Chapter Text
Lance had spent a lot of the last few days sleeping. Between the exhaustion from all of the stress, the injuries caused by the encounter with Allura, and the time spent in the healing pod after the trio of engineers fixed it, Keith thought Lance had spent more time unconscious on this planet than he’d spent conscious.
He was looking forward to being able to spend more time with an awake and uninjured Lance once he came out of the pod. But until then, Keith had other more pressing matters to attend to.
The scanner had been successfully recalibrated to differentiate between individual quintessence. They had scanned everyone in the camp save Allura just to make sure. They had even scanned Lance in the pod and the scanner had registered the quintessence of the pod mingling with Lance’s own to help speed the healing process. Pidge and Hunk had been fascinated by that whole process.
But now, the moment of truth was at hand. Keith hadn’t been sure what he was getting at when he had asked about the scanner and individual quintessence signatures, but there weren’t many explanations for the behaviour Allura had been exhibiting recently. She had been acting oddly for a while if the situation with the Omega shield was any indication. Keith suspected that Lotor had had a hand in it. The scanner was to see if his hunch was right. Shiro’s support in his suspicions was incredibly welcome.
Keith made his way out of the medical tent and toward the fire once more at the centre of their camp. The others had already gathered around the fire pit, Allura standing with Krolia beside her and the rest of the group around them in something that resembled a circle.
“Keith! Glad you could join us. I trust Lance is doing alright in the pod?” Shiro asked pointedly. The hinting tone was not lost on Keith, he knew Shiro would be questioning him on the red paladin later. He was not looking forward to it.
Keith nodded in confirmation.
“Good, now that we have everyone, less Lance, we can begin.” He turned to Allura who stood defiant and angry in the midst of the other members of the group.
“Allura, we as a team have some compelling evidence that you might not be entirely in control of your actions due to an outside influence. The device Pidge is holding is a scanner meant to pick out and differentiate between individual quintessence signatures. We believe someone has tampered with your inner quintessence and caused you to treat Lance the way you have been in order to weaken the team and therefore Voltron. We will be scanning you to either confirm or deny this hypothesis.” Pidge stepped forward, scanner at the ready.
The scanner was booted up and run up and down the length of Allura’s figure twice before Pidge paused to look at the readings more closely. A shocked look came upon her face before she looked up at Shiro and nodded.
The scanner was passed over to the once black paladin for him to see for himself. Shiro frowned at the display.
“Coran, you have a base level for everyone’s quintessence correct?” the mustachioed man nodded, “Would you say this is Allura’s normal quintessence reading or not?”
The advisor stepped forward quickly to gaze upon the display. He too frowned at the readings.
“These numbers are not in accordance with my records. The pink here is the princesses own quintessence, but the purple colour is most definitely not.”
Keith watched the confusion on Coran’s face. His suspicions had merit it seemed.
“What does that mean Coran?” Matt asked from next to Pidge.
“Well, in the life cycle of an Altean, the quintessence is expected to change to some degree. It grows and changes as the individual grows and changes, but not to this extent. The fact that there is obviously her original quintessence underneath the other one indicates to me that someone has somehow managed to overlay her essence with something much more sinister.” Coran explained.
Allura remained rather unaffected by the entire affair. Odd behaviour in and of itself.
“Have you ever encountered something like this before Coran?” Shiro asked pensively.
“Not personally but the act of manipulating someone by tampering with their core quintessence was a blight we faced in the underworld of Altean alchemy. It can be reversed and unfortunately it will take some time. Though I think it important to mention that with this technique, the victim is entirely removed from their usual morals and essentially is not themselves. The princess did not hurt Lance deliberately, she has been forced too. It seems as well that the perpetrator has taken an interest in Lance in particular.”
“So, what do we do then? Just because she isn’t doing it of her own choice, doesn’t mean she’s not still a danger.” Keith pointed out.
