Chapter 1: The abandoned colony
Author's Note: This story has evolved from a previous idea I had for a Voltron/Steven Universe crossover, the original idea had been too close to my story 'Ocean Blue' so I made some changes such as the type of Gem Lance was going to be. This story was also inspired by 'ardett' and 'maychorian's 'Dream, Seam' series.
I'm breaking my rule of not starting a story unless I know where I'm going with it, but I'm eager to start this story and I'm hoping that the direction will come to me as I'm writing or with the help from commenters. If not, hopefully it'll be popular enough for someone else to continue the story on for me once I'm out of ideas.
In Alfor's defence, he had no way of knowing that the warp would go wrong, as far as he had known, the ship would have emerged from the wormhole with no issue and continue its way to the planet he and his friends had been working on an alliance with. Instead, as soon as the ship exited the wormhole, alarms had gone off as power began to drain.
"What's going on?" Zarkon asked.
"Something's messing with the ship!" Alfor exclaimed.
"I'll check the core." Trigel quickly left the bridge.
"Energy levels are getting dangerously low." One of the Altean crew reported.
"I think we're getting pulled into the gravity of that planet." Blaytz said, pointing at the viewing window.
They all looked out of the widow at the planet that was gradually getting bigger.
"I believe that planet is the cause of our issues." Trigel appeared on a screen in front of Alfor. "There's no obvious issues with the core, so it must be an outside cause."
"What is that planet?" Gyrgan asked. "I thought this was supposed to be a dead zone, no technology or space anomalies should be out here to affect us."
"Unknown, we don't have any data on this planet and with the ship being affected like this, we can't scan it." Another of the Altean crew reported.
"Well, whatever it is, we're landing on it." Alfor said, turning the ship in the direction of the planet.
"Is that really wise?" Zarkon questioned.
"It's our only option." Alfor responded. "With how fast we're losing energy, we won't be able to get far. It's best if we land the ship while we're still in control."
Reluctantly, his friends agreed that they had no other plans, allowing Alfor to continue piloting the ship towards the mysterious planet.
The ship began to shake as it entered the atmosphere.
"Gravity stabilisers are malfunctioning." An Altean crew member reported. "Energy levels have now fallen to dangerous levels.
"Everyone strap in, it's going to be a rough landing!" Alfor called.
The other four leaders ran to their designated seats and pulled the belts over their chests, pinning them to their chairs firmly.
"Impact imminent!" The crew member warned.
Alfor gritted his teeth as he fought to retain control of the ship.
"10…9…8…7…6…5…4…3…2…1…"
Everyone grunted and lurched forward in their seats as the ship made contact with the ground, coming to a stop.
"Report." Alfor sighed.
"Systems are operational, but a full damage report is going to take time with our low energy levels." The Altean crew member reported.
"Well, we may as well go try and find what caused our abrupt landing in the first place while we wait." Alfor said, leaving the bridge.
"Yeah, go out into a world we know nothing about, it'll be fine." Blaytz joked.
"According to scans, the air should be suitable to breath." Trigel said as they approached the door.
The door opened to lush greenery, tall plants and trees that reached towards the sky.
"There doesn't seem to be any exterior damage." Zarkon noted as he looked back at the ship.
"Come on, you have so little faith in my piloting skills?" Alfor feigned hurt.
"Are you forgetting the Benza Tai incident?" Baytz asked.
"Come on, I thought we agreed never to speak about that again." Alfor wilted.
"We never agreed to anything." Trigel teased.
As they walked, cutting a path through the foliage, attempting to find higher ground to survey the area, they came across artificial scarring in the landscape.
"Well, we know what someone's been here before us." Gyrgan commented, surveying the damage as if he could work out what made it.
"Or is still here." Zarkon added, keeping his blade at the ready.
He then stopped.
"What is it?" Alfor asked.
"We're being watched." Zarkon said.
They looked around but couldn't see what their friend sensed.
"Let's keep walking, hopefully they're friendly and will reveal themselves." Alfor said.
From amongst the branches of the trees, curious blue eyes peered down at them.
The five continued to walk, following the artificial scarring in the land in hopes that it would lead them somewhere. They eventually came to a stop at a large structure that was covered in overgrowth, it was tall, and no doubt would have looked brilliant if time had not claimed it.
"It looks like whoever was here abandoned this place." Gyran said, noting broken areas of the structure.
They all froze when they heard growling, quickly readying their weapons.
They didn't have to wait long to be attacks as a large mass burst its way out of the foliage towards them, followed by another, and another. They were being ambushed.
"What are these creatures?" Trigel asked as she dodged one of the things coming at her.
