Your Past, My Future
Chapter 12
a/n Well, this is the last chapter, and it only took me, how many years? Hopefully, by the end of this chapter, I'll have a better title for the sequel than Your Past, My Future, part two.
Kallen looked at the obsidian mask on the table and at Lelouch sitting patiently in Zero's costume. She wanted to sit down.
"If this is a joke…" she started. No, Zero was too serious and Lelouch wasn't nearly that stupid. Or suicidal. "If I'm…" No, she didn't think she was dreaming. If she was still on that floating sword thing… "Okay, what's the deal here?"
"I assumed it was obvious." It was the sort of thing Zero would say, in the sort of way he'd say it, but Kallen wasn't buying it.
"Oh no. I was here the first time I invited you to join the Black Knights, Lelouch. You were right here, Zero was over there, you two talked for a bit, and…and so unless you're a body double or…" a usurper—no, Zero wouldn't get killed by some high school kid—"or something…"
"I've mentioned this before, but anyone can wear a costume," Lelouch said. "And anyone can use a tape recorder."
"A tape recorder," she repeated skeptically.
"The conversation was brief and only you and I were speaking, and I knew what you were going to talk about. It's more complicated with people I don't know very well."
Kallen thought about the boy she knew from the student council. He always seemed so…aloof, confidently intelligent, and trying to pretend he wasn't looking down at you. Some girls liked that sort of thing, but Kallen wasn't sure that it couldn't irritate the heck out of her. Zero was intelligent and confident too, but on an entirely different level, and he didn't just watch things happen, he made them happen.
"If it helps," Lelouch added, "You aren't the same person at school as you are here."
"I was Kozuki long before I was Stadtfield!" she snapped. She tried to calm herself. How many people in the Black Knights had wanted to know who they were working for? Lucky her. "Alright, so if you are Zero, why are you telling me this?"
"Because I trust you. And because you need to know."
"Oh, you trust me now. That's nice to know. It would really suck if I got in my Knightmare and fought a Britannian army for someone who didn't. And would you mind putting your mask back on? Your face makes me want to hit you."
Lelouch picked up the mask and put it on his face. "The Black Knights follow me because I give them victories, but if they knew everything, only a few would follow still. You are one of those few."
"And who are the others?"
"C.C. and Orange know, and Mao found out on his own," Zero said. "So including you, there's only four."
"And now the emperor."
"Yes."
Now Kallen did sit down. "So what's the deal with the other three? All three of them are people you brought in yourself, and they never acted like regular recruits."
"As I said, Mao figured it out on his own. He is much more astute then he pretends to be, and I wanted to keep an eye on him, so I offered him a position. I do not trust him, but he has not reported me to the enemy, and for the time being he is more useful than he is dangerous. Orange's original loyalty is to a woman who was assassinated several years ago without much concern. I offered him justice for the murder, and he accepted. C.C. was involved with the emperor's Ragnarok project, but she decided that the world Ragnarok would create was not the one she wanted. The emperor cannot complete the project without her cooperation, and I have offered her my protection."
Zero was usually more tightlipped than this. There were more questions she wanted to ask him, but most she didn't want to know the answer to, and only one question mattered. "So what do you want me to do?"
"Just wait," Zero said, "and be ready. I haven't caused enough trouble for the emperor to consider me a threat, and he has a noose around my neck he doesn't think I know about. That will change soon, Kallen, and when it does, I'll need to be able to rely on you."
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The confrontation went about as well as he had suspected. Part of Zero was sure that he would have left with a black eye, but she didn't even pull out her gun on him. Of course, he left a few things out. Kallen didn't need to know about his heritage, and she wasn't ready to know about the Geass yet. She would, later, but for now it would be best to do things one step at a time.
The days passed. Lelouch may have been the only person not surprised when Suzaku was knighted, but the rest of the Black Knights were.
"We cannot allow this," Deithard insisted. "If Suzaku becomes a symbol to the Japanese, then we will fall."
"What's the big deal?" Kallen asked. "He's a decent pilot, but I beat him at Narita, and I can do it again if I have to."
"It wouldn't matter if Suzaku couldn't walk," Deithard explained. "The Black Knights are Heroes of Justice, correct? If Britannia ceases to be unjust, then how can we fight them? How can the Japanese people support us as we fight them?"
"Knighting Suzaku does not absolve Britannia for invading our country," Todoh said. "Nor does it negate seven years of tyranny." His tone made it clear that Deithard was not included in the first person plural.
"What Deithard means," Zero interrupted, "is that Suzaku gives people hope. It won't help anyone, it won't make anyone's lives easier, but people will return for their fill again and again until they starve."
"Exactly!" Deithard said. "And that is why he should be assassinated as soon as possible."
"Is that the only thing you guys think about?" Mao asked. "This guy's a problem, bang, bang, done? Seriously, has killing people ever solved anything?" The Black Knights looked at him as if to say, "Does this guy really need to be here?" "Oh, right," he said after a moment. "Dang, I wish violence would solve some of my problems."
"I never had anything against the guy personally," Kallen said. It was hard to dislike someone like Suzaku when someone like Mao was right there. "But I do go to school with him, so I am in the best position if we need to have him…" She paused as she searched for the politically correct euphemism. "…murdered."
"I object to this strategy," Todoh said. "Suzaku may be a traitor, but he is still a warrior, and should die as such. He learned to fight by my hand, and it is my responsibility to see that he dies by it."
"With what, your Gekka?" Rakshata scoffed. "Lloyd's brain child won't be matched by anything short of my Guren. But while we're on the subject, if you could bring me back this Lancelot in one piece, I could do things with it."
"Of course, that would rule out assassination," Ohgi said. "We'd have to lure him out in his Knightmare, trap him, and carry off the Lancelot before the rest of the army catches up."
"I remember that at Narita he was pretty fast," Kallen said. "He'd be able to out run his back up if he's not cautious. But ultimately, it's up to you, Zero. What do you think?"
Zero leaned back in his chair and addressed his Knights. "For the time being, we will do nothing. The Japanese people will not thank us for destroying the symbol he has become, and I will not strike until after he has become…tarnished. But when the time comes to kill Kururugi, I will hold the gun. You all have your purposes here. You are warriors, scientists, publicists, but I am the assassin. I killed Clovis when he needed to die, and if Suzaku needs to die, I will kill him as well, but I will decide if and when."
