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- It had been four days since he’d gotten any sleep. Keith had pushed the limit on sleep deprivation back at the Garrison, when grade dependent essays waited for no man or when flight simulators were considered much higher priority than sleep.
In the desert he’d had many sleepless nights, when there had been too many noises outside his shack and no one around for miles. He’d bundled himself up with a gun in his lap and a blanket around his shoulders, pointed himself at the window, and waited for day break.
That had been different, though. There were moments to catch up on sleep, there. Lazy afternoons that were too sweltering to move at all were perfect for catching up on long lost hours of sleep. He had a lot of freetime after being expelled from the Garrison. He hadn’t had to keep a sleep schedule.
Space was a different story, though. Free time was no longer a thing that existed, or at least it wasn’t a thing anyone hoped for. When it was available, it was a precious treasure, treated with the utmost respect and never wasted. Keith had intended to spend his with Hunk, going over those documents Hunk was so excited about.
He really hadn’t meant to fall asleep.
It had been about four day cycles since he’d slept, though. Every mission bled into the next when they happened frequently enough, and the adrenaline following missions left him too wired to even attempt closing his eyes. He hadn’t realized his mistake until too late, when even the post battle adrenaline couldn’t win against the heavy exhaustion shutting down his body. He’d been falling asleep on his feet when Hunk said, “Go wait in the living room, dude. I’ll meet you there in a sec.”
So Keith went, and he waited, and he dreamt he was on a boat. It wasn’t a vivid dream, but it was nice. Keith had never been on a real boat back on Earth, but it was easy to imagine. Blue sky, clear water, the silent calm and the easy sensation of rocking.
Back and forth, back and forth. Keith felt like his head was lolling, being moved ever so gently. And that was when his brain picked up the sensation of pressure, of something touching him, and that was when Keith woke up.
He woke sideways, horizontal on a couch he was sure he’d been sitting on before. His head was resting against something sturdy, and there was the obviously warm presence of another body nearby. Then there was the feeling of something that was both rough and soft at the same time raking over the side of his head, and that woke Keith up completely.
He opened his eyes to Antok, the large Galra leaning over him, tongue half out of his mouth.
Keith blinked once, twice, then sat up quickly and jerked away.
“Um,” he said, words getting lost on his sleep heavy tongue. He rubbed a hand over his face, scooted a little farther on the couch, and frowned. “What were you doing?” he asked, ending the sentence with a yawn that took up his entire face.
Antok stared at him, something soft in his expression. Keith suddenly felt vulnerable, like Antok was staring right through him, seeing something he wasn’t supposed to. God, Keith needed to sleep. He was starting to get paranoid.
“Grooming you,” Antok said simply, as if that was the most normal thing in the world. Keith wrinkled his nose up. “You needed rest. I was providing comfort.”
Right. Well. “Thanks…” Keith managed, pushing himself up off the couch and standing on shaky legs. “I’m just gonna… yeah.” He hooked a thumb at the door and ambled away, off down the hallway and towards his quarters. He didn’t realize until he got to the privacy of his room, after Shiro and Allura had giggled at him in the hallway, that the hair on half his head was sticking up in the most amazing cowlick ever.
“God damn it,” he muttered, too lazy to fix it, no real vehemence in his voice.
They lived together. They saw each other look ridiculous all the time.
Besides, Keith was too lazy to care. He just kicked his shoes off and collapsed into bed. He barely got the blanket pulled up over him before falling back into sleep. He didn’t dream of boats this time around, but he kind of wished he had.
- Lance’s eyes were brimming with tears as they all crowded onto the couch around Pidge’s laptop. “I look at these when I’m lonely,” Pidge had said, double clicking on a folder and opening up a sea of jpeg files. They’d gone through all of them, finding comfort in the images of Earth, even if they weren’t looking at their own families.
Pidge had a dog, and a nice house, and a happy family. They had a back yard with grass and room to run around. She had baby pictures of her and her brothers, pictures that followed them sporadically through childhood, and a good number of ridiculous selfies the two of them had taken with the computer’s webcam.
