With my re-writes finished, I'm finally moving forward with the story again. I'll try to keep a more consistent update schedule now that I've finished everything. I'll try to write as much as I can, but I can't guarantee more than 2 chapters a month. If you get lucky and I have extra time to write, it'll probably be 3.

Chapter 9: The Cavalry

Whitehold

Mars

March 16th, 2841

"What's your status?" a familiar voice sounded in Shiro's ears. Always right to the point, he thought to himself with a smirk. For all her banter aboard the Pax, Victra always got right to business when they were in an actual battle. He bit back a witty remark and focused himself on the current situation.

"Whitehold's command center is secure," he reported. "We're working on liberating the prisoners, but the board's deploying Lurcher squads. Could use some reinforcements to help secure the facility." Even going into this mission, Shiro understood the strike force was vastly outnumbered by the Board of Quality Control's security. If the rebellion could spare even just one extra squad, it could tip the balance in their favor here.

"Nobody's available now," Victra answered. "But I'll send the Telemanuses your way once they take Yorkton"

"We're going after Yorkton already?" Shiro replied. "How's everyone else doing?"

"Lune's forces control two hundred fifty cities. Darrow's holed up in Agea for the moment trying to find where he's needed most. Mustang, Quinn, and the poet have naval supremacy over most of Mars. New Thebes is ours, and your boyfriend just took Cyprio. He's headed for Corinth so once you've finished up in Whitehold we'll send you to reinforce his troops."

"Fair enough," he said, his voice trailing off as he looked at his friend, reminding himself that the speakers in his helmet meant that nobody besides Keith and Victra would hear him. How was he going to explain this? "By the way, there's been an… unexpected development."

"Unexpected how?" Victra demanded.

"Keith's here," he answered bluntly. Might as well rip off the band-aid and get it over with, he told himself.

There was a long pause, and Shiro was beginning to think the coms might have been jammed. It was a full fifteen seconds before she finally spoke again.

"Alright," Victra sighed. "Glad you got your little reunion, but we've got bigger things to worry about right now. We'll sort out this time travel mind fuck when we aren't fighting for our lives, register?"

"Register," Shiro responded.

"Good," Victra said. "Keep hammering at Whitehold. I'll contact you once a squad is free and see if you still need reinforcements. Good luck."

"Hic Sunt Leones," he replied. Mustang's brother and late father were dedicated to upholding the hierarchy, but the saying was too appropriate for him to just allow it to retain its original association. So, he was going to make sure that the words were remembered as something more, something better, than the family motto of a tyrant.

"Hic Sunt Leones," she answered. Despite her brusqueness, Shiro could hear the friendly teasing in her voice. He chuckled as the connection cut out and his helmet retracted back into his pulseArmor. He looked over at Keith, whose body language broadcast his confusion to everyone present. Shiro bit back the urge to take his friend aside and explain what was going on. But they didn't have time. Nexiti's forces were under siege in the building's command center, and if Shiro's team didn't lift that siege, this whole mission would be for nothing.

"Alright," he called out to the troops. "Let's move. Fennix, on my left. Evey, on my right." The two veteran Sons of Ares nodded in understanding and took their places on either side of Keith. Shiro sighed, relieved to know that if they were attacked from the side, his two lieutenants would be ready to protect his fellow time travelling Paladin. A moment later, the rebel forces resumed their mad dash for the control center. Alarms blared as they ran through the labyrinthine corridors of the board's central compound. As they made their way towards the facility's security center, an incoming transmission chimed on Shiro's datapad. I'm in the coms system, Nexiti's message read. Playing the Reaper's speech now. Pinned down in command center. Hurry.

"I would have lived in peace," Darrow's voice echoed over the PA system. "But my enemies brought me war."

Shiro smiled under the leonine snarl of his demonHelm. Nexiti had done a head-count of the prison's records when he cleared their way to Level 4. There were enough prisoners in Whitehold to throw the guards off balance and give the rebels a chance to tip the battle in their favor. Their orders were to play Darrow's speech and let the rallying cry inspire the prisoners with hope. With any luck, most of them would be willing to join the Rising, as the coalition of rebel forces was starting to call itself.

"My name is Darrow of Lykos. In the last twelve hours, you have all seen my story. It is but an echo of your own."

Shiro winced as gunfire from the guards pinged against the built in forcefields of his armor like hail on a metal roof. He lobbed a pulseGrenade in the direction of a barricade the enemy Grays had hastily erected in front of the entrance to the compound's dining facility. When the explosion cleared, the guards were either dead or wounded. Evey and Fennix finished off the survivors as they moved forward into the mess hall.

