Chapter 7: Just like her

Being face to face with the very being that he'd been fighting against, the one who caused Shiro so much pain, took Allura and Coran's planet and people for them, terrorised the universe for ten-thousand years, and who his mother fled from, Lance couldn't even begin to describe the fear he felt.

"Blue Paladin." Zarkon spoke, his voice commanding. "Do you know why you have been brought here?"

Lance swallowed and gathered his courage before Zarkon's imposing presence could take it from him.

"I don't know." He answered back. "Beauty tips? You could certainly use some."

Then, before Lance even had time to process it, the druid who'd been standing at Zarkon's side suddenly teleported across the room, back-handing him so hard that he would have fallen over if not for the sentries holding him.

"Do not dare to speak to our emperor in such a manor!" Haggar ordered.

"You have been brought here because you hold information I find very valuable." Zarkon continued as if Lance hadn't talked-back and Haggar hadn't slapped him.

Lance was tempted to talk-back again, but the warning look from Haggar accompanied by the harsh stinging pain and feeling of blood on his cheek, kept him silent.

"I will only give you once chance to give up this information freely, but if you choose to remain insolent, Haggar will make quick work of those thoughts and find what you know in a much more…excruciating way." Zarkon said.

Haggar's grin told Lance that she was hoping for his silence.

Lance stood straighter, without needing the sentries needing to support him, the drugs that had been given to him having finally worked their way out of his system. His eyes quickly scanned the room for signs of escape while he bought time for himself.

"Depends, what do you want to know?" Lance said calmly, trying to keep his care-free persona in place.

"Where is Lapis Lazuli?" Zarkon growled.

Lance broke away from his escape searching to look at the emperor in shock.

"What?"

"The previous Blue Paladin, who you have stolen from." Zarkon elaborated with a frown.

"Uh…" Lance said.

Lance was at a loss, he had no idea how much Zarkon knew of the situation, what to say in response.

"I have no idea what you're talking about." He decided to plan dumb. "I found the Blue Lion in a cave and she chose me. I don't know anything about a Lapis Lazuli."

"There is truth in his statement, but he also lies." Haggar hissed.

"Show him the consequence of lies." Zarkon growled.

The sentries holding Lance let go, causing him confusion, but that feeling was quickly overcome by pure agony as Haggar attacked him with her magic, sending him to the floor, writhing him pain as the dark energy coursed through his body. After a couple of minutes that felt like hours to Lance, Haggar eventually stopped, leaving Lance twitching on the floor.

"You have used a power held only by the Lapis Lazuli who piloted the Blue Lion." Zarkon stated. "How were you able to use this power?"

Lance grunted from where he lay on the floor, trying to gather his thoughts as well as the energy to support his body, able to support himself with his hands. Internally, he began to panic, he thought he'd destroyed all of the ships back then, but one must have escaped to learn about what he did, this made things substantially more difficult for him.

"I don't know." Lance gave the first response that came to his head.

Haggar shocked him again for his lie.

Lance was at a loss for what to do, Haggar could tell if he lied, but he couldn't think up any half-truths that wouldn't lead to more trouble, and telling Zarkon that it was because he had his mother's Gem certainly wasn't an option because there was no telling how Zarkon would react.

"Speak!" Zarkon ordered.

Lance chose instead to remain silent.

"If you will not speak, then the information shall be pried from you." Zarkon concluded.

The two sentries picked Lance back up and made to drag him away again when Zarkon held up his hand to stop them.

"It shall be done here." He ordered.

"Yes, my lord." Haggar said. "Bring my tools!" She ordered her other Druid who was present.

The Druid bowed and then disappeared.

Lance fought through the pain-created fuzz in his mind to try and formulate and escape before the public torturing could begin. He managed to support himself on his two feet again, fighting off the numbness, but by the time he had, the Druids had returned with the tools for Lance's torture.

Lance grew cold as he looked at each instrument, having no idea what they did other than to cause him pain. Haggar had a sick grin on her face as she looked over her tools, choosing which one to use first, she landed on a sharp-looking tool and picked it up.

"Something basic to start off with I think." Haggar said. "From what I learned from the Champion, it does not take much to cause pain to your species."

Lance looked at the sharp-looking tool in Haggar's hands in fear as she approached. He struggled against the sentries holding him but their grip remained tight.

"Where is Lapis Lazuli? How do you command her power?" Haggar questioned, her arm already drawn back to strike like she was anticipating Lance not answering.

"I'm not telling you anything!" Lance declared as he struggled, realising that there was no point in playing dumb.

"You will." Haggar promised before slashing the tool in her hand across Lances stomach where he was only protected by his flight suit.

Lance grunted as the tool slashed across his stomach, but it didn't manage to cut through the thick material of his flight suit and the pain wasn't much more than he'd catch his hip on the sharp edge of a table, leaving Lance to wonder if Haggar's weapon was defective or if she was under the impression this amount of pain was meant to break him.

But then the burning pain started, like a paper cut but much, much worse, building until Lance had to grit his teeth to stop from screaming out. The weapon Haggar had chosen somehow caused pain without a wound. He crippled from the pain with only the sentries supporting him. Eventually, and thankfully, the pain decreased to a background level, still noticeable but allowing him to focus on his surroundings and stand on shaky feet again.

Haggar hummed as she took in Lance's pale and sweaty complexion, unsatisfied by hit lack of vocalising his pain. She placed back her weapon and picked up another.

"Remove his armour." She ordered the sentries holding Lance, approaching with her new choice of torture.