They’d gone through every single one of them, and by the time they reached the end, both the Alteans and the Galra on board had come into the room to join them.
“Let me see what we have here,” Coran had said, getting up from the couch and going over to a panel on the wall. After a great deal of fiddling, part of the wall illuminated like a screen and images began to flash across.
They showed the paladins of old, and just looking at the predecessors made Keith feel anxious. They had so much to live up to, so much that could go wrong. They had a mission that stretched on forever, and Keith finally had someplace he belonged.
It felt as suffocating as it did comforting.
There were other images, too. A few showed Coran and Alfor in their youth, others showed the newly married King and Queen alongside their Royal Advisor on the day of the wedding. Further down the line were pictures of Allura, held in her parents arms. There were some through her childhood, pictures of her and her parents and other children, of her and the paladins and Coran.
The way Coran was smiling was a clear enough message- the love in those pictures was genuine. It was all as familial as it looked.
It didn’t take along for Lance to actually start crying, and for Allura to join him after that. Keith leaned into Shiro’s side and tried not to feel uncomfortable. Part of him wished he had something to share.
“I have one,” Kolivan stated, and Keith glanced over just in time to see Antok’s unmasked face light up with surprise. Kolivan reached into the front of his shirt and fished something out of a hidden pocket, a small circular device just slightly bigger than his thumb print. Kolivan clutched it between his thumb and forefinger and pointed it at the wall.
The image changed, picture of teenage Allura and younger Coran making faces in the castle mirrors being exchanged for something much older. The colors were colder, image not exactly as clear, but it was easy to make out the scene in front of them.
It was a group of Galra in Blade of Marmora garb, standing in what Keith remembered to be the entrance hall. There were at least a dozen people in the picture, but with a little bit of studying, Keith could pick out some familiar faces. Ulaz was standing to the left, arm thrown over the shoulders of Thace and someone else. The three of them were smiling impossibly big, the younger versions of themselves overcome with glee even in the middle of the war.
Another Blade member was standing behind the other, hanging limply off her shoulders like a cat and grinning at the camera. They reminded Keith of Lance and Pidge. He couldn’t hold back a grin.
A number of the photo’s occupants were standing seriously, with crossed arms and straight looks on their faces. In the middle of the scene, however, were two people that Keith barely recognized. They had aged greatly, color faded and faces decorated with scars. How long ago had this picture been taken?
Kolivan and Antok stood in the middle of the pictures, shoulder to shoulder. Antok had his arm draped around Kolivan’s shoulders, and Kolivan stood against him comfortably. Antok’s smile lit up his entire face, while Kolivan’s grin radiated a million emotions at once. Hope and pride, joy and sadness, comfort and fear, and the determination of a young man obviously destined to lead.
“Does that have both on it?” Antok asked, taking the pod from Kolivan’s hand and flicking his thumb over the side. The image changed, this one less busy and slightly blurred, like the person who took the photo had been trying to move quickly.
It was Kolivan and Antok, both of them just as young as the photo before, sitting close and wrapped up in each other. Kolivan had his tongue out, was running it up the side of Antok’s face while Antok leaned in, eyes closed and grin huge.
The picture made it seem like, in that moment, nothing had existed beyond the two of them.
“That was after one of our first battles as a resistance,” Antok said, nudging Kolivan gently. “You had such trouble relaxing, back then. It was nearly impossible to calm you.”
“Somehow you managed,” Kolivan answered, nudging Antok right back. “What cubs we were then… look at us.”
“What a cub you were,” Antok offered. “Even let yourself be groomed like one.”
A loud sniffle caught Keith’s attention and drew him away. “This is too cute, guys,” Hunk gushed, wiping at his nose with the back of his hand. “Also, I think you might have broken Lance.”