“Until we can confirm that Allura is in her right mind again, I think we should continue as we have been. She is clearly being forced to target Lance and with him in such a vulnerable state still, they cannot come in contact. If this gets any worse, we may have to look at restraining her, which is something I would truly rather not do.” Shiro said decisively.
“Okay, we continue how we have been. But this whole situation raises the question, who’s quintessence is messing with Allura? I don’t know of anyone who’s spent enough time close enough to her to be able to manage this outside of the team and we know that’s impossible.” Keith wondered aloud.
“Allura spent an awful lot of time alone with Lotor before you came back Keith. He’s the only one I can think of that would have had the time and the ability to do this.” Pidge added.
“But what reason would he have to manipulate the team that way? He already had us all fooled. If Keith hadn’t come back with Romelle when he did, we’d have fallen for his act without any questions. Any manipulation of Allura at that point wouldn’t have made a difference.” Hunk reminded.
The group fell quiet at that. Lotor was their only real suspect. No one else of dubious intent had had enough access to Allura to have been able to plant the corrupted quintessence in her system without raising suspicion.
Allura herself remained unfazed by the events happening around her, quiet as the grave. The group, on some level, forgot she was even sitting there.
The tense silence reigned for a few more moments before Shiro finally broke it.
“We’ll put our suspicions on the backburner for now. We need to focus on helping Allura fight the corruption and keeping Lance safe. For right now that means taking Allura back to her tent and keeping her under twenty-four-hour watch. We need someone to stay with Lance at all times as well as an extra measure. Allura isn’t herself right now and we don’t know what she’ll do or how she’ll react.” Shiro commanded.
“Interesting choice you’ve made Shiro, placing so much effort into the safety of the weakest member of the group.” Allura smirked coldly, and very not Allura-like, up at Shiro from where she was still sitting next to the fire.
Keith froze abruptly. He turned to stare at her, shock, and anger on his face. Keith held himself in check, breathing deeply through his nose to stop himself from launching at Allura. She was not herself. She would never say something so hurtful about Lance. Never.
The smirk disappeared from her face as she realised that no one was reacting the way she had planned.
“Lance is not weak.” Keith said quietly before turning and walking quickly back to the tent that Lance’s pod was in. The other boy was going to be out soon, and Keith refused to let him wake up alone.
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It took another varga in the pod for Lance to be fully healed from his injuries. Keith was right there to catch him when he came tumbling out, shivering from the cold of the cryopod.
“Hey Lance, how you feeling?” Keith whispered into the younger boy’s hair. He held Lance tightly, knowing Lance’s legs would be shaky and just to give himself piece of mind.
“’m cold. But I think okay. Everything is still a little fuzzy and numb.” Lance slurred into Keith’s shoulder.
Keith chuckled and gave Lance a light squeeze, “lets get you lying down then so that the numbness can wear off.” He led Lance over to the cot next to pod and moved a couple pillows from some of the other cots so that Lance could recline without having to lie down the whole way. Afterwards he pulled a chair over from the edge of the room so he could sit next to Lance’s cot.
Lance hummed in content once he was resting against the pile of pillows. His eyes slipped closed and he just rested there for a moment.
“That better?” Keith asked amused.
“Mm hm.” Lance hummed in reply.
They sat in silence for a few minutes before Coran walked brusquely into the tent. He didn’t even look at the two boys, just grabbed his scanner off of the cart in the corner and moved back toward the pair.
“It’s wonderful to see you out of that pod number four. Now, I just want to do some quick scans just to make extra sure that you’re in tip top shape and then you can be on your merry way.” Coran stated cheerfully. He waited for Lance to nod before getting into the scans.
They made no noise while Coran ran the scanner up and down Lance’s body a few times. Lance laid there, eyes closed and just letting the numbness fade from his limbs and the warmth from being out of the pod and knowing Keith was there next to him, seep into his body.
