Disclaimer: I do not own Code Geass or any of its canon characters.
AN: What happened? It is a question everyone reading this will undoubtedly be asking. TLDR: A lot happened, and the result ended in failure. The long version is as follows.
Update: I just read the live copy on the site, and finally noticed that some things got horribly chopped up during upload since I copy paste into doc manager. I had to manually go back and redo some things to get them to show up correctly. It should be fixed now. The next chapter is almost done, and I will be sure to check it for crap like that before I put it up. If you see any formatting failures, please be sure to let me know.
I never truly abandoned Oath of Blood in the sense that I stopped thinking about improving and progressing it. I am, however, unhappy with this story, and have been for nearly three years. Not for the ideas presented, but how I presented them.
The first few chapters were the first attempt I ever made at writing a coherent story. It was great for its time, but the quality difference got huge as it went on. For most of it, I had no outline, no plan, or even a coherent idea of major events. Every time I read Oath of Blood, I cannot help but feel that the first half of it is poorly executed crap that I know I can do far better.
My disappearance from this story for two years is related to that. As I mentioned in Rise of a New Moon, I went about doing an extensive rewrite. The contents of this chapter were actually slated to be 30 instead of 22. I got more than half way through it, 16 chapters specifically, and met the spectre of hard drive failure in the worst possible way. There was no backup. Everything was lost, including the original files. That is not happening again.
It sat in limbo for a bit as I tried to decide whether to start over, or just keep going from 21. The final decision was to just continue from 21, and redesign what comes after it.
The original ending, and how I was going to get there, was quite honestly garbage in hindsight. So I outlined a stronger storyline that picks up where Tokyo ended, absorbing what I had before into a more complete idea. Most of this chapter was designed a long time ago, so it will be not as "new" as 23 will be.
Christmas eve came far too fast in 2017. At least that was what it felt like for Shirley Fenette. Normal had never quite come back for her after confronting Schneizel with Zero's identity. Even though the world around her was about as normal as you could ask for, it never really felt the same. In a sense it never would again, until she faced the cause of the constant drag on her thoughts.
Obsessed with finding some measure of justice for her father, Shirley had stepped far outside of her character. She was unable to tell one man how she felt, and yet was able to work up the courage to walk up to one of the most powerful people in the world and sell him out. Milly too. The president had trusted her enough to share a secret she had never once slipped up on for seven years. Yet she couldn't even hold it a week.
The entire thing had been one hell of an emotional roller coaster. She had felt something different about Lelouch almost every day. She hated him, she loved him, felt sorry for what he and Nunnally had gone through, and then she hated herself. Every day since Shirley landed back in Pendragon, the constant feeling that she had betrayed the best friends she had ever known plagued her.
She had once heard Lelouch say that a good Britannian would stab his best friend in the back in a heartbeat for a decent promotion. She had done it for much less, and every time the thought crossed her mind she wanted to cry.
The fact that she had finally accepted that her father's death was an accident only made it worse. He had been in the wrong place at the worst time. It wasn't like Lelouch walked up to him and put a bullet in his head. Despite her nightmares having told her otherwise, she knew it was not his fault. If he had known he was there, he would have sent someone to get him out of the way.
The news reports she had seen had all but confirmed it to her. Lelouch could be a merciless killer when he wanted to be. After all, the Britannian military units that refused to surrender were exterminated almost to the last man. He had killed Clovis, and there were rumors that he had Princess Carine executed as well. He could be horrible, a monster even, but he wasn't evil.
Almost immediately after the battle had ended, the Black Knights were helping to clean up and rebuild. Reporters were already praising it as one of the cleanest battles in recent history. The Black Knights had gone out of their way to avoid civilian casualties and unnecessary collateral damage.
Shirley was pulled back to the real world as the car she was in slowed to a stop. Encouraged to go by her mother, she was at a rather large Christmas party. Although there were a few nobles in attendance, it was far from being an exclusive event. Shirley doubted that her mother was sending her here with the intention of having her marry up the ladder. Even if she wanted her to, which she probably didn't, this would be a pretty bad place to try. Still, Shirley figured that maybe she would meet someone nice that could take her mind off to a happier place.