Lance was hiding his face against Hunk’s shoulder, not moving or making a sound. Allura reached over and patted him not too gently on the back of the head, and Shiro offered him a comforting knee squeeze. Keith had the overwhelming urge to nuzzle against him, which he suppressed, instead pushing closer to Shiro and grumbling quietly as Pidge clambered over him to plop down on Hunk and Lance’s laps.
“Let’s take a new picture,” she said, fishing her phone out of her pocket and turning it on. “Something to show off when we’re old. So we have proof of what our family looks like right now.”
“Our family, huh?” Keith asked her, aiming for teasing. She shot him a look.
“Yes, family . Don’t start with me, Kogane. Everyone get in the picture.”
Allura shifted her arm just a tad longer to get them all in the frame, squeezed together tight on the couch. They all looked tired, run ragged and a little rough around the edges. But that was who they were, just then. That was the family Pidge wanted to capture.
And if they were a family, well… Keith really couldn’t ask for a better one.
….
Keith didn’t mean to walk in on them. He paused the moment he realized his mistake, holding his breath and peeking around the door into the room. He’d forgotten his jacket in the living room earlier that day and had come back to retrieve it. Faced with the scene in front of him, Keith decided to wait.
Kolivan and Antok were on the couch, backs to the door and demeanor calm. They were pressed close together, Kolivan leaning into Antok while Antok traced the back of his ear with his tongue.
It was gross, but also kind of sweet, and way more intimate than Keith had any business looking at. He backed slowly and silently out of the room and tiptoed back down the hallway.
His jacket could wait.
He wandered the halls of the castle for a while and eventually found himself in Red. He curled up in the pilot’s seat, comforted by the familiar environment of the cockpit and the quiet hum in the back of his head.
Red was warm and comforting and content with him being there. He dug the extra blanket out of the storage in the back and wrapped it around himself. He fell asleep like that, just for a short while, and dreamed of a real red lion curled up protectively around him.
- Kolivan could handle a lot of things. The sting of a whip, the bite of an electric shock, the taste of blood on his teeth. Drowning, beating, having someone root around in your brain- the Blade of Marmora trained to endure all of these types of things without cracking. They had to, for the sake of the rebellion. The fate of the universe depended on it.
It had come up in conversation once with the paladins, and the air had grown stiff with discomfort. Lance had lightened the mood by referring to the Blade of Marmora as the “Galactic Seals! You know, like the Navy Seals of space!” They’d all gotten a chuckle out of that, though Kolivan hadn’t understood what it meant.
“The Navy Seals are the strongest soldiers in our country,” Hunk had told him. “They train to do all kinds of stuff like you guys do. They’re the big guns, kind of like Voltron… but they can handle anything.”
Kolivan couldn’t handle anything. He told himself he could, and he projected an illusion of strength and tranquility, as was expected and necessary for a good leader. But there were things he did not feel strong enough to handle, things that training couldn’t prepare him for. Listening to the echoes of Keith’s screams bouncing off the walls was pushing Kolivan about as far as he could stand.
It was tempting, oh so horribly tempting, to try to break down the door and go after him. He wanted to pace the cell, scream, and hit the walls until they crumbled. He wanted to threaten whoever was hurting him, tell them that whatever they did to his cub he’d return in abundance. He wanted to release the dangerous, on fire spirit festering in his gut and growling to be let out.
But he couldn’t. He couldn’t show he cared for Keith like that, couldn’t show they were having an effect on him at all. He couldn’t do anything but sit back in his cell, back against a corner so he could survey the entire room, and wait. He couldn’t show them he was hurt, or scared, or angry, because they would take that, they would take his care for Keith, and they would break him.
Kolivan refused to be broken.
He kept his eyes sealed on the door and absorbed every scream that came to him, every bitten back cry and crack of a whip, every crackle of electricity, every labored breath. He let the noises wash over him and tried to stay calm.
In situations like this, somebody had to be.
Strength and tranquility. Kolivan had trained for this. Kolivan had signed up for this.
