Under My Skin

Chapter 2

Today's battle had been quick and easy, he hadn't even broken a sweat. In fact, it was all too easy and something about it wasn't sitting right with him. He should mention that to Shiro and Allura, or maybe reach out to Kolivan and see if the Blades had any useful information.

Keith hadn't talked to Kolivan in a while, even though he'd already started his Blade training. He had been leaving for a few quintants at a time to learn new techniques or just to spar with the other members. Sometimes all he'd learn was random cultural stuff or history stuff or language stuff instead of combat stuff. Those were his least favourite visits. Learning new fighting stances was easy and natural, learning a literal alien language was not. Even if was his heritage.

The offer to join the Blade of Marmora permanently had been put on the table the last time Keith spoke with Kolivan. The Blade leader put it out there as Keith prepared to leave the base, switching his Marmora suit for his Paladin armour. But Keith honestly didn't know what he wanted. Was there a part of him that relished in how smoothly he blended into Galran culture? For sure; it was nice to finally feel like he belonged somewhere. But did that mean he wanted to run off to the Blades forever? No, it didn't.

Plus, Keith was the Red Paladin of Voltron and he couldn't just abandon his team, they needed him. They needed Red. Without him, there was no Red. And without Red, there was no Voltron. And without Voltron, there was no hope for the Universe.

No pressure or anything.

A piece of debris hit Red right in the face and Keith jumped in his seat, having been startled out of his reverie. Something strange glittered in the distance, catching his eye from the corner of the screen. It was way out there, he could just barely see the spot of light, and it was hard to tell if the source was just a random star or a Galra cruiser on its way to their location.

He zoomed in on the screen and squinted to get a better look. It did appear slightly purple, or maybe it was more of a blue and the red light of the cockpit was distorting the colour. Still, something about it felt off to Keith. He'd learned early on that it was always smart to trust his instincts, so he turned Red toward the Castle and punched it.

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Lance waited for Keith outside the Red Lion's hangar, not about to let that opportunity to speak with Keith slip by again. He needed to know the answer to the questions Hunk had planted in his mind. Did Keith like him? Was Keith an evil alien replica? Had he gotten brain damage from playing fisticuffs with the gladiator? Nah, had to have a brain for that.

Lance was hoping Keith liked him, but he was betting on the evil clone thing. It wasn't nearly as far-fetched as it seemed. After all, Keith actually was half evil-alien and they all knew the Galra could make clones, so an evil-alien-Keith clone was actually pretty plausible the more he thought about it.

And think about it he did. Obsessively.

He'd been standing outside Red's hangar for nearly five whole minutes, which was more than enough time for Lance to spill a whole pot of molten crazy in his mind. By the time the bay doors actually opened, Lance had nearly convinced himself that Keith's skin had started taking on a purple tint. It hadn't.

"KEITH!" Lance exclaimed, arms flying up in surprise masked as excitement. "How's it going buddy? We need to talk about something."

But Keith didn't stop walking down the ramp, he barely even broke stride as he stepped past Lance's body and powered off down the hall.

"I don't have time for this, Lance." He called back over his shoulder.

Rude! Lance thought, but once again he found himself following in Keith's wake.