Kallen left Japan with her father before the Second Pacific War erupted. In Britannia she found new friends, made a home for herself, and soon came to a startling revelation: deep down, she was more Britannian than Japanese. Events spiral from there.
Kallen Stadtfeld, Countess of Britannia
is a For Want Of A Nail Code Geass Fan Fic by Forthwith. The story's main point of departure stems from Kallen's decision to leave Japan with her father for Britannia, where she befriends Euphemia and Nunnally. This causes her path to cross with Lelouch's, resulting in a very different childhood for both of them as they soon become each other's closest friend. Of course, neither of their extended families will give them a moment of peace. note The struggle the pair undergoes to survive ultimately culminates in a vow between Lelouch and Kallen to create a better world. note
Years later, Lelouch and Kallen embark on their quest for the Britannian throne. They start in Japan, now Area Eleven, where they intend to find a valuable ally to add to their cause and hope not to run into too much (unasked for) trouble along the way.
At 35 chapters and ongoing.
Kallen Stadtfeld, Countess of Britannia contains the following tropes:
- Abled in the Adaptation: None of the children are at Aries Villa when Marianne is assassinated, meaning Nunnally is neither blind nor wheelchair bound.
- The Ace: Marianne, and to some extent so far Lelouch and Kallen.
- Adaptational Badass:
- Because Kallen got training in Knightmare simulators from the time she was ten, she's Knight of the Round level two years before canon. During the battle of Shinjuku, Kallen dances around her enemies, easily eliminating over half a dozen Sutherlands rather than struggling to flee from them like in canon.
- Marianne uses their Geass to Body Surf between enemy combatants and use them to gun their allies down.
- Kallen also has a Geass that lets them see if they or someone emotionally close to them will die within a given timeframe. They've learned to abuse the ability in such a way as to functionally see the future.
- Affably Evil: Clovis is one of the friendliest of the royal family and is particularly fond of flirting with various women seemingly for the sake of it. He's still responsible for human experimentation so horrible that he hid it behind a claim of being banned chemical weapons development.
- Aggressive Submissive: When Kallen and Lelouch have a Relationship Upgrade, their bets start becoming sexual in nature and Kallen sometimes seems almost eager to lose.
- Amicable Exes: Kallen's parents to the point that they would happily remarry as soon as it was safe to do so, emphasis on would.
- Arbitrarily Large Bank Account:
- Kallen is rich enough she could "buy the Shinjuku ghetto and laugh off the expense" due to being the Countess of New York. It's mentioned that between tax revenue and Stadtfeld Industries, she regularly deals with dollar amounts in the tens, if not hundreds, of billions.
- When Lelouch thinks expense is what is keeping Naoto from attending his sister's knighting ceremony, he notes that he and Kallen could each buy Naoto a private jet and laugh off the duplicate gift.
- Ascended Extra: Marianne appears regularly throughout the story though it's some time before Lelouch and Kallen are made aware of this.
- Assassin Outclassin': Possibly the Ashfords, but the vi Britannias especially. In particular, Lelouch and Kallen killed a geass assassin presumably sent by V.V.
- Awesome, but Impractical: The Ganymede was superior to the Glasgow but it's open cockpit caused a much higher fatality rate that ultimately doomed it.
- Awesomeness by Analysis: Lelouch deduces from a couple statements by others, including his father insisting he'll need a Geass to get revenge for his mother's death, that 1) Marianne was killed by an immortal, and 2) Geass users are capable of killing immortals.
- Batman Gambit: Kallen plays up her Aggressive Submissive status to get Lelouch to make a bet that a coin will land on either heads or tails, then catches the coin so it lands on its edge, winning the bet and making her the one in control in bed that night.
- Beauty Is Never Tarnished: Near the end of the Russian campaign, Kallen mentions having a large scar on her back to which Lelouch rolls his eyes and mentally notes that his mother had accrued dozens of scars over her career and was no less beautiful for it.
- Berserk Button: Besides anyone who draws Charles' attention away from him, V.V. hates being compared to his family, something Marianne utilizes during his assassination against her by taunting him how he's lying to his brother while manipulating and murdering his family, just like his family used to do.
- Best Friend: Kallen and Lelouch, although Lelouch intends on something more.
- Blue Blood: After the fifth chapter, Kallen becomes the Countess of New York.
- Body Surf: Marianne can hop from body to body with her Geass.
