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Well back at base (or in other, more accurate words, the warehouse at the edge of the Saitama ghetto where she and the rest of the Black Knights had been squatting for the past two weeks or so) Kallen pulled her battered old brick of a laptop out from under her bed; did a bit of an acrobatic maneuver (very smooth, if she dared say so herself) to get the other end of the power cord into the wall outlet, then she parked her butt on the covers, shoved her pillow behind her back, and powered it on.
It wasn’t the first time that Kallen had been happy she was something of a big shot in the organization. Even in these days of running and hiding she was proud of it; of what she’d helped to accomplish, of her prowess in a Knightmare, and of the trust she’d been given by her comrades and their mysterious masked leader. (Well, not so mysterious nowadays – not to her at least. Still.) Right now, though, she was mostly just pleased that she was one of the few people who got to have a room of their own.
Not that it was anything to write home about – especially not compared to the primped-up lifestyle of the Stadtfeld-heiress; four bare white walls, a plywood desk with an empty vase on it, her plank of a bed, and the pervasive smell of new paint and rusty metal. The Pendragon Imperial Palace, it was not. Still, no point complaining about the living situations; with how long they’d stayed already, and especially considering today’s catch, tomorrow would no doubt be another move day. Besides, all she was looking for right now was a bit of privacy, and for that this bland little box did the trick just fine.
The laptop (which was so old it needed to be plugged in at all times – thank god they’d managed to wire electricity into this place) rattled to life, and Kallen sat there for a second, fingers hovering over the keys, cursor locked and loaded into the search bar.
It was kind of rude, wasn’t it, what she was planning on doing? He was out there right now, probably getting the ol’ sit-rep from C.C. or Urabe or someone. She could just go ask him. Yeah. Like he’d answer her.
Kallen snorted, and started typing.
A simple three-word search brought up – a whole lot of results. Too many, too mainstream, too normal, quite frankly, to be anything but a real name for a real prince. (At least she got the royal particle right. She hadn’t been a hundred percent on what she’d heard; for all she’d known it could have been a ‘ri’, or a ‘bi’, but she got it in one.) It was – honestly, the sheer amount of information was kind of overwhelming.
At a quick scroll she was looking at – a list of popular regal names from some baby name site (skip), some kind of professional page explaining the line of Britannian succession (maybe later), a magazine article about kids’ fashion through the decades (hard pass), an op ed about Britannia’s treatment of Japan (interesting, but not right now), a listicle of dead royal kids (yikes), a Quora listing of someone asking if they’d found the body yet (very yikes), some sort of conspiracy forum with a long discussion about how exactly he had faked his death and was secretly living in hiding right now (extremely yikes), along with several years of memorials and think pieces at the anniversary of the Japanese invasion (Seriously? This was what the Britannians thought about when they remembered what they did to Japan? What the hell!).
So yeah, it was kind of a lot. Made her feel a bit better about what she was doing though, that it was all so public. She probably could have known some of this from pure Britannian osmosis if she’d given a single shit about it. But this wealth of possibilities, ironically, brought its own issues with it. Namely, where the hell should she even start?
Actually, right at the top sat something very nice and familiar. The gleaming white sheen of a Wikipedia article; friend to all with a school paper to write or an idle question at four in the morning. And a wonderful jumping off point for any research project.
It was a short one, as far as wiki pages on royals went. An introductory paragraph, then a handful of sections on his life, his death and the resulting investigation, one on his ancestry, his titles, before the obligatory sources list. Perfect. Exactly what she’d been looking for. A nice little overview of the subject. But what caught Kallen’s eye first was no particular piece of text, but something entirely else. A picture.
Right there at the top, a well staged, clearly professionally shot, photograph of a boy in a garden. A dark-haired, fair-skinned boy in a splendid white frock coat with gold trimmings. Feeling a bit out of it, Kallen brought it up large, zoomed in on his face and – yes, there it was – it wasn’t a trick of the light, those eyes really were that remarkable, brilliant violet.
It was him. It was really him.
Kallen’s hand dropped away from the trackpad.
“Lelouch…”
“Ah yes, Lelouch vi Britannia,” Zero closed the door behind him with a click, only stopping to lock it before (an absolutely astonishing thing to watch the hero of the Japanese resistance do; Kallen couldn’t tell anyone about this, no one would believe her) plumping down on the bed beside her and scooting up to get a better view of her screen. “One of the Emperor’s lesser-known children, to be sure. Still, he was last seen in Japan; though as you’ve no doubt noticed, as far as any documentation is concerned, he is considered to be long since dead. Doing some research on our enemies are we? How very diligent of you.”
“Oh, come on Lelouch, lose the mask,” Kallen rapped her knuckles against it (the absolute, thrilling audacity of her today). “We both know you’re in there, and I’m not having this talk with Zero.”
A chuckle from inside the mask and then, with a click and a hiss, there he was. Like a magic trick. Never, ever, ever had it ceased to astonish her that there was an actual person inside that mask. Just a kid her own age, really. Goes to show why he needed it, no way she would implicitly follow the orders of some gangly half-grown high school student.
(An obvious and blatant lie. She’d seen what he looked like now, giving orders without the mask. The gleam of his eye, the daring quirk of his mouth. She would follow this half-grown high school student into the depths of hell itself if he asked her to.)
“You’re hardly in a position to bargain, Kallen,” Lelouch (and yes, even despite everything it still was and remained him) smirked. “After all, you’re the one who is sneaking off to read about someone else’s personal history. Some respect for privacy you seem to have.”
“It’s a Wikipedia page, Lelouch; it’s practically common knowledge. And there’s barely anything on it, anyway.”
“No, there wouldn’t be, would there?” Lelouch clicked out of the picture and did a cursory scroll down the page. “Not when he died so young. Hardly the most interesting of royal children to read up on, I should think. Even if he were alive today, he would only be – what? Seventeen? Eighteen? He wouldn’t even be out of school yet, hardly one to be making a big splash on the political stage.”
