I feel like an idiot right now, the reason is simple. Before writing this chapter, I went over my stories, reading up on already posted chapters to get back in the mindset that I had when I was writing them and to properly keep the story coherent and strong. As I did this, I found so…. many damn spelling and grammar errors you wouldn't believe, or you would since you read them. Some I blame Microsoft word as I don't know how girls being misspelled can autocorrect to guys but for the most part, it's all me. I've learned my lesson, an embarrassing lesson but a lesson, nonetheless, not only will I start using Grammarly on ALL my new chapters from now on but I've finally gotten a beta reader to check through my work. Anyway, this latest chapter will cover pretty much the last of the back story before we move onto the first movie itself.
Chapter 8: Nothing is as it seems.
5th October 2019
Kirihara Estate – Outskirts of Tokyo
"Sorry for visiting unannounced you like this." Viktoriya said as she was led into a private tearoom in the portion of the Kirihara estate that had been put aside for the newly married couple.
"Nonsense, it's quite the opposite really, I rarely host friends." Lelouch, who was seated in the chair opposite hers, replied to her statement with a mere wave of the hand. "Would you like some tea?" he offered her as it was approaching the lunch hour.
"I could go for some right now." Viktoriya answered as she smoothed out the folds of her dress. Unlike before, the girl was wearing civilian clothing, that being a green knee-length dress, black tights, and brown boots. Underneath the dress, she wore a white sleeved shirt to help with the chill that was in the air. Hearing her response, Lelouch gestured towards the maid that was in the room with them to leave and go prepare tea for them.
"While we wait, I might as well ask. How was the honeymoon?" Viktoriya asked him as he had only returned a couple days ago from his honeymoon, one that the media had caught wind of when the two were sighted in Gengenbach, Germany.
"Lovely. I doubt that I ever had that much fun with a member of the female sex before." Lelouch replied with a soft smile as he found that he had great fun on the trip, even with the press being annoying as usual, that didn't dampen his mood.
"I didn't think you the type to enjoy such activities so much." Viktoriya stated with a little smirk, taking his statement out of context to see how he'll react.
"Don't try and make it dirty, you know what I mean." Lelouch responded to her without pause. "Speaking of family, how has yours been doing as of late?" He asked her as it had been some time since they last spoke about her own family.
"They are doing well. My younger brother is starting high school next year." Viktoriya told him a smile, happy that her kid brother was finally starting to progress again, he was 16 but he had been held back in junior high for a couple years now.
"He was the one held back, right?" Lelouch asked as if he recalled correctly, she had told him that her little brother had difficulty learning and had been struggling in school for some time now. It got so bad that he stopped going and needed therapy to deal with it.
"Yes, but we finally managed to get a tutor for him. He's been doing a lot better now." She responded as she had gotten the news a couple of days ago. She would have received it earlier, but her family had been quite busy these past couple of months.
"There is no need to explain yourself. He has a learning problem, but I won't judge him for that, especially since I hear that he has never let it get him down." Lelouch answered as he had no qualms with people that were different, the lad was hard working and from what Viktoriya had told him, a good boy so he was only happy for him.
"Yeah, he has loved the outdoors ever since he was little. Sometimes he jokes that he feels more at home out in the woods than in his bedroom." Viktoriya laughed as she could remember all the times they went camping and how happy he seemed to be. He wasn't the best camper of the group, but he certainly was the most outdoorsy of them. He loved everyone from hikes, fishing, swimming in rivers and lakes to rock climbing. The one time they had seen a black bear, he was the only one that saw it as an exciting experience, seeing nature in its element he said.
"He has his bedroom now? I thought he shared with your other two siblings." Lelouch asked as he recalled that his partner and friend came from a rather poor family, being a 9-member household didn't help things either. It was at that same time that they both heard a knock on the door.
"Kirihara-sama, I have brought the tea as requested." The maid announced herself respectfully through the closed door. Something that Viktoriya hadn't been surprised about was the fact that the maids and all the other staff she had seen had been speaking in Japanese.
"You may enter." Lelouch responded in their native tongue as he had been the whole time whenever had was speaking with the staff. The door was quietly opened, and the maid entered carrying a tea set on a glass and steel tray. The set included a teapot that was still letting out steam, two teacups and their little saucers, a container of sugar, and the assorted spoons.
"My family moved houses about a month ago. Thanks to my salary and my father's promotion, we can afford a larger house." Viktoriya informed him as the maid set up everything on the coffee table between the two of them before moving back to the side where she had been standing in the first place.
"That's great, I hope that you're enjoying the new home?" Lelouch told with as he picked up the pot and poured himself some tear before doing the same for Viktoriya, she asked for no sugar so he didn't add any to hers but did put two teaspoons worth in his own.
"Yes, it's in a better neighborhood than before. My brother's high school is actually in the area." Viktoriya added in as their new neighborhood was in a better part of St. Petersburg. As she told him this, he handed her a cup of tea which was still very much hot. "Thank you."
"Then allow me to say that I'm happy for the good fortune your family seems to be enjoying and I hope it lasts as long as possible." Lelouch said as he took a sip of his tea and let the hot liquid travel down his throat and soothe him. Taizo was right, this brand of tea was relaxing.
"Thank you for that but that isn't the reason why I came over today." Viktoriya said as she placed her tea down, getting to the heart of the reason she had come to see him so soon after he got back.
"I thought that to be the case, you seemed quite startled at the door." Lelouch stated as he figured that it was serious when she met her at the door. "So please, why don't you let out whatever is it you have to say?" he finished as he leaned into his seat.
"It's…. kind of a private matter." Viktoriya said as she eyed the maid in the corner. She didn't feel comfortable speaking about what she had come to talk about with untrustworthy witnesses. Not when what she had to say was both crazy and groundbreaking.
