After Season 7

3 words.

Lance ran towards the briefing room. He noticed the activity all around him. He nearly collided with Pidge and Hunk at the front door.

"You two aren't leaving are you?"

"We were looking for you, to find out what the Quiznack is going on." Hunk replied slightly defensively.

"Yes so what exactly the hell IS going on?" Pidge demanded. We didn't get any kind of notifications or anything.

"I wonder if Shiro was trying to give you an out to be with your families," he paused a tick thinking about that. "but, this is a high alert. I don't know what's going on yet. Although, I can say for sure we need both of you."
Was
The trio walked briskly towards the briefing hall and as they walked they were joined by other Garrison officers, MFE fighter pilots, and Voltron alliance partners. Slav bounded up and Hunk caught him.

"Did any of you have peanut butter today?" Slav looked at the Paladins and MFE Pilots specifically. "Well?" He insisted. "I believe this version of reality is influenced positively by peanut butter. I tried it today. It's clearly the leading commodity of this little blue ball you live on." Slav noticed the 4 MFE pilots and Lance's uniforms. All were in brand new Paladin armor. He shrieked, jumped from Hunk's arms and tried to stop him by hanging on his leg. He yelled. "You have it all wrong! You can't change roles till the 9th Varga!"

Hunk picked him up and allowed him to curl up on his broad shoulders like a scarf. "That's why we are still here, this is clearly only the 5th and they still need back up and training, I also had peanut butter at lunch."

"Whew." Slav was relieved. And snuggled in tightly to Hunk's neck.

Lance squinted as he entered the briefing hall. "Shiro isn't here?" Lance asked. More thinking aloud than actually expecting an answer.

"That's odd." Leifsdottir replied with a monotone that gave Hunk goosebumps.

"He's probably making preflight rounds, right? Right?" Hunk unsurprisingly sounded freaked.

On the raised platform ahead, Allura stepped to the microphone. Veronica handed her a notebook from the table. Coran stood to her right and Sam Holt to her left. The room, which seconds before was a garbled muddle of sounds, grew silent. "At 1500 hours today," Allura began, her voice tinkling off the rafters of the massive hall, "the young Altean woman who had been the power source for the mysterious robeast, awakened, a varga, um, hour? later she passed away. She said several indecipherable, incoherent words and 3 words which were very clear. Those words were Witch, Lotor, and of most pressing concern, Acxa." The room collectively gasped. "We have no context. We don't know anything now except that when we spoke with Keith one uh..." Veronica whispered something in her ear "Yes. Week ago, he was fine. Sick of the food but fine. He did tell Shir.. um, Captain Shirogane, that he mostly trusted Acxa despite not being clear on her motives for helping us. Since then communication has been dark. The Captain and part of the on-duty portion of the crew is aboard Altas, inspecting the ship, the Lions, and the Fighters. Please report immediately to a 1st shift posting. We embark absolutely as soon as possible. We will get to Keith, and make sure there is no immediate threat. You are dismissed."

Lance turned to the crew who had followed him into the hall. "All MFE pilots are to report directly to sleeping quarters, understood?"

"Sir, yes sir!" The four original MFE pilots and the dozen new ones sounded off as they saluted. Lance turned to Hunk and Pidge.

"I'm going up there." He pointed to Allura.

"Makes sense to me." Pidge said, then added, "I'm going to sleeping quarters on Atlas. I was up tweaking MFEs before the sun came up. Hunk? You with me?" Hunk nodded.

"Agree. Oh. And Lance," Hunk put his hand on Lance's shoulder, "wake us up if you learn anything new okay?"