Note: the cover image, along with the two series that this story was based on, belong to their respective owners.
Things had gone… surprisingly better than expected. Naoto took everything in stride, which was a godsend for a certain prince. In fact he seemed to be extremely patient, and managed to avoid the elephant in the room regarding the two fifteen year olds. Of course, that wasn't hard to do when you were then told that the Martyr Royals weren't actually dead. Not to mention that one of them was currently in a plot to murder his own father for condemning him and his sister to death, along with oppressing the people of both Japan and Britannia. Even Kallen was surprised with how well he was taking it.
"So," Naoto began, "You're Lelouch Vi Britannia, who is supposed to be dead. But you aren't dead, you're actually alive?" Lelouch nodded. "And you're a part of a brotherhood of assassins who want your father dead?" He nodded again. "And they want him dead because he is a tyrant who opposes freedom and peace?" Another nod. "And you want my resistance cell to join your brotherhood because you believe that it's the best way for both groups to get what they want?"
The assassins looked between themselves for a moment before nodding in agreement and facing the Kozuki siblings again. "That about sums it up, yes." Arno said. Naoto sat for a moment, staring at the assassins with a calm and collected stare before finally breaking the silence.
"Assuming I believe all this," Naoto started, "how exactly does killing the Emperor solve our problems?"
This time, Lelouch responded as he leaned forward and rested his elbows on the edge of the old wooden table between them. "My apologies, we seemed to have oversimplified it." Lelouch watched as the man simply looked back at him, keeping the mask of indifference up all the while. "You see," Lelouch continued, "we intend to do far more than kill Charles. We intend to remove all forms of filth from Britannia; corrupt officials, murderous generals, and power drunk nobles that consider themselves demigods."
Naoto sat quietly, deep in thought for a long time before posing his next question.
"So you intend to have us become assassins in order to help you accomplish this?" he asked.
"Yes," Lelouch replied, "we're offering you the chance to do what a normal army never could."
The man looked to each of the other attendees in quiet contemplation for a moment. He looked at Lelouch, then to Arno, then to Connor, then to Suzaku, and then finally to his sister Kallen.
"What do you think?" Naoto said, making her look to the ratty carpet of the floor as she answered him.
"I think that they have a better chance than we do if we turn them down." She muttered.
"Then that settles it," Naoto replied, making Lelouch smile in triumph. "Now, why don't you explain why your friends were asking me about my sister's dating habits your highness?"
The smile was gone in seconds.
(A/N: I fucking hated this scene. I spent two days trying to get it the way I wanted it and I still don't like it.)
"What do you mean we've been recruited!?" Tamaki screeched into Naoto's ear, making him cringe in pain and annoyance. Tamaki was one of his best friends, but he was dumb as bricks at times. He had just finished his little meeting with the brotherhood, and was currently informing the rest of the group about what the assassins wanted. Naoto didn't particularly like the idea of turning himself and the other members over to the brotherhood, but if four assassins had managed to take out fifty trained Britannians then he would be a fool to turn down the offer of being trained to be able to do the same. But unfortunately, that was exactly what Tamaki was: A fool.
"I mean," Naoto replied in a tired sigh, "that the four hooded people that came in here and saved your pathetic ass offered to let us join them." Naoto already knew that Tamaki was going to argue, he always did, but it wasn't going to change a damn thing.
"You can't be serious!" The jackass wailed like a teenage girl, "There's four of them! We should be recruiting them!" Naoto and the others stared at the imbecile for a solid minute before anyone could even hope to respond to what was possibly the dumbest thing any of them had ever heard.
"I don't know why," Naoto muttered, "but I suddenly find myself questioning why we ever became friends." Tamaki simply sneered at the statement. It really didn't matter though, he would forget about the entire thing within days and it would be like it never happened. "Anyone else have a problem with the idea?"
The rest of the group immediately shook their heads in answer. Now for the hard part, Naoto thought.
Naoto hit the ground with a resounding thud for what must have been the umpteenth time in the past hour. It had been less than a week since their induction into the brotherhood as novices and they had immediately been thrown straight into training. At first, it hadn't been that bad. They had been told that the group would return to their normal lives during the day and practice at night. Things were simple enough at first. They would meet at a private gym within the Tokyo settlement at around ten each night and practice a large variety of things. But after a few days of basic exercises that had been orchestrated by masters Arno and Connor, they had been told that they were to be split up into groups based on their physical capabilities. Those who weren't ready for actual skill training were to remain in the gym with Arno while those who had been deemed capable would move onto mobility training with Connor.
So naturally, Naoto had been placed in the mobility class with several of the other more physically prepared novices. Suffice to say, he wasn't doing very well. At the moment, the group was being shown how to scale walls during stealth operations. But it couldn't be that simple could it? Connor didn't think so apparently. The man had enlisted his personal assistant, Brother Suzaku Kururugi, to prepare the exercise. He had prepared a large acrobat matt for novices to fall on if they lost their grip on the climbing obstacles, and had recreated a small urban environment for them to attempt to traverse. Perfectly reasonable right? It would be if he hadn't decided to add in several tennis ball launchers to pelt them with as they attempted to make their way through the course.
Naoto groaned in agony as he rubbed the side of his head where one of the balls had struck him, causing his fall. He understood that it was to prepare them for if they were ever to come under fire, but did Suzaku really have to aim for the head?
"How many fingers am I holding up?" Came the young voice of a certain tennis ball sharpshooter. Naoto turned his head to see Suzaku in his usual yellow hooded trench coat with a concerned frown as he kneeled next to the downed man. The boy was a brutal instructor, which Naoto and the others hated, but he was also always ensuring that none of the novices were critically injured.
