Sorry that I didn't update last week. I…ran out of inspiration. Again.
It was several days later that Shiro finally recalled all the events that supported his plan and a few ideas.
But with a deep breath, he began.
"Everyone." He said, his voice carrying across the coms.
He could tell by the sudden shifting he could hear that everyone was laying close attention suddenly.
"Remember before I…" he paused for a moment in thought, "disappeared, when we were fighting Zarkon, and we were hit with that ball of energy?"
"Yeah!" Hunk chimed. "It drained all of Voltron's energy…"
At the same moment it clicked with Keith. "We powered up Voltron on our own."
"That's right." Shiro agreed. "Maybe you could do it again."
There was a moment of silence as they regarded this. Maybe they could…
"I can't help but feel that this is my fault." Allura murmured, heartbroken. "Ever since I joined in I've been dragging you down, and you have been unable to accomplish such a feat."
"It's…no one's fault." Shiro assured her. "But if you were all a group of fully realized Paladins, you could do it."
"…Shiro's right." Lance decided, smiling. "We should try."
"Shiro, with all that you've been through, how did you find the strength to continue being Voltron's leader?" Keith inquired, the curiosity thick in his voice.
"I had help." Shiro smiled gently, setting his hand on the back of Pidge's chair. "That's why there's five of you. To lift each other up."
Everyone made sounds of happiness, appreciation, and agreement.
"So…what should we do?" Hunk asked, thinking about strengthening their bonds with their lions.
"Well…let's try formation flying." Keith suggested.
"Wait, what's that?" Pidge quipped.
Shiro, also looking out the cockpit window, had the same thought.
"Oh, you know," Keith probably wasn't paying attention to his surroundings, his voice taking on the fondness of an older brother. "When you fly in line-"
"No!" Pidge protested, shaking her head. "That! Outside the window!"
"Holy crow!" Lance stammered, jumping.
"It's a comic storm!" Romelle gulped, shaking.
"AW! COM'N!" Lance yelled.
"We can make it through it, guys." Keith's voice, though calm, had a slight tremor in it.
At that moment it hit.
Everyone shrunk back every time they were hit, yelping in shock.
Pidge tried to jerk her lion out of the way of a ball of electricity, but instead her lion only succeed in back tracking a little bit, only delaying the collision.
Shiro shook for a moment, grinding his teeth to hold back a cry of pain, though Pidge wasn't able to hold back all the noise and released a yell at the same time that the others let out screams, Keith literally howling.
The world went black.
Pidge gasped, freezing as the cosmic storm disappeared. Her lion wasn't operating, completely still as she floated through the void of space. "Guys?" She asked, a slight tremor in her voice. "Are you there?"
"Mmm…everything hurts…" Lance whined.
"At least you can feel! Everything's numb for me." Hunk complained.
"Pins and needles…" Keith groaned, sighing deeply. "Nngh…"
"Hmm. This feeling is…unpleasant." Allura murmured uncomfortable.
"G-guys, I don't think you've noticed, but the lions are drifting apart!" Hunk cried, inhaling deeply.
"On it!" Pidge chimed, hoping against hope that they wouldn't remember her legs. Luckily, (or perhaps unluckily) nobody called her out. She turned around, and-
"Quiznaking ruggle!" She screamed, staring in horror at Shiro, who was frozen like a statue, unmoving. "Shiro, Shiro, can you hear me?!"
"Buddy, what is it?" Keith asked, his entire voice shaken with worry. "My wolf's not responding."
"Neither is Coran, or the mice!" Allura wailed, trembling.
"Same with Romelle." Lance informed them, the only one sounding even slightly calm. "What's going on?"
"The same shock that got the lions must have effected them, though our armor protected us!" Allura realized suddenly.
"The good news is that Shiro's vitals are steady. It's just like he's…frozen in time." Pidge murmured, and the others breathed sighs of relief.
"Right, but what about the lions?" Hunk asked Allura, voice tightening.
"I might have something to tie the lions together." Allura noted thoughtfully.
"Some magical powers you learned on Oriande?" Lance suggested, sounding hopeful.
