veepofchess | Snowstorms suck! And boys are stubborn!

Snowstorms suck! And boys are stubborn!

Lelouch hadn't anticipated the blizzard being quite this bad. There were a lot of things he could control, but the weather was not one of them. Normally Shinkiro could handle some adverse weather, but the damage it had taken, while minor in general, had changed that. Water and ice was beginning to seep into the electrical systems.

He wasn't alone, of course. He wasn't stupid. Suzaku and C.C. were alongside him in their own Knightmares. When Lelouch told them he was having difficulty, they all had agreed it best that C.C. go on and fetch help from the Avalon (the weather made long-range communication iffy at best and he didn't want to risk a partial transmission either alerting the enemy or making his army overreact and change position), and Suzaku would stay with Lelouch. After all, if someone chose to take advantage of the crippled Shinkiro, he would be more able to deal with it, even if the Lancelot was arguably a faster unit than C.C.'s.

"She'll probably smell like pizza when she returns..." Lelouch muttered on the open communications channel. He didn't seem to mind if she was out of range of it or not. If she wasn't, she didn't make any reply. "I've turned disabled all combat systems and diverted some of that power to the sensors and radar. As well as the heater. I'm in your hands."

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Any way he looked at this situation he knew he ought to leave the Shinkiro sooner rather than later, but he did not want to leave its wider view behind. They were sitting ducks out here, exposed. He wanted to know what was coming before they found them. "I'm going to stay here as long as I can. Until I lose my computers. Clear off my vents, gently please."

By this point, there wasn't anything he could do to aid his situation than keep an eye on it. He slouched in his seat, leaning off to one side with a hand on his chin. His eyes flitted between looking for moving objects on the radar and keeping an eye on his computer diagnostics. Every time a new alarm went off, he switched off the obnoxious sounds and rerouted the remaining power. There was more red than green before too long.

Suzaku did as he was told, though he cursed Lelouch for his stubbornness.

He continued patrolling, checking the damage to make sure no fires had started. Inwardly he was counting the alarms.

"Open your hatch." His tone brooked no arguments. There couldn't be much power left now at all.

Lelouch scowled. "As soon as I do I'll be soaked to the skin from the snow that's been melting since I took the hit. And crawling into that closet you call a cockpit won't improve that situation at all. I would sooner eject." He didn't mention that the ejection system had been one of the first to go after the float.

Sure he had plenty of energy left in his filler. It was the encroaching water that was the problem.

"That's a bad idea." He told him unnecessarily, it would waste time to look for him, and it would leave either Lelouch or Shinkiro vulnerable as Suzaku couldn't be in two places at once.

"You will mostly be sheltered by Lancelot, open the hatch." He got closer, looming over the kneeling knightmare to give as much storm shelter as possible.

Lelouch was about to rebuke him when the decision was made for him. All at once, the fire alarm went off, and then everything went dark. Lelouch went for the manual hatch release, muttering curses. His asset had turned into a death trap. It took several tugs, and he had to put all his weight into the lever, but it popped open. Just as he thought, the water that had once been snow that had melted on the hatch poured down on him, soaking him through. He climbed up and out as quickly as he could.

Suzaku opened his own hatch, letting down the cord so Lelouch could move into Lancelot's cockpit. It would be a tight squeeze, Lancelot wasn't really made for passengers.

It took a lot for Lelouch to hang on to that rope with his shaking hands. He wrapped his arms around it. That cold water was doing the trick quickly. "Suzaku! Push Shinkiro onto its back. The snow should put out the fire! Do not let the Sakuradite ignite! If we lose Shinkiro our whole timeline will have to be delayed!" He was shivering so bad, he had difficulty pushing the switch to reel himself in. He dumped himself unceremoniously into the cockpit, tucked as far off to one side as he could. No amount of stubbornness could stop the shivering, but being out of the wind helped a lot. He'd worry about that once Suzaku had secured the Shinkiro.

Suzaku would worry about him once the immediate threat of explosions was gone. He pushed the larger knightmare backwards into the snow. There were more sparks but the snow did its work and the actual flames went out.

It would take a lot of fixing, Lloyd probably wouldn't talk to either of them for a week, but it wasn't lost.

That sorted he halted the Lancelot and turned around to where Lelouch was shivering. "Here" He took the blanket and handed it to him.

