A Young Girl's Guerilla War

[Kelenas]

Like I wrote on SB; it's basically an unholy fusion between late Imperial Russia, Industrial Revolution era Britain, and Nazi Germany, resulting in a monstrosity that is about an order of magnitude or two worse than any of them.

 

[Roquemore]

The thing that stood out to me, as silly as it sounds, is the talk about farming. To even have sharecropping and people farming by hand at the same time they have the tech base for Knightmares, their institutional priorities must be immensely screwed up at any number of levels.

 

[GuestLurker]

The thing that stood out to me, as silly as it sounds, is the talk about farming. To even have sharecropping and people farming by hand at the same time they have the tech base for Knightmares, their institutional priorities must be immensely screwed up at any number of levels.

Click to shrink...

Their priorities are the enforcement of the status of the nobles, if changing things to make the work easier would have even the slightest risk of the peasants getting uppity due to not needing to spend as much time working the nobility has little reason to do it. Some farms and the like might go for more efficient methods, but that's probably not common.

 

[Scopas]

(Thank you to Sunny, MetalDragon, 0th Law, and Mazerka for beta-reading and editing this chapter, to Aminta Defender for beta-reading this chapter, and to KoreanWriter for beta-writing and brainstorming.)


(Note: There is a portion of this chapter that explicitly references a slogan used by Imperial Japan. This should in no way be construed as apologia for Imperial Japan, nor does it represent anything of my views on the actions and atrocities committed by that historical entity. In the universe of Code Geass, nothing of the "Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere" happened, which is why I am using the slogan in-universe, but I fully understand why this reference could be triggering for anybody whose family suffered under the IJA or who has studied the wars fought by Japan between 1894 and 1945.)

Scene 1: A Father's Arms​

August 31, 2016 ATB
Neighborhood #12 (Honorary), Tokyo Settlement


One week before the Rising


It had taken everything he had to get to this point. Every scrap of credit he had earned over the last months' work, he had spent. Every favor he had, he called in.


In Souichiro's eyes, his ticket back to Tokyo, back to Shinjuku, had been worth it.


When he had seen the target list, read the orders, heard the plans for the first hours and days… the former policeman had known that there was no choice.


That there were things that he could not bring himself to sacrifice for the Cause.


Favors had bought him a reassignment, away from teaching new recruits the basics of firearms and onto an assault unit half-made up of his own former students. Credit had bought a blind eye turned to his age and his health, had seen him placed on that unit despite the fact that his fiftieth birthday was long behind him.


Hoarded money and moonshine had bought him quiet passage through the Britannian checkpoint at the gate leading into the Shinjuku Ghetto, along with the necessary permit to work outside of the Ghetto, valid only for a day.


A day, Souichiro knew, was all that he needed.


For all of that resolve, everything that had driven him forwards, only a single thought was in his mind as he stared up at the whitewashed concrete face of the apartment block, still full of sleeping families an hour before dawn.


He could not do it.


Could not betray the Cause. Could not betray his blood. Could not carry out his self-appointed mission.


I should not have come, he thought.


That much, at least, was obvious.


His new unit, a six-man section designated as a mortar-supported rifle team, had been one of the last to come home to Shinjuku, and had ridden one of the last trucks carrying "donated food relief" into the ghetto. In the final days, there would be no trucks packed with contraband weapons or hidden soldiers entering Shinjuku, nothing that could prompt last minute Britannian suspicions.


Accordingly, when his squad disembarked at one of the Benevolent Association's satellite kitchens, Commander Hajime herself had been there, waiting for them. She had not been standing on ceremony, surrounded by guards, but instead had been waiting in the distribution line for her dinner, clutching a battered tin tray identical to those in the hands of the neighborhood's locals.


When Souichiro and his five comrades stepped down from the truck, the commander had handed her tray over to a girl whose owlish glasses made her look years younger than Hajime. Her place in line secured, though Souichiro doubted very much that anybody would boot her from the queue, she had come to greet them. To welcome them home.


"Mister Matsumoto," Commander Hajime had said, greeting him personally. Below her hachimaki, identical in every respect to the bands worn by all of the Sun Guard, piercing blue eyes had held him in place as she inspected him.


Souichiro had known, known then, known with certainty, that she knew why he had come, why he had returned to Shinjuku. It was impossible to understand how this girl, only twelve years old if his memory had not failed him, could possess eyes so feverish in their intensity, so wise in their regard, so heavy in their exhaustion. It was impossible to think that any secret could survive such scrutiny.


"I know why you have returned," the Commander had continued, sotto voce as she stepped close, almost treading on his shoes as she looked up into his face. "I know why you fought so hard to secure your transfer; I was surprised when I saw your name on the list, I'll admit, but a moment's thought made it all clear to me."


The contempt that had flashed in those sky-blue eyes, incandescent in the heartbeat it had taken for shutters to close around that inner furnace, had scorched Souichiro's soul.


"You must have understood from your orders that your hour to make good on your long-cherished revenge had come around at last," Commander Hajime mused aloud, unblinking and quietly resolute, her voice as cold as her eyes were fevered. "Allow me to remind you, Mister Matsumoto, that I expect only the highest standards of professionalism from all soldiers of the Rising Sun. Do I make myself clear?"


If only I could tell her… What, tell her that I considered it, really considered killing my own flesh and blood, but decided to warn them instead? Decided that it was worth betraying the Cause, betraying my country, even for just a little bit, to save my son and granddaughter's lives? Would admitting to my treachery but denying that I am the detestable would-be murderer she sees me as reduce that contempt by even the slightest degree?


…What would telling her help? If she believed me, I would make her complicit in my treachery, unless she orders me shot, punished as a traitor deserves. If she doesn't believe me, then I would only have lowered myself still further in her eyes.


Besides, I deserve the contempt. I came so close to a different decision… Too close.


"...Yes Ma'am," was all that Souichiro had said, all the words he had allowed himself.


"Good," she had replied, but to Souchiro's continued surprise, she had not drawn away. Instead, something like a tremor, a momentary shake passed over her face.


When she had continued, her voice was even quieter still.


"Mister Matsumoto… Souichiro…" When he had not protested, she had continued. "Souichiro, far be it from me to step into private matters, but…" Another tremor. "Far be it from me to judge, but it is… Unsound, from a psychological point of view, for a father to… dispose of his own child. No matter what the circumstances.


"I have taken the liberty of assigning your team to a unit in the south of the city. I… Hope that you will not resent this imposition, but…" Commander Hajime had squared her shoulders, the momentary weakness vanished, impossible to see in that youthful face, prematurely lined but still implacable. "My decision is final. Your son and his family might be traitors, but the Cause is too important for the futures of too many people to lose a soldier as a psychological casualty. Understood?"


"Yes Ma'am," Souichiro had lied, and had stared dumbly as the Lady of Shinjuku, the one that barracks gossip held to be both a Britannian princess and Amaterasu Herself descended to Earth as in the oldest days, turned on her heel and marched back to the chow line, every stiff line of her body radiating discomfort.


They are traitors, Souichiro told himself again, struggling to reason himself away from the cause that had brought him to Stratford Place despite Commander Hajime's attempt at, he believed, mercy. Misplaced though it was. They betrayed Japan, they betrayed their ancestors, and they betrayed me. Worst of all, he betrayed my son, his brother, and my wife, his mother. They were in their graves thanks to Britannia, and he had the gall to take a Britannian name!


The pistol hung heavily under his workman's overalls, weighty as a guilty secret.


The wave of revulsion brought the tang of bile to Souichiro's mouth, as bitter as the hate he had harbored for years, and the pain.


Kenji, Ami, whatever they might have named my granddaughter in a better world… The trio of half-recalled faces swam before his weary eyes, barely recognizable through the residue of five long years. The anger was cold ash now, energy spent now that the dawn had come at last. My son, my little boy… The girl who I could never bring myself to love… Mari, would you have loved her as the daughter we never had? You always wanted a daughter, and now you have a granddaughter, though I have no prayers to reach you, to pass along the news…


I should not be here. I should not have come. They will call for the police. Kenji will drive me from his door.


But how could I ever feel clean again if I did not warn them? How can honor ever command a father and a grandfather to let his son and his son's family die without even trying to save them?


Beside him, the dustpan and broom leaned against the wall. Souichiro had stolen them, along with the overalls he wore over his own clothes, from an unlucky street sweeper. It had been easy to come up behind the Honorary, to loop an arm around the man's neck, and to jerk up and to the side just so. It was a trick that he had learned from Major Onoda.


Killing a traitor to save a trio of traitors.


Souichiro mustered up a half-hearted snort at the thought. The hypocrisy was not lost upon him; the man he had murdered, and it certainly was murder, presumably had a family too, just as Kenji did. Just as Souichiro once had. Children who depended upon him, maybe, a wife who would fret and worry as he was late to return home.


He could not muster up any sense of guilt, of shame, over the murder of a traitor, civilian or not.


And yet, he thought, forcing himself to take a step, and then another, I cannot muster up enough guilt or shame to stop myself from betraying the Cause that I just killed a man for.


Who am I to accuse anybody of treachery?


The lobby of the apartment building, Stratford Place, according to a sign written in Britannian that Souichiro struggled to read, was spotless. For all that every surface screamed of hard wear and maintenance deferred, the floor was swept clean and gleamed with polish. Every door handle shown, every window glistened despite the cracks, and every step of the stairs Souichiro trudged up was thoroughly scrubbed.


The people who lived here cared about the building in which they lived, the building in whose shelter they worked to build their new lives. The paint might be flaking and half the light bulbs flickering, but everything that could be cleaned, was.


Souichiro supposed that said something about the people who called this place home.


He did not want to think about it.


The stairs opened onto a hallway lined with doors, each with a neat number and plaque with a surname engraved in the bronze.


No snow-crusted mountain slope could be so difficult to climb as it was for Souichiro to shamble down the hallway, dustpan and broom trailing after him. The gun weighed him down with every step, with every passing door whose name Souichiro had to sound out in his head as he passed.


Win-Ham. Gra-Den-Hey. Whale-ey.


All Britannian names on Japanese faces.


A plaque caught his eye, with a name he remembered from the second worst day of his life.


Forester.


Keith and Emily Forester.


All Souichiro could do for a long minute was stare, cowlike, at that door. That door, with that hated name.


If I squint just a bit, though…


The letters engraved in the metal plaque swam, and for an instant, Souichiro could make himself see the familiar strokes of his surname, the Britannian symbols dissolving into Japanese characters.


This could have been home. My home. If I had allowed myself to give up, to give in. To submit.


It still isn't too late to prove myself true to Japan, a seductive voice whispered. Killing an Honorary Legionary, an armed collaborator in the rape of my homeland, can be nothing short of honorable.


Even if I remember changing that collaborator's diapers… Remember his giggling laughter as I lifted him up and down, so light in my arms… Remember standing next to him beside what was left of our house and bowing our heads…


If the price of proving myself is my son's blood, my granddaughter's blood… It is not worth it.


Nothing could be worth such a high price.


With that, Matsumoto Souichiro took a deep breath, steeled himself, and, before his resolve could fracture, knocked upon the Forester's door.


All throughout his journey towards Britannian Tokyo, hidden in the back of a truck along with the rest of his six-man unit and the disassembled mortar they were sharing the cover with, past the guards yawning at their checkpoint, along the dark and trash-strewn streets of the Honorary districts, and, most of all, when he had hesitated in the shadow of the Stratford Place Apartment Complex, Souichiro had steeled himself to meet his soon, his Kenji, for the first time in half a decade.


It was not Kenji who opened the door.


"Good morning," mumbled Ami in Britannian, yawning as she stood in the door frame, her eyes still bleary with sleep. "What can I help you with, Mister…"


Even before she had joined his son in betraying Japan, Souichiro had disliked Ami. The Osakan was crude, stupid, and in Souichiro's opinion, far below his son in potential and worth. She laughed extravagantly, mocked authority, and had ensnared his son between her legs and bound him to her with a baby.


But Kenji loved her, and whore or not, she is my granddaughter's mother.


That thought was enough to still Souichiro's hand before it could even begin to creep below his overalls towards his gun. Standing there in a loose housecoat quickly belted on over pajamas, hair still rumpled from sleep, blinking in the early morning hours, it would be ease itself to kill her, Souichiro knew, and knew that he would feel just as little about the deed as he had felt in regards to the street sweeper.


She is Kenji's wife; he would miss her.


The gasp of recognition startled Souichiro back into the moment. Looking into Ami's eyes, he saw the exact moment when she managed to look past the pilfered overalls and cap to see the man within; to see him, and to recognize him.


Eyes widening in horror and sudden, desperate fear, Ami took a step back, her mouth opening to yell, perhaps to scream.


"Wait!" Souichiro barked, the enemy's language harsh on his tongue.


"Wait," he said again, softening his tone as he slowly lifted his hands up to waist-level, open palms facing the frightened woman. "I… To talk. A warning… Please. Li-listen."


"...You should not be here," Ami said after a momentary silence, her voice almost as stilted and unnatural as Souichiro's own. "You should not have come."


What a thing for us to agree on. Common ground, at last!


"Yes," Souichiro said aloud, agreeing with her, "but… No choice."


For a moment, he just stood there, hands out and throat full of words. Words that would not come to him, so long as he spoke in the invader's language.


"Listen…" Souichiro continued, lowering his voice as he switched to Japanese. Seeing the wince on Ami's face, the way her eyes darted up and down the corridor, made him want to ball up his fists in anger, but he kept his hands open and raised. "Listen to me, Ami. Is Kenji home?"


"It's Emily," she corrected, lips tight with disapproval and anxiety. "Emily and Keith. Those are our names."


This time, his fingers did flex briefly before Souichiro could master himself enough to shove the immediate anger away.


Judging by the way Emily blanched and took a step back into the apartment, hand drifting to the door, no doubt preparing to slam it shut, she had noticed too.


Damn it!


"Emily," Souichiro said, forcing himself to keep his voice level, to not spit the alien name out like gristle, "please…" he switched back to Japanese, "please do not close the door. I am trying…"


"Trying what?" Emily spat, and now she was speaking in Japanese, face twisting as fear gave way to anger. At least in part; Souichiro could still see the fear lurking below the anger. "Trying to say hi? Trying to mend bridges now, five years too late?"


Would that I had, and would that you hadn't made such bullshit necessary by… No, keep calm. Anger is personal; this is important. Although, I suppose it too is personal…


"I am trying to save your lives," Souichiro ground out, and took a deep breath. "I am trying to help. You are in danger."


"...How do you know that?" Emily snapped, but took another step back. "Is this a threat?"


…I can't do this.


For a moment, Souichiro despaired.


I must do this. My son… My granddaughter…


Mari…


"Emily," Souichiro tried again, forcing himself to speak slowly, calmly, "is K… is Keith home? This is not a threat. This is not… Not revenge. I am… I am trying to help. You are in danger.


"Not," he raised his voice as Emily opened her mouth, clearly about to interrupt again, "not from me. Not because of me. But because your husband is a soldier for Britannia. Please…" he spread his hands, carefully, out to his sides, "I am trying to save my granddaughter's life."


It was the mention of her daughter that finally brought a crack to Emily's mask of anger.


"No…" she swallowed, "no, Keith isn't home… He was on duty last night, at the base."


Dammit.


He had no choice but to give Ami, this bitch, the warning.


He would have no chance to see his son one last time.


"Then you listen to me," Souichiro said, and heard despair in his own voice, mixed with an anger all his own. All for his own. All for him. "If you are still here in a week, you will die. K… Keith will die. My granddaughter will die. Get out of Japan, all of you. Take what you can, and go. If you are still here in a week… It will be too late."


"...What happens in a week?" Emily asked, still suspicious.


I've said enough.


"Death," Souichiro replied shortly, and then hesitated.


Honorary soldiers are not issued guns, he remembered. Except in battle, and even then, sometimes not.


This will truly be treachery, arming a traitor… But he is still my son.


"Emily," Souchiro said again, putting his life into the hands of his son's wife, "I have a pistol at my side, under my overalls. Please don't close that door!"


When she paused again, Souichiro relaxed, his shoulders slumping back down. "I have a pistol under my overalls. I am slowly going to take it out and put it down on the floor, along with a magazine. It…" he licked his lips, the untrimmed hairs of his mustache stiff and spiny against his tongue, "it might help."


When Emily did not immediately reply, but also did not slam the door shut, Souichiro took it as his cue. Moving with exaggerated slowness, he reached into his overalls and unclipped the holster from his belt, freeing the magazine pouch that hung next to it as well, and carefully putting each on the apartment threshold.


Then, he stepped back, out of armsreach of the weapon, and then took another step back, his back brushing against the far wall. When he saw Emily still hesitating, he carefully raised his hands again, this time to shoulder height.


With rabbit swiftness, Emily bent, scooped up the pistol and the ammunition, and then was back on her feet, eyes fixed on Souichiro. Her stance told him both that she had never held a firearm before, and that she had halfway expected him to attack her when she was stooping.


When she saw that he had not moved, that he was still well out of reach, hands up… Her eyes softened.


"Would…" Emily swallowed again, nervous still, though the anger had drained completely from her face. Her hand flexed convulsively around the pistol's grip. "Would you like to come in and meet Hannah? Would you like to meet your granddaughter?"


I should not, Souichiro told himself. I need to go, to get back to my post. I need to forget that these people live. I need to let go now, forever.


"I would love to," he said aloud, and then, feeling as if he was taking a knife to his own flesh, said it again, this time in the hated language of the bastards who had killed his wife and his boy. His boys.


"I would love to."


Mari… She is beautiful. You would have loved her.

---

Scene 2: Outreach Meeting​

September 2, 2016 ATB
Ashford Academy, Tokyo Settlement


Five days before the Rising


Nunnally's grip was tight around his hand. She was squeezing his hand for all she was worth, hard enough that it was beginning to hurt Lelouch's fingers.


He did not pull away.


"I love you, Nunnally." Four little words, oft repeated but still fresh on Lelouch's tongue.


Ever since they had so narrowly avoided death, first at their mother's side and again in suffering Japan, Lelouch had tried to say those words with the gravity they deserved, as if each time he uttered them would be his last chance to assure his little sister of how much she meant to him. He knew that he had fallen short; during those quiet years, of torpor and safety, the urgency had slipped, replaced by rote routine.


"I love you too, Brother," his sister replied, as ferociously intense as her thin voice allowed. The tightness constricting her throat made her words husky with nerves, but her grip still did not slacken. "I love you so, so much, Brother. Please… Please come home."


I promise nothing will happen. The temptation called. The urge to put his sister's heart at ease with but five more words. Yet, he could not say them.


I will not lie to her. He had promised as much, just the same as he had promised to include her in his secret life, in his rebellion against That Man.


Just as Lelouch had pushed the temptation to leave without informing Nunnally, without saying goodbye, away, so too did he push away the temptation to offer empty platitudes he knew that neither of them would believe. If I am to defeat That Man utterly, Lelouch resolved, I must remain a better man. One who does not fill his family's ears with convenient lies and cast them aside.


Instead, he said, "I will not take any unnecessary risks, Nunnally… And I will look forward to sharing dinner with you tonight."


"If anything happens," she replied, voice low, flat, and, to Lelouch's ear, brimming with commitment, "if even a hair on your head is harmed, Brother, I will make Rivalz pay for leading you into this trap."


"I'll have you know that I quite literally asked for this," Lelouch gently pointed out, trying to bring a playful smile to his lips, but then hesitated. "Though… I suppose if… In that case, I suppose it would be your prerogative to do as you wish, Nunnally. In this matter, and in any other."


"Then I assert my prerogative to demand that you come back alive, Brother," Nunnally replied, and Lelouch could swear the bones in his hand were grinding together in that grasp, made vicelike by determined practice of moving her manual wheelchair up and down the accessibility ramp outside the Clubhouse. "You idiot."


The grip loosened; despite his stinging fingers, Lelouch cradled his little sister's hands between his own for a moment longer.


The discreet cough from Milly, standing near the door to the apartment, reminded Lelouch that he was on the clock.


"I will be back for dinner," Lelouch said, rising to his feet. "Let Sayoko know that it will be a special night, alright?"


Outside the apartment, Milly took him aside as well. In the shadow of the heavily locked and reinforced door protecting the sanctuary, she offered him her own goodbye.


"...Come back in one piece, Lulu," the Ashford heiress sighed, pulling away from their kiss. "I'm too young to be a widow."


"Don't you mean Leland, Miss Ashland?" Lelouch replied, smirking slightly as he tilted his head to brush the tip of his nose against hers. "After all, Milly Ashland is Leland's fiancee; no such nuptials have been concluded between Milly Ashford and Lelouch Lamperouge. I know, because I would have remembered. Nunnally certainly wouldn't leave us unchaperoned in such a case either."


"...On second thought," Milly mused aloud, arms looped around his neck, over his shoulders, "I would look pretty good in black… If anybody asks, I could just say I am going through a phase, and that black frills are all the rage back in the Homeland."


"A worthwhile silver lining for my death," Lelouch noted, nodding agreeably. "I will try not to disappoint."


"You never do, Lulu," Milly sighed, and pulled him down again to meet her upraised face. "Just… Be safe, okay?"


"Rivalz will be with me," he pointed out, "I won't be going alone. It will be just like old times in that respect."


"You mean all the times you almost got stabbed in the kidneys for cheating at chess or cards?" Milly wryly asked, a mocking eyebrow lifted high as she teased him about his chess hustling, just like she always had. In a different time, Lelouch would have risen to the bait, protesting that he'd never needed to stoop to cheating. It all seemed so irrelevant now. "Wow, you sure know how to reassure a girl, Lamperouge."


Only with the benefit of knowing Milly Ashford for six years was Lelouch able to detect the tremor beneath the confidence of "Madame President" that Milly wore like armor.


It was the same tremor he felt too, whenever he allowed his thoughts to linger on all the ways this meeting could go wrong. The mere thought of it, of leaving the mystery of his mother's death unsolved, his vengeance against That Man unfulfilled… the thought of leaving Nunnally alone, of leaving Milly so soon, after whatever it was that stretched between them had only just started to bloom…


I will not be shackled by fear, Lelouch told himself once again, pushing the bowel-dissolving thoughts of empty chairs and lonely tears away. If the True Anglicans are to truly become a weapon against Britannia, certain risks must be taken. And Father Alexander must be the one to take them.


"Almost stabbed in the kidneys, thank you very much," Lelouch rejoined with a smile an equal to the last one he had shared with his sister in its gentle protectiveness, carefully disentangling himself from Milly's arms, not without regret, "Rivalz and I have quite the experience making dashing getaways, after all. Then you can join Nunnally and I for a celebration dinner once I return. I am certain Sayoko will make enough for three."


"I'm sure she will," Milly smiled, stepping back. Her smile through her smudged lipstick was wistful, not quite sad. Lelouch was certain that she was fixing his image into her mind, trying to see him in the shade of their stolen kiss in a way that she could remember. Would remember, should he not return from the meeting. "Let me check my makeup, and then… Rivalz is waiting for you outside."


"Rivalz and I can handle ourselves," Lelouch said, and jerked a thumb over his shoulder towards the apartment door. "Could you just… Make sure Nunnally isn't by herself? I know Sayoko will be there, but…"


"The more the better," Milly said, and nodded understandingly. "For sure, Lulu. I promise that she won't be alone."


The unspoken half of the promise, that Milly would be on hand to support Nunnally should Lelouch not return for dinner, hung heavily in the air.


"...See you later, Madame President," Lelouch finally said, and took another step back. It felt like a goodbye. "...Milly."


"See ya, Lulu…"


Outside the Clubhouse, Lelouch found Rivalz lying almost flat on his back, splayed out across his motorcycle as he stretched hugely in the warmth of the mid-afternoon sun.


"Oh?" Rivalz perked up at the sound of footsteps on the cobblestones and, levering himself up onto his elbows, turned to look at the approaching Lelouch. "Ah, at last! Took you long enough!"


Said the divine to the condemned.


"Apologies for the wait," Lelouch said, acerbic as a lemon. "I hope I have not delayed your busy schedule."


"Nope," Rivalz replied, grinning unrepentantly as he heaved himself up to his feet. "No need to worry for me. Here, catch."


The spare helmet thudded into Lelouch's hands. It was the same one he had always worn before, back when he rode in Rivalz's sidecar nearly every day. He donned it without complaint or comment; One wouldn't want to take undue risks on the drive to this dangerous meeting, after all.


"Let us be off, then," said Lelouch, speaking past the lump in his throat as he settled himself down into that same so-familiar sidecar. "No time like the present."


Rivalz gunned the engine in acknowledgment, and with a guttural roar from the motorcycle's diesel engine, they were off.


As they streaked out through the Academy's gates, Lelouch couldn't help but turn back to catch one last glimpse of Ashford, before his refuge for the last six years vanished behind the buildings rearing up over the curving road.


"Here," said Rivalz, still looking straight ahead. "Put this on."


Glancing down, Lelouch found a bundle of black cloth dangling from Rivalz's outstretched arm, and, gingerly accepting the thing, recognized it as a blindfold.


"I'm sure you know how this is going to go," Rivalz went on, speaking with the same cool voice Lelouch had heard in the garage, over the thunder of the compressor. "Inoue wants to talk to you, and only to you, but also knows that you don't want anybody outside of Shinjuku to know that you're talking to her. For both of your benefits, I'm going to drop you off at a certain place, where a few of her people are waiting. You'll be blindfolded so you don't know who they are or what route they take to get you into Shinjuku."


"You certainly aren't asking for much," Lelouch murmured, doffing his helmet temporarily to wind the blindfold around his head and replacing it once he couldn't see anything.


It's a leap of faith, he acknowledged, but so is this entire meeting. If they decide to kill me, there is very little I can do to prevent them from doing so. So, why not walk into this serpent's mouth quite literally blind?


After that, Lelouch tried to focus on nothing beyond the wind on the exposed lower half of his face, and the breath flowing steadily through him. In and out, in and out…


It was almost a shock when the wind slowed and softened as Rivalz came to a stop, his bike's motor guttering for a moment before stilling.


"Sun's up!" Rivalz called out, loud and cheerful. More quietly, as he unbuckled the helmet's strap from beneath Lelouch's chin, he added, "keep calm, buddy. I'll be waiting here when you get back."


"So, this is him?" A different voice cut in, the Britannian enunciation slurred by a non-native's tongue. "He doesn't look like much."


"Neither's Kallen, and we both know she could fold me like an omelet any day of the week," Rivalz replied, a casual shrug in his voice almost hiding the tension and respect beneath. As rough hands half-guided, half-dragged Lelouch out of the sidecar, he couldn't help but wish that Rivalz had been perhaps a bit more firm in iterating that point. "But yeah, that's him. I'd like him back in one piece, alright?"


"No promises," a different voice muttered as strong hands gripped Lelouch's left arm. "He'd better keep a polite tongue in his mouth…"


Without further ado, the presumed Japanese insurgents began leading Lelouch away from where he thought Rivalz and the motorcycle were. He walked willingly, doing his best to respond to changes in his escort's grip, cooperating as best as he could while blinded.


Especially as the small party entered into first the still air of a building, and then the humid subterranean coolness of a tunnel or basement.


The old subway tunnels, Lelouch decided, gingerly making his way down a set of stairs, trying not to lose his footing on worn concrete. Hardly a surprise that they're still in use. I'm certain that criminals of all ethnicities have made good use of them since Tokyo fell. Hopefully someone's been maintaining them well enough that I don't need to worry about cave-ins.


He was gloomily certain that he would worry about cave-ins regardless of any slapdash maintenance conducted over the last six years, and tried instead to focus on his escort's muttered conversation. From the voices, there were three of the Japanese escorting him, with one in front of him, another behind, and then the third who still had not let go of his arm.


"Fucking rats," the leader cursed, kicking something away with a wet squeak. Lelouch was gratified that he had no issue understanding the grumbling; his Japanese had gone little used in the last six years, but his fluency hadn't slipped at all. "We should tell Mishima to add more tunnel duty assignments to the pot."


"Who cares?" the trailing escort asked, the soles of his shoes slapping against the pavement. "This far out from Shinjuku, why should we be wasting our time with these tunnels? And especially with the rats. Keeping the roof up, I'll grant you, but the rats are gonna be here no matter what we do. Might as well save our energy…"


"They'll follow us home," came the gloomy reply from up ahead. "Mark my words."


"How could you even tell?" the one gripping Lelouch's arm asked reasonably. "A rat looks like a rat, yeah? Besides, if any come sniffing under Shinjuku, they'll give the kids something else besides each other to club for once."


"And then maybe the evening soup will have meat in it for a change," the trailing guard chuckled. "Boil it long enough and nobody'll know."


The reflective and somewhat hungry silence following that remark lasted until the group came to a halt, and someone guided Lelouch's hands towards the bars of a ladder.


"Climb up," the guard who had been up front grunted to Lelouch in Britannian, "but once you come out, just take a few steps forward and stop. Don't touch the blindfold. There'll be eyes on you, and we'll be right behind."


"As you say," Lelouch murmured in the same language, and then nodded his assent to emphasize his compliance.


No need to risk ending up in the soup along with the rats thanks to an overly anxious guard, he thought as he clambered up the rungs. We walked quite some distance in those tunnels… I wonder if I'm climbing up into Shinjuku, or if we're somewhere in the Honorary districts…?


No hands immediately grabbed at Lelouch as he clambered out, but he still heeded his orders and left his blindfold untouched; if there was a sniper, or even just a gunman waiting out of arm's reach, there was no need to antagonize them unnecessarily. He took the moment to lift his face up towards the unseen sun, enjoying the clean warmth of the afternoon after the clamminess of the tunnels.


Half a minute after he returned to the surface, Lelouch heard his escorts emerge up the ladder, one by one. As a familiar hand closed around his left arm, more lightly now, presumably since he hadn't tried to run, the grating sound of metal on pavement followed the ring of metal on metal.


Closing the manhole back up, Lelouch realized. Either an old maintenance port, or at some point we left the subway tunnel and entered a sewer or drain instead.


"Alright, Britannian," the apparent leader of the escort said, again speaking in the tongue of his enemy. "Just come this way…"


More stairs followed, and then the coolness of a building's interior, the heat of late summer left behind as a door closed. More walking, more stairs, and another two doors led Lelouch to the side of a table, which he bumped into, and a chair, into which he was gently pushed.


"You can take the blindfold off, Mister Gelt," a female voice speaking, bizarrely, European-accented Britannian said from somewhere on the far side of the table. "Or is it Mister Lamperouge? Or is 'Father Alexander' your preferred method of address?"


Lelouch's breath caught on the second name. Dammit, Rivalz!


"I see that Rivalz has told you all about me," Lelouch replied, grateful for the distraction provided by the blindfold's stubborn knot. Focusing on picking the damned thing apart gave him something else to focus on besides the unwelcome invocation of his "true" name. "Mister Gelt is my preference, but as I am here in my clerical capacity, Father Alexander will serve."


"Young for the priesthood, aren't you?" A different female voice replied, again in accented Britannian, although this speaker's voice carried the tones of Tokyo instead of… Brandenburg, maybe? "An early calling, I suppose."


"When the call comes, one must answer," Lelouch murmured, saying what he imagined Father Timothy might in answer to such questions, and then grunted with satisfaction as the blindfold slackened at last and fell around his neck, giving him his first clear view of his questioners.


He blinked, and wondered if the pressure of the blindfold had somehow impacted his vision.


Three people sat before him on the far side of the table, all staring keenly at him from behind poker faces. Two of them, the man and the women flanking the central speaker, were about what he had imagined when he had tried visualizing the leaders of Japanese resistance to Britannia. The man was gaunt, almost skeletal, and the ropey scar splitting his face gave him a savage, almost inhuman, mien. In the woman's hard face, eyes lively with intelligence sparkled below hair tied up in a scarf, her dispassionate gaze unapologetic in its dissection of his features.


