Code Geass, "A Clever Disguise/Breakfast"

[sincere]

More than her planning, more than her war, Leloucia cherishes her family and the few friends she can truly lean on. She's never been able to let go of the past. Not easily. Not like C.C.
This was written with 10_switched in mind. That means genderswap. You've been warned!


.a clever disguise: breakfast.
It had been nothing short of a disaster. An unmitigated, infuriating disaster.

C.C. had no respect for her frustration; the relentless creature lounged on her bed, kicking legs idly, and said, "You took care of it. There's nothing wrong with making the best of a bad situation. If you're going to fuss over every minor miscalculation, how do you expect to get by in the real world, little girl...?"

Leloucia shot the insolent witch a glare, impotent but resentful. "That white Knightmare is ruining everything," she snapped.

"That's a little dramatic," C.C. said, with a lazy laugh. "So you didn't get the energy fillers last night. Go get them tonight." And she shrugged, hair sliding over her slim shoulders with the disinterested gesture.

Raiding an energy filler warehouse wasn't exactly subtle. They were bound to know what she'd been planning. Leloucia set her jaw and pulled on the armored vest she wore under her school uniform. "We'll have to keep using Rakshata's solar panels," she said, ignoring that. "We can't afford to fail another strike." But we can't afford to power half our Knightmares at this rate, either. The Black Knights had a depressing number of KMFs gathering dust as they struggled to find the resources to refill their energy fillers, while every building in Tokyo Settlement was feeding solar power to their enemies.

She said, more to herself than to C.C., "I'll skip the warehouse. I'll take one of the solar stations themselves." Her eyes narrowed. If she acted early enough, they could start diverting the boundless energy captured by the city's gleaming panels today. If she requisitioned just a dozen panels, she could recharge her whole army in three days.

It would be easy to infiltrate them and report that a solar bed was broken. Child's play, for this power of hers.

Leloucia flung the uniform on quickly and tied her hair back into a neat queue, then headed straight for the door. C.C. called after her, "Pizza tonight."

Like hell, she thought, but was flying down the stairs already. Lost in thought, she took long, quick strides to the front door, reaching into a pocket. She would call Ougi and tell him to load the energy fillers into a flatbed truck and bring them to the Tokyo Bay power station. By the time he was there, she would already have finished and gone--

"Brother?"

She froze, her hand on the doorknob, and turned.

Nunnally's smile was sweet and warm, the way that it always was, but there was a crease over her pale brow, a line of worry that Leloucia knew and hated knowing that she had put there. It made it so much easier to face her and take hurried steps back, to lower on one knee to put herself on the level of the wheelchair-bound girl, and take slight hands gently in hers.

"Good morning, Nunnally," she murmured.

The distinctive sound of loafers sounded from beyond Leloucia's sister, but she didn't look up. There was only one other student who might be here at this time of the morning.

"I was hoping you would join us for breakfast," Nunnally said. "Milly brought bagels."

"Your favorite kind," the blonde girl added, practically caroling. Leloucia heard her wave the bag, but she still didn't look up.

"I'm sorry." She squeezed Nunnally's hands. "Have I been neglecting you?"

Nunnally's smile eased, turning into something more relaxed. With just a hint of reproach she said, "I wouldn't put it that way. I was worried. And Milly wanted to help."

"Help you lay a trap for your neglectful brother to keep him at home?" Finally Leloucia glanced up at the older girl while Nunnally protested. Milly was smiling fondly, but there was an edge of concern to her look, as well.

She'd have to be more careful. That damn white Knightmare had been agitating her so much she'd begun to get careless. Tearing out of the clubhouse in the morning before even having breakfast... What had she been thinking?

Safely ensconced in the kitchen with bagels and vegetable spreads, they dropped the barriers and lies they all kept up through the day. Milly was a vivacious speaker and she made up her own topics with an innate sense for what would be appropriate and what wouldn't, so she talked about the boys at school and not about what Leloucia was doing every morning and every night to keep her away.

"Suzaku's getting popular now that he's been endorsed by the student council," Milly boasted, waving a knife casually at Leloucia. "Or maybe it was Nana's kiss that turned him into a prince!"

Nunnally giggled. "He was a prince to begin with. Other people just didn't see it until he saved Leloucia."

"Leloucia, you made such a good damsel in distress," Milly added brightly, and the other girl covered her eyes, sighing. "It's such a shame no one else knew you were a damsel. Well, this much of one, anyway." She pointed the knife at chest level.

"...Thank you, Ms. President."

Nunnally said serenely, "I can't imagine how anyone believes she's a boy. She's so beautiful, wouldn't it be obvious?"

