#momowrites

“I don’t think you trust me, Lord Kururugi,” Rolo says coyly, narrowing his eyes and leaning back against the make-shift counter of fold-up tables for the carnival tent. A reckless use of his Geass for certain, but Suzaku nearly jumping out of his skin in surprise was worth the risk of reprimand. It wasn’t like he hadn’t used it for worse— “Coming to campus like this…”

“R-Rolo! Damnit, don’t—” Blinking quickly, he snatches a napkin from the table and covers his over-full mouth of funnel-cake samples. Knight of Seven dies by cake while in disguise, god, he turns on heel to glance about the fairgrounds… but, as expected, no one has noticed they lost any time at all.

The tent staff are just as confused at Rolo’s sudden appearance, but he’d played the part of mouse for so long they’d assume he was already there. It wasn’t like he stood out in a crowd anyways, or that people were prone to noticing him for being anything that wasn’t being Lelouch’s younger brother… which, the thought brings Suzaku’s brows down.

“Shouldn’t you be with… Lelouch…?”

“He’s back at the apartment,” a nonchalant answer with an equally nonchalant shrug that puts a frown to Suzaku’s face, “So I thought I would… ah, hmm, make an appearance for student council?” Rolo’s tone is too sweet, his eyes too big, and he slinks past the Knight of Seven as if his being here were the most innocuous thing in the world.

Turning to reluctantly follow after the younger man, Suzaku calls after, “Doing what? You’re supposed to keep him under surveillance–this isn’t really--”

“He’s puking, probably,” he must have sensed Suzaku’s eyes bug, and he casts a flat look over his shoulder in response while ferreting them through the crowd, “He has the flu. He’s not in danger. I gave him medicine. I’ve already taken care of everything, including scheduling an appointment for him to get a shot next season,” he recites it like a laundry list, obviously tired of playing keeper.

For a moment, Suzaku almost mentions that such a thing was Sayoko’s responsibility, but—that’s hardly the present they live in now, isn’t it? He goes still for a moment, a gaggle of students pushing past his shoulders. Here he was, on the Ashford University campus, and… everything was so wrong.

He was wrong, really, wearing shades and a coat he hadn’t pulled out of his closet since the last outing with Euphie. And now…

“Lord Kururugi, you’ll catch flies,” Rolo offers primly (receiving another grimace).

He takes a few wide strides to close the gap, grasping the smaller man’s bicep to push him through the crowd, “Don’t call me that out here. I’m pretty sure everyone knows Lelouch’s younger brother isn’t really best of friends with the Knight of Seven,”

“Right. That’s Lelouch’s--” Reflexively, Rolo’s hands fly up to catch Suzaku’s as the other reels. The locking of fingers about wrists, a tangle of initiation-versus-counter, pushes them haphazardly through the crowd. Rolo’s been in enough fights to know it isn’t worth resisting someone with this much strength over him, though. He ragdolls.

A girl snaps watch it, and the darling Knight of Rounds gives her an immediate apology—

Before slamming Rolo against the brick wall of one of the craft sheds. Now, they’re parallel to the crowd. Festival goers pour through the cobbled, blossom-laden main street to their left, the tents forming a makeshift alley about the shed that ensures their spat-slash-rendezvous remains unseen from the student gawking.

The Britannian gives a small wince before levelling his gaze up at the other. Unflinching, really, and it reminds Suzaku of the way his officers used to look at him as a recruit. The way the captured Black Knights turned their eyes at him, full of scorn and betrayal.

“Your mouth is new, Rolo,” Suzaku’s lips part one more time, only to purse tightly as he relaxes his grip on Rolo’s blazer.

Although his hands are unable to move away entirely. They’ve been pinned underneath Rolo’s own, and he only cocks his head to the side, as if this were a natural arrangement. This is the way one was meant to talk to their superior officers.

At this proximity, Suzaku wonders if Rolo has ever worn an expression that didn’t look like a wounded animal attempting to hide its injuries. Everything about him is soft, and maybe those eyes are just wide enough, empty as they appear under duress, to uncomfortably remind him of Euphemia’s.

“…Let go of me. Please.”

There’s no backtalk (pleasant surprise). Rolo releases his grip and quietly fixes his jacket. He’s unperturbed by the violent turn, and it leaves Suzaku wondering what in god’s name made him that way.

(not that he has to reach too far to guess)

“Your temper is new, Suzaku.”

Maybe if they weren’t who they were, maybe if it wasn’t now, the retort would be funny. It would be bitter banter between friends that look like not-quite friends to the uninitiated. The sort of attitude Lelouch gave Milly at her reckless behavior as student body president (and at her attempts to wrangle him and Shirley together before senior year).

But it wasn’t, and it couldn’t be. He knew coming here was a mistake, during the university’s cherry blossom celebration nonetheless, but nostalgia and melancholy and loneliness brought him here.

And it’s that mixture that keeps Suzaku locked uncomfortably in place. There really wasn’t any salvaging this interaction (and frankly, he wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to. Rolo was strange to put it lightly. At least, Rolo Haliburton was strange. Rolo Lamperouge was a different persona entirely, and it sours his stomach) but...

“I’m… sorry. It’s, the whole thing has me on edge. Lots of people… This wasn’t easy, Rolo,” He takes a step back to clear the air, and still the rise in his pulse.

Rolo seems unconcerned with the apology. He’d probably received half a dozen like it in the past, but Suzaku pushes the thought to the back of his mind, “Just, don’t call me anything regarding the Knights of Rounds here. And… I don’t want to—”

“Hear about Lelouch,” Rolo finishes definitively, “Understood.”

A beat, and then his voice lilts in a way that might have Shirley or Milly tripping over themselves at the sheer sugar intake of cuteness, “Ah, Suzaku, are you going to go back to the fair, then? Besides, I’m sure big brother—”

Suzaku drowns out the rest, staring in shock, awe, and more than a touch of horror. Lelouch was good at theatrics and making a show of things – Zero was ample proof of that – changing from one charismatic persona to the next. But this was… this was something else entirely.

