~~~~Saoirse~~~~
I sat inside the Silver Lion cockpit, my mind going back to the terrifying thoughts of what happened during iur absence. But I kept a straight face, not showing my worry. However, once we get to Earth, I'll need to find a way to contact my family on Teshiria. They must be worried sick about me.
"Allura, try the sonic wave." Pidge said.
"Okay, I'll try." Allura replied.
The Blue Lion tried charged up the sonic wave, but it was no use. All of our lions' energies were too weak to use any of their special abilities.
"It's still not working. And it probably won't work again until our power-cores are recharged."
"Roger that. Well, our long-range scanners still haven't detected any planets nearby. No star systems, nothing." Pidge informed us.
"Ugh!" Lance graoned, "How long have we been out here?"
"Going on four movements." Romelle groaned as she answered.
"And how long is it gonna take to get to Earth at this speed?"
"I think Pidge said something like ten billion deca-phoebs." Romelle said.
"I said one and a half Earth years." Pidge corrected.
"Whoa, whoa. Wait, theres a big discrepancy between ten billion deca-phoebs and one an a half Earth years. Which one is it?" Hunk asked.
"It's one and a half Earth years!" Pidge screamed in annoyance, "We've gone over this several times, though there may be a margin of error of about a month, depending on any time dilation we encounter."
"Look, we knew this wasn't going to be an easy or quick voyage, but replacing the Castle of Lions is our top priority." Shiro said.
"We just have to stay sharp and maintain discipline." Keith added, "We knew when we started this journey that we'd be low on power. We didn't plan on going through the galactic void, but we'll get through it."
"Don't worry, guys. We'll run into something eventually that will turn this trip around." Lance said assuringly.
"What makes you so sure?" Hunk asked.
"If my experience has taught me anything... it's that something always comes along to try to kill us."
"He has a point there. We're never not in danger for long." I said, "But, Lance? Maybe hold off on that type of topic. After all, our lions are weak and we can't fight back."
"Sorry, Saoirse." Lance apologized.
Hours turned to days went by and still no sign of sign of any planets nearby. Not even a destroyed or abandoned planet where we could land and rest, not that we wanted to.
I passed the time trying to use my powers to re-energize my lion, but I could only give so much, and my lion took a lot of energy from the quintessence in the area.
Even more days of travel passed, and soon we began to notice the lack of stars around us. I looked up from my pendant, staring at the picture of my family, only to see the darkness of space. Barely any stars were visible and I felt almost no energy around us.
"Hey, Pidge, why is is so dark out here?" Lance asked, him and everyone else noticing the darkness around us.
"I can't be sure, but my theory is that this area is surrounded by some kind of nebula that blocks most of the light." Pidge answered.
"Oh, yeah. Must be a patch of that dark matter I've heard about."
"That isn't what dark matter is."
"Although, when it's this dark, I guess it doesn't matter, right, guys?" Hunk joked. I wanted to at least chuckle at his joke, but my uneasy feeling kept me from doing so.
"This is why no one rides with me anymore, isn't it?" Hunk asked then went silent.
"I don't know, guys." I said, wrapping my arms around myself, "It's cold here. I feel almost no energy. It's almost as if we're in a void."
"How does that even work, Saoirse?" Keith asked.
"I'm not sure myself, but usually, I can feel energy even if there's nothing but stars. But here, there's nothing, just darkness." I explained. I began to feel uneasy in this place, to the point where my scar began to burn.
"Guys, I think I might have an idea on how to get the lions back up to full power." Shiro suddenly said, breaking me from my thoughts.
"And you're just now telling us this?" Lance asked.
"Well, I'm sorry, Lance, but I guess having my consciousness and energy transplanted from the infinity of Voltron's inner quintessence into the dead body of an evil clone of myself has left me a little out of sorts for the past few weeks." Shiro answered in a sarcastic tone.
"Oh. Yeah." Lance quietly responded.
