Entropy 8: (R1;7) Attack on Cornelia
Shortly after the Cat Hunt, all of Ashford Academy assembled in the school's auditorium to watch a live event, broadcasted straight from Pendragon, the capital of their Empire. The State Funeral for Prince Clovis was finally being held, and every patriotic Britannian was duty-bound to bear witness to it. Present on location was Clovis' mother, Odysseus, Schneizel, and many others, and all wore suitably solemn expressions.
Nunnally's jaw dropped in disbelief, and she almost felt like slapping a palm across her face at what she saw.
"They conjugated it wrong," the Britannian Empress muttered, not to anyone in particular, referencing the information banner at the bottom of the broadcast. "I'm so glad I was blind when this happened."
As the camera filming the funeral panned across a stage and a huge portrait of Clovis behind it, a banner appeared at the bottom of the screen for everyone in the Empire to read:
PRINCE CLOVIS'S STATE FUNERAL
Cornelia and Guilford both sat in silence, arms crossed and their faces twisted into looks of contempt. At the back row Jeremiah was shaking his head, and beside him Anya was choking back another snicker. Lloyd made no attempt to hide his laughter.
"This went out live across Britannia," he pointed out amidst a burst of giggles, also physically pointing to the screen. "And the news people botched it up! HaHA!"
From his own little spot in the theatre, Tamaki frowned and squinted, trying to pinpoint what all the Britannians seemed to be on about. After a long moment of scrutinizing, his face scrunched up and he scratched at his hairline.
"I don't get it. Everything looks fine to me."
Kallen dropped her chin onto her palm and rolled her eyes at the man.
"They conjugated 'Clovis'' wrong. For names ending with 'S' you don't put another 'S' to show possessive."
At the front of the room Xingke nodded, rather bemused, himself, but at least capable of recognizing the error now that it had been explained. Kaguya and some of the others were able to follow along too, but Tamaki was having a hard time grasping the nuances of English. In response to Kallen's quick lesson he fielded the most intelligent thought that came to his mind.
"Huh?"
Kallen groaned, and before she could try again using plainer language, Anya cut in, holding back a mischievous grin.
"That's not true," she prodded. "Adding another 'S' after the apostrophe isn't wrong. It's just less common. Look it up."
Sitting next to Lloyd, still in the midst of a giggling fit, Milly shook her head.
"It would be nice to standardize it. But until that happens it's generally accepted that we don't do that for proper nouns."
Rivalz raised a brow.
"What about common nouns?"
"Then go right ahead."
Beside Tianzi, sitting in bewildered silence at this odd turn, Kaguya turned in her seat to check with any Britannian who would answer her.
"So 'Clovis' is a proper noun, right?"
"Right."
"What about if you're trying to say there are multiple people who possess something, like 'the Joneses' family heirlooms'?"
"Uh..." Milly stopped to ponder that one.
Nunnally had paused the DVD as the debate began to flare up, and at the back Jeremiah looked down on Anya beside him, breathless and pink-faced as she laughed at all the chaos that was unfolding from a simple grammar disagreement.
"You just like making things worse, don't you?" he asked simply.
She gasped back, clutching at her sides.
"It's hilarious!"
While all this was going on, Tamaki was being unusually silent, looking back and forth as different members of the audience shot queries around haphazardly, answers and possible exceptions to different grammatical rules coming just as sporadically. The look of utter bafflement across his features showed the obvious turning of gears in his head, long unused and now choking to life to make sense of what he was hearing. Eventually he'd had enough of thinking, and he interrupted.
"I get it now!" He made of fist of triumph and grinned. "Clovis was a prince, so 'Clovis' is a noble-noun, and something like 'Tamaki' would be a commoner-noun. That's why you don't use the apostate!"
Almost everyone went silent at that statement, except for a few troublemakers still laughing uncontrollably in their seats, and turned to face Tamaki, once again unwittingly uniting former enemies in the shared shock at the bounds of his ignorance. He looked around, seeing the appalled faces staring at him, and his mouth fell into a scowl.
"What?" The crass Japanese man didn't get a reply, just more dull stares and scattered guffaws. "Oh, c'mon! Why'y'all ganging up on me all the time? How am I supposed to know this crap!?"
Amidst rising laughter from Anya and Lloyd, Nunnally sighed in defeat, and raised her remote to get the show going again. As the video resumed and showed more of those in attendance of Clovis' funeral, Tamaki huffed and glowered to himself.
"English is stupid."
The whole nation was in mourning for the Artist Prince, the Flower Prince Clovis, but surprisingly, or perhaps unsurprisingly, Emperor Charles was not. The giant of a man took to the center of the stage before a podium and delivered the first powerful line of his funeral speech.
"All men are NOT created equal!"
The former emperor's speech had been given quite a long time ago, and the audience had mostly forgotten it since then, but hearing it again brought back bad memories for the Japanese in the room.
"His son is dead," Ohgi growled in disgust, "so he gives a speech about the benefits of an ultra-stratified society?"
They kept listening, Charles' words seeming more like the ravings of a madman every second, even to the Britannians in the theatre, and as he continued a montage of characters flashed, each reacting to the speech in a different way.
Shirley's eyes shimmered with sadness, perhaps for Clovis, perhaps for all the people who Charles preached discrimination against. Rivalz smiled on oddly, not quite sure what to think. Kallen held back a growing outrage. Most interestingly though, Diethard didn't pay attention at all, instead rewatching his footage of Zero, almost entranced by the hero, like a film critic analyzing an actor's performance.
Xingke scoffed at one part of the speech and Tianzi blinked up at him in surprise and confusion.
"We're not lazy, are we, Xingke?"
"No, Empress," he replied with a wan smile.
"Then why did he say we were lazy?"
Xingke had to think. How could he quickly summarize the intricacies of the Chinese Federation's economy in a way she might understand? After a moment, he decided to just take the easy way out and explain in detail later.
"Because he was a bad man, Empress."
"Britannia alone moves forward, advancing steadily into the future," Charles continued. "Even the death of my son Clovis demonstrates Britannia's unswerving commitment to progress!"
While the Britannians around the room stayed silent, sharing a perplexed expression, the others in the theatre could hardly believe their ears, even if this wasn't the first time they'd heard Charles' over-the-top rant of villainy.
"And then he says it's a good thing Clovis is dead." Chiba tested the words aloud, finding they made no more sense when spoken than they did in thought. "How could anyone support a man who doesn't even care about his own children?"
Gino shrugged.
"I always thought he was just trying to be positive."
"Poor Prince Clovis," Lloyd drawled, finally done giggling, if only for the moment. "He's probably rolling in his grave."
