It was a long night. They tried to pass a blanket to Lance through the gap, but anything of any size or thickness got caught between the metal and rock, and Lance was too weak to pull it through. They were only able to give him a handful of thin cloth scraps, and he said they helped, at least he could shield his skin from the floor. He might have been telling the truth, or he might have been lying to make them feel better; even Sam couldn't tell. Eventually Lance told them to stop trying, stop looking for anything else they could give him. He was worn out from the effort, and he just wanted to hold Sam's hand.
Sam could tell by Lance's labored breathing and by the way his hand felt too cool and stiff that he had a fever now. Sam and the others couldn't do anything about it. Couldn't give him any water, couldn't wipe his brow, couldn't even make a comfortable place for him to lie down. The two of them fell asleep, eventually, holding hands through that tiny gap at the bottom of the cell door, but Sam's sleep was troubled and patchy, and he knew Lance's was, too.
Before dawn the next morning, or at least before the guards turned the lights on, something shook the mountain.
Sam startled awake, his hand reflexively tightening around Lance's, and stared wide-eyed into the dark. Around him, the other prisoners stirred and muttered. Braxia, curled up against Sam's back, sat up slowly, and Sam felt him shifting as if he was looking around. Could Braxia see in the pitch dark? Some kind of sonar, perhaps? Sam had never asked. Lance probably had.
The room shook again, and Sam heard a dull, muffled thump that sounded far, far away. Lance let out a pained gasp as he jerked awake, his fingers flexing against Sam's. Dust and small rocks sifted down from the ceiling.
"Sam?" Lance's voice was cracked and rough, not yet fearful as he was still half-mired in sleep. "What's going on?"
"I don't know, sweetheart." Sam squeezed his hand and looked up at the ceiling. "Something might be happening, but I don't know what."
Another thump. This time Sam could swear it sounded like an explosion. Some kind of blast had struck the outside of the mountain, not close enough to reach them, but the sound still traveled through all the miles and miles of rock and dirt and twisting passageways. Closer, he heard voices yelling. Galra soldiers and guards. The voices sounded excited more than surprised, as if they had been preparing for this.
Lance let out a breath. "Oh."
Sam leaned closer to the door. The room shook again. "What is it, sunshine?"
"I dreamed... I had a weird dream. I was hurting, even in my dream. Everything was dark and hazy, and I couldn't move, like I was trapped in something sticky. Like a swamp, thick and hot and dragging me down, stinging everywhere it touched me. And then there was this wave. This wave of blue. It washed over the swamp, and it touched me, and everywhere it touched felt so cool and nice, like it was washing away the pain. And I felt... I heard... No, neither of those words are right. But I knew. It was my lion. It was Blue. She was looking for me, and she found me, and she's coming."
Sam's breath shuddered. He would have expected Lance to sound excited and happy with this news. Somehow, while he was sleeping, the block he had tried to put on his bond with his lion must have come undone. That, or she finally got close enough to hear him or something, Sam wasn't sure exactly how it worked, and at this moment he didn't care. What mattered was that Blue was coming. Voltron was coming. They were coming to get Lance and take him home, and all of this would be over soon.
Lance didn't sound happy, though. His voice was plain and factual, simply describing what had happened. Sam didn't know if he was too sick and pained to understand, or too mentally depressed and overwhelmed to see it as a good thing. Either way, it was more evidence that Blue needed to get here and rescue him. Now.
Sam pressed Lance's hand between his and rested his forehead against the cold door. "That's good, isn't it? Aren't you looking forward to seeing her?"
"Yes..." But Lance's voice was uncertain. "I just...I can't help feeling like I did something wrong..."
Sam shook his head vehemently in the dark. "No. No. Not at all. You didn't do anything wrong, honey. You did everything right. Don't worry about that."
"Okay." Lance's hand relaxed in his. "If you say so."
Still that trust, despite everything. Sam smiled, though he felt the tears rising in his eyes. He was glad Lance still believed him, even though Sam wasn't sure he deserved it.
Then the lights came on, so bright it was as if someone had hit a floodlight. The sudden, blinding impact felt like a bomb. Sam squinted and let go of Lance with one hand so he could shade his eyes and look toward the cell door. It was creaking and clanking, slamming open, and someone was coming. A lot of someones. A group of guards, more than Sam had ever seen at one time, and there with them in the middle...
