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Chapter Text

The visor of Pidge's helmet kept fogging up in the mist, which shouldn't even have been possible. She breathed out quickly through her nose, annoyed, and scrubbed at the visor with her gloved hand for what felt like the millionth time. The last time she was here, she didn't remember it being so wet. But then, maybe it had been. She'd been more than a little preoccupied at the time. At least this time, she knew Matt was alive.

"Where are you, you idiot?" she grumbled under her breath, "You can leave a coded message on your own quiznaking grave, but you can't remember to take your transmitter with you out onto the enormous quiznaking graveyard?"

She didn't like being here, even with her brother alive somewhere. She wanted to get out. Back to her lion. Back home to the castle. Away from these reminders of death, and the persistent memory that she'd thought Matt was dead, too.

Her visor fogged up again, and as she bit back another curse, she realized that Matt had gone out without a helmet at all. Was it safe to breathe here, then? She checked the readings from her suit carefully before pulling her helmet off.

Instantly, her glasses - Matt's glasses - fogged up, but Matt was back now, so she didn't need them. She took them off, tucking them into a pocket. That was better. She could see again. She'd felt silly, replacing Matt's real lenses with a set of non-prescription fakes, but his face when he realized she was wearing them had been worth it. She just had to get back to that face. And then they could go home.

She trudged up another hill, wondering why she couldn't seem to remember how many hills she'd already climbed. Matt had to be just over this next one, right? She felt something inside pulling at her, urging her to keep moving forward and not look back. Matt must be just over the next hill. It felt like he was. He must be.

A cloud drifted over the planet's sun, dimming the light around her. It made it even harder to see through the mist, but she forced herself to keep going, focusing on her hearing to compensate for the low visibility. Matt never had been good at keeping quiet. She'd hear him before she saw him. Probably.

Pidge squinted against the mist until it got so thick she couldn't keep going without a flashlight. Her helmet had a light, if she could only wear it without the visor immediately fogging up. She turned the light on anyway and carried the helmet at her side, and that worked well enough, more or less.

The thick white fog made the identical white grave markers she was walking through seem indistinct and ghostly. She didn't pay them much mind. It wasn't like she could read them anyway. She couldn't read any of the graves here, and she hadn't been able to since she'd left the statue at the front, which surely she must have left far behind by now. Maybe too far behind. She didn't want to look back, but she wasn't sure why.

She kept walking, frowning as the mist wrapped itself around her legs and wishing she'd come in uniform instead of her shorts. She always worried that even though it was one of Matt's old uniforms, and cut for a boy instead of a girl, the sheer fact that it was a Garrison uniform made it easier to tell she was lying about her gender. People were used to girls in Garrison uniforms. Girls in baggy sweatshirts and boys' shorts, not quite so much. Especially not now that she'd managed to grow back such a good crop of leg hair, which now felt particularly weird in all the mist.

She shivered. She knew by heart which graves belonged to her dad and brother. Not that they were in them. It was just a good place to talk to them, somehow. The Garrison had said their bodies were irretrievable, before they gave them headstones in the Garrison cemetery anyway, but she knew that wasn't true. Their bodies were alive. Somewhere. In space. She just had to get to them.

Except that wasn't true. Matt was here, she reminded herself, picking up the pace and switching her flashlight from one hand to the other so she wouldn't get tired of carrying it so fast. He was here, and she had to find him. He'd left her a clue. No, not this time. This time, they'd come to the cemetery together. Right? Somehow, it was hard to remember when she couldn't see.

She kept her ears focused around her, and when a voice cried out softly - a familiar voice - she picked up the pace. A second cry came to her, faint and muffled, and she broke into a run, her heart pounding.

Graveyards were shitty places for running. Especially in the mist. But she knew Matt was ahead of her, and that was what counted. She kept pushing.

"Matt!" she called, "Matt, it's ok, I'm coming!"

She glanced at the gravestones as she passed them. They had words on them. She couldn't read them, but the letters looked familiar. Cyrillic, a couple of them. Korean. Chinese. Arabic.

The next thing she heard was less of a cry and more of a whine, like their dog, but it wasn't their dog, it was Matt, and she had to find him.

She was getting close. She must be. "Matt!"

There was no answer, but the gravestones had the right letters, now. Letters she could read. So she was in the right place. Names flashed by, half familiar, but all she could do was listen.

She tripped over an unexpected footstone, short and grey and battered, and dropped her flashlight as she caught herself on her hands. Great. Now her skirt was all muddy. As she climbed to her feet, the name on the accompanying headstone caught her eye. That was right. This was where she should turn left and go over a few rows, if she wanted to get to Nonna and Nonnino's graves. How could she have forgotten? They could hardly go to all the trouble of coming all the way to Italy and then not visit their grandparents, even though they were dead now. Maybe if they lived closer, but not now.

Her family was probably waiting for her. They were probably worried. But no - hadn't she been the one who was worried?

Her headband had slipped when she fell, and she took a moment to pull it out of her hair and put it back in right, so her hair would stay out of her face. She had to catch up to the others.

She turned left, hurrying along the way through the haze. Why was it so hazy today? She could barely see anything. And everything was too bright, with the sun lighting up the fog. Shouldn't it be dissipating it, by now?

She heard a shout in front of her and broke into another sprint, heart leaping into her throat. After a moment, she could see Matt, and then he fell down in front of the graves with another shout, and she felt ice run through her veins. Four. Why were there -

Matt shouted again and the whole world was suddenly shaking under her and then Pidge opened her eyes to find darkness.

"What?" she gasped. "Matt?"

"Oh, fuck," Matt sighed. She was on her side, facing away from him, and she wasn't sure how that had happened, but somewhere in the process of rolling over, she realized she'd been asleep. It had been a dream. That was good. Maybe.

Matt was sitting up, hunched over his knees, and Pidge wondered if his heart was racing as hard as hers. She sat up, too.

Matt took a deep, shuddering breath. "Sorry, Katie. I didn't mean to wake you up. I didn't think about that when we told Coran we could just share for tonight."

For a moment, she hoped he wouldn't notice that she was shivering, too, but then she thought about it a little bit more and decided she didn't care. She wrapped him up in her arms as well as she could at this angle, and he leaned sideways into her.

"Nightmares?" she asked.