- Broken Pedestal:
- Learning of Code-R breaks Marrybell's image of Clovis, whom she'd previously viewed as a father figure.
- Played for Laughs in the "I Knew All Along" omake when Kallen learns that Marianne's wifi password is apparently "Lulu and Nunnally are so adorable I can't stand it".
- Brutal Honesty: When Lelouch suggests Marrybell replacing Clovis as Viceroy of Area 11, Charles outright declares it'd "put her one step closer to killing him and Lelouch two steps closer to the throne".
- Call-Back: Early on in their career, Kallen mentions wanting a statue in her honor made. Near the end of their Russian campaign, Lelouch remarks he'll build said statue once they get home.
- Can't Kill You, Still Need You: Kallen briefly holds this position in the "I Knew All Along" omake after she reveals that she knows Lelouch's true identity. Lelouch contemplates that she's a liability but she's also completely indispensable for her piloting abilities.
- Child of Two Worlds: Much of Kallen's character development in R0 revolves around her growing to identify more with her Britannian heritage. In contrast, her brother identifies far more with his Japanese heritage.
- Child Soldier: The oldest member of Valkyrie Squad is fourteen. Disturbingly, the squad is made of canon characters who may very well have enlisted that young (being not much older in their canon appearance taking place a few years later).
- Combat Clairvoyance: Kallen's geass allows her to predict her own death (and some others) and alter the timeline appropriately in a continuous process as opposed to iteratively checking if she's changed enough to prevent her fate.
- Combat Pragmatist: The second time she faces the Alexander in battle, Kallen uses a sniper rifle from across an open field then has artillery bombard the forest it takes cover in.
- Cover Identity Anomaly: In the "I Knew All Along" omake, Kallen already figured out Lelouch was Zero because she recognized his voice. During their first official meeting, she points out a flaw he forgot: He speaks flawless English with the same diction she does, marking him as a Britannian of high birth.
- Crippling Overspecialization: According to C.C., Joan of Arc's over-reliance on her Geass (implied to be a form of clairvoyance or scrying) is what allowed Britannian forces led by C.C. to capture her.
- Cruel and Unusual Death: Clovis is forced to relive everything he put C.C. through before finally being drowned.
- Cynic–Idealist Duo: A pair of duos at that. After learning of Ragnarok, Lelouch and Kallen believe the new system would merely be exploited by people and that all Ragnarok does is trade the world's current problems for new problems. Charles and V.V. believe that they'll create a world without lies that will be a paradise once everyone fully understands each other* . Marianne is somewhere in the middle, acknowledging that the new world will have it's own set of problems, but hopeful that they'll be easier to deal with.
- Dances and Balls: Commonplace in Britannian high society. Two have been shown so far with a third mentioned, and Kallen's debutante ball is upcoming.
- Deadpan Snarker: Lelouch and Kallen greatly enjoy snarking at each other's expense. Early in their friendship, Kallen finds Lelouch studying a chessboard to "see where he messed up in his game against Schneizel".Kallen: I imagine it was either when you challenged him or when you accepted his challenge.
- Death by Adaptation: Both of Kallen's parents are killed when she's still a child.
- Death of Personality: V.V. threatens to do this to Lelouch and Nunnally to keep Marianne from telling Charles he murdered her.
- Declining Promotion: Kallen was offered a position as a Knight of the Round when she was 14 but turned it down.
- Defeat Means Friendship: Lelouch and Marrybell agree to this in an early duel to avoid fighting each other over the throne later in life.
- Defiant to the End: Even when bleeding out and having her children threatened with a Fate Worse than Death, Marianne takes the time to taunt V.V. over how he's lying to his brother while murdering his family, just like V.V.'s family did.
- Demoted to Extra: Sayoko wasn't a major character before but has even less screen time in this story than canon due to spending years tracking V.V. at Marianne's behest.
- Didn't See That Coming: When asked his advice on who should replace Clovis, Lelouch suggests Charles use Marrybell and seemingly convinces him. To everyone's surprise, Euphemia becomes the next viceroy of Area 11.
- Didn't Think This Through:
- Kallen took to wearing all red for a time in an attempt to become known as the "Crimson Lotus". What she didn't consider is that the lotus isn't a terribly common or popular flower in Britannia nor does it hold any significant meaning to the average Britannian. Instead, she got saddled with the moniker "The Rose of Britannia" since red roses are very popular and have a great deal of meaning to the average citizen.