Moments later the scanner beeped, and Coran looked at the results and smiled. “Well Lance, it looks like you’re back to 100%. I’d take it a little easy for the rest of the quintant but otherwise you’re perfectly fine to start regular activities again.” Coran explained brightly.
“Awesome, I’m getting pretty tired of being bedridden so much lately. I’ll take it easy for today but tomorrow I want to start training again.” Lance said, eyes open and bright if a little exhausted too.
Keith couldn’t help the little smile that worked it’s way onto his face when he looked at Lance finally being able to relax.
“I think getting some training in would be a great idea.” He added quietly, still looking at Lance with a soft expression. Lance looked over at Keith and smiled back.
Neither boy noticed Coran making his way out of the med tent quickly and quietly with a small smile of his own.
“So, since you’re taking it easy, what do you want to do for the rest of the day? We won’t be packing up for another day at least so we can do just about anything.” Keith asked.
Lance didn’t say anything right away, pondering his options. What did he want to do? He had spent so much time sleeping lately, between the exhaustion from all the emotional shit and being injured, he didn’t really want to sleep. But at the same time, he was exhausted from the pod.
The healing pods were amazing. They healed you right up from any injury and left you in top shape. The only issue was that they used your quintessence and energy to do so which meant that you’d be tired as hell afterwards. Especially if your injury was severe, coming out after the explosion that left him in a coma had been awful.
Back to the matter at hand, what did he want to spend the rets of the day doing? The only thing he really knew was that he wanted to spend it with Keith and maybe Hunk.
“To be honest, I’m exhausted from the pod, so I’d be down for a nap for a bit, but after that? I don’t really have anything in particular I want to do. All I know is I don’t want to be alone.” Lance shrugged noncommittally.
“You don’t have to worry about being alone Lance. After the crap you’ve been through the past couple days, you’re going to have someone by your side constantly.” Keith assured, trying not to say that he would be by Lance’s side at all times. “As for stuff to do after your nap, I was thinking a nice walk around in the sunshine might make you feel better. A pretty easy activity and if you want, Kosmo can go too! That way you can feel extra safe and have a good time with whoever is with you.”
Lance raised a brow in confusion, “You’re not coming with me?” he asked quietly, on the verge of hurt.
“I can if you want me to! I just wanted to make sure you knew that you didn’t have to spend all your time with me if you didn’t want to!” Keith rushed to make sure that Lance didn’t think he was being a burden on Keith’s time.
He still remembers the conversation they had about Lance’s insecurities and the last thing Keith wanted was to drag those into the emotional turmoil that Lance was already going through.
“I know I’ve been all over you lately because I’ve been worried sick, and I get really protective and hover when I’m worried. I just didn’t want you to feel smothered or trapped by how I’ve been acting lately. I want you to be happy Lance, and if that means letting you out of my sight for a few hours than so be it.” Keith explained quietly.
Lance huffed fondly, “Keith, I feel safest and most comfortable when you’re around. I thought I told you that. Besides, after years of trying to get your attention with that stupid rivalry, it’s nice to have it entirely focused on me for a change. Even if the circumstances are pretty awful.”
Keith started when the implications of what Lance had just said finally made it to his brain. Had Lance--? No way. He shook his head to clear the nonsense thoughts from his mind. This was not the time to entertain such thoughts.
Lance giggled at Keith’s wide eyes.
“How about you help me get back to our tent for a nap and then we take Kosmo on a little stroll around the area before whatever major meal is next, huh?” Lance smiled.
“Y-yeah, sounds like a great idea. It’s only like 10:30 in the morning so a short nap will take us to lunch probably. Nap, lunch, walk?” Keith asked the younger boy.
“Sounds like a plan Samurai. I wanna get up now but I think my legs might be a little useless still, mind helping me up?” Lance looked at Keith a bit sheepishly. He didn’t want to make Keith help him, but he also didn’t want to end up face first on the floor of the med tent. Though if he had to pick, the med tent would be the best place to do so.
