2024-02-07: Checkmate
- Log: Checkmate
- Cast: Nunnally Lamperouge, C.C., Lelouch Lamperouge, Cornelia li Britannia
- Where: Area 11 - Hotel in Shambles
- Date: 2024-02-07 (ICly June 0098)
- Summary: Cornelia finds her half-siblings, and enacts a plan to save them. Lelouch is cornered in his bolthole, and enacts a plan to save Nunnally. C.C. reacts to the situation, and Nunnally can't affect it at all. Zero abdicates -- and uses all his power to ensure it doesn't end in bloodshed today.
<Pose Tracker> Nunnally Lamperouge has posed.
It's an early dinner, tonight, because Nunnally's big brother has to head out afterwards -- she's assured he just has to do some late-night shopping, and she doesn't question that. "Oh!", she exclaims, as her spaghetti flicks from her fork to her cheek, "It's wriggling like a little snake...!"
And she laughs, as she pops the spaghetti into her mouth -- and smiles, self-effacing, after she feels for a napkin and wipes at her cheek. "Is there still sauce there?" She asks Lelouch, because she can't precisely check, even if she were to have a mirror.
Everything is calm -- and lovely.
Until.
"ALL RESIDENTS OF BLOCK 148 BUILDING 13 ARE TO VACATE IMMEDIATELY," a booming voice rocks through their hotel, carried through a Knightmare's speakers. "VACATE IN AN ORDERLY FASHION AND STAND READY FOR ASSESSMENT OUTSIDE THE BUILDING. DO NOT FLEE. ATTEMPTS TO FLEE WILL BE MET WITH FORCE."
Everyone in the rickety building heard that.
"B--big brother?" Nunnally asks, anxiety all wrapped in her voice and the crease of her brow, as she grasps the side of her wheelchair. "What's going on? Did someone do something wrong...?" Not them, certainly, but they've all heard the arguments which go on in these lodgings. Whether it's drugs or terrorist activity, it's not difficult to think that something is fishy, in Building 13.
And the people who have come to root out that evil are...
"Are you in danger?" You, Nunnally asks, turning to Lelouch's direction. Not her. "Big brother, what do we do?"
<Pose Tracker> C.C. has posed.
The whole point of holing up in these creaky tenements was for the police to have a harder time showing up, C.C. had always thought. If that were less of a factor, the witch was sure she'd live just fine schmoozing her and her companions' way into something more prestigious. That's the way it tends to go when she first arrives somewhere - holing up somewhere dingier and more crowded is a signal that maybe, her stay in Japan's nearer to its end than its beginning.
Climbing the stairs on the way back to the apartment, a bag with tomorrow's dinner in hand, C.C. muses to herself just what she's stuck with the Knights for so long about - if her own interest is waning, and if so, why it feels like she can't let this go. Is it the same dissatisfaction that kept her around the Geass Order for a little too long, just on the other foot?
Tucking her hair under her beret, fixing at her suspenders, C.C. has to look down at herself for a moment, realizing just how often she's been in this exact situation, and how often it's been followed by skipping town. At the same time as the Massacre Princess's tragedy symbolically attested to the justice of the Black Knights, it only led to a tighter crackdown from Britannia. The ascendant rebellion's neither overcome its oppressors nor crashed and burned - it's hit the modern stalemate of intractable grinding.
In the middle of such selfishly exhausted thoughts, though - that announcement reverberates through the building, and, hiding behind a corner of the stairwell's window, C.C. takes a peek out the glass, recoiling at the sight of Knightmare Frames surrounding the building. A click of her tongue follows her hastier ascent to Lelouch's apartment, her key rattling hastily at the doorway.
"I didn't see them when I was on my way back in," C.C. puffs out the moment she enters, setting down the food on a countertop and retrieving a satchel with far more important belongings in emergencies. "They must've swooped in a hurry. Where they're located covers all three of our escape routes, to say nothing of the only one that we could've realistically brought along Nunnally. If the evacuating crowd's big enough, maybe we blend in and slip away..." There's a frustration laced in her voice, but it's not raised all that much higher than her usual cool tones - the way C.C.'s mind is racing is only really visible from how she's rather in a rush organizing her essentials.
<Pose Tracker> Lelouch Lamperouge has posed.
It's a strange comfort. That's how he thinks about it; it's a strange comfort, one he was unfamiliar with. He isn't home often, but there is a place to call home, as uncomfortable and unfamiliar as that place is. Work always calls, but that's life, and...
"No, you got it." The portions and taste have gotten a little better, as he's learned to prepare this now-familiar dish. Gradually, it became less 'a cheap thing I can cook', and more 'the thing my little sister likes', and that's better. Maybe he hasn't actually learned to cook better at all, and it tastes better because of an association that simpl-
A dead stop freeze, and ice in the veins. She can't see it. She doesn't have to. "Stay there for a second." The chair scrapes across the ground as he shoves it out, and moves over to a window, peaking through the blinds. Is he in danger? His brain is scrambling. Was he caught? Did someone see him? Is this even for him? If it's basic Knightpolice - if it's no one special, just cops - then he can play this off. That's why he checks, to see what he's up against. To identify the foe. In the best case, it's just a standard shakedown by standard, poorly trained colonist forces. That would be the best, because he could just manage that. Dangerous, but not...
Not this. Teeth grit, he identifies royal guard forces. Cornelia is here. "I -" Is he in danger? "Everything will be okay, Nunnally. I'm going to take you outside." They can't hide. They'll search the structure, and will probably just shoot anyone they find inside. They need to leave. ... No one knows where they are, except C.C. Maybe, if he had more time, he could scramble a response team here, make some noise, and escape. If the square was guarded, it would be fine. It isn't.
"I'm going to get you ready." It'll be rushed, but he'll help her into her chair. "C.C., I'm glad you're here." He hates that she's talking like that in front of Nunnally. It says so much about - she isn't stupid. He, at least, tries to keep her distant. Maybe it works. He doesn't want to know, but if she just says all that, the illusion is impossible. Neither of them get to pretend if she says too much.
"I need you to take her out with the others. I'm going to - figure something out." What is there to figure out? This is it. ... No, that isn't true. That can't be true, because he's still Zero. There's still something. He just has to find it. There's more noise, behind Nunnally. A zipper. A click.
"Sorry."
<Pose Tracker> Cornelia li Britannia has posed.
BEFORE
THE AFTERMATH
<"ZERO! ZERO! ZERO!">
The chant fills the room that was once Euphemia li Britannia's living quarters, blasted throughout the painstakingly crafted acoustics of the room by way of television speakers broadcasting footage from the Special Administrative Zone.
Footage Britannia had used everything in their considerable means to try to suppress.
Footage of the newly-minted Massacre Princess, turning on all those who had her trust in the most horrific way possible.
The footage broadcasts to an empty room... save for the Massacre Princess' sister, sitting on the rug next to the crackling fireplace, eyes affixed on the ceiling with wide-eyed disbelief.
Cornelia li Britannia doesn't know how long she's been in this room -- in this spot, where she and Euphemia would so often sit next to the fire and talk to each other. She doesn't know how long she's been listening to the footage. Every time it reaches the end, it rewinds, looping back to the beginning.
In this moment, she doesn't know... anything. Doesn't feel -anything-.
Like a numbness creeping across the senses.
The tingling, unfeeling heat of grappling with something that can't possibly be real.
How long ago was it that she had sat with Euphy, right here, and just... talked? ... Too long. Too long.
And now there's no one here. Nothing. Nothing but that chant, repeated over and over, to keep her company.
