On the blazing hot tarmac of the Pendragon Military Airfield, a prince and a princess say their goodbyes.
"Don't die." Euphemia whispered into his ear, her arms around his neck to pull him as close as she could manage.
She is a slender woman, all pastel colours, and soft silks but Lelouch had known since he first met her that she has a core of iron to rival Cornelia's. So he is locked in her embrace, his arms tight around her waist, as he commits her scent to memory. This is their ritual they have created for every time he marches off to war.
"You are not allowed to die, I almost lost you once already," She continues, not caring for the pair of eyes that are on them as they stand on the tarmac. "I will never forgive you if you die. I have lost too many people I love to this Area, you and Nelly are not allowed to die. Come home in shame if needed, so long as you come home."
"I will return to you," He vowed quietly, his lips pressed to her temple. "Give Laila and Gabrielle my love. I will visit when I can."
A small nod, and Euphemia pulled back to look him in the eye. "Take care of yourself," And she kisses him for their audience to see. Her lips are soft, and they do not rush but eventually she releases him from her hold and brushes her dress to fix the imagined wrinkles.
He knows the melancholy look she wears well. She wants to stop him, knows that if she simply asks he will obey but she stays her hand for now.
"I love you too," He repeats back to her. "I will call you when we land in the Tokyo Settlement."
Euphemia walked back to a waiting car after a teary-eyed smile. And Lelouch watches her leave. He watches until the car is a dust cloud on the horizon. Only then does he turn around to the pair of patiently waiting women.
"If I may?"
"Of course Monica." Jean's face was carved from stone, her eyes sharp as they darted from place to place, assessing everything she saw for a potential threat. The events of the last two days had left her high strung and as meticulous as ever about his safety. In contrast, Monica's face was an open book. Deep blue eyes watched him with concern. When she'd arrived back from Philadelphia she pulled him into a hug tight enough to squeeze the air from his lungs, and not gone more than a step from his side since.
"I feel it is a mistake to leave Euphemia at the villa. I understand the situation in Area 11 will be precarious, but I think having her at your side will do yourself and Lady Cornelia a great deal of good."
"I agree with you completely Monica," Lelouch said as he started to sweat under the August sun. He brought a hand up to run it through his hair and wipe his brow as he gazed upon his sword. Her concern was touching, and he could see Jean nod in silent agreement. "Unfortunately, Laila and the Lady Gabrielle have a greater need of her presence than I. Under different circumstances, I would be staying as well to comfort them. But Clovis's killer is in Area 11, and that is where I must go. I will not ask them to join me in the land that took Clovis from them, not so soon as he is yet to be buried."
"I understand Lelouch," Monica weighed her words carefully. "I simply wanted to express that it would be good for you to have someone as diligent in taking care of your needs, as you are in taking care of those around you."
"I will have you two with me, along with Cornelia and Milly," There was the faintest twitch from both women at the mention of his fiancé and he couldn't stop a small smirk at the reaction. "I think between the four of you, I will find no lack of support, nor pleasant company. I am blessed, to be surrounded by such love and care."
He paused to regard Monica. "You were visiting your parents after four gruelling months on campaign, and yet the moment you received your recall, you were on the first flight back. Why? I know how dearly you missed them, you know I would not fault you a day or two of peace."
"Because my place is at your side, my prince, as it always will be." Monica admitted quietly, a light flush on her face. "I am your sword, ready to strike through the heart of your enemies, and upon our vows, hell itself would not stop me from standing by you."
"I think you aren't giving yourself and Jean enough credit," He held his hands out to both his sword, and his shield. "With such dedication at my side, I'm sure I'll be fine."
Even without a full understanding of the incident, Lelouch could say Shinjuku had been a mess. What should have been a routine operation to purge the local terrorist cell after it revealed itself had turned into a near rout only saved by Schniezel's pet project.
"Broad strokes. We need to establish a timeline." Lelouch spoke to the air as he paced the length of the jet. Jean was absorbed in memorizing the details of the Viceroy's palace to see if she could spot any weaknesses, along with a variety of other dossiers while Monica was working through the user manual of the Lancelot with a steely focus.
It would be easier said than done. The mobile command centre had been completely wiped. The black box communication records had been removed and destroyed, so they were forced to rely on sparse witness testimony and the records scavenged from the ejection pods.
"Around noon we have reports of a high priority robbery at Apollo Medical Industries, Bartley overrides the police commissioner and allows the terrorists to get away with," Lelouch double checks the report on his tablet. "Pressurized Gas Distillation equipment."
"Bartley orders for observation only on the terrorists transport, and doesn't intervene until the transport is confirmed to have entered the Shinjuku ghetto via underground tunnels. Somewhere briefly before this, Clovis takes command and has his personal forces surround the ghetto. The Honoraries are dispatched to search the ghetto, and we eventually get confirmation that a soldier had located the stolen equipment. One, Suzaku Kururugi. Who is found later found injured by Lloyd Asplund and his assistant."
