A/N - Well, rapid-fire update. Got a few chapters planned out, but still open suggestions

HINT HINT - Send suggestions

For those that care, no, I do not like Suzaku. He can go _ a _ while he _ a _ for all I care. I hate his mindset, his goal, his views and his creepy fixation on becoming Knight of One, which he spins as part of his quest for peace. Right, sure, of course, becomign the right-hand man of a genocidal dictator is sooooo peaceful. Whatever, he will be bashed.

However, nobody is beyond redemption, sort of, so I will be lenient towards the little _.

Anyway, enough from me (not that anybody reads this...) lets get into the chapter...

His Lilac Queen: Part 0 - Due Divergence, Due Reward

Chapter 2

- Together Once More -

He slowly turned, afraid of what could shock the otherwise unflappable immortal, and saw…

...saw...

"...Euphie?"

Violet met lilac, eyes widened as far as could go, unwilling to believe the sight set before both of them. 'Impossible, she was killed...shot...I shot her...I killed her...she's dead because of me.' But there she stood before him, her long hair let down in rippling waves, a striking change from the two buns she always held them in. The rose strands blended perfectly into her clothes, a light purple loose-fitting dress, with what appeared to be a white collar piece that descended down to the edge of her shoulders, and the top of her breasts. The pink hem was cut in the shape of the Geass bird at both the collar and the breasts, declaring it a product of C's World.

"Lelouch?" Her voice was hoarse, dry from months of disuse, though her eyes were certainly wet enough. Tears began to drip down her face, splashing audibly on the wet puddles dotting the floor of the Elevator, though Lelouch was certain they hadn't been there before. "Lelouch! It's you… it's …*hic*...it's really you!" And suddenly she was upon him, tackling him with a force he couldn't believe, glomping him as hard as possible, determined not to let him go. They quickly collided with C.C, who was brought down with them in the ensuing tangle, grabbing onto them both on reflex. "It's you it's you it's you it's you it's you…"

"Euphie?" he began, his voice strained, tears almost flying out from his eyes.

"God I've missed you I was so scared with the soldiers and the blood and your Geass broke and I thought you'd hate me for what I did and I know you felt like it was your fault but it's not because it was an accident and you didn't mean it and I forgive you and…"

"Euphie…"

"Andithoughtyoumighthavegottenhurtaswellandwhoisthatsexyverdettegirlyouwerewithdoyoulikeher…"

"EUPHIE!" His sudden exclamation shut her up instantly, as she flinched back from his strained expression. "AIR! NOW!" She tried to jump off him even quicker, releasing her uncharacteristically strong stranglehold on his fragile frame, and unleashed a torrent of rapid-fire apologies. As Lelouch stood and attempted to regain his lost air, the princess turned around, blushing up a storm.

'Great first impression.' she thought, her pout audible even in her thoughts. 'Seven months of planning and I babble like a schoolgirl.'

Suddenly a pair of arms were wrapped around her, pulling her into her own bone crushing embrace. She felt his head bury itself deep into her hair, and a small dampness seeping into her collar from where his face touched her skin. "Please, tell me this isn't some joke, some cruel play of the gods," he whimpered. "Please, is that you Euphie?"

She softly turned around in his embrace, and touched her forehead to his, staring deep into his irises. "It's me, Lulu, it's me…" Both pairs of eyes were damp with happiness, bliss unfelt since their childhood's past. Days of freedom and innocence, caring only for each other and themselves. Days long since forgotten and discarded, in the mire that was their tumultuous life. It was her, the girl...the young woman he had kept in his heart eternally, her smile, her eyes, her happiness, her beauty...there was not a single fault to be found within. Not amongst the care, gentleness, empathy, curious, understanding soul that seemed to touch all around her. The perfection he had been forced to shoot in cold blood, because of his mistakes.

His mistakes. His failings. What were his failings? He couldn't remember, not when there was a true angel in front of him. He felt peaceful, fulfilled, happy. When was the last time he had felt happy? Who cares, he was content now. Why was his brain so hazy, so cloudy? He could barely think straight. What was happening, was it some kind of drug? They say love was a drug. Why was he thinking that? Did he love her? Of course he did, he loved her more than anything else in the world. He felt safe and secure near her, happy and at peace. Peace, he hadn't felt peace since...since…

Since Euphie died.

"Euphie…" he asked, his voice stronger than before, but keeping a gentle tone. "How are you here. You're dead, I saw everything…"

"Well," she giggled, "you wanted a gift…"

"So you're real-ouch!" Something had softly but firmly smacked his cheek. He looked up to see Euphie move away, and lower her hand. "What was that for?"