I chuckled at Shiro's smart retort.
"What is it, Shiro?" Keith asked.
"It's difficult to articulate, but remember when we were fighting Zarkon... and we were hit with that beam that drained all of our quintessence?"
"Yes, you were all completely incapacitated." Allura said.
"That's right, but we managed to generate enough power to keep fighting."
"Yeah. We repowered ourselves." Keith said.
"Exactly. And I think that's how it's meant to work. Since I disappeared, you've been relying on the Castle's crystal to keep the lions charged and Saoirse used her powers to help strengthen them when you were in battle. But if you were a team of fully-realized paladins, you wouldn't need that."
"I... I can't help but feel this must be my fault." Allura said sadly, "You were able to recharge Voltron before, but since I joined..."
"It's no one's fault." Shiro said, "Being a Paladin of Voltron takes training. You just haven't had time to focus on working together to find your balance in this configuration."
"Well, we've got nothing but time now." Pidge said.
"That's right. We've been down before, and we always come back." Lance said.
"Yeah, we've been through so much in the past, we can't give up when the universe needs us." I added with a smile, unwrapping myself from my arms and grabbing my controls.
"I'm glad you're here, Shiro." Keith said, "After all you went through, how did you find the strength to be the leader of Voltron?"
"I had help." Shiro replied, making me and the rest of the team smile, "That's why there are six of you, to lift each other up."
"So what should we do? Maybe some flight formation exercises?" Keith suggested.
I was about to agree on the exercises, but I felt something. A pulse of energy near us. I looked up at the endless space in front of us and saw what looked to be lightning flashes dead ahead. The light flashed in a strange pattern, lighting up the sky in cosmic colors, mostly green and blue. And with each strike came a different energy.
"What is that?" I asked.
"You know, when you line up and..."
"No, no, no! I think Saoirse is talking about what's dead ahead of us!" Pidge said.
Everyone looked up and saw the flashes of light in front of us. I gripped my controls tighter than before.
"My scanners aren't picking anything up!"
In an instant, the lights flashed even brighter, forming powerful waves of light and pushing us back in a sea of white.
"What the quiznak is this?" Lance grunted as we were thrown backwards.
"Whatever it is, we've gotta move!"
Following Keith's orders, we turned around and flew as fast as we could away from the light. As we flew away, orbs of the same light came from the waves and streams. They randomly appeared and hit us from all sides, causing us to grunt and scream in pain from the impact.
"Break high!" Keith shouted.
We flew in formation up high. We were relieved for only a second before the white light appeared again in front of us. The last thing I heard were the screams of my friends as the light finally engulfed us all.
I woke up however much time had passed, floating in my Lion's cockpit. I felt no energy from them at all, not even the little bit they had before being struck by those strange lights.
I groaned softly and pushed myself to the windows of my cockpit, but then, I saw all lf the lions lifeless and floating in the emptiness of space. I sensed everyone's energies, but the only ones that seemed normal were Keith, Lance, Allura, Pidge and Hunk. Everyone else's energies seemed to be in a frozen state.
"Everyone, are you all okay?" I asked. It was silent for a minute or two until I heard someone groan. I sighed in relief at the sound of my friends slowly coming to.
"I'm all right." Keith replied.
"I'm here." Pidge responded.
"Still alive." Lance said.
"That was crazy." Hunk said before he grunted in pain.
"I'm fine." Allura said.
"What about everyone else?" I asked.
"Hey, are you okay, buddy?" Keith asked most likely the wolf.
"Shiro, can you hear me?" Pidge asked, scanning his frozen body, "Shiro seems to be frozen but his vitals are strong."
"Same here." Keith said.
"Copy that with Romelle. What's going on?" Lance asked.
"Coran is frozen as well. Our paladin armoe must have protected us from the shock." Allura explained, "The Blue Lion is completely incapacitated. "
"Yeah, Red is out too." Lance confirmed.
