Hello and welcome! this fic is already complete in my ao3 account, by justmeandmysillystuff. If you read it complete please leave a comment!
The picture belongs to ikimaru on tumblr:

Enjoy!

"Well done, you damn genius! You ruined everything!"

"Me!? It was you who fucked up the thing!"

"What do you mean the thing ? See? You don't even know how this castle works!"

"For fuck's sake! It took you weeks to realize the castle was a damn ship!"

"And you yet haven't realized that mullet looks ridiculous!"

"Guys! Calm down!" Lance didn't even notice Shiro was in the room until he felt the hard press of his robotic hand on his chest, pushing him away from an equally infuriated Keith "What's going on?"

His slim fingers curled and clawed into Shiro's grip, senseless and drove by mere fury as he tried to set himself free. He didn't acknowledge the presence of the other paladins in the control center, nor the fact there maybe were more important issues to worry about. Hell, he didn't even acknowledge Keith right then. Only a voice he wanted to outsmart, and a face he wished he could sink his nails on.

"What's going on, you ask?" Said face opened its mouth again, and the noise could have been the roar of a rusted engine for all Lance knew "Ask that smartass!"

Even though Shiro didn't have two metal arms, his regular hand was still strong enough to keep a wild, enraged Keith from killing his prey cold blooded. Lance stared unamused as the restless tangle of fury attempted to escape its restrains, and it wasn't until he thought of the perfect sneer that he realized he must have looked fairly pathetic himself.

He tried to calm down, but with every new insult or punch Keith threw into the air, he found his own muscles clenching again and betraying him into anger. It took the sight of a very much disappointed Allura, standing with her arms crossed and her eyebrows knit, for them to finally find their cool.

"Enough!" The sweetness of her royal accent wasn't enough to conceal the hatred in her voice, as Shiro let go of both of their shirts and let them fall to the ground "May I know why is the Red Lion not at its base!?"

What had been some serene full seconds of silence, were followed by yet another round of insults and pretexts between the two paladins. Which, of course, weren't very appreciated by the rest of the team.

"It was Keith's idea to-!"

"Lance was the one who fucked up the-!"

"I don't care whose fault it was!" Allura pinched the bridge of her nose "Just tell me what happened, and where on space is the Red Lion!"

Lance and Keith stared at each other and, for the first time in what felt like hours, it wasn't a look of menace. Once they realized the princess' wrath would fall upon them both equally, their eyes met with some sense of solidarity. Sympathy, maybe. The indisputable knowledge they were both just as doomed.

"Princess Allura!" Before either of them got the chance to think of a proper defense, Coran had entered the room looking considerably agitated "We are heading towards a dangerous amount of quintessence! I need you to pilot us out of here, before it sucks us in and destroys us!"

The look of sympathy between the two guilty paladins wasn't late to turn into a wise sense of fear, as Allura's expression morphed in realization.

"What is that quintessence, exactly?" She asked Coran; voice serene, left eye twitching.

"It's a space hole! Just like the one that sucked Voltron into that parallel universe that one time! Remember? The evil Altean empire? This one's much smaller, but it's still dangerous! We can't risk getting through it with the ship!"

He spoke impatiently, with a worried grimace peeking from under his moustache.

But Allura didn't seem to be listening to his latest warnings. Her attention was fully set, instead, in the pair of clumsy idiots and the guilty look of horror now plastered on their faces.

"Keith, Lance…" She said between her teeth "Please tell me the Red Lion is not where I think it is"

"Well, technically we can't read your mind, so we don't know exactly what you are thinking, my fair princess" Lance tried, speaking to nowhere as not to look at Allura in the eye "Therefore, we can't really tell you if Red is actually where you think it is, since…"

"THIS IS NO JOKE!"

The rest of the paladins stared in pitiful silence, as if they were about to witness a cutthroat. No funny ice-breakers from Hunk, no witty comments from Pidge. Only Shiro looked like he wanted to say something, but he seemed too nervous to open his mouth.

"Did the Red Lion…" The princess proceeded, seemingly scared of her own question "…fall through the quintessence hole?"

Lance glanced at Keith with the corner of his eye, only to realize they were staring at each other. All malice had already withered within them, proving once again the bipolar nature of their relationship. They were partners in crime, after all. It was only logical for them to fall into yet another express, compromised friendship.

