Voltron Global Military Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism Unit

Two Steps Apart

A sudden noise was enough to awaken Hunk from his blackout. As his eyes slowly opened, the first thing he saw sitting beside him was a figure in a dirty striped scarf around the head along with a yellow shirt smudged with dirt.

As Hunk sat up, he felt something stinging at the back of his head like a painful headache. He held the back of his head, holding it tightly to suppress the pain. The figure turned around, revealing a light brown skinned woman. She eagerly approached him, sitting near him.

"Sir, a-are you alright?"

They both stared for a moment, unaware of how close their faces were. Hunk could also notice the mix of brown and maroon hair poking out from the bottom of her neck. He glanced around and noticed a red painted door a few feet away from him. Hunk looked down at his body and found his gear and weapons missing. Haxus and his men must've stripped him clean while he was out. What grabbed his further attention was the fact that they weren't alone. The room he was in was filled with women. Scared, feeble and weak women.

"A-Are these-?"

"Villagers, yes," the woman answered. Her kiwi accent made Hunk assume she was Australian. "The insurgents liberated their homes, executed the men and the elders and took away young boys to make them take part of their organization. They didn't say what they want to do with the women...my best bet would be labor or slavery."

It must've hurt to vision the whole scene with the men coldly executed and the women taken away from their sons. Hunk looked back at the woman.

"I didn't catch your name." He said.

"Shay, Shay Bainivalu. I'm a war correspondent. Are you a soldier?"

"I'm with NATO."

"I'm guessing you're here because of the Galra, right?"

He raised an eyebrow. How did she know exactly?

"You're here for the Galra?"

"Yeah," Shay answered as if she wasn't surprised to expect a reaction from him. "I was tracking their movement from Afghanistan to here. I heard stories about them overthrowing governments and armies."

Suddenly, Hunk heard the door creaks open. Whatever it was, it made the women and the young girls tremble and shake in fear. The light shone across the remaining part of the room. Three figures went inside and one of them was none other than Haxus but he wasn't alone. There were two more men accompanying him, all wearing jackets. One was slightly bigger and had a huge beard with a beanie. The other was shorter, sporting a slightly tanned skin with sideburns, giving Hunk the impression he was Armenian. However, what caught his attention was the fact the Armenian was wearing a puffer vest over a yellow striped track jacket with baggy cargo pants. Weird choice of fashion.

"Good to see you awake, ladies," Haxus said, shifting his focus on Hunk and Shay. "Cause I'm gonna need the Hunk guy and Miss Bainivalu to come with us."

They both looked at each other and back at Haxus. They weren't able to ask any further once the bearded guy and the Armenian approached them.

As soon as they arrived in Al Khor to capture Haxus, everything goes down and they lose Hunk to some terrorists. The team took a brief breather to recall the crazy events recently. Few moments later, the team began their search for Hunk. Shiro, Allura and Pidge grabbed some of the dead jihadist's AKM's with a few extra mags. Taking the jihadists' only car, the team set off after the tire tracks left on the sandy road with the headlights as their only source of light.

After thirty minutes of driving after some tracks, they noticed a slightly lit village from a distance. The tire tracks seemed to lead them to the entrance so there was no reason to barge in. Shiro parked the team at a pitch black hill a mile away from the village, killed the engine and checked the village. While the rest hung back to rest, Shiro and Allura glanced at the village surrounded by walls.