From the front row Rivalz sniggered to himself, offering a facetious quip.
"And here I thought my parents were bad for making me pay my own tuition."
Chiba wasn't listening, instead still processing Charles' thesis.
"And what about saying equality is wrong? What do you Britannians think about that?"
"Hm," Gino considered after a moment. "Well, he's not wrong, I don't think."
"You don't think people should be equal?" Chiba glared at Gino through the slits of her now hate-narrowed eyes, daring him to confirm his position. Luckily for him, he didn't have to, Kaguya quickly coming to his rescue.
"I think what Sir Weinberg means to say is he agrees people aren't all equally capable. This is actually true. The problem with Charles' ideology is that he advocates treating people differently based on those inequalities - real or perceived - rather than affording everyone a basic level of respect. And that's what we really mean by equality: Equality under the law. He's boiling all the nuance out of it and equating what's left with equity and parity. I'm honestly surprised so few Britannians saw through his strawmen."
Chiba had nothing to say in response to Kaguya's examination of Charles' words. She was a soldier, not a debater, and the majority of what the younger woman said simply went over her head. There were some hums of acknowledgement from around the room though, several other members of the audience understanding where Chiba did not. Charles' argument had been valid, but unsound, and it was only through long years of indoctrination into his own personal brand of Social Darwinism that his people accepted it as absolute truth.
And just like that, the screen went black as another episode came to an end, only to light up once more as the next one began.
It was the year 2009 a.t.b. when Lelouch vi Britannia made an appearance before his father, the Emperor, to demand justice for the death of his mother Marianne. The prince, still just a boy, marched purposefully into the Great Hall along a blood red carpet, flanked by throngs of nobles and courtiers, and despite their whispers he kept his view forward and his expression firm. He shut out the gossip, ignored the hurtful words spoken behind his back:
"I heard that Empress Marianne was killed inside of the Britannian palace."
"There's no way terrorists could've gotten in there."
"Which means that the real assassins must've been-"
Kallen wasn't alone in her surprise at the flashback displayed onscreen, nor the information that had somehow eluded her about Lelouch all this time. She checked around her, and aside from Sayoko, Kaguya, and Tohdoh, none of the non-Britannians looked like they had any idea exactly what was happening onscreen, and just as many Britannians didn't either. The Royal Family was enormous, Charles having almost a hundred wives and just as many children, and deaths among them were frequent, so it was no wonder why Marianne's assassination barely seemed worth noting at the time, much less so eight years later. Hearing about now though, for her very first time, Kallen got to thinking.
"Nunnally, is that true?"
The Britannian Empress nodded gravely.
"It is. I was there at the time." She paused and put a hand to her head, old and conflicting memories about that night mashing together in her mind. "At least, I think so."
"That doesn't make sense though. Terrorists always have a big goal of forcing a change in society. What could they gain by killing your mom?"
Cornelia narrowed her eyes as she shot a venomous glance at Kallen on the other side of the aisle. Jeremiah raised a brow and sat back in his seat, curious to hear more of the girl's thoughts on the matter. Anya only smirked, feeling quite superior for being the only one in the room to know the full story.
"It's over," a hushed voice within the crowd continued. "And the Ashford family who stood behind them is finished as well."
Milly's brow furrowed in concern. Once again her memories disagreed with the truth. She really had known Lelouch way back then, hadn't she? And the reason the Ashfords were no longer a Noble House was because they'd supported the vi Britannias within the Emperor's court. The blonde thought back, her recollection of that time seeming more blurred now than she ever remembered it to have been before. Why was her grandpa Ruben's title revoked? Milly honestly couldn't say she knew. She was sure she used to know, but for whatever reason...
"Hail, Your Majesty," Lelouch greeted, "my mother, the Empress, is dead."
Charles glared down from his throne.
"Old news. What of it?"
The audience went silent, and Rivalz was the first to respond, his jaw dropping in shock.
"Dude..."
At the back, Sayoko and Anya placed a hand each on Jeremiah's shoulders, stopping him from rising in his seat to scream in rage, already knowing fully what his response would be to such callous words.
"Why, that vile, awful, horrible, unfeeling...!" Jeremiah began to curse, and even as the scene continued before him he didn't stop.
"What of it?" Lelouch attempted to confirm, just as astonished by the Emperor's words, earning a short and dismissive reply from him.
"You sought an audience with the Emperor of Britannia simply to inform me of that?"
Lelouch was shaken by his father's response, but he had to try again. Charles was the most powerful man in the world, so keeping one woman safe should have been as easy task for him. It would be as simple as making one call to the right person and no harm would befall Marianne. And yet that's not what happened. Marianne was dead and her daughter was permanently crippled, and the man wouldn't even go to visit Nunnally while she recovered.
"I have no use for that weakling," Charles spat.
Nunnally could hardly believe her ears, and she shook her head in horror at what she was witnessing for the first time. It was true, she knew she couldn't be useful to the Emperor, and even after being brought back to Britannia it was only once she volunteered to be the Viceroy of Area 11 that he paid her any mind, but to hear him, her own father, so casually reject her, was new for the current Empress.
"L-l-lelouch..." she stammered to herself, her thoughts swirling out of control. "Why? Why didn't you tell me that Father...?"
The answer became apparent to the girl almost immediately. Lelouch had shielded her - from their father spurning her, and then from the world. Over and over. A tremble ran down Nunnally's arms and through her fingers, and she fought to keep her whole body from shaking as the weight of her realization hit her once again. She knew that Lelouch had protected her, but she never knew from just how much, and from what.
Zero meanwhile was clutching at the sides of his theatre chair, and any second now he was sure he was going to crush them in his grip. His jaw was clenched tight and his teeth were bared, and he felt a twitch at his eye from the rage beginning to take him. He, too, never knew about this exchange between Lelouch and his father. Lelouch had told him that he and Nunnally had been thrown away, and back then Zero, no, Suzaku, hadn't fully grasped the concept. Back then Suzaku hadn't understood how Lelouch could hate anyone so much as he did Charles, the prince keeping quite silent on the details of his grudge, but now, seeing it for himself, Zero thought he finally understood.
The young Lelouch was as outraged as the audience watching these past events, and he screamed his indignation, attempting to renounce his title as prince and finally goading Charles into action.
"You are dead," he said simply, not moving from his throne. "You have always been dead to me, dead from the moment you were born."
