#MAKE LELOUCH SIT DOWN NEXT TO HIM ON THE BED

[xxsycamore]

❝ 𝐕𝐈𝐑𝐆𝐈𝐍 𝐁𝐔𝐍𝐍𝐘 𝐈𝐍 𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐓 ❞

╰┈➤ 💜 Clavis seduces Emma in a bunny suit so she can finally pop his cherry.

Clavis Lelouch x Emma • rating: E (MDNI) • tags:Bunny Suits; Bunny Ears; bunny tail; that one Clavis card; Virginity; Virginity Kink; Making Out; Sloppy Makeouts; Dom!Emma; sub!Clavis; Femdom; Neck Kissing; Biting; Groping; Premature Ejaculation; Coming Untouched; Coming In Pants • wordcount: 1,495 • masterlist

"Welcome home, Emma. I've been waiting for you."

The wave of shock that washes over Emma's being brings forth an unmistakable familiar and dangerous warmth that traverses from her cheeks straight down to her nethers. It doesn't leave her time to breathe, to think, yet the words still manage their way out.

"Clavis, what are you wearing?"

Hand still on the doorknob, Emma's eyes are cast down low, at the figure kneeling on the floor. Clavis' tall, slender form is clad in a tight suit, squeezing his flesh in all the right places. Clavis lowers his head as if desperate to rub himself all over her legs, showing the joy of a domesticated animal welcoming his owner home, and in the act, a pair of long faux ears brush past Emma's frame. From the position he's taking on the floor, she can see the star of the outfit - an obscene protrusion on his rear, white and fluffy. A bunny tail.

"Isn't it obvious? I'm your little bunny in heat. I'm beginning you to finally, finally take me."

Emma's blood runs hot, fingers curling inwards until she can feel her own nails dig into the inside of her palm. It emphasizes their positions on the spot. She has claws, and Clavis is soft, pliant, vulnerable, practically begging. She can do whatever she wishes with him.

His methods of seduction are an incitement to riot, as she barely needs stimulus to desire him. Yet Clavis puts on so much effort for her. He moves his body alluringly in a way he's never done for anyone; he gazes at her in a way he's never gazed at anyone. The littlest things about him are enough, all those things he doesn't even suspect are erotic, so how is she to endure the current situation?

"On the bed, Clavis."

The man on his knees smirks as he obediently bows, turning around to comply with her wish. Emma's eyes follow his rump. Of course they do. He gives her so much to look at.

She'll have to give that tail a little squeeze later.

Emma follows him to the bed and climbs up, signaling for Clavis to come closer. He sits on the place between her legs, leaning slightly backward as he props himself up with a hand, chest puffed out. Ready for her next move.

Emma reaches two greedy hands to grasp his waist, and she pulls him in closer, letting his scent engulf her completely. Has he always had such a perfect waist? It's not tiny enough for her hands to properly enwrap it, but rather just enough to desperately try to tighten her hands enough to fit more.

"Kiss me, Clavis. You know how to do this much, right?"

Way better than a virgin does, she refrains from adding, for the sake of her own composure. They've made out before, but never took the next step. The amount of heated kisses they'd shared had been enough to see Clavis become bold and risqué in his need for more, often kissing her breathless. The bulge in his pants has always been alluring but it's never been quite the time or the place. Partly because Clavis has a penchant for being at the wrong time, in the wrong place.

His lips are now planted against her own, and he already begins with his game. No time for lovey-dovey kisses, even if they're to his liking as well. His tongue slips between Emma's parted lips, making his way in, provoking her. It turns her rasped breaths into moans, and she doesn't mind it even this early on. If she's being vocal, he'll start being vocal too. For the time being, she lets him lead the kiss. It's almost like he shows what he wants to be done to him in return, she thinks. Although he's a gentleman through and through. His demonstration simply can't be as true to his desires.

He withdraws, and keeps his mouth open, tongue poking out. Emma doesn't wait for the thin thread of saliva between them to break; as long as he took a breath he should be fine for continuing where they left. It's like they never stopped the kiss that way.

She takes it easy on him when she takes the lead, dragging her tongue on his plump lower lip as if asking for entrance. It humiliates him a little, as if they're still not past this stage, as if he needs that - but strangely it's only lust he feels as a response. He answers properly to the gesture, obediently parting his lips to be penetrated, and Emma slips her tongue in.

"Nngn…"

Emma takes notes of all the little things that push Clavis' buttons; like curving her tongue to caress the underside of his tongue, or withdrawing to scare him with a too-early end of the kiss. She wants to learn more and more about how he wants to be kissed, touched, loved.

"Haah… haha.. You can get more handy than that, Emma."

He needn't say more. Emma's hands move from where they've held Clavis' waist, leaving unmistakable warmth behind as their imprints, and they travel up his back. Emma traverses it with hands alone from one side to the other, measuring him up, taking note of the hard places of him just like the soft ones, following the curves of his shoulders, the dips of the junction between them and his neck. It's an endearing gesture, until she cards her fingers through the short purple hair on the back of his head, upwards, taking both of his sleek black bunny ears in her grasp.

He doesn't feel the tug in the way an actual appendix would, of course, but his groan is sincere, and the action successfully makes him tilt his head back to reveal his slender neck.

Emma leaches on it, her glistening lips wetting his neck as she sinks her teeth into the column of his neck. He's so weak to neck kisses, she can practically feel him get hard where they're pressed body to body.

Leaving only one hand on his head, she lets the other one get playful and travel back down. The moment she's past the leather of his belt, Clavis' body rocks forward, and his rear lifts off the bed. He's on his knees now, between Emma's parted legs, arms snaking around her shoulders for support as she keeps kissing and nibbling at his neck.

With his behind now in full reach, Emma gets bolder, squeezing and groping his rump, the back of his thighs, and finally his fluffy white tail. It makes a little wicked smile bloom on her face. She lacks all of those adorable assets, yet Clavis sees her as his little bunny. She understands now, both the endearment and the lust behind it. Though it's a little scary that they've both become like that - with carnivores and prey it's quite linear. They devour until they're sated. With rabbits, well, Emma knows what people say about rabbits.

Clavis moans now, open and vulgar, and each vocalization of his arousal makes his Adam's apple move where Emma can feel it under her lips. It makes her see hot-white behind her eyelids that fell closed amidst it all. She wants to be locked in that tango forever; to see how Clavis gets worse and worse, until they finally cross that line, to take and take from each other until there's nothing they haven't done to the other.

"Ahh-- Nghh!" Clavis' head trashes, and it makes Emma's sucking at his skin a little difficult as her lips begin to miss their target. She makes him stay in place again, nails biting on the fabric of his suit, pressing him closer to her. His moans become hopeless now, and she feels proud of herself, just a tad curious which part made him like this. Clavis riots in his flesh restraints again, though he can easily remove himself from her grasp with his strength alone. She lets him have his breath, letting go and catching a glimpse of his face that she began to miss.

He's a mess, cheeks flushed red, hair disheveled, and faux ears askew and flopping to the side. Although he pants heavily, he finds it in himself to smirk. It's a rather mischievous one; not the kind to signal achievement of his goal but rather that he's done something forbidden.

"Nnnh…You handled your bunny a little too rough and he creamed his pants."

Eyes widening, Emma feels a fresh wave of arousal wash over her as the words sink in. She's stunned, a little guilty, a little curious… but as her gaze shamelessly shifts to his trousers to see a little wet spot on the front of his still-tented crouch, she's sure she's never seen anything more erotic in her life. She wets her lips to speak up.

"Looks like my little bunny in heat will stay a virgin for a little longer."

Taglist: @arsnovacadenza @ale-teodora @kimi00twin @otomelady @g-kleran   @thesirenwashere @ravenarld @devonares @galaxyprison @sadshaxk @starshards26 @thewitchofbooks @acethephoenix256 @ikevamp-shrine-2 @nad-zeta @crystal13unny @lordsister @ikemen-banshou   @themysticalbeing @otome-scribbles @rhodolitesrose @coornn @kpop-and-otome @queen-dahlia @kisara-16 @chaosangel767 @ikemenlibrary @queengiuliettafirstlady @aurora-morning @ikemenlover24 @mcofthemansion @joy-the-reader @katriniac @ikemen-writer @tele86 @lovely-bubb1es @aria-chikage @babyblue0t7 @rhodoliteschaos @shrimpy-kitsune @nightghoul381 @xbalayage @lucyw260 @kittygrimm88 @lokis-laugh @judejazza @princess-pray-a @aceuuuuu @claviscollections Let me know if you want to be tagged/untagged!

[riveranova]

youre headcanons were so funny, could you do more please? there is this trend on tiktok where girlfriends film their boyfriends sleeping positions, can you do that but with the ikemen prince guys?

and female reader please and thank you!💗💗

A/N: I know EXACTLY what you mean! So sorry for the long wait, here you go! <3

I also made this Gender Neutral because there is no mention of any gender. I hope thats fine!

IkePri's Sleeping positions! x GN! Reader - Part 1

Warnings: A teensie bit suggestive, pure crack to be honest, Nokto

Characters: Gilbert, Silvio, Keith, Sariel, Rio, Clavis, Notko, Ikemen Prince

Word Count: 610

Gilbert von Obsidian

- Still - LIke, he doesn't move - He scares the shit out of you because he's literally cold and unmoving - Literally laying there like 🧍🏻 - WILL make fun of you if you panic and wake him up - He's a little shit, obviously he thinks that your crying face is adorable - Do you honestly think that he'd go out like that? - Do you even love him? - It's not that? Ahh, so you doubt him. - ''I'm hurt, little rabbit. I think I need to remind you how alive I truly am, heehee...''

Silvio Ricci

-This man is a prick - If you sleep in the same bed as him, I'm sorry - Will 100% not only steal your blankets and throw them to the floor but will also take up all the space in your bed - I don't think he's completely silent when he sleeps but he doesn't snore either - More like.. really loud breathing - My dog breathes really loud when he's sleeping well - Hold on.. Silvios crest- - I rest my case.

Keith Howell

-I'm pretty sure that he's a silent sleeper - There is one big problem, uh tall problem - Tall. He's very tall. (I'm 181cm, I feel the pain) - I'd imagine that he has trouble sleeping in small beds because of his height - Poor guy is completely folded next to you so that you have some space - His back pain must be horrible, oh dear - Now, his alter is a different story - I think he'd just pull you onto him - He's tall and strong, he can be your bed <3

Sariel Noir

-Does he even sleep - I think the question with him isn't how he sleeps but how you find him sleeping - His job is hard and trying to keep the chaos (Clavis & Nokto, really) in check is a lot - Falls asleep on his desk, mostly - Hunched over his papers, the candle already out and cold for a long time - This man has chronic back pain, that isn't even up for debate - Wakes up easily and decides to follow you into bed

Rio Ortiz

-I think he doesn't sleep much either - For him, I think it's because he just has too much energy - He just loves to get everything ready for you to start your day, he knows you work so, so hard - But even this battery needs some charging sometimes - Can and will sit down on a chair, sleep (sitting straight up) for an hour and wake up as if he slept a week - Has no back pain either - What is his secret? We will never know

Clavis Lelouch

-Okay. - We know that this idiot doesn't even have a bed in his room - When he does sleep, he just throws himself into his couch and sleep like that - Because when he's tired.. He's TIRED - Hangs off of the side of the couch like not quite dried paint - Cyran covers him with a blanket sometimes but doesn't bother most of the time because Clavis just plucks it off in his sleep - Doesn't sleep very long or very deep, he has a tight schedule after all! Haha! Ahaha! Haa.. poor Sariel.

Nokto Klein

-:I - I think we all know where this is going - Look, I know he's not ALL about women and sex - But he's MOSTLY about it and I'm pretty sure he doesn't even care where he falls asleep - Literally falls asleep with his arms in postions that do NOT look comfortable - Don't worry tho, just pluck his arms from under whatever bodypart they are and lay him down normally - Deep sleeper, 100% - Has mastered THE nap. Like the one where you wake up and you have imprints of your clothes

Thank you for reading, requests are always open!

[privatekururugi]

@touchreceptors although I am ABSOLUTELY SCREAMING BECAUSE CONFIRMATION THAT THEY FUCKING TALKED IS SO GOOD, I’m also even more livid because THIS IS A VERY IMPORTANT, PLOT MOVING EVENT AND INSTEAD OF SHOWING US THEY JUST STUCK A LINE IN THERE. IN THE PREVIEW, NO LESS. I swear on everything if the unaired scenes don’t involve the time skip and the suzalulu that came with it I’m going to rage quit sO HaRd.

[aquagirl1978]

Hello! I'm a fellow Chev stan and I'm loving all of your Ikepri posts and headcannons!! I'm not sure if you've done this yet, but I'd love to see how the suitors react to finding out that Belle is pregnant. Do you take requests on those? If you don't, no problem! 😄

Hello my friend! Here are the 6 suitors you asked for first - the rest I will answer in a separate post later 😊

Ikemen Prince Headcanons - Suitors react to finding out Belle is pregnant

Chevalier Michel

You were nervous when you entered his private library that afternoon.

It should have been like any of the many times you had entered - it was a daily ritual for you to take a break from your library duties to join him to read.

But today was different. Today, you had news to share.

A hand on your still-flat belly, you braced yourself as you entered the beast's private lair.

Sitting on his favorite chair, a book open on his lap, he looked up, a small smile forming on his lips as you entered the room. He stretched out his arm, inviting you to join him.

Once settled on his lap, he wrapped an arm around you; you stiffened as his hand rested on your tummy.

He noticed your movements immediately, and peered at you.

"When were you planning on telling me?" he asked.

You turned to him in shock - how did he know?

"I had my suspicions for a few days, but only received confirmation today. You figured it out yourself?"

"You have been sleeping later. Picking at your meals." He nodded solemnly at you. "How could I not notice the change in you?"

His arm tightened around your waist; he placed an awkward kiss on the top of your head, ruffling your hair. "You'll have the rest of the day off from work. After lunch, you will spend the remainder of the day with me."

"I have to make the most of my time alone with you now," he added with a smirk, placing a rough kiss on your lips.

Clavis Lelouch

"This is some kind of joke," the third prince said in awe and wonder.

"No, Clavis. This is most definitely not a joke, not a prank," you said calmly and quietly, rubbing your belly.

Clavis stepped closer to you and took your hands in yours. "You're really serious."

You beamed at him, nodding. "Yes."

"Clavis," you added in a whisper, "you're going to be a dad." He gazed into your eyes, his amber eyes filled with warmth and tenderness. You knew instantly in your heart that Clavis was going to be a wonderful father to your unborn child.

"Does Sariel know yet?" Clavis asked.

What an odd question for your lover to ask, you thought to yourself. "No, you were the first I told, of course."

Clavis chuckled, his laughter erupting loudly, and rubbed his hands together. "Can I be the one to break the news to him? That there will soon be another hellcat in the palace?"

Nokto Klein

"What?" Nokto blinked a few times when he heard your news. "I think I'm going to need to sit down," he muttered to no one in particular.

You helped your lover to a seat on his bed and sat down next to him. You took his hand in yours and brushed a kiss across his knuckles.

"Are you sure?" he asked cautiously.

"Yes, I am very sure."

"What if it's twins?" His crimson gaze darkened.

"If it's twins, then we will love them both and give them everything they deserve. And we will remind them how lucky they are to be twins. Like their father and their uncle."

"This is a good thing, Nokto," you reassured him.

Still somewhat reluctant, he wrapped his arms around you in an embrace, his body clinging to yours.

Jin Grandet

Butterflies fluttered in your belly as you awaited the arrival of your lover. You had planned a special tea party to announce your news.

Jin had a bright smile on his face as he approached you; sitting next to you, he planted a sweet kiss on your lips.

You poured the tea and shared some sweets before revealing your secret to him.

Upon hearing the news, Jin jumped off the couch and lifted you up in his arms, swinging you around in a circle, you both laughing and smiling.

You thought you had never seen Jin happier than the moment you told him he was to be a father.

Licht Klein

"You're what?"

Okay, not exactly the reaction you were hoping for. "Licht, we knew this could happen..." You took his hand in yours. "This is a good thing."

He sighed sadly, stress and unease washing over his features, while his body remained still as a statue.

"What if it's twins?" He averted his gaze, unable to meet yours.

"Then we will give them all the love in the world and let them know every day just how special they are."

You saw something softening in Licht's eyes; maybe, just maybe, this could be something to help bring him out of the darkness, even if for a little bit.

He nodded slightly, offering the smallest of smiles, as his body leaned against yours in a warm embrace.

Sariel Noir

"Belle, do you know why I called you in here?"

You wrung your hands in your lap - did he know your secret you weren't sure how to share yet? "Ummm..."

He walked around the desk and tilted your chin with the handle of his whip. "You've looked more tired than usual. Distracted. The kitchen staff informed me you haven't been finishing your meals."

"Oh...they noticed?"

Sariel nodded sagely. "Belle, you have not been taking proper self-care of yourself. Have you been drinking enough water? Enough rest?"

You couldn't stifle the laugh that bubbled from your lips. "Sariel, I assure you I am drinking enough water. But um..."

Sariel stared at your dumbfounded as you spilled your secret with him. "I see," he said plainly, still stunned by the news. "This does not get you off the hook. You will still be expected to continue with your studies; however, I will be overseeing you...making sure you get proper rest. And care." He smiled at you, a certain twinkle sparkling in his amethyst eyes.

[ikehoe]

Ikemen Prince Suitors’ Reaction to You Having a Naughty Dream About Them Pt. 1

Characters: Jin Grandet, Chevalier Michel, Clavis Lelouch, Leon Dompteur, and Yves Kloss

Rating: Explicit – Some headcanons are pretty explicit, so I’m covering my bases just in case.

Warning: SMUT!

A/N: This is my first time writing a headcanon, and it’s for my dearest, #1 reader @kleeps. Part 2 is coming soon with the rest of the suitors (minus Gilbert, Silvio, and Keith)

Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to Ikemen Prince or any of the Ikemen series games. I’m merely an avid fan of being MC.

Jin Grandet

Jin had been holding himself back for the past couple of weeks, understanding that you wanted to take things slow in your relationship.

However, as we all know, the 1st Prince is very familiar with the art of body language. It was at the point where he was purposely avoiding you at night, so he wouldn’t end up sexually frustrated again.

One night, you grab his hand before he could make a quick departure after dinner and pull him to your bedroom, sitting him down and having a long talk with him about how you two need to talk about your feelings and your relationship and how you can’t just avoid one another.

Finally, with exasperation, Jin admits that the reason why he’s been ignoring you is that he’s been highly sexually frustrated around you, explaining in great detail the things he wants to do to you in bed every night.

He chuckles at your reddened cheeks and gives you a quick peck on the lips, promising never again to keep anything from you.

That night, Jin hears you moan out his name amid your slumber, and it is on – immediately, any willpower he had to hold himself back is out the window, and he begins to caress your body all over, trying to rouse you from your slumber

You wake up with a start, finding the 1st Prince peppering kisses all over your body, his manhood rubbing against your leg, and his fingers dangerously close to your dripping core.

“If you told me you were having dreams about me, Belle, I would’ve helped you out,” Jin says, lowering his head until he’s face to face with your arousal.

Needless to say, the former womanizer of a Prince is exceptionally talented with his tongue, and he has you screaming his name all night long (much to the disappointment of Yves, the resident of the room next door).

Chevalier Michel

Chevalier corners you in his private library, intent on figuring out why you were avoiding him at all costs and why your face would redden every time you saw him approaching.

After all, you were his, and he thought you understood that

He traps you between his arms and looks down at you incredulously, demanding to know the reason why you were avoiding him.

Finally, after a frustrating back and forth with you, Chevalier drags the answer out of you.

“I had a … dream about you!” You stammer out, eyes focusing on anything other than the icy gaze of the Prince

“Oh?” Was the first thing that comes out of Chevalier’s mouth in response to your embarrassing secret

“Well, tell me what happened. Maybe I’ll be generous enough to make a dream come true for a simpleton like you.”