- When Nunnally and Laila determine that Kallen has some form of psychic powers and try to convince Marika, she asks them And Then What?, which causes them to realize they hadn't actually considered what they'd do with such information.
- Do Wrong, Right:
- Kallen criticizes a trio of thugs for their attempt to intimidate her, calling their efforts pathetic.
- Kallen chews out her brother the rebel... for doing a half-assed job of it. She flat out tells him that he should have either avoided drawing official attention entirely or gone for broke. When he later decides to go all in on freeing Japan from Britannia, she still accuses him of being half-assed for stopping there.
- Double Agent: Over Marrybell's protests, Suzaku acts as a double agent for her with the JLF.
- The Dreaded: Even years after her death, people still fear Marianne the Flash.
- Embarrassing Nickname: For a time, Kallen was known as the "Rose of Britannia", a moniker she hates.
- Even Evil Can Be Loved: Lelouch says as much to Marrybell over how she still loves Clovis like a father even after finding out about Code R. Lelouch also acknowledges his mother did some truly awful things in life but it doesn't stop him from loving her anyway.
- Even Evil Has Standards: Charles put a hard end to familicide within the royal family. Only twice has it been attempted since he took the throne and both times, he completely destroyed the perpetrators physically, financially, and politically.
- Evil Is Petty:
- The Stadtfelds wanting Kallen and her father dead so they can take his money makes a cruel sort of sense. Them also wanting his Japanese ex-wife dead is simply pettiness and racism.
- V.V. brutally murders Marianne, allegedly for weakening Charles's resolve to see through Ragnarok, but really just out of jealousy of his brother paying attention to someone that isn't him. His vendetta extends to her children as well, sending multiple Geass wielding assassins after Lelouch and trying to make Leila a contractor to kill him.
- Exact Words:
- The Purist leader claims his faction is responsible for bringing in five different terrorist cells and is closing in on a sixth. A later scene shows the purists go into a ghetto and brutalize random citizens until they're attacked, then kill their attackers and chalk it up to terrorists.
- When describing the details of Code R, Sayoko explains that C.C. was chosen because "a quirk of her biology makes her more suitable for it" and asks that Naoto not "make [her] embarrass [herself] trying to explain". While Naoto takes it to mean it's some genetic science that Sayoko doesn't understand well enough to explain, what she actually means is that C.C. is immortal and Sayoko doesn't want to try to convince him of such.
- Charles insists Lelouch needs a Geass of his own to get revenge on the one who killed Marianne. Since Lelouch is certain Charles knows Kallen has a Geass, which is later confirmed, he deduces that what matters isn't the specific Geass power Lelouch has but that he personally has one. From there, Lelouch determines that a Geass user can somehow kill immortals, like the one who killed Marianne.
- Anne makes several comments about her past, such as being a former pickpocket until she acquired a noble sponsor and being older than she looks to not quite tell Kallen she's actually Marianne controlling someone else with her Geass.
- Fangirl: Marika quickly becomes one for Kallen, to the point of being outraged at a "gossip rag" for implying Kallen's acting childish.
- Father, I Want to Marry My Brother: As children, Euphemia and Nunnally to Lelouch. Also, Lelouch briefly to Euphemia.
- Family of Choice: The vi and li Britannia children along with Milly and Kallen. Invoked near the end of R0 when Kallen stumbles into Aries Palace sunburnt, starving, and sleep deprived after her parents were killed. She passes out immediately after being welcomed home.
- Fire-Forged Friends: Kallen and Lelouch after surviving an assassination attempt where the latter distracts the assassin so that the former can land a killing blow. Also happens to be the title of the second chapter.
- For Want Of A Nail: Kallen leaves Japan with her father for Britannia, resulting in dramatic changes due to her friendship with Lelouch preventing him from being exiled and Nunnally from being crippled and blinded. As a consequence, he also appears to have little interest in Patricide, although he also doesn't balk at Marrybell's clear desire to do so.
- Foreshadowing:
- When Lelouch and Kallen are planning their guerrilla war against Russia, they note a candidate who can allegedly speak over a dozen languages fluently and has a typo on their file, with Lelouch remarking it's unlikely one of their soldiers is 616 years old. A few chapters later, Kallen meets said soldier who turns out to be C.C. in disguise.
- During the raid on the Code-R facility, soldiers keep turning on each other one by one to gun down their allies. It's actually Marianne hopping from body to body.
- Tohdoh mounts his red knightmare in Stage 30.