"I've never seen the likes of these before." Gyrgan said, meeting one of the creatures head on and grabbing it by its horns while avoiding its mouth.
Zarkon growled as he thrust his sword at the creature, piercing through it. But instead of bleeding around the sword, the entire creature disappeared with a 'poof'.
"What?" Zarkon questioned, looking at his blade that had no blood on it.
Another creature met the same fate at the end of Alfor's sword, disappearing with a 'poof' and leaving the king very confused. Soon, all the creatures had disappeared into seemingly thin air once defeated by the leaders, leaving them all questioning what they had just fought.
They then noticed that the ground was covered with a collection of shiny objects that hadn't been there before.
"Gemstones?" Trigel questioned, picking one of the objects up.
"Uh, guys, I think I found out who was here before us." Blaytz called out.
The others turned to see Blaytz pull vines away from the structure they had found, revealing a diamond symbol on the wall that was comprised of four different coloured diamonds.
"The Diamonds." Alfor breathed, recognising the symbol. "We must be on a Gem colony." He deduced.
"Which would make what we just fought Gems." Trigel added.
"They didn't look like any Gem I've ever seen." Blaytz commented.
"They didn't look like Gems at all." Zarkon agreed. "And if this is a colony, where are their ships, why is everything still overgrown? We should have seen something on our entry. Something happened here." He concluded.
"Should we head back to the ship?" Trigel asked.
Alfor shook his head. "We should find out what's going on." He said.
"We should take care of these strange Gems first, we don't want them reforming." Zarkon said.
Luckily, Trigel had a containment field on her, which was designed to contain many things including a Gem without letting it regain its physical form.
Moving past the structure, which they realised was a half-built tower, they climbed higher through the land, more and more of the foliage falling away until the land became barren at a cliff. They looked over the cliff into a canyon, machines clung to the walls and holes littered the walls of the cliffs.
"A kindergarten." Gyrgan recognised. "There aren't that many holes."
"If seems as though this colony was abandoned." Trigel said. "The question is, why?"
"Likely whatever caused the ship's systems to fail." Alfor theorised.
Looking past the kindergarten, the Gem ships they had been looking for came into view, covered in the same overgrowth that claimed the structure they had found.
"There's out best chance at answers." Alfor said.
They walked their way over to the closest Gem ship. Above them, a lieth figure jumped silently from tree to tree, keeping an eye on the strange visitors to his home.
"How do we get in?" Blaytz was the one to question when they reached the Gem ship.
It turned out that they didn't have to work out how, as the door was conveniently broken open for them.
"It looks like someone scavenged inside here." Gyrgan observed.
The inside of the ship was a mess, devices pulled out of their places and pieces of metal lying everywhere.
"No power." Trigel said, attempting to activate anything.
"Their power core has been torn apart." Blaytz called after wandering down the steps to the engine room of the ship.
"Do you think someone's still here, who's not those strange Gems?" Gyrgan asked.
"It's possible that we are not the first to have crashed here." Trigel said.
"Well, we're not getting any answers here, only more questions." Alfor said. "Hopefully the next ship will audio logs or something salvageable to tell us what happened."
They left the ship, heading for the next one. Along the way, being attacked by more monstrous Gems.
"We don't have to fight, we can work something out." Alfor tried to communicate as he blocked an attack.
The Gem only screamed at him.
"Don't bother, they are beyond reasoning." Zarkon concluded, not hesitating to poof the Gem he was fighting.
"At least we're not killing them." Trigel said as she put the gemstones in her containment field.
"What has made them like this? There's no way the Diamonds would purposely make these Gems." Alfor frowned.
The others nodded in agreement, knowing how obsessed the Diamonds were with perfection.
Like the one before, the next ship had been broken into and showed signs of being scavenged for parts, though this one was more intact, which included the power core.
"I doubt the core will last long when we power it up, but it will hopefully be enough to get some information from the logs." Trigel said.
The ship shook as the power core came to life, flickering weakly. Trigel wasted no time in accessing the ship's logs and downloading as many as she could onto her device.
Eventually, the core stuttered, and then failed completely, smoking slightly as its light faded.
"How much did you get?" Alfor asked.
"Only a couple of video logs." Trigel said, opening the oldest one.
A screen projected out of her device, displaying the video log.
"This is Peridot Facet-1F3R Cut-4XG, reporting on the progress for quintant 24 of Yellow Diamond's fifth colony." A green Gem appeared on the screen. "Work is progressing without issue, there appears to be no natives to interfere with the conversion of the planet, the building of structures is on schedule and the kindergartens have hatched their first Gems. That is all to report."
