Father's Day
by Kyence
Song: The Living Years, by Mike & the Mechanics
Disclaimer: All Voltron characters are property of World Events Productions.
Italics / ‘’ denote Lotor's thoughts. Song lyrics are in bold or
separated by lines.
Author's note: If you've never heard this song, don't bother reading this until
you do, because this just seems stupid then. However, I would recommend reading
this twice, because there are two levels of story in this. Hope you like this
sappy stuff J And a big thanks to KK for all of his help in tweaking this ^_^
Dedicated to my father, who has no idea I write fanfiction, but when growing up,
I thought there was no tyrant meaner than him. Love ya, Dad. I'm glad you're
still alive, so I can tell you whenever I want. --Kyence
-
Every generation
Blames the one before
And all of their frustrations
Come beating on your door
-
Lotor sat on his bed, exhausted from the trials of the day. ' I am home from the academy for not even a week, and he already has me wishing I were back there!' He flipped over to lie on his belly, grumbling to himself about his miserable life. He rubbed the dark velvet comforter with his fingers, which had blisters on them from all the sword practice he was forced to undertake. The tiny bristles soothed him as they brushed against his sore digits.
He groaned as he heard his father bellow, "LOTOR!!!"
-
I know that I'm a prisoner
To all my Father held so dear
I know that I'm a hostage
To all his hopes and fears
I just wish I could have told him in the living years
-
Lotor plopped onto his feet, his face scowling from the call. 'Probably screaming for me from his throne. He makes me spar hours at a time, even with blisters, and instead of coming to my quarters like a normal father, he makes my tired ass crawl out to him!'
"LOTOR!"
"COMING, father," Lotor answered, gritting his teeth by the end to curb any curses spilling out. He met his father in the throne room, as usual, and ascended the far-too-many-steps. As usual, he knelt before his father in the pose of respect. "Yes, sire?" he asked.
His father, King Zarkon, looked at him smugly. "I will be gone for a few days," he announced.
'YES!' Lotor thought. 'Peace at last!' "Will you be back before I must return to the Academy?" he feigned concern.
"Possibly, only a day or two at the most," his father replied. "I am sure it tears you apart inside," he added with a sneer as he glared at his son. Lotor gulped.
-
Crumpled bits of paper
Filled with imperfect thought
Stilted conversations
I'm afraid that's all we've got
-
Zarkon lifted himself up from the throne. His huge height cast a dark shadow over Lotor, who could not help but look upward. "Well, why are you blocking my path, boy?!" Zarkon yelled at him. "I must depart. Get out of my way!!" Lotor scuttled to the side, and watched his father travel down the stairs. When his father left the room, Lotor looked down at his kneeling feet.
'I hate him!' Lotor screamed in his head, punching the ground with his fist lest he cry.
-
He says you just don't see it
He says it's perfect sense
You just can't get agreement
In this present tense
We all talk a different language
Talking in defense
-
The next two days' worth of hours were wonderful. No sparring or practice or father to yell at him to spar or practice. Lotor happily spent the time eating, sleeping, and chasing the prettiest slaves around his quarters. This routine would have been repeated until he left for the Academy, but his plans changed when he entered the royal hangar to fly in his personal fighter.
"Hey, you, robot guard!" he harshly addressed the nearest metallic servant.
"Yes, Your Highness?" its twanging voice replied as it saluted him.
Lotor pointed to a particular ship. "Is my father back yet?"
The robot guard shook its head. Lotor growled. "Then why is his command ship here?!" Before the robot's CPU could muster a reply, Lotor had already severed the android's head from its body.
'If my father has been spying on me this whole time…' Lotor began the threat as his body shook from rage, but before he could finish it, another robot answered, "He took his private jet, Your Highness."
"Private jet?" Lotor repeated. Lotor averted his gaze to the command ship. 'Why would a king risk traveling by himself? Why would Father risk it?' The reason tickled his eager mind. 'It has to be a really juicy secret if he won't even bring these stupid robots along.'
"Do you know where he was headed?" Lotor asked the intact robot.
"Negative, sire," was the machine's final command, as Lotor promptly decimated it.
He heard another one enter the room. He rushed at it with his blade. "Where is he?!" Lotor demanded.
"Opachre!!" the robot divulged as it used its own sword to parry the Prince's. "Prince Lotor, the King has gone to Planet Opachre!"
