Voltron/Aries Team crossover

                         Of Traitors And Twins
                              Part Three
                              By: Hell's Belle

On Arus 
     Lance and Allura had been searching the Arus forest in their lions for
some time.  Lance was wondering how they were supposed to find this
"dimensional rift" or whatever the hell they were supposed to be looking
for.  It had not occurred to him until after they had got in there lions
that King Alfor had not told them anything about how to find what they
were looking for.(And it really hadn't occurred to him to ask.  It was
too much for even Lance to question a ghost.) Finally, he decided he
needed to point this little detail out to Allura.
     However, when he did mention this in his usual blunt manner, she only
laughed.  "Oh, don't worry about that!  I promise you, father would have
told us that if it was important!"
     "Uhhh............Princess?  It IS kinda important.  I mean, how else do
we know what exactly to look for?"
     "The lions will find it." she said simply, as if that explained
everything.
     "How could the lions find it?  I mean, honestly, their ships, Ally! 
They do what there programed too, and who thinks to program ships to
track down dimensional rifts, or whatever the hell they're called?  That
just does not happen! I mean....."
     "Lance, your always asking us to trust you on matters like this.  Now
I'm asking you to trust me.  I know it sounds really far-fetched....."
     "Sounds far-fetched?  IS far-fetched!"
     "That's really rich coming from you!  Look, just trust me, ok?  We're
almost there!"
     Lance was about to make a really snide remark, but suddenly, Blue Lion
took a particularly low dive, and sped up while flying close the surface
of the forest.  Confused, he followed suite in Red lion. He was about to
hail Allura again, asking her what her deal was when Blue disappeared from
sight altogether.
     "Whoah! What the hell?  Where'd she....."
     He never got to finish the sentence before he flew through what seemed
to be an invisible doorway.  He found himself once again on Blue Lions
tail, flying through a completely unfamiliar forest.
     His radio came back on, and the Princess said in a really sweet,
uncharacteristically mocking voice,"We're here!"
     "Great." Murmured Lance, feeling a bit dazed. "Where is 'here'?"
     Thus, the first two members of the Voltron Force arrived on
Athens.......and went completely unnoticed by the Aries team, who was
busily trying to locate there missing team mates.  That doesn't mean
they went unnoticed, however.  

 


     "Look at that, my pets!"  Grimalkin crooned in a soft voice to her two
familiars.  She was staring into a monitor that displayed a pirated shot
from a secret uplink of King Phillips security cameras that had been
made a few days earlier.   She had just seen the entrance of the two
Voltron members.  "Just look at those beautiful lion ships they are
flying."
     She watched them for a moment longer, before saying in a thoughtful
voice, "Hmmmmmm, the appearance of these two gives me a strange
feeling." she smiled down at her faithful pets."I believe we should pay
a call on those two!  Maybe we could 'borrow' those wonderful ships they
so blatantly fly on my territory, or at least will one day be my
territory!"  She laughed as she thought about it.  "No need to involve
King Sauron, or that brat Prince Sauraman.  I've got a feeling now is
not the time to risk getting noticed by the Aries team...."