"Yeah."

"Me too," she admitted.

Matt sighed, turning his head to kiss her forehead. She usually would have squawked and shoved him away, but it was just a relief having him here, after her dream. And after all the months that had come before it. Maybe it would always be a relief having him here, and maybe he shouldn't get his own room once Coran had time to set one up for him. Not that he'd been the dead one in her dream, but there had been that graveyard where she'd thought he was dead.

"Do you think Mom and Dad are ok?" she asked, the words falling out of her mouth before she'd thought them through.

"I don't know," Matt said. "I used to think that at least you and Mom were safe but now you're here, so maybe you weren't, always. But I'm sure she still is. And Dad's - Dad. He's tough."

She'd already admitted to him that she didn't have any solid leads on Dad, and he'd admitted the same. It was frustrating, but there was nothing to be done about it.

"Sorry," she said, "That's not really - what did you dream about?"

Matt closed his eyes. "Battle. So it's not really something to talk about either."

"Oh," she said.

"Yeah," he said, "I was kind of hoping for one of those silly kid nightmares, too. Remember that one I used to get where I was wearing my bathing suit at school and they wouldn't let me go swimming because they said there wasn't a pool?"

"There wasn't a pool."

"That's not the point!"

She wasn't sure the story made her feel any better, but the fact that Matt was trying did, and that counted for something.

"I'm not mad you woke me up," she said, "I'm pretty sure when I got to the graves you were looking at in my dream, it would have just been upsetting."

"Shit, really?"

"Yeah. That whole coded gravestone message was a real asshole move, actually. I definitely thought you were dead."

"Yeah, well, if I'd known - no, I still would have done it. Dad - wait, maybe that's it! Or maybe it's something anyway. We can put something on my grave so it alerts us if Dad finds it. If he's not still in prison."

If he's not dead. But neither of them said that. Pidge just let go of Matt for long enough to grab her tablet and let the thought stay unspoken. "I'll make a note, so we remember in the morning. It's gonna be pretty busy tomorrow. We should probably try to go back to sleep anyway."

Matt groaned. "Yeah, probably."

Instead of lying down, Pidge leaned into his side again and let him slide an arm around her back. "I know it's dumb sharing a room like we're still little kids or something," she said, "But I'm still not used to you being back, so it's nice to have proof it wasn't just a dream."

"But that grave thing was."

"This time, yeah. That's... nice to have verified, too."

Matt looked around her dim bedroom. "How do you even get out of here? I kind of have to pee, but there's no floor. That's how I know Mom is definitely not also in space. She'd have made you clean it by now."

Pidge snorted. "Oh, ha ha. There's a whole two square feet of clear space right in front of the bed, and then it's just a little bit to hop over."

Matt rolled his eyes and moved his arm, then clambered awkwardly over her and stood up into the clear spot before picking his way carefully to the door. Pidge scooted over toward the wall, so he wouldn't have to climb over her when he came back, and curled up on her side, watching for him. It was good to have Matt home.

When she closed her eyes, she could half see the black pillar with his name on it, again, but she hoped that once he was breathing beside her, that would go away. When he came back, she pretended to be asleep, right up until he took her hand and the angle he picked felt weird and she had to rearrange them.

"Oh," he whispered, "Sorry, Pidge. I just thought I might sleep better if I really knew you were here."

"S'ok," she whispered back. "I think I might, too."

It was weird staring at her brother in the dark like this, but his hand felt familiar in hers, and her heart had stopped racing from the nightmare and it must be something like 3 am, and by the time she was halfway back asleep, it wasn't weird at all.

She fell asleep with a half smile on her face and didn't dream of anything.

Chapter Text

Keith gasped for breath, digging his fingers into the metal floor beneath him. It was real, solid, its artificial gravity holding him firmly. As Kolivan stepped into the room, doors swishing shut behind him, he hung his head.

"I'm sorry."

Kolivan was silent for a moment, and Keith could feel the Galra's eyes on him as he continued to pant, body taking back all the oxygen he'd almost lost through the hole in his suit. He reached a hand up, covering the tear again, just in case it made him feel more steady, but it didn't. He'd almost died. Regris had died.

He squeezed his eyes shut, but he could still hear it when Kolivan moved. He expected the footsteps to go past him, to leave him here. Kolivan must be angry. He'd known something was wrong. He'd wanted to turn back. Staying had been his idea, not Kolivan's, and now Regris was dead and they nearly had been, too. 

Kolivan's footsteps stopped beside him and Keith almost flinched. Then the alien's hands took hold of his shoulders, shockingly gentle, and pulled him up to a sitting position. Keith couldn't avoid looking at him, anymore, so he raised his chin and made eye contact.

Kolivan was studying him, checking him for injury. His eyes lingered for a moment too long on Keith's free hand, and Keith turned to look at it, too. It was shaking. Huh.

Kolivan pulled Keith's other hand gently away from the tear in his suit, checking to see that he hadn't been cut under it. As soon as his hand wasn't wrapped around his side, Keith could see that one was shaking, too. Huh.

He was still staring at his hands when Kolivan sat back on his heels, finished with his inspection. "You're alright," he said, "You made it."

Keith kept his eyes locked on his shaking fingers. "Regris didn't."

"Regris knew the risks."

"So did you. I should have listened."

Kolivan studied him again, and Keith forced himself not to squirm. He was almost used to that. Almost. But somehow it was easier when Kolivan just told him off or yelled.

"What's done is done," he said finally. "I'll take you back to the Castle. You seem shaken."

"I'm sorry," Keith said again, but he wasn't sure what part he was sorry for.

"It's alright. Being stuck outside in space can be . . . disquieting."

Keith looked up, surprised. "Oh, no, that's not — I've been outside like that before, I-"

As soon as he tried to think of an example he realized that wasn't true. He'd never been out there without the jet packs on his Paladin armor. He'd never been out there alone. A shudder ran through him.

Kolivan almost smiled, clapping a hand on his shoulder. "Ah. There it is."

Keith's shaking got worse, which was infuriating, really. He was fine. He was alive. He had no right to be shaking like this over a little free floating, when Regris was dead.

"Stand up," Kolivan ordered, his voice gentle under its usual solid authority. Keith pulled himself awkwardly to his feet, too used to taking Kolivan's orders, by now, not to take this one. Kolivan helped him only after he was most of the way up. "Walk with me. Moving will help. Moving in gravity. It'll help it sink in that you're safe."

