Chapter 23

A/N: I just own this story, nothing else I mine.

/comms/

"Bold is intercoms"

Flashbacks/telepathy/dreams

"Alright everyone listen up," Shiro said as they all stood on the bridge with a hologram of the teludav above. "I'll use the Black Lion to lead Zarkon and his fleet to our current location and make sure he's within the teludav's area of affect," he waved as a small hologram of Black flew out with Zarkon's ship chasing it under the teludav, "Keeping the teludav hidden behind the space-fold until the last possible second is essential. We can count on you right Slav?"

"Absolutely, I'll be fine…I'm not sure about the gravity generator though."

"What? What was that last thing?" Hunk questioned.

Slav tapped his chin in thought, "Hiding a ship is one thing, but I've never had to build a gravity generator for something this large before. I know it'll work, but I'm just not sure how long."

"It's a risk we'll have to take," Jaz stated, "I'll be using my magic to provide support and shield the teludav should the generator fail. Once we have Zarkon in position, Kolivan and Antok will coordinate with Thace and upload a virus designed to take down the power and security systems into the command ship."

Pidge crossed her arms, looking smug, "And then he'll be a sitting du'flax." They all raised an eyebrow and looked at her. "What? A du'flax is an Altean creature with a beak and webbed feet?"

"We'll wormhole Zarkon five-hundred million lightyears away!" Coran exclaimed, jumping in front of Shiro and grabbing the teludav projection, miving it down over the other two and tossing it randomly around the room. "He'll be in the Yggiz Galaxy before he knows what hit him!"

They all winced at the sound of something crashing, but Shiro took a breath to calm himself down before looking to Kolivan. "What about Thace?"

"He should be getting into position now. We received his last communication three quintants ago, we should hear from him soon."

Shiro nodded as Jaz smirked, "Let's do this."

-.-

/Zarkon took the bait/ Shiro called. /He's got my location. Is everybody in position?/

"We've not yet heard from Thace," Kolivan informed. "He was supposed to contact us two vargas ago."

"He must've been compromised," Antok growled.

"Or killed," Kolivan finished. "We need to abort the mission immediately."

"Abort?!" Alliura gasped. "No! We cannot back away now!"

"The Blade of Marmora does not take chances. It's how we've survived for so long."

"It's held you back. Your caution is the reason Zarkon's still in power!"

Kolivan turned to face Allura, "We would rather wait than jeoprodize everything. Besides, it's too late to get someone else on the inside.

"I'll go," Keith and Jaz said simultaneously before looking at each other.

"What?"

"Keith, you're needed to pilot the Red Lion."

"And you're needed to defend the Castle and the teludav, I have the better odds of getting in and out. I'm Galra, I can bypass the doors and interact with their technology," he stated. "Pidge, can you rig up one of those pods with a cloaking device?"

"Well, yeah, but—"

"Going onto Zarkon's ship is a suicide mission," Kolivan snapped. "I would never command someone so inexperienced to go on a mission so dangerous."

Keith narrowed his eyes, "No one's commanding me. In case you haven't noticed, this isn't exactly the time to play it safe. Zarkon already has a fix on Shiro's location, it's only a matter of time before he gets there. The plan is already in motion, whether you like it or not. I'm doing it."

Shiro was the first to speak in the wake of Keith's statement, /Pidge, get the pod ready. Keith…/ he trailed off looking pained for a moment, /let me know when you're on your way. I'll give you cover/

Nodding in reply, he and Pidge went down to the hangar, quickly attaching a device into the pod he would be using for the mission. "Ok, the cloaking device is ready to go," Pidge sighed as the closed the hatch.

"Pidge," a voice called and both Paladins turned to see Allura standing in the doorway, "may I have a moment with Keith please?"

The Green Paladin glanced nervously between them. It was no secret that Allura had been hostile towards Keith ever since his Galra genetics came to light, and frankly she found it kind of rude that Allura refused to acknowledge Keith's existence. So, that meant leaving them alone together might not be the best option. Glancing at Keith, she frowned as he gave a slight nod to her. "Sure, have all the moments you like," she reluctantly surrendered.

Keith watched silently as Pidge left, the hangar doors closing behind her, leaving him and Allura alone in the hangar. Turning his back to her, he opened the pod, beginning to double-check the systems. "Is there something I can help you with?"

"I…I just wanted to say…the Galra they've done terrible things. Destroyed entire civilizations."

