Recovery: Interludes

Of Course There's Guards

Description: It's only normal for a castle and the royal family to be guarded, so why the hell didn't the cadets call them for help? One guards in particular isn't going to let that stupidity slide. Takes place slightly after chapters 3 and 4 of Recovery.

Image: An edit of mine! The brunette is another OC (curtsy of a friend) named Nat!

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Heavy machinery was whirring, music blasting, and a not so calm off-duty guard ranted as she worked in the hangar with Pidge and Hunk.

"I can't believe them! We're literally a call away, and they don't think, 'hey! Let's call THE ROYAL GUARDS TO HELP PROTECT THE CASTLE FROM A BOMB THREAT'"

Nat was heated, and she wasn't about to hide it. She took her job seriously, as she's supposed to know who comes in and out of the castle, especially spotting potential threats among them. Except the two times the castle had intruders, both literally walking in without hesitation. She wasn't even there to help stop it,

"First Wade pushes past by waving his Skymarshall card in front of my soldiers, WHO DIDN'T EVEN THINK TO TELL ME ABOUT IT, and now a bomb disguised as Coran in our own castle?"

"You really shouldn't blame the others for Wade. He walked in citing a 'diplomatic meeting' after all," Pidge reasoned, "Plus, they're not in the Den Resistance like you are. They had no reason to stop him"

Nat glared at him from his desk, where he was reading over Black's diagnostics.

"That won't stop me from being pissed, though! They could've at least called him in to me!"

She passed another tool to Hunk, who was busy working on the wiring inside Black,

"At least we were there to take his weird droids down though, who let him design those things by the way, they just yell 'I'm full of myself!'" Hunk grumbled,

Pidge scoffed, "Oh absolutely, we can reuse their parts, but the screens are specially made for them, so we keep having to throw them out! It's a pain"

The two traded insults about their former boss, with Nat jumping in a few times with additional insults and questions if Wade really was as incompetent as they made him out to be. Then getting told they wish they were exaggerating. Only until hearing another familiar voice did they stop tearing into the old man,

"There she is, hey Nat!"

The three looked over at the cadets walking towards them, with Larmina heading straight for the woman of the hour,

"Boys, this is Nat, Captain of the Royal Guards. Nat, this is Daniel and Vince!"

Daniel cataloged another person into his growing list of important people in the castle. It was obvious she was out of uniform, as she was wearing rubber gloves and overalls over a loose pink shirt. A secondary pair of eyelids closed like Anya's did. He wondered if she had the same type of ears, and if she was the same type of alien, but couldn't tell as the brown hair that reached her mid-back covered them. Nat didn't look all too happy to see them, nor was she impressed with what she saw, instead she gave them an expression with as much annoyance as she could muster,

"Oh, don't look at us like that!" said Larmina, "You know we couldn't have just ran away and let that bomb do what it wanted!"

Nat huffed, "Doesn't mean you couldn't have texted! Hell, you could've called if you were mid-fight too!"

Daniel matched her annoyed look, "don't lump us into this since you're so mad about it! Vince and I are new here, remember?"

She grew even more annoyed at that, "of course I'm going to lump you guys together! It's a castle, dimwit! Of course there're guards!"

"To be fair, we were in the middle of a battle. It's kinda hard not to pay attention to certain death right in front of you," Vince added sheepishly.

"The kid's got pretty solid logic," Hunk said, not even turning away from the wiring,

"And logic is king!" Pidge chimed in,

None of that cooled Nat off. She knew Vince's argument was sound, but she wasn't about to let them off scot-free,

"Well, next time you face certain death inside the castle, your voltcoms have us, and specifically me, on speed dial. How did you guys take the thing down anyway? If he kept attacking you, he shouldn't have let you encase him like that"

The cadets tried to think of something to explain whatever the heck Vince did just earlier today, until Daniel landed on the easiest explanation,

"Magic"

"Ugh, I've had enough of magic, thanks," Nat said as she gestured to the robot lion currently going through the weirdest dentist visit known to man.

"Hey wait, don't blame us for fighting! The last time we had to fight stupid video robots Wade made for himself, and that's because you let him through!" blamed Larmina,

"Oh don't you start, I would've stopped him if I was there, and you know it!"

"How about just not letting people randomly walk into the castle, then?"

"Oh trust me Duchess, it won't happen again"

Larmina gave her a judging look, "yeah, we'll see about that"

The music kept playing, Nat and Larmina kept arguing, and the heavy machinery never stopped doing what they were doing as the rest of the boys kept working on the sickly robot lion in front of them.