Meeting the woman's eyes, Lelouch realized that he knew her, or at least had seen her before. During his short-lived time as Alan Spicer, he had taken orders from her while volunteering at one of the soup kitchen dinners in the Honorary district just outside the Shinjuku Ghetto itself.


That must be Inoue, then. Rivalz's contact.


Both Inoue and the scarred man sat tall and upright in their chairs, but both of their body language screamed deference to the short figure caught between them. The one whose incongruity had briefly inspired Lelouch to question his own eyes.


She can't be any older than Nunnally, was his first overriding thought, his horror tinged with fascination. She might actually be younger… Although, he thought again, noting the signs of a hard life with too little food on the figure's thin face, perhaps not that much younger. She just looks that way because of the impacted growth…


There was no question that this girl was the leader, and not Inoue or the man Lelouch mentally dubbed Scarface.


There was equally no question that the girl looked just as Britannian as Lelouch himself did.


"Well then, Father Alexander," said the girl, her lips twisting in a pinched expression that, after a moment, Lelouch interpreted as amused, "you requested this meeting; so, speak. My schedule is quite cramped."


Skipping the niceties, hmm? Not particularly Japanese, if my memories of Kururugi Genbu and his interminable meetings are anything to go by, but… Well, the circumstances make the impoliteness understandable.


"To business, then," Lelouch agreed, with a polite smile. "Though, you have me at an advantage, I'm afraid. What names would you prefer me to use for the course of our meeting? After all," he said, injecting just a touch of levity into his voice, "I can hardly think of you as just 'Man, Woman, Blondie,' now, can I?"


For a moment, as the girl slowly blinked at him, reptile eyes cool and dull, Lelouch thought that he had overstepped already.


He refused to look away, though, refused to back down or apologize as the silence stretched on.


It's just like being back at court, he had realized, staring boldly back at the lean Britannian face with a Basilisk stare. Any sign of weakness, and they will eat me alive, guaranteed safe passage or not. If I demonstrate weakness now, they will never consider me a serious partner, and if I am not a serious partner in their eyes, then there is no reason to permit a Britannian with knowledge of their faces to live.


"That would hardly be conducive, yes," the girl said at last, breaking the silence. From his peripheral vision, Lelouch saw the two other insurgents seated at the table relax just as he did.


Neither of them knew how she would react either. That is… worrisome.


"I am Commander Hajime," the trio's leader went on, and blinked at him again, her big blue eyes unnerving in their intensity just much as in the way shutters seemed to close behind them. "This is Inoue, the primary officer on the board of the Rising Sun Benevolent Association, short of Lord Cardemonde, of course. She also serves as our outreach officer, and is here in that capacity."


Commander Hajime offered no name for the man seated on her left.


Lelouch did not press for any further identification. The lack of introduction was all the information he required.


Outreach officer, is it? She was in charge of the soup dole, and the men escorting me mentioned a soup kitchen and evening meals in Shinjuku. She must be the soft face of the leadership, and probably has something to do with logistics support too, or at least the part involving keeping people fed. Scarface must be the other face of the leadership, then. The kind whose attention nobody wishes to catch.


But neither has a rank attached to their name, or any badges of office. Only Commander Hajime has that dignity. So, what does that mean?


"It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Commander," Lelouch bid, nodding gracefully, "and yours, Miss Inoue. I have heard many good things regarding your attempts to mitigate some of the suffering in the wake of the rampage last winter. Such mercy for those who have no reason to care for you speaks volumes about your organization."


As does the sudden cessation of those efforts. Kallen was quite upset about that, when she talked to "Alan" about the end of the public dinners. Although she said it was just a matter of funding, I am sure that feeding potential enemies was not an idea without foes. Yes, Scarface just grimaced; I am certain that he, at least, did not approve of feeding the homeless Honoraries.


"They are Japanese," Commander Hajime said flatly, "even if they have forgotten as much. Besides, when Britannia is so determined to make enemies of them, who are we to decline to assist the Administration in their efforts? Which," she continued, setting her hands flat on the table in front of her, "brings us back to you, Father Alexander, friend of Rivalz Cardemonde, without whom we would have struggled mightily. You too wish to make an enemy of Britannia? Or did you just come in hopes of soup as well?"


"Not Britannia," Lelouch admitted with an easy smile, allowing the jab to pass unchallenged, "not per say, at least. The Britannic Church, however, as well as its head and the state figures that support the heretical beliefs of the Church, are all very much our enemies."


"...The head of the Britannic Church is Charles zi Britannia, isn't it?" Commander Hajime asked, glancing at Inoue for confirmation, who nodded. "Right," Hajime went on, looking back at Lelouch, "so your enemy is Charles zi Britannia, the Emperor of Britannia?"


"Correct," Lelouch said, in perhaps the most truthful statement he had ever given.


"But not Britannia?"


"Also correct."


"...That appears to be a distinction without a difference."


"From the outside, it likely is," Lelouch agreed. "From our point of view, that is, from the point of view of the True Anglican Church, we are loyal Britannians. The only loyal Britannians. We did not leave Britannia; Britannia, you could say, left us."


Which is indeed how the True Anglicans see themselves, and how Father Alexander sees himself, Lelouch thought, almost idly, still not breaking eye contact with Hajime. For that reason, it is indeed as close to the truth as is necessary to come.


"...Alright," nodded Commander Hajime, her voice still flatly skeptical, though thankfully not outright hostile. "Far be it from me to debate a man of the cloth in such weighty theological matters. Instead, tell me why I should permit such a loyal son of Britannia to leave this room, much less to leave with any agreement between your church and ourselves. And," she raised a quelling hand, "do not think that our agreement with Lord Cardemonde leaves you untouchable. We are no longer dependent upon his name for transit through the checkpoints."


"Because our internal loyalties are, as you put it, a distinction without difference, at least from where you sit," Lelouch said, shrugging. "At the end of the day, both you Japanese and we Old Believers have excellent reasons to hate Charles zi Britannia and vested reasons to fight his agents. It will be the wheel for any of you who are taken alive, and then the public exhibition of your broken bodies until the birds are through. For me, it would be the burning stake for heresy. For the moment, we are in the same boat."


"For the moment," Hajime slowly nodded, accepting his argument, "but what about a month or two down the road. I am… not interested in setting a fire that could burn my own house down. You say that you are loyal to your idea of Britannia? Fine. What relationship does Japan have with this dream version of Britannia?"


"A restoration of the status quo before the invasion of Indochina," Lelouch said, leaning forwards slightly, now that business was finally at hand. "The True Anglican Church repudiates the wanton corruption and grasping actions of Charles zi Britannia, both in his reformation of the Britannic Church and in his unwarranted aggression."


"And what does that mean?"


"Put simply?" Lelouch feigned a grimace, "it means that given my druthers, I would immediately hand Areas 10, 12, and 13 back to the Chinese, and I would restore the independence of New Zealand and Japan. Ruling half the world is already more than enough, and trying to hold down the Western Pacific Rim on top of rebuilding from the Emblem of Blood and squashing noble and Number uprisings in the Heartland and Old Areas is an impossible task. Of all of the New Areas, only Area 9 is close to stable and only Area 11 is profitable, and that's only because of the Sakuradite.


"Collectively, all of the New Areas are a massive net loss. We only benefit by cutting them loose."


"That makes… a great deal of sense," Commander Hajime replied, rubbing a thumb over her chin, her eyes drifting away over Lelouch's shoulder as she seemed to lose herself in thought. "Colonies can be quite sticky, though… What about all of the Britannians who have gained title over Japanese land? Who now live in the atrocity called the Tokyo Settlement, or in all of the lesser settlements scattered across the Home Islands?"


"They can leave and remain Britannian or stay and deal with you on their own," Lelouch said, entirely untroubled. "Ideally, if you Japanese somehow manage to actually push Clovis and his followers out of Japan, the bulk of the Britannian migrants will return to the Heartland. They will be dispirited and angry with the Empire's current leadership, and my followers will be mixed into their ranks. Word will spread, hopefully, and then the True Anglicans will have a presence wherever the would-be settlers go next."


"Hah!" Hajime barked a laugh, and at last the shutters behind her eyes opened a crack, just enough for the glow of cynical humor to shine. "Spoken like a true priest, always eager for souls to save!"


"When we are called," Lelouch replied, answering smile with moderate smile, dripping with deliberately mocking modesty, "what are we to do but answer? And if the call perhaps needs help in arriving…" He allowed the sham piety and most of his smile to slip from his face. "But, you see, we have a good reason to hope for your victory and to desire your help."


"So you do," the blonde agreed in her incongruous European-accented Britannian. There was, Lelouch was certain, a story there. "Indeed you do. Fine, we have sufficient reason to enter a… let's call it a business relationship. Not a friendship, not an alliance, but we can talk. We can talk about what you want, and what currency you will use to tender your purchases."


"Indeed," Lelouch laughed, relaxing. His foot was in the door, and that meant that, regardless of how else this meeting proceeded, he would be returning home for dinner. "Indeed, indeed. Well, to put matters quite simply, my flock is growing rapidly but remains quite poor and low on the social strata. We have a few connections, sufficient to gain access to many of the places where technicians work and enlisted rankers guard, but not the sort of connections that can deliver significant quantities of money or of weapons. We have hands and we can reach for necks, but we lack the knives to put through barred throats."


"How illustrative," remarked Commander Hajime dryly, also relaxing slightly in her chair. "Access, you say? Access to what?"


"Take your pick," Lelouch glibly replied. "The arsenals for the Honorary brigades stationed around the Shinjuku Ghetto? I have a devout sergeant with a key. The conduits through which the fiber cables run? Telecom workers need hope too. The Tokyo power grid? I have enough electricians with access to enough infrastructure to ruin a good part of the distribution network. Plumbers, boilermakers, custodians, clerks… so many little, but ever-so-important, trades have representatives among my flock."


"What about the artillery base out on Chiba?" Commander Hajime asked, "or the aircraft hangars at the airport, where the VTOLs are based? Perhaps most importantly, what about the Knightmares?"


Ah, of course. Hardly a surprise, but is it doable…? Lelouch considered it for a beat. Despite himself, he felt his heart race and lips twitch. I always did love a challenge.


"Hmm… Access wouldn't be easy," he qualified, steepling his fingers as he let his mind run through the possibilities, "nor do I believe that outright theft of military hardware on that magnitude is possible. Sabotage, though…? Well, that's another question entirely."


"...I will want a demonstration first," Commander Hajime said, and Lelouch grinned inwardly at his victory. "You are making some very impressive claims; forgive me if I do not take your word as your bond on the matter, Father."


"Every doubting Thomas can be won over eventually," Lelouch said, but nodded. "That is a very understandable demand, and one that I would be willing to meet to advance negotiations. With that in mind, let us discuss what you could spare to help the True Anglican Church burn the heretical usurpers to the ground."

---

Scene 3: The Empress's Speech​

September 4, 2016 ATB
JLF Central Command Bunker, Matsumoto Prefecture, Area 11


Three days before the Rising.


Kaguya had spent all her life in the shadows cast by a parade of ambitious men.


Heading that parade was her father, back straight and proud, face as haughty as a hawk upon the wing, and dead these six years, nobility and high office proving poor shields in the face of Britannian missiles and bombs. He had died in Tokyo, in the opening salvo of the Conquest, had died alongside thousands of others. Though the details of what had called him to Tokyo on that black August day would remain forever unknown, Kaguya was confident that it had been a development in some scheme that required his personal attention. Always bitter that the Clan of Kururugi stood only a bare degree closer to the extinct House of Yamato than the Clan of Sumeragi, her father had forever pursued an ever greater share of power in the Republic's government.


In his daughter's memory, he still strode forwards, undefeated by death and unhumbled by sharing a final resting place with the common men and women who had died with him, all buried under mountains of trash and broken concrete in one of the great landfills outside of the Tokyo Settlement.


Next in line was Kirihara Taizo, the man who had shaped her and protected her. Her real father, Kaguya supposed, in all the ways that mattered. His heavy-handed instruction had never been sparing, but neither had she ever doubted the affection she had seen in his eyes. He had made it equally plain that she would always have the protection of his faltering house, just as she would always be a tool in his eyes, a piece within his schemes. For all that the great bear of the Kirihara Clan was failing at last, leaving only an inheritance of fire for alienated grandnephews and for Kaguya herself, ambition still burned like coals within his vast, sagging belly.


Clovis la Britannia had a place in that superb parade as well, a strutting peacock and a boy who refused to become a man. "Lady Sophie" had paid homage to the prince annually, coming to the Britannian Concession along with her fellow great traitors of Kyoto to reassure Clovis of their loyalty, and of course to offer generous gifts. During these "voluntary displays of steadfast loyalty," Kaguya had taken Clovis's measure; even as a child of seven, she had found him wanting. Indolent and callous upon his viceregal throne, the Prince of Passion had prattled on, about himself, his art, his unbridled emotions, and the great joy he found in the love his subjects felt for him.


She had only counted herself lucky that she had been too young to attract his attention, either as a prize to be won or a player in her own right. Clovis's hunger for the pleasure brought by the conquest of the former and the satisfaction yielded by the domination of the latter were secret only to those without ears to hear, and as the head of a clan of one, Kaguya had ears sharpened keen by necessity. In every laugh and every pronouncement of his passions, she heard the words beneath all of Clovis's many wasted breaths; that he would never allow himself to be upstaged, to be forced from the stage's center into obscurity in the wings.


That the only joy he would allow any under his control was the fawning over the ever-greater accolades for which he yearned.


Above him stood his father, the Emperor of Britannia, Charles. A man whom Kaguya had never met, but whose face she could envision with equal clarity as her own. Where her father had been a hawk and where Clovis was a peacock, Charles was some great eagle, a roc from an older world, a different time. A holdover from the days when titans still wheeled overhead on dread wings, and giants still flourished in the great abyss. A time when every prince had waged a war to the knife upon all of his siblings, and when every imperial scion was a kinslayer.


Alone of all of those, the founder of the last surviving branch on that great old tree, Charles strode the world, vast and terrible. A man so assured of his power and of his glory that the entire world had no choice but to bow in subjugation. A man who was as proud as a demon, with ambition enough to declare himself a god through his priestly puppet.


Kaguya had lived her life in the shadow of ambitious men, and so she had paid close attention to Colonel Kusakabe Josui during the planning meeting with the rest of the leaders of the Japanese Liberation Front. He had concealed the rage flashing in his eyes when the 3rd Division was ordered to head south with commendable speed, but she had been watching, and she had seen it. Likewise, she had seen the fury directed personally at her when she had named Tohdoh as the man in charge of executing the key stroke of her audacious plan.


That second burst had been a bright and searing thing, fueled both by personal grievances and, Kaguya knew, with thwarted ambition. She suspected that it was the second of these that had truly set Colonel Kusakabe's soul ablaze.


Fortunately, she was not the only one in attendance with eyes to see. The JLF officers had kept to their own council, perhaps unwilling to express concern over a brother officer with outsiders, but Lord Taizo had taken her aside after the meeting, intent on working out a scheme to dismantle this newfound obstacle suddenly lying in their path.


Killing him, they had agreed, was out of the question, as was simply removing Kusakabe from command. A sudden death at this juncture would inject suspicion and division into the ranks of the JLF at the worst possible time, while too many of his soldiers were personally loyal to Kusakabe to safely pluck him from their head. He had been the most active commander in recent years, and the champion of all of the hotheaded urges to attack now rather than wait another day.


The answer to the quandary of Kusakabe was easily found. Ultimately, the colonel was only worth worrying about because of the men whom he could command. If their loyalty could be diverted away from Kusakabe to the broader cause that the JLF served, the man would be neutralized as a factor without becoming a martyr or a rallying point for the dissatisfied.


And the best way to redirect personal loyalty to something as insubstantial as a cause was, of course, to make the cause personal.


Which was where Kaguya, Empress of Japan, became a factor superseding anything that Kaguya herself might achieve.


A fact that the clothes enrobing her, the costume, only reinforced.


"Your Imperial Majesty," a JLF lieutenant whose rank insignia bore the blue piping of a signals officer said, stooping into a deep bow. His brief expression of flickering uncertainty loudly telegraphed that he had no idea if this was the proper way to greet his monarch or not. "All is ready for your broadcast. As soon as you have been introduced, your voice shall reach all of Japan's soldiers!"


"Thank you," Kaguya replied, accompanying the simple words with a smile. She savored that quiet, concise expression of her thoughts; soon, she would have to drizzle formality over everything she did, all in order to reinforce the costume. "We are gratified by your professionalism."


She ignored the lieutenant's babbled thanks as he proceeded backwards out of the room without rising from his bow, blowing well past respect and into inadvertent self-parody. Or at least, that was what Kaguya thought of the man's performance, but she struggled to think badly of the man. He was an overaged lieutenant who had remained a junior officer for well over half a decade because his world had vanished out from under his feet, not from any mistake or failure. He was, apparently, buying into the world that she was offering him to replace that lost one, a world based on memories harkening at least to the time of his great-grandfather, rather than any one among the living could recall.


So what if he is acting out what he feels would be appropriate to such a world? Am I not doing the same thing?


With effort, Kaguya resisted the urge to look down again at herself. At the black hakama and the white kosode under the breastplate and gorget lacquered black and gilded with gold, at the uchikake patterned with cranes draped over her shoulders and belted about her waist with a thick obi gleaming with golden threads. She did not look, but her fingers tightened around the dark shaft of the naginata fully two heads taller than her; at least the spear's blade was of fine steel and razor keen, for all that tassels drooped from its crossguard and gilding encrusted its haft.


In the privacy of her mind, Kaguya could only think of the outfit as her costume. Every fold dripped with symbology, from the cranes spreading their wings across her back to the golden imperial chrysanthemums accenting the center of her breastplate and of her gorget, to the dragon chasing its way up the naginata's blade, all of it meant to convince all who saw it that the girl buried within was an empress in truth. Only Kaguya, Lord Taizo, and a select few servants knew that she had been forced to resort to accounts written by Britannian and European servants for details on old court costumes, and that everything had been put together on the basis of those foreign accounts and half-guessed approximations.


It is as if I am an underprepared actress, arriving on the stage for opening night without having read the script to the end and without the benefit of any dress rehearsal.


But if it is opening night, it is for an entirely new play, one perhaps based upon old themes but never performed before. Which means that the audience will be even more clueless about how all of this is supposed to work than I am. Which means that, so long as I can sell a sufficiently convincing performance, they will not recognize just how far out of my depth I am.


"It is time," Kaguya, Empress of Japan, announced, mostly for her own benefit, and turned to the small conference room's only other occupant, her herald for the day at the suggestion of Kozuki Naoto, passed along to her via a call from her Tanya. "Announce me, Major."


"As you will, Your Majesty," murmured Major Onoda Hiroo, rising to his feet at her bidding.


For a man in his fifties, he still moved with a grace Kaguya found surprising, with none of the aging stiffness that had so plagued Lord Taizo over the last few years. That easy mobility did not extend to his face; beneath the thin iron line of his cropped mustache, the major's lips remained as immobile as they had since Kaguya first made his acquaintance two days previous. But, while neither smile nor frown crossed his face in her presence, his eyes were always keen, always watchful.


An ambitious man, the nascent empress thought, following the officer out of the conference room, taking care to lower her naginata before the blade scored the doorframe, but per Mister Kozuki's reports, a competent and dutiful officer. In short, a sword without a hilt in my hands, perhaps, but in Colonel Kusakabe's eyes, nothing but an outright liability and a clear threat.


The perfect tool, Lady Sophie murmured, just as much a part of Kaguya as the girl who adored cheap cookies. Britannian lessons, refinement and quiet docility draped over bloody-handed ruthlessness, given a convenient voice. Too renowned for Kusakabe to act directly against, yet too strong for him to overlook or tolerate. If the colonel embarks upon a rash act, he will be forced to neutralize Onoda first, a move that will inevitably weaken his forces' trust in their commander.


Better still, if the Kozuki Organization reports about Onoda's enthusiasm for the return of our rule are accurate, a man as cunning and ambitious as Onoda might spot the danger Kusakabe represents and handle him for me, without any need for further investment.


Kaguya hated thinking like that. It was so Britannian in its disregard for anything but immediate victory, of how people could be useful to her, regardless of how that use impacted them. The way she could so easily turn her own people against each other to suit her own ends… Just the meat and drink of Britannian politics, and now, apparently, hers.


She suspected that she would have to think a lot more like Lady Sophie in the future, provided she survived the next few days.


"Announcing Her Current Majesty, by the grace of the Sun and the Sea," Major Onoda's surprisingly stentorian bellow rang out, effortlessly dominating the auditorium and the several hundred soldiers assembled inside as soon as he stepped across the threshold, a few steps ahead of Kaguya. "Kneel! You are in the presence of Her Reigning Majesty!"


Then, he stepped neatly to the side, leaving the aisle straight through the auditorium to the stage, and the hastily assembled impromptu throne thereupon, empty and clear for Kaguya's approach.


The throne was not the only attempt to dress up the space most commonly used as basketball courts by the garrison of the vast Matsumoto Bunker Complex; the "aisle" cleaving the neat ranks was a somewhat battered roll of navy blue fabric hastily removed from some peripheral barracks, hastily relocated to save Kaguya the "indignity" of setting a slippered foot on the erstwhile basketball courts herself.


The stage, located on the far side of the courts, was generally used by formation leaders to conduct and guide calisthenics exercises, a key part of the bunker-bound force's regular physical training, so it at least had not been erected solely for her benefit.


Kaguya had asked for none of this, but had reluctantly accepted it all as inevitable when she turned down General Katase's offer of the Command Bunker for her venue. She had specifically requested the use of the largest space available within the Complex, eager to speak to as large of an audience as possible. A few concessions to monarchical dignity were worth the opportunity to ensure her words went beyond the cliques of the upper ranks.


As soon as Kaguya's toes touched that repurposed carpet, a rippling wave of motion swept the hall. Soldiers in their ranks dropped to their knees, hands on thighs, and touched their foreheads to the auditorium's floor. On the stage, Colonel Kusakabe knelt and bowed forwards, but did not go so far as his subordinates. Instead, he lowered his head only a respectful degree, and kept his eyes open.


Those suspicious eyes tore away from the hole they were boring into Major Onoda to fix upon her, noting each small, careful step down the runner.


My message, Kaguya thought, recognizing the seething hostility in that glare, was very clearly received and understood. Good.


As Kaguya processed, the major himself fell into step a few discreet paces back, shadowing her across the courts and up the shallow stairs to the elevated rise of the stage, where he found a place to stand on her left side as she turned to face her audience, Kusakabe seething in her shadow to the right.


"Rise, soldiers of Japan!" Major Onoda bellowed out, repeating the formula Kaguya had laid out for him in advance. "Rise, and hear the words of the Daughter of Heaven, the Empress of Japan!"


As the soldiers in the audience, and Kusakabe, rose back to their feet in a thunder of noise, Kaguya cast her eyes across the crowd. They were, almost to a man, male, and all bore the insignia of the Third Division upon their shoulders. The first three ranks were all officers, majors to lieutenants, and likely represented the bulk of the leadership of the division's several battalions. Behind them, a rank and a half or so of non-coms stood, with a further four ranks of enlisted standing in the very back, together comprising the better part of the two companies Kusakabe had brought with him to the JLF Strategy Meeting as an escort.


Which means these are all his most loyal, his picked men. The ones he trusts enough to put on a show before his peers and his rivals. But how far could a man like Kusakabe ever trust his subordinates? Moreover, how successful was he in concealing his mistrust from those subordinates? Little corrodes personal loyalty quite like the knowledge that your superior doesn't trust you, after all. Kaguya paused at that, and then winced internally at the arrogant assuredness of that last thought. At least, she amended, no good leader that I have met has ever indicated any mistrust of his subordinates to their faces.


And loyal to Kusakabe though they might be… They are all Japanese soldiers. All of their attention is focused now upon me, and me only. That's all that really matters, now.


"Soldiers of the Japanese Liberation Front!" Kaguya cried out, raising her free hand up and out, palm extended towards the raptly attentive audience, "Heroes of the Japanese people, of their ancestors and their gods, we hail you!"


That did not get the appreciative roar Kaguya had half-expected. There were few smiles, especially among the rankers in the far back, but noise or effuse reactions.


There was only the hungry, expectant silence.


And so, in that instant, Kaguya cast all of her carefully laid plans aside and threw herself headlong into the moment.


"What is the purpose of something so archaic as an empress? We are sure that all of you have wondered just that much, asked yourselves that same question. Well, we.. I have wondered just the same! What is the purpose of an Empress of Japan when there is no Japan, when the Japan that my father served, that your officers swore their oaths to, was the Republic of Japan?


"But what is Japan?"


That silence still yawned like an open grave, ready to swallow her soul whole.


Kaguya gave herself over to it unstintingly, Lady Sophie and the Current Empress and even Sumeragi Kaguya all speaking with her tongue.


"Is Japan merely a collection of islands, a cartographer's label on a map? I say to you, no!


"Is Japan merely her people, those who call themselves Japanese? The remnant of a remnant who have endured hunger and disease? Those who survived cruelty and indifference, and who resisted the easy route offered by taking the enemy's Oath?" This time, Kaguya let the silence linger for a few thoughtful beats, before answering her own question again, voice low as her fingers tightened around the spear shaft in her hand. "Again I say to you, no. The people are the heart of the nation, but the nation is not merely a huddled tribe of starvelings."


There was a rustle through the ranks, an angry murmur. Many of the recruits who had come to expand the 3rd's ranks after the Conquest had come for the food above all else, including the many recent recruits from Niigata, at least a few of whom must be in the crowd.


That touched a nerve, Kaguya observed, concealing her smile. Good. You're angry, ashamed… But that still means that you have your pride.


"Japan is her people," Kaguya acknowledged, "starved and sick, the passion that burns within the Japanese heart for revenge and for a restoration of our pride is the hearthfire of our nation… But that is not all that Japan is. Japan is her gods, her traditions and her institutions! Japan is our language, our customs, our festivals and our funerals!


"And as our long history shows, the heart of Japan belongs to no one else, is not for anyone else, save the Japanese! We are not the Chinese, to absorb foreign conquerors and to make them our own. We are not the Europeans, however much they tried to corrupt us with the help of opportunistic aristocrats happy to prattle republican ideals while lining their own pockets and securing choice appointments for their own kin and clients."


Behind her and at her side, Kusakabe stirred angrily, but held his peace for now, presumably content for her to dig her own grave without his help.


"Believe me on this, for I was fathered by one such aristocrat, and raised by another."


On her other side, Onoda stood stock-still. Kaguya wondered if he recognized the barely veiled attack on Lord Taizo, and if he cared about it if he had.


"Above all else, we are not Britannians, something our Honorary Britannian former brothers and sisters would like to forget. But, as one who has taken an enemy's name and eaten the enemy's bread, I tell you this: No matter how deeply they might wish to forget it, a Japanese heart beats in the breast of every Honorary Britannian, and one day, those hearts will make their way to their throats and there they will choke them! Choke them, unless they remember who their true brothers and sisters are before we remind them ourselves…


"But now, I come back to you, oh heroes of Japan. You humble me! For six weary years, the JLF has rebuilt itself from the ashes of the old army, all in preparation for this very moment. Throughout your training, your observation and spying, your long preparation, you have never lost hope… An accomplishment that I cannot say with full-throated honesty belongs likewise to me!


"You have never lost hope… And you have not forgotten a single insult, a single torture. You have not forgotten how our best and brightest were packed aboard ships and sent east across the Pacific! You have not forgotten how all the rest of us were herded into ghettos, where cholera and hunger stalked, nor how the Britannians took our fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, sons and daughters, and threw them into the garbage like dogs! You have not forgotten the looting of our treasure houses of knowledge and beauty, nor how the discarded scraps were burnt!


"You have not forgotten, nor have you forgiven, nor did you abandon hope.


"All for this day."


The naginata whistled as it spun, flipped upside down in Kaguya's deft hands. The blade thudded into the timbers of the stage as she drove it home, the sharpened steel sinking deep into the worn planking.


"I am the last of my house, the last of my line!" Kaguya cried out. "You ask what the purpose of an empress is? I am Japan, all of her ancient traditions and her hopes for the future! The blood of the gods waters my veins, and the knowledge of my enemy sharpens my blade! When I die, so too will Japan die!


"Unless you heroes of Japan can save me, save your mothers and sisters, wives and sweethearts, and save all of our futures. If there is a Japan again, a free nation of Japanese ruled by the Japanese, unencumbered by foreign shackles and foreign dreams, it will be your doing, and your doing alone!


"Once, a great wind overturned the invaders, but what great wind can sweep away the Knightmares of the Britannians? Only the last dying breaths of every Japanese soldier necessary to sweep the Britannians back into the sea! Only the hands of each Japanese man and woman holding Britannian heads down in the water, until the salt purifies their wretched souls and the bubbles cease! Only until each stolen Japanese child rips the Britannian name from their heart and their tongue and throws it to the stones and the ravening gulls! Only until each traitor, be they loyal in their heart to China, to Europa, to Britannia, be cast out and burnt from our ranks and from our memories!


"So, I say to all of you! Revere the Empress! Expel the barbarians! Let us all shed our blood, until the Sun rises again and our enemy's drown in their own froth!"


Recognizing his cue without ever having needed to be warned of it, Major Onoda stepped forward in the silence to stand next to her, reaching down to run his palm across the blade of her naginata.


Then, with blood running down his arm and staining his uniform jacket, the major pivoted on his heel and brought his dripping hand to his brow in a salute, crying out, "Long live Her Majesty the Empress! Long live Japan! Ten thousand years!"


And when the crowd of soldiers, Kusakabe's own picked men, echoed his cries with one voice, Kaguya knew with a curdling certainty that, whoever else they might once have been, they were now hers.


"Long live the Empress! May she rule for ten thousand years!"

---

An interminable hour later, that cheer still rang in Kaguya's head as she carefully excavated her own face from the mask of the empress, standing before the mirror of her ensuite.


"They were certainly enthusiastic," Kaguya muttered to herself, releasing her hair from its carefully-organized pins. "Just as I'd hoped they would be. By any reasonable measure, the speech was a success. Any plan Kusakabe had that hinged on his men's personal loyalty to him has almost certainly been rendered into nothing but ash on the wind now…"


But it is equally certain that I have let loose a tiger, and though I might be riding atop it, I have no control over how that great cat might move, or who it might maul.


"...How did I get into this mess?" she asked herself, hanging up the ornamental robe. Despite its old-fashioned cut, Kaguya knew that its stitching was merely a few days old, the product of a last-minute commission from a well-paid tailoress of her acquaintance.


Just as much a modern product aping antiquity as "Empress Kaguya" herself was.


The only part that was real was the steel, both in terms of the costume and in terms of my own masquerade as a monarch. If I lacked steel, I would have been just as the other house-heads believed me to be, a mere puppet for Lord Taizo's ambitions. If my costume lacked the spearhead's steel, then it all could have broken down, for if Major Onoda had not taken it upon himself to cement my speech with his own decisive gesture…


And that act, all by itself, demonstrates just how foolish the concept is, that any one person should have supreme and endless authority, that blood alone should bestow power! By all accounts, the major came from common stock, but he usurped my entire presentation with one move! But what was that move in service for? Was it in the name of his own power? In ensuring that men such as himself should have the freedom to choose their fates, to find their own fortunes?


For a moment, the major's eyes gleamed from the mirror, as shiny and cold as the moon. Like the moon, all that light was only a reflection; the Empress, not Kaguya but the old robe she wore, was his sun, the source of that light. Kaguya felt that she rarely erred when taking the measure of men, and in Major Onoda, she had found a fanatic.


