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Gunfire and enemies seemed to be raining down on the paladins as they raced along the corridoor of the ship.
The mission was supposed to be easy. They only had to sneak onto the command ship, download access codes and tactical schematics which could be used against the Galra in the future and get out. But like usual, something just had to go wrong.
You see, Lance always had a habit of being in the wrong place at the wrong time and this time, it had caused the team to be spotted and chased after by dozens of Galra foot soldiers.
'Why is it always me they go after, huh? Why not Keith? Or literally anyone else?' Lance yelled sounding rather annoyed as he took out of few soldiers from his position behind a pillar.
'Maybe your good looks have finally attracted something.' Keith retorted as he sliced a bot in half.
'Or maybe it has something to do with your winning personality? Clearly these things just love you Lance.' Pidge joked, as she swept a soldier off of its feet.
'Hey! I thought you guys were on my side.' Lance exclaimed.
'Paladins, please can we focus?! These things just keep coming at us, we need to get to an airlock so we can reach our lions.' Allura stated, causing everyone to think for a moment.
Pidge glanced around her surroundings and eventually her gaze landed on a control panel that was a few feet ahead of her.
'Guys! There's a control panel nearby, I can cause a distraction if you cover me.' Pidge suggested as she spoke into her comms.
'Okay guys, all focus goes on covering Pidge.' Keith ordered, 'Go Pidge, now!' He yelled, as everyone shifted their fire to give her time to dash across the corridoor.
Pidge knelt next the the panel and quickly hacked into it using her upgraded gauntlet. The corridoor wasn't near any critical systems so it wasn't encrypted heavily enough to slow Pidge down.
The panel seemed to only control basic systems such as air filteration and temperature and whilst that may seem insignificant to anyone else, Pidge knew exactly how to use it to the team's advantage.
'Okay I think I can triggered a blast if you can buy me some time.' Pidge declared as she ducked down to miss a stray laser.
'We can buy you some time but it won't be long before these overrun us.' Hunk announced as his upgraded laser canon turned into an even more heavy duty weapon.
Pidge's plan was to cut the air filtration system so the air wouldn't be purified. And from the information provided by the Blade of Momora, Pidge had discovered that a system of pipes ran through the Galra ships and these pipes carried highly flammable gases. So all Pidge had to do was leak the pipes and ignite the gas.
Sounds easy enough, right?
The slight whir of the filtration system slowed and stopped as Pidge turned it off.
Now she needed to find the pipes.
In the midst of the chaos, Pidge looked above her and spotted a section of uncovered pipe. Pidge quickly raised her bayard and fired it towards the pipe. The thick metal was no match for the Altean tech.
A loud hissing sound rang out as soon as Pidge retracted her bayard so she knew the gas was leaking out rapidly.
All that was left to do was to ignite it.
'Okay, I'm ready. Lance you just need to shoot the pipe above me when I give the signal.' Pidge explained as she began to sprint away from the control panel.
The Galra soldiers seemed closer than Pidge would have liked but they were now right under the pipe.
'Lance now!' Pidge yelled.
Without hesitation Lance fired a single shot towards the hissing pipe and the corridoor was engulfed by an explosion which sent the paladins flying towards the ground.
A loud high-pitched ringing could be heard in everyone's ears as they all picked themselves off the floor.
'We need to go now!' Keith yelled as he raced down the corridoor once more, the rest of the team following swiftly behind him.
Luckily it wasn't long before they came across an airlock, which they were going to jetpack from in order to meet the lions who were patiently waiting on a nearby moon.
'Everyone ready to go?' Keith asked, as he quickly glanced around, he got positive looks of everyone so he started to reach for the airlock's control panel.
'Oh my god.' Allura gasped, raising a hand to cover her mouth in shock which stopped Keith mid-task.
Keith followed Allura's gaze and it wasn't long before Keith realised what had caused her concern.
One-by-one the paladins were all staring at the same thing.
'What?' Pidge asked, feeling rather confused as all of her teammates stared at her with a look of horror.
Pidge followed their line of sight down to the side of her torso and that's she saw it.
'Oh shit.' Pidge whispered.
A jagged piece of metal was embedded in her side and it had somehow torn straight through her armour and from the red patch that was growing larger every second, it had also torn through her flesh.
Now that she had noticed the metal protruding from her body, Pidge felt a cold sweat run across her body and she suddenly felt light-headed.
Pidge clutched her side before falling to her knees. The other paladins rushed towards her then and Allura managed to catch her by her shoulders before she toppled foward.
Pidge's face twisted into a look of anguish as the fiery, shooting pain lashed at side. Her breathing became heavy and it felt as though her body was lead.
