**Author's Note: Happy (late) 4th of July to those who celebrate it! Here's a long chapter for ya ;)
**I do not own Voltron: Legendary Defender!
Thanks to the abundance of unused Altean garments residing in all of the ship's extra bedrooms (once meant for the many guests of the Castle of Lions), doing the laundry was not a high priority for the resident humans. There were plenty of outfits to choose from, including armor, space suits, sweats, robes, pajamas, formal garb, and even swimsuits. Yet more often than not, the Earthlings chose to wear what was most comfortable and familiar to them whenever they got the chance: their casual attire (a.k.a. the clothes they had been wearing the night of Shiro's rescue). So with this particular preference of theirs, loads of laundry were started almost every day anyways.
Still snug in her pajamas and Black Lion slippers (an extra pair lent to her by Shiro), Mari hummed jovially to herself as she shuffled down the halls towards the Castle's laundry room, a small basket full of her own dirty clothes resting against her hip. She was more chipper than usual as she had gotten to sleep in and wake up naturally without an alarm for once. It was her so called "reward" from Shiro for completing her bonding-with-Allura training from the previous day, and although she had indignantly grumbled about being too old for incentives, she was glad that he had let her sleep well into the morning nonetheless. The others were no doubt preoccupied by their Sendak interrogation today, meaning the Castle's laundry room was free for her to take advantage of without having to wait for a vacant washer or dryer.
I wonder how things are going with Sendak anyways, Mari wondered to herself as she approached the door to the laundry room. Coran had mentioned using one of the memory extraction units for the interrogation, but the thought of them forcefully prying into Sendak's mind made a shiver run down her spine. Even if Coran wasn't using a Putaverunt Crystal on Sendak, the memory extraction process was bound to be a least a little painful and it was undeniably invasive. And sure, it was currently their only way to gather intel and discover potential weaknesses of the Galra Empire, but as someone who had had her memories intruded upon once before, Mari couldn't help but grimace at the idea.
Well, I guess there's no helping it, she sighed to herself, pausing to press the 'open' button on the panel next to the door. Sendak's already stuck on the ship so we might as well take advantage of his presence here. Consider it his karma for almost killing Lance and Takashi and for trying to steal the lions. Besides, with the guys done with training, Allura still weakened, and Coran finishing repairs on the ship, we're all kinda at an impasse here. Maybe Sendak will have some valuable info tucked away in that fuzzy head of his that'll help us decide our next move against Zarkon.
The door slid open with a silent whoosh and Mari was greeted by the faint flowery scent of Altean laundry detergent. The room was pristine and neatly organized with a row of washers flush against the left wall and a row of dryers against the back wall. To the right were shelves full of miscellaneous soaps, detergents, stain-removers, bleaches, and fabric softeners; a small table; and several baskets, metal hangers, and hooks to carry clothes.
Mari entered the room and set her basket on the floor next to the nearest washer, the door silently shutting behind her. She carefully separated the colors from the whites, placing them into their own separate washers before plucking a bottle of pink colored detergent off of one of the shelves and adding a cap-full of it to both loads.
"Warm for whites, cool for colors," she murmured to herself as she shut the lids and fiddled with the settings before activating both machines. The clear glass of the lids were tinted blue as the cleaning process began and the washers hummed gently as water began to filter into their chambers.
Okay. I've got half an hour—er, half a varga to kill until I can put my clothes in the dryer, Mari told herself as she replaced the cap on the detergent and returned it to its original spot on its respective shelf. I guess I could get some lunch now?
She returned to the door and hit the 'open' button on the panel to leave, but to her confusion the entrance didn't open as it should have. The door hadn't even budged. She tried again, double checking that she was touching the right control and pressed the button harder this time. Still nothing happened.
What the quiznak, she frowned, crouching down to closer inspect the control panel. I'm pretty sure this thing doesn't have a lock function…Did it get stuck on the track? Or maybe it's just malfunctioning? I mean, I guess it's possible. This is a ten thousand year old sh—
BANG! BANG! BANG!