This was the breaking point for Gino. He'd already been on the fence about whether Charles was actually in the wrong or not, having spent enough time at Ashford and with the Black Knights to erode his opinion of the man, but now his mind was made up. He could see the Emperor being too busy to discuss the death of his wife with his son. He could see why Nunnally was being more or less thrown away since she had no use, whether he agreed with it or not. But this was too much. Gino believed in the bond of father and son, the same bond he shared with his own father, and seeing Charles' outright contempt for Lelouch convinced him once and for all.
"No way..." he murmured to himself, lost in a myriad of conflicting emotions and memories. He'd been a loyal Knight of the Round Table for Charles once, but this new evidence threw all the respect he had left for the late king out the window. It felt like a veil had been lifted from his eyes and he could finally see clearly for the first time. He thought back on the policies and edicts that had come out of the Charles regime and wondered at how anyone could have gone along with them, nevermind approve of them. Gino couldn't fathom it. How? How could he have been so blind? Was it his thirst for glory that allowed him to look past Charles' moral failings? Or was it all the easy living as the son of a baron, keeping him ignorant? "Damn him... Damn Charles! Was that really the man Dorothea and Monica died for!?"
"Lelouch, you are dead, therefore you are not entitled to any rights." The flashback faded into the future while Charles spoke, ending on the image of Lelouch, sitting on his bed in the dark, head down, stewing in the unrestricted depths of his hate. "I am sending you and Nunnally to Japan. As Prince and Princess you will serve well as bargaining tools."
Guilford glanced over to Cornelia beside him and saw an odd look in her eye. She seemed to be angry, but different from usual it was only directed at Charles, and not Lelouch. If anything, the way she tensed the muscles in her face and the position of her brows suggested she had only sympathy for her brother, her hate for him temporarily forgotten.
Cornelia understood. She knew exactly what Lelouch had been feeling when he went before the Imperial Court, and she was well-acquainted with the boundless, protective fury he must have been feeling because of Nunnally. She had feared for Euphemia's safety on multiple occasions exactly because of Lelouch's interaction with their shared father. She knew just how easily Charles could abandon his own children, and didn't dare cross him so long as Euphy was still under his roof. She could empathize with Lelouch - could truly understand the lasting hate that burned within him so bright and eternal it eventually took him with it at the end of Zero's sword.
It was an odd sensation to once again feel something akin to compassion for her brother, and for a moment Cornelia wasn't sure if she could even go back to hating him. His behaviour was making more sense with every episode, the only thing left unexplained being why he would become a tyrant just as bad as Charles. If Lelouch truly despised that heartlessness, why would he emulate it? As far as Cornelia could tell, there were only two options: Either he'd grown to love power the more of it he got, or else he fell into despair and lost what little sanity he was clinging to, gradually losing his grip on reality as black rage pulled at his mind and slowly ate him from the inside out.
Regardless what the cause though, Lelouch had done tremendous evil as the Demon Emperor, and even before that. Cornelia's opinion of him was changing, now seeing his end not only as justice being served but as a mercy killing, finally releasing him from years of mental degradation, but she could never forget what he did before that point. If anything, with all this new insight, assassinating Lelouch had been even more necessary and right. What happened to him was monstrous, and so he became a monster.
"You know," Rakshata considered amidst the dumbstruck silence of the audience, "Charles didn't accept it when Lelouch forfeited his title."
Kallen blinked as she thought on this.
"You're right. Then, that means he was always a prince, even when we knew him. Because even though he said he renounced his title it wasn't official!"
Nunnally and Cornelia began to add to the subject, having personal knowledge on the matter, but Tohdoh and Xingke weren't listening. They looked to each other, once again sharing a conversation with a mere glance. It was obvious now, even moreso than it had been before. Lelouch's goals were multifarious, and even with this perfect look at his hidden life, neither man was sure they would be able to pick up on all of them. This also threw into question why he became the Demon Emperor. Up until this point, they'd thought it was just because Lelouch wanted power and was willing to manipulate and slaughter his way to the top. But the true reason could in fact have been something different, or even a number of reasons that no other man could ever begin to comprehend.
Back in the present, Cornelia and Lloyd were discussing the Lancelot in the ASEEC knightmare labs, and nearby Suzaku was with Cécile.
"Sorry you have to sit here watching me do my homework," he said, jotting down answers on a reading guide for his history class.
Cécile didn't mind. In fact, she was quite curious how he was doing. For whatever reason, she was worried about how Suzaku was fitting in at a Britannian school. Luckily for him, he explained, he ran into an old friend who smoothed things over for him.
Cécile smiled.
"Be sure you never take that friend for granted."
Zero sighed behind his mask. At first he thought watching these DVDs was going to be easy and everything would be about Lelouch, but no such luck. They were covering everything, especially Suzaku's slow descent, and it wasn't exactly pleasant for Zero to remember all his failings. Then he thought watching them might get easier as he came to terms with all the worst of what happened. But he could never predict these small moments, so quickly forgotten, that seemed to pop out of nowhere and twist the knife of regret even deeper in his side.
Who had forsaken who first? Had Lelouch abandoned Suzaku? Or was it Suzaku who renounced their friendship first? Zero honestly couldn't remember. It would be just one more thing he'd have to pay attention to as the Truth continued to play onscreen in all its gruesome detail. But no matter if it was him or Lelouch, the fact was he was still guilty of giving up on their friendship, and no amount of punishment or acts of virtue as Zero could absolve him of that.
Cécile offered Suzaku some food.
"NO!" Lloyd shouted from the front row in horror, causing Cécile right next to him to cross her arms and cast an insulted glare his way. "Don't do it, Suzaku!"
Suzaku took a bite from the rice ball, lovingly crafted to remind him of his heritage by the ever eager Cécile, and cringed.
"I just happened to get some lovely blueberries," she explained happily.
The Japanese in the audience sank in their seats in disgust but otherwise didn't bother to voice their thoughts at Cécile's interesting cuisine. All except Sayoko.
"Hm. That doesn't sound so bad." She turned to Anya and Jeremiah. "What do you think about blueberry jam rice balls for a snack when we get home?"
The Orange and Pink Knights whispered to each other in short deliberation before replying as one.
"Make it marmalade and strawberry and we have a deal."
"Alright everyone," Lloyd announced, coming back from his meeting with Cornelia, "pack it up, pack it up, we're done today. Don't do any more." He flapped his arms and squealed: "Hip hip HOO-RA~Y!"
"Ugh," Tamaki shivered, looking over at Lloyd and seeing the self-satisfied grin on his face, quickly cheered right back up from the sight of his 'favourite character'. "And here I thought he couldn't get any gayer."
Back in the Student Council room Kallen and Shirley were setting up Arthur the Cat's new cat house, and out of the blue Shirley decided to field a question to the other girl.
