#trying to choose between only the brave and defenceless???

[somedisastergay]

@fuckingniall decided to absolutely torture me with this challenge (Katie, I love you but why would you do this to meee?? 😭 hdjsks)

I tag: @stronghaz, @lxvelylouis, @bigsparrowharry ,@sunflowrhaz, @sunflwerlou because y'all can suffer with me :) 💕 dhxjsks

[kuramirocket]

On July 10, 1520, Aztec forces vanquished the Spanish conquistador Hernán Cortés and his men, driving them from Tenochtitlan, capital of the Aztec empire. The Spanish soldiers were wounded and killed as they fled, trying in vain to drag stolen gold and jewels with them.

By September, an unexpected ally of the would-be conquerors had reached the city: the variola virus, which causes smallpox.

How the Aztecs responded to this threat would prove critical.

The Aztecs were no strangers to plagues. Among the speeches recorded in their rhetoric and moral philosophy, we find a warning to new kings concerning their divinely ordained role in the event of contagion:

Sickness will arrive during your time. How will it be when the city becomes, is made, a place of desolation? Just how will it be when everything lies in darkness, despair? You will also go rushing to your death right then and there. In an instant, you will be over.

Facing a plague, it was vital that the king respond with grace. They warned:

Do not be a fool. Do not rush your words, do not interrupt or confuse people. Instead find, grasp, arrive at the truth. Make no one weep. Cause no sadness. Injure no one. Do not show rage or frighten folks. Do not create a scandal or speak with vanity. Do not ridicule. For vain words and mockery are no longer your office. Never, of your own will, make yourself less, diminished. Bring no scorn upon the nation, its leadership, the government.

Retract your teeth and claws. Gladden your people. Unite them, humor them, please them. Make your nation happy. Help each find their proper place. That way you’ll be esteemed, renowned. And when our Lord extinguishes you, the old ones will weep and sigh.

If a king did not follow this advice, if his rule caused more suffering than it abated, then the people prayed to Tezcatlipoca for any number of consequences, including his death:

May he be made an example of. Let him receive some reprimand, whatever you choose. Perhaps punishment. Disease. Perhaps you’ll let your honor and glory fall to another of your friends, those who weep in sorrow now. For they do exist. They live. You have no want of friends. They are sighing before you, humble. Choose one of them.

Perhaps he [the bad ruler] will experience what the common folk do: suffering, anguish, lack of food and clothing. And perhaps you will give him the greatest punishments: paralysis, blindness, rotting infection.

Or will he instead soon depart this world? Will you bring about his death? Will he get to know our future home, the place with no exits, no smoke holes? Maybe he will meet the Lord of Death, Mictlanteuctli, mother and father of us all.

Clearly, the Aztecs took the responsibilities of leadership very seriously. Beyond uplifting morale, a king’s principal duty in times of contagion was deploying his subjects to “their proper place” so that the kingdom could continue to function. This included mobilizing the titicih, doctor-healers with vast herbal knowledge, most of them women pledged to the primal mother goddess Teteoh Innan.

What about the rest of the people? As with our own modern call for “thoughts and prayers,” the Aztecs believed their principal collective tool for fending off epidemics was a humble appeal to Tezcatlipoca. The very first speech of their text of rhetoric and moral philosophy was a supplication to destroy plague. After admitting how much they might deserve this scourge and recognizing the divine right of Tezcatlipoca to punish them however he sees fit, the desperate Aztecs tried to get their powerful god to consider the worst-case outcome of his vengeance:

O Master, how in truth can your heart desire this? How can you wish it? Have you abandoned your subjects? Is this all? Is this how it is now? Will the common folk just go away, be destroyed? Will the governed perish? Will emptiness and darkness prevail? Will your cities become choked with trees and vines, filled with fallen stones? Will the pyramids in your sacred places crumble to the ground?

Will your anger never be reversed? Will you look no more upon the common folk? For—ah!—this plague is destroying them! Darkness has fallen! Let this be enough. Stop amusing yourself, O Master, O Lord. Let the earth be at rest! I fall before you. I throw myself before you, casting myself into the place from which no one rises, the place of terror and fear, crying out: O Master, perform your office … do your job!

