August 31st, 2018. Pendragon. Imperial Palace, early afternoon.

After a lunch that was more lavishly-presented than I especially cared for, but wasn't actually bad in any substantive way I can pin down, Gino leads us through a series of hallways toward a secure office.

"So about the Valkyries," he begins, before immediately wincing when he catches the tension building up in our jaw. "Whoa, hey, I agree in principle with most of what you said to Monica earlier. But there's enough going on that we can't afford right now to train you for overseeing the investigation to confirm Bradley's crimes and oversee the dissemination of his estate; that aside, putting a man's killer in charge of his affairs is just a bad look all around – you understand that, right?"

"That was… look," I admit with a sigh, "I was pissed off and going pretty heavily on instinct back there. And more to the point, I've pretty much internalized that if I don't take it upon myself to do the right thing, or the least bad thing, then I can't really trust anyone else to. And I'm not so caught up in myself that I can't see a need to work on both of these faults."

Gino grins in relief, shameless enough that Suzaku wonders if he'd thought we were going to lash out and put him through a wall or something. "…you do remember that Guilford, Cornelia, Bradley, Bismarck, and especially Dorothea all swung first on me, right?"

The tall blonde ducks the question with an embarrassed chuckle, producing an access card from inside his uniform and unlocking the office door with it. "Anyway, you're probably expecting me to try and guilt a favor out of you for the help – the truth is, one of my aides is on maternity leave, and some of my own paperwork's developed a serious backlog. I know, I know! It's my own fault for underestimating how reliant I am on her help and taking so long to find a substitute, but the situation is what it is."

Gino opens the door to Luciano Bradley's office, revealing a spacious luxury room with rich carpet, other fancy décor I don't have the context or background to properly assess, and a shiny wooden desk… that's barely even visible under several foot-high stacks of undone paperwork.

"So! I was thinking that since I'm going to be stuck in the capital for a while," Gino says with a clap, "I can take over dealing with the administrative affairs directly relating to Bradley's death. Anything else I might need from Area Eleven, I can either get via remote communications or make a stop over there myself. And in exchange, while I'm training you on what you need to handle as the Knight of Ten, you help cover me on as much of my own business that I can get away with delegating until such time as I can get a new aide. Sound fair, buddy?"

Suzaku and I stare in horror at the reams upon reams of bureaucratic nonsense we're about to have to contend with, before Suzaku takes over with a solemn nod. "It's a deal, Gino. Although I think I'm going to be better served if we skip going to the quarters set aside for me, and just have a fold-up bed delivered to this office."

Gino stops and double takes. "Don't tell me you're thinking of sleeping here?!"

Suzaku's already gone to Bradley's desk – our desk now, I suppose – and has picked up some far-off district prosecutor's request for handing out the death penalty to a Number. Attached to it is a form that apparently delegates the responsibility of carrying out that sentence to a more local official.

Is… are all these entire stacks going to be like this?!

Probably not in their entirety, but a large proportion probably will be. The duties of the Knight of Ten traditionally include being the Royal Executioner, responsible in the monarch's absence for choosing life and death in matters of law.

And Luciano Bradley was given that role?! Is this some kind of sick joke?!

The more I hear and think about Charles zi Britannia, the more I start to wonder if maybe it could be his idea of one…

"The time spent going from one site to the other is more efficiently spent trying to catch up," Suzaku replies instead. "In light of everything I'm being put through anyway, a little more personal comfort over the next week isn't that much of a sacrifice."

Suzaku peers at the next form down, and frowns. He then moves past it to the next one, and our expression deepens to a scowl. "…hey Gino, do you happen to know how these are organized?"

"As far as I know, Bradley only ever really had any kind of backlog like this after a vacation or extended combat deployment. They're probably just ordered by either the date submitted or by when they arrived in the mail."

