Chapter 8: Plenty of Time

A/N: I do not own Voltron: Legendary Defender.

I just own Ziera, Colran, Sephiras, Janze and any other OCs mentioned in this fic that isn't canon.

WARNING: Contains violence, death, racism, implications of sexual acts, Lance's flirting, and other things that may cause some readers discomfort.

Hey guys! I finally got this chapter finished! It took a while, but now I know why considering it's almost 10k words long! Yeesh! Anyway, please let me know if there's any inconsistencies with this chapter, I'm writing so many stories that it's hard to keep up, lol!

Enjoy!

'So we're finally heading to the Blade of Marmora?'

In the depths of space, the Castle of Lions moved swiftly through the stars, the strong engines of the ship working at a steady speed while the occupants inside all stood on the bridge. Well, some stood, some sat, mainly Pidge and Keith, while Allura, Hunk, Lance, Coran, Shiro and Ziera stayed standing.

Coran was stood at his usual control unit, piloting the ship while Allura held onto the two podiums connected to the central platform, in case they needed to wormhole. Shiro was stood beside Coran as he worked, and the others were just idly hovering around, waiting for the ship to arrive at their destination. Ziera was stood by Pidge's large metal chair, leaning against the back of it as she let herself get lost in thought.

It had not been that long since she arrived, maybe a few days, at most; time tended to blur together when you were in space, therefore she did not quite know how long she had been travelling with her new friends. However, since joining them, they had constantly mentioned the Blade of Marmora, and following the co-ordinates that a Galra soldier named Ulaz gave them, one of the few rebellious Galra under Zarkon's rule.

Now that it was finally happening, thanks to Shiro's new link to the Black Lion stopping Zarkon from tracking them, she found it a little hard to believe. 'I wonder if they're all Galra, like that Ulaz was?' She pondered silently, trying to imagine what Ulaz looked like, since she had never met him, though with the story she was told by Keith and Shiro, she wished she could have.

He was an inspiration to anyone who wished to co-exist with the Galra.

Her thoughts were disturbed when she heard Shiro speak. "Coran, how soon will we get to the Blade of Marmora's base?"

"Based on the co-ordinates Ulaz gave us..." Coran started, his brows knitting together as he looked down at a small floating screen. "We should be there within a few doboshes."

"I can't wait to see it!" Pidge gleefully chimed in, jumping out of her chair to stand by Hunk, who was just chilling with his arms crossed. "I mean, they were able to fold space-time, and that was just at an outpost!"

Hunk smiled sleepily, rubbing his belly. "Mm, the space taco!" His stomach grumbled. "It left us too soon..."

Pidge gave him the side eye and pouted as he took their conversation off track. "Well, sure...but the point is-" she spun to face the larger teen, arms outstretched excitedly. "-Imagine how amazing their home base will be!"

"Exactly, it could take on any shape!" The hungry Paladin began to daydream as he thought of various different foods. "Like a space jelly doughnut! Or long, like a space eclair! Or a space cheese blintzes with cherry sauce on top, maybe with a dusting of powdered sugar? That's the stars."

Lance groaned softly, while Ziera giggled at Hunk's rather descriptive thoughts. "So are these all Earth foods?" She asked curiously, her tail swaying behind her as she crossed her arms on the top of Pidge's, now empty, chair.

"Oh yeah!" Hunk chimed in, as she rested her chin on her arms, curious like the cat she was. "We have so many different breakfast foods! Pancakes, waffles, churros, crumpets, scones, cinnamon rolls, cookies, and so many more I can't name off the top of my head!"

"Aww..." Lance audibly complained, catching their attention as he pouted very similarly to Pidge, who had done the same moments prior. "Now I'm hungry for breakfast!"

Keith growled from his chair and lowered his elbows onto his knees, shooting them a glare. "Guys!" He started, irritation clear in his voice. "This is a serious mission." He opened his hands, emphasizing his point. "We need to focus!"

This did not sit well with Lance, who scrunched up his face and spoke in a very mocking, very childish imitation of Keith's voice. "We need to focus!"

Coran spoke up then, stopping any arguments before they could even start. "The base is in range."

"Take us in slowly." Shiro commanded.

"That might prove the tiniest bit of a challenge..." The older Altean continued, looking up and out into the vast depths of space, where two large holes seemed to tear through the darkness, leaving a folded glow of blue light to envelope a strange orb in the center.

"Is that a black hole?!" Hunk gaped.

"No, no, no, no!" Coran said, shaking his head. "It's two black holes, and a giant blue star!"

"That's not better..."

Both Ziera and Pidge's jaws hit the floor and their eyes sparkled with the inspirational, yet almost impossible science behind the Blade of Marmora's security system. "No kidding!" The young green Paladin chimed in. "Just inside a black hole, the temperature is one millionth of a degree above absolute zero! But, just outside of that is hundreds of millions of degrees Celsius!"

Hunk seemed confused for a moment, but Ziera gleefully trilled as she straightened up. "I didn't think such a complicated feat of science was possible, even the Olkari would revel at the chance to see this!"

It was then that a figurative light bulb lit up above Hunk's head. "Okay, so it's like when you try to nuke a frozen burrito and it comes out all scorching hot on the outside, but it's still frozen in the middle! Right?" He glanced at Pidge, who was pouting again, refusing to answer his hypothetical question.

"Now I'm hungry for lunch!" Lance whined once again, which sent Ziera into yet another fit of giggles.

Of course, this set their hotheaded friend off as Keith stood up and snarled at them. "Guys, quiet!" The entire group looked at him like he had grown a second head, but he wasted no time in ignoring their blank stares, turning his attention to Shiro and Coran, who had also glanced back. "Coran, where's the base located?"