Entering the building, she found exactly what she had expected. The first floor ballroom was full of upper class commoners with a few members of the lesser noble classes sprinkled throughout. Almost exactly as she had been told, it was an upper class party, without the over the top extravagance normally associated with anyone above a baron. Thus, her job was as simple as look nice, smile, and maybe laugh a bit without worrying about tripping over stupidly complex social protocols.
For the first hour or so, Shirley found it somewhat relaxing. She had melted into the crowd, and slipped a few glasses of wine from busy waiters too busy to care that she was a year under the legal age in Pendragon. Glowing with a bit of alcoholic warmth, she really did manage to get her mind off of more important events, at least until she caught a glance at a hauntingly familiar shade of red hair.
For the smallest of moments, she registered it as Kallen, but quickly disregarded it. For one, that was impossible, and two, she would not be wearing a very nice men's suit. Still, the resemblance was just too much to ignore. He turned in her direction, and Shirley got a perfect look at his eyes. It clicked.
Kallen had mentioned a few times that her father was an earl, and that he lived in the capital. She remembered a few of the pictures she had seen briefly at her mother's house, and made the connection. Earl Nelson Stadtfeld, the redhead's somewhat mysterious father was only a few short meters away. The illusion of relaxation came crashing down as her guilt returned. There was only one thing she could do.
"Excuse me sir, I'm sorry to bother, but you seem terribly familiar."
"Not surprising. I get that quite a lot, doubly so from attractive young women such as yourself." He turned to see a girl with captivating orange hair behind him. "What can I do for you miss-?"
"Shirley Fenette."
"Nelson Stadtfeld. Don't bother with Earl, I reserve the title for business use only." He replied with a smile.
"We haven't met before, but I went to school with your daughter and I-" Nelson cut her off, getting much closer to her ear.
"Follow me and stay close. Act as if you're very attracted to me." There was no time to explain. She did exactly as asked, almost too well. Nelson wondered for a moment if she was a good actor or if she really did want to get him in bed. They weaved through the room, disappearing down a side hallway and into a more private room.
"I apologize for that, but I have to keep up appearances since I came here with a few 'friends'. There are less questions to be asked if they think I got picked up by another horny party girl in a nice dress." Shirley blushed, her mind bouncing between wondering what kind of man he really was and what people would think of her going for a man at least twice her age.
"It's alright, I understand." She reassured him.
"So, miss Fenette, you said you know Kallen?"
"Just Shirley, and I...umm...knew would be a better word." She looked uncomfortable, unsure, but still definitely like she wanted to be there. These few silent moments told volumes to the earl.
"Have you talked to anyone yet?"
"Talked?"
"I've seen this before plenty of times. Something is chewing away at your soul, and you're bottling it up. Am I wrong?" Was she really so obvious? Shirley Fenette, now available in large print format. She couldn't hold it in anymore.
"Whatever it is, it can't be much worse than my own secrets. After all, if it were common knowledge that the ace rebel pilot is my daughter, I doubt I would last very long here."
"Zero...Lelouch, killed my father. I couldn't stop myself from blaming him for it, even though it was an accident. One of the best friends I've ever had told me about his real identity in confidence, and I betrayed her. She made me swear to keep it secret, and I just couldn't."
"Damn, and I thought my baggage was heavy." He was thoroughly surprised. Shirley gave him that look, one that felt like it was being rubbed in.
"I don't know what to do."
"What's keeping you here, besides the navy's blockade around Area 11?" He asked the regretful girl.
"Not much. Nothing feels the same here. I was never too close with my mother to begin with, and my new school and friends feel so...fake. Like shallow replacements for those I left behind."
"Then come with me." Stadtfeld offered. It took Shirley a few moments to realize what she was being offered.
"What?"
"You're not the only one that regrets the terrible decisions that they made.
My wife, my real wife, is over there in Japan. We were a perfectly happy family before the invasion. Sure, some people thought it was a bit strange to marry a foreigner, but at the time nobody really had anything terrible to say. Then the Japanese became Elevens, and I was married to a woman that noble society viewed as subhuman vermin.
I was stupid at the time. I cared far too much for wealth, power, and reputation. So much that I abandoned everyone I loved and married some blue blooded bitch just to preserve my reputation. Not a day goes by that I don't hate myself for it. So I'm going to do something about that." The earl explained to her.