The video ended and Trigel brought up the next one.
The next video was basically a repeat of the last report, the Peridot saying that everything was going according to plan.
The report after that gave something more interesting.
"This is Peridot Facet-1F3R Cut-4XG reporting on the progress for quintant 26 of Yellow Diamond's fifth colony. All work is progressing without issue, but we have come across something strange while excavating an area. We don't know what it is yet, but we do know that something big is buried in the rock and that it messes with our devices the closer we get to it. It is almost excavated, once we know what it is we will inform my Diamond and she will tell us if she wants to use it or if she wants it destroyed due to the interference it's causing. That is all to report."
"That's the last report that was recorded." Trigel said.
"Think that thing she mentioned is the cause of our problems?" Blaytz asked.
"She said that it was messing with their devices, so it could be." Alfor said.
"Any idea where this thing is then?" Gurgan asked.
"It should be close, hopefully the next ship will have the exact location." Trigel said.
They travelled to the next ship, the monstrous Gems seemed to have gotten the message they weren't to be messed with and they weren't attacked again.
The next ship was in the same state as the last two, but Trigel managed to pull some more video logs from the computer. In the first couple of logs, the Gem detailed the specifics for how a structure was being built, it was only the last log that she offhandedly mentioned the thing they were excavating, also mentioning where it was in relation to the kindergarten.
"That was her last report too." Zarkon observed. "Whatever happened to them seems to have struck fast for there to be no mention it. And both last mentioned what they were trying to dig up."
"At least we know where it is now and can look for ourselves." Alfor said.
There was yet more trekking over the land, going back to the kindergarten and then heading west until they came across ground that had obviously been dug up.
"I think we found it." Gyrgan said.
"What are we waiting for then?" Blaytz prompted.
Behind them, someone reluctantly followed as they all delved deeper into the quarry, hiding behind rocks and dirt piles when there were no more trees.
"What is that thing?" Zarkon asked when they reached the centre of the quarry.
A glowing rock was half buried in the ground, signs of destruction all around it.
"Whatever it is, it seems dangerous." Gyrgan said. "Just looking at it gives me a bad feeling.
The others hummed in agreement.
Behind them, rocks suddenly tumbled down a hill, a shadow darting away.
But Zarkon was already there, grabbing it before it could escape and lofting it into the air.
"Why have you been following us?" He demanded.
He only got desperate growls in response.
"Zarkon, careful, it's a child." Alfor exclaimed.
Taking the time to look properly, Zarkon realised what he was holding was indeed a child and not just a small creature. He quickly placed it on the ground but kept hold of its arm so it couldn't escape.
"Is that a Kurogane?" Blaytz questioned.
Now that they could get a clear look at the child, they could see the fluffy triangular ears that popped out of their long, mangled hair and the tail that stood stiff behind them, a piece of ripped fabric covering their lower half was the only thing they wore.
"They are very far from the Trading Belt." Trigel said.
Alfor knelt down to the child's level.
"Hey, there." He said gently. "Can you tell me you name and why you're here?"
The child hissed at him in return before resuming their struggle to get out of Zarkon's hold.
The five leaders looked at each other in surprise.
"Look, I'm not going to hurt you." Alfor tried again. "I'm King Alfor of Altea, I can help."
The child hissed again and added a growl.
"I don't think he can understand me." Alfor said, standing.
"At their age, they should be capable of speech and reasoning." Blaytz said. "I don't think this kid was ever taught."
"You mean he's feral?" Grygan frowned.
The Nalquoi didn't have time to answer as Zarkon suddenly shouted in pain, they looked back to him to see the Galra clutching his hand. The child was running away behind him.
"They bit me." Zarkon growled.
They gave chase after the child, not willing to let them go into danger, as the monstrous Gems were still around.
"I got them!" Grygan shouted, readying to catch the child as he caught up.
Just as he was about to grab the child, they suddenly disappeared in a cloud of smoke, leaving the Rygnirathian to grab at nothing.
The child reappeared a few metres away, scaling up into the trees and continuing to run away along the branches.
"And they can already speed travel." Alfor moaned. "This is going to be hard."
They continued to chase the child, managing to keep them in their sights despite their attempts at disappearing, the young child obviously wasn't well practiced in the art of speed traveling or disappearing yet.
The child led them to a ship that was different to the others, it sat atop a cliff with little sign of overgrowth on it and bits of agriculture built around it such as a farm. The child ran up to the ship and placed their hand on the outside, a door then appeared and the child disappeared inside.
The door thankfully didn't close, allowing the leaders to enter the ship.
"I think we found the home of our scavenger." Blaytz said.