Kolivan was right. As Keith followed him from the craft's small cargo hold to its even smaller control room, every step made it a little easier to keep breathing. Kolivan turned to look at him once, making sure he was following, and then left him to it. That was good. Better. Keith's legs were shaking, too, and he felt like it must be showing when he walked.

They ran out of ship much too soon, and the quiver in his legs got worse when he had to stand still, hovering behind Kolivan's shoulder as the Galra set the ship's navigation system to the current coordinates for the Castle.

Once the coordinates were entered, Kolivan turned to look at him again, studying him just as thoroughly as he had when he first got on the ship, and Keith looked away, avoiding his eyes. Kolivan always saw everything, and what he was seeing now wasn't exactly what Keith would have hoped for. He was weak. Shaking. Losing it. And all over the smallest, dumbest part of this.

Kolivan moved, and this time Keith couldn't stop himself from flinching, his eyes squeezing shut instinctively.

Then Kolivan's arms were pulling at his shoulders again and Keith went with them, letting the commander pull him into a huge, encompassing hug. He sighed deeply, breath audibly shaky as he leaned into Kolivan's chest and let the contact stabilize him.

Kolivan's breathing was steady and his limbs were solid and Keith didn't put together that Kolivan had been worried about him until his claws carded gently into his hair. "You're alright," Kolivan said again, "You made it inside. You're alright."

Keith's fingers locked instinctively into the front of Kolivan's suit, and his breath came a little easier.

"Things will be better when we get into some planetary gravity," the alien assured him.

"I'm sorry," Keith whispered again.

"I could have told you 'no.' And Regris knew the risks of checking the computer logs, just like you knew the risks of staying to plant the tracker. We made our own choices."

"And I made a bad one."

"Perhaps."

Kolivan didn't let go of him, and Keith was actually glad for that. He didn't hug people like this, but then, neither did Kolivan, so he supposed that was fair. They were even. Or something. Kolivan held him until his legs stopped shaking and his breath was evened out all the way.

"You didn't kill him," Kolivan said, after a few moments of steady breathing together. "And you didn't strand us out there. The Galra did." Keith nodded against him and Kolivan finally let go of the hug.

"So tell me about the other times you were outside, free floating. What was different?"

Keith's hands started shaking again, and Kolivan took them, his hands dwarfing Keith's.

"I've been out there, before, but I've never been alone like that. Even the first time, I could feel her coming to life before she caught me, and when Allura and I were out in open space I could feel her in my head the whole time. I knew she was coming. But this time she wasn't coming."

"She?"

"The Red Lion. But she's with Lance now. And Black's not — she didn't —" he turned his face away. "We're not like that. It's just . . . it's for convenience, you know? Because Shiro was gone, but now he's back and she won't take him back and I don't know why, but it's not-" He cut himself off, looking back up at Kolivan.

"She wasn't coming," Kolivan finished for him. "But she didn't need to. You made it back on your own."

"Yeah," Keith echoed. "I guess I did."

Kolivan let go of his hands. "Don't forget that. We'll have to keep making tough choices, if we want to disrupt their supply lines. Try to make choices you can survive."

It was gruff and to-the-point and a ridiculous thing for someone to say out loud, but Keith nodded. It made sense, maybe more sense than anything had for a while. "I will," he said.

Kolivan nodded. "Good."

As they settled into silence, Keith thought "choices he could survive" might mean a lot of things, really. He turned on his heel and went for another walk, trying to shake the feeling of having been alone in space, and trying not to think too hard about what would happen if he just didn't go back.

Chapter Text

The minute he stuck his head into the lab, Pidge knew Matt was up to something. There was a familiar gleam in his eye that always meant trouble, but unlike at home, seeing it felt good instead of nerve-wracking. It was just good to have him around again, and she grinned at him instead of asking what he was up to.

"Pidge, Hunk, you've gotta come see this. I found something in the memory banks!"

That tracked. Matt had listened with interest as she explained the data they'd gotten out of Sendak's memory, but something about the questions he'd pressed her with about the memory system hadn't seemed entirely like scientific curiosity. She decided to play it cool so Hunk wouldn't pick up the fact that something was up. "I didn't realize you were working with that stuff," she said casually, rising to her feet.

"Yeah, I figured algorithms are great and all, but you can write better analysis programs if you know more about what's actually in the data. I've been going through some stuff manually."

His voice was just a little too casual. They were talking about science and data analysis all at once, and there was no way he'd be this calm about it. Hunk didn't pick up on it.

"Oh, yeah, that totally makes sense," he commented. "We did some of that, but Pidge's programs always make things a lot faster."

Matt turned, beaming genuinely at her. At least that was real. "Yeah, she's pretty cool."

Pidge grinned back, trying not to blush. She was pretty sure she was never going to get tired of Matt being proud of her.

On the bridge, the rest of the team was already clustered around one of the viewscreens, turning around as Matt bounded excitedly into the room. "I found them!" he said, "I can show you now. You are not gonna believe it!"

Matt took his place at the control panel and Pidge shoved her way in front of Allura and the boys, so she didn't have to try to look over them. It was tough being the shortest one on the team sometimes, though it made it a little bit better having Keith back. He followed behind her, slipping through the gap she'd left so that he could see, too.

"You'll have to look closely," Matt said. "But I think this is gonna blow the lid off the whole Galra empire."

He was definitely, for sure, 100% up to something.

For a minute the screen showed blurry footage of the inside of a Galra cruiser. The camera (or she guessed, the eye, if it was a memory) looked down the hall and then turned through a doorway, and on the other side — the screen cut to a different video.

The moment the synthesizers started, Pidge almost choked in surprise. Lance groaned loudly and Hunk laughed so hard Pidge had to turn to look at him so she could make sure he was ok. Keith just snorted, grinning softly behind her shoulder. She grinned, too. Of all the things Matt could have been up to, this was the best possible thing.

"Who is the man with the orange hair?" Allura asked, "He looks a bit like you, Coran."

"That doesn't look like the inside of a Galra cruiser," Coran said.

Matt laughed, and Shiro put a hand on Coran's shoulder. "That's because it's not. Matt played a trick on us."

