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Terrible things happen to people who mess with time.
Your hand shook as you pulled the trigger, and you cursed and adjust your scope, somehow ignoring the numbness in your shoulder as you prepared yourself for the next shot.
You had barely a few hours, maybe even less left.
The tingling started weeks ago and there was so much smiling and gestured joking you could do without attracting attention from your comrades.
Your hand still shook, but you were still breathing, you were still able to aim
And you pulled the trigger a second time.
Hit.
Stand, run, hide, next position, next target, another saved life.
Another nail in your coffin.
You smiled and repeated all of it again and again and again.
This is what you wanted after all.
The day you fall through the portal and into a pretty important looking meeting is just as bad as the last few days.
(You can hear her crying, your hand still tingled from her warmth and your eyes still hurt from the light and the colours. Your lips still feel cold.)
There are weapons in your face and people screaming, black and purple surrounding you within seconds and staring at the sword you are clutching in your hands.
You?
You smile. It's wry and broken and feels so very wrong in your face, but you smile. You smile and you stand up.
You throw up on the shoes of the leader of the Blade of Marmora and lose consciousness again.
There are few questions.
You answer what you can, you explain in their tongue and you mess up the pronunciation and their grammar, but your galran has to be enough.
Their leader, Kolivan, fewer wrinkles and far less white than you remember and less pain hounding his eyes, seems to believe that this is enough.
Since you had little time to learn and there had been few teachers willing to teach and this is all you have.
You win them over with the sword in your hand and the scars on your arms and the words of a long dead leader you know they worship.
They don't trust you at first, but you still don their cloaks and their armour, you hide your face behind a mask.
And you never give them a name.
So at some point?
“Sharpshooter” becomes your name and it burns itself into your very existence until there is little more left.
You learn their culture from scratch, you have little to say, but when you talk they listen.
You are not wise.
You have never been wise, but you paid for your ignorance with pain and those stories are apparently something worth listening to.
Because once upon a time you have been a Paladin of Voltron. But that was years ago.
He was the last to go. You watched your beloved, the sparks of a foreign, purple fire, the way it glowed on his skin, so pretty and perfect, until it burnt the corpse. You scattered the ashes, thinking of regret and so many unsaid words, her hand in yours and pain in both of your eyes. Shay was leaning against Yellow, Matt buried himself in Greens jungle of internal wiring and Allura let go of you to walk back to Black. It would be a pain to find another Paladin for Red.
Or rebuild her, for that matter.
You didn't cry. You mourned with roaring rage and possessive destruction, you learned and broke and learned and suddenly you were the Paladin Blue maybe never wanted you to be.
You forgot mercy.
Her hand was warm in yours and you craved to pull her into your arms and kiss the pain away. There was this tiny wrinkle on her forehead when she was sad or mad or desperate and you smoothed it over, only to watch it reappear again.
Smiling was futile and you gave up long ago, but the kiss on this wrinkle felt genuine and you forced yourself to let go.
Saying goodbye is hard and you left the news of your departure with her. Because you could not watch the others breaking down.
The loss of this war was already heavy enough.
Years pass behind a thousands of bullets and hundreds of lenses, millions of victims of a sword that is not yours and a gun that shoots bits and pieces of your soul.
You wait and survive, you learn and fail and learn and kill.
You pray.
You take out commanders, generals of your enemies, you destroy their ships, you break and repair your mask.
Pray. Survive.
Sleep, rise, eat, plan, go on a rampage, clean, bandage, eat, sleep.
Rise, repeat.
Sometimes you flirt, then there are nights filled with sensation and last shreds of hope and emotion, but nothing ever compares to her touch, or his smiles.
Sometimes there are nights filled with the haze of some substance that reminds you of alcohol and the friendly warmth of Kolivan. Those nights are filled with rants and screaming behind close doors and small admissions to nightmares and the unspoken fear of failure. They are filled with a hand on your shoulder and a calm voice, regret and insanity.
Pain.
Memories.
And a certain sense of friendship that can only be born between souls too used to darkness.
Most times you forget those nights, but those that you do remember, you cherish them. And maybe you even tell him about good times one day.
When you are sober and feel like remembering and missing them.
Because heaven forbid you miss those smiles.
Because heaven forbid there are tears staining your cheeks some mornings and last remnants of screams tearing at your throat some nights.
Because heaven forbid you hate colours to the point that you see flowers and silver on patches of pink, fire and bitterness staining red, indigo cold and green filled with so much determination and hope. Golden love and gentle kindness in shadows.
Because heaven forbid, this destructive hope keeps you alive.
Because heaven forbid you are slowly forgetting their faces and you cling to all these memories, Because heaven forbid for some nights and many days you forget your mission.
Years pass behind a thousands of bullets and hundreds of lenses, millions of victims of a sword that is not yours and a gun that shoots bits and pieces of your soul.
Years pass and one day you are standing there, just another soldier and you almost break down as you realize just how young you all have been.
Children.
Katie is just a child.
Hunk, Lance, Keith.
Allura.
Coran looks so alive and Shiro is more exasperated than desperate.
You crave their touch, but you know your limits.
They remind you of your mission and your promise and you will keep it.
They will live.
(Always.)
You never found Hunk in the mess of this planet. Only Yellow and his mourning cries and a broken balmeran girl set on destroying Zarkon more than ever.