"Kallen, are you hiding something from us? If it's nothing too personal."
Kallen had a bad feeling about this.
"No," she answered hesitantly, using her best sick-girl voice. "What are you talking about?"
"You can tell me. I promise I won't be shocked or upset." Shirley paused, as if to decide how to approach the topic. "Well, the thing is, I happened to see you before."
Yep. Kallen was right. This was definitely not good. She pulled out her knife-purse.
"I keep saying it," Gino laughed, not bothered at all that Kallen's past self was about to murder someone to keep her identity secret, "but damn, this spy stuff is sexy!"
Tamaki groaned and looked away, putting a hand over his eyes so he didn't see the underage girls onscreen.
"And those skirts... Good grief! Who designed those!?"
In quick reply to the rhetorical question, a small cackle of delight came from somewhere in the front row.
Shirley turned, red-faced in embarrassment, and just got straight to the point.
"You're going out with Lulu, right!?"
Kallen gawked.
"Lulu?"
"The other day I saw you outside!"
"Ah, no no no no!" The redhead got up in a tizzy, her knife safely hidden inside the folds of her yellow school outfit. "That was all his doing!"
"His doing?"
"No, wait! It wasn't like that."
Shirley was unconvinced.
"I don't get it. You were trying so hard to catch the cat before!"
"No, that wasn't it! Besides, it's not like we kissed or anything."
"Or anything?" At this, Shirley reeled back, aghast. "Then you stopped short of doing it?"
"Would you quit imagining things!? You don't understand the circumstances one bit!"
Everyone in the theatre sat in a stunned silence, then at last Guilford spoke.
"What are we watching right now?"
Elsewhere in the school Milly was on the phone with a very insistent parent.
"... but an arranged marriage is so..."
A tiny croak of a whine came from Rivalz from one side of Milly, and from the other came a boisterous chuckle from Lloyd.
"It seems this is an episode about romance, Gilly! Clearly, love can bloom even in the most dangerous of times." The silver-haired scientist grinned to his once-fiancée. "Too bad it didn't work out in the end though, right, Milly, dear?"
Milly frowned, looking down and not meeting Lloyd's cheerful gaze, then eventually answered.
"Yeah. It's... It's too bad."
"Hm? I thought we put our break-up behind us. Don't tell me you still have hard feelings about that whole affair?"
Rivalz blinked in sudden dismay and Milly looked up in surprise, the blue of her eyes locking with Lloyd's own behind his spectacles. The clueless man was peering at her, or rather, through her, like he was trying to spot the ills of her very soul. Apparently he was under the impression she still had feelings for him, wrongfully assuming she even had feelings for him in the first place.
'Well,' Milly considered to herself, shaking her head and smiling before looking back at the screen, 'not entirely wrongfully.'
Cornelia's forces were on the move, preparing to surround the Saitama Ghetto to flush out another terrorist faction, this time the Yamato Alliance, even broadcasting the time and location of the operation on the news. And for whatever reason, the tactics and forces she'd prepared were an exact copy of Clovis' battle in Shinjuku.
"Zero is a criminal with a flair for the theatrical," Cornelia explained to her men from her command throne in her G1 mobile HQ. "I've recreated the same conditions that existed in Shinjuku in order to draw him out. If he's the overconfident type I predict he'll come here to try and kill me."
Chiba scowled and Tohdoh's face hardened, but Xingke's face split into a half-smirk.
"Clever." He looked to Rivalz. "Excuse me, Mister Cardemonde, please put down my second-favourite character as Cornelia."
Cornelia raised a brow, not sure if she should be flattered, and from his spot a row ahead of her Rivalz did the same before complying, pulling out his phone and typing in a series of keys.
"If she's second, who's your number one favourite?" he questioned innocently.
Xingke looked down to Tianzi beside him and smiled.
"Why, Jiang Lihua, of course."
Tianzi's face brightened and her lips parted in a wide grin, and she threw her slender arms around Xingke's own, nuzzling against him. Rivalz didn't notice the touching moment though. He scratched at his head.
"Who?"
Lelouch found out about Cornelia's plan, just as Cornelia intended, and with a small smile, almost like he was excited, he pulled out the armour he'd stolen back in Shinjuku and laid it out across his room's floor. C.C. was on his bed, and as she spoke with him the camera panned over her lithe frame.
"You're not falling for the enemy's provocation?" she said with only a hint of incredulity.
Lelouch quipped back.
"They went to such trouble to invite me though! Besides, there's something I'd like to ask Cornelia personally."
"Destroying Britannia or discovering who murdered your mother. Which is more important to you?"
"The two are of equal of importance."
Chiba frowned, her face filled with annoyance at what she was seeing.
"What an arrogant brat. He couldn't destroy Britannia so he decided to just take it over instead. I bet by the end he didn't even care who killed his mother."
Cornelia knew that wasn't the case. She wasn't able to remember him asking her that very question during the Black Rebellion, since she answered under the influence of Geass, but she knew her brother, and she knew he wouldn't abandon his search for the truth. Perhaps he only took over the Empire because he learned the answer to that question. Before she could correct Chiba though, Nunnally paused the video and answered first.
"You take that back."
Everyone turned to look at Nunnally, sitting in the center of the aisle with a sharp scowl on her lips, made more menacing by the fact that she was usually so gentle. She repeated, in no uncertain terms, exactly what she wanted, nay, what she demanded:
"You take that back about my brother right this instant."
Chiba was flabbergasted, and she hesitated to reply, but then Tohdoh joined in.
"Chiba," he grunted, leaving no room for argument, "answer the Empress."
"I... But I...!"
Chiba couldn't process what was going on. They were sticking up for Lelouch? Even Tohdoh? But why? She just couldn't understand it. Even so, she didn't like being the focus of attention, and historically it was dangerous to be on a monarch's bad side...
"Yes..." The warrior woman bowed her head and submitted. "I take it back. I'm sorry, Your Highness."
Nunnally didn't look away from Chiba for a long moment, continuing to glare at her, until finally she returned her gaze to the screen and raised her remote, pressing the PLAY button.
Lelouch and C.C. were debating about the ethics of survival of the fittest, in C.C.'s case merely testing the prince to learn more about his character, but in Lelouch's case, taking it quite seriously.
"Should I simply give up on my sister because she's frail!? I refuse to accept that! I'll wipe out that sort of world myself."
There was a click, and Lelouch looked to his bedroom door to find C.C. was standing in front of it, a pistol in her hand and aimed right for him.