Kolivan could handle anything. He sat back, and listened, and waited, and hoped that when they returned his cub to him, they’d return him in one piece.
…
Keith woke up drowning. He jerked back against the wave of slime that hit his face, stumbling and falling. Something stopped his fall, wrenching his shoulders and startling a pained cry from his mouth.
“Oh how I love to watch them squirm,” a voice said, but Keith didn’t know who it belonged to. He didn’t know where he was. He blinked his eyes frantically, trying to clear the thick mucus from his eyelashes and regain his vision. Blurry, but there. Keith saw purple lights, shadows on the wall, something menacing and shiny and sharp. He blinked again, tried to breathe. The slime tasted sour, like curdled milk, and it stung his eyes like salt water.
He steadied himself on his feet, finding the floor with only a touch of struggle. He blinked again and looked up. Ah, there were his arms, chained in shackles and attached to the ceiling. He tugged at his wrists, and his shoulders ached in protest. His neck was stiff, his hands numb- how long had he been there?
“Figure it out yet?”
Keith’s head snapped up, searching after the source of a voice. The owner was tall, purple, with sharp teeth and at least eight feet of height. He wore Galra armor and held a rod in his mammoth hands. Keith suppressed a gulp, leveled the guy with a glare, and said nothing.
“A tough guy, huh?” the Galra asked him. “Your species is fiery, I’ll give you that. The Champion held the ring longer than any gladiator in the history of the Galra Empire. We need to visit Earth one of these days, find out what exactly they do to make your type so strong.”
Keith’s froze with panic as the Galra spoke to him. The Champion- that was Shiro. Was Shiro here? Was Shiro safe ? Had he come as rescue? He hadn’t been on their mission….
This mission- fuck. What had happened to their mission? They were infiltrating the ship, following a trace Pidge had found. They’d thought it was her brother when she’d first found it, based on the excitement in her eyes, but no. They thought they’d found Thace, the Blade Kolivan and Antok spoke so highly of, the one who’d sacrificed himself for Keith in the battle against Zarkon. She said he was alive. They’d come looking for him.
They’d infiltrated the ship, and then… then…. Keith couldn’t remember. It was missing- whatever had happened after they’d docked and snuck inside was gone. All he knew was the ache in his arms and back, the pounding in his head, the rancid smell that filled his nose and mouth and eyes, the sadistic studying stare of the Galra across the room.
We need to visit Earth one of these days , he said. They knew Earth’s name. They knew where it was.
Lance and Pidge and Hunk had families there. Shiro had an entire life there. There were seven billion people for the Galra Empire to exploit and enslave, and here, tied to the ceiling without his memories or a means of escaping, Keith could do nothing about it.
“Looks like I’ve made an impression,” the Galra said, circling Keith, just out of reach. Keith whipped his head around, desperate not to lose sight of such a significant threat.
But his arms were in the way, and he was basically immobile. The guy disappeared behind his back, and then something was slamming into the backs of Keith’s knees. He fell again, fire ripping its way through both shoulders at the force of his weight. He bit back a cry and clenched his teeth.
“Good,” the Galra said. “Maybe you’ll be easier to break than your friend.”
…
The broken leg had been easier. That had been zero to sixty, and while the excruciating pain had been drawn out for hours, at least it was constant. It hurt, and it hurt, and it kept hurting until he woke up icy cold. He’d take that again- hell, he’d take two broken legs over this.
The trials of Marmora had been easier. At least then he’d seen the attacks coming at him. He hadn’t been quick enough to avoid most of them, but at least he watched them happen. Training with Antok was easier. Allura’s training was easier. Even the tall and dangerous shadows of Keith’s childhood- the ones that convinced him everyone was unsafe and taught him to take a hit without crying- even they had been easier to handle than his.
His back was on fire. He burned from his shoulders all the way to the backs of his knees, an unrelenting sting and ache accompanied with the sensation of blood pouring down his back and over his wounds. The room smelled of blood and sweat, burnt hair from the electric rod the Galra had so much fun with and sulfur from the slime they sloshed over his head any time they felt he wasn’t paying attention.
