Chapter Two
Her
head thrown back and her eyes closed, Bethie released an explosive sigh and
collapsed against Skech. Her skin was moist underneath his trembling
hands and she tasted the salt on his when she pressed a kiss against his
shoulder. He laid back down, taking her
with him and she rested her cheek against his chest as she caught her
breath.
Moonlight
streamed in through her bedroom windows and cast shadows over their bodies as
they laid tangled in her sheets. Pillows
and clothes were strewn about, having been thrown carelessly in the heat of
their lovemaking. It had been a week
since they had last been together and Bethie had been desperate to touch
him. She had disabled the cameras in her
corridor for five minutes to allow him entrance and the second he walked
through the door, she threw herself at him and he had been unable to stop
himself from responding in kind. Meeting
in her room was daring but she was past the point of caring and the second her
hungry lips had been on his, he had been past the point of thinking. He had received his new assignment that
morning and did not relish having to tell her.
But
it seemed as if she already knew.
“When
are you going?” she asked quietly.
“Day
after tomorrow,” he answered. “I’m going
to Oceania Base.”
“Why
there?”
“They’re
short-staffed and they need an experienced second officer for the new General
commanding the base.”
Bethie
looked up at him, her blue eyes navy in the dim light. “Oceania would be the first to go if Lotor and the Lotorians ever
mounted a massive offensive against us…which will probably happen the day you
get there.”
He
ran his hand through her black hair, his touch slow and gentle. “I know, Love.”
Crawling
upwards, Bethie put her arms around his neck and buried her face in his
shoulder. “Why do you have to be so
damned heroic? Do you think you’ll be
put in the Hall of Heroes or something?
In the Pantheon on the Gods?”
“The
what?”
“Greek
Mythology…nothing. Skech…I
can’t do this without you.”
“Yes,
you can.”
She
sat up, hugging her knees to her chest.
“Everything that I know if falling down around my ears and you were the
last thing I had that was sane.
Now…you’re leaving.”
He
sat up behind her, curving his body against her back, wrapping his arms around her. “Princess, this is our reality now. All we have is each other but things have to
change.”
“Don’t
I know it.”
He
gave her arm a reassuring squeeze.
“You’ll be the best Red Lion pilot in history, I know it. Don’t curse your position, Bethie, make it
yours.”
Looking
over her shoulder at him, she couldn’t help but smile and she kissed him, her
lips lingering against his.
“You
always know the right thing to say,” she murmured.
Turning
her in his arms, he pulled her back down onto the pillows.
Keith
wondered how much longer he had until he completely lost his tenuous hold on
his sanity.
The
atmosphere in the conference room was charged.
On one end he had his wife, pacing in a circle, muttering things that he
wished he couldn’t hear. On the other
end, he had his daughter who looked as if she would rather be any place but
there, her gaze icy when it passed over him.
Between the two was the Voltron Force, uneasy
about the message they had just watched as well as the situation they now found
themselves in. In his hands he held
Lance’s detailed plans for how he was going to rip apart the ARF from the top
down and turn into something that would hold up against anything the Lotorians threw at them.
He’d already started on phase one, having not informed Keith beforehand,
but then again, Keith had not expected a blow-by-blow of Lance’s
movements.
He
and Allura had stayed up the entire night considering their options. They had batted around good ideas and not so
good ideas, but at the end, they realized that they had to take their plan as
far as it could go. He had not wanted to
see Arus falter again in his lifetime, but in order
to get through this, they would have to make some sacrifices. It was a plan that was held together with
nothing more than hope and good timing, but they were trapped. His head pounded as he thought about what
they were about to do and he cursed Lotor for doing
this to them again.
“Lotor looks pretty healthy,” Jack said lightly, breaking
the thick silence.
Matt
let out a snort of laughter and Jordan couldn’t help smiling. Ethan threw Jack an incredulous look.
“Are
you serious?” he said.
“What? His skin had a healthy blue glow. That’s gotta mean that the Lotorians are on a habitable planet and he’s got access to some
lotions.”
At
that, they broke out into laughter and even Bethie smiled hesitantly. It disappeared as soon as she saw that her
mother was also smiling.
“Alright,
that’s enough,” Keith said, tossing Lance’s report on the table. “Skech, is Romelle on the line?”
“In
five minutes, sir,” Skech’s voice came over the
communicator.
“What
are the odds of us staying in the Alliance?” Ethan asked, turning serious in
the blink of an eye.
“If
it were up to me, we wouldn’t still be in it,” Allura said.
“We
can’t face the Lotorians alone, even with Voltron. We can’t
step down, regardless of what he says,” he argued. “How trustworthy is Lotor’s
word anyway?’
“We
know that he’s about as trustworthy as a snake and I’m sure most Alliance knows
that as well, but the people are going to speak and they’re not going to want
to support a planet millions of light-years away, especially if it gets them
out of immediate trouble.”
“They
want Voltron to be in the hands of that madman?” Jack
said, derisively.
“If
it means getting those pods away from their planets, they could care less,”
Allura said.
“They
have to know that Lotor’s lying about leaving the
other planets alone,” Matt said.
“If
there’s one thing I learned from my mom, it’s that people tend to care more
about the short-term rather than the long-term,” Jordan said. “They saw the battle with the ro-beast and they know that they’ve got one of those near
their own planets, just waiting to be let out.
Anyone who had half a brain and a grudge against Arus
just needs to show those clips over and over again to start the wave to get Arus booted out of the Alliance.”
“That
sounds about right,” Romelle said, coming on the
screen and they could not hide their surprise at her appearance; in the last
two weeks, she had lost weight and dark circles were under her eyes. “It’s not looking good, Cousin.”
