Did I ask for this? Did I ask to watch this show and catch feels for a few lines that had color between them? No. No I didn't. Fuck everything. Ugh.
I don't own Voltron and this is purely a oneshot of Shiro's time in prison. Please enjoy reading it, because Lord knows I didn't enjoy writing it.
Thirty-six
Every single time Shiro left the gladiator arena, he seemed to find himself in a state of blurred introspection. Sounds melted away, smells too, and his vision was reduced down to whatever was right in front of his nose as guards pushed him roughly through his stupor and escorted him out of the arena. Light would turn into dark, the lit Galran arena melting seamlessly into the familiar but still unsettling blacks and purples that decorated the rest of the ship. Or, was it a ship? He was pretty sure it was a ship. A ship that floated through space, further into the galaxy than any human could could ever imagine, never mind travel to. It was a thought that rang through Shiro's head often. A part of him—a very small but no less irrational part—found it rather fascinating to be so far out. And then, the rest of him would be overrun with the kind of emotions that one would normally feel in this sort of situation; dread, hopelessness, confusion, horror.
Matt Holt showed all those emotions like a goddamn computer monitor. The kid looked at everything and everyone like he was sure it was going to kill him, never mind he kept in line or not. In a way, maybe he was right. Of all the memories Shiro had of this place, his first night here was one that he probably was never going to be able to bury away. The three of them were placed in two empty cells side by side, the Galrans recognizing the obvious relation between the Holts and shoving them together, leaving Shiro alone in the eerie blacks and purples for his first of many nights. He fell asleep against the wall, too tired to pound on the door and beg for mercy (or maybe he aware of the futility of the situation. Hell, maybe his head hurt too much for him to care). It didn't stop his friend. Bless the poor kid's soul. Shiro fell asleep to the sounds of Matt screams, his pleas, and then his racking sobs, loud enough to carry through the metal prison walls where they were now making their homes.
Both Matt and Commander Holt were now in some sort of Galran mining facility far away from the ship, according to the little knowledge Shiro could acquire from his fellow prisoners. It was for the best. The two of them might be working like mules under the Galra, but all of that was better than being dead. Or where Shiro was now.
Every day it was the same. At an announced time that he could never place, two sentries would open Shiro's lonely prison cell. They'd seize him, shove him out the door, and force him to walk through the halls back towards his stomping grounds. The first few times, he'd tried to resist. In one of his rare moments of hotheadedness, Shiro threw a hefty punch into the chest of the nearest sentry, hoping to knock it flat on it's ass so he could make his glorious getaway. Find a ship, rescue the Holts, and make it back to Earth to proclaim the eminent threat of alien abduction.
But, much like his hand, his plan shattered upon realizing that his guards were in fact made of metal. He didn't dare fight back again, even when he was sure that the creature under the armor was made of flesh rather than gears and machinery. His throbbing right arm served as a painful check to that.
Just before the arena, Shiro would be given a quick meal of flavorless gray goo that he learned to more or less swallow down, because they weren't feeding him after his work was done. A sword would be thrust into his hands, and he would enter the gladiator arena to face today's challenger.
Shiro had never done well in a spotlight before. At the Garrison, he preferred always to stay in the shadows. Not enough to totally slack off, but certainly not enough to draw attention to himself in the first place. He was a big dude, standing a head taller than most of his class, and it was easy for the others to peg him as their biggest threat. So he hung back. Waited for the perfect moment to strike. Allowed his classmates to tire themselves out with their endless competitions and rivalries while he went ahead and just miraculously slipped under the radar. It was what he was good at.
Well, Shiro threw all that out the window once he was made the champion of the arena.
Each day brought a new challenger, each day brought a new monstrosity that made Shiro wish his classmates had beat the living shit out of him so he'd at least have some experience to draw upon when doing it on a life and death scale. The arena was so tiny and cramped for him and his competitor that there was never a moment of respite unless Shiro actively fought for it. The four pillars were of little help as well, because what was the point of hiding when apparently aliens could teleport or run super fast or crack the floors seemingly at will? His competitors were always at least twelve feet tall, buff, and armed with something much more powerful than his stupid sword. Shiro never gave it much thought before leaving on the Kerberos mission, but now he really wished humans had evolved to breathe fire or something. Anything to give him an edge at this point.
