you're gonna go far, kid | ON HOLD

chapter 6

Though it was clearly handwritten, the book was written like a goddamn textbook. This was painful, as some words were unclear scribbles and made the content sound incredibly dull, but Keith spent the next several hours reading through it anyway.

He'd originally thought Voltron was only a weird, cool sounding name that the prodigies had conjured up, something that sounded like it was from some 80's sci-fi TV show about space robots, but it was more than that. Voltron had begun probably over a millenia ago, and instead of five people it was an underground organization of prodigies protecting the city. The Voltron he knew was just a scratch on the surface of what it really was.

Scythe, Meticulous, Pigeon, and Flare were the current top-tier elite members of the institution, the most powerful prodigies who went out in the streets and fought crime, the only person ranking higher being Momentous, who was this cycle's guardian. Though there were only four of them that the city knew of now, the full Voltron had five members, and each member had to be chosen by the talisman. From all the drama with Phantom, Keith was safe to assume the only one missing was the wielder of the red talisman. They didn't necessarily need all five talismans, they were fine with those four and then the lower ranking prodigies, but in dire emergencies all five were needed. That was now, apparently.

He also came to the conclusion that, with the help of the surrounding text and fragments of Meticulous' random bits of information on the talismans, the picture in the first page that kept showing up in different parts and diagrams– a magnificent lion-like spirit, it's fur the five colors of the talismans and glowing eyes– was the result of a fully formed Voltron. In most pictures, it stood behind the five heroes, roaring fiercely as they stared down an off page villain. The talisman holders were always different but the lion remained the same. The cycles seemed to be spread out, the last significant one being around the same time as Ancient Rome.

Each individual talisman had a lioness depicted in one subtle way, though because it wasn't complicated enough, each cycle of Voltron the artifacts changed and the design was different. There was always a gemstone of the talisman's color though– amethyst in the black, ruby in the red, peridot in green, apatite in blue, and amber in yellow.

Keith had scoffed at this.

Five incredibly powerful magical artifacts that had the power to probably destroy the galaxy, assigned a color in the group like different shape tiles in second grade math class.

The talisman selects its holder based off traits matching the properties of its gemstone. One can be spotted as the current user of a talisman of Voltron by the coloring of their eyes. It may be subtle, a violet or red tint or flecks of gold, blue, or green, though a brown eyed holder of the blue talisman might find their eyes turn blue or the blue eyes of a yellow talisman holder may change to gold.

There was a long paragraph elaborating in the meanings behind each gemstone following that part, which Keith skipped. He already knew them anyway. His father had an affinity for geology, and though a firm believer in science, he'd teach Keith about all the meanings behind different gemstones, drilling them into his head so at a moment's notice the boy could easily list off the health properties of carnelian.

Even now, years later, those lessons must've stuck because Keith was able to interpret each one immediately. Amethyst: stability and protection. Ruby: courage and passion. Peridot: creation and hope. Apatite: intuition and communication. Amber: intellect and calm.

Though there might be several qualifying people for the talisman, only one person may be the user, and when chosen their soul's bound to the talisman, and can only be severed through death. When the holder of a talisman passes, the other talisman holders will immediately sense it through their own talisman if the team has successfully bonded. The following two minutes after the talisman holder's death, it is vulnerable to claiming by any outsider, whether it be Voltron or other.