Catch the Stars ||Keith Kogane||

55

Shiro was gone. That was the only thing that Keith knew for certain when they pulled the black lion back onto the castle after their fight with Zarkon. He didn't know if Zarkon was truly dead, he didn't know what happened to the black lion or how the Bayard was returned, but he knew that the doors opened and Shiro wasn't in the pilot's seat.

It had sent everyone into a panic when the castle wormholes away without their leader, Keith included.

"We have to go back!" Lance is shouting as everyone crowds outside of the lion hangars, "he must've been ejected or something! He's still back there!"

Pidge had started pacing a hole into the ground, "our lions didn't pick up any biological signals from the area," the words were muttered and flung together to bring reason to the situation, "we would've picked up his location from his suit!"

Keith hadn't moved from the spot he'd stopped in after leaving the lion. He wasn't sure what to do or how to react in front of everyone. He wanted to start screaming and shouting and demand they all turn around and search the area until Shiro was found. But his temper always made things worse, as his brother had told him on multiple occasions. It would help no one.

Especially if he was second in command. That meant that he was now, technically, in charge of Voltron. That thought only further twisted his stomach into knots that wouldn't undo until he saw Shiro again.

"Even if he was floating, he couldn't have gotten far," Hunk says with the most positive voice that could be used, "if we go back and split into sections, we can cover a lot of space in very little time."

Hands shaking and his breath becoming uneven, Keith focuses on movement. On Pidge's feet, something that could catch his attention. He couldn't feel how he wanted to feel, not with everyone going to turn to him for answers. What to do and how to react.

"Keith," it's Hunk, "did you see any sign of him at all in there? A shoe? A shoelace? Anything?"

Don't yell at him, Keith tells himself as he carefully moves his eyes to Hunk, do not yell at him.

The Red paladin swallows, "just the Bayard," he reiterates, "which was lost an hour ago."

"Oh man, this couldn't get any worse!" Lance declares, vigorously running his hands over his head and through his hair, "we gotta get to Trip! Maybe the Olympians can help us start looking."

Trip. The Olympians. Keith sees her face just before she had boarded her ship to follow Shiro out into space. The image alone was enough to undo one of the millions of knots he had inside of him. Just enough to give him room to breathe. That's what he needed to do. He needed to talk to Trip. Tell her what happened. She was calm and composed every time shit hit the fan, the exact opposite of him.

Keith reaches for the back of his uniform, where he always kept the communication device that she had the other end to. He hoped to anything listening that she had it on her. Bringing it up and inches from pressing the button, the door to the hangar room opens.

"I'm afraid that won't be possible..." it's Allura. Exhausted-looking and eyes huge in factor of shock at their situation.

Keith looks up at her, the fear in his stomach doubling. He wanted to question what she meant himself, but his mouth was getting drier by the second. His was heart hammering so hard that he could feel it against his ribs. Had this bay always been so hot?

"What does that mean?" Asks Hunk as Pidge comes to a halt in the middle of a pace, looking up at Allura.

The princess swallows, and her eyes bore into Keth as if he was the one she was speaking to, "there was an...incident..." she says carefully, hands folding in front of her, "with squad 11...Trip...she isn't in stable condition."