Sam had never seen a creature who looked like that before. The person was tall, but shorter than the Galra surrounding them, with long flowing robes, smooth skin, and markings under their eyes. Or her? Sam was pretty sure it was female, whoever, whatever this was.
The prisoners around him shivered and shrank. "A druid," someone murmured, pure dread in their voice. Then someone else spoke, one of the more knowledgable planetary rulers who had once upon a time been involved in universal politics.
"Haggar."
Even Sam knew that name. For a moment, his mind lit up with white-hot terror, and all he could think that she was going to catch him holding hands with Lance and punish them for it. Move Lance to a different cell with no gap under the door, maybe. Or just break his hand.
It almost killed him to do it, but he let go of Lance's hand, setting it gently on the rocky floor. "Lance," he hissed into the gap. "I'm sorry, sweetie, but you gotta pull your hand back under the door, okay?"
Lance did not question this, just pulled his hand back. Sam winced when his swollen wrist scraped against the bottom of the door. Then Haggar and her escort were upon them, and Sam drew himself to his feet to face her.
Suddenly, he was not afraid. Not at all. The blue lion was still shaking the mountain with her continued attacks, and all Sam felt was anger. How dare they do this to a kid, a brave young man who only wanted to help, only wanted to make others feel better? How dare they beat him, isolate him, torture him, starve him, break his legs? It was incomprehensible, inexcusable, and it filled Sam with overwhelming rage.
Sam stood with his back to the door and pressed his palm against the metal surface as if he could somehow stop the Galra from getting through to Lance. He stared straight into Haggar's face, his teeth clenched and mind seething. "What do you want?" he barked. "Haven't you done enough to this poor boy?"
Haggar drew up short and narrowed her eyes at him. It wasn't even surprise in her expression, just contempt. As if he was an insect that had dared to rise up in her path and she had to step on it to get what she wanted. "You're the other human," she said, her voice grating. "We have a use for you as well."
She looked at the guards on either side of her. "Take him as well as the blue paladin. We'll use them both."
"What for?" Sam demanded, refusing to be ignored. "You wanted the blue paladin in agony, calling out for help. You have it. What else could you possibly take from him, or from me?"
Haggar bared her teeth at him. "You know nothing. Close your mouth before I see fit to close it for you. Permanently."
She lifted one hand, almost lazily, and the guards advanced on Sam and the cell door. The other prisoners had wisely gotten out of the way long ago, but Sam still stood there. He shifted himself to stand more squarely in front of Lance's cell, grimacing in hatred. "No, I won't let you, I won't..."
He barely got in one punch, ineffectual as it was, before a guard struck him upside the head with a thick baton. Sam's knees bent, and he lost control of his body for a second. When it passed, he was being held restrained between two Galra. He lifted his head to see two more guards dragging Lance by the arms out of the now-open cell. Lance was crying and whimpering as the movement jarred his legs.
Sam fought against the hands on him, unthinking in fury. "No, stop it, stop it! Stop hurting him, stop it, you've done enough!"
Haggar, standing nearer to him than the cell, growled in exasperation and reached for Sam. Her hand was sparking with something that Sam could only characterize as dark electricity, snapping and arcing between her fingers. "I told you to be silent, worm."
She touched his head with the black energy, and everything lit on fire. Sam screamed. He understood, instantly and with terrifying thoroughness, exactly why Lance had not been able to keep from crying out when the druid tortured him this way. Had it been Haggar, or another of her kind? The pain built quickly, overwhelming his body, his mind, everything. His senses shorted out, overloaded by the stimulation. Then everything went dark.
When he came to, he was no longer underground. It had been months since Sam had been anywhere but that prison, and for a moment all he could think about was the wind on his skin, the sunlight pressing against his eyes. Such simple sensations, so desperately missed. He was dangling from something, his arms held above his head and pulling painfully at his arm sockets. Everything ached and buzzed with the remnants of that dark electricity, and Sam gulped down a moan before it could escape his lips. Where was Lance?
Somewhere to his left, he heard the boy whimper. He heard other things, too, a massive, high-pitched buzz and crash and rumble like continuous electricity, shouts and yells, the sounds of enormous ships passing overhead. Haggar's voice somewhere ahead, roaring in triumphant laughter.
