Chapter Text
“Krolia.”
Her eyes traveled to the activated blade at her throat, eyes widening slightly. She raised her gun away from his face.
“You're late. We don't have much time.” Her curt voice spoke in hushed tones.
“I'm Keith,” Keith said as he powered down his mask and pulled down his hood. Krolia’s eyes flashed with recognition but just as quickly masked it.
“I know,” she quietly mumbled.
“What?”
“I said let's go!” Krolia turned on her heel walking swiftly away. Keith jogged to keep up.
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“Why did Kolivan risk sending you here now?” Krolia prompted Keith.
“Because he’s heard about Renveig’s superweapon. We can’t let it fall into the wrong hands.”
That made sense, but why send her son, this was one of the worst places for a family reunion. Of course, Keith seemed to be oblivious of the fact that it was. “I guess Renveig’s dead, since commander Trugg is attacking my base.” Krolia spoke with her back to her son; she had to stay focused on the mission.
“Trugg is on the verge of crushing your forces. We have to destroy the superweapon now.” Keith pressed on, curious, “What is it exactly?”
“Warlord Renveig intercepted an undocumented shipment of quintessence traveling through his territory.” Kroia explained. “He took it for his own and began experimenting with it. It’s more powerful than any quintessence we’ve received from the empire, and it has some very, unexpected effects.”
Keith was about to ask what effects, when an explosion rocked the base knocking them both off balance. First level breached. Activating second level of defense. The computer dutifully conveyed.
“Trugg’s fleet has touched down. We’re running out of time! Come on!” Krolia yelled, nearly instinctively, grabbing his hand to pull him to the elevator, yet she managed to refrain.
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Running out of the elevator Krolia yelled to Keith “Get to that console!” More explosions rocked the base.
“What now?” Keith asked as he reached it.
“We need to simultaneously enter this code-” before they could do anything the elevator doors blew open and smoke billowed into the room. Robots marched in, weapons drawn.
Keith launched himself at them. Yet, not headlong as he would have done not so long ago. Instead he slid on his knees, swiping at the legs of the first bot. He sliced and smashed two centuries then stabbed the third in the chest.
His sword got stuck and the bot grabbed him bodily, and threw him across the room. He hit the metal wall with a solid thunk and sank to the floor, dazed.
Krolia stepped in, taking out the guards with her laser gun. Giving only a moment's glance at her fallen son then leaping back into battle. She downed the one with the sword still protruding from its chest. She swept up the blade into her hand as she ran to attack more robots. Still activated the weapon sliced apart another guard.
She turned, glimpsed a gun and narrowly dodged a laser beam. The rage on her face in that instant was palpable.
These guards just kept coming out of nowhere! They kept firing and she, dodging. Launching the blade, it struck a century in the face. She shot two more and cut apart another. The whirring of multiple weapons charging stopped her destructive frenzy.
Six guards and Commander Trugg stood ready to fire. The centuries all aimed at Krolia. But her heart sank only when she saw who Trugg had, crumpled at her feet.
Keith, looking a little worse for wear, knelt with his hands bound behind his back and one of Trugg’s infamous axes at his throat. Blood trickled from his temple from where he had smashed into the wall and his violet eyes looked a bit hazy. Krolia felt a pang of guilt.
“Surrender or die.” Trugg barked. Pulling back her axe, she made Keith raise his head to avoid its razor-sharp edge.
Krolia immediately relaxed her fighting stance. She deactivated the marmorite blade and raised her arms.
Keith perked up a bit, confusion written on his face when he realized his blade had not reverted to a dagger as Krolia had fought.
“We can make a deal.” Krolia appeared calm externally but internally she was rending Trugg limb from limb.
“What are you doing?!” Keith leaned forward nicking his neck on the restraining blade of Trugg’s axe.
She looked sorrowfully at Keith, “I left you once, I'll never leave you again.”
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After Keith had hit the wall things seemed to move very fast. His head reeled from the blunt force trauma. The next thing he knew hands were grabbing him, restraining his arms. His head felt too heavy to lift. It was only when Trugg pulled the axe close to his jugular that he had to move. Through his drooping bangs and blood that dripped into his eye, he saw his sword in Krolia’s grasp return to dagger. Surrender: she was giving up!
“What are you doing?!” Was she crazy they had to fight! Knowledge or death! Mistakenly Keith pulled forward heedless of the razor edge that bit his vulnerable throat.
Keith stared at her in disbelief as she spoke those heart-wrenching words: “I left you once, I'll never leave you again.”
What? What was that supposed to mean? The edge of the axe stung like lemon in the fresh wound as he strained, Keith's mind reeled. This crazy woman was compromising the mission, for him?! Why? Who was she? Did he know her?
His brain felt like it was swamped, full of oatmeal. Thoughts could barely slog through. After being lost in his hazy thoughts, Keith snapped out of it and tried to salvage what he could from the conversation: “…self-destruct. Once we’re airborne, I’ll give you the code.”
Obviously Trugg had begrudgingly agreed to give them a ship, as, the next thing Keith knew, his hands were cut free and Krolia was helping him up.
He put a hand to his neck, it felt hot and swollen. He pulled up the collar on his Marmora suit, hopefully protecting it from germs and whatever other microbes might be floating in space. How could such a small cut hurt so much?
