Chapter Text
Their house in Nevada is warm. It’s bathed in sunlight that reflects off their mother’s ceramic bowl and scatters across the living room as tiny circles. Shiro spins the bowl around, and the dots of light cascade over the furniture. Keith watches them spiral around, fascination painted clearly on his face, until Shiro tilts the bowl at just the right angle to temporarily blind him. He shrieks and flops onto the couch dramatically while his older brother cackles. The entire space around them appears to glow.
No, not again!
Gravity seems to switch off and Keith’s floating up to the ceiling, his heart hammering against his ribs. The impact leaves him reeling for a fraction of a second. When he opens his eyes again, he’s no longer in Nevada. The familiar warmth and dry breeze are gone, replaced by grey skies and constricting humidity. And there it is -the all too familiar image that invades all his dreams: a hill, a pine tree, a dragon coiled around its yellow eyes unblinking. Below the hill a valley and beyond that the ocean. As Keith runs up the hill he can feel himself waking up. He’s reached the tree and suddenly he sits up painfully aware of his perch in a rickety NYC fire escape.
Everything around him is covered in morning dew, and the sky is a pale pink far above the skyscrapers. Keith moves to roll up his acquired sleeping bag, and the pain in his shoulder flares up. He ignores it, thinking it will heal, like the previous injuries have. After all, he’s too close to be distracted now. He can feel whatever’s calling to him going crazy, like a counter near a radioactive source.
He knows he’s heading to Long Island. He could have arrived there yesterday, but from what he’d heard nocturnal New York is dangerous enough for a normal person, let alone someone with Keith’s track record of mishaps. So he’d decided to stay the night in some old fire escape. He regrets this choice as he climbs down, the pain in his shoulder spikes with every awkward move. Once his feet hit concrete ground he checks it, and feels like he’s going to be sick immediately. The claw marks themselves are still a deep scarlet, but the surrounding skin is a mixture of bruised purple (no surprises there) or a very un-natural looking green. The kind of green Keith tended to associate with Disney villains. He resists the urge to poke it.
A soft rustling sound comes from further down the alley and Keith instinctively reaches for his knife. Cautiously, he approaches the source of the noise. A flash of fur appears and the next thing Keith knows is his hand is bleeding and there’s a ginger tabby sitting in the alley cleaning its ears as if nothing happened.
“Why you little-” Keith starts before the cat meows at him. It then gets up and circles Keith’s legs while he squints at it suspiciously. Keith starts walking back out the alleyway and the cat follows, looking up at him expectantly.
“If you want food you gotta find someone else.” he grumbles. He’s greeted by yet another meow.
Much to Keith’s surprise, the cat follows him across Manhattan. Much to Keith’s horror, the cat also follows him onto a traffic heavy road and it decides the appropriate place to take a bath is in the middle of the street. Not that Keith cares, right? Except he’s made it to the sidewalk and the traffic light’s about to switch to green and the cat is still sitting in the middle of the road, grooming itself.
He makes a split-second choice, turns on his heel, scoops up the dumb cat -who responds with an indignant mrrp- and reaches safety with a few seconds to spare.
Keith holds the cat at eye level, and tells it how dangerous roads are. It lets out a small meow as if it knows it’s being scolded. As Keith walks away, the cat follows him once again.
“I guess you can come along.” he says, half to the cat and half to himself.
He doesn’t know what’s awaiting him at Long Island; All he knows is around half a year ago, the tree on the hilltop started appearing in his dreams. At first it was just an after image, a shadow of an idea. Then it showed up more often, as flashes, and then incorporated itself into his dreams. The dreams were accompanied by this urge to reach Long Island, as if a magnet was pulling him in that direction. Eventually he caved, shoved what few belonging he had into a backpack, left a note to his foster parents, and got on the first bus heading east. Google had said the cross country journey would take him about a month. Six months later and he’s just arrived in New York.
The map on Keith’s phone glitches up and pulls him out of his thoughts. He checks the street signs against his screen, suddenly feeling very lost in the sprawling city. The distant sound of traffic and chatter of voices drown out everything else, save the low growl of the subway.
“Wait, what?” Keith voices his thoughts, as the growling sound grows louder. He has a suspicion this is one of his weird situations, the ones he could swear he imagined despite having scars to prove he didn’t. The only other life form on the street apart from him and the tabby is a big black dog. Keith dismisses it as an ordinary angry dog, until it locks eyes with him and he swears he sees it grin.
