Ticket of Dreams

Stage 12.55 takes place during the events of The Messenger from Kyoto.

Summary
It begins with Milly Ashford asking Shirley Fenette why she is so frustrated. Shirley has received tickets to a concert from her father and she wants to invite Lelouch vi Britannia but isn’t sure how to go about it. Milly tries to put the problem in perspective by saying that compared to the Battle of Narita, and the losses suffered there, it should be easy to tell Lelouch that she likes him. Shirley claims she couldn’t do that because she has too much self-doubt. Instead her imagination begins to run wild.

Her first imagination is that when she asks Lelouch to attend the concert with her, he doesn’t realize she is asking him out and instead he decides to give the ticket to Nunnally vi Britannia effectively ruining Shirley’s plan. This causes Shirley to mentally decide to be more upfront and direct with her request.

Her next imagination involves her stumbling over her own words as she tries to be direct with Lelouch but accidentally ends up insulting him. In this perception he gets upset for her saying that he never has any plans and then continues to rant about how busy he is as Shirley decides that she can’t be direct with her request either.

She starts to think that maybe there might be another reason that Lelouch is so busy. In this train of thought she imagines that Kallen Kōzuki and Lelouch have gotten engaged and so he simply can’t go on a date with her. In her imagination Kallen starts calling Lelouch Lou Lou and they both giggle as Shirley yells at her own imagination to stop. Shirley then tries to convince herself that since Kallen has already said she doesn’t like Lelouch, her previous imagination must be wrong.

She then starts to think that even though Lelouch might not be engaged to Kallen there might be someone else he likes. She then imagines that Lelouch is intent on marrying Nunnally who seems way excited about the prospect as well. Shirley freaks out that since they are siblings they can’t get married by Nunnally claims that they somehow aren’t really related by blood so it is ok. Lelouch agrees.

Shirley tries to stop imagining crazy things but instead pictures Lelouch and Suzaku Kururugi getting married. She stops that abruptly only to have Milly say that Shirley has been talking aloud this whole time. Lelouch magically appears and tells Milly that they should head off to their honeymoon in Monaco. Rivalz Cardemonde then jumps in and claims Lelouch for his own. Arthur the cat does the same and everyone that had previously been in Shirley’s imagination come and debate on who gets to marry Lelouch. Lelouch stops the debate by saying there is only one of him and Milly decides that polygamy is the best answer. she says that everyone, including Shirley, should marry him. Everyone but SHirley seems to like this idea.

Finally, Milly slaps Shirley back into the real world and motivates her to go ask Lelouch out on a date. She runs off and finds Lelouch. In a single breathe she explains how she got the tickets and then asks him out. He kind of accepts and then Shirley runs off to think about how good she just did.