<"ZERO! ZERO! ZERO!">
The question you need to ask yourself is not how to bring them home immediately, but whether they will be safer where they are... And, whether safety is the only goal you seek. 'Safety' is not the only human need, Princess.
<"ZERO! ZERO! ZERO!">
We both know what my true belief lies in. Not in the crown. I will pass up my chance, I will abdicate, if only to make the lives of so many that have suffered better. It won't be many people. It isn't much what we're doing for them. The reactions I've seen though... the people that are finding new joy, hope again in their lives, this is important.
<"ZERO! ZERO! ZERO!">
Since you can't overturn Schniezel, I had ... ... thought... perhaps too hopefully - that you would support me. That you could be there with me, on the day of this opening.
<"ZERO! ZERO! ZERO!">
She stares, unaware of anything, feeling nothing.
What remains, when your whole world has been stolen?
<"ZERO! ZERO! ZERO!">
Gloved fingers curl until they bite harshly into palms.
---
"We were too slow."
"Even though we've cut off the news being spread on the net, insurrections have begun to break out across Area 11! Counting betrayals by honorary Elevens, the Black Knights' strength are starting to soar, to say nothing of how this might galvanize the OCU and their allies to make moves of their own! Lord Guilford, we must do something now!"
"No! We cannot move without orders from her highness!"
"But sir! The Viceroy's been shut up in Princess Euphemia's room ever since she canceled the sub-viceroy's attack orders!"
"Not to mention we still can't confirm General Darlton's whereabouts! We--"
Within the war room at the Viceroy's villa in Nagoya, heated debate goes on, as it has in the chaotic days following the Special Administrative Zone's aftermath.
It is a debate abruptly ended as the doors crack open, ushering in the cold-eyed presence of Cornelia li Britannia in full regalia. Indigo eyes narrowed, jaw set, she looks the perfect picture of military severity she always has. Only those who know her could see how there is something missing that was there once before.
Guilford watches her for a moment, silent, but says nothing.
"So, in my absence you all have determined that the wisest course of actions was to twiddle your thumbs and lament your futures," observes Cornelia, her voice layered in frost. One of her advisors starts to speak; a single withering stare snuffs his voice out before Cornelia continues.
"Area 11 is to be placed under martial law, effective immediately. Nagoya will be locked down. If they wish to stain their hands with our royalty's blood, they will..." She hesitates a fraction of a second. Her jaw sets. "... they will know the cost. Send word to Pendragon; when reinforcements are mobilized, we will wipe out the Black Knights and every last person who has lent them a sympathetic ear."
A second passes. Her eyes narrow.
"You all know your duties. Go!"
The men and women of Cornelia's retinue all begin to scramble. Only Guilford lingers as Cornelia provides him a brief, indecipherable look. When all have left, she approaches, a hand touching to his shoulder.
"Guilford... my knight."
"Your highness, are you--"
"No," she cuts him off, immediately. "I need you to do something for me, Guilford. Something only you can do, for I need someone I know I can trust. There are two people living here in Nagoya. Two people very important to me.
"Find them for me, and tell me immediately when you do..."
NOW
WHAT REMAINS
Outside Building 13 on Block 148, Cornelia li Britannia stands, unassailably imperious.
To all who would look at her, this is the truth. She is as much Cornelia, the Witch of Britannia in this moment as she ever was. Her Knightmare Frame, the seventh generation Morgana, looms behind her like a symbol of her authority -- but she herself stands outside it, as if nothing in this city, in this world, could hurt her, whether in or out of her shield of steel and sakuradite.
It would be easy enough to assume that. To know the fear of her, to look at her.
To ignore the way her gloved hands are balled into fists of anxiety, how her jaw moves in subtle grinds with uncertain anticipation.
They have to be in here. They have to be.
A second passes, as she watches the building above. A frown creases purple lips, as she turns to Guilford at her side.
"If the residents are not evacuated within the next five minutes, you will take the building," she begins. "But you are -not- to shoot any of the residents. Seize them. Bring them to me. Understood?"
Guilford nods, a single time. Of course he does. He, more than anyone, understands the why of Cornelia's order -- the why of what they're doing here today.
"It shall be done, your highness."
Guilford leaves, to convey her orders. And Cornelia watches on, waiting.
Her hands tremble.
Sophia was wrong. Sayla was wrong. ... Euphy was wrong.
She has to find them. Find them and take them somewhere that no one can ever possibly hurt them, ever again.
<Pose Tracker> Nunnally Lamperouge has posed.
Nunnally loves that Lelouch puts in the effort, as much as she loves what comes of it. She's happy when he's able to spend dinner with her and make spaghetti, even in a situation like this.
But then, the situation --
"O--okay," Nunnally says, as she stays right where she is. Her head turns towards the familiar presence of C.C., though she can't see where she's come in. "It will be hard to blend in if I'm with you," she points out, entirely practically. "Maybe you should go on ahead... even if they're angry, they wouldn't shoot a blind Britannian girl in a wheelchair. I'll be okay!"
Would she? She sounds confident, at least.
She reaches up to latch onto Lelouch, as he transfers her from the dining chair into her chair -- and at least this way she can move, a little. She feels the tension, as she's moved from one place to another, and she worries for her brother. She smooths her dress out, on her lap, a frown on her face. There's nothing she can do but offer to take care of herself.
"C.C...?" Nunnally asks after her, Lelouch placing her in her care. "Ah --" A zipper, a clip, an apology -- "Big brother?"
"Big brother... we'll be okay," she offers him reassurance, even as she's helped out the door. All this time, she's worried about him.
There's only one elevator in the building -- and one they have to wait for, with everyone else trying to get out. There are stairs, of course. ... and they're stairs, which means that when the elevator doors open, the obvious course is to squeeze Nunnally's chair between four very nervous people. "I'm sorry," Nunnally says, hands clasping together. "Please excuse us..."
(Does C.C. ever notice the way Nunnally seems to know someone's there, even though she can't see them? Perhaps she noticed the dissatisfied grunts and shuffling. There's always an explanation.)
"It's going to be okay," she assures them -- and the quietly hurried C.C., who she looks back to address. "We're going to be okay." Somehow... she knows they're not going to shoot. Does she just have Euphemia's own faith in the world around her?
<Pose Tracker> C.C. has posed.
"I've got her, Lelouch," C.C. assures, tucking away a few important tools of the trade where few might look in baggier parts of her clothes, or into the lining of her hat...then, there's a few bulkier provisions they can't take with them anyway tucked into secretive little nooks in the apartment itself. Just in case they have to leave long-term, and just in case they wind up coming back here down the line. Contingencies piled upon contingencies.
And then, she finally guides Nunnally's wheelchair out the door, careful and practiced pushing it about by now. "...Part of me wants to carry you over a shoulder and move down the stairs, but I'm hardly that strong, and it'd be a little too rash. A fun change of pace for you, maybe, but this isn't the time for that, sadly." Even now, the witch can make a slightly smarmy little joke, though the terse circumstances cut her off from being too much of a brat about it all.
"...Don't do anything too rash. I know you're probably spinning with ideas on how to get out of this. I know you by now." C.C. cranes her head over her shoulder at Lelouch, her lip ever so faintly pressed tightly. "...I suppose it's a little pointless for me to tell you. You're running the numbers faster than I do. I've had to slip away a lot...but then, it's always been only me. I can afford to take risks when it's only myself on the line, but you can't let that happen here, huh...you have something more precious on the line."
And yet, it's C.C. who's been entrusted with Nunnally's care, and she doesn't wait to be polite or take her turn to get Nunnally in the elevator. Anyone who insists they're cutting in front of a girl in a wheelchair gets SERIOUS stink-eye from the witch, the kind that'd freeze anyone's blood solid.