This time around, Keith doesn’t even think about reaching for his knife, he just runs, weaving around streetlights and trash cans. Somewhere behind him, he hears a sharp high pitched meow. He’s not turning back for the goddamn cat - he is not turning back. Screw it. He drops his backpack and draws his knife, turning around to face the hound. The cat has also turned on the hound, now a spitting hissing hairball of rage. Except the cat is much closer to the salivating, growling, honest-to-god terrifying dog than he is. Despite his every instinct screaming ‘This is a bad idea, Gyeong,’ he charges the dog.
The hound shifts its weight to its back legs and swipes at Keith with its claws. He ducks out of the way but not before the dog’s massive black paw makes contact with his bad shoulder. He hits the ground then swings at the dog’s abdomen. With his other arm he scoops up the cat, still hissing. The knife makes contact with the dog and it explodes into a cloud of dust, leaving the smell of rotten eggs behind.
Keith lets himself lie down on the sidewalk, still shaking from the adrenaline. The cat is sitting on his chest and after a minute it starts purring. Keith scratches it behind the ears affectionately.
“If you’re gonna stick around you need a name. How about Red?” The cat meows and rubs its head against Keith’s hand, obviously happy with its new name.
A few hours later, the hill and its pine tree peak over the horizon, and all Keith wants to do is take a nap under that tree. Preferably lasting days. He jogs to the top, Red at his heels. The view beyond causes his breath to catch: A valley, rolling strawberry fields with Ancient Greek temples peppered among them. There’s a lake, and further away the ocean is caught in a crescent moon bay.
As he walks down the hill again, all the tiredness lifts off him, He’s here, the place he’s been searching for the past six months. Maybe things will start to make sense now.
It isn’t until Keith sees someone sitting on one of the house porches that he realises he may be trespassing. That all this could be another illusion, like the kind that have come to define his life. Then the person on the porch waves at him, and Keith is certain he’s hallucinating. Still, he walks towards them.
“You made it!” the girl exclaims, a toothy grin lighting up her whole face.
Keith frowns, “Made it where?”
“Oh, nobody’s told you yet? Seems logical, a lot of our parents are uncomfortable with the topic or don’t fully understand. But don’t worry, Chiron will explain everything.” she says all this quickly, Keith’s tired brain struggling to keep up. His response is a very intelligent ‘What?’. The girl keeps talking, introducing herself as Emi, and leads him into the house, where Keith meets Chiron: a middle aged man in a wheelchair, seemingly not a big deal. Except when he talks, Keith listens carefully. He tells Keith about how the Ancient Greek gods are real, how they’re based in the USA, and how -most surprisingly- they have demigod children. The place he has found himself in (Camp Half-Blood) is a safe haven for these demigods to protect them from mythological nasties that would see them dead. Keith is one of these demigods. After he’s done talking, he looks at Keith, expecting a reply.
“You’re telling me all this,” he gestures vaguely around him, “craziness is because of my parents?”
“More or less,” the man answers, still studying Keith’s face.
“But my parents,” he pauses trying to find the safest wording, “I never knew them. I met my dad once, and it did not go well.”
Chiron nods, like he’s seen this before.
“I have a question for you, young man. How are you still alive?”
“Excuse me?”
“You’ve survived outside our borders to age seventeen. That’s nothing short of a miracle. You must have some blessing or protection from your godly parent.”
“My godly parent” Keith echoes, disbelieving, “I have a knife, if that’s what you’re talking about. I’ve had it as long as I can remember. No matter how many times my foster homes took it away from me, it always reappeared in my bag, like some kind of magic.”
“Hmm, may I see this knife?” Chiron asks, politely.
Keith reaches for his belt, and unsheathes the knife: it’s simple, made of some golden bronze metal. At the base of the blade is a symbol he always keeps covered, like two letters overlapping. He holds the knife out to Chiron, reluctant to let go. Something about the knife being able to provide him with answers to the past makes him unwilling to part with it.
Chiron picks it up almost gingerly. He doesn’t remove the fabric Keith has covered the mark with (Keith is grateful for this), instead observing the blade.
“Celestial Bronze. A good metal for a half-blood’s weapon. It won’t harm mortals. The design is not entirely Greek however.” He says this last sentence almost to himself, before handing the knife back to Keith who breathes a sigh of relief.
“Go see the healers, Emi will lead you. And then she will send a councilor to give you a tour.” Chiron glares at Emi while they leave.
