When Alfor came to, he was in a cell. It took him a moment to recall what had happened, and when he did, he shot to his feet, grabbing at the bars.
"Hey!" he yelled. "I'm friends with Zarkon – I mean no harm! Hey!"
No one responded to him.
It would be fine. Zarkon would show up and free him eventually, and then he would explain what happened to Daibazaal, and then Alfor could go home and apologise to his wife and Coran for not listening to them. Then they would figure out how to help any refugees from Daibazaal. Alfor would not abandon his friend when he needed him – he wished Zarkon had contacted him as soon as it had happened.
As if on cue, footsteps echoed down the corridor. To his relief, Zarkon soon stood before him. Alfor couldn't read his expression, but he suspected his friend was pretty stressed. However, shock settled very quickly into his friend's features.
"Alfor?" he asked. Alfor was kind of surprised that he'd been able to alarm his friend – usually the Galran emperor was completely collected.
"Um, hello, Zarkon," he said. "It is good to see you. Would you mind letting me out of this cell?"
"You're alive," said Zarkon instead.
"Yes," said Alfor in confusion. "Of course I am. Zarkon, what's going on? What happened to Daibazaal?"
Zarkon's face darkened. Alfor finally started to realise something was off about his friend. His eyes were yellow, right? So why were they glowing purple…?
"Your wife destroyed it," said Zarkon coldly.
That's didn't sound right. That didn't sound like Fala at all.
"Why would Fala attack Daibazaal?" asked Alfor in shock. "I – I must – how long has it been?"
Normally he wouldn't have even considered time travel, but the more pieces that settled into place, the more the puzzle began to look like it had certainly been more than a varga or so since he left home. Zarkon didn't have that scar, did he? He looked older, too.
Zarkon didn't answer, still scowling at him. Alfor shook his head. "I must get back to Altea. I will talk to Fala – I – I don't fully understand what's going on, but in order to understand it I must get back."
"No," said Zarkon.
"No?" repeated Alfor.
"I destroyed Altea, ten thousand years ago," said Zarkon. Alfor's blood ran cold. No. That couldn't be right. "It was only fair. You are the last Altean left."
"No," Alfor said aloud. "No, no – tell me you're lying. You're lying."
"Take him to Haggar," said Zarkon to the Galran with him. "Let her have her fun. When she is content, dispose of him. And bring me his head, so we're sure. He has an annoying habit of not dying when he's supposed to."
Zarkon started to walk away. Alfor grabbed the bars desperately. "Zarkon – Zarkon, please! It's not true!"
He did not stop. Alfor sank to the ground and wrapped his arms around his knees, the sharp sting of betrayal only overshadowed by the dark cloud of loss. Zarkon was not joking or lying, as far as he could tell. This was – this was all his fault. If he hadn't tested the stupid teludav, he could have found a way to prevent this. Instead, here he was, at some point in time in the future, his planet destroyed and his race virtually extinct.
Fala – Coran – Allura – all of his friends and family – his people – all gone. His chest hurt – not from any physical injury, but from the loss and grief he never expected to feel. After all, who would expect to be the last of their kind? It wasn't fair, it wasn't right – it felt like his worst nightmare, except somehow even more terrible.
"Get up, Altean," grunted the Galran. Alfor hadn't even realised he was still there. "You'll enjoy your time with the witch. Get up."
Alfor did not want to. He didn't want to do anything.
"No," he mumbled. "Just kill me. There's no point in keeping me alive."
The Galran leered at him. "Not yet, Altean. The witch likes her playthings."
The bars opened. Alfor did not look up. The Galran lifted him by his collar, but Alfor couldn't bring himself to care, even as he was bodily lifted and dragged away. He didn't know who or what this Haggar, this witch, was, or what she wanted with him. Zarkon seemed pretty intent on eliminating every Altean, which meant he wanted Alfor dead, so Alfor didn't know why he didn't just kill him and be done with it.
Alfor would almost rather he did.
Just a few vargas ago, he had been at home. He had had breakfast with his family – his beautiful wife, his fantastic best friend and advisor, his wonderful, perfect daughter. Now they were all gone. Even if he couldn't have prevented this, he should have at least been with them. Now he was alone, imprisoned and betrayed by a man he had called his friend.
But as he thought of them, his grief was slowly replaced by anger. His family hadn't deserved to die. His people hadn't deserved to die. He couldn't die yet – not before finding a way to avenge them.
He was thrown into a room. Alfor pushed himself off the floor as a figure in a long robe came to loom over him.
"So," said the figure, "it is true. The last Altean is the lost King Alfor."
Alfor hadn't even thought about that. How long had his family been without him before they – they died? Had they mourned him?
He shook himself out of his thoughts, pushing them far back in his mind. "So you must be Haggar, then."
"Indeed," she said. "Get up."
Alfor blinked at her. "No."
She could kill him. He didn't care. He had no reason to listen to her.
"Insolent," she scoffed. "It was to be expected."
She lifted a hand, and suddenly dark energy surrounded him and lifted him up. He found himself struggling against the energy, to no avail.
"What is this?" he demanded.
"I believe you will make as fine a warrior as our current Champion," she purred. "I look forward to seeing what you can do, Altean. Hmm… I expected all the fight to have drained from you once you learned the fate of your people."
If he was honest, she was right. The fight had drained from him.
But not anymore.
"Release me," he demanded.
She laughed. "Oh, little Altean, I can't do that."