Smallpox arrived in Mesoamerica with a second wave of Spaniards who joined forces with Cortés. According to one account, they had with them an enslaved African man known as Francisco Eguía, who was suffering from smallpox. He, like many others on the continent of his birth, had no immunity to the disease carried there by the slave traders.

Eguía died in the care of Totonac people near Veracruz, the port city established by the Spanish some 250 miles east of the Aztec capital. His caretakers became infected. Smallpox spreads easily: not only blood and saliva, but also skin-to-skin contact (handshakes, hugs) and airborne respiratory droplets. It raced through a population with no herd immunity at all: along the coast, over the mountains, across the waters of Lake Texcoco, into the very heart of the populous empire.

The epidemic lasted 70 days in the city of Tenochtitlan. It killed 40 percent of the inhabitants, including the emperor, Cuitlahuac. Had he found it increasingly difficult to keep his people’s spirits up as tradition commanded? Had his leadership faltered? Did his subjects pray for his death?

Whatever the case, the memory of that devastation would echo for centuries. Some Nahuas—mostly the sons and grandsons of Aztec nobility—described the devastation decades after the conquest.

Their account harrows the soul:

It started during Tepeilhuitl [the 13th month of the solar calendar], when a vast human devastation spread over everyone. Some were covered in pustules, which spread everywhere, on people’s faces, heads, chests, etc. There was great loss of life; many people died of it.

They could not walk anymore. They just lay in bed in their homes. They could not move anymore, could not shift themselves, could not sit up or stretch out on their sides. They could not lay flat on their backs or even face down. If they even stirred, they screamed out in pain.

Many died of hunger, too. They starved because no one was left to care for the others; no one could attend to anyone else. On some people, the pustules were few and far between. They caused little discomfort, and those folks did not die. Still others had their faces marred.

By Panquetzaliztli [the 15th month of the solar year], it began to fade. At that time the brave warriors of the Mexica managed to recover.

But a hard lesson had been learned. None of the old remedies had worked. Entire families were gone. Funeral pyres effaced the sun.

The epidemic was only the beginning of the unexpected forces working in tandem to bring down the Aztec empire. On May 22, 1521—just as Tenochtitlan was beginning to recover, trying to rebuild trade routes, restock its supplies, replant its fields and aquatic chinampa gardens—Cortés returned.

This time he commanded more Spanish troops, men from the same second wave that had brought the smallpox. With them marched tens of thousands of Tlaxcaltecah warriors, the sworn enemies of the Aztecs. Smallpox had reached Tlaxcallan first, but its people—not as densely packed in urban areas like the Mexica—had fared better and were now ready to finish off their rivals.

The massive military force laid siege to the Aztec capital. Even with more than half the population dead or disabled, with little food or water or supplies, the Mexica held the city for three months.

Then, on August 13, 1521, it fell. Emptiness and darkness indeed prevailed.

Lines from a song composed by an unknown Mexica not long afterward sums up the emotions of the survivors:

It is our God who brings down

His wrath, His awesome might

upon our heads.

So friends, weep at the realization—

we abandon the Mexica Way.

Now the water is bitter,

the food is bitter: that

is what the Giver of Life

has wrought.

Without the smallpox, it’s much less likely Cortés and his allies could have taken Tenochtitlan. 

The plague—cocoliztli—was the most devastating post-conquest epidemic in large parts of Mexico, wiping out somewhere around 80 percent of the native population.

“Somewhere around” because population estimates are difficult to come by, with extrapolations made from incomplete colonial sources that date back to precolonial times. For the ethnohistorian Charles Gibson, there is no “sure method for determining whether the later [colonial era] counts were more accurate or less accurate than the earlier ones,” so that “the magnitude of the unrecorded population seems unrecoverable.”

