Chapter Text
Lance shaded his eyes from the harsh sun shining overhead. “Is it just my imagination, or is it still around midday?” he asked Pidge.
Pidge adjusted her glasses, off which a glare shone, and tugged on the collar of her shirt as she led him through the narrow, winding alleys of the dwarf planet’s small capital and only city. “Shamsi’s tidally locked,” she told him.
“Which means…?” Lance prompted, throwing her a confused, sideways glance.
“It means its orbit is locked so that the same side always faces its sun,” Pidge explained. “Earth’s moon is tidally locked around it, in a sense. That’s why the moon has a ‘dark side’”—she formed air quotes with her finger—”and why a lunar orbit is as long as a lunar day.”
Lance blinked at her, struggling to comprehend. “I thought the moon orbited Earth,” he said.
Pidge frowned. “It does,” she said. “That’s what I just said.”
“No, you said that the moon is tidally locked around the sun,” Lance argued while tugging his hood higher over his head to keep this sun from burning his face.
Pidge squinted at the numbers - or Lance assumed that was what they were - written in an unfamiliar alien script on the doors of squat stone buildings. “Well, I meant Earth,” she said simply.
“Either way,” Lance said with a shrug, “does this mean it’s always daytime here?”
Pidge nodded. “On this side of Shamsi, it is, but on the other it’s always night.”
“Huh,” Lance said, crossing his arms and stopping beside her when she paused before a small house with a bright yellow door. “I guess that means no one lives on the other side?”
“There could be,” Pidge said. “Matt said Shamsi doesn’t have a native race; everyone here’s a settler…and most are criminals. Apparently it was a penal colony back in the quintant.” She flashed Lance a smirk and added, “Maybe we’ve found space Australia.”
“What the quiznak is a penal colony?” Lance wondered, his eyes wide. “Because that kinda sounds like an STD you get from bacteria.”
Pidge snorted. “Oh my God, Lance,” she said, then burst into giggles.
Lance stared at her, raising a confused eyebrow, though the sound of her amusement filled his chest with a warmth quite different from the one threatening to give him sunburn. But he rolled his eyes at her.
“Fine,” Pidge said, smiling at him when she recovered from her laughter. “A penal colony is where convicts were sent and set loose, like Georgia or Australia.”
“You’re a nerd about more than tech, huh?” Lance mused with a grin.
Pidge’s smile faltered, her gaze sliding down, and she muttered, “Right…”
Lance frowned, startled by her rapid change in demeanor, but asked, “So…who do you think the convicts were convicted by?” He glanced over his shoulder, towards the bustling city center they’d left behind.
“Probably the Galra,” Pidge said. “I didn’t look into it that much.”
“Still, that’s a lot more than I know about where we are.” He smiled, impressed despite himself. “All I know about this place I’ve learned from you and just since we got here.”
“Oh?” Pidge quirked an eyebrow at him. “Tell me what you’ve learned since we got here.”
“It’s really quiznaking hot,” Lance whined. He rubbed his eyes, the dry desert heat sapping him of some alertness, and said, “How do people deal with this?”
“Aren’t you from the tropics?”
“Sure, but I could literally jump into the ocean to cool off.” Lance tugged on the collar of the shirt sticking uncomfortably to his chest. “Imagine how much worse this would’ve been if we’d come in our armor.”
“Yeah…” Pidge sighed and rubbed her arms. “To be honest, I feel a bit exposed without it.”
“Gotten used to it, have you?”
She smiled and patted her waist, indicating the weapon hidden beneath a brown cloak. “It’s not so bad when we have our bayards.”
Lance reached into his own jacket pocket, checking for his, and said, “Let’s hope we won’t need them.”
Pidge nodded in agreement, then turned back towards their destination.
Their feet crunched over gravel as they walked up the path to the tiny house’s yellow door. That was a feature here, Lance had noticed the tick they stepped out of their pod. Bright colors and intricate geometric designs decorated the surfaces of buildings, and the people - of many different alien races - wore voluminous clothes that shielded their skin from the sun with colors just as rich and vivid.
It almost reminded him of the pastel beach houses back home, or it would’ve if the dry heat hadn’t dehydrated his skin within doboshes.
“I’m going to need to bathe in moisturizer when we get back to the Castle, Pidge,” Lance complained. He licked his dry lips and wished he’d thought to bring chap stick.
