Lotor kicked the heavy door open with a grunt. Lance who was hunched in the alleyway with bayard at the ready didn't even flinch. Lotor smiled under his respirator. The young man held potential.
He turned to face the paladin. "Get in," he barked.
Lance ducked into the shadowy corridor followed quickly by Lotor. The half-galra shoved the door closed behind them. Thankfully, they were now out of the blasted wind. Lotor shook his braided mane before taking stock of the surroundings.
The two men stood in a sparse hallway lined with numerous white doors. Except the mess they had created when unsealing the building to the sandstorm, the area was pristine.
The red paladin huffed as he shook out his helmet. "Where are we?"
Lotor moved down the hall to peer through one of the windows set into a door. "This is the south wing of the university." He tucked his goggles into his belt. "Any intel from Voltron yet?"
Lance donned his helmet and listened with cocked ear for a second. Lotor let the moment allow him to catch his breath and pat off the sand still clinging to his heavy desert gear. It would need to be lost once they were sure no further excursions into the storm would be necessary. Thank the stars, the self-sealing cooling system was functional within the building.
"The Galra military is infiltrating the city. Insurgencies are happening everywhere. Kyrax's militia is burning the capital. Rumour is he's present, attempting to get inside." Lance shuddered. "Allura, Hunk, and Pidge are fighting on the east front. Enemies are attempting to fire more virus."
Lotor didn't bother hiding his anger. "Is he attacking the Galra or his own people?" Why the question came out so cold, Lotor did not know. The flame within him was white.
It was more than the knowledge that Kyrax had taken this weapon from him. It was his youthful naivete fully manifested. How he could have made such a massive miscalculation introduced a whirlwind of paranoia. This was his failure. There was no one else to blame. He should have ended this after the orbital bombardment so many years ago.
"The militia is fighting the Galra," Lance said after a pause. He met Lotor's eyes uncertainly.
Lotor frostily returned the stare. "It is civil war. They should be united under Galra rule."
Lance nodded; unsure what other response would be appropriate. A chill ran down his spine at the emotionless tone in the half-breed's words. The young man swallowed hard before hedging with a question. "So, we need to get to the capital and bring him down?"
"Yes," Lotor brought up a map from a device taken off his belt clip. A small holograph with blinking markers showed itself. Within moments, Lotor turned on his heel, heading down the corridor and making a hard right to a dimly lit corner. A well-used door opened to a shaft that led to both upper and lower levels.
Lance hurried after him. An inquiry egged at him while the two jogged down flights of stairs. "This place is so quiet."
For a long time, the statement hung in the air, only punctuated with the heavy thuds of their boots on the metal steps.
"Life goes on even in a sandstorm. This is fear."
"You think they know Voltron is here to help? I wish we could tell them that."
"We do not need to tell them anything. When we win, they will know for themselves. There is no room for failure here. I will not suffer a loss here over such a frivolous exchange." Lotor did not even look up from the steps disappearing behind him.
His callousness angered and perplexed the young man. "I wouldn't call it frivolous."
Lotor was silent for a long time before pausing, only for a fraction of a second, but it was still a hiccup in their rhythm echoing down the dark shaft. "Perhaps."
Lance snapped. "People are dying! You really can't help being evil, huh?"
The prince wondered how he had become so heartless.
Life.
Ah, yes that was right.
"You know I see through all these tricks," Lance continued. "Just because you killed Zarkon doesn't –"
Lotor whirled on the boy, gripping the banister with white knuckles and talons scraping metal. "And you never shut up! Everyone dies. People die every day. We only live to save those greater than the rest, Lance. The rescued go on to do the rest." His gaze faltered when a wave of unexpected emotion hit him. It was not the toxic burn of anger or rage. This was sickening and as heavy as abandonment. His reflexes kicked in after the split second. His jaw clamped shut; his mind going silent.
The young man was completely unable to penetrate the steel within Lotor's eyes, but he tried. It reminded Lance of the way Keith would just turn off. Hesitantly, he changed tactics… Maybe… "Fine. I will shut up," he barked back. "Let's just get rid of Kyrax."