At least, for as long as Allura's scolding lasted.

"We just wanted to investigate, ok?" Keith acted confidently, although his avoiding stare said otherwise "I tried to pilot Red but Lance said he's the red paladin now and he should do it, and he got into the lion with me and we started arguing…"

"We didn't touch anything, I swear! It was the lion who spit us into the empty space as if we were garbage!" Lance added.

"Yeah! We were just…having a little fight"

"Exactly! A tiny, little fight…"

The vein in Allura's forehead looked ready to combust.

"And so you just let the Red Lion jump through the quintessence hole!?"

"There was nothing we could do!" Lance said "The Lion went freakin coo-coo! We tried to get into Blue and stop her before it was too late but she was gone before we could say our prayers!"

Within the tense atmosphere, no one had noticed Pidge pulling out her laptop. The situation left little room to attention. It was only after she cleared her throat that she gave herself a presence, and every head in the room turned to look at the young girl in the corner, face hidden behind her massive glasses, reflecting numbers and symbols from the screen.

"I'm trying to locate Red but she's nowhere to be found" She muttered through her focused pout "Her coordinates are nonexistent"

"We went through one of those things before, right?" Hunk showed up too "We could do it again and look for Red"

"Last time we had Voltron" Pidge said, matter-of-factly "We need it because it's made from the same material as that force, any other ship would be completely destroyed. And we can't form Voltron without Red"

Lance saw Allura cover her own mouth with dread, and he couldn't help but feeling disgustingly guilty. Again, his childish nature had gotten in the way, and he had proven himself and the team his latent incompetence. Shame wouldn't even let him share the fault with Keith, who still looked way too temperamental to feel somewhat sorry. He wished he could blame him, he wished he could turn the guilt into hatred and let it out in some insult about his mullet, but he was in no mood to fool himself right then. He had been foolish enough for one day.

"Don't let your hopes down, team. We will find a way out of this" Shiro clapped, the noise muted because of the metal hand, but getting everyone's attention all the same "We just need to think of something"

"This quintessence hole is significantly smaller than the one we dealt with before" Pidge spoke swiftly, eyes still on the screen and fingers still typing restlessly "Maybe we don't need Voltron, maybe the mass of the Black Lion is enough to get through it by itself"

"I can do the calculations, check if there really isn't any danger" Hunk ran towards one of the castle's processor units, losing no time to start working "Coran, please help me out"

"I'll be piloting" Keith didn't hesitate either "My skills may be necessary and the Black Lion is my responsibility now"

"I'll go with you" Shiro put a hand on his stiff shoulder and they nodded at each other understandingly, any previous sign of tension suddenly melting as both former and current black paladins made their way to the biggest lion "Keep it up, everybody. We'll get Red back!"

Everyone moved around the castle in an instinctual, perfect pace; fitting into the team and playing their role like the essential, functioning gear of a motor. Just like with Voltron. They all connected and worked together as if they were one. Shrio was always the heart, the leader, the common spirit fixing them all together. Pidge was the undeniable brain. Hunk was enviously functional, the skilled and so necessary hands. And Keith, Keith was the guts. Keith was the passion and the drive and the verve. The man of action, the very first punch, the adrenaline running through every nerve. He was difficult to rival; his instincts and his power of will were a hard goal to achieve, and his shoes were way too big for any nobody to fill.

Everyone had a purpose, everyone had a role to fulfill.

Everyone but Lance, and his way too small feet.

Lance paced around the lion in the childish hope he could somehow make the time pass faster. It didn't. If anything, the constant rumble of his footsteps made the flight even more annoying for everyone around.

What logic told him had barely been a couple of minutes could have been hours for all he knew. Coran had suggested it was better if they gathered some speed before thrusting into such a large amount of quintessence and Shiro had taken the advice way too seriously, flying a bunch of kilometers away.

"We need to stay together" He had said "All of us should go, so in the case of finding any enemies we don't have to fight alone"

In the end, both Alteans had stayed at the castle. They couldn't fly such a huge ship it to the mission, plus they needed someone to keep an eye on the space hole while they were gone. If anything happened to the portal while they were away, there was a chance they wouldn't be able to get back to their universe.