"Add them to the list of hundreds of other races to do the same thing," Keith remarked absentmindedly.

"They took my family," she said quietly and he stopped, turning to face her, "but in time, I've grown to consider you and the paladins my family. So when I learned you were Galra, I…I didn't know what to think. I wanted to hate you!"

He looked down, feeling guilty. "Allura, it's—"

"But its not you," she continued, "it's me. My anger has blinded me for too long."

Keith made a small hum in understanding, "I get it, I do…You know, when I was a kid, I watched my entire city get destroyed," he whispered quietly barely noticing her shocked gasp at the rare confession from the most private paladin. "I wanted to hate the people that did it, and I did for a long time. But eventually I learned that, that type of hatred tends to eat away at you, turning you into something you'd never thought you'd be," he gave a small chuckle, "At least, what I'm trying to say is that I understand, and I don't blame you. It's hard to trust someone who's part of a race who took everything from you. You don't need to explain yourself to me."

Looking down at the ground, he turned to climb in the pod, before grunting as arms wrapped around his waist tightly. "I'm so sorry I misjudged you," she apologized. "You've proven it's not what's in your blood, it's who you are that counts. Please come back to us."

Manuvering himself, he managed to return her hug, "I will."

-.-

/I've got Zarkon on the hook, bringing him in. Keith, are you ready?/ Shiro asked. /We've only got one shot at this/

"Engaging cloaking device," he replied pressing the button. Muting the com-channels he looked at Yorak. "Yorak, change to Guardian armor, we don't know what we're up against here and I'd rather have the advantage."

"Finally!" the ghost exclaimed as the familiar weight of dark red and grey armor settled over him, taking the place of the lighter Paladin armor. Looking through his weapons, he pulled out his Crown-Splitter, a pulse rifle, and a semi-automatic, setting them next to him in the pod.

Tapping the coms again, he restarted comminucations, "Cloak engaged, moving towards fleet now."

/Roger that, I don't seen you but I'm locked on your signal/ Shiro called. /I'll clear a path/

Black flew ahead, carving a way through the fighters for them and Yorak looked at Keith. "Are you sure about this? I mean, you've been pretty insistent about staying in hiding, why show off now?"

"Yorak, I have a helmet, no one will be able to see my face and I can use the setting that distorts my voice. We won't be discovered. For all they'll know, Voltron just has some pretty powerful allies."

"And we do get discovered, you can just kill them!"

Keith shrugged. "That too." Moving the pod out of the way of an explosion, he zeroed in on the hangar as Black moved aside. "Thanks Shiro! I'm coming in hot!"

The pod slammed into the side of the narrow tunnel. It hit the ground, skidding along and running over a few sentries as it came to a stop. Leaping out, Keith punched the first sentry, effectively crushing its helm, before using his pulse rifle to blast the head off the second and sprinting towards the center of the ship.

"I'm in!"

Racing down the hangar, he ducked behind a ship, watching quietly as a sentry patrol passed him. With their backs now to him, Keith jogged over to the door, placing his hand on the pad. It lit up and let him inside the ship.

-.-

"The plan is working," Allura stated. "Keith's on board and Zarkon's fleet is on its way."

"The Castle of Lion's defenses are ready to go," Lance confirmed.

"Weapons systems are fully charged and ready," Jaz added.

/Starting the gravity generator now/ Slav called. /Commencing cloak/

-.-

Macidus narrowed his eyes behind his mask as he observed the disgraced Commander Thace. Nodding to his comrade, they turned the electricity up, smirking as the man began writhing and screaming almost instantaneously. Stopping the electrical current, he slumped in his restrains with a pathetic whimper.

Soon, very soon, he would break and tell them what they wanted to know.

"We're tracking the Black Lion. We know this is part of a bigger plan," he said levitating the traitor's knife up. Waving his hand, he frowned as the prisoner didn't even flinch as the blade stabbed into the metal beside his immobile hand. Apparating in front of him, Macidus couldn't hide the growl entering his voice. "Where is he going?"

Thace didn't respond. Looking to his partner, they nodded, confirming his thoughts. Time for Plan B. Turning away and leaving the knife they strode out of the room into a nearby chamber where another druid stood turning on the cameras as they waited for Thace to make his escape.

Then he felt it, a churning, unstable pulse of powerful energy. Looking to the other druids, he smirked as he saw that they had sensed it as well.

