#there's no ground on hunk's team or flying on shiro's but I think it's fine

[discordiansamba]

good morning, decided to make Pokemon teams for the VLD squad out of the blue this morning so now I am sharing them all with you.

Keith's team. his mom left the Ultra Beast behind for him. I'm sure there's no need to read into that any. Ceruledge because it's the most painfully obvious Keith Pokemon to exist. Liepard bc well. it's a purple cat. Beheeyem is an alien. Don't question that one either. It's fine. It doesn't mean anything.

allura's team. cute, girly, and can definitely kill you. a Primarina as a nod to her becoming the blue paladin. Clefable because it's very cute and also has ties to space. don't worry about the paradox pokemon I'm sure it doesn't mean anything.

hunk's team. Pom-Pom Oricorio is literally the perfect Pokemon for him. It too, wants to cheer everyone on. Alolan Raichu instead of regular Raichu bc Alolan Raichu apparently gained that form bc it ate a bunch of pancakes. this is a very Hunk vibe.

the Pidge squad. She would have a Porygon2 instead of a Porygon-Z, I think. Ferrothorn bc it's a grass/steel type that connects both to her love of computers and the fact that she's the green paladin. look me in the eye and tell me Pidge wouldn't have a Vikavolt. You can't.

lance has a LOT of water, but also an Armarouge to contrast Keith. But also all but one of these Pokemon rotates around guns/cannons somehow! Swanna bc it's a graceful and pretty Pokemon that also isn't super difficult to obtain. I think Lance doing some contests with it is a good fit.

coran's theme was mustaches and silly little guys. don't worry about the paradox pokemon here either, it still definitely doesn't mean anything. Sealeo is unevolved bc it is the superior goofy little guy over Walrein.

finally Shiro, who was the hardest one to pin down for some reason. I think he'd have a pretty strong squad, and then the Mightyena he caught in the grass near where he grew up back when it was just a little Poochyena.

[aspenmissing]

𝚁𝚎𝚋𝚒𝚛𝚝𝚑 (𝙿𝚝 𝟷)

On the Belmera, Voltron stands in wait for the transport ship to open.

"Oh, no!" Pidge says.

"Please tell m ethere's not a giant monster in there. Please tell me it's empty! Or full of space candy. One of those two. Either one is fine"

"I don't think it's a pinata, Hunk" Y/N says.

"If it's the same kind of monster that attacked us on Arus, we already know how to beat it" Keith ises the Red Bayard to summon a saber for Voltron; Pidge readies Voltron's shield"

"Hold your ground!" Shiro shouts. The Robeast, Drazil, emerges from its transport ship and attacks Voltron with its chest cannon. The Paladins defends themselves with their shield, but are pushed back.

"It's not candy!"

"And it's not the same monster!" Frantically, Voltron dodges the chest cannon blasts.

"We need to draw its fire away from the Balmera's surface!" The Paladins try fighting Drazil while flying around to avoid getting the Balmera hit. They defend with their shield, but the Robeast's chest cannon is too strong.

"We can't hold out!"

"My Lion's weakining! If the shield sustains structual damage, we're done for!"

"Pidge is right!" Keithe says.

"Oh Pidge is right. I'm the one that say, "We can't hold out!"

"Lance, watch your footing!" Y/N says. The Blue lion trips, and Voltron falls over, losing its shield. The Paladins groan from the fall.

"Okay, Team Voltron, disband" The Lions split apart "Everyone, evasive maneuvers! It can't shoot us all at once!" Unfortunately, Drazil spreads its arms, which are covered in laser cannons, and fires all of them to assult the Paladins with laser fire.

"Okay, it can do that too" Y/N says. The Paladins scramble to avoide being hit; the Castle of Lions suddenly appears to blast Drazil with a laser. Drazil responds with laser fire.

"Where does Zarkon get these beasts from? And how do they keep finding us?" Allura asks herself.

"Princess, the particle barrier won't sustan much longer. It's still not a full strength after the blast from the Galra ship.

"Keith, try to draw its fire! I'm coming in from above!" Keith uses the Red Lion's head ray to draw the Robeast's attention while Shiro sneaks in from behind with the Black Lion, prepared to fire its mouth cannon. Drazil is able to rotate an eye cannon around and blast the Black Lion. Shiro pulls away at the last second to avoid being hit.

"We need to find its blind spot!" Lance says.

"I don't think this thing has a blind spot. It had a thousand eyes" Pidge says. Hunk is frantically dodging the laser in the Yellow Lion.

"Laser eyes. Laser eyes!" Hunk says. Y/N dodges an incoming laser in the Purple Lion.

"What do we do?" Y/N asks "Fighting this thing is like fighting an entre fleet at once!"

"I think we've got to aim for those laser eyes and take them out"

"We'll cover you from up here!" The Castle of Lions fires lasers at Drazil; the Robeast retaliates with an onslaught of laser fire against the Castleship's particle barrier. Soul whines and curles into a tight ball (Like a hedgehog) under Coran's console.

"We've lost the spectral generator! Goint to reserve! There's a fire in VIN bay three! Suppressors on!" Coran looks to another screen "Supressors out! Princess, the ship is being torn apart!" Coran panicks.

"We're taking heavy fire up here! We're in trouble!"

"Princess, pull back! Get out of its range, now!" Shiro says.

"We will not abandon you!"

"You're not abandining us. We're about to pull back anyway"

"We are?" Hunk asks.

"We can't hold out. We have to. Lions, to the mine shafts! It's the only place the monster can't get us"

"Roger that!" Y/N says.

"Heading into orbit!" The Paladins fly the Lions into the mine shafts while Castle of Lions flie into Space.

==

Shiro, Keith and Hunk meets Shay's family at the bottom of a mine shaft. Lance, Y/N and Pidge are in a different mine shaft.

"What is happening?" Rax asks.

"There's a monster up there that Zarkon sent to destroy us" Keith says.

"A monster?" Shay asks "Will Zarkon's savagery never abate? Perhaps our people were never meant to be free"

"Shay, don't give up. Zarkon's power grows with every planet he conquers, but he's weakened by every being that fights back"

"Fight back? Against a monster like that? How?"

"I don't know, but we can beat it. Tell her, Keith"

"Can we?" Keith asks/

"Yes, we can. This is out first mission and we're not going to fail. We can beat it. We just neeed some time to come up with a plan"

"See? Told you we can. Thanks, Shiro" The Balmera groans and the planet rumbles "Do you guys feel that over there?" Lance, Y/N and Pidge are in a rumbling mine shaft.

"Yeah, we feel it" Y/N says.

"It's that sound again" Pidge says.

"What is that?" Lance asks. Shay's grandmother places her hand on the ground cracking apart. The Balmera stills.

"The great noise comes from the Balmera itself. Our home crumbles beneath out feet. The Balmera is dying" Shiro speaks to Allura and Coran over the communication channel.

"Coran, Allura, are you there?"

"Shiro, we're here"

"The Balmera-"

"We already know. Our scanners are showing the life energy draining from the Balmera" Coran brings up a scan of the Balmera on screen of the Castle of Lions. In the mine shaft, Pidge activated her armour to veiw the scan.

"How does that happen?" Coran speaks to the Paladins through the communication channel as Pidge and Shiro show the other Paladins the scan of the Balmera.

"Removing crystals from a Balmera is like removing a vital part of the might beast. the Belmera needs time to regenerate itselt to stay healthy, but the Galra's greed may have cost this noble Balmera its life"

"Poor thing" Y/N says.

"So, what's gonna happen?" Hunk asks.

"It's core will collapse, destabilizing the entire skeletal structure. Anything or anyone remaining on the Balmera at that point will be crushed into dust"

"How long before its core collapses?" Shiro asks.

"Probably a matter of hours. The mighty organism willingly gives itself to all, but not all return its kindness" On the Castle of Lions, Allura stands at the bridge.

"Then our time is short. We'll evacuate the planet. We need to get all the Balmerans to the Castle of Lions before the planet implodes" Shiro and Hunk appear on the Castle Screen.

"Okay, that sounds like a good plan, but how on Earth do you plan on landing the Castle with that monster-thingy on the surface?" Pidge and Y/N appears on the Castleships's screen.

"You'll need a distraction" Y/N says.

"We'll engage the beast in our Lionw. With it distracted, Allura and Coran will land the Caslt and load all of its citizens" Lance then appears on the screen.

"Or we could load Balmerans into out Lions a few at a time and shuttle them to the ship. No engaging ferocious laser-eye guys" Lance suggests "How long would that take?"

"Days? Weeks?" Keith appears on the screen.

"We only have hours"

"Look, we don't need to beat this think. We just need to bait it away from the ship" Shiro says "Provoke and evade"

"Okay, here's the thing. I'm worried that we're going to be really, really good at the provoking part, and then like really bad at the evading part" Hunk says "But if- if this is what is takes to save Shay and everyone on the planet, then I'm in" Keith turns to Shay.

"Can you contact the other Balmerans?" He asks.

"I can, but I know not what they'll say" She says "Leave the planet? Our home?"

"It's the only optionn" Allura says "I'm coming down"

"Princess, no! It's too dangerous" Coran says. Soul nods her head in agreement.

"Someone has to be there to lead these people out" Y/N speaks to Allura through their video transmission.

"You're coming down?" She asks.

"That thing will spot your pod and blow it to pieces" Pidge says.

"Let me worry about that. You just focus on keeping the creature distracted"

==

The Paladins launch their Lions from the mine shafts and attacks Drazil, who gives chase.

"Okay, we're provokes. Time to envade!" Hunk says. Allura is preparing to launch from the Castle of Lions on a drop-sled. Shiro speaks over their communication channel.

"Princess, we've lured the monsters away. It's time"

"I'll contact you all when I'm on the ground" Coran speaks over the Castle intercom.

"Be careful out there" Coran says. Allura launches from the Castleship. Coran looks to Soul "Well, its just you and me" She mades a noise and looks at the screen. Lance sees her descent.

"Is that Allura?" Lance asks. The Robeast Drazil tries to attack Allura with laser fire.

"We gotta protect the Princess!" Y/N says. She shields Allura with the Purple Lion and is badly hit. The other Paladins distract Drazil so Allura reaches the mine shaft safely. Shiro speaks to her over the communication channel.

"I'm on the ground"

"Hurry! I don't know how long we can hold this thing off" Allura runs over to Shay and her family.

"Shay, I'm going to need your help"

"Princess?" Shay asks. Allura places her hand on the tunnel wall.

"Have you contacted the other Balmerans?" Shay and her family look dejected "What is it? What's going on?"

"All Balmerans give thanks for the kindness you and the Paladins bestowed upon is, but, alas, we cannot take leave of our home"

"What?"

"If our great Balmera's life cycle is over because of us, then our desire is to stay with it until the end"

"But you'll never survive"

"We contacted the others, and all agree" Rax says "It's not right that you risk your lives for us. Please, away. We ask for no more guilt and shame upon us"

"It is out wish. The wish of all Balmerans"

"No. I won't give up on you. I won't give up on any of you, no matter the circumstances"

"But we do not ask this of you. Please!"

"I have heard your words. Now let me speak for you. I want to talk to the Balmerans. Can you get a message to them from me?"

"There is no need to speed for you. You have a unique power within. The Balmera will carry your words" Shay's grandmother points to Allura's hand on the wall, which is glowing. Allura recoils and speaks "Speak your heart, child. All can hear you" Shay's Grandmother takes Allura's hand and places it back on the wall. Allura focuses and speaks aloud, but her words are transmitted to all Balmerans.

"Balmerans, this is Princess Allura. You don't know me, but I am here to help. I know what it's like to watch your home planet die. For I come from planet Altea , a planet that has long been destroyed by the Galra. But I refuse to give up. And now, you all have the same choice. You can decide now to devote your lives to making sure this never happens to another planet. I am eternally sorry for what has happened to the Balmera, but I beg you, do not let its dying be in vain. Honour the Balmera's death by refusing to give up. Join me in my fight against the Galra" Shay's grandmother places her own hand on the wall to hear the response.

"Your words have touched out hearts"

"Thank you"

"No, thank you. You've given us reason to hope again"

"Everyone, head to the caves just under the surface. Coran and Soul are looking at the map of the Balmera on the Castle of Lions showing Balmerans moving.

"Princess, your speech must have worked. The Balmerans are moving towards the surface" Coran says.

"Coran, we're just beneath the surface. Triangular my position. This is your landing zone"

"Yes, Allura. Readying ship. Castle of Lions, coming in! Paladins, how are you holding up?" Y/N is fighting Drazil.

"I think we've got him pretty distracted. Are the Balmerans in position?" She asks.

"They're making their way to the top" All the Balmerans slowly climb towards the surface. The Castle of Lions lands just outside a mine shaft. Coran descends to the surface in a transport pod, Soul beside him, and motions for Balmerans to enter.

"Bring them out! Hurry, now!" Coran says. Soul makes a gesture to come in. The Balmera suddenly rumbles violently, causing the mine shaft to start crumbling and rock slides to occure.

"No!" Balmerans are in a panic but not injured.

"It's on the verge of collapsing! We have to go!"

"But the Balmerans!"

"They're trapped! What can be done? Time is short!" Rax says. The Paladins are dodging Drazil's lasers in their Lions; the lasers are hitting the Balmera.

"Every hit weakens the Balmera. Have you evacuated yet? What's happening?" Coran speaks over the communication channel.

"The Balmerans are trapped. Just keep distracting that beast!" He says.

"Uh, do you want us to distract it by dying? Because that's what's going to happen"

"Guys, remember when I said we didn't have to beat it?" Shiro says.

"Yes, I remember that" Hunk says.

"Well, we might have to beat it" Allura looks over the mine shaft.

"We're lost! All are trapped with no chance for escape!"

"We can't give up"

"But what can be done?" Shay notices the ground undertenath the Castle of Lions "The Balmera...The ground beneath your mighty ship appears healed. Its essence thrives. But how?"

"The Castle!"

"Not just the castle, but you as well"

"It's true. Your Altean energy combined with the snips Crystal has revitalized this part of the Balmera" Coran says.

"That's it! Maybe we can perform the ceremony you spoke about. We can save the Balmera"

"What ceremony?" Rax asks.

"In the days of old, when Alteans were given the gift of Crystals from a , we would repay its sacrifice by performing a ceremony. A sacred Altean would re-infuse the with . In this way, we had a symbiotic relationship"

"The Galra have only been taking. It's time we give back" Allura says. Soul jumps up and down in agreement "I can connect with the Crystal in the Bridge and use the Castle's power as an amplifier"

"When your father performed the ceremony, it was on a smaller scale. I beg you. To heal an entire planet, it could take more energy than you possess. You may not...live through it"

"I know you're scared for me, Coran, but I must try" Allura begins the ceremony with Shay's family and the other Balmerans.

==

The Paladins are scrambling to avoid Drazil's laser fire.

"Guys, this isn't working. We'll never take this beast down in our Lions" Keith says.

"Well, forming Voltron didn't work, either"

"Not without some way to shoot all those laser eyes at once" The Yellow Lion displays the keyhole console for Hunk's bayard.

"That's weird. What are you trying to tell me?" Hunk summons his Bayard "Guys! Guys, something's happening here! I-I think there is a way to take down all those laser eyes at once"

"Well, what is it?"

"Do you remember how Voltron formed that sword with Keith's Bayard? I think my Lions telling me I can do the same thing with my bayard?"

"Are you sure?" Y/N asks.

"Let's find out. Form thingy!" Hunk inserts his bayard into the console; nothing happens "It didn't work!"

"Because we didn't form Voltron yet"

"Oh, right. Yeah, I know"

"Guys, whatever we're planning, let's hurry up and do it" Pidge says. The Robeast notices the Castle of Lions and moves in to attack.

"We're got to defent the Castle of Lions! Everyone, follow me. Form Voltron!" After forming, Voltron, Hunk's Bayard summons a shoulder cannon to counterattack Drazil's energy blast "It's not enough!"

"We'll have to try something else!" Hunk is able to deflect the blast away from the Castle of Lions. Voltron takes flight, drawing Drazil's attacks away from the Castleship. Hunk's computer shows Voltron has locked on to all of the Robeast's laser eyes "Are you guys seeing this?"

"Roger that?"

"Let's see what this thing can do. Engage!" The shoulder cannon fires a shower of energy bullets at once, hitting all of Drazil's eyes and rendering it still. Meanwhile, Allura performs the rejuvenation ceremony and Quintessense spreadys across the Balmera.

"Guys, look!" Y/N says. The Quintessence is absorbed. Drazil suddenly begins attacking Voltron again. Keith punches Drazil using the Red Lion. The Robeast falls to the ground in a heap, lying still. Allura is released from the energy of the Castleship. Shay gathers Allura in her arms. Soul puts her hands on Allura's arm, shaking her slightly.

"Princess, are you all right?" Allura appears unconscious, but wakes up.

"Did it work?" Rax has his hand on the ground.

"Yes. The Balmera lives. It thanks you" The Paladins leave their Lions and arrive to check on Allura. Soul runs up to Y/N and climbs up her legs and into her arms. Drazil suddenly reawakens a second time, preparing to attack them.

"No!" The Balmera suddenly courses its Crystals through the Monster, destroying it and encasing its body.

"Wow"

"No. Way"

"The Balmera just saved us"

"Look at the Crystals!" Crystals begin forming across the Balmera. Hunk begins petting the planet's surface.

"Oh, who's a good Balmera? You are. Who ate the big monster? You did. Yes, you did. Yes, you did" Shiro, Keith and Lance look unamused.

"Dude, what are you doing?" Keith asks.

"What? It's alive, and it wuvs my scwatches" Keith facepalms and Y/N laughs.

[justheretobreakthings]

Whumpmas in July: Day 9

@whumpmasinjuly

“Look at me.”

Read on AO3 My house, my rules, my ko-fi

Even through his paladin armor, the fire was far too hot. Shiro could swear he could feel the flames of the burning walls licking against his skin as he raced by them, and was certain he would be covered in blisters by the time he got back to the castle. His helmet – especially the crackling in his ear reminding him that the comm hadn’t been working since they’d entered Viuter’s atmosphere and would be no help to him now – was irritating him, making him feel trapped and claustrophobic and plastering his sweaty hair against his skull and preventing him from wiping his bangs out of his eyes. Still, it was protection, enough protection to keep him upright and moving, and even though smoke clouded his line of sight, the visor of his helmet kept it out of his eyes, and the oxygen actuator mostly kept him from breathing in the ash.

Which meant Keith’s armor was giving him that same protection. Which meant he was fine. Wherever he was.

Keith shouldn’t have been in the building in the first place. He’d been blocks away when the explosion had occurred, the paladins all having separated to confer with different members of the Viuteran council. It had made sense, getting more done in less time and everyone getting to stick to their specialties, and it had resulted in Keith being all the way in the infantry armory building at the time of the blast. Shiro, though, had been right near the explosion, in the next building over where he and Allura were meeting with a group of military strategists. As he’d been wearing armor and Allura hadn’t, it was only natural that Shiro was the one to take the initiative of running into the building and taking charge of evacuating as many Viuterans as he could.

Sure, it would have been better if the comms had been working and the paladins could all coordinate together, but that wasn’t really any more than a flickering and quickly dismissed thought in Shiro’s mind. He would focus on rescue now, find his teammates when he was done.

It took longer than he would have liked to reach the point when he could look for them, but it came eventually. Once the building was deeply engulfed in flames and there was too much risk of it collapsing in on itself for it to be safe for Shiro to go back in and keep up the rescue efforts. He handed off an unconscious Viuteran to an emergency worker and looked around to find himself in the midst of a dizzying scene. Sirens were wailing, soldiers and civilians alike were running amok, some trying to escape, some trying to help contain the spreading fire. And all of it cast in an eerie red, the thick smoke in the sky blocking out all light except for that of the fire.

Pidge was the paladin he spotted, her green armor sticking out boldly against all the red and gray, and her face flooded with relief when spotted him approaching. “Oh thank fuck!” she cried, rushing to meet him. “When Allura said you were in there I – I didn’t know if – God, kept hoping the comms would magically start working and I could make sure you were – ”

“Is Allura okay?” Shiro hated to interrupt, but now that he’d found one of his teammates, he was more than eager to find the rest, make sure everyone was okay.

“Right, right, follow me,” Pidge said, and she hurried to lead the way, winding through the chaos. “Allura’s this way, they’ve got first aid stuff going so that was the first place I looked, to see who was hurt. Lance and Coran – they left ages ago. Before this bomb, apparently a different one went off on the other side of the city. Like, one minute difference. My guess is they were planned to go off at the same time, but they weren’t coordinated quite right. Anyway, they went to get Blue and they were heading that way, so I don’t know when they’re gonna be – ”

“Shiro! Shiro, you’re okay!” A voice cut across Pidge’s rapid speech as they approached what appeared to be a makeshift triage center in the square, and Shiro turned to see Hunk clambering in their direction as fast as the armful of medical supplies he was carrying would allow. Behind him, Allura looked up from where she had been bent over an injured Viuteran, her glowing hands pressed against his leg. Relief washed over her face, and she started in their direction too the moment she had finished.

Shiro nodded in acknowledgment to Hunk. “Yeah, I’m okay.”

“You sure?” Hunk asked. “You’re not hurt at all? Your armor’s looking kinda beat up, you might be hurt and not even realize it because of adrenaline! Do you feel dizzy at all? Do you need water? Do you need to sit down?”

“Hunk, I’m fine, really,” Shiro reassured him, turning his attention to Allura as she joined them. “How’s everything holding up here?”

“As well as we can hope for,” Allura said. “Everyone’s been too busy trying to get people to safety to investigate, so I don’t know where the bombs were, who may have been behind it, what the intent was – I take Keith was able to reach you? Where is he now?”

Shiro frowned. “What?”

“I thought – surely by now he would’ve – ”

“Allura,” Shiro said, voice tight. “What do you mean? Where’s Keith?”

“He was here, but he – I told him where you’d gone, and he took off, didn’t even let me finish the sentence. I thought he was going to help you with the evacuation.”

Keith had gone after him. Shiro had gone into the heart of the fire, and Keith had followed him in, and he hadn’t even realized. It hadn’t even occurred to him until Allura mentioned his name that he hadn’t yet seen Keith anywhere, but now…

Shit.

“I’m going after him,” he said, turning on his heel.

“What?” Pidge said. “Hang on, you think he’s still looking for you in there?”

“I know he is.”

“Wait, Shiro,” Allura said, “It’s certainly not safe! Surely Keith would have had the sense to get out of there by this point, we ought to – ”

“No.” Shiro shook his head. “No, he’s – I gotta get him. I’ll meet you all here when I’ve found him.”

One of them called his name again, as he took off running, but he ignored it. All his focus was on moving forward, his feet pounding the ground as he raced faster than he could ever remember having moved in his life, back toward the flames.

In any other circumstances, Shiro would agree that, yes, Keith had the sense to get out. He could be rash and stubborn and even foolish at times, but Shiro at least liked to think that Keith had been getting better about knowing when it was better to retreat than to dive headlong into danger. His failed battle with Zarkon, at least, had knocked that lesson into his head.

But he knew Keith, and more importantly, he knew Keith’s past. As little as Keith liked to open up about his life, he had at least let Shiro in on a bit about his dad. And how he’d lost him. Shiro had seen the look in Keith’s face whenever his dad had come up, the emptiness and desolation when he’d explained how that fire had taken him.

And he had seen the desperation and determination in his little brother’s eyes whenever Keith made it clear that he couldn’t go through a loss like that again. Whenever he insisted that he’d never have to take on the role of team leader because Shiro wasn’t going anywhere. He’d heard about Keith’s expulsion from the Garrison, the explosive lengths he went to in order to get Shiro out to his shack.

When it came to family – when it came to Shiro – all logic and reason was out the window.

And now Keith might very well meet his end because of it.

Making his way through the burning building required him to shut out all of his natural instincts pointing him to safety, screaming at him to get out of there before he wound up seriously hurt, or worse. He had to turn on the shade of his visor to keep the brightness of the flames from blinding him, and even then it was hard to be certain where he was going. Halls were blocked by burning debris, pieces of the building falling around him and some coming dangerously close to taking him out with them. Shiro jetpacked through a singed hole in the ceiling when the hall behind him folded in on itself, blocking his route to the main entrance, and every step on the second floor was accompanied by creaks and crackles that had him bracing himself to fall right through at any second.

Still, he kept going. Pushing through the heat and the sparks and the roar of the flames, yelling Keith’s name over the noise and through the billowing smoke. None of that was important. All that mattered was finding Keith.

He had to find Keith. Had to find him. Had to find him. Had to –

A crack sounded above him, and around the corner and along the hall, flaming shards of ceiling toppled down, and that’s when he spotted it: the distinct blue light that accompanied a shield activating from a paladin’s armor.

Keith. Ducked under his shield, fire and rubble tumbling around him, the red and white of his suit gray with ash. Alive, and moving, and okay.

He was okay.

Shiro dived into the wreck, knocking falling debris aside with his sword hand and, voice breaking in sheer release, shouting out, “Keith!”

Keith’s head shot up at the sound of his name, and although for a brief moment he stumbled from the battering against his shield, there was no mistaking the way his exhausted eyes widened the moment he spotted Shiro across the hall, as if he were seeing a ghost, only for his face to light up in stunned relief.

He may have shouted something in reply that was drowned out by the fire raging around them, or he may have sprung up from his crouch without a word. Either way, Shiro got no warning before Keith was practically flying across the hall to tackle him in a hug.

Shiro stumbled back, startled. It wasn’t as though hugging was completely out of Keith’s character – once he knew and trusted the person giving them, he practically reveled in them – but he was never the one to initiate the embrace. A means of preemptively shielding himself from being turned away, perhaps; a fear that the gesture may be misinterpreted, may be mistaken as something romantic or even sexual; maybe simply a matter of making sure he never set off any discomfort related to touch that Keith was often prone to himself. Shiro had never known for certain which was the case, but it all made Keith a distinctly non-touchy person. Even when they had first been reunited after Shiro’s disastrous return from Kerberos, Keith hadn’t hugged him with this much fervor.

It all spoke to just how terrified Keith had been, how desperately he’d been searching for Shiro. The embrace was a grounding one. He was pressing himself so firmly against Shiro, gripping his brother so tightly. As though reassuring himself that Shiro was really there. Like if he dared to let go, Shiro would vanish back into the smoke and flame.

“Hey,” Shiro said, trying to keep his voice soothing despite needing to practically shout to ensure he could be heard, arm wrapping around Keith’s trembling back. “Hey, it’s okay, I’m here.”

