Chapter 40: Knights of Light(Part 3)(Keith's POV)

Once inside the Fortress, three corridors await them. Two on the side and one straight in front of them. Looking at Allura he notices her eyes are closed in concentration. King Alfor moves closer to him and whispers, "Has my daughter always been so stubborn?"

He whispers back, "Pretty much. She didn't even think of the consequences that might await her choice of 'let's randomly bond with the Rift Creature and not tell anyone because they would try to come up with some other alternative when we need answers now or Honera will destroy the whole universe'."

"Really?"

Shrugging he whispers, "That's the gist of what happened. I wasn't all for the idea, but you know majority rules, and whatnot. But basically yeah she is a bit stubborn."

"Indeed," Alfor whispers. Turning to look at him, Keith can see he has a clear concern for his daughter. Which is good, it's just, he's her father, he should know how set Allura can be on an idea. And how stubborn she can be in persisting that idea.

But then again he's been trapped in the Astral Plane for ten thousand years, his memory could be a little fuzzy.

"This way," Allura says, leading them down the corridor on the left. Walking through the corridor, apprehension once again builds up in him. What exactly are they going to find? What Honerva wants and what her plans are, yes, but what else. He also has a sneaking suspicion that they are being watched somehow. But by Honerva or not he can't tell.

Arriving at the end of the corridor another door appears. Allura places her hand on it, while Alfor walks up to her. Looking around he still has this eerie feeling that they are being watched. His point becomes proven as once Allura opens the door, with a disapproving Alfor at her side a big shadow ball comes straight for them. He ducks quickly as it zooms over head.

Then the floor starts to dissolve along with the walls to the castle. They all fall and he notices what attacked them. His eyes widen, it's the Robeast from Arus! Suddenly his lion catches him and he scrambles his way to the pilot seat. Getting into position he notices that other lions have also arrived.

"Guys it's the monster from Arus, we know how to beat this thing." Shiro says.

Keith plunges his bayard into the red lion's bayard slot. The sword appears and they go to fight it.

"Remember we strike as soon as its third ball throw lands back in its scepter."

So all they need is to dodge two more strikes and then land the finishing blow. Simple enough. It shows its second strike at them which they dodge with ease, along with the third strike. Keith then moves his arm to land the finishing blow, defeating the Robeast easily.

"Do you think Honerva knows we're here?" asks Lance.

Lotor responds, "She won't know until we get to the heart of her mind where her deepest desires are. These are just the mental blocks we need to face. Allura I'm going to need to connect with you again to make it to the next stage."

And suddenly they are transported to the next stage which has another large fortress but it's mainly dark purple. And they are outside of it on a grassy field.

"Any chance that the Rift Creature isn't pulling us to the scary fortress up ahead?" Hunk asks.

"Sorry Hunk, but that is exactly where the Creature is guiding me." Allura answers.

Hunk whines but they trek onward towards the fortress. But before they can go inside another Robeast appears. He recognizes this one as the one who appeared before them when Ulaz was showing them his secret base. And the one Ulaz sacrificed himself to.

Suddenly four lions appear in front of the beast and he can hear King Alfor in his helmet say, "Paladins, we'll keep this beast at bay. You continue onward."

Allura smiles and says, "Thank you father."

Trekking towards the fortress they open the door. It transports them to another area of Honerva's mind where there are thick thorn branches. "These must be memories…" Pidge comments.

"Well then let's see which ones they are." Allura says.

He opens his hand for his bayard and begins slashing. He sees memories from an older time. A time probably before her and Zarkon corruption and some from her corruption days. And some from when she was uncorrupted. A memory that especially disturbs all of them is when they see three of the original paladins amidst a massive army with Zarkom looming over them. Honvera then kills them when they don't tell Zarkon where the lions are, and knows somehow that they are lying when they say the lions are destroyed.

"She killed them and he watched. He watched her kill his friends, his teammates!" Allura shouts in outrage after they witness the scene. "How could he!?"

Shiro puts his hand on her shoulder. "He did go mad from the creatures, it's possible the lions were the only thing he recognized."

"And not his friends?! People who he fought with longer than the lions were made! He should have recognized them more than the lions!"

Lotor hums, "Perhaps since the Creatures were from the rift all he wanted was power after they made him go mad. The Lions would be the only thing that could stop him so it makes sense that he would focus on that instead of who he was friends with. And he seemed to really want quintessence when he was alive. So much so other than the lions it was his only goal. It was the only reason he conquered planets after all."

