x
As Color Fades Away
Chapter Twelve
Where was he?
Lance turned around, taking in the landscape about him, frown pulling at his features.
Better yet...
How had he gotten here?
This place looked completely unfamiliar, but at the same time not. It felt... it felt safe.
He couldn't remember the last time he'd felt such a thing.
Water stretched out for miles and miles in front of him, practically glowing blue under the night sky speckled with stars. It lapped gently at his feet and he glanced down, his toes having burrowed themselves happily in the sand as the tide drew in and out.
He did not know this place, but it comforted him all the same.
It reminded him of the beaches back in Cuba before they'd moved to America; the air tasting of salt and if he listened closely he could almost hear the cries of birds over the soft lapping of the water against the sand and the singing of the stars.
Was... was this heaven?
He'd been shot, or so he thought. He'd been dying.
And then he'd heard Haggar.
He shuddered, wrapping his arms about himself and giving himself a start as there was no pain at the movement. A glance down revealed unblemished skin; no bandages, no bruises, no cuts or laser burns. His right hand too was whole once more and he twisted it without an inkling of pain.
He was still half-naked.
But this time he was clothed in swim trunks, a dark blue he could make out underneath the moonlight, and unlike with the Galra he was not cold. The faint breeze was warm and pleasant and the air was just the right touch of humid.
He turned again, wet sand squelching beneath his toes, and looked again for some clue as to where he was and how he got there.
All he continued to see was an empty beach.
"Hello?" he called out and started at the sound of his own voice. It wasn't that scratchy, weary one he was so accustomed to now, but whole and vibrant.
No one answered him.
Shrugging, Lance decided he may as well go look around. Keeping to the edge of the ocean, he followed it as it gently curved along the shore, splashing his feet into the tide and laughing aloud as bubbles burst around his feet and the warm spray dashed against his chest. He'd just reached a small rocky cove when a sharp crack filled the air and he jumped nearly a foot in surprise as part of the rock structure gave way, sliding into the ocean with dull plops.
The water by his feet began to bubble and he hurriedly stepped backwards onto the beach, eyeing the ocean distrustfully as the bubbles grew larger and larger. There wasn't an active volcano underneath there… was there?
But as a hooded figure began to rise out of the ocean from the bubbles Lance changed his tune and decided an underwater volcano would be just fine. He backed up further now, fists raised although he knew such a thing couldn't stop her.
Haggar was fully emerged from the water now and she glanced at him, a smirk pulling up her pointed face and yellow eyes nearly glowing in the twilight. Lance moved to step back as she stepped torward the beach but found his feet frozen. Not frozen with fear though. Legit frozen. His mouth too, he discovered, was locked shut, just like in the throne room.
He felt panic shudder through him at the utter helplessness but pushed past it with the best glare he could manage.
Haggar took no notice.
Instead she was looking about the landscape and paying him absolutely no mind. Lance struggled to move, to do something, but his body was no longer responding to him and he could do nothing but watch.
After nearly one of the longest minutes of his life, Haggar finally turned to look at him. "This is quite the mindscape," she smiled, nothing kind about it. "I suppose it is fitting though for the Blue Paladin."
Mindscape? Lance rolled the word over. He'd never heard it.
"We are inside your mind," she explained, gesturing at the oceanic expanse behind her. Her smile turned into a smirk as Lance's eyes widened at the implication. His mind? They were inside his mind? She was inside his mind?
He thought he'd heard her talking earlier in his head but this...?
This was insanity.
She chuckled. "Indeed I am. And there are no secrets here and no escaping from me here. This may be your mind, Paladin, but it is my playground."
Her playground?
No.
Absolutely not.
This was his mind, his ocean, his beach and he wanted her gone.
The waves about Haggar's ankles swelled and sent her stumbling.
Lance was just as surprised as her, moreso when he found himself taking a staggering step forward as her spell released.
What...
What had he just done?
Haggar fixed him with a more calculated stare than her previous smirk and made to bring her hand in front of her.
He'd seen that move before. That was how she worked her magic.
"Get out," he bit out, throwing his own hand wide and the water responded in kind, a small wave hitting at Haggar from the side.
Lance stared at his hand.
Was he controlling the water?
How?
Haggar though had regained her balance and with it her smirk. "No," she said simply. She raised her hand again and before Lance could gesture for another wave there was a flash of purple and black lightning angling at him. ,
A wall of water erupted near his feet and intercepted it as Lance stumbled back, throwing his hands up in front of his face.
