Author's Note: This is a giftfic for Aki1, my friend, as well as the amazing writer of Bird's Eye View! A long time ago, she made an offhand request for this fic. I offered to do it, and promptly forgot all about it until recently! So here it is, Aki!

Disclaimer: I don't think I could be the owner of Code Geass. That would mean I would be responsible for Lelouch dying, Suzaku becoming Zero, and the Euphy Incident. I wouldn't be able to take it.

Warning: Vague, non explicit sex. I don't think it warrants and M rating, but if it offends you at all, please let me know and I'll change it.

Epitaph

Suzaku finds it strange that, despite all the lives he has taken, both directly and indirectly, he has only been to a handful of funerals in his lifetime, the only one he could recall clearly being the service for Shirley's father. He barely remembered his mother's funeral, and he had never attended Euphy's. The thought of watching sweet, beautiful Euphy being put in the ground was too much for him to bear.

Suzaku supposed it was only natural. Killers didn't usually stick around to witness the aftermath. But then, they didn't usually have the opportunity to observe their own funerals, either.

Lelouch hadn't wanted him to go. He had argued that anyone recognizing him could potentially prove catastrophic to The Plan, but Suzaku had insisted. He was morbidly curious of what his memorial service would be like, and really, what was the point of dying if you couldn't attend your own funeral?

Under that logic, Lelouch had eventually relented, but only after making sure Suzaku's face was entirely covered by a hood and dark glasses (Suzaku thought he looked a bit like the Unabomber, but if it satisfied Lelouch, he would live with it).

Suzaku glanced up at the sky, somewhat amused. Lelouch had been hoping for rain. It always rained in the movies, and the fledgling Emperor had thought it would be more dramatic to hold the service in a downpour. But the sky was bright and clear, sun bathing grass and headstones soft, cheerful whites and yellows. It wasn't as if anyone else was going to be sad at his passing, so why should the sky be any different?

The collection of mourners was a small one, most of whom were probably more likely to spit on his grave than shed a tear. Jeremiah, a small procession of military officers and reporters, C.C. of course, and surprisingly, Milly and Rivalz.

Milly wasn't so much of a surprise, as there were reporters everywhere, but Rivalz was unexpected. Suzaku could only guess that he was sentimental enough to want to say goodbye to his former friend, probably while secretly wondering where it had all gone wrong.

The only one who wasn't there was Nina, for obvious reasons, but she most likely wouldn't have shown up anyway. She had never trusted him, and Suzaku knew that Nina blamed him in part for Euphy. Distantly, Suzaku pondered if his death made her glad.

Eventully, Suzaku's (bodiless) coffin was carried in by an able bodied group of strangers. Lelouch claimed that the corpse had been badly burned by the explosion, hence the closed casket. This was completely untrue. Suzaku had been gone long before Lancelot blew up. He was bruised, yes. Really, it was a miracle he had escaped without breaking anything, but burns? No.

The crowd seemed to hold their breath as Lelouch grimly approached the pedestal. Rather than his usual elaborate robes, he was dressed in all black; bare of any sort of decoration. It made him look…small, somehow, and incredibly pale, reminding Suzaku of the dour pictures of shinigami he had seen in books as a child.

Suzaku already knew what he was going to say. Lelouch had gone over the eulogy with him the night before. It was nothing more than an elegant, longwinded list of his military achievements, praising him for his courage, strength, and loyalty.

(Suzaku had laughed at that.

"Loyalty, Lelouch? How can you say that? I've betrayed everyone, my country, my princess, both your father and my own, and you, Lelouch. You most of all."

Lelouch had smiled, wrapping his arms loosely around Suzaku's neck. "Yes, but you came back to me in the end. That's all that matters.")

The entire speech would then be wrapped up neatly with a dark promise to obliterate the traitors that had brought the Knight of Zero to his end. All hail Britannia!

Lelouch looked towards the cameras, with the perfect expression of dignified grief that Suzaku knew for a fact he had practiced in the mirror.

But then he and Suzaku locked eyes (well, as much as someone in dark glasses could lock eyes), and Lelouch paused. For a long moment, he just stood there, flashbulbs going off in his face, looking entirely lost. It was if he had gone up to give a speech for a stranger, only to abruptly find out that the corpse was someone he knew.

And when Lelouch finally recollected himself, he opened his mouth, and for the first time in all the years Suzaku had known him, went off script.

"Suzaku Kururugi…" Lelouch began quietly," "He…he was a soldier, a devicer, the Knights of Honor, Seven, and Zero. But under all that…he was my best friend." Lelouch swallowed thickly. "He fought for what he believed in, even though he knew he would receive no thanks, that everyone would hate him for it, including myself. Eventually, he willingly gave up his life for a world that did nothing but pull him down. I never really understood why, but I think I do now, so I want to be the first...as well as the last to say: Thank you, Suzaku…and I'm sorry."