Nevertheless, Gibson’s best estimate is a population of 1,500,000 inhabitants of the Valley of Mexico at the time of first contact with Europeans. There was a sharp fall of about 325,000 by 1570; a drastic fall to about 70,000 by the mid-seventeenth century; followed by slow growth to about 275,000 by 1800. Gibson’s figures are simply staggering. They give us a rough impression, but tell us little about the suffering and massive social upheaval caused by these catastrophes.

Slavery, forced labor, wars, and large-scale resettlements all worked together to make indigenous communities more vulnerable to disease.

According to the “Virgin Soil” theory, the epidemics were so desctructive because “the populations at risk have had no previous contact with the diseases that strike them and are therefore immunologically… defenceless,” as the psychiatrist David Jones writes in the William & Mary Quarterly. The theory is still widespread, often devolving into vague claims that indigenous people had “no immunity” to the new epidemics. By now we know that the lack of immunity played a role, but mostly early on. Current research instead emphasizes an interplay of influences, for the most part triggered by Europeans: slavery, forced labor, wars, and large-scale resettlements all worked together to make indigenous communities more vulnerable to disease.

According to a group of scholars writing in the journal Latin American Antiquity, in colonial Mexico, “by the mid-17th century, many… communities had failed, victims of massive population decline, environmental degradation, and economic collapse.” This is why it’s crucial for today’s scholars to emphasize the influence of colonial policies—as opposed to the Virgin Soil theory, which shifts responsibility away from Europeans.

One peak of the epidemic occurred in the 1570s. The exact pathogen that caused that epidemic is not yet known. Some scholars have speculated that, since it struck mostly younger people, it might have been something unique to the New World and reminiscent of the Spanish Influenza outbreak, possibly a tropical hemorrhagic fever. Other recent theories include Salmonella, or a combination of diseases. Native communities were the main victims of this epidemic due to their poverty, malnourishment, and harsh working conditions compared to the Spanish population.

Three Circles in the Sun

Aztec authors from central Mexico noted their reactions to the epidemics in fascinating detail. Writing 100 years after the Spanish military takeover, they were painfully aware of the consequences of epidemics and colonization: epidemics had taken place before, but the unprecedented scale of the disasters caused widespread incomprehension, sadness, and anger.

Much of the extant writing by Aztec authors dates to the turn of the seventeenth century. Many of the authors had experienced the plague themselves, its effects still fresh in their memories. I want to focus on two pieces of writing: a report by the well-known historian Diego Muñoz Camargo from Tlaxcala, written in Spanish; and an anonymous text in the indigenous language, Nahuatl, from the Puebla region.

As Diego Muñoz Camargo, the famous historian from the era, wrote:

In 1576, another great pestilence struck this land, bringing death and destruction to the native population. It lasted over a year and brought ruin and decay to most of New Spain [the Spanish Viceroyalty covering today’s Mexico], as the native population was then almost extinct. One month before the outbreak of the disease, an obvious sign had been seen in the sky: three circles in the sun, resembling bleeding or exploding suns, in which the colours merged. The colours of those three circles were those of the rainbow and could be seen from eight o’clock until almost one o’clock at noon.

This passage demonstrates the great importance of omens for the Aztecs. 

It is not surprising that the second report, from the smaller community of Tecamachalco, also links diseases with the appearance of a comet. Probably written by the native noble Don Mateo Sánchez, the text shows the extent of the catastrophe in words quite similar to Diego Muñoz Camargo’s:

On the first day of August [of 1576] the great sickness began here in Techamachalco. It was really strong; there was no resisting. At the end of August began the processions because of the sickness. They finished on the ninth day. Because of it, many people died, young men and women, those who were old men and women, or children… When the month of October began, thirty people had been buried. In just two or three days they would die… They lost their senses. They thought of just anything and would die.

Several of Don Mateo’s family members also died, including his wife and the alcalde (mayor) of his quarter. Don Mateo then took over the post of alcalde. One can sense his incomprehension and anguish. The decimation of the indigenous elites is evident throughout his account.

This decimation contributed to the transformation of native societies well into the seventeenth century, including forced native labor and resettlements, the introduction of hierarchical Spanish laws and government, Christianity, and the alphabet. Together with increasing European immigration, the epidemic led to a massive upheaval of indigenous sociopolitical organization and ways of life, especially in the Valley of Mexico.

