Chapter Text
“Hey,” Keith says.
Shiro jumps. “Oh, hey.”
“How are you feeling,” Keith asks.
“Ah—I’m fine.” He turns his head back to the sunset he was looking at before. The sunset Keith had seen a thousand times from the rundown desert shack they now stood near.
“What happened?” Keith asks, breaking the comfortable silence. “I mean… Your arm… You were gone after the mission. Adam and I worried. We thought you were…” He pauses for a second, debating whether to say it or not. “Dead,” he whispers.
“I-” Shiro inhales sharply. His eyes seem to be looking at something else—or somewhere else Keith can’t reach. It stays silent for a minute before Keith places a hesitant hand on Shiro’s shoulder, startling him again.
“Sorry. You don’t have to. Talk about it I mean. I'm sorry,” Keith reassures.
“It’s alright.” Shiro smiles at him, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “We’ll talk about it another day, yeah?”
“Yeah.” He says, lowering his hand. “I… Uhm I just– I thought I wouldn’t… see you again…” he pauses, his voice cracking on the last word. “And I’m– I really am sorry. I didn’t want that to be the last thing that–” He breathes in, trying to hold back a sob. “I didn’t want that to be the last thing I said to you.”
He stops, silently looking at his brother who’s still turned towards the sunset. Shiro turns towards him, holding his arms out in offering.
Keith immediately jumps forward into the hug, turning his head as tears spill down his cheeks.
“I’m sorry.”
“I know you are. It’s okay,” he reassures his younger brother.
“I was angry at you… for leaving me… I didn't want to be alone again… and don’t say ‘you had Adam’ because it’s not the same. You’re my brother, I love you. I thought I wouldn’t be able to tell you that because I wasted time being mad,” he thinks he can feel Shiro trembling, but that may be himself.
“It’s alright, I know. I love you too.”
“They told me you died,” Keith whispers as if he’s afraid to say it too loud or it will make it true. As if it would make this yet another dream.
“I’m right here. I’m like Spock,” he jokes.
“That’s not even accurate,” Keith says as he pulls back to give his brother a look. “You’d have to die first for that.”
“Maybe I did and I’m a clone, I never said I didn’t die. I said I’m right here,” Shiro points out.
“Don’t even joke,” Keith glares as Shiro laughs at him.
“Alright, alright.”
There’s a brief silence before Shiro interrupts to ask, “How did you know to find me when I crashed?”
“I– you should come see this,” Keith says as he turns, beckoning Shiro towards the small house.
The sun sits behind the hills only barely peeking out. Pidge silently sits, typing away on his laptop. Hunk and Lance sit having their own conversation. Shiro and Keith enter through the door of the rundown shack. Lance’s focus immediately turns towards them, followed quickly by Hunk.
“Oh! You’re here! Lance and I were just discussing–”
Hunk is cut off when Keith wordlessly pulls back the white sheet that Lance had been prodding at earlier before the other two boys stopped him. Behind it is a corkboard filled with a map, pictures, writing, notes, drawings, and more, all stuck on with thumbtacks and strings, and marked up with different colors of ink, assumedly from the colored sharpies scattered on the floor.
Shiro looks from the sharpies to Keith, who shrugs at him and goes back to his murderboard. Lance is calling it a murderboard.
“What’s this?” Pidge asks.
Shiro turns towards him, opening his mouth to say something, which he cuts off with an introduction.
“I’m Pidge,” he says, something harsh in his gaze.
Shiro nods, turning back to Keith.
“A map… of sorts. It’s just to organize my thoughts,” Keith explains.
“Murderboard.” Lance states simply.
“What?” Keith asks as he looks at him.
“It looks like a murderboard,” he says.
“Anyway, it all points to this big central energy source–”
“Why were you in a shack in the desert anyway?” Lance interrupts.
“It’s not a shack. And that’s none of your business,” Keith snaps.
Lance raises a judgmental eyebrow, and Keith gestures in offense, readying an argument before Shiro steps in.
“Energy source,” he says, giving Keith another look.
Keith keeps explaining his map (and color coding) while the others dutifully listen, with few comments from Lance.
“That’s when I found this,” he says, pointing towards the energy source. “It’s an outcropping of giant boulders with caves covered in these ancient markings. Each tells a slightly different story about a blue lion, but they all share clues leading to some event, some arrival happening last night. Then you showed up.”
The two share a look that Lance can’t decipher.
“Wait a second! I recognize that!” Hunk interrupts, pointing at a photo of the cliffs. He looks towards Pidge, tapping his shoulder. Pidge swats him away, moving back.
“What?” He demands.
“On the Garrison roof,” Hunk says, ignoring Pidge’s annoyance. “One of your charts was kind of shaped like that. Do you have any of those papers with you?” He asks.
“I do.” Pidge digs through his backpack, pulling out different charts.
Hunk points to one. “That’s it!”
“Oh! You’re right!” Pidge exclaims. “Nice one, Hunk!”
He hands it to Hunk, who holds it up against the photo. Lance could totally imagine the fade-into-the-photo-and-show-they’re-in-front-of-it moment. It looks super cool. In his head.
They’re all trailing behind Pidge and Hunk who are doing some sort of tech thing Lance doesn’t quite understand. Keith and Shiro have been talking in hushed tones the whole way. Right now Shiro is laughing, seemingly at Keith. Keith looks back towards Lance, scowls, and says something to Shiro who rolls his eyes.
