Chapter Text
“We need to get to the shelters, now!” Shiro screamed.
Keith watched a fiery ball of light cascade from the outside of the wall, which then exploded with a deafening boom in the now fiery sky. All around him were the sounds of screams as shell after shell peppered the wall and nearby houses. People were running down the street in a blind panic, nearly trampling him as he struggled to pick the now-unconscious Prince Lance off the ground. Breathing burned his throat and lungs. His eyes watered from ash and smoke and hot, fat tears streamed down his face each time he blinked.
It was too much. It didn’t matter how many attacks he went through, it was always too much to handle, too much to go through. He struggled for a moment to breathe through the pain, but the air was too acrid to breathe in deeply.
Shiro dropped beside him, eyes full of worry and mouth in a hard set line. It was as if everything was moving in slow motion. Light from another explosion reflected on Shiro’s dirty face, highlighting his jaw and lighting his eyes up with orange for half a second. Shiro’s hands roughly grasped his shoulders.
“I know that you’re scared. But you’ve done this before, and you can do this again. Push it all down until we’re actually somewhere you can let it out, alright?” He sounded like a general.
Keith nodded and swallowed thickly. Commands, he was good at commands.
It was like his brain was on autopilot. He found himself with the Prince in his arms again, now hoisting him over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. His body buckled with the sudden weight but he did not fall.
He found himself running.
Running did not come easy to him with the added weight of the Prince on his back. Usually he could only sprint a few hundred meters at best, and now he was running to the base, a good mile away from their vantage point.
By this point Keith was only focused on small things. Never the big picture, that would be too much. His mind isolated itself to only the basics of the situation. He picked his way around the rubble. He noticed burned down buildings and he heard the cries of too-late sirens echoing painfully close. He caught the snatches of faces. Tear streaked, dirt covered faces. Coughing in the ash of the firestorm. He noticed Shiro running far ahead of him, yelling into a communicator but not making a single sound.
The weight on his back grew to be painfully acute. His muscles burned from the strength of trying to keep running.
The entrance to the shelters were so close. Keith could focus on nothing but sound, nothing other than blasts of artillery and shrapnel and fire. Fire. Fire. Licking at his heels as he struggled to run, struggling to breath, struggled to see. Shiro was yelling something at him, but it was like he was on mute. Keith was deaf but to the sounds of the dying, he heard it all.
Shiro was suddenly right beside him, pulling him roughly with him. He hadn't noticed he had stopped.
The doors were closed. With good reason, but now they needed to get in. Keith pounded at the doors, mindful not to drop his heavy passenger. Shiro was radioing in, but he didn't seem to be getting anywhere. The sounds of the bombs were getting closer. Keith imagined shrapnel stabbing through his back. His body being burned until there was nothing but charred flesh.
There were ships going over the wall now. Large, red beams blared onto the streets, catching everything in their path in an almost graceful arch of destruction. Rubble. Houses. People.
“Shiro! Why aren't they opening the door?” Keith screamed. Panic bubbled in his chest, drowning out all sensation.
“I don't know! It might be because of that tractor beam!” He said.
Keith’s hair whipped around his face. His load was getting heavier by the second, and if they didn't get in the shelters, they and the crown prince would die in minutes. Air was toxic and Keith felt his lungs burning to get good air. Either the bombs would kill them, or the air would.
“Did you tell them that we have the literal crown prince with us?” Keith shouted over the roar of the ships.
Shiro blinked. “No.”
“Then fucking do it! We're going to die out here!”
“Calling into Station. Please, open the doors! We have the goddamn prince of Altea with us… No, I'm not lying. Radioing to Station Beta Seven. Hunk, commit treason.”
The doors started opening with a sickening screech of unoiled gears. Only a few seconds now, only a few seconds-
The back of his neck prickled. A low hum made its way through his spine. Everything seemed to be at a complete standstill.
“Keith, dive!”
He lunged for the door, holding tightly to his cargo. His body hit the floor with a loud thud. He felt the prince’s weight leave his body. For a moment he couldn’t process anything. Just noise and breathing and panic flooding every part of his body.
The doors slowly creaked shut. From the slowly shutting opening he could see a purple light slamming into the ground. He had almost been taken. He had almost been prisoner. Keith exhaled, he hadn't known he was holding his breath.
A low groan came from his side. On the ground lay the prince. His eyes were still closed, though his face was contorted in pain. Keith was surprised he had stayed out the whole time. Whatever those drugs were and that hit to the head must’ve been what did it.
His muscles ached and his heartbeat was going a million miles a minute. But he was safe. He was alive.
Keith would take any pain if it meant he was still breathing.