- Friendly Sniper: Nonette Enneagram is cheerful and friendly, easily being the most personable of the Knights of Rounds, on top of being possibly the best sniper in the world.
- Generic Cuteness: Lampshaded by Clovis upon first meeting C.C., declaring she's a nine or a ten but he's met so many beautiful women that he isn't wowed by anything less than an eleven.
- Genre Savvy: After learning it's possible to talk with the dead but not recommended, Kallen remarks it's the kind of story where she'd go from excited to concerned to regretful before walking away with a lesson on letting go of the past. Lelouch comments there's always killing herself to be with the dead in the bad ending.
- Genre Shift: Chapter 10.5 is explicitly stated to be a short-lived genre shift because 'it wouldn't be Code Geass without it'.
- Go-Karting with Bowser: Lelouch takes Marrybell out to drink with Naoto, a resistance leader. All three have a good time.
- The Guards Must Be Crazy: When Kallen gets fed up with her brother's evasiveness, she ends up at his resistance cell's headquarters and escorted in by a suspicious Tamaki. After knocking him down, disarming him, and dismantling his firearm, she chews him out for everything he did wrong. Examples include (but aren't limited to): letting her get within arms reach, not radioing for backup, and leaving his post unmanned to escort someone he hadn't even searched to his boss.
- Heads, Tails, Edge: To prove a point, Lelouch sets up a bet with Kallen that a coin he flips will land on either heads or tails. Kallen catches the coin so it lands on its edge, winning the bet.
- Heart Is an Awesome Power: Kallen's Geass allows them to determine if they or someone they're emotionally attached to will die within a given time frame along with some details as to the circumstances. They quickly learn to game the ability with things like being determined to kill themselves if an idea they have is false, or deciding to convince an undercover Lelouch to declare his real identity to a group of suspicious bystanders to see if they'd kill him for it.
- Hidden Depths: Marrybell can apparently drink both Lelouch and Naoto under the table without getting a hangover, and is surprisingly good at singing Japanese drinking songs, including the raunchy ones.
- Honest Corporate Executive: Kallen is apparently one of these, given that Euphemia calls her a captain of industry and Marrybell discovered that she will employ a more qualified number over a Britannian.
- Humiliating Wager: Lelouch and Kallen regularly engage in these with the loser becoming the winner's Wager Slave.
- I Have Your Wife: Before killing her, V.V. threatens to psychologically break Marianne's children if she tips off Charles on who's responsible for her death.
- I Shall Taunt You: Marianne spends her last moments taunting V.V. for breaking his oath to never lie to his brother, claiming he's just like his family.
- Implausible Deniability: After V.V. tries to have Lelouch assassinated, Charles tries to claim it could have been a Geass user sent by a different Code bearer. Marianne calls bullshit and cites how incredibly improbable his idea is.
- Impoverished Patrician: Having lost their noble titles and their monopoly on knightmare frames, the Ashford family fell on hard times until all they really had to their name was a school for the elite in Area Eleven. At least, that was the case until Lelouch secures the duchy of Tokyo for Reuben Ashford, leaving the family in better financial condition than ever.
- In Spite of a Nail:
- Despite many of the major players' changed circumstances, the Skirmish in Shinjuku Ghetto plays out largely the same way two years earlier, albeit with drastically different stakes and a more competent commander on the Britannian side.
- In the "I Knew All Along" omake, most of the story goes functionally the same as canon despite Kallen being nobility and knowing Zero's identity as Lelouch Lamperouge/vi Britannia. The main difference comes when Kallen kills Suzaku during Lelouch's coronation and takes his place as the "Knight of Zero".
- Nina's still traumatized by the Japanese, though it's by a run-in with Naoto's resistance rather than the canon reason.
- Euphemia renounces her claim to the throne during a large festival, though this time it's celebrating her birthday and done to show her commitment to bettering Area Eleven as it's viceroy rather than part of her announcement of the SAZ.
- Incompatible Orientation: Suzaku used to have a crush on Marrybell, but she's a lesbian. Similarly, Marrybell had a thing for Oldrin while Nina is crushing on Euphemia, but both Oldrin and Euphemia are straight. Subverted when Oldrin later turns out to be in love with Marrybell.
- Insult Backfire: While playing Mario Kart together as children, Lelouch calls Kallen a bastard for hitting him twice in a row. Kallen cheekily tells him she was legitimised a couple months prior.
- Internal Reveal: In chapter 27, Marianne reveals her survival to Lelouch and Kallen.