...It's in trying times like these that every detail counts, and she absolutely senses that...resonance from Nunnally, the sense of threads reaching out, threads receiving. Even that gentle, warm faith in the world, despite everything, that Nunnally gives off - it's almost enough to reassure someone as jaded as C.C...
...almost.
There's a flash of remembered struggle across C.C.'s mind - echoes of all the times she herself has distinctly NOT been okay - all the times she has been shot at, all the times she has been detained, all the times she has rightly lost everything only to need to get back up, all emanating as a jumbled mass of resigned pessimism.
It's suppressed as quick as it comes. It's barely even noticed in C.C.'s face to others - she lost track of when she learned how to suppress ancient memories of pain whenever they push to the surface.
"...Nunnally, I got something new for the spaghetti tomorrow night. Want to guess what it might be?"
Something innocuous to drive past the gritty negativity. Something simple. Something to distract C.C. from how she's holding a precious life in her hands in a dire situation surrounded by dozens of hostile imperialists who may rightly have reason to shoot on sight.
When the elevator finally descends, C.C. carefully pushes into the clogged crowd of people exiting the cramped tenement doors, wincing whenever Nunnally's wheelchair catches on a ridge or a bump. Now's not the time for a disaster like that.
<Pose Tracker> Lelouch Lamperouge has posed.
Lelouch only exists as long as C.C. and Nunnally speak to him. As long as they acknowledge him and not Zero. But, for all C.C. says to him - he has almost nothing to say for himself. How can you have it both ways? How can it be - at the same time - 'don't do anything too rash', and 'even though you have something special'? Everything has been too rash. Ever since the very start. It'll get faster, too. Faster and worse and clumsier. This is as faster and worse and clumsier as it gets. It's his fault, again. Maybe he should've just revealed his hand. Put her somewhere actually safe, instead of this. This is the best he can do, so he can't say anything like how he'll be safe, or how he won't do anything crazy.
Instead, he says, "I won't be far." He wishes he said something else.
And then - that's all. Without Nunnally there, without C.C. to acknowledge him, then Lelouch can stop being there. In his place; a mask falls. Clicks into place. And, just like that, an illusion steps over Lelouch Lamperouge, and replaces him with the murderer of Euphemia. Just like that, gone.
Zero disappears into the 'backstage' of the building; the utility rooms, the back hallways, the isolated stairways, the prepared pathway to escape this building. C.C. said all that, but in reality? What can he possibly do here? Starting a riot might work, but if he did that, they'll open fire, and Nunnally might die. He can't risk it. The best he can think of is it wait until they find Nunnally, and then act.
He's desperate enough to do that. If they take Nunnally away, he might never see her again, so - he can't. He has to do something to stop it. Somehow. For now, he'll hide - a soldier is caught and told to pretend he isn't there, which is more effective than hiding for real.
Just wait for things to get worse. Just like always; wait for things to get worse, make things worse, then exploit it. As if he knows any other way.
<Pose Tracker> Cornelia li Britannia has posed.
Cornelia li Britannia's hand-chosen people are nothing if not efficient. It's to Lelouch's great fortune that they did not storm the building; all exits are covered, but at least within his impromptu prison, he has the faintest, slimmest amount of room to wiggle in.
To find something, anything he can do, when the mask is on.
Even with the mysterious absence of her general, Andreas Darlton, the Glaston Knights know what to do. The visored knights take point in dealing with the thronging mass of civilians who file out of the building, instructing subordinates to have them brought forth in an orderly line. No deviations; no breaking away.
There is at least one who tries to run, and earns the butt of a rifle to his face for the effort. The crack of metal on bone fills the air, the brief scent of blood. People shout, panic flares briefly.
<"REMAIN CALM,"> the voice over the loudspeaker booms in unerring repetition. <"DO NOT NOT FLEE. STAND READY FOR ASSESSMENT...">
The man who failed to flee is cuffed and dragged towards the Knightmare Frames, shouting something about Zero in fearful defiance as he goes until an officer's gloved palm cuts off his voice.
Cornelia pays him no mind. He isn't why she's here. That indigo gaze remains fixed straight forward as the Glaston Knights look over individual after individual, one after the other, in search of two, very specific people. They have descriptions to work with, and names, and little else. Through countless battles and iron-and-blood-forged trust, they've learned not to question too deeply.
One after the other, people are processed. They are looked over. Asked a name. And then escorted away.
Looked over. Name. Escorted. Looked over. Name. Escorted. Looked over...
Alfred Darlton pauses as he comes across a beret-wearing woman and her young, wheelchair-bound accompaniment. He blinks. He looks them over; behind his visor, his attention fixates wholly on Nunnally, a frown creasing his lips.
In the distance, Cornelia sees them. Indigo eyes widen.
Gloved hands open and seize in trembling realization.
"... Names?" Alfred asks, as Cornelia begins to slowly, tentatively approach.
As if every step was making the sight before her more real, more concrete, to a woman who desperately needs some sort of assurance that something... anything... remains to her.
"... Nunnally...?"
<Pose Tracker> Nunnally Lamperouge has posed.
Lelouch won't be far... and Nunnally can be seen clasping her hands to her heart, hearing that. "I know," she says, though perhaps she's too far into the hall to be heard.
But her big brother has always been beside her, in tragedies like this. She still remembers being carried on his back past what they all agreed was a garbage dump, after Britannia invaded Nagoya. Even before then, when they were sent to Japan... her big brother withstood so much just to bring groceries home to her.
(He's always eventually come home, even if he was late, sometimes.)
And then they're leaving, Nunnally reaches up, to place her hand over C.C.'s, on the handle of her chair. "Everything can get better," she says, and perhaps she doesn't even entirely absorb why she'd say it.
Like a gnarled mess of yarn which might have one day led her from the Labyrinth, all too tangled to serve as guidepost or aid.
No, the reason is obvious: they're in a stressful situation.
"Oh!" She exclaims, when C.C. engages her in a guessing game. And she smiles, because of course she smiles, as she says: "I bet... it's... Tabasco sauce? Like how the Japanese do it!" Of course Nunnally knows about Naporitan; she learned a lot from Suzaku, when they all lived together.
She doesn't complain, when they go over those bumps. She holds onto the armrests of her chair, instead, to keep herself there and make sure she's no trouble for C.C.
"Um..." Her hands clasp in her lap, as they're ushered outside with the crowd. (Too many people, for a building of this size. If there were a fire --) She can hear the fearful cries of that man, and she can hear the murmurs of everyone around her, but she can't quite see the way those soldiers are walking up until their footsteps get close enough for her to hear.
Their names...
"... Lamperouge," Nunnally says, politely, and practiced. "I'm --" Nunnally, a thing both voiced and expressed, before she can offer it herself.
Her head lifts, as her face turns towards the sound of Cornelia's voice. "Big sister Cornelia!" She exclaims, and -- "What a relief! Yes, it's me! We didn't do anything wrong, so please let everyone go, okay?" -- she's glad to hear her.
She's glad to hear her, and she wants to help these people.
Little sisters, it seems, are very much like that.
<Pose Tracker> C.C. has posed.
"Cetra Clearbell," C.C. easily lies to Alfred - the name she's been using lately to more or less pass as 'well, presumably Britannian, maybe'. Shooting him only the lightest of glances before agonizingly, painfully, trying to wheel Nunnally deeper into the crowd, crossing her fingers that she can find a path to slip through, to wheel Nunnally off to the market or something. She has other hideouts in mind - no matter what, she has to make sure Nunnally has a roof over her head.