The Black Lion's main cabin wasn't built for five paladins, especially not for those one with restless, pacing feet. So as Shiro piloted and made some preparations for the journey, the rest of the team was limited to a cramped space of action. Hunk was counting their food supplies, in case they had to stay there for a long time. Keith was sitting by the window, and Pidge was still investigating the quintessence through her laptop. Out of mere boredom, Lance ended up looking over her shoulder.

"Watcha doin'?" He asked, making her jump a little "Calculating the chance of us dying a painful, intergalactic death?"

"Nope, there's no way of reaching that percentage" She said, paying little to no attention to the nosy head breathing over her neck "And besides, if I happened to know the prospect, I'm pretty sure you wouldn't be happy to hear it"

"Yikes" It didn't scare him as much as it probably should have "Any chance we end up in a parallel, perfect reality where beautiful Cuban people have taken over the universe instead of the Galra? I would be a great emperor"

"I don't think there's quintessence enough in the entire cosmos to take us to such a far reality, Lance" The fact she wasn't even laughing made it even more insulting "Quite the reverse, actually. This is a pretty small portal, that other universe shouldn't be very different from ours"

"Boring! What's the point of traveling through realities if you don't get to see crazy stuff?"

"Finding the Red Lion" This time, she did smirk deviously "Which you lost"

Lance hid a genuine pout with a silly, theatrical one.

"I came here to have fun and honestly I'm feeling so attacked right now"

Pidge shrugged, giggling to herself, her eyes not leaving the screen even once.

Lance gave up. Somehow jokes didn't quite feel like jokes, and he wasn't able to distract himself from the insisting weight on his chest.

He instinctively turned to look at Keith, who was leaning over the window, mindlessly playing with his clasp-knife. The scene seemed oddly familiar, and he couldn't help but remembering those dreading road trips with his family back on earth. Every now and then, Lance or his sibling would misbehave, they would kick the front seats or mock each other, until his mother turned around from the driver's seat and distributed a random share of smacks. The situation usually ended in a quiet ride, with his mother driving tranquil, and one or more guilty children staring through the window in frightened silence.

That was exactly how Keith looked like right then. Pouty and sorry and low-key angry, like a kid who had just been scolded but was just too proud to whine.

"What's up, mullet?" He approached him, driven by that intermittent sense of solidarity, the compulsory brotherhood of feeling like hell "Everything ok?"

The loud sigh he let out was enough of an answer.

Lance sat down with him, for the first time feeling somewhat welcome since he stepped into the ship. After all, when they had a common enemy to keep them from fighting each other, he wasn't that bad of a company. And right then they were both facing together a monstrous sense of guilt.

They fell into a comfortable muteness he pretended to know how to perform, but it didn't take long for him to give up and fill in the silence.

"If you are going to fool around with a knife, you better do it properly" He teased, taking the sharp toy away from his hands "Wanna play the knife game?"

"The knife game?"

The look of confusion on his face reflected thrice as badly on Lance's.

"The knife game! You don't know the song?" The obliviousness was insistent "How can you call yourself a knife enthusiast if you never played the knife game?"

"How do you play?"

The lack of obvious rejection was certainly comforting. There were usually two default reactions Keith could have towards Lance: feverish annoyance, or outright indifference. The latest was the worst. Lance payed more attention to the red paladin that he cared to admit. He preferred to consider it just an unwanted side-effect of their rivalry, the classical need of acknowledgment from the enemy. It was better to be grudged than forgotten, in the end. And Lance wouldn't let Keith forget his name ever again.

"The rules are simple" He said, opening the clasp knife and meeting his smiley reflection on the blade "You put your hand down like this, and try to stick the knife through all the places between your fingers without stabbing your own hand"

"That's stupid"

"You are stupid" He pushed aside any interruptions, going back to his explanation "And while you play, you have to sing a song"

"What song?"

Lance spread his fingers and plucked his tongue out in concentration, ready to show off his talents.

"Oh, I have all my fingers, the knife goes chop chop chop. If I miss the spaces in-between my fingers will come off" He recited by memory, skillfully rolling the verses in sync with his hand "And if I hit my fingers the blood will soon come out. But all the same I play this game cause that's what's all about"

He didn't know if Keith was really paying attention, but considering it included knives and a fervent competitive spirit, he most probably was.