“Alright,” Kallen shoved at him (only lightly!), and he nearly toppled over entirely. Because this was Lelouch, and Lelouch was a twig. Was Kallen ever going to get used to this? “If you’re going to be like that then you can leave right now.”
“Oh? And here I thought you might appreciate some further professional insight.”
“’Professional’ my entire ass; but fine, if you want to talk then I want to listen. I would prefer to hear it from you anyway.”
She just – hadn’t trusted him to actually tell her anything.
But to Kallen’s complete and thorough surprise, Lelouch unhooked that large and imposing black cape, unbuttoned the blue-and-gold suit jacket, and tugged the rattling old laptop (growing hotter by the second, at least of the rest of the room was cold) to rest on one thigh each between them.
“Well, let’s see here…” Lelouch looked over the scant little article, before settling on the second and only other picture, this one placed next to a section titled ‘Life in Pendragon’.
As he brought it up large, Kallen was greeted by what was obviously a family photo. Three people in ridiculously fancy outfits against what looked to be the same garden as before. There was that boy again, this time in a white suit with black lapels and a white cravat (She glanced over to where Zero’s cravat laid against Lelouch’s throat. A connection? Couldn’t be.), a woman in a large blue gown with a kind expression, and a girl in a pink dress with lively blue eyes. In order: Lelouch, his mother, and –
“No,” Kallen barely recognized her, not like this, but – but it was the same sandy brown hair, the same fine cheekbones, the same little turn to her smile, and really, who else could it be? “That’s…”
“Nunnally…” there was such an expression on Lelouch’s face as Kallen had never seen before. Such a mixture of love and longing and sorrow and pain, as he brought a hand (still clad in all black) to trace the contours of her face. For a moment he seemed aware of nothing else, not even her presence beside him, then he blinked, once, twice, and his voice was steady. “Yes. Nunnally vi Britannia, Princess of the Empire, and 87th in line to the throne. Here depicted at the age of six, only four weeks away from the incident that would claim her mother’s life, along with both her sight and the use of her legs.”
“That was – that’s when she –” Kallen remembered having wondered a couple of times, if Nunnally’s disabilities were a result of birth of circumstance. She’d never considered actually asking, though. Besides, she was used to seeing that sort of thing. Came with living in a war zone. No one wanted to be asked why their kid was dealing with some issue or other, there was never a happy story there. “How? What –”
“The official story was that it was the work of terrorists,” Lelouch sounded like he was reading off a script; like he was doing some half-assed presentation on a dead royal for school. Except – except there was a coldness to his eye, too sharp and entirely too biting to be anything so blandly impersonal. “Ludicrous, of course. The Lady Marianne was an Empress, and in her home at that. There were no people in the world better protected against outside threats than her – save, perhaps, the Emperor himself. To anyone who gives it even a moment’s thought, this was an obvious case of assassination; no doubt aimed at the person of the Empress herself, and in which Princess Nunnally was no more than an incidental victim. Collateral damage, so to speak.”
Lelouch’s posture was ruler straight. His hands were balled in his lap, the leather of his gloves creaking. His eyes were hard, focused somewhere past the screen and into history.
“Considering the manner of attitudes that pervade the upper echelons of Britannian society, it should come as no surprise to you that this loss of physical ability de facto nullified any claim Princess Nunnally might ever have had to real power. In one fell swoop her future closed down upon her, rendering her essentially useless for any purpose the state might find in an Imperial Princess. In her state, she was not even fit to be married off for political gain. Not that it mattered much in the end, as she too was lost along with her brother in the capture of Area 11.”
Kallen looked at the little family in the picture, at the girl with the pink dress and the sparkling blue eyes, standing proudly at her mother’s side.
“She looks happy,” she said. It was true. The mother and brother looked perfectly pleasant too, but the six-year-old Nunnally was practically glowing with vivacity and life. “In the picture. You – you all do.”
“Yes,” a minute slump to Lelouch’s shoulders, his hands relaxing in his lap. “At the time depicted, there would have been no reason for them not to be. Save, of course, the tedium they’ve endured posing for the painting for the past hour or so. I believe the scene devolved into the princess stealing her mother’s hat. I suppose they ought to be grateful Clovis had the grace to depict them in the time before that incident.”
“Clovis?” Like former viceroy Clovis? Shot-by-Zero Clovis? That one? Also, “Wait – painting?”
She hadn’t even noticed, the screen resolution had been too poor, but looking closer it was obvious that what she’d been studying had indeed been a god damn oil painting. What the fuck.
“Clovis la Britannia, 3rd Prince of the Empire, former viceroy of Area 11, and indeed the first true victim of Zero,” a turn to Lelouch’s mouth. “He made a series of sketches of this painting while Lady Marianne and her family were living in Pendragon, but I believe he never finished it until well into his time as viceroy.”
The man who had painted this had been Britannia’s mouthpiece in Japan for most of her time fighting against it; the very epitome of its tyranny and excesses, a far more personal villain for her than the distant and scornful Emperor had ever been.
Clovis la Britannia, decadent, simpering, deceitful, and callous. The man who had personally ordered her own death, along with her whole resistance cell and the entirety of Shinjuku ghetto. Lelouch’s half-brother. His first true victim.
“Have you ever seen it in person?” Kallen asked.
“No. Not the finished product, at any rate. It’s not displayed for the public,” Lelouch smiled. “Besides, I find the idea of placing myself in close proximity to it alongside strangers – less than appealing. I’m sure you understand.”
“Tch,” Kallen waved a hand in the air. “You know what they would say if you did? ‘Wow, you sure look a lot like that boy in the picture, that’s cool.’ It’s either that or fuck all, because no one would give a shit if you’ve got a few features in common.”