"We're no strangers to love-"

"Oh!" Allura exclaimed, "He's singing, now!"

Matt laughed even harder, almost doubled over, as Lance started complaining.

"I can't believe we just got rickrolled in space!"

Hunk was still laughing, mimicking Rick Astley's dance moves as he sang along, "I just wanna tell you how I'm feeling, try to make you understand. Never gonna give you up, never gonna let you down, never gonna run around and hurt you!"

Lance groaned again, shoving him in the shoulder.

"Shiro! Make him stop!"

Shiro waved a hand at him dismissively, still trying to explain what was going on to Allura and Coran. "See, it's this video that people used to send each other disguised as a different thing. So they'd think they were getting a news story about something important or a picture of a cat or whatever, but then it was this video."

Lance whirled around. "Keith! Do something!"

Keith's grin widened. "Actually, I think it's kind of fun."

Lance flung his arms up in the air, and Pidge thought her brother might pass out, he was laughing so hard. "Betrayed! I've been betrayed!"

"But how did people not know what they were being sent?" Allura asked, "This doesn't look anything like a news story!"

"It is catchy," Coran observed, mimicking Hunk and the video even though he didn't know the words to sing along.

Pidge bumped Lance affectionately with her shoulder. "You're just jealous because you didn't think of it."

"I am not!"

Pidge ignored him, moving on. "How'd you do it, though? I know we're well out of range of Earth satellites. You haven't been close, have you?"

Matt took several deep breaths, getting himself under control. "Nah. I wasn't lying about using the memory system, I just used it on my own memories. Actually, I was worried I'd only be able to pull the first 30 seconds or whatever, 'cause I usually closed out of it once I'd realized what happened, but then it turned out I'd watched the whole thing enough times. That machine's not messing around."

"No, it's not," Pidge agreed, watching the end of the video appreciatively.

"You should play it again," Coran said, "I missed the beginning because Shiro was still explaining."

"I still don't see why it's funny," Allura said, "I mean it's odd, but I'm not sure about the humor. Perhaps you should play it again."

Lance stormed out of the room as Matt started the video over again, but Allura and Coran both seemed much more into the music video the second time, and when Matt took her hand, Pidge let her brother spin her around to the beat. He'd dragged her to swing dance lessons when he decided to learn so he could impress a girl at school (who had turned out not to be impressed) and it was amazing how fast it came back to her. Allura joined Coran and Hunk in their imitations of the dancing in the video, and even Keith bobbed his head.

Halfway through, Lance poked his head back into the room and let Shiro drag him into the dance party, but he made sure they all knew that if they wanted another dance party, they should raid his brain next. He said he'd be a better DJ than Matt, and he was probably right, but Pidge was just glad she and Matt could still hang out and be silly, even after everything.

Chapter Text

Keith kept his hand on his knife as he crept through the narrow passageways in the cave system. Everything was too tight and too narrow, but as he squeezed through spaces he almost couldn't fit into, he couldn't help enjoying the knowledge that he was really needed here. The other Blades could never have gotten to the old weapons stash now that the primary tunnels to it had collapsed.

The Galra Empire had left this weapons cache behind in the late days of the war, but Kolivan hadn't known about it until one of the other Blades, stuck at headquarters with an injured foot, had found mention of it in some old records. It had taken some time to confirm that the Empire had forgotten about it, but they had, and now here he was, hoping whatever they'd hidden was worth the trouble of finding it.

He wasn't really expecting trouble, but he also wasn't about to let himself get caught flatfooted if trouble came anyway. You never knew who might show up in a part of the universe that wasn't heavily patrolled by anyone. He ran his fingers over the hilt of his knife again.

When he stepped out into a larger cave and found some kind of enemy soldier waiting for him, he didn't even jump. His knife was out faster than the soldier's sword, and he'd squared up for the fight before the surprise hit him — the enemy soldier was an Altean. The armor wasn't quite like Allura's, but it did look a little like what Alfor had worn in his projection. The really unmistakable thing was the set of marks on his face, and the glint in his eye that reminded him of Allura at her hardest.

Keith relaxed his stance, holding his hands up and his knife in only two fingers, pointed toward the ceiling. "Hey," he said, "It's ok. I'm friendly."

The Altean's glare eased, but his stance didn't. That was ok. Keith could wait him out. "I'm not with the Empire," he said. "My name's Keith." It used to be easy to know what to say after that. But was he a Paladin of Voltron? Now that Shiro had taken back the Black Lion, he wasn't sure he was. "I'm with the Blade of Marmora," he said, "We're an underground organization working with the rebels. I used to be a Paladin of Voltron, and I'm part of the Voltron Alliance. I'm gonna put my knife away."

The Altean raised his sword instead of lowering it, and Keith stopped with his hand halfway to the knife's sheath in the middle of his back.

"You lie," the Altean said, "The Paladins of Voltron were not like you. And there was not a Keith. What kind of a name is 'Keith'?"

"It's an Earth name. I'm from Earth. But you're right. The original Paladins weren't much like us. I was one of the new Paladins."

"I knew no one wearing purple could be trusted. You claim there are new Paladins, when it is common knowledge that Voltron has been scattered. My King made sure of it, and if you hope by your ruse to learn where the lions are, you shall be disappointed."

"Oh crap, ok," Keith said, sliding his knife back into its sheath as a show of good faith, but keeping his hand right next to it. "Ok, you clearly haven't had outside contact for the last 10,000 decaphoebs. How are you still here after 10,000 decaphoebs?"

"10,000-" the soldier repeated, sounding confused.

"That's when Voltron was scattered and Alfor was killed. 10,000 decaphoebs ago. It's — well, actually, I don't know what the date is. Something about a spicolian movement? I'm not great at time words."

The soldier stared, his guard still up, but he seemed to be thinking, now, instead of getting ready to attack, and Keith would take it.

"Look, I - I don't know what to tell you. It might help to know that Princess Allura was put into cryosleep before Alfor was killed, and now she's awake and fighting. Voltron is back. We're building a coalition. Or, they are. I'm not a Paladin anymore, but that's just because I could do more good with the Blades. Zarkon is still alive, and we're trying to stop him. That's all we want."

