The Sixth Paladin

Chapter 16

"Somewhere in Sendak's memories, we should be able to find the inside information that gives us the key to take down Zarkon." Allura said. We're all gathered around Pidge, who was going through Sendak's memories.
"I don't think your father would approve of searching through an enemy's memories." Coran said.
"I know. But we have to do anything we can to beat Zarkon."
"Once we learn all his weaknesses, we can drive up to his front door and challenge him to a fight. Winner gets the universe." Lance said proudly. We all gave him a look.
"Anything good Pidge?" Shiro asked, deciding to ignore Lance.
"We were only able to salvage bits and pieces."
"We need something to work with. Right now, we don't even have a decent map of the empire." Keith said while sighing. He uncrossed his arms and grabbed my hand, pulling me closer. Who knew for such a hot head he could be such a softie?
"Who needs a map? After 10,000 years of conquering, I could probably fire my bayard at any random point in space and hit a Galra ship." Lance said.
"If we could just find troop locations or supply routes, small targets we could hit and run. Then we could start to free planets one by one." Shiro said.
"Boring. I want the big kaboom." Lance said, sliding next to Shiro.
"Zarkon's been building his empire for 10,000 years. We're not going to tear it down over night with six inexperienced pilots and one support ship. Hitting him where he lives would be a huge mistake." Shiro said.
"Okay. I've cross-referenced Sendak's memories with the info I got from the downed ship on Arus. Most of it was a garbled mess but one thing kept repeating, something called a Universal Station." Pidge explained.
"Universal Station? Like the kind of station that controls the entire universe?" Hunk asked, moving in front of Pidge. She moved his head out of her way.
"Well we are translating it from Galra so it could also be Galactic Hub."
"Or Space Base." We all gave Lance a look again.
"What?"
"I'm pulling up the location of your Universal Hub Station Base on our screens now." Coran said. He went over and pulled up what looked like three planets.
"So, where is it?" I asked.
"I don't know. Our long range sensors are unable to find anything at these coordinates."
"Maybe he remembered it wrong." Keith said.
"Or maybe we just stumbled a top secret base in Sendak's memories." Pidge said.
"Only one way to find out. Let's go take a look."
*After a while of flying through space.*
"We should be close enough to get a good scan but far enough way to avoid being noticed." Allura said. I heard Hunk let out a small yell, I turned to see him on the ground. He fell out of his chair that we was sleeping in. I walked over to stand next to Keith while stretching. We moved around a planet and saw a Galra base sitting between that planet and another one.
"There it is."
"It appears the gravitation between the two planets warps the electron emission spectrum enough to keep the planet off the deep space scanners." Coran explained.
"So you can only see it if you really know where to look." Pidge said.
"This place must handle shipments from all over the Galra empire." Shiro said.
"If this is some big airport where shipments come and go, why is it hidden?" I asked.
"There must be more to this than we're seeing."
"Then, we'd better go down to take a look. We'll need to enter here, the central control building." Allura said, pulling it up on the screen.
"I'm sorry princess, did you say we?" Keith said.
"I'm going with you. I've traveled through the Galra transportation hubs many times with my father before the war began. I know more about them than any of you." She explained.
"Princess, I'd rather you stay here." Coran said.
"I'm a part of this fight as much as anyone. I'm going. Does anyone have a problem?" Coran began at stammer as we kept silent. Honestly, I wasn't going to question it, Allura scares me a bit. Coran looked to Shiro who shrugged.
"Fine. Suit up." Coran screamed and we all looked at Shiro.
~~~
"We'll go in low, fast and hopefully undetected. Coming around the dark side of the nearest planet should keep them from getting the visual on us."
Pidge activated the invisibility cloak on her lion.
"Thanks to Pidge's modification on the green lion, we'll have thirty seconds of cloaking."
"I can flood their short range sensors with a radiation burst. That should buy you a minute or so while they assume it's a cosmic interference. But after that it's up to you to stay out of sight."
~~~
We managed to sneak in the control room. We knocked out the guards quietly. We stood around Pidge as she hacked into the computer, with the help of Shiro's arm.