“I thought – ” Keith choked out through his helmet’s speaker. “Allura said – she said you – you’d gone into – into – ”

“I know. I know.”

“You went into the fire. Shiro, you went into the fire, I thought you – I was going to lose you, I had to find you, I couldn’t – I couldn’t just let – ”

“It’s all right, Keith, I promise. I’m okay.”

“You could’ve died! You almost died, you almost burned up and never said goodbye, I thought you were dead, I – ”

“Hey. Keith. Look at me.” Keith kept his face buried in Shiro’s chest, so he pulled back to hold him by the shoulders. “Look at me, okay? I’m right here, see? I’m not dying on you yet. Swear it.”

“Y-yeah. I see you.” His voice shook, and this close up, Shiro could see the redness of his face, the way his eyes seemed to be struggling to stay focused. As hot-blooded as Keith ran, even he was susceptible to fire like this. “Sorry. Sorry, I’m – I was just…”

“Scared?” Shiro finished for him, and Keith nodded weakly. “That’s okay. I get it. And hey, you found me. You found me, I’m here, and we’re okay. And now – ” A crackling sounded from above, and Shiro yanked Keith aside without a second thought, throwing up a shield as a beam collapsed right where the latter had been standing, showering the two of them in sparks. “Now we gotta get outta here, okay? We gotta run.”

“Yeah.” Keith took a trembling breath and straightened as Shiro let his shield fizzle away. “Got it, let’s go. Just – ” Shiro looked down to see Keith’s gloved hand wrapping around the gauntlet of Shiro’s armor. “No splitting up. Please.”

Shiro smiled. “Deal. We won’t let each other out of our sights. Come on.”

He activated his sword hand, and beside him, Keith did the same with his shield. Ready to race back through the flames, side by side.

[calligraphist-artemisia]

Scattered Blue (Part 1)

Written for the Kidge Spring Event!

Prompt 3: Forget-me-nots | True Love, Memories, Remembrance 

Summary: Alternate Universe. From the moment the first blue petal passed her lips, Pidge knew what was happening to her.

Also posted on AO3 under the username Kishirokitsune

❀ - ❀ - ❀ - ❀ - ❀

Part One: Pidge

The small blue petal haunted her from the time she woke up to the time she laid her head down to go back to sleep. There was a part of her that desperately wanted to ignore it and what it meant, hoping it would go away if she just wished hard enough for it.

But as with all things in life, wishing did nothing without her also taking action.

Pidge covered her mouth as she coughed hard, feeling something slide up through her throat until it splattered out into her hand. She caught a glimpse of blue as she shoved that hand into her pocket to hide the evidence.

“Is everything okay?” Hunk asked in concern. He and Lance sat across from her at the cafe table they'd snagged for their weekly lunch.

“Everything's great!” she lied with a smile. “How was your flight, Lance? You transported some heavy cargo to the east coast base, right?”

Lance shrugged. “It was just a normal, boring flight. No issues.”

“Which is a good thing,” Hunk said, his tone long-suffering.

Lance agreed with a grumble that spoke strongly of his true feelings. He'd always dreamed of being more than a “simple” cargo pilot, no matter how often Pidge and Hunk tried to remind him that he was the backbone of the Garrison and served a pivotal role in keeping everything running smoothly.

“What about you?” Hunk asked Pidge. “You and Keith have been testing the new jets. That must be fun.”

Pidge's heart fluttered at the mention of Keith's name and she swallowed to try and stop the cough that threatened to overtake her. “Um, y-yeah. Yeah, it's been a ton of fun.”

Hunk and Lance exchanged alarmed looks at her unusually lackluster response and Pidge wanted to swear, but instead, she reached for her water and took several swallows until her throat was clear.

“Keith giving you problems? I could kick his butt for you,” Lance volunteered.

“We're fine, so please don't get yourself suspended trying to fight him,” Pidge said with a roll of her eyes. She set down her drink. “Our test flight went great! We're just waiting for the technical report to come back before we can go up again and there were a few minor tweaks the ground crew wanted to make to improve how responsive the controls are. Shiro's been coaching us through new drills while we wait.”

“Ugh, you're so lucky. You get Shiro as a mentor and you get to test fly the new jets. Can we trade lives for one day?” Lance asked.

“That means you'd have to work with Keith,” Pidge reminded him.

“Good point. I'd much rather trade with Keith and have you as my partner,” Lance said, sitting back in his chair as the waitress arrived with their meals.

Pidge rolled her eyes as he went about his usual routine of flirting with their waitress. She briefly considered apologizing on his behalf but figured it would only encourage him to keep going. At least he wasn't making a complete fool of himself and thus, by extension, of her and Hunk as well.

They didn't do much talking as they enjoyed their food and it was only as they got down to the last few bites and were contemplating dessert that Pidge asked Hunk how he was doing in the engineering department. His eyes lit up as he began describing their experiments with a new lightspeed engine that they hoped would be capable of drastically reducing the amount of time it took to get to the farthest planets in their solar system.

“Pretty soon you and Keith will be preparing to fly one of these! Well, uh, if everything goes the way we hope,” Hunk said, rapidly backpedaling in an attempt to curb his own enthusiasm.

“That sounds incredible, Hunk! You'll have to keep me updated,” Pidge said.

Hunk grinned back at her. “I will.”

In the end, they decided against ordering dessert at the cafe and instead walked a few blocks down to Lance's favorite gelato place where they each got a scoop in a little paper cup so they could walk and eat at the same time.

Every now and then, Pidge had to turn away and cough, though thankfully she didn't end up with any fresh petals. For the rest of the night, she didn't find a single speck of blue when she pulled her hand away and she went to bed with a smile on her face and no worry lingering in her mind.

She danced around her room with a spring in her step when morning came, taking a little extra time on her hair and putting a little bit of color on her eyelids, which she normally saved for special occasions. By some miracle, she didn't drip any of her breakfast onto her uniform and was able to leave the house soon after by catching a ride with her brother, who was also on his way to the Galaxy Garrison.

They split up after he parked in the Garrison's garage, with Matt heading over to the labs where they were analyzing new plugs taken from Saturn's moon, Enceladus, while Pidge went to the gym to meet up with her flight partner and get started on their training for the day.

Keith was already there warming up when she arrived. His black hair was tied back out of his face and he had swapped out of the heavy uniform in favor of a pair of gray shorts and a black tank top.

Pidge caught his attention with a wave before gesturing towards the locker room, silently indicating that she was going to get changed and would be out soon. Once she was dressed in her own gray shorts and Garrison-provided orange shirt she jogged out to Keith, dodging around the others who were taking advantage of the open gym.

“Hey, did you get the itinerary Shiro sent?” Keith asked the moment she was close enough to be heard.

Pidge had to take a moment to think about it. She's woken up to two messages from Shiro that morning – one was a note regarding a slight change in their schedule and the other was a list of what they'd be covering that week. She assumed he was talking about the week-long one. “I glanced it over. It looks like it's mostly what we do every week.”

“Yeah, except for Friday. Do you think I can convince Shiro to give me a pass to skip out on the annual health screening after what they pulled last year?” Keith asked.

“Doubt it, though I bet he'd go with you if you're really worried about it,” Pidge said as dread began to creep in her chest.

At their last screening, the nurse helping Keith found something “odd” in his blood and ordered him into quarantine for two weeks while they tried to puzzle it out. The Garrison medical team ran test after test, asking Keith all kinds of invasive questions, until Shiro, with the help of Commander Iverson, put an end to it all. Keith was let go, but he then had to suffer through several months of resurgent rumors about his parentage and whether or not his abilities were because he wasn't fully human.

Keith was anti-social and a little awkward, which when coupled with his innate sense of how to pilot and the fact that he out-flew even seasoned pilots on the simulator on his first try, led to a number of rumors that one of his parents weren't human or even that Keith himself was born somewhere far beyond their solar system. It was all nonsense, of course.

Pidge had her own reasons for being worried about the screening. She knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that they would find out about her affliction.

Hanahaki.

Just putting a name to it made it feel all the more real and terrifying.

“Hey,” Keith said, nudging her gently. “It'll be alright. I'm really not worried about anything happening again this year. They wouldn't dare.”

Pidge did her best to smile and try to reassure him that she'd also be there to stop them if they tried anything, but the weight of what was happening to her dragged her down, threatening to drown her if she didn't wrestle back control of her emotions. Her breath stuttered in her chest, a cough building even as she cleared her throat to try and chase it off. Her eyes watered.

“Pidge?” Keith's tone turned concerned and he placed one hand on her back to keep her steady.

She couldn't hold it back any longer.

Once her coughing started, it was nearly impossible to stop as something thick and slightly scratched traveled up through her throat, threatening to block her breathing, until it finally began to slide out. Pidge gagged and coughed even harder, forcing a long stem and the accompanying blooms out of her mouth and into her hands.

All she could hear was the sound of her own heartbeat. Dark spots danced across her vision and she swayed, nominally aware of Keith holding her up. Pidge closed her eyes.

❀ - ❀ - ❀ - ❀ - ❀

She woke in the medical wing.

Or at least, she thought that was where she was at first glance, but closer inspection of the wall next to her and the lack of orange décor told her that she was most likely at the Plaht City Memorial Hospital. Pidge stared at the wall for a moment and then slowly, stiffly turned her head to look around the room, which was when she realized Keith was sitting at her bedside and staring at her with a worried expression on his face.

“Wh... what happened?” Pidge groggily asked.

“You passed out,” Keith told her. “Pidge, why didn't you say anything sooner?”

She looked away from him. “Didn't want to. S'fine, Keith. I can handle it.”

“You can handle it? Pidge, this isn't going to go away on its own!” Keith's voice raised to a near shout. He blanched and ran a hand through his hair, clearly struggling to calm down. “You... Will you at least tell me who it is? I could go get them and... and then everything would be fine, right? Unless... you've already told them?”

Pidge swallowed thickly and glanced to the bedside table, hoping to see a glass of water there, but there was nothing. “It doesn't matter.”

“Of course it matters!”

“They don't feel the same way,” Pidge said, refusing to meet his eyes. “I don't need to ask them in order to know that.”

Keith growled in frustration and stood up. “I don't buy that for a second! Who wouldn't like you?”

“Keith...”

“Just tell me who it is and I'll go talk to them,” he said fiercely. “Or I'll bring them here, whichever works best for you. Please, Pidge, I just want to help. You're my best friend.”

Her chest clenched painfully at those words and Pidge wondered for a moment if she were about to be launched into another coughing fit, but after a moment or two, the pain subsided to mere discomfort, which allowed her to speak again.

Not that she really wanted to speak, since that meant revealing the truth: she was in love with him.

That was the cause of the Hanahaki Disease. Flowers would take root in the lungs, growing until there was no place left for them to go. The body naturally tried to rid itself of the invasion by coughing them up but there was only so long that could keep the disease at bay before it became too much for the body to handle. Sometimes, the person afflicted could “cure” themselves by falling out of love before the disease progressed too far. Otherwise, there were three ways it could end: in the death of the infected, by surgical removal, or by having their love reciprocated.

The last of those was the best-case scenario – the one that was often used in the plots of movies or cheesy romance novels. Having one's love returned would effectively shrink the flowers until they were gone completely.

Surgery was a more recent option, though one that some still chose to reject even if it meant their death. Choosing to surgically remove the flowers meant also removing any feelings they had for that person and often resulted in the complete loss of memory of them as well. No one could pinpoint why it was like that and all attempts to improve on the surgery fell flat.

Those were the options sitting before Pidge.

She didn't want to die. That much was for certain. There was still so much she wanted to see and do in the world, and though it broke her heart to think of needing to do it all without Keith, her partner, steadfast by her side, she wasn't going to give it all up. Besides, there was still the chance that she wouldn't forget about him. She was too stubborn for that. And if she could remember, maybe they could rebuild their friendship as well.

But what if she didn't remember?

Pidge slowly met his eyes.

He was her best friend too; the first person her own age that she'd ever truly gotten along with and felt comfortable around. Life without him wouldn't be nearly as vibrant. She couldn't lose him.

“Don't leave me,” she begged, her chest constricting as she forced the words out. She tried to sit up, her arms trembling from the effort, but gave up as Keith moved to help her. She shook her head and blinked back tears as she caught a whiff of his cologne, which usually inspired warm and fuzzy feelings, but instead dredged up an intense need to cough.

She swallowed, trying to force it away. She needed to talk first.

“Of course I'm not going to leave,” Keith tried to reassure her.

Pidge shook her head. “If... If I forget you, please don't leave me.”

Keith made a confused sound. “Why would you forget...?”

She could hear the exact moment he put the pieces together. The way his voice cracked was a dead giveaway just before his expression crumbled in distress. She reached out and grasped his hand. “It's okay, Keith. I know.”

He sucked in a shuddering breath. “It's not okay! Pidge, I-”

“You're not allowed to blame yourself,” she cut in. “This isn't your fault. You can't help who you like. Or who you don't like.”

While it wasn't something they'd exclusively talked about, she'd gotten the gist from past conversations that he wasn't someone interested in any kind of romance. He preferred focusing on his career and studies, which was something they'd always had in common right up until she went and fell for him.

She had to look away from him for a moment. “It's just... you're my best friend too and I don't want to forget that, but if I do then I need you to be there and make sure we stick together. I know that's a lot to ask.”

“No, it isn't,” Keith heatedly denied. “Of course I'll stay with you.”

Though Pidge mostly felt relieved by his agreeing to stay with her, there was still that sliver of worry that things could go wrong for them. But what choice did they really have?

She was saved from needing to talk about it more by the arrival of Shiro and her family, who crowded around her bed to ask if she was alright and if there was anything they could do to help. Matt seemed particularly stricken that he hadn't noticed anything wrong when he spent the most time with her, though her mom was a close second.

Once he was sure Pidge would be okay, her dad took charge of the situation and arranged for her surgery to take place that evening by calling on a few favors and using his influence as a Commander at the Galaxy Garrison. It took a little more convincing on Pidge's part, as well as some hefty backup from Shiro, to make an allowance for Keith to stay with her outside of surgery. It all happened so fast that she didn't have time to think about everything else she wanted to say to Keith, just in case she wouldn't get the chance later.

Her family stayed until the last few minutes until Shiro was able to direct them out into the waiting room so she and Keith could have one last moment alone.

And it was in those last few minutes that genuine fear struck Pidge.

She didn't want to forget him.

She didn't want to lose his friendship.

Heavy tears flooded her eyes, dripping down her cheeks without her fully realizing it. She choked back a sob as she looked at Keith. “I-I-...”

She couldn't get the words out.

Keith didn't need her to say anything. He got up so he could sit on the edge of her bed instead, cradling her against him and offering physical comfort. He refused to budge as the anesthesiologist entered and began prepping her arm for the IV which would administer the anesthetic directly into her bloodstream.

“Count backward from one-hundred, dear.”

Pidge tried, but she was still too choked up to speak and had to settle for mouthing it instead. Rather quickly, Keith's soft reassurances faded and she dropped off to sleep.

❀ - ❀ - ❀ - ❀ - ❀

There was an annoying beeping sound that cut through her dreams, dragging Pidge back into the realm of consciousness. It was a strange, rhythmic sound – wholly different from the obnoxious screeching of her alarm clock. She groaned as she opened her eyes and had to squint against the sudden, harsh light that reflected off of crisp white sheets and plain white walls. The only spot of color near her was a single stem of purplish flowers that was placed in a water glass on the bedside table.

“Pidge?” an unfamiliar voice called her name, relief present in their tone.

Her head felt heavy as she turned it to face whoever was speaking to her. She figured it was a nurse or something – she had to be in a hospital of some kind – but instead, she found a young man with dark hair sitting in a chair at her bedside.

“You're awake!” he said, a smile blossoming across his face. “How do you feel?”

“M'okay,” she said thickly. She stared at him for a moment and watched as his smile faded. “Sorry, but who are you?”

He reeled back as though he'd been slapped, his expression dropping into something close to pure anguish. “I...” He paused and took a deep breath. “I'm Keith.”

[actress4him]

Whumptober 2020 - Day 29

Okay, quick explanation of the next few days. I started writing Abandoned Part 2 for today's prompt. It's turning into a monstrosity. I ended up deciding that I was going to need some more time to finish it, and skipped to write the other 2 days first. So today's fic is actually the prompt for Day 30, and tomorrow's will be the prompt from Day 31. Day 29's prompt, the Abandoned sequel, will be on the last day. Everybody capiche?

Without further ado...Keith is an idiot, an ongoing saga.

Read on AO3

Read on FFN

Day 29 (No. 30) - Wound Reveal/Ignoring an Injury

Fandom: Voltron: Legendary Defender

Warnings: explosions, stab wounds, blood

The stitch in his side kept getting worse the longer they ran. It was odd, considering he didn’t usually have that issue, but he attributed it to some muscle he had pulled the wrong way when fighting with that Galra lieutenant and just kept running. It wasn’t like he had much of a choice. Pidge and Hunk had planted explosives all over the base, and they had less than a dobash left to clear the area before they went off.

Bursting out the front door of the building, Keith and Lance dove behind the boulders where Allura, Pidge, and Hunk were already waiting, just in time for the detonations to start. Heat washed over them as the ground shook.

“Cutting it a little close there, were we?” Pidge quipped.

Lance scoffed. “Maybe, but you have to admit that would have been an awesome action movie sequence right there.”

Still panting for breath, Keith cupped his waist where the pain was originating, only to feel a slight rip in the fabric. Startled, he pulled his hand back and saw that the fingers of his glove were wet. Huh. Guess that lieutenant got a knick in, after all. No wonder it had been hurting.

The base was fully obliterated, what hadn’t been blown into pieces now engulfed in flame. That took care of all the foot soldiers and sentries, as well as all the computers, weapons, and other technology that had been inside. However, it didn’t solve the issue of the fighters that had managed to escape just before the explosion and were now shooting down at them.

“Should we head back to the Lions?” someone shouted.

Keith turned to look for Shiro’s response and...everyone was looking at him. Right. He was the Black Paladin now. Everyone’s lives were in his hands, and he still wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Actually, he did know how he felt. Wrong. This shouldn’t have been his job, it should have been Shiro’s. He was no good at leading. Why Shiro and the Black Lion had ever chosen him, he had no idea.

But it was his job, like it or not, and so he had to step up and lead. “Yeah. Everyone back in your Lions, and take on those fighters. Remember, they can still call for backup from their ships, so we need to take them down as fast as we can.”

With cries of agreement, everyone jumped up and ran off in their respective directions, holding up their shields and dodging laser fire as they went. Keith gasped involuntarily as he stood and pain shot through his middle unexpectedly. For just a scratch, that knife wound sure was acting up.

By the time he sank into Black’s pilot seat, it had gone from stinging to throbbing, and the pain seemed to be growing by the second. He pressed his hand up against it again. This time his whole hand came back wet, and he was pretty sure he could feel that same warm wetness leaking down inside his suit, too.

Apparently it was worse of a wound than he thought.

He had no time to worry about it, though. The other Lions had already launched. Shoving the controls forward, he ignored the way the skin pulled and steered Black into the thick of the fight. 

“About time you joined us.”

“Sorry.” Normally he would snap right back at Lance’s insults, but now that he was leading - and doing such a poor job of it, most of the time - he generally felt he deserved them. “Allura, you’ve got a fighter coming in at two o’clock.”

“Already got it handled,” Pidge announced as she swooped past and fired her laser.

Right. He’d just mind his own business and take out fighters, then.

They were down to the last couple of ships in a matter of minutes. Keith was looking forward to heading back victorious to the Castle and quietly slipping away to his room to check out his injury. 

But when had anything in his life ever gone the way he wanted it to? Someone had called for backup at some point, and now there was a cruiser and a whole new fleet of fighters to deal with. Immediately they were surrounded, and the cruiser was charging up its ion cannon.

“-ith! Sh-...-rm…-tron?”

Keith shook his head, trying to clear it. There was shouting over the comms, but it sounded like it was coming from underwater. 

“Ke-!...-eed...us...do!”

“Um.” The fighters looked like they were multiplying as he stared out his windscreen, wavering unnaturally. “I…” Glancing down at the video screens, he tried to gauge what was going on from his teammates faces, but they were distorted, too. “I don’t…”

“...nee-...-ze up...so…-pful…”

“Jus-...-mation…-ltron!”

The other Lions all took off suddenly, flying in a formation that seemed familiar, somewhere in the fog of his mind. Voltron. They want to form Voltron. His movements were sluggish, but he managed to send Black forward to join them, taking his place in the lead. 

Black...I need your help…

Voltron formed without him fully being aware of it happening. He wasn’t sure whether he had completely blacked out, or if his brain was just working so poorly that he couldn’t remember it after, but the next thing he knew was trying to steer the giant machine in the general direction of the cruiser. Easier said than done when said cruiser wouldn’t stay still, bobbing up and down and side to side like a yo-yo. 

The rest of the team was still yelling back and forth over the comms. Even if he couldn’t understand the words, he could still recognize the frustration in their tones, and was pretty sure it was directed at him. He didn’t blame them. He was letting them down, again. What could he say, though? He wasn’t sure whether he could even form words, and they seemed to be doing just fine without him directing. All he had to do was keep pointing Black in the right direction - and keep his shaking arms from going slack and slipping from the controls - and they were taking care of the rest, using Lance’s sword to slash a hole in the side of the cruiser, and Hunk’s shoulder cannon to take out multitudes of fighters.

They really didn’t need him at all. It should have been Lance or Allura who led. Not him.

He lost a chunk of time again just before Voltron disbanded, the disorienting feeling of his limbs being pulled away bringing him back. Okay. Just have to make it back to the hangar now. He thought he heard Black rumble in his mind, assuring him that they would get there.

The jolt of landing made him grit his teeth to keep from crying out. It felt like his entire side was on fire. He could vaguely hear the others leaving their Lions, mumbling to each other the whole time, but he couldn’t seem to find the strength to move.

“Come on, Mullet, you can’t hide from us all day!”

The sudden, echoing voice from inside Black’s hangar made him jump, then squeeze the arms of the chair in a death grip as he rode out the wave of pain. Maybe it was because of the lack of other distractions, but he found it easier to focus on the words now. And they weren’t at all happy.

“Keith? We need to talk. Come on out, please.”

He squeezed his eyes shut. “Yeah. C-coming.” 

One hand pressed to his side. One hand gripping the steering control. Stand up. Don’t scream. Don’t fall over. Helmet off. Walk to the door. Wait for Black to lower the ramp. Don’t fall over.

“What the heck was that all about?” Lance screeched as soon as Keith was in sight. “I know we told you your leading was crappy, but that didn’t mean we wanted you to just stop leading!”

Keith wavered, still on the ramp, and found something unseen to lean against. There was still blood oozing out around his fingers.

Allura cleared her throat. “Yes, I...I think what Lance is trying to say is, we’re not sure what happened out there, but we were left floundering a bit without anyone giving us any direction. Thankfully, all turned out well in the end, but something like that simply cannot happen again.”

She was right. It couldn’t.

“It was like you just...froze up,” Pidge offered. He tried to look at her, but she and Hunk seemed to be dancing around each other, switching places. It made him even dizzier than he already was.

“Yeah, big bad Mullet, scared of a bunch of Galra fighters.” There was a pause where no one said anything. “Well, come on, man, don’t you have anything to say for yourself?”

Keith opened his mouth, and left it that way for a moment as he desperately tried to force some words to come out. “‘m s’rry.” Spots swam in front of his vision. “I...think…’ve been stabbed.”

His knees buckled. Distantly, he thought he heard someone shout his name, but a second later the black spots had taken over and he was out.

When he next opened his eyes, it was to the sight of the front of a pod dissipating. He stumbled forward until a steady pair of hands latched onto his arms and stilled him.

“We really need to talk about your view of team leadership, Keith,” Allura’s voice said softly in his ear.

His heart sank. “I know.”

“Don’t you know that team leaders aren’t perfect, that they have to let their team take care of them sometimes?”

Keith froze, unsure if he was hearing correctly. Stepping back, Allura smiled gently at him, her hands still on his arms. “Next time, you should tell us that you’ve been stabbed before you’re passing out from blood loss.”

Ducking his head, Keith let his lips quirk up just a little. “Yeah. I’ll...try to do that.”

“Good,” Lance declared from somewhere nearby. “Because I want that to be the last time that I have to drag your unconscious Black Paladin butt to the infirmary.”

Pidge scoffed. “You so did not do the dragging.” 

“Did, too!”

“Yeah, man, that was definitely Allura,” Hunk commented.

“I helped!”

Keith’s smile grew, and he shook his head. If they were going to give him another chance to get this whole leading thing right, then he guessed he could give himself another chance, too.

[toxxicsky]

Avatar and team Voltron. Chapter 4

Keith was rather surprised. This wasn’t supposed to be a formal Agni Kai but somehow he managed to get quite a crowd in the battle arena. Though he shouldn’t be too surprised, word does seem to travel fast. Especially when you live in a castle where there is only gossip to keep you going.

He took a firm step into the arena and heard a small roar of people which only made him chuckle a little. Keith looked over to see Pidge and Hunk give him a thumbs up and shook his head, of course, they were the culprit for this multitude of people in such a short time. He kept walking and started to feel the glare of a certain one armed man who was glaring daggers in his back. 

Keith finally strolled to the middle of the arena, “Welcome everyone! I see many of you gathered to witness this fight today. I’m sure you are aware this will be a non exile Agni Kai, and there will be no permanent damage done to either party. I’m wanting to test the capability of Lance McClain, If he is to win I’m granting his freedom, but if he is to lose everyone in the palace will welcome him with open arms, and will be working here.”

 He looked over when the gate opened as Lance walked into the arena now fully dressed looking much more refreshed. “Lance, we will be fighting with swords, if need be we will use bending. But do your best to refrain. We do not want to accidentally hit the people here speculating.”

Lance reached out to grab the sword that was handed to him. “Sounds good to me, your highness,” He swung the sword in a figure eight then threw himself into a sloppy bow. Coming up from the bow he faltered a little when he caught a glimpse of dark chocolate skin, long silver hair, with the most beautiful blue eyes woman staring at him. 

He shook his head and looked back to Keith, and took a stance. Keith did the same following suit, but Lance could tell his stance looked much sturdier. They slowly started to circle each other but Lance started to lose his patience, and couldn’t wait any longer and charge after him. Keith easily blocked the sword pushing the sword towards Lance’s chest forcing him to jump back into a roll. Barely making it to his feet in time to see dust fly towards his face followed by a sword nearly slicing his face. 