The Black Knights accepted his decision, some grudgingly, some confusedly, but they always did, in the end. They didn't understand that Euphemia's knight was exactly what he needed Suzaku to be right now, but they didn't need to. As the time passed, he kept on expecting some disaster to occur, for Cornelia to escape, perhaps, but nothing did. They continued working as the Black Knights, striking down injustice wherever they could find it, and gradually, the most important thing that seemed to be happening was the upcoming student festival.
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Princess Cornelia li Britannia's knight found himself faced against the greatest challenge of this career. Her Majesty had commanded him to protect her sister, but how do you protect a person from herself? Manipulation was the obvious answer, but Guilford did not know the art. His only art was war.
Princess Cornelia would have opposed the Special Administration Zone had she still been here. She would have been able to talk sense into Euphemia, but Guilford could do little besides watch the disaster happen. Euphemia wanted to create peace, and that was commendable, but it would also give the Elevens an unprecedented amount of freedom and economic prosperity, but if they could wage a war, the Elevens already had too much of the latter and were not ready for the former. And even if her plan worked, the Black Knights would vanish into nothing, and Guilford was not nearly done with them.
Villetta came into his office looking eager. Her art was more akin to the position of lesser nobility that she coveted. "I got a lead on Suzaku Kururugi." He trusted her like a jackal.
"Yes?" Technically it was Kururugi Suzaku; Elevens always put their last name first for some reason, but it wasn't relevant.
"It started in Shinjiku," she began. "I was in my Knightmare, then the next thing I knew, I was with that kid, Suzaku, handing him to the medics who were thanking me for taking care of him. A few days later, Zero shows up in costume to, out of all things, rescue that same kid from being executed. I asked Jeremiah about it afterwards, and he had the same story I did; intelligent, irrational behavior with memory loss."
Guilford nodded. None of this was new, but Zero's apparent connection to Suzaku was one of the reasons he opposed his promotion to Euphemia's personal knight.
"Then there was the event at the hotel at Lake Kawaguchi. I assumed that this was just a chance to introduce his organization, but why go out of his way to offend his most likely allies in favor of people who would try to kill him no matter what he did? Well, then I found out that Suzaku started attending a Britannian high school, and that same night several members of his student council were present at the hotel."
Guilford frowned. The existence of the connection was apparent, but the nature was not. "So you believe that Zero interfered with the hotel incident to save some of Suzaku's…acquaintances?" Guilford doubted that Suzaku, as the only Eleven in a school full of Britannians, would have made many friends very quickly. Of course, this was the same Suzaku who went out of his way to save Jeremiah's life, and he had tried to have the Eleven executed.
"That's what the evidence points to."
"The evidence seems circumstantial, but continue."
"Then there was the Battle of Narita. Suzaku and Princess Cornelia ended up cornered against several of Zero's Knightmares. Cornelia is one of the best Knightmare pilots in the world, and when the Lancelot was released during Shinjuku, Suzaku cut through the stolen Sutherlands like butter. Faced against a handful of Burais, there shouldn't have been a problem, but the princess was torn out of her Knightmare and the Lancelot was wrecked."
"Many people left that battle in defeat, Villetta," he said. He was one of them.
"Of…of course, Guilford. I mean no disrespect. I'm just laying down the facts. Now, you're right; a lot of these events could be coincidental, but then Suzaku was left alive and his expensive, experimental Knightmare was left behind, and later he became Euphemia's knight. It took some digging, but I found out about a meeting with the two of them the night before she announced her decision. The official report was that it was an interview, but it was an interview half an hour away. I spoke with the driver, and he said that before he dropped her off, she seemed nervous, but afterwards, she seemed oddly cheerful. Apparently he thought that they went to a hotel for an intimate assessment of Suzaku's…well, you get the idea."
"Tread carefully, woman," Guilford said coldly. "It is a princess of Britannia you speak of, and Princess Cornelia's one true sister."
"Of course, Guilford," she said quickly. "I'm only relating what I've heard, but consider this: an innocent motive to hide a less innocent one. Most people would assume it stops there, but who's to say it did? What's to say that there isn't something even more sinister underneath?"
"Do you think that Zero was involved?"
"Think? I only think that Zero has a way of controlling people, that he has a connection to Suzaku Kururugi, and right after this meeting, not only did she knight Suzaku, but Euphemia started raving about giving Elevens extra rights in her Special Administration Zone."
Guilford narrowed his eyes. If Zero was controlling Euphemia…all major activities from the Black Knights had ceased since Suzaku became a knight, and why fight when you have the Viceroy in your pocket? "You understand that the Special Administration Zone will become official this afternoon."
Villetta smiled. "Then unless you have any other leads, we had better hurry."
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Lelouch threw his hand in the general direction of the off switch of his alarm clock. Wait a second…it's Saturday. He buried his face in his pillow to block out the sun shining through his window. He was up half the night with the Black Knights too often to waste his weekends being awake. Why had he set his alarm in the first place?
The school festival.
Lelouch forced himself to sit up and get out of bed. If he was late to the festival, Milly would have his hide. No, that wasn't like her. Instead, she'd just start some fanciful story about why he couldn't be there, perhaps involving smuggling, sabotage, and a king's ransom. Lelouch had a knack for attracting rumors, but nothing approached the truth.
He got dressed in his school uniform and put a contact in his left eye. As long as he was wearing the contact, he couldn't use his Geass. According to the previous timeline, he still had more than a week before he lost control of his power, but why risk it? He had a knack for disasters worse than rumors.
He had a surprise waiting for him in the living room. Sayoko grimly faced a pair of intruders, and Guilford and Villetta appeared annoyed that an Eleven stood in their way. Guilford turned to Lelouch.
"You are, I assume, the master of this household?"
Lelouch planted a polite smile on his face. What did they want? He knew both of them better than they knew him. Guilford was loyal, first and foremost, to Cornelia. Whom Zero had captured. He wouldn't be a problem, but Villetta was one of the first people he had used his Geass on, and she had managed to unravel both his power and his identity before. What had changed? Did she still know? No. If they had anything more than a suspicion, they'd bring Knightmares.
"I am," Lelouch said. Lelouch Lamperouge, as far as he could fake it. "Now, I don't mean to be rude, but I was not expecting guests."
Did he know their names? Villetta, definitely not, but Guilford…no, Lelouch Lamperouge decided. He'd know the former viceroy, but not her knight. He thought about asking Sayoko in Japanese what was going on, but a loyal Britannian was expected to be patriotically ignorant. Besides, what did he have to worry about? He was a loyal Britannian. Except that they weren't supposed to know where he lived.
