This story has been in my WIP folder for four years, so it's a good feeling to finally get it out of there.
Many, many thanks to beta readers Nellie Bachesneg and MightyKeiseker for helping me with a plot point I was very stuck on. Zero thanks to the beta who dumped on my story idea when I asked for help.
Shiro carefully made his way through the Galra cruiser, hoping he could make it to the main deck undetected. He and his team were on a mission to take down the leader of the fleet which would liberate the planet they were currently occupying.
All in a day's work for the life of a Paladin of Voltron.
His robotic arm at the ready in case he ran into any Galra soldiers, he slowly walked down the long hallway.
"Anyone have eyes on Helyer?" he quietly asked through his coms.
"Negative," Hunk answered.
"Nope," Lance added.
"Nothing," Pidge chimed in.
"Not here either," Keith said.
Shiro sighed. The longer they stayed on this cruiser, the more danger they were in. "All right, everyone stay alert and be ready to fight."
The sound of chains rattling brought his attention to a closed door. It could be coming from someone Galran, but it was more likely coming from someone the Galra had taken prisoner. It wouldn't surprise him if it was one of the planet's inhabitants or someone from an entirely different galaxy. The Galra had no limits on who they were willing to take prisoner.
He knew that all too well.
Looking around to make sure there weren't any soldiers in the vicinity, Shiro used his robotic hand to slash through the keypad.
The door slid up and he entered the room.
Wide eyes stared back at him in fear.
Shiro couldn't believe what he was looking at.
A young woman was suspended into the air with her arms chained above her. She had been gagged, her clothing was ripped and dirtied, and her feet were bare and bloody. Inky black tears continually made their way down her cheeks, leaving dark streaks on her face.
At first glance, she appeared human, but when he looked closer, he noticed purple markings above both of her eyebrows and flattened protrusions peeking out of her long tangled teal-colored hair. She must not have been from this planet because she looked nothing like the other inhabitants. He wondered how long she had been the Galra's prisoner.
Even if only a minute, it was too long.
She kicked her legs at the sight of him, and he wasn't sure if she was trying to fight him or if she was excited that someone other than a Galran soldier had opened the door.
"It's okay," he said gently. "I'm not going to hurt you. I'm gonna get you out of here, all right?"
The girl looked him over, as if trying to see if he was being sincere, before slowly nodding.
Glancing around the room, he didn't see anything he could stand on to cut the chains.
Well, he could adapt.
Shiro jumped onto the nearest wall and used the propulsion to swing himself towards the chains, cutting them in midair.
The girl fell to the ground in a crumpled heap. She reached up and yanked the gag out of her mouth before gasping heavily.
Shiro knelt down by her side. "Hey, take a deep breath. You're going to be okay."
"Who are you?" she asked hoarsely.
"My name is Shiro. If you come with me, my friends and I can take you back home."
"This is my home."
"It doesn't have to be."
The girl wanted to trust him, but this life with the Galra was all she'd ever known. Could there really be something better for her? What reason did she have to trust a stranger rather than the people who had looked after her for as long as she could remember?
"Shiro, we got him," Keith said over the coms. "Helyer's officially relieved of command.
"That's great news," Shiro replied. "Head back to the castle. We'll rendez-vous from there."
"Who are you talking to?" the girl asked.
"One of my teammates. They're all heading back to the castle we live in, and we're happy to bring you with us and help care for your injuries." He gently undid the chains from the girl's red and raw wrists and stood up. Then he held his hand out for her. "What do you say?"
The girl took a deep breath before slowly taking his hand.
She started to stand, but almost immediately, her legs gave out beneath her.
Shiro quickly grabbed her by the waist before she fell all the way to the floor. "You must be pretty weak from all this. Is it okay if I carry you?"
The girl bit her bottom lip before nodding again.
Shiro carefully slipped his arm under her legs and lifted her up before making his way down the hall and back to the Black Lion.
Once the large machine was in sight, the girl immediately started thrashing around in his hold.
"No, no, NO!" she screamed. "Let me go! Someone please HELP ME! Someone! Let go!"
"Calm down, it's okay!" Shiro said quickly. "You have to be quiet or—"
A laser fired in their direction.
"Or that will happen!"
"Release her right now!" a Galra soldier ordered aiming his gun at both of them.
Shiro didn't know what caused the girl to start freaking out or why she was being held prisoner or why in the world she wanted to stay here, but he could not in good conscience leave her here after seeing what the Galra were willing to do to her. Maybe after they'd gotten away and weren't in immediate danger, he could find out why the Black Lion had scared her so much.
"Let me go!" she begged. "Please!"
"I'm not the one who's trying to hurt you!"
She looked over at the Galra soldier. "Help me!"
More soldiers were coming and Shiro could not fight and hold onto the girl at the same time.
Sensing the danger its Paladin was in, the Black Lion's eyes began to glow and it let out a huge roar.
