Disclaimer: I do not own Voltron/Go Lion or any of their characters. They are the property of WEP and Devil's Due Comic and Toei Animation. All other characters are mine. This is written purely for entertainment purposes and I am not monetarily compensated in any way.
The Legend of Angel Falls
"It shines like the crown of an angel and fades as the mist comes and goes."
Lyric from the song: Brown Mountain Lights
-Tommy Faile-
1
The jalla crashed through the leaves covering the wide forest trail in a race for its life. Lance McClain, Red Lion pilot of the Voltron Force, rode his horse in hot pursuit and took aim with his rifle. Keith Kogane, his commander, BlacK Lion pilot and best friend, was close behind; flanking him in an effort to herd the marsupial vicariant of a Terran deer toward a fallen tree blocking the path so that it wouldn't escape back into the cover of the wood. Just as Lance had the creature in his sights it made a spectacular leap over the dead fall and into a dense thicket of Arusian laurel bushes. Lance's horse pulled up short, unable to follow. Through sights of his crosshairs Lance watched the jalla bounding high over the tangle of branches escape and he cursed. He could have taken the shot and made his kill, but wading through the wicked, twisty tree limbs to collect his prize would have been impossible. Only the jalla, with their powerful springing hind limbs could navigate through the 'Laurel-hell.' Everything else on Altea needed to go around or risk getting fatally ensnared in the bushes', clingy vine-like limbs.
"Goddamn it! Quinoa and mung beans again! I was hoping for some meat for dinner." He exclaimed, clicking the safety back on and slinging the weapon across his back in a practiced movement.
"We still have some light. Maybe we can get some fennik or rabbits?" Keith suggested gesturing to the wood and heading that way.
Lance grunted in agreement, and turned his horse around and followed Keith down the game trail into the shade of the forest.
Before long the trail widened and their horse's hooves clip clopped on a paved road, cracked and half hidden with fallen leaves, weeds and branches. They exchanged a glance and continued to follow the path. Keith pulled his horse up at the edge of a clearing and Lance rode up beside him.
"What the hell, dude?" Lance asked frowning as he took note of the burned out shells of buildings covered in creeper weeds. "Did you know this place was here?"
Keith shook his head. "Uh-huh," he peered curiously down the rubble strewn two lane street that extended in front of them and formed a four way intersection before pulling out his comm and checked the GPS. "Huh? That's funny; it's called Orlena."
"Like Allura's aunt?" Lance asked wryly.
"Yeah, weird" Keith said as he urged his horse forward into the remains of the village.
"Must have been an airstrike," Lance observed as he followed. Keith merely nodded his expression somber as he took note of the destruction.
Once they reached what must have been the village green they dismounted, letting their horses graze on the overgrown lawn as they looked around. Keith loosed his sidearm in its holster and Lance unslung his rifle, ready for anyone or thing that might come charging out of the shadows. Gangs and outlaws were still a common threat, and most resented the restoration of peace and order that followed the Space Explorer's arrival on Altea.
The village was deserted, however. The charred and blacked remains of chimneys, half crumbled walls of brick and concrete covered in lichen were all that remained of houses. The young trees breaking through moss and weed-covered foundation slabs gave a bleak testimony of the total destruction rendered by the Drule on this once bustling town.
A flash of light in the street caught Keith's eye and he walked over to investigate. Through the grassy re-growth he saw it more clearly, a shiny gold ring near a cluster of small white stones. As he crouched down and reached his hand out to pick it up he suddenly froze. The ring was still wrapped around the skeletal finger of its owner. His eye traveled further, seeing the straight metacarpal bones of the hand and then the knobby carpal bones of the wrist he had mistook for rocks. A radius was next, its slender, elegant shape and size identifying it as the arm bone of woman. Then the graceful arcs of the ribs, some of which had been melted into the pavestone crater beneath them. The remains of the lower body seemed to be missing. Whoever this person was, they had taken a direct hit from a lazon canon… Keith realized with a sinking feeling. He looked around the ground to see if there was a skull, he saw it a few feet off wrapped in a tangle of vines, the empty eye sockets staring at him expectantly. He looked away, back down at the ground and noticed a second skull among the oddly orderly rib bones and vertebra. This one was small as a teacup and as delicate as an eggshell. Next to it was part of a jawbone with tiny teeth like pearls in a setting . A young child's skull and probably the rest of its bones lay underneath those of what was undoubtedly its mother. She had been running for cover, carrying her baby, when they gunned her down. Keith felt the bile rise in his throat.
"Hey! You find something over there?" Lance called as he exited from of what might have been a grocery store, the doorway was thing only part of the structure still standing. Keith nodded as Lance walked over to join him.
"What'd you find?" Lance asked as he peered over Keith's shoulder. "Oh." He said quickly as he saw the bones.
