Chapter Text
A sizzling bolt of purple energy cut through the deep abyss of space, arcing and bouncing around the platform where a towering figure stood, hands splayed wide and eyes glowing against the canvas as he searched and searched. He would find it. Nothing would stop him this time. Nothing would—
The power cut off with a blink as one of the Druids standing around the Emperor of the Galran Empire collapsed and the entire circle was interrupted.
Zarkon roared out his displeasure and smote the pathetic creature where he knelt.
"The Black Lion will be mine," Zarkon growled, fists clenching at his side and trembling not from exhaustion but a bone-deep anger and frustration that his search continued to be in apparent vain. He had not been able to make contact with the Black Lion for over two movements, no matter how much energy the Druids conjured for his search. Pathetic creatures.
"These parlor tricks," he snarled at the exhausted Druids, all collapsed around him, "are wasting my time."
"Perhaps we need a new plan," Haggar advised from above and Zarkon rounded on her, purple eyes flashing dangerously.
"I will not cease my search for the Black Lion!"
No matter that Haggar's Druids were incapable of assisting him further. His eyes narrowed. She was the one responsible for this failure. She would suffer in his pain.
She raised her hands placatingly as his own crackled with the power she had bestowed him. "I meant no such thing, my lord. Merely a suggestion on how to bring the Black Lion to us, rather than this ceaseless chase across the galaxy."
He growled low in his throat at the dig but had to acknowledge the chase had indeed been fruitless. He gave the slightest inclination of his head for her to continue. Haggar's Druids may have failed him thus far but his head Druid was a powerful, deadly force to be reckoned with. While no thought was above his own it was a foolish move of a leader to not use the resources at his disposal.
And Haggar was a valuable resource indeed.
"We set a trap to capture one of the Paladins," she said. "And then use them as bait to lure the Black Lion to us."
"They are no fools," Zarkon countered. "They will see it is a trap." This was her plan? Foolish.
"Yes," Haggar agreed to his surprise. "But we give them no choice. Either the Black Lion surrenders itself to us or we kill the Paladin in the most painful way possible. The Paladins of Voltron would not so easily abandon one of their own. And should the ploy fail…" she gave a shrug. "Then we have at the very least weakened them as they will no longer be able to form Voltron without their fifth member." Her lips twisted. "It is perhaps an idea my lord might entertain? A more productive use of time than the... elimination of my Druids."
Zarkon couldn't quite hide his own chuckle as her nose wrinkled in distaste as she looked at the smote of ash where one such creature had stood but minutes ago.
"And you believe you can accomplish such a feat?"
Haggar gave a cruel smile. "Absolutely, my lord. You will have a Paladin in your possession by the end of the movement and the Black Lion soon after."
Very well. He would indulge her for now. And should she fail...
Then it would not be a Paladin screaming in agony.
"Then do it," Zarkon commanded. "And do not fail me."
xxx
"Good morning my fellow Paladins!" Lance greeted cheerily as he strode into the kitchen. And what was there not to be cheerful about? The sun was shining (somewhere he was sure), he'd had a lovely hot shower and Coran had done the laundry yesterday so his favorite jacket was nice and clean.
Pidge looked blearily up at him from her tablet as he sauntered over. "Why are you such a morning person?" she groused. "Tone it down."
"Aww, did my little buddy have a long night?" Lance asked, sliding in right next to her and draping an arm around her shoulders. With the ease of practice he ignored the ticking above her eyebrow. "You know what I say; rest before work!"
"Of course you do," muttered Keith, hunched over his food goo and eyes hooded too with sleep. "It's why you never do anything."
Lance gasped in mock surprise. "Keith! What a cruel thing to say! Of course I do things. Why, yesterday I had a very relaxing nap and then a chat with Blue, and then the mice and I designed a new game for them with the pillows in the main room."
"So, nothing important."
"Hey!" Lance brushed aside the tiny tick of real hurt at Keith's statement. Just because he didn't dedicate all of his free time to training didn't make his own activities unimportant. Besides, it wasn't his fault entirely. He didn't have projects like Hunk and Pidge or responsibilities like Shiro and Coran hadn't needed anything cleaned or fixed and the idea of spending what relaxation time he had between training and missions and battles doing more training was insane.
Keith just didn't know how to have fun, he'd concluded. And any attempts to fix that had been met with a mixture of glares or confusion to the point where Lance had stopped trying, even though he was still trying to be friendly. Something Keith apparently didn't know much about either.
"Would you two cut it out?" Pidge snapped, shrugging Lance's arm off of her and it clunked on table. “I don't care what you have or haven't done. I have been tracking a Galra supply ship for the better part of the night and just want to eat my breakfast in peace!"