The mechanic cleared his throat and brought up a new monitor over the very real set of dangerous obstacles. The monitor zoomed into the view of the star, where the shadow of an asteroid, or base was seen. "In between those three diddly celestial objects."

"The perfect defensive position..." Pidge commented.

"How else would you remain safe from Zarkon's forces?" Ziera pitched in, staring at the image. "It's the ultimate barrier."

"Or the perfect trap..."

The two science geeks spun around to see Allura glaring daggers at the image on the screen, tension spreading through the room as her obvious distaste for the Galra became apparent once more. "Yeah, I'm with Allura..." Hunk stammered. "Maybe we shouldn't, like, go in there at all?"

And once again, this made Keith's blood boil. "What are you talking about?!" He snapped. "We have to go in. This is the whole reason we came out here!" His brows knitted together tightly. "There is no other option!"

Lance blinked, then sighed. "Okay, geez..." He lifted his hands in the air and slowly lowered them, as if silencing him. "Calm down."

Keith huffed and his eyes narrowed for a moment, before he turned and trained his aggressive gaze at the barriers between them and the Blade of Marmora's base.

Suddenly, the tense atmosphere was interrupted when the control unit bleeped and a message spread across the window in front of them, written in very obvious Galra script. "Identify yourself." The computerized voice asked, translating the words they could not understand.

Shiro thought for a moment, then glanced at the seasoned mechanic. "Open a hailing frequency, Coran..." Coran did as he said, and in just a second, the communication channel was primed and ready. "We are the paladins of Voltron, sent here by Ulaz."

A few ticks passed with nothing on the other side, when out of nowhere, the message changed and the mechanical voice returned. "Two may enter." The message changed again. "Come unarmed."

And with that, the monitor that was forced onto their window shrank and vanished from their systems completely. Allura's brows lowered and she crossed her arms. "Why would they insist we come unarmed?" She spread out her arms, imploring the Black Paladin to listen to her, as he looked back to see what she had to say. "Shiro, this doesn't feel right!"

"I can see where they're coming from, if I'm honest..." Ziera piped out, her ears lowering when everyone locked eyes with her, surprised she would so easily defend them.

"What do you mean, Era?" The princess asked, a little annoyed with her interjection, but willing to hear her out, since they were all friends.

"Well..." She scratched her cheek with her gloved claw. "This is their base, and here we are, uninvited, asking for access to their top secret location to discuss matters they aren't aware of." She and Allura swapped looks, her's open and honest, while Allura's was a little skeptical. "For all they know, we're soldiers sent by Zarkon to trick them into a trap...If we go in unarmed, we prove we're allies, not enemies."

The stubborn Altean female opened her mouth to argue back, but she choked on her own voice, unable to deny Ziera's sound reasoning. Instead she huffed and crossed her arms again. "You have a point there..." She admitted, looking away. "But I still don't trust them!"

Shiro chose then to interject. "Well, we've come too far to turn back now..."

Coran glanced over his shoulder. "They just sent us a route to the base, but we'll have to move quickly." He brought up a massive monitor over the window showing a simplified image of the two black holes and the sun in the center, with a line going from the bottom of the holographic screen into the base in a curved trajectory. "Because of the solar flares, it's only open for another varga, then it will be closed for two quintants!"

"They're gonna close it for two years?!" Hunk squeaked out, eyes widening in surprise.

Ziera snickered and shook her head, smiling back at the larger man with a loving heart. "No Hunk. A quintant is a...Oh, Pidge, what do you call 24 vargas in Earth time?"

"A day."

"Yes, that's it! It'll be closed for two days, Hunk."

The Yellow Paladin relaxed. "Oh."

Lance cleared his throat, getting everyone's attention as Keith moved to stand beside him, still relatively tense, despite arriving at their destination unharmed. "So, uh...Any thoughts on who's gonna join you on this little mission?" The Blue Paladin asked, stroking his chin with a confident smirk. "I'm thinking things might get a little hot, so you're gonna want someone who can stay cool~!"

Shiro blinked. "You're right." He glanced at the Red Paladin beside Lance. "Keith, you're coming with me!"

This seemed to bother the rivaling young man quite a bit. "But Keith's a hot-head!" The two boys shared a distasteful glare between them. "He's probably gonna shoot first and ask questions later!" Lance started, stepping towards Shiro, who became uncomfortable as the teen's voice began to elevate in volume. "But they're not gonna be able to answer his questions, because they'll be dead!"

The elder of the three and leader of Voltron grasped Lance's shoulders and pushed him back so there was space between them. "We haven't yet severed Zarkon's link with the Black Lion, so it has to stay here." He let go and straightened up. "And the Red Lion can withstand the heat from that sun, so yes, it'll be Keith."

Coran nodded and looked back at the map, pressing a few buttons as a thin, dotted line struck through the route, showing the exact way they needed to go. "The course to the base will be quite treacherous, to say the least." He glanced behind him. "You're walking a razor's edge between the gravitational pull of the black holes, and the sun." He frowned, a gleam of concern in his eyes. "One false move, and you'll either be crushed into infinity, or burnt to a crisp!"

Ziera swallowed hard at the thought of losing two of her friends. "I'm starting to think this a bad idea too..." She muttered, walking over to the black and red paladins. "Be careful, alright?" She gripped her pendant hard. "I don't want to lose anyone else."

Shiro gave Ziera a gentle smile and placed a hand on her shoulder, while Keith looked away, unsure how to respond, given his lack of social skills. "Don't worry, Ziera..." The eldest of the two men stated, squeezing gently with his one remaining human hand. "We've got this, right Keith?"