"No consistent backlog, huh? Something tells me the sick bastard just immediately or auto-approved every execution asked of him, just for the satisfaction of taking someone's life," I all but spit. "In any case, this is bullshit. Can we get some people to help process all this and just sort through it by Area, prosecutorial district, and crime committed? I'll still look into and sign a judgment on every case myself, but I want to be consistent in making sure that similar crimes with similar circumstances are given similar punishments."

Gino nods, already pulling out his phone and dialing to make a call. "Sure thing, the local garrisons usually have a handful of people each on some kind of penal duty; it shouldn't be a problem to have them reassigned to a good day's secretarial labor. Since you're taking the job this seriously – and I applaud that – then am I right to expect you'd like an IT guy to crack open the Knight of Ten's official email and other online assets?"

Suzaku figuratively nudges me in the side before I can ask if that's an actual thing, and nods. "Whatever policies Bradley had in place, I expect that I'm not going to continue them. If there's a digital means of spreading the word quickly and efficiently, then I'd appreciate you making it available to me."

As he helps Suzaku get a feel for the paperwork of the Rounds, Gino carefully considers his new peer in the back of his mind.

According to the combat recordings from his duel with his predecessor, Bradley compared this guy to a wild beast pulling at his leash. Earlier, watching Suzaku's interactions with Bismarck and Dorothea, I could see it. But right now, he's… understandably not exactly relaxed, but at least in a state of relative calm. Like the quiet that comes after a bomb's gone off, or the sea after a hurricane's dispersed… and here we are, picking up the pieces left in the wake of his disaster.

"You're not what I would've expected, you know?"

Suzaku, having cleared off enough desk space to sit down and do some actual work on it, doesn't look up. "I'm the surviving orphan of a murdered head of state, lived through an invasion and annexation by a hostile country, and both my birth nation and my adopted one respectively treat me like garbage at best. Dare I ask what, exactly, you expected?"

The words are harsh, but Gino looks quickly enough to catch a smirk behind them. Like it's all some sick and twisted joke he's long since gotten used to.

The question feels legitimate, though, and Gino is surprised to realize that he doesn't have an answer. "I… don't really know," the blonde admits. "But whatever it was, you're sure not it."

"Is that a problem?"

Suzaku's hands don't stop moving, but his gaze flickers to Gino, cool and ready to judge. Like the proverbial bomb having its parts brought together for reassembly, a stage or two before rearming.

"Nah. I like my friends to be surprising, it keeps life interesting!"

A pause. The confident, almost smug grin from earlier breaks down and turns sheepish, before Suzaku stops altogether and scratches his head. "…please excuse me if it takes a while before I get used to hearing that."

"Heh! I could say it a lot to make you get used to it quicker, but we've still got a lot of work to do and I can tell you don't like being embarrassed."

"Hmph. I appreciate that."

Just like I figured! He's not that different from the tsundere girls in those imported comics I used to read!

The pair continue, until the office phone starts ringing on the desk. It takes a few seconds of shuffling stacks of papers to uncover it, and Suzaku picks up with a soft curse on realizing that it doesn't have a caller ID function. "Knight of Ten's office. What do you need? …yes, what you've heard seems to be true. This is Suzaku Kururugi, not Luciano Bradley. …yes, I'd actually been hoping to discuss that matter with you as well. It seems I've inherited a lot of work to catch up on, though; would it be too out of bounds to ask if we have that meeting in my office – it's not unacceptable of me to ask, but you're still insisting on your office?"

A moment later, Suzaku leaned back in his chair and pinched his nose, while Gino stood up and stretched. From what he's said and how he's said it, I'm sure that's not Monica or Lord Waldstein… and Anya and Nonnette are supposed to be overseas right now… so at that rate, he's probably using that recklessly casual tone with –

"No, no, of course I'm not opposed to that! But given my inexperience with these spheres of influence, I'd hope you can understand that I don't know if I don't ask… No, I haven't been told of any other pressing business that should prevent me from seeing you today. At the very least, I doubt there's much the Rounds could want of me in terms of testing or training that I absolutely cannot possibly do elsewhere and on my own time with the right resources. …yes, I can and shall be en route in a few minutes, as soon as I get a guide – you're sending your aide to escort me? …as you like, Your Highness. Is there anything else you'd like to discuss now? No? I'll see you shortly, then."