Everyone knew Lelouch survived the encounter somehow, so it wasn't really worth getting worked up over, but Kallen hadn't spoken for a while, and this was just the kind of thing that got her angry.
"Pizza-bitch, what are you doing!?"
"Look at that," Gino exclaimed suddenly. "She was on the bed in one second, then the next she's all the way over there!"
Rakshata let out a long laugh.
"Super-soldier speed. Remember?"
"You can't go, Lelouch," C.C. said, finality in her tone. "You need to fulfill your part of our bargain, so I won't have you dying before that."
The Black Prince only smirked back.
"Notice that what you're saying and what you're doing are contradictory."
"Oh, I won't kill you. I'm merely going to shoot you in the leg to quiet you down."
Tianzi gasped, forcing Xingke to once again comfort her. Lloyd chuckled from the other side of the aisle.
"Right, because shooting him in the leg is LOTS better than shooting anywhere else. It's not like he could bleed out just as easily, or anything."
Anya hummed in thought, seemingly taking things seriously for once.
"It's counterproductive anyway. Have you ever seen a man who's been shot in the leg?" Or not so serious, as it turned out. "They're not very quiet. You might say they're the opposite of that."
Lelouch confirmed that C.C. didn't have a Geass of her own then drew his own pistol, the two of them locked in a Mexican standoff, weapons trained on each other.
"Hey!" Villetta pointed at the screen in dismay. "That's my gun! He's still got my gun, that little brat!"
"That weapon killed Prince Clovis," Jeremiah reminded his old friend. "If you could have it back, would you really want it?"
"Well, when you put it like that..."
"Do you honestly think you can threaten me with a gun?" C.C. wondered.
It was strange. Even knowing he couldn't harm her, Lelouch still drew his weapon. The chance of violence occurring was skyrocketing the longer things went on. Yet Lelouch only smiled, answering his Contractor's question with a smooth reply.
"Yes I do."
He put his gun to his temple.
The audience really didn't know what to say to that one. Only a few people said anything, and it was all the same single-word response, not a query, but a mere, flat statement:
"What."
Lelouch gave the explanation that was so sorely needed to explain just what in the hell he was thinking.
"Until I met you I was dead - an impotent corpse existing behind a false guise of life. A life in which I did nothing real. Day to day I merely went through the motions of living as if I were a zombie. And I always had the feeling that I was gradually dying. If I'm condemned to go back to that then I'd rather..."
He began to pull the trigger.
"STOP IT!" C.C. lowered her gun in defeat. "I see now: It's life without meaning. And a life like that..."
"Is that...?" Nunnally began to herself in a whisper. "Is that what you really thought about having a normal life with me, Lelouch?"
"He understood," Kallen muttered. "He wasn't content to stand by and let the world move without him. Just like me."
The redhead remembered. She could've lived a happy life as a Britannian, but she refused that future in favour of one she built for herself as her own person. And Lelouch did the same. They - Kallen and Lelouch - were the same.
The scene shifted abruptly to Saitama and a man being shot dead by a Britannian soldier.
It was jarring for the entire audience to change scene so drastically and so suddenly, but not everyone was equally disturbed. Civilians like Rivalz or Nina cringed in horror as the man fell limp to the asphalt, leaking red from several holes in his torso, but the more professional soldiers such as Xingke, Guilford, or Tohdoh barely reacted at all. Ohgi was incensed, but successfully held himself back. Kallen and Tamaki weren't quite so successful.
The two redheads went tense in their seats and narrowed their eyes at the wanton slaughter of their countrymen - innocents - men, women, and children.
Cornelia looked on disinterestedly. She already knew she was going to get criticized for her operation Saitama.
"It's in the past. Just get over it."
This may not have been the best choice of words for the princess, and Kallen hurled her immediate retort.
"Somehow you saying that only makes me even more pissed off!"
"Yeah!" Tamaki slapped Kallen on the shoulder proudly. "You tell 'er, Kallen!"
Cornelia huffed, not at all in the mood for this.
"Yelling at me now won't bring them back, so why don't you just stop wasting your breath?"
"Okay now," Cécile interrupted, using her most authoritative voice. "Everyone simmer down."
Kallen wasn't listening.
"You really don't care about what you did, do you?"
"If you mean to say I don't mourn every single person I sentence to death," Cornelia replied to the redhead simply, "then you're right. I don't care."
"You are such a piece of shit!"
Sitting right next to Cornelia, Nina was beginning to feel very unsafe.
"C-c-come on, guys, l-let's all be rational about this..."
From the front row Lloyd turned around to stare incredulously at the tiny girl, peering at her over the top of his glasses.
"Oh, that's a funny one coming from you."
"Ya know," Kallen continued, throwing her arms out grandiosely and getting herself more worked up every second, "I'm actually missing Clovis right now! Couldn't Lelouch have killed you instead of him?"
Guilford stood up to defend his princess's honour.
"Hold your tongue, girl!"
Tamaki stood up to defend his friend.
"Hey! Don't you talk that way to Kallen!"
Luckily for the Jeremiah of the future, watching these events play out onscreen and not earning the ire of the others in the theatre, his past self and the rest of the Purebloods were assigned as the rear guard, much to his displeasure at the time. They stood together in a single rank of knightmares, and as Jeremiah vented his frustrations at his lost prestige and honour, Villetta considered to herself:
'Zero... Could that student be working with him?'
Kaguya was just about to ask how long Villetta knew about Lelouch being Zero before another clip of mayhem played, explosions throwing bodies around and removing limbs, and the flash of gunfire turning the whole screen white as dozens more Elevens were murdered without offering any resistance.
Guilford was still standing and Tamaki wasn't backing down either, and with tensions already high, witnessing the massacre onscreen was enough for Kallen to be moved to action.
"THAT'S IT!" She shot up from her seat, Tamaki quickly moving in close to support her.
Everyone turned to face the two redheads in confusion, and from the other side of the aisle Gino and Cornelia stood too, sensing what was about to happen. In the back row Sayoko and Jeremiah glanced to each other and nodded once each.
"Jeremiah...!" the ninja-maid called, jumping from her seat and starting in a sprint toward the center rows. The cyborg wasn't far behind.
"Let's move!"
Anya just sat back in her seat in dull surprise and shrugged.
"I'll just sit here, I guess..."
Kallen had started into a run to get to Cornelia, the one who'd ordered the purge of Saitama, Tamaki close behind, their blood running hot and their minds filled with nothing but the desire for vengeance. It's true they knew what happened in that particular ghetto that day, but they never realized just how brutish it'd truly been. Back then, they'd only had numbers of dead and wounded, amount of equipment lost, members of the resistance lost, and other impersonal things - statistics. Nothing more.