There was no way Macidus' luck could be this good. The Guardian had come to them.

-.-

"I'm two minutes out," Shiro informed and he drove Black down away from the fighters currently chasing him. "Is everybody ready?"

/No/ Kolivan replied. /Keith hasn't made it to the hub yet/

He chewed the inside of his cheek at that. Keith was alright, he probably just got held up decapitating a few sentries. He fought a nest of evil space monsters, he could handle a few sentries.

/We need more time/

Shiro fired a blast at a cruiser. "How much more?"

/I hope not too much, because my gravity generator won't run forever!/ Slav warned.

This wasn't looking good. "I don't know how much longer I can hold Zarkon's fleet in the position by myself!"

Black shot between two of the cruisers, hoping to lose some of the fighters tailing him.

/You won't have to!/ Pidge said as he watched Yellow fly over Black and eat one of the fighters. Several blasts shot by, hitting the others as he sighed, relieved to see the other lions joining him.

"Good timing. Ok, we've got Zarkon's ship right where it needs to be. We've got to keep it here until the virus is uploaded."

/Let's do it!/ Hunk exclaimed sounding excited.

/All right!/

/We got this!/

Flying in, they began fighting off the cruisers.

-.-

/Ok you've made it to the lower communication deck. Head left down that corridor/ Kolivan instructed.

Even though he couldn't see, Keith gave a brief nod. He broke from his current hiding spot, down the dimly lit corridor checking his scanner for enemies every now and then.

/Based on the schematics from Thace, there should be a large door up ahead. This is the central hub for the Galra fleet/

"I see it," he confirmed zeroing in on the door at the end of the hall. Opening the door, he moved to the end of the platform, looking over the schematics. "Kolivan, I'm in. Now what?"

/Now you need to reset the systems using the codes Thace obtained. It'll be down for a dobash, that's when we'll upload the virus/

Swinging his hand, Yorak materialized and started looking over the console. "Got it," he said before blinking as the screen gave a sound of denial. "Give me a minute, they've updated the codes."

Keith nodded, adjusting his grip on his rifle as he pinpointed the cameras and shot them. The air in this place felt dark, worse the the lab where he'd fought that druid. This had to be where the most poweful ones were, the ones who might classify as low-level Hive Wizards. Two dark pulses in particular sent chills up his spine. They were old, something that had definitely been in direct contact with the Darkness. Hopefully they weren't nearby, because that was a fight he wouldn't want to take without getting the facts.

The door beeped and Keith grabbed Yorak quickly as they ducked behind a railing, watching to see who came it.

/Keith? Are you there?/ Kolivan questioned.

Keith didn't answer, silently observing the Galra that stumbled in. He was wounded, bearing the obvious marks of the same magic that had affected Shiro after their first attack on Central Command. This must be the missing Blade Kolivan mentioned.

The door opened again, and Keith swiftly peered around the other side as he felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up in alarm. "And now we know you were attempting to shut down the system," one of the Galra Wizards spoke mockingly as they glided down the platform towards them.

"You're too late," the wounded soldier growled typing on the monitor.

"No Thace. You're too late. We already changed the code."

"Yorak," Keith hissed quietly, "Skorkydoso bōsa ēva ao sagon isse [How long till you're in]?

"Sindigon nyke iā dorolvie tolī dobashes [Buy me a few more minutes]."

Nodding, Keith watched as the two druids jumped, aiming blasts at Thace. Popping up from his hiding spot, Keith changed his knife to its sword form, hurling it through the chest of the first druid. It shrieked loudly as energy arched off it, eventually dying in a burning ball of light.

The second druid landed, cocking his head. "So…it seems Macidus was correct, there is a Guardian aligned with Voltron."

Thace chuckled hoarsely, "Last I checked, it was illegal to attack Guardians, wasn't it?"

Keith raised his eyebrows in surprise, he certainly didn't know that.

"No matter, Emperor Zarkon will forgive me in exchange with your delivery to him," the wizard replied shooting a lightning blast at Keith. Flipping out of the way, Keith rolled back to his feet sprinting at his opponent, grabbing his sword along the way. Jumping up he swung down as hard as he could at him.

Then the druid fired a blast at him, knocking him off the platform. Turning on his jetpack, Keith rightened himself and slammed back down onto the platform as Thace fought. His Marmora Blade shifted back to knife form as he strapped it to his waist, as he haistily scrolled through his inventory.

