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"Is this where you've been for the past 18 years?" Keith had furrowed his brows and frowned, "Working for a fucking mob?!"
The sudden revelation that he'd finally found his mother on one of his Blade missions had shocked him. However as shock died down it gave way to anger.
"I... Keith please just listen to me, I can explain." his mother said as she reached her arm to rest on his shoulder, but he flinched away.
"You left me. For this. For this fucking life!" Keith cried out as tears threatened to form in his eyes, "Did you ever once even try checking on me? Or dad for that matter?!"
Krolia flinched as a guilty look came over her face and she wrapped her arms around herself to gain some form of comfort.
"I couldn't do it. You wouldn't understand." she muttered as her gaze fell to the ground in front of her.
"Couldn't or wouldn't?!" Keith spat out lost in his fury, "The only thing I don't understand is why you didn't stay with us! I don't understand why you didn't fucking run away from them and why you didn't just start from scratch!"
Krolia snapped her gaze from the floor and suddenly it was filled with anger as she focused on Keith.
"I DIDN'T HAVE A CHOICE!"
"BULLSHIT YOU ALWAYS HAVE A CHOICE!" Keith bit back with the same raged look in his eyes.
He turned his back towards her and started leaving when her voice made him stop in his tracks.
"They would have attacked you. They would have attacked our whole family and murdered us without a second thought." her voice suddenly felt very small and the tension in the room suddenly evaporated, "I couldn't risk your lives like that."
Keith turned around and saw tears starting to form in her eyes and just like that the anger had left his body and he started making his way back to her.
Krolia collapsed to her knees as tears poured out but was embraced by her son right after.
"Did you even tell dad about all of this?" Keith asked quietly as he held her in his arms.
"No..." a voice Keith hadn't heard in over 10 years suddenly came from the doorway, "She didn't..."
Both Keith and Krolia's breath hitched as their heads snapped in his direction.
"Dad..?" Keith stared at him in shock as tears started forming in his eyes.
"Hello, Keith. And hello, Krolia." the man said as a smile started appearing on his face, "It's nice to finally see you both again."
Keith quickly got up and rushed over to his father and embraced him in a bone crushing hug.
"I see someone missed me!" he gave a light chuckle, earning an immediate punch on the arm from Keith.
"He wasn't the only one." Krolia said quietly as she slowly made her way over, only stopping a few feet in front of them.
Their eyes locked and he closed the distance between them as he embraced her.
"I missed you so much, Texas..." she mumbled as her head rested in the crook of his neck.
"I thought that nickname was left in the past." he chuckled as he embraced her more tightly and for a moment it felt like everything was alright.
"Not to ruin the moment but we have a lot of catching up to do here." Keith said after bringing their attention back to him with a cough, "Both of you owe me some fucking answers."
They broke apart and once again the tension was back until his dad started speaking.
"I'm sorry I left you Keith." he apologized and turned his gaze back to Krolia, "I... I went looking for your mother when I thought I'd gotten a solid lead on her but then things got messy and I... I should have turned back but I couldn't after getting so close... and it turned into years of following random leads. I'm sorry."
Keith tried processing the news when Krolia's raised voice stopped his train of thought.
"You left him?!" the rage in her gaze from before had returned, "You left our son on his own!?"
"I DID IT FOR YOU AND ACXA!" Keith's dad raised his voice in a sudden flash of anger but it was quickly replaced by a hurt look, "I couldn't get him involved... but I had to get you both back. When I finally found out what you've been doing I had to..."
"Wait... Acxa? As in Lotor's consigliere Acxa??" Keith finally found his voice and mumbled out in confusion.
"Yes..." Krolia said with remorse in her tone.
"What does she have to do with all of this?" Keith stared at both of them with a puzzled expression.
His father turned towards Krolia with an unsure look.
"Well?" Keith urged them on to start talking.
Krolia inhaled sharply and let out a short sigh.
"It happened when you were one year old." she started speaking after turning her back towards the two men, "I had been absent from the Galra for too long and they had started looking for me. They sent out Sendak to come get me and he found out about all of you. He threatened to kill all of you if I wouldn't return back."
"It wasn't just you though." she continued, "The Blade unit I was working for would also be put at risk if I didn't comply. And Keith you of all people should know that if we want to take the Galra down we can't put The Blade in danger."
Keith nodded at that. The Blade of Marmora had been Voltron's biggest allies and losing them would mean losing the battle of taking down Zarkon. They couldn't let that happen after all of the progress they've achieved.
"When Sendak finally located me he gave me twelve hours to decide what side I'll stay on. I knew I couldn't escape without you getting hurt so I asked him if I could atleast take one of you with me." Krolia continued her story as she turned back around to face them both, "For some reason he had agreed and that same night I took your sister Acxa and went back to the Galra and the Blade. And I couldn't go back because they used all of our lives as blackmail."
Keith stared at his mother with a dumbfounded look on his face.
"You're telling me that... Acxa is my sister?" he barely mumbled it out.
Reuniting with both of your parents and finding out why they both left and what they'd been doing was a surprise enough, but finding out that you had a sister who you had ran into several times throughout the year, on opposite sides of the war, was even more shocking.
"Yeah she's your twin sister." his dad finally spoke up as the tension in his muscles drained out.
"I... But... If you took her with you, how did she end up with Lotor?"
"She grew up surrounded by the Galra members... Lotor was there too and they spent a lot of time with each other... and then she found out about you..."
"That would explain a lot of things..." Keith stated as his memory flicked back to several times when Acxa had spared him and saved him without any given reason. It was because she knew who he was.
"After finding out about what I'd done she got mad and went to Lotor. However Lotor at that time had gotten kicked out by Zarkon so she chose to go with him and since then I've only heard stories about her...", Krolia finished and turned towards her husband, "You shouldn't have left Keith alone. You had a choice to stay with him."
"And lose any possibility of ever regaining you and my daughter?!", he snapped back with furrowed brows, "For all I knew you both were kidnapped and when I found out that that wasn't the case I had to go after you both! I had to return you both to Keith! There was a chance and I took it and of course I regret leaving Keith like that but I left him in Shiro's hands!"
"I would have returned when we would have gotten rid of Zarkon." she muttered under her breath.
"And when would that have been? Tell me, Krolia, when?!" he broke down and took her by her shoulders, "The only reason Zarkon is gone now is because our son, my brother and his friends brought the Voltron unit back and managed to make alliances with other units. If not for Voltron who knows how long it would have taken to take him down, if at all."
Keith nodded at that.
It was true. Voltron was a huge part of why they even managed to defeat Zarkon in the first place and even now things are chaotic with Lotor being back and him having his own agenda.
"I'm sorry I left you both..." she apologized once more as she brought them both in a hug, "I'll never leave you again."
Keith felt something inside of him break as he let himself cry into his mother's chest.
After a few minutes of embracing, they pulled apart.
"Okay now that this is all sorted out... Let's work together and put an end to the Galra unit once and for all." Keith said with a raspy voice.
"Let's go get my sister."