Emi leads Keith towards the nearest building, and Keith can hear music blaring from inside. The sole occupant of the wide room is a boy around Keith’s age. He’s half dancing to the music, half tidying the a box of bandages away. He has short brown hair, and tanned skin. He’s wearing a blue checkered shirt over the orange t shirt that Keith’s seen on a few people so far. The boy turns, sees Emi and smiles, beginning to dance-walk in their direction. He tries to get the girl to join in, singing along to the song:
“I’m in love with the shape of you-”
“Lance,” Emi tries to interrupt him, in vain
“We push and pull like a magnet do,”
“Lance,”
“Although my heart is falling too,” He turns to Keith, almost inviting him to join too. Keith stands there, awkwardly.
“Aw, c’mon mullet, you’re no fun.” Lance remarks, turning back to Emi, who reluctantly joins him.
As the chorus ends, Keith is hyper-aware of how out of place he is. He lets his gaze rest outside the window, or the shelves lining the room, anywhere but on Lance. Suddenly, the pair stops, and Lance walks over to Keith, getting into Keith’s face.
“You’re new?!”
“Yes,” Keith responds flatly, and Lance squints at him.
“Which cabin?”
“What?” Keith frowns, genuinely confused.
“You heard me. Which cabin do you belong to, who’s your godly parent?”
“I- I don’t know”
“Ri-ight. So what’s the damage? Any infected wounds, broken bones?”
“You’re the healer?” Keith asks, indignantly.
Lance’s face morphs into a picture of over-the-top disbelief, eyebrows shooting straight up and mouth forming a perfect ‘o’.
“I’ll have you know I am a very capable healer- why is there a cat in here?”
“This is Red,” Keith responds, kneeling down to pet his newfound companion, “she found me this morning.”
“I guess she’s safe if the border let her through,” Lance mumbled, “Your shoulder looks pretty bad, lemme take a look.”
“My shoulder’s fine, it will heal with time.”
“I think you mean it will get infected with time, cat whisperer. You have no say in this, sit down and take your shirt off.”
Keith reluctantly does as he’s told, hugging the balled up shirt to himself. Lance inspects his shoulder and lets out a noise that’s half puzzlement half disgust. Keith glances at his shoulder and immediately wishes he hadn’t: it’s worse than it was this morning (honestly what did he expect? he’d been mauled by a black dog that was probably the spawn of the devil himself) and the green-ness has spread. Suddenly the room is a lot more spinny.
“Drink this” Lance says and hands him what looks like a pink smoothie.
Keith eyes it suspiciously, swirles the bottle around a bit and takes a sip from the straw. His toes curl at the taste of cold coffee, and he looks at the drink again.
“Why does this taste like Peet’s?” he asks, a slightly hopeful overtone detectable in his voice.
“Like what now?” Lance replies, and suddenly Keith’s entire shoulder stings from antiseptic, an undignified squeak leaves his mouth.
“A little warning next time?” he complains and Lance smirks. Keith honest to god wants to punch him in that moment.
“But seriously, what’s a Peet’s?” Lance continues, and Keith notices a needle in his hand. He resists the urge to flee for the hills.
“A coffee chain in California,” he holds up the smoothie thing, “what is this?”
“Nectar. The drink of the gods. Can have healing properties on half bloods in moderation.”
“Does it always taste like Peet’s?”
“It tastes different to each person. Usually something familiar that you associate happy memories with.”
“Uuh okay, what does it taste like fo- Ouch what the hell?”
“I’m distracting you, cali boy, keep talking.”
“I have a name you know.”
“Really? Lemme guess: Jon Bon Jovi”
“It’s Keith.”
“Richards? Is that why you have a mullet?”
Keith grits his teeth together from irritation- and the stitches. “Gyeong.”
“Lance Rosario, Cabin 7,” after noticing Keith’s blank expression he adds: “Apollo, god of music, medicine, and poetry among other things.”
“How do we know who our godly parent is?” Keith asks reluctantly.
“They claim you.”
“Right,” Keith replies, and his stomach feels as if he’s swallowed a bowling ball. If his mother even knew he existed she probably wouldn’t bother claiming him anyway.
“Okay, I’m done. The poison should start to recede soon. No archery or sword fighting with your right arm, because the stitches will tear.” Lance says, and Keith mumbles a ‘thank you’.
“Sorry, I didn’t catch that, a little louder please?” an irritatingly cocky smile spreads across Lance’s face and Keith glares at him, “Did you say ‘Lance is the best healer and I am very grateful he saved me’?”