Pidge’s gaze flicked up to his face, seeming to linger on his mouth, as she knocked on the door. “You’re not going to shrivel up like a raisin in only a few quintants, Lance,” she reassured him.
“Pidge, you don’t understand. Here, feel how rough my chin is.” He leaned down, pushing his head close enough to hers that her breath brushed his cheek…at least until she stepped away, startled.
She stared at him, her fist still frozen over the door. “I think I’ll take your word for it.”
Lance straightened. “Fine, but if I do end up wrinkling like a raisin I’m blaming you.”
“Blaming me?” Pidge gaped at him. “Why would it be my fault?”
“Because this extracurricular mission was your idea.”
“Lance, you asked to come with me,” Pidge reminded him. “And you piloted the pod.”
Lance snorted, and though she was right, he couldn’t help quipping, “Guess we’ll have to agree to disagree.”
She still eyed him incredulously, lips parted slightly, until the door swung open.
An old Unilu woman greeted them, stooped with age and with one of her four purple sleeves stitched closed. Her gold eyes darted from Pidge, at eye level with her, to Lance, and she wondered, “Who are you?”
“We’re Pal—”
Pidge elbowed Lance to shut him up - he recoiled with a roll of his eyes - and cleared her throat. “Major Tyrene? My name is Pidge, and this one”—she pointed at him—”is Lance. My brother Matt mentioned that you needed some kind of help.”
Lance frowned at her but kept silent. If she wanted to keep quiet about their rank, then he wouldn’t contradict her.
“Yes,” said Major Tyrene, squinting at Pidge. “I can see the resemblance now. Come in.” She backed away from the door to let them in, then closed it behind them.
The inside of the small house was as bright as the exterior. In the main room, the only furniture was a small, oval-shaped table in the center, around which lay brightly dyed cushions. Coarse orange curtains were drawn over windows, the fabric thin enough to allow in sunlight but thick enough to keep much of the heat out.
“Oh, so this is how people can live here,” Lance observed. He pushed his hood off his head and reveled in the marginally cooler air of the indoors.
Tyrene ignored him and instead beckoned for them to sit on the cushions. “My explanation won’t take long, Pidge,” she promised.
Pidge sat cross-legged on a green-and-white striped cushion, and Lance took the blue one beside her. “My brother said that your grandson is missing?” Pidge prompted as soon as Tyrene settled into the only chair in the room.
“Yes.” Tyrene sighed heavily and rubbed at her cinched in sleeve. “He’s been missing for almost a movement, and Shamsi’s law enforcement is useless and refuses to venture into the desert or anywhere near Nighttime.” She wrinkled her nose in obvious disdain.
“Nighttime?” Lance asked.
“It must be the dark side of Shamsi,” Pidge guessed with a finger tapping her chin.
“It is,” Tyrene confirmed. “Few live there, and most that do are criminals that operate out of there. During my time in the rebellion, the criminal element eventually grew so strong they kidnapped a leader and held her for ransom.”
“Desert, hive of scum and villainy…” Lance stuck up two fingers in turn and glanced at Pidge. “It’s starting to look a lot like Tatooine.”
Pidge bit her lip, a sign that Lance was pleased to know meant she fought a smile. “A wretched hive, actually,” she corrected.
“What is this Tatooine?” Tyrene wondered, looking between the two of them. “And can it help my grandson?”
Pidge coughed and said, “Sorry, Lance was just reminding me of something…similar to Shamsi.” She shot him a glare, which Lance took as his cue to be serious.
“So, about your grandson,” Lance steered the conversation back on topic and channeled every police drama he’d ever watched on Earth, “can you think of anyone that would’ve taken him?”
Tyrene frowned and shook her head. “No,” she said. “He’s just a little boy, and few people here even know my history with the rebellion.”
“Maybe someone figured it out and is looking for another ransom,” Pidge speculated.
“There’s been no note,” Tyrene said. “Nothing like that.”
“Could someone have taken him into space?” Lance wondered.
Tyrene crossed her upper arms and narrowed her eyes at him. “You think I’m enough of an imbecile not to think to keep a watch on everything and everyone that comes and goes from this planet’s surface?”
Lance ducked his head, his face hot, and muttered an apology. He didn’t look up again until he felt something squeeze his shoulder and turned to find Pidge resting her hand there.
“Are you sure he was kidnapped?” Pidge inquired of Tyrene without removing her hand. “What if he just wandered away and—”
Tyrene glared. “Now you just sound like the city police.” She stood with a groan. “Wait here.” She turned and left them, sweeping into an adjacent room with an orange curtain separating them.