She had puffed her cheeks out into her classic, adorable pout. "Lelouch vi Britannia," she said as she poked his nose. "I have waited the better part of a year to see you again, and I am not having you ruin it with your silly questions!" Lelouch decided to just wait out her impending rant, recognising her expression from their times at the Aries Villa. One that said 'hear me out or I will give you the pouty puppy dog eyes from hell'. Yet her face softened into a saddened frown, losing the childlike expression she so often carried. I had to watch, you know? I had to see you get hurt, over and over again. How you tried to keep all your pain to yourself, trying to bottle yourself up from others. I've seen how you try to like Atlas, despite the loneliness that comes with such a hard task. Always trying to carry the weight of the world by yourself, because everyone turned their back on you, on what you are. But even worse…" Her pout returned in full force, the bipolar swing in emotions almost physically battering Lelouch to the ground. "I had to bear witness to four girls flirt with you, over and over again. I actually started making bets with D.S. about which one you'd choose. How did you somehow get with none of them?!"

Lelouch began to realise with growing despair that his half-sister had witnessed everything that happened to him throughout the last year...including...oh please no...anything but...

"I was so bored once we made bets on how long you would last cracking one off, and I still lost to her." Lelouch started moving to escape, but she halted him with a wagging finger. Her smile was sadistic, knowing just how much torment she was putting her brother through. "No you don't, you're not getting away. I've been waited so long to say this, so you better sit still." Oh god, she had not just seen him naked, but with his literal hands down his pants, and had watched it with some level of interest. And had counted, every, single, second. "But seriously, I swear D.S is like psychic or something, she always guessed the exact second." She then smirked playfully and adopted a more teasing tone. "But at least you can say you're better than Suzaku at something..."

Vomit, in mouth. Must bleach brain. Requiring cyanide pills. Unable to function as human being. Must not imagine Suzaku naked, must not imagine...fuck...ew. "God, mercy, please?" he prayed/begged to the skies. "Please, don't make hear my sister's sex life."

"My sex life?" Euphie asked, surprised. "Why mine? I'm talking about your lack of one." Another bullet to his pride, or whatever tatters that remained of it. Mercy was a lie, it had to be. There was no god in this forsaken world. "And why would I do anything with Suzaku?"

Wait, they didn't have sex? 'I'm sorry god, you were with me all along!' "Then how do you know his...ahem...stamina?" he wondered out loud. "Unless you also did some stalk- I mean...voyeuring on him too?"

Euphie suddenly dropped her smirk, appearing to shiver in dread. "Must bleach brain, require cyanide pills," she mumbled in horror. "Unable to function as a human being." Wow, Suzaku seems to have that effect on people. "Must not imagine Suzaku naked, must not imagine...fuck...ew." The mere mention of physical relation with the knight was bad enough for his sister, the paragon of cutesiness, to swear. Then again, unlike him, she had actually watched him in action. All he had to cope with was the thought of it, and that was bad enough. But she wasn't done. "The worst part was, he said my name once...as he..."

…

…

"B-back to my sex life." Lelouch stammered, eager to shift the topic literally anywhere else. "Who were these four girls you were mentioned?" He knew of one, well two, but the first was underage and a high ranking political figure, and the other...well...Mao's apology helped.

"What...oh!" Euphie squeaked, just as happy with the change in discussion. "Maybe another time, I need to set a few things straight." She became serious once more, scanning the cavern as if searching. "That green-haired girl, the one who was just here, where did she go…" Unbeknownst to them, the forty minutes was almost up, so the witch had left to inform Suzaku that their talk was over. Had she not, there was a good chance the knight might have barged into their discussion, and should he witness the reincarnation of the princess, it could have become extremely volatile. "Even though I was always listening to you, I could never find out her name. It was like it was being censored."

"Well, her name's C.C, she's a Code bearer," he offered. "Could that mean anything?" He was still trying to wrap his head around the idea of Euphie sharing his more recent memories. Had she been in everyone's head? Or just his? But then, how did she know about Suzaku and his...yeah. Unless he had seen it too, and then forgot. 'Please don't tell me Suzaku roofied me or something.' Oh god, and his father had had a memory changing Geass. Terrible thoughts, terrible thoughts indeed.

"Probably, but it doesn't matter," she said, a hint of disappointment in her voice. "D.S would never tell me her name, or really anything." She had mentioned the Dimensional Supervisor a few times. Sounds like she had a friend in C's World.

"You said D.S, right?" she nodded her confirmation. "How much do you know about her? I only just found out she existed a few moments ago."

"Oh, she's like a spokesperson." That much he knew, it was what that might entail that caught his interest. "But she has some serious power, I mean, she's the reason I'm here now! Incredibly beautiful too, reminds me a bit of that C.C girl mixed with Kallen." She grabbed onto his coat, suddenly appearing troubled.