Sam lifted his head and forced his eyes open, breathing heavily through his mouth to try to regulate the pain. He was being held between a pair of Galra, each holding one of his wrists stretched high above his head. He tried to get his feet under himself and couldn't manage it, could barely get his toes down on the surface below to stabilize himself. The guard on his right tightened his grip on Sam's wrist and hauled him up higher, making him dance on his tiptoes. "Stop it..." Sam groaned, still not completely aware of his surroundings.
Lance yelped, and Sam's eyes flew open, his head whipping over to find him. Lance was being held the same way he was, dangling by the wrists in the grip of two Galra gaurds. His broken legs trailed to the ground, bending in nauseating ways whenever his body shifted. His head was slumping down on his chest, and his eyes were closed, his entire body heaving for breath.
"Lance!" Sam yelled, desperate for some sign of life from the boy. He looked awful, still bloody and striped from the physical beatings, pale and gaunt from starvation and imprisonment below the ground. He had looked bad enough in the dim light of the cell below, but in full daylight, he looked much worse. He barely looked alive. "Lance, please! Say something!"
Lance didn't answer.
Haggar cackled, and Sam looked forward, his heart in his throat. They were standing outside the entrance to the mountain on a large tract of cleared, paved terrain, a landing tarmac for Galra ships. Haggar stood about twenty feet in front of where Sam and Lance were held, her arms uplifted and robes whipping in a stronger breeze than the one Sam felt, himself. Magical energy was building around her, twisting around her body and upraised arms.
And there above her, where her arms were pointing and her energy was feeding... Sam raised his head to take it in, squinting against the sunlight. An enormous blue robot lion was suspended in the air, trapped in an unbelievably gigantic lattice of electricity like an animal caught in a hunter's net. Or a fly in a web. Two skyscraper-sized pylons bracketed the web of energy, stabilizing the trap created by Haggar's magic. As Sam watched, the lion shuddered and shook, trying to break free, but was unable to move. Eventually she went limp and dangled in the air, much like her young pilot on the tarmac below.
Even so, for a moment Sam's attention was riveted to her, fascinated by the incredible size and complexity of her, this combination weapon and spacecraft from a bygone age. He remembered all of Lance's stories and descriptions, the mingled awe and fondness and longing in his voice whenever he spoke of his lion, his "Blue." Here she was, now, at last, and Sam understood why Lance had missed her so much. She was beautiful and amazing. And there were four more like her?
Something massive passed overhead, a shadow the size of a blimp but as fast as a jet flashing over him. The roar of it popped in Sam's ears and shook both the air and the ground beneath him. The guards holding him tightened their grip and spread their stance to compensate. He followed the shadow with his eyes and saw... A black lion. Like the blue one, clearly made along the same design, but much larger, bulkier and more powerful.
Behind it came a green lion, then a red, then a yellow. All three were enormous, breathtaking. Sam stared without blinking, his mouth open. He was so numb with awe and amazement that he couldn't even feel his bruises, the stretch of his arms, the ache in his head and body from being struck with Haggar's magic. He looked over at Lance, hoping to see him perk up at the arrival of his people, his team, but Lance's head was still down. He seemed unaware of anything that was going on around him.
"Lance," Sam tried to call, but his breath caught, and he could barely hear himself over all the roaring and crackling and the sounds of the ships. "Lance!" he tried again, this time with all the power he could muster. "They're here! Everyone is here for you! Look up and see!"
Lance heaved for breath, and his hands spasmed helplessly against the hold on his wrists. His head rolled on his chest, eyelids fluttering, and he forced his eyes open and began to raise his head, groaning with effort. He looked at Sam, though he barely seemed able to make him out, and Sam nodded, then tipped his head toward the sky.
Lance squinted and tried to look up. Two great thuds shook the world, and Sam's attention snapped forward again. The black lion had landed not far from Haggar, and next to it, the green one. The red and yellow lions circled overhead, picking off small Galra fighters that flew into the area.
The green and black lions lowered their heads and opened their mouths, and two figures ran down the ramps onto the tarmac in front of Haggar. The black pilot was carrying a laser gun that took both hands to lift, and the green one had some kind of weapon lit and glowing in hand. Sam knew who they were from Lance's stories, but he still couldn't quite believe it, not until they got close enough for him to see their faces through their helmets. Shiro. Katie.