"They came to my home and killed my wife. Not for singing a song but for daring to question their reign. For daring to have a voice."

They were almost to the command center, and this was their last spot to regroup before they made the final push. As everyone checked and double checked their armor and inventory, Shiro looked over at Keith. Shiro had recognized the younger Paladin the instant Nexiti had shown him the security footage of the surgical wing. That had been part of why he'd been so desperate to get there in time.

"For centuries, millions beneath the soil of Mars have been fed lies from cradle to grave. That lie has been revealed to them."

But he had just as many questions about how Keith had gotten here as he knew Keith did about what was going on. How did he get here? What had he been doing? How long had it been since their plan to stop Zarkon? Had they succeeded? Why was Keith wearing the Blade of Marmora uniform instead of his Paladin armor?

"Now, they've entered the world you know, and they suffer as you do."

He momentarily considered the possibility that Keith had arrived from a time during his trial at the Blade of Marmora's base, but he quickly dismissed it as unlikely. There's been nothing with enough energy to throw Keith into the future the way he had been.

"Man was born free, but from the ocean shores to the crater cities of Mercury to the ice waste of Pluto down to the mines of Mars, he is in chains."

But that still left his litany of unanswered questions. But like he'd told Keith back in the interrogation wing, and Victra had reminded him earlier, explanations could wait until they weren't in the middle of a battle.

"Chains made of duty, hunger fear. Chains hammered to our necks by a race that we lifted up."

While the strike team readied for battle, Shiro walked over to Keith. Darrow's speech played on a loop in the background as he turned on a jamField and nodded that it was safe for Keith to take his mask off.

"A race that we empowered. Not to rule, not to reign, but to lead us from a world torn by war and greed."

"Sorry about all this," Shiro said sheepishly as the holographic mask flickered away. "From what Nexiti could find of the board's records, they think you're proof of life outside Earth's solar system. I figured it would be easier to maintain that lie than it would be to fabricate a backstory for you on short notice without attracting attention to the both of us."

"Instead, they have led us into darkness. They have used the systems of order and prosperity for their own gain."

"Hold on," Keith interjected, eyes wide. "You said Earth's solar system. Does that mean we're back on Earth?"

"Right solar system, wrong planet," Shiro replied with a teasing grin. "Welcome to Mars, Keith."

"They expect your obedience, ignore your sacrifice, and hoard the prosperity that your hands create."

"Mars?" Keith spluttered. "We're seriously on Mars? But the Garrison never…. How long was I out for?"

"I'm not sure," Shiro answered. "I need to know how long it's been since we fought Zarkon to be sure. The last thing I remember before I woke up in this era was using all our bayards to upgrade Voltron's sword. How long has it been for you since that?"

"To hold tight to their reign, they forbid our dreams. Saying that a person is only as good as the Color of their eyes, of their Sigils."

"What? Shiro, that was months ago," Keith replied, then paused, processing the rest of his friend's words. "Wait… What do you mean "this era"?"

"But now I stand before you, a man unbound. I stand before you, my brothers and sisters, to ask you to join me."

"Keith," Shiro responded. "It's been eight hundred four years since we found the Blue Lion." Keith stiffened in shock, his eyes wide as he registered what Shiro had said.

"To unite behind the Sons of Ares. To take back your cities, your prosperity. Dare to dream of better worlds than these."

"I'll fill you in on the rest later," Shiro said as he spotted Evey and Fenix motioning for him to rejoin the troops. "But we need to get moving again."

"Slavery is not peace. Freedom is peace. And until we have that, it is our duty to make war."

Keith clearly wanted to ask more questions, but he nodded and reactivated his mask. Shiro turned off the jamField and marched over to the front of the pack, his friend trailing behind him like a shadow. The doors opened and they resumed their push for the command center.

"This is no license for savagery or genocide. If a man rapes, you kill him on the spot. If a man murders civilians, high or low, you kill him on the spot."

They hadn't encountered any Lurchers yet, but the Board's Grays were attempting to bar their passage in greater and greater numbers. The element of surprise may have worn off, but the rebels still had the advantage of experience and firepower.

"This is war, but you are on the side of good, and that carries a heavy burden. We do not rise for hate or vengeance, for many highColors have had their eyes opened to the truth but lacked the courage or resources to act."

