**Author's note: Hello all and welcome to the third story featuring Mariko and the rest of the Voltron crew! If you're new here, I recommend that you read the other two stories in this series first: Rise of Voltron and Turmoil Begins. So, without further ado, here's Fights and Flights! Enjoy! :D
**I do not own Voltron: Legendary Defender!
"All righty then! I've successfully transferred all your memories back into the crystal. Here you are, Number Five."
Coran held out the Putaverunt Crystal to Mari, the glossy orb once again filled with glowing blue particles that were some of her most important memories. Smiling gratefully to the Altean, she took the gem from him and cupped it in her hands.
"Thanks for doing this, Coran," Mari said, following him as they exited the memory storage unit chamber. "I really appreciate it."
"It was no problem, my dear," he replied cheerfully. "I have to flush the ship's systems of that Galra crystal's energy anyways, so I might as well have done this first. Wouldn't want your memories to get deleted or tainted in the process."
"Deleted or tainted?" she frowned, raising a quizzical eyebrow at him. "What about Allura's father's memories? Will they be okay?"
"Don't worry, I'll be using a special program to cleanse Alfor's A.I. unit. His memories won't be damaged in the slightest," Coran assured her. "Now, let's head back to the bridge and start clearing all these systems. Well, I suppose I'll be doing the majority of the work since you, uh…can't read Altean."
Mari gave Coran a sour look that went unnoticed by him, and she sighed. Not too long ago they were well on their way to the Balmera, but as they gathered to discuss possible plans of attack, the Castle received a distress signal from a nearby moon. Allura insisted that they stop by and investigate, much to Hunk's dismay, and they discovered a crew of scavengers with a powerless ship.
Everyone except Coran and Mari had gone down to the surface to offer their assistance, with Mari claiming that she'd like to stay behind and help Coran with the Castle. She knew she wasn't going to be able to fight in every battle and she couldn't ever pilot the Castle of Lions, but maybe she could learn more about its systems instead. It would be wonderful if she knew how the castle-ship functioned; then she could help fix damaged structures after battles, or maybe she could operate the blasters if Coran or Allura were ever unable to. She didn't think she needed to be Altean to fire a laser cannon. How hard could shooting extremely powerful, extremely advanced, and extremely large guns be, right?
…Right?
Oh, who was she kidding? Other than motor vehicles, aircrafts, certain video games, her computer, and her cell phone, Mari could hardly understand and use Earth's technology. There was no way she was going to be able to properly operate the advanced systems within the Castle of Lions, whether she knew Altean or not.
Maybe I should have just gone with the others, she thought to herself as she watched Coran flit back and forth between his control panels on the bridge. At least they're being productive down there.
Behind her, the bridge doors slid open and a rather irate Hunk stormed into the room, a long piece of paper clenched in his hand. He marched straight up to Coran, startling the Altean as he thrust the paper forward.
"Oh? And what's this?" Coran asked, squinting at the words printed on the page in Hunk's hand.
"It's a list of parts those guys need to fix their ship," the paladin explained. "The one guy—Rolo, was his name, I think?— says that their whole flaxum assembly is supposedly shot."
"Ah, I see," Coran said. "Well, if you would follow me, I can show you where we keep our spare ship parts."
With Mari tagging along, the trio took the elevator down several levels before Coran led them to a vast and neatly organized storage room full of all sorts of machinery scraps. A crate sat next to the door and when Coran pressed a button on its lid, the top slid off and the whole thing began to hover several inches off the ground. He dragged the crate past several rows of workbenches and shelves before coming to a halt in front of one.
"All right, everything they'd need to repair a damaged flaxum assembly is on these three shelves," he said, patting all three ledges. "Now if you'll excuse me, I really must get started on cleaning the Castle's systems."
"Thanks Coran," Hunk said. "I've got it from here."
"I'll stay and help you," Mari decided. "I don't think I'll be able to help Coran with the Castle after all. But I should be able to do this."
Coran nodded in complete understanding. "Just bring that crate down to them once you've finished gathering the items. Call me if you need me!" he instructed before disappearing through the door, leaving the two humans alone in the storage room.
"Giving up on your apprenticeship already?" Hunk asked jokingly and Mari gave him an unamused look.
"Altean tech is too complicated for me," she sighed. "I can't read the screens and I haven't been able to understand anything Coran's been saying for the past half-hour that we've been working. I'll just leave that kind of stuff to him, you, and Pidge."
"If you say so," Hunk grinned. "Okay, now what do we need on this list…"
His eyes skimmed over the paper in his hands and his smile slowly faded. His brow furrowed and he scowled as he realized, "I don't know what any of this means."
"What?"
"I've never heard of any of these things on here. It just looks like a bunch of gibberish," he said, showing Mari the list as if to prove his point. Foreign sounding and looking words littered the page and she grimaced at the thought of trying to pronounce any of them.
