[Code Geass X-Over] Eclipse of the Never-Setting Sun

The Ero-Sennin

The Eyes of Heaven
Staff member
#1
Couple of days ago I had a dream and it lead to this. Where will it go? No one knows~

= = =


Disclaimer: Sometimes the worst ideas come in a dream. None of anything involved belongs to me.


You’re scared, I know. This world is a bleak and dark place–but it’s nothing for you to be afraid of.

You have something that the world needs more than anything else, that’s why you have been chosen. What you possess is the only hope in this sad world.

Now is the time for you to use that strength, and set forth to change the world. The battles will be difficult, but you will survive. The burden may become great, but others will come to shoulder it with you. Many will come to hate you, but you will endure. Evil will seek to consume you, but you will overcome.

Now shine and illuminate this dark world.



Eclipse of the Never-Setting Sun
A Crossover

Stage 1: Demons, Witches, and Knights Part A



Today was a bad day in the Shinjuku Ghetto. In fairness, every day was a bad day in the Shinjuku Ghetto for the Japanese population who have for the last seven years bore the label of “Eleven”, but today was a particularly lousy one because a bunch of teenagers with a chip on their collective shoulder and a Glasgow knightmare frame they managed to carefully put together from spare parts had stolen something big from their Britannian oppressors. Now an army of trigger-happy racists with heavy weapons were sweeping through the ghetto building-by-blasted-building and happily gunning down everyone they saw.

For resistance member Kallen Kozuki, this was graphically apparent as she rammed the slash harken of her hard-earned Glasgow into a tank that had just finished splattering several of her countrymen all over the ruined street.

“Those damned Britannians!” she yelled, tears in her eyes, as she recalled the wired weapon. She was a bit mad at herself, though. It wasn’t supposed to go like this, innocent people weren’t supposed to be involved, but that idiot Nagata and those idiot kids on their motorcycle… if she ran into any of them again in this life or the next, she would kill them!

“Kallen, can the Glasgow still move?!” It was Ohgi, the guy behind this stupid plan and the guy she was probably going to punch first after this was all over.

“Don’t worry Ohgi, it’s all right! I’ll decoy them, get the people out of here! The only people who will be captured are us in the resistance!” Kallen had no idea why she was being so optimistic. If they shot innocent people in the back for the crime of running, they’d certainly shoot them for the crime of surrendering.

“I know but we’re trapped, they’ve got us completely surrounded!”

Kallen swore under her breath. “Stay alive long enough for me to draw them away, then!”

It looked incredibly bad, but still, if there was the slightest chance, she wasn’t going to give up. If nothing else, there was always the chance at victory, be it a miracle or a stroke of luck, and she was going to grab it.

A passing helicopter placed its cannon’s sights over Kallen’s Glasgow, but the redhead’s slash harken found its mark first, sending it down in flames. Kallen had no time to enjoy the small victory, when an alarm warning her of the gaze of enemy Factspheres sent her on the move from the gunfire of a pair of Sutherland knightmare frames–the new mainstay units of the Britannian Empire quickly giving chase as she raced down the narrow, cluttered streets.

In the lead of the two man team was Margrave Jeremiah Gottwald, who could not cease to be amazed at the quick little fox he was chasing down. Despite being in an older model and piloted by an Eleven, it had been fairly successful at both avoiding him and doing some harm to the forces taking part in Clovis’s “Urban Renewal”.

“Perhaps I was a little hasty in getting rid of my Glasgow,” he said jokingly to his wingman. “If an Eleven can get this much out of it.”

In her Glasgow, Kallen was facing a power issue, in thirty minutes she’d have none and she wasn’t about ready to try to get out of this deathtrap on foot. She really needed a plan beyond “Run away from the guys with guns”, but luckily for her she didn’t have to worry about that because someone on the radio decided to hand one out to her.

“The west entrance, get up on the railroad tracks and head for the west entrance.”

Who was this, and Kallen asked as much. On the other end of the line was a young man who was having just as bad a day as she was, though the mystical powers he’d received fairly recently were balancing it out so far.

“That doesn’t matter,” sixteen year old Lelouch Lamperouge said to the angry redhead, “If you want to win you’re going to have to trust me.”

To win? Offering a chance to survive was one thing, but this guy was saying he could help her win? Well, she wasn’t about to turn down a victory, especially over some Sutherlands in just a Glasgow. Grabbing her chance, she jumped her Glasgow onto the railroad tracks indicated and headed for the western entrance of the ghetto.

Riding the rails, Kallen looked back again as both Sutherlands jumped onto the tracks behind her. “Okay, what am I supposed to do now?”

On his end of the line, Lelouch checked the map in the cockpit of his own misappropriated Sutherland. A train was due down this line, bringing more units to reinforce Clovis’s genocide. Guiding the terrorists to this point was easy, now he had to gamble on if the hothead could hold her own against the two units chasing her and stop the train.

“Hey, are you there?!” Such a pushy girl.

Directly behind her, Jeremiah couldn’t help his amusement. “You pathetic Eleven, if you simply run away this hunt doesn’t have much to offer in the way of sport.”

“Since you trusted me you’re going to win. Jump on the train,” Lelouch instructed.

Kallen looked up the rail ahead, but saw no train. “What train?”

Lelouch gave pause at that and looked at the digital map. That wasn’t right, there was supposed to be a train coming down the line right now. “That’s not right, was it delayed?”

“Wait, I see it! It’s derailed!” Kallen was coming around a bend, and there she could see it, a military train, with its locomotive completely derailed and lying on its side. “This is the train, right?”

Tracers suddenly whipped past the Glasgow, and Kallen swerved left and right, before one of its landspinners caught on the track. In the moment it stumbled, a few rounds glanced off the Glasgow, sending it crashing onto its side. “Damn it!”

Coming up to the Glasgow, the two Sutherlands rolled to a stop and pointed their weapons at it. Jeremiah smirked at the red machine. “Well, looks like the hunt is over.”

Kallen swore under her breath. “If you’re there, some help would be nice!”

Lelouch was already scrambling, targeting the two Sutherlands with his slash harkens. He only had one shot, his entire gamble was riding on this.

Staring up the barrel of Jeremiah’s Sutherland as she tried to get up, Kallen cringed. “Damn it, this is it…?”

Both Sutherlands suddenly switched targets, and before Kallen could wonder at what, the toppled train locomotive passed directly over her Glasgow and straight on for Jeremiah’s Sutherland.

“What in the world?!” Jeremiah yelled while having enough sense to rapidly move clear of the engine turned projectile. His wingman, however, was still stuck in that frozen disbelief long enough for the locomotive to smash into and send his Sutherland flying off the elevated railway and into the side of a building.

Jeremiah looked back at the building, a locomotive now sticking out of it. He wasn’t alone in his stunned disbelief, Kallen was still trying to process what was going on, while the chess piece Lelouch held slipped through his fingers. The Royal Guardsman looked back towards where the rest of the train sat.

The only thing he saw there baffled him. “What? What the hell is going on here?”

Kallen and Lelouch’s eyes went to what the Sutherland suddenly targeted, and they saw only a blonde-haired girl dressed in an old red, white, and blue Japanese school uniform with a skirt far too short.

“An Eleven girl?” Jeremiah immediately opened fire on the girl, nearly every round landing on target without fail. As dust rose from the impact, he turned his attention back to the Glasgow, which had jumped back to its feet.

“Do you Britannians just get off on killing kids?!” Kallen yelled as she launched her slash harken at the Sutherland. Narrowly evading it, Jeremiah opened fire on the Glasgow only for his burst to miss in turn.

“Slightly better than I thought, but still just an Eleven-!”

The Sutherland was suddenly taken off its feet and sent flipping into the air. Thrown about in his seat by the sudden acceleration, Jeremiah managed to recover long enough to see that schoolgirl standing where he had just been.

“She… she did this?!”

The girl jumped straight up for the Sutherland, like a rocket. Before Jeremiah could open fire, use his slash harkens, anything, the girl swung a kick into the knightmare’s waist, the force of the blow tearing it in half. The backpack mounted cockpit of the Sutherland automatically ejected, spiraling off over the rooftops as the rest of the knightmare exploded in midair.

Kallen’s jaw was still slack for a few moments after the impressive display. “Did… did that really just happen?”

The schoolgirl landed in front of the Glasgow, and Kallen backed up on reflex. The girl looked up at her, only for a moment, before she turned and ran off, jumping off the elevated highway. “Hey wait…!”

She stopped as the girl fell out of sight. She then turned her attention to her radio. “Was that one of yours, mystery man?!”

Choked gasps of astonishment gave way to silence, as on the other end of the line Lelouch finally regained his composure. Were it not for his newly signed contract helping him rationalize that he was no longer living in a normal world, he probably wouldn’t have been able to school himself at all. Within seconds he had already come to several conclusions. Whoever that superpowered girl was, she went only after the Britannian Sutherlands, having no interest in the terrorist Glasgow at all. It was simply as open and shut as that, she was on the Japanese side. However, she either could not or would not communicate with the Glasgow… which meant the next part of his plan could get dicey.

“A Japanese schoolgirl who can throw an entire locomotive and knightmares like toys. It looks like my day just gets better and better… and Britannia’s gets worse,” he said to himself in amusement.

“Hey, are you there?!”

Lelouch looked back towards Kallen from his hiding spot and saw that the other terrorists had managed to make it to the predetermined location. A minor hitch in his plan, but he was flexible… whoever this girl was just had to become another piece on his board.

He picked up a Queen chess piece from the number he collected, and twirled it between his fingers. It was time to get to work. He looked to his pawns and radioed them.

“I present to you the cargo in that train, they’re tools for your victory,” he said, “If you want to use them to win, then follow my orders.”

- - -

Earlier that day, as the Britannian Army and Shinjuku Ghetto began hurtling towards one another on a date with annihilation, fourteen year old Usagi Tsukino was running for her life to a monorail station, her long twin bunches waving behind her as she ran. “Please, please don’t leave! I don’t want to be late! Please, please, please, please!”

Like many Elevens living on the edges of Britannia’s Tokyo Settlement, Usagi was a resident of the Shinjuku Ghetto, a devastated and war-ruined swath of urban sprawl that was once the administrative center of Tokyo when the country was known as Japan. Since the end of the war seven years ago, progress in rebuilding this area had been met and mired by Britannian bureaucracy and racial hatred for their conquests. Life was difficult and often miserable in the shadow of Britannia’s soaring construction of the Settlement, but it still found a way to go on.

As fast as she could, she rushed to the platform and arrived just in time to see the Britannian-built monorail blow right through the station as though it weren’t there. Watching the train vanish around the bend, Usagi sank to her knees and let out a frustrated whine. “It didn’t even stop! Why would it even do that?!”

“There was a terrorist bombing; the news is making a big deal about it.”

A gasp escaped Usagi’s lips as she looked up at her live-in best friend Makoto Kino, the tall auburn-haired girl watching the emergency alert on one of the station’s monitors. “Hey! Why didn’t you wake me up?!”

Makoto glared down at Usagi. “I tried to, but you sleep like the dead!”

Usagi pouted. “I can’t help that I sleep so deeply.” She looked away. “Besides, I was having a beautiful dream.”

Makoto rolled her eyes. “Whisked away by a Britannian Prince again?”

“No!” Usagi spat back as she got up. She became starry eyed as she remembered her dream. “I was in a lovely garden full of the most beautiful roses, and I was wearing a white dress, and I felt like a princess! But then this mean old witch in a blue dress kept trying to freeze me with ice powers, and she was angry about me taking away her gumballs or something like that.”

Makoto frowned. “How does that make it a beautiful dream?”

“A handsome black knight arrived and helped me! His horse scared her, and I was able to punch her in her mean face!” Usagi sighed dreamily, while Makoto rolled her eyes in disgust.

“It’s always Princes this and Knights that, you should be careful with that kind of talk in public, Usagi! People might think you’re a traitor!”

Usagi got up and began walking with Makoto to the exit of the station. “Just because I think about that stuff doesn’t mean I want to be a Britannian or something like that, Britannians are awful.”

Makoto nodded. “I know, but think about what you say in public! I swear Usagi, you can be so clueless sometimes.”

“I’m not clueless!” Usagi snapped back defensively. “I’m just a carefree girl who speaks her heart!”

“Well if you want to stay out of trouble you should keep your heart to yourself.”

“That’s what Britannians do, and they’re awful.”

Makoto let out a snort. “That implies they even have hearts.”

Usagi deftly moved to change the subject. “Well, since we have the day off now, what do you want to do?”

Makoto tapped her chin. “Well, I guess I could make some cookies today.” At Usagi’s expectant gasp, Makoto nodded. “Yes, you can help me but you’re not allowed to even look at the stove!”

Usagi hopped up and down, much like a rabbit. “Yay!” she cheered before she hopped right into Makoto’s outstretched arm. “Eh? What is…?”

A crowd was forming in front of the cracked and boarded up apartment building the Tsukino family called home. They were all gathered around a strange woman with voluminous black hair that extended to just above her ankles, and a beautiful and elegant yellow dress more suited for a ball then a walk through a war-ravaged ghetto.

“I assure you I am most certainly not a Britannian and even if I were, I come bearing no ill-will or intent. I am here on an important errand and I would be significantly grateful if you allowed me to pass,” the blue eyed woman said to the acrimonious crowd blocking her entry to the apartment.

“You have a lot of nerve coming to this place dressed like some Britannian Noble!” a young man in the crowd yelled at the woman. “Who the hell do you think you are?!”

The woman brought the tips of her fingers to her mouth, aghast. “Ah, how dreadful of me!” She bowed politely. “I am Lunamaria Octavia-Odessa Kavinsky Iona Nyswonger Garibaldi Frederica Oppenheimer-Rhine Sawyer Augustus Iachetta Laguardia Oriskany Riviera Monaco Ornstein Olligschlager Nietzsche, but you may simply refer to me as Luna.” She reached into her considerable cleavage and drew out a card to hand to the man who demanded her name. “My card.”

The man stared at the card in question, then at Luna’s cleavage, and the up at her face. “Oh, you’re from Europe.”

Luna nodded. “Quite. Now, can anyone tell me where I can find the Tsukino family?”

“Ah, I’m Usagi Tsukino.”

Luna turned around, and upon seeing the girl, the woman’s eyes briefly grew wide. It could not be possible, she had only been here not ten minutes and she’d already found her! Clapping her hands together with a gasp, the woman ran to Usagi and took her hands in her own. “Oh my goodness! You’re exactly who I was looking for, Usagi!”

Usagi blinked. “W-what?”

- - -

Within moments, Luna was seated at the low table in the living room of the Tsukino’s fifth floor apartment, enjoying some tea with Makoto, Usagi, and Ikuko. “Ah, this tea is without equal. I thank you for your courtesy and hospitality, Madame Tsukino.”

Ikuko was completely atwitter at having such an elegant guest, especially one that wasn’t Britannian. Her bushy violet hair bouncing, she nodded eagerly to Luna. “Oh, it’s the very least I could do, Nietzsche-san-”

“Oh please, dear, you may call me Luna.”

“Ah, that is okay?”

“Yes, after all I am a guest in your house I should be the one addressing you with all formality.”

Both Usagi and Makoto still could not get over how beautiful the woman was. Her graceful looks, her long flowing hair, that dress! She was like a princess in their home!