“Oh wow, the great Fire Lord throwing cheap tricks.” He chuckled jumping back into the fight. 

“Never said this was going to be a fair fight!” and Lance felt his face go completely red with the way Keith smirked at him. 

The two went back and forth for a while, but Lance felt like he was going downhill. He was starting to struggle, and the more he struggled the more frustrated he got. He was losing his temper and what was once a simple back and forth was now starting to come out as snarls and yells, and was starting to feel heat in his hands.  

“Could you just, slow down!” He shouted then looked over to the crowd and caught the eye of Allura, and he was confused for a moment, she looked worried. That angered him; he knew she didn’t really care for him. He looked over at Keith with a snarl and rushed at him with such conviction that he left himself wide open that Keith easily knocked his sword right out of his hand, causing him to fall on the ground.

His brain blanked while fear suddenly filled his body. Images of water and ice rushing towards him. He backed on the snow, no dirt, crawling back. He was shaking as ice was charging at him like a spear. He did the only thing he could think to do was bring up a thick wall of fire that moved like water to protect himself. 

He then shot fire at the person to protect himself and was shocked to see the fire separate in a delicate arch and a hand reach out and grab his wrist pulling it back in one swift motion. Lance let out a low shriek in a panic expecting his arm to be turned into ice. 

“Calm down, say I win.” He heard the voice, Male. Then he remembered. He was fighting in an Agni Kai… with Keith. He took a breath looking around with a grunt and was happy to realize the crowd didn’t seem to notice his panic. 

“I admit defeat.” He said as loud as he could hoping his voice didn’t crack with the effort. 

The strong arm slowly released him, and Lance stumbled to all fours and looked up to see Keith walk in front of him. “As everyone can see, I am the victor and everyone will now welcome Lance with open arms in this castle. Now, Get out of here and back to work.” and Lance was surprised to see the people pout and sigh as they walked away seeming to go back to work without much of a fuss at all.”Pidge, Hunk, come with me to help Lance to your dorm house. He will be taking one last room in the house.”

  Lance would have chuckled seeing the girl with the chestnut hair, and the large man with the headband whine a little saying they had been using it for storage and a workshop, and Lance could swear they froze up for a moment as Keith stared daggers at them.. 

“I can get up on my own.” He replied before they got completely over, not wanting to bother them. Frustrated that his legs seemed to shake and his arms were a little sore, and before he realized it those same strong arms were already helping him to his feet.  

“Let me help you. I wasn’t expecting you to firebend like that, but you seemed frightened. Are you okay?” He looked up to see Keith stare at him with such concern. 

Lance knew his face was heating up quickly and looked away pulling his arms out of Keith’s grasp. "I’m fine, your highness.” 

Keith sighs but didn’t say anything as Pidge and Hunk walk up to them. 

“Welcome to the team.”  The curly chestnut hair girl bounced up and stretched out her hand. ”I’m Katie Holt, but you can just call me Pidge, and this large, soft guy is Hunk!”

Hunk came in for a hug which surprised Lance and froze up for a moment still in shock from his fight with Keith. “Um, nice to meet you Hunk, Pidge, as you guys know I’m Lance.” He said shyly. He gently pulled himself out of Hunks grasp and brushed his pants off. “Alright to the dorms I guess.” he smiled.

“Of course follow us. See you later Keith!” Pidge Pointed at Keith. “Don’t forget we got a trip soon!” 

“Ya, ya. And Don’t make Lance clean that room!” Keith chuckled as he waved them away, watching them pull Lance around. When they got out of his sight he let out a long and tired sigh. “I know you're still there, Allura Come out. 

“So how did you know?” She asked, walking out from behind the pillar. 

“Come on now. I could see you looking so upset through the whole fight. You look like you were about to cry.” He turned around to look at her. “You thought it was going to be worse didn’t you?” He walked up to her. “So you could tell. I wouldn’t be lying if I said I wasn’t worried, but you handled it quite well.” She let out her own sigh that seemed to rival his own. “I guess I need to get going. Thank you for talking to me.”

“You’re welcome, have a good night avatar,” Keith said calmly not wanting to deal with Shiro now that this was all over and quickly made himself scarce. 

[voltrontranscript]

VLD S8E9: Knights of Light, Part 1

Season 8 Episode 9: Knights of Light, Part 1

Transcript by @dragonofyang

Summary: After taking the dark entity within herself, Allura discovers she’s now mentally linked to Honerva. Using this connection to reach into Honerva’s mind with the help of the other paladins, they discover that there are more ghosts haunting her than they realized.

[Google Doc]

Honerva’s Voice: Allura. Allura. Allura. Allura… Allura!

Lance: Allura, are you okay?

Allura: What’s going on? Where am I?

Coran: You’re in the medical bay.

Lance: When we got back from Clear Day, we found you collapsed on the ground.

Coran: You’ve been asleep for two quintants. The entity, it’s missing. Did you…?

Allura: I did what needed to be done.

Coran: No.

Lance: What needed to be done? What are you talking about?

Allura: This entity, it is connected to Honerva in some way. I believe we can use it.

Lance: Use it? I…

Coran: I swore to your father that I would look after you, but I fear I may have let him down. This is the path of darkness.

Allura: It is the path toward defeating Honerva.

[Scene change to Shiro approaching a door, where he is greeted by the paladins.]

Shiro: You wanted to see me?

Pidge: We’ve been working on something, and we thought we’d run it by you.

Keith: We think we might have a way to find Honerva.

Allura: The entity has bonded me to Honerva. The link is there whether we utilize it or not. I believe that if the Paladins connect using the shared consciousness of Voltron, we may be able to travel through the void and into Honerva’s mind.

Pidge: That could, in theory, give us access to her physical location, as well as key information on how to defeat her.

Hunk: Which, after what happened the last time we faced her, could be super useful.

Keith: Honerva is capable of creating galactic Komars, wormholes, robeasts, and now Lotor and his mech are out there somewhere. She is the single greatest threat the universe has ever faced, and we don’t have any other leads. It might take lifetimes for another opportunity like this to come around. We think this is worth the risk.

Shiro: I spent a lot of time in the infinite void. It took all my strength not to lose my sanity. And if you face Honerva in the void, she will win. But, if you can find a clue that leads to defeating Honerva and Lotor, it could give us the upper hand in this fight.

Lance: I don’t like the idea of using Allura like this. We’re messing with powers we don’t fully understand that have ruined countless lives. It’s… it’s dangerous.

Allura: Lance, we’re the Paladins of Voltron. There’s no one more capable of taking this on. It has to be us.

Lance: Let’s do it.

Allura: Besides, the team will have our sharpshooter there to keep us safe.

Lance: I knew that nickname was gonna catch on one of these days.

Coran: It’s been a long time since it was only the seven of us in a room together.

Keith: Let’s make sure it’s not the last.

[Cut to Keith in Black Lion as Voltron powers up.]

Lance: Allura, are you okay?

Allura: I’m fine.

[Scene change to Veronica on the bridge.]

Veronica: It doesn’t seem fair that he won with a robot arm.

Iverson: Ah, almost everyone had a robot arm. The last guy had two robot arms.

Shiro: The lions are launching. Put the Atlas on high alert. Iverson, power up the Atlas’ weapons. Veronica, make sure the shield system is go.

Veronica: High alert? What’s going on?

Shiro: We’re just being careful. The Atlas needs to be prepared for any eventuality.

[Cut to Allura in Blue Lion.]

Allura: It is time to begin.

[Scene change to the astral plane.]

Hunk: Now what?

Keith: Allura, do you feel anything?

Allura: We must travel through that light!

Hunk: It looks so far away. How do you know?

Allura: The entity draws me toward it!

Lance: What is this place? It’s like… it’s like I can hear what the universe is thinking.

Pidge: Remember how the Olkari told me that everything is made of the same energy? I think it has something to do with that.

Hunk: So, thoughts are linked across some kind of, what, cosmic connection?

Keith: Yeah, but I think we are the thoughts inside a network of other people’s thoughts.

Lance: Oh, this is making my head hurt.

Hunk: Yeah, I’m actually with Lance on this one.

Allura: If we are to--[screams]

[Cut to the Atlas bridge.]

Coran: I’m detecting fluctuations in Voltron’s energy signature. Should we do anything?

Shiro: Hold.

[Cut back to the Paladins in the astral plane.]

Lance: What was that?

Hunk: It felt like cold water running down my spine.

Allura: That was Honerva.

Lance: What?

Allura: The entity inside of me is connected to her.

Hunk: Wait, then why did we feel it?

Keith: It must be because we’re all connected through Voltron.

Allura: Yes. The psychic link between us is now shared with Honerva. The closer we are to her, the stronger that link.

Lance: This is too dangerous. Honerva is gonna use the connection to find us, to find you.

Allura: No, this is how we are going to find her, but first, I must learn how to utilize this energy to do so.

Keith: This isn’t just on you now, Princess. We’re all in this together. Maybe if we concentrate, we’ll be able to feel her energy. Then we can track it back to its source. Let’s all focus.

Hunk: This is awesome!

[Scene change to a wide starry scape with two planets visible as Voltron flies by.]

Hunk: I can feel something, like an energy inside me.

Allura: It’s the entity.

Lance: This feeling, it’s like…

Keith: Like a dark realization washing over.

Pidge: It’s like we’re being pulled by a tether connected to our souls.

Allura: We’re getting closer. This way.

Hunk: Is this Honerva’s mind?

Allura: It’s on the other side of this wall.

Pidge: What is this?

Allura: It feels like… like these are the souls that Honerva has defeated and corrupted. It’s terrible.

Hunk: Of course we’re gonna have to get on the other side of the--what?

Pidge: Allura!

Keith: Come on! No! Come on!

[Scene change to Pidge inside Honerva’s mind, a green and black plain lit by stars.]

Pidge: Guys? Where am I? Guys, do you copy? Guys?! Team, can you hear me?

[Cut to Hunk inside Honerva’s mind, a yellow and black plain lit by stars.]

Hunk: Hello! Anyone?

[Cut to Lance in a red and black plain lit by stars.]

Lance: Team! Something severed our connection!

[Cut to Allura in a blue and black plain lit by stars.]

Allura: Paladins, respond! Why can you not hear me?

[Cut to Keith, on the black plain that shields Honerva’s mind.]

Keith: There has to be a way in. I can’t feel them.

[Cut to Pidge.]

Pidge: I can’t even feel my lion!

[Cut to Hunk, then Allura.]

Allura: Paladins! I will not let you hurt us any longer! This is some kind of horrible ruse and you will pay dearly for it. Time to end this!

[Flash back to the Castle of Lions armory.]

Alfor: Your suits of armor.

Trigel: They’re incredible.

Zarkon: We will be a force to be reckoned with in these armaments.

Gyrgan: They stretch, right?

Alfor: Yes, Gyrgan, they mold to fit their paladin.

Trigel: When will your wonders end, Alfor?

Alfor: Interesting you should mention that. I have one more piece of equipment for all of you.

Zarkon: What are they?

Alfor: I call them bayards. Now, each bayard is crafted with a small fragment of the comet’s ore.

Zarkon: With this much power, we will be unstoppable.

Alfor: They can create powerful weapons, but they can also act as a key bridging a paladin’s essence with their lion. Only so long as we fight together as a single unit. To defend the universe.

All: To defend the universe!

[Flash forward to return to Allura and Blaytz in the blue and black plain of Honerva’s mind.]

Allura: It’s really you.

[Cut to Pidge and Trigel in the green and black plain.]

Pidge: Your soul! Honerva must have--

[Cut to Hunk and Gyrgan in the yellow and black plain.]

Hunk: --trapped you here somehow! Please, I don’t want to fight you!

[Cut to Lance and Alfor in the red and black plain.]

Lance: Please! Remember who you are!

[Cut to Allura and Blaytz in the blue and black plain again.]

Allura: Blaytz, please.

[Flash back to the Castle of Lions on Altea.]

Alfor: Make no mistake, Zarkon is coming.

Trigel: Then we use the lions, fight him until our last breath.

Alfor: I am not certain we can win this fight. We cannot risk Voltron falling into his hands. We will utilize our lions to seal the Black Lion. Once we are done, we will send our lions as far away as possible. Coran, you and the Castle of Lions will take the Black Lion away.

Coran: You would have me leave your side at the very end?

Alfor: No. I would have you stand by my daughter’s. I am entrusting you with what is most precious to me in this entire universe, Coran.

Coran: It will be my greatest honor.

Gyrgan: Then it is decided. We go into battle together, one last time.

Alfor: To defend the universe.

All: To defend the universe.

[Flash forward to Trigel and Pidge in the green and black plain.]

Trigel: What… Where am I?

[Cut to Hunk and Gyrgan in the yellow and black plain.]

Hunk: You’re in the void just outside of Honerva’s mind. I know it sounds crazy, but it’s true.

[Cut to Blaytz and Allura in the blue and black plain.]

Blaytz: Are the visions from the lions true?

[Cut to Alfor and Lance in the red and black plain.]

Alfor: Has it really been ten thousand years?

Lance: It has.

[Cut to Hunk and Gyrgan in the yellow and black plain.]

Gyrgan: It saddens me greatly to learn that Zarkon wreaked such destruction in our absence.

Hunk: But not completely. Voltron was reformed and the Paladins fly together again.

Gyrgan: I have always believed that unity is where true power comes from, and true unity can only be born of love.

[Cut to Trigel and Pidge in the green and black plain.]

Trigel: I can’t tell you how much it warms my heart to know that someone so connected to the world around her is piloting the Green Lion. My race believes observation to be the most revered attribute. It is where intelligence is born. And for you, it is where it has thrived. The infinite abilities of your mind dwarf the smallness of your size. The Green Lion could not have found a more perfect Paladin.

[Cut to Blaytz and Allura in the blue and black plain.]

Blaytz: People often overlooked me because I was different, but the Blue Lion recognized something in me, something others couldn’t see. It saw the greatness within that even I did not. You, Allura, have greatness within you, as well. You’re so much like your father, and yet so different. You’re a remarkable person. Thank you for saving us.

[Cut to Alfor and Lance in the red and black plain.]

Alfor: Through the lion’s bond, I could feel your love for my daughter.

Lance: I could feel yours, as well.

Alfor: As Paladins, we face many quests throughout the cosmos, but the most amazing journey is that of life. And the biggest question you face is who to go on that journey with. I’m glad my daughter chose you.

[Cut to Keith on the black plain at the boundary of Honerva’s mind.]

Keith: Please. You’re back. You guys are alright. Wait, are they the…

Pidge: Yep, the original paladins.

Alfor: Allura! It is fitting that I would find what is brightest to me in the darkest place.

Allura: All that I have done, I have done to make you proud.

Hunk: Their souls were trapped by Honerva’s dark magic. When we came near Honvera’s consciousness, our connection attracted them to us. Crazy, right?

Pidge: But we used that connection to free them. The lions created a bridge, sharing old memories with new.

Alfor: What’s going on?

Allura: Honerva’s connection grows. We are very close to her now.

Alfor: You hold a dark entity within you. Don’t you know how dangerous that is? That’s what led to Honerva and Zarkon’s end.

Allura: I know the danger, but now I have the power to stop Honerva. You had to make a difficult choice in war by sending the lions away. I also had to make a difficult choice. I’m not going to be afraid to use the power I have. We need to continue.

Lance: But how do we get past the wall?

Allura: It’s… it’s like I can feel her thoughts. The way through is with the darkness.

Alfor: Honerva went mad, obsessed with darkness and power.

Allura: And now, we must enter her mind.

End.

[otterknowbynow]

Gotcha Day (3/3)

The catalyst for Team Voltron adopting a dog might be an offhand demand from Lance, but let’s be real: several of them are very much on board with this plan.

Written as part of Gentron Week 2020 as a combination of the prompts “Adopting a Pet Together” and “Cultural Exchange”, in two three parts.

Part 1 Here | Part 2 Here | Also on ao3

Keith sleeps terribly, of course. She’s warm, for one thing, so temperature regulation is next to impossible. And any time he moves she moves too -- at one point ending up draped over his legs, which would maybe be fine, if it didn’t mean they were trapped. When she starts whining around fourth varga, he supposes he must have fallen asleep at some point, since that’s the only explanation for the groggy way he’s dragging himself into consciousness now. 

“Yeah, alright,” he grumbles when she steps her front paws onto his back and sticks a very cold nose against his ear to whine directly into it. “I get it.” He carefully extracts himself from under her, moving her to the side of his bunk that’s against the wall, and sits up, scrubbing at sleep-heavy eyes. Folding his legs under him, he turns to look back at her. “I guess you probably need to pee, huh.” As if in answer, the hyrassie leaps over his lap and to the door to his quarters, whining again. Before she can escalate to anywhere near the shrieking sound they had to contend with last night, he makes a gesture at the control panel so the door will slide open, and she dashes out. “Oh, shit,” he mutters -- right. A leash would have probably been a good idea. 

He follows the faint sound of whining and catches up to her at the entrance to her deck -- thankfully on the same level of the castle as the paladins’ quarters; they made a good choice there -- where she’s scratching at the door with two hoofed feet and the whining is threatening to grow again. 

“Shh, shh,” Keith mutters at her, and activates the panel to let her in, grateful that she came straight here when the entire castle could theoretically have been accessible. The first thing he does once he follows her into the deck -- Turnip practically flying to the patch of grass -- is go to the chest of essentials they’ve set up by the door and stick a lead in his pocket. Sure, he can probably just carry her to the lounge to hang out until the others get up, but if there’s any hope of not being stuck there until someone comes to take over, he should probably try to get a leash on her. Keith is musing over the harness and collar options that Coran seems to have dug up from the castle’s recesses when he hears the door swish open again and looks up to see Shiro standing in it, looking a little too casually curious. 

“How’s she doing?” he asks immediately, and not at all casually.

“See for yourself,” Keith says with a shrug, trying to work out how the straps of the harness he’s holding are supposed to go around a six-legged animal. He may as well have not said anything, though, since Shiro is already halfway across the room and kneeling on the ground, with both hands outstretched. Turnip, seeing him and having apparently taken care of any business she needed to attend to, races over joyfully, before stopping abruptly and jerking her head back slightly from his right arm. Slowly, she moves her nose closer to it, investigating. Shiro waits, not moving, whispering reassurances to her until her tails give a low wag, and then scratching her under the chin with his hand. She tentatively licks at the metal fingers of it, and he grins down at her. Keith is surprised to find he’s grinning, also, given how crappy he feels overall. 

--

They try keeping her in Shiro’s quarters that night. He’s adamant that they should crate train her -- everything he’s read says it’s best practice, apparently, and Keith can’t help but support that option given the uncomfortable sleepless hours when she was on his bed. He’s a bit surprised that Lance doesn’t demand she stay with him, but apparently even just hearing about the fit she threw in the middle of the night is enough to deter him. He does volunteer to go with Coran to find something suitable for the pup to sleep in, though, which Keith hopes means he feels at least a bit responsible. 

“Looks like we’re all set,” Shiro says as Coran clicks the last support of the crate into place. It looks remarkably like an ordinary dog crate, to Keith at least, and they’ve put one of the cushions in it to try to make it more homey.

“Sure hope so,” he says, shooting Coran a look he hopes will be interpreted correctly as a reminder that he’s not going to take sole responsibility for the hyrassie pup overnight again. The Altean gives him the tiniest of nods in response and stands, dusting off his hands and looking over at Shiro. 

“It should be just fine, I think, especially if you give her a couple of those treats Hunk whipped up this afternoon -- the boy’s a wizard in the kitchen, especially with baking -- reminds me of my cousin Ira.” Lance, who Keith would normally expect to be annoyed at too much commentary from Coran, just smiles instead. 

“He sure is,” he says, sticking his hands in the pockets of his jacket and leaning against the wall by the door back out to the hallway. “You know he’s this close to figuring out sourdough biscuits? Like, perfect ones, I mean, since obviously even the quote-unquote failed attempts --” he’s mercifully cut off from continuing by a tone announcing there’s someone at the door. 

“That’ll be him and Pidge,” says Shiro, gesturing at the door panel to let them in, one sleepy hyrassie pup in tow. They coax her toward the crate, Hunk pulling out a couple of crunchy-looking treats that smell good enough that Keith almost wants to eat them himself. Almost. Luckily, they seem to smell even better to Turnip since she extends her head as far as she can to sniff at them as Hunk moves them toward her crate. When she walks in, she settles down almost immediately to demolish the treats, which sound as crunchy as they look, Keith lets out a breath he didn’t realize he was holding, and Shiro grins at all of them. 

“Well, that’s settled,” he says, waving them toward the door. “Goodnight, everyone.” 

And Keith is relieved to find himself in his quarters with no wriggly puppy and no shrieking, just peace and quiet. He climbs into bed, grateful that at least if his sleep is disturbed tonight, it’ll be by the usual suspects, rather than an all-too-present animal. 

Or so he thinks. Instead, he nearly knocks his head against the wall next to his bunk when he’s awakened again by that same shrieking sound. Looking at the timekeeper by his bed, he sees that at least it’s a bit after fourth varga instead of first, but he’s still not exactly thrilled. Where is Shiro that he’s not already handling this? Keith shoves his face into his pillow, pulling his blankets up around his head to block out the noise as best he can. Shiro will take care of it, he thinks. He probably got woken up just now, also, so it’ll just take him a second to get the crate open and get Turnip to her deck...but the sound keeps going on, and when he can’t take it anymore, he rolls out of bed, grabs his jacket from its hook, and shakes his head a bit to clear it before heading down the hall to Shiro’s quarters. 

Weirdly, he’s the only one of the paladins who seems to have noticed the sound. He can understand how it happened the first night -- since his room is closest to the deck they’ve set up for Turnip, with the Alteans’ quarters on the other side -- but shouldn’t at least Pidge have heard something? When he gets to Shiro’s door, he pokes a hand at the panel irritably. She’s still just keening away in there, which -- he notes as the door slides open -- doesn’t seem like something Shiro would just let continue. 

“Keith, what’s up?” Shiro’s voice comes from his bunk, where -- Keith can see from the light spilling in from the hallway -- he’s still at least half-asleep. 

“What do you mean, what’s up?” he asks, frowning. “Can I -- please --” he doesn’t wait for an answer, going straight to the crate in the corner of the room and opening it to release a highly relieved puppy. He picks her up quickly, before she can dart out of the room or -- worse -- pee on the floor. “She’s been screaming for like, ten minutes.” 

“She has?” 

“Did you not...did you not hear her?” 

“I haven’t heard anything.” Shiro sits up, picking up the timekeeper next to his bed and squinting at it, frowning in the dim light. “I’d be up in like half a varga anyway, but..” He trails off, and Keith is still a bit too stunned by a new realization to say anything for a moment. It’s just his luck that the new puppy -- a puppy he did not ask for, important to note -- apparently cries at some frequency full humans can’t hear. 

“Just another joy of being part-galra, I guess,” he mutters, as Turnip happily nuzzles at his hand before licking it. He grimaces, wishing he’d grabbed his gloves. “I’m gonna take her to her deck.” 

“Yeah, go for it -- I’ll meet you there in a couple minutes -- dobashes -- whatever.” 

She’ll have to sleep in his room, Keith realizes as he walks her down to the door to her deck. Allura has the mice, and Coran has already said no once. He draws a bit of comfort from knowing that at least she’ll be in a crate from now on, even if it does mean he’ll be getting up a couple vargas earlier than he usually would. 

“You’re lucky you’re this cute,” he mutters as he gestures the door open and lets her down to race over to the miniature Altean field. 

--

Lance helps him move the crate later that morning, once the rest of the castle residents are up. They don’t bother folding it up again, carrying it between the two of them down the hallway. It’s awkward and heavy, and Keith is grateful for his gloves keeping it from digging into his hands too uncomfortably. 

“Can’t believe you’re stealing my puppy,” Lance says, a hint of a whine creeping into his voice. Keith can see the corners of his mouth twitching too, though, and he lets out a small huff of amusement. 

“Stealing, my ass,” he says. He gestures at the control panel as they approach his door, and adds, “I didn’t ask for any of this.” 

“Stealing her right out from under me,” Lance continues dramatically as they put the crate down in the corner of the room. He opens the door to it and resettles the cushion inside. “Like some kind of...puppy-smuggler. Thief.” 

“You didn’t even like her when we brought her back,” Keith says, trying to keep his amusement out of his voice. It’s creeping in anyway, though, he can hear it. 

“So my judgment slipped for, like, a second!” Lance stands up, dusting off his hands so he can prop them on his hips indignantly. “That’s no reason to steal a man’s dog!” 

“I can’t even steal her long-term, not if I’m getting back to Blades training next week -- movement -- whatever.” He hopes that will settle it. Can’t steal something if you’re not here to keep it. 

“What’s gonna stop you from just taking off to the Blades, puppy in tow, huh? I bet that guy --- Kolivan -- would be all for having a deer-puppy-shark on the team. You’ll raise her up to be her own canine special ops unit, and then where will I be? Puppyless! A broken shell of a man!” 

“God, you’re ridiculous,” Keith says, rolling his eyes as he heads back out into the hallway and starts walking away. “You coming to the lounge to see your dog one last time before I steal her away forever?” He hears Lance slide the door shut behind him, and he catches up a few seconds later. 

“Keith, seriously, you better not monopolize her time now. Like, I was joking back there, you know I was joking, but you can’t just take over, like, she’s all of ours, you know that, right? Just because she’s sleeping in your room doesn’t mean she’s more yours than the rest of us, and --” They’ve reached the lounge, and as he gestures the door open, Keith is incredibly relieved that the rest of Lance’s words are drowned out by a gleefully yipping puppy, who is decidedly not going to be his sole responsibility from now on, as if that would even be a desirable outcome. 

--

“I’m not sure we’re ever going to be able to just give her free run of the castle,” Hunk is saying later that afternoon as he gathers up the pieces of yet another chew toy Turnip has shredded mercilessly with her razor teeth. “Not if this level of destruction is any indication.” 

“I mean, she is a puppy,” Shiro says, grinning from where he’s sitting on the floor against the couch, Turnip curled up napping in his lap. Her middle set of legs jerks every once in a while, and she’s growled at least three times in her sleep so far. Katie wonders idly if there’s a reason it’s the middle set of legs, or if it’s just that the back ones are folded under her and too squished to be a part of it. “She might grow out of some of it.” 

“I don’t know about that.” Hunk shakes his head a little, dropping the pieces in a waste chute at the corner of the lounge and dusting off his hands. “They’re supposed to keep needing to chew, like, forever. And a lot.” 