That’s how you ended up admitting to Chevalier that you had a dream about being bent over the desk in his library, him taking you roughly from behind while whispering naughty things into your ear.

With each added detail, Chevalier manages to maneuver you closer and closer to his desk, flipping you around and bending you over once you were close enough.

You squeal in surprise as the Prince begins to run his hands all along your body, culminating in an exact recreation of your dream but so much better

The rest of your afternoon was spent in Chevalier’s private library, getting your insides rearranged by the second Prince’s large cock

“Who knew my little innocent Belle was dying to get fucked like this, hm? You wanted it so bad that you even dream about it.” He says, amusement evident in his gaze as the tips of your ears turn pink

Clavis Lelouch

“Ugh, Rio! I can’t believe I had that kind of dream about Clavis last night. I haven’t been able to look him in the eyes since!” You exclaim, hiding your reddened face in your hands as Rio stiffly pats you on the back in an attempt to comfort you

“Well, he should feel lucky that someone as amazing as you would want him, even in your dreams,” Rio responds, noticing the third Prince’s presence from behind the pillar. “Perhaps you should tell him?”

“I could never do that! I can’t even face him without wanting to die from embarrassment. How could I tell him I dreamt about him taking me in the faction’s office!”

At your words, Clavis saunters away from his hiding spot, shit-eating grin plastered on his mouth as he thinks of all the ways he could get you to admit your naughty thoughts about him.

That’s why later when you receive an invitation from Luke to meet Clavis in the faction office, you have to brace yourself before showing up.

Clavis sat on the plush couch in the centre of the room, smirking at you with a mischievous glint in his eye.

“Come here, my Belle,” he said, patting the empty spot beside him and you had no choice but to endure the next hour of his slow torture as his hands ran all along your body.

“You know, I heard something interesting from a lil’ birdie. Did someone want me to fuck them until they were breathless on this exact couch we’re on right now?” Clavis asked, causing you to choke on your sip of tea.

He ends up capturing you in a passionate kiss, leading to you bare-naked on the pristine white couch as Clavis roughly enters you from behind.

He tells you how naughty you are and has your pussy clenching around his manhood as you reach your release.

That’s when he pulls away and presses a gentle kiss to your forehead.

“Come to me first when you have a dream about me. I’m the only one who’s allowed to picture you like this, needy and squirming beneath me.”

Leon Dompteur

Leon is the true gentleman of the Rhodolite Princes, and for that reason, he captures your heart quickly.

One day, he sees a sliver of light underneath the door of the study and thinks to himself that you must be in there, having to endure another one of Sariel’s boring history lessons.

“Hey, are you in here?” He asks, only to find your head against the desk and soft snores coming from your body every couple of seconds.

He’s about to take off his cape and cover you up, in perfect gentlemanly fashion when he hears a peculiar sound come from you.

“Oh, Leon… Yes, right there,” you moan, stirring slightly in your sleep.

The sound sends a jolt straight to his manhood, and he feels his slacks tighten, but knowing how exhausted you must be, he settles for wrapping his cape around you for warmth and leaving to go relieve himself of his sexual frustration

That phrase replays in his mind for the next three days, resulting in him barging into your bedroom one day, sweaty from having just finished practice and cock throbbing with need for you.

“What’s wrong, Leon?” You ask, eyes wide in surprise as the handsome, dark-haired man pants in front of you.

“I need you,” he says, capturing your lips in a heated kiss as he pushes you onto the bed.

He spends the next hour making you cum on his fingers, again and again, stopping only to praise you and urge you to give him one more before he finally enters you with his large cock

“How long have you been having those kinds of dreams about me?” He asks, a cocky smirk evident on his face as he looks you up and down (as if you two hadn’t already been making love for the past few hours)

“What?! How did you know?”

Yves Kloss

It was a ritual for you and Yves to fall asleep in bed together, arms cradled around one another for warmth.

What you didn’t know was that he had his own ritual of waking up early in the morning so he could stare at your beautiful face uninterrupted.

“Mmm, Yves, it’s so good,” you moaned, stirring slightly in your slumber.

He can’t believe what he has just heard, heat immediately rushing to his face as he looks away.

The lustful words echo in his mind for the entire day, dredging up insecurities for him about your sex life and relationship.

Does she think we’re not being intimate enough with each other? Does she think I’m not good enough at it?...

For the rest of the day, every time you try to approach Yves, the beautiful boy seems to immediately rush off in another direction, shouting something about how Licht needs him.

By the time night rolls around, he’s feeling light-headed from the lack of blood going to his brain the entire day.

That’s why when you show up in his room again right before bedtime, he jumps up and looks eerily like a startled cat.

“Ah! Wh—what are you doing here?” He stammers out with his arms crossed on his chest.

“What? This is what we do, Yves. You didn’t want to cuddle tonight?” You ask him, cocking your eyebrow at his weird behaviour.

“I didn’t say that! Just… right, go on then,” He says, awkwardly climbing into bed and rolling over, so his back is facing you.

You decide to let him ride out whatever is causing this strange atmosphere between you.

Ten minutes later, you hear him turn, and then his beautiful, deep blue eyes are gazing into yours, a light pink shade dusting his cheeks and the tips of his ears.

“I… I sometimes have dreams about you like that too…” He finally says, causing your mouth to gape open in surprise

The two of you end the night cradled in each other’s arms, tongues intertwined in a passionate dance and hands roaming all over the other person’s body.

What you didn’t have the heart to tell Yves was that your dream this morning had been about the delicious earl gray tea macarons he’d made for you the day before… that was a detail you wanted to keep for yourself.

[chaosangel767]

Clavis Lelouch, The Jack of Spades

The following is a crack fic that was thought up with the marvelous @xxsycamore. We were discussing the similarities between Clavis and Luka (their eye color, motif of purple and the fact their initials are reversed and they are in the third “rank” ect.) We thought it would be funny if they were swapped for a day. Mo wrote the marvelous ending. I present to you Clavis stuck with the Black Army Misfits.

Go Here if you want to see Luka thrown to the Noble beasts of Rhodolite. 

Thank you so much for the fun Mo! I hope you guys enjoy! 

Characters: The Black army, Clavis, Comte, Leonardo

WC:1200 

Type: Pure Crack 

Tagging: @thewitchofbooks, @queen-dahlia, @canaria-blackwell, @kissmetwicekissmedeadly, @aquagirl1978, @themysticalbeing, @devildomwritersposts, @luvrsn, @namine-somebodies-nobody, @atelieredux, @violettduchess, @sarahann-1984, @kpop-and-otome, @citizensofcradle, @curious-skybunny, @littlewitty, @lordsisterxotome - If your name is crossed out I was unable to tag you. If you want to be tagged/untagged please let me know or fill out this form here.    

Clavis Lelouch, The Jack of Spades 

It is another normal day in Rhodolite when Clavis is approached by an unfamiliar man with golden eyes.  

“Prince Clavis Lelouch” The man confirms and Clavis nods warily. “Please only open this tonight” The man warns before reaching into a pocket and pulling out a package wrapped in purple paper and tied with a golden ribbon. Clavis studies the package carefully, turning it over in his hands. Looking up to address the man, he realizes the stranger has gone,  leaving more questions than answers. Tucking the package in his pocket, he continues on his way. 

That night, when the sun goes down and the full moon is high in the sky, Clavis pulls out the package and inspects it. There is a sender's name in tiny letters, the moonlight making it easier to read the gold ink. 

Comte St. Germain 

“What is this about?” He carefully opens the package to find a spade clip sitting in the box. He picks it up, inspecting it in the moonlight.  He stands up to find some information, but a wave of exhaustion hits him and he sits back down on his bed. 

“I guess this can wait till tomorrow” He sets everything down next to him and drifts off to sleep. 

But when he opens his eyes, he is in a completely different room… 

~~

The sound of a hamster wheel is the first sound to greet Clavis as he awakens out of his slumber. Looking around the room he can’t help the confusion at the strange surroundings, his clothes are out of the ordinary as well. Standing up, he makes his way out of the room and down an unfamiliar corridor. He takes in the sights of soldiers, at least by their uniform, walking by him. He walks into the kitchen to be greeted a tall man. 

“Morning Luka, we have a request from the soldiers for breakfast, can you help me?” Sirius asks and Clavis nods confused, slipping on an apron. Who is letting him in the kitchen? Who is Luka? 

Clavis starts setting pots on the stove, looking at the recipe Sirius pulls out, trying to follow the directions slowly as others fill the room. 

“Okay, who are you and how the hell did you burn water? The tea leaves haven't even been added yet” Ray is growing suspicious of the strange man in the Jacks’ uniform and again Sirius steps in. 

“Leave him alone Ray, honestly what is up with you and Fenrir today, picking on Luka so much?” Sirius shakes his head.

“What do you mean what is wrong with us? Luka is the strange one today?” Fenrir cuts in before Sirius shoos both of them out of the kitchen. He turns back to “Luka” and watches the way the man stirs the burned water.  Clavis silently follows Sirius’s directions, listening as intently as he can for any clues on how he is supposed to act. Where is he? Other than being at a military base, he can’t tell much else.

After helping with the dishes and cleaning up, he heads off to explore, seeing the Ace that was so skeptical, he decides to have a little fun. He walks up to him, Fenrir he thinks is his name. 

“Hey Fenrir, want to help me with something?” Clavis walks up to Fenrir with a smile, holding up a a mystery bag. Fenrir nods, a smile growing as they find the safest spot in between the buildings.  

“What are you going to do?” Fenrir asks, his eyes growing wide as a banana peel is thrown, catching an unsuspecting Seth off guard. A startled yelp is hard as he slips on the banana peel and falls, caught completely off guard. 

“You brats!” Sirius yells, having seen the whole thing, causing both men to take off running, cackling through headquarters. 

“Fenrir! What have you done, you have corrupted our lovely Luka, did you bully him into this?” Seth catches them first, rubbing his hip where he landed. Fenrir raises his hand in surrender. 

“This man approached me-” Fenrir tries to defend, only for Sirius to cut him off, pointing to “Luka” 

“You are telling me that Luka…our Luka.. threw a banana peel at Seth’s feet without any provocation?” Sirius rolls his eyes, a frown on his face. With a mutter of brats and a wave of his hand, he turns from the officers. “Back to work you lot” 

 When dinner rolls around, the officers all sneak a peek into the kitchen to watch Sirius and “Luka” work. 

"Do you guys seriously  not see anything wrong here???" Fenrir shouts, sick of the others not believing him just because of his tendencies to joke around often. The strange purple haired man just continues cooking alongside Sirius as if he had lived with them his whole life.

"Fenrir for the last time," Sirius breaks his speech to let out an exhausted sigh, "leave him alone. I don't know what's gotten into you today to bully our Luka like this but I won't tolerate it much longer."

Sirius just now notices the purple haired, golden eyed man in black army uniform dropping the whole packet of salt into the pot. Strange. Luka usually knows his way around the kitchen. The dinner turned into a disaster.  Between his cooking adventures, the training he had to do for his troops and running around causing chaos, Clavis escapes to his “room” early, but his feet carry him outside.

Clavis lets out a sigh as the moon comes out, looking up he notices that it is still full. He wished he could understand where he was, the little bit he gathered throughout the day wasn’t much help. He had no idea how far he was from Rhodolite, or how this “Luka” person acted. Walking out into the courtyard, he reaches up to play with the spade clip in his hair. Footsteps startle him out of his thoughts and he looks up to see a figure stepping up to him. 

Golden eyes that seem familiar approach him with a package and with widened eyes he remembers the events the night before.  

"Ahh, here you are. I'm sorry, I don't have much time for explanations. Take your belt and put it on”  The mystery man thrusts a package in his hands and he finds his beloved belt sitting in it. He slips the belt back around his waist before the man speaks again. “Give me the hair clip” Surprise flickers in his face as he hands over the spade clip. As soon as the exchange has been made, Clavis stumbles, using the wall to catch himself and he starts to feel exhausted. 

"Woah there." The man, Leonardo, manages to catch him before he can collapse. He shakes his head. "This damned Comte and his messes. And he says he has put his mischievous past behind him. Tsk." He leaves the man on a nearby sofa and lights a cigarillo, off to his other destination.

[jazminetoad]

In My Reality | Prologue

Hey, I was bored so I decided to start a fanfic series of the Tatsumi Brothers from Juuni Taisen. Yay

It’s a “Tatsumi Brother x Reader” story about how the Tatsumi Brothers enter the reader’s reality which kinda flips her world upside down.

So I just finished the prologue. If you guys like it or if I’m bored again, I’ll make the first chapter. (Click “Keep Reading” to read the story)

"[Name] get out of bed; It's 3 in the afternoon," my mom told me as she came into my room with fresh, clean clothes. I didn't have to look over to know.

Groaning, I removed my mask from my eyes then rolled over to face up at the white ceiling. The sunlight seeping in from the blinds caused my sight to cringe before it finally adjected to the light and I could see the grey walls lurking in the corner of my eyes. Arising from my queen-sized bed a yawn escaped from my mouth. My form reached over and placed my sleep mask on the nightstand, next to my water mug.

"Morning mom," I greeted her as she sorted out the pile of clothes on my dresser. Looks like she did a colour load, which means no pants to put away.

"Morning sweetheart. Can you put your clothes away before you come downstairs?"

"Sure," I simply answered as I slipped out of the cozy sheets I once was tangled in.

"Thank you. I'll see you when you come down," she stated, placing the last of my t-shirts neatly on the others. Afterwards, she wrapped her arms around the remaining clean, clothes that weren't mine, carefully balancing them as she left my room and closed the door behind.

The click of the doorknob echoed into my ears when my feet landed on the fuzzy rug. My eyes drifted their gaze to the plain black bodypillow wrapped in [f/c] blankets, reminding me of a burrito. It just had the colour for the case, no special Anime character on it. I wish there were one though; it'd make the nights seem less lonely to see my favourite character's face on it. However, a pillow is a pillow. Despite me using it as an illusion for myself it doesn't change the reality that when I hug it in my sleep or when I'm awake no arms will return my embrace.

A sigh falls out of my breath, my eyelids dropping in sync. I turned my head away from the lying pillow and dragged myself to the other side of my bed, towards the dresser that patiently held the clean clothes my mom put there. I opened a drawer, putting my undergarments away first then my socks. Once those were put away, I moved to retrieve hangers from my closet, passing by my desk and shelves as I did.

If you were wondering why I slept so late into the afternoon, well, it's currently winter break, so that means I can stay up late and sleep in late past noon. Sadly enough, it's January which means the break almost over, and that means school is standing around the corner, menacingly. Just the thought of it disturbs my mind as that reality tries to infect my thoughts.

I hate reality. I know not all of it is shit, but there's enough of it that makes me want to drown myself in the world of fiction. Whenever it's the weekend or breaks from school, I binge Anime, tv shows, YouTube, and movies, so that's the only thing on my mind. I then write or read fanfiction, there is the rare occasion I sketch something but I'm not good at art since I don't practice enough. By the time I return to reality after having my head stuck in my imagination for so long, I can barely focus without going back to daydreaming. Eventually, that wears off, and then reality is what floods my brain; I despise it but I know I can't be stuck in my fantasies forever. Luckily my friends provide that nice spot in-between for me, helping me stay in the real world but also let me discuss the fictional. Then there's also my bro.

"Yo sis," my brother's voice called from the other side of the door after his fist knocked on it. "You wanna continue Code Geass?"

My bro is the best. Unlike most siblings I know, we actually get along. He's also a big help in my life, one of the reasons why I haven't lost my mind. He makes sure I don't overwork & stress myself and reminds me to have fun and chillax. I love him for it, and he's practically my best friend. We aren't the exact same age but we were born in the same year, just a few months apart so we get to be in the same grade. He's the older one. He's also taller which means he can t-pose over me, and we reenact the meme; it's great.

"Yeah," I answered. "Just let me get ready."

"Alright," he replied before I felt the vibration of his footsteps grow distant from my room.

'Heh, if I had Takeyasu's ability, I'd be able to sense his movement better.'

I chuckle to myself at the thought floating in my mind as I put the final shirt away. My two favourite characters that I desired to be real was the Tatsumi Brothers, Nagayuki and Takeyasu. I love those two. Whenever I watched their episodes from Juuni Taisen, I always smile. They make my heart feel something that I never felt for any character before. I don't want to be cliche and say true love, but to me, that's what it feels like. I know they're fictional characters, so I won't get much out of it, but strangely enough, I'm okay with that. I can't imagine my heart belonging to anyone else. I do wish they were real, though. I even used my wish on the bracelet my friend, Meri-chan, got for my birthday one year, that they'd become real.

The bracelet was some urban legend. It was lime green and had a few beads on it. The legend goes that you make a wish and when the bracelet breaks, your wish has come true. 'Course, it's most likely a bunch of baloney but that didn't stop me from wishing that the Tatsumi Brothers would become real. I currently just wear the bracelet as an accessory since the wish probably won't happen, it's not like the thing is going to break anytime soon.

Grabbing my towel, my other hand opened my door. I slipped down the hallway and slid into the bathroom, my foot pushing the door closed as I put the towel on the towel rack. Hopefully, I don't take too long because we were left on edge on the last episode of Code Geass we watched. Well, I'll finish sooner than my wish coming true that's for sure, heh.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Okay bro but if you think about it, Lelouch-"

"[Name], I washed your school uniforms. Can you put them away while I start on tacos?" Mom requested from the kitchen, interrupting the Anime, my commentary, and reminding me that school is coming soon. "You too, [b/n]."

"Yes, mom," we both respond.

My brother picked up the remote and hit the pause button so we wouldn't miss anything. I pulled myself up from the plush couch, disappointment growing on me since I had hoped not to be interrupted until dinner was ready. Well, I guess I could let the disappointment wither away since it's Taco Tuesday, my favourite. I chuckled to myself as my feet reached the next level above the main floor and headed down the open hallway to my room.

My laughter died out upon seeing my seven school uniforms, five that were the regular female uniform and two that were gym uniforms. Unlike most students, I didn't like the idea of having to wash my uniform every day, so to make things simpler, I paid for six more with my own money. It was a bit irritating, using the money I earned from my summer job for this instead of getting something else. Still, my practical choice, so I didn't necessarily have to worry about my mom washing my uniform every night.

"Hhhhhh, why does school have to come back so soon?" I asked myself as I picked up one of the uniforms.

The uniform wasn't too special, a simple white blouse, a blue skirt, a blue jacket, and a blue & black striped tie. Students could decide if we wanted to wear tights, leggings, or shorts underneath the skirt as long as it was black or white. I wore leggings unless it was summer which I then wear shorts and knee-high socks. There are those girls that only wear thigh-high socks and panties under their skirt to which my nerd brain questions why. 'Course that's their choice, have fun with your ass cold.

A Discord ringtone made me resurface from my pond of inner thoughts. Becoming aware of my surroundings, I realized my friends Meri-chan and Kamida were calling on the Discord group chat we had. I could tell by the laptop I had open on my desk. I quickly put the uniform I had in hand on the rack with the others before sliding over and clicking the answer button that popped up.

"Yo, what's up nerds."

"Hey I'm not a nerd," Meri-chan protested. "I'm a cool kid."

"Meri-chan, we're all nerds here," Kamida stated before greeting me. "Hey [n/n], how you doing?"

"Eh, good I suppose but I could be doing better, Kami," I answered simply. "How's life?"

"Pretty chill but I got bored, so I decided to call you guys."

"Well, I'm just putting my uniforms away," I informed them and went to put the last uniform away.

"I sometimes forget that you have more than one," Meri-chan commented before I heard her gasp. "Hey, how 'bout we hang out tomorrow, we only have so many days before we have to go back to school."

"Oh, don't remind me," I groaned, hanging my head, then went back to putting the uniform on the hanger and walking over to the closet, hanging it up with the rest.

"That doesn't sound like a bad idea Meri-chan, we could hang out tomorrow," Kamida suggested.

"I'm down," Meri-chan quickly responded.