With deliberate calmness, Suzaku carefully hangs up the phone. And then slumps forward, carelessly letting his head hit the desk in front of him with a groan.

"Let me guess," Gino asks. "The Prime Minister?"

"Got it in one," comes the muffled reply. "I'm pretty reliant on his KMF and engineering team, which is awkward now that I've been promoted out of being his gainfully-employed test pilot. So I need to go have a chat with Schneizel and discuss what's going to happen with ASEEC and its assets."

"You know, being as casual as you have been with people as powerful as live here in the capital is going to haunt you at some point. I'm not that worried about it in my case, but you might consider being more diligent in the use of proper titles more often."

"Schneizel is my girlfriend's big brother, and Bismarck's just a worthless parasite I haven't the means to be rid of yet. That's not an excuse or a counterargument, just an explanation."

"You really hate the Knight of One, don't you?" Gino asked.

Suzaku sat back up and popped his neck. "I don't respect anyone who's a bigger hypocrite than I am. If we stay friends long enough for you to see what I mean, then you probably won't either."

Gino hummed and nodded, not entirely sure of how to respond to such a claim, before he realized with a start what else Suzaku had said just moments ago. "Hold on, back up a minute. You say Princess Euphemia's your girlfriend?!"

Suzaku barely turns from his prone position, lazily looking back at Gino with just one eye. "She seemed pretty insistent about wanting me to be her Knight of Honor, to the point of creating Celestial Being and putting me in charge of it just to make me more qualified and experienced for the first role."

"Look, man, you really need to be more subtle and cautious with what you say. The fact that you're a Number breaking into the Knights of the Round is already a big enough mark against you to a lot of people –"

"Ugh; yet something else I hate about society's upper classes," Suzaku growled as he sat up. "So many of you nobles and aristocrats are so rich and unaccustomed to putting in an honest day's work that you make up stupid word games to play instead of getting directly to the point – and then punish regular people for not being equipped enough to play ball when they've got more important things to do – like putting food on the table, or keeping the lights on."

Word games?! More important–?!

…no, well, when compared to a struggle for basic survival and quality of life, Gino supposed he could see where Suzaku was coming from. "I'm not saying you have to like it, just pointing out that you're going to make things harder on yourself if you're not a lot more careful. You've heard the saying, right? When in Rome–"

"Do as the Romans do. Must be nice and convenient to arbitrarily say that any new place you go to is an extension of Rome so you don't have to modify your behavior."

"That's–! …fair," Gino grumbled after a moment's reflection. "…what's that you're writing, Suzaku?"

"My first official orders as Knight of Ten, if you don't mind passing them along for me in case the IT person gets here while I'm meeting with the Prime Minister. Do I need to apply any kind of stamp or seal to give it the correct enforceable authority?"

As he asked, Suzaku passed the Knight of Three a memo, who let out a whistle as he looked over it. "You sure don't think small, do you? I can't say I disapprove… although if you want it to take effect before you're knighted by His Majesty, we're going to need a few of the other Rounds to sign off on this and apply their seals, since you don't have one of your own yet."

The brunette sighed, resting his head in his palm. "And I guess using Bradley's seal would be considered fraudulent?"

"Afraid so, buddy. I don't mind helping you out, but–"

"If you need someone else, then try asking Dorothea. Share with her my earlier theory about Bradley greenlighting executions just for the sake of killing people without regard for whether it's just or not; if she's half as honorable or decent as she tries to present herself, she can use this as a chance to put her money where her mouth is with regard to the strong looking after the weak. And if there's any kind of public impression that you two aren't exactly the best of buddies, then her agreement will probably carry more weight than that of another teenager like ourselves."