"She was married." Keith said pointing at the ring. A sickening nostalgia washed over him as he thought of Beverly dying alone and afraid without him. He closed his eyes and pushed the memory aside. That was then. This is now.
Just then the light changed as a cloud had passed in front of the sun and chill wind ruffled the hair on both their necks. Lance looked around warily.
"Oh shit." He said as he suddenly saw them all.
Keith's head snapped up and he jumped to his feet drawing his side arm, then his mouth dropped open in shock.
There were bones everywhere. Bleached white by the sun they had blended into the shattered concrete and limestone. The forest's efforts to reclaim the town had done the rest of the camouflage.
"This was a fuckin' massacre." Lance said softly. "Do you think anyone's been here since it happened?"
"I don't know." Keith answered. He looked down at the gold ring. If people had been here- looters and their like- then either they had missed this piece or this place and its people had lay here for twelve years unshriven, unidentified, and unmourned. He was saddened but not surprised. There were still hundreds, maybe thousands of small settlements that had been destroyed just like this one had been and at least a million people still unaccounted for.
He looked around at the chimneys rising up, before they had looked like fingers before, now they reminded him of giant grave markers. Suddenly he felt the hair on the back of his neck stand up and felt the crawling feeling of eyes on his back. He turned around and saw only the thick overgrowth of a flowering rhodedendrium shrub and the dark forest behind it. He stared harder looking for some movement or some change in the leaf pattern that would show the outline of a predator, or a man, but saw nothing—Wait! There! Glowing faintly amid the trees about the height of a man a glimmer of lights shining like cat eyes in the dark-! He had the sudden sense of danger as a feeling of projected malevolence washed over him.
Hearing one of the horses whinny an alarm they exchanged a look.
"Let's get out of here. This is sacred ground." Lance said and rubbed the back of his neck. Keith could tell buy the tightness in his friend's jaw that he had felt whatever that was too.
They headed back to horses, their steps hurried when suddenly something charged out of under brush. Both Lance and Keith turned at once and had only the briefest of moments to glimpse its terrible red eyes and slavering jaws before their weapons were in their hands firing and the monster lay twitching in its death throes in the dirt.
Lance whooped in delight. "Now that's what I call bringin' home the bacon!"
"Outstanding! Meat's back on the menu!" Keith exclaimed and the two men walked toward the wild boar they had just shot.
It was a smallish beast, about eighty pounds, mostly white, with small black patches over one eye and dappled across its back and bristly tail. Its ivory tusks were small and white, indicating that it was a young pig and its meat was likely to be tender and not too gamey.
Lance crouched down, gingerly stepping around the pool of blood that was spreading underneath the animal. He rolled it onto its back and drew his knife and looked for a good place to open its belly and field dress their kill.
Just then both horses nickered and snorted in alarm and Keith's mare pawed the ground nervously.
Keith glanced over at the horses and hurried over to them, taking hold their reins as his mare stared wall-eyed, ears pricked forward at something in the town. The wind rustled the overgrowth and he felt a chill run through him, stronger than before. Lance's gelding backed up a step and tossed his head fearfully. There was danger here, for sure. He murmured soothingly to the horses and then turned around. His eyes sought out the hedgerows and the empty black doorways scanning for any sign of something amiss.
"Hey, dude! Get me some rope from my saddle bag." Lance called. "I'm just gonna tie him up so we can get outta here."
Keith nodded and whoa-ed Lance's horse as he dug into the bag and found the rope. He tried to walk forward with the horses, but the usually obedient animals refused to move closer. He clucked insistently and pulled on the reins and Lance's gelding sunk down on his haunches and threatened to rear. His own mare also balked and curvetted.
"Just toss it!" Lance called. Keith saw him glance around nervously.
Keith threw the rope and Lance secured the boar 'hog-tying' it with the speed that belied his Nebraska rodeo-cowboy roots. He slung the animal's limp form over his shoulder and used his boot to scuff some sand and rock over the blood on the ground in an effort to cover it. Then he hurried to Keith and the horses.
"Somethin's not right here, bro." Lance said as he secured the pig behind his saddle. "Not right at all." His horse squealed and reared a little, nearly dumping the carcass on the ground. Lanced cursed and finished tying off the knot as Keith settled the animal.
"You ready?" Keith asked as Lance took his horse's reins from him.
"Hell yeah. Let's go!" Lance said glancing around once more as he swung up in the saddle. Keith mounted up beside him. His mare trotted off without any urging. As they rode away Keith spared a glance behind him and then he saw them! Just for a split second! But for sure this time and as clear as day! He saw them! Shiny refractive eyes glowing, burning bright in a black window; boring into his own.
Keith turned and pressed his heels into his horse and she sprung into a gallop, as did Lance's; both equines as eager to put this unsettled place behind them as their riders.