“It seems like if we give her enough alternatives, we should at least be able to keep the important machinery and stuff safe,” says Katie, grabbing her tablet from beside the couch she’s sitting on and opening a note. “Do we have any toys she hasn’t destroyed?” 

“Uh, a few, but a lot of those even are hanging on by a thread.” Hunk wrinkles his nose, sitting down on the couch next to her so he can see the tablet screen. “Like, the one ring seems like it’s holding up mostly okay, but even that’s got some divots starting from her teeth.” 

“Seems like we should figure out what that’s made of and go from there,” Katie says. “You good here, Shiro? Hunk and I should probably go down to the lab.” 

“Yeah, we’re good,” Shiro says in a tone that suggests it’s a bit absurd to think they’d be anything but. He scratches behind Turnip’s ears gently. “Besides, Lance at least said he’d stop by once they’re done on the training deck. By all means, go do some R&D.” 

--

By the time Keith gets the call from Kolivan that he needs to start a new phase of training, they’ve fallen into a routine. Turnip sleeps through nearly to fifth varga before she starts whining, and he manages to get enough shuteye that that’s not the nightmare it could be. He doesn’t need all that much, anyway, as long as it’s relatively peaceful. 

They’re never alone on her deck for long. Even if he can’t hear Turnip wake up, Shiro can certainly hear Keith, and he usually shows up just as Turnip is finished relieving herself and ready to play, which works out well for everyone involved, especially with the nigh-indestructible toys Hunk and Pidge manage to produce. It’s just a few at first -- a rope toy of extra-strong fibers, a ring with some give in it that she somehow can’t rip through -- but pretty soon it becomes a game of who can come up with and produce the best designs that are also functional. 

One evening, the night before Keith is going to rejoin the Blades for a while, Hunk comes into the lounge holding a nondescript bag. Everyone’s off-duty at the same time, for once, since the bridge is automatically retuning its maintenance protocols, and he stands in front of them looking utterly triumphant. 

“Gotta say, I’m particularly proud of this one,” he says, then makes a dramatic fanfare sound with his mouth as he pulls something out of the bag. 

“Was that supposed to be a trumpet?” Keith asks.

“It’s clearly not a trumpet, Keith. It’s a cow.” Lance manages to sound both dismissive and slightly awestruck at the same time. 

“That’s a pretty incredible likeness, Hunk,” says Shiro, still holding the other end of a rope Turnip is pulling at enthusiastically, seemingly unaware that any conversation they’re having has anything to do with her. 

“Isn’t this a toy for her to chew on?” Allura sounds somewhat baffled. 

“I mean, yeah,” says Hunk, frowning at the cow in his hands. “That’s the idea. I used a new polymer we developed that’s firmer than the first one -- less give, more for dental care than general play -- that’s why there’s this texturing for her teeth.”  He indicates one of the legs of the cow, where he’s shaped ridges and spikes that do seem to approximate a toothbrush. If a toothbrush also kind of resembled a medieval morningstar.

“And it’s made to look like another living creature? One we ideally...don’t want her chewing on? Wasn’t the idea that they might be friends?” 

“Oh, I forgot about that,” says Lance. 

“You forgot you got us all into this by claiming you were some kind of cow-whisperer?” Pidge sounds as amazed by Lance’s lack of recall as Keith is. 

“I never said cow-whisperer!” Lance objects. “I said she needed a puppy friend. All cows need a puppy friend; it’s a fact of life.” 

“Shall we go introduce her to our fair lady Kaltenecker, then?” Coran slaps his knees twice and stands up, stretching. As if in answer, Turnip races over to Hunk and leaps toward the cow toy, snatching it out of his hand and giving it an emphatic shake when she lands back on the ground, growling. 

“Maybe we wait until she’s slightly less puppy,” says Hunk, inspecting his hand carefully for injury. “Maybe what Kaltenecker really needs is a calm adult dog friend.” 

[blueplanettrash]

Not a Great Friend (Klangst)

This is for my final crossword puzzle story winner @natsuhi-chan​! Who requested a story about the team not noticing that Lance wasn’t doing so well and Keith does notice. I don’t know how I feel about it, but I hope you like it! :)

Ω

Keith wouldn’t say that he’s a great friend.

Not that he’s a bad friend, by any means. But, he’s not a great friend.

He’d call himself a good friend.

Hunk on the other hand, he’s a great friend. Pidge is a great friend (when you’re not on her bad side). Shiro, Allura, and Coran were also great friends.

So, why was he the first one to notice how different Lance was?

He’d only come back to the Castle on a mission with Kolivan. Mostly to make sure all their information was synced up (at least the stuff that The Blade wanted to share with Voltron). It literally took him only a few minutes of being in the same room as him to realize that he was being a little too quiet. His smile was just a little too big to be genuine and if he looked over to quickly at the paladin, he would catch his expression before he could change it.

He couldn’t stop thinking about all the times before he left the team. Many people probably would have said that the two of them weren’t that good of friends, but considering his history with friendships… Lance was one of his best friends.

And even to him, it was painful to him to see such a bright, cheerful person turn into a hollow shell of himself. Even more so, it was painful to realize that none of their other friends seemed to notice. Maybe it was because he hadn’t seen the Cuban boy in so long that it stuck out to him. Maybe he was being dramatic and Lance was completely fine (he doubted it but it was still an option). No matter what the reason was, he still wasn’t leaving the room until he asked Lance if he was alright.

For the rest of the meeting, it was all that he could even think about. He was barely able to pay attention to the information being exchanged by their respective leaders, he could only keep his eyes on the former blue paladin. And the longer he watched Lance, the more worried he became.

He didn’t crack jokes, he didn’t try to lighten the mood of the meeting, he didn’t call Kolivan any fun nicknames that he came up with on the fly. In fact, he barely talked at all.

Over and over again, Keith asked himself why nobody else was concerned. Was he the only one that remembered the old Lance?

Finally, after what felt like forever, Allura and Kolivan wrapped up the general part of the meeting and Allura extended an invitation for the two of them to stay for a meal. Kolivan predictably told her that they had to return to base to process the information they were given but they were grateful for the offer. They walked with them back to the hangers where their ship was being kept. Keith smiled as his old team members gave their goodbyes and put up with Hunk crying a bit on him.

When it came to Lance saying goodbye, his mood instantly changed and he looked at him with concern shining in his eyes.

“Well, I guess we’ll see you later Samurai, maybe in another six months,” Lance said, giving him a half-hearted grin.

“Listen, Lance,” Keith stated with a frown. Lance’s grin fell and he bared his teeth a little.

“What? Was my goodbye not good enough?” He spit. Keith’s eyes widened dramatically at the change in behaviour. Without the false smile, he could see how dark the bags under his eyes were, how red and puffy his eyes looked, and how drained his face suddenly looked.

“What? No, of course not, Lance,”

“Whatever, I’m tired, I’m going to bed,” Lance proclaimed, turning away from the group around Keith. “It was good to see you,” he muttered somewhat bitterly.

“Wait!” He cried, grabbing him by the arm to keep him from leaving. “Are you okay Lance? You just seem so different from usual, you’re not yourself,”

There was a few seconds of silence.

Then Lance broke.

He planted his head in hands and sobbed. And it wasn’t just a few breaths that he needed to get out. They were almost inhuman in how violent they were. He gulped each breath in, just to let out in a mournful wail. Keith didn’t let himself think before he pulled him into a hug and let him cry onto his shoulder.

“I’m sorry,” he sniffled, letting himself sink into Keith’s warmth. “I’m so stupid for crying about this,”

“No, you’re not,” Keith shook his head and rubbed Lance’s back soothingly. “We all need to cry sometimes,”

“Even you?” Lance half-laughed.

“Uh yeah, you saw me during that Voltron interview didn’t you?” Keith asked sarcastically. “But, what has you so upset?” He asked hesitantly, and for good reason since Lance started sobbing again after he asked.

Keith waited patiently for him to answer him.

“It’s just been so long since anyone asked me if I was okay,” he finally got out. “I’ve been feeling like shit forever and it just seemed like no one even cared,” he lamented, clutching onto Keith’s uniform. “Or I was being over dramatic,”

Keith looked up at the team and saw them watching Lance with guilty expressions; Hunk with tears in his eyes, Pidge was picking at her fingernail beds anxiously and Shiro was looking down at the ground, his fists clenched tightly. He jerked his head at them, trying to get them to come towards them. Hesitantly, they did and wrapped their arms around both of them.

“I’m sorry Lance, I should have been more careful about monitoring everyone’s mental health, I didn’t even think about it,” Shiro said, ruffling Lance’s hair.

“No, it’s fine. I should have just said something instead of keeping it all inside,” Lance muttered, leaning into the hand.

“Well, that might be so, but we still should have looked out for you, we’re a team after all,” Shiro grinned fondly.

“I think we’re all in need of a little team bonding,” Pidge announced, backing out of the hug.

“Mercury Gameflux II anyone? Keith?” Hunk offered, nudging him with elbow.

“You’re on!” Keith smirked.

“Party in my room!” Lance cheered, jumping away from the others and racing out of the hangers. The other yelled after him, chasing after him and leaving their leaders behind.

“I think I’ll take you up on that meal offer,” Kolivan deadpanned, turning to Allura and Coran; who brightened up immediately.

“Excellent! I make a mean Paladin Lunch!”

[musicanddancingthroughlife]

Langst/Klance -- Pierrot

Okay guys, I know I forgot to upload something last week but this is like. My longest chapter yet, I guess. It is Klance, which I haven’t written in a while, and it’s probably super rough cause I hate myself and won’t go back and edit, but hey, have. Other than that, I hate myself and that sums up a lot of aspects of my life right now.

------------------------------- 

“Hunk? Hunk, where’d you go? All right, so Coran isn’t as good of a cook as you are, but I think by now we should be used to that, there’s no need to run from it.”

              Lance stopped short when he heard loud sobs and that too quick breathing that signaled Hunk’s anxiety attacks. Lance didn’t hesitate, though. “Hey, Hunk? Can I touch you, buddy?” His friend shifted under his mess of blankets, shivering and shaking. Lance swept him up into a hug, holding close for a few minutes before he grasped one of Hunks’ larger hands in one of his own. He settled their joined hands on Lance’s chest, Hunk instantly using lance’s heartbeat to steady his gasping breath.

              It took several minutes, but Lance sat patiently, whispering reassurance and comfort in both English and Spanish. Once he was sure Hunk was calmed down, he pulled back into a tight hug, letting Hunk weep into his neck, uncaring of how the tears were dampening his clothes and making him uncomfortable. “Wanna talk?” Hunk nodded, but it was still a while before he said anything. And when he did, Lance felt his heart stop.

              “Lance, what am I doing here? I’m not a pilot like you guys; I don’t even like flying. How can I save the universe if I can’t even do basic flight exercises like today’s?” And with that, he burst into a fresh wave of tears.

              Lance contented himself with rubbing Hunk’s back, letting him cry out his insecurities and frustration, but he didn’t let that stop him from trying to assuage those fears. “Come on, man, you’re one of the two smartest people on our team! 50% of our brain power! Maybe something like 33% if we’re really gonna count Coran, but let’s also keep in mind that you’re the reason we’re not dying of starvation or too much exposure to goo, so at the very least, you deserve more credit than that. And you’ve come so far! Yellow is lucky to have you as her pilot! And you’ve got some of the top skills in the training rooms, don’t you? You’re just behind Shiro and Keith!

              “And come on, it’s not like you’re the only making mistakes! Remember last week when I accidentally used those weird pellet gun things and shot Shiro in the ass? And what about when I was racing Keith and wound up making both of us crash into the ground? Was that stupid, or what?” Lance belted out a laugh, cringing inwardly when it sounded just a little too loud, but thankfully Hunk didn’t seem to notice. He just let out a weak giggle, but Lance could see that there were still tears in his eyes. That was fine. He had plenty of stories to entertain Hunk with.

              Keith was annoyed. Why was he always the one having to track down Lance when he wandered off? It’s not like Keith was his keeper or anything. Hell, he didn’t even like Lance!

              …Okay, maybe that was a lie, because what wasn’t to like? Honestly, Keith was just as infatuated as he was irritated, even at that moment, which was impressive because at that moment, Keith felt more horrified at what he was hearing. First, the very idea that Hunk was doubting his worth on the team, was ridiculous, and he wished that he knew what to say in order to make him feel better, but at least Lance was handling that okay. Keith just wished it wasn’t at Lance’s own expense.

              At first, he was just surprised at hearing Lance recount those stories, stories which made Lance look like an idiot who can’t do anything right. He was pleased to hear that Hunk was seeming to cheer up, but he also knew that Lance’s laughter wasn’t completely honest. There was a tinge of pain to it. Lance normally tried to avoid reminders of those moments, and here he was, voluntarily sharing them, just to help a friend.

              More laughter spilled from the room, and Keith bit his lip. Lance’s laughter was sounding more and more broken as he continued sharing stories. Thankfully he had begun reminding Hunk of all the good he had done, both before and after Voltron, but the tears in Lance’s voice were starting to hurt him. Thankfully, it was really only a couple minutes later when Hunk and Lance stepped out of Hunk’s room, arms slung over each other’s shoulders. Keith felt a pang in his chest.

              “Keith!” Hunk’s eyes were rimmed with red, but the beaming smile he gave Keith told him that Lance had succeeded in making his friend feel better. “Did you need something?”

              “Coran and Allura wanted me to tell you guys that we’re ready to have dinner, if you want to join us.” His eyes drifted over to Lance, and found himself amazed by how Lance was able to mask the pain in his eyes. Sure, Keith could still tell, because he was actively looking for it, but no one else would have any idea. How did he do that? Why would he do that?

              Hunk quickly ducked under Lance’s arm to clasp a large hand on Keith’s shoulder. “Well, let’s get to it, man, I’m starving!” And Hunk began to drag Keith away, leaving Lance behind to follow. Keith glanced back, but when he did, he just saw Lance flash a wide grin at him, and then Hunk was pulling him around a corner.

              The next time he saw Lance was a few minutes after he and Hunk had seated themselves, when he quietly slipped into the dining hall. He was just a little too quiet while they ate, but nobody else seemed to notice, and that’s when Keith resolved to keep a closer eye on his sharpshooter.

                “Lance! You’re not nearly fast enough!” Lance’s concentration broken, Pidge managed to catch his foot with her katar. Startled at the unexpected catch, she accidentally shocked him, and Lance yelped in pain, crashing to the ground.

              “Oh my god, Lance, I am so sorry!” Pidge started to rush over, but Allura stopped her before she could.

              “Lance!” she snapped impatiently, “get up, now, and try again!” Lance was amazed. She wanted him to what? He just got shocked with who knows how much electricity! Hunk and Keith stared in shock, first looking at Allura in disbelief, then at Lance, still on the ground, trying to breathe through the pain coursing through him, and finally at Shiro, begging him to do something. He stepped forward.

              “Allura, come on, we’ve all been training for hours. We’re exhausted.”

              “You guys are fine. Go get some rest. Lance still has a lot of work he needs to do, and he’s never going to improve if he doesn’t stop wasting our time!” These last words were focused on Lance, who squeezed his eyes shut, shooting hand rhythmically flexing and relaxing. He felt a stab of shame in his chest. Of course, she was right. He was the weak link. He was behind everybody else in hand-to-hand, hell, even Pidge just took him down! They were never going to get anywhere with him being such a baby about training.

              “Allura—” Shiro began, but Lance cut him off.

              “No, she’s right.” Lance shakily got to his feet, small gasps and grunts escaping him as he forced his wobbly legs to support his weight. “I can do better, just let me go again.”

              Shiro looked less than impressed. “Lance, you can barely stand. Let’s just call it a day and we can hit it hard in the morning.” And hell, Lance wanted nothing more than to be able to take a break. He wasn’t positive how long they had been going so far, but he knew it was at least a couple of hours – usually they train hand-to-hand for two, taking turn so everyone could rest, and so that they could each practice with varying styles and techniques. Then they would take an extra hour in the shooting range, and then move on to team building exercises before finishing for the day. Briefly, he wondered how long Allura wanted him to continue practicing.

              “There, you see? He gets it, at least.” Oh, he got it all right. He was a failure, as usual, and he needed to work harder to catch up, to not bring his friends down. People could die if he wasn’t good enough. Lance gritted his teeth, preparing himself to go again. “Come on, Pidge, I won’t make it as easy on you this time.”

              “Actually, I believe Coran needed both Pidge and Hunk for a project today, so if you two would go get showered and then meet with him, that would be fantastic.” Allura’s face was set, decisive. Pidge and Hunk were done for the day. Lance blinked.

              “Okay… Shiro, will you run through it with me again? I know I can get it.” He really didn’t, but he wasn’t going to stop until he did, so it wasn’t like he had any other choice.

              “Lance, I need Shiro so we can plan our next course of action. Got that, Shiro?” Her voice was hard and unforgiving, but still, Shiro hesitated, looking back at Lance almost questioningly. Lance shook his head. “It’s fine, Shiro, I’m sure Keith will help me?” Keith stepped forward, but Allura spoke up again.

              “Honestly, Lance! Keith spends too much time training as is. You are the only one who needs the extra practice, stop trying to guilt the others into staying behind to help you. Keith, I don’t want to see you anywhere near the training room until tomorrow, when we are in fact scheduled to train.” The look in her eyes dared Keith to argue, and Lance knew him well enough to know that he needed to step in.

              “Don’t worry, Princess, I can do it on my own. More fun to have company, but you’re right. Keith deserves a break.” Lance couldn’t look them in the eye. Not only was he going to struggle with the training itself, but now he was going to be isolated from his friends for who knows how long. What a day.

                Keith clenched his fists, anger rushing through him. Lance was trying just as hard as any of them! In fact, he was trying harder than most of them! This was ridiculous, and he had no idea why Allura was acting the way she was. Like Lance needed a punishment or something! But with Lance agreeing with her, Keith couldn’t see how he could stay behind to help him with the combination.

              “Lance, if you need to see the combo again – though you really shouldn’t, seeing as Shiro and Keith demonstrated it numerous times for you and you would have it if you had been paying attention – you can recall it on the databases here in the training room. You will practice until you get the combo, and until either Shiro or myself can confirm that you know it.” And without another word, she swept out of the room, calling to the other paladins on her way out.

              Slowly, hesitantly, Pidge and Hunk wished Lance good luck, before they left to find Coran. Shiro look sympathetic, but ultimately, there wasn’t much they could do. Especially where Lance was willing to just put in the extra time. Already, he was gulping down some water, shuffling and shifting to allow his feet to find the beginning stance. Keith wanted nothing more than to stay behind, to offer some help or advice or dammit, even just some company! Lance needed people, and to cut him off from everyone like this was unnecessarily cruel. But before he could even offer any encouraging words, Lance was moving his way through the combination, slowly mapping out each step. Keith sighed, but then he followed the rest of their friends out of the training room.

              Hopefully Lance would be okay.

              Of course, none of them saw Lance again until way after dinner. The other paladins had long since headed to bed, but Keith had been unable to sleep and was in the middle of debating whether it was safe to go to the training room or not when Lance came stumbling out of it. Trailing behind Allura, he looked beaten and exhausted. His hair and clothes were soaked through with sweat and Keith suspected he was favoring his leg. Meanwhile Allura looked smug, pleased with the knowledge that her slowest paladin was improving, that they were that much closer to defeating Zarkon. Lance slowly shuffled towards the kitchen, but Allura stopped him with a hand on his shoulder.

              “What are you doing?” she questioned.

              Lance frowned. “I haven’t eaten yet…”

              “It’s far too late to be making another mess in the kitchen,” she looked at him disapprovingly, and Keith felt anger rising to the surface. “It’d be best if you slept instead. Eat in the morning.” Keith gaped at her, but he was unnoticed by the two of them. Really, that just meant that once Allura had turned Lance towards the direction of their bedrooms, Keith was in the perfect position to see the pained resignation cross Lance’s face.

              Before he even realized it, Keith had retrieved some light food from the kitchen and was knocking on Lance’s door. He left the foot on the floor, where Lance would hopefully see it, and then scurried around the corner as quickly and quietly as he could. He heard the door open, there was a few seconds of silence and then some rustling before the door shut again. When Keith peeked around the corner, the food was gone.

                Only a couple days later, and Keith was again frustrated about Lance. It looked like he still hadn’t recovered fully from that long night in the training room, and he couldn’t understand why. Shiro had been really careful in making sure that nothing like that happened again, but that didn’t stop Allura from pushing Lance’s limits as hard as she could get away with when Shiro wasn’t looking. But despite this, Lance still looked so tired all the time.

              That night, at dinner, Keith kept a close eye on Lance. He seemed normal, though tired, and it wasn’t until after dinner that he realized Lance wasn’t retiring to his room like most of the rest of the paladins were. Instead, he headed to the training room. Keith camped out outside, bored out of his mind, but more determined to find out if Lance was really okay or not. Lance logged a good three hours before he finally came out of the locker room exit. He was breathing heavily, gasping for air, and muscles loose and trembling, but otherwise seemed unharmed. Keith forced himself to relax as he followed Lance down the hallway from a distance. Lance gulped down a water pouch, and then set off to the Lion Hangar, where Pidge was still absorbed in her latest project.

              “Pidge.” It was quiet, and the reaction was slight, but Keith still recognized how Pidge flinched and her shoulders shot up to her ears. “When are you going to go to bed?”

              “None of your business!” Pidge spat, and Keith was more than surprised at the venom in the girl’s voice. Lance only sighed.

              “Pidge. You need to sleep. Please.” Was this why he was so tired? He was trying to make sure Pidge was getting to bed? Keith looked at Pidge critically. If that was the case, he really wasn’t doing a good job. But, he realized with a pang, that wasn’t his fault. No one else was trying to get Pidge to sleep at all, and it was obvious she desperately needed the rest.

              “Fuck off, Lance, I don’t need a babysitter.” Lance flinched, but refused to back down. “Come on, just one night. You haven’t slept more than a couple of hours in who knows how many days.”

              Pidge narrowed her eyes. “Have you been keeping tabs on me?”

              “I’m worried about you.”

              “Well no one else is and the only people who really care are who knows where and I’m trying to find them, so leave me alone.”

              There were a few moments of silence where Keith wondered if he should intervene. Before he could, Lance spoke up again. “I know you have nightmares, Pidge.” Pidge froze. “Come on, did you really think I wouldn’t notice, kid? You’re pushing yourself too far. Keep it up and you won’t control when you collapse from exhaustion. You’ve gotta sleep at some point. At least this way, you’ll have more control over when and how.”

              Pidge shook her head, but even Keith could tell that her eyes were glazing with tears. “Pidge, come on. I’ll stay with you. You don’t have to worry about nightmares. I chase nightmares for my siblings all the time.” Lance’s hands fisted briefly, then relaxed again. Pidge looked up at Lance pleadingly. “Would you really stay?” she asked hesitantly.

              Lance bent down without another word, scooping her up into his arms. “Of course I will. If Matt can’t be here to do it for you, then I’ll gladly fill in for him until he can, don’t worry.”

              When Keith saw them the next morning, Lance looked even more exhausted than before, but Pidge was obviously more relaxed and clearheaded.

              Everyone expressed their joy at Pidge getting rest, and they praised her for finally taking some time to herself.

              She didn’t mention a single word about how Lance basically had to force her to finally get some sleep, or that he was the whole reason she felt comfortable for doing so in the first place.

              And no one else seemed to notice how Lance was so tired he could barely keep a handle on his emotions during training that day.

                In fact, Keith suspects it was because of that loose grip on his emotions that the disaster that was training really occurred.

              “Lance, come on, really try here! Everyone else is working so hard, and they’re doing great, just try a little harder for us! We’re a team, and we can’t be that if we have to drag you along on missions.”

              Keith knew, okay, he knew that Shiro was under a lot of stress. He was still young, only a little older than them, and he’d suffered a lot of trauma that no one should ever have to go through. But, really? Lance was so tired, and he was trying so hard, and he was doing so much for all of them. He didn’t deserve this.

              Lance, though, merely looked up at Shiro from where he was laying on the floor, eyes bleary and unfocused. Shiro clenched his jaw, visibly willing himself to dredge up some of that incredible patience he’s always preaching at Keith about. “Lance, if you won’t take this seriously, then we have no reason to keep you on as a paladin. I’ve been trying to defend you from Allura, but honestly? She’s right. You need to work harder and take this more seriously, and if you can’t even do that then I don’t know why you’re bothering to stick around.”

              Keith glanced around for help from Pidge and Hunk, but they were far on the other side of the training room, and hadn’t noticed what was happening yet. Keith slowly stepped forward. “Shiro, maybe we should…” Shiro barely glanced at him when he walked past, all but racing out of the training room, leaving Lance an overtired and emotional mess on the floor. At first, they both just sat there in silence, but then Lance visibly steeled himself, taking a deep breath and choking back tears. And when he finally staggered to his feet, wiping his eyes clear of any moisture, Keith felt like his heart might break.

              “He’s right, it’s fine. I’m going to go take a breather, and I’ll come back to try again after dinner, I think. I need to get this right.” For a moment, Keith couldn’t breathe, his heart and soul ached so much for this sad, lost boy in front of him, but before he could gather his thoughts enough to speak, Lance had taken off.

              He didn’t see him again until very late in the night, or early in the morning, depending on your perspective. Keith had been heading to the kitchen to get a water pouch, but instead barely managed to stop himself from walking into Shiro having a panic attack. Keith was more surprised by that than by the fact Lance was talking him down from it. He had Shiro’s hand clutched against his own chest, helping him to time his breaths, and he was gently chattering away about his family, joking with Shiro as if it wasn’t a one-sided conversation during which the other participant was having a full-scale attack. It was impressive, but when you looked closely, it wasn’t hard to see that Lance’s hands were trembling, and there were tears in his eyes.

              Some time later, it was evident that Shiro was too tired to notice any of those things, as he instead broke down into tears once he’d calmed down enough. Lance stayed with him the entire time, and Keith kept a silent vigil over his friend. The two of them didn’t retire until the day castle had begun shifting into its day cycle. And if anyone else noticed that Lance was starting to look a little less vibrant, a little less happy, a little less excited about life, they didn’t say anything. Lance appeared to wish to just brush it off, and Keith was content to bide his time.

                But that wasn’t going to last too long.

                “I don’t know how to help you, okay!” The quiet that followed that outburst was just as loud. Keith couldn’t bear it. Lance should never look this depressed, this dejected. “Lance.”

              There was silence, Lance refused to glance up and acknowledge Keith, so he tried again.