He stayed out of Suzaku's way as best he could while he did what he needed to do. The heat coming off of Shinkiro faded, according to the sensors. He felt blind compared to the wide array of information Shikiro had to present for him. Not to mention distinctly less comfortable. But he wrapped himself as best he could, and wedged himself between the array of controls at the armrest and the side monitor. He hoped he wasn't dripping on anything important.

He stayed quiet for the moment, aside from an occasional groan from shivering and curse.

Suzaku checked the sensors again, before looking back at Lelouch. He turned the heating controls up to maximum. "Are you alright?"

"I-I will be s-soon," he shivered. He pulled the foil blanket tightly around himself. He knew the thing would work better against bare skin, but he wasn't in a hurry to strip like this. Staying in the wet clothes wasn't a good idea either.

"I'm n-not going to l-let something like th-this kill me..."

He clicked a few more buttons, making sure the alarms for any signals entering the sensors range were set correctly and turned to fully face Lelouch.

He fussed with the blanket a moment, it probably wasn't doing much when there was wet clothing between it and Lelouch. "You should probably take your wet things off, you're not going to get any warmer like that."

Suzaku was right, though Lelouch considered resisting out of principle. He breathed on his hands to steady them before setting to the ties on his shoes. His feet ached to be forced out of them, but he bore it. It wasn't the worst pain he'd ever experienced, but it was up there.

His fingers proved useless, though. While he successfully got his shoes off, the buttons on his shirt were harder. "G-give me your gloves." He wasn't sure they'd make a difference, but he hated that he couldn't move his fingers much.

Suzaku pulled off his gloves and handed them over, watching him struggle for a moment before his patience got the better of him and he began unbuttoning the shirt for him.

Once Suzaku started helping him, he didn't really argue. He tugged the gloves on. They were still warm from when Suzaku was wearing them. Almost painfully so.

Once his shirt was gone, he was dexterous enough to take care of his own pants. He put all the clothes inn a soggy pile in the back, away from anything important. He rolled himself up in the blanket as tightly as he could. This was hardly any way or an Emperor to be. But it's better than dead.

Suzaku was a bit worried at Lelouch's condition, and the heating was up as high as it could go.

"CC should be almost there by now."

With the wet clothes off and the foil blanket up against his skin, he was starting to feel better. He just made a light sound of affirmation at Suzaku's statement.

He kind of glared at the view screen that showed the damaged Shinkiro. As if this was the machine's fault. He leaned over against Suzaku's pilots seat and let out a breath that sounded kind of exasperated. "I should be warm by the time she gets here, my wet clothes notwithstanding."

"Let me know if your condition worsens." He watched him for a moment, feeling bad he was slumped on the floor, but it wasn't like he was in any condition to pilot if they got attacked.

"I will be just fine, Suzaku. It's not time for me to die yet," he replied. This whole incident was far from what he'd planned, but it could have gone worse he supposed. He could have ordered Suzaku to fly to the Avalon, but he didn't want Shinkiro to be taken by the enemy.

Speaking of... he reached up and assumed control of Lancelot's sensors and radar for a moment. He went into its code and tried to enhance the range, but there wasn't much further the hardware could go. Lancelot, after all, was a combat unit, not a commander's. "I may have to talk to Lloyd about upgrades to the Lancelot. I feel like we have blinders on."

"CC will kill me if I let you die." He said, an attempt at humour, lost a little.

He watched Lelouch attempt to upgrade the sensors. "He'll be happy."

"It's the least I could offer him, after dropping a damaged Shinkiro on his lap. It's only right I let him play with Lancelot," he said, in a tone that plainly said he wasn't looking forward to the Earl's wails of despair when he sees the holes and scorch marks on Shinkiro. But it was only a few decibels shy of what it would be if Lancelot were damaged.

Suzaku nodded, following that thought easily. "He's going to be impossible for weeks."

He always was when things got damaged.

Lelouch seemed to finally be getting comfortable, such as he could in these cramped quarters. At least his company was decent. He leaned against the side of the pilot's seat; his hair dripped unavoidably onto Suzaku's arm. Settled in though he was, he was far from relaxed. He never really was, anymore. He couldn't afford to be. There was far, far, too much at stake here. The shortened field of view clearly still bothered him, but he knew there was nothing he could do about it now.

Suzaku wasn't relaxed either but he didn't bother about the dripping, the flight suit could handle it.

"The speed of the Lancelot will win us back any time we would have lost from having a shorter sensor range." He told Lelouch seriously.

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Snowstorms suck! And boys are stubborn!

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