A/N: Probably my most random story ever. Pairing is Lelouch/Shirley. It's kind of angst centered so be prepared for sadness. Enjoy…if you can.

Disclaimer: Code Geass does not belong to me.

(Edited extensively as of 12/26/21 & 3/9/22)

Picture to Burn

It means nothing to him, or at least that's what he keeps telling himself as he uses a cigarette lighter to bring flames upon her diary. He tells himself she never meant anything to him and that things are better off this way. Now that she no longer remembers who he is and what he's done, he can continue on his path of blood without any hesitation or fear that she would entangle herself in his chaos again.

The pages of the diary burn easily. Ink melts along the pages, transforming each word written into nothing more than splotches of nonsense that would never be decoded. All evidence of his existence in her world evaporates with the embers that float up into the frigid air with the smoke.

With bitterness he muses that this is his just punishment for killing her father in Narita. He had not killed the man with his own hands, but it was his order that had brought the girl so much pain. If not for his carelessness, his complete idiocy...she would still be a part of his life.

He shakes his head, muttering to himself that it means nothing once more.

But this was just another lie on the pile of falsehoods.

The night he erased her memory, he told her he hadn't known how much she'd meant to him until it was already too late. By that point, the girl in question had no idea he was talking about her. With a tender smile, she merely told him that a new morning would come and he would be able to move forward.

She had no idea of what had occurred a few short hours before that moment. She held no memory of how he'd held her lithe body in his arms, cradling her as if she were a fragile doll mere seconds away from shattering into pieces, and though he'd removed himself from her mind, he couldn't fix the tragedies his crusade had wrought upon her heart or the lingering emptiness she would feel after having lost someone so precious to her. The absence of a father's love would haunt her just as the absence of his mother continued to haunt him despite all the years that had passed.

Over and over, as ashes gently drift toward the pavement below his feet, he continues to say she meant nothing to him.

However, no matter how many times he repeats the words in his head or out loud, the image of the young woman with glowing green eyes remains. He sees her smile and hears her laugh echoing in his mind. He feels the pressure of her lips and remembers the taste of rain mixed with mint.

No matter how many times he tries to delude himself and forget her sadness, he recalls everything with a heightened sense of clarity that almost robs him of breath.

Her forlorn expression, the tears sliding down her cheeks, and the sobs that wretched through her that night...

All of this will remain with him regardless of the passage of time or his foolish attempts to ignore it all.

In times of war, some say the first kill is the most difficult to process. With each subsequent kill, a man will see that person's likeness in the faces of each life he takes from that point forward.

For Lelouch Lamperogue, this wasn't the case.

Not once did he ever see the face of his half-brother Clovis when he killed. All he ever saw were the faces of men and women who meant nothing to him. Using Geass to eliminate the obstacles around him had held no real meaning to him before now. Destroying his enemies was a means to an end, an inescapable necessity. To create the peaceful world his younger sister desired, he would have to tear down the current system through whatever measures available, drastic or otherwise.

Casualties on both sides, whether innocent or guilty, were inevitable.

Death holds no prejudice.

But even knowing this, Lelouch felt a change in his mind-set regarding his mission. The next time he saw someone sobbing from having lost a loved one, he would see Shirley's emerald eyes filled with tears as she stared at him, begging him for answers he could not give. An intimate embrace would call the memory of her lips on his when the fragmented pieces of her soul reached out to him for comfort.

A bitter laugh falls from his lips. She would have never found true comfort with him.

She found out his secret and killed to protect him.

She was targeted by a childish maniac who could read her every thought.

That maniac used her. He tried to get her to kill the person she loved.

Somehow, Shirley broke free from his power, only to fall susceptible to the power Lelouch wielded. Her anguished emotions left her powerless against it.

"She was a thorn in my side from the beginning," he thinks, watching as the remaining ashes fall to the ground. Reaching into his pocket, he draws out picture after picture. The first one is of him lying in the grass and sleeping the day away.

"She never meant a thing to me. She was just a naïve girl that got in the way."

He sets flame to another picture. This one is a photo of all the student council members together. The picture was recent, since Suzaku was in it as well, but Lelouch didn't care. He burned the photo anyway, desperate to erase his grief.

"She foolishly clung to me. That girl was just another one of my fangirls."

One photo after another, he burned them. Inwardly he ranted on about the strawberry-blonde girl with the glowing green eyes.

"Insignificant, a nuisance, nothing more than an acquaintance."

His violet gaze set itself on the final picture. Shirley stood at the forefront of the photo, smiling and waving a peace sign while he stood in the background, a sly smirk on his face. The picture was taken two years prior, when they had all been freshmen at Ashford Academy.

For while, Lelouch merely stared at the photo in his hands.

Eventually, he places it back inside his coat pocket.

"I'll learn from my mistake," he thinks, turning away from the pile of ash on the ground. "She doesn't mean a thing to me anymore."

One year later Lelouch finds himself staring down at her body. She's covered in blood.

With disbelief and horror clouding his violet eyes, he kneels down beside her body. Acid rises through his chest before settling in his throat. He can't explain the sickening feeling. He can't fathom why now of all times he would feel nauseous at the sight of the crimson liquid flowing beneath Shirley's body. He'd seen the substance plenty of times before. After the Special Zone Massacre a year prior, he was certain blood and gore would never bother him again.

