It had been about a day since the incident with Lotor. The Paladins had been introduced to Novae's younger siblings, Orasis and Arrome, the first set of twins in the Estellian royal family. During the time they spent with the Paladins, they had been slightly closed off from the group, talking to each other about things they didn't want the Paladins to know about.
They wouldn't even tell the Paladins what was happening on Estellia, nor the condition about their older sister, Novae. All they said whenever the Paladins asked about it was "It's best you see it with your own eyes" or "We'll explain everything that's happened when we get to Estellia".
It was annoying to everyone, but the one most afraid for Novae and the most annoyed about the situation was Shiro. He couldn't take the suspense, especially after everyone had told him about Novae's sacrifice in the Quintessence field. He wanted to see her again. To help her in any way he could.
Another hour passed and Pidge came back out of the Green Lion with a sad look on her face.
"Were you able to contact Earth?" Shiro asked Pidge.
"No luck." Pidge answered sadly, "The low power levels are probably affecting our broadcast distance. I'll keep trying as we head for Earth."
"I can't believe we're finally going home." Lance said almost in disbelief.
"I'm gonna hug my parents and never let go." Hunk said hugging himself to further prove his point.
"I can't wait to see how Dad integrated Altean and Earth technologies together." Pidge said excitedly with stars in her eyes, "I bet he came up with something amazing. And my mom..." her happy face turned unsure and a little but scared, "oh, she's gonna be so mad at me for running away. I hope I'm not grounded."
"Do you forget that you have to come to Estellia to help our sister?" Orasis asked, "Or do you not care about her enough to--"
"Orasis!" Aromme shouted, "I'm sure they're worried about their families just as much as we worry for our sister." She turned to the others, "If you agree to come with us, it will take you just a little longer to get back to your planet. But everyone on Estellia will be in your debt."
"Of course we're going to Estellia." Shiro said, "But how are we going to get there and how long will it take?"
"It shouldn't take too long with Narissa's power." Orasis said.
"Narissa?" Keith repeated.
Aromme nodded and smiled, "Our younger sister, the fourth born and forth heir to the Estellian throne. She was gifted the a talisman that allows her to convert her own energy into a wormhole. Such the same way that the Princess used the Teludav to create wormholes."
Everyone was surprised by what the twins had said. One of Novae's siblings had that kind of power. Such an incredible power.
"However, we have to wait some time." Orasis said."
"What do you mean?" Hunk asked.
"Well, because the energy that it takes to create a wormhole comes from our sister directly, she needs time to rest before she can do it again."
"Yes, that's true." Aromme agreed, "Narissa opened a very small wormhole to get us to this location, and even though it was small, she still used a lot of energy to do so. It could take her at least a movement or two in order for her to regain the necessary energy to make a big enough wormhole for all of the Lions."
"So for the time being, we'll have to fly closer to Estellia." Orasis finished.
Keith turned to Coran, "Coran, with this added detour, how long do you think it'll take us to get home?" He asked.
"I was just calculating that now." Coran said, "Without the luxury of a wormhole and with the diminished power cores and the added detour to Estellia, which is..."
"Without a wormhole, it's about a couple of lightyears away." Orasis answered.
"Okay, that changes somethings, let me see, carry the one... oh, it's gonna take us approximately 170,000 Earth years. Give or take a cycle" Coran answered.
Everyone gasped in shock at the long predicted journey time.
"A hundred and fifty thousand years?" Keith shouted in shock.
"Coran, I think your finger counting is a little off." Pidge pointed out, "It's gonna be 1.7 years." Everyone groaned in relief.
"Oh, right. I didn't carry the three." Coran chuckled sheepishly.
"It's going to be a very long and difficult voyage, but it's our only chance of getting Novae back and to replace the Castle of Lions." Allura said.
Shiro smiled, thinking about what Novae had told him about Estellia. The cities, the villages, clear sweet waters. The bright night skies that reflected the cosmos so clearly you could almost touch it. She had promised to show it to him one day, and here he was, going to Estellia without her.
"I can't believe I'm going to Estellia without you, Novae." Shiro thought to himself, "But don't worry. Whatever's happening to you, we're going to help you."
"Well, what are we waiting for, guys? Let's hit the space road!" Lance cheered excitedly.
"I suppose we need to figure out who's flying with whom." Krolia said.
"And what about the animals?" Coran asked, bringing the subject back to our passenger arrangement.
"What about them?" Pidge asked.
"Well, the wolf can't go with the Kaltenecker, wolves eat cows. And the cow can't be in the same area as the mice because aren't cows afraid of mice?"