"Government business," Guilford explained. "We would like to ask you a few questions."
A look of pure disgust crossed Sayoko's face.
"Just a few questions?" Lelouch asked skeptically. Politely, but skeptically.
Guilford frowned. "Your…" For a moment, he seemed about to say guard. "…maid, here, was rather antagonistic earlier. It was almost…suspicious."
Antagonistic? If Sayoko had been antagonistic, she'd have gotten out her kunais, and there'd be dead people pinned to the walls. What did she have to be antagonistic about anyway? Lelouch realized that while it was not widely approved, a high ranking officer could search someone's house without permission, but if asked to leave, they would need to produce a warrant. Suspicious? If they had found his Zero costume, people would start dying. Heck, if they had found a handgun in his bedroom they'd ask questions.
"Don't take offense," Lelouch said easily. "That's just her way with people. You get used to it eventually."
What would Lelouch Lamerouge want to hide from people? Definitely not evidence of terrorism. A secret porn stash under his bed? Did normal people actually have those? Of course, maybe they weren't after Zero at all. They could be looking for Lelouch vi Britannia instead.
The doorbell rang. Lelouch looked at Guilford and Villetta, but they weren't expecting anyone else either.
"I'll get that," C.C. said, walking past them. "It's probably for me." She ignored the tension in the room as she greeted a pizza-boy and purchased her breakfast. She set the pizza on the counter and took out a slice before she noticed that everyone was looking at her. "I don't intend on sharing, if that's what you're thinking."
Right then, Lelouch could have strangled her. "And you are…" Villetta prompted.
"C.C.," she responded. "Now, I know that you're Cornelia's knight, Guilford, but I don't know who you are."
"That's it!" Leouch said quickly. "I knew that I saw you somewhere before." He laughed. "Well, this is a surprise. What can I do for you?"
Villetta glared at him, annoyed at being interrupted. "You could answer a few questions for starters. For example, C.C. What is that, your initials?"
"They stand for Cassandra Casanova," Lelouch said quickly. C.C. shot him a murderous glance, one that he'd have to make sure they misunderstood. "Her father doesn't technically know she's here, so this business is confidential, right?" That would explain her look as well as her fake name, if they looked into it.
"The term is classified, but yes," Guilford said. "Although, is there a reason she's in a prison uniform?"
C.C. was seen during the battle of Narita, but neither of them seemed to recognize her. Prison uniform? Nunnally never noticed, and Sayoko didn't ask those kinds of questions, so Lelouch had gotten used to her wearing the same clothes he found her in, and hadn't realized how peculiar it looked. Until now. He threw on a roguish grin that looked a little guilty. "If your girlfriend looked that good in a prison uniform, would you complain?"
Great. He'd just given himself a…there was probably a name for the kind of fetish he'd just ascribed himself, but at least he didn't look suspicious.
"Anyway, what did you want to ask me about?"
"I understand that Princess Euphemia visited the premises three weeks ago. Would you care to describe the events that took place here?"
It was Lelouch vi Britannia they were looking for, then. Probably. He could use his Geass to make Guilford forget, or keep it a secret, but Villetta…exactly how many people would be concerned if she died?
"Sure," he said, still playing dumb. "But I don't understand why you can't ask the princess herself. Wait, you can ask her, can't you? Has something happened to her?"
"Perhaps," Guilford said.
Perhaps? He seemed serious, but either she was okay or she wasn't. And besides, the Black Knights were the biggest threat right now, and they certainly hadn't done anything.
"Well, there's not much to say," Lelouch explained. "She had a few questions about my friend Suzaku." At Suzaku's name, Guilford and Villetta exchanged a look he didn't like. Well, it was too late now. "She was considering taking him on as her knight, and wanted some background info. I guess she liked what she heard."
"Was anyone else here?"
Lelouch shrugged. "My maid was here, and so was Suzaku, but that was it." If he mentioned Nunnally, they'd want to question her too, and she was off limits.
"Would you say that she was behaving…oddly?"
"I wouldn't have anything to compare it to. Also, what do you mean by perhaps nothing happened to her?"
"That's classified."
"Then are you going to tell me what I'm accused of, at least? Because I feel accused right now. Or is that classified too?" Lelouch Lamperouge would be irritated by now, wouldn't he? And he'd be innocent, so he wouldn't need to hide it.
"Do you have any idea what has been going on with Euphemia since she came here? She's become the first Britannian princess ever to promote an Honorary Britannian to Knighthood."
"Then I'll tell Suzaku to be more pathetic than he already is!" he retorted. "Though it worries me that the person in charge of making decisions for the entire settlement isn't fit to make decisions for herself."
"You have no right to speak about the viceroy like that!" Guilford snarled. "We don't even know if she's the same person anymore!"
Bingo. They knew that Zero could control people, they knew that Euphemia wasn't acting as they had hoped she would, and now they came to him, grasping at straws. Was she being controlled? Had she been replaced? They didn't know that he'd done anything. They didn't know if anything had been done. They only feared, and hoped their fears were true.
"Sayoko?" he said. "Please take Nunnally to the festival. She won't want to miss it." He rubbed his eye and took out his contact. "I started wearing contacts a while ago. Never got used to them." No one responded, but Sayoko gave him a worried look as she left. "But anyway, I really don't know what you are concerned about." He'd have to be subtle about this, so Villetta wouldn't recognize what he was doing. "If the viceroy has made some political errors, well, she's young and that's why she's in charge of Area Eleven instead of someplace important. I'm sure that it's nothing to be worried about."
He activated his Geass.
"Trust me."
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"I still think we should have searched his house."
Guilford shook his head as they left. "There's no point. We have no evidence, and I wouldn't have Euphemia demanding why we were harassing people for being associated with her knight."
"Some other time when no one's home, then," Villetta suggested.
"Give it up. We've hit a dead end here. We might as well move on and find another lead."
"You can't be sure of that."
"No, but sometimes you can reason your way forward, and at other times, you just have to go with your gut. Was he lying to us? It's hard to tell, but I trust him."
"You trust him?" Villetta repeated, mostly to herself. She took a backwards glance.
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"Lelouch! Finally! What took you?"
Lelouch shrugged submissively and smiled at the student council president. "Sorry, Milly. My alarm clock didn't go off. I got here as soon as I woke up."