"You're going back to Japan?"
"My son is dead, my daughter is close to joining him, and the most wonderful woman I have ever known is little more than a slave to my current wife. I'm going to make it right, no matter what it costs me. I can't live this lie anymore."
"How are you going to get there? The navy has the whole Pacific cut off."
"Did I mention that I'm a badass pilot?" He smirked. "I have a private jet with a few modifications of questionable legality. Combine that with the fact that I know the navy's patrol routes and the capabilities of their air defense radars, and I can get us there in one piece. We both have sins to account for in Japan, and I wouldn't mind having company on such a long flight."
"How soon could we go?" Shirley's eyes lit up at the idea. She needed this, more than anything.
"Tonight. I have a flight plan scheduled in five hours that takes me to Area 5. All I have to do is disappear about a thousand kilometers from land."
Shirley quickly agreed to the plan as they worked out the finer details. This was something the absolutely wanted. Disappearing from her life in Pendragon was necessary. There would be no regrets this time.
"No wonder my Guren lost." One mad scientist said aloud about another mad scientist's work. Rakshata Chawla was busy overseeing operations with the captured Lancelot. Even in its damaged state, she could tell that the machine was a masterpiece.
Once she and her team got their hands on the unit for themselves, the superiority of Lloyd's creation quickly became apparent. As much as she hated to admit it, the Lancelot was truly the better knightmare frame, even though both were classified as seventh generation.
Extracting the unit's operational data and combat recorder to get Lelouch the information he wanted was the easy part. The real challenge would be figuring out how this ridiculously complex machine worked. It was pretty clear why they only had one of them. Reverse engineering it would definitely take time, and with Lelouch requesting that the unit remain intact, it would be doubly so.
Still, she already had some ideas as to what they could do with the Lancelot once they figured out how to repair it. The brilliant Indian scientist dressed up the battle scarred unit with her mind. A new arm, experimental weapons, and even a fresh, vibrant coat of paint appeared with clarity in her thoughts.
Further schemes were quick to form. The actual technology in the unit was more advanced, almost to the point of being alien to all other knightmare frame designs. The entire Lancelot was filled with a sakuradite based superconducting data transfer network. The medical cybernetics expert in her immediately recognized it as being a sort of artificial nervous system analogue.
It was the most comprehensive real time data collection system she had ever seen. The Lancelot's operating system was continuously fed with incredibly accurate information on the performance of every single component, sensor, and armor piece.
In essence, the Lancelot, at any given moment, knew its limits in a much greater resolution than any other knightmare frame. The system used this information to translate the devicer's inputs into actions with greater efficiency and power. Rakshata's first thought was the difference that fly by wire made for advanced aircraft. The problem, she quickly realized, was that as much as this system increased the skill ceiling, it also raised the skill floor substantially. As strange as it sounded, the average pilot would actually perform better in a Sutherland or Burai.
Such an advanced operating system, at least in the very technical version built into the Lancelot, was useless for mass production without extensive refinement and modifications. However, it could almost be called a superweapon in the hands of a true prodigy. Knowing what she knew now, there was no question that Suzaku Kururugi was one of the most talented pilots in the world. Perhaps even the actual best.
Not one to be content with second place, especially to Lloyd Asplund, a new idea began to coalesce in her mind. One that would bring everything together in a way that only she could pull off. It was brilliant, it was beautiful, and she would make it the future.
Bright. It stopped her every other thought for nearly a minute as she struggled to adjust from so much time in utter darkness. As her eyes began to compensate, the surroundings revealed themselves.
It was certainly not the winter landscape she had last remembered being in. A bright blue sky, gentle warm breeze, and puffy white clouds illuminated by the afternoon sunlight. No cold, no snow, no explosions, gunfire, or death. A quick glance around revealed a springlike grassy field, Fuji and Tokyo, the old Tokyo, visible off in the distance.
"Am I...dead?" Kallen Kouzuki wondered aloud as she took in the view. It was impossible. The last thing she remembered was war. Fighting the Lancelot on a snow covered battlefield. If there were such a thing as an afterlife, she always imagined it would look something like this.
"Not quite." A familiar voice answered from behind her. Kallen turned around to see CC laying in the grass.
"CC? What happened? Where am I?"
