Suzaku opened his eyes. He is inside the cockpit of the Shinkirō, flying above the surface of the water. Poking through the window are the metal claws of the Guren. Over the radio, Kallen's desperate voice is pleading.
"Zero! Zero! ZERO!"
"Hey. I'm alright."
A gasping sound from the other end. "Good. You've been out for ten minutes, and the Guren is losing power fast. There's an island over there that we can land on, and we can go from there."
"How far are we from the conference building?"
There is a pause. "An hour and fifteen minutes." Another pause. "What's wrong with your voice?"
Suzaku pulls off his helmet and groans. The visor is covered in spiderweb cracks, and the voice modulator has snapped in half. He switches the Shinkirō's microphone to disguise his voice and tries to contact HQ.
"Come in, HQ, come in."
Nunnally's voice comes over the comm. "Are you alright?" Her voice had the sound of barely controlled horror.
"I'm fine. Kallen, how's the Guren?"
"The Guren is operational, but losing power. The Shinkirō cannot fly, and is missing its left arm. We're going to land on an island to get zero aboard the Guren and exchange the energy fillers."
Suzaku tenses. For twelve years, He has been he mortal enemies leader. He's not sure if Kallen could handle being led by him.
"My helmet is damaged. Do you have a spare?"
"Yeah. I packed three extras."
"Three?"
"Never hurts to be prepared."
"Glad to hear it. Alright, Nunnally, tell the U.F.N. that we'll be late."
"OK. Come back safe."
Suzaku let that go. Hopefully Kallen won't realize that Nunnally has stopped being callous all of a sudden.
o-o-o-o
The beach they landed on looked like something from an advertisement for vacations. Or Kamine island. That's not such a nice island.
Suzaku, now with a new helmet, is trying to get the energy filler out of the broken Shinkirō. The metal had bent slightly in the battle, so pulling it out requires precision cuts with a welding torch. Twice, the Zero suit had caught fire due to mishaps.
Kallen meanwhile is repairing the minor damage to the Guren.
"Hey, Zero. Do you know where this reminds me of?"
"No. Did you come here once before?"
"We both did, if this is Kamine. This is where..."
She trailed off. She had forgotten that this Zero can't be the same Zero. Lelouch had been Zero then, and that's when she found out his true identity. Part of her always hoped that Lelouch had replaced Zero during the incident on Kamine, and that Zero was still someone else. Those hopes kept getting weaker and weaker as Zero's motives lined up along with Lelouch's. Then this Zero came and killed Lelouch. Hard to question that this is someone else, possibly even the original-
"Where what?"
Zero's voice brought her out of her reverie. "...where Suzaku and I learned that you were Lelouch."
For the next five minutes, only the sounds of tools could be heard.
"I killed Lelouch. I am not him." Zero is right behind her, causing Kallen to jump a little. He's carrying the energy filler from the Shinkirō.
"I know that, it's just, without knowing who you are, I keep seeing Lelouch under that helmet."
"I can assure you that I am not Lelouch. I also cannot tell you who I am. We've gone over this."
"I know. Thanks for getting the energy fillers out." Her voice lost the small sad quality that always hangs around whenever talking about Lelouch.
The rest of the journey was uneventful. The Guren is a tight fit with two in the cockpit, but Kallen managed to fly without much trouble. She dropped Zero off at the doors to the main hall, then went to find out how the security officers are doing.
Suzaku watched her go with a tinge of despair. He HAD been on that island, standing right in front of her. Shooting at the real Zero.
He entered the hall to find most of the nation's representatives already gathered. As he entered, heads turned, whispers started, and a few of the newer members looked shocked.
Suzaku approached the seat the he was assigned to. It stands directly in the center of the room, on a swivel to allow for viewing the entire room. Two opposite sides of the room held all the leaders and representatives currently gathered. The side Suzaku had entered held the newsstand twenty feet off of the ground. The far side of the room held the desk of honor, where the representative calling the council sits. Today, either Le Xingke or the Empress would be standing there.
Zero sits down in the chair facing away from the media. Soon, the meeting will start, and Millie can get her scoop.
Millie, another person from Suzaku's past.
o-o-o-o
"Ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the 37th U.F.N. council. Today, we are here to discuss a very serious matter. The Empress of China and Le Xingke were almost killed 6 hours ago. No organization is claiming to have done this deed, nor any country supported it. This is the biggest threat to our peace since we have formed the United Federation of Nations." the spokesperson stepped down.
Xingke stands from his chair. "An attempt was made on Her Highness's life six hours ago, as the chairman has said. This attack was recorded by security cameras around the area in which Her Highness was attacked. The assassins were wearing cloaks made of purple and orange, with a red symbol much like a bird across the shoulders and back. They moved very swiftly and silently, catching the guards flat-footed, and if it had not been for several sacrifices by Her Highness's personal guard, she would have left the ranks of the living."
Suzaku stands up and raises a hand to quite those who had begun to speak. "On my way here, I encountered five Knightmares painted in similar fashion. These were of unknown design, and they had at least one pilot skilled enough to temporarily slip past Kallen Kōzuki."
There are gasps from the audience. Kallen is known as the best Knightmare pilot after Suzaku, who is now dead. What they don't realize is that Suzaku isn't dead, but he let his skills fall as he hasn't needed to fight in a while. He sat back down.
The rest of the hall is filled with murmurs, and faintly Millie's voice can be heard reporting to the rest of the world today's news.
"So what do we do about it?" The prince of India asks to the rest of the room. "We have been at peace for a long time now. We shouldn't abandon this peace without good reason."
"Good point. But what if they come after us next?"
"Or maybe they'll start killing civilians."
A collective shudder goes through the room. The past twelve years had seen the little man become much more important in the eyes of the mighty.
"Should we call in the Black Knights to protect us?"
"We could, but that would be a lot of effort that would have to be diverted from other tasks such as the ghetto reformation."
The talks went on for some time.
o-o-o-o
As the UFN argued and talked and argued over how to deal with this new threat, Nunnally sits in the command chair of the floatship. Ever since she had gotten the operation to give her her legs back, people had treated her much more like a Person as opposed to a cripple. Her legs had been melded together with some advanced prosthetic that actually fed off of nutrients as a normal leg would. It's amazing what happens when Rahkshata and "The Earl of Pudding" got together to work on the same project.
Nunnally was initially asked to rule the country as Empress of Brittania. She had resigned after a year because she couldn't handle the tough decisions. She left the rule in Clovis's hands. She was given the choice of leaving the Brittanian Military completely, or acting as the leader of the HQ of Zero. She had chosen the latter, since she had suspected Suzaku even then, and wanted to be close to him in case he needed comforting. It's really hard to pretend you know nothing.
On the main screen a request to open communication had opened. It's a secure line to Pendragon.
"Nunnally? Is that you?"
Cornelia, stately as ever, sits in the Capital city's command center. It's substantially larger than Zero's.
"Yes. Did you get my message?"
"Yes." Cornelia shift in her chair. "Are you sure you want to know about this? I know of several thousand people who would rather this... thing... never existed."
"I'm sure. I need to know all about Geass."
o-o-o-o
Cornelia and Nunnally talked for two hours. Armed with all of the recovered knowledge from the old order, a new theory was developing inside Nunnally's head, one that had been dormant a long time.
It had been a long 11 years...
Click
"Don't move or we shoot."