The two pilots pulled up short, carefully out of Haggar's reach, and faced her with weapons at the ready. She cackled, hands still uplifted as she fed magic energy above her head into the trap that held the blue lion. "So you've come at last," she gloated. "I knew you would."
Shiro faced her head on, mouth grim and eyes hard, but Katie looked behind Haggar to the hostages. She saw Lance first and went pale and gasping, though she didn't speak. Then her eyes swept to the other side. "Dad!" A strangled scream. They hadn't known he was here.
Sam tried to smile, even as tears filled his eyes. "I'm okay!" he yelled as loud as he could. The guard on his right rewarded him with a punch to the kidney, making him gasp and double over, dangling painfully from the Galra's grip. But he straightened, still smiling, and called again. "I'm proud of you, Katie!" If they killed him now, he wanted her to know.
The guard punched him again. Lance really was rubbing off on him, it seemed. Sam just couldn't keep his mouth shut, not to save his life.
Shiro's voice rang out, clear and strong. "Let them go. Let Lance and Commander Holt go."
Haggar laughed, shrill and grating. "You dare to speak so to me, Champion? Are you so witless that you don't understand your position here? I've captured the blue lion! It is mine, and none can take it from my hand! You fell into the trap I set for you without hesitation, just as I knew you would. You paladins." She spat the word like a curse. "You've never understood the true meaning of power and control. You had Voltron in your hands, and to keep it all you had to do was ignore the pain of one worthless child. Instead, the very moment you knew where he was, you couldn't keep yourselves from blundering in after him. You don't deserve to wield the lions. You don't know how to use them!"
Shiro's lip curled, and his finger flexed against the trigger of his gun, though it was pointed safely at the ground. Sam could tell by the twitch of his muscles, though, that he could bring up the muzzle and shoot straight into Haggar's face in a fraction of a second. He was itching to do it. "Your words mean nothing to me, Haggar. We've come to retrieve our people. Let them go."
Haggar's voice rose in incredulous rage. "You still don't understand? You are not here to bargain, Champion! I have every advantage, and you have nothing! You will give me what I want, or you will suffer. That is the only deal to be made here."
"What do you want, then?" Shiro asked, strong and steady, as if he knew exactly what Haggar was going to do and he already had his response set.
Haggar looked back at the guards. Sam choked as the cold, hard muzzle of a gun was pressed under his chin, forcing his head up and back so he was looking at blank sky. A glance to the side revealed that Lance was getting the same treatment. Lance's eyes were closed, and he was limp and unresponsive. Sam couldn't tell whether he was even conscious at the moment.
Haggar's voice rang out. "I already have the blue lion. You cannot form Voltron, and you never will be able to do so again. If you surrender the other lions to me, I will refrain from killing these two pathetic examples of your species. Surrender the lions, and I'll allow all of you to retreat to that stinking castle I can see landing in the distance and give you time to retreat into the void. The Empire will not follow you. You will be allowed to live out your miserable lives in peace. Refuse this generous offer, and I will kill you all, starting with the two behind me."
Silence. Sam couldn't see Shiro's face with his head pushed back like this, so he had no idea what was going through his mind. He heard the wind, the roar of the lions passing overhead. Lance moaned.
"No."
Sam twisted his head to look at him, the gun digging into the flesh under his chin. Lance's voice was almost too soft to hear. His eyes fluttered, then opened, staring upward. His chest heaved for breath.
"No!" Everyone could hear him this time. Lance pulled futilely at the hands holding him, though if he managed to get free he would only drop to the ground. "Shiro, no, don't do it!"
"Hold on, Lance," Shiro called, steady and strong. "Everything's going to be okay."
He sounded sure. He must have a plan.
"No, no." Lance was weeping now, struggling with all the strength he had. Sam's heart was pounding, and he felt like he was going to be sick. "Don't! Don't do this!"
Shiro spoke to Haggar, his voice steely. "You have your bargain, witch. The lions for their freedom. Double-cross us, and I'll shoot you in the face."
Haggar cackled, triumphant, gleeful. "As if you could hit me, Champion of nothing."
