Author's Note: I am so pleased that everyone liked the last chapter. It was a last-minute decision for Morgan to let the proverbial cat out of the bag; again, these characters truly do dictate where this story is going. Thank you to everyone who's reading, and as always, I only own the idiots - I mean, characters - I've created.

To Cha━ - Thank you for the compliments! I'm glad you're enjoying the story, I hope enough to keep you coming back for more.

To bknbu━ - I am so glad you're still following along! I love Keith (and Jeff), but I adore Sven. He's my main man.

To Sally On━ - Oh, Keith. My poor, messed-up, guilt-stricken Keith. The women in his life need to work on him. And our friends on Pollux will definitely have an interesting chat somewhere down the line...

To Wade Wells━ - Our poor man! Literally, Keith just couldn't accept it when he saw his sister at the Academy after eight years. He just couldn't wrap his head around it. There will be more to that later. SPOILER ALERT: And if you liked the ending, wait 'til Allura asks her boyfriend who in seven hells Morgan is... (And speaking of, keep working on that fic!)

Title Song━: "Across the Ocean" by Missing Joe

Allura could hear the blood beating in her ears, everything━ - her teammates included━ - was so quiet. Who was this Morgan who broke Keith? And Christiane...this Christiane was Keith's sister? Most importantly, was Keith really crying in the cockpit of Black Lion?

Unbelievable.

"Keith? Keith." Morgan exhaled impatiently. "Akira-chan, pull yourself together. You're the captain of the Voltron Force and we have to rescue your sister. You're not allowed to fall to pieces until I say so."

"You tell him, Morgan," Hunk cheered her on.

"Thanks, Hunk."

"Wow," Lance mused. "I think this is the first time Captain Crankypants is actually listening to someone. You're awesome, Morgan. Or should I say, Tattoo Queen?"

She didn't skip a beat. "Thanks, Lemon Drop."

Pidge laughed. "Ouch."

Aidan cleared his throat. "Keith, are you okay in there? 'Cuz if you're not..."

Keith swallowed. "No, Aidan. I'm fine. I just...I'm finding all of this so hard to believe, you know what I mean? Yesterday everything in my life was normal, and today I find out that my sister, who I haven't seen in twelve years, has been kidnapped by Lotor and Wade. And now we're on a wild goose chase to Crydor━ - I'll have to tell you more about that planet later━ - to rescue her, and you're here, and Morgan's here..."

"...with her husband, no less. Hello, by the way," David's British accent shot out cheerfully. "David Rackens. Pleasure to meet the man whose initial is tattooed on my wife's backside." He paused, a deliciously evil grin spreading on his face. "Hello to you too, McClain."

"I hate you, man," Lance mumbled.

"Oh, and that's Taye Benton in the red mecha," Aidan made the introduction. "Little K rides with him."

Keith raised his eyebrows. "Little K?"

"Um...yeah. So Keith, how do you feel about being Big K?"

Commander Hawkins continued to stay in the bridge of the Explorer, but he had long since moved from his command seat and was now hovering near Sparks. Sparks was the Technical Sargeant aboard the ship, and being married to a woman who was a tech sargeant at her core, Hawkins knew something about systems analysis. He also knew enough to not step on the toes of the real systems analyst on the ship.

"Sir, we've traced the signal to the Planet Crydor," he informed the commander. "I received an incoming from the Albegas Team, and they are well on their way. However, the Explorer is much larger than those three ships, and will move much slower. I'd say we're about three hours behind Albegas."

"What if we sent the Voltron Force out first, and then we followed?"

"The Voltron Force would get there much faster than we would, Sir, but they wouldn't have us as back-up for at least another two hours."

The commander nodded, crossing his arms over his chest. "I think," he said slowly, "that the team would take the risk for Christiane. Besides, we already know that Albegas is out there, and if the Space Marshal has anything to do with it, then I'm sure the Lion Force Voltron will be there as well. If the Explorer isn't there to cover Voltron, then there will be two other giant mecha there."

"So it won't be a problem," Sparks concluded.

"Correct. I'll go tell the Force." Moving back towards his usual spot and the intercom, he paged the team, still waiting on standby in the hangar. "All units, prepare for launch. Chip, as systems analyst, Sparks is downloading the signal into your mecha."

"Roger, Commander," Chip responded.

As the hangar door opened, Jeff's heart pounded violently, so high up in his chest that it was practically in his throat. Once the fifteen mecha were out in space, they began to fly, not bothering to waste the time to form the Strato-Fighter, the Aqua Fighter, or the Turbo Terrain Fighter. They weren't against an enemy per se. They were out to rescue Christiane.

"Jeff," Cliff said to him over the intercom, "are you sure you're up to this?"

He nodded. "If I can't rescue my girl, Cliff, then I have no business being with her."

Cliff thought Jeff might say as much. "In agreement. Carry on, then. And pray that we make it there in plenty of time."