Gino read through the orders again. Then glanced at Suzaku, then back at the orders, before finally handing it back to him for signature. "You've been acting like a reckless, classless berserker for pretty much the whole day… but I guess you've got a clever side too, when you feel like using it. Or are you playing up the buffoonish commoner persona on purpose to make people underestimate you?"

A conflicted look came over Suzaku's face, before he spun around in his chair with a sigh. "I… wouldn't say I project the image on purpose. But I am at least self-aware enough to try and use it where I can."

A knock on the door precludes any further conversation. Suzaku stares at it expectantly, only for nothing to happen as a voice carries from the other side. "Excuse me, I'm here on behalf of the Prime Minister…?"

Gino coughs into his fist, at which Suzaku suddenly seems to jolt awake and stand up. "Er, yes! My apologies, come on in!"

The door opens, and a pleasantly smiling man with straight brown hair in a dapper aide's uniform steps inside. "A pleasure to make your acquaintance, My Lord. I am Kanon Maldini, an Earl in His Highness Prince Schneizel's service."

Suzaku is taken aback by the bow, and hurries to return it – defaulting in haste to his military salute. "Oh no, the pleasure's all mine. I'm Suzaku Kururugi, apparently the new Knight of Ten… but I would imagine you likely knew that already."

"Indeed I did," the Earl says as he straightens back up with a soft clap, smile firmly in place. "But I can hardly complain about such a to-the-point introduction! In that spirit, then: shall I escort you to the Prime Minister, Lord Kururugi?"

Before Suzaku can answer, Gino takes a step up. "Before that, do you mind if I have a brief word with my new colleague?"

"Not at all, Lord Weinberg! Please, take your time."

Permission received, Gino throws an arm over Suzaku's shoulders and drags him to a corner of the room. "What the hell is wrong with you," he hissed, "making an emissary of the Prime Minister wait on you like that?!"

"I'm not used to expecting privacy in my own spaces," Suzaku whispered in reply. "I seriously thought he'd just enter of his own initiative once he saw that the door was unlocked!"

"Civilian administration doesn't operate by the same customs and mores as the military!"

"I'm gonna refer you back to the first part of what I said; this time yesterday, I was only a Captain – and still not even used to that rank yet! And my experience with civilian administration isn't any kind of reliable context either, given… y'know…"

Gino stared down at Suzaku, before letting him go with a sigh. "Man…! You really are one of a kind, aren't you buddy?"

Area Eleven, Tokyo Settlement. Ashford University campus, ASEEC barracks.

While the social elites in Pendragon were preparing for afternoon tea, Earl Lloyd Asplund was merrily humming over his morning breakfast and waiting for a new arrival.

"You've been trying to dodge me for days," Elle huffed as she dashed into the impromptu kitchen. "I need to see your designs and research that went into developing the Lancelot's GT circuits so I can finish my project!"

"De-nied," Lloyd all but sang as he dug into a bowl of delicious pudding. "While the audacity of your plan is impressive, we don't have nearly enough data to confirm that GT can function as a stable power source in its own right. If it fails, your design will only amount to a very inspired and very expensive coffin."

Elle puffed out her cheeks in annoyance to keep from raising her voice in frustration, before letting it all out in a hot sigh. "Of course I know that – I'm not stupid, and more to the point, you know I'm not stupid. But I need to know how to make the circuits," she forced out with the kind of deliberate patience one might normally reserve for dealing with a small child. "So I can have the hardware ready as soon as possible after Suzakkun gets back. So we can reliably test it in controlled conditions here. And get enough data to determine how or even if it can be made suitable for live-fire combat."

Lloyd hummed as he slurped up his treat, nodding along without a care in the world. "Yes, yes, of course – but you seem to have studiously ignored the reality that he's probably a Knight of the Round now, and consequently won't have time enough to sit down and be our guinea pig for hours on end. And seeing as we don't have a suitable alternative test Devicer, I can't reasonably justify the expense in developing another GT unit – especially when it's an entirely new weapon design altogether – to His Highness."