He believes it all, she knew, shaking her head with amazement. I know who he is, from Tanya and Commander Kaname's reports, but… He believes it, and now, most of those men in that audience believe it too.


Nothing justifies horrors like unquestioning belief. What will these men do in my name?


More importantly… What will these men do, when it comes time for a new Japan to be reborn?


What wouldn't they do?

---

Scene 4: Accidents Happen​

September 6, 2016 ATB
IBI Field Office, Hiroshima Settlement


The day before the Rising.


"Thank you, sir, everything seems to be in order."


With the practiced smile of receptionists and secretaries the world over, William Monmouth slid the ID card back out under the reinforced glass shield cordoning his booth away from the front lobby of the IBI Hiroshima Field Office.


"Please take the elevator on the right up to the fourth floor, and then it will be the second door on the left," William continued, a fixed smile still glassy on his face as he told the nodding visitor where he needed to go. The man was already three paces away by the time he finished, clearly in no mood for the niceties.


Sighing at the rudeness of some people, William reached under his desk and pressed the button to activate the elevator's control panel. If the visitor was not welcome or unexpected, he would have found that the elevator's steel walls made an entirely serviceable cell, immovable with a dead control panel. The in-house goon-squad would have plenty of time to prepare a warm reception as he cooled his heels in the elevator.


Occasionally, William contemplated pushing that button on approved visitors, just for the hell of it.


"Get thee behind me, Satan," the young commoner clerk muttered, turning back to the pile of paperwork sitting on his desk, waiting for any moment not otherwise occupied by checking in visitors. "Probably a fast way to get fired too…"


A fate that William was eager to avoid. Not so much for the salary, which was meager, or the joy of working as a receptionist, which was nonexistent, but because of how his menial post meant he could tell the girlies at the club he liked to frequent after work that he worked for the Bureau, and be completely honest.


Ever since he'd gotten this receptionist post a month back, William's nightlife had improved dramatically.


A slight cough from the other side of the window announced that William's newest customer had arrived, and had perhaps been waiting around for a few seconds as William stared blankly down at the document uppermost on his heap.


"One moment please, sir," William smoothly replied, instantly transitioning from astonishment to the long-suffering endurance of a clerk unwilling to be hurried or, in his case, admit that he'd been daydreaming.


In service of this face-saving maneuver, William spent another few seconds staring at the form jumbled with nonsense before snatching up a pen and jotting an indistinct scribble of a note to the margin, contributing to the incomprehensibility of the document. Honor saved, he at last looked up to greet the waiting man.


Seeing the guy's put-upon expression and cheap suit, William felt a pang of guilt. The lack of any impatience or outraged entitlement underlined that this man, whoever he was, was accustomed to waiting on the pleasure of others. The crumpled packet of smokes sticking out of the breast pocket of his yellowed shirt, just the way his old dad had always socked them away, was really just the icing on the cake.


All and all, the waiting man was definitely a Commoner, just like William.


"Sorry about that," said William with a bit more warmth than usual. "Who are you here to see, sir?"


"No worries," the visitor replied, his smile knowing but sympathetic. "And no one in particular; I'm from the Fire Marshal's Office, here about the annual inspection.


"My credentials," he added, sliding both a personal ID card and a warrant card identifying him as an accredited fire inspector and arson investigator.


"Thank you," murmured William, scooping up the cards and checking that the names matched one another and that both pictures fit the man standing before him.


"Leonard Orr" was a tall, stout man, someone who had probably been strong as a youth but had since allowed himself to go to seed. Beneath broad shoulders, an equally broad paunch waggled, barely constrained by the straining belt and suspenders clearly outlined by the suit jacket's cheap fabric. A salt and pepper beard, flattened on one side like the man had somehow slept face-down on his pillow, fringed a flushed, flabby face.


A perfect match for the pictures.


"The annual inspection, you say? You'll need an escort," William said, scanning the personal ID into the visitor registry. "This is a controlled area; we can't just have people wandering around." He flashed the downtrodden man an apologetic smile, "Sorry, that's just the rule, nothing I can do. I'll get the duty guard to send someone down."


"I'm an official fire inspector," Leonard Orr pointed out, and William nodded in agreement; the scanned card was valid. "That means I'm allowed to go wherever I need to if I'm inspecting fire control mechanisms. Besides, d'you think I could honestly report on any issues if one of your co-workers is leaning over my shoulder the whole time?"


"Above my paygrade," William shrugged, sliding the ID cards back under the window, along with a visitor's badge made out to "Leonard Orr - Fire Inspector". "I don't have any say in it. But… Yeah," he conceded, "I mean, I don't like it when people are looking over my shoulder while I work either…"


Sympathy and guilt bit at his heart again, prompting William to throw up his metaphorical hands and say, "Look, I'll talk to the section chief, see what he has to say…"


"Thanks, Bill," Leonard replied, a smile creasing his ham-pink face. "You're a credit to your boss."

---

"Alright, thanks for your help," said Leonard Orr, clipboard tucked up against his armpit and cup of employee canteen coffee steaming in his hand as he shook the hand of his IBI escort. "Have a good one, Tim."


"Eh," the agent shrugged, pulling a face. "I'm not expecting much. Just a few hours left on the clock, anyway."


The young commoner took a long sip of his own coffee, clearly in no great hurry to return to his desk.


"Well, yes," Leonard agreed, a hint of impatience colouring his joviality. "Just enough time for me to finish up here and get back to the office to file my report. So, if you'll excuse me…"


"Oh, yeah." Tim, as the agent who had accompanied Leonard through his inspection of the secure areas of the IBI field office had introduced himself, grimaced slightly. "Well… Alright, poke around as you need. Be mindful not to let your hands wander now, Leo; we'll be watching."


He jerked a thumb over his shoulder, pointing at the security camera fixed down the corridor.


"I'd be disappointed if the Bureau wasn't keeping a close eye on things," Leonard lightly replied, "but don't worry, I'm not that big of an idiot, no matter what the wife says! Anyway…"


"Right, yeah. Be seeing you."


Having at last shaken off his escort, Leonard finished his coffee and resumed his inspection of the IBI field office. Proceeding floor to floor, room to room, the inspector took careful note of each fire extinguisher's maintenance tag and logged each potential tripping hazard near an exit.


As his pen scratched across the complicated forms pinned to his clipboard, Leonard's darting eyes searched the ceiling corners for cameras. Not that there was anything for the faceless observers on the other end to see, of course, as Leonard certainly wasn't foolish enough to fiddle with any of the desk safes or locked drawers he saw, but the placement of the cameras gave him some idea about their range, and their coverage.


Almost an hour after he parted ways with Tim, Leonard found himself on the very bottom floor of the converted office building, standing in front of a white-painted door hung with an unobtrusive sign labeling it as "Mechanical Room #2".


Eyes darted left, and eyes darted right, and Leonard's eyes found only a single camera pointed down the hallway he had come from, back towards the elevators. He reached out to test the mechanical room's handle, and found it locked.


Unsurprising.


A hand slipped behind his belt buckle, returning with a flattened metallic capsule about the length of a finger joint. A quick pull tipped the capsule's contents out onto the form-ridden clipboard; a narrow steel shim with a slight flattened end, a small twist of steel wire, and a similar length of much more malleable copper.


Humming to himself, Leonard casually inserted the shim into the lock, pushing back the sliding plate inside to expose the inner crevices. The steel wire wormed inside, probing for recesses and their yielding tumblers. When the lock was mapped to his satisfaction, Leonard quickly bent the copper into the appropriate shape, inserted the bent wire to match the groves, and rotated the still placed shim.


A click on one… three is binding… four is a false set… and-


With a satisfying click, the mechanical room's door handle moved under his hand.


Moving without worry or hurry, the fire inspector and arson investigator gathered up his tools and stepped inside, closing the door firmly behind him and leaving "Leonard" on the other side.


Packing his lockpicking kit back away into its easily hidden container, Errol Kefenick took an opportunity to peer around the mechanical room, looking for any cameras or other sensors that might betray his presence.


Definitely the risky part here, he thought, scouring pipe fittings and the narrow gantry overhead for any treacherous electronic eyes. If there were any cameras here, I'd be fucked. No way to really tell in advance either… Which made this the only interesting part too. The only hint of risk…


That risk, the feeling of taking his life in his hands… It was unprofessional, Errol knew, but it was part of what gave his life the salt he needed, the seasoning to leaven the unendurable boredom. It had been the joy of the risk, the freedom from tedium, that had first driven Errol into the Army's greasy bosom. When the Army with all of its rules and traditions had grown unendurable, that same adventurous craving had propelled him into the Directorate's Special Activities Center, and from that rarefied group of unmentionables, into the arms of the never-boring "Black Baron" Alvin Stadtfeld.


Although things have been a bit boring since he came to check up on the family homestead… Errol mused to himself, spotting the control panel for the building's gas main and crossing the room with a purpose. Kallen's a little spitfire, though. If she manages to keep her pretty head attached to her shoulders, she might grow up to be half as interesting as her old man some day… Now, where's that dongle gotten…?


Moments later, the dongle was jacked into the control panel's monitor port and the worm was happily disgorging all the options Errol could want or need onto the tiny screen. A few quick adjustments to the distribution's settings and the disabling of a few warning sensors later, as well as a quick edit to the control panel's log to delete any mention of those changes, and the dongle was back in his pocket.


Content with his work yet aware that soon, someone would come looking for him, Errol quickly moved on to the next stage of the plan and quickly located a likely location in a slight crack in the insulation around a hot water pipe.


While he had been quite the smoker as a younger man, it had been well over a decade since a cigarette last graced Errol's lips. Nevertheless, he had found that a crumpled cigarette packet could conceal any manner of sins, particularly when paired with artfully applied yellow stains on his fingers and teeth, along with an odor acquired by spending a peaceful quarter hour reading in any given bar. With all of the tell-tale signs of a chronic smoker, few bothered to even check if the packet contained cigarettes. There were, in case a particular nosy guard wanted to steal a few, but even those were just another layer of misdirection to conceal the device tucked right beside them.


It had started life as a disposable lighter, a cheap plastic butane-fired thing like thousands of others. Little had changed on the surface, but within that white shell, an entirely different beast lurked. One with an electronic sparker circuit governed by a remote receptor, as well as an ancillary timer, and one connected to an incendiary agent that burned a great deal hotter than mere butane.


Moving swiftly, Errol extracted the device, gave it a once-over to check that it was still in working order, and then quickly rubber-banded a few sheets of notebook paper over the plastic shell. The sheets when heated would flame up, the tinder for what he hoped would be a much larger blaze. The wad he wedged into the cracked insulation, out of sight or casual reach behind the heated pipe.


In seventeen hours, it will be quarter past ten, the occasional chauffeur noted, checking against his watch. By which point, all of the uppermost floors of the building will be flooded with gas. That should include the IBI server room, up on the fifth floor, as well as the off-limits hallway on the fourth. Inspector Garcia's private office is down on the first floor, but the explosion of that much natural gas will be enough to gut the building immediately. First floor or not, he'll be gone in a tragic accident.


At last. Thought I'd go insane if I had to spend another week watching the Black Baron try to remember how to be a father.

---

Right now, I should be dead.


Try as he might, drink as he might, Nelson Garcia could not shift that thought from his mind as he stared at the crater that had been his office only hours ago, still smoldering on the screen of his laptop, frozen for his perusal.


By all rights, I should be dead.


And if it hadn't been for the governor demanding an urgent report on that smuggling ring, I would be dead. Just like the rest of the Bureau's Area 11 branch, not to mention Kanae.


For all the urgency of Governor Kleinfeldt's barely polite summons, the report itself had been an utterly mundane affair. Nelson had arrived at the Settlement Administration Office at nine-thirty sharp, and after cooling his heels for a good half hour, had at last been allowed into the governor's office just after ten. The presentation had been extremely brief, its contents so straightforward that Nelson had been able to go over all the highlights in less than ten minutes.


It all could have been covered by a single email update, or even a brief phone call.


For his own sake, Nelson was grateful that it hadn't been.


Just as he was wrapping up his report, that the three commoners who had headed the smuggling ring out of the old Hatsukachi docklands and their Honorary factotums had all been dutifully rounded up in a Bureau sting along with their confederates on Quelpart Island, the governor's secretary had burst into the office.


The IBI's Hiroshima Field Office was gone, vaporized in a massive explosion. That his entire branch had been annihilated by a gas explosion that had, in addition to killing the twenty-three Bureau agents assigned to the office, killed an additional ninety-six others, ranging from the janitors sent by the dispatch agency to a Britannian child playing hooky from school and who'd had the stupendous misfortune to be on the sidewalk across the street from the IBI building when it had blown.


By the time that Nelson arrived on the scene, his initial stunned disbelief had dissipated completely, replaced by calmly professional detachment. As the settlement's fire fighters strove to save the neighboring buildings not yet fully engulfed by the flames radiating out from the burning crater where his office had once stood, Nelson had swung into motion.


His superiors were contacted and informed about the situation. The off-site backup server was checked to verify that the last bi-weekly backup had been completed without incident or data loss. It would need securing, but Nelson was rather short-handed at the moment. Messages were sent out to the next of kin of the deceased and agents who were like him, out of the office at the time, were contacted.


And all throughout the process of addressing the immediate issues of the explosion, Nelson's had kept the thought of "I should be dead" at bay, pressing it back with all the needs and requirements of duty and rank.


Once those burdens began to lighten, Nelson had smoothly moved on to the next lifeline, the next task to occupy his restless mind.


Someone has done this to me. Who could it have been?


Certainly, the accidental gas leak could have been just that, a dreadful and tragic accident, perhaps brought about by lacking maintenance or the poor installation of some gasket.


But that was not a thought Nelson could accept, certainly not before any possibility of hostile involvement had been thoroughly examined. While random strokes of misfortune could simply happen, it was not a survival skill for an Honorary Britannian of any stripe to assume as much. Random fires destroying buildings under Honorary Britannian proprietorship had far too long of a history for Nelson to ever assume misfortune in their case in particular.


The most obvious answer was of course that the incendiary device Nelson was sure a subsequent investigation would find somewhere in the ruins of what had previously been the better part of a city block had been planted by some band of Eleven insurgents. This was also the potential explanation that Nelson felt the most confident in dismissing.


While it was theoretically possible that Elevens could infiltrate the building, perhaps disguised as Honorary janitors or repairmen, those groups were also the expected route of observation, and thus kept under close surveillance while on site. Further, some nameless band of infiltrators would have had to source at the very least a tool to tamper with the gas mains without raising notice, and another tool to act as a remote incendiary.


Another possibility was that some band of organized criminals, not willing to tolerate Bureau interference in their operations, had instantly escalated to bombing the branch out of existence. This, Nelson was unwilling to immediately dismiss: The slaughter back in April of the clients and proprietors of the underground brothel on the outskirts of the Shinjuku Ghetto made it very plain that the criminal element in Area 11 were fully prepared to kill to protect their businesses or remove competition.


I should be dead… But why would a criminal organization of such significance attack a field office in Hiroshima instead of a police barracks in the Tokyo Settlement? That's where all the big fish swim – out here in Hiroshima, we've only been seeing the smallfry. Either we were on the brink of uncovering something big… Or the attack was specifically targeted at the Bureau, not at the policing apparatus in general.


So, who of significance in Area 11 carries a specific animus against the Bureau?


That list was much shorter, and consisted mostly of the Directorate of Imperial Security, the Bureau's great internal rival and, up until recently, the holders of a monopoly on the security apparatus in Area 11.


Well, not quite a monopoly; the Inquisition has an office here as well, at the Bishop's Palace. Nelson didn't bother suppressing his snort at the thought. For all the good they do.


But the DIS aren't complete fools, like the Inquisition is, and are fully capable of engineering a gas leak if it serves their goals. That said… Why would they have bothered? Field Director Felt was quite willing to parcel southern Area 11 off to the Bureau, so long as nobody said anything about the Directorate's conduct leading up to the Sniper Attacks. What good would destroying the Bureau's presence in Area 11 do him, particularly in such a public manner?


So, probably not the Directorate, at least not officially… But what about one particular agent of the Directorate…?


The half-melted ice cubes clinked in Nelson's whiskey glass as a heavy fist landed against his hotel room's door.


"Hey!" A man called out from the other side of the door. "Garcia! Nelson Garcia! You in there? Eh? I's gotta delivery for you that needs signing for!"


A delivery? Nelson blinked, cursing how slowly his mind seemed to be working, thrown suddenly out of his semi-soused introspection and into whatever this was. What could he be delivering?


How did he know that I was here?


That second question washed down the inspector's back, colder by far than the now barely-cool contents of his tumbler. Rising carefully to his feet, trying not to make any sudden motions that might cast shadows against the hotel room's windows, Nelson reached for the shotgun he'd brought up from his official car.


After all, if someone truly had blown up an entire office building in a bid to kill him, it was foolish to think that they would be content to make only the one attempt on his life.


The tumbler in Nelson's hand shattered in unison with the room's window as the tipsy night exploded into a storm of noise. Bleeding from his shredded hand, Nelson hurled himself down between the beds before the scything bullets could find his flesh, the inebriation seared from his mind by the sudden burst of adrenaline.


Almost before his knees and elbows hit the hotel's cheap carpet, the pain of the impact muted into irrelevance, Nelson was bouncing back up again to snatch the shotgun up from the bed. The shell was already chambered, the acceleration coil already charged, and so three seconds after that first burst of fire, the inspector braced the stock and began returning fire, blasting blindly away at the door with the first two shells of his semi-auto's clip each with nine rounds of buckshot, gouging though the cheap clapboard.


Five shells left, Nelson noted, absurdly cool as he hurled himself back down towards the floor as vengeful hornets whirred past his ears. So much lead in the air, doubt I'll get much of a chance to aim. They must have a submachine gun, at least.


As soon as they reload, I'll rush the window, he decided. There's nothing I can hide behind in this room. Die now or die later.


Belly to the floor, the inspector was about to climb to his feet and start lumbering for the window when the fire streaming in through the bullet-ridden wall of the hotel unit faltered, but caught himself just in time as a second torrent of fire began to pour into the room through the same holed wall, but from a slightly different angle.


Two of them, Nelson knew, his heart sinking. At least, maybe more. Not just a single hitman, but an entire team.


Whoever sent them wasn't willing to countenance a second escape from certain death.


His options were limited. Besides the front wall, where both the window and the door to the parking lot, not to mention the assassins, were, the only other way out of the hotel was through a connecting door leading to the next door unit. If a large party rented both rooms, the door could be unlocked to join the two units together; as it was, the door was certainly locked from his side, and, Nelson assumed, likely from the other side as well.


But considering how cheap this entire pile's construction is, perhaps I could break down the door quickly enough to… What, run around through the other room, stumbling in the dark, and come out the front door to take the team from the side? I would still be one man against a group…


Still better than waiting until one of the shooters gets lucky, or just charging into glorious death.


Carefully turning himself around on the floor to face the joining door, nearly biting his tongue off as the tumbler shards buried in his hand ground against each other and against his bones, Nelson rose up onto one knee, shotgun braced against his shoulder, and pulled the trigger.


With a thunderous boom and a percussive crack, the bottom third of the joining door practically sublimated under the impact of a cloud of several dozen steel pellets.


Underlying that sound and the constant whining zip of the bullets was the howl of pain that ripped its way out from Nelson's throat as the bucking shotgun tugged the impaling shards sideways, shearing at his hand.


By contrast, the white hot skewers piercing his side halfway up his ribcage and slashed across the back of his head were almost nothing, lost in the incredible pain from his hand.


Had Inspector Garcia not already been kneeling in a shooter's stance, the pain would have driven him forwards and down to his knees. As it was, it simply drove him forwards as he launched off his feet like a sprinter, hurling himself across the narrow confines of the hotel room and through the splintered hole that gaped out from between the smashed lintels of the doorframe.


This time, he had no breath to scream as he half-stumbled, half-fell onto more cheap hotel carpet, presumably in the same colorless gray, though the complete dark of the neighboring hotel room kept him from seeing it. As it was, Nelson could only sob with the agony now flaring from his side and his head in sympathetic chorus with his hand, the wet, mucous-ridden sounds hacking out as he pulled himself up, semi-automatic shotgun still in hand.


The room, he found, had been occupied. The beds were unmade, open suitcases were strewn around.


Nobody here, thought Nelson, the words sounding almost groggy in his head. He lifted a hand to his aching head, and found wetness all down his neck. Head injury. Bleeds like hell.


The bathroom, maybe?


He chanced a glance over his shoulder, towards the small antechamber with the sink, and the closed door beyond it.


Must be hiding in there, whoever they are. Not my problem.


Behind him, the hail of bullets slackened again. Nelson thought he heard some movement, but the ringing in his ears and the increasingly woozy feeling filling his extremities made it hard to tell.


Think I'm dead, he considered. They'll be trying the door, probably reaching in through what's left of the window. They'll want to establish positive ID.


And while they're focused on that…


Shotgun in hand, and without giving himself any further time to hesitate or slow, Nelson Garcia crossed the connected room and clicked back the lock.


Dios del Terror y del Poder, dame tu vara y tu espada. Salve Emperador, Salve Britannia.


The door banged open; the shotgun bucked, once, twice against his shoulder.


The man with his arms through the window of Nelson's decimated hotel room sagged, leaning heavily against the wall, arm abruptly skewered on the jagged glass teeth protruding from the bottom of the frame as his knees lost their strength.


The man standing a yard behind and to the side of the corpse at Nelson's door had already turned to face the inspector before he had the chance to take his second shot; Nelson's mangled left hand, pushed beyond endurance at last, slipped on the shotgun's receiver, sapless fingers hanging free by cut tendons, betraying him at last.


I know him, the inspector's mind garbled, almost incoherent with the blood loss and hammering adrenaline, absurdly out of place in this final moment. He was with Lord Stadtfeld! That's his damned driver!


The last thing that went through Nelson's mind as the baron's servant squeezed his own trigger was the realization that both the man he had just killed and the man about to kill him were Britannian, about as Britannian as they came. His killer had come from the Homeland, no less; a servant of one of the old lines.


A Britannian's Britannian.


Not by a Number, not by a treacherous Honorary, but in the end… Killed by a Britannian at the end.

---

Scene 5: Miracle Man, Immortal Mountain​

September 7, 2016 ATB
Sumeragi Industries Fuji Sakuradite Extraction & Refining Complex
0700


Frowning at the filth, Kyoshiro cast around for a rag or something similar he could use to wipe the blood spatters from the surfaces of his newly acquired command center. Unfortunately, the back-up control room nestled deep in the heart of the Sumeragi Industries' own Fuji Sakuradite Extraction & Refining Complex was entirely bereft of cleaning supplies. He would have to tolerate the blood, at least for the moment, until all the more important matters had been seen to.


As soon as I hear the base is secure, I'll order someone to clean up the mess, Kyoshiro promised himself, trying to ignore the heavy scents of death permeating the room. The team Commander Kozuki had sent to secure the command center in the initial flash of violence hadn't had time to haul the bodies of the Britannian "consultants" away, understandably busy with more time-sensitive matters, but Kyoshiro was having difficulty thinking clearly with the stench of loose bowels filling his nostrils.


Mess aside, young Kozuki's commandos did a good job, Kyoshiro noted as he poured over the the computer's contents, hunting for the most recent comm log, just in case anybody had managed to slip a message out. Honestly, I'm hard pressed to think of any units within the JLF who could have done better. So many unblooded recruits, so few old veterans…


At the thought of some of those old veterans, the men who had been his classmates once, his brother officers later, Kyoshiro's mind slipped his leash for a moment and wandered back to brighter days. Back when the future hadn't been something worth worrying too much about.


"Out of curiosity, Captain Chiba… Did you ever climb Lord Fuji, back before… all of this?"


From the corner of his eye, Colonel Tohdoh Kyoshiro saw his aide-de-camp blink, pulled from her contemplation of the back-up control center's communications system by his question.


Why am I distracting her? Kyoshiro berated himself, shaking his head at the wandering course his thoughts had taken. The time for navel contemplation has come and gone. I need to be focused on the task at hand.


"Don't worry about it," he added, waving the question away. "It was just idle curiosity."


And some superstitious bunkum.


"No, I…" Chiba Nagisa hesitated, her mouth slightly open and a minute frown crinkling her forehead. It was, Kyoshiro couldn't help but notice, a decidedly different frown from her more common, and more pronounced, irritated expression. "I didn't get the chance, Colonel. I had the opportunity, you know; I was in college, and a whole group of my friends went one weekend, and they invited me… But I turned them down. I… had other things to do, back then.


"I've always sort of regretted it…"


Noticing how sober her voice had become, Chiba pulled herself back together, an expression of forced joviality smeared unnaturally across her features.


"Well, I'm here now!" she got out, in a tone the match for her expression in artificiality. "Six years too late, but right on time to send a few Brits to hell, eh?"


"Too true," Kyoshiro conceded, and turned, meaning to leave the conversation there. But instead, words not his own forced their way from his lips.


"A wise man will climb Fuji once, but only a fool climbs it twice," he said, quoting the old cliche. "I climbed Fuji once, you know, Captain… I was a young student back then, just like your friends, still deep in my studies at the Army Academy… I went to Fuji with them, my friends, and we sang together as we jogged our way up the Yoshida route…"


Noticing how rapt Chiba's focus had become, how intently she was waiting for his next words, Kyoshiro fell silent, abruptly embarrassed.


No doubt she's expecting some sort of sage wisdom dispensed by Tohdoh of the Miracles, he thought, somewhat bitter. They always do. Sorry, none of that here. Just an old fool who should've died six years ago wondering what it means that he's come back to Fuji again…


"...Yes?" Chiba prompted, clearly not realizing that his silence hadn't been for dramatic effect, but out of a sudden reluctance to discuss the topic. A second later, she quickly added, "Sir? I mean… What then, sir?"


"...We had a good time," he grunted, memories of that "good time" and the afterparty he and his friends had thrown after they returned to the hostel at the foot of the mountain suddenly swam to the forefront of his mind. Glancing furtively around, Kyoshiro lashed out to grab the first topic he could seize. "We… Of course, we didn't see the mines then, not as they were."


That reminder, uncomfortable and jolting, was enough to remind Kyoshiro of where he was, and what he was supposed to be doing. It seemed enough for Chiba as well, as his aide took a hasty step away, formalities of rank slipping back between them.


Ah yes, the mines…


"What's the latest from Commander Kozuki?" Colonel Tohdoh asked, leaning over one of the secondary command center's consoles, currently demonstrating a map of the refinery's ground floor. "Has he reported back in on the progress of his special teams yet?"


"Yes, Colonel," Captain Chiba crisply replied. "All teams have reported back with successful emplacements. All charges are set in the refinery itself, as well as in the mines. Her Imperial Majesty's diagrams of the gantry system were entirely accurate, along with her description of the stabilization centrifuges."


Kyoshiro made himself nod, focusing entirely on conveying the necessary solemnity the moment called for.


After all, in the eyes of Captain Chiba and all of the other men and women preparing to die to defend the mining complex, barring a very select group, Commander Kozuki had just cocked back the hammer of the pistol placed to the temple of all Japan by Her Imperial Majesty, Kaguya.


Such moments called for an element of recognition.


"Very well," the Miracleworker acknowledged, gravely nodding his head. "It is done, then."


Perhaps I should have told her, Kyoshiro thought, hating himself just a little for lying to someone who had shown him nothing but earnest loyalty and devotion over their four years of shared service. But, Her Imperial Majesty was most clear in her orders… And I cannot fault her reasoning. And, soldiers gossip. Best to keep temptation away when possible.


"What about the rest?" he asked, brusquely moving on to a different topic. "Updates, Captain; I want them."


"Yessir!" Chiba smartly replied, and began reeling off a list of guard rotations instigated, fortifications installed, communication systems sabotaged, and exits plugged.


"...And we've got all the Honoraries that weren't with us and managed to survive the shooting all down in the Number Three Ore Locker," she beamed, with the overzealous tone of devoted subordinates who had addressed a problem their superior had overlooked without requiring any consultation. "All the ones who caught a bullet when Commander Kozuki entered the facility have been put with all the Brits out by the loading docks."


The infiltration, now a full half hour in the past, had been a rather neat piece of work, in Kyoshiro's considered view. The Fuji Mining Complex had enjoyed the protection of a complement of Britannian regulars who, along with a handful of Britannian "consultants," kept an eye on the Honorary managers, laborers, and specialists employed by Sumeragi Industries.


But, over the years of quiet productivity, security had slipped and complacency had set in. It had been easy for Lady Sophie Sumeragi, with the assistance of a select few others, to doctor the composition of the morning shift of September Seventh. Several new faces under old names appeared in the system as long-time employees with fully vetted backgrounds. Several old faces who had long cherished certain views were rotated off the night and swing shifts.


When Commander Kozuki, his Britannian red hair dyed black, had stormed out from the Complex's mess hall at the head of fifty of his picked men, each armed with pistols smuggled in via lunch pails and toolboxes, the Britannians on guard at the main gate and those keeping watch over the server room were taken entirely off their guard. By the time that the surviving Britannian officers, not to mention their civilian consultant charges, had instilled a vestige of order into their disordered soldiers, Colonel Tohdoh was already through the gates of the Fuji Complex.


And for once, Kyoshiro thought, allowing himself a private smile, it was we who had Knightmares coming to our aid, along with a full column of reinforcements. Amazing how much easier that sort of heavy support makes it to root out the last diehard pockets of resistance…


A lesson I should keep close to my own heart.


But, there he had been, at the controls of his Burai Kai and at the head of another thirty-one Knightmare Frames, the flower of his carefully hoarded Knightmare Corps. Behind them, a river sprung from many hidden tributaries had flowed as hidden trucks gunned their engines and surged for the compound, eagerly bringing their cargos of men, munitions, and supplies into the mountainside mining and processing facility even as the last few Britannians were hunted like rats.


Leaving Kyoshiro in command of the mountain, and also in command of thirty-two Knightmares, a hundred and thirty two commandos picked from Commander Kozuki's Rising Sun formation, the commander himself, and thirty-odd Sumeragi Industries employees who had chosen to follow their lady into a life redeemed of their Honorary names and identities.


And now, thought Kyoshiro, waving Chiba away, confident that she would know what she needed to do while he contemplated the battles stretching off as far ahead as he could see, all I need to do is to hold on as tightly as I possibly can.


Ienaga and his battalion held on to the death; hopefully, I will not be forced to order my own troops to hold to that same bitter end.

DAY 0 OF THE SHINJUKU RISING​

+6 Japanese
+23 Honorary Britannians
+54 Britannians
Daily Total: 83
Cumulative Total: 83

 

[Xilokiir]

Poor police-kun, little did he know that innocence proves nothing, loyalty is no defense, and competence is a capital crime.

Miss Empress continues to be possessed by the spirit of great leaders past, and has accidentally 'no chill'ed the soldiers, I'm sure this will have no unfortunate consequences, Teehee pero~.

The pace has finally allowed us to reach hour 0 of the actual uprising, and I still have half my teeth unground from the suspense. I would be more upset about the dental bills if what was written were less good, but this is excellent. I'm still going to bitch about it, but I bitch about everything.

 

[Ranmabomb]

Loved the chapter. This is one of my favourite fanfics.

I particularly love priest Lelouch and the empress.

 

[Scopas]

MinttSky has completed another wonderful commission for me, featuring Her Imperial Majesty Kaguya speaking to the JLF's 3rd Division

 

[Scopas]

(Thank you to Sunny and MetalDragon for editing this chapter, and to KoreanWriter and all the others over the last few months for help beta-writing and brainstorming.)


September 7, 2016 ATB
Port District 3, (Occupied) Tokyo Settlement, Empire of Japan (contested)
0724


Six years ago, Britannian bombs had fallen like rain on Tokyo.