"Welllllll..." I hesitated, sitting down in the [f/c] spinning chair in front of the desk.

"[Name]."

"You see, I kinda want to stay inside my last few days..."

"[n/nnnnn]!" Meri-chan whined.

"Come on [Name], you know you can't stay cooped up inside forever," Kamida reminded me.

"I know," I grumbled, leaning back in my seat. "Fine, I'll come out tomorrow, but it's going to be after 2."

"2 am, geez [n/n] I didn't know you'd be willing to come out that early," Kamida joked.

"I meant 2 pm," I corrected.

"Okay," he chuckled as Meri-chan pipped in.

"But if you're late again, you're buying lunch this time."

"Okay, bet, but what if I'm not?" I inquired, my fingers tapping on my desk.

"Mmmmmmm," she hummed, seemingly to be thinking.

"It's fine I'll pay for lunch tomorrow."

"Alright, but don't use it as an excuse to be late."

"I won't," I reassured her. "Anyway, I'm gonna go watch a few more episodes of Code Geass with my bro-"

"You still need to watch Dragon Ball Z," Kamida interrupted.

"And you need to watch Juuni Taisen," I countered, emphasizing the "you".

"Yeah, yeah," he brushed it off. "Anyway, go have fun with your bro. We'll call again later on tonight."

"Alright, bye guys." I left the call and closed out of discord then proceeded to shut my laptop.

Kamida and Meri-chan were my two friends from school; we've known each other since childhood. 'Course Meri-chan isn't Meri-chan's real name, that's just a nickname Kamida and I gave her. Occasionally, they called me [n/n]-chan but not too often. Then there are times where we call Kamida, Kami-kun, but mainly Meri-chan does it out of spite since Kamida doesn't like it. Especially when Meri-chan does it in her kawaii voice. Those two are the only ones outside of family that have the same vibe I do, that's probably why we've been friends for so long.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Hey, you guys ever wish fictional characters could become real?" I randomly asked out of the blue, staring up at the white ceiling as I waited for my friends over the call to answer my question.

"All the time," Meri-chan answered.

"We know simp," Kamida smugly commented.

"Nuuu!" Meri-chan pouted while Kamida and I laughed. "Hey, if anything [n/n] is the simp over here, she's the one actual crushing on the characters."

"Hey don't call me out like that."

"Ha! She doesn't deny it," Kamida jeered.

"Okay, what about you and Android 21?"

"Ack-" Kamida blurted before muting himself, causing me and Meri-chan to giggle. A few seconds pass by before he unmuted himself. "Why are you asking this question [n/n]?"

"No reason in particular-"

"Are you sure it's not you wanting to talk about Juuni Taisen?"

"No- it's not just that. I just think fictional characters would make reality interesting."

"Right..."

"Meri-chan if you could bring someone from Juuni Taisen to-"

"My boy Uuma! You should know this by now."

"Bruh-"

"Well, it's either that or Usagi, and I rather be alive thank you."

"Who's Uuma again?" Kamida inquired, not knowing who was who quite yet since he hasn't watched the Anime.

"Uuma is the warrior of the horse," I informed him.

"Right," Kamida mumbled before letting out a yawn.

"You sound tired, go to sleep!" Meri-chan told Kamida.

"No, you go to sleep."

"Guys, we're all on the same timezone. If one of us goes to sleep then we all do," I stated. "It makes sense since we're all planning on meeting up tomorrow."

"I guess we go to sleep," Meri-chan said bluntly.

"Yeah, alright, goodnight guys," Kamida yawned.

"Night."

"Night guys."

With that, we each left the call. I, however, didn't fall asleep right away. I woke up late and the night was still pretty early, so I opened up the Funimation app on my phone. Scrolling through the list of saved Anime, most of which were halfway through since my brother and I are watching them together, I came across Juuni Taisen.

"Why not..." I muttered to myself as my finger tapped on the Anime and went right to click on episode 7, In Like a Dragon, Out Like a Snake (Part 1).

By the time I finished episodes 7 and 8, it was 2 am when my eyes glanced at the clock in the top corner of my phone. Sighing to myself, I leaned over and snatched my charger off the nightstand, plugging it in the wall before connecting the other end to my phone. Turning off my phone, I placed it on the nightstand and snagged my sleep mask, putting that on my head.

As I laid there on my bed, silence flooded the room, not a sound to be heard but my own breathing. Vines of sorrow began to grow on me as the feeling of loneliness came over me. I tried to pull myself out of the emotion, turning over and wrapping my arms around the plain bodypillow in an attempt to comfort myself. In the end, it only helped slightly. It didn't erase the pain because I knew there were no arms that would hug me back. A tear escaped my eyes before I pulled my mask over them, and a final thought appeared in my mind before I entered the dream realm.

'I wish I wasn't alone...'

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

"Congratulations, Tatsumi {Ani|Otouto}, warrior of the {dragon|snake}!" Duodecuple exclaimed. "You are the winner of the 12th Juuni Taisen, everyone give yourself a hand!" The man started to applaud but soon stopped. "The antidote has settled in by now. You'll be fine."

{"Tch|Alright"} the Tatsumi brother simply responded.

"Now that you've won the Juuni Taisen, you can make one wish of your choice. Would you like to make your wish now, or would you like for it to be granted later?"

"In all honesty, when I arrived at the Juuni Taisen I wished for {nothing|money}, I didn't need anything else really but now that {I'm here|I had time to think about} I don't want to wish for {nothing|money}."

"Oh, do you have another wish in mind?" Duodecuple inquired the Tatsumi brother sitting in front of him, alone.

"Yeah... I wish me and my brother were never apart of the Juuni Taisen."

[naruwitch]

Code Geass: Paladins of Voltron Chapter 38: Jupiter's Sanctuary

Red. That was the color that surrounded the Castle of Lions from all sides. No, not the bleeding red of blood, or the orange flames of fire, but bright red clouds of dust and gas as Jupiter's Red Spot swirled in all directions outside.

Upon making it back to the castle, barely so much as touching down in Zen's hanger, Lelouch ordered for Allura to guide the Castle of Lions to their Solar System's largest gas giant, where in its lower hemisphere, they'd spot a hurricane that had been blowing and surging practically since the planet formed.

"Take us into the eye of that storm. It should provide enough interference and temporary shelter until we can regroup. Quickly!"

Despite the nearly mesmerizing display of the storm outside, no one was in the mood for exploring or observing it.

Yes, they got away. Yes, they'd managed to shake the Galra for now. But they all knew it wouldn't last long, and that didn't even take into account the losses suffered. Dozens who managed to make it back to the castle were left heavily wounded. Several hallways had to be boarded off and converted into makeshift extensions of the infirmary to treat all of the wounded. Only those with absolutely life-threatening wounds were allowed into the pods first. The rest had to wait and suffer the pain until one opened.

Lelouch and Nunnally both gazed anxiously into the pod that currently held Sayoko inside, the nearly mortal wound to her abdomen dying her cryosuit a rosy red as the machine worked to knit her skin back together, face still pale and slight shadows under her eyes from the blood loss.

Lelouch swallowed, fighting back bile as images of his maid-turned-surrogate-mother bleeding out on Zenobia's floor flashed back to his mind. Despite Lord Guilford's efforts to stop the bleeding on both Sayoko and his sister, they almost didn't make it.

'How many times have I been down here?' Lelouch wondered bitterly, 'Only watching as someone close to me nearly died in these things?'

Nunnally didn't say anything either, only glancing at her brother apprehensively, trying to read his face to offer words of comfort or encouragement, to tell him that Sayoko, and everyone else who made it would be fine. But so far, she had come up empty.

Lelouch didn't bother to turn around as the faint hiss of the infirmary doors opened behind him and the clear clacking of footsteps echoed through the room.

"...What are our losses?" Lelouch asked bluntly, nearly devoid of emotion as Allura approached the pair.

"...Civilian casualties remain zero for our side," Allura said briskly, "But as for our fighting force…? I'm afraid more than half have fallen."

"...I see…" Lelouch said so quietly Allura nearly doesn't hear.

"Lelouch, it's…" Nunnally started but stopped at the look on her brother's face. At that point, she knew that words wouldn't be enough to convince her brother otherwise right now. That he had done the best he could to save as many lives as possible. That this wasn't his fault.

"Where's everyone else?" Lelouch asked, still not turning around.

"Kallen, Rivalz, Shirley, and Milly are with their families. Helping them get settled," Allura said, "Coran is with the rest of the engineers repairing the damaged Knightmares. I believe Suzaku is with his cousin and Tohdoh's squad, and Rai and Nonette are looking over C.C. right now."

"She hasn't woken up yet?" Lelouch asked.

"No…" Allura shook her head, "She's still unresponsive, but clearly alive."

"...And our 'guest'?" Lelouch asked tersely, nearly spitting out the word like venom.

Allura scowled as well, "Currently contained in a cryopod. He won't be able to do anything for now, but we're not taking chances. We're having guards posted to him at all hours, and they have orders to take him out again if he somehow escapes."

"Good," Lelouch nodded slightly before turning out of the room, "If you'll excuse me, I have something else to attend to."

The two princesses watched him go with looks of concern. Yes, Lelouch looked like he was being strong, but they, Nunnally especially, knew better. Lelouch was barely holding it together, focusing on the tasks at hand just to keep from breaking down himself. While Lelouch had gotten better at showing his vulnerable side when around the Paladins, he still had much to work on. It was even rare for Nunnally to see (or hear at the time) her brother cry about anything, but the sobs she used to hear coming from his room during their earlier days at Ashford didn't fool her. Nunnally had no doubt that only after Lelouch was in the quiet of their bedroom would he finally let it out, and it would be painful for him, but she was determined to still be there for him no matter what.

"He'll be alright, Nunnally," Allura said softly, as if reading her mind, "He may be leading this fight, but he's not doing it alone."

"Yes…" Nunnally nodded solemnly before looking more directly at the Altean, "By the way, I never got to thank you for earlier… Thank you for saving me and Euphie. And thanks for looking out for Lelouch and the other Paladins."

Allura smiled sadly, "Ever since I learned of Altea's destruction, I've grown to consider the new Paladins as my family. And that does include you as well." Allura placed a hand on Nunnally's shoulder, "I told Lelouch long ago that I'd be there for him, no matter what. And I want to make that promise to you too, Nunnally, if you'll let me."

Nunnally smiled and wrapped her arms around Allura's waist, feeling the Altean do the same to her.

They'd be there for Lelouch. Both of them.

Kallen fidgetted, her mind flashing back to the day in the hospital when she last saw her mom face to face. She was still clad in her Paladin armor, her helmet resting next to her on her bed. If finding out aliens were real was overwhelming enough, finding out your own child was a pilot of one of the greatest weapons in the universe, and one of the only people that could stop said alien race was likely even more shocking. Kallen knew her mom deserved to know where she'd been these last months, and she was grateful to be given the chance to do so.

"Mom, you still with me?" she asked after a short silence.

"Um, yes…" Mrs. Kozuki nodded, "It's just a lot to take in… I know how much you hate Britannia, so it doesn't surprise me as much as it should that you'd fight against them, but you're even fighting an entire alien race as well…?" She glanced up at her daughter with an anxious expression, "I know I can't stop you Kallen… but this is how I lost your brother as well. I know our life was far from perfect, but I never wanted…"

"I know mom, and… I'm sorry for dragging you into this, but I couldn't just sit back and do nothing anymore, especially after Naoto…" Kallen felt her throat squeeze as tears pricked her eyes, "...At first, it was about revenge, I won't deny that. But ever since this, finding the Lions, fighting with the other Paladins. Even before this with the Black Knights… It's more than that now. We're fighting to actually help people now, to actually save lives. And I don't regret it, not for a second."

Kallen felt a soft hand on top of her own and she looked up at her mom again.

"I think I understand," Mrs. Kozuki said softly, "I know how much you care about your friends and what you believe in. Your brother was the same way, but… but I want you to know… I'm proud of you, Kallen. Just promise me that you'll stay safe. I don't want to lose you too."

Kallen didn't waste another second as she engulfed her mom in a hug.

"I promise, mom. I swear on my life…"

Shirley bit her lip, trying to gauge her parents' reactions. Just like Kallen, and after helping them get settled in, Shirley told her mom and dad everything that had been happening, including the things that she had come to realize about Britannia. About the disturbing parallels she saw between the Galra and the Britannian government's policies. She honestly wasn't sure what her parents would say. Her father was a scientist in the Britannian army, a position she knew he held with great pride. And even after they moved to Japan, Shirley couldn't recall if her mother ever really interacted with the Japanese (their manor being fairly deep into the settlement), honorary citizens or otherwise. Or at least, she never saw such interactions during the few times she was home during the school year. She didn't want to think her parents were bad people, but finding out your child was one of your nation's greatest enemies was likely not a pleasant surprise.

"...Look," Shirley said, the silence finally getting to her, "Whether you agree with me or not, you're still my mom and dad, so we're not going to kick you out or anything, but… you can't change my mind either. I'm too deep into this, I can't just turn my-"

Aurora Fenette suddenly stood up and shakily walked to the door.

"I...I need a moment," she muttered when the doors slid open for her and she retreated down the hallway.

Shirley's eyes shimmered as she watched her go before reluctantly turning back to her father, his expression still unreadable.

"Dad… I… I'm sorry, I just-"

"Shirley," Joseph said calmly, meeting his daughter's eye, "I want you to be honest with me. Does all of this…" he gestured around the room, "...Does this really mean that much to you?"

Shirley was silent, her heart pounding in her chest. She wasn't sure why her father was asking her that question. And the way he was… it sounded almost like coming to a crossroads, though she wasn't sure for whom. But no matter what he meant, Shirley shut her eyes and vigorously nodded her head.

Joseph didn't say anything for a moment, then he sighed and stood up.

"...Where are you going?" she asked nervously as the doors slid open again.

"There's something I need to do," he said vaguely, "and I'll talk to your mother too, Shirley. Just give her some time."

With those last words, the doors hissed shut, leaving Shirley still staring at the door, unsure what to feel at that moment.

"...And that's pretty much all that's happened until now," Rivalz finished after settling down to talk to his mother and siblings about the adventures they had gone on so far. Amelia, Isla, Ava, and his baby brother Joshua remained mostly silent throughout the story and still were as if most were still trying to digest what they had heard. (Though with Joshua being only three, he seemed more interested in 'inspecting' one of the pill bug aliens that joined them in the lounge. It had a surprising amount of patience for having its hair and fur pulled on by the toddler).

Amelia opened her mouth like she wanted to say something, but seemed to think better of it and just ducked her head back down to her lap.

The twins, Isla and Ava, both looked at each other, though didn't say anything either.

Rivalz cringed, "I know it's a lot to process so if you need some time I totally get it…"

"Girls," Topaz Cardemonde said finally, "will you take Joshua outside for a moment? I want to talk to Rivalz alone."

The girls didn't question her as Amelia swiftly scooped the boy up, ignoring the whine that followed as he was pulled away from his new 'pet plushy' and quickly hurried out.

An awkward silence followed as mother and son faced each other on the couch. It put Rivalz on edge.

Normally his mother was a very outspoken woman. She supported any passion her children wished to pursue, from Amelia's paintings and art to the twins' love of sports and cooking. He remembered in his earlier years how his mom used to be much more reserved when their dad still lived with them. Lord Corbin Yates from the moment he married Topaz had life all planned out for her and their children. They'd have a son who they'd raise to lead the family one day, then the rest of their children would be daughters they could wed off to well-off or even noble families so they could 'spend the rest of their lives in comfort.'

That changed when Joshua was born. Lord Yates hadn't wanted another son. 'Too much hassle trying to divide up the inheritance' had been his excuse. Topaz knew that if Corbin found out it was a boy, he'd likely demand it be aborted. But if there was one thing that his mother and her family had been solely against even by Britannian standards, it was abortion. They told their daughter that if she ever so much as thought about killing an innocent baby even before its birth, they'd disown her.

So, Topaz went through with the pregnancy, keeping the gender secret from Corbin as she did. Though Rivalz was only fourteen at the time, he remembered the look of sheer disgust on his father's face when Joshua turned out to be a boy. Despite this, Topaz loved and raised Josh just as much as Rivalz and his sisters.

Then one night, one of the family's head maids came to his room, her face pale and with a packed bag, telling him to quietly meet his mother by the horse stables. All three of his sisters were there, and his mother was carrying Joshua in a baby sling. They had escaped back to his mother's family that same night.

Rivalz didn't find out until several months later, when her mom finally filed for divorce, the real reason for their flight.

Apparently one of the maids, the same maid that helped them escape, had overheard a plot that Corbin was discussing through his slightly open office door. He was apparently planning to get rid of Joshua ("Sell him on the market, ship him to the EU, make it work!") and have it disguised as a kidnapping. There would be a bribed investigation where the cops 'gave up' after a few months of 'searching' and Joshua was long gone. Where? Not even Corbin would know… or even care.

Upon hearing this, the maid immediately alerted Topaz. It took several attempts to finally convince her of her husband's treachery, but after noticing some unusual activity in their bank account, she made arrangements with her father and mother to come live with them until this was sorted out.

It didn't take much convincing after that for Rivalz to turn against his dad and take his mother's surname, Cardemonde, instead. He hadn't seen that man since.

"Mom…" Rivalz started, "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I dragged you and everyone into this. But please-"

"Rivalz…" Topaz raised a hand to silence him, "When I left your father, taking all of you with me, that was likely the hardest decision I ever made. To this day I still ask myself if I did the right thing."

Rivalz blinked, confused. Where was his mom going with this?

"I did my best to raise you into a good man, and I like to think that I've done so, even if the ultimate result is… not what I expected."

"Mom…" Rivalz murmured, unsure what to say.

"Son, in that message, you said you believed you were doing the right thing. And sometimes the right thing isn't always the most popular thing, especially in our society… I'll admit, I'm not sure how I feel about this arrangement, but… above all else, Rivalz, know that I'll always love you."

Rivalz felt his shoulders sag slightly. It may not have been the answer he wanted, but hearing that last part gave him hope that he could have his family see things from his view. For now, though, he could settle for this.

"Just…" his mother spoke again, "Just don't get yourself killed, please?"

Despite himself, Rivalz laughed softly, "Got it, Mum."

"...Milly, when I joked to my colleagues that one of your ideas or schemes would one day bring about the end of the world, I meant it as just that. A joke…"

Milly laughed nervously from next to her grandfather as they strolled down one of the Castleship's halls, giving him a tour before officially settling him in.

"Um, well in my defense, the Galra were technically already on their way here, so it wouldn't have really mattered if we had found the Blue Lion at the time or not, so…" Milly argued back a little uneasily.

Ruben huffed out a laugh and shook his head tiredly.

"For what it's worth, Milly," he said, placing a hand on her shoulder, "I'm proud of what you've accomplished so far. It may have taken being abducted by aliens to do so, but you've grown into a fine young woman that I'm honored to be the grandfather of."

Milly smiled and leaned into her grandfather's side, "Thanks, Papa. Though… in all honesty, I doubt Mum and Dad will agree."

Ruben grimaced, "Leave your mother and father to me. There's a reason I asked you to move with me to Japan after the war, and I haven't regretted that decision, especially not now. I don't want you to make the same mistakes they did."

"I won't, Grandpa," Milly exclaimed, "I'm old enough to think for myself on the important things in my life."

"I hope so, and I believe you are…" Ruben said gently, "Just don't ever lose sight of that, Milly. At least promise me that."

Milly smiled, "You have my word, Papa…"

"Well… that was a shitstorm…" Nonette muttered from her position against the wall. Her left arm was in a sling and had several small, attachable Altean cold packs that Rai couldn't bother to remember the name of on her face and attached to the areas of her chest and back from the Gawain's hadron cannons. It was a miracle that she survived with mostly second-degree burns, much less that her Knightmare hadn't blown up with the Siegfried machine they'd faced. Though, the fact that she wasn't in the direct line of fire may have helped a little.