"I see…." Lelouch caught her gaze and where she looked at before making a decision. "Leave us, and tell the rest that they are to not come near here unless it is important, am I understood?" He ordered the maid who bowed to his request.
"Yes, Kirihara-sama." The maid replied as she quietly left the room and closed the door behind her.
"They refer to you by your last name." Viktoriya noted as she hadn't said anything before, but she was intrigued by it seeing how he legally had two different last names.
"That is something all Asian cultures do; besides, it helps to distance myself from most of my family." Lelouch explained to her before he gestured for her to say what she wanted now that they were alone.
"That's what I came here to talk about. It's about your family." Viktoriya started, looking away from him as she knew this was a sensitive subject, to say the least.
"Have they tried to give you trouble?" Lelouch asked as his eyes narrowed. He didn't think Cornelia would do anything but the rest of those parasites he, unfortunately, called siblings were a different story.
"No, No! I haven't had any interactions with them but it's not me I'm concerned about. It's, it's about your mother." Viktoriya was quick to shoot that down as she knew better than anyone that he held his siblings in great contempt.
"My mother?" Lelouch asked her, this was…. surprising to say the least.
"Yes, you know we as jaeger pilots venture each other's minds every time to drift together?" She asked him so that he would understand where she was coming from with this.
"That is basic knowledge among our ranks, I already know you've seen my memories of her. You don't have to say anything." Lelouch replied as he couldn't count the number of times he had ventured into her head. There were little secrets between the two of them because of that.
"And I know that, but the issue is your memories themselves," Viktoriya started as she tried to find the right word to say about the issue. "There is an issue with them but not the kind of issue you would think of."
"Oh?" Lelouch asked as this was something he didn't think about, but as she would be viewing his memories from a 3rd person point of view, she could offer up information that would have missed.
"That night, you…. you have two separate accounts of that night in your head." Viktoriya told him, halting any other thoughts he might have had as he heard that and leaned forward.
"Two separate accounts? How is that possible? I only recall the one." Lelouch asked as when he thought back to that night, he only had the one painful memory and nothing else. Did he unknowingly repress memories?
"That's right. At first, I thought it was only trauma, you know. The brain masks and suppresses information deemed harmful all the time so at first, I didn't think too much into it." Viktoriya told him what she had made of it at first when she saw this.
"At first? Meaning that you started looking into it and I assume you found something odd." Lelouch asked though it was more of a statement as his mind worked a mile a minute to try and figure out what she was trying to say as she relayed information to him. 'Strange, I don't think I suppressed any memories of that night, if I did then why remember all the details I wish never happened?' That was something odd as repressed memories were always the bad ones, never the fake good ones.
"I did, and what I found out was…. disturbing to say the least. As I said, you have two separate accounts of that night, but while you recall the one, there is another. One that is very different to that night." Viktoriya confirmed his suspicions as she looked down at her tea, no longer thirsty.
"Does my mother die in that one?" Lelouch asked her, getting straight to the point as he felt his hands close into a fist.
"I'm not sure, but what the second, repressed memory is may sound very confusing. In it, you're fast asleep in your room before you're woken up by Emperor Charles." Viktoriya told him, grabbing his attention even more now as the presence of the emperor was a big thing.
"The emperor? What the hell was he even doing there? He didn't attend the party, nor did he live with us, he stayed in the imperial palace itself." Lelouch was quirk to question that as from what he recalled, he had only seen the emperor when he had that fateful audience with him to demand as to why the investigation into his mother's death had been canceled.
"That's not the strangest thing in the memory. When the emperor wakes you up, he has this strange glowing red symbol in his eyes, they looked like birds in flight. I saw how you felt confused but also, drawn to those eyes, gazing at them as if under some kind of spell." Viktoriya told him as she looked as uncomfortable as he looked confused and irritated at what sounded like nonsense. "You didn't look away from them, even as the man said something that still gives me chills to this day." She said as she felt a chill work its way down her spine, she hugged herself to ward off this cold feeling, but it wasn't very effective.
"What did he say?" Lelouch asked, keeping himself from blowing up in rage as though this sounded ridiculous, she was his partner and one of his few friends, she wouldn't be saying all this unless she had a damn good reason to do so, so he'll listen till the end.
"He said and I quote: 'I, Charles zi Britannia, engraves into you false memories of what happened tonight. You shall forget what happened this night and remember what I command you to.'" She quoted to him. The atmosphere of the conversation dropped even colder at that as that one sentence made things a lot more complicated than they used to be. Lelouch for his part looked her in the eye and that while she was just as confused as he was, she still believed that she was speaking the truth.
"That, that's impossible. There is no way that he could even do this, where would he even acquire such a power? Magic is fantasy, nothing more." He said to deny this as if true, it would open up so many possibilities that he couldn't even fathom them right now, however, there was a part of him that considered it, after all. Kaiju were aliens from another dimension that seemed top only want to kill and destroy. If you told anyone this 10 years ago, you would be ignored, laughed at, or called crazy, but now…. magic didn't seem as crazy as stretch all considering.
"I thought so to, for a while I didn't want to believe it either. It made no sense as to what he would make you forget the truth, whatever it is but then I started looking into it. Going over what memories I've seen of your mother and that night over and over." Viktoriya stated as she had spent a long time thinking about what she had seen in his head and it unsettled her.
"Go on." Lelouch egged her on as he took a calming breath and relaxed his fist.
"The 'false memories' as he refers to them as clash with other, older memories that you have. From what you recall, your mother hated social gathering with the nobility almost as much as she hated them. She always wished to avoid them whenever possible, so why host a party? One where, from what you recall, your favored siblings were absent?" She asked him, the first part he knew as his mother was despised by the nobles, but the second part…. he hadn't ever considered that part.