“Well, you can never be too careful.”
“Paranoid bastard,” Kallen shook her head. “So? Weren’t you going to introduce me to the rest of the family? Come on, tell me about the woman – the mom. Who’s she?”
“I could ask you the same question. Do you know anything about her?”
“No. Should I?”
“I thought you might; after all, you are something of a successor of hers.”
“I’m what now?”
“Hm… Here we are,” Lelouch clicked out of the picture and onto a hyperlink, taking him to a different wiki page, this one substantially longer and with quite a few sections and subsections. “Lady Marianne vi Britannia, the Commoner Empress; also known as ‘Marianne the Flash’ a nickname gained in her youth, from her time as what is widely considered to be the finest Knightmare pilot of her generation.”
“What? Seriously?” Lelouch’s mom had been an ace Knightmare pilot? Wait – “No, fuck, I have heard of her!” She might not have given a single shit about royalty, but Knightmares on the other hand – “She was running one back in the prototype days! Back when Knightmares were just being tested out for real combat. She was like half the reason they were proved to be viable in the first place!”
She had been something of a hero of Kallen’s for a hot second – a female Knightmare pilot, pioneering the field with her remarkable speed and agility, even in those old and clunky electrical frames, back before they’d started using Sakuradite as their main power source. So yeah, there had been a time when she’d thought that lady devicer (whose name had just straight up slipped her mind – but to be fair, she hadn’t thought of her since she was like fourteen) and been pretty cool – right up until she’d remembered that her help popularizing the Knightmare frame had led directly to the Japanese invasion, and from there to her own and her people’s current situation, and that had sort of soured the whole thing for her.
“I never knew she became an Empress…”
“Well, it was all rather unconventional,” Lelouch looked at the picture of his mother, once again shown in that fine blue dress, with undisguised affection. “She was dubbed Knight of Honor for her deeds on the battlefield, but she held no titles by birth.
“From what I understand, she caught the Emperor’s eye back when he was still a prince, out on campaign in – oh, it must have been Area 8 back then. With her skills in combat, she quickly became his trump card – and a close confidant, no doubt. After all, he married her almost immediately upon their returning to the capital, and they eventually came to have not one but two children of their own. It’s all quite romantic – and surprisingly meritocratic for Britannia, don’t you think?”
That all sounded – oh god damn it.
There was a flock of butterflies having taken up residence in Kallen’s stomach since – fuck, since a long time ago, how long exactly didn’t bear thinking about. They tended to act up around Zero and Zero-related situations, often at the worst possible times and in the worst possible ways. Like right the fuck now. A commander and his ace falling in love on the battlefield…
The Emperor and his pet Knight. Yeah, that took the wind out of those sails pretty damn quick. What the actual hell was wrong with her?
Kallen dared a peek at Lelouch, sitting stock still and very straight at her side. Despite the words he had said, which by all rights had sounded like they ought to have been delivered with some warmth, there was nothing of the sort to be found in his expression. Instead, what she saw on his face was nothing but a frozen, implacable mask of pure and perfect contempt.
Tension broke, and he looked to her with a smile.
“Hey, you know the old Knightmare they have at Ashford Academy?”
“Uh,” a quick adjustment to the change of topic. “The one we used to make the giant pizza?”
“That’s the one,” Lelouch scrolled down a bit and brought up another picture. “Take a look at this.”
There was Lady Marianne again, this time wearing what looked to be perhaps an older version of the uniform of a Knight of the Round. Her posture was straight, confident, and with a quirk to her mouth that looked a whole lot like the one the guy sitting next to Kallen was wearing right now. And beside her, a large blue-and-white creature of sheet metal and glass, far spindlier than the frames she was used to, but unmistakably –
“That’s it!”
“The Ganymede,” Lelouch nodded. “A rather unorthodox design, scrapped with the death of its star pilot. Still works well enough for pizza baking though, so it seems.”
“Yeah, I don’t know about that – we never actually did get a pizza out of it.”
“Outside interference,” Lelouch waved it away. “Unforeseen circumstances. You can’t blame that on the machine, it performed its function precisely as intended.”
“You know,” Kallen crossed her arms smugly. “You are allowed to blame piloting error. Suzaku messed up, and you know it.”
“Oh?” Lelouch smirked. “You think you can do better?”
“I know I can do better. No contest! I’ve never lost to him in a Knightmare fight, and I never will!”
“Well,” Lelouch turned to face her, lounging on one arm, eyes twinkling with mischief. “You’ve got a lot of raw power, that’s true; but you have to admit, in a battle of maneuverability it’s not so clear cut as that. You can’t just Wave Surger a pizza into submission, you’ve got to have that –” Lelouch flicked a fine-boned hand in the air, twirling his fingers. “– fine instinct.”
“Hey!” Kallen jabbed a finger in Lelouch’s feline smirking face. “Who among us is it who fights with their bare hands? Hm? That guy uses swords and shit! Guns! Who here is it who goes –” She mimicked the overhead lunge of the Guren, clamping down on the death grip that sends her poor, foolish, imaginary enemy buckling and boiling. “– right for the throat!”
“Right, right,” Lelouch was still smiling, and maybe it was the butterflies, but there was definitely something fond in the way he shook his head. “I have no doubt it would be a battle to behold. I keep you on staff for good reason, after all.”
“And I have more experience in older frames,” Kallen puffed up her chest. “Yeah, no contest! And don’t you forget it.”
“That would be rather hypocritical of me. Lest you forget, I was the one who insisted on you having the Guren, and over your own protests at that. To not have you in our best frame would be a frankly embarrassing waste of valuable resources,” Lelouch – no, this was Zero – was looking at her, and behind the mask there was real approval in his eyes, real warmth in his voice. Kallen’s insect-inflicted gastrointestinal issues were getting worse by the second. “Never mind that I myself am only an unremarkable devicer at best.”