“Luna-san, what made you risk coming all the way to the Shinjuku Ghetto for Usagi?” Makoto asked.

Luna took a sip of her tea. “I wish to take her as my apprentice and guide her to the path of becoming a fine and prosperous lady. It was a wish of Kenji’s, and I seek to honor it.”

Ikuko gasped at that, and then looked down. “I see.”

The light atmosphere became significantly heavier at that. Kenji Tsukino was a journalist who had covered the brief war between Japan and Britannia, avoiding trouble by working with a foreign media agency. Unfortunately, after the war and Japan’s brutal capitulation, he was arrested and had not been seen since.

“Have you heard from him at all?” Usagi asked.

Luna shook her head. “Not for lack of trying, but it’s difficult to find anyone in Japan that’s not a Britannian. Why, it was only after I managed to track down one of our old friends in Okinawa that I was able to find out you were here, and even then I wasn’t expecting to run into you so quickly.”

“We’re animals to them, so of course they wouldn’t even bother to keep track of us unless we did something,” Makoto growled.

Ikuko nodded. “If you’re really here to take Usagi away from here, then please by all means do. She deserves a much better chance at life than living in this awful place.” She gestured to Makoto. “But I must insist you take Mako-chan as well.”

Luna looked between the two girls, and then back to Ikuko. “I would be more than glad to, I can take you as well as you like. I have plenty of room back in my home in Paris.”

Usagi and Makoto grew starry-eyed. “Paris?!”

The City of Light itself, the most romantic place on Earth… it was almost too good to be true!

Ikuko did not know what to even say. “Luna-san… you’re really too kind!”

“It is the very least I can do for you, if I could I’d take all of the people trapped here away from this dreadful place and these dreadful Britannians.” Luna tightened her hold on her cup of tea at that. Britannians, fools the lot of them were. They were so obsessed with conquest and cocksure their own superiority, and not once could they see the dagger they were slowly bringing to their throats.

The droning of a great number of aircraft filled the air, interrupting the meeting. Getting up, Ikuko ran over to a window and opened it. “Oh no, it’s the military!”

Makoto and Usagi jumped to their feet and went to the window as one of the VTOL aircraft began dropping unarmed soldiers towards the ground below. Luna remained seated at the table, a frown on her face.

“Unarmed, but wearing Factspheres,” Makoto muttered. She looked to Ikuko. “They’re sending in the traitors to look for something.”

“But what would they even want here?” Usagi asked.

Makoto already knew. “The terrorist attack, whoever did it led them back here! That’s why the train didn’t stop, they don’t want anyone to try to leave!”

“They’re heading underground,” Usagi said as the Honorary Britannians of the army–the aforementioned traitors–began making their way underground through the various ruins and even the old subway station up the street.

“Attention Elevens! Return to your dens and stay there until further notice. Any Elevens seen violating this order will be shot on sight like the vermin you are,” the commander of a tank ordered as it and two armored personnel carriers rolled down the street, flanked by two Sutherlands. Ikuko quickly grabbed Makoto and Usagi and ducked down under the window.

“Dreadful,” Luna said as she took another sip of her tea.

As Makoto reached up and closed the curtains, Ikuko looked to Luna. “I’m so sorry, Luna-san.”

“Do not be, once this is over, we will be leaving this terrible place.” Luna replied.

Makoto shook her head as she peeked out the window at the Britannian forces. “Something isn't right, this is different from the other times Britannians have come here.”

Britannian incursions into the Ghetto at the very worst normally involved Knightpolice and Honorary Britannians coming through and trashing something before they marched off with whoever they were looking for and whoever was dumb enough to openly protest it. This was an outright invasion, and Makoto had a sinking feeling that all these Britannians weren’t expecting to go home without a kill to their credit nor were they picky about what they had to kill to get one.

“Mama, I’m scared…” Usagi whispered as she hugged tightly to Ikuko.

Ikuko gently pet Usagi’s hair. “It’s okay, Usagi-chan, just be calm and stay quiet until they leave.”

The sound of a distant explosion then echoed over the collapsed and toppled buildings. As Usagi tensed and buried her face against her mother’s shoulder, Makoto peeked out the window again at the column of smoke rising in the distance. “I hope that was those idiots getting what was coming to them so these guys can leave.”

It wasn’t. Moments after the explosion, the doors of the APCs opened and assault rifle-armed soldiers began filing out. As the soldiers fell into formation around the vehicles, the tank’s commander issued chilling orders, “By order of Clovis, Third Prince of the Empire, the Shinjuku Ghetto is to be destroyed! Kill every Eleven you see, whoever kills the most vermin will earn a promotion!”

Luna dropped her cup of tea, as Makoto recoiled from the window in horror.

“They’re… they’re going to kill us!” the girl gasped over the sound of Britannian soldiers running into the apartment building. The unmistakable and rapid reports of assault rifles being fired quickly followed.

“Why? What did we do?!” Ikuko gasped.

Usagi rightly began to panic. “No… I don’t want to die! Mama, what do we do?!”

Luna got up to her feet and looked to Usagi, Ikuko, and Makoto. “There is no other recourse, we must fight.”

Makoto looked at Luna in disbelief. “Fight?! Against the Britannians?!”

The sound of gunfire was closer, the soldiers were already moving to the second floor.

Luna did not want to do this, but it was unavoidable. “It sounds impossible but it can be done, and Usagi is the one who can do it.”

The three Japanese women stared in disbelief at Luna, and at the golden crescent moon symbol that appeared on her forehead as she held up a finger and drew a circle in it. To their amazement, Luna’s finger left a trail of glittering light, and when she connected the line into a circle, a golden brooch appeared for her to grab and present to Usagi.

The gunfire was ending on the second floor, and footsteps could be heard moving up the apartment building’s stairs.

Luna offered the brooch to Usagi. “Usagi-chan, you must take this and fight them.”

Ikuko looked at the brooch in disbelief and then at Luna. “What is this?!”

“M-me?! What am I supposed to do? I’m just a little girl!”

Luna took Usagi’s hand and placed the brooch in it. “You are a little girl, but you are not just any little girl, Usagi. This brooch will grant you a great and wonderful power… a power that will allow you to not only fight, but to protect what you hold dear.”

Usagi looked at the brooch, her eyes growing wide, and then back to Luna who nodded. “You’ve been chosen to become a beautiful warrior unlike any this world has seen before, Sailor Moon.”

“B-but-!” Usagi was hushed when Luna placed a finger on her lips.

“You’re scared, I know. This world is a bleak and dark place–but it’s nothing for you to be afraid of. You have something that the world needs more than anything else. That’s why you have been chosen, what you possess is the only hope in this sad world.”

“W-what I have…?” Usagi stammered as Luna drew her finger away.

Luna nodded again. “Now is the time for you to use that strength, and set forth to change the world. The battles will be difficult, but you will survive. The burden may become great, but others will come to shoulder it with you. Many will come to hate you, but you will endure. Evil will seek to consume you, but you will overcome.”

She took stood and helped Usagi to her feet as Makoto and Ikuko watched in shock. Downstairs, the sound of gunfire could be heard on the third floor. As Luna stepped back, Usagi stared down at the brooch and the crescent moon engraved on it. She began to feel something… a distant familiarity… like she knew what she had to do just by looking at it.

“I… I see…” she whispered.

“U-Usagi…?” Makoto began as she looked between her and Luna.

Luna smiled. “Now shine… and illuminate this dark world.”

Placing the brooch on her chest, Usagi nodded and lifted her hand up to the air before calling out:

“Moon Prism Power, Make Up!”

- - -

“Third floor clear, moving up to the next floor,” a Britannian soldier said as he and his fire team of three other soldiers made their way upstairs. Reloading his assault rifle, he raised his weapon as his flanks came up to the sides of the door. After a quick three count, the soldier at his right kicked open the door and they were immediately greeted by something unexpected.

“What in the hell?” The soldier said as Usagi Tsukino, now Sailor Moon, stood in the middle hallway with her arms folded and a glare leveled at them. A blonde-haired Eleven girl dressed like some kind of fetish model? He almost regretted having to put a burst into her, but it’d be a story to tell back at the base. Without hesitation, he shot Sailor Moon in the head and chest.

The bullets struck her, and fell to her feet warped, blunted, or in pieces–as if the soldier had just shot the side of a tank. Bewildered that she hadn’t been dropped, he opened fire again and went wide-eyed behind his factsphere helmet when he realized that the bullets just had no effect on her.

He looked to his men. “Quickly! Fire! Fire! Light her up!” he yelled as he opened fire, the rest of the fire team joining in. The bullets bouncing off her and falling harmlessly to the floor, Sailor Moon dropped her arms and began walking towards the Britannian soldiers, her glare growing in intensity with almost every step she took towards them.

Outside, the intense and lengthy barrage of gunfire caught the attention of the soldiers outside as they began spreading to other buildings. When it suddenly stopped, the tank commander looked up and stared at the apartment building. He keyed his radio. “What was that about?”

There was an explosion, as the body of one of the Britannian soldiers came smashing through the wall, to fall to the ground next to the tank. Another soldier fell through the hole, falling four stories to the ground with a loud thump. Looking up at the hole, the tank commander and the several soldiers stared at Sailor Moon as she clutched a struggling third soldier by the neck.

Panting heavily, and tears running down her face, she glared at the tank as the soldiers noticed the body of the fourth fire team member behind her, his head rammed into the wall and his body twitching.

“… MURDERERS!” she yelled as she threw the soldier at the tank, the force of his body’s impact rolling massive ground vehicle onto its roof and leaving a huge wedge in its side.

The two Sutherlands immediately lifted their own cannons to open fire, but Sailor Moon was faster, leaping out of the hole she made and kicking one in the chest with enough force to knock the cockpit out of its back. The second Sutherland’s factsphere attempted to track her, and only locked onto her as she punched the complex sensor system.

Blinded, the Sutherland tried to back off, but to little avail, as Sailor Moon punched the Knightmare frame again, the force of the blow sending it crashing onto its back with most of its head ripped off.

As the two APCs turned their cannons to her, and the remaining Britannian soldiers quickly reorganized, Sailor Moon landed and stood up. She was panting, not from the effort she had expended, but from the all-encompassing fury she felt as she stared at these awful people. Reaching up, she wiped the tears running down her cheeks, and then clenched her hands into fists.

“I won’t… I won’t let you get away with this!” she screamed as she charged the soldiers.
 
#3
Yeah, the Britannians have APCs and tanks active in their military. Both wheeled, for some dumb reason.
 

Jomasten

Well-Known Member
#4
Personally, I broke down laughing when I read Luna's introduction. She has such a looooong name.

This seems to be an interesting concept, and cannot wait what comes next.

Is this a crossover or a fusion?
 

seitora

Well-Known Member
#5
An update? In the Sailor Moon Section?

Mother of God.

You must write more, The Ero-Sennin.
 
#6
Interesting stuff, I quite like it and await an update. As an aside, I found Luna's name to be too long even for the joke. Also, if Lelouch somehow ends up being Tuxedo Mask I'm going to laugh at the image it's likely to present.
 

seitora

Well-Known Member
#7
Upon second reading...

I wonder if Usagi's immune to Geass.

lol at Luna being called Nietzsche. I wonder what Artemis is doing, now. Escorting a famous teenage model around Europe?

No Shingo? He's only like three or four years younger than Usagi, so he would've presumably been born by the time Kenji went off to cover the war.

Poor Lelouch. You have no idea what's about to really occur.
 

The Ero-Sennin

The Eyes of Heaven
Staff member
#8
Second Chapter, woo.

= = =

Disclaimer: Sailor Moon and Code Geass don’t belong to me. Please support the official release.


What is the point of being so powerful if all you’re going to use it for is killing? Look at how powerful you are, you can be better than that, you can use your power to end this any way you want… don’t waste the gift you’ve been given on perpetuating senseless murder!


Eclipse of the Never-Setting Sun
A Crossover

Stage 1: Demons, Witches, and Knights Part B




Clovis la Britannia, Third Prince of the Holy Britannian Empire, stood up from his throne on the bridge of his personal G-1 Base Command Cruiser, shaking as the situation that he had been in full control of moments before began to completely unravel before his very eyes. On the digital map in front of him and his chiefs of staff, blue arrows denoting the Britannian forces tasked with wiping out Shinjuku Ghetto were changing to orange boxes reading “LOST” at a frightening rate.

“This is impossible…” he muttered as he watched units disappear on two fronts. Not only were the forces being sent after the terrorists being wiped out as if every move they made was easily predicted, but the forces encircling Shinjuku at the western entrance were being utterly annihilated. Tanks, soldiers, VTOLs, and knightmares alike! “What is going on down there? What is this enemy force?!”

General Bartley Asprius, Clovis’s rotund servant who was as loyal to his Prince as he was bald, could not believe what he was hearing from the front. “My Lord, the Elevens have acquired Sutherlands and they are moving in a coordination fashion we’ve never seen before! Not even Todoh is this prescient!”

Clovis shook his head. “No, they do have our weapons, but how?!”

A staff member connected to the forces in western Shinjuku gave a start at what he was hearing. “What on Earth do you mean a witch?!”

Clovis and Bartley looked at the staff member. “A witch? No, you can’t possibly mean…?” The latter asked in horror.

“No, it can’t be her… there’s no way she has this ability!” Clovis gasped.

Bartley agreed. “We need visual confirmation, what is happening down there?!”

“We have a connection from Exeter Squad, they’re engaging the encirclement!” another staff member reported. A window appeared over the map through the Factsphere of a Sutherland firing wildly at the ground. Amidst the tracers, only a white, zigzagging blur could be seen approaching the camera before the screen went to static.

The same staff member shook his head. “Exeter Squad has been annihilated.”

Clovis’s handsome face had gone positively pale, which absolutely tickled Earl Lloyd Asplund as he rudely forced a connection to the G-1 Base’s bridge. “Good afternoon!”

Bartley looked up at the perpetually grinning, bespectacled white haired engineer. “What is it?! We’re in the middle of an operation!”

“Yes and it’s going terribly. I think now is as good a time as any to deploy our special weapon.”

“We haven’t the time for this!” Clovis shouted in frustration at Lloyd before he looked to Bartley. “Is there anything we can do?!”

“My Lord, with all due respect, we do not have the forces necessary to contain the witch and deal with the Elevens at the same time,” Bartley gently informed Clovis.

Clovis grimaced. “Then what are we supposed to do, you oaf?!

“That pride of yours is dreadful, your majesty and it may very well get you killed,” Lloyd chided, drawing a glare from Clovis and Bartley. “How about you leave the witch hunt to us so you can wipe out those rubbish Elevens?”

Oh that was just what the handsome young prince wanted, a debt owed to his older brother if he allowed Asplund to have his way.

“Lazlo Squad has been eliminated!”

But he was running out of options, and time. The longer this situation went out of control, the worse it was going to look when he finally had to answer to his father for this! He was third in line to the throne, so close to absolute power and authority he could taste it. “Lloyd! Can it do it, can it defeat the witch?”

Lloyd let out a huff. “My Lord, there is nothing Lancelot can’t do.”

- - -

Somehow Jeremiah had managed to make his way through the ghetto after leaving his cockpit-turned-escape pod without running into any angry Elevens. He considered himself fortunate but at the same time, he hadn’t run into any Britannians either, well… not any live ones. Shortly after he began walking to the Shinjuku perimeter, he had come across a trail of unspeakably violent destruction, dead Britannian soldiers, demolished armored vehicles, and mangled Knightmares lay in the middle of a street without a single sign of survivors.