"Now that you say it, I…I don't recall them ever being there. No Schneizel, Euphemia, Clovis. None of them were present. Not even the Ashford were there." Lelouch thought about it as he when he thought about it, no-one he knew outside his mother and little sister were there. He then thought back to a conversation he had with Cornelia shortly before he left for his honeymoon, where he questioned her on her part in his mother's death and found out something shocking. "Also, when I spoke with Cornelia the other day, she told me something disturbing."
"What?" Viktoriya asked him, wondering what he had learned about that night.
"That night, someone ordered my mother's guard to be withdrawn." Lelouch revealed to her, seeing that she was as shocked as he was when he got the news as it made no sense. "Cornelia swore that the order came from my mother personally. She was against it, but she convinced her to obey, which meant that the security was at its lowest that night." He finished as it made even less sense for her to throw a party and not have proper security measures. She knew enough about how Pendragon worked to never even think about such a thing.
"That would explain why Cornelia, as the captain of her royal guard, was absent. All it does in add evidence to a cover-up since there is no way she would host a party, with the security so low when she knew she wasn't well-liked by the majority of the noble court." Viktoriya told him as they could both agree that that was extremely odd but Lelouch wasn't convinced yet, there had to be more to this.
"Anything else to prove that my and every else's memories of events are false? This may be true but it's all circumstantial at best. Even if I tell Cornelia of this, she will need more before she has used her resources to look into it." Lelouch told her as Cornelia, being entrenched in Britannia and still have an influence on the military, would need more than speculation, especially when she has already been skeptical about this for years.
"The bullets." Viktoriya started before she took her cup in her hand and used the warmth coming off the porcelain into her hands to ground herself. "Or more accurately, the bullet trajectories don't match up with the story as you and so many others recall." She said before she started to explain when she meant by that.
"From your memories, you recall four out of the twelve windows for that hall were shot to pieces by the assassins, right?" She asked him to get his confirmation on it.
"I'll have to check in with Cornelia but yeah, that's how I remember it." Lelouch replied as she had got this from his head so his best bet was to speak to Cornelia about this and see if she could verify that.
"If that was the case, why wasn't the entire staircase riddled with bullets, sides included? If the shots were coming from the flanks of the hall, aiming at the stairs from an angle, shouldn't there have been more damage? Collateral from the people who you recall standing on the way of those supposed bullets?" She asked him, making him realize that in the corner of his eye that night, as he stared down at his mother's corpse in horror, he noted that there were people down the stairs, they should have been hit or at the very least injured but he heard nothing of the sort. "All the bullet holes, all the damage they caused, seemed to have come from directly in front of the steps. Trajectories that would have been impossible, unless the shooter was right in front of them, meaning they would have had to have been in the hall itself." She explained to him as she had looked at that single memory for a while now, turning over and over in her head and she could see no other way unless those bullets could change course mid-flight.
"There is no way, I don't remember anything even armed in the hall, there was no way someone could pull out a weapons fire it and kill my mother and get away with it like that. It should have been suicide." Lelouch immediately denied that. Not a single person there could have done it, even if the shots were off, he was confident he would have remembered if the shooters…. oh God.
"That's the most likely scenario I'm afraid. That calls into question you and everyone else's recounts of that night." Viktoriya saw that he saw where she was going with this as if the emperor did indeed have the power to alter memories, then his memories of that night were all question, especially now that she had pocked holes in the 'false' memory itself.
"False memories." Lelouch breathed out as he placed his hand into his hands, his hands covering his face as he leaned down as he processed this. "Hold on, you said shooter, as in singular." He asked as he looked up, picking up that she didn't use the plural.
"That's right, but I'll explain this with this first thing, the damage done couldn't possibly have been done by modern automatic weapons-both to the building….and Nunnally." Viktoriya gulped down a big one as she wished she didn't have to bring this up, but it was necessary.
"Nunnally." Lelouch asked as his mind flashed to his loving, little sister and how she was crippled and blinded in that attack. If that entire night was suspect, did that mean she wasn't injured that day?
"Her wounds….as much as it hurts me to say this, no matter how much I wish this to be false, they don't make any sense. From your memories, Nunnally seemed to have been with your mother who, at the first hint of trouble, shielded her with her own body which though saved her life, still left her crippled due to the injuries from the bullets and their fragments all but destroying the nerves and muscles in her legs. Her blinding being the result of physiological trauma from the whole event." Viktoriya summarized what was known on the night, both from speaking with Nunnally and what she picked up from her partner in conversation or training.
"The doctors worked tirelessly to try and save them. She's only recently made real progress in using them again. How could that be fake?" Lelouch asked as he had seen the blood, read the reports. He saw how his sister needed years of therapy and additional medical intervention just so that she could start walking with crutches. That couldn't be fake.
"It isn't, but her wounds don't match up to the incident. You and I both studied ballistics and have used and seen the effects of numerous types of firearms, as was our training, right?" Viktoriya asked him, getting a quick nod form him from which she continued. "Then by applying that knowledge to this, Nunnally shouldn't have survived. Your mother picked up Nunnally and held her to her chest to defend her if that was the case, why wasn't she torn apart by the same bullets that killed your mother?" She asked him a question that he had refused to think about out of an instinct for years now but as much as he hated it, he could see where she was coming from. Nunnally should be dead right now.
"Empress Marianne wasn't' wearing any kind of body armor, the average assault rifle caliber rounds used today would have had no issue going through her mother body and striking her sister. As a former knight of round, she would have known this and instead tried to push Nunnally out of the line of fire, not bring her into it." Viktoriya added in as she couldn't see any instance where his mother, a soldier, would bring her child into harm's way like that.
"The probability of your sister not being killed in that same firestorm that took your mother's life; they are extremely low. She would have had better chances of simply not being close to your mother when the shooting started." She finished as she took a deep breath because from what she saw in his older memories she really shouldn't have been there.