"Ooh, what for?" Lance asked, excitement kicking back into gear as tried to get a look at her tablet, but the resulting lines of text and code meant nothing to him. "Are we going on a mission?"
"Up to Allura and Shiro," she replied, back to typing while her food goo remained untouched. So much for eating breakfast, Lance thought. But when she was this focused on something Pidge found it hard to concentrate on the normal things humans needed to function. Like eating and sleeping. He just sighed inwardly and hoped Shiro could break her out of her work and get her to eat. He'd tried himself, but it always resulted in being yelled at or food goo being chucked at him. And getting that stuff out of his hair was ridiculously hard.
"What's up to me?" Shiro asked, strolling into the room with a towel about his neck having clearly come from the training deck.
"Pidge found a Galra supply ship," Lance said.
He felt his smallest teammate glare at him, made all the more scary with the light reflecting off her glasses. "Lance…"
"Oh? You wanted to tell him. Lo siento, my bad."
Shiro gave a soft huff of laughter and turned his attention to Pidge. "I'm assuming you have some more information?"
She nodded, wrenching her gaze away from burning holes into Lance. "My tracking algorithm for Galra radio signals went off around 0200. I traced it back to a supply ship coming in from the sixth quadrant of our current location. It's moving slowly and its shields don't seem to be up." She paused, frowning at the tablet. "It almost seems like it may have been attacked."
"Attacked?" Lance and Keith both asked at the same time.
"Jinx!" Lance cried, pointing a finger at Keith. "You owe me a soda!"
"What are you on abo-?"
"No talking! That's two sodas!"
"The two of you, please," Shiro said, rubbing at his head. "Lance, no jinxing games. Pidge, what makes you think that?"
"I've never seen a Galra ship moving like this before," she said. "It's practically limping along. If it is as defenseless as it seems it could be a great opportunity to plug into their systems and find out more information."
"Or it could be a trap," Lance pointed out.
"Really?" Keith deadpanned. "Never would have thought of that."
"Does it appear to be manned?" Shiro asked, ignoring them.
"I don't see any telltale Galra heat signatures, but it likely still has sentries if it's still moving. Otherwise it'd be dead in the water."
"We'll see what the Princess says," Shiro said after a moment. "It could be a good lead if we approach cautiously, but I don't want to take any undue risks."
They hadn't had a Galra sighting though in several days nor any distress signals that the Castle of Lions had been able to pick up. It was a little disconcerting and as of now they were just traveling about without any real direction. The only planets they'd recently encountered were uninhabited and other than providing a training ground for the Lions they hadn't even been able to make any new alliances.
If there was someone else out there attacking Galran ships it could explain why they'd not experienced any attacks themselves. But who would have the ability to go toe-to-toe with Galra? They knew there were freedom fighters out there (if the bounty hunters could be believed) but enough to take on a Galra ship?
Allura though thought it was an excellent idea when Shiro told her about it after breakfast, so long as all necessary precautions were taken. It was decided they would go down in the Green Lion thanks to Pidge's cloaking technology (and Lance whined not for the first time when his Lion would get cloaking technology too and had his foot stamped on painfully by Pidge with a huff that it took time and she had more important projects right now) and they would infiltrate the building.
Shiro would stay with Pidge so she could use his arm to access the Galran tech and the rest would provide security in the case there were rogue drones or this was indeed a trap. Allura and Coran would be standing by with the castle ready to dive in should they need firepower until the Paladins could get back to their Lions in the hangars.
And the first part of the mission had gone without a hitch. They'd docked the Green Lion on a landing deck and had encountered no resistance as Shiro opened the bay door for them. There were signs of damage on the outside of the ship, but nothing severe enough that seemed to indicate why anyone would have abandoned the vessel. It set everyone on edge.
Lance's comment of calling it a "haunted ghost ship," had Hunk moaning in fear and Keith telling him to "grow up" and Shiro letting out a low sigh and asking them to please focus on the mission.
Pidge had practically dragged their leader down a hallway, eyes fixated on her screen, and found the server room within minutes with still no enemy activity.
"This shouldn't take too long," she said, directing Shiro to place his hand on the access panel while she activated the system, already completely focused on the primary goal.
"Stay on alert, Paladins," Shiro cautioned as was tethered to the machine. "This seems too easy."
The remaining three Paladins exited the server room (which had only one entry door) and set up a perimeter down the hallway. Keith was the picture of seriousness while Lance leaned against the wall, his bayard held loosely in one hand.