"Okaaaayyy…" she drawled. "Should we ask Coran if he can translate it for us?"
"Finding him again and having him do that will take too long," Hunk waved the suggestion away. "Let's just load as much of this stuff as we can into here and bring it down to the surface. Hopefully we'll bring everything Rolo needs to fix his ship."
His plan didn't sound very efficient, but before Mari could argue, he hurriedly began to pick items up off the shelves and deposit them in the hover-crate. Shrugging helplessly, Mari followed suit and began to transfer the smaller, less heavy objects.
"Do you think it's going to take a while for their flax-whatever to be repaired?" she asked, trying to make conversation.
"I hope not. We've already kept Shay and her people waiting for too long now. Who knows what the Galra could've have done to them by now?" Hunk fretted. "We've already wasted enough time. After this, we're going straight to the Balmera."
That's right, they had spent an extra day on Arus for Mari to recover. A pang of guilt shot through her and she frowned as she muttered, "Sorry."
Hunk winced, realizing his blunder. "W-Wait, wait, that's not what I meant," he nervously tried to apologize. "Helping those Arusians and helping you figure stuff out, th-that wasn't a waste of time. Not at all, really. I'm, uh, glad—no, thrilled, that you're feeling better now and I—"
"Hunk."
"Y-Yeah?"
"I get it," Mari smiled slightly, and Hunk seemed to deflate a bit.
"I'm sorry, Mari," he sighed. "I'm just really worried about Shay."
"I can tell."
"And I just don't feel right about these scavenger guys. They're giving me a bad feeling in my gut."
"Are you sure that's not just the impatience talking?" Mari asked, pulling a large cylindrical piece of hardware off the shelf, only to nearly drop it onto her foot with how unexpectedly heavy it was. Hunk immediately came to her aid, taking the hefty item into his own hands and moving it into the crate with ease.
"I'm positive it's not," he said. "My gut is never wrong. You haven't met these guys, Mari. They don't seem trustworthy to me."
"Well, if you think something's up with them, I guess I'll have to assess their characters for myself."
"You're going back down with me?"
"Yeah, I might as well. I already said I can't really help Coran," Mari shrugged. "Besides, I don't think we can fit anymore into that box and there's still stuff on the shelf. If you've got the crate, I can carry what's left over."
A few pipe-looking parts remained on the shelves and she easily scooped them into her arms. With Hunk lugging the hover-crate stuffed with machine pieces and her carrying the remaining supplies, the duo headed down the hall towards the elevator.
"So, kind of a random question, but you know how to make egg rolls, right?" Hunk asked, grunting as he pulled the crate through the elevator doors.
Mari looked at him in surprise . "How did you—"
"Shiro kinda told us about your grandfather's traditional egg rolls when we were watching your memories," Hunk explained sheepishly. "He said that you guys were taught how to make them."
"Yeah, ojiisan taught us when we were younger," she smiled slightly to herself. "It's been years since I've made them. I was actually thinking about preparing some for when Takashi returned home from the Kerberos mission, but…well, you know how that ended."
"Mhm…" Hunk hummed. "But I was thinking, maybe we could try making our own egg rolls here in the Castle. It doesn't have to be today or anything, cuz we obviously have a mission to do, but I thought it would be nice if we—as a team, I mean—tried making them together one of these day."
Mari gave him an unsure look. "But what about the ingredients? We don't have anything we need to make them in the kitchen."
"That's what'll make it so fun!" Hunk beamed excitedly. "We get to experiment with a bunch of different recipes and foreign foods. Ooh! What if we had a taste-testing competition too? That would be so awesome!"
"I guess it could be a good team bonding exercise," she admitted, grinning as the memory of their food goo battle resurfaced. "Okay, we should do it sometime."
"You sounded exactly like Shiro, just then," he laughed and Mari felt her cheeks flush.
"I-I do not!" she scowled at him. "I just want to get to know you and the others a bit better, that's all."
Hunk beamed warmly at her, all of his irritation from earlier having completely vanished. "It's nice having you open up to us," he said. "I like this version of you a lot better."
Mari smiled to herself, silently agreeing with him. She was finally starting to feel comfortable living in the Castle, and interacting with the others was becoming a bit easier. It felt good not having her walls up all the time; she could finally relax around the team.
After reaching the bottom level of the Castle, they took the transport pod down to the moon's surface. Hunk pulled the crate out of the pod and parked it off to the side before Mari dumped the pipes in her arms onto the ground next to it.
"So I'm guessing that's Rolo then?" she whispered to Hunk, nodding to the purple male alien that was sitting in front of a campfire next to a clunky cargo ship. He was discussing something with Allura, Shiro, and Keith, and as Mari glanced around the area, she noticed that Pidge was playing with a robot nearby and Lance was talking to a yellow female alien a ways off.
"That's him all right," Hunk confirmed, frowning in dismay at Rolo. "That robot, Beezer, and that girl, Nyma, are his crew members."
