Chapter 26

The Hunted

Everyone had rushed to their lions to catch up with our leader, who had launched unexpectedly ordering us to follow him. I was still a bit annoyed at his rashness, and I knew, he knew that. We had not spoken a word to each other since back in the Blue Lion's hangar.

"Their cruiser's location is on the other side of the upcoming planet. According to stats and velocity projections, we should be within range in about one varga." I said motoring Lotor's ship and our current location.

"Good, hold position." Keith said.

Everything was going fine until the Blue Lion lost control and crashed onto the Yellow Lion. "Oh, apologies, Hunk!" Allura said.

"Mm, is attacking right now such a good idea? You know, since not everyone is so great with their lions?" Hunk asked.

"Do you mean me, specially?" Allura asked.

"You? No." Hunk said a bit sarcastic. "No way, I didn't. I'm just simply pointing out that more than half of the team are in new lions. Maybe now's not a great time to bite off more than we can chew."

"You can blame our hot-headed leader for that one." Lance stated, and for once, I agreed with him.

"First, you want me to lead, and then you complain about how I do it. Prince Lotor is the heir to the Galra throne. We could end their reign right now." Keith said.

The Red Lion zoomed ahead to fly next to Yellow and Blue.

"Allura, you doin okay in Blue?" Lance asked.

"I'm fine. I've been flying the castle for half my life. I just need a few ticks to adjust to the lion."

"Good…because we're going in." Keith stated.

"Uh, I have a bad feeling about this." I said as we got closer to the planet.

"I'm detecting movement." Keith said.

"So much for the element of surprise." Lance complained.

"It's just one single fighter." Hunk stated, "Where's the rest of them?"

"Probably scrambling as we speak." Keith answered. "Let's take it out."

A small grey and blue ship appeared from around the planet flying full speed towards us. Lance seeing this, tried to move out of the way quickly but misjudged his speed, he ended up nocking into the Black Lion.

"Lance, what are you doing?" Keith grunted.

"Sorry! Red here is a lot faster than I'm used to." Lance apologized. "Uh, where that fighter go?"

Lance's actions distracted us from the incoming enemy, we barely had any time to evade when the ship began to fire. The small ship seemed to be concentrating its fire on the Black Lion, Keith took evasive maneuvers, but he could not shake him.

"Come on, move!" Keith yelled at Black. "I can't shake him. Someone get this guy off my tail."

"Coming in on your six." Pidge said as we moved towards them at full speed and began to fire. The fighter quickly moved out the way and our laser fire hit the Black Lion.

"Cease fire!" I ordered.

"What 'a hell Taylin!" Keith yelled at me.

"My apologies, on my defense, I was trying to shoot the ship!" I shot back.

Suddenly, the Red Lion passed inches away in front of the Black Lion out of control, "Seriously, does this thing have brakes?!" Lance yelled.

The small ship was too fast, it kept coming in and out, making small attacks at the Black Lion. Whoever was the pilot, he or she was an astute one. Allura moved forward trying to get a decent shot at it but it easily evaded her, in front of her was the Yellow Lion.

"Allura! Allura!" Hunk yelled panicked.

They crashed into each other and nearly hit the Red Lion.

"Whoa! What's up with this guy? He's playing us against ourselves." Lance said.

I moved White to chase after the small ship, shooting at it with her mouth's laser cannon. He evaded each and every one of my shots. I growled in frustration, "This can only be the Prince."

"Ow, Allura, you okay over there?" Hunk asked.

"I'm fine, but these controls are not responding, not like the castle." Allura answered. "What's wrong with you, lion? Do as I command! Move!" She scolded Blue.

"Maybe someone should suggest to Allura that flying the lion is different the flying the castle." Pidge suggested.

"Hey, I already told her yelling at her lion wouldn't work. Didn't go over all. She yelled at me too." Lance commented.

"Yeah, count me out. She scares me when she's under pressure." Hunk added.

"I can hear you." Allura said annoyed.

I sighed, "Allura, stop comparing the lion to the castle and get a feel of how it moves. Oh, and by the way scolding it won't help, you'll just make it irritated. Bond with your lion, feel what the lion feels."

Allura let out a deep breath, "I'll try."

