Disclaimer: I don't own Voltron, Star Trek, or any characters mentioned here that are cannon to either franchise. What I do own are the fighter, Thunderwing, and the crew of the Berlin, except for Mordock and Scotty. The rest I'm just borrowing for a while.
Star Tron:
The Black Suits Cometh
Chapter 5
Driscoll reached the shuttlebay and ran to his locker, donning his jumpsuit, helmet, and leather flight jacket. The technicians had just finished hanging the second torpedo under his fighter's wing as the captain climbed aboard and strapped in.
With engine roaring, Thunderwing raced from the Berlin's shuttlebay and headed down toward the planet below.
As he broke through the atmosphere, a fireball engulfed the fighter, and Driscoll heard Gredar's voice hiss through his headset. "Captain, I must advise caution. Your actions are unwise."
"Noted, Commander. I've already activated my stealth systems. I want you to put the ship on silent running. We will maintain communication through microburst transmissions."
"Aye, sir. Gredar out."
Coming out of the fireball, Driscoll locked his sensors onto the dueling robots just as the green robot shot several missiles at the Technicolor Viking bot, which deflected the shots with its left arm. Ooh, that had to hurt, he thought, as he began to circle several miles above the battle zone.
But the green beast wasn't done yet. As the Viking robot turned back to face it, it jumped up and delivered a vicious ninja-kick. The Viking robot blocked with its right arm, and was knocked down. Before it could recover, the walrus-beast jumped and pinned it down, and pointed two of its arms, each equipped with missile launchers, at the Viking's head.
Adam didn't even think. Instinctively, he flicked on his rock music, armed his torpedoes, and rolled into a dive-bombing run.
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Keith gritted his teeth against the pain in his wrists as the control yoke
wrenched under the force of the robeast's attack.
"Keith! We've got problems!" Hunk called from Yellow Lion. Keith didn't bother to reply as the robeast brought two of its lethal, missile-equipped arms to bear on Voltron's head. The situation seemed hopeless. Voltron was pinned down, and there was no time to do anything about it.
Suddenly, there was a fiery glow behind the robeast as the creature leapt back, howling in pain and clutching at its back. Voltron quickly got to his feet and stepped back from the robeast.
"What the heck was that?" Lance demanded.
"There's a small craft circling the area, Keith," Pidge chimed in. "That must be what saved us."
Suddenly, the robeast charged, and Keith's attention returned to the job at hand. "All right, team. Form Blazing Sword!"
Voltron's right and left hands came together. As they parted, a glowing ribbon of energy spread between them, and quickly coalesced into Voltron's most powerful weapon. The robot raised the sword over his head, and awaited Keith's order.
As the robeast drew near, Keith announced, "Strike!" The sword swung down on the robeast, which put up one of its arms to block the blow, and used the other three to punch Voltron back. But before the robeast could capitalize on its position, the fighter swooped down and strafed it, drawing its attention away from Voltron. This allowed Voltron to recover and prepare for another attack.
"Whoever that guy is, I like him," said Lance.
"He's not bad, either," said Hunk as the robeast shot several missiles at the fighter, which nimbly dodged them before making another strafing attack on the robeast.
"Now, while he's distracted, attack." Keith ordered. Voltron rushed the robeast, but his attack was deflected again.
Thus the battle raged on. The robeast attacked, Voltron dodged, the fighter strafed, Voltron attacked, the robeast blocked. Seconds became minutes, became five, ten. But Voltron was beginning to weaken. His power was fading, but the robeast was still going strong.
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Thunderwing wasn't faring much
better. Though he still had plenty of fuel, Captain
Driscoll was losing power in his phasers. Two power
cells were already exhausted, and a third was nearly dead.
Besides that, the robeast had managed to score some damage by detonating
its missiles near the Mustang. This had weakened the
P-51's shields and caused some structural damage.
From his perch above the battle, things seemed grim. Adam could see that Voltron was tiring. No matter what, he just couldn't seem to get an edge. The two photon torpedoes that the captain had dropped on the robeast had only distracted it, and his phasers' effect was negligible. It was getting so that the robeast almost ignored his attacks. The best he could do was to try to keep the robeast's attention, and hope that Voltron could do something about the robeast.
Even when Voltron did manage to land a blow, though, the robeast shook it off. It seemed that Voltron had met his match.
Then, something remarkable happened.
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Keith was running out of ideas. No matter what they
tried, the robeast stayed one step ahead of them, and with Voltron's power
dropping, the situation was looking ever more hopeless, even to the innovative
Commander.
Then, from nowhere, the face of a man appeared on the Voltron Force's viewscreens. He had brown hair and a beard, and wore the robes of royalty.
