The Purple Paladin

Chapter Four : Team Bonding

I awoke early the next morning and began to prep for the day. I had decided that if I had any free time today I would train and learn to wield my bayard. It was different than the bow I had used back on Animaria so I knew it would take some getting used to. My room was fairly large so after putting on my armor I grabbed my bayard and started twirling the double-bladed weapon. I had been practicing for maybe 20 minutes when the castle's alarm system started to go off. "Everybody up! Zarkon is attacking!" Allura shouted through the speakers.

Without hesitation, I sprinted out of my room and down the hall at top speed. I'm joined seconds later by Shiro who's also wearing his armor. We hear pounding footsteps and I look over my shoulder to see the others following us, except Lance for some reason.

"The castle is about to be destroyed!" Allura yells.

I press myself to go faster and spread my wings, "I'll see you guys in the control room!" I yell and streak away down the hallway my wings working powerfully to increase my speed even further.

I enter to see that we aren't under attack at all but that Allura was tricking us. I sigh, 'I bet they're doing this to train us to be ready at a moments notice.'

The rest of the team runs in, still without Lance, and I notice that Hunk is still in his pajamas. It takes a little while for them to notice us standing there during which Coran takes things way to far by pretending Allura is dead. Finally, I cough to get their attention causing them to look up, "Coran that wasn't necessary. We were already here by the time you started doing that."

Coran shrugs and Allura turns to us, "You're all very lucky that wasn't an actual attack. It took you... Uh, Coran how long did it take?"

"75 degrees," he says, we all stare at him, "Oh sorry that was a meat thermometer." I facepalm.

"However long it took, it was too long. You must always be ready for battle. Look at you! Only Shiro and Victoria are in uniform. Alec, at least, has his bayard. Keith, Pidge, Hunk, where are your bayards? And where is Lance?" Allura scolded.

Then the door opened and the missing paladin walked in, still in his pajamas, "Morning, what's going on?"

"Coran and I have been up for hours getting the castle back in order. We had to run a test on the alarms and decided to test all of you as well. Guess who failed," Allura said angrily.

"Hey, you guys were asleep for 10,000 years. After everything that's happened in the last... however many hours it's been, I'm still trying to process what's happening. I don't even know what day I'm on anymore," Hunk says.

"It's the third quintess of the spongolen movement. Hump day!" Coran says.

"That's a lot to process," Hunk repeats.

"You must understand the stakes of our mission. Over the last 10,000 years the castle has been picking up distress signals from the following locations," Allura says, pulling up a map peppered with blue dots, "So we have to assume Zarkon has conquered most of the known universe. Earth is here," She continues and moves to show the others home planet, the area around it was filled with blue dots, "An attack on your planet is to be expected."

"Oh no," Hunk whimpers.

"And let's not forget that Victoria and Alec just lost their home to the Galra," Coran adds, shooting us a sympathetic look.

Allura nods, "Exactly, our mission is to free all those planets. Coran and I are getting the castle ready to leave. During that time, you have to learn to form Voltron, so we can beat Zarkon."

"She's right, let's get to our lions and start training," Shiro says.

Pidge looks up, startled, "Right now? But I wanted to talk to those prisoners we rescued."