x

Hope: The Truest Treasure

Three

Two weeks of hell later (or thereabouts) Lance made his move.

He knew he probably needed more time. Probably should pick a day where he hadn't just been freshly whipped the night before and the five long welts on his back screamed every time he raised the pickaxe. But if he'd learned anything in his time here it was that anything could happen at any time and if he waited he might not be in a state to attempt it again for a long while. If ever.

He'd had to wait until he was assigned to the excavation team again – having spent the last several says digging out the tunnel – and then arrange himself so he managed to be the last one on the row and nearest the entrance to the tunnel (although whether that was a quarter mile or a two to the exit he had no idea).

His plan was simple. He would be the first slave armed with the pickaxe when they handed them out. He would wait until the Toads had made it halfway down the line distributing the remainder and then strike out at the chain holding his ankle to the stake. He'd been examining the chains and while thick and sturdy enough to yanking if he hit the link with the axe it should snap off after a strike or two.

From there he needed to escape out of the tunnel, avoid recapture and then get a hold of a communication device and radio Voltron, whose transmission signal he had memorized, and they would come and rescue him and all of the other slaves. He'd have the pickaxe to use as a weapon if he encountered any guards further up the tunnel and despite the pain he knew adrenaline would kick in and he could (hopefully) avoid any blaster shots. As he'd observed, the guards carried the guns mostly as show pieces and he doubted they were very good shots.

It was a risky plan, he knew. But he hadn't come up with anything else since arriving here and every day he spent was one too long. He'd already witnessed two executions of slaves who had collapsed and the horror at their deaths was only overridden by the sheer apathy displayed by both the guards and his fellow slaves.

No one here cared. About anything. And that was almost more terrifying than the thought of living out the rest of his (probably very short) life as a mining slave.

Lance mechanically accepted the pickaxe as it was thrust into his hands, bobbling it for a second as the handle slapped against the still healing incision on his palm that he'd sacrificed part of his already raggedy shirt to make a dirty bandage to protect it a little bit.

This was it.

He sucked in a deep breath, the sound a calm reassurance. On the exhale he swung the axe.

A shower of sparks greeted the strike against the chain. It didn't break. Lance hit it again. And again. And again, a new sense of desperation fueling his swings as the Toads became aware of the commotion and one was closing in, cattle prod at the ready.

On lucky strike seven the chain was severed.

In the same instant the taser connected with his shoulder. Lance twisted around, swallowing the not audible scream, and slammed his makeshift weapon against the Toad's chestplate with a reverberating clang.

The force sent the Toad stumbling backwards with a throaty yell and Lance used the momentum to continue his pivot into the expanse of tunnel, the end of the chain dragging but otherwise there was nothing to restrict his movement.

All work had come to a screeching halt and there was a pregnant pause as slaves looked, blank expressions morphed everywhere from fear to horror to a few flickers of actual life that if Lance hadn't been in such a situation he might have returned with a grin.

Before the Toads could regain themselves he turned on his heel and ran.

There were a few blaster shots sent his way, pinging on the ground both in front him and behind and Lance just prayed that none hit him because he had absolutely no idea how to block.

He hit a bend in the tunnel, momentarily shielded and he put on an extra burst of speed. He raced past the whipping post, then the bathroom and the communal room. The next part of the tunnel started to become unfamiliar, an older section that had been excavated enough to the Toads' standards, and he tucked his head down and ran faster.

There were more offshoots here, winding passages that could lead anywhere. Part of him said to duck down one and lose the Toads in pursuit, of whom he could still hear giving chase and keeping up better than he'd have thought but he also wasn't at his own physical best, but the other part said to keep to the main path as it had to go to the exit.

He chose to follow the main path.

And it did lead out, he was certain of it, the tunnel widening and cart tracks clear in the stamped down dirt.

It also led to a full battalion of cloaked Toads. While no alarm system had blared to life they had been alerted some other way and Lance was facing a legit firing squad as they stood abreast across the tunnel, blasters raised.

Lance had no choice but to keep going. If he stopped he had no doubt he would die. He had to do this.

There was no battle cry from him, just harsh pants and a whistling noise out his nose, as he raced the guards head-on. Blaster fire rang out and Lance managed to dodge one and deflect another that had come too close. His axe was there a moment later, swinging and smashing into the ranks.