Against his good judgment, he had begun following the trail in an effort to get a good look at the author of the carnage. There was no doubt in his mind that it was that witch from before, but he just had no idea how any of it was possible.

“You couldn’t have gone too far ahead,” he muttered to himself as he relieved a Britannian corpse of his high powered sniper rifle. Sure enough, there was an explosion and he broke into a run for the source of it. It didn’t take him long to reach a good vantage point of the fighting–or to be more precise, the slaughter.

Armed with a heavy cannon, a Sutherland fired at Sailor Moon, and missed as she threw herself into a slide between the Sutherland’s legs. Turning around, she jumped and punched the backpack-like cockpit of the Sutherland, crumpling it like a can to half its size. The tires on its landspinners squealing, the Sutherland raced off aimlessly and crashed into a wall, its landspinners kicking up smoke as they continued to spin.

Landing, Sailor Moon bowed her head and rested her hands on her knees, panting loudly as she stared at the carnage that was left. Just beyond the dead Britannian soldiers and their ruined equipment, were the bodies of more civilians, corralled into a corner between two buildings and cut down with small arms and a rifle from a Sutherland.

She could not comprehend it. “Why? What did these people do? Old people… little kids… what did they do?”

Standing up, her fists clenched, Sailor Moon began to hyperventilate. “What did they do to deserve this?!”

Jeremiah lined up Sailor Moon squarely in his sights. For a moment he noticed tears running down her cheeks, and silently disregarded them. “You’re unspeakably strong, but I’ve never seen anything survive a bullet to the head.”

Taking a deep breath to steady his aim, he began to squeeze the trigger–when a burst of gunfire hit Sailor Moon in her chest and face. He watched through the scope in disbelief as the shower of bullets impacted her body and did no damage whatsoever. “What?”

Sailor Moon looked over towards the shooter, a Britannian soldier staring at her in terror as he tried to hold steady his assault rifle. He was badly wounded, both of his legs clearly mangled.

“No… no…!” he gasped in terror as Sailor Moon began walking towards him. “S-stay away… stay away you monster!”

“How many of those people did you kill?” Sailor Moon asked as she drew closer. “Did it feel good? Did it make you feel big and strong?”

“STAY AWAY!” the soldier shrieked.

“Go ahead, shoot me!” Sailor Moon shrieked at him as she stopped point blank. “Shoot me like you shot them!”

The soldier screamed and emptied the rest of the magazine ineffectually into Sailor Moon. The electric cracks of the mechanism firing ineffectually kept going even as the soldier’s screams broke down into terrified sobs.

“P-please no… no please… I only did what I was ordered. Prince Clovis, he told us to do it, I couldn’t refuse…”

Sailor Moon paused at the man’s pleas. “Clovis…”

“I only did what I was told… please… I have a family… don’t kill me…” He watched as Sailor Moon’s expression went from grief-stricken rage to something else entirely. Before he could even read the blank expression on her face, she turned and walked away from him. “… W-what…?”

Walking away from the soldier, she went over to one of the destroyed tanks and picked it up, lifting the partially crushed hulk above her head. Through his scope, Jeremiah watched as she turned around and walked back towards the soldier, who began to shake his head and try to crawl back from her.

“No… nonononono… please oh my God, no-!”

Jeremiah looked away, when Sailor Moon swung the tank down onto the soldier.

Sailor Moon collapsed against the side of the tank, a hand over her face as she wept loudly. Gripping the hull of the tank, she sobbed loudly and banged her head against it once, and then a second time. What could make people do these things? She couldn’t understand them, they felt pain, they got scared, they even had families… then why was it so easy for them to be so cruel?

“They… they’re all awful people…” She gripped the tank, its metal warping under her fingertips. “… No… they’re not people… they’re not human…”

Jeremiah was confused, as he watched the girl sob pathetically after such a brutal execution. She was completely unstable, he realized, there was no way that she was a soldier. “Acting like a child who just broke a favorite toy…”

He then heard movement amidst the buildings, a knightmare approaching from the direction of the G-1 Base… but far faster than a Sutherland. “What’s this?”

Sailor Moon, being much closer, looked up when she heard the approach, and then got up when she saw a white blur dart between two buildings. Catching her breath, she turned and leaped up onto a nearby toppled building as she saw another glimpse of it, heading towards her location but obscured by the ruins of the ghetto.

“What is that thing?” She asked as she got ready to fight.

It revealed itself, leaping into the air and landing on the roof of another building at the other end of the toppled building, a white and gold Knightmare completely unlike the Sutherlands she had been trashing up to this point.

Seeing it himself, Jeremiah stood up with a start. “The z-01, since when was it ready?!”

Inside the cockpit of the z-01 Lancelot, the world’s first 7th Generation Knightmare Frame, Suzaku Kururugi couldn’t believe what he was seeing as he looked at the “witch” he’d been ordered to kill. “… She’s only a…”

- - -

“… A witch?” 17 year old Private Suzaku Kururugi, an Honorary Britannian and one of the most notorious figures among the Elevens who knew better, asked Lloyd as he was filled in on the current situation in the ghetto.

“Yes, it’s some rather dreadful business. The poison gas those miscreants stole was set off, and many Elevens have been killed, but on top of that they seem to have some sort of bizarre little creature that our boys keep calling a witch.” Lloyd chuckled a bit. “Can you imagine it, a young lady with the physical strength to throw a knightmare into the air?”

In the back of his mind, a quieter and more cynical Suzaku wondered if that was a Britannian weapon that got loose too, but it was ignored by the idealistic young man who had more important concerns such as his best friend, and that mysterious girl that they had insistently claimed was the aforementioned poisonous gas.

Beside Lloyed was his assistant, a lovely and reserved woman named Cécile Croomy, who was waiting with a folded up flight suit. “The situation is getting desperate, there is concern that if they break the encirclement, they’ll attack the Settlement,” she said to Suzaku.

Suzaku grimaced. Even if there wasn’t any poison gas, too many people died today and if something wasn’t done then his best friend and many more would die too. “I understand that, but what do you want me for, if you don’t mind my asking?”

“Well it just so happens that desperate times call for desperate measures and you, Suzaku my boy, have been given the opportunity of a lifetime,” Lloyd replied as Cécile handed Suzaku the flight suit.

“A pilot suit?” Suzaku immediately realized what was going on. “You want me to pilot a knightmare?”

With a flamboyant beckon to follow, Lloyd stepped out of the back of the field ambulance and to before the shrouded knightmare standing against the raised bed of a large truck. Suzaku and Cécile followed him as he gestured up to it. “Not just any knightmare, my boy, a revolutionary one with power that not even a hundred Sutherlands can match. Hop in this machine and it will change your life!”

“Whether you want it to or not,” Cécile added.

Suzaku didn’t like the sound of that, but if it was something he could use, he wasn’t going to turn it down. “What’s it called?”

“Oh? Why, this is Lancelot, the very first Seventh Generation Knightmare Frame,” Lloyd replied.

Lancelot… this was it, his chance to put his ideals into practice. If it was as powerful as Lloyd said it was, then he could save Shinjuku Ghetto, and Lelouch, and that girl! “Get it started up.”

Lloyd’s eyebrows rose in interest. “Eager, are we? Good! I love enthusiasm from the test subjects–when they consent they have no one to blame but themselves for the consequences!”

Suzaku did a quick double-take. “What?”

Cécile let out a sigh, much as she abhorred that way of thinking… it certainly did make litigation easier…

As Suzaku prepared to mount his white steed, Clovis was nearly tearing his hair out as the situation in the ghetto went from bad to absolute disaster as numerous units were suddenly wiped out en masse by some kind of attack. “What… what is going on there?”

“The ground’s collapsing; the Elevens led our forces to a trap!” Bartley sputtered.

Clovis shook his head. “No… is it Todoh? Who is coordinating them? Who can be this many steps ahead?!”

Back in the cockpit of his Sutherland, Lelouch was beside himself with glee. “I did it! I can win! I can defeat Britannia!”

He clutched the Queen piece in his hand as he looked at the mass of “LOST” icons at the dead center of his digital map, and then at the icons that kept popping up along the edge of the perimeter. She was still going strong, and heading towards the checkpoint at a steady pace, one grisly kill at a time.

Lelouch, however, did not have time for a steady pace. “Well done everyone, now I have one more mission for you and you will have a coup like no other.”

“Really?” Ohgi asked.

“Yes,” Lelouch said before contacting Kallen. “Q-1?”

“What are your orders?” Kallen asked.

“Go to the Western Perimeter and direct our friend towards the checkpoint.”

Kallen paused at that. “You want me to get her?”

“You saw her didn’t you, Q-1? It’s time to topple the king on this board, we’re going to make our next thrust right down Prince Clovis’s throat while his perimeter’s weak and his personal guard are away from him.”

“Whoa, we’re going after Clovis?!” Tamaki yelled. “Oh man, you are hardcore! I’ll follow you to the gates of hell!”

“Just follow my orders and we’ll raise his corpse above the ghetto before the sun sets,” Lelouch promised.

Kallen was stunned. Eliminating the Third Prince of Britannia… if their little resistance group could do it… then there was no way Japan wouldn’t get fired up! “This guy… I think I might be in love with him!”

With that, Kallen turned her Glasgow towards the west and sped off, unaware that she had said that while her radio was on. Lelouch, letting out a small cough, tried not to let that bit of praise surge to his head. He failed.

“All right, the rest of you, we’re going to start moving into position so follow my lead-” A tremendous rumble from that very direction caught Lelouch’s attention, and when he looked to the west, his eyes grew wide.

“… What in the hell?”

- - -

“Wait, stop!” Suzaku spoke via a loudspeaker to Sailor Moon, giving her pause.

Tense, Sailor Moon stared up at Lancelot, as the white knightmare raised its hands slowly and pointed them away from her. Despite his submissive, relaxed posture, Suzaku was on a hair-trigger and ready to spring at a second’s notice. “I don’t want to fight you.”

Sailor Moon watched Lancelot carefully, was this guy even Britannian? “Who are you?!”

“I’m someone like you, who wants this all to stop!” Suzaku answered.

“Then help me fight them!” Sailor Moon yelled back.

Suzaku grimaced at that. “That’s not going to resolve this, if the fighting continues many more people are going to get hurt!”

“And if I stop now, they’re going to keep killing everyone in Shinjuku!”

“Oh my, that’s our witch?” Lloyd asked as he got a look at Sailor Moon through Lancelot’s cameras.

Cécile brought her hand to her mouth, mutely aghast. “She’s a little girl…”

Sailor Moon bowed her head. “They’re shooting everyone, even old people and little kids!” She clenched her fists before screaming out at Lancelot, “If they’re going to just do that, then why shouldn’t I kill every single last one of them, too?!”

They were killing elderly and children? Suzaku tightened his grip on his controls, and slowly nodded. This was the worst of Britannia, yes, but it wasn’t all of Britannia. “Fighting them like this isn’t going to make them stop either. That's the position you–we’re in, pointless bloodshed will only cause more pointless bloodshed!”

Cécile was honestly relieved to see that Suzaku was attempting a diplomatic approach with this girl. Lloyd couldn’t be more disappointed, just as much as he wanted to see how well Suzaku performed in Lancelot, he was just as eager to see exactly what this so-called witch was capable of.

“Then what am I supposed to do, let them?!”

“There are better ways of doing things than just killing! Yes, sometimes it’s unavoidable, but fighting them will only make them fight harder. That’s what Britannia does, that’s how they win!”

Sailor Moon tensed up at Suzaku’s logic and screamed in frustration, prompting Suzaku to almost back off, but he stayed calm.

“I don’t care!” she yelled, “If I have to kill a thousand Britannians I will! I just don’t want them to kill anymore innocent people!”

And if she killed a thousand, then ten thousand more would come after her, and everyone she knew. Fighting to the death like that, it reminded Suzaku all too much of his Father… “If it was so easy, then I’d do it too,” he replied.

Sailor Moon stopped and stared at Lancelot. Behind her, on the street below, Jeremiah watched with his rifle ready as he got into a new position, inside another damaged building in case of anything. When he heard Suzaku’s response, his brow furrowed. “… You’d do it too…?”

“Then why don’t you?!” Sailor Moon demanded.

“Because…” Suzaku took a deep breath, and opened the hatch of Lancelot, extended the seat backward and stood up on his seat with his hands raised. “… I’m trying a different path.”

Sailor Moon recoiled when she saw his white Britannian style pilot suit. “… Ah… you’re a traitor!”

Jeremiah got pissed. “Who put an Eleven in the z-01?!”

“I’m not a traitor!” Suzaku shouted at Sailor Moon. “I hate what the Britannians are doing as much as you are, but needlessly killing is not how you’re going to change anything anymore than their killing will! No one can learn and grow if we’re all too busy murdering each other!”

Sailor Moon, still huffing for breath in her anger, gave momentary pause at Suzaku's passionate rebuttal. “Do… do you really mean that?!”

“Yes! If you stop, I will help stop the killing on my end! No more people have to die today!”

Her fists becoming unclenched, Sailor Moon began to calm down. Was he being honest? Did he really want to stop this?

Seeing Sailor Moon relax, Suzaku’s tension eased as well. He could only hope that he was able to reach her, and this could stop before anyone else had to die. It was as he lowered his hands, that he noticed a familiar glint just over her shoulder in the building behind her–the sun reflecting off the scope of a sniper rifle.

“Eleven scum like you don't deserve the right to carry guns,” an absolutely incensed Jeremiah growled as he placed the dot squarely on Suzaku's forehead, “Let alone pilot knightmares!”

Even as he squeezed the trigger, Suzaku was already dropping down into his seat. The bullet had already passed harmlessly over Suzaku's head, by the time Sailor Moon heard the crack of the bullet and realized someone had shot at her.

“You-!” Sailor Moon gasped at Suzaku before she looked back towards Jeremiah's location and all but locked gazes with the wide-eyed man as he realized just how badly he screwed himself.

“Oh my God,” he breathed when he beheld the betrayal on her face right in the midst of morphing to rage.

Luck however seemed to be on the side of the particularly racist Britannian, as she immediately turned her ire to Suzaku. “YOU TRIED TO TRICK ME!”

Suzaku had managed to grab Lancelot’s controls just in time. Raising its right arm, Suzaku activated one of the Seventh Generation Knightmare’s newest technologies, the Blaze Luminous energy shield, to block the high speed flying kick Sailor Moon attacked with. A blinding flash immediately followed, as the Blaze Luminous expended a tremendous amount of energy to block the kick, before the overload finally launched her from the white knightmare.

Alarms blaring around him from the surge, Suzaku watched as Sailor Moon crashed onto the toppled building and tumbled down it, leaving a trail of smoke and dust behind her. Back at G-1 Base, Lloyd let out an impressed hum, while Cécile was in disbelief.

“Blocking that attack… it ate up almost a fourth of Lancelot’s energy filler!” she gasped to the amoral scientist.

Lloyd only let out an amused laugh. “Witch might just be an understatement, don’t you think?” He then contacted Suzaku. “If I were you, avoiding attacks would be a better idea than blocking them–even with all the stress tests, I doubt Lancelot can take a direct hit.”