The two glanced towards Keith, who stayed silent for a second, trapped in his thoughts.

"Keith!"

The young man snapped his attention to his two friends, looking at them with curious wide eyes, surprised by Shiro's raised voice. It was then that their conversation started playing through his head, and he realized he had been distracted. "Oh, yeah! Don't worry about us..." He agreed, giving her a false smile, his eyes displaying a nervousness Ziera had never seen.

She frowned, but kept her mouth shut, something was bothering him, but if he did not feel comfortable saying anything, she would not force it out of him.

"If there's any signs of trouble..." Allura called out. "Get out of there immediately, understand?"

Shiro nodded, but Hunk chimed in. "Uh, won't that be impossible? Since the path will be closed for two days?" Everyone gave him pointed looks and he cleared his throat, touching his two index fingers together. "Y'know, like Coran said? Just sayin'..."

The Black Paladin took a deep breath, changing the subject altogether. "Alright, if that's everything, we should get moving, we don't have long before the pathway closes." He started walking towards the door. "C'mon Keith."

Keith nodded stiffly and followed his mentor. "Right behind you..."

The two stepped through the doorway and looked back at their friends, who stared with worry written across their faces before the bridge doors closed, cutting them off from one another. The group waited with bated breath until they saw the Red Lion fly past the window and across the path that was given to them, only visible to them through the holographic monitor that Coran had shown them.

Eventually the Red Lion vanished into the blue seed-shaped mist that connected the two black holes together, and everyone finally took a breath, knowing that it was useless to worry past this point. They just had to trust that their friends would make it safe and sound. With that thought, Ziera walked around Pidge's chair and plopped down on it, crossing her legs as her tail swished behind her. "Now what do we do?" She asked as silence stretched through the room a bit longer than she was comfortable with.

"Now..." Allura started, focusing her intense gaze on the screen. "We wait for them to come back."

And wait they did.

~FbnL~

Okay, waiting was getting boring now.

Ziera and the others were still sat on the bridge, a good hour after the Red Lion had departed from the hangar. No one was saying anything, and every single person in the room looked rather bored, especially the energetic engineer that had recently joined them. "Right!" She exclaimed, making Hunk jump as he had fallen asleep in his chair, while Pidge glanced down at her, leaning against the back on her arms, like Ziera had done prior.

The feline jumped up and stretched an arm out over her head, mewling slightly as she held it with her other arm. With a sigh, she dropped them to her side and turned towards Pidge, hands on her hips with a bright, little smile. "Since we have two quintants, I don't think it'd be very productive for all of us to stay on the bridge at one time! If you all don't mind, can I leave the bridge and return to constructing my new ship?"

Allura smiled with a soft sigh as Ziera looked at her hopefully, ears raised slightly, giddy at the thought of her precious tinkering. "Of course you can, Era." The princess stated kindly, raising her hand to giggle behind a curved finger. "I'm surprised you tore yourself away from your plans for so long already! Go ahead, just don't overdo it."

Ziera's smile turned into a beaming grin and she nodded, quickly jogging to the door. "Actually, that sounds like a good idea..." Hunk chimed in, standing up with a grunt and followed after her. "While you guys keep watch for Shiro and Keith, I'm gonna try and fix the food goo machine. We can't fight Zarkon on empty stomachs!"

The feline snickered as she opened the door and stepped out, giving Pidge and the others a small wave goodbye as she and the Yellow Paladin were cut off by the door closing behind them, sealing shut straight down the center with a hiss. "It'll be far easier to sustain ourselves using the Nutritional Procurement Machine, than the almost incomprehensible ingredients lining the storage units." She told him, gesturing for him to follow her as she turned and strolled down the corridor.

"Uhhh, the what?" Hunk asked, a dumbfounded look on his face as he started following Ziera.

"The Nutritional Procurement Machine, or NPM as many like to call it. That's what you lovingly refer to as the 'food goo' machine! Didn't you know?" She spun around and walked backwards, her arms behind her back as she innocent conversed with him, happy her route took her past the kitchen anyway. "It's an amazing machine that collects the ingredients from the storage unit, weighs them, checks their nutritional values, before it grinds, chops them up and blends them together to create the 'goo' you all eat! It might not taste very good, but it is the perfect meal for any space traveler!"

Hunk's own eyes shined as he stopped by the kitchen, hunched over slightly with his arms loosely dropped and jaw wide open. "Whoa...!" He gasped, then straightened up, hitting the side of his fist off his open palm as he came up with an idea. "Wait a minute! Since you know so much about these 'NPM' machines-"

"Just NPM, If you add 'machine' at the end, it's a tautology, the 'M' already stands for machine."

"-Oh, well since you know so much about these 'NPMs'..." He gleefully grinned when she nodded excitedly, praising him for his correction. "Do you think you could...I dunno, help me fix them?" He laughed and rubbed the back of his neck, gesturing towards the kitchen door. "I'm good with machines, but if I don't know a lot about those things, it'll be harder to fix them without makin' the situation worse, so I could really use the help."

Ziera hummed and stroked her chin, breaking down the process of her ship-building to see if she had the time. "Well, since I'm still tinkering with the control units to ensure all upgrades don't cause fatal errors-" she heard Hunk gulp. "-I believe I can push that back to help, after all food is important, especially if I want to keep my minds sharp while working."

"Exactly!" The young man exclaimed, raising a finger, as if teaching her something. "Without a proper meal, you won't be able to focus as much! Everyone needs a good breakfast, lunch and dinner if they want to be at their best...Of course snacks are important too, you need a lot of calories to push through the day-er, quintant!"