              “Lance. Please. Look at me.” Another few seconds of silence before Lance shook his head weakly. Feeling the pain in his chest tighten, Keith tried again. He had a vision of Lance comforting and coaching Hunk through a panic attack, Lance running himself ragged training for Allura’s peace of mind, Lance’s willingness to sacrifice his own sleep to ensure Pidge slept, the trust and faith he placed in Shiro, despite consistently feeling that Shiro didn’t even like him, forget about trusting him.

              “Just.  Please. I just want you to be honest. Be you. Please, just be selfish for a few minutes. I promise, I’ll still be here. I don’t… I don’t need you to be anything but yourself. Please.” Still silence. “You’ve done so much for all of us, and I need you to know that even if you didn’t stretch yourself so thin for all of us, we would all still love you. We would still value you. You’re our friend. None of us knew what we were getting into, but we do all know that none of us would be here without you. We wouldn’t have even found Blue, we would’ve give up, I don’t know what exactly, I just know that we wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for you, and that we can’t do this without you!” Keith’s voice went soft, and Lance stood frozen, looking back at Keith with a shocked expression. “I can’t do this without you, Lance, and I can’t stand to watch you push yourself so hard and get no credit or appreciation or even a thank you. You’re worth more than that to me, and I know you’re worth more than that to the others, too.”

              Lance’s lower lip trembled. “I can’t not help them, Keith.”

              Keith stepped forward, placed gentle hands on Lance’s shoulders, carefully pulled him into a hug. “I know, Lance, I know,” This close, he knew to keep his voice quiet, murmuring directly into Lance’s ear. “I love you for that, but you can’t push too hard too fast. You deserve better, and we want more than that for you. I promise. Just talk to us, we can be there for you, just like you’re there for us. I’ll be there for you, if you’ll let me.” Keith felt his face flush, but he forced himself to stay put. Lance needed him more, right then.

              They stood there for several minutes, no sound save for Lance’s quiet sobs and Keith’s hushed reassurances and promises.

              “I’ll try.”

[stardust-and-blades]

Bloody Violets

A hanahaki story bc what writer hasn’t done one of these

as always, it’s klance :3 -------------------------

To most, it is slow. Painful. A long process of weighing the pros and cons of treatment, continuous nights of rolling around in the sheets plagued by insomnia and anxiety, a fine cocktail fit for one destined to be heartbroken to the point of death, to becoming a mindless zombie in the emotions department. 

To most, it is an unfortunate occurrence, but one people usually extract from their lungs because they would rather fall in love with someone else than die for a person who may never love them back.

But Keith is not like most. Keith is his own person. That kid who kicked ass in the garrison despite being told otherwise. The mystery boy who blew the desert ground to bits in order to reach Shiro. The reluctant soul of the black lion, wishing to stay in the past but forced into the future.

The angry, frustrated, annoyed child of earth who was deemed to never love someone outside of a platonic setting. 

Yet, here he was, doubled down a toilet coughing out bloody violets. 

He did not think this would happen. Sure he had some feelings living inside him, but he never thought it would get this bad. This...life threatening. Who would have thought love--something covered in chocolate hearts and sweet embraces--would be tinged with crimson-stained thorns. 

Keith rested his head against the porcelain, sweat coating his forehead and neck.

God. What is he going to do?

Yes, there is a procedure. A way of extracting the deadly vines and flowers from his suffocating lungs. But with it they would take his actual love. His feelings and memories, thrusting them into a fire and permanently extinguishing what gave him life. Even though it was physically harming him, even though it made breathing difficult and coughing agonizing, the worst pain Keith could imagine is a part of him being stripped away. A natural part of his life; the essence of what made him smile at the boy who goofily told many stories of his family back in Cuba. What caused his steely indigo eyes melt into adoration as the boy’s lanky arms fly up in a gesture of success over beating another level on his and Pidge’s video game. 

What made him laugh full heartedly, bathing in the shock of the other for Keith’s easy-going attitude when, in the past, they butted heads almost every day.

He did not want that taken away from him. He did not want that yanked out of his grasp, his hands reaching out for what was destroyed. 

Just like when the fires consumed the one parent who smothered him in parental love.

Just like the stars sucked in the brother he grew to trust and acknowledge, and the mother he never got the chance to meet until he was already carved out of stone. 

He could tell him. Tell the man of his affection, but with his consistent hitting on Allura, Keith would rather not advance the progress of his affliction. It would give him away. Would expose what he is riddled with and no doubt be shoved onto a table for them to extract the seeds and vines.

No, this is his. His little secret. His treasure, for while it caused him great pain, dreaming of the boy he loved every night was worth the strenuous days of him jolting awake and running to his bathroom.

It may kill him. But at least he would die happy.

So he got up, wiped the blood from his lips, and put on his gloves. He is a soldier, and he will handle this like a soldier.

----------------

A month later, the disease has drastically progressed. And it did not help it acted up on a mission.

The alarm blared that morning, Keith being forced awake from his safe haven that eased the ache in his chest and the tickle in his throat, his limbs acting on impulse and shooting up to put on his armor. Everything hurt, but not to the point where he couldn’t function. He was able to plaster on a brave face, fly the black lion, and sneak into the base where they were to gather intel on some prisoners to free for the voltron coalition.

It wasn’t until Lance, Hunk, and him were facing off some sentries did it severely act up, Keith’s lungs taking on a new branch of pain. He tried to ignore it; tried to focus on the enemies and cut them down. But it only grew worse, never subsiding into a dull ache. It was as if someone cranked the pain meter to 100 rather than the normal 40. 

He was breathing hard. Hard enough Hunk asked if he was okay. 

“I’m...fine...” Keith pushed out. Was the room always this fuzzy?

He felt a hand on his shoulder. Purple met concerned blue, Lance’s brows furrowed deep enough Keith could make out his features through the dumb helmet.

“Hey man, you don’t look so good. We can handle the rest of the mission if you need to head back.” Lance said, gentle and kind.

Keith weakly shook his head. “No its oka--”

Just then he noticed a sentry pointing a gun at Lance’s head, the robot’s body shielded by the wall but his weapon in full view. If Keith weren’t standing where he was, no one would have seen the red light zoom in on the center of Lance’s clueless head.

“Look out!” Keith cried, tackling the new appointed red paladin to the ground. A shot is fired, hitting Keith’s shoulder but definitely missing its kill shot. With all his strength, Keith chucked his sword bayard at the sentry and hit him square in the head, its gun clattering to the ground with its body. It didn’t move again.

“Holy shit!” Lance yelled, looking behind him. “He came out of nowhere. Thanks Keith--buddy? Keith? Keith!?”

Keith was on his knees, coughing up a storm. His hands circled around his neck, as if he could staunch the coughing with sheer force. It is useless. He coughed and he coughed, bundles of flowers overflowing his helmet to the point where he couldn’t breathe past the petals. Violets covered his vision, tears swimming in his eyes. It hurts. It hurts so bad he doesn’t know what to do. He has been stabbed, crashed into a planet, broken bones, electrocuted, and beaten the shit out of by an altean robot. Yet here he was, being taken down by flowers.

He didn’t feel it, but his body collapsed on the floor, still clawing at his throat but also attempting to hide what is clearly shown in his helmet. Against his wishes, Hunk yanked it off and Lance bent to his level, moving Keith’s hair from his face to get a better view at what is causing Keith’s state.

No. No do not look. DO NOT--

“Oh my God.” Lance said, sounding as if the air left him. As soon as they got the helmet off, he was covered in violet petals, the blue and purple combination painting parts of Keith’s face and suit red. Knowing the jig was up, Keith gave into the coughing, not bothering to suppress it anymore.

Keith couldn’t see anything since his eyes were closed, but he felt Lance’s hands on him, Keith’s body being shifted onto what he assumed were someone’s lap. Lance’s lap most likely, since Hunk was standing in blatant horror a few seconds ago.

“Oh my God oh my--Hang in there buddy. We will get you back to the castle.” Lance said shakily. Keith peaked up at Lance to see his panicked expression move to Hunk. “Did you have any idea about this? Did the team?”

Hunk shook his head. “No, I’m just as shocked as you are. He-he seemed alright the past few nights, albite a little pale. But he is usually pale. He’s a pale guy--oh no oh no what are we going to do?” 

Hunk also got on his knees to talk to Keith.

“Stay awake, Keith. Don’t die on us, we are going to help you.”

“He’s not going to die.” Lance said all too defensively. A hand moved to the comms, contacting the rest of the team. “Pidge. Allura. Do you copy?”

“Yeah, I’m almost done downloading the information we need. We stumbled into a few Galra but Allura handled it.” Pidge replied. “What’s up?”

“It’s Keith. He...” Lance opened and closed his mouth, the shock of what he was witnessing not settling well. “He...”

“Lance?” Allura said. “What’s wrong? Is Keith alright?”

“You...You know that disease that was plaguing the last planet we visited? The flower disease?”

There is a pause. Allura spoke slow, steady. As if she too were beside them and knew first hand what Lance is getting at. “Yes. Hanahaki disease. It drastically decreased their population in a matter of months.”

“I think...I think he has it.” Lance’s voice was a ghost of a whisper, his throat closing up at Keith’s body is wracked with incredibly violent and hoarse coughs. Blood leaked from his lips, the petals thinning out for the red tear drops. Keith wanted to talk, but the sensation was sharp needles against tender flesh. “Blue-ish purple flower petals. I don’t know for sure how long it has been going on, but Keith can’t breathe well. He can hardly move.”

Allura swore in Altean. She called for Pidge to wrap up, boots and metal echoing through the speakers. “He is in the final stage. If we don’t take out the seeds and thorns as soon as possible, there will be no saving him.”

Keith’s senses had been dulled, but the part about the surgery zapped him from his despondency.

“NO!” He screamed, the black paladin raising himself on his elbows before he collapsed again, he strength nonexistent.

“Don’t move!” Hunk ordered by Lance. “You’re going to hurt yourself further.”

“I don’t--I don’t care!” Keith said, glaring up at Hunk. “I’m not having the surgery. You cannot make me--”

“If you don’t you’ll die, you stupid mullet!” Lance seethed, forcing the other to look at him. If Keith wasn’t so weak, he would have jumped from Lance cupping his face just to make eye contact. There is cold fury in his eyes, the calming waves of the ocean swirling into a storm of wrecked ships and destroyed homes. “You’ve made some really shitty decisions, but this is by far the top of the list. No one is worth this outcome!”

“I. Said. No.” Keith enunciated the syllables to prove his point. Just as Lance’s storm thrashed and drowned its victims, Keith’s glare was all fire, burning everything in its wake. Covering the atmosphere with ash, leaving nothing behind for the birds to pick at. 

And Keith was about to flick another match.

“As your leader, as your black paladin, I order you all to stand down.”

Once the words left his mouth, he succumbed to the darkness feathering him with temptation. He doesn’t hear anything else besides the intake of a sharp breath and Hunk calling his name.

------------------

Keith was out cold. No doubt from the stress of the mission and the fact a literal flower bush was growing inside him, piercing his lungs and destined the puncture his heart. Lance nearly threw his bayard at the wall, choosing instead to hit oncoming sentries from the distance. Hunk did not think he would have the strength to fling his paladin bayard so easily, especially when it turned into a sword. Lance was the sharpshooter, not the samurai. But then again, everyone has evolved through time.

They had to think fast. While they were conflicted on the choice Keith made abundantly clear, they had no time to mule over it where they stood. Hunk picked up Keith’s limp form and told Lance to cover him, the two dashing for their lions, as well as Allura and Pidge. Since Allura stated they had to act fast, Lance took Keith in the red lion to meet Coran in time. 

Coran took him to the med bay, Lance carrying him to a bed as Coran hooked him up to altean machines and an oxygen mask. He injected some sort of serum Lance cannot pronounce, but it seemed to have taken the edge off of Keith’s groans of pain. His grimace smooths out after the liquid enters his bloodstream, Coran patting his head like a father and turning a grim expression to the team.

“I gave him a sedative that will stop the progress of the disease in its tracks temporarily. 72 hours I give it. But if he does not confess his feelings and continues to reject the procedure, there is no saving him.”

Allura hummed in thought, frowning. Her arms are crossed, shoulders tense and white hair in a loose, messy heap. “There has to be another way. It has been 10,000 years. Surely there has been progress in the treatment of the disease.”

Coran gave her a sad smile, but nevertheless, did not change his intel.

“I’ve scoured as many archives as I could on surrounding planets. Nothing. Not even the galra have a better cure.”

“There must.” She turned away from him, no doubt heading to the control room. “Coran, come. We have some research to do.”

“But princess--”

She stopped in the doorway, her hand resting on the cool exterior. She did not look at Coran, but he and everyone else could see her shoulders trembling. “Please, Coran. I cannot stand by and lose another friend.”

They left, hearts breaking in two, plastering a facade of hope and determination to counterattack the demand they wanted to dismiss, but were bound by honor. By respect. Though Keith’s wish and the team’s do not align, they were raised to honor a dying person’s last request. Even if that request is destructive in all senses. Hunk and Pidge watched them go, sincerely wishing Shiro were around to guide them. To tell them what to do about Keith. Maybe if he were around he would be able to speak reason to Keith.

But he isn’t. It is only them. 

They felt so helpless.

“Where is Lance?” Pidge hesitantly asked. Hunk pulled out a chair to sit by Keith. Lance had ran off as soon as he laid Keith down, Hunk noticing him hold onto Keith’s hand seconds too long and, as if it physically hurt him to do so, ripping himself away and left. 

Hunk couldn’t read him perfectly, yet a hunch told him he was the most emotionally affected by the turn of events and Keith’s choice. His face may have been blank, but his eyes screamed the opposite.

“He is doing what Allura is doing.”

-------------------------------

Who would have thought Lance would be angry enough to break down a door.

Normally one to open at its owner’s command or handprint, Lance pried at the door until his fingernails bled, him ultimately giving into temptation and shooting the damn system with his bayard. 

It worked. But Lance did not dally about and dance around at his success. Rather, he stormed in Keith’s too clean room. From a first glance, there really wasn’t much. A bed. A closet with his earth clothes. A bathroom with the bare essentials for a shower. a desk. A pouch thrown to the side, the only indication of Keith being some semblance of a slob.

“As your leader, as your black paladin, I order you to stand down.”

Lance clenched his teeth so hard, he was sure they would crack.

With a flick of his wrist he overturned the mattress, the blanket and sheets fluttering about. The soft cushion landed with a dull thud, Lance throwing the pillow next. Seeing nothing beside the floor, he moved to the pouch. He ripped it open, anger and frustration tearing at the zipper’s seems. He flipped through random scrawls of paper to earth receipts, nothing of vital information popping up on who Keith loves. On who Lance could track them and convince them to help Keith. Yeah Lance and him butted heads in the past, but that doesn’t mean he wants him dead.

He’s his friend.

He’s...He’s one of his close friends. Though he hasn’t said it out loud. He has a temper and can make terrible decisions, who doesn’t? They are kids, for crying out loud. They are just teenagers trying to get by. Trying to LIVE.

His eyes began to sting, Lance working to shake it off and focus on the objective. Nothing in the damn pouch. Desk, maybe? A journal of some kind? He wasn’t one to peak in on someone’s private thoughts but this is a legitimate emergency. 

He lifted the top of the desk, the hinges creaking from the lack of use. There was stacks of papers with haphazard scribbles, many with only notes on what Keith needs to improve on in terms on combat and crumbled pieces of his search for Shiro. There was one slip with a doodle of the team members, yet as Lance sifted and threw them all around, he couldn’t find some type of entry elaborating on the mystery person.

Keith took the expression "take the secret to your grave” too literal. 

Lance was practically pulling his hair out by this point. There is nothing. Nothing to indicate who it is. Nothing for him to do. Nothing for him to fucking act upon and save his friend’s life.

Was he really this goddamn useless? Was all he could do is stand by and watch as his leader--his teammate--be swallowed up and suffocated by unrequited love?

Would he have to stand by and watch as his heart monitor go straight, unleashing the monotonous, infinite screech of death’s timestamp?

“Come on...Give me something. Anything...” He said to himself. Begging the universe in some way. “Give me a clue. We already lost Shiro. We can’t lose anyone else. Please.”

His knees buckled, a hand flying to his eyes as he physically pushed the tears away. Shoved the heel of his palm against the onslaught of emotions, it gushing out in slow currents. He wasn’t sobbing--wasn’t wracked with grief, but stressed. Stressed and upset enough to start crying, remembering the last time he did it was when he failed to become a fighter pilot the first time. 

At the time, he lost something so trivial. Now, he was about to lose someone he considered family.

He was surrounded by Keith’s few belongings, but Keith left nothing for the team to find. Similar to how he disappeared from the garrison, talk of a legend, absence of a fact. It was like the desert whisked him away into a far away land, never to be heard from again like his mother.

If nothing is done, this will be what remains of him.

Lance sniffed, ready to get up and see with Allura if she had any luck when, form the corner of his eye, he saw a cylinder basket.

There was hardly anything in the trash can except a crumbled piece of paper.

Intrigued, Lanced wiped his eyes and walked over, gingerly picking up the wrinkled paper and unfurled it.

To the boy I love, was written in small cursive letters at the top. The rest of the page was a drawing. A sketch not old enough to be withered with time; the fine paper crisp and new. There was no color, but that didn’t matter. The drawing itself was a masterpiece in of itself, Lance having no idea Keith was an inner artist.

That isn’t what causes his mouth to hang open. What does is who the boy is.

It was Lance. Lance with his signature, happy-go-lucky grin, his eyes crinkled in glee and eyes lit up by a faint blue pencil. It was as if he were peering into a photograph, not a flaw in sight. Lance is speechless. Absolutely speechless. He never--when did he--what--

As he he mulled over the sudden realization he was the object of Keith’s affections, he noticed another feature. Something he would have missed if he wasn’t staring for so long.

It was dated a couple days ago. Judging from how the paper was the one thing in the trash, Keith most likely chucked it yesterday. But why--

It hits him like a truck.

“Another mission tomorrow?”

“Yes. Word from the blade there is intel at this facility detrimental to taking down Zarkon’s empire and finding Pidge’s family.” Allura said. “Keith, Lance, you will be partnering up.”

“Ugh, really?” Lance griped. “I have to work with our crappy leader again? I hate this.”

Keith stopped drawing what he had in his hand, his whole body covering the sketch book. He stilled, glanced at Lance with a blank stare, got up and left. As he did, a hand went up to his chest, Lance noting how he rubbed the area as if to alleviate it.

Keith wasn’t seen until the next day, skipped dinner from the night before and late to breakfast.

Moving with break neck speed, Lance long legs scampered to the bathroom and shoved the shower curtain aside. 

Lance let go of the drawing as he slid to the floor.

It was covered in copious amounts of dried blood and shriveled violet petals. 

---------------------

Allura slammed her hands against the monitor, the screen floating above her head glitching from the assault.

“By the goddess, how is there no advancement after the fall of Altea? We awaken thousands of years later, yet we might as well still be in the pods.”

“There are a couple more planets who were afflicted by the disease we can look at, but princess,” Coran said, a tone of fatherhood and concern for her well being. “You can only do so much. I do not like Keith’s decision either, but we must honor him as a soldier and a friend.”

Allura whipped around, ice fury meeting reserved orange. “Honor? There is no honor in this. There is nothing honorable about throwing your life away for something so...so...”

“Heartbreaking?”

Allura didn’t reply. She moved her attention back on the screen, rapidly typing and deleting pieces of her research, analyzing every detail until she was out of clues and had to move on to the next. Coran watched, reflecting on the time long in the depths of time where a similar person was doing the same for a friend, searching countless of galaxies before he shut down the operation upon their death.

-------------------

Keith didn’t wake up until the 24 hour mark, his consciousness gradually rising to the surface. There was still an ache in his chest. Like a snake constricting his chest until it was bound to break. But it wasn’t so bad he couldn’t stay awake. 

His eyes glazed over his surroundings. He couldn’t get up, he was at that stage in his disease. Moving would make it worse. The tickling in his throat subsided, save for the couple of petals slipping through his lips every few minutes. His eyes are tired and foggy, seeing nothing but white walls and white sheets. 

He spat out another flower and debated on going back to sleep. Sleep was nice. Sleep was endless and tolerable. The sheets over him were usually scratchy and uncomfortable, yet at the moment they were fluffy clouds tempting him into closing his eyes once more.

“Hey, bud.” A voice said beside him, quiet. Keith looked over and saw Lance sitting on a stool, mirroring Keith’s exhaustion. When was the last time he rested?

“Hey.” Keith said. His throat was torn apart, his speech shattered glass and loose gravel. 

“How are you feeling?”

Keith shrugged. Kind of. “like shit.”

Lance’s mouth twitched. “Yeah. Coran had to give you a sedative to help. It’s temporary, though.”

“Mmm.”

Lance poked his cheek. “Hey, no falling asleep. I’m talking.”

“I’m tired.”

“That’s because you have been coughing your lungs out.”

“That’s what happens when you have a literal flower bush growing in your body.” Keith commented, not fully aware of the impact they had.

It went quiet, Keith closing his eyes and taking slow, even breathes, ignoring the thorn really digging into his left side and listening to the beeping drone of his heart monitor. His heart rate was slower than a normal beat, most likely due to the branches at the point where they are wrapping around his heart. Keith should care more. Should be freaking out. But he was so tired.

“Keith.”

“...”

“Keith.”

“What?”

Lance fiddled with a folded up paper, eyes in any other world but this one. “Why don’t you want the surgery?”

“Reasons.”

“Can you elaborate?”

Nothing.

Lance set his head in his hands. “Keith, please tell me why. Explain to me why you would rather refuse both methods of helping you. I know this may sound hard to believe, but we care about you. Including me. Allura is running herself ragged on finding a different cure, Pidge and Hunk are breaking into galra tech, and I...I’m trying to work with you. It’s hard to do that when you keep shutting me out.”

“It’s...It’s complicated.” Keith rasped, hesitating on his answer. He doesn’t want to die, but to Lance he might as well be signing his death wish in ink right in front of him.

“Try me.”

Keith let out a pained sigh. He fought down the cough scratching at his mangled throat, choosing his words carefully.

“It’s not because I want to die, it’s actually the opposite.” He said, soft. “You know how when they do the surgery, you come out of it...different?”

“Yeah. Most of the time you lose your feelings for the person, but in rare cases you can lose all your emotions.”

He did know. Good. “Well, to me I’d be killing what I value in myself. I know you see me as nothing but a hotheaded idiot who runs us head first into trouble. And you’re right, that is me. It’s the reason I didn’t want to be the leader of voltron. To be honest, Allura should have been the leader. Or you.”

“You’re not that bad...” Lance said. “I mean, we are still alive.” Lance made to joke, but it fell flat. Strangely though, Keith chuckled.

“Thanks.” He had a coughing fit for a couple of minutes, Lance running to grab water and giving it to him straight away. As he finished, he settled back down and picked up where he left off.

“Anyway...That spark in me, the part of me making me human, those are my emotions. Not just my love for the person, but the thing known to make me laugh, cry, scream, fight, hope. All those pieces come together to form a picture. To create someone who is real and genuine, and if those pieces are taken away, the puzzle defining me falls apart. I lose what I value the most: my humanity. my soul. I lose what makes me, me. Yes, it sucks knowing the person you love doesn’t love you back, but what is worse is losing yourself just for the sake of survival. The surgery is not a means of going back to how things were in my mind, but a way of keeping a broken being in commission.”

Keith turned his shining eyes to Lance, the indigo irises wet with either sadness or acceptance of his fate. “Lance, I don’t want to be a husk of who I was. I want to be me. If that means dying to stay true to who I am, then it’s okay. I know the team took a blow when Shiro disappeared, and I know this is no different. But you guys will manage.”

Lance understood, yet at the same time the mention of Shiro and the fact they would be left with four paladins rather than five awakened the storm brewing in his belly. Manage? MANAGE? They did not just lose a black paladin, but a hero on earth. Lance’s hero and a mentor they all cherished close to their hearts. And Keith wanted them to simply “manage” his death, throwing care to the wind and go out scouring for another black paladin. As if it were some sort of job title they could advertise on a newspaper. As if he were as disposable as the broken castle parts Coran threw in a random bin. As if he had no effect on the team whatsoever, assumed to be hated when really, really he--

“How can we manage when we are seeing a friend kill himself and there is nothing we can do?” Lance snapped, casting away the tears for white hot anger. “Do you not realize how important you are to the team? We would be crippled; feeding fodder to Zarkon and his army. Play toys for Lotor and his generals. I know I have said some pretty shitty things in the past, but please believe me when I say we cannot lose another paladin. We can’t...we can’t lose another team member.”

“Lance...”

“Allura and Coran lost their family and species. Pidge lost her father and brother. Hunk never wanted to be a pilot, and I--” His head bent down low, his body losing its stance as he slumped and breathed a sigh. “I lost earth. Now I’m about to lose more.”

Keith took a few seconds to respond, coughing into his fist but suppressing it when he wanted to talk. He wondered how much time he has left. 

“What do you mean by that?”

“By what?”

“You...losing more. You hate me, don’t you?”

Lance felt as if he had been electrocuted. “W-Hate? I don’t hate you! What gave you that idea?” 

Keith gave him a look.

Lance scratched his neck. “Okay, so I haven’t been good with our relationship. I just...I do this thing where I get jealous of someone cooler than me and find reasons to see them in a negative light. I keep doing it. But...I don’t want to anymore. Not as I realize your as normal as the rest of us. Minus the whole galra part.”

“Being galra threw me for a loop too.”

“No shit.”

The two laughed, their inner walls crumbling to bits as they came to a mutual understanding. It was nice. Sweet even. Something Keith didn’t think he would be able to experience, and Lance relieved to see Keith isn’t a God or a demon. He is a boy. A regular boy thrown into a random war as much as Lance and the others. If Lance could pick a moment and stay there for an indefinite amount of time, it would be this. Because it is where they meet each other half way, extending their hands to conjoin an alliance Lance had been throwing away. One Keith kept working to ignore. 

But as the distance closed, Keith’s outstretched palm turned to stone and crumbled. For Keith’s serene expression twisted into agony. Coming out of nowhere, the branches and thorns and flowers shot up through his ribcage, his heart monitor going off the charts as he is flung into a violent coughing fit. Specks of blood turned into puddles, crimson flushing away the clean white sheets. Keith held his hands against his mouth, as if it could ward away the blood and pain. It spewed from the cracks, his fingers dripping with purple and red. 

