Chapter 37 – Fight My Battles

Lance could feel his strength sapped slowly. Even though he'd been training nearly nonstop for three months, he'd also neglected sleeping. He hadn't been in a fight this intense since, well, two days ago. It showed. One stroke was so slow, Lotor grabbed his sword and flung both across the airstrip. He skidded to a stop, but his knee gave out on its own, and he struggled to ready himself for Lotor, who barreled across the field. Keith would've facepalmed many times during this pathetic fight.

He managed to get the upper hand with the next few strokes and pushed him back. Lotor took a couple seconds to breathe. Being emperor all the time, he must not have a ton of time to train. Just centuries stored up. "You can't win. You're physically weak and in no shape to fight."

"Maybe you would be, but I live like this." He gritted his teeth and fought to stand. He readied his sword. "So make your move."

He yelled "nyah!" in an intimidating way and jumped, his sword up. The battle cry almost made him laugh. Lance sliced at his chest just as his sword came down, which apparently was a good move, according to Caden. Physics and whatnot. But he was still losing.

He slammed into Lotor, knocking the purple Legolas off his feet. He stepped back and evaluated his choices. One: stay here, keep fighting, eventually get knocked off his feet, and die. Was there a step two?

I don't want to die today, he thought to himself. So he closed his eyes.

He murmured under his breath, so Lotor couldn't hear and think he was crazy. "Okay. I know you can hear me this far away. Listen. You need to get over yourself and be upfront with me, because if you keep changing paladins, Voltron's never going to be strong enough to stand up to anything. You didn't bring me this far to die." He breathed heavily, seeing his enemy take to his feet. "I trust you. You know that." He held up his sword, opening his eyes. "So come."

Lotor jumped forward attacking again.

He apparently found it necessary to engage in conversation while he did so. "Do you truly think you will win this war? I've always been one step ahead of you. You have never been anything!"

"Then explain how you're losing in the middle of an airstrip." He could barely understand himself between huffs, but Lotor's eyes turned to slits.

"Your pathetic fighting techniques are nothing in comparison to my power!" He shouted, flinging him across the concrete. Lance couldn't get a footing—his muscles kept giving out—so he rolled on the floor, getting all kinds of scrapes and bruises. No armor to keep him safe now. He grabbed his sword, but Lotor kicked it out of his hand. It turned back into the black bayard ten feet away. Logically, Lance stood and punched Lotor in the face. He fell back a bit, then swung his sword and sliced him across the arm. He cried out in pain and fell back.

So this is it.

"You are nothing! You are a weak paladin and a worse leader. You put children together and call them Voltron! I shall show you what true power looks like." He raised his sword. "Goodbye, Lance."

His sword came down, but another stopped it.

At first, Lance thought it was Kroila coming to his rescue, because the sword was distinctly from the blades. But when he looked up, he saw that familiar mullet, and tears sprung up in his eyes. "Keith?"

"Stay away from Lance!" He shouted, pushing Lotor farther and farther back. Now that he was a swordsman, Lance could admire Keith's planned footwork and decisive swings. He probably would've thought about it for quite a while if he hadn't just realized his best friend was alive.

Keith slammed Lotor back ten feet, then turned back. "Lance!"

"Oh my gosh, Keith!" He squeezed him into a hug, crying like a baby. "You're alive, you're alive."

"Of course I'm alive, you idiot!" He pulled back, wiping away a tear with his finger. "Did—did you think I was dead?"

He nodded emphatically, pulling him back in for a much longer hug. "You're okay, you're okay," he kept repeating to himself. Keith stayed silent, knowing Lance was telling this to himself, and simply ran his fingers through his hair. Suddenly, he pulled back. "Is everyone else okay?"

"Yeah, we're all here. There—" He pointed to Hunk bolting across the strip, quickly followed by Pidge and the rest of the gang. Lance ran to meet Hunk, who had about the same idea about how long hugs should be. Pidge hugged him from the back, and everyone else—besides Keith—piled on, all repeated how happy they were to see him, how glad they were that he was okay, and how stupid of him it was to think they were dead. He didn't have the breath to tell them.