She giggled at his excitement, enjoying his passion for food. "Alright, I'll help you~!" She walked over to the kitchen door and pressed a button on the control pad, watching as it hissed and slid open. "Could you tell me what's wrong with it? I'm sure the power has recharged by now, considering all the lights are working, so there must be some internal fault caused by draining their energy source."

"Yeah!" Hunk jogged in after her, running around her walking form before he stopped right in front of her, between her and the NPMs themselves. "Well, I got the power up and running, it was nothin' really, just a few tweaks here and there-oh yeah, you might not have hot water for a while-."

"Wait, what?"

"-But after that, every time I turned on the machine, the goo wouldn't come out, so I altered the wirin' and installed a stronger suction tube that'd take the food from the storage container in the machine to the nozzle at a faster rate, but now when I turn it on, it sprays food goo everywhere, and I can't get it to stop without turnin' it off from underneath!"

Ziera hummed and stroked her chin with a gloved claw. "That is a problem, the last thing we want is to be hit in the face with our meal before a mission..." She walked over to the NPM closest to her, opening the underneath panel to see the wiring and mechanics beneath the screen. "Let me take a look at the wiring and the coding and I'll see if I can find the cause!"

"You're a lifesaver!" Hunk was practically giddy at this point, knowing she would find the solution so they could eat something nutritious again. "Hey, while you're doing that, do you wanna snack? I can whip up something real quick, if you're hungry!"

Ziera looked at Hunk over her shoulder, snickering when she saw the gleam in his eyes and a big smile on his lovable face. "Yeah, that'd be wonderful, thanks Hunk!"

"Oh it's no problem! Cooking soothes me~!" With that, he jogged into the storage unit to find some delicious ingredients. There was no way he had not figured out how to change the language settings on the monitors, especially after the Scaultrite cookie incident.

The feline engineer giggled again before she dropped onto her back and shuffled her way under the different wires and machinery, checking for damage to ensure it was not a mechanical error. All the while, she could hear the Yellow Paladin moving around in the kitchen, chopping unknown food items while pleasantly humming a tune. She found it soothing, and soon she was in her element.

It took her a long time, and many different approaches, but she soon found the problem when she got out from under the console and went through the machine's coding. "Ah-ha!" She exclaimed as an error message flickered on the screen. "It wasn't the tubes or the suction causing the issues at all!" She straightened up from her tired slouch and began typing at a furious pace, while Hunk walked up behind her to watch. "The coding was reset when the power was diverted to the Teladuv! Because of this, when you changed the mechanics without changing the code, it failed to comprehend the change, and instead automatically altered the amount distributed without the appropriate calculations!" She slammed her finger on the enter key, and the error message turned green, giving the machine the all clear. "There! Now it should give out the amount required per person, even with your alterations!"

Just as she turned to flash Hunk a beaming smile, she let out a small yelp as she was scooped into a tight bear hug. "Era, you're a genius! We can finally eat some real food!" He spun her around and plopped her down by a plate of cookies, which were unnervingly green. "You deserve more than a cookie, I'd make you a buffet if I had the time!"

Ziera laughed and took one of the cookies, biting into it, before her eyes sparkled as an explosion of amazing flavor filled her mouth. "The cookies are perfect, Hunk! How could you create something so tasty from ingredients you've never heard of?!"

"Hm, oh these?" He picked up a cookie too and sniffed it, before smiling and taking a bite. "Well, first I taste the ingredients, after all, I need to make sure the flavors compliment each other, or it'll taste bad..." He polished off the first cookie and moved onto the second, pushing a glass of purple juice towards Ziera, who muttered a 'thank you' and took it graciously. "Then, once I've made sure the different flavors work well, I make sure the scent isn't off-putting, 'cause no one wants food to smell bad, y'know?" She hummed and nodded along. "After that, I make a few batches, and ta-da, tasty cookies for a tasty victory!" He planted his hands on his wide hips, a smug, yet very much deserving grin on his lips.

Ziera noticed the extra trays that had been put in the nearby sink and giggled at the idea of him furiously making batch after batch to ensure she had a delicious reward for her hard work. "Well, you're a genius around the kitchen Hunk, without a doubt." She took another cookie and sipped her drink. "But maybe we should take these treats, and some plates of food goo back to the others, hm?"

"Oh yeah, those guys are gonna be hungry, plus, cooking is more rewarding when shared with your friends~!"

"Yes it is." She put the cookie in her mouth and the two collected several plates and a trolley to carry them on.

After doing so and filling the plates with the food goo and cookies, even some extra drinks that Hunk had made for them, the two pushed the heavy, yet tasty trolley back to the bridge. When the bridge doors opened and the remaining paladins and Alteans turned around, their faces lit up as Hunk pushed the trolley through the doors. "No need to worry anymore, guys!" He boasted brightly as everyone all but flooded the poor man to collect their tasty treats. "Dinner has finally arrived~!"

"Are these cookies?" Coran asked curiously as he eyed one of the green monstrosities, while Pidge snatched a handful and ran back to her chair like a hamster with its cheeks stuffed with seeds.

"I dunno, but something this sweet can only be for one person." Lance flirted, taking a plate of cookies and holding it out to Allura with a pair of very obvious bedroom eyes.

Allura laughed awkwardly and took a plate of food goo. "I'm alright, Lance, I'd prefer a more balanced meal."

"Oh..." Lance muttered, then snapped that same look to Ziera, who immediately jumped backwards in surprise and discomfort. "What about you, Era? Surely you're sweet enough to take one?"

"Ah-ha..." She glanced over at Pidge, who held up a cookie as an offering. "Oh Pidge, you've got some cookies?" She blurted out, scrambling towards the Green Paladin to escape Lance's obnoxious flirting.