"Father?" Allura breathed.
The spirit of King Alfor had appeared to help the Voltron Force before, and now his presence was most welcome.
"The danger you face is most grave," Alfor said. "But the answer is right before your eyes. The power you need to defeat this monster lies with your new ally. You need only to call upon it."
"How, Father? How do we call on it?"
"Keith must command it to interface with Voltron. I can tell you no more," the ghost said, beginning to fade. "Farewell."
"Command what to interface?" Pidge asked as Voltron dodged another attack.
"The answer is right before our eyes," Allura mused. She glanced up as the fighter made another attack, this time only three weapons firing. The plane passed near enough for her to make out the name on the nose. Then, it hit her.
"Keith! It's that fighter!" she called. "You have to command that fighter to interface with us."
"Okay, I'll try it," said
Keith. "Does that thing have a name?"
"It says 'Thunderwing' on the nose."
"Okay, here goes," Keith said.
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The Voltron Force were not the only ones to receive attention from the former
King of Arus. He spoke to the young fighter pilot
as well. Appearing on Driscoll's windscreen, he said,
"I am King Alfor, former ruler of this planet. I have
come to tell you that you will soon be called upon to assist."
"I'm already assisting. I've gone through two torpedoes and three power cells." He paused as another phaser stopped firing. "Make that four. I'm almost out of ammo, I've got damage, and I'm not even scratching that thing."
"You will be called. Be ready." And with that, Alfor was gone.
Pushy ghost. What the hell was he talking about? The captain wondered.
Suddenly, Driscoll heard a voice call out, "Thunderwing, interface!"
Screwy spook messed with my comms! Adam realized. But then he remembered what Alfor had said. He had just been called.
He dove toward Voltron. As he drew nearer, he felt a tractor beam lock on and pull him toward the robot warrior's back. At first, he thought he was going to crash, until he saw a small bay open in the robot's back. Instinctively, he folded his aircraft's wings as it slid into the bay, and the doors above him closed. He looked at his panel, and saw that his holographic interfaces had activated, showing Voltron's stats. The robot's power levels were falling steadily.
"Okay, damage, power's dropping, first thing's first." Driscoll rerouted his warp reactor's output through the circuit taps and into Voltron.
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"Keith, our power level's going off the scale!" Pidge announced. "We're back up to a hundred percent and then some!"
"What's that thing got under its hood?" Hunk asked.
"You can ask him later, Hunk," Keith replied. "Right now, we've got a big, ugly problem to deal with."
"Yeah, but what do we do about it?" Lance asked. "We can't even get a single swipe at it."
At that point, Driscoll chimed in from his place in Voltron's back. "Voltron leader, this is Thunderwing. Suggest you abandon slashing attacks. That thing's arms are solid armor."
Keith considered this a moment as the robeast prepared to launch another attack, and then the answer came to him as the robeast began to charge. "We'll use his own tactic against him," he said. "Aim!" he commanded, and Voltron pointed the Blazing Sword at the robeast. "And, charge!"
Voltron surged ahead, charging down the oncoming robeast. The two closed the distance quickly, and before the robeast could do anything, Voltron had run it through, his sword piercing the robeast's armored chest.
Voltron pulled the Blazing Sword from the robeast and jumped clear as Lotor's latest creation exploded in a mushroom cloud of flame and debris.
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"WHAT!?" Hagar gasped. "It isn't possible!"
"You lying old witch! You said that robeast was unbeatable!" Lotor bellowed in rage.
"It was, sire," Hagar
defended. "If you hadn't been so impatient to launch
the robeast, and waited until dark…"
"Enough!" the prince shouted. "Full retreat! Back to planet Doom!" he commanded as he settled into his command station, already planning the explanation he would offer his father.
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On Arus, the six vehicles had separated, and were now flying in a vee formation back toward the Castle of Lions. Naturally, the newcomer was the main target of attention during the flight.
"Thanks, Thunderwing," said Keith. "We appreciate the assist."
"Not a problem, Commander," replied the Mustang's pilot. "I was just in the area and thought I could lend a hand."
"We're glad you did," said Allura. "As a token of our appreciation, I'd like to invite you to join us for dinner tonight in the castle."
"I'd be most grateful, Your Highness, but first, I must withdraw to make repairs. But I will gladly return later this evening. And if it's not too much trouble, I'd like to bring two of my friends."
"Of course. Are they pilots too?" Allura asked.
"You could say that," the mystery pilot replied. "Anyway, I'll return in four hours. Until then, adios."
"Wait, we don't even know your name!" Pidge called.
"Just call me 'Dinoman'." The Mustang driver replied, before breaking formation and rocketing up into the sky.