Another signal, and the gun dropped away from Sam's head. He faced forward, blinking against the tears. Lance groaned, and his head fell down on his chest again, as he lacked the strength to hold it up. The red and yellow lions made one more pass overhead, then landed beside the black and green with twin thuds that shook the mountains. The ramps lowered, and two young men came out. The red pilot Sam vaguely recognized as a student he'd seen hanging around Shiro back at the Garrison, but the yellow one he didn't know at all, except from Lance's stories. Keith and Hunk. Their faces were grim, their weapons ready in their hands. They moved up to stand with Katie and Shiro, one force arrayed against the enemy.
"Hand over Lance and Commander Holt first," Shiro said. "Then you can take the lions."
"Acceptable," Haggar said. "We have you surrounded. If you try anything, you will die."
The guards holding Sam began to move forward. He moved his feet, but could barely touch the ground. He clenched his teeth to keep from crying out at the pain in his shoulders and arms. Beside him, Lance sounded like he was choking, he was fighting so hard to keep from screaming. The guards dragged them both to the tarmac between Haggar and the paladins.
The hands around Sam's wrists let go, and he fell to his hands and knees with a short, cut-off cry. Lance crumpled to the ground with a whine, and Sam immediately started crawling to him, his vision blurred and clouded, breath rasping in his throat. He felt hands on his shoulders, nervously clutching, heard Katie's voice breathless in his ear. He wanted to hold her so, so badly, but he was focused on Lance where he lay in a bloody, quivering mess, trying to curl up on himself in an attempt to mitigate the pain.
Shiro and Hunk were already trying to lift their teammate, Keith off to the side alternating between watching them anxiously and glaring at Haggar. Sam reached Lance's side and reached out for him, shakily grabbing at Shiro and Hunk's hands. "No," he forced out, "no, don't, just, let me, let me..."
They seemed to understand what he wanted. Their grip on Lance shifted, lifting him partway as Sam carefully slid himself underneath the boy to take his weight, to protect him from the rough pavement. Lance still choked and whimpered, but in moments he was resting in Sam's lap, curled up against his torso, his legs stretched out to the side at horrific angles. Sam wrapped his arms around him, bent down and buried his face in his hair, and closed his eyes. Lance's body was too warm, his face hot where it pressed into Sam's chest. He was fevered and sick and in so, so much pain, and Sam was aware of almost nothing else.
"It's okay, sunshine," he murmured. "It's okay, it's okay. Everything's going to be okay." Hunk's hands folded around Sam's shoulders, holding him steady as he shook.
"No." Lance wept, delirious, fingers clutching like hooks in Sam's shirt. "Blue, no, no, don't take her away from me..."
"It's okay, Lance." Shiro's hand moved over his head, gently brushing back his dirty, tangled hair. "Everything's going to be okay."
"You let them take the lions," Lance sobbed. He somehow curled even tighter into Sam, flinching away from Shiro's touch as if it burned. Shiro winced and drew back, and Sam tried to give him a steadying look. Lance didn't know what he was saying or doing right now. "You let them take Blue."
All those weeks underground, Lance had kept his faith in his team. He had shared it with Sam, with the other prisoners, with anyone who would listen. He had been so bright and joyful and confident that everyone had slowly, slowly grown to believe him, even Sam, who had thought he might never be able to believe in something good again. Now, at the end, Lance had lost that light inside him, and he had nothing left but grief and pain.
That was okay. Sam would believe for him. He would carry the torch Lance had given him until Lance was strong enough to take it back.
So he held him tighter, pressed him closer, and whispered yet more fervently into his ear. "It's okay, Lance. It's okay, sunshine. It's okay, it's okay, it's okay."
"Lance, Lance." Katie's voice, close to weeping. She was crouched beside them, reaching out, trying to find a place to touch Lance that wouldn't hurt him, wouldn't press on a wound. It was impossible. She stopped trying and just jammed herself into Sam's lap at Lance's back, wrapping her arms around him as far as they would go with no regard for the blood and bruises and tears. Sam moved his arm to wrap around her and pulled her in tight, their three heads pressed close together.
"Lance," Katie murmured, close to Lance's ear. "Lance, buddy. Mi hermano. I know you're hurting, I know you're sick, but listen. Listen to Blue. Can you hear her voice? Can you hear her talking to you? I know she's talking to you, because Green is talking to me. Does Blue sound scared? Does she sound like she's grieving, sad about losing you? No, Blue isn't scared. Green isn't scared. Don't be sad, Lance. Everything's okay. I promise, I promise. No one is losing anyone. The lions aren't going away. Everything's going to be fine. We didn't come here without a plan."