Don Mateo’s is not the only surviving account of the epidemic from an indigenous perspective. Other anonymous annals from Puebla and Tlaxcala from the era discuss earlier waves of disease, which remained firmly rooted in collective memory more than 100 years after the events. Like Mateo, these sources do not try to account for the origin of the disease, but they provide an idea of the scale and horror of the epidemic and the personal tragedies involved, the uprooting of families, of whole towns.

Meanwhile, the Spaniards’ narratives tried to explain the catastrophic effect the disease had on the indigenous population by pointing to difficult living conditions. But they also interpreted it as divine punishment for paganism and a sign of the native peoples’ alleged inferiority to Europeans. Of course, European remedies such as bloodletting, used in hospitals to treat indigenous patients, worsened conditions instead of healing them. Ultimately, the Spanish Crown feared above all a further loss of cheap or unpaid labour; the priests a loss of souls to be converted.

Holding Off Oblivion

Despite the harsh conditions, the descendants of the Aztecs did not give up—as has long been claimed in traditional scholarship. As the historian Camilla Townsend has argued, the demographic collapse lent urgency to the projects of major native historians—including the authors I’ve cited in this essay. Nearly all pre-Hispanic sources were destroyed by the Spanish, with some lost over time. The Chalca scholar Domingo de Chimalpahin commented on this confluence of factors: the destruction of sources and abandonment of communities strengthened his sense of responsibility to future generations. By writing history, he attempted to save his ancestors’ past from looming oblivion. Drawing on pre-Hispanic faith, continuing political participation, and recording the histories of their people: these are some of the ways in which Aztecs proactively shaped their lives following colonial devastation.

Centuries of colonial exploitation and violence have made the indigenous peoples of both Americas disproportionately vulnerable to current epidemics. This makes the resilience of indigenous peoples and cultures all the more incredible. Such resilience has developed over more than 500 years, in the face of continual adversity and disregard. Native American peoples provide varied and remarkable testimonies on weathering existential crises. The least we can do, in the midst of the current pandemic, is listen.

Other Source

[thereluctantinquisitor]

An Unlikely Ally

It was that thick, heavy feeling inside his skull that drove him mad. He could handle burning eyes and heavy steps, open wounds and broken bones. But to feel like a stranger in his own head, wading through endless fog, was almost too much to bear. 

He needed to sleep.

The nights seemed longer, somehow. Longer than when he used to watch over the clan grounds until dawn. Skyhold possessed an eerie stillness that made it difficult to distract himself. There was no investigating a rustle in a bush or a suspicious snapping of a branch. No need to follow a set of tracks to discern their direction, their numbers, their size and shape. Skyhold was just... there. Walled in and safe. He should be glad for it. It should be better that way.

Exhaling, Hanin raked his fingers through his hair, unbound and tousled from his earlier attempt at rest. He called it rest, now, because actual sleep seemed so impossible to achieve. How long had it been since he made it through the night? Days? Weeks?

How much longer could he keep this up?

Already, he was losing his edge. The bruises on his side from where he’d missed parries during training were a testament to that. Without thinking, he reached down, brushing his fingers over the welts left by the practice blades. In a battle, he’d be dead. Cut down by a recruit. 

He didn’t hear Anacrea approach.

“It is late, Lavellan. Even for you.”

Hanin jolted, hand and mind pulling sharply away from his idle reverie. The mage was in a thick overcoat, the dark cloth falling to just below her knees. Beneath, he could make out nothing more than a simple affair, soft and warm. A thing for sleeping, he assumed. It was far from her typical attire. 

“I could say the same to you,” he replied, returning to his empty contemplation of the courtyard. “If you have come to lecture me, know I do not take advice well.” He was about to add from a hypocrite, but stopped himself. After all, even he could see the irony in voicing such a statement. He wasn’t blind. Just tired.