"So, we're all alone in space, no power, no way to call for help, nothing within several thousand light years..."
"Hunk, you need to be calm. You're stressing yourself out." I said trying to calm Hunk down a little.
"What do we do?" Lance asked.
"First, we need to be calm, then come up with a way to get the Lions back." I said.
"That's smart, Saoirse." Keith said, "Pidge, is there any way to get the lions back up and running?"
"Maybe, but I don't know how long it'll take." Pidge said.
"I could try to use my powers, but that could take time as well." I looked around and saw the lions slowly drifting away from each other, and I was no different.
"Guys, we'd better do something about the lions, they're starting to drift in different directions from the blast." I said.
"If we don't get the power back on, we might lose each other." Hunk said, slightly panicking.
"Okay, the power's gonna have to wait. Our top priority is tethering the lions together." Keith said.
"I think I have an idea of how we can do it." Allura said.
"How? Some magical powers that you learned on Oriande?" Lance asked.
"No, I have some leftover zip line in my hull."
"Oh."
"We're getting out of our Lions to do this?" Hunk asked, "We don't even know what that energy pulse was."
"It's the only way to stay together. Allura, grab that zip line. Let's get moving." Keith said.
We quickly exited our lions gripped the outside of our lions.
"Everyone stay sharp and hang on." Keith said, hanging onto his lion.
I activated my jetpack and floated over to Keith, to which he took my hand and held me close ensuring that I wouldn't float away from him.
"Ugh. So many lions, all spinning." Hunk groaned, his flame turning slightly green as well as his face while he retched.
"Come on, Hunk. You've been through worse than this." Lance said.
"Yeah, yeah. Yeah, okay. Let me just..." Hunk retched again, "Nope. No good. Oh, don't barf in the space helmet, Hunk. Don't do it."
Allura successfully climbed out of her lion with the zip line in her hand.
"You're going to have to move your lions towatds my location. Otherwise, there won't be enough cord to attach us together." Allura said.
"Uh, by ourselves? I don't think that's possible." Hunk said.
"The impossible is just the possible that hasn't been done yet." I said.
Hunk climbed in front of the Yellow Lion, and tried to push him back with the help of his jetpack. It was no use.
"Yeah, no, we're definitely gonna need more help."
Keith's eyes widened and looked down towards me.
"Saoirse, can't you use your powers to connect to the lions and draw them closer?" He asked. I hummed in thought, not even considering the suggestion until now.
"I can try." I said, closing my eyes and focusing on the Lions, but as soon as I connected to them, it felt as if I was frozen from the inside out. I gasped and let go of my connection.
"Saoirse, you okay?" Keith asked.
"Sorry, but I can't connect to the lions. They're energy is frozen and immovable." I explained.
"Looks like we're gonna have to do this one by one." Hunk said.
"On our way." Keith said, "Everyone to the Yellow Lion!." We did as told and flew away from our Lions to the Yellow Lion, pushing with all out strength.
"Oh, no!" Lance shouted.
"What?" Hunk asked.
We turned around and saw the white lights appearing again.
"Everyone hold on!" Keith shouted and we grabbed onto the Yellow Lion. As soon as the blast came, we all began to shout and grunt from the force of energy pushing us away.
"I'm losing my...." Pidge said before screaming as she was blown away from us.
Hunk, who was in front of us all, lost his grip, bumping into us and making us lose our grip as well. I felt Keith's arms wrap around me as we fell back away from the lions, spinning further and further away from them.
As quickly as the light had come, we had flown far away from the Lions.
"I'm losing sight of the lions!" Pidge shouted.
"Stay together!" Keith yelled.
"Oh, no!" Hunk shouted.
Lance flew over to Hunk and grabbed his hand.
"I've got Hunk." Lance said when he grabbed Hunk's hand.
Allura and I flew over to Pidge and Allura grabbed her hand.
