A/N: First, I'd like to personally congratulate you on making it through that summary. Second, I'd like to give my sister credit for having the idea that inspired this fic. We felt a strong need to see this happening. I do hope y'all enjoy, and any comments you may have, even if it's just screaming are appreciated.
Disclaimer: Voltron: Legendary Defender belongs to Dreamworks, not me.
This is the first time this has happened to Team Voltron.
Never have they had to fight for the right to defend the universe's inhabitants. That's kind of expected of them considering it's their job description.
This was supposed to be a small mission. It was an isolated prison specifically for eight Olkari. Being the most advanced engineers in the nearest quadrant certainly warranted more than the colonization of their non-portable planet. Among those captured was Ryner, to whom they just happen to owe their lives to. This is the initial reason this mission was of top priority.
This prison break probably marks one of Team Voltron's most difficult fights. Getting in was easy enough.
Scramble the monitors, ambush the sentries, take down the warden, and send the prisoners on an escape pod to the Castle of Lions in case they were followed. That was the initial plan. Unfortunately, they had guards, not sentries. And they were prepared.
There had been some majorly close calls and none of them left unscathed, but they had managed to locate and gather all the Olkari after defeating what seemed now like every single guard in the prison considering they weren't being ambushed anymore.
The prisoners were all in the escape pod, and all that was left to do was press the button for their departure. But of course, as in literally every single mission they go on, something just had to go wrong.
A shot rings out from a blaster, hitting the switch beside the pod square on, preventing the pod doors from even closing.
"Lance!" Keith shouts angrily.
"It wasn't me! I was pointing the other way," he defends.
"Then who was that?" Shiro asks. No one has time to answer before more shots ring out from past the hangar doors. Lance points his bayard in the direction of the panel to shut the hangar doors, only to realize that someone had already taken it out, cornering them. Footsteps could be heard getting closer now.
A lot of them.
"Get ready," comes Shiro's voice as he powers up his arm. Team Voltron doesn't hesitate in getting their bayards out, shields up, dodging the growing number of blasts.
"We've taken over this base. Surrender yourselves, or suffer the consequences," comes a booming voice from the prison's intercom system.
"It's too late!" Keith shouts as they get a visual on the fast-approaching foot soldiers, "we have them ready to go and they're about to launch!"
"They're not going anywhere! Especially not with you," one of the closest intruders replies above the noise. Some more of them rush in with swords and other contact-based weapons. They come with their own shields, and surprisingly not in Galra uniforms.
"Do we trust them?" Keith whispers to Shiro.
"We don't know if they're working with the Galra. Disarm them but keep your guard up. Don't kill them," Shiro responds, addressing all of them, who nod.
Hunk fires and takes out two of their weapons and Lance shoots a shield away from one of them.
"Stop!" Ryner's pained voice is heard. All of Team Voltron turns to look in her direction to see Ryner in a headlock with a sword to her neck. She may be skilled with a weapon, but her opponent overpowers her in size and strength, so Ryner is defenseless. All of the Olkari in the pod remain motionless at the capture of their leader, cornered by one of the strangers aiming a blaster at them.
"No!" Pidge lunges towards Ryner but one of them slashes at her with their sword, sending her back, adding a wound to the ones already on her face from the fight. Lance and Hunk have to physically hold Shiro back despite their own injuries. Had they not had Ryner in their hold, they would've released the Protective Space Dad. Even then Keith is having issues holding it together, showing his disgust by spitting some blood on the floor.
"So you need them alive, huh?" another voice chirps from the side of the intruders, and Pidge can just hear the smirk in their voice.
"We need them away from you!" Hunk replies aiming his bayard.
A dense silence takes place after, each side awaiting the other's attack.
"Alright. How about we tave a civil approach toward this?" the leader speaks up, "You're not all Galra as shown in our biorhythm scanners, but trust doesn't come that easy. We've been deceived before."
"You're not Galra?" Lance asks, "We're the Paladins of Voltron, we're here to help," he states, his face lit by relief.
"Yeah, and I'm a driffolian mirang," one of them scoffs in indignation.
"It seems we're at a deadlock," he pauses, his gaze on the paladins never wavering as one of his own comes to whisper something in a foreign language,"A fair fight. The defeated party retreats." The leader continues, aware that anyone working for Zarkon would never agree unless they have an advantage.
