Third Person POV

The paladins were on the bridge of the castle, on a comms line with Kolivan and Keith discussing things about Lotor and their next attack.

"Entire Galra fleets have been mobilized. Zarkon seems to be out looking for Lotor," Kolivan says.

"It's only a matter of time before he gets the empire back in order," Shiro says. "We need to take advantage of this moment."

"What are you getting at, Shiro?" Allura asked.

"Now is the time to assemble the coalition that Voltron has been building. With intelligence obtained by the Blades and coalition observers, combined with Pidge and Nyle's Galra tracking software, we now have a detailed map of the Galra Empire," Shiro says as he pulled up a map. "I've identified an intermittent line of coalition planets that runs through the territory. If you look closely, there's only one Galra-occupied planet left on that line."

"Naxzela," Allura says.

"Exactly. If we can capture Naxzela and solidify that line, we can cut off all the Galra troops behind it from central command and use our position to defeat them," Shiro says.

"Wow! We could take back a third of the Galra Empire in one fell swoop," Pidge says.

"Do we have a plan for it?" Nyle asked.

"We attack several locations across the region, at once. First, we'll have to cut off communications between the region and Galra Central Command by striking the satellite relay station orbiting Vantax Five," Shiro says.

"Pidge, Nyle, and I can handle that," Hunk says with a thumbs up.

"The Blades have informed us of two Galra defense systems coming online called Zaiforge cannons. Now, these cannons can strike any target within our combat theater. The first, in high orbit around the planet Teq, will be attacked by coalition air forces led by Matt and Captain Olia. Kolivan will lead a Marmoran strike team against the second cannon, located on the surface of Senfama, which is vulnerable to a covert ground attack. We intend to take control of these cannons and use Zarkon's own firepower against him. Once the coalition forces and Blades neutralize these targets, Galra defenses will be weakened, allowing us to take down the remaining Galra-occupied planets in this area. While our forces are taking control of the planets, Naxzela will already be under attack," Shiro finishes.

"By whom?" Allura asked.

"Voltron and the Purple Lion," Shiro replied.

"Aw, yeah! Team Voltron's gonna drop in Naxzela, form Hunk's giant laser cannon and be all like, 'Pow! Pow! Pow!' Easy-peasy," Lance says.

"Unfortunately, not that easy," Shiro starts. "Naxzela will be tough. It's heavily fortified by Galra. Our attack must be swift enough to neutralize the Galra forces before they have time to contact Galra Headquarters. 'Cause, if they call for reinforces, we'll be caught in a fight in two fronts."

"If this works, the Voltron Coalition will possess a third of the Galra Empire's territory. It will be a massive victory," Kolivan says.

"And inspire a whole new wave of rebellions," Allura adds.

"There's no time to waste," Shiro says.

Some time went by, leaders and coalition forces came as the Paladins changed into their armor, Shiro facing them as he spoke.

 "All right, Paladins, it's time to gather the coalition. Friends and allies from across the universe must come together to take on the Galra. With their help, we'll have a chance to turn the tides of this war. We all knew this moment would come, and we are more prepared now than we have ever been. Let's do this."

They all separated into different teams, leaving each other. As Hunk, Pidge, and Nyle were meeting with the rebel forces, they were met with Nyma and Rolo. 

"We heard about the Voltron Coalition against Zarkon," Rolo says. 

"Yeah, we heard about you, too," Hunk replied, holding his hand out for Rolo to take.

"Matt told us that you guys have been helping the coalition forces," Nyle finishes.

"You guys really inspired all of us," Rolo says, taking Hunk's hand.

Beezer made a few noises, looking towards Pidge. Pidge gave a slightly upset look as Beezer made a sad look. Pidge finally broke and hugged Beezer.

"Oh, Beezer, I can't stay mad at you!" She shouted.

The paladins made their way back to the bridge where everyone else was, getting ready to do a broadcast for the coalition about the attack on Naxzela.

"All right, Princess, it's time to begin the broadcast," Coran says. 

"Have we secured communications?" Allura asked.

"Yes," Pidge responded. "Matt and I used the rebel's transponder encryption."

"Always helps to have a pair of tech-genius siblings around," Coran says, messing with his mustache.

The crystal started glowing as an image of the castle, connected to all these different-colored circles before Allura started to speak.