“Grumpy old lady,” Pidge observed, her voice low.
“Sad old lady,” Lance pointed out with a glance at her.
Pidge sagged and rested her hands on her ankles. “I know. I…” She inhaled shakily. “Missing your family is awful.”
Lance, sensing her sudden shift in mood, wrapped an arm around her shoulders and tugged her towards him. She came easily, leaning heavily against his side with a huff.
“And you found yours,” Lance reminded her. “We can find hers.”
“I know,” Pidge said, a smile crossing her face.
“Also…why don’t you want to tell her we’re Paladins?” Lance wondered, pitching his voice even lower. “She probably already knows anyway.”
“The Coalition and the rebels especially aren’t very happy with us at the moment,” Pidge pointed out, “and this is a pretty quiet and criminal corner of space. We don’t know who’s listening or…” She meaningfully jerked her head in Tyrene’s direction.
“Really?” Lance raised an eyebrow at her. “You think someone would…?” When Pidge nodded, he stared at her but said, “I get it, kind of, but maybe you’re being a bit too suspicious?"
“Or I’m being appropriately cautious and keeping you from bragging is what’s going to save our lives?” Pidge narrowed her eyes at him.
“I would’ve introduced you first,” Lance grumbled, crossing his arms. “Green Paladin—”
“Lance,” Pidge hissed.
“—and my own favorite genius.” He smiled and ruffled her soft hair and was relieved when she returned the smile, some of the tension leaving her body.
“Look, just…I’ve been places like this more than you have,” Pidge said, shooting a look over her shoulder and shifting away from him.
Lance resisted the urge to pull her back and instead teased, “Quiznak, you’re turning into Coran.”
Pidge laughed. “Not yet, I’m not, but let’s just be careful and finish here and we can go back to doing ‘public appearances’ where you can brag all you want.”
Lance grinned. “I’ll hold you to that.”
Tyrene returned from the other room, the curtain shielding the doorway falling back into place behind her. She approached Lance and Pidge with something small cradled against her chest in her upper arms.
“This is Hawa’s favorite doll,” Tyrene said. She reluctantly relinquished her hold on the object and passed it to Lance.
It was an Unilu-shaped doll wearing an eye patch and with bits of stuffing poking out of tears in the purple fabric. Dirt or dust stained it gray in a few places, but the single button eye was sewed securely into place.
His chest ached as he imagined a small child missing his well-loved toy, and when he exchanged a glance with Pidge he could tell she felt the same, despite her earlier suspicions.
“Hawa never leaves the house without it,” Tyrene explained with a sigh. “His mother - my daughter - made it so that it resembles his father, and he sleeps with it and plays with it and carries it everywhere.”
“And that’s how you know he was taken?” Lance said without taking his eyes off the doll’s face.
“Yes.” Tyrene took Pidge’s hands in all three of hers. “He’s the only family I have, so please, find him. If you’re anything like your brother, I know if anyone can, it will be you.”
Pidge stared at her with wide eyes and smiled cautiously. “We’ll find him, Major.”
Lance, not wanting to be left out, dropped an arm around Pidge’s shoulders and said, “He’ll be back in your arms and with his doll before you know it, even if we have to search Nighttime itself.”
“Hey, Pidge, something tells me that we’ll have to search Nighttime.”
Somehow, some way, Pidge had convinced the city’s menial police force to allow her access to the city’s equally pathetic surveillance systems, which, unsurprisingly, found them nothing. They witnessed many suspicious activities while combing through several quintants’ worth of footage, but nothing like the kidnapping of a small child.
Then they resorted to learning the more powerful criminal elements on Shamsi and searching a pattern in their crimes. Which gang was most likely to nab a child for ransom? Which group wasn’t above suspicion of trafficking in people?
(”Is it human trafficking if no one is human?” Lance mused.
“‘Slavery’ might be the word you’re looking for, Lance,” Pidge pointed out.)
In the two quintants they’d been on Shamsi and suffering its version of midnight sun, they’d found nothing…and no one.
Nothing until now, a mere few streets away from the shuttleport, where an Unilu merchant hawking his wares caught Lance’s eye.
A gold tooth gleamed when he grinned, but Lance took Pidge’s elbow and tugged him towards the merchant.
“What’ll it be?” he wondered. “Perhaps this fine scaultrite plate in exchange for your firstborn child?” He held up a dish that was glass painted a light blue.