     "Woah!  Check this place out."  said Allura in an awed voice.  They
were in the middle of a dense forest.  It was far denser than the one
on Arus.  That turned out to be a problem, because she and Lance had no
idea where they were going, much less how to find who they were looking
for.
     "Hmmm..."murmured Lance over his radio."Well your dad did say it was
more likely they would find us than us finding them."
     "Maybe we should get out of our lions."
     Lance would have immediately vetoed that idea, except for the fact that
both their lions right then, in the middle of the densest, darkest
forest you can imagine, on a strange planet, in a strange galaxy, in a
strange universe, in a strange reality, far from any type of help or
friends, simultaneously had power failures.  
     "MOTHER F***** HELL!"  screamed Lance.  
     "Uh-oh."said Allura.  "Looks like we have to get out no matter what,
huh?"
     "Damn straight we do!  For once, I wish we had Hunk with us.  I swear,
the one time I really need a F****** mechanic, he's not here!  Why the
hell does this always happen to me?!"
     "I don't know." said the Princess meekly, a little stunned by his harsh
tone and words.
     "That was a rhetorical question, Allura.  I wasn't asking for an
answer."
     They climbed out their ships, and began to inspect the ships in an
attempt to find the problem.  This was not a fun task considering there
current location.  It was dark, and the foliage was thick.  There was
not telling what was just underfoot, hidden by the underbrush.  Both had
pilots had visions of snakes, insects, rodents, large wild animals, and
other nasties.  Lance kept uneasily, and unconsciously, reaching for his
sidearm at the slightest sound.  And believe me, there were plenty of
creaks , cracks, and strange outdoor noises to make anyone who is
stranded in the middle of nowhere completely paranoid and panic
stricken in minutes.  Traveling around the lions,(which now seemed far
too large) they were scratched by branches, bit by bugs, and had many an
unexpected fall because of hidden branches and rocks.  Too top it off,
they were having no luck finding what the problem was.
     After searching his whole ship over twice, Lance sat down irritably on
top of Red Lion to take a breather, and try to think of a way out of
this mess.  It was then that Allura began to cry.  You had to forgive
her, she was tired, covered with scratches and bruises, and overwrought
from all the tension.  She may be a Voltron pilot, but she was still a
Princess, used to hiding in the back and being helpless.  Even her
experiences as a pilot did nothing for her background.  And Lance wasn't
helping her any, so she couldn't help crying a little.
     Lance's first implication was to feel annoyed, but then he remembered
that he was being awfully rough on her.  He began to feel guilty.  So he
jumped down to her from his ship, and tried to reassure her. 
     "Calm down Princess."  he said in an unusually gentle voice.  "We'll
find a way out of here, I'm sure of it.  If your dad said come here,
that we would find those Aries pilots here, I promise you we will."
     She wiped her eyes, looked at him pitifully, and said," Are you sure?"
     He smiled at her and said,"Have I ever been wrong?"
     At that statement, she laughed, and his smile broadened. "Come on,
let's get on top of my lion.  It's probably safer up there anyway, and I
know I have an emergency supply of water in it somewhere.  Your probably
thirsty after all that, huh?"
     She nodded vigorously, and he said,"Ok, then, let's take a water
break.  We can think more clearly if we don't tire ourselves out."
     So he helped her up onto his lion before entering it himself.  A few
minutes later, he reemerged on top of his ship, holding the promised
canteens of water. They sat down to enjoy the much needed liquid.  After
a few minutes of silence, Lance said,
     "You know, another thing that bugs me, your dad didn't specify where or
when we would find these two."
     "Lance! Dad said we would know them when we saw them. Somebody will
find us...."
     "Yeah.  That's what I'm worried about."
     Allura gave him a dirty look at that comment, and started to say
something, only to be quickly interrupted.  "Hold on!  I didn't mean it
that way.  If I didn't think your dad was right about this, I never
would have agreed to come.  I had a strong feeling about those guys, and
despite what I've been saying, I actually believe, one way or another
we're going to find these two, or vice-versa.  But something feels
strange to me right now.  Why the hell would both of or lions, for some
unknown reason, with no visible cause, up and break down in what is
debatably the worst place to get stuck?  I'm getting some really strange
vibes, almost ass if this whole thing is in no way natural.  You know
what I mean?"
     He would have gone on, but then his innate senses suddenly warned him
that they were in a very dangerous position.  He stood up, dropping his
canteen, and motioned for Allura to stay down and keep quiet.  He looked
around the him, having this weird feeling that something, and/or
somebody, was watching them.  He was about to tell Allura to run and
find a hiding place, but just then, a distinctly female voice came from
the surrounding area.  An old and cracked female voice, but still
distinctly female.  
     Then he saw her.  She was wearing a long black hooded robe, and was
leaning on a long cane because she was bent double with age.  Her
wrinkled and grey face was a testimony to many years of existence, but
her grey-green eyes had a odd gleam to them that defied her age.  Draped
around her shoulders was a beautiful long haired brown cat.  At here
feet was a snarling, soot black wolf.
     "If you are thinking about telling your girlfriend there to try to run
for it, I suggest otherwise.  Bishmilla here enjoys a good hunt, and I'm
afraid that silly toy weapon you hold in your hand would not save you
from him."  Here she smiled a twisted grin. "Or me for that matter. 
Let's make this as quick and painless as possible, why don't we?"  
     After she said that, neither of Lance or the Princess got a single word
out.  Nor did they get a chance to lift a weapon, run, or even finish a
complete thought.  They never even got a chance to be bewildered.  The
old crone made a strange motion with her hands, and before they knew it,
the pair had blacked out.  
     Grimalkin allowed herself a small smile of satisfaction.  That had been
all too easy.  The sorcerer picked her cat off her shoulders, and gave
him a mental command to fetch the lion keys from the fallen pair.  
     The cat obeyed his mistress's command, and soon the keys were in her
haggard, boney hands.  She quickly placed them in the thick folds of her
robe.  Sensing that there was a faint trail left by the lion ships that
could be traced and followed by the other lions, she cast an illusionary
spell that would make the trail seem to lead to the Athens palace, the
base of the Aries team.  Then, casting another spell, she teleported
herself, her familiars the lions and their pilots back to Hydra.  