Before Keith can reply, someone else walks into the room. She looks like she could be Lance’s sister, with the same upturned nose, tanned skin and bright blue eyes. Just like everyone else Keith has seen so far, she’s wearing an orange ‘Camp Half Blood’ t-shirt.
“I heard there was fresh meat!” She exclaims, “Hey, Lance.”
Lance nods a hello, then he turns to Keith: “This is Marina Russo. Cabin 11 and your tour guide. Good luck, Keith.”
Once outside, Keith can't help but ask.
“Cabin 11?”
“Hermes,” the girl responds, “god of travellers, thieves, and merchants among other stuff”
“Oh, is each cabin dedicated to a god?”
“Yup! And you will be staying in cabin 11 until your parent claims you.”
“How come?”
“You're a vagabond, so Hermes will protect you. Oh, this is the archery range” she adds the last sentence nonchalantly, gesturing to the open area.
A kid hits a perfect bullseye and Keith could have sworn her eyes were closed when she took the shot. This must show on his face because the next thing Marina says is: “Daughter of Apollo, they all have god given perfect aim,” before moving on to the next part of the tour.
So the Magical Destiny Tour of the camp continues until Keith is eventually lead to the cabin area: a circle of completely mismatched buildings, some looking like grand temples from ancient times, some like ranches out of an old western film. The one Marina leads him to looks like a bungalow. He is handed a bedding pack and told dinner is at 7. As soon as his bed is made, he passes out into a deep and much needed sleep.
He doesn’t dream of much, just darkness and an oddly familiar voice speaking in a language he does not understand. He wakes up groggy, but rested, and very very hungry.
He follows the general trend of people, who all seem to be heading for a pavilion overlooking the sea. He stands waiting in line behind a big guy who doesn’t seem to stop talking, ever. His hair is kept out of his face with an orange headband, and his yellow jacket has patches of grease stains and soot. He’s gesturing enthusiastically to someone named Pidge, whom Keith cannot see. Keith cannot help but overhear the words ‘automatons’ and ‘giant robot lions’. As they got closer to the food stand, the conversation shifted towards what dinner would be, and the big guy turned to Keith.
“What do you think it will be- Oh you’re new! Hunk Tupuola, cabin 9, nice to meet you” he said, and offered Keith a friendly hand.
“Keith Gyeong, I -uh- don’t know my cabin yet.”
Pidge joins the conversation, and Keith understands why he couldn’t see them before. They're small, with caramel coloured hair sticking out in every direction and eyes to match, hidden behind massive glasses that glint in the light in ways Keith is sure are forbidden by the laws of physics.
“You’ll find out soon enough, it doesn’t take too long for the big guys to claim you. I’m Pidge Holt, by the way,” they speak very quickly, reminding Keith slightly of the girl he met earlier.
“Who’s cabin 9 for?” Keith asks,
“Hephaestus, god of fire and blacksmiths,” Pidge gladly informs,
“And volcanos!” Hunk is quick to add,
“Oh” Keith says quietly, crossing another cabin off the mental list.
For the rest of the evening, he follows Hunk and Pidge’s lead, scraping off a bit of his food into the fire, discovering the glasses are self filling and asking for his favourite smoothie, sitting at with them for diner. He sits through the campfire, staring at the flames and lost in thought, most of it trying to process what he’d learned today, what this all meant.
Suddenly a lot of his memories make a lot more sense: When he was 7, his adoptive parents had taken him to the zoo, he’d run off among the petting animals and encountered ants the size of dogs. Another time, he’d sworn he saw a man breathe fire. Keith now understood these had been mythological beings. The fate of his adoptive parents had been made clear as glass. It hadn’t been some freak accident like he’d made himself believe, but of a magical cause with Keith himself as the target. Guilt stronger than anything he’s felt in years washes over him, bringing out his grief anew, and tears start to pool up in his eyes. Luckily enough, he’s found himself a seat near the edge so he simply sneaks away, towards the lake.
Keith sits at the dock as sobs shake his shoulders. He hasn’t felt this lost since he’d been separated from the only people he could call family. He pointlessly tries to wipe the tears off his face, still crying uncontrollably. He can hear someone’s footsteps approaching him, and tries to pull himself together -not that it works particularly well. He looks up to see who it is, and realises it’s the healer who patched up his shoulder.
