A train zooms by on the tracks, heading for Galaxy Garrison Headquarters in the center of the city. A glint of light from the sun on the large spaceship-like structure beamed directly into the man's eyes.
"Cor!" He said quietly to himself with a heavy Australian accent and covering his eyes, "That's enough light to blind a bloke!" As the blinding light ceased, he blinked his eyes for a while and stared about him, he saw a squiggle line of green in sight of his peripheral vision. He moved his eyes around and watched as this greenish squiggle line moved with the motion of his eyes. It kept his interest for a while until the PA system throughout the train went on.
"Good morning, travelers." It was the conductor's voice. "We will be stopping at Galaxy Garrison station for a few moments. All those getting off here should have their IDs ready."
"Looks like this is where I get off." The blond haired Australian thought. "I wonder who went on vacation." In a few short minutes the train slowed to a stop and everyone who was getting off was going toward the exits tickets and IDs ready. The Australian exited and was immediately stopped by a guard. Cliff showed him his ID. The guard instantly took the card and slipped it through a long slit in a small portable machine. The machine beeped verifying access. The guard stopped Cliff again before he took his card and left. "Cliff?" The Guard asked. "The Cliff, of the Voltron Force?"
"Yeah, what's it to you?" Cliff asked tiredly.
"You guys have the coolest jobs on this planet!" The Guard said, "I wish I were flying in Voltron than checking IDs all day."
Their short conversation was made shorter by the approach of three familiar figures. The first and most conspicuous was a blonde haired woman about an average height and attractively slender build. She was jumping up and down like a little girl.
"Cliff! You're back!" She said to him as she ran up and hugged him. Cliff knew that she did this to everyone she became friends with. She had the tendency to overdo it to.
"Easy there Ginger, I was only gone for two weeks!" Cliff said. He also noticed a large figure walking up to the both of them. He had near purple skin and blue hair and looked quite threatening at first, always frowning and was usually quiet.
"Tangor, how have you been?" Cliff said as the large Drule approached.
"Same as usual." Tangor grumbled.
"Oh he's just grumpy because he got stuck at GG for the vacation." Ginger jumped in.
"Bummer." Cliff said knowing how it felt to be stranded in a sterile place.
"So, how was Australia?" Ginger said lightly.
"Not so good." Cliff said hanging his head.
"Why?" Ginger asked sympathetically.
"Me granddad passed away," Cliff continued. "That's why I got my vacation early."
"Your grandpa?" Ginger said amazed. "How old was he?"
"I believe he lived to be 115 years old." Cliff said.
"Wow, God bless him." Ginger said happily. "I bet he saw a lot of things in his lifetime."
Even Tangor was amazed by the sight of his wide eyes when he heard the age of Cliff's grandfather. "115? You've got to be kidding me!" Tangor started. "How do you humans live so long?"
"It might be in our blood, or our common sense." Cliff replied.
"Ha, ha, very funny." Tangor grumbled in sarcasm.
"My, aren't we surly today." Ginger retorted.
"Surly isn't the half of it." Tangor replied.
"Oh, come on Tangor, cheer up a little, Jeff said we still have the rest of the day to do what we want. Tomorrow it's back to the ship," Ginger said. "I wonder if we have time to go to that new amusement park they put in on the south side of Garrison City."
"Nope, not for me," Cliff replied. "I've been traveling all day, and I'm feeling the effects of jet lag creeping up on me. I just want to go to my room and (yawn) sleep."
Ginger looked hurt when she heard that, but looking at Cliff again, he did look like he was deprived of much needed sleep. "Oh well, I'll just have to see if someone else will go with me." Ginger chirped happily.
They all gathered Cliff's bags and walked back to the big spaceship like building that housed the main operations of Galaxy Garrison. They showed their IDs at the front gate and were admitted. They headed towards an open elevator. Tangor ran to catch the elevator before it was called to another floor. In the process, a figure, trying conceal his identity, walked right in front of him and bumped into Tangor violently. Tangor, feeling very ticked off, grabbed the unknown person by the collar and lifted him half a foot in the air. "What the hell is your problem?" Tangor growled. Upon looking at the figure he saw a Drule. The Drule said nothing. Cliff and Ginger ran up to Tangor and immediately started calming him down. "It's OK Tangor, put him down and let's forget about it. Cliff is tired, and I'm sure he doesn't want to spend another three hours filing minor infraction reports." Ginger started. Tangor put the Drule down, as he did them both continued to stare at each other down angrily. Ginger took Tangor by the arm and tugged him into the elevator.
"I wonder what that was all about." Cliff asked as the elevator made its ascent to the fifteenth floor.
The fifteenth floor housed the Voltron Force's living quarters. When the doors opened, Cliff seemed to be in a daze.
"How long have you been up Cliff?" Ginger asked as they reached his room.
"Oh, about 27 hours, I think." Cliff yawned. He opened his door and his bags were brought in. When they left, Cliff just crashed onto his bed and fell asleep instantly.
---
Meanwhile
in another part of the Garrison,...
"Do you have the transmission equipment?" A cloaked figure said to another concealing himself in a trench coat and large hat. The figure in the trench coat pulled out a device from his coat and gave it to the cloaked figure. "It is here." Replied the first cloaked figure quietly.
"Good." The cloaked figure approved.
"We must act quickly if we are going to meet the time demand of this mission. What took you so long?"
"I bumped into one of the Voltron Force, I think it was Tangor." The trench coated figure replied. "I thought I was going to be beaten to a pulp. Luckily, they seemed to be in a hurry."
"You idiot!" the cloaked figure half-shouted. "Do you want the Garrison to know what we are up to?"
"Hey, I'm here, and I got the device." The trench coated figure took off his hat to reveal a Drule soldier with different markings on his helmet. "Let's get this thing connected, contact the emperor and get out of here before we are discovered."
The Drule soldier took out the transmission device and many different kinds of tools including obsolete ones like a screwdriver and wire cutters. The Drule soldier set them down as quietly as possible. The cloaked figure revealed himself as a Garrison officer of Drule descent, wearing the brown uniform that most commanders and captains wear. The officer produced what seemed to look like a laptop computer and cables for networking.
"What's all that for?" The soldier asked.
"We can't transmit anything without calibrating the device first." The officer grumbled. "We need these transmissions to be piggy backed on top of the regular transmissions, but encoded so that they can only be detected by those who have the specific coding." The soldier quickly began to remove panels from a nearby wall and start installing the transmission device.
"Ah ha..." The soldier quickly responded as he pulled the cover off. "There are uncovered wires. Let's see where these lead." He said tracing some of the wires with his fingers. He had picked out a group of three wires, a red one, a green one, and a white one, and followed them to a box located upon the upper left hand corner of the panel box.
TO BE CONTINUED...
VOLTRON: DEFENDER OF THE UNIVERSE and characters in the series are the property of World Events Productions and Toei Animation.