Hunk, who had been down in the engine room with Coran all morning working on a filtration system upgrade, placed himself between the two with an internal sigh.
He'd known Lance since they were kids and he could tell that despite the appearance of aloofness, his best friend was bothered by something and he'd bet it had something to do with Shiro's reprimand. Whereas the scolding had Keith straightening up and resolutely ignoring Lance, it had seemed to make the Blue Paladin droop.
"What's up?" he asked quietly, mimicking Lance's pose although he kept his own bayard firmly gripped and his eyes on the passageway.
"Shiro's mad at me," Lance muttered, idly kicking his leg back and forth, heel hitting the wall with a dull clanging.
"He's not mad," Hunk said carefully. "Just... Just a little frustrated, I think."
Lance's eyes widened behind his visor. "You're taking his side?"
"I'm just looking at things from his perspective," Hunk said soothingly, reaching his free arm out to give Lance's arm a quick squeeze. "Shiro is our leader and we're a team and as a team we need to be able to count on each other." And Keith and Lance's bickering and jabs had been rising in the last few days. Hunk blamed it on the lack of Galra sightings; the lull of quiet was unnerving and reminded too much to Hunk of the calm before the storm. Something was brewing and Keith seemed to be more attuned to it than most.
"He starts it," Lance grumbled. "I'm just trying to be friendly." He just wanted everyone to get along and have fun every now and then and it wasn't his fault that Keith was so uptight about everything and seemed to take it as a personal offence that Lance didn't live and breathe fighting the Galra and being a Paladin like he did.
"I know," Hunk said, giving Lance's arm another comforting squeeze. "We all know. But you need to give Keith some space. Being a part of a group like this is new for him and he's still getting used to the dynamic." Hunk didn't really know Keith, not at all, but he did know that Keith was the type that seemed to prefer quiet and silence and even at the Garrison he had always been alone. Being thrown into this
situation and forced to be around people so often, even with a building as gigantic as the Castle of Lions, had to be hard to adjust to.
Lance sighed, but did not look quite as glum as he had before. "You're right. I'll try. But," and his voice turned to a whine that had Hunk smiling, "he's just so… Keith-like. You know? It's like he doesn't know how to have fun and doesn't want anyone else to either."
"Hey," Keith said lowly as he peered into the dark hall beyond. "Stop talking. Something's coming."
Lance shut his mouth right away and both he and Hunk turned to look in Keith's direction.
First mistake, Lance realized as he heard the whine of a gun powering up from the opposite hall he was supposed to be watching.
He whirled around but was a second too late as a purple ray shot forward and struck his armor straight in the chest. It hurt, but the armor held and Lance fired a return strike and cheered when it collided dead-center with the sentry and it collapsed in a shower of sparks.
His relief was short-lived though as his own blast revealed there were quite a large number of sentries all hurrying straight for him. Hunk had left his side to give Keith long-distance support before they were overwhelmed and he had no other choice but to set up and pick them off one by one.
He had excellent aim, if he did say so himself. He proclaimed it on a daily basis to normally eye rolls from Keith and Pidge as they took it as him showing off (again), but he was glad that one of the talents he loudly claimed was actually legit. It may be his only real talent that paled in comparison to the rest of the amazing skills of Team Voltron but he could shoot.
So he did. He set up each shot, not wasting a single pull of the trigger as he fired into the oncoming ranks. But they were too fast,too many, and he couldn't take them all down.
"Uh, guys?" he called, activating his shield and thrusting out against the sentries, who had clambered over their fallen brethren and were trying to mob him with sheer numbers. "A little help?"
But both Hunk and Keith found themselves with their hands full as a ceiling vent in the middle of the hall burst open and sentries came pouring down in a metallic clatter. Keith was in the thick of it, his sword slashing with every turn and Hunk was firing into the horde of metal, careful to aim his bayard away from his teammates.
"Paladins, what is your status?" Shiro crackled in their comms.
"It was a trap!" Lance shouted, finally clearing out a small pocket of breathing space and ramming his shield under a sentry's chin and dislocating its head before another one swiped at him and he was forced to block, stumbling backwards at the impact. "We're being overrun!"
"Just another minute," came Pidge's voice, higher than normal as she tended to sound when she was worried. "Can you hold them?"
"We will hold," Keith said, not sounding out of breath in the slightest and Lance felt jealous in the face of that calm while he was starting to feel a little overwhelmed and hysterical.
There were so many.
And they weren't stopping.
"Speak for yourself," he snapped back instead, taking another blaster hit to his armor and trying hard not to panic as that one he felt a wash of heat.
