The Best Klance Fanfictions

Love and Other Questions

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eah i have no idea what that its ^^^
found here: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9237575?view_full_work=true

Love and Other Questions

squirenonny

(once again lovlies i am too lazy to edit this. srry!)
Chapter 1
A parched desert wind tugged at Keith’s clothes as he crested a short, steep cliff and paused to plot his course forward. After several weeks of nothing new in the southern reaches of the canyon system, Keith had decided to approach the source of the mysterious energy from a new direction.

A good plan, except the canyons here narrowed to impassable twists within the first half mile, forcing Keith up into the sun and stifling wind. He’d taken his hoverbike to the edge of the canyons, but it was impossible to spot cave entrances from the air. He was starting to think he should have gone somewhere else.

It was still early—he’d set out as soon as it was light enough to see, intending to spend the hottest part of the day in the caves, then return home at dusk—but he hadn’t counted on the journey being quite so difficult. The canyons widened again ahead, but even if Keith could get there, he would have to cut the day’s investigations short. There was no way he was coming back this way in the dark. A broken leg out here was as good as a death sentence.

He couldn’t do that to Shiro.

Shifting his stance on the uneven outcrop, Keith pulled a bottle out of his largest belt pouch. He tugged down the black bandana covering his nose and mouth against the blowing sand, and took a long drink of tepid water. Two hours in and he was already tired. More tired than he should have been, thanks to the ache deep in his hip that told him Shiro had had another bad day.

There was nothing physically wrong with Keith’s leg; the bond he shared with Shiro carried only pain and scars. Still, it was hard to hike the canyons when it felt like someone had tried to pull his leg out of its socket.

Keith sighed, rubbing the stark black Mark that cut across his nose—a platonic Mark, like the many black and green scars tattooed across his body (more black than green, nowadays.) He’d had the Mark on his nose for close to a year now, long enough that he no longer flinched when he caught sight of himself in a mirror. It matched a new scar on Shiro’s face—and it was all the proof Keith needed that the Garrison was lying about the fate of the Persephone’s crew.

Recapping the bottle, Keith forced himself to move on. Standing around wasn’t going to bring Shiro home.

He stepped across a ten inch fissure in the ground onto a level shelf of reddish stone. An ominous wobble was his only warning before the shelf gave way, and then Keith was falling, his palms scrapping against stone as he scrambled to catch himself.

It was over in an instant, leaving Keith flat on his back at the bottom of a narrow canyon. Pieces of the shelf littered the ground around him—not stone, as he’d thought, but clay, soft and crumbly. The canyon, he now saw, was wider than it had appeared from above. Not exactly spacious, but there was enough room for Keith to fall clear to the bottom, collecting new bruises along the way.

Groaning, Keith uncurled slowly, cataloging his pains. Sorry, Shiro, he thought, grimacing. At least he hadn’t broken anything.

The sky was a vibrant blue ribbon ten feet above him, squished between the red-streaked canyon walls, which bowed out like a three-dimensional Rorschach test. Climbing back up would be difficult.

Well, fine. At least down here Keith was out of the sun, and he might find a new entrance to the caverns with the lion carvings. He might as well see where it took him.

That was easier said than done. The canyons were still impossibly narrow here. Keith had happened to fall in one of the wider sections, but as he walked onward the walls pressed in on either side, sometimes wide enough to walk normally, often so narrow he had to turn sideways and shimmy through several turns before he could breathe again.

He stopped just after nine to rest, rehydrate, and eat a ration bar he’d stolen from a Garrison transport last week. He’d long since given up feeling bad about the thefts. When you were a seventeen-year-old with no cash living in a shack in the desert, you did what you had to. Besides, they’d already stolen something far more valuable from him.

There was a sharp pain between his shoulder blades, and Keith couldn’t tell if it was coming from Shiro or if he’d cut himself in his fall. His arms didn’t twist quite right to feel the fabric of his jacket for a split so, reluctantly, he took the jacket off to examine it.

There was no tear, no blood, and Keith wasn’t sure if he should be relieved or worried. His eyes went to the black Mark on his right arm, a ring all the way around his bicep, smooth on the bottom but gnarled on top like the Mark was reaching ghostly fingers up toward Keith’s shoulders.

Keith felt sick just looking at it. Shiro was out there somewhere, hurting. Being hurt. Keith wouldn’t delude himself into thinking all the new scars had happened by accident. Whether the Garrison was holding him prisoner somewhere on Earth, or whether the Persephone had run afoul of aliens (a ludicrous theory, but one that fit surprisingly well with the facts Keith had uncovered so far) Keith didn’t know.

It didn’t matter, anyway. Keith was going to get Shiro back, somehow, and something in his gut told him the lion carvings in the caves held the key.

As Keith moved to put his jacket back on, he caught sight of another Mark. Words—new since this morning—scrawled in a near-illegible chicken scratch in a vibrant blue that matched the Mark on the inside of his left wrist.

There’s something wrong with my cell phone, the words read. It doesn’t have your number in it.

Keith rolled his eyes, glad his pen pal wasn’t here to see his lips twitch. Keith had been trying for years to get his soulmate to give up on the bad pickup lines; letting Blue know the lines actually had some (perverse, unexplainable) effect on Keith would only serve to undo what little progress he’d made.

The smile soon faded, though, and Keith yanked on his jacket without replying to the words. He didn’t have a pen on him, but even if he did, what would he say? Sorry I haven’t written you in a year, I’ve been busy looking at cave paintings while my other soulmate gets the shit kicked out of him on a daily basis?

Yeah, no thanks.

Keith rarely even saw his pen pal’s messages anymore, with as much as he wore his jacket. (To keep off the sun, he told himself, and not because he couldn’t stomach the sight of Shiro’s scars.) Frankly, he was surprised Blue hadn’t given up by now. God knew Keith wouldn’t blame him.

Blue’s Mark—a tiny pair of royal blue pilot wings—peeked out from beneath Keith’s glove and he tugged it down once, firmly, to hide the stinging reminder of what a terrible soulmate he was.

The caves, he reminded himself. The caves were what mattered now. The calendar he’d found six months ago carved into the floor and walls of an oddly round room pointed to something happening tomorrow. Something big. An arrival, if Keith had interpreted the pictographs right. He’d copied them down in his notebook, taken pictures with his stolen Polaroid camera to pin on his board back at the shack, spent almost every night staring at them under the garish light of the shack’s lone lightbulb. And he still wasn’t completely sure his hunch was right.

The date, though—that he would bet his hoverbike on. He’d spent a full month studying the calendar, which marked time by the angle of sunlight through a shaft in the cave ceiling, and he’d been back twice since to make sure he hadn’t messed up the calculations.

Tomorrow.

Which meant today might be Keith’s last chance to explore the caves and find more clues. Tomorrow he would stay near his shack, maybe do some patrols on his hoverbike while he watched for signs of the arrival.

Crumpling the wrapper from the ration bar, Keith stood and dusted off his pants. If today was the last day, then Keith was going to take full advantage of his time. He stepped out of the small recess where he’d stopped to rest, glanced at the strip of sky overhead, and set off deeper into the canyons.

Pidge could hardly remember a time when she hadn’t been aware that her brother was her soulmate. She wasn’t sure how she’d found out—maybe she’d seen one of her own scars mirrored electric green on Matt’s skin, maybe she’d heard Matt or their parents talking about it.

Certainly it hadn’t been her own Marks that clued her in. Matt had very few scars of his own—a little triangular one on his thigh from crashing a bike before Pidge was born; a little puncture on his hand from a rowdy game of tug-o-war with the family dog; a few acne scars on his face. (Pidge was lucky Matt’s Marks were a muted red-brown, like a sepia-toned photograph, so the acne scars just looked like freckles.)

More than likely, Pidge had found out the same day Matt had—when Pidge was four and careening around the house. She’d apparently tripped and fallen against a bookshelf hard enough to knock down a cast-iron Scottie dog statue.

Its pointy metal ear had gone through her lip, she’d ended up with two stitches, and Matt forevermore had a vibrant green diamond tattooed on his lip.

You know I’m going to have to grow a mustache to hide this, Matt had once told her, staring at his reflection in the mirror. He’d been sixteen at the time, and somehow still worried about looking good for the person who’d been writing in Sharpie black on his arm every day for four years. (As if the sickeningly lovey-dovey words weren’t enough to show just how love-struck Matt’s pen pal was.)

Pidge was glad she didn’t have that kind of soulmate. All that romance crap seemed like an awful lot of work for very little payoff. Pidge would keep her two pain pals, thank you very much. (Even if she did kind of want to track down Red and twist their ear until they learned to calm down and stop getting in so many fights. Pidge had had more than enough sympathetic split lips and bloody noses and sore knuckles—and with blood-red Marks, it was always a chore to convince her teachers that it hadn’t been Pidge who had been fighting.)

Thankfully, most of the fist fight Marks faded as the real wounds healed without scarring, so Pidge didn’t usually look like she’d bathed in the blood of her enemies. Only sometimes.

Soulbonds were fascinating, really. Pidge had been obsessed with them for a while around the time her classmates started talking to their pen pals—romantic soulmates, the literature called them, or Type I Soulbonds. Most people found the official terms too stuffy to use in casual conversation, so they fell back on colloquialisms. The word soulmate was used to mean either kind, and people came up with a variety of ways to distinguish between the two. The most common that Pidge had seen was pen pals for romantic soulmates, who could communicate by writing on their skin, and pain pals for platonic soulmates, who shared each other’s pain.

All that assuming, of course, that the bond was reciprocated. It wasn’t always, and then you got the Marks—a symbol on the inner wrist for romantic soulmates, phantom scars for platonic—without the metaphysical cherries on top.

Pidge had been twelve at the time. Tradition said you didn’t reach out to your pen pal (or pals) until you were thirteen, or better yet, sixteen—but in reality, as soon as the first person in the class discovered writing on their arm, the whole class devolved into tittering clusters of love-sick scribblers.

In the case of Pidge’s seventh grade class, it was twelve-year-old Kara Johnson who was lucky enough to break open the floodgates. Hi, her pen pal had written in pastel green. A little heart had been drawn underneath the word, and all of Kara’s friends had cooed over it for a good twenty minutes before two or three of the more adventurous ones grabbed pens and wrote their own timid messages.

The infection spread for two days, then came to a screeching halt after the first heartbreak. Joey Kaetz had tried three times, and he still hadn’t received a response. His friends tried to tell him there was probably a good reason for it. His soulmate didn’t speak English, or was too shy to write back, or was a fifth-or-sixth grader and wasn’t allowed to write back, not until seventh grade at least.

But everyone knew that the most likely answer was that Joey’s soulmate didn’t reciprocate.

It happened, and most of the time it didn’t matter. People who weren’t soulmates dated and fell in love and got married all the time, and most of them were perfectly happy. Happier, sometimes, than the people who were only together because of some silly picture on their wrist.

“I don’t get why it’s such a big deal,” Pidge said, her voice muffled by the pillow she had pressed over her face.

She’d taken over Matt’s bed as soon as she returned from a particularly gossipy day of school. More than half the class still hadn’t reached out to their pen pals, and debates raged left and right over whether or not they should risk it. It was safer to wait for the other person to write first, but if they wanted to play it safe, too, then you could easily get stuck in a loop. Some people waited years before they worked up the courage. Some never did.

“It’s scary,” Matt said, still distracted with whatever prep he was doing for the Kerberos mission. Launch day was still a year off, but there was a lot to be done before then. Physical training and research and setting up experiments and more simulations than Pidge would ever have thought possible.

Pidge lifted the pillow and stared at Matt, upside down. “You were never this worked up about your pen pal.”

Snorting, Matt reached over and poked her between the eyes. “And you were two when I got my first words. How would you know how scared I was?”

“You’re you,” Pidge said. “You’re going to the edge of the solar system, Matt, you aren’t scared of anything!”

“Not true,” Matt said, rubbing his thumb over his left wrist, where the Mark was. He was wearing long sleeves today, so Pidge couldn’t see it, but she remembered it well enough. Letters were unusual in Soulmarks, especially when they didn’t even say anything. Pliv. Pidge had Googled it once and come up with nothing. Some kind of medicine, and pipe-line injection valve. Real helpful--if Matt was going out to a deep sea oiling rig instead of outer space. Maybe it wasn't even a word at all. The P and L were squished together so they almost looked like one symbol.

Gibberish, but it clearly meant something to Matt.

He turned toward her, smiling. “A couple people in my class had already started writing to their soulmates,” he said, “but there were five people in eight grade who never got an answer. The only reason I wasn’t freaked out about it was because my soulmate wrote me before I had a chance to work myself up. And even then, we were both too scared to tell each other who we were, in case we knew each other in real life and didn’t like each other.”

Pidge stuck out her tongue, wrinkling her nose. “Well that’s silly. You obviously did like each other, or why’d you keep writing?”

“It’s not that simple, kiddo.”

“Sure it is. If I could write to Red, I’d tell them exactly who I was, and then I’d ask them why they’re so masochistic.”

Matt laughed, fully abandoning his mission prep work now. “That’s different.”

“How?”

“It just is.”

That was the best explanation Pidge was going to get out of Matt about the difference between soulbonds. Though, to be fair, Pidge didn’t press the point. She had better things to worry about than pen pals and lovesickness.

Like the fact that Matt was leaving for Kerberos, and Pidge wouldn’t see him for eight months.

“I’ll be in high school by the time you get back, Matt!” Pidge complained, draped over his shoulders as he tapped out an email to someone Pidge didn’t know letting them know he needed to cancel something Pidge didn’t care about. “I thought you stayed at home so you didn’t have to worry about this.”

“So I didn’t have to worry about renting an empty apartment for eight months,” Matt said. “I’ve still got to cancel my subscriptions to all the journals, and the museum downtown.”

“Or… you could give them to me.” She raised her eyebrows hopefully, and Matt laughed. “How many times are you going to go to the museum while I’m gone?”

Pidge shrugged. “More if I have a membership than if I don’t.”

Matt tugged on the end of her ponytail, which dangled down beside his face. “Tell you what. First weekend I’m back we’ll go out to the observatory and I’ll give you the guided tour.”

“Deal,” Pidge said.

Of course, it didn’t turn out that way. Three months into the Persephone’s eight month mission, the news broke. Critical failure. Pilot error on landing. The pilot, along with Pidge’s father and brother, were dead.

“They’re lying,” Pidge said, tears in her eyes. Her mother looked at her like she wanted to send Pidge out of the room, shield her from the news, pretend this had never happened.

Pidge backed up as her mother reached out to hold her.

“They’re lying,” Pidge repeated, and hated that her voice broke. “Matt’s not dead. I’d know. I’d—Mom, I didn’t feel anything!”

She wanted to believe it, Pidge could tell. Neither of them wanted the other half of their family to be dead, but Karen Holt was a realist above all else. “It would have been fast,” she said. “There wouldn’t have been any pain.”

“I would have felt something!”

Pidge stopped, suddenly breathless. She had felt something. A pounding headache, several days ago now, that had faded and returned several times before it went away for good. But Pidge got headaches all the time, especially from bright lights, and she hadn’t thought anything of it.

She realized now it might have been Matt. There might have been a head wound. He might have lost consciousness and regained it a few times before he--

No. There would have been other wounds, too. Broken bones. New Marks where he’d been cut or burned. You didn’t come out of a shuttle crash with a fatal head wound and absolutely nothing else.

Too angry and too scared to argue with her mother, Pidge turned and retreated to her room, slamming the door behind her before she collapsed on the bed, where she lay for several hours, wondering if Matt really was dead.

The pains continued over the next few days. Pidge was certain they came from Matt, but her mother gently reminded her that she had another soulmate, who liked to get themself beat up. She was probably just feeling something from Red.

(Pidge could almost hate Red just for that, just for existing and confusing the matter of Matt’s survival, except that in the dark hours of night when she couldn’t make herself hope, her only consolation was the thought that, someday, she might meet someone else who understood her as completely as Matt had.)

One week after the news broke, Pidge got her answer: a ragged, sepia-toned scar on her shin, and pain that made her vision go white at the edges for just a moment.

She let out a strangled cry and shoved her laptop onto the pillow beside her so she could reach down, clutching at her leg as the pain crested, sharp and hot. Her mother was making dinner in the other room, but she came running at Pidge’s shout, throwing open the door with a look of distress and—hope?

Oddly enough it was that expression that broke through the pain and made Pidge shoot upright, nerves tingling with the possibility.

Swallowing the pain, she yanked the leg of her pajamas up over her knee, and there it was. Fresh and sore and ugly—and the most beautiful thing Pidge had ever seen.

“He’s alive,” she whispered, her eyes already filling up with tears. “He’s alive.”

Once they had their proof, no force in the world could stop Pidge and her mother from finding the truth. When Iverson caught Pidge searching his computer one too many times and kicked her out, she enrolled in the Garrison under a fake name, careful to always wear pants so no one would see the most incriminating Mark. She used concealer on a few others, and hemmed her uniform sleeves long so no one would see her bare wrist—not a dead giveaway, but rare enough that someone might remember Katie Holt and get suspicious.

After that was a lot of busywork and snooping around. The Garrison didn’t keep any smoking guns out where Pidge could find them, but she built a receiver to intercept their transmissions, then steadily increased the range until she started picking up strange transmissions from way beyond Kerberos.

She wasn’t saying it was aliens… but it was totally aliens.

Still it was a year before she found anything worthwhile. A year of aches and pains from Matt—maybe from Red, some of them, but her second pain pal seemed to have finally cooled down a little. Pidge hardly got any red scars that year, just a couple of scraped knees and hands that had disappeared by the following day.

By the end, Pidge was starting to worry she’d never find anything. She still watched, and she still went up to the roof every night to listen to the alien chatter about Voltron, and then she returned to her room and tried not to cry under the weight of Matt’s pain.

Then Shiro arrived.

Keith had been expecting any number of things on the day marked on the ancient calender. A ship, a signal, maybe just some celestial event the ancient people had found especially noteworthy. He set up shop on the rocking chair on the shack’s front porch, two different radios broadcasting static, his hoverbike ready for a quick start if something happened in the distance.

He had everything he’d managed to steal, make, or repair on the bike or in his belt pouches. His knife, two flashlights, water and a first aid kid, a couple of small grenades; his go bag, with its foil blanket, flint, spare clothes, and enough rations for two weeks.

He was as prepared as he could be.

The one thing he wasn’t prepared for was the pain. He’d mounted his hoverbike and set off after the meteorite as soon as he spotted it in the sky, several hours after dark, determined to be there the instant it landed, but as the impact shook the ground beneath him, a wall of pain hit him, so intense Keith momentarily blacked out and nearly fell off his bike.

He held on, gritting his teeth against the pain, and increased his speed still further.

The Garrison beat him there.

They had to have known about the meteorite—no, the ship . Keith’s blood ran cold, and then a hot surge of adrenaline shot through him. That was a ship , and unless Green had been up to more daredevilry than Keith had guessed, the pain pointed heavily toward Shiro being on that ship.

Keith waited until he saw the Garrison medics wheel someone—Shiro, said his gut, though it was too far away to see his face—into a quarantine tent, then pulled out every grenade he’d managed to steal and tossed them at the Garrison equipment ringing the crater.

Alarms blared, and troops rushed to do damage control, and Keith circled back toward Shiro. His pain was rising again—pounding head, aching back, muscle strain, bruises everywhere.

Then, abruptly, it faded.

Heart pounding, Keith charged in. There were medics inside the temporary structure, or maybe guards. Keith didn’t stop to check, just knocked them out as quick as he could and headed toward the central room, where two medics stood over a bed.

They went down even faster than the others.

“Shiro?” Keith asked, his voice hardly a whisper. With one trembling hand he reached out and turned Shiro’s face toward him. And it was Shiro. Ragged, bloodied from the crash, with a shock of white hair and a scar across his nose.

He was out cold, but still breathing. Probably a sedative. Anger burned in Keith’s gut as he cut the restraints binding Shiro to the bed and crouched to get an arm under Shiro’s shoulders. The right arm ended in a mechanical prosthetic attacked above the elbow—just where Keith’s Mark was. He straightened, staggering under Shiro’s weight, and turned toward the door.

“Nope. Nope. No-no-no-no-no. No you don’t. I’m saving Shiro.”

Keith spun, tensing, as someone—some kid in civilian clothes came striding forward and grabbed Shiro from the other side. He didn’t seem hostile, him or the other two kids lingering in the doorway, wide-eyed and skittish. But he was a stranger in a restricted military zone and that was reason enough to be wary. Keith turned back to the Latino kid hefting Shiro’s mechanical arm over his shoulders. “Sorry… Who are you?”

“Who am I? Uh, the name’s Lance.” The kid paused expectantly. “We were in the same class at the Garrison?”

“Really?” Keith looked him up and down. He was the right age, at least, and he seemed maybe a little bit familiar. Same class, though? “Were you an engineer?”

“No, I’m a—never mind.” Lance straightened, taking more of Shiro’s weight. “Point is, I’m saving Shiro, so you can just scoot on out of here, mullet.”

Keith’s sour mood turned fetid. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Lance opened his mouth to argue, but one of the kids by the door—the shorter one—spoke first. “You’re soulmates?”

Three gazes turned on Keith, who squirmed. The Mark across his nose started itching, but Keith didn’t have a hand free to rub it. So he just scowled and started toward the door, ignoring the short kid’s question entirely.

Lance lagged for a second, but he had to choose between following or letting go of Shiro. So he followed, his gaze hot on the side of Keith’s head. “Oh,” he said. “Ohhhhh.” He laughed weakly. “Right, of course. Is it reciprocal, then?”

Keith shot him a quelling look. “That’s none of your business.”

Keith made it back to the shack in one piece (and then some.) He supposed he couldn’t really kick Lance and the others—Pidge and Hunk—out, after they’d basically burned their bridges helping him get Shiro out. Not that he’d asked for help, or needed it. The extra weight had only slowed down his hoverbike, which had made it that much harder to lose the Garrison patrols.

The real problem, though, was once they got back to the shack. It was after midnight, and everyone wanted to crash, but the shack wasn’t built for visitors. Keith had his cot in the corner and the lumpy couch along the far wall.

Shiro got the bed—no one argued with that, thankfully—and Keith didn’t protest when Lance claimed the couch. As old and ratty as it was, one spring poking through the middle cushion, it was probably less comfortable than the floor, and Keith had slept worse places.

There were only four foil blankets, including the one in Keith’s go bag, so Keith told Lance he could pick: couch or blanket.

He picked the couch, and Keith tried not to smirk as he claimed a spot by the foot of the cot. He dug through the crate full of civilian clothes he’d stolen from a surplus truck until he found something that might fit Shiro. He laid the clothes on the cot by Shiro’s feet and lingered there, staring at Shiro’s face. He could hardly believe Shiro was here, alive.

“What did they do to you, Shiro?” Keith whispered.

With a self-conscious glance over his shoulder at the three strangers, Keith lay down, pulled his blanket over him, and fell asleep in minutes.

 

He woke to the sound of the door closing. Sunlight streamed through the shutters, the watery, colorless light of dawn. Keith sat up, fully alert, and glanced first to Shiro.

He was gone, as were the clothes Keith had left for him. The ragged jumpsuit he’d been wearing lay abandoned on the floor by Pidge’s feet. Pidge—as well as Hunk and Lance—still slept soundly, Pidge curled into a ball, while the other two seemed to be trying to take up as much room as possible.

Keith pulled on his shoes, then headed outside. Shiro was there, on a little rise of sand twenty feet from the shack, staring down at his hand.

Keith approached slowly, letting his feet scuff along the ground so Shiro would hear him coming.

“It’s good to have you back,” Keith said, laying his hand on Shiro’s shoulder. The words sounded trite, but he couldn’t think of anything more to say.

Shiro’s eyes stuck on the Mark across Keith’s face. He smiled, but it was only an echo of the smile Keith remembered. “It’s good to be back.”

His voice wavered, and the weight of Shiro’s absence, the year that had passed with no answers but a mountain of pain and scars, settled over Keith. He let his hand fall to his side. “What happened?”

“I—I don’t remember most of it,” Shiro admitted. “We were captured by aliens. They separated us, I think, I--” He paused, glancing almost nervously at Keith. “Do you have a pen?”

Keith was startled by the request, but only for a moment. Shiro and his pen pal had talked often enough, even in the short time Keith had known Shiro. “I’ll go get one,” Keith said, and went back inside, creeping past the sleeping teens to grab a pen from his desk. Most pens worked fine with the soulbond—the darker and thicker the ink, the better—but Keith tested a couple on scraps of paper and old receipts until he found one he liked.

As soon as Keith handed it to Shiro, he rolled up his sleeve, revealing the brownish Mark on his wrist and the bare, scarred skin above.

Shiro touched the pen to his arm, then hesitated. Keith was about to ask if he wanted privacy, but before he found his voice, Shiro started writing, the letters shaky and crooked.

I’m alive, he wrote. I love you. Be safe. He clicked the pen and started to lower his arm, then thought better of it and added one more sentence below the rest.

If you ever find a way to write, don’t use your right arm.

Keith’s eyes flickered to the smooth metal plates and intricate joints of the prosthetic, his stomach turning. Shiro met his gaze, smiling in a way that didn’t reach his eyes, and handed him back the pen.

“So,” he said, his voice forcibly bright. “What’s for breakfast?”

Chapter 2: Kerberos

Chapter Text

Hello. How’s your day going?

Shiro stared down at the words he’d just written, his heart pounding in the space between giddiness and dread. It was his thirteenth birthday, and he’d spent the last six months—since his first classmate had woken up to a bright orange doodle on his arm—trying to figure out the best way to introduce himself to his soulmate.

(One of them, anyway. The other he’d never met, had received no sign of except the occasional pain of a skinned knee or a stubbed toe. Nothing serious enough to leave a Mark, even a temporary one.)

Shiro watched the blank skin beneath his words, tapping his pen against his knee. He should have said something cleverer. If he were an artist, he might have drawn something instead. But he wasn’t, and in six months the best he could come up with was the world's most boring hello.

It was early—ridiculously early. Shiro had wanted to write his soulmate before his parents were up and ready to start the birthday celebrations. Akira, Shiro’s twin brother, was still asleep on the far side of their shared room. Of course he was. He’d been talking to his soulmate in secret for over a year. Shiro was less keen to break the rules. Especially when the rules let him put off the possibility of finding out his soulmate didn’t reciprocate.

Why hadn’t they responded yet?

Shiro forced himself to breathe. It was only six o’clock. Even if his soulmate lived on the East Coast, that was still only nine and they might not even be up, not on a Saturday morning. For that matter, they might live in Japan, near Shiro’s grandparents, or something. It was after eleven at night in Tokyo now, so they might not respond until morning their time. (Would they even understand what he'd written?)

In any case, there was no use staring at his arm waiting for words to appear. He should just… get dressed, then check again later.

He went to the closet and hunted for a long-sleeved shirt, both to keep himself from staring at his arm all day, and to keep Akira from seeing what he’d written.

Shiro and Akira were not soulmates, whatever people said about twins always sharing a bond. (Akira liked to say they did share a soulbond, only it was a type that hadn’t been discovered yet, and it let them read each other’s minds.) The thing was, soulmates weren’t the only people who mattered. Akira was just as important to Shiro as either of his soulmates, never mind he didn’t have a Mark on his skin to show it. Soulmates were different. Not better—not always—just… different.

People had lots of ways to describe what it was that set a soulbond apart from other kinds of relationships. Some said you only had a bond if fate was going to help you find each other some day, which was why it was so rare for family members to be soulmates. Other people said it had to do with who you shared your deepest secrets with, or who you most wanted to protect, or who you knew better than you knew yourself.

Personally, Shiro thought each bond was unique, and that it was pointless to make generalizations. He loved his soulmates, even if he hadn’t met them yet. He also loved Akira. He didn't need to write a thesis to know that.

As Shiro reached out for a dark blue shirt, he froze.

Words. He could only a see a sliver of the writing, which was scrawled in the same sepia tone as the Mark on his wrist.

The words were on his right arm.

Shaking, Shiro turned his arm over and read the words—cramped, hasty, almost impossible to read.

I’m fine. Question: Do you have any idea what our Mark means?

Shiro could hardly believe his eyes. His soulmate was real. His soulmate reciprocated. (Of course they reciprocated, the chided himself. Unreciprocated bonds were rare—only about one in a thousand. Somehow that number had always felt bigger before.)

Grinning broadly, Shiro scrambled back toward his desk, where he’d left his pen. In his haste, he kicked his chair, which banged against the desk. Akira mumbled irritably and rolled toward the wall, pulling his blanket over his head.

“Sorry,” Shiro whispered, even as he snatched up his pen. He wrote before he had time to think about what he was going to say.

You’re left-handed!

There was a pause, and Shiro felt his cheeks burn. Well there's my second impression out the window , he thought ruefully.

Oh, duh, his soulmate wrote back. ♇ IV is shorthand for southpaw. Can’t believe I never realized.

Shiro chuckled. Sorry. I was just surprised is all. I don’t know what the Mark means.

Maybe it’s not English?

Could be.

For a long moment, neither of them wrote anything new. Shiro’s big letters, unruly with excitement, had covered most of the easily reachable places on his forearm, so he stalled by going to the bathroom to wash off the ink.

By the time he toweled off, the sepia-toned words on his right arm had been smudged and mostly wiped away, and new words had taken their place.

This is harder than I thought it would be.

Shiro breathed a sigh of relief and wrote his answer in smaller, neater letters than he’d used before. Oh, good. I thought it was just me.

Shiro learned a lot about his pen pal in those first few weeks. He was an older brother. He liked to ask questions. He wanted to get a dog, but the baby had put that plan on hold. ( It’s been two years, isn’t that enough? )

His name was Matt.

Mat’s last name belong to the growing collection of things I’m not allowed to share. Other entries included: his age, the city or state in which he lived (he was in the US, though), his phone number, and the names of anyone else in his family.

My parents aren’t real into the whole soulmate thing, he explained when Shiro first dared to ask about the secrets. Mom’s a lawyer, so she doesn’t trust anyone she can’t cross-examine.

Shiro smiled at that, filing it away with all the other precious details he’d learned about Matt’s family. Aren’t they soulmates, though? Your parents?

Matt scrawled a messy spiral, their shorthand for rolling eyes. Are you kidding? Mom dated her soulmate for a year in college, then decided her Mark was wrong and dumped him for being a creep. Dad doesn’t have any soulmarks.

That’s so sad , Shiro wrote. Not even platonic?

Nope. He’s proud of it, though. Says we can’t even define soulmates, scientifically, so how can we know that’s what the Marks really mean?

Matt’s words had filled up Shiro’s right forearm, and now jumped up above the elbow. Shiro had to push his sleeve up to read them.

It’s funny. You’d think someone who believes in Bigfoot would be more open to soulbonds. But he says he’d rather make his own.

The end result of Matt’s parents’ skepticism was an awful lot of secrets. Matt offered to ignore their warnings, but Shiro thought it was better to be cautious. It was only until Matt was eighteen, anyway. Shiro could last that long.

Especially after sophomore year. Shiro was fifteen, he’d just submitted his application to the Galaxy Garrison, and he was trying not to let Matt distract him from Astronomy class. But Matt was so charming and so genuinely nice that Shiro still almost missed the symbol on the slide talking about Pluto.

♇

His Soulmark. Part of it, anyway. Stunned, Shiro ignored the sentence taking shape on his right arm and wrote, I just saw our Mark! It’s Pluto!

Shiro paused, contemplating the slide.

Pluto IV, he amended.

This discovery triggered an avalanche of discoveries and deductions. Matt looked up astronomical symbols and found out that ♇ IV referred to Pluto’s fourth moon, Kerberos.

Matt then said his dad was an astronaut with the Garrison (Matt was planning to apply, too; Shiro felt a thrill of excitement, but didn’t press). There was a talk of a Kerberos mission in the next ten or fifteen years.

What if we’re on it, Takashi? What if we’re going to Kerberos together??

Shiro tried not to get his hopes up—especially when Matt said soulmates were never assigned to the same mission. Pen pals were too likely to “distract” each other, and if one half of a platonic pair got hurt, it could put them both out of commission.

I can fake my mark for the exam, Matt said, but we can’t have been together before that. It’d be way too obvious.

Shiro thought it was a little silly, plotting about a mission ten years away when they didn’t even know they’d been—would be—selected.

But Matt had an amazing ability to capture Shiro’s imagination. Before he knew it, Shiro had committed to a long con. He and Matt wouldn’t fight fate if it brought them together over the next ten years or so, but they wouldn't search for each other, either. They would meet when they met, and not before.

A year later, Shiro enrolled at the Garrison.

It was easy enough, most of the time, to forget about the possibility of Matt being on campus. Training and exams kept Shiro plenty busy, and things hardly slowed down after graduation. That first year was a flurry of simulator runs, planet-side missions, low-Earth orbit training, and physical conditioning. The Garrison had officially announced the Kerberos mission, and everyone who would be old enough by selection next year was fighting for the three most coveted spots in recent history.

It was bad enough for Shiro, who was up against some of the Garrison’s best pilots, all of whom had more experience than him. Poor Matt had to balance preliminary selection tasks with his last year of school. (He’d finally shared his age when he turned eighteen, one year after Shiro.)

Then, finally, selection day came.

Shiro got the spot.

He shouldn’t have been so surprised when he received the phone call. His selection had practically been a given since he’d learned the meaning of his Mark seven years ago. It still felt surreal, and Shiro could hardly sleep the night before the first crew meeting—though in all fairness, that had little to do with the mission itself.

Tomorrow, said Matt’s spidery scrawl on his arm.

Shiro woke a full hour before his alarm and couldn’t get back to sleep. Once he’d wasted as much time as he could showering, making breakfast, and triple-checking he had everything he needed, Shiro gave up on restraint.

Good morning, Matt.

Matt’s reply came at once: a scribble that might have been good morning , six exclamation points, and eight—no, nine—smiley faces.

Shiro was grinning by the time he scrubbed the ink from his arm and set out for the meeting. It was a twenty minute drive from his apartment to the Garrison, followed by another twenty-five minutes of secretaries and forms and waiting rooms. Then, finally, he was shown to a small conference room where the other two members of his crew were already waiting.

“This is Commander Samuel Holt,” the mission liaison—Shiro had already forgotten her name—said. “Comms officer and senior scientist for the mission. And this--” Shiro’s pulse redoubled as he locked eyes with the tousle-haired young man beside Commander Holt “--is his son, Matthew Holt, engineer. Sam, Matt, your pilot, Takashi Shirogane.”

It was all Shiro could do not to give the game away with his smile. Matt had described himself to Shiro before: shortish, scrawny, brunette or blond depending on who you asked. His sister had given him an electric green Mark on his lip, but you had to look close to see it.

All the words in the world couldn’t have done him justice. His eyes were bright behind his glasses, honey brown and shining with excitement. His smile, no more contained than Shiro’s, dimpled his cheeks. He bounced on his heels as Shiro shook hands with Commander Holt, then stilled when it was his turn.

Their eyes locked. Shiro’s skin tingled where the tips of Matt’s fingers touched his wrist.

“It’s nice to meet you, Takashi.”

The voice was higher and more timid than Shiro had expected, though that might have been the nerves. It carried with it the simmering energy of nine years’ shared secrets. The spiral that conveyed rolled eyes, the starburst of laughter, a language all their own.

Shiro’s smile widened despite his attempt at calm. “I’m looking forward to working together,” he said, with as straight a face as he could manage.

Two days later, in the locker room after training, when they were finally alone for more than five seconds, Shiro kissed Matt for the first time. It wasn’t romantic in the slightest—they were both still sweaty from the obstacle course, and neither of them was practiced, and it was more squashed noses and clashing teeth than anything, but it left Shiro breathless and grinning. Matt kept hold of Shiro’s shirt when they parted.

“Hey,” he whispered.

Shiro swallowed, unable to look away from Matt’s fire-bright eyes. “Yeah?”

Mat smiled, cheeks dimpling. “I don't care what my parents say about soulmates. I think the universe got us right.”

Training for the Kerberos mission was slated to take two years, which looked like a lot on paper. But when it came down to it, Shiro never seemed to have a spare moment to breathe. When he wasn’t studying the technical aspects of the Persephone, he was running sims or training in the gym or sitting through the physical exams and blood draws he swore happened every single week.

Today, he was practicing one of the most brutal simulator courses—a slalom through a field of debris, followed by engine failure with both his crewmembers out of commission. His first two runs of the day were merely satisfactory , his ship barely holding together by the end, so Shiro booted it up for a third try.

Halfway through, he took a sledgehammer to the face.

At least, that was what it felt like. A burst of pain, then a pounding headache. Hissing, Shiro raised his hand to his nose and was surprised not to find it dripping blood. It felt broken.

He blinked his eyes clear of sympathetic tears and saw he’d crashed his simulation.

The pain in his nose had begun to fade, but the headache was only growing stronger. Groaning, Shiro unstrapped himself from the simulator and staggered out into the sim room, where the fluorescent lights made his head throb all the more. Squinting, he apologized to his trainer and headed for the infirmary. If this was his soulmate’s pain—and it wouldn’t be the first time Shiro had suffered the aftereffects of Red’s fights—painkillers would do him little good, but he’d take what relief he could get until Red found their own help. If they bothered.

The nurse on duty was sympathetic, if not especially hopeful, as she handed him two Tylenol and an instant cold pack and dimmed the lights.

“Stay here as long as you need,” she said.

It seemed to be a slow day in the infirmary, so there was no one to disturb the silence besides Shiro, who would just as soon pass out and sleep through the worst of the ache, and the nurse, who busied herself in the back office.

Five minutes later, the door opened with enough force to rattle the cabinets. Shiro shot upright, ready for a fight, and found himself face-to-face with a scrawny teen dressed in a cadet’s uniform. His nose was clearly broken and gushing blood all down the front of his uniform, his knuckles were split, and—most telling of all—his sleeves were rolled up far enough to show a black Mark on his forearm exactly where Shiro had once cut himself working with his dad on a motorcycle.

“Ah.” Shiro settled back against the wall and pressed the ice pack against his nose as the nurse blustered in. “So you’re the one who’s always picking fights.” Shiro smiled as realization dawned in the kid’s eyes. “You’re a lot scrawnier than I expected.”

It didn’t take long for Shiro to develop a soft spot for his pain pal, who’s name, Shiro learned, was Keith. He was prickly, private, and would as soon burn the world to the ground as listen to a single one of his instructors, but he was also incredibly loyal and surprisingly sensitive.

And he was talented. Though he was still in his first year of training, he already knew his way around a cockpit, no doubt due to his habit of sneaking into the flight simulators for unauthorized practice runs.

“Don’t you have class?” Shiro asked, amused, when he caught Keith skulking outside the sim room. The upperclassmen were in there now, but class would let out soon for dinner, and it would be an hour before anyone came back this way.

Keith jumped, then narrowed his eyes at Shiro. “Shouldn’t you be with your pen pal?”

Shiro shushed him with a hasty glance over his shoulder. “Keith!”

Keith smirked with the kind of self-satisfaction only a sixteen-year-old prodigy could manage. “Oh, right. I forgot. No one’s supposed to know. My bad.” He paused, smile turning devious. “Hey, Shiro, wouldn’t you say sneaking your soulmate to Kerberos is a bigger ethical misstep than me sneaking into the flight sims six months early?”

Shiro crossed his arms, refusing to rise to the bait. “I was going to help you get some legitimate practice in on the sim, but if you’re gonna be like that...”

Keith eyed him critically. “If you’re trying to get me to apologize, it won’t work. I’m getting by just fine.”

“Sure, on the basic runs. I know for a fact you’re already bored with those.”

“Have you been spying on me?”

“Not at all.” Shiro smiled placidly to cover the fact that his comment had been, in fact, pure guesswork. Educated guesswork, based on Keith’s class rank and the hoverbike he’d admitted to flying before enrolling in the Garrison. But still guesswork.

A few minutes later, class let out. As the flow of students tapered off, Shiro tapped Keith’s shoulder and headed for the door. Keith hesitated, then hurried along behind Shiro, giving the open door a surly look as they passed. Clearly he wasn’t used to entering this room without subterfuge.

“Hey, Clara,” Shiro said to the uniformed young woman near the instructor’s station, where runs were programmed in and monitored.

She smiled at Shiro, then arched an eyebrow in Keith’s direction. “Who’s this?”

“Keith,” Shiro said. “First year, but definitely headed for fighter class. Thought I’d give him a little demonstration.”

Clara smiled knowingly. “Well, have fun. Lock up when you’re done.”

She disappeared through the door, leaving behind a dumbstruck Keith. Not everything has to be a battle, Keith, Shiro thought wryly. But of course, following the rules was just no fun. Leaving Keith to gather himself, Shiro programmed in one of the first-level runs, then led Keith into the cockpit.

“All right,” Shiro said, settling in at the engineer’s station while Keith leaped over the back of the pilot’s chair and reached for the throttle. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”

From his position, Shiro could see just the barest trace of Keith’s confident smile.

The last six months of training flew by, and before Shiro knew it, it was launch day. He stopped by the Garrison the day before to say goodbye to Keith.

“No fights, now,” Shiro said, shaking a finger at Keith. “I’ll know.”

Keith rolled his eyes and gave him a shove toward the door. “Yeah, yeah. Just don’t hit your head on takeoff.”

Then they were off, Shiro and Matt, headed to Kerberos together. The luckiest people in the world.

Until the Galra found them.

Keith was a wreck in the days following the Kerberos disaster. He knew he was. He barely slept, he didn’t eat. He was more irritable than usual (which was saying something) and picked a fight with one of his classmates nearly every day.

The faculty tried to go easy on him; they knew he and Shiro had been soulmates. But there was only so far patience could be stretched. Keith suspected he was fast approaching that limit, but he didn’t care. Everyone said Shiro was gone— but Keith still felt him. Still felt his pain. That wouldn’t happen if Shiro were dead.

An outsider might have said that pain came from Keith’s other pain pal, but it didn’t. It was Shiro. He couldn’t prove it, so he couldn’t tell anyone, which made him more frustrated and more angry, but Shiro was alive.

Then one day he got his proof.

It was between classes. The other pilot candidates dawdled in Song’s classroom, chatting and gossiping. Keith, as usual, swept his textbook and notes into his bag and left with the bell. He’d wait in the next classroom.

But he’d barely reached the hallway when the pain reached him. It snuck up on him, first a faint sting like a paper cut, then heat, then burning. Swearing, Keith fell against the wall, dropping his bag in the sudden surge of pain.

Shiro.

For a moment he just breathed, fingers resting on the unbroken skin of his nose, feeling a feverish flush.

Then he sprinted for the nearest bathroom and stared at the fresh, black Mark across the bridge of his nose.

It was Shiro. It was Shiro. Keith shook, his breath rattling in his ears, as he stared at his Mark. Proof undeniable that Shiro had, in fact, survived the crash.

He ran out of the bathroom, not bothering to go back for his bag. By the time he reached the classroom where he had Tactical Basics, he was five minutes late, but he didn’t care. He needed to talk to someone. He needed someone who could help him—help Shiro.

Colonel Elle Rhodes was an imposing woman at the best of times, dark eyes sharp as knives, hair buzzed. But she was exacting in her fairness, and she listened to the cadets, which was more than could be said of Iverson.

“Kogane,” Rhodes snapped. “About time you showed up. Where--”

“Shiro’s alive.” Under any other circumstances, Keith wouldn’t have interrupted a commanding officer (without provocation). But this was an extreme situation, and he was finding it hard to think, let alone sit through an interrogation when Shiro was out there. Alive. Injured. Keith cursed. “Shiro’s alive,” he repeated, and gestured at his new Mark.

There was more to say—explanations, questions, demands that a rescue mission be organized—but his thoughts were a jumble and he was breathless from sprinting the length of the school.

Then Alfonso Reyes snickered into his hand and leaned over to the boy sitting beside him. “Five bucks says he drew it on with Sharpie.”

Keith didn’t remember crossing the room, Rhodes shouting at him to stop. He did remember punching Alfonso Reyes. He remembered that perfectly well, the way Alfonso’s nose crunched beneath Keith’s fist. Alfonso tried to stand, but Keith hooked his foot around Alfonso’s ankle and brought him crashing down.

Rhodes stepped in then, hands closing like vices around Keith’s arms.

“Kogane! That’s enough.”

“But--”

“Iverson’s office,” she said. “Now.”

They expelled him.

The reality of that fact didn’t sink in at first. Even as some petty officer or another escorted Keith back to his dorm room to pack his things, the whole thing felt like a dream. Shiro was alive, but instead of helping him, the Garrison was kicking Keith out.

He returned to the desert shack he’d found while exploring with Shiro. They’d rented a hoverbike one weekend, and even though Shiro was the only one who was supposed to drive it, he’d surrendered the controls to Keith the instant they cleared the city limits.

The bike Keith had now was stolen, it’s ID chip and GPS beacon ditched nearly forty miles in the other direction. Keith had never stolen before—certainly nothing on this scale. He almost regretted doing it, except that he had no other choice. He was seventeen years old, he had no family to return to. No job, not even a high school diploma. What was he supposed to do? Enroll at some public school, pretend none of this had ever happened?

No. Not while Shiro was out there. Not while Iverson and the others were ignoring him. If they wouldn’t help, Keith would just have to find out more.

He was at a loss for how to do that until, late that first night, the last traces of twilight staining the sky outside his window, the thought struck him.

They knew.

Iverson. Everyone at the Garrison. They weren’t ignoring Keith, they were shutting him up. They knew Shiro had survived the crash, and they didn’t want word to get out. The only thing worse than pilot error killing the entire crew was a survivor, abandoned in the far reaches of the solar system, slowly dying while the people who’d sent him there sat on their hands and pretended nothing was wrong.

Well, fine. If they knew about Shiro, that must mean they’d been in contact with him. If Keith could get a record of that contact, if he could make contact himself, then he could take it to the press. Iverson would have to do something then.

If only it were that easy.

Keith tried to find evidence for the first few months, raiding the Garrison, trying to hijack their communications satellite. There were a few problems with that plan. First, anywhere that might hold the kind of top secret records Keith needed was too heavily guarded for him to get in. Second, he wasn’t a comms officer, or really all that good with computers to begin with. Hacking a government satellite? Not happening.

As if that weren’t enough, the Garrison soon tightened security on their perimeter, making it harder for Keith to get in at all. He could still hit their transports on the long, empty road from the city, and that kept him supplied with food and water, clothes, power cells for his bike, batteries for his flashlight.

It didn’t get him any closer to saving Shiro.

It was four months in, while flying just to vent his frustrations, that Keith first discovered the carvings. They didn’t look like much. Interesting to a historian, maybe, but not to an astronaut. But they kept drawing Keith back, and before he knew it, he was obsessed.

He explored the caves, trying to decipher the carvings, with an almost manic energy—all the more so after he was woken late one night by a blinding pain in his arm. It seemed to last forever, waves of agony that stole his breath each time they crested, then cut out abruptly, leaving him sweaty and shivering, with a new Mark encircling his right arm.

The worst part of the Arena, in Shiro’s eyes, had always been the knowledge that each failure would reflect onto Keith. Shiro didn’t remember much of his imprisonment, but he remembered that fact, and the fear that had gripped him before each match. It hurt to see how much Keith had changed in Shiro’s absence, how much colder and quieter he was, the Mark across his face so much harsher than Shiro’s scar. But Shiro knew it could have been worse.

The last few days had been too chaotic for Shiro to find both the time and the privacy to talk to Keith about what had happened. They’d exchanged a few words and one, fierce hug after their first battle as Voltron paladins.

The victory, Shiro suspected, had merely been a convenient excuse for Keith to do what he’d wanted to do since Shiro returned. There was a desperation in the embrace Shiro wasn’t used to seeing in Keith, desperation and relief and sorrow, all knotted together in a hug that threatened to wring the air right out of Shiro's lungs. Keith had never been good at putting his feelings into words, Shiro knew.

At least they had each other again, which was more than could be said for Pidge.

Shiro found her sitting on one of the castle’s open-air walkways connecting the main structure to an outlying tower. Her feet dangled over the edge, and the Altean mice sat in her lap, watching Shiro’s approach with wariness.

Pidge didn’t turn as he reached her, but her shoulders tensed, and Shiro barely had time to sit beside her before the question came tumbling out of her mouth: “Why would you attack my brother? I thought you were soulmates.”

Shiro had been expecting this ever since they talked to the prisoners they’d freed from Sendak’s ship. Now, at least, he had an answer.

“I did it to save him. And to save you.”

Pidge looked up at him, wide-eyed, the look reminding him sharply of Matt the day they stood outside the Arena waiting to die. “What do you mean?”

The memory had been so elusive until the fight earlier, but now that it had come into focus, it refused to leave his mind. The stench of blood and sweat and fear. Matt, shaking, swearing, pleading with the guards.

No! Don’t do this. Don’t make me do this, please! I have a sister!

“When the Galra sent us to the Arena, we both knew we were probably going to die,” Shiro said, Matt’s voice ringing in his ears. He stared down at his hands, one flesh and skin, one metal. Matt’s Mark remained on his left wrist, but it seemed less vibrant that before. Less the soft, nostalgic color of an old photograph, more the color of dried blood. “But that wasn’t what Matt was afraid of.” Shiro met Pidge’s eyes. “He was afraid for you, Katie. Of what it would do to you to feel him die.”

Pidge breathed in, sharp and surprised. “He said that?”

Shiro nodded. “He was supposed to go in first, but I took the guard’s sword and attacked him. Pretended I was impatient for my turn.” He swallowed, guilt and shame churning in his gut at the memory. “The Galra don’t send injured prisoners to the Arena. It’s not enough of a show for them. Matt got sent off to a work camp with your father.”

The final moment replayed itself endlessly in his mind. Matt, flat on his back on the floor, bleeding, tears in his eyes. Shiro crouched over him, letting the mask drop for just an instant.

Make it home for me, Matt, he’d said. Hug Katie for me. And tell Keith I’m sorry.

Pidge threw herself at Shiro, crashing into him with a hug that shook him out of the past. He looked down at her, shocked, for a moment, then put an arm around her shoulder.

“We have to find him,” she whispered. “We have to.”

“Pidge...”

She pulled back, glaring at him, the expression no less cutting for her tears. “He’s still alive, Shiro. He’s alive, and he’s hurting.”

Her words hit him like a flash of sunlight on snow, dazzling. “He’s alive? You’re sure?”

“You didn’t know?”

For a moment, all Shiro could do was shake his head. His memories of the past year were a jumbled mess, all torn apart and shoved back out of order, flashes of disjointed images and impressions. Things had been lost, buried in the wreckage, but there were some things he knew despite all this.

“There are no pens in Galra prisons,” Shiro said. “We haven’t talked since I attacked him.” He traced the words he’d written for Matt the day he crash-landed on Earth. They were smudged now, faded from his recent shower, but he couldn’t bring himself to wipe them away entirely. He’d written more since then. I love you. I’ll find you. He hadn’t known if the messages were getting through, but he’d already resolved to keep writing, every day, for as long as it took. If it gave Matt even the smallest sliver of hope, Shiro would write until he ran out of skin. "If he's alive, we'll find him. I swear."

Matt lay in near-darkness in the work camp, his arm held above his head, the sounds of sleeping prisoners all around him. The lights were dimmed for the night, but they gave enough light to see the dark smudges on his skin—blurry and indistinct in a way that he could only partially blame on his poor eyesight.

Shiro was alive.

Tears brimmed again in his eyes, and he wiped them away with the sleeve of his grimy jumpsuit, his chest aching so powerfully he kept having to remind himself to breathe. Shiro was alive, and he was free.

I love you, he’d written. Be safe.

For the first time in a year, Matt felt the yearning to survive, and not just for his sister’s sake. He wanted to live. He wanted to get back to Pidge, and to Shiro, and to Earth. He wanted it, and for once it actually seemed possible.

The rest of what Shiro had written—not to use his right arm, the complete silence about his father, about Earth—raised more questions than answers and kindled a fear Matt hesitated to put into words. There was only one reason Matt could think of that would make Shiro tell him not to write on his right arm, but that would mean…

Matt rolled over, pressing his arm against his chest.

He’s alive, he told himself. He’s alive, and he’s free. That’s what matters.

After all, if Shiro had escaped, then maybe one day Matt would, too.

Chapter 3: Universal Constant

Chapter Text

So I’ve never asked. Do you have any siblings? I’ve got two. My brother’s eight, and my sister’s six. They’re both loud and a little bit annoying, but I figure that’s fair. I’m louder and even more annoying, so it works out. (They’re not so bad, really, except when they’re sitting on top of me trying to talk to my pen pal.) ((That’s what the drawings are, by the way. My sister got mad when I told her it wouldn’t show up for you unless I drew it, so she made me trace over it.)) Anyway, sorry, you don’t have to answer if you don’t want, I was just curious if you’ve got your own little sibs. Or maybe you’re the baby brother, am I right? I’ll bet you are. Give your big sibs hell, Red. You have my official Big Brother OK (TM).

Keith stared at his arm—now almost solid blue with words and doodles—in baffled amusement. It took him a moment to find a bare patch of skin on the outside of his wrist where he could compose a reply.

I looked away for five minutes. How could you possibly cover my arm in that time??

He flipped his arm over and continued on his palm.

Tell your sister her drawings are very nice.

Blue’s answer was a long time coming, so Keith turned his attention back to his biology homework. He’d been talking to his soulmate for over a year now, but Blue’s spectacular ability to ramble still surprised him, as did his patience. Keith had asked him, once, not to ask for Keith’s name—the result of a sudden, inexplicable fit of paranoia that still twisted him up inside—but Blue didn’t press. He hadn’t offered his own name, either, like he knew without having to be told that Keith would feel obligated to reciprocate.

He almost missed the new words, as thick as his skin was with Blue’s loose, loopy writing.

Check your foot, the writing said, crawling up his index finger.

Keith rolled his eyes, but pulled off his socks and tossed them toward the hamper by the closet. One landed a full foot short of its target, the other bounced off the wall and landed behind his backpack. Keith left them there.

The words were scrawled across the bottom of his foot, and his toes curled in belated, sympathetic reflex. His soulmate, apparently, wasn’t ticklish, but Keith certainly was, and he swore he could feel Blue’s pen ghosting over his sole.

You are there! I thought you’d forgotten about me.

That’s not possible, Keith wrote by his ankle. I'm basically a Smurf over here thanks to you.

Classy.

Keith grinned. The answer’s no, by the way. I’m an only child. Which was true, if misleading. His current foster parents didn’t have any other kids, fostered or otherwise, and Keith hadn’t kept in touch with the other families.

That’s okay, Blue wrote. We can share my siblings.

Warmth thrilled through Keith at the words, and he used the butt of his pen to trace a freckle-like green Mark on his foot. Not for the first time, he marveled at his luck in soulmates. It was rare to have three. Keith knew this because he’d looked up the statistics when he was seven, just after the first green Mark appeared. It turned out soulmate counts were hard to pin down. Did you count every soulmate, or only those who reciprocated? How old did someone have to be before you could be reasonably certain they’d discovered all their pain pals? What about cases where two different pain pals gave the same color Marks, or other things that didn't fit the usual pattern?

But in the end, most people came pretty close to the same answer: more than ninety percent of the world had two or fewer soulmates. One was most common number, with two close behind. A small minority, maybe ten or twelve percent, had no soulmate at all, or at least none who reciprocated.

Keith was part of the smallest demographic. Fewer than one in ten people had more than two soulmates—and all of Keith’s reciprocated, which was rarer still.

The knowledge that he was connected to not one but three different people had comforted him as he drifted from foster home to foster home, searching for somewhere that felt right, or at least somewhere permanent. He wished his soulmates would hurry up and find him, but he was happy enough talking to Blue for now.

Idly, Keith returned his pen to one of Blue’s sister’s drawings. It showed three stick figures, the smallest in pigtails and a boxy dress, the one next to her with a squiggle on his head that might have been a hat or just a mane of unruly hair. The third, tallest figure was surrounded by hearts and sparkles. Keith wondered if that was Blue’s doing, or his sister’s.

Keith had to draw over some of Blue’s writing to add himself in. It looked like another six-year-old had drawn it, but it got the point across. Keith skipped the sparkles, but added two small hearts, just to complete the image, and tried to ignore the heat spreading across his face.

A moment later, new words appeared on his foot.

If I go deaf, I’m blaming you.

Confused, Keith responded with a single question mark.

My sister is screeching about your drawing. In my ear. Super loud. Seriously, I think she’s part banshee.

Keith laughed, but his smile faltered at Blue’s next words.

She says she wants you to come over so she can

Keith let his foot thump to the floor before Blue finished his sentence. A lump of ice coagulated in his stomach, leaving him cold and vaguely nauseous. He didn’t know why he was like this. Scared. Paranoid. He hated himself for it, sometimes. For more than a year now, Blue had been nothing but friendly. They’d talked, they’d shared secrets. Blue had gotten Keith through his last placement—though of course Blue didn’t know that.

It was just so much easier to leave things like this. The words, the drawings, the anonymity of it all—it was safe. As long as Blue was just a Mark on his wrist and a jumble of words, abstract and distant, there was no risk. As long as they never got together, Blue couldn’t walk away.

A few minutes passed. Keith copied down his textbook’s definition of mitosis onto his worksheet. His foot itched with unread words, and Keith reminded himself that Blue was not his pain pal. There were no sensations to carry over. Just words.

Just words, and as much of himself as he was willing to share.

Eventually, the words on his arm began to fade, color thinning and smearing as Blue wiped the ink away. Words and drawings turned to a pale wash of blue, leaving Keith’s stick figure standing alone, stark black on pale skin.

Keith’s stomach twisted at the sight, and he snatched up a dirty napkin left over from his after-school snack. He spit on it and scrubbed at his arm until the drawing vanished. His skin glared back at him, angry pink with just the faintest ghost of his doodle.

Blue wrote in small, timid letters on the newly cleaned skin. Are you okay? You seem…

The pen continued to tap, leaving dots and half-started letters beside the words, as if Blue didn’t know what to say—or how to say it without offending Keith.

Sorry, Keith wrote, before Blue could sort out his thoughts. Dinner.

He tugged his sleeve down before Blue had a chance to respond.

“You’re leaving?” The question tore itself from Keith’s lips, sharp with surprise and anger. It had only been two days—two long, stressful days—since he and the other paladins had left Earth, but it felt like much longer than that. Long enough that the Arusians milling around the grand hall behind him no longer registered as an impossibility, long enough that Allura and Coran’s pointed ears no longer made him stop and stare.

Long enough, he’d thought, that they were all united in their common goal.

“We’re paladins,” Keith said, his arms jerking wide before they fell loose at his side. “You can’t just walk away from this.”

Pidge’s expression turned frigid. “You can’t tell me what to do.”

The anger surged, a tide rising in his chest. He took a step forward, hands balling into fists, and loomed over Pidge. “This isn’t just about you. This isn’t just about any of us. You’re putting the fate of two people above an entire universe.”

Shiro placed a hand on Keith’s chest, stopping his rant. Their eyes locked, Shiro’s gaze unyielding. “That’s not how this works, Keith,” he said, his voice a little softer than his eyes. “I’m not going to force anyone to stay.”

Beyond him, Hunk’s mouth hung open, either in shock or working his way up to jump in on the conversation. Keith was glad he didn’t. He’d already made it clear he wanted to leave, as if this fight was the sort of thing you could walk away from. As if they weren’t carrying the lives of billions of beings on their shoulders.

Pidge seemed not to have heard Shiro’s interjection, just went on glaring at Keith like he was the one in the wrong here. With a backpack hanging crooked and clothes rumpled from two and a half days of wear, Pidge looked impossibly young. “They’re my family. I’m not abandoning them. You guys are just going to have to find a new green paladin.”

Keith wanted to laugh. He wanted to scream. He was perfectly aware that for most people, a family meant more than some words on a legal document. But how could Pidge think that charging off alone across an entire universe was going to help them? Even if Pidge did find the Holts, what then? Hide out for however long it took Voltron to defeat Zarkon? Try to escape back to Earth? If Pidge could do that, knowing the other paladins were fighting for their lives, knowing Hunk and Lance were just as homesick as Pidge, knowing Shiro had already been out here for over a year, then maybe it was better for them all if Pidge left now.

The silence stretched, no one seeming to have an answer to Pidge’s outburst. Shiro started to speak, then held himself back, and Keith was grateful. If he’d spoken, Keith couldn’t have said which side he’d come down on, for if there was anything that could rival Shiro’s sense of duty, it was his love for Matt Holt.

Pidge scoffed, taking one step backward. “I don’t have time for this.”

A surge of emotion overtook Keith as Pidge turned. Hot desperation closed in around his throat. He was nine years old again, pressed against a door as Mrs. Koch told the caseworker in an undertone that Keith had to go.

I feel sorry for him, of course, but I have a responsibility to my family. Him being here is putting too much stress on my children.

Keith’s throat closed up, his body shaking. He reminded himself he’d only known Pidge for a few days. It wasn’t like Shiro was leaving again, off to see the stars with Matt while Keith twiddled his thumbs back home. So what if Pidge left? It didn’t bother Keith. It shouldn’t bother Keith.

It did, though.

“I don’t believe you,” he growled, chasing Pidge across the room. Hunk made a vague noise of protest, but Keith ignored him. “How can you be this selfish?”

Pidge rounded on him, eyes narrowed to slits. The little drone named Rover hovered at Pidge’s shoulder, silent but watchful. “I’m selfish? If it was Shiro out there, you’d already be gone!”

Keith flinched back, his eyes darting to Shiro. The Mark on his nose burned suddenly hot. “That’s--”

“Don’t say it’s different,” Pidge snapped. “Matt’s my soulmate, and he needs me. I’m not sitting here while they hurt him. I can’t.” The backpack shifted, straps slipping, and Pidge hitched it higher.

Keith had already opened his mouth to defend himself, but his words died in his throat. Pidge’s sleeve tugged down, revealing a small, red Mark down where thumb met wrist.

Keith’s own thumb itched fiercely, and it was all Keith could do not to tear off his glove and compare his scar—the result of a run-in with a rusted old swing set—to Pidge’s Mark.

There was a rushing in his ears as he frantically searched Pidge’s face and hands for more Marks. Most of Keith’s scars were on his knees or higher on his arms, where Pidge’s sleeves concealed Marks that might or might not exist.

Then he remembered the Mark on his lip—tiny, faded, hard to see even from a few feet away. Did Pidge…? Yes. It was just as small as Keith’s Mark, and even harder to see. He never would have noticed it if he hadn’t been looking. But it was there.

Pidge was his soulmate.

The revelation left him speechless, his anger surging even as a flash of joy caught him by surprise. This was his soulmate; his second. It had taken him sixteen years to find Shiro, but now, hardly a year later, he’d found Pidge. This was incredible. It was what he'd been waiting for for most of his life--a family. Something permanent.

But Pidge was leaving, and that hurt worse than it should have.

He thought of the day before when, after half a dozen failed attempts at team-building, Coran had handcuffed them all together. He thought of Pidge, so tired and frustrated and done. They were all tired, of course, and all bristling at this latest cruelty, but Pidge was the only one who snapped quite so spectacularly.

Oh, the Princess of what? We’re the only ones out here, and she’s no princess of ours.

Keith, virtually beyond words himself, had felt a biting satisfaction at seeing someone—anyone—wipe that cool, collected look off Allura’s face. He might have felt bad for his own viciousness, except that Allura had retaliated in short measure, splattering Pidge with food goo. Pidge had fallen silent with one final yelp of indignation, then sat there slack-jawed, dripping goo onto the table.

The roaring wave of anger and protectiveness had caught Keith entirely off-guard, and it wasn’t until later that he’d registered the way Pidge had responded without hesitation to his command of, Go loose!

They'd worked well together, and for some reason Keith hadn’t been able to put into words, that had meant something.

Of course it had, he thought now, feeling foolish. They were soulmates.

Pidge had turned and was heading away from the group, ignoring Lance and Hunk, who looked crestfallen, if sympathetic. Shiro looked two seconds away from pulling Pidge back—or giving chase.

Keith beat him to it. “Wait,” he said, and maybe it was that the fight had drained out of his words, or maybe the way his voice cracked, but Pidge actually stopped, heaved a sigh, and turned just as Keith caught up.

“What?” Pidge asked, scowling.

For a moment, Keith hesitated, feeling the others’ watchful presence behind. He closed his eyes, and the notion that he was rushing into this flitted through his head.

He ignored it, and looked Pidge in the eye.

“I’m coming with you.”

Pidge wasn’t sure which part of leaving was the strangest: the fact that she was going openly, dressed in full paladin armor, flying Green? The fact that Shiro had hugged her before she went, saying he had half a mind to come along? (Pidge had assured him that the lead she’d found on Sendak’s downed ship probably led nowhere, and she would call him if things looked dangerous, or if she thought she might actually find Matt.)

Or maybe the strangest thing was that Keith flew beside her in the Red Lion. Keith. Pidge didn’t have anything against the guy, not really. It was just that she didn’t understand him. Why come along, when he’d been so pissed that she wanted to leave? Hunk and Lance at least knew her from the Garrison, Shiro was dating her brother. Hell, even Allura seemed to have some bizarre sort of fascination with Pidge on account of having “a lot” in common.

But Keith?

Pidge tried to work up the courage to ask as they flew through a wormhole to the coordinates Pidge had found. Allura had been more than a little reluctant to let both of them go, but Keith had been quick to assure her they wouldn’t be gone long.

If Pidge’s family is there, or if this is a dead end, we’ll be in and out in a couple of hours. You’ll barely have time to miss us. If we find another lead, we’ll get in touch and take it from there.

Coming from Keith, it all sounded so reasonable. Because it was Keith, or maybe because it was Matt, Shiro was on their side, and he quickly talked Allura around. She’d huffed and complained, but eventually she’d done something to the lions that would let them return by wormhole to the castle-ship, the way the Blue Lion had brought them all from Earth, and wished them luck.

Now it was just Pidge and Keith and, far ahead, the coordinates from a log entry marking where Sendak had stopped for supplies and left behind two human prisoners.

Pidge’s eyes flickered to the screen to her right that showed Keith’s face, grim and focused. If she was going to ask, now was the time. “Hey, Keith?”

“Yeah?”

“What made you change your mind?”

Keith blinked, tearing his eyes away from the planet ahead of them. “What do you mean?”

Fidgeting, Pidge forced herself to meet Keith’s eyes. He seemed as restless as her, his eyes continually straying away. At least she wasn’t the only one who felt awkward about this.

“I mean, you were pissed at me for wanting to do this, and then you did a complete one-eighty. How come?”

For a long moment, Keith didn’t answer. A red flush crept into his cheeks, and he kept his eyes trained ahead as he said, “Because we’re soulmates.”

“What?”

Keith held up his right hand. Gloved as it was, it wasn't much in the way of proof. “I saw the Mark on your hand. It matches my scar. And I’ve got a Mark on my lip. It’s faded, now, but you can still see it if you look close.”

Pidge couldn’t see it over the lions’ video feed, and the paladin armor covered the rest of Pidge’s scars and Marks. That was probably a good thing; mid-flight wasn’t the best time to be comparing scars. Besides, this wasn’t the sort of thing people lied about—not Keith, certainly. Pidge had once seen Lance try to flirt with a girl using some line about, I’ll bet if you write your number on my hand, it'll show up on yours.

It hadn’t worked, and Lance hadn’t tried it again. It was too easy to tell a genuine soulbond from a fake.

“Oh,” Pidge said, very eloquently. She shook herself and let the implications sink in—Keith was her soulmate. Keith was Red. She grimaced. “Thanks for all the broken noses.”

Keith cringed. “Oh, uh… Sorry?”

By now they were nearly to the planet. Or rather, they were nearly to one of the planet’s two moons. There was a large facility that covered a good quarter of the moon’s surface, glowing with violet crystals and buzzing with activity. Pidge sifted through the comms chatter, but found nothing of interest.

“We should land on the far side of the moon,” she said to Keith, who nodded and followed her. They settled their lions side-by-side in the shadows at the edge of a crater and took the smaller, single-man speeders stowed inside their lions.

“Okay,” Keith said as they headed out. “What’s the plan?”

Pidge hesitated. Plan? It wasn’t like she’d had a chance to concoct some big, elaborate, foolproof scheme for this. All she’d had to go on were some coordinates. “Sneak in, hack their computers, see if my family’s there?”

“Works for me,” said Keith, and Pidge couldn’t help but grin. There were some upsides to having Keith along, she supposed. Her loose semi-planned approach wouldn’t have been enough for any of the others.

But there was still one more thing that sat heavy in her gut, and as they exited their speeders behind a rocky outcropping overlooking the base, Pidge reached out to stop Keith. He’d already refocused on the mission, and he had to blink a few times before his eyes locked on her.

“Something wrong?”