"Yeah…" Rai grimaced in agreement, "But… it could have been worse… So much worse."

The Paladins, upon arriving back, had been horror-struck when they learned about V.V.'s attempted assassination. While Allura had managed to hold him off briefly, the results likely would have been worse had Chigusa (or Viletta Nu as they learned she'd finally regained her memories) not intervened as well.

What truly baffled them though was the state that C.C. was in even now. The immortal still hadn't regained full consciousness, and their medical scans couldn't find the cause for her comatose state.

"Is it true what I've heard about her?" Nonette asked, "That she's immortal?"

"Yeah, it is true. We're still not sure how, but she is…" Rai nodded before chuckling humorlessly, "With Suzaku, that means that all of us have a Geass now, yet I'm the only one that didn't get it from her."

Rai's thoughts grew dark as he thought back to the one who did. He felt his stomach churn when he recalled how that witch had cut him open and sewed him back up again, more often than not wide awake as she did so. Plus, if she was the one behind Mao's robeast…

He looked at C.C. again, eyes narrowing, "Haggar likely did something. It looked a lot like her power from what Nunnally described."

"Is there anything we can do to help her?" Nonette asked.

"I don't know…" Rai admitted. He looked down at his hand in thought. Magic, now that it was confirmed to be real, was clearly a tricky area. One thing Rai did know though was that the Geass held some sort of mystic element, but C.C. had said that Geasses don't work on her… but his Geass wasn't from a human... "I guess… There's something I can try but I'm not sure if it will work."

Nonette didn't say anything but watched warily as Rai approached the sleeping immortal. Hesitating for a moment longer, he placed a hand on C.C.'s forehead, activating his Geass as he did so.

He gasped as images flashed through his mind. "What…?" Rai felt himself flung into a colorful void before landing in the middle of a battlefield. Barricades were dug around him and explosions were going off everywhere. A squad of tanks came rolling over a hill and…

"C.C.?!" Rai gasped as he spotted the immortal sprinting across no-man's land before she ducked down into the barricade.

"Hold it right there!" a man barked before a bullet fired. Rai watched in horror as the shot penetrated C.C.'s skull.

C.C. screamed as the landscape changed again. This time it was even older times, stones being thrown at a cathedral and...

"Oh god…" Rai gasped as he stared at the blazing stake, C.C. tied to the center of it, screaming in agony.

Rai was shaken from his stupor as another scream hit his ears. But this one was not one of pain, but of pure, blood-thirsty rage.

He barely caught a glimpse of a white-haired being streaking through the crowd of people, sword cutting down any in his path when he was yanked away.

"Rai!" Nonette shouted, pulling him away. The Green Paladin blinked and shook his head, barely catching the layer of dark… something faded from his arm.

"What…?" he whispered, looking up at C.C., only to see the same dark aura disappear from her entire body.

"Rai, are you alright?" Nonette asked in concern, "You're crying."

"I am?" Rai asked, hand reaching up to his cheek and feeling the dampness there. He glanced back at C.C. If that was what he thought it was then… no wonder she acted the way she did. So numb. So… unfeeling.

"...Cera…"

Rai blinked up in alarm. That was C.C.'s voice. Was she waking up?

"You finally called me... by my real name..."

"...Okay, you creeped out at all, Ohgi?" Tamaki asked, eying their prisoner in the stasis pod, "I know he looks like a kid but…"

"Well, according to Lelouch he's not," Ohgi said, looking just as uneasy, "He's actually the Emperor's brother. His and Nunnally's uncle."

Tamaki scowled and glanced at V.V. again, "Looks more like his grandkid to me."

"Maybe. But…"

"Yeah, yeah," Tamaki waved Ohgi off, "Magic and all that spiel, I get it."

The hiss of the pod chamber doors caught their attention and Tamaki tensed when Viletta entered.

"Oh, Chi… Sorry, Viletta, right?" Ohgi asked, surprised to see her.

The woman didn't answer right away, as if debating something in her head, then said, "I would like to speak Ohgi. Alone."

Tamaki narrowed his eyes. Most of the crew had been told that Viletta finally regained her memories, and if that was true, he didn't want to leave Ohgi even three feet away from her. "If you think I'm going to just-"

"Shinichiro," Ohgi interrupted, causing his friend to stop, "It's fine. I'll be fine."

"What?! You can't be serious! She's no ordinary Britannian you know, she's one of those Pureblood psychos!"

"Yes, she was," Ohgi confirmed firmly even as Viletta flinched slightly, "but she has nothing to gain by trying anything right now. Just leave us be for a minute, okay?"

Tamaki still stubbornly glanced between the two before sighing harshly and leaving, but not before shooting Viletta an 'I'm watching you' gesture.

With Tamaki gone, Ohgi suddenly felt awkward. While he may have been confident talking to his friend, he couldn't help but feel his guard raise slightly when facing Viletta. It hurt him to do it too. The two of them had gotten close over the past couple of weeks, and the thought of facing her as an enemy now felt surreal.

"I…" he finally started when Viletta stayed silent, "I'll be honest, I'm surprised you're choosing to stay with Voltron, with us, instead of going back to Britannia. I know others would have… and already have…"

...Considering you're a Pureblood went unsaid, but the message was clear.

Viletta frowned slightly, "I'll admit, the thought did cross my mind too. But I'm also not really a fan of having my entire race being sold off by the person we're supposed to be serving. Not only has he kept secrets, but is endangering everyone, including his people."

"I'm guessing by 'secrets' you mean V.V. here," Ohgi asked, gesturing to the immortal in question.

Viletta grimaced again, "That… and what I heard happened to Lord Jeremiah. Though, we're still unsure if Britannia had a hand in that or not yet."

"Jeremiah…" Ohgi muttered, furrowing his brows for a second. Then they raised in recognition, "He was the one that set up Suzaku, right? For killing Prince Clovis. If I recall, you were also a part of that at the time."

Viletta sighed but didn't deny it. "Not one of my finer moments, I'll admit… When I ran into Miss Fenette on the Avalon, one of the things she told me was that Britannia was evil and at that time, I couldn't understand why she would think that. I thought Zero had brainwashed her or something of that nature. But now that I look at things from her perspective, and with everything that has happened, I understand a little more."

Ohgi remained silent and continued to listen.

"Not only that, but she still saved me, an enemy soldier, pointing a gun at her. She could have just as easily left me for dead. I know it was likely to interrogate me and even without memories they still could have tried something. But they did the opposite. I was treated kindly, as another member of the group, even by you… If our roles were reversed, I can tell you right now that they wouldn't have gotten the same treatment. We would have used them to our advantage. As a pawn or a decoy."

Ohgi grimaced but didn't argue as he agreed. He had no doubt that that would have been the case.

"But… I'll admit, I'm still curious to know more. You all have lost so much, but you keep getting back up and pushing back. How do you do it?"

Ohgi shrugged, "I honestly don't know. I guess… if you really care about something, those things are just worth fighting for. And that makes them all the more precious to you."

Viletta blinked and looked down, "I never thought about it like that…"

Ohgi smiled, "If you want help understanding, I'm more than willing to be there for it."

At those words, for the first time in their conversation, Viletta smiled.

"I'd appreciate that."

"...Well, thank goodness they're all salvageable," Lloyd said as he lowered down from the damaged Lancelot, "the crystal isn't damaged, but the big problem will be getting a hold of replacement parts considering… Well, we can't exactly waltz back to our planet right now. What with it being occupied by aliens and whatnot."

"Lelouch explained to us briefly about the various governments of your planet. We may need to cautiously retrieve our resources from the other sovereign nations," Coran said with a grim frown, "but who knows how quickly the Galra will expand to the rest of the planet, especially with Zarkon himself there. I also have no doubt that they'll try and use some of your world's technology, regardless of how primitive, to their advantage."

"If you ask me, we should start searching for allies off-planet as well. Preferably ones with more advanced technology as well," Rakshata suggested.

"Oh, I agree," Coran nodded, "the princess and I have discussed several possibilities as of late. The more systems that we free from Galra rule, the better."

While the three continued to discuss such options, Cecile observed the footage from Lancelot and Gawain. Particularly, of Zarkon himself. Even just seeing him on recorded footage sent shivers down her spine.

'It doesn't seem possible…' she thought, 'How can one creature single-handedly stand up to a whole squad of Knightmares. None of the pilots made so much as a scratch on him. If they were normal Knightmare frames I could understand, but these were all upgraded from the castle, and even with that…'

Swallowing, she rewound the footage again, this time zeroing in on the weapon Zarkon was using. While she had never seen the Paladins fight in melee combat, she had heard from some of the Black Knights how these weapons, Bayards they were called, worked. How they could morph and shape into any tool that the Paladin needed or was suited for, from guns to swords.

So… did the Galra come up with a similar weapon, because from the description, whatever Zarkon was using acted a lot like the Bayards...

Cornelia blinked her eyes open, her vision slowly clearing as she looked around in confusion. The last thing she had remembered was passing out on the Black Lion's floor. She vaguely recalled Lelouch barking an order and Guilford leaning over her with some goopy orange substance on his hands. Otherwise, her memory was blank.

"Cornelia…?"

Whatever thoughts of returning to sleep Cornelia had gone flying out the window and bolted upright in the bed. Which was a bad idea as she felt a jolt of agony shoot up her right shoulder.

"Cornelia!" Euphemia yelped as she shot up in fright, Arthur yowling in annoyance as he was launched off her lap. "Wait, don't do that! It's not done yet!"

"Wha…" Cornelia gasped, blinking spots out of her eyes as they trailed down to her arm… or what was left of it.

'Oh that's right...' she remembered. Her arm was gone now, and whatever strange device that was attached to her shoulder, humming softly must have been repairing the damage.

"Sister, please, lie back down. It won't heal properly otherwise," Euphemia pleaded again before helping her sister back down on the cushion.

Any pain that Cornelia had felt previously, though, was wiped away as tears formed in her eyes. Her throat closed up in sheer relief at seeing her little sister alive and well.

"Euphie…" she breathed, sniffling as a tear trailed down her cheek, "You're okay…"

"Cornelia, don't worry about me," Euphemia responded, "you need to rest still!"

"I'll be fine, Euphie," Cornelia reassured as Arthur reclaimed his position on Euphemia's lap, "...I'm just glad that I didn't lose you down there."

Euphemia gasped softly before looking down ashamed. "I'm sorry, sister. This is my fault. I thought… I really thought with the SAZ that I could make a difference. Instead, I just made everything worse, like I always do!"

Cornelia frowned as her sister began to cry softly. "Euphemia, you were not the one who gave that order to shoot. You did not hold a gun in your hand and fire. Lelouch wanted to find a way to unite Earth for when the Galra came. We were offering the olive branch to our father, and he threw it away without even looking at it. He was the one stupid enough to form an alliance and sell out the planet to aliens, to monster even worse than he is..."

Cornelia couldn't hold back the shudder when she thought back to Zarkon. She had fought him face-to-face and he had bested her. Badly. And looking up at him from the ruined earth beneath her, she saw nothing in those glowing violet eyes of his.

"...Schneizel always used to tell us that a person's eyes are like windows to the soul," Cornelia said and Euphemia looked up at the mention of their older brother, "But when I saw Zarkon's eyes, there was none. There was nothing there. Just an abyss. A void that could never be filled or sated…"

Euphemia felt the color drain from her face. While it was true that she hadn't seen Zarkon herself, the stories she heard from Lelouch and the other Paladins were enough to scare her, but with her own sister adding onto it with such dread in her tone only made this nightmare more realistic than ever before.

What was even more heartbreaking, was that Lelouch had had to face a monster like that on his own.

Guilford looked up as he heard footsteps approaching the door he was guarding. He relaxed when he saw who it was, though.

"Guilford," Lelouch acknowledged as he came up to his room of the castle. Considering the infirmary was still flooded with patients, Lelouch inclined to let Cornelia recover in his room. Besides, there were a few things he needed to discuss with her and Euphemia in private, and it would be too much of a hassle to either move her or move everyone else in the area away.

Once his own head wound was addressed, Guilford insisted on standing guard. While he knew it would be foolish for someone to try and attack the princesses during this time, he didn't want to take chances, especially since Cornelia was still once the Viceroy, and many Japanese citizens were still less than pleased to even be in the same proximity as her.

"Lelouch," the knight acknowledged as he stepped aside.

Without another word, the Black Paladin entered his quarters.

"Lelouch!" Euphemia exclaimed happily when the doors opened.

Lelouch immediately smiled and embraced Euphie in a hug, "I'm glad you're alright, Euphie. I apologize for not seeing you sooner."

"It's alright," Euphemia shook her head, "I know you were… busy."

Lelouch smiled bitterly. 'Busy' was one way of putting it he supposed. But a neutral expression soon replaced it.

"I'm sorry to ask this, Euphemia, but there are some things I need to discuss with Cornelia in private. I'll come find you again later, okay?"

Euphemia nodded, though a little reluctant, but she ultimately stood up, Arthur in her arms, and exited the room, leaving her two older siblings behind.

With a hiss of the door closing behind them, Lelouch suddenly found himself silenced, unsure of what to say first. Though it seemed Cornelia was in a similar boat.

"I…" Lelouch rasped, his tongue feeling like lead. Licking his lips, he started again, "I'm sorry for the loss of your men."

Cornelia nodded, "I appreciate it. They fought bravely to the very end…"

Lelouch nodded jerkily, trying desperately to hold back a sudden wave of hot, bitter tears.

"How…?" Lelouch whispered, "How are you so calm about this?! You men died! Sayoko almost died! And you…! You lost your arm! Trying to protect me!"

Cornelia felt her heart squeeze as she watched Lelouch struggle to keep himself together. While on the surface it may not seem like it, Cornelia valued every soldier and knight that served under her. Losing even one of them was difficult enough and she suspected that with how small of a group they started out as, he brother and the other Paladins simply weren't used to watching other people die for them. In their eyes, the roles should be reversed. They were supposed to be the defenders, not the defended.

"This isn't your fault Lelouch, no matter if you believe me or not. All of my men, myself included, made the choice to protect you. And I don't regret it. Yes, it cost me an arm, but I'd gladly lose both if it means you stay alive… I just barely got you and Nunnally back, and I'll be damned before I lose you again."

Lelouch grit his teeth, "But I don't want to lose you either!"

This exclamation startled Cornelia as he sat down on the other side of the bed.

"I… I know I've been avoiding you since you came here, and I'm sorry for that. I guess… despite my Geass telling me otherwise, I couldn't see you as the sister I knew back at Aries Villa, or didn't want to… But when I saw you, with Zarkon on top of you, I…" Lelouch furiously wiped his tears away, "...I'm so sorry…"

Cornelia could only stare in surprise as her brother tried to pull himself together. She wanted nothing more than to hug him but honestly wasn't sure if that was something Lelouch wanted right now.

"Can we…" he took a breath, "Can we just talk? Just you and me? Please?"

"...Of course," Cornelia said softly after a moment.

"Thank you…" he exhaled in relief. Now the next conflict. Where did he even start?

Well… the beginning is usually a safe place, wasn't it?

"...When you heard that Nunnally and I had been killed, how did you handle it?"

Cornelia frowned and looked down, her own eyes misting with tears.

"When I wasn't comforting Euphie, I would cry myself to sleep every night. I kept telling myself that it wasn't true, that there had to have been a mistake. I don't think it was until about a month later where it finally sunk in for me that you were gone… or so we were told."

Lelouch couldn't help but scowl at that last part. "And yet no one seemed to remember that it was Britannia that initiated that attack in the first place. They blamed the Japanese for our deaths, but Britannia started the war. After they won, they just found that blaming the conquered nation was easier than taking responsibility themselves. A world, an empire, like that is one I never want to live in."

"Yes…" Cornelia nodded in agreement, "After the grief finally passed, I wanted to confront the emperor myself. Demand to know why he didn't keep you and Nunnally safe during the fighting. But I feared what he would do to Euphie if I did so. I was a coward…"

"No…" Lelouch shook his head, "Had I thought it through before confronting him, I likely would have done the same for Nunnally. Though I truly didn't expect him to banish her along with me."

Cornelia nodded, "I know this isn't an excuse, but being unable to blame the one who truly did it, I turned my anger onto the next best thing in my eyes. The Japanese. If the empire was blaming them, I might as well play along. I suppose I just kept telling myself that again and again until I actually believed my own lie… Or maybe I should have confronted him anyway, whether with you there or after the war. Hell… when we were watching you go I could have stepped forward and gone with you two. And Euphie as well. I… I should have tried harder to protect you like I promised I would. Like… like I promised to protect Lady Marianne before…"

Now Cornelia was crying and Lelouch sat silently, looking at her, patiently waiting for her to go on.

"...I completely understand if you hate me for everything, Lelouch. I couldn't protect your mother, and I failed as a sister as well. Terribly."

"...I did feel that way for a while. When no one came for us during the war, it was the final nail in the coffin for me so to speak. That us being sent to Japan was the final part of a plot to destroy our family. I closed myself off after that. I was afraid to form attachments with anyone, whether afraid they'd betray me or I'd get hurt if I lost them. And I know feeling hurt when losing someone is proof of caring for them, I just didn't want to feel that again." Lelouch paused before smiling a little, "However, joining Voltron, becoming a Paladin, not only did I forge attachments again, I felt something I never had before. Through everything, the Paladins and the Alteans aren't just my teammates or even friends anymore. I think of them as part of my family. When I told them who I really was, both as Zero and a prince, they were shocked, yes, but they also didn't judge me. I was fully prepared to step down as leader from the mistrust, but the opposite happened instead. They were willing to help me, to support me."

Cornelia smiled again, "I'm happy to hear that you have the support you need, Lelouch. After everything, you deserve to be happy, with a family you can trust."

"Thank you… if you would be willing, I'd love for you to be a part of that too."

This statement surprised Cornelia again. While it was clear that Lelouch no longer saw her as his enemy, the fact that he wanted her in his life like that was not what she expected.

As if reading her mind, Lelouch continued, "True, you may have been my enemy, but once you understood the entire situation and knew the truth, you didn't hesitate to help. I'm grateful to Nunnally for doing that. It showed me that even you were capable of changing. So… if you're willing, I'd very much like to have my older sister back. I'm sure Nunnally and Euphemia would like it that way as well."

Cornelia didn't notice the tears running down her face until they fell in droplets on her remaining hand. Now she was the one crying in front of her brother. "Do you mean that?"

"Yes… well actually, I do have one condition. Please don't sacrifice yourself again. Not like that." Lelouch amended, gesturing to Cornelia's arm, "I… I already thought lost you once. I don't want to feel that way again. I don't… I don't want to watch anyone else I love die."

Cornelia found herself nodding, wiping at her eyes, "Deal."

Lelouch then smiled and in a move that even surprised himself, he pulled his arms around Cornelia's shoulders, burying his face in her shoulder. She hesitated for a moment before doing the same with her remaining arm.

"I love you, Cornelia…" Lelouch whispered.

"I love you too, Lelouch…"

Contrary to everyone's fears, Tohdoh's eye itself wasn't as damaged as they originally thought. It was still functional and the only damage he'd have would be a grisly looking battle-scar on his face over it. Coran had offered to use one of the medical devices to heal it faster, but Tohdoh insisted that it be used on the other soldiers first before him. If worse came to worse, losing an eye wasn't really as big of a loss as some make it out to be. For now it was bandaged, gauze and a medical pad wrapped around his head.

"No word from Kyoto, Kaguya?" Suzaku hesitantly asked his cousin from their position on one of the star decks, the reed hurricane illuminating the room in a rusty red.

Kaguya shook her head sadly. "No. They all stayed behind. I doubt any of them survived, and if they did, they won't for very long considering their age…"

Suzaku grimaced, gritting his teeth. While he hadn't been as close with the rest of Kyoto since Japan's fall, that didn't change the fact that they were still kin of his. Kin who had been lost or slaughtered in the battle varga prior.