Most of the full time Gray security guards had never faced an Stained Obsidian in combat, so the Obsidians in Shiro's unit were able to take advantage of the enemy soldiers' momentary surprise to annihilate the guards' roadblocks.

"Now, we all rise together for love. For your children. For their future."

But the closer they got to the command center, they started encountering more and more Lurchers. The hired mercenaries were more experienced with the Sons of Ares' usual tactics, and casualties began to mount up.

"I speak now to Gold. To the Aureate who rule. I have walked your halls, broken your schools, eaten at your tables, and suffered your gallows."

Shiro ducked out of cover long enough to lob a plasma grenade at a squad of Lurchers. The Gray mercenaries dove out of the way, and Shiro tossed out a pulseGrenade before any of them could recover.

"You tried to kill me. You could not. I know your power. I know your pride. And I have seen how you will fall."

Keith took advantage of his agility and smaller size to slip between the enemy ranks and put his blade to good use. Shiro tore through the rest with his razor, while the stragglers were picked off by Evey and Fenix's troops.

"For seven hundred years, you have ruled over the dominion of man, and this is all you have given us. It is not enough."

They reached the rendezvous point ten minutes later. The remaining Lurchers weren't expecting to be attacked from the rear and were quickly wiped out. With their entire battalion back together, Fennix split their force back up into smaller squads, and Nexiti directed them to critical targets inside the compound, or to spots where the remaining guards were camped out. Shiro, Keith, and Evey were dispatched to the prison wing to help the prisoners break out. They left Prefect Vardan with the rest of their prisoners in a locked closet near the command center.

"Today, I declare your rule to be at its end. Your cities are not your cities. Your vessels are not your vessels. Your planets are not your planets."

They reached the detention level to find two dozen guards engaged in a tense firefight against the surviving prisoners. Dozens of mid and lowColor corpses littered the floor of the facility's prison wing as armored Grays with golden pyramids on their shoulders fired pulseRifles at the makeshift barriers the prisoners had set up in the prison's main throughway.

"They belong to us, the common trust of man. Now, we take them back. Never mind the darkness you spread, never mind the night you summon, we will rage against it."

The guards were so focused on the prisoners Shiro didn't need a ghostCloak to sneak up on them. He slit one's throat with an ionDagger, stabbed another with his razor, and decapitated a third before any of the enemy soldiers realized he was there. Fenix killed four more in as many seconds before the guards managed to realize that the attack was coming behind.

"We will howl and fight till our last breath, not just in the mines of Mars, but on the shores of Venus, on the dunes of Io's sulfur seas, in the glacial valleys of Pluto."

With the guards distracted, the former prisoners charged out of their hiding places wielding whatever weapons they'd been able to scavenge from the guards they'd already killed. seven more Grays fell before the guards started fighting back.

"We will fight in the towers of Ganymede and the ghettos of Luna and the storm-stricken oceans of Europa."

Once they realized that they were outnumbered, the prison guards dropped their weapons in surrender. The prisoners were hungry for revenge, but a quick rebuke from Shiro reminding them of the Reaper's speech held them at bay. Still, the prisoners, particularly the Pinks, took a cathartic pleasure in securing the security officers' restrains as tightly as they could without cutting off circulation.

As they secured their captives, Nexiti reported that most of the board had already been in the process of transferring their operations to Attica when the Sons of Ares attacked, meaning only Vardan and a handful of mid-ranking Golds and Coppers had stayed behind until the transition was complete. Frustrated with the news, he typed out a message to Victra on his datapad. "Whitehold secure," he wrote. "But most of the Jackal was already moving most of the board to Attica." He smiled as he waited for a reply. As the conclusion of Darrow's speech played on the PA system, the Black Paladin felt a renewed sense of hope.

"And if we fall, others will take our place, because we are the tide. And we are rising."

I tried something new with this chapter. I knew when I planned on Shiro attacking Whitehold that the Sons of Ares were going to hijack the PA system and broadcast Darrow's speech to rally the prisoners. I thought interweaving the words to the speech with the action would be an interesting way of representing that. Let me know if you think it worked.

Cylax Nexiti and Fennix were introduced in the Sons of Ares prequel comic. They were some of the original Sons of Ares members alongside Fitchner and attacked Whitehold in a failed attempt to save Sevro's mom from execution. Since they were both alive at the end of the comic and were never mentioned in the original series, I thought it would be fun to bring them back as background Sons of Ares members. Evey disappeared from the story after a brief mention in Morning Star and hasn't been mentioned since, so I thought it would be good to give her something to do in this divergent timeline.