Shinichiro Tamaki was ecstatic to return a little bit of the favor back to the Brits, courtesy of his 81-millimeter mortar. That he was one month late for the anniversary did little to dampen his enthusiasm.


Sprawled out on his belly on the roof of an anonymous, low-slung, gray office building, the faux-redhead peered through his binoculars at the whitewashed frontage of the District 3 Police Station and carefully noted the bearing, distance and the direction the wind was blowing. Pocketing the compass, Tamaki took one last glance at the station's gated entrance and then turned away, confident in his measurements. He'd gotten quite good at working out basic firing plans in his head back at the School, good enough to become an instructor along with the rest of his boys.


Quite the long walk for a guy who got his ass handed to him by an unarmed kid back in the day, Tamaki thought to himself, grimacing at the memory. But, everybody's gotta start somewhere. Me and the boys did good helping Naoto hold down Shinjuku, and now that Tanya's cut us free at last to deliver some whoop-ass to the Brits, we'll do good here too!


Grinning at the thought of vengeance long deferred, Tamaki shimmied back down the folding ladder to rejoin his squad. There they were, the once-gangsters once led by a braggart, now each of them a soldier of Japan in service to the girl who had raised them up from the trash they had once been.


"Alright, Inuyama," Tamaki said, clapping the man in question. "Seven hundred meters out, eighty-six degrees east, and the wind's southwest. You know what to do."


The soldier grinned, yellow teeth bared in humorless defiance as he spun the various dials on the mortar's base. Of course he knew what to do; they all did, every single soldier of every single squad fanning out across the Tokyo Settlement and all the people backing them from Shinjuku and hidden camps spread out across half a dozen prefectures. Weeks of planning must have gone into this operation; months of training certainly had.


The mortar at Inuyama's feet thumped its support, like a happy drunkard hammering on a table. Even through Tamaki's hands, pressing firmly over his ears, the blasts – one after another after another as Inuyama and the rest blazed through the six-pack of shells – were nearly deafening, but Tamaki couldn't care less about the noise and heat. He could barely care about the pounding headache the percussive blast always gave him; Tamaki could only look forward to the moment, only seconds away now, when he and the rest of Squad 16 would join Squads 17 and 18 and attack the ruptured police station, guns blazing as they cut the stunned and bleeding Brit pigs, standing or running, down.


This was it! At last, at last! The Day of Liberation had come, and with it the first hour of vengeance. Revenge for family, friends, and acquaintances, dead and crippled and lost in a churning and chaotic sea. Revenge for hopes and dreams quashed, homes and livelihoods turned into rubble. Revenge for petty slights and breathtaking cruelties.


Revenge for Japan.


"Alright, boys!" cried Tamaki, yelling over the ringing in his ears, savoring the fact that he was speaking in Japanese while standing outside Shinjuku's looming walls, "Let's not keep them waiting! C'mon! Follow me!"


"For the Commander! For the Empress! Expel the barbarians! For Japan! Banzai!"

---

September 7, 2016 ATB
Shinjuku Ghetto Check Point, Tokyo Settlement, Area 11
0730


When the 26th Infantry Regiment arrived in Area 11, the unit's officers and rankers alike had been delighted. Everything they had heard about the still-recently proclaimed Area spoke of opportunity and excitement, free from the constant political worries that invariably accompanied deployments back in the Heartland or Homeland. The Area even had just enough dead-enders clinging on to keep things from getting too boring, an extra entertainment whenever the whores grew dull and the regular Numbers too enured to being pushed around.


Two years on, Private Charles Klark was well past having second thoughts and starting to venture into third regrets.


"Every Britannian a lord!" they said! "All the Eleven girls you could plow, ready for the taking!" they promised! Stupid! How in the Emperor's name could I be taken in so easily?


Moodily, the young soldier prodded a discarded beer can with the toe of his boot; when it failed to explode, he kicked the rubbish away from his sentry box and back across the threshold into Shinjuku Ghetto where it could be with all the rest of the trash.


Those bastard recruiters… Klark growled, his black mood entirely unleavened. They always promise assignments where the beer flows in rivers and girls spread their legs like butter on toast… And it's always a lie. Dammit, dammit, dammit!


Frustratingly, even that wasn't quite true.


It used to be like that… the Britannian private thought sourly, casting his mind back to fond recollections from the first months of his tour of duty in Area 11. Back then, it was all brothels, cathouses, and bars past this checkpoint, up and down the streets! You could buy anything… well, any girl you wanted or anything you wanted to snort or shoot up, at least. No letting the Elevens buy weapons, after all. But anything else…


Oh, those had been the days. The Elevens were hungry enough and desperate enough that even a private's pay went a considerable distance, and since Charlie Klark had been stuck on sentry duty in and around the Tokyo Settlement more nights than not, the leverage of "overlooking" a sufficiently grateful Number trying to get in or out of the ghetto without a work pass had gone still further towards ensuring that the party never really ended.


All of that had come to a screeching halt right around the same time everything else had gone sour.


Fucking Purists, burning all the best Honorary dives and cathouses down… Bastards…


Not that the precipitous decline in the Tokyo nightlife was entirely the Purists' fault, much as it galled Klark to admit as much; the yellow-bellied Honoraries were at least as much to blame. It was, in his opinion, almost incomprehensible how quickly the Honoraries of the Tokyo Settlement had all but vanished from the streets.


A little rough-housing and suddenly all of the Honorary grog-shops were closed up! The ones who hadn't been looted bare, at least.


Still, at least for the first few months of the year, all the pleasures of Shinjuku were still spread wide open for his approval, even if prices had gone up just a bit. Sure, it hadn't been quite as fun after last Christmas – the vibe had been ruined, for one, and suddenly there seemed to be a lot more Numbers watching his every move every time he went into Shinjuku to blow off some steam – but the ghetto had still proven a reliable source of girls and giggles for an enterprising Britannian soldier with money to spend, and his gate income still provided said money.


Then, all at once, shit went sour again but in a way that hit far closer to home for Charlie Klark. The Kennel, his favorite establishment, run by a gang of Elevens who made a living providing for the appetites of their betters, had turned into a charnel house one sweltering April night.


I could have been there, Charlie thought, not for the first time, and shivered. One of those bodies could have been mine…


He'd volunteered to help out with the retributive killings the next day, of course, showing up bright and early nursing a bitter hangover courtesy of the inferior watering hole that had saved his life, showing up despite his leave pass extending to noon.


The experience had helped settle him down, but only a little. It rankled that only a fraction of the lawful punishment those who had lifted their hands against their betters had earned had been executed before other, more pressing matters down in Yokohama and along the Area's western coast had distracted the powers that be. Even worse, higher command had come down hard on all of the little allowances that had made the life of one Charlie Klark, perpetual sentry, more livable.


The perpetrators of the slaughter at the Kennel were entirely unknown, somehow escaping scot free from justice. Apparently devoid of any other answer, word had come down from on high that soldiers could enter the Shinjuku ghetto only in platoon-sized or stronger elements, and only on official orders. Given the circumstances, Charlie found it hard to blame them, but the directive had still badly damaged both his recreational funds and social life.


Why the hell am I even still here? Private Klark wondered, glaring at the empty patch of road where truck traffic usually queued. Why is this fucking gate even open? Traffic's been shrinking over the last month; over the last week, it's been dead quiet! Why not just brick this damned gate shut and have done with it, eh? Not like there's any point to having access to a ghetto full of Numbers if I can't use them…


Sparing a moment from his pity party, Klark glanced over at the pedestrian gateway to see how Corporal Wiggins – a real piece of work, in Charlie's opinion – and the rest of the fireteam were getting on. If they were busy, he'd better find something to do so nobody would call him over to help…


The pedestrian queue's empty too… Somewhere far in the back of Charlie's head, warning bells began to clamor. It's not even eight yet, isn't it? Where are all the Elevens with work passes?


"Klark!"


Charlie winced, hearing the familiar tones of Area Three on Corporal Wiggins' voice. He'd been caught looking around, and now the non-com was going to give him something to do.


"I'm falling asleep on my feet out here, Klark!" bellowed the noncom from across the road. "You're up for a coffee run! Make sure mine's double strength. Extra cream, you hear?"


"You got it, Corp!" Klark replied, tossing off a hasty salute. It wasn't strictly appropriate to leave the sentry box while on duty for something like this, but he didn't have any intention of questioning the brawny corporal's orders; he'd joined in with enough blanket parties before to have no intention of ever being on the receiving end of one.


Besides, the nearest convenience store was only a block or two away from the Kawadacho Gate into Shinjuku. He'd only be away from his post for fifteen minutes, tops.


And some coffee really would hit the spot, wouldn't it…?


Turning to trot away, Charlie heard something zip right past his ear. A wasp, maybe, or perhaps a mosquito.


It's pretty late in the year for mosquitos, isn't it?


He was on the ground before his ears had a chance to register the flat crack! of a distant rifle. His rifle, hanging over his shoulder, tangled around his left arm as he tried to unlimber it as he crawled. Charlie cursed as the butt thumped against his knee in a numbing burst of sparks.


Through the buzzing in his head, Charlie heard what sounded like distant shouting. He dimly recognized the voice as Wiggins'. Chancing a glance back, he saw that someone in Britannian gray was down, their blood shockingly bright against the asphalt. Wiggins was kneeling, his coilgun raised to return fire though Charlie couldn't see what he was aiming at.


The world swam before Charlie Klark's eyes. Suddenly dizzy, he glanced down at himself, wondering if he'd been shot. He didn't see anything but the movement had been enough to send the whole world swirling around him.


I'm still out in the road… he thought, and was alarmed at how muted and far away his own internal monologue sounded. Need to get into cover… Sniper…


There'd been something with an Eleven sniper recently, hadn't there?


Yeah… Bitch down in Yokohama… She must've had some friends…


Across the road, Wiggins toppled over, hands scrabbling at a ruined throat.


Bitch… Klark thought, dully satisfied. Not gonna yell at me… Heh… Oh God…


Why was he so tired? What was he doing, lying down on the sidewalk like this? Moving fingers like lead, he found his rifle, strap still tangled around his arm. Dully, questing fingers found the release and unsnapped it.


There. Got my gun back.


Woozily, Charlie looked up, rifle in hand, and peered off into the distance, into Shinjuku, looking for whatever Wiggins had been shooting at.


He saw a crowd coming his way, many of them armed and all with hard, angry faces.


Elevens, he thought disgustedly, and spat. The sputum came out pink and foamy. Bastard Number scum…


Almost carelessly, Charlie lifted his coilgun in the approaching mob's direction and pulled the trigger. His aim was bad, but he thought he saw at least one of the fuckers go down with roses blooming on his chest.


Just ninety-nine more to go… Gotta balance the scales… Or is it nine hundred ninety-nine now?


Before his puzzled mind could quite answer that question, before his increasingly numb hands could fit a fresh clip into his suddenly heavy rifle, the crowd was upon Private Charles Klark, and suddenly very little mattered.


Except for the horrifying, all-consuming pain that not even the peculiar lassitude burdening his limbs could conceal.


The last thing the Britannian private saw before dirty-nailed thumbs found his eyes was the flat-eyed stare of an Eleven slut he remembered tupping a time or three. No simpering smile for him this time, nor "gifted" service, only a hateful sneer of purest satisfaction.


For Charlie Klark, that pain would last forever; for the mob of angry citizens of Shinjuku, out to take a bit of private revenge before following the directive to evacuate underground, the last survivor of the Kawadacho Gate's small garrison only lasted a disappointingly brief ten minutes.

---

September 7, 2016 ATB
Shinjuku, Empire of Japan (contested)
0800


Forty stories up, Kaoru was keenly aware of how the burnt-out remains of the Kabukicho Tower groaned with each chilly breeze. Now, almost at the top of that rotting steel and cement tree, he very much regretted his rash decision to volunteer for the "special morale-boosting assignment."


Not that he had the slightest intention of revealing that change of heart to any of the other seven lucky kids chosen from Missus Tsuchiya's school. Especially not after how much he'd whined and begged until she'd at last given in to his wheedling and allowed him to go along with the other kids. At eleven, he was the youngest of the crew by two years except for Kotori, who was a month younger than him, and it had taken a lot of pleading and cajoling to work his way onto the crew; if he backed out now, he'd never hear the end of it. Especially since Kotori, who had taken advantage of his urgent pleading to come along too, looked supremely unconcerned.


Still, though… Kaoru gulped and tugged ever so slightly on his tether, making sure the rope was still firmly tied off to the guide-line Manami, the oldest of the group at fifteen and thus the leader, had strung out behind her from anchor to anchor. If I'd known that the special assignment Teach was talking about meant climbing to the highest point in the Ghetto, up to the top of a skyscraper that could topple over at any minute… That there were heights involved…!


He tugged the rope again. Still firm, still holding.


That reassurance was almost enough to make him forget how all the windows this far up were long-gone, as were the topmost eight floors of the building, and how a forty-story fall waited less than half a meter away from where he was standing right here and now.


"Kaoru, c'mon! Hurry up!" one of the others called back, waving him forwards. "Get your ass over here! We need the flag!"


Grimacing, Kaoru tried to ignore the yawning precipice beside him and how Manami was swatting their foul-mouthed classmate over the head for cursing. He had more luck with the latter than the former as he hurried forwards, sure to keep one hand on the guide-rope at all times. With his other hand, he kept the package, neatly wrapped in brown butcher-paper, pinned tightly against his chest, terrified that if he didn't, his great responsibility would slip between his fingers and fall those forty stories down to the recently repaved streets of Shinjuku far below.


And what a responsibility it was, that package entrusted to his care! The other kids, who were all, except for Kotori, older and bigger than him had carried larger and more structurally important burdens up the forty flights of stairs, from the improvised flagpole to the steel cables and hooks that would hold the thing in place, but none of it would mean anything without the package cradled in his arm!


And Kotori lucked out, Kaoru grumbled to himself, being the smallest one of all. She just has to carry that weird Brit's camera! Funny how her size didn't matter when it came to joining the crew, but all of a sudden when it came time to carry all this crap up…


The honor of his burden aside, Kaoru was looking forward to putting the package down and, hopefully, scampering quickly back downstairs and out of the ominously creaking tower. Heights aside, the burden was heavier than he'd really been expecting. Cloth was light, after all, but enough cloth tightly folded could apparently turn into almost a brick, especially after such a long climb up. Since the flag was fully three times his height in width and almost double that in length, that was quite a lot of cloth indeed.


"Here," grunted Kaoru, eyes focused entirely on Manami and her extended hands, and definitely not thinking about how he was now at the very ravaged edge, out by the corner with nothing but air to his left or his right. Incredibly, Manami was even further out in the corner of what might have been some boss's posh office, almost standing on the three spans of rebar bound together with wire and anchored with cable, the flagpole they'd improvised. "Take it."


"Surly~" Manami teased with an easy smile that made Kaoru's nerves jangle. Didn't she understand that she was standing on the edge of a massive cliff?! "Getting a little anxious about how high up we are, Kaoru?"


"No!" As soon as he blurted out the denial, Kaoru knew he'd overplayed his hand.


They know!


The teasing smirk on Manami's face stretched almost into a grin before she seemed to remember that she was the leader and supposed to set a good example, per Missus Tsuchiya's instructions.


"Don't worry," Manami reassured instead of teasing Kaoru further, shooting a quelling glance over his shoulder, no doubt stifling his fellows who were giggling behind his back. "The guide line is perfectly safe. I could rest my entire weight against it and, so long as I stayed in my harness, I wouldn't fall."


He almost yelled at her to not do that, to not take the risk. Thinking he saw the grin in her eyes again, Kaoru decided to keep silent and ignore how he could feel his neck heating with embarrassment.


The byplay was not lost on Manami.


"Relax," she sighed, turning around to kneel by the flagpole. Carefully, the leader of their little group unfurled the flag, wrapping more salvaged electrical wire through its eyelets to hold it firmly against the rebar pole. "We'll be heading down soon, and then we'll be heading even further down. You won't be seeing another view like this for… Well, for a while. Enjoy the view while it lasts, because we'll be seeing a lot of basements for a while."


Privately, Kaoru couldn't wait to see nothing but safe, sheltering, and unmoving walls. He hoped he'd never see anything but firm pavement under his feet ever again.


He did not share these thoughts with Manami, nor with Kotori or any of the others as he carefully picked his way as far back from the edge as he could.


Instead, Kaoru focused on the flag as it slipped free from Manami's fingers and billowed in the wind, tugging against its anchors.


It was a work of art, in his opinion, and it was different than any flag he'd ever seen. There were still plenty of old Republican flags left over from the old government and Kaoru had seen the familiar meatball on a field of snow hanging in many different apartments throughout Shinjuku. This one was different, larger than all of those and the white and red had switched places. A large white chrysanthemum blossomed in a scarlet sea, its petals and stem piped with gold thread "liberated" from the Viceregal Palace itself, or at least that was what Kaoru had heard. In the four corners, stitched in broad white lines, the four kanji of the Rising Sun's new battlecry flanked the Imperial flower.


"Revere the Empress; expel the barbarians."


Old Miss Tsuchiya had practically come alive when she'd handed the flag over to Kaoru and the rest, going on and on about "historical context" and "symbols for our future," but most of that had gone over Kaoru's head. As far as he could tell, the most important thing about the flag he'd cradled against his chest was that it would be the first Japanese flag, old Republican or whatever this new one was, that Kaoru had ever seen fly out under the open sky under the light of day.


It was enough to really make him believe that the sun was rising at last, at so very long last.


They might be going back underground to hide from the Brits, but their flag would still fly high above them.


"Missus Tsuchiya said it's a modi-fi-cation of some old imperial flag," said Kotori, carefully enunciating each word to avoid her usual lisp. The youngest and smallest of the crew had moved over to stand beside Kaoru, her borrowed camera in hand. She looked like she was staring at the flag too, but when she lifted her camera again and Kaoru followed the line of its lens, he realized his classmate was aiming past the flag billowing in the morning wind to capture the hulking elevated platform atop which the Britannian Concession squatted. In the middle of which loomed the Viceregal Palace, a tower atop another tower.


Kaoru wondered if the governor, Prince Clovis, ever looked down from his massive palace to see Shinjuku glaring back at him. He wondered if the blond Brit bastard would be able to see their flag from his balcony.


He hoped the prince could see; he hoped it made him wet his fancy underwear to see a new flag for a new people rising up from beneath his feet.


"They'll know we're here now," said Kotori, her voice thoughtful. "No going back now. One way or the other."


"No going back," Kaoru agreed, not that he could really remember any "back" he could have gone to. As long as he could remember, life had sucked and times had been hard. Even with the Rising Sun's help, his mom had still died last March from the wet coughs. "But that means things can only get better from now, right?"


Kotori turned, met his eye, and smiled. Kaoru thought it was a sad smile for such a happy moment.


"I really hope you're right, Kaoru. I really, really do."

---

September 7, 2016 ATB
Shinjuku, Empire of Japan (contested)
0820


"No pushing, no shoving!" Shimura Terauchi bellowed so his voice could carry over the tumult. "No pushing and no shoving! Keep your hands to yourselves and keep moving! There's room for everyone, so keep your damned hands to yourselves and keep moving!"


Fortunately, the crowd shuffling down the stairs into the pump station-turned-gateway to the sprawling subterranean network underneath Shinjuku was mostly calm, and mostly moving with a purpose down into the tunnels. Parents ushered children, both with backs bent under the weight of any movable supplies, and youngsters with Sun Guard hachimaki leant supportive elbows for elderly neighbors to lean on as they picked their way down the stairs.


Every one of them had drilled for this moment. Everyone had known that this day would come soon, even if most of the people of Shinjuku had been surprised to hear Commander Hajime's morning declaration crackling out across the radio waves.


And, Terauchi thought, privately smug, they have the benefit of a voice of authority to reassure them that not everything has been entrusted to a twelve year old girl.


And isn't that still an absurd thought to have… even more absurd that it doesn't sound all that unreasonable anymore now.


Unlike that old sailor and crook Nishizumi Tsutsumi, his former fellow councilor in the dissolved Chamber of Notables and a perennial pain in the ass, Terauchi's dislike for Shinjuku's new despot wasn't particularly personal. Sure, he didn't enjoy being beholden to a child for protection and supplies, and he certainly didn't enjoy taking orders from a hafu no matter their age, but then, who did?


Frankly, Tearuchi didn't even particularly resent the forceful dissolution of the Notables; that was only politics and it had barely diminished his personal powerbase. The chamber was created to consolidate Rising Sun's power, and it was dissolved for the same reason, all perfectly logical to Tearuchi. After all, his appointment to that body had only been a recognition of the authority he already enjoyed, the product of two decades spent as a key player at the Bureau of Waterworks of the old Tokyo municipal government, and that authority and institutional knowledge guaranteed his place at the table.


It isn't personal, Terauchi told himself again. It just isn't right that a girl with foreign blood should set herself up as a dictator over us! And an empress…? Another girl, and this one a former collaborator to boot?


It wasn't personal, his dislike, but it was strong.


But his hatred of the Britannians who had taken his left arm in their damned invasion and whose starvation and cholera had taken most of his family was much stronger.


And if that blonde bitch really can make those Brit bastards drown in their own blood… his mouth quirked up at the dream, of pallid faces and gray uniforms heaped on every street corner, of guidons crammed down the throats of captured officers. Make them pay the blood price for even a fraction of what they took from us… Or better yet, hold out until the real soldiers from the JLF get here… Perhaps the sun is rising indeed. And once the new day comes…


Terauchi cut off that line of thinking and resumed his business exhorting the stragglers to hurry up and get underground. There was plenty of trouble in the here and now to worry about, enough that he didn't have the luxury to consider his plans for a future that he might not live to see.


Survival for now, but for tomorrow… There will be opportunities, oh yes. And there will be no need for any drop of Britannian blood to remain on the Home Islands to see them.

---

September 7, 2016 ATB
Near a road leading north from the Tokyo Settlement, Area 11
0830


It would have come as a significant surprise to Albert Hanlon's coworkers at B & N Transport Solutions that, while his pleasant affability was no act, his complete disinterest in anything resembling politics, religion, or any of the other topics which fell under the umbrella of "what was really going on" most assuredly was.


If there was a substance more poisonous to the beleaguered commoner class of the Holy Britannian Empire than the vile rotgut that was its most common solace, it was curiosity. Short of outright defiance in the face of noble, or worse, imperial authority, no road led more swiftly to death for a commoner than an unfortunate tendency to ask too many questions, or ones of the wrong type.


From an early age, Albert had warred with the soul-deep need to know that clung to his shoulders like a gnawing demon. Growing into a man in the Britannia of Emperor Charles and serving a four year tour of duty in His Imperial Majesty's Armed Services as a combat engineer, the penalties for overt curiosity in an empire wearied of backtalk were abundant and obvious.


Nothing, not even witnessing the consequences of surplus curiosity and inquisitiveness paired with a lack of due caution had been enough to quench his boundless thirst for secrets. Just like every other engineer in his detachment back during his time in uniform, Albert had stood assistant to the regimental executioner from time to time, ready to hand the man any tool he required to extract a wagging tongue or one or both of the wandering eyes formerly in the possession of some fool or another. From that experience, bloody and wet and sizzling and heated by turns, Albert had derived the lesson that one's superiors misliked it when their lessers asked questions they ought not, and so he had been very careful not to ask those questions where such superiors ran the risk of hearing them.


And yet, with each skeleton he unearthed, his addiction to context only intensified. Albert still needed to know, despite the emptied chairs and the comrades called away to private meetings who never returned and especially the ones who did return, albeit in the hands of the military police and below the gloves of the executioner. He needed to know whether the reforms of Archbishop Warren had any grounding beyond the demands of an emperor's insatiable libido. He needed to know whether the scheming of the remaining and reformed noble factions would bring about more war, or whether the ever-busy hand of DIS would keep the weeds of aristocratic cliques at bay. He wanted to know what had happened to turn the tide and finally end a civil war that had lasted for decades.


Most of all, Albert needed to know what really happened the day Marianne, sometimes called the Flash and later known as the Commoner Empress, had breathed her last, shuddering in a pool of her own blood. What had happened to the darling of the people, the evidence that sufficient talent could lift even one of their own up to the heavens? Moreover, what had happened to her children, to Prince Lelouch and Princess Nunnally? Could they truly have been slaughtered by the Elevens in a pitiful act of defiance, their royal bodies thrown into some common ditch or even defiled in a barbaric ritual as some last act of desecration?


His suspicions regarding that last question, Albert buried deepest of all. Not once did he admit to even the slightest of doubts about the tragic fate of the Flash's Lost Children. Not to chaplain, nor to drinking buddy, nor even to the wife he had taken a year after Area 11 was declared. Every time he bit his lip, the imp's talons dug deeper into his back, the devil's whispers in ear grew a little harder to ignore. He'd had no choice but to bear the burden of his curiosity in silence. At least, he'd had no recourse until recently…


When word had gotten around that there were opportunities for honest Britannian families willing to claim the new clay on the rim of the Pacific and to make it truly part of the Empire, Albert had jumped at the chance. He had told Teresa, his wife, that there would be plenty of work for a man with his skills, both the skills the Imperial Army had taught him in Combat Engineer School and the ones he'd picked up in his post-military career as a teamster.


His military service in particular had been a plus when it had come to securing a place in the New Areas. The administrations of newly conquered Areas gave preference to veterans when it came to recruiting settlers, especially those healthy enough to be called back to the Colors should the Empire have need of them once more. A comparatively small amount of paperwork had seen Albert, Teresa, and their two small children on a boat out of Holy Angels, bound for the Tokyo Settlement.


It had been in Area 11 that Albert first found his quiet, slow, careful way to a local message board of fellow "Lelouch Truthers". Unsurprisingly, their numbers were much larger in Area 11 than in the rest of Britannia combined; it was hard not to wonder about the children of Marianne when the Princess Nunnally Memorial Hospital saw to the medical needs of the bulk of the settlement's Britannian population. It was harder still not to ask questions about the official narrative when the evidence of Eleven terrorism was practically ubiquitous.


The Elevens, in Albert's opinion, were absolutely proud enough and stubborn enough to cut the noses off their faces out of petulant defiance. He had no trouble believing that they had murdered the prince and princess entrusted to their care. That being said, after seeing so many grandiose yet altogether ineffectual attacks reported on over the years, Albert had a much harder time believing the savage Elevens would simply throw the bodies into a hole somewhere and bury the evidence.


If these defiant Elevens truly slaughtered the royal children in a savage act of barbarity, where is the evidence? Where was the theater? Where was the macabre ceremony celebrating their triumph? Albert had reasoned to himself during many moments of introspection. I would have sooner expected defiant savages to nail the severed limbs of their young victims to the gates of the Kururugi shrine and dare us to pull them down than to bury them in a hole no one in the Empire has yet managed to find in six years of searching. Especially since, if they were murdered prior to the Conquest of Area 11, someone involved would probably have run to the hills and survived to create propaganda about the murder of a prince and princess.


So, why haven't they?


Unfortunately, Albert's illusion of relief in finding a community of like minds in the anonymous corners of the message boards quickly evaporated. There was nothing of real worth there, no insights or information, just the wild imaginings of fevered minds. Worst, the only ones who had anything even potentially interesting to contribute were also far too naive, or too arrogant to realize the dangers that came with digging so deeply. Either way, Albert carefully shunned those accounts, knowing full well that they wouldn't last long. Sure enough, those verbose and temeritous accounts would always fall suspiciously silent after a few weeks, only to briefly revive with notably different word choices and grammar.


After a few months, the familiar old demon of needing to know spurred him on again with renewed vigor, and so Albert began once more to search for the truth.


When a pamphlet slipped out from the pages of a pew hymnal after Sunday service and fell into Albert's lap, it had felt like a message from a god Albert had only occasionally ever believed in. There, in large letters across the front of the pamphlet, printed in cheap ink, were the words 'THE TRUE PRINCE RETURNS TO US!'


Albert had slid the pamphlet into his pocket without alerting Teresa, had continued pleasantly about his day, and that very night had slipped away to a certain street corner. A shadowy meeting with a drab little man had been followed by a much brighter meeting with a pleasant young lady who had been all too willing to answer some of the many, many questions Albert had been keeping pent up inside, and…


And there it goes! Albert crowed to himself as the engine of the hotwired truck turned over at last. Finally!


"We're ready to roll," he helpfully informed the woman perched uncomfortably in the bucket seat next to him. "Didn't I say it'd be nothing?"


"Yes," she curtly replied, voice taut with the realization that her part in their holy conspiracy had just translated from mere talk into action.


At least, that was what Albert assumed had left her so agitated. It certainly wasn't because the woman, whose name Albert didn't know and whom he had only met earlier this morning when one of the brothers spearheading this mission introduced them to one another and told Albert to get her over to the route leading out to Chiba before embarking upon his own appointed task, had been subject to Albert's sterling and nonstop conversation for the better part of an hour and a half by now.


"Yes'm!" Albert happily replied, talking loudly over the engine's roar, "I told you I could get us in and get the truck – and not just any truck, but the one we were told about, no less! – moving just as easily as Old Chuck takes another wife! Yes'm, I told you that!"


Ignoring a murderous look from his captive audience, Albert put the garbage truck with the discreet Chi-Rho chalked on the left rear tire into gear and carefully navigated a path out of the Tokyo Settlement Municipal Sanitation maintenance lot, the pair of bolt-cutters he'd used to gain entry via the fence knocking against his knee. It had been quite some time since Albert had driven such a large vehicle and longer still since he'd driven one burdened with a load as heavy as the heap of scrap metal crammed into the back of the garbage truck, but it was like riding a bicycle and familiarity returned shortly. Even the hotwiring had been an old army trick, as sometimes one had to strategically transfer equipment to alternative locations, such as a truck, without the previous owners needing to know.


Presently, he was rolling down one of the primary arterial roads, heading for the prefectural highway headed north to Ibaraki and on to the Sendai Settlement.


"You just passed the exit for Chiba," his irritable passenger pointed out, breaking twenty minutes of sullen silence.


"Oh, piss on the exit!" Albert declared. "I know a better way!"


He lifted a hand from the wheel and placed it over his heart, a man on the cusp of swearing a solemn oath, "Why, I wager I could out-route and out-fox any damned taximan in Tokyo! I tell you what, I was born with roads in my veins and an interchange for a vena cava. Why, this one time, back in New Wight, I–"


"Let me out at the next exit," his sister in the True Church commanded. "I'll find my own way."


It didn't rub him right, taking an order from a woman. It wasn't how he'd been brought up and it wasn't how things usually were done when it came to matters outside of the classical feminine sphere. Blood of the Martyred! They were engaged in war here, not bloody flower arranging or maths proofs!


But, something in the nameless woman's voice indicated that her patience was hanging by her very last thread; years of marriage had taught him to heed that voice, and so, reluctantly, he pulled over at the next eastbound exit.


"You be careful now, you hear!" Albert admonished his sister as she wrenched herself free of the belt and all but hurled herself free of the cab. He rolled down the window of her slammed door so she could still hear him. "Go with God, sister! And don't forget to… and she's gone."


Alone now, Albert wondered as he continued north if Teresa had noticed the red paint he'd splashed across their front door that morning before leaving to steal the truck. If she had, he hoped she didn't try to remove it or worse, leave the house to go buy paint remover.


Albert didn't quite know why Father Alexander had warned all his people to daub a red sun on their doors, and on the doors of other random houses and apartments to confuse the authorities. But, beyond the theological symbolism, he had a few suspicions founded both on the orders Brother Roger had passed along to "sow thorns in the roads" and some specific details regarding the truck he was now at the wheel of, and on the sounds of gunfire he'd heard fifteen minutes earlier, when he'd been trying to jimmy the lock on the cab door open.