"That's not a bad guess," she absent-mindedly trails off when Nunnally gives her answer. "I wouldn't mind it myself, but actually, I was going to try adding pickled radish and fish cake to the spaghetti, to give it that extra Japanese zing." It's supposed to be a little ridiculous and silly. C.C. times her saying this little joke exactly on cue with a man being bashed in the face with a rifle, sending a wave of unease everyone can feel.
It's not a portent that anything's about to go well, is it?
~Big Sister Cornelia~, Nunnally exclaims, and C.C. fails to hide a groan rising up her throat. Cornelia. Here, of all times. C.C. hoped that she could just draw attention away from Nunnally entirely. But no. There's mutual recognition. This is where C.C. would, rationally, casually let go of the wheelchair and make her escape.
One hand does loosen from the handles.
. . .
"...how could I possibly even consider that...?"
No. Instead, her grip tightens, and she softly raises her head to look just askance of Cornelia's way - the aversive way any poor Britannian scullery maid would to an officer of the law. What is she even going to say, what lie COULD she even cook up when two princesses recognize each other and are patently waving their arms to get each others' attention?
"...Nunnally, I want you to listen carefully. If anything goes wrong, you cannot call for Cornelia to help you. I'm the one who's suppose to take...care of you. They might start shooting too aggressively. Just like they did...that day."
A sinking feeling rises in C.C.'s chest as she realizes...why should Nunnally trust her more than Cornelia? If anything, if she tried to wheel the girl out in an escape, wouldn't she yell louder? It's hard to say.
Putting on an airier voice, C.C. calls to Cornelia, "Ah, family reunions are nice and all, but we should save it for when there isn't so much tension in the air, huh? When this is all finished you can reunite over tea somewhere, that'd be great, yeah-?" It's something innocuous to throw off attention, to try and defuse it, but C.C. knows full well it isn't going to be that easy. After all - aren't they likely here for Nunnally...?
<Pose Tracker> Lelouch Lamperouge has posed.
There. There it is. His enemy, Cornelia vi Britannia, is out of formation, now. That's perfect. ... His enemy? No, Zero's enemy, certainly, isn't that different? No, it can't be - she's threatening to take Nunnally away just by being here, and she's killed so many. She's a tyrant. Staring at her like this, what stings at him isn't just anger and fear. No. Isn't that right? Back in the day - Cornelia stood for something. She used to be someone he looked up to, didn't she? Where did that go? The same place it goes for all of those disgusting nobles. Those that could do better, and do not. Drunk on power, she's ruined everything, again and again. Drunk on ego, she became the same as every other Britannian. Proud. Wrathful. Vicious. Were those the traits he looked up to? Her pride - her excellence? Her sharpness, when it was time to be sharp? Her strength, among all other things?
Ah, if only she could retain a strength of character. Truly, the only noble, just thing to do would've been to join him. Or, if not that - keep Euphemia from the bloody work of rulership. Her hands did not need to be stained. Yes, the final responsibility is his, but it is her failure; the greatest failure in the world.
Loyalty, to anything more than those few things you care for.
Trust, in anyone but yourself.
Zero never makes those mistakes. He is loyal to nothing. He trusts no one. And, thus... he is here. The corner he comes from should be covered - is, in fact. They 'missed' him. Oh well. Ordinarily, when he does this performance, there are speakers in place. He has more control. Instead, he's forced into desperation, and his voice drips with a curse unsaid.
"Cornelia li Britannia." But at this range, he can just project his voice. "Are you done slaughtering this district, or not?"
His plan is simple. He just needs to surprise them, and catch them off guard enough for C.C. to run away with Nunnally. They aren't in the building, and don't know this area as well as he does. Even in the chaos, they can slip away. After this, he can take her somewhere safe. That's as simple as it gets. It is, to be clear, the worst plan he's ever made. That's his fault.
As long as they make it out of this in the mess to follow, it's all okay. If C.C. didn't see them, they might not have snipers. They might not have a good perimeter. It might work. And after all - he is Zero; he creates miracles out of nothing. If he can just make one more miracle, then they can manage it just fine.
<Pose Tracker> Cornelia li Britannia has posed.
Big sister Cornelia!
Cornelia's heart soars at the same time it sinks.
It's real. -She's- real. Nunnally. She can hear her voice, see her face, full of so much innocent optimism, just like --
Just like--
She'll never get to know a more whole, better future with Euphemia, will she? She's alive, and Euphemia lost. Where is the fairness of that? And it's all Cornelia's fault. If she hadn't waited -- hadn't hemmed and hawed and been so -weak- as to listen to those who clearly did not know better... things would be different.
Instead, all she has is this. All she has is what remains. All because of her.
Her... and Zero.
Her slow walk becomes a brisk pace, steps growing faster and faster with dawning urgency as a thousand and one thoughts flood through her mind. The whole world around them becomes numbed down towards indistinct sounds and smudges as she stops just shy of running for Nunnally, pushing past Britannian officers with little more than a bark of "Move!" as they get between her and the whole of the reason she is even here.
Everything else falls by the wayside until she is there, in Nunnally's personal space. Until she is staring down at her.
"... Nunnally. It's you. I..."
Until decorum dissolves in the pit of desperation and crumbles completely away as Cornelia collapses to her knees and throws her arms around her sister.
It's a brief crack in the armor that Cornelia li Britannia has worn for so long; a flicker of public sentimentality in that shivering, fearful embrace that she swiftly smothers as she draws back, her hands on Nunnally's shoulders as she takes her in. "Nunnally. You must come with me; this place is not safe. These people will be fine," she assures, "so long as they have nothing to hide." And then in the same breath dashes those assurances on the rocks of protocol.
"But none of that matters. I need you to come with me. This place is no longer safe -- you and your brother will be returning to Pendragon immediately." Her brows furrow, faintly. "... Where is Lelouch--"
And then a voice cuts in through the pleasantries and demands. Cornelia, who had narrowed down her vision to such a single point she hadn't even noticed Nunnally's - maid? - until that point, narrows her eyes and snaps a stare at the woman. Her hands fall from Nunnally; she rises. And she regards C.C. with the suspicion the distrustful reserve for strangers.
"Silence," she snaps. "Just who are you meant to be? And where is her brother--"
Cornelia li Britannia.
Indigo eyes snap wide.
"No--!"
The taunt has barely even been announced before Cornelia is moving to interpose herself between Nunnally and C.C. almost by instinct. Hatred does well to contort her features and mask the fear that suddenly springs up inside of her. Not for herself, no. But for the one behind her.
The only one she has left. And he's here. He's here to take her away, just like Euph--
"ZERO!"
The name is bellowed out with murderous rage. Her gloved hand falls to her hip. Her knights start to scramble for their weapons, others getting into their Knightmare frames. Within a second, she is unholstering the gunsword she always has at her side.
Within the next, it is lifting and pointing towards the direction of that voice in violent, spiteful reflex.
She would taunt. She would threaten.
But she doesn't even think. She doesn't consider that he might have more here. How well covered he might be. That she cannot even line up a clear shot from here, without a sniper rifle to line up the shot.
-=PHHP=-
She just aims, and pulls the trigger in deceptively quiet discharge--
"SHOW YOURSELF, CRAVEN--!"
<Pose Tracker> Nunnally Lamperouge has posed.
"That sounds wonderful," Nunnally smiles, when C.C. talks about adding pickled radish and fish cakes to their spaghetti. "Let's try it, later, okay?" As if there'll be a later. Nunnally doesn't even consider the possibility it all ends, today.
Maybe she should. Maybe it's unreasonable to have this much hope, in an environment like this. But... if she stops smiling, won't she just be a burden on the people around her?