The soldier's eyes narrowed, and Keith's heart raced as he moved his hand farther from his knife, turning his open palm toward the soldier so it would be clear he wasn't holding anything. It was finally enough. The soldier relaxed his guard, all at once, bringing his sword down to his side.

"The Princess," he said quietly. "Can it be?"

Keith nodded. "It's ok. She's my friend. Or I'm her friend. Whichever makes you feel better."

"If you are a friend to the Princess, tell me something about her."

Keith felt himself drawing a blank. "Well, she's tall," he started, "And she has white hair." Dumb. That was dumb. He needed something better. He almost mentioned the mice, but then he remembered that she'd only developed her talking-to-mice powers after she was frozen.

"She's a really strong fighter?" he tried, "but she's a little impatient sometimes. She flies the Blue Lion, but that's new. Her paladin armor is pink to honor the paladins that came before — maybe that helps? I dunno. She likes juniberries, but sometimes it's hard for her to remember them."

The soldier's eyes had scanned his face the whole time he was talking, but at the end of his rambling, the Altean seemed to accept the answer. "Yes," he said, "I remember the little princess and her juniberries. Perhaps you do know her."

"I'm here for whatever the Galra left," Keith said, "We don't even know what exactly is in the cache, but we found records that said they stored weapons here, and if we're going to outfit more rebels to fight, we're going to need those weapons. Can you help me?"

The alien nodded. "Of course, Paladin of Voltron. I am at your service."

Keith didn't remind him that he wasn't a paladin anymore. It didn't seem helpful, at the moment. Instead, he nodded. "Thank you. Do you know where the weapons are hidden?"

The soldier nodded back. "Right this way."

Keith kept his hand over the hilt of his knife as he moved, just in case it was a trick, but the soldier hadn't sheathed his sword, so he felt like that was fair. The alien turned his back on Keith completely, like he trusted him, and Keith breathed a little more easily as he followed a few steps behind.

As they turned down one of the tunnels branching off from the cave, Keith felt a shiver run down his spine that he couldn't explain — at least not until he was a little way down the passageway and the temperature started dropping. He must have caught a draft when he first stepped through.

This tunnel didn't look any more occupied than any of the others, and Keith was glad he'd found an ally. Otherwise, he might have been wandering around the cave system for hours, or even days. Kolivan's intel had said the caves were extensive, and not all of the tight places had been tight 10,000 years ago.

The soldier went before him, not even disturbing the dust on the floor, and Keith wished he could be so light-footed. He himself stumbled through several cobwebs that the soldier had seemed to have no trouble leaving alone. He'd thought he'd gotten stealthier, working with the Blades, but clearly he had more to learn. He was in a hurry today, but maybe he'd make a point of talking to Coran about Altean spy training down the road.

The tunnel broadened out into another cave, smaller this time, and the rush of cold air that hit Keith as he entered was almost as much of a shock to the system as the two other soldiers who seemed to appear out of nowhere. He was sure he should have seen them from outside the entryway, but he hadn't, and another chill ran down his spine, more intense this time.

The Alteans jumped to their feet, crying out, but the soldier Keith was following raised his hands to calm them. "It's alright. He is an ally. A friend to the Princess." Keith noticed that the soldier didn't mention his connection to Voltron, but after how well that information had gone over the first time, that was probably wise.

The Altean guards put their swords down.

"Why have you come, ally?" the one on the left asked.

"We heard there's a cache of Galra weapons here. We need them to fight Zarkon. Every time we take a planet away from the Empire, there are people who need our help, but there are also people who want to fight. My friends are helping the refugees, but we need those weapons to arm the fighters."

The Altean on the right narrowed her eyes. "And how is it that we are to believe you retake planets from Zarkon when we know King Alfor is dead and the pieces of Voltron scattered?"

"Seora," Keith's escort admonished, "He comes on a mission from the Princess Allura."

"The Princess Allura is little more than a child. How do you know she leads? How do you know he comes on a mission from her? Does he carry her seal?"

The other new guard spoke up, "Caution is wise, Thellik. Now that we have captured this planet, we have been tasked with protecting these weapons and keeping them from Galra hands. This boy may be an ally, but we ought to protect them until Voltron returns."

"Voltron has returned!" Keith said.

The guards turned toward him, surprised.

Thellik spoke, not meeting the other Alteans' eyes. "He claims to have been a Paladin of Voltron. He also claims it has been 10,000 decaphoebs since Voltron was scattered. These parts of his story are somewhat less convincing than his description of the Princess."

Seora snorted. "You call him an ally, and yet he makes such absurd claims? You have been hidden away here too long, Thellik. Are you so desperate to leave that you would put our mission in jeopardy?"

Keith stepped forward. "Look, I — I don't know what to tell you. Part of why I left Voltron is that I'm not good at this diplomacy stuff. But I am friends with the Princess and she is the leader of the Voltron Coalition, and we are taking planets back."

He set his jaw, pressing on even as he struggled to think of details that would mean anything to them. "She loves juniberries and can beat the Gladiator in the training room as fast as anyone, and she and Coran can both fly the Castle, but she's the only one that can make wormholes. She flies the Blue Lion and she wears pink paladin armor to honor her father and the other original paladins, and she needs these weapons as much as I do."

At Coran's name, the two new guards drew in close, whispering amongst themselves.

"Wimbleton-Smythe?"

"Must be."

"There were those rumors, right after King Alfor-"

"Yes, but 10,000 decaphoebs?"

"Perhaps it is a mistranslation. Perhaps he means quintants."

"It still seems an odd way to phrase that."

Keith couldn't stand it anymore.

"Look," he said, "If it's all the same, I'd rather not fight you. But I'm not leaving without those weapons. Not when having them could help the rebels so much. So either let me pass or fight me."

The Alteans laughed, and Keith drew his knife, hoping that was enough to prove he meant it.

"You are outnumbered," Seora observed.

"Yeah, well, sometimes that happens," Keith answered, keeping his limbs loose so he wouldn't look like too much of a threat until he needed to.

"We could go with him," Thellik suggested, "We could accompany him to his ship to confirm he is who he says he is, and then give him the weapons."

Seora narrowed her eyes, but the other Altean smiled. "That's it! We'll do that. Take us to your team, ally."