- Irony: The Purist faction regrets that someone of good breeding like Kallen fell in with a commoner like Lelouch, not realizing that Kallen is half-Japanese.
- Knighting: Kallen is knighted at the beginning of R1. Jeremiah was knighted off-screen sometime before then.
- La Résistance: Naoto and his resistance cell qualify as this, obviously, although Kallen calls him out on being half-assed about it.
- Lady and Knight:
- Inverted with Kallen and Lelouch.
- Possibly played straight with Marrybell and Suzaku.
- Lady of War: Kallen is very good at pretending to be this in public.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall:
- Lelouch comments that Marrybell is similar to what he could've been in a different life, and that she and Naoto could've been in each others shoes barring "one or two character defining decisions".
- Kaname and Naoto talk about how Kallen is clearly living in a political thriller while they're stuck in a slice of life series, then jokingly lament they're not in a RomCom instead.
- Like Father, Like Son:
- Lelouch's promise with Kallen to create a better world is reminiscent of Charles' pact with V.V. to create a world without lies and occurs under similar circumstances.
- Lelouch's solution to Kallen's family problems is the same as his father's: kill them all.
- Lelouch also happens to have similar taste in women. Kallen has a lot in common with Marianne.
- The same is true of Marrybell, although she declines to become involved in a Love Triangle she knows she'll lose.
- Lensman Arms Race:
Word of God in the author's notes for chapter six says this will not happen, although the base forms of the Lancelot and Guren will be around when the start of Canon is reached. - Logical Weakness:
- The Ganymede's open cockpit made any pilots extremely vulnerable against snipers.
- Kallen's Geass grants them the ability to see if they or someone close to them will die within a given amount of time and get a rough idea of the circumstances. While they get an idea of how to game their Geass, it doesn't work if neither action they take will result in someone's death. Similarly, it won't alert them to the death of someone they're not emotionally close to.
- Marianne's main host body is a coma patient. On the upside, this means she doesn't have to worry about said body wandering off while she's elsewhere. On the downside, the body isn't being taken care of if she's not in it. At one point she starts pigging out on food because her body hasn't eaten in three days.
- Lost Him in a Card Game: Lelouch and Marrybell essentially wager themselves in a battle to decide between them who will get the throne and who will support the other.
- Maligned Mixed Marriage: Both Reese and Minami Stadtfeld are shamed by others for their marriage, with Reese's family pressuring him to have a "proper heir" and Minami being called a whore by her countrymen despite having been married for twenty years. They end up divorcing for the sake of their daughter, Kallen, with Reese and Kallen leaving Japan for Britannia while Minami and Naoto stay in Japan.
- The Matchmaker: Cornelia encourages Lelouch to consider Kallen in a romantic light when they grow up.
- Mentor Archetype: Marianne was this to Kallen, teaching her, among other things, how to wield a sword and pilot a knightmare.
- Notably, Cornelia finished Kallen's sword training (and probably other martial skills) using the lessons Marianne gave her.
- Marianne also mentions that she learned her sword style from a friend who is strongly implied to be C.C..
- Kallen continues the chain somewhat with Ayano, who is very much not on her side for a time and will probably do so properly with Marika (from the context of the story and one of the omakes set in a hypothetical, distant future).
- Mundane Utility:
- Kallen uses their Geass to cheat at cards, though mostly to prove the existence of "magic".
- C.C. mentions she can prevent her period by killing herself to reset her menstruation cycle.
- Marianne admits to avoiding sleep by jumping to a body that isn't tired.
- Mythology Gag:
- For a time, Kallen took to wearing all red in hopes of earning the moniker "The Crimson Lotus".
- Severe wind blows Kallen's hair into a style reminiscent of her canon "rebel" hairstyle, with her commenting that it's too rebellious for polite society but she could make it work.
- Just like canon, Sayoko is never seen without her maid cap, not even when she's undercover.
- Ninja: The Shinozaki clan.
- No Periods, Period: Kallen mentions the usefulness of her IUD to prevent her periods while C.C. admits she just kills herself to reset her menstruation cycle.
- Nonchalant Dodge: Kallen uses their Geass to do this for others, such as casually nudging someone out of the way of sniper fire before said sniper takes the shot.
- Noodle Incident:Kallen: His [Suzaku] job seems to be keeping me busy. I imagine he'll follow me, but I'm nearing the point of simply refusing to fight him. This is taking too long.Lelouch: I'm ecstatic to hear I successfully worked the tunnel vision out of you.