He didn't have time to look at where he was aiming, just striking out and each impact making his arms tremble but the shouts of surprise and pain well worth it. The Toads didn't seem to know how to fire in close quarters and Lance felt a sharp smile stretch his features.

He could do this.

And then a shock prod dug itself into his lower back, full voltage. He stumbled as pain whited out his vision, and that momentary slip was all the Toads needed. There were more prods then – shoulder, stomach, arm, leg, everywhere they could reach – and Lance screamed although all the action did was tear at his throat and came out a gasp of air.

They did not relent.

Lance's last thought as blackness stole across his vision was how horribly, horribly he had failed.

xxx

It had been five days since Hope had arrived.

That was the name Lance had given the little Balmeran girl. She had rekindled his hope, given him a new purpose. He had nearly resigned himself to living out the rest of his life in the mines but no. Not now. Not her. A child did not deserve this.

None of them did.

And it was time he did something about it. It had been… months, he'd guess, since his last attempt. The first one with the pickaxe had not gone well. After he'd been caught by the Toads he had, to his surprise, woken up.

He sort of wished he hadn't. He'd found himself stretched out on his back, hands and feet tangled in the mesh cording next to the whipping post that he had yet to figure out its purpose. He hated that he got a front row seat in discovering it.

The netting was there to hold slaves on their back so that blows could be delivered to their front instead. In Lance's case it had been repeated smashes of a pickaxe against his stomach, so many times that the blunted edge had begun to cut into his flesh and the bruise had turned into an incision and they had still not stopped.

It had gone on for at least an hour. The others had been forced to watch. Lance, when he found the strength to open his eyes against the beating, wondering if he was going to die from blunt force trauma, could not find a kind eye. Most angled their heads down and those that did watch did so with that blank mask.

He had found a smile. Barney had mustered up one; it looked pained and scared and the older slave had shook, but he had caught Lance's tear-lined eyes and given him one. It had been that smile that had sustained him.

When he'd finally been released from the netting his stomach and lower torso were a solid black and blue mass save for the weeping wound that the axe had eventually carved into him. Lance spent the night in agony, curled up on his pallet and not expecting to survive the next day. Guilt and regret had plagued him – he should have waited, the team could have been coming soon and he'd just ruined his chance and he never got to say good bye – and between it and the pain and the bitter scent of his own blood coating his hands as he pressed them to the wound to keep it inside he did not sleep.

Doctor Day, his very first one, had fallen the next day. He didn't remember most of it but he'd been injected with something and woken up back on a pallet with a sharp but dulled ache and bandages wrapped all about his torso and a strange smelling cream lathered into his skin on every wound he had received.

Lance had tried to escape one other time and it had ended just as badly. This time though… this time would be different.

It had to be different.

He could not afford to fail again.

It was why, as much as he wanted to bust Hope out now, he was waiting and figuring out the best way to successfully escape.

Unfortunately, all of his plans kept coming back to one crucial detail. He had no idea what was outside of the mines. And it was going to be hard enough to keep himself alive and free, let alone a child, and he didn't even have a clue how to factor another body – one that couldn't even fight nor did he want her to – into his escape. It's not like she had any idea of what he was planning either to go along with it.

They had made eye contact though, several times actually. Lance had managed to meet her gaze on that first day and her yellow pupil-less orbs had widened at the sight and he had given her a soft smile that she had hesitantly returned before she'd been yanked forward and lost to sight.

Every morning now if they passed one another Lance had felt his heart warmed as her green-tinged face would seek out his and she would offer up another smile and one time even a little wave when the guard had been turned away that Lance had returned.

The spark was growing to a fire now. It was kindled with every smile, every look that wasn't one of despair, that Hope gave him. And he hoped he was giving her at least some measure of the same feeling. She had yet to take a lashing, a fact he was beyond grateful for, and aside from a few bruises he could see dotting her arms from strikes from the butt end of the prod she was remaining unharmed.

She was a valuable slave, Lance knew. He wondered how much she had cost. He wondered sometimes how much he had cost before he decided he really didn't want to know.

But he had to leave her behind. Just for now. He would be back for her and for all the others, if they would follow. It was only for a little bit, he promised himself. And Hope was not a high profile target for abuse. She would be okay.

As okay as anyone could really be.