Lotor stomped down the remaining stairs before yanking a door open. "Yes."
xXx
"Voltron! We are losing men in the aft section of our flagship. We need to pull back. We are not equipped for biological warfare. Repeat we are not equipped!"
The dying gasp was overpowered with harsh static that made Allura's ears ache.
A shaking explosion from below her erupted into quickly extinguished flames. But the abnormal coloured smoke stained the pristine azure sky with toxic yellow smog. It dispersed in the high atmosphere like slow moving tendrils.
Another sleek T-shaped starship targeted her.
Blue pulled out of the arc they had been leading and made for the surface. The ship's air-seals did not allow any of the vaporised material to harm her but the same could not be said for the soldiers in the city down below.
Pidge's worried tones broke through the fray. "We need to draw these ships away from the city! There is too much collateral damage here."
"They are mostly focusing on the Galra," Allura said through grit teeth. Red coloured lasers rained down on her from the pursuer, which was still on her tail.
She pushed the lion down and into a spin, moving swiftly between two tall, glistening spires near Shadi's epicentre.
Below her, she caught a flash of the pristine dome which held the seat of local government. Flames burned throughout the streets. Galra soldiers being dropped onto the ground from the south side of the city were moving slowly towards the entrenched leader within the capital building. Local militias with flapping banners of numerous colours stood their ground in encampments and behind makeshift barriers.
The wind snaking between the buildings made flying difficult and treacherous amongst the closely placed architecture. Sand filtered the sun's rays into weak dusky hues. It ripped through the city like a clawing hand desperate to take hold of anything and drag it down deep into the churning maw.
Irritatingly, the fighter tailing the princess appeared more adept at flying within the storm. Her plan to lose the ship in the confusion was quickly showing itself as a mistake.
The ship banked hard to port before throwing its engines into standby and riding the wild air. A shimmering black sail unfurled in the same instant, catching the current and smoothly intercepting Blue's effort to escape the tempest.
Blue shuddered as she took a massive volley of energy shot by the now impossibly agile craft. Sweat broke over Allura's forehead. "Stay out of the storm!"
She pushed the lion into hard acceleration using Blue's sheer mass to punch through the sluggish airspace. The craft broke after her, finding another channel of wind and gaining unfair momentum.
A distracting thought came over her. This was her first meeting with Lotor. Almost every movement was a shadow of that battle. Yet, this time her fear was not terror. It was a tool. She had learned enough from war in the past months. She could not rid herself of the fear, but she could use it to the most advantageous possibility.
The recollection had taken too much of her mental faculties. A hard shudder ran through the ship, jostling her forward and giving Allura an instant headache. Her pursuer fired another barrage. Blue groaned from the beating. She cursed herself, grabbing the controls with white-knuckled force and pulled the lion into a sheer climb.
The ship was close. Another shaving blow charred the lion's backside. Allura flipped the lion into a grinding helix climb. Blue growled against the centrifugal force, struggling to compensate lest the paladin pass out.
Suddenly, with all the relief of a string snapping under tension, they tore through the storm's boundary. Allura sucked in a breath before turning the ship about with much more ease than before.
Her pursuer blindsided momentarily by the reversal of advantage, nosedived. Blue opened her mouth, shooting cobalt fire before the pilot could gain full control of the engines. The fighter vanished in a brilliant explosion.
Hunk's voice crackled over the comm. "Allura! Where are you?"
"Here. Stay out of the storm everyone," she panted.
"We managed to get the majority of ships out of range from the city," Pidge said.
Hunk added, "We have the eastern forces on retreat. What's going on in the city?"
"It's chaos down there. The militias are banding together to fight the Galra."
"What do we do?"
"We need to wait for the others. Hold the front," the princess replied.
Pidge's youthful voice sounded dubious. "That just got a lot harder, guys. Galran reinforcements from orbit. They are firing on our fleet!"