"C.C., big sister Cornelia isn't like that," she assures her, gently. "She might be stern, but she's actually very nice. I'm sure she'll understand."
(Does Nunnally know all the things Cornelia has done, as the Witch of Britannia? She knows one of her big sister's faces, and believes the best of her from it. Just like --)
Here, Cornelia is come, and Nunnally smiles up to her just the same. She doesn't have time to respond before the dam breaks, and Cornelia collapses into embracing her -- and her first response, instead, becomes wrapping her arms around her sister and squeezing her gently. "I'm so sorry," she murmurs, to her, with grief overlaying her compassion. "It must hurt so much." As close as she was to Euphemia -- as many times as she's replayed their last cup of tea in her head -- she knows that Cornelia was countlessly closer. Tears spring to her eyes for her worry, for her love, for she has never thought of her family as her enemies.
She doesn't stop her from drawing back, though, looking up to her as she places her hands on her shoulders. "Father told us to go..." And she is hapless, as she points it out, too low on the totem pole of ascension to ever speak out about it. (Not like her big brother.) "After the invasion," and she does call it an invasion, "we hid ourselves... it was safer. Is it really going to be okay to just go back..?" ... not that she can deny it's gotten much more dangerous, around here, lately.
She looks back, behind her, to the building. "He said he wouldn't be far," she says, honestly. "He must still be gathering our things..."
Well, it's not like Nunnally has never had a maid; it would be a decent guess. (Oh! She hopes that Sayoko is okay.)
But something strange happens, when her honest assessment is cut off by the sound of Zero. "Ah--!!" Her voice breaks into an exclamation of fear, and she throws her hands up, as if to defend her face.
"Wait!" She cries, and she is afraid. "Please, don't hurt her!" She is afraid for Cornelia. "She isn't slaughtering anyone, so please--!"
But Cornelia can certainly hurt people, as much as Nunnally would never believe it. She hears a gun fire, and she cries out, covering her ears. "C.C.!" She cries out, quailing. "Please, please -- go find my big brother! If everyone starts shooting -- if everyone starts shooting again--!!" She is beside herself; where else would she be? It was a massacre, and anyone would be terrified of another.
<Pose Tracker> C.C. has posed.
The savior rises to make one more miracle.
C.C.'s heart catches in her throat at the sight of Zero, shining like a beacon of hope.
Everyone here believes in him. Everyone here knows he'll do something impossible to strike the wicked Cornelia low.
Maybe he can.
...C.C. strains to see the strings. "You idiot, if you're doing this for-"
She strains to see anything at all. The world gets hazy and shimmery.
...When was the last time she cried for anyone? As the Britannians arm and ready - as bullets fly towards their hated enemy, C.C. can't help but tighten with what she's managed to feel, for such a reckless...-
She assumed she'd failed, the moment Cornelia's arms wrapped around Nunnally in a hug. The moment they have this heart-felt reunion. Nunnally opening her heart to a well loved friend of the family, one that C.C. immediately feels is constraining her desire for revenge. Her instinct is to back away from Cornelia - no, her instinct, for a moment, is to back away from Nunnally, who can so easily wrap such a terrifying presence in her arms.
The years haven't given C.C. the means to push against such a towering figure as Cornelia - and so the tremor runs through her that the person most important to Lelouch was going to be snatched up just like that.
Instead....Zero's proclamation is well timed. It gives C.C. the one window she's got. The one window she will ever have.
In one fluid motion, the witch turns around, careening Nunnally in a wide arc away from the platoon of Britannians, away from Cornelia, and finds between herself and a side street a bewildered, frozen throng of people she's pushing towards.
"...(MOVE.)"
-C.C. insists, voice carried with an almost painful aftershock of force. It isn't the Power of Kings she bestowed unto Lelouch - it isn't anything more than an emission of targeted hostility so deep that unprepared people react with fear. It's a simple trigger of mankind's primordial instincts - words laced with the presence of a lion's roar, as low and deep as her tones are.
With Nunnally right in front of her, the effect may resonate more harshly with her, more sensitive to such psychoactive effects, than the people she's trying to get through.
As fast as her legs can take her, C.C. makes a break through the panicked, parted crowd, teeth clenched, sweat across her brow. She doesn't have a plan for where to go. She has no idea how the hell she's going to hide Nunnally from a fully armed squadron of Britannians. But if Zero's going to stick his neck out on the line just to give Nunnally one chance of escape amist the din of Cornelia's gunfire, then what is C.C. even supposed to do - let him suffer for nothing? Abandon Lelouch to his fate and save her own skin when he trusted her most?
-(Yes.)-
-(That's always what I'm supposed to do.)-
-(And isn't that just sickening?)-
"Hold on tight, Nunnally. This isn't going to be comfortable or pleasant. We're probably not going anywhere nice for the night. I'm getting you somewhere safe first - your brother's resourceful, he's already on his way to our meeting point." Liar. "I'm sorry it turned out this w-"
The winding and run down streets of outer Nagoya don't let C.C. play the game of resentfully changing her fate that easily.
Catching on a stray brick that she wheels Nunnally over recklessly, her own feet falter. Unused to caring for someone else in a time of crisis, unused to carrying someone else's burden -
Her ungainly efforts to do so earn her a stagger and a fall, twisting over and toppling, sending Nunnally's wheelchair careening down the street.
-(There's my reminder why.)-
Defiance courses in C.C.'s veins. Staggering to her feet, limping on a strained ankle. Her hand extends out to Nunnally desperately, even if her face only barely breaks from its coldness.
-(Am I ever going to learn?)-
-(Change is for the living.)-
<Pose Tracker> Lelouch Lamperouge has posed.
But he won't answer so quickly or easily, because he doesn't need to. Cornelia is already beyond words, here. Maybe in a different life - maybe if he did this a different way - he could've done it. But for all his power, all his tricks, the only one that matters is that he can't fix anything. He's said so before. He doesn't know how to fix things like that; he knows how to break the things he wants to break, not do anything else. His argument is cannonfire and death.
It makes it hard to accomplish the things he cares about. It makes it hard to reach out to someone like Cornelia. Or to save anyone. He can't do those things; he lost that ability one day, and will never have it back.
It isn't that 'Cornelia isn't worth his words'. It is that he has nothing he can say to her.
The 'plan' was to make this distraction, and then let C.C. carry Nunnally out, and, somehow, escape. Fake a death, maybe? Well, as soon as C.C. was clear, there would be help coming, and he's just have to hide. Geass some soldiers to ignore him, maybe. All it takes is luck. At this range, she has no clear shot, and he can duck behind the wall, and wait for the chaos. This is the easy part. Hiding for long enough to escape was meant to be hard, and he trusted C.C. to get out of this. Drifting back through the crowd - it comes crashing apart.
It isn't that he expected too much of her. It's that there was never an out. His defeat was certain, and miracles do not exist.
The harsh assertion of reality comes when she just trips. Nothing special happens, really. It's such a perfectly human mistake. It doesn't take a magic, immortal witch to trip and fall. It doesn't take a genius strategist with a divine eye to make a bad plan. It doesn't take a vicious warlord to start shooting. They aren't any of those things. Just for a moment, the piercing beam of (reality) strikes through his heart. A light so bright and so certain that no mask can stand against it. Zero ceases to exist, when C.C. falls, and Nunnally goes with her. The illusion breaks;
Lelouch is not Zero. He is a scared brother, terrified for his family. C.C. is not an immortal witch; she is a scared girl, doing her best and falling just short, just like she always does. Cornelia is not a beacon of an evil empire; she is a scared woman, holding on to the things she loves so hard they die. And Nunnally... is Nunnally. The only one of them to have never lied at all.