“What’s
happening?” Allura said, eyebrows knitted together and her expression tight.
“Woltran V has almost half the other planets behind it and
it won’t be much longer, especially after that announcement, before everyone
else follows. There’s nothing I can do,”
she said. “I’m just waiting to get my
pink slip.”
“It
won’t take two days for the rest of the Alliance to fall in line behind Woltran. That
planet’s been a pain in my side since the beginning. Its leader didn’t even want to stand with us
against Galaxy Garrison and now…” Allura
took a deep breath.
“We
can’t seem to stick with this group for more than a couple decades at a time,”
Keith said with a shake of his head.
“That’s
it? You’re just going to let them drum
us out?” Bethie said disbelievingly.
“We
don’t have much of a choice in the matter,” Keith said. “And this doesn’t surprise me in the
least. That’s the trouble with
alliances; in times of peace, everyone is your best friend, but when you need
your allies the most, they turn tail and run.
The question that remains is whether the IAF will still let us keep
you…and me.”
“Funny
how they have conveniently forgotten that you and Mom played a big role in
getting the Alliance put together in the first place,” Ethan said, his lips
twisted bitterly. “I’ll resign my
commission if the IAF doesn’t allow us to stay here.”
“We
still have one little problem before we even get around to that,” Jack spoke
up.
All
eyes turned to him.
“Lotor wants surrender…you’ve only got half of his demands
met,” he said.
“We’d
prefer if you didn’t refer to what we’re doing as meeting Lotor’s
demands,” Allura said. “And we’re fully
aware of that, Jackson.”
“So…? What’s the plan?”
Romelle arched an eyebrow. “Patience is not one of your virtues, is it,
Junior?”
“I’m
not…” Jack pressed his lips together.
“Like you all said, we’ve only got two days. Stepping down from the Alliance—check! Surrendering to Lotor…?”
“Banish
the thought from you mind,” Allura snorted.
“I didn’t live underground for a decade only to have to go back down
there. I like it up here, I like my
room, and the only way Lotor is going to ever step
inside this castle again is if he walks over my dead body.”
“You
always did have a way with words,” Romelle said. “So shall we open the door to negotiations?”
“To
buy ourselves some time,” Keith said.
“And to exchange a few niceties with our old friend.”
“I
can’t find much fault in that. Allura
did pretty well on her last broadcast. Why
don’t we make the next one Alliance-wide?” Romelle
said.
“Agreed,”
Allura said.
“I’ll
speak to you again soon.”
“One
last thing,” Keith said.
“Yes?”
“Trust
us.”
The
way he said it made Romelle’s eyes narrow, but she
merely nodded. When the viewscreen went black, Keith faced the pilots.
“Surrender
is out of the question, but we have few options in front of us. Voltron is not
invincible and neither are we so we’re going to go to drastic measures to
maintain the sovereignty of this planet.”
“And
what would those measures be?” Bethie said.
Keith
outlined what he and Allura had concocted the night before and he watched with
a touch of black humor as the young faces went from surprise to down-right
appalled. They stared at him and Allura
as if they had lost their minds and he was not so sure if they hadn’t.
“Are
you kidding?” Ethan questioned. “Are you
seriously considering this?”
“We’re
beyond considering it,” Allura informed him.
“We’re going to do it. We’re
going to need your help and that’s all there is to it.”
“What
if it doesn’t work?” Jordan asked.
“Pessimism
will get you nowhere,” Keith said.
“However, if any of you have any better ideas, feel free to put them on
the table.”
No
one said a word.
“You’re
sure about this?” Bethie questioned.
“There’s nothing else we can do?”
“Nothing
that will have a pay-off of this magnitude if it works,” Allura answered.
Bethie’s eyes narrowed as she looked at her
mother. “Then I pray to Riaru that this works or else we’re all going to hell.”
Allura
stood behind the podium with the seal of the Royal House for the second time
that month, but this time she had Keith at her side. He was in his full-dress uniform, complete
with bars and medals, and she was in a gown that fitted her position. A simple circlet sat on her blonde head but
no amount of arguing could convince Keith to wear one as well. They stood, silent, waiting for the signal to
speak.
Bethie
and Ethan watched their parents. As
angry as she was with Allura, Bethie could not help but feel sympathy for what
she must be going through. Allura’s face
was blank, calm, but she knew her mother and she could see the strain that
Allura shoved to the edges of her consciousness. Still, she refused to meet Allura’s gaze.
“People
of Arus,” Keith started. “Your Queen and I stand before you to
announce the end of Arus’ membership in the
Intergalactic Alliance of Planets. By no
means are we surrendering to the Lotorians, but we
cannot let billions of lives be risked should we not meet this one demand.”
Reaching
out, Bethie found her brother’s hand.
“Surrender
is not Arus’ way,” Allura said. “We’ve stood shoulder to shoulder to protect
this land and I am asking you to stand by us again. However, war is not the answer. We…invite the Lotorians
to open a dialogue with us. There are
other channels that we can use to negotiate an end to this stand-off and we are
willing to listen. Above all else,
Admiral Porterfield and I are tasked with keeping Arus
and all its people safe. We will do all
we can to meet this end.”
The
transmission ended. Allura covered her
face with one hand and removed the circlet with the other. Keith put an arm around her shoulders as his
eyes sought out their children.
“No
more wasting time,” he said. “If we’re
going to do this, we have to plan it right down to the last second.”
Bethie
and Ethan looked at each other.
“We’re
ready when you are,” Bethie said calmly.
Keith
nodded. “We have one more call to make and
we’ll meet you in the conference room.”
“Uncle
Lance?” Ethan asked.