"And why should we agree to your terms?" Keith shoots back.
"Because we have this entire base under our control, and it's clear that you need all of them if your friend's reaction was any indication. You're at our mercy," he continues and Pidge curses herself for letting her emotions reveal her motives.
"How do we know you won't go back on your word? You're not the only one who's been lied to," Lance asks, suspicious.
"You don't really have a choice. And don't think you can fight your way out. We have the base surrounded." the leader states with an audible smirk.
Shiro sighs in defeat looking at his teammates, powering his arm down, "What are your terms?" At that, all of their their weapons lower, unlike their guard.
"Each of your members against one of ours," the remaining conditions are clear. The leader sees their disbelieving expressions and says, "do not worry, it will be a fair fight in terms of size, that much you can trust us on."
An awkward pause follows, filling every corner of the room.
"So," Hunk breaks the silence, "who goes first?"
"I'll go," says the smallest of the strangers' group, walking forward, metal staff in hand, "someone needs to teach you a lesson about what side to be on."
"Alright." the leader nods and turns to the paladins, "your smallest."
They all turn to Pidge and she looks much less worried about this than they do, stepping forward with a determined expression lining her bloodstained face. "I think you're on the wrong side." she growls.
Space is made between the two groups for the impending fight, and the two ready their weapons.
The smallest of the strangers sprints towards the Green Paladin, staff extended. Pidge waits until they're dangerously close to move to the side and push her opponent behind her, causing them to stagger but dig the staff into the ground to steady themselves. She whips around, slicing the air with her bayard just in time to block a kick from her opponent, though they do manage to get a solid punch to her chest during the block, sending her back slightly with a grunt. Her opponent is getting ready for another punch when she grabs the arm coming for her and pulls on it, using momentum against them to get them in a headlock and bring her bayard up to their neck, but only gets halfway to the latter as they scramble free. Though she does manage to slice the mask they wear, compromising its structure and falling to the ground altogether.
She freezes as her opponent is getting ready for his next attack.
.
.
.
"Matt?!" only to have him drop it immediately at the name. He mirrors her expression, but quickly bounces back from the shock.
"How do you know my name?" he readies his staff again. This makes Pidge spring into action.
"Matt… Matt! It's me." She shouts, ripping off her helmet and tossing it to the side. Matt finally recognizes her hair only because her face is scarred and bloodied, but still there.
.
.
.
I just had my butt handed to me by my baby sister, who used to hack the fire alarms to miss phys-ed- Wait.
I just had my butt handed to me by my baby sister.
My baby sister.
"Well?" One of the strangers on Matt's side asks, snapping Matt out of his stupor.
"Katie?!" at which she nods violently, a smile breaking across her face, refusing to let herself cry because she doesn't want the tears to blur her brother's face. She wants to remember this moment clearly.
Though that was quite the useless feat considering in a heartbeat they were both holding each other so tight, asking each other desperate half-questions on how they got to where they are through their laughing sobs.
Eventually, after a large amount of confusion from both sides, Shiro somewhat excluded, who couldn't believe it himself, they finally break apart.
"How are you here?" he voices his thoughts.
"Looking for you, you nerd," She replies with a wide smile.
"Well, Katie, I asked how, not why," he jokes.
"Holy crow. You haven't changed a single bit," she punches his arm.
"I see you haven't either, baby sis," he ruffles her now shorter hair, "What'd you do, pretend to be me?" He comments offhandedly.
"Well…" she starts and his eyes widen.
"What?"
Then it was Shiro's turn to tackle Matt in and scoop him up like a ragdoll. Matt's fight-or-flight reflexes were about to kick in just as he glimpsed his attacker's face.
"You're not dead?" is the first thing to fall out of his mouth before he notices what he said, eyes widening. "Sorry- I meant how are you? No that's not what I meant because you're obviously not fine, how did you even escape the Galra? And sweet mother of ketchup is that a prosthetic? You're going to have to tell me how it works later. It must be such a biological-"
"Only you would be losing it over biology at a time like this," he laughs.
Matt always did have a way with words. The family resemblance is uncanny.
"Right, sorry. But what's... this?" he vaguely gestures the white tuft on his head.
"After everything that's happened, that's what you're going with?" he teases through a smile of his own and glances back to his team, making Matt remember his own team.