The sound of her footsteps on the cobblestones was louder than he expected, given he hadn’t heard her approach. When she settled beside him on the bench, the thick cloth of her coat brushing his leg, he almost convinced himself to look over at her. Discern what she wanted. But in the end, even the thought of it seemed too difficult, so he just breathed, quietly and slowly, and hoped she would leave.

She didn’t.

“You cannot continue like this.”

Hanin snorted faintly, as amused as he could be at hearing his thoughts voiced so soon by another. “What choice do I have. The world won’t stop for me.”

“No,” she agreed. “It won’t.” 

Funny, he could say it to himself over and over again - repeat it like a mantra - but coming from someone else it felt like a knife to the chest. An inescapable truth. His temple suddenly pulsed and he realised he had been clenching his jaw so tight that it ached. He forced himself to work it loose, but the conscious effort it took to keep it that way seemed almost more distracting than the pain. Not that it mattered where his focus lay. He had nothing to say to her. Whatever she was doing, it was wasting both of their time.

After about five minutes, Hanin broke.

“Did you just come out here to sit in silence?” He was leaning forward now, elbows on his knees, forehead resting heavily against his steepled fingers. They were cold against his skin. “If you have business with me, get to it.”

On a better day, he would measure his words carefully around the mage. He was smart enough for that. But at that point, he just couldn’t understand why she was tormenting him, sitting there, silent as the stone battlements that walled him in. Creators, berate him! Attempt to console him. Coddle him, even. Damn it, he needed her to do something so he could chase her away for it. 

But she was just sitting there.

“I know you wished you were there. When your clan was butchered.” The simplicity of the words - the coldness of them - caught Hanin by surprise. So much so that he flinched and felt a growl curl at the back of his throat - a warning. A threat. 

“Careful, Trevelyan.”

“No.” He felt her shift beside him, crossing one leg over the other. An act of ease. “I will not be careful.” 

Was she mocking him?

“Then what do you want from me, shem.” Each word was like spitting blood. Especially the last. But Anacrea, true to form, seemed unfazed by his anger. His frustration. His brittle edges. Leaning back against the stone wall, the collar of her coat bunched at her neck, the air curling as she breathed it in and out. It was only after each detail registered that Hanin realised he was looking at her - glaring at her. With a grunt, he shifted his gaze back to the courtyard, but made no effort to soften it. Like his aching jaw, it was too hard of a fight. Another lost battle to add to his collection.

“Do your people know of Circles?”

Hanin barely kept the venom out of his voice. “Of course we do. We have mages. We know the dangers of losing them to humans.”

He was half expecting - hoping - she would take either the bait or her leave. She did neither. “My Circle was at Ostwick,” she continued. Her voice was low, but not quiet. It was the level of polite, midnight conversation. “When the mages began rebelling in Kirkwall, the Templars grew paranoid. Erratic. Saw threat where there was none. Cursed at writing on the wall that only they could see.”

She trailed off for a moment, prompting Hanin to sigh tightly. “Just make your point, Anacrea.” 

If you have one.

“Very well. One evening, we were all summoned to the dining hall for the evening meal. It was nothing unusual, but we all felt the tension between us and the Templars. I raised my concerns, but they were... not taken seriously by my companions. While people sensed things were not well, they remained reassured. After all, we were not apostates. They had no reason to harm us.” There was a steel to her tone, now. An age-old bitterness Hanin almost felt he could understand. Maybe even relate to. “I chose to remain in my room that evening, cloistered by my own paranoia.”

The conversation was heading in a direction Hanin recognised all too well. He knew better than to try to stop it. “What happened?”

Her response was as abrupt as could be expected. “Like you clan, they were butchered. Right there in the dining hall. Defenceless in a place they thought they were safe.” She closed her eyes. “When I heard the screaming, I took my staff and ran towards it.”

Hanin, careful not to interrupt the story, gave a single nod of appreciation. “Brave.”

Judging by the winkling of her nose, Anacrea did not share his sentiment. “It was foolish. Had I not stumbled across other mages who had avoided the call to supper, I would have died along with the others. It was only the combination of us, and the distraction of the main slaughter, that saw us to safety.” Her brow twitched, as though seeking to frown but meeting resistance halfway. “There were less than twenty of us who made it out alive. I remember... passing the hall. The door was ajar. I saw them dragging bodies into a pile at the center of the room. It was... like collecting the dead after a war.”