“I’ll keep that in mind, but…!” Suzaku jumped and flipped over Sailor Moon as she threw herself at Lancelot. Sailor Moon crashed into another building, before she ran up the side and kicked off it straight at the white knightmare. “… I don’t want to fight her!”

With a sharp spin, Lancelot avoided the magical girl-turned-missile, and then flipped up into the air to avoid her sudden lunge for its knees. At the top of its jump, Lancelot pointed one of its arms at a building and fired a slash harken at it, snagging the roof and winching rapidly away from Sailor Moon.

As Suzaku landed on the roof, he turned around and saw a trashed Britannian tank hurtling to meet him. With a swing of the Slash Harken, Suzaku cleaved the tank in half and found Sailor Moon coming at him right after it, twisting herself in midair to kick him. “Damn it!”

At the last possible second, Suzaku swung Lancelot’s arm, backhanding Sailor Moon with the Blaze Luminous and sending her flying through the air in a high arc. “Listen to me, I wasn’t trying to trick you!”

As Sailor Moon tried to recover, a pair of VTOLs observing the scene targeted her. “Is that the witch?” The pilot of the first craft asked.

“Even if it isn’t, shoot!” the second yelled as they opened fire with their cannons. A few rounds managed to hit Sailor Moon as she fell back to the ground below, but by this point it only made her angrier.

She crashed into the roof of a building and went through it. A moment later, one of the building’s I-Beams left the building at Mach 1.5, passing cleanly through the middle of the first VTOL which exploded a second later.

“No stop!” Suzaku yelled before Sailor Moon leaped up for the second VTOL, holding another I-Beam. Before the craft could escape, she swung the I-Beam and sliced clean through it. As it exploded above her, she turned around and threw the I-beam at Lancelot, which jumped up and over it as she landed on another rooftop. The I-Beam smashed into a skyscraper, which collapsed to the ground with a tremendous roar.

Suzaku glanced back at the collapsing building in disbelief. “How strong is she?!”

His attention snapped forward again, and he narrowly ducked under a chunk of rock thrown at him. The Blaze Luminous absorbed another hit as he nimbly jumped to another roof and another, making use of Lancelot’s landspinners and slash harkens to remain a difficult target for more projectiles.

When he landed on another roof, Lancelot’s factspheres spotted Sailor Moon falling on him with one leg raised high. Quickly, Suzaku jumped off and fell back to the street as Sailor Moon’s missed kick caused the entire ruin to shake.

“STOP RUNNING!” Sailor Moon screamed as she burst out the side of the building and fell towards Lancelot.

“I don’t want to fight you!” Suzaku yelled as he fired a slash harken up at her.

Sailor Moon batted it out of the way with the back of her hand and drew it into a fist. Her flying punch missed, however, when Lancelot narrowly spun out of the way. As she hit the street, Lancelot fell upon her, using the Blaze Luminous to pin her to the pavement.

As Sailor Moon struggled under the energy barrier, Suzaku called out to her. “Please! This shouldn’t be happening, there are people out here that I’m worried about too! If the fighting doesn’t stop, then they’re going to get hurt, or worse!”

“They should die too! You traitors and your Britannian masters!” Sailor Moon screamed back.

He was losing her, this wasn’t working. “Damn it…!”

An alarm to his side warned him almost too late of the slash harken hurtling his way. Suzaku leaped off Sailor Moon and out of way of the attack from Kallen’s Glasgow.

“What is that thing?” Kallen asked of Lancelot in disbelief before she called to Sailor Moon. “Hey! Are you okay?!”

Sailor Moon got up and looked at the red Glasgow she’d helped before. “Hey, you’re…”

Suzaku looked at the Glasgow and then at Sailor Moon. An old, one armed Glasgow wouldn’t be a problem by itself, but he’d need every ounce of focus against the girl in a much narrower battlefield like this street.

“Get away from this guy and go that way!” Kallen pointed towards the G-1 Base’s direction. “Britannia’s main force is over there and Prince Clovis is with them!”

Oh no, he couldn’t let her get away towards Clovis, not with her on a rampage. Firing up the landspinners, Suzaku dashed towards Sailor Moon and the Glasgow, firing a slash harken at the latter. Kallen countered with her own, as Sailor Moon met Suzaku’s charge and jumped to kick Lancelot in the chest.

As the two slash harkens deflected one another, Suzaku spun and swung the cable at Sailor Moon, who grabbed and swung herself up and over it into an arc over Lancelot. The white knightmare fired its other arm’s slash harken straight up, catching Sailor Moon in the stomach, before swinging it and her into yet another building overlooking the narrow street. Recalling both weapons, he jumped and flipped over Kallen’s changing Glasgow, kicking off its head as he passed over it.

“Ah! W-who is that guy?!” Kallen gasped before Lancelot’s slash harken took off her Glasgow’s other arm. “Damn it, I can't…!”

Armed with another I-beam, Sailor Moon came down on Lancelot, which blocked the attack with the Blaze Luminous. Another overload occurred, before Sailor Moon was sent flying back. Panting, Suzaku lowered Lancelot’s arms.

Landing on the street, Sailor Moon slid back to a halt on all fours, glaring at Lancelot like an enraged animal. Above them, the building she had kicked before finally began to lose parts of its roof, and it was then that Lancelot’s factspheres popped up and scanned the area. Seeing what the factspheres saw, Suzaku gasped. “No!”

Lancelot charged forward, but when Sailor Moon prepared to attack, Lancelot veered to her left and raised its Blaze Luminous over its head, to act as a shield from the falling roof.

Sailor Moon stopped at that. “Huh?”

At Lancelot’s feet were a group of Japanese civilians who had been using the building as a shelter from the Britannian raid. Looking up at the building, and realizing it had been the one she hit, Sailor Moon grew wide-eyed. “Oh… oh my God…”

“This is why fighting like this is pointless!” Suzaku called out to her. “Innocent people will always get caught up and hurt… but it doesn’t have to be like this!”

It took a moment, but Sailor Moon finally eased at Suzaku's words.

“What is the point of being so powerful if all you’re going to use it for is killing? Look at how powerful you are, you can be better than that and end this any way you want… don’t waste the gift you’ve been given on perpetuating senseless murder!” Suzaku pleaded to her. “Please… let’s stop this before we hurt anymore people!”

Sailor Moon stared up at Lancelot, and then down at herself. She brought her hand up to her eyes and wiped them. “Then what am I supposed to do?!”

There was no easy answer to that, Suzaku couldn’t think of one. Lowering her arm, Sailor Moon watched as the Glasgow's cockpit ejected from its back, and then looked towards the direction of the G-1 Base. That girl, she said the enemy’s base was that way…

Sailor Moon looked down at her hands, and then finally… she had an answer. She looked to Suzaku. “What’s your name?”

Suzaku wondered what she intended. “Suzaku.”

Sailor Moon nodded. “I’m going to stop this…” She looked at the civilians fleeing to safety. “… If you promise to protect these people here, I won’t kill anymore Britannians.”

Suzaku felt the weight evaporate from his heart and smiled. “I’ll do everything I can, but what are you going to do?”

Sailor Moon turned towards the G-1 Base. “I’m going to talk to Prince Clovis!”

- - -

“Q-1, what happened?” Lelouch radioed Kallen, her signal had gone silent after all those buildings started coming down.

“I'm fine, but my Glasgow was wrecked so I had to bail,” Kallen radioed back from her ejected cockpit.

“Did you at least tell her the location of the checkpoint?”

“I did, but she was fighting a new kind of knightmare. It's painted white and gold and way better than a Sutherland. It was able to fight her evenly, and even blocked her attacks. It rolled me over without stopping.”

A new knightmare? Leave it to Britannia to have a trick up its sleeve. At the very least, they didn't field it directly against the terrorists. “Good job Q-1, find someplace to lay low and rendezvous with the rest later.”

“Understood. Be careful out there, whoever you are and…” Kallen paused hesitantly. “… Thank you.”

With how soft that sounded maybe she really was in love with him, and Lelouch didn't have a problem with that. “Think nothing of it, I'm not a Good Samaritan lending a hand, I'm the same as you.”

He ended the call and radioed Ohgi. “B-1, Q-1 is safe and withdrawing. She says to be on the lookout for an extremely powerful white and gold knightmare.”

“Roger, when are we going to move forward? We're getting pretty antsy here.” The resistance leader wasn't exaggerating, the others in the terrorist were ready to go out there and start hunting Britannians, and that just would not do.

“Don't worry; we'll have our chance to attack-”

Lelouch was interrupted by a broadcast on almost every radio frequency. “ALERT: ALL UNITS DEPLOYED TO SHINJUKU GHETTO ARE TO REINFORCE G-1 BASE, THE ENEMY IS APPROACHING! THIS IS AN ORDER FROM PRINCE CLOVIS HIMSELF! REPEAT: ALL UNITS DEPLOYED TO SHINJUKU GHETTO ARE TO REINFORCE G-1 BASE, THE ENEMY IS APPROACHING! THIS IS AN ORDER FROM PRINCE CLOVIS HIMSELF!”

Watching the remaining VTOLs, armor, and knightmares heed the urgent order and rapidly turn towards the checkpoint, Lelouch smiled. "… Sooner than I expected."

“They're regrouping! What are your orders, voice guy?” Ohgi asked.

“You heard him didn't you?” Lelouch's smile became a full-blown grin. “Go reinforce G-1 Base.”

At the Britannian checkpoint, the VTOLs were already beginning to arrive as the Britannian forces began desperate and rapid efforts to dig in. Aboard the G-1 Base, Clovis had been as tense as iron since Lloyd happily told him that while Lancelot had headed off the witch’s attack on Britannian units inside the ghetto, the witch was now making a bee-line straight for their position.

“My Lord,” Bartley said, “We should evacuate while we still have the time to! I can requisition a VTOL to take you from here!”

Clovis would be more than happy to do just that, nearly every fiber of his being would’ve been happy with that, but the fibers that had final say decided he was going nowhere. “I am the third in line to rule the Empire, you fool. To show cowardice and flee in the face of the enemy–especially an inferior one–would be a humiliation that could endanger my right to the throne!”

Bartley grimaced and turned his attention to Lloyd, who was more interested in the data from Lancelot than their video conference. “What about the Lancelot?”

“Oh, it expended far too much energy fighting her, without a chance to recharge it won’t be much of a help,” Lloyd replied without so much as glancing towards the monitor Bartley yelled at him from.

Bartley removed the monocle he wore, squeezing it in his hand to the point it cracked. “How can you be so blithe?!”

“Well, Lancelot’s devicer did manage to convince her to promise not to kill anymore of us, so it’s not like our lives are in danger, is it?”

This did little to reassure Bartley, who knew well enough that humans had an absurdly high pain threshold before death occurred.

The tanks and Sutherlands of the Britannian Army began arriving in force, the latter whirling around and coming to a stop at the flanks and rear of G-1 Base, while the former took up positions at the front, ready to meet a frontal assault. Climbing out of one of the APCs, Jeremiah looked around wildly. “Where are those bastards from Camelot?!”

Taking cover in one of the red-cross marked ambulances with Lloyd, Cécile watched as the forces converged. “Are you sure you don’t want to leave?”

Lloyd was particularly engrossed in the data regarding the Blaze Luminous and its effects when Sailor Moon and it interacted. “Yes, there’s just a bit more data I want to acquire with my own eyes before we’re done today and this is the perfect opportunity for it.”

There was also the fact that Lloyd did not want to face an angry Jeremiah carrying a high powered rifle and Cécile could not argue with his prudence. Looking out the windows of the ambulance, she tensed. “Well, put that down and come look… she’s here.”

Jeremiah was about to search the Lancelot’s carrier, when he too noticed it, and then grabbed his rifle. “The witch…”

Emerging from amongst the ruins, Sailor Moon walked out to the end of the long clearing between Shinjuku Ghetto and the G-1 Base and found dozens of weapons leveled onto her. Cannons, autocannons, rocket pods, rifles, and even the small arms of Britannian Soldiers dug in amongst the mechanized units.

Aboard the land cruiser, Clovis’s eyes widened as he finally saw the witch for himself. “A blonde-haired Eleven?”

“A child… a child’s been wreaking so much havoc on our forces?” Were it not for the carnage he’d seen glimpses of himself, Bartley would not have believed it!

Sailor Moon looked directly at the G-1 Base’s bridge, and saw Clovis staring back at her from the window. From a new hiding spot, Lelouch twirled the Queen piece between his fingers as he watched with a growing smirk.

“With this move, I declare check,” he said quietly.

Bartley took nothing to chance, and called out to his soldiers, “Fire! FIRE AT WILL!”

The VTOLs were the first to open fire, unleashing rockets and cannon bursts that converged upon and struck Sailor Moon with laser-guided precision, engulfing her in tremendous explosions. The tanks and APCs opened fire next, the heavier artillery cannons of the latter thundering over the rapid chops of the autocannons of the former. The knightmares and the soldiers on foot were the last to join the chorus of steel with their rifles and rocket launchers, adding to the deafening din that had both Lloyd and Cécile covering their ears.

Amongst the Sutherlands at the back, a nervous Ohgi watched in disbelief as Sailor Moon disappeared underneath the volume of fire. “Oh man… there’s no way…”

In his own Sutherland, Tamaki was doing his best to stick to the plan and not just start gunning down the enemy Sutherlands with their backs so exposed. “She kicked a Sutherland in half… she can handle this!”

Standing next to an APC as it went through its entire internal magazine, Jeremiah aimed his sniper rifle at the very point the withering fire was converging and peered into the scope. “This is but a taste of Britannia’s true might… nothing is invulnerable, witch.”

Aiming a heavy, two-handed artillery cannon, a Sutherland fired directly at the center of the target area, the high-explosive shell striking at high velocity and creating an explosion that kicked up even more dust and smoke.

“Confirm that the target’s been eliminated!” Bartley ordered as the other staff stared at the video screens tense.

Clovis, still standing at the windows, narrowed his eyes in focus as he stared at the cloud. When Bartley looked over, he saw his Lord’s eyes widen in disbelief as the Prince stepped back.

“I-Impossible…” Clovis sputtered.

Jeremiah was of the same thought as he lowered his sniper rifle. Inside the ambulance, Cécile’s legs went weak and prompted her to take a seat from her own bewilderment.

“Oh my.” Lloyd sounded almost pleasantly surprised as Sailor Moon walked out of the smoke towards the Britannian position, completely unscathed by the force of the assault.

The same Sutherland opened fire with its big cannon, the shell arcing perfectly in on Sailor Moon–who reached up and caught it in her open palm. The shell crumpled in her hand for all of a half-second, before exploding violently. She emerged from the blast, her long blonde bunches whipping about behind her as she kept walking forward.

Autocannon fire from the APCs converged on her, the rounds hitting her ineffectually, as did the tank shells and rockets from more of the VTOLs. Unhindered, not once missing step or stumbling, she walked through the great waves of metal and fire that attempted to tear her to shreds at an almost leisurely pace.

Seeing that much heavier weapons were having no effect whatsoever, a number of Britannian soldiers on foot simply threw their weapons down and ran screaming in terror, while one soldier next to Jeremiah began laughing hysterically before he turned his weapon on himself and took the fastest way out possible.

As Sailor Moon drew closer, the tanks and APCs stopped firing as well, as their crews simply either abandoned their vehicles, or turned them around and drove off in a panic. Even the Sutherlands began to lower their weapons before their pilots, some Royal Knights, simply turned tail and fled as fast as they could.