Soon, it dissolved, and they all resorted to clumping in a group. Lance couldn't stop looking at all of them. They were okay, somehow. He didn't know how, and didn't quite care at this point. Will was going to—Will. Where was his team? He broke contact with Hunk to look back towards the hospital where he'd last seen Ari. He needed to find everyone.

"Well isn't this touching," Lotor snarled, standing. "I suppose you have quite a bit to catch up on, don't you? Too bad you won't have the breath." He held his sword out.

Lance rolled his eyes. "You do realize you're one against, like, twelve, right?"

"We really need to work on your math," Pidge said, pushing up her glasses, "but point stands. You're done."

"Am I?" He tilted his head, a sly smile on his lips. He focused on something behind them, and they looked to see plenty of soldiers coming from the opposite direction. Their eyes widened collectively—except Lance, his turned to slits. "I believe they'll be more interested in bringing the former paladins of Voltron before General Ranveig than myself. Enjoy your stay on this dusty planet."

He didn't turn and run. Instead, he raised his sword.

"Shiro do we have a plan?" Hunk asked worriedly. "Because that's WAY too many for us to handle."

"Everyone has a weapon. We've got to try to fight them off." He didn't look too happy with it, but they didn't have a choice. The soldiers engaged.

Lance ran to his bayard, which Lotor kicked out of his reach again. "Seriously? You again?" He dodged his swings, then rolled to grab his bayard. He used the broadsword to knock Lotor off his feet, then used his gun to take out soldiers who got just a little too close to his friends. But there were too many of him, and he ignored his own problems. Right after helping Keith out with four he fought, Lotor sliced his leg from behind.

Naturally, Keith didn't like that and promptly freaked out.

Lance recovered well, and shot Lotor point blank. It didn't do anything except knock him off his feet, but it went well enough to take a couple seconds to look to the sky and shout, "a little help here!" He could see Pidge struggling to use a sword out of the corner of his eye, and he gritted his teeth.

"You are nothing!" Lotor repeated. "I'll kill you today."

"You wish." They fought for a couple more minutes, resulting in Lance on the ground, disarmed. He could see Shiro struggling to keep the team alive, but there were too many. They needed a sharpshooter, but he was a little busy. Lotor held out his sword. "You can only run so far. You're alone, as you always have been. When no one has your back, anyone can easily take you out."

He heard a change in the wind, and smiled. Everyone else was too concentrated on their fighting to hear, but he knew what it meant. It meant they wouldn't die here. "You're forgetting one little detail."

Keith noticed he stood before an unstoppable enemy without a weapon. "Lance!" He screamed, and everyone fought a little harder knowing one of them was about to die.

"And what's that?" Lotor growled, hand twitching.

"I'm a paladin of Voltron. Someone's always got my back."

And with a deafening roar, the Black Lion tore through the clouds. It landed behind Lance, looking quite ready to kill whomever dared to lay a hand on its precious paladin next.

Needless to say, everyone was quite surprised. Lotor turned on his heel and bolted in the opposite direction. Ranveig's soldiers seemed to consider running, but then unanimously decided they'd rather die then go back to their terrifying leader empty handed. Victory or death, he supposed.

The lion opened, and Lance hurried inside, motioning for his friends. "C'mon!" They followed him, despite looking a bit disoriented and out of it. With a look at his screen—something from Kroila and something from Caden—he blasted off into space.

Unfortunately, Ranveig wasn't going to let him get away that easily, and had a fleet to prove it. Lance easily dodged the attacks, but knew he'd have to get into open space before he could make a wormhole. He felt Pidge and Hunk next to him, who simultaneously offered passive aggressive advice on how to fly. "You know, if you're gonna be like that, wait in the back with everyone else!" He, of course, didn't mean that, but knew they wouldn't listen.

"I have several questions," Hunk announced, "but most importantly, you're in the black lion?"

"Yeah, what?" Pidge said.

"Yeah, well, I may, or may not, be the black paladin now!" Lance yelled over the loud blasting.

"Use your mouth knife-y thing-y!" Hunk yelled, and they braced as they sliced through the main ship. Lance spotted a spot and flew through it, a hoard of ships chasing after him. "You're the what now?"

Shiro and Keith joined the cockpit party, but Lance couldn't see them.

"They're gaining on us!" Pidge shouted. "Do you have a plan?"