Rolo Haliburton was strange, but Rolo Lamperouge might be worse if he keeps this up.

He’s not like that all the time is he?

There’s a nagging curiosity in Rolo that wonders why Suzaku is here as they walk. Part of him believes it’s a matter of trust or disrespect, like he’d mentioned before: that Suzaku didn’t believe some pretty, boyish assassin would be able to maintain a demure enough front to repress Lelouch’s memories of Nunnally and keep an eye out for red flags that said Zero was back. That he saw Rolo as a threat to the mission, or worse, a threat to Lelouch, given Suzaku’s obvious prickly (yet very protective) disposition toward the topic. His ultimate orders were to kill Lelouch if Zero awakened, anyways, so maybe it was to – god forbid – stop him from doing so.

Still, a Knight of Round should be prowling Pendragon, or by now, the battlefields in Europe. A knight that knew about Geass, furthermore, should not be this close to the University. The Emperor (or maybe even V.V.) would have better use for them than this, so Suzaku must be on leave of some kind.

It was completely beyond Rolo. To have the ability to just… stop, let alone do what he saw as essentially shirking duty.

He gives Suzaku a sideways glance, ill-timed since their eyes catch and Suzaku bizarrely turns away with the makings of a blush on his face.

This was another aspect of Suzaku he could not make heads or tails of in their interactions. Certainly, Rolo had been taught to use proximity and emotional plays to lull targets into a false sense of security, but small hiccups in their (few) interactions had led him to believe he didn’t really need to try with Suzaku.

It was like he wanted to believe Rolo wasn’t an assassin. That he was just some melancholy-but-very-sweet university freshman. That Lelouch wasn’t even part of their main reason for meeting, and Rolo hadn’t fished him out of prison in a foreign state.

Maybe Suzaku was just very awkward, and this was his default state of being. Or, maybe he was being too critical of someone who was obviously not meant for more delicate works of subterfuge. Considering his rough reaction to a bit of cheek regarding his old relationships, Suzaku was someone who was led more by their heart than their brain.

There was more there, too. The fact that he apologized for being rightly offended at Rolo’s toying was strange.

“Have you—well. No, that’s probably assumptive-“

He widens his gaze, attempting to cover up that incredibly telling, pursed look he got on his face when analyzing someone too hard, “hmm?”

“I just wanted to know if you’d been to a cherry blossom festival before. Or, any festival… They told me you were from—you know. But they’d never given me any other details.”

A turn of his head signals his confusion at the cautious phrasing, and he pockets both his hands, “No. There’s been a few on campus, and Milly – not Lelouch – has begged me to go,” a heavy sigh before he says more concisely, “I don’t like crowds.”

I don’t like being smothered, as wonderful as the positive attention from Lelouch was. It was fake. It was empty. It didn’t mean anything to or for Rolo.

“…This is your first one? Ever?”

Another shrug, and Suzaku finally forces his knees to unlock from their shock to catch up again, “Wait, come on. Let me get you something. This one is my favorite, anyways, and after earlier…”

He wishes he could say he’s seen enough romantic comedies to know where this is going. At some point there would be a large stuffed animal involved, if he remembers correctly. But he didn’t need Suzaku’s help to win a balloon popping game to acquire a stupidly overfluffed monkey, or lion, or whatever they had in stock at university knock-off fairs. Nor did he have any interest in acquiring them.

But he hasn’t seen enough. At least, he hasn’t seen any that involve knights and their traumatized best friends. Nor did they involve assassins, undercover agents, or other obviously dangerous motifs.

Really, he’d only seen one romantic comedy at Shirley’s insistence, but he can’t regurgitate that information quickly enough to stop Suzaku from pushing them onward. Rolo Lamperouge was bashful, but Rolo Haliburton, at this moment, was tongue-tied into a state of bewilderment.

They’re just flowers. Pink flowers.

They sort of reminded him of Euphemia li Britannia’s hair in the back of his mind as he tries to quickly pull up a mental file on how he’s supposed to respond to such a social cue.

Yes, he looks up at Suzaku as the other maintains a polite sort of bodily-shield to keep them motivating through the crowd of petal-enraptured students as pink twisted through the air like confetti.

Suzaku was someone that was led more by their heart than their brain.

What a shame.

“…Lor—Suzaku. I don’t know how to eat this,” he says numbly, staring at the multicolored, circular treats stuffed on a stick like a pastel aesthetic corndog. An inspective squeeze tells him it’s too sticky for his personal taste, and if he were more considerate as a person he might feel bad for the briefly dejected look on Suzaku’s face.

“It’s just like eating anything else on a stick. You… Just put it in your mouth,” and because he really has to sell it, “it’s sweet, it’s good, and no viewing is complete without hanami dango.”

He refrains from pointing out that this stand – and the bench near it – are the furthest possible things from the row of cherry trees on the main drag. All they’re viewing is other people viewing the blossoms. That, and the crushed, wilted remains of what petals have blown too far away from the road.

“Just putting it in your mouth isn’t advice that should be dispensed… liberally,” Rolo returns plainly, disregarding Suzaku in favor of reaching to peel one of the – no, he raises a hand to prevent Suzaku from once again invading his space (which only slows him momentarily).

“Haha, well, I mean, yes! But, hang on, you picked it up upside down,”

“This is really complicated for a rice ball,”

“Not a rice ball. Rice flour. Pounded. My freshman year here – well, sophomore too – I helped make some,” Suzaku says warmly, finally tucking into his own treat, “Still have all my fingers intact,”

“Piloting would be hard without all of them, yes,” the dango is gummy in his mouth, and a mixture of good manners and self-loathing stops him from spitting it out. It’s not overly sweet, but it’s not bland either. He can’t place it, exactly, and the proper way of eating it reminded him of the tanghulu he’d gotten on the streets during missions in China.