Lance stood to go run and grab Allura and Coran. Keith stretched out and seized Lance’s wrist, a gesture expressing he desired not to be alone. Lance stayed, rubbing soothing circles on his back and gathering some Altean paper towels to capture the blood. For a good moment Lance thought he was going to die right there, but Keith’s coughing eventually stopped. When it did, he leaned back against the bed, aging a couple of years by the exhausting action.

“Keith--”

“Lance?” Keith said through a raw throat. He looked so tired, it twisted Lance’s chest. “Will you...will you tell me a story? About your family in Cuba?”

Lance blinked. “Why?”

Keith smiled weakly at him. “Because it makes you happy. And I always wanted to hear one of your stories. You make earth sound so...loving.”

Lance didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, because not only did he sound so quiet and fleeting, but he was asking something from the person who put him here in the first place.

“But--”

“Please? You are sad. I want you to smile at least once before I fall asleep.”

Lance bit down on his wobbling lip. Why did it hurt so much to see Keith smile like that? Why did his heart skip a beat, bleeding for someone he didn’t expect to effect him in his life? Why did he stare at the bloody bathtub for hours on end, telling himself he could fix this. Why does he care so fucking much if he has another day with the person he deemed his rival; his enemy.

Why did he feel his own thorns grow inside him?

Shoving his feelings aside, he hung a mask of happy and opened up a time in his life where he smiled the most. 

“Okay. So it was my first trip the Varadero beach, and my cousins were scared of water...”

By the end, Keith had fallen asleep peacefully. Lance rested his arms on top of the small slip of the bed Keith did not take up and joined him in slumber, knowing he wouldn’t be able to be content in his room. For if he stayed by Keith, maybe he won’t wake up to the sheets being empty and a lion asking for another paladin.

By morning, it clicked.

--------------------

Lance was awakened by harsh whispers and ragged breathing.

He stretched out, his back and neck aching from the position he allowed himself to sleep in. He was pretty sure he heard a few pops and wondered if he snapped his back. It didn’t help he took the brunt of an explosion in the past. 

“The serum isn’t working as well as it should. It’s growing at a rapid rate.”

“Can’t you give him another dose? Twenty-four hours should be enough for it to leave his system.”

“Not this kind of medicine. If we give it before 72 hours he could go into cardiac arrest. It affects the heart as much as the disease.”

“Lets say fuck it to his stupid fucking order and give him the surgery. He’s too stubborn to be convinced otherwise!”

“Pidge!” Hunk admonished. “What would we do once he wakes up from the surgery? He will be angry. That’s if he still has any emotions left.”

“So he throws a temper tantrum.” Pidge cracked back. “Better than finding a grave sight.”

“This isn’s about you, Pidge!”

“And this isn’t about doing what he wants, but what is right!”

“For the love of--”

Lance was still trying to distinguish the developing voices as he wiped sleep from his eyes when there is a sudden crack and a high pitched scream. Lance jumped up, fully awake and looking at the source.

Pidge, Hunk, and Coran went silent as they followed Allura, who ran to Keith’s side. Keith was writhing and squirming, his arms surrounding his middle as worked to turn himself into a ball. Screams and howls of pain ripped through his throat, more blood bursting from his lips as full flowers followed one after the other. Allura grappled with Keith’s arms, snatching the restraints connected to the bed so he would stop flailing. If he moved too much he could puncture and collapse a lung.

But Keith rivaled Allura’s strength, Altean and Galra blood near similar in combat and physical force. She managed to seal the restraints around his ankles and wrists, but it did little to ease his wails.

Lance, finally processing everything, picked himself up and worked to make Keith look at him.

“Keith, Keith I need you to look at me. I need you to open your eyes and stop moving, you’re going to worsen your condition.”

Barely hearing him through his screams, Keith made his body still little by little, his eyes squeezing shut as tears leaked from the corners of his eyes and his hands balled into fists. He moved his head away from Lance’s grasp, needing to vomit out more flowers and blood on the floor. The branches coursed past his ribs and up his throat, tearing open new wounds. Beautiful flowers withered into deformity, blood and fragile petals breaking as soon as they reached the surface, sapped of its water and aged from grief. They were no longer a vibrant color, but dried brown mixed with blue. 

Lance angled his head to the side so he doesn’t choke from his own blood.

“Keith, please look at me. I need you to see how serious I am.” Now was not the time to have a breakdown. Now was the time to get through to Keith and fix this.

Keith, fighting the impossible, opened his eyes, trying to keep somewhat still as the dead flowers built on one another.

“I know about the picture. I know the person you love is me. I know this and I need you to hear me out when I say I feel the same.”

There are gasps from the others, but Lance paid them no mind.

“I know you were hiding it because you thought I hated you. Let’s face it, I wasn’t aware myself on how I felt about you. All I could comprehend is it was passionate and fiery. I thought it was jealousy, and for a time it was. But now I’m sure of how I feel.”

Keith pulled away from his grasp, violently heaving out worse dead flowers on the other side, the hue a light brown and the stems breaking off into dust. 

“You...Lie. You love...Allura.” Keith said, gruff and waves of flowers wracking his body as the branches around his heart tightened.

Lance followed Keith’s gaze, Keith unable to turn away because of the pain rendering him immobile. His eyes began to take up a sheen of dullness, Lance fearing he was reaching his breaking point.

I know, I thought so too. I told myself it was Allura I loved, told myself she was the one. But I love Allura like I love the others: as a friend.”

A lung was punctured.

Keith gasped, his movement ceasing all together. His heartbeat monitor went from crazy beeping to a slowing pulse, the lines taking longer to show a spike. Lance glanced at it, panicked, and turned back to Keith. He was so pale. He was fighting to breathe and keep their eyes interlocked, but the shine in his eyes seemed to be flickering out by the seconds.

Why wasn’t it working? If the feelings were mutual, shouldn’t the flowers and branches dissipate and go away on their own? Wasn’t the third option actually loving the person back, ending the nightmare both parties were experiencing? 

Can’t Keith see Lance is genuine?

Lance grabbed his hand, attempting to tether Keith back to him. It was limp; clammy, his skin cold to the touch. 

He brushed the bangs out of Keith’s eyes, wanting to at least see those dark eyes one last time if it meant his wish was not met. This as the least he can do.

“Hey samurai,” Lance spoke, gentle as droplets of tears kissed his cheeks. “Remember the first time you jumped from the cliff as we were being chased down by the garrison? Remember when you fought Zarkon by yourself, despite Coran advising you not to do it? Remember when we scoured the galaxy for Shiro, you never giving up even when you were tired and dehydrated? Remember how determined you were to find out about your mother and who you are? You made countless leaps of faith. So many I thought you were invincible, regardless of the moment you returned from the blades with a concussion and many bruises. You took those leaps of faith and whether you succeeded or not, you never backed down. And you didn’t back down from trusting me when you realized you messed up with the Lotor mission. Now I need you to make one last leap of faith and please, please for the love of all you hold dear, believe me when I say I am just as in love with you as you are with me.”

Lance rested his forehead against Keith’s. “I love you. Now, come back to me. Come back to me so we can look at the stars together. So I can take you to Varadero beach when we return to Earth. Come back.”

The monitor flatlined.

But in mere moments after Lance bore his heart and soul to Keith in the last seconds of his life, and as Lance began to take in the continuous screech of the machine, it stopped. stopped, then a beep happened. A second beep. A third. A fourth and a fifth and a sixth and--

Keith gasped for air, gulping down oxygen as if it were water and he had been left on a desert without any for days. The branches and flowers subsided, the grip on his heart loosening and the remaining lung freed from its prison. They grew smaller and smaller, going back in time to when they were seeds, and soon enough those too were gone. 

Keith stared back up at Lance in awe. He didn’t pull away, but neither did he lean in, waiting for the illusion to shatter. Waiting for him to wake up and find himself back to square one, still coughing up petals.

But it didn’t happen. 

“You...Love me?”

Lance, after what seemed like a lifetime of stress and misery, smiled big, his cheeks pink and his eyes flooding with relieved tears.

“Yes. Wholly and unconditionally.”

Everyone cheered in the background, Hunk lifting Pidge up and spinning her around while she screamed for him to put her down. Allura sniffed and dried up her tears, happy to see her newfound family not to be consumed by grief a second time. And Coran, being Coran, whipped out a bottle of nunvill to celebrate.

Allura used her Altean powers to heal the puncture in Keith’s other lung, and after he was discharged from the bed, took a shower to wash off all the blood (as well as the room he was stuck in), and everyone retreated to their bedrooms for a well earned nap, Lance and Keith gathered some blankets and pillows and set up in one of the vast rooms overlooking the stars. 

All night they stayed up, pointing out constellations and making up stories, sometimes talking about home.

When they had nothing else to say after long hours of talking and Lance keeping Keith close a to make sure he really was there, they leaned on each other. For the first time they were alone together, happy and content.

And for the first time, the two kissed, sweet and soft. Glad to be in a reality where all was well, glad to know the universe had blessed them in the end.

“Oh, about that picture. You can throw it away. It really...It isn’t exactly done.”

“Are you kidding? It’s a masterpiece. And mine now, no take backs!”

Keith laughed. “Alright, goofball.”

Lance rested his head on Keith’s, the picture in his pocket, the boy planning to frame it when he is able. 

It’s important to him. Just like the dark haired boy beside him.

[madeofstardust17]

Whumptober prompts 16, 17 & 18. Pinned down, "stay with me" & muffled screaming.

Rating: T I guess

Tw: none

Pidge & Shiro, Pidge & Keith, Pidge & team

I did the best I could

...

The earthquake trapped them inside the abandoned galran warehouse. Hunk, Keith and Lance were thrown to the ground, bits and pieces of ceiling falling and hitting their raised shields. 

Shiro and Pidge weren’t so lucky. 

There were at the other, more unstable part of the warehouse when the earthquake hit basically the entire ceiling fell right above them. By some miracle, Shiro, mostly unhurt, managed to dig himself out rather quickly. But his satisfaction was quickly dampened when he saw the giant pillar that separated him from Pidge’s last known location.

He barely remembered a shout of pain and a grunt when the ceiling had caved in, but he hadn’t registered until now. 

“Pidge?” Silence. His heart sank.

He got up and ran to the place he had last seen the girl, climbing the huge pillar. From the top of the structure, he could see the entire room. He took his helmet off, since it was covered in dust. No sign of her.

“Pidge?!” He couldn’t keep the worry off his voice 

“C’mon Katie, talk to me”

“Ughhhmmm” the sound had come from his right. 

He jumped to the floor and started digging where he thought the sound had come from. 

A hand. He kept digging. 

He found her head and chest. Her visor was broken, and there was a bleeding cut above her eyebrow. A large block of metal was pinning her from the waist down. 

Despite everything, she grinned weakly at him 

“Hey” relief washed away most of the tension in his shoulders as he grinned back

“Hey yourself” she wrinkled her nose

“‘Feel weird” she closed her eyes “m’ head hurts”

“Let’s get that helmet off” 

He managed to lift her head and get it off. He was relieved to see that there wasn’t any blood, but she was ghostly pale and her left pupil was bigger than her right. So definitely concussed then. 

“Can you feel your legs?”

After a second, she nodded and winced “they hurt”

After a few minutes where Shiro was debiting how to proceed she closed her eyes

“Good night”

“You can’t fall asleep”

She opened her eyes and glared “but I’m tired. And you’re always telling me to go to sleep”

Leave it to Pidge to find a semi-logical argument even when concussed.

“I know but you have a head wound”

“Don’t care. Night”

“Pidge” when she didn’t respond, his voice hardened “open your eyes” he winced internally. That came out a bit louder than he meant. It worked though, even if she did look scared. Shiro took a deep breath.

“I’m going to lift the debris off your legs, okay? As soon as you can, I need you to crawl away”

She shook her head “it hurts”

He brushed her bangs from her eyes

“I know. But we’re going to get you home, and then straight into a cryopod”

“You can’t do anything straight”

Ignoring the comment, he grabbed his helmet and opened the comms

“Guys? Is everyone okay?”

“Shiro!” Keith sounded so relieved Shiro guessed they had been calling him for a while now 

“We’re all fine” Hunk sounded tired, but otherwise okay.

“The bad news is we lost connection to the castle when the ceiling fell. The good news is that we’ve found an exit”

“Good, because we’re gonna need an extraction” the comms exploded with voices

“Are you okay?”

“Where’s Pidge?”

“We’re on our way, Shiro”

“It’s Pidge” he looked at the girl in question, who was now saying something under her breath, too slurred to make sense “she has a head injury and I think one of her legs is broken, if not both”

“Stay there Shiro” Keith sounded like he was running “We’ll get the lions and bring them to your location”

“Copy that”

He left the helmet on the floor and kneeled next to Pidge 

“Ready?”

She blinked owlishly at him

“For what?”

“Your legs are pinned down. Do you remember the plan?”

She thought for a second before her face lit up with realization 

“That’s right! Okay I’m ready”

He put his hands underneath the debris and prepared himself to pull.

“Alright kiddo, on three. One… two… three!”

Heart hammering on his chest, he began to lift the metal. He grunted, it was heavier than he had anticipated. He could actually hear the mechanisms in his arm working double time to support the weight.

The metal groaned and started to shift, and Pidge groaned with it.

“C’mon Pidge” he grunted, urging the girl to move 

Pidge started whimpering, trying to crawl backwards. 

The moment she was out, Shiro let the debris go and it fell with a clang. He stood where he was for a moment, panting. 

“Sh’ro” 

That got him moving. He ran to her side, falling to his knees as he registered the yet to fall tears and the heavy panting while her gloved hand clutched at her ribs.

“Hurts” she had her eyes shut and his own trailed to her left ankle, which was twisted in an awkward angle. He tore his eyes away from it

“Ribs?”

“Bruised, I think. I dunno. I think I’m gonna throw up”

Just then the parts of the ceiling that my some miracle hadn’t fallen yet shook, along with the floor. Shiro mentally scolded himself for not expecting an aftershock. He shielded the small girl’s body with his own, but only pebbles and small rocks fell on him. 

“I’m gonna get you out of here, alright? I’m going to pick you up now”

Pidge shook her head violently, but Shiro scooped her up in his arms.

She bit on her hand to try to muffle the scream that left her throat, but it still made shiro wince.

“I’m so sorry, Katie. Just stay with me for a little longer, Alright?” 

She didn’t respond. She just continued crying, shaking as she waited for the pain in her ribs and ankle to stop.

He picked up his helmet, and after getting most of the dust off his visor, put it on.

“Guys?” 

“We’re here” Keith immediately responded. 

“I have Pidge. Probably broken ribs and a broken ankle. Where’s the exit?”

As if on cue, there was an explosion at their right. Pidge whimpered at the sound, and Shiro hated that the only thing he could do was place a comforting hand on her head.

“Did you hear that?” Lance asked 

“Please tell me that was you guys” Shiro pleaded 

“Yep. I think one more of those blasts and the wall will break. You guys get ready to get out as soon as it’s down.”

“Roger that” 

They were out in less than two minutes. 

The green lion roared, and all of the paladins felt a wave of relief pour over them. Pidge smiled against Shiro’s shoulder. 

The three boys ran to their side, looking worried as they studied their teammates conditions.

“You should have told us you were bleeding too” Keith crossed his arms. 

Shiro’s eyes widened, he touched the side of his head and felt something sticky and warm on his glove. 

“I honestly didn’t realize” he said truthfully. Keith glared at him, but didn’t respond.

“Let’s just get Pidge home” Hunk said. Shiro nodded

They agreed that Shiro and Pidge would ride on the red lion, since she was the fastest, while black and green would follow them.

Shiro lay Pidge down on the emergency bed on Red’s back room. 

She squirmed, trying to get a bit more comfortable, but quickly stopped when her ribs protested. 

Shiro grabbed one of the emergency water bottles and a rag. He wet the rag and whipped the side of Pidge’s faces that was covered in blood. She smiled weakly

“You know the pods clean the blood” it wasn’t a question. 

“I know. But you were freaking me out” 

She huffed out a laugh, wincing immediately after. 

“Lance’s right” she muttered, her words coming out slurred again, “you’re such a dad”

Shiro rolled his eyes fondly 

“I need to take the chest plate off”

She gave him the stink eye, which made him want to laugh, but he tried to keep a straight face.

Three of her ribs were fractured, and four were bruised was what he could tell by touching them. 

He grabbed his helmet and called Keith. 

“Is there something wrong?” Keith asked quickly. 

“Can Red fly to the castle without you? I need you here”

A strange presence on his mind and a phantom pain on his cheek, as if something had slapped him (a tail by the feel of it), told him what he needed to know.

“She’s offended that you think she can’t”

“I know” he rubbing rubbing his cheek. He could’ve sworn he heard a roar-like laugh. 

“I’m coming” 

Keith appeared three seconds later, walking over to Pidge. 

He muttered something shiro didn’t catch, and Pidge mumbled something back that made Keith smirk and ruffle her hair. 

“I’m going to need you to hold her down as I reset her ankle. 

The smile slid off Keith’s face. Instead, a steely determination replaced it, and he nodded. 

Before the started, Keith grabbed a clean rag and told Pidge to bite it. Looking confused, Pidge obeyed. 

Shiro took a deep breath and started trying to take off her boot. 

It was a slow process, in which Pidge kept whimpering and twitching involuntarily, the sounds that left her throat muffled by the rag. 

Keith stood beside her, one hand grabbing her hand and squeezing, the other holding her good leg to prevent her from kicking involuntarily.  

Once the boot was out, Keith dropped her hand and put an arm over her shoulders and chest.

Shiro’s hands were tingling as he grabbed the foot gingerly. 

He looked at Keith, and they younger boy nodded. Pidge looked like she was about to doze off. 

Shiro took a deep breath.

The ankle snapped.

Pidge screamed into the rag.

The green lion roared in their heads.

Getting her to the to the cryopod was a piece of cake after that. 

The four paladins stood still for a moment, watching Pidge’s frozen expression. 

And then the tension broke when Keith grabbed Shiro by the arm and lead him to one of the medical beds.

“Keith…” 

But the boy was hearing none of it. 

He pushed Shiro until he sat down and glared at him when he opened his mouth. 

He then started cleaning the bleeding cut on the side of his head. 

It wasn’t bleeding that badly, he tried to tell them, but Lance and Hunk seemed to agree with Keith, because Hunk had a hand on his shoulder to prevent him from moving. 

When Keith finished, no one moved. 

Shiro could feel himself crashing, could feel his hands trembling as he looked at them. 

They were tinted with red.

Keith sighed, sat next to Shiro, and pressed the side of his head against his un injured one.

Hunk, who sat on his right, squeezed his shoulder, and Lance, who had noticed how he was looking at his trembling hands, held them in his own. 

Slowly, the adrenaline faded, and tiredness seeped in. 

He took a deep breath, and let himself enjoy this moment of peace.

His team was safe.

That’s all he needed for now.

...

I forgot to post this yesterday sorry guys. I was working on a fma fanart.

Thank you so much for all your support!! I means a lot to me

[angels17324]

The Violet Paladin Ch. 9 (Keith x Reader)

Word Count: 1322 Update Schedule: Every Monday [Masterlist] [Prev]

We stared at it, without knowing what was it in making its presences all the more menacing. Zarkon had sent yet another monster to fight us. At least that's what we assumed it was... expect Hunk, who was very optimistic about what could possibly be in there.

"If it's the same monster from Arus we already know how to beat it," Keith spoke.

"I highly doubt they'd send the same monster if we beat it once already it just doesn't seem like something they'd do," I chimed in. We formed the sword and the shield and watched as the chamber depressurized to release its monster, It was quite different, I didn't have time to think as it began firing on us and attacking.

We weren't able to counter attack at all, so Shiro decided it was time to split up... this didn't help either apparently, it's many lasers were able to follow all of us. The attacks weren't letting up until Allura fired at it with the castle but was quickly attacked as well.

"Keith, draw its fire, I'm coming in from above," Shiro ordered as we all flew around, I was mostly trying not to get hit while also keeping it aiming away from the Balmera.

"Roger that!" Keith announced. Keith fired at it successfully drawing it's fire, however as Shiro went for the attack the beast fired at him. "We need to find its blind spot,"

"I don't think this thing has a blind spot," Pidge said as she flew.

"We've gotta take out the laser eyes," I said.

"We will cover you from up here," Allura shot at the beast before drawing all its fire.

"Princess pull back to get out of its range now," Shiro ordered.

"We will not abandon you," Allura told him.

"You're not, we're about to pull back too," Shiro reassured her. "Lion's to the mine shafts, it's the only place it can get us," Shiro ordered, I flew into the same tunnel as Lance and Pidge, while the others went into the other tunnel and Allura returned into orbit.

We got out of our lions, and I ran towards Lance and Pidge. I glared at the taller male.

"What?" he feigned innocence.

"You know exactly what and when this is all over we're having a talk," I jabbed at his chest. Pidge looked quite confused at the conversation but chose to ignore it as we opened up communications with the others. Allura sent us a diagram of the Balmera dying. It was painful to watch. Coran told us what would happen to the Balmera.

"We need to get all the Balmeran's to the castle of lions before the planet implodes," Allura told us. We quickly came up with our plan of action to provoke and evade, while Allura convinces the Balmerans to come to the castle of lions.

The six of us returned to the surface and got the beast to start attacking us again, this was both a little fun with all the maneuvering we're getting to practice but terrifying not knowing what's happening on Allura's side of it. After a short while, we saw the castle land meaning Allura had successfully convinced the Balmerans to come to the castle. However, the small bit of happiness from that was soon cut short as the Balmeran's got trapped. We needed a new plan and quick.

"Hey guys, something's happening over here," Hunk told us.

"What is it?" I asked.

"Remember how Keith's Bayard formed the sword well I think there's a way to take down those eyes."

"Well, whatever it is, we need to try."

"Form thingy!" Hunk shouted... "It didn't work,"

"We haven't formed Voltron yet Hunk!" I told him. The beast turned its sight on the castle where Allura and the others were performing what they had called a rejuvenation ceremony

"Everyone follow me! Form Voltron!" Shiro shouted, as we flew together and formed the giant robot. Keith fired his laser as we stood in front of the castle. Hunk was able to form a laser cannon which we used to blast the beast. The beast fired another blast at us, which we met with our own trying to hold strong from the powerful waves coming from the two blasts meeting, We redirected the blast away from the castle.

The beast got ready for yet another blast, this beast just doesn't give up. We flew away from the castle its blast following us. Suddenly a screen appeared showing all the spots we needed to hit.

"Are you guys seeing this?" Hunk asked.

"Let's see what this can do," Shiro said as the shoulder cannon was reformed and set out several blasts hitting each of the beasts then right before our eyes the entire Balmera radiated with a beautiful blue glow, before disappearing.

The beast stood up and began to fire at us yet again, this time we flew head-on Keith getting a direct hit to the beast's chest sending it flying back. Which seemed to have finally defeated it hopefully as it has yet to get up. We disbanded Voltron and landed running towards Allura and Shay. When the ground started shaking, we looked up to see the beast was getting back up yet again.

"Oh no..." I silently whispered. It charged but another blast, but crystals began to form around it sealing the beast.

"No way," Hunk breathed. We all stared in shock and amazement as the Balmera had just saved us. We looked around as small crystals formed on the ground. "Oh, who's a good Balmera," Hunk scratched the surface of the Balmera treating it like a dog.

"What are you doing?" Keith asked.

"What? It's alive, and wovs my scwatches," Hunk cooed and scratched the surface some more, Keith facepalmed at this. I couldn't help but laugh at this, because of how adorable yet normal this seemed to be for all of us now. Allura decided we were staying for at least the night to recharge the castle.

From the corner of my eye, I saw a certain teen I needed to have a talk with attempting to sneak away.

"Oh no you don't Lance," I glared at the boy who stopped right in his tracks.

"Yes, (Y/n)?" He asked I dragged him away from the group.

"You heard my conversation with Allura didn't you," I said.

"What makes you say that?" He asked.

"Because Allura was the only person I told and if she would have told anybody it most likely would have been the mice,"

"Fine, I did hear a small bit of your conversation but might I also add as a younger brother to two sisters I know what they act like," He said.

"Is it that obvious?" I buried my face in my hands.

"To a trained eye," Lance proudly smiled. "Don't worry big brother Lance will help you out!" He cheered.

"Yeah one problem with that, I'm older than you Lance." I stared at him.

"Do you want my help or not?"

"Considering your track record, I'm good." I laughed and walked away remembering just the other day with Nyma and before that with Allura and honestly who knows who else.

"Hey!" He called after. I ran away towards the castle laughing more. I'm really starting to love hanging out with everyone and becoming a team. If only I had known what would happen in the following days.

[Next]

Tag List~ @somebodytouchedmysaeran @ittie-bittie-tittie @izabellah816

[kcwcommentary]

VLD7x05 – “The Ruins”

7x05 – “The Ruins”

With the Paladin roster finalized as Keith in Black, Lance in Red, and Allura in Blue, and Shiro in nothing, and with the death of Zarkon, the title sequence for this show is antiquated. It now functions at the start of every episode as a reminder of what the show used to be. The opening title sequence for a show should always be a statement about what the show is, but this sequence is so far from what the show has become. The title sequence not matching the current content of the show highlights how the show has lost its sense of direction.

I like the first shot of this episode in that the nebula is pretty, the smallness of the Lions creates some of a sense of immensity for space. I don’t like the white trails behind the Lions though. They’re not shown to be moving through anything, so what’s creating the white trails behind them?

Hunk’s sleeping, and Keith yells, “Everybody up!”

Pidge is dreaming about getting “only [a] 99 on the test.” I guess some people – I’ll say Mitch Iverson, since he wrote this episode – think grade anxiety is funny. Grade anxiety comes from a lack of parental support. A kid thinks they have to earn the absolute highest grades possible to be able to keep their parent(s) from criticizing them, emotionally abandoning them, or even at the most extreme physically abusing them. Pidge has always had endless support from her family, so having her demonstrate having grade anxiety reveals this show sees intelligence as a caricature. The creators of this show, or at least the writer of this episode, included grade anxiety without having even a basic understanding of what it is. They just thought it’s funny how some clearly intelligent people are scared of not getting perfect grades. They’re mocking people with grade anxiety, not revealing character with Pidge.

Lance and Allura want to sleep some more. Romelle’s sideways on her bed, foot on the wall, head hanging off the side: her posture made me genuinely laugh.

Everyone except for Keith and Krolia have been sleeping. Keith says, “We can’t let this long journey make us soft or dull our skills.” It’s obnoxious for this show to have Keith equate the need for sleep with weakness. They have all been through really stressful events, it makes sense that they need to rest and recover.