"Your alarm clock?" Milly repeated. "Who needs an alarm clock to wake up at eight in the morning? What were you doing last night?"
"Reading." It didn't matter what he said, really. She wouldn't believe him anyway.
"Oh really?" she said skeptically. "Well, if you say so." She looked around. It was the job of the student council to organize the festival, so it was apparently Milly's job to boss everyone else around. "Let's have you manage the stockroom. Suzaku, take a fifteen minute break."
Suzaku peered at them over a box he was carrying. "Actually, I'm not really tired. I can keep on working if you want me to."
Milly smiled. "You know, I'm really glad you invited him into the student council, Lelouch. He's been here all morning. See, he's like you, only better."
"I'm sure I'll measure up somehow," Lelouch said, unconcerned.
Suzaku followed him into the stockroom and set down his box. He'd been meaning to have a talk with his old friend, but between his knighthood, school, and the preparations for the school festival, there just wasn't any time. And he really didn't want to have the talk in the first place.
"Hey, Lelouch? I've been wondering, why did you get Euphemia to make me her knight?"
"What do you mean? I didn't get her to knight you. That was her own mistake."
"You know what I mean. That night we all went over to your house, you spent half the time you were advertising me."
"If I was lying you should have contradicted me. Besides, do you think that Euphie doesn't have anyone else giving her advice? There are worse people in the world than me, and some of them are in her cabinet."
"That's not the point!" Suzaku protested. "If I only became her knight because I'm friends with her estranged brother, than I shouldn't have gotten knighted at all!"
"Well, I sincerely apologize for landing you your dream job," he said sarcastically. "I promise that I won't do it again."
"It's not that. It's just that I don't like getting something that I don't deserve."
Lelouch laughed coldly. "No one gets what they deserve, Suzaku. Do you deserve getting your gym clothes graffitied with racial slurs? When your people are beaten and killed for being part of the losing team, do they deserve it? And every day, the weak and innocent bleed out their lives and dreams so tyrants can live like pigs. Do they deserve it?"
Lelouch fell into dark moods, sometimes. Sometimes he became so filled with anger and contempt, it was a wonder Suzaku never saw it earlier. "And what about Zero? What does he deserve?
He hesitated. "He…why are you asking me?"
"Are you Zero?"
"Whatever gave you that idea?" He didn't miss a beat.
"I worked it out. Eventually, I asked Euphie, and she got really flustered and denied it emphatically."
"Well, I am," he admitted. "So, what, are you going to arrest me?"
Before he could stop himself, Suzaku punched him in the face, grabbed him by his collar, and slammed him against the wall. "You murderer!"
"Wow, coming from you, that almost means something," Lelouch replied with irritation. "Would you mind putting me down? You're stretching the fabric."
"Do you know how many people are dead because of you? This war was over before you resurrected it!"
"Before the war, there was slaughter." Lelouch adjusted his wrist watch—and electrocuted him.
Suzaku dropped him and fell backwards in shock. "What…what was that?" he panted.
"Watch taser," Lelouch explained. "Rakshata designed it for me. I thought it was very…James Bond, but can you imagine losing the battle for the free world in a common brawl? I mean, I could just stick a bomb to my chest when things get dicey, but I really can do so much better than a stalemate."
"Rakshata?" Suzaku repeated, getting up. "Are you really sure you should be telling me these things?"
He shrugged. "Who are you going to tell? Anyone you tell will want to know how you found out, and you can't turn me in without going behind Euphemia's back, so you're just going to keep your mouth shut and follow orders, because you're a good person like that."
"I'm a good person like that," Suzaku repeated. "Coming from you, that's almost not an insult. But you're right. If I was that kind of guy, I'd have just shot you back in Shinjuku. And followed orders, I guess. Is that irony? But all that aside, why? People have died because of you!"
"And others have lived. One of these days you're going to thank me for saving your life."
"Thank you? After digging up my dead father at Narita? What kind of friend are you anyway?"
"You were supposed to stay home sick that day," Lelouch explained.
He paused. "Wait, that was you?" Suzaku slammed him into the wall again, careful of his watch. "You poisoned me? Do you have any idea what it's like, cleaning throw up from the inside of a Knightmare?"
"You really should put me down, and for the last time, you can put that knife away. If I wanted him assassinated, I'd do it myself."
"What? I don't—" Kallen stood behind him with a knife and her face was a mask of cold fury. Cold, dead, and back for revenge. "But you…you're not…" He dropped Lelouch and backed away from both of them. "I really don't understand any of this."
"Me neither," Kallen responded, putting her knife away. "Every time we've talked about killing you, he's always told us no."
Kallen was one of the Black Knights? The quiet, frail girl that was barely awake half the time? That was even more ridiculous than Lelouch being Zero. "Do I want to know what you voted on?"
"What do you think we are, a democracy?" she scoffed. "I didn't vote."
"Huh."
"I volunteered. By the way, Todoh says hi, and that he's honor bound to kill you."
Suzaku looked at Kallen, then back to Lelouch. "Okay, I'm pretty sure that someone here has gone crazy, and I really hope it's not me."
"By the way, back to people who have lived and died because of me?" Lelouch said. "She's among the former, like you. Only she said thanks."
"You can be so full of yourself when you want to be," she said to Lelouch coldly, but didn't take her eyes off of Suzaku, and certainly didn't put her knife away.
"But—why? I mean, I know you've always had issues, Lelouch, but you didn't have to start a war over it."
"Did you think I was joking when I said I was going to crush Britannia?" he asked. "Let me put it this way. Have you ever read the book, The Time Machine?"
"The, what? No. Isn't that a science fiction story?"
"So?"
"I thought you hated sci-fi."
"What? No I don't. And that's not the point. Anyway, in the book, the human race has diverged into two different species: the Eloi, innocent, happy-go-lucky, childlike fairy people and the Morlocks, who eat them. And then there is the Time Traveller. He's enough like the Eloi to know why they should be protected, and he's enough like the Morlocks to be able to fight back."
"There are good people in the world, Suzaku. Good, innocent people who, in a just world, would be able to live in peace. And this world is going to devour them whole. Can you stop that, Suzaku? Because I can. And I will."
"Because you're the Time Traveller?" Suzaku asked.
Lelouch smiled, as though at a private joke. "Yes. I'm the Time Traveller."
"And what gives you that right?" Suzaku demanded. "Who are you to decide who lives and who dies?"
"I never pretended to understand your sense of honor. I don't expect you to understand my sense of justice."