Slowly, Hanin turned to regard the woman, his anger and frustration still lurking at the back of his mind, but no longer so overwhelming. Her face was blurry to him - most things were at that moment - but he could see the set of her shoulders beneath the cloak. The stiffness of her spine. “Not much of a war,” he murmured eventually, not exactly sure of what to say. Not understanding why she was telling him any of it.

“No,” she agreed. “It wasn’t.” She shifted then, and he felt the weight of her gaze upon him. “My point, Hanin, is this: I was there. I stood in that hallway. I passed that door. I saw the bodies of people I knew - people I cared about - stacked like rotten sacks of grain. I killed some people. Watched others fall.” She let the words hang for a moment, and Hanin had the feeling she was choosing the next ones carefully. “There is only one thing I have been able to come to terms with, after that night, and that is that none of it was in my control.”

Hanin frowned. “I... don’t understand.” She fought, after all. She was there. She made a difference.

“There is no one who made it out of there alive who did so because of my actions. I saved no one but myself. I am an excellent mage, Hanin - I am comfortable with my own ability. But I know my limits. My presence did not change what happened that night. It couldn’t. It is nothing but a fool’s wish - a desperate grab at grief and guilt - to believe otherwise.” Slowly, she reached up, adjusting her collar, drawing it closer to her neck. “All I am left with is a pile of bodies and blood on the walls. It is something I will never stop seeing.”

Some stubborn, irrational part of Hanin wanted to argue. To tell her that she had saved lives. That each Templar she killed was one less to harm those around her. If he had been there with his clan, he might have been able to buy someone else time. He might have...

I know my limits.

For the first time, Hanin forced himself to stop and think. Really think. He was not the only warrior among the clan. He was not the only one trained to fight, and fight well. Perhaps it was as Anacrea said - a strange mixture of guilt and grief - that left him with his hubristic notion that he would have been the one to save them. As though a gust of wind could change the course of a hurricane.

He really was nothing. 

“How...” The word stuck in Hanin’s throat, but Anacrea did not attempt to hurry it. She just waited until he found his voice. “How do you stop... feeling like this?” His hands curled into fists, and he stared down at them as though they were not his own. Ineffectual. Useless. “Every time I... it’s like losing them over and over again. Every night. I can’t...”

“I am not sure it ever truly goes away,” she said. There was no measure of comfort in her voice; no movement to console him. In truth, he was glad for it. “But how you manage the emotions will change with time. You will learn what works, and what does not. You will find ways to cast some demons out, and handle others.”

It was like torture, to drag the words out. “What did you do?”

To his surprise, the corner of her mouth lifted in a trace of a smile. “For a long time, not enough. I kept myself closed off from anything that could cause me pain. I returned home and left just as quickly. I was... afraid. That I would add my parents’ bodies to the pile. When I came here I sealed myself away with plants and sketches. Things I could control. Create. Keep alive.” Glancing across, her eyes seemed to reflect torchlight that was not there, somehow golden in the dark. “But I began with sleep, Hanin. There are natural remedies to assist the process - things you can ease away from once you regain control of yourself. Then I... began to share. With myself, at first, in writing. But then with others...” She trailed off, breathing a quiet sigh. “There are many here who have gone through terrible trials, be it war or demons or plain tragedy. Speaking... listening to them... it has helped remind me that I am not alone.”

Hanin let out a soft huff, but it lacked the bitterness of before. “So... this is all part of your personal remedy, then?”

“To be truthful, yes.” 

Well, at least she wasn’t shy about it.

“But I also spent too long wandering alone in... dark places,” she continued, “and if I can help shorten someone else’s journey, I consider it worth doing. So...” The fabric of her coat rustled gently as she stood, her hands coaxing the creases out of the front before she turned to face him. “If you will allow it, there are options.” She raised a halting finger. “Not cures. But options. Some will help. Some will not. The only question that remains is: are you willing to try?”