"Take as much as you want, we made extra for everyone!" Hunk declared to them as everyone stepped away from the trolley to sit down and enjoy their various meals. Hunk took a plate of food goo and a plate of cookies before doing the same himself, and eventually they all settled into a comfortable level of conversation while the sound of cutlery scraping across ceramic filled the spaces in their discussions.

~FbnL~

Two hours had passed since the food had arrived, and Ziera found herself sat crossed-legged on the ground, her tail swishing behind her as she pushed a bit of food goo around her plate out of sheer boredom. She was not fond of sitting still for too long, and noted that there was a lapse in conversation as worries over Shiro and Keith's health began to arise. In the moment she found herself desperate for some kind of entertainment, a distraction from her fears.

Lance, being the considerate person he was, around his rather annoying flirtatious advances, saw her bored expression and stood up from his chair, taking his plate as he walked over to her. "Hey..." He started, getting her attention as she looked up to see him stood over her with a warm smile. "You look like you could do with some fun, wanna come with me and Pidge? We're going back to her room to play some video games, if you want you can come with?"

Ziera blinked twice before she stood up, taking her plate off the ground as she did so. "Um..." She muttered, looking down at her plate as she played with her spoon. "What are 'video games?'"

She glanced back up at Lance and almost burst into a fit of laughter at the sight of his gaping jaw as it nearly hit the floor. She assumed it was not a question he was asked often back on Earth, and it made her laugh that their cultures and hobbies differed so much. It was fun to learn about his world. "Wait, hold up!" The Blue Paladin said suddenly, raising a hand as he gave her a dumbfounded expression, as if she was lying to him. "Are you tellin' me that your planet doesn't have video games?!"

"Well, yes. That would be what I'm saying, since I don't know what a 'video games' is?"

"What video games are." Hunk corrected from his chair, still eating as he had gotten seconds and now, technically, thirds.

"Thank you, Hunk!" Ziera shot him a kind smile, and Lance just pouted, annoyed that she would take this situation so lightly. "Let me rephrase my sentense...My species obviously don't have these so-called 'video games', as I don't understand what these so-called 'video games' are."

"Uh, uh...Nope, I'm not letting this injustice go unpunished!" Lance stubbornly declared, grabbing her wrist, much to her surprise. "Trust me, you'll love them! C'mon, Pidge should have the game set up by now!"

"L-Lance, wait-!" She squeaked, surprised by his sudden actions as he dragged her from the bridge, with Allura, Coran and Hunk waving goodbye with amused, yet exasperated smiles. "Why can't you just explain what 'video games' are?!"

"Because!" He refused to elaborate further as she huffed and yanked her arm out of his grip, stopping in the hallway, arms crossed as the teen spun around in surprise. "What're you doing? Pidge is waiting for us!"

"I will follow you once I understand what I'm agreeing to!" Ziera's tail swished behind her in a quick motion, obviously irritated by his insistence without answers. "I trust you all with my life, but I won't follow you unless you give me some indication of what we're doing!" She sighed and dropped her arms, her ears drooping slightly. "I want to know more about Earth traditions, and I can't do that without some form of communication."

Lance relaxed a little, his features warping into soft surprise, rather than a childish pout. He laughed and awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck, smiling apologetically at her. "You're right, if you dunno what something is, it's kinda scary to just walk in blind, huh?"

"Exactly!"

"Well, Tylyrions have pass-times right? Things you do when you're not working?"

"Hm? Oh yes, many things!" Ziera excitedly replied, only to falter and scratch her cheek with a black blush spreading across them. "Though I...can't really remember any of them...But I did have pass-times during my stay on Olkarion!"

"Okay, so what did you do?"

"We would zip-line across treetops and race one another in mechs, well, they would be in mechs, I would be using my Skate-Overs. It was an unfair race, but still exceptionally fun~!" She giggled, bringing the crook of her finger up to her catlike mouth as happiness flooded through her from the memories. "Melrak wouldn't be pleased when I beat him more often than he beat me!"

Lance laughed, smugly glancing at the bridge doors. "Heh, I can say the same about Keith, I think he's jealous that I'm not just a better pilot, but better with the ladies as well~!" He flashed her a smile and she sweat-dropped, awkwardly fidgeting in place until he got the hint and cleared his throat. "Well, your races are a kinda game, right?"

"Yes."

"So think of video games as a sort of game as well! But instead of racing in real life, we race through a TV screen!"

"What's a 'TV?'"

Lance facepalmed and groaned as he ran his hand over his eyes, stopping at his mouth, he then gestured for her to follow him. Curiosity ended up getting the best of her, and she followed him regardless of her lack of knowledge. "TV screens are kinda like those monitors Coran and Allura use on the bridge, but a little less...high-tech." He explained as they moved.

"Ohhhh, so TVs are essentially holographic screens...Without the holographic aspect?"

"Exactly!"

The two eventually stopped at Pidge's bedroom door and Lance smugly knocked, proud of himself for convincing Ziera to play with them. The doors hissed and slid open, but Pidge was not waiting to greet them, instead she was sat in front of a box with a glass 'monitor' where a 'video game' was being projected.

"Hey!" Lance whined as Ziera's gleeful love for technology took over and she all but shoved past him, crouching down to take a look at the machine she had never seen before. "You weren't supposed to start without me!"

Pidge shrugged and smirked as she beat the first boss, while half-listening to Ziera's questions about the machine. "Well, you took too long!" She stated confidently, then paused the game and smiled at Ziera, holding out the controller. "Do you wanna play?"

"No fair, it's my turn!"

"C'mon Lance, let her play first, she hasn't been here as long as we have, we should make her feel welcome!"