The inside machinery of the ship was perfectly intact, bit of machinery that were likely from the other ships was piled up against a wall or scattered on the ground. The ship also had clear signs of being lived in, a nest of fabrics lay in one corner and the walls were decorated with child-like drawings.
"There must be someone else here, I doubt the child would have been able to do this himself." Zarkon said.
The group them became aware of a clicking that echoed around the ship, and then an animalistic hiss.
"One of those things is in here." Zarkon growled.
"We need to find the child before it finds them." Alfor said, fearing for the child's safety.
"There they are." Blaytz pointed at the nest, the child peeping out from under the blankets.
He made for the child but was knocked to the ground by something colliding with him.
A monstrous Gem roared at him, bringing down one of its blade-like arms towards him, but it was knocked off of him by Gyrgan before the blade could hit him.
The Gem screeched and then crawled up the walls of the ship.
"Blaytz, grab the child and get out of here!" Alfor shouted.
Blaytz got up and made to grab the child again, but the Gem hissed and dropped off of the ceiling to land in front of him, swinging its blade arm.
"I don't think it wants me near the child." Blaytz concluded, backing away to avoid being hit.
"Is it protecting the child?" Trigel questioned.
"Protecting the child or not, it's still attacking us." Blaytz grunted as he used his scimitars to block the next attack aimed at him.
Alfor ran to attack the Gem, but it jumped away just before he could hit it, his sword almost hitting Blaytz as a result. The Gem quickly scaled the wall and climbed onto the ceiling again.
"How are we going to fight without endangering the child?" Gyrgan questioned.
"We'll just have to be careful." Zarkon said.
It was hard fighting the Gem in such a crowded space, especially taking the child in the corner into account, and attempting to lead her outside hadn't worked. The Gem seemed to always know where each of them where, swinging around and striking if one of them tried to attack from the back, and would attack whoever was nearest to the child.
"We need to use her protectiveness of the child to our advantage." Zarkon said.
Despite their reluctance to bring the child into it, everyone nodded in agreement, knowing they were currently struggling.
Gyrgan made a show of going for the child, which made the Gem break away from attacking Zarkon to go after him, but the Galra acted quickly and grabbed the Gem's leg, it hissed and turned to strike him, only to be grabbed by Blaytz.
"Now!" Blaytz shouted.
Alfor jumped in with his sword just as the Gem threw Blaytz off of her and escaped from Zarkon's grasp, by some miracle Alfor managed to avoid the bladed arms as they were directed at him and his sword found home in the Gems chest.
The monstrous Gem gave one final screech before disappearing with a 'poof'.
Everyone sighed in relief.
"I'm glad that's over." Trigel said.
She went to pick up the gemstone left behind, but before she could touch it, it was grabbed from the floor. She looked up to see the child running away with the gemstone in hand, wedging themselves underneath one of the machines.
"What do we do with the child?" Gyrgan asked.
"Once we get him out we can take him back to the ship." Alfor said. "But first, I want to see what we can get from this ship's computers."
"Everything in here does seem to be functional." Trigel agreed. "We shouldn't have any issue opening the video logs to see if they have any further information."
"While you're doing that, I'll work on coaxing the kid out." Blaytz volunteered.
While his friends worked on the computers to get them active, Blaytz knelt down next to the machine the child was hiding under and waited patiently, offering some shiny items from his pockets to the child in hopes of gaining their trust.
"This is all of the reports, I'll start from the oldest one." Trigel said after powering up the computer and finding her way into the ship's logs.
A screen appeared, displaying a purple Gem.
"This is Iolite Facet-1H7L Cut-3XK." The Gem introduced herself. "I have found a new planet that can function as a possible colony for the Diamonds, it has plenty of resources that could produce a wide variety of Gems and nothing beyond simple life has evolved here, meaning that there would be no resistance from natives. I have already sent my analysis of this planet to my Diamond, so I have to wait and see if this planet will need to be recorded as a colony. End report."
During the log, the child had creeped out of their hiding place, looking around as if they expected someone to there before looking at the Gem on the screen before smiling, reaching out to it.
"Hey there." Blaytz said quietly. "Do you recognise her?"
The child suddenly realised that they were out in the open and quickly hid again, causing Blaytz to sigh.
"Well, at least we know there was no one here before the Gems started their colony." Trigel said.
The leaders had to defend against Homeworld more than once when they attempted to make a colony out of one of their allied planets, or even their own home planets.
The next log started, showing Iolite with wide eyes and a shocked look, in her arms she cradled a baby.
"Well, this happened." Iolite said, not bothering with her introduction. "I can't even begin to understand it, but apparently a Sapphire fell in love with an organic species and then became this…baby…thing."