"How does it look out there?" Shiro asked Keith, who was keeping watch.
"This shouldn't take too long." Hunk said as he finished plugging stuff in.
"We'll have all the information we need in a few minutes. Hunk and I have made some improvements since the last time I tried to download Galra info. We should get a nice clean translation immediately. Hunk had a great idea to do it." Pidge explained while typing.
"Yeah, you guys remember when we studied algorithms at the Garrison, and Mr. York told us the joke about ghosts learning symbolic logic and innumerably infinite sets?" Hunk said.
"Boring!"
"Right, yeah it was totally boring. Anyway the joke goes-" Lance groaned and Keith spoke up.
"Hey guys, sorry to interrupt but I think we got company." We all crouched down to avoid being seen by the ship that was flying in.
"Think we should get out of here?" I asked, moving over to Pidge.
"We just need a few more seconds."
"Stay low. We need that intel." Shiro said. Suddenly the computer beeped and a Galra soldier appeared on the screen.
"Get down." Keith said. He dragged me out of the way as everyone else moved.
"He's still looking. I think he's waiting for a signal or something." Lance said.
"I got it." Hunk said. He pulled one of the knocked out soldiers and lifted it up to the screen. He moved the hand to give it a thumbs up, the Galra soldier on the screen disappeared.
"Nice job Hunk." Lance said walking over.
"Thanks." He said, holding up a Galra arm that Lance high fived.
"Okay, download complete.
"What's it say?"
"Nothing. This place doesn't have any useful information. Just a schedule of the ships coming in and out."
"Well I guess this mission was a bust." Lance said.
"Let's get back to the castle."
"Hold on. Pidge do you know where that ship is headed?" Allura asked, pointing to the ship outside.
"It's scheduled to be here for about half an hour, then head off to central command."
"That's where they have the information we need, and I'm going to sneak aboard and get it for us." Allura said.
"What? No way!"
"How are you going to get in?" Allura took off her helmet.
"I'm going to walk right through the front." She said, then her skin started to change color and she grew taller. We all gasped.
"How the heck did you do that?" Hunk asked the question we were all wondering.
"The Alteans are chameleon like people who can blend in with the local population. It's the ability that's made us great explorers and diplomat's trough out our history."
"So can you turn into like, a balloon?"
"How many different colors can you be at once?"
"Aren't you afraid you'll rip your pants?"
"No, just one at a time, and I will need a change of costume. I can use his uniform as a disguise." She said, looking at the soldier.
"I can't let you go alone." Shiro said.
"Excuse me? I don't need your permission." Allura said, quite sassy. We all gave Shiro a look.
"It's too dangerous. I'll go with you."
"You will stick out like a Choferiak's nose."
"You're going to need that nose princess. Shiro's hand is made from Galra tech. It's the only thing we have that will allow us to interface their systems and gather intel." Pidge waved Shiro's arm around, who didn't seem bothered.
"I can monitor the download remotely from here." Allura sighed.
"Fine, you can come."
"Uh guys, you better hurry up if you guys want to get on and off  before the ship leaves for Zarkon's central." Hunk said, they began to leave before Keith stopped them.
"How are you going to get Shiro in board?" They gave each other a look.
In the end Shiro wound up in a supply cart with Allura pushing it.
"They're in." Lance said. Me, him, Keith and Hunk are watching them from the window.
"What do you think they have in all those giant containers?" Keith asked.
"I suspect it's sporks." We gave Hunk odd looks.
"This is an advanced race we're talking about. Surely they've learned it's foolish to have forks and spoons when one tool will do the job." I sighed.
"Maybe this guy will help us. What is coming in and out of the station?" We looked over to Pidge who had one of the robots hooked up to her computer.
"Interrogation detected. Initiating lock down." The robot said.
"Not talking, eh?" She leaned forward and furiously typed on her computer.
"Whoa, check this guy." Keith said, making us look out the window again. It was a guy in a hood talking to the guards with the containers.
"Whatever's happening that requires the base to be kept secret must have something to do with that scary dude. I'm going to go check it out." Keith said and started walking out.