“Hey, man” Lance says, sitting himself next to Keith and swinging his legs over the side.
“Hey” Keith replies, voice heavy with tears.
“Rough first day?” he asks, and Keith manages a half-laugh.
“Yeah, you could say that.”
“We’ve all been there. When someone tells you the entire world as you know it is a lie it can be hard to stomach. It probably becomes more difficult the older you are.” Lance continues, and Keith sniffles in response.
“Your siblings will help you through it.”
“I don’t have any siblings” Keith says, “not anymore.”
“I meant at camp. Your godly parent has made a vow to claim you, and you’re not nearly as young or as magical as the children of the Big Three - Zeus, Poseidon, Hades- so you have siblings.”
“Gee, thanks,” Keith forces a response out, trying to push any thoughts of doubt away.
Lance squints, once again getting in Keith’s space.
“Was that sarcasm? Are you being sarcastic with me, Gyeong?”
“I’m not sure”
“Then you’re definitely not an Apollo child.”
“I can’t be an Apollo child anyway, Lance, my father’s a mortal”
“Oh” he said, and Keith could detect some disappointment in his voice,
“Come back to the campfire, the songs start soon” he added a few seconds later, before getting up and walking down the dock.
Keith wants to follow him, but doesn't. Instead, he sits at the dock, watching the stars follow their paths in the sky, remembering all the myths Shiro had told him. Had he known all along who, what, Keith was?
The next morning, Keith goes along with the cabin 11’s schedule. He struggles through ancient Greek, the new alphabet looks like meaningless spaghetti to him. He falls a couple of times on the obstacle course, but manages to do pretty well overall. Archery is not his thing - though that might have to do with the instructor being one Lance Rosario. In the afternoon, the cabin is due for a sword fighting class.
They’re sharing the range with cabin 5. Keith has been informed the godly parent of this cabin is Ares, the god of war. He hasn’t met anyone yet and he already dislikes them.
He dislikes them even more when a boy his age named Lotor challenges the sword fighting instructor to a duel. He and the sword fighting instructor - a wind nymph named Allura- seem to be evenly matched in skill, and Keith watches on in awe as the two exchange swipes, parries and blows in what seems to be a very deadly dance. Eventually, Allura manages to disarm Lotor in one swift and skilful strike, while the boy is left wheezing. Allura then instructs everyone to find a sparring partner and Keith, new as he is, is left on his own.
“I guess you’re against me, then” Allura says with a smile and Keith can sense his impending doom.
Allura spends a good ten minutes trying to find Keith a decent sword. None of the ones in the tool shed seem to feel balanced in Keith’s hands, so he finds the best fit and makes do.
Allura shows no mercy on the newbie, within the first half hour Keith falls twice. There’s cuts on his arms from when he barely manages to deflect her sword. By the end of the next half hour, he’s starting to get the hang of it, managing to get in a few strikes of his own. That’s when Allura’s so far pleasant smile drops, and Keith fears for his life. She keeps pressing, forcing Keith to improve or be hurt, and Keith is just about able to keep up.
Then, Allura sets up a duel between him and Lotor. Lotor is ruthless, and Keith is left with no option but to defend. He tries to search for a pattern in Lotor’s attacks, anything that might give him a chance. This is a fight Keith refuses to lose. He eventually finds his opening. As if everything is in slow motion, he sidesteps, his elbow connecting with Lotor’s chest, while he uses the same manoeuvre used by Allura earlier to disarm Lotor. He hears Lotor’s sword hit the ground, then everything seems to return to its normal speed.
Keith is painfully aware of every little detail in his surroundings, every movement sets him alert, he can hear the exact direction of every sound he hears: his own breathing, his heart like a drum against his ribs, everything.
“I knew you were a natural!” Allura exclaims and Keith turns to look at her with confusion.
“What just happened?” he asks
“Battle instincts. Every demigod has them to a certain extent,” Lotor replies, “that was a good duel, I wouldn’t be surprised if you soon joined us in cabin 5.”
“Not gonna happen,” Keith says, half smiling.
He spends the rest of his afternoon in the sword fighting range, up against straw figures, and old rusty automatons. He brings down food from the pavilion, Red at his heels, and eats with Allura instead. This soon becomes routine.
A couple of weeks later, and Keith just picks at his pizza instead of eating it, mood dampened by the fact he’s still staying in cabin 11. Another new kid had joined the camp a few days after he did, and was quickly claimed by Demeter.
