History Fanfic / AColdCalculus

* HonorBeforeReason: Suzaku is noted to be the type of person to put personal honor before all else. This leads him to keeping quiet about Kallen's being the Red Knight when he finds out about it early on, supposedly hoping to somehow sway her to his way of thinking. This comes to bite him in the ass when his bosses find out about this when Kallen disappears after the attack on Ashford Academy. He barely escapes getting executed, thanks to a combination his, until then, stellar performance track, [[VetinariJobSecurity the ASEEC's continued need of him]] and just a little bit of PlotArmor.

* MoralityChain: The author's notes acknowledge that Nunnally is the only real tether Lelouch has to his humanity in canon. [[spoiler:With her presumed dead to him, he has no reservations about the collateral damage he causes in pursuit of his goals and no greater purpose beyond revenge.]]

* NotHimself: Todoh notes that ever since the SDECE agents led by [[spoiler:Lelouch]] arrived, JLF General Katase has been seeking Todoh's counsel less, and his plans are getting far more reckless. [[spoiler:He's obviously not aware of it, but Katase has been subverted by Lelouch's Geass and is now only a pawn in Lelouch's quest for revenge against Britannia and Charles.]]

* HeKnowsTooMuch: [[spoiler:Lelouch]]'s Geass can kill anyone on the verge of revealing their secrets, including Private Peter Wake and [[spoiler:the Sumeragi retainer Ichijo]].

* OneSteveLimit: So far there has been only one case of characters sharing a first name, and since the two Lauras never end up in the same scene, telling them apart isn't hard.
** Come chapter 113, both Lauras appear in the same scene and the author trolls the audience by not specifying which Laura is doing or saying what.

** Colonel Jonathan Eyre is placed in one during the events of the prologue when he is ordered by Cornelia to arrest Duke Constantine for providing the military with substandard products. He can't disobey a legal direct order from a Princess, but if he carries it out it's him and his niece who will suffer the ire of the enraged nobles. Fortunately, when he explains the situation to Euphie, she grants him a [[TakeAThirdOption third option]] by taking his niece on as an intern, granting him a royal patron and sparing the two the consequences of her actions.
** Suzaku is nearly put in one during the Lake Kawaguchi incident when Euphie orders him to escort Nunnally home, leaving her in the care of a currently unidentified insurgent (Kallen). If he disobeys, he just committed direct insubordination against a princess of the Empire. If he obeys and the insurgent murders Euphie, he abandoned a princess of the Empire to get killed. Claudio notes after the fact that Suzaku got lucky it worked out for him.

* SadisticChoice: The EU agents led by [[spoiler:Lelouch]] tries this to undermine Euphie's rule. A petition is sent to her asking for the pardon and release of Japanese prisoners who were peaceful anti-Britannia protesters. If she pardons the prisoners, she wins Japanese support but loses Britannia support. And if she doesn't pardon them, she wins Britannia support but loses Japanese support. So what does Euphie do? [[spoiler:[[TakeAThirdOption She will release the prisoners if they pledge their allegiance to Britannia and become Honorary Britannians]].]]

* SadisticChoice: The EU agents led by [[spoiler:Lelouch]] tries this to undermine Euphie's rule. A petition is sent to her asking for the pardon and release of Japanese prisoners who were peaceful anti-Britannia protesters. If she pardons the prisoners, she wins Japanese support but loses Britannia support. And if she doesn't pardon them, she wins Britannia support but loses Japanese support. So what does Euphie do? [[spoiler:[[TakeAThirdOption She will release the prisoners in exchange they pledge their allegiance to Britannia and become Honorary Britannians]].]]

* AscendedExtra: Naomi Inoue was a bit character mostly remembered for being voiced by Creator/KikukoInoue and got kaboomed at the end of Season 1. Here, she's the most prominent member of the resistance group after Kallen. [[spoiler:She still dies towards the end of the R1 phase though, albeit differently (got shot and bled to death instead of engulfed in her Knightmare's explosion).]]

* TooBleakStoppedCaring: [[invoked]]Acknowledged in the author's notes for Chapter 15 as the reason why [[spoiler:[[TheUnfettered a completely unfettered Lelouch]]]] wouldn't be able to carry the story, as he'd ruin too many lives for his victory to be a satisfying ending. On the same tack, [[EvilVsEvil Schneizel]] and [[StatusQuoIsGod Cornelia]] would have similar problems in creating a satisfying conclusion to the story.

* LaResistance: Akatsuki and the JLF have recently stopped being this, but mentions are made of resistance groups in all the other countries and areas bogging down the operations of whoever they're opposing. Notably, not all of them are anti-Britannian as resistance groups in India have made alliances with them against the Chinese Federation.

* ForegoneConclusion: The synopsis outright says that Euphemia emerges as the Empress of Britannia. The story is about how she gets there.

* [[spoiler:FakingTheDead: Lelouch and Nunnally, despite the prologue, are alive and well in the meat of the story. The latter was spirited away by the Ashford family, had her death announced as being from the assassination attempt and given a cover as Milly's sister. The former faked his death after hearing of Nunnally's fake one and left for the EU.]]

