Kiara wasn't close enough to hear who was on the phone but judging by the fact that Raina didn't get a word in she guessed it was Lelouch. She watched as Raina and Gino flirted and her eyes narrowed as he mentioned being a knight. She was sure she'd seen his picture somewhere...

"I'll meet you in a bit," she told Raina. "I'm going to look around for a bit, see if there's anyone else here I know." She gave a polite nod to Anya and Gino before turning and beginning to weave her way through the crowd. Before she left she nodded her head towards Raina, silently saying that she'd follow the other when she got away from the other two. It might look a little weird if she trailed after the other when Raina said it was student council business after all. As she passed by people she felt herself sneer as she saw the swimsuit cafe run by Shirley. Of course she would come up with something like that although she did have to hold back a snort as she saw the Britannian agent, Miss Nu, among the girls. Shirley must have roped her into it. The woman was putting on a brave face but she could tell that the teal haired woman wasn't far off drop kicking some of the pervs that were looking at her. Kiara couldn't really blame her. If she was given those looks the guy would be on his way to the nearest hospital no questions asked.

Raina was slightly put out that she couldn't stay and talk to Gino, since it wasn't every day you met a tall handsome stranger at a school festival. But if Lelouch had called her, it must be important. Of course, C.C. must be here. She couldn't get some of the world's biggest pizza last time and she was probably damned if she let the fact that the Emperor of the largest and most powerful empire in the world was looking for her get in her way. As she turned the corner around the school building, Raina waited for Kiara to catch up.

Kiara's eyes darted this way and that, searching for Raina. She finally saw her friend slip behind the school building and took off at a slight job, carefully weaving her way through the crowd until she reached her friend.
"Let me guess," she said, pausing to catchher breath. "C.C.'s causing trouble and Lelouch needs us to stop her before she does something that'll either embarrass the hell out of him or cause trouble, right?"

"Yup," said Raina. "And it better be important. That guy was cute." She pouted, but then suddenly grinned. "He asked for my number. That means he's interested, right?"

"Well if he wasn't then clearly I've been misreading all the novels I've collected over the years," Kiara quipped lightly. "Now let's go and find Lelouch so you can get back to your golden knight." She smirked at her friend before beginning to walk towards where Lelouch had indicated they should meet. Hopefully this didn't cause too much chaos although...yeah they were going to cause some kind of scene.

The scene before them wasn't exactly what Raina had expected. The crate of tomatoes was there... but no sign of C.C. Instead, Lelouch was standing there with... Shirley?! And then there was the giant green thing. It was someone in a strange costume, and it was clutching Lelouch. Was that C.C.?
"Lulu! Shirley! What's happening?"

It took all of Kiara's self control not to start laughing as she saw the state that Lelouch was in at the moment. She bit her lip hard but wasn't able to stop the smile from pulling up the corners of her mouth. Lelouch knew it was her and sent her a death glare which she anoyed. Oh...if only she had that camera thing that Anya ahd been carrying...

She took a few cteps closer and from the angle she was able to see a hint of bright green in the tomato crate. Oh crap.....how did Lelouch manage to get himself into these situations? Granted C.C. wasn't helping but this was ridiculous!

"Um...excuse me?" she asked in a small voice, putting on her best 'innocent' act. "But is there anything I can do to help?"

"Who are you?" Shirley was exclaiming at the person in the green costume. "You're being really rude!"
As if things weren't interesting enough, Suzaku and Milly burst in. Raina took a small step in front of Kiara. Her outfit was good, but she didn't want Suzaku looking too closely. "Have you seen Arthur?" he called. "He ran off with a precious feather pen of mine!"
And then there came a thump from the crate. If this situation hadn't been dangerous, then Raina would have been rolling around on the ground laughing. C.C. was int he tomato crate!

((I always did love this scene...so completely ridiculous. It's round about now that Gino turns up with the knightmare for the tomato crate right?))

Crap... Kiara thought, glancing at Suzaku. If he recognised her things could get rather...difficult quite quickly. She thought quickly , eyes darting about for something to act as a destraction.
"I saw a cat run that way a minute ago!" she exclaimed, faking excitement as she turned so that Suzaku could only see her back and pointed in the vague direction of the crowd. "You'd better hurry. It looked like he was running pretty fast!"

"But that thumping," Suzaku was staring wide-eyed at the crate. "Is he in there?"
"No, cats and tomatoes generally do not go together," said Lelouch, his panicky voice confirming Raina's suspicions that C.C. was indeed in there.
Suzaku's reply was not heard as a giant Knightmare towered over them all - the Ganymede. "This is the start point, correct?" It was a voice she recognised. The Knightmare picked up the tomatoes.
"Don't tell me... Gino?" gasped Suzaku.
"This school is awesome!"

"Oh for the love of..."
If things got any worse she was pretty sure Lelouch was going to have a heart attack. They needed a destraction and they needed one now.
"Raina..." she whispered. "We need to..."
Before she could say anything more Gino took off with the crate. Immediately Lelouch and Kallen chased after him causing Shirley and Suzaku to start running after them and Aruther was somewhere around here...
"Ever get the feeling we're in an anime?" Kiara asked Raina curiously.

"Sweetie, I have purple hair," was Raina's reply before taking off at a run after the Ganymede and all the others. So, the mysterious Gino could pilot a Knightmare too... It wasn't that uncommon among the wealthier Britannians. Well, she herself had learned from simulators her family owned. But piloting a Knightmare smoothly did take practise and talent - Gino was becoming more interesting by the minute, she mused as she overtook Lelouch.