"Three," Naoto responded after looking at the boy's hand. He didn't enjoy the Suzaku's aim, but he wasn't going to yell at the kid for doing what Connor told him to. "Where is Connor anyway?" Naoto asked, taking note of the master's absence.
"He was apparently helping Lelouch with his training in Arno's absence," Suzaku responded as he rose to his feet, "but that's not important for you at the moment. What is important is making it to the wall before I get back to the tennis ball launcher."
"Shit."
"Busy as ever," Connor said. Lelouch turned away from the pale monitor that he had been staring at for the past four hours in the darkness of his room at Ashford Academy. He was currently attempting to scrounge up a list of low level targets for the new novices to strike once they reached the proper combat effectiveness. It was what he was best at, technical and tactical know-how. While Arno was still better, mostly through decades of experience, Lelouch was the one who most was known for it.
"Well," Lelouch began, stretching in the cheap computer chair, "I'm tired of waiting for my chance. I've trained for five years for the chance to do what you and Arno always told me about; fight for the people fight for my sister, fight for what I know is right."
Connor looked at the boy, obviously torn between understanding and concern for the prince. But Lelouch really didn't care how much work he did. He didn't care that it was two A.M. and that he would be attending classes tomorrow to keep up his innocent teen persona. All he cared about was getting what needed to be done, done. But naturally, Connor didn't agree.
"You can't survive on five hours of sleep a night," he began in his patronizing tone, "I know that you don't like being the only one who has to worry about early mornings, but it's what Britannian teens do."
"But what about Suzaku?" Lelouch shot back angrily, "he's training the novices and I have to go to school? I have thousands of things thousands of times more important to do."
Connor simply sighed as he leaned on the wooden doorway leading to the small room. They had this conversation thousands of times before, it was constantly a point of conflict between Lelouch and his pseudo-parents. "Suzaku is an eleven," Connor replied tiredly, "therefore he plays the part of a blue collar eleven teen who is expected to join the work force as soon as he can hold a tool properly. Just like how Arno and I play the butlers for you and Nunnally. Speaking of which, I don't think she would take kindly to finding out that you suddenly stopped attending school."
Lelouch began to grind his teeth at his mentor's words. He was right, he wasn't just playing the part so that officials didn't get suspicious. Nunnally had to be oblivious as well. Even with her knowledge of Arno and Connor's pasts, Lelouch refused to allow her to know about what they were doing. He believed that they were doing what was right, but he refused to allow her to become involved. But that didn't mean that Lelouch had to enjoy being idle while the others worked. "I hate playing powerless," Lelouch admitted. It was true; he hated not having everything well within his control. And he was a bit of a perfectionist too. It's why he was triple checking each target before even considering them for assassination, and why he was the one doing it.
"What if we found someone to play the part with you?" Connor asked, raising an eyebrow as he suggested the idea. However, Lelouch was a trained assassin. He could already see the small glint in Connor's eye that he got whenever he was planning something. Normally, it was something he would only see when the man was readying himself for a mission or plotting his infiltration strategy. He had a good idea what the scheme was and while part of him was leaping with joy, the other part was dreading the very hint of what Connor was thinking.
For god's sake, Lelouch thought, his face already turning pink.
Kallen didn't really know how she was supposed to act at the moment. Apparently, masters Arno and Connor had decided that it was in her best interest to learn infiltration by pretending to be a normal student at Ashford Academy with Lelouch. Normally, she wouldn't have a problem learning infiltration techniques like this. However, she had a very… awkward relationship with her "instructor." After all, only half a month ago her brother had brought up several rather embarrassing topics after finding Lelouch and herself in the old office. So it really wasn't a surprise that when the two found themselves being placed in the exact same classes and going the exact same route to school, they had both become extremely uncomfortable.
Well, Kallen was uncomfortable. She really didn't know how Lelouch felt. His persona was the very visage of indifference, and it almost never came down. The times that it did though, were mostly in moments where the two found themselves alone. Whenever such an event would occur, the boy would give her small tips and critiques about how to keep up appearances, much to the girl's relief.
"Are you okay?" Lelouch asked from across the picnic table from her. It was the middle of their lunch period and apparently she had been staring off into space thinking about her current predicament.
"Yeah," she replied, her cheeks becoming slightly red as she looked at the small lunch that she had packed for the day. Why am I the only one uncomfortable about the current situation?
I'm glad I'm not the only one uncomfortable about the current situation, Lelouch thought happily. Being who he was, Lelouch obviously showed no signs of his inner turmoil at the fact that Kallen and him were essentially joined at the hip, and probably would be for a very long time. For the most part, he was doing extremely well at hiding his feelings while trying to aid Kallen with her own acting.
That was probably the main reason why he was able to keep his cool actually. He was focusing mostly on her acting rather than their personal disposition. It wasn't that hard either. She practically wore her heart upon her sleeve; always making extraordinarily easy to read facial expressions, or blushing profusely when he made any comments in the presence of others in order to keep his own character intact.
Nodding at her answer, and also trying to move his thought process away from Kallen before his train of thought could get stuck on the thought of Kallen blushing, he returned to his food.
This is going to be interesting to say the least, Lelouch inwardly sighed.
A/N: Okay, so I know that this chapter may not be my best. But a lot of things lead up to it. I just started school on Monday, and I was also having a lot of trouble with the beginning of this chapter (which I still hate) and wrestling's preseason conditioning is starting soon too. So please understand. Also, just so you all know, this is probably about the speed that I'm going to be posting at from now on: 1-2 weeks to a chapter. Less free time means less writing being completed simple as that. Not to mention that I will be getting my wisdom teeth removed Monday which is a whole other beast entirely. But don't worry, I'll manage somehow. Thanks for reading and please… REVIEW!