He ate that the wrong way too, in hindsight—carefully picking it apart to put the pieces in his mouth.

By the time Rolo is on the final one, despite still trying to pinpoint exactly what flavor it is, he’s decided he likes them.

Suzaku gets them two more, looking considerably more delighted with Rolo’s company.

“Did the swim club get stuck doing something… awful again?” Suzaku asks, tilting this way and that to better peer into the tents. He hadn’t seen any glimpse of what was arguably the most popular club on campus (he’s sure there’s only one reason for that, and unfortunately it wasn’t because of Shirley’s phenomenal butterfly stroke). Ordinarily they’d be on the center stage, but it’s weirdly empty. That sinking feeling hits his stomach again.

“Mm? No, they’re… Managing one of the game tents,” Rolo gestures in some general direction, grabbing Suzaku before he can wander too close, “You can’t be seen here. Not by them.”

Right… Well, there had to be something they could do other than eat. Not that the food was bad (as bad as it was for their stomachs), but an Ashford University fair wasn’t complete without a nightmarish free-for-all of a game. Maybe Milly had finally toned it down some? He smiles at the thought, glancing away and—

Rolo knows what he’s spotted before his mouth opens.

Damn you, Shirley.

“Oh! Over here,” not that Suzaku is waiting for Rolo to follow after him, “That’s cute, they even have stuffed mascots.”

The stand is simultaneously identical to those around it, and yet very different. The colors are a typical mint green and pastel pink (how they afforded to color coordinate an entire festival is beyond Rolo. He assumes the alumni must be beyond loaded), a few streamers hanging down over the “counter” that was placed in front of a board of similarly colored balloons.

He knows where this is going. It doesn’t need to go there.

Right when he gets ready to activate his Geass, one of the Student Activities Council members throws their arm around his shoulder and disrupts the whole process. “Rolo! You actually made it for once, that’s—guys this is a miracle, look at him,” they pull away, doing some overly dramatic gesture that for some stupid reason requires them to do what Rolo can only describe as an upside-down dab.

“Oh! And who’s hiding behind those glasses, huh?” Mia asks, running fingers through lavender hair before turning her sly squint to Rolo, “boyfriend?”

God. He can’t believe Suzaku is laughing at this. He also can’t believe his face hasn’t somehow turned inside out with the sheer amount of concentrated sourpuss contained within. He’s only rescued by the third tent attendant – this one he doesn’t recognize from any particular club – “If it Is, let’s not terrorize him too badly. That’s just mean.”

“Y… Yes. How—how well have you been doing?”

“Aw, come on. You don’t ask about the bottom line during the festival, council-boy,” Mia sets her hands on her hips in a mock-haughty fashion, “But! If you really gotta know, it’s been slow.”

“Nobody here has enough hand-to-eye coordination to win one of the big prizes. But hey! Free stuffed animals for us,” the SAC member makes pistol fingers, just as Suzaku opens his mouth despite Rolo’s efforts to will him not to.

“That bad? I think I might be able to take a few off your hands,” Anya or Gino might like one, at least. The mascot of the university was… strange – some sort of lion-mermaid that didn’t have any official name as much as the entire student body called it “The Cryptid.” Supposedly, it was from Milly’s coat of arms, but it was just as likely she’d picked the first unsettling mythological creature she’d saw on Google.

He missed it here.

It’s a dart game, and once the two men are situated side by side to compete (with the trio of tent runners watching in eager anticipation) Suzaku tries to make small talk.

“Could you clean this place out?”

“Absolutely. It’s… It’s not hard,” Rolo glances at the other students, torn between which persona he’s supposed to be using. A loud pop takes him out of his thoughts, and with a grimace he reluctantly joins in the turn-taking, “You only have to aim, inhale—exhale, throw.”

“Oof, remind me not to cross him,” and Suzaku smiles at the spectating words as much as he frowns on the inside. Every time he began to believe he was just a guest on the campus, that they were all just regular students, he remembers reality. They’re all stuck in a dream-like haze where their memories have been permanently altered, and his hand falls from its ready position.

Even he wasn’t free from the vice-grip of Geass, deep down. Try as he might to resist it. Try as Euphie might—

By the time he’s left autopilot, Rolo is holding a stuffed creature only a mother could love and regarding him with what isn’t quite contempt – but what definitely isn’t fondness. “You missed the last three.”

“I did? How—” he could take a running leap at someone and kick them head on, but he couldn’t throw darts without concentrating?

“Don’t worry about it! You still get… goodies!” Mia’s enthusiastic voice cuts in, presenting Suzaku with a hand-woven bracelet adorned with an Ashford University crest charm, “not as good goodies, but, you get goodies.”

The skin on his palm crawls while he looks down at the small accessory placed into his hand. He needed to get rid of this before—

“Ah, Mia, he’s,” Rolo huffs, “don’t tease him too badly. He’s my guest, after all. But—oh, Milly needed me for something, I just remembered. I’m, I’m really sorry, you guys,” He looks so sad at having to leave for his made-up appointment while gently ushering Suzaku away.

Once they’re out of sight and earshot, Suzaku asks to exchange gifts. By now, he’s decided that Gino would definitely prefer the stuffed animal over Anya. It’s what he focuses on to keep his thoughts straight. Rolo seems indifferent to the exchange.

At least until Suzaku gently ties the bracelet around his wrist with a beaming smile and a thank-you.

“So they… Really don’t notice any difference…?” Suzaku asks hesitantly, patting the stuffed mascot situated on the bench between the two of them on the head. To have replaced someone to one person is simple, but to replace someone to an entire campus? That was harrowing, and it made his blood run cold to think the power of Geass was immense enough to drown the memory of so many individuals.