- Mention is also made of an incident from Cornelia's youth which ended in her getting completely covered in peanut butter.
- Not So Above It All: At the very least, Kallen, Euphemia, Nunnally, and Marianne are all major fans of Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. Kallen is immensely disappointed that Suzaku doesn't know it.
- Occam's Razor: Name dropped by Marianne when she dismisses Charles's suggestion that another immortal learned of their plans for Ragnarok and sent an assassin after Lelouch as a warning. Marianne points out that it's far more likely his yandere brother did it out of petty jealousy.
- Odd Friendship: Shy physicist Nina and maligned princess Marrybell bond over their affections for women who are sadly heterosexual, with the two trading verses from classical literature about being in love with someone who doesn't love you back.
- The One Guy: Lelouch bemoans being this in R0, although Kallen does take pity and expresses her interest in boy things.
- Open Secret: Everyone is somewhat aware that Lelouch led terrorists against Britannia in Shinjuku, although few are aware of the exact details. Most rumors claim that he came to heroically rescue his damsel in distress from traitors, something he clearly enjoys using to tease Kallen.
- An official statement was probably issued by chapter 10.5 that cast Lelouch's and Kallen's actions in a positive light.
- O.O.C. Is Serious Business: Kallen keeps Lelouch from confronting his father over Marianne's death by making him realize how out of character the man is acting. Not only was Marianne the Emperor's favorite wife, and possibly the only one he loved, but letting an attack on the royal family go unanswered makes him look weak. For him to not even use someone as a scapegoat clearly says there's more going on than Lelouch knows, and Charles might well be in on it.
- Other Me Annoys Me: A hypothetical version. Kallen and Lelouch briefly discuss what would've happened if she had stayed in Japan with her mother. Kallen mentions that "Kozuki Karen" sounds like she'd be too shortsighted and Lelouch remarks he probably wouldn't like "Lelouch Lamperouge" either.
- Out-Gambitted: Lelouch's final battle with Leila has him first believe that he's encircled her army perfectly, only to learn that half her army is outside said circle and will crush his forces in only a few minutes. Then while Leila is gloating, Lelouch reveals that he destroyed the dam upriver and has a considerable amount of long ranged artillery set up too far away for her to take out, meaning any of Leila's forces that don't drown or get swept away would be easy pickings.
- Paranoia Fuel: In-Universe. After Marrybell learns that Charles, or someone close to him, can manipulate memories, she finds herself constantly questioning whether her memories have been tampered with. After dealing with Code-R, Marrybell thinks the emperor hasn't taken action yet then second guesses herself that maybe he has but she can't remember it.
- Parental Issues: Lelouch has this to a greatly lesser degree than in Canon, although Marrybell seizes the displaced hate for herself.
- Pinky Swear: Lelouch and Kallen engage in one at the very end of R0. They vow to create a better Britannia, whatever it takes.
- Power Incontinence: Somewhat deliberately induced, but Kallen suffers Geass Runaway only a couple months after first gaining their Geass.
- Precision F-Strike: Lelouch gives a short speech during a toast in a seedy pub, ending it with a loud "Fuck the emperor!" which is echoed by the entire bar.
- Promotion to Parent: Marrybell admits to Clovis that after he helped her after Japan was conquered, she sees him as more her father than their actual father.
- Pun: When Kallen visits Naoto after the war in Russia, his secretary gestures that Naoto's girlfriend is in his office with him, causing Kallen to joke that "at least her brother's hard at work".
- Rags to Royalty: According to Ruben Ashford, Marianne used to be 'pickpocketing urchin filth'.
- Red Baron: Ace knightmare pilots tend to accrue such monikers.
- Marianne is known as The Flash.
- The Vampire of Britannia for Luciano Bradley.
- Kallen hates hers: The Rose of Britannia. She's tried on at least one occasion to acquire a different one to mixed results.
- The Japanese in Area 11 know her as The Black Queen, although she may or may not be aware of that.
- After the Russian campaign, Kallen becomes known as The Oracle.
- Red Herring:
- Multiple times, Anya's presence at Aries Villa is mentioned, usually with someone commenting how odd it is that she'd be learning etiquette from Marianne. Unlike canon, she's not Marianne's host and has yet to show up after the woman's assassination.
