1Chrys Aldebrand glared down at the necklace that she was currently holding in her left hand. It's thin golden bronze chain dangled down in between her fingers, not falling to the floor due only to the large bluish green crystal that was attached to the chain, resting in the palm of her hand. The inch long crystal glinted in the light of her dorm room, it's sharp edges looked jagged, like broken glass, even though the surface of it was smoother than polished marble. She closed the fist that she was holding the necklace in and let herself fall back onto her bed, placing her closed fist on her stomach.
Crystalia sighed in defeat and ran her right hand down her face as she closed her unusual gold eyes, attempting to hold back the faint sting in the back of them which signaled the tears that were threatening to spill. "C'mon, Chrys, you're gonna be late for class. Your parents left you, stop trying to figure out why, they just didn't want you and the stupid necklace mom left you isn't going to tell you anything." Chrys muttered to herself before sitting up and putting the necklace around her neck again, blinking back the shimmering tears in them.
She stood up and grabbed her school bag from the floor next to her bed, slinging it over her right shoulder as she walked towards the door of her dorm room at the Garrison. Its walls were painfully bland, no pictures,no posters, no calendars, no nothing hung on them. They were a simple beige color, and the only things leaning against them being her bed and the desk which stood below the single window in the room. The desk was boring and bland as well and the only sign that it was even used was the absence of dust on its wooden surface. Chrys had never really been one to make herself at home anywhere, never really made anywhere seem like it actually belonged to her, because she was bound to lose it eventually. Sighing, she placed her left hand on the scanner beside the door and it slid open, allowing the seventeen year old to walk into the hallway which was already bustling with students trying to make it to class before it started.
Chrys carefully stepped out of her dorm room and let herself be pulled along with the wave of students, wishing she had not waited till the last minute to come out of her dorm room. Usually she came out in the early hours of the morning and wandered around, not bothering to get breakfast from the cafeteria, until twenty minutes before the beginning of first period. The halls were always dead silent and almost eerily empty, with the exception of the occasional professor wandering through them, either heading towards their classroom or the teachers' lounge, sometimes reading something on a data-pad or speaking to a second professor. She hated all the loud sounds, the bright colors of the school's uniforms and the constant shoves from other students, so it was always much more comfortable for her to be out and about before everyone else.
Suddenly someone shoved past her (proving she had a reason to hate crowds), causing her to stumble backwards slightly before regaining her balance and balling her hands to fists at her sides. The guy that had run into her was probably about half a foot taller than her and Chrys could clearly make out the small green boomerang shaped markings just below his dark violet eyes. The top button of his uniform was undone, his bronze hair purposefully messed up. Immediately Chrys recognized him, Damien, the most popular and skilled pilot in her age level, also a well known heart-breaker who you shouldn't want, but for some reason many did and paid the price.
He was an Altean, just like most of the popular kids. There weren't a whole lot of Alteans at the Garrison in comparison to all of the other alien races here since most Alteans were on Altea, but the Alteans that were here were pretty much all popular. It probably had something to do with the fact that their race is the one that created the five lions of Voltron and that their princess had sacrificed herself fifteen years ago to save the universe and all realities.
Chrys had been just barely three years old when this had happened, so she couldn't remember anything first hand, but she tried her best to figure out everything as best she could from books and other things. A lot of things about what happened still confused her though. There were other realities? The Princess dying made it so Altea, which had been gone for over 10,000 years, was back? Alteans had magic powers, or at least to some degree? A paladin had died and come back? The ship the Garrison built had turned into a type of Voltron thing and then also combined with Voltron?!
"Watch where you're going!" Chrys snapped at the guy who had run into her, her eyes narrowed. Why did people never pay attention to people around them? Well, okay, she hadn't fully been paying attention either, but still, it wasn't her fault this guy had been running through the halls.
"How about you watch where you're going, sweetheart." The guy said and winked, almost as if he had meant to walk into her. Maybe he had, though Chrys was probably just imagining it, everyone always avoided her after all. She was the weirdo in the school, the one who didn't really have friends and had some anger issues. When she didn't respond to his statement with anything besides a glare he walked off, leaving Crystalia standing there, trying not to yell after him or punch him. Yeah, she definitely had some anger issues...