"Fellow members of the Voltron Coalition, if you are hearing me now, it is because you have pledged to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with us in our fight against Zarkon's enslavement of the free peoples of the universe. But that enslavement is about to be dealt a crushing blow. The time for a full-scale attack on the Galra Empire is now. Far in the future, when they speak of this day, they will speak of our sacrifice, but they will also remember this as the day that freedom began to overtake tyranny. You all have your missions. You know what to do. Good luck. We'll see you on the other side," Allura finishes.

Nyle POV

Hunk, Pidge, and I were making our way to the satellite in the Green Lion to stay cloaked as Shiro spoke to us through Pidge's arm device. 

"When you finish knocking out the communications hub, meet us at the rendezvous point," Shiro says firmly.

"Copy that, Shiro," Pidge says as she ended the comms line, talking to us. "According to its trajectory, it passes through the dark zone in five ticks."

"No pressure," Hunk says as Pidge started counting down. "Just the entire coalition rests on us disabling this Galra comms station."

I rub his back soothingly and smiled. "Hey, we'll be done with this quickly. Don't worry alright?"

He smiled at me and nodded. Pidge finishes counting and we all jumped out, activating our jetpacks before flying in undetected. 

We came in shooting, Hunk blowing the door open as Pidge and I came in starting to fight. We took down the sentries as the commander ran to the panel down below. Hunk got cornered by a sentry as he looked at us. 

"Pidge, Nyle, we can't let them trip that alarm!" He yelled.

I shot an arrow at him, causing him to stop in his track and allowing Pidge to wrap her bayard around him. She jumped at him, but he managed to dodge it and grab her arm. He threw her as I shot another arrow at him, which he got hit but it didn't do much. She managed to jump on him and wrap herself around him to try and drag him back but he fell back, causing her to hit the ground first. 

I kept shooting at him, hitting him a couple of times before he rammed me into the wall and caused me to get winded. Pidge grabbed his leg and made him fall over before Hunk yelled out.

"Pidge, duck!" He yelled as he body-slammed the commander. We hacked into the panel, Pidge used her program to get into the system. I used mine to override anything that tried to counter our hack as we contacted Shiro.

"Comm system hacked, ghost signal initiated," Pidge says. "Fully automated, so Galra HQ thinks it's running,"

"We have about eight hours before they figure it out," I add.

"Until then, no calls get in or out," Hunk says.

"Coran will monitor it from the castle so we know when it's back online," Shiro says. "Great work, guys." 

We high-fived each other and headed back to everyone else, getting to our lions. The team formed Voltron and I quickly activated my shield generator as we took down a cruiser on our way down to Naxzela's surface.

A bunch of cruisers started to surround us as Shiro spoke up. "Alright, Paladins, we've only got one chance to take Naxzela, so let's make it count." 

We started to attack all the cruisers, taking them down and shooting at all the Galra installments on the planet around us.

"Incoming cruiser, three o'clock!" Lance warned as Voltron moved away from the blast and I shot the cruiser down with my laser. Voltron flew up before something behind them exploded.

"What was that?" Allura asked.

"I didn't see-" Lance was cut off from another explosion.

I flew up before running into something and it exploded on me, flying back a little. "What the hell is going on?"

Voltron went back towards the surface before another explosion made them fall forward. I tried to rush and help but I was quickly tossed around by a bunch of explosions. 

"What's hitting us?" Shiro questioned.

"We're in a minefield. Somehow, the bombs were cloaked," Pidge says.

"Shield. Shield!" Hunk shouts as Voltron forms the shield to defend from the cruiser laser.

"My systems are able to detect the mines, but there's just too many to safely maneuver through them," Pidge adds. "And, with the cruisers covering all possible exits from this minefield, we have no way out."

I shot at the cruiser to allow Voltron to move from the blasts. But every time I shot, more just kept coming.

"Wait a tick. Perhaps I can freeze the mines," Allura says.

"Yeah. Then we might have a chance at flying out of here without them exploding," I added.

"All right, that sounds like a plan," Shiro starts. "Freeze 'em Allura."

Voltron disbanded as Allura used the freeze ray to freeze all the mines.

"Let's move!" Shiro shouted. "Form Voltron."

The lions went up, leaving me by myself for a while before they came back down. "Great work, team. Let's secure Naxzela," Shiro says.

As we were beginning to take down all the cruisers and secure most of the area, Coran showed up on our screens.