Keith scowled at him. He didn’t even do anything! Lance swears the boy hates him. He really couldn’t be more obvious if he tried.
He was better than Lance in early every way and still decided he needed to hate him. Well– not socially. He’s an asshole with no friends. There’s a reason for that. That’s why Lance can’t fathom why Shiro would put up with the kid.
He sees nothing to like about him, anyway. He’s rude, he’s clearly got some anger issues, he’s stubborn, his hair’s stupid, and his face is also stupid. And he’s stupid. Lance doesn’t get it.
Of course it’s that kid who has to swoop in and steal Lance’s chance to talk to the Takashi Shirogane. His idol! He’s pretty much the reason Lance wanted to go to the Garrison in the first place. But of course, he only cares to talk to Keith.
It’s always stupid Keith.
Lance tries. He may not be as talented as Keith, but he tries hard. It’s always Keith who gets the good opportunities.
Him and his stupid mullet.
How does his hair even look like that anyway? What is he using? Nobody’s hair is naturally that nice. His skin too.
It’s infuriating. Lance can't pick out a good quality in his entire personality, but somehow, he excels everywhere else. Especially the areas Lance fails.
It’s almost as if Keith were born to be a mirror that points out your every flaw.
Sure, that’s ridiculous. And wow, that sounds really self-centered if Lance thinks about it. So Keith doesn’t exist for him, but the point still stands.
And of course, Lance is the only one who sees this. Everyone else has no problem with him.
He’s pretty sure Hunk has done everything but call him crazy.
Even Pidge is– wait why are they in a cave?
Lance has not been paying any attention.
It’s… dark. Lance tries to look around, but his eyes are still adjusting to the dark. He follows the others further in, looking around when he can finally see.
“What are these?” Shiro asks, looking around at the walls.
“These are the carvings I told you about,” Keith explains. “They’re everywhere around here.”
He reaches up, brushing his hand up against the wall where the carvings are. The stone is surprisingly cold, which is nice compared to the heat. He slides his hand across one, pushing away dirt.
“Woah!” Lance slips his hand back, jolting as the cave lights up in a teal glow revealing the shapes of lions, people, and many more things he can't begin to describe.
“Whaaaat,” everyone choruses.
“They’ve never done that before…” Keith says.
Teal light spreads through the stone until it lights the cracks underneath them. A lot of things happen very quickly after that. Lance looks around at the others who are all looking doing the same. There’s a moment of silence before they realize that there are cracks under them. Another moment where they stand very, very still. And they fall. They’re sliding down some sort of waterfall
Lance screams. He’s not ashamed of it, okay? He’s about to die.
He can hear Keith letting out steady stream of ‘fuck’ and ‘shit’ along with Pidge while Hunk screams along with him. He hasn't heard shiro since the floor cracked under them and he let out a ‘oh crap’.
He lands in a pool of water on his stomach with a thud, groaning as he sits up.
He hears Pidge yell “Shit!” as he lands on the ground.
“Language,” says another voice. That’s likely Shiro.
Lance pushes himself up looking around. Right in front of him is a giant… Force feild… Bubble… in the middle is a giant blue lion.
He’s silent for a second, too stunned to think.
“They are everywhere,” he says.
“Is this it? Is this… the Voltron?” Pidge asks.
“It must be.” Shiro says.
“This is what's been causing all this crazy energy out here,” Keith adds. “Looks like there’s a force field around it.”
“Does anyone else get the feeling this is staring at them?” Lance asks as he walks back and forth in front of the lion.
“Mmm…” Shiro looks for a second, walking to the side a little. “No.”
“Yeah. The eyes are totally following me.” Lance is still walking back and forth, now raising an eyebrow at the thing.
Keith pushes his psalms against the barrier. “I wonder how we get through this…” he doesn’t seem like he’s looking for suggestions. More like thinking out loud.
“Maybe you just have to knock,” Lance says anyway. He yelps and scrambles back as the barrier lights up with some sort of energy.
It disappears as the lion's eyes light up. The ground underneath it starts to glow too in the shape of what Lance thinks are runes.
He blinks as images flash into his head of… more lions?
“Woah,” they all say.
“Uh, did everyone just see that?” he asks.
“Voltron is a robot! Voltron is a huge, huge, awesome robot!” Hunk replies.
“And this thing is only one part of it!” Pidge says with that look he gets when he’s analyzing something. “I wonder where the rest of them are." He adds more quietly.
“This is what they’re looking for,” Shiro says.
“Incredible…” is all Keith murmurs.
The lion leans her head forward. The rest of them back away, Pidge whines as it comes closer, and Lance stands still. Her mouth opens as a ramp touches down to the ground.
Lance hums, smirking as he walks forward towards it. “Huh…” he looks around, walking into the head of the lion.
He sits down in the seat, which drags him forward as the others come into the room. Panels appear in front of him and the eyes clear. In front of them is the pool they landed in earlier.
“All right! Very nice,” Lance says as the others release a chorus of, ‘woahs’.
“Okay guys, I feel the need to point out, just so that we’re all, you know, aware. We are in some kind of futuristic alien cat head right now.” Hunk interrupts.
“I know!” Pidge says excitedly.
Lance jerks his head around at the sound of…a cat?
He stays silent, but places his hands on the controls. With a smirk, he drives the thing forward.