His armor was starting to suffer under the steady barrage.
Close combat had never been his strength. Shiro and Allura had been pushing him to improve on hand-to-hand, but no matter how hard he tried he just didn't measure up to the others. Not Keith's natural talent in everything, Pidge's agility and cleverness, Hunk's strength and brains and he didn't even dare try and compare himself to Shiro.
He hadn't even been able to conjure up a good bayard backup for close range fighting. He figured if he at least had a sword like Keith he'd be able to do something, but his bayard stubbornly refused to be anything but a large, powerful gun (although at least no one else had had any success with changing forms and that made him feel slightly better) and he did not have the strength like Hunk to clobber people with it. He wished he did though. Hunk looked so cool when he did it.
So he did what he could now that he was boxed in, blocking the blasts with his shield and using it as a battering ram when he found a window to do so. He was surrounded now, sentries on all sides, and it was taking all he had not to call out for help again because neither Keith or Hunk had and if they could do this then he should be able to too. A shot struck him sharply from behind in the leg, right where the armor bent behind the knee and was most vulnerable.
Lance screamed.
He couldn't help it, the pain so intense as he could literally feel his skin burning as it buckled below him. The sentries wasted no time, continuing their relentless onslaught and Lance felt more and more hits smashing into his armor, warning indicators flashing in his visor that its integrity was becoming compromised. He wasn't such much as even fighting back now as he was trying to keep the shield between his body and their blasters while tears of pain blurred his vision.
And then in a swoop of Galra purple and Altean teal, Shiro was there, arm glowing and forcibly slicing down all of the sentries that Lance had been unable to defeat and Hunk was crouching next to him and pulling him to his feet, forcing him to run even as each step sent agony racing up his injured leg that refused to hold any weight.
Lance made out that all of the sentries Hunk and Keith had been fighting were bits of mangled metal and he felt the all too familiar feeling of shame wash over him that he had not been able to do the same. Hadn't been able to defeat the enemy, had gotten injured...
He had messed up.
Again.
They were running faster now to the point where Lance felt like he was being dragged and Pidge yelled at them to go even quicker as the self-destruct sequence she'd initiated would be going off in thirty seconds.
Hunk hefted Lance over his shoulder with all the grace of a sack of potatoes, but Lance found he couldn't even care as such an action cut off the worst of the stabbing agony that was making up his leg. They made it to the Green Lion with seconds to spare, cramming in and Pidge throwing the thrusters into gear as explosions sounded from inside the ship.
The Green Lion blasted away from the Galran ship with all the speed her form carried, and even then they still felt the shockwave as the ship imploded behind them.
"Everyone all right?" Shiro asked as they made their way to the castle.
"We're fine," Keith answered for them. But then his eyes flicked to the Blue Paladin, who Hunk had gently settled on the floor behind the pilot's chair. "Except Lance."
"Yeah?" Lance retorted, voice high with pain even as he tried to swallow it down. "Well maybe if you'd come when I said I needed backup—"
"You shouldn't need backup for a mission like this," Keith said. "We were able to fend them off. Why couldn't you?"
"Enough, Keith," Shiro said, earning a huff and Keith turned away, gaze going out the front window as space rushed by them. Shiro crouched down next to Lance and more gently said, "Are you all right, buddy? Do you think you need a healing pod?"
"Dunno," Lance said, even though he knew he probably did. Shiro moved his hand down to examine it and even that light touch against his armored knee had him nearly crying again. "Dios mío, Shiro!" He tried to withdraw and hated the whimper that was pulled from him at the action.
"Sorry, sorry," the Black Paladin said, pulling his hand back. "If it's that bad though I think you do need a pod. Coran?"
"Already on it," came the chipper voice of the royal advisor. "We'll have you fixed up in a jiffy, Number Three!"
"And the mission?" Allura asked over the comm. "Was it successful?"
"Not sure yet, Princess," Pidge said. "We need to go over the data I downloaded. But it looks like this ship was supposed to be carrying some pretty valuable cargo and it was removed following the earlier attack. If I can track down the coordinates of the drone ships that took it, it could be valuable."
"It seems to be sound," Shiro said, having been present to Pidge's mumbling as the data downloaded. "The sentries remaining on the ship were likely not activated during the initial battle and came online when Pidge started hacking the system."
"That is most excellent news then," Allura said. "Great work, Paladins. I shall see you on the bridge."
They arrived a minute later and landed without incident in the Green Lion's hangar. Shiro instructed everyone to disarm and report to the bridge, save for Lance and Hunk to report to the infirmary.