“No, but I would like to purchase some information, my good sir.” Lance flashed Pidge a smirk as he put on his best impression of Coran.
Pidge smacked a hand to her forehead but didn’t try to stop him.
“Oh, information?” The merchant laughed. “That will cost you, perhaps…” His eyes fell on Lance’s jacket pocket - on the arm of the Unilu doll sticking out. “A precious childhood toy.”
Lance’s blood ran cold at the realization that this bargaining was more difficult than he’d expected. “How about a shoestring instead?”
“Neither of us is wearing shoes with laces,” Pidge grumbled under her breath.
Lance ignored her.
The Unilu spun what looked like a teacup around a finger. “What is this information you want to buy, Paladin?”
Pidge stiffened beside him, but despite the pounding of his heart, Lance managed a laugh as he retorted, “Now that’s what I offer you.”
“Oh, quiznak,” Pidge muttered.
“Confirmation that I am, in fact, a Paladin of Voltron.” Lance pressed his hands to the table and smirked. “You won’t pass up that opportunity, right? I mean, sure, it might get me”—and Pidge, he remembered with a sinking heart—”killed, but there’s some information worth dying for, right?”
It would be fine, Lance reassured himself. Pidge was just being paranoid, and even if parading around in Paladin armor and flying their Lions was counterproductive and over-the-top, they were stuck and needed to move quickly.
“And why do I need confirmation if I have your word?” the Unilu wondered.
“Proof, obviously.” Lance rolled his eyes and thought that Pidge would be proud of him if she didn’t also want to kill him. “So you give me the information I’m looking for, I show you the proof, and we call it a day…that never seems to end.”
The Unilu considered him, grasping his chin with one hand, scratching his head with another, and with the other hands resting on his hips. Then he held out the hand that had just been on his face and said, “Deal.”
“Uh, not yet,” Lance said, pointedly clasping his hands behind his back. “Clearly I need to make sure you do have the information I want, so tell me…any news from Nighttime lately?”
“As a matter of fact, there is.”
Lance glanced at Pidge.
She sighed, then nodded and said, “The damage is already done, I guess.”
Lance touched her shoulder. “It’ll be fine, Pidge,” he promised.
She rolled her eyes. “Just shake the man’s quiznaking hand already.”
Lance grasped the Unilu’s hand. They shook, the merchant’s grip firm as he said, “Been more movement than usual between the city and Twilight. Man with a respirator and wearing old Galra armor - modified, I hear - is always sighted around the darkest well.”
“A man with a respirator wearing old Galra armor?” Pidge repeated. “Interesting…”
“And now”—the Unilu’s hold on Lance tightened enough that he had to repress a wince—”the proof.”
Lance nodded and held his breath as he opened his jacket wide enough for the merchant to catch a glimpse of his bayard nestled inside his pocket.
“Oh, well then,” the Unilu said with a toothy grin. “I won’t want to keep you waiting.” He dropped Lance’s hand.
“Thank you for the information!” Lance said brightly as he surreptitiously wiped his sweaty palm on the back of his pants.
“And for one more secret, I can tell you where to rent some cheap sand speeders to get you to Twilight.”
Lance raised an eyebrow at Pidge. “I think we can take care of that ourselves. What do you think, Pidge?”
“Yeah, we can manage,” she told the Unilu merchant with a wave of her hand. “We don’t have anymore time to haggle.”
“If you say so,” the merchant said, shrugging. “But I’m here if you change your mind…”
Lance and Pidge drifted a short distance away from him, careful not to stand in the way of the market’s crowds while they conferred.
“What do you think?” he asked her.
Pidge adjusted her glasses - processing the information, Lance thought with some amusement - and frowned. “It’s a pretty specific description,” she said, “and as far as I can tell, there’s no love lost between Shamsi and the Empire.”
“But…?”
“It’s the only lead we have,” Pidge said, sighing. “Let’s find some of those cheap sand speeders and—” She blinked. “This feels like a quiznaking Star Wars movie. Do you think we’ll find Boba Fett at the end of the trail?”
Lance laughed, her observation and bewilderment just enough to distract him from the risk he took showing the merchant his bayard. He wrapped an arm around her back, his chest filling with warmth when she returned the half-hug, and said, “Let’s go find out.”
(They didn’t see the GAC exchanging hands behind them, or the ‘vintage’ knickknack passing from someone lurking in the shadows to the Unilu merchant standing in broad daylight.)