Back on Arus, the next morning,
     Up to this point, Allura an Lance's disappearance had not been noticed. 
Had it just been Lance missing, it wouldn't have been noted until the
late afternoon, maybe later, due to the fact that he usually slept late,
unless he had a reason to get up early.  And it had to be a very good
reason.  But Allura was always awake promptly at 8 a.m. every morning. 
So when she didn't appear, and it was already 10 o'clock, a concerned
Nanny went to check on the Princess.....only to find her room empty, and
her bed immaculately neat.  The scene that followed this was described
later by one of the castle attendants as 'strange, disturbing, and a
little bit scary.......yet oddly hilarious.'  
     The Voltron Force was called in by the alarm sounded by the near
hysterical nurse maid.  When she told them what finally managed to get
out what had frightened her so much, Keith said with as much patience as
humanly possible, "Calm down Nanny.  Just cause she wasn't in her room
doesn't mean something awful has happened to her."
     As if on cue, Coran came running in, and breathlessly said, "Two of the
lions are missing.  Red and Blue.  I've been trying to contact them, but
none of our scanners have picked them up."
     "Wait, Red and Blue?  Has anybody seen Lance this morning?" said
Keith, suddenly aware of his seconds absents.  Without waiting for a
reply, he ran to Lance's room, only to find it, like the Princess's,
empty.  He turned to the others, who had followed him, and said, "So
nobody's seen either Lance or the Princess all morning?  No one remembers
seeing them leave?"
     A chorus of no's followed this statement.  Pidge spoke then,
saying,"They must have left last night. After that incident in the
garden."
     "Question is, where'd they go?"
     "I don't know, but I think I know how we can find them, regardless."
said Pidge.  "I've been studying the lions for a while, and in flight
I've discovered they leave sort of an energy trail, residue that is
undetectable to most sensors, but can be followed by the other lions. 
They last up to 48 hours, and from what I can tell, our lions can sense
how fresh the trail is.  We can find them
using the lions."
     "Then what are we waiting for?" said Keith.  "Let's go!"