"Keith, what's are next course of action?" I asked.

"How about this?" He answered, "Everyone stay out of my way! Taylin, you follow me."

I was dumfounded by the attitude he had taken, but I followed his lead to avoid having a fight with him. I moved my handles forward, moving White faster until I was right next to Keith.

"Great leadership." Lance commented with sarcasm.

Together, we began to fire at the small ship being careful not to hit one another with our lasers; that's what the enemy clearly wanted. The fighter kept going after Keith, shooting at Black's back. Lotor was smart, he went for the head first.

"Okay, this isn't working. We need to form Voltron." Keith said as we returned to the others. "Everyone! In formation!" He ordered. We flew up in a V shaped but nothing seemed to happen, the familiar tingle that I felt when we formed Voltron did not run through my body.

"Uh, guys? Guys, I'm not really feeling that Voltron feeling!" Hunk exclaimed.

"Keep going!" Keith pressed on.

"It's not happening!" Pidge said.

"What is going on?" Keith growled.

"Break formation! We have incoming fighter!" I ordered, the others followed my lead.

"Well, that was embarrassing." Lance commented.

"Agreed." I said back.

"So, should we call it quits? Maybe go back, regroup, get a meal?" Hunk suggested.

"No!" Keith exclaimed, "I know everyone is struggling, but we can't let Lotor slip away."

We followed Lotor's ship into the planet's atmosphere, we were immediately met with spiked mountains and lighting flashes. Thick yellow and orange gases covered the surface not allowing us to see how tall the peaks really were. Lotor had disappeared into the cloud of gas. "I don't think it was such a good idea to come here, he is trying to lure us in deeper." I said eyeing my instruments.

"Yeah, we may not want to follow him. We don't know what's in there." Pidge agreed with me, but Keith chose to ignore us. He launched forward into the gas storm without thinking of the consequences. We had no option but to follow him, deciding it would be better to stay together. When we entered, my instruments began to glitch and the lights of the cockpit glowed red in warning. Pidge tried to say something, but her voice broke after every other word, "Guys…. have a problem. My sensors are going crazy…think it's due to this…atmosphere and what must be strange…magnetic poles."

"We need to head back around, it's impossible to fly without knowing where were headed." I advised. I pressed a couple of button on my control panel but couldn't reestablish the navigation radar.

"We can't worry about that now. I'm not letting this guy get away." Keith argued.

"Keith, without accurate sensors or working equipment, we're not gonna be able to tell what's up or down, where we are, or how to get out." Pidge pointed out.

"She's right, we should head back to the castle and come up with a better plan." I tried to reason with him, but we wouldn't have it.

"-going."

"What? All I heard was 'going'. Are we going back? Is anyone else getting this static?" Hunk asked confused.

Since Keith was further ahead, his comm signal was not able to broad cast as well.

"I'm losing visuals on you all. I need you to slow down!" Allura complained.

I looked behind me and saw the faint light of the Blue Lion's eyes, Allura was falling really behind.

"We gotta keep up. He's getting away!" Keith ordered.

"Guys, I think this gas is messing with our radios. We gotta stay close if we want to communicate." Hunk advised.

"Keith! We can't leave the others behind." I pleaded as I followed close to his tail.

"I think we made it through the worst of it." Lance commented, but suddenly he let out a yell that send shivers down my arms.

"No! No!" Allura screamed as her lion took a hit.

I felt anxious and scared when on my screen Allura's signal disappeared.

"Allura took a hit. I'm going in after her." Hunk said breaking formation.

"Hunk!" Keith exclaimed seeing the Yellow Lion disappear; he groaned. "The rest of you, stay on me!" He kept on pushing forward regardless of the two missing lions.

"Keith, we have to go back for Allura!" Lance stated.

Keith only growled in response.

"Keith!" I yelled, "Keith! We have to go back for the others! We need to keep the team together!"

Keith said nothing but thankfully slowed down allowing Allura and Hunk a chance to catch up.

"How's everyone doing?" I asked, "Did everyone get a chance to catch up?"

"I'm sorry that I slowed us down, but the Blue Lion isn't listening to me." Allura replied.