The wave fell away back into the foam of low tide, revealing Haggar still standing further out in the ocean and a thoughtful expression on her face.
"Are you not even curious as to why I am here?" she asked, sidestepping another wave he awkwardly gestured in her direction, not sure what he was doing or how but he was finally able to fight and he was not going to waste it. "And do not lie, Paladin. I can feel your questions."
"Don't care," he said instead although yes, he did want to know. "I just want you gone."
She laughed again. "So hasty, Paladin. What if I were to tell you the only way to leave this place was with me, hm? Would you be in such a rush to push me away?"
Lance paused in trying to summon another wave.
He could leave?
Was... was he not dead?
"You are not dead," she replied, grin growing as he scowled at her.
She was reading his mind. He desperately tried to picture a shield, a giant towering wall of water, just like he did when the team mindmelded so they maintained their privacy. She wasn't going to get anything from him.
"Impressive," she commented and he raised it even higher.
"You are not dead," she repeated, "although you gave it your best shot. You were indeed fatally wounded; a laser blast punctured your lung." She shook her head. "Humans are such fragile creatures. You are fortunate I arrived when I did or you would have succumbed to your injury."
Lance felt another shiver down his spine at her description.
A punctured lung?
That would explain why he had been choking on blood.
He... he had almost died.
He felt suddenly faint.
"That is how one ends up in a mindscape," Haggar continued. "When the physical body is failing the mind seeks refuge to escape that pain. It is not so simple as that though. The conditions, so to speak, must be right. It is actually quite the feat to wind up in one's mindscape; most would just fall into unconsciousness and then likely fade from this world. But not you." Her yellow gaze turned searching, tracking over his face. "You are much more than you seem on the surface, Paladin."
Lance didn't quite know how to respond to that. It... it almost sounded like a compliment.
He did not want such a thing from her.
Another shiver went down his spine.
"What do you want from me?" Lance demanded, voice stronger than he felt.
"I know you know the answer to that," she smiled.
Information.
On his team.
His family.
"I'll never betray them," he said.
Promised.
Never.
"I admire your conviction," she told him, waving her hand and summoning up a a ball of crackling black and purple energy. "Truly. But it is all in vain. None can resist me."
"Watch me," Lance snapped, clenching his hand into a fist.
A fist that was suddenly wrapped tight about his bayard.
His eyes widened. When had that gotten there?
Well. He grinned. No sense it letting it go to waste.
Lance lifted the bayard, the weight comforting, and braced it on his shoulder. "Now get out."
"I like that look," Haggar purred, not at all intimidated by the gun aimed at her. In fact, she looked excited and Lance tried not to recoil. "You look so much like my Shiro," she continued and Lance stilled.
What?
My Shiro?
There was no shoving back the shudder at how wrong that sounded.
"Come," Haggar called. "Let me see your inner strength so that I may crush it."
With more bravado than he felt, Lance forced his lips into a smirk. "Your funeral."
And Lance fired.
The shot flew true for Haggar's head — and her death would not be one he would regret, assuming he could even kill her here — but she blocked it with her glowing orb.
And the threw her own attack.
Lance somehow summoned a wall of water to absorb it and then fired again, the water parting to allow his shot through. Haggar dodged it but Lance wasn't done, sending the ocean wave after her.
She was bowled over and he let out a cheer.
It was a little too soon for victory though as she struggled back to her feet, robes dripping wet.
She did not attack.
Lance held his next shot, held back the wave from pummeling her again, even though he knew he should take it. Haggar would not offer him the same mercy.
And yet...
Yet he couldn't pull the trigger. Not when she was no longer fighting back.
The water swirled about her ankles still and he took comfort in that. If she tried anything he would stop her.
But...
But if she was telling the truth and the only way out of her was through her...
Although did he want to go back? Out there he didn't have a gun or this magical control over the ocean. His body was hurt there, weak, and she would do all she could to get him to spill secrets on his teammates.
But...
But he didn't want to die.
He did want to live.
He swallowed thickly. What to do?
Hagger answered for him, a low chuckle echoing across the open water despite the quiet volume. "I see I was correct in my assumption."
Lance tried to return the the bravado and confidence he'd felt just a moment before, offering up a cheeky grin that if he tried hard enough almost reached his eyes "That I'm awesome?"