Keith sagged against his bonds, which wrapped around his forearms securely enough to hold his weight without breaking his wrists. That didn’t save his shoulders, but Keith was looking for the little miracles here. He needed something to hold onto.
“I will get what I want. You’ll either give it to me, or I’ll go in your head and take it myself,” the Galra said, the sadistic smile gone from his face and replaced with a look of pure irritation. Keith was pushing his buttons. He’d always been good at that. “What’s it going to be, half-breed?”
Keith summoned up the little bit of willpower he had left and spit in the Galra’s face, blood and saliva splattering his ugly gob from his nose to his chin. Ha. Right on target. Keith actually smiled.
The crack of the Galra’s hand against his face made the smile drop right off. Galran skin was like leather. Keith’s teeth clacked together. He tasted blood.
“Have it your way,” the Galra growled, shoving close to Keith and gripping chin in a punishingly tight grip. Keith held his tongue and fought back a whimper. “Back up!” the guy barked, and then the door whizzed open. The Galra stepped aside to reveal a druid, dressed in robes and a haunting white mask that reminded Keith of that lame vintage horror movie Pidge had made them watch on an off-night. It hadn’t been scary in the movie. Keith tried to convince himself that it wasn’t scary now.
“Do whatever you have to,” the Galra snapped to the druid, stepping aside as the druid drew closer. Keith tugged at his wrists and wondered if he had the strength to jump up and plant both his feet in the middle of the druid’s chest. Or his head, maybe. Yeah, face was better.
Keith figured he had the strength for that, but he might not have the strength to endure the whipping that action would earn him. Instead he forced himself to stay still; he forced himself not to flinch as the druid crept closer and wrapped its unnaturally cold hand around Keith’s throat. He held his breath, the druid’s claws pressed against his pulse points, and then everything lit up in a burst of electricity as Keith’s vision went white.
…
White. Everything was white, too bright, hot and dry.
“Keith!” a voice called from somewhere. Keith picked his head up and spit out sand, blinking against the harsh desert sunlight and scrubbing sand out of his eyes. “You totally wiped out there, cadet! Who taught you that hair-brained maneuver?”
Keith shot a playful glare up at Shiro as the older boy pulled Keith to his feet with a firm grip.
“You did, sir!” Keith shot back, making his voice painfully offbeat, the voice they used to mock freshmen recruits behind their backs after Shiro’s morning simulator classes. Shiro glared right back at him, unable to keep the smile off his face. He shoved Keith’s shoulder, sending the still dizzy teen tumbling back into the sand and down the small drift he’d wrecked his hover bike on.
“Race you back to the Garrison!” Shiro hollered, uprighting Keith’s bike before hopping on his own.
“Cheater!” Keith shouted after him, stumbling to his feet and sprinting to his bike as Shiro took off across the desert.
…
“Cheater!” Lance yelled, shoving at Keith’s face with the palms of his hands. Keith raised his pillow above his head and brought it down on Lance with a solid ‘whap!’
“How do you cheat at a pillow fight?” he asked, teasing lilt to his voice and challenging smile on his face. He was so focused on holding a pillow over his giggling teammate that he didn’t notice Pidge until it was too late.
“Like this,” she said, and launched herself over the back of the couch, tackling Keith, and sending the three of them crashing into the floor.
“Guys, somebody is going to get hurt!” Hunk said, standing cautiously at the edge of the room, peeking at them with a disapproving expression. That was when Shiro joined in.
“Hunk’s right,” he said. “Especially when I do this !” Shiro leapt on top of all of them, yelling ‘dog pile!’ Keith was consequentially crushed under their fearless leader, nose to nose with Lance and pinned next to a still battling Pidge, who committed herself to digging her fingers into Shiro’s sides and trying to launch him off with her feet, leg press style.