The fact that his unnamed sister in the True Church had a sidearm poorly concealed under her coat and pockets full of mysterious bulges had also been something of a clue about the day's planned events.


Now, idling to a slow and careful stop alongside the southernmost pylon of the bridge across the Naka River, over whose broad back much of the northbound traffic leaving the Tokyo Settlement for Ibaraki, Sendai, and parts north traveled, Albert did his part to further the works of the True Prince and his sole and holy Church on Earth by kicking the dump truck's manual brake and going to work.


As a combat engineer in His Imperial Majesty's Armed Forces, Albert had picked up a trick or three. He'd already used one of his old army skills in hotwiring the truck earlier in the morning; now, he used a second.


Ordinance had never been a particular passion of Albert's. He was not a sapper at heart, as so many of his fellows were, and he lacked the sheer love those men and women had possessed for all things explosive, which was why many of his old comrades had predeceased him. But lack of fatal obsession didn't change the fact that, when it came to the refined art of removing obstacles, often in an explosive fashion, he remained a trained professional.


And professionals… Albert thought, looking over the mass of miscellaneous scrap metal at whose heart sat a chemical surprise another previously unknown brother or two had left waiting for him. A surprise sufficiently mighty enough to tear a garbage truck's thick steel sides open like so much orange peel. It had taken every bit of his carefully cultivated lack of outward reaction not to shake his head in disgust when he'd opened up the back of the garbage truck back in the yard and had his first glimpse… Have standards. Probably for the best that Sister Tightass didn't try to peer in over my shoulder; she was sour enough even without knowing she was sitting on top of a bomb!


It hadn't been a particularly horrible job, that bomb, all things considered. Albert wasn't so snobby that he couldn't admit as much, at least in the privacy of his own head. It was just that it was so clearly the work of a talented amateur or some well-practiced hobbyist instead of anybody with actual demolitions training. At most, the whole thing had been cobbled together by a civilian whose job provided some vague familiarity with the ins and outs of do-it-yourself chemistry, not someone schooled by His Imperial Majesty's finest lads to bring down the work of years in a brace of seconds.


But again, needs must when the Devil drives… Albert eyed the bridge, and where he'd parked the truck. …It'll do. Damn well better. Not terribly efficient, but it'll work.


Just have to get the blasting caps set up… he thought, gloved hands retrieving the five homemade caps he'd previously fashioned in his home garage from their beds in a heavily padded cigar box he'd kept close to his heart, and then get the timer rigged up…


The timer's design was Albert he had picked up from an old buddy, and God alone know where that miserable old cuss had happened across it. All it required in its base design was a cheap watch, a battery, and a few copper wires. For this holy job, however? Albert had improvised, just a bit. He had, he'd reasoned, needed a bit of an extra kick to guarantee that all five blasting charges went off at once.


He hadn't mucked with the principles, though, though, so in no time at all each blasting cap found a home in the bags of gritty, metallic dust nestled within the onboard compactor's heavy maw, then each cap was mated to one of the nest of copper wires wound about the head of the screw driven through the face of the watch. A last lone wire stretched from the terminal of the salvaged boat battery to the watch itself, whose remaining hand was already ticking its way around the mangled circuit towards its date with destiny.


Twenty minutes ought to be plenty, thought Albert, wiping the remnants of the chalked symbol away before stripping his gloves off and briskly walking away from the still running garbage truck, whose doors he had closed to shield his gorgon-head of a detonator from the view of any casual passerby, and a truck full of dusted metal and fertilizer should be plenty to crack that bridge in half.


Just as Brother Rodger commanded.


Just like how Albert didn't approve of taking orders from pushy women, sister in the communion of the True Church or not, he didn't approve of doing dirty work on behalf of the Eleven savages. Not that anybody had said that was why Father Alexander had ordered Brother Rodger to set loose his collection of veterans and volunteers, but Albert wasn't a stupid man; he could put two and two together. On the other hand, the tantrum the savages were pitching back in Tokyo was fantastic cover for such otherwise impossibly audacious acts as, say, blowing up key pieces of mission-critical infrastructure. Anything the True Church did now would surely be pinned on the rampaging Elevens, giving the Bureau and Inquisition no reason to go looking for them.


Win, win, win, all the way around!


Smiling to himself, Albert tossed his gloves and cigar box away into the Naka River and strolled along at the unhurried pace of a man on his day off, waving politely at a few old men sitting with their fishing poles down by the river. He continued to casually saunter until he judged that he was out of their sight, at which point the teamster and father of two began to stride with a great deal more urgency, humming the tune of 'Sleepers, Awake!' between breaths as he sought to maximize the distance between himself and the truck bomb he'd just abandoned.


After ten minutes and the better part of a mile, Albert slowed down and switched over to the decidedly more secular 'Bonnie King Charlie.' It had been a good, enlivening day already, and he expected the rest of the day would be nothing short of exciting.


Enamored with his good works and praying that whatever nonsense was sure to overtake the Tokyo Settlement wouldn't find its way to his doorstep and the family that was, at least legally, his, Albert trundled off down the road in search of some nice public house he could disappear into, vanishing into the morning crowd of punters and layabouts as one unremarkable face among many. The True Prince was coming and Albert had no intention of becoming a martyr before his suspicions about Marianne's children were resolved, one way or another.

---

September 7, 2016 ATB
Shinjuku, Empire of Japan (contested)
0830


Long, long ago, in a different world, in a different life, in the skies over a place called Norden by some, called our own sovereign soil by the empire I had served…


I had fallen.


Plummeted, really.


Computation jewel shattered, every scrap of magic expended, boneless with exhaustion, I had tumbled from the sky with the supreme grace of a duck shot on the wing.


In that brief moment of freefall, I had been convinced that, by dint of death or near fatal heroism, I had left war and all of its dangers forever behind me in the clouds above. Utterly unencumbered by stress or fear for my future, I fell with a smile upon my face and a song of purest freedom in my heart.


In a strange way, I felt I had reached the absolute bound of freedom in the tumbling moments of that fall. Bereft of jewel and of magic, I had been equally bereft of any obligation to choose or to act, for I was incapable of changing my present situation. The burden of agency had been lifted. All but guaranteed to die when I hit the ground, I was free; I did not know whose responsibility dealing with the aftermath of that skirmish would become, but it was highly unlikely that it would fall upon my cold shoulders.


Standing at the central podium in the school gymnasium previously fancied as the Chamber of Notables, I felt the familiar weightlessness of freefall again.


That's the exhaustion, I told myself firmly, gazing out across the assembled crowd with all of the stoic dignity I could muster. Sleep deferred is sleep lost, and magic can only go so far.


And how far it had carried me already! I could never have done all that I had for Shinjuku and the Kozuki Organization without the help of my previous life's inheritance. The scraps of magic had been my only slim edge for long years, after all.


And now it has become my crutch, one that yields ever diminishing returns. Fresh casting no longer brings euphoria and energy, only a surcease from the drag and a step back from complete collapse.


Too late for second thoughts now.


Just as they had at the show trial of Lieutenant Ichiya almost two months ago, Inoue and Koichi stood at my shoulders, Sun Guard hachimaki brazen across their brows. A three-headed monster all our own, we were a lesser sculpt of the triumvirate Ohgi, Naoto and I had brokered so many months ago. Lesser troika or not, Shinjuku rested now within our sweat-soaked palms.


The remainder of the Leadership Commission assisted, of course, as did the many officers both Inoue and Koichi had promoted from within the ranks of their respective organizations. However, with the dissolution of the Council of Notables and the more final dismantling of other rival powers, all responsibility for the city had come to rest upon our three shoulders, upon mine most of all.


I'd thought the idea of me holding absolute authority over Shinjuku was a bad idea once, but… Peering out across the eager sea of faces, of healthy faces, faces no longer lined with starvation, of bright-eyed faces, I could only reflect that perhaps my fears had been misplaced.


The results, after all, spoke for themselves.


Oh yes, I chided myself, the results do indeed speak for themselves. Remember that thought in four hours, when the first blows of Britannian retaliation fall on these oh-so-eager faces.


My eyes sought out Junji, across the room. The skinny communications lieutenant looked up from his recording equipment and gave me a thumbs up, assuring me that he stood ready to broadcast my words across the lines criss-crossing Shinjuku and, via the relay system spanning three prefectures, most of central Honshu as well. Doubtless, recordings would also be distributed under some vague idea of boosting morale. Perhaps it would soften the hammerblow of incoming artillery, but I very much doubted it.


Behind him, Tanaka Chika stood, owl-eyed and solemn behind her glasses.


As if I needed some damned memento mori to remind me of just how mortal I am and how fallible! As if I were ever free of that knowledge!


I took a deep breath and forced my hands to uncurl, my fingers to straighten, and let the impulse to simply lash out disperse.


Everything was ready to go.


I could rest soon.


"Brothers and sisters!" My voice rang out across the gymnasium and all within fell silent. "Men and women and children all across occupied Japan, I come to you this morning with good news!


"Here in Shinjuku, in the very lap of our subjugation under the foreign tyrants… the Sun has finally risen."


It was interesting how the subtleties of pitch could so easily modulate a receptive crowd's reactions. A slight inflection and they all knew they should rise to applaud.


I had included no such inflection; my voice, low and intense, held them spellbound, pressing them down firmly into their chairs and keeping the gym as quiet as a tomb. Applause would come later.


"After a long Night of Sorrow… the Sun has finally risen. And yet… a dark fog of terror and pain lingers over us all, blanketing Tokyo and all of our beautiful islands. And unless the beams of our brilliant sunrise burn that fog away, it shall remain blanketed over us always, occluding the light of our new day.


"How fortunate we are that those purifying rays of sunshine are descending already, cleansing our holy land of the flesh and false security of our enemies even as I speak to you.


"This is not a homecoming, my brothers and sisters, my comrades! Our home is gone! Our past is crushed!


"This," I bared my teeth, hand gripping the sides of the podium, leaning forwards towards my audience, "is a reconquest! Nothing short of a complete and total victory will appease our righteous demands! Brothers and sisters across Japan, hear my voice and know that today, known now and forever as the Day of Liberation, the Kozuki Organization declares war in the name of Kaguya, Empress of Japan, and in the name of the millions of restless dead!"


My voice began to rise along with my hands, reaching for a crescendo. "In cooperation with the Japanese Liberation Front, with the Six Houses of Kyoto, and with all Japanese of true spirit, we declare war to the hilt against Britannia and all her might!"


That last line carried that inflection, the one that told the crowd that this was the time to applaud. Rapturous, they obeyed, rising to their feet like a crashing wave surging past a breached dam. Each person in attendance seemed to compete against those to their right and left to clap and cheer the loudest.


I could only hope that applause carried out beyond the walls of Shinjuku.


If everything's proceeding according to plan, Fuji will already be in Naoto's hands, I reminded myself. That's where the real crux of our plan is. This? This is just…


I grit my teeth as I surveyed the crowd of cheering masses, all so uproariously happy to finally fight for Japan reborn. …A show. A distraction. A stage performance designed to hold the Britannians' attention for as long as possible.


The sense of tumbling, plunging freedom was on me again, the pressure of a future beyond a week sleeting away. After so long spent in careful deliberation, careful planning… I took a deep breath, and tasted a liberty that could not last, and so was all the much sweeter for it.


"I will not waste any more of your time, my comrades!" I spoke over the sound of the applause and the rising chants, meeting eye after eye in the assembly, striving for that personal touch, seeking the individual in the crowd. "Today will be a very busy day for us, as will tomorrow and every other day until no Britannian breathes Japanese air. You all know what is expected of you and what your duties shall be! Follow your leaders and take heart that, come what may, we are all Japanese and shall live and die as such!


"I am honored to have you all by my side."


I only hope you do not curse me when you meet the fate you all so ardently wished for.

 

[reginaldReginaldusson]

good update after i nearly feared that the Story was dead

 

[Scopas]

good update after i nearly feared that the Story was dead

Click to shrink...

Not quite. Glad you enjoyed the new chapter!

 

[Xilokiir]

Goodness, the slow grind forward is killing me. I had to get a filling at my dentist recently, I really need to stop grinding my teeth. Excellently written as always, I found it interesting how you managed to make the gate guard likeable for a brief period before then quickly making him very unlikeable.

 

[Psyraptor]

TFTC

 

[kalistira]

Good chapter as always! Love your way of showing things with side characters, keep up the great work!

 

[Scopas]

(The blue moon has risen. Rejoice. Hope you enjoy the chapter. As usual, a huge thank you to Sunny and MetalDragon for editing this chapter and helping me bounce ideas around, and to KoreanWriter for helping with the brainstorming. Thank you also to the people who helped with miscellaneous grammar and sanity checks. To head off questions like "Where is the protagonist? Why isn't she in this chapter?", chalk it up to in-universe chronology. I wanted to tell the story of what Kallen's up to on the Day of Liberation in this chapter, covering the complete events of her day in one go. Tanya and Naoto are both involved in situations evolving by the hour and minute, so I can't really fold them into a day-long chapter like this one without breaking up the narrative. So, that's why "No Tanya?" in this chapter.)

---

September 7, 2016 ATB


The rumble of distant explosions shocked Kallen awake.


Maybe a transformer blew? her sleep befuddled brain rationalized, her thoughts still bleary and slow. Could've been another bombing.


Her body knew better. When the frantic knocks came at the door of her room in the hotel suite, Kallen was already on her feet, her concealed knife in her hands.


A single explosion could be another insurgent attack. A series of explosions indicates something more substantial.


"Kallen!" her father shouted through the door, his typical reserve gone. "Kallen, wake up!"


"I'm up!" she yelled back, scrambling to throw open the deadbolt and wrenching her door open. "I'm–"


"Kallie, we nee-!" Alvin yelled, caught in mid-knock when the door flew open under his hand.


Alvin's instincts saved him as Kallen, instinctively lashing out at the stranger standing far too close for her to tolerate, slashed her knife through the space where his belly had been. Only the smart step back he had taken kept the Baron of New Leicester from being opened like a fish, and kept Kallen from becoming an accidental patricide on the spot.


Her father's eyes, Kallen saw through the witch's brew of fear and adrenaline blasting her brain, were wide with surprise and justifiably startled. In a rare moment, he had been caught completely off-guard by his brush with death. Kallen could swear she saw, just for a heartbeat, a flicker of approval in those eyes too.


"Sorry…" she muttered, clicking the blade back up into its hidden sleeve before remembering her own outrage. "You startled me!"


"No time for that." And suddenly, Alvin was back in charge, the incident forgotten. "We need to leave. They are coming. Did you pack your uniform?"


"Y-yes?" Kallen ventured, head still spinning as the last remnants of sleep slowed her. "Who's coming?"


"Get it on," commanded Alvin, ignoring her question. "Pack whatever you can carry on your back. We leave in five minutes, or whenever Errol returns from the garage."


When Kallen lingered for just a moment, Alvin's lips twitched downwards.


"The Japanese, if you must know."


"The… Japanese?" Kallen blinked. "And you want me in uniform… why?"


"Because," snapped Alvin, "apparently the Japanese snuck a significant formation backed by artillery to the edge of Greater Hiroshima and are bombarding the settlement. I suspect that any refugees who try to flee via the coastal highway will encounter more Japanese formations, and that the treatment those refugees will find will be quite harsh, considering Britannian conduct in Japan. Consequently, we will head to the Hiroshima Garrison in the hopes of joining the column once the brigadier in command attempts a fighting retreat."


This is it, then… the Revolutionary murmured. The Day of Liberation has come.


And I'm far from my comrades and my friends. Stuck among Britannians, wearing Britannian clothes, with a Britannian face…


Noticing her hesitation, the Baron of New Leicester grimaced a smile. "Ah, yes. You are, of course, reluctant to take up arms against those whom you consider to be your natural comrades, don't you? Why," he chuckled, a sound full of seemingly genuine emotion and yet clearly empty of amusement or conviviality, "you may even be itching to mount up beside them. The thought's surely crossed your mind already, hasn't it, Kallie? Joining up with them who are fighting the 'good fight' for your homeland and all. It wouldn't be natural if your thoughts went any other way."


"Wha-? Of course I am!" Kallen seethed, seeing no point in denying the obvious. "This is exactly what I've been waiting for! Waiting for years!"


"Ah." Her father held up a hand, a gesture that instantly quelled Kallen's protests, to her own disgust. "Allow me, dearest daughter, to disabuse you of that notion."


Raising his second hand, he began ticking off points on his upraised fingers.


"First," said the baron, his Lewiston accent thickening as it only did in his private moments with family and friends, "if your rebels are even half as competent as I think they are, then we both know that the army crestin' over the horizon and turn'n up a ruckus out there won't have heard hoot nor holler of who you are from Shinjuku."


A tapped finger folded down.


"Second, I reckon the hooligans lighting fireworks right now don't seem to be the type to be interested in what a pretty little Brittannian lady like yourself has to say. They're out for blood, Kallie, make no mistake."


Another finger down.


"Which brings me to my third and final point." Alvin ticked off another finger, then lowered his hand. The smile he gave his heiress was bittersweet, filled with grief and pride. "My blood runs thick, Kallie. It's why you were able to attend Ashford, it's why you were able to make it in the JROTC even though you loathed every second you spent in the grey. For all you might claim Japan as your homeland, for all you might have your mother's undeniable beauty, fact is that my blood runs hot through your veins. It's plain enough for all to see that you are a lioness of Britannia, and there ain't one thing you can do about it."


Kallen ground her teeth together, hating herself more and more as she tried, with increasing intensity with every passing word, to find a way to rebut his words, and again and again failed.


"So, what then?" she spat, glaring up into eyes a perfect match for her own. Even in that detail, apparently, the Stadtfeld blood had bred true. "What the hell are you saying then, huh!?"


"Kallen Stadtfeld," the Baron of New Leicester pressed, "has a role to play and a future that, should we reach the garrison, will almost certainly extend past tonight. Kozuki Kallen, on the other hand, almost certainly won't survive to see the evening.


"Which would you rather be today?"


Blood hammered in Kallen's head and ice crept up her legs. She felt trapped, anxious, eager to explode into motion but no idea where she would go or what she would do when she got there.


I can't help anybody if I'm dead… Tanya, Naoto, Ohgi, Mom…


I hate this. I hate everything about this. But I swear I'll come back to you.


Her fist thudded against her breast, right above her heart. Back straight, chin lifted, right fist above her heart. A perfect salute, exactly as Pitt had taught her.


"Cadet Sergeant Stadtfeld, reporting for duty, sir."


Her father's grey mustache twitched. He returned her salute almost lazily, but with echoes of that same precision.


"A pleasure to hear, Sergeant," said the Baron of New Leicester, and Alvin added, "A wise choice, Kallie. My thanks."

---

Madness had descended upon Hiroshima.


Men of every social strata pushed and shoved, bellowing curses and threats at anybody who crossed their path. Overstuffed bags bulging with belongings got underfoot and dug into knees and thighs. Children yowled as they were tugged along by the hands of parents and household servants, or otherwise quietly whimpered, eyes wide, as every adult present collectively lost their minds.


Kallen saw all of this and more, all before she and her father had finished navigating the hotel lobby and down to the garage where Errol waited by the car, an assault rifle cradled in his hands.


Never in her life had Kallen been so eager to see her father's factor, the killer whose history remained obscure to her despite having traveled with the man for the last several months. Normally a disconcerting presence looming in the corner of her vision, a living reminder of just who Alvin Stadtfeld really was when he wasn't trying to be her father, Errol's cold face and professionally detached calm were a relief after experiencing even a small slice of the feverish panic ripping through the Hiroshima Settlement.


"Errol, my good friend, how are the roads?" Her father greeted the man almost casually, as if the city wasn't under siege and burning down around them. "We have an appointment with Brigadier Axelrod, though that might come as a surprise to him."


"Crowded, sir," Errol replied, just as easily, "Forecast seems to have people a bit jumpy to hit the road. Can't imagine why."


For some reason, Kallen found the easy, pointedly-understated banter the two exchanged an oddly soothing balm for her racing heart. It almost sounded like a comedic routine, a stereotypical conversation between a nobleman and his butler tweaked by the circumstance and juxtaposed against the distant krump of artillery.


That peculiar relief lasted until the cold eyes of her father's personal killer slid her way, acknowledging her presence for the first time.


"Back in uniform again, eh, Sergeant?" said Errol by way of greeting. "I haven't seen you in your greys since we first met. Things must really be getting serious now, huh…?"


"There'll be time to reminisce once we're in the car and en-route to the garrison," commanded Alvin, moving briskly around the rented black sedan and tossing his and Kallen's hastily assembled possessions into the trunk.


"Understood, sir." Errol opened the passenger side door for his master, but to Kallen's muted surprise, her father gestured for her to sit up front. As soon as her rear made contact with the seat cushion, Errol passed the rifle to her. "Looks like you'll be my escort today, Sergeant. You know what to do?"


Kallen made her quick check of the rifle her reply, running her hands over its guide-rail, accelerating motor, charging rod, and magazine with practiced ease before verifying that the safety was engaged.


"Looks like you do," the killer chuckled, opening the door behind her for the baron to slide in. "Anyway, if we're going to get to the garrison before the Elevens kill us all, we'd better get moving. The streets are already filling up with traffic; five pounds says that the roads will be impassible in half an hour tops."


"Then," grunted Alvin, reaching under the driver's seat to retrieve a pistol case, flicking the lock open with practiced ease, "I think we'd best be going."

---

True to Errol's word, the streets of the Hiroshima Settlement were crammed with vehicles of all descriptions and matched the hotel's corridors in pure confusion. Cars honked, motorcycles dove in and out of traffic, sometimes tearing up the sidewalk and sending pedestrians scattering. Above, in the cloudy morning sky, the heavy thump of VTOL blades cut the air.


Under it all, an echoing growl that was not thunder resonated. Like waves, it waxed and waned in intensity; like the wind, it insinuated itself effortlessly into all spaces great and small.


Six years after howitzers had spat fire into the sky and rained hell down on arrogant Britannian sailors less than twenty miles away, the sound of artillery had returned to Hiroshima.


As Kallen watched, the confusion on the street worsened. Pedestrians of all ages crowded the sidewalks and spilled into the streets. Some hammered on windows, begging, wheedling, and demanding a ride. Others, members perhaps of the "help yourself and heaven will help you" club, smashed open the handful of parked cars, searching for keys or valuables. Fistfights broke out between the desperate and the angry, but even the most determined brawlers fought to maintain contact as the press of the crowd thickened, tugging the bodies of mere mortals along like flotsam in a flood. Nobody knew where to go, where to run; the crowd surged first one direction down the street, then the other under a gabble of indecipherable and contradictory instructions, insults, and pleading cries.


Some men, including a man in a noble's brocaded jacket, emerged from the press of humanity and began to approach their car as Errol nosed his way into traffic. They stopped in their tracks when they saw Kallen's uniform jacket, and the rifle leaning against her chest.


"...I think you were too optimistic, Errol," Kallen remarked, keeping her eyes fixed on the probable noble and what could be his retinue. The man looked like he was trying to decide whether he could pull rank and demand their car. His followers appeared to be weighing less diplomatic strategies. "Half an hour? The road's impassable now. We're never going to get anywhere like this, much less to the garrison."


"We can't show up on foot, Sergeant," her father said from behind her. In the reflection caught in the wing mirror, he looked entirely unruffled, no hint of the fear she'd heard when he shouted her awake to be seen. "When we reach the garrison, we will come before Brigadier Axelrod as something other than beggars solely by dint of my name, my rank, and my reputation. Any combination of which would, most times, be potent in the extreme, yet here and now could mean little to an incompetent with an armed command. Should he realize my weakness, our leverage will vanish. Arriving on foot, sweaty and tired, will all but guarantee the brigadier will brush us off."


Damned Britannian power-plays.


And yet, Kallen couldn't help but nod along. As with all of her father's lessons, it made sense in a twisty, cold-blooded sort of way.


Always strength, never weakness. That's the Britannian way.


So, how to resolve the traffic question?


The rifle's weight pressed against her chest. She looked down at the matte grey weapon, at its sleek black accents and the quiet menace it exuded. Against the backdrop of her uniform, the dark grey of a native-born Britannian despite the cadet stripes, it was an advertisement of the strength that had subsumed half the world.


It was the promise of conquest, of strength unending, of a people chosen by God to master the world through merciless force.


What would Tanya do? Kallen wondered, her mind spinning back to their fateful first meeting. Tanya hadn't hesitated that day, and had saved both of their lives through the immediate application of terrorizing force. I suppose you taught me more than one lesson that day, Commander…


"Very well," said Sergeant Stadtfeld. She looked up and was pleased to note that the sedan had a moonroof. "I will clear the road, then."


At a tap of a button, the moonroof slid open. Standing in her seat, Kallen levered the rifle up onto the car's roof first, then followed. Below her, she heard Errol bark a laugh.


"Oh? Not a bad plan, Sarge!"


She kicked at his shoulder, making the damned man laugh harder.


Fucking Britannians. The safety clicked back against her thumb; she depressed the charging stud, the accelerating motor whining in her ears. Damned savage, bloody-minded Britannians!


At a squeeze of her finger, a trio of hyper-accelerated beads screamed through the air above the sidewalk, sending the jacketed noble and the other men with him diving for cover. The piercing whine of their supersonic transit ended in the emphatic crack! of ballistic ceramic against stone facing and molded concrete facade as Kallen's rounds left a wall pockmarked.


Other pedestrians, already fearful, panicked at the sight of the falling men and the sound of the rifle.


"Run!" a woman screamed, a weeping toddler in her arms. "They're shooting! Run!"


"The police!" another yelled, scrambling for the dubious safety of an alley. "Someone call the police! There's been a killing!"


Below Kallen's line of sight, Errol must have noticed the sudden space. With a hard jerk on the wheel, the driver sent the rented car lurching up onto the pavement, bouncing over the curb and running over an abandoned suitcase with a thump.


At least, Kallen hoped the obstacle that jolted the car up and down had been a suitcase. In the moment, she was glad for the overwhelming pandemonium from the crowd and how it effortlessly drowned out any single yelp of agony.


"Move!" she bellowed, her voice lost in the cacophony of screaming and yelling, like an entire armada of gulls upset into flight. She sent another spray of beads over the heads of the fleeing pedestrians. Some threw themselves to the ground, desperate to escape the gunfire, but more took to their heels, running and then stampeding away from the shooting and the manic behind the wheel rapidly accelerating down the sidewalk. "Move, dammit! Move!"


The crowd surged like a freak wave, a mob of humanity as demoralized and panic-stricken as any Kallen had ever seen caught in the confined channel of the boulevard. People ran for the cover of shops, hotels, or alleys; more often than not, they were thrust back out into the heaving morass by those inside determined to defend their refuge from the chaos and the horror. Others ran into the street, diving under the wheels of cars parked or otherwise as fear seized reason by the throat. Screams brittle with pain and wrenched by grief rose up from behind Kallen to join the lunatic chorus of the merely fear-stricken and Phobos-ridden as the car jolted on.


This is necessary, Kallen told herself, jaw clenched. Get to the garrison. Let Dad talk us into a place with the army. Once they accept me as one of them, I'll be in a position to help the Cause out from inside. Just like Tanya told me. This is all for the mission.


She tried not to feel sick. She tried not to feel sympathy for the crowd of men, women, and children of all ages. She tried not to hear the cries of terror and pain, to not see the beseeching eyes or the uplifted arms.


Her stint as a journalist had been brief, but it had been long enough to refine her natural eye for detail. What she'd seen last Christmas had given her experience crafting narrative from senseless tragedy.


This is necessary, she insisted against the Reporter's silent regard. It has to be done!


This is war, said the Revolutionary. What did you expect? Don't get cold feet now.


You've gone soft, she scoffed at the back of Kallen's mind, laughing at the queasiness in her stomach. Weren't you planning on killing Milly and all the other bitches laughing it up at Ashford? Weren't you going to open Lelouch from crotch to chest that one time?


You've lived with them for too long. You made the mistake of seeing Britannians as people.


Which side are you on, anyway?


The thunder of explosions, terrifyingly close and shockingly loud, broke her reverie. A few streets over, smoke and dust began to billow upwards. Car alarms rose in a shrieking chorus as more shells began to howl down from above. Bloodied forms staggered as stray shards of glass, splinters of stone, and knots of brick ripped outwards down the road. Only a few that Kallen could see fell, the swirl of the crowd and the bouncing motion of Errol's madcap driving down the sidewalk obscuring her view.


The Japanese! Kallen jolted, remembering her father's mention of artillery support. They must have advanced the guns! We're in range now!


Below her, Errol gunned the engine. The crowd at last was breaking apart, demoralized by the shelling and terrorized by the handful of drivers lucky and ruthless enough to pilot their vehicles through the throng. More and more dropped behind whatever meagre shelter they could find, holding children and possessions close to their chests as, behind them, a fresh round of hate dropped from the sky in steel-shod boots.


Kallen dropped heavily down into the passenger seat, the rifle's charging rod and barrel hot against her uniform blouse. She tried not to notice as the car thumped over something else.


"Good thinking, Sergeant," said the Baron of New Leicester approvingly. "Best we get a move on though. Those last few shells were a bit too close for comfort. Errol, if you will?"


With a lurch, the car shuddered forward in response to its master's wordless assent.


I did what I had to, Kallen thought, falling back on the routine movements of swapping out magazines and checking the rail for debris or heat deformations. This is war. If I hadn't done something, we would have been eaten alive. We had to leave them. They were just Britannians anyway.


It was necessary.


She repeated those thoughts time and again with every fresh horror, with every pull of the trigger and every time Errol had to gun the engine to force the car over… obstacles. The refrain looped like a mantra, again and again.


It was necessary… It was necessary… It was necessary…


By the time the hellish ride ended at the front gate of the Hiroshima Garrison, Kallen could almost believe it.

---

The first real barrier on the road leading out of Hiroshima by way of Brigadier Axelrod came not at the front gate, as Kallen had somewhat suspected it would, but in the cavernous, gaudily decorated foyer of the grandiose headquarters building.


Just the room alone is half the size of Stadtfeld Manor, Kallen thought, mildly impressed at the sheer wasteful opulence of the 22nd Brigade Headquarters Office. That bitch Alicia would love it. Her and her fucking butler.


…How long has it been since I thought about either of them? Kallen wondered a second later, marveling at the drift of her own thoughts. As best as she could recall, she hadn't thought about her step-mother or her paramour since her father had come to Stadtfeld Manor to collect her. I wonder if either of them are still alive? If this really is the Day of Liberation, Tokyo's going to be the furthest thing from quiet or safe for anybody, Britannian or Japanese.


…Stay safe out there, Commander… Big Bro… Mom…


"I'm sorry, my lord," a slim captain in a red coat that masqueraded as dress uniform but was not, as far as Kallen could tell, army standard, was saying to her father. "My lord Sir David, Brigadier Axelrod, was quite clear in his direction that no outside disturbances would be permitted into the War Room. It is quite the tense situation, my lord Baron, as I'm sure you understand."


"Oh, of course, of course," agreed the Baron of New Leicester as he stroked his prominent red mustache, affable in a manner that was both paternal and quite distinct from the way Kallen knew he actually behaved in private when he was trying to be her father. "We did just arrive from the city, you know. Now, my son, I was just a lowly colonel in the Royal Fusiliers, so perhaps I might not have the firmest grasp on the situation, but even I can see that things are shaky. Perhaps the brigadier would appreciate a first-hand report on the situation?"


At the mention of her father's old unit, the captain's smile grew a great deal more brittle. The Royal Fusiliers was an ancient formation by the standards of the Royal Army, with a history stretching back more than two centuries before the Humiliation of Edinburgh. Moreover, it was a Homeland regiment, whose officer corps was exclusive to nobles who held title in the Homeland itself.


