The secure line crackled faintly in the dim-lit command rooms — two locations separated by thousands of kilometers, yet bound by the same message. Lelouch in North America and Tanya at Odessa both straightened as the Zeon Intelligence officer's clipped voice came through:
"Operative Selene von Zehrtfeld — last contact lost during Operation V. Status: Missing in Action. Recovery efforts underway, but conditions are hostile."
For a moment, neither spoke. The silence on the channel was heavier than the words themselves. The quiet acknowledgment that Selene's fate hung in the balance pressed in on both of them, even across the great distance. Their eyes met only through the grainy feed of the comms screen — a flicker of shared understanding passing between them before duty forced their expressions back to stone.
Lelouch leaned back in his chair, his gloved fingers steepled before him, the picture of calculated composure. Yet inside, the message had struck deep. Selene was more than an operative — she was the shield between himself and Tanya, the unwavering constant in a war of shifting loyalties and fragile alliances. If she's truly gone, he thought, it leaves a hole no tactic can fill. His lips pressed into a thin line, unwilling to let the officers around him see that crack in his armor.
"She always was the shield between us and the storm," Lelouch finally said aloud, his tone clinical but his gaze distant. "And storms have a way of finding their way through once the shield is gone." Those who heard him assumed it was a tactical observation, but Tanya would recognize it for what it was — the guarded grief he rarely allowed to surface.
On the other side of the world, Tanya listened without breaking her soldier's bearing. She had learned early on that the battlefield devoured hesitation. Still, her mind drifted to the days Selene had stood over her training maps, pointing out not only strategies but the value of human instincts. Selene's care had been quiet but constant — the kind that shaped foundations without fanfare. Losing that anchor was like losing the ground beneath her boots.
Tanya's voice, when it came, was firm but carried the faintest tremor, the kind only those who knew her well could hear. "Selene fought in the shadows so we could stand in the light. We must not let her efforts be in vain." It was both a vow and a reminder — to herself, to Lelouch, and to anyone listening — that this war demanded more than grief. It demanded resolve.
Neither spoke further on the matter. The war allowed little room for mourning. But as the channels went quiet, both knew the same truth: Selene's absence was a wound that no victory could truly heal.
The secure channel pulsed to life again, this time a direct link between Lelouch and Tanya. For a moment, neither said anything — just the faint hum of encrypted transmission filling the space. When Lelouch finally spoke, his voice carried the gravity of someone who had weighed every word. "She was more than an elder sister… She was our guardian." The admission was quiet but deliberate, stripped of his usual layers of calculated detachment.
Tanya's reply came with the steadiness of a soldier but the warmth of shared blood. "And we will carry her legacy forward — no matter the cost." There was no hesitation in her tone, no space for doubt. Even over the comm, Lelouch could sense the steel in her resolve.
For a brief span, the war seemed to fade into the background. They spoke not as officers of Zeon, but as siblings, bound by the same loss and the same determination to survive it. They acknowledged their fears — the creeping thought that Selene might truly be gone — but they anchored themselves in a shared pledge: to protect each other, and to see the war through in her honor.
The moment was broken by the arrival of another voice on the line — crisp, formal, and unyielding. "This is Zeon High Command. Operative Selene von Zehrtfeld is hereby classified as Missing in Action. All personnel are to maintain operational focus and uphold morale. That is all." The message was short, impersonal, and absolute.
When the channel closed, Lelouch and Tanya exchanged one final glance through the grainy vid-feed. No further words were needed. The weight of their loss was now armor — heavy, but unbreakable.
Lelouch sat alone in his quarters, the dim lighting casting long shadows over the desk where a worn family portrait rested. His eyes lingered on Selene's smile — the same one she'd worn the day she pulled him and Tanya out of a flooded riverbank during a summer storm. He could still hear her scolding them through the laughter, soaked to the bone but relieved. "You two are trouble magnets," she'd said, wrapping them both in the same towel. The memory brought a faint smile to his lips, bittersweet and fleeting.
In another part of the base, Tanya methodically checked her Zaku's maintenance logs and combat gear, every movement crisp and precise. Her mind, however, drifted to the same day — to Selene's steady hands holding hers as they crossed the slippery rocks back home. Tanya remembered the warmth of her sister's coat around her small shoulders, and the way Selene's voice had softened when the scolding was over. It was the first time Tanya truly understood what protection meant.
Though separated by distance, both siblings felt the same silent vow settle in their hearts. The war ahead would be long, and the loss of Selene left a void nothing could fill. But in their shared memories — her laughter, her guidance, her unshakable presence — they found the steel to move forward. Neither needed to speak the promise aloud: they would fight, survive, and protect, just as she had taught them.