Requiem for a Dream [Suzaku x Lelouch]

V. Wildest Dreams

1703

Despite his promise, Lelouch can't allow himself to visit Suzaku. He fears Desire's influence and the havoc it might wreak. Instead, he keeps his distance both in the Dreaming and in the waking world. He turns his attention to other dreams and other tasks. Still, not a day goes by that he does not think of Suzaku, and it pains him. Time passes no more quickly for the Endless than it does for mortals, and the days feel longer still as he thinks of Suzaku and tries not to think of Suzaku. A great deal of time passes this way, without any new knowledge of Suzaku's life. Then at last Lelouch realizes he is coming up on their next 100-year meeting, and he allows himself to look.

The year is 1703. The Edo period of Japan is known throughout the world as a time of internal peace, political stability, and economic growth. The Japanese dream the gentle, mundane dreams of a people with full bellies and open horizons ahead. Nightmares are few and far between. Bad dreams are simple and straightforward: loss of health, of wealth, of favor. They are not the kind of dreams that steal away lives or drive anyone toward madness. They are normal, manageable dreams in normal, manageable lives.

The change is striking. Japan once held some of the world's most interesting and terrible dreams – kitsune and oni, tengu and bakemono. Dreams with complex themes and generations of building tension and violence. Japan's quiet dreaming of late is a dramatic departure from previous centuries. When Lelouch turns his looking glass to Suzaku, the change in him is even more striking.

For the first time in centuries, Suzaku Kururugi does not wish for death. The realization sinks like lead in Lelouch's stomach. Suzaku has met the terms of their contract. Suzaku's dreams hold only the slightest tinge of grief and guilt. Instead, his dreams hold the hopeful, bold ideas of a visionary leader in his prime.

Suzaku serves in the court of the shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu as one of his chief advisors. History will remember Ieyasu as the man who united Japan after a hundred years of war in the Sengoku period. But Lelouch sees Suzaku's hand in this new peace. After living for so long in such violence and chaos, Suzaku has a strong instinct for order and rules that resonates with the commoners and serves the shogun well. It is Suzaku who suggests freezing the social order and prohibiting movement between the four classes (warriors, farmers, artisans, and merchants). He charts the course for this new bureaucratic system with a steadfast belief in the stability he knows it will bring.

Lelouch has always known that Suzaku's dreaming would change the world, and now it has. Perhaps this peace in Japan was the reason Destiny set Suzaku aside for Lelouch and allowed Death to stay her hand. Perhaps this was the great purpose for it all, and now that the purpose has been met, the honorable thing to do would be to release Suzaku from his eternal contract.

Roiling with ambivalence, Lelouch visits Suzaku in the waking world on the eve of their anniversary. Suzaku lives in a castle fortress now. These days, he is not burdened by cold or hunger. His room is warmed by a hearth that is tended by servants. His meals are served three times a day. Lelouch looks around the dark castle and feels satisfied with what he sees. Suzaku deserves all this and more.

He finds Suzaku in his room, sitting on a cushion by the hearth, reading a book by the firelight. Lelouch stands in the shadows for a moment to marvel at this sight. Books have been among Lelouch's favorite inventions in all mankind's history. In this new period of peace, organized schooling is becoming commonplace, and Japan has begun to mass-produce books through woodblock printing. It warms Lelouch to see Suzaku reading for leisure by firelight. It is a moment that would have been impossible in the previous century.