He isn't athletic, or fast, or strong, but he dives back into the crowd, pushing and shoving through them to get to them. He thinks he's yelling. He isn't sure. He might get shot; he doesn't care.
There will certainly not be a miracle.
<Pose Tracker> Cornelia li Britannia has posed.
It must hurt.
So much.
She thinks of her sister, disgraced even in death. Spit upon as evil. Forsaken by her family. Made to bear the full weight of a sin that is not - CANNOT - be on her shoulders alone. She thinks of how fervently Euphemia declared her commitment, how she was willing to even relinquish her titles, just to bring happiness to those she barely knows... those who, in Cornelia's mind, barely deserved it.
"... I..."
She should say she doesn't hurt. She should say Euphemia was a traitor and got the traitor's due. She should tow the party line. But she can't. She can only grit her teeth and feel the emptiness inside her grow that much more for having to face it.
"... Those who did this to her will pay."
And the only way she knows how to resolve the gaping hole inside her.
Gloved, trembling fingers tighten that much more around Nunnally in those brief moments before Cornelia pulls away and becomes the composed, diligent sister once more.
"You and Lelouch will be safe in Pendragon. You will have my explicit protection." It is the last assurance Cornelia can offer, before everything falls rapidly apart.
Before Zero.
Zero!
The name rings in her head. She hears the voices chanting it in celebration over the bloodied body of the person who mattered most to her in this entire world.
The shots fire. They hit concrete, bullets lodging in the wall Zero hides behind as Cornelia snarls out a curse, eyes wide and features contorted with vengeful bloodlust.
"Move!" Cornelia shouts to her men, even as the denizens of the building start to scramble in a frantic panic. "Cut off his avenues of escape!" They should have had that area covered! What happened??
Zero.
"He will not escape this place, even if we must burn it down--!"
-Zero happened-.
His fault. His fault. -His fault-. All his fault! He's taken everything from her -- and he's here to take again!
"COWARD!"
But...
...
this isn't right.
This isn't Zero.
This is too obvious.
He always has a plan.
What is his move here?
What is--?
MOVE.
Cornelia's eyes widen as she hears the freshly-familiar voice behind her. She wheels, perhaps unwisely.
Just in time to see that green-haired maid, rushing off with Nunnally, -right under her nose-.
Cornelia's furious gaze widens with surprise, with fear. C.C. is already gone, the force of her command briefly confusing and sending her men staggering startled as she darts into the rushing crowds. Cornelia's men, scrambling in the opposite direction, are poorly prepared to pursue. Something so simple, something so brazen--
Zero is mocking her.
Zero is taking someone else in front of her face and laughing while he does it. And what about Lelouch? Missing. Maybe already dead.
She's going to lose Nunnally - lose Lelouch - just like she lost -- just like she lost--
She turns. Caught between revenge and salvaging the last vestiges of the family she has left - the family she has only just rediscovered after so long - she lingers in the crosshairs of want and need...
And then
-THMP-
there is a miracle.
A simple fluke of fate sees C.C. spilling out mid-flight. Cornelia's knights have already started to rally even as C.C. collapses and Nunnally's wheelchair careens.
C.C. struggles back onto her feet. Zero rushes down the street and through the crowds.
Cornelia begins to turn.
Horror happens in an instant. Things unravel in a time far shorter than they ever took to build up. Every second that C.C. takes to stand, to reach out to Nunnally--
All of that is dashed on the rocks in an instant as a bullet fires straight for her skull.
There, standing at an opening amid the throngs, stands Gilbert G.P. Guilford, gunbarrel smoking, eyes narrowed.
"Your highness--" he begins, but his words aren't for Cornelia. They are for Nunnally.
"Don't worry, your highness. You're safe now. I'll get you out of here--!"
Guilford is already moving to take Nunnally's wheelchair, even as Zero - as Lelouch - breaks through the crowds.
Cornelia's baleful purple gaze fixes upon him.
Every moment that Zero has built, every sacrifice that he has made.
Every life that Cornelia has taken, every nation she has conquered.
All of their deeds rendered meaningless in a single moment as she swings up the long barrel of her gun, points it at that masked head--
And fires.
<Pose Tracker> Nunnally Lamperouge has posed.
Nunnally can't blame Euphemia for what happened. No matter what everyone says -- she knows that her sister isn't someone who would cause a massacre. And so she meets Cornelia with not even the shadow of a question, in the arms of their grief.
"I miss her, too," she murmurs, to Cornelia's grim resolution, because what she hears is all the grief pouring out over the party lines and beyond them. She can accept that Cornelia's grief would be sterner than hers -- but she still knows it as grief. She is too gentle-hearted to hope for vengeance, and she is too gentle-hearted to confront the reality of Cornelia's vengeance.
But she is... very sad. So sad, honestly and plainly, so different to the schemes collapsing around her.
Something awful happened to her dearest sister -- something which made her say an awful, awful thing. Something Euphemia would have never wanted, not in a million, million, million years. And now she's gone, even though her vision was so beautiful, and it isn't fair, and it hurts, and they're hurting, and...
And Cornelia still has to be the Viceroy. "Mm," Nunnally hums, tilting her head, when she offers her her safety. She might have nodded -- might have accepted it -- except: "Ah--!!" Nunnally gasps, as instead of going to find Lelouch, C.C. grabs her wheelchair to -- to bring both of them to him?! She grasps the armrests of her chair tightly as C.C. flees the field --
And she cries out, again, as she feels that force wave out from behind her, lurching forward as if she would be flattened. It's a good thing she was holding onto her chair; if she hadn't grasped so tightly, she might have fallen from it. She's trying her best, even as her heart races, not to be a burden.
But that brick sends her wheelchair bouncing, and she feels her stomach lurch as she senses it lifting from the ground. To fly through the air is no freedom, when you can't see the ground. And then C.C.'s hands leave the handles, and it is a wonder of the machine which aids her which sees her able to grasp those circular controls and steady her wheelchair. It responds to her very thoughts, as she bids it to stop careening, and to stop gently instead of locking its wheels in such a way that she'll spill onto the street.
But she does stop. She stops, and turns, and cries: "C.C.! C.C., are you all right?! Ah-- C.C.--!!" And that last cry raises out, not in distress, but in warning.
A warning which comes too late.
"Ah --" Nunnally gasps, hands flying to her mouth, as she registers the sound of the gunshot. She quails in her seat, looking around for a voice she hasn't heard for years. "Gilbert?" She asks, and asks politely. "Gilbert, my friend, she..." She can't see; she doesn't know he fired the bullet.
She weeps, her hands covering her face, trusting for the moment that Guilford will keep her steady. Her voice hitches, as she half-sniffles, half-asks: "B--big brother... where are you..?"
<Pose Tracker> C.C. has posed.
-<A flower of unending agony blooms.>-
At the crack of the gunshot, C.C. whips around just enough for the bullet to clearly, obviously, in front of everyone in the crowd - lance through her temple with a spray of blood, and the witch screams out once in a short call of agony.
-<Crimson tearing apart every thought.>-
Her first instinct is to laugh.
It's a low, bubbling, breathy thing, but the absurd first thought sparking through C.C.'s fatally ruined mind is- ((It's obscene that I have to know how this feels.))
Few humans ever do. Few humans ever will. 'Knowing' the feeling of a catastrophic, unsurvivable blow to the very capacity to 'know' is horrible.
Fissures erupting in all the countless lost hopes racing in C.C.'s head. She sees Nunnally in the corner of her eye - for a moment, that girl, and the name 'Nunnally', are ripped apart viscerally. Then, a rift between her sight and her understanding whatsoever. The image is still there, but now it no longer feels within reach.