She squirmed, bit her lip. “No. I hope not. I just--” She took a deep breath. There was nothing to worry about. Keith was her soulmate, after all, and that counted for something. “Before we go in there, there’s something I want you to know. It’s… I… You might…” She paused, then blurted it out. “I’m a girl.”

“Yeah?” Keith blinked again, then gave her a lopsided smile. “All right. Thanks for telling me.”

Pidge felt something inside her loosen. “That doesn’t bother you?”

“Should it?”

Pidge shook her head, smiling, and joined Keith in a crouch beside the stones, looking down over the base. “My name’s Katie,” she said, and saying it aloud brought a release of tension so heady she wanted to scream. “But you can still call me Pidge if you want.”

Keith nodded. “Okay, Pidge. Let’s get in there and save your family.”

“Wait, seriously?” Hunk asked, Lance adding some incoherent noises that made Coran’s smile twitch wider.

The Altean spun his mustache around his finger. “You don’t really thing you’re that special, do you? Humans!” He laughed, not in a mean sort of way, more like someone laughing at a kid trying to explain gravity. “Adorable.”

Hunk still had a hold of Coran’s other arm, which had the sleeve pushed up to the elbow. Pale blue lines like veins, the same color as the markings under his eyes, lined his skin. Scattered among these were pink Marks. A crescent-shaped one on the back of the wrist, a longer, straighter one down the forearm. Soulmarks. Mirrors of Allura’s scars.

“So, like, do all aliens have soulmates?” Hunk asked, turning Coran’s arm over and poking at the stark white symbol on his wrist. It wasn’t anything Hunk recognized, but then, if it was an alien thing, he probably wouldn’t. “Does it work the same way for all aliens? Can you have a soulmate who’s a different species from you? Do you think my soulmate is an alien? The other one, I mean,” he added with an apologetic smile for Lance. “Obviously you’re not.”

Lance just waved him off. They were used to it by now. When you’d met one soulmate and not the other, you got used to referring to the mystery party as my soulmate. There wasn’t anything else to call them, considering Lance’s pen pal had never told him his name and Hunk’s other other reciprocating soulmate was another pain pal. (The fact that his romantic soulmate didn’t reciprocate was a bit of a disappointment, but he’d hardly thought about it in years, to be perfectly honest. Whoever they were, they didn’t even register as a soulmate. Not the same way Lance did. Not the same way the person behind the golden-brown Marks did.)

Coran arched an eyebrow. “Ah, so you’re kelyaps, are you?”

“Uh...” Hunk glanced at Lance.

Lance shrugged and turned to Coran. “What’s a kelyap?”

“Soulmates, of course!” Coran beamed, tapping one of Allura’s Marks. “It’s an Altean word for a family you acquire later in life.”

“Oh...” Hunk blinked twice. “I guess, then, yeah? We don’t call them that on Earth, though.”

“Yeah, we call the pain pals. Much catchier, if you ask me.” Lance jabbed his elbow into Hunk’s side. “Way more accurate, too, mister ‘coral is pretty and fun and I should rub it all over my face.’”

Hunk pouted at Lance. “I never rubbed it on my face.”

“No,” Lance said, “but you touched it, and I ended up with an invisible mystery rash for like three weeks--”

“Four days.”

“--I thought I was dying!”

“Because your arm kinda hurt a little?” Hunk asked, skeptical.

Lance’s mouth dropped open. “Kinda hurt? A little? My arm was on fire! It was the worst! My mom had to take me to the doctor because she thought I was allergic to cotton blends. Because of you!”

Hunk arched an eyebrow. “Because of me.”

“Yes!”

“And not at all because you were being melodramatic about it?”

“I’m not melodramatic!”

Coran laughed and grabbed a cup of nunvill from a floating tray. Hunk gagged just watching him drink it, but Coran downed it like an espresso before a pre-dawn Garrison exercise. “Ah, youth,” he muttered. “I remember when Allura was little. I had to stop sparring with Alfor, you know. One little laser blast to the side and Allura was sobbing like a leaky faucet.”

“Allura?” Hunk shook his head. “No way. I don’t think she even has tear ducts.”

“Oh, you’d be surprised. She may have a high pain tolerance, but even she has her limits.”

Lance stared into his own, untouched glass of nunvill. (Hunk was mostly convinced he’d grabbed it just to look sophisticated.) “Sounds like my little sister. She’ll scream up a storm if she thinks you aren’t paying enough attention to her, but when she’s really hurt she doesn’t make a peep. Hates anyone to see her cry, even me. Heck, one time she almost cut her toe off playing with some tools my cousin left lying around. We wouldn’t have known anything happened except I suddenly had a big ol’ Mark on my toe.”

“Your sister’s your kelyap, too, huh?”

“Yeah. And my brother.” Lance got a far-off look on his face, and his smile turned wistful. “They’re ten and twelve now, you know. Haven’t seen them in more than a month with all the stuff going on at the Garrison. Training, and classes, and hanging out with my friends, and going into town for wings and trivia…” He paused, smile fading. “Kinda seems silly now. I always figured I could see my family whenever, so I hardly ever made time for them. Now… who knows when I’ll see them again. If I’ll see them again.”

His voice trailed off, thick with emotion, and he shied away from Hunk’s outstretched hand.

“Whoo, sorry,” Lance said, wiping his eyes hastily on his gloved hand. “Must be the nunvill getting to me. I’m just gonna—go. Off. This way. Get some air or something.” He fluttered a hand as Hunk started to follow. “No, no. Stay here. Enjoy the party! I’ll be back soon.”

Hunk hesitated. He knew Lance sometimes needed space. He was a lot like Luz, in that way. Hated people seeing him cry—which was kind of a problem, because he cried pretty easily. Normally Hunk was the exception to that rule, but not this time, it seemed.

While he was still hesitating, Coran sidled up beside him, tapping one finger on his glass. “Don’t worry, Number One. I’ll go talk to him.”

“You sure?” Hunk asked. “Maybe I should—I don’t know. You think I should go?”

But Coran just patted his shoulder, passed him the empty nunvill glass, and headed up the stairs after Lance. Hunk tried to keep his mind off it. Lance had told him to stay, so he should stay, and enjoy the party. The Arusians were all nice, and almost as funny as they were adorable, so Hunk should be having a great time.

It was just hard when part of him felt like he should have gone after Lance. Maybe he still should. He was Lance’s best friend. If Lance was feeling homesick, Hunk could help better than anyone, right?

Except, who knew where Lance was by now? The castle was huge, and Hunk hadn’t even explored all of it. If Lance didn’t want to be found, Hunk wasn’t going to find him. Then again, if he did want the company, then maybe he’d gone somewhere he figured Hunk would look for him. Maybe Hunk should go check Lance’s room and the Blue Lion’s hangar. Just to be safe.

As he was heading for the quieter corridors beyond the party, however, Hunk caught sight of Shiro and Allura, locked in a serious-looking conversation in a dimly-lit corner. He wondered if they were talking about Pidge and Keith going off to look for the Holts, or trying to figure out contingencies for if they got attacked now, when they were down two lions.

Hunk watched them from a distance, hesitant to interrupt. Whatever they were talking about, it was pretty obvious they didn’t want to be overheard. Hunk would have walked away, except leaving the hall would mean heading straight past Shiro and Allura. Hunk didn’t want them to think he was trying to eavesdrop, but now that he’d made up his mind to go find Lance, he didn’t want to lose his nerve, either.

There was no warning. One moment Hunk was wavering on the edge of the crowd, laughing politely at an Arusian joke he only half heard.

The next, his world went white.

He didn’t register the pain until it had already faded. He was on the ground, and the room around him was dark; screaming Arusians ran for the exit. Allura and Shiro knelt beside him, dust and bits of rock peppering their shoulders and hair.

“Hunk!” Allura cried. “Are you all right? Your face!”

His what? Hunk shook his head, trying to clear it, and let the others help him to his feet. A serving platter was still hovering nearby, and Hunk snatched it out of the air, spraying hors d’oeuvres after the fleeing crowd.

Hunk couldn’t bring himself to care. Shiro was saying something—something about an explosion? That made sense; Hunk’s ears were ringing, and he was pretty sure that wasn’t the kind of thing you could share across a soulbond.

With the room as dark as it was, it was hard to see his reflection in the silver platter, but then Hunk found the right angle, and his heart just about stopped.

There, seeping down the side of his face like blood, was a brand new Mark, vibrant blue and big enough to freeze the air in his lungs.

“Oh, no,” he whispered, platter slipping from his fingers even as he turned and sprinted for the stairs. “Lance! ”

Chapter 4: Balmera

Chapter Text

Hunk ran, stumbling from the aftershocks of the shared pain, and nearly broke his nose on the elevator doors when they failed to open for him. He didn’t care about the pain, though, not after what he’d felt from Lance.

There was nothing now. No headache, no dagger-pang of broken bones, no burning or throbbing or even the faintest twinge to say that Lance was still alive. Just a hollowness that darkened the edges of Hunk’s vision.

“Lance!” Hunk roared, pounding his fist against the elevator doors. His throat felt raw. He didn’t know where Lance was. Didn’t know where he would have gone even if the elevator had let him in, but he felt the need to move, to run. The need to find Lance burned like a welder’s torch inside his chest.

Allura appeared behind him, Shiro at her side. She was holding her ribs and, belatedly, Hunk noticed a spray of aquamarine Marks across her face and hands.

“The power’s out,” she said, voice strained. Hunk ignored her, trying to get his fingers into the seam of the door. “Hunk. Hunk.”

“Let go of me, Allura,” Hunk snapped as she reached out for him. His voice was a millimeter away from breaking. “I need to get to Lance!”

“You can’t get there this way as long as the power is down.” Allura’s voice was so calm, so utterly patient, that Hunk wanted to pick her up and shake her. Lance was hurt—dead, for all Hunk knew. Why wasn’t she panicking? But when he turned, he saw the worry plain in her eyes and it registered. It hadn’t just been Lance. Coran was hurt, too. “We’ll have to take the stairs.”

Hunk followed her without complaint. Shiro, behind them, was as level-headed as Allura. “Do we even know where they are?”

“The bridge,” Allura said. She sounded sure. “The crystal there supplies the castle’s power. That must have been where the bomb was detonated. Lance and Coran will be close.”

Hunk’s stomach dropped. The bridge was at the very top of the castle, more than a dozen floors above them. It didn’t matter, though. He’d sprint to the top of a skyscraper for Lance.

They ran in silence, except for their pounding footsteps and labored breathing. Shiro lingered by Allura for a moment, seemingly afraid that she was going to collapse, but once she waved him on ahead, he quickly pulled away. He burst out of the stairway and onto the bridge while Hunk was still a full floor below.

“Coran!” Shiro called. “Are you okay? Where’s—Lance!”

Hunk didn’t think he had any more energy to burn, but he found it at the raw edge in Shiro’s voice. He picked up his pace and entered the bridge two steps behind Allura, who went at once to Coran—awake, sitting up, bleeding only a little from a dozen little cuts.

Shiro knelt several paces farther on, a still, limp form in his lap.

Hunk’s lungs gave up the fight for air and shriveled inside him. He felt the pain of loss so keenly he thought for an instant Lance had been impaled by one of the crystal shards littering the floor around them. Stumbling forward, Hunk fought for words. “Is he… Did he…?” His voice sounded strangled, foreign, like someone else was speaking.

Shiro turned, and Hunk caught sight of Lance’s face. Blood. There was so much blood.

Hunk felt sick.

“He’s alive,” Shiro said. “He’s in bad shape, but he is alive.”

Hunk’s legs did give out then. He collapsed beside Shiro, drawing in shallow, ragged gulps of air as he stared at Lance. His brow was furrowed, his lips slightly parted in a grimace of pain.

There was so much blood.

“He’ll need a cryopod,” Coran said. His voice trembled slightly, whether from worry or because of his own injuries, and he leaned heavily on Allura as he surveyed the destruction around them. Smoky shadows, glittering shards sprayed to the edges of the room, a crack in the floor beneath the shattered remnants of the crystal. “But for that, we’ll need a new crystal.”

“Where can we get one?” Shiro asked. Where, Hunk noticed. Not, can we get one. Where. Shiro wasn’t allowing for the possibility that Lance was beyond help, and that—Hunk needed that. He closed his eyes and tried to breathe.

“We’ll have to find a Balmera,” Coran said. “I’ll go down to the pods. We might be able to force one of the bay doors open. Hunk? I’m going to need your help transporting the crystal.”

Hunk looked up at him, then back at Lance, every fiber of his being screaming at him to stay with his soulmate. “But...”

“I’ll stay with Lance.” Shiro gripped Hunk’s shoulder, a tight, grounding pressure. “I’ll make sure nothing happens to him.”

Nothing else, Hunk wanted to say. But he just nodded, squeezed Lance’s hand, and hurried out with Coran. I’ll be back, Lance. Just don’t die. Don’t die on me.

A sound split the silence of the castle.

Shiro paused near the entry hall, every sense on alert. Allura had left ten minutes ago, gone to help the Arusian village after their king had brought word of an attack. Shiro had felt profoundly useless, watching her go, but he couldn’t leave Lance. Not now that they were certain the Galra were still nearby. He wished the castle hadn’t lost power, or that the shuttle Hunk and Coran had taken had long-range comms. He would have felt much better with Keith and Pidge here to back him and the princess.

Shiro had decided to take Lance down to the infirmary, by the cryopod room. It was more defensible than the demolished bridged, and it had first aid supplies, which Lance badly needed.

But he’d heard something in the entry hall. Footsteps, too heavy to be Allura or the Arusians. Shiro slowed, then carefully lowered Lance to a bench set in a small alcove in the wall. Lance let out a soft groan, and Shiro wondered if he was in pain. He hadn’t stirred yet, and more than once Shiro had had to stop and check that the kid was still breathing.

It was lucky that, in lieu of more formal clothes, the paladins had all been wearing their armor for the celebration. Without that protection, Lance might already be dead.

Shiro turned back toward the approaching footsteps, heat and light igniting in his prosthetic hand like a furnace. If the Galra were here, Shiro would fight. He didn’t care how many soldiers Sendak had brought with him or the fact that Shiro wouldn’t have any support. No one was touching Lance; not as long as Shiro was still standing.

Shiro waited only until he could see the huge, twisted shadow in the door to the entry hall, and then he charged.

Keith crouched low against the wall, listening for the sound of guards. Pidge stood at his shoulder, a small screen projected from her gauntlet.

“This hallway’s clear,” she whispered, and Keith kept moving. They hadn’t been able to access many of the Galra base’s systems from the outside, so they were going in mostly blind, searching for the control room. Or prisoner cells. Or anywhere with computers where Pidge could link in directly. Or…

Keith was giving himself a headache thinking about it, so he decided not to think. Pidge had the camera feeds streaming direct to her armor, which meant they could avoid patrols. That was good enough for now.

“Patrol,” Pidge said, and waved Keith through a door into a dark storeroom beyond. Keith didn’t hear the approaching footsteps until the door was already closed behind them. He waited with his back pressed against the wall just to the right of the door, his bayard active in his hand. He deliberated for a moment, then summoned his shield, too. Pidge was still typing away at that hologram keyboard, trying to crack the security so they didn’t have to go any deeper into the base. If they were attacked, she would need a second to switch from hacker mode to fighter mode.

That was why Keith was here. The others all had their areas of expertise—Pidge her hacking, Hunk his mechanical and technical knowledge, Shiro his leadership and strategies, Lance his… Actually, Keith wasn’t sure what Lance’s area was. In the last three days, all Lance had shown an interest in was flirting, bad jokes, and picking fights with Keith.

Whatever. Point was, Keith’s job was brute force—now more than ever. He would be Pidge’s shield, the first line of defense while she tackled the real problem.

The patrol passed on without checking the storeroom, and Pidge ducked back out into the corridor, Keith behind her. They needed few words to understand what the other was planning. Pidge took the lead, keeping them away from trouble. Keith kept his eyes on their surroundings, wary and watchful in case the Galra had any surprises in store.

The ease of it was what surprised Keith the most. He was used to friction on any team he was assigned to. Endless bickering, endless nitpicking. He’d never been able to get anyone to follow his orders, and he found most other cadets too high on their own egos to formulate workable plans, but when he tried to strike out on his own, he found only reprimands from the instructors and hostile glares from his squadmates. That had been the worst part of Garrison training—the three man squads. Keith worked better alone. He always had.

Except with Shiro.

And now, apparently, with Pidge.

They ducked into what looked like an unoccupied dormitory as another patrol passed, and the motion of Pidge’s fingers slowed.

"This isn’t a prison,” she said, her voice so low Keith almost missed it.

He frowned at her, the significance behind her words slow to penetrate. “Oh... Your family.”

Pidge’s mouth tightened. “I knew it was too much to hope for,” she said, and Keith was surprised to recognize the defensive growl in her voice. “You said it yourself. There was always a chance they were sent on somewhere else. A high chance. It’s been a year, after all. Stupid.”

She huffed, then hurried on, sparing the briefest of glances for the sentries’ retreating backs.

Keith wanted to say something, but he wasn’t sure what. He wasn’t good with these sorts of things. With comfort, with encouragement. With soulmates. Shiro did more than half the talking between them, and Keith honestly couldn’t remember the last time he’d written anything to Blue.

Blue. Keith felt a twinge of something—not quite homesickness; he didn’t get homesick. Even if he did, who ever heard of getting homesick for a person? But it was a twinge of something cold and seeping in his ribcage, a sickening sort of hole caught up in the tiny blue pilot wings tattooed on his wrist.

Blue hadn’t written anything since Keith had arrived at the Castle of Lions. Not a how-are-you, not a story about his day, not even his usual morning pickup lines.

It was the distance, Keith told himself. Soulbonds weren’t meant to stretch the width of the universe. Never mind that he’d felt Shiro’s pain across that distance. Never mind the black Mark carved into his face. That sort of bond followed different rules. It had to, otherwise Blue’s silence meant he’d finally given up on Keith, and that possibility hurt to much to entertain.

Keith had no right to be hurt by Blue’s sudden silence, he knew, not when he’d been doing the same thing to Blue for so long, and anyway he had more important things to worry about right now. Still, his chest felt hollow as he quickened his pace to catch up with Pidge at the next corner.

“Have you found the control center yet?” Keith asked in a low voice. “Your family did come here, even if they didn’t stay. There have to be records.”

Pidge nodded. “I know. And I did.” She tapped the side of her helmet and smiled. Faint images flickered across her mask, though Keith couldn’t parse the information from his angle. “We’re almost there, but there are guards posted outside.”

“Not a problem,” Keith said.

Pidge grabbed his arm before he could brush past her. “Slow down, hotshot. We’ll have to time this with the patrols. As soon as someone notices the missing guards, we’re going to have a very limited time frame to finish our work and get out of here.”

Keith deflated. “Oh. Right.”

She smirked, already refocused on the cameras. “What would you do without me?”

A smile tugged at Keith’s lips. “Well, without Shiro, I broke someone’s nose, got expelled, and spent a year living off stolen rations in a shack in the desert, so...”

The look Pidge gave him was equal parts impressed and horrified. She sighed as she got moving again. “You’re just as hopeless as Matt.”

Keith wasn’t sure if she meant that as a compliment or not, but it warmed him all the same.

They stopped again in a storeroom just around the corner from the control room, and Pidge projected the camera feed onto her gauntlet’s screen. “We’ll wait for the next patrol to pass, then...”

Keith didn’t hear the rest of her sentence. Pain, sudden and sharp, shot up his arm. He hissed, instinctively clutching his arm to his chest. He itched to take off his armor to look for a Mark, but here in the depth of Galra territory it was too risky.

Besides, it hadn’t hurt that much. And it was his right arm, the one Shiro had lost. It could have been phantom pain—it wouldn’t have been the first time Shiro (and by extension, Keith) had felt an ache seize on muscles that no longer existed.

Pidge was watching him now, and Keith tried to smile for her, forcing down the unease in his gut. “Sorry,” he said. “How long do we have?”

“A few more seconds. Keith...”

“Right. Get ready.”

She frowned, but let him distract her. They watched the sentries on the screen, listened to the clang of metal feet on metal floor outside their hiding spot. As soon as the patrol was past the small side-corridor that led to the control room, Keith and Pidge were on their feet.

Pidge fired her bayard as soon as they rounded the corner, yanking a noose tight around the guard on the right and zapping him. Keith put on a burst of speed and cut down the other before he could sound an alarm, then spun toward Pidge’s target. She cut the flow of electricity through her bayard an instant before Keith cut him down.

The guards hit the ground, the rattle of armor loud in the sudden silence, and Pidge went to hack the door controls.

Keith was through as soon as she cleared the way, taking out the two Galra stationed inside. As Pidge crossed to the computer, unloading her laptop and plugging into the base’s mainframe, Keith dragged the guards inside and sealed the door.

He was on his way to check Pidge’s progress when the pain hit him again, sharper this time. Another twinge at the level of the Mark on his right arm, and an ache on the other forearm sharp enough that his breath left him as a hiss.

Pidge’s head snapped up. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know,” Keith said, kneeling beside her. The pain faded as quick as it had come, which Keith could only assume meant there was no lasting damage. Or else an adrenaline high, Keith’s or Shiro’s, was blotting out all but the worst of the pain. Keith’s gut churned. “Shiro’s--”

This time there was no mistaking the pain, or what it meant. Something cracked against the back of Keith’s skull, an instant of white heat that blurred his vision. Then, nothing.

Keith became aware of Pidge’s hand on his arm, became aware that he’d fallen against the Galra console. He was shaking. He didn’t know why.

“We have to get back.”

The words sounded strange, garbled, like he was hearing his own voice on a staticy radio. He pressed a hand to his head, noticing for the first time that he was sweating. He didn’t think it was from the fight.

Pidge’s lips pursed, and she glanced at her laptop. “I haven’t finished copying the files...” she started, but Keith cut her off.

“Shiro’s hurt. Unconscious, maybe.” He refused to put the other possibility into words. Anyway, the thought of someone knocking Shiro out was enough to catch Pidge’s attention.

“Sendak?” she asked.

“I don’t know. I don’t care. How long is this going to take?”

Pidge hesitated, then keyed in a few short commands. “I’ll only take the records from the month after they were transferred here,” she said. “This isn’t a prison, they couldn’t have held them long.”

“No. They were probably in and out within a day,” Keith said. He didn’t know if it was true, but it seemed likely. He hadn’t seen anywhere on this base for the Galra to hold prisoners. The words seemed to steady Pidge in any case, which was all Keith really needed.

She nodded, and stared at the progress bar on her screen as it crept past the fifty percent mark. “Right? A month is probably way more than I need, and that much will only take a few more ticks...” She held her breath, and Keith closed his eyes, willing Shiro to be okay. A few ticks wouldn’t make a difference either way. A few ticks wouldn’t get Keith there in time to stop Sendak from killing Shiro, or recapturing him—if that was even what had happened—but it might make all the difference in the universe for Pidge’s family.

The utter absence of pain was harder to endure, even, than the agony he’d felt when Shiro’s arm had been taken, but Keith concentrated on his breathing. Patience yields focus.

What did he know? Shiro had been knocked out by a blow to the back of the head. Before that, the pain had all been in his arms, mostly his right, where Shiro’s prosthetic joined flesh. That suggested a fight. Shiro must have been holding his own before the end; he hadn’t taken many hits. No bad ones, anyway. Even adrenaline couldn’t wipe away that initial burst of pain.

A fight, especially now, especially one that ended with Shiro unconscious, meant Galra. Unless there were other enemies out there the paladins had to be worried about. Keith didn’t let that thought go far. Patience. Focus.

No one had contacted Keith or Pidge yet. Had the Galra caught them by surprise? Had they all been captured?

However he looked at it, things seemed bad. When Pidge finally disconnected her laptop from the Galra computer and shoved it back into her bag, Keith shot to his feet. He was out the door an instant later.

They found a Balmera.

Hunk tried to focus on that fact, on the cosmic bouquet of miracles that it entailed, and not on the Galra chasing them across the planet’s—creature’s?—surface.

Miracle One: there was a Balmera close enough for the shuttle’s scanners to detect. (Hunk screamed as lasers flashed by on either side.)

Miracle Two: the Balmera was close enough that it took less than an hour to get there, even without a wormhole. (Coran put them into a tight spiral and angled downward, toward one of the holes littering the Balmera. Mine shafts. From Galra mines. Because the place was very clearly occupied by the Galra.)

Miracle Three: the Balmera was still alive, and Coran said there was a good chance it contained crystals large enough to power a ten-thousand-year-old castle. (They dove into the mine shaft, half a dozen Galra fighters on their tail, and spun between steel beams and vents gushing steam and rocky outcroppings that could have torn them to bloody pieces.)

Coran must have been a better pilot than he let on, because they reached the bottom of the shaft with only minor engine damage, while their pursuers pattered down around them in flaming pieces. So, Miracle Four: they were still alive.

Hunk staggered out of the shuttle, too shaken to feel the nausea that surely must have been stirred up by their rough landing. He put a hand on the shuttle’s hull to steady himself, then snatched it away, hissing. Apparently a frantic descent from the upper atmosphere, an endless barrage of laserfire, and a few minor collisions with solid earth added up to a lot of residual heat.

Something shifted in the shadows at the edge of the pit, and Hunk straightened. “Who’s there?” He backed toward Coran, summoning his bayard. If it was Galra—if they’d survived all this just to be gunned down here, five feet from the sparkling crystals that could save Lance’s life—Hunk was going to scream.

But it wasn’t Galra who emerged from the darkness, eyes glowing firefly yellow. It was an alien—two of them—with rough, knobbled skin and stumpy tails and bony carapaces on their heads. Hunk began to lower his weapon, realized there were probably plenty of aliens who wanted him dead, and tensed once more.

Then one of the aliens stepped forward and spoke in a voice that was much softer than Hunk would have expected. He didn’t hear the words, though. His eyes were riveted on the Mark on her bare foot, as yellow as her eyes.

“Oh my gosh,” he whispered. He knew that Mark. That bright, sunshine yellow, the short, wavering lines that framed the ankle and dotted the top of the foot. It was the same Mark he’d seen on Lance their first night as roommates, which had kept them both up screaming three hours past curfew. It was a perfect match to the scar on his own foot from a surfing accident two years ago.

He looked up, stunned, into the eyes of Miracle Number Five.

“You’re my soulmate.”

It was possibly the most inane thing he could have said by way of introduction, and it made everyone stare at him in a way that wasn’t entirely comfortable, but Hunk was too busy trying to remember how to breathe to care. Lance was dying in an alien castle, Hunk was stranded on a Galra-occupied planet with a busted ship and a desperate need for a crystal, and yet somehow he’d managed to find the one person in the universe he was absolutely certain he could trust.

He was halfway to taking off his boot to show his own scar when the Galra patrol ship appeared at the top of the shaft, the engine roar echoing all around them.

The second Balmeran—not Hunk’s soulmate but the grumpy one—backed away.

“Shay, exunt. We must go before the Galra arrive.”

“Wait!” Hunk cried, as much because he and Coran needed help as because this impossible, wide-eyed alien was his soulmate.

But Shay was faster. “No, Rax. We must help the skylings.”

Rax narrowed his eyes. “Because this one claims to be your soulmate? A lie, Shay. Leave them.”

Shay was already moving, joining Coran and Hunk by the shuttle and helping them push the wounded craft toward the relative shelter of a nearby tunnel. Rax hesitated a moment longer, then muttered something that sounded like vex and came to help.

“If this is a trap...” he muttered.

Shay, still shoving against the shuttle’s hull, turned her gaze on Hunk and smiled. “No. I do not think it is.”

Allura realized too late she’d been tricked. She’d been so concerned about the Galra attacking the local villagers just to strike a blow at her that she hadn’t stopped to think. She’d just run out here, alone, carrying only a staff from the castle’s stores, and watched the Arusian village burn.

By the time the sentries standing within the flames toppled and she realized she’d been had, she’d lost too much time. She turned and sprinted back to the castle, but the particle barrier was already beginning to form, spreading in honeycomb tiles from the tip of the central spire. Allura was still a hundred paces away when the sphere closed, flashing once before the light faded.

“No!” She pushed herself harder, chest heaving, and swung her staff at the shield in a futile attempt to gain entry.

Useless. The Galra had taken over the Castle of Lions. They must have installed their own crystal if the shield was up—up, but tinged a sickening red.

Biting down on a shout of frustration, Allura backed up from the shield and craned her neck. The castle had not yet begun to move. Perhaps the Galra didn’t know it could fly, or couldn’t figure out how to make it work. Allura didn’t want to trust her luck on the matter.

“Shiro,” she said, squeezing her earring to boost the comms signal as high as it would go. “Shiro, can you hear me?”

No answer. Either Shiro was out of range—unlikely, unless he’d somehow managed to escape when the castle was taken—or he was out of commission. She swore, and struck the shield again with her staff.

No. It would do her no good to throw a fit like a spoiled child. Two of her paladins were trapped inside the castle with the enemy, probably captured, probably hurt. Hunk and Coran would not return from the Balmera soon enough to help. Keith and Pidge were too far away for her suit’s comms to reach.

But another presence tickled the back of her mind, one that sparked a tendril of hope within her chest. The mice! She closed her eyes, trying to focus on the strange bond she had with the tiny, intelligent creatures. They were some way distant, much farther away from her than any of the previous times she’d experimented with their connection.

Please, she thought. She didn’t know if the mice could hear her words, but they’d already proved themselves more than capable of responding to her needs when the situation was dire. Please, I need your help.

Four small minds perked up at her call, and Allura leaned forward, resting her forehead against the particle barrier as a sigh of relief escaped her. She formed an image in her mind of the shield generators, and the path the mice would need to take to reach them from Allura’s room, where they had been napping.

I need you to let me in. Please. Hurry.

“Princ--”

Allura froze. The voice in her ear—Keith’s voice—startled her out of her communion with the mice, and her heart leaped into her throat. Static buzzed on the comms, drowning out whatever else Keith might have said, and Allura pressed a hand to hear ear, straining to hear his voice.

The static cleared a moment later, and Keith spoke again. “Princess. Are you there? Allura?”

“Keith!” Allura could have wept. “Oh, thank the ancients. What are you doing here?”

“Keith felt something from Shiro,” Pidge said. “Was there a fight? What happened?”

The Red and Green Lions swept by overhead, diving toward the castle. Allura shouted a warning, and the lions veered aside an instant before they would have crashed into the particle barrier.

“I don’t know,” Allura said, breathless, as they caught sight of her and landed nearby. “It must have been Sendak, though I don’t know how he survived our last battle. Someone detonated a bomb. Lance was hurt, badly.”

Pidge sucked in a sharp breath. “What? When? A bomb?”

Allura ignored the question. “Shiro’s inside with Lance. And Sendak.”

“Where’s Hunk?” Keith asked, jogging out of his lion, Pidge close behind. “Where’s Coran?”

But at that moment, Allura felt the mice’s unanimous cry of triumph. She spun and watched the shield begin to fall. “Gone,” she said shortly. “It’s just us. Let’s go.”

Lance was hurting. Hunk felt it deep in his chest, like an ache only partially masked by painkillers. His stomach felt restless with the pain, however weak it was. He clung to it as a reminder that Lance was still alive. He was hurt, he was in danger, but he wasn’t dead yet.

A thin comfort, seeing as Hunk was currently sitting in a Galra prison cell on an alien planet with Coran.

It was hard to resist the urge to blame Coran for this, when Coran had been the one to waste time with some old Altean crystal-harvesting ritual. They’d spent enough time just finding a big enough crystal—though… in all fairness, Hunk’s repairs on their shuttle could have been faster, too. Would have been, if Shay hadn’t been there with her curiosity and her wonder and her steely determination to help in any way she could.

Hunk groaned, dropping his head into his hands. He didn’t want to be angry at Coran, didn’t have any right to, but beneath the anger was only fear and a looming threat of tears. Lance was dying, and Hunk was stuck in a cell.

He kicked the door, relishing the pain in his foot, but was surprised to hear a hiss of pain from the other side.

A second later the lock beeped and the door swung open to reveal Shay, holding a severed robot hand. This she tossed aside, then bent to rub her foot.

Hunk clapped both hands to his mouth. “Oh my god, Shay, I’m so sorry! Are you okay?”

“I am well,” she said, waving him off. “But come. We must make haste.”

“Make haste?” Hunk frowned, even as he followed Shay down the tunnel. Coran was silent as he followed. “Where? Why?”

“Your ship. I have loaded the crystal onto it, but the Galra will soon notice its absence. You must be gone before then.”

Hunk firmed his jaw, picking up the pace. “You’re coming with us.”

“What? I cannot--”

“The Galra will know you helped us, Shay. I’m not leaving you here.”

She smiled. It was the same bright, innocent smile she’d worn when she spoke of the sky, and Hunk felt the same tug in his chest. A soulbond’s pull, he supposed, but he suspected he would have felt the same with or without Shay’s scars painted on his skin.

They ran all the way back to the tunnel off the main shaft where they’d left the shuttle—repaired now; thankfully Hunk had had enough time for that, at least. But this was where their luck ran out. Rax was waiting for them in the tunnel, two dozen sentries behind him.

“Shay!” he shouted, voice sharp with anger. Hunk had tried to be lax with the guy when he was being surly and snappish about the ‘skylings’ and his sister taking foolish risks. He just wanted to protect Shay. Just wanted the strangers to go away and stop angering the Galra. Hunk got it. Really he did. He thought Rax was being a bigger ass about this than he needed to be, but he understood where he was coming from.

Still, Hunk could hve done without the welcoming committee.

“Stop this, Shay,” Rax said. “We must not ally ourselves with these skylings. The Galra will spare us if we stand aside.”

Shay’s jaw clenched. “I will not. I will never side with Galra.”

Hunk saw the impending attack before it came and tugged Shay toward him, summoning his shield. “Run!” he shouted, as lasers filled the air. Coran had already taken off toward the shuttle, leaping for the pilot's seat and the weapons controls. The shuttle was no lion, but anything was better than standing here waiting to be gunned down.

Halfway to the shuttle, Hunk felt a sharp pain in his leg. He thought for an instant he’d been shot, but then Shay was pulled out of his grasp, a tether around her leg dragging her back toward the Galra.

Hunk stumbled to a stop. “Shay!”

“Leave me! Your friend needs you. Go!”

Hunk hesitated, ignoring Coran, behind him, shouting for him to hurry. How could he go? How could he leave Shay to the mercy of the Galra, after she’d risked everything to help him? But the sentries were already closing in between them, their lasers peppering the shuttle’s hull. Much longer, and Hunk would be stranded here with the crystal that would save Lance’s life.

How were you supposed to choose between one soulmate and another?

“Hunk, we have to go, now!”

Hunk made his decision. He turned toward the pod, just for an instant, and smiled at Coran. “Go,” he said, feeling an unexpected calm wash over him. “Take care of Lance for me, okay? And… hurry back.”

Shock washed over Coran’s face, but Hunk didn’t stay to argue. He turned, roared a challenge, and charged toward the Galra holding Shay prisoner, unloading with his hand cannon. Sentries sparked and crumpled around him. Lasers fizzled out on his armor, scorching and bruising but not penetrating. Not yet.

Coran shouted his name, but they both knew he had no choice. Coran was no paladin; even if he stayed, Hunk had still picked an impossible fight. But Coran could save Lance. He could bring the others to help Hunk—assuming Hunk survived that long.

It was only a matter of seconds before the shuttle took off, screaming out of the tunnel and into the wider shaft beyond.

Hunk wished Coran luck, shot down three more sentries, then grabbed Shay’s hand, hauled her to her feet, and took off running. With luck, they would find somewhere to hide until Coran returned with the others. With luck, the Galra wouldn’t consider one stranded paladin enough of a threat to commit to a large-scale search.

Thin hope, but the universe had already handed Hunk five miracles today. He just had to pray there was one more waiting in the wings.

Keith leaped out of the elevator shaft, sword at the ready, but the hallway was empty. Behind him, Pidge dangled for just a moment, long enough to see that Keith wasn’t in immediate danger, and then dropped out of sight, her bayard hissing as she descended to the ground floor to grab Allura.

Sendak’s crystal may have restored power to the castle, but he’d jammed the elevator, and none of them were willing to waste time climbing the stairs to face him. As soon as Pidge had hacked the cameras and located Sendak on the bridge, together with his lieutenant Haxus (testing his energy blade on the Altean architecture), Shiro (hands cuffed behind him), and Lance (unconscious and bloody enough to make Keith’s heart skip a beat), they’d sprinted to the elevator shaft. Once they’d forced the doors, it was easy enough to hitch a ride to the top.

Pidge returned with Allura, and the three of them took a moment to ready themselves. Shiro’s headache pounded at the base of Keith’s skull, but he’d suffered worse. They both had. Keith drew in a deep breath, activated his shield, and led the others onto the bridge.

Keith came in fast and silent, angling the tip of his sword at Haxus’s back. If he could take one of them out quick, this battle would go much more smoothly.

But Haxus was too fast. He dodged aside as Keith struck, shouting an alarm that drew Sendak’s gaze—and Shiro’s. Keith felt Shiro’s eyes following the progress of Keith’s battle with Haxus, heard Pidge and Allura behind him dealing with Sendak.

He couldn’t let any of that distract him. Haxus was all that mattered right now.

Keith pressed forward, never giving Haxus enough room to gain a foothold. He wouldn’t let Haxus go on the offensive. He would not relent, even for a moment. Everywhere Haxus tried to go to escape him, Keith was there, never slowing, never tiring. The pounding in his head and the eyes watching him from the other side of the room kept him moving, tireless and savage.

Then, a burst of pain in his side. Pidge cried out and hit the ground. Keith lost his stride. His eyes wanted to turn, needed to turn, needed to see that Pidge was okay. In his mind he saw her lying crumpled, as still and pale as Lance.

The thought chilled him, and Haxus bore down on him like an avalanche. Keith barely got his sword up in time to meet the attack, and Haxus’s glowing magenta blade radiated heat so intense it seemed to sear Keith’s skin from several inches away.

Grinning, Haxus stepped forward, using his taller frame to his advantage. Keith twisted, deflecting Haxus’s sword to one side as Keith himself dove the other way—but even in this Haxus was faster. His left hand snaked out and caught Keith by the arm, twisting it behind his back until Keith’s bayard clattered to the ground, until he thought his arm was going to snap.

He bit his tongue to keep from shouting, but Shiro grunted, weary, and Pidge shouted in surprise and pain.

The shout became a cry of anger as Pidge’s bayard flashed past Keith, speeding toward Haxus’s face. The Galra released Keith and caught it before the blade reached its mark. A trickle of dark, sticky blood oozed down his wrist from his palm, and he smiled past Keith at Pidge, his mouth open as if to taunt.

One corner of Pidge’s mouth quirked up. Her thumb twitched, and electricity surged down the tether and into Haxus, who screamed.

The sound cut off abruptly as Keith ran him through.

He met Pidge’s eyes and smiled, and she answered in kind.

Allura's cry of pain wipe the smiles from their faces. Forgetting Haxus, Keith turned and saw her lifted high in Sendak’s massive mechanical arm. Her staff hung limp in her grasp, her face contorted in pain as Sendak squeezed. Keith started forward.

“Stop!” Sendak roared. “One more step and I squeeze the life right out of your precious princess.”

Keith froze. Beside him, Pidge growled under her breath, a sound to match Allura’s expression—pissed and dangerous. If Allura hadn’t been trapped in a hand the size of a greyhound, Keith had no doubt she would have taken Sendak’s head off herself.

But they were stuck, all of them useless. Sendak was facing Keith and Pidge, watching for signs of an attack. Neither of them could possibly close the distance before Sendak killed Allura, and Pidge couldn’t fry Sendak without Allura getting caught up in the current.

A blast of laserfire, bright enough to sear Keith’s eyes, lit up the room and exploded against Sendak’s shoulder. He staggered, his grip on Allura faltering.

Keith let the impossibility of it wash over him, but he didn’t dare look at Lance. Not while Sendak still had his feet. Not until this fight was over.

Allura struck with her staff as she fell, smashing the lens of Sendak’s cybernetic eye. He cried out, turning his rage toward Shiro—toward Lance. Keith risked a glance as he ran and saw that Lance had slumped against the console, either fainted or simply too pained to keep his head up. His bayard, inactive once more, dangled from a loose fist.

Shiro moved faster than Keith would have expected, considering the pain he was in. He gained his feet and charged in, catching Keith’s eye as if to say, Get ready.

Sendak raised his massive hand and slapped Shiro across the room, the blow reverberating through Keith’s body. He staggered, and Pidge pulled ahead of him, bayard cutting a neon green line through the air—and through the energy cord that connected Sendak’s prosthetic to his body.

He screamed as the arm fell away, and that gave Keith the moment he needed to recover. He charged, sword flashing, and forced Sendak back toward the eerie purple crystal. It sat squarely within the circle in the floor tiles Allura had said marked the emergency containment shield. Keith and Sendak deadlocked on the threshold for an instant, Keith’s eyes darting to Allura—now hunched over the controls.

She looked up, nodded, and Keith raised his feet to kick off Sendak with all the strength he could muster.

Sendak stumbled back, and the shield rose around him as Keith hit the ground, bruised, exhausted, but alive.

Everything in him wanted to remain there, limp on the floor, but he forced himself to roll over and push himself to his feet. Pidge had already gone to Shiro, slicing through his restraints with the tip of her bayard. Keith’s feet wanted to carry him to them, his two soulmates, both as drawn and bloodied as he himself, but his eyes stuck on Lance.

He wasn’t unconscious, as it turned out. Shaky, sluggish, struggling to sit up—but clearly awake, and clearly in pain.

Keith knelt beside him, catching him as he began to sway. “Lance! You okay?”

Lance’s fingers curled around Keith’s, warm and trembling, and he lifted his head just enough to look Keith in the eye. “What do you know? We do make a good team,” he said with a smile. It was perhaps the first thing Lance had ever said to Keith that sounded completely sincere.

Keith smiled despite himself. “Glad you think so,” he said dryly. “Next time, let’s make a good team when you haven’t been blown halfway to hell.”

Lance laughed, the sound paper-thin, and sagged against Keith. He almost slid right out of Keith’s arms and onto the floor, but Keith quickly shifted his grip, one arm wrapped around Lance’s shoulders, the other—still clasped tight in Lance’s hand—steadying him from the front.

“Next time?” Lance asked. “You gonna… run off again? Hafta make another dramatic entrance?” His words were beginning to slur, and Keith would have been worried if Lance wasn’t wearing that smile, smug and lopsided, like the whole world was a joke and he was the only one in on it. “Cause damn, girl. You worked that runway.”

The words startled a laugh from Keith, brighter and looser than anything he’d felt since the day he heard that Shiro was dead. “You’re delirious, Lance,” he said, though he couldn’t for the life of him keep the smile out of his voice. “God, you’re almost starting to sound like--”

Keith faltered, the breath rushing from his lungs. Lance was by this point too far gone to notice.

You’re almost starting to sound like Blue.

Keith’s arm itched, though he’d seen no words there in days. Of course not. When would Lance have had time to write anything with the chaos that had filled the last few days?

But, no. There was no way. Lance? Whiny, annoying, altogether too much Lance… was Blue? Impossible. Keith was just tired and stressed and dealing with three people’s battle aches, and Lance was delirious. Lance, who flirted with any girl in sight. Who hated Keith’s guts, when he wasn’t drunk on pain and adrenaline. One bad pickup line didn’t make him Keith’s soulmate. That was ridiculous.

Keith stared down at Lance’s face, slack and bloody but not quite as ashen as before. The echo of Lance’s laughter rang in Keith’s ears, still bright and warming despite the situation, and Keith felt his ears burn.

Lance. Was Blue.

Well, shit, he thought, and rested his chin atop Lance’s head.

Chapter 5: Rainbow

Chapter Text

Hunk ran, and kept running, never giving up his grip on Shay’s wrist until the sound of lasers faded into silence.

He was lucky Balmerans had such thick skin, or else Shay’s wrist definitely would have been black and blue by now. As it was, his own skin felt raw, like he’d replaced his gloves with sandpaper.

Releasing Shay, he leaned against the wall of the tunnel and lowered himself to the floor, dropping his head between his knees and trying just to breathe. He wasn’t sure how much of it was the running, how much the panic that came with stranding himself on a Galra-controlled world, but his lungs seemed to have shrunk to half their size.

After a moment, Shay sat beside him, staring at her hands. “Thank you,” she said. “For saving me.”

Hunk laughed, slightly hysterical. “Least I could do, seeing as I’m the one who got you in trouble to start. I mean, you didn’t have to help us, you could have sided with Rax. I wouldn’t have blamed you. I’m a paladin of Voltron, and even I wouldn’t pick a fight with the Galra if I didn’t have a giant alien robocat backing me up.”

“But you do not,” Shay said. Her luminous eyes should have been disconcerting, yellow and pupilless and so like a Galra’s. Instead, he found her gaze warm and comforting, and the knot in his chest began to loosen. “You did not have your lion when you came back for me.”

Hunk hesitated, staring at the Mark on Shay’s foot. “Well… sure. You’re my soulmate.”

“And you mine.” She fell silent, as if that was all that needed saying. And maybe it was.

Hunk leaned his head back against the wall. There was still a twinge of anxiety in his gut, but he was breathing more easily now. Enough that he could take in his surroundings. He didn’t know how far the tunnels ran, but it must have been quite a way considering his blind flight hadn’t let him to any dead-ends. Or maybe that was Shay’s doing. He remembered her nudging him down one tunnel or another a couple times.

However they’d made it here, this area seemed unused. Crystals embedded in the tunnel walls gave enough light to see by, but there was no sign of the Galra—no equipment, no metal pillars bracing the ceiling and walls. Except for whoever had dug this place out, Hunk could easily believe no one had ever set foot in this area.

“Okay,” he said, heaving a sigh to clear the last of his jitters. “Coran made it out with the crystal—I hope—which means he’ll be back to the castle soon. Hopefully the others are through dealing with whoever planted that bomb, so...”

He paused, trying to measure the time it would take to install the new crystal, fix whatever else needed fixing, and call Keith and Pidge back. Hunk doubted Lance would be fighting any time soon, magic Altean healing pod or no, so they’d definitely need the backup.

“We’ve got a few hours till my friends reach us,” he said, “but probably not more than half a day.”

If repairs were going to take longer than that, the others would just come in their lions. Probably. Unless some other disaster had struck while Hunk was away.

Shay nodded, unaware of Hunk’s doubts. “We can endure a half a day,” she said. “The Galra do not venture where Balmera may crush them.”

“Uh… crush?”

Shay smiled mysteriously, then pressed her hand to the wall. “I will know if any draw near. Let us rest a while, and then seek somewhere to shelter for the night. I will show you how to harvest cave root, if you are hungry.”

He wasn’t, actually, not with the anxiety still eating him up. But sleep sounded good. He closed his eyes and let Shay distract him with questions about the sky.

It was obvious from the moment Coran arrived back at the Castle of Lions that something had happened. (Though in all honesty, the stab of pain he’d felt from Allura halfway back was proof enough of that.)

Allura and the paladins met Coran in the pod bay—all except Lance, who was resting in the infirmary. Pidge stared at him, then at the empty copilots seat beside him.

“Where’s Hunk?”

Coran grimaced. He’d had an hour to rehearse this conversation, but he’d found no way to break the news that wouldn’t put them all in a panic. “He found another soulmate,” he said, trying to sound calm. “A Balmeran named Shay. The Galra knew she’d helped us and captured her. Hunk stayed to rescue her.”

“And you just left him there?” Keith growled.

Coran sighed, turning to climb down from the shuttle. He was glad the action hid his face from the others, if only for a moment. He could hardly believe he’d left, either. A paladin Hunk may be, but he was just one human—and a young one at that. “I had to,” he said. “If I’d stayed any longer, the shuttle would have been destroyed. Hunk wanted me to make sure Lance was all right.”

No one looked happy about it, but Shiro forestalled an argument by crossing to the cargo hold. “Let’s just get this crystal unloaded,” he said. “As soon as Lance is in a cryopod, we’ll go get Hunk.”

Shiro looked like he could use a few ticks in a cryopod himself, but Coran knew better than to say so. Shiro, Allura, and Keith lifted the crystal easily, hauling it to the elevator. The castle had power once more, thanks to a corrupted Galra crystal, but Allura had been wary of using that sort of power in an attempt to heal Lance. Coran had to say he agreed.

Twenty minutes later, after Coran suffered a minor heart attack at the sight of Sendak trapped behind a particle barrier on the bridge, the new crystal was installed. The bridge had suffered considerable damage from the explosion, but Allura’s controls and most of the weapons systems were still operational. Delaying only long enough to check the castle’s shields, Allura sent the paladins to their lions and opened a wormhole to the Balmera.

Coran, meanwhile, went down to the infirmary to see to Lance. The boy drifted on the edge of consciousness, occasionally mumbling a few words too slurred to make out. His brow furrowed as Coran set about removing his armor--thankfully, Lance's expression spoke more of confusion than pain.

Once the armor was gone, it was time to trade the reinforced black bodysuit for the thinner medical garb. It was a difficult job, and far too slow for Coran’s liking, but the paladins’ armor was imbued with every protection known to Altea, including several energy-absorbing layers that would have interfered with the cryopod’s work.

But Coran had prepped more than one injured paladin for the cryopod, and he soon had the suit off. The medsuit waited nearby, but Coran’s hands slowed as he caught sight of the Marks laid bare now that Lance wore only his underclothes.

For a moment, Coran forgot about the cryopod. All he could think of were the Marks and what they implied.

He closed his eyes, fighting down a surge of guilt and pity, and snatched up the medsuit. There was nothing to be done about the Marks now, however Coran wanted to take fate’s reigns in his own hands for a time. He dressed Lance quickly, settled him inside the cryopod, and went to help Allura with the battle.

Hiding out on a Galra-occupied Balmera wasn’t nearly as stressful as Hunk would have expected. Mostly it just involved waiting, and talking with Shay. She put her hand to the wall every now and again, twice leading Hunk to a new tunnel when the Galra drifted too close.

Really, it was kind of nice. Hunk told Shay about Earth—his family, his friends, the Garrison—and about finding the Blue Lion and getting dropped in the middle of a ten-thousand-year-old war. In return, Shay spoke of the Balmera. Her people had been slaves of the Galra since long before she was born, forced to mine crystals to power the Empire. The Balmerans were given no food except what they could gather in the tunnels and were never permitted to go to the surface.

“That blows,” Hunk muttered. He’d never been one for swearing, but just then every curse he’d ever heard was running through his head. “Okay, first thing we’re doing after my friends get here and kick the Galra to the curb is stargazing. Then I’m cooking everyone a real meal.”

He paused, realizing he didn’t know how many Balmerans were included in “everyone,” and in any case he didn’t have access to real food. Didn’t matter, though. He’d find a way.

Shay only smiled. “That sounds wonderful.” She reached out for the wall again, her hand glowing with that eerie light. Hunk wished he knew how the Balmera communicated with the Blamerans. Was it a language, something humans couldn’t hear? Or was it a chemical communication system? He wondered if Pidge would have been able to design a translator.

His curiosity faltered as Shay’s smile disappeared.

“Oh, no.”

Hunk summoned his bayard, climbing to his feet before the words were out of Shay’s mouth. “What? What is it? Did they find us? Where are they?”

“No.” Shay’s voice trembled, and she stared up at Hunk with wide, frightened eyes. “It’s… my family. The Galra have taken them.”

Hunk stiffened, then swept away his fear and pulled Shay to her feet. “Where are they holding them? We’ll break them out.”

“But--”

“I don’t know how much longer it’ll be before the others get here. We can’t wait.” He held Shay’s eyes until she nodded and led the way up the tunnel, back toward the enemy.

Hunk couldn’t entirely ignore the fear gathering in his chest, but the motion helped keep it at bay. He wasn’t going to leave Shay’s family in Galra hands, any more than he would have stood by while someone hurt his own family, or Lance’s.

They hurried down empty tunnels, Shay trailing her hand along the wall to avoid patrols and other Balmerans. It seemed to take forever to get to where Rax and Shay’s parents were being held, yet not nearly enough time. Hunk kept expecting to hear Shiro’s voice on the comms, assuring Hunk the team was there to get him.

But the comms stayed stubbornly quiet until Shay pulled Hunk to a stop where the tunnel opened up into a wider chamber.

“They are within,” Shay said. “As are many Galra. What do we do?”

Suddenly Hunk realized Shay was expecting him to take charge. He was a paladin, after all, and she’d been following his lead pretty much since they met. Hunk wanted to laugh. No one should be following him anywhere.

But here they were. Hunk couldn’t falter now. He cautiously leaned around the open door and surveyed the scene. Rax, Shay’s parents, and her grandmother hung suspended by their wrists, metal muzzles over their mouths. Two dozen sentries or more surrounded them, rifles at the ready.

“We can’t just go in guns—er, gun—blazing,” Hunk said. “I’m not going to risk your family getting caught in the crossfire. I’ll have to lure the guards away while you free them.”

“But that will put you in danger!” Shay protested.

“I’ll be fine.”

Shay scowled. “How? You cannot fight so many alone and hope to emerge unscathed.”

She was right, and Hunk knew it, but he didn’t see any other option here. They either risked Hunk or gambled with the lives of Shay’s family—and Hunk wasn’t willing to take that bet.

Then he got an idea. “Hey, Shay? You remember when you said the Galra didn’t go into those deep tunnels because they were afraid of being crushed? What did you mean by that?”

A slow smile spread across Shay’s face. “That,” she said, “is a very clever plan.”

Hunk was glad she thought so, because he wasn’t entirely sure what this very clever plan was. But Shay seemed on board with it, whatever it was. She crouched just behind him, ready to run.

“Can you sever the chains holding my family?” she asked. “It will take me too long to do so myself.”

“Not a problem,” Hunk said, activating his bayard. “I need to get their attention somehow.”

Shay nodded. “Good. Then run.” She pointed back the way they had come. “We will need a short time to rouse the Balmera, but we will help you as soon as we can.”

That seemed to settle the matter for Shay. Hunk wanted to ask for more details, but she seemed to know what she was doing, and Hunk’s part of the plan was easy enough. Provoke and evade.

He took a deep breath, hefted his bayard, and stepped out into the open with a roar of challenge. He opened fire, aiming high, and the laser pellets from his cannon cut through all four chains. Shay’s family dropped to the ground, and the sentries all turned toward Hunk.

A Galra officer at the back of the group spun, gaped, then gestured wildly at Hunk. “The paladin!” he cried. “Seize the paladin—all of you!”

That was Hunk’s cue. Ducking the sudden burst of laserfire, he turned and sprinted back down the tunnel. He passed Shay, hidden behind a rocky pillar, but didn’t slow. The sentries came marching after him, the officer shouting encouragement as they came.

Hunk took corners as he found them, trying to keep as much stone between him and the enemy as he could. He felt bad—the Balmera was a living creature, after all—but he was just one little paladin, and the lasers that did hit packed a punch. His armor was holding up so far, but he didn’t want to push his luck. Shay had said she would need a few minutes.

He still had no clue where he was going, but he tried to stick to narrow, empty tunnels. The sentries had to squeeze through two or three abreast, and the ones behind didn’t dare shoot with so many of their friends in the way.

There was no way to tell how long he’d been running, but his ribs were on fire and his head was beginning to spin when he heard the first rumble in the walls around him.

He stumbled in surprise but managed to keep his feet, which was fortunate, as the floor rose up just behind him. The ceiling began to fall—no. The whole tunnel was constricting, walls closing in on every side. The lasers that had been chasing Hunk petered out, and he heard several cries of alarm.

Hunk turned just in time to see the first sentry get crushed between the walls. Its head twitched, sparks shooting out of its joints, and then its visor went dark as it was compacted into a tangle of metal and wires together with all the other sentries.

Hunk fell back against the wall, a breathless laugh escaping him.

Guess they were right to be afraid of getting crushed, he thought dizzily.

The speaker in his helmet crackled then, and Shiro’s voice came through: “Hunk! Do you copy?”

“Shiro!” Hunk sagged, tension bleeding out of him. “Man, it’s good to hear your voice. How’s Lance?”

“Healing,” Coran said. “Not to worry, Number One. He’s going to be just fine.”

Hunk breathed out. “Good.”

“It is,” said Pidge. “Now how about you worry about yourself?”

“Eh, I’m actually doing all right,” Hunk said with a weak laugh. “Me and Shay’ve got the whole Balmera on our side, so...” He glanced at the remains of the sentries, just twisted lumps of metal falling to the floor as the walls returned to normal. “Shouldn’t take too long to clean this up.”

The Castle of Lions stayed on Shay’s Balmera for several days while Lance slept in the cryopod. Everyone seemed to have something to do to distract themselves, whether training or talking with the Balmerans or repairing the ship. Pidge was up to her ears in analysis of the records she’d stolen from the Galra base, and she had little patience for anyone who dared distract her.

Even Hunk was faring alright, though he spent more time in the pod room than the rest of them. He at least had Shay to drag him away every now and then.

The only one who couldn’t seem to cope was Keith.

He was still reeling, even three days later, still more than half convinced he was making a fuss over nothing. Lance couldn’t be his soulmate. The very notion was absurd. Lance hated Keith. They couldn’t last five minutes together without a fight. It wasn’t that Lance was a bad person—hell, he’d shielded Coran from the explosion, and almost died for it. And Keith hadn’t forgotten that Lance’s first instinct when faced with the Arusians was to knit them sweaters. If anything, he was too nice for his own good.

The problem wasn’t Lance, it was that Lance was the embodiment of everything that got on Keith’s nerves. He talked too much, he turned everything into a joke, he flirted with anything that moved.

Well, not quite anything. He’d certainly never flirted with Keith, delirium and soulbonds (hypothetical soulbonds) aside. Keith was ashamed to admit that it stung.

But if Lance was Blue, if Lance was the greatest constant in Keith’s life, then… Then what? he asked himself. Then Keith was ready to dive in headfirst? Then the constant fighting didn’t matter? Keith wasn’t that much of a romantic. He knew he didn’t have the patience to put up with Lance’s… everything.

But he wanted to try. He had to try. The quiet moment after the battle with Sendak had awoken a longing in Keith he hadn’t felt since he’d cut off contact with Blue. A longing for connection, for companionship with the first person to ever make him feel like he didn’t need to earn the relationship.

More than once, Keith found himself wandering into the pod room just to look at Lance. Sometimes Hunk was there, and Keith could pretend he’d come to keep Hunk company. Sometimes, it was just Keith and Lance and the cream-colored medsuit that covered Lance’s wrist, where a pair of tiny pilot wings would be if Keith was right.

(He had to be right. Lance had been chosen by the Blue Lion for god’s sake. If that wasn’t the universe shoving the Lance/Blue connection in Keith’s face, then he didn’t know what was.)

Keith was glad for the suit, though, even as he wanted to burn it for hiding the answer Keith so desperately needed. Peeking at someone’s Marks while they were sleeping felt like an invasion of privacy, even if the Mark in question was—might be—his own. It was for that reason that Keith stubbornly resisted the urge to draw a line across the back of his hand, just to see what happened.

Well. That, and he was scared.

He was ashamed to admit it, but Keith had always been a little afraid of his pen pal. Afraid to say the wrong thing, afraid of getting too attached, afraid to make Blue realize he could do much better than Keith.

Still, when Coran finally called them all to the pod room with news that Lance was finally ready to wake up, Keith sprinted all the way from the training deck. Only Allura and Hunk beat him there, and Allura had probably had advanced warning, considering she actually knew how these pods worked. Keith slowed at the door, trying to hide the fact that he was out of breath, and hoped no one noticed anything out of the ordinary.

Even if Lance was Blue, that didn’t mean everyone else needed to know. Keith had to talk to Lance first, find out whether Lance was even interested in acting on their soulbond, which he probably wasn’t. Maybe he could forgive a year of silence, maybe, but he was bound to be disappointed when he saw it was Keith and not someone gorgeous and charming, like Allura.

While they waited for Shiro and Pidge to arrive, Keith tried to figure out how best to tell Lance what he knew (thought he knew.)

At length, they were all gathered, and Keith turned at once to open Lance’s pod.

Allura grabbed his wrist. “Hold your yelmores, Keith. The cycle isn’t complete yet—just a few more ticks.”

“What difference does a couple of ticks make?” he asked, and when Allura failed to answer immediately, Keith pulled his hand free and pressed the big red button that was a universal symbol for stop.

The screen flashed, and the pod opened with a faint puff of vapor. Lance groaned, his face scrunching up in a way that was altogether too adorable, and for an instant Keith forgot what he was doing. So when Lance collapsed, Allura was a fraction of a second faster than Keith, catching Lance before he hit the floor.

Keith’s hands were outstretched to help, but he snatched them back as Lance found his balance and glanced around at them all.

“Hey, guys. Who’s the party for?”

“Lance!” Hunk cried. He didn’t quite shove Allura aside to get to Lance, but it was a near thing, and the hug he gave Lance was tight enough Keith half expected it to land Lance right back in the cryopod.

Instead Lance laughed, a little winded, and returned Hunk’s hug. He seemed utterly unruffled at being lifted clear off his feet and just sort of flopped against Hunk, smiling sleepily. “It’s good to see you, too…?”

“How much do you remember?” Shiro asked.

Hunk gently set Lance back on his feet, though he hovered nearby. Over the last several days, the vicious blue Mark on Hunk's temple had dwindled, growing smaller and fainter as the cryopod did its work. Now all that remained was a faint blue crescent near his hairline. The blue of Hunk’s Mark—the same blue as the Marks on Keith’s skin, though that didn’t necessarily prove anything—was too vivid for even the most faded of scars to disappear the way the green Mark on Keith’s lip had faded, but now it looked much less like something that had almost killed one of their friends.

Lance furrowed his brow, staring at the floor. “I remember the party. I left to get some air, and me and Coran ended up on the bridge talking about… stuff.” He glanced quickly at Coran, smiling faintly. “Next thing I know, Allura’s catching me. I told you I’d fallen for you,” he added with a wink for Allura, who rolled her eyes.

“I see you’re back to normal,” she said, turning away. Only once her back was to Lance did she let a small smile show. “It sounds like we have a lot to tell you, but perhaps it would be best if you get something to eat first. The cryopods do tend to leave you a bit famished.”

“A bit famished?” Lance scoffed. “I could eat a horse!”

Allura frowned, glancing at Coran. “I’m afraid we don’t have any... horse in the castle storerooms,” she began, and Lance laughed so hard he fell against Hunk.

“It’s an expression,” Shiro explained. “We don’t actually eat horses.”

“Oh.” Allura flushed, but it was obviously hard for her to remained embarrassed when Lance was in such a good mood. Everyone was grinning; Lance’s laugh was infectious, and the castle had been far too quiet without it the last few days.

Even Keith smiled as they all relocated to the dining hall and Hunk got Lance a bowl of food goo. Soon Keith would have to talk to Lance. That looming disaster twisted him up inside, but he claimed a spot on the table near Lance—not as close as Hunk, of course, but close enough to see the lines around Lance’s eyes that he hid with wide smiles as Hunk and Pidge and Allura caught him up on everything he had missed.

When they finished, Lance propped his cheek on his hand. “Wow,” he said, watching as the mice ate food goo off his spoon. “Sounds like I missed a lot. Sorry for leaving you guys hanging.”

“Don’t worry about it,” said Shiro. “We’re all just glad you’re okay.”

“I’m glad I’m okay, too.” Lance chuckled, but this time his happiness didn’t seem quite as effortless. He gave Keith a charged smile, something brittle behind his eyes. “I hope this means you aren’t gonna charge off on any more solo adventures, Keith.”

The unease that had been building in Keith’s chest began to coagulate into a fear he didn’t have a name for. “Hey,” he said sourly. “We came back, didn’t we?”

“Yeah, yeah.” Lance turned to Pidge, his smile a little brighter than the one he'd offered Keith. “Did you find anything on your family?”

She nodded enthusiastically. “They weren’t at the base we went to; that was just a kind of Galra transit center. But I think I found the prisons they were sent to.”

“Prisons?” Lance frowned. “Plural?”

Her smile faltered. “They were split up.”

“But it’s okay now,” said Shiro, placing a hand on her shoulder. “We know where they are, and as soon as we’re all rested and ready to go, we’re going to go rescue them.”

Pidge looked up at him, electric smile blinding, then glanced cautiously at Lance. “Sorry about leaving...”

But Lance just fluttered a hand at her and went back to watching the mice. “Don’t worry about it, Gunderson. We’re cool. You had a perfectly good reason to go running off. Family’s gotta come first.”

The implication behind Lance's words made Keith's face burn.

Pidge sensed it too, and she crossed her arms. “Keith had a perfectly good reason to come along,” she said in a warning tone. “He’s my soulmate. And anyway, I wouldn’t have made it to the control room without him.”

Lance’s expression stilled, his eyes darting to Keith. “Soulmates, huh.” His voice was oddly flat, and Keith felt an inexplicable desire to justify the Marks on his skin. But Lance just shrugged and smiled fixedly at the table. “That’s neat.”

This wasn’t the way this conversation was supposed to go. Keith didn’t know what he’d done to make Lance hate him, but there was no way a conversation about their own soulbond would go well as long as Lance was like this.

Heart in his throat, Keith leaned forward. “When Pidge needed me, I was there. When you needed me, I came back.”

“Yeah, and did what? It sounds like the mice were more useful than you.” Lance held out a finger toward the mice, cooing at them and gently petting their backs.

Keith’s stomach felt like a tangled mess. What had happened to the Lance he’d seen after the fight with Sendak? The Lance who smiled so openly, who called them a team, who flirted with him? Sure, the pain had probably had him more than a little confused, but confusion didn’t explain away the hostility in Lance’s eyes now every time he glanced at Keith, or the fact that he seemed determined to look at Keith as infrequently as possible.

“Oh, come on!” Keith cried, his inner turmoil bleeding into his voice. “We had a bonding moment! I cradled you in my arms!”

Lance’s smile turned cold. “Really,” he said, his voice oozing venom. “A bonding moment?” He laughed, and the sound froze Keith where he was. He’d begun to reach for his glove, ready to bare his wrist and be done with it.

Lance beat him to it—but it wasn’t his left sleeve he pushed up. It was his right, and when he thrust his bare wrist out for Keith to see, there wasn’t a pair of pilot’s wings there but a small, bright red Mark, right where Lance’s thumb met his wrist. Right where Pidge and Shiro had a Mark that same shade of red, the color of Keith’s lion.

“How’s that for a bonding moment?” Lance asked. There was something sharp behind his words, but before Keith could figure it out, Lance had pushed away his bowl of food goo. “Sorry, princess, but I’ve lost my appetite.”

Before Allura could say anything, before any of them could say anything, Lance was out the door.

Lance’s first day at the Garrison had not gone well.

He got lost in the sprawling complex of buildings and arrived late to Intro to Astrophysics, earning a tongue-lashing from the instructor that left him flustered and frantic. When she’d called on him to answer a question about stellar classifications from the pre-term readings, Lance’s high-wired brain had deserted him, cementing his reputation, once again, as class dunce. Never mind that he’d passed the Garrison’s rigorous entrance exams. Never mind he remembered the reading as soon as some snooty German girl answered the instructor’s question.

But that was just the first class, and Lance was still beyond excited just to be here. How long had he dreamed of going into space? How hard had he worked to prepare for the entrance exams? He was not going to let a bad first impression ruin this for him.

His stubborn optimism stuck with him through the brutal first day of physical training. The upperclassman who’d led Lance’s orientation tour had called it boot camp, and Lance was beginning to see why. Before today, he would have considered himself pretty athletic. Not major league material, but maybe high school varsity.

After a three mile run, an obstacle course, more push-ups, sit-ups, chin-ups, and ladders than he could count, and a positively brutal hand-to-hand spar against the instructor, Lance was dead on his feet—and the day was only half over.

The new cadets trudged to the commissary for lunch—colorless mush and hard dinner rolls—and gathered in clusters to complain about the curriculum.

“They’re trying to break us,” Lance complained to Sala, Jen, and Marcus, three of his classmates he’d struck up a quick friendship with. “That’s the only explanation. Trying to thin the herd.”

It was at about this moment that he ran smack into Keith Kogane and only narrowly avoided spilling Garrison gruel all down the back of Kogane’s uniform. Sala gasped, Jen cringed, and Marcus laughed aloud. Lance just stared, mortified, as Kogane rounded on him, his eyebrow twitching.

“Sorry, man,” Lance said quickly. “I wasn’t looking where I was going. I’m dead on my feet after that obstacle course.” He laughed, a wordless offer of truce, but Kogane wasn’t having any of it.

“If you’re already having trouble on day one, maybe you should reconsider your career path.” The words had no real venom to them, which might have made it worse. The guy wasn’t trying to insult Lance; he was just offering some helpful advice to the poor schmuck who was in over his head.

