Outside, the cold wind howled hysterically. Nunnally sat huddled in the narrow vent. She listened to every screech, every metallic rumble, afraid to recognize the heavy footsteps in the midst of them. The shivering that had been beating her all this time slowly released her and allowed her to breathe in relief.
Nannally finally grew little bolder, quietly pulled back the bars, and cautiously peered out of the narrow hatchway. She could see the cloudy abyss in the bright depths of the shaft, the galleries on its walls, and the web of suspended bridges. Then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw a red flash.
Her chest froze with fear, and she jerked back into the vent, hitting her head on the ceiling. A scarlet streak buzzed through the square opening. The humming hovered somewhere beyond her field of vision, he could not strike blindly...
Nunnally clamped her hands over her mouth to keep from screaming, scraped her feet on the floor, shoving herself backward, rolled over, and scrambled away on all fours. He heard her, sure, heard her, heard her, heard, he heard, but it did not matter, just to get as far away as possible…!
The metal beneath her hands crumpled and flapped downward. Nunnally, screaming, ducked into the hatch, and at the last moment clung to the hatch cover with her hands. She hung on it for a few seconds, the floor spinning beneath her, and then the hinges failed and she flew on. Before she hit the ground, she had time to group herself as Jedi Masters had taught her, but she still tumbled onto her side. The hatch cover clattered loudly next to her. The sound caused a wave of not just fear, but also some kind of instant shock that hit her nerves painfully. Nunnally jumped up, looking around frantically.
Her heart was rattling already in her head like an empty barrel rolling down a rocky slope.
And the outside of her head was almost silent. An empty dark room, round. Steps converged down to a black hole in the floor, a metal monster looming overhead, an indistinguishable structure in the darkness and fog. Something was hissing quietly, ominously.
That fog... from somewhere it had sprung up right in the interior. Nunnally, trying to tread silently, began to pivot toward the nearest door behind her. She nervously darted her gaze around, back and forth. The bracelet concealed her, but kept her from sensing others in the Force.
And he was somewhere nearby. Invisible to the eyes and the Force.
Nunnally turned around to figure out how to open the door.
And then, from the edge of the foggy darkness, red flashed again.
She barely had time to ignite her saber. The scarlet blade swooped down from above, pressing down on her in a clinch. It hung in the air as if held by an invisible ghost. Nunnally was thrown into a fever.
"No..."
The blade was mercilessly pushing through her defenses. And there was no way to throw it away, for it was controlled not by human muscles, but by the Force itself.
It was over... so soon.
Nunnally wailed in despair and jerked backward. The blade lunged for her, but at that instant she yanked the bracelet off.
The sensations came over her familiarly. It was as if the scarlet saber had slowed to a crawl, blazing a crimson sunset before her eyes. The darkness loomed even closer.
Darth Zero could definitely see her now.
And she... didn't. The flash of the clash almost blinded her. The scarlet saber twisted at an inhuman angle, tried to reach her from below, from above, and she defended herself desperately.
Through years of blindness, Nunnally had learned to see with the Force in a way that many Jedi could not. All of her paltry abilities to it went to compensate for her lost sight. And still Darth Zero remained invisible.
Impossible! No one could use the Force in battle and hide in it at the same time!
But the icy Darkness thickened across the room, and he dissolved into it like a drop of water in the ocean.
'Where are you?!' she wanted to scream hysterically.
The flying saber drove her away from the door. Nunnally pivoted, fending off the blade with all her might. It struck her at angles no human would ever be capable of, forcing her to twist and turn, sucking her strength away at a furious pace. The only thing that saved her was that the Jedi Masters knew of Darth Zero's unique fighting techniques and had developed a strategy against him.
A knowledge that took many sacrifices. Almost no one survived. It took them all by surprise.
A void opened up behind her. The back of her neck was frozen by the cold of the fog, through which nothing more could be seen. Nunnally was caught between ice and flame.
"No-o!"
She summoned the Force and pushed the other's blade as far away as she could. And then swung herself over the black hole.
Empty. Dark. Dreadful.
She felt so alone in the bottomless gape of bitterness. What about the others? Are they dead already? He had killed them, just like Matt... Tears ran cold on her cheeks.