Ziera carefully took the controller and sat beside the young teenage girl, who pointed at various controls as Lance huffed, finally accepting his lost turn, as he shuffled into the room, closing the doors behind him. He then sat behind the two girls, pouting at the screen as he waited for Ziera to start playing. "And that's how you use it!" Pidge finished explaining, holding her ankles excitedly as Ziera started pressing the buttons, looking at the screen as she guided the fictional sprite through dungeon walls. "See, easy right?"

"This is fantastic!" Ziera piped up after a second of collecting her thoughts, she took on her first enemy and stuck her tongue out slightly in a way humans would consider a 'blep.' "Humans have such interesting ideas for entertainment!"

"Yeah, when we go back to Earth, after this is all over, we'll have to take you with us and show you all the other cool stuff we do for fun!" Lance chimed in, placing a hand on each girl's shoulders, grinning from ear to ear as the three gleefully made plans to hang out more in the future.

Ziera never would have thought that such a low-tech machine could hold so many wonders.

~FbnL~

It had been an hour or two since Ziera finished playing games with Lance and Pidge. Honestly, it had probably been longer, maybe even half a day at most, after all, when she was focused, she tended to lose track of the time quite easily. After their gaming session came to an end, she went to the pod bay and immediately started working on her own fighter once again. Thankfully both Pidge and Coran had looked through her blueprints by now and tweaked any errors to ensure that the amount of explosions caused by her engineering feats were kept to the absolute minimum.

That is how she ended up losing the time, and found herself on her back, under the belly of her ship, messing with the wiring beneath. She had a box of old tools Coran had loaned to her, along with her own box of tools she had brought from Olkarion, and she found herself concentrating fully on what she was doing, as she always had, even during her flashback when she realized she had a brother.

She knew the sooner she finished this ship, the sooner she would fight alongside the paladins and put an end to the destruction Zarkon caused across the cosmos. She paused in her rewiring for a second, letting out a heavy breath as she closed her eyes and thought back to that horrible moment, the moment she realized she was all alone in the universe, now the very last of her kind.

Suddenly footsteps echoed from outside her building space and she hummed, sliding out from under the ship to see Allura walking up to her. "Oh, Princess!" She exclaimed, wiping the sweat from her forehead as she got to her feet and stretched her arms out over her head with a heavy yawn. "Ah, sorry about that...I was lost in thought, what can I help you with?"

Allura nervously waved, which caused her feline friend to tilt her head to the side curiously, her ears flopping with the motion. "Well, I wanted to ask you a question, but didn't want to address it in front of everyone else..." The Altean royal started, placing her knuckles on her hip as she looked at anything but Ziera. "Why do you stubbornly believe that the Galra aren't evil?" She snapped her blue eyes back to her engineering companion, who's own ombre ones widened in surprise at her bluntness.

"Wh-what?" Ziera awkwardly turned to the ship, picking up a cloth to wipe the oil off her hands and face. "Well..." She looked at the rag and arched a brow at the sheer amount she left on the fabric. "Yeesh..." She tossed it on the ground beside her tools. "If you consider the complete population of a species, namely the Galra, and the Blade of Marmora as a whole, assuming they have a significant number of allies, then that means only 10 percent of the populace would be inherently good-."

"That's what I mean, why does no one else understand-."

"I'm not finished!" Allura's mouth snapped shut and she shot an annoyed glare at Ziera, who glanced away to avoid it, uncomfortable with raising her voice at a friend. "Then, let's say a fair number of the Galra under Zarkon only follow him because it has been their heritage for the past ten thousand years...The tables would have flipped and only ten percent of the population happen to be inherently evil, the rest are just being strung along like puppets without any real understanding of any other kind of lifestyle!" Her lips twitched up in a small smile, hope fluttering through her chest. "That means that at heart, a vast majority of the Galra would switch to our side once they understood that there was another way to survive in the universe! Some would want peace, just as much as we do~!"

Allura stared at her for a moment, then opened her mouth to retort, but suddenly Ziera's eyes widened and she let out a sharp hiss, curling in on herself as she grasped her head with her clawed hands, overwhelmed with the pain of another memory. "Era!" The princess shouted, crouching beside the crumbling form of her feline friend as she whimpered to herself. "Are you alright?! Ziera, can you hear me?!"

But she could not, Allura's voice had dulled, becoming nothing more than a distant hum and slowly, everything went black.

Ziera gasped as she woke up in a darkened cell, unsure of where she was or how she had gotten there. She quickly looked around and found the door, diving for it as she curled her clawed fingers around the bars. However, as she got to her feet, she came face to face with another person, stood far enough away to be concealed by the shadows, but not far enough that she could not make out a pair of glowing eyes in the darkness.

Yellow sclerae with deep blue irises.

"ERA!"

Ziera suddenly snapped out of her memory, opening her eyes and lifting her head with frantic gasps for air. She felt like she had been trapped in a tight space and was more than a little relieved when she saw the familiar, if not worried, face of her friend Allura, along with the large, vast area where they kept the pods. "P-Princess?" She managed to say, confused more than anything.

Allura relaxed when she heard Ziera speak and her shoulders sagged with a heavy breath. "Oh good, you're back...I was worried you may have collapsed, you were in so much pain!"

"I'm fine, I've had worse spells..." The Tylyrion assured her, smiling weakily, which did nothing to sooth Allura's fears.

"Maybe you should go to the medical wing with Coran for a scan...These headaches can't be good for you, and for all we know, they're causing you serious, permanent damage!"

Ziera nodded absentmindedly and walked back over to her ship, sitting down on the ground as she prepared to slide back under and work, anything to process her memory better. "I will, ok? I just need to make sure I get these wires properly attached, otherwise the whole ship could go up in flames!"

