Hey, sorry for making you guys wait for so long. I've been really busy and all, but I'm going to try to update whenever I have free time. Like right now. Hope you guys like it, and sorry again for the long wait.

:)

P.S.: thank you so much for 1.1K viewers. I love that you guys like my story.

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We run out of the control room and Lance shoots the control panel, keeping it closed, before running with us. We run down hallways, and in my helmet, I hear Pidge and Allura have a conversation, but I'm too busy running to pay attention.

"Hey, team," Pidge says. "Be careful." More than usual? "The Balmera is very unstable."

We run down a maze of tunnels until we turn a corner and come to a narrow corridor, guarded by four Galra soldiers. I think I can see a door in the darkness ahead, but I'm more preoccupied with the sentries.

I pant. "Awesome," I manage. "Well isn't this a surprise. Hello!" I tell the Galra. "We're looking for the core of the Balmera, but we got lost. Mind giving us some directions?"

They start shooting and I jump to the side, landing next to Keith.

"What was that?" he asks.

I shrug. "Worth a try."

He turns to Lance, crouching across from us. "Their shooting is destroying the Balmera," he tells us. "We gotta do something."

I stand and activate my shield and, before I can think my stupid plan through, I step out of my hiding place and block as many hits as I can. I hear the Balmera moan as some hits escape me and hit the walls.

"Nova!" Keith yells. "What are you doing?"

"Protecting the Balmera with a stupid, not at all thought out plan while you two find a plan. Why?"
He groans and slaps his forehead.

"Well, we can't shoot back," Lance says. "It'll just make it worse."

"I agree with Elsa here," I say, blocking another shot. The shot hits one of the beams holding up the ceiling. "Guys," I say. "I'm going to try to take the support beams out so they'll crush the Galras."

"No, wait," Lance says.

I jump when Keith's arm grabs me and pulls me behind the pillar. I turn to him to give him a piece of my mind, but I see him stare at Lance with a confused expression. I open my mouth and turn to Lance only to see him pointing in different directions, and changing his facial expression.

I raise an eyebrow. "Are you have a seizure?" I ask.

Lance gives me a deadpan look, but I stop paying attention when I see Keith climbing a ladder, and decide to follow his example. We start crawling down the narrow tunnel as Lance starts taunting the Galra. We crawl a bit more until we're right next to the Galra.

"On three," Keith says, counting off his fingers. "One..."

I ignore him and jump down, Keith following my example. Keith slashes one in half, while I kick one, stab the other, cut the second one's head off, then cut the first one's head off. Lance deactivates his shield and gives us a thumbs up and a silly grin.

I smile as I shake my head.

"Let's go," I say.

All three of us walk down the hall to the door at the end of it. It opens automatically and we walk in. the core is quite impressive. It's like a huge tree. Or a huge mushroom. Depends on how you look at it. I decide to go with the mushroom, getting some Alice in Wonderland vibes.

"I don't like this," I say, looking all around me. "Not one bit."

"Me neither," Keith says.

The others are all here, so is Shay, whom I recognize thanks to Hunk describing her to me. Suddenly, all of the doors slam shut. I turn and bang on them. I don't notice Keith and Lance going to the others.

"Not an ambush. More like a trap," Shiro says helpfully. "Whatever it is, keep your guard up."

I raise my dagger and walk up to one of the doors, trying to pry it open.

"The Galra," Shay says. "They gained knowledge that you would return to Balmera."

"How?" Pidge asks.

"I know not. But they set this trap just for you. I was the bait."

"Who could have possibly known that we were heading here to save Shay?" Shiro asks.

"Rolo," Hunk says with distrust dripping off his words. "Those liars must've told Zarkon."

Okay, I personally highly doubt that, for many reasons. Number one, they failed to bring in a lion and a paladin. They've already screwed with the Empire, so they're out of the equation.

"We have to figure out how to get out of here," Shiro says.

I grunt. "Well, I'm trying to open a door, here," I grunt. "A little help wouldn't be unwelcomed."

"Wait!" Lance says. "We have a giant Castle ship hovering in the sky." He looks up. "Allura, can you please come get us?"

I roll my eyes as I hold the tiny opening I'd managed to make, with my foot and my back. "How do you expect her to do that, genius?" I ask.