"Relax. You're still alive. As for where we are, the answer is anywhere you want to be. We're inside your mind, after all." The witch in white replied.
"This is...my mind?" She sounded somewhat shocked, even though it was making more sense. If she had thought that she was dead, then it should be logical that she would imagine her own idea of an afterlife. In this case, a peaceful spring day in pre invasion Japan.
"The battle!" Her memories began to clear up. She suddenly remembered exactly where it all went black. "If I'm here, did I lose?"
"That depends on your point of view." CC began, looking up at her from her bed of green. "You were defeated by Suzaku and his Lancelot. The Guren Nishiki was destroyed, and you were left to die on the battlefield."
Every word felt like a punch in the gut to the proud warrior. She could not remember any of it, but she could feel the truth in CC's voice. She really had been beaten.
"Luckily for you, you did have an angel for backup."
"Euphie." Kallen smiled, figuring that Lelouch had been right to label her as such.
"Indeed. Euphemia saved your life. Anyone else may have been too slow to prevent your death."
"How did she get past Suzaku?"
"She didn't have to. The Lancelot was damaged and drained from your assault. Suzaku had nothing left, and fled rather than be destroyed. His knightmare was found abandoned only a few hundred meters away."
"Almost a draw then."
"Despite your personal defeat, I would call it a victory. You kept the Lancelot out of the city, where it could have made a difference. Instead, he was too busy fighting you to stop the Black Knights' advance." CC explained.
"Did we win?"
"Of course we did. Did you ever doubt that Lelouch could do it?" No, Kallen decided after a second, she did not. If there was anyone in the world that could challenge Britannia and win, it was certainly Lelouch.
"It's just hard to believe that Japan is really free. After so much suffering and death, for it to be over...it doesn't feel real yet."
"It's not over." Kallen looked down, blue meeting gold, as CC said those three words. In some twisted sense, it felt relieving to hear that. War had become a part of her, so much so that it was actually more scary to contemplate there not being another battle ahead.
"Do you really think he would stop here?" The witch continued. "Six months, Kallen. That was all it took for Lelouch to conquer Japan, starting with nothing more than Geass and willpower. Now he has an army, a nation, and the drive to keep going."
"Today Japan, tomorrow Britannia?" She asked.
"I doubt it will be that direct. More like today Japan, this weekend Britannia."
"I can hardly wait."
"Not so fast. You still need to rest and recover." CC stopped that idea.
"Where am I, anyway? If I'm not dead, my body has to be somewhere." Kallen asked her, figuring that CC would know the answer. It was more than a little unsettling to think about; having a conversation in some super realistic dreamstate not knowing where her body was, or even what condition it was in.
"You're at Tokyo University Hospital, in an artificial coma. I am sitting in a chair next to you, holding your hand."
"Right, you need physical contact to do this. It's the same as when you gave me Geass right?"
"Similar, although not as forceful. Everything that happens in this illusionary world is the result of your subconscious mind. I am simply a guest." CC explained.
"How bad am I?" The warrior asked the witch. She automatically assumed that it was pretty bad, considering she now knew that she was in a coma at a hospital.
"Bad enough to worry Lelouch half to death, but you'll heal. That's not the issue."
"Then what is?" Kallen wondered aloud.
"Self discipline."
"What do you mean?"
"Your Geass, specifically your lack of restraint in its application, is why you lost that fight. It is why you are currently in a hospital bed recovering from injuries that every doctor who has seen you believes you had no right surviving. It is a miracle among miracles that death's door did not open when you came knocking. Even more so that you're expected to make a full recovery." CC told her, giving her a sense of just how near to death she had been.
"What did my Geass do?"
"Your Geass forces your mind to do things it was never designed to do. The massive increase in your senses and reaction time puts a tremendous strain on you. Think of it like overclocking a CPU. Increasing the performance requires more energy and generates more strain in the form of heat. Go too far, and the system fails.
You used your Geass so many times that the strain on your mind and body far outweighed the benefits. This is not from the first time I have seen it happen. Excessive use of Geass has killed more than half of those I had contracted over the centuries, in one way or another. You're very lucky to have not joined them, Kallen." CC explained.
"I...did this to myself?"