"What?" Alfor questioned. "How is that possible?"
"The Diamonds definitely aren't happy about this, I thought I was going to get shattered when my Diamond called for me. Instead, I've been put in charge of the thing! The Diamonds apparently want to see if there's any advantage to a Gem/organic hybrid before they kill it, so they needed someone to raise it, and that someone is apparently me." Iolite was clearly distressed. "I get it, I'm an Iolite, part of my job is to infiltrate the societies of organics, so I'm the type of Gem with the most knowledge of how organics function. But that doesn't mean I have any idea of how to take care of a baby, all I know is that they're messy, are completely helpless and are little noise machines." Iolite took a deep breath. "Its okay, my Diamond asked me to do this, so I can do it. I've set up a semi-permanent home for us on the planet Yellow Diamond has just claimed for her colony, I remember being told that children do better with open spaces than cooped up in a ship while undercover, so this is hopefully the correct direction. End report."
The five leaders were stunned.
"That child is a Gem hybrid?" Trigel questioned, looking back at the child where they were hidden.
It didn't take much to connect the baby Iolite held to the Child they had found.
"If they're here, where's their caretaker?" Gyrgan questioned. "Why would she just leave the child behind?"
"Play the next report." Alfor said.
Iolite appeared on the screen again, this time looking clearly dishevelled, holding the wailing baby in her arms.
"Will you please stop crying?" Iolite begged the baby before turning to the screen. "Well the baby's not dead. I didn't think I'd make him survive this long." She said. "All this little monster does is eat, refuse to eat, sleep, refuse to sleep, cries constantly and just makes so much mess. How do organics cope having to care for something so helpless and disgusting, and actually enjoy it? I've contacted other Iolites to find information on caring for babies and send it to me, specifically for whatever species this monster is, hopefully they can tell me when he starts getting smart and can do it all for himself. Anyway, he doesn't yet seem to display any abilities, but it's a bit early for him yet. End report."
"That certainly reminds me of my first few days as a parent." Alfor commented.
"You have a nanny to help look after Allura." Trigel reminded him. "This Iolite has no one to help her and has no idea what she's doing. It's a miracle that the child is here now by the looks of things."
Blaytz nodded in agreement, rolling a small ball under the machine, pushing it back when it rolled out again, engaging in a small game with the child hidden underneath.
The next report began to play, showing Iolite even more dishevelled, eye twitching and just looking like a mess. In her arms, the baby was still crying, similarly messy.
"I don't know what to do." Iolite sobbed. "He won't eat what I give him, unless he can somehow eat through his skin, he doesn't want to sleep even when he's clearly tired, and I just don't know what he wants. One of the information files I was sent said it was because he's teething, but I can't see anything coming though and he screams so loud when I try to feel his gums. And I've apparently got to put up with this for years. Years! I don't know if I can do this."
The report ended with Iolite openly sobbing as the baby continued to cry, yanking on the Gem's hair.
"I never thought I'd feel sorry for a Gem." Blaytz said.
"We have a few Gem allies that broke away from the Diamonds." Alfor reminded him.
"I meant that were still loyal to Homeworld." Blaytz amended.
The next report showed Iolite in a much better condition, she was neatened up and even smiling. And instead of being cradled in her arms, the infant was behind her in the nest of blankets, contently sleeping.
"This is Iolite Facet-1H7L Cut-3XK." She introduced herself again. "After my…breakdown, I've managed to get a hold of things now. The child is eating properly again, turns out it was his teeth coming in, and he's sleeping more easily, he's even crying less. It's actually not that bad when you get a hold of things. According to the information on his species, he's developing at the expected rate, but nothing from the Sapphire he came from seems to have manifested yet. It took a while to explain to my Diamond that organics grow and come into their abilities as time passes, and aren't born with everything already there, so I suspect it's going to take a while before we get any results, my Diamond wasn't happy but seemed to understand. End report."
Alfor had to laugh. "She's going through the stages of parenthood." He chuckled.
"She seems to be getting attached to the infant now." Gyrgan agreed.
The next report played, showing Iolite holding an older looking baby, both smiling at each other while Iolite tickled the baby with the end of her braid.
"Who's a precious boy?" Iolite said to the baby.
"Ah!" The baby replied, reaching for Iolite's face.
"Oh, you're so cute." Iolite gushed.
Everyone had to laugh at Iolite's sudden attitude shift from the last reports.
Iolite then looked at the screen, suddenly remembering that she was recording.