"Oh chop chop chop chop chop chop, I'm picking up the speed. And if I hit my fingers then my hand will start to bleed"

He dropped the knife and did a small reverence, not missing the way Keith rolled his eyes in reaction.

"Why would anyone want to play that game?" He scoffed, crossing his arms and leaning back onto the window.

Once again, the pattern was persistent: either annoyance, or indifference.

Lance didn't like that last option.

"What is it, are you scared?"

Dark, petty eyes went back and forth between the window and the blade

"No way…you are just doing it too slow"

The smirk of sheer satisfaction as Keith pulled the knife away from his hands was almost inevitable.

"Oh? I thought you said it was stupid?"

"Shut up"

Lance observed as Keith repeated his movements, swift and agile and disturbingly familiar with the weight of the weapon in his hand. His concentration face was funny, sort of. Not the expression itself, but the fact those could have been the same knitting of brows and frowning of lips he wore during a battle against the Galra.

It was mesmerizing to watch the game, both thrilling and distressing. Back at the garrison, when he played with his friends at lunch, it was the same twisted feeling. Few understood the joy of risk. Few understood that small rush of adrenaline that came with hazard. And very few understood that, sometimes, that's all the emotion one can possibly get.

Unconsciously, he traced the old scar still staining his middle finger.

The point wasn't to feel pain. The point was to feel you had the chance to feel that pain. That there was something to fight for, a purpose, even if it was the ridiculous victory in such a foolish game.

What would be the purpose of not playing at all?

"Keith, Lance! Stop that, you'll ruin the floor" Shiro threw a disapproving glance at them, forcing the game to an end "The Black Lion is about to accelerate, we need to focus on our mission"

Before they could even open their mouth to complain, Shiro took the small clasp-knife away. He leered down at them, both fatherly and childishly, making his way back to the pilot's seat.

Lance stared slyly at Keith only to realize he was looking back at him, mouth agape and hand still clutched around an object that wasn't there anymore. No knife, no game, no excuse.

He was about to say something, anything that sounded like an apology without being one. But before he could open his mouth, a subtle grin cracked on Keith's stoic face and Lance remained quiet. Blinking the shock away, he smiled back.

The game was stupid, the game was risky, and the game was nothing but a silly call for attention.

But the game was worth it, and Lance didn't want to stop playing.

To say Lance was scared was an understandment.

Even though he would probably have preferred the term "cautious", "wary" or "thoughtful", there was no way to conceal the multiple shivers queuing to go down his spine.

The Black Lion had accelerated and so had his heart, and as they flew right towards the quintessence hole at full speed he almost voiced a prayer.

"Hey Hunk" He called out, leaning over his friend, using his much bigger body as support "Remember that time at the garrison when the older kids tied you upside down all night and you swore you could feel your stomach in your throat?"

"Uhm, yeah?"

"I think I kind of understand how you felt right now"

The sound Hunk let out through his nose wasn't exactly a laugh, and Lance wasn't exactly pleased.

"I truly don't recommend you to stand by me right now, buddy" He said, hand pressed onto his belly "If you truly remember how that day at the garrison ended, then you'll be wise and avoid having to do some cleaning"

"I don't mind you throwing up" He really didn't, he was way more focused on the yellow crack of light about to gulp them whole "If you do, though, point the load at Keith"

The red paladin didn't gift him more acknowledgement than an aggravated glance from the other side of the room, and it didn't last more than some glorious seconds before his attention went back to the frontal windshield, where the glowing quintessence hole only continued to get bigger and brighter.

Lance wondered if Keith's face looked the same as he turned around. Was he still frowning? Was he indifferent? Did the portal's glow make him narrow his eyes? Did his brows rise and his mouth fall open as they got even closer?

Was he scared?

"Ok, be ready guys" Shiro blew out, hands gripped powerfully around the controllers. Even though Lance didn't get to see Keith's expression, he didn't miss the way his hold tightened onto the pilot's backrest "We are going in"

The engines of the Black Lion let themselves be heard, buzzing loudly into the empty space, and driving them fast and straight into the yellow hole of luminescence.

They didn't even have time to take one last look at the stars. Everything around them, the castle, the asteroids, the emptiness of the sky; it was all swallowed by the golden hurricane of beam.