First things first, he needed to escape. Then the plan was to get access to a communication device and contact Voltron. The Toads' datapads were secured but someone in town – there had to be a town of some sort, right? – had to have one that wasn't password protected. He still winced at that. If he'd only been Pidge or Hunk he had no doubt he'd have already escaped from here.

But if he could get out a transmission to Voltron then they would come and they would absolutely free Hope and the other slaves. It was the best bet he had as going up against all those guards again would be suicide. And this time he doubted they would let him live. Humans were only supposed to have one life and Lance had already used up three.

He had to focus tough. Escape first. And Lance had a good plan.

Or, well, it wasn't a completely awful plan.

Pickaxe during forced labor had failed.

Picking lock cuff from bed had failed (his most recent attempt although recent was a relative term at this point).

But escaping during the limited bathroom break?

He was going to make it work.

That was the one time in the entire day that he was not chained in some way. They were released from their bed spots, walked by gunpoint to the bathroom, let inside and then observed by another Toad with a blaster the entire time (the breach of privacy still gave him the creeps, especially the one Toad with the weird dimple because he leered and Lance tried desperately not to think about it more than he had to) and then released back out.

Inside the bathroom it would be just him and the guard. And of all the guards in the compound, that one was generally the most complacent because even though the slaves were unchained no one would dare to waste their limited time on anything else and no one would definitely try to overpower a guard with a blaster with mere bare hands after having worked all day.

Lance did love to prove people wrong.

For this to work though… he was going to need the guard's blaster. That part was non-negotiable because he needed a weapon with long range capabilities. He just… he hadn't decided yet what to do about the guard.

Killing was not something Lance liked to do. He understood that Voltron had undoubtedly killed many when they blew up bases and ships, but those had always been so removed from him. He knew Shiro had killed in close combat, but anyone else? Nope. Just wounds so they could escape.

None of the Toads deserved to live. They were not good people. They were absolute monsters.

It was just… pulling the trigger, literally, was so final.

But he couldn't afford to show mercy. Not to them. He had to focus on those that mattered, those that deserved a better life. Those like Hope. Even… even those like himself. None of them deserved to die in the mines.

None except the Toads.

He could do this.

And tonight was the night. He was relatively healed from any recent beatings and he'd spent the last two days on jewel sorting so his stamina was as good as it was going to get.

His palms still felt sweaty when the guard unlocked him from his pallet and escorted him over to the bathroom entrance, shoving him into the room and closing the door behind him.

The interior was as dim as normal and Lance cast a quick look to the guard in the corner. Not the gross leering one and he was a tad disappointed at the discovery, and then immediately sickened by his own thoughts. He wasn't killing them out of revenge. It was a necessity.

He needed to remember that.

He did his business first, quickly, counting down ticks in his head. Twenty ticks later he was retying his ill-fitting pants and moving towards the water wall where he generally spent the majority of his time, letting the trickle trace over his fingers and smear rock dust away.

The guard yawned, revealing his thick tongue, clearly disinterested in Lance's regular routine.

Lance struck.

In one movement he was pulling away from the wall, fist cocked, and slamming it with more force than ever before, corded muscles visible on his slender arm, right into the Toad's face.

The alien let out a low bellow, hands instinctively flying to his face as cartilage gave under Lance's hand. He held onto the gun but the grip was tenuous at best.

Lance reached forward, latched his own hands about the blaster and fingers trailed instinctually down the barrel to the trigger. He didn't allow himself to think as he pushed down and a burst of yellow light seared from the barrel…

Right through the Toad's head. He dropped like a boulder and Lance backed away from the body, gun clutched in trembling limbs.

He'd just killed a Toad.

There was no going back now.

He was either going to escape… or he was going to die. There was no in-between.

There was a pounding on the door, the gruff voice of the escort Toad demanding to know what was going on. Lance winced. The door was not as soundproofed as he had hoped.

He shouldered the gun. It was like the clothing here; ill-fitting and unfamiliar but he would make it work. It wasn't too much smaller than his bayard blaster although the trigger was a longer stretch. The door to the bathroom opened and Lance took the shot, downing the Toad as soon as he had crossed the threshold.

His legs were shaking, a mixture of adrenaline and fear and what did he just do?, while his brain was screaming at him to get going because there were most certainly going to be other guards coming soon when no one returned and his plan did not involve being cornered in the bathroom.