"Whoa wait, no you don't. We should stay here and not blow our cover." I stopped my boyfriend.
"Well someone has to check it out." He argued.
"Then I'll go with you." I started for the door.
"No you don't." I stopped him.
"Don't you dare try to argue with me, I'm just as stubborn as you are." I pointed at him. He sighed.
"Fine, let's go."
"Hey guys we really shouldn't leave." We ignored Lance.
"Don't go through that door!" We went through the door and left them behind.
~~~
Now we're outside watching the guards push the containers with the cape guy. We follow them, they go through a door, that we hurry and go through before it closes. Knocking out guards, we walk into a giant room that's full of the containers. We see a container on a conveyor belt, going towards some kind of orb. The stuff inside goes into the orb making it glow. The guy used Galra magic at the orb, a purple liquid coming out the bottom and filling another container.
"What is that?" I whispered.
"I have no idea." He whispered back. He connected the glasses part of his helmet to send what he was seeing to the ship and Pidge.
"Coran, you need to see this."
"I've never seen anything like it." Coran said, while gasping
"What is it?" Pidge asked.
"The material is quintessence, the substance with the highest know energy per unit volume in the universe."
"Hey nice job Pidge you made him work for us." Lance said. Oh, so that was the robot talking.
"What? That's impossible." Coran said.
"Raw quintessence is transported from here throughout the Galaxy and refined into standard Galra fuel requirements."
"Did you guys hear that?" Pidge asked.
"I can't believe it! They've found a new way to acquire quintessence."
"Guys, I'm going to steal some of the quint- whatever." Keith said and began to run off.
"Wait, Keith get back here!"
"You coming or what?" He asked. I sighed and ran after him. We waited at a door. The container that is now filled with quintessence, came by on a cart and Keith grabbed it. I looked out to see the guy gone.
"Keith, where'd he go?" Keith looked out. Suddenly the man appeared behind Keith and knocked him over. I got my bayard and charged, but he easily shoved me way with his magic. I skidded on the ground next to Keith, the man taking the container. We both ran to him, he kept disappearing every time we tried to hit him. When he was gone for longer, we looked up to see him on a platform, and tried to hit us with his magic. We ran to get out of the way, nearly getting hit. We used our jet packs to fly up to him. Keith tried hitting him, only for him to use his magic on him and throw Keith across the room, hitting one of the containers.
"Keith!" I yelled out. I heard crackling, I turned to see the man standing behind me.
"Oh quiznak." I said.
"Pidge I need an extraction now! Korra move!" Keith yelled out. I jumped back as the man shot out his magic. I ran over next to Keith. We used our jet packs to fly around the room, avoiding the magic. Keith got hit and dragged me down with him. We ended up on the conveyor belt, the man behind us. Keith pushed me slightly behind him, which normally I would roll my eyes at but I could care less at this point. The man was getting ready to shoot, when the roof suddenly began to collapse. When the dust cleared we turned to see the green lion.
"Get in! We got to get Shiro and Allura!" Pidge said. We went inside, Keith stopped and looked at his hand.
"Hey, you okay. That throw looked like it hurt." I asked him.
"Yeah I'm good, just tore up my glove." He gave me a smile and we went inside the lion. Once inside the lion, we flew out to see the ship beginning to take off. Just as the ship took off, a pod flew out. The door to the lion opened, I saw Shiro, but something was missing.
"Where's Allura?" Shiro didn't look up from the ground.
"Shiro?"
"She sacrificed herself to save me." I let out a small gasp.
"So she's still on the ship?" Pidge asked.
"The ship that's headed for Zarkon's central command?"
"The place that's way too dangerous for us to attack?"
"It's doesn't matter how dangerous it is. We can't let Zarkon get Allura." Shiro said, looking at us.
"But you said going there would be a huge mistake. You said for us to attack that place head on would be the dumbest possible thing for us to do." I pointed out.
"I know, but we don't have a choice."
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Random Korra fact of the day: she has a little sister named Lilly, who is ten years old.
I actually don't like how I wrote this but I don't want to rewrite it so sorry guys
Yooo almost done with the first season hey