"Oh, uh. This is Iolite Facet-1H7L Cut-3XK. The baby is progressing at the expected rate, still no sign of a Sapphire's abilities, though they might manifest soon once he's able to play with cognitive toys. He's also got a name now, Lance. I was taking him for a walk around the colony and one of the Jaspers decided to name him after her weapon, and the name just stuck. End report."
The child had poked his head out of his hiding place at the mention of his name in the recording.
"Is that your name, Lance?" Blaytz asked him.
Lance looked at him and backed up slightly, but he didn't disappear back into hiding, which Blaytz took as progress. They then continued rolling the small ball back and forth to each other.
"I didn't realised Gems could have maternal instincts." Zarkon said. "It certainly wouldn't be programmed into them."
"Maybe Gems have the capability to develop after all." Gyrgan theorised.
The next report began, though no one appeared on the screen at first, until Iolite wandered into view.
"Laaance." She sang. "Where are yooou?"
She then, once again, realised she was recording and ran up to the screen.
"Oh, right. This is Iolite Facet-1H7L Cut-3XK. The child is now progressing at a faster rate, he's started crawling, and walking, and has become very fond of hide and seek. I always know where he is though, you can never hide from an Iolite, so there's no need to panic."
"I forgot that Kuroganes develop the ability to walk faster than other species." Alfor said to himself. "He's going to be a handful now."
"He's yet to speak" Iolite continued. "But he shows understanding of what I say and has specific sounds for things, so he should start developing speech soon."
Iolite then held out her hands and stepped back, just as baby Lance dropped into them.
"How did you even get up there?" She questioned the baby. "You're going to hurt yourself!"
Baby Lance's lip started wobbling and he let out whimpers, Iolite was quick to bring him to her chest and cradle him.
"I'm sorry for being loud, I'm not mad, just concerned." Iolite soothed.
Baby Lance was back to smiles and Iolite composed herself.
"I'm going to start testing him for a Sapphire's abilities next to see if he's developed anything yet, just a simple guessing games for now. I'm also going to have to take him on a new path for our daily walks, the others are digging up something on our usual path and all the dust would not be good for Lance. End report."
"It seems we've reached the point that the other reports ended." Trigel said. "With a couple more reports to go."
"Hopefully, they'll finally tell us what happened here." Alfor said.
The next report opened to a scared looking Iolite, clutching baby Lance to her desperately.
"I-I don't understand." She stammered. "That thing they unearthed, it's dangerous. Anyone who was around it has become corrupted, and that area of corruption is spreading. What's worse is that none of the ships are working enough to take off anymore, that thing must have damaged them too, we're all stuck here as the corruption creeps closer. The Diamonds, my Diamond, they're not sending help, I sent out a distress signal and they ordered that the colony is to be abandoned and quarantined, that any Gem that can't make it off planet through the interplanetary warp is to be left behind."
Iolite was sobbing in fear, which was distressing baby Lance in her arms.
"I'm to be left behind. The closest warp pad that leads to the interplanetary warp is in the corruption zone, I could try to make it to the next warp pad before the corruption reaches it, like the others are doing, but there's no way I'd be able to travel and look after Lance at the same time, and I just can't leave him behind to save myself. My Diamond doesn't care about Lance's potential enough to have him rescued either, so we're completely on our own."
The report ended.
"Corruption?" Alfor questioned. "I remember hearing about that."
"So, that's what we've been fighting, corrupted Gems?" Zarkon asked.
"It appears so." Alfor said.
"It's such a terrible situation for her." Trigel said in sympathy. "But she's also so brave, to prioritise the life of her child over her own."
"And I think I know what happened to her for her sacrifice." Zarkon said.
The next report opened, displaying a calmer Iolite, though she was clearly exhausted.
"I don't have long until the corruption reaches the ship and it's now too late to attempt to make it to the next warp pad, so I can't save myself even if I wanted to. I've been scavenging the abandoned ships in hopes of repairing whatever has been done to my ship so we can fly out of here, but I've had no luck so far. On the bright-side, Lance doesn't seem to be affected by the corruption, he wandered off into the corruption zone and came back out with no change." Iolite sighed. "On the negative side, on top of what's already bad anyway, the former Gems have started coming out of the corruption zone, and are attacking me and Lance, I've had to poof more than a few in the last vargas while scavenging, it's incredibly dangerous to leave the ship now, but I have to if I want those ship parts, I'll be leaving Lance behind from now on though."
"And this is the last report." Trigel said solemnly, pulling up the final ship's log.
Iolite appeared on the screen and appeared to be in pain, holding herself tightly as she shook.
"Np, please, not yet!" She begged before looking at the screen. "The corruption has reached the ship, I'm out of time, I'm going to become like them!"