As soon as Nunnally's feet touched the floor, she rushed forward, tearing through the haze. The clouds of smoke around her flashed purple, mistily reflecting her saber.
Ahead, the air grew brighter. A large panoramic window cast a gray light. It beckoned an exit. All Nunnally could think about now.
A shadow moved at the edge of the light.
He stood higher up the steps, the edges of his figure showing more clearly. His right hand curled its fingers against the light like the branches of an old tree in a dead forest. And a crimson glow crept through the mist.
The heart barrel rolled downward and shattered into splinters. Nunnally lowered her saber doomedly, rounding her shoulders in a second. Now that she was near him, she could feel him in the Force. He radiated frost, like an unmoving block of ice. Only now it didn't matter anymore.
It had been a trap from the start. He'd cornered her between himself and his saber. And he'd already learned how she fought.
Perhaps he had once chained her brother in terror as well. And then he just killed him, invariably wordlessly and indifferently. He stepped over and went on to wreak death. To kill Clovis. Euphemia. Maybe Shirley. Matt. And even her father, whom Nunnally had never missed, but his death was just one more harrowing reminder that there was a Shadow prowling somewhere, eager to take everything from her.
Why? Why is everything like this?!
Nunnally had never wanted revenge. She only wanted to understand why this man was ruining her life. She couldn't believe that it was all a coincidence that didn't make any sense.
Her fingers dug into the curved hilt of the saber, and it gave off a warmth. No, Lelouch would never be afraid. He wasn't afraid of anything, and he could always find a way out, if there was one. He took advantage of every opportunity.
Nunnally pictured his sly, satisfied smile from that photo she'd been looking at for hours when she regained her sight. She would never see that smile in person, as she had dreamed for a very long time. But she would look at the picture one more time, because she would not give up.
And she rushed forward, straight into the Darkness.
Scarlet light buzzed behind her, and Nunnally fell to the floor at the last moment. The saber swept over her, she almost flew up the stairs after it, swung, knocked sparks out of the wall, and struck toward the dark figure. She didn't reach him, the scarlet saber blocking the way again.
"Why!" she screamed. "Why, why, WHY!"
She saw where his face was, because the white sparks of the blade clinch reflected in the black Mandalorian visor. And they met gazes for the first time.
In that long, eternal moment...
...The block of ice suddenly erupted at once into a fiery vapor. The rapidly expanding gas was like an explosion, only in the Force. Nunnally was hurled against the opposite wall, colorful circles splashing before her eyes. She jerked blindly forward, but froze.
Fury.
Pure fury burst into the real world in a hurricane. All the metal of the walls, floor, and ceiling seemed to vibrate with the unbearable feeling. From somewhere above, sparks sprinkled in a stream of fire. Darth Zero stood with his fists clenched and his saber hovering above his head, casting bloody shadows across his figure.
Her mouth went dry and her skin became clammy on the flip side, her thoughts flitting helplessly. Nunnally thought she couldn't possibly experience greater horror, but this... Such a sudden change in behavior. It was sheer unpredictability.
"You..." his voice cut through as rusty gears on a sharp exhale. "What are you...?"
Nunnally had heard that voice more than once. In his speeches strolling through the holonet. She'd heard the excitement and the threat, the righteousness and the sadness in it, and once she hadn't even flinched at that mechanical, deep vibration. Back in a past life, when the Academy had been safe, and when her friends had been saved from those terrorists. Then she'd heard the hope that later turned into a funeral march.
But she couldn't imagine that voice could sound almost... shocked?
"Answer me."
Answer what? Nunnally didn't understand what he was saying, only could make out his intonation through the howls of panic. The Force pulsed with menace.
Darth Zero moved elusively fast, snatching a saber out of the air as he flew. Nunnally fearfully raised hers to defend, blindly fending off a blow, another. Stepping back, the window now shone behind her, into Zero's face. And she thought she could see through the mask as he curved his lips in disgust.
"You," he spat out, 'you, where did you get that saber?!
Another lunge scorched the tip of a strand. Her hair was completely out of the low ponytail and strewn across her shoulders.