Ohgi–realizing that he too was in a Britannian machine and unsure if the invincible girl was in on the plan–wondered if running for his life was a good idea as well. This shit was unnatural, every fiber of his being telling him that what he was seeing was wrong. Tamaki, being the idiot he was, could not imagine a sight more badass.

“YEAH! KEEP ‘EM RUNNIN’ IRON LADY!” he cheered loudly.

Lloyd looked from Sailor Moon back to the data sent from Lancelot, and nodded as he became absolutely focused on the data regarding the Blaze Luminous. “That’s exactly what I was expecting…”

Cécile, being a human being, was on the verge of tears. Like Ohgi, everything she was seeing was wrong and she knew why it was wrong: Who on Earth would place such power, such a burden, on a little girl?

Watching from a nearby building’s balcony, Luna sneezed loudly as she waited patiently.

Walking up to an abandoned tank in front of her, Sailor Moon grabbed it by the front of its hull, and tossed it up and over her head. It landed a hundred yards behind her, with a loud crunch and a small explosion.

Waiting behind it was Jeremiah, pointing his rifle at Sailor Moon’s forehead. “Eleven witch.”

Sailor Moon recognized him. “You’re Jeremy Gottwald, yes?”

“Jeremiah, pronounce it correctly.” He was fantastically calm. He knew he had to be. If plebs around him were going to suddenly show cowardice before such a threat, he was going to show his courage as a pureblooded Britannian.

Nodding, Sailor Moon walked up to Jeremiah, who didn’t hesitate to shoot her. The bullet hit just above her tiara and bounced harmlessly off to the ground. Tensing, he fired again, to no effect. Before he could fire a third time, Sailor Moon took the rifle from his hands and broke it in half. She dropped the ruined weapon at his feet, and walked around him.

Frozen where he stood for only a moment, Jeremiah looked back at Sailor Moon. She had stopped just below the G-1 Base’s bridge, in view of Clovis. Prince Clovis stared back at Sailor Moon, ignoring Bartley’s desperate pleas to retreat before they ebbed and he too stared down at her.

“Prince Clovis la Britannia,” she began, “I demand you pull your forces away from Shinjuku and return to your bases. You will then send search and rescue efforts into Shinjuku and offer proper housing for all Japanese within the ghetto inside the Tokyo Settlement. You will then publicly admit to having your soldiers massacre the innocent people here, and you will publicly apologize and offer reparations for what you’ve done!”

Bartley paled. “My Lord, you can’t concede to those demands! They will ruin you! Have the remaining Sutherlands run a screen so we can retreat-!”

“If I were you,” Ohgi said as he and the other resistance Sutherlands aimed their weapons at the G-1 Base’s bridge, “I’d accept those terms!”

Bartley looked at the Sutherlands in disbelief. “W-what is the meaning of…” It dawned on him. “… The resistance!”

Clovis heaved a sigh. “There really is no avoiding this, is there?” He grabbed a radio handset, and responded. “Very well, I accept these terms and surrender. All Britannian forces in the vicinity of the Shinjuku Ghetto are to lay down your weapons and withdraw to your bases. Search and Rescue Assets are to be sent to Shinjuku to help the Eleven population… and housing is to be made available to all survivors rescued from the ghetto inside Tokyo Settlement. This is not just an order, but a formal decree from your Prince and Viceroy of Area Eleven, Clovis la Britannia!”

Jeremiah could not believe himself, nor could Bartley. Hearing Clovis’s decree, Suzaku smiled broadly and pumped his fists. “She did it!”

Sailor Moon all but melted in relief, she had actually done it! She had stopped the fighting… and she really didn’t need to kill anyone else. “I’m going to hold you to that, Prince Clovis… if not, then I will come see you again!”

“You have my word as the Third Prince of the Holy Britannian Empire!” Clovis answered, before he asked a question of his own. “Who are you, my Lady?”

Bartley grimaced at Clovis taking such formality with her, while Jeremiah ground his teeth in impotent rage.

Blinking a few times, Sailor Moon thought of a way to introduce herself, and like that it came to her. “For love and justice, compassion and understanding… I am the warrior known only as Sailor Moon.”

“Sailor Moon…” Clovis repeated, before nodding. “Very well, Sailor Moon. I hope that we do not have to meet under these circumstances again.”

“So do I,” Sailor Moon called back before she turned and began walking towards the ghetto. She suddenly felt so tired, but she knew it was the emotional collapse more than any physical exertion weighing on her.

Ohgi and the other resistance members broke into cheers, as Jeremiah punched the side of another abandoned tank in frustration. Watching Sailor Moon walk away, Cécile found herself fighting the urge to rush out there and give her a hug, while Lloyd was completely lost in his data analysis.

On the bridge Clovis lowered the radio handset and bowed his head. Bartley gave him a critical stare. “That was an act, right? A ploy? You didn’t honestly mean-”

“That girl walked through the combined assault of some of Britannia’s finest and paid it no heed. She drove Royal Knights from the field in terror. Bartley you fool, look me in the eyes and tell me… if you faced that monster with anything less and it demanded the same from you as it asked from me, would you say no to it?”

Bartley stared Clovis in the eyes, and pulled a grimace before bowing his head. His silence spoke volumes to Clovis.

“Exactly, now let’s begin overseeing the relief effort.” A man embittered and humiliated, Clovis turned from Bartley and began issuing commands to his staff, as Bartley quietly watched from the side.

- - -

Finally out of sight from anyone in an underground car park after a long walk back into the ghetto, Sailor Moon slumped against a wall and let out an exhausted sigh. She heard footsteps behind her, and looked back to see Luna standing there.

“Luna, why do I have this power? Why did you have to choose me?”

“I did not choose you, I found you. This power was always yours, and it would’ve manifested on its own eventually.” Luna hugged Sailor Moon. “You have an awful burden to bear, and it could not have come at a worse time… but it’s here, and it’s yours…”

She pulled back. “But you won’t carry it alone, and that’s because I am here, and so are Makoto and your mother.”

Sailor Moon sniffled, and rubbed her eyes. When she lowered her hand she was Usagi Tsukino once again, and she fell back into Luna’s embrace. “Luna… I’m so tired…”

“I know. I’m going to take you to a safe place, where you can rest. Your mother and Makoto are already there.”

Usagi nodded as she nuzzled Luna’s shoulder. “Thank you, Luna…”

Luna hugged Usagi tighter, as the crescent moon on her forehead began to glow. A moment later, both she and Usagi vanished from the car park.

“Suzaku, Lancelot’s power is running low, we should call it day,” Cécile suggested as Lancelot cleared another road for some ambulances.

Surveying his handiwork and finding it suitable, Suzaku nodded in agreement. Finding Lelouch and that girl would have to be left with Search and Rescue, though he did give them directions to their last known location. “I understand, I’m bringing Lancelot back now.”

Cécile nodded, and after a few moments silence as Suzaku began back for the white knightmare’s carrier, she spoke, “You were wonderful, convincing her to stop rampaging.”

“Oh, thank you…”

“You and Lancelot, you make a nice fit, like you were meant for each other,” she added.

Suzaku smiled some, and looked around the cockpit. “I guess we do, don’t we?” He then saw something out the corner of his eye, a Sutherland hidden inside a building. “Hang on.”

Cécile saw it too. “It’s a Sutherland, one of the resistance units?”

“They wouldn’t abandon them already, would they?” Suzaku approached the back of the Sutherland, and found that its hatch was open and chair extended out. “It’s empty…”

“A recovery team will be along for it. Hurry back.”

Suzaku nodded. “I’m on my way.”

Lancelot turned and sped back towards home, with Suzaku understandably missing a single white chess piece lying on the seat–a toppled King.

Aboard the G-1 Base, after Clovis finally drove out his staff following coordinating the lengthy rescue effort, a Britannian soldier armed with only a pistol walked up to the doors to the bridge and smirked.

“Checkmate,” the disguised Lelouch quietly said as the door opened and he stepped into the darkness.


= = =


Oh Lulu, you're still an absolute bastard.
 

Cosgrove

Well-Known Member
#9
Wow, with Lelouch's actions there's quite possibly a good number of things that might happen.

With the existence of Sailor Moon, there's no need for Jeremiah to frame Suzaku (though he might anyway) which leaves no need for a Zero introduction yet (unless Jeremiah fucks things up).

Which means, when Cornelia arrives, she won't be expecting to fight Zero, but Sailor Moon. Which means that Lelouch will be in the background able to influence things more and have his actions noticed less which means Mao might not be involved.

Which means we would have three factions here:

Britannia (led by Cornelia for now)
Sailor Moon (and perhaps the Senshi)
Lelouch/C.C. (Zero and his band of merry men?)

And, honestly, unless monsters start showing up, Cornelia's gonna get her shit fucked because she's worse than Clovis in her actions.

Though Lelouch vs. Tuxedo Kamen in a competition of who is the more fabulous ham is something I now desire to see.
 

mishie

Well-Known Member
#10
You don't get it do you, what if Lelouch IS Tuxedo Kamen, the world will not be able to handle the amount of pure fabulous. Also, it should be interesting to see if Sailor Moon tries to work with Zero, because well, the ideals of Justice and Equality he goes on about in the show would be pretty appealing to her.
 
#11
Holy crap. Is this a Code Geass/Sailor Moon crossover or a Code Geass/Superman-in-a-fuku crossover?
 

Aarik

Well-Known Member
#12
Sailor Moon has physical god super powers, it just never comes up because her lazors are so much more hax.

In this case, she doesn't know about the lazors yet, so she just goes with the physical god boost and goes all "POWER THAT CAN SMASH EVEN THE SOULS OF THE GODS!".

In the manga, one the early chapters features Moon getting startled.

She jumped into upper earth atmosphere, got there in about two or three seconds. The others followed her.

Her physical strength has always been hilarious. This is just what happens when she gets to abuse it.
 
#13
Man they really downplay the Sailor Senshi's physical strength in the anime don't they? Now all those Dragon Ball Z/Sailor Moon crossovers make so much more sense...

Is it bad that I prefer the anime Sailor Moon to this overpowered sounding manga version? I'm a fan of the "glass cannon" magic user myself. Awesome attack power, low defense. Also great at making food and water and for opening portals to Ironforge after a hard nights raid. :)
 

zeebee1

Well-Known Member
#14
While I can understand Lelouch's actions this will hurt his stance as Zero. With Clovis dead the reparation will be canceled and he will be the one who is blamed. Usagi's family will in fact suffer because of this.
 

Aarik

Well-Known Member
#15
Could just order clovis to kill himself after making the reparations.

Or to go to a certain place to be killed by Zero in a flashy display.
 

zeebee1

Well-Known Member
#16
Clovis would still remember that Lelouch is alive. That was the reason he had to kill Clovis. He couldn't use his powers without taking off his mask, and once he took off his mask Clovis might have figured out who he was facing had he lived. But Lelouch needed the information that he thought Clovis might have so he would have to kill him to guarantee his secret and endanger the dead usagi made.
 

The Ero-Sennin

The Eyes of Heaven
Staff member
#17
OH SHIT.


= = =


Disclaimer: Sailor Moon and Code Geass don’t belong to me, support the official releases.


Eclipse of the Never-Setting Sun
A Crossover

Stage 2: Many Shades of Revolutionary Part A


In a lavish hotel in the Tokyo Settlement, Makoto looked out over the settlement’s skyline and the smoke that continued to rise from Shinjuku Ghetto despite it being long into the night. She was still in shock over everything. All of the fear, violence, and death, and then what Usagi had done to stop it all.

She looked back at Luna, who was dressed far less extravagantly but still quite expensively in loose-fitting black slacks and a yellow shirt embroidered with jewelry. Luna was watching Usagi, who was curled up against her mother’s side on the hotel room’s bed, fast asleep. Ikuko was awake, gently stroking her daughter’s hair and humming a soft tune for her.

Had it not been for Luna finding them all, what would’ve happened to them? Makoto couldn’t even bear to think about it. But at the same time… “Did you really even know him?”

“Kenji? Yes, he and I truly did work together for EUNN during the war.”

“And it just so happened that his daughter is the protector of the Earth?” Makoto asked.

Luna nodded. “It was always my intention to find you and help you, and I endured seven years of Britannian and European bureaucracy and red tape to make my way into Britannia to do just that. If I had known years ago of Usagi’s power… I would’ve rescued you without suffering the politics.”

Ikuko stopped humming to Usagi, and looked to Luna. “So this is all new to you, as well.”

Luna gave a slow nod. “It was little over a month ago, that I gained my powers and learned of my mission.”

“What is your mission, what is Usagi supposed to do with this power?” Makoto demanded.

Luna steepled her fingers and rested them against her nose. “As Sailor Moon, it is Usagi’s mission to protect the Earth from a great and terrible evil that threatens it.”

“Britannia, right? Well, let’s hop on a plane to Pendragon and end this.”

Luna huffed. “If it were Britannia, then I’d have done it myself. As it is, this is a threat far bigger than a country of racist war mongerers.”

“So, what is it?”

Luna’s hands fell into her lap and she let out a sigh. “Unfortunately, the only answer I received was that it was an enemy that would require all nine Sailor Senshi-”

“There’s more of them?!”

“Mako-chan!” Ikuko hissed, although Usagi didn’t stir.

“Ah, s-sorry…” With a quick and apologetic bow to Ikuko, Makoto looked back to Luna. “There are eight more Sailor Senshi? What in the universe could require that much power?”

Luna gave her a dire look. “Do you even want to think about that? Go ahead, consider the implications.”

Makoto gave it a shot, and grew wide-eyed. “My God…”

Ikuko looked down at her still sleeping daughter, stricken. “Usagi-chan…”

“Don’t fear, with Usagi and the other Senshi, we’ll be able to protect the Earth. She’s more than strong enough for the task, in more ways than one.”

Makoto couldn’t help her wariness at that. “So, when do we leave?”

“We can’t.”

Everyone looked to Usagi, who had opened her eyes. “I can’t leave until I know Clovis has kept his word.”

As much as Makoto would rather hop a plane to Pendragon and watch Usagi lay waste to it, she was right. Sailor Moon had appeared to save the Japanese, and if she were to just disappear now…

“Damn it you're right, what are we supposed to do then?”

Luna smiled. “Well I said I would take care of you and that is what I'm going to do! Name your desire, ladies and I shall grant it.”

“Some parfaits would be a good start,” Usagi replied before she snuggled to her mother. “When I wake up though, right now I wanna sleep for a week.”

Happily, Ikuko returned her daughter's embrace. “That's an idea I can get behind.”

As the two settled back to sleep, Makoto looked back to Luna. “How do we find the others, how do we find this great evil they’re supposed to fight?”

Luna hummed. “I only knew Usagi was Sailor Moon. I wasn’t told who the others were. However…”

“However?” Makoto repeated when Luna trailed off, as if searching for a way to put her next words.

“… I found all of you when I absolutely needed to. If you believe in such a thing, we will find them when we are meant to.”

“Our enemy, too?”

Luna answered with a slow nod. “Or they will find us. Either way, there is little we can do.”

At that, Makoto chuckled some, surprising the strange woman. “What’s so funny?”

Makoto smiled darkly. “How funny would it be if it turned out all of the Sailor Senshi were Japanese?”