Keith snorted in amusement before moving forward to hook his arm under Lance’s so that he could be a stable point for Lance to lean on.
Lance got up off the bed with little issue, his legs were a bit unsteady still from the pod, so he leaned a bit of his weight on Keith. They moved slowly but surely toward the tent flap and out into the camp proper.
Everyone was attending to tasks within the camp and didn’t pay the two paladins any mind. Thankfully, Allura was not in sight at that moment so Keith didn’t have to worry about Lance’s reaction. He hadn’t told the red paladin the team’s decision or discovery, electing to let Lance be comfortable for a bit before unloading that bomb on him. He knew that Lance would ask eventually though, he knew about the meeting and scanner after all.
They made their way through the camp and into their shared tent. Kosmo was laying on the bed when they came through the flap of their door. The massive wolf boofed at them before vacating the bed. Keith helped Lance sit down, but he let Lance handle his own shoes and comfort. They crawled under the covers next to each other and settled down for a short nap.
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Keith found himself wandering the camp alone later that day. Hunk and Pidge had grabbed Lance for some time together and as much as Keith wanted to be around Lance as much as possible for his own piece of mind, he couldn’t keep Lance from spending time with his best friends. So, he left Kosmo with the trio to help give Lance some piece of mind and went to wander around to find something to do until Lance came to look for him.
“Keith!” he heard come from ahead of him. He wasn’t exactly looking where he was going and Lance would definitely call what he was doing sulking, but Lance didn’t need to know.
“Shiro? What’s up?” Keith asked as his older brother figure moved towards him.
“Not much, we just haven’t spent much time together since the whole thing with Lance and Allura. I was hoping we could hang out for a bit.” Shiro shrugged, hope in the smile on his face.
“Sure, Lance is with Hunk and Pidge right now anyway and I’ve always got time for you.” He smiled back.
“You sure about that? Lately all of your time has been dedicated to Lance.” Shiro smirked knowingly.
“Someone needs to look out for him Shiro and since I don’t really have a designated task anymore, I figured I’d be the best person.” Keith retorted, blushing.
“Right and your red face says nothing about that does it?” Shiro said, crossing his arms, and leaning in, embarrassing Keith like only an older brother could do.
“The colour of my face has nothing to do with it Shiro. I’ll admit, I’m worried about him. He went through a lot while we were gone and even though he’s trying to mend the relationships with everyone else, I’m the only one who didn’t hurt him that way. I’m the only one left who he doesn’t associate with the exacerbation of his insecurities and I want to give him that comfort.” Keith huffed. He knew he was getting defensive, but he wasn’t going to let Shiro just get what he was looking for, that’d be too easy and Keith’s pride as a little brother would not stand for that.
“Oo exacerbation, big word.”
“Shiro!” Keith snapped at the older man’s teasing.
“Fine, fine” he put his hands up in surrender, “You’re providing Lance with the comfort you think he needs right now so that he can heal, but have you thought about what you want after he doesn’t need that comfort anymore?” the pout on Keith’s face told him that he had.
“I know you don’t exactly want to talk about it, but we both know you’ve got a thing for Lance and even though we’re hip deep in an intergalactic war and stuck on a really stupidly long space-road trip, I think you should take any chance you’re given to make your feelings known to Lance. We both know it takes a lot for him to open up to someone about what’s really bothering him and for how touchy he is, he doesn’t really do physical affection and neither do you. You’re something special to each other outside of just being teammates.
“You’ve been a source of comfort, safety and familiarity for him in all this upheaval, but I don’t think it’s for those things that he wants you around so much. I think he genuinely wants you Keith. He wants to spend time with you and be close to you, not just for what you’ve been doing for him these last few weeks.” Shiro explained.
Keith stared at his brother, eyes wide and brain trying to catch up.
