Chapter Text
Kallen was absolutely, positively miserable. It was bad enough that she'd had to live as a prisoner for the better part of a year now, but she also had had to suffer through it all brooding over what she'd learned during the Black Rebellion. Knowledge of Zero's identity, of a power called Geass, knowledge that Lelouch had been playing everyone for a fool. It burned that she couldn't say anything about it. She wasn't foolish enough to blab his identity to everyone, despite how she personally felt about him. Zero was an extremely capable and invaluable leader. To jeopardize their one chance of overthrowing Britannia just because she personally didn't like the boy would be a big mistake.
Currently, she was in a barren holding cell with Ohgi. The cell had two uncomfortable beds and a slightly secluded toilet. The Britannians didn't even have the decency to house her with at least Chiba. As much as she trusted Ohgi, sometimes it could be slightly awkward to go to the bathroom, since though there was a wall divider, there was no door.
Tamaki was in the cell to their left with Tohdoh. It was a wonder that Tohdoh had the patience to deal with him, though she supposed the reason they were housed together was because Tamaki was probably the one least likely to contribute to scheming anything with Tohdoh—in fact, he was probably a hindrance. To her cell's right was Asahina and Chiba. Farther down in that direction were Senba and Kento.
She wasn't sure if any of the other more influential Black Knights had been captured. She hoped that Kaguya and anyone else had managed to escape execution. The Six Houses of Kyoto had to have been in heaps of trouble after the failed Black Rebellion.
Kallen couldn't help but wonder what had become of Lelouch. The last she'd seen him, Suzaku had captured him during their confrontation. She had a feeling that if he was a prisoner as well, he was in a more secluded holding cell.
Back in the aftermath of the Rebellion, she'd eluded the Britannians for a while by laying low, but eventually they'd caught up with her. Suzaku had apparently been rewarded for capturing Zero by becoming a Knight of the Round. With his newfound political power, he'd pulled some strings to make sure she had been captured alive. At first she'd been a little confused, but it'd all made sense when he met with her in jail to bargain with her to revoke her Japanese name and forsake the Knights. Apparently he still had some kind of attachment to her, if she could call it that. More likely, she suspected that he respected her Piloting skills in a weird way and wanted to have her as an ally rather than an enemy.
She'd spat in his face and told him to go to hell.
He'd tried a few more times, but after receiving only her same responses, he'd given up.
Tch. As if she could be tempted to turn traitor like he had. Especially since he'd seemed to have completely revoked all of his morals after he became the Emperor's dog.
The rhythmic clicking of shoes coming down the hallway forced her attention. It wasn't the usual time for a guard to deliver meals or a shift change. So what was this?
Her heart jumped. It wasn't good. Whatever it was, it certainly didn't mean anything good for any of them. The dread in her heart was testament to that. She had a very bad feeling.
The guard stopped outside her cell, wrinkling his nose in disdain as he glared at her. "You've all been scheduled for execution. The date's a week from now." The man's expression twisted into a smug sneer. "A week from today, the Black Knights will be publicly executed. The whole world will watch you terrorists face your punishment. It'll be like this whole 'rebellion' business never happened."
Kallen heart dropped to the floor as her eyes widened. Ohgi was staring at the guard from where he was sitting on the bed. He looked just as shocked as she felt.
The guard's eyes darkened with a sick pleasure. "And just between you and me, I wouldn't count on anyone bailing you out. The only one who might've been able to save you is going to be executed with you. It's only fitting that Zero die with the rest of you dogs."
Kallen felt sick. So Zero was in Britannian custody. And he was going to be killed, along with everyone else. For the first time in a long while, Kallen had a taste of terror. Her own life would be ending in a week. And the guard was right. The only person who could've saved them was in no position to.
The guard smirked at her expression. "I look forward to all your executions." He turned and walked down the hallway the way he'd came.
"We're going to be executed next week?" Kallen asked in a daze. It didn't feel real. She'd gotten lulled into a false sense of security, she recognized that now. She'd been naive. Foolish. Of course an execution had been coming. It'd been such a long time coming she'd started to lose the fear of it. But now that fear was back in full force. She stuffed down a hopeless sob. She wouldn't dare give the Britannians any of her tears.
"Damn them Britannian assholes!" Tamaki shouted from the next door cell, and Kallen heard what she imagined was probably his fist colliding with his mattress. "He was just waving it in our damn faces!"
"Don't get so worked up," Tohdoh replied, his calm voice breaking through Kallen's numbness more than Tamaki's anger. "It's what they want. At least face these events with dignity."