Stifling a yelp, Mari spun around on her heel so quickly she almost fell over. The two washers she had turned on just moments ago were now rumbling and jolting, violently crashing against each other and the wall. They had begun beeping obnoxiously in warning and Mari's heart nearly leapt into her throat as sudsy water began to leak out and pour onto the floor.
"Oh no, no, no! Dammit!" she swore and she nearly threw herself onto the washers, pressing down on their lids as if it would help to slow the water flow and cease the incessant shaking. She frantically searched for their off switches and pressed them repeatedly once she found them, but the machines were unresponsive and they began to thrash even harder instead. The other washers that had been left dormant were trembling now as well, rocking back and forth faster and faster as water filled their interiors and began to slosh out onto the ground.
"What the HELL is going on here?!" Mari yelled frustratedly to no one in particular, but her shouting only seemed to piss off the machines even more. All at once like a row of miniature geysers, the lids abruptly blew off all of the washers as buckets and buckets of a mixture of freezing cold and scalding hot water poured into the room.
Mari was harshly thrown onto the floor, her sopping articles of clothing falling next to her with a heavy splat. Her soft groans of pain quickly transformed into angry growls as she hauled herself to her feet and reassessed her situation. The room was rapidly starting to flood, the water having already reached her ankles and covered every inch of the metal floors. The door was still stuck and appeared to be airtight, allowing nothing to drain out into the hallway. The washers were still on the fritz and were unable to be shut off as they continuously spouted soap and water. But if she couldn't turn them off here, she was sure Coran would be able to power them down remotely.
Scooping her sopping clothes off the floor and tossing them onto the table, Mari trudged through the foaming water and tried the door again. When nothing happened, she let out an angry huff and tried the Castle-wide intercom system.
"Coran, I have a situation here in the laundry room," she shouted over the din of rushing water and beeping machinery, her voice quivering slightly and her heart thumping anxiously inside her chest. "The door won't open and I'm stuck inside here with washers that are freaking out and flooding the room. Can you please turn them off and send someone to open the door?"
She waited with bated breath and strained to listen over the deafening noise for Coran to respond affirmatively over the loudspeakers. The water was getting ever higher, lapping against her calves now, and with every passing tick Mari's panic steadily increased. She tested the door again, jamming her finger against the button several times and praying that it would open. When it continued to remain immobile, she tried the speakers once more.
"Coran, I'm seriously starting to freak out!" she warned, her voice cracking a bit. The water had risen to her knees and it showed no indication of receding. "Hello? Anyone? I could really use some help here!"
A few more minutes and there was still no answer. Mari was full on panicking now, desperately banging on the door and furiously clicking both the intercom and 'open' buttons as she screamed for help. Behind her, the bottles of detergent and other clothing cleaning products on the lowest shelves were beginning to be swept away by the rising pool, several of them losing their stopper caps and their contents mixing in with the water to create even more foamy bubbles of various colors.
The sudsy and cloudy water had reached her waist and was only continuing to climb up higher and higher. The door was still immovable, her pleas for assistance were remaining unheard no matter how loud she yelled, and the washing machines just continued to spew gallons of water. At this rate, they were going to fill the entire room until they drowned her. This realization was like a smack to the face and the utter ridiculousness of the whole situation made Mari's blood boil.
"Dammit! I am not letting myself be killed by a bunch of stupid machines!" she spat furiously, giving the door another good smack before backing away.
Wading through the water that was creeping up her stomach, she made her way to the right wall and snatched all of the hangers off of the hook they hung on before returning to the door. Then tightly holding onto one of them, she channeled all her strength into jamming it into the minuscule crack where the door met the frame. There was no way she would ever be able to completely pry open the heavy door with such a feeble metal hanger, but if she could manage to wedge it open even a little bit, that would be enough to let the water spill out into the hallway. The room wouldn't be able to fill up completely and someone was bound to stumble across the water pooling on the floor outside eventually. But with each hanger that ended up bending uselessly out of shape and with the door not having budged in the slightest, Mari's hopes for that plan to actually work quickly dissipated. If she couldn't stop the water flow or drain the room, her only other option was to find a different way to escape.