And yet, somehow, every day, it would be Shiro who came out on top. God, his memory was failing him, or perhaps his body was doing him a favor by shutting everything out. He didn't remember most of the actual fighting itself. Only the monster of the day, what it looked like and what it did that made it stand out to him. The methods to his victories were a mystery to him, but somehow it was always him who came out the victor. Just like that. His sword dirtied, blood dripping down his arms and legs, the roar of the alien crowd above him so deafening that Shiro couldn't process the last however many minutes and what made him do what he did. Did he lose control? Did he find a chink in the armor and hit its weak spot? Or was it just sheer dumb luck?
Slowly, he would raise his bloodied sword over his head and engage the crowd. They loved it, the Galra most of all. But Shiro wouldn't return their excitement.
A thousand emotions whirled around in his head like a hailstorm, each one knocking in his brain. Some had a lingering familiarity to them, and Shiro could figure out why he felt them. Others had a foreign feeling, out of place. Confidence. Despair. Relief. Pride. Anger. Shame. Wrath. Fear. The list went on. And Shiro would keep his mask.
Once his grand show was done, and the spectators began to leave for the night, Shiro would be ushered through the darkness back to his cell. Wash, rinse, repeat. No deviation, no hope of change. There was a certain feeling of finality to everything Shiro did, like every breath he drew could simply be his last. Death seemed to be hiding in the shadows and personally dogging his stained footsteps. Each day drawled on longer than he cared for, until it came to the point where Shiro would simply curl up on the cold floor of his cell and pass out upon returning to it. Nothing felt familiar anymore. He felt like a trapped mouse in a wall desperately trying to survive with the cat lingering outside.
It happened after he'd beaten the monster that cracked the floor. Most of the crowd was beginning to leave, and the Galrans had sent for cleaning robots to repair the arena for the next fight. Shiro hoped against hope that it would take a few days, maybe a week, but he had learned a long time ago not to hold his breath.
His usual post-fight stupor was broken much faster than Shiro could have ever thought possible. His foot brushed against something hard, and he saw a blur shoot out in front of him and bounce off of one of the damaged pillars. His eyes rose, captivated. The sound of it hitting off the pillar was dull at best, but it echoed through Shiro's head like a church chime.
When it was finally done spinning in the dust, he could see that it was nothing more than a shard of the arena's floor: a rock about the size of his fist with a nice flat side that strongly resembled a diving knife. It had landed directly in his path, and the guards leading him back to his cell had paid no attention to it.
His timeframe wasn't exactly forever, so Shiro summoned what little strength remained in his body, bent down, and snatched the shard up before standing back upright again. His guards looked back, eyes narrowed dangerously, but Shiro had already slipped the rock up his sleeve and out of sight. He would never forget the crawling feeling of the Galran's eyes, but they eventually turned around and continued forward, and Shiro escaped repercussion.
It was the first time in so many days that Shiro stayed awake, holding the shard in his hands and just staring at it. In the purple lights, it didn't appear to have any use that would help him escape. The edge was sharp enough, but there was no way that Shiro could fight through an army with it. Plus, there was the matter of fighting through a Galran mining facility to get the Holts, which was impossible even with a weapon. Could he hold off with just this until he found a better weapon? The Galrans used guns, so maybe he could steal one? But it was him against thousands of guard, and a weapon wouldn't change that.
Shiro gripped the shard in his hands until he thought he was going to slice his palm open. What would history say of a man who could fight off an alien army with a rock? Of the pilot Takashi Shirogane, who single-handedly protected his planet from monsters with nothing but a piece of rubble and his own humanity?
They'd probably say he was crazy, because Shiro wasn't even sure if he had all of those things anymore.
There was an attempt to sleep the night off, but his mind whirled too fast for him to stay down for too long. When Shiro awoke, he wasn't sure if he had two minutes or two hours before the Galra fetched him for the day's competition. The small watch he'd worn when he'd arrived on the ship had long since died. The blacks and purples offered nothing for him. They rubbed against his shoulders and fell across his arms, soft and quiet, always calling. Purple was the color of mystery, after all.
Shiro didn't know why he pressed the shard into the wall and started carving. Curse his failing memories. All he remembered was one minute he was leaning against the wall, cradling the thing in his arms as if he could rock it to sleep. The next, it lay on the floor. Shiro faced the wall, and right at his eye level was one large, jagged line the size of his index finger. Purple shadows fell across it, making the line crawl along the dark room like a scar on an otherwise flawless canvas.
Almost unconsciously, Shiro picked the rock up again and made another line. And another. And another. It took him so long that his fingers were sliced open and his blood left smears on the wall that shown black under the dim lights. He sat back, hands dropping to his sides. By the time they came for him in the morning, Shiro was sure he was all caught up. Twenty-four jagged tallies had been chiseled into the wall just over his where he slept.