"The communications satellite is back online. Galra distress calls are going through," He says.

"It doesn't matter, Coran. They're too late," Shiro says. "We've just about secured Naxzela."

"There's another Galra battle cruiser approaching Naxzela," Coran adds.

"It doesn't make any difference, Coran. We have Naxzela," I replied.

After the news of the Galra cruiser coming towards us, our cannons went down.

"That incoming battle cruiser must have shut them down remotely," Coran points out.

"Sorry, Shiro. That's it for artillery support," Keith says. "What should we do about that cruiser?"

"That cruiser's gonna be too late," Shiro responds. "Naxzela's almost secure. We just need to take out the last of the heavy artillery. On our left! Shield up!" 

Voltron pulls the shield out before blocking the blast and knocking it back at the cruiser. I shot at the cruisers, doing some damage but nothing too big.

Then Voltron flew up and formed the shoulder cannon, hitting a bunch of vital targets at once. Voltron landed back on the ground as the planet moved, making us think we moved it.

"Whoa! Did we cause that earthquake?" Lance asked.

"I don't think that was us, Lance," I said.

"Guys, look over there!" Hunk exclaimed as pillars started rising from the ground.

"Uh...guys, what are those?" Lance asked.

"We've never seen anything like this from the Galra before," Pidge says.

"Are they weapons?" Hunk asked.

"They look like some sort of generators," I replied.

"Stay alert," Shiro warns.

"I say we get outta here," Lance urges. "Pidge, plot a course for our escape."

"Hold up. We should find out what these things are," Shiro says.

Then the pillars powered up, covering the planet with some sort of purple force field.

"This can't be safe," Hunk says.

"Do you feel that?" Allura asked. "That wave of darkness?"

Then there was some sort of pushing force that caused me to feel heavy.

"I can't move Red!" Lance exclaimed.

"Yellow won't budge, either!" Hunk shouts.

 Since my lion was still up in the air, I plummeted down to the ground like a missile. I yelled out at the sudden drop and groaned at the impact, wincing on hitting the ground harder than I thought I would.

"Nyle! Are you ok?" Allura asked, worried.

"Yeah, yeah I'm good. Are you ok?" I asked.

"I'm fine," She replied as Voltron fell to its knees.

"This energy field is holding us down! Gravity levels are spiking!" Pidge exclaimed.

"We have to get out of here!" Shiro yells with a grunt. "If we stay here, we'll be crushed. Everyone, we have to focus. Give everything you got and maybe we can fight through this energy field. Ready?"

"Ready!" We all shouted at the same time.

Voltron got up and took off. It took me a little longer but I put a good amount of power into my thrusters and followed behind them.

We fell back down not long after flying up, completely incapacitated at this point. 

"Is anyone else able to move around?" Hunk asked.

"Barely, but the gravitational pull is worse on Voltron and the Purple Lion," Pidge says. "Maybe if we go down to the surface, Hunk, Nyle, and I can figure out a way to interrupt this energy field."

"That sounds good, except for the zillion robot dudes still kickin' around down there," Lance adds.

"We're gonna have to stay in tight formation," Shiro starts. "Watch each other's backs. Let's move!"

We all managed to get together safely and made a run for one of the pillars and got down on one with sentries shooting at us.

"Pidge, Hunk, and Nyle do your thing and do it fast," Shiro says.

The three of us dropped our shields and scanned for the information about the pillar. 

"This rod seems to go all the way down into the planet's core," Pidge says.

"I'm not detecting any kind of energy source on the planet that could be causing all of this," I added.

"Then we'll need to follow it down to the core," Allura says.

There was a bit of beeping before the door opened up. "It's open! Let's go!" Pidge yelled as we all went inside the pillar.

We jumped off the side and fell to the bottom, using our jetpacks so we didn't die. We found ourselves in a room with a giant glowing purple ball.

"What is that?" Lance asked as we walked inside.

"This is Zarkon's witch's doing," Allura replied. "The energy I felt...this must be the source."

"Allura, this facility...it looks Altean," Shiro says.

"I'm afraid you're correct Shiro," Allura says as we walked closer to the ball. "This is a decommissioned Altean terraforming plant. Somehow, the witch has been able to reactivate it remotely."

"Can you shut it down?" Shiro asked.

"I can try," Allura says as she reached her hand out, blue light coming from it. Then a bolt came from the ball, electrocuting Allura as she screams out.