After a moment, once the guy was out of sight, Chrys closed her eyes and took a deep breath, trying her best to calm herself. When it didn't work she just stomped towards her first class, pushing past people so that she could go faster, not really caring that she was doing what the Altean guy had done to her to other people. Pretty much everyone in the school was used to her acting like this, so nobody really called her out on it, all they did was shoot her annoyed looks and growl in frustration or anger.
By the time she had arrived at her first class of the day, history, her anger had subsided somewhat and she was able to calm herself down by closing her eyes and taking a deep breath while sitting down at her desk. She clenched und unclenched her fists a few times before finally fully calming down just before the professor walked into the room. Chrys never really paid attention much to class, though she always knew what they talked about and learned, despite the fact that she didn't even try to listen to any of the professors. She wasn't incredibly interested in learning stuff if she couldn't use it.
She knew what they learned, knew about all of the alien races that were known of and they had learned about so far. Knew about multiple planets and what their atmospheres were like and the plant life that existed there. She knew of the war against the galra that Voltron won fifteen years ago. She knew about the Lions and their paladin, The original and the more recent ones. She knew how to fly a fighter ship and how to fight and all that. But... She never needed that information outside of school. Well, at least she hadn't yet, not that she ever really left school...
All the stuff they learned was for exploring and saving the universe. But... What really was there in the universe that needed saving anymore? The galra no longer were controlling the universe and there were no other great threats out there. At least, that's what Chrys always seemed to be telling herself, despite the fact that she constantly had the feeling something wasn't as they believed. Lately things seemed to be happening again, the professors all seemed more on edge, the curfew was earlier and kept to more strictly, and they were all trained much more than before. Nobody else seemed to notice however, and she didn't have any friends to mention it to, so she didn't say anything.
Chrys sighed, pulling a notepad and pen out of her bag and starting to trace what she imagined characters from books that she had found and read looked like, pushing away any thoughts about the dangers of the universe and the popular kids of the school. The professor, a tall and strongly built human woman with long brown hair pulled up into a ponytail, dark, olive skin, and bright, dark brown eyes, had just began talking about the lions of Voltron ( again, Chrys thought in slight annoyance as she drew what she imagined a character by the name of Jem Carstairs to look like; She's always speaking of Voltron! We already know everything there is to know from someone who isn't a paladin! Can't she just talk about something else? Some other part of history? Something before earth was involved in the universes' wars and problems? Maybe one of the many, many wars humans had against each other, maybe? ) when suddenly the loud, commanding voice of Director Iverson crackled through the whole school and she stopped, her lips pressing together tightly. The awed look in her eyes that she always got when she talked about the previous paladins had disappeared completely, replaced by a nervous, protective glint.
"All higher ranks to the discussion room immediately! I repeat, all higher ranks must come to the discussion room! All students must return to their dorms immediately as well, this is urgent." Everyone suddenly went into a frenzy, jumping up from their seats and grabbing their bags while the professor told them to quiet down and then ushered them out of the room, the nervous look in her eyes seeming to increase tenfold.
Within seconds, before Chrys had even stood up herself and slipped her pen and notebook into her bag, half of the class had already disappeared from the room, chattering amongst each other. Some seemed scared, others only slightly nervous and others didn't seem bothered at all, as if all that mattered were the fact that they didn't have class even if the cause might be something serious. Chrys slowly stood up, slinging her bag over her shoulder as snippets of her classmates conversations drifted back to her.
"Wonder what's going on..."
"You think maybe Voltron showed up again? Mrs Williams would flip!"
"Maybe one of the Paladins is here!"
"What if one of the Paladins is hurt, or dead?"
"I hope this isn't too important, I have a date later and I really don't want to miss it because we're gonna be locked in our dorms." Chrys forced herself not to roll her eyes at that. Seriously, that's all that guy's thinking about? Something serious could be happening!
"What if another war's coming? I... My dad talked about what it was like and it sounds horrible."