"Superhuman reaction time means little if you are barely conscious. Combat data extracted from both units gave a pretty clear picture of your state. You would have passed out anyway within two or three minutes, faster if you tried to activate it again." CC sat up in the grass.
"I'm not blaming you, Kallen. Nobody is. What happened to you is partially my fault as well. I should have given you some training, or at least a warning about the signs of overuse."
"Didn't you do that for Lelouch?"
"No. The manifestation of his Geass is very different to yours. Absolute Obedience has no direct side effects for the user, because it does nothing to himself when used. His targets are a different story. His own testing revealed that they suffer from memory loss while under the effect, as you know. That's not all, however. If the mind attempts to resist his command, they are subjected to crippling headaches, lethargy, and so on."
"So because mine only works on me, I get the bad parts too?"
"Exactly. Don't worry. I'll go over it in detail with you when you wake up."
"Any idea when?" Kallen asked.
"When you're ready. Your body needs to heal. Just enjoy the rest while you can. The world isn't going to end while you take an extended nap."
"CC...thank you, for being here for me." CC smiled at her, her form beginning to fade. A few moments later, Kallen was all alone in the field. She copied the witch, laying down on the sun warmed grass and staring up at the puffy white clouds.
"I wish every dream could look this nice."
Everything happened exactly as Earl Stadtfeld had planned it. Shirley packed light, stuffing a bit of clothing in a backpack. She did not really need anything more. There were no real attachments to this place. It felt fake to her, like a replacement for the true life she had left behind.
Barely an hour after she had returned home, she slipped out the back and headed to the meeting point they had agreed upon. Disappearing in such a way would probably worry her mother sick, but that was nowhere near the top of her list of things to care about. They had never had an especially close relationship anyway.
As she walked, Shirley wondered if this was what it felt like for Lelouch. He had always found some sneaky way to slip off of school property to go on his gambling escapades. He willingly walked into dangerous situations betting amounts of money that people would kill for.
Shirley stopped her analyzing the past when she saw his car, right where it was supposed to be. It took her only a few more seconds to reach it and get in.
The trip to the airport was short, taking only a few minutes to cross the distance in the non existent late night traffic. Security stayed out of his way. Apparently he was a regular here, and they had no desire to annoy an earl.
The private hangar they stopped behind was smaller than she had imagined. Completely normal looking on the outside, they stepped inside to a beautiful sight. The private jet within was a sleek and elegant looking aircraft. Although Shirley was not well versed on aircraft design, the one before her might as well have had 'high tech' and 'ultra modern' painted on the side.
Nelson opened a covered keypad on the fuselage and entered the codes to unlock the vehicle. The side split open, extending the stairs leading up to the main door. He then opened the trunk of the car to grab whatever he was taking on the plane. Shirley, in addition to her backpack, picked up two heavy briefcases.
"What's in these?" She asked, wondering about the reinforced cases. Stadtfeld grinned at her.
"About a billion pounds worth of diamonds." He replied as if the contents were completely normal. Shirley felt her hands quiver a bit. A billion pounds? She was really holding more wealth than she could even dream of?
"I'm switching sides. No point in leaving everything behind for for the government to seize when they brand me a traitor. Diamonds are easier to move than cash, and there's no electronic trail to follow, at least if you get them from the right places. That was the most I could get while covering my tracks." He explained as he loaded a larger travel case into the aircraft.
Those words truly drove in how serious he was about doing this. It was not some spur of the moment plan put together after the Black Knights took Tokyo. He must have been planning to give up his life here for quite a while. Recent developments did nothing to discourage him from going through with it, they just made it a bit more dangerous to pull off.
It took only a few minutes to ready the plane for takeoff. Shirley stood behind him, observing how smoothly he was talking to the air traffic control tower. Her heart was picking up the pace with the fear of them being caught, but Nelson was as calm as could be. It sounded like he was going on vacation in Area 5, not about to attempt a run on a naval blockade.
If she had to guess, she figured that Kallen got it from her father. She had lived a double life at Ashford Academy virtually undetected for years. Even more so, using a frail, sickly persona as a cover when her true self was a battle hardened warrior spoke volumes about her acting talent.