"They're good," Matt oh-so-eloquently explains, pulling his sister and best friend closer, "Guys, I want you to meet my sister, Katie, and my friend, Shiro," he says, gesturing respectively. They wave.
"So that's your real name," comes Lance's teasing voice.
"Yeah. Though I'm not sure you were really that intent on finding out anymore considering 'dolores' was your most recent guess," she quips back before turning to Matt's team.
"I suppose we're on the same side then. Can you vouch for them?" the leader finally speaks and Matt nods, he steps up to Shiro, extending a hand, "My name is Veron, and I would like to continue our conversation somewhere more private."
He takes it, "Shiro. I know a place, but first, we need to get these prisoners back to Olkarion, are you alright, Ryner?"
"I'm fine," she says, glaring at the rebel that temporarily held her hostage, who offers her apologies.
By the time the Olkari are on their way back to their planet on another pod and they're back on the castleship, Matt, Pidge, and Shiro have been gushing about each other's stories and why they were at the prison at the time that they were. Apparently they had the same purpose, giving them all a glorious moment of face-palm.
"I just have one question, if you didn't trust us and even offered a fair fight, how did you know you would win?" Lance asks Veron.
"I didn't. We put a tracking device on the pod." Lance can't bring himself to look offended by that no matter how hard he tries.
"That's," he starts with indignation, but runs it over in his head again, "fair."
"I'm just surprised there weren't more sentries guarding the some of the universe's top engineers." Hunk remarks.
"Yeah, that's because we took the rest out for you," replies another rebel.
Allura and Coran greet them at the doors of the bridge, and are immediately wary (in the most diplomatic way Shiro has ever seen) of them, but much more willing to talk than with the Blade of Marmora.
After all diplomatic talks had gone over and the group of freedom fighters had agreed to further discuss working with Voltron for the greater good, they split up, knowing that Katie and Matt most certainly need more time to catch up on more… personal matters. They head to Green's hangar and a pregnant silence hangs between them.
"You're here," Matt says with a weak smile and Pidge doesn't have to think too hard to figure out what he's implying.
"I know," she looks down, "Mom's all alone and I don't know what they told her this time." Matt nods, and this somber statement brings up another important issue.
"Do you…" Matt clears his throat, "know where Dad is?"
"No… I-I don't," she looks disappointed in herself as if it's her fault, but lifts up her chin, "but at least I've got you. That's one Holt down, one Holt to go." she finishes with a half-hearted chuckle that Matt sees right through.
"Katie," she looks up at her brother. It feels good to be called that again. Like she has nothing to hide. Like she doesn't have the universe's safety riding on her and her teammates' shoulders. She's just Katie, and she has her family. "We're going to find him." And she knows he's saying much more than what the words convey. The sheer emotion in his words also holds a promise.
"Hold up, did you say we?" she asks.
"Heck yeah, you think I'm going to let you look for dad alone?" He chirps. After the pause and look of shock on his sister's face, he laughs, "Katie, you once lost your glasses and were blind for days, when they were on your bedside. The one place you see everyday. You think I'm going to leave this to you?" he jokes.
"Oh, says the guy who lost his pen while holding it?" she teases and he snickers, soon turning into laughter that has them both doubling over simply because the other one is there.
There's that smile he thinks, satisfied.
"Now, I just have one more question that you happened to leave unanswered from before."
"Yeah? And what's that?"
"Why did you cosplay as me?" And Pidge's face completely pales because she's somehow going to have to tell her brother about how she hacked into a military base, committed fraud to be able to infiltrate, and is probably wanted for treason now. She takes a deep breath.
"Okay, but you have to promise me you're not going to worry," she says, cringing at his brother's inevitable protective sense that no promise can take away. From Matt's face, she can just tell he's worried already.
A few hours later, Shiro goes to check on them in Green's hangar only to hear muffled traces of what he's sure is Katie saying "it's not that big of a deal" and Matt screaming "did you happen to remember that we work there?!" and various other things. Shiro decides that he could totally conveniently get lost in the castle for a few more minutes before calling them to dinner.
A/N: I'm real glad you made it to the end. Like. Really glad. Like I said, any comments are wonderful, and I hope y'all have an amazing, fabulous day!
raibowrider1290