Haggar let out a laugh. "Come now. We both know that is not true."
What?
Lance shook his head, protest on his lips at her denial. "I—"
"I see you as you are, Paladin," she cut in. "You have strength, yes, but you have weakness too. More than you wish you had."
"You're wrong." His voice didn't waver. It didn't.
She was wrong.
Right?
"Am I?" Haggar waved a hand to the side. "Why are you here, Paladin?" She held up a hand as he opened his mouth. "In this mindscape? Because you nearly died. Why did you nearly die? Because of your failed escape attempt. Why were you even here to attempt such? Because you were captured. Why were you captured? Because you are weak."
"No," Lance shook his head. "I... I'm strong." He was. Maybe not as brave as Shiro or as fierce as Keith, or as smart as Hunk or as clever as Pidge, but he was strong. In his own way.
"No. You are not."
And Haggar's words hurt. There was a darkness to them that sent a choppiness to the waves, clouds racing across the sky. They dug in like shards of glass, piercing and pointed and he found himself frozen once more, unable to escape them.
"I am," he whispered, although he could barely hear it over the howl of the wind beginning to brew.
Images, memories, flooded his mind then and he was not sure if it was Haggar's doing or his own. They showed him pleading for water. Screaming as he was shocked and his bones were broken.
They hurt.
His bayard vanished.
Lance didn't even have a chance to miss it as new memories were swarming in front of his eyes.
Each one was a failure.
The simulator crashing again and again. Iverson telling him he was only there because Keith had washed out. The snickers behind his back as he received another dismal test score. The disappointment in Allura's eyes as he messed up another training simulation. The reprimand and exhaustion in Shiro's as he had to separate him and Keith yet again.
Failure.
Weak.
Getting stabbed aboard Blue, dropped and kicked and taunted.
Pathetic.
His breath caught as his wrist twisted on its own accord, bruises blossoming across the dark skin and the pain as fresh as if the commander had just broken it.
He screamed, the sound echoing about the open expanse, and Haggar laughed.
"You are weak, Paladin. You see it too."
Lance grit his teeth against the pain her words caused, his heart breaking and twisting.
She was...
She wasn't entirely wrong.
He was weak.
But.
He would protect his friends, his family.
Their faces flashed in his mind but this time not disappointed, angry versions, but smiles and laughter and happiness.
He would not let them come to harm.
"M-maybe I am," he stuttered out, feeling a sharp pain at his own admission, "but... but I'm strong enough to protect them."
And if the earlier words were darkness and pains his were light and healing. Immediately the vice wrapped about his heart lessened and the throbbing pain of his wrist vanished, replaced by a caress of warmth. The wind swept back to a gentle evening breeze and the clouds parted above to reveal only the star studded sky.
His bayard reappeared in his hands.
Yellow orbs widened and then narrowed at the declaration. Haggar was impressed, truly. His inner strength was unlike any she had ever seen; the cracks she had pressed into his very mind being filled in with warmth and love.
He would be more difficult to break than she had anticipated. But he would break. All things did before her.
She readied another attack in her hands, black lightning crackling.
The sound was swallowed up by the roar of the surf and Haggar's eyes widened as the ocean rose up before her.
It crashed down before she could so much as raise her hands.
On the beach Lance held one trembling hand outstretched as the tidal wave smoothed back to the rolling surf, Haggar nowhere to be seen.
Had he done it?
It seemed too easy.
The beach was quiet though save for the sounds of the water lapping at the shore and he released a heavy breath, legs giving way and sending him into the sand.
He'd done it.
He'd actually fought her off.
For now.
The thought sent a pang as real as the memories he'd seen through him.
Once he returned, somehow, to his body Haggar would be there. And she was no doubt going to be very, very very angry with what he'd done to her here. Somehow he was going to have to fight her off.
Again.
And again.
But he had done it once. He could do it again.
He was not weak like she said.
Well, not entirely.
She had been right. He did fail. A lot. Probably more than he succeeded.
He was the weakest link after all, the seventh wheel in Team Voltron.
He wondered how long he could last.
At what point would they tell him that the trade wasn't happening? A day? Two? A week? And then he what, held out for the rest of his life?
He knew how impossible that was. Torture without an end?
No one would make it through that.
There could be an end though. A definite out and one that protected his family.