Not just any baron, thought Kallen, not a little bit smug to see the weight of noble privilege turned against a deserving target for once. And not just any colonel either.


"Hey, sir?" Somehow, Errol turned the mere act of stepping forwards into the captain's personal space into a swaggering assault. All without the slightest outward sign of disrespect. "Allow me to explain a few matters…"


"Wha-aaggh!" The captain's face twisted as Errol's hand descended on his shoulder.


Kallen winced with sympathy as the twerp went white, her own joints aching at the memory of Errol's faux-friendly grip. Hours spent drilling in close-quarters and hand-to-hand had left her with far more familiarity with those powerful and callous hands than she would have liked.


Couldn't have happened to a better person, she decided, and smiled as the supercilious captain quailed.


While Errol leaned close to murmur something in the captain's ear, undoubtedly some combination of threats and vague promises, Kallen snuck a glance at her father's expression. He was looking around the bustling, echoing lobby with some interest, nodding to whoever happened to meet his eye. To most, he probably looked aloof, arrogant, and affable as all Britannian nobles of the upper crust should when they were in their element. To her practiced eye, however, her father was looking increasingly agitated, irritated, and even slightly aghast.


She couldn't blame him. The entire building was a flurry of activity, with uniformed men and women bustling in and out of rooms and down hallways, clutching sheathes of paper and tablets and all talking loudly at one another.


Superficially busy, the Soldier noted, but clearly disorganized. This is the brigade's headquarters, but nobody's in command here. Brittle too. If anyone stopped to think seriously about the situation, they would panic, so they clutch busywork to their chests instead.


God alone knew what the situation was like out in the city.


"I-I'll just show you to the command center, then," said the captain as Errol at last relinquished his bone-grinding grip on the man. "Please follow me, my lord…"


Kallen fell in automatically behind her father, taking a place behind his right shoulder as Errol took the bodyguard's position on his left. Her rifle, still slung over her shoulder, bumped against her thigh as she walked. The pistol at Errol's hip and the guns in the hands of the guards posted at the garrison's gate aside, it was the only weapon she'd seen since they'd arrived at the headquarters.


The rifle probably explained at least some of the looks she was getting. Certainly not all of them, though.


"What business does a cadet and two civilians have with the brigadier?" Kallen thought, sourly guessing at the thoughts of the staffers who stopped to stare at her. Wonder how long it will take for the penny to drop?


If they start to notice the Knightmare Pilot tabs on my jacket, not long, probably.


The command center for the 22nd Brigade and the Hiroshima Garrison was, in Kallen's opinion, an almost perfect example of how even the most powerful tools could be made useless in the hands of the suitably incompetent.


Easily the most prominent sign of this proven axiom was the ornamental alcove located immediately beside the entrance to the War Room. Sporting a fresco of a triumphant Saint George thrusting the impaled head of the dragon down out of his painting and into the bubbling font at his feet, itself faced with actual marble and predictably chased with gold, the entire piece was as spectacularly tasteless as it was ill-placed in a military setting. Arguably making the entire effect even worse was the clear technical skill of the artists responsible for the installation, utterly wasted on the obnoxious folly.


In that one, limited way, the art spoke volumes to Kallen.


Behold, Britannia! mocked the Revolutionary from behind her eyes. Religiosity without faith, expense without purpose, artistry without appreciation, and bloodshed without meaning! Only Britannian hands could so effortlessly capture the essence of their empire, and only Britannians could do it unknowingly, by mistake!


The idiotic font wasn't the end of it, of course. Every surface within the War Room not decorated to within an inch of its life with paintings, brocaded drapes, and gilt-encrusted inlays instead bristled with an intimidating series of monitors, consoles, keypads, and phones that seemed to ring constantly. All of these were staffed by a platoon's worth of junior officers, each of whom seemed the equal for any of the civilians out in the street in both volume and panic.


As Kallen watched, a lieutenant who could have only been two or three years her senior picked up one ringing telephone, bellowed something incoherent into it, then slammed it down and picked up another one right next to it, only to wince as someone on the other end yelled into his ear.


It's a madhouse! Kallen thought wonderingly, eyes darting around at the astonishing sight of a sector headquarters in charge of the defence of a major city in action. Nobody has any clue on what they're doing or what's going on. They even let strangers, armed strangers, into the very nerve center of their army!


Which, she concluded, means Brigadier Axelrod has no idea what he's doing either. If Tanya were here and in command, or Naoto or Ohgi or even Inoue, the atmosphere would be entirely different.


Not this… this hysteria.


Most of the action in the room seemed centered around a broad projector table displaying a holographic map of the Hiroshima Settlement and the area of Greater Hiroshima. Kallen recognized its like from her ROTC training, when Major Pitt had used a smaller model to project tactical situations for his students.


The widely dispersed blue dots, she was certain, represented Britannian units and positions. These were spread out all over the Hiroshima Settlement and the broader region of Greater Hiroshima beyond the Britannian enclave, together establishing a thin, shaky perimeter. Surrounding this narrow ring of blue was an impressive array of red dots and blobs, whose locations and sizes flashed and shifted as Kallen watched. A trio of technicians feverishly entered updates, apparently manipulating the display in a futile attempt to keep the data accurate to the moment as an overworked captain singlehandedly juggled phones, manning the dedicated phone bank behind them.


Even as she watched, a new red block populated the sector south of the city and just east from the coast, right on top of the primary highway leading back to the Tokyo Settlement.


'Armored Element(?)' Kallen read the tag attached to the new block, peering slightly to make out the narrow writing against the table's glare. It must be the JLF, then. None of the other Japanese organizations have any real amount of armor.


Unless, the Journalist pointed out, these aren't Japanese units at all. Could the Chinese have snuck a few dozen Gun-ru's up onto a beach somewhere?


Is that more or less likely than the Japanese deploying tanks to cut off a Britannian force backed by Knightmares?


…Is the Hiroshima Garrison backed by Knightmares?


Professionally disturbed by the situational ignorance her own question revealed, Kallen tore her eyes away from the table's display, searching for someone who could give her answers.


She found him across the table from her. There, surrounded by aides, a thin man with a colorless mustache, a thinning beard, and a brigadier's crowned trio of stars on his rank tabs presided over the circus masquerading as a headquarters. He was, Kallen knew immediately, just as hopelessly out-to-sea as the officers at their consoles.


"Sir David!" their captain-escort shouted over the mass, pushing through the throng of junior officers. Kallen, realizing her father and Errol had pressed on after him while she stared at the tactical display, quickly hurried after them before the crowd could press back in. "Sir David! A Baron Stadtfeld to see you, sir!"


"A baron?" The brigadier was incredulous. "Dammit, man! Can't you see I'm trying to defend the city? Send him to the tea room to wait, I'll deal with him when I can."


"Sir David," said Lord Stadtfeld, stepping around the captain without missing a beat. "Allow me to introduce myself. I am Alvin Stadtfeld of New Leicester."


"Alvin Sta–" Sir David visibly bit back what he had been about to say and turned away from the situational display to give his new visitor a second look. "Alvin Stadtfeld…? Where have I…?"


His eyes widened.


"The Black Baron…" the brigadier gasped, his hand twitching.


Kallen suppressed a smirk. Unless she missed her guess, he had been about to cross himself and still looked about ready to dump his head in the font's holy, presumably dragon-tainted, water


Then she wondered what he could have heard about her father to merit such an immediate reaction. Suddenly, Brigadier Axelrod's knee-jerk response was much less funny.


At least we won't have to worry about him not taking us seriously.


"In the flesh," the Baron of New Leicester agreed. "It seems like you're having a bit of trouble here, David. Quite the situation, eh?"


"Indeed it is, Alvin!" the brigadier agreed, practically falling over himself in relief at the casually affable address. "Hell of a way to start the day, with a damned Number insurrection. We had no warning!


"Well," he added a moment later, "looking back on it, perhaps the Bureau's field office going up in a ball of fire last night should have been some indication. If anybody knew about this, it would have been them, yes?"


"One would hope," Lord Stadtfeld acidly agreed, but Kallen could barely hear him.


The Bureau field office blew up? She hadn't heard a peep about it. Though, Dad's not surprised, and neither is Errol…


Wait, does this mean that Inspector Garcia is dead too? The thought made a knot in the back of her mind release at last, after a month of tension and periodically restless nights. If so… We certainly got lucky. He seemed way too competent for comfort.


"'Awfully bad timing for a 'smoking accident', that's what I thought." The brigadier shook his head ruefully. "Damned Numbers must have snuck a bomb in, poked out our eyes the day before they attacked. Clever bastards.


"You mark my words," Axelrod continued, looking like he was going to shake a finger under Alvin's nose before quickly reconsidering. "Tohdoh is in charge over there. The 'Miracle Man of Itsukushima' and the only Number with a brain worth a damn, come back to revisit the scene of his old triumph.


"We'll shove him back to his mountains, Alvin. Have no fear on that score."


Kallen wondered who he was trying to convince. Certainly not her father, who betrayed no interest in Axelrod's theory and whose cold, empty smile hadn't shifted a hair since he'd greeted the brigadier.


If I were feeling charitable, perhaps I'd assume he was trying to reassure all of his men, all the analysts and officers and aides so clearly listening in.


But I think it's far more likely that the one he's trying to reassure most is himself.


"Britannian courage has never failed on the field of battle before," her father agreed, nodding amiably, "I see no reason why we should fail the Empire in our duties today, hmm?"


The platitude, smugly self-assured in its complacency, stood in stark contrast to the lessons he shared in private.


It was still enough to stiffen the spines of those listening. Faces hardened, anxious tics smoothed away, and hands returned to their tasks with renewed fervor and intent.


And all with just a pair of mealy-mouthed sentences…


The change was not lost on Sir David either. The brigadier, torn between irritation and relief, settled on pretending not to have noticed anything.


"Quite, quite!" he agreed heartily, forcing a chuckle. "But, enough about that. Was there something I could do for you, Alvin? If not…"


The brigadier made a vague gesture back towards the table. The implication was clear.


Fuck off.


"Not in the least," the lord of New Leicester briskly replied, shrugging past the semi-polite brush-off. As if the Black Baron could be so easily dismissed. "In fact, I came here with the intention of offering my services, and the services of my daughter, to the 22nd Brigade. As loyal soldiers of His Imperial Majesty, we could do no less."


Only her knowledge of her father's own divided loyalties, the habits of years spent under a mask of demure nobility, and the lessons taught by both Major Pitt and her father kept Kallen from openly gagging at the characterization.


As it was, she recognized her cue.


Stepping forward to stand at her father's side, Kallen met Brigadier Axelrod's pale blue eyes squarely, back straight and just the slightest hint of a sneer marring the otherwise cold detachment stamped across her face.


Every inch a heiress straight from the Homeland.


"Sir David," she acknowledged, a scion of the Greater Nobility recognizing an example of the Lesser. Then, with parade ground perfection, her fist thumped against her breast as her heels clicked together. "Brigadier Axelrod, sir!"


"Cadet… Sergeant?" Axelrod's returning salute was much less crisp, almost casual if not for the focus in his stare. "At ease…"


He's got no idea how to react, the Revolutionary crowed as Kallen slid into parade rest, one hand easily managing the rifle butt as the weapon tried to slide free from her shoulder. Doesn't quite know where to fit you into his precious little system!


Before Sir David could make up his mind, Alvin interceded.


"Yes," her father said, pulling the brigadier's focus back towards him. "Not much in the way of reinforcements, of course, but perhaps this old colonel could give you a word or two of advice?"


The brigadier almost began to frown, his brows starting to furrow and his lips parting as he prepared to issue what Kallen could only imagine would be a half-hearted protest.


"And," Alvin casually cut him off, almost casually throwing in an incentive as an afterthought, "perhaps you could use another Knightmare pilot? She's still a cadet, of course, but you'll have to excuse a father's indulgence. I couldn't pull my little girl away from all of her school friends quite yet."


Her father chuckled with a simulacrum of warmth that, though convincing, was entirely alien to the sincerity Kallen felt whenever they were alone and he called her Kallie.


"Oh, and don't you worry your little head about her taste for battle, Davey old boy," Alvin grinned, pointedly using a diminutive of the brigadier's first name. It was, Kallen recognized, a power play, imposing over-familiarity in front of the audience of officers to diminish Axelrod in the eyes of his command. "She's already been blooded."


"...I hadn't heard about any cadets fighting in Area 11," said Brigadier Axelrod suspiciously. "Not unless she's part of that lunati– excuse me, not unless she's part of Margrave Jeremiah's faction? I heard the last batch of trainees from the Homeland all went straight to his base in Mariannetown…"

"I'm afraid that there is much you haven't heard, David," said the Black Baron, shaking his head in a conciliatory apology that could be taken for sincerity, if one could not see the icy contempt for Sir David in his eyes. "You know how it is, of course. Sometimes, it's best to just keep things hush-hush. Sub rosa, if you will. Saves the Help from having to clean up too many of our messes, eh? I do hope you understand."


The brigadier swallowed. The atmosphere in the room dropped. Ten minutes ago, Axelrod had been the unquestioned master of the Hiroshima Garrison's command post. Now, it was clear who held the reigns.


"I understand," said Brigadier Axelrod, conceding the de facto usurpation of his command with a nod.


"Wonderful!" grinned the Baron of New Leicester, suddenly ebullient again. "I will look forward to working with you, Brigadier. I only have one humble request. Grant us both a kindness and allow my daughter to prove herself just as capable and loyal a steward of the Empire as myself. Kindly give her the privilege of serving His Imperial Majesty in the defense of Hiroshima."


I hate this, Kallen thought, meeting Axelrod's eyes again. I feel like I'm only catching half the implications still, and it definitely feels like he's bartering me away…


And all so I can have the "privilege" of serving the empire I hate…


This is your mission, said the Soldier. Death before dishonor and duty above all.


Remember this feeling, whispered the Revolutionary. So long as you serve Britannia, serve Charles, serve your father… You will always be a dog.


Naoto would want me to live… So would Mom and Dad… and only Kallen Stadtfeld can live here.


"Brigadier!" Kallen barked, staring a hole through Axelrod's head. "Please, sir! Give me a chance to show these damned Numbers just who they're up against!


"They're bringing armor up from the south, aren't they? Another fist to slam into us while they shell us from the hills? The Knightmare Corps turned their tanks to scrap and ruin six years ago, and that was back when we just had Glasgows! Let me show them how nothing has changed, and that they never should have crawled out of their holes, sir!"


The hurly-burly of the command center had, Kallen noted, fallen quiet. The phones were still ringing but every face had turned towards her.


Ears burning, Kallen realized her voice had risen to a shout as she over-acted her assigned role.


Please just chalk it up to youthful impetuousness, she begged the seemingly stunned Axelrod, who was staring blankly at her. Please just dismiss me as an idiot girl who should be back at school!


"Bravo, bravo!" said a dark-haired, tanned man with a major's tabs. As he pushed clear from the throng of silently staring junior officers, Kallen recognized with dim horror that his uniform, like hers, bore the symbol of the Knightmare Corps. "Give her to me, Brigadier, sir! She'll breathe some fire back into my dregs."


"Major Coltain," Axelrod acknowledged. The brigadier shot Alvin a questioning look, as if asking permission, then nodded to the major. "She's yours. God knows, if we're willing to accept help from the Navy," beneath his sculpted mustache, Axelrod's lips spasmed into a momentary sneer, "I'd be happy to accept even the help offered by a cadet. Standby for orders and, for God's sake, Major, don't cock things up this time!"


"Yessir!" Major Coltain saluted. "Won't cock things up, sir! You can depend on us, sir! Sergeant, with me."


He had already taken three steps before Kallen realized the major had been talking to her. She shot her father one last look, then turned on her heel and followed the Knightmare Corps officer, her rifle bouncing off her hip at every step.


Errol, infuriating as always, gave her a broad grin and a theatrical wave goodbye.


"So," said Coltain as they stepped out into a hall branching away from the 22nd Brigade's War Room, "you're Pitt's little protege, hmm?"


Instantly, Kallen felt a sinking feeling in her gut.


"Sir."


It was a good all-purpose response. Flatly noncommittal and concealed by the shield of inferior rank.


"None of that," Coltain mildly chided, actually waving a sun-darkened finger in her direction as he strode along. "Word gets around, Stadtfeld. Especially word about a noble girl who set an ace record the very first time she entered a Knightmare simulator.


"You can't even imagine how pissed your Major Pitt's been," Coltain laughed to himself, "ever since your daddy swooped you up. Ah, to let a catch like you escape his net! No wonder he's so stroppy."


"It doesn't sound like you and Major Pitt get along very well," Kallen observed warily. Based on the strength of their less than five minute acquaintance, it was clear to her that Coltain was cut from a slightly different cloth than Pitt.


They're both Britannians, through and through, thought Kozuki Kallen, the Revolutionary itching to shove her knife through the side of his neck and bleed the pig dry but holding back, necessity staying her hand. Coltain, though, at least seems inclined to pitch in with the work still, instead of just playing politics and waxing on and on about his salad days for a captive audience of wannabes and recruits.


I suppose that makes him a slightly better breed of pig. If only by default.


"He'd say that he's a washed-up old has-been," said Coltain with startling matter-of-factness. "I'd say he's a useless never-was wannabe pilot.


"By the way, Stadtfeld, it's 'sir' to you. Or 'Major.'"


"Sir," Kallen added belatedly.


"Good," Coltain nodded approvingly. "So, you're not so stiff with nobility that you'll snap, eh? That's good. You ever been in a fight, girl?"


"Yes, Major."


"You ever killed before, girl?"


"Yes, Major."


Looking straight ahead, Kallen could nevertheless feel Coltain's interest sharpen.


"Really?" The major let out a low whistle. "Were they fighting back? Aware that you were trying to kill them and trying to kill you too? Or did you round up a gang of friends for a back-alley thump? Maybe poison a maid or something?"


The memories came back as they always did. Hot and sticky and in a flood. Just like the blood that had poured over her hands that afternoon in Shinjuku.


"He had a knife. I had a knife," Kallen said shortly. "I was better."


The two of them walked in silence for another minute.


"I'm breveting you to lieutenant," Major Coltain announced. "Congratulations, Lieutenant Stadtfeld. Also, you can stop with the cadet business. You're in the Army now, and this time for real."


Kallen nearly tripped over her own boots.


Just like that, huh?


"Yup, just like that," Coltain agreed, and Kallen couldn't tell if she'd accidentally spoken out loud or if the thought had just been written so clearly across her face that Coltain hadn't needed to hear a word. "You'll find that promotions and other awards come quickly if not easily in the Knightmare Corps, on the grounds that they're mostly tied to performance in battle. Not easily because the alternative to rapid promotion is usually getting cooked alive in your own Knightmare, but so it goes."


"And a knife-fight is grounds for promotion?" Kallen demanded, incredulous. "Sir."


"For an ace in the making with a Greater Noble's surname?" Coltain chuckled. "Oh yes! Honestly, Stadtfeld, you'd have gotten your lieutenancy just for not tripping over your boots. Be thankful that I'm promoting you for your moxy instead.


"Oh, and also because I'm going to put you in charge of a squad, which is a lieutenant's billet."


This last sentence was delivered so casually that Kallen knew it had to be bait.


She almost rose to it anyway.


"As you say, Major," replied the Soldier. "Will I get a chance to inspect my Knightmare first?"


"Ooh, you are a cold one!" Coltain half-laughed, half-jeered. "Their names are Hamm, Hankey, and Hayes, by the way. The three H's."


"...The Knightmares?" Kallen asked.


"Your subordinates," Coltain explained. "You didn't ask, but I thought you still might like to know. Hamm is the sergeant. They had a lieutenant, but he got seconded to Tokyo after most of Tokyo's pilots transferred to the Purists and went north with Jeremiah."


"...Jeremiah?" Judging by the way Coltain said it, Kallen felt she should already know the name. Unfortunately, the intricacies of Army politics hadn't really been her forte during her stint as an amateur spy.


"Gottwald," explained Coltain. "The Margrave Sir Jeremiah Gottwald, Count of Pensacola and leader of the Society for the Purity of Britannian Arms here in Area 11. That's the Purists, if you haven't heard their full name."


"Oh." Kallen dimly remembered hearing the name of that specific Purist leader before. Something about a punitive expedition sent north to scour Niigata and Aomori.


So a Brit bastard standing out in a sea of Brit bastards. Fantastic. At least this one doesn't seem like the type to have many friends.


"So, anyway, sir, about my Knightmare…" Kallen began, returning to the business at hand.


"You'll be pleased to know that we accepted delivery of a consignment of Sutherlands just last month." Major Coltain paused, clearly expecting some reaction. When none was forthcoming, he prompted, "You know, Lieutenant, the new mass-production model? The RPI-13?"


"The replacement for the Glasgow?" Kallen asked, a memory from one of Pitt's lectures returning to her at last. "Simplified pilot interface, better response times, and more armor around the cockpit, right, sir?"


"All that and more," said Coltain grandly. "I'm assuming you've had some stick time in a Glasgow before, right? It's like night and day. The Sutherland's air conditioner actually works more than half the time, for one."


"That… does sound nice," Kallen had to admit. "The improved response times paired with the enhanced acceleration and the increase in the upper speed limit too."


To her shame, Kallen found herself starting to anticipate the opportunity to give this new and improved version of the archetypical Britannian killing machine a spin.


"A fine toy indeed, Lieutenant," said the major, almost indulgently. "Perfect for putting down Numbers by the batch-load. Why," he laughed, "with the new armor over the landspinners and the increased speed, you won't even need to fire a shot to deal with the bulk of the current infestation! Just run 'em down and keep on accelerating, that's the ticket. Ride them down like the knights of old!"


Remember the mission Tanya gave you. Anything for the Cause.


"...As you say, sir," Kallen agreed mechanically, the ashes of her previous anticipation bitter upon her tongue. The thought of the speed and power soon to be at her command had been nearly enough to make her forget the work she and her new mount would be expected to turn their hands towards. "What can you tell me about the enemy?"


"I can tell you that there's a damn sight more of them than I think anybody knew were out in the hills," Major Coltain replied frankly. "From what we're hearing over the comm lines, this is just a fraction of the total too. They're making an attempt on the shippie base down at Fukuoka too, and something rough's happened over by the Fuji Special Zone.


"It's like we flipped a log over and all the ants in the world came out to bite us."


Serves you right!


Kallen fought hard to keep any sign of the sudden joy she felt off her face. Her heart felt like it had wings, and her smile was almost irrepressible.


It's happening at last! she thought, the news finally settling in a way it just hadn't when she'd had to worry about incoming artillery. The Day of Liberation, the day of revenge… It's here!


And I'm on the wrong side.


As quickly as it had surged, the momentary joy seeped out through her boots.


"That's… disturbing," said the Debutante, the almost timid noble girl whose face she'd worn at Ashford Academy. It was easy to find the feelings of hopelessness and isolation and sick weakness that were that girl's stock in trade. But, the Soldier soon bulled her way forward. "But, what about the forces here, sir? Artillery, clearly, and I thought I saw some notes of armor back in the War Room?"


"Don't know anything about armor," said Coltain. "Not saying that isn't the case, but so far all we've been seeing north of the settlement is infantry backed by artillery. Motorized infantry, deploying out of trucks. I think they must be shuttling them forwards from somewhere."


That explains his comment about running people over with the landspinners… Kallen thought, and felt slightly ill.


"So…" Kallen groped for the conversational thread. "What are our orders, sir?"


Why are you and these Three H's here at Headquarters instead of out running over brave men and women with your damned killing machines?


"The 22nd Brigade only has three squads of Knightmares on hand, even though we're supposed to have a company," grumbled Coltain. "Garrison formations like us are always the first to have our top-shelf units stripped, and most of our pilots got sent to Tokyo or Indochina. Sir David wanted what was left of us to keep close and act as a rapid reserve."


Makes sense, the Soldier concluded. Infantry or not, a mere twelve Knightmares deployed alone would be vulnerable, especially if the artillery's on the ball. Deploying to weak spots in the line is the best way to maximize our capacity.


"The other two squads are already out," the major went on. "I was holding the H's back because they're down a man, and an officer, and because all three of them are hardly less green than you."


"Fresh from depot, sir?"


"Fresh from depot, Lieutenant," agreed the major with a put-upon sigh. "And between you and me… There's a reason why they're still here and not holding the line against the damned Chinese or standing watch over the Viceroy-General."


"...I see. Sir."


This could be a chance to do some good from the inside, the Revolutionary realized. Incompetent soldiers, worried officers, widespread confusion… If the other pilots happen to find glorious deaths on the battlefield, that will take this sector's pilot count down by a third.


Plenty of chances for friendly fire, especially among trusting dullards after all…


It was just a fantasy, of course. Even now, months later and with the Day of Liberation dawning at last, the words of her loyalty's true mistress still echoed in her ears.


"You will become a soldier; moreover, you will be the best soldier you can be. You will learn all that you can from the Britannians. You will be as Britannian as possible. You will be Cadet Kallen Stadtfeld."


Tanya's last mission to me… That, and the instruction to come back alive, to return to her side and to Big Bro and to all the other members of the Rising Sun.


So Kallen smiled at Major Coltain's coarse jokes and nodded approvingly when he talked of the bloody harvest his tiny command would reap amongst the ranks of the advancing JLF. So she exchanged first salutes and then handshakes, enthusiastic on their parts and perfunctory and grudging on hers, with the Three H's, who turned out to be boys only a few years older than her, and who, she could tell, fell for her as soon as she smiled. So she ooh'ed and ahh'ed enthusiastically over her new Sutherland, still nearly factory fresh.


It was only in the locker room, changing into a freshly issued pilot's suit with lieutenant's crowns freshly sewn into the lapels, that Kallen let herself breathe and her mask lapse.


This isn't me.


This isn't who I am. I'm not Britannian. I'm not Kallen Stadtfeld.


My name is Kozuki Kallen. Japanese and proud of it. Not an Eleven, never a Britannian.


I'm me. This isn't me.


But, the old cruel voice she'd dreaded for years said, insinuating itself into the forefront of her mind from whatever dark pit it laired within, a person is nothing less than the sum of their decisions. Who we are is always subject to change, for good and for ill. That cadet's uniform really wasn't feeling all that uncomfortable on the way over, was it? And all of Dad's lessons were so easy to take in, easy to learn from…


You've trusted him this far; let him work his skulduggery over that seat-filler of a general. What's a few more choices, hmm? You'll still be you, after all.


Head tucked in her locker, just in case there were any cameras hidden away in the eaves of the locker room, Kallen shuddered convulsively, clenching her teeth as her face twitched. She wanted to cry, to scream, to rage and kick and destroy until the world was better and she was spent.


The worst part of it all wasn't that she had no outlet for those urges – soon, she'd have practically unlimited license to destroy as she willed – but that she had nothing to refute everything the voice said. She was changing, was learning, was growing into the role the mission had ordained.


My skin isn't my own, Kallen thought crazily, and sobbed a laugh as she pulled her head out of her locker and slammed the door shut. It bounced back open immediately, but Kallen was already stalking towards the exit, uncaring of the discarded cadet uniform she was leaving behind or even the wallet with its hidden knife.


Everything Lieutenant Kallen Stadtfeld could let herself care about right now was in the Knightmare hanger, in the rack reserved for the Squad 2 lieutenant's ride.


I'm going to war… I'm doing my duty… I'm carrying that mountain…


But how long will it be until I'm crushed under its weight? Crushed, pressed… and like a diamond, born anew?

---

When the ready room's overhead speaker squawked to life, Kallen couldn't have been more relieved.


"Squad Two, Squad Two," boomed out Major Coltain's electronically distorted voice. "To your Knightmares! Deployment in T-minus three minutes!"


Already antsy from the wait and irritated with the unsubtle looks her three new squadmates kept shooting her whenever they thought she wasn't looking, Kallen was on her feet and surging towards the door to the Knightmare bay before Coltain hung up his mic.


Behind her, Sergeant Hamm chivvied the two other H's to their feet, but Kallen had no time for any of them. She'd already buried her head in the mission, desperately hoping to drown her troubles in the work that lay ahead.


The Sutherland's cockpit closed around her like a steel coffin, plunging her briefly into total darkness. An eyeblink later and the displays flashed into life as the Knightmare's FactSphere woke up. The fingers of one hand danced along the dashboard, firing off a system's check while the other fumbled with her seat's straps. Below her feet, her mechanical mount's Sakuradite core revved to life, stung into motion by the electric impulse of the starting motor.


Seven seconds later and her system check completed. Safely strapped in, Kallen took the span of another few breaths to check the automatic results, checking the status of her battery and her engine's output before marking the system check as completed.


Then, she checked on her squadmates.


Hankey, a lanky man with curly ginger hair and an apparent inability to moderate the volume of his voice, a trait that had already led Kallen to mentally peg him as a pale imitation of Tamaki, had only just reached his Knightmare. As she watched, he thumped the side of his still open cockpit, cursing as he fumbled his authentication code.


Sergeant Hamm and Corporal Hayes were only better by degrees. As the designated squad leader, the status of all of her subordinate units was piped to a sub-display in the corner of her monitor. According to that, they were still busy with the initiation sequences, though as she watched, Hamm's status updated to reflect that his system check was running.


Amateurs, she sneered, disengaging the maintenance cradle's locking arms and wheeling her Sutherland out into the middle of the bay and towards the arms rack. Coltain really wasn't kidding…


Kallen had thought her father had been overestimating her talents when he'd thrust her into this position. Now that she got to see what dregs the base had been working with, she couldn't help but wonder if the best way she could sabotage the Hiroshima Garrison would be to simply leave them to their own devices and watch as the fools tripped over their own feet.


"Control, this is Pilot Two-One," said Kallen, pressing the transmission stud on her radio. "Do you copy? Over."


"Pilot Two-One, we hear you," replied a communications officer back in the War Room, where Kallen knew a tactical console would be guiding her unit's deployment. "Request status update, over."


"Control, all pilots are mounted." Kallen quickly checked to see if this was true; Hankey was just closing his cockpit.


Good enough.


"Squad Two will be ready to roll in another minute, over."


"Copy that, Two-One," came the prompt reply. "Will update with the current tactical situation then. Over."


Waiting on the rack for her squad were four of the Knightmare-scaled rifles, purposefully designed for the Sutherland's three fingered hands. Kallen selected one for herself, performing a quick and thorough check of the rifle, running through the routine ground into her skull by Major Pitt. Finding nothing amiss, she slid the weapon into a magnetized holster and slapped it onto her thigh next to a handful of extra oversized magazines and a knife. That last was most likely unnecessary, between her rifle and her slash harkens, but Kallen was of the firm opinion that one could never have too many knives.


When she turned around, three cyclopian giants stood waiting, each a four meter shadow in purple and grey.


No, Kallen reminded herself, fourteen foot shadows. Britannians use feet.


"Well?" Kallen demanded, opening the squad channel and hailing the other three Sutherlands. "Anything to report? Issues? Concerns? Over."


"...You're really fast, Lieutenant." That was Pilot Two-Two, Sergeant Hamm. Kallen couldn't tell if his voice was admiring or surprised.


No, you're just unbearably slow, she thought, already biting back the familiar bile from all the Britannian brownnosing. Any half decent veteran would be ready to go in half the time it takes for a rookie like me to prep. You lot… Inexcusable. Simply inexcusable.


"I'll take that to mean you're all ready to deploy, Pilot Two-Two," said Kallen, allowing just a hint of acerbic dryness to color her reply. "Does Major Coltain usually provide the brief? Control mentioned a tactical update, over."


"Yes, ma'am," answered Pilot Two-Four, Hayes, who seemed like the quiet man of the trio. "But that's usually for, like, training situations or routine patrols. Not… this."