Elle opened her mouth to argue again, but was cut off by a knocking on the locked door.

"Ah," Lloyd mused, "that will likely be Kururugi's replacement as a test pilot for standard development of Knightmare equipment. Be a dear and let her in, won't you Mariel?"

The redhead grit her teeth and growled, but schooled her features and stepped over to do so without a fight. Just before she reached the door, she looked back over her shoulder and asked, "…what's their clearance level?"

Lloyd beamed at his protege. "Not high enough that you can avoid changing the subject."

Elle twitched in annoyance, but refrained from making any noise about it lest the probably-innocent new transfer on the other side of the door get the wrong idea.

The door clicked open, and in stepped a cute girl around Suzaku's age with long flowing black hair and clear blue eyes like an afternoon sky. "Ensign Maya Garfield," she introduced with a salute so smart it could have been ripped straight from the regulations manual. "Reporting for duty."

A half-second later, her expression faltered at the sight of Lloyd happily chowing on snack food in the main office. "Err… have I gotten lost? I was told to meet an Earl Asplund, with the Advanced Special Envoy Engineering Corps…?"

"That's him and that's us alright," Elle sighed, closing the door behind Maya. "I have to admit though, you seem pretty young to be subbing in for piloting prodigy like Suzaku. Are you Closer to Eden too?"

Maya almost jumped back at the question, before bashfully scratching at her cheek. "Prodigy? Closer? Oh no, I don't know that I could say I'm anything as special as all that… I've been told my KMF performance in training was impressive, but it's hardly like I have the experience to assert that claim myself."

She's not just cute, Elle thought, narrowing her eyes, but the kind of beautiful that makes me think of how an anime main character would be designed. She wouldn't even be here if she weren't at the very least genuinely talented, but just like Suzaku she came out of seemingly nowhere…

"Have I… said or done something wrong?" Maya asked.

"Huh? Oh, no! Not at all! Don't mind me, I just had something silly on the brain. I'm Elle Lubie, welcome to the team!"

If Britannia's good at anything, it's probably making exceptional people stand out from those who aren't. Just because this girl's got the vibe of a mysterious transfer student doesn't mean I have a reason to be suspicious of her.

"Quite so," Lloyd agreed as he finished up and stood. "While my precious Lancelot is currently overseas, we do have a backup machine coming in today that should be capable enough to match its performance for most testing purposes – a special Sutherland customized and tuned up to the point that its performance far exceeds that of a Gloucester. Your first duty today will be going with us to pick it up at once, in case the Viceroy needs an emergency ace in the hole during her little shindig tonight."

Maya saluted again, only to stare in confusion when Lloyd turned to leave without even acknowledging it.

"Show Miss Garfield around and introduce her to the personnel that aren't off on vacation, won't you Mariel?"

Fresh from basic training but unsure of whether this qualified as a dismissal, Maya's wide pretty eyes darted between Lloyd's retreating back and Elle's exasperated sigh. "Erm…?"

Elle clapped her on the shoulder with an awkward smile. "Don't worry about it, we're normally pretty lax about those kinds of regulations and protocols here. We're pretty much on a first-name basis for the most part… you can take that to mean at ease, if you need to hear it out loud."

Maya relaxed with a nod, letting out a breath she hadn't entirely known she was holding. I expected everyone in the military to be really intense like General Darlton, but apparently that's not the case. At the very least, this girl seems friendly enough. "In that case, Elle… when Mr. Lloyd mentioned Her Highness and a… shindig, don't tell me he meant–?"

"The sakuradite distribution conference, yep. We're going to be standing by for security assistance in case some terrorist gets a bright idea."

Maya slightly turned away so Elle wouldn't be able to see how her eyes gleamed at the insight, even as the other girl turned towards the back exit to the room and waved her onward. "This way, Maya; first I'll introduce you to Viletta, Schnee, and Reed, and then we'll head for the garage so you can meet the mechanics on our way to the airport…"