"That's going to be a bit of a problem," Keith said, getting ready for a fight in earnest. Dealing with Thellik had been one thing, but there was no way he was going to talk all three of them into trusting Kolivan and the other Blades. Not once they realized the Blades were all Galra. He'd just have to try to incapacitate them instead of killing them, at least until he could send Allura or Coran in to talk to them.

"A problem?" Thellik asked.

"My team are Galra. But they fight against Zarkon, not for him."

Both of the guards' faces settled into glares, and Keith knew it was about to be a fight. He took off, sprinting for the entrance to the cave and hoping they'd be unsure of themselves long enough for him to get inside.

He wasn't so lucky.

Seora and the other guard were both shockingly fast, but he managed to twist out of the way of one staff and block the other on his knife blade. He didn't want to hurt them, but he shouldn't be taking on two opponents this fast, never mind three, so he went for it.

His knife dug into Seora's shoulder, but he couldn't yank it back out fast enough to block the other guard's staff, so he braced for the impact instead — only to find that there was none. The staff moved all the way through his body, sending a wave of cold, but no real pain, in its wake.

Keith gasped at the cold, and the guard froze, startled, but Seora wasn't so easily flustered and went back on the attack. Again, Keith caught her staff on his knife blade, but this time she was ready for it, sweeping her leg at his until — it swished straight through his legs, leaving him standing just as firmly as before. The cold was just as uncomfortable but just as painless as before, and whatever this was, something deep and instinctive told Keith to get away from it.

The back of his neck prickled as he sprinted for the entrance to the weapons cave, and the prickling only got worse as Thellik's sword suddenly appeared through his chest, sending another icy shock through his system without actually making him bleed.

As soon as he'd made it into the shelter of the cave entrance, he spun around, getting his knife up fast enough to block the staff headed for his face. Not that it would have hit him, if he hadn't caught it. But every time the cold hit him, it got harder to think for a minute, and that wasn't good.

The Alteans were equally confused, shouting at each other, but Keith couldn't focus on that. He had to focus on blocking the blows coming toward him and on figuring out what was going on. His knife could block them. It could hurt them. But when he tried his own sweeping kick, his leg went through the Alteans instead of hitting them, with another wave of cold, and when their blows landed anywhere but the knife, they swooshed through them.

Maybe it was something about this place. Some kind of magic. He looked around the room, glancing over his shoulder any time he could, and finally he saw them — the bodies.

"Oh," he said, attention wavering for a moment so that more cold rushed through him with the Alteans' staves.

He took a step backward, hoping the Alteans would follow. It was perfectly clear, now. The Alteans had taken back this weapons cache, and they'd defended it for as long as they could. But 10,000 decaphoebs was a long time. Too long.

He didn't lash out, now. There was no point. They were already dead. He just parried blow after blow until he could draw them over toward the three skeletons in Altean armor, perfect matches for their own.

They were focused intently on him, to the exclusion of everything else, and he understood that. He'd fought that way himself, enough times. But he needed to get through to them. He needed to stop this.

Gritting his teeth, he flung his arms out, letting the next several blows land and shivering against the sudden cold.

The Alteans stepped back, their guards up, but he kept his arms outstretched, his knife held loosely off to the side so they'd see he wasn't fighting anymore. "I don't want to fight you," he said.

They watched him, still not looking down, still not seeing.

"I didn't want to fight you before, but that was because I thought it would be wrong to hurt people who should be on my side. Now, I don't want to fight you because there's no point. I'm taking these weapons either way. You don't need them anymore."

"You think just because we haven't figured out how to wound you that you can just take-"

"No," he said, interrupting Seora, "I think I can just take them because you're dead. Look. That's you. But you've done your duty. Voltron is back, and these are going to a good cause. They are. You can rest."

For a moment, the Alteans looked shocked. Then they glanced down at the bodies, and he stepped aside to give them a better look. Thellik knelt down to get a better look, then reached slowly out toward his skeleton. As his fingers got closer, he started to look less solid, the floor of the cave appearing faintly through him.

"Thellik!" Seora gasped.

He turned to look up at her, still fading gradually. "It's true," he said, "That's why I felt I could trust Keith even when he said it had been 10,000 decaphoebs. Can't you feel it? Can't you feel how long it's been?" He turned back toward his body and started fading even faster.

"Oh," the other guard said softly, and when Keith turned to look, he was fading out, too.

"No," Seora said, setting her jaw, "This is some kind of trick."

Keith shook his head. "No. I wish I could tell you it was. I know it's hard for Allura and Coran being the only ones left, and I wish I could take you back to the Castle to meet them, but I can't. You're dead."

"Seora!" Thellik gasped, reaching his translucent, almost-gone fingers toward her, "Come with us!"

"Thellik, I-" She sounded like she was going to say no, but her hand drifted toward him anyway, going faint around the edges as it neared the edge of what had once been his skin. She drew her hand back.

He had to do something. He had to do something, and this was exactly the kind of thing he wasn't cut out for doing. "You have to move on," he said.

"No, I-"

"Seora," he said, "You have to move on. I - I know how hard it can be to give up the fight, but this isn't - You're dead. And you were a soldier, so you must have known that might happen. But you did a good job. These are safe. No one found them, and no one took them, and now they'll go toward defeating Zarkon once and for all. Because you protected them. Your job here is done."

There were other things he wanted to talk about, things he couldn't say out loud like 'surely you decided you were ok with dying' and 'you must have been waiting for this day, somehow, deep inside.' But then she looked at him and he knew he didn't need to. It had been enough.

"You fight Zarkon."

"Yes."

"You'll keep fighting."

"Yes."

In the silence that stretched between them, Thellik faded out completely, and the other guard wasn't far behind.

"Please, Seora," he said, "Go. You don't have to do this anymore. Your fight is over. There's a new war and we're a new army fighting it. Go with your friends. You don't have to give them up. You don't have to give up anything, anymore. Just this. And then it's over."

The other guard was gone.

Seora squeezed her eyes shut, and Keith watched, waiting for her to say something. To do something. She started fading, all over this time, and he let out a breath he hadn't realized he was holding.

Just before she disappeared, she whispered, "Keep fighting," and he didn't know if he should take it as a thank you or a threat, but either way, he could tell she was gone. The air in the cave was warmer, and the silence was thicker.