"Tohdoh's right," Ohgi said tiredly. When Kallen turned to look at him, he gave her a look that seemed just as numb as Kallen felt. "There's not exactly much we can do about this."
"This can't be it," she whispered meekly. "All we did...just to be executed? We can't have lost. There's gotta be a way out of this."
Ohgi shook his head at her. "We'd need a miracle to get out of this one," he finally murmured.
That was enough to jolt Kallen's thoughts to get in order. "Miracle..." The gears in her head were suddenly turning. Where was Lelouch? If he was to be executed with them, maybe he'd have a plan! If anyone could save them, it'd be him.
"What about Zero?" She finally spoke up, trying not to sound too hopeful. "If he's going to be executed with us, maybe he'll have formulated a way out of it!"
"He's probably going to be under even more security measures than us. I doubt they'll even let him speak." Tohdoh's words crushed any remnants of hope Kallen had started to feel. She felt a little foolish for even suggesting it.
"That traitor probably wouldn't help us anyways," Chiba spoke up tartly. "If he hadn't abandoned us in the first place, we wouldn't even be in this situation."
Kallen wilted further. No. Morale was low, and trust in Zero was all but gone. No one knew that Lelouch had disappeared during the Black Rebellion because Nunnally had been kidnapped. And from what Kallen could tell, Nunnally was Lelouch's entire world. No one knew that Lelouch had been effectively forced to leave the battlefield. Kallen had had a long time to mull over that night, and she'd started to sympathize more and more with Lelouch. The more she thought about it, the less she could blame him. Her whole motivation was not only for her brother Naoto, but for her mother as well. She understood the sway that family held over someone.
"We don't know, he might've had his reasons," Kallen tried, carefully testing the waters. She still hated Lelouch's guts, but...Zero still could lead them to victory.
"Like what?" snorted Chiba incredulously. "What could be so important that he'd leave during the decisive battle?"
"Enough," Tohdoh sighed sternly. "Arguing over what happened then doesn't change the fact that it did."
Ohgi gave Kallen a pitying look. "I wanted to believe in him too." He spoke quietly, his words just for her. "But no matter why he left or whether or not he's a traitor, he's no longer in a position to help us. We're all stuck in the same boat."
Kallen slumped down on her tough mattress. "I know. I just...I'm not ready for it all to be over." She felt her eyes beginning to water, and she blinked to try to disperse her tears. "...I don't want to die."
Ohgi got up and crossed over to her, sitting down next to her. He draped his arm over her shoulders and pulled her close to his side. "I know," he murmured, and he sounded so, so tired.
——
Across the facility, two floors down, in the subbasement level that required key cards and plenty of special permissions to access, Lelouch was housed in a squalid cell. He was alone, apparently too dangerous a convict to be housed with other people. He was always in a straitjacket, and was only ever released for the basic necessities. He knew that the Emperor (or someone similarly privy to the confidential knowledge of Geass) must've had a specific say in the security measures, because an electric collar prevented him from speaking—surely to counter his Geass. For once, Britannia had been so careful he had no way of escape.
A guard had just informed him that he was to be executed in a week's time along with the rest of the Knights, which was just great. He'd really been hoping he'd be able to weasel his way out of this one. As it stood now, things were not looking up. He'd wracked his brain for solutions, but came up empty every time. His Geass was necessary to get anywhere at all while he was in such a vulnerable position, and it had been very effectively barred off from him. There was no way at all he could remove the collar. If the collar only kept him from speaking due to pain, he could have at least a chance of powering through the pain for long enough to at least deliver one order, but the collar's zap was enough to make the muscles spasm and therefore, make them unusable. No matter how much pain tolerance or determination he had, his muscles would just cease to listen. There was no chance of utilizing Geass while he was collared and shackled like a dog.
With Geass effectively useless, he'd tried to think of any way to get things done without it. But that list of options was somehow even shorter than the one involving Geass. After all, any plans he'd formulated had way too many conditions to clear that, simply put, his chances of getting out of here were null and void. He was useless at physical combat, so no fighting his way out of here—this plan would also require the prerequisite of him being unrestrained, so it would have to be during the small windows of time that his binds were loosened, so there was that. His main strengths had been nullified—his commanding prowess was his main ace, and he couldn't even so much as cough without getting a painful zap. His only usefulness besides strategy—which required more than just himself on the board to be effective in this case—and Geass was his solid marksmanship, which would be handy if he had any chance whatsoever at getting ahold of a firearm (which he didn't).
...Yeah, he was royally fucked.