"If you think that you're allowed to do something just because you can, then you're no different from your father!" Suzaku regretted the words immediately. That was a secret Lelouch trusted him with, and he didn't know how much Kallen knew.
"You have no place to judge me!" he snapped. "You don't even know the ground you're standing on."
"Yes I do."
"Then what's that?" He pointed at the ground. "What is that, right now?"
If he called it Japan, he'd be disloyal to the empire that he had sworn allegiance to. If he called it Area Eleven, then he'd be turning his back on his people that he had joined Britannia to aid. You couldn't be loyal to anyone without betraying everyone else. "That is part of the world we share with are friends as well as our enemies," he said instead. "Political boundaries come secondary."
Just then, the door opened and Milly stepped in. She looked at the three of them, and took in Lelouch's ruffled jacket, Suzaku's naked aggression, and Kallen's apparent desire that Milly wasn't there. "I hope I'm not interrupting anything," she said, with a smile that implied the opposite.
"Not at all," Lelouch said. "What do you need?"
"I need someone to man the graveyard in the haunted house. The last guy passed out from heat exhaustion, so you're going to find someone else, Lelouch. Suzaku, we're going to do the giant pizza thing, so if you want to be the man in the Knightmare, you had better go now. And Kallen? It's just silly to make to guys fight over you when you can handle them both at once."
"Wait, what?"
"See you later!" Milly said, leaving quickly.
"But I wasn't—man, this is embarrassing," Kallen said. "I should try to set the record straight before she starts some sort of rumor about me."
"That's a bad idea," Lelouch said. "The best thing you can do with rumors is just leave them alone."
"But—"
"Look, remember how a few weeks ago, there was a rumor going around about how I was the kingpin of the settlement's white collar crime syndicate?"
"When was this?"
"Exactly."
"Wait, I remember that," Suzaku said, heading out the door. "I thought that it was ridiculous. I probably should rethink a lot of things now."
"So, why did you not want anyone to kill him?" Kallen asked. "I mean, I don't have anything against him personally, but he's a knight, a royal sellout, and he knows too much."
"Then it's his first time violation."
"I'm being serious. I've never been interested in the politics of it all, but Deithard had a point. Ever since Suzaku became the viceroy's golden boy, our support has been going down the toilet. I was the best person for the job, until you opened your mouth."
"Shall I kill him because the people love him? He gives people hope. Must I monopolize that resource?"
"Well, if that hope is false…"
"All hope is false. Only victory is real, and the White Knight has delivered that no more than the Black Knights. If hope has merit by itself, I prefer the free market for the sake of efficiency."
"If you're sure that's a good idea," she said doubtfully.
"I am. Now, if you don't mind, I need to find a volunteer." He hesitated on his way out. "By the way, I wouldn't be able to convince you to work the graveyard, would I? It will probably be hot and humid, like your old Glasgow days."
"You mean the days I'm not nostalgic of?" Kallen responded. "I only do that if I get to kill Brits. And don't even think about making that an order. I only take orders from Zero."
"I am Zero. And I refuse to let you have my existential crisis. Get your own." He opened up the door. "I guess I'll get Nina to do it. She's scary enough."
"What? Nina? What's so scary about her?"
He smiled.
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Suzaku had started tossing the giant pizza dough into the air in front of the cheering crowds when Lelouch's cell phone rang.
"Hey, Euphie," he said. "Do you need something?"
"What? No. I just called to say hi. Can't I call you without needing something from you?"
"Sure, I guess. How's the Special Administration Zone coming? Hold on, aren't you supposed to go live on TV pretty soon to officially declare it?"
"Oh, no, I did that last night. It will just be broadcasted later today."
"So it's not live."
"I was live when they filmed it," Euphie said. "And I'll be alive when they broadcast it."
"But that's not…nevermind."
"But I really think I should have mentioned you," she said. "One of your aliases, at least. I feel like I'm plagiarizing or something."
"Really, Euphie, no one cares. You're probably the only politician in the country who hasn't cheated through high school."
"But I never got through high school."
"No one cares about that either. They never teach you how to run a country, anyway. Also, it wasn't my idea in the first place, so if you gave me the blame, you'd be lying."
"Whose was it then?"
"I'm not required to tell you, so you'll just have to blame yourself."
There was a pause. "Sometimes I wonder how Cornelia would have done things. I don't think she'd have done it like I have."
"No, not many people in the royal family look for the peaceful alternative. That's why I came to you and no one else."
"She's alright, isn't she?"
"I told you she was, didn't I?"
"Yes, but when are you going to let her go? I want to see her again."
"Look, if I let her out today, what do you think she'd do about the Special Administration Zone?"
"I don't think she'd like it, actually. She never listens to me. No, that's not true. She did listen to me during that hotel thing."
"What hotel thing?"
"You know, when the JLF people took a hotel hostage. Cornelia wanted to knock the building down, but I got her to wait for a while."
"That was you? I was wondering why she was holding herself back. But anyway, if she was free, she'd prevent you from opening the Special Administration Zone. But it would work. It will work. Now, if I let go after it works, then she'd have to admit you were right. I'm going to let her go, I promise, but after you prove yourself so well that not even Cornelia will believe that she could have done a better job."
"You could have done a better job."
"This—is not—about—me!" He lowered his voice quickly. "Besides, I'm dead, remember? Even if I came back to life, I doubt the emperor would be too keen to give me a seat of power in his world order."
"Yeah, I know. I'm just glad you didn't kill her," she said. "I still wish you didn't have to kill Clovis."
Their conversations always turned to this, eventually. "Do you remember what he was doing the day I…" He looked around to see if anyone was listening. "The day he died? He made a mess of his office, so to clean it up, he decided to clean out an entire ghetto. Over a thousand people, just because they were there. Now tell me, Euphie, tell me if a man like that deserves to live."
"I don't know! I mean, he shouldn't have killed anyone, but killing him didn't bring anyone back."
Lelouch shook his head. Nothing he said could break through her iron curtain of naiveté. He wasn't sure he wanted to.
"I'm at a school festival," he said, trying to change the subject.
"Yeah, Suzaku told me all about it!" she said. "Is he really going to make a giant pizza with a Knightmare frame?"
Unless the festival turns into a disaster for the third time in a row. "That's the plan. Yesterday's Knightmares are today's cookware. It's an odd sort of progress, but I could get behind it." He laughed softly. "You'd probably like it here, Euphie. They have games, cotton candy, and more ridiculous contests than you could imagine."