-<Someone was very important for me to protect.>-
-<What is that crying object so far away from me?>-
Red hues stain over her vision entirely - red pools up beneath her. A flame of instincts - the primal desire to not die, wracks hold of C.C.'s nerves and muscles, forcing her to writhe in agony. A haze of dejection - the long-lasting desire to finally die, loosens that for her, and her pain-seared mind blooms with joy and relief - because logically, it's finally happening.
((Not like this,)) she hoped, but a sigh escapes her body. There's someone she wants in her arms more than anything right now - she can even hear his voice shouting incoherently.
It was too good to be true, though, wasn't it?
The witch goes limp. The light fades from her eyes. The crowd begins to panic and flee in every direction, as they see a girl shot to death before them.
And so the tome closes.
() () ()
() () ()
() () ()
_ _ _ (oh. right.) _ _ _
Color returns to the world. Sights and sounds return to coherence. The pain still resonates with a dull gong. There's something C.C. has to protect no matter what, and it's Nunnally, who is just right over there-
...with a Britannian at her side.
Rationality takes over. What a stupid idea, to make a break for it with Nunnally. What a stupid idea, for Zero to put his life on the line to keep that girl out of the hands of someone who, at minimum, clearly has no plans to kill her.
...And now, it'd be a catastrophically stupid idea for someone who, by all rights, ought to be dead, to be anything but. To even move a muscle, no matter how badly her instincts say she should. Her best bet is to hope nobody on Cornelia's squad is in the know that she'd just escaped from Britannia's clutches, because if they do, then the dead will kind of just have to walk.
...but...what. What is she supposed to do, seeing Nunnally in such intense distress? This girl, who doesn't deserve anything of what's happening here, who doesn't deserve the world being so unfair?
( ( ( ( I'm alright, Nunnally. ) ) ) )
( ( ( ( Keep that a secret for a while, okay? ) ) ) )
( ( ( ( We're going to see each other again soon. ) ) ) )
( ( ( ( You'll be safe with these people, unlike me. ) ) ) )
The voice rings clearly to Nunnally alone - clearer than a whisper, cutting past the din of the panicked crowds and commanding Britannians.
<Pose Tracker> Lelouch Lamperouge has posed.
What a stupid world. Where all you can do is watch.
Isn't it always like that? What in the world has all his power, his might, his work, accomplished? What is the power of a King matter, if in the end, all he can watch is the people he loves hurt, over and over? What pain has he ever spared C.C.? What has he ever offered back, in return for all she's done? Nothing. Nothing. Never anything. Again and again, she hurts for him. Ripped apart by some evil aura. Ripped to shreds by a Gamia. Shot, over and over. Isn't this the same? Isn't this how they met, again? What a stupid world, where all your efforts can't save one person even an ounce of pain. ... It isn't that 'she is dead'. He knows better. It's play acting. But who cares? A mask doesn't spare that. She hides it well, but there is a reason she runs away, when it gets hard or scary. She could've ran away without Nunnally, and she would've gotten away easily. That's how it always is, for her. The more she takes on, the worse she hurts for it.
Zero knows she is not dead; and Lelouch screams for her anyway. As ever. As always. He is a failure, who can only remove a splinter by amputation. As long as any other person believes in him, they'll hurt.
What a stupid world. Where no matter how hard you fight, you can't win.
No matter who you are, trusting Lelouch is stupid. He won't try for you. He'll try for himself, certainly, but not for you. If it looks like he's working hard - it's for him. Even for Nunnally, isn't it? It was that he wanted a better future, and used her as an excuse. For her disability. For those little things he can't possibly understand, but sees. It was never a lie; he would never, ever lie like that. ... but, it was something less than the truth, too. Has it been like that, ever since that day? What pain has he spared her, for dragging this out so far? Aren't they in the worst possible place, now? He couldn't even shield her from the violence he invited on himself, selfishly challenging the world to a fight, boldly declaring he would win. Maybe that was impossible. No, obviously not. It was possible. It was easily possible, to avoid her being hurt like this. Trivially possible. He could've just taken her somewhere else. He could've watched his mouth, when he spoke to Euphemia. He could've ... just never tried, at all. Nunnally didn't need this. She didn't want this. Not in a million, million years. Where did he go wrong? Was it so long ago, when he tore into his father, and screamed for justice?
If you scream until your throat bleeds - and no one answers - were you wrong to scream?
What a stupid world. Where you can't ever, ever win.
Something inside Lelouch splinters, watching Nunnally stand above a 'corpse' again. For the first time in his life - he understands C.C., fully and absolutely. The comfort of surrender. Of letting fate take the reins. One man can't stand against the world. His mask slides open, to reveal an eye, and he turns to face Cornelia. Cornelia, who... he wishes, despite everything, he could hate less. He can defend everything she did here. But maybe it would've been better if she gave up, too.
"Don't shoot me, Cornelia. Not here."
The world twists at the words of a King. Men bend their knee and let their wills turn to nothing before his word. All men are slaves before the voice of a King; it's natural. It's necessary, perhaps. ... the worst, most hateful power in the world. To capture mens will, and steal their control. To dash the ambition of others. To bind them into a path you decide, just like that. It is disgusting.
"I surrender. Just... not here, Cornelia. Not here."
His voice is broken; there is no future in this struggle, now. C.C. has been shot. Nunnally is already taken away. He will die, soon. But Nunnally doesn't have to hear it. She doesn't need to feel it. He can die in some ditch somewhere far, and they can take her somewhere safe. This is his abdication; checkmate.
<Pose Tracker> Cornelia li Britannia has posed.
Gilbert, my friend, she...
Gilbert G.P. Guilford knows Nunnally vi Britannia. He knew her, when she was little more than a child; when he and Cornelia were still in the academy; when she was Euphemia's favorite playmate.
But he is not her family; it's an outsiders perspective that lets him see things that Cornelia, with all her sharpness, might be blind to.
A bespectacled stare falls on the bloodied body of the green-haired woman who Nunnally calls out for.
"... Friend...?"
And something sinks inside of him. Friend? How long had Zero known about the Lamperouges? How long had this woman infiltrated them? ... Or... or was it...
Something about the woman looks familiar, in hindsight. Something that reminds him of files seized from Clovis' Code R project.
"..."
... No. It doesn't matter now.
"She'll be alright," Guilford says after brief, wary hesitation, unaware that his lie is not a lie; unaware that his false assurance follows like an echo in the immediate wake of C.C.'s truer one. What he says next, however, is utterly sincere:
"I promised Princess Cornelia I would protect you and your brother with my life, your majesty -- and that is what I will do. ... I'll make sure you get to Pendragon safely. Both of you."
Guilford's gloved grip tightens around the handlebars of Nunnally's wheelchair, and he begins to push her on, past the misery and the mayhem still scenting the air with panic and blood.
-+-
Everything in Cornelia li Britannia's wreckage of a life burns away down to this single moment.
Right now, nothing else matters. She is deaf to the shouts. Blind to the panic.
Insensate, even, to the sorrow of her precious sister.
All that matters in this moment is Zero.
Zero!
His name is the chant her mind cannot be rid of.
Zero!
His existence is the only thing that matters.
ZERO!
His death is the only thing she has left in this world.
She doesn't know why he's marching so brazenly forward. Part of her is sure it is another ploy. Another trap. Purple lips twist.
The overwhelming majority of her -does not care-. Let his traps come. Let his cowardice shine! She expects it. She wants it! Her gloved finger curls at the trigger. She'll tear it all down. Every trick, every machination. Let her expose him for the skulking opportunist he is! Let her peel it all away and show the world how craven this man is! Let her make his reputation a bloody smear on the pavement of Area 11's foul history!
