Chapter Text
Let’s talk about space.
Let’s talk about how it’s big and limitless and has endless possibilities.
Let’s talk about how, when you’re floating around in a pod that you may or may not have irreversibly damaged the comm system in, space suddenly feels a lot bigger, and a lot lonelier, than you’d ever imagined.
Keith had been thinking about space ever since he knew that the sun was the middle of their universe. After he learned that there were more planets beyond pluto, he’d been completely sold on the idea of thinking about space for the rest of his life. The fact that he wound up at the Galaxy Garrison just happened to line up with that plan.
But lately, Keith’d been wondering if he’d seen too much of space.
When he was a kid, he’d been trained that the galaxy was fabulous place that had so many wonderful things that the people of Earth couldn’t even begin to imagine. He’d decided that, when he eventually did leave for space, he’d be able to leave all of his earth problems behind. No dads who left or moms that died or boys that disappeared without a real explanation. Just him, the stars, and maybe a nice rocket.
Turns out, going to explore the universe didn’t give you a free pass to just leave everything that bothered you behind. If anything, it was all of that plus new problems like aliens that weren’t very nice and magic robot cats that you wound up piloting.
Red would’ve killed him if she found out that he’d called her a cat.
She was the hardest goodbye that he gave before he left, mostly because she was the only one he’d said goodbye too. He’d somehow thought that he could just slip in and out, leaving his bayard and armor, without her saying a word. What an idiot. They didn’t exactly talk, that’s not how the lions worked, but he’d felt her disapproval when he’d set down the bayard. He’d felt the nag in the back of his mind that was her way of telling him to stay. He’d felt the emptiness as he left with a final “be good to the next guy,”, but maybe that feeling was more him that her.
Maybe it was kind of both.
He’d felt bad for skirting around the truth with Allura. But she didn’t question him or the fact that he wasn’t dressed in his own clothes. That he had a large sack of his belongings slung across his back. So he tried to be as gentle with his attempts to leave by himself as he could.
Maybe this was the coward’s way out. Maybe he should’ve sat down with the team, had a rational conversation, not destroyed his comm system.
But Keith thought about Shiro. He thought about how he’d looked so ridiculously peaceful last night, and Keith felt awful because he knew that he was being selfish by taking as much of that as he could get before he left. He thought about how he would do anything for that man, about how if Shiro had asked him not to go then he wouldn’t’ve. Because out of every problem that Keith had to deal with, out of every monster and crumbling planet and opening of Lance’s mouth, he had Shiro. Shiro, who’d left him but came back but not the same. Stronger, but not because of his new arm. Stronger in the sense that he’s seen things that someone so young shouldn’t ever see.
There was a pattern, Keith had noticed. Leaving. Parents and Shiro’s and friends and senses of self and whole planets. And… Was it sick that Keith was happy that he was finally the person that was leaving, and not being left? Of course he wished that it were under different circumstances. Of course it tore out Keith’s heart to sneak away from that little room like a crook in the night. Of course in an ideal world he wouldn’t have to leave in the first place.
But still, this had been his choice, this had been Keith’s doing. And as he let his head fall back so he could look at the vast nothing of space, Keith settled into himself. This was something that he’d needed to do. This was for the safety of the team. He was a liability, he was a threat, and on top of all of that he had a million questions about himself that he knew nobody on the team would ever truly understand. He didn’t other options.
He’d be back eventually.
He told himself that a lot.
One day he’d go back, but he needed to sort himself out first.
-
Six months later
-
Word of Voltron’s victory spread across the universe. Even to the most remote, most distant parts of it. The parts that Keith seemed to find himself these days. He was proud of them, he really was. And he wanted to go back. He so, so desperately wanted to.
At this point, though, it was too late. He kept up with their news, he knew that Lance was in Red - why?- and Allura was in Blue. And Keith? Keith was forgotten. He hadn’t been the one that Zarkon was tracking, so what? He still had a million other questions that needed answering and almost no leads. He had his sack, he had his knife, and he had a handful of credits that he’d made doing odd jobs, usually smuggling things past Galra borders.