Finding what he wanted, he pressed it, smirking as a familiar black and red sword settled in his grasp.

Charging forwards, he attempted to slice through the druid's back as the quiznaking thing teleport above, firing a blast at the pair. Summoning a light shield to deflect it, Keith pulled out his rifle coming out and firing, making the druid teleport repeatedly to avoid getting shot. Emptying his current clip, eith crouched back behind the barrier reloading. "How ya holdin' up?"

Thance grunted, "I'll manage."

"Move!" Keith ordered grabbed the Blade and yanking him out of the way as their opponent teleported above them. Firing a blast that nearly hit Thace and effectively destroyed Keith's shield.

Nodding they rushed forwards, each swinging their swords expertly, forcing the druid to teleport quickly or get cut in half. Barely avoiding a swing from Thace, the druid fired a blast at his chest sending him sliding back across the platform with an agonized cry of pain.

Feeling a surge of energy, the druid turned and saw a quintessence covered fist swing at them before they abruptly burst into ash.

"KEITH! I'M IN!" Yorak shouted.

The Guardian sighed, his shoulders visibly slumping. So much for secret identity. Letting his helmet vanish, he walked over and helped a rather stunned Thace up. "I'm Keith, Red Paladin of Voltron."

"As well as Guardian and fellow Blade I see," he grunted holding his side. "I guess we haven't failed."

"Not yet, our first order of business is shutting down the systems and uploading the virus. Yorak, can you do that?"

"Psh, ye of little faith."

-.-

Blue dove down along one of the spires of Zarkon's command ship with two fighters on her tail. On the inside of the cockpit, Lance grit his teeth, praying his plan would work. Pulling back, Blue jerked into a flip, soaring over the fighters. Blasting one, he smirked as he ended up behind the second before blasting that one away too.

"Whoo! Yeah! That was close!"

/SOMEBODY! ANYBODY! A LITTE HELP!/ Hunk pleaded flying past with three fighters behind him.

/Lure them to me!/ Shiro ordered as Black shot upwards, effortlessly slicing through the three ships with the jawblade.

/Guys! Zarkon's ship's leaving the area of effect!/ Jaz snarled. /Get him back in!/

/The gravity generator won't hold out much longer/ Slav warned, /if it goes down, we're going to be exposed in open space!/

/I'll prepare a shield/ Jaz replied.

/Do what you can/ Shiro called, /We'll hold them off/

"Geez, things are getting hairy," Lance muttered. "So Keith, buddy, are you almost done?"

-.-

Keith swung his sword, smirking as the Terran metal easily dismantled it. Now they just had to finish before the explosion that was the result of this metal's particular effects.

"We're working on it," he replied to Lance walked back over to where Yorak and Thace were working. "How's it going?"

"I'm ready to shut the systems down, however, with these improvements the Galra made, I doubt they'll stay offline long enough for us to upload the virus," Yorak informed. "Which is rather weird because its incredibly easy to swipe all the footage of you from their systems."

"Yorak, are you carrying the virus yourself?" Thace questioned.

"Y-Yes, I made a copy before we left."

"Good, begin the upload, when I say go, send the file," he said typing quickly, going through and clicking on several commands.

-.-

"High Priestess," Macidus said, "Thace has barricaded himself with a Guardian in the central hub. He's attempting to shut down the system."

"He's working with the Paladins, it was a trap!" she snarled.

Zarkon growled, turning to face them. "I will end this firefight, retrieve the traitor and the Light Weilder," he ordered.

With a final glare to her underling, Haggar teleported down to the hall leading to the control room, several sentries racing to her aid. As if she needed them to complete her task.

Inside, Keith reactivated his helmet, loading his grenade launcher and he prepared to manifest another shield to protect Thace and Yorak. The metal of the door turned red with heat before exploding open and two sentries walked in.

"Hey, on your left," Keith called as the metal of the lock mechanism turned white and exploded, take the sentries with it. Traveler, he loved Yolosite weapons. Without a pause, he hefted the heavy weapon onto his shoulder, aiming at the obelisk-like structure handing down above the platform.

The room shook with the explosion as the metal slammed onto the platform, effectively barricading the door.

"Go!" Thace ordered and Yorak began sending the virus into the system.

"That solves one problem, but now we're trapped."