Shirley managed to calm down a bit as the jet took flight, quickly turning Pendragon into a fading point of light behind them. If she remembered it correctly, the plan was to follow their legitimate flight path until they reached a point about a thousand kilometers off the coast of California. From there, Nelson would perform a rapid descent to less than fifty meters above the sea, drop a distress beacon in the ocean, while cutting lights and communications. It was intended to appear as if they had an engine failure and crashed, and by the time anyone realized what actually happened, they would already be in Japan.
Cornelia li Britannia could not help but grin at the scene she was bearing witness to. This conference room in the capital's government building was currently occupied by two dozen of the most important people on the island. Britannian and Japanese, nobles, business leaders, police and military. The most they had in common was that they were almost all male and over 40.
Therefore, it was absolutely adorable watching a fourteen year old Japanese girl in a pink kimono wield words like a rapier. Parries, thrusts, feints, and counterstrikes. The negotiations going on very much mirrored the intricacies of a good sword fight. Kaguya Sumeragi was proving herself a master far beyond her years.
This was the third such meeting in which the power and structure of a new Japanese government was to be decided. As the sole representative of the Kyoto Group in the room, she held an immense amount of power. Her organization controlled the majority of Japan's remaining industrial interests, including over 80% of all sakuradite operations.
Silently, Cornelia was not alone in being thoroughly impressed with her performance. It was expected that Kyoto would take a 'give not an inch' approach to the negotiations. After all, they had never willingly done so in their years of building and consolidating power across Japan.
Instead, Kaguya had done the opposite. She had given up a substantial amount of their existing industrial control, and gaining much in return. It was brilliant as her plan started to come together after five hours of maneuvering.
Kaguya had pushed hard, and had gotten a near unanimous agreement to resurrect the long defeated Japanese military. She argued that Japan needed a strong force to defend their new found freedom, and that the Black Knights were the wrong organization to provide it.
It may have been her one and only slip as her message was briefly misunderstood. After all, it was the Black Knights that had broken Britannia's grip on Japan, and given them the opportunity to have this discussion at all. There was genuine surprise at one of their largest supporters saying such things.
It was only with Cornelia's clarification that the true magnitude of her argument became apparent. The former viceroy explained that the Black Knights were designed and intended to be an offensive force. Their mission to defeat Britannia would eventually take them far from Japan as they brought the fight to the enemy.
And so it was, that the little girl in the pink kimono, in the span of an afternoon, had created an army, and laid the groundwork for a military industrial buildup to supply them.
"Lulu!" Lelouch, still wearing his Zero suit, minus the mask, had little time to react as he was struck from behind. Kaguya pounced on him as she re entered the former viceroy's office. Zero was left defenseless against the girl giving him seven years worth of hugs in one shot.
"Kaguya." He was not at all surprised to see her. Cornelia had warned him the day before.
"I'm so happy to see you! I always knew you would be alright. I missed you so much!" Kaguya blurted out, muffled by the fact that her face was buried against his chest.
"I missed you too, especially for the first year after the invasion. Nunnally too."
"How is Nunnally?"
"Lonely and homesick, the last time I heard from her a few days ago. She's been at a secret location in Hokkaido for a few months now. It was a painful choice to make, sending her away, but I would never willingly leave her in a warzone again. The immediate aftermath of the invasion was traumatic, for us both. In fact, that was the only time that I ever felt glad that she had lost her sight. It was horrible enough without having to see the bodies and faces of the murdered." Lelouch explained.
Kaguya's happy, cheery mood fell down a few pegs. While she was glad that her friends were safe, memories of that terrible time came back to her in force. it had been without question the worst period of fear and uncertainty she had ever known.
"Any chance I can see her soon?"
"Next week, if the conditions are right. I want to make sure the capital is stable enough before I bring her back."
"Don't worry, Lulu. I'll help you apologize for sending her to live in the middle of nowhere without you." Kaguya beamed up at him. Lelouch vi Britannia was now certain of one thing, this would be a long day.
Black Knights salvage and recovery teams were well into the most intense week of their lives. The battle for Tokyo, and control of Japan, had left a colossal mess for them to clean up.
Hundreds of damaged and destroyed armored vehicles, knightmare frames, and military aircraft sat waiting for somebody to recover, repair, or scrap them. They simply did not have enough equipment and manpower to tackle such a load quickly. By Christmas Eve, they had largely cleared most of the wreckage out of the capital itself, but plenty more remained in the area surrounding the city.