Lance looked around, mouth agape, staring dazedly at how the lights played with the shadows in the ship. The shine was everywhere; eating up the sky and the reflections of every window and the glint of everyone's eyes.

"Woah" He wasn't the only one in trance, apparently. Hunk had walked all the way over to the front glass, pressing his hands against it "Does everyone else feel like they just met god?"

Without even looking at each other, they all nodded simultaneously.

The experience was so brute, so odd and surreal, that the familiarity of meeting the starry sky again as they made their way out felt somehow uncomfortable. As if it didn't belong there, as if the stars and the clouds they were so used to were foreign, misplaced. After such a journey they seemed to be waiting a much bizarre destination, to the point they felt fairly weirded by the landscape they knew so well.

"Is everyone ok?" Shiro asked sternly, still tense and in full pilot position.

"What a ride" Pidge adjusted her glasses "That was pretty cool"

"I suddenly don't feel nauseous anymore" Hunk said.

Shiro let out a breathy laugh, letting go of the controllers.

"That was so intense , what the hell" Lance jumped in his place and grabbed the pilot's bicep like a little child "Can we do that again? Pretty please?"

"It's not a rollercoaster, Lance" Keith stated "We need to find the Red Lion first"

"Which reminds me…" Shiro stepped in, standing up from his seat "That's your duty, Lance"

Everyone, even Lance, seemed surprised about that.

"Me?"

"Yes, you. You are the current red paladin, aren't you? You have a connection with Red, only you can find her now"

Only you.

Only you can find her now.

"Well, if you insist…" He pursed his lips, keeping the foolish joy from tugging at his mouth as he sat on the pilot's seat.

Again, his eyes fell on Keith, looking for that tiny spark of conflict, of jealousy. But it wasn't there. Much to his disappointment, his expression was strictly indifferent.

"You need to concentrate, come on" Shiro grabbed his shoulder comfortingly "Try to think of Red, connect with her"

But it wasn't that easy.

Right then, all Lance could think about, was the feel of the controllers under his grip and the seat molding onto the shape of his back. He was so alert, so overly-conscious of his every moment and every cell of his skin that was in contact with the Black Lion. The Black Lion. He was in front of the Black Lion.

"Feel anything yet?" Pidge asked, inpatient.

"Shhh, let the Chosen One work at his pace" He retorted quickly, trying to fit his fingers into the pressure prints some previous pilot had left at the levers. Had Shiro grabbed onto them so tightly? Or had it been Keith?

"Come on dude, being in another universe is sort of freaky, you know?" Hunk clutched his arm too "The faster we get out of here, the better"

"I know, I know" Lance took a deep breath, fixing his posture a little and stretching his neck "Ok, here I go"

He closed his eyes, trying to ignore the levers and the seat and the thundering beat of his heart; all becoming a distraction, all keeping him away from his lion.

"Come on, concentrate" He ordered himself "Red, Red, Red, Red…"

"Can you feel it? Do you see her?"

"Uhm, eh…don't worry, I just need some more time"

He ducked his head forwards, gritting his teeth and his grip on the controllers. He cleared his mind, trying to think of Red and only Red, his lion. Was it his lion, though? Was he really the Red paladin?

"You really can't sense her? Is she that far away?"

Every single one of his muscles was rigid with effort, as if he were trying to find just from which fiber of his body did he have to clutch out an answer. He could feel his own hands beginning to tremble around the levers, and he wondered if everyone else could notice.

"Anything yet?"

"What do you see?"

"Lance?"

"Wait!" In no second, all eyes had fallen on Keith "I can feel her, I can feel Red!"

"Are you serious? How is that?"

"That's so cool, Keith!"

"Well done!"

As everyone suddenly gathered around the Red Paladin, asking him questions and making him lead their way, Lance's hold became loose around the controllers.

He stood up in silence, leaving the pilot's seat free for Keith to use.

"There! I see something!"

Pidge's announcement had everyone standing up from their seats, heads up and eyes open wide in the desperate search for a view that wasn't just another patch of empty space.

"Finally! Is it the Red Lion?"

"Let me see, let me see!"

The paladins all gathered in front of the window, noses stuck to the glass and eyes narrowed as they tried to shape that small spot in the distance into the Red Lion inside their minds. Everyone was cheering with anticipation, elbowing a pushing each other a little bit just to take a good look. Everyone, except for Keith; who was still sitting in the pilot's seat with his head down and his eyes closed in concentration.

