The Gold Paladin

Taking Flight

The room was silent, empty except for the sleeping woman lying on the bed. Novae opened her eyes slowly, her sight adjusting to the soft glow of her bedroom lights.

Her mind quickly brought forth the memories from the past day, and as she sat up in bed, she immediately felt the itch from her bandages.

"I suppose I must inspect the scars." She whispered to herself, carefully taking removing the bandages from her arms and chest.

Novae walked up to the mirror on the other side of the room and smiled at the sight of the scars she had gained.

They were not her first scars, though she had never had scars such as these before. The one on her chest was shaped as if she was cut from the right shoulder to the top of her ribs on the left side. Another scar was on her right shoulder, and a larger scar on her abdomen on top of a large bruise.

All over her body were several smaller scars that were nothing more than badges of honor in her mind. They were symbols of how she gained strength throughout her years fighting in this war. And she had no regrets in having any of them.

Novae quickly changed into her casual clothes, but stopped when she saw spotted a mark on her right leg. She carefully knelt down and grazed her fingers over the mark.

"I will have to fix this mark. If I am unable to use my legs, then it will cause future problems." She muttered.

Pulling down her pant leg, she slipped on her boots and left her bedroom. Novae smiled when she felt the cooling air that spread throughout the halls. It was calming for her to not have so much stress about being attacked in her sleep.

This was the only place where she could feel safe. However, that is if only she could keep her secrets....

Certain things should be kept in the dark, away from the eyes of the light.

🦁🦁🦁~~~~🦁🦁🦁

The team watched the pod holding Lance inside, waiting for him to wake up after healing. However, much of the team was impatient about his release.

"I can't tell if he looks healthy or not." Hunk wondered aloud looking through Lance's sleeping form in the pod.

"I think he's breathing weird." Pidge said as his face was smudged on the glass of the pod. Even though Pidge was worried about Lance, his concern was more focused on Novae. But her condition had improved greatly, so Pidge left her side to see Lance wake up.

"Oh, come on!" Keith sighed and was about to release Lance, when Allura quickly slapped his hand away from the glass.

"Not yet! A few more ticks." She said.

"How much better do you think she's gonna get in a few more ticks?" Keith asked.

"And what exactly is a tick?" Pidge asked.

"You know, a time slice." Allura clarified.

"What, like a second?" Shiro compared.

"What is a 'second'?" Allura asked, confused by Earth time stances.

"Like this." Pidge pulled out a small timer and showed Allura an Earth second ticking by.

"I'm not sure. I think ticks are bigger." Allura said turning to Coran, "Coran, do you have a ticker?"

"Right here, Princess." Coran said pulling out a smaller timer. He turned it on and compared it to the second the team had.

Pidge looked back and forth from his timer.

"I think we need to start them at the same time." Pidge said. Both sides restarted their timers and on the count of three, we started the timers.

"Yeah, we're winning." Hunk exclaimed.