Back on Athens,
     "...and that's all they told you?"  asked a very anxious King Phillip.
     "Basically, yes." muttered Keith.  He was in a dangerous mood.  Like
his mother, the renowned General Steel, there was one thing he hated
above all; the feeling of helplessness, that whatever happened next was
largely out of his hands.  He was feeling this in abundance right now,
and was ready to tear somebodies head off.  Biting back that sudden
impulse, he turned as he heard someone enter the room.  Mike.
     "Any luck with those guys we found tied up?"
     "Rob just sent me to tell you what's up.  Their names are Rosco and
Jena."
     "And?"
     "That was about all we got without forcing a mind link."
     "Mike, will you please just go ahead and get to the relevant stuff
before I....."
     "Chill out!  Jesus Christ, Mitch, you really should take our
suggestion, and sign up for anger management courses.  Just don't manage
it how Lance manages it, cause you know that when he does finally get
around to blowing off all that excess steam, GOD ALMIGHTY!  I pity the
fool who...."
     "GET TO THE POINT PLEASE!  I DON'T HAVE TIME FOR THIS!" Keith roared in
frustration.  Mike didn't even flinch.  In fact, he had to briefly bite
his tongue to avoid laughing. He lived to piss people off!
     "Well, getting to the point, those two we picked up are from some small
team called the 'Red Hound' team.  Their team is one of hundreds, maybe
thousands like it. Each team was assigned some small part of our reality
to explore.  They are looking for cat's gold.  Why?  Our guess is as
good as their's.  Apparently, these guys are only told what is directly
under their noses.  So we're not even one hundred percent sure who they
are working for.  But we do know that the so-called Voltron Force knows
nothing about it.  The only thing they've been told that I also got from
these two 'Hounds' is the order to try to capture or kill us if they
found us.  And our ::ahem:: 'prisoners' are having trouble believing us
when we tell them that they aren't prisoners.  They think we're the bad
guys."
     "No surprise considering how Lance and Alli handled things.  I'm gonna
wring both there necks when I find them.  Anything else?" 
     "Nope. Nada.  It was at that point that the beloved, beautiful Nana
steps in and decides that our guests have had enough interrogation, and
that it is time to feed them.  We couldn't convince her otherwise.  I
was about to sick Tora on her, but Rob told me to just drop it.  He sent
me to tell you that nearly useless piece of info, before running off to
see what kind of food was being served."
     "Typical."
     "I suggest we join them."  said King Phillip with a smile. "You need a
break. Even your mother didn't work herself this hard."
     Keith chuckled a little at that statement, and was about to give in,
but suddenly Felicity appeared at the door.  She had heard the last part
of the conversation, and came in saying,"Ixnay on that!  Come down to
the control room quick! We've got company!"
     "What is it, sprite?"  said Keith, the King, and Mike at the same time.
     "It looks like three of those lions things we saw on Arus."



Planet Hydra, much later,
     Lance came to rather groggily. "Where am I?"  He thought. He looked
around a couple of times.  He was in a dimly lit stone room, lying on
the floor.  The next thing he noticed was that he was extremely sore,
and could barely move, then the fact that the princess was unconscious
only a few feet away from, chains on her wrist.  Then he realized he
himself was securely chained.  Before he had time to wonder, one of the
most strangest things he'd ever seen appeared right in front of him.  He,
or at least he assumed it was a he, had long pale green hair, and rather
yellowish skin.  He had strange, evil looking yellow eyes that were
slitted like those of snakes, and appeared to be unlidded as well.  On
either side of his neck, he had what looked like gills, with flaps of
skin covering them.  He was very tall, and quite formidable looking. 
"Ahhh," he said in soft, menacing voice,"I see one of our lion pilots
has finally woken up!  Pitiful weakling, you do not know me now, but
soon you will!  And then you will wish you'd never lived to see me, the
almighty Prince Sauraman!"
     "Gee, how original."  muttered Lance.  "Now I suppose you want
something from me, and if I don't hand it over, you'll kill me.  Listen,
why don't you just save me the typical speech and tell me what it is, so
I can get to part where I spit in your eye and refuse?"
     "Oh believe me, wise-ass," said Sauraman, grinning broadly," you are
going to wish all I do is kill you if you don't tell me what I want to
know.  Oh, by the way, thanks for the lions.  They are going to come in
handy helping me defeat that bothersome team of sorcerers."
     Just then, Allura regained her consciousness, moaning weakly. 
"Lance?"she said faintly.  "Where are we?  And who is that?"
     "As to the where, I can't tell you.  But this is the mighty Prince
Sauraman," said Lance, his voice dripping with sarcasm.  "He says he has
our lions, and if we don't answer him a few questions, he is going to
give us a fate worse than death."
     "Gee, 'almighty Prince Sauraman'! " came a light, cackling voice from
across the room. It was that old hag he and 'Lura had seen in the
forest.  "He really sounds terrified!  Now do you see why I captured
them myself?" 
     "SHUT UP YOU OLD CRONE!"  Bellowed the Prince.  He turned back to the
pair, and smiling, said,"I don't think either of you quite comprehend
what kind of danger you are in.  So I'm going to give you a free
demonstration."  With that, he reached down, and grabbed Lance by the
front of his uniform, and hauled him to his feet.  "And since you
volunteered by deciding to be funny, I'm using you as the first
demonstration!  Both of you pay close attention now!"
     Without any more ado, Sauraman got a tight hold of the back of Lance's
neck, and with the other hand, got a bone crushing grip on his right
arm.  Then, he pulled Lance's arm out of joint with a terrible wrenching
pull!   Before the victim had time to react in any way, he shoved the
arm back into joint, but not before shoving part of the skin and muscle
covering his shoulder into the place where the bone was jointed.  Lance
opened his mouth in a silent scream of agony.  He could actually feel
the blood in his shoulder backing up.  It felt like the muscles were
going to explode.  He couldn't see straight, couldn't think straight,
all he was aware of was the pain.  Through the veil of agony, he become
vaguely aware that Allura was screaming, begging the Prince to stop.  He
heard him laugh in reply, and felt him loose his hold long enough to hit
her hard enough to throw her across the room, into the wall with a loud
thud.  "No!" he heard himself scream, and he tried to struggle away.
"Don't touch her, you bastard!"
     At that, Sauraman laughed again, and grabbing Lance by the pinched up
arm, once again pulled it out of joint, which was sheer agony on it's
own.  He then roughly reset the arm in it's proper position, and threw
Lance to the floor.  Just before he blacked out from the pain, Lance
thought he heard Allura scream  his name again...........