Before Kallen could comment on his poor radio discipline, Two-Four quickly amended his answer with an "Over."


Amateurs, Kallen thought again, feeling her gut twist at sheer, awkward greenness on display.


Just contempt, she told herself. These utter morons… I know they aren't the best of the best, but surely only nepotism carried these bumbling dumbassess through cadet school and whatever passed for their basic training. Even Pitt's standards weren't this low.


"Ma'am?" It was Hamm again, Two-Two. "Permission to ask a question, over."


"...Granted," Kallen allowed despite herself. "Ask away, over."


"Have you seen combat before? Only… well, you showed up in a cadet uniform but now you're a regular lieutenant. Over."


"Worried about who you'll be following?" Kallen sneered into her mic, imagining the doubt in the useless Britannian boy's eyes. She was not going to waste display space on the indulgence of a video transmission.


"No ma'am!" answered Two-Two immediately, displaying the lack of spine Kallen had come to expect from commoners and Petty Nobility in the face of their betters. "Just wondering, ma'am!"


Britannians…


Then, a thought crossed Kallen's mind.


Although… Father is always telling me that I'm a lioness. I'm not playing the meek little student anymore, I'm supposed to be a member of the Greater Nobility, a rising star playing the part of the debutante on the greatest stage of all. In that case… Arrogance it is.


"Just wondering… over," Kallen corrected, overemphasizing her real disdain and twisting the concluding word in her mouth. "Use proper protocol or don't speak at all, Two-Two. Over."


"Yes ma'am! Over!"


Then, of course, the idiot decided to speak up.


"Don't worry, Two-One." In the privacy of her cockpit, Kallen groaned as Hankey's cocky, loud voice echoed around her steel box. "We'll look out for you out there. No need to be worried, you know! We're veterans! Over~!"


"Two-Three?" Kallen allowed the sunny sweetness of her father's cadence to shine through her voice, as vibrant as a chemical sunrise. "Thank you for being a dear and volunteering to take point on our first approach. Your gallantry is much appreciated. Over."


Thoroughly slapped down, Hankey only clicked a response. Neither of the other two H's seemed inclined to come to their comrade's rescue. Silence reigned as the rest of the squad got their weapons organized.


Then, thirty seconds late, Control chimed back in.


"Pilot Two-One, Pilot Two-One," the cockpit radio crackled from the dash. "Acknowledge, over."


"Control, this is Two-One," Kallen replied, effortlessly switching the channel back and toggling the transmit key with the slightest twitch of her thumb. "I hear you, over."


Just as Majors Pitt and Coltain had promised, the Sutherland's control scheme was like night and day compared to the old Glasgow configuration. Everything was just so easy and intuitively placed. Even the air conditioning was working perfectly.


Kallen tried not to resent how natural it felt to sit behind the steel beast's yoke.


"Pilot Two-One," the anonymous tactical officer back in the War Room droned, "you are ordered to lead your squad to grid square 34N. Repeat, 34N. We have reports of anti-air elements in the area covering advancing infantry. Your primary objective is to eliminate the anti-air elements. A VTOL has been downed in the area. Your secondary objective is to find the crash site and evacuate any survivors of the crew. Over."


Rather lacking in details, aren't we. It sounded like a nightmare already. How many AA are there, what type, what's protecting them, how many infantry are there… Hell, how many air crew and soldiers were on that VTOL?


The Sutherland may have many upgrades but passenger capacity was not one of them. Do they just expect us to scoop the survivors out of the wreckage and carry them back to the Garrison with our hands? All of these things would be good to know.


"Copy, Control. Any information on enemy strength? Over."


"Negative, Pilot Two-One." Kallen's heart sank. "Just get in there, kill the anti-air guns so our birds can fly freely, and get out. Over.


"Copy, Control. Out." Another easy adjustment switched the channel to the squad's band. "That was the war room. We're heading to 34N to hunt and kill AA. If we can, we're supposed to find out where that VTOL went down and see if anybody's still alive. Any questions? Over."


Still cowed, her squad stood silent.


"Then let's roll." Kallen paused, considered, then thumbed her radio back on. "Two-Three on point. Let's give Hankey the privilege of demonstrating his gallantry. Over."

---

On arrival at the patch of the Hiroshima Settlement known to her only as Grid Square 34N, Kallen understood immediately why the Powers That Be, presumably her father and Brigadier Axelrod, had chosen to forsake the place.


Between the stone-lined river channel and the north-south highway already cratered with shell holes running parallel along the western side of the grid square, passage on foot would be almost impossible in that direction. The built-up interior of the square was dominated by the burning remnants of a once prosperous shopping mall, the fumes and flames of which conspired with the flimsy construction to make the entire complex useless for shelter against the punishing artillery.


Altogether indefensible and difficult to traverse, was Kallen's conclusion.


Her fellow pilots seemed to agree.


"These damned roads!" Hamm cursed over the squad channel, narrowly dodging either a very large pothole or a surprisingly small shellhole. It hadn't taken much damage to render the terrain nearly impassible for landspinners. "What the hell's DPW been doing?!"


"Clear the comms," Kallen snapped, privately agreeing with the sergeant. "Two-Three, any sign of hostile activity?"


"No ma'am," Hankey reported back from his position fifty yards ahead of her and Hamm. Hayes, bringing up the tail of their little formation, trailed fifty yards behind. "Found some friendlies, though."


The friendlies in question, the consolidated remains of two infantry companies, greeted the arriving Knightmares with a chorus of ragged cheers. The soldiers' grey-helmeted forms peered out from windows and doors of the residential building they'd taken over as a temporary blockhouse, apparently on the presumed strength of its brick walls.


To Kallen, very familiar with the fragility of civilian structures in the face of artillery after hearing far too many of Tanya's frantic lectures about Shinjuku's vulnerability to Britannian shelling, the entire place looked like a death trap, one made enticing by an illusion of safety.


Not that she had any intention of saying as much.


With luck, she thought, vicious behind her blank face, a nice big 155 will land right on top of their damned roof.


But for now… to work.


"Who's in charge here?" Kallen demanded over the common channel. "This is Lieutenant Stadtfeld, Knightmare Corps. Do you lot have any officers left?"


"Lieutenant," a new voice crackled back in reply, "this is Lieutenant Winuk. I… uh… I think I'm the new commanding officer of 3rd Company."


"You think you're in charge, soldier?" Kallen pressed.


"Major bit it in the first round of strikes. Saw a shell land right on him. Poor bastard didn't have a chance." The lieutenant sighed into his radio. "Haven't been able to reach the captain in all this mess. Coulda been killed already and we just don't know it. Not like there was much left of the major to find. Eleven bastards could have captured him in all this shit too. Either that, or… Uh…"


The lieutenant trailed off pointedly.


Or the captain decided to cut and run the moment the people he was grinding under his boot actually fought back, Kallen filled in. Desertion and cowardice before the enemy is a summary execution charge in His Imperial Majesty's Army. Not that some privileged captain would expect to see any of that, of course. Rough Britannian "justice" is strictly for the lessers, don't you know?


Instead of saying any of that, though, she moved on.


"You saw the VTOL go down, Lieutenant?" Kallen inquired, wondering which of the anonymous helmeted and masked figures was Winuk. "More importantly, did you see where the enemy fired on it from? Over."


"There's a hill about half a mile northeast from here," said Winuk. "If I were to put an anti-air gun anywhere around here, that's where I'd set up. That's about the direction the fire that hit the VTOL came from too."


Peering through the smoke and the still-standing multi-story buildings, Kallen thought she could just make out the forested slope of the hill in question.


It's not much of a hill, the Soldier noted, but Hiroshima's built on a flood plain. You wouldn't need much elevation to have a commanding view.


It was the prime location for an anti-air emplacement.


There's no way we'll come back alive if we run straight at it though.


That much was equally obvious. The space between the hill and 34N was heavily developed with residential and light commercial structures, chock full of hidey-holes where soldiers could wait in anticipation for Britannian attempts at revenge with shoulder-launched missiles at the ready.


Besides, Kallen noted hopefully, if the officer in charge of the gun is smart, he'll have moved by now. Ready to pop another Britannian bird whenever the next idiot sets out on a strafing run.


So, what do I do?


"We're heading out after the VTOL," Kallen announced to her squad, changing the channel back to the band she'd used to speak to Lieutenant Winuk. "Any idea where that bird went down?"


"East of us," Winuk reported. "I doubt either of the pilots are alive, though. The company holding that sector had to pull back when the Numbers started to swarm. That was why the VTOL was there to begin with: to provide fire support. By now, those Eleven bastards are probably crawling all over the wreck. If the Lord's merciful, the pilots both died on impact."


Privately, Kallen agreed with Winuk's assessment.


"I'll not be leaving any valuable pilots behind," she said out loud. "Hold here until we return, Lieutenant."


She had no right to order him to do anything, not given their parity in rank and especially not how junior Kallen was in hers. But not all lieutenants are equal, and lieutenants sitting in Sutherlands with voices dripping with noble arrogance and touches of a Homeland accent are quite a bit more equal than others. A fact apparently not lost on the infantry lieutenant.


"We'll hold this location until you return, or until we get new orders," said Lieutenant Winuk, his phrasing implying that he'd come to the decision himself, as if Kallen hadn't just given him an order to his face. "Happy hunting, Lieutenant."


"God bless."


"Splatter a savage for me, Lieutenant. Winuk out."


Bastard stole the last word! Kallen seethed, teeth gritting. Just who the hell does he think he is?


"We're moving out," she told her squad. "Two-Three, you're on point again. Everybody, eyes up and fingers on your trigger. We're looking for wherever the Elevens stashed that AA gun."


The mask of Hankey's Sutherland was as stoic as a robot could be, but Kallen fancied she could hear the would-be gallant cursing as he rolled past the impromptu blockhouse, his landspinners kicking up sparks on the broken asphalt.


The thought was enough to squeeze a grin out of Kallen as she fell into place behind Two-Two, Sergeant Hamm following Hankey at Kallen's gesture.


Nothing like ruining a Brit's day to make the sun shine a little brighter.


Although the Knightmares stood at roughly double the height of a man, the two- and three-story buildings of the residential district between Grid Square 34N and the hill that Lieutenant Winuk had indicated still overshadowed the war-machines. Swiveling her FactSphere from left to right, searching curtained windows and rooflines for lurking figures, all Kallen could think about were Tanya's stories of the ambush she'd effected, where she and her fellow soldiers of the Rising Sun had waited until the Knightmares rolled down the road and into the divide cutting through the hillside, presenting the vulnerable sides of their cockpit pods for the waiting ambushers.


It would be just my luck if these guys got her old notes, Kallen thought sourly. Hell, they probably got one better – Tanya had that JLF officer with her, didn't she? Or he was close by, at least. If these guys really are the JLF, they probably learned what she did straight from him.


Suddenly, every window seemed to yawn open, a mouth with a rocket-propelled grenade protruding from its gullet. Every roof had a heavy machine-gun hidden behind each decorative crenelation and air exchange unit. When the blinds hanging behind a half-open window clattered in the desultory breeze, Kallen nearly opened fire at the sound and the movement in her peripheral sight.


So convinced was Kallen that the Japanese moving into Hiroshima wouldn't neglect the tactical advantages offered by the roofline that the attack, when it came two minutes later, caught her almost completely by surprise.


"Contact front!" shouted Two-Three, Hankey, over the sudden hammering of his rifle. "Bunch of Numbers on foot!"


Kallen turned just in time to see the attackers. There were five of them, all in grimy civilian clothes and all at least in their middle years. A few carried improvised weapons, pipes and hand tools, and the one furthest in the back was struggling to pull the pin from a fragmentation grenade.


Not JLF, the Soldier knew, but civilian Numbers joining the rising. Coming for their liberation.


Kallen barely had time to clap eyes on the knot of rebels then Hankey corrected his aim. Previously too high, his fire flicked down and swept the street, massive rounds capable of ripping through armor and leaving holes in brick walls the size of a man's fist scything down the unarmored Japanese.


It was massive overkill, but somehow the man with the grenade made it through the burst of fire untouched. Splattered with the blood and shredded viscera of his leading companions, face twisted into a snarl of defiant hate, he at last managed to free the pin from his grenade.


The shot from Sergeant Hamm, Pilot Two-Two, dropped him, what was left of his head raining down on his corpse and on the live grenade slipping from nerveless fingers.


By the time the tardy explosion cracked across the street, mulching the bodies of the unfortunate insurgents, Kallen was already turning, the tonfa deploying from her Sutherland's wrist.


A decoy unit! she realized, her internal monologue belatedly catching up with her instincts as bullets pinged off the arm she'd raised to protect her Knightmare's vulnerable FactSphere. Of course that's what the JLF would use any civilian volunteers for!


It wasn't a bad idea, Kallen had to admit. Undisciplined and untrained, the volunteers would have nothing but their passion and their bodies to offer the Cause.


And offer them they did.


From every door, men and women rushed the Knightmare squad. Further away, down a block and even up in the garret rooms Kallen had been eyeing, figures in olive uniforms broke cover to shoot down at the Britannian war machines.


No children though, Kallen noted with relief. No young adults either. Just middle-aged and up.


Sacrificing the least useful from the start? The realization made Kallen shiver, ice water seeping down her spine. Whoever was commanding the JLF here in this sector was cold.


Which means, she realized, they'll have absolutely no issue making sacrifices.


"Back!" she yelled into the radio channel. "Back down the road! Don't let any of them near you!"


"What?" It was Hankey again. Of course it was Hankey. "Lieutenant, they're just rabble! What–"


Hairs rising on the back of her neck, Kallen didn't wait for the threat she suddenly knew that rushing, screaming wave of humanity posed. Her slash harkens erupted from her shoulders, the jet-fired steel blades lashing out at the end of their trailing, wailing cables to slash across the first rank of that wave, cleaving through limbs and opening guts with ease.


From at least three locations within the sudden charnelhouse quagmire, explosions erupted as grenades clenched in the hands of the Japanese suicidally determined to take a Brit with them to hell cooked off.


"That was an order, Two-Three!" Kallen commanded, and this time Hankey obeyed without any backtalk, miracle of miracles. "Fall back to the last intersection! Two-Two, Two-Four, leapfrog us! Don't let them close!"


Then she was next to Hankey, her landspinners vomiting up a sea of wet splatter as she zipped straight through still more civilian volunteers swarming from behind. Unlike the hellish car-ride she'd taken with Errol and her father an hour or so earlier, the bodies weren't enough to shift her Knightmare or even produce a noticeable impact.


The ease through which her multi-ton mount trampled down her countrymen made it so much worse.


Don't think about it, don't think about it, don't think about it, she chanted to herself, incapable of thinking about anything but what a traitor she was, how far she had fallen.


If you think about it, the Soldier murmured, you'll go insane.


Advancing the Cause was always going to require sacrifices. That was the Revolutionary, surprisingly enough. Don't let theirs go to waste.


"Far enough!" Kallen barked into the radio as she and Two-Three hit the intersection. "Here's far enough. Two-Two, Two-Four, back."


Heeding her words, Hamm and Hayes did so, retreating on their landspinners without turning their backs on the distant JLF soldiers still peppering them with small arms fire.


Align the sights with your target, then squeeze the trigger, Tanya murmured from her memories, the younger girl's voice as coolly calm as Kallen had ever heard it. Manage your shots. Spray and pray rarely helps.


Her rifle thudded against her Knightmare's waist. With its sights slaved to her monitor, and at this paltry range, there was no real need to bring the weapon up to "her" shoulder.


The Knightmare's aping of human form was, after all, only skin-deep.


"Report, Squad Two," Kallen demanded as Two-Two and Two-Four took up stations behind her and Two-Three, facing the opposite way. "Any damage?"


"None."


"No, ma'am."


"All clean."


"As am I," said Kallen.


Except for my hands.


That wasn't quite correct. Her "hands," the multi-digited manipulators the Sutherland generally used to handle its upscaled weapons, were entirely clean.


Her slash harkens, though, were not. Blood was oozing out of the shoulder slots housing the retractable jet-propelled blades, leaving two trails running down the chest of her Knightmare.


A match, Kallen was sure, to the feet and shins of her Knightmare.


Brothers and sisters, husbands and fathers and sons and daughters and mothers…


Kallen wanted to weep, but when she spoke again, her voice was cold and clear. "We go back in," she directed. "Until we find that AA gun, our mission is incomplete.


"If we remain in one location, we will get swamped by the Elevens," she continued. "Speed will be our armor. We will split into pairs to cover more territory. Move quickly and stop for nothing. If you see the anti-air element, pass the coordinates along and we'll rally on that point.


"Questions?"


"Yes," said Sergeant Hamm. "What about the crash site?"


Damn, Kallen cursed, remembering the secondary objective. Almost forgot about it.


"Hankey and I will start that way," answered Kallen. "If we see anything along the way, so much the better. If not, we'll circle around to the north and loop back down. Got it?"


"Copy."


Without further discussion, Hamm and Hayes peeled off and skated off to the west, the wheels of their landspinners blurring below their perfectly stationary feet.


"...Let me guess," said Hankey, voice crackling through a direct channel. "I'm on point again."


"Clever boy!" Kallen cooed, mockingly sweet. Then, voice hard, "If you question my orders again, you'll wish tripwire duty was the extent of your punishment. Clear?"

"Crystal, Lieutenant."

---

The first Kallen saw of the wrecked VTOL was the plume of smoke threading its way up.


It was far from the only smoke rising from the Hiroshima Settlement. Missiles from the Royal Navy light cruiser Forsythe had started a massive blaze in the rugged foothills northeast of the city while shells from Japanese artillery had started innumerable structure fires all throughout the city itself.


But Kallen hadn't noticed any artillery falling on this sector, presumably because the JLF's junior officers leading at the front had radioed back their success in overrunning the region. Without the artillery, the smoke rising ahead of them lacked any obvious cause.


And it just so happens to be right where that infantry officer said it would be. East of 34N.


Her radio crackled as Hankey, half a block ahead, opened a channel. "Just saw someone run around the corner, Lieutenant. Think they beat us to the crash."


No shit.


Kallen would have been shocked if the Japanese hadn't reached the crash yet. It had been at least twenty minutes since the VTOL had gone down.


Out loud, she commanded Hankey, "Keep your eyes open. We need to see the corpses before we write the pilots off."


"We could probably just say they're dead," objected Hankey. "They probably died on impact, and if they survived, no way the Numbers left them alive."


"Why, Pilot Hankey, you certainly wouldn't be trying to shirk your knightly duty to the Empire now, would you?" Kallen in a passable imitation of her father's saccharine drawl. "After all, shirkers have no place in His Imperial Majesty's Knightmare Corps, and I would simply hate having to report your sins to Major Coltain."


You aren't getting out of this that easily, coward.


"N-no ma'am!" Hankey quickly stuttered out. "I-I just… uh… wanted to be more… efficient about taking out those AA guns, yeah!"


"Mhm… Two-Two, Two-Four," Kallen said, a grin tugging at her lips as she heard the boy squirm, but she kept it from her voice as she switched over to the squad channel. "Status report, over."


"We've hit scattered resistance," Hamm replied, the dull whine of a Knightmare-sized rifle accelerating rounds audible in the background. "Just infantry so far, with some irregulars. Over."


"We're about two hundred yards west of the probable crash site. Circle south and meet us there. We think they're waiting for us. Over."


"Copy that. Pilot Two-Two out."


Kallen rolled up next to Hankey, who was still standing in the street, his FactSphere scanning the buildings up ahead, where the road curved out of sight.


"Why is it so quiet?" the other pilot wondered aloud. "We've been hitting random groups of Numbers this whole time, but now everybody's gone? Doesn't that seem weird to you, Lieutenant?"


"...Yes," Kallen reluctantly agreed. She was still eyeing the rising smoke plume. It had begun to thin and to lighten, perhaps as the supply of available fuel depleted. "Either the Elevens have all moved on, or they're concentrating their forces somewhere."


She tried to keep her mind fixed squarely on the tactical situation. It was more productive to think about what order she would give next than to wonder just how many families she'd ruined today. Easier to think of them as just numbers. As Numbers.


I hate this. I hate this so much. I feel sick.


"If they're waiting for us," said Kallen, pushing the rising nausea back down, "then the more time we give them, the harder everything will be."


"Harder?" Hankey snorted incredulously. "Please, Lieutenant! The Elevens might have gotten the jump on us this morning, but they're still just a bunch of peons armed with hoes and their grandfathers' guns. We're in 5th generation Knightmares. They can dig in if they like, maybe make a few traps, but if they're smart, they're avoiding this district. We've already proven we can cut through them like a knife through butter."


It's amazing how patronizing he can be without any real shift in his vocabulary.


Not for the first time that day, or even that hour, Kallen wondered if she could get away with a "friendly fire accident."


It would be so, so satisfying… and it is just the two of us here…


But it would endanger our mission, said the Revolutionary, not unsympathetically. 'Be the best Britannian you can be, until it's time to come home.'


…Besides, he's such a blithering idiot that I probably don't even need to manufacture an "accident" for him. I just need to be patient and wait for nature to take its course.


"My my, such inspiring words!" Kallen said with acrid cheerfulness, "Why, with such confidence as our shield in these trying times, how can we possibly fail?"


"...So, I'm on point again, aren't I?"


"Got it in one."


On the dashboard monitor reserved for the digital map of her surroundings, two IFF icons appeared to the southeast of her position.


Hamm and Hayes are in position, it seems.


"Alright, Two-Four," Kallen said, her Knightmare beginning to move once again, "to the crash site, on the double!"


"Yes, ma'am!"


Five yards behind Hankey, spinning through the sparks kicked up by his passing, Kallen found herself remembering a different battle she'd sprinted headlong into, bursting in among an enemy concentration of unknown strength and disposition.


She remembered the train station.


For a moment, her big brother's broad back overlayed Hankey's Sutherland, pounding up the broken asphalt ahead of her. The dusty black of the road and the dirty gray of the sidewalk flashed by her, broken up by a memory of a wet redness spreading from the man Tanya had killed.


It hadn't quite been like that, Kallen thought, still lucid enough to remember different details as she sped through the memory and plunged down the dark stairs. But the feeling was there…


It had been the first battle she'd intentionally participated in, over her brother's wishes. Just as would happen again and again, Tanya had overruled Naoto and pulled Kallen along in her service to the Cause.


I wonder how Big Bro reacted when he heard Tanya had ordered me to go along with joining the Brits?


She hoped the blow-up hadn't been too bad.


I hope they're still both alive.


Unlike all the Japanese patriots I've killed today… Somebody else's big brothers, dads… Friends…


They erupted out into the parking lot of a church at almost the same time the other half of Squad Two shot out from between a row of houses to the south. The VTOL, Kallen saw, had come down hard on some sort of shed or outbuilding, the remnants of which smoldered around the downed aircraft's shattered tail.


And waiting for them, between the cars…


Already in motion, Kallen hurled her Knightmare to the side, both of her landspinners leaving the pavement and slamming down on a landscaped traffic island in a desperate bid for lateral traction. Turf and dirt were sprayed through the air as her own body was thrown about in her iron coffin from the last second maneuver. Hankey, lacking either her keen eyes or quick reflexes, wasn't so speedy.


A roaring wall of noise cut through the clearing as the waiting AA gun's near-solid stream of armor-piercing rounds sheared effortlessly through his Sutherland's left arm. If the gunners handling the outmoded towed piece had aimed just half a meter, or even just a foot, further to the right, the spewing rounds would have bisected the Knightmare's torso.


"Contact! Contact!" Kallen yelled through the channel back to the tactical control officer. "Control, we've found the AA gun and the crash, at the same location! We have encountered heavy resistance, over!"


"Copy that, Pilot Two-One." Control's voice was gone; Major Coltain was on the line. "Estimated strength?"


Spinning around the corner of a house, Kallen strafed right across the street, her rifle spitting death across the cluttered parking lot towards the olive green figures sheltering in the church and between the cars.


"Fifty to eighty infantry," she breathed, "with small arms. One towed anti-air gun."
A large platoon with a single heavy gun is heavy resistance for two Six Generation Knightmare Frames? The Soldier snorted. Britannians certainly are mighty conquerors.


Something whizzed out from between the double doors of a bar and left a vapor trail behind as it skimmed right past Two-Two and continued out of the view of Kallen's FactSphere. "At least some missile launchers, probably shoulder-fired, over."


"Copy that, Two-One," Coltain snapped. "Disregard your secondary objective. Hold in place for two minutes, then retreat a quarter mile back. Your coordinates have been forwarded to the Forsythe as a priority target. Over."


"Copy that, Control." Something moved in the alleyway right beside her. Before she could think about it, Kallen backhanded whatever had been there, slapping it away like a pesky fly. The man in worker's dungarees slammed into the wall and Kallen imagined a sickening crunch. When he fell forwards, he left a bloody shadow behind where his head had pulped against the whitewash. "Hold two minutes, then away. Two-One out."


Two minutes, when every second could be my last!


But Kallen's body, in flagrant disregard for her divided, screaming mind, was already in motion. The Sutherland was her second skin, its armor her dress, and when her hands moved, it was with an almost instinctual grace that her Knightmare spun out from the temporary cover offered by the alley.


Her assault rifle was raised, the FactSphere alive with probable threat locations derived from thermal flashes and detected motion.


"Squeeze the trigger; don't jerk," Tanya advised from a memory of a different life, from the cramped lanes of an impromptu range set up in a Shinjuku basement.


Kallen followed her friend's, her commander's, advice.


Perhaps the cars the Japanese insurgents and JLF soldiers were hiding behind could have provided some protection against small arms; they certainly offered none in the face of Knightmare rounds. Kallen's return fire slashed just across the top of the parked cars, deliberately too high to hit the men and women squatting between the vehicles.


A thermal detection or two vanished from her FactSphere's tracking.


Kallen bit her lip hard enough to bleed.


Behind her, Two-Three erupted from the alleyway behind her, firing his weapon with his Knightmare's remaining hand. The weapon bucked wildly, sending bullets capable of piercing lightly armored military vehicles careening through the church's frontage and into the surrounding homes.


"Take it, you bastards!" Hankey was shrieking over the squad channel, his earlier arrogance nowhere in evidence, as was anything resembling the much-touted Britannian courage under fire and cool martial prowess.


Perhaps the gunners manning that cannon shot them off when they took his Frame's arm? The Revolutionary thought, amused despite the circumstances. Oh, listen to the proud Britannian! Truly, nothing conveys mastery of the world quite like the barely concealed panic in his yelp.


Sparks cascaded from the pavement as Kallen slalomed across the torn-up road, knees bent to lower her profile as she strafed the cars in the parking lot when she could get around the stalled vehicles out in the street. She danced between running leaps when the road was completely blocked and then crouching spins and hairpin twists atop her smoking, befouled landspinners when the road cleared up.


From the roof of a two-story apartment building, the vapor trail of a missile lanced out, passing just over where her head would have been. Biting back a curse, Kallen glared up at the tiny figure hurling the still-smoking disposable tube away. She could have died just then, would have died if not for luck or perhaps the missiler's experience. Either way, she had no intention to give them a chance to correct their error.


"Someone nail that roof!" Kallen ordered into the comms, bitter and cold and without permitting a hint of the sudden terror spiking at this renewed awareness of her own mortality to touch her voice. Her own gun clicked empty. "I'm reloading!"


"On it, Ma'am." It was Hayes, Two-Four, who had spoken. The quiet man of the unit. Fifty yards further on down the road, standing perfectly still in defiance of the bullets pinging off its heavy frontal armor, his Sutherland raised its rifle and housed the targeted roof down.


There was no signature moment of clarity where his shot obliterated the brave Japanese soldier's body, no precise bit of marksmanship. Instead, Hayes proved that the anonymous Corps officers who had skimmed the cream away everywhere and sent it all to Indochina had been correct when they categorized him as part of the dregs. His hail of fire perforated the house, tearing up the walls and roof in a long chain of staccato gunshots rather than anything resembling the short controlled bursts Kallen knew he'd been trained to use.


Either way, no further rockets swooped down to punish Hayes for his temerity of standing still and upright on a battlefield, like a soldier in a line regiment two centuries ago. Either the Japanese soldier with the missile launcher had been hit, or he'd moved on to find another perch to hurl defiance down at Kallen's unit.


Despite how close the soldier had come to killing her, Kallen desperately hoped it was the latter.


"Good shot!" she yelled into the radio in place of the lament she wanted to give voice. "Now, get the hell down, you bloody fool!"


"Ma'am!" Sergeant Hamm, Two-Two, called out over the channel. Kallen quickly checked her display's map. The petty officer was on Hayes's right, the furthest unit north in her squad. "I have eyes on the VTOL pilots!'


They're alive?! If so, that was at least a minor miracle, considering how many Japanese there were surrounding the crash site.


"Where, Two-Two?" Kallen demanded, still not halting her constant, zigzagging motions. Her eyes were glued on the AA gun. Its handlers were urgently limbering the towed weapon up for transport, hitching it to a battered truck. They're green and scared too, just like my squadmates. Green vegetables, fresh from the depot, the Soldier clinically noted. They'd be better off standing and fighting.


If she wanted to, Kallen was sure she could take them. It wouldn't even be that hard of a shot. "Are they alive?"


"...Permission to share my feed with you, Ma'am?" Uncertainty entered Two-Two's voice, audible even over the channel's static and the blood hammering in Kallen's ears. "I'm… not sure if they're alive or not."


Using her access as the squad leader, Kallen opened the view from Sergeant Hamm's FactSphere into a new window and understood immediately why the man had sounded so thoroughly put-off.


Clearly, the locals hadn't wasted any time when they swarmed over the fallen VTOL and pulled the two pilots from the wreckage. Their flight suits, uncomfortably close to Kallen's own pilot suit in appearance and design, hung in rags; the flesh laid naked and bare was laced with blood. Though one of the pilots was dark-skinned and the other dusky compared to Kallen's own pale hide, she could still clearly see the mottled bruising through Hamm's feed.


The compound fractures of shins broken with a hammer were unmistakable.


The beatings must have happened quickly, and were, Kallen guessed, the work of the civilian volunteers who had probably reached the crash site first. Harsh, angry, but uncontrolled.


The rest of what had been done to them, she felt comfortable in assigning to the JLF once they had arrived on scene. Morbidly, she wondered if they had brought skewers for this express purpose, or if the long spans of steel had been salvaged from a flagpole or similar. Either way, those poles transected what was left of the pilots.


That they didn't push the tips out through the neck must have been deliberate, Kallen thought, detachedly noting how Hamm's confusion was quite justifiable. Even she was not certain if they were alive or dead. There was motion but it could have been due to the wobble of each pole. Yes, definitely deliberate. They wanted to drag it out. Look, someone lashed a crossbar, to keep them from sliding down the pole when they propped it upright.


I suppose expecting men to stand on broken shins was a bit too much of an ask.


Psychological warfare, the Soldier noted. If we'd entered the square from the south, by the main road, we would have seen those two at once. Hell of a demoralizer, for any Britannian rescue force.


And, the Revolutionary noted, one hell of a banner to fight under. Proof that the Occupiers can bleed, that even their mightiest are but mortal flesh. A pilot, ripped from their machine and turned into a badge of the revolution in the flesh…


Kallen shuddered.


"Leave them." It was an easy call twice over. It squared with her orders, and there was absolutely no chance that those men were going to survive. And their Emperor was not, by any account, overly inclined to demonstrate mercy for those who failed in his service.


Besides, why should I risk my neck for a pair of Brits?


"But, Lieutenant!" Predictably, it was Hankey. "We can't just leave them! We're already here!"


Kill him! Kill him right fucking now! In this, both her Britannian and Japanese sides were united in their sentiment. Question my orders, will he?


