Chapter 43: Teamwork Exercises!(Lance's POV)
Lance puts the mind reader thing on his head. He had done this once before, the day after learning that his friends are the Defenders of the Universe. Hopefully this exercise will go better than it did last time.
With no one taking after Pidge and not wanting to open their minds for others to hear.
He is especially interested in Marinette's thoughts, as the girl rarely had fun and expressed her opinions outside missions and other things that have to do with taking the Galra done.
But the point of this exercise is to…
"Paladins, some of you know how this exercise works well others don't," announces Coran from the announcers box. "So I'll explain. The device on your head allows the others to hear your thoughts, and the point of that is to unify your thoughts into forming Voltron. The device produces an image and when Voltron is formed your thoughts will have ceased. Leaving behind the hum of thoughts before your focus was on Voltron."
Lance nods, knowing the exercise and wishing they could start already.
The more time it takes to complete each teamwork task, the more time their enemies have to plan their attacks and carry them out. Not that he finds teamwork training useless, just that they need to do it efficiently.
"Alright Paladins, close your eyes. Let your minds be open….."
Lance opens his mind and feels the others probing. But he doesn't mind, after all his thoughts are harmless. He senses Marientte thinking of her friends and family on Earth but also the Paladins and Coran and a wistfulness to know more about the Red Paladins(Keith most likely). There's also a hint of her thinking about a crush back on Earth.
"Now Paladins, put your focus on Voltron.."
Lance prys away from reading the others thoughts and begins to think of the Red Lion and forming Voltron.
"Alright now focus on forming it."
He already was, but doesn't say it aloud to Coran cause he is just trying to help.
"Paladins! You did it! You formed Voltron mentally!" Coran shouts.
Lance opens his eyes and sees a hologram of Voltron in the middle. Amazing, they did it. But that was easy compared to the other exercises Allura and Coran put them through the first day they trained to become a team.
Like the maze or the one where we have to protect all members of our team no matter what.
"Alright Paladins. Consider the first exercise a success. Now onto the maze one. Each of you will be paired with another Paladin and you will have to try and guide them out the maze, while your partner is in the maze trusting your voice. You will each have a turn with guiding and trusting and there will be multiple setups. For example Marinette will partner once with Allura, Hunk, Pidge and Lance, taking a turn being the one out of the maze and a turn in the maze."
Lance nods, though he had difficulty trusting Keith the first time they did this exercise. Hopefully he will be more willing to trust the others when he is actually in the maze and they have to guide him.
The turns with Pidge and Hunk went smoothly, as we all trusted each other as back in the Garrison they were a team. Just the three of them. The turns with Allura also went smooth, as he trusted in the Princess to guide him safely after fighting alongside her for however many months in space.
Being with Marinette also went easy peasy, as Lance also trusts her to guide him when he can't really do anything.
So the maze exercise was a success for him at least.
Then came the Gladiator challenge.
"Alright Paladins, this exercise is also supposed to build trust, but by protecting your teammates with every available weapon you have. As such you'll be situated in a circle with drones firing at you and if one of you gets hit the floor will drop beneath you. The goal is to protect your fellow paladins." Coran states to the group as the arena floor changes beneath them.
Great, Lance thinks. This totally will go well.
He gets onto one of the circles, with Allura on his right side and Marinette on his left. It's a bit strange to see Allura in Blue paladin armor, but that's because she doesn't wear it all the time, where Marinette wears the Black paladin armor almost every second.
The drones start to fire and he puts his shield up. Marinette covers for him with her black yo-yo while he tries to protect Allura with his shield, while also trying to fight the drones off.
Eventually he gets shot from protecting Marientte with his shield when she was busy swinging her yo-yo to block the drones fire from reaching Hunk.
The drop isn't that bad, as he lands in the lounge. Discovering that Pidge was also shot by the drones not too long ago.
"Ya know Lance, for Marinette and Allura not liking each other they sure are protecting each other from the drones fire."
Lance nods, "Yeah, they were even protecting us, ignoring each other."
Now that Lance thinks about it. But to be honest he wasn't really paying attention to the fight, other than trying to block hits from hitting himself or Marinette or Allura.
"Hunk just got hit." Pidge states. And soon enough the big oaf gets dropped onto the couch.
"Hey guys," Hunk says. Lance only nods to acknowledge the greeting, his eyes focused on Allura and Marinette fighting against the drones.
Mariette's POV
Marinette again swings her yo-yo to protect Allura, while also using her own shield to protect herself.
The shield would've been useful all those times her partner got hit by an akuma because the akuma was also targeting her. As that would have saved her from kissing him because he got hit by Dark Cupid. Although they weren't exactly fighting Dark Cupid at the moment Chat was hit.
But still.
The shield is so useful to have when she has to swing her yo-yo to attack or to swing it away from her body to protect her friends in this exercise.
When she is getting home she is making her own shield.
Finally the drones stop attacking, after more shots are fired and Marinette keeps her defense up despite the drill seeming to have ended. She sighs, as much as Allura annoys her with her rebuttals against her plans, Allura is still a good member of Team Voltron and deserves to be protected, even if Mariette wants to strangle Allura herself sometimes.
"Well done guys! Excellent teamwork. And Lance, Pidge and Hunk you could learn how to defend your teammates while also protecting yourself from Marinette and Allura. While Allura was attacking drones that wanted to harm Marinette with her ribbon weapon, Marinette used her yo-yo to shield Allura from all side attacks while protecting herself with her shield. Just excellent teamwork!" Coran trills, praising her and Allura.
"Coran's right, you know." Allura says as she walks to Marinette's side.
"We do make a good team on the battlefield, despite our different opinions on how to lead. Today showed me that."
Marinette nods, "Yeah. I'm glad that we can work as a team in battle. And if we do have leadership arguments, we'll just have to trudge through them until we find a plan that works for the both of us and the rest or our team, or try to compromise."
Allura laughs, "Of course. Saving the world isn't a job just for me you know!"
Marinette smiles. She's just glad they solved their little debacle. Still they might have future dilemmas, but it doesn't matter to her. As long as they are able to compromise and work together, instead of doing their own things then the future is looking pretty bright for their team.
Author's Note: Merry Late Christmas! And yes I finally got this chapter done after wondering how to go about it. Anywho the next chapters for the Miraculous side of things after the Syren chapter is Frozer, Style Queen and then the Hero's Day episode. So in between those there will be Voltron chapters, but it will focus on mostly the character interactions like this chapter(Mainly Marinette's and Allura's dynamic). And then the finale before the Hero's Day chapters will be Tailing a Comet episode. And if you are waiting for chapters for this fic, I suggest you check out the other fic that is active which is the Crumbling Code(Rewrite of my first fanfic, Trouble with the Code). Anyways I hope you have a happy holidays!