Lance resisted the urge to slam his lunch tray down on the nearest table in a dramatic display of indignation. Instead, he settled for a smile. “You do realize we’re going to be sorted into squads at some point, right? You might wanna work on your people skills before then.”

If Kogane didn’t hate him before that, Lance’s words shoved him over the metaphorical cliff. His face tightened and he raised a finger to jab at Lance’s chest. “If you want to make friends and have a good time, be my guest. I’m here to fly.”

He waited, but Lance was too busy staring at Kogane’s hand to reply. There on his thumb was a pale, raised scar, maybe a quarter inch long. Lance wouldn’t have noticed it if it wasn’t hovering six inches from his nose, but he recognized it at once and forcibly kept his gaze off his own hand. His uniform sleeve covered the matching red Mark, as long as Lance didn’t get too enthusiastic with his hand gestures, but he couldn’t help feeling as if the Mark was bared for all the world to see.

Lance locked eyes with Kogane and felt something inside him shrivel up. For years he’d told himself that it didn’t matter if his soulmates didn’t all reciprocate. It didn’t mean they couldn’t still be friends. After all, there were plenty of people in his life he cared about, people who cared about him, and none of them bore each other’s scars.

The way Kogane wrinkled his nose and stalked away, though, Lance thought this particular soulbond had taken a very wrong turn.

He stumbled through the rest of the day, fuming on and off about Keith Kogane. Once the initial shock of finding a not-quite-soulmate wore off, Lance was able to set aside his wounded pride and admit that neither one of them had made a very good first impression.

That was fine. They were going to be classmates for the next four years; Lance would have plenty of chances to prove himself. And once they both made it into the fighter pilot program (which they would, obviously—Kogane was a jerk, but he’d made the fastest times in physical training and didn’t bat an eye whenever an instructor called on him in class), they’d have even more chances to bond.

By the end of the day, Lance had a plan in place. He was going to be the best damn pilot cadet Keith Kogane had ever seen. Once Lance started beating him at his own game, Kogane would have to admit Lance was more than a piece of gum on the bottom of his shoe.

Though… at the moment he felt more like the used piece of gum, and as soon as he made it back to his dorm he flopped backwards onto his bed with a dramatic groan.

His roommate, Hunk, looked over curiously. The big guy’s flight had been delayed, so he’d gotten in late last night, and they’d barely had time to talk this morning before heading off to their separate classes—Hunk was an engineer, as it turned out. He was a cool guy, though, and Lance was already pretty sure they were gonna be best buds.

“Long day?” Hunk asked.

Lance was about to laugh and toss out some fluffy excuse about the early morning and terrible food, but one glance at Hunk’s face said he actually cared about Lance’s mood.

Feeling a little bit better already—nothing like a sympathetic ear to make even the heaviest clouds lighter—Lance sat up and started picking at the laces on his boots. “Eh, you know. Tough classes, brutal boot camp, instructors from hell. Ran into a jerk in the cafeteria—that didn’t help anything.”

Hunk made a disgruntled noise as Lance tossed his shoes across the room and reached for his socks. Sweaty feet weren’t helping his mood any.

“Sorry you had a bad day,” Hunk said.

“Not your fault.”

“Still… We should relax tonight. What do you say? Movie night? Video games? What’s your favorite way to—” Hunk choked on his words, letting out a shout that might have been surprise or fear or sudden asphyxiation. “Oh my god, Lance!”

Lance looked up, frowning. The ear-splitting grin on Hunk’s face was not at all enlightening. “What? You look like somebody just handed you a box of kittens.”

Hunk shook his head emphatically, then ripped the sock off his right foot and thrust it into Lance’s lap.

For a moment, Lance was too confused to do anything but stare at Hunk’s foot, then up at Hunk himself, who was leaning back, his hand on his desk chair for balance. Lance looked down again, and then he saw it—a scar, pale and shiny on Hunk’s dark skin. Little lines like a hundred cat scratches trailing from calf to ankle and down onto the foot itself.

Lance’s toes curled, and he looked down at his sunshine yellow Mark in disbelief.

“We’re… soulmates?” Lance asked, hardly daring to believe it. But Hunk was nodding again, and somehow managing to grin even wider. Tears gathered in Lance’s eyes, and he launched himself at Hunk, forgetting the foot still in his lap, forgetting that Hunk was balanced precariously against his chair.

They toppled, but before Lance could formulate an apology Hunk was laughing, wrapping Lance in a crushing hug that reminded him of home.

“I take it back,” Lance said into Hunk’s chest, his voice more than a little wobbly. “Best. Day. Ever.”

Lance knew it was only a matter of time before someone came to find him after his tantrum in the dining hall. He’d gone to his room and shut off the lights, hoping he might be able to convince the others he was sleeping, but he was too wired to rest. He expected Shiro to show up at any second, all quiet concern and empty comfort for a problem he didn’t know about—and wouldn’t know about, as long as Lance had his say.

If not Shiro, Lance figured Keith was the next best bet. He’d show up angry and gearing for a fight, just like he always was, and Lance would give it to him. He wondered how bad he’d have to screw up before he got himself kicked off the team.

But it wasn’t Shiro or Keith who came knocking on Lance’s bedroom door ten minutes after he abandoned his breakfast to the mice.

“Lance? Are you in there?” Coran’s voice was timid, and more sympathetic than Lance would have expected. “I need to talk to you.”

Lance considered ignoring Coran, but he had nothing against the guy. Not after their talk on the bridge, Coran offering Lance a shoulder to cry on when the homesickness was too much to ignore. Aside from Hunk, Coran was the only person Lance might have talked to right now, though neither of them could be allowed to know just how messed up Lance was.

Well good job with that, he thought bitterly. Maybe next time don’t go flashing your Marks for the whole castle to see.

Groaning, Lance rolled out of bed, turned on the lights, and opened the door to let Coran in. “Sorry,” Lance said quickly. “Guess I’m still kinda tired after getting blown up. I shouldn’t have snapped like that.”

“I’m not here to reprimand you, Lance,” Coran said softly. He paused, still standing by the door as Lance returned to the bed and sat against the wall, hugging his pillow to his chest. It wasn’t much of a shield, but the cryopod had left him hollowed out. “I saw the Marks.”

Lance’s head shot up and he stared at Coran, his mouth running dry. He wanted to laugh it off, wanted to paste a smile on his face and pretend he was fine, the way he always did. He knew someone must have changed him into the soft, white medsuit, but somehow he’d managed to hope it had been some kind of robot nurse.

“Yeah?” Lance asked weakly. “What about them?”

Guilt flashed across Coran’s face, and he crossed to the foot of Lance’s bed, sitting so they didn’t have to face each other directly. He seemed to be having nearly as much trouble figuring out what to say as Lance, which helped take the edge of awkwardness off.

Then Coran looked at him, his eyes steady, his lips turned down into a faint frown. “How many soulmates do you have, Lance?”

Lance’s heart constricted painfully, and he stared down at the red Mark peeking out beneath the sleeve of his jacket, near the ordinary scar Lance had from running through a plate glass door once when he was chasing his cousin. The other Marks dotted across his body seemed to prickle—all of them either covered by his clothes or painted over with one of the few brands of concealer Lance had found that could mask a Soulmark.

He hesitated, reluctant to speak aloud what he’d kept bottled up for most of his life. But Coran was still watching him, looking very much like he wanted to reach out and hug Lance.

Lance stared at his knees as he spoke. “Nine.”

Coran blew out a sharp breath, surprise tangible in the silence. Not that Lance expected any different. A handful of people had three soulmates. Lance had heard rumors of people who had four or—in one story—even five. He’d never heard of anyone who had nine.

“And… how many reciprocate?” Coran asked.

Lance’s hand closed around his left wrist, fingertips pressing against the red pilot wings tattooed on his skin. He felt his pulse there, slow and solemn. He tried to remember the last thing Red had said to him. It had been more than a year ago now, and of course at the time Lance hadn’t known it would be the last words he’d see. Red had never been very talkative, sometimes going silent for weeks at a time before he suddenly responded to Lance’s morning greetings with an apology and a veritable essay on Lance’s arm.

Lance had often wondered, this last year, whether it was possible to fall out of love with a soulmate. Whether Red had un-reciprocated somewhere along the line. Whether Lance’s words even reached him anymore.

“Just one,” he told Coran. “Just Hunk.”

“Oh, Lance.”

It was the pain in Coran’s voice that brought the familiar painted-on smile crashing back down on Lance’s face. “It’s okay, though,” he said, and almost sounded as if he believed it. “It’s like I told my brother and sister back home: they don’t need to feel my pain. I wouldn’t want them too. I’m the big brother, and it’s my job to look out for them.”

Coran laid his hand on Lance’s elbow, and the touch threatened to break through Lance’s mask. “Do you know who they are?”

“Not my pen pal—romantic soulmate.” Lance felt a twinge of pain. He couldn’t very well call Red a pen pal if it wasn’t reciprocated. “But the others...” He pushed his sleeves up to his elbows and started counting. “Luz and Mateo, obviously, they’re the white and orange ones. And Hunk. Keith. Saw his scar the first day we met.” He tapped the red Mark on his thumb, then moved to a small electric green burn Mark on his forearm. “Pidge. She’s got a scar on her lip she thinks no one notices, but I had a whole year at the Garrison to recognize it.”

It had hurt a little, trying so hard to make his communications officer give him a chance and always getting brushed off. Though in retrospect, that probably had more to do with Pidge’s real purpose in coming to the Garrison, and the secrets she was keeping, than anything Lance had done. More than once, Lance had considered foregoing the concealer and letting Pidge see his Mark, but he’d restrained himself.

Lance lifted his hand to his nose, rubbing at the slightly tacky patch of old concealer. “Shiro. Didn’t figure that one out till I saw him in the tent after he crash-landed on Earth. And I mean, I would have rescued him anyway, the guy’s been my hero for ages, but once I knew he was my soulmate, too?” Lance blew out a long breath.

That had been the worst part, he thought. That year of compounding Marks. He sometimes woke up to a dozen new ones, most of which never quite went away, but he never felt any pain. He wished he had—wished he could have taken on some of his pseudo-soulmate’s pain. Everyone knew people with pain pals had a higher pain tolerance, but most people figured it was just the result of feeling so much more pain over the course of your lifetime.

Lance thought there was more to it than that. When you split the pain across two bodies, didn’t it stand to reason that both of you only felt half as much?

“You and Allura make nine,” Lance said, smiling thinly at Coran. He tapped a pair of overlapping marks, pink and aquamarine, the colors of the Altean markings that framed Allura and Coran’s eyes.

“Everyone in this castle is your soulmate,” Coran said. There was a note of something incongruous in his voice. If he didn’t know better, Lance would have called it pride.

But there was nothing to be proud about here. A pathetic little boy so desperate for attention he latched on to everyone around him as his soulmates, even though it was obvious there was nothing substantial between them. A sentimental crybaby trying not to take it personally that no one but Hunk reciprocated.

Not that he could tell the others that, of course. He’d made a mistake showing Keith his Mark, and now there was sure to be trouble. Lance knew the others weren’t heartless people; they’d just already filled up their quota of soulmates. Even if they hadn’t, Lance didn’t want them to feel guilty about the Marks, any more than he wanted them to have to put up with his pain.

It was better this way, he told himself. What would have happened if the whole team had felt it when Lance got caught in that explosion? Pidge and Keith had been in Galra territory; if they’d been knocked flat the same way Hunk was, they could have been killed.

The thought made him wish he could go home, even as it made the castle itself feel like home. He wanted to cry. He wanted to laugh. He loved his soulmates, and he hated them for not reciprocating, and he hated himself most of all for being so selfish.

“Pretty cool, right?” Lance said to Coran, tugging his sleeves back down to cover the criss-crossing scars that painted a rainbow on his body. He kept his smile bright and his tone upbeat, refusing to let Coran think he needed pity.

Still, Lance had to wonder which was broken: the universe, or just him.

Chapter 6: Heartstrings

Notes:

Trigger warning for violence and character death in this chapter. More details (which include minor spoilers for this chapter and the next) and what part to skip if needed can be found here.

Chapter Text

“Are you sure you don’t want to come with us?” Hunk asked. He tried not to sound like he was pressuring Shay—she had to make the choice that was right for her; Hunk got that. But he couldn’t deny that he would have loved to have her on the castle-ship with him. It had barely been a week, but Hunk already considered her one of his best friends. She was sweet and funny and clever—and she’d been the one who always knew just what to say to comfort or cheer or distract him when he’d spent too long staring at Lance’s cryopod.

Even more importantly, Lance and Shay had hit it off at once. Despite Lance’s vocabulary being at least twenty-five percent pop culture references Shay didn’t get, they seemed to have a knack for making each other laugh. Maybe it was that Lance’s stories of his brother and sister and the other little cousins back home reminded Shay of her brother Rax, who often watched the Balmeran younglings. Maybe it was that Lance and Shay both had that indefinable openness about them that made them instantly likeable.

Whatever the case, Hunk was thrilled to see his soulmates getting along. They’d spent their last night on the Balmera gathered around a cookfire, Hunk in charge of dinner, Lance and Shay trading scary stories. Balmeran ghost stories were consierably more intense than anything Lance had in his arsenal, so Lance spent most of the evening clutching Hunk’s arm, which Shay seemed to find amusing—but he snuck up on her once with the fibrous tendrils of caveroot and a near-perfect imitation of the hissing of the monster from her last story.

Shay had screamed and flung the caveroot against the wall, Lance collapsed in a fit of mirth, and before Hunk could worry too much that Lance had crossed a line, Shay was laughing, too.

They stood now just outside the castle-ship. Allura was saying goodbye to the handful of Balmerans who had come to the surface to see them off, Shiro beside her. Everyone else was already inside.

Shay smiled at Hunk, bending down to kiss his cheek. “I would very much like to accompany you, Hunk,” she said. “But my people have much to rebuild in the wake of the Galra occupation. I am needed here.”

“You’re right,” he said, squaring his shoulders. “Anyway, I’m sure we’ll come back this way eventually.”

“I should hope so.” Shay grinned shyly, taking a reluctant step back. “Your princess gave my grandmother a device with which we may call for aid, and...” Shay didn’t blush—or at least, Hunk had never seen her blush—but she seemed suddenly bashful, playing with the bone ring that dangled from her carapace. “She said we may use it to stay in touch, as well.”

Hunk perked up. “What, like alien Skype dates?”

Shay tilted her head to the side, frowning slightly. “What are… Skype dates?”

“Oh, uh. Earth thing. I meant we can talk to each other whenever we want?”

“Yes.” The glow in Shay’s eyes brightened. “You will call me often, I hope?”

“Every chance I get.”

Shay smiled and hugged him, and he reluctantly trudged up the ramp to where the others were waiting. Pidge gave him a smile that would have looked perfectly at home on Lance’s face.

“Are you finally done saying goodbye to your girlfriend?” she asked.

Hunk flushed, glad Shay was too far away to hear. “She’s not my girlfriend,” he said, crossing his arms. “We’re pain pals.”

Pidge and Lance exchanged smirks. Behind them, Keith rolled his eyes and headed for the elevator. “All right, well I've got better things to do. Let me know when we're ready to go.”

Hunk considered following him, if only to get away from the teasing, but before he could, Shiro and Allura appeared at the top of the ramp.

Pidge instantly abandoned her efforts to tease Hunk, looking suddenly serious. She shivered in anticipation as Shiro and Allura turned toward her. "Are we ready?"

"Just about," said Allura. "Coran finished the repairs this morning, but we can't test the weapons systems or the teludav until we clear the atmosphere."

Pidge didn't quite pout, but she came close, crossing her arms and staring at Allura with narrowed eyes. "So...?"

"One of your hours," Allura said. "Then we're going to find your brother."

Nine days had passed since Matt found out Shiro was still alive. Nine days—the first he’d counted since he was sent to this place. The tedious work and strict schedule made one day blend into another, and the climate inside the work camp enclosure didn’t vary enough to suggest the passage of seasons.

But now... Now everything had changed.

Matt still worked, of course. There was no faster way to raise suspicion than to break routine, and if Matt was going to have any chance of getting out of this place alive, he needed the guards to remain complacent. This was the place they sent all their sick and injured prisoners, the ones who posed little risk of rebellion. Matt and the other prisoners were put to work sewing uniforms, sorting through scrap metal for usable salvage, and other menial tasks that required no skill and little physical labor.

All in all, Matt had been lucky. He knew there were far worse places in the Galra Empire to be held prisoner—places like the Arena; places, probably, like wherever his father had been sent.

But a prison was still a prison, and the Galra offered their slaves little food and even less medical care. A few bandages, the occasional antibiotic. Those who arrived ill died quickly, and the injured dealt with their wounds as best they could. The other prisoners had cared for Matt when he arrived, keeping the cut on his leg relatively clean. Matt knew their efforts were all that had kept infection at bay. Without them, he probably would have lost the leg. As it was, he walked with a limp—but he was alive, and Shiro was alive, and he woke each morning to a new message on his arm.

Shiro’s messages faded over time, but he rarely washed them away entirely, so Matt’s skin was covered in strata of encouragement, reassurance, and declarations of love.

Matt kept the arm covered at all times. Other prisoners sometimes had marks appear, and the guards rarely noticed or cared, but this was one thing Matt didn’t want to share with his captors. Shiro’s words were his own personal treasure, and he looked at them only when he could be sure no one else was reading over his shoulder.

Over the last nine days, Matt had been planning an escape—or at least trying to. With his limited mobility, meager combat training, and complete lack of resources (uniforms and scrap metal notwithstanding), his options were limited. If he’d had his sister’s skill with robots, he might have stood a chance at hacking a sentry or two; with something more than scrap as material, he might have built himself a gun. But given his circumstances, the best he’d come up with was grabbing the heaviest piece of metal he could find and bludgeoning every Galra between him and the hangar, then trying to steal a ship.

Fortunately, good news came before he could put his suicidal plan into action.

omw

To anyone else here, the letters on his arm wouldn’t have meant much, might even have looked like meaningless scribbles. The Galra might have been able to read English because of their translators, but he doubted their technology could decipher textspeak.

But to Matt, it was a promise. On my way. Matt’s heart was in his throat all day, and he could hardly focus on the tasks assigned to him, every sound making him tense in anticipation of a rescue. He didn’t know when or how Shiro was coming—it might be days before he got here, guns blazing, or he might already be inside the prison complex, ready to sneak Matt away.

Let it be soon, Matt thought, the hope an almost unbearable pressure in his chest after drifting so long. Just let it be soon.

Allura had given the paladins an hour to "rest" before they went to find Matt Holt. Everyone had their own way of passing the time: Pidge was off with Hunk, making a few final modifications on the little drone she called Rover. Lance didn’t understand the technical side of it, but he got that it was tricky, and Lance being there asking questions probably wouldn’t help. Keith was off who knew where, probably training again, never mind they were about to go into battle. He’d call it a warmup if Lance confronted him about it—not that Lance planned on doing any such thing—and Shiro was either up on the bridge helping with preparation, or hiding in his room writing to Matt.

At least Shiro knows his pen pal has a legitimate reason for never writing back, Lance thought, and immediately felt guilty for it. Matt and Shiro weren’t lucky in any way, and it was rotten of Lance to be jealous of them.

Still, he couldn’t resist the urge to shrug out of his jacket and push up his sleeve. He didn’t honestly expect to find anything, not after all this time, but the curiosity was like an addiction. It popped up from time to time, soft and sneaky, latching onto Lance’s mind and refusing to let go until he caved.

There was nothing on his arm, of course, just the red pilot wings. Lance used to wonder what they signified. Romantic Soulmarks often had something to do with the way pen pals first met, or something important that they shared. Lance used to think he would meet his soulmate at the Garrison, or that maybe Red would one day be Lance’s co-pilot. That was before Red stopped talking, before Lance took an express flight to space and cut off ties with literally every eligible pilot on Earth.

Lance went on staring at his blank arm, fighting the urge to try one more time to write to someone who might not even see his words. But with Shiro and Matt’s reunion creeping ever closer, Lance couldn’t find it in him to resist.

Swearing, he yanked open the nightstand drawer and pulled out a pen. He’d hunted it down his second day in the castle, figuring as long as Alteans had soulmates, they had to have some way to write to them, even if everything else was digital.

He’d found the pen without much trouble, then promptly stashed it in the drawer in hopes of forgetting it existed.

Now he held it between thumb and forefinger and wiggled it back and forth, trying to think of something clever to say. It was hard to come up with a new pickup line every day—harder still to think of good ones, ones worthy of his soulmate. He’d started flirting with strangers several years ago mostly as a way to field test new lines before he embarrassed himself with Red. Since then, the strangers had drawn more and more of his attention (they were there, after all, and they responded), but he still only passed on the best of the best to Red.

Except it had been more than a week since Lance had had a chance to flirt with anyone besides Allura, who never reacted to his lines except occasionally with an eye-roll. Lance had tried his luck with Shiro and Hunk, too (less out of real attraction than desperation for an audience.) Shiro had shut him down, kind but firm, and Hunk thought every one of Lance’s lines was amazing.

It didn’t help, and now that Lance had finally decided to yield to the urge to strike up another one-sided conversation with his soulmate, he found he didn’t even know where to begin.

Well, time was limited here, and Red hadn’t exactly put a lot of effort into this relationship lately. Lance figured he was allowed to slack off, just this once.

With a deep breath, he set pen to skin and started writing.

Hey there, beautiful. Hope your week’s going better than mine.

Keith stared at his arm in mute horror.

The little blue letters stared back at him, silently accusing.

The gladiator he’d been fighting (a level one; he wasn’t about to risk an injury right before they went in for Matt) stood deactivated nearby, its dead gaze unnerving. Keith had been in the middle of a light spar when he’d noticed the writing on his arm, and he’d promptly forgotten how to breathe.

It was lucky level ones didn’t hit very hard, because Keith hadn’t even seen the staff swinging until it hit him in the sternum.

Now he stood off to the side of the training deck, his thoughts rushing like they were trying to achieve flight.

Lance, said the loudest voice. Lance is Blue is Lance is Lance.

The rest of him was scarcely more coherent. His soulmate was writing to him. His soulmate could write to him. The distance wasn’t an issue, after all. Unless Blue really was Lance, somehow, never mind that Lance's Mark matched Keith’s scar perfectly and no one— no one— had two kinds of bond with the same person.

But Blue was writing, and Keith was standing in the open in a t-shirt, where anyone walking by could see the writing.

Feeling suddenly jittery, Keith dashed into the prep room for his jacket, then hurried back to his room and locked the door before, cautiously, removing the jacket and reading the words once more. There were more of them now, the letters small and cramped, like Blue was saving room for a monologue—or like he was afraid of covering Keith’s arms in unwanted Marks.

Sorry, that sounded less pathetic in my head. My week’s actually been pretty awesome, all things considered. It’s just been long, and I kinda just wish it was summer already so I could take a break. You know? There’s too much going on, and I guess I just needed to rant about it.

There was nothing after that, and nothing appeared as Keith watched. He wondered if Blue was finished ranting, or if he was waiting for Keith to give him permission.

Funny. He’d never asked permission before.

Keith read the words twice more, searching for something that would say it was Lance on the other side of the link. He could almost make himself believe it, but the words were so mundane. Any high school student might have written them, tired of homework and tests and unforgiving teachers. It sounded nothing like Lance.

Lance was… big. Keith didn’t know what other word to use to sum up all that Lance was. He was loud and talkative and confident, charismatic enough to make friends with everyone and egotistical enough that he didn’t mind making enemies. Blue, on the other hand, sounded very small. Tentative, even, and that was one thing Keith could never associate with Lance.

The words remained on his skin, as much an invitation as Keith was ever going to get, and for the first time in a long time he felt the urge to respond.

He searched the room for a pen, found none, and swore. He knew the castle had pens—Shiro had found one, somewhere, to talk to Matt. Lance had one, too, apparently. If this was Lance, which it wasn’t. Keith was just deluding himself because he’d gone and developed a crush on the one person in the universe he had no chance with.

Forget it, Keith told himself. Forget him. A bonding moment? Seriously? He called you girl and used a pickup line he’s probably used a thousand times before.

So why was it so hard to get Lance’s smile out of his head?

Keith screwed his eyes shut, swore once more for good measure, then shrugged on his jacket and headed out in search of a pen.

Pidge hunched over Rover, fiddling with the wiring on a new scanner array. She knew it wasn’t likely to make a difference. The records said Tchorra was a minor prison world, home to just a few small habitat enclosures where the prisoners lived and worked. The castle-ship would probably be able to pinpoint the human bio-life indicators from orbit, and Pidge would be able to drop right into her brother’s cell.

But she had an hour to kill, and she wanted to be as prepared as possible.

Across the room, Hunk sat before a small holoscreen, chatting with Shay, his totally not-girlfriend. Pidge was tempted to point out that they’d been apart for literally twenty minutes and he was already calling her… but that sounded like way too much effort. If Hunk was too dense to realize he and Shay had been flirting from day one, then Pidge wasn’t going to try to make him see sense. They were happy, and that was good enough for Pidge.

“No, no, seriously,” Hunk said earnestly. “Water as far as the eye can see. We call it the ocean. You’d love it, Shay.”

“Perhaps then someday you could take me there?”

Hunk was grinning loud enough for Pidge to hear it even with her back turned. “Of course! We'll all go. You and me and Lance—Lance loves the ocean, Shay, you have no idea.”

Pidge glanced over her shoulder, incredulous. Had Hunk seriously just third-wheeled his own hypothetical date? I’m fourteen and ace, and I know that was a mistake. Unfortunately, the angle was all wrong for Pidge to see whether Shay was disappointed by Hunk’s answer. She sounded happy enough as she went on asking questions about the ocean and the beach and Earth weather and sunburns and--

The world burned to white.

Pidge gasped, dropping her tools. Her chest was on fire, a searing bolt of pain so intense Pidge thought for one wild moment she was having a heart attack.

It vanished as quickly as it had come, and Pidge snapped back to herself. Her tools rolled to a stop on the floor. Hunk stood, tipping over his chair, and kicked the desk on his way to check on Pidge. Somewhere, someone was shouting.

Pidge pressed the heel of her hand to her chest, her breath catching on tears she couldn’t bully back behind her eyelids. She scrambled up, running for the nearest bathroom—refresher—whatever they were called. Her head was too muddled to care. Behind her, Hunk was calling her name, but Pidge ignored him and slammed the lock button to shut him out.

Her breath was coming fast and shallow, her vision going dark at the edges, and her hands shook so bad it took two tries to pull her shirt off.

Her reflection in the mirror stared back at her, pale and wide-eyed, and her fingers pressed numbly at the small, crisp Mark on her chest, round as a dime and the color of old bloodstains.

Matt…

Suddenly Pidge was on the floor, the metal wall cold against her bare back. She felt… numb. The Mark on her chest wasn’t directly over her heart, but it was too close for comfort, and the utter nothingness radiating cold across her soulbond screamed the truth directly into her heart.

A sob tore loose from her throat, raw and raging.

“Not now,” she whispered. “Not now, please not now, please.” A day sooner, an hour, and Matt would be here with her now, instead of--

“PIDGE!” Hunk roared. He pounded on the door. Pidge thought maybe he’d been doing that for a while. “Pidge, answer me! Pidge!”

“I’m… I’m here, Hunk,” she said. Her voice sounded like a stranger’s, impossibly steady. Maybe her brain had just short-circuited, and some kind of failsafe had kicked in.

The pounding stopped, Hunk apparently mollified with the knowledge that Pidge hadn’t passed out on the toilet. “Are you okay?”

She couldn’t say the words, couldn’t even think them. She pressed her palm to her chest, and she swore she could feel the ragged edge of Matt’s wound.

She felt cold.

After a moment, she remembered how to move and climbed slowly to her feet, using the sink to pull herself up. She kept her eyes down, aware of the mirror, and the reflection there, and what it meant. She couldn’t look at it now, not again. She pulled her shirt on, unlocked the door, and hardly even waited for it to open before she collapsed, sobbing, against Hunk’s chest.

He froze, arms closing around her in a jerky, automatic movement, and she knew the questions were coming. She gathered herself before he could asked. One breath, shallow and hiccuping. A second, hardly deeper.

On the third, she pushed away from Hunk and wiped her eyes on her sleeve. “Where’s Shiro?” she asked. “Is he on the bridge?”

“Uh… yeah, I think so. Pidge--”

But she was already walking, one step after another. She felt like a robot following glitchy code, stumbling along, detached from the world. She tried to make herself move faster, but she couldn’t convince herself that it mattered. One minute or ten, Mat was still…

She stumbled out of the elevator onto the bridge, aware of Hunk behind her. He was talking—she couldn’t parse the words, but it caught Shiro’s attention, and Allura and Coran’s. They turned, and they saw the tears wetting Pidge’s cheeks.

Shiro’s face fell, but he came toward her, hands outstretched. “Pidge? What’s wrong?”

She tried to hold it together, she really did, but the memory of the pain in her chest returned, a spot of white-hot fire burning out in an instant, over and over and over.

“It’s Matt,” she said, tears falling freely now. “He’s dead.”

Allura sounded the alarm immediately, and didn’t even wait for the paladins to gather before she made the jump. Shiro watched the stars stretch and blend into a vortex of blue, denial sounding loud in his ears. Pidge clung to him, sobbing, and Hunk lurked just behind, crying silent sympathy.

Even Allura was teary-eyed, but not Shiro. He refused to cry for someone who wasn’t dead, and Matt could not be dead. Not now. Not after everything Shiro had done to protect him, everything Pidge had done to find him. Tchorra waited just beyond that wormhole, and Matt was there, alive. He was.

He had to be.

“Get to your lions,” Allura said steadily, her unshed tears the only outward sign that this was anything but an ordinary mission. “I’ll send Lance and Keith along as soon as they arrive.”

Hunk ran for his lion, but Pidge refused to move. Shiro hesitated a moment more, then urged her with him toward the Black Lion’s access. Pidge was in no state to pilot right now, let alone fight, but he knew better than to ask her to stay behind. Not in anything that concerned Matt. Better to keep her with him, keep her close.

Sending someone away, it seemed, was a shitty way to protect them.

By the time they reached the Black Lion, the castle was out the far side of the wormhole. Shiro flew in silence, Hunk keeping pace as they headed for the still, quiet planet below. Keith hailed them as they landed to let them know he and Lance were on their way. Surveying the devastation around him, Shiro wanted to tell Keith not to bother, but he couldn’t make himself speak.

The work camps were in ruins, buildings burning or collapsed, the dust still choking the air. Bodies littered the streets, Galra and prisoner alike, and ruined sentries sparked and twitched in heaps against the walls of what few buildings remained.

Pidge took one look around, shuddered, then seemed to… flip a switch. One moment she was crying, on the verge of hyperventilation, not loosening her white-knuckle grip on Shiro’s armor. The next she pulled away, face stony still, and drew in a single, deep breath. Then she turned and headed for the control tower at the center of the complex.

She still wore her civilian clothes—Shiro would have made her stay in Black, would have ordered his Lion to seal her in—except that he suspected the danger here was long past.

Still, he stuck close to Pidge, gesturing to Hunk to keep his eyes open. They hadn’t yet seen anyone living, but that didn’t mean they should abandon all caution. Someone had done this, not the Galra, but probably not the prisoners. Shiro wasn’t going to lose anyone else today.

It took them a few short minutes to climb the stairs to the control room, but the moment they forced open the door, Pidge let out a soft sound of dismay.

The room was in shambles, computers smashed, one of them smoking. Three Galra lay dead in the far corner, blood spatter darkening the window that overlooked the grounds. From here the destruction looked even worse. Not a single street had been left untouched. Over the comms, Keith and Lance reported similar carnage in the other camps.

“I don’t get it, though,” Lance said, his voice low and solemn and nothing at all like his usual self. “There’s plenty of Galra bodies, but not a lot of dead prisoners.”

Shiro straightened, glancing to Pidge, who was still poking around the ruined computers, searching for something she might be able to salvage. She was listening, Shiro knew, but she hadn’t said a word since she stepped out of the Black Lion.

“Some kind of resistance strike?” Shiro asked. “Maybe someone was planning a prison break.”

Maybe some one else, someone friendly, got Matt out.

He didn’t say the words aloud, but Pidge turned to look at him sidelong, her expression grim. “What difference does it make?” Her voice was raw and ragged, her eyes hollow. “Matt’s dead either way.”

The words were no easier to hear a second time, and Shiro closed his eyes, riding out the swell of grief and despair. The hope he clung to was a thin one, he knew. But he had to hold on until they found Matt’s body, or until Shiro saw Matt alive and well. He had to.

“All right,” he said. “Coran, can you scan for survivors?”

“Already on it.”

“Good. We get the survivors out as fast as we can. Then we’re going to get Commander Holt.”

Pidge laughed once, the sound so broken Shiro felt as if his chest was caving in. “You’re assuming he’s still alive.”

“He is,” Keith said, and his voice left no room for argument.

Pidge didn’t try, but neither did she pick up her pace. She looked small and fragile, and Shiro would have moved the stars to fix her. To fix this. To find Matt.

Somehow, Shiro thought moving the stars would have been easier.

Chapter 7: A Sea of Stars

Notes:

Potential trigger warning for gun violence/death. For more details go here.

(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)

Chapter Text

“Why the hell are we still here?” Pidge demanded, bursting through the bridge doors with Hunk and Lance trailing behind her. Hunk shot Shiro a look that seemed to say, Sorry. We tried to stop her.

Shiro gave Hunk a slight nod, then turned his attention to Pidge. “Allura and I thought it best to give us all a chance to calm down and prepare ourselves,” Shiro said. He’d explained all this before, when he’d brought a nearly catatonic Pidge back to the castle-ship, but he wasn’t surprised that she didn’t remember what he’d said. The carnage on Tchorra had been hard to bear—harder still when they pulled a half dozen battered survivors out of the rubble. “We’re all… upset, and rushing headlong into another battle isn’t going to help anything.”

“Right.” Pidge crossed her arms and glared up at Shiro. “Much better to sit around twiddling our thumbs until the Galra get my dad, too.”

The spark in her eyes, the stubborn set of her jaw, the way she seemed twice her height through sheer presence—it all reminded Shiro keenly of Matt, and he had to close his eyes to get the image out of his head. This was Pidge. Her brother was dead.

Beside Shiro, Keith had gone stiff, his breathing carefully controlled. Shiro suspected he was only staying silent out of respect for Pidge’s loss; backtalk had never sat well with Keith (except of course when he was the one doing it), and he had even less patience for people who sassed Shiro.

Shiro shot him a warning frown, then turned back to Pidge. “We aren’t going to let anyone hurt your father.”

“Then let’s go!” Pidge flung her arm out, and Shiro couldn’t tell if she was about to cry or inches away from screaming. “We know where he is. Open the damn wormhole already!”

She glared at Allura, who glanced at Shiro. She and Coran were no strangers to grief, but the universe had allowed them no time to mourn the loss of their home and their people. Faced with today’s tragedy, Shiro had finally realized just how much the pair of them were soldiers, the same way he was a soldier. They could compact their pain and tuck it safely away to be dealt with when circumstances allowed.

Pidge was not a soldier. None of the younger paladins were, really, not even Keith. They were unused to the shock of loss, and they had no coping mechanisms to fall back on in times of crisis. Shiro was glad they’d been spared that pain until now, and he wished he could have shielded them a little longer.

But the Galra didn’t wait for children to grow up before they slaughtered innocents, and the simple fact was the paladins couldn’t afford to stop fighting in order to process their grief. Shiro had begged Allura and Coran to give Pidge and the others a little time—just a few hours—to steady themselves, and Allura had deferred to Shiro’s judgment.

“Pidge,” he said now, stepping toward her with hands held up, a placating gesture that only raised her hackles further. “There’s no reason to think Commander Holt is in any more danger than any other prisoner. The best thing you can do to help him right now is to go in with a clear head.”

“My head is fine!” Pidge snapped. “You’re the one who doesn’t even care that he just lost his soulmate!”

Her accusation bit into him like a Galra blade, sharp and hot. Shiro must not have concealed his hurt well enough, for Pidge’s face suddenly blanched. She took a step backwards, clapping her hands over her mouth in horror, and stared at Shiro with wide eyes.

“Oh god. Oh my god, Shiro, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean--”

“It’s okay.” Shiro swallowed the lump in his throat and closed the distance Pidge had opened up between them, taking her gently by the shoulders. “I know you’re hurting now, Pidge, I know.”

He paused, trying to figure out how to say that he knew how to shut his pain away in a way Pidge didn't. He didn't want her to feel inadequate—but he didn't want to make her pity him, either. She didn’t need to worry about him on top of everything else.

“I don’t know how I’m still going, frankly,” he said at last, which wasn’t far from the truth. “I know it’s going to catch up to me sooner or later. But listen—I wouldn’t want to go in while I was distraught, either. We both need to be in control for this.”

“I’m fine,” Pidge said quickly, but her voice was smaller this time, and she shot a self-conscious look toward the door, where Keith had joined Hunk and Lance. The three of them conversed in quiet tones, conspicuously ignoring Shiro and Pidge. By the control panel, Allura and Coran were also deeply engrossed in a holomap of the region.

Shiro spared the others only the briefest of looks, then studied Pidge. He didn’t want to push her too hard, but excessive caution in this moment might be nearly as damaging. She was strong, and she was proud, and as the youngest paladin she was desperate to prove herself. “If you say you can handle this, Pidge, I’ll trust you,” he said. “I just don’t want you to tear yourself apart because you think we expect you to charge back into battle without a chance to breathe.”

The look she gave him said very plainly that she saw every ounce of hypocrisy Shiro had squeezed into his words. She didn’t call him on it, though, just sighed and pulled off her glasses to rub red eyes. “Maybe I’m not fine,” she said, and the neither are you was implied. “But I can’t wait. As long as they still have my dad, it’s only going to get worse. Please, Shiro. Sitting here doing nothing is driving me crazy.”

His smile felt stretched thin, much like the rest of him, and he tousled her hair. “Me, too, kiddo.” He sighed, hugging her tightly. He didn’t complain when she squeezed him tight enough to bruise. “Let’s go get your dad.”

Pidge waited until the paladins were all in their lions before she spoke her plan aloud. (If it could be called a plan. All she had was a burning need to know and a crushing fear of seeing her father battered and bleeding or—god forbid—dead.)

“Shiro? Keith? Can you two do me a favor?”

“Of course,” said Shiro, and Keith spoke over him, a little too eager to help: “Anything.”

Pidge closed her eyes, letting the Green Lion follow the others down toward the prison facility nestled in the mountains below. “Get my dad out for me. Make sure nothing happens to him.”

She could feel the questions filling the silence—questions not just from Shiro and Keith, but from all her friends.

It was Keith who finally worked up the courage to ask. “What do you mean?”

“I mean, I need you to find my dad and get him back to the castle-ship. I’m going to hit the prison’s main computers, like always. Watch the cameras, hack the defenses.” Find out who killed my brother. “You know. The usual.”

A small window popped up on her viewscreen—Shiro, watching her with concern. “Are you sure? This isn’t exactly a typical mission.”

Pidge focused on keeping her face neutral. Her anger had chased away the sorrow, at least for now, but she didn’t want Shiro to see her running on fury and try to reign her in. She wanted to be angry. She needed it. Somebody had killed her brother, and Pidge was going to make them pay, one way or another. But the only way to do that was to get to the computers and find the camera data from Tcharra.

“I’m sure,” Pidge said. “The best way to help Dad is to not let my grief control me, isn't it? I want to do this right, Shiro.”

She was amazed that her voice remained steady, even more amazed that Shiro bought her lie.

But he did, nodding and calling for the other paladins to go in quiet. Unlike Tcharra, the planet where Sam Holt was being held had some degree of security. It was entered in the nav computer with only its planetary ID—V-T7698—and all of the data available to Coran made it look like an uncharted, uninhabited world in the middle of nowhere.

From the Galra records, though, she’d learned that it held a single prison—not a large one, but one the Galra wanted to hold. The prisoners here gathered a certain mold from mountain caves that could be processed into something called kalreg. Pidge didn’t know what kalreg was, but it was apparently useful enough to deploy several squadrons of fighters to patrol the skies above a top secret prison.

It had to be just about the most boring assignment ever, since the records only showed one or two ships entering the system each month, all of them scheduled transports taking the mold away to be processed.

The aerial defenses weren’t especially worrisome, but Shiro left Hunk in the sky, hiding among the rocky peaks. When their infiltration inevitably set off alarms, Hunk would be ready to smash through the first line of fighters, hopefully keeping an exit open for the others.

Keith, Shiro, and Lance headed for the prison block, sticking to the shadows until Pidge had a chance to take out security. She listened to their status reports, letting the mission wash all other thoughts away. They weren’t here for her father; they were here for an ordinary bunch of prisoners. Faceless, impersonal. Pidge darted down empty hallways on light feet, bayard out and ready.

There were two guards stationed outside the command post—sentries. Normally, Pidge would have looked for an air duct to use to bypass the guards, or sent Rover in to try to rewrite their loyalty programs. Not this time, though. This time she charged in screaming, burying her bayard in one sentry’s chest and flinging him sideways into his companion.

Both robots crashed into the wall, sparking with the bayard’s electricity, and lay still.

“What was that?” Shiro asked. “Trouble?”

“I took care of it,” Pidge said shortly. Rover was already at the door controls, silently running through his database until he found the right access codes.

The door slid wide, and two Galra jerked to their feet at the sight of a Voltron paladin standing on their doorstep. One of them reached out for a button on the control panel, probably an alarm, but Pidge fired her bayard. The hook pierced his outstretched hand, pinning it to the wall beyond the control panel, and he screamed.

The other Galra charged, but Pidge was already retracting the bayard, letting it carry her across the room. She kicked out with one foot as she passed, tripping the charging Galra, and planted her feet just short of the one whose hand she’d pinned. Giving him a jolt to keep him still, she yanked her bayard free and slashed his throat.

Even as he fell, she spun, activating her shield as the second Galra, still sprawled on the floor, opened fire with his rifle. The shots exploded against her shield, bright and loud, and Pidge pressed forward. She slammed her shield against the barrel of the rifle, knocking it from the Galra’s hands, then buried her blade in his chest.

The control room fell silent, the only sound the rushing of blood in Pidge’s ears. She took a few steadying breaths, ordered Rover to seal the door and change the access codes, then settled herself at the computer.

“All right,” she said to the others. “Let’s make this fast. I, uh...” She glanced over her shoulder at the dead guards. “I had to take out a couple of guards, and it’s only a matter of time before someone notices.”

Shiro paused for just a moment, like he knew what she wasn’t saying. But he was a professional, more than any of them except maybe Allura. He’d probably lecture Pidge later about acceptable risks, but for now he stayed focused on the mission. “Okay, Pidge, take us in.”

With a few quick commands, Pidge surveyed the prison, noting guard locations and the layout of cells. Then she scanned through the cell feeds, searching for her father. Some of the cells were empty—those prisoners were probably out in the caves, collecting mold. Her pulse pounded a little harder and a little faster for every cell that flashed past without a sign of her father until she began to think her fears hadn’t been unfounded, after all.

Then she found him, curled in the corner of his cell. His prison uniform clung to his bony frame, and his face was turned away from the camera, his hands curled around his stomach. Pidge almost didn’t recognize him, but there weren’t many prisoners who could pass for human, even over the fuzzy security feed. She stopped, watching him, until he shifted enough for her to see his face.

“I found him,” she breathed, her voice shaking with relief. “I found him. He’s alive.”

Shiro breathed an audible sigh, and Pidge smiled. It was comforting, somehow, knowing that it mattered to someone besides herself.

She flipped over to the cave cameras. There were fewer of them, but she spotted several hunched forms moving through the darkness, a handful of sentries watching them work. “Looks like about a third of the prisoners are in the tunnels,” she said.

“They must work in shifts,” said Keith, tapping his sword against his leg. “Guards?”

“A few. Not as many as you’re gonna face in the prison itself, once they realize we’re here.”

Shiro nodded. “Lance, get to the caves. Pidge, see if there’s another exit, somewhere Hunk can pick up Lance and the prisoners that doesn’t force them to come back through here. Keith and I will get Commander Holt and the rest of the prisoners out the same way we came in.”

Pidge nodded, got Shiro, Keith, and Lance headed in the right direction, and found Lance’s escape route.

Then she turned her attention to Tchorra. The Galra network was set up in a way that made it hard to navigate and even harder to get into the files she wanted, but this wasn’t the first time Pidge had wriggled between the cracks, and she was even more determined now than she usually was. The need to know what had happened to Matt, why he’d died, why they hadn’t found his body—that need clawed at her chest like a caged lion, and she sure as hell wasn’t going to let a couple of firewalls keep her out.

Laserfire sounded over the comms, and Pidge glanced at the security feeds. It was Lance; he’d reached the caves and was picking off the sentries one by one. The prisoners screamed and ran for cover, but the guards were too focused on Lance to take aim at any of the bystanders—though that might have been because of Lance’s taunts.

“Hey sparkbutt! Did you see the way I shot your buddy’s head off?” Lance cackled, ducking behind a stalagmite as the sentries returned fire. He leaned out the opposite side and took out another sentry.

On another screen, Keith quietly ran a guard through. The second guard turned in alarm, and Keith charged him as Shiro went to the cell controls and pressed his hand to the scanner. Keith’s opponent slammed against the wall, and the cell doors slid open.

“Careful, Shiro,” Pidge said, eyes darting to another camera. “I think the guards heard something. You’re about to have company.

Shiro met the reinforcements at the door, tearing through them like nothing as Keith began coaxing prisoners out of their cells.

Pidge turned back to her hacking, entering another command on her gauntlet. The system took a moment to process, and then she was in. Tchorra. She ignored the prisoner and personnel files, heading straight for the camera footage.

“Commander Holt?”

Shiro’s voice jerked her out of her focus, and she looked up at the screen in time to see her father raise his head, eyes wide.

“Shiro?”

Shiro let out a shaky breath and nodded, kneeling to help Sam to his feet. “Are you okay? We’re going to get you out of here.”

“You’re alive.” Sam’s voice came through Shiro’s comms only faintly, and whatever else he might have said was too soft to make out.

Blinking back tears, Pidge checked the others’ progress. Keith was gathering the other prisoners, giving Shiro a moment alone with Sam. Lance, meanwhile, had taken out the last of the guards in the caves and was heading down to the exit with the prisoners—about a dozen of them, all huddling together, many of them crying. Lance had muted his mic, but his mouth was moving—words of encouragement, no doubt, trying to keep the prisoners moving.

Sam Holt coughed, a wet, pained sound, and Pidge’s heart clenched. She remembered once when she was younger and they’d found mold in her bedroom, growing in the walls and in the corners of her windows. In the week before her parents had realized what the problem was, Pidge had suffered a cough like that, a cough that kept her up at night and made her miserable during the day. Breathing had been difficult at the best of times, and her head had pounded so hard she could barely think.

Had her dad been dealing with that for the last year?

The thought made her hands shake, and she brought up the wrong video file by mistake. It showed the attack on Tchorra, but from the control tower instead of the prisoner barracks. Two ships swooped in seemingly from nowhere, small and agile and painted with insignias Pidge didn’t recognize.

She took a still image and saved it to her armor’s built-in memory so she could show it to Allura and Coran later, then watched a few seconds more. Small, dark figures dropped from the ships to the ground and opened fire on the sentries in the street.

Scowling, she closed the video, then opened the other, the one that showed the barracks. It was a split-screen image, two cameras filming the sleeping prisoners inside, two filming the street outside. A pair of sentries guarded the door, and they turned as the attack began.

The attackers shot them down before they had a chance to defend themselves, and three cloaked and masked figures raced into the barracks, two more standing guard outside. One by one, the prisoners began to emerge, led by one masked stranger, hastened along toward the…

Toward the ship. It was just visible in the corner of one of the exterior feeds, hovering a few feet above the street. The attackers—the rebels—helped the prisoners into the ship, their cobbled-together guns sweeping side to side in search of guards coming to stop the escape.

Suddenly, laser fire. It was coming from off screen, but it must have been the Galra. The prisoners screamed and tried to scatter, more than one falling to the hail of death. The rebels returned fire, shouting over their shoulders at the prisoners.

The last two rebels emerged from the barracks, shoving the remaining prisoners toward the ship. Matt was among them, and he ran with a limp, one of the rebels supporting him with one hand as they fired blindly with the other.

The rebels who had been guarding the door began backing toward the ship, still shooting. One of them took a laser to the shoulder, screamed, and struggled onward. The other went down and didn’t move.

One of the rebels pulled something from their belt and threw it toward the Galra. An explosion rocked the street, and two cameras’ feeds went dark. But Pidge could still see the rebels beating their retreat, herding the last of the prisoners into their ship. The Galra’s laserfire had slowed, but one or two soldiers were still firing, the blasts sparking as they struck ship and street.

Matt was just a few steps from the ship when a laser hit him in the back.

Lance was almost to the exit when he heard Pidge gasp. He froze, only a second behind Shiro in asking her what had happened.

“Are you okay?” Shiro demanded. “Pidge? Pidge?”

The only sound was ragged breathing, followed by muffled sobs.

Lance’s heart lurched in his chest.

“Pidge!” Keith roared. “Screw it. I’m going after her.”

“No you’re not,” Lance said. “Are you even out of the prison block yet?” Keith grunted, but didn’t answer. Lance could still hear lasers over the comms, and the labored breathing that said Keith and Shiro were in the middle of a battle. “That’s what I thought. You two need to focus on getting the prisoners out of there. Hunk? These guys are almost to the exit. Make sure they get out of here. I’m going back for Pidge.”

“Lance,” Shiro began.

Lance was already running. “Nope. Not this time, Shiro. You promised Pidge you’d get her dad out of here, didn’t you?”

Shiro’s sharp intake of breathe was all the answer Lance needed. He charged up the tunnel, ignoring the rough, meandering trail packed down by prisoners harvesting mold—slimy, white, and glowing faintly in the darkness. Lance charged straight up the slope, or as near to straight as he could get. The cave itself was a big, open space, all loose, slick rock and stalagmites except where dense patches of the luminous mold had attracted the prisoners’ attention.

Lance had wanted to burn the mold when he first got here. He’d had to seal his helmet against the damp, heavy air, which made his throat feel slimy from the first breath. He’d coughed so hard his first shots had missed.

He couldn’t imagine working in this place day after day with nothing more than a few strips of rancid cloth to cover the prisoners’ mouths. He noticed that only sentries stood guard down here; the Galra used prisoners for this job for a reason, apparently.

It had taken Lance fifteen minutes to clear out the sentries, calm the prisoners, and pick his way down to the exit.

It took two to get back up to the steel door that led to the prison building. He met a few guards inside, attracted by the commotion, or maybe just suspicious that the sentries had stopped reporting. Lance didn’t care. He shot each guard as they came, hardly breaking stride.

He knew the control room by the cluster of Galra and sentries gathered around the door, some pounding on the keypad, others trying to cut through the steel.

Lance shot them all before they knew he was there, then leveraged his full body weight against the glowing purple sword wedged in the seam of the door. Fortunately, the Galra had done most of the work; Pidge was still crying softly on the comms, though Lance had given up trying to get her to talk. He didn’t know if she was hurt, but she wasn’t responding, which meant he had to get through this door on his own.

Maybe he should have let Shiro come. His Galra tech hand could have had this door open in a second.

But Shiro needed to be with the prisoners. The sound of lasers was quieter now, though not gone entirely, and Lance could hear Shiro calling for the prisoners to follow him.

The sword finally cut through the last of whatever was holding the door in place. It slipped suddenly, and Lance almost cracked his faceplate on the door. Using the sword as a lever, he forced the door open, inch by inch, until he was able to slip through into the room beyond.

Two Galra lay dead on the floor, but Pidge knelt several feet away, sobbing, a video playing on the display screen, overlaying the prison’s camera feeds.

“Pidge?” Lance asked, suddenly nervous. He scanned Pidge for signs of an injury, but she seemed fine. Well, as fine as she could be when she was sobbing her heart out on the floor of a Galra prison. “Pidge, what’s wrong? What happened?”

In the end, she didn’t need to tell him anything. The video on the screen suddenly went dark, then began again. Lance watched the attack on Tchorra play out with growing horror. When he saw Matt get shot, it was like someone had shot him, and he stumbled back from the screen, chest tight.

The rebels hauled Matt’s limp body onto their ship, then took off. Lasers rained down on the prison complex from above, leveling buildings, until the cameras finally cut out, and the video began again.

He couldn’t watch it again. Couldn’t hear the shouts of pain and fear. He stumbled toward the console and hammered buttons at random until the screen went dark, then dropped down beside Pidge and crushed her against his chest.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I’m sorry, Pidge, I’m so sorry.” There was nothing else to say, nothing that could have eased her pain. She shouldn’t have had to see her brother get shot—bad enough to feel it!--but Lance couldn’t fault her for searching for it. If it had been Lance in her place, he would have wanted to know what happened, too.

For a moment, Pidge remained rigid in Lance’s arms. Then she twisted, clutching at Lance’s armor.

“They were so close,” she whispered.

Before Lance could find his voice, footsteps sounded in the corridor outside. Lance had his bayard up and leveled at the door before he could even think about it, tugging Pidge and twisting himself so he covered her as much as possible without making it impossible to aim.

When the first sentry appeared in the gap, Lance shot it in the head.

“Pidge,” he said, voice low and urgent. Another sentry appeared, and Lance shot that one, too. “Pidge, we need to get out of here. I know—I know you feel like shit, and I’m sorry, but we can’t stay here. It’s too dangerous. Shiro and Keith have your dad, okay?”

She shuddered something that might have been a nod, then pulled away. He couldn’t afford more than a quick glance, but he saw the steely composure fall over her face. It wasn’t Pidge, not the Pidge he knew. This was something harder, something angry, and Lance didn’t know whether to be relieved that she was moving or worried that Matt’s death had broken something irreplaceable in her.

She ran for the door before he could decide, and Lance yelped as he scrambled to follow. Pidge had mowed down the guards waiting in the hallway before he caught up to her, and she hardly waited for him to wriggle through the door before she was off.

They didn’t speak as they ran, and Pidge killed every guard they met with brutal efficiency, often closing the distance before Lance could take a shot. He took out as many as he could without hurting Pidge—not a risk he was willing to take, not after watching that video—and stuck close the rest of the time, concern for Pidge lodged in his throat.

He didn’t take a full breath until their lions were in sight. Keith had already taken off, apparently taking most of the prisoners with him on the Red Lion, but Shiro and Commander Holt waited between the Black Lion’s front paws. Shiro stood protectively between Sam and the door, but when Pidge appeared, Sam darted past Shiro.

Pidge let out a cry that was more pain than words and flung herself at her dad.

Lance watched them for only an instant before he turned away, trying to give them privacy—as much privacy as they could have on the slopes outside a prison. Shiro caught his eye and nodded his gratitude, and Lance nodded back, his heart too heavy for anything more.

Ten minutes later they were all back at the Castle of Lions. Lance had picked up the Green Lion and brought it back to the castle, setting her down in the Black Lion’s hangar—the only one large enough for company.

He was down the ramp almost before Blue had settled in, chasing Shiro and the Holts toward the elevator. They made slow progress, Pidge clinging to her father, Sam wheezing as he walked. Both of them were crying softly, but some of the unrecognizable anger had bled out of Pidge. Shiro placed a hand on her back, and Lance realized with a start that he was crying, too.

Keith, Hunk, and Coran were waiting in the cryopod room. It looked like some of the other prisoners had been stuck in the open pods, but they’d left one for Sam. Keith took a single, jerky step forward, like he wanted to hug Pidge, or comfort her, or something, but he stopped himself and looked instead to Shiro.

Lance didn’t think he’d ever seen Keith look so openly worried.

“You’re dad’s going to be fine, Pidge,” Shiro said. His voice was low, but the room wasn’t big enough to keep it from carrying. “But he needs healing.” He looked up at Sam, pleading, and Sam carefully extricated himself from Pidge’s crushing hug.

“I’m right here, sweetie,” he said, choking a little on the words. He’d suffered two coughing fits on the way up, and Lance suspected he was fighting off another. “I’ll be out before you know it.”

Lance wondered how much Shiro had explained—about the cryopods, about Voltron, about how Pidge had ended up in space to begin with. Sam had to be pretty confused, Lance figured, but he was smiling like this was just any ordinary day for him, and that seemed to calm Pidge, who nodded, wiped her eyes, and threw her arms around her dad’s neck in one last, quick embrace.

“I love you,” she whispered.

“I love you, too, Katie.”

Then Sam was in the pod, and Shiro guided Pidge to the side of the room with a hand on her back. Lance wanted to go to her, to comfort her, but he left that to Shiro. They’d both been Matt’s soulmates, after all, so they were better suited to comforting each other than any of the rest of them.

Lance turned and wandered out the door, and Hunk followed silently behind. Lance didn’t have to turn to know who it was; he and Hunk were closer than brothers, and after today they both needed the company.

Slowing his stride, Lance waited for Hunk to catch up, then fell into step beside him, his helmet tucked under his arm. “I feel so useless,” Lance admitted as they neared the elevator. “I wish there was something I could do.”

Hunk’s eyes on the side of his head were sharp and sad, but Hunk kept quiet as they rode up to the sixth floor, where the bedrooms were. Their clothes were still in the prep room where they’d changed into their armor, but neither of them had the energy to go there.

They went instead to Hunk’s room, shed their armor, and found pajamas—Hunk and Lance had had enough sleepovers since Lance emerged from the cryopod that Lance just kept a spare set of PJs in Hunk’s room. It was easier that way, and it was certainly easier now.

“It’s a good thing you were there,” Hunk said, his voice startling Lance out of his thoughts.

Lance turned, tugging his shirt over his head, and found Hunk seated on the edge of his bed, hands in his lap. “What do you mean?”

“In the base,” Hunk said. “It’s a good thing you were there to help Pidge. Shiro and Keith ran into some pretty heavy security on their way out. If either one of them had gone to Pidge...”

Lance closed his eyes and sat beside Hunk. “I had to go to her,” he said, and he wished he didn’t sound so much like he was asking for reassurance. “I heard her crying like that, and I just--” He faltered, clutching at the blue silk that covered his stomach. How did you explain that pain in your soul? The way it made you sick to know someone you loved was hurting? “I had to.”

“Because she’s your soulmate.”

Lance’s breath stuck in his throat. He didn’t turn toward Hunk—didn’t think he could have moved an inch, as a matter of fact—but he watched from the corner of his eye as Hunk leaned his elbows on his knees. They’d never talked about Lance’s other soulmates, except for Luz and Mateo and Red. Those three Lance found easy to talk about. He was proud of those bonds. Mostly proud. The pride outweighed the hurt, at least, which was more than he could say for the rest.

“What do you mean?” Lance asked, but he knew denial wouldn’t work—especially not when his voice sounded so dull and flat.

Hunk leaned toward him, pressing their shoulders together, and sighed. “Pidge,” he said. “She’s your soulmate, isn’t she? Like Keith is?” He paused, and when Lance didn’t answer, he continued. “Don’t think I didn’t notice how desperate you were to be friends with Pidge back at the Garrison.”

The tears took Lance by surprise, and he turned his sob into a laugh. “Pretty pathetic, right?”

“Lance...”

Lance sat up straight, waving his concern away. “I’m fine,” he insisted. “Honest to Voltron.” He tried to smile, but it felt fake, an ill-fitting cheer that sat crooked on his face. “It’s like Luz and Mateo—I don’t care if it’s reciprocated.”

Liar, whispered a voice in his head.

Hunk sighed, scooting backward so he was sitting against the wall, then tugged on Lance’s arm until he joined him. Hunk’s arm curled around Lance’s back, and Lance leaned his head on Hunk’s shoulder.

“Two of us reciprocate, at least,” he said. “That’s pretty great, right?”

“You reciprocate,” Lance said sullenly, but some of his dour mood lightened. “And yeah, that’s awesome. Best soulmate in the universe.”

Hunk laughed, the sound reverberating through Lance’s body. “Second best,” he said, and Lance grinned despite himself. Hunk waited a moment, just breathing, Lance’s head rising and falling with the motion of his chest. Then he squeezed Lance’s arm. “You have Red, too, remember.”

Lance’s smile faltered. “Nah,” he said, sitting up and stretching. “Pretty sure he unreciprocated.”

“That’s… not a thing.”

“Okay, then he died.” Lance could feel his mood taking a nosedive, which was only to be expected when the castle felt more like a funeral home than anything. He pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes and let Hunk guide his head back onto Hunk’s shoulder. “He hasn’t said a word in more than year, Hunk. Who does that?”

Hunk hummed, soft and sad. “Maybe he’s just been having a rough year. Red was never very talkative to begin with.”

Leave it to Hunk to believe the best about everyone, even someone he’d never met. The worst part was, Lance wanted to believe him. He liked Red—he maybe even loved Red, or at least he’d come close, back when they’d actually talked. He didn’t want to think that Red simply didn’t feel the same.

“Are you still writing him?” Hunk asked.

Lance shrugged, suddenly embarrassed by his morning routine. It sounded a little desperate to admit he wrote his estranged soulmate every morning with a new pickup line. “A little.”

“Have you ever told him that him not writing hurts you?”

“Of course not!” Lance cried, pulling away. “Why the hell would I do that?”

Hunk frowned. “Because it’s true?”

Lance scoffed. “Sure, but what’s it gonna accomplish? If he hates me, me whining about being lonely isn’t going to change that, and if you’re right, and he’s going through some shit, it’s only going to make him feel bad.”

“Like you don’t feel bad?”

“I--” Lance hesitated. I always feel bad, while true, was not something he ever wanted to admit aloud, especially not to Hunk. As Lance’s pain pal, Hunk considered himself responsible for making Lance happy, and the last thing Lance wanted was to make Hunk feel like he’d failed somehow. This wasn’t something anyone could fix, not even Hunk.

But Hunk was insistent, staring at Lance with that face that said, This is for your own good.

Lance groaned, but he was already feeling miserable. He supposed now was as good a time as any to prove once and for all that his pen pal didn’t love him any more.

He went to his room to grab his pen, then sat on the bed with his sleeve rolled up. Hunk had probably intended Lance to come back for moral support, but if Lance was right, he’d rather have time to compose himself before he let Hunk see him.

So he uncapped the pen, stared at his arm, and then began to write.

Are you there? If you want me to stop writing, you can just tell me, and I’ll stop.

The words shot an unexpected pang of hurt through Keith, and he set his knife on the nightstand. He’d stayed in the cryopod room for only a few minutes, wanting to reach out to Pidge but not sure how. He’d never been very good with people, not like Shiro was, so Keith had left Pidge to him and returned to his room. If he’d been hoping for sleep, however, that wasn’t what he found.

Keith had never met Matt Holt, though he’d heard stories. They’d been innocuous at first, just Shiro talking about his training for the Kerberos mission, then news articles about the lost crew. After Shiro’s return, Keith had heard more, from both Shiro and Pidge.

Matt Holt sounded like a good person, and Keith was sad he’d died. It was a cerebral sort of mourning, and the pain Keith felt was more on behalf of Shiro and Pidge than the stranger Keith would never know. The fact that he couldn’t truly mourn the man who had just died gnawed at him. Shouldn’t he have felt something? Anything?

He’d turned his mind to the knife he’d received from his parents, turning over that oldest mystery the way he had so many times before. Who had they been? Where had the knife come from? What was the meaning of the symbol on its hilt?

The questions didn’t distract him as well as they usually did, but the sight of Blue’s handwriting on his arm—that chased away everything else.

Keith stared at it, painfully aware of how long it had been since he’d last responded to Blue’s writing. He’d known, on some level, that the silence must have hurt Blue, but for the most part he could ignore the guilt. For the most part, really, he just didn’t think about Blue at all.

Two of Keith’s soulmates were hurting because Matt Holt had died. That wasn’t something Keith could fix, and if there was a way he could comfort Shiro or Pidge, Keith couldn’t see it.

But Blue’s hut was something he could fix—after all, it was entirely Keith's doing.

The pen he’d found earlier in the day, and which he’d brought back to his room with every intention of responding to Blue, had rolled under the bed when he'd leaped to respond to Allura's emergency call. Keith had to crawl around a little to find it, but eventually he did.

He sat on the bed, contemplated his words, tried to formulate an apology. When nothing clever or eloquent came to mind, he settled for something simpler.

I’m here. I don’t want you to stop. I’m sorry.

Lance tried to stifle his sob, but his room shared a wall with Hunk’s, their beds separated by just an inch or two of metal, and Hunk was no doubt listening for any sign that Lance needed him.

He stumbled through Lance’s door just a few seconds later, eyes wide with worry.

“Sorry,” Lance choked out, and held up his arm for Hunk to see. “He wrote back.”

Hunk blinked, then grinned and tackled Lance with a hug, and Lance returned it in earnest. He didn’t know whether to laugh or cry, so he found himself doing a little of both, hiccuping into Hunk’s chest as the words reverberated in his bones.

I’m here, I’m here, I’m here.

“Wait.” Lance squirmed out of Hunk’s hug, groping along the bed in search of his pen. “Waitwaitwait. I need to answer.”

Hunk found the pen—it had rolled off the bed entirely in the tussle—and Lance grasped the cap between his teeth, pulling it off.

It’s fine. I was afraid something had happened to you. Everything all right?

Red’s answer was slow in coming, but it did come. As long as the red letters still appeared, Lance could deal with slow.

It’s been-- Red paused here for a long moment, then went on. Tough. My pain pal was in an accident, and I didn’t know how to deal with it. With anything.

Lance’s heart ached. Are they okay?

Yeah. Mostly. Yeah. Sorry. I wanted to write sooner, but I didn’t know what to say.

Don’t worry about it, Lance wrote, and meant it. As long as you and all your soulmates are okay.

Once again, there was a long pause before Red answered—long enough that Hunk found time to squeeze all the air out of Lance (twice) and left to take a shower. Lance knew it was mostly just an excuse to give Lance and his pen pal privacy, but he appreciated the gesture all the same.

Eventually, Lance got up and wet a towel in the bathroom sink. (Easier that way than having to go to the bathroom every five minutes, or sitting in the shower ready to wash old writing away.) He cleaned his words away, marveling at how easily the Altean ink came off. Though considering the pens were, as far as Lance could tell, intended expressly for this purpose, he supposed it made sense. Even humans had pens that wrote better on skin and washed off easily (or were meant to, anyway). Lance had always used regular old ballpoints because it was easier.

So, he wrote once his arm was clear. How’s school?

Red responded with a squiggle, and Lance warmed at the sight of their old shorthand. This had always been one of Red’s favorite—a mix of laughter and eye rolling.

Really? Red wrote. That’s the best you can come up with?

We’re teenagers. School is like 90% of our life. Except when you were a paladin of Voltron, but there was no way he could tell Red that. It would sound like a joke at best, an outright lie at worst, and Lance didn’t want to jeopardize this now that he’d finally got Red talking again.

Red hesitated, then wrote in small letters, Actually… I dropped out.

Oh. Lance cringed. So much for school being a safe subject. Sorry.

It’s fine.

So what are you doing now?

Stuff.

Lance rolled his eyes, belatedly remembering that they had a symbol for that. He drew it, then traced over it for emphasis, and Red responded with laughter. You don’t need to tell me about your job if you don’t want. What do you do for fun? Last I heard it was… Pokemon, right?

Oh my god, I forgot I was into Pokemon.

Lance grinned. So you’re not filling out this gen’s pokedex, I take it?

No. Acutally… Red stopped, ink splotches appearing as he tapped his pen against his arm. Promise you won’t laugh?

I would never laugh at you, Red, you’re my soulmate .

That’s not very reassuring, Red wrote, but he washed away the writing, and as soon as Lance had done the same Red plunged ahead. I got into podcasts a little while ago, actually.

That’s not embarrassing, dude.

I know. It’s. (Red crossed the word out.) They’re. (He crossed this out, too.) I mostly listen to conspiracy theory podcasts.

It was all Lance could do not to laugh out loud. The only thing that stopped him was the awareness that Red was actually talking to him. Really talking, about himself. Even before the year of silence, Red had never been one to reveal personal secrets—even if the secret in question wasn’t the sort of thing that could lead back to his real identity.

The fact that he was sharing now was… well, it was nice.

Conspiracy theories? Lance wrote. Like bigfoot and aliens?

And other things. Unsolved deaths, haunted houses… You’re a skeptic aren’t you?

I don’t know. Never really thought about it, I guess. Never really had to. Doesn’t matter if ghosts are real or not, I’m not going into a haunted house, y’know?

Sure. Aliens are real, though. I’ll fight you on that one.

Lance grinned into his pillow. He grabbed it at some point without realizing and held it pinned against his chest. Maybe he could tell Red about Voltron—someday. If they ever got a chance to go home. A kind of, I-know-you’re-iffy-on-IRL-meetups-but-what-if-I-brought-aliens? sort of thing.

No need to fight me, Lance wrote. Aliens are the one thing I do believe in. The universe is a big place, after all.