The five leaders watched in horror as Iolite grew taller and her arms became thinner, the hand of the arm she was clutching fusing together and becoming sharp before her eyes as she held it up. Iolite wailed as she saw what was happening to her body.
They from behind her, baby Lance began to cry.
"Lance!" Iolite cried, looking behind her. "It's okay, baby. I just need you to stay away, alright."
She looked back at the screen, her face now slightly elongated, fur appearing around her chest and her hair growing longer.
"No! I can't hurt Lance! I'm meant to protect him. Need to protect Lance. Need to protect Lance. Need to protect Lance." Iolite chanted as she hunched over.
Iolite hand clutched at her hair, but then became blade-like just like the other as her chanting became more frantic and less clear until she was no longer legible, becoming growls.
Iolite then lifted her head up and screeched, fully corrupted.
The video ended there, leaving the room in silence.
"Hey now, it's okay." Blaytz comforting voice broke the silence.
The other turned around to see he had Lance on his lap, the child clutching Blaytz's vest and hiding his face in the Nalquoi's chest.
"I guess her corruption really scared you, didn't it?" Blaytz said, wrapping his arms around the scared child.
"No wonder that corrupted Gem was so protective of the child, she was the one who took care of him. Part of her must still have remembered that despite her corruption." Alfor said.
"How long has this child been living like this, under the care of a corrupted Gem in an abandoned colony?" Trigel questioned.
"It's hard to tell with his current state, but I'd say he's around seven deca-phoebs at a guess." Blaytz said, standing up with the child cradled in his arms.
"And he looks to be just over a deca-phoeb in the last report." Trigel said. "Meaning he's been living like this for around six deca-phoebs."
"No wonder the child is feral." Zarkon said. "Most his development has been done under the care of someone with the mind of an animal."
"Hopefully, we'll be able to help him." Alfor said. "For now, let us return to our own ship and work out what we can do to contain that rock that's stopping us from taking off."
The others nodded in agreement.
As they were exiting, Lance started wiggling in Blaytz's arms.
"Come on, we can't stay here." Blaytz told him.
But Lance continued to struggle, pointing at something and whining.
"Oh, do you want to bring something with you?" Blaytz asked.
He walked over to where Lance pointed, but instead of pointing at an object he wanted, Lance pointed at his drawings on the wall.
"I don't think we can take the wall with us, kid." Blaytz laughed.
His eyes then widened when he looked at the wall.
"Woah. Hey, guys, look at this!" He called to his friends.
The others came over.
"What is it?" Alfor asked.
"Look, it's us." Blaytz pointed to the drawings on the wall.
Drawn on the wall were the five leaders, they were crude drawings, but it was obviously them. Above them, there was a drawing of what appeared to be their ship crashing towards a circle that was clearly meant to represent the planet. The wall was also covered in a layer of dust, meaning the drawings couldn't have been done in the time since they had arrived on the planet.
"I think the kid knew that we were coming." Blaytz said.
"How is that even possible?" Gyrgan asked.
"Perhaps it's the powers of a Sapphire the Iolite mentioned." Trigel theorised.
"Visions of the future." Alfor said, looking at another of Lance's drawings that showed five lions.
Lance put up no fuss about leaving the ship after showing off his drawings, allowing the leaders to take him back to their ship. There was another encounter with more corrupted Gems where Blaytz had to stay out of the fight to protect Lance, but they manged to make it back safely.
"Ah," Alfor's advisor, Coran ran over to them when he saw them appear. "I was just about to send a search part after you, you've been gone so long."
"Sorry to have worried you." Alfor smiled. "We've been finding out a lot about what happened here. How's the ship?"
"There's no damage from what we can find, but we still can't seem to get it to lift off, and these beasts keep attacking us." Coran reported.
"We've found the cause behind both of those problems, we just have to work out how to contain it now, then we'll hopefully be able to leave." Alfor said. "Until then, I have a new job for you."
Blaytz walked over to Coran and deposited Lance in the Altean's arms.
"Oh, hello." Coran said at the child suddenly in his arms.
Lance held out him arms for Blaytz with a whine, but then looked at Coran and hugged the man like he already knew him, much to the man's surprise.
"Why do you have a child with you, are there natives we didn't know about?" Coran asked, looking the child over.
"It's a long story." Alfor said. "I'll tell you later. For now, I'd like you to clean the child up and give him some clothes and food while we work out what to do with the source of our problems."
"Can do." Coran held up a thumb.
He then wrinkled his nose when he took a good look at the state of Lance.
"I think you'll need a few baths with my best soaps first, young man." Coran told the child as he walked off. "And maybe some clippers to take care of these lumps in your hair."
