Chapter 34: Surely a Festival with Lighten up the Mood, Right?(Allura's POV)

Allura sits down with Lasam. It was nice to talk about Altea with someone who was actually invested in what she was saying for hours on end. But now he's come to talk to her about Honerva's plan which excites her more.

"Thank you for speaking with me….."

"It's no problem. But I don't have a lot of time. Honvera will know and then he'll…."

"He'll who?"

"Nevermind. Honvera is planning on…." Suddenly Lasam's eyes go wide and he falls off his chair and onto the floor. Dang it they were so close! She rushes to his side just as Lotor does. Watching Lotor puts his hand on Lasam's forehead and a purple light emits from his hand. All of a sudden a dark creature flies out of Lasam's throat and starts to bounce around the room. In shock she freezes as the dark creature signals in on her. Lotor quickly grabs her arm as doctors come in to get Lasam. Once out of the room Commander Holt shouts, "Reverse the polarity of the room and maybe it will stun it!"

The people observing the room quickly do as the Commander asks and the polarity of the room reserves sucking on the metal in the middle. The creature stops moving and its trail of inkiness is lost.

"Get a containment chamber for this creature!" Commander Holt shouts as Kuro wraps her in his arms. The warmth of his embrace is enough to get her out of the shock just a bit. "What was that thing?" she asks.

Lotor looks on into the room grimly. "It's a rift creature."

"Like the ones that attacked Daibazzal and later Zarkon and Honvera."

"Precisely. But why was Lasam carrying one? And who was this he Lasam mentioned? He seemed almost afraid of whoever that person is."

"All good questions we don't have answers to. Is Lasam okay?" Kuro asks.

"It seems Lotor got the creature out of him in time. He's alive though until we get the doctor's diagnosis I am not sure when he will wake up or if he will recover at all."

"Leaving him in a coma?!"

"Yeah. Being in a coma is a worse case scenario but hopefully the sleeping period does not last long. Although," Commander Holt continues, "We will have to tell his comrades what happened."

"No!" she shouts, breaking out of shock, "They'll just retreat into their shells again. I was making progress with talking to the others besides Lasam after Hunk and Marinette's continuous visits along with me accompanying them."

Kuro nods, "Allura's right. This will just confirm Cimiru's suspicions of us and make the others more afraid to speak up. However, I don't like the thought that when the others decide to speak up that they go through the same process as Lasam. It looked painful and I think it would be dishonest to hide this from them."

"You can't be on the fence about this!"

"But it's how I feel, Lura. On the one hand I don't want this to backtrack the progress we've been making, while on the other hand I feel it would be dishonest to hide what could happen if they speak up. What if Lotor isn't as fast as he was today? Or he's busy with other things and can't be around for their confession? It's risky."

"I agree with Kuro. While I would like to get information about what that witch is planning, I cannot subject your people to torment at the expense that they reveal what she is planning. It is not right. Even if I manage to save them like I did for Lasam." Lotor adds.

"But!" Allura protests, but Lotor shakes his head, "No buts Princess. We will have to tell them. Like Kuro said, it wouldn't be right to reveal this huge risk they would take by confessing what they know."

"But…."

"My mind is made up. That witch will not take anything more from us." Lotor then turns towards the door and exits. She sighs. She knows Kuro and Lotor are right, but Honvera must be stopped. Surely a little risk to learning what the Pilots know is okay as its for stopping the end of their reality as they know it. Right?

"Lura are you okay?" Kuro asks her once Commander Holt and the others have also gone.

"Yes….No….. I just wish I could end this. Find out what she's planning and stop it once and for all. But for all the progress I make it seems like there's always some obstacle we have to tackle to get to the next point. Not to mention that mysterious he that Lasam feared."

"Didn't Keith mention seeing Hawkmoth beside Honvera during the battle. Perhaps he's the he Lasam was referring to."

"But the others…."

"Didn't see him, I know. Though I think it's time we learned more about this Hawkmoth from Keith's point of view, don't you?"

"It could be a clue…." She admits

"Then it's settled. We'll arrange for Team Miraculous and Voltron plus you and I to learn more about this Hawkmoth."

At the Meeting Room:

Keith stands at the center of the room making it clear he is the center of attention. Looking around she notices how weird it feels for just the twelve of them to be in the same room together all at once. She wonders where Pidge is, but dismisses it, and focuses on the task at hand.

Allura clears her throat, "My interrogation with Lasam didn't go as planned. The only thing Lasam mentioned was that a mysterious he would do something to him. Not that Honvera would do something, but this mysterious he would. Kuro thinks that he could be who Keith saw as Hawkmoth."

She notices Keith tense visibly meanwhile Adrien shouts in outrage, "But that's impossible. He died months later to me accidentally cataclysmed him due to him trying to escape our clutches which didn't work since we had taken the horse miraculous from him earlier!"

Calmly she responds with, "But it's the only thing we've got and Lasam seemed afraid of him just as much as Keith is with this Hawkmoth character. So we brought you all here to learn more about him."