“So, what you’re telling me is that you think I have non-platonic feelings for Lance, and he has non-platonic feelings for me, and I need to do something about that? What makes you think that any of that is true? Or even that I want to do something about it if it is? Maybe I’m totally fine with how things are between me and Lance! We’re comfortable with each other and moving him too fast in any direction emotionally could hurt him more! I’m more than happy to let things go at their own pace and move in Lance’s comfort zone. Especially when it comes to physical affection. He’s really touch-deprived and that isn’t something I’m willing to push.” Keith replied, not noticing his lack of hypotheticals halfway through.
Shiro picked up on it though.
“That’s very considerate of you Keith. I’m proud of you for communicating with Lance so well about your feelings and boundaries. I didn’t know you guys were already at that stage.” Shiro fought back the smirk trying to make its way onto his face.
Keith squinted suspiciously at him.
“What are you—Shiro! Lance and I aren’t a thing! I’m worried about him and I want to protect him! That doesn’t equate to romantic feelings!” Keith yelled at his brother who was snickering and steadily backing away with his hands up in a placating manner to avoid Keith going all whoop ass on him.
“Your protective instincts are strong when it comes to that boy.” Keith whirled around to look at his mother walking up behind him.
“He is good for you Keith.” She added proudly. Keith gaped at her.
“Not you too! Shiro being on my case is bad enough and now my mom is in on it! I’m never going to hear the end of this!” Keith gestures in frustration.
“We just want you to be happy Keith, and whether you admit it or not, Lance makes you happy.” Shiro tried to assure in a calm tone.
“Of course, he makes me happy! He’s my friend and I care about him! But if you two are going to keep going on about this craziness then I need you to make sure that Lance never hears you. He’s been through enough, has second guessed everyone and everything around him for too long. I refuse to be another stressor for him, so keep it to yourselves.” Keith warned lowly. Just because it was his mother and his brother, didn’t mean he wasn’t entirely willing to throw them across camp if they made Lance uncomfortable.
“Keith, we’re not going to say anything to Lance. We are merely teasing, if you are not comfortable telling him then we have no reason to make you. We are not here to attack you or meddle in your relationship with Lance.” Krolia explained gently.
“Yeah Keith, we’re just giving you shit. It’s okay, you don’t have to worry so much, Lance isn’t going to find out.” Shiro added.
“Lance isn’t going to find out what?” Keith froze at the voice.
The three whipped around quickly to see Lance and Kosmo coming towards them. Lance looking confused but still with a smile on his face.
“Nothing important Lance, I promise. Are you all done with Hunk and Pidge?” Keith glared at Shiro and Krolia before walking over to Lance trying to distract him from the conversation.
“Okay?” Lance looked at Shiro and Krolia confused before turning back to Keith, “Yeah they wanted to start work on something they think is going to help us with powering the Lions and it was all going right over my head so I figured, instead of pulling them away from their project we could go fort hat walk you promised?” he looked at Keith hopeful.
“Of course.” Keith smiled, leading the trio towards the edge of camp, away from the lions and the tree where Lance broke his arm.
They walked in comfortable silence for a few minutes before Lance broke it.
“What were you talking to Shiro and your mom about back there?” he asked curiously.
Keith sighed, of course he wouldn’t let it go. “They were giving me shit about something I don’t want to talk about yet and went too far. I didn’t want you to know because I’m not ready to talk, not because it’s something bad or anything, I’m just not ready and I didn’t want you thinking it was me saying stuff about you behind your back. You’ve got enough on your plate without me adding something stupid like that.” he admitted, that was all he was willing to say at the moment.
“So, you’re not ready to talk about whatever it is, and they were busting your balls over it? I’m guessing it’s something that you want me to find out from you and not someone else, and that’s why you said not to tell me? And you don’t want me to worry that you’re talking about me behind my back because I overheard that?” Keith nodded in answer.
“Okay.” Lance replied simply.
“Okay?” Keith looked confused at the shorter boy.
“Yeah, okay. You aren’t hiding something from me, you’re just not ready to talk about it yet. You’re allowed to not be ready and if it was something bad, you’d tell me. I trust you Keith, I know you wouldn’t do anything to hurt me.”