There were no other doors or windows within the laundry room and her eyes instantly shifted upwards towards the ventilation shafts. On the upside, it seemed that there was one grate in the ceiling that seemed large enough for her to fit through. On the downside, she'd have to wait for the water levels to rise so she could reach it. There were other nagging factors to take in as well: what if the grate was screwed shut and she couldn't open it? Or what if the shaft led to nowhere or ended up being too small for her to crawl through? It wasn't a foolproof plan, but it was her only option right now. She would try it first rather than do nothing and let herself drown in the soapy waters.
Positioning herself underneath the grate, Mari pressed her lips together anxiously and clenched her fists as she held her arms above the water, trying her best to ignore the fact that the water had now reached her chest. Her heart was hammering and she was straining on her tiptoes to remain in contact with the floor. It would just be a few more minutes until the water reached her chin and she'd have to start treading.
Just as the foamy water began to splash against her neck, the washers suddenly spluttered to a stop and everything went silent as the overhead lights flickered out. Mari was cast in darkness and she bit the inside of her cheek, trying to hardest not to scream. Her heartbeat was erratic as her fear spiked, the only sound in the eerie pitch blackness being the sloshing of neck-high, lukewarm water.
No more than a dobash later, the lights fluttered back on and the door to the laundry room slid open. Like a bursting dam, the murky yet sweet smelling water gushed out into the hallway, sweeping Mari, empty soap bottles, baskets, mangled hangers, and her sopping clothes along with it. She slammed against the wall adjacent to the laundry room with a solid thunk before sliding down onto the floor, choosing to just sit there for a moment and take deep breaths while the rest of the room drained.
"Mari! Are you all rig—W-WHOA NOOO!"
There was a loud and wet sounding splat as Coran rounded the corner only to slip on the squelchy floors and fall onto his back. The momentum of his fall caused him to slide down the hall towards her, and she quickly latched onto him before he could skid all the way out of sight.
"Good gracious! I haven't seen floors this slick since Pop-Pop Wimbleton had a case of the slipperies!" he gasped, quickly sitting up and straightening so that he was kneeling in front of her. "Are you all right, my dear?"
"I-I'm fine," she stammered, her voice hoarse and her throat raw from yelling. "H-How did you find me? Were my calls getting through?"
Coran shook his head solemnly, his purple eyes full of concern. "I'm afraid not. I wasn't even aware you were trying to ask for help. Lucky for you I was checking the Castle's security camera systems when I saw what was going on here. I rebooted the laundry room's systems to shut everything off."
"I-I just wanted to do some laundry," she murmured lamely, her hands shaking as she moved to squeeze the excess water from her hair. Her clothes were drenched and the cool air that typically flowed through the Castle's halls made her shiver. She took another deep breath and hugged herself to better trap her body heat. "T-Then I couldn't open the door and all the w-washers just started shaking a-and spewing water. T-They were flooding the room and I-I tried calling you but…"
She sniffed and quickly brushed the water out of her eyes, her cheeks instantly flushing from embarrassment. Coran gave her a kind look before producing a warm towel he had thought to bring along with him and draped it over her shoulders.
"It's all right now," he assured her gently, rubbing her arms up and down in the hopes that the friction would help warm her some. "You're safe now, my dear."
Mari gave him a small yet extremely grateful smile. "Thank you, Coran," she said quietly and he beamed encouragingly in response.
"Now then, let's have you change and get warmed up," he prompted, carefully standing before offering his hand to help her up. "We'll deal with this mess here later."
"Is it really okay to just leave it for now?" she asked, taking his hand and allowing herself to be easily pulled to her feet.