Luna’s pondered that for a moment with a hum. “It wouldn’t be very funny to Britannia, that’s for sure.”

- - -

Lelouch couldn't remember sleeping so well, after making it back home from the ghetto–he barely remembered even getting into bed when he woke up. Yesterday had been exhausting, even with everything going his way.

I was wiped out from just winning, fighting Britannia is going to take all of my strength, even with everything in my favor, he realized to himself as he walked from his home–the Ashford Academy Clubhouse–to the main building of the verdant campus.

“Hey Lelouch, you jerk!”

Hearing the voice of his friend, Rivalz Cardemonde, Lelouch turned and gave him a cool look. “Rivalz, you made it in one piece, how's your bike?”

“Oh it's still in one piece. It really was just the power line.” Rivalz joined Lelouch's side and walked with him towards the front of the school. “I did have to walk it all the way back to school and missed two classes. What happened with you?”

Nothing really, he just received mysterious powers from a dead girl and used his chess skills to help defeat Britannia in a savage battle. “I had to walk because the public transportation was shut down. What else did I miss?”

“Just the greatest fireworks show you’ll ever see. Some crazy stuff went down in Shinjuku yesterday, I think it was a battle or something with the terrorists who bombed that building.”

Oh, if only he could boast that he had a front row seat to the show. Before he could even vaguely hint at it to his friend/wheelman, another voice called out to him.

“Lelouch!” At her call, he turned to face the pretty orange-haired girl who marched up to him. Before Lelouch could even say a word, Shirley Fenette grabbed him in a tight hug.

Lelouch froze where he stood. “Shirl…?”

She stood back, a bit embarrassed at her lunge. “Please tell me you weren’t anywhere near Shinjuku yesterday, were you?”

“Of course not, I only called you yesterday because the traffic was awful. Why, what happened?”

Shirley sighed in relief, and then grew grim. “There was a battle in Shinjuku, between the army and the terrorists… it was really bad.”

“How bad?” Rivalz asked as the three resumed walking into the school.

“My Dad said that Prince Clovis ordered a complete withdrawal from Shinjuku to stop more casualties on the Britannian side.”

Rivalz blinked several times as he tried to process that. “Wait, you mean the military lost?”

Shirley looked around, hesitant to say it out loud. “Dad said that more than half the soldiers Clovis sent into Shinjuku were killed.”

Lelouch was as shocked to hear that as Rivalz was, but for different reasons. Over half? I didn’t realize she did that much damage.

When they walked into their classroom, Lelouch, Shirley, and Rivalz discovered that Shinjuku was the only thing people were talking about.

“I heard that the Elevens had stole some Knightmares and that’s how they were able to win,” one student said to his friend.

Said friend gaped in disbelief. “Wait, Elevens can pilot Knightmares? Since when?”

“A witch?” Lelouch’s eyes darted towards a pair of girls talking.

“My brother works as a mechanic at the base, he overheard everyone talking about a witch when they came back, and they were all really freaked out about it.”

“Oh man, are you talking about Sailor Moon?” A boy holding a laptop asked.

“Sailor Moon?” Shirley asked before she looked to Lelouch, who dumbly shrugged his shoulders.

“It sounds like an Eleven trying to use Britannian words to sound cool,” the first girl discussing the “witch” replied.

“It might sound stupid but check this out! She apparently did this to a Knightmare with her bare hands!” The boy held up the laptop to the girls, who immediately reacted with horror.

“Oh my God, you can see the pilot’s body!” the second girl yelped.

“Don’t look at that!” the first admonished.

“You think that’s gruesome, you don’t even want to see what she did to the regulars on foot.”

Morbidly curious, Rivalz headed over. “Hey, let me see.”

As Rivalz walked over to be thoroughly disgusted by what he would see, Lelouch had to repress a small smirk. Clovis may have been a buffoon on the battlefield, but he knew when he was beaten and that was a lot more than could be said for most Britannians. He found it interesting that everyone seemed to know exactly what was going on, there wasn’t any attempt to cover up anything like there was yesterday.

Well… everything except that girl who gifted him with his power. He looked to Shirley after he took his seat. “Hey, Shirley, did your Dad say what happened with the poison gas?”

“Oh, apparently it wasn’t any gas they took, just some Knightmares.”

Lelouch wondered if they recovered the girl; he did leave that Britannian woman who so kindly lent her Sutherland to him right next to her body, after all. If they were willing to wipe out an entire ghetto and everyone in it to recover her, she must be back in their custody.

He rested his hand just below his left eye, as if to rub it. He would find out what Clovis was up to with that girl soon enough.

- - -

Alone on the bridge of G-1 Base, Clovis sat brooding in impotent rage. With his orders sent out and made abundantly clear, he’d chased out all of his staff so he could try to think of anything to turn this around in his favor, but the stark reality left him seething: The Elevens had outwitted him at every turn, and then played a hand that would’ve made any winning strategy he could play useless regardless.

“Those damn Elevens,” he growled. The savages, they never failed to take away the things that mattered to him in his life. The siblings he adored, his work on far nobler efforts, and now… now they emasculated him before his men, and soon he was to humiliate himself before his subjects. Once his father found out about this he would be directly in line to the throne behind his dead little brother!

A door opening to the bridge garnered his attention, and he looked to see a soldier enter the bridge. His countenance drew into a grimace. “I thought I said I was not to be bothered-”

“Oh how low the Third Prince has fallen,” the soldier cut him off as he approached the throne.

Clovis stood from his throne. “How dare you-?” His retort was immediately cut short when the soldier drew a pistol and pointed it at him with a click of the safety being removed. “My God…”

This wasn’t happening. After everything that had gone wrong today, he was now being held at gunpoint by one of his soldiers?! “What is the meaning of this?”

“If you think this is punishment for your failure, don’t worry. I’m here for something else entirely, big brother,” the soldier replied as he reached to remove his helmet.

“Big-? Who are you?” Clovis demanded before he saw the face of the young man before him. “It can’t be…”

“The oldest son of the late Consort Marianne and seventeenth in line to the Imperial Throne.” Lelouch lowered the handgun and knelt before Clovis. “Lelouch vi Britannia, at your service.”

“Lelouch…” Clovis still could not believe it. His brother, thought murdered in cold blood along with his sister, alive and well before his eyes! “B-but I thought…”

“That I was dead? You were wrong. I have returned, your highness, and I have come back to change everything.”

Clovis stood up. “They told me you and Nunnally were killed when Japan was conquered, you’ve been here in hiding all this time?”

“Hiding, yes, to avoid being used as pawns and playthings by you and the rest of our family… or do you even remember why we were sent here in the first place?”

Clovis knew. “How could I forget? Marianne’s death at the hands of terrorists-”

“Not terrorists, our own family!” Lelouch snapped at Clovis, who recoiled.

“W-what?!”

“Despite being a Knight of the Round, Mother was a commoner by birth. The other Imperial Consorts loathed her esteemed status at the side of the Emperor, and you Britannians had her killed! That terrorists did it was a lie to cover the bloodsoaked trail leading back to all of you!”

Lelouch pointed his gun at Clovis. “I have come for the truth, and you will tell me everything you know.” A red light flickered it his left eye. “The truth can no longer be hidden from me!”

Lelouch had expected a great deal of things from Clovis when he confronted him: Verbose denial, cowardice, and even guilt for the crimes committed against him, his mother, and sister. What Lelouch had not expected, or even remotely considered, was being embraced tightly by Clovis. In his surprise, the power within his eye deactivated, and he dropped the pistol.

“Lelouch, I swear on my life that I had nothing to do with Marianne’s murder,” Clovis said to him with a breaking voice. “I admired her, and I adored you and Nunnally. Why would I possibly want to hurt any of you?”

Lelouch pulled away from Clovis, startled by the emotion shown by his half-brother. For the second time today, he was thrown off by something not going entirely as planned. “You say you had nothing to do with my mother’s murder?!”

“Absolutely none!” Clovis fired back with equal ferocity. “Cornelia, she was responsible for protecting Marianne and the both of you that night, and she had ordered her men to remove the palace’s defenses!”

Lelouch narrowed his eyes. “Cornelia…”

“When Marianne was killed, I was devastated, and furious with Father that he’d send you here as hostages before she was even buried!” Clovis shook his head ruefully. “And then to say that you were killed, you and Nunnally… when you were alive all this time…!”

Clovis looked away and brought one of his hands to his mouth, as if horrified by a realization. He then looked back to Lelouch. “Why didn’t you give me some clue, something, anything?!”

Lelouch knew Clovis pretty well, and one of the things he knew best was that he was terrible at deceiving him. Whether at the chessboard or watching his emotional public addresses to his subjects, it was never impossible for Lelouch to see Clovis’s true motives or feelings. That was what made this strange. There was none of his “acting” in play here, instead he seemed more like the honest Clovis he was used to seeing… frustrated and at wits end towards the end of their games of chess in the past.

Clovis, Lelouch realized, was truly happy and relieved to see him. After a day where everything went wrong for the Third Prince, something that actually meant something to him had appeared before him, and Lelouch knew at that very second that he could use this!

“So, I now have a real lead to my mother’s murderer, but that won’t be enough,” he declared.

Sure enough, Clovis seized upon this. “No, you’ll need to confront Cornelia won’t you?”

“Naturally, and I can’t reveal myself as alive to anyone in the royal family. Had I not known your true colors… this would’ve ended differently for you to ensure my secrecy.” Lelouch looked to the pistol on the floor for emphasis.

Clovis nodded. “Lelouch, we may have separate mothers but we are still brothers by blood. Please, let me help you however I can to find the ones responsible for what you–all of us who loved Marianne had to go through for losing her.”

Lelouch simultaneously resisted smiling and gagging at Clovis’s sappy declaration, and he stepped forward to hug his half brother. “Thank you, brother.”

Pulling away from him after, Clovis became somber. “All this time, I’ve been fed a lie and taking it out on the Elevens. What actually happened?”

“We were kept safe, that’s all you need to know for now,” he replied.

“We?” Clovis’s eyes grew wide, as he grew hopeful. “Lelouch… you mean to say that Nunnally…?”

Lelouch smirked. “If you can make amends for what happened here in Shinjuku, I might consider your hands clean enough of blood for you to see her.”

Clovis wanted to fall to his knees, weak with relief. Nunnally was alive too, the humiliation he endured today was now but a distant memory, none of it mattered. “Very well, Lelouch… I’ll make amends. I’ll become a man worthy to stand in Nunnally’s presence, you’ll see!”

There was that theatrical fop again, but this time he was being a sincere loser, too. Picking up his pistol, Lelouch holstered it and turned to leave. “I’ll be going now.”

Clovis, in his joy, nearly forgot. “Wait, how will I be able to contact you?”

Lelouch stopped to pick up his helmet. “When the time is right, I’ll contact you. But don’t worry, that will be soon.”

“I’ll be waiting then… Lulu,” Clovis said after him, as Lelouch departed the bridge and left him to plot just how he would redeem himself to the Elevens.

- - -

“That is so sick!” Rivalz’s cry of disgust snapped Lelouch from his recollection, and he looked over to his friend. “She did that with just her bare hands?!”

“If you don’t stop I’m telling the teacher!” one of the horrified girls yelled at the boy showing off the gore.

“Honestly, put that away before Nina shows up!” Shirley protested as well.

The Japanese had a saying borrowed from the Chinese: Speak of Cao Cao and he appears, and it seemed that today Nina Einstein, a quiet girl with dark curly hair and glasses, was filling the role of the Chinese Warlord. “You don’t need to hide it, I already heard…”

Lelouch looked over at Nina and found she looked positively morose rather than withdrawn. “Hello, Nina.”

“Good morning, Lelouch,” she quietly replied as she went straight to her seat.

Shirley sighed, and then went over to Nina’s side, in hopes of somehow cheering the girl up. Lelouch went to his seat and sat down as well, unable to help but have a little pity for Nina. Her aversion to Japanese was a well-known thing around the school, so the fact that one with superpowers was running around splattering Britannians all over the place was probably a nightmare made real to her.

If only the rest of them could be so easily intimidated. Clovis may balk in Sailor Moon’s face, but any cause to fight is a noble one, so they won’t be so intimidated. Cornelia is still conquering the Mideast, so at best it’ll be a week or two before she cleans up there and comes to deal with the problem herself if Clovis can’t cut it.

That was not a lot of time to prepare for dealing with her. Even with his crazy little eye trick, he wasn’t about to start using Clovis and his men directly, the risk of exposure was far too high. His best bet would be to make use of those obedient little terrorists, but finding them would probably take more time than he could afford.

“Kallen, you’re here!”

Hearing the exclamation of the girls nearby, he looked over and within the space of a second, his plans received a much needed boost. Standing there with her hair down as opposed to the spiked up fashion he saw before, was Kallen Stadtfeld… or “Q-1” as he had come to almost affectionately call her.

I knew she looked familiar, but what is a Britannian doing in a Japanese Terrorist group? Oh well, it’s saved me precious time to plan my next step.

“Didn’t know you had a thing for the fragile, sickly type, Lulu,” Rivalz teased as he sat down beside Lelouch. Over at her table, Shirley glanced over from Nina and towards Lelouch and Rivalz, before following their line of sight to Kallen. She then cast her eyes to her table and sighed.

“Huh? Oh no… I prefer more athletic girls. I’m just surprised that Kallen managed to show up today,” Lelouch quickly deflected as if he knew Shirley was within earshot. Sure enough, Shirley looked back over again, much more interested in the discussion.

“Well exams are coming up,” Rivalz pointed out.

“That’s a good enough excuse, but I wonder how she can get away with it.”

Rivalz shrugged his shoulders. “I guess when you’re as connected as the Stadtfelds, you can do whatever you want and no one will bat an eye. I mean, you’re no different you know.”

“I guess,” Lelouch said.

“Except that Kallen is still top of the class despite her absences.” Shirley’s damning observation caused both Lelouch and Rivalz to cringe. The mention of her name also brought Kallen’s attention to the back of the class, what were the spoiled spawn of Britannia gossiping about now?

Shirley huffed. “Honestly, comparing yourselves to someone as hard-working as her when you’re nothing but motorcycle riding delinquents!”

While she probably would’ve thanked Shirley for the compliment, Kallen caught something else entirely. A motorcycle?

There was no way she’d forget when yesterday had gone completely wrong. Some idiot on a motorcycle with a sidecar cut in front of them, forcing Nagata to take a wrong turn off the road and into a construction site. It had cost them precious time, allowing the Britannians to catch up with them and follow them into the ghetto.

“Oh, ow… hey Shirley that’s a little below the belt,” Rivalz whimpered.

Kallen watched Lelouch and Rivalz carefully. Was that really them?

“Besides, I at least made it back in time for some classes unlike Lulu here.”

Lelouch grew aghast at Rivalz. “Don’t throw me under the bus!”

“Hey I didn’t tell you to go after that truck, did I? No… you had to be a good Samaritan.”

It was them, and Lelouch… he went after me! This was bad for Kallen. Had he seen her face?

Lelouch was no happier at having his spot blown up by Rivalz, as he looked from the corner of his eye at Kallen. She was staring at him, damn it! She’ll want to have some words with me the moment we have a chance alone.

It was easy, though for him to see the bright side of it, though. Oh well, it’ll be an opportunity to find out about her and the rest of her terrorist cell.

