I'm back! With the first alternate reality! This was very fun to write. I won't lie.

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As always, feel free to leave requests in either the review or as a PM. I love receiving requests.

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I used prompts from the Hogwarts (where I'm a snek). They are listed below.

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Warnings: Depression, pain. Pretty much the same as the opener to this multichap

Word Count (Excluding A/N): 1966

Dainty Fingers Bring Heavy-Handed Mistakes

"Lenora! Lenora! are you okay? What's wrong?"

Lotor's eyes flew open and he let out a desperate gasp, the pain of fresh air slicing through his lungs. He was dying, wasn't he? In the Quintessence field. He was supposed to be dying—he had readied his mind, let his conscience slip and his body relax. He had given in to the pain and the despair, and he had let his desperate need for power dissipate because what is power when you no longer have a body to wield it?

So why did he feel so alive?

Maybe he wasn't. He felt too light, too unbalanced. Maybe he was just hallucinating, imagining the concerned voice that had been calling out to him.

"Lenora. Snap out of this."

The voice was new, not the first one who had spoken. It was commanding, and with it came large hands gripping his shoulders, fingers digging in to his unarmored flesh.

Unarmored? That didn't seem right. He was rarely unarmored.

His heavy eyes landed on the blurry face in front of him, and he struggled to focus. Soon grey eyes, a scarred nose, and a tuft of white hair came into view.

"Shiro," he breathed in relief, though his voice seemed to come out in a squeek. He coughed to clear it before trying again. "Shiro, I'm so sorry."

Confusion clouded in Shiro's eyes as he helped Lotor into a seated position. From over Shiro's shoulder, Lotor could see Allura's worried features—the last time he had seen her, her face had been twisted in rage. How could she look so worried now?

A sharp pain shot behind Lotor's eyes, and he closed them out of instinct.

"Lenora…" Lenora? That wasn't… "You've just fallen. I'm worried you might have a concussion," Shiro said gently, though his grip didn't lessen on his shoulders. "Can you tell me where we are?"

"My ship," Lotor answered, but the words weren't his, "my home. We are… we are in the engineering room."

Relief filtered through Shiro's eyes, and he let go of Lotor's shoulders at last, though he kept his hands raised as if to catch Lotor if he wavered. He then turned his head to face Allura. "She should be fine, but maybe you both should take the rest of the day off. Let her rest."

She?… Her?...

Lotor, the speed of his breathing increasing, looked down at his hands—too delicate to be a man's. Manicured nails, dainty fingers, thin wrists. His eyes traveled past his hands to the legs curled beneath him. He was wearing simple, under-uniform leggings that couldn't hide the shapely curve of his thighs, nor the soft taper of his ankles from his calf to small, fitted boots.

His shoulders heaved, lungs constricting and heart pounding. He clutched at himself in a panic, tugging at the neck of his shirt, his forearms pressing against his chest, a chest which certainly didn't belong to a man.

This wasn't right. This must be the Quintessence seeping into his mind and corrupting it. He could no longer trust what he knew.

Frightened eyes lifted to Shiro's concern before all sight disappeared and was replaced by memories.

Memories of the body Lotor was now inhabiting.

…

When Lotor woke up, he felt the overwhelming urge to cry.

Or, more, he woke up and started crying. They were silent tears, but they felt like a tsunami, tearing at his cheeks and burning his skin. He gasped for air, pushing himself into a seated position.

He had been moved to his chambers, which were decorated very closely to how they had been decorated back in his reality. The only difference was the small bit of lace that trimmed the cloth around his windows and bed, and the formal dress that hung on the side of his wardrobe, where his formal robes used to reside.

It was disjointing.

After a few minutes, he finally caught his breath and pushed his legs over the side of his bed. Standing up in the foreign body was weird, he felt disproportionate and far too light, though his chest was annoyingly heavy. Lotor had never quite understood the appeal of female breasts, it made designing armor much more tedious, but now that he had to deal with them… he liked them even less.

It seemed as if Lenora had a life much like Lotor's—really, the only difference Lotor could discern was that Lenora was female. She had still grown up under Dayak; she had been banished after trying to work with people Zarkan had deemed beneath her; she had still spent ten thousand years learning everything she could about her past; she adopted Axca, Zethrid, Ezor, and Narti as her generals; she had still saved the Altean's, and she had still used them to harness their quintessence to further her research; she had still managed to get Voltron to trust her; she had still fallen in love with Allura.

She was still Lotor.

He suppressed a self-deprecating laugh, running his thin fingers through long hair. "I guess I really am my own worst enemy," he murmured to himself, still rattled by his own voice, the femininity setting him on edge. "Is this my punishment? To relieve my worst moments in different realities?"

A knock sounded on his door, and he instinctively let out a soft, "Come in."

Slowly, the door opened and Allura peaked her head through, chewing on her lip nervously. "Are you okay?" she asked, stepping into the room and closing the door softly behind her. "You fell over, and…" she trailed off, looking at Lotor from under her thick eyelashes.