"It's okay. We're a team. We stick together." Lance said to her, but I felt like it was more aimed at Keith.

"Yes, we are a team. Aren't we fearless leader?" I shot at Keith with sarcasm.

"It's not about the team. We have a mission that's more important than any one of us. We need to find Lotor and stop him, and I plan on doing that right now." He responded shooting forward, leaving us behind.

Heat ran through my veins in anger at his words, nothing was more important than the team. Voltron would not exist without one another; Keith's mentality was preventing us from forming Voltron. He only thought of what was ahead, and not the people around him.

"Come on guys. We'd better stick together." Lance said with a sigh.

We all kept moving forward, gaining speed to catch up with Keith. I said nothing more, afraid that I would snap at someone.

"This is crazy! We can't see a thing." Hunk whined.

"Stay together. He's around here somewhere. I know it." Keith said looking around until he found what he was looking for, "There!" But as soon as he spotted Lotor, he was gone.

"Where did he go?" Allura asked.

"No clue." Pidge answered, "Our radars are worthless in here."

"Hey, is it just me, or does anyone else get the feeling this guy is just toying with us?" Hunk asked.

I silently agreed with him, all the shoot and evade tactics he was using was a clear sign of that. It seemed that he wanted to know how capable we were, and we were failing miserably.

"I'm with you, big guy. I'm getting a case of the heebie-jeebies." Lance complied.

"He must have lured us here on purpose." Pidge said.

I kept looking around for any sign of Lotor's ship, him having a smaller vessel had made it harder for us to find him and easier for him to move quickly around the planet's terrain. I noticed a slight movement beyond the gas, studying it closely, I made out a shape of a ship. "He's right there!" I yelled. As if he had heard me, Lotor flew his ship right in the middle of our formation breaking us apart.

"We need to get out of here. We've been lead into a trap. The tables have turned. They've flipped the script. The hunters have become the hunted." Hunk started babbling in fright.

"Hunk, shouting tag-lines is getting us nowhere!" Lance yelled back.

"Lance is right." Keith agreed to my surprise.

"He's coming back around, prepare for another attack. All lions stay close together." I ordered, and they did just that.

"As soon as you see him, fire with everything you've got." Keith said.

The fighter came back around trying to separate our formation once again, he moved so agile and skilled through our defenses. "Now! Fire!" Keith ordered. He was the first one to shoot but once the laser beam left his lion's mouth an explosion occurred right in front of him sending him flying back. I had not time to react and the same happened to me and the rest the team. The explosion was so big that it sent me crashing onto a nearby peak and bounced off only to crash on the Black Lion. I pulled on my handles trying to stabilize my lion but we both ended up stumbling towards a ledge. Keith grunted and stood up his lion ready to take flight again.

I was angry. He put everyone at risk for one fighter, even if it was Lotor, the lives of our team mates always came first. I stood up too and launched myself at him pushing his once again to the ground. The Black Lion was belly up, Whites paws were on its shoulders preventing him from moving. "What were you thinking?!" I growled. I had connected deeply with my lion without thinking until I was seeing through her eyes; she roared loudly. White brought her head closer to the Black Lion's until we were eye to eye. It was as if somehow White and I had become one, I could feel the metallic hull of the Black Lion under her paws. "You put the lives of everyone of the team in danger." I said but my voice did not only come from my mouth, but the lion's as well making it sound less soft and more like a thunder strike.

"Guys! Break it up. As much as he deserves it, this is not the place or time." Lance intervened. His voice snapped me out of my trance, I pulled my handles backward setting the Black Lion free.

"Sorry." I apologized, "That was strange."

The Red Lion landed and looked around, "What happened back there? Where's the rest of the team?"

The Black Lion has stood up and approached us, "This is all my fault. I followed him right into this trap. Everyone warned me, but I didn't listen. I put the entire team in jeopardy." Keith said admitting his fault.

"Yeah, you kinda did. But now we gotta fix it." Lance said sharply.

"You're right. I'm sorry Taylin."

I took a deep breath before answering, "What's done is done, now we need to work together to get ourselves out of this mess."

"Let's go."

We took off flying slowly to avoid hitting a peak, everything was covered in thick yellow gas, preventing us to see more than a few feet in front of our noses.