Lance stepped over the body and into the narrow hall, shelf of rock separating it from the living quarters with a secondary passage leading off to connect back to the main tunnel. Lance took one last breath, willing his legs to steady, and headed down the tunnel.

He ran, blaster cocked and ready on his shoulder. So far there were no signs of pursuit, no yells of the discovery of two bodies, but it was only a matter of ticks at this point. He needed to be at least a good distance away as he could not fight pursuers and defenders at the same time.

His pulse was pounding so loudly in his head he could barely even hear his rough panting and he desperately tried to quiet them. He needed to listen for the Toads and if his own breathing made him stop breathing he was pretty sure ironic did not begin to describe it.

He was about thirty ticks in when he heard the first shout, a bare echo that only carried due to the tunnel. He smiled grimly. Thirty ticks? He could work with that kind of lead.

The tunnel kept going and going, twisting in some places and widening in others and he made sure to stick to the main path. He had yet to encounter any resistance and Lance prayed it remained so.

A moment later he found his prayers were not answered. Lance wondered for a half-second if he'd jinxed himself, but jinxes needed to be said aloud, and, well, that had certainly not been the case.

But unlike last time he had gotten this far there were only two Toads. The evening dinner hour had definitely been the better option, he congratulated himself. The Toads hadn't been prepared at all.

Lance didn't even blink this time as he pressed down on the trigger. He fired two shots in quick succession as bolts peppered the air around him from the Toads.

They didn't fire again and he rushed past their bodies. He caught the glint of one of the tablets and he nearly paused before urgency won out over the unlockable tech. He hadn't managed it the first time; he knew he hadn't improved in his hacking since. No, stick to the original plan.

The path was evening out now, dirt giving way to smooth stones that stung his feet, calloused as they were, but Lance didn't allow himself to falter even as a stitch was stabbing like a knife into his side.

Almost there.

There were rooms now on his trek and he spotted Toad uniforms in one, armor gleaming for the next wearer, while another room his mind recognized even in the split second he as he past it for the threadbare clothing stacked in haphazard piles was not one he would forget.

Almost there.

He could hear shouts growing closer as he sped past more rooms; guard quarters, likely, and another Toad, this one wearing a cape appeared out of one door. Lance made the headshot before he could even raise his gun and leapt over the corpse as it fell in his path.

The light in the tunnels had always been made from a glowing white stone in brackets along the walls. It was a dim light though, like a light bulb on its last legs. The light coming towards Lance as he made around another curve was not that wane, pale color.

It was a soft blue, as though looking at sunlight bouncing off water.

It had to be the moon.

If Lance had had the air he may have let out a sob. The air was clearing too; the earthy dead scent giving way to something fresher, a bit of a bite.

And then it was there.

The end of the tunnel.

There was no door to the mine. It was an open hole, large enough to fit the Green Lion, and it led to the outside where Lance could see a star-studded sky past mounds of rock.

He crashed into the night, almost tripping in his haste and breathed.

The stone path wound away from the entrance to the mine, which was part of a mountain chain that stretched into the distance. Down below Lance could make out what had to be the town, silhouettes of buildings illuminated in the bright blue moon overhead and a twinkling of lights from those still awake at whatever hour this was.

And beyond that…

A castle.

It rose above the town as though presiding over it, spires striking the sky. That, Lance's eyes narrowed, would be where the king lived.

But it wasn't his goal. His goal was the town but right now he knew striking for it was a bad idea. There was no cover from the mine down the mountainside and although the Toads had shown to have terrible aim there was no way they could miss from the height advantage if they all shot.

He would be dead before he was even halfway down.

New plan.

The rock of the mountain mine was covered with grasses that went off into the distance, trees dotting the landscape before giving way to a thicker copse and then a forest. Lance had no idea what kind of creatures lurked in there but he would take his chances over rabid squirrels than trigger-happy Toads any day.

Lance left the path, long grasses brushing his lower legs and tickling his feet, and running as fast as he could for the treeline. The Toads would be emerging any second from the mine and he needed to be gone from their sight.

The grasses were growing taller the further he moved out, making it harder to walk through as they were thick. He also realized as the shouting became audible, that he was not going to make it to the safety of the forest.

Without missing a step Lance dropped to his knees and then his stomach, heart thumping so hard he thought it might pop out of his chest. He glanced over his shoulder, vision slightly obscured by the stalks, but he could see Toads pouring out of the mine now, their angry croaks filling the air.

