「Grand Eunuch」

They were taking the risk of moving even further into the ancient Forbidden City of Beijing. The closer they got to the center of the capital, the thicker the guards appeared to be. Soldiers were even present. Soldiers which seemed more alert than the Royal Guards which barely noticed their presence.

They kept their weapons lowered, their movements slow. They couldn't be caught now. They needed to secure the third objective after they were finished here. The plan was to eliminate the majority of the High Eunuchs except for Gao Hai, which he had marked for indoctrination.

The idea was to have Gao Hai believe that Zero, Lelouch vi Britannia, was an important asset to the Empresses bid for power and escape from her shackles. Despite the High Eunuch being flamboyant and outgoing, he was a good choice for being the Grand Eunuch, or in other words, Prime Minister of the Federation.

His third targets were Empress Tianzi and her dear protector, Li Xingke, in order to have the Federation guarantee the Japanese Empire's independence after they had broken away from Britannia on their own.

He was aware of Tianzi's unrealized affections towards Xingke who had made a promise to her when she was much younger. A promise to allow her to leave the Palace and see the world. This promise meant everything for her, and she never forgot it and never will forget it.

After entering the forbidden palace, the two of them found themselves standing in a long room. One could assume it was the grand hall, or dining hall. There were small tables and sitting areas set up on either side of the carpet.

Sitting at each of the tables was a High Eunuch, and at the very end of the carpet was the Empress. She was much smaller than he had imagined.

Graham stood there for a few moments, looking over the individuals present. Within the group of guards was Xingke and his group. He was a man of the people and a man worthy of the albindo empress.

Raising their weapons, he paused for a moment. Graham had an idea. Opening fire on them would be a bad idea. Even with their muzzles stopping the flashes from being seen from a distance. They'd be giving their location away. They'd end up killing more people then they had to, and they'd be endangering himself.

"Hold fire," he said quietly beneath the mask and motioned for her to move back. The two of them moved behind a pair of red pillars. Closing his eyes, he activated his Geass for the first time since they had arrived in the chinese federation.

As a few minutes passed the sound of buzzing drones could be heard. And in a few seconds after that in came a pair of drones which were just like the ones which had been used to kill a handful of Japanese Liberation Front soldiers.

The drones moved passed the pillars and circled around the room.

Immediately Xingke moved in and appropriated the Empress and moved her out of the way. However before any of the High Eunuchs could even stand up completely from where they were seated eating their supper, the drones opened fire.

Putputputputputputputputputputputputputputputputputput!

Tianzi's sight was hidden within the abdomen of her protector. She didn't want to see the death of others, yet she could hear their screams and grunts, followed by the mersiable silence.

Just as the drones turned to leave, they suddenly exploded as they were shot down by guards. They were designed to combust to the point of unrecognition once they were taken out of commission. They couldn't be traced back to him.

"Guards! Guards!" Gao Hai hopelessly shouted for the Royal Guards, who soon came rushing into the room. He was dumbfounded to not only find that he was the only Eunuch alive, but the Empress was also unharmed.

What was the meaning of this? He began to suspect that this was the doing of Xingke, but said nothing. There was no one else here to back him. The only choice he had was to go along with whatever happened next.

However despite the drones being burnt beyond recognition, there was a piece of a drone that remained, it had a Britannian symbol on it. This clearly marked that the assassins were most definitely of Britannian origin.

Though if any real investigator looked at it, it was like a treasure trove. That was the only evidence there. The only part of the Drone which survived. Otherwise there was no barcode or serial number on the drones. They had been clearly manufactured privately. It was a frame job, a good one too.

With objective two partially complete, the two of them moved about the forbidden palace, avoiding patrols. They couldn't stay in one place for too long as security had tightened.

They believed that the perpetrators were still nearby and hadn't left. They weren't wrong, and it seemed like the were close to weeding Graham and Cera out.

"This special ops stuff, is kinda fun." Cera commented quietly as they moved about on the roof of the Palace. Their weapons were still in hand. They were attempting to conserve ammo, as well as to avoid unnecessary casualties.

This op needed a perfect success rate, otherwise Graham was going to have to use his powers on even more people. Essentially this would end up getting many people either killed or brainwashed. Not that it really mattered. Even when people are 'changed' they aren't necessarily changed. With their personalities still in tact, it would be possible for them to regress to their previous way of thinking should there be too many inconsistencies. Since Graham didn't want to go super in depth when it came to editing data, there was a chance that those he changed would only temporarily stay that way.

Kneeling on the edge of the rooftops, they looked down at the courtyard where Gao was surrounded by a royal escort. He was being heavily guarded. He was either under suspicion for assassinating his colleagues, or it was a trap for them to fall into.

That or it could be very well be both.

Now all they needed was to get this man to be alone. They could only assume that the best opportunity would be to wait until he returns to his chambers for the night. If he was put under house arrest, that'd be even better.

No after observation, it didn't seem as if he was suspected of treason. If anything, they believed he was spared by chance. This however still gave them an opportunity.

Cera and Graham descended from the roof and closed in on Gao as he was making his way to his personal quarters within the Forbidden palace. There should be no where else that he would go.