When the bright lights fell on them, and Shiro cast one more fleeting glance at the wall before he left for the day's competition, he could have sworn that they shrunk back towards the darkness.
Every night before he fell asleep, Shiro made one more tally. Sometimes he would stare at them, try to anchor himself back into reality and remind himself that another line made meant another day breathing. Others, he would reach out and rub his hands along the wall and admire his poor craftsmanship. Number nine would slice his fingers open if he wasn't careful with it, and number twenty-seven wasn't nearly as long as the others because Shiro fell asleep halfway through carving it. But it was comforting, in a strange and twisted sort of way. To him, it was a tangible reminder of what he had here, and what he left behind.
Purple was the color of ghosts too, wasn't it? And wasn't it also a color of death?
He was going to die here.
But he didn't.
Each day, Shiro kept fighting. Each day, Shiro returned to his cell, battered but alive. Each breath, each exhale, each taste of cold air a stinging reminder of his own mortality. Each night, Shiro made another tally. Before long, thirty-six lines had been etched into the metal of the Galra ship: watching silently, judging silently. A benevolent and malevolent presence at the same time; caught in some apathetic equilibrium every single night that Shiro fell asleep under them.
It fell into the day's tasks. Get up, eat, fight, return, tally, sleep. Wash, rinse, repeat. His fingers healed and the arena was cleared, but the tallies stayed up on the wall. They were Shiro's only measure, only idea, of exactly how much time he'd spent in the arena. If it meant doing it every single day until he died, then so be it.
Then they would tell stories of the great Takashi Shirogane. The one who died on an alien ship with a weapon during the day and a weapon during the night. As disgustingly venerating as that was, the thought didn't appeal to him too much.
On the morning after the thirty-sixth tally, the day started normally. The same guards grabbed him by the collar of his tunic and walked him down the hall. Shiro said nothing the entire way. Instead, he chose to study the graceful way the purple and black lights danced off the Galran sentry's armor. The parallel lines plummeted downwards and fell across the back, brothers racing each other to their demises. With his hands tied behind his back, Shiro could only huff sharply at the hair falling across his face and walk forward on a familiar path.
Upon being presented with his daily meal, the Galran snorted at Shiro in amusement. "You're lucky," it grunted, sounding like it was holding back a laugh, "you have an easy one today, Champion."
Shiro gave no sign of his confusion and buried himself into his meal, letting his mind wander. What could that possibly mean? Nothing in the arena was ever easy—the multiple scars that crisscrossed his back functioned as a reminder to that. In any normal situation involving the word 'easy', Shiro might've gotten excited and hopeful. Thoughts of easy tests and jobs passed over his vision like mist. They dissipated immediately. Nothing ever stayed, not here. Shiro buried his nose into his meal and tried not to dwell on what he had just felt.
The sword in his hands, Shiro walked out into the crowds and was met with the usual thunderous roar of the aliens waiting for the fight. His eyes fell into their usual scan of the seats. Forty rows of aliens all screaming at the top of their lungs. Some were old, and a lot of them were young, which was weird considering how graphic these things usually got. Eventually, Shiro found himself staring at the large throne about ten rows up with a perfect view of the action.
Shiro had heard that Galran's name before. A name that was passed around by the other prisoners like a grenade about to go off. A name that people claimed the very utterance of would doom an entire planet. Aside from the bright burst of fear in every prisoner's eyes whenever his name was uttered, Zarkon didn't have much else going for him in Shiro's humblest opinion. Even from this distance, he looked like a withered turtle in an overgrown shell. The thing about him that did genuinely unnerve Shiro were his eyes; all the rest of the Galrans had bright yellow eyes, but Zarkon's were instead a piercing purple that seemed to glow with something otherworldly, like there was something else there possessing that hollow husk of an alien. Despite his doubts, Shiro would be lying if he said that there wasn't anything intimidating about their captor.
The second deafening call of the crowd yanked Shiro out of his thoughts. His challenger was entering in the ring; he was sure of it. The crowd was going ballistic, frankly seeming more exciting then Shiro had ever heard them. Taking a deep shuddering breath, Shiro spun on heel and turned to face his challenger.
Shiro had seen monsters bigger than Garrison spaceships. Shiro had seen monsters with horns and fangs and spikes and just about everything else that his mind would possibly deem as scary. And yet, what had entered the arena was far more disturbing than Shiro's mind could have ever dreamed up.