* HistoricalVillainUpgrade: The [[FictionalDocument FictionalDocuments]] shown at the start of each chapter are implied to have been written well after the end of Euphemia's reign, and as such the portrayal of some figures in them tend to be exaggerated. Most notable is [[spoiler:Suzaku]] being referred to as one of the greatest traitors in history, when the actual story shows his treason to be limited to leaking some classified technical documents and firing on his squadmates during a battle, [[spoiler:which gets him killed when reinforcements arrive]]. And all of that was the involuntary result of [[spoiler:Lelouch's Geass]]. [[spoiler:The author eventually decided to rewrite the story so that Suzaku survives the JLF uprising in a manner that will allow him to return and do something that would better qualify him as one of history's greatest traitors.]]

** JurisdictionFriction: One key bone of contention between them is whether a foreign agent operating on Britannian soil falls under the jurisdiction of Hereticus or Xenos. While the Ordo Malleus (whose very existence is so classified that even most people in Xenos and Hereticus don't know the Inquisitio has more than two Ordos) considers the actions of Geass users to be under their jurisdiction even if their actions or sphere of operations would normally put them under the jurisdiction of one of the other Ordos.

* WhatTheHellHero: It gets pointed out to him that his paranoia actually did more damage to those members of the royal family who were the Directorate's enemies than its allies.

** WhatTheHellHero: Later on it gets pointed out to him that his paranoia actually did more damage to those members of the royal family who were the Directorate's enemies than its allies.

The [[ForWantOfANail "Nail"]] of this story is that both Nunnally and Marianne die in the "terrorist attack". Prompting Lelouch to despair and kill himself much to Euphemia's dismay after earlier asking her sister to keep him safe. This prompts her to change her outlook and direction in life.

* AscendedExtra: Naomi Inoue was a bit character mostly remembered for being voiced by Creator/KikukoInoue and met her fiery death at the end of Season 1. Here, she's the most prominent member of the resistance group after Kallen. [[spoiler:She still dies towards the end of the R1 phase though, albeit differently (got shot and bled to death instead of getting kaboomed inside her Knightmare).]]

* SilkHidingSteel: Euphie's still kind-hearted and idealistic, if more grounded than her canon counterpart, but crossing her reveals that she has a steel spine. During the Lake Kawaguchi incident, she responds to [[spoiler:the Blood of the Samurai taking Nunnally hostage]] with a threat to make them drown in their own blood. Much later, as they're planning on their retaliation, Euphie surprises both Cornelia and Jeremiah with her opting to KillEmAll.

* AscendedExtra: Naomi Inoue was a bit character mostly remembered for being voiced by Creator/KikukoInoue and dying at the end of Season 1. Here, she's the most prominent member of the resistance group after Kallen. [[spoiler:She still dies towards the end of the R1 phase, however.]]

* LoadsAndLoadsOfCharacters: Done to avert TheMainCharactersDoEverything and NewPowersAsThePlotDemands. If the author discovers that a skillset is needed that is not already shown to be possessed by someone in the existing cast, he either comes up with a plausible reason for a character to spend several chapters learning that skillset, or introduces a new character who already has it.

* SpotOfTea: Referenced in one of the FictionalDocument segments. After the war with the EU and China cuts Britannia off from the tea fields of India, Japan steps up to try to fill the gap as the largest tea-producing region under Britannian control, getting a much needed economic boost in the process. The fact that Indian tea blends and Japanese tea blends are nothing alike is glossed over.

* HonorBeforeReason: Suzaku is noted to be the type of person to put personal honor before all else. This leads him to keeping quiet about Kallen's being the Red Knight when he finds out about it early on, supposedly hoping to somehow sway her to his way of thinking. [[RealityEnsues This comes to bite him in the ass when his bosses find out about this when Kallen disappears after the attack on Ashford Academy.]] He barely escapes getting executed, thanks to a combination his, until then, stellar performance track, [[VetinariJobSecurity the ASEEC's continued need of him]] and just a little bit of PlotArmor.

* AdaptationalBadass: In a way, all of Emperor Charles' legitimate children. The series was a bit spotty about each child's competence and temperance, which is odd if one were to believe that Britannia possessed a DeadlyDecadentCourt. Here, all of them have greater involvement with the empire's workings, political or military. The most noticeable of them, other than Euphie of course, is Odysseus: In the series, he's an unassuming milquetoast of a man strung along by Schneizel despite being the Crown Prince. Here, he's a prominent figure in the Britannian Navy and is much more aware of himself and his siblings [[spoiler:which is why he pulls a HoldTheLine stunt to let his siblings escape from Lelouch's forces when the capital city is under attack as he understands that Schneizel is much more important than he is.]]

[[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/11348379/1/A-Cold-Calculus A Cold Calculus]] is an AlternateUniverse ''{{Anime/Code Geass}}'' fanfic by [[https://www.fanfiction.net/u/211888/Z98 Z98]] (also known for their [[FanficRecs/NeonGenesisEvangelionAU recommended]] ''{{Anime/Neon Genesis Evangelion}}'' fanfic, [[https://www.fanfiction.net/s/11042928/1/In-Tune In Tune]]).