"This is a nightmare…" Chiba muttered a hand pressed to her forehead, "I knew they would come eventually, but to see them, and just be told…"

"It kind of makes you wonder how long it would have taken for them to get here if Voltron hadn't shown up," Asahina added.

Senba and Tohdoh shot the bespectacled member a hard glare. "Now hold on, it's not fair to blame this on Voltron…"

"I'm not!" Asahina insisted, raising his hands in surrender, "I agree with you. At least we were warned and able to prepare but…"

"...I guess it doesn't change the fact that we still led them here, is that it?" Suzaku asked, head looking down in shame, "Maybe if we had stayed away, it could have bought Earth more time. Maybe some people could have lived a little longer..."

"...I disagree," Tohdoh said gravely, drawing everyone's attention, "I still think Voltron coming now rather than later was the best call. Had they chosen to stay away from the planet, the war Britannia was waging would have continued. And without Zero, without Lelouch's, leadership, the rebellion he was organizing would have fallen apart quite quickly. That's not taking into account how many more innocent lives would have been lost because of it. Ironically, it was the threat of the Galra coming, and the knowledge we received beforehand of it that was able to bring most of the Earth together when it was so divided. Yes, it was a gamble, one that Lelouch himself admitted to, but a gamble that had to be taken and was well worth it in my eyes."

"...Yes," Chiba nodded finally, "You're right."

"Apologies, Colonel," Asahina bowed his head, "I didn't think about that…"

"We may have lost the battle for now, but the war is far from over," Senba added, "Urabe's death, and everyone else's, will not be in vain."

Suzaku thought back to the very thing Lelouch has said back on Arus. About the possible scenarios that could happen when they returned and thinking about what his sensei just said as well, he even back then, Lelouch was taking all strategies into consideration, accounting for all possible outcomes on a military and civilian level. And unfortunately, especially in war, there were times when there wasn't a 'good' option at all, but a choice between two evils instead and trying to judge which one was worse, and which one would ultimately bring victory with the best outcome. And he also found himself agreeing with his sensei.

Considering all of the factors, all the ways this could have gone terribly wrong much earlier, it really could have been much worse. They could still fix this, right? They had to fix this. For Urabe. For all of the people who died trying to defend their home, their world from monsters.

'And if they have the will to not give up… perhaps I can find that will too…

It wasn't long after that Suzaku started the trek back to his room. He had no doubt that Lelouch and Allura would be calling them all for a team meeting soon to discuss their next move and he hoped to take a few minutes to meditate and clear his mind before that.

"Oh…!" a small gasp caught his attention as he rounded the corner and came face-to-face with a pair of familiar lavender eyes.

"Euphie!" he exclaimed in relief, just barely lifting his hands in time to catch her when she ran into his arms.

"Suzaku! I'm so glad you're okay!" she cried, leaning into Suzaku's chest as they both lowered to the ground.

"You're glad I'm okay?!" the Purple Paladin almost laughed in disbelief, "I'm glad you're alright!"

Euphie let out a wet chuckle, feeling tears trickle down her face, "I'm sorry… I'm sorry for everything..."

Suzaku paused and pulled back to look at the princess, "What are you talking about?"

Euphemia looked down, not willing to meet Suzaku's eye, "Sister told me already, but… and I'm not trying to blame myself for what happened… but it feels like anything I'm actually good for, it's worthless when everyone else is fighting."

Suzaku frowned in concern when the message became clear. Euphemia may say that she wasn't blaming herself, but Suzaku didn't believe her from the tone of her voice.

"Euphemia, your idea for the zone… there was nothing wrong with that! I personally loved the idea. And it would have worked! It would have worked if…" Suzaku didn't finish his sentence. Not that he needed to.

Euphemia didn't say anything, only sighing and placing her head against Suzaku's chest. It clear that she still didn't believe that.

Suzaku bit his lip. He hated seeing Euphemia like this, but if there was one thing he noticed that many of the Britannian royalty seemed to have in common, it was that they tended to blame themselves for things they either didn't have control over or weren't even involved with in the first place. Such mental gymnastics always shocked him.

"...Euphie, I never told you the truth about why I became a soldier, did I?" Suzaku asked suddenly.

Euphemia blinked and looked, confused about the sudden change in topic.

"Euphie… I killed my own father. And I joined the Britannian military because I thought that was the best way to atone for what I'd done." Euphie was now looking at Suzaku in shock, "I used to believe that if I went by the system, I could find a way to change things for the better, even if I died in the process. But… that was just an excuse I kept telling myself. I understand that now. I was trying to avert the blame, to lessen the guilt I've been carrying for so long… but then I realized, my friends helped me realize, that dying wouldn't let me atone for anything. I was just running away from my problems. If I'm serious about wanting redemption, the best thing I can do for that is live. To live for a cause I believe in.

"So that's why, no matter what," Suzaku said softly, smiling gently at Euphemia, "I'll be there to help you every step of the way as well. You have my word on that."

Euphemia didn't know when the tears began to fall again, but she did know when she once more threw her arms around Suzaku, feeling warm, happy, and relieved as Suzaku embraced her back, holding her as she cried with tears of joy.

"Suzaku?" Rai's abrupt voice rudely interrupted the moment and Suzaku couldn't stop the slightly irritated sigh that escaped.

"What's going on, Rai?" he responded as he pulled away slightly to answer.

"The Paladins need to meet in my room. C.C.'s awake."

All of the Paladins made it to Rai's room almost as one and nearly ripped the doors apart to get inside. They were all relieved to see the immortal awake again. Nonette politely left the room to give them space.

"Well, it's not like whatever was done to me would have killed me…" C.C. attempted to say nonchalantly.

"So?" Shirley gasped, "That doesn't change the fact that it still happened! What if you do die some time and actually stay dead?!"

"You're a part of this ragtag crew as much as the rest of us, C.C.," Kallen smiled, "You ain't going to get rid of us that easily."

C.C. actually looked startled before huffing out a laugh, "You've all become so clingy…"

"But you love us for that, don't you?" Milly winked with a smirk.

The door to the room opened again and this time Allura entered. She also looked relieved to see C.C. awake as well.

"I'm glad to see that you are alright, C.C." Allura said in relief, "And I must apologize for not getting there to assist you sooner. If I had, I could have prevented whatever knocked you out."

C.C. shook her head, "I doubt that would have mattered… Whatever attack that was that V.V. used, it wasn't one he originally had."

"What did happen anyway?" Rivalz said, voicing the question everyone wanted answered at the moment.

"I am not sure how he got on the ship," Allura confessed, "Whatever means he used, it bypassed most of the castle's security. We're just lucky that the internal security caught him before he could cause any damage."

"Yes. He was targetting Nunnally and Euphemia," C.C. confirmed. Lelouch stiffened, body rigid with sudden rage. Suzaku's face also contorted but managed to keep his expression somewhat calm. "I tried to stop him, but… he threw something at me. It looked like a small black marble. But when it hit me…" C.C. shivered, suddenly looking ill.

Lelouch scowled, looking down in thought, all of this new information swirling in his head. V.V. snuck onto the castle, undetected, and then displays a power that not even C.C. was aware of? And the fact that C.C. seemed scared of it?

"...It was Haggar," Lelouch finally stated gravely, "It had to have been. It's the only thing that makes sense."

"So… Charles really did form an alliance with the Galra. Or with Haggar at least," Suzaku said.

"Meaning… they did all of this of their own free will," Kallen frowned angrily, seething. While she may not have liked Britannia from the beginning, but this was a new low and she felt even more betrayed. From the looks on the rest of them Paladins' faces, they were feeling similarly. Even C.C. looked disturbed.

"...Cera," Rai murmured.

C.C. blinked and gasped in surprise. Everyone else also looked at the Green Paladin in confusion.

"That's your real name, right? Cera?" Rai asked.

C.C. suddenly frowned, "It seems you have a habit of eavesdropping… and sharing secrets."

"Cera? I like that name," Shirley said, honestly.

"Same," Rivalz agreed, "It's way better than calling you C.C. all the time at least."

"It's at least a lot more human calling you that," Kallen said.

C.C. scoffed, "That's a joke! As if I want to be 'more human.' After all, I…"

Everyone stared as C.C. started to tear up, clutching the sheets of Rai's bedding like a security blanket.

"I've forgotten how… How to be human. I can't age. I can't connect with anyone without them passing by me. They move on, while I remain the same. I can't find love, or have a family, or watch them grow old and mature," C.C. was practically sobbing now, "And I can't die peacefully with them. I… I can't die period…"

Unable to stand it any longer, Shirley sat on the bed next to her and pulled C.C. into a hug. She didn't resist only crying harder as the Orange Paladin rubbed her back gently.

"It's okay… shh, shh, it's okay," Shirley soothed to the best of her abilities.

"C.C… We're here for you now," Milly reminded her, "You don't have to deal with all of this alone."

"We know that we still don't know much about you, but…" Suzaku hesitated, "but you're still our friend and ally."

"Yeah, and you've helped us so much since this whole adventure began," Rivalz added.

"You've been playing a part in this just as much as the rest of us," Kallen said, "We likely wouldn't be here now without you."

"Plus, didn't we say that we'd find a way to make you mortal again?" Rai asked, remembering the conversation they had after facing Mao, "You haven't forgotten that, right?"

"Rai's correct. We haven't forgotten that promise," Allura agreed, "Every being deserves to live life fully, and if this immortality, this curse, is standing between you and that, then we will help you break it."

"And once it's done… You can have a family of your own," Lelouch said in finality, "You can do all of those things you wish for. So please, C.C., or whatever you'd like us to call you, let us help you do that."

C.C. gasped out a wail before reaching out blindly, grabbing Milly's arm, being the closest, and pulling her roughly. With a yelp Milly collapsed onto the bed, dragging Rivalz with her. It wasn't long after that the rest of the Paladins and Allura joined C.C. in a group hug. She still continued to sob, but instead of sorrow, it was tears of joy that she shed.

"Thank you all for coming…" Allura addressed everyone present. After a couple more hours of resting, Lelouch and Allura requested for a number of people to meet them and the other Paladins on the bridge. These people consisted of Nunnally, Ohgi, Tohdoh, Cornelia (being transported in a hoverchair with Guilford behind her), Nonette, Villetta, Euphemia, Lloyd, Rakshata, Cecile, and Kaguya. C.C. and Coran were also there, standing with the other Paladins.

"Firstly, I wish to apologize for the defeat we've suffered. Your planet may be held hostage for the time being, but the war is far from over. There is still hope to counteract this."

"We're planning a counterattack already?" Ohgi asked in surprise, "But… we don't have the resources or people for that yet!"

"This meeting isn't to plan the counteract for Earth," Lelouch informed everyone solemnly, "Several more preparations and precautions must be taken before we can even think about trying to take Earth back. No, we called each of you here to inform you of something. Something about Voltron."

"Or, more specifically, why Voltron broke apart when Zarkon showed up," Coran added, face grim.

"Voltron… fell apart?!" Nunnally gasped, eyes wide.

"I wondered about that myself when I saw that…" Tohdoh muttered, his good eye narrowing.

"So I wasn't imagining that…" Nonette muttered.

"Did it happen right as Zarkon came?" Villetta asked.

"No, it was right before. I remember seeing Voltron freeze up right before that mothership appeared in the sky. Then it broke apart," Cornelia reiterated. Guilford nodded in confirmation.

"Considering, from what we understand, it requires the Lion pilots to think and act as one to form Voltron," Rakshata said, "I highly doubt that it was due to mechanical failure."

"Highly unlikely," Lloyd agreed, "None of the Lions suffered too much damage after they returned to the castle."

"Then… Why did it happen?" Kaguya asked.

The Paladins all glanced at one another with uncertainty, as if asking the others if this was really a good idea… whatever it was they were about to reveal.

Finally, Suzaku let out a sigh, "As most of you have probably guessed, the seven of us aren't the first Paladins to use Voltron."

"Well, you did mention that Voltron was an ancient weapon. Nearly as old as this castle," Cecile reminded, "So that does make sense."

"Right…" Kallen nodded, "Anyway, we're apparently only the second set of Paladins to use the Lions, and that was only after we found them after 10,000 years of hiding."

"Yes," Allura confirmed, "My mother and father were two of the original Paladins in fact. The Paladins of the Purple and Red Lions respectively."

"Oh… cool," Ohgi couldn't help but say.

"Anyway, for someone to be a Paladin. Their energy kind of has to match that of the Lion," Rivalz went on, "Kind of like putting the red balls in the red box and blue balls in the blue box so to speak."

"Basically, the seven of us have a quintessence that mirrors that of the Lion we pilot. We did mention when we first got back that the Lion chooses the pilot, not the other way around, right?" Rai asked.

"So theoretically, not just anyone can fly a Voltron Lion," Guilford stated, "You have to be bred for them."

The Paladins winced at the wording. "I guess that's one way of putting it…?" Shirley cringed.

"Anyway, just like us, the Paladins before us shared the same quintessence with their Lions as well," Milly went on, "And a bond between a Lion and its Paladin is strong. Like, really, really, really, really, really-"

"I believe they get it, Milly," C.C. interrupted.

"...Really incredibly strong."

"But… What does this have to do with Voltron breaking apart?" Euphemia asked hesitantly, voicing what everyone was thinking.

"...Because the Black Lion still shares a connection to its previous Paladin. A Paladin that is still very much alive," Allura spoke gravely.

"...'Still shares'...?" Ohgi asked, face suddenly growing pale as realization slowly dawned on him. Similar expressions were mirrored on most of the other occupants.

"The original Black Paladin…" Lelouch spoke up, the air now heavy with trepidation, "...My predecessor was... or rather, is... Zarkon."

[cynthiaandsamus]

Custom Toonami Block Week 79 Rundown

Code Geass: Lelouch is establishing the official United States of Fuck Imperialism which is like the UN but actually does stuff, plus he has to deal with the fact that CC’s lost her memory and is acting like a demure slave girl harem choice from a VN. Charles is still trapped in the Human Instrumentality Shadow Realm so everyone figures this is a great time to unify everyone against Britannia. Kallen beats the shit out of Suzaku for being a dick to her all this time and the Knight of Ten is making his rounds because they realize they forgot to give him any buildup and he’s going to be a miniboss later so they have to cram all his being a dick personality into like five minutes while all the Knights of the Round assemble to prepare for an attack on Japan once the National Federation is formed. Llyod and Cecile for some reason enhanced the Guren for Suzaku even though he’s clearly more used to the Lancelot but apparently they enhanced it too much and made it a death machine like the Talgeese in Gundam Wing so Suzaku has to stick with the Lancelot. Looks like the Guren will have to sit and collect dust unless a certain pilot is rescued and then immediately has a convenient upgrade. Amazingly all the countries go along with everything Zero says and give up their militaries and have the Black Knights be the official military of the Federation. I don’t know how that works given that the Black Knights have been struggling to fight off one nation’s military idk how it’s supposed to substitute for a dozen nations’ military but I guess they conscript support and troops from the other nations or something. Charles comes back on the tv after the Federation is formed and is all “Awww what a cute little UN you have, fuck off bro.” which you’d think this’d be the perfect time for him to just out Lelouch as Zero and wreck the Black Knights’ morale but he doesn’t for some reason and they’re just gonna fight. Lelouch is freaking out and knows that having everyone want to murder the Britannian royal family includes Nunally so he calls Suzaku who just straight up goes “Bro cut the crap are you Zero or not?” and after so much plotting and scheming Lelouch just comes right out with it. Suzaki agrees to protect Nunally as long as Lelouch meets him alone at the Kururugi Shrine where this all began.

Inuyasha: This is another one of those Modern Day filler episodes which are always fun. There’s just something about Inuyasha running around in modern Japan being Spider-Man and saving people and catching bank robbers on the way to deliver Kagome’s lunch that’s so thoroughly entertaining. Basically Inuyasha spends this whole episode jittery that everyone’s so chill and ready to relax after Naraku just got away and is probably an inch from death but after a big adventure in the modern era where Kagome is as usual unprepared for her test, he ends up passing out on the bed after insisting a little battle with Naraku wouldn’t exhaust him. It’s a really cute little episode to let everyone bide some time and reflect on the past arc now that we’re starting a new wave of filler before we get to the Band of Seven and Mt. Hakurei stuff.

Yu Yu Hakusho: The first match of the tournament is about to begin and Botan, Shizuru, and Keiko come in with Koenma who is sick of baby jokes and puts on his bishonen disguise to impress everyone. There’s some neat lore about how they gave Koenma the guest team every year to bribe him into not shutting down the tournament without giving him anything of value and how the bloody show of the Dark Tournament pacifies the demons so they kill fewer humans, so that’s cool. Since Yusuke is still passed out, Kuwabara is de facto Captain and decides on simple one on one matches while the other team Captain just kinda roasts an eight of the crowd to see if it’ll wake Yusuke up. Kuwabara’s in the first match versus Prototype Killua, complete with afterimages and yo-yo tricks. They size each other up for a while and Kuwabara shrugs off getting his fucking neck broken surprisingly well while they go back and forth with “Well I can track YOU better” for a while. Togashi really loves his yo-yos of death so those have Kuwabara on the ropes and turn him into a fucking kite ready to slam back down into the arena, so yeah, Kuwabara’s having a rough time of it.

Fate Zero: Waver’s been having strange dreams about Iskandar, and not the ones people usually have about him. So he goes to get a basic history lesson on the historical figure that’s been chilling on his couch for a few weeks and spending all his money on xbox live arcade. They also go through all the ridiculously obvious historical inaccuracies and Iskandar’s just like “idk bro, I’m here so the book must be wrong” which is hilarious because Fate also does this with more modern historical figures that we have pictures of and shit so they basically sit there saying all historians have no idea what they’re talking about and gaslighting the field of history as a whole. On the way back Waver’s upset that Iskandar’s so awesome that it basically takes any effort on his part to win and it won’t be an actual achievement despite the fact that they’ve taken out like… one servant, MAYBE, and most of the other historical figures are equally over the top. But still Iskandar says that if your aspirations are big enough it doesn’t matter how big or small you are, everyone’s tiny in the grand scheme of things and clawing at greatness you can’t truly perceive is what matters. Also Caster and his boy have found the wreck they made of their workshop of dead bodies and are kinda fucked up about it but also ready to fuck up more people because God sucks or some shit. So Caster summons a Bloodborne monster which you think more people would notice and mention during Shirou’s time, like nobody in UBW ever said “Hey remember like seven years ago when a giant Bloodborne monster appeared in the river?” so I’m guessing there’s some kind of perception blocking going on. But yeah everyone’s gonna jump on the Bloodborne Monster next time for the season premiere.  

Konosuba: So we pick up where we left off and Kazuma is working off his debt by… killing more toads. Wow this world really is like a video game, we get the same five enemies over and over again. However they’re fucked without Darkness throwing herself into monster orifices looking for a good time so Yunyun has to save them. We already met Yunyun in the OVA so it’s kinda weird to be re-introduced to her here in basically the same way but their relationship is basically like Gai and Kakashi if they only did the lame dorky challenges Kakashi suggested when he’s too lazy to think of a good one. Also there’s a cat now, I don’t think that really comes to anything, just a scene of Megumin going “we have a cat now” and everyone’s like “kay”. Kazuma and Megumin play Naked Chicken to see who can get more naked before the other backs down and end up taking a bath together because they’re both stubborn assholes. Also we get a quick snippet of Yunyun and Megumin’s backstories which you can basically make Yunyun’s the swing scene from Naruto (idk why Yunyun is bring out the Naruto references in me today) and Megumin is stealing bread like Les Miserables in increasingly bizarre and disgusting ways because she’s ridiculously poor or some shit.