She lost her love but you just lost a part of your soul.
Keith was arguing with Matt again and the hole in your chest grew.
First Shiro in this messed up fight with Zarkon. Then Pidge, brave, genius Pidge, sacrificing their life for their family.
Now Hunk.
You were slowly losing it.
Corans hair was slowly turning blue, you sometimes tease him about grey hair.
You might count those moments as your last seconds filled with laughter and the last remnants of a joke.
Allura was right beside you. Her hand was warm.
Keith was staring at your backs.
The boy is stupid and young and radiant and you can't look in the mirror anymore.
Pretty much the same way you actively avoid him and the team for the first weeks, until the planning starts and you are introduced as an important member of the Blade.
You watch Keith's trial and you watch as his dagger turns into the sword hanging by your side. You nod at him, and bow before the Paladins.
All this while staying mute and as cool as your posture allowed.
You can shatter later, when everything's said and done and when there is no one watching.
Aside from Kolivan that is.
Glad about the mask you stare at your princess, radiant and beautiful, so full of hope and frowns. She barely looks at you and you would never dare to approach her in fear of endangering your mission, but you watch her. You also watch her back.
Whenever you notice a pretty flower on some planets, you bring them to her and just grab her hand, put it there and leave. She never reacts but once, only this once you look back and notice a faint smile on her lips, hidden behind masses of hair and pale or radiant petals.
You watch your younger self, confident, good, merciful and so, so kind, talk to his team and you watch Shiro. You engrave every little detail into your brain, every strand of hair and every oh so small movement of his hand. You teach him how to shoot. You teach him the subtle art of flirting, the seduction of small movements and gentle gestures. And his smile is all the reward you would ever want.
You talk to Coran. With gestures and steps and small doodles left on edges of pages filled with tactical manoeuvres. One day he is standing in front of you and just touches your shoulder and there is something knowing and confused in his eyes that makes you step back and stare at him.
This man has never been stupid, eccentric, yes, but never stupid.
You hug Hunk only once, lost in a flashback and needing the comfort you remember he always gave to you. He feeds you and a few others, fills the kitchen with tales and chatter and you find out that he sometimes tells stories about you like a proud grandmother talking about her grandchildren.
Kolivan never lets you live this down.
You listen to Pidge, hidden in the shadows, how they ramble on about scientific nonsense you still don't get, even after all these years. You tried reading up on that.
It's still altean to you.
You watch yourself fall in love with Keith and you cringe at how obvious you are and how oblivious both of those idiots seem to be. And when did you start seeing that boy as his own person?
You find solace in Shiro's presence during training and later when he somehow worms his way into your and Kolivan's friendly circle. He still never sees your face and you make up some stupid excuse about being embarrassed about your looks. He never buys it, but he leaves you alone.
(Later, much, much later, when there is barely time left, he is standing behind you and you are alone and then there are arms around you and that one sentence you never knew you needed.
“Good job, Lance. I'm proud of you.”
You freeze and then he is gone and you flee into the safety of your room. You never dare asking how he found out. He is still the only one who finds out and actually calls you out on it.)
This was your last kiss and you made it count. Allura was all you had left, except for regret and pain.
Blues voice filled your head with her song and you knew that you couldn't look back.
This was your last chance and you would make it count...
The colours were disturbing but beautiful. Someone should have told you that time travel might be nauseating. And you would never admit it, but you threw up on the shoes of the Leader of the blade the second you stepped out.
It was not the best of first impressions, but your wry smile and the knife in your hand would win them over.
You are sitting on a tower of the castle, Zarkon is your target and you pull the trigger without any second thought.
This day your pinkie disappears and you ask for your first prosthetic.
Later Black literally purrs at you and you indulge in five minutes of Blues song. Red is growling and Blue snaps back and there is a promise from all five that they will keep your secret.
They knew from the start. And they accept your decision.
Even though it's not for you anymore.
That day you lose your hand.
And your body disappears with every time you change something important.
You push Allura towards Shiro.
A leg.
You watch Lance get his head out of his ass and ask Keith out.
Your arm.
You help save Katie's family and you are in the first row when Hunk and Shay marry.
You create the future you always wanted for your team.
A tingling in your chest and later you find out that this was your first warning. The stronger it gets... Well, the less time you have.
You last moments.
Another last chance.
"This is a suicide mission, Lance."
"And it's our last hope. I can't... Allura, I just want to make things right."
Your skin starts to glow the same golden hue as quintessence at some point, lost limbs reappearing. You feel like a ghost when your armour falls and they all see your face. You really hope that your lower body is not naked or something, but you are too stuck on their faces, on their eyes, their colours without the mask to check.
Lance is screaming like a girl ("GUYS SHIT HE LOOKS LiKE ME IN OLD AND HOT WHAT THE FUCK!!"), Shiro and Coran smile that sad smile you promised yourself you would never see again. Allura stares. Pidge gapes, Hunk cries.
And maybe you laugh at that.
Your eyes meet Lance's and you smile, “Make it better. Use this. Don't let go of each other. Trust me, this is a bond for life.”
You meet everyone's eyes.
Kolivan's face is dark and sad and you mouth a heartfelt “Thank you” at him.
You don't beg for forgiveness.
“Stay safe. I love you. All of you.”
And then you disappear.
Terrible things happen to people who mess with time.