Shiro speaks (what? he’s still a character on this show?). “Keith’s right. Routine is what got me through being Zarkon’s prisoner and being in the infinite void of the Black Lion.” What!? Having a routine can be very useful, but neither of Shiro’s citations are instances in which he created a routine for himself. Shiro was a prisoner. Prisoners don’t manage their time, those who imprison them do. If he had a routine while imprisoned, while having to literally fight for his survival, then it was because the routine was imposed on him by the Galra. As for being in the Black Lion’s psychic space, what exactly was that routine? Literally, what actions is he supposed to have done while disembodied and existing in endlessness? This line written for Shiro is ridiculous.

Keith won’t even give the other Paladins a chance to wake up, he’s already calling or them to conduct battle simulations. Krolia has programmed a new one. I still don’t feel that she’s earned the prominence this show is giving her character. She presents the challenge. “You’re on a planet with double gravity—” what does that even mean? double what? double Earth’s gravity? “—dense volcanic fog, and eight [some kind of] raptors are attacking. What do you do?” Keith thinks that “this is a good one.”

What’s the mission objective that’s supposed to be at the center of this simulation? They’re on a planet and local lifeforms are attacking. Okay, why are they on the planet? If the challenge is solely to survive the creatures, then just leave the planet.

One of the raptors latches onto the Yellow Lion, and Krolia yells, “A [whatever kind of] raptor just melted your face off, Hunk!” Krolia has not earned the position of integration into the group that she’s being written to have. It makes her presumptuous. I guess the personalities being demonstrated in this scene are supposed to make Krolia and Keith look like badass personality types, but it doesn’t work for me.

Krolia says, “Now it’s eight-on-four,” and Hunk quietly replies, “That’s fine by me. I’m eating.” If you’ve read much of my commentaries, you’ll know that I usually have a big problem with how this show writes Hunk and food, but I like his response here. I don’t blame him one bit. Hunk, you go get yourself some food.

The planet weirdly shoots like twenty-foot wide columns of lava hundreds of feet up into the air. It looks silly to me. Keith orders everyone to “split up to thin their numbers.” For a story that’s supposed to be about the development of a team, these guys don’t really work as a team often. If you’re being attacked, you have greater safety and defense as a group. That’s why a lot of animals have herds or flocks or schools. Separating from one another makes the group weaker. This is not good leadership or tactics. Keith gets hit by an energy blast from one of the raptors. What is with this show having so many animals that can emit weapons blasts?

For a place that has “thick volcanic fog,” as Krolia said and Pidge now repeats, they all can see really well. Does this show know what the word “fog” means? Pidge says that the raptors “must use some form of thermal vision to see us.” Again, this environment has been depicted as having high visibility, not any kind of fog, so the raptors could see just like the Paladins can. But also, if they use “thermal vision” on this volcanic planet, then the raptors would have a hard time seeing. Unless this show is making up something else with its use of the term “thermal vision,” what is being referenced is the ability to see into the infrared spectrum of light. Things that are warm radiate light in the infrared portion of the spectrum. If we humans could see infrared light, every time we looked at another person, they would be glowing. I like the idea of the show presenting creatures that see more of the spectrum that humans can, but what Pidge says here doesn’t make sense. She’s presenting the idea of the raptors having “thermal vision,” as their natural ability to see, that it’s somehow supposed to be an adaptation to living in “volcanic fog.” But if the raptors see infrared, then the heat of the “volcanic fog” would inhibit that vision. And the heat of the lava on the ground would be blinding. This show really cannot do science.

Lance says, “Maybe I can lure them away with my heat-rays.” Have the raptors been distracted by the large, hot plumes of lava that jet up off the surface? No? Then they wouldn’t care about Red’s fire cannon either. But Lance blasts some rock with his fire cannon, and the raptors fly off to check it out. It’s senseless, and thus contrived.

Allura, Lance, and Pidge all get taken out simultaneously by a lava plume. Krolia chastises them for having “focused too much on the raptors and forgot about the volcano.” I still don’t like Krolia. She says, “I programmed the simulator to be unbeatable. I wanted to see how long you survived.” In other words, Krolia wasn’t trying to help them with training whatsoever. This wasn’t designed for them to learn anything, not new skills, not something about their character, nothing. Krolia was just being a troll. She and Keith woke up people who needed rest in order to mess with them.

Hunk is making burritos. He packages six of them, ties them around the space wolf, who teleports them to the others. Krolia and Keith each get one. The wolf gives Alura, Romelle and Coran each one. Then suddenly, the wolf’s bundle has more than what Hunk put in it. Pidge takes two, one for her and one for Shiro. That leaves one for Lance. I guess this counts as an animation error? Hunk only put six in the bundle, but there are eight given out. Team Voltron kind of discuss the wolf, nothing that explains the wolf’s narrative importance or reason for being included in the show or anything, but his name. Hunk suggests “Cosmo.” Keith objects to the name, “I figure when he’s ready, he’ll tell me his name.” Does Keith actually think the wolf is going to talk? Keith lived with this wolf for two years while in the quantum abyss, and he hasn’t named him yet? Who has a pet for two years and doesn’t name them?

Lance likes the way the burritos taste but doesn’t want to know what’s in them, saying, “I just want to eat it and pretend that it’s my meemaw’s home cooking.” Lance is supposed to be Cuban. Why is he calling his grandmother “meemaw?” The best I can tell, Meemaw is a southern United States thing, and I’ve seen one suggestion that it’s derived from French through Cajun culture. Why is a Cuban guy using Cajun or southern United States slang for his grandmother? As a Cuban guy, wouldn’t Lance call his grandmother Abuela?

Pidge picks up a signal that she only identifies as, “a signal!” Allura reacts with, “How did you get a signal?” Unless the Lions’ communication systems are broken or the rest of the inhabitants of the universe, including all the Galra, ceased to exist, the Lions should be getting more than a few signals. Getting any particular one they’re looking for is different, but the idea that it’s such a surprise for them to have picked up any signal at all is absurd. What is the signal? A television show from Bii-Boh-Bi’s planet. Bii-Boh-Bi is not and never has been funny, can the show please stop using him and his species? Please!? Team Voltron watching the show goes on for far too long.

There is what Pidge thinks is some interference in the signal, but Krolia – because of course it’s Krolia because why have the main characters have any importance in this show when you can instead give the importance and time to a side character like Krolia – can tell that it’s not interference. She has Pidge “amplify that signal.” She then listens to it with her eyes closed. Pidge says that it’s “just deep space interference.” Krolia says that that is “just what it’s supposed to sound like. Listen to the sounds in between the pulses. There’s a unique pattern.” Only after Krolia says this does the sound design for the show actually start including a specific beep to correspond with what Krolia is identifying. That beep did not exist in the sound until after she says so. That seems like bad sound design to me; the beep should have been there the whole time.

Krolia says, “Before the Blades were unified, we would use this crude way of communicating with each other.” Uh, when were the Blades not unified? Is this some undetailed period of the Blades’ history that the show hasn’t ever presented? Why am I expecting this show to have anything be deeper than the shallow instantaneous and fleeting use of anything just because it suits the individual moment of its usage? “Not many Blades know this code,” she says. “It must be a senior member.” I guess that means that she’s also supposed to be a senior member?

She says it’s a distress signal. They trace the signal to a specific area, which Hunk says is “a pretty severe detour from Earth.” So severe that it lasts only this one episode. So, yeah, not severe at all. Dialog like Hunk’s has no meaning, no impact on the story. It’s not like diverting to check out this signal will make them late to Earth and something bad will happen while they’re on this detour. The bad thing that’s happened to Earth has already happened because of the time jump (I’m still significantly annoyed by the time jump’s plot hole).

Cut to the Lions arriving at the planet where the signal’s coming from. That was such a big detour that it happened instantly. The planet is one of the most ludicrous planets this show has done. Like, it’s bad even for this show. It’s maybe the size of an asteroid, but it’s jagged and has weird holes and slopes. This show doesn’t even try, does it? Pidge says there are signs of a former civilization, but no signs of life. There are broken buildings. Team Voltron walks around – remember how the space wolf was injured and that’s why he supposedly couldn’t help Coran two episodes ago, well that’s resolved with no resolution.

Krolia says, “The signs are all around us. There was a massacre here.” This episode is really giving Krolia a disproportionately large amount of the script. It’s just so frustrating for a side character to be given so much screen-time, but main characters, like Shiro are nearly non-existent.

Allura says, “Some of this damage looks like it’s from magic.” What does that even mean? What are the characteristics of building damage that indicate it comes from magic? Ultimately, this line from Allura is leading. The show knows that the villain of the episode is one of Haggar’s Druids, so it has Allura make this comment to foreshadow that. Allura saying this right now though feels totally forced and manufactured.

Krolia says that some of the “strike patterns,” scratches in the rock, “look Mamoran.” If this signal is supposed to be a Mamoran signal, then is it a surprise that they might have gotten into a fight here? I know this episode thinks it’s setting up some mystery, but it doesn’t feel mysterious.

The space wolf growls and runs off and tackles someone to the ground. Keith yells at the guy, asking, “Who are you? Who’s broadcasting the signal?” Why does Keith assume this guy knows anything about the signal? Oh yeah, because characters make whatever assumptions the writers need them to, rather than behaving in a way that’s actually natural.

The guy says that he’s the one who’s broadcasting it, and Keith replies, “Impossible! You’re not Blade of Marmora!” What is Keith basing that on? Keith doesn’t know every Blade in the universe. If he’s basing it solely on the clothing the guy is wearing, then that’s senseless. Keith’s a member of the Blades, but he’s not wearing a Blade uniform currently. Krolia’s a Blade, but she’s not wearing a Blade uniform right now either. Why would Keith assume this guy couldn’t be a Blade? Again, it’s the writer leading the story, rather than the story unfolding in a natural way. The writer knows that this isn’t a Blade, so I guess it’s supposed to be foreshadowing. It gives the writing an unnatural, jerky development.

They let him up, and he takes them to his campfire. Romelle calls the location of what looks like someone struggling to survive “disgusting.” Good to know that her experience hasn’t changed her pampered, privileged mindset. At least she gets called out on her insult. She tries to cover, but it’s obnoxious. “‘Disgusting’ is Altean for lovely. You don’t speak Altean, do you?” She could have been written to recognize her privilege and apologize for her insult, but no. I don’t like Krolia, and I don’t like Romelle either. Ugh.

Pidge confirms the signal is from here. The masked guy reveals he knows they’re the Paladins of Voltron. Shiro asks him what happened here. The masked guy, with an ominous voice, says, “Bloodshed happened here. Death happened here.” I actually kind of like this line and how he sounds saying it. It actually has some creepiness to it. He identifies himself as Macidus and says that this is his home planet and that he’s the only one left alive here.

Krolia finds a not-really concealed set of blades from Blades of Marmora. She immediately turns her gun on him. He says he has them arranged as they are “in honor of their sacrifice. They died trying to protect the universe.” Knowing that he’s eventually revealed to be a Druid, he’s not exactly lying in saying that, the Blades were trying to protect the universe from people like him.

Macidus tells them how this all started when Voltron disappeared. He says that the “power vacuum that ensued destabilized much of the universe.” That again makes Voltron’s turn against Lotor look totally short-sighted. The problem I have with this is that, while this does reveal consequences to the Paladins’ actions, I never get a sense of them actually taking responsibility for those consequences.

Allura asks, “what happened to Haggar, the witch,” and Macidus says, “no one knows, but her Druids continued her work.” What work is that? This is a big part of my dislike of Haggar: Whatever she does off-screen that’s supposed to be so villainous is almost never shown. What her goals are for these actions are not revealed. We know that Honerva was obsessed with quintessence, and that drove her to poisoning herself. We know she would create Robeasts to attack Voltron, but that was mostly in support of Zarkon and his dictatorship. We know she used the komar (are we to assume there was ever only one komar?) to extract quintessence from the life on planets, but we only ever see that done once. We know she had a particular interest in Shiro – “You could have been our greatest weapon,” she said to him in 1x13 “The Black Paladin – but we have no idea why she was interested in him or what she was planning in thinking of him as a weapon. Are we supposed to think that she was just accumulating miscellaneous weapons? It’s not like Voltron had reemerged at the point she had started thinking of Shiro as a weapon, so with the Galra dominating the universe, what were the Galra lacking that meant they needed more weapons? We know she oversaw the clone program, but there was never anything that suggested the Druids were involved with that; instead, it seemed more like that was a secret side project she had. And we never are given an explanation as to why she was having so many Shiro clones produced.

So, Voltron has been missing for three years. Haggar hasn’t been seen in that time either. Given season eight, we’re supposed to understand that during these three years, she found Lotor’s colony hidden in the quantum abyss, establishing a relationship with the Alteans there, hyping them up into a vengeful fury against Voltron for killing Lotor, and using whatever powers she gained from killing the White Lion in Oriande searches through all the other realities to find one that she thinks of as being perfect? I guess I’ll get to all that when I get to those episodes, but the topic of who’s the show’s antagonist is a topic relevant to now. Once we get to Earth and dealing with the invasion and occupation there, Sendak becomes the primary antagonist. But Sendak has always only been a secondary antagonist. That’s one of the many weaknesses of the story in season seven. The villains are shallow. Ezor and Zethrid were villains for two episodes because they wanted power. Sendak wants to conquer and dominate. Haggar is off-screen, at best, only slightly coming into play with the Altean-controlled mecha at the end of season. There is no character motivation grounding the antagonism of the conflict of the season. That’s not to say the show has ever been all that great at having compelling villains because it hasn’t, but at least in the first two seasons Zarkon and Haggar worked as foils for Shiro and Allura. There was a character connection there. And as much as I hate that they played the Lotor’s-secretly-been-a-villain-all-along absurdity for seasons three through six, at least he was emotionally connected to Allura. But here in season seven, anyone that can be identified as the antagonist could be easily replaced by any other character and things are really still the same. Consider this season’s story, but instead of Sendak, it’s another Galra like Ranveig or Gnov from back in season five. The story doesn’t change whatsoever. Sendak behaves the same as every other villainous Galra.

Macidus says that Haggar’s final order to the Druids was to destroy the Blades of Marmora. Another problem with this is we don’t know anything about the Druids. Who are they? Why are they Druids? How are they Druids? They all use magic, so do they come by that magic on their own, and in demonstrating magic are recruited by Haggar into the Druids? Or does Haggar teach them magic after they join the Druids? Part of me kind of likes the Druids because they’re differentiated from regular Galra, but I find them frustrating because they don’t feel like characters. They’re masks and magic, and that’s it.

Pidge says, “After Lotor took over the throne, almost every Mamoran agent was exposed.” They were? This supposedly-multiple-millennia old covert organization failed to maintain their cover because Lotor became Emperor? This is a huge deal that’s never come up before. Did the Blades suddenly become incompetent when Lotor became Emperor? I could understand maybe Kolivan became exposed because he was broadcasting his face all over the universe when communicating with the Voltron Coalition, but every other Blade took explicit measures to conceal their identities. How were they exposed? This does not make sense.

Macidus says that “all Blades were called from their assignments and sent to this base. Kolivan knew they were being hunted and wanted to make a stand against them.” Are we to assume that the Druids were just so good at magic that the Blades’ covert methods were no protection? The Blades could conceal their existence for thousands of years, but now for no reason they couldn’t? Maybe this is the problem with all this story being told through exposition. None of the logistics of this have been thought through by the creative team.

Macidus continues, “When they arrived here, my people helped them fortify their base.” So, Kolivan wanted a base for the Blades to be able to defend against Druid attacks, and he chose an inhabited planet? I know Macidus is spinning a tale here, but thinking of it logistically, this planet has been established as having once had a civilization on it. Unfortunately, this means that once again this show reduces the concept of a civilization to a few hundred people and one city – they did it with Arus, they did it with the mermaids, they did it with Taujeerians, it also feels like they did it with the Olkari. The population of planets in this show are unbelievably too low.

“The Druids […] arrived without warning.” How were there no monitoring systems for this planet or from the Blades? Throughout human history, we monitor the borders of our respective territories, but not here.

The conflict was supposedly a long one. Casidus refers to it as “a long battle of attrition.” I guess. “Casualties on both sides were enormous.” There have only ever been a handful of Druids in this show. So, these enormous casualties had to have just been regular Galra. This show has had the Paladins blow up a lot of Galra, so this “both sides” crap feels manipulative. But then, Macidus is being manipulative, but his ruse should be such that he doesn’t care about the Druid+Galra side. Is this supposed to be another hint that Macidus is not who he’s pretending to be? The Druids have never been shown to care about Galra death before; like with Haggar, the Galra have always seemed as nothing more than pawns for them to use. I can’t believe that Macidus now cares about the Galra who died under his command.

“My people were the first to try to escape,” and they’re shown running through the city streets. I thought this was supposed to have been a war of attrition? That would require the Blades and this planet’s people to have hunkered down in a strong defensive situation. That’s antithetical to escaping. Macidus says he stayed behind with Kolivan, who “led those of us who remained to battle the last of the Druids, but for each one we were able to take down, nearly a hundred Blades would fall.” Again, there have only been a handful of Druids in this show. Allura, Kolivan, and Antok – just the three of them – were able to kill two Druids while also fighting Haggar in 2x13 “Blackout.” So, the Druids are more powerful now without Haggar than they were when they literally fought alongside her? I know that Macidus is spinning a tale, but is any of what he’s saying supposed to be considered accurate? And if it’s not, if this is all a total lie, then this episode is giving way too damn much time to his telling this tale. You don’t write a character to tell a tale like this unless most, if not all, of it is true. This conflict between the Druids and the Blades feels totally disproportionate to what we’ve seen of both Druid and Blade in the past.

Krolia can apparently “recognize every one of these blades.” She’s got a really good memory then. “I trained many of them myself.” This makes her character feel even more over-important than she’s felt already. Kolivan’s blade momentarily glows. I thought a blade only glowed for its owner. I guess the way the blades function for the Blades of Marmora is another instance of the show’s magic system never being defined. Krolia concludes that Kolivan must be still alive, and Macidus, with the cliché voice of an 80s villain, says, “Just barely.”

Surprise everyone! Isn’t everyone surprised? Macidus has tricked you all!

“Your hand is looking much better,” Macidus says to Keith, referencing way back to 1x12 “Collection and Extraction,” when Keith’s hand was injured fighting the Druid and was healed when quintessence accidentally splashed on it. That happened so long ago that it feels, not like a long-range plan for the story, but like someone in the writing staff went back and rewatched the first season and realized they never really explained that moment in that episode.

“You’ve been using that signal to draw Blades in,” Keith says. Thank you for stating the obvious, Keith. The Druid cackles like an empty, cliché villain. He teleports away, and in his place a grenade falls to the ground. Krolia yells, “No!” in slow motion as it explodes. It’s silly. The space wolf teleports to Keith and teleports him away from the explosion. The explosion creates a pink bubble of energy, and everyone is stopped inside it. I guess it’s some kind of time-stop bomb?

Keith, the wolf, and the Druid are in some tunnels. Keith and the wolf initially just walk off to the side, but then are suddenly underneath the platform the Druid is walking on. I guess the Druid is just assuming that his bomb took out everyone? Despite the thin, wooden walkway he’s clomping across, the Druid stops because he hears something somehow over his loud footsteps. I guess maybe he magically sensed something since magic is whatever the writers want it to be at any given moment in this show. A canister rolls out of nowhere, and the Druid zaps it with purple lightning and walks away. Keith turns around, and boom, the Druid is behind him and stabs down through the platform. His aim with the stab is not even remotely accurate though. I guess he’s supposed to have teleported to behind Keith after having walked away. It feels more like a fake gotcha moment.

The space wolf teleports Keith away. The Druid follows. Keith slashes at the Druid’s mask, and it breaks and falls away, revealing the Druid’s face. He doesn’t look Galra to me. He has no nose and circular ears. I don’t know if he and/or the Druids are supposed to be Galra or what. He screams and attacks. Keith fights using his Marmoran blade rather than his bayard. It makes me think of how Keith gets two weapons while Shiro gets none.

A ball of energy starts to glow in Allura’s hand, and then that quick piece of a scene cuts back to Keith. The Druid keeps teleporting after Keith, Keith and the wolf run and teleport. By happenstance, Keith and the wolf end up in a room where Kolivan is suspended by ropes from the ceiling.

The Druid arrives, and complains, “Our high priestess Haggar has forsaken us because of your treachery. But after I kill you and the other Paladins, Haggar will allow me to return.” Because the show does not show us her “forsak[ing]” the Druids, this is mostly just confusing. We’re not told or shown any specifics of what happened. Did Haggar tell the Druids off? Did she just disappear? Both could be considered her having “forsaken” them, but they’re still very different. Macidus seems to connect, I guess, the Paladins’ killing Lotor to Haggar’s leaving. I guess Haggar’s supposed to have blamed Voltron for it, but we’ve never seen anything to show what Haggar knows about Lotor’s death. The last we saw of Haggar was in 6x05 “The Black Paladins” when Lotor told her off, Axca tried to shoot her, and Haggar teleported away. Is it supposed to be that Haggar irrationally blames the Paladins for the emotional rift she created when she abused Lotor? If Haggar has forsaken the Druids, if they haven’t seen her for years, then how does Macidus think he’ll be able to present his having killed the Paladins to her? I imagine the show would just say, he’s a villain, he’s not thinking clearly, thus nothing has to make sense within the narrative. That’s just lazy writing.

The Keith-wolf-Macidus teleport battle resumes. Allura’s ball of energy glows blue, the air swirls around them, and then poof. The sphere of pink energy disappears and Allura is left glowing pink. I guess she’s supposed to have absorbed the time-stop energy? Allura asks Pidge to “lock on to Keith’s location,” and conveniently, he’s “right directly below us.” Allura slams her hand into the ground, which cracks underneath her. She blasts through to the chamber Keith is in. I guess the blast vaporized all the rock because there’s almost no debris. The other Paladins join Allura in jumping down into the chamber. They fight Macidus, and he knocks them around too easily. Again, I think back to Allura, Kolivan, and Antok killing two Druids while those Druids fought alongside Haggar, and that makes Macidus seem overpowered. He teleports behind Allura and zaps her unconscious.

Macidus looks at Keith and teleports away. Keith then closes his eyes, somehow sees flashes of where Macidus is (if he’s invisible) or will be (if he finishes a teleport to wherever he’s going to appear). Keith throws his blade at where Macidus appears, hitting him. What is this power? Since when does Keith have magic sensing powers?

Macidus has a couple of blue lightning sparks and then he glows and explodes. The other Druids we’ve seen killed didn’t explode like this, so what’s causing this other than inconsistent writing and production?

They get Kolivan down. He’s injured, but alive and will recover. We find out now that Keith gave Kolivan the coordinates of the Altean colony. Why this hasn’t been brought up before now, I don’t know. Kolivan says he “sent a team. There was nothing there, just an empty facility.” Keith would have had to have given Kolivan the coordinates sometime between the end of 6x02 “Razor’s Edge” and the beginning of 6x04 “The Colony” because he was too busy with fighting the clone and Lotor after “The Colony.” Did Kolivan sit on the information until sometime after Voltron was under the effects of the time skip during the battle with Lotor (again, ignoring the plot hole that Coran, Krolia, Romelle, and the clone would have experienced the three years that passed outside the rift since the Castle Ship never went in)? When did Haggar collect the Alteans from the colony?

I know throughout the entirety of this episode’s commentary, I’ve put a lot of work into trying to understand the logistics of events that are only halfway referenced, at best, and take place entirely off-screen. I have probably put more work into understanding this than the creative team did in writing it. I really doubt that any of them cared if any of this really made sense or not. Keith got to have a supposedly exciting fight alongside his magic space wolf, that’s all that mattered to them, really.

Kolivan says that he has to “find the others. The universe needs us now more than ever.” So, did any of the battle that Macidus described in his tale even happen? Or did he only capture Kolivan and lure other Blades to this location one-by-one to kill them? The show is not clear about what has actually happened.

Krolia declares she’ll join Kolivan to help rebuild the Blades of Marmora. At least she won’t be here to take up so much of the story for a while. She goes to Keith and says, “I’m sorry to have to say goodbye to you for a second time.” Yeah, remember when she revealed herself as his mother back in 5x05 “Bloodlines” when she couldn’t control herself in the moment and said, “I left you once. I’ll never leave you again,” remember that? Yeah, that overwhelming amount of emotion that got to her in that moment no longer exists. She’s going to leave Keith. I don’t mind her leaving (beyond my being tired of her character) because they’re both adults and they’re both fighters in a huge conflict. But her leaving here makes her previous proclamation that she would “never leave [him] again” lose meaning. It takes away whatever emotion that part of the story had. It makes her declaration hollow. Once again, this show has flipped a switch narratively, and things are just different now just because. Keith gives her his Marmoran blade, and they hug. “Thanks for everything you taught me, Mom,” Keith says. Of course, we have no idea what any of these supposed things she taught him are since almost all of their relationship has happened off-screen.

“Keith, it’s time to get going,” Shiro says. Oh? Shiro’s still in this show? Of course, the show would have it be Shiro to be the one to interrupt Keith and his mother’s moment. And why are the Paladins so eager to leave right this very minute? I know they want to get to Earth, but they’re all still in the decompression phase of this conflict with Macidus. This separation feels forced.

Krolia and Keith tell each other they love each other then cut to the Lions flying away from the planet.

I like the premise of this episode. I like bringing the Druids back into the story, but that’s mostly because the show has never treated the Druids like characters and I’ve always wanted to learn more about them. While we get a Druid as an actual character in this episode, because of his lying, we have no idea what he says is true and what he says is a lie. We still don’t have any sense of the actual organizational relationship between Haggar and the Druids.

This episode having Macidus be the specific Druid that Keith fought in “Collection and Extraction,” while kind of cool to have a reference back to that early in the show, it reminds me about Keith’s hand seemingly being healed by the quintessence. If quintessence, and not Allura’s generated quintessence, but the refined quintessence ripped from living creatures can heal wounds, then how is quintessence a substance that poisons people so that they lose control of themselves? So, unfortunately, this episode just leaves me with more questions than it answered.

While I spent a lot of time trying to understand the logistics of off-screen events, and I don’t think much of it makes sense, and I know that a lot of my questions have no answers because the show’s creative team never thought to have answers for them, this episode is still way better than the past three.

