Travelling to Earth with the Lions being almost drained of power seemed indomitable at times, but they were Paladins and Survivors, and thus they would persevere.
It wasn't long, for example, until Pidge realized that due to the distance they had left to travel, it was entirely possible that pre-galactic travel Earth-sent radio and other primitive frequency signals might have travelled as far as their location. Soon, she was able to locate trace broadband signals which Green was then able to configure a viewscreen to be able to show them...television…
She quickly passed her screen patch into the other Lions, and soon they were all enjoying sights they had honestly never thought they would ever see again... The next few weeks passed seemed to thankfully pass by unnoticed…
A few failed sleep rotations later, during a particularly riveting episode of an 1980s-era cartoon Trolvon (which had shocked Pidge, Hunk, and Lance for never hearing of it before-and thus captivated all their attentions to a fault) the Lions passed very close to a particularly viscous nebula. Suddenly, all hell broke loose among the entire formation! Claxons and warning lights pervaded ever Lion's cockpit, as each pilot found themselves at a sudden dead stop facing a different life-threatening crisis!
Green's lights were flickering rhythmically and her internal gravity had failed, for example…
Yellow stiffened up and seemed utterly unable to move.
Red seemed completely powerless.
And no one could get any kind of communication out of Blue.
Coran, from his position in the Black Lion-which fortunately seemed none the worse for wear, quickly took control of the situation, and attempted to guide each Paladin to a solution for their particular dilemma:
"Alright Pidge, listen carefully. The green lion's hydraulic circulatory system seems to have aquired air in the line. You're going to need to navigate to the Green Lion's core, and then manually bleed the line. Are you with me?"
"Yes! Okay, on it!" The diminutive Pidge launched herself through the rear hatch of the cockpit and navigated effortlessly through the narrow corridors and access passageways until she reached the central core and hub of the Green Lions interfaces. Light flashed in time with her own heartbeat, which she knew instinctively was not by accident, as she could also sense Green's fading energy as the issue became more dire.
"I'm here! What-"
Off.
"-Do I do-"
On.
"-Now? Oh God, Coran, hurry!"
Off.
"Right. Okay, Do you see a valve in front of you?"
On.
"Yes, I do now!"
"Excellent. Now, I'm going to need to you to turn it-"
Off.
"-And then-"
On.
"Again."
Pidge hurriedly complied, rotating the stiff valve two full rotations, until at last the flickering light remained steadily on, and a deep energetic hum reverberated throughout the lion. A sudden pulling sensation also informed Pidge that the gravity sub-system had also once again been restored. The things Coran heard over the 'com at that point informed him that all was well, and he turned his attention to the other Lions' dilemmas.
"Hello, Hunk? Are you all right in there? Do you need help?"
"Yeah, hi. I'm okay. I'm disabled."
"Okay, don't panic, we'll come to get you. What happened?" Coran's voice cracked slightly, Keith and Romelle crowded around him emoting concern in the Black Lion's cockpit, not helping his worried state.
"No-no, that's okay, it's kind of a mess in here, the sudden stop kind of threw everything all over the place. But, I'm disabled."
"How?" said Coran, forced calm trying to edge back into his voice.
"How what?"
"How are you disabled?"
"Oooh..." said Hunk, his own voice reaching a halfway embarrassed falsetto. "Leg disabled?"
"OH!, well, okay, um." Coran's brain calculated rapid-fire probabilities and potential solutions. "Well, do you have anything to lean on to support yourself until we can get a medical assistance to you?"
"WHAT?! Oh nonononono! I'm fine. Yellow is disabled. He can't move at all. I'm pretty sure something just got into an intake, I'll have it taken care of in no time, go help the others. OH! One thing though. I have the space mice with me here, and with everything being...everywhere, Can I get someone over there to keep an eye on them through my vidfeeds? Just, y-know, to make sure they don't get into anything they shouldn't…"
"I can do that," Said Romelle cheerily and plopping herself in front of a bank of monitors, she began flicking through them until she found the space mice busily worrying a small wooden barrell(?) in Yellow's hold.
"Right!" Relief palpably written on his face, Coran switched the line to try to reach out to Allura in the Blue Lion. "Princess, can you hear me? Are you all right? Your lion looks to have gone completely unresponsive. Are you receiving me?"
Silence answered Coran's frantic call. But on the viewscreen, emotionless text scrolled into view:
Dear Sir/Madam:
Fire!
Fire!
Please Help me.
-Blue Lion, Right Leg of Voltron, Defender of the Universe.
PS: Looking forward to hearing from you.