Lance gave up on his attempts to look over the huge mass of Hunk's body, who was blocking him the view entirely, and his attention fell straight onto Keith instead. The ease of his features made his stomach revolt. Not the seat he was taking, not his hands fitting into the levers like they were carved onto them. No, it was the easiness with which he piloted what made him jealous the most. The guy was in the lead of Voltron's biggest, central ship, which required a fair amount of focus and mutual comprehension with the lion; all while he tried to contact another lion lost in the vastness of space. And beneath all of that pressure and tension, he still managed to pull a straight face.

He was talented like that, his long-time rival could tell better than anyone else.

So as soon as he saw that small frown suddenly cracking between his brows, his lips slipping into a pout, Lance got the bad news earlier than everyone else.

"Uhm, guys, that is not the Red Lion" Hunk's remark did nothing but assert his suspicions, and as he turned around to stare at the window once again, it wasn't disappointment but sheer surprise what got his jaw to drop.

There was no red but shining, stainless white. There were no paws and claws but towers, long and vast and equipped with propellers. And he was pretty sure those glints of blue light weren't feline eyes staring at them from the darkness; there were glowing columns, and windows, and huge alien mechanisms worth of a genius engineer.

No, that certainly wasn't the Red Lion, but it certainly wasn't an unknown ship either.

By the time Keith opened his eyes and joined the bewildered parade of reflections in the window, the so familiar Castle of Lions, their home for the last year, was clear and visible through the eternal night of space.

"No way" Hunk slapped his own face with both hands "We came back to the castle? Have we been flying in circles?"

"I swear we didn't" Keith almost stammered "I feel Red, she was the one to take me here"

"Maybe she's inside, she just messed with us and now brought us back"

"That's impossible, there's no way we went through the quintessence hole again without noticing" Pidge looked confused, as if she was starting to wonder maybe science had betrayed her "Unless…"

Four demanding pairs of eyes weren't late to fall on her.

"Unless what?" Shiro had the audacity to ask.

"Unless this isn't our castle"

Suddenly, the homely sound of the opening hatches showed them the way inside the ship with no hesitation, as trusting as ever, welcoming them aboard.

Maybe it was his natural impulsiveness, or the fact he insisted he had followed the Red Lion to that exact place, or perhaps it was the general familiarity of the castle and its lights and sounds; but Keith was immediately piloting them inside the castle with no hesitation.

"Stay alert" He said, as if he hadn't been the one to just drive them right into known unknown territory. Or was it unknown known? Lance's head was beginning to hurt.

"Is this...this universe's version of our castle?" asked Hunk.

"Apparently, it is"

"Wait, so there are weird other versions of ourselves in here?" Lance gasped, holding onto Pidge and shaking her with zero mercy "That means there's another princess Allura in here!? We have been blessed!"

"Shut up for once" Keith snapped "We don't know how these people are going to act, they are not us "

"Ow, come on! Why do you have to be such a fuddy-duddy all the time? I bet you are just afraid I'll be so much cooler than you in this reality. Maybe you just clean the toilets here"

"You are a pain in the ass"

"You are an ass"

"Guys, stop" Shiro didn't seem to be in the mood for more fights "Not now"

If Shiro's warnings hadn't been enough, then maybe the small thud of the Black Lion landing was what finally gifted the team some full seconds of quietness.

The interior of the castle was exactly the same as they knew, the same tunnels, the same lightening, the same odd Altean technology...same five lions standing proudly on their bases. They had to land at some of the extra spaces, since the Black Lion's usual spot was already taken, and Lance couldn't help but wonder how long would it take the passengers of this castle to realize there were two of them.

"IDENTIFY YOURSELVES!"

Well, not so long apparently.

"Is that…?" Hunk gasped as soon as he heard that voice through the speakers, somewhere between terrified and excited, as he seemed to recognize the accent way too well.

"Princess Allura" Shiro spoke firm and clear "I know this may some odd, but we are the paladins of Voltron, and…"

"That's ridiculous! My paladins have been in the castle all day. Who are you and how did you get pass out security systems?"

They couldn't see her, she was probably talking to them from the control room, but her voice was still as scary and intimidating as their Allura's. So much, that none of the paladins dared to speak back at her. Only Shiro, though he seemed fairly disturbed as well.