Keith nods, yeah that would make sense. It doesn't make what Zarkon did any less wrong, as he still enslaved thousands of peoples and killed his closest friends with the help of Honerva. Suddenly their landscape changes again, and now they are in a field with lots of pink flowers. The sky is caught between day and night, making it twilight. A dark moon is the focal point of the whole landscape with how big it is.

Appearing out of nowhere comes a mech he doesn't recognize. It's very lage, about the size of Voltron. It has wings protruding out of its back and it looks vaguely similar to Zarkon. The lion's roar behind them and they all quickly get to them. Flying in Red, he notes that it looks scarily similar to Zarkon.

"Alright I know we've beaten this mech before, but it took the whole might of Voltron. As Voltron we need to make sure to avoid his blasts or getting too close for our quintessence to be drained by it." Shiro says.

Ah, so it be be a mech they faced while he was in Paris, France helping in an entirely different war.

They begin the fight, dodging blasts and hitting the mech with their own. It's too bulky to be really fast. But their hits aren't doing that much to slow it down or destroy it. This little game of dodge and blast continues until he feels an old spirit join together with him. He feels the power of his lion also get boosted and in his head he can hear Alfor say, "Let us lend you our strength."

Then he notices his bayard slot open up again. "Keith, do you feel that!?" Shiro shouts.

He nods and he shoves his bayard into the port and twists. Suddenly a big flaming sword appears and with one slash they defeat the mech. Voltron splits into five separate lions again with the other four paladins also having lions. Keith is also stunned that they are now outside of their lions. The mech has turned into a black lion and roars, which invites the other lions to roar as well. And outside of the lion appears Zarkon. But he looks different, his eyes are no longer just yellow, and there is no scar down his face. He is also wearing his black paladin armor.

After he's done taking in his surroundings he says with relief, "Alfor, Trigel, Blaytz, Gyrgan, you're all okay…. I'm so…."

"You had Honvera kill them! Why should you be relieved that they are okay, don't you remember anything!" Allura shouts in anger at him.

Zarkon looks confused, "But I didn't…"

Lotor sighs, "It seems that we've ended his corruption but made him forget what he did during that time. But that's okay, I don't want to deal with the corrupt version of my father."

"Father? Does that mean…." "Yes I am. Yours and Honvera's to be specific. Now we are kind of in a rush and we need to find what she desires…. most."

Why the hesitancy? And he remembers what they saw in Honvera's memories. She is Lotor's mother despite him claiming otherwise. He must be unwilling to admit that he was wrong.

Zarkon looks around and then stops at the moon. "That moon looks like a moon of Daibazaal's."

"You're right, there is no moon of Altea."

All the Lions send shots to the moon making it burst open. And what he sees he is surprised by. He sees pictures of a life that wasn't in her memories, of her raising a Lotor as her son. That she desperately wants a life with him, and Zarkon too. It aligns with what he saw in her memories that she desperately wanted to find them and make sure her son was alright. Those memories stood out, besides her killing the original paladins, amidst the swath of memories they saw.

He then turns to look at Lotor and feels rage building up inside of him. All of this could have been avoided if he would just talk with Honerva and get to know her. But no, he assumed that she hadn't changed that all she wanted was Quintessence. He knows that from how Honerva tried to find him and his friends that she was more good than Gabriel Agreste ever was. And the fact that she wasn't aware it was her son that she was hurting almost gives her a free past. But what makes her better than Gabriel is that she tried to reach out to her son, to reestablish a connection with remaining family member she had left instead of trying to bring Zarkon back from the dead and ignoring Lotor altogether just because a stupid wish could make her family come back and everything would be fine. Because no more heartache could ever happen after her wish was made. Surely not. They'd just be a perfect family together.

Lotor says, "Now that we know of her desires we should go before she sends someone to fight us to get out of her head or do something even more damaging. So let's focus on going back to the waking world."

Closing his eyes and trying to let the anger fade, he concentrates on going back to the real world. But before they manage that, Allura suddenly cries out in pain, breaking his concentration. And what he sees is Allura hunched over in pain, hands on her head. She's also shaking pretty badly.

Lotor quickly grabs her hand and shouts, "Grab my hand as well I can guide us back to Voltron. Zarkon, I need you and the others to distract Honvera for a bit while get the others out of here. Everyone focus with me and…"

He flutters his eyes open and gasps for air. That was too much excitement. But at least Gabriel didn't appear. At the mention of Gabriel's name his anger at Lotor returns. He shoves it down, he can deal with it later.

Honerva's POV

"Are you sure I did the right thing by trying to take Allura out of the picture?" Honvera asks Gabriel as he stands beside her.

"Absolutely. They know what you want now and they will try to stop you no matter what. And without the princess they can't wormhole to our location. I do say it's about time to test the mech we've finished constructing."

"You're right."