(Not that he could be so surprised. Euphemia had committed unspeakable horrors against that same power.)

The gazebo is quiet, and most of the students have headed back to the dormitories or campus apartments for the evening. The grove here was oak and maple, the architecture a redux of the Britannian capital. For a moment, Suzaku is so displaced with the chilled feeling he almost believes he’s back at the gardens in Pendragon, and Rolo’s quiet voice pushes him out of his stupor and puts his mind solidly back into his body.

Rolo doesn’t think Suzaku wants the answer, worrying his index and thumb nails together.

“No, they don’t. If I don’t act out of character for their perception of Nunnally, they don’t notice. There are no emotions to trigger for most of them. Lelouch…” he pauses, reading Suzaku’s expression before he continues, “… You saw what happened with Julius Kingsley. No Geass is infallible. If I were to act too uncanny, then Lelouch’s subconscious would rebel,”

“He would remember Nunnally. Would he remember everything else?”

Ripping away Lelouch’s sister, relocating her to the relatively safe hand of the emperor… that was removing Lelouch’s motivation to become Zero. But wouldn’t that be enough? He has to wonder where the desire to be Zero ended, and where it began. If it was all for Nunnally, then wouldn’t it repeat with Rolo?

But then, he supposes Rolo Lamperouge doesn’t want distant dreams like peace or harmony for that reason. He wonders if Rolo Haliburton would either.

“Mm. The Geass would come undone entirely,” Rolo says simply, continuing to pick at his nails.

They sit in a more comfortable silence than the last, at least until Suzaku offers Rolo his coat against the encroaching night air. Spring here wasn’t terribly warm, and the nights were worth putting at least a light coat on. The breeze had cooled considerably during sunset, and Suzaku tells himself he’s being polite against further uncomfortable recollections of his last serendipitous encounter with someone.

“…How old are you?”

God, why did he say that?

Suzaku sputters for a few seconds, trying to repair what he perceives as damage (and what Rolo perceives as nothing) as he fixes his blazer, “I mean, you don’t look older than Nunnally and she was a year ahead because of her test scores. So, a Freshman in college when she was just a senior in high school-“

“I didn’t go to school.”

“Ah… I, I’m sorry--? No. I am sorry,” he reaffirms, expression steeling to better fit the symbol he was to the populace. The Empire used everything, and it spared nothing and no one, and… He knew that. He knew that when he had to put Lelouch on his knees before the emperor – twice – but he’d never really encountered what happened when the hand of Britannia (the hand of Geass) was all someone knew.

But he knows it’s wasted, and Rolo doesn’t care anyways. He doesn’t know why he continues, then. It’s desperation, something that might want validation or miserable company. The same parts of him that chastise his every past action and failure, and the same parts that drive him to crave revenge as much as he is disgusted with his being for wanting it so badly.

It’s an admission, one he hasn’t heard himself say for a year.

“I… wanted to change that. When I became a knight – when I joined the military. To change the way things are, and the way they would be,” he folds his hands together, resting his elbows on his knees and denying Rolo any glimpse of his face to make out his intentions, “I don’t think it takes extremes to make the world better. I think benevolence is stronger than Zero – than Lelouch – thinks.”

He swore Rolo had used his Geass to escape, the silence after his confession was so thunderous and overwhelming. He’s ashamed that he’d vilify himself out loud like it would change anything he’d done. Why now, of all times, was he so overcome?

His hands rake through his hair, cradling his head from his bent over position.

“I didn’t want to do it just for one person, not like Lelouch, but when I finally met someone I could change it for, to change it with, I—”

A light hand on his shoulder stops him, and his frazzled state has him afraid to look up at Rolo because he knows there’s tears and he knows it’s all about Euphie, the massacre, the betrayal, everything.

But he does. He turns his green-eyed gaze to Rolo’s cold silence. He flinches as the hand leaves his shoulder, only for fingertips to lightly graze the firm line of his jaw, a thumb to gently stroke over the hollow in his cheek. Instinct tells him to lean into the touch (that’s what he’d do with Euphie, and this is wrong) but he refrains out of shock.

Rolo knew something about proximity and lulling people into a false sense of security – it wouldn’t be a violation of the mission to prevent his superior from having some sort of neurotic, trauma-induced come apart. That wouldn’t do, especially not on the campus. It would jeopardize everything, and Rolo has never failed a mission.

Suzaku can’t do anything except wait with his heart in this throat. He’d admitted to the Emperor what his motivations were, what drove him. An accusation of treason didn’t scare him.

It was the idea of being rejected on a base, empathetic level. His left hand shakily wraps around Rolo’s wrist, now trapping them both in a moment that seemed to stretch indefinitely.

Rolo doesn’t know what Suzaku wants to hear, not exactly. He could make a damn good guess, but what someone’s heart truly desired was lost on him. He doesn’t know the nuances of empathy, or consideration. They were all ripped from him while he was young.

“…I’m sorry.”

To Lelouch. To Euphemia. To Nunnally, it’s for them, Rolo thinks, and he looses his hand just enough from the grip to brush away the one tear that had escaped. His mind is still sifting through words, trying to puzzle together the right things to say—

“I’m so, I’m so sorry. I didn’t want… None of this was supposed to be this way,” a pressure on Rolo’s lower back ushers him forward, and he remains still (gentle, demure, calm) as Suzaku’s forehead presses against his abdomen, as his arms wrap around his waist, “I wish she could be here. I wish I could have shown her—”

He considers using his Geass to buy himself time, to escape before this leaps from a recollection to a living memory, but…

“I can’t change anything. I couldn’t change anything,” the growing dampness in the fabric of his blazer tells him Suzaku has given up on damming his feelings, and hesitantly Rolo slips his hands around Suzaku’s shoulders, “We should all be here, together, not… Not like this…”

Rolo doesn’t count the seconds of his moment, as he’s prone to do for his Geass.