Sailor Moon Crystal: So turns out that Usagi and Mamoru BOTH had their shots with the ‘fucks everything up’ sword with a pocketwatch and… the discarded gems of the four knights? Idk how that works given they were humans and also dead but what baffles me more is that both Usagi and Mamoru very obviously did not get hit by the sword but decided to fall down dead and not move for a couple minutes despite their shots very much being blocked and there being no blood. Anyway Queen Metalia has the crystal, bullshit is happening, 1000 years of darkness, you’ve seen Xiaolin Showdown, you know the drill. The remaining four Guardians get a cute little flashback of Usagi saying what she likes about them and then they give up their lives to revive her inside the dark energy blob of Queen Metalia and crystals and lights and shit happens and swords and wands are pulled out of nowhere and you know how a final boss goes, they beat it with the power of believing in themselves and shit like that. Also apparently the only difference between sealing Metalia away and killing her is hitting the giant bullseye on her forehead so yeah, hopefully she’s down for good this time. I don’t want to complain because this show was genre-defining but it’s hard to find things to say about something so generic and milktoast, it’s the Seinfeld problem where there’s been so many more interesting iterations that it’s just kinda “get on with it already” at this point. The only real markedly noticeable thing about it is how plainly and unashamedly it is about being a power fantasy for teen girls, and there’s something to that, harmless power fantasies can be fun but it just feels like the physical mechanics of this kind of progression being “She feels this shit REALLY HARD” is less exciting than some of the alternatives

Durarara!!: It’s the big Masaomi backstory episode and we get the whole deal of how he formed the Yellow Scarves and got into a relationship with Saki because Izaya wanted to orechestrate a gang war because that’s what Izaya does all day is orchestrate gang wars. It’s kind of amazing how many kids in this show are like “I don’t know how it happened but one thing led to another and suddenly I was at the head of one of the largest gangs in the city” like they kinda really yadda yadda over how that actually happens. But anyway Saki gets hurt in the gang war and Kadota’s gang has to save her because Masaomi’s adrenaline wears off at the last second and he can’t try and rush in and save her. I mean Dota’s van got there first anyway so how much he’d have been able to help would be doubtful but he feels bad about not even being able to try and Izaya says that fear and failure of his past will dominate his future actions which is exactly what he’s doing by letting his paranoia and frustration lead him to a war on the Saika army. Dota-chin tells him to face up to it and stop running or live with the shame of lying to Saki but Masomi can’t do that and his shame and determination to reverse the situation leads everyone into chaos as Anri discovers his secret.

[theraikouhotel]

Massive Headcanon Post

ALRIGHT I HAVE IDEAS!!! I think.... Headcanons below the damn cut because they’ll be separated into different series! God I hope this becomes a thing I do...

Please enjoy!! 

Fate

Raikou’s favourite time of day is dawn. She likes to see the sun coming up and the hope of a new day washes over her, making her look forward to another day of her being not insane as she believes she is. 

Shikibu secretly collects figures of the other Casters and sometimes makes them move with her magic, re-enacting something she sees in her head. She then writes out in her little diary, as if it was the most interesting thing ever when really...she made them kiss with her own figure she had gotten made.

Arturia also does baking on the side whenever she’s alone and she’s made sure that the cafeteria is empty. She’s been caught several times but they let her do her thing as she looked determined to get the recipes down. This is usually to thank everyone who has helped her, especially her master.

Tiamat likes to decorate mindlessly when she’s stressed. She’ll do it usually with Christmas decorations she has in her room, because she likes how fun they look. Sometimes it might be with Halloween ones. The Primordial Mother just likes decorating so much.

Europa sometimes might summon Talos and pet him to calm herself down. Having her bull close to her soothes her, especially when she sees things aren’t going as well. If she doesn’t have her bull, she’ll curl up and try to breathe but it doesn’t work sometimes.

Irisviel isn’t too fond of people badmouthing her children. Especially those she considers her own. She’ll kick the crap out of you so hard that you won’t even get up for the next week.

Black Clover

Asta hates it when people ask about his parents or drill into him that he should have died way too long ago. He’s never had any proper blood parents so he’ll say the Father at the church he was raised at is his dad. But when people say that doesn’t count, he won’t like it. He’ll also say that the belief in his comrades helped him live.

Noelle isn’t actually too close to the Mama Squad. She feels awkward around them. Or any sort of mother figure as she has no idea what to say. She’s also afraid of breaking down in front of them as it’s not becoming of a royal as she has drilled into her head. 

Vanessa only drinks to make sure the lonely thoughts don’t invade her mind. She hates feeling lonely and drinking helps alleviate it. But when she doesn’t, her mind starts playing on the fact that she’ll be alone forever and she just heads to bed, crying.

Bleach

Ichigo has nightmares about Yhwach from time to time. He always thinks about how he could have ended it a lot more quicker so that everyone could have lived. He always imagines several outcomes. But whenever he opens his eyes, he remembers those who have died in the War and it hurts him so much.

Orihime wishes she was as strong as Yoruichi. She has one of the strongest abilities yet she hates how indecisive she can be. She has kept to herself that her kind heart has hindered her so much, even with the amount of people telling her it’s her best trait and one that should be kept as there was enough hate in the world.

Yoruichi often feels like a failure. She has strongly felt this ever since Aizen and it continues to eat away at her even after the Thousand Year Blood War. 

Highschool DxD

Issei often feels like the girls that love him aren’t real. That he’s not really deserving of their love. He has these thoughts that plague his mind every other day that tell him that Rias is lying or that Raynare is actually still alive and is playing tricks on him.

Rias does her best to be there for everyone. But hates how her own duties stops her from doing that which instead makes her rely on Issei to see how everyone is. It’s not just as the alpha female in the harem, it’s as a friend to everyone.

Sona secretly enjoys dressing up with her sister, Serafall, as it reminds her that one day she may not be able to spend much time with her. So she never tells her to go away whenever Serafall is with her, rather she’ll just bear it and blush in embarrassment.

Date A Live

Kotori still enjoys the kids meals at the nearest restaurants as she loves how cute they are always made. She’ll always add it in with another order so she gets to indulge in how cute it is before devouring it.

Kurumi isn’t a big fan crowds. Whilst it does help her with her concealment, she feels her heart race whilst being within them. She has to take a moment in the shadows to get her heart to a more normal rate before going back in there again.

Love Live!

Umi is always the strict one. However, she almost always feels bad when she has to berate someone because in her own home, she has been treated a lot more harshly as the next head of the Sonoda household. But she keeps this fact closely guarded.

Kotori is always thinking about something. Usually about how to get Honoka to be hers only but she never acts upon it. She’d hate that she’d feel horrible if she did make Honoka only hers and “took out” the other competition that is her idol group. So instead, she gets out of this habit through fashion designing.

Mari isn’t actually a big fan of showing her wealth off to other people, only her friends. Sometimes she accidentally does it and then they try and cosy up to her. She hates that. She can see right through them and immediately denies them.

Chika doesn’t actually have many passions except idols. If it weren’t for idols, she would most likely stare blankly into the ceiling of her home as she would take over the Ryokan Inn that her mother owns. She’d just wonder what she was doing, whether or not if existing was right or not.

Karin has been offered various modelling gigs, which is of no surprise. However, there have been times when she has considered going 18+ modelling but refused in the end. She was curious yes but will never do it.  Of course, she’s just about getting by.

Emma has always been Karin’s best friend. They always look out for each other. However, Emma can see whether or not something is bothering Karin but doesn’t ever bring it up. Instead, she just wants to see her happy.

Bang Dream!

Sayo is a girl of many secrets. She only ever tells them to her twin sister, Hina as of late. Before, she’d never tell anyone about herself and if she did, it was only the bare minimum. She’s still closed off as she refuses to get hurt by anyone.

Tomoe is always overworking herself. She has lots of volunteering and things she does, which always leaves her knackered (tired as fuck) at the end of the day and all she wants to do is sleep. Even on days when she looks like she’s okay, she isn’t. She wants to rest.

Aya is clumsy and will get lost, just not as often as Kanon, her friend. However, she feels inadequate as an idol. She has trained for this but it always bothers her, as it goes into late night practices and early dawn nap times. She has considered giving up so many times, because of all the hate she has seen, even with her idol group, she’s usually the one with the most hate as she is at the centre most of the time.

Arisa is just gay as fuck. But she isn’t sure if it’s right to feel that way or not about certain people (KASUMI TOYAMA)

My Hero Academia

Kyouka has an innate talent of analysing quirks as well, she has never realised it. She has an analytical brain that can probably compete with Midoriya’s if she applied what she knew about music into hero work. 

Momo hasn’t been the biggest fan of being raised rich. She always wondered what it’d be like to live a normal life, without all the privilege and weight of a legacy she has  on top of her.

Danganronpa

Tenko has always been confused about what to feel about the ‘degenerate males’ she has met. Especially the likes of Shuichi and Makoto. She has wondered if her view of them being horrible is skewed as she seems Shuichi as one of her closest friends. But she won’t ever admit that, ever. 

Kaede really wants to know if she can stop with the piano puns. She likes to make them too much.

Makoto hasn’t exactly had the easiest time mentally. The death of his friends always haunts him even in his sleep. The screams, lights, flames, everything. He remembers all the details vividly and when he tries to reach out for them, their dead bodies are there on the floor.

Komaru has a hard time of knowing if she fits in or not as she had been taken from school and is now older than what she believes she is. She sits there wondering if it’s right to be this way now or not.

Other Muses

Jotaro is very cautious of everyone he meets. He doesn’t want a repeat of what happened in Egypt if he gets too close to anyone he likes. Even if DIO is gone, he’s never gotten rid of the feeling that someone will die in his presence or in his name.

Levi has a soft spot for his brats. He basically sees them as his children as this point and he may have been called dad once or twice by a few them. He enjoyed that but only gave them a glare.

Weiss is a soft gay for Ruby. But apart from that, she’s fine with both guys and girls. 

Mami always has the feeling of her wish being selfish at the back of her mind. It’s there nagging away at her as if it would come back to bite her in the ass so she’s always out there doing her best for her juniors and always on the look our for Kyoko Sakura.

Natsu hates how his former guild had treated him. He isn’t a dumbass who can’t do anything right, rather he’s someone who was the most attuned to his emotions as his flames prove. If he meets anyone from there, he won’t hesitate to take them out with one punch.

Lelouch actually had a crush on Cornelia for a brief moment before knowing of his relation to her. He decided to drop it and add her to the list of “Siblings I absolutely adore” but from time to time he does wonder if they weren’t related, would they take over the world together?

Haru has pictures of her friends in a small box. She also has one thing they owned within it too. She’s unaware of how strange this is.

[lelouch-vi-zero]

Entry 11

Hello everyone! This is part of an AU I’ve been working on since 2014 where Nunnally receives a Geass instead of Lelouch. Check out the Main AU Page to learn more and find all the previous entries. It’s been nearly three years since I last uploaded (yikes!), but thankfully I left myself a few chapters that were nearly complete.

Main AU Page Previous Entry Next Entry

In this entry, some of the Nameless Army try to figure out Nobody’s secret... come on! Don’t act like you wouldn’t gossip about your charismatic leader’s private life.

Rating: T (some innuendo and other Code Geass shenanigans) Words: 1,156

Kallen followed the unusual silence like a mother about to catch her children dropping keys in the toilet. As she made her way through the dorms, she could hear some hushed whispers near Nobody's room. She tapped on each door, praying that she wouldn't find interlopers snooping around Nobody's stuff. With each empty room she passed, her blood pressure increased.

"Tamaki, I swear!" Kallen shouted as she pushed open the door.

"How did you know I was here?!" Tamaki jumped up, but his crossed legs toppled him over.

Minami's face turned beet red, and Yoshida scanned the room for a hiding place.

"All of you? Have you no respect? No decency?" Kallen scolded. This was Nobody's room! She... she had never stepped in Nobody's room before.

The bed was made, but the duvet had been molded into the shape of a restless body. A pillow was wedged between the mattress and the headboard, slowly sinking into bedroom oblivion. The worn throw rug's name had been taken literally, and Kallen wasn't sure if it was supposed to be at the foot of the bed or at the bedside. The simple dresser sitting against the wall was old, but still functional. Its three drawers, however, were lazily closed with towels and notes overflowing out of them.

Kallen stepped into the room, and a crackling of chips stung her ears. An empty bag had barely missed the trashcan, ignored and forgotten.

This couldn't be right! Nobody was a brilliant speaker. He could heal a person's broken spirit with a simple touch on the shoulder. He had a structured reconstruction plan for Japan. He was an organized man. This room... this room couldn't be his. Neither Nobody nor C.C. actually slept in the room. The bedroom was only a formality, but still! It didn't fit his personality at all.

"Tamaki! You're supposed to take out the trash! Not dirty the place up!" Kallen said.

Tamaki raised his hands in self-defense. "Hey, I found it like this," he said with a sly grin.

Kallen's face turned red. "What's in your hands?!" she lunged at Tamaki, grabbing the cloth from him.

"Hey! Ouch!" he groaned.

She held the bra from its strap, and the polka-dotted cups swung like a pendulum.

"Whose is this?" she seethed.

"That's what we're trying to figure out." Yoshida crawled from the open bathroom.

Tamaki piped, "I saw it sticking out from under the pillow. Looks like somebody else has been in that crazy suit of his." Tamaki elbowed Minami, who looked away in embarrassment.

"You seriously think Nobody is..." Kallen couldn't finish that thought. She didn't want to imagine Nobody being so illicit in their hideout.

"Well, it's definitely not you," Tamaki added.

"What?!" Kallen moved to punch him, but he reflexively dodged. Were her feelings that obvious?

"We would have noticed if he was bringing in any outsiders, so we figured it must be someone already here. There's one problem though..." Minami said.

Kallen looked at the bra in her hand. She felt sorry for the owner. She couldn't imagine how embarrassed she'd be if she found out that a bunch of men were examining her undergarments for clues.

"It's too small for any of the girls here!" Tamaki exclaimed. "Of course, Minami was the one who realized that."

Kallen looked at the bra's tag. It was tiny! It almost looked like a starter bra.

No, she was not going to be sucked up into this nonsense! Kallen turned her nose up and folded the bra. She'll have it washed and returned to the room with dignity. Maybe she'd even clean up a bit too.

"I still think it belongs to C.C.," Yoshida said.

"I still have a pool going on when she'll get pregnant if you want in, Kallen," Tamaki said.

"She and Nobody aren't like that!" Kallen shouted.

"And how do you know?"

"I uh... I asked her." Kallen was ashamed to admit that she was initially suspicious of C.C.'s relationship with Nobody. She continued, "She said that they were 'transactional business partners.'"

"That's posh talk for smashing and you know it!" Tamaki slapped Minami's back, and the guys fell over with laughter.

Kallen stuck out her tongue, blowing a teasing raspberry at the other guys.

Tamaki playfully tapped on Kallen's shoulder, but he looked up and the color drained from his face. Yoshida cowered behind the bed, but he couldn't hide from Sohma's disapproving glare.

Minami, Tamaki, and Kallen stood alert, bowing their heads out of respect. Kallen snuck the bra into her pocket.

"Every time I feel like you're ready for more responsibility, you prove me wrong," Sohma said.

Kallen stepped in front of him. "I was just lecturing them--"

"You were sitting on the floor playing around with them," Sohma corrected.

Kallen bit her lip.

"Tamaki, finish your chores. You two, go back to your posts. Starting next week, you'll both be on the skeleton shifts."

Minami mumbled an acknowledgement as he walked past Sohma. Yoshida shuffled past with his head hung low.

Sohma focused his stern glare at Kallen, and she followed him as he walked out.

"I know I'm going to regret asking this, but why do you have a push-up bra in your pocket?" Sohma asked.

"Uh... it was in Nobody's room." Kallen massaged her sore cheeks. She had enough embarrassment for the day.

"Huh. I could tell it wasn't yours... Ah! I'm sorry, I didn't mean--"

"It's fine. We were trying to figure out who it belonged to. It can't be anyone here!"

Sohma scratched his chin, and Kallen could see the thoughts buzzing behind his eyes.

"Do you have an idea?" Kallen asked.

"Uh... yeah, I do," he said with a small chuckle.

"And?" Kallen was shocked how interested she had become.

"The right answer is usually the simple answer. You found it in Nobody's room, it must belong to Nobody."

Kallen gasped. "He's a crossdresser?"

"Does that bother you?"

"N-no! I mean... that doesn’t change what he's done for us. Whatever he does in his private life is irrelevant," Kallen muttered.

Nobody was likely small enough to wear the bra, but a crossdresser? Technically, he could be anything under that suit of armor. Kallen had been drawn by his unconventional appearance. He was not much taller than her, and she was already one of the shortest members of their resistance group. She never really put much thought into what he looked like under the suit.

"Either that, or he's a woman," Sohma mused aloud.

Kallen jumped. She swore her heart skipped a beat. Maybe two beats! She clutched her shirt, trying to calm herself down. She heard wheezing, but it wasn't her own breath. She looked up and caught the sly twinkle of Sohma's dark stare.

He laughed.

"You-!" She couldn't find the words to express her anger!

"You make it too easy, Kozuki," he said while giving her hair a playful tussle.

[eachainn]

Obsession

Suzaku didn’t need to look at the clock to know that he had woken up late. He could see the way that sun slanted in through the curtains and across the floor.

Usually he would have been up hours before, taking a half hour to himself to train before going through his usual routine of checking in with the guards. He and Captain Gottwald would go over what the family had to do for the day before going their separate ways. Sometimes, he might go out for a ride with Lady Marianne or he might just sit with Princess Nunnally while she had her breakfast. If he was honest with himself, he had been killing time until Lelouch woke up. The prince didn’t keep regular hours, he would get distracted with his work and sometimes not go to sleep at all.

At least that pattern had changed, although to his detriment. Lelouch was sleeping now, but at the expense of his morning training.

Suzaku smiled wryly into his pillow, shifting his head when Lelouch gave a half asleep murmur and rolled over. Suzaku adjusted, lifting his arm as Lelouch curled into him. The prince’s arm flopped over his side, Suzaku shivering as Lelouch’s fingers drifted over his back before settling. Their legs tangled together, Suzaku huffing a laugh into Lelouch’s hair. He heard the prince grumble in annoyance, but Lelouch was quick to settle down.

Suzaku waited for Lelouch’s breathing to even out again, the prince quick to fall asleep. It had been like that since the prince’s meeting with Clovis. Suzaku hadn’t even needed to ask how it went, there was no question what the answer was after the frantic energy that Lelouch had poured into his work.

Suzaku dragged his fingers lazily up Lelouch’s back, watching as the prince hummed and moved closer. Suzaku looked down at the top of his head, smiling softly.

Lelouch had managed to convince Clovis and his father that his plans were viable. It was a step forward, and it meant that Lelouch would be leaving.

Suzaku’s fingers curled on Lelouch’s back. He swallowed, pushing back a soft noise.

He had known that it was going to come eventually. It was what happened with every prince and princess. They would be used to help continue the emperor, assigned to posts and turned to their work. They would gather a cadre of soldiers around them and under their knight. It was the expected pattern that he had studied.

Becoming the personal knight of one of the royal heirs wouldn’t have helped him, only being the Knight of One would give him what he need. He could take Japan under his protection and work to help them from there.

It was a simple enough plan, and one that Suzaku was sure that he could accomplish. After all, the hardest part was already done. He was in the Rounds, all he had to do was prove himself. There were always rumors about Bismarck Waldstein retiring, but Suzaku was sure that it would happen in his lifetime. By then, he would be able to earn enough honor and glory to impress the next emperor. After all, he had impressed the current one enough to be put in charge of the safety of Marianne’s family.

That didn’t stop him from wanting.

Lelouch was going to Japan, going to help it and Suzaku wanted to follow along. It would be a smart move on Lelouch’s part, but Suzaku didn’t want to ask. He had his orders and Lelouch would want his family looked after. Besides, Suzaku couldn’t forget the way that Julius had asked him to come along.

He shuddered, remembering the smile that Julius had given him and the way that the prince had spoken. Both of the older twins were confidence, so much so that it sometimes was overwhelming. But there had been something about the request that had raised his hackles. He couldn’t put his finger on it, but Suzaku was sure that it would come to him, right after he had time to think. Of course, that might take a while between his duties, his Japanese lessons with Lelouch and…everything that followed.