"Did Kururugi give it to you?!"
How does he know?
Darth Zero almost threw her back against the window. Her head was spinning, her lungs had burned, and the air scratched her throat.
"Do you really think," Darth Zero hissed angrily, "that you can get me? He thought you could drive me out of my mind! With such a despicable, pathetic trick?!"
He stroked his left hand unevenly across the forehead of his helmet and suddenly laughed. It was a muffled laugh, distorted by a vocoder to an indistinct electric rumble. And there was something about it so disturbing, so genuinely maddening, that Nunnally bolted to the floor, unable to move.
She was cornered by an unpredictable madman, and... and... and...
Why did the exiled Council of Masters even think she was capable of doing anything against Darth Zero?!
"I don't know what you're talking about!" Nunnally shouted, a coarse shiver pounding her.
He turned his head sharply toward her.
"What am I talking about...?" Darth Zero's voice had once again changed in tone beyond belief. It now oozed quiet menace. "How dare you even exist!"
Inhale. Exhale. For the first time, she heard Darth Zero breathing strangely loud, whistling breaths too.
"They did make a forcesensitive clone. And they decided to make you to…" he stepped forward and raised his saber. "Oh, and they're going to pay for it, they're going to regret..."
"I'm not a clone!" Nunnally yelled, backing away.
He's insane. And he's mistaken her for someone else.
"I'm not a clone!" she repeated for some reason. "I'm just...!" her throat spasmed. How many furious things she had wanted to say when they met! But now all the words were spilling out of her head.
"It can't be," Darth Zero said, shaking his head oddly from side to side. He said it flatly and almost neutrally, but it sounded... confused to Nunnally. "You are dea..." he stammered suddenly. "But only if the Jedi..."
The air grew cold again. No, no, whatever it was that threw him off, if he regained his coolness...! Nunnally now realized for sure that she didn't stand a was only one way out remaining.
She turned around, drawing a purple arc of light. The window behind her stood with a melted streak for a second, then cracked and shattered. Behind her, the air had grown completely thick, palpably draughty. The Darkness was trying to stop her.
"No-o!" Nunnally darted after the shards.
The wind slammed into her face, took her breath away. For a moment she thought it would blow her straight into the cloudy abyss. But the rattling platform slammed into her legs, into her shoulder, and Nunnally rolled on it, kicking up hot glass with the Force. It hurt, like a pin had been shoved into her windpipe and melted into her spine, preventing her from moving and breathing.
Got to get up. Got to run. As far away as possible — and then put on the bracelet to hide. Think about it all calmly, in safety.
The remnants of the window exploded outward with a crunch, right along with the frame and laths. A rain of glass flashed, and a black shape flew up in the midst of it. Yet the shards did not scatter apart, but all moved in a single stream. Nunnally clenched her eyes tightly, covering her face with the palm of her hand. As if that would save her from turning into a bloody sieve.
But nothing happened.
Nunnally jumped up, opened her eyes in a leap, shrieked as she nearly ran into a shard. She backed up. The glass continued to float in the air, almost motionless. It seemed as if the air itself had begun to turn into ice crystals. She lifted her head and saw that he was still there. Up there.
Darth Zero hovered along with all the glass, a black shadow amidst the glittering spray. He spread his arms slightly apart, his fingers outstretched in tension.
How is this... how is this even possible...?
"Stay where you are," he ordered in a low voice.
Nunnally glanced around. They were on a circular platform poking through the rough wall of the shaft. There was a walkway running down the well pipe from the platform, but the path to it was cut off by flying glass splinters. And there was nothing to be done about them, because the way Darth Zero mastered telekinesis was truly eerie.
Tears began to gather in her eyes again. Nunnally shook her head. No, she would not stand there and meekly accept death.
And there are no glass walls above the abyss.
Nunnally jumped onto the rickety railing. The metal beneath her feet groaned.
"Stop!"
She stepped into the abyss with her hand in the air. The Force told her the right moment, her fingers caught the bottom rail of the railing, and her whole body wrapped under the platform. A moment of free fall through the wind, and she landed on the platform one floor below.