Lance turns to me. "I don't know, maybe they got teleporters or something."

"Dude, this isn't Star Trek."

Honestly, Star Trek is not my favorite show, but my dad used to watch it every night to relax after work, so I sort of know some of the plot, and the opening lines by heart.

"We're quite occupied at the moment," I hear Allura's voice over the coms.

"Funny, I thought they'd have disabled the com system," I grunt just as my foot slips and I fall. "Gah!" The doors shut. "No, no, no!" I pound on the doors.

"We're completely surrounded by Galra ships and we're taking heavy fire!" Allura stopped talking for a minute and I heard blasting and Alien Weasley saying some incoherent words. "Paladins, you need to get out of there as soon as you can!"

I stab the doors with my dagger, trying to open them again.

"This is it!" Lance cries dramatically. "We're going to die in here. I can say bye-bye to that parade."

I leave my dagger in the door to pick up a pebble and toss it at Lance. It nails him right in the back of his helmet.

"Ow!" he screams, rubbing his helmet, and turning to glare at me.

"Stop being a drama queen," I say, going back to trying to pry the door open.

I hear Keith snicker and blush a bit.

"Get it together, guys," Shiro says, trying to calm us down. "Allura, we'll get there as soon as we can."

"If you people decide to help me," I say, as I try to pull the doors open, to barely any avail. "Argh, this is useless!" I kick the dented doors.

"Perhaps my people can help us get out," Shay tells us. I walk over to them, intrigued, and stand next to Keith as Shay puts her hand on the core. "This is how we communicate. The Balmera senses our vibrations and sends a message to those in the tunnels."

That's super cool.

"Are you sure someone will be able to hear your... hand from all the way down here?" Keith asks.

I elbow him in the ribs. "Have a little more faith," I murmur. I, for one, believe Shay.

"The Balmera will deliver the message," Shay assures us.

She closes her eyes and the core starts glowing and I hear the Balmera moan softly.

Allura's voice crackles over the coms and I look up. "Paladins, the lions are in danger!" she sounds frantic. "You must get back to them immediately! Paladins, do you copy? There's a battle cruiser locked onto us. If it fires with its ion cannon, I don't know if we can survive."

"We're trying, Allura," Lance says, scratching the back of his helmet. "Shay's pressing her hand against a wall, which apparently sends vibrations to the other rock people, who vibrate back or something? Hand talking? I guess the answer to your question is 'yes, we copy'."

I roll my eyes. "They're aliens, not bats," I tell him. "And I believe what Shay said. And by the way, it's called communication, Haircut."

"Is that my new nickname?" Lance asks, winking at me.

"Yes," I reply. "Among Elsa, and some others that I will come up with along the way. And we've already talked about the flirting. I'm not your type, and you're not mine. I've even told you about my crush!" I whisper that last part.

Lance shrugs. "Yeah, I know."

It was true. At the beginning of the schoolyear at the Garrison, the year Pidge joined, Lance had tried to flirt with me. It took me a while to figure out he was flirting, since he was very low-key about it. To be precise, Pidge told me. Afterwards, I found Lance and let him down as gently as I could. Thankfully, he understood and didn't take it the wrong way. Otherwise, things would've been much more complicated.

And now they were. I was still mentally kicking myself for telling him about my crush on Keith. Knowing him, he'll team up with Pidge and together, they'll try to set us up. I wouldn't be surprised if I learned that he'd already planned the wedding.

Maybe I could bribe him with Jammie Dodgers to keep quiet. Though I doubt that'll work. I know Lance enough to know that he is a great guy, very loyal and funny, but he is also super romantic. He flirts, he sets his friends up, I wouldn't be surprised if his mom was Aphrodite. 

"Shay, are you sure the Balmera is sending your message?" Shiro asks, snapping me out of my train of thoughts.

I roll my eyes. "Will you guys just trust her?" I say, exasperatedly. "Maybe she needs concentration."

Suddenly, one of the doors caves in, and I turn to see.

"Well, there's another way to get out," I say.

Once the dust clears, I see four Balmerans standing in front of the broken door. Two are women, one very old looking, and the other two are men. I recognize none of them.

"Rax!" Shay exclaims.