"I have a feeling that only gets worse, doesn't it?" Lelouch asked her, feelings of anger and sorrow building in him as he felt the urge to just laugh at it all.
"I wish it didn't, but I can't keep this from you, you deserve to know." Viktoriya told him as she watched with eyes filled with sympathy for him as this was something no-one should have to consider, to think about. "I spoke with Nunnally some time ago and learned more about her injuries from what the sweet girl's doctors told her, going over what I know about bullet ballistics and double-checking it, Nunnally wounds look nothing like the wounds of a person hit by 2nd hand fire. They were much closer to 1st hand fire. In an impossible instance, every one of those bullets hit important ligaments or muscles but actual bone was pretty much intact with only 2 rounds nicking them." She told him the straight facts, telling him enough for him to realize the same thing she did. Nunnally was shot separately from her mother.
"Lelouch, she was shot 13 times in that attack, all of which hit her legs. There is no way that random fire didn't hit her bones." She said as he could now look at that fact as less a miracle and more suspicious as the odds of that happening were so low it wasn't even funny. Which only leads to one possibility.
"Someone planned it." Lelouch said as his eyes harden and his anger soared to heights he hadn't reached in years, even higher than that as he now had reason to suspect that someone had his sister shot just to help support this story.
"That's the conclusion I came to myself. Another thing that stuck out was the caliber of rounds. They didn't match the ones that killed your mother, they were much smaller, the size used in most pistols. Whoever planned this, they purposely aimed for her legs, missing her bones so that the chance that would walk again wasn't zero, but would still be crippling." Viktoriya told him of that twisted piece of evidence of mercy. The sick bastard that did this wanted to support the narrative they were building but they didn't want her to be crippled for life. "That same person used smaller rounds as to possible limit the damage done to her as we both know assault rifle rounds would have torn her legs to ribbons. She would have needed one or both amputated at worst and she still wouldn't be able to walk using them at best."
"And they only way they could do that," Lelouch said as he felt the need to say it out loud, to voice their thoughts. "Is if she was shot at a different time, at a different place." Realizing this and recalling how it was his father that tampered with his memories in the first place, he now knew that the old bastard had a role in this. At the very least, he knew the truth and chose, CHOSE to cover it up and do nothing while his child, an innocent child was shot and crippled!
"That son of a bitch, I'm going to rip out his throat if I ever see him again." Lelouch swore as he left his hatred for his father, which hadn't gone down ever since he was banished and left for dead, rise even higher as he was now sure that if he had the chance, he would try and murder that old fool. "Tell me everything you saw in my memories, how much of that night was false." He asked her, keeping the peace of mind to look away from her lest she see the ugly hatred brewing on his face as he had to notable work to calm himself down.
"The entire night. From what you recall, there was no party that night, Nunnally wasn't even supposed to be there, she was supposed to be having a sleepover with Princess Euphemia." Viktoriya told him that heartbreaking piece of info as they both felt both righteous anger at the perpetrators of this crime and sorrow at knowing that the sweet, little girl wasn't even home when she was 'shot'. "Meaning that that night was a cover-up, ones that the Emperor, has a large part in seeing how he was the one that altered the memories of everyone involved."
"But he didn't think of everything, leaving gaps and inconsistences and as much as I want to believe it, I know for a fact he didn't gain the throne and keep it for this long by being an idiot. This cover-up was a rushed group. One he didn't plan for." Lelouch said as he thought about all this. If this was planned, then his memories would have been altered in such a way that there would have been no gaps or inconsistencies.
"What are you thinking? Do you have a clue of what is going one right now?" Viktoriya asked him as she knew he was the smarter of the two and would have better chances of figuring this out.
"I have a theory, he had to cover this up." Lelouch said as he emphasized on the 'had to' part, implying that he didn't have much choice in it.
"According to Cornelia, my mother personally had her security pulled that night. That meant that whatever was supposed to go down, she felt safe enough to not need them," Lelouch said, though he would have to take that piece of evidence with a grain of salt as if his memories were compromised, then her were as well and seeing how she didn't say anything about these flaws, they were. Still, there was no way Charles would put such a memory in her head since it would only make things seem more suspect then he would have liked. "Or more accurately, she was keeping the number of witnesses down."
"Witnesses? For what?" Viktoriya asked him, his mother didn't have many allies and the ones she did were known to be her allies. If she wished to talk with them, there were numerous ways they could have gone about it.
"A secret meeting. They happen all the time in Pendragon and politics in general. She wasn't a fan of the nobility and they hated her, but what if she was meeting with one of them and couldn't afford to be seen. It would have to have been someone she trusted enough to not have security or...someone close to my father." Lelouch explained as his mind worked at maximum performance speed to make connections and solve mental puzzles surrounding this mess. His mother would have never met with someone she didn't trust….unless that person was endorsed to her by someone she already did and seeing how the Ashford had nothing to gain, there was only one person that could have spoken on how meeting with this mysterious person with little to no security was a good idea.
"Then that would mean that the meeting, was a trap from the beginning?" Viktoriya asked him as she could see whoever this person was, they most likely had planned to kill his mother from the beginning.
"That would be a logical conclusion, but we don't have enough evidence and by now, any hard evidence would have been destroyed or otherwise lost." Lelouch thought as he was sure that this old home, the Aries villa, must have been repaired by now so the crime scene was gone.
"But why would the emperor help to cover it up? Wouldn't he want to punish the person that killed his favored consort? Make an example of them?" Viktoriya asked as from her impression on the man, he believed himself to be the strongest, why wouldn't he make an example against someone for attacking his family? The fact that the culprits hadn't been caught or publicly caught was a stain against his power as it was a clear sign of his weakness if he couldn't even protect his favorite consort.