Allura sighed and a small smile spread across her lips. She placed a hand on her hip and watched as Ziera scooted beneath the underbelly of her ship and started tinkering once again. "I admire your courage, Era." She blurted out, blushing slightly as her feline friend paused in her work, then slowly slid out from under the ship to give Allura a confused stare.

"What do you mean?" The engineer asked, unsure she understood or even heard the strong, fearless princess's words. "I don't really see myself as 'courageous,' if I'm honest...Intelligent, maybe, but not brave by any means." She shrugged, sitting up to listen more closely to the conversation.

Allura glanced at her, then slowly sat down with her legs crossed, holding her ankles much like Pidge had done previously. "Well...First you're jettisoned from your home planet as it burns..." She frowned apologetically as Ziera's ears drooped and she looked down at the ground. "Then, you crashed on the neighboring planet with no recollection of your previous life, or how you even escaped Zarkon's destruction to begin with...You fought the Galra to take back the Olkari's city...Then you did everything in your power to keep us from falling into Zarkon's hands when the Teladuv lenses began to crack!" The princess smiled and put her hand on the Tylyrion's shoulder, getting her to meet her gaze. "I'd say that's pretty courageous, wouldn't you?"

Ziera's solemn frown slowly twisted into a cat-like smile, shy but happy all the same. She nodded a little, and Allura laughed at her modesty as she got to her feet. "Thanks, Princess..." Her friend stated, still sat in front of her ship. "But...Even if my home planet hadn't been destroyed by Zarkon...I'd still help you, even now." She slowly got to her feet as well, turning to look at the machine she was engineering. "Because...I believe that deep down, almost everyone in the universe wants peace and stability...Even with my motivation for revenge, I...want the rest of the universe to smile and be happy, like I hope my people were before Zarkon destroyed them..."

"...Do you really think we can ally ourselves with the Blade of Marmora? After all, we only know what Ulaz told us...Can they be trusted?"

The alien technician turned back to the Altean royal and stared for a moment, then nodded with all the determination she could muster in her response. "Yes. If they're risking their lives to rescue you, and rescue those under Zarkon's thumb...Then I well and truly believe they are the best allies we could ask for."

Allura nodded slowly, then cleared her throat and linked her fingers behind her back. "Alright..." She said softly, almost lost in her own thoughts as she turned to walk away, giving Ziera a slight wave with a smile. "Thank you for spending some time with me...Good luck with your ship!"

Ziera giggled and waved back, a little more energy in her movements now that she felt she had gotten through to Allura, even just a little. If it helped the princess understand that there was always some good among the bad, then she considered every second of that conversation worthwhile.

With that, she dropped back down and slid under her ship, snapping back into the busy mindset of a tech-loving engineer.

~FbnL~

"How long has it been?"

Despite her best efforts to be patient, Allura found herself growing more and more anxious as the hours passed. Eventually, after many hours of mindless entertainment elsewhere, everyone had returned to the bridge for an update, only to find that the pathway to the Blade of Marmora was still blocked for the time being. Coran was by his controls, while Hunk and Pidge were in their chairs, Allura was at her podiums and Ziera was sat on the floor, in front of Lance who was sat on the platform behind her.

"Roughly ten vargas." Coran said.

"Is that all?!" Ziera squeaked, eyes widening from the short amount of time that had passed. "It feels like twenty at the very least!"

"We cannot just wait here..." Allura stated, arms crossed as she continued to glare at the monitor, hoping for some kind of sign her friends were alright.

Lance sighed. "The path is closed for like...I dunno..." He trailed off for a second while Hunk yawned, which then lead to Ziera yawning, and then Pidge, like a chain reaction. "Thirty more vargas, or something?"

Out of curiosity, Coran checked the calculations and his eyes widened. "That's actually correct."

Hilariously, this also surprised everyone else in the room, even Lance. "Really?" The Yellow Paladin asked, just as impressed as Coran was.

"Well yeah!" Lance chimed in confidently, linking his fingers as he stretched out his arms, before resting them behind his head. "I wasn't born yester-quintant!"

The princess sighed, too consumed with concern to find their topics amusing, while Ziera was giggling among her friends. "I have to know what's going on down there..." Allura piped up, opening her own tiny monitor in front of her to check the communications.

"There's no way to get a read on their base!" Everyone turned to look at Pidge, who had her own monitors open as she analyzed the data. She was just as worried as Allura was. Out of curiosity, the feline stood up and strode over, leaning behind Pidge's chair to read the screen better. "Too much interference from the solar flares and the black holes."

Hunk thought for a second. "If we count for the gravitational lensing, maybe we could reduce the noise and interference and connect with the Red Lion's censors, right?" He glanced from Lance to Coran. "That's right, right?"

Lance looked confused, then made sure Hunk was actually talking to him, he could not have been, right? "Are you looking at me?!" He asked, dumbstruck, he had only guessed a number, he had no idea what the hell they were talking about now.

Ziera hummed and drummed her fingers on the chair. "That does seem possible, if we boosted the signal between the Castle of Lions and the Red Lion itself while reducing the interference, we should theoretically connect with the Red Lion...Though the connection would be fuzzy, at best."

"We can still give it a try!" Coran chimed in, nodding as he too ran the numbers and felt it was possible, though there was only a slim chance, even then.

Allura thought for a moment, then steeled her expression. "Get on it."

After that, the group spent hours trying to connect with the Red Lion, however every single attempt seemed to fail. They took turns sleeping while the others kept an eye on the monitors and tried to patch in, but to no avail. Eventually almost thirty vargas passed and they found themselves no closer to getting the results they wanted.