But this... This was real and visceral, worse even than Shinjuku by an order of magnitude. Cornelia said it herself: Clovis hadn't intended to kill everyone in Shinjuku, and purposely attempted to avoid casualties. Burning the whole place to the ground had been his Plan C. But Cornelia attacked Saitama specifically to kill, innocents even more than actual resistance members, knowing the senseless death would infuriate Zero and cause him to come to the rescue.
Not for the first time that day, Kallen was actually sorry Clovis was dead and Cornelia was still alive instead. She'd make sure the Witch of Britannia joined her brother.
Nunnally looked back and forth between Kallen and Cornelia in shock.
"What're you doing? Stop! Stop right now!"
"Whoa, Kallen," Zero stood up and raised his hands, trying to calm the girl now rushing at him on her way to Cornelia's section of the theatre. She didn't so much as slow down.
"I am so DONE with you!"
Zero felt his eyes twitch and could hear a whisper at the back of his mind, and without meaning to, rather than standing between Kallen and the warrior princess, he turned to flee.
Kallen leapt into the air and delivered a spinning kick to make Suzaku proud directly into Zero's back, throwing him clear over Nunnally's wheelchair and sprawling over the seats of the other aisle. It was an effective attack, but for Kallen, it was just plain satisfying seeing Zero get a taste of his own signiture move. Too bad her red thirst for violence hadn't been sated yet.
Cornelia took up a defensive posture, Guilford taking up a similar position as best he could in the confined space between rows of theatre chairs. The Purple Witch spat in fury, not caring who was attacking her or why.
"Have at you, knave!"
"Hey!" Against his better judgement Gino had decided to get involved as well, and he raised his fists as Kallen came close. "C'mon, back off, Kallen! I don't want to fight you!"
The blood was pumping in Kallen's veins, rushing behind her eardrums so all she heard was the thump of war drums, driving her toward the attack. All she could see was red.
"Yeah?" she laughed as she closed the distance between herself and the Knight, practically gliding toward her target, the awkwardness of the theatre rows not seeming to affect her assault whatsoever. "Well, I'm in the mood to fight you!"
She pulled back a fist and let it fly, her knuckles hammering into one of Gino's raised arms, blocking the strike from hitting his face. He countered, loosing his own fist only for Kallen to catch it with her other hand. She drew her left leg back and pounded it into the blonde's side then flipped him out of her way, over the row of seats and onto Milly and Rivalz's laps before he could even register the sudden pain coursing through his body.
"I used to wish I could do this to you all the time," she snarled to Cornelia, making the last strides past a cowering Nina to get into range.
"I DID do this to you people all the time," Cornelia growled back.
The two women reached their fists back and stepped forward to attack. Then...
Kallen stopped as she felt the point of a knife at her throat. Sayoko was in front of her, armed with a kunai and glaring the redhead down.
Cornelia stopped as a massive body of flesh and steel appeared in front of her, Jeremiah, both golden arm-blades extended from his wrists, cutting her off from advancing any further.
Almost everyone was shouting, and most the audience were out of their seats, and they either gathered at the corners of the room to avoid getting involved or were running as fast as they could to come and break up the fight. Ohgi was the first to file into the row behind Tamaki, and he took hold of his friend's shoulders, yelling some nonsense at him and trying to pull him back.
"Now," Sayoko began calmly, a razor edge to her tone, "everyone's going to sit back down and go back to watching the show." Her eyes darted around. "Understood?"
Kallen's eyes were slits and her teeth were bared like a ferocious red hound, but at length she relaxed and turned to grudgingly go back to her seat in silence. Tamaki wasn't as easy to persuade though, fighting against Ohgi's grip holding him back, and Jeremiah pushed past Sayoko and Kallen to poke him with his arm-blade.
"Alright, alright, that's enough out of you. Get back to your seat or they'll rename me the Knight of Red for how much of your blood I'll spill!"
"Yeah, yeah, whatever."
Slowly but surely order was restored to the theatre, Kallen sitting back down as Tamaki brushed Ohgi away and joined her, and Zero and Gino dusting themselves off before going back to their spots too. The other members of the audience trickled back to their seats as well, leaving Cornelia, Guilford, Sayoko, and Jeremiah as the last people standing.
"Sit down, Princess," Jeremiah commanded, harsh and cruel. "You too, Guilford."
"Gottwald..." Cornelia started through clenched teeth. "How dare you!?"
Jeremiah retracted his arm-blades and shoved Cornelia down into her chair, quite displeased that his good mood from the Cat Hunt had been so thoroughly ruined.
"I don't work for you anymore, Princess. I'll acknowledge your title, and I'll always respect you for your accomplishments, but Lelouch is the only one I'll ever bow for again. So don't think you can pull rank or bully me with bravado. That goes for you too, Guilford, old buddy, old pal."
Sayoko had somehow transported herself back to her seat in the back row without anyone seeing it, and that left only Jeremiah to thump his way back to sit with her.
Nunnally looked around. This really turned into a mess quick. This was what happened after not seven episodes. And there were still more than 40 left...
"Does everyone remember?" she sighed eventually. "I had the guards confiscate your weapons at the door because I was afraid something like that might happen."
Xingke raised a brow.
"Why didn't they take their weapons?"
"They were supposed to..."
Sayoko flashed a deceivingly pleasant smile.
"A shinobi never reveals where she keeps her knives."
Jeremiah raised an arm and popped one of his arm-blades into place so everyone could see it.
"These don't come out. Don't ask why I have them."
Nunnally nodded and sighed again, long and frustrated, and raised her remote to rewind back through everything they'd missed in the chaos.
"Now, if everyone's calmed down...?"
Lelouch had snuck into Saitama in his stolen armour, and as he overlooked the battle from the top of a ruined building a Sutherland shot up from below, using its slash harkens as grappling hooks.
"What unit are you from?" the pilot demanded through his knightmare's speakers. "Your unit name and ID, soldier!"
With the power of Geass at his command, stealing the fool's frame was perhaps the easiest thing Lelouch had done all day.
As for the terrorist cell residing in Saitama, as Cornelia closed in on them they hid in the bombed out office building that was their home, falling into a panic.
"It's hopeless."
"Can't we break through along the Saikyo Line?"
"They've got armour blocking it."
"We can't use backroads either."
"Any reinforcements from Akabane or Jujo?"
"One man might get through, but not a group."
The members of the Yamato Alliance were ragged and undisciplined, and they babbled amongst themselves in a blind frenzy of terror. Then one of their members ran in with an unnatural focus in his every move and a barely perceptible ring of orange around his irises.