Funny enough, Kallen could see the bright side of it too. You’re going to pay for ruining everything you arrogant shit.

The PA notice suddenly rang, and both Lelouch and Kallen abandoned their machinations to join everyone else in listening to the announcement. “Attention all students and faculty. His Royal Highness Prince Clovis, Third Prince of Britannia, will address the Area at 13:00. The address will be viewed in the gymnasium and attendance is mandatory. This is a Royal Decree.”

“A royal decree, huh? I wonder what he’ll have to say,” Rivalz thought aloud.

Lelouch’s disinterested expression hid his glee. “If everyone has to listen to it, it must be huge.”

- - -

In Britannia’s two thousand year history, a more humiliating defeat could not be remembered. Not even the Humiliation of Edinburgh could match this. Terrorists seizing Britannian arms and routing superior forces, Royal Knights running in fear of a little girl in a miniskirt, and the Viceroy himself bending to the will of lowly numbers and enshrining their humiliation with a speech this very afternoon asking for forgiveness from them.

This was the very moment members of the Purist faction of the Britannian Government and Military had dreamed of since the fop took power in Area 11. With his tremendous failure their opportunity–their moment–had to come. Villetta Nu, one such Purist, was especially excited by this turn of political providence and was strongly looking forward to the vacuum she would fill once Clovis and his circle were forced to leave in shame.

She actually had to refrain from skipping with glee as she reached the office of her superior, whom she had come to see in his office at Area 11’s military headquarters. Standing before the door, the elegant, dark-skinned beauty of a woman eschewed knocking and allowed herself in. “Margrave Jeremiah, have you heard-”

She stopped when she saw Jeremiah seated at his desk, staring at the two halves of a high-powered sniper rifle broken completely in two. He looked up at Villetta, revealing the dark rings under his eyes that came from a lack of sleep.

“Have you been up all night?” she asked.

“Yes,” he replied in a low, rough voice.

“You should get some rest before we are deployed. The Royal Knights are going to be standing as Clovis’s guard while he makes his public address.”

“A public address…” Jeremiah chuckled darkly. “You mean Britannia’s surrender to its miniskirt-clad overlady?”

“Don’t sound so defeated, it’s not becoming of a man of pure Britannian blood,” she said as she approached the desk. “This is Clovis’s surrender, not the Purists’, not yours, and definitely not Britannia’s. This is it Jeremiah, the moment you have been waiting for.”

Villetta’s encouraging words did not fall upon deaf ears, but they were discarded all the same. “Where were you, Villetta?”

An embarrassing question, grimacing slightly, Villetta looked aside. “I was…” There was no way she could tell him what happened, how she lost her Knightmare and couldn’t quite remember how. “… Incapacitated. I had to withdraw to the southern perimeter.”

“Did you see any of the battle?” Jeremiah asked.

Villetta shook her head. “I didn’t see anything but the images after.” She walked around to Jeremiah’s left side, and pulled herself up onto the desk before looking down at him. “I saw you standing your ground against that Eleven Witch, while soldiers and even the Royal Knights panicked and fled. You stood your ground firmly even when she walked up directly to you.”

Jeremiah let out a hollow laugh, from the other side of madness. “You didn’t see anything, then. You did not see what she did.”

Villetta regarded Jeremiah with bemusement, before she let out a sigh. “But you did and you didn’t even flinch in her presence. You shot her in defiance!”

“Twice,” Jeremiah quietly said. “I shot her twice in the face. All she did was take the rifle from me and break it in her hands like a stick. She didn’t lay a finger on me, she didn’t want to…”

He closed his eyes when he remembered the witch crushing a soldier underneath a tank, the rage in her eyes when he had attempted to shoot the Eleven in the Lancelot, the violence with which she fought the Lancelot to a standstill in hand to hand combat…

Reaching up Jeremiah ran his fingers through his hair and slowly shook his head. “I was an ant she didn’t waste the effort to step on.”

Silently, Villetta stared at Jeremiah and shook her head. It was difficult to believe anything could reduce him to this. Jeremiah was a proud man, but for something to affect him so deeply it could make him tremble in fear, something like that should not exist in this world. It left her imagination reeling at what he must have beheld over the course of that battle. There had to be more to it than that, surely. There had to be something else.

“Jeremiah… ” Villetta began as she tried to find words to say to him. Before she could grasp them, the door opened and she and Jeremiah looked over to find Kewell Soresi standing in the doorway trembling even worse than Jeremiah. “Kewell, what is it?”

“Villetta, Margrave Jeremiah…” The brown-haired Purist began shakily. “The orders that we were given have been rescinded.”

Villetta shook her head. “What?!”

“No Purist Knights are to take part in the guard detail of His Highness, we’ve been ordered to remain at the base for the duration of the address.”

Villetta stood up, shocked. “For what reason?!”

Jeremiah let our another dark laugh. “I know exactly for what reason.”

Villetta and Kewell looked to one another, and then at Jeremiah as the realization quickly dawned on them.

“They want me to act as Prince Clovis’s guard detail? Just me?”

Suzaku couldn’t believe the honor that had been bestowed upon him, after being told of it by Lloyd and Cécile. He looked up at the Lancelot, which was undergoing preparation for its unexpected deployment in Camelot’s assigned hangar.

“That’s the order from His Highness himself. Impressive how high you’ve come up in the world, isn’t it?” Lloyd asked. “Why, when I found you, you were just a lowly Private not even fit to carry a gun. Feels like only yesterday.”

“But it was,” Suzaku pointed out.

“Cécile, be sure to brush up our Devicer on sarcasm,” Lloyd noted to his assistant.

“I’ll be sure to put it on my to do list,” she replied gaily.

Suzaku’s eyebrows quirked, and he put on a mock scowl. “I’ll take your snark over being shot in the back any day.”

Cécile repressed a laugh as she rested a hand on his shoulder. “Give us a few days, we’ll change your mind.”

Smiling briefly at Cécile, Suzaku looked back up at Lancelot. It was as Lloyd said, the Knightmare had entirely changed Suzaku’s life and renewed his purpose. In just one sortie he had helped stop a massacre, and now he was being given the prestigious honor of escorting and protecting a Prince.

Still, despite everything that had happened there was one thing still eating away at him. “Miss Cécile, were there any reports of a Britannian schoolboy or a girl with green hair among the survivors?”

Cécile shook her head. “I don’t think anything was mentioned, but I can look into it.”

Suzaku nodded. “If you must… check casualty reports too.”

“Goodness, what an unusual request,” Lloyd said. “Friends of yours?”

“You could say that.”

Cécile nodded to Suzaku. “Well I hope they’re all right”

Lloyd agreed, in his own way. “It wouldn’t do for our Devicer to be operating at less than optimum efficiency, no.” He brightened up. “Well, we shouldn’t keep His Highness waiting now, should we?”

- - -

“13:00? An announcement so soon…” Luna was rather impressed by the swiftness that Prince Clovis was acting, but also suspicious. She looked over to Ikuko, Makoto, and Usagi, who were eating breakfast at a poolside table of the hotel. Well Usagi was eating at least, Ikuko didn’t appear to have much of a stomach, and Makoto was staring trance-like at the reflection of the morning sun dancing on the surface of the outdoor pool.

“I can’t imagine him admitting what he did, that would be too easy… What do you suppose he’s going to say out there?” Ikuko whispered.

Makoto huffed, but didn’t bother to say what was on her mind. The idea that Clovis would go out there and just sincerely apologize and take responsibility, even under threat from Sailor Moon, was a fantasy. No, he was going to tell everyone that he had a bunch of Elevens killed by accident or something and then the occupiers would be angry that he stopped.

Luna poked at her scrambled eggs. “He’ll stick to his word if Sailor Moon is there to keep him to it.”

“And I will,” Usagi said between mouthfuls of rice.

“Then what?” Makoto grumbled.

“Then we will find the other Sailor Senshi, and the enemy we face. Hopefully we find the other Senshi first, but in these crazy days there’s no telling what will happen next,” Luna replied.

“And what if we find the enemy, or if the enemy finds us first?” Ikuko aksed.

Luna hummed. “Then dealing with Britannia might be easier, if they don’t want to be destroyed with us. Either way, Sailor Moon will not stand alone, if worst comes to it I will fight beside her.”

Usagi finished her breakfast and smiled to the eccentric woman. “Thank you, Luna…”

“What’s going to happen to us, though?” Makoto asked. “We don’t have a home anymore thanks to Britannia… again.”

Luna nodded in agreement. “It wouldn’t do for lots of people to see Sailor Moon coming and going out of such a public place, either. Luckily, I have people who can take you in… though there will have to be sacrifices.”

Ikuko didn’t like that. “What kind of sacrifices?”

“Well they are a Britannian Family so-”

“No!” Makoto vehemently yelled.

“Please hear me out-” Luna attempted to insist.

“No, I refuse to live under some Britannian’s roof!”

“Makoto-chan!” Ikuko snapped, silencing her. “Let Nietzsche-san finish.”

Folding her arms, Makoto bowed her head and seethed while Usagi stared in silent shock at her friend and her outburst.

“They aren’t just any family, they’re the Ashfords. They run the-”

“Ashford Foundation, former nobility,” Ikuko said quietly.

Makoto ground her teeth. “And they’ll just take us in?”

Luna nodded. “They’ll take you in and they’ll take care of you, they owe me a favor.”

“What did you do for them to get that kind of privilege?” An astounded Usagi asked.

Looking to Usagi, Luna hummed. “I’ve kept a secret for them.”

Makoto narrowed her eyes at that. “What kind of secret?”

“The kind dangerous people would kill to learn,” Luna replied.

- - -

“On the bright side, we’re going to miss next period,” Rivalz cheerily said as the students of Ashford left lunch and headed for the gymnasium. “Don’t think I can take another lecture about how Napoleon totally cheated and how it was so cowardly.”

“That’s amusingly hypocritical don’t you think?” Lelouch, who was alongside him, asked. “Hearing our teacher go to great, critical lengths about Napoleon’s employment of ‘Fulton’s Folly’ at Trafalgar, when we live on the backs of a nation conquered in the same way.”

Looking over to Lelouch, Rivalz hummed. “Didn’t think about it like that, but that is kind of funny in a really dark way.”

Lelouch looked ahead. “History is full of those little ironies.” He smirked. Like an Empire being deliberately destroyed by one of its Princes.

Speaking of little ironies, his favorite of the day was walking over with her friends to join the pilgrimage to the gymnasium. Kallen noticed him at the same time, her sleepy-eyed look sharpening ever slightly, but enough for him to notice. He looked ahead, appearing aloof to her sudden proximity as she fell into step with him and Rivalz.

Though as surprised by this sudden move as Kallen’s hanger-ons, Rivalz didn’t hesitate to be his amiable self. “Oh, hey Kallen. Nice to see you back at school.”

“Thanks,” she quietly replied to him before looking back over to Lelouch. “You’re Lelouch Lamperouge, right?”

“Yes, is there something wrong?”

Kallen shook her head. “No, I just wanted to talk to you… alone.”

“What?!”

Ahead of him and Rivalz, Shirley looked back when she heard the surprised cry from Kallen’s circle of friends. “Huh?”

“Oh, what’s this?” Milly, who walked along Shirley, asked as she looked back as well.

“Funny thing that, I was actually wanting the same thing,” Lelouch replied, prompting even more gasps. “Let’s go.”

Shirley stared, gobsmacked, as Lelouch and Kallen broke away from the procession in flagrant defiance to the mandatory nature of the upcoming speech. Whistling, Milly put a hand on Shirley’s shoulder. “You know, the more you just stand around and stare, the more any old girl will walk up and run off with your man.”

That didn’t immediately register with Shirley, so Milly wrapped her arm around her and pulled her close, taking the opportunity to grope her chest. “But that’s okay if I have less competition I have for you.”

That definitely registered, and Shirley let out a squeal. “MILLY YOU DIRTY OLD MAN!”

Hearing Shirley’s cry, Lelouch had to repress his smile as he and Kallen casually walked around the school and towards the Student Council Clubhouse.

Kallen looked over to him. “The clubhouse?”

Lelouch nodded. “There’ll be no one there to bother us, so we can talk freely about our extra-curricular activities.”

She stared at him, her droopy, sickly facade gradually vanishing as she scrutinized him. “Extra-Curricular activities?”

They reached the front door of the clubhouse, and Lelouch opened it. “I know you were in that truck, the one the Britannians were after.”

Tension gripped Kallen at that very second, as her every worst fear was confirmed. He did see me, he knows!

Looking out the corner of his eye at her, Lelouch walked into the Clubhouse. Following, Kallen reached into her pocket and slowly pulled out a small pink wallet. It carried everything she needed for her day to day: money, IDs, and a switchblade for self-defense and silencing arrogant Britannians who knew too damn much.

As she followed him inside, however, hesitation reared its head. Why would he just say that? He saw me, didn’t he? He knows that I’m a dangerous terrorist, why is he confronting me like this?

She closed the door behind her, not taking her eyes off Lelouch for a moment as he walked across the empty Clubhouse ballroom and over to the a television covered by a white sheet, that he pulled off. She tightened her grip on the knife.

“So you saw me, in Shinjuku.”

“Yes, you piloted that red Glasgow.”

He was an egghead Britannian more at home behind a chessboard than doing any physical activity–there was no way he’d be able to stop her if she went for his life. The only problem would be cleaning up the mess.

“And you wanted to talk to me alone about it?” Kallen asked as she tightened her grip on her wallet.

“Yes, I wanted to thank you.” He relished this moment, as he deliberately shifted his tone to the one he’d used the day before. “You performed beyond my wildest expectations, Q-1.”

The wallet fell to the floor with a soft thud, as a wide-eyed Kallen took a step back from Lelouch. “Impossible… y-you were-?”

“Like I said then, the same as you.” Lelouch picked up the remote.

Kallen shook her head. “But you’re a Britannian, why would you-?”

“Ah? You first,” Lelouch cut her off.

Struck by that, Kallen frowned. “I’m not full-blooded Britannian, my mother is Japanese.”

It was Lelouch’s turn to be taken by surprise. “A half-blood… I have to admit I’d never suspect it looking at you.”

Kallen glowered at him. “Your turn. Why?”

“Because Britannians killed my mother and crippled my sister.”

Kallen took another step back. “What?”

“It opened my eyes to the cruelty Britannians not only let happen but promotes. That the strong must prey among the weak, you can kill anyone in your way and be lauded with honors and status. My mother died before my eyes in a hail of bullets, and my sister’s life was torn apart, solely because they were in the way of some other ambitious Britannian, and my Father did not care and abandoned us before her body was even in the ground.”

Lelouch closed his eyes. “Tell me, Kallen… if you did not have a drop Japanese blood, if you were a pureblooded Britannian and that happened to you, wouldn’t you hate Britannia enough to want to crush it?”

Kallen stared at Lelouch, and didn’t realize at first that she was nodding but didn’t stop when she did. Of course she would, without hesitation! Britannia had taken everything from the Japanese, right down to their identity! But what struck her was that they would do this kind of thing to their own… to true-blooded Britannians like him.

“Seven years, Kallen, for seven years I have let my hatred fester and grow, dreaming of crushing the Britannia. Yesterday I stopped dreaming of it and we took the first step towards making that dream a reality.” He looked back at the television, as the news anchor for Hi-TV announced the beginning of Clovis’s address. “Right now you’re about to see the next step.”