"No. There's an exit through the main power conduit, it leads to the second deck," Thace stated as Keith's armor changed from Guardian to Paladin and Yorak vanished.

Pulling out a spare helmet and chest plate, Keith tossed it to the man. "Put it on, quickly."

"No, you'll go without me."

"What?" he snapped whirling back. "I'm not leaving you! We've downloaded the virus and shut down the system! Now we need to leave!"

"Its my job to make sure the system stays shut down, this is where my journey ends," he said sounding accepting, "But as a Guardian and a Paladin of Voltron, you have a bigger mission. You must understand that."

"No we don't!" Yorak exclaimed appearing in front of Thace's face as his startled Guardian yanked him back. "And I have a plan to ensure it. Thace put on that armor and grab those wires! We're overloading the system!"

"We don't have time—"

"Oh yes we do," Yorak interrupted, "I downloaded the highest clearance I could find, I can send a majority of the ship's energy right here. It'll overload the system about three times faster. And since the virus is already in the system as soon as the barriers are permanently down, it'll be able to wreck untold havok!"

"You get in the armor I attach the cables?" Keith offered as Thace nodded. Making quick work of their tasks, Keith nodded to his fellow blade as he attached the last cable as Yorak disappeared.

"Starting energy transfer now."

"Hold on!" Keith exclaimed putting as much quintessence as he could into a shield for the console.

"Keith, take this back to Kolivan," Thace said handing him a knife.

"Thace! I told you! You don't have to—" he was cut off as the doors exploded open.

"It was an honor to fight beside you. Allen would be proud," Thace said and Keith didn't get the chance to reply before he was blasted off the platform.

-.-

/The gravity generator just failed!/ Slav exclaimed. /Now there's no reality where we all get out alive!/

"Princess, the teludav's completely exposed," Coran breathed.

"Focus on your other jobs! This isn't the time to panic!" Jaz reminded standing near the front of the bridge. With a quick prayer, she summoned as much power as she could, her hands and hair glowing with the effort before throwing her arms out and creating a shield around them. "I'll hold it as long as I can, but you better teleport this thing soon!"

Black flew by, and Shiro watched, hoping Jaz would be able to hold on long enough. "Come on Keith." Driving Black up, he used her jawblade to slice through a cruiser and a few fighters, ducking under the shot of a cannon.

/What do we do?!/ Pidge exclaimed.

"We need to hold them off long enough for Keith to get out. Hopefully Jaz's power won't run out before then."

/We cannot wait any long, powering up teludav now/

-.-

Keith glanced back, gritting his teeth. Why in the universe would Thace do that? He was immortal, so what if he blew up. He could've gotten Thace out of there, the plan was going perfectly "Yorak, how long till the explosion?"

His ghost didn't have the chance to answer as the ship shook, a fiery light growing brighter as it came for them. His sparrow dissolving, Keith pulled up another shield. The blast hit him and he was ejected into space.

/The system is down and the virus is uploaded/ Kolivan informed as they watched the ion cannon of the command ship power down.

/I thought you needed to upload a copy?/ Coran questioned.

/Keith…/ Jaz grunted, /he must've…taken a copy/

/How'd he even get one?/

/Who cares!/ Lance sighed as the fighters stopped chasing him.

"Thace," Keith panted.

A deep, sympathetic rumble echoed through his mind, and Keith smiled seeing Red fly over.

-.-

Haggar glared at the broken platform where the powerful shield had been standing. Macidus was right, Voltron and their allies had a Guardian among them.

And they fell right into their trap.

-.-

Jaz's shield dissolved as Allura turned on the wormhole, slowly moving it down the massive ship, the Princess's face beginning to show the strain. Finishing, Coran started piloting the Castle to the other side into the portal. /Everyone hold on! Hurry Paladins we must make it in before the wormhole closes!/

Flying Red into the hangar, Keith turned on his comm screen with the others and the Castle as Thace stumbled out, hopefully to meet the others blades waiting. /How's Allura?/ Shiro questioned.

/Weak, but alive/ Jaz panted.

/Take care of her, we've got it from here/ Shiro said as the exited the wormhole, Zarkon's ship floating uselessly through space.

/WE DID IT! I CAN'T BELIEVE WE DID IT!/ Pidge cheered as Red flew out to join them.

/See, I told you we could do it/ Slav said.

/It's not over yet. Everyone, form Voltron!/