"True," Kiara murmured before taking off after Raina. She smirked as she passed Lelouch, turning her head and calling back to him "You might wanna hurry up!" to which he replied by glaring at her. Unfortunately for the poor lost prince he just couldn't say anything because he was too out of breath.
Rivalz was announcing everything as it happened although he thought it was Suzaku that was piloting the knightmare. Weren't they in for a surprise. Her eyes narrowes as she stared at the knightmare. He was piloting it awfully well...she was destracted when she saw he was shaking the crate. Poor C.C.

Raina winced as the Ganymede shook the tomatoes. Maybe this would be enough to put C.C. off pizza. Then again, maybe not. She seemed to live off the stuff.
"Hang in there, Shi!" she called softly, so that no one could hear her.

*be right back, I'm off for dinner*

As they ran Lelouch turned away suddenly. Kiara skidded to a stop and ran back to him. He was shouting something down near the pizza and suddenly all that everyone could see was steam. The tomatos were being emptied onto the piza and C.C. would've been seen but the smoke hid who she was.
Kiara took her chance. While everyone was destracted she leapt from where she'd been standing and ran towards the pizza, grabbing C.C. by the hand and dragging her away, cringing slightly as she was covered in tomato juice.
"You just can't help yourself can you?" she grumbled as she pulled the other girl away as the smoke began to clear.

Everyone gasped in astonishment as they realised first that it was not Suzaku piloting the Knightmare, and then that while the tomatoes were being poured out pink gas erupted from somewhere and swamped the entire oven. Raina caught a glimpse of Kiara dragging C.C. away, Kallen not far behind. Good, they were out of danger. Now Raina was able to look round at everyone, see their expressions and burst into peals of laughter.
She was still wiping away her tears as she rejoined Kiara, C.C., Kallen and Lelouch where the tomatoes had been before.
"I think she was a teacher..." Kallen was saying. "She was dressed in a bikini. But I swear she was with Ougi here last y-"
"What?" Raina interrupted. "Ougi and Viletta-sensei? Now there's a match I wouldn't have thought of!"

"There was rumors that Ohgi had an informant or something..." Kallen murmured.
"Ohgi was holding something back from me?" Lelouch demanded.
"You really can be quite dense you know," C.C. said before moving closer and whispering something to him.
"Forget about that for a sec," Kiara interupted. "There's something off about that guy that was piloting the knightmare. He was way too good to be a random guy taht just happened to find it. Suzaku knew him."
"WHat was his name?" Lelouch asked.
"Gino but I didn't get a surname," Kiara replied promptly. She looked at Raina, raising an eyebrow. "Anything to add?"

"Aside from being deliciously sexy?" Raina grinned wickedly. "It's not so unusual to be able to pilot a Knightmare, Ki-chan. I mean, we can do it, and the Ganymede isn't a difficult one to operate."
"I'll look into it in any case," said Lelouch. "In the meantime, it seems I finally have something I can use to get Viletta on my side." He had that evil look in his eye.
"Blackmail? Tut tut, Lulu, that's bad," nagged Raina.

"BUt he wouldn't be Lelouch if he wans't bad, now would he Rai?" Kiara replied, smirking at Lelouch. She raised an eyebrow before turning to C.C. and tilting her head to the side. "Did you learn your lesson this time?"
"What lesson?" C.C. asked, looking at her curiously. kiara sighed.
2Oh, I give up!" she grouched, throwing her hands in the air in annoyance. It seemed C.C. really would never learn.

"Anyway, with regard to you three," said Lelouch to Kallen, Kiara and C.C. "I can call in a favour with Xing-ke, and he can take you back to the Chinese Federation with his diplomatic power."
Raina's face fell. "You have to take Ki-chan away again? Can't she stay here, Lulu? We've had hardly any time to catch up after the past year!"

"And besides," Kiara added, smirking towards Raina. "Someone's got to keep an eye on her. I have a feeling you'll be too busy dealing with our teacher and avoiding Suzaku to make sure she doesn't get into too much trouble."
Lelouch glared at her before turning away.
"On your own head be it," he replied. Kiara smirked before sending a small fireball in his direction. Lelouch yelped and turned to glare at her. Kiara gave him an innocent look. "What?" she asked mildly.

"You'll have to be careful though, Ki-chan. Suzaku knows you're a Black Knight. Unless you know of a way to completely change your entire face you probably can't rejoin the Student Council. I don't want him to arrest you!" Raina glomped Kiara again and would not let go no matter what.
In the meantime, Lelouch made a call to Xing-ke, to arrange for him to come and collect Kallen and C.C.

Kiara struggled for a moment against Raina's hold before finally giving up and accepting that nothing she did would get rid of her friend.
"I'll just avoid him for the moment," she replied. "I don't need to become a student again. Besides with all these people around there's no way he'll recognise me. He was probably sent here to watch Lelouch anyway so a random girl won't mean that much unless I draw too much attention to myself."
"It's still risky," Lelouch commented, finishged with his phone call.
"No more risky than you pretending to still not know who you are," Kiara retorted.

"Well for now you're fine, Miss Yuuki Cross," Raina grinned. "Now come on, the dancing's going to start soon! See ya later, Kallen, Shi! Are you coming Lulu?"
"I'm going to go up to the roof for a while. You know I don't like dancing."
"Yeah, because you can be so dull and boring sometimes. It's ok, I forgive you for it." Raina winked. "But one day I'm gonna have one dance with you whether you like it or not. If you're lucky, I might even do it while you're being Zero!"

Kiara snickered at the expression on Lelouch's face, somewhere between bemusement and abject horror. It really was a sight. She began to walk towards the crowd with Raina, calling back over her shoulder at Lelouch. "If you dance with her then you dance with me too. You're not getting out of it and one day we'll get you."
She turned to Raina and raised an eyebrow at her. "Is it just that you want to go to the dance or are you hoping to see a certain blond knightmare pilot there too?"