- During the raid on the Code-R facility Sayoko throws a rapier to an enemy soldier who promptly starts gunning down his allies then throws it to another as he's gunned down. On the third pass, the remaining soldiers gun down the recipient before he even touches the rapier. Marianne was using it as a distraction while she used her Geass to Body Surf from enemy to enemy.
- Red Oni, Blue Oni: Kallen and Lelouch fall into this category with Kallen being the fiery, passionate half and Lelouch the controlled, brilliant half.
- Refuge in Audacity:
- During the campaign against Russia, Lelouch takes the time to build a citadel in Russian territory and applies for all the necessary permits to do so legally.
- In the "I Knew All Along" omake, Kallen deals with Suzaku finding out she's a Black Knight by first acting like she's outraged he saw her naked then claiming to be an OSI agent whose main assignment is protecting Lelouch. Suzaku is so caught up on that idea that he forgets all about her being a Black Knight.
- Rhetorical Question Blunder: When Marika's squadmates don't see the big deal about Kallen being called childish, she asks them what that'd make all of them, to which they all reply that they are children. Of the Valkyrie Squad, only Marika is even a teenager.
- Royal Rapier: Kallen's weapon of choice. She's rather put-out that her knighting ceremony has to be done with a longsword.
- Royals Who Actually Do Something: Marianne is one of Britannia's most successful generals ever.
- Runaway Bride: Mareki Soresi, who enlisted in the army to evade her Arranged Marriage. In a twist on the trope, she's not opposed to the match, just the fact that she's only twelve and her in-laws to be want her to get married and consummate the relationship right now. Being in the military gives her an acceptable excuse to avoid her family and fiance until she's ready to take on those obligations.
- Russian Roulette: Kallen plays twenty rounds by themselves to prove to Lelouch that magic is real.
- Sarcastic Confession: C.C. puts her real age and the many languages she's fluent in on her enlistment form, with the former being something Lelouch and Kallen mistake for a typo.
- Secret Art: The style of swordsmanship Kallen and Marianne use is explicitly stated to be old and thus probably mostly forgotten. It's implied C.C. taught it to Marianne.
- Seers: Kallen's geass allows her a limited view into the future to predict (and alter) the death of people satisfying some criteria.
- Sense Loss Sadness: Marianne seriously overloads her foods, such as a bowl of rice that positively reeks of garlic or tea that's almost more sugar than tea, because she shares sensory input with her host body and Marianne's main host is a coma patient with almost no sense of taste.
- Shell-Shocked Veteran: Marianne has a clear case of PTSD, including having an episode over the Emblem of Blood. It's suggested Charles has an even worse case.
- Shipper on Deck: Marianne wants Kallen for Lelouch. As it turns out, Cornelia got to be The Matchmaker.
- Shout-Out: When Lelouch calls Kallen "Sorceress", she insists she's Sorceress Supreme.
- Single-Target Sexuality: Or dual target as the case may be. In the "I Knew All Along" omakes, Kallen is only romantically or sexually interested in C.C. and Lelouch.
- Something Only They Would Say: Anne confirms her identity to Kallen by calling her "Poppet", something only Marianne ever did.
- Spared by the Adaptation: Naoto isn't killed by Britannian forces in this story.
- Spotting the Thread: Though she already knew, Kallen in the "I Knew All Along" omake points out some flaws in Zero's secret identity, such as the fact he suddenly appeared in Shinjuku when they already knew everyone in the ghetto and that he speaks perfect English with the same diction as Kallen, marking him as a Britannian blueblood.
- Stating the Simple Solution: When Kallen discusses their plans to get Lelouch as emperor, Anne suggests simply asking Charles.
- The Strategist: Lelouch and Marrybell are the obvious examples, along with Schneizel. Michele Manfredi might be as well. Marianne also may have been one of these.
- Stunned Silence: Lelouch needs a few seconds to find his voice when one of Kallen's demands for marrying him is that he "help her out of her dress tonight".
- Stupid Evil: Kallen grouches that even though her practice of hiring more qualified Numbers over lesser qualified Britannians has made her one of the richest nobles in Britannia, none of the other nobles follow her example.
- Stupidest Thing I've Ever Heard: In the "I Knew All Along" omake, this is Kallen's general response to hearing the Black Knights intend to prosecute Emperor Lelouch for his crimes. She takes the time to point out they have literally no admissible evidence and their argument is "magic powers". Even though they're correct, they'd be laughed out of any court they made their case in.