"I know! The cotton candy was great!"
"What? You're not—oh, no."
"What do you mean, oh no? That's kind of mean, Lelouch."
"You're not the disaster I need today. No offense."
"Well, Suzaku told me all about this, and it sounded like fun, so I thought, what the heck? I can take the day off."
"If anyone recognizes you, do you think pass yourself off as a comic impersonator?"
"You worry too much! No one will recognize me. I'm incognito."
"Let me guess. You're wearing a big hat with fake glasses."
She paused. "Okay, that was pretty creepy. How'd you do that?"
"I'm in charge of Area Eleven's top terrorist organization. I have to know practically everything."
"No you don't! I bet you just saw me. But I can't see you. Where are you, anyway?"
"Where are you?"
"I thought you knew everything."
"Practically. Do you see the big red tent with blue stripes?"
"The one with the rigged shooting game?"
"What?"
"The game's rigged, I tell you! I spent fifteen dollars on that thing, and I didn't even get the stuffed penguin!"
"Maybe you're just a terrible shot."
"No I'm not! Well, I am, but it's still a rigged game."
"Anyway, you know the place. I'll meet you there in a few minutes."
"Okay, I'll see you there. Bye!"
"I'll see you later."
He hung up. Ever since he became Zero, every school festival had been a disaster. It was sad that he could try to change the world when he couldn't even manage a high school event. This was the third time so far. It was also the first.
"Hey, Lelouch. When's the pizza ready?"
"Hey, C.C. The pizza will be—" He stopped. "You crazy, reckless, idiotic fool of a woman! What are you doing here?"
"I'm being rudely insulted and waiting for pizza. And you?"
"I'm trying to prevent a disaster from occurring."
"So it's the usual for both of us."
"Alright, I'm sorry I yelled at you. In fact, I'm not even surprised anymore. Risking my ambitions, this war, and the world itself never stopped you from a giant pizza before, and I don't see why it should now." She was wearing one of Nunnally's school uniforms. "Though you will stand out dressed like that. No one's going to believe that you're fifteen years old."
"Well, you could just say that I was held back for nine hundred years."
"Is that how old you are?"
"I could be. The calendars keep on changing on me so it's hard to tell. Anyway, you worry too much, Lelouch. I wouldn't risk your ability to fulfill our contract for a giant pizza when I can get all I want with your credit card."
"Yeah? And what happened this morning?"
"That was a test. If there were people looking for me in the government, you could just use your Geass to make them forget they saw me, and I'd just stay home today."
"C.C., one of those two people was one of the first people I used my Geass on!"
She paused for a moment. "You really should tell me about these things beforehand. That could have been very dangerous for you."
"For me? I—never mind. Even if Villetta and Guilford didn't recognize you, Suzaku still will."
"So? He already knows who you are, so I don't see how that matters."
"You knew about that?"
"Of course," C.C. said. "Mao told me a few days ago."
"I wish he told me," Lelouch muttered. "Though I guess he has to get his laughs somewhere."
"Really? I doubt he's close enough to hear. He doesn't do well with crowds."
Lelouch filed away that nugget of information instinctively, though really he couldn't do much against Mao besides keep him in a position where he couldn't kill him and get away with it. He didn't like working with a plan that depended on Mao's predictable insanity, but it had worked out so far and was better than the alternative.
"Well, anyway, just stay out of trouble. As a member of the student council, it is my responsibility to make sure that events like these don't turn into flaming disasters like that last two. How superior Knightmare pilots can consistently screw up a giant pizza is a mystery."
"But the pizza will be fine this time, right?" The concern in her voice was evident.
"We'll see. I'm not strictly in charge of everything, and things like that tend to go up in smoke. But now I have to see a princess and make sure she doesn't do anything foolish." He considered making a comment about how women had no sense of caution—or much else—but he didn't believe in taking foolish risks.
He found Euphie by the striped tent as planned—talking to Rivalz, of all people. Rivalz held a chef's hat under his arm and was wearing a large, fake mustache.
Euphie waved. "Lelouch! What took you so long?"
"Wait, you two know each other?" Rivalz asked. "That is so…typical, actually."
"Hey, Rivalz. Don't you have to be doing that, uh, thing?" He hoped that there was a thing that Rivalz had to be doing.
He checked his watch. "Not until—ah, crap, I have to go. Lelouch, I need to have a word with you really fast."
They walked off a short distance before Rivalz continued. "Who is she?"
"Who's who?"
"That's what I'm asking you! And don't try to say that you two are dating, because I know you're not."
"How do you know?" Lelouch asked. "We could be."
Rivalz hesitated. "I don't know how to say it without insulting you, and I need a favor right now."
Lelouch smirked. "People I respect much more than you have tried to insult me before, and it didn't work."
"Okay, fine. Because she's the perfect woman and you're you," he said bluntly
Lelouch considered that. "I don't think I can argue with either statement."
"So do you think you could set me up with her? I know she doesn't go to school here, but that's it."
"I could, but I can tell you know that you're not her type."
"What makes you say that?"
"Because she's the perfect woman and you're you, maybe?"
Rivalz glared at him. "Okay, I admit I set myself up for that one. That's also true, but she doesn't know that!"
"Also, weren't you interested in Milly? What happened to that?"
"Gee, I don't know, maybe she got engaged? She's not exactly what I'd call available right now."
"Yeah, but to someone called the Earl of Pudding? Is that the sort of name of someone committed to a serious relationship?"
"He's an earl, Lelouch, an earl! I can't compete with a guy with a title!"
"So? Titles don't matter."
"Does Milly know that? I didn't think so. But that's not the point."
"Okay, okay. She is Euphemia, princess of Britannia, and viceroy of Area Eleven. She's also dating Suzaku."
Rivalz gave him a level look. "Are you joking?"
"What do you think?"
"I think that I'm not that politically minded, but I'd recognize my own viceroy if I saw her. Besides, Euphemia doesn't wear glasses."
"Fine," Lelouch said. "Although I was serious about that girl dating Suzaku."
"Dang it! That's just because he's a knight, isn't it? Man, I need to get me some of that rank stuff."
"Well, if I ever take over, I'll be sure to give you a seat of power in my new world order."
"Much obliged. Well, I better get going. They can't do the giant pizza thing without me."
"Is that what the fake mustache is for?"
Rivalz felt his face with horror. "Oh, crap! Did I have this on the whole time? I'm such an idiot."