“Yeah, for such a big brain player you’re not much of a fighter, are you?” Kallen smirked.
“I don’t need to be, now do I. I have you for that.”
And god damn it if that didn’t set the already agitated flappy infestation into an uproar.
“Yeah, of course you do,” She was blushing, wasn’t she? She was definitely blushing. Fucking shit, was he doing this on purpose? He was looking distressingly pleased with himself. “But you know, I can’t always be there to save your hide for you. Wouldn’t hurt for you to join me in the simulators some time; who knows, maybe I could even teach you a few tricks?”
“And let the new recruits watch you trounce me in a fight?” Lelouch’s eyes were sparkling with mirth. “I do want them to actually trust me on the battlefield, you know. And I’m not that bad either, it’s just a matter of comparison. Most everyone look like children in bumper cars when fighting you, it just so happens I’m no exception. However, need I remind you; plain tactics are no match for proper strategy. Rest assured that, should it come down to it, I am as well versed in your fighting capabilities as I ever was when we outmaneuvered the Lancelot.”
“Yeah, yeah, whatever you say,” Kallen leaned back, propping herself up on her hands. “Actually, come to think of it, how did you get that Knightmare training of yours?”
“Believe it or not Kallen, but I do use those simulators as well on occasion.”
“No, no, before that. The first time,” She furrowed her brow. “We all kind of assumed you had some prior experience in the business, but you really were just a student back then, huh? That time in Shinjuku. How in the hell did you know how to pilot your Knightmare in the first place? Or – wait, did you make someone drive you around with that –”
She gestured vaguely to his eye. To the power Suzaku had alluded to and C.C. explained, and she still had a hard time believing was actually real. But Lelouch just smirked.
“No, no, I did have some proper practice, even back then,” he said. “In that very thing, in fact.”
He gestured to the screen, at his mother and her strange old Knightmare.
“Milly enjoys bringing it out of storage for events, and I suppose someone had to do the honors of piloting it. I was as good a choice as anyone – at least until we got our hands on Imperial Ace Kururugi Suzaku.”
“Seriously?”
“Deadly,” Lelouch’s smile turned wry. “Milly thought it was hilarious. Very ironic, me taking the Flash’s old model out for a leisurely stroll every festival season.”
“Milly?” Kallen frowned. Then, “No! She knows?”
“But of course,” Lelouch’s eyebrows flew up, but then he shook his head and chuckled. “Oh, but why would you know that. Here, let me see…”
He backed out to the main text of the page, skimming paragraphs until he found what he was looking for.
“‘…due to their involvement in the production of her signature frame,[164] the Ganymede, through the eponymous Ashford Foundation. The Ashford family itself, having supported her rise from simple Knightmare pilot through Knight of the Realm, found the zenith of their influence under her tenure as Empress.[165] After her tragic death their star once again waned,[165][166] and soon they left Pendragon entirely for the at the time newly established region of Area 11.[167] There, remnants can be found to this day, heading up the foremost school of the area,[citation needed] Ashford Academy…’”
“Oh,” Kallen blinked. “Huh. That’s – that’s why you’re living like you do? They, what, took you in?”
“After the war, yes,” Lelouch looked solemn, but not sad. “A kind deed. A noble one, ironically. Certainly, they would have had a lot to gain from handing a pair of lost royal children back to the homeland.”
“After the war…” Kallen frowned. “I’ve – yeah, I’ve kind of been wondering about that. How – when did you end up here, in Japan? If you don’t mind me asking.”
“Ah yes, a very good question. One that, it just so happens, leads us neatly back to the heart of this matter.”
Lelouch clicked out of Lady Marianne’s article and back on the page they were on before. His page. He brought up the first picture, the one of the boy in the garden; Kallen noticed now that he was holding something, a pair of flowers – red roses. She looked over to Lelouch, who was studying the picture as well, face impassive.
“Lelouch vi Britannia. 11th Prince of the Empire and 17th in line to the throne. Or, he would have been, had he not renounced his claim at the age of ten, in connection with the incident that took his mother’s life and rendered his sister permanently disabled. Though I suspect –” Lelouch took a quick look at the (alarmingly elaborate) list of titles. “As I thought, that is not mentioned here. In all likelihood, his abdication from the line of succession was never formally recognized. After all, it would have been something of an obstacle to the purpose he and his sister were subsequently put to.”
“Purpose?” Kallen really didn’t like the cold, stony expression having fallen over Lelouch’s face like a cloak.
“At the time, as I’m sure you’re aware, the Empire of Britannia and the nation of Japan were deep in negotiations over the allocation of Sakuradite. The resource had long been a topic of geopolitical interest, but with the recent development of the Knightmare frame from a mere futuristic novelty into what was increasingly looking to become a staple of modern warfare, Sakuradite’s crucial role as a power source turned the material from a commodity to a necessity – especially in the eyes of the Empire, which had not seen a full year of peace since before the relocation to the homeland.
“Now, as you may well imagine, two children of ten and seven have, let us say, a limited sway over these types of diplomatic engagements. Still, be these two children a pureblooded prince and princess, their value comes not from anything they might say or do, but in the symbolic significance of their delivery to the enemy leader, and the tacit implication of what fate might befall them, were peaceful negotiations be abandoned and both parties to resort to force of arms. In short, the pair were sent to Japan as hostages.”
“Hostages?” Kallen felt shaky, brimming with sympathetic outrage for that pampered little Brit kid in his fancy white frock coat – and for the young man beside her as well, still looking straight ahead, face carefully blank and voice absolutely bloodless. “You were –? And Nunnally too?”
Not even fit to be married off for political gain. That was what Lelouch had said before, hadn’t he? No doubt quoting straight from the mouth of some scheming toad of a noble or other.