"No, elephants are afraid of mice." Lance pointed out.
"Elephants?"
"Yeah. There giant, gray animals with long noses that grab things." Lance explained doing a terrible impression.
"Giants with long, grabbing noses? Earth seems so strange." Allura said.
"The wolf is riding with me. But that means Hunk will have to take the cow." Keith said.
"Me with the cow?" Hunk asked as he pointed to himself, "Not a good idea."
"Hunk's right. Keith, you're keeping the cow. Someone else is gonna have to take the wolf." Lance said, making everyone look at Pidge.
"Not me." She said, "I am allergic."
"I'll take the mice." Allura said happily.
"How come you get the smallest passengers?" Keith asked begrudgingly. Allura glared at him.
"I say we go old school and draw straws." Hunk suggested.
"But I'm terrible at drawing." Allura slumped.
"She really is." Coran stated, "One time, she tried to draw her Nan-nan, but what she came up with, I've gotta say it looked more like a flan-bil-diplor."
"Guys, you're all overthinking this. I know exactly where everyone should go." Lance said.
A little while later after following Lance's instructions
"Hunk and mice, ready to go." Hunk said.
"I'm ready too. But the wolf looks restless. How did I get stuck with it again?" Allura said, Aromme giggling as the wolf started licking her face.
"I'd gladly trade you the wolf for--." Keith said annoyed by Coran, Shiro and his mom being stuck with him.
"I have a question." Coran said, "Why did we let Lance decide all this?"
"Enough whining!" Lance said, "Romelle, Orasis and I are going to Earth, who's coming with us?"
The Lions quickly started up and began flying, but it didn't take long for everyone to start complaining about their assigned partners on the voyage.
"Aw, man, you guys are like the ultimate road companions." Hunk said enjoying his time with the mice.
"Oh, and I get to finally play some of your Earth road games." Coran said leaning over Keith, "I'll go first. I spy with my little eye something that starts with "plexis"."
"Coran, we don't know the Altean alphabet." Shiro pointed out.
"This is perfect. I can teach you." Coran happily said, then began singing the Altean alphabet song, annoying Keith even more.
"What does this one do? Is this the lasers? Where's the mouth-blade button?" Romelle asked, her questions never ceasing.
"Could you please sit down and shut up, Romelle?" Orasis growled plugging his ears.
"It's jaw-blade, and don't touch that. Romelle, come on. This is a dangerous war machine." Lance said, but Romelle kept firing off her questions.
Hunk started sharing pictures of the mice, having all the fun he could have alone with the smallest creatures.
"No! Bad! Stop biting that." Allura yelled at the wolf, "Put that Belexiam assembly down right now, or so help me--! Aromme, can't you control him?"
"I'm trying my best princess!" Aromme shouted chasing the wolf around the cargo hold of the Blue Lion.
"Keith, your wolf is tearing up the cargo hold."
"Because he's lonely. Just let him in the cockpit." Keith said.
"I will absolutely not let that beast In the cockpit."
"He's not a beast Princess! That's just rude." Aromme scolded.
"Guys, check out this picture. The mice look so cute." Hunk said sending another picture of the sleeping mice on his shoulder.
"Ooh, this looks shiny." Romelle said following with a loud whooshing sound.
"What did you touch?" Lance asked.
"What if I touch this?"
"Guys, I think I did a bad job choosing passengers."
They all dealt with this for a little while longer, until finally, enough was enough.
"That's it. We're switching passengers." Keith declared.
"I second that." Allura agreed.
"Agreed." Lance said.
"Hey, why haven't we heard from Pidge?" Hunk asked.
"Yeah. Wait, who's in her lion again?" Lance asked.
"I don't know, you're the one that came up with this grouping." Keith said annoyed.
"Well, she must have-- no, they're with Keith. And the wolf and Aromme are with Allura, I have the mice." Hunk listed off.
"Is she all alone?"
The team made a quick stop on a nearby asteroid and switched, giving Pidge the most passengers before flying off again.
"Oh, come on, you guys this is so not fair!" She said, Romelle and Coran shouting over who got the controller first.
"I call dibs on playing the video game first." Coran shouted.
"But I already have the controller." Romelle retorted.
"Pidge, tell Romelle to give me the controller. I called it first."
"No. Nope. Nuh-uh. Now way. Can't do this." Pidge said.
Once again, they stopped for a moment and changed passengers again. This time, Aromme and Orasis were together in the Blue Lion, keeping to themselves as they sat in the cargo hold. But Aromme seemed to be troubled as she glanced up at her brother.
"Bro--"
"Not gonna happen." Orasis said quickly, knowing what she was going to ask.