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The ship powered up, glowing red on the outside. Krolia determinately kept her head facing the console. “I can’t believe you’d give them the weapon just to save me. You compromised the mission!” Keith cried.
The jog to the ship had tired Keith more than it should have, especially since he had been training with the Blade for so many months. He was tired, in pain, and angry. He shouldn’t have been captured so easily. And what gave this woman the right to hand over the super weapon just to save his lousy skin? The emotions that Krolia had shown for him were not acceptable for Blade missions, Keith knew that best. What kind of operative was she?
“Keith,” Krolia said, turning her head toward him, “shut up and trust me.” Returning her attention to the console she contacted Trugg. “Commander Trugg we are ready for liftoff. Are you at the weapons console?”
“Affirmative.” Keith looked on disbelievingly. He wanted to pull her away from the console or shout random numbers, anything to keep the weapon out of Trugg’s claws. But his pounding head and better judgement held him silent.
“The code is Beta-5-2-7-4-Omega-5-4-5.”
“Confirmed.”
Already Keith had taken the pilot’s chair, they needed to get out of there fast. His grudge could wait.
“Get us out of here now!” Keith launched them forward.
Their ship shot off into the sky.
Mere moments later, as Keith suspected, the base began firing at them. Keith called to Krolia.“They’re locking onto us, hold on!”
Krolia sat back, confidant in her kit’s piloting skills, she was his mother after all.
Blood and sweat dripped down his face and into his eyes. Keith swiped them away with his arm as he dodged and weaved in the small ship, avoiding the massive purple beams of energy.
After an extremely close shave with a purple blast that nearly tore off their left side, Keith’s temper snapped. “This is why you shouldn’t have made that trade for me. We could die and you just handed that weapon over to Trugg.”
“No, Keith. I handed them over to it.” Her reply was decisive if not cryptic. Skeptical but engaged in saving their necks, Keith grit his teeth and continued skirting the blasts.
Krolia was knocked forward as one of the beams hit the ship. Keith, whose skin looks paler than normal, apologized on the tail end of a curse. Krolia’s eyes narrowed.
A few more narrow minutes and misses later the blasts just…stopped.
Nonplussed, Keith stated the obvious, “they stopped firing at us.”
“That’s because they’re all dead.” Krolia spoke calmly. The cut on Keith’s neck twinged, his jaw stiffened. He flew further out of range, just in case.
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The planet was a pinprick when Keith finally stopped. The stars were fuzzier than he remembered. The flight had really taken it out of him. Head pounding and neck itching he slid the pilot’s seat back and he stood, wobbling slightly. What was wrong with him? Had he hit the wall harder than he thought?
“Your head…” Krolia gestured to the laceration from his introduction to the wall. He reached for a pouch on his hip but his hand met only air. Oh yeah. His pouches were with his regular clothes back in the castle ship. Medical attention would have to wait. He held his left hand to the gash, hoping to keep the headache and the bleeding to a minimum and gave Krolia a quick thumbs up.
Krolia pulled the dagger from her belt,“I should give this back to you.”
“How were you able to use it?” Keith squeezed his eyes shut, and blinked hard a few times, trying to see clearly. By some miracle, his hand found the knife and took it gingerly in his right hand.
“Because it was mine…” The pause seemed to last several minutes, if Keith had been more cognizant he would have expected the next part. As he was now, he couldn’t even sheath his marmorite blade. It weighed heavily in his hand.
“...before I gave it to your father.” The words buzzed between Keith’s ears. Krolia’s form, already blurred, tripled before his eyes. That meant- But she-
Slurring slightly Keith spoke what his frazzled brain computed; “You're... my-”
The Marmorite blade clattered to the floor of the ship. Keith’s eyes rolled up into his head and his body fell forward.
Krolia caught him. She thought he had passed out from shock until she adjusted him slightly and saw a deep purple mark rising up his jaw.
She pulled away the tight neck of the suit revealing the small nick he had gotten from the axe, pulsing and puffy. Nearly-black-purple veins spread from the infected site radiating out, creeping up his neck, back toward his spine, and down toward his shoulder.
Poison! Krolia cried. “Keith! Keith, no, stay with me!”
Her long-lost boy’s body shook in her arms, sweat and blood coated his brow. His bangs, damp with both, clung to his forehead. Pinched face and clenched teeth betrayed how much pain he was in.
“Shit.”
Gathering him up she put him back in the pilot’s chair, his head lolling onto his right shoulder. Activating the comms Krolia called out to the receiving blade member to get Kolivan. He appeared swiftly on the screen.
“Krolia! What is so urgent?”
“Keith- he’s been poisoned by Trugg’s blade! The ship is damaged, I’m not sure we can attain hyper speed. He’s fading fast Kolivan I don’t know that he’ll make it back to the base. Please.” She had only felt this desperate but once in her life.
“I will contact Voltron at the Castle of Lions.” Kolivan spoke in his customary even tone, but Krolia thought she heard a slight tremor. “They can create wormholes and have more advanced equipment.”
“Please, I can’t lose him again, not now.” Tears crept into the corners of her eyes.
“They will ensure his survival.” Kolivan’s stoic face gave a nod and the communication ended.