Somehow, the fog in Hanin’s mind seemed to clear for a moment. As he gazed up at Anacrea, her brow slightly arched, her expression patient without pity, he couldn’t shake the feeling that this was it. This was the moment that would define his path. Despite his better self, some dark part of him scratched and clawed, desperate to keep him in place. Hold him back. Where he was now... it was a strange kind of comfortable. He had grown so used to feeling empty that the idea of possibly filling that space seemed almost too daunting for words. He could manage one step. But another? Then another after that, over and over? How could he possibly drag himself out of it? Maybe he’d manage it for a day. Maybe even a week. But could he really risk the inevitable failure? That moment when he misses a step and goes crashing right back down again?

Anacrea waited silently, her form a dark silhouette against the greystone walls. Silent. Standing. Broken, but mending, solid on her feet before him. Just as she was the day before. Just as she would be the next day. And the next...

Slowly, Hanin felt himself rise to his feet. In a single step, he was at her side. Exhaling, he glanced to the barracks on the far side of the courtyard, then turned his face to the tower in the distance, gaze eventually resting on the balcony at the highest point. 

“I will try.”

[kidgetrash]

I already did G, so here’s Y!  You have been warned!  Also, I can’t leave stuff angsty!  So angst with a happy ending, I guess!

Y - Yelling at each other (for the angst)

(as always, my characters are aged up!)

Pidge ground her teeth.  Of all the stupid things to do, of all the stupid people to do it, it had to be him, it was always him.  She had lost count of the number of times he had almost sacrificed himself for the good of the team and she couldn’t deal with it anymore.

She ran down the ramp from Green as she pulled her helmet from her head, not even bothering to put her glasses on as she stormed towards him.  They had landed on the planet they had been aiding, safe now that the threat was gone, and everyone was disembarking for a brief post battle check before continuing.  Pidge didn’t care about that.

‘I took a little damage on the left flank.’  Keith was saying to Shiro as she approached.  ‘Nothing Pidge and Hunk can’t fix, I’m sure, right?’  He turned towards the smallest Paladin but was rewarded by having her helmet thrown at him, striking him in the chest before falling to the floor.  ‘Ow, what…?’

‘What the hell were you thinking?’  She yelled, shoving at his chest with her hands hard enough to stagger him.

‘Pidge…’  He started but she didn’t relinquish for a second, continuing to shove him as her anger flowed through her.

‘Do you think it’s brave, what you’re doing?  Do you think it’s smart?  Because it’s not!’

‘Hey, I just did what I thought should be done in the circumstances.’  He snapped back, trying to grab at her wrists but she avoided him easily.

‘You’re a selfish idiot, that’s what you are!  A quiznaking moron!’

‘I did what needed to be done.’  He said firmly, as though he were explaining to a petulant child, but it only made her angrier.

‘It’s your solution to everything!  If at first you don’t succeed, crash my stupid ass into it!’

‘Hey!  If we hadn’t stopped…’

‘Then what?’  She interrupted as Shiro carefully approached her, everyone else watching anxiously.  ‘We stopped it without you having to sacrifice yourself anyway, all you did was scare the shit out of all of us, again!  You’re the Black Paladin, Keith!  Without you there is no Voltron!’

‘That’s not true.’  He argued.  ‘If anything happens to me we have Shiro and…’

‘And he can’t pilot with one arm!’  Pidge all but screamed, her voice breaking as her eyes filled with tears.  ‘You would leave the rest of the galaxy defenceless, you would leave us without a…a you!  You’d leave me!’

‘Katie…’  He said quietly as he stepped towards her, realising where this was truly coming from.  They had been together now for some time but had kept it between the two of them, thinking at first that it was because of the circumstances they found themselves in, but had recently realised that it was more than that, a whole lot more.  It amped up the threat level considerably when you were in danger of losing one another on a daily basis.

‘Don’t “Katie” me, Kogane!’  She waved her finger at him threateningly.

‘Pidge, maybe you should…’  Shiro tried, but she glared at him until he took a step back.