"Oh, it'll be fine," he waved the concern away as if it were nothing. "I'll just have some cleaning drones come down here later and—"
The faint sound of two familiar voices screaming in terror cut him off, and Coran and Mari looked at each in other in confusion as the noise quickly grew louder and louder as whomever was shouting drew nearer. Seconds later, Lance and Keith came veering around the corner, their expressions a mixture of panic and fear.
"Coran! Mari! Thank gosh we found you!" Lance shrilled in relief once he spotted them. "This castle is going nuts—W-WHOAAAAHH!"
Just like Coran had earlier, Lance hadn't noticed the slippery ground and his feet were swept out from underneath him. His arms flailed about uselessly as he reached out for the nearest solid object to prevent his fall—Keith in this case—but he only ended up dragging the Red Paladin down with him as they crashed to the floor. They lay there for a moment, stunned from their harsh impact with the wet ground, before groaning and slowly trying to sit up. Their backs were completely soaked and tuffs of suds clung to their dampened hair.
"Lance!" Keith growled, wincing as he quickly untangled himself from the Blue Paladin, but Lance didn't seem to have heard him.
"What the cheese…" he muttered to himself. "Where'd all this water come from? Is there a pipe leak somewhere?"
"Fortunately, no," Coran replied as both boys carefully stood up and shuffled closer. "But Number Five here has just had a rather traumatic experience with the laundry washers. They nearly flooded the room with her trapped inside."
"The door wouldn't open and all of the machines started pouring out water on their own. Plus the intercoms weren't working," Mari grumbled in further explanation, squeezing as much water as she could from her shirt and pants before adjusting the towel around her shoulders so that it was hanging around her neck. "The whole room was malfunctioning."
"The whole Castle has been acting weird today," Keith said.
"Yeah, no kidding!" Lance immediately pitched in. "First I got stuck in one of the cryo-pods and then I got trapped in the airlock and was almost launched into space! And then one of the training deck robots was out to kill Mullet over here!"
"And the washers tried to drown me," Mari grimaced. "All of this can't just be a coincidence, can it?"
"Maybe all of the Castle's systems are just on the fritz," Lance shrugged. "I mean, this place is pretty ancient. No matter how futuristic and cool this ship is, it's still over ten thousand years old."
Coran frowned and slowly shook his head. "That can't be it," he insisted. "Not my grandfather's ship. No, it has to be something else. Oh, I have a bad feeling about this…"
With Lance leading the way, the group hurried towards the Green Lion's hangar to find Pidge and Hunk. Mari's wet slippers squelched obnoxiously against the metal tiles and it felt like she was stepping in slushy snow with each step. About halfway there, she was completely fed up with them and practically kicked them off, the poor soggy Black Lions splatting against the wall. Lance made an offended sound as he mortifiedly watched the slippers slump pitifully to the floor and Keith looked like he wanted to laugh. But Mari was too irritated to care and she grumpily scooped them up before continuing to plow ahead, her bare feet slapping against the cold metal.
Soon enough they reached their destination and Coran quickly pressed the button on the side panel to enter the hangar. Just as the doors began to slide open for them, there were several loud thuds from inside and the group was greeted by the sight of Pidge and Hunk sprawled out on the floor, their equipment and the Galran crystal strewn around them.
"How can you guys be taking a nap while this castle is trying to kill us?" Lance blurted incredulously as he marched towards them with Coran, Keith, and Mari right on his heel.
"Taking a nap? We've been floating around in Zero G!" Hunk protested, rubbing the back of his head as he stood. "You know how scary that is?"
"That's not scary! That's fun! I was almost ejected into space!" Lance shrilled, gesturing angrily to the door they had just come through.
"Well I got attacked by killer food, and that's the most horrifying thing you can imagine! The stuff of nightmares! It'll haunt me to my grave!" Hunk fired back.
"Well, I had a robot trying to kill me!" Keith piped up in his defense.
"The washing machines almost drowned me," Mari felt the need to chime in, and Pidge gave her a quizzical if not horrified look as she took in her drenched form.