But now he finds himself trembling more than ever before. Though he couldn't fathom why at first, it soon dawned on him why he was reacting so strongly. This girl should have never been in this position. Her skin shouldn't look this pale. Her clothes shouldn't have these ugly, red stains.

An onslaught of terrible images filtered through his mind, reminding him of his beloved mother who'd been thrown aside by his own father for slaughter.

Right now, he feels as if he's done the same thing.

"Shirley, who did this to you?"

He asks the question, but inside he's casting blame upon himself.

Shirley's eyes flutter open, and Lelouch notices a dull sheen coating the usually vibrant green color of her irises.

"Lulu, I'm glad we can talk at the very end."

Lelouch tried to stop her there. He tried to tell her that it wasn't the end, that everything would be alright, but with one touch of her delicate hand atop of his, he stopped dead in his tracks.

"Ever since I've regained my memories I've been so afraid," she tells him, her voice but a whipser. "A teacher that wasn't a teacher…friends who don't have memories to share…everyone was just lying." She gasped, the pain stealing her breath. "That's…that's the world you've been fighting by yourself isn't it…all alone."

He had fought alone, but Lelouch had always been alone. That was his truth, his undeniable truth ever since his father abandoned him.

"That's why I wanted…why I wanted to be someone who would at least be truthful to you."

Lelouch's eyes widen in bewilderment. "Shirley..."

She smiles up at him, letting him know with her eyes that all his past sins against her are forgiven. "Lulu, I love you. Even knowing that you killed my father…I simply couldn't hate you. Even though my memories were tampered with…I still fell in love with you."

Her eyes dim even further. In a panic, Lelouch realizes her blood is flowing out faster than before.

"And I'll fall in love with you…over and over again."

"No Shirley!" he exclaims, removing the contact covering his left eye and the Geass. "You can't die!"

Vainly Lelouch activated his Geass, commanding her not to die. Commanding her to stay. A tinge of red surrounds her irises, but it doesn't make any difference. Her life's blood continues to flow away. The embers of her life fading out as quickly as candlelight in the wind.

"No matter how many times I'm reborn, I'll keep falling in love with you Lulu," she rasps out, tears streaming down her face. "I suppose that it is simply fate."

"You can't die," he pleads, his own tears falling now. He couldn't lose her. He didn't want to lose anyone else. He loved her.

"I order you not to die!"

"And as I'm reborn…I'll keep falling in love with you over and over…"

The Geass flicks away in her eyes. He's losing her, and there's absolutely nothing he can do to stop it. Internally he berates himself for putting distance between them. He still has so much he needs to say to her, so much he needs her to know.

"I need to tell her now. I need to tell her before..."

"I'll keep falling in love with…"

Her hand falls away from his, dropping with a sickening splat into the pool of blood. Those shimmering green eyes close, the remaining tears falling as she breathes her last.

A smile is on her face.

But Lelouch can't breathe. In a single instant, all the air was knocked out of him.

It was too late to tell her the truth…too late to show her briefly just how much she'd meant to him. Shirley was forever lost to him now...just like Euphie and his mother.

He grabs her shoulders. "Shirley! Shirley!"

Lelouch knew she wouldn't respond. It was far too late to do anything to save her. He knew that fact. He had seen plenty of people die right in front of him in his lifetime, but this…this seemed so much worse. She wasn't supposed to die. He erased her memories to protect her and yet…none of it helped.

She still died.

And it was all his fault.

Tears drip from his face and onto the floor as he tightly closes his eyes, silently praying that all of it would be a relentless nightmare that he could wake up from, but he knew…he knew that this was no nightmare. This was real life. This was his truth. The deaths of the people he held most dear in his heart was all he would ever know.

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!"

"We'll crush them!"

C.C. blinks at Lelouch's show of anger through the monitor. "Tell me what happened."

And so Lelouch tells her the whole story. How Rolo, his impostor sibling, had used his Geass to kill Shirley. Now that he had located the Geass order, he was determined to tear the place apart and offer the deaths of the monsters who sent it out into the world as a burial present to his beloved.

Once the conversation between him and his accomplice ends, the former prince of Britannia turns off his computer and releases a deep, sorrowful sigh. He would never escape his guilt over what happened to Shirley, but he hoped that the deaths of the people responsible would be enough to distribute justice.

Of course, when he thought about that, he knew that he deserved death as well for his own horrendous actions. And if all went according to plan…he would be able to join Shirley again soon.

After a long while, Lelouch rises from his desk chair and reaches into his dresser. Opening it up, the first thing he sees is the lone picture he never burned. It was now the only reminder of what he once had.

He could never go back. He couldn't change what happened even with his Geass. The realization brings him back down to Earth as he continues to hold the small photo in his hands. There's no way for him to delude himself any longer.

"Shirley…you meant everything to me."

A/N: I don't know what happened to me while I was writing this. Right before I watched two HAPPY Christmas movies and had a steaming cup of hot cider and had visions of sugarplums dancing around in my head. Somehow, that turned into this tragedy filled story you see before you. Totally weird. Anyway…hope you enjoyed it. Review please.