"I see."
"Doesn't Rolo look shifty?"
"Umm…Not exactly?"
"What? How does he not look suspicious? Just look at what he's wearing!"
"Did you expect him to be wearing a fancy suit or something? He's a scavenger, Hunk, not an alien tycoon. You shouldn't judge a book by it's cover."
"Yeah, well I still think this 'book' shouldn't be trusted," he insisted with a determined scowl. "He's got some nasty pages inside of him, I'm sure of it."
Mari raised a quizzical eyebrow at him, but said nothing. She folded her arms over her chest and leaned against the crate full of ship parts as she watched Hunk approach the group sitting around the fire.
"Hey, sorry to interrupt, but I think you guys are kind of keeping Rolo from working," he said, interrupting whatever conversation the scavenger had been having with the two paladins and Allura. "It's just that we're in a hurry. A hero named Shay saved my life, and I swore I would return to do the same for her and her people. You understand."
"Sure. Sorry," Rolo nodded apologetically, standing and patting the Yellow Paladin on the shoulder. He moved towards the container of spare parts and an amused smile played on his lips as he noticed Mari. "S'cuse me, beautiful," he said, gesturing to the cargo she was blocking.
Bristling at the pet name, Mari scowled at him and huffed indignantly before brushing past him so she could join the others near the fire. Behind her, she could hear Rolo chuckle, "We've got a feisty one over here," and it took all her willpower not to spin on her heel and punch him in the jaw.
"…I don't trust this guy as far as I can throw him," Hunk was whispering to Shiro as she approached. "We ought to leave him with parts and just say, 'Adiós, amigo'."
"I second that idea," Mari agreed, deadpan. "Let's leave the creep."
"Changed your mind, already?" Hunk said, blinking at her in surprise. "That was fast."
"You too, Mari? You haven't even been around him for two minutes," Shiro said incredulously.
"And that's all the time I needed to decide that I don't like him."
"Hey, beautiful!" Rolo suddenly called over, and Mari's eye twitched involuntarily.
"'Beautiful'?" Shiro repeated quietly with a grimace, and Allura frowned in dismay.
"Do you think you could hunt down a length of thermal pipe about yay long?" Rolo continued, displaying the approximate length with his hands.
"I don't know what that is," Mari snapped back harshly, unable to keep a lid on her hostility, but her apparent temper only seemed to entertain the scavenger even more.
"Oh, well…I thought you knew considering you helped gather this stuff," he smirked, gesturing to the box of parts. "Sorry that I assumed you were familiar with this kind of stuff."
As Mari struggled not to retort, biting her lower lip and clenching her hands into fists at her sides, Hunk frowned as his eyes were drawn to the pipes that she had deposited next to the crate just minutes ago. "Uh, I think there are some thermal pipes right down there," he said, pointing to the pile next to the scavenger's foot, and Rolo glanced down in surprise.
"Ah. Didn't see that there," he muttered. "Thanks, bud!"
Mari groaned in annoyance and tiredly dragged one hand down her face. Behind Shiro, Keith smirked and said lightly, "So why is it that you don't like him, beautiful?"
"Ugh, it sounds even creepier when it's coming from you!" she cringed and he grinned in success.
"Sorry you feel that way, beautiful."
"Keith, I will literally strangle you if call me that again."
"All right, that's enough you two," Shiro quickly intervened, shutting both teens down with a pointed look. Then turning to Hunk he said, "We'll get going as soon as their ship is fixed. Just hang in there for a bit longer, okay?"
"Fine," he grumbled. "This better not take too long."
"Okay…I think I've got everything that I need," Rolo said, having moved all of the hardware he needed from the crate to the ground next to his ship. Addressing Hunk he continued, "Hey, bud! Mind if we get started on these repairs?"
"…Sure. Let's do this," Hunk sighed, and he joined the scavenger as a hatch on the side of the space craft slid open.
"You helping us, beautiful?" Rolo inquired of Mari. "I can show the ropes to this kind of stuff."
Letting out a curt growl, Mari firmly planted her butt on one of the cargo boxes next to the campfire. "Only if you want your ship to be permanently put out of commission," she replied through gritted teeth. "And I don't think either of our parties want that. The sooner you can leave, the better, right?"
"Ah, right," Rolo nodded, and he gave her one last grin before delving into his work with Hunk.
"That quiznaking son of a…Ugh, I hate guys like him!" Mari grumbled and Shiro sighed.
"I agree his…advances towards you are a bit uncalled for, but you barely know him," he said. "You shouldn't be judging a book by it's cover."
"I wasn't!" she said in offense as her own words came back to haunt her.
"That's what it seems like," Keith muttered. Then with a smirk he barely uttered, "Beautiful."
And with his neck just barely out of reach, Mari settled on socking him hard in the arm.
**Please feel free to drop a comment/review down below! They're always appreciated and I'll do my best to respond to them :D