"Unlike me, yes, yes I do have a plan!" He gripped his bayard. "Okay, you're probably gonna lose your minds, because I haven't been sane since the first time I did this."

"That's correlation, not causation!"

"Pidge, just—never mind."

He plugged in his bayard, and the wormhole opened.

Instant silence.

He flew through quickly and down to Daria. Slowly, Hunk began to unfreeze. "What—the heck?"

"Did you just make that?" Pidge screamed in his ear. "Do you know what this means?"

"Oof, you and Caden are gonna get along."

"I mean, seriously, what does that mean? Can you make a wormhole all the time? Is it just the black lion?" He jerked forward, smudging his face on the glass. "Is that the CASTLE?"

The scientists continued to fangirl as he landed. He could see Lotor's ship and REALLY hoped that was a good thing, but wasn't quite sure. The Green Lion was safe inside. He sighed in relief. Once landed, he stood, turning to see Keith and Shiro standing there, still gaping at him. "Wh—what?"

"Um, you just made a wormhole?"

"Yeah?" It had become so standard to him, he'd forgotten Shiro and Keith had both piloted the Black Lion much longer than him without unlocking that.

"What have you been doing?"

"AHH I GET TO SEE MY ROOM" Pidge sprinted out of the lion, Hunk on her tail.

"Wh—wait! Pidge there's stuff in your room just give me a second don't be mad—" He hurried after her, passing Allura, Coran, and Matt. "Pidge—"

Pidge skidded to a stop as Will stood a couple feet from the mouth of the lion. "Uh…"

"You're a human." He pointed at her.

"YOU'RE a human!"

"WAIT, there's a HUMAN?" Hunk picked Will up and studied him for a second.

"Haha, you're tickling me," Will said cheekily. Lance, Shiro, and Keith followed. "Wait, MORE humans? Ooh, Lance!" He hugged his black paladin tight, smiling endlessly. "Thanks for coming to get me."

"I'm glad you're okay."

"And you brought HUMANS!"

"Will. You're a human."

"I KNOW, but it's still COOL!" He gaped. "Ooh, that one's buff."

"I'm sorry, who are you?" Pidge asked, her fingers on the bridge of her nose.

"Madam, I think the question is, who are you?" He finger gunned her.

"Will, you have a girlfriend.

"I'm the green paladin!" She told him pointedly.

"Uhh…no."

"Yes."

"No."

"Yes!"

"No because Caden's the green paladin!"

"Who's Caden?"

"He's—one second." They stepped out of the lion—confused—as Will turned and shouted "CADEN!" down the hallway.

"What?"

"Come over here!"

A second of silence. "I'm a little busy! Just a second."

"Wait a second—who are you?" Pidge pointed at him.

"Hi, my name's Will, I'm the blue paladin."

"Allura's the blue paladin."

"I'm pretty sure I've been the one flying blue for the past three months."

"Wait—" Allura was starting to figure it out. "Lance, you weren't in the black lion when we disappeared. Have you been here?" He nodded, and her mouth hung open. "You rebuilt Voltron."

"I didn't have a choice. I thought you guys were—"

"That should be impossible. It took ten thousand years to find five suitable paladins, but you did it in three months!"

"Two days," Will corrected. "He actually found all of us in two days."

"Lance." She looked him right in the eye. "That's amazing."

"Wait, wait, wait. Hold up." Hunk held up his hand, putting an arm around Lance's shoulder. "You're telling me that—not only are you the black paladin, which is extremely cool, totes, but you also have an entire team of new paladins? And they're here? As in I could meet the mini me?"

Will nodded emphatically. "Dude, Jesse is gonna flip when he meets you."

"Will, is everyone okay?" The question had weighed on Lance for a bit, and he need to get it off his chest.

"Yeah. Caden found his friend, Jesse's all good, and—" He looked down at his hand, squinting. "…uhh, I can't read this, but the purple lady helped Ari and I get out. We got Lotor's ship. It's pretty dope."

Allura tilted her head. "What purple lady?"

As if on cue, Kroila walked past the hangar. "Lance I found your space son."

"Cool I found yours too!" He shouted back.

After a couple seconds, she shouted back. "WHAT?"