[ he opens his mouth to respond, but haggar in the dreamscape moves, to stun lotor -- knocking him out, to keep him docile while zarkon razes the planet. and the dreamscape itself dims, darkens -- because this is lotor's memory, and lotor doesn't recall the actual destruction of the planet. he woke up to seeing it, and to zarkon informing him of his banishment from the empire.

when he finally looks at allura, tearing his eyes away from the happy little family reunion, he draws in a breath at the sight of tears in her eyes. a nightmare, honestly. she should have never been able to see this, but what stings more is the realization that he had told the truth to her, and some part of her likely wrote it off as a lie.

not that he can blame her for that, really. ]

Yes.

[ finally. ]

The people of this planet were concerned that Zarkon would react with anger, when I worked with them. I assured them that he would see reason, and common sense, and see that my way of rule was more productive, better for the Empire and for its constituents. I thought putting it into numbers would cause him to see the humanity in the universe, even if it were just through an actuarial table of base production of quintessence.

[ he pauses -- the memory is still dim, dark, but is growing somewhat lighter -- zarkon's voice can be heard in the background, a dim echo: you are not fit to rule this empire; a shame on our existence, you are hereby banished --. ]

I stopped trying to see in the good in him, after that.