"Normally, yes. The bastard was more than willing to toss Nunnally and me to another country because I dared to speak against him, but I doubt he had much choice, not if he wanted to keep in hold on power." Lelouch said as he recalled everything he had learned from studying political leaders of the past, and from what he had observed with how Taizo and other major players in the Japanese industry had a lot of sway over the diet and even the emperor. So in Britannia, a country where national policy encouraged competition and violence in exchange for power, he already figured that though his father was a powerful man, he had forces at play in the shadows keeping the country from tearing itself apart and more importantly, keeping him in power.
"You suspect that the culprit is…" Viktoriya started as she could see where he was going with this.
"Someone of great influence in either the state, military, nobility, industry or some combination of any of these four. Someone he can't afford to lose the support of lest he lose the throne or worse, the country falls into another bloody civil war." Lelouch finished as that was the most logical reason as to why he would brush aside the death one his favored consort and tamper with potential witnesses and evidence.
"But then the question remains," Viktoriya started to ask the question that none of them could answer. "Who is that powerful in Pendragon that Charles can't afford to lose their support?" That was the million-pound question. Very little was known about the inner workings of the Britannian government even among the commoners of the country, having been in Japan for over a decade now, Lelouch knew that any information he could recall was not only suspect but also likely to be outdated and useless to them.
'The knights of Round? No, none of them are connected enough and Bismarck is the one with the most sway and he would never commit such a deed, he respected my mother far too much.' That was the easiest to shoot down, knights of round were loyal to the emperor alone and had more authority than even the many princes and princesses that Charles had fathered. If one was even suspected of defaulting in that loyalty to the crown, they would have been executed for it.
'High ranking nobles perhaps? A possibility but only if they came together as a group, as it stands now, they hate one another and are constantly trying to get a leg up on the other.' That one would be a short term thing as even during the emblem of blood period, clicks of nobles that had banded together to place one of their sons on the throne fell apart quickly after they couldn't decide which of their houses would have the 'honor' of becoming the new imperial family. Even alliances via marriages were loose at best.
'The Prime Minister? Also, a chance but he died in a car accident around 7 months after the attack, Schneizel couldn't be the one since he stood to and gained nothing from it.' That one held the most substance but was equally flawed in that with the old PM dead, why didn't Charles try to restart the investigation now that that powerful force was gone? Schneizel maybe, he's a weasel but he wouldn't have dared such a thing. It was clear that he gained nothing from the attack and lost him, he knew this as even as a child, he knew that his elder brother was grooming him into an ally. For what he did not know as even back then Schneizel never showed any real interest in the throne.
He needed more information.
"Master?" One of the maids on standby asked after Lelouch pressed the call button on the coffee table.
"Contact Lord Kirihara, I need to speak with him." Lelouch told her, he needed to arrange some things and arrange them quickly, he was due to ship out in only four days.
"At once, Kirihara-sama." The maid replied as they ended the call, most likely heading off to do as instructed.
"What is your plan? We don't have the full picture here." Viktoriya asked him as she could tell that whatever the hell was going on, was a very deep and very dangerous thing.
"I know, that's why I'm going to try and get as much information as I can." Lelouch said as he pulled out his phone but recalled that he didn't get service to Britannian. Dammit, he'll have to use the house phone.
"How?" Viktoriya asked him as they both got up and made their way towards the door.
"We'll see if we can't gain more knowledge from the minds of my siblings." Lelouch revealed as he needed to get into contact with Cornelia and Euphemia. They could travel to Japan without scrutiny. Clovis was a possibility but he didn't know if he was available right now and Schneizel couldn't just drop his duties as Prime Minister. "I'll just to contact Cornelia and Euphemia and see if they can't travel to Kyoto. Hopefully, the jaeger school there will let us use their simulation room as a way for you to probe our memories and see if you can't find out more." He finished as he knew someone at the Kyoto Jaeger school, he should be able to arrange for them to use their jaeger pilot simulation facility for them to probe their minds.
"You want me to do it?" Viktoriya came to a stop as he didn't know what the make of this. Seeing this, Lelouch turned around and placed both hands on her shoulders, reminding her that he was the taller of the two now.
"Vik," Lelouch said, using her nickname as she looked into his eyes and saw his intent. "You the one that discovered this, I'm not sure if I can do it since my memories have been altered. You're the only one who will have an unbiased view on things. Will you help me?" He asked her, letting her the honest joy at finally having a real chance of finding out what happened that night, of finding out who killed his mother all those years ago.
.
.
.
"I wouldn't be much a partner if I say now, will I?" Viktoriya said after what felt like hours of her thinking it over.
"That's your choice, I won't force you into it." Lelouch reminded her as he wouldn't have wanted her to feel like she didn't have a choice. As much as he wanted this, he refused to force her into helping her. It needed to be her choice.
"No, I need to do this. We need to bring this to light. Charles and his shadow backer have to pay for this." Viktoriya said as she shook her head at him before matching his gaze of determination with one of her own.
"Kirihara-sama. The master has been informed. He awaits you in the main tearoom." A maid said though the door from the other side. "Shall I inform him you're on your way?"
"Do so, I'll be there soon." Lelouch said as he opened the door and walked out, a man with a goal in mind as Viktoriya followed close behind him.
"Viktoriya, for now. I would advise you to keep this information to yourself. If they had enough sway to kill and get away with it in the heart of Pendragon," He told her, only for her to catch on quick as to what he entailed.
"Then they could have people abroad. I understand." She responded as they both knew that this unseen enemy didn't last thing long in the shadows by being stupid. If they thought they were on to them, being members of the PPDC wouldn't protect them…. or their families.