"You may have destroyed Altea, but our allies will rescue me," he said, which was a bit of a bluff. Blaytz would probably rescue him, if he knew. The problem was everyone probably thought he was dead.
"Altea has no more allies," said Haggar. "Zarkon destroyed the entire system and everyone in it."
Alfor's heart sunk, but he forced down the newest grief. He could mourn later.
He wasn't sure what the strange magic was. The Galran had called her a witch, but Alfor thought magic foolish and unrealistic. There was always a scientific explanation, even if he didn't necessarily know it. There had to be a way to break free.
He struggled more forcefully. Perhaps he could tire Haggar out. Perhaps she would lose concentration. Perhaps–
Pain.
It came very suddenly, and he hadn't been expecting it, so it tore a cry of pain from him. It was short, but it left him weak and trembling and still trapped by her strange magic.
"What…?" he managed to ask.
"Take that as a warning, Altean," she said coolly, leaning close to him and narrowing her eyes. It was the first good glimpse he got of her face; she most certainly wasn't full Galra. Her features were almost Altean, but not quite. Alfor doubted it anyway – with the way Zarkon was talking, he would never work with an Altean. He wondered again what happened to his friend – the man that he trusted and who trusted him in turn, the one who had saved him so many times, the kind, gentle leader Alfor knew was gone, replaced by a monster. "Stop struggling, or the punishment will be worse next time."
Then she turned away and walked briskly to the other side of the room.
"Put him with the Champion," she said.
The energy holding Alfor disappeared and he dropped to the ground. He thought briefly about trying to fight, but he was grabbed before he could. He was dragged out of the room again, but this time he struggled against his captor. The man growled and slammed him hard against the wall. He blinked darkness out of his vision.
"Knock it off," the man said.
Alfor did. He couldn't break away right now. He'd have to find another way, later.
He was thrown roughly into another cell. He forced himself into a sitting position, feeling the back of his head for what he knew would be a nasty bruise later.
To his surprise, a stranger knelt by him. Alfor didn't know his species. He looked similar to an Altean, but with rounded ears and strange eyes. His hair was dark and his face was kind. He said something Alfor didn't understand.
Alfor shook his head. "I'm sorry, I don't speak your language."
The man looked vaguely disappointed.
"Do you know Galran?" asked Alfor, switching to his very limited Galran. He wasn't exactly pleased to use the language of his newfound captors, but he did want to communicate with his fellow prisoner.
Recognition flared in the man's eyes. When he spoke next, it was in halting Galran. "Little. I am some new here."
Alfor nodded. "I have – had Galran friends. I learned some of the language for them."
"I am Shiro," said the man, offering him a smile.
"I'm Alfor," he said in response.
"What is friends?" said Shiro. It took Alfor a moment to realise he wasn't asking about the concept but rather the Galran word – after all, if his only knowledge of Galran came from being imprisoned, he wouldn't know the term.
"People you trust," said Alfor, hoping he knew those words. "People you love."
He put a hand to his heart, then to where he hoped Shiro's was, though he knew nothing of his new friend's species. He smiled, because that facial expression seemed to be shared.
"Ah," said Shiro, then said a word in his own language. Alfor assumed the word meant 'friend'.
He repeated the word in Shiro's language, then said in Altean, "Friends."
Shiro nodded and repeated it back in only mildly accented Altean. Alfor was somewhat impressed.
"How were you captured?" he asked.
Shiro frowned and looked away. "My crew and I – we explore a moon near our planet. Galra found us and took us."
"Where is your crew?" Alfor asked hesitantly.
Shiro's frown deepened. He looked somewhat sad. "I don't know."
"Oh," said Alfor. "I'm sorry."
"How were you captured?" asked Shiro.
"I was stupid," said Alfor bitterly. "I – did something stupid, and I was stranded. The Galra found me."
"No crew?" asked Shiro.
Alfor shook his head. "Only me."
"No… friends?" he asked, being careful with the new word, hesitant and worried.
Alfor closed his eyes. "No. They are all dead. My planet is gone."
He did not want to see Shiro's pity, so he did not look. To his surprise, he felt arms wrap around him – tentative, as if unsure of whether it would be a social faux pas, but with the certitude that only came from experience in comforting people. Alfor stiffened in surprise, and Shiro nearly pulled away, but Alfor stopped him and wrapped his own arms around his new friend. He'd always been a tactile person. Near-stranger or not, the hug was a welcome comfort.
"I'm sorry," said Shiro. "The Galra are evil."
Alfor still didn't want to believe it. He still wanted it to be a dream. It was something he would have never even imagined that morning. Still, he furrowed his brow and said, "Yes. They are."
A/N: This chapter was interesting to write this chapter. I've found I've written so much pre-Rift Zarkon that writing evil Zarkon was kind of weird for me. Alfor, poor guy, has no idea what happened really. Now he's lost everything. Luckily he has Shiro!
I figured Shiro would know at least some Galran, and Alfor definitely would. So it's the closest thing to a lingua franca they've got. Now, I'm a linguistics major (and a huge nerd) so I'm actually pretty excited about their situation, because in real life there'd be a good chance that they'd form a pidgin for communication using Galran as the superstrate language, or the lexifier, which is going to give most of the vocabulary. Meanwhile, Altean, English, and possibly Japanese (because I headcanon that Shiro is fluent in Japanese) would be the substrate languages that will give a lot of the grammar (morphology, syntax, even phonology) to the pidgin. It's a really, really cool thing to think about, but I'll stop nerding out now.
I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter! Love you all!