This gave Shiro just enough time to run inside the Lion and out of harm's way from the soldiers and their guns.
He gently placed the girl down behind the controls and she quickly backed away from him.
Wasting no time, Shiro ran to the chair and put his hands on the two bars that gave him control over the Lion. He thrust them forward and the Lion pulled out of the Galra cruiser.
He could hear the girl's frantic gasping behind him. "Everything's okay, I promise," he tried to assure her while keeping his eyes to the front. "You don't have to be afraid."
Shiro flew back to the Castle of Lions and docked his Lion in the hangar.
As soon as they touched the ground, the girl summoned what little strength she had and raced out the way Shiro had carried her in.
"Hey, wait!" Shiro called.
Her legs aching and throbbing, the girl ran down the hall leading out of the hangar until she happened upon the other Paladins.
"Whoa, who is that?" Pidge asked.
The girl tried to back away from them, but Shiro joined them which blocked off the way she had just run from.
"Stay away from me!" she shouted frantically as they started to form a half-circle around her. "Don't touch me!"
"It's okay!" Shiro said in an attempt to placate her. "You're safe here."
"Please don't hurt me! Just take me back! I don't want to be here! I want to go back! Please just let me go!"
Suddenly, she felt pain in her shoulder before the world turned black and she fell to the floor.
The Paladins looked at her before looking up at the person behind her simultaneously.
"What?" Coran said as he held his arms up. "Did you have any other ideas?"
"Who is this?" Allura asked.
"I found her on the cruiser," Shiro explained. "She was being kept prisoner. But I'm not sure why she wants to go back. She looks terrible. I can only imagine what they've put her through."
"Let's get her to the med bay. We'll see if we can get some answers once she wakes up."
Serenity slowly opened her eyes.
It took a couple moments to realize she was in a soft bed with two thick blankets rather than the thin hard bed and ratty blanket she was used to sleeping in.
That's when she remembered what had happened.
The members of Voltron had taken her from the Galra cruiser and brought her onto their ship.
She couldn't be here. She had to get back somehow. The Galra may not be entirely kind to her, but they were the much better option between them and Voltron.
Commander Kyzik, her primary keeper, always warned that should she ever come in contact with Voltron, she couldn't trust them. They would lure her in with the promise of a better life and attempt to turn her against the Galra. And then once she had given them their trust, they would do worse things to her than the Galra ever did.
How could she have been so foolish as to allow a complete stranger to take her off the cruiser? Who else but Voltron would've been brave and stupid enough to attempt to free someone they considered one of the Galra's prisoners? She hadn't been a prisoner then, but she definitely was one now.
Maybe if she could find a control room or the main deck, she could send off a signal to Kyzik and warn him that she was in trouble. He would have no problem taking out Voltron in order to bring her back. She knew was valuable to him and she was counting on that to get her out of this mess.
Serenity took the blanket off and saw that her ripped clothing had been replaced with a clean black tank top and red and black checkered loose-fitting pants.
The idea that any of the members of Voltron had changed her made her feel sick.
She slowly eased herself out of the bed, and her legs nearly buckled out from under her.
Her head hurt like crazy, her entire body was hot and weak, and her chest felt so heavy that it was difficult to breathe.
She cried out in pain when she touched her wrists and saw that dark red lines encircled both of them as a result of being suspended by the chains.
But all of these injuries would be minor if Voltron got their hands on her.
Serenity pressed a button next to the door of the small cell, and it raised up for her. Nervously, she began trekking down the hall to try to find something that could help her contact Kyzik.
This place was absolutely ginormous. It was going to take forever to figure out where anything was.
But she didn't have that kind of time. She had to get out of here before the Paladins tortured her like Kyzik said they would.
Her heart sank when one of them appeared at the end of the hall. It was the one who had been wearing yellow earlier, but now he was dressed in a long-sleeved yellow shirt and a green polar vest.
"Oh, hey, you're awake," he said with a small smile.
Serenity quickly turned and bolted down the corridor.
"Wait!" the boy called after her.
But Serenity had no intention of stopping. She wasn't going to be their prisoner. She may have been foolish enough to let the Black Paladin get her into this castle, but she refused to let any of them do anything further to her.
However, her head was throbbing so much that she could barely see straight. All she knew was that she had to get away. She could work out the details later.
When she turned a corner, she collided straight into someone wearing a gray shirt beneath a green jacket.
Afraid and overwhelmed, Serenity turned and ran in the opposite direction.
"Hey, hold on!" the person yelled after her.
Two people had already seen her. And now they were surely going to alert everyone else.
She would never get away now. What would they do to her when they realized she had been trying to escape?
Serenity finally found herself on the main deck, but she was so preoccupied with getting away from all of the people attempting to hunt her down that she couldn't think about how to send out a message to Kyzik.