He just... his hands clenched in the sand.
He...
He would do anything to protect them. Anything.
But...
Could he do that?
Could he take that final plunge all on his own?
If he was lucky he wouldn't have to. They'd go too far one time, cut just a little too deep.
Haggar couldn't always be there to save him, right?
He shuddered and shook his head as a cooler breeze picked up.
He shouldn't think about such things right now. Not until...
Not until that was the last option available. Although, he let out a low laugh that was anything but humorous, he didn't think they'd be so lax in their guard of him anymore. He'd bet it was cuffs or some other restraint for him for the remainder of his time here.
His wrist already ached thinking about it.
He stood up abruptly, sand falling away.
Enough.
Enough of only thinking of the negatives, of the worst outcome. He couldn't say what the future held but right now?
Right now he was in his mindscape that apparently was the most beautiful beach he had ever seen and he should take advantage of it. He had no idea if he was ever going to make it back and if his end was soon coming, if torture and pain were going to become his new best friends, then he should enjoy this peace while it lasted.
Lance walked back to the ocean and let the tide tickle his feet. It was neither hot nor warm and was beckoning him to go for a swim.
So he did.
He crashed through the surf, a real smile pulling at his face at the ocean spray and the feeling of home. His feet squelched through sand until suddenly there was no more and he was off the bar and into open water.
Laughing with just the sheer joy of swimming again he dove in and out, gliding through the waves with all the grace of a dolphin, splashing water and dancing with the current.
When he'd had his fill he floated on his back with the water bobbing gently below him, staring up at the stars that contained Earth's constellations. He picked out the North Star and then the Big and Little Dippers and traced the made up constellations he and his siblings had created over the years. There was the giraffe on ice skates and over there the flying pig.
He wondered how they were all doing.
He forced himself to not think about them as he threatened to add his own salty tears into the ocean at the sharp pang of homesickness.
Good things, remember?
He'd just begun looking for his personal favorite made-up constellation – the diving mermaid – when a burst of pain shot through him and he gasped and flailed in the water. A cramp? In his chest? A second later it happened again and he groaned, treading with just his feet as both hands went to clutch his chest where the center of pain was emitting.
And although it was dark, he could not miss the telltale scent of blood and the way the water grew warm around him.
Another stab of agony had him slipping beneath the surface where the blood was even thicker and turning the crystalline blue into purple. A spasm shook him and his wrist screamed as it unnaturally twisted all on its own.
What was happening? Dios, what was happening?
Lance tried to breach the surface, but the blood was pushing him down, heavier than the water. He clawed at it with his good hand, desperate now as despite his efforts he could not reach the surface.
He was going to drown.
The thought was beyond terrifying.
He flailed again, putting all of himself into one last push, reaching for the surface–
–and awoke with a sharp gasp, lungs burning and chest heaving and bright purple lights and hands digging into his shoulders and pain pain pain oh Dios duele duele duele, Dios, por favor hazlo parar, make it stop make it stop make it stop.
"Welcome back," came a low chuckle over his harsh breaths and moans.
Haggar.
A hand caressed the side of his face and that touch was more painful than any of the agony emanating from his chest and Lance tried to pull away.
The hand tightened painfully. "As I told you," came a murmur, "You will not escape me so easily."
Lance hated the whimper pulled from him and Haggar's subsequent laugh.
The hand patted his cheek and then withdrew.
"Commander, he is all yours," she said and Lance stiffened.
What?
His eyes flew open and he he pushed past the searing light to make out the blurred forms of Haggar and...
And Theodore.
Oh no.
He moved to sit up, to do something, to go somewhere, but just like last time he'd awoken in the lab room his hands and feet were restrained although there was no bar across his throat. Pulling at his hands was a mistake as pain so intense his vision flared white as he jammed his broken wrist up against the manacle and he dropped his head back down with a weak groan and thump.
"I expect quite the show, Commander," Haggar said, amusement coloring her tone.
"The Kri Za Kri will give us both what we desire," came the returning rumble.
Kri Za Kri? Lance sounded out. He didn't like the sound of it; all harsh consonants that the Galrans seemed to love and anything they loved was most definitely something he knew he would not.
"Then I leave you to it."
A moment later a door hissed shut and Lance had a sickening feeling he was all alone in the room with the Galran commander. It was proven a moment later as sure enough Theodore was there, looming over him and fangs flashing in a smile that had Lance instinctively shrinking back and making the Galran's grin widen.