Hunk and Lance worked together to gently twist Pidge's body and remove her helmet, so that she now lay on her back with her head cradled in Allura's lap.
'What do we do?' Lance said, panicking as he looked at his teammates for guidance as he placed his hand on the wound.
'We need to her to a pod. Can we make it to the lions?' Hunk asked hopefully.
'Her suit is damaged, she'll lose too much oxygen.' Allura said logically.
'Damn it, how did I not notice!?' Keith chided himself angrily.
'It's okay, it's just a scratch.' Pidge joked, as she gave her leader a shaky smile.
'We need to put more pressure on this wound.' Lance said as he noticed blood started to trickle down in-between his fingers.
'Let me do it, I've got bigger hands.' Hunk offered, as he switched places with Lance.
Pidge cried out at the sudden change of pressure and tears began to fill her eyes.
'Damn it, looks like the adrenaline is wearing off.' Pidge half-laughed, as fear began to take over.
'Oh Pidge...' Allura said sadly, as she brushed the hair off Pidge's sweat-covered forehead.
'It won't be long before the guards find us here. We need a plan!' Hunk exclaimed.
'Melt it.' Pidge groaned as she accidently shifted.
'What?' Allura asked, confusion laced in her voice.
It took a moment but it wasn't long before Hunk realised what the youngest paladin meant, 'She wants us to melt the ends of the metal so it creates a seal on her suit.'
'Would that work?' Lance asked, wincing at the thought.
'Maybe-' Hunk started, '-but it would hurt like hell that close to her skin.'
'If we going to do this we need to do it now before we get pinned down again.' Keith spoke stoically, although it was hard to stop his voice wavering as he glanced down at his injured friend.
'How... how are we going to do it then?' Lance asked nervously.
'We'll have to use Pidge's bayard. The electric current can be used as a heat source.' Hunk reasoned, although the suggestion made him feel sick to the stomach.
'Who's gonna do it?' Keith asked quietly.
'I will.' Allura said certainly.
'You sure?' Hunk asked.
Allura nodded as she took a shaky breath, 'I know how to repair these suits better than anyone and have studied some human anatomy so I should be able to fix the suit and cause the least amount of damage.'
'Here's her bayard.' Lance spoke as he passed the weapon over to Allura.
It took all her willpower not to vomit at the sight of Lance's hands and the blood covered handle that was facing towards her.
Suppressing the wave of nausea, Allura grasped the handle firmly before shuffling from her position from beneath Pidge, Lance soon took her spot supporting Pidge's head.
The injury was even worse to look at from her new angle, the jagged metal sticking out unnatural from Pidge's tiny body looked horrifying.
'You've got this, 'Lura.' Pidge said weakly, giving her a small smile.
'You might want to hold her down for this.' Keith suggested, an almost unnoticeable waver in his voice as he kept his sights on the end of the corridoor.
'You ready?' Hunk asked as Lance gripped Pidge's shoulders.
Allura took another unsteady breath.
'Ready.'
Allura then moved the bayard towards Pidge causing Hunk to quickly withdraw his hands from the wound and move to hold down Pidge's legs.
Blood began flowing down the pristine white suit once more, however Hunk's decision to move has been the right one because the second that the bayard touched the bottom of the metal Pidge began to writhe in pain.
She then let out a sickenly loud scream causing the remaining paladins to wince in pain themselves.
'I'm sorry Pidge. I'm going as fast as I can!' Allura yelled, hoping that the young paladin would feel some reassurance that the pain wouldn't last too long.
'Oh god.' Lance mumured as he struggled to hold his teammate down, his nose wrinkling as the smell of burning flesh seeped into the air.
'Guys we've got company!' Keith yelled from his position by the corner.
'Lance go and help Keith! We'll finish up here.' Allura ordered before turning to her teammate, 'Pidge you'll have to try and stay still. Can you do that?'
Pidge simply gave a tearful nod.
Lance then quickly and carefully placed her head onto the metallic floor and joined Keith.
'You have done amazing, we're nearly done now.' Allura said reassuringly.
'Good.' Pidge said, tiredly.
For the final few solders, Pidge managed to remained still for the most part. As she screwed her face up in pain, she threw her hand out towards hand who gladly took it and rubbed her knuckles soothingly.
'It's done!' Allura shouted towards Lance and Keith who began backing away from their vantage points towards the airlock.
'I'll carry her.' Hunk said, as he placed his arms underneath Pidge who could barely keep her eyes open.
'It's over?' Pidge whimpered.
'Yes it's over, you're been so brave little one.' Allura said smiling softly.
'Home?' Pidge replied, her eyes closing as she passed out.
'Yeah Pidge we're going home.'