"I don't care what you say, Coran. This castle has gone apples and bananas!" Lance huffed, turning on the Altean man with a glare that dared him to say otherwise. The others turned to him expectantly as well and Coran frowned as his eyes trained on the jagged purple crystal still sitting in the middle of the hangar.
"As I feared, this isn't the result of glitching systems," he sighed before nodding to the crystal. "Perhaps the infection from Sendak's Galra crystal is worse than we thought."
"I thought you were able to flush all of that bad energy out though," Mari said.
"I thought so too!" he exclaimed. "I double and triple checked every system and they showed up clean. But after hearing about the anomalies you've all experienced today, it seems that there's some residual energy hiding somewhere."
"Well if that's the case, let's just get rid of the crystal then," Hunk suggested.
"It's too late. When Sendak plugged it into the ship, it corrupted the entire system," Coran explained grimly.
"Sendak…" Keith murmured and he paused for a moment in thought. His eyes suddenly lit up in realization and his brow furrowed in concern. "Wait. Has anyone seen Shiro?"
The others were silent and Mari's stomach did an involuntary flip. "You guys…didn't leave him alone with Sendak, did you?" she asked slowly, her sense of dread impending.
"Ummmm…" Hunk drawled hesitantly, almost nervously. "We…might have done that…"
After booking it down to the cryo-pod chamber reserved for holding prisoners, the paladins plus Mari and Coran found Shiro leaning back against an empty memory container, his right hand clutching his head in pain. Sendak was nowhere to be found, his cryo-pod having disappeared.
"Takashi, are you all right?" Mari called out to him as they approached, and he seemed to startle at her voice. He looked uncharacteristically frightened, his forehead beaded with sweat and his eyes wide and fretful. Seeing him like this made Mari falter in her steps and she anxiously whipped her head around the room expecting the Galran commander to jump out and attack them at any moment.
"Where's Sendak?" Keith tried to ask calmly, but seeing Shiro so distraught had caused his own fears to flare and the question came out harsher than intended, sounding more like an angry demand.
"I...I had to get him out of here," Shiro stammered, his voice weak and quivering as he struggled to regain his composure. "I-I was hearing his voice. He...He can't be trusted on this ship."
"It is the ship! I got stuck in a cryo-pod, then, in an airlock. Keith got attacked by a robot, Hunk and Pidge got attacked by food, and Mari got attacked by washing machines!" Lance explained exasperatedly, resulting in a confused look from Shiro. "Yeah, it's been a weird morning."
Suddenly, the screen on the wall lit up and beeped in warning, prompting everyone to turn their attention towards it. Coran's face instantly contorted in surprise upon seeing the image on screen and his eyes flicked worriedly over the text that accompanied it.
"What? How is that possible?" he wondered in mild disbelief.
"What is it?" Keith pressed.
"The ship is starting a wormhole jump!"
As they had suspected, Allura, still clad in her lavish nightgown, was on the bridge standing at her control pillars and driving the ship to who knows where. The central forcefield had been activated around her, separating her from the others as they entered the room.
"Allura, what's going on?" Shiro called out to her, unable to keep the alarm out of his tone.
"We're going to Altea," Allura replied dreamily, turning to smile at them with glazed over eyes. "We're going home. My father is taking us."
"Ooh, that's not good," Hunk squeaked nervously.
Shiro tsked softly in dismay and he started towards the princess, the others quick to follow his lead. They had to snap Allura out of it and get her away from those controls before she was tricked into killing them all! But before anyone could even touch the energy field protecting her, King Alfor's face manifested on all screens and he was glaring daggers at the imposing group.
"Stay away from my daughter!" he yelled, his voice reverberating off the walls and causing the entire bridge to shake.
"Allura, wake up!" Shiro shouted frustratedly.
"The crystal must have corrupted King Alfor's artificial intelligence," Coran quickly analyzed the situation. "It's taking over!"
"So much for his memory A.I. being left unharmed," Mari muttered and the older Altean shot her a look that said 'Not helping'.
The Castle exited the wormhole and the entire bridge was momentarily engulfed in a blinding white light that gradually faded away to reveal a rusty-red fireball sitting directly in their path.