"We need to tell them sooner or later. And personally, I believe we should choose to tell them sooner rather than later."
"Aromme, you know as well as I do that if they figure out the truth too soon it'll break them." Orasis said.
"But Vae said that we should tell them everything--"
"When they are mentally stable." Orasis finished and sighed, "I know you want to spill all of the secrets we're keeping, but for our sister's sake as well as theirs, we can't tell them anything."
"What about explaining our sister's condition?" Aromme asked, "Surely they should at least know that?"
"And how exactly would you explain what's happened to our sister when we don't even understand what's happened to her?" Orasis pointed out making his sister rethink her decision to tell the others about their sister.
She wanted to tell everyone the truth, but according to their sister, she had to wait to tell them the whole truth.
Aromme sighed, knowing that her brother was right. The Paladins needed to be in a stable state of mind in order to help their sister properly. But it killed her that she was keeping such secrets in the dark when the Paladins trusted them to get to Estellia safely and they were expecting to see Novae.... a healthy strong Novae...
🦁🦁🦁~~~~🦁🦁🦁
After a few hours of flying, Krolia's voice came through the radios.
"This is the Klii-Nyn System." Krolia said. "There's a Blade of Marmora rally point located on a moon here. We should check in with them and get an update on their operations."
"Team, we're going to make a quick stop. Everyone follow me." Keith said and led the others to the Marmora rally point.
They all flew for a while longer before reaching an asteroid belt near the moon where the rally point was located.
"Hailing Zailox Station. Please respond." Krolia said through the open hailing frequency, "Repeat, Zailox Station. Please respond." All that was responding was crackling static. Not a single voice responded as they landed on the asteroid.
Everyone, including the twins, who insisted on going along with them, floated over to the door and Allura forced it open with her Altean strength. Krolia went in first, surveying the area before the others followed soon after. They moved cautiously into the base, but there were no signs of life.
They went deeper into the station and saw the metal platforms, the generator, all broken and unused.
"It doesn't look like anyone's been here for years." Keith said.
They all went to the control where Pidge sat down, pressing keys to start up the system with no such luck.
"The system won't boot." She said, "Looks like the backup power has been out for a while."
"If the Blade of Marmora abandoned this place, that means something really bad must have happened." Hunk said.
"That's impossible." Mom said in denial, "This base was fully operational during my last check with the Blades."
"I wonder what could have happened here." Aromme wondered aloud.
"Nothing good, I can tell you that." Orasis added.
Suddenly, a loud thud erupted form the outside.
"Enemy ship! Incoming!" Coran shouted.
"Everyone, back to the Lions!" Keith said and they rushed back to the Lions.
As soon as they got back to their Lions, they took off and rushed to see what was going on. Soon after taking off, the team spotted several Galra ships flying around. Orasis and Aromme glared at these ships, for they have seen these kinds of fighters before.
"It looks like a small fleet. Mostly Galra fighters." Keith said.
"That's good. We should be able to take them out pretty easily." Lance said.
"Yeah, but remember, we're not flying at full power." Pidge reminded.
The fighters began to fire and the lions dodged with ease.
"Pidge is right. Everyone stay sharp." Keith advised.
ThePaladins kept flying and dodging the attacks, eventually splitting up and taking on a different number of ships on their own. Just then, the wolf Keith had suddenly appeared in the Blue Lion and teleported Orasis away, leaving him in the Black Lion with Keith, Krolia, Shiro and Coran all inside.
"What in the name of Zaurelia just happened?" He questioned himself as the wolf disappeared.
"Keep an eye out. Where there are fighters there's usually a cruiser nearby." Lance said.
I scanned the surrounding area and found no signs of a cruiser, which was very odd. It's normal for a fighter fleet to be near a cruiser with a commander giving battle plans and other orders, so why wasn't there one anywhere?
"Some of these ships look like they belong to Lotor's fleet." Romelle said from the Blue Lion.
"How did you get in here?" Allura asked shocked by her new passenger.
"The wolf seems to be having a little bit of fun." Aromme said.
The lions dodged and weaved around the fighters and their attacks. However, because they weren't at full force, they couldn't avoid everything shot thrown at them at them.
"We need to get out of here!" Keith shouted. The Black Lion suddenly pulled back away from an attack and flew away from the group of fighters.
"Guys, they've got me. I can't move." Hunk said as he and the Yellow Lion were tied down by glowing lines attached to the fighters.
"Hang on, Hunk. I'm gonna get you out of there." Keith said flying to Hunk's Lion.
The Black Lion summoned his jaw blade and cut the lines, freeing the Yellow Lion.