Her weakened legs faltered and she tripped onto the floor.
Several people ran into the room behind her, five of them she recognized from when she'd run out of the Black Lion and two others she hadn't seen before. The unfamiliar ones were not human as she determined by their pointed ears and the markings beneath their eyes.
Serenity backed away from them as far as she could go until her back hit the furthest wall in the chamber. She stared back at everyone with wide eyes filled with fear and panic.
When they started towards her, she flinched and curled herself into a tight ball.
"Wait, is she afraid of us?" the one with black hair wearing a red jacket asked.
"We don't know what she's been through, Keith," the tallest one answered. Shiro, he'd said his name was. "And I know better than anyone what it's like to wake up in a strange place."
The woman with the long white hair started to walk over to her, but Serenity curled tighter into herself and unintentionally let out a small whimper of fear.
"Okay, stay back," Shiro said firmly.
Serenity thought he was saying that to her, but she then realized he was talking to the other Paladins.
The man took a very small step towards her. "It's all okay," he said gently.
His voice was rich and smooth and enveloped her with its soothing touch. It was exactly why she'd allowed him to attempt to free her.
But she could not let herself feel that way again. She couldn't trust him.
"My name is Shiro, remember?" he told her, keeping his hands in front of him for her to see in the hopes that it would help her relax. "These are my teammates, Keith, Lance, Pidge, and Hunk. And these two are Allura and Coran. Allura is the princess of the planet Altea and this is her castle. Coran is her trusted advisor. Both of them are some of our closest friends and allies. I promise that no one is going to hurt you. You're safe."
Serenity's eyes darted around the room in fear.
"Allura, she really doesn't look good," the one Shiro had called 'Pidge' said quietly.
"I know," Allura answered.
"What's your name?" Shiro asked her.
Serenity didn't answer as her eyes continued to frantically scan the room. She didn't want them knowing who she was. Maybe if she kept her identity a secret, it would somehow protect her from them.
Too late, Shiro realized why she had been looking around.
Before anyone could stop her, Serenity stood up and bolted out of the chamber down another corridor.
The Paladins began sprinting after her as best they could, but for someone so ill, she was faster than they anticipated.
Serenity rounded a corner and hid inside one of the rooms. She quickly put a hand to her mouth to stifle her breathing so that no one would be able to hear her.
"Where'd she go?" Keith asked.
Tears of fear formed in her eyes as she began to tremble.
"I don't know," Shiro answered. "But she's got to be around here somewhere. Come on."
Serenity waited for their footsteps to disappear before she exited her hiding spot. She started to make her way back to the main deck to see if she could communicate with Kyzik now that everyone was scouring other parts of the castle for her.
Unfortunately, her vision started to blur and she could barely walk anymore. With the burst of energy she'd just had very quickly fading, everything rushed back to her all at once. She was now aware just how much her head ached and her chest hurt and her legs felt as if they might snap in two.
She put her hand to her head as if that might help dull the pain, but it only worsened. She could barely breathe. Everything hurt so, so much.
The world around her darkened, and she passed out onto the floor.
Lance ran down the hall and saw a lump of clothing laying at the end of it. "Hey, Allura, I got her!"
He and the princess raced towards the downed injured girl. Lance knelt down and took her into his arms.
"Geez, she's on fire."
"No, she isn't," Allura responded. "She probably has a fever, but there isn't a fire in sight."
"It's an expression," Lance smiled, finding it adorable how she had taken him literally. "It means she's really, really hot. Temperature-wise, I mean, not like by looks. Though she is that too."
Allura rolled her eyes.
Lance took the girl's hand and examined her wrist. "Man, they really did a number on her."
The other Paladins and Coran raced towards them once they realized they had found their newest addition.
"Shiro, take her to one of the cryo pods," Allura said. "That should help."
"No, wait," Shiro said as he knelt down next to Lance and felt the girl's forehead. "I recognize this. It's a Galra poison. They use it to torture prisoners. It's really brutal, and there's nothing to do except just…waiting it out and letting it run its course. Putting her in the cryo pod would probably just make her worse."
Allura sighed. It seemed the Galra had no limits in what they would do to their poor prisoners. What reason could this girl have to want to return and endure something like this again?
"All right," she conceded. "In that case, take her back to the med bay and we'll watch over her there. We'll also have to do our best to keep her from running off again or the poison will never be able to get out of her system."
Someone was carrying her.
Their touch was very gentle and protective.
There was a bed beneath her.
She felt as if her very blood was boiling inside of her.
"Take it easy. You're going to be okay."
Cool water touched her forehead, soothing the burning sensation.
A familiar feeling of energy emitting from her body left her even more weakened.
"Our main systems are failing!"
"What's going on?!"
"Where is this coming from?!"
"What is this?!
"It's coming from her!"
"Give me the anesthetic!"
There was a small pinch on her arm.
And then only blackness.