"Allura and I have Pidge." I said. One by one all of us grabbed each other's hands and were floating in a circle.
"Fire your jetpacks. Let's get stabilized." Keith said. We did as told and quickly stabilized ourselves.
"Oh, thank you." Hunk said once we stopped spinning.
"Does anyone have eyes on the lions?" Lance asked.
"I can't see them." Pidge said as she looked around.
"Neither can I." Allura said.
"I can't even feel their energies. " I said, "They're gone."
"At this point, I don't even know which direction they're in." Hunk said.
"Olay, let's run through our checklist. Does anyone have any supplies?" Keith asked calmly.
"Nope." Lance said.
"Mm-mm. Nothing." Pidge answered.
"No food. No water." Hunk replied.
"Okay, our suits will recycle enough moisture to keep us hydrated for a little while. The important thing right now is for us to stay together." Keith said.
"Keith's right. We have each other, so all we have to do is hang in there." I added.
Lance smiled at the thought and turned to Hunk.
"Don't worry, Hunk. Something else will be along to kill us any minute now." He said, then dropped his head, "Any minute."
We repositioned ourselves to be back to back with our arms linked together. Keith set a timer in his suit to go off every hour or so.
Three hours passed, and still there was no sign of life anywhere near us.
Keith's helmet beeped, the alarm going off.
"Everyone sound off." Keith said tiredly.
"Lance here." Lance sounded off.
"Pidge here."
"Allura here."
"Saoirse here."
Hunk stayed silent.
"Hunk?"
"I'm hiding." Hunk replied.
"I need you to sound off, Hunk." Keith said, "It's important to maintain discipline and mental acuity in these situations. These techniques helped my mom and I through the Quantum Abyss."
"Keith is right." Allura said, "Being lost in space has been known to drive one mad. Too much time contemplating infinity is not good for the mind."
"I like to keep busy calculating pi out as far as I can." Pidge said, "The record is 4 quadrillion, but that's using the Hadoop parallelization framework. I'm just using my brain."
Hunk chuckled, "Hadoop."
"Wait. Guys! Look! Lights!" Lance shouted.
"Told you Lance would go crazy first." Hunk said.
"No, no, no, no! I see them! They're really are lights!" Pidge shouted. The rest of us turned our heads and saw what our friends saw.
A large light with several other little lights floating around it. Our hopes were raised again by this new discovery.
"Perhaos it's a ship." Allura wondered aloud.
"Oh, yes! Yes! We're rescued!" Hunk shouted. However, my hopes disappeared when I felt nothing from that light. There were flames coming from it, henceforth, there was no one alive in that light.
However, there was something in that light. The several small lights came closer, letting us see them more clearly.
Small creatures emitting a soft glow swarmed around us as the brighter light turned golden.
It was incredible, the creatures swirling around us creating a heavenly glow that filled us with awe and wonder.
"Amazing." Pidge gasped.
"They're beautiful." Allura said, releasing her hand from Hunk's and reaching out to touch one.
"We should follow them." Hunk suggested.
"What?" Keith asked.
"Yeah. They must be heading somewhere. Like a hive or something. And wherever that is must be better than floating around here just, like, starving to death."
Keith looked down and thought for a moment, then looked back up at the creatures.
"Hunk's right. Let's follow them. Everyone stay together." But as soon as we activated out jetpacks, the creatures and the light disappeared.
We all gasped at their sudden disappearance.
"Where'd they go?" Lance asked.
"Were they even real?" Allura wondered.
"I guess it could've been a hallucination." Pidge said, her tone lowering, "But that usually only happens when you're going mad."
I looked over Keith, gripping his hand tighter, staring at his wide eyes when he realized that the creatures were not real. At my contact, he calmed down a little and we all linked arms again, continuing to float in space.
My scar burned again, but now in a pulsating pattern.
Three more hours passed, and we were more exhausted than ever. I could feel the black circles under my eyes grow darker. I was so tired.