And Lance was actually living with aliens—not that Red needed to hear that yet. Someday.

Patience was easy to find now that he actually had a someday to look forward to.

Matt drifted.

He didn’t feel pain, but he remembered pain. And heat. His head felt thick, his body hot and heavy, and he wondered without any real urgency whether he’d been in a car accident. That had happened once before… hadn’t it? The smoke and the slowness and the pain-that-wasn’t-pain.

It was so hard to remember.

Voices drifted at the edge of his awareness, but he couldn’t find the energy to listen to them. He felt like he was floating in a sea of stars, the voices passing like distant comets.

“His species responds well to our medicine,” said one of the comets. “I think he will survive.”

“How long until he awakens?” said the other.

Were they talking about him? The question formed itself in his mind, then drifted off without an answer, joining the other stars surrounding him. It was peaceful here, and safe in a way that felt at once familiar and strange. The pain lurked just out of sight, and he knew it would be there to greet him when he awoke. He was in no hurry to face the pain.

The comets passed, and Matt let himself sink into the darkness.

Notes:

*slides a post-season 2 rebel!Matt soulmate AU across the table* This is so not where I planned to take this when I first started writing, but I regret nothing.

So this brings us to the end of Part One of this fic. Like I said a few chapters back, this fic is going to slow down a bit as I finish planning the back half and wrap up some other projects I've been working on. I'm switching to updates every other week update for the Interludes (there will be three of them total, and they'll probably be a little shorter than normal chapters) before coming back with weekly updates in Part Two.

In the meantime, I'll be posting a modern witchcraft AU I'm writing for Fandom Trumps Hate--first chapter goes up next week.

Chapter 8: Interlude: Commander Holt

Notes:

This is the first of our three interludes (slightly shorter than normal chapters covering a handful of important moments between Commander Holt's rescue and the end of season 2, where Part Two picks up. Because we have so much time to cover (that's basically the same plot as canon) these interludes are going to be less plot-heavy and much more focused on characters and relationships.

This chapter takes place before the episode "Crystal Venom" (and the training mission that's mentioned is the one from the comics, just in case you're curious.)

Chapter Text

Cryostasis was an incomparable experience. A moment of claustrophobia, a creeping cold, a long, empty stretch of nothingness. And then light, bright and dizzying. A cacophony of sounds. Gravity suddenly reasserting its existence.

Sam Holt caught himself on the edge of the cryo-pod, legs buckling, the bang of his elbow against the metal uncomfortably loud.

There was a snort and a rustle, and Sam blinked the sleep from his eyes as he searched for the source.

“...Dad?”

Sam’s knees buckled anew, this time from an unexpected cascade of emotion. The numbing fingers of cryosleep were sliding away, and a jumble of memories rushed in. A stranger in black and white outlined in the door of his prison cell, recognizable only by his voice. Shiro's face, scarred and lined and aged ten years since Sam had last seen him, swimming into focus and Shiro approached. A hushed conversation. A hand heavy on his shoulder as Shiro broke the news: “Matt is dead.” Then…

“Katie,” Sam breathed, dropping toward the blurry lump on the ground nearby. A year in captivity had taught him to function without his glasses, but he still found himself groping, trying to orient himself in the bright white sterility of this alien ship. His fingers made it to the edge of a thin blanket before Katie threw herself at him, a sob tearing loose from her throat. “It’s okay,” he whispered, wrapping his arms around her. “I’m here, sweetie. I’m right here.”

Her fingers dug into his sides, painfully present through the thin fabric of his prison uniform, but he didn’t flinch. Katie pressed her face against his chest and hiccuped, her breath faltering more than once as she searched for words.

“Coran said it would take longer,” she whispered. “He said four or five days.”

Sam wasn’t sure who Coran was—a doctor, he assumed. It wasn’t important now. He tucked Katie’s head under his chin and squinted at the nest around her. Blankets lay in a tangled mess, green and blue and black layered over three or maybe four pillows. There were smudges stacked up around the edges that might have been dishes, and the familiar glow of a laptop screen pulsing with a screen saver.

“Have you been sleeping here?” Sam asked. It was a silly question, really. He knew his daughter, and he saw the evidence of someone who had entrenched themself for a long wait. But his mind was still slow, and he was still trying to piece together a million little changes from the hell that had been his life for the past year.

Katie pulled back, her head tilting up to stare at his face. She wiped her eyes, muttered angrily under her breath, and scrambled toward her laptop. “Here,” she said, returning with delicate frames that she pressed into his hand. “The cryopod’s scans recorded your prescription, so Coran had the castle make these for you.”

Stunned, Sam unfolded the glasses in shaking hands and slid them on his face. They fit perfectly—better than the pair the Galra had confiscated, which had pushed uncomfortably against his skull behind the ears. He blinked, breathing out a tension he hadn’t realized he’d been carrying as the world came into focus.

Katie sat on her heels before him, her eyes big behind glasses she hadn’t needed when Sam had left home. Tears glistened on her cheeks, and her smile wavered as she stared at him.

“You’re alive,” she whispered, voice soft with awe.

Sam thought of Matt, dead with freedom in his sights. He thought of his wife, all alone back on Earth, probably assuming her whole family was dead. He looked at Katie, small and shaking and pale, and his heart broke for her.

Swallowing a lump in his throat, Sam pulled her close. “I’m so sorry, Katie.” He wasn’t sure what he was apologizing for—for leaving her? For losing Matt? For everything they’d both been through because of the Galra?

Katie seemed to understand. Her breathing quickened, and her hands grasped at the blankets around them, white-knuckled with the effort of holding herself together. “We were so close, Dad. So close—if we’d just—if I’d just—Why’d he have to die?”

Sam wished he had an answer to give.

Katie insisted that she’d gotten plenty of rest while waiting for Sam to emerge from the cryopod, but she was asleep inside fifteen minutes, curled up against Sam’s chest, her cheeks wet with tears but her breathing steady and deep. Sam didn’t know if she’d been lying about her sleep schedule or if her sleep had been fitful because of Matt’s death and Sam’s illness, and he wasn’t about to press the issue now.

Instead he just gathered her closer and let her sleep. Whatever technology these alien healing pods had, it really was spectacular—Sam was able to take full, deep breaths for the first time in months, and the constant ache in his joints had quieted to near nothing.

He was feeling so good, as a matter of fact, that he might have carried Katie to a real bed to tuck her in, if he’d had any clue how to get from this room to the sleeping quarters.

Fortunately, he didn’t have to wait long for help to arrive. Ten minutes, maybe. Long enough that Sam had begun to doze, but not so long that he started to ache from sitting on the floor leaning awkwardly back against the pod that had held him for the past few days.

“You’re awake!”

Sam blinked sleep away and glanced toward the door. Shiro stood there, the surprise on his scarred face softening to a smile as he started toward Sam and Katie. Sam opened his mouth for a hello, but words left him as his gaze caught on the gleaming metal prosthetic where Shiro’s right arm should have been.

“Your arm.”

Sam regretted the words the moment they were out of his mouth. Shiro’s steps slowed, his smile faltered. Glancing down at his arm, Shiro curled his fingers into a loose fist. It was remarkable, the way they moved so much like fingers of flesh and bone. Sam would have been impressed if not for what it meant. If not for what Shiro must have gone through in the year since they’d been separated. Sam may have endured a year of hard labor and a persistent cough that kept him up long into every lonely night, but at least he’d come out of it in one piece.

It wasn’t fair—none of it. Sam was the oldest of them, the commander of the Kerberos mission. He would have gladly sacrificed himself to keep his crew safe. Instead, Shiro was scarred and aged and reserved in a way he hadn’t been before, and Matt was--

“The Galra wanted us to fight in their Arena,” Shiro said, his voice soft. “I… I got Matt out. I thought I was protecting him.” He closed his eyes, drawing his metal hand closer to his chest. “It should have been me.”

“Don’t say that,” Sam said, his voice sharper than he meant it to be. Katie stirred in his arms, and Sam waited long enough to be sure she wouldn’t wake, then eased her off his lap and stood, crossing to Shiro, who remained wide-eyed and silent. He seemed brittle, uncertain how to react to Sam’s words, ready to shatter at any moment.

Sam sighed, then pulled him into an embrace.

“I miss him, Shiro,” he whispered. “We all do. I would trade my life for his in a heartbeat—but I wouldn’t trade yours. Never yours.”

A shudder raced through Shiro’s body, but although his arms remained dead at his sides, he let himself be held.

It was a fine line Sam walked, between comfort and pity. Pity, he knew, could rankle, especially after a year spent playing the victim. Shiro wouldn’t want to be seen as week any more than Sam did; that mask he wore now was a perfect match for the strength Sam had tried to project for Katie.

So Sam held the embrace only long enough to remind Shiro he was not alone, then stepped back and knelt beside Katie. “I was going to take Katie to her room,” he said, “but I realized I don’t know where that is.”

A ghost of a smile crossed Shiro’s face. “At least you didn’t wander off. You would not believe how hard it is to find people in this place.”

Sam swayed a bit as he lifted Katie, his body reminding him that malnutrition and bone-deep exhaustion were beyond even alien healing pods to fix. Shiro steadied him, and Sam nodded his thanks. “It sounds like you’ve had some personal experience there.”

“It’s only been a week.” Shiro gave an incredulous laugh, shaking his head, and led Sam out the door. “But Lance likes to explore, Keith needs his personal space, and I’m pretty sure Pidge had three secret caves set up by the end of the second day.” He rolled his eyes, but he was smiling now. “It wouldn’t be so bad if they actually showed up for dinner and training once in a while.” He paused. “Well, Keith’s always there for training, to be fair. But he’s the worst about meals.”

“Sounds like you’ve got your hands full.”

Shiro shrugged. “They’re good kids. I can’t blame them for being overwhelmed.”

Sam walked the next several steps in silence, watching Shiro’s profile. “I don’t think anyone would blame you for being overwhelmed, either.”

“As much as I appreciate the sentiment, Commander--”

“Sam.”

Shiro hesitated, glancing over his shoulder. Sam smiled grimly.

“I’m not your C.O. anymore, Shiro. I’m not anyone’s C.O.” He paused, wishing he had a hand free to clasp Shiro’s shoulder. “And anyway, I think right now you need a friend more than you need a commander.”

The slope of Shiro’s shoulders spoke his gratitude more clearly than his soft words: “Thank you. Sam.”

Days passed. The paladins trained and fought and slept off the post-battle exhaustion, and Sam learned to live with the fact that his daughter was a defender of the universe. He didn’t try to stop her—not after his first attempt at broaching the subject ended with her tense and snappish as she forcibly redirected the conversation to the security drone she was building from scrap metal.

This was her life now, however Sam felt about it. He suspected she was pushing herself harder than usual in the wake of Matt’s death, but that wound was slowly scarring over. There were still tears, of course, and more than one sleepless night as Katie and Sam and Shiro gathered in the castle’s kitchens to reminisce.

Midnight snacks, it turned out, were the best time to experiment with the questionable substances Alteans considered food.

But more and more, the tears were mixed with tentative smiles and even the rare spurt of laughter.

The hardest times, for Sam, were those first moments after battle. The paladins returned exhausted and bruised, and Sam wanted nothing more than to steal her away and assure himself she was safe.

Somehow the red paladin always made it to her side before Sam could, knocking fists with her and flashing a smile far warmer for Katie than the one he spared for Sam.

“They’re pain pals,” Shiro explained, more resigned than Sam to the worry-free buffer Keith erected around them. “I think he’s decided she’s his responsibility, and that anyone else trying to protect her is an attack on his pride.”

Keith only snorted when he heard this and said Pidge could protect herself just fine; he was only there to keep the grown-ups from coddling her. “She’s not a kid, you know.”

“She’s fourteen,” said Sam, and only barely resisted pointing out that Keith himself was only three years older.

Keith’s dark eyes, that surreal shade between indigo and true black, reminded Sam for a moment of Shiro’s eyes: weary and incongruously old. He turned his glare on Shiro, who obviously agreed with Sam, though he hadn’t yet joined this particular argument. “The things they did to you? We felt it, too—not all of it, I know. Not the emotional parts. But what we got was bad enough. Pidge hasn’t been a kid since the first Mark appeared.”

Sam supposed he couldn’t argue with that.

Besides, it was true that Katie more than held her own on this team. Just two days after Sam emerged from the cryo-pod, Coran took the paladins on a “training run” to the Karthulian System. It ended up encompassing considerably more mortal peril than Sam thought belonged in training, but everyone agreed Katie’s sharp mind and quick action had saved the day, in the end.

After hearing the story, Sam resolved to pay no more mind to the paladins’ training. Better to talk with Allura and let her mice entertain them both. (Space mice—now there was something that would take some getting used to. Sam was an astrobiologist, and he’d always maintained an unspoken belief in the existence of intelligent life somewhere in the universe… but pantomiming alien mice had never occurred to him as a possibility.)

It was the day after this training mission that Lance turned up at Sam’s door an hour after all the younger paladins had turned in. Even Shiro was in his room by now, though Sam doubted he was asleep. Coran had been wrapping up the last of the day’s system checks when Sam parted ways with him.

He’d only been in his room a minute when Lance knocked.

“Something I can help you with?” Sam asked. He wasn’t wholly surprised to find the boy there—Hunk had made a similarly tentative approach two days ago. He’d seemed unusually anxious for someone just offering small talk to a friend’s dad, at least until Sam realized what it was Hunk really wanted, what he couldn't seem to put into words.

They were all missing their parents, he supposed. He couldn’t blame them for latching onto the only human around old enough to be their father.

Sam was more than happy to offer what comfort, advice, or terrible jokes he could. They were all stuck out here together, after all, and they weren’t the first kids Sam had accidentally adopted.

So it wasn’t the sight of Lance, eyes downcast, fingers restless on the ties of his bath robe, that surprised Sam. Only that it had taken him so long to come knocking.

Lance didn’t immediately offer up an excuse for bothering Sam after curfew, so Sam stepped aside and gestured Lance into the small bedroom. The accommodations would have been sparse by Earth standards—twin bed, cramped bathroom in the corner, and hardly enough floor space for a desk—but after the Galra prison, it might as well have been a luxury suite.

Lance sat on the edge of the bed, back rigid, fingers drumming on his kneecaps. Sam settled in beside him, a few inches of space between them. He hadn’t been able to get a read on Lance yet—not like Hunk, who gave hugs freely and fell into them whenever they were offered, nor like Keith, who avoided physical contact as a rule, except where Shiro was concerned.

With Lance, it seemed the waters were even more muddied. Of all the paladins, he was one of the freest with casual touch. He hugged Hunk, wrestled Katie, and high-fived Coran with a loose ease somewhat ruined by the haste with which he pulled away; he kissed Allura’s hand with a wink and a smirk that said he only meant it halfway. And there was somehow even more of a barrier where Shiro and Keith were concerned, a restraint on Lance’s part and a look in his eye like he was standing at a cliff’s edge with no clue how he’d come to be there.

Maybe that had to do with what Katie had confided late one night when she was telling him about how she’d found out Keith was her mysterious second soulmate. A red mark on Lance’s wrist, an ugly half a soulbond everyone in the castle knew about and no one seemed to want to discuss.

“Something on your mind?” Sam asked, watching Lance’s face. He was used to Katie’s attempt to cover up her distress, but he’d had thirteen years to learn her tells. Lance was, thus far, an enigma.

The motion of Lance’s hands slowed, and he chewed on his lip for a moment before he blurted out, “You don’t have soulmates, right?”

Sam raised his eyebrow as Lance flushed crimson and ducked his head. “Katie tell you that?”

“Uh.” Lance looked up guiltily. “Yeah? Sorry.”

Sam shook his head. “Oh, no need to apologize.” He rolled up his sleeves and turned his arms over, showing Lance his un-Marked skin. “Plenty of prime real estate for tattoos here, eh?”

Lance laughed, relaxing where he sat. “Guess that’s a perk of not having soulmates.”

“Not having Soulmarks,” Sam said, smiling when Lance scowled at him. “I’ve got plenty of soulmates, Lance. My wife, my kids.” His heart twinged at the thought of Matt, dying alone on an unfamiliar world. “I don’t know if Shiro ever mentioned this, but I’ve always considered my crews to be like soulmates. When you’re spending months on end crammed up against each other on a ship that’s gotta get you to the stars and back, you get to know each other. You work in tandem so much sometimes it feels like you’re all part of one big, well-oiled machine.”

“Is that why you didn’t tell Iverson--” Lance cut himself off with a squeak and clapped a hand over his mouth, but Sam only chuckled.

“That Shiro and Matt were soulmates? Yes, Lance, I figured it out. Matt only spent the first decade and a half of his life staring at the Kerberos symbol on his wrist and coming up with ridiculous theories about what it meant.” Sam lay back on the mattress and a moment later, Lance followed suit. “I think my favorite was the time he decided it meant his soulmate was a Roman centurion time traveler.”

That startled a laugh out of Lance, bright and cheery. He draped an arm across his face, snorting as he tried to stifle his mirth. “I think the metal skirt look suits him.”

It was Sam’s turn to laugh. He let the silence stretch between them, well aware that everyone here had things they weren’t ready to talk about—certainly not with the strange old geezer they’d just met.

With a sigh, Sam reached out and patted Lance’s shoulder. “Marks are just a starting point, Lance,” he said. “Don’t let what is or isn’t written on your skin dictate who you spend time with.”

“But--”

“Do you care about him?” Sam asked. Lance hesitated, but didn't deny that he was here because of Keith. “It’s okay if you don’t know. Soulmates are confusing. But if you want that bond, then you need to be ready to put in the effort.”

“But he doesn’t reciprocate.”

Sam stared at the ceiling, scratching his chin. “Are you sure?”

“He doesn’t have my Marks.”

“Okay. But does he not have your Marks because the universe knows he’ll never ever like you? Or is it that you're avoiding each other because your Marks say you aren’t meant to be? How do you know he doesn't reciprocate if you haven't even given him the opportunity?”

Lance sat up. “What difference does it make?”

“You can't control your Marks, Lance, but you can control your relationships.” Sam smiled. “You didn’t ask for advice, but I’m going to give it to you anyway: forget the Marks. Focus on the person. You’ll be glad you did.”

Chapter 9: Interlude: Questions

Notes:

Me: The interludes are going to be shorter than normal chapters
Also me: *writes an 8,000 word interlude, making this officially the longest chapter to date in this fic*

This chapter begins the sprint through season 2 canon and covers events up through episode seven, "Space Mall" (though most of these conversations happen between episodes.)

Chapter Text

“When was the last time you talked to Lance?” Shiro asked.

Keith blinked, pulling his gaze away from the fire to stare at Shiro. In the semi-darkness Shiro didn’t look quite as pale as he had when Keith had first found him, injured, weak, and cornered by a pack of territorial alien beasts. He still had one hand pressed to the glowing wound in his side, though, and Keith could feel it pulsing—a hot, ever-present ache reflected back on Keith.

“I thought you were asleep.”

Shiro cracked his eyes open and raised an eyebrow at Keith. “Could you sleep through this?” he asked dryly. “Because if so, I really need to get my hands on whatever sleep-aid you use.”

Keith tried to smile at Shiro’s feeble attempt at humor, but his stomach twisted, and his gaze drifted back to the campfire. Maybe Shiro had been onto something earlier, when he’d tried pretending he wasn’t in pain. It hadn’t convinced either of them, but it had certainly been easier than having to face up to the reality of the day. Shiro could have died, and Keith--

Keith had been all but useless. If the Black Lion hadn’t listened to him, hadn’t let Keith guide her to Shiro…

“You didn’t answer my question, by the way.”

Keith hunched forward, aching muscles protesting the movement. “What question?”

Shiro made a noise that said he wasn’t amused by Keith’s faux innocence. “When was the last time you talked to Lance?”

“We were just with the others, like, six hours ago, Shiro--”

“That’s not what I mean, and you know it. Have you even had a real conversation with him since the explosion?”

“Have you?” Keith’s voice was sharp, and he took a savage sort of pleasure from watching Shiro flinch. He’d been tiptoeing around the subject—everyone had—and Keith was sick of it. “Fine, no. No, I haven’t figured out how how to apologize for my existence yet. Sorry to disappoint.”

“Keith...”

Keith hugged one knee to his chest and stared out over the rugged landscape of the planet they’d crash-landed on. They’d seen no sign of more creatures like the ones that had tried to make Shiro their dinner, but Keith wasn’t sure he trusted their safety enough to sleep tonight.

He didn’t have to turn his head to feel Shiro’s gaze on him, steady and concerned. It rankled him, and he tried to ignore it for all of ten seconds before sighing heavily.

“Sorry. That was...” Uncalled for? Pathetic? Bitter and childish and stupendously un-paladin-like? “It’s been a long day.”

“I know it has, Keith,” Shiro said in his very best dad voice. Keith could see him out of the corner of his eye, reclining against a weathered rock, tired and pained and grim. They made quite a pair out here in a barren wilderness, alone in the universe except for the Black Lion and Red—who hadn’t stirred once since Zarkon’s beat-down earlier that day.

Keith wondered whether he was only good for hurting the people bonded to him.

The melodrama of the thought brought a wry smile to his lips, and he shook his head, trying to dislodge some of the melancholy that had settled over him.

“I know it’s hard, Keith, but you're the one he needs to talk to." Shiro was silent for a moment, as though hoping that would be enough to get Keith to relent. "You’re going to have to talk to him sooner or later. A leader can’t let things like this fester, or--”

“Woah, woah, woah.” Keith whipped around, gloomy mood vaporizing in the face of a fresh wave of anger. “What are you talking about? Leader?”

“Of the paladins,” said Shiro. “I meant what I said back there. If something happens to me, I want you to lead them. The Black Lion has already let you pilot her once, hasn’t she?”

Keith was pretty sure that had been a fluke, and even if it hadn’t, a thirty-second desperation-fueled tumble into a canyon and a few crushed lizard monsters made for some singularly atrocious leadership credentials. “I heard you the first time,” Keith grumbled. “I figured it was delirium.”

A spasm of pain wracked Shiro’s body, and Keith’s breath hitched as the echo hit him.

“Haggar really did a number on you, huh?”

Shiro’s smile was thin. “Are you kidding? I had to suffer through your rebellious teenage years. This is nothing.”

Keith snorted. “Jerk.”

“Troublemaker.” Shiro could have left it at that. But of course he was nothing if not stubborn (Keith had a sneaking suspicion that was largely his own fault), and so he kept pushing. “I don’t know what you’re so afraid of.”

“You’re joking.” Keith stared at Shiro, but Shiro’s eyes betrayed nothing. “He’s my soulmate, Shiro! Or—I’m his. I—Shit.” Keith pressed his forehead against his knees. “It’s no wonder he hates me.”

Shiro made an unhappy sound, and the twinge in Keith’s side said he’d tried to stand before thinking better of it. “Lance doesn’t hate you, Keith. I’d say exactly the opposite.”

Which was exactly the problem.

Shiro sighed. “Talk to him.”

“We can talk our way through the entire English language, Shiro. It’s not going to change the fact that he has my Marks and I… I don’t have his.”

Shiro’s foot stretched across the distance between them and kicked Keith’s shoe. “Hey,” he said, and waited until Keith looked up at him. “Maybe all Lance needs from you is to see that you care. I know.” He held up his hands before Keith could argue. “I know it’s awkward, and I know you normally try to avoid things like this. But I promise you, it’s not going to be any worse than you sitting around working yourself up over nothing.”

“It’s not nothing,” Keith huffed, but Shiro was smiling like he knew he’d already won. With a heavy sigh, Keith flopped backward onto the hard stone. “Fine. I’ll… think about it.”

Do you ever think that Soulmarks actually make relationships harder?

Absolutely.

Lance grinned at Red’s response. There had been no hesitation there; in fact, it was probably the fastest Red had ever responded to one of Lance’s questions. It made him wonder whether Red had asked himself the same question before.

A second passed, and more writing appeared on Lance’s arm—large and slanted, like Red was in a hurry.

Is something wrong?

Lance grinned despite himself. He considered telling Red the truth, but, “I just spent a day and a half getting mind-controlled by mermaids and fighting giant sea worms, and when I finally make it back to the castle-ship—cause, oh yeah, that’s a thing that exists in my life—I run into my sorta-not-really soulmate and it’s just about the most awkward thing ever so I’m feeling a little depressed...”

Yeah, Lance didn’t think Red would take that well, even if it was the truth.

The thing was, he could almost believe Keith’s awkwardness was because he felt guilty about Lance’s Marks, which was the very last thing Lance had wanted. But Lance hadn’t missed the way Keith had glanced at Shiro before executing the universe’s least-casual fist-bump and telling Lance it was good to see him back safe.

Lance should never have showed Keith that Mark. Especially not in front of the whole team. Now Space Dad was involved, which meant a whole series of heartfelt conversations and awkwardness that could have been avoided if Lance had just shut up and kept his whole soulmate sideshow to himself.

Blue?

Lance stared at the fire-red letters on his skin. That was one band-aid he wished he’d ripped off before it became a Thing. Aside from Hunk, Red was the only person who really knew Lance—knew his insecurity and his secret hopes and all the other pieces of him he hid under a layer of false bravado and cutting wit. And Red didn’t even know his real name.

He got it. Really he did. Red wasn’t completely on board with the whole soulmate thing. He was a private person, and sharing his real name was a huge step. Lance had kept his own name secret because he hadn’t wanted Red to feel pressured, but sometimes he couldn’t help wishing he’d shared his name from the start.

I’m fine, Lance wrote, then hesitated. He’d only been back on the castle-ship for a few hours. Just long enough for a misty-eyed reunion with the team, after which Shiro finally caved to Coran’s needling and let himself be ushered into a cryopod. (Lance still hadn’t heard the full story, but he gathered that Shiro had been hurt fighting Haggar, and had refused to be put under until he saw his whole team back safe and sound. Which was adorable, but also worryingly self-destructive. Lance would have shoved Shiro into the cryopod himself if he’d resisted one second longer.)

With Shiro recovering, Lance had grabbed some food and hit the shower. (Salt water. Hair. Thirty-six hours. Gross. ) Allura had said dinner was in an hour, but dinner meant Keith (and, well, everyone , but Keith was the worst because Keith was the one whose Mark was now public knowledge.)

Lance was trying to prepare himself, and apparently that meant talking to Red.

Want to talk about it? Red wrote. He hesitated just a second before continuing. Sorry if I’m being pushy. I’m… not good with this.

Don’t be ridiculous. You’re perfect.

The thing with writing, Lance was realizing, was that it gave him far too much time to second-guess himself. Not like talking, or even texting. No, with that, words just tumbled out of him and he did his best to roll with it.

Writing, though, was slow. So Lance was already regretting his word choice before he finished it—though by then it was too late to change course. Well, it was the truth, at any rate. He and Red were still figuring things out, sure. Lance was still a little surprised every time Red wrote back, and Red still sometimes seemed not to know what to say, but he could talk to Red about things he couldn’t discuss with the other paladins. Everyone here was too close, too fully invested in each other’s business. Sometimes Lance needed to talk to someone that was outside his personal problems, and Red was easy to talk to.

Unlike Keith.

It’s just… Lance paused, considering how much to tell Red. Admitting the truth about his unreciprocated bond with Keith just opened the door to more questions. Questions Lance wasn’t ready to answer. He considered his words before he started writing.

There’s this guy I know. (That was true.) At school. (Partially true, if a year out of date.) He hates me. (Also true. Maybe. It was impossible to say for sure where Keith was involved.)

Red didn’t respond immediately, and Lance flicked a hovering bouncy ball at the wall. It glided forward, rebounded off the wall, and returned to Lance’s waiting hand. He’d found it in a storage room on the third floor and had promptly forgotten to ask Coran what it was and whether flicking it repeatedly at the wall was a good idea.

It hadn’t exploded yet…

What does that have to do with soulmates? Red asked.

Lance grimaced. I don’t know. It’s stupid.

I don’t believe you.

That I don’t know? Or that it’s stupid?

Both.

Lance flicked the ball again, then caught it and let it hover beside his head as he settled back against the pillows, towel still draped around his neck, pen in his hand.

Well it is stupid… I keep trying to strike up a friendship with this guy.

The guy who hates you.

Yes. Shush. Maybe he doesn’t hate me. He just thinks I’m annoying. I don’t know. Point is, we’re not soulmates or anything, and it’s like… That’s that. If the universe doesn’t draw your names from a hat, you’re shit outta luck. Too bad, so sad, do not pass go or collect $200.

Lance let his head fall back against the wall and sighed. What was it Pidge’s dad had told him? Don’t think about the Marks. Great advice—except Lance couldn’t help it if other people still let their Marks rule them.

It’s like no one wants to waste time on relationships that aren’t soulbonded, Lance wrote, feeling tired. Sometimes I wonder how many great friendships could have been if Marks just didn’t exist at all.

Red was silent for a long time, and Lance wondered if he’d overdone it. Before he could panic too much, though, the letters started forming again, slow and precise.

I used to think the same thing. Maybe I still do, I don’t know. But I’m… not a very social person. If not for these Marks, I don’t know if I’d have any friends. I definitely wouldn’t know you.

Lance readied his pen to respond that of course Red would still have his friends. Soulmates were soulmates because they were meant to be. Even without the Marks, they’d find each other somehow.

But he stopped, thinking of Sam. Did Keith not have Lance’s Marks because it wasn’t meant to be? Or did their friendship suck because they were letting the Marks make the decision for them?

My head hurts, Lance wrote. The floaty ball had drifted a little while Lance was distracted, and he nudged it away before it could run into his nose. I’m glad I have my soulmates. Don’t get me wrong. I’m glad I have you. It’s just…

Complicated, Red said, and Lance chuckled.

Complicated, he agreed.

“Do you think Ulaz was telling the truth?”

Coran looked up at Allura, surprised by her question. It had only been a few hours since Ulaz had sacrificed himself to save Voltron from the latest robeast, and a somber mood had descended on the castle. Whatever hostility the paladins might have harbored toward Ulaz had vanished with his death—though in all honesty, Coran suspected they’d all trusted him since Shiro had identified Ulaz as the man who’d freed him.

Ulaz had helped Shiro, and in doing so, had placed himself in direct opposition to Zarkon. That made him an ally… or so the paladins believed.

“Truly?” Coran asked. It was just him and Allura on the bridge now, quiet and conflicted. “I’m not sure what to think.”

Allura stared at him, brow furrowed, eyes sharp in a way that said that wasn’t the answer she’d expected.

“You’re not just saying that to pacify me. Are you?”

A tired smile tugged at Coran’s lips. The kelyap bond didn’t grant him access to Allura’s thoughts, but sometimes he felt as if the long years they’d known each other did.

“I’m not,” Coran said, leaving his station to lay his hands on Allura’s shoulders. “I believe Ulaz was working against Zarkon. I believe he saved Voltron because of the hope we carry—hope that Zarkon might one day be defeated. I also believe this sect of his, this Blade of Marmora, has it’s own agenda, and it may not align with ours.”

Allura turned to look at the nav computer. They’d already entered the coordinates Ulaz had given them, though they couldn’t go to the Blade’s headquarters yet. Not until they were certain Zarkon wouldn’t follow them.

“The paladins think I was too hard on him,” Allura said. “That I should have trusted him more easily.”

“The paladins haven’t lost the things you and I have lost.” Coran paused, choosing his next words carefully. “They trust easily. More easily than you or I. That’s a good thing, I think, as long as they don’t put their faith in the wrong person. It’s good they have you to act as the voice of caution. As long as we all continue to listen to each other, we’ll be fine.”

“Then you think we should ally ourselves with the Blade of Marmora.”

Coran stared out at the empty expanse of space. He still sometimes caught himself searching the sky for something. Some sign of Zarkon’s slaughter. Stars extinguished, scars etched across the night sky, a void to mark where Altea had once been.

This universe was not the one he’d left behind ten thousand years ago. All his knowledge of alien customs, all his training in diplomacy, counted for little in a world he scarcely recognized.

“I think we should talk to them,” he said, regretting that he’d lost the part of him that trusted as easily as the young humans who now shared the castle with him. “But I can’t blame you for being skeptical. I am too.”

Allura had held herself rigid through the conversation, but she slumped now, leaning her forehead against Coran’s shoulder. “I don’t want them to live our tragedies,” she whispered. “I can’t allow them to suffer our same losses because they trusted someone who didn’t deserve it.”

Her voice was pure iron, and Coran couldn’t stop his smile. “It won’t happen, Allura. We won’t let it.”

“Then… you are well?”

Hunk felt a pleasant flush at the earnestness in Shay’s voice, not at all dampened by her shyness. The sound was about a billion times nicer than the alarms that had become near constant since the paladins left Olkarion behind, and some of Hunk’s exhaustion began to ebb.

“You are not hurt, are you?” Shay’s voice faltered, and she fiddled with one of the bone rings dangling from her carapace. “Any of you, I mean. I would know if you had been hurt.”

She tried not to show her worry, but Hunk heard it just the same. I miss you, she was saying. Be safe.

It was nice. It had only been a day or two since the string of ambushes had started—a day or two since exhaustion had kept Hunk from space Skyping Shay. It felt like way longer.

“We’re good,” he said. “Tired as heck, but still alive. I’ve been helping Coran fix stuff as it breaks, so hopefully Zarkon won’t be able to catch up to us before we figure out how he’s tracking us.”

“Well, with you there, I am certain all will be well.”

Hunk blinked, fighting back a grin. “Aw, Shay, you’re making me blush!”

Shay ducked her head, her hands flying up to cover her face. “It is the truth,” she squeaked.

“Well, thanks.” He scratched the back of his neck, something happy fluttering in his chest. “But Coran’s the one who knows all these systems. I’m just there for the heavy lifting.”

Shay’s scowl said she didn’t believe that for a second, which was strangely thrilling.

“And this is the Yellow Lion’s hangar.”

Hunk turned at the sound of Pidge’s voice and found her backing into the hangar, arms spread wide. Sam Holt followed her, eyes alight as he took the space in. (Not that there was much to see. Hunk’s work station, a half dozen unfinished projects, and Yellow herself. And a lot of junk Hunk had been meaning to clean up.)

Sam had been on the castle-ship for a little less than two weeks now, but the tour Pidge had tried to give him after he’d emerged from the cryopod kept getting interrupted—first by training, then by a haunted castle, then by Allura’s capture and the ensuing chaos of the paladins getting flung to all corners of the universe.

Hunk would have thought Sam would put his foot down after that, would have told Pidge she was too young to be a paladin.

Instead, Sam had just insisted on learning everything there was to know about the castle so he could help Allura and Coran in battle. Today, apparently, that meant seeing the Lions.

Sam’s eyes drifted to the screen where Shay’s feed was visible. “Is that…?”

“Hunk’s alien girlfriend?” Lance asked, popping his head in behind Sam and Pidge. “Yeah. Her name’s Shay.”

Irritation twisted Hunk’s mouth into a small frown. Girlfriend, girlfriend, girlfriend. If it wasn’t Lance, it was Pidge, the pair of them always ribbing Hunk about his so-called crush on Shay. It wasn’t that Hunk didn’t care about her, or that she wasn’t pretty, or brave, or funny, or kind—he did care about her, a lot, and she was all of those things.

She was also his platonic soulmate, and Hunk didn’t appreciate his friends trying to make it something it wasn’t.

“Hey Mr. Holt!” Hunk called, trying to pretend he hadn’t heard Lance’s comment. “Getting the tour?”

“Yeah.” Pidge shrugged and strolled forward, her hands in her pockets. “Figured it was about time we wrap up this epic.” She crossed her arms on the back of Hunk’s chair, waving lazily at the camera. “Hey, Shay.”

“Right—Shay, this is Pidge’s dad.” Hunk gestured toward Sam, who had joined Pidge and Lance in the camera’s view. “Mr. Holt, this is Shay—my pain pal.”

He may have put a little more emphasis on the words than really necessary, but Lance got the message. He held up his hands as Hunk glared at him, but he didn’t look terribly apologetic. “Hi, Shay. Hunk treating you like a lady, or do I need to give him a lesson in chivalry again?”

“Again?” Hunk asked.

Lance grinned, and Shay laughed into her hand. “Oh, no,” she said. “He is being a perfect gentleman.”

“And you probably couldn’t teach him anything anyway,” Pidge muttered.

Hunk sighed, rubbing his wrist as Lance and Pidge bickered, Shay and Sam looking on in mingled confusion and amusement. He wasn’t sure why all the teasing bothered him so much. Maybe because it put thoughts in his head. Thoughts about what it would be like to date Shay. To hold her hand as they looked up at the stars, to make her dinner and listen to her talk about her family. To kiss her.

And that was the problem. They were pain pals. Platonic soulmates. Even if Hunk had a crush on Shay—which he didn’t, it was just Lance and Pidge putting ideas in his head—she obviously didn’t feel the same way about him.

The strangest part was, that actually hurt. Just thinking about Shay’s discomfort—disgust, maybe—if Hunk ever admitted his feelings to her was… It was worse than the way he’d felt when he realized his pen pal didn’t reciprocate.

Granted, Hunk had been sixteen when he’d made that discovery, and hadn’t spared a single thought for the mark on his wrist—a golden swirl inside a small circle—for nearly two years prior. Sure, there had been a time when all his friends were talking about their pen pals. Hunk supposed it was inevitable, when everyone was finally getting to talk to the person they were meant to be with.

Hunk’s pen pal had never written. Hunk had considered striking up a conversation once or twice, but he never knew what to say. It had never seemed that urgent to him. He figured some day he’d probably meet his soulmate, they’d fall in love, get married, have children… the American dream.

It had never seemed to be worth the bother of doing anything about it, though, and days turned into weeks. Before he knew it, he was at the Garrison, and Lance was scribbling something on his arm, grinning like a fool as red letters answered.

My pen pal, he’d said. Red’s a man of few words, but he’s got a killer sense of humor once you manage to unearth it.

Hunk had smiled, ready to let Lance go on about his soulmate at length—he usually did, ever since the two of them had discovered their matching Marks. The slightest push could make Lance ramble for an hour about Hunk, or Red, or his brother and sister.

This time, though, Lance didn’t start rambling. He just leaned forward, his eyes intent on Hunk’s wrist. So what’s yours like?

My what?

Lance had stared at him like he was speaking another language. Your pen pal. I live with you, dude. I saw the Mark.

Hunk had held his hand close to his chest, much as he was doing now, and reluctantly admitted he’d never talked to his pen pal. Lance, of course, had declared that a capital offense, and had shoved his pen at Hunk, staring at him with big eyes until Hunk finally broke down and wrote an awkward greeting.

No one had answered.

Hunk was pretty sure Lance had taken the news worse than Hunk, but that was probably because Lance dreamed about falling in love, about meeting Red face to face. Lance was the kind of person who’d had his wedding planned from the time he and Red first exchanged words, and he could hardly bear the agony of not knowing who it was behind those small red letters.

Lance was a romantic, and Hunk… wasn’t.

Except now, with Shay, for pretty much the first time ever, Hunk was starting to think he might know what it was that made Lance scream every time he saw a new message from Red. What made Sam sigh when he talked about Pidge’s mom. What tugged at Shiro whenever someone brought up Matt.

Hunk didn’t know what to do with that.

So he did nothing, just sat back and let Lance dominate the conversation. Lance and Shay were, after all, the two most important people in the universe to Hunk. He wasn’t going to let a silly little crush get in the way of that.

“But why would he leave?” Lance demanded. There was something cold and restless stirring in his gut, something that compelled him to move, to act, to do something, damn it! Keith was gone, and Allura was gone, and all the paper-thin justifications in the universe couldn’t change the fact that it felt like a betrayal.

“They’re trying to protect us,” Coran said.

Lance was only vaguely aware of him, hovering by the ship’s main controls, keeping an eye on the little blip that was Keith and Allura’s shuttle. Sam Holt lingered in the shadows a few feet further back, silent, distracted. The other paladins had already left to get their lions and head down to Taujeer, and Lance knew he should be with them, but he couldn’t stop the ragged voice inside telling him that he should be flying as fast as he could the other direction.

“Screw them!” Lance spun, flinging his hands up in the air, and stalked back the other way. I should be there. He reached the main controls, growled under his breath, and spun back the other way. “Friggin' Keith, always trying to be a big damn hero.”

Coran grabbed him by the shoulder, halting him before he could pace a rut in the bridge’s floor plates. “They’ll be fine, Lance.”

“You can’t know that! What if Zarkon finds them? What if it’s a trap? What if they get hurt—die—because they were off being absolute fucking idiots?!”

There was a bomb going off in Lance’s head, a swirl of heat and light and terror, only it wasn’t Coran who stood in the inferno’s path this time. It was Keith, and Lance wasn’t there to take the hit. Sendak held Allura off the ground in a massive mechanical hand, slowly crushing her, and Lance wasn't there to save her.

He stared down at his hands, expecting to see fresh Marks appear, expecting a flood of red and pink that said he’d failed.

“Lance. Lance.” Coran tilted Lance’s chin up so they were eye-to-eye, and Lance almost lost his composure at the fear smoldering in Coran’s eyes. “I know you’re worried, but they’ll be fine.”

“But--”

“You don’t actually believe Zarkon’s tracking them, do you?” Sam asked. Lance turned toward him in time to see a lopsided smile. “I might be able to handwave that Altean energy beacon thing Princess Allura was talking about, except that Zarkon could have used that to destroy her and Coran before any of you paladins showed up. And—what was Keith’s theory?”

“That Zarkon imprinted on him in battle or something?” Lance muttered. “Which, I mean, of all the hare-brained evil alien half-rate Twilight knock-off bullshit excuses...” (But there was something there, something Lance couldn’t put his finger on but which nagged at him with a sharp, searing terror.)

Sam shook his head, chuckling to himself. “They’re scared, Lance. They need to prove to themselves that they aren’t putting the rest of you in danger. They’ll spend a couple boring hours out there, realize they worked themselves up over nothing, and then they’ll be back.”

“But...” Lance hesitated. There was another argument to be made there, he knew there was, but he couldn’t pin it down. They were in danger. Lance should be there.

Except that Keith obviously didn’t want him there. They’d barely talked outside of battle and training since Lance had showed Keith the Mark on his wrist. They’d barely even spent time together. Once when the castle was haunted and they’d both been too terrified to realize how awkward things were between them. And once, yesterday, when they’d gotten stranded in an elevator together on the way down to the pool. Coran had found Lance some weird Altean concealer that was supposed to be one hundred percent waterproof, so at least Keith hadn't seen anything he shouldn't have. But it had still been the single most uncomfortable experience in Lance’s life, and if Keith felt at all the same (which he did, if the way he kept his arms crossed over his chest the whole time was any indication), Lance couldn’t blame him for keeping his distance.

But the rest of his team needed him now, so Lance forced a laugh, flashing Sam and Coran brilliant, only mostly-forced smiles as he backed toward the elevator that would take him down to Blue. “You know, if Keith wanted to get away from me that bad, I’m sure he could have found a better excuse.”

The joke fell flat, and Lance had to fight not to flinch at the pity that washed over both men. God, this was worse than Lance’s parents tag-teaming him when he was feeling down. (And by that, he meant it felt like home. And by that, he meant he was going to cry if this kept up much longer, and he really couldn’t afford that when both halves of his ragtag little space family needed him.)

But Coran saw straight through him, as per usual. Lance expected a hug, or a pep talk. Braced himself for it. Got ready to run out the door and down to Blue where he could take all this pain he’d never asked for and pour it into the vast, soothing ocean that was his lion.

Instead, Coran just pulled off his glove and tilted his hand back to expose the inside of his wrist. An intricate white symbol marked the skin there, hardly visible until Coran stepped closer. Confused, Lance stopped backing toward the elevator and stared down at the Mark.

“Who…?”

“King Alfor,” Coran said, and smiled sadly when Lance looked up at him in surprise. “He didn’t reciprocate, but he was still one of my best and truest friends.” Lance’s heart contracted painfully, and he scrambled to find the words to respond, but Coran just held Lance, one hand on either side of his face, and whispered, “Don’t give up on them just yet.”

So… you’re a pilot?

It was official. Keith was running out of questions—and running out of hints to drop. Nearly two weeks of talking to Blue—to Lance?--to Blue and trying to figure out once and for all whether Keith’s suspicions were as groundless as they seemed. He’d tried everything he could think of that might have made Lance give away his identity.

If it was Lance.

Which it wasn’t.

Keith was slowly coming to accept that. He still felt knotted up inside whenever he thought of Lance’s Marks, but just because Keith felt bad about not reciprocating didn’t mean he could close his eyes and wish his way to being Lance’s pen pal. The universe didn’t work that way, and Keith was just going to have to suck it up and fix things with Lance the Shiro way. With talking and words and actually seeing Lance, face-to-face.

He was procrastinating. So sue him. Blue was in a chatty mood today, and Keith was still coming down off an adrenaline high. Realizing his possible (definite) Galra heritage hadn’t betrayed his entire team would have been enough of an emotional overdose to knock him flat. Add in an exploding shuttle and a battle on Taujeer that could have easily turned into a full-blown disaster, and Keith needed a few minutes with someone who wasn’t going to ask questions he wasn’t ready to answer.

I am a pilot, yeah, Blue wrote. How’d you know?

In answer, Keith just circled the blue pilot wings on his wrist.

Blue drew the squiggly shorthand for laughter. Oh, right. Duh. You know, I always wondered if that meant you were gonna be my co-pilot someday.

Keith’s lips twitched. How do you know you won’t be my co-pilot?

Because I’m the best pilot ever? Get with the program, Red.

Keith wanted to tell Blue he’d been the best pilot in his class, but he held back. He told himself it was because that conversation would inevitably lead to talk of how Keith had gotten himself kicked out when Shiro disappeared, how he’d thrown away his entire future for someone the world said was dead.

But Keith wasn’t that good a liar, not even to himself. He held back not out of shame, but out of fear. That wasn’t dropping hints. That wasn’t nudging Blue with questions like, “What’s the farthest from home you’ve ever been?” and, a few days after he’d saved Lance from getting auto-ejected out the airlock because of Sendak’s crystal, “I’m pretty sure my house tried to kill me today. Full-on poltergeist shit.” And then when they'd been stuck in the elevator, Lance had had every opportunity to see the pilot wings on Keith's wrist. (He hadn't seen, or else he hadn't recognized them, and Keith could have pulled his hair out over that--especially since Keith hadn't been able to get even a fleeting look at Lance's wrist. The boy was just too damn spastic.)

But telling Blue he’d been top of his class at the Garrison was as good as writing out his own name, and it would put an end to the whole charade. No maybe he didn't see to wiggle out of it. Either Blue was Lance, and he’d finally figure it out, or Blue was someone else and Keith would have to face facts.

He didn’t want to let go. He didn’t want to admit to himself that Lance and Blue were two different people. They’d become too entwined in his head.

So Keith kept pushing—slowly, carefully, never hard enough to shatter the illusion.

What sort of ships do you fly? Keith wrote, and immediately reminded himself that even Lance wouldn’t respond with, “Oh, you know, a giant blue lion.”

Mostly simulators for now, said Blue. I haven’t technically finished flight school.

That’s a relief. I might have had to feel inferior if you had your license before me.

Doesn’t matter when I get my license, Red, I’m still gonna fly circles around you.

Right.

The conversation lulled after that, and Keith let it. Every time he talked with Blue, he felt like he was rushing toward an end. He couldn’t hold onto his illusions forever, but he wasn’t ready to let go of Lance. Not yet.

So he kept quiet, and held onto the image he’d built for himself of Lance sitting a few walls away, pen in hand, laughing as he talked to Keith instead of looking at him with suspicion and hurt. He held onto the possibility of a universe where he and Lance could breathe the same air without it feeling like Keith was slowly suffocating, searching for a way to fix things and not knowing how.

He held on, and he held his secrets close for just one more day.

“Sorry—is this a bad time?”

Lance’s voice shot through Keith like an electric discharge, and he shoved his knife back into its sheath, angling his body so Lance wouldn’t see the glowing rune on the hilt.

“L-Lance!” he said, his voice too high, too thin. “What are—What are you doing here?”

That was the wrong thing to say. Lance’s eye widened fractionally, and the smile he’d plastered on his face faltered. “Nothing, jeez. Sorry to bother you.”

He turned, and Keith shoved his dagger under his pillow as he rolled out of bed, surging forward just in time to catch Lance’s wrist before he left. Lance froze, and Keith’s fingers burned where they touched Lance’s skin. The little red scar peeked out from beneath Lance’s sleeve, a hair’s breadth from Keith’s index finger.

Keith let go, backing off as Lance turned toward him. There was a question in his gaze, and Keith wished desperately he knew what answer Lance was looking for.

“So...” Keith trailed off, hoping Lance would jump in and start the conversation like he always did. Keith wasn’t good with this sort of thing. “Is everything all right?”

Lance shrugged. “Sure. You’ve just been spending so much time off by yourself, I was starting to worry that...”

“That… what?”

Pursing his lips, Lance leaned back against the door. He looked very much like he was trying to appear unconcerned, but it wasn’t working. Keith felt himself tense up in response, his eyes wanting to dart toward his pillow and the knife hidden underneath. Did Lance know?

He couldn’t. No one had seen the symbol on his knife—Keith always kept it covered, weirdly protective of its secrets, even before he suspected (knew) what it meant.

Lance let out a loud, exasperated sigh, and flung his arms out toward Keith. “I was afraid you were planning another suicidal jailbreak-distraction-oh-hey-maybe-Zarkon-imprinted-on-me thing.”

“A… what?” Keith arched an eyebrow, some of his tension unwinding as Lance let his head drop back against the wall.

“I thought you might have left again, and…” He turned his head aside, voice dropping so low Keith almost didn’t hear it. “And maybe this time you weren’t coming back.”

Taken aback by the admission, all Keith could do was blink. “Oh.”

“Yeah, oh.” Lance straightened up, squaring his shoulders. “Look, man, I’m sorry if I made things weird with the whole… Soulmark… thing.”

Lance was still talking, but Keith felt suddenly awful for letting Lance think he was mad about it, like he blamed Lance, like this was somehow Lance’s fault. So instead of letting Lance finish, Keith stepped forward, hands spread in a plea, and cut him off.

“I’m sorry, too. It--” He faltered, because Lance’s eyes had gone wide, and Keith hadn’t realized how much distance he’d crossed, how close they now stood. Words were suddenly very hard to come by. “I—It’s not like—like I don’t care, but I just. You just--” He growled under his breath and backed off, crossing his arms. “I wish we could start over.”

And, strangely, Lance smiled at that. "First impression three-point-oh? I could go for that." He stuck his hand out, directly under Keith’s nose. “Hi, I’m Lance. Universe's best pilot, paladin of Voltron, all around awesome guy. You're welcome.”

Keith stared at the hand, going slightly cross-eyed as he did, his brain slow to catch on. Then he looked up and found Lance staring back at him, laughter in his eyes, and a dam broke.

Laughter tumbled out of Keith in a rush, a heady flurry of emotion that left him breathless and doubled over, tears of mirth gathering at the corners of his eyes. “You--” he said, staring up at Lance, who somehow hadn’t broken character, though his face was now split with a grin. “--are an idiot.”

Lance shrugged, still holding out his hand. “But I’m your idiot.”

Heat rushed to Keith’s face, and Lance seemed to realize a second later what he’d said. His face went red, and his hand, still held out waiting for Keith to shake it, started to retreat toward Lance’s chest.

Keith grabbed it before the opportunity disappeared, painfully aware that Lance’s palm was sweating, that Keith’s own fingers were ice cold, that there was a tremble in the handshake that might have come from either of them. He couldn’t seem to look away from Lance’s wide blue eyes.

“I’m Keith,” he said, and his voice only shook a little.

“Nice to meet you, Keith.” Lance laughed, self-conscious and unsure, and pulled his hand away. Keith let it go only reluctantly. Rubbing the back of his head, Lance backed toward the hallway. “So… Hunk improvised an adapter for the console we found at the mall.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder. “Want to get in on game night?”

Keith hesitated for just a second before a smile won him over. “Sure,” he said. “Sounds like fun.”

“Why the hell does no one around here have a pen?”

Matt Holt thundered down the ship’s central corridor, glaring at the aliens—allies—captors—strangers who cowered away from his rage instead of lifting a finger to help. Some of them were refugees, former prisoners, like Matt, who had nowhere else to go. He felt bad for scaring them.

But not bad enough to stop.

“Hello! Anyone? Pens? Ink? Hell, I’ll take a freaking squid and harvest the ink myself!”

No one answered, and Matt ran a hand through his hair, resisting the urge to scream at the top of his lungs until someone on this ship miraculously found the time to talk to him. That was petty and childish, he reminded himself. He was better than that.

(Besides, he needed to save the theatrics for when he was really desperate.)

He didn’t know how long he’d been aboard the Skernet. When he’d first woken up, his head stuffed with cotton and a peculiar numbness suffusing his body, a medic tried to catch him up, but a combination of fatigue, a savage case of vertigo, and a generous application of alien painkiller tech made for poor inter-cultural communication.

Apparently Matt had been shot during a jailbreak. The laser had missed his major organs and self-cauterized the wound, which saved him from bleeding out immediately, given the alien healing tech time to work, but the trauma of the wound had knocked Matt flat for eleven quintents. Whatever those were. Matt was pretty sure a quintent was the local—or maybe universal—equivalent of a day, but whether that day was twenty-four hours, or twenty, or thirty, Matt couldn’t say. He’d spent most of the three (four?) quintents since waking up drifting in and out of a restless sleep.

He still wasn’t totally awake. The little quarter-sized device digging claws into his chest near his newest scar was only supposed to keep the pain at bay (and thank god for that), but sometimes Matt swore the rebel medics were slipping him soporifics.

God, he wanted to sleep.

But he wasn’t going to. Not until he found a pen, or something he could feasibly use to write to Takashi. An adolescence full of bored experimentation had confirmed that there was some flexibility in writing to a pen pal. Various inks worked, and most paints, but not pencil or crayon or watercolors or blood. (The last one had been an accidental discovery but, well, when a fifteen-year-old Matt had been bit by a neighbor’s dog bad enough to need stitches, he hadn’t let the opportunity for experimentation pass him by. Shiro had not seen Matt’s feeble werewolf jokes—though Katie had, and that had at least helped her deal with the pain.)

As far as Matt could tell, the bond would transfer only clear, bold, relatively thin Marks. Which meant Matt was just going to have to tear this ship apart until he found a damn pen.

The Marks on his arm were gone, Takashi’s words washed away sometime in the last two weeks, with not a single word to replace them.

It made Matt’s gut churn with icy dread.

A medic—not the one who’d tried to talk space time (heh; spacetime) to a heavily drugged Matt, but one he’d seen a few times since—appeared out of the elevator ahead and headed straight for Matt, her long, spindly arms quivering at her sides. A much bigger, meaner-looking lizard-alien followed close behind the medic, glaring at Matt like they were hoping he'd drop dead.

Matt held his ground. “I don’t suppose either of you have a pen.”

“Skernet has no need of pens,” said the lizard-man. (Lizard-woman? Lizard-person.) “They’re a security risk.”

Matt scoffed. “Security risk? Seriously?”

The medic shuffled her feet, glancing anxiously at the lizard-person. Funny. She hadn’t been nearly this timid when it was just Matt. “Matt, sweetie, don’t you think you ought to be resting?”

Matt stared at her. One corner of his brain was trying to recall her name, but it was lost along with the two dozen others he’d learned in the last four (three?) days. “I rested for two weeks. I need to get in contact with Shiro.”

The medic muttered something about how close Matt had come to dying, and how he shouldn’t be out of bed yet, and blah, blah, blah. He felt fine. Though maybe that was only because of the little metal disc on his chest that numbed his pain…

“It’s people like you who make these security protocols necessary,” the lizard-person grumbled.

“Well excuse me for causing you so much inconvenience,” Matt muttered. “You’re the ones who rescued me. And got me shot, by the way. Thanks for that.”

The lizard-person hissed at him, but Matt was beyond caring. Shiro had said he was coming for Matt. A few hours more, and Matt could have been back with other humans instead of stuck on a ship that didn’t have any oh-so-terrifying writing implements.

“You have to understand, dear,” the medic said, holding up her hands to try to soothe Matt—and maybe the lizard, too. “We’re in a very delicate situation here. If the Galra find out where we are, a lot of people will die.”

“I’m not writing to the Galra.” Matt lifted his goggles (the closest thing these people had to glasses, but at least it let him see clearly) from his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose. “I just want to talk to my boyfriend, okay?”

The lizard sighed. “You would only be putting him in danger. If the Galra think they can use him against you—against us--”

“What exactly do you think I’m going to do?” Matt asked. “Hijack a space ship to attack a Galra fleet? Even if the Galra took Shiro again, that’s not your problem.”

“Maybe not,” said the lizard. “We still don’t have pens.”

Matt groaned. “Fine,” he said, and threw his hands into the air. That twinged something in his shoulder, or maybe his chest—not pain, just a kind of vague echo of pain that said maybe he shouldn’t do that very often. “Fine. What do I have to do around her to get to a spaceport where I can buy a pen?”

“There are escape pods in the hangar,” the lizard growled. “If you’re really that desperate, I’m sure we can--”

“Absolutely not!” The medic was quivering now, and though she flinched at the glare the lizard turned her way, she didn’t back down. “This young man is badly injured. He needs to rest, not be ejected into space. I cannot allow you to send him away.”

Matt ignored her, staring down the lizard, who seemed to outrank the medic, which made them the highest-ranking person Matt had yet met. “So you’re all about freeing prisoners and fighting the Galra and whatever, right?”

The lizard scowled, eyes narrowing. “And if we are?”

“Let me help. If I can’t contact Shiro, at least let me look for signs of where he might be.”

“The universe is a big place, delanda. What makes you think you’re going to find one person in it?”

Matt shrugged. It was getting harder to work up the energy he needed to argue, so all he said was, “I have to try, don’t I?” And besides, if these rebels didn’t have a pen, he could at least try to steal one from the Galra.

The lizard person seemed to find his answer amusing. They shook their head, resigned. “Tomorrow,” they said. “Have someone show you to the training deck. We’ll see what you have to offer.”

Chapter 10: Interlude: Marmora

Notes:

You know how last time I wrote 8k and mentioned that it was the longest chapter to date? Yeah... this one's 14k, because I have no self-control. (And this is like...95% a "Blade of Marmora" fallout chapter.)

This interlude brings us to the second-to-last episode of season 2 ("Best Laid Plans"), with the next update picking up with the finale. Next week will be the last off week for this fic, but I'll be back with regular updates for part two on April 15. Enjoy!

Potential trigger warning for the first scene of this chapter for self-harm. (Matt considers how to let Pidge know he's alive, and the only way he can do that is by creating a new Mark for her.)

Chapter Text

“I got shot.”

It was late at night, the hospital ward quiet, a few medics passing by outside the small room Matt shared with another patient. He’d been asleep—or nearly so—his mind still roaming the ship in search of a pen, or some paint, or a freaking tattoo gun. In just a few more hours, he’d head down to the training deck where, hopefully, he’d earn himself a spot on one of the rebellion’s active teams.

But a horrible thought had just driven all other considerations from his mind.

He’d been shot.

Though the chest. (Well, shoulder, but he wasn’t about to quibble now.)

He might not remember getting shot, but he was sure it had hurt, at least for an instant.

Katie would have felt that pain.

He sat upright in his bed, heart hammering, the night air freezing against his sweat-slick skin. Katie. He’d tried not to think too hard about her over the last year, tried not to let himself drown in guilt over all the pain he must have caused her—first vanishing from the surface of Kerberos, then collecting wounds faster than he ever had before.

Now this.

“Fuck,” Matt hissed. He tossed his blankets aside and scrambled out of bed. That set off a quiet alarm that roused his temporary roommate, but Matt ignored the commotion. He needed something. A pin. A needle. But a quick search of the room turned up nothing.

Swearing under his breath, he raised a hand to his mouth and bit down on his finger—softly at first, then harder.

He felt no pain.

Matt stared at his hand, uncomprehending, until a medic bustled into the room. Seeing that it was Matt, and that he hadn’t fallen and cracked his head open, her look of concern cooled into something approaching impatience.

Well, that was just uncalled for.

“I need a pin,” he said, realizing too late how strange that would sound. At least he hadn’t asked for a knife. “I need to let my sister know I’m alive.”

She stared blankly at him for a moment, then shook her head and swept toward him, shooing him back toward the bed. “You need rest,” she said. “You aren’t fully healed.”

“I’m fine,” Matt said, only to be betrayed by a yawn. He scowled before the medic could say anything. “Please, I need to--”

“I’m afraid that will have to wait,” the medic said, and something in her voice had changed. It wasn’t angry, not exactly, but there was no sympathy in her eyes as she herded him back into bed and tugged the blanket up over his lap. “Rest,” she said. “I’ll have someone talk to the director in the morning, see if we can’t get this all straightened out.”

Matt almost asked if the director was the lizard person who’d shut down Matt’s attempts to contact Shiro. If so, he doubted they were going to be any help. He doubted anyone was going to be any help contacting Earth, unless someone helped him figure out why he couldn’t feel pain.

But the medic had already withdrawn, glancing once over her shoulder on her way out the door.

Groaning, Matt slammed his head back against the headboard. Without pain, the gesture was decidedly unsatisfying.

“It’s the gensa.”

Matt lifted his head and found his roommate sitting up. “What?”

The boy glanced toward the door, then dropped his voice low. “The gensa.” He pulled aside the collar of his loose medical tunic—identical to Matt’s in every way except that it had four arm holes instead of two—and revealed a smooth white disk attached to his chest. A few inches from the disk, Matt spotted a bit of gauze tinged faintly pink. “It’s what keeps things from hurting.”

Matt lifted a hand to his chest, feeling the shape of the device through his tunic. “Everything?”

“Everything,” the boy said. “Command’s worried about getting soulmates involved in our work, so everyone gets a gensa when they enlist. Can’t stop the scars, but I guess that’s what armor’s for.”

Ice slid down Matt’s spine, and he waved his hands, trying to find a framework for the situation that wasn’t two stops up the line from dystopian. “You mean this isn’t a medical thing?”

“Well… It kinda is. People tend to get beat up fighting the Galra. Better not to be hurting all the time, yeah?”

Sure, that sounded nice— probably was nice; with the way his shoulder still pulled sometimes, Matt had to imagine he would have been sore as hell without painkillers . It was also really freaking creepy. “Aren’t any of you worried your soulmates will think you’re dead?”

The boy shrugged uncomfortably. “That’s… That’s the whole idea, isn’t it? If they think we’re dead, they don’t have to worry about us.”

“Oh, yeah,” Matt said, sarcasm dripping from his words. “Much better to let them mourn you!” Damn these rebels. If Matt had been in a better mood, he might have been willing to cut them a little slack. They were fighting a losing battle against the army that ruled most of the known universe. They only had—how many people did they have? Not enough to challenge Zarkon directly, that was for sure. They had to be careful.

But Matt hadn’t signed up for this. He hadn’t agreed to lose contact with Shiro, to give up the search for his father, to abandon all hope of ever seeing Katie again.

He pulled his tunic off over his head, ignoring the way it made his injury twinge in not-quite-pain. Shaking fingers grasped at the edges of his gensa, nails scratching at his skin as they tried to pry up the smooth plasticy material.

The device might have been fused to his skin. He got a tenuous grip and tugged, and in the instant before his nails slipped, he felt a horrible, sickening lurch in his stomach, like someone had grabbed his guts and pulled.

He let go, panting, and swiped at his brow. His hands were shaking worse than ever now, beads of sweat gathering on his bare skin. He shivered, and his roommate pushed himself up on two hands to watch with a mix of confusion and concern.

Swearing again, Matt bit his hand again, harder. If he could just break the skin--

“Medic!” the boy shouted. “Medic! He’s—he’s--”

Before the boy could figure out how to finish the sentence, the medic was back, her face taut as she took in Matt—upright, shirtless, biting his finger nearly hard enough to draw blood. She hurried to the bank of medical equipment beside his bed and keyed something in, and an unnerving warmth spread out from Matt’s chest. From the gensa.

He wavered, the room around him spinning, and tried to catch himself before he fell back onto his pillow. Dystopia, he thought, groggily. I’m definitely living in a goddamn dystopian novel.

The medic leaned over him, brushing the hair back from his face. “Rest,” she whispered, her voice sending a shiver down Matt’s spine. “The director will see you in the morning.”

Agony dug its claws into Shiro’s side as he watched Keith fight on the sands of the Arena. There were four opponents this time, four Galra in the featureless, shadowy costumes of the Blade of Marmora. Keith already wobbled where he stood, blood trickling from a wound on his shoulder, his face pulled tight with pain.

Everything hurt. Shiro wanted to scream with the pain, but Kolivan’s presence at his side kept him quiet. He would not give the man that satisfaction. He would not show weakness. He was the Champion, and--

Shiro silenced that line of thinking, difficult though it was. This was not the Arena. This was not the Galra Empire, whatever it felt like. Keith had entered this contest of his own free will, and he could withdraw at any time. (He wouldn’t though; Shiro knew that, just as he knew Kolivan had not been lying when he said people sometimes died in the Trials.)

But standing here, safe in this observation booth, feeling every kick, every bite of the enemies’ blades, every throb that kept the wound on Keith’s shoulder from fading to the background… Shiro felt like a spectator. He felt like the Galra who had gathered to watch him fight. Their Champion. Victory or death—that was Zarkon’s motto, and Shiro couldn’t help it if his opinion of the Blade soured at the similarity to their own credo: Knowledge or death.

“You need to stop this,” Shiro said, struggling for calm. Kolivan would, of course, realize that Shiro was feeling Keith’s pain. The scar on Shiro’s face, and the matching Mark on Keith’s, proclaimed them soulmates from the second they’d set foot on this base. But Shiro’s fight to maintain his composure was born of more than pride; Kolivan needed to see Shiro as the black paladin, as someone in control, able to make rational decisions.

If he’d been able to look inside Shiro’s head, Kolivan would have seen just how much self-control Shiro had. It had been thirty minutes, and Shiro had so far managed to hold himself back from cutting down anyone who stood between him and Keith.

Kolivan glanced sideways at him, the three eyes on his mask glowing cobalt blue. “Only he can end the Trials.”

“What, by dying?” Shiro snapped, before he could stop himself.

It was impossible to read Kolivan’s expression through his mask, but Shiro sensed displeasure in the silence that followed. Fine. Shiro wasn’t happy about all this, either. “Death is one way the Trials will end,” Kolivan said, his voice utterly devoid of emotion. “The boy may also complete the Trial, or he may surrender.”

“Keith will never surrender,” Shiro said, turning his eyes back to the screens that showed close-up views of the battle below. “Once he sets his mind to something, he doesn’t give it up.”

And he’d obviously set his mind to uncovering the secret of his knife long ago. The risk hadn’t deterred him, nor had Shiro’s assurances that whatever answers the Blade might give didn’t matter this much. Shiro wondered whether Keith had considered that Shiro and Pidge would feel his pain. Probably he had, and the fact that he had still accepted the challenge spoke to just how desperate he was for answers.

Shiro hoped Pidge wasn’t panicking too much. You need to end this, Keith, he thought fervently at the magnified image of Keith on the screen, pale and shaking with exhaustion. She’s suffered enough.

But the look on Keith’s face—desperation, fear, vulnerability not quite masked by his determination—was so raw it hurt Shiro to see. The soulbond didn’t carry emotional pain, though right now Shiro wished it did. This was an open wound that had been festering for a long time. Maybe if Shiro had seen what was happening, it wouldn’t have come to this.

Keith fought with a ferocity that lacked his usual refinement—which wasn’t to say that his technique had suffered; in fact, Shiro had never seen him fight at this level. No, this was Keith without his usual inhibitions. This was Keith fighting for his life. Fighting for his family. Fighting with everything he had to hold onto the people he’d come to love. The people he was terrified would abandon him if the answers he found today weren’t the ones he was hoping for.

“You know how this will end.” Kolivan’s voice was neutral, his posture stiff but disinterested. “There are very few explanations for how a stranger came to be in possession of one of our blades, and if he didn’t steal it from one of our operatives--”

“He didn’t,” Shiro said. “He was telling you the truth; I’m certain of it.”

Kolivan inclined his head. “Then he is Galra.”

The words sank claws into Shiro’s heart, but he kept his face impassive. Keith knew. He had known. The desperation behind his every attack was his last, feral attempt to find another answer, because he knew what he was.

He knew the hatred Allura harbored toward the Galra, the unease the rest of them still felt to one degree or another.

He knew, and that knowledge had been tearing him apart. Shiro hadn’t even suspected.

He turned to Kolivan, clenching his jaw as Keith took another kick to the ribs. Everything hurt, but Shiro would bear that pain as a penance for not seeing sooner what Keith was going through. “So what if he is Galra?” Shiro asked through gritted teeth.