He wasn't sure how he was going to explain this to Kolivan, but then, he wasn't sure he needed to. He might just keep it to himself. He took a moment to lay their bodies out in what felt like a more comfortable and respectful position, lying down instead of sitting, and then packed the weapons up into his bag and hurried away, feeling suddenly and terribly alone.

Before he left the cave where he'd met Thellik, he turned around and looked behind him, making sure they were really gone. Then he laid a hand on the cave wall, closed his eyes for a moment in a silent goodbye, picked up his bag, and kept walking.

Chapter Text

It was weird being on this side of the chair, but he was pretty sure that, nerves or not, he still wasn't squeezing the back of Allura's seat nearly as hard as Shiro had had to hold onto his. Her flying wasn't great, but it wasn't wildly erratic, either.

Blue careened into another small asteroid in the field they were using for practice, and Allura groaned.

"At least you missed the big one," Hunk said, "I mean, sometimes you're just gonna hit something, and you've gotta pick the one it's more helpful to hit. Or least harmful."

Allura's nostrils flared. "Keith doesn't run into things. And Lance would have missed that."

"Yeah, but you didn't see Lance in the Garrison simulators. He talks a good game, but we really thought he might kill us all when he started flying Blue."

"Don't try to make me feel better, Hunk. Just teach me how to do this."

"That's the thing though, Allura. Shiro always said it wasn't about the mechanics. It was about feeling your bond with your lion and figuring out how to communicate with them. You don't have to do it all. You just have to tell her what you want from her in a way she can understand."

"So I should talk more? Lance does talk a lot, but the Castle wouldn't understand what I was saying if I talked to it. I'll try it."

Hunk tried not to roll his eyes. "No, Allura, slow down! I just mean don't think about moving the lion by moving the controls. You're just guiding her."

"Guiding her," Allura repeated, taking a deep breath. "I can do that."

"Yeah," he said, "You're working together. And that's not so bad."

Allura and Blue narrowly missed another asteroid, wobbling as Allura pulled the controls too far to the side and Blue overcorrected, starting a spin before she realized Allura didn't want one. Allura muttered something under her breath that he couldn't quite catch.

"See, that was good! You missed the asteroid! Just trust her a little more. You don't have to overreact."

This time, he did catch her muttered, "I'll give you an overreaction," even though he was pretty sure she didn't actually want him to hear it.

Actually — maybe that was it! It was weird thinking back to his first few times piloting Yellow, but that didn't mean he'd forgotten how working with Shiro had turned it around for him.

"Allura, get out of the asteroid field. I have an idea."

"Which way? Through to the other side, or back the way we came?"

Hunk shrugged. "I dunno. Check your sensors and readouts and see which way's easiest."

"We're going back the way we came," Allura declared immediately, without checking anything. That was alright. Hunk always felt better when he wasn't trying to order Allura around. It was just that she was the Princess and he was used to her being in charge. Actually, he thought that might be why she'd picked him to teach her. That and he wouldn't flirt, yell, or get impatient.

The familiarity of passing clusters she'd seen before relaxed Allura almost immediately, and she flew much better.

He wished, not for the first time, that they could just go back to Arus and practice in one place for a while, but they couldn't afford that. The rest of them had been able to train in relative safety, picking locations around them that worked for their purposes. Allura was learning on the go, scratching out practice time whenever she could using whatever was at hand.

Hunk reached forward and patted her shoulder. "You're doing great. I know it's tough having to learn so fast like this. But look how good you are when you relax a little."

She narrowly missed an asteroid that had drifted a little from where it was last time, but this time the overcorrection wasn't as bad. She sighed, but with a nod that told him she wasn't at her most frustrated. "Thanks, Hunk."

Once they'd made it out of the asteroid field, Allura looked up at him, tipping her head backward. "What are you thinking, Hunk?"

"This is gonna sound dumb," he said, "But I want you to fly as badly as you can."

"What?"

"You know, not the way you'd fly if you were trying to impress people. Veer around corners too hard. Spin. Pinwheel. Do whatever. You can't be afraid to mess up. I mean, Shiro mostly just told me I couldn't be afraid of my lion, but it's the same thing. He made me do spins and dives and go really fast and crash into stuff I knew Yellow could handle, until I wasn't scared anymore and I stopped worrying I was gonna puke or lose control or anything. And then Yellow and I were a lot more comfortable with each other."

Allura's eyebrows constricted. "I'm not afraid."

"No, I know you're not! You're really brave. It's just you're trying so hard to do it right and be the best, and you have to let go of that. Every time something isn't perfect, you way overreact trying to fix it. So overreact as hard as you can now, and then maybe you can cut down on the overreactions after that."

Her eyes narrowed. "I'll try it. But I'm still not sure I know what you mean."

Hunk thought for a second. "Well, what if you started with spins? You almost pulled her into a spin in there anyway. See how it feels."

She nodded, adjusting her hands on her controls, then pulled Blue abruptly into a spin. Hunk tightened his grip on her seat, digging his feet into the floor and letting the force of the spin hold him down. He and Yellow did this often enough that his stomach was fine and he could keep his head about him, but he remembered doing it with Shiro that first time and coming out queasy and shaking and soaked in sweat because he'd been so scared.

Allura spun them harder and faster, like she was making a challenge out of it, and she probably was, but it was still good to watch her flying like this, without being so worried.

"I wonder-" she muttered, before abruptly pulling them in the opposite direction. The spin slowed, but instead of just straightening out, Allura spun them in the opposite direction. Hunk grinned as he leaned into their second spin. It seemed like it was working.

Allura pulled them out of the second spin sooner than she had the first one, evening out with a big grin.

Hunk smiled back when he caught her looking back at him, and she laughed. "Alright, I'll admit that was fun. What else should I try?"

Hunk laughed, too. "I don't know. Somersaults? Cartwheels? Donuts?"

Allura laughed. "Donuts? I don't know what that means."

"Oh!" Hunk said, "Not like the food. Like you do with a car! But I guess you guys don't have cars. Maybe you could do it with a speeder, I don't know. Anyway, you go in a circle so fast your back wheels spin out and go around your front wheels, so the skid marks are concentric circles and they look like a donut."

"I think I understand the mechanics of that, yes, but I still don't understand the donut part. Is it a round food? Like some kind of fruit?"