"We're headed straight for a star and it's about to explode!" Pidge gasped as the ship drew ever nearer to the dying celestial object. But Allura hadn't seemed to realize this as she stared straight ahead, her eyes full of wonder as she took in an illusion only she could see.
"Father, I can see Altea," she exclaimed, beaming in excitement as the holographic A.I. of her father appeared next to her.
"Allura, snap out of it!" Shiro desperately tried again. "You need to wake up! We're all in danger here!"
"Princess! What you're seeing isn't real!" Coran pitched in, uselessly slamming one fist against the energy barrier separating him from her.
Allura didn't even spare him a glance as she continued to murmur contentedly, "The juniberries, the most exquisite flower of all…"
"Allura, please!" Coran urged, striking the force field again as she plucked a nonexistent flower. "You've got to listen to us!"
The princess paused this time, turning towards Coran slightly and blinking once at him. "Is this real?" she inquired hesitantly after a moment.
"Of course it is real, daughter," the hologram of her father tried to persuade her, his tone eerily flat and his expression emotionless. "That flower you're touching is real."
"But where is the fragrance of the sweet juniberries?!" Coran pointed out and Allura frowned before delicately raising the invisible plant to her nose and taking a whiff. Her eyes seemed to come back into focus and they widened in realization as she was pulled out of her hallucination.
"That's not Altea," she said shakily, sounding betrayed as she took in the sight of the unstable star before them.
"When that star goes supernova, it will destroy the entire system," Pidge brought the princess up to speed. "Allura, you must reset the course and get us out of here!"
Allura nodded curtly and wasted no time in resting her hands on the controls to take the Castle to safety. But before she could even relay a single command, her control pillars emitted strong electrical currents that shocked her, causing her to scream in alarm. She stumbled out of the energy field and her position at the helm was immediately taken over by King Alfor's A.I.
"Father, please, I beg you to turn this ship around," Allura pleaded with the hologram. "If we don't do it soon, we will all perish!"
"I know," King Alfor intoned. "That is my intention."
"What? Why?" she cried out in disbelief.
"Don't you see, dear daughter?" King Alfor said, his image beginning to faze in and out of focus. "Zarkon can never be defeated. He's been ruling for ten thousand years."
"But we must continue to fight!" Allura asserted.
"Fight for what?" the king scoffed. "It is all over for Altea. You don't have to live a lifetime of war. You can be with me and the rest of your people."
"Father, please!" the princess continued to beg. "The paladins and I can still stop Zarkon! Somewhere in there, you must want that to happen."
"Allura, my A.I. has been corrupted. You must disconnect my power source," the hologram suddenly said, his tone fearful as he fought with the bad energy of the Galran crystal to remain in control. "We can stroll across the Blossom Canyon every morning, just like we used to. Remember how much you loved that?"
Allura's expression saddened and she bit her lower lip to stop it from quivering. "I remember. I'll see you soon, Father," she whispered, guilty averting her gaze down to the ground as she came to terms with what had to be done. Her hands clenched into angry fists as she steeled herself and she turned to the others with a look of rigid determination. "I've got to get into the A.I. chamber to disconnect my father's power source manually."
"But that means…losing King Alfor forever," Coran said, his own face scrunching up in sorrow.
The princess's expression was grim but she didn't think twice about her decision. "Paladins, get to your lions! I need you to slow the Castle's descent into the star," she instructed as she sprinted towards the doors. "Mari, you come with me. I might need your help getting inside my father's A.I. chamber."
"I can try to override the system to open the hangars," Coran volunteered, and the group immediately split up to fulfill their assigned tasks.
As Mari followed Allura out of the bridge, she could feel the air around them growing warmer as the Castle inched ever closer to the star. She could feel her damp clothes drying against her skin and they were practically steaming by the time they reached the room that housed King Alfor's memory storage unit. Allura pressed her hand to the panel next to the door and waited anxiously for it to open, but the panel only beeped in rejection and turned red as the corrupted A.I. refused to let her enter.