That was, until Allura's smaller monitor, which she had opened the moment she woke up, sent her an alert, which immediately snapped her addled, tired mind into focus. "The Red Lion is moving!"

Lance, who was on the verge of napping on that little platform he liked to sit on, suddenly snapped to attention and spun around to face Coran. "We've gotta get down there!"

Ziera quickly stood up from her place near Hunk, who sat in his chair, working while the feline helped. "The path won't open for another five doboshes!" She told them while Hunk tried fruitlessly to access the Blade of Marmora's security footage.

"The Red Lion has started attacking!" Coran told them, as the marker indicating the Red Lion's location began flashing red in an alert.

"Wait..." Hunk suddenly said, lifting his head as Lance got to his feet and ran to his chair, both he and Pidge linking to the Castle of Lions should they need to help in any way. "What does that mean? Why would the lion attack...Unless?!"

Ziera gripped the back of Hunk's chair as worry crossed her features. "Shiro...Keith..." She looked at Allura, who's eyes narrowed. "Princess...?"

"Everyone, stay focused!" She told them, her strong voice grounding them before they had time to panic.

With a nod, they all got back to work, Ziera running over to Coran, standing at his side as the two typed with rapid fingers in an attempt to find any means of patching into their communications. But it still did not work. Ziera let out a sharp cat-like hiss and slammed her hand down on the side of the control unit. "Come on!" She ground it, desperate to help her friends. "Why isn't this working?!"

"Coran, how much longer 'til we can get in?" Allura asked.

Coran quickly checked, glancing back at her. "Just a few more ticks, Princess!"

"Get ready! Ziera, hold onto something!"

Ziera clicked her tongue and finally let go of the control unit, running over to Pidge's chair before she grabbed the back of it tightly and planted her feet down as hard as she could. "Don't worry about me, If the passage opens, go full throttle! A bruise is the least of my worries right now!"

Allura nodded, glancing down at the monitor she had stretched to surround her peripheral. "Alright, as soon as the passage opens, we're going in!"

Coran nodded and began the countdown. "Five..."

Pidge swallowed hard as she prepared to navigate them inside.

"Four..."

Hunk felt shivers run through him out of fear, but gritted his teeth, ready to help his friends.

"Three..." Lance activated a drone, dreading the loss of his rival.

"Two..." Ziera's tail swished behind her, and she leaned in close to the monitor in front of Pidge, ready to help any way she could.

"One!"

Just as they were about to rocket into the passage, suddenly an image of the Red Lion flying back towards them filled the screens and the alerts all died down. "Princess!" Shiro called out through the coms, leading everyone to sag with relief. "We're coming back, and we're bringing someone you should meet!"

"They're alright!" Coran said, stating the obvious in his joy.

"Yes!" Pidge chimed in, clenching her fists as Ziera dropped to her knees, holding her chest. "They did it!"

"Thank the Divine Beings..." The feline gasped, smiling as she looked at the Red Lion with soft, genuinely happy eyes. "I was so worried!"

Allura relaxed at her podiums and sighed, lifting her hand to rub her lips against the side of her finger, closing her eyes as she tried to calm her racing heart. She and the others continued to cheer as the Red Lion flew into the hangar, and one by one, they started making their way down to greet their friends in their victory.

~FbnL~

They all stood, pride radiating off each of them as the lion flew into the airlock entrance. As soon as it was sealed from space, the doors opened and the lion continued its short flight back into the hangar, stopping and settling down in front of the group. With a very accurate grumble, the beast leaned down and opened its maw, revealing Keith, Shiro and their unnamed ally wearing the Blade of Marmora's distinctive garb.

"Keith, Shiro!" Ziera cried out as the three stepped out of the lion's jaw and into the hangar. Suddenly the two paladins were tackled by their feline friend, then Hunk, then Pidge. "I was so worried about you two! What happened, why did the Red Lion suddenly attack?!"

Shiro laughed as he tried to breathe around three crushing hugs, both he and Keith sharing sheepish smiles. "Look, we'll tell you about it later, okay? Right now there's someone we want you to meet...Guys, this is Kolivan, the leader of the Blade of Marmora."

The three reluctantly let them go, and they took deep breaths, relieved to be able to intake oxygen once again. That was when the third man, Galra if his anatomical stature was anything to go by, stepped forward and stood in front of Allura in all his towering glory. The mask he adorned warped and rippled like water before it dissipated and he used his gloved claws to pull down his hood, revealing his Galra features, white hair and long plait. "Princess Allura..." He started, crouching down into a bow, his large ears flopping down due to the ship's artificial gravity. "It's good to see that the rumors are true...You're still alive after all these years."

"So is Zarkon..." Allura stated coldly, glaring down the man as she ensured her guard remained high. She would not risk losing anyone else to deceit. "Can we consider you our ally in the fight against him?"

"Yes..." The man stood up, now looking her sharp disdain right in the eye. "But we have little time to discuss this...I just received word from our spy inside the Galran hierarchy, they have become aware of our presence, so the timetable for our plan has been moved up."

"How soon do we need to begin?" Shiro asked.

Kolivan's pupil-less eyes narrowed. "Now."

Ziera swallowed hard when she heard those words, her fists clenched at her sides as she felt her own resolve rise in realisation. Now more than ever, she needed to knuckle down and finish her ship so she could join them in executing their plan.

She refused to be a spectator in their battles any longer. This time, she would fight.

A/N; Thank you for reading, please review as it helps me improve as a writer and motivates me to keep going!

Voltron Time

Tick = Second

Varga = Hour

Dobosh = Minute

Quintant = Day