‘This concerns all of us, Shiro!  If he dies, Voltron dies with him!  There is always another way!’

‘But what if there’s not?’  Keith yelled, Pidge turning her glare back on him.  ‘What if one time that’s the only way to do it?  Shiro sacrificed himself for us and I would do the same, for the sake of the galaxies and…’

‘What about my sake?’  She all but screamed back.  ‘What would I do if you weren’t here?’

‘Are we missing something?’  Hunk asked, but got ignored.

‘You’d carry on, because that’s what you have to do, that’s what you do in war.  You’d find a way.’

For some reason this incensed Pidge, pushed her over the edge, and she leapt at him, but Lance was there, catching her around the waist and lifting her off the ground, even as she struggled.  ‘Easy, Pidge!’

‘I won’t easy anything!’  She shoved her thumbs into the pressure points in his wrists between his armour and he dropped her with a yelp.  ‘And you’re going to stop this stupidity, once and for all, before it finally does kill you!’

‘If it saves lives…’  Keith said harshly.

‘What about my life?  What about our life?’  Pidge yelled.  ‘Why should I have to explain to our baby why they don’t have a father?’

Keith visibly paled, his eyes going wide as Pidge realised what she had let slip, what she hadn’t told even him.  ‘Katie, are you…?’

She didn’t reply, instead she pushed him out of the way as she ran, needing to put some distance between them.

‘Did she just say baby?’  Shiro looked at Keith, his face full of confusion.

‘Katie!’  Keith ignored him and ran after her, leaving the rest of the team to look between one another in surprised confusion.

Keith found her sitting in a small sheltered formation of rocks, her knees drawn up to her chest and her chin resting on them.

‘Go away.’  She said without looking up, dragging her glove across her face to get rid of the tears.  She didn’t want him here, she didn’t want his sympathy, and she definitely didn’t want to forgive him just yet.

He didn’t answer, instead he came and sat beside her, careful not to touch her.  ‘How long have you known?’

‘A couple of days.’  She sniffed loudly.

‘Any idea…uh…’

‘If it’s yours?’

‘I know it’s mine.’  He countered immediately.  ‘I meant how far along are you?’

She shrugged.  ‘I don’t know.  Nine weeks, nearly ten, maybe.  Periods in space aren’t an exact science.

‘I’m sure the Alteans can…’

‘Enough.’  She growled.  ‘I can’t do this, not knowing that tomorrow might be the day you choose to go out in a stupidity induced blaze of glory.’

‘What if,’ he started, his fingers daring to touch her arm, the barest of touches she could hardly feel, but she didn’t pull away, ’I promised to stop being an idiot Paladin and offered to be your idiot husband instead?’

‘I don’t need you to marry me, Keith, I need you to be alive.’

‘Can you do both?’

She let out a shuddering sigh and looked at him through bleary eyes.  ‘You’re saying you’ll stop being an idiot and marry me?  Sounds pretty farfetched.’

‘What if it wasn’t?’  He managed to pry her fingers off herself and laced them with his own.

‘No more stupidly?  No more suicide missions?’  She asked suspiciously.

‘No more, I promise.’

‘You’re still not forgiven.’  She replied, squeezing his hand.

‘So…I’m going to be a dad?’  He gave a small laugh.

‘Yeah, so, I’m going to be a mom.’

‘Oh boy.’  He said as he realised something.  ‘Your dad is going to kill me.’

‘Not if Matt gets his hands on you first.’

‘Damn, I forgot about him too.’  Keith grimaced.  ‘But no matter what happens I promise not to pull any more stunts like that.  I want to be there for you and our little paladin.’

‘Little paladin.’  She snorted a laugh.  ‘Speaking of, hadn’t we better go back and face the music?  They didn’t even know we were together, let alone the other thing.’

‘Let’s let them stew for a bit.’  He edged closer to her and pulled her into his arms.  ‘Right now I just want some quiet time with my wife to be.’

‘You’re serious about that?’  She asked as she nuzzled her cheek against his shoulder

‘Never more serious.’  He kissed her hair, never more grateful that she had crashed into his life than he was right now.

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