5th October 2019
Pendragon – Pendragon Thought Elevator
"Any progress?" Charles as his elder brother as the two stood on the platform that formed the part of their currently unfinished sword of Akasha. It had been some time since their last talk as with this global war against monsters from another dimension, he had to be seen more in public and take a more active role in governance lest his enemies(Schneizel) try to pull anything.
"The three thought elevators under our control are acting normally, no change." The child immortal known as V.V. replied to his younger brother as the two stood side by side, but it was clear that he was not happy. "The real issue is that my spies have confirmed the locations of five others, all of which are not under our control." He reported as he was pissed that their plans had been stalled for years now, if things had progressed as planned, they would have been able to commence things last year.
"The one in Japan, one in London, another in the middle of Russia, another near the Caspian Sea and the last one in French-controlled colonies in Africa." Charles rattled out as he had read the reports that the Geass Order's spies had compiled.
"Yes, and without those five-under our sway and CC still missing, our plans have ground to a halt." V.V noted as that was another snag in their plans, the fact they C.C had fallen off the radar shortly after Marianne had died. He was confident at first she was just on one of those dumb escapades of hers but when she didn't show up or make contact with them 6 months, he knew she had vanished and too much time had passed for him to get any solid leads. He was lucky when she was sighted in Japan the day of the invasion but before he could order her capture, kaiju become a problem that drew his attention away.
"You haven't been able to locate her?" Charles asked, even if he knew where she was, he wasn't at liberty to tell his brother this, not after what he did.
"No, as far as we know. She fell off the face of the earth, but my men will keep looking." V.V, none the wiser, replied as he still had quite the sizable portion of the order's field agents on the look-out for her. "There are only so many hiding spots she could be in."
"Even then, we can't begin any of our plans until the present threat has been dealt with. And so far, this so-called, Pan Pacific Defense Corps hasn't had any luck in closing the breach." Charles said as he wasn't impressed with them but then again, he was a man with impossible standards to begin with. As far as he was concerned, this problem should have been solved years ago but according to the latest reports, not even a 4-ton Sakuradite bomb was able to collapse the breach.
"Should we lead our aid?" V.V asked as though he was the immortal of the two, he wasn't the most patient and he itched to get their plans back on track. Even if they would need serious revision now that most world powers had Knightmare programs of their own, none had any new ideas as many of the genius behind the Knightmare project itself had been drafted into the PPDC, leaving most Knightmares still just being Glasgows in performance. Not even Britannia had the funds to produce anything better other than the Sunderland model which was still in developing/testing.
"And have to explain hour knowledge? That would do more harm than good." Charles shot that down quickly as it would be very difficult to explain that on the international stage, not when both Japan and the EU have no love for them. "The way things are our hands are tied. All we can do is lobby to increase funds to the PPDC so that they have better chances of forcing these aliens back." He concluded, though when he thought about the PPDC, he thought about his wayward son and how he was rising in their ranks, which to most would be he'll soon have quite the level of influence in the organization but to those who knew the truth, they knew it meant the opposite.
Even Marianne was calling for him to try and make peace with the boy as it was becoming more and more clear as the days go by that he would need his support. The boy is well-liked by the commoners for much the same reasons Marianne was, being living proof that greatness can come from relatively minor beginnings. He was a star on the international stage for being not only one of the 'defenders of humanity' but also the youngest person to ever complete the academy to even become a pilot. He was slowly rising in the ranks of the PPDC, to the point there were rumors he would make commandant in less than two years. Then there was the fact he was well connected into Japanese high society, being close friends with the son of the Prime Minister, being married to the princess of a major Japanese tech conglomerate, and being the chosen heir of Taizo Kirihara, that puts in a position where he stands not just to gain control over Sakuradite mining in Japan but a large part of the tech industry as well.
The only problem with trying to make peace was that the boy for a lack of better terms…. hated him with the fury of a thousand suns. It would a lot to even get him willing to speak with him never mind agree to anything.
"I swear, I never thought that such a thing would ever be possible. If I didn't know better, I'll say that the collective unconscious had a hand in this." V.V said through ground teeth as this seemed like it was planned to counter their plans, from the first attack occurring the same day they began their bid to gain control over the Japanese thought elevator to the war hawks of the imperial court being silent or voicing support for the PPDC rather than imperial expansion. Those same war hawk families hadn't cared about such when they still wished to expand the empire even during the emblem of blood period, but they suddenly care? This felt odd to the two brothers.
"We don't know anything about that, samples we managed to acquire also don't support anything like that. Those things are made from biomaterials not even native to earth." Charles said as after trespasser was killed, he ordered that the creature be studied thoroughly so that they understood what the hell it was. Those finds were the first to discover and prove that Kaiju blood itself was both toxic AND corrosive and that the DNA of the creatures was drastically different to any known species on earth, and that combined with the discovery of the breach made it clear that where these things came from, it was a very different world to theirs.
"And because of those…. things," V.V said, though Charles did catch some hints of fear from him. "Our plans are on an indefinite pause. We should have acted when the federation broke up, we could have easily taken a third of their lands, which would have put us in a great position to invade Iran."
"You and I both know that such a move would have been a death blow to us, both abroad and domestically." Charles reminded him as they did think about it when the federation broke apart but such a move would never gain support, even if the nobility that mattered agreed to support it through persuasion or threat, the common people would never agree to it, not while the Kaiju were still a threat. There was also the threat that international powers would intervene to stop them, with the Middle Eastern Federation being the closest to Iran would most likely send ground troops, air support, or some combination of the two. No doubt the EU would also back then, and Japan would increase if not cease Sakuradite trade to the empire. They'll be starved into submission, and for Britannia to be defeated in such a way, it'll be a blow to his image and reputation which would cause all sorts of issues he'll have to deal with, without accidentally starting a revolution. The numbers were already up in arms and he was still dealing with that.