He hopes he won’t regret it later.

“Stop sneaking onto campus, Kururugi,” this time, Suzaku is expecting the sudden appearance, and he tilts his chin up with an unbegrudged smile. He pushes his glasses further up his nose, leaning back against the wall of Waterford Hall while students filed by with buzzing excitement to the “dead day” festival – because clearly what students needed on their day off to study for finals was something to distract them from studying for finals. “You’re making this difficult.”

“I was feeling nostalgic. Besides, I had to talk to the dean of admissions,” for once, he’s got the one-up on Rolo… although now that he’s focusing on him in proper, he can tell the younger man is hiding something behind his back.

“You’re coming back?”

“It seemed like… It was something I needed to do. It’s—” He inhales deeply, and briefly, concern flutters across Rolo’s face, “what Euphie would have wanted. And it’s the least I can do for her, right?”

Rolo knows Suzaku doesn’t need his agreeance on this, but he nods his head.

“… A-anyways, before this gets… so did you have something to report? I can meet you later-- or were you just trying to sneak up on me again?” He tries to peer behind Rolo, get a glimpse at whatever he’s playing keep away with, and—

He’s gone.

No, this was not okay – he whirls on heel to his right, where Rolo has somehow (Geass, he internally grumbles) materialized beside him with a skewer in one of his hands, laden with strawberries and a thickly crystallized sugar coating.

“I asked Milly to search around for other street food vendors, and one of them happened to be something I recognized from older missions,” Suzaku plucks the bamboo skewer delicately away, raising an eyebrow, “the Directorate is a secret, obviously,” he situates himself against the wall beside Suzaku, prying off a sugary strawberry and popping it into his mouth, “but I spent a lot of time in Northern China.”

Suzaku has to wonder if that’s Rolo’s way of opening up to him, after… after their last encounter. He twists the skewer, “I see… It’s not poisoned?”

“No,” Rolo gives him a sideways glance, mumbling around the fruit in his mouth before he swallows, “I have nothing to gain, anyways,”

Now, a grin crosses his features, “Any advice?” at least there was something light hearted he could recall from… the last time he’d stopped by here unbidden, and the grin is dissolved by laughter at the response he receives,

“You just put it in your mouth.”

Viola pours a second ring of salt around herself, tucking her skirt underneath her folded knees for the dozenth time. She doesn’t believe the second ring will protect her if the first doesn’t, especially not when every protective sigil she could think of was chalked between the two.

A single chime from across the room tells her she has thirty minutes – starting now, at 11:30 p.m. – to begin and end the binding ritual.

She had made the other preparations in advance: the curtains had been tightly drawn around every window in the attic; two lit, black candles had been placed before both sides of the locked door; an unlit white one was placed before her.

The offering was wrapped tightly in fabric, tied with the prettiest bow she could manage. Presentation mattered – or, she told herself it did. The gift would be essential in starting negotiations with… whatever would come through the door. She’d put in every power object she could think of: a locket she had always worn, the last letter from her grandmother, a lock of her hair, it went on.

She struck a match with shaking fingers, wincing against its sudden light.

Most witches didn’t need to complete a binding to strengthen themselves. They were born with magic in their blood, with power in their blood. Their abilities went beyond confusing dreams and telepathy, mind reading. The latter two in their strength might have been unique to her lineage, but they weren’t enough. She would always be a fledgling, shrinking violet of a witch.

And in desperation, the only remedy left to her was to bind to something stronger. It was costly, some degree of forbidden, and highly frowned upon even if it were successful. If she walked away from this with a contract, with a binding, she would be immeasurably more powerful.

If she failed, she would be cast out from her coven with nothing to show for it.

She lights the white candle in front of her, shaking the match out. It nearly flies from her hand at a loud knocking behind the door.

Three knocks, then invite them in—

The wood and metal strain suddenly. When the door opens, the candles extinguish with the draft.

Her eyes snap open.

One, one knock, if that even counted. She didn’t invite them in. Her pulse starts racing, and she feels the beaded sweat at her temples slip down with the alarmed raise of her eyebrows. She’d never heard—read—of a binding that didn’t require an invitation of some kind. The ritual powered the gateway, but the arrangement alone didn’t allow the summoned entity in. It was a one-way path at that point, not two, and questions tear through her mind.

Viola can hear the glass of the locket shatter and the metal scrape, as if the package had been stepped on. In an ordinarily binding, in one that was – contained? No, executed properly? – a rejected gift ended the negotiations. The ritual ended, and one could never attempt it again.

This was beyond that, and she pushes her hot, flushed palms into her eyes before pressing her forehead to the wood of the floor.

She had let something far worse into her home, into her coven. Her ribs rattle while she breaths, murmuring nonsense protections and burning with humiliation that she would try to save herself when her sisters would be at the mercy of what monster she had summoned if she was able to repel it.

And then what? It would come back for her. Entities always came for who called them. She could smudge the salt herself, and let it take her. Maybe that would sate its appetite – maybe that would be a way to undo such a god-awful mistake.

The ritual wasn’t like her in the first place, perhaps it knew that and was seeking to punish her for even attempting. Her blood was too weak for even this, and her hubris needed to be checked—

“Oh that’s precious. You’re already groveling,” the echo that follows the words is like woodsmoke, warm and cloying. Heavy, resounding steps approach Viola within her salt ring, “But that’s not an offering, so I hope you’ve got something better.”

It – he – they – had just cast aside everything she’d collected. Her tongue is thick in her mouth, and an involuntary whimper escapes her when she feels their presence a foot before her. A strange warmth radiates from the entity’s body, and she can imagine in her mind’s eye a sort of shadowy, clawed hand reach over to the innermost ring and drag a line through her meticulously planned protections.