"Izumi!" He presented a radio, and a voice came through, strong and absolute.
"This is Zero."
"Whoa, hey," Rivalz began, slightly confused. "I thought Lelouch was working with your group, Kallen."
Kallen didn't answer, still in the process of cooling off from her attempt on Cornelia's life, so Rakshata did instead.
"It would seem the old Zero was still only window shopping for troops at that point."
Zero gave his oath to the terrorists over the radio, his word as good as gold.
"I assume all of you have heard about the Shinjuku incident. Do what I say and you will be saved."
The scene shifted to Cornelia's encirclement of the ghetto, and apparently everything was proceeding as planned. Then a two-knightmare team was lost from an RPG ambush.
Gino was still sore from being throttled by Kallen, but seeing the return of Zero's genius tactics put his mood right back up.
"Here we go!" He leaned back in his seat, confident this would be another thrilling victory for Zero. "These are going to be the best parts."
Lelouch's militia got straight to business.
A tank was shot through.
Two Britannian Sutherlands were blown to pieces by 'friendly fire.'
An attack helicopter was smashed by a slash harken.
Another tank was hit by a Sutherland rifle's attached grenade launcher.
The casualties were racking up, and to top it all off Lelouch ordered the bridge into the ghetto destroyed, defeating every single enemy soldier on it, either dying in the explosion, ejecting from their knightmares, or falling into the Arakawa River.
The audience sat in silence as they watched Lelouch doing what he did best, even Tianzi appreciating the deadly efficiency the Black Prince was displaying. Words could not describe the sheer amazement they were feeling, absolutely sure from Lelouch's earlier exploits that he could not fail. Cornelia and Guilford knew better.
Aboard Cornelia's G1 one of the comm operators gave grim news.
"Point 1-7 has fallen! Hally Team: Contact lost."
"That's enough," Cornelia said suddenly. "Order all troops to fall back. Further damage and casualties serve no point."
Lloyd nodded to himself.
"If you'd used my Lancelot, Princess, that battle would have been won in a jiffy."
Cornelia smirked.
"Keep watching."
The audience didn't know quite what to make of Cornelia's order, but Xingke and Tohdoh each raised a brow, pushing their minds to decipher her strategy. It didn't make sense so far. She had ample troops left over, and the Yamato Alliance was made up of cowardly civilians, so in theory the Witch of Britannia could have pressed her numbers advantage and routed them within perhaps an hour's time. Of course, full-on urban warfare was exactly the worst possible end for this conflict, with the possibility of ambush around every corner, so it was quite fortunate for Cornelia that she didn't care about the infrastructure of Saitama. The most logical decision for her would be to simply carpet bomb everywhere that wasn't under her control, then comb the remains with an infantry battalion.
Yet, that's not what happened.
Tohdoh knew the Yamato Alliance was destroyed from reports received from Kyoto, which meant Kaguya knew the eventual end of this battle as well, but how the end was achieved was still a mystery.
Xingke hummed in amusement as he figured out Cornelia's plan.
"Cornelia's definitely my second favourite." He glanced back at the princess and nodded. "I see what you did there."
Lelouch was just as confused as the audience when an order came through on his pilfered knightmare's comm to retreat. Still though, it could only be a good thing for him, because now he had an excuse to roll right up to Cornelia's G1, go in there, and kill her, hidden in plain sight - after questioning her with Geass first though, of course.
The scene changed, the camera briefly panning over C.C.'s still form, resting once again on Lelouch's bed, and strangest of all, talking to herself.
"So," Rivalz added unhelpfully, "we're sure she's a super-soldier. Does that also explain why she's a complete loony?"
Rakshata started to ponder that question while Anya giggled her dark reply, only half-joking.
"Don't you hear the voices too?"
Shirley was pretty bothered by her talk with Kallen, and while the secret rebel had already left the Student Council room Suzaku had come and replaced her. He attempted to play with Arthur, but the cat wasn't happy to see him, so eventually he gave up and listened as Shirley recounted a tale.
It was a simple story about something she saw once. She just happened to be in the right place at the right time to spot Lelouch helping an elderly couple deal with a traffic accident, and it was from that that her interest in the aloof Student Council Vice-President was sparked. She fell in love as she learned more about him, but more than that, she seemed to really believe in the goodness within Lelouch that he kept locked away from discerning eyes.
Zero remembered that conversation. He remembered what it was like to see Lelouch in only a positive light, just like Shirley had. It seemed to him that at some point he'd gotten caught up in fighting and jostling to secure the rank of Knight of One, and somehow forgotten who Lelouch truly was underneath the cold mask. He'd forgotten Lelouch's virtues, seeing only the negatives. But Shirley hadn't forgotten. She focused on what was important, all the way to the very end. Going back to the beginning like this, and seeing every perspective and every detail, Zero was reminded of how selfless Lelouch had been, and now he wondered if he was going to finally see Lelouch in his entirety, as a whole person rather than just the sides he presented.
It was clear to Zero that his opinion of Lelouch was incomplete, but what wasn't clear - what nagged at the back of his mind - was if he even had it in him anymore to change that opinion after so long.
Most everyone was silent as the show continued, but Villetta let out a small groan of disgust. She didn't hate Shirley. It had been clear to her even from the start that she was just a normal girl who had nothing to do with the mess Zero brought upon Britannia. That being said, she still never fully forgave the orangette for shooting her, and Villetta wasn't looking forward to seeing that on the big screen.
Lelouch joined the retreat in his stolen Sutherland and stopped in front of Cornelia's G1, as certain of his victory as she was of hers, when his cellphone rang.
Ohgi scowled, irritated the prince was answering his phone right in the middle of a battle. He still wasn't quite over how easily Lelouch blended his personal and professional lives.
As for Zero, the masked hero almost felt like laughing. If he'd only known where Lelouch was when he - no, Suzaku - called from the Student Council room to ask if he liked Shirley... Honestly, he had no idea how he would've reacted, but for some reason he didn't think he'd be upset. He was actually pretty sure he would only be concerned and try to rush over to Saitama as fast as possible to help him - to help his best friend.
Chiba groaned from her spot in the front row.
"That stupid kid. He almost died in Shinjuku because of his phone ringing. You'd think he'd learn to not bring it with him before battles, or at least turn it off."
Way at the back Anya shouted in disgust, clutching her own phone to her breast protectively.
"NEVER!"
"Well." Chiba blinked in dull surprise and shook her head in disappointment with one of the 'Greatest Knights in Britannia'. "At least he wasn't the only one who couldn't put his phone down."