"Oh gracious no!" Coran exclaimed. "The Blue Lion's 'com must've been damaged, and the emergency frequency situational signal has been activated!"
Keith, who had been pushed out of the way when Coran had bravely taken control of the situation, expressed mild alarm and more...confusion at the building crisis..
"Fire? In the Blue Lion? But can't she, like, literally make water out of the raw Quintessence? And what's with that alarm text?"
Romelle piped up in agreement with Keith. "Fire in the Blue Lion does seem really strange, I mean, how does that even happen? But even though that's moot-as it already has happened, that message seems a little understated, don't you think?"
Coran cast them daggers askance. "What!? You don't think civility is important even at the height of crises?" His look softened as he pondered their words. "You're absolutely correct, though. The Blue Lion's internal damage control systems should have kicked in by-oh. There they go."
As he spoke the words, Coran and Keither saw clouds of dirty steam erupt from ports around the Blue Lion's head, and moments later Her systems came back online. Allura's groggy voice crackled over the 'com at them.
"Paladins! Coran! What happened? The sudden stop jarred me unconscious, and I only just came to. I smell smoke, I think there was a fire on board. Luckily my Lion seems to have taken care of it, though. How is everyone else?"
"Most of us have all been accounted for, Highness. I still want you to come aboard the Black Lion so we can give you a once-over for the sake of that head wound. In the meantime, Hunk and Pidge are wrapping up their own issues as well, and I was just about to reach out to lance in the Red Lion…"
*crackle* "Hello?"
Everyone: Coran, Lance, Keith, Romelle, Pidge, Allura, and Hunk; all exclaim into the 'com at once:
"Lance, is that you?!"
"Ouch, yes. Jeez, loud! Yeah, what happened? I was watching that weirdly familiar cartoon and then all my systems just cut out completely, and there's a smoking box pushed halfway out of the wall here. I think I might've burned out a system!"
"Oh dear, I was afraid of something like this happening." Coran's brow furrowed. "Those symptoms indicate there's something wrong with the Internal Network Systems Routing Box on board the Red Lion. It's going to need to be replaced as soon as possible. Pidge!" Coran Shouted into the 'com, pointing dramatically for emphasis.
"Aah! What!?" Startled Pidge.
"The Green Lion has the capability to replicate core system components for the other Lions, it was a feature King Alfor thought necessary for situations not unlike this very one! I need you to requisition a new Internal Network Systems Box."
After a few moments, Pidge's skeptical voice echoed over the 'com once again.
"Coran, is the Internal Network box just supposed to look like a little black box with a blinking red light on the top?"
"YES, that's it! Excellent! Now, you're going to have to perform a spacewalk to get it over to the Red Lion. But be extremely careful, the Inter. Net. Box is remarkably fragile when not in it's housing."
"Right, got it. Lance, I'm comin' in!"
"Roger that," Lance's voice crackled uneasily.
Keith raised a skeptical eyebrow as he considered Coran's earnestness."That little box controls all of a Lion's internal systems, Coran? Doesn't that seem a little dangerous?" he asked.
"Shh. It's really just a relay that can be bypassed with a flick of a switch, but I wouldn't want Lance to think his dilemma was any less dire than all the others, we'd never hear the end of it!" Coran's conspiratorial wink sealed the deal, and keith rolled his eyes, but smiled and nodded in spite of himself. "Besides, it's a necessary enough part to replace all the same, no harm in saving Morale while I'm at it, eh?"
Romelle giggled but held her finger to her lips when they glanced warily at her.
"Oh, by the way," she said, pointing at her monitors, "The mice...they have an apple."
"Oh?" Remarks Keith, half-heartedly interested.
"Oh yes," she said, totally engrossed in her play-by-play, "The biggest one has kicked the apple, and now the apple is over there." She switches vidfeeds to another section of the larder. "That other mouse has it now-that's an interesting development. Maybe they'll kick the apple?" Romelle squints and leans in closely. "They have indeed and apparently that earns a round of applause from all the other mice." She turns to regard both Coran and Keith, as well as the princess and the rest of the Paladins (who conferenced their faces onto the main viewscreen while she was speaking) staring at her, rapt at attention, hanging on her very word.
"Those mice are fascinating" says Pidge, as Hunk crunches on some popcorn.
Once all the Lions were back in operation, Pidge and Hunk set up proximity alarms that would attract attention even through the riveting miasma of hackneyed cartoon plotholes and hamfisted dramas, and soon they were back on course, travelling to reconnoitre with the Galaxy Garrison on Earth.