Milly insisted, "Well, she makes a beautiful boy! Nothing wrong with that." She leered a little bit at Leloucia, something she could get away with only because Nunnally couldn't see her.

She wasn't used to the flattery they lavished on her when no one was around to hear; wasn't really used to flattery at all, from people who really knew about her. Leloucia could feel that her face was red as she tried to firm her voice to insist, "I only dress like one, Ms. President. More importantly, I think you have a little something, right here..." She raised a finger innocently to indicate the path of a trail of drool on her own cheek, and Milly cracked up.

Nunnally tilted her head, thoughtful. "Although I do wonder what you've told C.C."

Leloucia stiffened a little. "What do you mean?" She was very aware of Milly sobering up, and the girl in question directly upstairs.

"Well, it's just that she said you'd made a very important promise..." A faint hint of pink touched Nunally's face as she added, "If you really were a boy, I might've thought she meant -- a certain kind of promise..."

"Really!" Milly's features lit up. She had just been offered her favorite thing. "Well now, Lulu~ Why haven't I heard about this C.C.?"

Leloucia gave her a flat stare. "Because I didn't want you to project your strange motives onto me."

"You know, Nana," the blonde drawled, leaning closer to Nunnally, "there are certain promises two girls can make together that are quite scanda--" She cut off sharply, wincing as Leloucia's shoe connected hard with her shin below the top of her sock. Nunnally's face never lost its confusion, thankfully.

"I haven't made any promises like that," Leloucia assured them both, tearing off a piece of her bagel. "She just made it sound mysterious because that's what she's good at. It's nothing important, but I'm supposed to keep it a secret."

"But, Sister," Nunnally murmured. "Does she know that you're... my sister?"

Her usually sweet, fluting voice was strained with worry. Leloucia looked over at her, reluctant to lie, but she was spared the need when a knock on the door interrupted them. Immediately she stiffened, straightening her posture, and so did the other two girls, shifting as if the intimate, comfortable scene they had engaged in was something taboo with a male student, with a brother.

Milly cheerfully welcomed Rivalz. She prattled on about how early he was, and he muttered something under his breath about seeing her with bagels and directed a suspicious look at Leloucia.

Leloucia was looking out the window.

She had missed her opportunity to get the solar panels. Tonight.




Somehow, C.C. had acquired pizza without her permission. The relentless creature was sprawled on the bed, propped up only by the boneless yellow blob of Cheese-kun with a slice of pizza stringing from her mouth as she watched Leloucia prepare. Leloucia reminded herself to raid her room to find whatever scrap of paper had her credit card number scribbled on it.

"At least pay with the account the Ashfords set up for me," she said, tucking her disguise into a briefcase. "If you pay with my account, you're taking away from my chess winnings. It was years building that up and I'm using it to fund some of our covert operations."

"Why are you doing this now?" C.C. asked. She lost a shred of cheese into her cleavage and peered down at herself, frowning.

Leloucia sighed. "That's disgusting."

C.C. gave her a flat look, a golden version of the same flat look Leloucia had given Milly in the morning for suggesting they might be lovers. "You can't have any."

"I don't want any," Leloucia snapped, and closed the lid.

"You let them distract you?"

The amused words stopped her. When she glanced back at C.C., the witch was smiling at her, perfectly opaque and completely in control of herself, her surroundings, everything. Maybe even Leloucia.

C.C. said, "I've told you, haven't I? There's no point catering to them. The power of kings will isolate you."

"I know." Leloucia picked up the briefcase, smoothing the slacks over her slim hips with one restless hand. She ran over the plan in the mind. Take the subway to the solar station. She'd hacked their shift rotations and she should arrive there just in time to geass the incoming guard into thinking of her as his partner--

"They don't want to sit and have breakfast with you, you know. They just want the part of you that makes them comfortable." In the lighting, in the moment, C.C.'s amber eyes looked brown, dark and fathomless. "I'm the only one who will ever accept all of you, now."

All the things you are, and all the things you've done, and all the things that lie ahead.

Leloucia said nothing, passing her and heading out the door, leaving behind the witch and photographs of old friends and family.

Comments

[churched.livejournal.com]

Poor Leloucia! I guess all the isolation Lulu Prime goes through is compounded by Leloucia pretending to be a boy. You skate the line of C.C.'s barbs very well -- I always felt that half of it was trying to toughen Lulu up, half of it was out of plain malice. In that respect, you write her wonderfully.

[cryingcat613.livejournal.com]

Ooh, very nice. You've really captured Lelouch's canon personality and added to it Leloucia's burden of keeping her female identity secret. Love it!

[robotlove.livejournal.com]

Very nicely captures the feel of Geass. I shall be waiting for more! :9