“But there was still a war! I mean – we didn’t even start it! Britannia attacked us first!”
“That they did,” Lelouch nodded. “After all, hostages are only as valuable as they are cared for. It was a very clever move. Very tactical. Well befitting a man claiming dominion over a third of the world. I have no doubt Prime Minister Kururugi knew exactly how much – or how little, as the case may be – the pair of pawns he had received were worth. Still, he was honor bound to act as though they were of some use to him, at least in public. Couldn’t well intimate that the Emperor didn’t even care for his own children.”
Kallen was abruptly reminded of her own father; a man she had not seen for going on two years now, and still could not find herself missing. A distant, stoic figure; presence not so much seen as felt in the shadow cast over the inhabitants of his household, even as he himself was back in the homeland. Her stepmother, with all her arrogance and pride, could do nothing but bend to his will. Her mother had broken by it. He may have loved her once, but not enough to keep her once a more advantageous match had appeared, and certainly not to bother with any kids until it turned out his more politically useful wife had been barren, and he needed an heir who could pass as Britannian.
A harsh, remote overlord, bearing his all-powerful decrees over people he never even deigned to see. Britannia, in all its foul glory.
Yeah. She got it.
“Suzaku too, huh,” she said instead, bumping Lelouch gently with her shoulder. (He only flailed a little bit. Good for him.) Really, she would have liked to hug him right about now, if she wasn’t sure he wouldn’t accept it. “What, did the whole Student Council know you were a secret prince except for me?”
“Well, we’re coming up on half of it now,” it’s a wonder to see the ice on Lelouch’s face thaw, if only by a degree. The mere fraction his mouth quirked upwards was a miracle of its own.
“But I’m not sure if Suzaku should count. After all, he was only on the Council because we’re old friends; I was the one who invited him,” his face fell. “My first friend. He never knew me as anything but that boy; he had to relearn how to treat me after we’d met at Ashford. We’d both changed so much, even as we’d just found each other again. I wonder, were we ever really friends? Or were we just playing at it? Just going through the motions of friendship, both too stubborn to admit it was long since dead and gone and rotted into nothingness. Well, Suzaku, see where that gets us now…!”
And there was that rage Kallen had been expecting when Suzaku had first been mentioned. It was coming off Lelouch in waves; thick pulses like a deep, rolling bass she could feel in the back of her teeth. And of course, she knew why. The memory of Kamine was as fresh to her as it must have been for him. She had no idea what happened after she left (after she abandoned him), but she had a sudden, violent sense, right then, that she was far better off not knowing. There was a cold flame in those violet eyes. Whatever it was, it had been nothing pretty.
“Hey,” she said, and she dared put a hand on his forearm. He startled at that, just a little bit, like he’d forgotten she was there in the first place. “So… Let’s see, who have we got left? Rivalz, Shirley, Nina, none of them know, right? Okay, so who do you think we should be inducting into the secret prince club next?”
Lelouch blinked a few times, gaze refocusing on the present. Then he cocked his head, considering.
“Shirley,” he concluded.
The butterflies did some sort of weird threat display at that, puffing up their wings and waving them around. Dumb shit. And so not the time for it.
“Oh? Why?”
His face was still so damn serious.
“She deserves it. I’ve already put her through so much.”
Ah. Her father. And what an asshole Kallen was, that hearing that was what calmed the butterflies down. However, all this sad stuff was entirely counterproductive to the thing she was trying to achieve here.
“Come on,” she said. “And it’s not because it would be funny as shit to see how she’d react?”
Lelouch’s eyebrows rose.
“Do you think so?”
“Are you kidding me?” Kallen snorted. “It would be hilarious! She’d never see it coming. Not in a million years. She’d have an aneurysm. Or faint. Just – poof! Out like a light on the spot. Or swoon –oh, I bet she’d be the type to swoon,” she put a dainty hand against her forehead and sagged against Lelouch. “Oh, my sweet baby Lulu, a prince! Why, I simply cannot believe it!”
“Stop it,” Lelouch shoved at her. (Well, more like patted her, but hell, he was trying.)
“You know I’m right,” she relented, graciously allowing him his shoulder back.
“Well, I don’t know,” and would you look at that, there was a smile tugging at Lelouch’s lips. Score one for Kallen. “I understand I’m considered to have something of a ‘regal charm’, or at least Milly’s relayed as much. You don’t think she might suspect already?”
Oh, that asshole. Kallen had definitely heard that said in the girls’ locker room. She’d never gotten the appeal herself. Lelouch had always seemed way too prissy, and those girls fawning over him way too vapid. Who’d be interested in some limp-wristed do-nothing of a Brit boy, who just sat on the sidelines, smugly judging everyone who tried to make a real difference in the world? Those girls, talking about ‘regal charm’ like being resembling royalty was in any way a positive thing. Kallen would rather make out with an actual toad. Well, that was egg on her face now, she supposed. Though she still couldn’t imagine herself being into that Lamperouge kid – just turned out he wasn’t all that into himself either.
“Oh, don’t hype yourself up about it,” Kallen said. “Or they might start calling you ‘your Highness’ in the bathrooms.”
Lelouch shuddered.
“Please, don’t even joke about that.”
“And why not, your Highness?” Kallen leaned in, smirking as Lelouch tried to dodge away. “That is your title, isn’t it? Since it’s never been – oh, what was it? – officially given up?”
“Kallen, few things in my life have sounded as wrong as you calling me that, even as a joke. I would order you to stop, but at this rate I suspect it would only encourage you further.”
“Ha! You got that right,” Kallen leaned back, smug in her victory. “Speaking of – you know who would call you ‘your Highness’ all the time, given the chance?”
“Who?”
“Rivalz. Obviously.”