Lance’s soft smile made Keith’s heart skip suddenly in his chest. Oh god this boy was really going to be the death of him.
“Besides, I know how older brothers and nosy moms get, one thing about being in space I don’t really mind is not being picked on all the time by my siblings for stupid stuff like crushes.” Lance grinned.
Keith knew Lance meant what he said but he also missed his family dearly and he’d probably have given anything to be back with them in that moment.
“Older brothers are the worst. I only have one and he’s not even related to me by blood. I can’t imagine what it would be like to grow up with that everyday.” Keith grimaced at the thought before a thought occurred to him, “I don’t think you’ve ever said how many siblings you have? You’ve mentioned you have a big family but exactly how big is big?”
Lance’s grin turned bittersweet for a moment before he chuckled, and it was bright once more.
“I am the youngest of five. I have two older brothers and two older sisters. Well two older sisters and a sister-in-law who might as well be added to that list. She and Luis got married when I was like eleven, so Lisa’s been essentially my sister since I was nine. They’ve got two kids, Nadia, and Silvio, who were five and three when we left Earth. Plus, my parents and my grandparents, makes twelve of us total, including me.” Lance grinned as he counted out on his fingers.
“Holy shit, twelve people? In one house? That’s crazy Lance!” Keith blurted.
“Not all in one house Mullet, we have a big farm and it’s got like four houses on the property. Mama and Papa have one with Marco, Veronica, Rachel and I, Luis and Lisa have one and Abuela and Abuelo have another. The other one is kind of the guest house right now for when any of the extended family comes to visit.” Lance explained, giggling at Keith’s growing expression of disbelief.
“I should have expected the farm thing with how you handle Kaltenecker.” Keith muttered, trying not to let his cheeks catch fire at the sound of Lance giggling.
“Yeah, hopefully we have room for her too. She’ll like having so much space with the other cows.” Lance smiled softly.
Keith didn’t notice his expression soften when he looked at Lance and neither did the object of said affections. He was startled out of his soft thoughts by Lance.
“Oh! I meant to ask you how the whole thing this morning went. Did the scanner find anything?” Lance paused his walking to ask.
Keith hesitated, Lance needed to know, even though Keith knew it would hurt.
“Yeah actually it did. We scanned everybody for a baseline and let me tell you, Pidge and Hunk were fascinated by the interaction between the pod and your quintessence…” Lance gave him a half-hearted glare to cut the stalling, “The scan Pidge did of Allura’s core quintessence produced very abnormal results.” Keith sighed.
“Her normal quintessence has been badly corrupted. It’s almost unrecognizable as hers at all. Coran said it’s fixable but right now, Allura essentially isn’t herself. Everything she’s done since she was corrupted hasn’t been Allura’s decision but the effects of the way that she’s been fucked with.” Keith explained, meeting Lance’s eyes.
“How long has she been like that? Who’s quintessence is it that’s messing with her?” Lance asked, worried for his friend’s well-being over the fact that whoever had done it was targeting him personally.
“We can’t tell exactly how long she’s been like this but apparently the effects get worse the longer she’s under its influence. The only thing we really know is that whoever did it had to have access to Allura for long periods of time. The only person the rest of us could think of was Lotor but there wasn’t any reason for him to use this kind of manipulation. Knowing who did it would probably help us help Allura fight this shit off too.” Keith was frustrated.
They’d long since stopped walking and Lance’s hand had somehow found Keith’s and interlaced their fingers to help ground the older boy in his frustration.
“So, it’s probably safe to say that she’s been effected since before the Omega shield thing?” Lance smiled ruefully.
“Either that or she was corrupted close to that.” he sighed, “I’m sorry Lance. I want to give you good news but all you get is that you’re still someone’s target but now we don’t even know who. And after all the shit that’s happened the last little while, this is just another shitty thing.”