"Allura!" Lance yelled as we all came to grab her away, getting electrocuted in the process.

The lightning bolt thing pulled back as we all fell to the ground.

"Are you okay?" Lance asked, helping Allura get off the ground.

"It's too powerful," Allura says.

Hunk groans as he looked at the dirt in his hand. "This soil is weird. It's so white and powdery, like ground-up rocks or earth. And heximite!"

We started getting shot at, everyone putting up their shields except Hunk, Lance, and I as we shot back at the sentries. 

"What's heximite? Some of us may have slept through chemistry," Lance said.

"The whole planet is a bomb," Pidge says.

"One that's big enough to wipe out several solar systems," I added.

"It's under increasing pressure, and when the pressure reaches a certain point, it's going to explode," Hunk says.

"How long do we have?" Shiro asked.

"Maybe 20 minutes if we're lucky," I said.

"We have to get off this planet and warn everyone!" Lance exclaimed.

"Anyone within ten solar systems of us is going to get blown to bits," Hunk says.

"They could take out Voltron, the rebels, and the Blade of Marmora in one fell swoop," Allura says.

We all activated our jetpacks and made a beeline for the door to get back to the surface. We got back to our lions and worked on trying to get them off the ground.

"Coran! Keith! Do you copy?" Shiro questioned, trying to reach them. "Anyone? Hello! We've lost communications. Pidge, can you boost our signal?"

"No, there's too much electrostatic repulsion!" Pidge replied.

I sat down and took a look at our timer before this thing goes off. "Guys, we have to hurry. We only have seventeen minutes left."

"We have to get off this planet immediately," Allura says as they started getting Voltron up.

I couldn't get my lion up, so while they stood, I was still on the ground. But they cracked the surface and only sunk down further between the cracks.

"Oh, no! We've fallen even further down!" Lance exclaimed.

"Fifteen minutes!" I exclaimed. "What do we do?"

"No! We can't die here. Not yet," Pidge says.

"Listen. We've come through a lot as Voltron. We just have to think," Shiro says.

"Allura, you felt the dark energy when it first started. You have a connection to this magic. I know you can get us out of this somehow. We all saw what you did on the Balmera and how you power the castle," Lance says.

"I-I don't know. I haven't been trained," Allura responds.

"No one trained you to save the Balmera, but you did that. I know you can do it. There's a reason the Blue Lion chose you. You're the one who brought everyone together. You can do this. Every moment we've had together, they've all led to this day. This is your destiny. You are the heart of Voltron," Lance finished.

"Okay, I'll try," Allura says.

I saw a bright blue light coming from the crack where they fell before my cockpit started to glow bright blue. 

"It's working!" Shiro exclaimed.

I was able to fly up again without falling, and I saw Voltron shoot up as well. I flew behind them as they busted a hole into the force field, flying through it as I followed.

"Thank you, Lance," Allura says.

"That was all you," He replied.

"I hate to kinda break this moment but we still have to defuse that bomb!" I shouted.

"Keith, can you hear me?" Shiro says.

"Shiro! Where are you? Is everything ok?" He asked.

"Not for long if we don't stop Zarkon's witch," Shiro starts. "She must be aboard that battle cruiser."

"I'm way ahead of you," Keith replied. "And I brought some backup."

"Coran, you need to get as far away from Naxzela as you can immediately," Shiro says, connecting to the castle. "Pick up any members of the coalition who are nearby, but go."

"Wh-what's happening?" Coran asked.

"Naxzela is a bomb, and it's about to go off," Allura says.

"But what about you?" Coran asked.

"We'll stop it if we can, but we need you to do this," Allura says.

"Yes, Princess," Coran says hesitantly before disconnecting.

"Thrusters are at max power!" Lance exclaimed.

"I sure hope we make it in time!" Hunk yelled.

"I don't think we're gonna make it!" I shouted.

Just as the planet was glowing brighter and brighter, it suddenly went down.

"Naxzela is returning to normal! You did it!" Coran exclaimed. 

"Good work, Keith," Shiro says.

"It wasn't me," Keith replied. "It was Lotor. The cannon on his ship was the only thing powerful enough to take down that shield."

"Attention, Paladins of Voltron and rebel fighters," That's Lotor's voice. "I know we've had our differences in the past, but, I think it's time we had a discussion."