- - -

In televisions across Area 11, and in households throughout the Holy Britannian Empire, millions of Britannians and Numbers tuned in as the Hi-TV anchor newswoman professionally announced the beginning of Prince Clovis’s address. None were more tuned in than the Capital of Britannia itself as His Royal Majesty, Emperor Charles zi Britannia, halted a military ball to watch the speech. It was an excellent idea, because all most of the nobles, officers, and knights present could discuss was the “Shinjuku Humiliation”.

“It’ll be interesting to see what he has to say for himself.” Charles looked to his side over to his second oldest son, the man who spoke, Second Prince of the Empire, Schneizel el Britannia.

Charles agreed with a curt nod. “It will be good to put to rest these ridiculous rumors of a lone girl stopping an army in its tracks.”

On the complete other side of the world in what would be Area 17 within days, Third Princess Euphemia li Britannia sat in the garden of a mansion with her older sister, the Second Princess Cornelia li Britannia, attempting to enjoy breakfast while they waited for whatever stomach-churning words their half-brother would say.

“If what happened yesterday is true, God help the Elevens,” Cornelia murmured.

Lowering her head, Euphemia nodded. Clovis just never got over their younger siblings’ deaths. He wanted more than to rule Japan, he wanted to punish the Japanese and make them feel the loss and anguish he felt every day. It was this single-minded revenge that made Area 11 the perfect home for despicable people like the Purists, who happily carried out his wrath to exemplify their superiority over Non-Britannians.

What would it be, a call for a War on Eleven Terror? An internment policy to drain the ghettos? Stripping even Honorary Britannians of their status? Pogroms?

“How far will you go now, Clovis?” Euphemia asked.

Back in Area 11, Producer Diethard Reid rolled his eyes as he waited for the commotion of press and staff to die down in anticipation of Prince Clovis to emerge from inside his palace to make his speech on its steps. Unlike prior public appearances of the Prince, he nor his staff had the privilege of speaking to or even seeing Clovis so they could discuss what he wanted of the film and production crew to get the best possible angles on His Royal Highness.

The sudden freedom was actually refreshing. As artistically inclined as Clovis was, he didn’t know a damn thing about making a spectacle, just making himself look good. Even having no other word from His Royal Highness beyond “Have Cameras at my Palace at 1300” was an exciting change of pace.

“Diethard, His Highness is about to come out. We’re just awaiting the arrival of Lancelot,” a lowly assistant called to Diethard, who was waiting by one of the dozen different news vans parked to one side to broadcast the address worldwide.

Pulling his hands from his pockets, Diethard looked to the assistant. “Lancelot?”

Before the assistant could answer, the sound of an approaching Knightmare’s land spinners filled the air. Both men followed the noise, and watched in surprise as Lancelot performed a leap over the palace’s wall, spun gracefully and landed perfectly, coming to a halt besides the steps of the palace.

The assistant, a bit gobsmacked, just pointed at the Knightmare. “Lancelot.”

Diethard nodded. “Lancelot.”

“Suzaku do you enjoy dancing?” Cécile radioed Suzaku asked after he brought the Knightmare to a halt.

Bemused, Suzaku blinked several times. “Why do you ask?”

“Oh… just curious.”

He would’ve attempted to throw her banter back at her by asking her if she wanted to go dancing, but he was more concerned about the security situation regarding the palace. There were no Knightmares, no soldiers, not even visible guards. “When Clovis said he only wanted Lancelot, he wasn’t exaggerating.”

“That’s Clovis’s faith in Lancelot,” Lloyd chimed in.

“And in you,” Cécile quickly amended. “Good luck, Suzaku.”

“Thank you, Miss Cécile.” Cutting the connection, Suzaku tried to relax in the cockpit… but was unable to shake his worries. “Lelouch…”

Kallen gasped when Lancelot appeared. “That white devil…”

Lelouch narrowed his eyes. That’s the monster that fought Sailor Moon to a standstill? It’s definitely a new model… but how powerful is it?

Lancelot’s head suddenly moved, looking back towards the wall of the palace. The camera watching the Knightmare followed its line of sight and stopped on Sailor Moon, who was walking cautiously towards the palace steps until she’d been spotted. Upon being seen, she froze and bashfully tugged at her skirt, which suddenly felt way too short for this kind of thing.

Seeing her directly confirmed something that unnerved Lelouch. She’s got to be no older than Nunnally.

“That’s Sailor Moon?” Villetta could not believe her eyes as she, Jeremiah, and Kewell watched from the former’s office.

Jeremiah slowly nodded. “The witch…”

At a party in Pendragon, a single glass of champagne fell to the polished floor and shattered. Schneizel, surprised by the sound, looked aside to his father the Emperor and was not prepared by the immutable surprise on his face as he beheld Sailor Moon. Well! This was interesting.

“Hell yeah, Iron Lady! Rock that mini-fuku like a champ!” Tamaki shouted, prompting several other members of the Resistance Cell immediately yelled at him to shut up as they tried to quietly watch. Ohgi slapped him across the back of his head and let out a sigh.

Quickly, Lancelot brought itself to stand at attention, and the back hatch opened. The seat retracting from the cockpit, Suzaku quietly stood up.

Lelouch quietly gasped. Suzaku, he’s alive?!

Kallen was just as struck. “A Japanese piloting for Britannia?”

Looking down from his perch, Suzaku smiled gratefully to Sailor Moon, before bowing deeply in respect to her. With far less adrenaline in her system than yesterday, Sailor Moon nervously gulped as she looked back up at him, and blushed when he bowed.

He’s really cute! she thought before it occurred to her to bow back, which she did.

“Oi… Sailor Moon!” Makoto groaned. She and Ikuko sat on the hotel room bed, watching as Sailor Moon fidgeted in the face of all this publicity.

The front door of the palace opened, and both Sailor Moon and Suzaku looked to see Clovis emerge from within. Immediately they and all in audience were startled by Clovis’s appearance. None more than Diethard.

“Did he lose his mind?” The blonde TV Producer gasped at the sight of the Third Prince of Britannia wearing but a simple white t-shirt and gray pants. In his hands, he carried a sheathed ceremonial broadsword, one used for knighting and other matters of great import. He quickly looked to his staff. “Get every camera on this, now!”

He could feel it in his blood, something truly sensational was about to happen right before the world’s eyes. “Where will this go?”

In the Ashford Gymnasium, Milly gasped. “Wow… he’s not even wearing makeup.” She scrutinized his face, and then smiled. “He looks even hotter without it. Like a real man.”

Behind her, Rivalz made a mental note to never wear makeup… and maybe do some lifting.

Lelouch noticed something even more striking. You really lost sleep over this, haven’t you Clovis?

The sword held tightly, Clovis rubbed his darkness-ringed eyes stepped up to the podium and cleared his throat. “To all of you who heeded my decree, I thank you. To those who chose not to, I understand completely and hold no ill towards you. I, Clovis la Britannia, Third Prince of the Holy Britannian Emplire, stand before all of you not as a member of Royalty, not even as a Britannian… only as a man.”

“Only as a man? The nerve of that Britannian to pretend…” Tatewaki Katase, commander of the Japanese Liberation Front, could not help himself but to speak this out loud–voicing the very thoughts of every Japanese in the command center of their secret base, hidden miles away from the Tokyo Settlement and Britannia’s prying eyes. Since the “Humiliation of Shinjuku”, the JLF had been struggling to make sense of the incident as much as the Britannians to just as little avail.

“Enough dramatics, Britannian brat. Slice your belly at that podium and be done with it!” General Josui Kusakabe bitterly snapped at the screen as he held up his own war sword for emphasis.

Sitting seiza on the floor behind the table-seated leadership of the JLF, Kyoshiro Todoh grimaced at the sight of Suzaku at the helm of the Britannian Knightmare, but he was elated somewhat to see Sailor Moon as something so absolutely innocuous as a Middle Schooler. “Humiliation indeed.”

“We all are aware of what happened yesterday, the events in the Shinjuku Ghetto; the defeat of the Britannian Army at the hands of resistance members who commandeered Knightmare Frames and used them to devastating effect. You have been told of the horrific casualties sustained by Britannian troops at the hands of ‘cowardly terrorists’, you saw for yourselves the toll that had been exacted upon us by our enemy.”

Kallen clenched her fists, but said nothing as she and everyone else viewing watched as Sailor Moon reached the bottom of the steps and climbed up them to join Clovis’s side at the podium.

“In all, the Britannian Army suffered one hundred sixty-seven casualties yesterday in a pitched battle with the resistance forces. One hundred sixty-seven soldiers who deployed into battle trained, hardened, and prepared to fall in battle for Britannia… and proud to have.”

There were murmurs in Ashford Academy Gym, as some students looked back and forth to one another. The room was a mix of emotions; sadness, anger, and fear about the battle, those lost, and the consequences they would have. Nina’s fear was especially pronounced, as she stared at Sailor Moon… half expecting the Eleven girl to reveal her truly monstrous form and murder Clovis there in front of everyone.

Sailor Moon looked downward, her hands clenching to fists as she was reminded of those casualties. Most of them directly at her hands.

“One thousand, nine-hundred forty-five,” Clovis then said. “This is the exact number of civilian fatalities inside the Shinjuku Ghetto. These are the people who were murdered at my explicit order yesterday. Entire families, parents, children, grandchildren… shot upon sight at the command of I, Third Prince of the Holy Britannian Empire, Clovis la Britannia. These people had nothing to do with the resistance forces I was in pursuit of, they were simply there… going about their bleak and miserable lives under Britannia’s heel… and I elected to have them all killed purely because of that.”

The theatrical bombast of his little “memorial” speech was entirely absent. In front of millions, Clovis sounded like he was in a Confession Booth, quietly airing the sins he committed and only given voice by the microphone he spoke into. It truly gave Lelouch pause to hear the weight in his words.

“I am here, as only a man, because only as a man can I face the crimes I’ve committed, admit to them, and atone for them. For seven long years as Viceroy of Area Eleven, I have allowed the persecution and humiliation of Elevens, seeking tirelessly to avenge for my beloved siblings who lost their lives as political hostages. But yesterday I saw for myself what I had been truly doing…”

Clovis gripped the sword tighter as his voice broke ever slightly. He regained himself. “I, a man who put so much value and love into his family… had been destroying entire families to satisfy my revenge. Murdering fathers, mothers, brothers, and sisters! Just like those that I had lost. I ask you, all of you, what sort of man would do something so wretched and cruel and still call himself a man?!”

Bowing his head, Clovis stared at the wood grain of the podium. Releasing his sword, he let it fall to the ground and collapsed to his knees entirely, his hand clasped over his mouth and nose as he broke into tears.

Kneeling to his side, Sailor Moon wiped her eyes and rested a consoling hand upon his shoulder as he openly wept. Aboard Lancelot, Suzaku watched as Sailor Moon went from simply patting his shoulder to outright embracing him.

“Is she really the same girl?” Suzaku asked as Clovis returned the hug.

“You did a wonderful thing reaching her, Suzaku,” Cécile reassured him.

“Are you okay?” Sailor Moon asked Clovis.

Clovis shook his head. “Not after what I’ve done… but that’s fine.” He took several breaths, and stood back up, picking up his sword with him. Looking down at the cameras, he took a long, deep breath and spoke. “There is nothing that I can say to you that could possibly convey the depth of my remorse, so I will show my resolve to undo my injustices.”

He then suddenly unsheathed the blade, prompting gasps from press audience and cameramen. Sailor Moon gasped and prepared to intervene, but instead of aiming the blade for his gut, he grabbed his fabulous long blonde hair and roughly pulled it back, before clumsily putting it to the sword and shearing the vast majority of it off in a single motion. Looking at the cleaved away mass in his hand, Clovis tightened his grip on it, before letting it fall to the ground.

“Prince Clovis…” Suzaku murmured.

“My, how very Japanese of him,” Lloyd quipped.

“This is my first decree as a man reborn, a man who seeks nothing but atonement for my cruelty and justice for my victims. No more shall the Japanese be cruelly mistreated as conquered subjects! I, Clovis la Britannia, Third Prince of the Holy Empire of Britannia, demand that my following decree be enforced on pain of death!”

Lelouch’s eyes grew wide. “What?”

“What?!” Kewell and Villetta shouted in unison.

“WHAT?!” Half the students not moved to tears at Ashford by Clovis’s speech shouted as everyone else simply gasped.

“Effective immediately, the use of the designation Eleven in the context of this nation and its people is hereby outlawed. Furthermore… all Japanese regardless of descent and status are to be regarded as true Britannians of equal rights and status to all such non-number subjects across the Holy Empire of Britannia, and all properties, businesses, and other assets stripped from the Japanese at the onset of the occupation onward will be returned rightfully to them.”

In Pendragon, it was Schneizel’s turn to drop his drink. In the mideast, Cornelia stood up from her chair, pale with disbelief, while Euphemia covered her mouth and gasped with joy.

For once in his life, Tamaki had no words. No one in the small garage used by Ohgi’s resistance cell could even form them. Completely overwhelmed, Kallen simply dropped to her knees and stared at the screen with the same wide-eyed look as Lelouch.

“Clovis… you… you…” Lelouch blinked several times, and then grinned. For the first time in his life, he’d underestimated his brother. … You incredible maniac! You’d damn Britannia and all it stands for just to see Nunnally again!

“This… this isn’t real. This is some kind of trick.”

He looked over at Kallen, who was shaking her head in disbelief as she uttered those words. She looked at Lelouch and grabbed him by his shirt. “It can’t be over, as easy as this…”

“Of course it’s not over.” Lelouch placed a hand on her shoulder. “For undoing the wrongs committed by Britannia, he’s going to be seen as soft-hearted at best, and a rebel at the very worst. No doubt there will be challenges to his conviction.”

Clovis isn’t that naïve, he knows what he’s asking for by doing this… Lelouch looked back at the screen and at Sailor Moon. So that’s it.

“We can’t leave,” a stunned Luna suddenly declared, interrupting Ikuko and Makoto’s ecstatic cheering.

“Huh? What is it, Nietzsche-san?” Ikuko asked.

“Very few people are going to support Clovis on this policy. The Britannian Army in Japan is under heavy Purist influence, and even units not affiliated won’t like the idea of the Japanese they fought and conquered suddenly becoming their equals by decree. Then there are the Japanese themselves. Clovis gave you back Japan, but he hasn’t implied he’ll be stepping down from his position. There will be those who won’t accept being given their freedom.”

Makoto looked from Luna to the television and back. “So then…” She realized what it meant. “There’s going to be a war, isn’t there?”

Luna nodded. “And Clovis has just recruited Sailor Moon to fight it for him, because there’s no one else who will be able to.” She sighed. “We will be leaving, ladies.”

Ikuko got up. “Leaving? Now?”

“I have to get you to Ashford Academy, and then I have to go get Sailor Moon. Though it will be a long day for all of us.”


= = =


BOOM.
 
#18
I saw this on spacebattles and passed it by since Code Geas/Sailor Moon cross is crazy. Yesterday, I saw it recommended in the Mechanics of In Flight forum and gave it a shot. Your dreams are clearly inspired, sir. Looking forward to how you have Lelouch adapt his plans to Sailor Moon's presence given that you are already spitting off from cannon in a big way with Clovis. Also, how will the Emperor react if the great extra-terrestrial threat Luna is preparing for reveals itself.
 
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