"He actually doesn't use his phone much anymore."
"Huh?"
The pinkette looked away, realizing she'd said too much.
"NOTHING!"
Cornelia deployed her Royal Guard, and sensing the battle's approaching end, Lelouch gave one of his units an order through his knightmare's comm.
"N1 will reengage their IFF signal. Operate as a Britannian unit-" he smirked as N1 sounded his confirmation, then finished his thought after turning off the radio, "-as my decoy."
Cornelia let a gentle smile onto her lips as she translated Lelouch's order into its corresponding chess move.
"Good boy, Lelouch," she whispered proudly. She still couldn't bring herself to believe her brother was good, from start to finish, but she could at least acknowledge his tactical brilliance. "Very smart."
Cornelia wasn't falling for Lelouch's bait, and she sent out a three-knightmare team of Gloucesters, led by Guilford, her Knight of Honour himself, and together they speared the helpless N1's cockpit, killing the Eleven terrorist inside instantly.
"Jeezus!" Tamaki balked at Cornelia's ruthlessness. "What if that was one of your own guys!?"
Cornelia answered plainly.
"Then I would have written a letter of condolences to his family."
"You crazy bitch! People aren't pawns! You can't just expect them to do what they're told and get them killed like that!"
"Why not? It's their job. My soldiers lived because I allowed it. They died when I demanded it."
Ohgi pulled the discussion back a bit.
"I think the more pressing issue is how Lelouch made that man a target so you'd kill him and think you'd gotten Zero! If anyone was using people as pawns, it was Lelouch!"
"No confirmation?" Lelouch wondered once N1 perished. He was monitoring the Britannian comm chatter, and no report of killing Zero came through. His tactic had failed, so he tried something else. "Well then..."
Tamaki stopped berating Cornelia for a second as onscreen Lelouch confirmed Ohgi's assertion. Up until this point, his respect for the Black Prince had been growing once again, and he'd almost forgotten all the sorrow and hurt that had come because of him during his years as Zero and beyond. The same deflating feeling was shared by almost all the other Black Knights too, and even many of the Britannians. The ones who took it hardest were the ones who liked Lelouch the most.
"Oh, grow a pair!" Cornelia growled. "How can you pathetic worms call yourselves knights!? A knight's LIFE is to die. A commander's job is entirely to send them to places where they CAN die! Battles are won through sacrifice - by spending men's lives to purchase victory. That's what Lelouch was doing. If his plan had succeeded, he would have lost only one man, and potentially taken my life as a reward. I cannot, and will not, fault him for playing the best trick available to him."
The audience sat in stunned silence at Cornelia's outburst. Of all of them, she was among the most anti-Lelouch, yet still she stood up for him. It was unthinkable.
The most appalled at Cornelia's speech was Chiba, Cécile, Tamaki, and Ohgi, the rest either stone-faced in agreement or suitably cowed.
Lelouch tensed and began delivering orders in rapid succession, playing a game of cat and mouse with Cornelia's Royal Guard. His Yamato Alliance militia would lead them into an ambush, but at the last second they would always sniff out the trap and turn it in on itself, forcing him to change his plans.
Minutes went by and neither side saw their enemy, always escaping from each other before the hammer fell then regrouping. The stress of it all was too much for the Yamato Alliance, and despite Lelouch's directions, which may yet have won the day for them, they surrendered.
"IDIOTS!" Kallen and Jeremiah raged in unison at the Yamato Alliance onscreen, watching as they threw down their arms and left their knightmares, hands raised only to be gunned down without mercy.
Before anyone could lose their temper again Sayoko whistled, drawing everyone's attention to her. Her kunai was back in her hand, and she wagged it in front of her menacingly.
Before long, the entire Yamato Alliance was wiped out, and Cornelia revealed her checkmate.
"Attention all knightmare pilots!" Cornelia's voice rang in Lelouch's cockpit. "Open your hatches and reveal your faces!"
Gino sank in his seat and pointed at the screen in horror, finally understanding Cornelia's plan.
"OH SHIT!"
"Well," Lloyd chuckled to himself, "I wonder how he gets out of this one."
Lelouch was finished. He'd followed the order to retreat hoping to slip through Cornelia's defences, but now he was surrounded, and as soon as the Britannians saw his face and didn't recognize him, he was as good as dead. Or worse.
Guilford went to each pilot in the lineup as they opened their cockpits and checked their faces, and before long it was Lelouch's turn. He hesitated.
Back in the present, Guilford harrumphed to himself.
"I knew there was something suspicious about that pilot."
Eventually, though he did so grudgingly, Lelouch began to comply with the order to reveal himself, when...
"Zero's been sighted!"
Lelouch looked at his HUD to see Zero standing atop a building dramatically, facing down Cornelia and all her men, unarmed. They opened fire and he swan dived, back-first, falling several flights down somewhere behind the building.
Cornelia cocked her head to the side, utterly baffled by this turn, as beside her Guilford choked in fury.
"Who in the hell...!?"
Rivalz meanwhile breathed a sigh of relief.
"Whoever it was," Milly grinned, "they have perfect form."
Sharing the girl's smile, but for completely different reasons, Gino spoke up excitedly.
"Have I ever mentioned that the Zero costume is freakin' awesome? The formal suit's better than the jumpsuit though." He was met with bored glances and irritated glares. "Hey, sorry for having some levity!"
In all the chaos of sighting Zero, Lelouch managed to escape, hopping out of his knightmare and making for the nearest sewer grate.
'That's how Cornelia is,' he thought to himself spitefully as he sprinted through the sewers. 'She's nothing at all like Clovis!'
Lelouch stopped in his tracks as a dark figure appeared before him. He was supposed to be alone down there. Was he caught?
As the figure approached, Lelouch could make out some details, first making note of its batlike cape, then its silk cravat, and finally its mirrored helm.
He addressed Zero scornfully.
"Why did you rescue me?"
"I told you already," he replied simply, removing his mask and letting out a whole headful of green hair, showing his true identity to be none other than C.C. "I can't have you dying."
"I wouldn't have lost if the conditions were equal!"
"You sore loser." C.C. seemed to think this was all a game, and she tossed her mask up and down in her hands. "If you're really that good you should be able to set up conditions the way you want."
Lelouch didn't take the strange girl's chiding well, and as the camera flashed to a close-up of his eyes, narrowed in fury, he made his declaration:
"That's what I'll do, then! I'll set them up! I'll raise an army that can't lose to Britannia - OF PEOPLE! A NATION!"
LLLLLLLLLLLL