"Yep." Rivalz glared at him. "As in, yes you did have it on the whole time."
"Sure." He put on his giant, white chef's hat and ran off.
"So, what was that about?" Euphie asked afterwards.
"Student council business," Lelouch explained. "Also, your disguise is more effective than I thought it would be."
"See! I told you! You worry too much. You always do."
Someone has to. "Yeah, you're right," he said instead. "I always stress out too much about these things."
"You'll never have fun at these things like that. Hey, look! They're starting the giant pizza thing! Suzaku's in the Ganymede, right now, right? Wow, they didn't even have Knightmares at my high school!"
"Yeah, here they have all the Knightmares a school needs," he said dryly.
Suzaku tossed the pizza without incident, and for the first time in three school festivals, the pizza dough didn't end up on someone's head. You can't make a pizza larger than a human and expect it to cook right, but that wasn't the point. The point was to have a second chance to do things right, even the little things. Especially the little things. He noticed an origami crane in Euphie's hand.
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Euphemia's announcement of the Special Administration Zone became public later that day, and Zero was one of the only members of the Black Knights who wasn't surprised. Or concerned.
"I find it ironic," Todoh noted at a meeting, "that our greatest threat against the greatest military power in the world should come from a pacifist."
"Todoh's right," Ohgi said. "You once said that you didn't want to assassinate Euphemia because she'd just be replaced by someone worse. I think it's time we reconsider. She's proving to be more of a threat than her sister ever was."
Mao perked up. "Is this the part where we brainstorm murder ideas? I say we get Suzaku to kill her."
Todoh closed his eyes, looking for calm. "Suzaku does not work for us."
Mao shrugged. "So? I bet I could get him to do it. Just give me two weeks, a fluffy red marionette, and a paper clip, and I'll give you a tarnished knight."
Todoh turned to his commander. "Zero, does your questionably sane interrogator really need to be at these meetings?"
"What's questionable about it?" Mao asked. "If you have any questions for my sanity, you can ask them any time you like, such as, what will your people think when we kill a pretty, little girl for being nice to them?"
"As much as I hate to admit it," Deithard said, "he has a point. We'll have to pin the murder on someone else."
Zero finally spoke up. "I will not divide our allies to kill someone who has so effectively divided our foes."
"That's a good idea," Deithard said. "The same moves that have gained Euphemia favor with the Japanese and the Elevens are causing discontent among her own people. If we can make it look like a Britannian faction killed her, then we can prove once and for all that Britannia will never allow the Japanese to live in peace. We can prove that they have no hope but us."
"I do not believe that the Japanese people have fallen so far as to sell themselves for table scraps," Zero said. "I do not believe that they are entirely without pride. Some will accept her offer of peace, I know. Some people have been fighting for so long that they only wish to rest. Some people would rather be safe than free. But those are not the people who have supported us. And if I am wrong, if they throw down their arms as one body and accept the peace that is offered them, there is something that we should ask ourselves: Who is it that we are fighting for?"
"But until then, consider this: Euphemia, by our actions and by chance, has fallen into a position of leadership over Area Eleven, and since then has done more to promote equality than any Britannian official who ever ruled here. So ask yourselves, what was her crime for which she must die?"
It was sad, really, how quickly his men failed to meet his gaze. He didn't even have eyes that they could look at. But they called themselves Heroes of Justice, and, at some degree or another, they believed that.
"So that's it?" Kallen said softly, finally breaking the silence. "We just let them walk over us?"
"No," Zero responded. "We fight until the people no longer need us. And when that day comes, it will not mean that we have given up, but that we have won."
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Kallen confronted Zero in his office after the meeting. She never did that before he took off his mask, but now, well, a man with a face was much less intimidating than a man without one.
"What are you really up to?" she asked.
Zero took off his mask and set it on a table. Did he do that to irritate her, or did the mask just make him uncomfortable? "What, you think that I would go this far, risking the lives of people who trust me and then lie to them? I should be insulted."
Kallen rolled her eyes. "I'm not stupid and I'm not gullible, Zero. I know you didn't try to kill Suzaku because he's your friend and all, but is that why you're not doing anything about the viceroy?"
"It is true that if I killed Euphemia, Suzaku would hunt me down to the ends of the earth, and I would like to discourage that," Zero said. "It is not true that our friendship is what stayed my hand before or now. Suzaku is most useful to me in the position he is in now, and even Euphemia is an anomaly. She thinks with her heart instead of her head, making her hard to predict but easy to manipulate."
"Manipulate? I, for one, haven't seen much manipulating going on," Kallen said. "Unless the whole Special Administration Zone was your idea."
There was a glint in his eye as a slow smile spread across his face. "And what if I were to tell you that it was?"
She paused. "Then I'd have to guess that you have one heck of a plan somewhere, because that sounds really idiotic. Unless…" She narrowed her eyes suspiciously. "You're not getting tired of this war, are you?"
She half expected him to feel insulted, but instead he threw his head back and laughed. "Tired? This war is what gets me up in the morning. If I stopped, what would I have to go back to? A quiet, peaceful life in a world I couldn't change? No, there is no going back. For any of us. I will see this conflict through until our victory or my death."
"So I guess that means you have a clever plan, then."
Lelouch smiled and, instead of answering, pulled out a chess set. "Do you play?"
"I have played, but not much." She remembered Shirley complaining once about how Lelouch would make money playing high stakes chess games, and Rivalz mentioned that he had stopped after finding an interest in some other hobby. It was only later that Kallen realized what that was.
Lelouch set up the pieces into a position midway through a game. "I don't recall the exact scenarios of every game I've ever played, but this was a special case. The last time I was in China, I ran into an old acquaintance that I had never before been able to beat. The end of the game was as you see here."
It looked at first like white was winning, but that was just because they had more pieces. While black had no major pieces besides a queen and a knight, white had two bishops, a knight, and a rook, as well as most of the pawns. The odd thing about the board was that both of the kings were in the middle of it, instead of hiding on the back row like they usually do.
"At this point, my opponent, playing white, moved his king forward, thus." He pushed the white king adjacent to the black one, and waited for Kallen to respond.
"That's not allowed," she said. "You're not allowed to move your king into check."
"True," he conceded. "But there was no one but ourselves to enforce those rules, and part of knowing how to do something right is learning how and when to do it wrong. But you see the dilemma, don't you? If I had taken his king, I would have won the game, but lost the victory. I would have admitted that he was my equal, if not my superior, and that I could do no better than accept whatever was offered me."