No, as much as he hated it, he had to play ball, even if it meant that Ragnarök couldn't even commence when he was much…much older. Later, after V.V had left to carry on with his duties, Charles was seemingly left alone but that was not true.
"You're stressed, aren't you?" A feminine voice up, the emperor of the strongest nation on earth didn't even turn around to address the speaker, he knew who it was.
"How can I not? Our dreams are unobtainable at the moment." Charles said as the speaker stepped forward to stand at his side. Revealing themselves to be the Knight of Six, Anya Alstreim…or at least, it was her body that was there. the one in control of her body at the moment was in actuality, his deceased wife, Marianne.
"That's the issue, Charles." 'Anya' said as she looked up to the much taller man, the rims of her red eyes trimmed with a glowing red ring, showing that Anya wasn't in control or even aware at the moment. "We need to rethink this." At her word, Charles looked down at her in slight confusion and worry at the tone of her voice.
"What do you mean? You don't support them anymore?" He asked her, wondering that if in some twisted way, his brother was right about her before he shoved that thought away.
"I do but…. Charles, you're not getting any younger, and we haven't been able to restore my body, even after all these years." Marianne admitted as she gestured to herself. A 39-year-old soul trapped in the body of a 16-year-old girl. Anya was younger than Nunnally by a full day. They at first thought it would be temporary, once they restored her body that they had Schneizel move to a medical research black site, she could make her return and her children could be brought back to her but that was years ago. After year three passed with no significant changes to her still preserved corpse, she started losing hope. At this point, she had lost a full decade of her life, lost out in seeing her children grow up. She missed so much of their lives, her son was married now! And she couldn't even attend the wedding, all of it was started to hammer home the fact that she might never be able to return to her body, to live her life once more.
"You shouldn't give up hope." Charles, sensing this tension and emotional baggage from her, spoke up. Keeping himself calm and caring, something that almost no-one alive had ever seen or heard from him, most assuming he didn't have a soft or caring side.
"It's hope that has gotten me this far but, we need to face facts. Ragnarök won't be possible for years, could be another decade before things get back on track and even then, it'll be years before things can start." Marianne replied to him, her stolen face twisted to that a sad smile and leaked bitter acceptance. She wanted their plans to work, to eliminate lies from the world but at the rate things are going, her husband would be in his 80s before they came to fruition.
"What are you saying?" Charles asked her, knowing that she wouldn't be saying all this unless she had something to add to it. In response to this, Marianne went out of character and lost some of that confidence he had fallen in love with as she starred at 'her' hands as if they'll disappear or rebel against her.
"Charles, I'm dead in all but name, even then, being tethered to another's body…. that isn't living, it's existing. I'm no more alive than a parasite right now." She told him as she looked down at the body she was using, the body of someone else. A body she was effectively stealing every time she wanted to do something.
"Don't you dare call yourself that." Charles, in a rare act, showed his own emotions as he placed in hands on her shoulders and looked into her eyes, his eyes lit with feelings of sadness and love. Love for his fallen but not broken wife and saddened for the fact she wasn't whole right now. That he couldn't hold her close. That they could never be as close as they once more, not with how things were. Seeing this, Marianne started to tear up a bit as she placed one hand on one of his.
"It's okay my love, I…. I've come to accept that. Same as I have come to accept that you're getting older, slower, and weaker. We can't deny it, but it seems that only that goblin, V.V. would still be around to enact our plans." She stated, bitter bile rising in her throat as she thought to the source of their problems, to what robbed her of almost everything, and the reason her children had to be banished to protect them. But the fact of the matter was, while she would stay around as long as Anya did, which was potentially decades since she was so young, her husband didn't have that time, having long since declined from the prime of his life. He didn't have any more than two, maybe three decades left on the clock, 'Anya' didn't have the power or sway to continue their plans without him. Which left V.V. he had a secret army of loyal, near-fanatical geass imbued followers, off the books resources and funds, and was immortal, he could stay at this for centuries if he wished.
They couldn't.
"But there is a part of us that will live on, our children." Marianne told him as she thought back to days long gone where she would spend her time playing and guiding her children, advising Cornelia while teasing Schneizel over his possible future defeat at her son's hands. She thought back to the long nights she and her children would spend watching the stars, the sleepovers, the times they would watch her practice in the Ganymede. She thought of the life she no longer had.
"Marianne." Charles started but paused as he didn't know what to say to soothe her.
"I miss them, Charles, I miss my babies. When we…. did what we did," Marianne, too ashamed of how what they had done to their daughter to continue. "When we had then sent away to escape V.V., we both hoped that in time, we would have completed our plans and destroyed lies, we would have been with them again but…. we haven't. And now our son still grieves my loss and holds you responsible for it." She laid out their failure as both leaders and parents as thought reports hinted that Nunnally would be more open to them, she was scarred by that event, and their son, the handsome, brilliant young man she knew he could become, held a burning resentment towards his father, one that she wasn't sure would ever truly fade.
"Maybe…. maybe we should try and connect with them again, tell them of the plan." She offered up that solution, being unwilling to give up on their pursuits but at the same time, having come to realize just what she had lost in trying to obtain it.
"Are you sure that our rebellious son would even be willing to listen?" Charles asked her softly as he held no delusions over his relationships or lack thereof with his numerous children. He was sure that some either hated or resented him in some capacity-much like his rebellious son, others were scared of him due his public and private cruel and unrelenting stances like Clovis and the rest were either planning or waiting for his death so they could lie, steal, cheat and kill their way to become his successor.
It was only later in life after his plans to create a world without lies were brought to a screeching halt that he realized his folly. In that his single-minded drive to complete his goals, his inaction to curb racist and violent officials in both the government, nobility, and military. His harsh, unapproachable nature and ultranationalist expansionist views before K-Day and his public support for Social Darwinism had done nothing to better the current system, the system that had taken his mother from him. All he had done is stir the pot and put a lid on it.