Let her avenge Euphie--!
She wants him to press on. She wants him to show her his next trick. The carefully laid trap he has set up here, to bewilder her, to take Nunnally from her like he took her Euphemia. She needs it. She needs something more than-- more than--!!
Don't shoot me, Cornelia. Not here.
"--What?"
Something, anything more than this.
Cornelia li Britannia pauses for a seizing moment where her entire world grinds to a complete halt upon the axis of Zero's surrender. Just like that. Indigo eyes widen in disbelief. A gloved finger trembles so close to the trigger she desperately wants to - NEEDS to - pull.
"... You... How dare you..."
In the glimmering moments before her memory becomes nothing but a sludgy smear of half-remembered events, she'll remember one thing: the voice of Zero, the man she hates most in this world.
... How familiar it sounded.
How much the color of that single, exposed eye reminded her of someone she will struggle to place in the aftermath. Someone like... someone...
"Lelo--?"
I surrender. Just... not here, Cornelia. Not here.
The King's compulsion seizes her as her eyes go wide as dinner plates. He's surrendering. She can't shoot him. Not here.
He's surrendering? And she has to accept it? Just like that? Yes. Just like that.
Her finger struggles towards the trigger. No. That's unacceptable.
She can't shoot him. Not here.
For it to be over this easily, this simply. Unacceptable!
She can't shoot him. Not here.
"Nnn...!!"
He didn't even fight back! He didn't tell her the truth while he gurgled on the last pint of blood drowning his lungs! No plan! No machination! Unacceptable!!
She can't shoot him. Not here.
To let Euphemia's killer go on living. Defamer of her reputation! Desecrator of her legacy...!
She can't shoot him. Not here.
He gave her a death worse than death, a death of all that was important to her, and he expects her to let him live?!
She can't shoot him. Not here.
Unacceptable!
"Nn...!"
Unacceptable!!
UNACCEPT
she can't shoot him. not here.
Cornelia li Britannia's gun arm goes slack. A choked sound spills pained from purple lips, trying to speak in a voice that is smothered for something more favorable.
unacceptable
"i won't shoot you. not here."
The decree of a King.
unacceptable
Her gun lifts into a vertical position of nonaggression.
"Alfred. Claudio. Take him into custody. I will deal with him later. Just... not here."
The two ordered Glaston Knights hesitate, looking between them. It lasts only a second before she wheels an imperious glare on both.
"NOW!"
The two knights scramble, moving to rapidly seize and secure Zero, the most dangerous terrorist known to Britannia, just as simple as that. Guilford, as he wheels away Nunnally, pauses as he looks back Cornelia's way. A frown creases his lips. But he presses on all the same.
Cornelia says not a word after. She just stands there, her gun held up in the air. Her finger still trembling at the trigger.
A single tear she will never remember rolls down her cheek.
unacceptable
<Pose Tracker> Nunnally Lamperouge has posed.
Nunnally weeps. She tries not to weep -- she tries to keep herself steady. She can't make a problem of herself, as all the problems cascade down. If only she could become so small --
But she is still here, still unable to do anything, and still painfully, horrifically aware of just what happened to her friend. And she does weep, sniffly and hitching, hands fumbling at her face.
"Ah--" She gasps, and perhaps it's just more tears, the way her head jerks up. "C.C..." And perhaps she is grieving for that dead woman, as her voice lingers on what must be Cetra's nickname.
(It's a voice only she can hear, whispering up her spine to her ear; she's alright, she'll see her again. A voice which Nunnally can't say is all in her head, even as it clearly isn't carried on the wind.)
"Okay," she says, when Guilford lies to her, and perhaps she is just being a mindful girl. And then he assures her, and she takes a breath to steady herself. "I think... my big brother is still in the building," she tells him, an outsider to the family who has nevertheless been a faithful attendant of Cornelia's for years and years. Of course she trusts him; of course she is honest with him. Of course she wants him to save --
Nunnally knew that her brother was afraid. She knew that he made things better for her because it was easier than admitting he wanted something better for himself. She knew because she's always known -- she's always seen the way people act, around her. That's why she's always tried to help him, just the same; he might not need support in finding where dinner is, but he needs safe harbour, a steady presence who is always there for him.
And now he's gone, and she's so worried. He's going to see C.C. -- he can see C.C. -- and Nunnally doesn't think he'll hear what Nunnally heard, that otherworldly reassurance that the feeling of life seeping from her isn't the whole story. Everyone is shooting. Won't it remind him? It reminds her.
"Nnn..." She scrubs at her face, and grasps at the armrests of her chair again, because she has to help Guilford, here. Keeping herself in place is the only way she can. "Zero's... giving up? That means -- everyone can stop shooting -- right?"
She can feel Cornelia's distress, the way she doesn't recognise she should feel Zero's. She can feel the struggle, the tension, knive-carved through the air. And...
And the shooting stops.
And Nunnally sighs, as she's taken away: "... thank goodness..."
<Pose Tracker> C.C. has posed.
It stings, to be singed with the agony of near-death - to feel the contract invoked. The moment Lelouch's words force Cornelia's iron will to submit, a stab of searing pain forces C.C. to choke down a scream. Not now. Not now.
Will his command throw this carefully laid order into chaos? Will he somehow think of how to make a miracle happen from there?
...No. And it's enough to let slip a faint sigh of relief from C.C.'s nose. No. He's not going to dig himself into a deeper hole, at this perilous moment. He's not going to make some insane sacrifice that threatens to make all of this worse.
-<You could've made a much more heinous order.>-
The metallic taste of blood in C.C.'s mouth, and ringing in her mind, brings C.C. to remember just how badly those she's contracted in the past abandoned their principles to hold onto the power she offered. How they would burn down the world to live another day.
With a bit of skill, surely Lelouch could've turned Cornelia and several of her officers against one another. Surely he could've taken the risk and drenched this place in blood. He could've decided that the Massacre Princess wasn't a mistake, wasn't anything to regret, and determine that it was simply the most efficient means to an end.
And C.C. would've been halfway across the world right now if that was the type of person he turned out to be.
It's probably what she would've done, to get herself out of this mess. What's one more sin like that atop her already drenched soul?
Instead, order returns - and the gathered throng of residents splinters off - those who are more brave step forth to assess C.C.'s condition, to determine if she can be saved or not...to determine how they will handle the corpse of a stranger that lived among them. What use do the Britannians have for the lifeless body of a maid, after all?
Ever so subtly, when C.C.'s lifted up over the shoulders of a weary civilian, she lolls her head to angle towards Lelouch, now that she's said her farewell to Nunnally. Her eyes, a touch glazed over, meet his.
=A promise deeper than words is forged with the link that they share.=
A chain forged of sheer assurance. One that says nothing to him, and yet says everything.
==(I'll be here.)==
...the body of Cetra Clearbell would be laid outside a clinic awaiting a doctor or mortician to arrive, amidst hails for someone to help those who were injured in the chaos.
The moment prying eyes are away, she'd disappear into the fog of uncertainty, and leave them wondering just who misplaced a tragic corpse.
A strange little feeling bubbles in C.C.'s heart. She's used to this being an ending, a farewell, a tragic past among many. And yet, what she must do is obvious. What she must do to 'be here' for Lelouch, is unlike anything she's ever done before.
"...god, what a juvenile idea. Centuries later, and I'm willing to still be that immature."
Hiding in a rusted cargo container until nightfall, a strange little smile crosses the witch's lips, shaking her hair free from her hat.
"...I guess it's worth a little laugh from you when you get back, Lelouch."