The same soldier that the Purebloods had pinned as the murderer of Clovis. His trial was set to start in an hour, but Lelouch had already contacted the presiding judge. No verdict was to be reached until Lelouch or Cornelia reviewed the case. Kururugi would act as a necessary scapegoat to soothe the masses for the time being, but all the evidence, and Lelouch's own gut feeling suggested that he wasn't the man Lelouch was after.
"Clovis's royal guard was dispatched to retrieve the equipment before they go radio silent for the remainder of the battle. Their corpses are eventually found, by a knightmare pilot Villetta Nu." Lelouch tapped out a quick reminder to himself. Dame Nu's report would be followed up on, in person.
"Around this time the battle turns, the terrorist start to act with far greater cohesion. It's too late in the fight to suggest that the terrorists finally found their nerve and coordinated a counter attack. It suggests a new element. Bartley attempts to stall out the terrorists new momentum but his intentions are read. Clovis panics, tries to throw bodies at the problem and in rapid succession loses the majority of his operational forces."
And by sheer chance he manages to pull himself out of the fire. Sadly it was his last bit of luck. Clovis, what had you gotten yourself into? He lamented to himself. Lelouch knew his brother, and this had a familiar air to it. Of Clovis fumbling in panic to cover up a greater mistake.
"Kururugi is given emergency leave to pilot an experimental 7th generation Knightmare frame, and through a combination of his natural talent, and the machine's overwhelming capacity manages to tear through the remaining terrorists." He tapped out another reminder. Lloyd Asplund was a genius they couldn't afford to lose, but Lelouch had no qualms in reminding him about imperial policy when it came to Knightmare access.
"From there it's simple clean up. The survivors of the purge are holed up in an abandoned warehouse, and surrounded by Britannian infantry. They are saved from their gruesome fate by a last minute ceasefire from Clovis himself-"
"It doesn't make sense for him to order a ceasefire. Clovis won. He may not have what he came looking for, but he has time to comb through the wreckage to find it." Monica spoke up, the unnecessarily large user manual closed in her lap. "Oh,- Sorry my prince, I didn't mean to interrupt, but it doesn't make sense."
Lelouch gently waved away her interruption. "No, you are completely correct. It was a near thing but Clovis had won. But to your point, the simple answer is Clovis's killer already had him at gun point and forced the ceasefire." He concluded as he let himself fall into a chair across from Monica.
"But, surely- A standard G-1 base has a crew, and escort in the hundreds! And if Clovis hadn't left the control floor, he would have had at least a dozen personnel between him and any assailant. I just- Did no one see anything?! It seems absurd!" Monica balked at the sheer impossibility of the idea.
G-1's were moving fortresses, the idea that a single person could infiltrated one, hold a member of the Imperial Family at gun point long enough to call a ceasefire, then shoot said hostage eight times in the chest before walking out with no one the wiser was beyond absurd. It was the sort of impossibility that lit a fire of paranoia in Jean that Lelouch had never seen before.
It also didn't explain how all the security footage of the G-1 was deleted. It didn't explain what happened to the tactical or comm data. It certainly didn't explain how thirteen G-1 military technicians and a long-standing General of the Empire could offer no explanation to their absence, each one citing a gap in their memory.
That shared gap, that lack of evidence felt important to Lelouch. Fourteen people all sharing the same feeble excuse destroyed any lingering suspicion in Lelouch's mind that Clovis had been killed in an internal conspiracy. Fourteen was simply too large a number to ensure they all kept silent, or disappear without someone noticing.
Lelouch could only shrug in agreement at Monica's confusion as his mind continued to race. "There are three questions we need answers to; Firstly, what was actually stolen by the terrorists? Second, who got involved later into the battle? Thirdly, how was an enemy force able to infiltrate the G-1 without any opposition? If we get an answer to one, it will give us an answer to all three."
Those weren't all the questions he had about Shinjuku, but they were the important ones. The ones most likely to lead him towards Clovis's killer.
"-Lelouch?!"
"Yes," Lelouch turned around in his seat to look at Jean. There was a worried raise to her voice that set him on edge. "Is something wrong?"
"I-, I don't know, but I think you should see this." She got up, and turned on the jet's television before rapidly flipping through the channels to land on the Area 11 news station.
The broadcast showed a bridge at night, people lined the streets, some to mourn the loss of their prince, some to enjoy the spectacle. He knew what event they were tuned into without needing to be told. The convoy taking Kururugi to his trial.
Blocking the convoy's progress was Clovis's public transport, the large Britannian flag shifted in the wind before it ignited into a blaze.
From the fire and smoke, a masked figure emerged atop the car. A cape of crimson, with lines of gold trim wrapped around their form, leaving only the opaque, polished surface of their full-faced helmet exposed.
"I Am Zero!"
Notes: Hello again! Sticking relatively close to canon for now, but we'll probably go a little off the rails in the next chapter or two. This chapter, was about getting characters into place, establishing relations and kinda setting how Lelouch will be tackling Zero from a different angle than Cornelia did. On a side note, I just wanted to mention that this story will also be Cornelia x Lelouch (A criminally underrated ship) and Milly x Lelouch (also underrated) along with the various other ships because FF doesn't let me tag more than 4 characters (for better or worse). Anyways! Hope you enjoyed, drop a review, or a message if you enjoyed the chapter, and have a good one!