“Oh, Rivalz,” Lelouch was very good at keeping the laughter out of his mouth, but it leaked out of his eyes. They were practically glittering. “He would, wouldn’t he.”
“Every chance he gets.”
“Do you think he’d be upset, me having kept it from him all this time?”
“Maybe for like a second, then he’d be too busy asking you about – I don’t know, what sort of dumb shit you had to wear as a kid? What the Emperor’s real hair looks like, what the stupidest thing you had to eat was, which one of your siblings was the worst in the morning? You know, he’s easygoing like that.”
“Yes, I know,” Lelouch was getting distracted again, voice going distant. “It’s one of his best qualities…”
“What?” Kallen was no idiot, she could see the gears turning in that head of his.
“Hm? Oh, I was just thinking –”
“Yeah thanks, I could see that –”
“Cornelia… I think.”
“What.”
“Yes,” Lelouch nodded. “Take it with a grain of salt, the information is several years old, and she was only a teenager at the time, but as far as I’m aware Princess Cornelia is – not a morning person. To say the least.”
“Oh,” huh. Well, “That’s one question, I guess. Get ready for a hundred more.”
“I’ll make sure to prepare a statement.”
“Okay, so,” Kallen said. “Shirley’s good, Rivalz’ good. No idea how Nina would take it though.”
“Hm,” his mirth ebbing out again. “I don’t imagine it would change too much for her. I understand – I understand she had a great fondness for Euphemia; no doubt it would only remind her of that. Perhaps… perhaps it’s for the best that she won’t find out.”
“Yeah, well…” Kallen didn’t even know where to start with that one. The Massacre Princess was Lelouch’s – was Zero’s – half-sister. The puppet princess who had hidden her cruelty behind a smile and betrayed them all. And Lelouch had shot her. Perhaps he had a right to sound so somber when he spoke of her; even after Clovis, that couldn’t have been an easy thing to do. Even though she’d deserved it. Every bit of it.
“And you?” Lelouch turned to her and, even wearing Zero’s iconic outfit, blue and gold and cravat and all, he looked more than ever like the Lelouch Lamperouge she had chatted with on a bench, some months and half a lifetime ago. “How’s Kouzuki Kallen taking all this?”
“Me?” Kallen frowned. Paused. Actually thought about it. “I don’t know. It’s fucking weird, let me tell you that. But – I mean, I found out you were Zero first. That was always the bigger deal. After that – well. Finding out you’re a secret prince, it – it doesn’t really compare? Don’t get me wrong, I get it’s a big deal, but it’s – it’s mostly about your past, right? It’s about your motivation, and your opinions, and maybe a bit about your goals, but mostly it’s like – I mean, it’s kind of cool? I guess? Almost like some TV drama – you, out to get revenge on your dad for fucking your family over when you were kids. All your secret identities. Identities! Plural! How do you have more than one secret identity! How do you even manage that? But yeah, it – I guess it just kind of makes sense? Makes me understand why you’re so hellbent on destroying Britannia, anyway. Makes you a bit more, I don’t know, human? Yeah. Yeah no, it’s cool.”
“Cool! Ha!” and Lelouch’s whole careful expression cracked open like his mask before Suzaku’s bullet, into a wide and entirely genuine grin, and then he was laughing. A whole, full-throated, right-from-the-belly laugh the like Kallen had never heard from Zero nor Lelouch Lamperouge but might be all Lelouch vi Britannia and had her face flaming and those traitor butterflies flapping up a storm.
“Cool! Oh, Kallen,” Lelouch was wiping away tears from his face, still shaking with bursts of uncontrolled laughter. “Never in my whole life –! Yes, I suppose it is rather cool. And to answer your question: with great difficulty. You cannot imagine how much trouble it is to keep three distinct yet overlapping identities straight at any given point. My god – do you remember the school festival? Before the Euphemia debacle, back in the storeroom?”
“No? Wait – yes! I ran into Ohgi while working the haunted house, and I was hiding him and his date when I ran into – you –” Kallen’s hand hit her forehead with a sharp slap. “Oh my god! This whole time!”
“Precisely! And then, of all people –”
“And then Suzaku turned up, and he already knew who I was, because of –”
“Because of the Kamine Island incident –”
“And you already knew that, of course! Because you were there too!”
“And it gets worse.”
“How!”
“The only reason I was there? I had to find somewhere to hide C.C.”
“No.”
“She was behind me, hiding around the corner the whole time.”
“No! No fucking way! I do not believe it!”
“She came for the giant pizza. That witch nearly blew the whole operation in search of a snack!”
“The whole goddamn time! What the actual fuck, Lelouch!”
“So, you may imagine I was feeling somewhat pressed at the time.”
“Yeah, no fucking kidding,” Kallen groaned. “Why the hell is it you have to make things so goddamn hard for yourself all the time!”
“I’m sorry?” Lelouch crossed his arms. “I was under the impression that both you and Ohgi were well aware of C.C.’s relation to Zero at the time, or am I mistaken?”
“Obviously,” Kallen crossed her arms right back. “And what about it?”
“What about – what about it? Kallen, if you – either of you, but you in particular since you’d already suspected me once – if you’d seen her with me then my identity would surely have been all but revealed!”
“Sure would have. I would have clocked you in a heartbeat,” Kallen looked at him defiantly. “But you know what? Maybe, just maybe, that wouldn’t have been the worst thing in the world.”
“Oh? Really now?”
“Yeah, you ever think of that? That maybe – get this – maybe it could even have been a good thing!”
“And how so, exactly?”
“Well shit, maybe then we wouldn’t have had to stumble over each other like drunk idiots in a dark back room, huh? Maybe we could even have coordinated something – you know, worked together? Like we’re supposed to?”
“Kallen,” Lelouch said.
“It’s not that hard you know, talking to people. I know you can do it – in fact, I see you do it all the time. Sometimes you even tell the truth.”