Kolivan stared back at him, silent and unreadable, and Shiro stared back. He would not back down from this test, if that’s what it was. Keith was his soulmate, whatever his blood. If Kolivan thought he could drive a wedge between them, he was sorely mistaken.

Shiro didn’t see the moment where Keith escaped. He only noticed that the screens had changed to a view of a darker place, without the frantic motion of the arena. Keith stood alone in an open hall, faint bluish light illuminating his path. He still held his knife, and his other arm was wrapped around his ribs. He didn’t bother trying to keep the pain off his face.

“Guess I really wasn’t meant to go through that door,” Keith muttered with a feeble laugh. He began to walk forward, but hadn’t even made it ten feet when his legs gave out.

Shiro’s heart clenched, and he took half a step towards the door before one of Kolivan’s guards pushed him back.

“The first Trial is over,” Kolivan said softly. “Now the second may begin.”

A new wave of anxiety rose at this declaration, and Shiro turned back toward the screens just in time to see himself step through the far doorway on one screen. Another screen showed the same scene, only without the doppelganger. “What is this?” Shiro demanded, his voice low and dangerous.

“A mindscape,” Kolivan said. “Generated by a device in your friend’s suit. It shows its wearer’s greatest hopes and fears.” The man turned, his voice heavy with affected curiosity. “Which do you suppose it is? Does he want to see you now more than anything? Or is he afraid of you? Of how you’ll react?”

Shiro balled his hands into fists to keep from punching Kolivan. The Blade was an ally. Could be an ally. Shiro had been sent here to negotiate, not to make new enemies.

Surely Kolivan had a reason for subjecting Keith to all this pain.

Shiro watched silently as his doppelganger hurried to Keith’s side and knelt down. With the doppelganger’s help, Keith managed to sit up—but it was only in the mindscape. The other screen showed Keith still lying on the ground, unconscious.

Shiro’s heart beat faster.

The doppelganger managed to sound like Shiro at first—it was uncanny, really, but if the vision drew its inspiration from Keith’s own mind, that wasn’t surprising. Shiro listened to the conversation, but he scarcely heard the words. All this focus was on Keith. On the hope and fear tugging at his expression.

“Just give up the knife, Keith!” the doppelganger snapped, its impression of Shiro beginning to wear thin.

Keith pulled back out of the doppelganger’s reach, still clutching his knife. “I can’t, Shiro. I need to know.”

“You already know. You know exactly what you’re going to find out. And you know what it will mean. Give it up. Let’s go back to the others. Nothing has to change.”

Keith stared at the doppelganger, then down at the knife in his hand. He closed his eyes. “I’ve made my choice.”

“Then you’ve chosen to be alone.”

Shiro watched in horror as Keith’s expression shattered. “Shiro,” he whispered, reaching out as the doppelganger turned its back on him. “Shiro, wait!”

Shiro couldn’t take it anymore. He couldn’t stand by and watch as Keith’s world crumbled. He couldn’t let his best friend—his brother—his soulmate think Shiro had rejected him. He turned toward the door and shouldered his way past the guards at the same instant a shudder swept through the building. Shiro staggered, caught himself against the wall, and ran on. Behind him, someone shouted something about the Red Lion, and Shiro grinned savagely.

Give ‘em hell, Red, he thought.

The world faded as Keith opened the door of his old desert shack. His father stood behind him, ready with answers about his mother. About his heritage. Those were the answers he’d given up everything to find. The answers he’d chased even to the point of losing Shiro.

But the Earth was in danger. Zarkon needed to be stopped.

And Keith, after all, was the red paladin. He had to fight. He had to stay the course, whatever the cost to himself. He’d made that choice long ago.

He never made it to the barren sand outside his shack. As soon as he opened the door, he awoke on a cold metal floor, the ceiling above him wreathed in darkness. Pain in his shoulder reminded him of the Trials, of dropping through a hole in the floor into this hall.

Shiro was bent over him, his face pinched with worry, and he sagged when he saw Keith looking back at him.

Hope sang agony in Keith’s chest. “Shiro? Is that you?”

“It’s me,” Shiro whispered. “You’re okay.”

“You came back.”

Shiro flinched at Keith’s words, though Keith’s tired mind couldn’t fathom why he should. He was here, though. That was the important thing.

Thunder rumbled overhead, and it was only the way the ground rattled beneath his hands that reminded Keith where he was. The Blade of Marmora’s headquarters, floating somewhere in empty space. That couldn’t be thunder. “What’s that sound?”

“Red,” Shiro said with half a smile. “She’s as worried about you as I am.” He slid an arm under Keith’s shoulders, and it was lucky Shiro could feel the stab of pain that overwhelmed Keith at the touch, because Keith wasn’t sure he could have made himself speak. Shifting his grip, Shiro helped Keith to his feet. Even when he was finally upright, though, Keith had to lean heavily on Shiro’s shoulder to keep from collapsing.

“Sorry, Shiro,” he muttered.

He felt Shiro’s head turn, but didn’t dare meet his eyes. “What are you apologizing for?”

The disappointment—the disgust— on Shiro’s face when Keith had argued with him just before the vision came back to him now, and Keith’s stomach turned over. “I should’ve given it up,” he said. “I should’ve just...” He shook his head as his eyes burned with tears. He should have what? Gone on lying about what he was? “You didn’t have to come back for me.”

“Keith,” Shiro said, his voice raw with pain. “That wasn’t me. That was an illusion. I would never abandon you like that.”

Keith did look up then, fully expecting Shiro’s face to betray the lie. But the Shiro looking back at him wasn’t the cold, angry stranger who had left Keith behind with all his unanswered questions, all the holes from his childhood he still couldn’t quite fill in.

This Shiro was the man who had taken Keith under his wing. Who’d had nothing but patience for a cadet who picked more fights than was healthy, who acted out and talked back and pissed off everyone he met. Everyone but Shiro.

“But… I’m Galra.” The word burned Keith even as he said it. He’d been lying to himself for too long, hoping against hope that these trials would change what he already knew to be true.

A smile quirked one corner of Shiro’s mouth. “Barely.”

“Shiro--”

“No, seriously,” Shiro said, his voice altogether too light for the topic at hand. “What did you actually get out of this deal? I haven’t seen any claws. Or bat ears. You don’t even get those jack-o-lantern eyes. If I were you, I’d demand a refund.”

Keith gaped at him for a long moment, his brain slow to process what he was hearing. A joke. A terrible joke, but a joke nonetheless. Shiro was… Wait. “Is that supposed to cheer me up?” he demanded, voice cracking indignantly. He snorted, soft and sharp. “Asshole.”

“There’s the Keith I know and love,” Shiro said, grinning. The smile was strained, but Keith thought that was more from the pain still wracking both their bodies than the fact of Keith’s heritage. They shuffled together toward the far door, one of Keith’s arms draped over Shiro’s shoulders, the sounds of Red’s assault echoing in their ears.

After a few steps, Shiro squeezed Keith’s hand. “Hey.”

“Yeah?”

“You’re my soulmate, Keith. Nothing’s ever going to change that. You know that, right?”

Emotion condensed at the back of Keith’s throat, leaving him unable to talk as tears burned behind his eyes. He nodded, letting Shiro take more of his weight.

Shiro squeezed his hand again. “Good. Now let’s get you home.”

“You okay?”

Keith gave a start, Hunk’s question pulling his attention back to the present. He glanced sideways, wary despite himself. Things between them had been awkward ever since Keith came back from the Blade of Marmora base and confessed the truth to his team. Apparently I’m part Galra.

There had been no time to talk it out. Shiro had stood calmly at Keith’s shoulder as he told the others what had happened—leaving out most of the details. A test. Awakening his Blade. He’d seen the utter shock wash across his friends’ faces—all but Allura, whose expression immediately darkened.

He hadn’t waited for the others to move from shock to anger, just turned to Kolivan and asked him to outline the plan they had for stopping Zarkon. As long as they all had something to focus on, some common goal, there was no time for them to ask Keith to leave.

But things were better now, at least with Hunk. He’d just needed time. He’d just needed to process it. He hadn’t complained about being paired with Keith for this weblum hunt, hadn’t made any hostile gestures. It was just awkward, and even that was getting better since they’d worked together. Familiar rhythms and all that. When they had a mission to focus on, things between them were just like they’d always been. Better than they’d always been.

Keith couldn’t help waiting for the backlash.

“I’m fine,” he said, instantly regretting the irritation that seeped into his voice. Hunk didn’t deserve that. Hunk, who still trusted Keith enough to listen when Keith vouched for a stranger in a wrecked Galra fighter. Hunk, who cracked jokes when he was nervous and went out of his way to reassure Keith that he was still a part of this team. Hunk, who thought Keith’s skin was turning purple—but treated that the way he’d treated Coran’s weird space-virus: as a novelty, but not a threat.

Keith appreciated it. He really did.

It wasn’t Hunk’s fault the Galra they’d found, the Galra who’d fought alongside them inside the Weblum, had run off the way he had. “I keep expecting him to come back,” he admitted. He tensed almost immediately, and glanced at Hunk nervously.

Hunk only looked thoughtful. “Your Galra friend, you mean?”

“I wouldn’t exactly call him my friend,” Keith muttered. “But… yeah. I know it’s stupid, but I guess… I guess I was hoping he’d turn out to be a good guy.”

Hunk was silent for a moment, guiding the Yellow Lion toward the rendezvous point where Allura would open wormhole for them. He glanced up at Keith, his face unusually solemn. “Just because he ran off doesn’t make him one of them. Maybe he was just scared.”

“But--”

“It doesn’t matter anyway,” Hunk went on, overriding Keith’s protests. “I don’t need someone else to tell me you’re a good person.”

Keith faltered, his voice abandoning him as he stared down at Hunk, who smiled smugly back at him. “I never said...”

“You just found out you’re part Galra,” Hunk said. Somehow he managed to get the words out without tripping over them, which was more than Keith had yet managed. “So far the only Galra we’ve met are Zarkon’s evil minions and the Blade of Marmora, who are kinda huge jerks, too. No offense, but I mean, even Allura wouldn’t make you fight to the death to find out the truth about your own family.”

“They need to protect their secrets,” Keith said. It felt like a hollow justification.

Hunk reached up to pat Keith’s arm. “I know you want to find someone like you—a Galra who’s not just fighting against Zarkon, but actually is a decent sort of person. I get why you might need that. That proof that all Galra aren’t… whatever if is you think they are. All I’m saying is that you’re proof enough for the rest of us.”

Not for Allura, he thought, but the bitterness that usually accompanied thoughts of Allura was weaker now. He returned Hunk’s smile. “Thanks, Hunk. That means a lot, considering you’re—I mean--”

“Considering I’m not your soulmate?” Hunk guessed.

Flushing, Keith turned his head away and nodded. “I’m grateful for Shiro,” he said. “I am. I just figured the rest of you would need more time.”

Hunk chuckled. “You don’t need a Soulmark to be family.” Their eyes met, and Hunk’s smile widened. “You’re stuck with us, man.”

Keith shook his head, riding out a wave of emotion. “I think I can live with that.”

“Hunk!”

Hunk’s heart leapt into his throat at the sound of Shay’s voice, never mind he’d talked to her less than two days ago, when he’d had nothing else to do to distract him from the long, tense wait for Shiro and Keith to return from their meeting with the Blade of Marmora. That conversation had been somewhat soured by Keith starting the Trials, causing Pidge to cry out in sudden pain.

Keith really needed to learn to think things through.

Well, that was a problem for later. For now, Shay was here, and Allura said it would be a couple hours before the crystal she’d harvested was loaded onto the castle-ship and secured for transport. That was a couple hours Hunk had with Shay, face-to-face.

She ran to meet him, a smile splitting her face, and her hug lifted him clean off the ground. Laughing, Hunk returned the hug enthusiastically, holding on even after she set him down.

“You have not been sleeping well,” she said, frowning at him and the dark circles he knew had gathered under his eyes.

He blushed, scratching the back of his haed. “Well… no, not really. It’s been a hectic couple of weeks. There was the whole Zarkon-tracking-the-Black-Lion thing, and now this new plan that doesn’t leave a lot of breathing room. And Pidge has been trying to dig up stuff on the rebels who tried to rescue her brother, so me and Mr. Holt have been helping out there. Better to be there for her than to have her run off when we weren’t looking and try to, I don’t know, get some revenge?”

That was its own mess, honestly. No one really blamed the rebels—they’d only been trying to help, after all, and they’d rescued a ton of other prisoners. But Pidge was still hurting over her loss, and Hunk couldn’t blame her for needed to do something on that front, however small.

He sighed, then flashed a smile. “But all that can wait. How’ve you been?”

In answer, Shay grinned. “Come,” she said, tugging on his arm. “There is something I wish to show you.”

Hunk let himself be pulled toward one of the tunnels that led deeper into the Balmera. He’d almost forgotten how beautiful the glow of Balmera crystals was—or maybe it was just that the Balmera was healthier than it had been last time he was here. The crystals on the castle-ship all glowed with a steady blue light, but here there was more depth. Blues and greens and occasional streaks of yellow, all pulsing in a way that made Hunk think of a heartbeat.

He hadn’t spent enough time on the Balmera to know his way around the tunnels, even without the chaotic weeks between visits, so he didn’t know where Shay was taking him until he recognized a crevice in the wall where they’d sheltered after Coran left to return to Arus.

“Is this…?”

“We are almost there,” Shay said. “Soon.”

She was smiling, bouncing a little as she walked, and Hunk smiled along with her. He couldn’t help it. There was something about Shay—her innocence, her ferocity, her excitement—that caught Hunk up in everything she did. When she was sad, he ached for her. When she was excited, he wanted to sweep her up in his arms. When she smiled, it pulled at something in his core that left him feeling light-headed and hot all over.

He was beginning to realize that there was another, not entirely platonic, layer to his feelings for Shay. He just hadn’t quite figured out what to do about it yet.

Once, the summer after his first year at the Garrison, Hunk had asked his parents how they’d known they were soulmates. Both had dated as young women; it was a tradition, in some circles, to act as though Marks didn’t exist, to act on crushes and date freely and only compare Marks after you’d decided the relationship had some substance.

Both of Hunk’s mothers had followed that tradition, comparing marks with their other potential partners when things began to “get serious” (which was, itself, a part of the dating process Hunk had never understood.)

So how did you know it was different when you found each other? he’d asked, rubbing the inside of his wrist, where his romantic Mark lay. He’d had a hard time ignoring it since Lance had made him write to the person on the other end. Or, well, not on the other end, as it happened.

His mom said she’d known when she was too scared to show her Mark on the third date, like she usually did. I didn’t want it to end. That’s how I knew Lana was the one I was going to hold onto forever.

His mama smiled at that and said she’d known from the first moment. With her other girlfriends, the relationship had burst into being, bright and hot, but it had always felt like a distraction. But from the moment she’d locked eyes with Akani across the street, she’d known this was something to take slow. I didn’t want to scare her off.

Neither explanation had helped Hunk much. Love as other people described it always seemed so sudden, and so obvious. So random. A glance across a crowded room, a ten-second conversation that left both parties with fluttering stomachs. Most people, it seemed, could fall in love with anyone. A stranger, a friend-of-a-friend, a classmate. Sometimes it was a friend, but even those stories were often prefaced with, well, I’d had a crush on them for forever; I just couldn’t work up the courage to say something.

Hunk didn’t understand it. He couldn’t imagine falling for someone he didn’t know. It all seemed so superficial. Hunk had had crushes on exactly two people in his life: his best friend growing up (after they’d already gone to the same school for six years and spent two entire summers practically glued together)… and Lance.

Neither had lasted long. Both were entirely smitten with their pen pals, and Lance was Hunk’s platonic soulmate, so it would have been weird to date him, anyway.

But there had been a moment. An instant where Hunk looked at Lance—at his kindness and his fear, at the way he smiled brighter than the sun and the way he cried every time they watched Up , at the secrets they’d shared and the easy way they fit together. Falling would have been easy, if Hunk had let himself go down that road. He knew Lance. Knew every part of him. That was the first and most important part of loving.

Somewhere along the line, Hunk had hopped the rails on his relationship with Shay, and he’d already passed the point of no return before he realized their nominally platonic soulbond was turning into something else.

The worst part was the way he could almost convince himself Shay felt the same.

It was a glimmer in her eye when she looked at him, the way her fingers lingered on his skin when she finally pulled him inside a small chamber overflowing with moss and mushrooms and tubers unlike anything Hunk had ever seen.

It was the breathlessness in her voice when she said, “The Balmera is healthy enough now that she can support more life than the caveroots we knew before, especially down here near the core. I have been experimenting. I… thought you might like to try some? I have more gardens, so if you wish to take anything for your kitchen, you need not worry about us.”

She smiled, fiddling with the bone ring that dangled from her carapace, and Hunk stared at her too long before he realized he should probably at least acknowledge her offer . So h e went to examine the garden, trying to ignore the electric charge that filled the space between them. It wasn’t just moss and fungi in Shay’s garden, either. There were herbs. And vegetables. Little bushes growing things that looked like gourds. “How can you grow all this down here?” he asked. “There’s no sunlight.”

“The plants feed off the light of the crystals,” Shay said, gesturing at the ceiling, where an unusually large crystal protruded from the rock. She met his eyes, gave a start, then hastily bent to pluck something that looked a little bit like a purple tomato from a vine near the far edge of the garden. “You should try this one,” she said. “It is sweet, like you.”

She held it out to him, and with her arm turned that way, palm up, extended toward Hunk, he had a clear view of her wrist.

Her wrist, where a very familiar spiral was etched in sunshine yellow lines.

Hunk gave a cry, grabbing her hand in both of his, and Shay dropped her purple tomato over as he pulled her wrist toward him for another look. “That’s...” He shook his head, but the lines didn’t suddenly rearrange themselves into something new. “That’s impossible.”

“What is?” Shay asked, her voice shaken.

In answer, Hunk peeled off his glove and held his right hand out next to Shay’s. An identical Mark, golden spiral inside an inch-long oval, stared up at him. He’d rarely looked at it, never more than idly thought about how this Mark was the same color as Shay’s scars. It happened sometimes. Two soulmates could have the same color Marks.

This, though —two kinds of Marks for the same soulmate—this didn’t happen. Not as far as Hunk had ever heard.

Shay stared at Hunk’s wrist for a long moment, her mouth hanging open. “But…we are not that kind of soulmate…?” Her voice pitched up at the end, a question and, just maybe, a sign of hope.

Hunk bit his lip, holding in his nervous laughter. “Apparently we are? I don’t know how. I mean, you--” He faltered, remembering that day in his dorm room, Lance draped over his shoulder, pen tapping nervously against his palm.

“You never wrote back.”

Shay spoke the words at the same time as Hunk, and both recoiled.

“I never--” Hunk blinked. “What do you mean, I never wrote back? I never saw anything written on my skin!”

“I wrote you many times. More than I can count.”

Hunk remembered blank arms, Lance’s crushing disappointment. The void where Hunk’s grief might have gone. How? “When did you write? How long ago? You’re not, like, five hundred years old or something, are you?”

Shay blinked, then laughed. “Five hundred? I should be offended.”

Hunk flushed. “Well, I don’t know. Alteans apparently live forever. Coran tried to baby-proof the castle when he heard we were mostly all teenagers!”

“Alteans are an anomaly,” Shay said, still biting down on her laughter. “Most people are not so long-lived. I am nineteen years in the standard measure.”

“Standard—like Galra standard?” Hunk asked. “Okay, uh, hang on. We figured this one out last week. Well, Pidge did. She was bored.” Hunk furrowed his brow. Galran years were a little shorter than Earth years. “I think I’m eighteen?”

“Then we should not have missed each other’s writing.” Shay sighed, sitting back on her heels. “I am confused.”

“Me too,” Hunk said. It wasn’t unusual; love had never made sense to him. It occurred to him, in an odd, detached sort of way, that that might be an answer in itself. If he fell in love differently, could that mean his Marks worked differently, too? “Do you have a pen on you?”

Shay’s head tilted to one side. “I do not. Why…?”

Hunk was already standing, tugging on Shay’s hand. “Come on. There’s tons of pens on the castle-ship.”

He could sense Shay’s skepticism as they raced up through the tunnels, Hunk taking the lead until they both remembered he didn’t know the way. Then Shay took over, and Hunk stared at the back of her head. His thoughts felt hazy, the world around him not-quite real. How could it be real?

But then, did it really matter? He’d already fallen for Shay, and she hadn’t seemed disappointed at their Marks or anything. Quite the opposite, in fact. And Mark or no Mark, he still wanted to kiss her.

They ran on, driven mostly by confusion, perhaps a little bit by tenuous hope. They didn’t slow when they reached the castle-ship, didn’t pause to greet Shiro, who was supervising the loading of the crystal together with Allura.

They just ran until they came to Lance’s room. Hunk knew he had a pen, and Lance—Lance of all people—wouldn’t give them a hard time for giving the impossible a chance.

Lance wasn’t in his room when Hunk arrived, but his pen was. Hunk snatched it up, hesitated for the briefest moment, then drew a line down his arm.

A fresh Yellow Mark blossomed on Shay’s skin, breathtaking in its clarity.

Shay’s eyes filled with tears, and she sat down, hard on the bed. “I did not think you felt as I did,” she whispered.

Hunk stared at her, joy and guilt and confusion welling up inside him in a painful, beautiful array. “I don’t think I did.” He sat beside her, staring at his hands, and swallowed a lump in his throat. “I don’t think I could— not until I knew you. It--” He shook his head, laughing at the absurdity of it all. Soulmarks were supposed to make things easy. “It doesn’t work that way for me.”

He traced a golden Mark on his arm. Shay’s Mark. Shay’s platonic Mark.

He’d fallen in love with his platonic soulmate. It was a ridiculous notion, more than a little strange by most people’s standards—but it felt right. The more he thought about it, the more it seemed it couldn’t have happened any other way. Hunk couldn’t fall in love with a stranger, or a friend-of-a-friend. But this?

He looked up, afraid of what he would find on Shay’s face.

She just watched him, thoughtful. “And now?” she asked. “Do you… Do you think you could…?”

“Yes.” Hunk reached out, interlacing his fingers with Shay’s. “Absolutely yes.”

Shay smiled then, and Hunk could have burst aflame with her joy. “Then that is enough for me.”

“I’m still mad at you, you know.”

Keith paused in the rec room door, staring warily at Pidge, who sat on the couch, her eyes fixed on her computer screen. She didn’t so much as look up when Keith entered, but there was no doubt her words were meant for him.

This was, after all, the first time they’d been alone since Keith returned from the Trials.

“I’m sorry,” he said, forcing himself not to turn and run from the room. Shiro didn’t care about his heritage, and neither did Hunk, once the initial shock had worn off. Surely Pidge—his soulmate as much as Shiro was—would find a way to be okay with it, too. “I know I should have said something sooner. I just didn’t know how to bring it up.”

Pidge looked up, brow furrowed. “Wait, what?”

Keith hesitated, searching Pidge’s face for a clue to what she was thinking. “I should have said something,” he repeated, more slowly this time. “About being Galra? I knew for a week before we met with the Blade. I suspected, anyway.”

“You think that’s what I’m mad about?” Pidge asked, sounding genuinely surprised at the notion. “I get it. You were freaked out.” She paused. “Do you not remember how nervous I was when I told you I’m a girl?”

“Oh.” Frowning, Keith drummed his fingers against his thigh as he tried to figure out what it was Pidge was mad about if not his lies. “I’m… sorry I decided to hold onto my Blade? It’s not like I’m choosing them over Voltron, Pidge, I—I just—It felt like something I should hang on to. For now. Just in case.”

Pidge dropped her head backward onto the couch cushion and groaned at the ceiling. “Oh my god, Keith, just stop.”

Keith’s mouth had already opened to apologize again (and again, and again, as many times as he needed to until he fixed things with his team.) At Pidge’s words, though, he snapped it shut and just watched her, trying to figure out what it was she wanted from him.

She glanced back at her computer, clicked something, and shut it with a snap. Then she stood and turned toward Keith, her hands on her hips. “You’re still hurt.”

“What? No I’m--”

Pidge yanked her collar aside to reveal a vibrant red Mark across her shoulder.

Keith cringed. He wanted to say it was fine, it didn’t hurt that much, she shouldn’t worry about him. But lying was less than useless when Pidge felt his pain as clearly as he did.

“Sorry,” he said. “I should’ve asked Coran for some painkillers before we split up.”

Covering her mouth with her hands, Pidge bit down on a scream. “Stop apologizing.”

I wish I could, Keith thought. He’d never been much of one for apologies, since he’d never really cared what people thought of him—at least, not until he met Shiro. But things were different now. Keith had people he cared about, people he wanted to do right by, and he’d screwed things up with the way he’d handled the whole Galra heritage situation. Not having a lot of experience fixing the problems he created, he was left with an endless, unproductive supply of remorse.

He and Pidge eyed each other from across the room, both of them restless and silent, risking eye contact then looking away once they realized the other was looking back at them. It was pointless and frustrating, and Keith wanted to skip past this part, but he didn’t know how.

After a moment, Pidge grumbled something to herself, then crossed to the door. Keith opened his mouth to—not to apologize, not after she’d told him to stop, but to… something. To fix this.

Pidge lashed out before he could find the words, striking with her right hand, her knuckles jabbing into his ribs. His breath left him in a rush, and he stumbled back, more surprised than hurt. “Damn,” he wheezed. “I’m starting to regret teaching you hand-to-hand.”

Pidge darted forward again, and Keith braced himself for another attack (fully deserved, he had to admit.) But Pidge just fell against him, burying her nose in his chest. Her arms hung loose at her sides, and she was leaning so far forward she was beginning to overbalance. Keith gripped her shoulders to hold her upright.

“I thought you were dying,” she whispered.

This quiet admission left Keith more winded than Pidge’s first strike, and his mouth flapped soundlessly. He tightened his hold on Pidge, even as he wanted to run away in shame. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t apologize.” Pidge reached up to smack him, but there was no heart behind the gesture, and she ended up just holding onto his arm, her fingers trembling. “I already lost one brother, Keith. I can’t lose you, too.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, oh.” Pidge pulled back, scowling at him. The circles under her eyes were darker than they’d ever been, her eyes red with a threat of tears. “Get with the program, ya furry.”

Keith felt another piece of him relax, and he let his grip on Pidge turn into something closer to a hug. “You know you’ve basically got four brothers out here, not just me. Hell, Lance has actual big-brother experience. And you’ve got a sister. You don’t really need me.”

Pidge scowled at that, and returned Keith’s hug almost grudgingly, but all she said was, “Allura’s lost sister privileges. They’re suspended till she stops being a jerk to you.”

“Pidge...” Keith trailed off, unable to curtail the happy flame that kindled in his chest at Pidge’s words. “She has every right to--”

“She knows you.” Pidge’s arms were now wrapped fully around Keith’s waist, and she squeezed, forcing the air out of his lungs. “I don’t get why she’s being like this.”

Because she lost everything to the Galra, he thought. Because the last Galra paladin took away everything she ever knew.

That was the worst part, he thought. He knew where Allura was coming from. He knew why she couldn’t look him in the eye. He didn’t blame her… He shouldn’t blame her. It still hurt, though, hurt in a way that too easily turned to anger. He’d been glad for the weblum hunt, if only because it put space between him and Allura. He’d hoped things would be better when he returned.

They weren’t, though. Allura still couldn’t look at him. She hardly even acknowledged his presence on the castle-ship.

And he hated her for it.

“This is between me and Allura,” Keith said, holding his voice carefully neutral. “You shouldn’t worry about it.”

Pidge hesitated, then nodded. “Are you going to at least spend an hour in the cryo-pod? Your shoulder’s killing me.”

Keith grimaced. “Sorry about that. Again.”

A protracted sigh warmed his chest. “That’s what I get, having the red paladin for a soulmate. Ugh.”

Smiling, Keith patted her back. It was an awkward motion, his hands unused to having someone to comfort, but Pidge didn’t seem to mind.

She clung to him a moment longer, then pulled back, smiling brightly as though defying the tears on her cheeks. “Go on, then. Into the cryopod with you.” She fluttered her hands at him, and Keith chuckled as he let himself be shooed from the room.

Keith was halfway to the cryopod room when he ran into Allura. She had one hand to her ear and was talking to someone—Coran, presumably—about how the Blade’s plan was coming along, so she didn’t immediately see Keith.

He froze, glancing around frantically for somewhere to hide. An elevator, an empty room. A broom closet, for god’s sake. It was ridiculous, of course. He was a paladin, and she was the princess, and sooner or later they were going to have to actually talk about this. (This, of course, being the fact that Keith belonged to the species who had slaughtered everyone she knew and loved.)

Allura looked up before he could bolt, and her distracted smile turned brittle. She stopped walking, and Keith gave up on hiding. He crossed his arms over his chest, a large part of him wishing he was still in his armor so he’d have some semblance of protection against the fire in Allura’s eyes.

“Princess,” he muttered.

She stared at him for a long moment, her lips pressed together, her gaze steady and cold. She didn’t greet him by name or by title—but she was looking at him. He just wished he knew whether or not that was a step in the right direction.

Allura gave a start, then turned her gaze aside. “No, I’m still here. Sorry. I was… distracted.”

She turned to go, and the dismissal roared through him like a wildfire. He tried to tell himself to let it go, to give her space, to let her work though her grief. He tried to tell himself she had every right to be upset. But he couldn’t. He didn’t deserve this, damn it all.

“Why do you hate me?” he asked, managing to keep his voice calm only by a tremendous effort.

Allura stopped walking, though she kept her back to him. After a moment, she sighed. “I’m sorry, Coran, I’ve got to deal with this. I’ll contact you later.”

Keith bristled. I’ve got to deal with this. Like he was a leaky pipe, or a termite infestation. Something to be cleaned up and forgotten about. “Look, I’m sorry that you lost your people. I am! But I had nothing to do with that.”

She spun, pain and anger drawing her face tight. “You think I don’t know that? You think I don’t know who, exactly , killed my family? My friends?” She took a step toward him, her hands shaking. “Zarkon was a paladin, too. I trusted him with my life.”

“I’m not Zarkon!”

“No.” Another step brought Allura toe-to-toe with Keith. She held herself just shy of touching him—deliberately, Keith knew. She loomed over him, and he almost retreated before her rage. “But I will not make my father’s mistake. I will not risk the lives of those I care for because I want to believe you are who you say you are.”

Keith didn’t know what cut the deepest—that Allura had just admitted she wanted to trust him, or that she’d said outright that she wouldn’t. “You think I’d hurt them? Really? Shiro and Pidge and—They’re my soulmates, Allura.”

She stared back at him, unblinking. “I will not risk my paladin’s lives on faith,” she said, enunciating each word so they hit like so many little slaps to the face. Keith felt something inside him crack.

“If you really feel that way, then just tell me to leave. I’ll go.” Keith spread his hands wide. “I’ll go, and you can find someone else to pilot Red. Someone you trust.”

He didn’t know what he was expecting. For Allura to contradict him, maybe. For her to say she wanted him to stay, she just needed a little more time.

Instead, she only snorted. “Don’t think I haven’t considered it. But Kolivan’s plan needs Voltron if it is to succeed. I don’t have time to search for another paladin.”

She might as well have cut him down. Keith was shaking, his face hot, his body numb. Allura wanted him gone. He’d known it, on some level; he’d expected nothing less from this conversation. But it still hurt—more than in might have, after Shiro and Hunk and Pidge had made him believe his Galra heritage didn’t make a difference.

He fell back a step, swallowing the rising panic that threatened to choke him, trying to make himself speak. I understand. I’m sorry. Just let me see this fight through, and then you’ll never have to see me again.

A hand closed around Keith’s arm, pulling him away from Allura. Keith tensed, but Lance just brushed past him, inserting himself between Keith and Allura.

“You need to back off,” Lance said to Allura, his voice low and dangerous.

But Keith was still reeling. Lance’s pull had forced him to take a step backwards, and he couldn’t seem to find his balance. His back hit the wall and he reached out blindly for something to hold onto.

Tomorrow, he told himself. Tomorrow they made their run on Zarkon’s command ship. Tomorrow this would all be over, and Allura could find a new red paladin, and Keith could go back to his shack in the desert where he couldn’t hurt anyone by being what he was.

“This doesn’t concern you, Lance,” Allura was saying. Her voice seemed to be coming from a very long way away, like Keith had fallen into the ocean, the water closing in over his head. He couldn’t breathe. He couldn’t meet those cold blue eyes.

He couldn’t stay here.

Turning his back on Lance and Allura, Keith took off running.

Lance spun at the sound of running footsteps and watched Keith disappear around a corner. He had a storm raging in his bones as he returned his gaze to Allura. “What the hell, Allura?”

She held herself stiff. Regal. More distant than he’d seen her in a long time. “Do not take that tone with me, paladin.”

“I’ll take whatever damn tone I like! You just told Keith you want him gone!”

“I said I considered it,” said Allura coolly. “And, obviously, I have decided that is not the best course of action.”

Lance’s hands were shaking. His eyes found a small, faint scar on Allura’s chin—a perfect reflection of the Mark he’d covered up with Altean concealer that morning. She was his soulmate. He knew that, but right now he had a hard time remembering what it was that had drawn him to her.

(That’s not fair, a corner of him said. You’re not being fair. But she wasn’t being fair, either.)

“Why do you hate him so much? What has he ever done to make you think you can’t trust him?”

“Zarkon--”

“I didn’t ask about Zarkon!” Lance’s voice burst out of him, firecracker hot and pitched high with hysteria. This wasn’t right. The paladins, Allura, Coran—they were a team. They were family. They weren’t supposed to fall apart over things like this.

Allura, to her credit, looked ashamed, but she offered no other explanation for her behavior. Lance waited for her to say something, anything. He waited, even as his feet screamed at him to go after Keith, because damn it all, Allura mattered, too, and if he could just figure out why she was being like this, maybe he could fix it . They weren’t supposed to hurt. Lance wasn’t supposed to let them get hurt.

But he couldn’t wait forever. When Allura kept her mouth shut, her eyes downcast, Lance turned away. “Never mind.”

Allura’s voice chased him down the hallway. “Where are you going?”

Lance didn’t slow. “To make sure Keith’s still here.”

She didn’t follow him, for which Lance was grateful. He needed time to cool off before he talked to Keith. Things were still awkward between them, even without the whole Galra thing, and Keith was sure to be more defensive than ever after this. Lance had to do this right.

Keith wasn’t in the Red Lion’s hangar (though Red was, thankfully, and no escape pods had been launched.) He wasn’t on the training deck, either, or in his room. That was… basically everywhere Keith went when he wasn’t with the team. Which, now that Lance thought about it, pretty much guaranteed Lance wouldn’t find him any of those places. After Allura’s verbal slap to the face, he’d probably either gone to Shiro to vent…

Or he’d burrowed in somewhere he was sure not to be disturbed. Somewhere no one ever went.

Oh. Duh.

Lance turned and sprinted to the elevator at the end of the hall, his steps light with renewed purpose. As he reached out to press the button for the second floor and his jacket sleeve rode up a few inches from his wrist, he spotted writing. Small red letters, shaky and meandering.

Are you there?

Just three words, but they stopped the breath in Lance’s lungs. Red was writing to him—unprompted. When was the last time that had happened? Two years ago? Three? Had he ever been the one to strike up a conversation?

The elevator jerked to a stop, startling Lance out of his thoughts.

Right. Keith.

The doors hissed open, and Lance glanced at his arm one last time, his heart in his throat. Then he yanked his sleeve down and stepped out of the elevator. The waters of the Altean pool shifted overhead, casting patterns of crystalline light on the walls. The air was thick with the smell of water; not the chlorine tang of Earth pools, but the sharp, vast smell of salt water.

It wasn’t the ocean, but it was close enough to claw at Lance’s throat. He almost turned around, walked out of the room, tried to forget about the pool—the closest thing on this ship to home and still impossibly out of reach.

But there was Keith, curled in on himself against the far wall, his skin aglow with the reflected light. Lance crossed the room silently and sat beside him, breathing deeply a few times to smother the anger that flared up again at the sight of Keith looking so small and uncertain.

“Hey,” he said, and Keith tensed. “You look like you could use some company.”

Keith’s heart pounded in his throat, faster than his racing thoughts, loud enough to drown out everything but the never-ending litany of Allura wants you gone.

But there was a new voice now. Lance is here, that voice said. Lance stopped Allura. Lance found you. You asked for him and he came and he--

Keith screwed his eyes shut against the thought. Lance hadn’t seen Keith’s words, couldn’t have, because Lance was not Blue, and Keith needed to stop fixing all his hopes on an impossibility.

But Lance was here, whatever coincidence had conjured him less than two minutes after Keith had broken down and written to Blue. (It had to be Blue he wrote to about all this. Had to, because Keith didn’t think he’d be able to explain the tempest inside him if he’d had to speak the words aloud.)

“Sorry,” Lance said, wrapping his arms around his knees. “I think I might have misread the situation. Do you need to be alone? I’ll go if you--”

“Stay.” Keith drew in a long breath and let it out slowly. With careful motions, he slid his pen into his pocket and shook his sleeve down over the smudged ink on his arm. Only then did he look up. “Please stay.”

Lance was looking back at him, blue eyes sad, and Keith realized he hadn’t even started to go.

Keith buried his face in his arms. For a moment everything was quiet, only the lapping waves overhead disturbing the silence. Lance’s hand found Keith’s shoulder and hesitated, a silent question: Is this okay?

Keith didn’t move. It seemed any reaction might break the spell, and Lance would vanish.

“You know,” Lance said, his voice as tentative as his touch. “I get that Allura’s still grieving her people and all that, but she’s being a real jerk.”

Conflicting urges tugged at Keith. He wanted to agree with Lance, wanted to be angry, wanted to rail against Allura’s unfounded suspicions. But the other side of him was louder. He hunched his shoulders, turning his head to the side so his words weren’t muffled in his sleeves. “We’ve only been out here a month, Lance.”

“So what? I’m pretty sure we’ve been through more than enough shit by now to make us a team, at the very least.” There was a familiar prickliness to Lance’s voice, a tone Keith was used to having directed at him whenever Lance decided to play up their rivalry.

It was strangely comforting to hear Lance riled up in his defense.

The warmth that came with that thought soon faded, though, and Keith swallowed. “So,” he said. “A month ago, Allura was in stasis. Before that, she was fighting a war, and her people were still alive. Zarkon betrayed her a month ago, Lance. That’s not long enough to get over something like that.”

Lance made a noise like he wanted to argue, but the words never got off the ground. He hesitated, breathed, then tugged on Keith’s arm until they were both turned, facing each other head-on. Lance put one hand on each of Keith’s shoulders, grounding him. Steadying him. Their eyes locked, and Keith didn’t know how to look away.

“Fine,” Lance said. “Then she’ll get over it. None of the rest of us feel that way.”

The truth of his words reverberated through Keith. He saw Shiro, angry and unyielding and ready to take on the entire Blade of Marmora to keep them away from Keith. He heard Hunk’s delighted laugh at Keith’s pitiful attempts at humor. He felt Pidge fall against him, squeezing the fear right out of him.

They didn’t care. They didn’t hate him. They still wanted him. Keith closed his eyes and repeated the words to himself until the tension bled out of his shoulders, until Lance pulled him closer, guiding Keith’s head down onto his shoulder and reaching around him to rub circles on his back. Lance was here. Lance didn’t hate him.

“Thanks,” Keith said.

Lance shrugged, like he hadn’t done anything more significant than offering to take Keith’s dirty dishes to the kitchen, and went on rubbing Keith’s back. “One more thing? If Allura ever does go all anti-Galra on you and order you off the castle-ship, make sure you come find me first.”

Keith snorted, breathing in the smell of Lance—salt water and the not-quite-coconut smell of his lotion. “Why, so you can stop me?”

“So I can come with you.”

Keith fell silent, squeezing his eyes shut, willing himself not to start bawling into Lance’s shoulder. “You’d give all this up… for me?”

Lance lifted one hand from Keith’s back, and Keith raised his head to watch as Lance shook his sleeve back just enough to show Keith’s Mark on his arm. A tiny little scar; nothing much to look at, but Keith couldn’t tear his eyes away. “You’re my soulmate, Keith. I’m not going anywhere.”

He smiled then, a lopsided smile that made Keith’s chest ache and his eyes burn. “Good to know,” Keith said, and Lance didn’t even comment on the way his voice trembled. He just scooted closer and wrapped his arms around Keith once more, humming a tune Keith didn’t recognize. Keith hesitated only a moment before leaning into the touch, his head finding the warm, bony slope of Lance’s shoulder, his hands folded awkardly against his own stomach. Every inch of him burned with the heat of Lance’s skin.

Maybe Lance was Blue. Maybe he wasn’t. Keith wasn’t sure it mattered anymore. He’d fallen, and fallen hard, and only the fear that he might still somehow screw this up kept him from baring his wrist and finding out once and for all whether his suspicions were true.

He couldn’t ruin this. He wouldn’t.

Lance propped his chin on the top of Keith’s head and hummed, the sound shivering in Keith’s chest. “You know,” said Lance. “I don’t think we’ll ever actually have to run off and become space pirates together.”

“Space pirates?”

Lance’s laugh was a silvery sound, cold and hot at the same time, spinning giddy currents through Keith’s center. “What, not a pirate fan? How about space rangers, then?”

Keith snorted, trying to ground himself. Trying to reclaim familiar ground. Trying not to get caught up in the heady tide of Lance’s touch. “Whatever, space ranger. Why are we not eloping?”

There was a little hitch in Lance’s breathing that Keith might have imagined. (Had definitely imagined.) Fuck. Eloping? Why had he phrased it like that? Lance laughed again, but there was a nervous quaver there now. “Because the second Allura tells you to leave, all four of us are gonna defect with you. We’ll just go be Voltron somewhere else.”

“You think?”

“Obviously.” Lance flicked Keith’s ear lightly. “We’re a family, Keith. Family’s got nothing to do with who screwed who to make you.”

Keith laughed, turning his face into Lance’s collar to muffle the sound. (It was a cheap, underhanded tactic, to get closer, but Lance wasn’t pulling away, and Keith but he was too wrung-out to stop himself. He was going to take advantage of Lance’s proximity for however long this lasted.) “Some people would argue with your logic on that one.”

“Well screw them!” Lance shifted, and for a second Keith thought he was pulling away after all. Instead, he only leaned back against the wall, pulling Keith along with him. Keith risked a glance at Lance’s face. The set of Lance’s jaw, the depths behind his eyes, brought a fire roaring across Keith’s skin.

“Lance...”

“We’re a family, Keith,” Lance said. His voice left no room for doubt. “All of us—even Allura. She’ll remember that eventually. I promise.”

Lance glared at the pool overhead like he might find Allura there and argue her back to her senses. Keith had never seen Lance like this before: still and quiet and soft, but hard as steel just below the surface. He was a fire waiting to rage, an ocean awaiting the storm. Keith watched the water’s reflection play across Lance’s skin like the spirit of the ocean itself and thought how unsurprising it was that Lance bore his Marks.

“How’d I get this lucky?” Keith murmured.

Lance looked down at him, making a soft, questioning noise. “Lucky how?”

Keith smiled. “Getting you for a soulmate.”

Eyes wide, Lance spluttered through some kind of response, then settled for flicking Keith’s forehead. “Stop appreciating me,” he said, fighting down a smile. “This is Keith Appreciation Day. I’m the one who gets to say how great you are.”

Keith snorted. “You ever stop to think the feeling might be mutual?”

Lance was silent, his grip on Keith’s shoulder tightening reflexively.

“That’s what I thought,” Keith said, breathing in deeply and melting into Lance on the exhale. “Shut up and enjoy the moment, space ranger.”

With a watery laugh, Lance leaned his head back against the wall. Keith didn’t comment on the tears gathering at the corners of his eyes.

It started with a Mark.

A line of white etched into the purple skin on the back of Zarkon’s hand. Allura, loud and curious and years away from the steel forged in a lifetime at war, sat between her parents in the castle-ship’s dining hall, stirring her food goo and staring at Zarkon’s hand while he and Allura’s father told the other paladins about the training they’d done earlier that day.

Allura had stopped listening after the third name she didn’t recognize, and her attention had fastened instead on Zarkon’s Mark.

“Zarkon?” she asked, cutting into her father’s story. “What’s that on your hand?”

Zarkon looked down at his hand, confusion puckering his brow. Seeing the Mark, he smiled. “This?” He held up his hand, waited for Allura’s nod, then glanced at Alfor with a devious smirk. “This means your father is a reckless fool who almost lost his hand trying to pet a thermyok.”

“Zarkon!” Alfor cried, color flooding his face. Beside him, Allura’s mother, Lealle, was laughing into her hand. “You can’t just—you’re going to frighten her!”

Zarkon arched an eyebrow. “Frighten her? I should think it’s more likely to encourage her.”

Allura rolled her eyes and grabbed at her father’s hand, tracing the long, thin scar with her fingertip. It was fresh and pink, like he’d just come out of a cryopod. “Mother says not to pet thermyoks,” she said. “They have very sharp teeth.”

“Yes, well.” Alfor huffed, giving Zarkon a dirty look over Allura’s head. “Your mother wasn’t there when this happened.”

“No, she wasn’t.” Zarkon had his hands folded under his chin, a smug smile tugging at his lips. “Coran was, though. I’m not sure you should be entrusting the Princess’s care to the man who told you—what was it again? They’re only teeth, Alfor! You’ve got a whole head full of them!”

It was Coran’s turn to laugh at that one, and Alfor sent him a look of utmost betrayal.

Lealle patted Alfor’s arm. “It’s alright, dear. We’ve all had our moments of...” She paused, seeing Alfor’s scowl, and cleared her throat. “We’ve all done things that, in hindsight, may not have been the wisest course of action.”

Alfor just sighed and submitted himself to a good round of friendly ribbing.

It started with a secret.

For as long as Allura could remember, Zarkon and Alfor had been inseparable. From the moment Alfor took the young Galra under his wing, through Zarkon’s training, through his ascension to black paladin. They were friends. Brothers.

They were soulmates.

So when Zarkon nearly bowled Allura over as they passed just outside the bridge, she knew something was wrong.

“Whoa! What’s—Zarkon?”

He stopped, glancing at her, a guarded look in his eyes. “Pardon me, Princess.”

“Is… everything all right?”

“Fine,” he said shortly. And before she could ask anything else, he was gone, disappearing around a bend in the hallway with a flourish of his cape.

Frowning, Allura watched him go, then stepped onto the bridge. Alfor was there, his jaw clenched, his hands white-knuckled on the ship’s controls. “Did something happen with Zarkon?” she asked. “He seemed… upset.”

“I don’t know.” Alfor blew out a long breath, then turned toward her, confusion and concern buried deep beneath a skin of anger. “He wouldn’t talk to me.”

That in itself was more worrisome than Zarkon’s mood. Zarkon told Alfor everything. He always had. Zarkon refusing to talk to Alfor was like Allura refusing to talk to Coran.

What had changed?

It started with a smile, and it was almost over before anyone realized what had happened.

They were at a summit with the leader of the Galra forces that had been terrorizing the universe for the last few months. (Leader. Ha. Later, Allura would curse herself for thinking that spineless scrif of a man could ever lead the Galra army.) The paladins were all there, along with Alfor and Allura.

The talks had stalled—the Galra seemed not to want to make any concessions, to the point that Allura couldn’t fathom why they’d agreed to these talks in the first place.

Alfor’s patience was running thin. He’d tried nearly every tactic Allura could think of to reach some agreement that would put an end to this war, and the utter lack of response had begun to wear on him. Soon, Allura knew, he would stop trying to negotiate at all. He would threaten to bring the full might of Voltron against the Galra, demanding an unconditional surrender if any of the rebels wanted to keep their heads.

Then Coran raised them all on the comms with news of an attack—the entire Galra fleet had moved against the Castle of Lions and her support ships, striking while the paladins were out of the way.

Alfor’s rage made him seem ten feet tall. “To your lions!” he roared, then turned his icy glare on the Galra commander. “You will regret this betrayal.”

“Will he?” Zarkon asked, smiling in a way that seemed oddly foreign on his features. “I wouldn’t be so sure of that, my old friend.”

Allura had already begun to retreat, following the other paladins to the exit. Soldiers had blocked their path, and the air was heating up as lasers began to fly. It was only her father’s soft, startled exhale that alerted her something was wrong. She whirled, and found Zarkon gripping Alfor’s shoulder with one hand.

The other held a knife that was driven deep into Alfor’s side.

Allura screamed, even as she fed her horror to the flames of her rage, and charged. Zarkon released Alfor and turned to meet her. They grappled for a moment, Zarkon swinging his knife at her chest. Allura ducked, grabbed Zarkon’s wrist, and broke his hold on the blade.

She snatched the dagger from the air as it fell and swung—but Zarkon was faster, and her attack bit a shallow line into the side of his face.

Alfor grunted. Someone shouted.

Allura stood her ground, ready to defend her father against the man he’d called brother, but Zarkon just stepped back, dabbing at the blood flowing freely down his face.

“Allura!” Coran shouted. “You have to get out of there!”

Zarkon’s smile widened. “Go ahead and run. I will find you wherever you go.”

Heart pounding, Allura turned and helped the Red Paladin, Keturah, lift her father. There was blood on his side and a horrible, vivid purple Mark cutting a line from his left eye to his jaw, exactly where Allura’s strike had wounded Zarkon.

It was a sight that still haunted her dreams.

Allura remembered a time when the universe made sense. When paladins were closer than blood, and the thought of one betraying the rest was so outlandish as to be absurd. When Marks didn’t lie. When Zarkon was as much her family as Coran.

Things weren’t so simple anymore, however much she wished they were.

“This could kill you, Allura,” Coran said. “Powering a machine this size is…”

They stood on a balcony overlooking the newly-finished teludav Coran and Slav and the Olkari had built for tomorrow’s raid. A bone-deep fatigue had settled over the team, most of them already retired for the evening in a desperate attempt to get enough rest for the coming battle. It had been just two and a half days since Kolivan had laid out his plan. Two and a half frantic, furious days of rushing across the universe to get ready for the impossible.

She still couldn’t believe the Olkari had managed to build such a massive structure in so little time—but they weren’t universally renowned engineers for nothing.

Allura sighed, letting herself take comfort in Coran’s presence. He was right to worry; she’d pushed herself to the brink of collapse throwing the castle across the universe as Zarkon gave chase. Powering something on this scale would be much more strenuous.

But she would do it. She had to. “If it will stop Zarkon, then it’s a risk worth taking,” she said.

Coran laid a hand on her shoulder, and she knew he wasn’t happy about this plan. Allura was grateful for his concern, though she wasn’t sure she deserved it.

“Allura,” Coran said. “Can I ask you something?”

Unease coalesced in Allura’s throat. She suspected she already knew what Coran meant to ask, and it wasn’t something she particularly wanted to discuss. But she swallowed her guilt and nodded. “Of course.”

“Are you ready for tomorrow?”

Startled, she turned to face him. His face gave nothing away. “As ready as I can be, considering how little time we’ve had to prepare.”

Coran hummed thoughtfully, one hand coming up to smooth his mustache. “Are you sure? There’s nothing… else you might want to do before you all…?”

And there it was. The awkwardness, the discomfort. The unasked question that danced on the edge of accusation. Allura sighed, folding her arms on the railing. “You heard.”

“There have been a few, ah, whispers. Among the paladins.” Coran braced his hands on the railing beside her and leaned forward, trying and failing to inject levity into his voice. “I’m honestly surprised Shiro hasn’t come to speak with you yet.”

“I’m not.” Emotions began to build inside her, roaring and rampaging and twisting the past together with the present. A mark. A secret. A betrayal. Keith is not Zarkon, she told herself. He can’t be.

That sort of mistake couldn’t happen twice. The lions would be more cautious since Zarkon’s betrayal. Surely they would.

Coran was still there, silent sympathy within arm’s reach. He bore her Marks upon his skin, and she his. Once she’d loved him for their bond. Now, she loved him in spite of it. Zarkon’s poison infected everything he’d touched, and Allura didn’t know how to combat it.

Coran seemed to sense where her thoughts had taken her. “Keith is not Zarkon,” he said, and Allura felt the guilt shoot through her once more.

“I know that,” she said. A dagger flashed behind her eyes. A scar in her father’s side, a Mark across his face. They’d still felt each other’s pain, even after the betrayal. Zarkon would have felt Alfor die, but that hadn’t stopped him. “I trusted him.” Allura’s voice cracked on the words, words she hadn’t spoken aloud since she’d carried her father back to the castle-ship and settled him in a cryopod—barely in time to save his life. Save it for a few more days, at least.

Coran’s hand rubbed the length of her spine, the way he’d soothed her when she was young and trying not to admit she was sick. “We all trusted him, Allura.”

“Then how can I trust Keith?”

“How can you trust anyone?”

Allura cringed, bowing over until her forehead rested on her crossed arms. The evening air felt too cold all of a sudden, and she shivered, closing her eyes against the rising tears. She needed to trust her paladins. Her friends . She had to, if she ever wanted them to rise to the heights the paladins of old had reached.

But she’d known them such a short time. She knew pieces of them—how they fought, how they trained. Their dedication and their passion and even, to some extent, their fears. Yet they were hardly more than strangers. She didn’t know what they did for fun, or how they acted when they were allowed to be something less than the pillars on which the fate of the universe rested. She didn’t know their families, the petty rivalries they’d left behind on Earth. She didn’t know how to make them laugh, or how to help when life brought them to the verge of tears, or where they drew the line between loyalty and obligation.

She didn’t know them—any of them—as well as she’d once known Zarkon. If she was being honest with herself, she didn’t trust any of them as much as she’d trusted Zarkon.

She hated herself for it, but she’d woken from stasis surrounded by the shattered pieces of her trust, and she couldn’t make it hold the shape of what she’d had before.

“Do you trust him?” Allura asked. “Truly?”

“I do,” said Coran.

Allura lifted her head, searching him for answers to questions she didn’t know how to ask. “Why?”

“Because.” Coran’s hand ceased its motion on Allura’s back, but he left it between her shoulder blades. The weight of it grounded her, reminded her she was here, in the present, surrounded by friends and allies. “I can believe all the universe is like Zarkon, just waiting for a chance to stab me in the back. Or I can believe what I’ve always believed: that people are basically good, so long as they’re given the chance to be so.” He shrugged, a faltering smile on his lips. “I know which universe I’d rather live in.”

Allura shook her head, anger bubbling just below the surface. “Wishful thinking doesn’t save lives, Coran. What if Keith does betray us? I’ve lost too much to risk the only people I have left.”

“Isn’t that exactly what you’re doing, though?” There was no accusation in Coran’s voice, just a slow, heavy sadness. “In driving Keith away, you risk alienating the rest of the paladins.”

She couldn’t even argue with his words. There was a rift between her and the humans since her argument with Keith and with Lance. She could feel it festering in eyes that wouldn’t meet hers, in conversations that faded to silence when she entered a room.

“I can’t lose them,” she repeated. “I know Keith isn’t Zarkon. I want to believe he is what you all believe him to be, but… I just can’t, Coran.” I’m scared.

Coran sighed. Somehow that sounded more like a reprimand than anything that had come before.

Allura wasn’t ignorant. She didn’t believe Keith was a monster just because of his blood. It was the secrets that had worried her, the way he’d tried to hide his parentage, the way he’d closed himself off—just as Zarkon had so long ago.

(That was a lie. Allura kept comparing Keith to Zarkon in a desperate quest to justify her suspicions, when really the problem lay with her.)

It couldn’t go on forever. If Keith was going to stay, she would have to mend the open wound in their relationship. If she couldn’t do that, she had to cut ties entirely. No hesitation, no second-guessing. Walking the edge like this solved nothing.

She just wished she knew which choice was the best.

In the end, Keith made the decision for her. The day of the battle had arrived, and when the Blade’s spy failed to report in, it was Keith who stepped up to keep the mission on track. He stood tall, his face grim as every single one of the paladins moved toward him, as though they intended to keep him off the Galra ship by force of will.

He held fast, staring straight at Allura as he resolved to infiltrate the Galra ship, and Allura knew—she knew— this was her doing. Keith was ready to martyr himself because of her.

She wrapped things up with Kolivan and Antok as quickly as she could and ran all the way to the hangar where Keith and Pidge were readying the shuttle that would carry Keith to the heart of Zarkon’s command. Pidge had her arms wrapped around Keith’s waist, her words too muffled for Allura to make out.

Keith smiled, though, ruffling Pidge’s hair until she pulled away, scowling up at him.

“I’ll be fine, Pidge. Don’t worry about it.”

In that moment, standing at the edge of the hangar as Keith prepared to throw himself on the spear for his friends and allies, Allura recognized something she should have already known: whether or not she could trust him, she still cared for him, as she cared for all her paladins. And she couldn’t lose anyone else. She couldn’t lose Keith.

Allura cleared her throat, and the sound put both paladins on edge. It was easier to face Pidge—a fire in her eyes, a fight waiting just below her skin—so Allura kept her eyes on Pidge as she approached. “I’m sorry, Pidge. I need to have a word with Keith before he goes.”

Pidge tensed, her mouth opening to spit venom, but Keith quieted her with a hand on her shoulder. “It’s fine,” he said. “Go ahead.”

Allura watched her go, then stared at the closed door for a long moment. Too long. Keith shifted uncomfortably beside her.

“So, uh… what did you want to say?”

Allura resisted the urge to sigh as she turned back toward Keith, holding herself straight, as a princess should. “I owe you an apology, Keith.”

Keith’s eyes widened. “There’s no need to--”

“There is.” Allura breathed in, clasping her hands before her. “I have treated you unfairly. You gave no reason for me to distrust you, yet I let fear rule me.” She paused, a million emotions running through her. She still saw Zarkon everywhere she looked—not just in Keith, but in everything. The lions, the castle-ship, her memories, the universe itself. He had been too much a part of her life before he threw it all away. His ghosts would haunt her long after the man himself was gone.

That didn’t mean she had to listen.

“Don’t do this, Keith,” she said. “You don’t need to prove your loyalty to me, or to anyone.”

To her surprise, Keith smiled. “This is the best chance we’ll ever have of defeating Zarkon. We have to take it.”

Allura looked at him, reading the sincerity in his words. “You could die.”

“I’m a paladin, aren’t I? It’s all there in the job description.” He took one step back, and Allura’s hand reached out to stop him. She hesitated at the last instant, but Keith’s steps slowed.

“Come back,” she said. “That’s all I ask.” Give me a chance to fix this. I need more time to fix this.

Keith’s smile was small and crooked, and he lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “I’ll do my best.”

And then, he was gone.

Chapter 11: Dead End

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

Matt woke the next morning groggy and confused, his limbs heavy and his eyes slow to focus. He heard movement in the room around him, but it was some time before anything of last night’s events came back to him.

The medic. The gensa. The sedative.

His eyes flew open and he shot upright, startling the other patient in the room. The boy flinched when Matt’s eyes fell on him—guilty over calling the medic last night? Or just afraid of how Matt would react? It wasn’t an unfounded fear. Right now Matt wanted nothing more than to tear into him, unleash all his anger and helplessness on the closest target to hand.

You can’t do that, Matt reminded himself. He was better than that, for one, and for another this kid wasn’t the cause of Matt’s troubles. Not really. That honor went to the leaders of this shitshow.

Plus, Matt couldn’t afford to get himself thrown in the brig—or whatever the equivalent was on alien spaceships. He needed to find out where he was. He needed to find Takashi. He needed to get in touch with Katie, to somehow let her know he wasn’t dead.

None of that, of course, was going to be easy. He stood, paused for a moment as vertigo overtook him, then managed two measly steps toward the door before a medic was on him.

“I’m fine,” he said, before she could protest. “I have to get down to the training deck. I was supposed to take some kind of test… qualification… thing.”

The medic put on a face of semi-convincing sympathy as she patted his shoulder. “I’m afraid you missed that, sweetie.”

“Missed it?”

She nodded, pointing to a blocky device on the wall Matt could only assume was a clock. “You should have been there two vargas ago.”

“But that’s not my fault! You literally drugged me.”

The medic’s smile took on a sharp edge. “You were agitated last night. I administered a mild sleep aid--”

“Mild!” Matt protested, but the woman ignored him.

“A mild sleep aid to help you get the rest you needed.” She spread her hands before her. “There was nothing else I could have done. Finder Kletzak is a very busy man, but don’t worry. I’m sure you’ll have another chance to test for placement—and perhaps by then you will have recovered fully.”

Yeah, and when will that be? A year from now?

Everything in Matt screamed at him to fight this. Throw a tantrum, steal an escape pod, punch this sad excuse for a nurse in the face before she administered another “mild” sedative and put him under until everyone he knew was already dead.

Breathing deeply, Matt force himself to think. That was, after all, what he did best. He’d survived the Galra prisons by relying on his wits and creating opportunities where there were none. (The Galra certainly had never done him any favors—him, with his scrawny frame, weak eyesight, and injured leg.) He had to stop trying to brute force his way through this situation and consider his options.

As soon as he stopped to think, he realized three things.

One: These rebels were paranoid about secrecy, to the point that they stuck machines on the people they rescued to keep their soulmates from knowing they were even alive. There would be nothing on the ship—or at least, nothing readily accessible—with which he could write to Takashi, and nothing sharp he could use to cut himself to let Katie know he was alive. He might be able to bite a finger hard enough to break the skin or something, but he had a sneaking suspicion people were going to be watching him.

Two: Somebody here didn’t want him taking Lizard man’s (Kletzak’s?) test. Which probably meant they didn’t want him getting off this ship. It could be the officers themselves, trying not to be obvious about their intent, or it might be someone else. But now wasn’t the time to try to decipher rebellion politics.

Three, and most importantly: The harder Matt fought against Alien Big Brother’s control, the less freedom he was going to be given.

Sinking back onto the bed, Matt let his frustration and lingering fatigue spill over, contorting his face into what he hoped was a convincing mask of resignation. “It’s probably for the best,” he muttered. “I’m a terrible shot, anyway. There’s no way I would have passed.”

Which, in all honesty, was the truth. Matt had taken a gun safety course at the Garrison, but his scores at the range were so abysmal he’d never been issued a gun of his own. Hell, the only thing he would have accomplished taking Kletzak’s test was maybe accidentally shooting himself. Might have solved the Katie issue, but he’d still be stuck here.

The medic watched him for a moment, and Matt pretended not to notice. He was no actor—the last role he’d gotten had been in the fourth grade school play, and Matt had been so excited to have a speaking role he’d shouted all three of his lines at the top of his lungs.

But Katie had dragged him into enough trouble that he’d perfected his poker face. He’d just have to hope playing nice with rebels had more in common with sibling mischief than elementary school operettas.

Eventually, the woman relented, patting Matt’s arm with a hand that reminded him suddenly of a talon. “Combat isn’t for everyone.”

It was meant to be a platitude—probably more relief than real sympathy—but Matt saw an opportunity.

“Are there other things I can do?” he asked, trying not to sound too eager. “I mean, if I prove myself, maybe they’ll let me contact my family, right?” He didn’t wait for the medic to nod; he wouldn’t have believed her even if she promised that they would. “I trained as an engineer, you know. And I’m pretty good with computers. Do you need mechanics or-or technicians or something?”

Something, ideally, that might give him access to the ship’s computers so he could try to sneak out a message for Shiro. (Not that he was foolish enough to say so out loud.)

The medic just hummed thoughtfully, then nodded. “I’ll talk to Kletzak for you, see if we can’t get you set up down in engineering. How does that sound?”

If they won’t give you opportunities, you just have to make your own.

“Sounds great,” he said.

Keith ran, his friends' voices a distant hum in his ear. He’d turned the comms down to near nothingness, afraid if he heard Pidge begging him to come back, he’d lose his nerve.

He had to do this. Not because he felt he had to prove himself, not because he wanted Allura to trust him again, but because he was a paladin of Voltron, and this might be the best chance they ever got to bring Zarkon down.

Shiro understood that. Pidge did too, probably, or she would once he was back on the castle-ship, safe and sound. She’d probably punch him again, just for making her worry, but Keith was okay with that. Just as long as he managed to upload the virus that would punch the crucial hole in Zarkon’s defenses.

Another lock yielded to his touch, an uncomfortable reminder of what he was. Then again, what he was made it possible for him to do this. Kolivan and Antok wouldn’t have risked an infiltration like this, with their inside man compromised. It had to be Keith.

He paused at an intersection and waited for a pair of sentries to pass, calling up the Blade’s stolen map of the command ship and checking his position. Almost there.

The sentries were barely out of sight before he took off, jogging the last few turns to the door he wanted. Breathing a sigh of relief, Keith pressed his hand to the scanner, waited for the door to hiss open, then stepped through into Zarkon’s central computer hub.

“I’m in,” he whispered, taking in the room at a glance. Crystals grew upwards along the walls on all sides, giving the room a dull purple glow, and latticed structures hung from the ceiling like stalactites. These, he assumed, were the servers—or whatever they were called. Pidge would have known.

It didn’t matter, really. The room was small and dark, with only one entrance, and it was impossible to miss the computer terminal standing in the very center of the floor. Keith hurried over to it as Kolivan whispered instructions in his ear.

After a few seconds searching for the appropriate slot, Keith inserted the data chip he’d been given, and a window popped up on the screen asking for a password. Keith typed in the sequence of unfamiliar letters Kolivan had written out for him earlier, then tapped the screen to verify.

The window flashed red, showing some kind of error message. “Kolivan?” Keith whispered. “I think there’s something wrong with your password.”

“What?” Kolivan hissed. “Impossible. Thace--”

There was a beep from the door and, swearing, Keith dove behind the computer. It wasn’t much cover, but there was nowhere else for him to go, unless he wanted to scale the walls and try to hide in the dark upper corners of the room.

“Keith, what’s wrong? Keith?”

Shiro’s voice was tense but not yet panicked. He would know Keith hadn’t been hurt, but he was tense. Not that Keith could blame him. Heading into the very heart of Zarkon’s power alone wasn’t anyone’s idea of a relaxing vacation, and Shiro had always hated standing on the sidelines.

Keith muted his comms. He couldn’t reassure his friends right now. Not with a Galra in the room, so close Keith could hear his breathing.

Pained breathing.

What?

He thought for a second the battle had somehow started without him, and an injured soldier was coming to trigger some kind of final salvo—but that made no sense. The others were all gathered on the bridge of the castle-ship. Ready to launch, yes, but holding back until Keith succeeded in bringing down the defenses. There was no point in starting the fight before they stood a chance of winning.

So why was this Galra injured?

Claws clicked against the keyboard as the soldier typed in a passcode. Keith had just enough time to realize that this might be exactly the opening he needed—once the Galra logged in, Keith just had to take him out and he’d be free to upload the virus.

Then the computer buzzed another error message, and the Galra drew in a sharp breath. Understanding flickered in Keith's mind, followed quickly by doubt. If he was wrong about this... Keith closed his eyes briefly to focus himself, then summoned his bayard, stood, and turned to face the enemy all in one smooth motion.

The Galra leaped backward, raising a knife defensively. A very familiar knife.

“Thace?” Keith asked, still wary. He couldn’t afford to let his guard down now. He couldn’t leave himself open.

But when Keith drew his own Blade and activated it, holding it so the sigil on the hilt was clearly visible, Thace just quirked an eyebrow.

"You don't look like a Galra," Thace noted.

Keith snorted. "I hadn't noticed." He hesitated only a moment longer, then sheathed his knife and rounded the console, joining Thace in front of the monitor. “Your password isn’t working.”

“Unfortunately, no,” Thace said dryly. His fingers flew across the keyboard, yellow eyes reflecting the red of the screen so that they looked like windows onto a furnace. “They found out I was a spy. They must have changed the security protocols throughout the ship.”

“Can you get through it?”

Thace hesitated. “Maybe. Give me some time. I’ll see if I can--”

An explosion in the hallway outside the computer room silenced Thace. He and Keith traded worried looks, and Keith silently summoned his shield.

“I’ll buy you as much time as I can,” he said, then turned to face the threat lurking just beyond the door.

Chaos reigned on the rebel ship, which Matt had learned was called the Fallow. Aliens of all stripes dressed in armor and carrying mismatched weaponry raced past, officers shouting orders, support staff and civilians (if there were civilians on this ship) scuttling out of the way. Overhead, speakers blared sirens and a discordantly soothing voice repeated the words Code Five on endless loop.

Matt turned toward Sira, the mechanic who had been escorting him down to Engineering for some kind of aptitude test. She was a stout, six-armed being with natural armor that gave her a hunchbacked appearance vaguely reminiscent of an armadillo, and she ducked down as the corridor burst into a flurry of activity.

Shouts and sirens and pounding footsteps ringing in his ears, Matt opened his mouth to ask Sira what was happening—but then he stopped. Sira claimed to have been hand-picked by Kletzak to introduce him to the people who were to be his new babysitters. Oh, she hadn’t phrased it quite like that, but Matt understood the implication well enough.