“What’s bothering you, Keith?” Allura asks, sick of watching him glare a hole into the paper plate.
“What if I’m doing this wrong?” he wonders aloud, “What if my mother never claims me?”
“The gods swore on the river Styx to claim all their children” Allura says, placing a comforting hand on his shoulder, “I cannot see why your godly parent wouldn’t want you, whoever she is she must have her reasons for the delay. These things can take time.”
“Thanks, Allura” he half-whispers, grateful.
Then a ka-BOOM resounds across Camp Half-Blood, and everyone scrambles to their feet. Allura and Keith look at each other, grab their swords and sprint towards the sound.
As they reach the clearing, Keith can make out what seems to be a giant red mechanical lion going berserk in the middle of the cabin ring. He can see a lot of demigods and nymphs with bows, crossbows and all other kinds of long-range weapons perched on roofs, trying to bring the lion down. The arrows seem to be bouncing aimlessly off its armour. Lotor tries to charge the lion, then runs away screaming as the lion breathes fire in his direction. Keith doesn’t blame him.
A thought tugs at the back of his mind, something about the lion, somewhere he’s heard it before. He closes his eyes, tries to focus on a memory, anything to help with the chaos unfolding around him. The sounds in the background fade away to a voice Keith knows he’s heard before:
“I was thinking, maybe we should install a flamethrower on Lion 2?”
“Hunk, a fire breathing automaton in Camp Half Blood is a terrible idea! Let’s install it.”
That’s it! He knows why he remembers the lion. Keith opens his eyes and scans the crowd for his friends. If the two of them built it, they should know how to shut it down. Keith would hate to see something as beautiful as the lion-automaton destroyed.
“Can you see Hunk or Pidge anywhere?” he asks Allura.
A moment later Allura points them out; they’re near the lion at the edge of the circle of campers. Keith pushes his way towards them.
“Oh boy, this is almost as bad as last time,” Keith hears Hunk say,
“This has happened before?” he asks,
“Not with the lions, but a year ago or so another Hephaestus kid named Leo Valdez found a giant metal dragon- that didn’t go so well.” Pidge replies in Hunks stead.
Keith pulls a face.
“How do we shut this thing down?” he asks,
“There’s a chip at the back of its head which controls the whole thing. If you can take it out you can force it to shut down.” Hunk tells him, “However, I don’t see how anyone would get close enough to do that.”
“Leave that to me,” Keith answers, then “Do either of you have a screwdriver?”
Pidge fishes through their pockets, then hands him a bright green screwdriver.
“Good luck, Keith” they say.
Keith nods, then runs into the circle.
He flanks the lion while it’s distracted by a sniper wearing a familiar blue checkered shirt. His idea is stupid, reckless and potentially deadly, but it’s the best one he has. He stabs the lion in the leg, and it roars, turning to face Keith. Uh-oh, Keith thinks, sure he’s about to be turned into crispy fried demigod. Then a perfectly aimed arrow hits the lion in the eye, knocking out the lights. Keith turns to look at the sniper and sees Lance giving me a thumbs up. He reminds himself to thank Lance later. Grabbing his sword, Keith pulls himself up, then uses the sword as a foothold.
Balancing on the lion’s back is difficult, Pidge and Hunk definitely built the thing with care. An arrow whistles past his ear, and Keith is reminded of how dangerous his idea is. This is how I die, he thinks, on the back of a giant metal lion shot down by friendly fire.
He quickly climbs up the lion’s neck, and almost falls off twice while it turns to try and torch different targets. He can see the panel Pidge and Hunk told him about, a few feet above him. “Sorry, buddy,” he tells the lion before stabbing his knife in the metal plating. Then he finds himself holding on to the dagger for dear life, as a giant metal machine tries to shake him off. He may or may not be screaming right now.
He lets go of the dagger at the right moment for the lion to fling him onto its head, a pleased smirk lighting up his face. He’s short for time so he quickly unscrews the metal panel, and stares at the electronics inside. There’s a lot of small chips connected to wires and there’s stuff Keith is pretty sure operates by magic. All the wires seem to pass through one bright red crystal, which Keith assumes is powering the whole thing. He yanks it out, holding his breath. He can hear the gears whirr as the lion powers down and crashes to the ground.
He pulls himself out of the wreckage and finds himself face to face with Lotor who is looking at him in awe. Allura, behind him is wearing a similar expression.
“Why is everyone staring at me?” Keith asks. In response, Allura points to the spot right above Keith’s head.