“They only work if you’re strong enough to sustain them, you know. Stronger than me,” and they sound so pleased that a shiver runs down her spine from a mixture of awe and horror. For a moment, she’s in shock at her own weakness… but her focus was unmatched amongst her sisters due to her mental magics. For something to tear through the sigils, to eat her defenses, not just disrupt the ritual…

Maybe, deep inside herself, she could admit she was proud at what she’d done. But the feeling is poisonous, burning inside her. That’s wrong, that’s not who I am. But if she listens close enough, if she strains her telepathy, she could swear the feeling was validated in whatever stood before her.

“What is it you wanted – look at me when I talk to you.”

After a beat, she slips her palms away from her eyes. Irrationally, she’s afraid if she opens them that there will be some ungodly consequence. They’ll burn out of her skull – she’d heard of it with angels – or suddenly she’d cry blood. Something deep inside her tells her to remain kneeling, but she raises her gaze upwards. She can’t see anything but inky darkness, despite the candle before her burning brightly.

Her mind is blank on where to proceed. She had rehearsed negotiations in the mirror what felt like a hundred times, but she couldn’t recall a single word of any of the scenarios. She didn’t prepare a, a speech for something like this.

“I don’t like weak things. So you should start talking.”

“It—I… I wanted to complete a binding,” She swears it rolls its eyes at her, “I wanted to…” swallowing, she speaks louder and affirms her words. She couldn’t turn back now. If it was civil, she would – she had to make the contract. No matter what.

“I wanted to match my sisters.”

“You wanted to best your sisters, don’t lie to me.”

Viola pales, forcing her eyes to remain focused. If she was strong enough to bring them here, she was strong enough to face them. She was strong enough to face herself – “…Yes. I… wanted to best them. Nothing I do, nothing I’ve tried – it’s not in me.”

“So you want my power. To make up for your own poor blood,” she knows they just want to hear it. They want to hear her admit it, and she has never damned her telepathic strength more than this moment. Her face flushes bright red, and first she nods to a reprimand. Then she speaks.

“I don’t want it. I need it.”

That seemed to please them. She can see them smirk in her mind. The candle before her flickers, and the loss of warmth tells her the entity has turned away.

“You already know what you left at the door wasn’t offering enough, and I don’t really care for words. Do you want to offer one of them to me?”

She trips over her thoughts before sputtering, “No! I—I won’t do that. This is mine. It’s my responsibility,” she didn’t think she could live with herself if she repelled the summon earlier and it turned and eviscerated her sisters. She wouldn’t turn on them now, even if it cost her everything. She was strong enough for that, and she steels herself before continuing. “I won’t sacrifice them to you,” but she means can’t, “They’re not mine to give.”

A sigh echoes through the room like wind, allowing a glimmer of moonlight through the curtains. The shape before her – the shape she imagines – contorts viciously, monstrously. She can feel teeth, piercing eyes. The chill and sharpness of metal, the iron scent of blood. It was changing, like a snake preparing to strike. she can’t stop herself from darting to her feet and reaching out blindly, as if she could prevent it from shifting further.

“Stop! I—I can’t give them. Not in good faith, but—" her fingers plunge into something sinewy and tightly bound, like leather but with the thrum of living flesh, “I can give you anything else that I do have in good faith. I—”

“You. I’ll take you.”

I’m going to die; it flashes like a warning through her mind. To pay the summoning price it was going to consume her and stow itself back into whatever depths it had come from, waiting for its next victim.

“…Me,” maybe it wouldn’t though. “Not now.”

The darkness returns to its more docile appearance, smooth beneath her fingers as she slowly pulls them away.

“What, Gino what do you mean you took all of them--” Suzaku cradles the phone between his shoulder and cheek, brows furrowing down while he juggles an Ashford University bag of fresh books, “Gino-”

“They’re free, yeah,” the lock is stuck. Or maybe his keycard isn’t working, it could be any number of things, and he’s short one hand to deal with it, “No, Gino, the samples. The samples are free,”

Third time’s the charm. He drops the bag down to the crook of his elbow, sliding the card with one hand, pulling the door lock with the other, push, and -- shit there went the keycard -- “The samples are free that doesn’t mean you can take all of them!”

“The whole table? Gino that’s, that’s like fifty cubes of cheese! Put them back--” He needs to get these books off his arm. Slowly but surely, he’s losing circulation from the sheer weight. This is why he should have gone back earlier, like Euphie wanted. At least then he wouldn’t be carrying around a two semesters of Freshman material.

He tosses the bag onto the waiting metal table in the middle of the surveillance room, twisting right after to get the card off the floor, “You ate them?! Oh. That’s… what, almost thirty cubes each? No you won’t die from constipation...”

God, it was like explaining to a toddler. He loved Gino, he was… a good guy, most of the time. But the times when his sheltered upbringing collided with the real world could be… trying. “Look, I have to study, just, go back to the kiosk and pay for the samples. Yes! Because you took all of them,” Suzaku jams his thumb on the end call button, collapsing immediately into one of the swivelling chairs about the table. The wheels propel him away with the sheer force of his exasperation (or weight) and he scrambles to grab the table edge and pull himself back to it.

And immediately, he pushes his palms into his eyes, sighing. “How can he be so educated and yet so dumb.”

“Oh, mood.”

Oh no. He’d been so wrapped up in the call he didn’t check if anyone else was in the room. Most of the surveillance staff would be at lunch right now, but more importantly, Lelouch was off campus for a class trip that Viletta was in charge of. Suzaku moves his palms from his eyes -- slowly, nervously, and with dread, to peer to the direction of the voice.

It’s Rolo. Somehow, he’s not surprised - or, he is, but he isn’t surprised it’s Rolo. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d gotten the figurative jump on him. There’s the heavy, savory scent of pizza on the air, and once he fully drops his hands away, he can see that the younger (he thinks?) man is holding a slice while working on textbook notes.