Suzaku closed his eyes, tugging Lelouch a little bit closer. The prince had been up late, which meant that he would probably be sleeping for a while longer. Suzaku knew that he had duties to attend to, but all of those could wait, at least for a little while longer. No one would hold it against him, certainly not Captain Gottwald. The man liked to feel like he was in charge of every portion of the household guard. He had been looking longingly at Lady Marianne when the two of them had gone out on their rides, and Suzaku was glad to cede his position to the captain.

He grunted as Lelouch shifted again, pushing harder against him. Suzaku held his ground for a moment before rolling onto his back. Somewhere in the shifting Lelouch must have woken up because the prince groaned and tried to burrow in further.

Lelouch stayed that way, trying to burrow into Suzaku’s chest like it was a pillow. Suzaku winced when Lelouch dug an elbow into his stomach, and then the prince was pushing away.

Lelouch shot a bleary look at the clock, Suzaku biting his lip to keep from laughing as Lelouch frowned at it for far longer than it should have taken to read it. The prince swayed in place before falling over to the clear side of the bed with a groan.

Suzaku propped himself up on his elbows, watching as Lelouch groped blindly for the covers, pulling up the edge over him before slumping again. Suzaku watched him for a moment before slipping out of bed.

Despite all appearances, Lelouch was awake. The prince would protest for a little while more before finally getting up. Lelouch would go immediately back to work, which meant that he had a good ten minutes to bring something for Lelouch to eat. With only a few months left, it was only a matter of time before Lelouch started to forget to eat entirely.

Suzaku smiled softly at Lelouch, giving himself a short moment to look his fill before moving around the bed to collect his clothes. He would have to stop by his rooms to gather his uniform before he could present himself. The staff of Aries Villa knew what the two of them were up to by now, but there was a matter of professionalism to consider, even if it was a thin veneer. Suzaku didn’t think that Lady Marianne would care. Things were very informal, dangerously so. When this was all over, he would have to get used to the formality of the court or the military again.

He was in the middle of pulling on his pants when he heard another groan from the bed. Suzaku glanced over his shoulder, shaking his head as he watched Lelouch push himself up. It didn’t take him long to feel Lelouch’s annoyed glare on his back.

Suzaku pulled up his pants, not bothering to zip them up. He glanced back in time to see Lelouch drop back down onto the bed with a grunt. Whatever Lelouch said was initially lost in the pillows and blankets, Suzaku tipping his head to the side. Lelouch remained there for a moment before lifting his head and repeating himself. “Take those off and get back in here.”

“Is that an order?”

Lelouch glared balefully at him, the prince dropping his head back onto his pillows. “Yes.”

Suzaku shook his head, padding back over to the bed. He knelt on it, leaning over to kiss Lelouch’s temple. He got a soft mumble for his troubles, Suzaku pulling away. Lelouch made an aborted grab for him before his hand flopped limply onto the covers. Lelouch stared at it for a moment before shifting it bed. “Let me guess…duty?”

“Yes.”

“Damn it all.” Lelouch made an impatient gesture, Suzaku not sure if it was meant to dismiss him or to order him closer. “Can’t you forget it?”

“Your mother-”

“Will forgive you. I’m sure of it. Besides, she has no reason to complain, not when she was doing the same thing when she was in the Rounds.”

Suzaku raised an eyebrow. Marianne might have been lax, but there was no question that she took her duties seriously. There was no other reason that the empress, a woman stripped of all other titles and duties, would continue to patrol the grounds and sit in on the guard briefings. She couldn’t have gotten into the Rounds without being serious.

Suzaku zipped up his pants, giving Lelouch a skeptical look. “Are you sure?”

Lelouch flinched. “I’m a direct result of it.”

“Ah.” Suzaku chuckled, sitting down on the edge of the bed. “Poor prince.”

Lelouch made a weak swipe at him. “Don’t mock me.”

“Apologies, your highness.”

“Better.” Lelouch huffed and dropped his head back to the pillows.

Suzaku gave him a moment before reaching out to drag his fingers down Lelouch’s back. The prince shuddered but didn’t bother to move. He would eventually, but Suzaku couldn’t wait for it. There was only so much indulgence that he would allow himself. He still had to stay in shape, to stay sharp in case something happened.

He leaned over Lelouch, brushing away strands of hair before kissing the back of the prince’s neck. Lelouch shuddered under him, Suzaku tempted to roll back in bed and continue. It was obviously what the prince wanted, and Suzaku was tempted.

Suzaku took a deep breath and pulled away, ignoring the muffled curse from the prince. He brushed his fingers down Lelouch’s back one more time before standing up. He thought he heard the curse turn into a whine, but then he was already walking over to where his shirt had been dropped the night before. Suzaku pulled it over his head, tugging on it in the hopes to get rid of the worst of the wrinkles. He frowned when they didn’t come out, but he gave up soon after. Gino and the other knights would be coming to the villa soon to drill. His shirt would just get dirty anyway.

He gave the hem one more tug before looking back over his shoulder. Lelouch was still sprawled over the bed, looking like he was on the edge of falling back asleep. It would be good for him, considering all the hours he had to make up. Even if he slept through most of the day it probably wouldn’t be enough. Suzaku made a note to try and coax Lelouch to be earlier, but that was for later. For now, he had his own schedule to keep.

That didn’t stop him from pausing, Suzaku watching Lelouch for a moment before speaking. “Gino and the others should be here in twenty minutes to practice.”

As he thought, that got Lelouch to lift his head. The prince studied him for a moment before rolling laboriously to the side. “I’ll be there.”

Suzaku inclined his head in a partial bow before walking out of the room. He knew that Lelouch would hold to his word, even if he was a little late. It didn’t matter, the prince would never participate. He would just sit on the sidelines with his book and pretend not to watch them.

Pretend not to watch him.

He allowed himself a small smile, Suzaku ducking his head as he walked out of the suite. He would never be Lelouch’s knight, but those moments were the closest he would get and he intended to hold onto them.

---

Julius leaned forward towards the screen, knowing that it wouldn’t help. The distance between him and his family wouldn’t change, but he couldn’t fight it. It had been months since he had seen them outside of their calls, and even those had gotten spotty. Schneizel was keeping them moving, hoping from capital to capital ahead of their forces. Schneizel seemed to think that he could convince the leaders into a treaty, but Julius knew them better. They wouldn’t bend, which made Julius want to point out that it would be better to sit in Euro-Britannia and muscle their way into the EU from there.

At least then he would be able to talk to his family every week, if not every day.

He looked over the gathered group, hungrily memorizing everything, from the way that Rolo sat upright and alert for the first time in a long time and the way that Lelouch looked ready to fall asleep in his chair. None of that matter more than seeing them.

He dragged his gaze over all of them, finally settling on Marianne.

His mother was leaning back in her chair, her bad leg propped up. Julius frowned, about to address that when Marianne beat him to it.

“I feel you worrying from here. I’m fine.” She patted her leg, a wince crossing her face. “It’s about time I tried to work it again. It’s a matter of building up my strength again.”

“But Mother-”

“Suzaku and the others are making sure to go easy on me.” Marianne laughed. “I doubt that I could win against all five of the Glaston Knights. They’re just sparing my feelings, but I’ll let them figure out their mistake soon enough.”

Julius sighed and sat back, getting comfortable. He doubted that he would be able to convince Marianne otherwise. His mother seemed to be fixed on her course. He felt a flash of nervousness. If Marianne was training, then she would be going out more, possibly without guards. His gaze flicked to where Sir Kururugi was standing behind Lelouch.

At least Sir Kururugi was still there, he wouldn’t let Marianne get into too much trouble.

He let out his breath in a rush, Julius rubbing his shaking hands against his legs. His gaze darted over to Rolo, giving his younger brother a nod. That got Rolo to relax, Julius watching as Rolo leaned forward.

“Nunnally and I have been keeping busy, big brother. We’ve been to three different openings, a couple of hospitals.”

“And that one debut. Lady Fitzwilliam’s daughter just came of age to be presented at the court.” Nunnally pressed her hand to her face to smother a giggle, Julius watching as Rolo tried to make himself smaller. It took Nunnally a while to gain control of herself, and then she spoke so quickly that her words seemed to run together. “They wouldn’t let Rolo stop dancing.”

“Nunnally!”

“They wouldn’t stop talking about how handsome he is.”

Rolo blushed and ducked his head, Julius watching his brother carefully. It was rare that Rolo went out, and this was far better than the coddling than his brother had been getting. Then again, it was probably not for the best that all the attention had landed on Rolo. He hadn’t been trained to deal with the court, they had avoided it since the assassination and Rolo had been too young before. He didn’t know how to deal with the lying and the flattery. It would end badly.

Julius glanced over at his brother, waiting for Lelouch to say something. Instead, Lelouch just started awake, Julius sighing. He had heard about what his brother had managed to do, and he didn’t know what to do about it. Schneizel seemed to think that it was a good idea, but Julius wasn’t sure.

He had always expected Lelouch to follow after him, to be annoyed at everything that they were doing and bungling his own plans. But they would work together, like they always had.

Julius licked his lips, watching as Rolo and Nunnally teased each other, Rolo getting redder with every moment. It was a conversation he didn’t know how to bring up, or want to with everyone there. Maybe he could get his mother alone on the next call, and they could discuss how to deal with Rolo. After all, it was important that Rolo got the proper court introduction.

He turned his attention back to the conversation when Marianne reached over to swat Rolo lightly on the shoulder. “Later.”

Rolo nodded and settled back in his seat, looking attentive. It took a moment for Julius to realize that they were waiting for him. He cleared his throat, glancing around the empty room he was in before nodding. “I can’t tell you where I am-”

“Typical.” That came from Lelouch, Julius glancing over at his brother with a smirk.

“It’s a military secret. I can’t just tell anyone.”

“But you are in the EU somewhere?”

Julius rolled his eyes at Lelouch’s question, ignoring his twin. “If we stick to the current schedule I should be able to talk to you next week.”

“And will you be safer?”

Julius nodded in answer to his mother’s question. “I will. We have to wait and see what we’ve done has taken fruit. And, by then, I hope my presents will have reached you. An apology for being out of contact for so long.”

There were various exclamations of surprise and excitement, Julius smiling through them even as the call came to a close, far too soon for his liking. He sighed and looked at the clock, hating that there was an allotted time. Still, they were in dangerous territory and calls could be traced. It was only because Schneizel indulged him that he was allowed to do this. If it was any other way, then he would have gone months between talks.

Then again, if it had been any other way, he would have been in Euro-Britannia using their force to crush the EU instead of just talking with them in the hopes that they would back down.

If it had been any other way, Sir Kururugi would have been with him.

Julius shuddered and looked back towards the door. He wouldn’t be bothered for a few hours, Schneizel wouldn’t meet with him until the morning and the room was all his. The only restriction on his time was the call, and that was done.

He swallowed, glancing back at the screen. He had fought hard not to stare at where Sir Kururugi had stood behind his brother. It should have been easy because Sir Kururugi had been unobtrusive. There was every chance that Sir Kururugi wouldn’t be included, but Julius was glad that he was there. It had been a relief to see him standing there, perfectly formal swathed in his cloak.

His hand twitched against his leg, Julius tipping his head back. He may have missed his family but, now that he had seen Sir Kururugi, he ached to see him again. Working in the EU had been enough of a temporary distraction, but the fixation got worse every time he called his family, because Sir Kururugi would be there. Taunting him, teasing him, making him want to go home and complete his game. Complete the game and talk to his father. Then the Knight of Seven would be his.

Julius shuddered, his fingers restlessly tapping against the armrest before he gave in. He reached for his pants, hastily undoing them. He shoved his hand in them with a gasp, wrapping his fingers around his cock as he closed his eyes, imagining Sir Kururugi with every stroke.

[therewillbebeauty]

dear lord, when i get to heaven - rololulu

Word Count: 3600 Listen to this.

Your name is Rolo Lamperouge—at least, that is your current name. You are sixteen years old. You have light brown hair and violet eyes, and have killed more people than you could possibly keep track of, even if you wanted to. You don’t like sweets much, but make an exception for pastries. You think that someday, if you could get away for long enough, you would like to go to the sea.

Your mission is simple: watch over the disgraced prince and ex-terrorist Lelouch vi Britannia. You are to report on his every move, and make sure that he does not regain his memories. You have your orders to kill him if something goes wrong.

But nothing will go wrong. You are very good at what you do.

You can’t help but be good at murder and assassination; after all, that’s all you know.

You were a little surprised when you learned that you were to act as his little brother, since you have never had a family, have never known the love that only those connected by blood can share. You have never had someone to comfort you when you fall, to tuck you into bed at night and kiss your forehead, to hold you close when the nightmares come creeping back in the dead of night when you are alone (but you’re always alone, so you’re not sure why they come at all—it’s not like your life isn’t a living hell, anyways), to play with outside, to help with homework, to laugh with, to cry with …

But you graciously accept the assignment. Killing and spying is all that you know; why would you turn down an opportunity to be useful?

Another has come before you—Clara—but she let her guard down and died in by the hands of a spy. You will not make the same mistakes.

In the days before you are to begin your new life as Rolo Lamperouge, younger brother of Lelouch Lamperouge, student and member of the student council of Ashford Academy, you throw yourself into your research. You are not just sneaking in, stopping time, and shooting this time. You are replacing a living, breathing princess, and you must do your job well. In your research, in every waking moment spent gathering information on the Princess Nunnally, you learn that her—your—birthday is on October 25th. You learn that she is not actually blind, but that Charles has altered her memory, just like he has done to her—your—brother. You learn that she has been practicing her origami cranes, and that she believes in that Eleven legend that one thousand folded cranes can make wishes come true.

(One night, in the solitude of your bedroom, after all the other children have gone to sleep, you slip out to the computer room and search for ‘how to fold a paper crane.’ your first attempt is sloppy at best and downright unrecognizable at worst, but you smile all the same. Maybe, if you practice, you can be good at something besides taking lives.)

Soon, it is time to go to Ashford Academy. You slip into the clothes given to you, grab the suitcases provided for you with clothes—normal civilian clothes, instead of the uniforms worn by the children of the cult—and a new leather notebook. On the cover, embossed so faintly that you think it might have been an afterthought, are the words ‘Lelouch Lamperouge.’ You are to record his every move.

He welcomes you placidly, without the affection you will come to know, as if he does not quite remember you. That does not surprise you, considering you two have never met, not really. You settle in to Nunnally’s—your—room, carefully move all of your new clothes into your dresser, and flop down onto your bed. It is more comfortable than the beds at the cult were, but you can’t help but feel uneasy. You go to bed early that night, and when you wake up, your eyes are sticky, like you have been crying.

In the following days Lelouch quickly warms up to you, like he had forgotten how to interact with you but has quickly fallen back into step. You eat breakfast and dinner together, and walk to class together (when Lelouch bothers to go). You drive him away on Rivalz’ motorcycle when he needs to escape Villetta-sensei, and attend to student council matters together. Lelouch seems to think that you are his real brother and treats you appropriately, which is both a relief and a strangely disconcerting sensation. You are not used to anyone caring about you.

When you mention that your hair is getting too long, he offers to cut it in the courtyard like he always has. He looks at you strangely for a moment, like he can’t believe you would have forgotten. You quickly make amends and vow to be more careful in the future.

He gives you a locket on Nunnally’s—yours, now—birthday. It must have been purchased beforehand, when Nunnally, his real sister, still occupied Lelouch’s thoughts instead of you, his fake brother—because why would your brother give you a locket?—but you treasure it anyways. It is a gift, given freely to you by one who loves you without strings or expectations of reciprocation. You attach it to your cellphone and take it with you everywhere you go. It is the one thing that you have that is truly yours.

He teaches you piano. He remembers that he has always been teaching you, since you were old enough to climb onto the bench yourself; you know that this is not true, but laugh and claim that you have all but forgotten during your stay abroad. It is fortunate that you are a fast learner. You pick it up quickly, and Lelouch does not seem too fazed.

Nunnally had liked sweets, it seems, because Lelouch keeps them around, though you never sees him eat any. You push down his disgust at the overly-sugary taste and eat them whenever prompted. It is a small price to pay.

She must have also liked bedtime stories, because on days when you are ready to tear your hair out, whether because of a difficult member of the Intelligence Service whom you are ready to shoot or simply because of an algebra problem, Lelouch will knock on your bedroom door, book of fairy stories tucked under his arm. He will sit beside you on the bed after you have climbed under the covers and read you stories of men who steal from the rich and give to the poor, and of wishes granted not by the power of Geass or paper cranes but by magic, and of happily ever after. He will move your bangs off of your forehead and kiss you goodnight, and in the morning he will have cooked you breakfast. It is scary, how close the reality of family is to how you had imagined it when you were young and naive.

(You don’t tell anyone—not Villetta-sensei, not Lelouch, not your student council friends—but you are still working on your paper cranes. You have probably folded three hundred or so, but they have become like your body count, and so you let the number escape you. It makes more sense, you figure, to wish on every crane as you make it, so that when you unknowingly fold the final one you have already expressed your wish. That way, you can make sure that you remember to do so, because wouldn’t it be a shame and a waste of paper if you folded the thousand and then didn’t wish at all?)

And then one day, everything changes.

That witch C.C. must have found him somehow, because Lelouch has regained his memories. He doesn’t tell you, but you know. You know because he tenses ever so slightly when he sees you next, how his voice is full of fake mirth and carelessness, how inquires about the locket. He offers to take it back and exchange it for something more suited to a man, and that is how you know for sure, because Lelouch had never seemed to notice how out-of-place it was until that point. You can’t keep yourself from snapping at him in anger, because how dare he want to take the only thing that truly belongs to you? The locket may have been meant for Nunnally once upon a time, but it is yours now. Lelouch lets the subject drop, but you know that something has changed.

That night, you nearly crush the locket in your fist as you bite your lip to keep from crying yourself to sleep.

Eventually, he confronts you, and offers you a deal, that if you help him save his sister then when this is all over you can be a real family. We already are a family!  you want to scream, want to carve the words into his skin with your fingernails because how dare he forget, but you do not, because you’re not a family, not really. You have been gifted with a year of bliss and care and love, and that is more than you deserve. You should not have let your guard down.

You accept.

His schemes are despicable, that much you acknowledge, but they are no different from yours, fundamentally. His are flashy and loud while yours depend on your stealth and silence. His are waged in broad daylight, with an adoring public cheering his name as he slaughters people in the names of Justice and Nunnally. (Sometimes, you think that those two names have become confused in his head, have forged into one, because when he cries for the first you know that he yearns only for the second, because what he does could never be called Justice, because you have it on good authority that the death of so many innocent people can never be justified like he says it can.) Your only grudge against him is that the sea of innocent blood that you have carefully cultivated for years he has achieved in only a few weeks.

You find your brother, one night, after Nunnally has introduced herself to the populace as the long-lost Nunnally vi Britannia, in an empty construction site. You arrive slightly too late, but what you can see is that Kallen is there, and that Lelouch seems to be coming on to her. Your hand is on you gun before you can think rationally here, and the barrel is pointed at Kallen when she slaps Lelouch across the face. You sigh, and tuck your gun back inside your jacket. She storms off, and you run up to your brother and do your best to do what he always does to you, to give him comfort in his darkest moments. It is in this moment that you realize just how deeply he loves his sister, and how whatever love he has spared for you is not enough. Now that you have had a taste, you will always want for more.