[greenteafiend]

hi! i'm loving your badthingshappen series!! are you still taking requests? if you are, can I get "human shield" with pidge and keith? maybe this time it could be pidge who protects keith? but i would love it either way, your writing is beautiful

Here you go anon, hope you like it :)

@badthingshappenbingo

And also, a bit late but @keithgenuary for Pidge, day 12.

Even though Pidge only has a split second to make her decision, it is an easy one to make.

These are the facts:

The Galra is aiming for Keith’s head.

If Keith gets shot in the head, he will die.

If Keith doesn’t die, he will most certainly be rendered unconscious at the very least, and will therefore be unable to make it back to his lion under his own power.

Paladin training has made Pidge stronger, but Keith is heavy. It’s doubtful that she’d be able to move him anywhere quickly.

Even if she does manage to outrun their enemies while carrying an unconscious/possibly dead Keith, she can’t pilot Red, the lion that is their ride out of here.

When leads to her justifications:

She can move, and take the shot somewhere that isn’t her head, like her shoulder or something.

She probably won’t immediately die from a blaster wound in the shoulder.

If that renders her unconscious, it won’t matter because—

She is a tiny human—as loathe as she is to admit it—and Keith is strong. She had no doubt that he can carry her and run if necessary.

Keith is the Red Paladin, the Red Lion is his to fly.

So Pidge jumps in front of him, and the world explodes into pain.

—

“Pidge!” Keith screams. Watching her fall feels like slow motion. Her knees hit the ground first, and then she tips forwards, torso following. The thud reverberates through the inside of Keith’s skull, and then Pidge lays still. Dangerously still. Everything inside of Keith contracts in horror and denial.

No—

He barely feels the motions he goes through to end the fight. Slash the sentry in front of him, pivot and hurl his whole fucking bayard at the one across the room that had aimed for him, but hit Pidge. Shot Pidge.

The force of the throw impales the sentry through the chest, right up to the hilt, and it goes down, but Keith doesn’t wait to watch it fall.

He scrambles to Pidge’s side, rolls her over onto her front, and gasps.

His hands curl into fists and he swears viciously under his breath, because this looks bad.

The shot blew clear through her armor, leaving the edges blackened, and blood seeps out of the hole like water out of busted pipe.

Should have been me.

Her eyes are wet and clouded with pain and confusion.

This is my fault.

“K-Keith?” she stammers weakly, trying to raise herself, only to fall back with a pained gasp.

“I’m—I’m gonna get you out of here,” Keith vows.  

Without thinking about it, he raises an arm in the direction of his bayard, and it materializes in his hand. He’s never done that before, but it doesn’t matter. Time is of the essence.

He gathers up Pidge’s limp body, trying to be careful, trying not to jostle her injury, but still, she fights him.

“Ow! Hurts—p-put—lemme down—” she cries, words slurred, squirming weakly.

“I’m sorry,” says Keith, hitching her higher in his arms so that he can run.

She whimpers, a pained sound that reaches directly into Keith’s chest cavity to stab at his heart. But he can’t stop, no matter how much she begs, or tells him it hurts.

“Just stay with me, you’re gonna be okay,” Keith urges.

He runs so fast he’s practically flying.

—

Pidge’s memories after that are fuzzy and indistinct. An outraged growl. Panicked words urging her to keep her eyelids open—they feel so heavy. Being lifted, weightless, as fire and agony assail her shoulder. Struggling against it, trying to push it away.

And then blissful cold, dark, nothing.

—

When proper consciousness returns to her, she is falling out of a cryopod, and into directly into Shiro’s arms. He hugs her tightly, with a desperation that surprises her.

“Is she okay?” That’s Keith, and he sounds impatient.

“She’s fine, number four.” It sounds like that is not the first time Coran had said those words.   

Shiro finally steps back, holding her at arm’s length.

“You gave us a scare,” he says. 

“We’re so glad to see you back on your feet,” says Allura, stepping forward to gently press her glasses back onto her face. 

It lets her see that behind them the whole team is assembled. They were all worried enough to be here, waiting for her to get out… it makes Pidge feel warm.

“I knew Keith had everything under control,” she says, grinning.

To her surprise, her words make Keith’s face crumple in distress, and then he covers his face with both hands as his shoulders start to silently shake.

Pidge can only stare at him in shock, because—is Keith—? Is he crying?  

Hunk sets a hand on Keith’s back, giving him a comforting pat, and Lance says “There, there, mullet, she’s fine,” and they are the first words Pidge has ever heard Lance say to the other boy that contain no hints of meanness or teasing.

Pidge stumbles forward unsteadily until she’s right in front of him.

“Keith?”  

Keith sniffs, and lowers his hands, revealing red eyes and tear-streaked cheeks.

“That shot was for me, they were aiming for me, but you—you—” he hides his face in his hands again.

“They were aiming at your head specifically,” Pidge points out, and then she starts to ramble, scratching the back of her head because this is awkward. Keith is their resident emo hotheaded loner, and here he is crying. Over her.

“I’d do it again, you know. I knew a shot to the shoulder wouldn’t kill me, and I knew you’d get me out of there, and I couldn’t fly Red anyways so we’d have—oof.”  

Keith lunges forward and swallows her up in a hug.

“Don’t do that again,’ he growls, squeezing her so tightly she can barely breathe.

More arms pile around them as everyone joins in on the hug.

“But… thank you,” Keith whispers, just to Pidge.

[a-spoopy-bird]

Glowing Eyes

Sorry ubt immean take this langst as tribute for my absence!

We all are stranger creatures than when we all started out as kids. Culture forbid.

The paladins were going to stay on Earth for a while, learning about this new Altean. This gave time for them to chill. Sure, they’d train, and they would strengthen diplomatic connections, but it seems like the Galran threat was gone.

They mourned the lost, and honor ceremonies were given to them, awards and medals for their bravery. Lance let his little relatives put on the badges, laughing as they went around, pretending to use a blaster. He remembered being that young, only five or six, and he would also play games like that, his dad looking on and laughing. His grin widened. These guys were the best.

“Lance, what’s this?” Joseph asked, picking up Lance’s bayard. He hadn’t explained it yet, because, after all, there had been a lot going on with ceremonies and recovering.

“This, is my bayard.” Lance said with a flair of drama. “It’s my weapon. It’s different for everybody.”

“Cool! How does it work?”

“Honestly, I don’t know. Something about Altean alchemy. You’d have to ask Coran. It might take a few minutes to get an answer though.” Lance grinned.

“What does it do?” He asked, looking at it.

“It’s different for everyone. Some people, like me,” He grinned, “have several bayard forms. It doesn’t matter which bayard you use, it’ll take the same shape.”

“How do you know?”

“I originally piloted the Blue Lion. She’s pretty great, but Keith left Red to Black, so I got a promotion. Allura took Blue, so I passed on the bayard.” He explained.

“What are your bayards?” Marco asked.

Lance grinned. “I have a blaster, sniper rifle, and I got a sword.”

The was a chorus of woahs and wows. “Show us!”

“Maybe later. I don’t think the nurses would like it very much if I just started activating my bayard.”

They pouted, but then moved on. “Tell us space stories!”

Lance smiled. It was good to be home, however different it was.

We have romantic fantasies about what dying truly is. Fall off the grid.

“You died?” Veronica gasped. Lance was in the middle of telling her a story.

“Yeah, it’s nothing compared to what Shiro went through. He died, was cloned, then his soul was forced into his clone.” Lance said hotly.

“Now you’re just lying.”

“I am not! Anyway, Allura saved me with her crazy Altean magic.”

“A lot seems to happen with you and Allura.” Veronica said. Lance felt the nudge to open up.

“You’re getting sloppy, I felt that one a mile away.” He snorted.

Veronica shrugged. “Worth a shot. Are you two dating or…?”

Lance blushed instantly. “Wh- what, no, we’re just friends. Besides, she just got over Lotor.”

“Space prince?”

Lance’s shoulders tensed ever so slightly. “Yeah. He had us all. He was bad, being Zarkon’s son, then he was on our side, then he went insane from quintessence, like Haggar and Zarkon did. It was hard on Allura. She was in love with him, the version he told us.” Lance’s shoulders fell. “Honestly, I didn’t trust him, but I thought it was just my jealousy. He got so close to Allura so quickly, and I had been with her for several months and made less progress. But, my gut was right. He lied to us all, and that put the universe in jeopardy.” He shrugged. “We left him in the quintessence field.”

“That must’ve been rough.”

Lance laughed. “Understatement of the year.”

Veronica studied Lance, noticing how he didn’t laugh as long, he didn’t make as many jokes. He looked like the same Lance, but the Galra had hardened him into someone almost completely different.

We live for the night’s décor, it reveals what we dream of.

Lance missed looking up at a night sky. After so many nights and days of being in one, it looked so much better being on the ground. The stars, familiar constellations blinked down at him, a comfort from his childhood.

“Lance? Are you down there?” Keith’s voice floated over the little ledge that was washed out by the sea.

Slightly confused, Lance called back, “Yeah, there’s a slight lip.” He watched as Keith got down and sat beside him. “What’s up?”

“I needed to get away from the Garrison and Griffin. He’s such an asshole.”

Lance smirked. “Didn’t you guys fight all the time?”

“Still do.” Keith grunted, looking at the moonlight that bounced off the waves.

Lance looked up at the stars. “I wonder how many of these are planets we visited.” He wondered aloud.

Keith looked at Lance, then the sky. “I don’t know.”

Lance fell silent. He stared at the stars, expression content and a bit sad too. He thought of the countless battles, and of how often he wanted to come home, just too look at his stars again. Slowly, he relaxed, leaning into the embankment, letting out a soft sigh. This was his reward for making it through the war.

He didn’t notice Keith looking at him, wondering why Lance wasn’t trying to pick a fight.

I know there’s someone at the door. They come for help of this I’m sure.

“You wanna talk about it?” Lance heard Keith ask. He had fallen asleep at the embankment and had just jolted awake. He knew instinctively he was pale and clammy. It happened every time he had a nightmare.

The image of Galran sentries bearing down on him flashed through his mind. He suppressed a shudder. “No, it’s fine. I should get home. Don’t want them to think I disappeared again,” Lance joked, grin obviously forced.

Keith watched as Lance got up and left him alone under the stars on Veradero beach.

But do I want to say goodbye to all the glowing eyes?

Lance walked to his hiding spot. He wasn’t even sure if it was there anymore, but it remained intact. Just a tree with a platform in its branches. It was about fifteen feet up, but he had made a small ladder up.

Curling around his knees, he let out a quiet, dry sob. Was he ever going to be free from the Galra? He let the tension slowly leave his body. It’d be fine, he was finally home. He could chill sometimes, not fearing an attack any second.

I’m holding onto what I know, and what I know I must let go.

Having Keith back after a month of him being gone was weird. Lance didn’t really know what to do. Half of him wanted to fight with him, but the other half wanted to drop it. This resulted in some very mixed signals.

“Your hair needs cut,” Mrs. Holt said one day as they chilled in the Garrison lounge.

“I’ve been saying that for months.” Lance snorted.

Keith fingered his hair. “I don’t know, I kinda like it long.”

It doesn’t look half bad. Lance thought, but he didn’t know how to say that. “It’s more of a mullet this way. It’s better.”

Keith glared.

“But it’s so long, just a trim,” Mrs. Holt continued. “It’d be so much easier to manage.”

“Thanks for the offer, Mrs. Holt, but I think I’ll keep it for now.” Keith said politely but continued to glare at Lance.

But I would rather sing a song, for the eyes to sing along.

Lance was getting used to waking up in his own sweat, visions of towering sentries and cruisers and fighters burnt onto his eyelids. He would silently sneak out of his house, or the Garrison, or where ever he had fell asleep at, and go to his hideout, his guitar in a waterproof case. He’d pull it out and sing softly, relaxing into the music.

For now, he would be safe.

We all know somebody who knows somebody’s who’s doing great.

Lance sat politely as Hunk and Pidge talked about how good it was to be on Earth again, even if they didn’t have as advanced of technology. They compared notes as he sat in the background, half listening. They didn’t seem to be haunted by the war.

We all know people who know people who are flying straight.

“Paladins, we have to continue training with out lions.” Allura said. “We can’t let our bonds grow stale.”

Lance climbed into Red, feeling his impatient and violent nature, but also feeling his protectiveness and fierce love for the other paladins. Especially his paladin, Lance.

Lance missed Blue, for sure, but Red was also great. Red wasn’t as chill as Blue. Red wanted Lance to be the best he could be, and so did Blue, but Blue was more maternal about it. Red let Lance make mistakes. When it got out of hand he stepped in. Or fell onto.

They did drills for hours. Red responded well, even occasionally giving Lance tips about his flying form. Red was speedy, so Lance had to take it down a notch. But Red was also temperamental, so when the team got slightly heated at him, Red bristled. Lance soothed him. It was fine. He was fine.

He felt Red questioning how firm his belief was. He knew Red knew he was lying. Red had a direct link with his mind, of course he knew. He knew about the nightmares and the panic attacks and the absolutely, mind numbing, body freezing fear that took him over.

But I’ll kindly enter into rooms of depression, while ceiling fans and idle hands will take my life again.

By this time, Lance knew he should confide in someone besides his giant mechanical cat. It wasn’t getting better on its own, as Lance had hoped. He thought about Hunk or Pidge or Shiro, but none of them seemed right. He wanted to go to his family, but he’s been gone for so long and he didn’t know if they’d be awake right now. It was… three in the morning.

He huffed. This isn’t what he had planned for when they finally came home. Then again, he hadn’t planned on being in some sort of stasis for three years. He sighed, just staring at the ceiling. Shark stickers that glow in the dark dotted his ceiling. He remembered naming them when he got them, but by now he forgot the names. All he knew is that one was Hunk, for his best friend.

He heard a soft knock on his door. Who the hell was awake? He considered grabbing his bayard and snatched it from his dresser. He slowly opened the door, bayard up, but not activated.

“Jesus, Lance, I’m not here to kill you.” Veronica whispered, entering his room. “Why are you up?”

“I could ask the same thing,” he whispered back, putting down the weapon.

“I asked you first.” She said, falling into the familiar pattern of their talks.

“What is this, middle school?” Lance scoffed quietly. “I just couldn’t sleep.”

“Bullshit.” She answered. Lance looked up, ready to defend his claim. “You didn’t sleep at all last night either. When I came in to check, you weren’t even here.” She accused. It was true. He had snuck out to his hideout again.

“I don’t really want to talk about it.” He muttered, looking down. “You should get some rest.”

“I’m not going to bed until you tell me what’s up.”

Lance sat there tired and exasperated. Veronica knew he valued his family’s needs over his own personal ones. He also knew she had his best interest at heart. But he really, really didn’t want to talk about it.

“You know, you don’t have to be Red Paladin, you can just be Lance.” She said, her voice concerned and honest.

He felt his shoulders slump. Those words crashed down on him. He suspected Veronica saw through him, and maybe Keith. “Fine. It just seems silly to me. It just a few bad dreams.”

“Every night?”

“Most nights. So, I leave with my guitar and just softly play. It’s not really a big deal.”

Veronica wasn’t really convinced. “Okay. Try to get some sleep, okay?” Lance nodded, and she left.

Lance bit his lip. He wanted to tell Veronica everything, like they were kids again. Instead, he found himself texting Keith to meet him at the embankment. He snuck out his window, knowing Veronica wasn’t asleep yet, and crept off.

The tide was in, and the water was a few feet below Lance’s feet. He figured it would be a few hours until Keith showed up. After all, it was four in the morning.

We live for the night’s décor, it reveals what we dream of.

“Lance?” Keith called. Lance blinked and sat up. Keith jumped off the embankment and sat down. “It’s four in the morning, why are you up?” Lance felt Keith studying his reaction.

Lance chose his words very carefully. “I just- uh, I haven’t been sleeping well, and you’re the team leader, plus, Pidge and Hunk are busy with Garrison tech things, so I-” He broke off, knowing he had started to ramble.

“Nightmares?” Keith asked quietly.

Lance bit his lip and nodded. “How’d you know?”

“I had the same problem. When the Blade showed up and showed their symbol, I realized I might be part Galra, and I was terrified. I had nightmares about it. It made me moodier and more irritable.” Keith said.

Lance hung his head. “I don’t really hate your mullet.” He muttered.

Keith raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“I don’t actually hate your mullet.” He said a little louder, head almost between his knees. He felt his face heat up. “I hated how you were better. I was kind of jealous. Griffin was your rival, not me.”

“I was always confused about why you’d make fun of my hair and purposely press my buttons.”

Lance looked up at the now waning moon. It was funny how the night air and sky seemed to strip you away until you were left naked, nothing left but your true self. “Yeah I was just extremely jealous. You could fly great, you never had to study, you picked fights when I probably would have cried.”

Keith looked at Lance, obviously confused as to why Lance was opening up to him.  “I didn’t like getting into fights. People just said the wrong stuff.” He paused. “Those people were assholes.” Keith didn’t like how sad it was getting. Lance was the happy-go-lucky guy on the team, being sad didn’t look right on him.

Lance laughed half-heartedly, then looked at Keith. “I want to show you something.” He decided, getting up. He went down the beach until he found his gnarled tree.

I know there’s someone at the door they come for help of this I’m sure.

But do I want to say goodbye to all the glowing eyes?

Lance heaved up onto the platform, waiting for Keith.

“What is this?”

“This,” Lance said with a flair of pride and drama, “is my Quiet Place. When I come here, I just chill. It’s not exactly a panic room, but it’s close.”

“Why are you showing me this?” Keith asked, looking at the carvings on the trunks and the floor.

“Well, you’re our leader, and there’s really no one else right now…” Lance bit his tongue. He wasn’t thinking when he brought Keith here.

I’m holding onto what I know and what I know I must let go.

But I would rather sing a song for the eyes to sing along.

“Lance?” Keith asked softly. “Do you- do you want to talk about it?”

Lance shrugged, rubbing his arm. He sat down, motioning for Keith to do the same. It was kind of cramped, but Lance got out his guitar. “So, when I come up here, I just sort of play until lyrics come to me.” He tuned it. “And since we’ve been home, I’ve written all of these.” Lance brought out a stack of sheet music. “This is seven songs, and it takes a few days, generally, to write one. They aren’t very good.” He added, watching Keith as he read them.

Lance started to play one of his favorites.

This room is far too dark for us to stay around.

Redemption’s not that far and darkness is going down.

Keith listened to the minor key cords and the lyrics that seemed to come effortlessly. The more he listened, the better he understood what Lance was going through. Almost impeccably, it molds into a different song. It was slightly more depressing, Lance strumming harder and more passionately. Keith listened, Lance’s singing just as soft as before, barely escalating over the guitar.

This room is far too dark for us to stay around.

Redemption’s not that far and darkness is going down.

Keith wanted to interrupt but wanted to hear the rest of the song.  Lance didn’t seem to remember Keith was there as he kept playing, getting louder and more passionate, until he stopped, with a slow, sad strum.

Lance didn’t look up.

“Lance, do you- you want to talk?” He asked softly.

Lance shook his head no. He slowly put the guitar away then hugged himself, refusing to look up. He took a shuddering breath. “I- I don’t understand,” He started, voice congested and full of sorrow. “I don’t understand why after- after everything we’ve done, I breakdown when we’re safe.”

“Lance-”

“And it’s not like I’m scared!” Lance said, voice stronger, fueled by anger at his own weakness. “I don’t understand it! I don’t feel scared, I know I’m safe, but there’s still this lingering paranoia and I’m just so, tired, of being afraid.” He ended it with a contained sob.

“After how long in space, it’s okay to feel like this.” Keith said without knowing what he was saying. “How many times were we woken up by the alarms blaring, or a rattling explosion when Coran forgot the proximity alarms? We’ve been through so much. You more. I spent two years on the back of a space whale bonding with my mom.” Keith knew Lance knew the stab at humor was weak. Lance hardly laughed. He just sort of jerked, a weak chuckle that sounded more like a sigh. “You aren’t going to be alright right away. Just give it time.”

“But- what if we don’t have time?” Lance chocked out. “There could be an attack from any of the Galra who are fighting for power.”

“If you keep focusing on the bad, you lose sight of the good.”

Lance’s head bobbed, but his lips quivered, holding back tears.

I’m holding onto what I know and what I know I must let go.

But I would rather sing a song for the eyes to sing along.

They sat in silence. Lance wished Keith would say something to get rid of the despair still welling up inside of him, but he knew that wouldn’t happen. He had to take action. But he was scared. What would happen? Would he start to sob? Get thrown into another panic attack? Even at the thought he felt his chest constricting. He didn’t want to vanish inside a panicked shell in front of Keith.

In front of anyone.

La di da da, la di da di da,

La di da da, la di da di da,

La di da da, la di da da, la di da da, la di da.

Time passes. It’s natural. But other things don’t. Lance didn’t recover. He just got better at hiding it. He got worse. Nothing was alright anymore. He just wanted to leave and never come back, or to be in Blue’s cockpit one last time. He missed her but respected her decision to block him out. She was, after all, a wise Lion of Voltron, and he was just a silly human trying to keep it together.

For the eyes to sing along.

“Lance!” They were calling out his name. He had vanished from the Garrison overnight, leaving a note.

Make them stop.

Lance quivered and shook in his tree house, too tired and panicked to play. He bit his lip so hard it bled. His hands were gripped in his hair, tugging at his scalp. They were too loud, they called so, so loud, he couldn’t ignore the truths.

Make them stop.

“Lance!” Hunk was near tears. Pidge was on his shoulders, hoping to see any sign of him. Keith had gone off on his own. Hunk had lost track of where Allura, Coran, and Veronica had gone. When had this happened? Hours ago? Hunk was going to breakdown.

Pidge realized that. She hopped down from his back. “Hunk look at me.” She said. He didn’t. “Hunk.” She said again, quieter. “We’re going to find him, okay?”

Hunk nodded. Still too close to tears for Pidge to feel safe on his shoulders.

Keith had stalked off on his own. He had a suspicion of where Lance was but didn’t want to tell the others. That was Lance’s call.

Still. Sneaking out at night, while he did it regularly, wasn’t good. He had left a note, which really wasn’t good. The shaky writing and the panicked message was hard to read, but they went out anyways.

Lance quivered. They had passed right in front of his tree. He felt like he was being chocked. He couldn’t breathe. He was sliding out of control. He couldn’t control his body, oh God, he was drowning. His hands were fists, but he couldn’t feel his fingers. He strangled out a gasp, desperate for air.

Make them stop.

Keith stood a bit away from the tree. He could hear Lance strangled breathing. He swallowed. He went forward cautiously.

“Lance?” Lance heard his name from far, far away. He couldn’t look up, he could feel his hand or feet, he was going to throw up, God, this isn’t good God, please-

Suddenly there was a hand on his back. He flinched. He felt someone wipe the tears off his face. The touch was so unexpected, Lance tried to scoot back, his brain yelling to stop but his body continuing.

His hand slid off the edge of the platform. He strangled a gasp, new, fresh fear washing through him. Arms were around him, keeping him on the platform. He struggled to leave. The arms held fast.

The arms of the enemy. He thought, lungs being crushed. He wasn’t getting enough air. He was going to die. He was going to vomit. He was going to die here in the arms of what he’s been running from with its smells of man shampoo and leather in his nose.

Men’s shampoo and leather? Lance took a shuddering sniff. And sweat? Who smelt like th-

Keith.

Lance froze. He couldn’t breathe for a different reason now.

Make them stop.

Keith locked his arms around Lance. If he wasn’t careful, Lance would end up taking both of them out of the tree. He made small shushing noises, no knowing what to do, or what was wrong. Lance kept pushing away, trying to escape, struggling for breath. He pulled him as close as possible, forming a cage with his arms.

Lance froze. Keith hesitantly released some of the tension in his arms. “Lance?”

Lance said something against his chest that Keith couldn’t hear. “What?”

“I’m sorry.” His voice was thick. Keith saw how pale he was. This wasn’t the Lance that he went up to space with. This was a scared teenager needing comfort.

“Why are you sorry?” Keith asked, shifted so that Lance could be in less danger of falling off.

“Because I’m weak, and pathetic, and I’m just-”

“You’re just brave, and funny, and a good friend.” Keith cut in.

“How can you say that? You hardly hang around me.” His voice was thick and muffled by his shirt, but Keith clearly heard the pain in it.

“Just because I don’t hang out with you doesn’t mean that stuff isn’t true.” Keith said, confused about where all this was coming from.  “Just look at you and Hunk. You guys are always there for each other.”

“Yeah, but he has Pidge now. They have technical junk to work on.” Lance sniffed. “I’d just be a third wheel.”

“Lance, they enjoy your company. Both of them are out trying to find you.”

“Oh, man, I just made them worry more, we should go.” Lance pulled back, wiping tears off his face.

“Slow down, don’t worry about it. It’ll be fine.” Keith said. He didn’t want Lance to get worked up. Keith could tell he was tired from the panic attack, and no doubt running from the Garrison base to the tree.

“Keith, just- please. I don’t want to talk about it.” Lance looked away. He could barely think straight. His gay panic and an actual panic attack hadn’t been good on his energy, which was already low form countless nights not sleeping. He just wanted to sleep until he didn’t like Keith.

Lance could feel Keith trying to sort out what to do. He almost heard the click of the last piece, the decision, falling into place.

“When I was with Krolia on the space whale, we had a big blow up.” Keith started. “We were getting a little stir crazy, and there was a really small thing that had escalated far too quickly. We both said some hurtful things. It ended with me yelling that I wished I hadn’t found her and storming off with Kosmo.” Lance looked at Keith. He was looking into his lap. “I could tell Kosmo didn’t like it. I didn’t even like it. But I was too stubborn to walk back to my mom and tell her I was sorry. I didn’t see the moment was right for me to apologize and did it far too late.” Keith looked up. The starts of tears were in his eyes. “I feel like you might be the same way. You apologize way too often, for stuff that isn’t even your fault.”

Lance shook his head. “Keith, I’m just- so, tired, please,” He looked up. It felt like his bones weighed too much for him to support. “I just want to sleep.”

Keith paused forever. Lance was terrified he was going to refuse. Then he nodded. “Where?”

The question caught him off guard. “What?”

“Where do you want to sleep? Here, the Garrison, your house?”

Lance was caught off guard by how considerate Keith was being. “I don’t want to move.” Lance said. “Is it okay if I just, sorta…” He trailed off, too tired to form the sentence. He leaned forward and practically collapsed onto Keith.

Keith rubbed Lance’s back, not knowing what to do. Lance sighed, relaxing until he was in the familiar space between awake and asleep. He was half aware of Keith humming, then singing.

“Make them stop.”