There was no fanfare, no military propaganda or false sentiments, there was simply Lelouch. This funeral was a farce, merely a show for the media, but Lelouch had given him one thing that they both knew was absolutely real, and for Suzaku, that was enough.

Lelouch stepped off the pedestal, and with a small nod to the gravediggers, his coffin was carefully lowered, entombed forevermore in the cool, moist dark.

The funeral party is quick to disperse (because why would they stay?), but Suzaku lingers a little longer. It felt somewhat unreal, looking at his own tombstone.

"What are you thinking?" Lelouch asks, walking up behind him.

"I was wondering what you were thinking," Suzaku replies, gesturing towards the headstone.

Lelouch smirks, "What, you don't like it?"

"You called me a "consummate and invaluable knight to his Majesty, Lelouch vi Britannia,"" Suzaku points out dryly.

"All of which is true, in many ways," Lelouch says playfully.

Suzaku laughs bitterly, "This whole plan is built on lies, and now so is my very existence. I suppose it's nice that my grave can at least tell the truth."

Lelouch frowns, almost pouting, "You're not having second thoughts, are you?"

"No, and even if I was, it's too late for that." Suzaku sighs, crouching down to idly trace the now immortal words. "…I suppose it won't be too long before your stone will joining mine. Have you picked out a spot yet?" Suzaku isn't sure if he intended the question to sound as harsh as it sounds, but the words are out and he can't take them back.

"I don't want to be buried here," Lelouch admits quietly, leaning down to join Suzaku on the ground.

That takes Suzaku by surprise. "Where else can an emperor be buried if not here?"

"The emperor can stay here. As far as the public is concerned, my resting place will be right next to yours. But I have no desire to stay in this place built on blood and lies. I'd rather my body rest in the only place I've ever truly been happy, the Kururugi Shrine. That is," Lelouch cuts Suzaku a sidelong glance, "if you are willing to fulfill that final request."

Suzaku bumps his hand against his heart, an immediate, instinctual response, "Yes, my lord."

Lelouch rolls his eyes, "Don't be like that. What do titles matter to the dead?" He removes Suzaku's hand from his chest, carefully intertwining their fingers and placing them back on the grave. "Now, Kururugi Suzaku, do I have your promise?"

Suzaku's face softens, "I'll get you there, Lelouch. I swear it."

"Thank you," Lelouch says quietly.

There is a long stretch of silence that is somehow awkward and companionable at the same time. "I'd like to be next to you," Suzaku remarks suddenly. "You know…after everything."

Lelouch laughs, "How poetic, together forever in death. Don't join me too soon, though. You need to live, Suzaku. Live for me, for Nunnally...and maybe for yourself, too."

"But not as myself," Suzaku says ironically.

Lelouch sighs. It irritates him that Suzaku keeps going back to that, the emotion almost head to head with his guilt.

"…Will you visit me?" he asks quietly. Lelouch knows it is an unreasonable request, but he asks anyway, partly to change the subject, partly because he is simply afraid of being alone.

"When I can," Suzaku answers, which of course meant rarely, if at all. Zero's duties are all consuming, after all. But Lelouch knows that Suzaku will try at least, because the former knight knows better than anyone that the dead can get lonely. He himself is proof of that.

So Lelouch smiles and kisses the corner of Suzaku's mouth, for he can see the love that is held in the lie, and he is grateful for it.

The kiss is followed by another, and then another. To his forehead, cheeks, eyelids, warm and insistent until Suzaku finally relents, tilting his head slightly to meet Lelouch's lips.

Lelouch, pleased with the response, pushes Suzaku further back into the gravestone, most likely imprinting its words into his back. He is mostly in the green eyed boy's lap now, and he pauses to play with the zipper on Suzaku's hoodie.

"Here?" Suzaku asks incredulously. The sunglasses had been lost long ago, and Lelouch can see the disbelief in his eyes.

Lelouch shrugs, "Why not? It's not if the neighbors are going to complain." And Suzaku submits to his emperor's logic, just as he always does.

There is something morbid about doing something originally meant to give life (although obviously not in this scenario) in a place of death. Even more so when Lelouch considers that it is with someone who, for all intents and purposes, is dead. But it is also exhilarating, forbidden, and so utterly wrong that Lelouch is convinced that if he hadn't been going to hell before, this was definitely pushing him over the edge.

And maybe some part of Lelouch finds a secret thrill from making love to a dead man, because it means that no one else in the world can have him.

Lelouch digs his fingers in Suzaku's back, deep and possessive. "Suzaku," he breathes into his ear. "Suzaku, Suzaku, Suzaku." Whispers it over and over again like a prayer.

Suzaku closes his eyes and simply listens, memorizing his name, the sound each syllable, the light hiss of the beginning to the soft vowel of the end. He needs to remember it, because he knows that he won't hear it again.

Author's Note: In the spirit of full disclosure, the line in the third paragraph from the end is not mine. Aki wrote that while we were talking about this. The rest is entirely my own though! I hope you enjoyed reading this as much as I enjoyed writing it!

And if you did, please review?