So, when word came down that an aerial recon flight had discovered the biggest item on the list, these men and women met it with equal parts excitement and frustration. They were having a rough enough time with wrecked Sutherlands and Panthers, and now an airship had been dumped on the to do list.
The salvage teams were not the first to reach the
crash site. A quick reaction force had moved in to secure the site over ten hours earlier, but they had neither the knowledge nor training to do anything more than check for survivors and perform EOD operations.
Flying in to the scene of the crash provided an awe inspiring sight. The massive, charred crater from the third Mjolnir missile off to the west, and the nearly kilometer long wound the
had carved into the land between where it hit and where it stopped.
The rear sections of the ship made it pretty clear why it had gone down. Surfaces facing the blast had been melted and warped by the extreme heat; titanium transformed to look like resolidified liquid by nuclear fire. The damage was extensive. Nobody would ever doubt the effectiveness of nuclear weapons in anti aircraft applications after seeing this.
As the crews began to land near the crash site, one of the first things they encountered on the ground were the rows of bodies the QRF had extracted from the
. Most of the airship's former crew, at least those that remained, were burnt and charred beyond recognition, cooked alive as the blast transformed their vessel into an industrial oven.
They would probably find more bodies as they disassembled the wreckage. There was nothing in the Black Knights' arsenal that could move something this large in one piece. They would have to take it apart, piece by piece, for transport to Narita.
It would be an especially difficult job when dealing with unfamiliar, extremely valuable technology. It would be well worth it though. If Britannia had one, they would certainly have more, and learning how to bring one down without the biggest bombs in the world would be a necessity.
After that, there was the more enticing possibility that they would learn how to construct their own flying battleships.
Christmas Day was always a special moment of the year. Even with any religious significance having long since fallen away for the general person in both Britannia and Japan, it remained one of the largest and most popular days of celebration.
2017 was different. Falling only a few short days after the dramatic, history shaping battle in which the Black Knights had taken Area 11 by force, it could never be just another ordinary Christmas.
For the Britannians, the gloom of the defeat lingered on. The Black Rebellion, as it was becoming known, was a disaster on par with Trafalgar or Edinburgh. It had been the first time in Britannian history that any rebel or separatist force had decisively achieved their objectives.
For many, the shock had yet to wear off. The loss of an Area to a rebel army, no matter how well equipped and organized, was a truly unprecedented event. Comparisons to Washington's Rebellion were quick to appear. Although George Washington had failed in his attempt, the scope and ambition was of equal caliber. The connection was closer than than they knew. CC had been intimately involved with that centuries old failed endeavor, although not as personally committed as she now was to the leader of the Black Knights.
The feeling was very different in Japan, for many of the same reasons. The Japanese people had received freedom and liberation as a Christmas present. They wasted no time stitching the two events together. However, no matter how hard they tried, or how creative they got, there was one person that neither they, nor anybody else on the island could match.
Milly Ashford knew a thing or two about how to create a party. Even more so when she had free reign to spend someone else's money. It had been Lelouch's idea to use Christmas as a way to jumpstart peaceful integration after years of division and subjugation. Therefore, Milly had a checklist of conditions she had to meet.
At the top of the list was the need to break down barriers. The vast majority of Japan's now sizable Britannian population was not going anywhere. There was simply no feasible way that millions of people could migrate across the Pacific Ocean to rejoin a hostile nation. Japan was their home too.
The idea was, that if they could learn to play and party together on a day they all valued, they could also learn to live and work together. The most important part was to start sieging away at the entrenched stereotypes and preconceptions. Both sides were equally guilty in this way.
Modern Britannian society had been shaped by centuries of fascist ideology. Although not as extreme as the positions of some fringe groups and short lived European movements, it was still a huge obstacle to overcome. The concept of Britannian superiority was ingrained from birth. Almost every Britannian citizen believed it at some level; the idea that they were nationally, socially, and racially better than those they conquered. Constant reinforcement from the Emperor only made it worse. Ripping the ideas of Areas and Numbers out of a Britannian population would take time, especially doing so without excessive violence and oppression.