On the spaceship of the Red Hound team,
     It had actually been about four days since Lance and Alli had stowed
away with the R.H. team, and thus far they had not been found out.  Only
Guinivere knew they weren't really Rosco and Jena, and she wasn't
planning to give them away!  They had found out little more than what
Mike had found out from the Rosco and Jena, which made Lance extremely
suspicious. He wasn't exactly sure why, but he suspected foul play on
the parts of whoever was in charge of this mission, and he wasn't
thinking Marshall.  
     Alli, for her part, didn't know exactly what to think, except that
Lance probably already knew something she didn't.  Which to tell you the
truth, bothered the hell out of her. 
     Either way, Lance used the computers on board the ship to hack into the
so-called Galaxy Garrison files.  He found something fairly interesting
there.  "If I didn't know any better," He thought, reading the account,
"I'd say this Galaxy Garrison thing has more double agents in it than
our own universes beloved Alliance!  But the question is, why our
universe?  And why cat's gold?  I know that it is a great conductor, but
it's such a pain to make usable!  The only way to melt it and mold it is
to bring it to a fire-shark world, and everybody knows only sorcerers
with some amount of control over matter can go onto one of those planets
without getting fried instantly, or at least a human with sorcerer
guidance, or at the very least one with sorceresly affected
equipment!  Unless these people have a sorcerer leading the whole damn
operation, which doesn't seem to likely, cause the closest I've seen to
even a clone of sorcery is Genny, and that's only cause she seems to
have a sixth sense, all this metal they are after is gonna be
worthless.  And what would they use it for, anyway?  It has to be
something really big to justify using something that's almost more
trouble than it's worth......."
     It wasn't until he broke down and asked Genny that he got his answer
about the sorcery bit.  "As a matter of fact, we do have sorcerer, or
rather a witch, in our reality.  And we're talking the bona fide thing,
not just some silly second sight, or whatever it is you called what I
have.  Her name is Hagar.  Her specialty is making giant bio mechanical
weapons, commonly known as Robeasts.  But it's usually Voltron that
handles her."
     "Ahhh, yes, Voltron." said Lance nodding.  Genny had filled in the gaps
for him on that the first day, which had been a good thing, because her
team talked about him a lot.  It would have seemed awfully suspicious if
the two interlopers didn't know what was pretty much common knowledge
where the RH team came from.  It suddenly came to Lance what might be
happening, but it was only a glimmer of an image, something which he had
no evidence to back up.  So he kept it to himself.  
     The two Aries team members probably could have completely handled this
whole thing without ever being found out, until something unforseen
happened.  They had just passed Planet Hydra("unnoticed and unscathed.
Thank God."thought Lance and Allison.) when Guinivere collapsed in
pain."Owww, my shoulder!"

                              End Part Three!