Lance’s grip tightened on his hand until he looked back up to meet Lance’s eyes.
“This is actually pretty good news.” Keith looked at him incredulous, “It makes far more sense then Allura suddenly hating me and it means that I don’t have to reconcile the Allura I know and care about with the Allura who left me in a position where I almost died because she trapped me. She isn’t in control of herself right now which means that all the things she’s done to hurt me haven’t actually been her. She hasn’t done anything to me of her own choice. It’s like how things went down after we got Shiro back and found out that the other guy was a clone sent to destroy the team…from the inside out. Keith!” Keith jerked at Lance’s sudden exclamation.
“The clone! The Shiro clone!” Realization finally dawned on him at Lance's exclamation.
“The Shiro clone was trying to tear the team apart from the inside! He wasn’t doing it directly like Lotor he was trying to be sneaky which would be the perfect reason to use corrupted quintessence! So that we wouldn’t notice until it was too late!” Lance nodded furiously in agreement. “He probably started really close to the Omega shield mission and that’s why Allura never told anyone! The effects wouldn’t be strong enough to stop her from saving you, but they would have been strong enough to keep her from telling anyone.” Keith reasoned excitedly.
They had their perpetrator! Now, how did they use that information to help Allura?
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“The clone had the access to Allura and a reason to use those kinds of tactics! Plus, the clone was already targeting Lance!” Keith explained to the rest of the group after he and Lance had run full tilt to the middle of their camp to relay the breakthrough.
“But the clone was trying to be me, I don’t have the ability to control or manipulate quintessence in any way so it stands to reason that neither could he.” Shiro argued.
“Well who was controlling the clone? Who planted him in our team?” Hunk pointed out.
“Well, according to what Keith said of his fight with the clone, there was a massive facility of Shiro clones, that Keith destroyed. So, who could possibly have been able to create such a massive operation and who would center it around Shiro?” Pidge asked.
“Haggar.” Matt said casually from his seat on a rock near the fire.
Everyone turned to stare at him in confusion.
“What? She’s the head of the Druids, likes to do weird experiments and has a weird interest in both Shiro and destroying Voltron. She’s crafty enough to have figured out how to clone Shiro and to realize that Lance is an integral part of the team. Without him, you guys fall apart and with Keith gone, if Shiro was the cause of Lance’s issues, you’d never even notice because it’s Shiro.” He added with a shrug.
The team gaped at him. Keith felt nauseous with the sudden onslaught of guilt and he could tell that Shiro did too. Lance looked pale so Keith reached out and grabbed his hand tightly to offer any comfort he could.
Keith swallowed down the bile climbing his throat, “So Haggar is behind all of this?”
“I mean, that’s our best bet. She’s got the means, the motive, there’s really no other explanation.” Matt said, counting points on his fingers.
“Okay. Okay, so what do we do with this information now?” Hunk asked, shaken.
“Well, there’s nothing we can do for Allura at the moment except wait out the corruption and surround her with uncorrupted quintessence to help encourage her own to fight back. Getting rid of Haggar would be helpful because removing the source of the corruption would remove their quintessence from the victim as well.” Coran added.
“As much as we’d all love to go kick Haggar’s creepy ass, we still need a ship like the Castle of Lions in order to be able to combat her and the remains of the empire. Which means we still need to get to Earth before we can take out the nasty old hag.” Keith reminded everyone.
“Well, at least we know the person trying to kill me isn’t someone new.” Lance joked half-heartedly. Keith moved to wrap an arm around Lance’s waist to offer a solid body to ground Lance in the sea of stress he must have been feeling. Not having a new enemy was a small comfort compared to knowing Haggar was actively trying to kill Lance.
The others in the group gave the pair an odd look before returning back to the topic at hand. The discussion lasted for a few more minutes, no one really coming up with anything substantial to add to their predicament.
They would have to make it to Earth before anything could be done about the witch. It was a long road ahead.