“Kallen.” Once again, same tone of voice. “You know why I couldn’t.”
“No,” she frowned. “I really, really don’t. Seriously, it would have helped a lot to have known. I won’t lie, I would have preferred if you’d told me, but just to have known, even like that, even by accident. Would have made me trust you, if nothing else.”
She thought of Kamine and what could have been, and wondered just how much of this feeling was anger about Lelouch, or guilt about herself.
“Think, Kallen. You have to remember; remember who you’re talking to.” Lelouch gestured at the computer screen, at the picture of a Britannian princeling in pristine white and gold. “That is who I am. I am Lelouch vi Britannia, son of 99th Emperor Charles zi Britannia and his wife Empress Marianne, the Eleventh Prince of the Empire.”
He picked up the mask of Zero, left beside him on the bed.
“This too is who I am. I am Zero, leader of the Black Knights and the symbol of Japanese resistance, the last hope of liberation from tyranny and despotism.”
He contemplated the blue glass of its surface, his own distorted reflection. Then he turned to her.
“What do you do when the truth is irreconcilable? What recourse is there, then, but to lie? Do you think either of these faces of mine a mask? Is Zero perhaps only a tool to cover for the revenge of the discarded prince? Or may it be the mask is the true face, Zero finally free to be himself under the cover of anonymity? Or what of your classmate, impotent and vapid, is he yet another shield, or is he the vulnerable core these masks seek to protect?
“If you believe any of these things, then you are mistaken. The truth is this: there is no one to find beneath the masks. Or, more accurately, the one you seek is the mask. They may all be lies, but I can assure you, I am not. And I am all of them and more; Prince and terrorist, royalty and rebel leader, the face of terror and tyranny and the knife in the back and the bolt from above that shall bring them all crashing back down to earth. I am no empty shell and no hollow mask, I am no mindless pawn nor willing vessel; I am the harbinger of the storm that is rising, and woe betide all who shall stand in my way.”
Lelouch was alive, burning from within, and that icy flame was ravenous, starving, sucking up all the oxygen in the room and Kallen could barely breathe, because this was the fire he was to unleash upon the world and god help her, but she was about to help him do it.
“And yet,” he said, eyes still locked on hers. There was something off about one, the thought. A discoloration; an odd, gleaming redness. She hadn’t noticed it before, his face in profile and no second eye to compare it to, but looking at it straight on there was no way to miss it. Was that it? The unholy power he had been granted to bend the minds of others to his will? Geass?
“And yet, these two halves of me, so integral to my very being, never must they ever come to meet. Could you imagine what would happen, were the Black Knights to find out their leader was not only Britannian, but Britannian royalty? Worse, if the world were to find out? Everything would crumble. This rebellion, the work of my life, made out to be some farce. Controlled opposition by the Empire, perhaps? Or an internal power struggle – yet another bid for the throne by an underdog prince. Do not mistake me, we are walking the edge of destruction, teetering on the line with naught but a single misstep between us and the twin abysses of death and ruination. With a life like mine, I can never be too careful.”
“But –” Kallen said. “But your past is why you fight. I mean, you if anyone have a good reason to be angry at Britannia.” She thought of her own father. “For you, it’s personal.”
“It’s always personal,” Lelouch drew himself up. He looked, for that moment, remarkably regal. “No one fights without personal motives. You yourself have your mother, do you not? Even those who claim to be fighting for high-minded ideals.” His gaze narrowed to cold disdain. “Even they have personal motivations driving them to what they do. No one is exempt from that, not one. We are all only skin and bone beneath our masks. Oh, but what masks we wear.” He tossed the face of Zero in the air and caught it as it came down. “There was a good reason, after all, that old man Kirihara urged you to trust me, even as he told you to let me keep mine on. And a very, very good reason why the front of it is made of glass.”
“Kirihara… you knew him, didn’t you? Or he knew you?”
“He was there when we were living with the Kururugi family. He saw it as you’ve come to, that my heritage makes me indeed a true enemy of Britannia.”
“Well.” Kallen leaned back against the wall, folding her arms behind her head, one leg up and bent to her and the other one dangling over the side of the bed. “I still think you should tell someone. Actually tell someone, that is; on purpose, and not just talk to me because I happened to be there when the mask came off and now you have no other option. Fine, I get why you’re not broadcasting it up and down the country – you do have one hell of a past – but at least tell some people. Ohgi, maybe Tohdoh – people you want to trust you. Show some faith, for once! Let us follow you, not just your miracles. We really do want to believe in you, you know, but you’re not exactly making it easy for us.”
“I don’t need you to believe in me.” Lelouch was frowning, expression shuttering by the second. “I need you to believe in Zero, and Zero is not who he is, but what he does. The less you know about me, the better.”
“Urgh, fine, whatever.” Kallen stretched, pointedly looking up at the ceiling. She knew a lost cause when she saw one. “Don’t say I didn’t warn you though. I won’t have you come crying to me when all your lies inevitably come crashing down upon you at the worst possible moment.”
“Oh, don’t worry,” Lelouch said, one frigid eyebrow raised. “I won’t.”
Kallen sighed.
“To be honest,” she said. An olive branch extended. “I’m surprised they haven’t already. The storeroom thing’s bad enough; you’ve been stacking this shit up high for a while now, your weird house of cards. It’s like you’ve been baiting the universe to come knock it all over from the start.”
“Well, you were always the worst of it,” Lelouch smirked. Truce accepted. “Most everyone else I was dealing with in purely one capacity – the possible exception perhaps being Suzaku. But you, I spoke to you regularly as both Zero the masked rebel leader and Lelouch Lamperouge the ordinary high school student. In group settings it wasn’t too difficult to keep the identities apart, but speaking to you one on one…”
A memory unlocked.