The Japanese, too, had a similar problem, although ingrained by force instead of slowly over time. Before the invasion, Japan was one of the most peaceful, disengaged places in the world. Very few Japanese were seriously patriotic, and even less truly nationalistic. Britannia had utterly destroyed their way of life. Even with the actions of the Black Knights, it was still very common for the average Japanese person to view all Britannians as enemies and invaders.
Even though it was a massive issue, it was not an unchallenged one. Lelouch had plenty of experience with it. After all, the Black Knights were living proof that integration was not only possible, but also powerful. However, his experience had been on the military side, bringing people together to wage war upon a common enemy. Milly was the one person he believed that could truly match his success in the civilian arena. He would be providing substantial support, but this would be her show.
This was easily the most radical transformation Ashford Academy had ever undergone, at least if becoming a rebel FOB was excluded. With the help of the Black Knights, the school had been turned into a Christmas paradise. The Academy was thoroughly covered in the usual for this time of year: tens of thousands of lights, ornaments, and over one hundred fully decorated trees.
Milly had even requisitioned a dozen Sutherlands to assist. The knightmare frames were instrumental in getting the place ready in time, but they also were here to take part as well.
Although still fully armed, they had been dressed up for the occasion. Each frame had been painted red and white, with a matching santa hat upon the head. Stun tonfas were made to look like candy canes, and their assault rifles appeared as if they were constructed of gingerbread. Large speakers had been installed on the sides of the cockpit blocks, both for music and Milly's announcements.
In the courtyard, a full scale stage had been constructed. Twenty live performances were planned for the day, at least half of them being from mixed or entirely Japanese groups. Games and activities were plentiful, including a combat zone in which participants fought team elimination matches with CO2 powered snowball launchers.
"You know, I was expecting you to go wild, but this is just…"
"Perfect?" Milly cut in as Lelouch observed the inner workings of the largest Christmas party in Japan from her control center.
"A bit over the top, but very well done." Lelouch added after a moment, not entirely disagreeing with her assessment. "After all, I've never seen a Sutherland Santa before."
"One, those overworked little elves needed an upgrade, and two, I just couldn't resist." Milly said with a grin. "Also, if they are going to provide security, they might as well look like they belong there. Knightmare frames in regular military colors certainly aren't going to make anyone feel more at ease."
"I'm impressed, Milly. This is precisely why I wanted you to do this. You're about as far away from a military mindset as there can be, and that's what we need right now."
"Lelouch, this is probably the only time anyone will ever approve of using knightmare frames as Christmas ornaments. I need to enjoy it as much as possible." They both laughed, still focused on the ridiculous looking Sutherlands.
The call of the twelve monitors before them, one for each Sutherland, proved too tempting. Lelouch and Milly looked over the festival, and were proud of what they saw. The population at the festival was still about 60% Britannian, but it was enough to call the project a success. People were coming together to have a good, happy day. In the four hours since the gates opened, there had been no major incidents either. After all, nobody wanted to be known as the one that ruined Christmas.
Milly's eyes eventually settled on the feed from Unit 02, whose pilot was hard at work helping a group of children build a fortification out of snow, and three piece snowmen to man the walls. The student council president could not shake how beautiful it was. A machine designed and built exclusively for the purpose of efficiently killing people was playing around with a pile of snow.
"Do you really think we can do it, Lelouch?" Milly asked, not taking her eyes off the screen.
"It won't be easy. I would dare to say that this may be one of the most challenging tasks in history. Breaking down two divisive, intolerant cultures and truly unifying these people without using brutal Britannian methods would be an unprecedented accomplishment. Doing it with soldiers sharing a common goal is one thing, but doing so with civilians that lack military discipline and motivation is quite another." Lelouch replied, knowing full well how hard it would be.
"I guess this really is the right place to start then, with the few things they still have in common."
"Indeed. Winning the battle was the easy part, now we have to make it mean something. A lot of people died for this on both sides, and I would rather they be lives well spent instead of lives wasted."
"Has anyone ever told you that you have a way with words, Lelouch?" Milly looked over at him.
"I believe I may have heard that said about me, once or twice." He turned toward the door.
"Leaving already?"
"Unfortunately. I wish I could stay, but there is much that needs to be done, and it won't wait. You, at least, should go enjoy your own festival. You've given the whole island a much needed gift, and you can be proud of it. Merry Christmas, Milly."