He shivered, pressing himself more fully into the dirt, gun uncomfortably digging into his stomach.

They weren't looking in his direction, all of their attention on the path as they spread out. Still, it would only be a matter of time before they ventured into the grass. Lance awkwardly hefted the gun under his right arm and began a one-armed crawl, keeping as low as he could in the grasses and praying that the light breeze that whispered in the air would be enough to keep them from noticing a few stalks moving with a bit more force.

Sweat was beading his brow even in the cooler air and every snapped blade beneath his hands made him freeze as they had to have heard that even though it was barely a crackle.

The dirt and grass began to give way to root systems and Lance winced as his knees hit the rough knobs. But he was almost there.

Just a little further.

He kept expecting something to go wrong. It always had before.

But he had to have hope.

For Hope.

One breathless exhale later he was clear of the high grasses and in the cover of the trees. Lance shifted himself around one large trunk before carefully standing, his legs and left arm shaking from the crawl. He stood there for a few minutes, the canopy under the trees too thick for the moon to penetrate and only the barest outlines of more trees visible in front of him.

He couldn't afford to get lost in the forest, but even more than that he could not afford to get caught. Just like with any potential wild animals, he would take his chances.

Lance moved slower now, each step careful in the dark and the gun held loosely in hand rather than tight on his shoulder. With every successful minute in which no search beams penetrated the forest, where the shouting grew quieter and quieter until it disappeared entirely, he felt his heart slowly start to return to normal.

Light began to filter in more heavily up head and Lance beelined for it, wondering if there was some sort of clearing. It would at least give him a bit of direction. He could get his bearings there, mark a tree maybe with what direction he'd come from, and then shimmy up one of the trunks and hide up there until daylight when he would make to go back to the town and figure out how to contact his team. His stomach clenched painfully as he had made his escape before dinner and he shushed it with a pat. He'd dealt with worse.

The clearing came into view and Lance was brought up short, eyes widening.

For it was not a clearing of grasses like he'd imagined.

It was a lake.

A lake.

Water.

He knew Hunk would insist he check it for both acidity and creatures and bacteria and a host of other things that could kill them in space. Lance A; had no idea how to do any of those things and B; he did not care. The water was a gleaming mirror, brushed only by the ripple of the wind across its surface.

He was splashing in before he even realized he'd reached the shore, blaster abandoned on the beach.

Droplets reached up as he sloshed deeper into the lake, striking his chest and face. The water was cold. It was wet.

It was perfect.

He let out a gasp of delight even as his teeth clacked together at the temperature and dove head first in. The water was dark below, thicker than the beaches on Earth. Lance shot up out of the water like he imagined a dolphin would, scattering water droplets as his head whipped backward.

With another happy, hoarse cry, he dove back beneath the surface. He could feel the dirt growing muddy and he surfaced to scrub at his limbs, shrugging out of his nearly gone shirt and using it as a rag. His bangs, grown long again, dripped into his eyes and he pushed them back with a careless hand before lifting said hand up into the light of the moon, marveling at the clean flesh that stared back.

A wide grin stretched his face and he flopped onto his back, floating and staring up at the moon. Just for a minute, he promised himself, idly kicking his feet to propel himself in lazy circles, relishing in the water flowing over his body, the tug on his hair, the scent of the forest and clean air and freedom.

Hot tears stung his eyes then and Lance didn't even try to blink them away nor muffle the distorted sobs tearing out of his throat as reality sunk in.

He was free.

He had done it.

He had actually escaped.

But…

Lance shifted to stand back on his feet, arms wrapped about himself as he shivered in the light breeze and gazed up at this planet's moon.

It wasn't over yet. Far from it.

This was only the beginning.

But Lance liked beginnings. They were a fresh start, a blank page. Anything could happen.

And in this story… he was going to be the hero.

It was time to get started.

xxx

Author's Notes:

And things are starting to look a little bit up for our boy. And Hope. And really everyone cept the Toads. Look at how *happy* Lance is in the lake. *sniffles* So pure, so precious. Poor thing deserves that bit of peace, absolutely. He's had a rough time and that escape, although all together smooth, was a little hard on the soul. But all for the greater good, yeah?

Still reading and enjoying the fic? Please drop a comment below. I'd love to hear from you!