“You’ve used the Zero voice on me,” Kallen gaped. There was no exact situation coming to mind, just a general sense that there had been times when she’d talked to Lelouch and thought – just for a flash of a second, she’d been sure he’d been someone else. A sudden urge to stand to attention and follow orders. Her cheeks prickled with a blush.
“It’s been known to happen,” Lelouch looked away, scratching his cheek. He looked almost – embarrassed? “A few times.”
“A few?” Kallen leaned back in, she could sense when there was blood in the water. “Like when, exactly? Hm?”
“Most of the time, it was on accident,” Lelouch looked distinctly alarmed. Rightfully so, what the hell did he mean ‘most of the time’? “But, ah, turns out you’re rather more predisposed to do paperwork if it’s Zero who asks you – more than the Vice-President of the Student Council, at any rate.”
“Oh, you bastard!” Kallen lunged for him, laptop flying, and Lelouch (who, once again for the people in the back, was a twig) just yelped and scrambled away ineffectually as she clamped down on a headlock. “You think that’s funny, do you? Abusing your Zero powers to make you do busywork? Hm? Hm? Do you?”
“Oh, give it up, will you!” Lelouch was wheezing, shoving at her forearm with all the strength of a particularly irate moth. “I get it, I get it! Now let me go.”
“Ha! You know you can’t beat me in a fight,” Kallen considered flipping him over and putting him in a submission hold but, ah, this was Zero, even if it was also Lelouch. “And I’m not letting you go yet; not until you promise me, right now, not to use your special Zero privileges to make me do stupid Lelouch Lamperouge work – or Lelouch vi Britannia work for that matter. Got it?”
“I have special Zero privileges?”
“Dodging the issue, Lelouch,” Kallen tightened her grip and he gasped. “Now go ahead, I want to hear you say it.”
“I would, I would, if you’d just –” Lelouch tugged at her arm again, and she let up. “Thank you. Now, where were we?”
“No special privileges for you.”
“For me? But I thought you said –”
“For you, Lelouch. Not Zero.”
“Ah, but I told you, didn’t I?” Lelouch was straightening up his suit jacket, which admittedly did get a bit rumpled in the scuffle. “I am Zero. You might make a distinction there, but I do not. Quite frankly, you should be thankful I don’t have you disciplined for taking such liberties with the Black Knights’ beloved leader and commander-in-chief.”
“You wouldn’t dare,” Kallen smirked, crossing both her arms and her legs, taking up her space on the bed as Lelouch rose from it. “I know all your secrets now; you have to keep me on my good side.”
He turned at that, looking down over his shoulder at her, eyes half-lidded.
“All my secrets?” that little smile flickered back on. “Do you think so? Well, I won’t disabuse you of the notion.”
“You get back here –!”
“Ah,” Lelouch held out a hand and Kallen stopped dead. That motherfucker, one word about special Zero privileges and he – “Is that C.C. calling? Ah, that is too bad, but it seems our little conference has reached its end. Well then, if you’ll excuse me then I believe it is time I should take my leave.”
Lelouch was all done up again; buttoned to the nines, cloak and gloves and ruffled cravat all hooked and pinned and returned to their proper places. Only the mask left now, resting in the palm of his hand, ready to fall into place at a moment’s notice. Kallen realized that she’d never seen the back of it before. It didn’t look to be great for his field of view.
“Cool…” he murmured to himself. He shook his head, still lit by that secret little smile. Then he looked up at her. “It’s been a pleasure, speaking with you. Truly. I’m – glad, that I still have your allegiance, even considering the circumstances. Do come to me if you have any further questions; you know my door’s always open for you.”
Then, with a click and a hiss, there he was.
“Of course,” Kallen’s back was ramrod straight. “The pleasure’s all mine. It’s been an honor, Zero.”
He chuckled.
“Yes. Until next time then, Kallen.”
The rattle of the door unlocking, and he was gone again. Kallen’s head thumped against the wall.
She could see it out of the corner of her eye, sprawled out on her sheets where it had landed after having been so unceremoniously flung. Her laptop, still showing that bare little Wikipedia page and the photo of the boy with his roses.
“Keep going, hm?” she said to herself. There was still a lot more info out there if she wanted to read on, and it wasn’t even like he’d told her not to. Still, turned out she could just go ask him – and he actually might even answer her! What a concept.
There were actually quite a few things she’d very much like to ask him. Stuff that couldn’t be answered by a plain internet search, but that she felt she’d very much like to know. Like what he had been up to these past few months, how Nunnally was doing right now, what the plan was going forward, and what was that about the mind control power he apparently had – and had he ever used it on her?
Many good and well-founded questions that Lelouch clearly didn’t want to answer, and now that she was thinking about it, she hadn’t heard anyone calling for him at all, had she?
“Oh, you are just the worst,” she sighed. She’d like to pretend she was angry, but that would have been as much of a lie as any he’d told. “And you managed to get out of it without promising me anything, didn’t you?”
Always had to have the last word, even when he wasn’t in the room. Why the hell did she have to fall for such an infuriating dick of a man. Naoto would have had kittens. Actually, considering the guy in question was both an exiled prince and a rebel leader wanted for high treason, she was pretty sure everyone in her life would have kittens about him for one reason or another.
Kallen gave another just absolutely bottomless sigh.
“This is all going to come back to bite you in the ass some day,” she shook her head at the ceiling. And yeah, game set and match, the butterflies win. “I bet you know it too; better than me, probably. God, I hope we figure out what the fuck to do with ourselves before then, because if we don’t this is going to be such a shitshow.”
She stretched, let her back pop in three different places in a very satisfying way, and unplugged her laptop. That was enough sitting around, she had shit to do. Wars to win, revolutions to foment. Couldn’t let Lelouch get all the glory. Besides, it was a big job, and if he was going to do it then he would need all the help he could get. Empires didn’t just topple themselves, after all.