A rumble of rattling and ringing hail of crumbling glass came from above. There was no time to catch her breath. Nunnally took off and ran along the wall. Her frantic stomping was echoed by heavy footsteps from above.
The wind whipped at her face, howling with her despair.
She was almost out. All she has to do is run to the nearest door into Cloud City. It's close, beyond the bridge over the abyss. And there, down the technical corridors she'll escape, wearing the bracelet...
A terrifying screeching sound cut into her ears, screwed into her very brain. A piece of the ceiling of the upper road flared into a painful stain, and a rectangular, rough plate crashed to the floor in front of Nunnally with a rattling thud from a powerful kick. Splatters of molten metal flew fireflies to the sides. Darth Zero came down from above.
Didn't jump, didn't fall off. He floated down like a liquid black shadow in a slow fall.
Nunnally shrieked. She turned jerkily, nearly tripped over her own boots, and rushed out, but a scarlet saber blocked her way. She grabbed the railing and spun herself onto the bridge.
The saber sliced through some pipes above her head, sparks rolling across the floor. Nunnally twisted around again, meeting another blow. Darth Zero was once more holding his saber in his hands. In one hand, with a graceful unfurling of the wrist, and the other he was slightly winding it behind his back.
"Stop running away."
He slowly pressed her further down the bridge, and she realized with horror that it led nowhere. The bridge gradually narrowed to a tight passage to some sort of antenna.
"No!"
"You can't beat me anyway," Darth Zero said almost irritably.
Another blow tore down the railing to Nunnally's right, and she couldn't fight it off. If he had been a little more accurate, it would have taken off her arm. But Darth Zero missed...
Because he wasn't trying to kill her anymore. She realized.
"What on earth do you want from me?!" Nunnally lunged at him, swiping at his shoulder, but only burned through his cloak, revealing a metal plate underneath. Darth Zero exhaled low, almost growling, and threw her back with the Force to the very edge of the bridge. She scrambled backwards and fell to the floor with her back.
The wind threw another gust of icy air into her face. Nunnally clutched at the remains of the railing, trying to find the strength to get up.
"Enough," Darth Zero extended his left arm. Darkness rushed toward her and twisted her right hand, squeezing the saber out of her grip. Nunnally clenched her teeth in silent grit and fought for it. It was her saber, her brother's saber, the only thing left of him, it wouldn't give itself to a stranger...
The purple blade faded. The curved hilt arced smoothly into Darth Zero's hand. Nunnally's eyes bulged.
That's impossible. For a lightsaber to betray its owner... How... How strong is his telekinesis?!
Both of them were silent and breathing heavily. He was also strangely-loud, and unnaturally steady.
"Why are you here, with the Jedi?" Darth Zero finally asked. He had been staring at the hilt of the purple saber the whole time, as if searching for something in it.
"None of your business!"
It's clear. He wants to interrogate her. But she won't say anything!
He hung both sabers on his belt. The wind was ripping his cloak sideways, trying to tear it off into the abyss, but there wasn't enough strength for that. Pity... There was a rumbling in her head. Nunnally lowered her gaze downward. There, in the cloudy, distant abyss lived freedom and light.
"You must come with me," Darth Zero concluded. "You're not even a Jedi. They rejected you a long time ago, thinking you weak and useless."
"You know nothing!" Nunnally objected, only to object.
"And now they have found their advantage and are using you," his voice became even lower with anger. But it was not directed at her. "They told you that you should kill me, didn't they? That you were the only one who could do it? How disgusting, they wanted to make you an assassin..."
Darth Zero clenched his fists until his gloves creaked, and the Force gurgled so much venom of disgust that it clogged her nose with the stench of acid.
"They didn't want anything! I made up my own mind! I came to them myself, because you…" Tears welled up in her eyes, and reality shimmered. Nunnally wiped them away with her hand and finished furiously: "You killed my brother!"
He tilted his head to the side and raised his shoulders almost in shock.
"What is this nonsense...?" Darth Zero exhaled. "Who told you that, Kururugi too?"
"Oh-oh, he told me a lot of things!"
Nunnally slowly crawled back to the edge. With her hands she clung to the hoop around the antenna. It didn't matter what Darth Zero was up to, bring her over to the Dark Side? That would never happen.