Chrys slowly followed the rest of her classmates out of the classroom, wondering herself what was happening that was so urgent. Iverson rarely called everyone but the students to the "discussion room" as it was called and the last time it had happened it had been because the Black Paladin came by. Nobody knows why he came or what it was everyone discussed with him but it had seemed quite serious, and afterwards all of the professors had become fidgety. Chrys really hoped this wouldn't be like the last time. She hoped-
Her thoughts were abruptly brought to a halt as she felt a sudden, strong pull on her right side, as if someone had grabbed her arm and was pulling her in the opposite direction of the dorms. "What the-?" Chrys muttered and the pull became even stronger and stronger, until she was being dragged through the halls of the Garrison, trying to pull away from whatever was dragging her. "What the hell?! What's happening?! Let me go!" She yelled, trying furiously to yank herself out of the weird pull that no longer just felt like it was surrounding her arm, but also the rest of her, forcing her to run while trying to stop. She imagined she probably would look quite hilarious to anyone that saw her like that, but somehow she didn't pass anyone even though she was heading in the direction of the discussion room, where all of the Garrison's staff was heading.
She was pulled around the corner in the hallway leading towards the discussion room and Chrys desperately tried to pull away, knowing that if she was caught right in front of the discussion room (not that she hadn't secretly listened in multiple times on what they spoke about in there, wanting to know something about what was going on outside in the universe.) she would be most likely either thrown out or would be guarded for a few weeks, if not months. People were already suspicious enough of her, with her piloting skills, the orange, red and gold flame markings twining all the way up her back and arms, and her tendency to snap at everyone who so much as asked her how she was doing, she really didn't need to add spying to that list.
"I can't be here." Chrys hissed under her breath and suddenly the pull stopped, causing her to stumble back at the sudden lack of resistance to her attempts to escape and slam into the wall. Did I just stop it? She wondered but then realized that she was right outside the discussion room and, out of nowhere, a strange sort of purring voice spoke in the back of her mind: "You must meet my paladins. They are in there."
Chrys stumbled away from the door and tried to run off but once again she was pulled towards the room, causing her to groan in frustration. What the hell is going on?! She then quickly clamped her hand over her mouth and sighed slightly, letting herself slide down the wall beside the door to the discussion room, behind which she could now hear voices speaking.
"-nce, slow down! We can't understand what you're saying! What happened while you and Keith were out on that mission?" A voice that Chrys recognized as Matt Holt's was currently saying in an urgent voice. She imagined he probably looked slightly exasperated, his eyes slightly wide as he gestured around wildly with his hands. Why exactly that image flashed through her mind, she didn't know.
"I'm not sure! It's... It was supposed to be a small mission, just check up on a planet that hadn't responded and come back after making sure everything was alright! But... Something went wrong! I don't know what exactly or why all I know is we were shot out of the sky by this huge ship that I didn't recognize, which doesn't happen to Keith like barely ever and we crash landed on the planet. Then we were attacked by... They looked kinda human but... Not quite. Their eyes and hair and skin were a whole bunch of weird colors and some of them had fangs or horns or something! It was... I don't know! It's all kinda fuzzy, I probably bumped my head when we crashed or something. But, Keith got hurt somehow and I managed to drag him away and into some random ship nearby and flew back here! I don't... I can't really remember much else... I just know that those beings that attacked us weren't the race that lives on that planet... And I don't think that planet's race was the one that shot us down.
"And... Please... Is Keith gonna be okay?" Another male voice that Chrys was sure she had heard somewhere before replied and she could hear the obvious worry in his voice along with a hint of fear. Whoever he was, and whoever he was talking about, seemed important, or at least had encountered something of importance.
"He should be fine, Lance." A voice that Chrys didn't know well either said and she heard a small sigh of relief.
Wait... Lance? Keith? Weren't those two of the Paladins' names? She suddenly thought and stood up quickly, an idea of what was happening beginning to form in her mind. Every scenario she could think of didn't look good at all, they all had something to do with war and death and fires and blood.
Oh no... Something's wrong. Something weird is happening... Oh God, what if there's another race that's trying to take over the universe like the Galra?! Chrys thought fearfully, slowly starting to back away from the door, no strange pull stopping her this time. No, don't get ahead of yourself, Chrys. It could just be a race that was at war with the other one and had won. That seemed more likely than another race following in the Galra's footsteps... But... What if that really is what's happening?!