You take him home and put him up in his bed. He looks so peaceful, sleeping soundly, dark hair splayed across the white bedsheets. He looks older, more worn, more exhausted than you have ever seen him before. In this state, he reminds you of one of the fairy stories he has read you before, the one about the woman with the hair as dark as night, and skin as pale as paper, and lips as red as blood. Lelouch’s hair isn’t quite black—more of a dark chocolate brown, but it is close—and his lips are nowhere near red as blood—they’re more of a petal-pink, like the cherry blossoms in the school courtyard—but his skin is very nearly pale as paper, which makes the bags underneath his eyes stand out. (You prefer it that way, honestly. Between the two of you, there has been enough blood spilled.) In that story, you remember, the woman had been cast out into the woods by people who wanted her dead, but she found companionship in seven friends. The parallels here are enough to make you smile ironically. In the story, a poisoned apple rendered her unconscious, but a prince comes along one day and wakes her with the power of true love’s kiss. You feel a bit silly, but you can’t help but brush his hair aside, can’t stop yourself from cupping his cheek—they’re cold to the touch, too cold, like ice runs through his veins instead of blood—can’t keep yourself from lowering your lips to his. You have never kissed anyone like this—you’ve never kissed anyone at all. It feels like a taboo, like you are not supposed to love him like you do, even though you are not brothers, not really. You don’t linger, just in case the magic works, but it becomes apparent that it did not. Maybe kisses aren’t really magic; maybe you should stick to your paper cranes.

You stay by him constantly after that, keeping watch just in case he wakes up and reverts back to his previous state. As you were leaving the scene last night, you noticed the Refrain on the ground, and put two and two together. You swear to yourself that you will never let him near another vial of the only thing that can steal him away from you. He mumbles in his sleep, little bits of garbled gibberish that might have been words but have been confused by sleep. You stop trying to make sense of the not-words, and instead busy yourself in short bursts with preparing food for your brother—he is bound to be hungry when he wakes, after all. But Lelouch never wakes in time, and the food always goes cold, and you always end up scarfing it down instead, so as not to let it go to waste.

When you are not cooking, you wait patiently by his bedside. You fold more cranes in that span of twenty-four hours than you have in the past month. Upon every one completed, you whisper your wish that is starting to sound more like a prayer.

Once, he says something intelligible, gasps out his sister’s name like he is drowning and she is oxygen. It makes your blood boil, and when he inquires later, you claim that it did not happen, that he did not say anything at all.

Too soon, you return to your role as murderer, as the one who shoots first and asks questions never, because the dead do not speak. The girl with ginger hair—Shirley, your friend from the Student Council—has regained her memories of Nunnally. She wants to reunite brother and sister. She pleads to you to help her, thinks that you will because you are her friend and because she does not know that they did not pick just anyone off the streets to play Lelouch’s brother but a trained assassin with a time-stopping ability. She does not know that the mere mention of Nunnally’s name is enough to send you into a rage, to remind you that you don’t belong here. You don’t even think about what you need to do.

She dies in a pool of her own blood, cradled in your brother’s arms.

Afterwards, you lie to him. You tell your brother that she was chasing him, that she remembered that he had killed her father and was coming to exact her revenge. He seems to believe you, and you fall a little deeper in love with your brother when he thanks you for protecting him. You tell him that you will always be there to protect him.

(You are aware that he attaches a bomb to your Knightmare, are aware that he has not forgiven you for taking the life of one of his few friends, are aware that that simple mistake might have been enough to make him hate you forever, but you do not tell him that you regretted it, because you are not sure that you do.)

Lelouch is caught in a trap by the Order of the Black Knights, but you come to his rescue, as you promised him just days ago. You break through the walls of their hideout in your Vincent before flying away, but that Knight of the Round that goes to your school—Anya, the one with pink hair—is chasing you. You know that you aren’t skilled enough to evade her, and you also know that your Knightmare can never outrun hers. You know that there is only one thing left to do, only one card left in your hand.

You stop time. Over and over again. Your heart stops every time. You labor to breathe. Your brother cries out in pain every time that you do it, because he knows of your Achilles heel that you were careless enough to divulge, knows that you will die because of this. He pleads with you to stop, but you can’t, not now. This is your requiem, your atonement for your sins. You will deliver your big brother from evil, and you will take his cross as well as your own upon your shoulders and bear it into Hell for him. He must go on, must live on. You love him too much to watch him die, and thus you will have to die first.

He attempts to convince you, in those final moments, that he is just like everyone else, that he has just been using you, but you won’t have it. You know that he truly did love you, maybe not as you loved him, maybe not as deeply as he loved Nunnally, but that does not matter. You can’t help but spill your thoughts, open your heart that does not beat in those final moments, even though he cannot hear you. “All throughout my life, people have used me like a tool,” you begin, though he is not listening, is frozen in time with the rest of them.

When he comes unfrozen, he begs you to stop trying to save you, but you do not let him finish his sentence before you continue. “I was used by the Order … And then you used me, big brother … Yeah, maybe you've been using me for your ends right from the very start. But… only the time I spent with you seemed real!” Every time you stop your Geass, every time you snap back to reality to gasp for breath, he interrupts you, imploring you to stop wasting your life for him, but you can’t. You won’t.

Your breath is coming in short bursts, when it comes at all. Your chest hurts, like it is being torn in half. But still, you persist. “It was… those memories… that finally made me… human!” you gasp as you fly to your death. Your Geass deactivates prematurely, against your will. “That's why I'm not…” You cannot summon it again. Your body, it seems, still has some self-preservation instincts that your brain cannot override.

“I'm not…” Finally, you activate your Geass one final time. You know it, then, that you will never use it again, that you will not make it out of this alive. “I'm not… a tool! I do this… out of my own… free will… as a human being!” From the time you were born, from the time you were conscious of your status as a slave to the cult, this is all that you have wanted.

(So why don’t you want it now? Why don’t you want to be your own person? Why don’t you want to make your own choices? To save the person you love? To be useful?

Why don’t you want to die?)

You crash-land, and Lelouch demands to know why you did what you did. You don’t have the heart, even now, to tell him the whole truth, so you settle for what he can stomach. “Because… you're a liar, big brother,” you explain. “It was… a lie, wasn't it? What you said about trying to kill me, about… hating me and all of that.”

He assures you that you are correct, and your still heart breaks, because you know him well enough to know when he is lying. You know now, as he comforts you in your final moments, that he is lying, that he has never once loved you like you thought he did, not since he remembered his real family. Still, you pretend to believe him, to ease his pain. You may be the one dying, but he is the one who will have to live, and that is infinitely more painful.

“That's right, I thought so, 'cause I know who you really are inside your heart. I know everything about you, big brother.”

Those are the last words to come out of your mouth.

You retain your consciousness for several seconds afterwards, though you are too weak to move. You feel your brother place your cellphone, locket dutifully attached, as always, in your cooling hand, hear him agree with you one last time, feel a single tear drip from his eye and onto your sleeve. You remember the story about the woman, and the legend about the cranes. Though the former may have been nothing but a story, the latter certainly must be true. You must have folded well over a thousand cranes, you reason, because your wish has come true.

Lelouch, your brother, may not love you like you loved him, but he loved you enough to shed a tear for you upon your death.

You close your eyes. That is enough for you.

[aquagirl1978]

Ikemen Prince Headcanons - How the Suitors react when MC gifts them a plushie of their crest animal

This was an idea rolling around in my silly head for too long. I mentioned it on Discord, and they demanded I post this. So here ya go.

I'll make this in a few parts and post the links when they're posted.

Part 2 - Leon' Faction

Chevalier Michel

"What is this?" he asked, as he stared into the bag you presented him.

You smiled as he pulled out a soft, plush baby white tiger. He held it gingerly, as if he didn't want to dirty his hands with this item. "It's a tiger, like the one on your crest."

"And what am I supposed to do with this? Does it...do anything?"

"No," you replied sheepishly. "It's decorative. You can put it on a shelf. Or maybe your bed." The second prince look mortified at the idea of this thing sitting amongst his precious books.

"It's okay if you don't like it, I can take it back," you offered, reaching out for the plush tiger.

"No," he said quietly, awkwardly hugging the tiger to his chest. "I'll find...something to do with it."

The next morning after you awoke, you went to Chevalier's room, knowing he'd still be asleep.

Cracking open the door, you found his sound asleep, the tiger nestled in his arms.

Clavis Lelouch

"A gift? For little old me?" Clavis was stunned to receive a gift from you.

Clavis pulled out the plush leopard, immediately examining it with curiosity.

"Do you like it?" you asked nervously.

"Is this a prank?" he asked, poking at the leopard, waiting for it to do something.

"No, silly, it's a plush, it's not some trick."

Clavis stopped, his gaze softening. "You're not trying to prank me?"

You laughed as his eyes lit up with delight. "You mean...I can use this for pranks?"

From that day on, no one in the palace was safe.

One day, you were with Yves when you were attacked. The plush leopard was launched at you from the nearby staircase, its owner's distinctive laugh heard in the distance as Yves shrieked, pulling the plush off himself.

Nokto Klein

"A gift? For me?" He purred seductively.

When he pulled out a plush fox and not something, ahem, sexier he looked at you in confusion.

"A fox for my sexy fox," you replied.

Satisfied with your answer, Nokto pulled you into a tight embrace and kissed you.

The next time you visited his room, you saw the plush fox sitting on the nightstand next to his bed, your gift always close to him.

Luke Randolph

"You got me a bear!" Luke practically shouted as he pulled his gift out of the bag.

"Calm down, Luke," you said, trying to stifle your laughter. "It's just a little something I saw in town earlier and I thought of you."

Luke immediately introduced your bear to the bear he wore that he sewed himself.

In the weeks that followed, you were frequently invited by Luke to tea parties with his two bears where you all drank honey tea and shared honey cakes.

[eachainn]

"I'm not half as good at--at anything as I am when I'm doing it next to you." – Tony Stark to Steve Rogers, Avengers Prime

Lelouch leaned against the door as soon as it shut, passing a hand over his eyes. He was sure that it was his imagination that the meetings were getting longer and less was getting done. All of his councilors were under his geass and they should have just automatically agreed with everything that he said. It still felt like it was an argument and it still felt like he was getting nowhere.

He rubbed his eyes before looking over his suite, sighing when he saw the piles of papers waiting for him. He had brought them there after Suzaku had chivied him out of the room for lunch, fully intending on coming back and starting on them. But then the minutia of running the empire had come back to him, leaving him no time to work on the future of the empire as he saw it. He could stay up late again, but the thought of sitting in his suite alone as the rest of the city went to bed suddenly wasn’t appealing. It was easier to face the idea of Zero Requiem in the daylight and in small batches. Then he could almost imagine that everything was years away instead of the few weeks that he had left.

Lelouch stared at the empty room, feeling loneliness press in around him before he turned on his heel and strode over to the door. His fingers stumbled over the code, Lelouch gritting his teeth as he worked it through two more times before he finally got it right.

The door slid open, Lelouch breathing a sigh of relief when he stepped into the next room. This room looked lived in when compared to his neat bed and desk piled high with papers. The cover of the bed was pulled back and wrapped around one person, the long hair laid out over the pillow giving her identity away. Lelouch stepped carefully through the bed room, giving C.C. a wide berth. The woman had returned to their private rooms long before Lelouch had, and she had looked ready to collapse. It would be better to let her sleep, especially since the two of them would have to go through it all again.

He picked his way through the room, freezing when he saw that the doors to the balcony were open. Lelouch muttered a curse under his breath and rushed over. 

It was impossible to find a set of rooms that didn’t have windows or a way outside. It had been the creation of some Britannian noble that had been trying to combine Britannian and Japanese architecture with little success. The house had far too many balconies or tasteful hanging gardens. It didn’t matter that half of the guards in the place were geassed to be loyal to him, there were plenty of things that Lelouch couldn’t control and he was waiting for one of those many things to go wrong.

Lelouch stepped out onto the balcony, sighing when he saw Suzaku standing there. His knight was braced against the railing, his head tipped back. The only sign that Suzaku had heard him was the slight tip of his head.

He bristled at the way that Suzaku ignored him, stepping up beside his friend. That got Suzaku to turn his head, Lelouch thrown off by the lazy smile that Suzaku gave him.

“You going to lecture me?”

Lelouch wanted to nod, but he found himself sighing instead. He leaned forward to rest against the railing to stare down into the garden. It was a tangled mess because of neglect, and Lelouch didn’t have the time to look after it. That was something that Nunnally would have enjoyed, but he couldn’t show that kind of favoritism. His sister would have to stay locked up with the rest of them.

He turned his head to look at Suzaku, glad that his knight was looking back at him. “I don’t think I can. I expected you to do something like this.”

“I’ve been cooped up for three days.”

“I know.” Lelouch picked at the edge of the railing.

He had expected the admission to ease something in him, but it didn’t. All it did was remind him that Suzaku hadn’t been at his customary place by his side for the past three days. He wasn’t so far gone that he was counting the seconds, but he felt the loss keenly, and Lelouch was sure that it showed. For the moment, it was enough to act like he was just mourning his knight as they expected. But it was more than that, there was an ache every time he realized that Lelouch realized that Suzaku wasn’t there.

Lelouch relaxed as Suzaku smoothed a hand over his back. Suzaku leaned against him for a moment before turning and bracing his hip against the railing. “I noticed that pile of work in your room. You’ve been slacking off.”

“You’re not there to bug me.”

“I thought you could work on your own.”

“Yes.” Lelouch glanced back towards the windows of his room. The stacks of paper were waiting for him at the moment, but Lelouch couldn’t bring himself to go back to that loneliness.

Suzaku couldn’t come into his room, not when that was the one place that everyone knew where to find him. It was easier for him to slip into the side room and work and then come out when he was needed. That meant that he spent less time doing the work that he needed to do, and more time where he wanted to be. If anyone knew why then Lelouch was sure that they wouldn’t have blamed him. He only had a short time to live, and he wanted to do something other than paperwork that was about the end of his life.

He looked back up at Suzaku. “But I don’t want to.”

Suzaku smiled and dragged his hand up Lelouch’s back. His hand lingered in Lelouch’s hair for a moment before it lifted away. The touch was enough, Lelouch finding himself relaxing a bit more. Suzaku leaned over the railing, making sure that their shoulders were touching even as they stared out into the ruined garden below.

[eachainn]

Part of the AU where Lelouch convinces Suzaku to join him (Part I - Part II - Part III).

Suzaku was used to walking through the clubhouse in the dark. His duties with Camelot kept him at the college late, sometimes nearly until the next morning when the Black Knights had been in motion. On those nights, Suzaku considered himself lucky if he could get to the clubhouse to sleep. Lelouch was used to him climbing into bed at odd hours or crashing on the couch if C.C. had claimed his usual spot. With the arrangement going on for so long, C.C. had started to get bold, not that Suzaku minded.

It was still hard to get a read on her, but they were seemed to get along well. They certainly got along better than she and Lelouch did. Of course, the two of them would get along better if she stopped baiting him, but Suzaku assumed that it was part of the fun for her.

He hesitated in the hallway, torn between the ache in his stomach and his need to sleep. Tomorrow, or today depending on the time, was a weekend, and Lelouch had no plans for another attack. There was a chance to sleep in and try to make up all the homework that he had missed out on during his double life. The break would be a welcome one, especially after a week of running double patrols.

Suzaku rubbed the small of his back, trying to tease out the ache that had settled there. Stretching out would help, but he wanted food more. He couldn’t remember the last time he had eaten real food, and nibbling on the recognizable parts of Cecile’s creations didn’t count.

He shuffled towards the kitchen, surprised when he saw a light on. Lelouch and Nunnally didn’t made a habit of going for midnight snacks, the two of them ate like birds. Sayoko was probably already asleep in her room and wouldn’t wake up for anything. Suzaku hummed under his breath, trying to drop into a crouch despite his aching back.

He would have to talk to Lelouch and Rakshata about the shocks in the seats of the Burais. There were people doing patrols longer than he was and he could just imagine the pain that they were in. If Lelouch wanted his rebellion to work, he needed soldiers who would be able to move. But that was a subject to discuss later.

Suzaku edged into the kitchen, breathing a sigh of relief when he saw C.C. sitting on the counter with an open bag of chips beside her. She didn’t look too interested in the chips, her gaze on the lights and the rest of campus that she could see out of the window. She didn’t have a perfectly clear view of the approach to the clubhouse, but she had to have seen his approach. Her fingers moved around the edge of the glass, the motion slow and lazy. “You’re late.”

“Are you in charge of this place now?”

C.C. smiled and looked away from the window. “Don’t tell Lelouch.”

“Your secret is safe with me.” Suzaku walked up to the counter and snatched up the bag of chips. He heisted before digging in.

C.C. usually guarded her food with an almost cheerful joviality that hid the real worry that came from not knowing where her next meal would come from. Suzaku could understand that, he had worked through the same thing when the Britannians had invaded. Anything he had found had gone to Lelouch and Nunnally first.

He crunched through a few handfuls of chips before bothering to turn his attention back to C.C. The woman had remained perched on the counter and her gaze had gone back to the campus. Suzaku intended to leave her to it and look for leftovers when she turned her attention back to him.

Her gaze made him feel like he was pinned in place. Suzaku swallowed and met it, the rare thought crossing his mind that C.C. wasn’t just the lazy woman that she pretended to be. He shifted in place, waiting for C.C. to say something.

The stillness lasted until C.C. shook her head and jumped down from the counter. She walked past him to open the fridge doors, starting to pull out things and lay them on the island in the center of the kitchen. “He should take better care of you. You look like you’re going to collapse.”

“I’ve had worse.”

C.C. made a sound that could have been a laugh as she rattled around in the silverware drawer. She returned with a fork, starting to work on a slice of cake. Suzaku pulled over a plate of pasta, taking the fork she offered him.

He didn’t bother to heat the plate up, shoveling the pasta into his mouth. He kept an eye on C.C. as he ate, watching as she picked out parts of the cake, carefully eating it layer by layer. She paused halfway through the second layer, fixing him with a different look. “It took a while to get him to settle down. He thought that things had gone wrong.”

“There weren’t any raids for the night. It was just more calibration on the Lancelot.” Suzaku licked his lips, shoving the uneasy feeling of betrayal down. It was something that he was very practiced at doing. “He’ll get his Knightmare. He doesn’t have to worry about that.”

“I don’t think that’s what he’s worried about?”

“What?”

C.C. shook her head. Suzaku wanted to ask her what she really meant by her question, but she was already pushing ahead. “He’s never told me why you’re doing this? You look like you’re too honest for this kind of work.”

Suzaku stared at her, trying to figure out how the conversation had jumped tracks. When C.C. just continued to stare at him, he sighed and shifted his weight so he was leaning on the counter. “I wouldn’t have, if I hadn’t know that it was him. But, because it’s him… I know what makes him dangerous and this is everything that will push him the wrong way. If I’m here, I might be able to save people, because he doesn’t think about that.”

C.C. made a sound that was almost agreement. Suzaku watched her for a moment before shrugging. “He might have given up his title, but he hasn’t figured out how to not be a prince. Those people aren’t his pieces to be moved around at his will.”

For a moment, she looked impressed, but then she shook her head. “You’re naïve.”

“Maybe, but it’s better than nothing.”

C.C. made the almost agreeing sound again, Suzaku careful not to meet her gaze. This was the part of C.C. that he didn’t quite know how to handle.

He stared down at the empty plate before shaking his head. “I’m going to sleep while I can. Are you getting the bed tonight?”

She laughed and went back to her cake. “I had to trade that away to get Lelouch to stop pacing or storming wherever they keep you. They’re plenty of guest rooms for me. Besides, he kicks in his sleep.”

Suzaku laughed, but he didn’t bother to deny it. If Lelouch did, then he had never felt it, but he wouldn’t doubt C.C’s word on it. He was just glad to know where he was sleeping, and he always seemed to sleep better when he was curled around a warm body.

He dropped the plate in the dishwasher, giving C.C. a sleepy nod as he passed. Suzaku didn’t see if she returned it or not, his attention on the kitchen door and the dark hallway beyond it.

“He pays more attention to you as you think.”

Suzaku stopped abruptly at the sound of her voice. He turned slowly to look at her, expecting to have her staring at him with that strange, ancient look on her face. But she wasn’t paying attention to him, her full concentration on the slice of cake. Suzaku stared at her for a moment before shrugging it off. C.C. had always been strange, it was sometimes easier to just move on and file her words away.

He shuffled out into the hallway, his mind already on Lelouch and the bed that waited for him.