Sam opened his eyes and looked up just enough to see the lions in front of them. Green and Black and Red and Yellow all had their shields raised even as Galra swarmed around them, setting up transports to take them away. The gigantic magical trap above their heads crackled like a thunderstorm, and Sam raised his head and watched Blue's motionless form. There was a sense of anticipation, of waiting. All of the paladins were crowded around him and Lance now, crouching on the ground and watching the lions warily. They were waiting, too, though for what, Sam did not know.
He bent his head back to his daughter's and breathed shakily against the side of her helmet. "Katie," he murmured. "What's the plan?"
She smiled, grim and satisfied. "It's a very simple plan. We all agreed to it. Just two words."
Lance was motionless in their arms, barely breathing. Sam felt dizzy. "What two words?"
Katie's smile broadened, vicious as a shark. "Lion smash."
Sam blinked. He tipped his head back up to the sky to look at Blue. Below, Haggar had moved to stand directly below the bulk of the lion, hands still raised, pouring ensnaring energy. She was weaving ever tighter around the lion, perhaps in preparation of turning off the pylons and lowering Blue to the ground, still trapped. A pulse of dark electricity surged from her hands as she laughed to herself, and Blue's body shivered against the bonds. Lance moaned into Sam's chest as if he could feel his lion's pain.
Something cracked. Something snapped. Shiro stood up suddenly, tension in every line of his body, his gun lowered at side. "Haggar!" he bellowed.
She turned to look at him, face twisted in contempt for his audacity to speak to her.
"I told you that you could take the lions!" Shiro yelled. "But I never said the lions agreed to it!"
A burst of light went off above their heads, far brighter and more blinding than the sudden morning activation in the underground prison. Sam's eyes squeezed shut on instinct, head pounding with the shock and sudden pressure. When he opened his eyes, Blue was still suspended between the pylons, but something had changed. Her limbs were splayed, her head and tail lifted. She looked like a cat in the middle of a leap. She was surrounded by a shell of bright blue energy, sharp and crackling, cutting through the dark electricity as if it was nothing. Disrupted, the trap's energy retreated to the pylons and wrapped around them in a chaotic, sparking mess of electricity, like ball lightning with nowhere to go.
Haggar stumbled back, her hands falling as her magic faltered. "No... No!" She spun toward Shiro again, face twisted in hatred. "What is this? What have you done?"
"We knew this was a trap," Shiro said grimly. "We've known all along. We only waited this long to come because we had to prepare a defensive mechanism for Blue. We knew you would try to capture her. And we knew she would want to break free."
Sam could almost swear he saw Blue nod. Then her shield deactivated, and she dropped from the sky. Right on top of Haggar.
Chaos. Shouting. Screams. The thud of massive feet over the land, the footsteps of titans as they crushed and tore and destroyed. The other lions had deactivated their barriers as well and turned on the Galra who dared to try to trap them. They were merciless, overpowering. They did not bother with their weapons, which would have put their pilots in danger, too. They simply stomped and smashed, snapped their jaws, whipped their tails. The enemies fled in terror only to be cut off at every turn. The lions smashed.
They did not discriminate. Everything disappeared under their feet, ground into powder and dust. Everything except for the paladins and Sam, still clutching each other in a small huddle in the middle of the tarmac. Nothing touched them, not even the slightest particle of debris. It was supremely surreal to sit there, surrounded by disaster and destruction, a cataclysm of monstrous proportions, and to remain completely unaffected by it. The most Sam felt was a breeze ruffling his hair when one of the lions rushed by too near.
It was over in moments. The lions smashed. And nothing remained.
Lance was limp in Sam's arms, completely worn out, gasping for air. Sam clutched him close, feeling almost as bewildered and exhausted as the boy. A castle was descending and people were running toward them, some pulling stretchers. The Galra lay in pieces and bloody smears all around. Sam found himself staring at something he barely saw, his vision blurring in and out.
It was Haggar's robe, empty on the ground where Blue had first descended. Sam could not comprehend it. What did it mean?
It was all too much. His vision went dark, and he felt himself slumping over Lance, caught and held by many hands as he went down. And he still believed what he'd been telling the boy, despite it all.
Everything was going to be okay.