“I… I’m going to guess you heard all of that,” the flush is creeping on his cheeks, and before he even gets the answer, Suzaku has deflated further into the chair.

“Most of it,” a beat, and then Rolo pushes the Pizzahut box closer from his side of the table, “hungry?”

There’s worse ways to downplay embarrassment than gorging yourself, and after a few seconds of deliberation, Suzaku rights himself and frees a slice from the gooey pie.

“It’s stuffed crust.”

“I didn’t… think you ate pizza-”

“Lelouch orders it as a force of habit sometimes. Residual, from the Geass. At least it doesn’t have hotdogs in the crust anymore,” Rolo offers simply, picking up an orange highlighter and resuming his work. If Suzaku peers close enough while taking a bite, it looks like he’s taking notes on…

“Early childhood psychology?”

“Mm.”

“...You’re studying… are you a early childhood ed major?” He says it with more disbelief than he means to. It was, well, he didn’t think they would have actually had Rolo take on a major. Generic associates classes? That made sense. It was necessary to complete the act. But real studies?

Rolo sets the highlighter aside, remaining still for a few moments before finishing the crust in his hands. Suzaku can’t discern if he’s unhappy or not to be quizzed on his pseudo-life choices, and he’s about to retract the statement when he receives an answer: “I wanted to do something more productive than college algebra.”

Suzaku wished he could get away with that. Wiping his fingers on his jeans, he fishes out some of his textbooks and the fresh notebooks to go with them, “Oh. Well, uh, good. I was going to do pre-k and kindergarten. But, the general ed requirements couldn’t be waived. So, I’m playing catch-up.”

He always rambled as a nervous habit, but it was somehow worse when stuck with Rolo. It was probably his lack of expression, but… He forces himself to shut up, pulling his lips into a thin line before turning his attention to arranging and labelling notebooks for class. Just, ignore him. He was here studying too. It wasn’t like Rolo would care.

And they carry on like that for a while, in silence. Between the two of them, it doesn’t take long to finish the medium-sized pizza. He’s made decent headway in the outline for his first paper, plus gotten some chapters of reading out of the way when a quiet chiming indicates that Villetta is back in the radius of campus and has checked in.

More importantly, that means Lelouch is back. He fixes his eyes on the surveillance screens, trying to identify which of the many students unloading from carpools was Lelouch. He didn’t have his own car, so…

“Ow,” his hand goes up to cover his cheek, blinking several times before swivelling the chair about and coming face-to-face with the eraser tip of Rolo’s pencil.

“You’re taking introduction to education, right?”

“Wh…”

“I’ll help you with the background and aptitude documentation,” Rolo says, the ghost of a smile on his face. His tone changed - softer and… invested? “You’ll also have to do some interviews of teachers at your preferred teaching level, so… as Knight of Seven, you’ll need some discretion.”

“Oh-- right, of course. But,” for a second, Suzaku turns his gaze back to the screens. A green icon flashes on one of them, indicating that Viletta has checked in once more and Lelouch was back within the ordinary surveillance range.

He’d spent so much time keeping tabs on what Lelouch was doing. What Lelouch’s life was. What Lelouch’s life was going to be -- for good reason. He’d harmed and destroyed so many people and lives. And, really, he’d gutted Suzaku’s as well - maybe he didn’t want to admit it so directly, but…

“...Yeah, okay. So, what documentation?”

For a couple of hours, he could be Suzaku and be concerned with Suzaku’s future.

“How did they... “ No, that’s not the question he wants to ask. Suzaku chews the inside of his bottom lip for a few moments, holding the bag of books from the campus bookstore once more as he walked Rolo back to his and Lelouch’s shared apartment. They’d have to stop short soon enough, lest Lelouch open the door to both of them chatting it up and jump to (typical Lelouch, he’s almost fond of it) conclusions.

“...You didn’t really pick this major to be more productive. Right? That doesn’t add up.”

Rolo’s eyebrows go up, and he stops briefly in his step. Adjusting the strap on his backpack, he frowns before closing the space between them. Conspiratorially, almost as if he were to whisper his answer but he doesn’t get so close.

“I’m one of the eldest in the Directorate. So my… brothers and sisters,” he says it differently from how he says it when describing Lelouch. He sounds endeared, and they begin walking shoulder-to-shoulder again down the path from the plaza fountain, “They look up to me. Everything I do… they’re just important to me.”

They quiet when a rowdy group of students come down the library steps in front of them, carrying coffees from the cafe and waving at Suzaku (who weakly waves back). Once they’re out of earshot-

“And you?”

How should he answer that? That his own childhood was a disaster? Growing up in a warzone, living with two pawns… Knowing his father was willing to accept innumerable casualties and harm the closest thing to a sister Suzaku had ever known? He knew why, but it was harder to define how he meant to utilize it. He could guess Rolo wanted to help his… the other directorate kids, to adjust. A window into the real world. But for him, for Suzaku, it was more about the gaping hole of betrayal adults had left in him. Lying to a toddler-aged girl about how they were near a garbage dump, and…

“There’s kids that grow up… in the shadows of what Britannia has done. Not just in the ghettos, but, everywhere,” the words are stilted, “And.. if I could finish here,” quieter, “...If Zero never came back, I would want to help them.”

They’re at the crossroads between the dorms and the apartments, and maybe for too long they remain there, opened hopes lingering between them. Suzaku makes the move to say goodbye first, “Anyways, I’ll let you get, uh, back to Lelouch. Let me know if--”

Rolo takes his hand to stop him, lightly anchoring him back.

“It was nice to talk to you, Suzaku. If you need more help with… class, message me.”

“Y--yeah. I’ll be sure to -- on your work phone?”

“Mm.”

Their hands part slowly, and Suzaku fixes his bag one more time, swaying where he stands. “So-- I’ll see you later, I guess. Rolo.”

A beat.