Anyway, the fact that Kletzak had picked her was telling enough. Matt would get about as much information out of her as he would from Officer Lizard himself.

Fortunately, the chaos around him presented another option. Matt drifted away from Sira. Just a step or two, but it was far enough that the next squad to come racing by jostled him. He stumbled, playing up the collision and then staggering for real as his wounded leg tried to buckle and that tugging, sickening, not-quite-pain sensation flashed through his knee.

Hissing between his teeth, Matt let the current of the ship sweep him away. He caught a glimpse of Sira, still huddled against the wall but now standing on tiptoes in a desperate attempt to find her charge. For all the good it would do her. Matt was short enough to get lost in the crowd on his own, and Sira was shorter yet. She’d never spot him before he had half the ship between them.

Grinning, Matt ran the other direction, taking turns at random until he could no longer hear the stampede headed for the fighters. There were still a few rebels out and about here, but they shrank back at the sight of him, ducking into side chambers. Doors clanged shut as he approached.

Something about that tickled his mind, but he didn’t slow to puzzle it out. He had a chance now, a chance to find out what was going on, and he intended to take it.

A few corridors later he found a computer tucked into a nook in the wall. He had to blink a few times to focus through the corrective goggles the rebels had given him, but the lenses contained some kind of translator, allowing him to read the text on the screen. He clicked through directories, cursing as more and more came up with prompts for authorization keys. He typed in a random string, just to say he’d tried, but of course it came back with an error message.

Just about the only thing he could access was some sort of community schedule. It listed meal times, open hours for the training deck, and a startling number of “All-ship Addresses.” The rest of the current day had been blotted out red, however, and clicking on the box supplied a short memo:

Emergency Code Five. All activities canceled until further notice. Noncombatants are encouraged to remain in their rooms until Command issues the all-clear.

“Well screw that,” Matt muttered, closing out of the terminal. Hacking was out—unless and until he learned the passkeys or found time to write a program to brute-force security.

That certainly wasn’t happening today, which mean he was just going to have to do this the old-fashioned way.

“I’m not going to be able to get through this security in time.”

Thace’s words were slow to reach Keith, who was busy trying to fend off the army at the door. Dozens of Galra and sentries filled the corridor outside, and though only a few could get close enough to strike at Keith at any given moment, there seemed no end to them. A heap of dead bodies and ruined robots was piling up around him, an incidental barricade that did little to slow the tide of Zarkon’s troops.

Yanking his sword free of the latest sentry’s main processor, Keith shot a glance over his shoulder at Thace, who still stood by the computer terminal. The motion of his hands had slowed, and he met Keith’s eyes, expression grim.

“So, what?” Keith demanded, grunting as another soldier made a run for him. Keith caught the Galra’s blade on his own, then traded his shield for his knife and stabbed the man in the neck. “That’s it? We just give up?”

Thace closed his eyes. “No. I can overload the power cells in this room. The chain reaction will destroy the computers responsible for the defenses, which will give our allies the opening they need.”

Something cold dripped down Keith’s spine, but he didn’t allow himself to slow. “When you say destroy...”

“If you leave now, you may be able to get far enough away to be safe.”

Keith eyed the door, through which he could still see a restless throng of Galra. There seemed to be some sort of commotion going on farther away—bringing in the heavy guns, he supposed. “I’ll never make it through this mess,” he said. “Even if I did, you’d be swarmed.”

Thace’s face was unreadable, but his voice—thin and strained from whatever interrogation methods the Galra army used—sounded mournful. “I can’t ask this of you.”

A lump rose in Keith’s throat as he thought of his friends. Shiro, he thought, would understand. It would hurt, but he’d understand why Keith had to do this. He’d see the battle through. But Pidge…

“We came here to end Zarkon,” Keith said, a heavy weight settling over him. “Do whatever you need to do to make that happen. I’m… I’m gonna tell the others.” He swung with both swords, clearing a space around him for just an instant as he switched over to his comms and contacted the castle-ship.

Something was wrong.

Allura stood as still as a statue on the bridge of the castle-ship, her friends and allies arrayed around her. Kolivan and Antok stood with Coran at the forward station, all of them trying desperately to reach Keith, who had gone suddenly silent several minutes ago.

“He’s not hurt,” Shiro said. “Not really. A few minor cuts, maybe, but nothing dangerous.” He sounded like he was trying to reassure himself, but it wasn’t working. It certainly did nothing to ease Allura’s tension.

One of her paladins was alone in enemy territory—alone and in danger, and all because Allura had turned her back on him.

You must be all right, Keith, she thought. You must give me time to make things right.

But the words that finally split the uneasy silence were not at all the ones Allura had been hoping to hear.

“Hey, uh, guys? We’ve run into a little bit of trouble.”

Shiro turned toward the viewscreen where Keith’s signal was displayed. There was no visual component, just an audio feed and a small icon indicating his position on the command ship. “We?”

Keith grunted, the ring of metal on metal audible in the background. “I found Thace. Or, well, he found me.”

“Thace,” Kolivan breathed. “He’s alive?”

“Barely.”

Keith paused, breathing hard, and Allura felt her pulse rise as adrenaline coursed through her. He was fighting. Keith was fighting. Even as he spoke, outlining the bare bones of what had happened—how Thace had been discovered and tortured—she called up a new screen and readied a pod to launch. Their plan was not built to accommodate a rescue mission, but she was not leaving Keith alone in there. As soon as she and the paladins had pushed Zarkon’s command ship through the wormhole, she would--

“Thace wants me to let you know he didn’t say anything,” Keith said, wrenching Allura out of her half-formed plans. She couldn't help but think his words sounded like a farewell. “They knew he was hacking their systems, which is why they changed the passwords, but he didn’t tell them anything. Your people are safe.”

For a moment, Allura thought Kolivan’s steely composure would finally crack. He opened his mouth, then closed it and nodded. “Tell him… Tell him I am honored to have fought alongside him.”

“Hang on!” Pidge cried, shouldering her way through the knot of paladins so she stood before Kolivan. She was half his height, and so slender it seemed he might break her just by breathing on her, but her fury made her seem larger, and even Kolivan faltered. “Why are you talking like that? They aren’t dead!”

“Pidge...” Keith’s voice cracked, and the sound of it silenced everyone on the castle-ship. He was quiet for a long moment, and Allura felt guilt and fear building in her chest. “They have us trapped in here, Pidge. There’s an army waiting outside the only door. It’s okay, though. We’ve figured out a way to bring down the defenses, so the plan’s not a total bust.”

The way Kolivan lowered his head, eyes closing in something very much like grief, told Allura all she needed to know. “You’re going to overload the power supply,” she said, the words falling from numb lips. “You’re going to blow up the computer core.”

Hunk spun toward her, his eyes wide. “With them inside it?”

“No way!” Lance cried, then went on over the top of Keith as he tried to butt in. “No, shut up, Mullet. I’ve got the corner market on blowing myself up. Find another way.”

“There is no other way!” Keith’s sword rasped against something close to his head, and when he went on, his voice was strained. “Stopping Zarkon is all that matters now. I’m sorry, but I can’t--”

He cut off with a cry that shook the bridge. Lance and Pidge took half a step forward, as if they meant to leap through the screen to Keith’s aid. Shiro flinched, his eyes going distant, as Hunk clapped a hand to his mouth, looking faintly green.

For her part, Allura felt as though she were floating above it all, Keith’s ragged breathing reaching her from a great distance. It all felt like a dream, like she would awaken at any moment, run down to the paladins’ quarters, pound on Keith’s door, and beg his forgiveness for the way she’d been treating him.

“Everyone,” Keith whispered. “Pidge. I’m sorry. You’re going to have to finish this fight without me.” There were cries of protest around the room, all quickly stifled as Keith went on, his voice still low and pained. “Allura?”

It was difficult to speak past the lump in her throat, but she managed. Somehow she managed. “I’m here.”

“They’re going to need Voltron for this fight. You know they will. And since it looks like I won’t be able to help out… you need to pilot Red.”

The breath left Allura’s lungs. She stared at the blinking marker on the map that represented Keith, her mind grinding to a halt as she attempted to process Keith’s words. Red. She would pilot Red. “But...”

“We’re a lot alike, Princess,” Keith said. There was a smile in his voice, and he groaned as he shifted, armor sighing, sword rasping against the floor. Allura imagined him picking himself up and turning to face the waiting army. “We both listen to our guts—maybe too much—and we’ve both screwed up once or twice. Red won’t exactly help with that, but… she’ll let you in. I know she will.”

Tears welled up in Allura’s eyes. She was still floating above herself, but a spear of pain grounded her now, too sharp, too hot to forget. “I’m sorry, Keith. I’m so sorry.”

“I--” Keith gasped, the sound setting Allura’s nerves aflame. She heard shouting in the distance, grainy and unintelligible over the comms, but building into an inferno. Keith’s voice rose above it all, pitched high with fear and confusion. “What the hell? Who are--?”

There was a roaring on the comms, then utter silence. Shiro staggered. Pidge dropped to the floor.

Allura wanted very much to collapse herself.

“Keith!” Lance screamed. There was no answer.

Coran turned toward Allura, his face pale, his hands shaking. “The defenses are down, Princess.”

“Oh my god,” Hunk breathed. “Oh my god Is he--? Are they--?”

“Still alive,” Shiro said, wrapping a hand around his ribs. “He’s—He’s still alive. For now.”

Pidge was on her feet in a flash, her face a cold mask. “We’re going after him.”

“No.” The word left Allura’s mouth before she realized how it would sound. Four paladins spun toward her, all wearing looks of shock and horror. For an instant, Allura’s resolve wavered, and she nearly gave in to the voice screaming in her soul to go after Keith before it was too late.

But she was a commander first. She could not allow her emotions to rule her.

Standing up straight, she met each gaze in turn—Pidge’s fury, Hunk’s terror, Lance’s blank shock, and Shiro’s sharp-edged grief. He alone seemed to understand her reasoning, and somehow that hurt worse than the rest.

“We will save Keith," she said, "but not yet.”

“But--” Lance began.

“We came here with one purpose,” Allura said firmly. “To stop Zarkon. This is the best chance we will ever have, and we cannot throw it away. If we do, Keith’s sacrifice will have been for nothing.”

She saw the words hit the three younger paladins like a slap. Shiro swayed with the blow, his eyes fluttering shut. “Princess Allura is right,” he said, and though his voice was soft it did not waver. “The mission has to come first. The longer we spend arguing,” he went on, drowning out Pidge’s next protest, “the longer it will be before we can go help Keith. Understood?”

Sullen silence met his words, but there were no further arguments.

“Good,” he said, his shoulders slumping. “Everyone, get to your lions. We end this, now.”

They left, darkness hanging over them all like a cloud, and Allura turned her attention to the teludav. It seemed a more daunting task than ever, but she would not—could not—fail now that Keith had given her this chance. Drawing on her Quintessence, Allura focused her mind on the coordinates they had chosen, somewhere far away from any inhabited world, where Zarkon’s army could wither away without hurting anyone else.

The wormhole blossomed before her, a blazing blue corona in the deepness of space. It made her eyes water and her limbs tremble with the effort of holding it, but she grit her teeth and stood fast as the four remaining paladins got in position and pushed the outer ring toward Zarkon’s ship.

Interminable seconds passed before the ship was through. Allura allowed herself a brief sigh of relief, then detached the castle-ship from the rest of the structure and plunged into the wormhole.

Coran caught her wrist as she turned and ran for the red paladin’s zip line.

“This wasn’t your fault,” he whispered, and his sympathy on top of the strain of opening a wormhole large enough for Zarkon’s ship threatened to bring Allura to her knees.

Smiling, she broke out of Coran’s hold. “Not now, Coran.”

He must have seen the cracks in her composure. The grief, and the pain, and the guilt. Shiro had said Keith was still alive. He was wounded, maybe captured, but they could still save him. They would save him.

She would not settle for any less.

All too soon, Allura found herself in the Red Lion’s hangar, staring up at that implacable face. It might have been her imagination, but Allura swore she could sense Red’s hostility in the air, crackling like electricity. You drove him to this, the lion seemed to say. This is your fault.

And she was absolutely right.

“I know you don’t want me here,” Allura said, before she could lose her nerve. Red had her shield up—something that hadn’t happened on the castle-ship since Keith had first claimed her—and Allura stopped just outside its boundary, raising a hand and pressing it against the surface, which seared her skin in silent accusation.

Your fault.

Allura blinked rapidly, unwilling to back down when Keith needed her. When he’d specifically asked her to do this. How many times had Red roused herself to come to Keith’s aid? Surely now, with the stakes so high, she would even allow Allura inside—so long as it gave her the slimmest chance to get her paladin back alive.

“I know you hate me,” Allura said again, more steadily now. “I know I’m probably the last person you want to pilot you, but please. The other paladins need you. Keith needs you. Let me help you bring him back.”

There was a rumble on the edge of hearing that had the tone of a warning, but one by one the tiles of Red’s shield flickered out. The lion lowered her head almost grudgingly and opened her mouth.

Allura let out a long breath and paused long enough to lay a hand on Red’s nose as she headed up the ramp. “Thank you,” she said.

“Thank you.”

“What do you mean vanished?”

Matt flinched away from the shout, compacting himself even more behind the trash can near the door of the—what was this? A command center? Comms deck?

Whatever it was, it was the first place he’d found where people seemed to know what the hell was going on. Matt hadn’t paused to consider whether sneaking into a no-doubt-restricted area was a good idea, just charged through the door as it closed on the heels of a harried aide and found a dark, quiet corner to hide in.

“I don’t know, sir,” said one of the rebels, a lower ranked officer, if his uncertain tone was anything to go by. “That’s all the report said. Zarkon’s ship and the remaining paladins just… disappeared.”

Zarkon? Matt thought. Paladins? Piecing together what was happening was turning out to be harder than he’d anticipated. So far all he’d found out was that there was a battle happening somewhere nearby between the Galra army and… someone. The rebels didn’t seem to actually be part of the battle—so why were they here?

“We’ve spent the last five years seeding Zarkon’s army with our software, Vyr,” Kletzak roared. “Don’t tell me you don’t know what happened. Find out!”

“Sir,” Vyr said, still cowering away from Kletzak. “Their systems have lost all power. We can’t access any of the security systems.”

Matt blinked, certain he’d heard that wrong. These people had access to Galra security systems?

Kletzak growled. “Did we at least get the paladin out?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then pull out. Perhaps he'll be able to answer our questions. Until then, we’ll just have to hope Voltron hasn’t doomed the universe with their idiotic decision to trust the Galra.” Kletzak turned away, and Matt, peering around the edge of the trash can, saw a flash of disgust on his reptilian face. “Gods help us all.”

Notes:

You know what I was thinking at the end of season 2? "Okay, but what if there was no deus ex escape cute?" Because what the finale really needed was more angst. *finger guns*

Also! I have a short meta on my Tumblr now about this fic and specifically the theory behind platonic soulbonds (and how/why they might go unrequited.) If you're interested, you can read it here.

Chapter 12: Disappearance

Chapter Text

Pain throbbed in Shiro’s side.

He tried to put it out of his mind, tried to focus on the matter at hand: Zarkon’s command ship, dead in the water and just waiting to be dismantled. The Blade of Marmora’s plan had worked so far, but the battle was far from over. The virus Keith had implanted had taken effect a little less than five minutes ago; in another fifteen, the ship would begin to come back online, and if the paladins hadn’t disabled it by then they would have to retreat—with or without their missing teammate.

Shiro cut back on the throttle and spun the Black Lion toward another of the countless turrets mounted on the hull of Zarkon’s ship. Two quick laser pulses demolished it, and Shiro turned to continue on to the next one. As he did so, his side twinged again, and his eyes went to the featureless midline of the ship.

Keith was in there, somewhere, injured but alive. Shiro knew he must be at least semi-conscious, since he was in pain, but he hadn’t responded to anyone on the comms, despite a near constant stream of questions and promises that they were coming, that they would get him out, just as soon as they were done.

“How’s it coming, Allura?” Shiro struggled to keep his voice neutral, but there was a storm raging inside him. It wasn’t Allura’s fault that convincing the Red Lion to let her pilot it was taking more time than they’d anticipated. He knew that, even if he didn't want to accept it. What was it she’d said all those weeks ago, on the day they’d first become paladins? Red was temperamental and slow to trust.

Still Shiro couldn’t help feeling a twinge of impatience. Without the Red Lion, they couldn’t form Voltron. Without Voltron, they couldn’t take out their main targets: the engines, the shields, the photon cannons, and the bridge. The four paladins who had already mobilized were taking out smaller weapons and hangars full of one-man fighters, but Shiro knew they were all itching for this to be over.

Truth be told, Shiro was itching, too. In the time it was taking Allura to join them, they could have gone in and found Keith.

No. The mission had to come first. The universe was more important than any of them.

Keith would never forgive them if they let Zarkon go free for the sake of rescuing him.

“She let me in,” Allura said, relief tangible in her voice. “We’re on our way.”

Shiro nearly sighed; Lance and Hunk did, and Pidge simply muttered, “Thank god.”

“All right,” Shiro said. A sudden jolt stole his breath away, and his hand went automatically to his side, his mind supplying images of the new Mark he would have there when all this was over. (He’s alive, Shiro reminded himself. He's alive, and you need to focus.) With some effort, Shiro took his hand away from his ribs and settled it back on the controls. “Let’s be quick about this. Form Voltron!”

The transformation was slower now than Shiro was used to. He’d formed Voltron often enough with his team that the act had become second nature, but now as the process began, he found himself reaching out for Keith. When his mind found Allura instead, he faltered. They all did. He could sense them—distantly, yes, but drawing nearer all the time. Embarrassment and discontent festered in the bond, and Shiro forced his own confused emotions beneath a smooth surface. He needed control.

Reaching out again, Shiro found Allura, her mind hesitant, floundering in the swirling chaos of five shared minds. She may not be Keith, but she was a member of this team, and Shiro trusted her with his life.

He felt his confidence spread out through the others, and their own private tempests quieted. One by one, they reached out for Allura. First Lance, then Hunk, then, with one final mental tug toward Zarkon’s ship, Pidge.

The connections between their lions clicked into place, and Shiro breathed deeply, cementing the union in his mind.

“Good work,” he said, because they were all still uncertain about this. Allura didn’t fit neatly into the patterns they had worn into their souls over dozens of battles, and it was hard not to stick on the places where she deviated from Keith’s shadow.

But Voltron moved smoothly, confidently, and as they gained momentum it was easier to remember what they were, rather than what they expected to be. Shiro stared out through his lion’s eyes, searching for their first target. The engines, he thought. A stranded but otherwise functional warship would still buy them some time to rest, recover, and plan.

The other four signaled their agreement, Allura’s more weighty than the rest, and for just and instant Shiro wondered whether she ought to be the one leading them.

She quashed the thought mentally, then said, “We're with you, Shiro.”

But before he could move, a flicker of movement caught his attention. Something small and dark had separated from the main ship. A fighter, maybe, or—no. No, it was much larger than a fighter.

“What the--?” Lance began.

He was interrupted by a massive sword, jagged and coal-dark, slamming into Voltron’s side. They tumbled, Lance and Hunk fighting to stabilize them as Shiro turned back towards the thing that had attacked them.

He spotted it, a robot easily as tall as Voltron but painted in reds and grays. A familiar, stomach-turning presence emanated from the machine, a tug at his memories that reminded him of dark water under a smattering of stars, of a fight that dragged on and on, and a cruel laugh as the last black paladin asserted his claim to the Black Lion.

The lion growled now, putting into Shiro’s mind the image of a cat with its back arched, its tail puffed up in rage and fear. She knew who it was inside the other robot, as Shiro knew. His metal arm felt icy cold as he stared into blank yellow eyes, through them to the man within.

“Zarkon.”

Kletzak caught Matt listening in the dark corners of the command center.

Honestly, Matt shouldn’t have been surprised. There weren’t many places to hide, and with a million and one rebels coming in and out of the place, it was only a matter of time before one of them spotted Matt.

No, it wasn’t the fact that he was noticed that surprised Matt; it was the fact that he wasn’t punished. Not really. Oh, Kletzak hollered for a good five minutes about how Matt wasn’t supposed to be there, and this was classified information, and he should have Matt’s pelt for this. (It reminded him a little of Iverson, really, and Kletzak didn’t very much appreciate Matt’s smile at the thought.)

Matt would have expected to be tossed in a cell when Kletzak was through with him, or at the very least escorted back to the med bay or his permanent quarters and guarded for the rest of the day. And though he did leave the command center with an escort, the two rebels only took him as far as the engineering deck, where the mechanic Sira was waiting for him.

Her ears drooped pitifully at the sight of him, and though she didn’t say a word as they walked the remaining distance to the workshop where Matt was to train, disappointment practically oozed off her. Honestly, she could give Matt’s mother a run for her money in the ‘silent guilt trip’ category.

“You could have been hurt,” she finally said, stopping just outside the workshop door. “You shouldn’t wander off like that.”

Matt eyed her sideways, frowning. “I can take care of myself.”

Sira shook her head. “We are at war, my friend. We must take care of each other.”

There was something in her voice, some implication that hovered just out of Matt's grasp. He didn't think Sira was worried for him just out of the goodness of her heart. “What aren’t you telling me?”

She avoided his eyes, pressed her hand to the scanner beside the door, and gestured for Matt to enter ahead of her.

There’s something more going on here. Matt entered, noting the way the handful of other mechanics turned to watch him for a moment. Was it that he was a stranger to them? Or was all this special attention for Matt himself? He had yet to see any of the other prisoners who’d been rescued with him, and the one time he’d tried to ask a medic about them, he’d been told that only those who needed medical attention had been brought aboard the Fallow. The others, it seemed, had all been sent on their way.

The answer only raised more questions. How many former prisoners had needed medical attention? Why were they trapped here, when the other prisoners had been set free without a second glance? Had any of the healthy prisoners asked to join the rebellion, and if so, had they been turned away?

And it wasn’t just that. Everyone seemed to know who Matt was. They watched him in the halls, but they fled when he drew near. The boy he’d shared a room with in the med bay had called for a medic the second Matt tried to get around the gensa’s pain-dampening effects.

Who am I to these people?

Sira spent the next hour introducing Matt to their workspace, then left him at a computer console to look over the schematics for some of the weapons awaiting repairs. Matt wondered whether he’d be allowed to work on these weapons, or if Kletzak would find an excuse to confine him to less dangerous projects.

As soon as Sira turned away to focus on her own project, Matt opened a new window, navigating somewhat clumsily through the ship’s unfamiliar directories. There were still an awful lot of restricted files on this ship, but Sira had logged into this terminal for him, and since Sira was a mechanic…

Yes. Matt smiled to himself, cautiously checking to make sure no one was paying him any mind, then opened up the hangar records. The screen brought up a list of all the ships that had come and gone over the last few days, along with notes on what systems needed attention.

The one at the top of the list had arrived less than twenty minutes ago, in Hangar 7, and only needed a standard post-flight check. Someone had already signed off on the maintenance request, but Matt didn’t care about that. Twenty minutes ago—and the arrival before that not for almost four hours. This one had to be the one Matt had heard about, the one carrying the paladin. He backed out of the records, then found security camera footage from Hangar 7 and keyed in the appropriate time code.

Matt watched, buzzing in anticipation, as a small shuttle landed. A surprisingly large company of guards filed onto the ship, followed by a med crew.

The medics emerged a moment later, keeping pace beside some kind of stretcher that hovered a few feet off the ground. A figure lay on the stretcher, one hand reaching out toward the medic at his side, who glanced down only briefly before hurrying on.

The stretcher passed out of the camera’s view, and Matt closed out of the video, feeling numb. The paladin…

He was human.

The fight with Zarkon seemed to Pidge to take forever. As the one-time black paladin, Zarkon was intimately familiar with Voltron’s capabilities, and he’d had ten thousand years to perfect his one-man Voltron knock-off. Whatever the paladins could do, Zarkon had a counter ready.

Add to that the fact that the red bayard—one of only two that had so far allowed them to access stronger weapons for Voltron—was still with Keith somewhere in the heart of Zarkon’s ship, and the battle was more than just an uphill climb.

But they won.

Somehow, they won. Zarkon’s robot drifted lifeless through space, shattered almost beyond recognition. Voltron itself had split apart in the wake of the final collision, their power sapped, their paladins bone-weary.

As the adrenaline faded, Pidge became aware of Keith’s pains once more. They’d faded in and out of her mind through the battle—in and out of Voltron’s collective awareness, no doubt—and Pidge wasn’t sure how much of that was her adrenaline numbing her to the pain and how much was Keith, hovering on the edge of unconsciousness. (Let it be unconsciousness, and not death. She couldn’t lose him, too.)

“Kolivan!” Allura cried, wrestling the Red Lion away from Zarkon’s corpse. Pidge had been able to sense the struggle between Allura and Keith’s lion as they fought, Red always straining just at the edge of Allura’s control. She seemed now to want to take off after Keith, whether or not Allura gave her the go-ahead, and Pidge couldn’t blame her. “How much time do we have left?”

“Two minutes,” Kolivan replied. “The engines and shields are damaged beyond repair, but the ion cannon--”

“Forget the ion cannon,” Shiro said. Pidge wasn’t sure she’d ever heard him quite so hard before, his voice cold enough to burn. “Zarkon’s dead, his ship’s stranded, and he has no defenses left. Once we get Keith out of there, we can blow the whole thing to kingdom come.”

Kolivan was silent, and Pidge didn’t think it was a particularly pleased sort of silence. Not that she cared. Shiro had already headed for the hangar Keith had used to get inside the ship, and Pidge was close behind him, breathing through her teeth as something on the other end of the bond aggravated Keith’s wounds.

Hang on just a little longer, Keith. We’re coming.

“Can your shields hold out if the ion cannon comes back online before we’re ready to leave?” Allura asked. Pidge spotted Hunk and Lance falling in to either side of Green, but she couldn’t be sure whether or not Allura had moved to follow.

Coran hesitated for only a moment before he answered. “We’ll make do. Just be quick about it, won’t you?”

If Allura answered, Pidge didn’t hear it. She’d spotted movement ahead, a flash of light inside an open wound where Voltron had struck the warship during the fight. For an instant, Pidge couldn’t make sense of it—it looked like a living thing, a snarl of ivy growing outward from the ship in fast-forward… Except that the ivy was black and jagged and--

“Shiro!” Pidge screamed as realization struck home. “Look out!”

It was too late. Haggar’s lightning enveloped the Black Lion, wreathing it in darkness deeper than space itself. Shiro gasped, more shock than pain, and then his comms went dead.

“Shiro!” Hunk cried. At the same moment, Lance surged forward, firing a laser toward the source of the lightning as he flew Blue toward Black, who had gone limp, drifting silently. Pidge’s heart thundered in her ears as she watched the scene play out. Shiro… Shiro was hurt. Shiro was…

“Fall back!”

Allura.

Pidge blinked, belatedly realizing that the lightning hadn’t stopped. Blue was quick enough to dodge out of the way, and Red swooped in, spewing fire. Sparks of white as bright as suns exploded where the two elements met, but Allura never faltered. Her voice still thundered over the comms, shouting orders. Sounding a retreat.

Pain lanced through Pidge’s shoulder, and she gasped. For once, though, she was grateful for the pain. It snapped her out of her shock, shattering the dam holding her anger at bay. “What about Keith?” Pidge demanded.

“We’ll never reach him,” Allura said. “I’m sorry, Pidge, but Shiro--”

“Shiro wouldn’t leave Keith in Zarkon’s hands!”

Pidge’s shout shocked Allura into silence, but another voice took up the fight, soft and calm and maddeningly patient.

“Katie,” her father said. “Allura’s right. Shiro’s hurt, and the rest of you are headed that way just as soon as that lightning catches up to you.”

“But Keith--”

“Wouldn’t want you to die saving him,” Sam said. “He’s still alive, isn’t he?”

Pidge didn’t answer. Wouldn’t answer. Yes, Keith was alive, but for how long? If she left him here—here, with Haggar, with no way to contact them, no way of knowing whether anyone was coming for him--

“You can come back for him.” Sam went on in that same even tone, and Pidge railed against it, flinging the Green Lion toward Zarkon’s ship. Red appeared in her path, snarling, Allura shouting at Pidge to turn back. Hunk, she saw, had already grabbed the Black Lion and headed for the castle, and Lance wasn't far behind. Soon it would be just her and Allura.

Lightning flashed, so close Pidge’s hair stood on end. She wavered.

“We’ll come back for him, Pidge,” Lance said, his voice steely edged and wavering with tears. “I swear we will.”

Pidge’s eyes burned, but she refused to cry. Not while Keith was still alive. Somewhere, someone called out that the ion cannon was preparing to fire.

Cursing, Pidge wheeled around and fled back toward the Castle of Lions.

Lance stumbled out of the Blue Lion, his head a mess. Thoughts of Keith (alone, injured, trapped, vulnerable ) clashed with thoughts of Shiro (quiet, too quiet, why was he so quiet after that last attack?) He needed to be back in Blue, rushing back to Zarkon’s ship to help Keith. He needed to be here, sprinting toward the Black Lion’s hangar to see what had happened to Shiro.

There was an elevator in the corner of Blue’s hangar that went up to the bridge. After a normal mission, that’s where Lance would have gone for debriefing. Not today, though. Today he punched the button for the bottom floor, where the Black Lion’s hangar was. He bounced on his toes the whole way down, his fingers drumming against his thigh.

Shiro had to be okay. Lance didn’t know what the team would do without him. He didn’t know what the team would do without Keith, either, but they’d stand a much better chance of rescuing Keith with Shiro leading them.

“Coran, take us out of here.” Allura’s voice on the comms spoke directly into Lance’s ear, but he barely heard her. His mind was already back on Zarkon’s ship. (What had happened? Had Haggar found Keith already, or was he hiding somewhere, praying for rescue? What sort of Mark would Lance find when he changed out of his armor?)

Coran barked an affirmation over the comms, and then... nothing. In the silence of the elevator, Lance could hear the change: a dampening of sound, like he’d passed from a sprawling cave to a small, dark room where sound didn’t echo. Someone had turned off their comms.

Several someones, actually; as Lance stepped off the elevator into the branching corridors that led from each of the four lions’ elevators to the Black Lion’s hangar, he heard voices shouting.

“If you would just let me--”

“You left him, Allura! You abandoned him!”

Lance’s throat closed, but he broke into a jog, hurrying toward the shouting voices. Rounding a corner, he found Pidge and Allura facing off in the corridor. Allura’s face was a cold stone mask, her blue eyes flashing dangerously. Pidge’s face was splotched with red, her voice wavering, tears building in her eyes but—so far—held at bay.

“I did what I had to,” Allura said. It was obvious she was struggling for calm, but ‘calm’ right now was somewhere just shy of shouting, and Lance flinched back from the sound. “We’ve already lost two paladins, Pidge. What good would it do to sacrifice the rest of you?”

“They’re not dead!” Pidge was shaking now, full-body tremors so intense Lance wondered how she could possibly still be on her feet. “Keith’s still alive, Allura, and now Haggar has him. He’s hurting! He's—fuck.”

She doubled over suddenly, her arms wrapped around her middle. Lance surged forward to help her, but Allura was closer. The anger seeped out of her, leaving only pain and sympathy behind, but as soon as her hand touched Pidge’s shoulder, Pidge lurched back. She straightened up, slapping Allura’s hand away.

“Don’t touch me,” Pidge snarled.

Allura’s mouth hung open, her eyes bright with hurt. “Pidge...”

“I don’t want to hear it! Whatever happens to Keith now is on you.” Pidge paused, lips tightening, fingers digging into the black fabric of her undersuit. Everything about her posture was razor-edged and stretched close to breaking, and she looked at Allura like she was Zarkon himself. “I hope you’re happy.”

“Happy?” Allura recoiled. “Of course I’m not happy.”

“Aren’t you? You hate Keith—everyone knows it. I’ll bet you’re thrilled that you don’t have to deal with him anymore.”

Lance saw the exact moment Allura’s composure shattered. He expected shouting. He almost expected this to come to blows, and he was already moving forward, not pausing to wonder how he was going to stop the woman who was known for running through steel doors, just knowing he couldn't stand by while two of his soulmates turned each other into bloody pulps.

But Allura didn’t rage at Pidge’s accusation. She crumpled. Her hands flew up to her mouth, her feet stumbled as she backed up, and when her back met the wall, she very nearly collapsed. There were tears in her eyes.

The sight drove the breath from Lance’s lungs and he stumbled, caught himself, stepped between Pidge and Allura. He grabbed Pidge by the shoulders and pulled her against him before she could do anything she would regret later.

“It’s okay, Pidge,” he whispered. “It’s going to be okay.”

“Keith--” she began.

“Keith’s going to be fine. We’re going to get him. We’re not going to let Haggar do anything to hurt him.” Lance wasn’t sure if he believed his own words, but they were what Pidge needed to hear right now, so Lance packed them full of conviction. They would get Keith back. Lance wouldn’t rest until they did. None of them would rest until Keith was back on the castle-ship. “We’re going to get him back,” Lance repeated, “and then you can help me lecture him about not getting himself beat up like this.”

That startled a laugh out of her, thin and small and disbelieving. She’d been fighting Lance’s grip, but she relaxed now, her hands coming up and latching onto the back of his armor, her head resting against his chest. She took one shuddering breath, then looked up at him.

“It hurts."

Lance closed. “I know. I'm sorry. But I swear, Pidge, I’m not letting that asshole have his heroic death." Pausing, he plastered a crooked smile on his face. "Seriously, how am I supposed to out-paladin him after something like that?” He winked, and Pidge managed a tentative smile back.

“Guys!” Hunk’s panicked shout shattered the momentary peace. Pidge and Lance broke apart, both of them turning towards the Black Lion’s hangar. “Guys!” Pidge swore under her breath and took off running, Allura staggering after her.

Lance caught Allura’s wrist. There wasn’t time—he knew there wasn’t time—but he couldn’t let her go. She turned, hurt and anger and guilt flashing across her face. Lance didn’t give her time to protest, though, just pulled her closer and threw his arm around her neck.

“This isn’t your fault,” he whispered in her ear.

Allura froze. Lance clung to her, willing her to know that he got it. (And he did. He’d been as mad as anyone over the way she’d treated Keith after his heritage came to light, but she'd been hurting. She'd been scared. She was hurting now, and as desperate as anyone to get Keith back. That was enough for Lance.)

After a moment, Allura pulled away. Their eyes met, and she nodded once, then turned and took off toward the Black Lion. She seemed steadier than she had before, and Lance allowed himself a moment of satisfaction as he followed her. His team, his family was falling apart, but he would do what he could to stop the cracks from getting worse. It was the one thing he was good at.

The Black Lion lay on her side in the middle of the hangar beside Yellow, who had carried her in. Black seemed lifeless, her limbs tangled, her head lolling, and it seemed to Lance Yellow was standing guard. Hunk stood between them, staring at Black's open mouth, but he turned as Lance and Allura entered, his expression so full of raw ache it cut Lance to the core.

“What happened?” Allura demanded. “Where’s Shiro?”

“I don’t know,” Hunk said, his voice flat. “He’s just… gone.”

Noise.

There was so much noise.

Keith remembered fighting, killing. Lasers flashing past his ears, the stench of blood and hot metal rising to choke him. Pain in his side, in his leg. Someone behind him, shouting.

Thace.

The lights changed, and Thace called a warning.

Keith said his last goodbyes.

Then, chaos. People in white and blue armor broke through the crowd of Galra, weapons flashing. Their face masks made them look inhuman and blank, but Keith could feel them watching him. Judging him.

Who are you?

Even as the words began to form on his lips, Keith’s world went white.

After that was flashes. Heat. Pain. Movement.

Voices.

Keith stayed conscious through it all—though conscious might have been too strong a word. He drifted, the pain in his ribs too strong to let him sleep. There were other pains, too—an ache in his head, a distant burning all along his back and his right arm. He thought those might actually be burns, but he couldn’t be sure. The fire lodged between his ribs reduced everything else to a murmur.

The noise and the motion quieted for a time, then returned, and when Keith finally gathered enough of himself to open his eyes he was in a room so white it stung.

“He’s awake,” someone said.

“The exoreplenisher must be working.”

Questions hung just out of Keith’s grasp, but his muddled head couldn’t focus on anything other than the way the bed beneath his back seemed to be made of hot coals. He groaned, trying to roll onto his side, trying to stand. All he got for his trouble was a flash of pain in his ribs.

He opened his eyes again, and barely managed to track the flurry of motion around him. Strangers in white smocks and soot-stained armor flitted around, some talking in low voices at the edges of his vision, others swarming Keith with bandages and needles and strange, bulky gloves that glowed with a comforting blue light.

For a moment, all he could process was the fact that none of them were Galra.

“What happened?” he asked, his voice rough and scratchy. He swallowed, grimacing at the pain in his throat, in his chest. “Who are you?”

A face swam into view, pale pink and wrinkled, three silvery eyes searching his own. “Hush,” the stranger said. “You’re with friends.” They looked up at someone Keith couldn’t see. “Where’s the gensa?”

Keith didn’t know what the stranger was talking about, but unfamiliar terms were the least of his worries. Where was he? Where were the other paladins? Did they know he was alive, or did Pidge think she’d lost another soulmate?

He twisted again, fully intending to roll off the bed and go in search of his helmet. It was gone, along with most of his armor and the upper half of his bodysuit. He was bare from the waist up, goosebumps raising along his arms as he registered the room’s cool air. When he tried to sit up, something tugged at his wrists.

Restraints.

Keith stared at them, uncomprehending. Snug, padded cuffs encircled both wrists, holding him to the bed.

Panic swelled behind his breastbone, but before he could shout, or thrash, or try to summon his bayard (it might still work, if his armor was nearby) a soft, incessant beeping silenced the chatter in the room. Faces swiveled toward the door.

Another alarm joined the first, this one more insistent, and several of the aliens in white smocks hurried out of the room.

The sound of shattering glass reached Keith’s ears, and the soldiers (guards?) took off at a sprint.

Keith blinked, and it was only him and two medics left in the room. One held a small gray disc. The other came to stand behind Keith’s head, hands holding his shoulders down against the bed.

“What is that?” he demanded, fighting against the hold on his shoulders as the medic with the disc drew closer. “What are you doing to me? Stop!”

Someone screamed, and for a moment Keith thought it might have been him.

Then a screaming blur barreled into the medic holding the gray disc, and Keith heard the muted thump of something heavy connecting with the medic’s head. The attacker whirled, still screaming something between fear and incredulity, and charged the second medic.

In an instant, it was over. The intruder leaned over Keith, eyes wide, a large, sturdy wrench dangling from one hand.

Pidge, said Keith's pain-addled brain.

No. This person was taller than Pidge, his face more gaunt, his dirty blond hair a little bit shorter than Pidge’s. He looked like Pidge, though. Almost like--

“You’re human,” said Matt Holt, and Keith was too stunned to stop the words that tumbled out of him.

“And you’re dead.”

Matt faltered, blinking. “I’m… pretty sure I’m not, though?”

Shaking his head, Keith tried once more to sit up, only to remember the restraints. Matt cursed, hastily plucking at the cuffs until they fell away. Keith accepted Matt’s help sitting up, then let his head drop into his hands. “You’re Matt Holt, aren’t you?”

“You know me?” Matt asked, then gasped, ducking down to look at Keith’s face. “Wait! You’re Shiro’s friend. Uh… Sorry. It's been a while. I don’t...”

“Keith. And... yeah. Shiro’s my soulmate.”

That might not have been the best thing to say, but Keith didn’t realize it until it was too late. Without a shirt, Keith’s Marks were on full display, and there was no hiding just how many scars Shiro had collected over the last year. Matt went still, even the sound of his breathing fading to nothing as he stared.

Shit. Shiro. He'd be a mess right now, knowing nothing more than that Keith was alive. (Alive and injured.) Did he think Keith had been captured? Was he waiting for Keith to start collecting scars to match his own?

Shoving Matt aside, Keith scrambled to his feet, wavered, and caught himself against the bedside stand. One of the medics on the floor groaned as Keith stepped on his hand.

“Woah, careful!” Matt cried. He reached out for Keith, then seemed to think better of it and knelt beside the semi-conscious medic and pulled off his gloves. “Exoreplenishers,” Matt explained at Keith’s questioning look. “One of the only goddamn things in this place anyone bothered to explain to me.” He slipped on the gloves, frowned at them for a moment, then pressed a button on the wrist.

The gloves lit up blue, and Matt laughed in delight.

“How’s that for user-friendly?” he muttered, then turned the glowing gloves toward Keith. “Healing tech.” He waved the gloves over a patch of glossy, half-healed burns on Keith’s arm (Burns. He should have noticed those sooner.) and watched as the skin knitted over. “I don’t know how much they can heal, but hey. Better than nothing, right?”

At voices in the corridor, Matt fell silent, his face going taut.

“We should go,” he said. “Before someone stops us.”

Keith didn’t have the energy to argue, so he let Matt pull Keith’s arm across his shoulders and lead him out into the bright, cold corridor.

Chapter 13: Missing Pieces

Notes:

I got some gorgeous fanart for this fic earlier this week! Check it out!

Also, heads up: if you're easily triggered by depictions/discussions of self-harm, please read this note [contains minor spoilers] before you start this chapter.

Chapter Text

“We need to go back.”

Pidge strained to keep her voice level—no small feat when the whole universe was out to get her.

Shiro was gone. Vanished. Up and disappeared from his cockpit sometime in the middle of the last, desperate battle against Zarkon. He’d left his bayard behind, but nothing else. Even Allura couldn’t make any sense of it, and no one could accuse Allura of giving anything less than her very best effort where Shiro was concerned.

The Black Lion remained utterly silent, sprawled out on her side where Yellow had dropped her. Pidge could find no mechanical reason for it. Neither could Hunk or Coran or Allura. It was as if her soul had vanished together with Shiro.

“You cannot.” It was Kolivan who spoke, not Allura, but as far as Pidge was concerned, they were both at fault here. The two of them with their quiet distrust of Keith, pushing him to do stupid, reckless things in an effort to prove himself… It made her want to hit something.

“Keith is still alive,” she said, refusing to let the towering Galra cow her into silence. It was supposed to just be Kolivan, Antok, and Allura on the bridge now, discussing their next step in the war. Zarkon had been defeated, his command ship stranded (at least for now), but Haggar and the vast majority of the army remained.

Well, screw the war. Pidge could still feel Keith on the other end of her soulbond. The pain across his back and down his right arm had peaked ten minutes ago before beginning to fade. She’d pulled off her gloves, but the wash of red across her skin stopped her from inspecting her new Marks any further. She thought it was a burn, and desperately tried not to consider what else Haggar might have done to cause a wound so large.

In any case, she’d stormed onto the bridge, her father behind her keeping up a feeble plea to calm down and let Allura and Kolivan figure something out. She could go to Hunk and Coran, Sam said, try some more to figure out what had happened to the Black Lion. Or she could go in search of Lance, who’d disappeared once Allura had made it clear rescue was off the table, at least for the time being.

Pidge crossed her arms now, glaring up at Kolivan. “He needs me.”

Kolivan sighed, his eyes drifting to the viewscreen, through which Pidge could see a broad swath of empty space. “The universe needs you, too, paladin. As long as you wear that armor, you must be ready to make sacrifices for the greater good.”

“He’s my soulmate.”

“And Thace was mine. Do not make the mistake of thinking you are the only one who suffers from Zarkon’s reign.”

Kolivan’s voice was mournful, and it sapped the anger from Pidge’s bones. She’d never considered that Kolivan might have a soulmate. That any of the Marmorites might have soulmates. They all seemed so grim and emotionless, hardly more than robots fighting for their cause—fighting and dying and turning their backs on people in need, all in the name of ‘secrecy.’

But why should that mean they didn’t have soulmates? If Alteans had soulmates, and Balmerans, and every other kind of alien they’d come across, so why not Galra?

Kolivan tore his gaze away from the stars and looked down at Pidge. The scar through his right eye gave him an intimidating appearance, but it was tempered now by the furrow of his brow, the flash of sorrow in his eyes. Moving slowly, he pushed back his sleeve, bearing his wrist, which was covered by a fine layer of short, dark purple fur, then extended it toward Pidge.

Two Marks stared up at her, inked onto his skin but also visible as a discoloration in his fur, like halos around the symbols. The top Mark was faint gray, almost silvery in the light of the Balmera crystal overhead, and bore a striking resemblance to the sigil set into the hilt of every Marmorite’s blade.

Below this was a shape Pidge couldn’t quite make out, something small and intricate and obscured by the fur around it. It didn’t help that this one was colored midnight blue, a shade nearly indistinguishable from the fur, if not the lighter skin underneath.

“Two?” Pidge asked.

“Antok is the other,” Kolivan said with a nod to the man standing behind him, silent and masked as always. Pidge stared at him, realizing that she’d yet to see one without the other for more than a minute or two. And though Antok rarely spoke, Kolivan often glanced at him as though seeking his opinion. She’d assumed theirs was a relationship of commander and lieutenant, leader and adviser, but maybe she’d been wrong.

But Kolivan only looked at him for a moment before returning his stern gaze to Pidge.

“We are both prepared to die for this war, just as Thace was. Just as Keith was.”

These words, finally, washed away Pidge’s shock. She straightened, narrowing her eyes. “Except Keith isn’t dead yet.” Maybe it was cruel, shoving Keith’s survival in Kolivan’s face, when in all likelihood one of his soulmates had just died. Pidge didn’t care. She’d already lost Matt; she’d be damned if she gave up on Keith now.

Her father came up behind her, settling his hand on her shoulders. He’d remained silent during the confrontation, probably knowing Pidge needed to fight, probably knowing how much she was hurting. He wouldn’t have wanted to take Kolivan’s side in this argument, so he’d kept quiet.

Why wasn’t anyone else trying to help Keith? Why was it only Pidge?

She shook off her father’s hand, and he retreated, dropping heavily into the chair behind him with a sigh.

“We will get him back, Pidge,” Allura said fervently. “But we must prepare first. We must rest and plan. It will do him no good for you to die in a premature rescue attempt.”

Pidge narrowly bit back a snarky retort. Sure, Allura had been an asshole to Keith these last few days, but that wasn’t who Allura really was, was it? She cared about Keith—didn’t she? Pidge wanted to believe Allura was better than that, wanted to believe the pain in her voice and the tears in her eyes, but it was hard.

And even if she did care, a small, ugly, selfish part of Pidge couldn’t help but think Allura had no right to act so hurt by Keith’s capture.

Later, Pidge told herself. There were bigger battles to be fought now than unraveling how she felt about Allura.

“When?” Pidge demanded. “When are we going to go after him?”

“When we have at least a slim hope of success,” Allura said. “The castle is in need of repairs, we all need to rest, and...” She paused, her gaze sliding to the padded chair behind a dark console where Shiro usually sat. “And I would very much like to have Shiro with us when we go charging into the depths of Haggar’s stronghold.”

The reminder of Shiro’s loss hit Pidge hard. Too much was happening. Too many people were going away. First Matt, then Keith, then Shiro…

“Rest,” Allura said firmly. “Coran and I will work with the Blade of Marmora to prepare ourselves. You focus on being ready for the rescue when the time comes.”

They glared at each other for a long moment, a silent contest of wills. Allura showed no sign of bending on this issue, but Pidge was just as stubborn. When she finally broke eye contact, it wasn’t so she could retreat to her room. She wouldn’t have been able to sleep, anyway. She went instead to the chair where he father had settled, curling up in his lap.

He wrapped his arms around her and sighed into her hair, the sensation making her shiver as a flash of pain swept through her. “It’ll be fine, sweetie,” he whispered. “Everything’s going to be fine.”

A headache built behind her eyes and pain throbbed the full length of her back, but Pidge closed her eyes and tried to believe her father’s words.

Matt kept an eye on Keith as the exo-replenisher did its work. It was true that Matt had coaxed an explanation out of one of the medics—only because she’d been using the device on someone who wasn’t Matt—but he only knew what it did, not how. Keith’s burns were receding, true, and he seemed to be in less pain than when Matt had first found him, but what about whatever other injuries he might have? The name exo-replenisher made Matt doubt whether it was effective on internal injuries. Or maybe it was just called that because it didn’t need to be inside the body to work.

“So what happened?” Keith asked. His voice was tired, but it no longer sounded like he was biting back a scream, as it had when he’d very briefly told his own story. Magical robot lions, an intergalactic war, and Matt’s own sister fighting on the front lines. It had been a shock, to say the least. “Pidge thinks you’re dead.”

Matt sat back, breathing out a long sigh. He and Keith had found an empty room to hide in while they figured out what to do next. Alone and unarmed on a ship full of probably-hostile aliens with no way to contact Shiro or anyone else. They could steal a ship, Matt supposed. Maybe. But then what?

“I got shot,” Matt said, staring down at Keith’s arm. As the burns receded, Matt had started picking out green Marks that matched his own. He took some comfort in the knowledge that Katie had found her other soulmate—not to mention Matt’s father and Shiro—even if that did little to offset the rest of what she’d faced while Matt was stuck here. “That’s what they tell me, anyway.”

“You don’t remember?”

Matt shook his head. “I was unconscious for, like, two weeks.” He tried not to think too hard on that, or on the fact that the rebels had proved more than willing to knock him out to keep him out of their way. “The whole rescue’s a blank, to be honest. All I know is that it happened, and these people brought me here for healing.”

“Okay, then why hasn’t Pidge felt anything from you since you woke up? You can’t tell me you haven’t even pinched yourself so she’d know you were okay.”

Matt grimaced, his hand lifting up to trace the warm, hard disc set into his chest. “The gensa,” he said. “That thing they tried to put on you. I’ve got one, and I can’t find a way to get it off. It blocks pain—all pain, as far as I can tell. And I can’t get my hands on anything I could use to cut myself or whatever. Pens, too. They’ve gone to great lengths to make sure I couldn’t write to Shiro.”

Keith muttered a curse.

Matt’s lips twitched toward a smile. “My thoughts exactly.”

“But why?” Keith ran a hand through his hair, his face screwing up in frustration. “What’s the point of cutting you off from your soulmates like this?”

Before Matt could repeat Kletzak’s claims about this all being for the sake of secrecy, a way to protect the rebels against discovery, the door shot open. Matt wasn’t fast enough to gain his feet before Lizard Man himself was there, seizing the front of Matt’s shirt and lifting him off the ground.

“Matt!” Keith cried, scrambling up. Matt couldn’t see his face, but his voice promised murder.

Don’t, Matt wanted to say. You’re still hurt!

But Keith was faster, roaring a challenge as he charged in, only to be slammed against the wall by one of Kletzak’s minions. Keith’s cry of pain speared Matt, who thrashed in Kletzak’s grip. “Stop!” Matt roared. “Leave him alone!”

Kletzak’s eyes flicked to the side, narrowing to slits. “He won’t be hurt, so long as he behaves himself.”

Keith’s growl told them exactly what he thought of that idea.

Matt spoke before Keith could hurt himself—and Katie—any further. “What do you want with us, Kletzak? Why are you holding us prisoner?”

“I’m trying to win this war,” he said, as if Matt had anything to do with that. “I’m trying to stop the Galra.”

“So are we!” Keith hissed in pain as the guard pressed him harder against the wall.

Kletzak scoffed. “Are you?”

“Of course we--”

“You made an alliance with them.” Kletzak’s voice was cold and hard, and vibrating in a way that sounded almost-but-not-quite like a growl. Being about ninety percent lizard, he didn’t have ears to lay flat or teeth to bare, but Matt was still somehow reminded of a territorial cat. He wrapped his hands around Kletzak’s scaly arm and tried to alleviate some of the pressure threatening to cut off his air supply, glad that at least those furious eyes weren’t staring at him.

Keith made a strangled sound. “What—the Blade? They’re not--”

“They’re Galra!” The words reverberated in the small room, making Matt flinch. “You claim to be a paladin of Voltron—you claim to be a defender of the universe, and yet you cast your lot with the enemy.”

“They’re not the enemy,” Keith insisted. “They’re fighting Zarkon just like we are!”

With a scoff, Kletzak released Matt. He dropped heavily to the floor, legs crumpling beneath him, as Kletzak gestured toward the guard holding Keith. He, too, was released, and the rebels backed toward the door. “It’s no wonder they betrayed you,” Kletzak snarled.

Keith frowned. “Betrayed?”

“You think it was a coincidence you ended up trapped in a room? You think your so-called ally tried to blow you up in order to help you?”

Matt grabbed Keith’s arm as he tried to make a run at Kletzak. It earned him a glare, but there was no way Matt was letting a scrawny kid like Keith take on the hulking mass of muscle and scale that was the rebel leader.

“You’re naive,” Kletzak spat. “All of you. You don’t deserve to possess the Voltron Lions.”

“So, what?” Matt asked. “You’re going to hold him hostage? Take Voltron out of the fight entirely?”

“Hardly.” At a gesture from Kletzak, his companions withdrew, leaving only Kletzak to block the door. “I intend to give the lions to men I trust to do the right thing.”

Keith was snarling, prying at Matt’s hand as he strained toward the door. “They’ll never give up the lions.”

Kletzak only smiled. “They will if they ever want to see the two of you again.”

Kletzak left them there, locking the door behind him. Keith threw himself against it, clawing at the seams until his nails broke and his fingers ached and Matt had to haul him back. Even then, Keith wanted to fight, wanted to scream. He relished the pain for what it meant—Pidge would know he was alive. She would be worried sick, and Keith hated himself for that, but at least she would know she hadn’t lost him yet.

“At least now I know why they were so desperate not to let me get in touch with Shiro or Katie,” Matt muttered, slumping back against the far wall. “Can’t exactly hold me hostage if I can figure out an escape plan with my soulmate.”

Keith snorted. He wasn’t surprised to hear that these rebels didn’t trust anyone—not the Blade of Marmora, not the paladins of Voltron. It made a twisted sort of sense. Zarkon had ruled for ten thousand years, and these rebels’ sense of self-preservation wasn’t much different from Kolivan’s. Secrecy protected those who would fight back against the nearly-omnipotent.

Didn’t stop him from loathing Kletzak’s guts.

“We have to get out of here,” Keith muttered. “We have to get in touch with the others.” What did they think had happened to him? Unless by some chance they’d spotted the rebel ship that had taken Keith away from the battle, they had to assume he’d been captured. Was Zarkon’s ship still intact? And if so, were they planning an assault to get to him?

He almost wished the medic had put the gensa on him. At least then he wouldn’t have had to worry Pidge or Shiro or any of the others would die on a futile mission to save him. But the gensa would have made Pidge think Keith was dead, and he couldn’t bear the thought of that, either.

Blinking clear of his thoughts, Keith found himself staring at a small vent on the wall, near the ceiling. Smiling, he glanced at Matt. “You ever crawled through air ducts before?”

Matt frowned. “...No?”

“Shame.” Keith headed for the wall, reaching up toward the vent. “Pidge does it all the time. Give me a boost?”

Matt stared at him for only a moment before coming over and offering his hands as a stirrup to lift Keith higher. With the boost, Keith managed to curl his fingers through the grating and rip off the vent cover. The space beyond was small, but Keith was pretty sure he’d fit. Matt certainly would. It wouldn’t be comfortable, but they just might be able to make this work.

Keith hauled himself up into the vent, grunting at the tight fit, and ventured forward until he found an intersection where he could turn himself around and crawl back to help Matt up. It was loud, hot, uncomfortable work, but soon enough they were both moving forward, if slowly. With no real destination in mind, Keith wandered, checking vents he passed for an empty room or hallway where they could emerge unseen.

Unfortunately, she ship was either too small to have many empty rooms or just too crowded. Everywhere they went, they saw aliens, some sleeping, some training, some settled in at computer stations working on who knew what. A few shot confused looks at the ceiling as Keith and Matt crawled past, knees and elbows banging against the sides of the duct.

“So do you actually have a plan?” Matt asked. “Or is this a ‘fake it till you make it’ sort of thing?”

Keith snorted. “Plans require actually knowing something about the situation, which I definitely do not.”

Matt hummed. “That’s fair.”

They crawled on, and just when Keith was starting to think they’d have to spend the rest of their lives in the ducts, he heard a familiar voice up ahead.

“And the Galra?” Kletzak asked.

Keith froze for half a second, convinced Kletzak was talking about him. But of course he wasn’t talking about Keith. He didn’t know. He couldn’t. (Though these rebels had known about the Blade’s plan, somehow, and they’d managed to find Keith in time to stop him being blown up. Was it really that much of a stretch to think they might have somehow heard about Keith’s Trials?)

“Still not talking, sir,” said an unfamiliar voice. Keith’s momentary panic faded, and he started to ease backward, nudging Matt with his toe to get him to move.

Then the rebel’s words registered, and Keith froze.

Still not talking.

They had another Galra on this ship?

Thace.

Keith’s pulse quickened, even as he tamped down on his hope. Thace was dead. Blown up by his own hand in an effort to give their allies the opening they needed. The rebels had saved Keith, but they obviously considered Thace an enemy, no different from any other Galra. They’d probably just grabbed some random officer during their raid, hoping to interrogate him for information.

Kletzak growled. “Then what are you doing up here? I want to know what other traps they’ve set for Voltron!”

Matt touched Keith’s foot, the gesture soft with confusion, and Keith tried to figure out how to say what he was thinking. He didn’t know Thace, except that he felt he did. They’d both been on that ship for the same reason; they’d both been ready to die to stop Zarkon. If he was alive, Keith owed it to him to get him out of here.

But to do that, they had to get away from Kletzak. Keith began backing up once more, his feet bumping into Matt as he tried to give Keith space, his shoulders and back rubbing against the duct, constricting him. How Pidge moved around in places like this so quickly, Keith would never know.

He was almost to the edge of the room when a section of duct bowed under his weight, making a soft, hollow sound that echoed through the duct. The voices coming through the vent up ahead cut off, and Keith froze, cursing silently.

Maybe they hadn’t actually heard anything. Maybe they wouldn’t realize what the sound meant. Maybe…

A laser burned a hole through the vent twelve inches from Keith’s hand. He yelped, jerking backward, and another laser followed close on the first one’s tail.

Keith scrambled back, kicking at Matt to make him go faster. There was an intersection not far behind them, another length of air duct running away to the left, a chute deeper into the belly of the ship to the right. If they could make it that far…

“I’m really starting to hate this guy,” Matt muttered as another laser pierced the vents. By Keith’s estimation, they were nearly past the wall of the room by now, so Kletzak no longer had a clear shot at them, but that was no reason to relax. “Though, on the bright side, if I get shot again, at least Katie might see the Mark and know I’m alive?”

They’d reached the intersection, and Matt had turned into the side passage. Keith glared at him. “You’re not getting shot again.”

“But Katie--”

“Is already going to kill you when she finds out what’s going on. Don’t make it worse.”

Before Matt could retort, a laser erupted through the bottom of the vent a few feet ahead of him. Matt recoiled, and Keith retreated hastily. His foot found the hole where the air duct turned down toward a lower deck. He hesitated, but the scent of ozone and hot metal filled the duct already, and Kletzak soon had three more holes poked in the duct near Matt.

Cursing, Keith grabbed Matt’s ankle and yanked him along as he slid into the open chute.

Matt yelped as they fell, Keith spreading his limbs to try to control their descent. It took Matt a floor or two to catch on, and by that time Keith felt raw and bruised from the friction.

“Freaking rebels,” Keith muttered, swinging himself into a horizontal duct when he could no longer hear the sound of Kletzak’s shouting or the lasers searching the air vents for stowaways. Matt crawled in beside him, and they sat there for a long moment, resting, pressed too close together. Keith didn’t let himself relax, though. He didn’t put it past these people to have poison gas or a fiery duct-cleansing cycle ready for a case like this, and he hadn’t come this far just to die covered in sweat and dust.

They soon found a vent that only exposed them to a single person when they emerged, and he flinched away from them when they dropped down from the ceiling of her bedroom. Keith briefly considered trying to knock her out, but the commotion that would cause probably wouldn’t be worth it. So he turned, Matt on his heels, and sprinted out into the corridor.

Ten minutes, five close calls, and one frantic skirmish later, they finally found the prison block. Matt and Keith each held a stun wand taken from the pair of guards who’d cornered them in the elevator, and Matt had already confirmed that they didn’t leave any mark that might be transferred to Pidge.

The cells down here were mostly empty, but Keith and Matt hurried down the aisle, glancing into each in search of the Galra prisoner—a man named Thace, apparently. (Maybe. Keith had seemed to doubt his own words when he explained his deductions to Matt.)

Matt was the one who found him, sitting calmly in the far corner of a small, dark cell. He was in bad shape, his fur blackened where it wasn’t burned off entirely, one side of his face coated in dark, sticky blood.

“Thace?” Matt asked hesitantly. He would have thought the sight of a Galra—even one who was, ostensibly, a friend—would have made him uncomfortable, but he felt only pity for this man. Thace was obviously in pain, his eyes dim and drooping as he looked up at Matt.

He blinked. “Who are you?”

The voice was calm despite the situation, but it wasn’t the dangerous calm Matt had heard so often from guards at his prison camp. Thace’s words carried no warning, only resignation.

He perked up somewhat when Keith appeared beside Matt, leaning in close to the clear plastic window to peer at the man inside.

“Paladin?” Thace asked.

Keith grinned. “Thace! You’re okay.”

“By a certain definition,” Thace muttered. “What happened? Where are we?”

Matt glanced at Keith, who ran a hand through his hair. “Long story,” he said. “This ship is run by rebels who think all Galra are the enemy and want to take Voltron for themselves. I don’t suppose there’s a key lying around here somewhere so we can get you out?”

Thace gave a crooked smile. “Not so far as I’m aware. Though I do believe they put my weapons in a storage room near the security checkpoint.” He gestured to one side.

Matt grimaced at the word security, but Keith’s face just darkened with determination, and he took off at a sprint, shouting so loud two security guards came barreling out into the hallway past the last of the cells. Matt gave chase, but long before he arrived, Keith had spun into an attack, ducking beneath the first guard’s sword and jabbing him in the ribs with the stun wand. As he fell, Keith straightened, smacking away the other guard’s pistol and tasing her, too.

The hallway fell quiet once more as Matt arrived, slowing to a jog and giving Keith a pointed look.

“What?” Keith asked, and when Matt failed to find words to express the general what the fuck-ness of the situation, Keith rolled his eyes and turned back to his search for weapons.

They found them inside the guard booth: two daggers and two suits of armor. The daggers seemed to be a set, the pair of them shaped a little differently but bearing the same strange symbol on the hilt. Keith quickly dressed himself in the red-and-white armor, leaving the gray set behind, then grabbed one of the knives from Matt and ran back to Thace’s cell.

As he approached, a red sword appeared in his hand. He swung, low to high, and sliced through the lock holding the cell door in place. It slid aside, and Thace raised an eyebrow. “Crude,” he said, “but effective.”

Keith snorted, tossing Thace the other knife.

“Hang on,” Matt protested. “I need to let Katie know I’m okay.”

Keith shot him a scowl, then turned to Thace. “I don’t suppose you have a pen on you?” he said, not sounding very hopeful. But Thace drew his dagger and inserted his claw into a small slit on the hilt. A slender stylus popped out of the hilt, barely as long as Matt’s finger. A pen. Matt snatched it away.

“Finally,” he muttered, shoving his sleeve up to his elbow and grasping the pen awkwardly in his left hand. It had been more than a year since he’d written to Shiro. More than a year since he’d held a pen at all. He--

Keith grabbed his wrist before he could start writing. Matt snapped his head up, ready to snarl at Keith to let him go, but the uncomfortable look on Keith’s face stopped him. Matt’s heart clenched. He remembered suddenly the first message Shiro had sent him after escaping.

I’m alive. I love you. Be safe. If you ever find a way to write, don’t use your right arm.

“He lost it, didn’t he?” Matt asked, his voice low.

Keith grimaced, but nodded. “Haggar's doing. He has a prosthetic now, but--”

Matt nodded, then transferred the pen to his right hand. It felt strange, but not so much stranger than it was to hold a pen at all. He pushed up his other sleeve, hesitated for a split second, and then wrote, So it turns out I’m alive. Surprise?

He waited, but no response appeared, and Matt was left staring at shaky, uneven letters. He tried to give it time, tried to tell himself Shiro would have to find a pen. Might be in battle—no. Keith was Shiro’s pain pal. If Shiro was fighting, Keith would know.

Hand shaking, Matt tried again, painstakingly writing Shiro’s name across the back of his left hand.

Five minutes passed. Matt looked up at Keith, who was glaring at Matt’s hand like it had personally offended him.

“Why isn’t he responding?” Matt asked.

Keith shook his head. “I don’t know. He… might be wearing his gloves?”

Gritting his teeth, Matt spun the pen around and drew a line across his cheek. Someone would have to notice that. Surely someone would see.

Nothing.

Keith was shaking now, too, his eyes wide and fearful. Matt stared at him, then down at the ink on his hands, then up at Thace, who started to say something and then stopped himself.

Shiro wasn’t answering.

After everything that had happened, Matt couldn’t process it. There had to be some explanation. It was night where Shiro was, and he was asleep. Or he was alone, his hand and arm covered, no mirror around to see his face. A few hours from now he would notice, and he would respond, and everything would be cleared up. Matt should just find somewhere to hide, and then…

No. Keith had only just been taken. His team wouldn’t be sleeping now. They couldn’t be. There was no reason that none of them had noticed the Mark suddenly appear on Shiro’s face.

No reason at all, unless Shiro was…

No.

It wasn’t true. It wasn’t. He needed to try something else. He needed--

Katie.

Dropping the pen, Matt reached out and yanked free the knife clipped to Keith’s waist, and in one smooth motion he drew the blade across his palm.

Chapter 14: Revelations

Notes:

More lovely art for this fic from vamppires on Tumblr. Check it out!

Note: There's a little bit more of the communication-via-self-inflicted-injuries thing in this chapter. If that's something that makes you uncomfortable, stop reading at, "Pidge's mind was already racing ahead." You can start reading again halfway through the next scene where Keith says, "Dammit, Matt."

Chapter Text

Pidge wasn’t sleeping, but it was a close thing. Something about the combination of post-battle crash, emotional fatigue, dull but constant pain, and her father’s arms around her lulled her into a light daze. The pain kept her just this side of unconsciousness, but she was nevertheless plagued with vague waking dreams that came in time with Keith’s aches. She saw Haggar beating him, cutting him open. Heard him scream.

She opened her eyes once and saw that the red Mark on her right hand had almost completely vanished. Had someone been healing him? Why? Just to make the next round of torture that much worse?

She closed her eyes again, halfway convinced she was still dreaming.

The next time the pain crested (a sharp ache on her left forearm and a duller throb at the base of her palm) it brought a different image. Not torture, but battle. These were familiar pains. A heavy blow on her shield that she felt in her bones. Her bayard twisting in her hand as it rebounded off armor. She could almost see Keith fighting, sword flashing as he struggled through his enemies. Knocked aside a sword swinging for his neck. Thrust forward with his weapon—not a sword, but…

Furrowing her brow, Pidge reached out, her sleepy mind trying to draw more details from the dreamlike image. She couldn’t see Keith’s opponent, couldn’t see where it was he fought. She thought of the Arena, then immediately rejected the idea. This was something else.

Her semi-conscious mind continued to worry at the problem for some time after the pain faded. Eventually, though, she was roused by the sound of Hunk and Coran’s arrival, punctuated by questions of whether there was a plan yet, whether Allura or Kolivan had learned anything new.

Pidge shook off the dreams as she began to uncurl. Had any of them been real, or was it just her concern for Keith working overtime? Yawning, she opened her eyes and looked down at her hand to check the state of Keith’s burn Mark. It had receded. She could barely see it past the cuff of her undersuit. It was just a small, feathered patch along the outside of her hand, and a thin, crisp line across her palm.

Wait.

Pidge froze, staring at her palm in shock. There was a Mark there, bold and vivid and fresh. But it wasn’t Keith’s. Keith’s Marks were bright red. Blood red. The color of the Red Lion. This one…

This one was more muted, a muddy sort of brownish-red like an old sepia photo. The color of freckles.

Matt.

A shout ripped itself from her tongue, a sound that came closer to a sob than to words. Pidge launched off her father’s lap, startling him out of his drowse. The others on the bridge turned toward her, Kolivan and Antok reaching for their weapons, Allura growing three inches before she stopped herself. Coran hurried forward, glancing around the bridge as though expecting to find an attack. Hunk, who seemed to be half asleep himself, only blinked at her.

“Katie?” Sam asked. “What is it? What’s wrong?”

Pidge couldn’t answer. She stared at Matt’s new Mark, shaking, hardly daring to believe what she was seeing.

Matt.

Matt was alive.

Matt was alive?

She didn’t realize she was crying until Sam wiped a tear away with his thumb. He was crouched down in front of her, his eyes pained. “What happened?”