"Shut it, Pilot Hankey," Kallen snarled into the line, hanging onto her mission with iron will. "That wasn't a suggestion, it was an order."


"Sorry, Lieutenant," spat Hankey, and Kallen could almost see his face reddening with his own affronted pride, "but like you said, there's no place for shirkers in the Corps!"


And then Two-Three was in motion, his one-armed Sutherland streaking across the churchgrounds turned warzone towards the wrecked VTOL.


None of the Japanese are shooting at him, Kallen realized, even as the rogue Knightmare neared the shattered outbuilding crushed under the VTOL. It's like they don't care if he gets close–


Some instinct in the back of her mind came to life and screamed for her to move. It might have been the part of her who had listened to her brother, Ohgi, and Tanya discuss how to turn Shinjuku into a killing floor for Britannian troops. It might have been the details her father had shared with her from reports about Nghia Lo.


Those instincts screamed for her to run, to put cover between herself and whatever was coming.


Instead, she started forward, after Hankey.


Damn him! Kallen screamed inside her skull, her own voice echoing off the swelteringly tight confines of her skull, her cockpit. This stupid fucking Brit! This damned upjumped peon! I'll kill him! I'll kill him myself!


No, her slash harken lanced out before her mind could even process it, not here and not now.


You belong to me.


That last thought, had Kallen had the time to recognize it, came not in the voice of Tanya, nor in the voice of any of the versions of herself she had dreamed up to represent the various facets of her complicated life.


Instead, it arrived unbidden in the voice of her father. In the voice, a little girl named Kallie knew, of Britannia.


But all her thoughts were running a distant second behind her now, a wispy tail behind the streaking comet of her jet-propelled anchor. The blade of her harken bit deep into the already broken shoulder of the blithering idiot, its steel cord a leash to wrench him back. Like a charging dog yanked off its feet by the cruel constriction of its chain, Hankey's Sutherland reeled back at her command, very nearly falling straight onto its back as the pilot within fought for his balance.


Then a wall of noise slammed into her.


Kallen felt like a brick loose in a typhoon, a heavy object carried aloft by a force that could not be resisted, in no way the mistress of her movements. The explosion jolted her teeth, punched her in the lungs, and rattled every inch of her Knightmare.


Artillery! screamed the Soldier, hammering for her to get to her feet, to move, to scramble out of the open and into cover. They must have pre-sighted on the crash, waiting for a rescue to come! When Hankey got close, an observer radioed in the signal!


No, a different corner of her brain demurred as Kallen clambered back to her feet, distantly surprised to find that she was still alive. And, it seemed, so was her squad. At least two of her unit's IFFs were still active, somewhere out in front of her in the smoky haze. Not artillery. They wouldn't have just fired a single shell.


The wreckage was boobytrapped, probably with a remote detonated bomb. The impaled pilots were the bait in a trap. A trap that Hankey fell for.


She spared a glance for Hankey's Knightmare. She had fallen flat on her face, or as close to that as a Knightmare could manage, but he'd fallen backwards, collapsed into something approximating a sitting position, with his pilot pod partially crumpled against the asphalt.


"Squad Two," Lieutenant Stadtfeld snapped into the general channel. "Headcount! Sound off."


"Two-Two here."


"Two-Four, all well."


"...Two-Three. I'm alive… Somehow…"


Kallen was just as surprised by this as Hankey sounded. "Two-Three, status report."


"That… that almost killed me," Hankey gasped breathlessly into his microphone, "Ma'am … You… You saved my life…."


She looked up and checked his Knightmare's status manually. It was, unsurprisingly, shot to shit. The outer armor was pitted, scared, and broken all across its torso and remaining limbs, the very bones of its frame were cracked, one landspinner had been wrenched off his leg and had flown across the street on the wings of the explosion, his oversized rifle was just so much scrap metal, and, and… Half a dozen other faults threw their red flags up as one in the squad command system even as Kallen ran disbelieving eyes across her display.


It's a miracle the moron actually survived, thought Kallen, privately bitter. God loves fools and protects them whenever He can, right?


"No," she corrected him, "I saved what was mine. You owe me Hankey. Everything you are, everything you ever will be, is yours no longer. You are mine, Pilot, a dead man walking, to be buried the moment I see fit."


My very own scrap of cannon fodder.


"...Ma'am, I-"


"Don't speak unless spoken to, Hankey," said Kallen, cutting the dead man off. "Lest I reconsider the wisdom in keeping you alive."


Wisely enough, Hankey finally got a clue and shut up. It was almost enough to soothe her anger.


When we get back to the Garrison… There will be a reckoning, she promised herself. Oh yes, a fucking reckoning will be had. Later. When I can enjoy it.


"Squad," Kallen barked into her communication relay, the indicator for her rifle's ammo status flashing green as she reloaded, a new magazine clicking home, "form up on me."


Now that the Japanese had shown their hand, it was her turn to attempt a trap. Coltain's orders had clearly been oriented towards attracting as many Japanese as possible to the downed VTOL and "entrapped" Knightmares. After the fighters from all of the surrounding blocks concentrated on her position, Kallen would lead her squad on a breakout just in time for the Forsythe to annihilate the congregated enemy in a single blow, along with the entire block.


A solution that, while workable, would minimize my own role in the victory, Kallen Stadtfeld, Britannian in thought and deed, noted with disdain. Any credit would go first to the Navy, then to Coltain.


All that matters is that AA gun, Kozuki Kallen noted, sentiment locked tight behind clenched lips. Destroying it is all I need to do to declare victory. Anything past that is unnecessary for my cover. That anti air cannon is the only heavy weapon here worth a damn; Britannians won't care about a few handfuls of Japanese with farm tools and ancient grenades when there's so many other problems to worry about today.


Take out the gun, the rebels don't have anything else to die for in this area, and the cruiser doesn't have to waste its artillery on obliterating mothers and fathers armed with lead pipes.


It was, Kallen decided, the shortest path through this horror, and so the only one she could take.


Just for a little less fraternal blood on my hands…


"Command wants that AA gun down," said Kallen into her microphone, speaking precisely and taking care not to let even a hint of the horrible survival calculus she'd run through slip into her voice to betray her. "So, we're going through the enemy to kill it."


Then she gunned her throttle.


The Three H's fell in on Kallen's tail in a classic diamond pattern, with the mangled, one-armed Hankey on her right, where his missing left arm would only slightly hamper him. Kallen barely noted how easily her subordinates jumped to obey without offering any backtalk or even cheers.


All of her attention was on the faces on her display, of the brave, doomed gunners still struggling to save their piece, refusing to abandon their gun as she bore down on them like Death herself.


It was over before it could begin. Kallen's thumb flicked over a switch, a deceptively small motion, and her other slash harken shot out of its housing, slicing through the air so quickly that the wind itself keened at its passing. Rocket-assisted blade met the wheels of the gun's assembly and the truck it was mounted to and tore through both without stopping, shredding all to the axle.


She tried not to think of the men and women, so desperate to hook the damn weapon up to the truck and fend them off, caught in its remorseless path.


Instead, teeth sinking deeper into her bleeding lip, she slammed her fists down, goading her Knightmare on and plunging the stone of her soul deep into the muck, where she wouldn't have to see it. The Sutherland, her ever faithful mount, heeded her guidance. The mighty war machine rammed straight into the crowd of her fellow Japanese patriots, each and every one the survivors of a thousand little battles and all willing to sell those preciously, painfully preserved lives in the name of Liberation. They turned to slurry beneath her multi-ton weight, human meat presenting not even a challenge to the ferociously spinning landspinners.


She pushed herself into the Sutherland and away from the horrible sprays in the corners of her FactSphere's vision, breathing hard as sweat poured down her brow and the stink of blood and opened bowels invaded her Knightmare through the damned air conditioning vents. Better to focus on the machine, on the mechanical actions she needed to do to accomplish her mission, than the human carnage she left in her wake.


Behind her, Two-Two and Two-Four's rifles pounded out a drumbeat, the rattling snares heralding her charge. She was a last curaissar, a relic of a dark day long past come again atop a steel horse, and like all cavalry in the midst of a swarm of undisciplined militia, she was unstoppable.


More Japanese surged forward to oppose them, like bees seeking to avenge a wounded nest. Most of these were in civilian clothes, and the only ones among them that Kallen bothered herself with were the suicidal grenadiers, the men and women surging forward with grenades in their hands, determined to get as close to the mechanized cavalry as they could.


She used her hands for those, swatting them away as they neared. Ribs shattered, skulls pulped, their broken bodies flew back into walls, into the crowd, or tumbled limb over limb across pavement already slick with blood. In their mangled hands, the grenades cooked off, reducing the already dead still further.


Perversely, Kallen found herself thankful that the meat of the corpses absorbed most of the cruel shards propelled out on the hot wings of the explosions.


Still, as the old Vampire of Europe, who had terrified her father's ancestors into fleeing Great Britain, had once quipped, "quantity has a quality all its own." When the mob jumped from the second story of the building Hamm had put his back up against, raining down onto the Sutherland's metal shoulders to beat at the protruding cockpit pod and to swing pipes at the metal lids guarding his FactSphere, at least a few had grenades with them.


Some of these dropped and rolled around his feet, clattering under his landspinners as the panicking sergeant rushed blindly forwards, his arms raised as high as they could go to beat at the pygmies crawling over his back and gouging at his mount's eyes. Further explosions rang out from atop his pilot pod, as some of the handful of remaining boarders attempted to force their munitions into any crack in the Sutherland's armor they could find.


It's a pity, Kallen decided, eyeing the corner of her display dedicated to her squad member's statuses, that the JLF hadn't given these poor fools mines. They might have actually managed to crack his armor with those.


Then, a sharp whistle slipped through the chaos. Quick and hot, and lanced across the street, and slammed into the mob of bodies crawling over Hamm. A thunderclap ripped the men from his armored form in an explosion of screaming shrapnel and howling meat, the last of the boarders tumbling from the slopes of the ambulatory mountain. Hamm's Knightmare stood, the pilot pod undamaged, but the FactSphere mounted within his head was a ruined mess of burning scrap and sparking electronics, its protective armor wrenched open by many bloody yet determined hands.


Kallen glanced up, and saw that same rocket armed soldier as before, retreating behind another rooftop.


A headache dearly purchased by twenty or so lives.


From the roofs and the alley mouths, more soldiers in JLF green stepped forward, unloading their rifles at Kallen and her so-called comrades.


The sound of the bullets plinking off her armored shell reminded Kallen of spring rain.


Ignoring it all, Kallen stalked up to the AA gun itself and set her ruinous hands to work. By the time the weapon was reduced into a twisted pile of scrap, only the whimpers of the surviving wounded and the sounds of distant gunfire disturbed the small battlefield.


As the small arms fire petered away and the surviving Japanese began to retreat back into the houses and down the roads crowded with abandoned and burning cars, Kallen activated the channel back to the War Room.


"Control, this is Pilot Two-One. Cancel the missile strike." Kallen gulped, the filthy word catching in her throat. "The Elevens are dispersed. The AA gun is neutralized. Awaiting further orders, over."

---

"Pilot Two-One, this is Control. Please make haste to Grid Square –"


"–reporting heavy enemy presence at Thirteen-North, potentially backed by armor. We need you to–"


"–cover the withdrawal half a mile southwest to the current perimeter line."


"All units in Sector 6, this is Control. Fall back to the designated rally point at–"


"–Forsythe has sustained moderate damage from rebel artillery batteries. Counter-battery support will be unavailable until repairs are–"


"–lost another VTOL."


That makes at least four, thought Lieutenant Stadtfeld, absently chalking up another fallen bird on her mental tally. Rough day for the air cavalry, it seems.


A rough day all around, the Soldier pointed out. For us and for the Japanese. This pace can't last much longer; everybody's getting tired.


That much was certainly true.


The sun hung just above the horizon, orange with the smoke rising from the fires rampaging unchallenged over the bulk of the Hiroshima Settlement. It was nearly evening now, the reddened orb just beginning to set on what Kallen knew, in the privacy of her skull, to have been the Day of Liberation.


A day she had spent in the uniform of her enemy, rushing from emergency to emergency as the Britannian lines crumbled and the sectors marked in blue on her display shrank to a tight cluster around the garrison and the nearby port authority.


She had no idea what the other squads of Knightmares based out of the Hiroshima Garrison had been doing all afternoon. The last she'd heard about either of them was the news that Third Squadron had been caught out under an artillery barrage. One pilot had died and another had been forced to eject, abandoning his Knightmare.


In this hell, that might as well be a death sentence in and of itself.


Of First Squadron, she had heard nothing at all. For her own Second Squadron's part, Major Coltain and the tactical officers back in the War Room had clearly designated her own unit as a fire brigade, ordering them to make best speed to wherever the combat had grown the most heated.


Over and over again, weary Britannian infantry had raised tired hurrahs for her and the Three H's in their Sutherlands as they rolled past, holding up the Japanese advance long enough for the retreating formations to reconstitute their broken ranks and dig in again at their new positions in the slowly constricting defensive line. Over and over again, her little squad had held the line when Control ordered a withdrawal; once or twice, they had held the line from behind the infantry when Control had ordered that there be no retreat. It seemed the JLF was unwilling to risk their stock of heavy weapons against Knightmares, not when they could send waves of infantry out to harass the Sutherlands instead, waiting until they were deployed elsewhere to resume their push.


Kallen, exhausted twice over from exertion and from grief, hadn't bothered to issue a warning. The first time a Britannian platoon had dissolved under fire and begun to rout from their positions before her, she had simply grabbed the closest of the fleeing soldiers in her Knightmare's three-fingered manipulators and, with a single violent twist, snapped the man's back.


Some Britannian blood at last… Staring down at her manipulator, befouled once more as fresh blood coated the old and coagulated coats, Kallen allowed herself a small smile. Finally, they get a little taste of what it's like…


"You took an oath to fight and die for His Imperial Majesty!" Kallen had boomed out through her Sutherland's external speakers. "Rejoice, my fellow Britannians! Through the fires of war, he has given you the opportunity to fulfill your oaths! Today, you have the chance to fight as a true loyal subject of the Empire! Failing that, you will die here and now as the subhuman cowards you are!"


Her exhortation, coupled with the broken body at her feet, had proven sufficient to drive the rest of the shirkers back to their positions. Cowed by the demonstration of strength, goaded by their own propaganda and the prospect of glory, and, perversely, in Kallen's opinion, seemingly reinvigorated by the immediate demonstration of leadership, the reconstituted platoon had dug in again as the Japanese force heaved forwards.


That had been at least an hour ago. Perhaps two.


It had also been around that time that she and her pilots had last found a chance to take even a small break, wheeling back to an impromptu logistics base for just long enough to grab a box of ration bars each and as many water bottles as they could carry before sliding their cockpits closed again. If anything the three Hs were more battered and shell shocked than she was. Hamm was still speaking with a slight slur, and had almost fallen over when he decided to purposefully smash his right landspinner against a wall to try and unclog a sticky gear.


Hopefully his brain is bleeding and he'll collapse at the controls.


But… at least I killed a Brit today, Kallen consoled herself, wiping the sweat from her brow. That has to balance the scales somewhat, right?


Perhaps for someone it would. Not for her.


"Pilot Two-One," her radio crackled back to life, Major Coltain on the line. "Status report, over."


"Control, this is Pilot Two-One." Kallen quickly ran her eyes over her display. "Energy filters are in the low yellow, nearing red. Two-Three is barely mission functional, Two-Two is down a rifle and has suffered major damage to their FactSphere. We are all out of slash harkens. We are out of rifle ammunition. Over."


"Getting a bit bare on the bone, are we?" Coltain replied, with the sort of joviality that can only come from a man who'd spent his day on his ass when speaking to a subordinate dripping with sweat and grime. "I knew you'd be a born officer of the Corps."


"Thank you, sir. I'm just doing my duty!" Kallen said, raising her voice to make it clear over the radio.


"Keen as mustard! And just as spicy. Reports are showing you're quite willing to get stuck in. A chip off the old block, eh? Red to match the Black Baron, mmm? Don't fret, Lieutenant. We're pulling you back to the garrison. Not for too long, now, don't worry about that. We'll get you back out stomping savages soon enough," the major added. "Just for a few hours. Long enough for you and your boys to grab a bite to eat and a few hours of shut-eye while the technicians rearm your machines."


Coltain chuckled at his own joke.


"Sir?" It was almost too much to hope for. Just the opportunity to get out of the increasingly musty cockpit and breath fresh air sounded like luxury to Kallen. Food and a bed were almost unimaginably appealing. "Effective immediately, sir?"


"Almost immediately." Coltain sighed into the radio, sending a gust of electronic static down the line and into Kallen's ears. "You'll be needing to make a small detour along the way, I'm afraid."


"As you command, sir."


In Kallen's ears, her own voice sounded wooden and unenthusiastic. Coltain, either by dint of radio interference or an exertion of his own will, must have heard something different.


"Such enthusiasm!" the faraway officer commended from the Garrison's War Room. "Just what I knew I could expect from you, Lieutenant Stadtfeld."


"Sir."


"Your orders," said Coltain, suddenly all business again, "are as follows: Cross the Enko River at the Francis Bridge and head northwest along Route 2 until you reach the university hospital. Once there, determine why the battalion assigned to hold that sector has fallen out of contact."


The radio clipped out and Kallen wondered whether the conversation was finished. A moment later though, Coltain was back on the line.


"At last check in, a Captain Winuk was the officer in charge of that sector."


"Winuk?" The name rang a faint bell in Kallen's memory. "I think I met him earlier today. Wasn't he a lieutenant?"


If he is, how did he end up commanding a battalion?


"He was," Coltain sighed. "He got breveted up. Battlefield promotion. You should know all about that, Lieutenant."


"But a battalion?" Kallen couldn't keep the disbelief fully out of her voice. A company was the usual extent of a captain's command, if Major Pitt hadn't led her astray on the matter. Battalions were usually the preserve of majors or lieutenant colonels. "He's commanding a battalion as a brevet captain?"


"It has been a… trying day," said Coltain, in a masterful display of understatement. "Allowances must be made."


"I see…" said Kallen, feeling faint.


If the Japanese could make just one more solid push, she thought, eyeing the fragile patch of blue still clinging to the northeastern mouth of Hiroshima Bay, around the mouth of the Seno, they really might be able to push the Britannians clear out Hiroshima altogether… And without any transport ships waiting to ferry people out, the bay would turn red with Britannian blood.


Mine included. And Dad's.


She remembered her father's words from this morning.


"Kallen Stadtfeld has a role to play and a future that, should we reach the garrison, will almost certainly extend past tonight. Kozuki Kallen, on the other hand, almost certainly won't survive to see the evening."


Remember the mission Tanya gave you.


"Very well, sir," she said out loud, pulling her scattered focus back together. "We will proceed to the location assigned to Captain Winuk, check in with him, and then return to the Garrison to refuel and rearm."


"Very good, Lieutenant," Major Coltain acknowledged. "Control out."


As Kallen led her squad across the Francis Bridge, rolling past the thin line of newly minted refugees stumbling towards the slice of the city still in Britannian hands, backs burdened under the weight of whatever mementos and supplies they could salvage, she couldn't help but chuckle.


"Some… thing funny, Lie-utenant?" a voice slurred.


It was Sergeant Hamm, Two-Two, in her ear.


Damn, Kozuki Kallen cursed, pulling herself back together, the squad channel was open, huh? I must be getting tired…


"In a way, Sergeant," Lieutenant Stadtfeld replied, falling back on the same aristocratic unflappability that was her father's constant armor. "In a way."


The sergeant's attentive silence invited a response. True to the rank, social and military she wore, Kallen met the challenge head-on.


"Just look at them," she said, pointedly directing her FactSphere towards the refugee column and their escort, a handful of wounded soldiers in filthy uniforms. "The so-called 'masters of the world,' each and every one of them! And yet, when push comes to shove, how much alike they are to the Numbers who probably crossed this very same bridge just six years earlier."


She didn't bother keeping the scorn out of her voice.


"Parasites and cowards," she spat, venting her true feelings and, behind her mask, laughing at her supposed comrades as she veiled her disdain in the Social Darwinism proper for a lady officer of her station. "Just like that rabble who tried to flee without orders earlier, they put the integrity of their skins over their honor and pride!"


"There's… some kids there, my la– I mean, Lieutenant," muttered Hayes, Two-Four. "I don't really know if they've got much of a choice here…"


A Britannian with a soul? The Revolutionary smirked. How unheard of!


Don't, warned the Journalist. Don't fall into the trap of categorization.


After all, what about Rivalz? What about Milly and Lelouch? Hell, what about Dad?


"I've seen a twelve-year old stab a man to death," said Lieutenant Stadtfeld, dismissing both Two-Four's comment and her own internal turmoil. After a day spent killing her own, she had little patience for anybody counseling sympathy and understanding for Britannians.


Least of all her. Least of all when she could almost feel all the Japanese blood on her hands, slicking her palms and clotting beneath her fingernails.


"Anybody can fight," she went on, "anybody can kill. Provided they've got the guts to try. None of these rats scurrying away have any guts. They might as well be Numbers.


"If you can't fight and die to maintain your mastery of the world, then you will be a master no longer. And if a Britannian isn't the master of their world, then are they even a Britannian?"


"...I suppose not, ma'am," blearily conceded Sergeant Hamm, doubtless relieved he hadn't been ordered to make another example out of the refugees.


The squad completed the rest of their short journey in silence, which gave Kallen time to breathe and truly look at the dying Hiroshima Settlement as their Knighmares stomped down the remains of the street. Between the shelling collapsing the roadway and the abandoned cars knocked all hither and thither, their landspinners could be only used on the rare islands of intact roadway.


And so, they plodded on.


It really is just like it must have been six years ago, Kozuki Kallen thought wonderingly. We might have a cruiser instead of a lone artillery battery providing support, but the city's burning again and its inhabitants are refugees. And here I am, a Britannian in a Knightmare, rolling down the same old streets, ruined all over again.


History might not repeat, but this time it sure feels like it is.


Only this time, unless Dad was wrong, there's nowhere for the survivors to escape to. All the roads closed, the hills alive with Japanese prepared to fight and die for freedom, and nothing but Hiroshima Bay at our backs.


"Hospital's coming up, ma'am," reported Hankey, stuck plodding out in the front as he had been the entire day. "I'm… not seeing any sign of Captain Winuk's formation."


…Ominous.


"All units," Kallen said, transmitting on the established general band, "All units near the… the Maddox University Hospital, come in. This is Lieutenant Stadtfeld. I say again, come in, over."


She toggled back to the squad channel.


"Two-Four," Kallen ordered, "get some elevation and see if you see any movement or probable ambushes nearby."


"No slash harkens, ma'am," said Hayes. "I'll see if I can get up on that parking deck…"


"Go," she ordered, then addressed Sergeant Hamm as his wingman lumbered around a shell crater pitting the road and towards the hospital parking structure, "stay a hundred yards behind Two-Four and keep an eye on the windows and rooflines. If you see anything, kill it."


"Ma'am."


A few minutes passed as Two-Four made his way up the ramp to the top of the parking structure and scoped out his surroundings.


Then, Kallen's radio crackled again. "Ma'am," said Hayes, "Movement, half a mile north of us. Looks like an armored personnel carrier and four or five armored cars, plus a company plus on foot. They're heading north."


"North?" Kallen checked her map. Sector 7 of the Hiroshima Settlement, while still in Britannian hands, was decidedly outside of the area Winuk's force had been tasked to hold. "Squad, on me. Let's go see what the good captain thinks he's doing."


Chasing down Winuk was hardly a matter of minutes. Knightmares, despite their shortcomings, were incredibly mobile even over difficult and irregular terrain, including streets freshly cracked and cratered by shell holes. Winuk's force, partially on-foot and obliged to maneuver the larger vehicles in their column around abandoned cars and the rubble of toppled buildings, was not. In short order, Kallen's squad of Knightmares stomped up on the tail of Captain Winuk's column.


The captain was waiting for them, though Kallen didn't realize that at first.


"Where's Winuk?" she demanded through her Knightmare's loudspeaker, addressing the knot of non-coms that had emerged from the rear ranks of the column as her Knightmares sliced into view. "Step forward, Captain Winuk."


Still with the rank badges of the lieutenant he had been at the start of the day, a man took a step out from the handful of corporals and sergeants, his gas mask hanging around his neck by its straps. "Right here… Lieutenant Stadtfeld, wasn't it?"


"Good memory." In her ears, Kallen's voice was flat and humorless. In the booming voice of the external speakers, she sounded like a machine herself. "Why aren't you in your sector, Captain?"


"Because my home is there," Winuk replied, gesturing towards the north, the direction his scratch battalion had been traveling. "Same for most of the rest of us. We live there. Well," he spat, "we did until the damned Numbers came, that is."


"So?" said Kallen, ice creeping down her spine at the baldfaced hypocrisy of a man angered by being driven off his stolen land. "What about it?"


"Shouldn't that be, 'What about it, sir?'" growled Winuk. "I'm still a captain, Lieutenant."


"And I'm still acting on the orders passed down to me from His Imperial Majesty's representative here in what's left of the Hiroshima Settlement, Brigadier Axelrod," Kallen retorted. "As you appear to have abandoned your post… You are not.


"Indeed," she added, injecting just a hint of the thick Lewiston drawl her father sometimes affected, "considering your battalion's distance from where it ought to be in the eyes of our commander… I'd even go so far as to say that you're deserting your responsibilities."


The words hung in the air like a headsman's axe. Desertion in the face of the enemy was a guaranteed death sentence, to be carried out at earliest convenience.


A sentence Kallen had already carried out once today, with her Knightmare's hands.


Their import was not lost upon Winuk, but he did not collapse. Instead, perhaps already knowing he'd gone too far, he drew himself up straight, front and center between his patchwork command and Kallen's squad of killing machines.


"Look around you, Lieutenant," he called out, pitching his voice so the onlooking soldiers could hear him just as clearly as they could hear Kallen. "The settlement's doomed. Nothing about it is remotely defensible, not with the Numbers having all the artillery in the world and the hills. Sector 7's no different; it'll be abandoned to the damned Elevens soon, whenever Axelrod orders another retreat.


"Well, we're not letting our families get left behind, and we're not going to stick around and wait to see if the Navy shows up with enough boats to haul everybody's asses out of this pinch we're in.


"We're getting our families, getting our things, and punching out. And damn anybody who wants us to stand and die for a battle that's been lost, and damn anybody who wants us to pull another Fort Aurelian here in Area 11!"


A ragged cheer rose from the ranks of the men and women standing behind him. Lifting her FactSphere from Winuk, Kallen surveyed the dirty, tired, and in some cases bloody faces staring back at her. The Soldier noted that none of the armored cars or APC's turrets were occupied.


Sloppy. Sloppy.


Not so different from Rivalz, a part of her, perhaps the Journalist or perhaps Kallen Stadtfeld, pointed out. Not so different from Milly either, or even Lelouch. Not so different from Dad.


Not so different from the people of Shinjuku, the Revolutionary countered. Not so different from the Japanese they drove from their homes six years ago, to die or become slaves or second-class race traitors in their own country.


Remember what the Baron of New Leicester taught us, murmured the Spy, as quiet and cold as it ever had been, speaking as ever with Tanya's voice. When an opportunity presents itself, exploit it ruthlessly. This is an opportunity to cement the status of Lieutenant Stadtfeld, once and for all, just as the Baron, and our father, told us.


So, what is the most Britannian solution to this problem?


"Squad," said Lieutenant Stadtfeld, opening up the squad channel and turning off her external speakers, "I say these men are deserters in the face of the enemy, defeatist cowards, and rebels. Do you disagree?"


"...They might come back," said Hamm, to Kallen's mild surprise. "Calling them rebels is a bit much… ma'am."


Well, so much for unanimity.


But, Lady Kallen Stadtfeld sneered, we aren't Europeans, are we? We are Britannian.


"Men," ordered Lieutenant Stadtfeld, "I do believe that nothing stands before me but shirkers and cowards. As the ranking officer present and a witness to the way they have spat upon the oath sworn to His Imperial Majesty, I am issuing you new orders.


"Kill them."


She could feel their reluctance. She could feel their unwillingness to execute men who had, despite their lower social status, been comrades-in-arms up until the moment before she had spoken. She could feel them balk.


So Lieutenant Stadtfeld gave them some extra incentive.


"When I say that all I see around me are cowards and shirkers…" she said into the squad channel, "did you think I didn't include you three too?"


Hankey's Knightmare fidgeted. Hamm's broken headpiece twitched under her gaze. Hayes readjusted the grip on his rifle.


"I've seen sloth and lust and pride in this squad. Disobeying my direct orders, trying to slack out on work, dare I tally out your other sins?" Kallen drawled, leaning on every lesson Tanya and her father ever taught her as she improvised a performance she hoped would be worthy of at least a grudgingly respectful nod from Milly, were she there to see it. "However… Perhaps I am mistaken? Be darlings and prove me wrong."


The Three H's held, strained… and then broke.


"Yes ma'am," they chorused through the squad channel, rolling up to her Sutherland, and then past it.


It should have been a hard fight. The Japanese insurgents, armed with yesterday's weapons and supported only by a few handfuls of towed guns, had put up nothing but hard fights all day, with men and women enthusiastically hurling themselves, barehanded, onto Britannian positions, eager to kill.


Winuk's deserter column, armed and equipped though they were, backed by armored vehicles though they were, crumbled in an instant. They had never considered fighting a Knightmare, not real ones at least, they never trained for this, never thought it would happen, even now they can't believe their eyes. They're not even running, the Soldier noted.


Where the Japanese lived under those guns for six years and spent every day seething and dreaming of their chance. And unlike these men they know Britannian pilots can be defeated, whispered the Revolutionary into her ear. Do you see now what a difference it makes, to have a cause worth fighting for? To have fire, real fire, burning in your belly?


Keep your own flame burning, Kallen, otherwise you'll die with just a whimper too.


In her cockpit, Kallen closed her eyes as the screaming began, not hiding from the wails and bellows and ineffective small arms fire and the barely audible thumping impact of oversized steel fists slamming into fragile meat, but sinking into it, allowing the sounds to overwhelm her.


It's been a long day… So long. The Day of Liberation…


So many Japanese faces, blurred and generalized and anonymous through the lens of her FactSphere, glared back at her from behind her eyelids. All the comrades she had sacrificed, unbeknownst to them, to solidify her Britannian credentials.


And now, some Britannian cowards too… Hypocritical thieves… Bastards…


In the stuffy cockpit of her Sutherland, stinking with overheated electronics and her own funk after a day of white-knuckled piloting and littered with discarded water bottles and ration bar wrappers, Kallen tried to find the victory, the glory, the hope for a better day, for a new Japan born from vengeance and fierce pride.


Not even the slow tapering-down of the noise outside could lift her heart, though.

 

[jamesboxjames]

Well that was heavy, good job I guess but Christ

 

[kalistira]

Woof, that was a heck of a chapter. Loved seeing lots of Kallen, so no worries about a lack of Tanya. I can't imagine this one was easy to write, but damn was it solid for it. Visceral as heck, and almost uncomfortable to read, and I mean that in the most appreciative of ways, rare that am author gets feelings like that, bravo, Scopas!

 

[Scopas]

Thanks, y'all. It was a heavy chapter to shift, especially when I started thinking about what Knightmare-on-infantry combat would really look like. Kallen's not having a remotely good time either, but she's trapped by her own resolve and by some spectacularly shitty circumstances.

 

[Maitue]

Well, now Kallen's Southerland looks like good cover art, what with all the blood drenching her mech's legs and arms. Always wondered about the amount of blood on Knightmare Frames forelimbs when they get shown in the anime, I think this is a really good depiction of how that would go.

 

[Vergessen]

Stellar writing as always.