"We flew right in! Look, the castle recognized us. We are from a parallel universe, our Red Lion jumped through a quintessence hole and ended up right here, we just want it back"

The hum of nothing being spoken to the microphone let them knew the princess was debating the idea. And, for a second, they had hope.

"Activate castle's defenses!"

Easy comes easy goes. And hope was fast to go as soon as the first laser guns started shooting from the walls.

"What do we do!? What do we do!?" Lance screamed, breaking out his shield.

Everyone looked at Shiro, waiting for a plan, wanting to know what the leader had to say.

"Run for your lives!"

The first one to react was Hunk, who immediately threw himself through one of the ventilation ducts and the rest of the team just followed him instinctively like a herd of stupid sheep. They knew the ship like the back of their hands already, but they weren't exactly familiar with the ventilation tunnels. So all they did was scream and crawl even faster as soon as they heard the alarms going off. Which seemed to be an acceptable plan for a few seconds, until they came across a forked path and realized they had no idea of where they were heading.

"Oh no, which way!? Where are we!?"

"We are gonna die!"

"Hunk, you are not helping"

"Keep moving!" Keith left no time to oppositions, as he crawled his way to the front, not looking really worried about the destination "We don't even know where we are going! It's worse if we just let them find us!"

"Stay right here, mullet! We need to think of a plan!"

"Lance's right, Keith!" Shiro said, trying to hold him back "We can't just move around blindly"

But Keith was never the one to follow orders, nor to just sit and wait for the enemy to find him.

"No, bad mullet! Bad mullet!" Lance shouted above the alarms "Who do you think you are? Come back here!"

"Make me"

And that was is.

If the situation hadn't been chaotic enough as it was, it certainly broke some sort of shameful record as soon as Lance got a hold of Keith's armor and held him back violently, marking the beginning of an awful wrestling echange.

"Guys, stop!"

"Knock it off!"

Just to add to the ridiculousness of the overall situation, the quarrell seemed to suffer some kind of spider web effect, and every gentle hand who tried to stop the fight just got stuck and tangled into the ball of senseless fury. Shiro's mechanical arm got trapped between someone's legs, Lance had blindly gripped onto Hunk's headband, and Pidge had instinctively stuck her nails in what she supposed was the bridge of Keith's nose. Everyone was screaming they should stop, but no one was actually letting go of each other, afraid they would simply end up crushed or asphyxiated between the tangle of wild limbs.

The tunnel was too tight and unprepared to hold such amounts of fierceness, though. And before any of them could discern the sound of loosening screws, the hutch underneath gave up and all five paladins fell in a cloud of debris.

Lance blinked several times, trying to push the weight of Hunk's leg away from his face, and adjusting his vision to the sight of a very familiar ceiling. The impact made edges blurry and shook colors a little, but there was no way to mistake that room. He sat up, confident, with a ridiculous sense of homeliness keeping him calm and oblivious, taking in the view of the automatic doors and the semi-circle of benches. He smiled.

"Shiro, look!" He said, noticing the captain was the only one who had been able to sit as well "We are at the common room!"

But Shiro's expression wasn't one of delight but of sheer horror, as he stared wide-eyed at something right over Lance's shoulder.

Only then, he heard the unmistakable beeping of a laser weapon.

He turned around to find himself nose to nose with the cold muzzle of a gun, but he couldn't bring himself to be scared on the slightest. Blue stainless steel rifle, one inch of canon diameter, shooting speed of 2000 meters per second. He knew that fusil, he knew it way too well. As well as he knew the long, scrawny fingers curled around the trigger, and the little, clumsy gasp of shock that left the assaulter's mouth.

Lance looked upwards, and blue eyes met brownish skin, met the shape of a long nose and pointy, stubbled chin; large ears, thin lips, and a scar cracking through the left eyebrow like a lightning.

Blue eyes met blue eyes.

No one got to speak a word as Lance McClain met Lance McClain. Older, taugher Lance McClain; grip loosening around his weapon and mouth falling agape as he mimicked the expression of his panicked target, and stared into his own shocked eyes.

After five eternal seconds of plain contemplation, it was the two of them, in unison, who broke the eternal silence:

"WHAT THE CHEESE !?"