"I didn't kill him," he repeated in a somehow pained voice.
"Then where is he?!"
Nunnally suddenly realized how much she wanted to believe those false words. How she wished Lelouch were alive, how she wanted to hug him again. The old, good world would never return, but that would be enough for her. Still, Suzaku couldn't lie to her, especially about that. And Darth Zero could very well be lying to her...
"Where is he?!" she shouted angrily.
Darth Zero was nervously crumpling the fingers of his right hand, and something brittle appeared in his entire posture. It looked so... wrong.
"Right here," he didn't look at her, but somewhere beyond her, into the abyss. "Nunnally, I'm your brother."
What?
It seemed that even the wind had died down in that instant and the whole world paused. Her head was spinning.
"No!" Nunnally whispered in horror. "It's not true. It's impossible!"
All this time... it simply could not have been Lelouch! He would never have killed Euphie. He could not have killed so many people in cold blood, and Matt too, right in front of her while she was helplessly hiding in the vent... He would not have abandoned her, and he would have tried to contact her, by all means. Because he was a good man, and there was no one in the world who loved Nunnally more, who cared for her more. He always protected her.
He couldn't turn into... this. This hollow shadow intoxicated with hatred and Darkness.
"Listen to your feelings and you'll know it's true."
"You're lying!"
"No, the others lied to you. And so did I. But now... you must know the truth so no one can use you again."
Darth Zero finally looked her in the eye, turning the visor in her direction. Nunnally tried, really tried, to imagine Lelouch's face from the photo just behind that mask. She could not.
Impossible. However, it explained everything.
Consciousness was tossing up memories against her will. How Lelouch had started disappearing all the time, and right when Zero had shown up on Mandalore. And the fact that Zero had then tried to kidnap her, even though she meant nothing in politics. And that strange phone call that Suzaku later claimed was a mistake. Nunnally had sensed he was lying to her then, but refused to believe it.
And in the end, that explained why the saber had given in to someone else's telekinesis. Because the telekinesis was not someone else's. The saber remembered its first owner.
"That's not tru-u-ue," Nunnally jabbed her face into the antenna. The metal chilled her heated forehead.
She wished her brother were alive, but the man standing before her did not feel like him at all. His voice was alien, his eerie, icy Force not at all like the sometimes prickly but always warm aura that surrounded Lelouch.
"You must come with me," Darth Zero held out his hand invitingly. "And I will protect you."
The words sounded like evil mockery or fake concern. Because the Darkness around him had sucked all the tenderness and warmth out of his voice, if it had been there in the first place.
"No... No, no!" Nunnally shook her head violently.
Even if everything she believed was a lie, this war was real. Matt's dead eyes were real too. And the Darkness. It was unbearable. Better to fall into the abyss than into the embrace of the Darkness, because any longer, the strength to fight would be completely drained.
Her legs weakened, her hands parted, Nunnally sobbed and pushed against the metal surface. The wind immediately embraced her and pulled her downward. Lightness spilled over her body, and her stomach felt empty.
At the last moment, Lelouch's saber snapped from Darth Zero's belt and swung into her hand.
"No!" the scream, ringing with desperation, did not belong to her.
The air thickened, slowing her fall. Dense bundles of Darkness clung to Nunnally with their weightless feelers, slowing her down. Darth Zero hung over the railing, reaching down with a tense hand as if he held a ton of weight with that hand.
Nunnally floundered in the air, slowly sinking lower and lower.
"What are you doing?!" he wheezed.
For a moment, Nunnally thought there was one warm whip of wind among the cold ones. Her heart beat faster. She wanted so badly to believe that it was really Lelouch. But she couldn't let a phantom hope lead her off the right path.
Darth Zero clenched his fist. Darkness roughly dug into her skin, pulling Nunnally upward. Tears spurted from her eyes again. He clung to her as tightly and desperately as really only her brother could.
Or a horrible, twisted version of him.
"I wish you were dead!"
Nunnally raised her hand with effort, summoned the Force. And slashed through the air, breaking the bonds of Darkness.
She will no longer allow anyone to lead her down a wrong path. She must find the truth, but on her own terms.