"She found me, in that maelstrom." she continued, her voice softer and with subtle hints of fragility. "Imagine it, and endless void filled with millions of screaming souls, all trying to remember what they once were. I was so scared, I kept calling out to you, Suzaku too, just wanting to see you two again." She tightened her hold on his jacket, as if the very memory was enough to relieve the pain. "Apparently, I wanted it so bad, that D.S could hear me from her Thought Elevator in Munich." Despite being drawn into her tragic narrative, Lelouch managed to store that nugget of information away for later. That was the third Elevator he knew the location of now. "I remember when she saved me, it felt like I was grabbed by the collar, thrown out of the giant cloud of spirits. It hurt. I suddenly had to comprehend existence again, after so long just being in a tumultuous nothing. I screamed for days, apparently."

Lelouch hugged her as securely as possible as she started to tear up, desperately trying to solidify her in the present, instead of the tormenting past that still haunted her even in memory. She pressed her face into his coat, mumbling her story into his collar, just audible, but with none of the confidence she was known for. "She said...said that I could see you two, under one condition." She looked back into his eyes, conveying streams of emotion with just a second's glance. "I couldn't ever join you, or talk to you again." Lelouch tightened his hold on her once more, he himself close to joining her in tears. "It was that, or go back to nonexistence. I made my choice."

"I could watch only those who meant the world to me."

Never had Lelouch imagined he meant that much to her, even as her only true brother. Even as the only one who had supported her in full, who had lived solely in her memory, dedicated to her ideals above all else, even if not in the peaceful ways she had imagined. To be one of only two people she held above all else meant everything to him, made him feel just a bit better about himself, his choices, his path.

"But, what about Cornelia, or...well Cornelia? You two were inseparable." Surely there were more in her life than just two of them? Her sister, Nunnally, before her...disappearance, surely, someone?

"She's changed, Lulu. She isn't the sister I once had," she admitted, shocking Lelouch in her apparent acceptance of her closest siblings distance. "Even before I died, she was growing apart from me, always out of reach, lying, stalling, keeping me away. How can I be there for her when she can't even trust me? And now...she's so far gone…"

"I'm so sorry, Euphie." he cried, finally releasing his own tears. "Nellie, her little quest, it's all my-"

"Stop. Now." she cut in. "None of that now… I don't want to hear it." He begrudgingly acquiesced, though the guilt remained. She hadn't denied it, after all. "It's...nobody's really to blame. But even so, I missed her...I still do, but…sigh...anyway, Suzaku was the other one, obviously, but he's…he hasn't changed."

"What are you talking about, he's not the same at all!" he exclaimed, trying to see how Euphie could still see the naive, headstrong, passionate fool in the jaded, genocidal monster left in his place.

"All that's changed is his cause," she answered, her eyes locked on the ground. "He just feels more justified, now that he thinks you killed me."

"But I did, that's why-" he was cut off once more.

"V.V, he did this, he overloaded your Geass." Lelouch gasped at the revelation. That he hadn't been directly responsible for her demise took a massive weight off his conscious, left more questions than answers. "D.S told me, how he interfered with your contract with C.C, messed with you Geass." she tightened her fists, bunching his clothes within her grip. "Charles ordered it. My plan was doomed from the start, it was too naive to ever work. I guess...I guess I understand you more than before, why you did what you did, it was the only way."

"But you never had to see the horrors I did, Euphie." he reasoned. "You never had to see the bodies or the destruction, the intrigue and corruption, you could never have gotten it perfect the first time."

"True, but I never asked. No matter, what's done is done, now we move forward." she finally released him, and began walking to the cave mouth.

"Euphie, Suzaku's out there, are you ready to face him?" he asked, worried for the impending confrontation. It was inevitable, but maybe it was too sudden for her to face him so soon after her return.

"I can deal with my knight, Lulu," she answered, voice hard and firm. Her eyes narrowed in determination as if readying herself for the coming storm. Her fists tightened, fingers digging marks into the fabric of her white gloves.

"I'll make him see..."

A/N - Well, I know there's a lot of WAFF, but you kinda need it at this point in a story. The ropes need to be tied and tightened for Lelouch to have the support network required for his new plans. After all, you know the famous rhyme -

'First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes war on a scale you can't imagine'

The start might be a bit slow, but will pick up relatively soon. The Part 0 will have the shortest chapters, as it is like a prologue, clocking up at about 3k a piece. Part 1 is looking more like 4-5k per chapter, and 2 will most likely have 7-10k updates.

Up next, the confrontation between Euphie and her Knight. Will they make up? Will they get back together? Hell no, because screw him. The real question is, will Suzaku keep trying?

Aenarion the White signing out.