"Graa!" Lance responded.
Alfor sighed in relief, feeling better now that he knew Lance was being taken care of.
"Now, lets get to work containing that rock." He said.
"It'll be a temporary fix, but it'll be enough for us to get off the planet and away from its effects. We can send somebody more equipped to deal with it at a later date." Alfor said.
The screen they were looking at showed the plans for a dome that would cover the glowing rock and bury deep into the ground around it.
"Wouldn't it be best to surround the entire thing?" Gyrgan asked.
"We don't know how big it is, it could be what we saw, or there could be so much more beneath the surface." Trigel pointed out.
"The Gems didn't have any issues until they unearthed it, so the rock around it must work as an insulator to its influence." Alfor reminded. "So, we hopefully only have to cover the exposed part."
They were interrupted by a wailing and shouting.
"Come back here, young man!" The voice was unmistakably Coran's.
Lance suddenly burst into the room on all fours, laughing loudly, and also wet and completely naked.
"You can't run around indecently like that!" Coran shouted, bursting into the room after him with a towel in hand.
Coran chased after the child until Alfor managed to catch Lance as he attempted to run under his legs, lofting him up into his arms.
"Are you giving Coran trouble?" Alfor asked the child.
Lance continued to laugh, attempting to escape Alfor's arms.
"Oh no you don't." Coran said, taking Lance from Alfor's arms and wrapping him the towel he held. "Sorry about that, he managed to disappear on me when I took him out of the bath."
"He looks better with all of that dirt gone." Trigel commented.
"He could use some food." Gyrgan said, taking in the child's thin form.
"I'll go get him some food now, after getting him into some clothes." Coran said.
"Good luck with that." Blaytz said as Coran left again.
The protective dome had been built and was ready to take to the glowing rock.
As they were preparing to move out, they spotted Coran and Lance again. Lance had food goo all over his hands and face, and also down the front of the clothes he had been put into.
"I'm taking him for another bath." Coran explained. "He refused to use a spoon, just kept using his hands to eat, and he sat under the table rather than on a chair. I don't understand why he won't do as told."
"Oh, we probably should have told you." Alfor said in realisation. "Lance is feral, he won't understand what he's meant to do or even what you're saying."
"Oh." Coran said in shock. "My apologies, my boy." He said to Lance. "I didn't realise."
Lance looked up at him and then gave him a hug, getting food goo on Coran's clothes.
Coran sighed. "I guess I'll need a change of clothes now too. Come on, lad."
He picked Lance up and walk off back towards the wash room.
"Let's get this dome over that rock and get off this planet." Alfor said, more than ready to leave.
It was a long trek to the quarry, but they thankfully weren't attacked by anymore corrupted Gems along the way. The rock was still as they had left it, so they were able to fit the dome over it without issue, digging it deep into the ground.
"Well, did that do it?" Zarkon asked.
"We won't know until we get back to the ship." Alfor sighed.
It was another long trek back to the ship, by now the sun had almost set, making it hard to navigate, but they managed to make it back without issue, heading to the bridge.
"Coran." Alfor greeted his advisor when they entered the bridge. "Where's Lance."
"I've managed to put him down to rest, he was very sleepy after his second bath." Coran said. "What happened Alfor, why is the child feral, what happened to his parents?"
"From what we understand, this planet was to be a Gem colony, the child was brought to the colony as a baby and a Gem was his caretaker, but the rock that's been causing our problems caused the Gems to corrupt, including Lance's caretaker." Alfor explained.
"You mean he was raised by one of those beasts?" Coran asked.
"It seems so." Alfor said.
"It's going to be hard work teaching the child, with his formative years spent on this planet." Coran said.
Alfor hummed. "I'm sure we'll be able to help him." He said.
"Energy levels are rising." One of the Altean crew reported.
"The plan seems to have worked." Trigel said in relief.
"Let's get off this planet then." Alfor said, taking his place at the controls as everyone took their seats.
The ship lifted off of the ground, launching into the air and leaving the planet behind.
Author's note: Please comment.
This chapter is just going to be a tester for now, to see how many people will be interested in it and if they can give me any advice for moving forward, if I'm going too fast in parts, more things need explanation, something doesn't make sense etc. I'll post the second chapter and a reworking of this chapter if needed after I finish 'Ocean Blue' so that I don't have too many stories running at once.
I decided that I didn't want Lance's other half to be human again, so I made him an alien. After deliberating a few different aliens for him to be, I decided to make his Monsters & Mana form an alien species, naming them Kugogane, after Lance's original name in Beast King GoLion.