Lotor's body moved, but not by his own doing. He felt a smile tugging at his lips, and his arms raised up. Allura breathed a sigh of relief and strode up to Lotor, tucking herself into his chest, her arms wrapping around his waist. Despite having a female body, Lotor was still larger than Allura, and the Altean only really reached his chest.

"Don't do that to me again," Allura murmured, squeezing him tighter before pulling back just slightly to look up at Lotor. He was caught breathless by her beauty, the love in her eyes something he never imagined he would be able to see again, and when they kissed, he nearly started crying again.

He hated what he had done to his Allura, what was going to happen to this Allura, and the kiss, both desperate and gentle, sent a wave of remorse through his entire body. He needed to change this—he needed to change Lenora's destiny because if he didn't, she would end up just like him.

Lotor pulled away just slightly, resting their noses together as he caught his breath. "I won't," he whispered, gently tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. "Everything is alright, Allura. I promise."

…

He couldn't fix it. It seemed that there were very few times that he could actually control Lenora's body and voice, and he wasn't able to change anything.

It was maddening. He wanted nothing more than to confess to Allura, to show her every facet of himself, no matter how dark, but he couldn't. Lenora seemed to think that everything was better off hidden, and Lotor couldn't push through enough to outrightly defy her.

He wanted to scream, but he couldn't even manage that.

So he watched, helpless, as Lenora continued to dig the ditch of her life. As they neared the completion of his ship, Lotor became more restless, but was only able to show it in the occasional tightening of his hand into a fist. It was overwhelming, more mentally agonizing than the Quintessence Field.

"Nora, are you okay?" Allura asked softly, her hand ghosting over Lotor's fist. He instinctively relaxed and allowed her to slip her fingers through his. "You're looking a bit stressed."

Lotor smiled softly, the expression a relief to his formerly tight muscles of his face. "I'm alright. I'm just… we are so close to reaching our goal, Allura. Together, you and I. We will rebuild both of our cultures. Our people…" That wasn't what he wanted to say, but over the past couple of weeks he had accepted that words were not his own to control.

Allura stroked Lotor's knuckles with her thumb. "I know. It's nerve wracking. I never thought I'd get to even hope for something like this to happen."

Lotor looked down at their intertwined hands, her words heavy on his heart. He was so caught up in his own guilt that he barely heard her next words.

"Thank you, Lenora. Thank you for everything."

…

Lenora kept her cool in the Quintessence Field, but Lotor did not. The Quintessence burned, and he mentally begged Lenora to turn them around, to not pierce the veil. He begged for this to be over, yet he was terrified to go back to the Castle of Lions.

He knew Keith would be there with Romelle. Lenora's life as she knew it would be over.

Of course, they were successful in equipping Lenora's ship with the ability to collect Quintessence, and they made it back to the Castle safely. Lotor kissed Allura just as he remembered doing back in his own reality, but he barely processed it. He knew what was coming, and he was terrified. How could he enjoy the kiss when those same warm lips against his would twist in disgust in just a few moments?

It was worse the second time. Lenora's emotions perforated his own, and he felt overwhelmed by it all. He barely registered the pleading words that spilled out of his lips, nor the hot tears that stained his cheeks. He just felt the tearing of his heart and the overwhelming fear, cold against his fingers and toes.

When Allura threw him over her shoulder, he blacked out, and he welcomed the darkness—anything was better than the flood of emotions he was currently feeling.

…

When Lotor came too, everything happened in a blur. Lenora was acting out in anger, desperation, and fear, just as Lotor had done in is own reality, and he couldn't keep his own conscience intact. It hurt too much, and it was just easier to let it happen.

He had been struggling for so long, and he didn't want to put himself through this again. Not when there was nothing to be done.

So he simply watched as Lenora denounced Honerva, refusing to accept the witch as her mother, and he watched as his generals re-attached themselves to his side. He watched as Lenora pleaded with Allura.

It was a mix of his tears and Lenora's that streamed down their face as Allura shot at their ship, and Lotor felt the scream that ripped past Lenora's lips as she counterattacked.

When they went into the Quintessence Field, an all too hauntingly familiar memory burning at Lotor's soul, he gave in completely, begging without words for it to all be over.

It felt like hours had passed when Lotor finally let out a scream that broke through the veil between him and Lenora, except it wasn't Lenora's voice that cried out in anguish. It was his own. The pain of the Quintessence Field had distracted him enough so that he hadn't even noticed that he was back in his own reality, in his own body.

"Please. Please. Please," he begged, over and over again, unsure of what he was begging for. The repeated word escaped him like his very breath. His hands gripped the controls of his ship, and he writhed in his seat, his body feeling heavier than it had in weeks.

He didn't know how long he screamed and pleaded, but by the time he had calmed down to mere whimpers, he felt his consciousness slipping again—

A/N 2.0: Prompts

Hogwarts 365 Challenge - (word) Femininity

Hogwarts Insane House Challenge - (dialogue) "Are you okay? What's wrong?"

Writing Club:

- Sophie's shelf #2 Katya: (dialogue) "I am my own worst enemy."