His opponent for the day resembled a rabbit that had suddenly gained the ability to walk on two legs. Its fur was ruffled and dirty, probably not having been washed since it got here. It was a pale green with a white underbelly, with patches of fur missing like it had been rubbed away or yanked out. A ragged tunic draped was over it's body, offering no cover for the sickly looking scars that tried to hide from preying eyes. Its ears stood straight up in alert despite one of them being extremely twisted and crooked, like it had been a Galran's preferred method of grabbing the poor thing. Even with the added height of the ears, the thing couldn't have come up any further than Shiro's navel. Black eyes stared back into his gray ones, shining with terror. When it walked, it limped slightly, one of it's hindquarters having been twisted awkwardly to the side. The thing had a sword like Shiro's, but it was so heavy for it's tiny arms that it could only drag it through the dust of the arena, leaving a thin line in it's wake as it approached its fate.
Shiro swore he felt his stomach drop somewhere between his knees. The thing trembled from head to foot (head to ear? Shiro wasn't concerned about the proper terminology), waiting for the round to begin. Fear was painted clear on it's face. The look it gave was reminiscent of the one Matt had given him not too long ago; in fact, it was almost uncanny. Unsettling. It made Shiro's insides writhe painfully, his gut a pair of hands roughly and furiously wringing themselves out.
Another loud shout from the crowd, their voices swelling into one giant mass that threatened to blanket the entire stadium, signaled the start of the match. Shiro, still wrapped in his own thoughts, scarcely reacted until he saw his opponent struggle to swing the sword forward. It still sagged like a damp sail, it's greater weight nearly too much for the alien to take. Eventually, it hoisted the weapon up, gripping with two hands.
For a moment, neither moved. Shiro was still too stunned to attack first and fright was clearly holding the alien back. The moment dragged on, and on, and on, time moving at a standstill, and Shiro felt every single second clawing at his skin as it passed him by.
And then, it charged.
Just like that, Shiro's concentration broke—even with a hurt leg, the alien was fast. Not fast enough, however. All Shiro had to do was merely pivot out of the way and watch as the little thing careened past him, unable to stop from the momentum it had built. When the alien finally skidded to a stop, it struggled to spin around, ears now lying completely flat. The crowd bellowed out their approval.
This went on for a little bit. Shiro barely moved, allowing his challenger to build up it's courage for another charge and merely spinning out of the way again. The alien might as well have been holding a broomstick, because Shiro could feel the utter lack of power behind each charge from the way the wind only lightly whipped at his tunic when it passed. The dodges took up so little of his concentration that Shiro allowed his mind to branch out to other things, like how the crowd was slowly losing interest in their fight. Each attack and subsequent sidestep elicited a weaker and weaker cheer from the spectators. The gladiator fight was a ticket paid back in blood, and there wasn't much of that this fight. Not if Shiro could help it.
Eventually, however, his good luck ran out. His next dodge earned Shiro his first ever boos from the crowd. His skin pricked; alien displeasure was nothing like what he expected. He looked up once he was sure the little alien had safely made it's next passing. Galra sentries were trying to subdue a crowd that was beginning to go berserk. Aliens of all shapes and sizes howled and shrieked and snarled in the stands above them. Some hurled their belongings into the ring while others appeared to be trying to leap into the pit like they were desperate to get a shot at the challenger for themselves.
Shiro even chanced a glance ten rows up at Zarkon. Surprisingly, he was the only one who appeared completely unperturbed, but Shiro wasn't a fool. If he had to guess, he would figure that he was probably the angriest of all of them, watching his champion toy with his challenger so insolently. The hooded figure next to the Galran Emperor bent over and spoke something in his ear, and Zarkon's eyes narrowed into furious purple slits that burned into Shiro even from this distance.
Something fractured inside of Shiro's heart in that moment as he turned back to his adversary. The alien had stopped charging him, caught up in confusion as it watched the crowd go ballistic. It looked no less comfortable, Shiro noted, but fear wasn't completely overshadowing its' features anymore as it returned its sights back to him. Only a strange mixture of bafflement and apprehension, as if it was sure that it's luck wouldn't last.
When it started its next charge, this time Shiro planted his feet and raised his sword. The alien noticed this and tried to stop but by then it was too late. Shiro swung and, making sure to hit the creature with the flat side of the blade, batted the little thing away like a lion swiping its paw at it's cub. It wasn't even that hard of a hit, but he struck the alien forcefully enough to go flying. The sword spun out of it's hands, striking ground somewhere a few feet away as it's owner tumbled through the dust and landed facedown on the floor.
