The castle erupted violently out of a roiling wormhole. The ambient lighting immediately changed to a deep crimson glow. Several bleeping alarms sounded as the entirety of the ship shook forcefully. Lotor braced himself against the seat, gripping the armrests in an attempt to fight the inertia overcoming everyone in the chamber. "What happened?" He barked, struggling to keep his voice smooth amongst the bucking ride.
Allura stood struggling to keep her balance where she had stood opening the portal. "Coran!" She edged out the name through gritted teeth.
The Altean man did not look up from frantically pressing buttons. "There is a massive solar storm in this area," he said tersely. However, the roughness in his voice disappeared at the same moment that the fierce pitching of the ship died. "We stabilised the castle for right now."
Pidge added from the back of the room. "According to my calculations, we have three hours till the next solar shift. There is a small probability it may occur spontaneously, but…" She righted her glasses. "I am highly doubtful," she finished.
Lotor's yellow eyes flicked from the small human to Allura. She looked to be recovering quite quickly from the previous exertion. "You knew this was the state of the system?" He had to bite down the remark that perhaps storms were the reason someone had omitted the route from the records.
Allura did not meet his gaze. "There was a possibility we would encounter this –"
Her words were cut off by Coran's exclamation. "Princess!" The moustached man tore his eyes from his screen to look out the main viewport.
All other gazes swept to the swirling starscape before them. Lotor's eyes widened slightly. Few things surprised him, but the view was both baffling and eerie at the same time.
"Is that…" Shiro looked lost for words. He wasn't the only human to have such a reaction.
"That looks just like earth!" Lance yelped incredulously.
Lotor filed all the information away as he surveyed the view through the castle's panorama. The scene was a peculiar one, indeed. A cluster of planets in close orbit around each other hung in gaseous space. Amidst the roiling red gases, each planet was an almost perfect twin to its neighbours. Mottled white cloud patterns dotted over much of the blue and green globe. Land masses were easily distinguishable on the worlds… Again, they were nearly identical.
"How do they all look the same?" Hunk asked, breaking the awed silence that had fallen over the team.
"I don't know…" Pidge admitted.
Lotor's first instinct told him it was a trick, an illusion. But he quelled the idea as others shrugged or merely turned back to their monitors puzzled and searching for answers.
Allura cocked her head. "I have never seen anything like it." She looked down at Lotor and he had to fight hard in order to not smirk when Shiro's face stretched into utter disapproval to her next words. "Lotor, will you accompany me to the surface?" She amended her words slowly. "Your knowledge of ancient texts may be useful."
"Now, wait a moment, Allura," Shiro said raising a palm. "We shouldn't rush into things."
The princess kept her eyes resting on Lotor. "Don't worry, I think we will be quite alright. Like I said, I may find his knowledge helpful. He did help me find this place to begin with. We will be fine." she assured.