"I can walk," Lance protested as Hunk made to sling him over his shoulder again. Or, well, limp. But he could feel Keith's eyes on him and he flushed, ducking his head. No doubt his fellow Paladin was embarrassed by how easily Lance had been taken down. He needed to at least try and save a little face. Hunk sighed but allowed Lance to loop an arm over his shoulders and assisted him in his painful hobbling hop.
Once the other Paladins had branched off towards the living quarters though, Lance slumped bonelessly, leg burning, and reflexive tears trying to make themselves known. Hunk gave him a sympathetic smile and scooped him into his arms and Lance tucked his head beneath Hunk's chin.
"I'm sorry I couldn't help you," Hunk said softly, guilt pooling in his stomach at the clear pain Lance was in and the way he had seen him fold up at Keith's words.
""s my own fault," Lance mumbled. "Keith was right. I should have been able to fight them off."
"And I should have been there to assist you," Hunk said, tightening his arms around his best friend. "Your weapon isn't good for close combat and we know that. It won't happen again."
"No," Lance said nearly inaudible. "It won't."
And Hunk could only sigh and hold Lance a little closer.
Coran was waiting for them next to a cryo-pod and clucked his tongue sympathetically as they came into view. "That does indeed look painful," he said as Hunk settled Lance onto the nearby bench. "Let's just get his armor off you and into the pod you go."
That was easier said than done. Coran expertly knew where all of the latches were, but the blast to the leg had melted the connector on the side and they'd needed to physically pry him out of the leg guard with what appeared to be the Altean version of a crowbar.
Lance had been unable to hold back a cry as the armor was finally pulled free and blinked back the hot tears that had sprung up again.
Coran winced at the sight of burned flesh and patted Lance on the shoulder. "That was a pretty lucky shot by those sentries," he said. "I'll see what I can do about enforcing the armor there a bit."
"Thanks," Lance said breathlessly as Hunk picked him up once more and sent a lancing pain down his leg that seemed to hurt even worse than before. His chest and arms were littered with small bruises too from the sentries' guns and although they were nothing like the pain in his leg they were throbbing with a dull hurt now. It only got worse as Hunk manhandled him as gently as possible into a cryosuit over his underamour.
"I'd say about two hours," Coran advised as Lance was placed into the pod, having to balance uncomfortably on one leg as the other hurt too much to put down, which only added to his growing unease in the small space. "You'll be feeling right as ravioli once you're finished." He reached in and gave Lance's shoulder a squeeze, eyes softening in understanding.
Lance's throat was thick again and he tried his best to give Coran a smile of thanks.
"It's right as rain," Hunk corrected as Coran booted up the sequence and the front of the pod began to slide down.
"Such a strange saying," Coran said shaking his head. "On Altea rain is very painful indeed. Huge boulders coming down from the sky."
"On Earth it's actually very pleasant," Hunk said. "Although I could really go for some ravioli now. I wonder if we have any of that Kersphek cheese left from our last supply."
Lance's smile fell as a familiar sense of panic took root as he was sealed fully in. He hated being put into the pods while he was awake. He loved the results, sure, but ever since the castle had tried to kill him in one he was not all that fond of the cramped space. Or any cramped space, really. Or dark ones. And both of the above? He shuddered and it had nothing to do with the growing cold.
It would be just a few seconds now, he knew, before the cryo part of the pod took over. He just had to make it for a few more seconds.
Happier thoughts, he told himself, for those last ticks. Ravioli they'd been talking about? He would really like some ravioli now too. Maybe Hunk would have some ready when he came out of the pod.
And with that in mind, Lance succumbed to the healing powers of the chamber.
xxx
"They have taken the bait," Haggar informed Zarkon with a low bow. "We will commence the next phase shortly."
He scowled at her instead. "I grow impatient, Haggar. It has been four days since you proposed this plan and I have yet to see results." All he had seen were wasted opportunities to strike at the Paladins as instead he recalled units in their last known location and had purposefully had to cripple one of his ships. Haggar assured him it was well worth it.
"They are coming soon, my lord. By tomorrow's end we will have a Paladin in our custody and the Black Lion to shortly follow."
Zarkon inclined his head a fraction. It was at least a better timeline than the "soon" Haggar had been feeding him and if it did not work he knew whose screams he would hear for wasting his time like this. "Good. Then dismissed."
She bowed low and disappeared in a whirl of black lightning.
Zarkon allowed himself a smile in his empty audience hall, gaze drawn to the darkness of space across the room. If this did plot of Haggar's did work... then he would soon be in possession of the Black Lion and Voltron would fall completely and utterly.
And then none would stand in his way.