Even though he knew Crydor━ - he knew the weather, he knew the atmosphere, he knew the terrain━ - he wasn't prepared for the violent windstorm that swept his Polluxian cruiser. Blast it. It had been nearly eight months since he'd been on this God-forsaken planet, and in that time, the conditions had somehow worsened. The small cruiser couldn't handle the windstorm; then there was the whiteout, and then the radio had gone out, and then...crash.

He swore under his breath in Norwegian.

As he stepped out of his ruined cruiser, he closed his eyes, feeling the Black Ice tech take over his system to keep him warm. And protected━ - he had no idea what he would encounter out here. If Keith's sister had crash-landed onto Crydor, then he was sure that Lotor and Wade would come searching for her. If that was the case, he needed to be ready.

Forming his battle axe weapon with his makeshift VoltCom, he began to trudge the terrain, looking for the girl. He had a feeling that he'd better find her soon. She was going to need him.

"My lord! My lord, are you all right?"

Lotor felt as though his skull had been split in half. "Huh? Maahox, what are you doing in my personal chambers?" he demanded of the occult scientist testily. His eyes scanned the room for his captive girl, the one he had fallen madly in love with. "And where's Christiane?"

Maahox sighed, aggravated. "My lord, the girl you captured has escaped in one of our cruisers. Apparently, she hit your head with something━ - your vanity stool, from the looks of it." He motioned to the busted pieces of the stool littering the floor and the bed. "I just gave you a Haggarium booster to help heal your injury."

Lotor placed his hands on the back of his head. "She did what? Blast her, I offered her everything. Everything! I offered her a spot in my harem, I offered to make her my queen, and she does this in return? Forget about holding her hostage. I want that girl dead."

"Well, I do have to say, for all of Cossack's flaws and shortcomings, he is a good pilot and gunner. When we saw the alert that the hangar door was open, he spun the ship around and shot her down. Remarkable, really. She's crash-landed on Planet Crydor, and seeing how miserable that planet was, I wasn't sure if you wanted to track her down further or just allow the elements to finish her."

"Track her down!" the king barked.

Maahox nodded. "As you wish, my lord. The Sky Marshal is in agreement as well; he believes that we will have a better chance of success if we have the girl in our holding."

"Indeed." Lotor's eyes flashed with Haggarium rage. "Then I shall break out all the instruments of torture, and I will do to her what I should have done earlier."

The occult scientist slowly back out of the room, leaving the king alone with his thoughts and fantasies of revenge.

Crydor was a harsh, miserable, unforgiving planet. Christiane decided that when she made it off this rock━ - and she would make it off this rock; she swore to herself that she was going to make her way back to Jeff if it was the last thing she ever did━ - she would only visit tropical locations in the future. The desert? It looked really, really good right about now.

She wasn't wearing much, only the street clothes she was wearing at Sullivan's━ - her jeans, a black cashmere sweater over a black T-shirt, and thick wool socks underneath her grey eight-hole Doc Martens. While warm enough without a coat inside the stolen cruiser, there was no way she could go out in Crydor's whiteout conditions and not freeze to death in under a minute. Cursing the busted control panel, she scouted around the small ship for supplies. Maybe there was a blanket or a jacket or...something.

Icicles. There were already icicles forming over her screen and on the outside of her ship. Had she really been crashed long enough for icicles to form?

Defeated, she gave up looking. There was nothing on the ship to offer her any extra protection. Not only that, there were no rations. She would die from starvation or freezing before she was ever rescued. So she had to rescue herself.

And how, pray tell, am I gonna do that? Think, Kogane, think.

As she was thinking, looking out past the blurry, frozen-over screen, she saw something coming towards her. It looked like a huge, dark, walking rock. It didn't look like anything the Drule forces might have sent after her, but it certainly didn't look friendly. She shuddered to think about what types of defense the inhabitants of Crydor might have...if there were any inhabitants of Crydor.

Whatever that thing was, it swung at the door. Christiane let out a shrill yelp as a battle axe came plunging in through the side of her crashed ship. A pair of muscular arms pried the door apart, letting the ice-cold air into the ship. She shivered violently from the cold, but for some reason, she was not afraid.

Well, it wasn't a rock. "It" had a face, a beard, and slate-blue eyes. He reached his arm out towards her and said in a Norwegian accent, "You must be Christiane. Come with me."

"Please," she responded in a small voice, "I don't know how you know me, but I promise you that Space Marshal Stensson of the Galaxy Alliance will reward you handsomely for my safe return."

His eyes pierced through her. "Christiane," he replied patiently, "I know your Space Marshal Stensson better than anyone else. And I know your brother. I will not harm you." He continued to hold his muscular arm out towards her. "Will you come with me now, or would you rather wait for Wade and Lotor to come find you again?"

"Well, since you put it that way..." She reached her arm out towards his, and took his gloved hand in her bare one. Cold! He was so cold! She shivered again, wondering how she was ever going to survive in the arctic temperature dressed the way she was.

As if reading her mind, he projected the same rocky, Black Ice tech on her body. "Wow, this is weird," she commented, sticking close to her new protector. "How'd you figure this out?"