Oh, yeah, another thing he had: a new race to belong to. Galra. The thought curdled in his head like sour milk.
He’d walked into an alien knife dealer, a handful of weeks after he’d landed on Adriemia -which was a week after he’d discarded the pod on Bragua FJ4, from which he’d promptly smuggled onto a cargo ship and gotten off at the first stop.- The minute he’d heard the steel bells ring when he’d entered the shop, something felt off. It took a whopping three ticks before a short, old, possibly female alien came out from behind the counter. The blue swirls decorating her orange skin vaguely reminded Keith of Allura and Coran, but he pushed the thought from his head the minute it entered.
“We don’t serve Galra here.” She said firmly, and Keith had to admire her bravery. Even if she was wrong, denying someone she thought was Galra took guts. Keith was sure he would’ve liked her had her words to him not been so, so wrong in every way.
“I’m not Galra,” he replied calmly, searching for her eyes, only to find opaque orbs staring back at him. Must be blind, he thought. Explains why she thought I was Galra.
“Yes you are,” she countered, reaching over to grab what looked like it could be a broom, but there were live worm-like creatures attached to the end of it. “You glow red, just like the rest of them! Angry, destructive, chaotic red!” She moved to whack him with the broom-thing, but cleanly dodged it and palmed his knife, which he’d long since stopped bothering to wrap in his cloth. Who’d he have to hide it from, now? Everyone he really cared about was left behind. She tried to hit him again, but this time instead of dodging he intercepted the wooden handle with the blade, catching her broom in midair.
“What do you mean ‘I glow?’” He asked, pushing the knife a bit closer to her.
She looked like she was about spit at him.
After what he’d done to the team, Keith probably would’ve let her.
It didn’t come to that, though. Before she could bark out another scathing comment, there was a voice speaking behind them, which startled Keith as the bells attached to the door hadn’t chimed.
“She’s an Astral Reader, in case you couldn’t tell,” Keith looked over to see a masked and hooded figure, with a strong build and a menacing sword slung across his back.
The woman bit out a hiss, muttering another, “I said we don’t serve Galra.” before backing away to retreat behind her desk, and Keith noticed the faintest hint of a tail behind her floor-length skirt. Keith thought for a moment, ultimately deciding that this wasn’t worth it, and left the shop with an indignant huff. The masked figure followed him into the street.
Adriemia was a small planet, and the entirety of it was covered in a vast cityscape. As he moved along the ground level, he looked up to see layer after layer of bridges connecting buildings, hovercraft transportation, and floating advertisements. As he kept walking, the stranger kept on his tail. Keith maneuvered left and right, doubling back and circling blocks multiple times, but the mysterious creature kept stalking him. Eventually, Keith sighed to himself -because of course he had to deal with this. Did he ever get a break?- and readjusted his dark red bandana, which he’d been using to tie over his face in an effort to hide his identity. Whatever. Fine. Fine. He’ll find another knife dealer later. There was bound to be at least twelve more in this district alone.
Keith wandered down an ally, putting up the guise of being lost when he, in fact, knew exactly where he was. He’s not an idiot, after all. Of course he’d grabbed one of Pidge’s devices that plugged into pretty much any mainframe and seemed to be the most convenient thing in the world. (She’d made them for everyone after they’d been separated through the corrupted wormhole. Each had the ability to send out a distress signal, as well as hack into security cameras to give live feed and a blueprint of wherever they were.)
(Keith missed her a lot.)
(Keith didn’t let himself ponder on that thought for more than a second.)
So, yeah, he knew his way around the planet. He knew that this ally was a dead end. Just like he knew that there was a fire escape on one side of it that he could use to hide and get the jump on his follower.
And get the jump he did.
As soon the unknown creature paused to look for Keith, he jumped. He landed gracelessly on the alien, his legs twining around their waist and his arms around their neck before they had the chance to react. He thought back to the Castle, and how he probably looked like Pidge when Hunk gave her piggyback rides down the seemingly endless halls. The sword on the alien’s back dug into Keith’s ribcage -Shiro’s sweatshirt only giving him so much protection against things like that- and the stranger thrashed around until eventually slamming Keith onto the wall.
