saying that if we trace all the way back, it was ultimately the Emperor's fault to have shaped Lelouch and Kururugi into the ways they were, hence causing so many tragedies to countless number of people?" Chiba asks seriously, to which Rakshata nods.

Next to a frustrated Chiba who is confused by her maternal instinct of pitying Lelouch and Suzaku, Tohdoh closes his eyes. 'Had I kept a closer eye on Suzaku-kun, perhaps such tragedy would not have taken place… but all such guesses are with the benefit of hindsight, and there is no use to cry over spilled beans now.'

Kallen frowns and tightens her fists. 'It was all the Emperor's fault that things turned out to be like this…! However, had Lelouch remained a Prince of Britannia, I would not have the chance to get to know him... darn!' the red-haired girl is frustrated by her realization that as much as the Emperor was to blame for all the sufferings Lelouch, Suzaku and Kallen had gone through, it was precisely how the Emperor had thrown Lelouch out of the Brtiannian Imperial Court that had allowed Kallen the chance to get to know and be close to the boy she eventually fell in love with.

The screen then fades back to the moment right after Suzaku finished his call with Lelouch in the Area 11 Government Palace. A heavy-hearted Suzaku was sitting on a luxurious red armchair in an empty, large but rather dark room with only natural lighting coming in through the window, his head lowered and his upper body inclined to the front. Behind the depressed Suzaku, there was a gigantic portrait of the deceased Princess Euphemia in her white dress, standing next to a white flower vase and smiled brightly, her pink hair styled downwards as usual.

'Call me Euphy!'

'It's tomorrow!'

'Once the SAZ is established…'

'Suzaku!'

Everything Euphemia had ever said to Suzaku kept whirling around his mind.

"Yes, I understand," Suzaku suddenly muttered to himself as he stood up slowly, his emerald eyes narrowed with anger and hatred oozing out, "As Euphy's knight, I shall have Lelouch to…!"

"Princess Euphemia…" Nina is mesmerized by the image and voice of her one and true goddess, even though the voice part seems to have stemmed from Suzaku's own thoughts.

"Suzaku…" Cecile is sad to see how infuriated Suzaku was, and how he seemed to be consumed by nothing but anger and hatred, thereby losing his empathy to others as evidenced by how he casually slaughtered his EU foes and thought of nothing about them but instead thinking whether Lelouch was the reappeared Zero. The second disc has shown to the audience how Suzaku gradually lost his empathy and became a slaughtering machine for the Holy Britannian Empire under the guise of upholding the one single rule that the Emperor of Britannia had forced upon the world: the strong devours the weak.

"His face is scary!" Tianzi is scared by Suzaku's angry face on the screen, which is a great contrast to Suzaku's gentle face that the young Chinese girl has got used to in the previous disc.

"It's okay, Tianzi, I'm here," Kaguya immediately attends to her younger friend to console her, though she is also thinking inwardly about what she has just seen on screen and shoots a quick but unnoticeable glance to the current Zero. 'Suzaku… so you eventually trumped over your burning hatred and anger to work with Lelouch. I could respect that, and given what has been shown to us so far about Princess Euphemia, I believe she would be pleased to see you have done just that as well,' she muses.

"So this disc starts with Suzaku, and ends with Suzaku," Gino observes, "it seems to me that C.C. wants to give us a deep dive into Suzaku's thoughts in this disc after having us to do a deep dive into Lelouch's in the previous disc."

"Man, it's just sad to see how Suzaku got consumed by hatred and anger… he was a super nice guy back then," Rivalz sighs. Ever since that shocking day when Lelouch appointed Suzaku as the Knight of Zero, Rivalz has been perplexed by the drastic change of his two Ashford friends that led to a Pax Britannica across the globe, albeit one forced upon everyone through fear and oppression. However, Rivalz has since refused to believe that and kept questioning what he had seen, wondering inwardly whether such a world was what Lelouch really wanted in the first place. The screening event has revealed to him the parts that he didn't know about his two friends, and it hits Rivalz quite hard when he finally realizes how little he knew about them, if at all.

"It's alright, Rivalz, everyone has his or her secrets," Milly tries to console her blue-haired friend. Deep down, however, she feels sorry for hating Suzaku so much since the disc reveals that he sold Lelouch to the Emperor and placed them under intense surveillance at Ashford Academy, now knowing how Suzaku came to be his rather pitiful self. 'It's really the Emperor's fault that things had turned out like it was,' she muses with a tint of frustration and sadness, recalling how she was disgusted by the Emperor's "eulogy" to Clovis back when she was listening to it at the school hall of the Ashford Academy.

"I think I see the dilemma Suzaku's facing here," Kaguya observes, "he was struggling between whether to act as Lelouch's friend and agreed to Lelouch's request to save Nunnally, or to act as Princes Euphemia's knight and avenge her."

Cornelia, however, is still perplexed about Suzaku's sudden change of heart at the end. 'It is clear that Kururugi still considered himself to be Euphy's knight first and foremost, even trumping his new status as father's Knight of Seven. He's still completely loyal to Euphy, even pondering on avenging her despite Lelouch, his best friend, begged him so hard to help him to save Nunnally. Also, now we know that the Geass Lelouch had cast onto Kururugi was "to live", that means Kururugi was not geassed into following him at the end, so it is clear that he eventually sided with Lelouch on his own volition. Why did such a loyal knight willingly betray Euphy's legacy eventually and became the right-hand man of the most treacherous ruler in the history of mankind?'

"What would be next?" Ohgi asks.

"Well, we still have one disc left. Let's go ahead and watch it," Kallen suggests expectantly, knowing that she is getting closer and closer to the question that has bugged her mind in the last 12 months: what did she mean to Lelouch?

Nunnally recovers from her sobbing, nods to Kallen's suggestion and turns to Zero. "Zero, would you be so kind?"

"Yes, Your Majesty," Zero replies respectfully and replaces the "Transgression" disc with the "Glorification" disc immediately.


AN:

We have finally made through "Transgression"! I still can't believe we were able to make it this far – your readership and reviews are what I am thankful for in making this possible.

When I was writing the segment on the discussion among the audience regarding Lelouch and Suzaku suffering from PTSD in this chapter, I have used parts of an article on the Encyclopædia Britannica contributed by Professor Robert E. Emery, Director of Center for Children, Families and Law at the University of Virginia. Below is the APA citation of Professor Emery's article on the Encyclopædia Britannica:

Emery, R. E. (2020, July 30). Post-traumatic stress disorder. Retrieved November 21, 2020, from h-t-t-p-:-/-/-w-w-w-.-b-r-i-t-a-n-n-i-c-a-.-c-o-m/science/post-traumatic-stress-disorder

On another note, the Code Geass production team is going to make a big announcement on a new project for the franchise tomorrow (5 December 2020, Lelouch's birthday) on YouTube at 8 p.m. (GMT+9). Interested readers may consult the production team's twitter account ([at sign] GEASSPROJECT) for more information.

Once again, thank you for your continuous support and generous reviews. I hope you have enjoyed the story so far, and will continue to do so as we progress into "Glorification".