The sentries loosened their grip on Lance and began to remove his Paladin armour, and Lance quickly took his chance. Using the grip the sentries still had on him, Lance kicked forward, knocking Haggar's weapon out of her hand while using the motion from his kick to flip over the sentries' heads, twisting himself free and sending them to the floor. Lance landed but them almost fell to the floor himself because of how weak all of the pain had left him feeling, he quickly recovered and used his stumble to pick up Haggar's weapon from where it had fallen to the floor, holding it in front of himself defensively.

Lance had no idea as to how to use the weapon, but that didn't mean he couldn't pretend he did.

"You are foolish, Paladin." Haggar told him. "There is no escape for you."

"Maybe." Lance agreed with a shrug. "But I'm not really the type to sit there and take it."

Without need for command, the Galra in the room rushed forward to put Lance back under control, Lance dodged as best as he could and even figured out how to work the weapon to take a few Galra down, but he was eventually grabbed and subdued, forced to face Zarkon again.

"I can see why you were chosen as the Blue Paladin." Zarkon told Lance, having remained seated during Lance's futile attempt at escape. "You hold much of your predecessor's strength and defiance."

Zarkon then stood and stepped down from his throne, striding over to Lance and grabbing hold of his neck and forcing the Blue Paladin to look straight at him. Lance chose to stare it him with the defiance the emperor had just commented on, holding back the fear he felt from the large hand around his neck.

"I can see much of her in you." Zarkon commented further.

'Does he know?' Lance thought.

"Perhaps, when you give the information I require and my daughter is back in her rightful place, I shall let her decide your fate instead of killing you." Zarkon said.

Lance didn't know what made him do it, maybe it was Zarkon confirming that he viewed Lance's mother as his daughter or maybe it was him insinuating that Lance had taken her 'rightful place', but whatever it was, Lance finally snapped and opened his mouth before he could think of the consequences.

"I don't think that's going to be possible considering she's gone." Lance spat.

The hand around Lance's throat grew tighter and he was lifted off the ground more, the Galra who had been holding him letting him go.

"What?" Zarkon demanded.

"She's gone, no more, dead! And has been for over twenty years." Lance continued in anger, giving no mind to increasing lack of being able to breath.

Zarkon lifted Lance up into the air so that he really was choking, Lance grasped desperately at the emperor's arms to try and support himself enough to be able to breath and futilely attempt to escape the hold.

"Lies." Zarkon hissed.

Lance's vision was becoming dark around the edges as his life was choked out of him by the infuriated emperor.

"My lord, we still need him for questioning." Haggar said when she realised that Zarkon wasn't going to stop.

Zarkon didn't listen and only tightened his hold.

Lance was getting desperate as he struggled for the breath he wasn't being allowed, he looked frantically around for something to escape with but there wasn't any water anywhere in the room for him to control and there were no weapons in range for him to use. Well, almost no weapons.

'But that'll means they'll find out.' A part of Lance's mind told him.

'I don't want to die!' Lance cried back.

As Lance began to lose consciousness, he realised that he had no other choice, it was either this or death.

Fighting against preservation instincts, Lance let go of Zarkon's arm with his right hand and reached down to his leg, he managed to unlatch his leg armour which confused the Galra and Druids present, except for Zarkon who was still lost in his rage and desire to kill Lance. With his armour out of the way, Lance placed his hand over where his Gem was under his flight suit and concentrated with what was left of his consciousness, his Gem glowed and there was a ripping sound as something forced its way through his flight suit from his Gem.

Before the Druids or Galra could react or Zarkon could finally take notice, Lance grasped the shaft of the arrow that had emerged from his Gem, brought it up and plunged it into Zarkon's arm with all his remaining strength.

Zarkon shouted in pain and let go of Lance, sending the Blue Paladin to the floor as he fought to get air back into his lungs, holding his throat protectively with his left hand while holding his arrow and supporting himself with his right.

Lance forced himself to sit up on his knees when he noticed that he was being approached, waving the arrow in his hand threateningly at them through blurred vision, unable to make out what was sentry, Galra or Druid, the only one he could distinguish was Zarkon because of his size.

Zarkon looked at the Blue Paladin, who was waving a very familiar arrow at anyone who got too close with clouded eyes, the same arrow that had just been plunged into his arm and forced him to release the Blue Paladin, though it was clear that if any of them made a serious attempt to get at the Blue Paladin that he wouldn't be able to fend them off, the Galra were simply waiting for their emperor's orders.

Haggar approached Zarkon and placed her hand over the wound, forcing her quintessence into him to heal it.

Once her emperor was healed, Haggar teleported over to Lance, the Blue Paladin tried to attack her but only ended up knocking himself out after pushing his body too far after what had been done to him, his weapon disappearing into light.

Zarkon approached the Blue Paladin and picked him up again, this time by his body instead of his neck. He turned the boy to look at the hole in the leg of his flight suit, eyes narrowing suspiciously as he placed a claw at the hole and ripped the suit to make it bigger.

Zarkon's eyes went from suspicious to shocked when he saw what was underneath the flight suit.

A tear-drop-shaped lapis lazuli gem.

Everything fell into place for Zarkon.

"Lazuli." Zarkon said as he moved Lance to cradle him instead. "What has been done to you?"

Zarkon vowed that whoever did this to his daughter would pay dearly, the Princess, the Paladins, the Blue Valkyries, Homeworld, whoever it was would feel his wrath for what had been done to his daughter to make her have this form he held, to make her go against him, to declare herself dead.


Author's note: Considering that season 3 is so close, I'm going to hold off writing the next chapter until I've seen it so that I can integrate it into my story and see how much of my plans I'm going to change to fit with the story, such as how the character of Lotor will interact with the Paladins.

Also, if Zarkon continues to believe Lance is Lazuli, should Lance go along with it or should he try and tell Zarkon that's he's Lazuli's son only to not get listened to, or should Zarkon learn that Lance is only Lazuli's son and not Lazuli and what should his reaction be to the news?