"How are we going to find them?" Lanced asked.

"Maybe I can track them down, I just need to concentrate." I answered.

"Do it, we'll cover you." Keith said and moved to my side. I closed my eyes and extend my mind out to the others, I could feel them, but their locations were unclear to me. Everything looked the same, the only thing I was able to pick up was fear, the others were scared and lost, but suddenly I felt confidence and the familiar mind of Allura. She had found a way to navigate through the terrane.

"Allura."

"Taylin! I'm coming, don't move. I have connected with Blue and used his sonic waves to create a map of the terrain."

"I sense you are close, keep heading straight."

"I see you!"

I opened my eyes to see faint glowing eyes in the thick gas until they became clear and the Blue Lion appeared.

"Allura!" Lance exclaimed, "I'm so happy to see you."

"I'm glad I found you, but we need to keep moving. Lotor was following me, we need to find Hunk and Pidge quickly."

"Let's move and get out of here." Keith said.

Allura took the lead, with the help of her map it was much easier to fly. It wasn't long before we found them.

"Hailing Pidge and Hunk. Are you Paladins looking for an exit?" Allura asked as we appeared before them.

"No way! You guys found us!" Hunk cheered.

"Actually, Allura found you." Keith stated, "She found us all."

"She connected with her lion and with its powers created a map of the place." I said with pride.

"Wow! How did you do it?" Pidge asked fascinated.

"I just had to get into a Lance like mindset and stop thinking so much." Her answered caused me to giggle.

"Yeah, think like Lance! Wait a minute!" Lance said understanding, "Are you calling me dumb?"

"No, I'm calling you natural." Allura said quickly, trying to fix her mistake.

"Naturally dumb." Hunk teased.

"Yeah, he was born with it." Pidge added.

"Oh, that is so mean." I said with a laugh.

"Look, I'm glad we're all making fun of Lance, but we still have to find a way out of here." Keith said.

"Well, since Allura has the map by all means lead the way sister." I said with a slight bow of my lion's head.

Allura moved ahead of us, "Wait a tick. Everyone, we have company."

"It looks like Lotor called for backup." Hunk said, "Oh, man its always something."

About a dozen ships appeared on our radar, they were approaching the planet fast.

"We have to form Voltron." Keith said.

"But we were not able to form Voltron the last time we tried." Allura reminded him.

"We have to keep trying. We may have come here fragmented and disorganized, but the only way we're getting out of here is if we work together. This is our team." Keith said lifting our spirts, "Shiro believed in us. We have to believe in ourselves. Who's with me?"

"Yeah!" We yelled in unison.

"Now, form Voltron!" He ordered.

I began to fill the familiar tingle that ran through my body and my lion began to shift until it connected to the Black Lion, the other lions came together to form the appendages until Voltron was finally formed. I moved Voltron towards the incoming ships, dodging their laser fire.

"Hunk, I'm a leg!" Allura yelled in excitement.

"Pretty cool, right?" Hunk asked agreeing with her.

We kept approaching the Galra ships at a fast speed, they fired their ion cannons, but Pidge activated the shield blocking the incoming attacks. The shield reflected the laser beam back to the ships hitting a few. The ships kept on firing not noticing their mistake, "This is about to light up." I said with a smile and moved Voltron towards the incoming shots, taking them down with their own attacks. A small ship began to retreat after seeing their fleet destroyed, "They're getting away. Should we go after him?" Pidge asked.

"No." Keith answered, "Pushing the team too hard is what got us in this mess in the first place. We'll face them again when we're ready."

"Spoken like a true leader." I said with a smile.

"Roger that team leader." Lance agreed.

I moved Voltron to head back towards the Castle of Lions, leaving a grave yard of Galra ships. As we moved away rapidly, my smile vanished, and I felt a strange feeling in my gut. It was as if something was calling to me, pulling at the strings of my heart but as it quickly came, it vanished.

If only I had looked back.

Oh no! The star crossed lovers were so close, yet so far. :(

Thanks for Reading!

Also thanks for your lovely comments. :)

ukitakeitalialover041757- I really love this story! I can't wait to read more.

Anonymous-E- Another good chapter. Can't wait for the next one.