Pidge smiled, still sniffling. “Nothing’s wrong, Dad,” she said, and turned her palm toward him.

He breathed out, sounding a little like a deflating tire as he took her hand in his and traced the line across her palm. “That’s impossible.”

“What is?” Hunk asked tentatively.

Pidge turned, pulling off her glasses to wipe her eyes. “It’s Matt.” She laughed, incredulous. “He’s alive.”

There was a moment of stunned silence, and then everyone began to talk at once—the Marmorites asking who Matt was, Allura and Coran asking how it was possible, Hunk beginning to tear up as he came forward and lifted Pidge off her feet in a hug.

Pidge’s mind was already racing ahead to more important questions. How Matt had survived could wait until she had him back. Right now, she need to find him. Squirming away from Hunk, she turned a quick circle, her eyes darting over the clean lines of the bridge.

“I need to talk to him,” she muttered.

Hunk frowned. “But… you’re pain pals. You can’t write.”

“Sure I can.” Not finding anything immediately helpful in the vicinity, Pidge summoned her bayard, careful to keep the electricity turned off. This was going to be painful enough without adding burns to the list. She was halfway through prying off the armor covering her forearms when Sam realized where this was going.

“Woah,” he cried, grabbing Pidge’s wrist before she could set the tip of her blade to the back of her arm. “You’re not going to cut an entire conversation into your arm.”

Pidge glanced at her arm, frowning. “You’re right. That would take up way too much room.” She paused, considering. “I don’t suppose anyone has a pin on them?”

“Goddammit,” Keith hissed, clapping a hand over his forearm as a sharp pain assaulted him. Matt looked over at him, then down at his own arm, and crowed in delight as more pinpricks followed on the heels of the first. They weren’t especially painful, not once Keith knew to expect them, but that didn’t stop him from cursing quite colorfully as the pricks continued.

Gritting his teeth, Keith pulled his hand away from his arm and watched in fascination and mild horror as a series of bright green dots and dashes appeared on his skin.

“Morse code?” he asked, hissing as Pidge continued to write.

Matt grinned. “My baby sister’s a fucking genius!” There was a dangerous gleam in his eye, and he raised Keith’s knife like he was going to mimic Pidge’s trick with a six-inch blade.

And people said Keith was the reckless one.

He lunged for Matt, but Matt scrambled away, his eyes still following Pidge’s message as he set the knife to his skin.

“Dammit, Matt,” Keith growled. He could tackle Matt, maybe, but wrestling with a knife was a good way to get one of them stabbed. Thace, of course, made no move to help, just raised an eyebrow and bent to retrieve the pen Matt had dropped.

Gritting his teeth, Keith whirled, holding out a hand toward Thace. “Pen,” he snapped.

Thace blinked, glanced down at his arms—fur singed, skin blistered in places—then sighed and handed the pen over. “You have a pen pal on the castle?” Thace asked.

Keith hesitated, his eyes catching on the small blue pilot wings as he bared his wrist. He was all too aware that he was counting on an impossibility. He’d hoped, and he’d wondered, but was there really even a chance?

One glance at the blood running from the cut across Matt’s palm, at the way the knife trembled as Matt pressed it against his skin, steeled Keith’s nerves.

He breathed in, bit his lip, and wrote Lance’s name across the back of his hand.

Lance showered in the dark.

This wasn’t his usual habit, of course, but it was hard enough to stare at Shiro’s scars every day. If he’d tried to wash up with close to half his body painted red, he’d have lost the little bit of food goo he’d managed to force down.

So. Lights off it was.

He’d rather be out there fighting, clawing his way toward Keith, but Allura had been firm in her decision. They’d all been running too hard for too long, and they were severely weakened by the loss of both Keith and Shiro. Not to mention the fact that Haggar would be ready for them if they came back now. They needed to rest. They needed to plan.

Lance wasn’t going to lie; he’d wanted to argue. He had argued, nearly as much as Pidge had. But Allura was right—and anyway, she wasn’t going to back down. Lance had left, hoping if he cooled off he might be able to approach the situation more rationally.

He wasn’t sure the shower had done anything about his pressing need to shoot something, but at least he had the advantage of being only half a soulmate. He could turn off the lights and forget about Keith’s wounds. Pidge and Shiro (wherever Shiro was) had to deal with the pain, too.

It all just pissed Lance off more. It wasn’t just one of his soulmates suffering for every minute they delayed. It was three— it was all of them, to a lesser extent, because Lance knew Allura and Coran and Hunk were all worried about Keith, too.

Lance let the water wash over him for twenty minutes before, reluctantly, shutting off the tap and groping along the wall for the towel rack. He dressed by touch, stepping into his underwear and jeans. Only once he had his shirt on did he dare face Keith’s Marks.

When at last he flipped on the lights, he was met with a swift kick to the gut.

LANCE.

His name. Scrawled in bright, bloody red across the back of his hand.

What? How?

The room around him tilted on its axis as Lance turned and sprinted for the pen resting on his bedside table. Snatching it up, he pushed back his sleeve and found more writing waiting for him there.

Please say something, Red had written. Please tell me I didn’t just fuck everything up.

Lance faltered for a moment, his heart clenching at the words. His first instinct was to say it was fine, Red was fine, everything was fine, he didn’t fuck up.

What he wrote instead was, How do you know my name?

He knew the answer before Red had time to respond. He’d known the answer, honestly, since he saw Hunk and Shay making out on his bed.

Both.

Hunk and Shay were pain pals, but as it had turned out, they were pen pals, too.

It should have been impossible. It was impossible. Lance had told himself that, over and over, because he hadn’t wanted to get his hopes up over nothing.

But still, there was that afternoon down by the pool, Keith warm where his body pressed up against Lance’s. There had been something that day, a spark between them, a connection. Lance wasn’t imagining that.

It’s me, Red wrote. Keith. I’m your soulmate.

Lance sat down hard on the side of his bed.

“Well, quiznak me,” he muttered.

It was a moment before Keith wrote again, but once the words started coming, they came quickly, scratched out on Lance’s skin at such an angle they seemed to be trying to take flight. I’m sorry. You can be mad at me later. Just go find Pidge and tell her I’m fine and Matt is fine and

Matt??? Lance wrote. Matt Holt. The guy who died. He was beginning to wonder whether he’d slipped in the shower. Hit his head, maybe. All he needed now was for the space mice to show up with a message from Shiro and this trip to Wonderland would be complete.

Keith scribbled a sigh, big and angry. Yes, Matt. He’s alive, and he’s going to lose a hand at this rate. Find Pidge.

This exchange honestly only raised more questions, like Why is Matt losing a hand? And, What the quiznak can Pidge do? And just a general, What the hell, man? But Lance didn’t wait long enough to ask any of these questions. Keith said to find Pidge, so Lance was going to find Pidge. Flinging his towel across the room, he sprinted out the door.

Pidge. Where was Pidge? She’d still been pestering Allura when Lance left to cool off, so… bridge? It was worth a shot.

Words continued to appear on Lance’s arm as he ran, small cramped letters that were hard to read without slowing or running head-first into a wall. Lance read them anyway, glancing up every so often to keep himself moving in the right direction.

There are rebels, Keith wrote. God, Keith. Lance grinned at the thought. Keith was alive. Keith was okay. Keith reciprocated .

Lance told himself that it was nothing new. Red had always reciprocated. But it was different now that he knew Red was Keith. Red was an abstract. Red was an inevitability. Lance only cared about Red—only knew him at all—because they were soulmates. It didn’t make their affections any less genuine, but it was safe.

Keith was not safe. He was a mystery, a question. Keith was someone Lance had fought with, laughed with. Keith was risk itself—and that risk had paid off in the best way possible.

In the elevator, Lance finally had time to read everything Keith had written. Rebels who didn’t like that Voltron had made an alliance with the Blade of Marmora had rescued Keith—and apparently Thace and Matt, who it turned out was not dead, just a hostage. The rebels were planning to trade Keith and Matt for the lions.

Screw that, Lance wrote. We’ll just bust in there and kick some alien ass for you.

Keith drew the swoop that was their shorthand for a smile. The line seemed somehow hesitant, less smooth than it should have been. Lance didn’t have a chance to figure out why that might be, for at that moment the elevator door opened on to a crowded bridge.

Everyone was there, even the Marmorites, and all had their eyes on Pidge, who was bent over her arm holding… a sewing needle?

“Guys!” Lance cried, darting into the room. “Guys, it’s okay! Matt’s okay—he’s with Keith!”

Everyone turned Lance's way at the same moment, eyes widening almost comically as Lance waved his arm over his head to show off the bright red scribbles.

...Except no one seemed to be looking at his arm.

“Lance…” Pidge said slowly, scrubbing at the tear tracks on her cheeks. Her eyebrows knit together the way they did when she was working through an especially tough problem. “Have you always had Shiro’s Marks?”

Lance froze, his hand flying up to cover his nose. Oh. Oh shit. His shower… He’d washed off the Altean concealer on his face and hands before getting in. The stuff was damn near miraculous, but it wasn’t permanent.

And in all the excitement of finding out Red was Keith and Keith was okay, Lance had completely forgotten to reapply his concealer before sprinting out of his room.

Lance tried for a laugh, but it came out strangled, then cut off altogether as Allura gasped. She looked at Lance, then at her own arm, pushing up her sleeve to stare at the aquamarine Mark—one of Coran’s—that crossed an ordinary scar at an angle.

Hunk and Pidge glanced at her, then back at Lance, who felt all to keenly the absence of his jacket. He’d left it in his room, with his concealer, because apparently he’d tossed every last scrap of common sense out the airlock as soon as Keith wrote his name.

Pidge’s eyes tracked Lance’s hands as he waved them frantically, and he knew with a sick sort of certainty that she’d recognized her own Marks among the rest.

He groped for an excuse. Something, anything, to make them all stop staring at him like he was some exotic creature they’d only ever seen in a zoo.

“Keith is with Matt? You’re sure?”

God bless Coran. There was concern in his eyes, too, but it was buried deep, and he was asking about something that wasn’t the kaleidoscope of Marks laid bare on Lance’s skin.

Licking his lips, Lance nodded. He tried to talk, to explain what Keith had told him, but he couldn’t seem to get his mouth to work. Thankfully, the spell on the others had been broken, and the questions started flying, giving Lance a few moments longer to get a grip on himself.

“Keith is okay?” Allura asked. “He’s—He’s not--?”

“Where are they?” Pidge demanded, bearing down on Lance, wielding her needle like a sword.

Sam just frowned, crossing his arms. “How do you know any of this?”

Hunk had been babbling more than any of them, firing off ten questions a second, but at Sam’s words he froze, face lighting up. “Oh gosh. Oh my gosh. Lance. Lance. He’s not--? Is he--? Oh my gosh, Lance?”

Lance couldn’t say if it was Hunk’s excitement or the reminder that Keith— Keith— was sitting on the other end of Lance’s pen pal bond. Either way, though, a little bubble of happiness burst inside him, cutting through the anxiety. He smiled, and yeah, okay, it was probably a little bit dopey, if Hunk’s cooing was anything to go by, but Lance couldn’t help it.

“Keith is your pen pal? ” Hunk asked, his voice rising to a squeal on the last words. “Lance! Why didn’t you say anything?”

“Because I just found out?” Lance asked. He had just long enough to see the understanding flash across the others’ faces before Hunk barreled into him. Lance might have laughed at the others’ reactions, except he was having a hard time breathing through the hug.

Especially once Hunk whispered in his ear, “This is a good thing, right?”

“A very good thing,” Lance whispered back, feeling giddy.

He didn’t let himself dwell on the giddiness, though. There was still work to be done, and friends to be rescued. So he pulled away from Hunk, waved his hands until the others quieted, then got distracted when he noticed that Keith had written something new.

Okay, Pidge stopped writing, so I’m assuming you found her, but now Matt’s yelling at me to ask you to tell him what she’s saying. I’m going deaf, Lance.

Lance grinned, not least of all at the way half the words were smudged almost to illegibility, presumably as Matt pounced on Keith.

“That smile seems to be a good sign,” Coran muttered.

Lance looked up, blushing. “Uh… yeah. Keith’s whining because Matt’s yelling in his ear.”

Pidge seized hold of his arm, yanking it down so she could see what Keith had said. Lance staggered a little, but didn’t protest. He figured since both of her soulmates were at stake here, she had every right to be a little pushy.

“Sounds like they got picked up by a group of rebels,” Lance told the others who didn’t have Pidge’s excuse to read for themselves what was happening. “I don’t think they’re hostile, exactly, but uh…”

He trailed off as Pidge began to growl, staring up at him with eyes that almost made him want to run for cover. “Seriously?” she asked. “They’re holding Keith and Matt hostage because we teamed up with the Blade?”

Lance shrugged, glancing up over Pidge’s head. Allura had stiffened, shooting wary glances at Kolivan and Antok, who seemed to be bristling. “Yeah,” Lance said. “They’re… not so into the whole good guy Galra jam.”

“But… Keith’s Galra, too.” Hunk sounded nervous, which only made Lance’s heart start pounding. Keith was Galra. Part Galra, but Lance somehow doubted the people who held a paladin hostage because of an alliance would care about his human half.

“I don’t think they know that yet,” Lance said. And hopefully Keith and Matt would both be back here before that changed. Lance didn’t like the thought of Keith stuck on a ship full of people who wanted him dead. Just thinking about it made his skin crawl.

Pidge straightened up suddenly, fingers tightening around Lance’s wrist. She spun, eyes wide, toward Kolivan. “Thace is alive.”

A jolt ran through Kolivan, disrupting his usual stern facade. He seemed to hold his breath, eyes fixed on Pidge, and whispered, “What?”

“Yup.” Pidge held up Lance’s arm, grinning. “Looks like we’ve got three soulmates to rescue.”

Soulmates? Lance wondered. He watched, stunned, as Antok laid a hand on Kolivan’s shoulder. The two shared a long, meaningful look, and Lance suddenly felt very foolish.

“Ohhh.”

Pidge snorted, elbowed him in the side, then shoved his arm back toward him. “Ask Matt why I can’t feel him,” she ordered. Her face was set in something like a pout, but there was uncertainty lurking behind her eyes, like… Oh.

Her thumb rubbed along one of the green Marks on his hand, and Lance’s insides twinged uncomfortably. “I’m sure he still reciprocates,” Lance whispered, low enough that only she could here. “You didn’t lose him, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

Her head snapped up, and now instead of uncertainty it was anger in her eyes. Lance flinched back, averting his gaze. He turned away hastily, lifting his pen and trying to make his brain think of anything other than the Marks on his arm and the way everyone was staring.

He sat down at his spot in the circle of chairs, legs pulled up so he could brace his arm against them as he wrote. Pidge and Hunk hovered nearby—too close, it seemed, their eyes burning holes in him. He kept his head down, hiding the black scar across his face as best he could, and wrote.

Pidge is fine. Happy, but confused. She can’t feel Matt’s pain??

It’s the rebels, Keith replied. They have this thing that blocks pain. Didn’t want Matt getting in touch with anyone. He’s been trying to write to Shiro for weeks. There was a slight pause, just long enough for Pidge and her dad to start speculating about this pain-blocking tech, its applications to medicine, the risks involved in tossing people who felt invincible into an intergalactic war. Then-- Did something happen to Shiro?

Lance went rigid, which was enough to halt the conversations around him.

“What?” Allura asked, leaning forward. “What is--?” She fell silent when she saw the words.

“Matt must have tried to write,” Lance said. “Which means wherever Shiro is, he can’t respond. Guess he wouldn’t have a pen,” he added, trying for optimism. “He might have seen Matt’s message, though. That oughtta cheer him up, right?”

No one answered. They were all just staring at Keith’s words, probably wondering just as much as Lance how they were supposed to tell Keith that Shiro was missing.

“We have to say something,” Hunk said. “Keith is Shiro’s soulmate.”

“Matt too,” Pidge said, almost defensively.

Hunk shook his head. “Well, yeah, but I mean Keith is the only one of us who would know if Shiro’s hurt. What if he’s asking because he felt Shiro… you know…”

Pidge’s hand went to her chest, and Lance quickly pulled her against him. She’d been sitting on the arm of his chair, and his tug made her lose her balance, squawking indignantly and squirming as she sank down into the space between the arm and Lance’s hip, but after a moment she stilled, leaning her head on his shoulder.

“He’s still alive,” Lance said with more confidence than he felt. “But Hunk’s right. We can’t just… not say anything.”

Allura nodded grimly, and Lance maneuvered his arm around Pidge, hesitating for a long moment before he found the right words.

Shiro kinda just… disappeared? From the Black Lion. After the battle. He’s not hurt, is he?

No.

The word was a long time in coming, and there was an audible sigh of relief as the others saw it appear. Lance remained tense, though, something restless trapped inside his ribs. Shiro wasn’t hurt. That meant he hadn’t been recaptured, probably. But a little bit of pain would have at least confirmed he was alive.

We’ll find him, Lance wrote. But right now we need to get to you guys. Any clue where these rebel assholes took you?

They haven’t let me get near a computer. Matt says

Lance never got to hear what Matt said. A sudden, vivid line cut across Lance’s arm and then… nothing. Lance scribbled a few question marks, then looked up, worried, at Pidge just in time to see a red-brown Mark nick her cheekbone.

Lance’s mouth ran dry, but it wasn’t until she gasped in pain, clutching her arm, that Lance started to panic.

“They have been discovered,” Kolivan growled. He spun toward the control panel, eyes narrowed to slits. “What sensors do you have on this ship of yours? Can you locate the red paladin?”

“Not unless he’s a lot closer than I suspect he is,” Coran said, hurrying to join him. “Maybe if we boost the signal? Pidge--”

“On it,” she said, kicking Lance in the stomach as she launched off the chair, diving for her own station and pulling up the scanning software. “Is there anything on this thing we can use as a satellite dish? We’ll need to increase the signal strength before I can sort through the data.”

She kept talking, Coran and Hunk offering up suggestions, but Lance’s eyes went to Allura, who seemed uncertain, shuffling her feet like she was torn between making a break for the door and... what? Offering her Quintessence to boost the signal? Was that even possible?

“What is it?” Lance asked.

She glanced at him, squaring her shoulders. “I’m not certain, but… There may be one other way to find him.”

Before Lance could say another word, Allura turned and sprinted out the door.

Allura flew into the elevator, slamming the button for the Red Lion’s hangar. Just before the doors slid closed, Kolivan and Antok slipped inside. Both had a hand on their blades, and Kolivan’s eye was twitching—the only outward sign he gave that he was anything less than perfectly composed.

Allura arched an eyebrow. “Is there a reason you followed me?”

“You’re heading for his lion,” Antok said simply.

“I am.” Allura crossed her arms. “I fail to see how that’s any of your concern.”

Kolivan barked a laugh, tilting his head as the elevator’s descent began to slow. “We’ve seen first-hand how far the Red Lion will go to protect that boy. It seems to me she is the best chance we have of locating him quickly.”

Allura couldn’t argue with that. Red had once traveled over a light-year to reach Keith and Allura after their pod exploded—a far greater distance than Allura had known the bond to cover. It was that incident that had convinced her that Zarkon may have been tracking the Black Lion.

Keith was probably far more than a light-year away this time, probably much too far away for the Red Lion to sense him, but perhaps if Allura helped… Perhaps if Allura offered Red the castle-ship’s resources to expand her senses…

The doors slid open, and Allura met Kolivan’s eyes. “It’s up to the Red Lion whether or not she lets you in, but I won’t say no to a little help.”

With a nod, the two Galra fell into step behind Allura as she charged across the hangar toward Red. The lion had her shield up, but she was pacing back and forth across the room, visibly agitated, her head swiveling from side to side.

“Red!” Allura cried, stumbling despite herself when those intense eyes swung her way. “You can sense him, can’t you? You know he’s out there. Let me help.”

Red hesitated only a moment, gaze shifting to Kolivan and Antok. A sense of dislike washed over Allura—not as strong as when she’d first come to ask Red to accept her as a pilot, but still a clear indication of discontent. Kolivan and Antok seemed to sense it as well, or perhaps they’d simply realized how powerful the lions were, how easy it would be for Red to crush them if she chose to do so.

Don’t, Allura thought, reaching out through the tenuous partial connection in an attempt to soothe Red. We need them.

The oppressive sensation lifted, Red growling a warning as she deactivated her shield and lowered her head. Allura charged up the ramp, Kolivan and Antok close behind her, and slid into Keith’s seat at the controls. Unlike before, Red held nothing back; Allura slid at once into that vast, restless presence, felt her mind stretching out across open space. Something tugged at her, pulling her insistently toward a distant corner of the universe.

Allura gathered her Quintessence—sluggish now after the exertion of the earlier battle—and linked into the castle’s systems.

The image sharpened at once, the pull becoming a beacon, and before Allura knew what she was doing, she’d wheeled the Red Lion around and shot out of the hangar into open space.

The comms burst to life as soon as she emerged, the paladins’ voices overlapping, asking her if she knew where Keith was, if she’d found him.

“Princess!” Coran said, his voice rising above the rest. “What are you doing?”

Allura closed her eyes, pouring herself into the Red Lion and opening a wormhole near the place where she could sense Keith. “What am I doing?” she repeated, a smile tugging at her lips. “What Keith would do—trusting my instincts.”

The Red Lion roared and plunged into the unknown.

Chapter 15: Fury

Chapter Text

Keith was so done with this. With the rebels, with their ship, with the gensa they’d stuck on Matt. With this whole damn nightmare.

“Look out!” Thace cried, and Keith spun just in time to see a rebel taking aim at him. He ducked and charged toward the woman, bayard in one hand, Blade in the other. His bayard sliced the barrel of the woman’s gun in two, and then Keith spun, kicking her feet out from under her and slamming the flat of his Blade into the side of her head.

That was the worst part of it all, Keith decided. He couldn’t just kill these people, however much he hated them. They were rebels. They wanted to stop Zarkon just as much as Keith did. And (though he was loathe to admit it) they weren’t actually trying to hurt him.

Most of them weren’t.

Keith probably should have realized something was wrong when no one had immediately barged into the prison block to keep Thace from escaping. But he’d been so wrapped up in the blue writing on his arm (and the Matt-shaped ball of energy all but climbing atop him to read the conversation) that he hadn’t stopped to think.

Thace had figured it out first—the shuffling outside the reinforced metal doors, loud in the otherwise stifling silence. Lance had been talking about rescue, asking if they knew where the rebels had taken them.

Give me ten minutes at a computer terminal, Matt had said, and I can probably figure something out.

Keith had barely had time to start writing a reply to Lance when Thace suddenly grabbed him by the elbow, hauling him to his feet.

They’re coming.

Keith had lost his pen—Thace’s pen, whatever—in the ensuing battle, which was just one more reason to be pissed off that these weren’t Galra sentries he could smash without feeling guilty about it. His burns still stung faintly when his armor rubbed over them, and the flashes of blue on his left forearm, which he hadn’t had a chance to cover before the rebels charged in, distracted him.

Most of the rebels were using nonlethal weapons—stun wands and low-powered lasers. But interspersed among these were men and women holding regular rifles, at full power, and these weren’t always aimed at extremities.

Keith didn’t have time to figure out which guns were deadly and which only dangerous, so he was just trying to take out everyone before they could hurt the others. Thace had his armor and his Blade, but Keith couldn’t help noticing that most of the full-powered lasers were aimed at him. No reason to keep the Galra alive, right? And Matt had neither weapon nor armor—though that didn’t stop him from charging into the fray, kicking and biting rebels who were focused on Keith and Thace until he managed to wrestle a gun away from a willowy six-limbed alien.

Keith was almost disappointed when it turned out to be the nonlethal kind.

After a few moments of Keith’s raging offense, Thace’s quieter progress behind him, and Matt’s wild barrage from the opposite site of the throng, the rebel line wavered, then broke.

Thace breathed a sigh of relief as the guards beat their retreat. “Thank Marmora for that,” he muttered. “Now if we can just--”

Keith barely had to look at Matt to know they were thinking the same thing. Here in the prison they were trapped. There were no computers here to search for the ship’s current location. No back door to retreat through if the rebels sent a larger team next time—and Thace was much too large to crawl through the vents.

Matt arched an eyebrow, Keith grinned, and at the same moment both of them took off running after the retreating rebels.

“Wait!” Thace called after them. “What are you doing?”

Keith and Matt were already in the corridor, Keith skidding as he took the turn too fast, Matt firing a few warning shots into the cluster of rebels up ahead. One or two of them spun, and their eyes widened as Keith barreled toward them, swords drawn back for a strike.

The rebels who had turned stumbled, then charged passed their friends. In seconds, they had all disappeared around the corner up ahead.

Keith was feeling pretty smug—right up until Thace grabbed hold of his collar and spun him around. “What was that?” he hissed, glowering. Keith had a feeling it was this that had frightened the rebels—this towering Galra with singed fur and burning yellow eyes, his lips pulled back to show his sharp teeth.

Keith slapped Thace’s hand away, refusing to be intimidated. “We can’t just stay here,” he said, gesturing with the hand that held his bayard. “We were trapped in there.”

“And if we’d waited thirty seconds we could have done this without the danger of getting shot.”

“They could have had reinforcement’s waiting,” Keith argued. “I’m not going to wait around while the enemy gathers its strength.”

Thace closed his eyes, visibly struggling for calm. “And if they did have reinforcements, you would have just run right into--” He paused, breathing deeply, and ran a hand down his face. “Never mind. Let’s go.” He glanced toward Matt, who was shifting from foot to foot near the far wall. “And try not to draw any more attention than you have to. We are still terribly outnumbered.”

“Yeah, but we’ve got a big, scary Galra on our team,” Matt said with a shrug. “Just yell at them or something, and they’ll tuck tail and run.”

Keith snorted in amusement while Thace merely sighed and stalked on ahead, grumbling under his breath about reckless children. "And Kolivan wanted me to train the new recruits."

They ran, Matt in the lead. He didn’t know where he was going, exactly, but he had a better idea than the other two. He at least knew (kind of) where Kletzak and the rest of the bigwigs were likely to be, and that gave them a starting point. They stayed on the lower decks, away from the living quarters, command deck, medical suite, and other areas of high traffic, keeping their eyes open for a computer terminal.

They found one, eventually, tucked into an alcove on the wall. Matt set his borrowed gun atop the console and got to work, biting his lip as he delved through the directories.

“It’s a public terminal,” Matt hissed after a few seconds. “And I don’t know their OS very well. I’m not sure if I’m going to be able to get into the nav systems.”

“Great,” Keith muttered.

Thace just hummed thoughtfully. “Could you trigger the emergency beacon? Fake a depressurization event or something?”

“I don’t know,” Matt said. “Give me a minute.”

The sound of footsteps made Keith whirl, heart pounding. The hulking, lizard-like commander, Kletzak, thundered into view, followed by three more rebels. All held guns, and Keith was willing to bet these weren’t the nonlethal sort.

“I’m not sure you’re going to get a minute,” Keith hissed to Matt, who swore.

“Okay,” he said. “Okay, let me just--”

An alarm rang through the corridor, echoing off the walls in a way that made Keith’s ears ache, and though he grimaced, he was grinning as he turned to Matt. “That was fast.”

Matt, though, looked confused. “That… wasn’t me.”

Allura emerged from the wormhole to empty space, but the Red Lion roared in triumph. Keith was close—close enough, anyway. She could sense him now, a little bundle of emotions in the near distance. He needed help.

“Coran,” Allura said, urging Red in the direction of Keith’s Quintessence. “Do you have a lock on my location?”

“Yes, Princess. Where did you go?”

She smiled, glancing to the side, where Kolivan stood looking perplexed. “To Keith—or near enough. Bring the castle through; we're going to want all hands on this one.”

She heard a chorus of agreement as Lance, Hunk, and Pidge headed for their lions, and saw a flash of blue light as another, larger wormhole appeared behind her. But Allura didn’t slow. She didn’t think she could have even if she wanted to. Now that Red had Keith in her sights, nothing and no one would keep her from him. Allura almost would have liked to see these rebels try to find a pilot for Keith’s lion, if they’d managed to get their hands on her. She doubted their dreams of assembling their own team would have lasted long in the face of Red's fury.

It was a matter of moments before the rebel ship came into view—a big, sleek vessel with bay doors large enough to launch a sizable support fleet. The others called out, one by one, as they came close enough to see it. Kolivan rested a hand on the back of Allura’s chair and leaned forward.

“That’s a lot of ship to search for three people,” he muttered.

The Red Lion rumbled at that, and Allura smiled. “That sounds like a challenge,” she said, and accelerated toward the rebel ship. She didn’t try to guide the lion, instead letting Red take the lead. She drifted for a moment, realigned, then opened fire.

The force behind the shot made the lion shake, Kolivan and Antok staggering. Allura knew before her vision cleared that Red's shot had pierced both shields and hull; they dove in at full speed, crashing bodily through the opening, and Allura sealed her helmet as she stood. Seeing that Kolivan and Antok had done the same, she lowered Red’s jaw and charged out, staff in hand.

Red’s entrance had depressurized this section of the ship, causing airlocks to automatically seal, but Antok simply cut his way through the locks and wedged himself into the gap, holding the door open long enough for Allura and Kolivan to squeeze through.

There were no soldiers in the hallway Allura found herself in, though she could hear shouts and laserfire from somewhere nearby. Overhead, an alarm blared—probably from Red’s dramatic entrance. Perhaps that would summon more guards to this area, perhaps not. Allura wasn’t certain it really mattered. She, Kolivan, and Antok followed the sounds of battle, weapons out, hearts pounding.

“Have you found them?” Lance asked over the comms. He sounded breathless, like he was running, though Allura couldn’t be sure how far behind her the other paladins were.

“Someone’s fighting up ahead,” Allura said shortly. “I’ll know soon.”

“Well, we’re on our way. Pidge hacked us into a hangar not far from you.”

Allura grunted an acknowledgment, but at that moment she skidded around the corner and spotted Keith ahead, dressed in three quarters of his paladin armor, swords raised and ready. A human who bore a striking resemblance to Pidge stood beside him, both of them shielding the singed and bloodied Galra behind them from an enraged reptilian man.

Even as Allura took in this tableau, the stranger raised his rifle and put his finger to the trigger.

With a roar that made Allura jump, Kolivan charged in, dropping his shoulder and slamming the lizardlike alien into the wall hard enough to leave a dent. Keith and Matt gave a start, lowering their weapons in shock, while Thace only smiled, slumping against the wall behind him.

“Impeccable timing as usual, Kolivan.”

Kolivan fell back as Allura and Antok caught up, his gaze flickered toward Thace. He took in the burns, the blood matting the fur on the side of Thace's head, the slump of his shoulders, his weary expression. “How much of this is their doing?” he demanded, jerking his chin toward the lizard man, who was still reeling from Kolivan’s tackle, and his lackeys, who had their guns trained on Antok and Kolivan even as they gaped at the sight of Allura.

“Hard to say,” Thace said lightly. “The line between explosions and interrogations is so fuzzy these days.”

Kolivan’s brow furrowed, and he look like he might take on all four of the rebels with just his sword, but Thace’s hand on his arm calmed him. Somewhat.

“What is the meaning of this?” Allura demanded. She glanced once at Keith and Matt—long enough to be sure neither of them was gravely wounded—then fixed her glare on the reptilian man, who seemed to be the one in command. “Why are you holding my friends hostage?”

“Friends?” the man hissed. “I never thought the fabled princess of the Castle of Lions would make nice with the Galra.”

Allura bristled. “These Galra have proven more noble than your people—I'm sorry. I didn't catch your name.”

“Kletzak,” Keith said. His voice carried a tired sort of satisfaction.

“Kletzak.” Allura straightened, pointing her staff at the man’s face. “You kidnap one of my paladins, you make another believe her brother is dead--” Matt made a small, sad sound at that, which only stoked Allura’s fury. “You imprison, interrogate, and insult my allies. Tell me why I should not blast this ship out of the sky.”

Behind her, Keith shifted. Allura wondered if he was unnerved by her speech or merely surprised by it. But this was her fault—at least in part. She had made Keith feel as though he had something to prove, and, true, without him being captured they would have no idea that Matt was alive, or Thace. If Thace had survived at all.

That didn’t mean she wasn’t pissed off.

She wouldn’t destroy this ship, whatever Kletzak’s answer. She couldn’t know that everyone on board felt as he did—and even if they did, could she really afford to do Zarkon’s job for him? The Galra Empire had not fallen, and there were precious few people in the universe willing to fight back.

But she would not let Kletzak's actions slide.

“The Galra are monsters,” Kletzak spat. “They cannot be trusted.”

“They have my trust,” Allura said.

Kletzak scoffed. “Then you are every bit the fool I thought you were. We wanted to forge an alliance with you, but you were the ones who proved yourselves unworthy of guarding the free universe. That is why we concealed the human from you—we hoped you would see sense, and we didn’t want him falling back into Galra hands.”

“You ‘concealed’ me because you wanted to use me as a bartering chip,” Matt argued. Thace, leaning heavily on Kolivan, reached out and grabbed Matt’s arm to keep him from rushing Kletzak. “You held me hostage to try to force them to give you the lions.”

“Which is funny,” Keith muttered, “because they never would have let someone like you pilot them.”

Kletzak’s face darkened. “Let me pilot them? You hold to that old superstition?”

“It is no superstition,” Allura said, even as new shouts sounded in her ears; the others were close. “The lions choose their paladins. We could not simply hand them over, even were we inclined to do so.”

Scoffing, Kletzak raised a hand. “We’ll see how picky these lions are once they no longer have their chosen paladins to pilot them,” he said. The four soldiers behind him raised their rifles. Allura and Antok stood shoulder to shoulder, blocking the others with their bodies, and Allura braced herself for the pain.

Instead, a ragged shout split the air, followed shortly by the sound of crackling electricity. The cord of Pidge's bayard lashed two of the guards together, spasming as the current rushed through them. When the bayard retracted, they slumped, unconscious. Lance and Hunk opened fire a second later, their lasers burning scars into the ground at the rebels’ feet.

Pidge sprinted through the confusion, striking out with her bayard as she moved. The electrified blade caught Kletzak’s two remaining lackeys, knocking them to the ground.

“Matt!” she cried as she broke through the rebels. She slithered between Allura and Antok, throwing herself at her brother. He staggered under the force of her charge, and Keith reached out to steady him, smiling faintly. Pidge dissolved into a stream of incomprehensible babble that was somewhat muffled by Matt’s shirt. She seemed to be berating him, though her affected anger was undermined somewhat by the way she clung to him, trembling. A smile softened his face, and he wrapped his arms around her, burying his face in her hair.

"I hear you ran off and became a hero without me, Pidgeon," he said, and Pidge's voice cut off with a sob.

Keith started to move away, only for Pidge’s hand to lash out and seize him by the wrist. She didn’t say anything—nothing beyond more of the same muffled not-quite-anger, quieter this time. Keith didn’t try a second time to give her space.

Allura smiled at them, then turned back to Kletzak, that smile hardening into a dagger's edge. Hunk and Lance hadn’t lowered their guns and Kletzak, wisely, had chosen to remain still.

Allura stepped forward, her staff held at her side—loose, but ready to swing. “I’m taking my friends,” she said.

“And if I stop you?” Kletzak growled.

Allura snapped her staff up, the heavy endpiece coming so close to Kletzak’s cheek he flinched away. Allura stopped the staff just short of impact, however, and glared him down. “You do not want me for an enemy, Kletzak.”

Kletzak’s eyes darted around the hallway, taking in the situation. His henchmen were down, and he was surrounded--outnumbered, even with Kolivan supporting Thace, and Pidge... Well, Pidge hadn't yet let go of Matt, though she'd momentarily turned her attention to Keith, launching herself at him and all but dangling from his neck by the arm that wasn't twisted up in Matt's shirt.

Snarling, Kletzak threw down his gun and stepped back, holding up his hands. Allura followed, keeping her staff up. “Let's go,” she said to the others. “Before this snake changes his mind.”

For a moment, no one moved. They just went on staring at Kletzak, obviously expecting some sort of trick. When it didn’t come, Lance lowered his gun, skirted around the edges of the confrontation, and gently pried Pidge off Keith, letting him stand up straight. He rubbed his neck, but quietly rested a hand on Pidge’s back.

“Okay, you little gremlin,” Lance said. “You heard Allura. Back to your lion. I--” He paused, darting a look at Keith, who was staring at the black Mark on Lance’s nose—a mirror image of Keith’s own Mark—in confusion. Suddenly, Lance turned to Allura. “Blue says she’ll take you back to the castle, if that’s okay with you.”

Allura looked at him, then over at Keith, who seemed to have suddenly realized that Lance was asking for some time alone with him. He went rigid, his eyes wide, his face a truly impressive shade of red, but when Lance flashed a smile—a little more timid than his usual smiles, but no less warm—Keith returned it immediately.

“Of course,” Allura said, fighting down her own smile. “And… Keith, I--”

Keith cut her off with a hand on her shoulder. “Thanks. For coming for me.”

Allura froze for a second, tears pricking her eyes, and rested her hand atop Keith's. Behind Keith, Lance was grinning. Even Pidge was watching, and if her smile was mostly for Matt and Keith, she at least seemed to have forgotten her anger at Allura.

Allura met Keith’s eyes. “Of course I came. You’re family." Her eyes slid toward Lance. "All of you.”

The sound of pounding footsteps sounded down the corridor, putting an end to conversation. Kletzak made as if to dive for his gun, and Antok hit him in the temple with the hilt of his sword. He went down hard, and Allura straightened. There was still a lot that needed to be said, but it could wait until they were all back safe on the castle-ship.

“Go,” she said, hefting her staff and turning in the direction Lance, Hunk, and Pidge had come from. “Be careful on your way out.”

Lance and Keith nodded, then took off running, heading back toward the Red Lion. Allura could almost hear her anticipation. She knew Red wouldn't let anyone hurt Keith and Lance on their way to her.

Comforted by the thought, Allura took off after the rest of her team.

They met little resistance on the way to the Red Lion, whose roars Keith could feel in his chest from four corridors away. A few rebels appeared, but between Keith and Lance’s armor and Red’s roars, they quickly turned and ran the other way. It seemed not everyone here wanted to pick a fight with the paladins of Voltron.

Keith’s wounds ached too much to let him trust to the easy passage, but before he knew it they were out, and Red’s roars were all around him. The force of her relief made him weak in the knees, and he fell against the back of the pilot seat, laughing weakly.

“I missed you too, Red. Jeez.”

She started moving before he could make it around the chair. As they pulled away from the Fallow she purred again, the sound resonating in his teeth, and gave him a mental nudge toward Lance, who waited uncertainly by the door. Keith’s laughter cut out abruptly, and he turned, his eyes going again to the Mark on Lance’s nose. Lance noticed, of course, and turned his head away. There was no hiding that Mark, though—except that obviously there was, because it had been weeks and Keith had never even suspected.

"That's Shiro's Mark," he said, as though there were some question. Lance hunched his shoulders but nodded. Keith frowned. "How?"

“I guess there's no point in keeping quiet about it, is there?” Lance asked, smiling weakly. “You’re not the only one I have a defective soulbond with. ...Surprise?”

The confusion, shock, and guilt that had begun to build in Keith's chest fled at Lance’s words, and Keith crossed his arms. “Defective?”

Lance flinched. “Well, I mean...” He paused, rubbing his nose. “I’ve got all of your Marks—you and Shiro, Pidge and Hunk, Allura and Coran. Hunk’s the only one who reciprocates. And you now, I guess.”

“Lance...”

“It’s fine,” Lance said, holding up his hands. “We don’t need to talk about this.”

Keith opened his mouth to argue, then hesitated. It was obvious Lance needed to talk to someone about this, but was Keith really the right person for it? He wasn’t good with people. He wasn’t good with feelings.

No. No, Blue had—Lance had helped Keith through some of the worst years of his life. Keith wasn’t going to let him down now, no matter how awkward he felt about it.

“Do you ever think Soulmarks make relationships harder?”

Lance’s head snapped up, and Keith’s arm suddenly itched with the words written there. He remembered their past conversations—the innocent smiles and inside jokes from before the Kerberos disaster; the more tentative exchanges since they'd come to the Castle of Lions. There was a certain vulnerability that hung over their recent conversations—particularly the one about Soulmarks and how no one seemed to want to put time into relationships that weren’t Marked.

He suddenly understood why Lance had seemed so hesitant to discuss it.

“We all love you, Lance,” Keith said. “You know that, right?”

A blush rose in Lance’s cheeks, and Keith replayed his words in his head, feeling his own face heat up. He coughed, staring at his shoes and wishing this could be as easy as his conversations with Blue.

What's the difference? he asked himself. They're the same person. But there was a difference. Blue had been his soulmate--always supportive, never one to pick a fight. Keith and Blue had never fought. Keith and Lance, on the other hand...

Keith crossed his arms forcing himself to go on. “Seriously. Everyone knows you’re Coran’s favorite, and Pidge talks about you the same way she talks about Matt. And Shiro--” He paused, heart constricting. Shiro. Keith had felt his absence when the others arrived. He kept expecting Shiro to show up, arm blazing, eyes dangerous as he stared down the people who had threatened his soulmates.

But Shiro was missing, and Keith didn’t have the first clue where to look for him. The day’s events suddenly caught up to him, and he slumped backward against the chair, scrubbing his hands over his face. His back still stung where his burns hadn’t quite healed, and his head throbbed just enough to be distracting.

“We’re going to get him back,” Lance said, coming forward and grabbing Keith’s arms.

Keith’s skin prickled, and he looked up, keenly aware of how close Lance was. Lance faltered, and Keith swallowed a few times before he managed to speak.

“I thought we were talking about you.”

Lance’s expression wavered like he was trying to keep up his cheerful facade, but his eyes darted down to the words on Keith’s arm—still exposed to the air. Keith couldn’t remember what had happened to his gauntlet; it was probably still down in the prison with Thace’s pen. He hoped Coran had some way to make new paladin armor.

But the vivid blue words seemed to trigger something in Lance. Maybe he was remembering all their conversations. Keith had always opened up more easily to Blue than to anyone else and, from what Keith had seen of Lance, he suspected the same was true of him. There was something about writing to a stranger who shared a piece of your soul. It broke down barriers.

It was harder in person, Keith knew, but they were still the same people they had been. And Keith remembered other conversations. Fights, bickering, yes. But other things too. Awkward apologies, easy laughter as they played video games with the others, and the day Keith had fought with Allura, when Lance had found him by the pool. They'd talked then, hadn't they?

Lance breathed in and leaned forward—not quite close enough to touch his forehead to Keith's, but close enough that the air between them felt charged.

“I’m fine,” Lance said. “Really. It’s not like they hate me. We’re friends. We are. And I get that. It’s just...”

“Hard,” Keith said, his own breath stagnating in his lungs. “It's hard to see the good because you want something else, something more, and it feels impossible.”

Lance must have heard the ache in his voice, because he looked up, and Keith had to fight not to pull back from that look. It was too much sympathy, too much understanding. Too gentle. Keith's lungs began to burn, but he couldn't remember how to make them work.

“How long have you known?” Lance asked. “About us?”

“I made the connection when you started flirting with me after the last fight with Sendak.” Keith’s lips twitched as Lance’s blush deepened. “But then you showed me the other Mark, the platonic Mark, and I figured I was wrong about us." He paused, fighting the next words, and fighting himself to force them out. "Didn’t stop me from falling for you, though.”

Lance was still staring at him, and Keith wished he knew how to make him stop. He wanted to pull away, wanted to change the subject. He wanted to press closer, to fit his lips to Lance’s. Anything to stop feeling like he’d just stripped naked and put himself on display.

“Red never felt real,” Lance whispered. “I loved him—you—I loved the idea of you, but… it always felt like something I’d made up. Too perfect to be true.”

“It’s not,” Keith said. “Nothing about me is perfect.”

For some reason, that made Lance smile. “Nothing about any of this is perfect. That’s how we know it’s real.”

The light changed, and Keith was distantly aware that they’d entered the hangar. He swayed as Red touched down. But she didn’t lower her head, and Keith made no move to leave the cockpit. He held his breath, watching Lance, waiting.

Keith had fallen for him twice, he realized. He'd fallen for the thoughtful, lonely boy behind the words on his arms, who always knew how to make him smile. Who never gave up on him, even when he'd walled himself off from the world for nearly a year.

And he'd fallen for the boy who teased him and annoyed him and goaded him into dumb competitions for no reason other than because he knew Keith would respond. The boy who called him out when he was being reckless, who stood up for him when he was feeling insecure, who hunted him down and held him and told him he belonged.

Keith stared at Lance, wondering how he could say everything that was churning inside him, wondering how to condense all that they were into words. He waited for Lance to speak, and when he didn't, Keith's patience finally ran out. Heart in his throat, he closed the last inch between them and pressed his lips to Lance’s.

Chapter 16: Stars Alight

Chapter Text

“I think I messed up.”

Pidge sat behind the controls of the Green Lion, eyes fixed on the castle-ship as it expanded to fill her vision. Matt stood behind her—weary, but alive. She kept glancing back at him to assure herself that this was more than just a dream. He was alive. They’d have to figure out a way to get that damn gensa off him soon, but that seemed like a minor concern now that the worst of it was behind them.

He frowned now, giving up on fiddling with the bandage Pidge had tied around his palm. “What do you mean?”

“It’s Lance,” Pidge said, hunching her shoulders. “I think I hurt him.”

She kept seeing the hurt in his eyes when he’d tried to reassure her that Matt still reciprocated, as if that was what she was worried about. As if she wouldn’t have given up her Soulbonds in an instant if that was what it took to get Matt and Keith back safely.

She wondered now if she’d feel differently if she’d grown up like Lance, watching Marks appear on her skin without the usual pain to accompany them. Watching as her soulmates came into her life, not knowing who she was to them. Wondering if anyone really cared.

Pidge was bad with words, and she was bad with people, but she knew that Lance was hurting, and she’d had a hand in it—whether or not she’d meant it. She had ignored him for months at the Garrison, chasing faint transmissions from outer space when Lance just wanted to get to know her. She had spent more time with Keith and Shiro and Hunk than with Lance since they’d all become paladins.

She had chosen to focus on getting Matt back, even after she saw Lance’s Marks, instead of addressing the problem staring her in the face.

She automatically tried to justify that decision to herself. Matt had been missing. Keith had been hurting. Saving them was more urgent than any other consideration, and she’d needed time to wrap her head around all those colors on Lance’s skin. (All her justifications fell flat when she thought of the ache in Lance’s eyes.)

“He’s my soulmate,” Pidge said, aiming Green toward the main hangar. Everyone else was headed that way, including Red—with both Keith and Lance inside.

“But… you only have two soulmates,” Matt said slowly.

Pidge grimaced. “I know.”

“And Keith is the other one.”

“I know.” Matt didn’t have to say anything for Pidge to feel his confusion, and she sighed. “I know. It’s messed up. Lance has my Marks—he has all our Marks. Even Keith’s, and they’re pen pals, too, apparently.” She paused, restlessness making her want to get up and pace. She forced herself to remain still and guide Green in, her fingers drumming against the controls. “I’m pretty sure Hunk’s the only one who reciprocates.”

Matt swore softly, and Pidge was glad she wasn’t the only one who felt that way. “When’d you find out?”

“About the time Keith started writing to Lance?”

“And what did you say?”

“Nothing. No one said anything.”

“Oh,” Matt said. “Well, shit.”

The Green Lion set down between Red and Yellow, facing the crumpled form of the Black Lion, who still lay outside her alcove, where they’d set her after the battle with Zarkon. The restlessness still burned in Pidge, but she remained seated, watching as Hunk, Allura, and the three Marmorites emerged from Yellow and Blue.

“We all care about him,” Pidge said, the need to be understood clawing at her throat so her words came out strained. “We do. All of us here are like family. Just because we don’t have Marks doesn’t mean anything, right? It’s like Dad—except that it’s not the same. Not really. Not to Lance. If he didn’t have our Marks it would be easier, and maybe that’s the problem. Maybe it’s just that none of us know how to react to this. I kinda want to apologize, but what would I apologize for? It’s not my fault I don’t have his Mark.”

Pidge squeezed her eyes shut, her stomach tying itself in knots. This was why she hadn’t said anything before. She felt bad. She felt guilty as hell. And she wouldn’t make this about her.

Pidge was well aware she had a different view of soulmates than most of the world. How could she not, after the things she’d been told growing up? People said her dad was incapable of love because he bore no Marks. They called her mom a whore for leaving her soulmate to marry someone else. They called Pidge broken for the simple fact that neither of her Marks were romantic.

“Fuck Soulmarks,” Pidge muttered emphatically. Behind her, Matt laughed. He, at least, understood.

“Maybe you should try that argument on Lance,” Matt said, crossing his arms on the back of Pidge’s chair.

She tipped her head back to pout up at him. “I’m pretty sure that’s the opposite of helpful.”

Amusement played across his face, and he tapped her on the nose. “Well, don’t phrase it like that, Pigeon. Just tell him that how you feel has nothing to do with how you look on the outside.”

Pidge snorted. “Thanks, Mom.”

Matt grinned. “Hey, you know she’d be pissed if one of us didn’t say it on her behalf.”

The thing was, he was probably right. Pidge’s mom had all kinds of sayings she liked to bring into discussions of soulmates. Sayings about how you shouldn’t forgive anything just because you happened to share a Mark with someone. About how writing to someone didn’t automatically mean you knew them. About how love had nothing to do with fate.

Across the hangar, the elevator door opened, letting Coran and Sam in. Coran headed for Allura and the Marmorites, waving a scanner at Thace, who had one arm draped across Kolivan’s shoulders. Anotk hovered nearby, looking more antsy than Pidge had ever seen him.

Matt, meanwhile, had gone perfectly still, and Pidge looked up to see him staring out at their dad, motionless except for the rapid blinking of his eyes.

Smiling, Pidge unbuckled herself and stood, tugging on Matt’s arm. “Well, come on then,” she said, feigning irritation. Green lowered her head, and Pidge towed Matt halfway down the ramp before he remembered himself and, with a wordless cry, sprinted the remaining distance to Sam.

“Dad!”

Sam wrapped his arms around Matt, visibly relaxing into the hug. “Oh, thank god,” he whispered into Matt’s shoulder. “Thank god.”

Pidge smiled, her heart singing in her chest. She couldn’t believe it. She’d done it. She’d found her family. After more than a year, here they were, alive, together.

Now they just had to find Shiro, dismantle the rest of the Galra Empire, and get back home. Easy, peasy.

Pidge’s eyes slid to the Red Lion as she began to lower her head. Okay, so it wasn’t all smooth sailing from here. That was okay. She’d do whatever it took to make sure Lance knew how much he meant to her. That was what she did—she fought for her family.

Keith clung to Lance’s arms, Lance’s hands warm where they touched his waist. Their first kiss was short, but when Keith pulled back Lance chased him, his fingers tightening their hold. Don’t go, he seemed to be staying, and Keith was only too happy to oblige.

Even when they did stop, breath coming hot and loud into the space between them, they didn’t release each other. Keith stared at Lance—at the freckles on his cheeks, at the Mark across his nose. At the smile that lit his eyes as he stared back at Keith with such fondness it left Keith reeling.

“So I guess you’re okay with the way this turned out,” Lance said, sounding dazed.

Keith smiled, pressing his forehead against Lance’s. “That’s putting it lightly.”

They could have stayed like that for hours, and Keith wouldn’t have minded in the slightest. Red, apparently, had other ideas. She’d stayed perfectly still thus far, content to let her passengers work out their feelings uninterrupted, but now that they had she tipped forward, lowering her head none too gently. Lance yelped, stumbling against Keith, who scrambled to catch himself on the chair behind him.

“Red!” he growled—then promptly forgot how to be angry when Lance started laughing into his neck. That laugh was entirely too bright. It just wasn’t fair.

Red purred, clearly pleased with herself. Keith sent a bolt of exasperation her way, then (reluctantly) stood up, separated himself from Lance, and headed for the exit.

Pidge was waiting at the bottom of the ramp, smiling briefly at Keith before glancing over his shoulder at Lance, who had gone rigid. Keith glanced backward, his eyes going to the bright green Mark on Lance’s lip, and gave Lance’s hand a squeeze. It might have been enough to get Lance to relax if Hunk, Coran, and Allura hadn’t joined Pidge just then. The Marmorites headed for the elevator with a small nod for Keith—a nod, he thought, of respect—and the Holts seemed to be considering doing the same.

“Lance,” Pidge began.

Lance pulled away from Keith, plastering on a smile. “So! Cryopods, or can we just head up for a victory dinner? Because I don’t know about the rest of you, but I am starved!”

Keith frowned at him. How could he do that? Wipe away all his emotion and smile so brilliantly even Keith had to remind himself it wasn’t the truth. Hunk’s steps slowed, his face pinching in sympathy, and Coran’s brows drew together. Allura and Pidge both looked like they’d been slapped.

“Lance,” Pidge said again. “Please, Lance. Can we at least talk about this?”

“Talk about what?” he asked, flipping a hand. “We’re cool, Pidge. Sheesh. You coming or not?”

Pidge responded with sharp, desperate words, but Keith didn’t hear them. Something plucked at his mind, a string vibrating in his soul with a sound just on the edge of hearing.

It was coming from the Black Lion.

Keith turned, as if in a trance, and followed the silent call. There was something familiar about that tug. Something like… Shiro? No. It was what he’d felt the day he’d piloted the Black Lion. Not quite a voice, but a connection. An understanding. Shiro needs us, Black seemed to say. I need you.

Keith stopped beside Black’s head, staring up into her eyes. They were dark and lifeless now, staring past him, but she was—if not quite awake—certainly aware of Keith’s presence. He didn’t know how he knew this, but he did know. Black was calling to him, and her call had something to do with Shiro.

“Please,” Keith whispered, scarcely aware of the voices of the other paladins back by the Red Lion. “Please, Black, if you know what happened to him--”

The lion gave no response, but Keith felt the tug again, drawing him toward the cockpit. Black’s mouth was partially open, and Keith only had to wriggle a little to get inside.

The instant his feet touched the ramp, a wave of pain washed over him. A pounding in his head, a fire in his ribs. Crushing aches, tiny pricks, the burn of overworked muscles and the sting of sweat pouring into open wounds. It all hit him in an instant, and he screamed, losing touch with the world around him for just a moment.

The last thing he remembered was his head hitting the floor.

Lance didn’t want to do this. The worry in Allura’s eyes, the guilt in Pidge’s. He couldn’t. This was the whole reason he’d kept his Marks a secret—because he didn’t want them to feel guilty. They couldn’t help what Marks they were born with, and all the guilt in the world wasn’t going to change it.

Things would have been so much better if none of them knew.

But Pidge had sunk her claws into this, and Lance knew she wasn’t going to let it go. She was going to hound him until he talked to her, which he couldn’t do because if he talked about this, he knew he was going to lose his tenuous grip on composure. The worst part? He wanted to break down. He wanted to hear that they cared. Some part of him was glad they all seemed so worried about him, because at least that was proof that his Marks weren’t there for nothing.

Even just thinking that made him feel like a manipulative asshole who didn’t deserve their pity.

He was almost glad to hear Keith’s scream. Almost, except then it registered and he felt like someone had hollowed out his chest.

He was already running toward the sound, the others close behind, before he realized where it was coming from. The Black Lion. Oh, shit. Lance pushed himself faster, guilt coagulating in his stomach as he wriggled through the narrow opening and dropped to his knees beside Keith.

“Keith!” he cried, reaching out. Shiro, he thought distantly. This has something to do with Shiro. Lance should have been here. Keith had every reason to be distraught over Shiro’s disappearance; of course he would have gone straight to Black to see what had happened. But what had happened?

Before Lance had a chance to panic, Keith stirred, groaning softly. Lance put a hand on his shoulder, hovering close as he sat up. The others pressed in around him, Pidge and Allura leading the pack, Matt shouldering past Hunk and Coran.

“What was that?” Pidge demanded. “It sounded like you were dying.”

The words brought a pallor to Keith’s cheeks, but he kept moving, shaking off Lance’s hand as he forced himself to his feet. “Shiro,” he said.

He stumbled, and Matt was there to catch him before he smashed his face against the floor. “What about Shiro?” Matt demanded. “What happened? Keith?”

Keith’s breath was coming in short gasps, and he wrapped an arm around his stomach as he pressed forward, staggering up the ramp and into the cockpit. “Shiro,” he repeated, his voice hoarse. “He’s hurting.”

In the cockpit he stumbled again, grabbing onto the pilot’s seat to steady himself. The instant he did, his Marks began to glow faintly—so faintly Lance barely noticed the light in the darkened cockpit. It was only Shiro’s Marks that glowed, the purple light tracing a line across Keith’s nose and dotting the forearm where Lance’s handwriting was still visible in blue. Lance froze, staring down at Keith’s arm, and someone behind him muttered an oath.

“What?” Keith asked, scowling. Lance hesitated for a second or two, then set his hand beside Keith’s on the chair. From the way Keith’s eyes widened, Lance figured his own Marks must have been glowing, too. “What’s going on?”

“I don’t know,” Allura said slowly. It sounded almost like a question, and she shot a meaningful look at Coran. “But this is the first sign we’ve had of Shiro since he disappeared…”

There was silence for a few moments, Black rumbling something that felt like an invitation. Lights flickered on the console, a twinkling of artificial stars, and then one panel in particular lit up and stayed that way. Keith looked up at Lance, who smiled back.

Allura stepped forward, a warning on her tongue.

Lance and Keith surged forward at the same moment, their hands stretching out toward the glowing panel. As soon as Lance’s fingertips brushed the metal, the cockpit vanished. Lance hung suspended for a moment, then dropped toward the surface of a placid sea. He braced himself to fall into the water, but his feet met something solid just an inch below the surface, and he dropped to his knees. Beside him, Keith stumbled, but stayed upright.

“Where--?” Lance began.

A flash of light, brighter than the distant stars overhead, drew his attention, and he lurched to his feet, searching for the source of the light. Shiro was there, panting, his sweaty hair plastered to his face. A dark, viscous liquid dripped from his left hand into the water below, and his right hand blazed with familiar light.

Zarkon stood over him, eyes burning like stars, lip pulled back in a snarl. Where Shiro seemed to be on the verge of collapse, bloodied and exhausted, Zarkon was untouched. His armor had only a few small scratches, and he moved like someone fresh to the fight.

They clashed, and Shiro cried out as he was thrown backward, tumbling through the water. He landed prone, pushing himself a few inches off the ground with a monumental effort.

Zarkon flickered, appearing over him, and water sprayed as Keith sprinted forward, his face pained. “SHIRO!”

Shiro froze. Zarkon drew back his hand, which glowed with a sickly crimson light. Keith was running, but he was too far away. He was never going to make it in time.

Lance saw all this in an instant, his heart in his throat. White crept in around the edges of his vision. No, he thought. No! They hadn’t come here just to watch Shiro die before their eyes. He summoned his bayard, but it was slow to form as if something in the air was holding it back.

Zarkon brought his fist down.

“No!” Lance screamed, and suddenly he stood between Shiro and Zarkon. There was no time to defend himself. No time to wrestle his bayard into submission or try to summon his shield. He got his hands halfway up into a block.

Then Zarkon’s fist connected, a glancing blow that nevertheless wrenched Lance’s shoulder and sent waves of pain coursing through him. He yelled, collapsing under the force of the blow, and heard something roaring in his ears.

“Lance, no!” Shiro cried, surging upward with renewed strength, and threw himself at Zarkon as water seeped in through the cracks of Lance’s armor.

“What happened?” Hunk demanded, staring around the suddenly-less-crowded cockpit. “Where did they go? Are they okay?”

No one answered, which wasn’t doing anything for Hunk’s nerves. He looked to the place where Lance and Keith had been an instant before, and the panel on the dashboard that was unlike anything Hunk had seen inside Yellow. It wasn’t glowing anymore, probably because it had accomplished its purpose in whisking two more paladins off in a flash of light and a faint puff of wind.

“They’re… probably with Shiro?” Matt suggested, just as baffled as the rest of them. More so, probably, since he’d never seen a Voltron Lion before today. He kept his hands pulled close to his body, as if afraid he might get catapulted into a black hole if he touched the wrong button. “Seems like it had something to do with their Soulmarks.”

He glanced down at his wrist, where Hunk could just make out thin black lines, then cautiously reached out for the chair. His Mark, unlike Keith and Lance’s, didn’t start glowing. Hunk wondered if it was because it was a different kind of Mark or because Matt wasn’t a paladin.

“Matt’s right,” Allura said. She visibly gathered herself, then squared her shoulders. “We know Shiro’s alive, wherever he is, and he has help now. That’s more than we had before.”

Pidge scrunched her nose up. “So, what? We just sit here and hope for the best?”

“We could go see if Blue and Red can help us,” Hunk suggested weakly. “If Black could take Shiro’s soulmates to wherever he is, maybe Blue and Red could take us to Lance and Keith?”

Coran frowned. “I’m not sure it works like that.”

“Worth a try though, right?” Hunk asked, glancing at Pidge, who hesitated.

“You try that,” she said, heading for the door. “I’ve got another idea.”

She didn’t stick around to explain more, just darted out and headed for the elevator. Hunk watched her, frowning, then went to Blue. Sam and Allura trailed after him, both of them silent. Blue stared down at him for a long while before lowering her head to let him in, but there was none of what they’d seen inside Black. No glowing Marks, no reaction from the controls. Hunk poked around for a while, feeling a vague pressure at the edges of his mind echoed more clearly by Yellow—curiosity.

I don’t know what I’m doing, Hunk thought in Blue's general direction. I was kinda hoping you would.

Neither lion answered him, though, and eventually he wandered back to Black. Pidge had already returned, and she had her laptop hooked up to Black’s console, lines of code scrolling down the screen.

“Are those the mind meld headsets?” Hunk asked, glancing at the devices on the floor beside her.

Pidge grunted. “I know they’re not meant to connect to the lions, but I figured...”

“This is a bad idea,” Coran said. Pidge just wrinkled her nose, typed one last command, and snatched up one of the headsets.

“Hunk, you in?”

Matt grabbed the headset before Hunk could make a move for it. “You’re saying this can help us get Shiro back, right?”

“Honestly?” Pidge asked. “I have no idea. There's really only one person--well, lion--who can tell us where the others went, and this is the only way I can think of to talk to her. If she'll talk to us at all.”

“Good enough for me.” Matt turned the headset over, glanced at Pidge and Hunk as they put theirs on, then followed suit.

Hunk looked up at the others. “Any other takers?”

Sam scratched his chin. “No offense, but I think it might be a good idea for someone to keep watch in case this goes wrong somehow.”

Coran nodded, then nudged Allura. “You're connected to the lions, too,” he said. “She might talk to you even if she won't talk to the others.”

“All right,” she said, then joined the circle on the floor. Pidge leaned toward the computer, glanced around to make sure everyone was settled, and--

A flash of darkness. The sound of splashing water. Voices.

“He’s trying to claim the Black Lion!”

Hunk snapped back to himself, head pounding, and leaned back on his hands. “Well that was… something.”

Matt and Allura frowned at him, but Pidge was already typing away, her tongue poking out between her lips. “You saw something?” Matt asked.

“I heard him,” Hunk said. “Shiro. He was saying something about someone trying to claim the Black Lion.”

“Zarkon,” Pidge said. “They’re fighting. Keith and Lance are there, too. Wherever there is. It was too dark to see much.”

Scowling, Matt glanced at Allura. “Did you see something, too?”

“No.” Allura drummed her fingers on her thighs, looking impossibly regal kneeling like that when the others were all cross-legged. She seemed thoughtful. “Hunk and Pidge have joined minds with the others many times before. I’ve only done that once, and you not at all. It's possible that's helping draw their minds to wherever Shiro and the others have gone.”

Pidge hummed, scrolling up through the text on the screen. “I’m adjusting the settings. Less chat with Black, more, homing pigeon of the mind. If I get it close enough to give me and Hunk a stable connection, you two should at least be able to see something. Ready?”

“Do it,” Hunk said. Pidge hit Enter, and the world once again turned black.

Shiro charged toward Zarkon, roaring. Everything hurt, but he would not give up. He’d been close—god, he’d been so close to his limits—but now Keith and Lance were here, and Shiro would go on fighting for their sake.

He didn’t know how they were here; he was halfway afraid to ask. The last he’d known, Keith had been caught up in an explosion—still alive, but in bad shape. Had they both died, then? Had Shiro? He recognized the place Black had brought him before, where he’d shattered Zarkon’s hold on the Black Lion, but he still didn’t know much about it. For all he knew, this was the afterlife. Maybe the paladins were fated to go on fighting Zarkon for eternity.

It certainly felt as though an eternity had already passed for him here.

“Shiro!” Keith cried, swinging his sword for Zarkon’s neck. Zarkon vanished and reappeared behind Lance, who was drooping from Zarkon’s first attack—but still upright. Still firing. Shiro charged forward, intercepting Zarkon before he could hurt Lance more than he already had. “Shiro, what’s happening?” Keith demanded.

“He’s trying to claim the Black Lion!” Shiro called. He could feel it—the force of Zarkon’s will bearing down on him. Shiro didn’t know how they’d come here, but he knew the stakes. Zarkon was clawing at Shiro’s bond with his lion, trying to unseat him. Shiro suspected the loser would never emerge from this place. It felt more immediate than the last time he’d been here, the pain sharper, the void on the horizon more present.

Keith’s eyes narrowed, and he charged after Zarkon, roaring a challenge. Shiro fell back toward Lance, trying to catch his breath. He hadn’t stopped fighting since he’d arrived here—how long ago was it now? An hour? Ten? It was impossible to tell.

Shiro looked toward Lance, checking him over for signs of injury. His gaze stuck on the Mark cutting a bold line across Lance’s face. Shiro’s Mark. He found himself wondering if it was new—hoping that it was, because he didn’t want to face the possibility that he'd somehow failed to notice something so important for so long. “Are you okay?” Shiro asked, the words sounding more tentative than he meant them to.

Lance kept his eye on Zarkon, who darted around the field, too fast for Keith to follow. “I’m fine. You, on the other hand, look like you got tossed to a pack of angry rhinos.” He paused long enough to look at Shiro—at the blood on his arm, at the way he cradled his ribs, where Zarkon had caught him with a blast of crimson energy. “We’ll handle this, Shiro. Just take it easy.”

He said it like he thought it was possible for Shiro to sit by and watch others fight his battles, and Shiro opened his mouth to dispute this assumption. But Lance was already charging in, bayard flashing with bursts of white light, hollering at Keith to kick that purple turtle’s ass. The next time Zarkon tried to teleport away, Keith copied the motion and managed to strike Zarkon in the chest before he realized what had happened.

The blow hardly left a mark.

Shiro grimaced, willing himself back into the fray. He’d figured out how to fold space around him here, though it took a considerable amount of mental effort to get it to work. Run-down as he was, it was getting hard to keep it up. Especially when the few blows he’d managed to land barely even fazed Zarkon. The man seemed untouchable here, while Shiro collected more wounds with every passing minute.

A flicker at the edge of his vision pulled him up short and he turned, only to find nothing but stars. But there it was again—definitely Pidge this time, and Hunk behind her.

Lance planted himself between Shiro and Zarkon, taking the brunt of a blow that knocked them both off their feet. Lance was up on his elbows in a flash, firing at Zarkon as Keith held his attention. Several of the shots hit their mark, but Zarkon shrugged them off as easily as a bear shaking off a BB gun.

“Stop that,” Shiro growled at Lance, struggling to his feet. Holy hell, he was so tired.

Lance’s eyes flickered to the side for a moment, then refocused on the battle. “Stop what?”

“Protecting me!”

Lance snorted. “Good one, Shiro. Yeah, I'm just gonna walk away and leave you to frickin' Zarkon.”

Shiro squeezed his eyes shut, pressing a hand to his forehead to fight off a pounding headache that even had Keith's face scrunched up in pain. Lance didn't get it. Protecting people was Shiro’s job. He was the black paladin. He was the leader. He was one of the few adults in these kids’ lives—and he’d be damned before he let any of them sacrifice themselves for his sake.

“Hey, ugly!”

The shout, which was followed by a burst of tiny lights, made Lance whip around toward Hunk—or Hunk’s image. He seemed transparent, his form wavering, but his attack found its mark, and Zarkon flickered away.

Pidge was there waiting when he materialized, her bayard cutting a neon green line through the air. Zarkon cursed, retreating far out of the paladins’ reach. His armor was faintly scorched from the surprise attacks, but he himself remained unharmed. Hunk and Pidge glanced toward Shiro, closing ranks around him together with Lance and Keith. Shiro wanted to yell at them to stay back. Zarkon only cared about Shiro. He only needed to beat Shiro—but he would kill anyone who got in his way.

“Hey!” Lance cried, beaming at Hunk. “You made it! About time, too. Did you have to bribe Black with cat treats or something?”

