VOLTRON ONE-SHOTS

Keith - Void of Dark

He couldn't deny himself stiffening at those words, fingers unknowingly tightening around the mug still clutched in his hands before forcing himself to relax again, fighting to chase off the memories of the dreams that still plagued his dreams since the fight.

Since Shiro-

Keith swallowed hard, sightless eyes blinking, his left eyelid still scraping against an empty socket under the patch he wore-

Shiro had really beaten him during that fight, he'd tumbled down several levels of that cloning plant, breaking ribs and a leg along the way. But it was his fault when he lost his sight, he was the one who backed himself into a corner, landing on his back and forced to fight against the pressure crushing mercilessly against his own blade, attempting with screaming muscles to gain at least a little ground against the sizzling blade headed straight for his face-

It hadn't been enough.

The scalding hot sword clutched in Kuro's grasp literally cooked his left eye out of the socket in a wave of heat and fire, and pain like nothing he'd ever felt igniting in his face when it suddenly burst in a mess of blood and gore, the scalding liquid hitting his face, making him scream, and just like that-

His left eye was gone.

It- it was gone.

It hurt.

His right was quick to follow the other, and Keith could feel how close he was to losing it, just barely managing to push Shiro off before the heat became too much, his sight now foggy with black, making it nearly impossible to see through, the orb feeling like it was about to burst right out of his head, his sockets feeling as if they were both burning, much like the blood from his destroyed eye coating his face and with the thought, burned even more.

The rest of what happened went by in a blur: Shiro being knocked unconscious from the cloning facility crumbling to bits around them just before he landed another blow, falling like a pile of rocks to the unstable floor. Keith was left clumsily grabbing the man's limp hand just before they plummeted off the platform to the planet below before Black managed to swoop in and rescue them both before they hit the ground.

He'd quickly lost consciousness after that.

The next time he woke, his world was pitch black, a new kind of darkness enveloping him when Coran explained the nerve damage in his remaining eye was too severe to fix, his right being completely seared off. Even with the advantage of Altean technology, there was no hope of restoring either.

He was blind.

And would be for the rest of his life-

"It's- it's fine, Shiro, I'm fine-" his fingers shook, betraying his emotions, and he hastily looked away from where he hoped Shiro was, biting his lip and praying the man couldn't see just how fast his wall of calm and collectiveness was crumbling around him, leaving him nearly shaking to his core.

He was blind.

He was fucking blind.

And as much as part of him whispered and wished he could pile the blame on Shiro, it- it wasn't his burden to take, if anything, it was his own for not being careful enough, for losing both of his eyes in the span of a single fight, for not being there for his team, for not realizing the Shiro he'd left with his family wasn't the real Shiro because the real Shiro had died.

How was he so stupid?

How could he have let this happen?

Now, here he was, stranded in bed because his broken leg wasn't recognizable by their only healing pod (after all this time it still hurt like hell), and to top it all off, the Garrison doctors said it'd be more than likely he'd have a limp by the time all this was over.