The pot, was the nobility, his children, and the current system of power and control, the lid was himself as there was no way any of them would dare try something so long as he was emperor and healthy, but if any of those things changed, that boiling tension that had been building up for years, it would explode. He knew that another brutal and bloody war of succession wasn't a possibility, it was almost assured. He needed to act fast and act as soon as possible.
Otherwise, the Holy Britannian Empire will tear itself apart.
"I don't know, but…." Marianne started as she worked to collect herself before she started to cry. "I want to try, I want to be a family with them again, even if I can't feel them with my own body ever again." She finished as she felt a nudge in the mind she shared with an unwilling and unaware host. That was another thing that had been happening, Anya was getting better at fending off her takeovers of their shared body, even if the girl didn't know it. In the past, she could take control whenever she wished but now it was proving to a struggle to keep control most of the time, forcing her to take control only when the girl was asleep and even then, it wasn't a cakewalk. She turned around to leave the Sword of Akasha, intent in getting Anya back to her quarters so that when she regained control, she wouldn't suspect that she hadn't done anything more than sleep like everyone else.
And that is that the chapter is done. As I said in the beginning, this will be the last chapter pre-first movie as the next one will take place after the time skip to when the movie will take place. So, since that was going to happen, I wanted to flush out the cast a little more before then. One of those things was giving Viktoriya more backstory on where her family lives and their circumstances. I also finally did the scene where she lets out all that she suspects on the table before him and Lelouch….handled it better than I originally wanted him to because he's more level headed then cannon, he is 19 right now and understands that he has responsibilities. Though he was angry and rightfully so, that anger won't blind him or make him needlessly cruel. He has a support base to help him, people he can trust.
I made her brother have an unnamed learning problem because one of the people I know has one and I've seen how much they struggled with schoolwork. I'm not gonna lie, before I understood that he had learning difficulties, myself and others just called him a slacker or below average to name a few things, this is a real problem. Not only did I feel like a complete jackass after I found out, but I also felt like part of the problems he was facing, because I was. Lucky for him, he got a special tutor and get a lot better in his academics, right now he's studying to become an electrical engineer and we managed to talk things out. I'm not asking for much but please, before you call a classmate stupid or slow, please try to understand them first.
With Charles and Marianne, I wanted to try something different. Though I still think them both in the top ten worst parents in anime, I wanted to write things from how they see it, from their point of view. I was trying to follow something that Batman said in the second injustice game on how all criminals are the heroes in their own stories. SO, from where they stand, everything that did and wanted is justified…. or is it. Because that hasn't been able to do anything towards that goal, they have no way to justify all the destruction caused, deaths, and lies told. It is this sober atmosphere that I made them realize things about themselves they either didn't already know or denied in their hearts and minds.
For Charles, he realized that he didn't even attempt to reform the system he hated and that the only real change from pre-Charles to the modern day is that the royal family and their allies don't fight and kill each other in the open. It's a cold war of sorts, all sides never actually fighting one another in the light of day but using proxies and other methods to accomplish their goals. And as a man in his mid-60s, he knows that he can't stop this, nor can he carry on like he has been doing for years. He has realized that he had failed as a leader of his country and as a father as his children will tear each other apart when, not if, when he's unable to stop them.
For Marianne, it's a different thing as with the plan no longer something that can work towards, she has to see everything for what it is. But she's still selfish, she still wants the plan to work and is still helping Charles and V.V. to make that so BUT on the other hand, she wants to be a mother again, to be with her children once more. It's a change from cannon where she was willing to throw them aside for the sake of the plan but she's far from being repentant as she wants it both ways. She's unwilling to abandon Ragnarök for her children but at the same time, she wants to make amends in her children. Canon Marianne as I said could justify it, at least to herself, that once the plan succeeds, she'll be able to be with them again but here? Here that justification is no longer something she nor Charles can hold on to. So, all she has is resentment and regrets. Resentment against V.V. since he started this whole mess of their family and regret because she didn't say a word against her daughter being shot, her children as well as close family friends such as the li Britannia sisters having their memories altered, against her children being banished and against the war that followed.
Lastly, the thing about knightmare development was answered as when countries have other things to worry about, things such deemed as non essential military expenditure is pulled and used for other things. I got the idea to pause it partly because the world has larger concerns and because of another story where Lelouch caused an mass economic fall-out in Britannia which saved Japan as the Britanians had to pull out to deal with it. Because of that situation he engineered, knightmare development stalled. The story picks up in 2020 and by that point, Glasgows are still in mainstream use with Sunderlands being considered the best knightmare around. I'll let you read the story itself to find out more, the story is called 'The Power of the European King'.
Reviews:
Vein Bloodborne: Thanks, writing that lemon was a lot harder than I thought it'll be. As for kids, they didn't have one right now, but they WILL have one by the next chapter, even if that kid doesn't make an appearance as I'll be focusing on other things aside from family life.
JCarrasco: Thanks, hope you liked the latest chapter.
Blaze1992: Well a normal wedding would have been boring, so I wrote something different. The whole having sex the first night of their honeymoon was something I placed it just for the sake of it, I have never been married nor did I ask my friend who got married this year if he did have sex on the first night because that would be super creepy, stupid and all-round gross. So, if this is something that typically doesn't happen, please remember this is a work of fiction.
ewertondragon10: Well it was bound to happen sooner or later, Euphemia in cannon only has enemies because she's terrible at networking and is very rash and impulsive, even if she doesn't want to come off as selfish. This version of her is more mature and has been actively working to create the world she wants. With the wait, I hope it was worth it.
Xander Keellay: Thanks.
nliochristou: Well, he finally made his appearance, what did you think of it? Not the appearance you were expecting, right?