"Quiznak," the princess cursed under her breath. "He's locked us out!"
"Can't Coran just open the door?" Mari asked but Allura shook her head as she furiously began to hike up her skirt.
"He's already preoccupied with opening all five lion hangars. There's no time left to wait," she said. "We'll just have to pry it open ourselves."
From a holster strapped to her upper thigh, Allura pulled out a staff similar to Mari's and elongated the weapon, spear tip and all. Then without any hesitation, she thrust the blade deep in between the crack where the double sliding doors met and began pushing and pulling to wedge the staff further in.
"I could use a little assistance here," she grunted, casting a look Mari's way as her inhuman strength was still not quite enough to crack open the heavy metal entrance.
"O-Oh, yeah," Mari stammered and she instantly joined the princess's side, putting her all into pulling the staff back. "D-Do you always hide a weapon under your dress like that?"
"Yes, of course I do," Allura managed through clenched teeth, sweat beginning to line her brow from the effort and intensifying heat. "Don't you always carry your staff on your person?"
"That would be a smart thing to do from now on, yeah," Mari muttered, recalling her attempt to open the laundry room doors with hangers. Hangers!
The chamber doors creaked and groaned in protest, the machinery controlling them screeching angrily as they were forcefully wedged apart. When enough space had been created for at least one person to squeeze through, Mari said, "Hurry up and duck inside!"
Allura's eyes widened and she shot her a look of concern. "Are you sure you can hold the doors open long enough on your own?"
"Yes! I'll be fine," Mari promised, readjusting her sweaty hands to get a better grip on the staff and channeling the rest of her strength into her arms, legs, and upper back. "I just have to keep it open for a few more seconds, I can handle that. And like you said, we don't have much time left anyways."
The princess hesitated for a moment before setting her jaw in determination. "All right, I trust you. I'm letting go…Now!"
As soon as Allura let go of her half of the weapon, Mari inhaled sharply as the transferred weight of the doors nearly threw her forward. But gritting her teeth in vexed persistence, she dug her heels into the floor as best as she could and pulled back harder, ignoring the burning sensation in her arms and shoulders and the sting of the hot metal floor against her bare feet.
"O-Okay, Allura!" she hissed, nodding towards the small entryway she was just barely managing to keep open by herself. "I-I'm not sure how much longer I can hold it open! So hurry up and go now!"
The princess gave her one last grateful look before squirming through the small gap, and just in time too. Not even a tick later, the door panel beeped in warning and mechanisms whirred loudly before the staff snapped in two as the doors slammed shut on it. The sudden release of pressure sent Mari stumbling forward and she fell on her knees, the broken half of the weapon clanging to the floor in front of her.
The Castle was heating up more and more with each passing second. The air was becoming uncomfortably thick and humid and it was getting harder for Mari to breathe. Waiting anxiously outside of the chamber, she imagined they only had a few more minutes left until they completely combusted from the dying star, and she hoped to God that Allura successfully managed to shut down Alfor's A.I before then.
When the doors to the chamber suddenly opened and Allura exited the room with the other broken half of the staff grasped in her hand, Mari gave her an expectant look that was answered with a solemn nod: she had successfully disconnected the A.I. They were going to be all right! But despite their victory, the princess's blue eyes were sparkling with fresh tears and her relief wasn't enough to mask the sadness in her expression. Without a word, Mari felt her body moving on its own as she wrapped Allura in a gentle hug that was returned almost instantly.
"I'm so sorry, Allura," Mari whispered, as the princess sniffled and her body trembled slightly. "I know that was painful. But you did the right thing."
"I know," she murmured in reply. She took a deep breath to steady herself and pulled away from Mari, giving her a small smile as she did so. "But we're not out of this mess yet, I'm afraid. Let's get out of here."
**Please feel free to leave a comment/review down below! They are much appreciated & encourage me to keep writing this fic :D
**Feel free to check out my tumblr too, which is pufftheninja.