That cause the former red paladin to stumble and fall off, landing in a crouched position. He palmed his knife and the alien turned, drawing their sword. It was long, sleek and dark. Curved at the end it kind of reminded Keith of what he thought pirates used for weapons. And there, at the top of the hilt, was the same design on Keith’s knife. The same glowing purple sigil that had driven Keith from his team.
“Who did you steal that blade from?” A booming female voice came from behind the mask, the three purple circles and casting an ominous light on their otherwise shadowy corner. She twirled her blade, though not in a show-offish manor. It seemed almost relaxed as she sank back into a crouch of her own. “You do not read as a member of the Blade.”
“I-I didn’t steal it!” He countered, suddenly thrown off guard by the fact that she must know something about what was happening. This is what he’d abandoned the team for, this is what he was looking for. And suddenly, he was facing it down, both ready to harm the other. Keith had never considered that, perhaps, his answers were better left undiscovered. “I’ve had it all my life.”
“You lie!” The female hissed and lunged at him. Keith dodged easily, tossing his knife between hands and aiming to block the sword as she moved in again. This time, the blades caught, and Keith had to use both hands to brace against the strength of this mysterious stranger.
“Please!” He begged, forcing the blades apart and rapidly backing up, “I’m telling the truth! I don’t want to fight! I’ve had this knife for longer than I can remember. Just tell me what it means!”
“We don’t serve Galra here.”
“You fight like a Galra.”
The way his hands had turned that hideous purple when the quintesence had spilled onto him.
“You seek knowledge?” She asked, stepping back and lowering her weapon. Keith inhaled sharply and nodded. When was the last time he’d been in a fight? A few weeks? He was off his game, getting sloppy through laziness. The female alien inspected him again before sheathing her sword and removing her mask, though the hood remained. Staring back at him, with big, yellow eyes, was a Galra soldier.
Keith readjusted his grip on the knife.
“My organization has only one way to attain knowledge.” She jut out her chin, which had three dark purple striped running over the light blue skin, from the bottom of her lip and disappearing beneath the collar of her armor.
“Anything,” Keith huffed, “I’ll do it.”
She considered him for another moment, and for the first time Keith saw intelligence and rationality in the dandelion eyes of a Galra soldier. “The Trials of Marmora.” She straightened, gaze burning Keith, “should you survive, the answers you seek will become apparent to you.”
Keith’s not going to lie, the hardest part of the trials weren’t the countless battles. It wasn’t even seeing his dad after what felt like an eternity. The hardest part was standing there, listening to a vision of Shiro the he knew wasn’t real but couldn’t help hoping was tell him that he was being selfish.
It mostly hurt because it was true, because Keith knew it was true.
He knew it wasn’t real, but it might as well have been.
The name of the Blade woman who’d originally found him was Brae. She was a scout sent to Adriemia to see if she could find any information on possible new Galra Empire stations. She was mean and stern and unafraid to speak and also probably the best fighter that Keith knew.
After the Trials, after it was confirmed to him that he was at least partially Galra, he’d explained his situation. He was a paladin of Voltron on a little personal detour. They told him that the paladins of Voltron would be arriving any varga now, as one of the Blade members, Ulaz, had gone against orders and sent word to them. They offered to let Keith stay on the base until the rest of his team arrived, and Keith declined because he still had questions, if not more than he’d started out with. He’d asked them if they wouldn’t mind failing to mention that he’d been there and they agreed.
They gave him a single-pilot ship and let him keep his blade, which was more than Keith could’ve really asked for. As he was leaving, Brae gave him a small device to ring if he ever needed help, and then promised that if all went smoothly with Voltron when he returned she’d be glad to finish their battle without the high-stakes of actual death, which Keith took as a compliment.
And that was that, and Keith was gone.
As it turns out, the artist Hyteri (the person responsible for this entire AU in the first place) has more than one work in the collection! Such as this!