As if the switch had been flipped, Shiro could hear the crowd begin to recollect themselves after the hit. The boos stopped, turning into cheers as the alien picked itself off the ground. Its pale fur was ruffled and coated in dust, and it visibly winced as it got back on it's two feet. Shiro began to pace, and the little creature mirrored his actions, the two of them moving around in a circle. Shiro had purposefully moved in the opposite direction as to direct the alien back towards it's sword. Getting the message, it picked the weapon back up again with some difficulty, only succeeding in ripping it out of the ground after a few pitiful tries.
This went on for some time. Shiro was forced to get resourceful with his hits, sometimes allowing the alien to make advances on him before batting it away again. He even allowed it to hit him once or twice, just to make the situation seem more realistic. The wounds had all the sting of a paper cut, so it was virtually a painless endeavor for Shiro. The real pain lay in the circumstance. The alien crowd was being played like a fiddle, howling with delight whenever a blow was landed or blood was drawn. But the more times he hit the poor thing, the harder Shiro found to keep it up. Each blow, even though it was purely blunt and never meant to maim, made the alien stay down longer and longer. It scrambled up eventually, but the fight was clearly taking its toll. Blood dripped out it's nose after a time, and an awkward landing had twisted its other leg. Yet, it still rose. It was like it was driven by some kind of erratic willpower that was driving Shiro crazy. If the thing just stayed down, then maybe, just maybe, the fight would end. Shiro could be declared the winner. His opponent could be returned to wherever it came from. Everyone could go home and the fight would just be another passing topic. But the alien seemed to be possessed by something Shiro couldn't fathom. Determination? Hopelessness? Sheer stupidity? Every single time the poor thing got up, Shiro felt his body ache like he was the one being attacked instead.
Stay down, Shiro thought desperately. Stay down and don't get up if you know what's good for you.
And then, finally, mercifully, it happened. Shiro's hit wasn't any harder than his previous ones, but the next blow sent the alien straight into one of the stone pillars in the middle of the arena. It bounced off hard, and Shiro knew that this time it wasn't getting back up. The thing crumpled into the dust, and it struggled once to stand back up before collapsing and lying there motionless, finally defeated.
Bedlam. The arena split into a cheer so earsplitting that Shiro didn't care if it resulted in the loss of his hearing. Aliens were screaming and stamping and making so much noise that the alien's sword, which lay abandoned on the ground next to it, rattled and shook from the combined sound.
Disgusted, Shiro leaned against the pillar and waited for the sounds to quell and aliens to leave and the sentries to take him back to his cell so he could never remember the fight again. Nothing happened. The noise died down, but the alien crowd remained motionless. In fact, they looked more confused, as if they were seeing something they didn't foresee.
Shiro spun around, bewildered and expecting Galra, but there was no one else in the arena coming to take him away. Gripping his sword harder still, he felt his eyes travel upwards and fall on a familiar sight. He wasn't the only one; most of the arena was now turning to look expectantly at the ringleader. Even the alien had found the strength to raise its head.
Zarkon hadn't moved either, staying utterly stationary on his throne. He made no motion, made no wave of his hands nor say a word in anger. He just stared. There wasn't even a squint, but their eyes locked a third time and somehow Shiro understood everything.
The gladiator fight was a ticket paid back in blood, and the debt had not yet been repaid.
Feeling like he was wading through mud, Shiro forced his legs to move.
The alien's ears twitched and, alerted to his approach, began squeaking pitifully and crawling through the dust, desperately trying to outpace the champion as it's fate dawned upon it. It was useless, however, because Shiro caught up with the thing in a matter of seconds. He planted his foot on it's back, ensuring that it couldn't escape. The sound of the crowd was back but fading away now, like the lapping of waves on a distant shore.
As Shiro readied the sword, he caught one last glimpse of the alien's eyes. It was amazing how much emotion simmered in that blackness, how much Shiro could actually see reflected back at him.
The roar of the crowd's approval.
The raising of the sword.
The approving nod of Zarkon.
The hands on his shoulders as they dragged him away.
The purples and the blacks greeting him again like two old friends that missed him dearly.
The blood that dripped down his arms and legs.
This one time, just this one, Shiro remembered.
He remembered all of it.
-X-
And just like that, Shiro recalled why he made the tallies in the first place.
A benevolent and malevolent presence at the same time. Just like him.
Thirty-seven.
I hate myself.
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