"No. I have some leftover zip-line cable in the cargo bay." Allura quipped, the sounds of her jetpack flaring up.
"Oh." Lance mumbled, not sounding quiet as cheerful. In fact, it was like he was down-right let down.
Pidge rolled her eyes, jet-packing out. She winced slightly as her leg got caught on the doorway, mumbling a little exclamation of pain.
Nobody made a comment, so she breathed a sigh of relief, escaping from her lion.
She watched as the others appeared too, immediately going to the jaws of their lions and pushing with all their might.
"Ooh…" Hunk mumbled heavily, watching all the lions spinning…and spinning…and spinning… "I think I'm going to be sick."
"Keep it together, Hunk!" Lance ordered, groaning.
"You will all have to push the lions to my position!" Allura ordered from Blue. "Otherwise there won't be enough cable to connect them."
Everyone fell into a silent routine of pushing and shoving and gasping for breath as their lions didn't move in the slightest.
"Out jet packs don't have enough thrust! We're going to have to do this one by one!" Hunk groaned eventually, the light from his said equipment dying.
"Hunk's right. Everyone head over to the Yellow Lion." Keith ordered, and everyone began to journey to Yellow.
No sooner had they all arrived and gotten in position to begin pushing that Lance looked to the side and inhaled sharply. "Oh-no!"
A quick check revealed a new, even bigger cosmic storm headed towards the Lions and the small, defenseless Paladins.
"Everyone! Get to cover!" Keith ordered, reaching out to grab the Yellow Lion's 'cheek bones'.
In the next moment it was upon them, clawing and pushing at them, trying to pry their fingers out of their hold on the Yellow Lion.
Pidge's deadweight legs only drug her down, giving her no options to try to get a foothold (if one was even to be found) and just hung there, pulling at her body.
It took hardly three seconds for Pidge's grip to begin slipping, and she cried out to her friends. "I…can't hold…on much long- AAAH!" And then her grip lessened and she was tossed about the storm like a leaf in a breeze.
She could hardly see the others being knocked off and heading towards her, and she screamed, begging them silently to be alright.
Oh why did she have to join them? If she was in the lions she could be safe…selfish, she knew, but, still.
As suddenly as the storm began, it was over.
But they were still being thrown around, and Keith's order hardly reached Pidge's ears to grab hold of each other, lest they lose each other.
Allura's hand suddenly lashed out, grasping Pidge.
The two woman clung to each other, Pidge clinging onto her arm like it was her last lifeline.
She felt Lance latch onto her leg, and she held back a scream as her bone shifted slightly, grinding against each other.
Lance didn't hear the slight pop, nor did he hear the rattling sound.
After several agonizing seconds, they were all connected.
"Alright, guys, does anyone know where the lions are?" Keith asked, staring into the distance as he searched for them.
"No…" Lance sighed.
"We drifted so far out, I can't even know which direction they're in." Hunk groaned.
"I don't see them." Pidge noted.
"Oh, sweet Altea! Whatever will we do?!" Allura wailed.
"Keep calm, everyone." Keith ordered, staring around. "Our suits will recycle enough moisture to keep us hydrated. We just need to hang right for a while."
"Don't worry, Hunk." Lance soothed his best friend, who was looking especially let-down and grossed out by Keith's assurance. "Something will be along to kill us aaaaaaany minute now. Aaaaaaany minute."
Dead silence met Lance's statement.
Two ticks.
Five ticks.
Ten ticks.
"Ye-no. That doesn't make me feel better!" Hunk moaned, shaking his head.
"Yeah. Sorry." Lance sighed, looking into the distance regions of stars. "Just…trying to lighten the mood."
Ten minutes passed in slow precession, the ticking agonizing.
3.14159265358979323… Pidge had resorted to reciting pi. There wasn't much else to do. …238462643383279…
"Woah, Pidge!" Hunk suddenly cried, shattering the moment of blissful calculating. "What about your legs?! Why're you even out here?"
Ah. Here was the moment she was waiting for. The moment where everyone exploded on her. It was a distraction to say the least.