"Thanks, Keith."
"We're getting our quiznacks handed to us." Lance said, "We need to do something. We need to form Voltron."
"Okay. Everyone, in formation." Keith said.
They flew their lions into formation, but something was off again, but they weren't forming Voltron. Aromme noticed this instantly and quickly used her bracelet to contact her brother via holographic messaging.
"Orasis, you need to use your power now!" She said, "Figure out what's happening to the Lions."
Orasis nodded and ended the call, pushing past everyone and placing a hand on the console.
"What are you doing?" Keith asked.
"It's not working." Lance said.
"Hold!" Keith ordered.
"I'm trying to figure out what's keeping Voltron from being formed. Give me a couple ticks." Orasis said. He closed his eyes for a moment and just a couple ticks later, his eyes shot open, but glowing a shining blue color. He looked around and sighed as his eyes turned back to normal and he took his hand from the console.
"Your Lion doesn't have enough energy to go through a full Voltron transformation. Also, some its structure has been slightly damaged due to you all going into and coming out of the quintessence field. It'll take a while for your Lions to fully recover."
"Orasis is right, Keith. The Lions can't take much more of this." Allura shouted.
"Abort!" Keith finally said and the Lions flew out of formation.
"What just happened?" Lance asked.
"Exactly as my brother explained." Aromme said, "You need to give the Lions as much time as you can so that they can recover what strength they can."
"So now what?" Hunk asked.
"We run." Keith said.
Just then, the Lions shook after hitting something. But there was nothing in their way.
"Is everyone okay?" Lance asked.
"I'm okay." Pidge responded.
"Me too." Allura replied.
"What did we hit?" Hunk asked.
"Xanthroium crystals. They've been cloaked." Coran informed the team. Suddenly, the Black lion was thrown off by one of the cloaked crystals. Orasis went crashing to the floor and landed next to Shiro's feet.
"Orasis, you okay?" Shiro asked, but the boy didn't say a thing and stood back up.
The Green Lion was being hit by some kind of new weapon, thankfully, Pidge was able to dodge it.
"Whoa! Where did that come from?" She shouted.
The Yellow Lion flew around the fighters as they used their new weapons to try and capture them.
"I've never seen the Galra use weapons like these before." Hunk said.
"And they're not using standard Galra battle formations." Allura added.
"How are we gonna get away?"
"They're trying to trap us by chasing us through this tunnel of crystals." Keith said.
"He's right." Pidge confirmed. "Look, there are more crystals up ahead."
"They're corralling us like we're space cattle." Hunk compared.
"They backed us into a corner." Lance said, "We got xanthorium crystals all around us, pirates behind us, and a cyclone blocking our exit."
Everyone looked up and indeed saw a large green cyclone in front of them, swirling around as if it was ready to suck everything in front of it inside the vortex.
"We have no choice. Everyone into the cyclone." Keith said, the cyclone roaring with thunder and lightning, "Hunk, that means you and I are gonna have to punch a hole through the storm and create a path for the team. You ready?"
"As I'll ever be." Hunk replied flying next to the Black Lion.
The Black and Yellow Lions flew in front of the rest of the group, punching a hole through the cyclone. But as they flew, debris flew all around them and the harsh winds made it even worse to navigate.
"Guys, we can't take much more of this." Lance said.
"Everyone scan the area for anything we can use for cover." Keith ordered, "We need to go somewhere where we have the advantage."
"There's a volcanic ice planet nearby." Pidge said, "It has geysers, steam vents, ice tunnels, extreme changes in temperature and an unstable core. It's super dangerous. It's perfect."
"Okay, team, let's do this."
The Paladins steered their lions to the right and flew towards the unstable planet to hide in. The Galra ships followed us to the planet, even though it was dangerous. They broke through the clouds and began flying downwards towards the canyons that ran across the ice planet.
"All right, everybody, stay in formation and follow me." Keith said.
They flew deeper into the canyons, reaching a section where several geyser holes were carved into the canyon walls, shooting out powerful shots of water at anyone who would come close.
"Geyser. Geyser!" Hunk shouted as we neared the geysers. The Paladins quickly flew past them, dodging their blasts while the fighters were being taken out by several of the geysers
But the remaining ships stayed on track, proceeding to slow us down by shooting at one of the ice bridges in front of us. The attack hit its mark and the ice came crashing down.
"Watch out for the falling ice." Shiro warned.
Everyone dodged the falling ice, when Keith said something that sparked an idea for their escape.
"A cave." He said, "That gives me an idea. Lance, bring up the rear. When everyone's through the tunnel, fire above the cave opening. Red should be fast enough to get in before the avalanche completely blocks the way."