However as they did so, there was something that both of them seemed to notice. The Royal Guard which was loyal to the Eunuchs were virtually gone. The ones who controlled the palace were Xingke's men. Why the sudden change? Were the guards not trusted anymore? Or was this some sort of elaborate trap?

Good thing he didn't need to show himself to use his magic. They entered Hai's room, he was facing the door from the other side of the room. As if expected someone to come in.

They watched as he squinted at the door, not capable of seeing them just yet as he wasn't close enough to see their outline shown by light wrapped around them to give the illusion of invisibility.

The room was filled with treasures of course, lucious rugs and tapestries decorated the floors, desks and dressers. The bed was the simplest thing there, covered in silk pillows and soft blankets.

"My, my~" The man seemed the giggle at the arrival of the two. "So you are..." The moment Graham activated his Geass, Gao Hai went silent and closed his eyes. "So that's what I have to do... The Empress, the Empress is paramount, Zero is the key to her renewed sovereignty. If Japan doesn't regain its independence, Britannia will carve the Federation apart!"

As flamboyant as always with his hand gestures, this would merely look like a man going mad.

Glancing over to the corner of the room, there was a camera. It had clearly been set up while they had been observing Gao Hai earlier. It was just like Xingke, think ahead. He may have been left alive for a reason. One may try to approach them when they're alone and unguarded.

"Interesting..." Xingke stated as he walked into the room behind the two. Since he was entering from behind, he could see their outlines as he entered the room.

Making a hand gesture, Graham had himself and Cera disengage their cloaking devices. Making their masked forms apparent to those present. Which seemed to only be Xingke, as he had seen their agenda.

"What did you do to him? Why has his loyalty shifted from himself to his Empress? Why does he seek Zero?" It was clear he had been suspecting the Eunuchs of planning to sell off their Empress for the sake of their own power and riches.

"Don't you have a Promise to keep, Xingke?" He raised a hand with his thumb and pinky sticking out of a fist. "Don't keep her waiting."

His questions were answered by a single question and an ushering to fulfill a promise. "Why are you doing this?" Clearly disgruntled, he made himself seem taller and tucked his chin into his collar to appear domineering.

"The reason you fight, is to protect something, someone. Is it not? The my reason is the same, just with a splash more. Isn't this a mutual arrangement?" Graham smirked quietly, his head tilted to the side.

The two looked like devilish imps made of darkness due to their inhuman masks and being draped in nothing but nano-weave cloth and sleek compact high tech gear. Xingke felt like he was about to make a deal with the devil. Or at least, be letting the devil escape. "Where do you think you are going?"

"To seal the fate of the Britannian Empire."

To him it sounded like this man was going to destroy the enemy of the world. Or at least try to and definitely weaken them to the point that the world will continue the rest. Xingke began to deduce that it was wise to let this devil go, at least this once.

"You have a ten second head start once I leave this room, if you don't escape on your own, I hold no promises that your lives will be preserved." Xingke warned as he turned to walk out of the room.

Graham and Cera darted forward, however in the moment Cera went to rush passed Xingke, the man drew his weapon. Using the momentum from the draw, his blade went out to the side and near instantly decapitated her.

Xingke watched the unexpected, like watching a game of soccer, Graham caught Cera's head in his hand and tucked his head into his chest. Yet the moment he went to look at the rest of Cera's body, all that was left was an empty stealth suit.

"What in the world...?"

Cera's immortality came into effect even should she be decapitated, or even destroyed at the molecular and atomic levels. She would always come back, that was her curse, thanks to the Geass code. So in turn, her remains disappeared and began to grow back from the head, like a tree from a sapling.

By the time Graham had made his stealthy escape, undetected by the guards after the ten seconds allotted to him, only Cera's torso had returned partially grown back. Luckily, she was nowhere near conscious. He could only imagine the pain.

Back in the car, he began to speed his way back to the beach of Tianjin, in order to get to the nearest outlet to the ocean. At least, that is what he thought his pursuers to believe if they were going to continue to follow him.

In two hours, her lower body and arms began to reform. She lay rested on the back seat. Her body bare, all except for the mask which covered her face. The fact that Xingke had decapitated her, meant that he had also cleaved her hair to the point that it was only mid-neck length now.

However when they reached the beach, violently bouncing along the uneven ground due to their speed, it was clear that they didn't follow. They didn't try to cut them off. They had been expelled from the Forbidden Palace, no further aggression was used against them. The world outside wasn't disturbed by the Federation forces. While he found it slightly strange, he assumed Xingke was trying to send a message, a warning not to mess with the Federation any further.

It didn't matter, he got what he wanted. So he had no qualms as his car dove into the ocean and switched into its submarine mode. He was going to his next target. His plan was to get rid of his Geass in exchange for immortality, even though he hadn't mastered it yet.

He was going to use a thought elevator in order to steal V.V.'s code. That was his next objective. If he did this, while he would no longer be able to control people, he'd very much be able to stop himself from losing control and possibly devastating his own plans for the future.

His next destination, Kamine Island.