He said nothing though as he stepped up next to the table, a series of metal rings in his hands.
Manacles.
He grabbed Lance's right wrist, squeezing it and drawing a sharp inhale as Lance tried not to scream, new dots dancing in vision, and before he knew it the manacle was tightly clasped there and a matching one on his left wrist, a length of chain connecting them.
The same was done to his ankles and Lance's weak attempts to jerk his foot away did nothing except earn him a set of claws digging into the bottom of his foot right on top of the injuries made by the grate.
He whimpered again, unable to control it.
Haggar had apparently saved his life from the fatal lung puncture but everything else she had left as it was.
Figured.
His hands were then released from the table but before Lance could even think about trying to swing a punch (for all the good it would do) Theodore yanked on the chain lead extending from the wrist manacles and Lance screamed as he was pulled to sitting by his broken wrist, vision whiting out again.
The chain was affixed now to the end of the table between his splayed feet and he was forced to hunch over uncomfortably, chest aching. He twisted his head as Theodore moved to go behind him and there was sudden pain as claws descended into his hair, Theodore's apparent favorite pastime, and his head was dragged backwards, baring his neck and forcing Lance to look directly up into cruel yellow eyes.
A glint of metal in Theodore's other hand captured his attention and his eyes flicked to it; some sort of metal ring that instinctively he knew he did not want near him.
It lowered, brushing against his throat, and Lance jerked his head.
"Let go of me," it came out a rasp but at least belied any of the fear trying to claw its way free.
Theodore's answer was to backhand him with the object, Lance's head snapping to the side but going nowhere thanks to the grip in his hair.
Dazed and ears ringing Lance offered no further resistance as the the ring was opened and snapped about his neck, tightening so much that he gagged, hands unsuccessfully trying to pull free from where they were chained to claw at it.
Theodore laughed and released his head.
Lance attempted to take in a gulp of air around the device, and felt his throat constrict.
He couldn't breathe.
He listed sideways on the table, not even the pain as he dragged his full upper body weight against his broken wrist enough to break him from the closing in darkness.
A claw dug into the back of his neck then and the ring, collar he realized sickly, loosened the barest bit but it was enough for him to suck in a greedy breath and then another.
"Pathetic," he heard Theodore mutter over his gasps. "Humans are so weak."
Lance focused instead on breathing over trying to disagree.
A clawed hand tipped his chin up and Lance forced himself to narrow his eyes into the best glare he could muster even as his heart hammered in his chest and meet that predatory yellow gaze.
Don't show fear.
That was what the Galran wanted, Lance knew. This was a power trip, just like last time.
But unlike last time Lance wouldn't give into it.
He wasn't scared.
Absolutely not.
He was lying.
He was terrified.
But he couldn't show it. Couldn't let this Galran gain any more power.
And so he set his glare and clenched his jaw.
And Theodore...
Smiled.
It was not a nice smile.
The hand holding his chin up disappeared and Theodore moved to the side. Lance turned his head to follow him...
And found his vision blocked by a strip of cloth.
A blindfold.
Darkness.
Just like the vents.
Pitch black and small and tight and he couldn't breathe again, he couldn't do this again, not again not again not again.
No. No no no.
"N-no," and that weak voice was not his, couldn't be his. He wrenched his head to the side but Theodore grabbed him by his hair again and he was absolutely helpless to stop him as the blindfold was affixed, so tight and thick he could feel it cutting against his ears where it was tightened.
Everything went dark.
He swallowed thickly, pulse pounding, and trying not to give into the growing panic.
He wasn't in the vent. He wasn't in the pod. There was air. He could breathe. He was okay. He was okay. He was oka–
The chain jerked without warning between his hands and Lance choked out a gasp and then winced at the cruel chuckle.
"I find your attempts at defiance irksome, Paladin." The chain jerked again, this time to the right and Lance's body moved without his permission in the twist. "Let me see that pathetic glare of yours now."
All went quiet then, the chain slack.
And Lance realized the silence and lack of touch was worse.
He had no idea where the Galran was.
That was scarier than anything.
Where was he?
There was the sudden harsh sound of metal on metal and a release of pressure on his ankles.
He was no longer restrained to the table.