"Roger that, team leader." Lance responded, flying towards the back of the group.
"We'll see each other on the other side."
The team flew faster towards the cave and went inside, the Red Lion firing at the opening before flying through as well. But the plan was only half successful.
"Uh, oh. Some of them still made it through." Lance said as a few fighters rushed through the caves right behind them.
"Split up. We need to thin our attackers." Keith said, everyone flying through different tunnels one by one.
As the Black Lion flew through the caves, one of the fighters rushed behind them until Keith got an alert that something was on top of the Black Lion.
"He's trying to break in." Shiro said, "I'll take care of him."
"No, you're still recovering. I'll do it." Krolia insisted
"I'm coming with you." Orasis said.
"No way, kid."
"I'm no child that can't fight. Besides, there's a score I want to settle with these punks." Orasis claimed.
"Wait." Keith said stopping the two in their tracks as he held out his Blade of Marmora knife, "Take this."
Without a second thought, Krolia took the knife as she and Orasis ran outside of the Lion and confronted the attacker. Krolia threw the blade at the attacker just as they were rushing out from the escape hole. The two flipped out of the Lion and landed away from the attacker.
Krolia's blade elongated with a bright purple shine, while Orasis reached behind him and pulled out what seemed to be a pole attached to the belt he wore. But instantly, Orasis pulled the pole apart and revealed that they were actually twin blades used for close combat. Krolia was surprised to see these kinds of weapons, as it reminded her of Novae. She remembered the times she would watch Novae as she trained with dual swords and others weapons of the similar type.
The three charged at each other, Krolia aiming high while Orasis went low. But no matter what they tried to do, the attacker would always block them.
"Hang on!" Keith warned as the Black Lion jerked back and spun around the avoid the many columns that were in the tunnel. But that hardly did a thing to throw off the attacker. The attacker jumped form end of the Lion to where Krolia and Orasis were.
He was about to attack Krolia, when Orasis swooped in from below and caught the back of the attacker's ankle, causing him to cry out in pain. Orasis grabbed Krolia and pulled her out of the way just before a large stalagmite came and hit the attacker, sending him flying off the Black Lion.
Meanwhile with Allura, Romelle and Aromme, they were being blocked by one of the fighters as well. Allura forced the Blue Lion to open its mouth and crushed the ship between its jaw.
"Nice." Romelle said, but her congratulations was too early. The alarms started to sound and Allura pulled up the feed from the Lion's mouth.
"Oh, no." She said as they all saw the pilot of the ship with a rifle in hand, alive and ready to fight.
"What are you waiting for? Shoot him." Romelle said.
"I can't. The jaws are stuck shut." Allura explained.
"I'll take care of him." Romelle said.
"Not without someone to back you up." Aromme said and rushed after Romelle to the mouth.
Just before they got the entrance to the mouth, Aromme stretched out her arm in front of Romelle.
"What are you--"
"You focus on getting the jaw unstuck. I'll handle the intruder." Aromme said. The gold gauntlet around her wrist began to shine brightly and split into two pieces. The glowing pieces soon cleared up and showed off identical gauntlets of pure Estellian gold. Though they seemed delicate, they were far more powerful than that.
Aromme ran through the entrance to the mouth and upon seeing the intruder, she didn't hesitate to punch him hard. Her attack was so hard that if you were listening carefully, you could hear a couple of his ribs breaking before he slammed into the destroyed seat of his ship.
Romelle was astounded, but then realized she had a job to do. She scanned the mouth and saw a piece of metal stuck between one of the sparking grooves. Romelle ran to the metal and pulled it out with her Altean strength.
"Allura, open the mouth." She called out and the Princess did as she was told, the ship being tossed out of the Lion with ease.
"Wonderful work, Romelle." Aromme praised with a smile as the mouth closed.
"And I have to say, what a powerful punch!" Romelle praised back.
"Is everyone okay?" Keith called.
"Clear." Hunk announced.
"Me too, thanks to Romelle and Aromme." Allura responded.
"Well, Pidge and I need help." Lance shouted.
"Yeah, we can't shake these guys and we don't have any room to maneuver." Pidge added.
"I see your location. We're headed your way." He said.
There was a moment of silence before Pidge and Lance announced that they were all right. Suddenly, everyone saw a bright light at the end of the tunnel. They kept flying until they reached the end of the caves and met outside. But then, just as they exited the tunnel, a bright red glow covered them from above and forced the Lions to the ground.
Everyone groaned from the sudden intense pressure, not knowing that they were about to see some old, familiar faces.