"It's sort of like a makeshift VoltCom," he replied.

"Um...a what?"

"A VoltCom. It's the implement that the Voltron Force uses to break out their specifically-chosen weapons during a hand-to-hand battle. Your brother's, for example, is a sword. Mine, due to my upper-body strength and Norwegian heritage, is a battle axe."

"Yeah, I noticed." They remained quiet for a few moments until she took a step and slid, crashing right to her bottom. "Ow. You couldn't have warned me about━ - uh, what is this, anyway?"

"This, my dear, is Crydor's version of an ocean, completely frozen over," he replied, lifting her back up. "We have to hurry. This time of year, the sun is not up very long, and we have to get to the underground tunnels before it gets dark. Otherwise, we will not survive the long night in the pitch black."

"Okay. So we have to cross a frozen ocean?"

"Yes. Christiane Kogane, you ask a lot of questions, don't you? Trust me when I say that one of the entrances to the underground tunnels is across the ocean. And trust me when I say that you don't want to be out here when the sun goes down."

"Okay, I trust you." She frowned. "So how come you won't tell me who you are? And how do you know my brother and the Space Marshal?"

There was a glimmer of amusement in his slate-blue eyes. "Save your strength for the walk across the ocean, Christiane. You're going to need it. We can talk later."

By the time Voltron and Albegas reached Planet Crydor, the sun was well into its descent, and there was not enough light━ - or time━ - to even begin to search for Christiane properly. Keith sighed loudly, trying not to break down into tears again. The only thing that made him feel better was the fact that he knew Sven was there on Crydor, too. If anyone had a chance of finding his sister, it was Sven.

"Aidan," Morgan choked out over the intercom, "we're not gonna find her tonight."

Aidan exhaled sorrowfully. "No, Feld. We're not."

Pidge cleared his throat. "Hey, teams? I think we should head back to the castle and discuss our strategy. If I remember correctly from the last time we were here, Crydor only has a limited amount of sunlight this time of year. This time might be better used by coming up with a more effective strategy and navigation path than trying to search for her with dwindling light."

Taye spoke up. "I think he's right," he agreed. "You know Chris is my girl, and I'd hate to leave her out in the wilderness overnight, but I think the kid's got a point."

Morgan shuddered.

"Keith, Pidge and Taye are right," Allura spoke gently. "I think we need to regroup at the castle and come up with a better strategy. This won't work."

Keith slumped his shoulders, but he agreed with them. There was no time, and as long as Sven was there to help Christiane get through the night, then she would be better served by them coming back in the daylight. "All right, teams. Back to Arus."

"Not without us, you're not going."

Keith's mouth dropped open when he heard the voice over the intercom. The voice of his old friend, the voice of his old roommate. The voice belonging to the Captain of the Voltron Vehicle Team.

Also the voice that belonged to somebody he needed to beat up when he got ahold of him, but that was beside the point.

"Amigo!" Morgan screeched through the intercom. "You guys made it!"

"Morganza," he replied in a serious voice, "are we ready to go down there and get her back?"

Aidan took the heat off his navigator. "Aki, we've decided to regroup at the Castle of Lions on Arus. The sun is setting on Crydor, and fast; you know we'll never find Chris before it gets dark. Captain Kogane and I made the executive decision to go back to Arus, re-strategize, and come up with a new flight plan to allow us to maximize the sunlight tomorrow."

Of the twenty-three mecha hovering near Crydor, all of them could hear Captain Aki slamming his fist down on the control panel so forcefully it might have broken. "Then I guess we have no other choice. Blast it, Dalloway, you couldn't have told me this sooner?"

Cliff rushed to Aidan's defense. "Jeffrey, calm down. Don't forget, you were of no use earlier today when you found out the news, especially not with Sammy's absinthe in your systerm."

"Dude! You drank absinthe?" Aidan and Lance asked at the exact same time.

Even David laughed. "Seven hells, Jeff. You're the man."

Jeff scowled. "Could we please talk about something other than my earlier inebriation? I'd like to get Christiane back as soon as possible."

Keith bit his tongue to keep from lashing out.

Crik spoke up next. "I'll contact the commander and let him know to go to Arus and not to Crydor. Then we'll make up the rest of the plan. We've got a navigator and a systems analyst, right?"

"Two systems analysts," Chip spoke up. "Three, if you count Sparks."

"CHIP!" Pidge screeched.

"Hey, Pidge," Chip greeted his twin. "And hello to you too, Hunk."

"Yo, Chip, nice to have you around again," Hunk answered, a smile growing on his face.

Allura interrupted. Her head was reeling; there were too many thoughts and ideas, too many new people, too much going on! "I suggest we all get back to the castle now, and we can catch up later. Once we're back at the castle, we'll gather together the necessary crew to make up a game plan, and we'll head back to Crydor at the best time tomorrow morning."

And then you can tell me who all of these people are, especially this Morgan who's got your initial tattooed on her back.