There was another tug on his wrists and Lance barely had a moment to register the movement before he was being pulled the length of his table, his body dangling off into the unknown.
Theodore was going to drag him off the table.
He frantically tried to get his feet out in front of him and they slid over just as the rest of him did.
They hit the floor first.
Lance cried out at the pain as everything jolted at the hit and barely managed to get his feet under him, ankle cuffs and chains clinking, before Theodore was puling forward on his bound hands again and Lance had no choice but to stumble in his direction as fire swam down his broken wrist.
He felt lost.
Disoriented.
It was so dark.
"Nothing to say now?" Theodore's voice came from up ahead. "Pathetic. And you call yourself a Paladin of Voltron."
Lance jerked to a stop without meaning to, wrist screaming at him for that mistake, but its pain muted by the words.
What?
What did he just say?
He could hear nearly the same words rumbled out in the same dark cadence wash over him then, followed by laughter.
Theodore's brother had said the same thing.
Pathetic.
The word echoed.
Lance swallowed thickly, feeling the collar digging into his flesh at the action.
He wasn't.
"I'm... I'm not," he whispered. His voice grew stronger. "I'm not."
Another laugh greeted him. "Tell yourself whatever brings you false comfort, Paladin. Your true colors will be revealed to even yourself at the Kri Za Kri."
Theodore started walking again and Lance was forced to follow, stomach churning.
They were wrong.
He was not pathetic.
But...
But what was this Kri Za Kri? What was it going to do?
Why did he feel so sick just repeating the phrase in his mind?
They came to another stop, but this one of the Galran's make.
"We are here," he said simply, although the dark glee lighting up his voice did not reassure Lance in any way.
"Welcome to your Kri Za Kri, Paladin," Theodore said. "Or, as you would say in your tongue, your blood for blood."
Blood for blood?
That...
That did not sound good.
In front of them a door must have opened as suddenly there were the sounds of hundreds of voices chanting "Kri Za Kri, Kri Za Kri" and the stamping of boots and staffs and Lance balked at the tidal wave of noise against his dark world.
He didn't want to go in there.
There was a churning in his gut, a sick feeling of premonition.
If he went in there...
Something bad was going to happen.
Something he could not even begin to imagine.
Why was he so scared?
Theodore chuckled lowly. "It is time for your judgment, Paladin." He pulled forward on the chains and despite Lance's best efforts he was dragged forward into the maelstrom, into whatever horrible future he knew awaited. "And I daresay I am going to enjoy it very much."
Author's Notes:
Fun Fact: Kri Za Kri is Croatian for 'blood for blood.' Try chanting it outside your sibling's door in the wee hours and increasing in volume. It's lots of fun.
So quite a bit of things happening this chapter. I created the idea of a "mindscape" as a way to allow Lance to regain some semblance of himself and mentally recover. I sort of based it off the idea of (reading too much Yugioh fanfiction xD) of the "soul rooms" of the spirits. The word "mindscape" was chosen from the words "landscape" being that it represents a location and "escape to the mind" as that is what it essentially is. And in here we got to see Lance conquer some personal demons (for the time being, at least) and fight of Haggar. Mwahaha. You are strong, sweetie.
Next chapters involving the Kri Za Kri return us to all of our whump. As Scar would say, be prepared! And for those asking, we will be checking in with our other Paladins soon. I haven't forgotten about them, never fear!
Thanks again to the amazing lovely reviewers. Seriously, I can't thank you all enough. Shout outs go to: Alexa, Swirly Rainbow, cookiebook322, ariatheguardianangel106, Jadegem02, LishaChan, guest, deaththecripple, wingedflower, Purplehood, Blakeyfur, WhiteWolf100101, DoctorMerlinReid, Lasagna, sally3015, leximay, McCorkren, Eeveecat1248, GracefulReader, Bryler, StrawberryFever3, Dragon Queene Layla St Gabriel, Lady Zephyr, NotSoJelsaShipper, SonoSvegliato, unicornpie, Violinworld, CreepyLittleLullablyLiL, jaymzNshed, vickydd, GingerJazzy, PaintedWings45, and fandomspotatoes!
And since I'm apparently on a Disney quote kick, let's go with Cruella. Just like her I worship fur (reviews), I live for fur (reviews) because is there any woman (author) in this world who doesn't? So if you've got a tick to spare and you've been enjoying the story/chapter, please do drop a comment below. Thanks everyone!