"Specifically from Keith's point of view." Kuro adds.

Keith sighs and then takes a deep breath. "I guess I don't have a choice do I?... It all started when I was expelled because of Lila. Lady Time had appeared to me and told me to come with her. Like I told Pidge I was confused as to why but did anyway. And what I saw was terrible. A fake ladybug, Sentibug, had led us to Hawkmoth's lair; however he didn't look surprised and instead looked thrilled to see all of us. Adriden confronted him first, outraged at the situation but Hawkmoth beat him down easily."

He then takes a deep breath before continuing, "It was a terrible fight with Hawkmoth beating all of us easily. When he took off the ring that Adrien held he wasn't at all flustered at the fact that he killed his own son, but rather pleased that now he had the Black Cat Miraculous and once the real Ladybug came back all would be fixed and this bloody battle would have never taken place."

"Lady Time then showed me that the universe was so distraught by this outcome it ripped itself apart destroying everything. She gave me a version of the Rabbit Miraculous that wasn't being used by another holder and told me to beat Hawkmoth so that the universe would not rip itself apart later. I did as I was told and took on Hawkmoth angry and upset that he could ever be okay with himself for hurting his own son."

Keith takes another deep breath, "I beat him eventually. Lady Time also told me to make sure this future never happened so I went to where Mayura had planned to fake a fight between her and Sentibug and stopped it before it could happen. That's how I got the peacock miraculous as well."

Stunned silence persists throughout the room after Keith's confession.

He then continues, "Hawkmoth while in his pursuit to get his family back together ignored Adrien and thought that he could easily repair everything to be a blissful utopia where his wife and son would be with him forever. He was so engrossed in having the perfect family he dreamed of he ignored Adrien and a new potential love, Natalie. I will always hate him, but also fear his burning desire that led him to do anything including murder."

"Keith I'm so sorry, I had no idea you had been through that. Hawkmoth sounds like a truly evil person." Shiro comments.

"He was." Keith says with scorn, but he's trembling as if he's afraid.

"My father truly did that?" Adrien whispers.

Keith nods, still trembling.

"I mean I knew he was a horrible person for neglecting me and figuring out that he was Hawkmoth the person who was emotionally terrorizing Paris but I never thought, I never believed….that he would commit murder and be so emotionless about it."

"He thought everything would be fixed once he had Marinette's miraculous. But he had no way of knowing how long Ladybug would take to get back from Space. No idea! And yet he just patiently waited, not giving a damn about all the damage he caused!" Keith angrily spits out, still trembling.

Silence once again fills the room and Keith suddenly takes leave out of the room. Adrien notices and tries to go after him but Shiro stops him. "Why are you holding me back? He needs to be comforted. To know it's okay!"

"He's always been hiding his emotions even from me and we just forced him to open up. I don't think any of us should go near him right now."

"I'm not the one who forced him. It was you two!" Adrien shouts at her and Kuro.

"And I didn't hear you answer Keith's question with a 'yes Keith you have a choice. You don't have to tell us if you don't want to'!" refutes Kuro.

Kagami calmly replies, "We all wanted to hear what his thoughts about Hawkmoth were and why he was so afraid. It's all our fault for wanting to listen. No one here is the only one to blame. All of us are."

Marinette nods, "Yeah."

Adrien sighs, "I suppose you're right." He sits back down. "I just wish we could comfort him somehow."

"How? We have never been in a situation where we've seen a future that ends the world." Chloe states. "I agree with you Adrien, somehow we have to comfort him. But none of our personal experiences can even relate to what he went through."

"So we're at a roadblock." Zoe comments.

"Uh-huh," confirms Allura. All she wanted to know was if Hawkmoth could be the person Lasam was afraid of. But it seems like Keith's experience wasn't shared by his comrades as they aren't afraid of him. So it couldn't be possible.

She excuses herself from this drama to think about it on her own. Walking to the Bridge she looks at the stars. So far nothing has gotten them closer to understanding Honerva's plan. Just what was Honerva's plan and why was it so frustrating to try to find out what it is?

Sighing she looks at the dashboard.

Taking a closer look she notices that the scanners are picking up some weird activity on a planet. An enormous amount of activity which isn't normal for this particular planet. Though it does look familiar. She opens up a hailing frequency and Dringneir appears.

"Ah Blue Paladin. To what pleasure do I owe this transmission."

"Oh I was just wondering why this planet had so much activity on it and now that I know it's Sandeia well….."

"Why don't you and the other Paladins come to Clear Day? It might make you be rid of those troubling thoughts."

"I'm not…."

Dringneir laughs, "I can tell when something is bothering someone. So why not come to our Clear Day Festival and relax for a bit."

"I guess we all could use some relaxation."

"Perfect, see you there!"

"See you."

Somehow she had gotten the Atlas invited to a Festival. Sighing, she announces on the microphone. "Attention, all Atlas Crew, we have been invited to a Clear Day Festival. Let's use this time to destress, relax and have some fun."