- Sue Donym: Elizabeth Ward goes by Anne while working as an OSI agent, implies she's a couple decades older than she looks, and triggers at the idea of living through "another" Emblem of Blood, hinting she might be under the influence of Marianne's Geass. It's officially confirmed in chapter 27
- Take That!: A number of shots are taken at canon, some more lighthearted than others.
- Merrybell apparently smacked Suzaku upside the head when she heard his plan to become the Knight of One without even a royal patron to back him up.
- Kallen refers to her hypothetical canon self as someone who'd be immensely shortsighted.
- Lelouch and Kallen both remark his initial plan of demanding an explanation from the emperor regarding his mother's murder was quite possibly the dumbest possible thing he could've done.
- Apparently at some point, Suzaku made his canon argument that terrorists should join the police if they wanted to help people, resulting in Marrybell brutally explaining how corrupt the police actually are, including providing charts.
- These Hands Have Killed: In chapter two, Kallen isn't distressed that she killed an assassin, nor is she worried over her lack of distress. She is, however, concerned at how natural and easy it felt, especially for her first kill.
- Time Skip: Five years pass between R0 and R1.
- Tomboy with a Girly Streak: Kallen plays sports in the mud, enjoys video games, duels with swords, pilots mechas, and practices parkour, but she also enjoys tea parties, snuggling with stuffed animals, dancing, and has a repeatedly denied fondness for poetry. She appears to be much more open about this after meeting Euphemia.
- Too Dumb to Live: Nina Einstein several times during the attack on the Code R facility.
- First, Nina insists on walking through what she's already been told isn't a particularly safe part of town rather than accept a ride.
- Second, upon hearing "several loud pops and explosions", Nina decides it must be fireworks despite not seeing any in the sky and knowing it wasn't a holiday of any variety.
- Third, when Nina mostly manages to escape the combat zone, she stumbles across what she's absolutely sure are terrorists (because they're speaking Japanese and hiding from the attack). When she finds herself facing the back of one who has no idea she's present, Nina shrieks at the top of her lungs.
- Troll: In the "I Knew All Along" omakes, Kallen spends some time implying to Lelouch she knows he's Zero and royalty while also implying to Zero that she knows he's Lelouch. In the second part, Kallen screws with the Black Knights top brass by weaving a tale of how she is the real one behind Lelouch's plots as part of her own plot to become empress of Britannia.
- Undying Loyalty:
- Kallen will take any fight to protect her friends and family, even ones she can't win. She'll even kill for them.
- All knights of honor are expected to exhibit this to their liege. There's even a classic work of in-universe literature about a knight's undying loyalty to a prince that routinely abuses her, which is used to warn people to think carefully before agreeing to become a knight of honor, as most of the abuses described in the book are technically still legal.
- Utopia Justifies the Means: Kallen and Lelouch openly acknowledge that the path to the throne will require them to 'swindle, murder, cheat, and conquer' the innocent but can't see any better means to change the world for the better.
- Warrior Prince: Lelouch, Marrybell, and Marianne are all known to take the field as commanders, and Marianne piloted the Ganymede in actual combat.
- Warts and All: Downplayed since he doesn't know about Ragnarok, but Lelouch acknowledges his mother did some truly awful things in her life and doesn't let that diminish his love for her, unlike canon Lelouch who painted Marianne as a borderline
Purity Sue. Once he learns of Ragnarok, Lelouch doesn't quite agree with it but understands Marianne's reasoning, though he does admit he'd likely reject it out of hand if he wasn't given time to consider the idea. - Well-Intentioned Extremist: Clovis wanted to learn the secret of C.C.'s immortality as she didn't need to eat or drink, was immune to all disease, and could activate her regeneration at any time with even a minuscule injury. In his words, spreading such a thing to everyone would eliminate three of the biggest issues the humanity faces regularly.
- What If?: The fic's premise is essentially 'what if Kallen and Lelouch were childhood friends'.
- The "I Knew All Along" omake is a "What if Kallen didn't meet Euphemia and Nunnally when they were children".
- Worf Had the Flu: Kallen loses against the Alexander in their first battle due to her using the large and slow Panzer Hummel, which is not only outclassed by even a Sutherland, but requires a fighting style completely contradictory to her own.
- Worthy Opponent: Lelouch feels Marrybell would be one of these and hence went out of his way to recruit her before that could happen.
- Yandere: V.V. for Charles. Marianne is rather outspoken to Charles about this before V.V. kills her for all the good it did. Almost a decade later, Kallen learns about V.V. and outright calls him a "Yandere brocon".