"In this game, however, there is much more at risk than a few lifeless pieces of wood. In this game, we cannot afford the luxury of pride. If there is any cheap, dirty, demeaning path to victory, we owe it to the several billion people in the world to take it."
"Hold on," Kallen said. "You're not making sense anymore. You say that you're going to stick with this fight until you win or die. You also say that we should try to win by any means necessary. And yet you refuse to move against Euphemia, even though what she's doing could cripple us."
"You raise a valid point, Kallen," he said. "And you would be right, except that the princess is not our enemy. Our enemy is the emperor. He has so far permitted us, partially because he wants to recapture C.C. for his own agenda and that can only be done subtly, and partially because our forces are beneath contempt. However, he'd expect us to find Euphemia's proposal to be tempting. We get nearly everything we were fighting for, and we never really had a chance at winning anyway. Going along with the Special Administration Zone would not be our victory, but it wouldn't mean a defeat, either." He leaned forward across his desk and looked her straight in the eye. "If you were the most powerful man in the world, would you settle for a stalemate?"
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Lelouch wasn't sure if Kallen was convinced when she left his office, or if she just understood that she had nowhere else to go. He liked to think that most of the Black Knights believed in him and trusted him, but sometimes he wondered if they didn't just follow him to get front row seats to the next big disaster. Well, every victory was a disaster for someone else.
Was he getting tired of this war? That question had bothered him. He realized that he was tired of doing the same thing he had done once before, of climbing up the same ladder he had already climbed. And most of all, he was tired of wasting time on fights that had no meaning. He didn't want to wage a war against his sister and his friend, and he didn't need to. He just needed to provoke the emperor into getting involved.
He'd tell Kallen who his father was, later, if it became relevant. It shouldn't still mean anything after all these years. Lelouch had expected his paternal anger to subside quiet embers, but it never did. Even waging his vendetta against the royal family and killing Clovis twice hadn't helped. On those days when he performed such atrocious acts that he couldn't even tell his band of terrorists about them, his pretty words and high ideals had done nothing to keep his father's face out of the mirror.
And yet, it was because Lelouch knew his father that he could trust his gambit to pay off. The emperor was a man of ideals in a way that Lelouch never was. He believed in strength, that ability and will were reason enough for anything, and had placed his own children on the altar of social Darwinism. How would such a man respond to the peaceful solution? He'd expect his prodigal son to respond first, and prove himself over the dead body of his weaker, simple minded sister, but what if Lelouch took the surprise route and did nothing?
The ninety-eighth emperor wouldn't take it as a joke, or even an insult. He'd take it as the deepest pitch of blasphemy.
And so Zero did nothing, and waited. Sure, some of the Black Knights whispered that Zero had lost his passion, but he had lost nothing but the initiative. And what good was the initiative, really? The initiative was white's strategy, and Zero always played black. White could stay one step ahead by moving first, but in that one move, the player could reveal everything. Did he favor defense or offense? Did he take off pieces one by one or did he go straight for the king? Black moved second, but he made his move knowing his opponent. And knowing was what the game was all about.
The stage is set, the prize hangs in the air, and the clock is ticking.
Your move.
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a/n And that's the end of part one. I bet some of you thought that I was never going to finish this, that this story was going to be one of those that started out great and never ended. "Well, I liked that story at first, until the author got abducted by aliens." Well, now would be the time for those darn aliens, because this is definitely not an ending. It's just the halfway point.
Your Past, My Future will continue in Risks and Sacrifices. I had a lot of conflicting ideas about how to handle the sequel, and by a lot I mean two. Here's an excerpt from the idea I didn't go with.
Kallen made her way through the smoldering ruin that had once been a city. How could this happen? There hadn't been destruction on this scale sense…no. Even the war eight years ago hadn't come close.
"Dead, dead, dead," Mao sang merrily, skipping among the debris. "The sky is painted red. I sing this song 'cause hope is gone and everybody's dead."
"This is serious, Mao!" Kallen snapped. "And you don't know that."
Mao laughed. "Only one person could have survived that, and she doesn't wear a cape."
"I'll believe that Zero's dead when I see the body." She didn't say that there probably wouldn't even be a body left, after that explosion. And the Gawain had no ejection system didn't help either. But Zero was a man of miracles, right? And if there was a time for a miracle, it was now. Mao kept on laughing. "Would you cut that out? We're supposed to be looking for him."
"I am looking for him," Mao replied. "And he's not within five hundred meters if he's alive. And if he's not, he's probably in your lungs."
Just then, a gloved hand broke through the rubble, reaching out toward the sky like a plant. Kallen gasped. She'd recognize that glove anywhere. Holding back the tears, she dug him out of the ground. It was an impossible miracle, but that was who Zero was.
Zero stood in his tattered suit and cape and mask, covered in soot and soil. Mao took emptied his handgun at him.
"No!" Kallen screamed. She fired her own gun at Mao, but it was too late. Both men lay bleeding on the ground.
"You killed her!" Mao coughed. "You killed her! You broke your promise and killed her!"
Why? Kallen stood dazed in between them. She couldn't have come all this way just to watch Zero get killed for no reason. And then, cheating death for the second time that day, Zero sat up.
"What? But—how?"
One of the bullets had shattered his mask, and it fell in chips off his face. There was a tattoo on his forehead that wasn't there before, one just like the one C.C. had.
"Questions, Kallen, questions," he said, standing up despite his wounds. He knelt down next to Mao and closed the corpse's eyes reverently. "I don't have the answers to all of them right now, and for some of them I never will. But right now, only one matters."
"Would you like to form a contract?"
I thought about doing it that way, but I didn't want to kill Mao and coming up with a bunch of Geass powers seemed like a lot of work, but if I finish Risks and Sacrifices, I might go back and do the alternate ending.
I admit that I have never read The Time Machine, but I did see the Wishbone version and I did look it up on Wikipedia. Did I go out of my way to make a pun that I've been planning for several chapters? Yes. Yes I did. If you haven't figured this out yet, I have no shame at all.
I just want to thank all the people who reviewed this story, you know, over four hundred times, not that I'm bragging or anything, I mean, I didn't review my story at all, and if it weren't for you, I'd have gotten bored and done something constructive with my life. But really, you're encouragement means a lot. I'd also like to thank the internet for knowing everything, including the obscure facts that I need to know. And finally, I'd like to thank Michael Jackson, for teaching zombies how to dance.