She wakes to cinnamon and salt on the air, thick and humid with the close quarters of the pint-sized studio. It’s hard to remember the last time she woke to breakfast - maybe most recently with someone who got too cozy after sharing her bed - but the calm she feels brings her closer to memories of home, when her mother would make time to squeeze breakfast in on days when she had school trips so she could last until lunch.

Her ankle smarts while she untangles herself from the mix-and-match blankets that were piled on her in the evening. Most of them look like a poor attempt to cover up the scratchy fabric of the sofa, and she takes inventory while running her hands delicately down her bandaged left leg.

The windows are open to let the heat from the kitchen out, and she doubts this injury would stop her from getting out of them if necessary. However, with the rhythmic drops of rain, she’s not certain she could get far without slipping on the fire escape or asphalt. The coffee table has nothing she can readily identify as a weapon: no keys, no decorations, not even any magazines. Whether or not this was standard or done purposely for her arrival she’s yet to make heads or tails of.

Felicia spies her jacket neatly folded on a well-worn armchair, boots by the wooden legs and her tool belt draped over the top. She sort of expected more, screwing her face into a confused grimace before snapping her head in the direction of footsteps.

“Breakfast? For me? I think this is the best treatment I’ve ever gotten while under arrest, detective,” she smiles, narrowing her eyes and glancing over him. He didn’t seem armed, just haphazardly dressed-down from the evening before.

Did the man sleep?

Dakota musters a snort, setting a loaded plate down on the coffee table (she can’t say she appreciates the way he makes bacon look burnt beyond recognition, but she wasn’t going to complain). “I wouldn’t say you’re under arrest. I’d say… you’re hiding out,” he offers finally.

“That’s harboring a fugitive--” he gives her a look when she reaches for the fork he’s got in his other hand with his coffee mug, instinctively jerking his hand away. Please, stabbing was hardly her style, and with a flutter of her eyelashes Felicia plucks it away to poke at her scrambled eggs. “I thought you were still with the law?”

“The law doesn’t say anything about letting a vigilante get mauled by dogs-- or other officers,” Dakota remains standing, watching her eat with all the attention he’d give someone in a true jail cell.

“You could have left me. I’m sure I could have made something work.”

“You hope you could have made something work. You’re as resourceful as anything, Felicia, but we both know at this point the rest of the department is aiming to kill after your last stunt with the mayor’s wife.”

Testy, she inspects some of the egg on her fork before popping it into her mouth. God, she felt like she was starving. It’d been a long few nights to case the mayor’s place properly -- and damn Dakota for making such a fluffy, cheesy pile of goodness -- so maybe she hadn’t been on top of things like usual.

“What are they saying?”

“Nothing new,” he takes a drink from his mug, lips drawn tight. He couldn’t keep her here for long, but it also wasn’t as if anyone from the department would come knocking. They tended to keep their distance lest the “golden child” decide to raise any alarms to officials not being paid off.

Silence. She picks through her plate while trying to ignore his dark eyes on her, increasingly uncomfortable. It wasn’t the same lecherous gaze she was accustomed to when caught off-guard (she didn’t want to use the word vulnerable), the kind that sized her up for jobs and dismissed her at the same time they handed her the orders. It was more like a disappointed teacher, making her squirm inside no matter how she levelled her expression.

“I-- sorry about the bacon. I forgot about it while, I, um, was working on the cinnamon rolls,” Dakota blurts it from nowhere, causing Felicia to sputter a half-laugh. So maybe he wasn’t so sterner-stuff. “How is your leg?”

“Hmm? Oh, sprained, I imagine,” she shrugs. With years of parkour, she’d memorized the different ways a joint or bone or ligament could hurt and had enough doctor’s visits for them she was sure she could qualify as a specialist in physical therapy, “But it’s not bothering me as long as I don’t move it.”

The cushions next to her depress with the weight of Dakota’s body, and she turns her gaze to him after pushing her plate aside. He pats one of his knees, and, maybe because it’s such a fine morning, she humors him, placing her calf delicately overtop once she’s situated herself on the sofa.

“A doctor now?”

“I picked up some things on tour,” that’s right - she raises an eyebrow. She’d never been able to see him in proper light before. They met in darkness or barely illuminated streetlights, on more dire occasions they’d spot one another under the red glow of emergency lighting. Now, she could see the way the right side of his face was twisted and melded back together into a patchwork of burn scars, the larger patches broken apart by what she assumed was injuries from shrapnel or… whatever had caused the rest.

It was almost like looking at the Phantom, or maybe Frankenstein’s creation, if she reaches far enough back into her school days. He didn’t heal nicely, and she can sense he’s nervous about her eyes on him in the way his hands barely shake as his skims his fingertips down her knee.

Felicia huffs when he turns her ankle, screwing her face into a pained grimace -- “Sorry,” -- and the pain makes her laugh.

“I’ve had worse. Although I don’t imagine I’ll be walking on it anytime soon -- am I right, doctor Fitzroy?”

He’s blushing, and his fingertips skim the small bones of her ankle for a brief moment before he lifts her leg off as gently as he can, “I think so, nurse.”

“Nurse? I don’t get to be a doctor too? For shame.”

Dakota’s eyes roll, and she returns her attention to her abandoned bacon now that he’s been sufficiently deemed a non-threat. He wouldn’t have taken his time with her if he planned on turning her in, nor would he be so concerned for her -- or so gentle, she doesn’t think. He was certainly better than most of the force, at heart, but if he meant to get something done he would have.

“When you’re the one doing the diagnoses and examining on me, you can be the doctor.”

An eyebrow raises, “Is that an invitation?”

“It’s --- it’s something, alright,” but he’s already turned his back away from her, rubbing at his neck and moving to clean the kitchen.

Maybe he wasn’t such a hard one to crack after all. Valiant enough to rescue her, honorable enough to not throw her in a cell, but most importantly he was…