Pidge rolled her eyes. “We used the mind meld, actually.”

“You bribed a lion with the mind meld?”

Zarkon appeared behind them, and Shiro spun, ready to throw himself into battle—only for a burst of bluish lightning to catch Zarkon in the chest, flinging him backward. Allura appeared there for an instant, glaring down at Zarkon, before she disappeared like mist scattering in a strong wind.

“Okay, what actually is going on?” Keith asked, pain and anger making his voice sharp.

“Hell if I know,” Pidge said. “We’re using the mind meld to lock onto your mental… signatures, I guess? I don’t know, Keith. I’m improvising.”

“It’s the astral plane,” Allura said. Shiro could almost make her out—her skin a current in the mist rising from the water, her eyes stars watching him from the darkness. Her voice seemed to come from everywhere at once. “It’s always been a mental construct before, a manifestation of wills. I’m not sure how, but you three entered this place physically. The rest of us just followed.”

Keith raised an eyebrow. “So… you’re not really here?”

“Oh, she's here. She's just weak.” Zarkon stood slowly, his eyes bright as he leered at Allura's vague form. “She can still die here, though. Hello again, Princess Allura.”

“Zarkon.”

Shiro didn’t think he’d ever heard something as cold as Allura’s voice when she spoke Zarkon’s name, but Zarkon only chuckled, the sound reverberating through Shiro’s body. “What is it, princess? Still mad at me?”

“You killed my father.”

“He was holding me back.”

Allura materialized beside Zarkon, swinging a staff at his head. He vanished, and a feather touch on Shiro’s back warned him just in time to duck, spinning into a kick that knocked Zarkon off balance. Keith charged into the opening, but Zarkon had already recovered, catching Keith's attack and tossing him backwards into Pidge, who flickered for a moment, Keith passing through her before both landed with a splash. Shiro absorbed Keith’s pain, his teeth clenched.

“Holding you back?” Lance demanded. “What do you mean, holding you back? Because Alfor wouldn’t let you murder whoever you wanted?”

For some reason, the question seemed to amuse Zarkon, who glanced to the side a split second before Allura appeared, her image shifting with the mist. “What’s this? Haven’t you told them?”

“Told us what?” Hunk asked.

Allura’s face was hard as stone, and her gaze never left Zarkon’s face. “Zarkon and my father were soulmates. Pain pals, you would say.”

“And he had an unfortunate habit of throwing himself in harm’s way in the name of nobility. Rather like you fools.”

Lance went rigid, his gun flickering briefly into the shape of a wicked-looking harpoon before stabilizing. “What?” he hissed.

Zarkon smiled. “I killed Alfor because his pain was becoming an inconvenience. Or is that still not clear enough for you?”

“You bastard.” In an instant, Lance was in front of Zarkon, his gun gone, his fist already swinging for Zarkon's face. Zarkon wasn’t fast enough to teleport away, though he barely swayed as Lance’s punch landed. Lance seemed not to care. “An inconvenience? He was your soulmate!”

“Soulmates are a weakness." Zarkon smirked, vanishing as Lance summoned his rifle once more.

Allura had vanished again, but Lance was shaking with rage, his eyes burning, the Marks on his skin seeming to reflect the starlight. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. Weakness? Soulmates aren’t a weakness. They make us stronger. I never would have gotten this far without my soulmates.”

“Then you are even more pathetic than I had imagined,” Zarkon said.

Lance roared, and when he shot at Zarkon this time, a blue aura chased his laser, the sound of a lion’s roar following like thunder. Black rumbled inside Shiro’s mind in answer. She’d helped him where she could during this fight—almost every bit of real damage Shiro had dealt had been because of her—but she didn’t have the strength to stay here indefinitely. Whatever Haggar had hit them with during the battle had drained her. She was stirring now, though, ready to lend her strength to one last attack.

The bond, a voice whispered in his ear. Shiro thought he should have recognized that voice. I don't really understand it, but bonds mean something here. Soulbonds mean something here.

“You’re the pathetic one here, Zarkon!” Lance snapped, eyes blazing. "You're so selfish you can't even stand a little bit of pain. Boo hoo."

Shiro needed time to think, needed time to formulate a plan and share it with the others, but there was no time. He could see Zarkon gathering himself for an attack, saw a disturbance in the air as Allura coalesced behind Zarkon. He felt a hand on his shoulder, a stirring of breath beside his ear.

Lance is bonded to all of you.

An idea came to him in a flash, Black roaring in his head. He shifted forward, laying a hand on Lance’s shoulder. "You think you can hit him from here?" Shiro whispered.

"I don't know how much good it'll do," Lance muttered. "But I can make the shot, yeah."

In the distance, Allura became fully solid, her staff trailing stardust as she swung. Zarkon caught it in one hand, and she pivoted, sweeping her toe across the surface of the water. Lightning crackled in its wake, and Zarkon, whose form had begun to blur, suddenly solidified, grunting as Allura’s next attack came.

Shiro nodded to Lance, then turned to the others. “Guys, hurry! Give Lance your strength.”

“What?” Lance asked, frowning at Shiro. “Their—what does that even mean?”

Shiro shook his head, heart pounding. He couldn’t explain it, the instinctive knowledge pressing at him. “Black gave me strength before, through our bond. You're bonded to all of us, Lance—aren’t you?”

Lance’s eyes widened, a question on his lips.

“It doesn’t matter how I know,” Shiro said before he could ask. What he meant was, I don’t know how I know. “Just—hurry.”

Keith appeared at Shiro’s side, reaching down to squeeze Lance’s hand briefly before moving his grip to Lance’s shoulder, near where Shiro’s hand lay. Pidge and Hunk were only a second behind, Hunk splaying his hand across Lance’s back, Pidge looping her arm around his elbow--loosely, so as not to impede his aim.

There was a moment of silence, the only sound the grunts of Zarkon and Allura fighting. Then Lance’s Marks began to glow. A violet streak across his nose. A yellow nick at his jawline. A green starburst on his upper lip. Crimson light peeking through the cracks in his armor, near the place where Keith had been wounded during the Trials of Marmora. More and more of them, dancing across his skin, shining through the armor itself, brighter than the stars overhead.

Shiro looked up from the multi-hued glow and met Lance’s eyes.

“Take the shot.”

Lance stilled for a heartbeat, then turned, raising his rifle in steady hands. Allura still dueled Zarkon, dancing around him with a glittering staff, leaving lightning in her wake. Lance took aim, breathed out, and fired.

A laser bolt flashed across the empty air, burning away the mist as it passed. Its trail ghosted the colors of Voltron, the colors of Lance’s Marks, and it passed close enough to Allura’s head to paint an aurora in her hair.

Then it took Zarkon in the temple, shattering his helmet in a shower of otherworldly light. He fell, and as he hit the ground, the world around them vanished.

Shiro woke up back inside the Black Lion, sitting in his pilot’s seat, staring at a darkened cockpit. It was remarkably similar to waking up after Black showed him her memories, except that his body felt drained, battered almost to the point of breaking, and none of his hurts had disappeared. His armor was still cracked and dented, a stream of blood marring his left arm.

But he was back, and from the shouts of alarm and excitement behind him, he wasn’t alone. Keith and Lance lay tangled together on the floor, groaning, and--

Pidge suddenly launched herself onto Shiro’s lap, bony arms wrapping around his chest and squeezing, aggravating the gash in his side. He grunted, tipping his face away from the nest of tawny hair. “Pidge,” he said, somewhere between exasperation and fondness. “You know I’m glad to see you, but I’m kind of in a lot of pain here.”

“It’s good to see you, too,” Pidge said, her voice coming from somewhere behind him. He twisted, gaping at the sight of her crossing her arms on his chairback, a devious grin playing across her face. “So I might have forgot to mention one or two things in all the excitement.”

“Oh my god, Katie, I forgot how much of a brat you are.”

Pidge grinned as Shiro’s mind went blank. The person on his lap shifted, pulling back to give him a teary smile, and that was definitely not Pidge.

“Hey, Takashi,” Matt whispered. “Bet you’d thought you’d seen the last of me.”

Feeling numb, Shiro lifted a hand and trailed his fingertips along Matt’s cheek. I’m dead, he thought, mind foggy as Matt leaned into the touch, eyes fluttering closed. Zarkon killed me, and I’m dead, and none of this is real. Then Matt kissed Shiro’s palm, his eyes shining with tears, and Shiro’s breath caught in his throat.

“You’re alive.”

There was a scuffle at the door, and Shiro turned to see Lance hurrying out, Keith chasing after him. Shiro’s heart constricted, and he gave Matt an apologetic look.

“Matt, I--”

“Go,” Matt said, climbing off him. “We’ll have time later, and he needs you now.”

Shiro smiled, leaning forward as he stood and kissing Matt once, quickly. “Thanks.”

Then he turned, darting out into the hangar. Several pairs of footsteps followed him, but Shiro had eyes only for Lance, who was trying to pull his hand out of Keith's grasp near the elevator doors.

"Lance!" Shiro called, picking up the pace. Lance stiffened, looking at Shiro with a raw, anxious expression. Shiro dropped his voice as he drew near, holding up his hands in a disarming gesture. "We need to talk about this."

Lance tensed, Keith's expression tightened in sympathy, and then, deflating, Lance stepped away from the elevator. "All right, fine," he said, glaring at the floor. "Let's talk."

Chapter 17: Scars

Chapter Text

“Lance...” Shiro said, finding himself at a loss for words. The wounds Zarkon had given him were throbbing, and Keith’s aches were only a little less insistent. His thoughts had turned fuzzy, but he pushed the fatigue away for now. Just for a while. Just until they’d worked things out with Lance. Then he could rest. “Lance, please.”

Lance looked up, his tired face showing no trace of his usual smile. “I’m not mad at you, if that’s what you’re worried about," he said. "You can’t help what Marks you’re born with.”

The words pricked at Shiro, little barbed accusations all the more biting because he knew Lance didn’t mean them to hurt. But Shiro should have seen this. He should have known something was wrong with his team. Hadn’t there been signs—in the way Lance acted? In the way he felt when they formed Voltron? Lance couldn't be that good at hiding his pain.

“I never blamed Allura for the way she reacted to my heritage,” Keith said softly from his position at Lance's shoulders. He darted his eyes once toward Allura, who stood nearby with Coran, her face pained. “That doesn’t mean it didn’t hurt.”

Lance closed his eyes. “We’re in the middle of a war. I wasn’t going to distract you guys with my issues.”

“Distract us?” Pidge had been trailing behind Shiro, but she stepped forward now, aghast. “Lance, you literally spent two hours helping me steal all the coins from the fountain in the mall so I could buy the Gameflux. That’s a distraction. This is…” She shook her head, hands balling into fists. “This is important! You’re important. We would have dropped everything if we knew.”

“It wasn’t a big deal,” Lance insisted. He seemed almost angry now, a forced levity in his voice not quite smoothing the jagged edges of that anger, but Shiro could see the hurt underneath. His eyes were fever-bright and glistening as he stared around at them all. “I mean it. I always knew I had a bunch more soulmates out there and, okay, fine, I wasn’t exactly expecting to get shot out into space with all of you, but it’s not like I’ve never had to deal with this before.”

Pidge stared at her shoes, her face scrunched up in guilt, and Lance’s carefully neutral mask slipped. Shiro knew they'd been on a squad together at the Garrison--he wondered now how early Lance had realized she was one of his soulmates.

“Pidge...” Lance said, starting to reach toward her before stopping himself abruptly. “I didn’t mean--”

“You know we all care about you,” she said, looking up at him. “Right?”

Lance opened his mouth to answer. Then he closed it without speaking.

Sorrow speared Shiro, as sharp and hot as anything he’d ever felt from Keith, so strong he felt the need to check to be sure he hadn’t been run through. It wasn’t a weapon that had wounded him, though; it wasn’t a soulbond. It was just Lance, still floundering as Pidge began to tear up. His mouth worked soundlessly for a few moments before he managed a weak, “Of course I do.”

Shiro wanted to swear.

In that moment, Shiro saw something of himself in Lance. The fierce desire to protect, to take his friends’ pain on himself. To suffer in silence so others could go on with their happy lives, ignorant of the agony the universe could inflict. He knew exactly how hard it was to let go once you’d taken on a burden like that. How much you clung to it even as you craved a release. How you longed for someone to share the burden, how adamantly you resolved to endure alone.

Lance needed his friends now, but Shiro knew he would never ask for their help. He knew, because he’d been there himself too many times before.

Shiro hesitated for only a second, then stepped forward and pulled Lance into a hug.

Lance had always known there was something different about his soulbonds. Two of his soulmates were already covered in scars by the time Lance was born, though they never added a single Mark to their collection as Lance grew up. The family photo albums were full of pictures of a laughing toddler covered in patterns of pink and blue. His mother had once commented, an unidentifiable strain in her voice, that it looked as though Lance had been born to battle.

Other Marks appeared from time to time—red, black, green, and yellow. Everyone thought Lance was the sort of child who didn't cry when he was hurt... at least until the first big yellow Mark arrived and Lance, then six years old, howled loud enough to give the neighbors a heart attack.

He was a brother by then, but it was a few years before his siblings' Marks began to add up. Before they realized not all of Lance’s bonds went both ways.

By junior high, Lance’s classmates had begun to take notice of his Marks. Of all the different colors. Lance, who liked to make up stories about the people he imagined would one day be his second family, blossomed under the attention, for a few days. Then--

“Why’d you do it?”

Lance paused in the middle of a fanciful telling of the time Green and Yellow had nursed an injured chipmunk back to health, leaving both with tiny scars on their hands. He'd connected some of those Marks with a gel pen, tracing constellations across his skin. “Why’d I do what?” he asked.

“Draw on all those Marks.”

Lance, offended, turned his nose up. “I didn’t draw them on,” he said. “Just connected them. The Marks are for real.”

“Yeah, right. No one has that many soulmates. You just want attention.”

Lance ignored the jibe, pointedly turning his back on the boy who had spoken and continuing his story for the rest of his friends. It was harder to ignore the new, doubting looks in their eyes, or the way similar comments chased him down the halls in the days that followed. Faker, they called him. Attention-hog. Drama queen.

If it was only after those comments started to breed that Lance took to wearing jackets everywhere he went, well, that was just coincidence.

Still, he couldn’t quite bite down on his shame when, a few years later, Mateo traced one of his own Marks and asked, “How come you have my Marks but I don’t have yours?”

“It’s cause I’m older than you,” Lance said, smiling as big and bright as he could manage. “It means I’m not ever gonna let anyone hurt you. Not even me.”

Lance fought against Shiro’s hug for a moment, hating the way his throat had closed up, hating the pressure building behind his eyes. He didn’t want this. He didn’t want to hurt them.

“It’s okay, Lance,” Shiro said, his voice low and gentle. Part of Lance wanted to snap at Shiro to not be so condescending. Part of him wanted to burst into tears, the way he always did when someone took the time to look beneath the confident mask Lance worked so hard to project. He wasn’t supposed to hurt them. “You have nothing to be ashamed of.”

Flinching, Lance turned his head aside. He’d stopped fighting the hug, but he didn’t return it. He was wound too tight, and he feared the smallest concession might break him. “I’m not ashamed,” he said. It was only partially a lie. “I just… I didn’t want to hurt any of you.”

“Lance… Lance, you don’t have to worry about that.”

“I do, though!” Lance pushed against Shiro’s chest, opening up space between them and gesturing at the pained faces around him. He saw them all, the teary eyes, the pinched looks. The way Hunk looked like he wanted to hug Lance and apologize for letting things get this bad, the way Coran looked so much older and so much sadder than he ever had before. And Pidge—and Allura—they were aching, and Lance just wanted it to stop. “Look, Shiro! Look at them. You were all happier when you didn’t know—tell me I’m wrong.”

Shiro placed his hands on Lance’s shoulders—nearly as bad as the hug for squeezing Lance’s lungs. He wasn’t going to cry. He wasn’t.

But Shiro was looking at him with such raw concern that Lance felt as though he’d slipped beneath the surface of a frozen lake, every nerve alive with pain and cold. It was the way his parents looked at him, the way his cousin did. That subtle mixture of pride and sorrow that Lance could understand most of the time, except when the yawning vacuum inside him swelled too big for him to control. You care, Lance, his dad had told him again and again, over and over and over every time Lance's Marks felt more like a burden than a blessing. Maybe too much. Remember that we care, too.

They did care. His family back on Earth. His family here in the castle. He had to keep reminding himself of that fact.

“We aren’t hurting because we know about your Marks,” Shiro said, drawing Lance’s eyes back to his face. Back to gray eyes that stared at him with such intensity Lance felt a sudden urge to run away. “We aren’t hurting because we feel guilty, or offended, or attacked, or whatever it is you think is happening here.” He paused, squeezing Lance’s shoulders once, gently. “We’re hurting because you’re hurting. Because that’s what soulmates do. They hurt for each other.”

Soulmates. The word rang through Lance like the tolling of a bell, resonating with something deep in his soul. His unreciprocated bonds had been called many things over the years—first by classmates and skeptical strangers, then by Lance himself in a knee-jerk apologetic reflex. Fake. Broken. Flawed. Defective.

But whatever Lance had thought of the bonds, the people on the other end had always, always been his soulmates. In the depth of his heart, untouched by his self-doubt, he knew they'd never been anything less. He'd just never expected to hear them agree.

A sob tumbled past Lance’s defenses before he could stop it, and then another, and before he could patch together the remnants of his composure, he found himself crying into Shiro’s shoulder, fingers clinging to the fabric of his shirt. Shiro’s arms locked around him, his chin resting atop Lance’s head, and Lance struggled to quiet himself.

“I can’t imagine how hard it must have been to see our Marks every day,” Shiro whispered. “I can’t imagine how lonely that must have been. But we do care about you. We do.”

There was a huff behind him, then angry footsteps, and Pidge’s head thumped against his back, her arms wrapping around his waist. “Shiro’s right,” she said. “You’re family, Lance, whatever the universe thinks.”

Lance wanted to thank her, but he couldn't make himself speak. His tears tasted sharp on his tongue, and though they fell silently now he was afraid of how frail he felt, surrounded by the too-weighty gazes of his friends. He could feel them there, watching, drawing closer, but he kept his face buried in Shiro's shoulder so he didn't have to look at them.

“I hate this,” Pidge muttered after a long moment. “I hate that you’re hurting. But I’m not going to apologize.”

Lance knew she was aiming for stubborn, but her voice betrayed her. Choked with pain and wavering with guilt, it screamed I'm sorry in a way mere words never could have. Her arms squeezed tighter around his waist, and Lance reached down to lay his hand over hers. “Good,” he said, his voice embarrassingly shaky. “You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Her head burrowed deeper into his back, which couldn’t have been comfortable with his armor. Pidge didn’t seem to care. “I mean, really,” she said, still with that edge of forced composure, the desperate pain that sounded so much like anger. “What would you actually get out of me reciprocating, huh? More pain? You find enough of that on your own.”

“I don’t--” Lance’s indignant retort cut off as Pidge pulled back and squeezed his arm just below the scorch marks left over from Zarkon’s attack. She didn’t actually touch the wound, but a wave of pain still brought Lance’s mind screeching to a halt. He had to bite his lip to keep from crying out.

Shiro let go with one arm as Lance turned toward Pidge, but the other arm remained a comforting pressure around Lance’s shoulders. Pidge stared up at him, her forehead creased with worry. “You do,” she said. “You jumped between Shiro and Zarkon without even blinking. You took the brunt of Sendak's bomb to save Coran. You used yourself as a shield to keep me safe after I found that video of Matt getting shot. And...” She hesitated, eyes drifting aside, guilt plain in her features. “And you protected Allura from me when I freaked out about Keith.”

“And you protected Keith from me,” Allura added, appearing behind Pidge and laying a hand on her shoulder. With the other, she reached out and squeezed Lance’s hand. “You protect us. It’s who you are.”

“And you get hurt doing it,” Shiro said, his voice soft. “Pidge is right. I can’t be sorry that you don’t feel my pain. That you didn’t feel what I felt the last year in the Galra prisons. Bad enough that Keith had to deal with it.”

Keith snorted. “Bad enough that you had to feel it, Shiro.”

Shiro’s lips twitched, but his eyes never left Lance. “You expect too much of yourself, Lance.”

Lance closed his eyes against another swell of tears. “It’s not like I planned any of it,” he said helplessly. “I just— I--” How could he put it into words? The way the pain clawed at his throat whenever he saw any of them suffering. The way it hurt worse than anything a soulbond could inflict when he failed them. “I couldn’t just do nothing.”

Pidge huffed, wiping her eyes. “That’s the point, Lance. You give, and you give, and you give, and somehow you always end up getting hurt to protect us. And now you want to take on my pain on top of that? Fuck that! If reciprocating means making you hurt more, then I’m glad the universe decided not to give me your Mark!”

Lance stared at her, too tired to argue that he wanted the pain. He could deal with that sort of pain if it meant it made things easier on everyone else. “You don’t care about Matt or Keith taking your pain,” he said instead, weakly.

“Matt and Keith don’t have eight goddamn soulmates.” Pidge shook her head, her shoulders slumping. “I know you don’t want us to get hurt, Lance, but we don’t like seeing you hurt, either.”

Lance smiled at that, even as he blinked his vision clear. It struck him as ridiculous, suddenly. Fighting with her over who should be allowed to hurt, like this was all some kind of competition in masochism. With a crooked smile, he reached out and ruffled Pidge’s hair. “Aw, you do care,” he teased.

Her head snapped up, and Lance realized she actually was crying, her eyes red, her nose running. “Of course I care, Lance.” Her voice was ragged in a way that wiped the fragile smile from Lance's face.

Somehow, it had never occurred to him that the pain from an unreciprocated soulbond could go both ways.

“You’re right, Pidge,” he whispered, dropping his hand from Pidge's hair to her shoulder. “I should never have doubted you. Sorry.”

She slumped against him with a sigh. “Don’t apologize. ‘s not your fault.”

“Yeah,” Lance said with a feeble laugh. “It’s just these dumb Marks. I don’t know why I let myself get so worked up over them. They’re basically pointless anyway.”

“No.”

Lance looked up, surprised, as Keith glowered at him. He hovered just outside the protective bubble that was Shiro and Pidge, shoulder-to-shoulder with Hunk, who was chewing on a thumbnail, looking distressed.

“Sorry, what?” Lance asked.

“I said no,” Keith said. “Those Marks—they aren’t meaningless. They’re real, and they’re powerful, and you shouldn’t apologize for them. Hell, Lance, you and your Marks are the whole reason we won that fight. You killed Zarkon, and that--” He faltered, gesturing vaguely. “That’s pretty damn impressive if you ask me.”

Hunk nodded emphatically while Coran, somewhere nearby, whispered, Killed Zarkon? in an awestruck voice to Allura, who promised to tell him the whole story later.

Lance sniffed once, eyes still watery, then gave a lopsided smile. “I am pretty awesome, aren’t I?”

Pidge snorted into Lance’s chest. “You say that like it's a joke."

"Pidge," Lance whined, trying to ignore the heat rising in his cheeks. The warmth in his chest was harder to dismiss. "Stop it."

Pidge looked up, smiling through her tears. "Not a chance."

They lingered there by the elevators for a long while, and Lance quickly lost track of all the hugs being passed around. Pidge remained attached to his hip for a long while as Hunk caught them both up in a hug and whispered an apology in Lance’s ear.

“I should have realized, Lance. I should have known something was up.”

Which was ridiculous, and Lance promptly told him so, but Hunk nevertheless insisted on making Lance whatever kind of dessert he wanted as soon as he came out of the cryopods. Lance figured he would let Hunk have this one, if only because he really had been craving some of Hunk's special space-chocolate cake. Besides, he had a feeling the more he fought it, the more determined Hunk would be to shower him in attention.

All the while Keith hovered at the edge of Lance’s vision, hiding a smile behind his hand. Allura went to him at one point, but she only got halfway through an apology before Keith hugged her and whispered, “I meant what I said. I never blamed you.”

Lance was pretty sure Allura teared up at that, but she just held on to the hug until Lance was swept up once more in Hunk’s embrace. By the time Lance’s feet found the ground again, Keith was alone, watching him. Their eyes locked, and Lance read a question in Keith’s expression: Are you okay? Are we? Lance smiled, wriggled away from Pidge and Shiro and Hunk, flung his arms around Keith’s neck, and sagged, smiling up at him.

"You'd better not be thinking about apologizing," Lance said, "or I might start thinking you're not happy with our relationship."

Keith turned crimson, stuttering out the beginnings of a few sentences before he just huffed, scowled, and planted a kiss on Lance’s forehead. Lance froze, blushed, and melted into Keith’s shoulder as Hunk’s coo tickled his ear.

“You…?” Shiro began, his voice straying toward the edge of neutral, and Lance felt Keith bristle.

“Shiro, don’t you dare.”

But Shiro let out a laugh of pure delight, and Lance pulled back, fascinated, as Keith’s blush deepened. “Oh my god,” Shiro said. “So Lance was the one who wrote all those pickup lines? I should have known.”

“Pickup lines?” Pidge asked, intrigued.

Keith broke away from Lance and scrambled toward Shiro, face burning as he tried to clap his hands over Shiro’s mouth. “Don’t--”

“Every day,” Shiro said, twisting to keep away from Keith’s hands. “Without fail. For ages. Got Keith every time.”

Lance stared at Shiro in disbelief as he finally gave in and let Keith silence him, eyes sparkling as he winked at Lance. Dazed, delighted, Lance sauntered toward Keith.

“They actually worked?” he asked, falling into his best coy voice. “Really, now.” He came up behind Keith, draped his arms over his shoulders, and propped his chin on Keith’s shoulder. “What do you say we go explore some... celestial bodies?”

Keith let out a strangled moan, spun, and headed for the door. “So!” he said, voice cracking in a way that was altogether too endearing. “Cryopods?”

“Aw, babe,” Lance said, striding after him. “Getting too hot for you? Cause y'know, my lion's got ice powers. We could make our own little tundra and huddle for warmth.”

"I'm leaving now." Keith’s ears were pink, and he didn’t turn or slow as he stomped toward the elevators, but that was fine by Lance. It was enough to know he could get this kind of reaction out of Keith with his lines. His oh-so-terrible lines that Keith had always complained about. Sure, Keith.

He was going to have fun with this.

Shiro and Coran followed Keith and Lance into the elevator (where Keith steadfastly ignored Lance's flirting and Shiro tried his very best not to laugh.) The elevator let them out near the med bay, and Shiro and Keith pulled ahead, Shiro still ribbing Keith about his (truly embarrassing) weakness for Lance’s pickup lines. Coran held back, though, a hand on Lance’s shoulder.

“I’m proud of you.”

Lance gave a start, squirming as Coran fixed him with a warm smile. Allura had pulled him aside down in the hangar, probably filling him in on the battle in the astral plane. “What—Zarkon? That was everyone, really. I just happened to make the shot that did it.”

Coran shook his head. “That is impressive, but… no. I’m proud of you. Of your heart.” He started walking again, keeping pace some distance between Shiro and Keith, who were now taking turns shoving each other toward the pod room. “I’m not at all surprised the Blue Lion chose you. She’s always favored people who place a high value on their team.”

“We all place a high value on this team,” Lance grumbled, his face feeling like it was on fire. His tears had dried by now, leaving stiff, salty tracks on his cheeks, and he scrubbed at them. “You know… it’s funny, but I kinda feel better about my Marks now that I’ve heard the way Zarkon talked about his. He really didn’t care at all, did he?”

“He did once,” Coran said softly. “He just cared for power more.”

“Yeah.” Lance sighed, rubbing his wounded shoulder. “My Marks might be kinda weird, but at least they’re real.”

Coran beamed at him, patting him gently on the back. “That they are, Lance,” he said. “That they are.”

Keith and Shiro had reached the pod room door by now, so Lance picked up the pace. If he was aching, he could only imagine the state Keith and Shiro were in. Keith had been blown up (a brand of suffering Lance had personal experience with) and Shiro had been fighting Zarkon for—how long? Lance thought for sure it must have been days since the battle against Zarkon’s forces, but he couldn’t remember sleeping in all that time. Could it really have only been a few hours?

Still. A six-hour marathon fight against Zarkon was still an accomplishment. Shiro deserved to rest.

Kolivan, Antok, and Thace were waiting in the pod room when Lance and Coran arrived, Thace smirking at Keith.

“You’re actually slowing down enough to recover?” he asked with exaggerated surprise. “Astounding.”

Keith scowled, jabbing the center console until four pods rose. “Very funny.”

Thace chuckled, then stood, wincing, his hand cradling his side, and crossed to where Keith stood. “I’m only teasing.” Thace placed his hand on Keith’s head, making Keith turn, his expression guarded. “You handled yourself very well today, considering the circumstances. You may be reckless, but you have the skill to back it up. I owe you my life.”

“Well--” Keith huffed, hunching his shoulders. “I wasn’t just going to leave you.”

Thace’s smile widened, and he glanced to Kolivan, who had come up behind him. Kolivan studied Keith for a long moment before he gave a curt nod. “You would have made a fine Blade, had you chosen to stay.”

Keith looked up so suddenly he dislodged Thace’s hand, his eyes wide, his cheeks mottled pick. “I… Thank you, Kolivan.” He paused, fingering the dagger at his waist. “Actually, I wanted to ask you if I could train with you. I’m a paladin, but I’m Galra, too. I don’t want to ignore that part of me anymore.”

“Of course,” Thace said, then flashed a grin and with a hand between Keith's shoulder blades propelled him into Kolivan. “Kolivan will take you on, won’t you, love?”

Kolivan growled at him as Keith regained his balance. “Me?” he asked. “Why me?”

“Because the last time I worked with him, we both got blown up and captured,” Thace said. He reached up, patting the side of Kolivan’s face. “I’m sure you’ll do better at quelling his more… destructive impulses.”

“Hey!” Keith spluttered, his face flashing with an indignant anger to rival Kolivan’s. Lance laughed as Antok stepped in, hands raised in a placating gesture.

“I’m sure we can iron out all the bumps,” he said soothingly. “After you two have healed up.” It was hard to tell through that mask of his, but Lance was pretty sure he was glaring at Thace and at Keith, neither of whom responded, though both began to strip off their armor and weapons. Lance and Shiro did the same, and Kolivan pressed his nose to Thace’s just before Thace stepped into his pod.

“It’s good to see you safe,” Kolivan said.

Thace smiled, stroking Kolivan's cheek. “It’s good to be home.”

One by one they stepped into the pods and let Coran put them under. Lance’s last thought before the world faded was, Home... Yeah, that sounds about right.

Hunk blinked as his character crumpled to the ground, the last of his health depleted by Matt’s combo. “Wow,” Hunk said, lowering his controller. “You’re really good at this.”

Matt grinned, leaning toward Pidge, who sat beside Sam working on her laptop. Matt ruffled her hair. “I had to be,” he said. “Or someone would have wiped the floor with me.”

“I wiped the floor with you anyway,” Pidge said, not looking up from her screen. Her lips quirked into a smile. “It’s good you’re finally getting more practice.”

Matt squawked, abandoning his controller to snatch Pidge’s computer away. She gasped in mock outrage (or maybe genuine outrage) and lunged after him, catching him around the middle in a tackle that made both of them grunt. Matt stuck his tongue out. “Careful, pigeon. You’re not safe from my pain anymore.”

Hunk quietly took the laptop away from Matt and set in on the floor, away from flailing limbs, as Pidge and Matt dissolved into a pillow fight that had Sam chuckling, the crow’s feet around his eyes softening. It had taken Coran only a few minutes to find the release switch inside the gensa and take it off Matt, and a little bit of Altean healing gel took care of the three small punctures where the device had sunk in its claws.

After that, they’d all retreated to the rec room to distract themselves while the others were in the pods, and Hunk was grateful to be included—really, he was. It was nice to see Pidge and Sam happy, and Matt was just as smart and snarky as his sister. He'd fit right in with the paladins.

But Hunk couldn’t help it if his thoughts kept turning back to Lance.

Someone knocked at the door, and Hunk called out for whoever it was to enter. After a short pause, Allura stepped in, clearing her throat to catch Pidge’s attention. Pidge stopped, hands yanking at Matt’s hair as he tickled the bottom of her foot. One of her shoes had ended up on top of the couch somehow, and Sam held the other, looking amused.

At the sight of Allura, though, Pidge’s smile faltered.

“It looks like it will be a few hours yet,” Allura said. “Keith and Lance should be out by morning, Shiro and Thace a few hours after that. I thought I should let you know in case you wanted to try to get some sleep.”

Hunk glanced at his watch and was surprised at how late it had gotten. They’d launched the attack on Zarkon’s fleet first thing in the morning, by the castle’s clock, and somehow close to sixteen hours had passed without Hunk even noticing. God, no wonder he was tired.

“Thanks, Allura,” he said, leaning back. “That’s probably a good idea.”

Except however tired he was, he didn’t think he’d be getting much sleep tonight. He couldn’t get Lance out of his head. The guarded look in his eye when they’d all confronted him in the hangar. The way he’d sobbed into Shiro’s chest. Hunk had never wanted to see Lance looking so uncertain of his place on this team.

Allura turned to go, but Pidge called her name.

“Wait,” Pidge said, scrambling over the back of the couch and rushing over to where Allura stood, hands folded at her waist, her face expressionless.

“Yes?”

Pidge opened her mouth, faltered, then fell to fiddling with her glasses. “I didn’t get a chance to apologize earlier. For being such a jerk to you.”

Surprise flickered across Allura’s face, and her carefully crafted composure slipped away as she waved her hands. “It’s all right, Pidge. You had every reason to be mad at me.”

“No.” Pidge looked up, her jaw set. “I had no clue—about you. About Zarkon. I wasn’t fair to you.”

Slowly the surprise and the embarrassment faded from Allura’s face, replaced with a sad smile. “I trusted Zarkon,” she said. “After he betrayed me, I had to learn to trust again. I’m still learning to trust again. But my reaction was my responsibility. I didn’t need to let it affect my relationship with Keith.”

“And it’s our responsibility to support you, Allura. To help you trust again, not to jump on you the first time you have a bad day.” Pidge sighed, hugging Allura. “We don’t jump on Shiro when his past makes him freeze up.”

Hunk could see Allura getting ready to argue more, but Matt had stiffened at the mention of Shiro, looking pained. There hadn’t been much of a chance to bring him up to speed on everything that had happened, but Shiro wore his trauma plainly. In his scars, in the lines on his face and the white in his hair, in his missing arm. Shiro didn’t talk about his past (what he could remember of it) freely, but Matt could guess as easily as any of them.

“It’s been a rough couple of weeks all around,” Hunk said diplomatically, turning back to Pidge and Allura. “And all the stuff with Zarkon didn’t help. Why don’t we just say we’re all sorry for the way things went and start over?”

Allura smiled, finally relaxing in Pidge’s grip. “Well said.” She squeezed Pidge, then stepped back. “Friends?” she asked, holding out a hand.

Pidge rolled her eyes and hooked her pinky around Allura’s. “Sisters,” she said. Then she grinned, jerking her thumb toward the gaming setup in the middle of the circle of couches. “So you wanna fight me in a video game?”

Intrigued, Allura accepted, and Pidge set about explaining the controls and the objective to Allura, who picked the game up faster than Hunk would have expected. Pidge crushed her easily, of course, but this only seemed to spur Allura on, and Hunk smiled as he watched them start a new match.

His smile faded, however, as his thoughts turned back toward Lance. “It’s not enough,” he said, and instantly felt foolish as the others turned to look at him.

“You’re talking about Lance,” Pidge said, not missing a beat. Hunk wondered whether she’d been thinking the same things as him. About how much Lance had done for them all, never expecting anything in return. About how a short conversation and some hugs—however much they'd all needed both—fell far short of expressing how much Lance was loved.

Allura sighed, pulling her feet up onto the couch. “We just have to keep at it,” she said. “Keep reminding Lance that he is important.”

Pidge pursed her lips. “You're not wrong...” she said. “But what if there was something we could do?”

Hunk and Allura both sat forward at the same time, and Hunk couldn’t help but smile, propping his chin in his hands. “You have something in mind?”

"Of course I do, Hunk," Pidge said, looking smug. "But we might need to pick a few things up from the space mall."

Chapter 18: Pride

Notes:

(See the end of the chapter for notes.)

Chapter Text

There were malls in space.

Somehow, Matt hadn’t actually expected there to be a real, literal mall. He’d assumed Pidge was being sarcastic when she said they were making a mall run, but here they were. In a mall. Surrounded by weary-looking aliens chasing down their children. Fighting the crowds as Pidge, Hunk, and Allura huddled closed and debated the best place to search.

“Shocking how mundane it is, eh, son?” Sam said—entirely too nonchalant about this whole thing. Matt glanced sideways at his father, frowning.

“You don’t seem very shocked.”

Sam shrugged. “Last time they came here your sister reappeared on a cow, dripping from the waist down and clutching a new video game system. Honestly, if you replace the cow with a dog, it’s--”

“Just like that time when she was seven?” Matt finished, hiding a smile behind his hand. “Fair enough.”

Even so, this was going to take some getting used to. Matt eyed shops as they passed, wondering whether Allura would let him borrow some of their money to buy clothes that actually fit without being alien spandex like the Altean outfits Coran had offered him. Matt still had the baggy pants and stiff jacket the rebels had given him, but he’d really rather not wear it for the rest of his life.

Suddenly Hunk eeped and ducked behind Allura, trying (and failing) to make himself disappear. Matt frowned at him, and then followed his gaze to… a food court.

Pidge slowed, arching an eyebrow. “Something wrong…?”

“Um.” Hunk paused scratching his chin. “Not wrong, per se. Sal’s working.”

Matt glanced at his dad and mouthed, Sal? Sam only shook his head.

“The chef guy who tried to kidnap you?” Pidge asked—totally off-hand, like chef kidnappers were all in a day’s work for a paladin of Voltron. Hell, maybe they were. Even the little Matt had heard so far of Pidge’s space-faring adventures was enough to turn his hair gray.

Hunk, though, just scoffed. “Sal is not a chef. He barely qualifies as a cook.”

“But he is the one who tried to kidnap you?” Pidge’s voice had gone dry, and she went up on her toes to scan the food court. “What, you don’t think he’d actually try that again, do you?”

“I do, and I don’t want to risk it.”

Pidge just grinned. “I kinda want to see him try. Allura would kick his ass into next decaphebe.”

A smile twitched at Allura’s lips, but she gave Pidge a passable attempt at a stern look. “I would not kick anyone’s ass, Pidge. At the very least, not until they proved themself unreasonable.”

“Of course not,” Sam said, reaching out to ruffle Pidge’s hair as she began to protest. “One Altean with a vendetta against mall security is enough.”

With an effort, Matt suppressed the many millions of questions he wanted to ask—not least of all what, exactly, Coran had done the last time he was here that had gotten him unanimously banned from today’s outing. Though honestly, Coran’s offering of space pirate cosplay pieces (some of which Matt was honestly considering stealing if he didn’t find real clothes at the mall) and rapid-fire list of mall tips painted a pretty clear picture. Matt doubted there was a mall anywhere in the universe where “bribe mall staff—unless it’s a teenage girl,” “always start bartering with pocket lint,” and “bring some smoke bombs in case you need a distraction” were considered sound advice.

They eventually made it past the food court, though Pidge wrung a promise out of Hunk to come back for lunch if they had money left over. The group moved on, passing the Earth Store, as Pidge called it, along with two more clothing stores that looked like they catered to disturbingly large centipedes, a juice stand, and a store that only sold crystals.

In the far back corner they found the Unilu swap-shop Coran had told them about, a crowded room that reminded Matt of a flea market. A U-shaped counter ran around the edge of the room, behind which weapons and ceramic plates and delicate-looking figurines were displayed on the walls. Beneath the glass pane of the counter top, Matt spotted jewelry, coins, trading cards, and other small odds and ends.

And then there were the racks in the middle of the room—half a dozen of them packed too close together and piled high with everything you could imagine. One held blankets, clothes, purses, handkerchief, and other textiles Matt couldn’t begin to guess the point of. Another held an odd assortment of stones—ordinary rocks, so far as Matt could tell, though some of them seemed to have been carved to look like… more… rocks. Alien minimalist sculpture at its finest, he supposed.

Pidge immediately dove into a bin of junky-looking tech, holding things up for Allura’s consideration. Hunk went to flip through the boxes of paintings beside the counter. Matt and Sam found a collection of scented oils and tried to identify the aromas.

After a short time, Allura took a device from Pidge’s hand and turned it over. It looked like a small, blocky iron, or maybe like a single defibrillator paddle—flat, shiny metal plate on one side, handle on the other, and a smartphone sticking out of the top edge.

“Is that it?” Pidge asked.

Allura hummed, pressed a few buttons, and smiled. “It’ll do,” she said neutrally, her eyes flickering sideways for a moment. The Unilu trader had been hovering nearby ever since they’d entered the shop, a predatory look in his eyes.

He smiled now, scenting a serious customer. “Ah. I see you’ve got your eyes on a real treasure there.”

“Treasure?” Allura asked, turning toward the man. She’d instructed them all to let her handle the bartering, which Matt was only too happy for. “I suppose you could call it that, in comparison to some of the junk you’ve got here.”

The Unilu’s smile took on a strained look, but he pressed on. “Lucky for both of us you aren’t looking to buy the rest of the shop.”

“I suppose so.”

The merchant held out a hand, and Allura passed over the space-defibrillator, watching with a blank expression as he turned it over. “Qinturian workmanship… looks like a 9450’s piece—now those were the days. They really knew how to make telamars back then. Not like the cheap shoddy stuff you get nowadays. Care to trade your firstborn for this masterpiece?”

Allura gave him a flat stare. “I’ll give you five hundred GAC and a promise not to alert the local trade authorities to the fact that you apparently deal in sentient beings.”

The Unilu recoiled as if he’d been slapped—and from Hunk and Pidge’s scandalized oohs, Matt gathered Allura had just violently derailed the usual flow of Unilu bartering. Flustered, the merchant waved two of his four arms frantically. “Now, now, now. No need to get extreme. If you want to deal in cash, just say so.” He paused for a fraction of a second, then slammed the device on the counter. “Ten thousand GAC.”

“Ten thousand?” Allura snorted. “This—what did you call it? This telamar has been sitting in a puddle of rust for several decaphebes, and you surely know how the rust interferes with the kentari connectors. Twelve hundred GAC.”

“Eight thousand, and I’ll throw in a tin of my favorite rust cleaner. It’ll restore those finicky kentari connectors in a snap.”

Allura crossed her arms. “You say that, but I’m the one who's going to lose a movement and at least two thousand GAC if I have to send this thing out for repairs. I’ll give you twenty five hundred.”

“You’d lose three times as long looking for another one of these babies—if you can even find one!”

“My ship has a top-of-the-line wormholer and I’ve got nothing else on my schedule for today. I’m sure I can find a better price somewhere.” Allura paused just long enough to fix the merchant with a hard look, then turned and headed for the door. Matt watched in fascination as the Unilu man began to sweat. For a moment, no one else moved.

Then Allura was gone, and Matt realized she was serious. Glancing at Pidge, who seemed just as stunned, Matt hurried out after Allura. He expected to find her waiting outside the store, but she was already halfway to the nearest escalator.

“Uh… Allura?” Hunk asked. “I thought we needed that?”

“We do,” Allura said calmly, still walking. “But not for eight thousand GAC.”

Matt leaned over to Pidge. “Is that a lot?”

“We haven’t completely figured out the exchange rate, but I think it would be something like… two hundred bucks, maybe?”

“Allura and Coran have started pawning some things from the castle’s stores,” Sam put in, “but they have to be careful about it. I think they only have about ten thousand GAC in cash right now.”

Matt whistled. “Okay, so then--”

“Wait!”

Matt turned as the Unilu man came charging out of his shop, waving the telamar. He was red-faced and frantic, and Matt spotted a smirk on Allura’s face for a fraction of a second before she turned around and fixed the man with an impatient look.

“Four thousand,” he said, panting. “With the rust cleaner. You’re not going to find a better deal this side of the dead moons of Hinterlig.”

Allura tapped her chin a few times, then nodded. “Very well. Four thousand.”

She paid the man, who tried to tease her into buying another four thousand GAC worth of junk. Allura flatly refused, even when Pidge gave her puppy eyes over an ancient pager-like device that no one—not even the merchant—seemed to recognize.

Allura remained adamant, but as she was heading out, Pidge managed to make a deal—she got the space pager in exchange for fixing up another piece of tech she’d found broken in the bin.

No sooner had they shaken on it than Pidge opened the busted thing’s case, twisted two wires together, and snapped the case back together. The screen lit up, the merchant blinked, and Pidge grabbed her prize and chased after the others, flashing Matt a smile.

“Was there a reason for that?” Matt asked. “Or did you just want to show off?”

Pidge wiggled the space pager. “You know what this is?”

“A relic from Earth, circa 1985?”

Pidge rolled her eyes. “This,” she said, spinning around in front of Matt and Sam and grinning, “is a project. I've got to have something to keep myself busy now that I don't have to save your sorry ass." She winked, shoved the pager in her pocket, and chased after Allura while Sam burst out laughing. Matt scowled at the back of his sister's head, but he couldn't stave off a smile for long.

“So where’d you learn to haggle like that?” Hunk asked Allura, who smiled, tossing her braid over her shoulder.

“That man,” she said, “has nothing on my mother.”

“Did you honestly think I’d say no?” Keith asked, brushing a few ice crystals from his hair.

Pidge chuckled. “Not really. But we want to do this right, and that means getting everyone on board before we go to Lance.”

“I think the suspense might actually be killing her,” Hunk said in a stage whisper. He flatly ignored Pidge’s pout, so she settled for sulking. Yeah, okay, so she was impatient. So what? It wasn’t like the rest of them weren’t. Antok had had to distract Coran with a Marmorite strategy game to keep him from bringing everyone out of stasis early.

As it was, Pidge didn’t think any of them had slept for more than about four hours; they’d come back from the mall late and crashed, only to be woken up by Coran’s overhead announcement that Keith and Lance would be waking up soon.

Sure enough, there was a hiss, and then Lance came stumbling out of his pod into Hunk’s waiting arms. Pidge latched onto Keith’s arm before he could move toward Lance and hissed, “Distract him.”

“What?” Keith hissed.

Pidge checked that Hunk still had Lance’s full attention. “We still need to make sure this thing actually works, and we need to fill Shiro in when he wakes up, but we don’t want Lance to think we’re avoiding him.”

“But you… are. Avoiding him.”

Pidge huffed. “We don’t want Lance to think we’re avoiding him in a bad way,” she amended. “That’s why we’re gonna give you two a couple hours of alone time.”

Keith flushed crimson and spluttered a protest, but Pidge just grinned and gave him a shove toward Lance. They’d thank her for this later. Probably.

Keith was going to murder Pidge.

It wasn’t that he was opposed to the idea of spending time with Lance, in theory. He just didn’t appreciate her framing it as a distraction, or waggling her eyebrows at him like she was expecting them to get up to something… compromising.

But Hunk had given Lance a knowing wink and told him to go spend some time with Keith, that they’d all get together for lunch with Shiro after he was out of the pod, and then Matt—Matt, of all people!--had patted Keith on the shoulder and whispered, “Two hours,” like it was some kind of survivalist challenge Keith hadn’t known he’d signed up for.

So there they were. Alone. Keith and Lance. Walking the halls of the castle-ship in perfect, utter, awkward-as-hell silence. Lance had tried to strike up a conversation a few times—asking how Keith was feeling; calling the rebels who’d “rescued” him a string of names Keith didn’t recognize, but which he assumed were insulting. But all Keith could think of was Pidge’s urge to distract Lance (without letting Lance know he was being distracted) and the two hour countdown playing in his head.

“You okay, man?” Lance asked finally, when they were in the elevator headed down to… somewhere. “You seem a little out of it.”

Well, great. Now Lance sounded hurt. Probably thinking Keith would rather be somewhere else.

Taking a deep breath, Keith tried to make himself forget about Pidge and Hunk’s grand plan. It wasn’t like anything would be different if they hadn’t asked him for this favor. He'd still have wanted to be with Lance. “Sorry,” he said. “There’s just… been a lot happening recently.” He sighed, giving Lance a weak smile. “I keep getting stuck in my head.”

Lance relaxed a little at that, leaning his shoulder against Keith’s. “Understandable. You need some space to sort things out, or would a distraction help?”

Keith felt bad taking advantage of Lance’s sympathy, but he couldn’t deny that he was running painfully short on viable distractions. Having Lance distract himself by distracting Keith might actually be his best option here.

So he shrugged, ducked his head, and said, “Distractions would be nice.”

And just like that, Lance had a mission. He leaned back against the wall of the elevator as it descended, tapping his chin. For a moment he stayed like that, just thinking, and then he straightened, a delighted (and slightly ominous) gleam in his eye.

“Keith.”

“Yes…?”

“Keith.”

“What is it, Lance?”

“Keeeeeith. Babe. Sweetheart. Honey. Lover of mine--”

Keith, who had forgotten to keep breathing after babe, reached out on blind, panicked instinct and clapped both hands over Lance’s mouth. He was aware of the furious blush prickling across his face and neck, and he was aware of Lance’s eyes on him, and he was aware that he’d somehow, in his momentary loss of control, managed to pin Lance to the elevator wall.

He was also aware that if Lance came out with one more pet name for him, he was going to burst into flame, and then Pidge would be down one distraction.

“Is—is that really necessary?” he stammered, avoiding Lance’s eyes.

Lance smiled, his lips brushing against Keith’s palms, and gently pulled Keith’s hands away from his face. “Yes,” he said, and Keith groaned. “But we can take it slower if you like, samurai.”

Keith was pretty sure samurai was the worst of them all, at least in so far as maintaining his composure was concerned, but he wasn’t going to react to this one. He wasn’t. “Did you have an idea, or were you just planning on embarrassing us both until my heart craps out?”

The elevator chimed as it reached the first floor, and Lance grinned. “Oh, I’ve got a plan.” As soon as the door opened, he tugged Keith forward, leading him at something near to a sprint down the hallway. Keith didn’t know this area of the ship well, since it was mostly storerooms and Keith never had any reason to visit them. Lance, apparently, had made a mission of exploring. He didn’t hesitate for a second as he led the way past door after identical door, finally stopping near a T-shaped intersection.

Lance tapped the door controls, and Keith strode into what looked like a kid’s arts and crafts room on steroids. Paints and markers and jars that glowed with color-changing lights lined the shelves on the right wall. To the left was paper, fabric, wood blocks, mirrors, and monochrome plastic figurines. The back wall had baskets filled with scissors, pens, rulers, and all sorts of other tools Keith didn’t recognize. And right in the center of the room was a massive table with ten chairs set around it.

Keith arched an eyebrow. “What is this, art therapy?”

“If that’s what you want to call it,” Lance said with a grin. He headed for the back wall, fiddling with the baskets. Keith watched him for a moment, then went to look at the shelves of paints. He wasn’t exactly an artist, but he’d repainted the wall of his desert shack to make way for his theorizing, and he’d found there was something strangely relaxing about it.

He reached up for one of the glowing jars, curious to see what was inside, and the sleeve of his jacket tugged back far enough to reveal a vivid blue line.

Keith frowned over his shoulder at Lance, who continued scribbling on his arm, ignoring Keith altogether. His jacket lay on the table behind him and, curious, Keith shed his own jacket and tossed it atop Lance’s. He looked back at his arm to see that Lance had drawn a pair of stick figures, one with a boxy dress and pigtails, one with something that might have been a baseball cap. Lance was almost done with a third, taller stick figure—one that was winking, little sparkles by his face.

The doodle surprised a laugh out of Keith, and Lance stopped drawing for a moment. Keith looked up to find Lance watching him, a blush darkening his cheeks. It only deepened when their eyes locked, and Lance hastily finished his drawing, then came over and held a pen out toward Keith.

“You wanna add yourself in again?”

Keith stared at the pen, stunned. For a moment he was thirteen again, letting Lance ramble about his family and adding himself into Lance's sister's doodle of their family. “You remember that?”

Lance scratched the back of his neck. “I remember the way you clammed up afterward,” he said. “I always wondered why, but now… I mean, you were living in a shack in the desert, man. You went through the whole Trials thing just for a chance to find out about your parents. You...” He closed his eyes, then took a step back, lowering the pen. “It’s none of my business. Sorry.”

“You don’t have to apologize, Lance.”

Keith hesitated, then took the pen from Lance. He uncapped it and stared at the stick figure family on his wrist. Writing was so much easier than talking, but he didn’t want to not be able to talk to Lance, so he put the nib of the pen to his skin and started carefully sketching out the lines of a stick figure as he talked.

“I never knew my mom, and my dad died when I was just a kid. I spent most of my life in foster care.” He paused, staring at two-thirds of a person—legs and a torso and a head with no face. He carefully drew two dots for eyes, but couldn’t quite convince himself to draw a cheesy-ass smile like the one on Lance’s stick figure. “None of my foster families were bad, exactly, but they... They weren’t permanent.”

“This is permanent,” Lance said, and blushed as Keith looked up at him. “If… if you want it to be, I mean. I just—I’m not going to walk out on you--on us--is what I’m saying.”

Keith’s heart was pounding behind his ribs, and he finished his stick figure with a few quick strokes. One arm, reached out to touch Lance’s. One arm, loose at his side. And a mouth, curved into a soft smile. Maybe not as big and loose as Lance’s, but a smile nonetheless. It felt right.

But Keith wasn’t done yet. He started drawing again, adding in another stick figure, taller than the rest, just beside stick figure Lance. After a moment’s deliberation, Keith drew a line across the head with two tails sticking out to the side—probably the world’s crudest imitation of Hunk, but enough to make Lance laugh a little in surprise.

By the time Keith was finishing up the Pidge stick-figure, Lance had caught onto the game. A pair of blue glasses appeared on Pidge’s face, and Keith looked up in time to catch Lance’s smile. Shiro was next, and Lance managed a halfway decent rendition of Shiro’s white bangs, all things considered. Sometime while Keith was drawing the next figure, Lance snuck in an inked mullet on Keith’s stick figure, then hurried to add Coran’s mustache. Allura came last of all, and Lance spent an inordinate amount of time on her hair, adding little curls and cloud-like swirls.

Keith waited until Lance was done, then looked up at him. “This is permanent, too,” Keith said.

“I know.” Lance capped his pen and stuck it in his pocket, then backed Keith against the paint shelves and kissed him. Keith let himself forget about Pidge and Hunk and their plan, about the clock ticking away in his head, about everything else besides him and Lance and the kiss and cold, wet something dripping down the side of his face.

Keith jerked back, rattling the bottles behind him, and reached up to the thing on his face. His fingers came away purple, and Lance burst out laughing. His fingers were stained the same incriminating shade of violet up to the first knuckle, which kind of ruined his attempts to hide a bottle of paint behind his back with the other hand.

“Whoops, sorry, Keith,” Lance said, grinning. “My bad.”

Keith smirked, reached behind him, and produced a bottle of shimmering neon green. He twisted the cap off, dipping in two fingers, and fell into an offensive sword stance. “You asked for it.”

Lance shrieked as Keith charged in.

It was hard to say which Holt was the most enthusiastic about greeting Shiro when he fell out of the pod. Partly this was because they all looked so much a like when you could hardly keep your eyes open, and Shiro was just as happy not trying to understand that cacophony just yet. Partly it was just that they were all so damn loud.

“You can have your boyfriend back in thirty seconds, Matt, calm down. God.”

“I haven’t seen him in a year!”

“I--” Pidge cut off, growled, then said, “Fine,” in a way that sounded almost comically melodramatic.

Shiro opened bleary eyes to see that it was Sam who had caught him. He was chuckling to himself as his kids wrestled over—apparently—who got to see Shiro first.

“You know,” said Shiro, straightening up so Sam didn’t have to support his entire body weight. “I’d almost forgotten what it was like to listen to bickering that isn’t Keith and Lance.”

Hunk snorted, then sidestepped the tangle of Holt siblings and gave Shiro a squeeze. “It’s good to have you back, Shiro.”

“Agreed.”

Shiro turned toward Allura’s voice, beginning to feel like he was in the middle of a game of Twister—one arm still looped around Sam, one patting Hunk’s back, his legs still remembering how to support him, his body contorted to look at the Altean coming up behind him. Coran pressed one last button on the side of Thace’s pod, releasing him into Kolivan and Antok’s waiting arms, then joined Allura in smiling at Shiro.

“It’s good to be back,” Shiro said. He breathed deeply, letting the situation wash over him. Zarkon was dead. Matt was alive. The war wasn’t over yet, but for now at least they were all together.

All except Keith and Lance. Shiro glanced around the room once more, just in case he’d somehow missed them, but no. They were conspicuously absent. Shiro opened his mouth to ask whether something had come up, but at that moment Matt shouldered his way past Sam and Hunk, flung his arms around Shiro’s neck, and kissed him.

The force behind Matt’s kiss made Shiro stumble, and he grabbed onto Matt’s waist to steady himself. Shiro had only a moment to remember that Matt’s dad and sister were both here, watching, before Matt pulled back, laughing. The sound made Shiro forget his embarrassment, and he ran his gaze over Matt’s face, absorbing his presence, his life. He heard Pidge mutter something that sounded vaguely teasing, heard Sam chide her gently, but none of it mattered half as much as the arms still looped around the back of his neck or the lopsided smile he remembered so well from their stolen moments aboard the Persephone.

“So Katie says you recruited her to a space war,” Matt said, trying and failing to sound angry. “Honestly, Takashi. I turn my back for one year--”

Shiro laughed, lowering his forehead to rest against Matt’s shoulder. “I’d apologize, but I’m pretty sure I’d be dead without her.”

“Yeah, fair enough.” Matt breathed in, the motion of his chest a whisper against Shiro’s skin. When he exhaled, he seemed to fold into the embrace. “You’re going to have to tell me everything, you know.”

“Right back at you, Mr. Schrodinger.”

"That's Schrodinger's Matt to you," Matt said with a snort. He muttered, physicists, under his breath with the kind of exasperated fondness only a soulmate could manage.

They clung to each other for a few moments longer, but Shiro could feel Pidge’s building anticipation, so eventually he stepped back, linking his fingers with Matt’s. Pidge barreled into him, giving him one quick hug before grabbing him by the elbows and fixing him with a stern look.

“Shiro,” she said. “We’ve got a plan.”

She and Hunk explained it quickly, and Shiro nodded along, unable to keep himself from grinning.

“So you’re okay with it?” Hunk asked when they’d finished.

Pidge was chewing on her lip. “We weren’t sure if you’d… with the...”

Shiro laid his hand on her head. “I want this.” And he did. Not just for Lance—though Lance certainly needed it more than any of them. But it would be good for the whole team. It would be good for Shiro.

Coran called over the PA to let Keith and Lance know they were all heading up to lunch, and it was only a few minutes after they’d all arrived—paladins, Alteans, Marmorites, and Holts—that there was a shout of laughter from the hallway. Keith cursed, Lance screamed, and footsteps pounded toward them.

Then the pair tumbled through the door of the dining hall, looking like a couple of children left unattended with the finger paints. Both had streaks of color—ink, paint, what looked like Sharpie—covering every inch of exposed skin. The red and blue of their respective Marks stood out among the rest, some of it attempting to be words, much of it just haphazard streaks and hand prints. Written on Lance’s face in a wobbly purple and echoed on Keith in royal blue were the letters I ❤ L and what might have started as an M but ended up trailing down across their lips like a halfhearted lightning bolt.

And the color wasn’t limited to skin. Lance and Keith had both lost their jackets at some point, and their shirts looked like the casualties of a paintball tournament. Their hair, too, was damp and sticky and pointed outward at odd angles. Parts of it seemed to actually be glowing. There were two very vivid yellow hand prints on Lance's hips, two more in mottled green, purple, and pink that disappeared into the hair on the back of Keith's neck.

Shiro covered his mouth with one hand, trying not to laugh (too hard) as, with a roar, Keith tackled Lance from behind. They skidded together across the floor, Lance laughing too hard to put up much of a fight as Keith smeared crimson paint on his own lips and planted a kiss in the center of Lance’s forehead. Then he calmly wiped his mouth on the back of his hand, crossed his arms on Lance’s chest, and smiled smugly down at him.

Shiro valiantly resisted the urge to tell Keith he looked like a vampire with all that red smeared around his mouth.

Hunk was grinning broadly as he sat down backwards in a chair, staring over the back at them. “So are you two planning on eating paint with your food goo, or do you wanna go get cleaned up?”

Lance and Keith simultaneously looked down at their hands, which were coated in no fewer than a dozen different colors of paint. They locked eyes, snorted once, then gave in and started laughing. Shiro tapped a button on the underside of the table and grabbed several wet wipes from the dispenser that appeared. He tossed them to Keith and Lance, who seemed almost disappointed to wipe off their hands and faces.

Neither of them made an effort to clean their arms above their wrists.

It still wasn’t enough to save Shiro from getting a multi-hued hug when Keith finally managed to find his feet, but in all honestly Shiro wasn’t going to complain about a messy shirt. He thought he’d lost Keith, as he thought he’d lost Matt, as he’d once thought he’d lost everything that mattered.

But here they were.

Hunk and Pidge pulled Lance upright, and he glanced at the empty table. “I’m pretty sure someone mentioned food, so unless we’re planning on playing make-believe, can we get a move on? I’m starved.”

“Just a tick, Lance,” Coran said, catching him by the shoulders as he headed for the kitchen. “We’ve got one quick thing to do before we eat.”

“We… do?” Lance asked.

Keith turned, smiling, as Matt and Sam headed off with the Marmorites to start getting lunch ready. Lance stared after them, making an uncertain sound.

“What—uh—what is this?”

“We had an idea,” Pidge said, scrambling around the far side of the table to to box she’d stashed on the floor. She picked it up, then hesitated.

Hunk glanced at her, then took up the explanation. “So we were thinking. Soulmarks are a lot more complicated than we thought, right? I mean, you and Keith are both kinds of soulmates. So are me and Shay—and our Marks changed. You were there when I tried writing to my pen pal. You know I never saw anything from her. We were unrequited and… now we aren’t.”

“We don’t know why some Marks change,” Allura said. “We don’t know that new ones won’t show up tomorrow, or a year from now.”

“So why wait?” asked Keith. “I don’t need the universe to tell me when something’s the real deal.”

Coran nudged Pidge, who opened the box and lifted out a small handheld device. Shiro squeezed Keith’s shoulder once, then stepped past him and laid a hand on Lance’s back. “So what do you say? Do you have room for one more Mark?”

Tattoos.

Lance had never really thought much about them, except once, when he was younger, to wonder whether they showed up on your soulmates’ skin, too. They didn’t, as he would later learn. Pain pals would feel the needles, of course, and would get a rash-like Mark that usually went away pretty quickly. But the ink that made up the tattoo couldn’t be transferred through platonic bonds, and romantic bonds only worked when you wrote on yourself.

Tattoos were a little bit mystical themselves, in that sense. They were one of the only permanent changes you could make to your body that your soulmates wouldn’t share.

And they were permanent. Just like the silly little stick figures he’d drawn on his arm to make Keith feel better. Just like the silly little stick figures that had, inexplicably, made Lance feel better, too. This was permanent. This was family.

Lance was a little too stunned by the offer to say anything at first, and he felt a little foolish when he realized he’d actually teared up over it, but Coran just patted his back and told him he could take time to think about it if he needed to.

“I don’t need time,” Lance said, wiping his eyes. “I—yes. Yes.”

The next ten minutes was spent trying to figure out all the details of the new Mark—where it should go, what it should look like. Lance kept trying to remind the others that this was for all of them, but they were pretty damn insistent that Lance should have the final say. He was relieved when Hunk finally spoke up with a suggestion: the same design for all of them so that the meaning was clear to anyone who looked, but everyone could choose for themselves where they put it.

So Lance sat down a few minutes later, pulled off his right shoe and sock, and let Coran settle the alien tattoo gun into place on top of his foot. The cool metal plate expanded, conforming to the shape of Lance’s foot, and Coran input the design—the Voltron wings; the V-shaped design that marked the breastplate of the paladin armor. A symbol of the fight that had brought them all together. A reminder of the trust and the love that let them form Voltron and track each other down across planes of existence.

A few seconds and a brief prick of pain later, Lance held up his foot and smiled at the vivid blue Mark—his own color, the color of his lion.

“Fair warning,” he said, wiggling his toes. “I’m not going to wear shoes for, like, a month.”

“You could’ve gotten it somewhere easier to see,” Pidge pointed out. “Like the back of your hand.”

Lance tapped her nose, grinning. “But I’m not an arm, am I?”

Hunk and Shiro nodded, like they’d already figured out the reasoning behind Lance’s choice, but Keith looked almost as startled as Pidge, though that only lasted a moment before he stole Lance’s chair and held his right arm out toward Coran, palm up, and indicated the inside of his wrist.

Lance sat on his lap when it was done, snagging both of Keith’s hands and comparing his Marks while the others took their turns. It was almost impossible to tell the difference between the Marks—two sets of wings, one red, one blue. The device Pidge, Hunk, and Allura had found gave more vivid color than any tattoos Lance had seen on Earth, the color of Keith’s new Mark matching the red on Lance’s skin perfectly.

Keith squirmed as Lance pulled both wrists closer to his face to scrutinize them. “Happy?” Keith asked tentatively.

Lance smiled, then kissed first one Mark, then the other. “Very,” he said.

It didn’t take much longer for the others to get their tattoos done—Hunk on his left ankle, Pidge on her left shoulder, Shiro on the back of his neck, just above his collar—each in the color of their lion. Coran and Allura both chose the color of their Altean markings for their tattoos. Allura placed hers on her hip, and Coran got his on his back below his left shoulder blade, near the one small scar he’d received in the explosion that had nearly killed Lance.

(And if Lance teared up again at that, well, the others were gracious enough not to comment on it.)

“And, hey,” Shiro said, brushing his fingers along the spot where his Mark burned faintly red around the edges. “Even by the classical definition, this does meet all the requirements of a soulbond.”

“Really?” Lance asked, skeptical.

Shiro flashed him a smile. “Well, sure. A bond only really needs two things to make it official. Coordinating Marks…”

“Check,” said Pidge, poking her shoulder. Keith hissed as she did so, and Lance laughed at the glare Keith shot her way.

Shiro chuckled, then dropped the hand messing with his own Mark. “And some kind of metaphysical connection. I don’t know about the rest of you, but as far as I'm concerned literally sharing a brain on a regular basis qualifies.”

“But that’s the lions,” said Hunk scratching his neck. “Are you sure it counts?”

“The literature doesn’t actually specify that either the Mark or the bond has to be organic in nature.” Pidge said. “It’s entirely possible to be soulbonded to a robot. In theory.”

“And you know this because…?” Keith asked.

Pidge flushed, but lifted her chin. “I’m naturally curious.”

Lance laughed, and ran his thumbs once more over Keith’s wrists. “So you’re saying this is a new kind of soulbond.”

“Something unique,” Shiro said, nodding. “But just as real.”

Lance nodded, fighting down a smile. “Uh-huh. Uh-huh. So just hear me out here. We’re not pen pals--”

“God, no,” Pidge muttered.

“Shush.” Lance fluttered a hand at her, giddiness building in his chest. “And we’re not pain pals.”

“Which I believe we’ve already established is a good thing,” Allura reminded him. "If only for the sake of your health."

Lance hummed, then let go of Keith’s wrists to fold his hands in front of his mouth. “So then, would you say that, maybe—just maybe— the seven of us are pride pals?”

Pidge groaned loud enough that the people in the kitchen must have heard her. But Hunk was laughing, Shiro had turned his face away to hide his grin, and Allura and Coran, though confused, seemed vaguely enthusiastic.

Lance twisted around to look at Keith. “Pride pals?” Lance repeated. “You know, because of the lions?”

Keith blinked. “Oh. The—right. I thought you meant because none us us is straight.”

This time even Pidge had to laugh, and Lance high-fived a perplexed but amused Keith. “Double the puns!” Lance cried. “Even better!”

It was about then that Matt poked his head in from the kitchen to ask if they were done with the “love fest.” Lance was pretty hungry, since he and Keith had wandered off to their paint fight without getting food, so he let Keith push him off his lap and feigned dejection as he tailed along behind. Then Pidge ran into him from behind, wrapping her arms around his waist, and Hunk slung an arm around his shoulders. Lance stumbled under the sudden attention, but before he could fake a complaint about all the sudden attention, Shiro had passed by and reached out to ruffle Lance’s hair. He joined Keith up ahead, and Lance caught a soft smile playing at Keith’s lips.

Lance ducked his head—and saw his new Mark smiling up at him from the top of his foot. And he decided that Shiro was wrong—this bond wasn’t as good as the kinds everyone knew about. It was better. It was better because his friends had chosen this. They'd chosen him.

And that counted for an awful lot.