Lance’s eyes crinkled as he smirked. “Fancy meeting you her- ow!” The force of Coran jumping on top of the dog pile shoved Keith’s head down, causing his and Lance’s foreheads to smack together. Keith rolled off of Lance with a groan, and Lance clutched at his face. Pidge cackled like the gremlin she was, which did nothing to help Keith’s headache.
…
Headache. Head, God, Keith’s head hurt.
“Your memories are mine,” said a woman’s voice, hauntingly familiar and chilling Keith down to his core. “I can get anything I want from you. Got anything to hide?”
…
Keith tightened the knot of his bandana and crept down the hallway on cat’s feet, clutching his backpack straps tightly and praying to a God he didn’t believe in that the food he’d stolen wouldn’t rustle.
The desert was a cruel home, bad for gardening or scavenging, even though his father had taught him how. Useless, of course. Just like everything else related to his dad.
He didn’t have any money, otherwise he would have picked up supplies in town. But he was broke, on the run, and out of options. Stealing from a store was hard. Stealing food from the Garrison? Not as hard as you would expect.
Know the guard’s schedules, step lightly under the cameras, don’t bother with lights, and don’t make a sound. Get in, get out. He’d gotten too good at this. What would Shiro think if he could see him now?
Nothing , Keith chided himself. He’s dead.
The way the memory swayed and faded with the fog of consciousness wasn’t real, but the drowning feeling that welled up in his chest was, a heart break renewed and lived all over again.
…
“The Champion?” Haggar asked, and it must have been her hand around his throat now. When had that changed? Keith wasn’t sure. How long had he been there? Where was he?
“Well isn’t that cute?” Her hand tightened. Keith couldn’t breathe. He was thrown into the fog again.
…
“You can do this,” Shiro said, and he sounded so sure of himself that Keith almost wanted to believe him. His arms were strong where they were wrapped around him in a tight hug, the kind of embrace Keith had always ducked away from before. He didn’t like being touched. He’d learned not to trust it.
Shiro was teaching him a lot of things, though.
“It’s only six months.” Shiro’s voice was as strong as the rest of him, holding Keith up, holding him together, as if it were Keith who was about to plunge into the depths of space, farther than mankind had ever gone before, the youngest pilot the Garrison had let go past Mars. “You can do this without me. I know you can. I believe in you.
“Patience yields focus. You’re so much stronger than you give yourself credit for.”
Keith didn’t trust himself to say anything, so he just squeezed Shiro tight one last time before letting go. He pushed back, putting space back between them, and steadying his breath with the concentration of a monk.
“You’d better be an officer when I get back,” Shiro said sternly, smile teasing. Keith chuckled and shot him a mock salute.
His voice cracked as he said, “Yes sir.” Shiro’s smile cracked when they called for loading. Keith kept his head up and kept his back ramrod straight as the only family that ever mattered turned and walked away, out of his life, out of this world, for six months or longer.
Longer.
So much longer.
…
“How much longer?” Lance complained, tossing himself dramatically over the back of the pilot’s seat. Keith rolled his eyes.
“Coran said it’d be a long trip. Sit down before you fall over.”
“We’re in open space. How am I going to- ACK!”
Keith pulled Red out of a perfect corkscrew and grinned at his annoying team member. “What was that? Red’s false gravity acts a bit funny when she’s upside down? Maybe we should test that again….”
“Okay! Okay, I’m going- geesh. Dad! Keith’s being mean to me.”
“Did you deserve it?” Shiro’s voice asked from the back of the cockpit. He’d long since given in to the paladins calling him dad. ‘So long as you remember the real dad here is Coran,’ he’d joked one night. Coran had agreed dubiously.
Shiro’s voice sounded bored. He was reading, or napping, or something. Keith wished Lance hadn’t disturbed him. He didn’t sleep enough.
Either way. “Yes!” Keith chimed in, before Lance could answer.
“Then shut up.”