"There. Now that was not so hard," Lotor acknowledged. He lowered his sword. When he saw the robot do the same, he laughed, spinning his blade in a deadly arc as he slashed the sentry in two. "That's for no one telling me sooner!" he spat as he placed his sword into its scabbard. Without another word, he hopped into his own fighter jet and launched into Dhm's atmosphere.
-
Say it loud, say it clear
You can listen as well as you hear
It's too late when we die
To admit we don't see eye to eye
-
It took a couple of days before Lotor discovered his father's whereabouts on Opachre. The planet was the closest of his kingdom's border to the Drule Empire; Lotor learned at the Academy that his Father's "annexation" of the planet caused a lasting enmity between the two governments to this very day. After the time it took to get to Opachre, Lotor had to ask the governor if his father had arrived. The governor admitted as much. He answered that the King had just left the governor's palace after completing his barrage about the planet's fiscal and political state. Lotor was not alarmed that the conference had taken days. 'Father DOES like to talk…or is it yell?' Lotor's inner voice quipped as the governor even babbled out to Lotor that Zarkon was headed to an old town in the oldest province delineated when the Drules had been in control. Lotor had to prod the governor by holding his sword to the politician's neck for more precise coordinates and a vow of silence. After retrieving the information, it was only a matter of time. When he saw his father's jet appear idle on his ship's radar, he laughed in triumph. He did not know his son was spying on him, and this fed the young prince's ego exponentially. 'Let's see what you're up to, old man!' Lotor snickered as he landed his fighter a safe distance away.
-
So we open up a quarrel
Between the present and the past
We only sacrifice the future
It's the bitterness that lasts
-
From his hiding spot, Lotor watched his father stand motionless before the rotting remains of an old manor. The metal foundation held up surprisingly well over the centuries it must have existed.
'This type of architecture dates back at least 500 years!' Lotor thought amazed. The breeze of the countryside smelled of life, a stark contrast with the musty currents of his homeworld. He wrinkled his nose, but resisted the urge to sneeze. He saw his father move a couple of steps closer to the manor's main entrance. He looked up at the right statue flanking it.
Zarkon held a hand up, and placed his palm on its skeletal robe that had been chiseled in its morbid design. "Hello, Grandfather," he greeted in a dead tone to the statue of a winged apparition. He then turned slightly to the left likeness, identical in design. Ritually, he held his left palm up to it and in the same lifeless voice, uttered, "Hello, Grandmother."
-
So don't yield to the fortunes
You sometimes see as fate
It may have a new perspective
On a different day
And if you don't give up, and don't give in
You may just be O.K.
-
Lotor wished he could see his father's face, but the back was all he was granted. The proud shoulders, which were always erect, sagged as Zarkon kept his hands on the cold figures. Lotor felt something strange in the pit of his stomach. It was the first time in his life he had seen his father look so defeated.
-
Oh say it, say it, say it, say it loud, say it clear
You can listen as well as you hear
It's too late when we die
To admit we don't see eye to eye
-
'It's like an invisible burden is on your shoulders now,' Lotor observed. He bit his lip innately as he pondered. 'What drives you to come here if it weakens you so?!' He looked up at the statues, which from the distance away he was, were both in his sight. 'Father, you said grandfather and grandmother…what did you mean? Was this… was this your home once?'
Zarkon lifted his hands off the monuments, and gazed intently at the open entrance. Lotor saw his father rummaging through his clothes. He arched an eyebrow, waiting impatiently for this secret to be discovered. A letter was the object of desire.
-
I wasn't there that morning
When my father passed away
I didn't get to tell him
All the things I had to say
-
' A letter? A letter. ' Lotor rolled his eyes. He had been expecting a gem or a talisman of some sort to activate these macabre creations and be used in the army back home. 'Pathetic, just a stupid parchment with Father's scribbles on it.' Lotor covered his mouth to stifle his groaning.
Zarkon advanced to the doorway. He paused just before the next step that would bring him into the main foyer of the long-dead manor. Lotor noticed the heaving of his father's shoulders. 'He's breathing heavily, like a slave as it's whipped,' he scrutinized.
The note twirled into the ruins with a flick of Zarkon's wrist. Without a pause, he turned around, and walked briskly to the small ship. Lotor knew his hiding spot could not be discerned, but he instinctively cringed as his father came closer to him. A few more seconds, and the ship was airborne. The wind it generated blew the bushes and branches surrounding Lotor in a million directions, but he himself allowed only his platinum hair to gyrate in the gust. The rest of his body was frozen in position until the ship was no more than a glimmer in the sky.