Hunk felt one hand creep upward to rest against his sternum. "Oh no," he said, horrified, "You mean donuts donuts. You've never had a donut donut. We are gonna have to fix that. I am making donuts as soon as we get home."

Allura laughed. "I will look forward to eating them, then! How do I do the car donut?"

It turned out that even with all the practice he'd had flying now, car donuts were not as good for Hunk's stomach as the real thing, but it wasn't so bad going back to the Castle early with Allura relaxed and laughing, hands steady and easy on Blue's controls as she flew them home.

Chapter Text

Allura stepped back from the control panel, finally convinced that Lotor really had gotten far enough away to get off their sensors before they could chase him, and nearly stepped on Coran.

"Oh! Sorry, Princess. Standing too close!"

Coran always had a lot of energy, had always had a lot of energy, but something about the cheerfulness in his voice and his quick step backward didn't feel right to her.

"It's alright, Coran," she said carefully, "I don't mind."

He nodded, too fast.

"I think I'm going to go get something to eat," she said, "We might not be permanently injured, but taking hits in the lions is always a little exhausting."

"Good idea, Princess," Coran answered, "Would you like me to make you something besides food goo? I can see what we've got in the larder."

"No, that's alright," she said, "I'd rather just eat and go meet up with Pidge and Hunk. I'm sure they'll be able to find some way to track down Lotor and the comet, and I'd like to keep advised of their progress."

Coran nodded again, and she turned away, conversation over. As she made her way to the kitchen, he followed behind her, a little too close again. She was perfectly accustomed to having him at her shoulder, but she was almost worried he'd step on her heel this time. She wrinkled her forehead. He was acting like things were normal, but he was too close, so something must be going on. She just had to figure out what.

In the kitchen, he kept hovering, handing her things as she needed them when he'd usually let her do it herself and still standing a little bit too close to her.

Instead of making her way straight to the lab, she turned the other way at the door, heading for the dining room. Whatever was going on, she needed to deal with it before Coran drove her crazy.

He followed behind her like she'd expected him to, still a half step too close, and when she took a seat at the head of the table, he stood behind her like they were at some kind of state dinner. She sighed. "Coran, will you please sit down instead of hanging over me like that?"

"Sorry, Princess," Coran said, sliding into the nearest chair and scooting it subtly closer to her as he pulled it in toward the table.

She ate the first few bites in silence, studying Coran and trying to get a read on him. His posture was relaxed, but something about his gaze was more intense than usual, and she couldn't help squirming a little under it.

She'd been working on not being so blunt. It was important that she hone her skills as a diplomat, and that she improve on her ability to bring the team together now that Shiro wasn't here to do it for her. But she was tired, and residually sore from the hit Lotor had gotten in on Voltron, and it had been a long day. "What's wrong?" she asked, "You've been practically underneath my feet since we returned from the other dimension."

Coran suddenly became the squirmy one, turning his face away a little to look at the chair across from him instead of at her. "Ah, you noticed that."

"Coran, you reached over me to hand me a plate I could have reached myself."

"Yes, I suppose I did do that."

"So what's wrong?" she asked.

"Well, see, it's like this," Coran said, enough extra words besides the point that she knew he didn't really want to tell her, "I don't know if you know this, but when you and the other paladins crossed over into the other universe, I couldn't see or hear you anymore. You were totally gone. And it was — difficult."

"Difficult?" she echoed.

Coran looked back at her, setting his jaw. "I felt like I'd lost you. I knew you had Voltron, and I knew you and the others would look after each other, but I felt like I'd lost you anyway." He paused, and she went still, waiting for him to finish before she took another bite. After a deep breath, he pasted on an obviously fake smile, and added, "But that's silly. You're right here."

She shoved a bite of food goo into her mouth before she said something too harsh about that fake smile. She loved that Coran could be positive about things even when things got hard — she'd depended on that before, and she was sure she would depend on it again. But she'd never liked it when people wouldn't talk to her about things, and she knew Coran knew that.

By the time she swallowed, she was calm enough just to say, "I hadn't thought about that. I'm sorry we scared you."

Coran's smile got a little more real. "It's alright. You were doing what you had to as a part of Voltron."

It was Allura's turn to set her jaw. Coran wasn't getting away with platitudes. Not this time. "All the same, it was jarring enough realizing we couldn't hear you. I'm sure it was worse for you losing contact with all of us at once."

Coran looked down at the table. "Ah, yes. With all of you."

Allura's forehead wrinkled. "Is this about me? About me being a paladin?"

Coran looked up sharply, eyes widening. "No! Of course not! I'll always be proud of you for being a paladin. I know it's what you've always wanted, and I know your father would be proud if he could see you."

Allura smiled softly. "No, Coran, that's not what I meant. But thank you."

Coran's eyes scanned her face and then he waited for her to figure out how to say what she'd meant.

"It must be hard watching me go into danger," she finally said, choosing her words carefully. "I'm not going to stop doing it, but I'm sorry it's hard for you."

This time, Coran laughed. "Princess, you've been running into danger for a long time. And not just as a paladin of Voltron! I trust you to handle yourself in a fight and to always do the right thing. It's just different when I can't see you. I like knowing I can back you up if you need me. I like knowing where you are, even when you don't need me."

Allura looked down at the table, blushing. "Oh."

"It's alright that you're a fighter. It's good, even! It's just that I'd rather you not go where I can't follow."

Allura let his words sink in, thinking them through. She did understand that feeling. Even when she didn't need Coran's help, she liked having him there. Even if she felt like she could get by without an advisor, she didn't want him to leave.

But could she really promise she'd never have to go through a rift again? Could she really promise, when Lotor had the comet and the universe was at risk, that she'd never have to go so far that Coran couldn't come with her?

She couldn't. She knew she couldn't, and Coran knew she couldn't, and she didn't know what to say. She reached for his hand, and he gave it to her before she could grab it.

"I'll try," she said, finally. It was the best she could do.

Coran squeezed her hand gently, smiling at her. "That's all I can ask for," he answered, his smile soft but genuine this time.

It would have to be enough. She smiled back, and when she was finished eating, she let him brush a kiss against her forehead and clean up the dirty dishes, instead of insisting that he let her do it herself. When he reappeared behind her halfway through her conversation with Pidge, she didn't mind at all.