…
Shut up , Keith growled at himself, throwing his head to the side and trying to break Haggar’s hold. Stop thinking! But he couldn’t. It was unconscious, his awareness chasing memories through his head like he was going down rabbit holes, throwing him all over the place and making him dizzy. His mouth tasted metallic. He let out a broken cry when the whip came down on his back again.
“Be still!” the rough voice of the Galra from earlier scolded. Keith had almost forgotten about him. Almost forgotten where he was.
And that was when Shiro walked through the door.
“Let go of him!” he shouted, arm activating with a tell-tale hum. He launched himself into the room, and Haggar squeezed Keith’s jaw, forced his head forward. Still chained to the ceiling and caught in her grasp, Keith couldn’t do anything but watch.
…
“Shhh…” Kolivan soothed. He clutched Keith close to him, wary of the stripes decorating his back, careful with touch. “Shhh, be at peace, it is not real.”
When they’d thrown Keith back into the cell he’d been too weak to stand on his own legs, barely conscious at all. Regardless, he’d pounded at parts of the door he could reach, and he’d screamed mindlessly for Shiro.
“They killed him,” Keith murmured in the present, breath coming out in trembles. “I saw it.”
“It is not real,” Kolivan reassured again, pulling Keith impossibly closer and tucking him tight against his chest. “Listen to me, it is not real. This is real. Focus with me here.”
“Patience yields focus,” Keith said, his voice barely above a whisper. Damn those druids. Damn them to the deepest black hole and the darkest parts of hell. They’d taken Keith away in one piece and returned him broken. Not permanently, Kolivan hoped. No, he knew . Keith was strong. Keith was a fighter. This experience would do nothing but drive him, in the end.
“Patience yields focus,” Kolivan agreed. He ran his fingers through Keith’s hair, as gently as he could manage. The cub was so small, all of him so delicate even when healthy. Small enough to fold up and fit in your pocket, and Kolivan tried not to let that distract him, but in moments like this he felt distractions were permissible. Small comforts were an aid to will. He clutched Keith close, being weak now and knowing in the near future that he could not be.
“Rest,” Kolivan whispered. “You do not need to fight now, little warrior. You are safe. I am here.”
He was as safe as Kolivan could keep him, and considering where they were, that wasn’t very safe at all. Small comforts, though. Distractions. Keith would forgive a white lie in this sort of situation.
He probably wouldn’t even remember it. The boy was dead weight in Kolivan’s lap, too weak to do anything but let Kolivan hold him. His legs were draped over Kolivan’s own, side pressed to Kolivan’s chest, head lolling on his shoulder. He was dead weight, but still so light. Light and small and still trembling, covered in blood and reeking of disaster. Keith would never be able to rest like this, so worked up. Even if he did, after the druids, he would only be plagued with nightmares.
He was filthy. Kolivan wiped a layer of grime away, pushing Keith’s sweaty hair back off his forehead and following the action with another swipe of the tongue. The action calmed both of them, Kolivan’s heart rate steadying for the first time since they took Keith away, Keith’s exhausted body finally giving up its fight and ceasing its shakes.
Kolivan kept grooming him, listening in the dark silence of their cell as Keith’s breathing slowed down, as he drifted off into rest. Kolivan wasn’t about to stop there. Keith needed comfort in dreams just as much as out of them. Kolivan could use the comfort too.
He got some comfort from the way Keith’s fingers curled against the fabric of his uniform, clutching at Kolivan weakly, holding on subconsciously.
“You’re safe, little warrior,” Kolivan whispered. It was a nickname he could never get away with under normal circumstances, something Antok and Kolivan used frequently when discussing any of the paladins. So small, yet so strong, overflowing with fierceness and determination.
Kolivan could handle a lot of things, and so could Keith.
“You are stronger than you know,” he murmured, pushing Keith’s hair back. Keith sighed in his sleep. Kolivan nuzzled him gently.
Small comforts. Kolivan was allowed that. The Blade of Marmora trained to endure anything, but there were things that did not need training. Some things just came naturally.