He charged towards the manor, his large strides pulling him ever closer to the mystery that needed to be solved. He stopped between the representations of undead angels trapped in stone. He gave each one a long look. He rubbed his arms at the chill that began to creep through his spine when he saw a white crevice in one of them. He unsheathed his laser sword and placed its tip into the hoary chasm. Using it as a chisel, he widened the crack enough to stick his hand into it. Sheathing his laser sword, he immediately thrust his fingers inside the cleft.
'Damn, I need to take my glove off!' Lotor cursed at the realization that the opening was still too small. Rather than go through the trouble of hacking again, he simply removed his glove and gingerly placed his right hand in. His arm was able to travel up to his elbow. His fingers probed inside the cavity, when he suddenly felt something long, thin, and knobbed on the top. Lotor instinctively cried out and pulled his hand out while still grabbing the object.
The force he used knocked him to the earth. He looked at his hand and saw a shattered bone.
"Ah!" Lotor cried in shock as he tossed the remains at the decaying seraph. They disintegrated into dust at contact, with the grim guardian continuing its purpose as a tomb for an ancient relative.
Lotor picked himself up. 'I wouldn't even do something this cruel to Father. And I have good reason to, more than anyone!' he snarled. He recalled the scene of his father's body sagging from an unknown weight.
Lotor's lip quivered at the realization. "You knew, didn't you?" he whispered. He looked at what he had desecrated in the name of curiosity. "What did he go through? I know nothing of him, of you, or anyone in between you! Tell me!" he challenged the silent graves. A sudden breeze played with his hair. He turned around slowly until he saw something in the corner of his saffron eye. An old Drule man was staring at him from the foyer. Lotor quickly snapped his head to full attention, but the image was gone. Lotor readied his sword as he inched step by step to the entrance of the decrepit manor house. He looked around, then sighed loudly.
'The letter must've been blown away,' Lotor frowned. 'Now I'll never know what the hell father has to do with this place!'
A faint rustling came from within the manor. It sounded like leaves scraping the metal floor. Lotor stared into the darkness intently, able to see the interior well. The forest had won the battle with time, as flora blanketed a majority of this area of the house. Lotor saw no one. He turned around, but kept his ears sharp to detect any sudden movements a foe would make. There was no adversary. As Lotor exited the property with his imprisoned ancestors flanking him, a final gust of wind pushed him forward. Lotor's gait was upset for a moment as he stumbled, but he regained his fine posture soon enough. "I'm going, I'm going," he yelled. He then felt something fly atop his boot. He looked down, and regarded a piece of paper flapping in the wind. He kneeled down, retrieving it with two hands lest the wind blow it apart.
He could see that it was extremely old. Not as old as the manor, but the signs of age were evident that it had been abandoned decades ago. He looked at the handwriting and recognized it immediately. He read the letter out loud, incredulous from the content:
-
I think I caught his spirit
Later that same year
I'm sure I heard his echo
In my baby's new born tears
-
"Father,
My firstborn child has arrived. A son. I can see so much of you in him, I cannot think of a better way to cherish your memory than granting him the name of his grandfather. I will raise him to be the warrior you had always wanted to be. Though your disappointment in me is perpetually understandable, I hope you will convene with Fate and grant him success in all his endeavors. Do not punish him for our failed relationship; let him use your blood and name to define a new Age in the Universe.
Your Son."
-I just wish I could have told him in the living years-
Lotor's hands shook as the letter's words branded themselves into his mind. He trembled as he folded the letter and placed it within his uniform, and shivered the entire trip back home to Dhm. Ironically, he only stopped when he approached the stairs in the throne room. He saw his father was already sitting there, discussing matters with various advisors. Zarkon saw his son and was the first to initiate.
-Oh, say it, say it, say it, say it loud!-
"Why are you staring at me like that?!" The voice was crude and angry.
-Say it clear!-
Lotor had wanted to show the old letter, and let its words return to their creator.
-You can listen as well as you hear!-
But he kept his hand still.
-It's too late,-
He uttered, "My apologies, sire."
-When we die-
Lotor left the room with the sad truth.
-To admit we don't see eye to eye-
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